In a perfect world yes but we don't live in a perfect world, and if we did we wouldn't need to do it.
Poll: Genes and children Or why some should not have kids
- Thread starter IceStar100
- Start date
This is called Eugenics. It has been deemed unethical by the majority of people as the determination of "good" and "bad" genes are entirely arbitrary except for ones that actually cause impairment or death of an individual. Selecting what genes your child receives is a much better form of Eugenics even if it is only in the very early stages of practicality. This is because it does not hamper individual freedom like a government breeding program would.IceStar100 said:
Also genes are a bit more complicated than what your friend thinks. Sure there are genes that guarantee some attributes but many genes are involved in complex traits. These are traits (like baldness) that can't be ascribed entirely to any one gene, but are a combination of many genes and the environment to trigger an event. This means that two parents who individually do not exhibit the trait can have a child who does. I rarely say something is impossible, but I would like to see someone find someone (let alone two someones of the opposite sex) who had 0 "bad genes". Good luck.
Physical defects are far to petty to implement Eugenics on as improving them at this point doesn't really help our species. Intelligence would be much more beneficial for our species but what causes intelligence isn't really known. And instead of implementing a eugenics program we would likely be able to get better results from a better education system and better parenting.
Also the idea to do it simply for cosmetic attributes (beauty/baldness/ect) is to be quite frank the stupidest thing I've heard this week. Those things aren't objective, aren't entirely genetic, and have more to do with an individuals own mental state than any objectivity. Add in the fact that many individuals have objectively positive attributes (strength, speed, better bone density, intelligence, resistance to cancer, and so forth) but do not have your positive arbitrary cosmetic attributes and you have a big old pile of stupid.
Long story short: Your friend hasn't thought this through, and suffers from a severe case of vanity. Everyone has "bad genes" and cosmetic genes are entirely arbitrary. Some people think bald is sexy, and some people don't give a rats ass if a face is perfectly symmetrical or if your breasts are the perfect size. In fact selecting for these attributes will reduce variety in our species which not only makes it more boring, but also puts us at risk if we also accidentally select for or against genes that have actual positive or negative benifical effects.
And if it turns out that a unfashionable gene that has been bred out of the genome was essential to the survival of the species for reasons currently unforeseen? Fashion doesn't mean a thing when you're dead - unless your that bothered with leaving a good looking corpse.
The concept of what is "bad genes' is purely subjective.
Let the genome be filtered by environmental factors and peoples interests, not fashion trends instigated by rich folk whom control the media.
The concept of what is "bad genes' is purely subjective.
Let the genome be filtered by environmental factors and peoples interests, not fashion trends instigated by rich folk whom control the media.
No.
As many people said, we'd have to define "good" and "bad" genes. And even if we do, there's no way of knowing which ones the child will get. Technically, me and my brother should have gotten brown eyes because brown (from my mom) is a dominant gene over green (from my dad). Surprise, surprise, I got green and my brother god blue (from my dad's dad (!)). So, even if you try as hard as you can, you will never know what will your child get. Of course, if you have a hereditary disease, you know that there is a big chance of giving it to your child. That depends on the person; some people wouldn't care if their children also have it, some would. Do as you wish.
And about cosmetic reasons? Who determines what is handsome and what is ugly? Two thousand years ago our ideal of beauty would be considered horrible. And there are millions of people in the world who believe someone is handsome and you think they're ugly as hell. And there is no way of knowing how the child will turn out to look, no matter how handsome the parents are (or what traits they'll have; case in point, eye colour in my family. Both me and my brother should have ended being dark haired and brown eyed, but we didn't).
Anyway, requiring people to not have children because someone tells them they're "ugly" is just plain ridiculous. But sure, if you consider yourself ugly and don't want ugly children, do whatever you want. Forcing it on others would be... well, fascist, and bad in the long term. Humanity needs diversity and diversity is what we get when we don't regulate breeding according to someone's personal opinions.
As many people said, we'd have to define "good" and "bad" genes. And even if we do, there's no way of knowing which ones the child will get. Technically, me and my brother should have gotten brown eyes because brown (from my mom) is a dominant gene over green (from my dad). Surprise, surprise, I got green and my brother god blue (from my dad's dad (!)). So, even if you try as hard as you can, you will never know what will your child get. Of course, if you have a hereditary disease, you know that there is a big chance of giving it to your child. That depends on the person; some people wouldn't care if their children also have it, some would. Do as you wish.
