[ExI] circumcision again

[William Flynn Wallace]

We might speculate that it will likely eventually be the anti-Heinlein
situation: those births left entirely to chance will likely be looked down
upon.



I know that isn’t an answer, only an observation.  spike



I think it's a good answer.  In a couple of scifi books I've read
'naturals' compose a control group who suffer allergies and all that
'natural' brings.  I am totally in favor of messing around with the gene
pool.  I do have serious questions as to how we are going to get started on
it (though we already have).


Here's an item I found in Dnut:


DNA Threesome Produces Healthy Three-Parent Baby

Surprise! It has been possible for a child to have three biological
parents since
the 1990s
<http://dailypnut.us9.list-manage1.com/track/click?u=e8d181bde02154228dd7d7c0a&id=2ff0f8610b&e=595a16146c>!
But according to a report in New Scientist
<http://dailypnut.us9.list-manage.com/track/click?u=e8d181bde02154228dd7d7c0a&id=bd1e739da4&e=595a16146c>,
there is now a *new* method that proved successful earlier this year. A
baby was born in Mexico in May with two biological mothers and one
biological father. The method, which uses a small amount of mitochondrial
DNA from a third parent, is banned in the United States. It was used in
this case to prevent the child from inheriting a disease from its mother.
Critics say there may be numerous unknown failed cases and ethical
questions that still need to be answered
<http://dailypnut.us9.list-manage.com/track/click?u=e8d181bde02154228dd7d7c0a&id=f726ec2c98&e=595a16146c>.
The
whole thing really gives a new meaning to the term “ménage à trois.”

Cute, eh?  So getting rid of diseases is going to become old hat real
fast.  But how about improvements?  (Yes, preventing a disease is an
improvement but you won't catch me saying 'positive improvement').  You
can't take mice data for human data, and so any attempt to improve an
embryo is going to be very iffy.  Can you see the pile of legal documents
the parents will have to sign?  Just a few screwups and they'll ban
improvements - not in Mexico or elsewhere, but here.

I am sure Anders can supply us with some ethical question links on this
subject.

bill w

On Wed, Sep 28, 2016 at 12:10 PM, spike <spike66 at att.net> wrote:

>
>
>
>
> *>…* *On Behalf Of *William Flynn Wallace
> *Subject:* Re: [ExI] circumcision again
>
>
>
>
>
> >… OK - now can we return to the question that started this?  From Anders
> post I assume he thinks that any good done by genetic meddling is OK.  Is
> that it?  When you become aware of what was done to you by the gengineers
> you are just thankful because they created you as good as you could be with
> the genes you were given and those that they reprogrammed, were donated by
> someone else and so on, are OK too?
>
>
>
> >…I remember from Heinlein's Friday ("My mother was a test tube") that
> being a hybrid of sorts and not 'natural' was looked down on.  You were a
> second class citizen.  Was Heinlein simply wrong about people's reactions
> to not being 'natural'?  bill w
>
>
>
>
>
> Hi BillW,
>
>
>
> OK then.  Leaving the DNA recombination to chance is also doing
> something.  A similar argument was made to me regarding my stance on
> circumcision: my blocking that was doing something.  Now my son must face
> that operation later, they said.  My volley: sure but if he does, he is the
> willing victim if he opts for it.
>
>
>
> Regarding the act of facilitated genetic recombination, we again have all
> the moral dilemmas posed by the puzzling dichotomy of doing something vs
> doing nothing.  I don’t have the answer for that, other than to make the
> following claim: if the technology is available (it is now) to eliminate
> some known genetic diseases, then failing to do so is an action.  Doing
> nothing is doing something.  Assuming that natural is good is doing
> something.
>
>
>
> We might speculate that it will likely eventually be the anti-Heinlein
> situation: those births left entirely to chance will likely be looked down
> upon.
>
>
>
> I know that isn’t an answer, only an observation.
>
>
>
> spike
>
> _______________________________________________
> extropy-chat mailing list
> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org
> http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat
>
>
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