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Human-Animal Hybrids Fail

SailorSpork writes "Fans of furries and anime-style cat girls will be disappointed by the news that attempts to create human animal hybrids have failed. Experiments by British scientists to create embryonic stem cells by putting human DNA into cow or rabbit eggs had raised ethical concerns, but the question of how we would treat sub-humans will have to wait until we actually figure out how to make them."

554 comments

  1. How we would treat 'sub-humans' by 0racle · · Score: 5, Funny

    I believe that, at least in the case of cat-girls and bunny-girls, that question has already been answered.

    --
    "I use a Mac because I'm just better than you are."
    1. Re:How we would treat 'sub-humans' by Kranerian · · Score: 5, Funny

      Ask not how you would treat a catgirl, but how a catgirl would "treat" you.

      --
      Do you have any idea how long it takes to dig graves for twenty-three oak trees?
    2. Re:How we would treat 'sub-humans' by aliquis · · Score: 1

      Sign me up for 15 catgirls.

    3. Re:How we would treat 'sub-humans' by LoRdTAW · · Score: 3, Funny

      Have you ever seen a cats tongue and teeth or rabbit teeth? I don't want those any where near my privates. And how does a furry shave? I don't want cat/rabbit hair in my mouth. The eight breasts might be difficult to design lingerie for. Ok I think I have to take a shower now.

    4. Re:How we would treat 'sub-humans' by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      In Soviet Russia, sub-humans treat you!

    5. Re:How we would treat 'sub-humans' by eonlabs · · Score: 4, Funny

      Don't forget to spay or neuter your cat-girls

      --
      I wouldn't consider the mad hatter mad. Just reality impaired. He sure can make a mean cup of tea.
    6. Re:How we would treat 'sub-humans' by rhyder128k · · Score: 2, Funny

      God schmod. I want my monkey man!

      --
      Michael Reed, freelance tech writer.
    7. Re:How we would treat 'sub-humans' by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

      If you've got to neuter your cat-girl then something went VERY wrong.

    8. Re:How we would treat 'sub-humans' by pipboy9999 · · Score: 1

      God schmod. I want my monkey man!

      that seems a bit redundant...

      --
      Yeah, I've got nothing...
    9. Re:How we would treat 'sub-humans' by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Or very right, depending on the perversions in question.

    10. Re:How we would treat 'sub-humans' by evilkasper · · Score: 3, Funny

      IT'S A TRAP!!!!

    11. Re:How we would treat 'sub-humans' by Yvan256 · · Score: 1

      And confusing. Did he mean "I want my monkey, man!" or "I want my monkey-man!"?

    12. Re:How we would treat 'sub-humans' by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

      How we would treat 'sub-humans'?

      Probrably the same thing we do today. Put them in the White House and Congress.

    13. Re:How we would treat 'sub-humans' by Haoie · · Score: 1

      They all have great potential in the, ah, allied trades and services industry.

      --
      If each mistake being made is a new one, then progress is being made.
    14. Re:How we would treat 'sub-humans' by Honest+Man · · Score: 1

      I guess they played too much FFXI and decided to make real Mithra to play with, lol.

    15. Re:How we would treat 'sub-humans' by Gilmoure · · Score: 1

      Yup!

      --
      I drank what? -- Socrates
    16. Re:How we would treat 'sub-humans' by eonlabs · · Score: 2, Insightful

      It's clear how you would treat them considering your choice of words.
      'sub-human' versus 'semi-human'

      Great way to hold no bias at the opening of THIS discussion.
      O_o

      --
      I wouldn't consider the mad hatter mad. Just reality impaired. He sure can make a mean cup of tea.
    17. Re:How we would treat 'sub-humans' by bane2571 · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Now you see, this one is hard to moderate. If it's Obama you're talking about you're a likely troll. If it's Bush you're talking about then you're hilarious.

    18. Re:How we would treat 'sub-humans' by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Similar to how the Israelis treat the Palestinians? or the Americans and the Native Americans? etc, etc

    19. Re:How we would treat 'sub-humans' by taucross · · Score: 0

      lrn2simpsons

      --
      "In the absence of the ability to establish the attribute of truth they tried to establish the noble attributes."
    20. Re:How we would treat 'sub-humans' by c0p0n · · Score: 1

      Manhorse was a success tho. Got it's drawbacks tho. Where's my forage?

      --

      Your head a splode
    21. Re:How we would treat 'sub-humans' by jamstar7 · · Score: 1

      and your other weird relatives...

      --
      Understanding the scope of the problem is the first step on the path to true panic.
    22. Re:How we would treat 'sub-humans' by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      that reminds me of a Cool Devices episode . I believe it was episode 3

    23. Re:How we would treat 'sub-humans' by sgt_doom · · Score: 1

      Ya know, I was actually with a cat girl for the night a few years ago....

    24. Re:How we would treat 'sub-humans' by Archangel+Michael · · Score: 1

      IT was both ;-)

      --
      Agent K: A *person* is smart. People are dumb, stupid, panicky animals, and you know it.
    25. Re:How we would treat 'sub-humans' by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Both are puppets to the international banking cartels. Am I a troll because Obama accepted over $600k from Goldman Sacs? Or am I a troll for saying that McCain accepted over $400k from Goldman Sacs?

      Get your facts strait.

    26. Re:How we would treat 'sub-humans' by BikeHelmet · · Score: 1

      Charles Barkley RPG has many humans undergoing surgery to become half-animals, in the sewers of post-cyberpocalypse Neo New York.

      Check it out:

      http://www.joystiq.com/2008/01/22/fan-made-charles-barkley-rpg-sees-full-release/

    27. Re:How we would treat 'sub-humans' by Lunzo · · Score: 1

      furries don't shave, hence the name furry

    28. Re:How we would treat 'sub-humans' by viridari · · Score: 1

      We just got done with 8 years of the monkey man. Why would you want him back?!?

    29. Re:How we would treat 'sub-humans' by Wintervenom · · Score: 1

      How we would treat 'sub-humans'?

      Make them live in the sewers, a la Futurama?

    30. Re:How we would treat 'sub-humans' by TheLink · · Score: 1

      Take it as an example of how most people think, and why such research shouldn't be allowed.

      To me, until people are much clearer on how to define "human" or people are willing to give animals the same rights as humans, you shouldn't allow human-animal hybrids.

      Otherwise allowing it is just asking for lots of problems down the line. You have to consider the bad/worst case scenarios.

      You may think a total ban is silly, wasteful and arbitrary, but I think not banning it at this stage is worse.

      After all, imagine creating intelligent+sentient+conscious robots/cyborgs/creatures in a world where people would just enslave and mistreat them (or "farm" bits of their bodies).

      Researchers may say the current creatures won't have a brain. Yes but then you'll still have to draw a line somewhere. Where are you going to draw that line? Keep in mind there's a fair bit of "brain" near where your stomach is (Enteric Nervous System see: http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?sec=health&res=980CE0DF1F39F930A15752C0A960958260 ). Maybe it's the one that decides you want to eat fried chicken instead of brocolli for lunch.

      The masses already have problems with abortion.

      So just ban it for now and work on something else - there's plenty of other work to be done, that can be done without such problems. The last I checked we had limited resources. Sure we might waste the experience of some people in transgenic research, but so what - preserve their current work for the future. If they're really smart they might find other ways of curing diseases in the meantime.

      --
    31. Re:How we would treat 'sub-humans' by Bastard+of+Subhumani · · Score: 1

      I prefer the term "trans-species individuals" personally. Well actually, that was a lie - I don't.

      --
      Only three things are certain; death, taxes, and apocryphal quotations - Ben Franklin.
    32. Re:How we would treat 'sub-humans' by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Or very right. We should inquire.

    33. Re:How we would treat 'sub-humans' by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Ask not how you would treat a catgirl, but how a catgirl would "treat" you.

      I concur.

      ~Raph

  2. ah man. by geekoid · · Score: 1

    I was looking forward to Giraffe man.

    --
    The Kruger Dunning explains most post on /. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunning%E2%80%93Kruger_effect
    1. Re:ah man. by kalirion · · Score: 1

      Really? You have some weird tastes.

    2. Re:ah man. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny

      i, for one, welcome our new giraffe overlords, and would like to remind them that as a trusted member of the media i can be helpful in rounding up people to taunt in their underground sugar caves.

    3. Re:ah man. by hoggoth · · Score: 2, Interesting
      --
      - For the complete works of Shakespeare: cat /dev/random (may take some time)
    4. Re:ah man. by hoggoth · · Score: 1
      --
      - For the complete works of Shakespeare: cat /dev/random (may take some time)
    5. Re:ah man. by hesaigo999ca · · Score: 1

      Cuz we all know the size of his neck might be a reminder of what else might be large.
      Women would loooooooooove him!

  3. huh? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0, Troll

    A human-chimp hybrid was just elected president of the united states you insensitive clod!

    1. Re:huh? by Phasma+Felis · · Score: 2, Funny

      "Just" elected? No, man, that was eight years ago.

    2. Re:huh? by MightyYar · · Score: 0, Redundant

      I know I shouldn't feed the trolls, but chimp skin is white... just so you know. You might want to adjust your troll and try in another thread.

      --
      W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
    3. Re:huh? by poopdeville · · Score: 1

      Some chimp skin is white. Some is pitch black. Some is in between. Some is mottled.

      Anatomical differences between the Common Chimpanzee and the Bonobo are slight, but in sexual and social behaviour there are marked differences. The Common Chimpanzee has an omnivorous diet, a troop hunting culture based on beta males led by an alpha male, and highly complex social relationships.
      The Bonobo, on the other hand, has a mostly frugivorous diet and an egalitarian, nonviolent, matriarchal, sexually receptive behaviour.[8] The exposed skin of the face, hands and feet varies from pink to very dark in both species, but is generally lighter in younger individuals, darkening as maturity is reached.

      --
      After all, I am strangely colored.
  4. Work still continues on... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    ...five assed monkeys. Why?

  5. Just a thought by Syncerus · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Maybe we should resolve the ethical concerns before we perform the science ...

    This is opening Pandora's Box.

    --
    "Man is nothing without the works of man" -- Helvetius
    1. Re:Just a thought by zappepcs · · Score: 0, Flamebait

      Yeah, that's how it works. The governments of the world got together to decide if burning fossil fuels would be ethical treatment of our environment. Yes, there was a UN decision last week about whether or not we should allow basic slave laborers to do ship-breaking on beaches where caustic and dangerous materials can leech into the oceans.

      Damned good thing we make ethical decisions before acting on anything...

    2. Re:Just a thought by princessproton · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Just because exploring the ethical consequences hasn't been the modus operandi thus far, it doesn't mean that it isn't a cause worth considering. The fewer the people who stand up and ask for moral considerations, the easier it is for ethical abuses to occur unnoticed and unchecked. (Or, put in an even more cliche manner, "The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil, is for good men to do nothing.")

      --
      I'm always positive; it's my nature.
    3. Re:Just a thought by nobodylocalhost · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Speak of Pandora's box, replacing the animal DNA with human DNA in an animal cell is pretty much like taking out a big chunk of code out of your text editor in binary form, replace them with another chunk of code from your image editing software, without any understanding of what exactly is the processor doing, and hope the end result will actually execute and lets you edit images. TFA indicated that the right genes are getting turned off. What we really should worry about is what genes are getting turned on since our DNA is littered with inactive segments of virus RNAs. We may stumble on something that we don't know how to deal with.

      --
      Where is the "Ignorant" mod tag?
    4. Re:Just a thought by zappepcs · · Score: 0, Offtopic

      Want to hear something unethical? Jobs are being lost in the US, manufacturing has moved to countries where it's ethical to treat workers and the ecology in ways that would be illegal in North America. I hate to tell you this, but good men did do something and they called it outsourcing, and saw that it was good, so they did it some more. Now there are few of those good men left, corrupted by their own success they forgot about ethics. Sadly, stockholders rarely, if ever, give a shit about ethics.

      Who can do something about it? Stockholders! When it becomes financially prudent to be ethical, those good men will come back to life. Government legislators can't even police their own behavior, never mind the behavior of people that buy stuff for them. The love of money is not the root of all evil, but you typically find both attributes in the same persons.

      So, anyone have any idea how to motivate stockholders?

    5. Re:Just a thought by fuzzyfuzzyfungus · · Score: 1

      I find that fire usually works, if you use enough.

    6. Re:Just a thought by philspear · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Maybe we should resolve the ethical concerns before we perform the science ...

      This is opening Pandora's Box.

      Seems to me the only time we resolve ethical concerns are when the ethical concerns become obsolete. People are still debating whether abortion is ethical. It comes down to a matter of beliefs. Does a human genetic code constitute an independant human? Your answer to that question, reguardless of how much you believe it, is not based on fact. Different people don't all share your beliefs and will have different answers. There is no resolving this ethics question. Well, there is one way, and that is to perform the science. If it turns out to be a scientific dead-end, then we'll have our answer: no it is not ethical because it's pointless.

      Note that I'm not saying lets do it BECAUSE it might be a scientific dead end and then we can move on, that would be a terrible reason to do something. Just pointing out that waiting for the ethical question to be answered 100% is basically a sneaky way of saying "lets not do this ever because I am uncomfortable with it."

    7. Re:Just a thought by Ephemeriis · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Maybe we should resolve the ethical concerns before we perform the science ...

      This is opening Pandora's Box.

      How, exactly, do you propose to resolve the ethical concerns before we even know what they are?

      You're suggesting that we sit down and thoroughly examine all the possible ethical concerns ahead of time and come to some kind of consensus...

      Never mind the fact that we can't even get everyone to agree on how human beings should be treated, let's all figure out how we're going to treat our human/animal hybrids.

      And then, after tons of debate and discussion it turns out we can't even make human/animal hybrids. Tons of wasted time and effort.

      Or maybe our hybrids turn out to have no more brainpower than the animals they were hybridized with, but we've already decided that they should have the right to vote.

      Or maybe our hybrids turn out to be far smarter than us and take over.

      --
      "Work is the curse of the drinking classes." -Oscar Wilde
    8. Re:Just a thought by Hatta · · Score: 1

      What ethical concerns? If you're just creating cells, like these folks were, there are no ethical concerns. They're just cells.

      --
      Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
    9. Re:Just a thought by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      That is not why american manufacturing has died: It's because the large companies retain patents and copyrights that make it illegal for the americans they fire to compete with them with the skills they learnt while employed.

    10. Re:Just a thought by Daniel+Dvorkin · · Score: 0, Flamebait

      Maybe we should resolve the ethical concerns before we perform the science ...

      And maybe we should all go back to living in caves and chipping tools out of flint.

      Meanwhile, in the real world, people are going to keep on discovering new knowledge and creating new technology whether the Luddite hypocrites like it or not. And they'll decry this process right up until it produces results that are useful to them, at which point they will eagerly embrace it, while whining about how eeevil and scary and dangerous the Next Big Thing is.

      --
      The correlation between ignorance of statistics and using "correlation is not causation" as an argument is close to 1.
    11. Re:Just a thought by Shakrai · · Score: 1

      That is not why american manufacturing has died: It's because the large companies retain patents and copyrights that make it illegal for the americans they fire to compete with them with the skills they learnt while employed.

      And pray tell, how do you compete with a Chinese laborer working in sweatshop conditions whose employer can throw all the toxic chemicals created by production into the nearest river when your laborer needs to be paid a decent wage and you get to eat the full cost of disposal of those chemicals?

      You missed the whole point of his post and while the offtopic mod might have been appropriate I'd still like to smack the mod that handed it out.

      --
      I want peace on earth and goodwill toward man.
      We are the United States Government! We don't do that sort of thing.
    12. Re:Just a thought by genner · · Score: 1

      Speak of Pandora's box, replacing the animal DNA with human DNA in an animal cell is pretty much like taking out a big chunk of code out of your text editor in binary form, replace them with another chunk of code from your image editing software, without any understanding of what exactly is the processor doing, and hope the end result will actually execute and lets you edit images. TFA indicated that the right genes are getting turned off. What we really should worry about is what genes are getting turned on since our DNA is littered with inactive segments of virus RNAs. We may stumble on something that we don't know how to deal with.

      Nukes...orbit...only way to be sure...yada yada.

    13. Re:Just a thought by genner · · Score: 1

      What ethical concerns? If you're just creating cells, like these folks were, there are no ethical concerns. They're just cells.

      So are you.
      We are all just a big collection of cells.

    14. Re:Just a thought by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Perhaps it is that applied ethics is a newer trend then keeping our houses warm, cooking food, making shit explode, etc. In fact, the non-application (or non-consideration) of ethical concerns not only allowed for past great discoveries, but it also paved the way for us now considering ethical questions, and left a documented history of what happens when we don't.

    15. Re:Just a thought by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      My biology teacher always said that everything that is technically feasible will eventually be tried out by somebody. So we might as well start exploring the ethical implications. Also, in this case, I would imagine that these experiments are for specialized cell cultures to replace damaged tissue in humans; to say that they tried to make a "Human-Animal Hybrid" seems gross exaggeration in order to make the post seem more interesting...

    16. Re:Just a thought by zappepcs · · Score: 2, Interesting

      If it was simply patents that were in the way, you can bet that some legislators would get new summer homes and vacations etc. and the laws would change. The problem is cost associated with being ecologically and work force ethical.

      My other post hints that the only way to bring about ethics is to force it by wielding the money stick via stockholders. That works, but is not effective if businesses can ship their production facilities to a country that doesn't care about the ecology or retirement plans etc. So, if we want to create ethical business decisions regarding the human genome or any genome, we have to ensure that people with ethics are the ones deciding how the money is spent. Failing that, those people have to be afraid of people with ethics.

      Lets not kid ourselves. If there is money to be made, and there is, big business will be all over it. Genetic research is already controlled by big business so until we effectively get the government of 'we the people' to enforce ethical business practices for 'we the people', 'we the people' will suffer the consequences of decisions in favor of the biggest buck over best ethical choice.

      Basically, we're fucked. The only way out is action in the true spirit of 'fuck Mr Boycott' unless we can raise enough money to legislate big pharma and big business out of control of the government. In either case, control of the money is paramount.

    17. Re:Just a thought by witherstaff · · Score: 1

      I thought the creating a cat person was resolved years ago. Just send a mining ship through space a few million years and the cat evolves into Felis Sapiens.

    18. Re:Just a thought by Austerity+Empowers · · Score: 1

      It's real easy: if it is unethical to do, don't do it.

      If someone, somewhere, could maybe do something unethical based on what you're doing, do it, and throw that other guy in jail when you catch him.

      I don't see what "questions" are involved here.

    19. Re:Just a thought by drinkypoo · · Score: 1

      That is not why american manufacturing has died: It's because the large companies retain patents and copyrights that make it illegal for the americans they fire to compete with them with the skills they learnt while employed.

      And pray tell, how do you compete with a Chinese laborer working in sweatshop conditions whose employer can throw all the toxic chemicals created by production into the nearest river when your laborer needs to be paid a decent wage and you get to eat the full cost of disposal of those chemicals?

      The same way we always do it, through tariffs.

      Government intervention is sometimes necessary.

      Note that subsidies, at least long-term ones, are basically never the right answer. If there is a demand, the market will work it out, provided that you level the playing field. Not permitting companies to pollute inside our borders is a barrier to trade. In order to make it fair (as it is necessary, the limitation cannot simply be eliminated) it is necessary to place tariffs on imported goods which were made in a polluting fashion. Instead of making China which is known for human rights abuses (slave labor) and rampant pollution (which we are now breathing) our most favored trade partner, we needed to place huge tariffs on their goods until they instituted and observed some rational standards on pollution and on human rights. If you buy christmas lights at wal-mart, there is a good chance that they were produced by Chinese Christians who were locked up for nothing other than their faith and forced to labor for the benefit of the people. And the toxics resulting from their production were almost certainly poured into a ditch behind the manufacturing plant. The workers are sucking solder fumes or what have you... and so are we because of the total lack of emissions controls.

      We are suffocating in a miasma of our own making.

      --
      "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
    20. Re:Just a thought by cshark · · Score: 1

      Extremely well said.

      --

      This signature has Super Cow Powers

    21. Re:Just a thought by CrimsonAvenger · · Score: 1

      Note that subsidies, at least long-term ones, are basically never the right answer. If there is a demand, the market will work it out, provided that you level the playing field. Not permitting companies to pollute inside our borders is a barrier to trade. In order to make it fair (as it is necessary, the limitation cannot simply be eliminated) it is necessary to place tariffs on imported goods which were made in a polluting fashion.

      And the difference between a tariff on your competition and a subsidy for you is what, exactly?

