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.
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:I got into an interesting debate with a woman today over children. She believes that if you don?t have a good gene code Parsons, Baldness, Bad skin, Ect. You should not have children because with the vanity of most third world countries it will do more harm to them in the long run. Using that fact people spend millions on Rogan or cosmetic surgery every year to try and feel better about them self. Then if you have a high chance to give them medical problems. You?re being selfish to have children who you can pass it down to. She truly believes that only those with a good Genetic makeup should be allowed to breed and if other want children they should be required to adopt from those who can have children. Plus this could also cut down on bad parent since you'd have to be screened to have children.
At first I thought little of it but as I?ve dwelled on it. Well I?m losing my hair at 26 and it does have an effect on me. It took me a long time to come to grips with it. Even now I hate thinking about it. It started me wondering can anyone think of a reason why people with bad gene should have children?
The forum ate the poll it seems.
I think I.Q. would be a good measure of intelligence. I don't see why super intelligent beings can't be tailors or plumbers like everyone else. And with the concentrated smartness we would have robot servants to do all those things.orangeban said:What is intelligence? How can you differentiate it from the kind of book-smarts acquired from school? What about people with different talents? If we focus on making a race of super-intelligent beings, who fixes the crappers, who is the tailor?Soods said:I agree completely with this.
(+50 renegade)
There's more than enough homo sapiens roaming this planet. The only problem is defining good genes. Appearance shouldn't have major influence on the decision, instead it should focus on genetical diseases and maximizing intelligence.
Our robot slaves of course.orangeban said:What is intelligence? How can you differentiate it from the kind of book-smarts acquired from school? What about people with different talents? If we focus on making a race of super-intelligent beings, who fixes the crappers, who is the tailor?Soods said:I agree completely with this.
(+50 renegade)
There's more than enough homo sapiens roaming this planet. The only problem is defining good genes. Appearance shouldn't have major influence on the decision, instead it should focus on genetical diseases and maximizing intelligence.
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:I think I.Q. would be a good measure of intelligence. I don't see why super intelligent beings can't be tailors or plumbers like everyone else. And with the concentrated smartness we would have robot servants to do all those things.orangeban said:What is intelligence? How can you differentiate it from the kind of book-smarts acquired from school? What about people with different talents? If we focus on making a race of super-intelligent beings, who fixes the crappers, who is the tailor?Soods said:I agree completely with this.
(+50 renegade)
There's more than enough homo sapiens roaming this planet. The only problem is defining good genes. Appearance shouldn't have major influence on the decision, instead it should focus on genetical diseases and maximizing intelligence.
All right, fair answer, though I'll point out that out of all the "intelligent" people I've met, not one demonstrates every single one of the abilities you mention.Navvan said:Our robot slaves of course.orangeban said:What is intelligence? How can you differentiate it from the kind of book-smarts acquired from school? What about people with different talents? If we focus on making a race of super-intelligent beings, who fixes the crappers, who is the tailor?Soods said:I agree completely with this.
(+50 renegade)
There's more than enough homo sapiens roaming this planet. The only problem is defining good genes. Appearance shouldn't have major influence on the decision, instead it should focus on genetical diseases and maximizing intelligence.
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.
basically this.Hagi said:You're forgetting a few things:
- Genes aren't just determined at conception, your body is able to dynamically switch genes on and off when certain conditions are met. Check up on epigenetics if you're interested.
- Everyone has some bad genes. With the amount of conditions you can have genetic predisposition to and that 95% of the world's population has some physical quality that isn't optimal and thus they could feel bad about it. You're basically wiping out humanity within a few generations.
- Most genes only give predispositions. They don't solely determine exactly how you'll look and feel 20 years down the line. There's many, many, many more factors. A much better, but equally unrealistic, solution would be outright banning alcohol and smoking. Those things cause more harm then your genes will ever do. Smoking gives you a much higher chance of getting cancer then any gene will ever do.
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:All right, fair answer, though I'll point out that out of all the "intelligent" people I've met, not one demonstrates every single one of the abilities you mention.Navvan said:Our robot slaves of course.orangeban said:What is intelligence? How can you differentiate it from the kind of book-smarts acquired from school? What about people with different talents? If we focus on making a race of super-intelligent beings, who fixes the crappers, who is the tailor?Soods said:I agree completely with this.
(+50 renegade)
There's more than enough homo sapiens roaming this planet. The only problem is defining good genes. Appearance shouldn't have major influence on the decision, instead it should focus on genetical diseases and maximizing intelligence.
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.
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: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:All right, fair answer, though I'll point out that out of all the "intelligent" people I've met, not one demonstrates every single one of the abilities you mention.Navvan said:Our robot slaves of course.orangeban said:What is intelligence? How can you differentiate it from the kind of book-smarts acquired from school? What about people with different talents? If we focus on making a race of super-intelligent beings, who fixes the crappers, who is the tailor?Soods said:I agree completely with this.
(+50 renegade)
There's more than enough homo sapiens roaming this planet. The only problem is defining good genes. Appearance shouldn't have major influence on the decision, instead it should focus on genetical diseases and maximizing intelligence.
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.
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:SNIP