Slashdot Mirror
Scientists Attempting to Create Simple Life Form
derubergeek writes "The Washington Post is reporting on an apparently credible project to create a simple life form in a petri dish. The goal is two-fold: 1) to actually create a unique life form essentially from scratch and (more importantly) 2) to extensively analyze and model the entire biology of this critter. Exciting and scary at the same time. From the article, it sounds as if they are quite wary of their project and fascinated at the same time. I usually refer to that sensation as 'That little voice that I should have listened to...'" There's also a NY Times article.
This has already been done.
To ensure safety, Smith and Venter said the cell will be deliberately hobbled to render it incapable of infecting people; it also will be strictly confined, and designed to die if it does manage to escape into the environment.
hmmm...where have I heard this before? Something to do with female dinosaurs and frog DNA.
As they say that they're going to do it in a "petri dish" I assume that we will not see Frankenstein, but rather Flubber.
I though that this has been done part-way in simulations of earths early atmosphere using electic discharges. At least they made aminoacids that way (I think they did that).
But the non-infectous-to-humans single cell organism may escape it's environment, and then immediatly die!!!!!!
Programming is simply the application of logic to creativity
They are gonna create a Slashdot Moderator From Scratch.
They are called Sea Monkeys!
...of a 'simple lifeform'. It lives in the white house...
Honey, I shrunk the Cygwin
When attempts to create life in a petridish are successful, scientists might actually try to create life in a woman.
Be wary of any facts that confirm your opinion.
The project will begin with M. genitalium, a minuscule organism that lives in the genital tracts of people and may cause or contribute to some cases of urethritis, an inflammation of the urethra. The scientists will remove all genetic material from the organism, then synthesize an artificial string of genetic material, resembling a naturally occurring chromosome, that they hope will contain the minimum number of M. genitalium genes needed to sustain life. The artificial chromosome will be inserted into the hollowed-out cell, which will then be tested for its ability to survive and reproduce.
They're taking an already extant organism, "hollowing it out" as it were, and seeing if it can live and reproduce normally with a series of increasingly customized (and minimal) genetic material. Not creating something from nothing.
If they had to choose a bacteria to do unpredictable and possible dangerous experimentation with, why did they choose one that is known to cause crotch-burn in humans?!
When I read the headline this morning I thought it was going to be entirely from scratch, but the article says that they're "just" (like it's not still amazing we can do this) going to take an existing organism, and strip it of most of its DNA until they get down to the bare minimum required to sustain life. So I don't know if I'd necessarily call it "creating" life, because it seems to be more of the same modifying existing life people have been doing for a while now.
If it/he/she survives, they should give it/him/her a name.
I vote for the name "spam"
When will I end this grieving ? When will my future begin ?
Can you get bolts small enough to go through the neck of a blob in a petri dish? Phil, just me
"Cattle Prods solve most of life's little problems."
What will "Hello World" in DNA look like?
God has the patent!
will it now mean "life from scratch".
If it's female, sounds like the best chance many slashdotters have of getting laid.
Read reviews of shopping cart software
Frankenstein was a story. It was fiction. And so was Jurassic Park, and so was Gattaca. I won't comment on the Bible here, although my view of that book is probably pretty clear from the context
The correlation between ignorance of statistics and using "correlation is not causation" as an argument is close to 1.
No they haven't! Miller and Urey made amino acids. That's a very long way from creating even the simplest entity anyone would consider alive.
"E pur si muove!" - attributed to Galileo Galilei, 1564-1642
Considering that they're using some bacteria that causes burning/itching in the crotch, I suppose that creating this new life from 'scratch' was more of a play on words?
:)
Who knew they had advanced so far in subtle humor?
No, you're the only one to whom it seems incredibly foolish. Well, okay, you and a bunch of other fools.
As I said in another post, no one raises these objections with physics, or chemistry, or math, despite things like, oh, say, the atomic bomb. All scientific research is potentially dangerous. But stopping research because of some vague fear, or some pseudo-philosophical-religious claptrap like "some things are better off left alone" (what things exactly? Be specific) would leave us in the Dark Ages.
Jellyfish don't do scientific research. No jellyfish has ever built an atomic bomb, or engineered a dangerous virus, true. But would you rather be a jellyfish, or a human being?
The correlation between ignorance of statistics and using "correlation is not causation" as an argument is close to 1.
The New England Journal of Evil
And if the scientists in question are not interested in those areas? What do you suggest - making it illegal to fund "non-important" science? Who would have the say on what is important? And how exactly do you then stop those affected scientists from continuing their work at a university in another country, rather than toeing to the line and doing 'important' stuff? The science community is by it's nature a pretty mobile bunch of people; it's built into the system that spending time at other universities and other countries is seen as a good thing and a boon to one's career.
This is a parallel to those advocating the joining of competing open-source projects. It won't work to mandate what people work with there, and it won't work here. In both cases, people are working on what they do (or financing the work) because they find it fascinating and important, and no matter what others say they should be doing they will continue doing what they do.
Trust the Computer. The Computer is your friend.
Duh. Of course the Easter Bunny has hairy palms. He's a friggin' RABBIT!
Call me crazy, but I see a parallel here with this. - Taking an existing, known format and minimising it as far as possible. Heck - even the number returned by the code is relevant.
Insert witty sig about inserting witty sig here, here.
The Washington Post is reporting on an apparently credible project to create a simple life form in a petri dish.
They should try a fridge instead. Last week i looked in there and i swear something jumped at me!
Star Thistle is commonly found in California fields only it's not native and it wasn't put there on purpose. It has displaced the local grasses almost completely in some areas. This is only one of thousands of examples of non-native species that have infested new (to them) environments.
All environments will be new to this critter. That makes the "scary" part, to me anyway, the fact that if this were to escape and survive it would displace something else with absolutely unknown consequences. We are completely dependant on our environment's biology for breathable air and edible food so it's pretty damn important that we don't accidentally (no one would even _consider_ doing it purposely, would they?) introduce some species that will screw it up.
I'm not saying we shouldn't experiment. I'm just saying that everyone should have a healthy dose of fear over this particular kind of experiment.
TW
I've had asked this question before but never received a good answer.
If man creates a new life form by definition man is the "Creator" of that life form. If somehow in a distance future man builds on this knowledge and creates an intelligent life form, from scratch, would man be it's "Creator"? If so, could one say that man is it's God?
This was touched upon in the Deep Space 9 trek series. The Dominan (sp?) created two life forms and the life forms acknowledged their "Creators" as their God.