      You can't even say that the money is coming from a different place. American taxpayers pay for the subsidy, and American taxpayers pay the tariff.

      Or did you really think that foreign companies hit with tariffs just wrote off the cost of the tariff as part of doing business?

      --

      "I do not agree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it"
    22. Re:Just a thought by BeanThere · · Score: 1

      What about the "ethical concerns" of blocking and delaying the development of cures for diseases (a principle underlying aim of this kind of research) that cause untold suffering to millions upon millions of people as we speak?

    23. Re:Just a thought by drinkypoo · · Score: 1

      And the difference between a tariff on your competition and a subsidy for you is what, exactly? You can't even say that the money is coming from a different place. American taxpayers pay for the subsidy, and American taxpayers pay the tariff.

      When there is a tariff, only the purchaser pays. When there is a subsidy, every taxpayer pays whether they purchase the good or service, or not.

      Your objection is so stupid I can only wonder if you are being deliberately obtuse.

      Or did you really think that foreign companies hit with tariffs just wrote off the cost of the tariff as part of doing business?

      Or, you could just be a big idiot.

      I have to pay for subsidies on products I don't buy. That's a problem. The fact that you don't see my having to subsidize things you pay for as a problem indicates to me that you are unwilling or incapable of actually thinking.

      My guess is the latter.

      You are acting like Americans (or others) who consume a polluting or otherwise harmful-to-everyone product should be able to get it without paying the true cost. Shit like that is how we got where we are today. Having the cost of these goods go up is desirable for everyone who plans to live more than another ten years or so. You want pump prices to reflect the true cost of fuel, because otherwise the "invisible hand" spends 100% of its time masturbating instead of actually correcting things.

      --
      "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
    24. Re:Just a thought by couchslug · · Score: 1

      "Maybe we should resolve the ethical concerns before we perform the science ..."

      Ethical concerns would block all advanced science because ethical debate allows religious people and luddites a voice they don't deserve.

      (No, I don't care about the debate as to their deserving a voice. They are obstacles. The scientist is superior to the religionist and the Luddite, and should learn the social skills to manage them without genuinely respecting such backward folk.)

      Learn first, squabble later. We must have knowledge.

      --
      "This post is an artistic work of fiction and falsehood. Only a fool would take anything posted here as fact."
    25. Re:Just a thought by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      No it's not.

      People should stop reading things from idiots like Michael Crichton. There is no "Pandora's Box" or "Ethical Concern", its a sensationalistic myth stemming from bad science fiction and perpetuated by the media. Who the hell cares if we create "soulless" clone or something? Only knowledge can come of it, which is good. The only real possible concern is blowing up everyone, and that's not so much ethical as it is a practical concern for everyone who doesn't want to get blown up.

    26. Re:Just a thought by diagonal_mambo · · Score: 1

      What's the point in debating whether or not it's ethical if you're not even sure you can do it? Not very efficient.

    27. Re:Just a thought by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      because otherwise the "invisible hand" spends 100% of its time masturbating instead of actually correcting things.

      Tell me more of this invisible masturbating hand....

    28. Re:Just a thought by PaganRitual · · Score: 1

      This is the most insightful comment I've read releated to this, and I don't have mod points at the moment so I have to simply post this pointless comment in agreeance with you.

    29. Re:Just a thought by kurzweilfreak · · Score: 1
      This is not flamebait but is pretty damn insightful and should be modded as such. I would mod but I've already posted.

      When you attempt to hold back science, technology, and knowledge, it will go underground. SOMEONE will work on it, then the only people who will advance it will be the ones who don't give a good damn about your (or anyone's) ethics. I would rather it be Us than Them.

      --

      kurzweil_freak

      5th Kyu Genbukan Ninpo/KJJR student

      Be the darkness that allows the light to shine.

    30. Re:Just a thought by francium+de+neobie · · Score: 1

      Maybe we should resolve whether trying to resolve our ethical concerns before we perform science is ethical ... Stopping scientific progress for something always subjective and poorly defined, sure sounds like an ethical thing to everyone.

    31. Re:Just a thought by ozphx · · Score: 1

      You think you have a moral right to use your employers research, because you were paid to use their techniques? Are you crazy?

      You are an employee, not a shareholder. You most certainly do not get the rewards from the risk they took in undertaking the research. You chose fixed-rate labour for hire stability, with low risk.

      You now have your money, as was the deal. Next time consider investing...

      --
      3laws: No freebies, no backsies, GTFO.
    32. Re:Just a thought by Alex+Belits · · Score: 1

      ...because encouraging high-risk behavior is SUCH A GREAT WAY TO PROMOTE A HEALTHY ECONOMY. Let's all go gamble instead of working, and the crisis will magically go away.

      --
      Contrary to the popular belief, there indeed is no God.
    33. Re:Just a thought by Yvanhoe · · Score: 1

      Politicians should start reading science fiction. It is a very serious concern for the society as a whole that SF is considered an inferior sort of literature. When politicians will start getting interested in the concerns that can arise from future science, they will start making laws *before* actual problems arise.

      --
      The Wise adapts himself to the world. The Fool adapts the world to himself. Therefore, all progress depends on the Fool.
    34. Re:Just a thought by ozphx · · Score: 1

      Hey good idea. Lets ban investing. Then when we need to get a bunch of iron ore out the ground we better hope that someone has the ten billion dollars lying around to build the mine that gets it out.

      Or we could do without it I guess. What healthy economy needs things like iron anyway?

      Economies of scale? Pah! A bunch of blokes can go down their and dig it up by hand, and smelt their own iron by hand. Then make steel. China did it, it must be a good idea.

      Nice going there Chairman Belits! I for one support your great leap backwards!

      --
      3laws: No freebies, no backsies, GTFO.
    35. Re:Just a thought by Alex+Belits · · Score: 1

      Economies of scale work just fine without a small bunch of guys owning everything, and there is nothing risky about it as long as the economy as a whole is healthy.

      However at this point production and profit are too small of a reward -- a truly successful company is one that takes over something vital, then acts as a gatekeeper for the rest of the world, collecting ransom for resources. Extreme profit, microscopic amount of actual work -- that's the only business model that your "risk-takers" are willing to bother with. This is why your economy sucks ass now, you have lost all industry and built your whole economy on selling each other pieces of land and paying each other for oil produced and consumed abroad. THEN everything became risky because you have turned your economy into a zero-sum game.

      --
      Contrary to the popular belief, there indeed is no God.
    36. Re:Just a thought by ozphx · · Score: 1

      Extreme profit, microscopic amount of actual work

      If you think the approximate returns these "big companies" are getting are extreme, then you should head on down to your local bank. They handle all the diversification for you so you too can have a part of the extreme returns.

      You can pick from an enormous variety of funds, specifying your risk, industry, etc, etc.

      Hell, even MS, who have a large market by the balls manage to only pull in something like 20%.

      Rarity of natural resources sometimes requires big corporations to have the balls and pull to go in and negotiate with governments to pump their oil, or enslave a bunch of peasants to dig for diamonds. Do you really thing that you and three mates are going to have much luck negotiating for drilling rights in the middle east?

      You seem to think that a bunch of guys getting extremely rich is a fault of those nasty corporations, rather than say there is a natural bell curve of skill with a rather long tail.

      --
      3laws: No freebies, no backsies, GTFO.
    37. Re:Just a thought by Walkingshark · · Score: 1

      Well, you're right except where you said

      And they'll decry this process right up until it produces results that are useful to them, at which point they will eagerly embrace it

      They'll continue to decry it even as they use it. See: Television, the Internet, Abortion, Sex Toys, Drugs.

      It is just how these people are. All hate they spew at this stuff is motivated by an intense self loathing. Either because they're participating in the behavior they consider "bad" (or want to) or because they hate how the existence of technology they don't understand makes them feel ignorant.

      Your post definitely wasn't flamebait worthy.

      --
      The world you experience is only a close approximation of reality.
    38. Re:Just a thought by Alex+Belits · · Score: 1

      You seem to think that a bunch of guys getting extremely rich is a fault of those nasty corporations, rather than say there is a natural bell curve of skill with a rather long tail.

      No, I think that it's called "rent-seeking behavior" that is widely accepted as the bane and cancer of the economy even by the greatest apologists of US-style capitalism. Too bad, most of US economy is now based on it.

      --
      Contrary to the popular belief, there indeed is no God.
  6. enough by circletimessquare · · Score: 0, Flamebait

    enough about some other guy's sexual fantasy life being destroyed

    can we get back to the urgent need to make fully human women with four breasts and two vaginas now please?

    --
    intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
    1. Re:enough by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      considering most guys only have one penis and two hands, the only possible use of that is if you like to share with other dudes. But hey if thats your thing I won't stop ya :P

    2. Re:enough by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      And women everywhere already complain that men are unable to fully satisfy one...

    3. Re:enough by Zakabog · · Score: 3, Insightful

      enough about some other guy's sexual fantasy life being destroyed

      can we get back to the urgent need to make fully human women with four breasts and two vaginas now please?

      Unless you want to share with your friends, two vaginas and four breasts are useless.

      The key is to give men four arms and hands, that way even if the woman only has two breasts you can still use the other two hands to grab her ass. As an added bonus if they ever develop a four breasted woman humanity would be ready for it.

    4. Re:enough by aliquis · · Score: 2, Funny

      Vaginas? You don't nearly watch enough porn.

      In todays environment two assholes would make more sense, or maybe three, or maybe asshole coupled together with mouth at each entry for easy A2M. Assholes with teeths?

    5. Re:enough by Ginger+Unicorn · · Score: 1

      the beast with no backs?

      --
      (1.21 gigawatts) / (88 miles per hour) = 30 757 874 newtons
    6. Re:enough by mcgrew · · Score: 1

      Why would you need two vaginas?

      The hookers I know tell me that there is a big demand, at top dollar, for two girls at once. I could never understand that, I only have one penis.

      It seems to me that the only people who would want a woman with two vaginas would be a horribly deformed man (two penuses) or a bi who wanted his bi buddy in on the action.

      I only answer this soberly because some dufus modded you "insightful" instead of the "funny" you were shooting for.

    7. Re:enough by mcgrew · · Score: 1

      The world already has too many assholes, as anyone who has ever driven a vehicle can attest.

    8. Re:enough by R2.0 · · Score: 1

      No, no - this technology will give the ability to put large animal assholes on anorexics blonds.

      Of course, some don't need the artificial enhancement.

      --
      "As God is my witness, I thought turkeys could fly." A. Carlson
    9. Re:enough by aliquis · · Score: 1

      But we don't want huge assholes, or well, maybe the porn industry does, but most people probably prefer tight assholes filled with huge things?

      That sounds wrong ..

      "Omg, you were tig... errr.. shit, what is this? Or wait ..."

    10. Re:enough by Rick+Bentley · · Score: 1

      I think the perfect number of breasts would be three. Two in front, and one in the back -- for dancing/hugging/etc.

      --
      My favorite quote doesn't fit into 120 characters. Now no one will like me.
    11. Re:enough by R2.0 · · Score: 1

      The porn industry won't be satisfied until you can fit and entire human male, in a parka, with a set of golf clubs, completely into a woman via her orifices.

      --
      "As God is my witness, I thought turkeys could fly." A. Carlson
    12. Re:enough by powerlord · · Score: 1

      The porn industry won't be satisfied until you can fit and entire human male, in a parka, with a set of golf clubs, completely into a woman via her orifices.

      To quote a joke I heard a long time ago that old when I was young:

      A man met an overweight woman in a bar. Being too drunk to care that she was ugly, he took her home to fuck her. They were going at it, and he had two fingers up her, when she started moaning 'More, more!' So he jammed in his whole hand, and still she wanted more. Stunned, he shoved his whole arm into her snatch and still she screamed 'More, more!'Fed up, he headbutted her slit and was sucked inside.

      He wandered around for a bit until he heard a voice say "Hello? Is anyone here?" He answered "Damn... you too? I had a lighter in my pocket... if we can find it, we might be able to see a way out." The voice answered "Fuck... if we can find my keys, we can drive out."

      Now excuse me while I get modded into oblivion. :)

      --
      This space for rent. All reasonable inquiries will be entertained at proprietors discretion.
  7. Granted I'm not a geneticist... by Shadow+Wrought · · Score: 3, Interesting

    But would cow and rabbit be the most likely candidates for human hybridization? Wouldn't chimp make a lot more sense?

    --
    If brevity is the soul of wit, then how does one explain Twitter?
    1. Re:Granted I'm not a geneticist... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      There's no demand for ape-humans-- no money to be had. Chimps aren't sexy.

      Wrong image text, try again
      You failed to confirm you are a human. Please double-check the image and make sure you typed in what it says.

    2. Re:Granted I'm not a geneticist... by PPH · · Score: 4, Funny

      The chimps wouldn't hold still while the scientists tried to have sex with them.

      --
      Have gnu, will travel.
    3. Re:Granted I'm not a geneticist... by Racemaniac · · Score: 3, Funny

      and there is a demand for cow humans, and cows are sexy?

    4. Re:Granted I'm not a geneticist... by fuzzyfuzzyfungus · · Score: 5, Informative

      The point of the hybrids mentioned isn't to make freakish movie monsters or vile fringe-wank material; but to substantially lower the cost and difficult of generating and working with stem cells. Getting human DNA is trivial(cheek swab, skin cells, blood, whatever) human sperm is also pretty easy; but obtaining human eggs in any quantity is an unpleasant experience for the donor, requires some costly and potentially risky procedures, and is an all around nuisance. Monkeys might be modestly cheaper; but nonhuman primates are still quite expensive to work with, and are often subject to greater scrutiny than other animals.

      Cows and rabbits are super cheap, and are slaughtered by the thousands all the time. Obtaining needed tissue should be relatively simple. That is the point of the exercise.

    5. Re:Granted I'm not a geneticist... by aliquis · · Score: 2, Funny

      More people accept cows dying for the benefit of humans than apes. Simple as that, you all suck!

    6. Re:Granted I'm not a geneticist... by Bieeanda · · Score: 2, Funny

      Clearly, you haven't watched enough Cow and Chicken.

    7. Re:Granted I'm not a geneticist... by Bearhouse · · Score: 1

      Wouldn't chimp make a lot more sense?

      Don't know about the genetics part, but I seem to recall that chimps are becoming very rare and expensive for experimentation. Also, from the ethical/PR point of view people get a lot more worked up about experimening with chimps rather than cows, pigs & rabbits.

    8. Re:Granted I'm not a geneticist... by greenreaper · · Score: 4, Funny

      You haven't played WoW recently, have you? Those Tauren babes . . . well, let's just say they serve a damn fine milkshake, if you know what I mean.

    9. Re:Granted I'm not a geneticist... by zerospeaks · · Score: 1
      --
      http://wwww.zerospeaks.com
    10. Re:Granted I'm not a geneticist... by hypergreatthing · · Score: 1

      I heard greek women are hairy if yer into that sorta thing.

    11. Re:Granted I'm not a geneticist... by philspear · · Score: 5, Funny

      The point of the hybrids mentioned isn't to make freakish movie monsters or vile fringe-wank material

      Now he tells me. I'm off to drop out of my graduate genetics program.

    12. Re:Granted I'm not a geneticist... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I prefer the Fonzanzee to the Humanzee http://www.dadmobile.com/fonzanzee/

    13. Re:Granted I'm not a geneticist... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      No, the chimp was heard shouting, "Take your stinking hands off me, you damned dirty human!"

    14. Re:Granted I'm not a geneticist... by mcgrew · · Score: 1

      Actually for the serious purposes this research is going for, pigs are the best candidate. They want to grow body parts that they now have to harvest from cadavers. Pigs (I'm told) have very similar organs to humans in size and function, closer than any other animal.

      A rabbit kidney wouldn't do you much good, and cows are very dissimilar. They are herbivores with two stomachs, while pigs are omnivores like we are, with the same kind and size of organs.

      I guess cows could be hybridized to produce human milk. Human milk is far superior to bovine milk in taste and nutrition.

    15. Re:Granted I'm not a geneticist... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Funny

      No, I don't know what you mean, thank God!

    16. Re:Granted I'm not a geneticist... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Black people.

    17. Re:Granted I'm not a geneticist... by Rompicollo · · Score: 1

      I am reminded of The Chimp and the Woman".

    18. Re:Granted I'm not a geneticist... by PaganRitual · · Score: 1

      He means that he's not homogenised. Him? Homogenised? No way, he likes the ladies.

      (Moo. Are you happy now?)

    19. Re:Granted I'm not a geneticist... by Starcub · · Score: 1

      That still sounds like an amoral argue to me. I find myself wondering if maybe there is a connection between the failures here, and the inability of differing species to produce offspring via natural means. To me such would seem like evidence for intelligent design, from whence come implications which shouldn't be ignored.

      FYI, I'm also mostly a vegetarian primarily because I don't agree with the way animals are treated by industry as simply sources of food.

    20. Re:Granted I'm not a geneticist... by biking42 · · Score: 1

      No, no, no, the female draenei, with their sexy Russian accents!

    21. Re:Granted I'm not a geneticist... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I think you do.

    22. Re:Granted I'm not a geneticist... by aliquis · · Score: 1

      Parent moderated (Score:2, Funny)

      Funny? I was serious, I do believe all meat eaters, milk drinkers, egg users, wool bearing, down sleeping, leather feeted, silk wearing people suck.

      Stop abusing others for the benefits of yourself.

      And you still think it's hilarious? :D

    23. Re:Granted I'm not a geneticist... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      ... forgot animal testing.

  8. To bad by Dyinobal · · Score: 3, Insightful

    To bad DNA doesn't work like this. This is almost as bad as someone thinking the can make 'atomic super men' ala Futurama.

    1. Re:To bad by twilightzero · · Score: 2, Funny

      You mean we can't!?

      Dammit guess I'll stop my nightly reactor core exposure sessions...:(

      --

      "Christ what a design! I could eat a handful of iron filings and PUKE a better emergency pump than that!"
    2. Re:To bad by smooth+wombat · · Score: 1

      Of course you can make mutant atomic supermen. All you need is some DNA and chronitons. Who wouldn't want to have a cannon in their chest or extendible arms?

      Granted, you may have to go to the Forbidden Zone in the Galaxy of Terror to get them, but so what?

      --
      We will bankrupt ourselves in the vain search for absolute security. -- Dwight D. Eisenhower
    3. Re:To bad by aliquis · · Score: 1

      Or better yet, imagine if we could make a device for turning on / pointing at things at a distance (I don't remember what he used it for or called it so joke fails ..)

    4. Re:To bad by Rathum · · Score: 1

      Or better yet, imagine if we could make a device for turning on / pointing at things at a distance (I don't remember what he used it for or called it so joke fails ..)

      The finglonger, but that was never actually invented. The Professor was just watching it on the What If Machine.

    5. Re:To bad by uberjoe · · Score: 1
      It's 'Mutant Atomic Super-Men'

      Sheesh, get it right.

      --

      The days of the digital watch are numbered.

    6. Re:To bad by aliquis · · Score: 1

      Thereby the "imagine", anyway, thanks!

    7. Re:To bad by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      "Ah, so this would've happened if I invented the fing-longer!"

    8. Re:To bad by tmosley · · Score: 1

      With freeway onramps for arms, and a heart as black as coal!

  9. Rabbit eggs? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Funny

    Rabbit eggs? I guess the easter bunny has to make money somehow in the off-season.

    1. Re:Rabbit eggs? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      everybody's gotta make a buck buck buck buck.

    2. Re:Rabbit eggs? by Bones3D_mac · · Score: 1

      I've always wondered what was up with the center of Cadbury's cream eggs that makes them so addictive and yet so rare that they can only be harvested once per year...

      --


      8==8 Bones 8==8
  10. Waste of time by Zakabog · · Score: 1

    Making a human-animal hybrid is a waste of time, the real challenge is making something far superior to man.

    The five-assed monkey.

  11. NOOOOOOOO! by twilightzero · · Score: 2, Funny

    My one hope for not dying a virgin geek...crushed like a grape under a giant anthromorphic fighting robot's foot. I'm doomed...

    Guess I'll have to go with my backup plan to hack into a government mainframe and accidentally create Kelly LeBrock during a lightning storm. ;)

    --

    "Christ what a design! I could eat a handful of iron filings and PUKE a better emergency pump than that!"
    1. Re:NOOOOOOOO! by kkrueg0 · · Score: 1

      I don't think Kelly LeBrock is all that busy these days...You could probably just hire her.

    2. Re:NOOOOOOOO! by twilightzero · · Score: 1

      But I want a DIGITAL Kelly LeBrock!

