I have made very few friends in the time I have lived in Oregon. I am kind of an introvert and have always been socially awkward around people I don’t know. That being said, the few friends I have made are good ones. One in particular I met through my wife. He is incredibly clever, very funny, and just generally fun to be around. He has some really interesting views of the world and when I hear them the always get my brain going off on some tangents. This one is inspired by the fact that he doesn’t believe in stem cel research and genetic engineering…
Show me the downside of stem cel research and genetic engineering that outweighs the benefits. Any conversation prompted by that challenge will end up being hypothetical; however, if you really dig in and think about it, there won’t be any. The worst things that they will bring is perfect and unethical test-tube super humans, bio-weapons, and unintentional/intentional super-plague. Those suck, no doubt about it. The problem is that those are minor problems in the grand scheme of things. If all of those things happened right now, the human race would be wiped out. If they don’t happen right now then something else (sun consuming the earth, whatever) wipes out the human race. The difference is that one of them has so many possible benefits that it completely outweighs the risks. The very technology that could cause those problems could also be the solution to the problems caused if you think long-term.
Let me put it a different way. If you could go back in time and stop the invention of the car, then you could theoretically save every person that died in a car accident. That is millions of lives saved. The problem with that is that the mobility that cars allow itself likely allowed those people to exist in the first place. If cars didn’t exist, than most of those people you might have saved would likely never had existed. Technology always introduces problems, but it also solves them eventually too.
My wife made a comment that I am pessimistic the other day. I really took offense to it. I am the definition of an optimist. I always hope that things will work in my favor. What I don’t do is pretend that life is fair. I try to think of all of the things that can go wrong and I plan for those things. When they don’t happen (which is almost all the time) I have a great time. When they do, I clean it up and move along. Technology works the way I do. It plans for the worst, hopes for the best, and addresses unseen problems as they arrise.
When I think about the future I look forward to the day when diseases will be cured and life extended through technology whether it be stem-cel research, genetic engineering, or any other sci-fi kind of stuff you can think of. I love Ray Kurzweil’s view of the future because it is so optimistic. I look forward to those days. They are coming and they will be here faster than anyone can imagine. There will be people that try to screw it up or use it for evil purposes; however, for every one of them there are more people who will shore it up and make it work the way it was intended. For every person that tries to genetically engineer the perfect human or the perfect virus there are more people who will question the ethics and engineer the cure. For every robot built for military purposes there will be more built to help the elderly get up the stairs or better yet, research to make it so people don’t have to fall apart physically.
You really have to take a step back and think longer term than a few years or even your lifetime. Everyone gets scared when you talk about robots being humanlike. The always think of the Terminator movies. The problem with that is that the Terminator movies are completely one-sided as far as thinking of the future. They talk about building robots that decide to attack humans as if the technology to develop the robots would be limited to the robots. It works both ways. The technology that allows the robots to play the human games would also allow humans to play the robot ones. While Terminators are trying to infiltrate human bases, the humans wouldn’t be shitting their pants trying to detect them with dogs, they would be injecting themselves into the robot infrastructure. It eventually ends in stalemate and moves on in a way that benefits everyone. Enslavement of the human race by robots is pretty unlikely and it is a dumb reason to be scared of the future. Anyway, Back to reality…
My point is this. You have to think past the first problem that technology will cause and think about all of the solutions that it is ultimately capable of. Humankind is intolerant of abuse of power which is why revolutions happen when power is abused. That will always be the case. Refuse to be scared of what a few bad apples might do with technology and embrace the direction that millions will move with it, forward.
September 8th, 2008 at 1:16 pm
the only trait more annoyingly human than trying to categorize everything is our desire to escape the pitfalls of mortality. we’re supposed to get old and we’re supposed to die. we’re supposed to have glandular disorders, chemical imbalances and premature baldness. we’re supposed to be deaf, blind and dumb. if you get your kicks utilizing your precious technology to confront these quandaries after the fact, fine. but don’t you go tinkering with test tubes and fucking with our genetic make-up before we even get out of the gate/womb.
me and my savage brood might not jump as high, win light saber battles or make photoshop obsolete, but at least we’ll be human. human beings are imperfect and only human beings can create art.
i’m not interested in grinding it out for two hundred and fifty youthful years in your brave new world.
go watch gattaca.
p.s. i love you.
