[extropy-chat] Eumemics

[Adrian Tymes]

--- "Robert J. Bradbury" <bradbury at aeiveos.com> wrote:
> On Wed, 7 Jan 2004, Adrian Tymes wrote:
> > Technical understanding.  The state, having
> evolved
> > through memetic influences, has at least a rough
> > understanding of beneficial vs. non-beneficial
> memes.
> 
> Ha!  Lets see -- we have the Greek, Roman and
> southern
> U.S. cultures that evolved through a number of
> memetic
> influences and yet all had slave based economies.
> Beneficial? yes. Morally correct? probably not.

I said rough, but I also said imperfect.  Where it is
imperfect, it should be resisted.  It's not a blanket
"all eumemics are okay" or "all eumemics are not okay"
statement.

> > On the other hand, genetic engineering is very
> much in
> > its infancy, so imposing genetic solutions at this
> > time - prior to a better understanding of what
> genes
> > do what - is likely to cause more problems than it
> solves.
> 
> Well... it seems likely that the insights are going
> to come quite quickly (within 1, certainly 2,
> decades
> for most complex traits).

I disagree - but mainly because of the level of
insight that will be needed.  Yes, it may be possible
to say that genes X and Y roughly correlate with
higher intelligence within 2 decades, such that
individuals would choose those genes for their own
children.  It takes a much higher confidence level in
the causation, which is going to take much longer to
achieve, before the state may be permitted to require
such.

> Why should a state allow
> the birth of less than average intelligence
> individuals
> or individuals with genetic defects that may pose a
> health care burden upon the state (and the
> shareholders
> of the state -- i.e. the taxpayers) at some future
> date?

Even in genes where we're almost certain, for instance
cystic fibrosis, the argument is marginal at this
time given the current cost and risk of genetic
engineering techniques.  To mandate interference in
anything less well understood, such as intelligence,
is to invite disaster, and almost everyone
acknowledges this.

> > (Note that this does not apply to, say,
> > state-mandated treatment of genes that are well
> > understood to be desirable or not; for instance,
> > correcting the gene that gives cystic fibrosis or
> > certain other diseases.  But in these specific
> cases,
> > there is not much debate anyway: what parent wants
> > their child to be born sick?)
> 
> Oh, no Adrian you don't get away with that.

Yes I do. ;P  As I said:

> > genes that are well
> > understood to be desirable or not

...and by your example, the condition of deafness (and
therefore the genes that cause it) is not "well
understood to be desirable or not", regardless of how
well we know what genes cause deafness.

> There
> is
> a very active "classic" debate within the bioethics
> community that uses the example of deaf parents who
> want their child to be born deaf when presented with
> a proposal by the medical community to use genetic
> engineering to reverse the child's deafness.  It
> gets into very sticky issues that involve the
> presumption that to exist as a deaf person is
> somehow less valid than existing as a non-deaf
> person.

Deaf != sick.  "What parent wants their child to be
born sick" != "What parent wants their child to be
born deaf", by this very example.  We're talking
"sick" as a condition that is universally considered
undesirable; the very existance of defenders of
deafness excludes it from this category.  (Personally,
after having reviewed the arguments of said defenders,
I still consider deafness to be an overall disability,
but that's irrelevant to this discussion.)

> > Perhaps a better way to put it: both memetic and
> > genetic engineering are allowed when it is widely
> > known what memes/genes are good and what are bad.
> 
> Subjective.  What is good and bad are entirely
> context
> dependent.

That's why I put the "widely known" in there.  If
there is much room for subjective disagreement, that
invalidates it until the disagreement can be resolved.
It is not too inaccurate to say that the disagreement
itself, and any resolution thereof, becomes the
limiting factor in these cases.

> Didn't you learn anything from Star Trek??? :-)

Yeah.  That life is darn great for species that have
already gone through their respective Singularities.
Also, if you wear red shirts and have no name, you get
to demonstrate how the monster works.

> > Not just a simple democratic majority (although it
> may
> > come to that in some cases), but closer to
> universal
> > consensus levels.
> 
> But the consensus can be quite wrong (perhaps as the
> slavery example cited above may indicate).

Many slaves disagreed with the consensus (although
many other slaves agreed).  I would therefore not call
it universal, or even nearly universal.

> > Without that knowledge, attempts to
> > impose solutions have historically just caused
> damage
> > without achieving the desired results; the limits
> on
> > government impositions in this case are there to
> > prevent a repeat of that mistake.
> 
> But do such limits accomplish this?

Sometimes.  No one has found and implemented a perfect
solution to avoid repeating mistakes of the past.  I
was just talking with my father about some tech he
developed for walking robots some decades ago; the
problems he encountered in that development effort
seem to be being repeated by modern efforts.  (Of
course, his effort was never detailed for Google et
al, so the modern efforts were unaware of it.)

> I can easily make an argument that the right of a
> parent
> to enhance their child to be an ideal physical
> individual
> for the NFL directly harms me as a parent who does
> not
> choose to enhance his child to that level. 

There, you may be correct.  But allowing parents to
choose is a far cry from allowing the state to
mandate.

> Furthermore
> the enhancement of such individuals may contribute
> to
> their being violent megalomaniacs which are
> certainly
> a threat to society.

"Power must be shared."

The response is, of course, to allow others -
including others who have already been born - to be
enhanced in similar manners if and when they desire
it.  (This is one reason I favor development of
bionics over development of genetic enhancements.)
Eventually, you wind up with the average physical
capabilities being increased.  This may cause a
lessening of the status of the unenhanced...but part
of the reason for allowing individual choice is that
individuals can upgrade when they believe it makes
sense for them to do so.  Perhaps eventually this is
essentially a forced choice, but the theory is that,
by allowing individuals to at least control the
timing, pace, and _exact_ nature of their
enhancements, the end result can be better - and
perhaps the transition can be less painful.

Free will and destined choice, both in one.  In
theory, only true improvements - ones that some people
would freely apply to themselves absent other factors,
and which people would envy in others to the point
that they believe cathing up would be desirable - can
come about by this path.

To wit: some might say, "But what if I want to remain
as I am for all time?"  Answer: "If this that I do
does not improve me, you may remain as you are, and by
definition you will be without disadvantage.  But if
this is an improvement, then you will eventually not
want to remain as you are now.  You will be the judge,
and you may revisit your decision whenever you wish."