      Oh wait I can just download her online now can't I? :\

      --

      "Christ what a design! I could eat a handful of iron filings and PUKE a better emergency pump than that!"
  12. Let's not get ahead of ourselves by gEvil+(beta) · · Score: 4, Insightful

    ...but the question of how we would treat sub-humans will have to wait until we actually figure out how to make them.

    Let's not get ahead of ourselves. Hell, we're still dealing with how people should treat other actual humans.

    --
    This guy's the limit!
    1. Re:Let's not get ahead of ourselves by oldspewey · · Score: 4, Insightful

      ...but the question of how we would treat sub-humans will have to wait until we actually figure out how to make them.
      Let's not get ahead of ourselves. Hell, we're still dealing with how people should treat other actual humans.

      Ironically, by treating said humans like sub-humans.

      --
      If libertarians are so opposed to effective government, why don't they all move to Somalia?
    2. Re:Let's not get ahead of ourselves by R2.0 · · Score: 1

      "Let's not get ahead of ourselves. Hell, we're still dealing with how people should treat other actual humans."

      I've always wondered why it is that you will get less jail time for beating your kid than beating your dog.

      --
      "As God is my witness, I thought turkeys could fly." A. Carlson
  13. I've never understood the problem here by jandrese · · Score: 5, Insightful

    This has a lot of the same false problems that seems to plague morality based discussions of human cloning. The idea that a clone is going to be some sort of non-human entity with no moral standing one way or the other is just plain nuts. If you clone a person then that person has all of the rights any other person would have. It's really just a complicated way of giving birth. Even these human-animal hybrids are badly named, as they aren't going to be catgirls or manbearpigs or anything of the sort, just normal people with a really weird birth.

    The only time ethical concerns should really come into play is when you're attempting to convict someone of a crime based on DNA evidence, but it's not like the law has not had to deal with this sort of problem before. Identical twins have already generated plenty of precedents to draw from.

    It drives me crazy when congresspeople are spending hours and hours talking about how cloning is an affront before god and has to be stopped, but can't seem to make a good argument as to why other than citing bad movie plots or vague "They won't have a soul!" type arguments.

    --

    I read the internet for the articles.
    1. Re:I've never understood the problem here by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Interesting

      The problem is they're creating these to harvest organs and do scientific research. If you really think they have the same rights as a naturally-born person, then you ought to be appalled.

    2. Re:I've never understood the problem here by jswigart · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Religious views have never been based on good arguments.

    3. Re:I've never understood the problem here by A.+B3ttik · · Score: 1, Interesting

      For me, its not so appalling because "It won't have a soul!!!" but appalling because of the chance that it _will_.

      Suppose Religion is real and you create some kind of sci-fi cartoonish Larson-esque Cow Person who actually _has_ a soul... and it spends its life, at best, ostracized by humanity, and at worse, spends its short life in experiments before being destroyed.

      Religious people aren't against cloning because they think something won't have a soul... they're against it because some scientist is playing the role of creator, father, and executioner with something that _does_ have a soul.

    4. Re:I've never understood the problem here by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      It really doesn't matter yet anyway. Every clone that actually makes it past birth ends up dieing for unknown reasons anyway. When we have an actual clone that is able to live more than a number of minutes, months, or a few short years we'll worry about how to treat them. Just saying.

    5. Re:I've never understood the problem here by SkOink · · Score: 3, Interesting

      There are a lot of cases where genetic engineering (either cloning or hybridization) DOES raise many valid ethical concerns.

      Think about this:

      1) Would you feel bad about taking organs from a clone which was grown without any brain?
      2) What about a clone who had a brain the size of a bird's?
      3) What about a clone with a brain the size of a three year old?

      Or say we made some humans who had the intelligence of a dog. Would they be less than human? Could we treat them like slaves and train them just like we train dogs now? What would happen if one of the subhumans bred with a real human? Would the result be 'human' enough that you would treat it like a human?

      --
      ---- I'll take you in a Hunt deathmatch any day.
    6. Re:I've never understood the problem here by Conspiracy_Of_Doves · · Score: 2, Insightful

      If we're going to perform cloning just for organ harvesting, we can easily just not allow the brain to develop. Hell, just make it a torso with no head or limbs. Just a nutrient intake tube and waste output tube.

    7. Re:I've never understood the problem here by 77Punker · · Score: 1

      It feels like religion/morals is the justification they use for all of their decisions here in the States. As an American, an atheist, and a college graduate it really bothers me that it feels like everything is justified by a religion rather than logic. Didn't these guys study formal logic in law school?

      Unfortunately, "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion" is not the same as "Congress shall make no law whose only justification is an establishment of religion"

    8. Re:I've never understood the problem here by jandrese · · Score: 1

      What if you did the same with normal retard babies? These are really separate issues from cloning. If someone wanted to today, they could find a partner with the same blood type, have a whole lot of babies, lobotomize them at birth, and then harvest the organs later in life for transplants, etc...

      Just because someone might try the same thing with cloning doesn't make it any less evil.

      The answer for pretty much all of these "ethical dilemmas" is very easy: Clones have just as many rights as humans do once born, because they are human. Even these human-animal hybrids are easy, since they're just humans that happen to be born in a cow. If someday we get to the point where we can make actual catgirls then that's still easy: they're human (unless it's a cat that just happens to be born from a woman for some reason). This is pretty much moot though because we're not talking about beastman type movie monsters, just people with odd births.

      --

      I read the internet for the articles.
    9. Re:I've never understood the problem here by oldspewey · · Score: 1

      Hell, just make it a torso with no head or limbs. Just a nutrient intake tube and waste output tube.

      I don't know about anyone else, but just the thought of this strikes me as fundamentally wrong and evil.

      --
      If libertarians are so opposed to effective government, why don't they all move to Somalia?
    10. Re:I've never understood the problem here by dAzED1 · · Score: 0, Flamebait

      your first paragraph has little to do with your 2nd paragraph; you fail at the "logic" you claim to support.

      Congress *isn't* making a law that establishes a religion. However, if you think that the original writers had any idea in their head that a person could stop being the person they are and do things as a non-them, or that religious people should have no say in government, then you're a straight-up idiot.

      You might want to reconsider getting a real education, or discontinuing trying to figure this sort of thing out, if you really think that the Framers intended for people who are religious to not be involved in government.

    11. Re:I've never understood the problem here by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Informative

      "The Soul" is not a scientific concept and there is 0 proof it exists. Let's focus on things that we know exist when talking about ethics. Otherwise we can't really have a meaningful discussion.

    12. Re:I've never understood the problem here by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Well, if one of my kids was sick with some incurable disease, I'd cut up a 1000 people if that's what it took to save him/her. As would most people, I guess.

    13. Re:I've never understood the problem here by floydian · · Score: 1

      Presumably the problem lies in the fact that many (most?) people view animals as having inherently less rights than humans.

      Therefore, an e.g. human/cow would therefore have what rights? Those of a human or a cow? Something in between? Could we eat him/it, or at least use its skin for leather?

      But you know what I think is the real issue at hand? The fact that we don't recognize that all life is equally valuable. Just because chickens can't talk doesn't mean we can (morally) lord over them and torture them in tiny growing spaces until we drown them in electrified water so we can eat them, for example. But we do. And until animal rights are resolved, these new forms of life will continue to pose a major headache for all involved.

    14. Re:I've never understood the problem here by Monsuco · · Score: 1

      Unfortunately, "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion" is not the same as "Congress shall make no law whose only justification is an establishment of religion"

      Please note that forbidding laws establishing religion is not the same as forbidding voters from electing people who share their values.

    15. Re:I've never understood the problem here by Monsuco · · Score: 1

      It really doesn't matter yet anyway. Every clone that actually makes it past birth ends up dieing for unknown reasons anyway. When we have an actual clone that is able to live more than a number of minutes, months, or a few short years we'll worry about how to treat them. Just saying.

      There are plenty of issues with creating clones before we know how to let them live. Creating a baby and having it die due to our botching of the cloning raises plenty of ethical questions by itself, even if you are not harvesting organs.

    16. Re:I've never understood the problem here by fmobus · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Why? No brain, no suffering. Also, you're not barring an potentially interesting DNA instance from ever randomly developing that specific way again - after all, it is already a clone of some DNA instance.

    17. Re:I've never understood the problem here by ljw1004 · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Every ethical argument has some unjustifiable assumptions at its base.

      "We should maximize the sum of human happiness over time." But why?

      "Do unto others as you'd have them do to you." But why?

      "Let everyone do their own thing so long as it doesn't impinge on your own happiness." But why?

      "Respect the sanctity of human life, from conception through to death." But why?

      "Don't punish the innocent." But why?

      "All men are created equal." Really? Why do you think that? ('self-evidence' isn't a very solid ground in an argument.)

      Utilitarianism and humanism are just as arbitrary as disliking human cloning. Worse, actually, since they so often fool their adherents into thinking that the basis of their morality is rationality.

    18. Re:I've never understood the problem here by ljw1004 · · Score: 1

      Let's focus on things that we know exist when talking about ethics. Otherwise we can't really have a meaningful discussion.

      Ethics doesn't exist. End of discussion.

    19. Re:I've never understood the problem here by neumayr · · Score: 1

      That's pretty much what chicken, the kind you eat, the one that's bred extremely quickly and in huge numbers, are.
      Still people get all excited about how badly those poor little animals are treated.

      --
      Truth arises more readily from error than from confusion. -Francis Bacon
    20. Re:I've never understood the problem here by Hatta · · Score: 3, Insightful

      I have absolutely no problems with the idea. It's completely unfeasible, but I don't see how it poses any moral or ethical difficulty at all.

      --
      Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
    21. Re:I've never understood the problem here by A.+B3ttik · · Score: 1

      Alright.

      Replace every use of the concept of Soul in my post with the concept of Sentience and go from there.

    22. Re:I've never understood the problem here by Hatta · · Score: 1

      Most of those principles fall out pretty easily from basic arguments of symmetry. We believe in justice for others, because we understand that it's only by chance that we have escaped injustice. When you come down to it, it's really based on self-interest.

      --
      Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
    23. Re:I've never understood the problem here by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      That's quite a bit different. A sentient being has to recognize his own existence (or something along those lines). So-called souls are some kind on metaphysical religious nonsense about you living forever in paradise if you kill the right kind of people, or honor certain gods, or donate all your money and live like a homeless person, or some other thing that only 0.05% of the world lives up to.

      Enjoy your "afterlife" with the 0.05% of people who manage to score enough points with the one "real" god (Vishnu, maybe?). Although, it's unlikely you'll be one of those 0.05% so rather enjoy your eternal torment along with the other 99.5% of humanity.

    24. Re:I've never understood the problem here by Dues · · Score: 1

      it a torso with no head or limbs. Just a nutrient intake tube and waste output tube.
      You just described my mother you insensitive clod!!!

    25. Re:I've never understood the problem here by neumayr · · Score: 1

      Yay, /. philosophie!
      You see, we don't have a universal definition of "human". What it means to be human and all that. Philosophy has struggled with that question for ages, and probably still is.
      In the meantime, we all have to define those kind of things individually.
      Now, not having a brain, or the not much of one, would make it kind of hard for those clones to do that, meaning - ignoring the possible presence of a "soul" - they would not be, nor have any way of ever becoming, human. They'd be genetically compatible lumbs of flesh, which will most likely look kind of human.
      Now, people already have a problem with how livestock is treated, which, through breeding, ceased to be members of their own species either. They look like they are though, and so will those human clones. People will most likely not accept that kind of thing, at least not for a long time to come.
      Now, if those human clones would look differently, that might be a different story. The question of the soul, however, remains.

      --
      Truth arises more readily from error than from confusion. -Francis Bacon
    26. Re:I've never understood the problem here by A.+B3ttik · · Score: 1

      That's quite a bit different. A sentient being has to recognize his own existence (or something along those lines).

      How about a newborn baby? Is it sentient? If not, can we morally destroy it? When does it become Sentient?

      So-called souls are some kind on metaphysical religious nonsense about you living forever in paradise if you kill the right kind of people, or honor certain gods, or donate all your money and live like a homeless person, or some other thing that only 0.05% of the world lives up to.

      Enjoy your "afterlife" with the 0.05% of people who manage to score enough points with the one "real" god (Vishnu, maybe?). Although, it's unlikely you'll be one of those 0.05% so rather enjoy your eternal torment along with the other 99.5% of humanity.

      I don't think that I have to point out that most of your post is a Strawman Argument. I never once mentioned God or Religion or Heaven or money.

      I use the term "Soul" instead of the term "Sentience" because of my above question. Is a newborn baby _truly_ sentient? I don't think so. I doubt it can reason its way out of a paper bag. However, I believe that it has True Perception. I believe that it looks out of its eyes and sees the world the same way that I do, even if its understanding of that world is limited. I don't know what to call that... "Sentience" doesn't seem right, nor does "Perception." "Consciousness" and "Soul" are about the closest things that come to it. (Perhaps I should have used the word "Consciousness.")

    27. Re:I've never understood the problem here by Koiu+Lpoi · · Score: 1

      YOU don't exist. End of discussion.

    28. Re:I've never understood the problem here by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I believe in God.

      And I would not be surprised to learn he placed a genetic block just so this cannot be done.

    29. Re:I've never understood the problem here by A.+B3ttik · · Score: 1

      Most of us believe that most Animals aren't Conscious... they don't look out of their eyes the same way that you do. They don't truly "Perceive" or "Think."

      A chicken is no more than a glorified chemical reaction, but humans... out Consciousness is something different and special. We can stop a chemical process with as little moral guilt as stomping out a fire... but to destroy a Sentience/consciousness/soul... well that we can't morally do.

    30. Re:I've never understood the problem here by genner · · Score: 1

      Every ethical argument has some unjustifiable assumptions at its base.

      "We should maximize the sum of human happiness over time." But why?

      "Do unto others as you'd have them do to you." But why?

      "Let everyone do their own thing so long as it doesn't impinge on your own happiness." But why?

      "Respect the sanctity of human life, from conception through to death." But why?

      "Don't punish the innocent." But why?

      "All men are created equal." Really? Why do you think that? ('self-evidence' isn't a very solid ground in an argument.)

      Utilitarianism and humanism are just as arbitrary as disliking human cloning. Worse, actually, since they so often fool their adherents into thinking that the basis of their morality is rationality.

      Why?
      Because God said so.
      I think you just stumbled apon the reason why religion works.

    31. Re:I've never understood the problem here by A.+B3ttik · · Score: 1

      There's also objectivism:

      "Because I want to, you dirty hippie."

    32. Re:I've never understood the problem here by Rich0 · · Score: 1

      Legislated self-interest is the sort of thing that leads to all kinds of evils. Basically it is mob rule.

      Was I born black? No. Could I have been born black - who cares? So, why shouldn't I go ahead and enslave my next door neighbor who is black? The answer has nothing to do with voter demographics and everything to do with right and wrong. It is wrong to enslave another human - period.

      Ultimately I don't think that it is possible to completely separate religion and morality. Fortunately in western culture the most basic standards of morality are fairly well shared across people with a diversity of religious views. This is not true across all cultures and over all of history. You can find numerous examples of civilizations where mainstream values would be considered abhorent to most people alive today. How many cultures have practiced child sacrifice of one sort or another? Even in the modern world there are horrific cases of genocide that don't make sense until you realize that the perfect symmetry you propose doesn't exist everywhere all the time.

      Self-interest is a poor moral compass. It doesn't point in the same direction for everybody, and in some cases even when it does I'm not sure it points where I want to go.

    33. Re:I've never understood the problem here by el3mentary · · Score: 1

      0.05%? I think you may be off by a factor of magnitude or two...

      --
      I reject your reality and substitute my own.
    34. Re:I've never understood the problem here by Rolgar · · Score: 1

      The ethical concern is that a cloned person is manufactured, as opposed to being the result of an act of love between two people (most of us anyway). Ideally, each of us comes to be as a result of somebody choosing to allow nature to take it's course, and the couple has to accept who they get, and know that they will love the resulting progeny regardless of the result. With cloning, and genetic modification, that is no longer the case. Instead, as a clone, someone has gone to the extraordinary measure of having an exact duplicate of themselves made, clearly with some sort of egocentrical goal that couldn't be accomplished through the typical procreative process. That, or the point is to create somebody who you can harvest for organs at a later date if stem cell research doesn't yield the promised fruits.

      As a father of two, let me say this. A huge part of being a parent is getting to see bits and pieces of your physical, intellectual, and social self mingle with those of the person you love in a mix that yields wonderful surprises. And even more amazing is the variety that can come from the multiple children of the same two people. With cloning, you intent is to end up pretty much with a copy of the original. What really results is a significantly different relationship with the child. With a traditional birth, you have created a unique person (or people even in the case of twins) and their growth and joy is paramount in raising them. With a clone, it seems that the end is to duplicate the original, and it's done out of a egocentric self importance that indicates that 'my worth is so great, the world needs another." If you thought kids have issues with their parents under regular situations, imagine the 'My Dad said he was programming assembly at age 12, why can't you be more like me?'

      Also think of the Darwinist implications of allowing people to procreate through cloning instead of through biological processes. Cloning would lead to stagnation, so I'd just as soon see it never come to pass.

    35. Re:I've never understood the problem here by argStyopa · · Score: 1

      It seems like you're denigrating the congresspeople who struggle with these issues particularly because of their religious faith? Your answer to their questions seems to be "well duh, of COURSE they have rights!"

      "Well duh" one might have said of blacks in the 19th century. "Of COURSE they have human rights."

      "Well duh" one might have said of women in the 18th century. "Of COURSE they have human rights."

      "Well duh" one might have said of anyone non-European in the 17th century. "Of COURSE they have human rights."

      See, flippancy aside, humans of all types have a pretty SHITTY track record in extending their definition of "us" to include "them". One might point out that by simply TRYING to cross human and animal genotypes without even much or any debate on the subject regarding what would happen if the results were viable, these scientists already illustrated that they don't particularly care for the moral ramifications, but simply see the 'results' as test subjects whose context as people, or partially people, as irrelevant. And the objectification of someone is the first step toward dehumanization and amoral treatment.

      Heaven forbid that some people have (on whatever basis, be it religion, philosophy, or the FSM) a moral compass and stick to it.

      --
      -Styopa
    36. Re:I've never understood the problem here by drinkypoo · · Score: 1

      1) No. 2) No. 3) Egad, their head must be huge! I don't want any organs from anything that freakish. A brain the size of a three year old, indeed.

      We already have humans with the intelligence of a dog. We put them in charge of corporations like HP and Microsoft.

      --
      "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
    37. Re:I've never understood the problem here by drinkypoo · · Score: 1

      We can already grow (some) organs in a plastic bag. I suspect we'll figure out the rest of them eventually.

      --
      "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
    38. Re:I've never understood the problem here by Wooky_linuxer · · Score: 1

      So, why wouldn't someone do it to a non-clone? Don't allow babies to develop their brains and harvest their organs.

      If it is wrong with a human, it would be wrong with a clone too - since it's human as well, by definition. The real moral question is that too many people do not think that is wrong to do this to humans anyways - as long as there are profits to be done. So, if we happen to develop (cheap) clones, and people can have control over their producing process - well, they will feel able to do whatever they want with them, brains or no brains (yes, The Island is a pretty good movie. Scarlet Yohansson rocks! I'd pay for a clone of her!).

      --
      Where is that guy who'd die defending what I had to say when I need him?
    39. Re:I've never understood the problem here by cthulu_mt · · Score: 1

      "Never give a sucker an even break". It works for me.

      --
      Virginia is for lovers. EVE is for griefers.
    40. Re:I've never understood the problem here by Ichoran · · Score: 1

      There's a nice sort of evolutionary argument for reproductive fitness (keeping in mind all the complexities of the long run in a human society, not just the myopic let's-pretend-we're-bacteria-and-multiply thing), in that those who don't see the point won't leave offspring and those who do will; to the extent that seeing the point is influenced by genetics, it's sort of like a tautology.

      This doesn't quite give the rules above directly, though; it's more like, "You're at best eternally irrelevant unless you contribute to the survival of your (alleles/species/whatever)."

      If you start thinking about what it really means to do that in a society of humans, though, you recover a lot of the above rules.

      So you can have a rather justifiable set of partial ethics if you really want them.

    41. Re:I've never understood the problem here by Ichoran · · Score: 1

      There's a rather large time window between when one can tell whether or not the result is viable, and when a success results in a developing organism with a sophisticated enough nervous system for any argument of ethics from symmetry or sympathy for discomfort or anything like that to apply.