Who knows?
Nick Powers
Encryption: I may not agree with what you say, but I will defend your right to encrypt it...
The minimum number of genes required for an organism to survive has been a topic of interest for several years. An excellent semi-technical overview of this effort was produced by The National Academy of Sciences...
There are two basic approaches to medical research. The first is the "shotgun" approach -- throw a bunch of chemicals at a disease and find one that stops the disease process without killing the patient. This approach has led to some great successes over the last century or so, but the problem is, as far as we can tell, we've just about discovered everything we're going to discover by this method. The easy stuff has been done.
The other approach, the molecular approach, is to figure out how life works -- and, of great interest from the medical applications point of view, how it goes wrong -- from the ground up, and try to use that knowledge to build new treatments. That's what these guys are doing. I can almost guarantee you that when a cure for cancer or AIDS is found, it will come from this approach.
The correlation between ignorance of statistics and using "correlation is not causation" as an argument is close to 1.
Life will find a way.
---
When you come to a fork in the road, take it! --Yogi Berra--
Start from the real beginning and try to create the basic building blocks with silicon instead of carbon. That would be a real accomplishment. (No, not silicone. Those life forms are already all over Hollywood.)
This experiment is very exciting for many reasons, but the modeling aspects alone make it worth while. Just following the up and down regulation of thousands of genes is an overwhelming burden. Modeling/visualizing the entire cell network with the normal complement of entities would be fantastically difficult. Simplification through gene reduction is a fundamentally important first step.
Hmmm... a lot of trees will die if Boehringer Mannheim tries to print this one out (a la biochemical pathways).
First entomology, then virology, and finally bioinformatics systems. Bugs follow me wherever I go.
But would you rather be a jellyfish, or a human being?
Human. Those poisonous sea anemones are a bitch. And rocks suck as pillows.
One day a group of scientists got together and decided that man had come a long way and no longer needed God. So they picked one scientist to go and tell Him that they were done with Him.
The scientist walked up to God and said, "God, we've decided that we no longer need you. We're to the point that we can clone people and do many miraculous things, so why don't you just go on and get lost."
God listened very patiently and kindly to the man and after the scientist was done talking, God said, "Very well, how about this, let's say we have a man making contest." To which the scientist replied, "OK, great!"
But God added, "Now, we're going to do this just like I did back in the old days with Adam."
The scientist said, "Sure, no problem" and bent down and grabbed himself a handful of dirt.
God just looked at him and said, "No, no, no. You go get your own dirt!"
The REAL jabber has the user id: 13196
What you do today will cost you a day of your life
Back in the '70s, GM stripped the engine from and Oldsmobile so that they were left with an empty engine compartment. Then, in that same lab that resembled nothing like a petri dish, they inserted a Chevy engine. POOF! They had just created a new car from scratch!
"How do you expect me to see the forest with all these damn trees in the way?!"
If you want to make a car you need to define "what is a car", so far so good ... If you want to make "life" they will first need to define what exactly the criteria are before we can call one of their siblings "life".
Is it life because it moves,breathes, contains other cells, eats, sleeps, breeds, farths, burps ??
At which point exactly do we call an life ?
Their technique is equivalent of what many programmers do with someone's code when they want to see if it could be used for their own purpose. They will try removing code from the source of the program function by function and see if it still compiles and runs and what kinds of exceptions they get. So these guys are l33t h4x0r5!
You can't handle the truth.
With all we now understand about biology, and with the incredible advances working with "stuff" on the molecular scale, how long until we are really building single-celled organisms from scratch?
What they are doing here looks like its not totally from scratch. They are taking an already existing shell and then putting some other stuff in there and seeing if it comes to life.
This is very cool, but really a stepping stone to "life from scratch". How long? 5 years, 10?
obviously no deficiencies vs. no obvious deficiencies
This is the same as the premise of the science fiction book by Greg Bear Blood Music .
In which a researcher inadvertently creates sentient cells. But more importantly, the book describes a near future in which biological research outpaces computer research and that it spawns an entire "Gene Valley" type area as opposed to a "Silicon Valley". With organisms being manufactured to do just what the article describes -- Create hydrogen, purify air etc. Except the researcher decides to inject himself with his cells to "save them" and standard Sci-Fi goodness ensues.
The hypothesis that "chemistry explains all of life" is nearly universal in science, yet is not fully proven yet (though I believe it). The ultimate test of the chemistry hypothesis is be to construct life from inert chemicals off the shelf. The closest one got was the constuction of a polio virus from regeants earlier this year. The virus appeared viable, but was about a thousand times less potent than its natural version. The simplest life form, as described in this article, is about 20-50 times more complicated than a virus in terms of genes and chemicals (proteins, sugars, others).
The alternative hypothesis is "neo-vitalism" or that is some mysterious substance or force outside of pure chemistry. This was the prevailing hypothesis until well into the 19th century. But it keeps on reappearing in more "scientific" forms today. One statement is the "only living material can produce living matter", even though you can fully explain all the chemistry, physics, and genetics. Another version callled "morphogensis" is that there are "patterns" in lving matter that are transmitted from ancestor to descendent. Yet another version, championed by physicist Roger Penrose is that there is secret unknown physics involved (clarification: he specificiation is attributing human consciousness to a new form of quantum interaction). Still another variation is "holism" or "emergism" which states the totally is greater than the sum of the parts, i.e. a reductionistic explanation is necessarily incomplete.
Note the relation of life to matter is a very old philosophical problem. The ancient Greek story of Pygmalian, the medival Golem, and the 186 year old Frankenstein novel all addressed this issue.
An auxilary problem is artificial intelligence. Its seem obvious that this can be done by us computer geeks. But 55 years of effort have had disappointing results. Some people use similar arguments against artificial life against artificial intelligence.
At some point we should be able to use XML to describe properties of an organism we want to create. The XML will be validated so that our organism will be correct to some minimal set of parameters. Later we will be able to print our new organism with some sort of an organic cell printer. A machine that will print organisms ala Fifth Element, only our machines will be smaller and will only print simple cells in the beginning. The Fifth Element's printer will be used by big corporations to create PHBs and BAs in the beginning but may be powerfull enough with time to actually print slave programmers, administrators and good quality assurance people.
That's what is really behind this project, not some waste management as they want you to believe.
You can't handle the truth.
One thing that small organisms do very well is to swap genes. So what if it escapes, borrows some missing/interesting genes from a passing E. Coli ?
GM crops have been found to swap genes with plants that they weren't supposed to.