And about cosmetic reasons? Who determines what is handsome and what is ugly? Two thousand years ago our ideal of beauty would be considered horrible. And there are millions of people in the world who believe someone is handsome and you think they're ugly as hell. And there is no way of knowing how the child will turn out to look, no matter how handsome the parents are (or what traits they'll have; case in point, eye colour in my family. Both me and my brother should have ended being dark haired and brown eyed, but we didn't).
Anyway, requiring people to not have children because someone tells them they're "ugly" is just plain ridiculous. But sure, if you consider yourself ugly and don't want ugly children, do whatever you want. Forcing it on others would be... well, fascist, and bad in the long term. Humanity needs diversity and diversity is what we get when we don't regulate breeding according to someone's personal opinions.
Our robot slaves of course.orangeban said:
As for what is intelligence: A very general mental capability that, among other things, involves the ability to reason, plan, solve problems, think abstractly, comprehend complex ideas, learn quickly and learn from experience. It is not merely book learning, a narrow academic skill, or test-taking smarts. Rather, it reflects a broader and deeper capability for comprehending our surroundings?"catching on," "making sense" of things, or "figuring out" what to do.
All of those things are testable. Also simply selecting for intelligence does not mean there won't be a bell curve, and that the bottom end of the bell curve would be doing the less "intelligence based" jobs. Assuming we have not yet invented the robot slave. Note: I'm not saying that intelligence eugenics is a good idea, its not, but I thought I would answer your questions.
I.Q. is a crock of crap, because it doesn't measure a lot of things. Someone could have an incredible I.Q. but have the worst goddam eye-hand coordination in the world.Soods said:
And that still links to my point about plumbers and stuff. In the book The Wind Singer, a persons place in society is determined by how well they score in an I.Q. esque test. But at the end
the people who get crappy test results, instead of doing the test, write about what they do actually know (baking, painting, paving-slab designging, ect.) because society doesn't just need people with high I.Q.s, it needs people of all kinds.
basically this.Hagi said:
the most athletic person i have ever met in my life looks like fucking napoleon dynamite, and he looks nothing like his parents.
i have a few friends where the parents were extremely fat and had asthma problems, while the child ended up strong and can run like a horse, should they have not had kids?
OP, tell that fool that vain people should not be allowed to reproduce. 
Now, seriously - people likely to pass their children severely crippling conditions (see "Lorenzo's Oil") should refrain from reproducing. Other than that, no.
Now, seriously - people likely to pass their children severely crippling conditions (see "Lorenzo's Oil") should refrain from reproducing. Other than that, no.
I agree fully with this. We should make it illegal for those who have bad genes to reproduce. You know what? That's not enough. We should sterilize everyone who either got a bad phenotype or are carriers of bad genes. Wait, we're not doing this right. We should collect them in areas across the world where there's only them and guards. Let's call these areas concentration camps since it means we've got a high concentration of bad genes. Oh, what we really should do is instead of sterilize them at these camps just kill them all.
For the record I am being sarcastic.
We can't decide to route genes out for several reasons. Many of the mutant alleles are recessive, which means they wont be expressed in the offspring unless both parents are carriers. Mutant alleles might be in both parents and create a kid who has the disease or the negative character in question. Thus 2 healthy parents create one sick child, this can not be determined before the child is born. 2 sick parents can get one healthy child (like in the case of dwarfism where there's 33% chance the kid will be normal).
A healthy mother who carries the gene for baldness or colour blindness will have 50% chance of getting a bald or colour blind son (given she gets a son).
There are also cases where negative characters can also be positive. Sickle cell anemia will cause the red blood cells to get a sickle shape rather than being round blobs. If I had that it would mean I wouldn't be able to get enough oxygen throughout my body. If an African child was born with this it would mean he would have improved resistance against the parasite that causes malaria.
Right now those who have Downs syndrome aren't allowed to reproduce. Men will never be sterile, women will be advised to use birth control since they're usually not fit to be parents. However they are allowed after passing a test that proves them able to take care of a kid from what I know.