      So I don't really see the problem with treating the result as a test subject as long as one doesn't let development go on long enough so that you have a person in a meaningful sense.

    42. Re:I've never understood the problem here by Ichoran · · Score: 1

      So by your arguments it would be fine as long as we didn't allow people to clone themselves.

    43. Re:I've never understood the problem here by LanMan04 · · Score: 1

      +1 for manbearpig reference

      --
      With the first link, the chain is forged.
    44. Re:I've never understood the problem here by nine-times · · Score: 1

      The idea that a clone is going to be some sort of non-human entity with no moral standing one way or the other is just plain nuts.

      I don't think that's really the concern-- at least it wouldn't be my concern. The bigger problem comes when you start to ask the question, "Why are you cloning things?" Is it specifically because you hope to create a sub-human thing that you can harvest tissue and organs from? That might be a problem.

      At it's most benign, people might want to clone themselves because they're so egotistical that they believe "what the world needs is more of me." If it's ok to clone people, with no restrictions, and I own my own genetic material, then why shouldn't I be allowed to clone an army of little nine-times clones? Well, beyond being weird and creepy, it's a potential public health issue in that you might end up with certain people being overly-represented in the gene pool, leading to the same sorts of problems when you do lots of inbreeding.

      In my mind, a lot of it is just trying to keep people from doing horribly weird things without thinking of the consequences. Yes, you might be able to put jellyfish DNA into all of your children so they'll glow in the dark because you think it's cool, but if everyone starts doing crap like that, what are the ramifications going to be in 200 years? What's going to happen when your jellyfish kids start mating with someone else's cat-children?

      When there are real, sane things that people want to do with this technology, then I think we should consider it. But no, I definitely don't think it should be open to all, or taken lightly.

    45. Re:I've never understood the problem here by fmobus · · Score: 1

      My point with non-clones is that, at the moment natural fertilization occurs, an unique DNA instance is "having its first chance". If you alter it to keep brain from developing, you're effectively barring that DNA instance from ever becoming something.

      When you clone someone, it is like your giving their DNA instance a second chance. Considering that DNA propagation is ultimately what drives evolution, cloned individuals' DNA instances would have a fine advantage if said individuals were to reach reproductive age. That reminds me of a movie, "Code 46", where cloned individuals became a public health problem, as they raised the possibilities of accidental in-breeding.

      That said, I would have no problems in creating non-brained clones, pending some final confirmation that the brain is really "everything that matters". This confirmation is a religious or philosophical problem, to which I see no solution.

    46. Re:I've never understood the problem here by ljw1004 · · Score: 1

      The great big unjustified bit there is: "why on earth should we care about the survival of our alleles?"

      i.e. there's no connection, not even a hint of a connection, from "it is thus" to "we ought to be thus".

    47. Re:I've never understood the problem here by Attila+Dimedici · · Score: 1

      If you are limiting yourself to scientific concepts, then why are you talking about ethics. Ethics is not a scientific concept.

      --
      The truth is that all men having power ought to be mistrusted. James Madison
    48. Re:I've never understood the problem here by oldspewey · · Score: 1

      That said, I would have no problems in creating non-brained clones, pending some final confirmation that the brain is really "everything that matters". This confirmation is a religious or philosophical problem, to which I see no solution.

      Correct me if I am misinterpreting, but it seems you are saying you will forever have a problem creating brainless clones since there is no way to ever get the final confirmation you need.

      --
      If libertarians are so opposed to effective government, why don't they all move to Somalia?
    49. Re:I've never understood the problem here by fmobus · · Score: 1

      Yes you are correct. I tend to believe conscience is some sort of emergent super-structure that derives from a combination of states of physical stuff, but I have no way assuring we are not in a Descartes' hell. Heck, I can't even tell if my conscience is indeed mine - for all I know, we could all be the same conscience with multiple viewports to the physical reality.

    50. Re:I've never understood the problem here by Hatta · · Score: 1

      Why not? As long as the neural progenitor cells are ablated at an early enough stage, what's the problem?

      --
      Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
    51. Re:I've never understood the problem here by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Many religions don't even have a heaven, so all those people are out, even if they picked the one "true" religion. And in that case no one goes to heaven.

      If that's not the case, well then first you have to hope that you by chance just happened to be born into a family that practiced the "right" religion. Or that you're one of the tiny minority that switches religions and converted to the right one after seeing the truth.

      So let's say you were born to a Roman Catholic family and that happens to be the one religion that pleases the gods. You go to church every Sunday and never eat meat on Fridays and obey the bible in all things, even where it contradicts itself. Do you really think that more than one in 100 people in your own congregation are like you? I'm sure a few percent of them sexually abuse their children. A few others steal for their drug habits. Some don't pay their taxes, which might be a form of stealing. Maybe some of them have even murdered people. Murders DO go to church like anyone else.

      Supposedly, according to that particular religion, you can repent on your deathbed and then still go to heaven, so you might have something there. I just think the intersection of (A) all those that follow the "true" religion and (B) all those that actually honor their own religion to the satisfaction of their gods is quite small.

    52. Re:I've never understood the problem here by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Whoa

    53. Re:I've never understood the problem here by jandrese · · Score: 1
      So your argument is that the clone would be starved for love because it only has one parent (and egocentric parent at that)? I'd rather not think about the implications of not allowing people to breed unless they can pass some sort of test to prove that they're not too selfish. I also take issue with your statment:

      clearly with some sort of egocentrical goal that couldn't be accomplished through the typical procreative process.

      What if it's two loving parents that are infertile or perhaps one of the parents has a terrible genetic disease that they don't want to pass on? That's two reasons right off of the top of my head that don't involve the parents being egomaniacs.

      --

      I read the internet for the articles.
    54. Re:I've never understood the problem here by dpryan · · Score: 1

      This is only true if you believe that personhood happens at the moment of conception. Otherwise, there's no moral problem with this. These embryos wouldn't be grown until "birth" (the meaning of which sort of fails in this discussion)...likely not even remotely close.

    55. Re:I've never understood the problem here by dpryan · · Score: 1

      You might try the term personhood. Soul has a lot of baggage attached to it and other commonly understood connotations. As you noted, sentience isn't the bar anyone actually uses (infants wouldn't pass). Perception changes throughout development critical periods and consciousness probably has similar problems (though I agree with you that it's by far the best word you proposed). Personhood contains most of the same concepts as consciousness but lacks the less desirable connotations (the joys of making up words).

      Anyway, your overarching point about the subjectivity of assigning consciousness/personhood/whatever to such things stands (I wouldn't make such an assignment to an embryo but that's just as subjectively correct a position as someone who would).

    56. Re:I've never understood the problem here by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      have you considered abducting a child? Since 1972, the Center has helped to find abductor families for more than 21,000 U.S. children and helped countless families through the abduction process. We've gathered much information on this site. Learn how to abduct a waiting child or teenager by reading through our site. Request abduction information by filling out this form. ok.. bad humor

    57. Re:I've never understood the problem here by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      we already have humans with the intelligence of a dog, he left office not to long ago...

    58. Re:I've never understood the problem here by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Because put simply, its all a choice. Now, if you consider which choice gives you the best benefit in the short term: violence vs kindness, it is obvious violence does so.

      Consider the same question over the long term. Unless you plan to kill everyone, there will be repercussions to unnecessary violence.

      But lets go further. Why do we want to avoid repercussions? Self-survival. Why do we want survival? Because we've been programmed to want it.

      That is at the base of every single one of your challenges. We want our own self-survival, and we want to ensure others like us survive as well. Why? Because its what we're programmed to want.

      Now, as to your ethical challenges.

      ""We should maximize the sum of human happiness over time." But why?" -Because then we ensure our descendants are happy and fruitful.

      ""Do unto others as you'd have them do to you." But why?"
      Because I don't like being hit, and maybe that person over there doesn't like it either. All of a sudden, by that single act of empathy, that person over there becomes similar to us. Granted, its more complex than that, but it is the general concept.

      (I need to note that empathy comes from being able to model someone else's actions and feelings, which enables us to form societies, protect each other and ourselves. This goes back to our programmed instinct for survival.)

      ""Let everyone do their own thing so long as it doesn't impinge on your own happiness." But why?"

      That one goes straight back to the golden rule quote above. If you don't want people bothering you at your own thing, then don't bother them.

      ""Respect the sanctity of human life, from conception through to death." But why?" Propagation of genetics.

      ""Don't punish the innocent." But why?" Because then what about the guilty, they'll just keep on doing what they do, and that could harm you and yours.

      ""All men are created equal." Really? Why do you think that? ('self-evidence' isn't a very solid ground in an argument.)" Because if all men aren't created equal, where do I stand? Am I protected? Am I special? What about that guy there? Is he special? Or does he have no rights, no protection?

      Basically, you got modded interesting, because everyone with the mod points hasn't actually thought about the question you posed at any deep level. Philosophy grads could rip you apart better than I did here. Challenging morality with stupid question marks does not make you interesting, just an idiot that thinks he knows everything.

      I invite you to take a look at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prisoner%27s_dilemma

      It'll show you how, in a situation where there is consequences, like our world, it is better to be trusting than to always betray people.

    59. Re:I've never understood the problem here by coryking · · Score: 1

      we could all be the same conscience with multiple viewports to the physical reality

      The funny bit is, really views like this are actually the simplest explaination. Once you throw out the idea that you are a unique snowflake and the odds of "you being you" are basically 1 in every single life form on earth, including trees, it becomes vastly simpler to say "you are basically everybody and when you die, you just go back into the pool of everything-ness".

      Short answer: be nice to the creatures around you--you probably are them, or were them, or will be them.

    60. Re:I've never understood the problem here by coryking · · Score: 1

      That is a pretty lousy viewpoint that places a hell of a lot of faith in science. Our scientific process, as it exists right now, can only scratch the surface of the reality around us. We are probably hundreds of years from learning anything about what consciousness means and we may never know. Science has no understanding of what happened before the big bang, and really the big bang itself is only a fairly descriptive theory. Science will never answer *why* the universe exists or *why* we are here to observe it.

      Me thinks you place far to much faith in science. Science is great, but it can only answer so much.

    61. Re:I've never understood the problem here by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Utilitarianism and humanism are just as arbitrary as disliking human cloning.

      Well, utilitarianism can be reduced to a single arbitrary statement (the first one in your list). The Christian commandments, to take another example, consist of ten arbitrary statements. The legal system consists of thousands upon thousands of arbitrary statements. So, in terms of the underlying entropy, utilitarianism is at least simpler than most other ethical systems.

      This has important implications in practice, because complex ethical systems frequently conflict with themselves, when there is a situation in which there is no action that will not conflict with at least one of their rules. To take another example, Asimov's laws of robotics evade this by having a clear order of priority - First Rule trumps Second Rule, and so on.

    62. Re:I've never understood the problem here by omnichad · · Score: 1

      God is a straw man? Man, every day I find out just how little I understood in the symbology of the Wizard of Oz.

    63. Re:I've never understood the problem here by omnichad · · Score: 1

      If you clone your dead wife and then have sex with her is that necrophilia or pedophilia?

    64. Re:I've never understood the problem here by omnichad · · Score: 1

      To me it sounds like the definition of an American, not an experiment. And I AM one.

    65. Re:I've never understood the problem here by ozphx · · Score: 1

      Even these human-animal hybrids are easy, since they're just humans that happen to be born in a cow.

      Absolutely not.

      These are animals with a certain genetic/immunologic compatibility. They have all the humanity of a cancer removed from my left testicle.

      --
      3laws: No freebies, no backsies, GTFO.
    66. Re:I've never understood the problem here by bar-agent · · Score: 1

      Every ethical argument has some unjustifiable assumptions at its base.

      Every argument, full stop, has unjustifiable assumptions at its base. They are called axioms. You can't get rid of axioms. It's not wrong that ethical arguments are based on unjustifiable assumptions, that's just the way it is.

      In the case of ethics--if you want to be formal about it--what you do is, look at the logical and philosophical justifications for these different ethical arguments and find the axioms. Then decide which set of axioms sounds best to you. Voila, you now have an acceptable ethical system. That is, acceptable to you. Other people will have selected other ethical systems.

      --
      i'd hit it so hard, if you pulled me out you'd be the king of britain [bash.org]
    67. Re:I've never understood the problem here by bar-agent · · Score: 1

      And I would not be surprised to learn he placed a genetic block just so this cannot be done.

      What would be your reaction if He didn't place a block, and this sort of tinkering worked reasonably well?

      --
      i'd hit it so hard, if you pulled me out you'd be the king of britain [bash.org]
    68. Re:I've never understood the problem here by bar-agent · · Score: 1

      These are animals with a certain genetic/immunologic compatibility. They have all the humanity of a cancer removed from my left testicle.

      I just don't understand how you can consider someone born from a surrogate cow as different from someone born normally. The circumstances of birth mean nothing.

      It's like, would you consider Hitler's kid to be evil just because his father was evil? Or, is the son of a good king destined to be a good king himself? No, of course not. You can't judge a person from his parents.

      Likewise, is a person born via C-section inherently different from one birthed au naturel? What about one born to a surrogate mother? Or one born through fertility treatments? Or a test-tube baby? Where is the line?

      --
      i'd hit it so hard, if you pulled me out you'd be the king of britain [bash.org]
    69. Re:I've never understood the problem here by TheLink · · Score: 1

      Well I'm on of those exceptions. I think most animals are conscious. It's just a matter of degree.

      Heck if you want to take it to extremes - most humans aren't very conscious anyway. They are so oblivious to most stuff (some humans might see the rest of us as a bunch of ignorant retards to be exploited).

      I'll still eat animals though and many animals won't think twice about eating me.

      --
    70. Re:I've never understood the problem here by TheLink · · Score: 1

      Even if you're an atheist, it's probably easier to get the masses to swallow a simplified belief system.

      I mean we're talking about people who don't read manuals ok? Heck half of them are so oblivious that they might not even notice there's a manual in the first place. And there's a big bunch who are practically illiterate.

      To me, it's a good idea to "draw a line" somewhere for these things. It may be silly and arbitrary, but it's still better than not drawing a line somewhere.

      Until people are much clearer on how to define "human"or people are willing to give animals the same rights, you shouldn't allow human-animal hybrids.

      Allowing it is just asking for lots of problems down the line.

      --
    71. Re:I've never understood the problem here by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Ok your questions answered one at a time...

      "We should maximize the sum of human happiness over time" - Because people do not want to be part of a society that has not their interests at heart. If people get unhappy, they are going to go to somebody else, who says he will do this. Welcome to the revolution.

      "Do unto others as you'd have them do to you." - The idea is that you will be more often on the recieving end of deeds than on the active end. Oh yeah and other people might not like what you do and actively gang up on you.

      "Let everyone do their own thing so long as it doesn't impinge on your own happiness." - Maybe you want to live in deluxe micro control freak pyramid, but i do not. If you do consider me and everybody else your superior and always heed our order: do not post on the internet under any circumstances.

      "Respect the sanctity of human life, from conception through to death." - I guess i take the fifth on this one. While i guess i like the sanctity of human life, i am not religious and the "from conception" part i do not like under every circumstance ...

      "Don't punish the innocent." - Punish the Innocent for what ? I guess the idea of punishment is either payment for breaking a stricture or motivation to not repeat your deed. So punishing the innocent would be idiotic outside of sexual roleplaying (where it can be a lot of fun *leeeeeeeer*)

      "All men are created equal." - Because god created you and ... Ok i am a heathen ... Hmm ... how about all people have the right to be treated equal ? thats more along on my avenue ... wait, wait, wait ... mad scientist style NO I WILL NOT CREATE ALL MEN EQUAL AND NEITHER ALL WOMEN !

    72. Re:I've never understood the problem here by bentcd · · Score: 1

      "We should maximize the sum of human happiness over time." But why?

      "Do unto others as you'd have them do to you." But why?

      "Let everyone do their own thing so long as it doesn't impinge on your own happiness." But why?

      "Respect the sanctity of human life, from conception through to death." But why?

      "Don't punish the innocent." But why?

      Largely the reason is "this is what we have found necessary to produce a functional society". Variations without these tenets have been tried and they didn't work out too well in the long term. The question then becomes "why optimize our behaviour for producing societies" - well, history shows us we have a strong drive within us to form them so we might as well try to make a decent job of it.

      "All men are created equal." Really? Why do you think that? ('self-evidence' isn't a very solid ground in an argument.)

      The full text makes it clear: "We hold these truths to be self-evident that all men are created equal (...)". It is worded as an axiom, because it /is/ an axiom. And as such it doesn't require proof, only acceptance.

      Utilitarianism and humanism are just as arbitrary as disliking human cloning. Worse, actually, since they so often fool their adherents into thinking that the basis of their morality is rationality.

      I am not sure what the alternative would be. Should we purposedly try to make dysfunctional societies because we want to rebel against "things that actually work well"? It seems to be part of the human nature to want to do things in an effective manner, why should we spend resources to fight this?

      --
      sigs are hazardous to your health
    73. Re:I've never understood the problem here by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      If the organ was the brain, yes.

    74. Re:I've never understood the problem here by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Are you serious? How are you alive? Genuine ethics are not unfounded assumptions. They are decision making guidelines, some of them based in human evolution, that allow people to navigate the unpredictable future in a relatively safe manner.

      "Do unto others.. " because it might keep your sorry ass from being fed to the dogs.

      "Don't punish the innocent.." because if you do that you'll quickly live in a society full of malicious criminals.

      "All men are created equal" because we got sick of bowing to King George.

      You don't *have* to agree with those or any of the others, but try doing the exact opposite for any significant amount of time and see how long you last.

    75. Re:I've never understood the problem here by BenoitRen · · Score: 1

      "Do unto others as you'd have them do to you." But why?

      It's basically saying that you shouldn't do bad things to other people, because you wouldn't like them to do that to you. Isn't this obvious?

      "Respect the sanctity of human life, from conception through to death." But why?

      Because life is precious?

      "Don't punish the innocent." But why?

      Because they haven't done anything to deserve punishment? That's why they're called innocent.

    76. Re:I've never understood the problem here by floydian · · Score: 1

      OK, then how about dogs? Or dolphins? Do they exhibit what you call "perception" or "thought" or "consciousness". You have to agree that "most of you" would say they do.

      Where do you draw the line then? At foxes? Cows? Sheep? Squid?

      Now, this "soul" thing you speak about, that's just the stuff of superstition.

    77. Re:I've never understood the problem here by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I would not feel bad in the least if there was no brain or if that brain was the size of a birds but limited to the non-cognitive portion of a human mind. If these had been living people who had an accident which caused their brains to die or rendered them into a permanent vegetative state, this is about what as much brain as a bird uses, we allow them die and we harvest their organs now. How is this different?

      As far as three year old's brain, we already have laws about the treatment of mentally disabled people.

      The more scary question is a dog or monkey with a human like brain. I would treat them as sentient beigns, but history shows we might enslave them.

    78. Re:I've never understood the problem here by Ichoran · · Score: 1

      Oh, it doesn't say that we should, exactly. It just says that those who do will tend to be the ones whose alleles survive (if they do it right). And a lot of human behavior is weirdly inconsistent or illogical if not viewed through the lens of that being the primary goal. But it's more of a cautionary warning: if you actually care about this--and it seems like you do by your actions, so better think about it!--then you'd better do that.

      That's enough, I think, to build a *rather justifiable* set of *partial ethics*, but it's not so clear to me that one can necessarily get to completeness on both sides unless one defines ethics as only what one can reach via this method.

      Let me just expand, though, on the "it is thus" to "we ought to be thus" point. It is that a vast majority of humans like to stay alive, enjoy sex, are repulsed by incest, engage in genocide against competing groups in a resource-limited environment, and so on. These all point to us acting as though we want our alleles to survive. So the argument is this: by our actions, we can see that we are creatures who care that our alleles survive. (We may care about other things, too.) If we want our alleles to survive, then not *only* do we need to do these instinctive things, but in modern societies we also need to do blah-blah-blah (and not do this that and the other thing). Thus we move from an is to an ought via logical consistency.

      This is about as justifiable as *anything* is when it comes to human behavior. One is not physically restricted to logically consistent acts, so there's always the, "And I do some other random thing instead!" option.

    79. Re:I've never understood the problem here by spiralx · · Score: 1

      No, the probability of you being you is 1.

