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If I understand your argument correctly, the US should abandon attempts at preventing eugenics because other countries will do it?
by refurb 4y ago
If I understand your argument correctly, the US should abandon attempts at preventing eugenics because other countries will do it?
- s1artibartfast 4y agoPreventing research =/= preventing eugenics. eugenics =/= unethical eugenics. If you screen your embryos for downs syndrome, you are practicing eugenics. If you screen your fetus for any genetic defects, you are practicing eugenics. If you want smart kids and want a smart spouse, you are practicing eugenics.
- refurb 4y agoSo all eugenics is ok? I’m confused at what point you’re making?
- jl6 4y agoI thought it was pretty clear. eugenics =/= unethical eugenics
- thebradbain 4y agothat’s like saying “good murder is different than bad murder” — adding an adjective doesn’t actually change what it is, nor the morality around it
- Iolaum 4y agoWell if I come in the middle of the night at your house with a gun, you killing me is different than me killing you.
- concordDance 4y ago"Eugenics" actually just means attempting to improve the genome our children will have. This does not need to involve forced sterilisation or indeed the government at all. E.g. giving all parents free genetic screening and genome correction for their fetuses if they wish it would be eugenics.
- inglor_cz 4y ago"Murder" itself contains a moral judgment and is actually banned. Some forms of eugenics are routinely practised in the West already. For example, pretty much every IVF clinic out there will recommend patients to scrap embryos that are proven to be aneuploid. (So either not viable, or, in some cases, viable but with Down syndrome.) This is accepted everywhere I know and is considered a part of your reproductive rights. How is this not "good eugenics"? How would you frame it as unethical?
- refurb 4y agoOk, but how is that relevant to the discussion about restricting data to prevent unethical eugenics?
- sokoloff 4y agoBecause it’s incredibly difficult a priori to restrict only research that could lead to unethical eugenics without restricting that which could lead to ethically sound, widely beneficial eugenics or even unrelated advances. You can (for example) ban research on things might lead to the development of novel poisons. But that ban is almost sure to prevent the development of some new cancer treatments.
- refurb 4y agoWhat “positive eugenics” do you imagine coming out of research on the genetics of intelligence? I mean one that would generally benefit mankind as a whole?
- sokoloff 4y agoAnything that increases the health outcomes of humans in the long-run would be broadly beneficial and could stem from research that's initially targeted at understanding the role genetics plays in intelligence. That could be breakthroughs in early childhood (or lifelong) nutritional support, eradication of diseases, creating lower susceptibility to some forms of cancer or heart disease, improvements in pedagogy, improvements in general intelligence, lower susceptibility to cognitive decline. Research is not laboring to progressively color in a pre-defined picture, where you can just tell research scientists "don't color in the naughty bits".
- refurb 4y agoHow is gene linked to intelligence related to "eradication of diseases, creating lower susceptibility to some forms of cancer or heart disease"? The genes that impact those things aren't being restricted?
- midoridensha 4y agoDo you consciously avoid procreating with partners who are ugly or stupid, or somehow undesirable? If so, you're practicing eugenics!
- RobotToaster 4y agoI never understood the argument that genetic engineering must be bad because someone once practiced it in a evil way. It's tantamount to claiming we shouldn't do brain surgery because someone once practiced it by drilling holes in people's heads to remove demons.
- mxkopy 4y agoAt some point you have to question the effects you have as an individual on the rest of society. The implicit axiom that "doing what's in your own best interest is not unethical" clashes with the fact that this often means seeking unfair advantages or worse, normalizing them. Eugenics at scale seems inherently unethical to me because its purpose and effects are contradictory under any moral justifications I can think of, except that which basically say "I deserve this power because I have it." If we can't distribute a vaccine universally and equitably, we definitely can't eugenics. It will always boil down to who has the most proximity to the resources. On the individual level the purpose of eugenics is to make your life better. But if it's done on a societal scale, then that reason becomes increasingly meaningless. It's all too often co-opted into nationalistic, corporate, or blind structures which you might not even notice as an individual. I hope this sort of thing will be treated like high-tech weaponry, even if not weaponized. On the individual level I want the most protection possible, but I'm not allowed to get a Sherman tank, at least not very easily.
- remarkEon 4y agoIf you want to be reductive about it, then the answer is yes. Or do you think that some stern moralizing talking points directed at Russia or China will stop them? That seems to only be a tactic successfully deployed in the United States.
- throwaway290 4y agoAn argument could be made about setting an example, which US as the leading country still is in some ways for Russia and China, whether they want it or not, especially for the people if not the gov.
- remarkEon 4y agoI guess I don't think that Russia and China too much care about the "example" that the United States sets for them.
- throwaway290 4y agoOh they do. Even some staunch putinists would say Russia is following US/western example (like of meddling in foreign country affairs in case of Ukraine).
- inglor_cz 4y agoI am reading this with contact lenses in my eyes. How is that different from a potential future intelligence magnifier? We take it for absolutely granted that people's weaknesses and handicaps get compensated with inventions all the time. Organ transplants, artificial limbs, immunotherapy for cancer. If it turned out that intelligence tends to correlate with depression, but the depressive part could be tuned out, would it be ethical to let the individuals suffer from depression and deny them a potential cure? As far as eugenics goes, it is already to a large degree performed by proxy: the elites intermarry. But we are not really talking eugenics here; I am almost positive that in the second half of the century, genetic and epigenetic alterations in living adult humans will be commonplace.