From the article:
...every any project latching itself unto this Third Reich wünderclone speedboat and heelhauling itself into existence and the public faith.
"More worrisome than the risk of escape, they acknowledged, is that the project could lay the scientific groundwork for a new generation of biological weapons, a risk that may force them to be selective about publishing technical details. But they said the project could also help advance the nation's ability to detect and counter existing biological weapons."
It used to be that you'd have to have a clear goal and some ethics to get funding and public good will. I guess all you need these days is to mention that it'll help protect the motherla, er, I mean assist Homeland Security.
Maybe I can get a grant to play America's Army: Operations.
Don't get me wrong, I'm not at all sqeamish about this project, I think it's great. I'm just wary of every science project
My
Limekiller
No need, I've found one sitting at the dest opposite me. .... oh it's a mirror.
thank God the internet isn't a human right.
Finally, geeks are able to stay in their labs and get a life - at the same time!
(Sorry, the other jokes I could think of were 'can you build a Beowulf cluster of these' and 'does it run Linux?')
Trollem mirabilem hanc subnotationis exigiutas non caperet
I don't think there are "some things better off left alone." I do think I have provided an example of a scientific experiment with a valid ethical question. I also think we should have some idea of the ramifications of our actions before we proceed on any endeavor, and I think it's reasonable to ask that these scientists think long and hard before moving forward. Not because we as humans don't have a right to do such a thing, but because they are dealing with complex systems, and their safeguards may fail in unexpected ways. While I would never say, "We don't have the right to know this," it may be prudent to say, "We're not ready to do this yet."
Brevity is the soul of wit
-- Polonius
Respect for something that is decidedly dangerous because of clear evidence is healthy. Fear is not.
Get your own space, your own moonlight, your own particle-wave guides...
If nothing else, God is our bootloader.
But would you rather be a jellyfish, or a human being?
Or would you like to swing on a star?
"Information wants to be paid"
Fiddling around with the genes of extent organisms; and
Using extent organisms for our own purposes, especially when it destabilizes an ecology; and
About a bazillion other things that we humans do on a daily basis. People's fearful reactions to anything involving genetic engineering or anything that violates the supposed sanctity on the creation of life (which is as common as dirt, literally) is mostly an irrational reaction based upon an inappropriate generalization. These sorts of things are no more inherently, and thus implicitly, ethically dubious or dangerous than is technology in general. Some activities are ethically dubious and dangerous; and people that are honestly concerned about these issues should understand that a net that is vastly oversized is useless because it catches too much. Focus on what is clearly dangerous and ethically dubious and scrutinize, regulate, or prevent those particular things.
In this case, trying to build an organism from what is relatively first principals will be the first step in beginning to really understand life; and, more to the point, will probably enable an increase in our comprehension of what truly is and isn't dangerous by increasing our fundamental understanding.
Your comment is a particularly stupid one that not only shows a lack of knowledge on the field of science, but of the personalities of human beings. There is no overlord scientific authority that directs what each and every scientist in the world should be working on. Science is very much an individual pursuit. You learn about what you are interested in or what you accidentally discover. A good scientist is a highly motivated scientist, not one forced to work on a project he/she has very little interest in.
We have plenty of scientists working on both AIDS and Cancer. If we were to stop all other pursuits until all disease were eradicated our overall standard of living would be much lower due to a lack of innovation in every other field. I suppose just because there's still rabies in the world you think that no scientist should be working on fuel cells, or just because a cure for lupus has been found no one should care a rats ass about developing more efficent supply chain methods...etc.
Mac OS X and Windows XP working side by side to fight back the night.
I don't mean to be a conspiracy theorist... but we have a situation where a well-known scientist is going to take a common organism and complete research that he already started a while back.
Ummm... are you telling me that *nobody* in the military -- this country or some other -- has thought of this before?
I'd guess that there's a report on modified Mycoplasma genitalium somewhere in the bowels (bad pun) of some defense department vault.
So, which conspiracy theory is it?
* No conspiracy, he just happened to get $3 million from the government on good looks and charm.
* The military couldn't manage to do it, so there's no harm in letting this guy fail as well.
* The military couldn't manage to do it, so they're going to "open source" the development of artificially created organisms.
* The military *did* manage to do it, so they need this guy to recreate the results so they can blame him when the New Plague appears in the wild.
Excuse me, there's someone knocking on the door... wow, nice suit. Uh oh.
Stressed? Me? Of course not. Stress is what a rubber band feels before it breaks, silly.
From what I have read so far (caveat: none of what I have read has yet been in the scientific literature) what they are doing is taking a whole cell that already exists, removing the native DNA, and replacing it with synthetic DNA to see if they can control the cellular processes with their inserted DNA instructions. This is equivalent to taking a PC and wiping the hard disk of Windows, replacing it with Linux, and seeing how the Linux programs drive the video, memory, speakers, etc. They are not building a PC from scratch.
Replacing the DNA is the easy part. The hard part or creating "life" will be building a cell wall and getting all the receptors and ion channels and all the other embedded transmembrane proteins to work, making sure that the translational mechanisms are there to make proteins from the DNA, etc. The cell is a complex factory.
Probably what will really - to me - qualify as made life will come from using what is known about constructing small vesicles from phospholipids or perhaps synthetic equivalents. A small sphere of a lipid bilayer with one embedded synthetic protein, a short hunk of DNA that codes for that protein, and appropriate RNA to translate the instructions is the minimum requirement. But even then you have to worry about: getting the amino acids through the cell membrane, sequestering them at the assembly area, getting energy to drive the process into the vesicle, and on and on. The simplest cell imaginable is still going to be a huge project - manyfold times more complex than this experiment.
If Slashdot were chemistry it would look like this:Cadaverine
Did anyone else catch this obvious question? Do scientists have the right create life? Well, can they have childern without people fretting over some frankenstien killer virus child springing fully evil out of their groins? I don't believe anyone is challenging their ability to procreate, which by definition is creating life, so I don't see why are we asking these kind of idiodic questions. We should be far more concerned with why we let non-scientists procreate! Creating a rogue human is far more dangerous than creating a rogue crotch burning bacteria.
The next remark is false. The previous remark is true.
I'd feel better about this experiment if their starting point weren't a pathogen, especially one that causes urinary tract infections.
We'll know something went terribly wrong if the authors can't present their paper because they keep having to excuse themselves to go to the restroom.
The Washington Post is reporting on an apparently credible project to create a simple life form in a petri dish. The goal is two-fold: 1) to actually create a unique life form essentially from scratch and (more importantly) 2) to extensively analyze and model the entire biology of this critter.