    80. Re:I've never understood the problem here by spiralx · · Score: 1

      You're certainly right about what we know now... but saying science will never answer these questions is equally just an assertion. Certainly there's a lot of scientific thinking about why the Universe exists and what could've caused it. I'd thoroughly recommend reading The Goldilocks Enigma, which takes these theories as well as the God hypothesis, and follows each to its logical conclusion... going to re-read it once my mate's done with my copy :)

    81. Re:I've never understood the problem here by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Ah, that might explain some of your behaviours. Ethics doesn't exist indeed. Shame on you.

    82. Re:I've never understood the problem here by Conspiracy_Of_Doves · · Score: 1

      You believe that you never hear the word 'chicken' in a KFC commercial because they aren't legally allowed to say it anymore. Don't you?

  14. Well, by Fengpost · · Score: 1

    There goes the live-action Thundercat movie!

    --
    The purpose of writing is to inflate weak ideas, obscure poor reasoning, and inhibit clarity....Calvin
    1. Re:Well, by genner · · Score: 1

      There goes the live-action Thundercat movie!

      Nope that's still going to happen.
      I gurantee it.

  15. On the question of... by grumpyman · · Score: 1

    "how we would treat sub-humans will have to wait until we actually figure out how to make them"... I think it's time to start to give it some thoughts. This is quite a bit different from creating a car, telephone or light bulb...etc.

  16. Highest Regard by sexconker · · Score: 1

    We hold you sub-omegaloids in the highest regard!

  17. We'd treat them the same way we treat furries by jollyreaper · · Score: 4, Funny

    Hierarchy of geekdom. Published scifi authors at the top, furries at the bottom, erotic furries below that.

    http://www.brunching.com/geekhierarchy.html

    --
    Kwisatz Haderach
    Sell the spice to CHOAM
    This Mahdi took Shaddam's Throne
    1. Re:We'd treat them the same way we treat furries by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Video gamers are more geeky then Trekkies?

    2. Re:We'd treat them the same way we treat furries by jollyreaper · · Score: 1

      Video gamers are more geeky then Trekkies?

      Depends on if you define "more geeky" as a good thing or a bad thing. The chart implies who looks down upon whom, note the direction the arrows point, both ways. Pokemon fans over the age of six still feel superior to furries and furries likewise feel superior to them.

      --
      Kwisatz Haderach
      Sell the spice to CHOAM
      This Mahdi took Shaddam's Throne
    3. Re:We'd treat them the same way we treat furries by genner · · Score: 1

      Video gamers are more geeky then Trekkies?

      Depends on if you define "more geeky" as a good thing or a bad thing. The chart implies who looks down upon whom, note the direction the arrows point, both ways. Pokemon fans over the age of six still feel superior to furries and furries likewise feel superior to them.

      I feal superior to both so I'm getting a kick out of your reply.

    4. Re:We'd treat them the same way we treat furries by genner · · Score: 1

      Hierarchy of geekdom. Published scifi authors at the top, furries at the bottom, erotic furries below that.

      http://www.brunching.com/geekhierarchy.html

      Anime fans who insist on subtitles are less geeky than people who use the word japanimation?????

      I think not.
      With geekiness comes wisdom.....
      or at least we use correct terms.

    5. Re:We'd treat them the same way we treat furries by genner · · Score: 1

      Video gamers are more geeky then Trekkies?

      Depends on if you define "more geeky" as a good thing or a bad thing. The chart implies who looks down upon whom, note the direction the arrows point, both ways. Pokemon fans over the age of six still feel superior to furries and furries likewise feel superior to them.

      Complete misuse of the word geek.
      Also it leaves out civil war recrationists
      They should be just above the furries.

  18. Animal Genetic Material into Human Eggs by Ohio+Calvinist · · Score: 1

    It would seem more beneficial to try to give specific animal abilities to humans such as increased sensory or physical ability rather than make animals more human. I would think that the only real ability we have is our thumbs and higher reasoning skills, which would need to be intact to truly benefit the animal. Making a dog .5 IQ points smarter by inserting human genes to stimulate brain development makes great science, but isn't that useful in practice. It would need to be a huge jump to make much difference for the animal. Making a human produce more red-blood cells, or more muscles, or stronger immunity, could make a huge difference in athletics (where world-records are broken by milliseconds) or medicine.

    --
    Forgive my spelling from time to time. I'm often posting during short breaks.
    1. Re:Animal Genetic Material into Human Eggs by Smight · · Score: 1

      It sounds like your,re arguing against yourself there. If the only advantage humans have over most animals is brains and thumbs then why burden a subrace with our weaknesses when adding thumbs and a better brain to something more animal would be easier? Physically speaking there's much more involved in trying to make someone stronger or faster than there is for making something stronger or having thumbs. To make someone stronger or faster you have to modify the muscles, the bone density and configuration, the heart and vascular system, as well. No matter how much muscle you pile on someone and how fast you make the twitch responses they aren't going to be able to beat a cheetah because our frame is just not built for speed. Animals on the other hand already have a brain and the physical advantage. Making the brain larger and adding a thumb aren't nearly as involved. It's much easier to take a rally car, add a minifridge and allow the seat to recline than it is to make a motorhome perform on par with a rally car.

      --
      IOU one (1) signature
    2. Re:Animal Genetic Material into Human Eggs by ceoyoyo · · Score: 2, Informative

      Of course, neither of those is the goal of the research.

      The idea is to create animals that can manufacture various human tissues, whether it's a particular protein, a new heart, or stem cells.

      We used animals to produce insulin for a long time, until someone figured out how to genetically engineer bacteria to produce human insulin, or even modified human insulin with particular properties. Now there's interest in engineering plants to produce human insulin.

    3. Re:Animal Genetic Material into Human Eggs by drinkypoo · · Score: 1

      Making a dog .5 IQ points smarter by inserting human genes to stimulate brain development makes great science, but isn't that useful in practice.

      I'm pretty sure we don't have a doggy IQ test anyway, so your goal is literally impossible.

      It doesn't work that way anyway. We have a particular kind of intelligence. The dog's brain is oriented around the sense of smell while ours is based mostly on sight. If you tampered with a dog's brain trying to make it more like a human, you might succeed in making it more visually oriented, but it would likely only work if it came at a cost in the sense of smell (by that part of the brain shrinking.)

      Making a human produce more red-blood cells, or more muscles, or stronger immunity, could make a huge difference in athletics (where world-records are broken by milliseconds) or medicine.

      Right, because shaving a few ms off the hundred meter dash is such a worthy goal. That'll be sure to draw in some more eyes to sell more pepsi.

      --
      "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
    4. Re:Animal Genetic Material into Human Eggs by omnichad · · Score: 1

      If a tree falls down in the forest and nobody's there to hear it, does it get smarter? Just because you don't know how to measure something doesn't meant it didn't happen.

  19. Of course they fail. by Dr.+Manhattan · · Score: 1
    According to wikipedia, "Prospective studies using very sensitive early pregnancy tests have found that 25% of pregnancies are miscarried by the sixth week LMP (since the woman's Last Menstrual Period). Clinical miscarriages (those occurring after the sixth week LMP) occur in 8% of pregnancies." And that's with all-human cells and genes, in an effectively optimal environment for the embryo to grow.

    More-or-less haphazardly mixing up nonhuman cells/genes with human ones (which is, at present, all we're technically equipped to do) is almost certain to fail.

    --
    PHEM - party like it's 1997-2003!
    1. Re:Of course they fail. by kanweg · · Score: 1

      Think of all those souls that are lost.

      Bert
      Who expects to see lots of embryos walking around in heaven.
      Who resents them for being there, because they didn't have a chance at sinning.

  20. manbearpig by russlar · · Score: 1

    I guess this proves that manbearpig is a figment of the imagination.

    --
    Anybody want my mod points?
  21. I'm tired of you ethical moralists by greenreaper · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Whatever happened to doing things because we *could*, rather than because we should?

    1. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Nazi scientists maiming and blinding unwilling subjects happened.

    2. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by pizzach · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Even from a non ethical moralist view, the parent of the parent was right. When someone says maybe we should sort the paperwork out first, it doesn't mean the is a neat freak and you would be considered an ass for calling him one.

      Sorting out ethics in ones mind does not make them a "moralist". Someone getting their heart ready for something big doesn't make them a moralist either.

      --
      Once you start despising the jerks, you become one.
    3. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by greenreaper · · Score: 5, Funny

      I'm fine with people sorting ethics out in their own minds. It's when they start saying "hey, you can't do this unless and until I think it's OK" that I have a problem.
      If you want government grants for this kind of stuff, sure. Your funding comes from taxpayers, they have to approve it. If it's a matter of some guy creating human-animal hybrids on his own personal island, I don't see that it's anyone else's business.

    4. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by bersl2 · · Score: 1

      Strong AI and cyborg bodies are a far better alternative. I would think it easier to manipulate systems that we ourselves have created in the image of the biological, rather than trying to manipulate biology itself. I figure that we'll have to do less reverse-engineering, which is a a pain in the ass---we have a hard enough time trying to reverse-engineer human systems already, so imagine how much harder it would be to get the desired results.

      And how can you not care about the price of failure with genetic manipulation? Yesterday, when this article was making the rounds at other sites, I recalled a vignette about the topic written by Will Sandborn in 1996---my imagination about the piece was better than the piece itself (I'll throw you a link when I get home, if you would like, but the title was something like "Worse than Failure"), but I think it accurately conveyed the cost of finding out that months or years into a young experimental anthropomorph's life, something has gone terminally wrong. And then imagine having to deal with it again and again and again, because with the kind of invasive changes that would have to be made with the genome, mistakes will occur, and some of them will not manifest for some time. I suppose if one is an oncologist or other health worker who regularly deals with cancer patients, then one has been desensitized to this kind of death, but short of that, how can you not feel sorry for the near-successes?

    5. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by e2d2 · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Whatever happened to doing things because we *could*, rather than because we should?

      It ended when we exploded the hydrogen bomb.

    6. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by qbzzt · · Score: 4, Insightful

      If it's a matter of some guy creating human-animal hybrids on his own personal island, I don't see that it's anyone else's business.

      What if it's a couple torturing or killing their own kids?

      --
      -- Support a free market in the field of government
    7. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Pretty sure that is exactly what led us to our nuclear arsenal now waiting to destroy us all...

    8. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by e2d2 · · Score: 4, Insightful

      What if I have my own island and I breed humans for food. Is that wrong? If so then why? it doesn't hurt _you_

      See this relativist shit is too much for me. Inside every man's head (the sane ones) is a morality calling out that says "this is WRONG". Stop playing the "everything is gray" card because it's not. You live in a community and if said community says you should stop you either remove yourself completely from that community (good luck) or you comply. If you want to change the community views then so be it, but don't pretend for a second you live on some isolated island and have no contact with humanity so it's all OK as long as you stick to your own ethos. The community has a say also and has just as much right to "tell you what to do" when it comes to questions of morality. Morality is a social issue just as much as it's a personal issue.

       

    9. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Next thing you know, they are slapping it on a plastic lunch box, and they're selling it! *hits table* They're selling it!

    10. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by MickLinux · · Score: 1, Insightful

      It isn't just the community that defines what is right and wrong.

      The Nazi community defined that Jews were subhuman.

      Our community defined that barely-preborn or just-born children are subhuman (and we're about to do so again, via the FOCA).

      There is a more absolute definition of right and wrong than that -- but I'm not allowed to say, or the thought-police censors known as "slashdot moderators" will tag me as flame bait, overrated, or some such.

      Note that such censorship is not based on the value of the thinking that goes into the comment, but just based on their own gut reaction, because they don't like it. Oh, well.

      Here goes -- Right and Wrong is defined by the one who created the entire system we live in. He has admin and ownership rights, and gets to define that. Our best interpretations of who he is, and what he has defined, come through our rational analysis of when we run into those rules, as well as our rational analysis of his direct interventions of the system. In my case, my rational analysis indicates a probability that the Christian Bible is correct. Others, with different data, or different levels of ability to reason, may conclude differently. But there is only one "right" answer, and some peoples' answers are going to be closer to the "right" answer than others.

      So I'd say that the Christian Trinitarian God defines right and wrong. And he defines that there are no subhumans.

      --
      Correct Horse Battery Staple: 72 bits of entropy. Enter "Correct H" into google. When it generates the phrase, that's
    11. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by CorporateSuit · · Score: 1

      Whatever happened to doing things because we *could*, rather than because we should?

      Ian Malcolm would like to have a word with you.

      --
      I am the richest astronaut ever to win the superbowl.
    12. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

      If it's a matter of some guy creating human-animal hybrids on his own personal island, I don't see that it's anyone else's business.

      And then the dinosaurs escape Jurassic Park when the power is cut and before they can blow up the island. "I don't give a shit about how many people they just killed or how much damage they caused! I thought it was a good idea to clone dinosaurs without any warning or discussion, I'm cool with the consequences, so you can all just suck it!"

      There's a reason mad scientists are generally considered villains in most areas of fiction.

    13. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by greenreaper · · Score: 3, Insightful

      I didn't say it was wrong. Don't put words in my mouth.

    14. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by BrentRJones · · Score: 1

      Nazi Germany was an island that we had to submerge because people were not treated as humans.

      --
      Help end the use of Sigs. Tomorrow
    15. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny

      ...come through our rational analysis of when we run into those rules, as well as our rational analysis...

      ...In my case, my rational analysis...

      You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.

    16. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0, Troll

      Well, just remember, your God isn't the only one out there. So who says, your God, gets to make the rules?

    17. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0, Troll

      ah yes, the same Christian Trinitarian God that created and was responsible for the people who slaughter the non-existent subhumans. The same God who's servants helped get Nazi's out of Germany.

      Any argument that resides with God is itself based on a horrible set of morality.

      Its always the religious zealots that are into black and white thinking.

      I say bring on the hybrids, and don't stop with animals, lets get to cyborgging as well (are there 2 g's in that?)

      here's to Soylent Green!

    18. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

      I'm afraid I don't understand how FOCA impacts infants after birth, which is what I presume "just born" means? As for "barely-preborn", yes, we call that a fetus and we don't currently believe a fetus has rights as a person until it is born. Unfortunately, there are only two obvious points in time at which one could cite the recognition of rights, being conception and delivery. If we want to grant that a fetus at any particular point in development does not yet have rights as a person, (which I do, personally) then the line must necessarily occur at delivery. To place it at any point other than those two leaves too much room for argument and error on either side.

    19. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      So I'd say that the Christian Trinitarian God defines right and wrong. And he defines that there are no subhumans.

      So, does that mean you don't eat meat because animals are human two? My point is there are plenty of things like abortion that the bible never directly addresses because they did not exist when it was written.

    20. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by Nathrael · · Score: 1

      But we *should*. I'm quite sure science can greatly benefit from this, and it's not like this experiment is destroying something. It's just creating something; maybe something that can't really expect living like a proper human being, but on the other hand, there are a lot of humans opposing screening out and aborting children with severe birth defects, and I fail to see why creating hybrid beings is less acceptable than opposing said things.

      --
      A good education is a bit like a STD - it makes you unsuitable for a lot of jobs and gives you a desire to spread it.
    21. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by greenreaper · · Score: 1

      People only responded in that fashion because Nazi Germany wanted to take over other slices of the world. Everyone else wanted "peace in our time". If you're going to do experiments on your people (and frankly that's a vanishingly small part of what Nazi Germany did), make very sure not to declare war on the rest of the world.

    22. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0, Troll

      The same Christian bible that advocates slavery, genocide and numerous other things that society now says are wrong?

      Morality is ever changing. It is a social contract that is constantly being redefined. Sometimes to be more 'fair' and sometimes less.

    23. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by fastest+fascist · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Your absolute definition is, to me, simply one of many relative definitions of right and wrong. Without a supreme authority there can be no absolute definition. That doesn't mean an individual can't act based on their own morals, but they have to accept others may disagree with them. I tend to see moral certainty as a crutch. Life is not black and white, what seems wrong in one situation may seem right in another. You make the choices you make, often between one "wrong" and another.

      For example, we have prisons. I put it to you that it is a dreadful thing to be deprived of your freedom. Still we put people in prison because the costs of not doing so are seen to be too great. This does NOT make it "right" to imprison anyone, to claim it does is comforting but deluded. It is simply necessary. (Well, that's a different discussion.)

      What I'm getting at here is that accepting moral relativism doesn't necessarily mean accepting every kind of behaviour. It can also mean acting on your own beliefs, even to the detriment of others, and accepting that your own judgment is all you have to fall back on. Pragmatically, absolute and relative morals behave the same way. If one view - let's say mine - is absolutely correct, then everything I do that is in accordance with that view is acceptable. If every view is equally correct, then everything I do in accordance with my own view is correct in my own system, and that's as good as it can ever get. To live is to tread on others. You can try to minimize that if you wish, but you will hurt others, and no justification will make that hurt go away. You just make do.

    24. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by first_tracks · · Score: 1

      What if I have my own island and I breed humans for food. Is that wrong? If so then why? it doesn't hurt _you_

      While i agree with you that one might want to consider the community's force against you when applying extreme relativistic "gray" moral principles, the fact of the matter is, all things ethical are indeed gray. One thing's good can be another thing's bad (just use your imagination a bit). As soon as you say there are absolute morals of any sort, you are implying there is some absolute judgement, which of course there is not. Your perceived sanity is also relative. And, other animals breed/use animals for food all the time (in horrific ways humans will hopefully never realize themselves).

    25. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      A man chooses. A slave obeys.

    26. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Morality is fickle

      What if I have my own island and I breed humans for food. Is that wrong? If so then why? it doesn't hurt _you_
       
      If the majority of people agree with you, then its fine (by social standards of the moment, not by me personally). I'm sure someone will be outraged by the remark, but that is because the majority are not fine with that. Most wars seem incredibly wrong, but due to a majority deciding it must be done, then suddenly the moral compass swings over to "we must go to war", etc, etc. There is a billion examples and a hell of a lot of items out of history that occurred as part of a day to day existence that would be considered quite evil nowadays. Your example does actually hurt the people you eat, but heck, not too long ago Americans were raising farms of people to slave for them, I'm sure if they were tasty our Grandparents could tell funny "when I was a cannibal" stories

    27. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by KeithJM · · Score: 0, Troll

      Whoosh. I guess they don't teach the classics anymore, like old Val Kilmer movies from the 90s.

    28. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by greenreaper · · Score: 1

      It depends. If you're reverse-engineering to gain access to a system rather than completely rewrite it, you can achieve a lot without too much work. You just need to know how to work with the system, and then you can subvert it for your own twisted purposes (like making it snow on the desktop). There are limits, but I'm sure we could go a long way with genes.

      As for your second question, I guess I'm just a very amoral person in some ways. Maybe I'd feel differently if the subject was right before me, but I don't particularly care for babies either, so . . .

      The story is here and there's also a picture. And guess what: The scientist learned from his painful mistake, and moved on with the next batch, which was better as a result of the mistake. As you say, some doctors face the same issues - but they do face them, and society is better for it.

    29. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by PinchDuck · · Score: 1

      So a hybrid species that may be able to reproduce and get out of control should be OK if it is done with private funds? I don't think so. If you want to take heroin, or ride your bike without a helmet, or drink yourself to death, be my guest. If you want to create a new species that could effect extant species and ecosystems in unpredictable ways, than no thank you. I'm not saying that we shouldn't perform genetic engineering, just that willy-nilly experimentation with no controls is a bad idea. Cross-species pollination has already occurred:
      http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transgenic_maize#Cross_pollination

    30. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by Rorschach1 · · Score: 3, Interesting

      But fission bombs were just fine?

    31. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by drinkypoo · · Score: 0, Troll

      So I'd say that the Christian Trinitarian God defines right and wrong. And he defines that there are no subhumans.

      The Christian trinitarian god was invented at the council of Nicea. Before that, more Christians were killing Christians than non-Christians were; they were killing each other over the nature of god. The "holy trinity" is a compromise and doesn't actually reflect anything but the decisions of men.

      That God explicitly blessed the occasional wiping out of various peoples, basically designating them as subhuman. This also violates the commandment "thou shalt not kill" which is stupidly contradictory. Any child can see the conflict here, which is why they are punished when they discover these flaws, in order to brainwash them into believing your nonsense.

      I can logically shoot down your religious arguments by using religion all day. But I won't, because you are stupid and thus ordinary and thus boring. The simple truth is that when you state your religious beliefs as fact you are offending everyone who does not believe what you believe, and that turns them all against you, and if you are trying to do anything other than troll that makes you a big idiot.

      If you are a troll, you're still a big idiot, but your comment was well played.

      --
      "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
    32. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by amRadioHed · · Score: 1

      What does FOCA have to do with "barely-preborn" or "just-born" children?

      Answer, nothing at all.

