4 ms·

I honestly thought my generation will not yet live through Gattaca; seems like I was wrong.

by pmlnr 6y ago

koonsolo 6y ago
Helping people with severe diseases is still far away from creating the perfect humans. You turning this positive into a negative is distasteful.
- pmlnr 6y ago
  > Helping people with severe diseases is still far away from creating the perfect humans. Not as far as it looks. Honestly, it looks closer, than real self driving cars. > You turning this positive into a negative is distasteful. I'm incredibly happy that we, as humanity, are advancing with science - the mRNA vaccines are also incredible. The part that is not incredible is that we, as society, are in most cases still behave like we did in the stone age: greedy, selfish, narcissistic. Because of this tech that should be used to help those in need is most commonly used to "help" those with enough funds or means. Cheering for science advancements that are far out of reach for the majority leaves a bitter taste. EDIT BTW, Gattaca is a temporary time. Once it's passed - one whole generation, so say ~80 years - that world would be wonderful, but that limbo time, when the movie plays out, is the nasty part.
  - boxed 6y ago
    > Cheering for science advancements that are far out of reach for the majority leaves a bitter taste. Yes. Damn that new fancy tech of farming that only the rich can afford! Seriously. Think about what you're saying for a second. Tech that is only for the rich becomes affordable for the masses faster and faster every year. Computers were for nation states in my parents life time. Today there are computers more powerful than the first computers in cheap toys. We cheer for tech that only the rich can use now because it will be for the masses soon. Tech that never exists for the rich, will not exist for anyone ever. Check your logic.
    - delfinom 6y ago
      >We cheer for tech that only the rich can use now because it will be for the masses soon. Tech that never exists for the rich, will not exist for anyone ever. Realistically however, this kind of area falls squarely in the healthcare field which is increasingly becoming a thing for the rich and indentured servitude for the rest.
      - alistairSH 6y ago
        In the US. Other high-income nations have mostly solved the problem of affordable access to health care.
      - boxed 6y ago
        You don't have to keep living in the US.
  - maxerickson 6y ago
    Gattaca isn't just about the oppression of the natural born. You cheer for a world full of Anton's, calculating that it isn't possible to make it to the other side, deciding not to try.
  - 542354234235 6y ago
    >Not as far as it looks. People vastly overestimate our understanding and ability to produce reliable phenotypic changes. Being able to change the tiny percent of diseases that have a straightforward and simple genetic connection is a far cry from designer humans. I think Richard Dawkins said it well. > “Think of the body as a blanket, suspended from the ceiling by 100,000 rubber bands, all tangled and twisted around one another. The shape of the blanket — the body — is determined by the tensions of all these rubber bands taken together. Some of the rubber bands represent genes, others environmental factors. A change in a particular gene corresponds to a lengthening or shortening of one particular rubber band. But any one rubber band is linked to the blanket only indirectly via countless connections amid the welter of other rubber bands. If you cut one rubber band, or tighten it, there will be a distributed shift in tensions, and the effect on the shape of the blanket will be complex and hard to predict. In the same way, possession of a particular gene need not infallibly dictate that an individual will be homosexual. Far more probably the causal influence will be statistical. The effect of genes on bodies and behaviour is like the effect of cigarette smoke on lungs. If you smoke heavily, you increase the statistical odds that you'll get lung cancer. You won't infallibly give yourself lung cancer. Nor does refraining from smoking protect you infallibly from cancer. We live in a statistical world.” >Cheering for science advancements that are far out of reach for the majority leaves a bitter taste. Yet a random child born in the slums of Mumbai has a higher life expectancy than the wealthiest people on earth did 100 years ago. Just because the rich have it better than everyone else does not mean that