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I think FollowingTheDao has a point worth exploring and it's easy to be afraid of it because it sounds cruel and against modern individualistic thinking. Genet

I think FollowingTheDao has a point worth exploring and it's easy to be afraid of it because it sounds cruel and against modern individualistic thinking. Genetic diseases that have survived a long time in our population may well have some positive selection pressure and may be good to the population overall. He gave the example of sickle cell, but I also recently read about a similar idea with schizophrenia. Suppose we eliminate the schizophrenia genes from the gene pool? We would also lose the benefit they provide - probably to people who don't quite become schizophrenic. > I don't suppose you're claiming that this treatment (or other genetic treatments) result(s) in the vast majority of the patients dying? I think he is claiming that but the vast majority is future generations who die from some other problems that this "bad" mitochondrial DNA was protecting the rest of the population against. I'm not sure if he meant "a moral" or "amoral" but genes evolve to ensure their own survival and that might be done more effectively by killing a few babies with mitochondrial disease as a side effect of something else. These unknown benefits of genetic diseases might simply be keeping mutations out. Mutations are going to happen anyway and maybe it's useful to the species for them to be fatal instead of just degrading performance in life which might accumulate over generations. Consider a program stopping with segfault vs silently continuing with corrupt memory.

perching_aix 1y ago
I do not think they have a point that can be explored much, or that they're suggesting an exploration of anything to begin with. I further think that the fear is on their side: fear from being associated with a historically malicious movement (eugenics), fear from being the possible culprit of unintended suffering (gene editing going wrong downstream) and thus having that responsibility, and fear of the disruption of some higher balance they believe exists (religion). For example, > may well have some positive selection pressure and may be good to the population overall How will we find this out if we espouse gene editing in general as bad? From my perspective, like religious folks in general, they wish for leaving unknowns remain unknown and just being passive; unfortunately, I think this goes against the very essence of life, and our very fundamental biases that come from being alive and perceiving ourselves as sentient. If I took their worldview to the extreme, I wouldn't be able to do anything: the smallest things would require a full and complete understanding of the entire state of the world, lest I might cause some unintended effect that may hurt me greatly, and so when I do do anything, I'm exhibiting hubris. This is also why I brought up healthcare in general being a best effort, because all active actions in life are at most a best effort due to the impenetrable wall between our perception of the world, and the world in its actuality. To tie it back to your example: > Consider a program stopping with segfault vs silently continuing with corrupt memory. Think about how you can reset your graphics driver by pressing Win+Ctrl+Shift+B without having to restart your entire system. Or how you continue to write programs, despite not being able to guarantee that the code you write for those programs is actually what's going to execute, on the state you expect them to be executed on, in the environment you expect it to execute in, in a way you expect it to execute. You might get other programs inject themselves into your program, other programs manipulate the memory of your program, the system libraries you call into do something unexpected because 20 years have passed and now things are different, or simply being scheduled out and your program not even receiving CPU time, meaning if your program powered a real time experience, that now ceases to be that way.
- foxglacier 1y ago
  There's a balance between best possible healthcare for all individuals and full blown eugenics. Neither extreme is very good, so yea it's worth at least trying to understand the consequences. In the extreme of too much healthcare for too long, we'll breed humans into being dependent on it. That's a risk because if we somehow stop being able to provide that healthcare, we might die out. On the other hand, maybe we'll always be able to provide that healthcare and we'll become superior in some way as a consequence. This probably already happened with the technology of clothes, cooking, and houses. We depend on those because we're hopeless at digesting raw food and staying warm at night, whereas animals without those technologies are burdened by things like permanent fur coats and more expensive digestive systems, or having to slow down in the cold. That's general healthcare. The issue here is different - "bad" genes are probably actually good at the population level so do we really want to get rid of them? I'm not much of a luddite but I really don't think we should manually eliminate any "bad" genes from the gene pool. That's like trying to improve the environment by exterminating some troublesome species without realizing the indirect benefits it provides. Do you also call protecting endangered and apparently useless species a religious like fear of disruption of some higher balance?
- FollowingTheDao 1y ago
  > If I took their worldview to the extreme, I wouldn't be able to do anything: So you obviously don’t understand my worldview. I don’t worry about the small things, I worry about the big things. But yes, so careful, because I have empathy. For example, it’s easy for me to throw a cigarette butt out of my window and it’s very convenient and it makes my life easier. But I know the consequences of that are many fold, starting fires, having animals eat the cigarette butt. So I don’t do it. The topic is about genetic editing and just throwing in the mitochondria of some random woman into the cytostolic DNA of another woman. Does anyone know the effects of that yet, long-term? Not only for the population but for the child? Has that even been examined before?
  - perching_aix 1y ago
    I'd assume no. How would they do that though if we all stood up, regarded this as eugenics, and banned it for good? Where do you draw the line between small and big things though? I can appreciate if someone tries to go for paraconsistent logic rather than classical when thinking about the real world, but then I think it's important to establish where we both land in there.