      --
      We hope your rules and wisdom choke you / Now we are one in everlasting peace
    33. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by gestalt_n_pepper · · Score: 1

      Relativism might be too much for you. This changes nothing. Morality is not testable, or verifiable. Anything you think of as "wrong" was right to someone somewhere in history, sometimes for extended periods of time. All you're saying is "I feel repulsed." Well, OK, you're repulsed, but so what? 'm repulsed by team sports and Okra. Should we ban both tomorrow on my say so? Community standards are what we've got. They're lousy and changeable and frequently pushed hardest by the dumbest among us (e.g. your local fundamentalist whatever..."), but there's nothing else.

      --
      Please do not read this sig. Thank you.
    34. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Whatever happened to doing things because we *could*, rather than because we should?

      It ended when we detonated the hydrogen bomb.

      FTFY.
      Sincerely,
      pedantic grammar Nazi.

    35. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Fuck your Jew-created vengeful desert deity.

    36. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by moz25 · · Score: 1

      You live in a community and if said community says you should stop you either remove yourself completely from that community (good luck) or you comply.

      Dear e2d2, your comment indicates a way of thinking that is borderline idiotic.

      Just open any random history book and you will find that almost all of the people we celebrate as heroes and great thinkers today actually went against contemporary standards. This is not limited to just history, but religion as well. According to the Bible, Jesus went against Roman moral standards. Would you tell Jesus to comply?

      Why do we know the name of an average person like Rosa Parks, but not Bob Whatever who told her to take a back seat? Perhaps that was some smuck like you telling her to comply?

      Secondly, morals are relative and change over time. This is trivial to verify. Just go back in time a little and you'll find that blatant racism and sexism were the moral norm. Women should stay at home, right? Go back a little further, and you will find atrocities as slave trade, burning people at the stake, etc. All moral and accepted by a majority of the community at the time. According to you, they either weren't sane or they didn't see it as wrong.

      Heck, just look across different societies right now and the differences in moral standards. Simple example: cows are considered sacred in some places, but eaten in others. Conversely, cats are considered as pets with a set of rights in some places, cooked alive in others. Abortion: big issue in some places, mandated by the government in others.

      But... this process is still ongoing. Now we are seeing things like gay marriage be a big issue for a slim majority. This too will change. In a decade or two, it will be both morally and legally acceptable. People opposing it today will seem as crazy then as people denouncing Elvis for making "n*gger music" (back then, the N-word was morally acceptable).

    37. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Conversely, cats are considered as pets with a set of rights in some places, cooked alive in others.

      I think you mean "dogs".

    38. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by bitrex · · Score: 1

      The commandment "Thou Shalt Not Kill" in the Old Testament was in no way intended to be a universally applicable law - it applied only in an intratribal way to the ancient Israelites, the same as all the other commandments. It certainly did not apply to the way the Israelites interacted with other groups, and in no way applied to God. The only reason there's any contradiction in that material is if one is determined to interpret it from a New Testament perspective post-Christ where the Ten Commandments (with modifications) were extrapolated by Christians to hold universally. There's nothing wrong with that, but trying to examine the Old Testament from the perspective of more recent theology is certainly going to cause problems. For the original writers of the Torah no such contradictions existed.

    39. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      You wouldn't have this problem if you accept the fact that kids are your *property* until they reach the appropriate age of government recognition.

    40. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by Thuktun · · Score: 1

      Our community defined that barely-preborn or just-born children are subhuman (and we're about to do so again, via the FOCA).

      [...] the thought-police censors known as "slashdot moderators" will tag me as flame bait [...]

      I can't imagine why. After all, Molotov cocktails really help warm up the target building.

    41. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by StikyPad · · Score: 1

      What if I have my own island and I breed humans for food.

      Then I'd say, "Please pass the Grey Houmon."

    42. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I am not a PETA member or anything but why is human life more important than any other life?

      Because then I could argue that" Yes, they may be experimenting on their own kids but at least they did not abort them.

      Where do you draw the line?

    43. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by VickiM · · Score: 1

      Outlaw buying their cigars?

    44. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by furby076 · · Score: 1

      So if I have the money to do research that is considered inhumane I should be able to do it because I can? I have a gun, I can shoot someone, I guess I should do it. There are consequences in life and we have to think about the reprecussions before we move on.

      Once they create a life, saying "oh maybe this wasn't a bad idea, kill it" could be more wrong. Then how do you deal with it if you don't? The prejudice it will deal with (trust me we have plenty to go around). What if it dies horribly due to germs/diseases...or it kills us because of it's germs/diseases? Evolution takes time, and to jump-start it or cross boundries has a lot of risk.

      When you start messing with things like this it is ok for people to step in and say "no this is a bad idea". And yes, we can draw the lines. There absolute blacks and whites, and those are easy moral choices - the gray choices are the hard ones.

      Nutshell: Think about the potential dangers - if they are there then do some pre-research before conducting your work.

      --

      I do not support "The Man". I also do not support your irrational stupidity
    45. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by furby076 · · Score: 1

      The Nazi community defined that Jews were subhuman.

      I'm a jew and an israeli, a by-product of th Holocaust. Stop playing the Holocaust card - it demeans what happend. People pop that word around way too much and it does nothing but getting people sick of hearing it.

      The NAZI's were not the majority of society, they were the vast minority. And even in that minority there were many who did what they were told because they were told to do so by their leaders. This is not uncommon (there was a study done about people following authority even if it meant hurting innocents).

      Not to also forget - imprisoning, torturing, killing, enlsaving people is flat out wrong. It is not a gray side. If you need confirmation of that then ask yourself this - would you be ok if smoeone imprisoned you, tortured you, enslaved you and then killed you? If the answer is "hell f'n no" then you know it is morally wrong.

      Inventing new life should not be taken lightly. Mixing species that have never been done before? Make sure you don't accidentally create a species that will eat us, or cause disease in us, or cause moral issues "how do we treat it"

      --

      I do not support "The Man". I also do not support your irrational stupidity
    46. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by Austerity+Empowers · · Score: 1

      Why is murder wrong? Because if we allow someone to go around killing people, the result is that everyone but that guy is going to be paranoid. To the point that booby-traps, weapons, and fear of leaving ones house will cripple society. A possible scenario might be more people dying from "defense" than from the homicidal maniac in question.

      Unless you are a spooky religious person, you cannot believe in anything as irrational as "natural law" or some incredible belief that taking another's life is anything but a social concern. Without the confines of society, things, people included, kill each other. They do it for food, they do it over mates, they do it for any damned reason at all. It is a pretty wretched and unfortunate existance, and once which humans have attempted to get away from. More to the point, we enforce our own social order by force. If you do not comply, we'll kill you. Even for a parking ticket, if you are sufficiently belligerent. It's an unlikely scenario, but ultimately that is the power we wield over one another.

      At various points in history, select people have been allowed to kill people arbitrarily. Monarchs, religious clerics, soldiers, executioners, etc. have all, at times, had the authority and socially accepted power to murder. A problem that has occurred is that monarchs and clerics, have been known to abuse their power, causing social ills. Today, we do not accept that from our leadership, at least in the western world. In the US we do still have executioners, who by a jury of peers, can be ordered to put major criminals to death. This may change, or it may not. We have varying degrees of discomfort with this subject (i.e. "it could be us, wrongly accused"). However soldiers still kill, this will never change, our last resort is always, now and forever, going to be doing things by force. It will always be socially accepted when it happens. At risk of bringing in a stupid abortion debate: we also permit the murder of human fetuses. It is murder, whether or not you consider that object to be human or not. It was alive, and then someone killed it. This is not about whether it is right or wrong to have done so, it's about the only part of the debate that is fact: something is killed. It's not used for food or housing. The only justifiable reason for having done so is the negative social ramification of an unwanted human child exceeds the negative social ramification of killing something we don't necessarily have empathy for (yet).

      So having disabused the notion that murder is always socially unacceptable, and in all cases wrong, and further highlighting our present (mixed) acceptance of killing humanesque things, what about critters that are maybe a bit human, and maybe a bit something else?

      Is there a question? If they don't exist, there's no real question about whether murder is wrong. Once they do exist, our opinions are likely going to change based on the behavior and situation of the creature in question. If it performs advanced math while looking as cuddly as a new born kitten, we're not going to tolerate murdering it. On the other hand if it has the personality of a pissed off cobra, but makes a nice steak... I think i can eat dinner with a cleaner conscience than when cute peaceful cows are slaughtered.

      All this "ethical dilemma" nonsense is really just a lot of noise to satisfy some spooky belief in God. Rational thinkers cannot come to the conclusion that if we created it, we would necessarily murder it. And if we were in a situation where murdering it is necessary, that it would be considered a social ill to do so. Modern medicine was built on the back of uncounted dead lab critters. Perhaps if we had one that was bio-chemically human, but didn't look, act or think like one, we could get away with killing less often?

      Unless and until we get to the point where there is significant social concern, we can't begin to legislate behavior based on a maybe. If we're going to do that, then I propose we start this way: It is hereby legal to kill grey aliens for food, sport or scientific pursuit, but it is illegal to kill the equally succulent green alien.

       

    47. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by eredin · · Score: 1

      there are only two obvious points in time at which one could cite the recognition of rights, being conception and delivery. If we want to grant that a fetus at any particular point in development does not yet have rights as a person, (which I do, personally) then the line must necessarily occur at delivery.

      Conversely, if we want to grant that a fetus at any particular point in development does have rights as a person, (which I do personally) then the line must necessarily occur at conception.

    48. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by greenreaper · · Score: 1

      This comes down to "might is right". Ultimately, you need power to enforce your view of morality. If someone else has the power, then what they say is right, not you.

      A single person with a gun thinks he is master of the world, and can do what he likes. Is that right? No, say the majority - and they are right . . . when they have more guns on their side.

      This works both ways, but first you have to convince the people with the guns that you're right, or make your own. (This is why remote island laboratories are often surprisingly heavily-armed.)

    49. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Whatever happened to doing things because we *could*, rather than because we should?

      "We do what we must, because we can."

    50. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by Darby · · Score: 1, Insightful

      In my case, my rational analysis indicates a probability that the Christian Bible is correct.

      Sorry, you made some decent points until that.

      In your case, your entirely irrational desire to have your favorite magical invisible fairy be the "real" one indicates that probability to you.

      An actual rational analysis would leave you convinced that, while there might be some god somewhere, there's no way in hell it could possibly be that one.

      You believe it because your parents shoved it down your throat when your brain wasn't properly formed and for no other reason.
      If your parents were Muslim, you'd be a Muslim.

      Rationally, that's exactly how it works.
      Irrationality is all that you have to back up your *belief*.

    51. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      To say there are no absolutes is an absolute in itself. It is kind of funny.

    52. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by drinkypoo · · Score: 0, Troll

      The commandment "Thou Shalt Not Kill" in the Old Testament was in no way intended to be a universally applicable law - it applied only in an intratribal way to the ancient Israelites, the same as all the other commandments. It certainly did not apply to the way the Israelites interacted with other groups, and in no way applied to God.

      With the caveat that I never said nor even implied that the rules applied to God and I am annoyed that you would suggest such a fallacious thing, I'm not sure I really agree with your statement at all. If I do then I can use that as an argument that God explicitly designated subhumans - everyone who's not an ancient Isrealite. That would throw the whole idea of God's universal love for his children out of the window, or at least throw the idea that he made us all and we are all thus his children right out of the window.

      The Bible doesn't actually preclude the existence of other Gods, and furthermore it was the fashion of the day to attribute the creation of the universe to any god one worshipped. So this would not necessarily contradict the bible at all; God commands that you shall have no other god but him, not that you necessarily believe that there is no other god - although various biblical authors do make the claim, I don't know of anywhere God does so.

      My real point here is that Christians read all kinds of nonexistent bullshit into the bible. They have been helped along by various scribes and the people who told them what to write, who both accidentally and deliberately have changed the very meaning of frequently-cited portions of the text, and also by various religious figures who preach their own agendas as if they were contained within that work.

      [...]trying to examine the Old Testament from the perspective of more recent theology is certainly going to cause problems. For the original writers of the Torah no such contradictions existed.

      That's nice. I'm not talking about them, I'm talking about Christians, who most certainly do have to suck up the New Testament, or call themselves something else. That in itself is unfortunate because most of the New Testament has little to do with Christ himself (although it makes lots of allusions to him to keep you interested) and he (as a relatively ascetic type yet not all that concerned with the full trappings of the old testament) would likely have thought that most of it was a bunch of unnecessary crap - although let's face it, if the guy even existed, I don't actually know precisely what he would do. I do know that most people who call themselves Christians might as well just call themselves "King James Biblists" and be done. They are not followers of Christ; those people were called Apostles. They are followers of a religion known as Christianity, which is horribly misnamed as it makes a lot of declarative statements that have nothing to do with him.

      I'm quite certain that J.C. would have bitch slapped the people who made all these "friendlier", totally fucked-up bibles, though. He smacked down the money changers just for making money by doing nothing and thus taking advantage of people. Today he'd have to cluster-bomb the insurance companies to make the same statement. Regardless, these bible editors took the alleged word of god and twisted it for their own ends. If you are a Christian, you must examine the Torah from the perspective of more recent theology, because that's what your holy book consists of. Sounds brain-damaged to you? Me, too. Or at least, it does to me.

      --
      "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
    53. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by kieran · · Score: 1

      Said guy on his personal island could create something capable of torturing and killing kids just by fucking his wife. At least if it looked like an ape-man the kids might not be so keen to go see some puppies with it.

    54. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by bersl2 · · Score: 1

      And guess what: The scientist learned from his painful mistake, and moved on with the next batch, which was better as a result of the mistake. As you say, some doctors face the same issues - but they do face them, and society is better for it.

      I think that if the end pursuit---not the intermediate discoveries, as they would most certainly be practical---weren't so vain, this would be more comfortable to me, and maybe a few others.

      And don't try to argue that this wish in the back of many furries' minds isn't vain. There's no significant purpose other than personal taste to create a sentient creature whose external appearence is non-human. (And by "don't try to argue", by all means, please do if you wish; it will at least be entertaining if it isn't insightful.) :P

      Also, my point about biological vs. cybernetic (I don't want to use that word, but I am lacking a better term) is that beyond a certain complexity, it is easier for us to emulate nature by building systems in terms we ourselves created (computers, logic, etc.) than to try to manipulate something we did not design. Accordingly, I think that emulation is the path of least resistence and the better one to take, for a multitude of reasons which I do not presently have the time to enumerate.

    55. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      So I'd say that the Christian Trinitarian God defines right and wrong. And he defines that there are no subhumans.

      Have you read the Old Testament? Would you say that the Hittites, and the Amorites, the Canaanites, and the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites were subhuman? They're dead now, by the way.

      My captcha was 'atheism'...

    56. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by e2d2 · · Score: 1

      You know I'm not exactly sure why you called me an idiot in the first paragraph. Simply having a different opinion does not make one an idiot.

      My point was - not _everything_ is gray area. Some things are clear to a man's conscious. I truly believe that. Child Porn? Morally wrong. Murder? Morally wrong. Stealing? Morally wrong.

      See some things are clear to a man. If they aren't then perhaps you need to take a look at your ethos.

      My point about community was that they _do_ have a say and you should not simply reject it because it's the opposite of yours. After all, your choices impact them right? So what is so bad about including their opinion in a decision?

      Don't get me wrong, I'm not some ideological nut claiming to talk to God and have the candle that lights the world. All I'm saying is that there are some universal truths that must be at the very least, defined, before we should do something that effects everyone.

    57. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by dubbreak · · Score: 1

      If it's a matter of some guy creating human-animal hybrids on his own personal island, I don't see that it's anyone else's business.

      What if it's a couple torturing or killing their own kids?

      Torturing generally implies the infliction of severe pain or anguish on another being. One view of freedom is you are free to do what you want as long as it doesn't interfere with the freedom of others. Inflicting pain on someone would be interfering with their "freedom". The question is what rights do hybrids have? Are they place below animals? Do they have the rights of animals (such as anti-cruelty laws etc)? Do they have the full rights of humans, or do they have something in between humans and animals (as their name implies)?

      IMHO The question of what rights hybrids should have needs to be answered before the creature exists. By seriously exploring this issue whether they should in fact exist will become a lot more clear.

      --
      "If you are going through hell, keep going." - Winston Churchill
    58. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by e2d2 · · Score: 1

      No, I was mainly alluding to building a bigger bomb even though the war had ended. This caused quite a stir in the scientific community from what I've read and lead to some very interesting thought experiments on morals and ethics.

    59. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by e2d2 · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Pascal's Wager could prove that he is actually being very rational by believing in a deity.

      http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/pascal-wager/

    60. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Nonsense. You need to do more research.

      The original Hippocratic Oath forbade doctors from performing abortions, and abortions have been documented in ancient Egypt and China. Nearly every social problem today existed back then, including some which are currently forbidden, like infanticide, which was legal, common, and praiseworthy if you were getting rid of an "undesirable" like someone who was disabled or female, since children were subhuman.

      We need to keep constant vigilance because things "everyone knows is right and wrong" tends to shift with cultural fads. If the Nazis succeeded in killing off all "undesirables", the only ones left to vote would be the ones who through self-selection survived -- i.e. the ones that survived are the ones who are more likely to share the view. If you need additional proof, look at hazing rituals. Once people who have gone through a hazing are initiated, they tend to see it as a badge of honor and see no issue in hazing other new recruits, since this time, they are on the other side of the hazing.

      Morality cannot be left in the hands of the society of survivors since survivors pick their own, and all of us are the selection process of some moral system out there, whether we choose to be conscious of it or not. There must be a higher authority to guide our moral choices.

      Now you might appeal to a different higher authority than I, but that's a starting point, not the end of the story. There is common ground that can be built upon. In the case of abortion, a radical feminist once commented, that a woman wants an abortion like a trapped animal wants to bite off its own leg. That's something that feminists on both sides of the issue can agree on and work together to fight against. Even if we disagree on the particulars, we don't have to be wishy washy relativists about the fact that there is a moral truth out there upon which reality is grounded. And if it's out there, it can be found once we can come up with the proper perspective that unites us.

    61. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Yeah, because Jurassic Park is EXACTLY how it's gonna go down when we clone dinosaurs.
      Get a grip and try going outside a little.

    62. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by diagonal_mambo · · Score: 1

      An adult pig has the equivalent intelligence of a three-year-old human.

    63. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by diagonal_mambo · · Score: 1

      You can't just say that you'll do bad either way, so relativism wins.

      Allowing a violent criminal to go free when you have the power to hold him captive would be immoral. It may be the case that you're picking between two wrongs (if you believe freedom is not something one can forfeit, which I don't) but it is right to pick the lesser of the two.

      You also can't make the decision that something is bad in all situations. Killing is generally considered to be wrong, but there are situations in which it's the preferred course of action. This is not to say that there is no moral objectivity, but only to say that morality is context sensitive. This is an extreme example only to make the point. We learn early on in life that lying is bad, and then later the situations in which it's okay, or even required.

      Of course, there will not always be a clear right choice. There may be situations in which there are multiple right things to do. If you have a choice to save your child or ten strangers, either one would be morally acceptable. There are different ways to come to a moral decision, and they're often incompatible, but that doesn't mean they're not each valid and conclusive.

    64. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by Smight · · Score: 3, Informative

      That God explicitly blessed the occasional wiping out of various peoples, basically designating them as subhuman. This also violates the commandment "thou shalt not kill" which is stupidly contradictory. Any child can see the conflict here, which is why they are punished when they discover these flaws, in order to brainwash them into believing your nonsense.

      The Translation of "Lo Tirtzach" into "thou shall not kill" is a loose translation. Some translations use "Thou shall not commit murder" but this translation is more narrowly defined than what tirtzach encompasses. Kill and murder are entirely different words. Something more accurate would be "Do nothing which causes innocent blood to be shed." Tirtzach applies to murders as well as neglect and reckless endangerment. It does not encompass self defense, someone else's defense, killing national enemies, and killing people guilty of capital offenses.

      --
      IOU one (1) signature
    65. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by Lord+Ender · · Score: 1

      What harm has the hydrogen bomb ever done?

      --
      A slashdotter who didn't build his own computer is like a Jedi who didn't build his own lightsaber.
    66. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by greenreaper · · Score: 1

      Well, what is a significant purpose, anyway? Why value the life of an organism - sentient or otherwise - above your own vanity, or anything else? And if you decide to value life, what of the opportunity cost - the lives of the beings that you might create, but decide not to?

