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Author Topic:   Can we accelerate evolution?
Dogmafood
Member (Idle past 349 days)
Posts: 1815
From: Ontario Canada
Joined: 08-04-2010


Message 1 of 77 (578071)
08-31-2010 5:11 PM


As we gain the ability to manipulate genes, will we be able to effectively hyper accelerate the evolutionary process? Are we becoming the stewards of our own genome? Are we up to it?

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Dogmafood
Member (Idle past 349 days)
Posts: 1815
From: Ontario Canada
Joined: 08-04-2010


Message 5 of 77 (578424)
09-01-2010 6:19 PM


So you guys are saying that you dont see the elimination of gene based diseases in the next couple of decades? You dont see stronger hearts or the staving off of dementia? You dont see the development of genetically modified humans who are more suited to space travel?
We are designing organisms at that point.
This is what I am talking about. As we identify the genetic markers for intelligence will we not be irresistibly compelled to utilize this knowledge? Naturally evolved humans are sure to become a relic of the past. It will take some time and will be limited by economics more than ability but the super humans are coming along with the super cows, pigs, sheep and soybeans.
Or are you saying that this is no longer evolution?
Edited by Dogmafood, : add final question

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Dogmafood
Member (Idle past 349 days)
Posts: 1815
From: Ontario Canada
Joined: 08-04-2010


Message 9 of 77 (578473)
09-01-2010 8:10 PM
Reply to: Message 7 by jar
09-01-2010 7:14 PM


I see that perhaps some folk might eliminate some genetic disorders, most likely before we really understand the consequences, resulting in even bigger problems.
No faith in our abilities? No faith in the method?

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Dogmafood
Member (Idle past 349 days)
Posts: 1815
From: Ontario Canada
Joined: 08-04-2010


Message 11 of 77 (578489)
09-01-2010 8:30 PM
Reply to: Message 8 by Omnivorous
09-01-2010 7:40 PM


Re: Richie sapiens
Again, I think we're a few generations from effective practical genome management, but I don't think the gene is going back in the bottle.
Haha. I dont think so either, nor should it. Generations is right. 5 generations is 100 yrs.
Perhaps being born with a superior mutant allele will be the new Powerball lottery.
The possibilities stretch as far as the imagination. But I take your point about it becoming an issue of wealth and I agree.
We've always lived with the rich getting richer--can we live with them getting better?
We are already there. I am sure that the Prime Minister enjoys better health care than I do. Even here in the Great White North! Better health care=better health=better.
Everybody mutates or nobody mutates.
I doubt it.

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Dogmafood
Member (Idle past 349 days)
Posts: 1815
From: Ontario Canada
Joined: 08-04-2010


Message 13 of 77 (578664)
09-02-2010 8:44 AM
Reply to: Message 12 by Omnivorous
09-02-2010 12:00 AM


Re: Richie sapiens
Wealth has long been a measure of fitness for survival. It is the result of applied knowledge. Intelligence and effort are rewarded, usually, with wealth.

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Dogmafood
Member (Idle past 349 days)
Posts: 1815
From: Ontario Canada
Joined: 08-04-2010


Message 29 of 77 (578797)
09-02-2010 4:26 PM
Reply to: Message 28 by nwr
09-02-2010 3:42 PM


That's the risk of following the intelligent design way of change. Nature's evolutionary way seems to be more robust.
I certainly agree with that but we also are products of nature and risk is inherent to life.
I think the technology will come way faster than we can handle it. This isnt unusual but genetic engineering seems to be on another level.
I see all kinds of pit falls but I also see it as inevitable. Can anyone disagree that we are well under way? Some rich dude is probably already growing himself a new heart somewhere inside somebody else's body.
This video describes children being born with the genes of one father and 2 mothers.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iLWm0kc4L98&feature=related

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Dogmafood
Member (Idle past 349 days)
Posts: 1815
From: Ontario Canada
Joined: 08-04-2010


Message 61 of 77 (615432)
05-12-2011 11:33 PM
Reply to: Message 56 by Alfred Maddenstein
05-12-2011 3:12 PM


That is a wrong question. The theory does not describe any directional process leading from point A to some definite point B.
I agree the theory does not describe a goal. It does describe a process and that process has left a trail. The many directions that the trail has taken can be seen ever more clearly. We are now at a point on the trail where we can begin to directly effect the trails direction. If we can design super brains for our children what will they, in turn, design? Is this not on the way to Nietzsche’s Overman?
The natural selection is not in any hurry in any direction whatsoever so cannot be possibly sped up.
You do not see any direction in the process that evolved a human out of a single cell? Again I am not saying that humans were a goal. They are a result, thus far, of the process. The fact that we are now becoming able to manipulate our genetic code is a result of the process. The fact that the process has resulted in an ability to consciously manipulate ‘itself’ seems to be a very definite point of acceleration. As well as the point where the direction begins to be predictable.

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Dogmafood
Member (Idle past 349 days)
Posts: 1815
From: Ontario Canada
Joined: 08-04-2010


Message 68 of 77 (615600)
05-14-2011 2:45 PM
Reply to: Message 64 by rueh
05-13-2011 3:22 PM


Are you not still in effect performing "selection" by determing which genes are manipulated though?
I would say that you are and I would ask; why is it considered artificial? At what point did the actions of man leave the natural realm? I would say that it is more than semantics.
When a lion kills a cheetah cub that is natural selection but when man kills all the malaria bearing mosquitos that is not?

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