The catholic church in cooperation with a genetic institute in Greece tried to advice couples who had the disease thalassemia against having kids, but this was never forced upon one. Also this is a quite serious disease compared to something merely aesthetic such as baldness.
Those are my major reasons which boils down to the following.
No, no-one should be refused to have kids.
Reason: you can't predict phenotype based on phenotype, nor predict a person's genotype before he reproduces.
Also, sorry for the long post. I am a biologist and I have strong beliefs in freedom to choose.
For the record I am being sarcastic.
We can't decide to route genes out for several reasons. Many of the mutant alleles are recessive, which means they wont be expressed in the offspring unless both parents are carriers. Mutant alleles might be in both parents and create a kid who has the disease or the negative character in question. Thus 2 healthy parents create one sick child, this can not be determined before the child is born. 2 sick parents can get one healthy child (like in the case of dwarfism where there's 33% chance the kid will be normal).
A healthy mother who carries the gene for baldness or colour blindness will have 50% chance of getting a bald or colour blind son (given she gets a son).
There are also cases where negative characters can also be positive. Sickle cell anemia will cause the red blood cells to get a sickle shape rather than being round blobs. If I had that it would mean I wouldn't be able to get enough oxygen throughout my body. If an African child was born with this it would mean he would have improved resistance against the parasite that causes malaria.
Right now those who have Downs syndrome aren't allowed to reproduce. Men will never be sterile, women will be advised to use birth control since they're usually not fit to be parents. However they are allowed after passing a test that proves them able to take care of a kid from what I know.
The catholic church in cooperation with a genetic institute in Greece tried to advice couples who had the disease thalassemia against having kids, but this was never forced upon one. Also this is a quite serious disease compared to something merely aesthetic such as baldness.
Those are my major reasons which boils down to the following.
No, no-one should be refused to have kids.
Reason: you can't predict phenotype based on phenotype, nor predict a person's genotype before he reproduces.
Also, sorry for the long post. I am a biologist and I have strong beliefs in freedom to choose.
It is true that the number of people who would score high across the board would be few if any. However people will score differently than others creating a distribution curve which is all that is needed to implement artificial selection (Eugenics). This is done by simply taking the top X% and having them breed and repeating for all future generations. Perfect scores aren't required.orangeban said:
There's no way I can respond seriously to this so instead here's one I made earlier.
***** is crazy.
Anyway, I like how baldness is up there with disabilities. My boyfriend started the "thinning" process a year ago, I'm going to go make fun of him now.
***** is crazy.
Anyway, I like how baldness is up there with disabilities. My boyfriend started the "thinning" process a year ago, I'm going to go make fun of him now.
Right, then, if you keep taking the top percent, then what you do is reduce the bell curve. People become more and more alike (let us presume that you can only be *so* smart, and this process of selection is closing in on that point) until you basically have no bell curve. Then one child is born that has a super-human intelligence (raising the point that everyone else was homing in on) and the process starts again. But it still won't be that dramatic of a bell curve after this point, because the majority of humanity will still be incredibly similar, and therefore their children will also be similar, with the very few children of the super smart breeding more and more until there are enough to carry on existence on their own, and the rest are sterilised. But no bell curve, no plumbers.Navvan said:
I'd say YES, at least until you realize that "bad genes" are mostly based off assumptions of what make up good genes. Change is required for evolution, if we never change we'll die so nature experiments with random mutations (fun stuff). Theoretically you could breed the populace to be smarter, stronger, or faster (they did that to the slaves for over 200 years and we got a lot of strong black people as a result). Ethics aside breeding for specific traits usually leads to rampant stagnation, any rancher should be able to tell you that this is becoming a problem (not that science isn't quick to side step it in favor of cloning).
Where was I?.. oh ya,. how about, bad parents should be neutered to keep them from having MORE children.
Where was I?.. oh ya,. how about, bad parents should be neutered to keep them from having MORE children.
Baldness and such are not bad genes; stupid is bad genes and that is what should be selectively bred out of our species.
next time you see her (if you do) go sieg heil she is an idiot if she believes baldness and bad skin are inferior genetic defectsGeneric Gamer said: