
CRISPR, the Disruptor - SapphireSun
http://www.nature.com/news/crispr-the-disruptor-1.17673?WT.mc_id=FBK_NATURE_1505_NEWSFCRISPR_PORTFOLIO
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toby
Ramez Naam had a good response to all the fear surrounding CRISPR:
[http://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2015/05/don...](http://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2015/05/dont-
fear-the-crispr.html)

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SapphireSun
I don't fear the CRISPR, but most of the points in the article are
consequentialist in nature based on how hard it is to apply CRISPR in practice
right now. Genetic technology moves very fast, c.f. CRISPR :P What seemed
impossible a few years ago is now almost practical.

The real point one should take away I feel is the idea that parents will act
to benefit their children more than they want to create "superhumans" or other
mutants. It's pretty clear to me that the way forward is to allow disease
oriented research, but debate other uses well in advance of feasibility.

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pmalynin
What's wrong with creating superhumans? That is if we all become superhuman.

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nmrm2
There are a lot of risk reduction reasons and also a lot of ethical and moral
reasons. These are all legitimate and worth considering, and hopefully another
commenter or two can elaborate and point you to resources.

But I want to take a moment to highlight the legitimacy of sentimental reasons
in this case.

Humanity is an important and closely guarded trait, for reasons that some have
characterized as "self-evident". One could characterize "civilization" largely
as a mechanism for preserving humanness and helping it flourish. When it comes
to deciding the genetic fate of the species, these rather sentimental ideals
about what makes life worth living are perhaps one of the most important
decision criterion.

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meatysnapper
What exactly is humanity? Wiping out as many other species as we can? The
Kardashians? Soylent?

Hopefully we can leave that behind.

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derefr
Boredom, laughter, appreciation of art, curiosity, etc.

Genetic modifications could theoretically remove all of those things, and give
us other things besides, drives we wouldn't recognize in the slightest.

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vdaniuk
Humanity is also suffering, pain, despair, hate, agony, torture.

Human condition is indivisible from suffering. Such is life they say. For
millenias humanity has not made a significant number of its individual members
happy or fulffilled.

Humanity as something immutable is in its waning years. And I won't mourn for
it. The posthumans are coming. Let them come faster.

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Brakenshire
Frankly, it is precisely because of the human condition that technologies like
this are dangerous. What happens when a misogynist wants their daughter to
have a reduced sex drive, or a fundamentalist government wants its people to
be more religious. If we have this capability, it will not go well.

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vdaniuk
> it will not go well.

It doesn't go well now, at this very point in time.

>misogynist wants their daughter to have a reduced sex drive

Number of instances of female genital mutilation is absolutely insane.

>fundamentalist government wants its people to be more religious

ISIS. Saudi Arabia. Russia. Propaganda and state religion works well enough.
There is no need to look far from HN to see how governments prop up religious
beliefs in general populace. "In God We Trust" on US dollars and "under God"
in pledge of allegiance are a few fine examples.

And frankly, human genetech and biotech modification can't be stopped, neither
by laws or popular opinion. The incentives are just too great.

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sabujp
It seems like creating superhumans just became easier. I wouldn't doubt it if
in a few years someone or some country creates superhumans and a society to
rule the world. Remember there's only a 1-2% difference in genes that
differentiates us from the apes. As NDT puts it, what would a human (he uses
aliens as an example) be like with genes that are just slightly altered that
puts their intelligence at a level higher than ours as ours is to apes?

AFAICT the majority of humans are no better than any other organism in nature
that competes against members of its own species (or other species) for
survival. Maybe these superhumans, rather than being evil will finally
understand this and help the rest of humanity.

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jeremysmyth
_Maybe these superhumans, rather than being evil will finally understand this
and help the rest of humanity._

Has this ever happened before? Any time any group of hominids has had an edge
over another that they shared space with, it's pretty much resulted in
subjugation or extermination. We're really, really bad at tolerating those who
are nearly the same.

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JulianMorrison
So wait, some yutz kid made _air-infectious lung cancer_?

I rather strongly suggest that the ethical oversight board review that
particular lab with a flamethrower.

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derefr
The HeLa cervical-cancer cell line seems to be air-infectious as well—at least
to nearby lab cultures. Cancer is very easy to, even accidentally, turn into
something infectious. It's hypothesized that this is a major reason behind
human T-cells: the mechanism by which T-cells reject allografts (e.g. organ
transplants) is an unintended side-effect of a useful function, in being able
to reject foreign-body human-derived cancer cells.

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nmrm2
There's a fantastic episode of Radio Lab which includes a story about the HeLa
cell and discusses the fact that it's air-infectious, in case anyone wants to
know more: [http://www.radiolab.org/story/91713-famous-
tumors/](http://www.radiolab.org/story/91713-famous-tumors/)