September 9th, 2008 at 4:37 pm
You assume that genetic research is only for building perfect humans before they are born. That isn’t the interesting part. The interesting part is being able to cure disease, slow aging, build resistance to disease, etc. Making super-humans will always have ethical implications. Making it so paralyzed people can walk and blind people can see won’t. I don’t want science to create a baby that can beat me in a light saber fight; however, if science could have made Christopher Reeves walk again that would have been pretty awesome. If science could rebuild limbs for people who suck at light saber fighting against super babies that would be pretty cool too.
How do you define a human being? Is it the body or the mind? You don’t think a super human might loathe his inability to stand out from his peers and create art about it? Do you think a super human would be immune to sadness, loneliness, and rejection or be unable to react emotionally to a flower or a sunset? Even with no genetic or physical flaws, there will always be inspiration for art. Anyway, I think it is unlikely that they will be able to cure death via biology. Our bodies wear out and I don’t think there is much you can do about that.
What if they never find a way to make it so your body can last for more than 120 years, but they do find a way to offload your mind into a machine? Is that machine human or does the biology define it? I think as the years progress it will get harder and harder to define what it is to be human.
It’s not going to be a brave new world. It’s not going to be Gattaca. You should seriously go read “The Singularity Is Near”. The cool thing about reality is that it is never Utopian. Nothing is that simple. Nothing is that black and white. Nothing is that good and evil. It never has been and it never will be. Using Utopian examples is cool for helping the mind get around cause and effect scenarios, but it doesn’t translate to reality. The world isn’t a metaphor. When people try to make things that simple they fail because anyone who doesn’t fit into that mold will ultimately break it. There is a reason that Orwell’s vision of the future hasn’t arrived even 24 years after he wrote about it happening and it isn’t because the technology doesn’t exist.
p.s. I love you too.
September 10th, 2008 at 3:59 pm
yesterday my friend called me a ’satanist’ because i told him that when i have been dead for a hundred years, i will only have begun to be dead, so the now is all that mattered. the future is an illusion… which would explain my sub par ability to plan for anything. i have no interest in preparing to live forever before or after i die. i’ll cross that bridge when i come to it. so when you’re talking about taking strides now to live for a hundred years, or at least choose when i die, i can’t really wrap my head around it. i don’t want to extend my life, i want to WANT to live right now.
the idea of transferring my consciousness into a machine makes me shudder. other than philosophy (’i think i think therefore i think i am’) there are no guarantees that we’re more than the sum of our parts. spirit or no, our bodies are our vehicles for interacting with this world. i don’t like fucking with them. robotic limbs for the dismembered is a cool concept, but you’re arguing with someone who hasn’t touched a drop of alcohol because he hates/fears the idea of altering his natural state. i know my side is full of holes here. yours is the better argument.
justyn got that laser eye surgery. he’s been so much happier, never fussing about his contacts/glasses and he can spot a field mouse in the grass from four hundred feet off the ground. there is no logical downside. but something about it fucking weirds me out. it just FEELS wrong. but very importantly, it’s HIS choice and i sincerely respect that. heather suggested i get that laser surgery to permanently remove my socially unacceptable back hair. i cited financial limitations, but really, given all the money in the world, i’d never do it. i’ll manage it on a temporary level, just like i shave my face, but using a machine to change me on a biological level, no. never.
so really, this is probably less a discussion about the benefits of genetic research and more my own inability to cope with permanent change. and yes, it’s not black and white and probably can’t be in a rational sense. but my instincts force ideas out of gray areas. maybe it’s the storyteller in me, but it’s there. MY world is good and evil and i’m sure i’m less sane for it.
in ‘kingdom of heaven’ the main character refuses to “do little evil to do greater good” and is chastised for it. what follows is ugly and brutal and based wholly on his decision to see the issue in black and white. with the exception of one person i’ve watched it with, everyone is like “what the hell? how could he not choose that?” and i’m always a little bewildered. what choice?
but that’s me. i also believe in the individual. which is why, i say, go ahead, map our genome, tinker with our genetic cocktail, improve lives, cure diseases. i won’t stop you. i won’t steal your glory. but i’ll have no non-cybernetically-enhanced hand in it.
and i’ll still write better poetry than the super-est super human. he’ll just be able to do it for years and years after i’m dead and pressed six feet beneath the soil.
