Gene Eugenics

[Ksandra]

I don't think I'd ever play around with the way my kid is born, I'd want them to grow up the way they really are. Especially too, if given the choice it means it's still a new technology, and who knows what can get fucked up with it. Instead of a gay daughter I could get stuck with a son with internet autism.


I don't even think I could bring myself to do the sperm sorting they do to guarantee a boy or girl.

[Nekio]

I'd go for this if I could shooting lightning out of my fingers and gain telekinesis when the process was complete.

[isladar]

Wasn't Hitler attempting Eugenics during WWII?

Eugenics movement started in England by some dude named Galton? I believe, then blew up over here in the States. Obviously tapered off in popularity after WWII, but the Reich got all their ideas from us.

http://alina_stefanescu.typepad.com/...0738970b-320wi

[Rowe]

I don't think I'd ever play around with the way my kid is born, I'd want them to grow up the way they really are. Especially too, if given the choice it means it's still a new technology, and who knows what can get fucked up with it. Instead of a gay daughter I could get stuck with a son with internet autism.


I don't even think I could bring myself to do the sperm sorting they do to guarantee a boy or girl.

Well, if not benign traits what about more serious conditions. Suppose you were told your child would be blind, deaf or suffer from a mental condition such as Bi-Polar disorder. If such a condition were confirmed and an effective treatment were available would you use it?

Reading the second article in my OP I would want my wife to get the treatment. Simply because the treatment is to prevent a physical deformity of girls with this condition and a secondary side effect is increased femininity. I'm an Atheist so nature is not perfect, random chance sometimes produces undesirable results. Any defect should be prevented because it is a child not God's precious and unique creation.

Even though I am an Atheist I believe all life should be given the opportunity to thrive. We all live our own lives we can not judge the quality of another's life. Personally I would not condone aborting/terminating a life due to a defect. Preventing or repairing a defect is another matter.

[isladar]

inc abortion thread

[Kuya]

Should we really be surprised or angry that people might want to change if their children are born straight or gay?

Do the people here honestly think that being gay has the same value as being straight, even to themselves? Let's not joke around here. I bet half of the gays in the world would kill to have their orientation changed to straight so they could avoid the grief they have to go through for being gay (granted, there's some truth in the idea that the grass is always greener on the other side). Not only that, but most men think that being gay runs contrary to being a male. So even if they didn't get grief for being gay, any gay who looks masculine and cares about his masculinity will probably still feel inadequate because he's not quite "masculine enough". And he's not masculine enough because he's not straight.

There's two aspects to this: Things society places more value on, and things society actively shuns.

Being blond has more value than being a brunette, but being a brunette won't get you shunned. Still, many prefer the blond colour of hair because it seems to have more value. The same is true for green and blue colored eyes or even for lighter skin. You have contact lenses and even skin lighteners that have a strong market exactly because some traits have more value than others. And then you have traits that have less value than others and is actively shunned: kinky hair on black women in some parts of the world.

So we can expect this: if and when there is the ability to change your children's sexual orientation and your own, people will be on it in a heartbeat. They may not be open about it, but i wouldn't be surprised if most people used it. And the reason is simple, not only is being gay considered a bad thing, even if it had no stigma, it would still have less value than being straight. And if people can spend money to increase their social standing or that of their children's, they're gonna do it.

Why is changing sexual orientation bad, when that's exactly what our values lead to?

[Narol]

I bet half of the gays in the world would kill to have their orientation changed to straight so they could avoid the grief they have to go through for being gay (granted, there's some truth in the idea that the grass is always greener on the other side). Not only that, but most men think that being gay runs contrary to being a male

That's a problem with society, not homosexuality.

[Cadsuane]

This issue is way way way too ethically complex to ever be properly discussed here. Technically that's true for pretty much everything we talk about to some extent but this really stretches incredulity.

[Fistandantilus]

Should we really be surprised or angry that people might want to change if their children are born straight or gay?

Do the people here honestly think that being gay has the same value as being straight, even to themselves? Let's not joke around here. I bet half of the gays in the world would kill to have their orientation changed to straight so they could avoid the grief they have to go through for being gay (granted, there's some truth in the idea that the grass is always greener on the other side). Not only that, but most men think that being gay runs contrary to being a male. So even if they didn't get grief for being gay, any gay who looks masculine and cares about his masculinity will probably still feel inadequate because he's not quite "masculine enough". And he's not masculine enough because he's not straight.

There's two aspects to this: Things society places more value on, and things society actively shuns.

Being blond has more value than being a brunette, but being a brunette won't get you shunned. Still, many prefer the blond colour of hair because it seems to have more value. The same is true for green and blue colored eyes or even for lighter skin. You have contact lenses and even skin lighteners that have a strong market exactly because some traits have more value than others. And then you have traits that have less value than others and is actively shunned: kinky hair on black women in some parts of the world.

So we can expect this: if and when there is the ability to change your children's sexual orientation and your own, people will be on it in a heartbeat. They may not be open about it, but i wouldn't be surprised if most people used it. And the reason is simple, not only is being gay considered a bad thing, even if it had no stigma, it would still have less value than being straight. And if people can spend money to increase their social standing or that of their children's, they're gonna do it.

Why is changing sexual orientation bad, when that's exactly what our values lead to?