scientific advancement has not led to vastly improved lives all over the world. Yeah, people are still greedy and mean and blah blah, but with 2 extra decades of life to live on average. >BTW, Gattaca is a temporary time. Once it's passed - one whole generation, so say ~80 years - that world would be wonderful, but that limbo time, when the movie plays out, is the nasty part. I don’t think you understand the point of the movie. The movie was about how we shouldn’t put total and complete faith in gene editing, because our genes are not the only thing that make us “us”. Jude Law is a genetic phenom but ends up not doing anything with his life of note because of his decisions, bad luck, and his lack of drive and motivation. Ethan Hawk was written off as a loser before he was a day old because of his genes, but he succeeded due to his decisions, good luck, and his drive and motivation. His genes said he had a statistically super high chance of dying because of his heart, but he didn’t, because a statistical likelihood is not a certainty. Ethan Hawk is allowed on the shuttle by the doctor, who’s genetically enhanced son is “not all he would have hoped”. The message of the movie is that we need to be careful of using genes as a proxy for everything that makes up a person, and how that could lead to a dystopian society where people are pigeon holed based on one thing about them. That taking the shortcut of using a proxy, even one as complex as our genes, for something as complex as “human potential” is folly. The statistical nature of genes, epigenetics, and environmental factors cannot be ignored.
- saiya-jin 6y ago
  Road to hell is paved with good intentions. In this case, creating super-humans that lack any weakness, sickness and are just ideal of what can human being be without those is putting them already way above everybody else. One doesn't need an x-ray vision or flying around to be to have superhuman status. I understand your optimism because it sounds properly awesome. But we humans always, without exceptions, fuck up everything that is even theoretically fuckable and often even the rest. If you don't see potential for evil with this then I guess you lack a bit of imagination. For every great discovery to help humanity there is always some powerful idiot thinking how it can we weaponized, used to gain advantage above others, the non-conforming, the unknown, or simply the weak.
  - f6v 6y ago
    > we humans always, without exceptions, fuck up everything that is even theoretically fuckable Don’t mean to intrude, but it reads rather negative. Maybe you should seek help?
    - lurquer 6y ago
      Yep. He totally fucked up a post I didn’t think was even theoretically fuck-up-able.
  - 542354234235 6y ago
    > But we humans always, without exceptions, fuck up everything that is even theoretically fuckable and often even the rest. Yet science has allowed us to live longer, healthier, freer of disease, less likely to be poor (and far less likely to be extremely poor). Its easy to complain about how terrible everything is when you’re not dead of tetanus at 5 years old or have gone blind due to lack of vitamin A.
pitspotter 6y ago
Curing genetic diseases is going to turn unlucky people into more normal people, not privileged people into superhumans.
- gomox 6y ago
  Given the history of humanity, I find this take to be anywhere between optimistic and naive.
  - meowface 6y ago
    The parent said "curing genetic diseases", not "CRISPR".
- gnulinux 6y ago
  Are you seriously arguing in 50 years super rich people won't use this for e.g. cosmetic reasons?
  - pitspotter 6y ago
    Health, intelligence and facial symmetry do seem to be linked to the absence of deleterious mutations so yes it may well be that the children of wealthy people benefit, in the farther future. I don't foresee any particular harm, since the standard arguments apply: what starts as luxury eventually becomes accessible to all with the rich having paid the development costs. Also consider that since the industrial revolution child mortality in the West has declined tremendously (thankfully), so it's possible that our genomes have accumulated mutations presently unknown which will need to be deleted at some point. Better done via gene-editing tech than via the cruelties of natural selection or eugenics.
corpMaverick 6y ago
Rich people already have easy means for genetic improvements. They just marry people that are more attractive, tall and intelligent.

