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Thanks for not being reactionary. You are in the minority so I figured I would disclaim. > What’s the alternative? Acceptance. These parents can still reprodu

Thanks for not being reactionary. You are in the minority so I figured I would disclaim. > What’s the alternative? Acceptance. These parents can still reproduce. A female child will most likely be healthy, like the mother. And the male child will not always be born with a mitochondrial disease. People do not realize that father's can also pass mitochondrial genetics to their children. (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/search/research-news/6639/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/search/research-news/6639/) In trying to remove all risk from our lives we are making it inherently risky in other, usually unknown, ways. All the spiritual practices talk about acceptance, so just pick one. But my bigger point is that it is still eugenics. And that is bad no matter what the goal is.

perching_aix 1y ago
> But my bigger point is that it is still eugenics. And that is bad no matter what the goal is. You're literally advocating for letting genetic diseases cull the afflicted populations, "selecting for the better genes" that way. Seemingly the exact opposite of your claimed position, I hope you appreciate. Or you have no problem with selection as long as "nature does it"? That's the best idea I have for reconciling this at least. Are we humans not part of nature though? Is you preferring what nature does not just a preference still? If we figure out that some specific genetic difference results in people eventually dying before they reproduce, what's the difference between editing that out vs. letting nature do its thing?
- lukeschlather 1y ago
  > If we figure out that some specific genetic difference results in people eventually dying before they reproduce, what's the difference between editing that out vs. letting nature do its thing? We're not that smart. Everything has unintended consequences. One example some people have studied is sickle-cell anemia. It's a recessive trait so if you get two copies of the gene you get sickle-cell which is a horrible disease. However, if you only get one copy of the gene it provides substantial immunity against malaria. Now, maybe in this case you could say, okay, we will cure malaria somehow, not worth sickle-cell existing. But the thing is that gene isn't "the gene for sickle-cell anemia," nor is it even "the gene for malaria resistance and sickle-cell anemia." It affects hundreds, thousands, maybe millions of different things. I think there are some conditions where I don't have a problem doing that, and sickle-cell, mitochondrial disease, these things do seem "bad enough" to be worth putting our fingers on the scale. But I am not sure it's so clear-cut, and I think it's right to say that eugenics are categorically suspect.
  - perching_aix 1y ago
    > We're not that smart. How do you determine that? We've come far enough to see and manipulate individual atoms, emit and count individual photons, and build machines that understand human language (if ever so fleetingly). Unless how we work is fundamentally betraying how we can reason about the world, and we find that that's intrinsically linked to our genetics, I really don't see us not cracking it eventually proper. > Everything has unintended consequences. People use medications every single day that are effective for what they are taking it for, yet have "unintended consequences" that are consciously ignored or are found otherwise negligible by them. Seems like unintended consequences are not a blocker. The criteria hasn't been perfection even up to this point, it's always been a desperation-driven best-effort. Much like life and civilization as a whole. I can appreciate e.g. hesitance in taking on the responsibility of possibly being wrong about how something like this works - nature cannot be blamed, but humans can and that feels bad. But the alternative is pretty clear and is not going away on its own. I'm pretty sure at least that just like how genetic traits can be evolved multiple times independently, genetic defects can be too. This is also why I think to characterize this as eugenics is extremely and fundamentally wrong. Eugenics was about leveraging population control to ensure only the "good" genes get passed on - a concept that flagrantly flies in the face of this independent recurrence effect, for one.
    - FollowingTheDao 1y ago