Just great - I wonder how long it will be before this:
3) Patent the life form
If corporations can apply for and get patents on human genes (in stark denial of a few million years worth of prior art), why wouldn't the patent office grant this one. Harvard has already got a patent on a mouse after all...
Oops! I almost forgot the obligatory reference:
4) ???
5) Profit
*** Where are we going? And what's with this handbasket?
Josh Woodward
Let us not forget to consider that this process also likely spawn a few nasty mutations, that may have otherwise been easier to kill. There are actually a few mutations of AIDS (or maybe it's HIV) out there.
So yeah, despite the pessimists this might not be such a bad way to go about things.
We are meddling with forces we do not comprehend,
Yes. The technical name for such meddling is "science".
I feel safe now. I hope they'll put up a Created Life Park, where people can sit in an automated tour cart and see different evolved artificial creatures. With modern techonology it will be totally safe.
This is a regular straw man attack. The original, informative post didn't claim viruses were living organisms (in fact, it specifically said that viruses were 20-50x less complex than the simplest forms of life), and it called Penrose a physicist. So how is this response relevant in any way?
Savant
I think they constructed a working Polio virus. They didn't design the thing - if they did, they would be mass killers and way ahead of their time.
The scientists in the article are trying to design and construct a new organism, if I understand correctly.
Stop the brainwash
A "scientist" considers *any* hypothesis, and then ranks them according to the facts, the repeatable experimental observations, the simplicity of explanation, etc.
A "dogmatist" has a conclusion in mind and forces all observations to fit that conclusion, even when that conclusion becomes so contorted to lose belief.
As a "scientist" some variations of the creation hypotheis are in my [ large ] inventory of hypotheses, but ranks low in likelihood.
A religious creationist has only one immutable conclusion in mind. And I've met scientists who are dogmatic about their pet theories and dont consider any other.
"One statement is the "only living material can produce living matter"
Biologists say crap like that. It makes life simple. You know the old joke about the alien biologist and the alien engineer? The alien biologist sees a TV for the first time, and promptly goes about dissecting it, drawing and photographing every diode, transistor and capacitor in excruciating detail. Doesn't really explain much about how the system works though.
What does the engineer do?
The engineer presses the power button.
Until recently - VERY LITTLE work has been done on how you would go about creating life from bare chemicals in any kind of serious sense, because until recently, the tools just weren't there. Now the tools are there, and people who think about problems like engineers are getting at those tools. I have no doubt we'll be able to create organisms from scratch, something I think is much more near-term than assembler-based nanotech - in a way, it is nanotech, though.
Artificial intelligence is a much more complicated problem. For example, dispite overwhelming evidence, mention a psi effect in mainstream journals - or even slashdot - and you get mocked. Obviously, there are things going on in our brains we're not aware of, but as one famous hypothesis you mentioned indicates, that just might be quantum nonlocal effects - something that we can engineer.
The arguement that humans have 100-1000+ billion neurons is only part of the problem (although a large one). Simpler creatures exhibit obvious concious reasoning dispite having far fewer neurons. That doesn't mean there's inexplicable magic going on. It just means -we don't know-. So we go about finding out. That's why life is interesting, ya know?
ObShotAtCreationists: 55 years isn't bad compared to how long it took evolution, by all measures, several hundred thousand if not millions and millions of years.
..don't panic
It depends how you define God. The Christian God is usually described as all-knowing, all-powerful, and all-good. Humans certainly don't come close in those departments. (Although many aetheists would argue that a god as described above couldn't possibly exist in a world where so many bad things happen seemingly at random.)
Indeed, a far more likely scenario would be that the created lifeform would be more powerful than Man, and thus it would become our God. (At least until an interfering starship captain came by and talked it into self-destructing.)
As copyright owner of this comment, I authorize everyone to defeat any technological measure which limits access to it.
The paper you talk about (Cello, Paul and Wimmer, Science 297: 1016-1018) describes the de novo synthesis of Poliovirus. The authors used polymerases in a cell-free system to translate synthetic cDNA derived from the entire polio genome. The synthetic virus did not differ significantly from the wild-type phenotype (i.e., it was not a "1000 times less potent"). Admittedly, the polymerases used were ultimately of biological origin; however there was no force vital that hindered the synthetic poliovirus. Article specifically states that vitalism was shattered, and that poliovirus is "a chemical with a life cycle". Quo vadis, neovitalism?
And the rest of your troll goes downhill from there. "Life begets life" dates back to the mid-19th century, and is an empirical observation that countered hypotheses like maggots spontaneously arising from rotting meat.
Morphogenesis is a genuine scientific concept, but there is nothing mysterious about it. These "patterns" you speak of, they sound strangely like "genes", don't they? Hmm.
I could find no reference to Penrose and a quantum description of human consciousness. This sounds bogus to me, but even if he did seriously make that claim, human consciousness is in no way a prerequisite for life. A bacterium or an earthworm has no human consciousness.
And finally emergism. Certainly, in living organisms, the whole is greater than the sum of the parts. The whole can replicate, while the parts cannot. Living organisms are emergent systems, but there is nothing mysterious about emergent systems per se.
The relation of life to matter is indeed an old philosophical problem. My own religion (Hinduism) has some very interesting perspectives on the divisions between mind, matter and spirit. However this has nothing to do with the issue at hand.
I am not personally qualified to talk about AI and whether are not it is feasible. However, judging from the rest of your post, I doubt your competence in that field of human endeavor as well.
My other sig is also a
The difference is that God the creator is able to create out of absolute nothing. No raw materials needed.
The scientist still needs some raw materials in order to create.
Also, it is likely that this organism (if it can be 'created', would not survive beyond a few generations and be a failed attempt. If you accept evolution of life here on earth (many people don't, so I feel I should address that); then you also realize that there were many different paths it could have taken, and tried to (numerous mass extinctions changed its course). So, it is also likely that early on that if these living things sprang out of nothing, that it could have happened simultaneously in different places and that not all variations would have survived for various reasons. After all, the odds are pretty much not in favor of the living thing have the proper characteristics to survive in its environment.
What?
Athiest Version:
1. Put a bunch of gunk in a beaker
2. Wait
3. ???
4. Life!
Monotheistic Version:
1. Put a bunch of gunk in a beaker
2. Wait
3. Ask God for help
4. Life!
Polytheistic Version:
1. Put a bunch of gunk in a beaker
2. Wait
3. Ask gods for help
4. Life!
5. Sacrifice new life to gods
Capitalist Version:
1. Put a bunch of gunk in a beaker
2. Plant outside life
3. Sell company before fraud found
4. Profit!
Table-ized A.I.
