Genetic Engineering: Playing God

Technically, an embryo isn't yrt considered living, well yeah the cell devides numerously til it forms a fetus, but at embryonic stage, it can't still be considered life, much less human. At most, an embryo might turn out to be anything from plant, animal, human or whatever comes next.

In that sense, yes bacterium are considered living things but viruses are not!

 

When did this turn into an abortion/stem cells discussion?

 

Technically stem cell research is part of genetic engineering, plus some guy on the last page added this argument, it's absolutely fine though

 

the problem is that you introduce new problems after solving old problems.
so is it worth it?!

suppose you create something and it cures all cancer. it would be great for all the victims of cancer. but then there will eventually be a replacement for cancer, maybe something less severe but permanent or something more deadly. this is a risk unknown for anything [maybe there will be a replacement for cancer or maybe not, we don't know]. but we all know that when we replace something, something else usually takes over that position.

in addition, since man have ate the fruit of knowledge, it is obvious that man should perform the operation as he is curious. to move forward we must venture into the unknown and make risks, if you don't then you stop.

 

That's true, take for example Leprosy, before this was the plague that ravaged humanity. When a cure was found, a new disease surfaced, Cancer. When man started researching a cure, AIDS surfaced.

 

Yet when leprosy and plague roamed the world, people did not become very old. Becoming 70+ was rare back then.

Still it makes you wonder what will happen if we run out of living space (i.e. too many people on this planet), but that's another debate.

 

These diseases don't just surface because a cure is found for others...
We've known about cancer since the Ancient Greeks....

AIDS has also always been there....just not in humans

 

just for the record, diseases will offen evolve faster then finding cure because single cell (including viruses) have the ability to duplicate and growth really really really fast, hance they will have alot of chance to mutate and evole to survive, so technically a cure might or might not lead to new diseases.

i doubt genetic engineering could cure cancer, it can might able to pervent cancer cell from developing, but since cancer is develop when cell duplicate improperly, new type of cancer might found they way to growth even we geneticly engineer a body with higher cancer resistance (making cancer cell harder to develop and growth), so the only true cure for cancer (IMO) is nano-tech which use nano-bot to detect and destroy cancer.

for those who have genetic superior human phobia, dont be scare, you are long death before human able to mass produce genetic superior human, and like loonylion said, genetic cant make up for skill.

and finally, screw religions who oppose stem cell research because people like you make medical advencement so slow, sure we destroy an embryo but it just an embryo, a group of rapidly developing cell. If you said its a consider as a living being, then next time when you are sick, dont go for a medical treament, because those treatment are killing the cells or viruses that cause you sick, in other word you are killing living being (group of cells or viruses) that have entered your body. If you are arguing about the value of life, then what make human life any more valuable then a b.coli bacteria?

 

I didn't mean that a new sickness arises from finding cures to old ones. What I meant was that as old problems are resolved, we discover new ones that may have existed before or not.

And to Calvin_0:

Yeah screw religion!!

If the Dark ages didn't occur, we might have been exploring space on Warp 9 by now, plus Nano tech medical robots could have been our vaccines by now!!

 

The entire medical field is only based on "delaying". Genetic engineering may be quite a powerful science, but it's not like one can cure "death".

 

you can't cure death because life is a timeline and as a timeline there is a begining and an end, just as a story there is a begining and an end. but you can slow the process of death by slowing the aging process.

btw, everytime i think of nano machines in our bodies to cure diseases and such the one thing that comes to mind is borgs from star trek. it's good because it will destroy all the problems of diseases and such as well as death but would you like to live as a machine like that?!--->this brings back to my point, there are choices that you make to get one thing but you get different results in the end [which may be good or bad].

the overpopulation crisis [where the earth is at it's max on holding people] would more then likely be solved when people are able to create nano machines that do what the borgs do as this would have the necessary technological advances where we would live like in the jetson's! ;D

 

Death is something we need to not fear. For we must all die, for living forever is a great burden. Life wouldn't have a meaning without knowing you will die. BTW I support stem cell research...the suffering of any major illness is too great...

 

Speaking of which. Why are most people afraid of death?

Heck I for one can't wait for it!!

Really, if you guys only knew the trials & tribulations I've been through, but I'm not saying I'm suicidal or something like that though, that phase of my life ended after my angst filled teenhood ended.
;D ;D ;D ;D ;D ;D ;D ;D

 

well maybe not anytime sooner in the future, but when human learn how to map and convert human brain into binary code, we may able to escape death by having our brain data downloded before we die, and uploaded it to a newly clone body but the technology need to perform that isnt avaliable for the next 50 years since we still dont fully understand how brain works >.<

 

I don't wanna sound like I'm mocking Calvin_0's last post but that kinda feels like the classic Transformers of the 80's episode "Autobot X" where Spike's Brain data was transferred to this Frankenstein-ish abomination his father Spark plug made because, Spike had to umdergo major surgery where if unsucessful atleast his mind will "live on" inside Autobot X. What happened then was Spike, upon waking up on his new body became so confused that he almost became a Decepticon & almost shot his dad.

 

How about the Ghost in a Shell principle? They use 'cyberbrains' (which are ofcourse hacked, but still).

 

Oh dear...

As an atheist who spent two years living in a village full of priests-in-training, I think I can safely say from experience
no amount of debating at all will ever resolves the "when is it human" question

 

when is it human: when it cannot be distinguished from a human.

 

"What is a man, nothing but a bag of mysteries" ---Dracula to Alucard: Symphony of the Night

I'm not sure if I quoted that correctly, correct me if I was wrong

Anyway, what makes up a human anyway??

Is it our physique?

Is it our brains??

Are we not basically all the same??

A wild random concoction of protiens, who just happens to "think" or Sentients of our time??

Damn, this thread's gotten all Philosophical
;D ;D ;D ;D ;D ;D

 

actually there is some movie or cartoon base on that thoery, RoboCop, Ghost in the Shell and The 6th day is just a few that came into my mind.

Edit: oh i just recall a game that touch this theory as well...its call Metal Gear Ac!d 2 =P