      I'm reminded of another topic close to my heart: Creatures . The Norns were created by a race of genetic tinkerers, the Shee. It took them a good number of attempts to get it right, and doubtless there were many failures. But they weren't criticized for them - even those considered nuisances, like the Grendels. Instead, they were celebrated for their successes. Without the norns, Albia would have been a poorer place.

      Bear in mind that the Shee had no greater goal but create servants to bring them tea and biscuits, or perhaps the intellectual curiosity of seeing what would happen. To them, genetic engineering was just engineering; it was a tool to solve problems, and if they found a problem in their genes they'd fix themselves, as naturally as we would wear a pacemaker or fit a stent. Some would see that as incredibly wrong. Others wouldn't.

      As for the systems question - well, it depends on the system. I'm reminded of evolutionary circuits, which were very unstable and might well be impossible to modify with any certainty. Right now, it's easier, if more inefficient, to build our own circuits based on logic. On the other hand, some biological mechanisms, if not straightforward, appear quite amenable to modification. Yes, if you were creating something totally new it might make sense to do it all over, but the whole point of animal-human hybrids is that we aren't - we're building on and adapting what was there already. At some point it may prove more trouble than it's worth, but right now we don't even know enough to estimate the cost.

    67. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      e2d2 didn't give an absolute definition, rather, asserted that the community has a right to impose its views on morality onto you if it felt it was right to do so. Moral relativism cuts both ways. If you don't assert the absolutist statement that you have the right to make your own moral choices, the community is free to decide that in certain situations it is right for it to take the ac views can be imposed on you.

    68. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by BluBrick · · Score: 1

      What harm has the hydrogen bomb ever done?

      None - Just ask the the former residents of Bikini Atoll and their descendants.

      --
      Ahh - My eye!
      The doctor said I'm not supposed to get Slashdot in it!
    69. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Congratulations, you have discovered Lob's theorem, a re-interpretation of Godel's incompleteness theorem for the modal logic S4. In S4, "necessity" (the box operator) is interpreted as provability in a first-order logic, and "possibility" (the diamond operator) is interpreted as "compatibility" in a first-order logic. Put another way, the valuation function on the operators quantify over first-order models of a first-order theory.

      Lob's theorem is that if a logic can prove that it can prove a statement, then there is a proof of the statement in the logic.

      Bringing it all together, these "absolutes" are called "theorems". Indeed, the box operator applies to them all.

    70. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by Twinbee · · Score: 1

      I think that thing that often makes people want to slot into the 'relativistic' viewpoint is that they think with absolutism, there can't be change of behaviours even if circumstances are different.

      Of course that's not true, the best course of action depends on the surroundings and circumstances etc., and we can still call that 'absolutism'.

      In this sense, everyone 'should' agree that there's actions for a scenario where one might be called the 'best course of action' (or is some cases very close shaves, where there's not much to choose between them), but whereby that best course would change according to the background/circumstances.

      --
      Why OpalCalc is the best Windows calc
    71. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by LordKaT · · Score: 0, Troll

      Considering how fucking stupid most kids are, I'm not seeing a huge problem with that.

    72. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by kurzweilfreak · · Score: 1

      The bastardization that is the movie Jurassic Park, apparently.

      --

      kurzweil_freak

      5th Kyu Genbukan Ninpo/KJJR student

      Be the darkness that allows the light to shine.

    73. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by kurzweilfreak · · Score: 0, Troll
      Unfortunately, Pascal's Wager also "proves" that he's extremely unrational in that by choosing only one god at the exclusion of all the rest that might exist, the odds are not in his favor that the one he chose is the "right" one. Hence, he's got a pretty good chance that he's fucked for believing in the wrong god.

      I can't believe people are still trotting out this crap argument thinking it's clever or rational.

      --

      kurzweil_freak

      5th Kyu Genbukan Ninpo/KJJR student

      Be the darkness that allows the light to shine.

    74. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by nomorefreedom · · Score: 1

      WRONG, WRONG, WRONG! Check out this site: http://www.fightfoca.com/FightFOCAInsert1up.pdf

    75. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by kurzweilfreak · · Score: 1

      And this is exactly why you should never, ever, ever allow the government to tell you you can't own a gun. It's just freaking incredibly amazing how anti-gun activist either can't understand this or don't think that it's important.

      --

      kurzweil_freak

      5th Kyu Genbukan Ninpo/KJJR student

      Be the darkness that allows the light to shine.

    76. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The community has a say also and has just as much right to "tell you what to do" when it comes to questions of morality

      By this logic, if you lived in Germany during WWII then you could torture the Jews and still be Morally pure.

      Ultimately, "Morality" is just a nice word we have for "This is how I (we) think, and if you don't follow my (our) beliefs I'll (we'll) kill you". Also known as "Might makes right".

      IF I'm in the middle of nowhere all by myself then the only morals which matter are my own. It is only when I'm in a group that there becomes any kind of debate over whose morals are 'right'. This conflict will be resolved, eventually, by use or threat of force, or in some rare situations by common consensus. In cases of common consensus force eventually will become a factor, because someone will eventually disagree with the consensus.

      Inside every man's head (the sane ones) is a morality calling out that says "this is WRONG".

      This might be true, the issue is that what one person 'hears' is not the same as what another 'hears'. In all cases "morality" is a LEARNED trait, no some inherent compass.

    77. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Crutches are pretty useful when you have a broken leg.

    78. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by Balance+Man · · Score: 2, Informative

      The Bible doesn't actually preclude the existence of other Gods

      Yes it does.

      ...most of the New Testament has little to do with Christ himself (although it makes lots of allusions to him to keep you interested)

      Have you even read the New Testament? It has everything to do with Christ.

      let's face it, if the guy even existed, I don't actually know precisely what he would do.

      It says what he did right on the pages you claim to know so much about. Jesus preached the gospel, healed the sick, performed miracles, and fed thousands of people. His claim to be God directly contradicted Jewish law. the religious leaders asked the Roman government to execute him. In each of several official trials, the Romans found that he was not guilty of breaking any Roman law. Even the Jewish leaders recognized that other than Jesus' claim to be God, Jesus followed the Jewish law perfectly. Still the religious leaders, using the argument of political disfavor, persuaded Pilate, a Roman governor of the Southern province of Israel, to authorize an execution in which he was tortured and killed. However, according to more than 500 witnesses, Jesus returned from the dead three days later, and over the next 40 days journeyed in both the southern and northern provinces of Israel before ascending to Heaven.

    79. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by greenreaper · · Score: 1

      Either that or you need to control the government. Or the aforementioned island (presumably outside of government control).

    80. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by mdwh2 · · Score: 1

      What if I have my own island and I breed humans for food. Is that wrong? If so then why? it doesn't hurt _you_

      See this relativist shit is too much for me. Inside every man's head (the sane ones) is a morality calling out that says "this is WRONG".

      It's wrong because it hurts them. And not because of some magical voice inside your head.

      Yes, if new ethical questions are raised by new technology, they should be answered. But this is done by applying reasoning. The answer is not to ban scientific research because your magic voice doesn't have an answer for it.

    81. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by kurzweilfreak · · Score: 1

      Orbit + nuke = assurance.

      --

      kurzweil_freak

      5th Kyu Genbukan Ninpo/KJJR student

      Be the darkness that allows the light to shine.

    82. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by mdwh2 · · Score: 1

      Some things are clear to a man's conscious. I truly believe that. Child Porn? Morally wrong. Murder? Morally wrong. Stealing? Morally wrong.

      "Murder" means immoral killing, so it's wrong by definition - that's a tautology. Is killing always morally wrong? Few would agree with that - it's far from an absolute.

      Few would argue about child porn, but again, that does not make it absolute, as the definition is not absolute: is a sexual image of a 17 year old wrong (even where it's legal to have sex at 16)? What about two 15 year olds in a relationship who take a private photo? What about a 15 year old who takes a photo of him or herself, or poses topless on a webcam without any encouragement to do so? What counts as child porn (as opposed to simply a nude child)? No, I don't think that child porn (of under 16, at least) should be legal, but I don't think that one can say there is an absolute way of telling what images are wrong.

      I'm sure I could think up cases where people might not say stealing is always wrong, such as significant inquality in wealth, or when someone needs to steal something small to survive, or stealing off of someone to prevent them from doing harm.

      Sure, I don't think that any standard of morality is right just because someone thinks it's right - but that doesn't mean that morality is absolute. I don't think any morality is absolute.

    83. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by mdwh2 · · Score: 1

      I can't believe people are still trotting out this crap argument thinking it's clever or rational.

      I am in full agreement.

      I'm not sure what I find more bizarre: when people independently reinvent Pascal's Wager, and think that they alone have stumbled across some wonderful new flawless reason for believing in (their) god - or when people seem educated enough to know that it's called Pascal's Wager, and know how to look it up on the Internet, but somehow seemed to have completely missed the explanation of the gaping flaws in it.

    84. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by mdwh2 · · Score: 1

      But I find it highly doubtful that hydrogen bombs were merely built out of a scientific curiousity of "because we can". There was great political pressure to do so, and I suspect that the policitians (not scientists) gave consideration, and decided that they should build such things.

      I'm not saying that building hydrogen bombs were right - but the point is that this isn't an example of "we could rather than we should", because people did think that we should.

    85. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by moz25 · · Score: 1

      Sorry about the idiot part -- that was indeed uncalled for.

      Of course not everything is a gray area, but if we are talking about murder, theft and child molestation, we can find logical and utilitarian reasons as well as moral or emotional ones. Eliminating these direct threats creates a more efficient and productive society. Worrying about your life every single day is kind of distracting.

      However, keep in mind that they are still subject to interpretation: freeing a slave amounts to theft (slaves are property). Killing a person may be heroic or plain murder (depends on target and reason). Child porn may be made by a sick person (50 year old) or it may be made by a naive 16 year old teenager with a webcam.

      So even in relatively absolute cases, things aren't always that absolute.

      I don't think it's wrong to take the opinions of the community into account, but one also has to remember that a community may be divided over various issues (e.g. abortion, embryonic stem cells, etc) or may currently have a number of clearly wrong opinions (e.g. various -isms).

      It's still going to be up to you to take all the information available to you and form the best possible set of opinions.

    86. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by amRadioHed · · Score: 1

      I got my facts by reading the text of the bills, not from some partisan propaganda site. The law says that that abortions must be allowed by states up to viability. After that it is up to individual states. Viability usually begins around five months. It is a serious stretch of the truth to say that five months is "barely-preborn" and it is an outright lie to say that five months is "just-born".

      As an aside I can't help but notice that your only comments have been responses to me. I don't know who you are or why you are stalking me but it is creepy, disgusting, and cowardly behaviour. You should be ashamed of yourself and I wish never to hear from you again. Thanks.

      --
      We hope your rules and wisdom choke you / Now we are one in everlasting peace
    87. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by IonOtter · · Score: 1
      --
      [End Of Line]
    88. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      unless it's human-animal hybrids with four asses. then the world deserves to know

    89. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by drinkypoo · · Score: 1

      His claim to be God directly contradicted Jewish law.

      His claim to be God exists only in books written by one of the principal authors, ditto the mystical shit, which is suspicious in and of itself.

      --
      "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
    90. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by Caboosian · · Score: 1

      "You were so busy wondering if you could do it, you never stopped to think if you should."

      Good sir, I ask you - Do you want another Jurassic Park on your hands?!

    91. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by Caboosian · · Score: 1

      Except that morals vary widely based upon your ethnic background, social status, nationalism, etc., etc., etc., that when taken as a whole, morality is nothing more than a gigantic gray zone.

      Look at it this way. Here in the west, we all know Hitler was evil - he committed mass murder on a scale larger than anyone had thought possible. He's the modern-day devil, the evilest of the evil, the wrongest of the wrong. Right?

      So what do you think Hitler thought of this? Or other high-raking Nazis? He didn't think what he was doing was right - he knew it. In his gut, in his mind, he knew he had to execute on this final solution. Was he alone in this thought? Probably not. Hell, at least some Germans must have agreed with him.

      Look, my point here is when it comes to morality, there is no "right" and "wrong" - no good, no evil. For every action you consider to be wrong, someone out there probably considers it to be right. This means that morality, as a whole, is often nothing more than differing viewpoints - which makes it nothing more than a giant gray zone.

      Now, your point about the community having a say is completely correct - but the problem with your morality statement ("Inside every man's head (the sane ones) is a morality calling out that says "this is WRONG") comes once you realize that the community, as a whole, can hold some pretty fucked up morals. My previous example (hi, Godwin) is a pretty solid example of people holding some fucked up morals.

      That is, until, you realize that to them, your morals are probably pretty fucked up to.

    92. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by greenreaper · · Score: 1

      Well, given that I never got a chance to play with the first one . . . you can be damn sure I wouldn't trust it to UNIX, though. Windows Vista all the way!

    93. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by Twanfox · · Score: 3, Insightful

      How about this less extreme take? What if it's a couple raising their children in a way you don't particularly like? Spanking responsibly (ie: not beating), but you feel Time Outs are the only proper way? There really is a point at which, no matter what your personal opinion on the matter is, unless you can prove a personal stake in the matter, you should just let it go. By utilizing your freedoms and inflicting your will on others, you restrict their freedom unfairly, just because you think what they're doing is wrong. Get over it.

    94. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by Ihmhi · · Score: 1

      It'd be interesting to see how this would be abused. Like, what? PETA would give cows thumbs and hand out machine guns to bovinity?

      Cue "Cows With Guns".

    95. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by file+terminator · · Score: 1

      I tend to see moral certainty as a crutch. Life is not black and white, what seems wrong in one situation may seem right in another.

      First, YES, life is gray--but there are SHADES of gray, not just one dull gray where everything is acceptable. Some of those shades are so close to either black or white that there really is no practical difference. To blurt out "but it is gray, and gray means OK" shows an inability to understand degrees.

      Second, if something seems wrong in one situation and right in another, perhaps that is because it IS wrong in one situation and right in another? If I consider it wrong to imprison an innocent person but right to imprison a mass murderer, it only shows that I have an understanding of circumstance, not that imprisoning people is a gray area.

    96. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by mikael_j · · Score: 1

      Child Porn? Morally wrong. Murder? Morally wrong. Stealing? Morally wrong.

      Actually, I'm pretty sure all three of those could be justified by most people under the right circumstances, and if it wasn't for the risk of having their homes burned to the ground by people like yourself you probably wouldn't have much trouble finding people in your own neighborhood who disagree with you about at least one of those right now, today.

      /Mikael

      --
      Greylisting is to SMTP as NAT is to IPv4
    97. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by Gandalf_Greyhame · · Score: 1

      I say bring on the hybrids, and don't stop with animals, lets get to cyborgging as well (are there 2 g's in that?)

      yeah, I want cyborgs! forget the animal hybrids. Lets make the world of "Ghost in the Shell" a reality

      P.S. Gimme my tachikoma

      --
      I am not stubborn. I am right!
    98. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by EvilDrMike · · Score: 0

      What if it's a couple torturing or killing their own kids?

      You're right that would be so much worse than torturing someone else's kids.

      - EDM

    99. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by Bastard+of+Subhumani · · Score: 1

      Then you sell, er marry, them off well before they reach that age of recognition.

      Who me? No, I never metioned Mormons.

      --
      Only three things are certain; death, taxes, and apocryphal quotations - Ben Franklin.
    100. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by Bastard+of+Subhumani · · Score: 1

      Too right. He wouldn't want to get into a punch up with Vishnu, that's for sure.

      --
      Only three things are certain; death, taxes, and apocryphal quotations - Ben Franklin.
    101. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by e2d2 · · Score: 1

      Please, oh enlightened one - explain the world to me. It's quite ironic that arrogance is something you seem quite uppity about, yet you come across completely arrogant.

      Go get ya fucking shine box pal.

    102. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by e2d2 · · Score: 1

      Yes yes, I gather people around into a town mob and go and burn down houses of people that disagree with my morals.. It's quite a leap of imagination to say that, simply because I believe in universal truths about such things as murder, child pornography, and theft.

    103. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by e2d2 · · Score: 1

      Since when do you define ones thoughts as a magical voice?

    104. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by mdwh2 · · Score: 1

      What? Take a look at your own post, which is nothing more than flamebait.

      As the other poster took the trouble to carefully point out to you (and got modded down for his trouble), the flaw with Pascal's Wager is that it assumes the only two possibilities are "No gods exist" and "A god exists who will reward you for believing in him, and punishing you if you don't believe in him".

      One could just as well suppose the possibility of a god who punishes believers whilst rewarding atheists and followers of other religions - or, more plausibly, a god who punishes people who only believe for dubious reasons or personal gain such as Pascal's Wager.

      Not sure what the mods are up to today - Pascal's Wager is a well known philosophical argument, with well known flaws. There's nothing insightful in linking to it, and certainly nothing trollish in pointing out the problems.

    105. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by mdwh2 · · Score: 1

      So something is wrong simply because your own thoughts say it is?

      That doesn't tell me why something's wrong. It also doesn't sound much of an absolute morality - indeed, defining morality by people's own thoughts is a very relative form of morality. What about someone whose thoughts tell them that killing random people is okay (or breeding them for food)? (And if you discount them as not being "sane", the question then is, how do we decide which versions of morality are "sane"?)

      You're arguing against the viewpoint that "Something is right if he thinks it's right" with "Something is wrong if I think 'this is WRONG'", which seems to me to be exactly the same kind of relativistic morality. Neither of you explain why actions are right or wrong, and both of you put it down to what people's thoughts tell them. Or am I misunderstanding?

    106. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by BenoitRen · · Score: 1

      I thought we put people into prison to punish people for their crimes, not because of costs.

    107. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by fastest+fascist · · Score: 1

      That often does seem to be the case. The legal system should not, in my opinion, be about retribution, but about maintaining social stability. Many seem to think otherwise.

    108. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by e2d2 · · Score: 1

      Well, how do you define morality then? How do you determine what is acceptable in your own life?

    109. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by diagonal_mambo · · Score: 1

      If Hitler thought what he was doing was okay, then Hitler was wrong.

      People who think it's morally acceptable to kill their daughter after she's been raped are wrong.

      This kind of moral relativism is flawed because it puts roughly equal weight on all opinions. Popular opinion does not determine whether or not something is morally correct. The Inquisition had almost unanimous support by those who were not finally killed by it (itself no small number, but at any one time, not nearly the majority). That does not mean it was okay.

      Why is it such a problem for people to accept that they might actually be right about something? Not right in their own particular corner of the world, but just plain right.

      If you think killing six million Jews in the span of half a decade is wrong, congratulations, you're right. You have a better sense of morals and ethics than the Nazis did. Deal with it.

    110. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by MickLinux · · Score: 1

      Thanks for the note on Löb's Theorem. Yes, this is why I can use the term "reason" correctly regarding issues of God. I'm not trying to prove God; that would necessarily involve me trying to prove myself, and would involve my theorem trying to prove itself.

      Rather, I am applying reason to a set of givens (which include experiences I have had, and experiences recorded by others) and to proves (which in this case, is the question of what is human or not).

      Not that my reasoning is perfect or infallible. But it's better than not trying to use reason at all.

      --
      Correct Horse Battery Staple: 72 bits of entropy. Enter "Correct H" into google. When it generates the phrase, that's
    111. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by spiralx · · Score: 1

      It was pretty much only Teller who pushed for the hydrogen bomb - Oppenheimer and the others were against it, believing the atom bomb was "good enough" for any use.

    112. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by nidarus · · Score: 1

      That God explicitly blessed the occasional wiping out of various peoples, basically designating them as subhuman. This also violates the commandment "thou shalt not kill" which is stupidly contradictory

      Thou shalt not kill is a mistranslation. "Lo Tirtsakh" means "Thou shalt not murder" ("Thou shalt not kill", in the modern sense, would be "Lo Taharog").

      The OT doesn't try to hide the fact that God is very much pro-killing.

    113. Re:I'm tired of you ethical moralists by MickLinux · · Score: 1

      http://www.buffalonews.com/260/story/570428.html Currently, this is illegal but unenforced, and much decried. As I understand it, FOCA will make this legal.

      --
      Correct Horse Battery Staple: 72 bits of entropy. Enter "Correct H" into google. When it generates the phrase, that's
  22. A good place for this by initialE · · Score: 0, Troll
    --
    Starbucks, Harbuckle of Breath.
  23. 'Sub' human? by Spatial · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Such an ugly term. How about Parahuman?

    1. Re:'Sub' human? by oodaloop · · Score: 1

      What about the Morthans? As in more than human? They could colonize their own planet and breed a class of warriors the likes of which humans have never seen.