If the DOE is sinking money into funding this project then do they own the subsequent life form? Does J. Craig Venter get to patent its genes and control who does and does not use it. They say that they are planning to hobble it so that it can't leave the lav without their assistance.
I realize that this may sound farfetched (this is a single-celled lifeform). But, what legal precident does this establish with regards to ownership. If they argue "we made it we own it," what does that mean for clones?
Ownership of genes is already a big issue (they can patent you see here)
So that having been said I'm glad to hear J Craig mention "eithics" but I'm still not sutre that I trust him, the DOE or this project.
This is a wonderful new field of science that has incredible potential for human advancement. It also has incredible potential for misuse and unethical behavior.
Heck, forget honest mistakes made by intelligent, thoughtful, ethical scientists; forget unethical misuses slowly plotted by glacial corporations and governments. What I'm worried about is N years after that, when the biology script kiddies swing into action.
"The Crystal Wind is the Storm, and the Storm is Data, and the Data is Life"
That makes the "scary" part, to me anyway, the fact that if this were to escape and survive it would displace something else with absolutely unknown consequences
They are making a minimal cell with almost all of the genes stripped out. It is about the equivalant of taking a human baby, cut off it's arms and legs, gouge out its eyes and ears, wipe out its immune system, remove it's entire skeleton, slice out every muscle except the heart and diaphram, rip out it's digestive system, and connect it to a feeding tube of pre-digested nutrient solution.
Now take that baby and toss it out on your local freeway during rushhour traffic. And be terrified that the baby is going to displace the local wildlife and kill us all.
-
- - You can't take something off the Internet! That's like trying to take pee out of a swimming pool.
I think many thinking theists would argue that too. The argument against an all-knowing, all-powerful and all-good entity existing is too simple to dismiss (e.g., natural evils, etc.)
...
One can still have a Christian-style God without the omni-this and that; it is in fact the only way to deal with the idea rationally. Nearly omnipotent for example is a good starting point!
Then there are more sophisticated models which have God being omnipotent and all-good, but within limited domains, such as an individual's subjective experience. This starts diverging from canon somewhat though
we could create life from nothing, could we consider ourselves equal with god...
except for his childish qualities of course....
Ave Molech Setting
Step back a minute. Are these forces "we" don't comprehend, or forces "YOU" don't comprehend? Just because YOU don't understand the subject, doesn't mean that a genetic scientist doesn't.
More importantly, who cares if we kill a "frankenstien" micro-organism? You seem to be thinking that we're making a multicellular organism here, perhaps with sentience. This is not the case. It's a simple micro-organism. We kill millions of them every day walking down the street, laying in bed, or even floating in space(with a space suit, mind you).
Everybody should stop believing that fiction is somehow a prophecy of what will happen if those "nasty scientists" try treading on something interesting. Do you think that we should hold off a manned expedition to mars because the space creature from planet X will get us? Should we stop using vaccines because someone might slip a mind control drug in there? Doubtful.
It's been a long time.
If we have a problem that big, most organisms have a natural enemy known as "fire". :)
It's been a long time.
Nah...the dispoof of a being compliant to all the abilities above can't exist due to the paradoxes involved (ie creating something he/she/it can't lift and lifting it).
Dumbing the powers down, and restricting its responsibilities (ie he's responsible for the earth being flat, oh no...uh...the planets spinning round...uhhh...well, he created gravity!) just proves more and more that a god is a lie which is losing more and more credibility with every discovery made. The real question is why does humanity need a god/pantheon in the first case? True, religion is a great control mechanism, but why do so many buy into it?
-- Waht? Tehr's a preveiw buottn?
Actually, according to a Catholic theologian when asked about this, to "play God" you would have to invent the rules then sit back and watch what happens within the rules. What we do is try to figure out what the rules are and then do everything we can within them. So trying to create life within the rules that we've got is not "plyaing God" but "playing Man".
Nope, no sig
Reading this just makess that god character more and more ridiculous. The hoops you jump through...BTW, why aren't creatures just popping into existence now then? God got bored?
-- Waht? Tehr's a preveiw buottn?
Yes! What we need to solve the worlds problems is millions of scientists working on something they aren't interested in!
By the way. You're first. I hope you know something about retroviruses and human gene modification, because you're heading straight in. With no training. Oh, you're a scientist, you'll figure it out, even if you *don't* care!
It's been a long time.
I'm curious what hoops I am jumping through? I was stating that in order to actually 'create' you have to do it out of nothing. Thus, these scientists will not be 'creating' life, because they have to work with something.
If you don't believe that God (or other diety(s)) created the universe (emphasis on who not how), then you have to have some other explanation for how matter and energy came into existence.
I never stated that creatures popped into existence, but it is a pretty sketchy area of biology and evolutionary theory. They've been able to get amino acids from non-living things, but they haven't been able to get a living thing from non-living things. There are many theories as to how this took place and most of them boil down to something (single celled organism) just 'popping' into existence. It's what's needed to make that happen that they're trying to figure out.
So, it is highly likely that if this were the case that it would have occured in many places on earth simultaneously/in parallel, and it's also highly likely that not all of them would have survived or have been able to. Thus, I am basically saying that even if they were to get non-living to become living, chances are it would either die right away, or not last more than few generations.
Many people would claim this is a failure, but it's really not.
What?
Go tell that to the East Africans. Better yet, go spend a week barebacking in San Francisco and tell us how you feel in a few years.
Geek: "Hydrogen atoms are just protons, which are made out of three quarks stuck together, and about which an electron happens to be found. If I put enough hydrogen in the same place, I get a star, which I can use to synthesize helium, carbon, and all the other elements. And by combining these elements in the right way, I can make amino acids. And by combining those amino acids just so, I can make life from scratch! Yah00! I'm a God!"
God: "Really? So, like, next time, you'll start with your own quark-gluon plasma instead of Mine?"
Yes. The technical name for such meddling is "science".
'Funny'? Did someone take this as a joke? 'Insightful', certainly, but definitely not 'funny'. Meddling with forces we do not comprehend is what's brought us this far. Most animals run from fire, giving a force they do not comprehend a very wide berth. Our ancestors meddled with it, they learned how to control and use it. I'm sure a great many of them got burned before they got it right. People still burn to death on a daily basis because of a fire getting out of hand. But if we hadn't meddled with forces we didn't comprehend, where would we be now?