I honestly thought my generation will not yet live through Gattaca; seems like I was wrong.

by pmlnr 6y ago

I honestly thought my generation will not yet live through Gattaca; seems like I was wrong.

Helping people with severe diseases is still far away from creating the perfect humans. You turning this positive into a negative is distasteful.

pmlnr 6y ago
> Helping people with severe diseases is still far away from creating the perfect humans. Not as far as it looks. Honestly, it looks closer, than real self driving cars. > You turning this positive into a negative is distasteful. I'm incredibly happy that we, as humanity, are advancing with science - the mRNA vaccines are also incredible. The part that is not incredible is that we, as society, are in most cases still behave like we did in the stone age: greedy, selfish, narcissistic. Because of this tech that should be used to help those in need is most commonly used to "help" those with enough funds or means. Cheering for science advancements that are far out of reach for the majority leaves a bitter taste. EDIT BTW, Gattaca is a temporary time. Once it's passed - one whole generation, so say ~80 years - that world would be wonderful, but that limbo time, when the movie plays out, is the nasty part.
- boxed 6y ago
  > Cheering for science advancements that are far out of reach for the majority leaves a bitter taste. Yes. Damn that new fancy tech of farming that only the rich can afford! Seriously. Think about what you're saying for a second. Tech that is only for the rich becomes affordable for the masses faster and faster every year. Computers were for nation states in my parents life time. Today there are computers more powerful than the first computers in cheap toys. We cheer for tech that only the rich can use now because it will be for the masses soon. Tech that never exists for the rich, will not exist for anyone ever. Check your logic.
  - delfinom 6y ago
    >We cheer for tech that only the rich can use now because it will be for the masses soon. Tech that never exists for the rich, will not exist for anyone ever. Realistically however, this kind of area falls squarely in the healthcare field which is increasingly becoming a thing for the rich and indentured servitude for the rest.
    - alistairSH 6y ago
      In the US. Other high-income nations have mostly solved the problem of affordable access to health care.
    - boxed 6y ago
      You don't have to keep living in the US.
- maxerickson 6y ago
  Gattaca isn't just about the oppression of the natural born. You cheer for a world full of Anton's, calculating that it isn't possible to make it to the other side, deciding not to try.
- 542354234235 6y ago
  >Not as far as it looks. People vastly overestimate our understanding and ability to produce reliable phenotypic changes. Being able to change the tiny percent of diseases that have a straightforward and simple genetic connection is a far cry from designer humans. I think Richard Dawkins said it well. > “Think of the body as a blanket, suspended from the ceiling by 100,000 rubber bands, all tangled and twisted around one another. The shape of the blanket — the body — is determined by the tensions of all these rubber bands taken together. Some of the rubber bands represent genes, others environmental factors. A change in a particular gene corresponds to a lengthening or shortening of one particular rubber band. But any one rubber band is linked to the blanket only indirectly via countless connections amid the welter of other rubber bands. If you cut one rubber band, or tighten it, there will be a distributed shift in tensions, and the effect on the shape of the blanket will be complex and hard to predict. In the same way, possession of a particular gene need not infallibly dictate that an individual will be homosexual. Far more probably the causal influence will be statistical. The effect of genes on bodies and behaviour is like the effect of cigarette smoke on lungs. If you smoke heavily, you increase the statistical odds that you'll get lung cancer. You won't infallibly give yourself lung cancer. Nor does refraining from smoking protect you infallibly from cancer. We live in a statistical world.” >Cheering for science advancements that are far out of reach for the majority leaves a bitter taste. Yet a random child born in the slums of Mumbai has a higher life expectancy than the wealthiest people on earth did 100 years ago. Just because the rich have it better than everyone else does not mean that scientific advancement has not led to vastly improved lives all over the world. Yeah, people are still greedy and mean and blah blah, but with 2 extra decades of life to live on average. >BTW, Gattaca is a temporary time. Once it's passed - one whole generation, so say ~80 years - that world would be wonderful, but that limbo time, when the movie plays out, is the nasty part. I don’t think you understand the point of the movie. The movie was about how we shouldn’t put total and complete faith in gene editing, because our genes are not the only thing that make us “us”. Jude Law is a genetic phenom but ends up not doing anything with his life of note because of his decisions, bad luck, and his lack of drive and motivation. Ethan Hawk was written off as a loser before he was a day old because of his genes, but he succeeded due to his decisions, good luck, and his drive and motivation. His genes said he had a statistically super high chance of dying because of his heart, but he didn’t, because a statistical likelihood is not a certainty. Ethan Hawk is allowed on the shuttle by the doctor, who’s genetically enhanced son is “not all he would have hoped”. The message of the movie is that we need to be careful of using genes as a proxy for everything that makes up a person, and how that could lead to a dystopian society where people are pigeon holed based on one thing about them. That taking the shortcut of using a proxy, even one as complex as our genes, for something as complex as “human potential” is folly. The statistical nature of genes, epigenetics, and environmental factors cannot be ignored.
saiya-jin 6y ago
Road to hell is paved with good intentions. In this case, creating super-humans that lack any weakness, sickness and are just ideal of what can human being be without those is putting them already way above everybody else. One doesn't need an x-ray vision or flying around to be to have superhuman status. I understand your optimism because it sounds properly awesome. But we humans always, without exceptions, fuck up everything that is even theoretically fuckable and often even the rest. If you don't see potential for evil with this then I guess you lack a bit of imagination. For every great discovery to help humanity there is always some powerful idiot thinking how it can we weaponized, used to gain advantage above others, the non-conforming, the unknown, or simply the weak.
- f6v 6y ago
  > we humans always, without exceptions, fuck up everything that is even theoretically fuckable Don’t mean to intrude, but it reads rather negative. Maybe you should seek help?
  - lurquer 6y ago
    Yep. He totally fucked up a post I didn’t think was even theoretically fuck-up-able.
- 542354234235 6y ago
  > But we humans always, without exceptions, fuck up everything that is even theoretically fuckable and often even the rest. Yet science has allowed us to live longer, healthier, freer of disease, less likely to be poor (and far less likely to be extremely poor). Its easy to complain about how terrible everything is when you’re not dead of tetanus at 5 years old or have gone blind due to lack of vitamin A.

pitspotter 6y ago

Curing genetic diseases is going to turn unlucky people into more normal people, not privileged people into superhumans.

gomox 6y ago
Given the history of humanity, I find this take to be anywhere between optimistic and naive.
- meowface 6y ago
  The parent said "curing genetic diseases", not "CRISPR".
gnulinux 6y ago
Are you seriously arguing in 50 years super rich people won't use this for e.g. cosmetic reasons?
- pitspotter 6y ago
  Health, intelligence and facial symmetry do seem to be linked to the absence of deleterious mutations so yes it may well be that the children of wealthy people benefit, in the farther future. I don't foresee any particular harm, since the standard arguments apply: what starts as luxury eventually becomes accessible to all with the rich having paid the development costs. Also consider that since the industrial revolution child mortality in the West has declined tremendously (thankfully), so it's possible that our genomes have accumulated mutations presently unknown which will need to be deleted at some point. Better done via gene-editing tech than via the cruelties of natural selection or eugenics.

corpMaverick 6y ago

Rich people already have easy means for genetic improvements. They just marry people that are more attractive, tall and intelligent.