3 ms·

> What's wrong with "designer babies". It destroys our existing concept of the human experience. Is it silly to want to live among "natural" children? Then exp

> What's wrong with "designer babies". It destroys our existing concept of the human experience. Is it silly to want to live among "natural" children? Then explain me why it's not silly to want to continue the species at all?

Houshalter 12y ago
I can just imagine our distant descendants reading through this thread, thinking how horrible we are for condemning our children to genetic diseases and inequality. Just like we look down at the people who fought against the smallpox vaccine because it was unnatural.
- orblivion 12y ago
  > our children What does this phrase mean?
  - Houshalter 12y ago
    Children? As in the next generation, descendants, kids, etc? What do you think it means?
    - orblivion 12y ago
      Well, I'm trying to highlight the "our" part. Does it matter to you how much the kids have to do with "us"? If so, why? As I was trying to express above, it seems strange to me to imply somebody is irrational for wanting "natural" kids, but not likewise call someone out for caring about creating "their" progeny at all.
      - Houshalter 12y ago
        I'm confused about your confusion. All I meant was that future generations will probably think it's weird and immoral that we allow children to have genetic diseases, when we have the technology to stop it.
        orblivion 12y ago
        I'm trying to ask a deeper question in response. Asking what "our children" means was an attempt to get there with a somewhat Socratic method. What I'm trying to do is get you to consider the full implications of not caring about whether things are "natural". What if we not only swapped around genes, but edited genes directly to cure things? What if we added enhancements? What if we completely genetically engineered babies from scratch and called them "our children", would that be okay with you? What if we made AI enabled robots and called them "our children"? Why not... just not have children at all anyway? At what point do you draw the line, and by what principle? To say that "natural" humans doesn't matter raises the question of why "humans" matter at all in the first place. I raise the issue of the "human experience" because that's the paradigm I live in, and I wonder what I'm going to do without it. I suspect that anybody who cares about "the next generation" but doesn't care if babies are "natural" also thinks they're living within the "human experience" but they haven't thought it through. I think that if you don't care about "natural" babies, you might as well go all the way and be an anti-natalist. I'm actually quite open to that as well, at least it's consistent. BTW one way of avoiding genetic diseases without genetic engineering would be genetic screening. Such things exist as I understand, I met a guy who said he worked for a company that did this sort of thing. Certain couples just avoid having children. Maybe they can adopt. Is that unfair to them that they don't get to have "their" children? Again, why does that even matter if you don't care about things being "natural"? Thank you for continuing this conversation so late after the article was posted, btw. Now that I've laid it all out I wonder what ideas you have in response.
        Houshalter 12y ago
        > What if we not only swapped around genes, but edited genes directly to cure things? What if we added enhancements? What if we completely genetically engineered babies from scratch and called them "our children", would that be okay with you? What if we made AI enabled robots and called them "our children"? All of these things will happen in the (potentially near) future. The world will be much weirder, but also better. I mean you can argue that people shouldn't reproduce at all, but good luck convincing everyone of that any time soon. A significant percentage of people believe even having such a view is horribly immoral (it's associated with eugenics and other bad things) and that reproduction is a basic human right. So if we are going to be reproducing, there is nothing wrong with removing genetic diseases.

Houshalter 12y ago

I can just imagine our distant descendants reading through this thread, thinking how horrible we are for condemning our children to genetic diseases and inequality. Just like we look down at the people who fought against the smallpox vaccine because it was unnatural.

orblivion 12y ago
> our children What does this phrase mean?
- Houshalter 12y ago
  Children? As in the next generation, descendants, kids, etc? What do you think it means?
  - orblivion 12y ago
    Well, I'm trying to highlight the "our" part. Does it matter to you how much the kids have to do with "us"? If so, why? As I was trying to express above, it seems strange to me to imply somebody is irrational for wanting "natural" kids, but not likewise call someone out for caring about creating "their" progeny at all.
    - Houshalter 12y ago
      I'm confused about your confusion. All I meant was that future generations will probably think it's weird and immoral that we allow children to have genetic diseases, when we have the technology to stop it.
      - orblivion 12y ago
        I'm trying to ask a deeper question in response. Asking what "our children" means was an attempt to get there with a somewhat Socratic method. What I'm trying to do is get you to consider the full implications of not caring about whether things are "natural". What if we not only swapped around genes, but edited genes directly to cure things? What if we added enhancements? What if we completely genetically engineered babies from scratch and called them "our children", would that be okay with you? What if we made AI enabled robots and called them "our children"? Why not... just not have children at all anyway? At what point do you draw the line, and by what principle? To say that "natural" humans doesn't matter raises the question of why "humans" matter at all in the first place. I raise the issue of the "human experience" because that's the paradigm I live in, and I wonder what I'm going to do without it. I suspect that anybody who cares about "the next generation" but doesn't care if babies are "natural" also thinks they're living within the "human experience" but they haven't thought it through. I think that if you don't care about "natural" babies, you might as well go all the way and be an anti-natalist. I'm actually quite open to that as well, at least it's consistent. BTW one way of avoiding genetic diseases without genetic engineering would be genetic screening. Such things exist as I understand, I met a guy who said he worked for a company that did this sort of thing. Certain couples just avoid having children. Maybe they can adopt. Is that unfair to them that they don't get to have "their" children? Again, why does that even matter if you don't care about things being "natural"? Thank you for continuing this conversation so late after the article was posted, btw. Now that I've laid it all out I wonder what ideas you have in response.
        Houshalter 12y ago
        > What if we not only swapped around genes, but edited genes directly to cure things? What if we added enhancements? What if we completely genetically engineered babies from scratch and called them "our children", would that be okay with you? What if we made AI enabled robots and called them "our children"? All of these things will happen in the (potentially near) future. The world will be much weirder, but also better. I mean you can argue that people shouldn't reproduce at all, but good luck convincing everyone of that any time soon. A significant percentage of people believe even having such a view is horribly immoral (it's associated with eugenics and other bad things) and that reproduction is a basic human right. So if we are going to be reproducing, there is nothing wrong with removing genetic diseases.