This is why churches in the past have invested so much time and money in converting the gays to the righteous path of heterosexuality. They've been banishing the demons for years, now we just have a scientific way to get rid of this problem once and for all before a person is even born. It's nice that religion and science are finally able to come together and work towards a common goal that helps humanity.

[Kuya]

I'm not talking about the ontology of homosexuality. I am exactly talking about society. We don't take the high road with our skin colour, the texture of our hair, our hair colour, the size of our breasts or eye colour. Why should sexuality be any different? If we could we'd definitely change our IQ too.

Let's see what happens when men can easily, safely, and cheaply increase their penis sizes.

No point in taking the high road; it's gonna happen because our values and interests demand it.

[wagon]

If genetic manipulation is as perfect as it is portrayed in Gattaca, you bet your ass I will use it to my advantage. I'd imagine anyone who can afford it will do the same.

[OWS_Tonx]

I don't think I'd ever play around with the way my kid is born, I'd want them to grow up the way they really are. Especially too, if given the choice it means it's still a new technology, and who knows what can get fucked up with it. Instead of a gay daughter I could get stuck with a son with internet autism.


I don't even think I could bring myself to do the sperm sorting they do to guarantee a boy or girl.

nobody wants a child born with a mental illness. We do accept them, for the most part, when it happens though. If I could 100% make sure my child was born without an illness and no side effects because of the alteration I'd do it in a heartbeat. I wouldn't mess with gender and such though.

[Narol]

Let's see what happens when men can easily, safely, and cheaply increase their penis sizes.

Then we'll see what happens when men realize 15-inch penises aren't what women want.

[Fistandantilus]

That's not a bad point, a lot of the current acceptance of disorders is because the person can't do anything about it. If the parents purposely let a genetic disorder affect their kid would people look at that kid and say "shame on those parents for letting their kid have a disease"?

[Narol]

Just like 50 years ago it was "shame on those parents for letting their kid be gay."

But there's a huge difference between something benign and something malignant.

[Rowe]

damn I should have put bowleggedness in the list. My male cousins on my father's side have bowlegs. My mom is mean and once said all the men on my father's side of the family would be 6 feet tall if not for their bowlegs.

luckily my brother and I don't have bowlegs, maybe because the bowlegged cousins are the son's of my father's sisters.

Just like 50 years ago it was "shame on those parents for letting their kid be gay."

But there's a huge difference between something benign and something malignant.

As I said earlier I'm an Atheist therefore I see nature as imperfect and more than capable of producing unexpected results. There is no purpose to life other than to thrive. Some may argue to thrive life should seek to reproduce. Therefore to exist as a homosexual when a member of a heterosexual species is not optimal. It is an anomaly. Nature produces many anomalies of varying degree.

Homosexuality is not completely benign. Baldness is not completely benign either. Some homosexuals are completely content and thrive. But I do believe some homosexuals are troubled by their sexual orientation. As I said before my Dad is bald and he started going bald in his 20s. I had a lot of anxiety in my late teens early 20s that I was going to go bald. That's pretty minor compared to sexual orientation.

[Eugene]

I'm not talking about the ontology of homosexuality. I am exactly talking about society. We don't take the high road with our skin colour, the texture of our hair, our hair colour, the size of our breasts or eye colour. Why should sexuality be any different? If we could we'd definitely change our IQ too.

Let's see what happens when men can easily, safely, and cheaply increase their penis sizes.

No point in taking the high road; it's gonna happen because our values and interests demand it.

Comparing an individual's right to determine the color and style of their hair to a parent's right to determine the sexuality of their child is a false analogy.

[Narol]

Yeah, but it's Kuya.

[Kuya]

Comparing an individual's right to determine the color and style of their hair to a parent's right to determine the sexuality of their child is a false analogy.

If you had read properly, you'd see i mentioned both changing your child's sexuality and changing your own. When comparing it with things such as changing your eye colour or hair colour, i was comparing it to the latter. You mgiht also have noticed that almost everything in that post refers to changing something about oneself and not another person. It is the post i made before that that mentions changing someone else's sexuality.

Evidently, changing something that belongs to someone else requires that one consider whether it's necessary to do so without their consent. This standard, however, is not always applied. Take for example, circumcision.

edit: The post you quoted does not specify whether it's referring to changing sexuality of another or oneself. The previous post mentions both. You could have assumed that i was referring to changing one's sexuality since that was the theme of the post, but you instead assumed i was referring to changing the sexuality of another. This means that you did not read the post i made previous to the one you quoted and it also means i should have specified.

[Zilong]

Did you see the show on the History Channel "The Gate to Hell" or something like that, basically it was investigating the fact that cultures/religions all around the world believe in a Hell that is underground where you are tortured for eternity.

My take on it is people explore. Caves and volcanos are scary places. Hell is born. Same thing with the mythology of dragons and giants, people tried to make sense of fossils and skeletal remains

I actually watched that, and the entire time I keep wondering why they even discuss it so fucking seriously instead on chalking the entire thing on primitive people being less informed and/or retarded.

Hell is just a concept derived from fear of uncertainty, that's all there is to it.

Anyway, to be on topic, I probably would just go straight for the gold if I was to do the whole designer babies thing. No point in doing thing half-assed, and if I was to shower a being with love, affection, and money for a good portion of my life, I'd want it to be a prodigy.

But then again, there is a good reason most of my friends told me I shouldn't have kids if I gonna treat them like an RPG character.