      > We've come far enough to see and manipulate individual atoms, emit and count individual photons The fact that you don’t see the downsides of manipulating atoms, and the trouble is causing in this very day with the risk of nuclear war, literally proves that we are not that smart. > Eugenics was about leveraging population control to ensure only the "good" genes get passed on Everyone’s assumption are that these genes that are killing these children are “bad“. They know these jeans survived thousands of years of evolution for a reason. And that’s because on Balance. They are not bad, but for some they are very bad. Human genetics cares about our survival, it is totally a moral. It would rather a few babies die so that hundreds could live.
      - deleted 1y ago
- imtringued 1y ago
  Yeah, I find it pretty telling that the person arguing against eugenics is in its distilled essence telling me to not reproduce, because I might have an undesirable trait I do not wish my children to inherit. It's like he managed to be against eugenics, because it's eugenics, but not be against any of the negative consequences that eugenics brought in the past. For me this reeks of someone putting on a facade.
  - FollowingTheDao 1y ago
    > Yeah, I find it pretty telling that the person arguing against eugenics is in its distilled essence telling me to not reproduce, because I might have an undesirable trait I do not wish my children to inherit. I did not say that at all. Mitochondrial diseases are not transmitted 100% to the children so I am saying go ahead and reproduce and accept the results.
Waterluvian 1y ago
> remove all risk from our lives As a parent of young kids, this is a core issue I grapple with. I want my kids to have fun and take risks and learn how to handle the bumpiness of life. But I don’t want my kids being maimed or killed. I think the argument could be simplified to “we’re collectively better off if we live in a manner where one consequence is that x% of us will get badly hurt.” And I personally believe that’s a true statement. My youngest was one of the x%. He played in a risky way (that was entirely normal when I was a kid) and later that night a team of orthopedic pediatric surgeons had to put his body back together. The hardest thing for me is not to be constantly saying “that’s too high; get down from there; don’t go too far; slow down” because that trauma lives with his mom and I far more than it does with him. But I believe it’s important for him to keep taking risks. I also believe it’s up to each parent to decide how they want to raise their kids. We don’t get to collectively decide for the parents. Which relates back to the topic: I think it’s collectivism vs. individualism. I believe we cannot decide for people that they don’t get a choice in the matter. Even if one might argue that this poses a collective risk to the population.
- tomrod 1y ago
  I'm so sorry that happened. As a parent, stories of injured children get that bad-news stomach drop to me, and I both empathize and sympathize. We are dealing with a similar (but older child) issue now and it is just heartbreaking to see them hurt.
- FollowingTheDao 1y ago
  > I think it’s collectivism vs. individualism The idea of individualism is a hard one for me. Are we really individuals? I mean, we get half our genetics from each parent, so where is the individual? Can any of you live as a total individual, without the assistance of even a small group? When in human history, even primate history, have you seen our species survive without a community? When a parent makes this decision for gene therapy, that does not just affect the parents, it affects the child (the outcome of which is still not understood) and it affects those child's children. Natural selection exists for a reason, but the eugenicists think they can control it. Comparing gene therapy to cognitive therapy (telling your kids to not be stupid), is in no way comparable. Doing gene therapy is not "raising your kids", it is creating your kids. I am saying this as someone who lives with THREE genetic disorders. von Hippel-Lindau syndrome (Father and Mother, hemangioblastomas), Cystathionine beta-synthase deficiency (Mother, homocystinuria), and a DNM1L Deficiency that leads to mitochondrial fission dysfunction (myoptahy, ME/CFS, OCD, Anxiety, Asperger's).
tomrod 1y ago
When applied to non-human life, the alleged benefits of eugenics goes by the names domestication, husbandry, and similar. Correct me if I am wrong because I am absolutely not a historian. Eugenics was horrible not because we understand Mendellian genetics but because it was forced on people in the intent to allegedly "improve" a (political boundary placeholder)'s population in some way that was outright obscene, including use by Nazi Germany and many other places and regimes. US courts, etc. I think the difference here is that the technology is not forced to be used.
- FollowingTheDao 1y ago
  Not all eugenicists had what they thought were Negative intentions. In the 30s the plan was to send Native Americans to the cities to to interbreed breed with white people to make white people more communal. And besides, aren’t we forcing these genetic changes onto the children without their consent?