Electricity was a force we did not comprehend. Radio. Magnetism - should navigators have used compasses if they couldn't write out and solve Maxwell's equations? Meddling with forces we do not comprehend is what humans DO. It's our big evolutionary advantage, that where most creatures will run from things they don't understand, we'll go right up to them and start prodding, even at the risk of our lives. Meddling with forces we do not comprehend has won us the Earth. Meddling with forces we do not comprehend can win us the stars too. Maybe it can win us near-immortality. If you don't want to meddle with forces you don't comprehend, switch off your computer, take off all your clothes that contain synthetic fibres and live in a cave.
Real Daleks don't climb stairs - they level the building.
And maybe when they are done, they can store them in rusting canisters in a medical storage facility. Where those said canisters can accidently be punctured by a fire axe, and spread the now mutated organism through the air.
And after the chop up and burn the cadivers, it can be spread to a nearby graveyard !!
COOL!
U.S. Govt: "And now we award Dr. Romaro's development research team their requested grant."
--Ne auderis delere orbem rigidum meum, non erravi pernicose!
All it takes is a Google search, my friend...
Israel has actually been accused of the reverse by some nutcases.
If your bitterest enemies are people who hack the heads off civilians, then I would say you're doing something right.
Something I thought about once was getting together 46 different people, taking a chromosome from them each, and throwing them together to make a new individual, completely at random.
Of course, after Captain America destroyed my evil cloning plant, this won't happen, but was my idea feasible?
That wouldn't of really be more successful, though. If right now, they live (usually) harmlessly in the urinary track of every human, then that is a huge habitat. If they start killing off the human race in a plague of bloody toilet water, then they will drastically reduce their habitat, perhaps even killing off so many hosts that they will no longer be spread.
Think about it, as a species which is better, small pox or the common cold?
(and yes, I know that viruses are not life, therefore not "species" yadda yadda yadda, but the example still holds)
omnia tua castra sunt nobis
to simply abandon the idea and not experiment with it?
I'm sorry.. but those who think that "creating life" or other forms of genetic research are unethical are nothing but religious whackjobs.
yes, when it comes to genetically engineering HUMANS, there are ethical, and more importantly, sociological concerns, but they are not about "right" and "wrong" or "good" and "evil"; they are about society living and dealing with the consequences.
This research is fantastic... I see no ethical issues whatsoever.
Unfortunatly, this level of ignorance is why I am cutting back on slashdot. Not only do you have no reason to believe this stripped down cell will be dangerous, its very likely a bacterium like this existed...and was driven extinct by a more complex version. You're basically implying that with some random tinkering we could create a life form able to supplant existing life on earth. This isn't reasonable.
Go tell that to the East Africans.
Show me the body bags. We saw this for Ebola. Why not for AIDS?
Better yet, go spend a week barebacking in San Francisco and tell us how you feel in a few years.
I guarantee you that I'd feel better doing that than I would if I were taking the poison known as AZT for a few years, incubation period or no incubation period.
I don't make the rules. I just make fun of them.
I think that for some, yes, believing in a lie is the only way that they will be able to go through life. It's better for them and I think that's what matters.
You can line up many times more scientists and physicians who work on infectious disease or viral and/or bacterial infections, and they will agree that an HIV-1 infection will lead to the destruction of CD4+ T cells in the body which leads to immunodeficiency and susceptibility to secondary infections which characterize AIDS.
AIDS research is the single most well-funded disease research in human history. More so than other diseases which kill and harm many, many more people than AIDS does. Is it possible that money may be a factor? I think the answer is Yes. I notice that you write as if you are in the AIDS research field.
Exposing purified CD4+ T cells in culture outside the body to HIV-1 leads to their infection and killing. I've observed this many times under a microscope.
HIV has not been isolated. How can any of your claims, which deoend on the existence of HIV, be true?
The same antiviral drugs used in humans who are infected with HIV-1, prevents diminishment of CD4+ T cells, reduces the amount of HIV-1 present in the body, and extends life of HIV-1 infected persons.
Antiviral drugs such as AZT? Do you work for Burroughs-Wellcome?
An early proponent in questioning whether HIV-1 caused AIDS was Peter Duesberg at UC-Berkeley. I've met Peter before, and some fo my senior colleagues know him quite well. Peter is a smart man and has made important contributions as to our understanding of cancer usng retroviruses as a model to explore oncogenesis.
Duesberg is one of the principal opponents of the HIV-AIDS hypothesis. I don't understand why you write so fondly of him since you labeled my claims, where are partly based on his writings, as "disinformation."
Here are some more questions for you:
I don't make the rules. I just make fun of them.
Scores of chicken-and-egg problems remain. The best they could hope for is modifying an existing lifeform, and that's boring.
Got time? Spend some of it coding or testing
AIDS research is the single most well-funded disease research in human history.
I find this dubious, and the NIH spends vastly more on cancer research: see their official funding page.
HIV has not been isolated.
Even Duesberg contends that HIV exists. The genome has been sequenced, the structures of the protease and reverse transcriptase have beeen solved. You people are more interested in dogma than science- just as bad as the creationists.
As for AZT, everyone with more than a basic knowledge of biology and chemistry understands how dangerous it is- a brute force attack on reverse transcription (and, unfortunately, normal DNA replication). It's a particularly poor example, because the nasty side effects are obvious; why don't you try arguing against the therapeutic power of, say, Crixivan or d4t instead?
i wasn't ducking your questions as they weren't posed to me per se but posted in this forum. moreover, i was stating facts and not questions as you were.
;)
And you still haven't answered the questions, you've only given me an excuse as to why you haven't. And don't try to turn this back on me.
you've picked up on some of the points that peter duesberg originally put out. thus i also wanted to raise the possibility that his motivation might be influenced by other personal factors other than the science
Don't try to pin this on Duesberg, either. He's not the only one who has questioned the HIV==AIDS mantra. And he's not the only one to suffer financially, emotionally, and physically from having the audacity to do so. AIDS is BIG MONEY.
(1) & (4) are semantic issues, right?
No, they are not.
Concering #1, the definition of epidemic is specific. The pattern of AIDS does not meet the criteria, yet it is called an "epidemic" anyway. Why is this?
the larger question you were posing prevoiusly was whether HIV caused an immunodeficiency that allowed secondary infections. i think the data is unequivocal on this point.