September 11th, 2008 at 9:01 am
September 12th, 2008 at 12:04 am
Genetic engineering is already a very big part of medicine, healthcare and the world we live in. There are genetically engineered drugs that I give quite frequently and they are great. One quick example is a drug called Epogen. It stimulates bone marrow to produce red blood cells. Cancer patients get it to counteract the effects of chemo so they don’t have to have blood transfusions. Premature babies get it because they get quite anemic and it can prevent them having to have transfusions. (Blood transfusions still carry some risk, so something that avoids this is a good thing, I think!). Another new thing from genetic engineering is a amino acid protein that, when injected, finds veins in little kids. This allows sick, dehydrated infants and children to get lifesaving IV fluid without having to be stuck numerous times or possibly have a surgical cutdown or needle placed in their bone if an IV site can’t be found. This sounds very cool to me!
Stem cell research and genetic engineering are very misunderstood. Chances are, you’ve eaten genetically engineered corn or a loaf of bread made from genetically engineered wheat.
Both genetic engineering and use of stem cells can improve the quality of many people’s lives. I find this to be, morally and ethically, a good thing. Technology isn’t inherently bad or good. It just is. How human beings decide to use it can be judged if you’re so inclined. Somedays I am and some days I’m not, but I do think we need a bit of wisdom in how we choose to use it in our lives. Personally, I’m not interested in having my brain transferred to a computer, and Jason, if you do that to me… I will haunt you! Just saying, I’ll also haunt you if you bury me in a dress. Just saying! Anyway, I’m tired and Ill close with a quote from Albert Einstein: “I know not with what weapons World War III will be fought, but World War IV will be fought with sticks and stones” I’m not positive what he was saying, but I think he meant that technology used for harm will in the end, destroy itself.
Jason’s Mom
September 12th, 2008 at 1:32 pm
Putting your brain in a computer isn’t what would be done when your body died, it wouldn’t ever be done against your will, and depending on the state of the world, might not be radically different than having a physical body. People will just slowly evolve into hybrids and you won’t really know where to draw the line between human an machine.
Maybe it will start with the ibod that apple makes and it will be the size of a piece of rice. Maybe you’ll swallow it and from then on you can listen to music without having a music player, you just hear whatever you decide you want to listen to. Maybe later on they will have clouds of nonobots that are as small as molecules that can form into any shape that you decide you need at the moment. You might think about needing a broom and the nanobots in the room all clump together and turn into one. Jeff might never get an ibod because he won’t want to permanently modify himself; however, he might choose to have his nanobots turn into a normal ipod or something. When the technology is that advanced though you can get even more crazy with it. Maybe instead of an ipod you want a flying broom so you can play Quidditch or some other fantastic game that can’t be played right now. Imagine how rad it could be if you could google your memories and re-experience them or send your experiences to others instead of pictures so they could experience it first hand. When you start getting to that point the line between reality and fantasy gets blurrier and blurrier. Being a mind in a computer could still be a very human experience. I’m just making shit up obviously, but these are the things I hope I survive long enough to see. Seriously, check out those books. Even if they are completely wrong they are fascinatingly optimistic views of the future.
September 12th, 2008 at 7:07 pm
Mom
September 14th, 2008 at 11:49 pm
I wouldn’t hesitate.
Oppenheimer believed he was ending the Holocaust and saving the estimated one million American military casualties required to force Japan into surrender. Ask him how he felt when he realized how his noble science would be used. And the full potential of his work hasn’t even been actualized, thankfully.
I know it’s not fair to liken genetic research to weapons research. But I’m talking about making small sacrifices for the greater good. Maybe you just don’t see a cost in tampering with our blueprints. Maybe there isn’t one right now. But those nuclear baby-steps then are the war drum now.
With genetic and stem cell research we’ve opened another door. We pull impressive bounties out into reality. I won’t attempt to argue with that. I agree with that. But what is slipping by our ankles to slither away and grow up in some dark corner of civilization?
Genetic science is a fire cracker in an open palm. It looks like magic. Just no one’s curled his fist around it. Not yet.