  - BEEdwards 1y ago
    We force life itself on them without their consent, so ensuring they actually live past childhood seems like a package deal...
    - FollowingTheDao 1y ago
      Is there less beauty and purpose and meaning in a child who lives for 1 month over one that lives for 80 years?
      - BEEdwards 1y ago
        Objectively yes, I'm not even sure that's a question. I have some serious antinatalist leanings, but if one is going to live (assuming decent quality of life and what not) more life is always going to be objectively better.
jjcob 1y ago
So as someone who spent the last few years caring for a kid with a genetic defect.... I really don't wish that on anyone. If there is a way to detect or prevent genetic defects before the kids are born, we should really allow people to make a choice. And I really don't care if doctors mix genetic material from 3 people to make a healthy baby. It's still a form of evolution. I'd think we should really try to give two people who really want to have a kid a chance to have a healthy kid...
nick__m 1y ago
But my bigger point is that it is still eugenics. And that is bad no matter what the goal is. That's a thought terminating cliché for the ages ! The problem with eugenics is the noneconsensual, racist, ignorant ways and ideas of the early egenists. But the idea of editing out genetic mutation that purely detrimental (like the COMT-Val158Met polymorphism that make people prone to psychosis and schizophrenia, or one of the defective variants of the many genes that cause hereditary blindness or deafnessl would be a net positive for everyone. How can you argue otherwise? They should not mess with genes where the sciences is not 100% settled but that still leaves a lot's of mutations known to be 100% deleterious. There are no benefits in having hereditary blindness, deafness or schizophrenia!
- FollowingTheDao 1y ago
  > How can you argue otherwise? Because I know more about how integrated and complicated genetics is than you? Now you’re talking about editing out polymorphisms, not even mutations? Did you know the COMT is only a minor risk for schizophrenia, right? And that it not only metabolize is catecholamines, but also estrogens? How did you know the COMT enzyme is stimulated by magnesium and SAMe? Maybe the person needs just more of those than needing to have genetic therapy.
  - nick__m 1y ago
    You didn't argue for anything! Assuming science had the ability to cleanly edit that variant (which is not the case today), the ethical choice is to remove that small risk factor. That variant of the COMT gene have a mountain of evidence against it and no evidence showing any benefit whatsoever. The fact that the COMT enzyme is also implicated in estrogen metabolism is not an argument for or against editing out the known defective variant of the COMT gene. There is an argument to be made that we should wait until medical science has the means to cleanly and reliably do a single gene edit but I don't buy the argument that removing a gene variant from the humans genes pool is eugenics therefore it's bad and should be forever forbidden.
    - FollowingTheDao 1y ago
spauldo 1y ago
Eugenics gets a bad rap for good reason. But like everything in life, it's not black-and-white. It's one of those scary words people are afraid of because some assholes used it for evil. But avoiding having children because you don't want to pass on genetic diseases doesn't make you Hitler. So let's leave the charged language in the trash where it belongs. I've got a genetic disease. I decided not to have kids because I didn't want to pass it on. Ended up with one anyway, and I hope for his sake he didn't inherit it, because I don't want him to have to deal with the problems I have. You might say that's not natural, but humans have evolved to care about our offspring. What can be more natural to a human than not wanting to watch your child suffer? Your argument could be used to justify abandoning health care altogether. I should have died of gangrene when I was 12, but I had ingrown toenail surgery that saved my life. I wear glasses, surely that goes against natural selection since I wouldn't be as fit a mate as someone with 20/20 vision. My girlfriend had breast cancer, should her children have grown up without a mother for the sake of the species? Should I abandon her because her breasts and ovaries were removed and she's no longer a fit mate? Evolution is just a process, and one we've been opting out of for thousands of years, ever since the first human helped another human survive something that should have killed them. Don't make Darwin your god. The irony would spin his coffin right out of the ground.