So the immunodeficiency "allowed" secondary infections? I suppose you've chosen this verb because you can't say "caused." In fact, you know that ALL of the secondary infections existed in absence of HIV before the alleged discovery of HIV. And the data is certainly not unequivocal.
as per what secondary infections occur in 'AIDS' caused by HIV-1, this has changed somewhat over time because people learned more about the disease and some of the early second infections became treatable and non-issues (thus saving lives).
You didn't answer my question. How many times has the list of secondary diseases changed? And, once you figure that out, can you form the list of these so-called secondary infections for each time the list changed? Wouldn't the contents of those lists be interesting? I find it to be very important since a diagnosis of AIDS has always been either a death sentence or "buy our drugs if you want to live" sentence. It's just ripe for abuse, isn't it?
as per question (2), i don't know what burroughs-wellcome does with its money but am generally suspicious of large drug companies. as per question
This might be my foot in the door!
(3), supply whichever peter duesberg theory you want as this is one of his issues. he stopped scientifically publishing on HIV for the past 4-5 years, and has primarily gone back to his cancer work.
Weak, weak, weak. I can reference writings that are NOT by Duesberg that discuss the positive link between KS and amyl nitrate ("poppers"). Why do you keep trying to pin this on Duesberg? He's not the only opponent of the HIV==AIDS hypothesis. Is Duesberg your scapegoat?
do you have specific knowledge of this or perhaps have done any molecular biology research to back this up? HIV has been isolated numerous times. it's real. it's not so hard to do. you can in fact isolate just it's nucleic acid genome, put this into cells, and they will make the virus.
Wrongo Dongo, amigo. It is you that has to back up your claim that the virus has been isolated. You can't just assert that it has been isolated and then tell me that I have to disprove you. The easiest way for us to solve this is for you to link to the paper which describes the circumstances under which the HIV virus was isolated. Don't tell me to go to some website and dig around. Just link to the paper. There is a prize for anyone who can claim isolation of the HIV virus. Perhaps you'd like to claim it?
peter duesberg (again the leading scientific figure who used to question the HIV/AIDS link) has done the same exact experiment with other retroviruses. it's a pretty simple one.
Yes, let's bring it back to Duesberg again. This is not convincing.
No. Why are you so hung up on this company?
Because they are the manufacturer of AZT and have thus made millions off of the "AIDS epidemic."
I decided to professionally continue studying retroviruses after seeing a friend die of HIV-1 infection that progressed to AIDS while I was a grad student. Pretty sad as it was the year that these drugs called protease inhibitors were coming out experimentally and he was trying so hard to get in a protocol so he could get the meds.
One question: was your friend on AZT therapy?
I'm not going to get into a debate of whether you have or I have on this topic because I think you're coming at it with an open mind and willing to examine information or evidence as presented....
Flattery will get you nowhere.
I decided to put my own curiosity on the research bench and test things myself. It's no conspiracy. HIV kills CD4+ T cells. Stopping the virus saves these important immune cells and it prolongs life.
I'm not the slightest bit impressed. For all I know, you could be working for a pharmecutical company and lying about your job. The profit motive is certainly there for just such a fabrication, considering that AIDS has more money than God does, and the only thing which might stop the gravy train are those which actually question the bald and hollow assertions which support the HIV==AIDS house of cards. And your "stopping the virus" (through drugs, presumably) is the same line that the big AIDS drug manufacturers have been preaching since the alleged outbreak.
If you answer my questions you will gain more credibility with me.
I don't make the rules. I just make fun of them.
Moderator: we are discussing the ethics of this technology, and much of Western ethics is based on Biblical morality. Posting discussion-provoking quotes is not the same as "Trolling"
/. terms)
Metamoderator: do your thang...
BTW, IAMB=I Am a Molecular Biologist
(so says my diploma, anyway--and no, it is NOT from a "Prestigious non-accredited university")
To answer your question: there is no Bible verse (to the best of my recollection) that says "thou shalt not attempt to create life." However, someone who actually believes in the God of the Old and New testaments and actually _fears_ him (as the verses I posted above recommend) might want to think twice about going ahead with this experiment.
Throughout the Bible, there is the repeated theme of being punished for Pride/wanting equality with God/trying to do what only God is allowed to do.
Examples: Satan (cast out of Heaven because of pride)
Adam & Eve (cast out of the garden because "The man has now become like one of us"(Gen 3:21))
Tower of Babel (literal example of technology used with pride, and its consequences)
Herod: struck down for not praising God when others claim that he _is_ a 'god.'
I am sure we will be punished for not even thinking twice about such things.
Although it might have decent applications, we're probably better of for not allowing such technology to exist (yes, I'm comitting blasphemy in
Life, by definition, has the capability to reproduce. Having this capability will a) let us mess up in some pretty grandiose ways b) open the doors the engineering of really nasty biological warfare agents c) probably enable the creation of fully patentable lifeforms
I am far from being a luddite, but we would be a lot better off if certain technologies had never been developed/invented (biological/chemical warfare, A-bomb, PCP, mind control, landmines, e-meters, spamware, particle-board, C#, etc.)
Moderator: how about hitting 'reply' ???
Watch 'Brazil' by Terry Gilliam if you get the chance. You'll like it :)
-- Waht? Tehr's a preveiw buottn?
Listen, you started this thread with the left field assertion that HIV does not cause AIDS.
... but they're probably similarly clueless in your book
/.er? Absolutely.
"You started this!" How middle-school of you. My assertion is not left-field.
I write a response based listing facts used to prove that HIV causes AIDS. Yeah, that's the ticket, list some evidence before making an assertion that you can't back up. Give it a shot.
You have listed no facts. You have merely reitereated the point in dispute, that HIV==AIDS. I refuse to believe it until you show me the evidence. The burden of proof is on you, not on me. Just becuase I go against the single most well-funded disease research in human history does not shift the burden of proof.
You spend a good deal of your posts getting hyped about AZT and know full well that HIV/AIDS existed prior to any individuals getting AZT.
You are wrong. AZT existed before HIV and was shelved. Why was it shelved? What were its side effects?
You probably know that most of the people in the world that are HIV infected and develop AIDS never see AZT or other antivirals.
I doubt that there is anyone who is infected with HIV and who is developing AIDS as a result of it. Where are the millions of corpses from those Africans who should be dying from AIDS right now? We all saw images of what Ebola did, but the so-called AIDS epidemic (which is called an epidemic despite the fact that it does NOT follow an epidemic pattern) in Africa is nothing but talk so far.
you prefer to ignore Occamm's razor and go with what is mostly a crowd of scientific misfits, dilettantes, and yahoos
Yes, it's so much easier to slander your opponent than to refute his argument, isn't it? This is called argumentum ad hominem and it's a logical flaw. It's a sign that your argument is weak.
that claims that people get AIDS because of poppers
It claims no such thing. It claims that people get KS from poppers. Even the exalted Gallo has shifted his position on KS and poppers, where previously it was "caused by AIDS (HIV)."