perching_aix 1y ago

I do not think they have a point that can be explored much, or that they're suggesting an exploration of anything to begin with. I further think that the fear is on their side: fear from being associated with a historically malicious movement (eugenics), fear from being the possible culprit of unintended suffering (gene editing going wrong downstream) and thus having that responsibility, and fear of the disruption of some higher balance they believe exists (religion). For example, > may well have some positive selection pressure and may be good to the population overall How will we find this out if we espouse gene editing in general as bad? From my perspective, like religious folks in general, they wish for leaving unknowns remain unknown and just being passive; unfortunately, I think this goes against the very essence of life, and our very fundamental biases that come from being alive and perceiving ourselves as sentient. If I took their worldview to the extreme, I wouldn't be able to do anything: the smallest things would require a full and complete understanding of the entire state of the world, lest I might cause some unintended effect that may hurt me greatly, and so when I do do anything, I'm exhibiting hubris. This is also why I brought up healthcare in general being a best effort, because all active actions in life are at most a best effort due to the impenetrable wall between our perception of the world, and the world in its actuality. To tie it back to your example: > Consider a program stopping with segfault vs silently continuing with corrupt memory. Think about how you can reset your graphics driver by pressing Win+Ctrl+Shift+B without having to restart your entire system. Or how you continue to write programs, despite not being able to guarantee that the code you write for those programs is actually what's going to execute, on the state you expect them to be executed on, in the environment you expect it to execute in, in a way you expect it to execute. You might get other programs inject themselves into your program, other programs manipulate the memory of your program, the system libraries you call into do something unexpected because 20 years have passed and now things are different, or simply being scheduled out and your program not even receiving CPU time, meaning if your program powered a real time experience, that now ceases to be that way.

foxglacier 1y ago
There's a balance between best possible healthcare for all individuals and full blown eugenics. Neither extreme is very good, so yea it's worth at least trying to understand the consequences. In the extreme of too much healthcare for too long, we'll breed humans into being dependent on it. That's a risk because if we somehow stop being able to provide that healthcare, we might die out. On the other hand, maybe we'll always be able to provide that healthcare and we'll become superior in some way as a consequence. This probably already happened with the technology of clothes, cooking, and houses. We depend on those because we're hopeless at digesting raw food and staying warm at night, whereas animals without those technologies are burdened by things like permanent fur coats and more expensive digestive systems, or having to slow down in the cold. That's general healthcare. The issue here is different - "bad" genes are probably actually good at the population level so do we really want to get rid of them? I'm not much of a luddite but I really don't think we should manually eliminate any "bad" genes from the gene pool. That's like trying to improve the environment by exterminating some troublesome species without realizing the indirect benefits it provides. Do you also call protecting endangered and apparently useless species a religious like fear of disruption of some higher balance?
FollowingTheDao 1y ago
> If I took their worldview to the extreme, I wouldn't be able to do anything: So you obviously don’t understand my worldview. I don’t worry about the small things, I worry about the big things. But yes, so careful, because I have empathy. For example, it’s easy for me to throw a cigarette butt out of my window and it’s very convenient and it makes my life easier. But I know the consequences of that are many fold, starting fires, having animals eat the cigarette butt. So I don’t do it. The topic is about genetic editing and just throwing in the mitochondria of some random woman into the cytostolic DNA of another woman. Does anyone know the effects of that yet, long-term? Not only for the population but for the child? Has that even been examined before?
- perching_aix 1y ago
  I'd assume no. How would they do that though if we all stood up, regarded this as eugenics, and banned it for good? Where do you draw the line between small and big things though? I can appreciate if someone tries to go for paraconsistent logic rather than classical when thinking about the real world, but then I think it's important to establish where we both land in there.