perching_aix 1y ago

> But my bigger point is that it is still eugenics. And that is bad no matter what the goal is. You're literally advocating for letting genetic diseases cull the afflicted populations, "selecting for the better genes" that way. Seemingly the exact opposite of your claimed position, I hope you appreciate. Or you have no problem with selection as long as "nature does it"? That's the best idea I have for reconciling this at least. Are we humans not part of nature though? Is you preferring what nature does not just a preference still? If we figure out that some specific genetic difference results in people eventually dying before they reproduce, what's the difference between editing that out vs. letting nature do its thing?

lukeschlather 1y ago
> If we figure out that some specific genetic difference results in people eventually dying before they reproduce, what's the difference between editing that out vs. letting nature do its thing? We're not that smart. Everything has unintended consequences. One example some people have studied is sickle-cell anemia. It's a recessive trait so if you get two copies of the gene you get sickle-cell which is a horrible disease. However, if you only get one copy of the gene it provides substantial immunity against malaria. Now, maybe in this case you could say, okay, we will cure malaria somehow, not worth sickle-cell existing. But the thing is that gene isn't "the gene for sickle-cell anemia," nor is it even "the gene for malaria resistance and sickle-cell anemia." It affects hundreds, thousands, maybe millions of different things. I think there are some conditions where I don't have a problem doing that, and sickle-cell, mitochondrial disease, these things do seem "bad enough" to be worth putting our fingers on the scale. But I am not sure it's so clear-cut, and I think it's right to say that eugenics are categorically suspect.
- perching_aix 1y ago
  > We're not that smart. How do you determine that? We've come far enough to see and manipulate individual atoms, emit and count individual photons, and build machines that understand human language (if ever so fleetingly). Unless how we work is fundamentally betraying how we can reason about the world, and we find that that's intrinsically linked to our genetics, I really don't see us not cracking it eventually proper. > Everything has unintended consequences. People use medications every single day that are effective for what they are taking it for, yet have "unintended consequences" that are consciously ignored or are found otherwise negligible by them. Seems like unintended consequences are not a blocker. The criteria hasn't been perfection even up to this point, it's always been a desperation-driven best-effort. Much like life and civilization as a whole. I can appreciate e.g. hesitance in taking on the responsibility of possibly being wrong about how something like this works - nature cannot be blamed, but humans can and that feels bad. But the alternative is pretty clear and is not going away on its own. I'm pretty sure at least that just like how genetic traits can be evolved multiple times independently, genetic defects can be too. This is also why I think to characterize this as eugenics is extremely and fundamentally wrong. Eugenics was about leveraging population control to ensure only the "good" genes get passed on - a concept that flagrantly flies in the face of this independent recurrence effect, for one.
  - FollowingTheDao 1y ago
    > We've come far enough to see and manipulate individual atoms, emit and count individual photons The fact that you don’t see the downsides of manipulating atoms, and the trouble is causing in this very day with the risk of nuclear war, literally proves that we are not that smart. > Eugenics was about leveraging population control to ensure only the "good" genes get passed on Everyone’s assumption are that these genes that are killing these children are “bad“. They know these jeans survived thousands of years of evolution for a reason. And that’s because on Balance. They are not bad, but for some they are very bad. Human genetics cares about our survival, it is totally a moral. It would rather a few babies die so that hundreds could live.
    - deleted 1y ago
imtringued 1y ago
Yeah, I find it pretty telling that the person arguing against eugenics is in its distilled essence telling me to not reproduce, because I might have an undesirable trait I do not wish my children to inherit. It's like he managed to be against eugenics, because it's eugenics, but not be against any of the negative consequences that eugenics brought in the past. For me this reeks of someone putting on a facade.
- FollowingTheDao 1y ago
  > Yeah, I find it pretty telling that the person arguing against eugenics is in its distilled essence telling me to not reproduce, because I might have an undesirable trait I do not wish my children to inherit. I did not say that at all. Mitochondrial diseases are not transmitted 100% to the children so I am saying go ahead and reproduce and accept the results.

Waterluvian 1y ago

> remove all risk from our lives As a parent of young kids, this is a core issue I grapple with. I want my kids to have fun and take risks and learn how to handle the bumpiness of life. But I don’t want my kids being maimed or killed. I think the argument could be simplified to “we’re collectively better off if we live in a manner where one consequence is that x% of us will get badly hurt.” And I personally believe that’s a true statement. My youngest was one of the x%. He played in a risky way (that was entirely normal when I was a kid) and later that night a team of orthopedic pediatric surgeons had to put his body back together. The hardest thing for me is not to be constantly saying “that’s too high; get down from there; don’t go too far; slow down” because that trauma lives with his mom and I far more than it does with him. But I believe it’s important for him to keep taking risks. I also believe it’s up to each parent to decide how they want to raise their kids. We don’t get to collectively decide for the parents. Which relates back to the topic: I think it’s collectivism vs. individualism. I believe we cannot decide for people that they don’t get a choice in the matter. Even if one might argue that this poses a collective risk to the population.

tomrod 1y ago
I'm so sorry that happened. As a parent, stories of injured children get that bad-news stomach drop to me, and I both empathize and sympathize. We are dealing with a similar (but older child) issue now and it is just heartbreaking to see them hurt.
FollowingTheDao 1y ago
> I think it’s collectivism vs. individualism The idea of individualism is a hard one for me. Are we really individuals? I mean, we get half our genetics from each parent, so where is the individual? Can any of you live as a total individual, without the assistance of even a small group? When in human history, even primate history, have you seen our species survive without a community? When a parent makes this decision for gene therapy, that does not just affect the parents, it affects the child (the outcome of which is still not understood) and it affects those child's children. Natural selection exists for a reason, but the eugenicists think they can control it. Comparing gene therapy to cognitive therapy (telling your kids to not be stupid), is in no way comparable. Doing gene therapy is not "raising your kids", it is creating your kids. I am saying this as someone who lives with THREE genetic disorders. von Hippel-Lindau syndrome (Father and Mother, hemangioblastomas), Cystathionine beta-synthase deficiency (Mother, homocystinuria), and a DNM1L Deficiency that leads to mitochondrial fission dysfunction (myoptahy, ME/CFS, OCD, Anxiety, Asperger's).

tomrod 1y ago

When applied to non-human life, the alleged benefits of eugenics goes by the names domestication, husbandry, and similar. Correct me if I am wrong because I am absolutely not a historian. Eugenics was horrible not because we understand Mendellian genetics but because it was forced on people in the intent to allegedly "improve" a (political boundary placeholder)'s population in some way that was outright obscene, including use by Nazi Germany and many other places and regimes. US courts, etc. I think the difference here is that the technology is not forced to be used.