But of course, there's many more facts than just the etiologic association of HIV and AIDS as I've listed previously.
So why don't you share some? Your ad hominems are getting boring.
I don't think you were able to really dispute a single one of then, right? Even that apocryphal claim that HIV hasn't been isolated doesn't sound too strong now, does it?
Your attempts to indimidate me will fail. Produce the document which shows that HIV has been isolated. Until you can produce this document, I think all of your claims about HIV are baseless and don't need to be refuted.
I think I'll let someone else contend for the lammo website's prize on this
Probably because you can't. You don't have a document that shows HIV has been isolated.
Given that you're so 'fact' based why don't you start with some and show us what you know about the topic before demanding answers to questions to a thesis you can't back up?
I don't need a thesis because my position is skepticism, not belief. Show me the evidence that HIV exists and causes AIDS. The evidence is not in your favor.
What causes AIDS and how?
We first have to agree as to what "AIDS" is. The definition of AIDS keeps changing. What is the list of the so-called "secondary diseases" this year?
Why does HIV not cause AIDS?
You're assuming a point in dispute with this question. If HIV has not been isolated, then why do you believe it exists?
i presume at least a couple papers from reputable scientific journals and not someone's manifesto/novel
It's very hard for those who doubt the HIV==AIDS hypothesis to get published in reputable scientific journals. Anyone who deviates from the Holy Sacred Truth that HIV==AIDS is treated with disdain, scorn, and violence. The rude and disrespectful way that you've treated me is an example of this.
what's the proper definition of an epidemic (actually the UN refers to the HIV/AIDS crisis as a pandemic
This is not a useless question. If the UN calls AIDS a "pandemic" yet AIDS does not meet the requirements for a pandemic, then why is AIDS labeled as much?
Stick to the big questions and fact based evidence first for the claim you put forward and then deviate into your lists of random questions.
I'm all about facts and I am still waiting for you to give me some. And I note that you can't seem to answer my questions. Why? They aren't unfair. Are you afraid of the answer?
Are you out of your depth? Yes[.] Will you ever admit it? No
Your attempts to intimidate me will fail. If you're such a big-shot scientist then you'll produce the document that shows that HIV has been isolated. You'll also be able to explain why AIDS is called an epidemic or pandemic even though it doesn't meet the criteria.
Typical of a good
I'm just "another typical slashdotter." Do you know what this is? It's another typical ad hominem argument. In other words, your argument sucks. You rely on ad hominems, ad numerams, and ad verecundiams to try and make your point which gets weaker and weaker every day. You dismiss my questions as if they were irrelevent when they most certainly are not.
I don't make the rules. I just make fun of them.
I find this dubious, and the NIH spends vastly more on cancer research: see their official funding page
You win points for actually linking to data, and what you say about the NIH is partly true. I wouldn't call twice the amount on cancer research to be "vastly more." I would call it twice as much. If it were one hundred times greater then I might accept "vastly more." Then again, consider the rate of AIDS cases verses the rate of cancer cases and the story changes. Also consider that you've only linked to funding done by NIH. Are they the only group funding AIDS research? So I don't think my statement is as dubious as you claim it to be.
Even Duesberg contends that HIV exists. The genome has been sequenced, the structures of the protease and reverse transcriptase have beeen solved.
I notice that you do not claim that the virus has been isolated. You claim it exists and attempt a sort-of ad verecundiam by sticking Duesberg onto it (even though you don't provide any evidence that Duesberg believes such a thing, so you could be making it up), but who cares what Duesberg thinks anyway? Either the virus has been isolated or it hasn't been. You could very well be making up your statements about protease structures and reverse transcriptase since you post no links to your claims.
There is a one-thousand pound reward offered to anyone who can isolate the alleged HIV virus. Are you prepared to claim it?
You people are more interested in dogma than science- just as bad as the creationists.
Not only is this a cheap-ass "you people" ad hominem, but it's really ironic that you'd accuse me of being "like a creationist" when all I am asking for is evidence and also in light of the the language coming out of the mouths of the HIV==AIDS adherents. Consider:
"Dr. Mark Wainberg, president of the International AIDS Society, called for jailing AIDS dissidents, whom he called 'HIV deniers' (his explicit analogy to "Holocaust deniers').
"Said Wainberg: 'If we could succeed and lock a couple of these guys up, I guarantee you the HIV-denier movement would die pretty darn quickly.'"
--John Lauritsen in AIDS REALISM VERSUS THE HIV HYPOTHESIS
As for AZT, everyone with more than a basic knowledge of biology and chemistry understands how dangerous it is- a brute force attack on reverse transcription (and, unfortunately, normal DNA replication). It's a particularly poor example, because the nasty side effects are obvious; why don't you try arguing against the therapeutic power of, say, Crixivan or d4t instead?
"Basic knowledge of biology." "Pretty poor example." "Crixivan." "d4t." You know what? Your efforts to indimidate me will fail. If you can spout off these condescending phrases and big words then you can also muster up the chutzpah to actually answer my questions. As is, your own words condemn you. Do you work for a big pharm company?
My bringing up AZT is certianly NOT a "particularly poor example." AZT was the AIDS therapy for years. It was a veritable gold mine for Burroughs-Wellcome during those years. Yes, the nasty side-effects are obvious, but trying to cloud them with language such as "brute force attack on reverse transcription" only makes your argument more suspicious, particularly in light of the questions that you've failed to answer. What, exactly, are the side effects of AZT? When and why was AZT shelved?
Here's a side story which helps my position and hurts yours. A while back, a major network aired a special about gay adoption. (As a gay adoptive parent, I was particularly interested.) They highlighted a gay couple who had taken in five foster children, four of which had HIV. A bit later in the show, the narrator explained that the HIV in these children "went away," a phenomenon that has "only been observed in children."
Under my (lack of) belief (specifically, that there is no such thing as HIV and it certainly does not cause the disease-with-the-ever-changing-definition "AIDS") this is easy to explain: the children were never given the poisons used to treat "AIDS" and thus never suffered from this alleged "epidemic."
How do you explain it under your belief system, you know, the one that dictates that HIV==AIDS?
I don't make the rules. I just make fun of them.