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Allergy-Free Kittens Produced
An anonymous reader writes "San Diego-based company, Allerca, said that using a technique known as genetic divergence, it has 'bred the world's first hypoallergenic kitten, opening the doors and arms of millions of pet lovers for whom cuddling a cat has, until now, been a curse ... After identifying the genes of kittens with proteins that provide less of a reaction in humans, they selectively bred litters over several generations to end up with an allergy-friendly super cat.' The company says its customers are expected to take delivery of their $4,000 hypoallergenic kittens in early 2007."
oops, they forget to mention the lawsuits against the owner, no actual product scientifically tested, and the expose done by local San Diego TV.. I'll take two..
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I'm sure they will be delivering them spayed and neutered. But for my $4000, I'd want one that had all its parts... And if one got out into the wild, would they pull a "Monsanto" (Monsanto demanded and got fees from farmers who ended up with genetically altered crops from cross polarization, not because they planted them)
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It would be nice to play with a cat without being miserable. However, I think we should be trying to breed healthy and smart pets instead of designer stuff like this. I'd rather have a smart mutt than one that is stupid and gets sick all the time. Yeah, I realize my ideal pet could be considered "designer". Also, YRO??
This smells like a troll, but what do you think different breeds of dogs and cats are? That's basically human genetic engineering.
Not to mention that dogs and cats are artificially created animals anyway. Dogs were 'manufactured' from wolves, and cats from (whatever that proto-cat was called that I'm too lazy to look up).
Sometimes it's best to just let stupid people be stupid.
They aren't always going to cost $4000. Just at first.
It's not right to use anti-allegery medicine. If being allergic is how you were made, then you shouldn't play God by taking it.
And while we're on the topic, something needs to be done about those people who use machines to add up thousands of numbers per second. Doing arithmetic on such a Godly scale, is just plain blasphemous and arrogant.
Then there's the people who think they can fly like gods, or move across an unnaturally-hard straight piece of ground faster than a cheetah, or breath while under water. Or kill other people at a distance far greater then the length of even a really long club. Or make music without any musicians appearing to be nearby. Or live in a cave-like habitat when there aren't any actual natural caves around. Some of the really arrogant ones, play God by drinking cold beer in spite of the fact that winter ended several months ago.
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So your problem is actualy with labs?
Analogies don't equal equalities, they are merely somewhat analogous.
They use traditional breeding, a technique that humans have been using for millennia to produce domesticated animals with desirable attributes. If anything, breeding cats to be hypoallergenic is more noble than usual reasons for selective cat breeding.
Furthermore, humans play God all the time. We have treatments for diseases (genetic ones even), shape the land, and create synthetic substitutes for fabrics, transportation, etc. etc. for stuff that isn't optimal. Even if they were to directly engineer the genome, it would follow in the grand tradition of humans not settling for what God provides us -- because it sucks.
Wouldn't allergy-free people be much more efficient?