FollowingTheDao 1y ago
Not all eugenicists had what they thought were Negative intentions. In the 30s the plan was to send Native Americans to the cities to to interbreed breed with white people to make white people more communal. And besides, aren’t we forcing these genetic changes onto the children without their consent?
- BEEdwards 1y ago
  We force life itself on them without their consent, so ensuring they actually live past childhood seems like a package deal...
  - FollowingTheDao 1y ago
    Is there less beauty and purpose and meaning in a child who lives for 1 month over one that lives for 80 years?
    - BEEdwards 1y ago
      Objectively yes, I'm not even sure that's a question. I have some serious antinatalist leanings, but if one is going to live (assuming decent quality of life and what not) more life is always going to be objectively better.

jjcob 1y ago

So as someone who spent the last few years caring for a kid with a genetic defect.... I really don't wish that on anyone. If there is a way to detect or prevent genetic defects before the kids are born, we should really allow people to make a choice. And I really don't care if doctors mix genetic material from 3 people to make a healthy baby. It's still a form of evolution. I'd think we should really try to give two people who really want to have a kid a chance to have a healthy kid...

nick__m 1y ago

But my bigger point is that it is still eugenics. And that is bad no matter what the goal is. That's a thought terminating cliché for the ages ! The problem with eugenics is the noneconsensual, racist, ignorant ways and ideas of the early egenists. But the idea of editing out genetic mutation that purely detrimental (like the COMT-Val158Met polymorphism that make people prone to psychosis and schizophrenia, or one of the defective variants of the many genes that cause hereditary blindness or deafnessl would be a net positive for everyone. How can you argue otherwise? They should not mess with genes where the sciences is not 100% settled but that still leaves a lot's of mutations known to be 100% deleterious. There are no benefits in having hereditary blindness, deafness or schizophrenia!

FollowingTheDao 1y ago
> How can you argue otherwise? Because I know more about how integrated and complicated genetics is than you? Now you’re talking about editing out polymorphisms, not even mutations? Did you know the COMT is only a minor risk for schizophrenia, right? And that it not only metabolize is catecholamines, but also estrogens? How did you know the COMT enzyme is stimulated by magnesium and SAMe? Maybe the person needs just more of those than needing to have genetic therapy.
- nick__m 1y ago
  You didn't argue for anything! Assuming science had the ability to cleanly edit that variant (which is not the case today), the ethical choice is to remove that small risk factor. That variant of the COMT gene have a mountain of evidence against it and no evidence showing any benefit whatsoever. The fact that the COMT enzyme is also implicated in estrogen metabolism is not an argument for or against editing out the known defective variant of the COMT gene. There is an argument to be made that we should wait until medical science has the means to cleanly and reliably do a single gene edit but I don't buy the argument that removing a gene variant from the humans genes pool is eugenics therefore it's bad and should be forever forbidden.
  - FollowingTheDao 1y ago

spauldo 1y ago

Eugenics gets a bad rap for good reason. But like everything in life, it's not black-and-white. It's one of those scary words people are afraid of because some assholes used it for evil. But avoiding having children because you don't want to pass on genetic diseases doesn't make you Hitler. So let's leave the charged language in the trash where it belongs. I've got a genetic disease. I decided not to have kids because I didn't want to pass it on. Ended up with one anyway, and I hope for his sake he didn't inherit it, because I don't want him to have to deal with the problems I have. You might say that's not natural, but humans have evolved to care about our offspring. What can be more natural to a human than not wanting to watch your child suffer? Your argument could be used to justify abandoning health care altogether. I should have died of gangrene when I was 12, but I had ingrown toenail surgery that saved my life. I wear glasses, surely that goes against natural selection since I wouldn't be as fit a mate as someone with 20/20 vision. My girlfriend had breast cancer, should her children have grown up without a mother for the sake of the species? Should I abandon her because her breasts and ovaries were removed and she's no longer a fit mate? Evolution is just a process, and one we've been opting out of for thousands of years, ever since the first human helped another human survive something that should have killed them. Don't make Darwin your god. The irony would spin his coffin right out of the ground.