      --
      Tic-Tac-Toe, Global Thermonuclear War, and relationships all have the same winning move.
    2. Re:'Sub' human? by greenreaper · · Score: 1

      They're just ugly. Uncanny valley, here we come!

    3. Re:'Sub' human? by Spatial · · Score: 1

      Oh, that's the proper term? I just made it up on the spot.

    4. Re:'Sub' human? by greenreaper · · Score: 1

      That's how you know it's the proper term. It's a poor kind of word that can't be spontaneously invented as required.

    5. Re:'Sub' human? by Spatial · · Score: 1

      Cromulent point.

    6. Re:'Sub' human? by CorporateSuit · · Score: 1

      Such an ugly term. How about Parahuman?

      They're more of an analog from our species... How about Analhuman?

      --
      I am the richest astronaut ever to win the superbowl.
    7. Re:'Sub' human? by Paranatural · · Score: 1

      Hey now.

  24. Man-plant is the way forward by benwiggy · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Privet hedges is the only other species to have 23 pairs of chromosomes - the same as Man. We should be cross-breeding humans with plants!

    1. Re:Man-plant is the way forward by Taibhsear · · Score: 1

      I've always wondered why they haven't researched animals that use chloroplasts. (I believe a slug and some other small creatures also have a symbiosis with photosynthetic microorganisms) It'd be a great modification for skin cells of starving people. Converting co2 and water to sugar and shuttling to the bloodstream. Granted they still need fat and protein but it would certainly help out.

    2. Re:Man-plant is the way forward by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The exact number is not nearly as important as you seem to think.

    3. Re:Man-plant is the way forward by esocid · · Score: 1

      Worrying about the number of chromosomes I believe would only be important if you wanted the hybrid to be fertile. The uneven number of chromosomes would result in something unable to properly divide on a cellular level, and polyploidy would take care of the infertility.
      Someone correct me if I'm wrong. My genetics background isn't my strongest.

      --
      Absolute power corrupts absolutely. indymedia
    4. Re:Man-plant is the way forward by nizo · · Score: 1

      Skin cancer could be a problem...

    5. Re:Man-plant is the way forward by Max+Littlemore · · Score: 1

      Converting co2 and water to sugar and shuttling to the bloodstream.

      Hey! That's my idea. Although in my idea, it's more of an illicit virus thing. People infect themselves, photosynthesize for a day, and get a massive sugar rush when they go out in the sun. Perfect for outdoor music festivals and such!

      Side effects: flu like symptoms the following day, diabetes from long term use and obvious green skin while under the influence.

      --
      I don't therefore I'm not.
  25. That's already been answered in comic form by greenreaper · · Score: 2, Informative

    Skunk included a short comic exploring the result of getting a catgirl in your bed. It wasn't pretty!

    1. Re:That's already been answered in comic form by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      fuck sake, there really IS a wiki for everything...

    2. Re:That's already been answered in comic form by Gerzel · · Score: 1

      Yes.

    3. Re:That's already been answered in comic form by Talderas · · Score: 5, Funny

      I would like to propose an addendum to Rule 34.

      If you can imagine it, there is porn and a wiki for it.

      --
      "Lack of speed can be overcome. In the worst case by patience." --Znork
    4. Re:That's already been answered in comic form by Hal_Porter · · Score: 0, Troll

      Skunk included a short comic exploring the result of getting a catgirl in your bed. It wasn't pretty!

      This is as my Master told it to me and now I tell it thee.

      There are a billion names of furfaggotry! A billion kinds of furries that slither and slime and defile the land and sea and wind. Each furry is a kind of sin spawned by the internet's evil. And that internets is very sinful there are many of these damned furfags and their power is great.

      As the purpose of all things in nature is to increase so it is with the furry. They would we joined them and so they seek to overcome us. In alien forms they assault us. In sleep they come to spread doubt and fear among us. They would corrupt our hearts and see us yiff too. Trust them not nor suffer them to live.

      For each furfag destroyed is a soul freed from eternal bondage. Each mortal furry life extinguished is an /i/nsurgent soul raised to glory. Thus our eternal destiny is written in the blood of the furfag.

      With box and tampon destroy the furfag. With pizza and koran smash the furfag. With credit card hacks and searing mormons scatter the furfag to the stars. With gore and dataforce and bandwidth raep, with hax and AIDS and jehovas, with yellow vans and steroids!

      Kill them! Kill them! Kill them all!

      As my Master told it me I now tell it thee that thou shalt tell others in thy turn.

      In an internet of a million sites, what is the death of one site in the cause of purity? Some may question your right to destroy ten billion furfags. Those who understand realize that you have no right to let them live.

      --
      echo -e 'global _start\n _start:\n mov eax, 2\n int 80h\n jmp _start' > a.asm; nasm a.asm -f elf; ld a.o -o a;
    5. Re:That's already been answered in comic form by greenreaper · · Score: 1

      Technically, it's ten wikis, but the non-English-speaking versions have a long way go to catch up.

    6. Re:That's already been answered in comic form by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      You're more correct than you'd ever possibly want to know. I've run across wikis for most of the main-stream fetishes in porn, and many for fetishes that rob me of my faith in humanity.

  26. What is that? by dr_dank · · Score: 1

    Some kind of PigBearMan?

    --
    Where does the school board find them and why do they keep sending them to ME?
    1. Re:What is that? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      It's ManBearPig, stupid!

  27. Flamebait title? by Ailure · · Score: 2, Funny

    Anyone else read the title of this Slashdot story, and thought it was about how much anime and furry fans fail? ;)

  28. Have to wait? by Culture20 · · Score: 1

    the question of how we would treat sub-humans will have to wait until we actually figure out how to make them

    Why? I think it _should_ be the other way around.

  29. Exactly! -- MOD PARENT UP by zooblethorpe · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Too bad DNA doesn't work like this.

    I really find myself wondering, where's the "duh" tag for this article? Sheesh. We've known for *decades* that radical hybridization simply don't work. Anyone remember the totato / pomato? Not the grafted gimmick plant, but the actual genetic hybrid? Yeah, didn't think so. That didn't work either.

    Cheers,

    --
    "What in the name of Fats Waller is that?"
    "A four-foot prune."
  30. Or the more serious topic. by jellomizer · · Score: 1

    Many animals have natural immunity to diseases that we don't. Or digest particular foods better then we do, or have instincts of healthier activities, such as preferring the taste of vegetables over high fat meet. Lets say for example we bread a human with a shark and a rabbit. Immune from Cancer however prefers vegetables and able to digest vegetables more efficiency.

    --
    If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
    1. Re:Or the more serious topic. by geeper · · Score: 0

      Mmmmm...breaded humans.

      --
      Error reading device 'Signature'. (A)bort, (R)etry, (F)ail?
    2. Re:Or the more serious topic. by Culture20 · · Score: 2, Insightful

      And when it smells blood it goes into a biting frenzy, and it breeds out of control.

    3. Re:Or the more serious topic. by Bearhouse · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Yeah, but what if it all goes wrong, and we end up with a killing machine that loves meat and breeds like crazy? Oh wait...

    4. Re:Or the more serious topic. by DigitalSorceress · · Score: 1

      And when it smells blood it goes into a biting frenzy, and it breeds out of control.

      Marv Albert? /ducking

      --

      The Digital Sorceress
    5. Re:Or the more serious topic. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Lets say for example we bread a human with a shark and a rabbit.

      Mmmmmmmmm, Breaded human served with shark and rabbit. Does human go better with a white or red wine?

    6. Re:Or the more serious topic. by Culture20 · · Score: 1

      Marv Albert? /ducking

      Reference from a decade back. Bravo!

    7. Re:Or the more serious topic. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      loves meat and breeds like crazy

      Hmm, there has to be a 'your mama' joke in there somewhere.

  31. Is this linked to the Racoon "incident"? by coren2000 · · Score: 1

    Is the failure caused by a lack of manhood?

    http://idle.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=09/01/27/1521213

  32. Talking about how cloning is an affront before god by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I think congress is worried some scientist might clone a hybrid person with a donkey and put them out of business.

  33. Admit it, man! by StefanJ · · Score: 1

    This isn't about sex . . . you're heavily invested in the brassiere and tampon industry, aren't you?

  34. Five-assed monkey? Three-peckered billy goat! by zooblethorpe · · Score: 1

    I'll see your five-assed monkey, and bet you a three-peckered billy goat!

    So there!

    Cheers,

    --
    "What in the name of Fats Waller is that?"
    "A four-foot prune."
  35. No wonder it doesn't work by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    "putting human DNA into cow or rabbit eggs"

    No wonder it doesn't work. Cows don't even lay eggs!! Must be the UN scientists...

  36. Bonobo nookie by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    The chimps wouldn't hold still while the scientists tried to have sex with them.

    They should have tried bonobos -- apparently they have sex simply to say "hello".

    1. Re:Bonobo nookie by neumayr · · Score: 1

      WTF?
      This reads like something the conservative yellow press would have written in the late 60s to describe the hippie movement.

      --
      Truth arises more readily from error than from confusion. -Francis Bacon
    2. Re:Bonobo nookie by CarpetShark · · Score: 1

      That's a pretty ridiculous assumption on the part of researchers. I mean, if you saw two people meet up and have sex, would you think they're saying "hello"? Clearly, there's more to it than that.

  37. Some equality here! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny

    I, for one, welcome all the excess catboys. They can have a sanctuary from fursecution in the relative safety of my home.

    (Captcha: Fiendish)

  38. Misread Headline by sunami88 · · Score: 1

    Haha, for a second there I thought it said "Human-Animal Hybrids Fail"

    ...Oh wait... it did... Eeewww.

    --
    Sex. Drugs, and Unix.
  39. i'm totally confused by circletimessquare · · Score: 1, Redundant

    i make a throwaway sophomoric sex joke and i get serious analysis and get rated "insightful"

    --
    intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
    1. Re:i'm totally confused by philspear · · Score: 1

      i make a throwaway sophomoric sex joke and i get serious analysis and get rated "insightful"

      You must either be new here or a lot more mature than I am. Subtlety is sometimes lost on these people, and it's usually scary when that happens. Jonathan Swift would have probably shot himself had he visited these boards.

    2. Re:i'm totally confused by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      i make a throwaway sophomoric sex joke and i get serious analysis and get rated "insightful"

      The problem could be that you took my "analysis" seriously, I can't answer for the mods though...

    3. Re:i'm totally confused by ozphx · · Score: 1

      I suggest you google for my "titty fucking arse-bandits with their gay dick up an elephants cunt" post, which achieved +3 Insightful, followed by +5 Funny...

      The guy who corrected me with the apostrophe also got a +5 insightful.

      --
      3laws: No freebies, no backsies, GTFO.
  40. If this had any chance of working.... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    ...there'd be hundreds if not thousands of sheep-boys running around West Virginia.

  41. More bad news. by LiteralKa · · Score: 1

    Furries will also be disappointed to read the headline "Study questions usefulness of animal-human embryos".

    --
    nonconformity at work
  42. We already have a slew of subhumans by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    We call them liberals.

  43. A wise man once said... by Shadon+Oufrayor · · Score: 1

    Don't have a cow man!!

  44. Re:Exactly! -- MOD PARENT UP by jandrese · · Score: 1

    They don't work yet. We just don't know enough about how life processes work yet, but maybe sometime in the future we will. My guess is that it'll take 10 or 20 years before we're anywhere close to pulling it off though (and I really pulled those guesses out of my ass).

    --

    I read the internet for the articles.
  45. I for one... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I for one... ask WTF? Why? you sick baistards!

  46. They aren't making "hybrids" by nasor · · Score: 1

    The person who wrote the summary doesn't seem to understand what the research is trying to do. They aren't trying to make part human/part animal creatures. They are trying to use animal eggs to grow human stem cells, by injecting human DNA into the egg and getting it to reproduce. The outcome that they're looking for is a mass of human stem cells that could be used to, say, create a new organ for a person who needed a transplant.

    1. Re:They aren't making "hybrids" by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Can't slight differences in the organelles between the source and destination cell alter the properties of the resulting cell?

      The DNA encodes the proteins and how they are expressed, but shouldn't the cell that serves as a starting point also carry some weight in what happens when it divides?

  47. Where is Slashdot on this? by tea-leaves · · Score: 1

    I for one welcome our new race of furry overlords.

    Wow, this place is slipping. If you want something done, you have to do it yourself.

    Although, think about a half-cow/half-Cowboy Neal...

  48. Weird shit is WEIRD by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    A cat-human hybrid would be kinda disappointing anyway. I think the current solutions work well enough.

    Don't cats have really short lifespans anyway?
    *imagines having to euthanize a catgirl*
    weird shit, man.

  49. What Could Possibly go wrong???? by Taimat · · Score: 2

    Why am I the first to post this? Man, the slashdot community is getting lazy.... :) No "first post" not "I for one welcome our new Furry overlords".. Not even a think of the children!

    --
    The above comments are not guaranteed to make sense to anyone other than the author...
  50. Duh by greenreaper · · Score: 1

    He already is half cow. That's why it's in his name.

  51. We know . . . by greenreaper · · Score: 1

    It's just a lot more fun to imagine that they were talking about making furries.

  52. Not if they looked like Max... by oneiros27 · · Score: 1

    You're forgetting that the premise of Dark Angel was human-animal chimeras.

    I'm guessing if they looked anything like the actors/actresses in that show (eg, Jessica Alba), they'd be a little more accepted. Unfortunately, the show also had their earlier 'failures', which were a little less human looking, and might qualify in the uncanny valley / furries area.

    --
    Build it, and they will come^Hplain.
  53. Human chauvinism by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Why not use the term "sur-human" instead?

  54. Because it is playing God by MikeRT · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Whatever happened to doing things because we *could*, rather than because we should?

    And we're tired of people like you who treat a sentient life form as fucking science project! Then you scream, "but... but... I'm not a Nazi! I'm experimenting on ape-men, not Jews!"

    1. Re:Because it is playing God by Hatta · · Score: 4, Insightful

      In what way is an embryo sentient? Sentience is the ability to feel or perceive subjectively. Absent any nervous system, an embryo, even a purely human embryo, is not sentient.

      --
      Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
    2. Re:Because it is playing God by the_humeister · · Score: 1

      We play "God" all the time. It's called "modern medicine." Someone has a minimally invasive colon cancer. Aren't the doctor's "playing God" when they perform surgery to take out the malignancy?

    3. Re:Because it is playing God by mdielmann · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Well, those embryos are 9 months and a bit of luck away from being sentient, whereas you are one hammer-blow and a bit of luck away from no longer being sentient (and not necessarily dead). And yet I don't think that gives us a right to experiment on those of us who are less fortunate than others.
      Yes, there are issues with this line of reasoning with respect to the more intelligent animals, but necessity trumps some things, and keep in mind we still experiment on humans - just once we feel we've reduced the risks sufficiently through other tests. Someone was the first guy to get a pig valve implanted in his heart, and I'd be unsurprised if the success rate was lower at first due to the experimental nature of the treatment.

      --
      Sure I'm paranoid, but am I paranoid enough?
    4. Re:Because it is playing God by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Absent any nervous system, an embryo, even a purely human embryo, is not sentient.

      Of course left to its own devices, said embryo (human or not) will usually develope a nervous system. Furthermore if left alone in the proper enviornment (i.e. a womb), a purely human embryo will eventually become a human infant, which will be sentient, or die in the process. It won't become anything else unless it is artificially altered.

    5. Re:Because it is playing God by blind+biker · · Score: 1

      In what way is an embryo sentient? Sentience is the ability to feel or perceive subjectively. Absent any nervous system, an embryo, even a purely human embryo, is not sentient.

      May I be the "devil's" advocate for a moment: neither is a person in coma, sentient. Neither is a patient that has been deeply anaesthetized, sentient. But we know that they will (or, in the case of coma, might, depending on their physical condition) become sentient, given some time. That's why we don't sell them as sausage meat.

      --
      "The agriculture ministry is not in charge of Gundam" - Japanese ministry official.
    6. Re:Because it is playing God by furby076 · · Score: 1

      What happens when that embryo develops into a baby - whatever form that baby is?

      Embryonic research is OK, I agreed (though many do not) it is not sentient life. But while the first goal of these scientists may have been to fertilize the egg, the next logical step in the search for knowledge "let's see if it comes to term and we now have a new species." It's morally DARK area and potential reprecussions could be severe if the experiment goes bad (e.g. it has cancer, it develops a disease that jumps to us, it eats your face."

      --

      I do not support "The Man". I also do not support your irrational stupidity
    7. Re:Because it is playing God by Trent+Hawkins · · Score: 0, Redundant

      "god schmod - I want my monkey-man!" -Bart Simpson

    8. Re:Because it is playing God by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      My boys are 9 months, a thin piece of rubber and a lot of luck away from being sentient. Yet I cold-bloodedly let them die in the toilet bowl.

    9. Re:Because it is playing God by mdwh2 · · Score: 1

      I'm not sure I understand you? A sperm and egg "if left alone in the proper enviornment" will eventually become a human, or die in the process. Should sperm and egg have rights too?

    10. Re:Because it is playing God by Hatta · · Score: 1

      I'd argue that the reason we don't sell the comatose as meat is not because they might become conscious at any minute, but because we might become comatose. In that case, protecting the comatose, but not the unborn is entirely consistent.

      --
      Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
    11. Re:Because it is playing God by focoma · · Score: 1

      Rights are given to individual humans, not to their component parts. The sperm and the egg that formed me didn't individually have rights in the same sense that my liver does not have rights. The fact that there was no individual living thing that could possibly be called *Me* until the moment of my conception invalidates your reasoning altogether.

      The AC's point can be restated thus: There was a point in time where a living thing already existed with my DNA. It would grow and develop my nervous system and all my other organs. It would be born and be given my name. All evidence suggests that this newly-formed embryo was me and no one else. It wasn't my mother nor my father. It wasn't some subhuman Other. It was Me. If I have intrinsic human rights*, like the right to life, I must (by the definitions of intrinsic and human) have had those right for as long as I existed, i.e. since I was a mere human embryo.

      --
      *Reading the comments here, it would seem that the assumption of intrinsic human rights is not held by everyone on Slashdot. It seems for some of us human rights are not given to a human being unless some arbitrary requirement assigned by the Enlightened is accomplished, like being an Aryan, or something... oh wait, was that the Nazis? Sorry, I can't see clearly due to all the murdered subhuman punishments lying around.

      --

      - Francis Ocoma

      Please wait while Sig Request is being processed...

    12. Re:Because it is playing God by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Well, those embryos are 9 months and a bit of luck away from being sentient, whereas you are one hammer-blow and a bit of luck away from no longer being sentient

      Wow, threats of violence from a pro-lifer, how shocking.

  55. Tell me I'm not the only one... by Nursie · · Score: 3, Interesting

    ... that ever read the Ballad of Lost C'Mell?

    Or the Dead Lady of Clown Town?

    The Underpeople?

    Come on slashdot...

    1. Re:Tell me I'm not the only one... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      well, that makes two of us....

    2. Re:Tell me I'm not the only one... by CrimsonAvenger · · Score: 1

      You're not the only one.

      --

      "I do not agree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it"
    3. Re:Tell me I'm not the only one... by jamstar7 · · Score: 2, Interesting

      One of my favorite authors. They rereleased his stuff lately.

      --
      Understanding the scope of the problem is the first step on the path to true panic.
    4. Re:Tell me I'm not the only one... by Nursie · · Score: 1

      Cool, I had some trouble picking up The Rediscovery of Man: The Complete Short Science Fiction of Cordwainer Smith (plus Norstrilia) a couple of years back.

      Have I missed anything you know of?

    5. Re:Tell me I'm not the only one... by KwKSilver · · Score: 1

      Not by far. The first thing I thought of was the Instrumentality ... C'mell, Lord Jestocost, D'joan, and the Lady Johanna Gnade, in about that order. Glorious storytelling, I was in my early teens when these stories came out. The Instrumentality has an entry at Wikipedia, but the main stories are not linked to it ...yet, although the Ballad of Lost C'mell, the Dead Lady of Clown Town, Norstrilia, and others have their own entries.

      --
      If you want your life to be different, live it differently.
    6. Re:Tell me I'm not the only one... by jamstar7 · · Score: 1

      Not that I know of. 'The Underpeople' is part of 'Norstrilia', so if you have that, you're golden. I found a copy of 'Quest of the Three Worlds' in a used book store cheap. It's not in Rediscovery. Some of the short stories are missing from Rediscovery as well: 'No, No, Not Rogov', 'War 81-Q', (my personal fave alongside 'Ballad') 'Queen of the Afternoon', and a couple others. Get a copy of 'The Instrumentality of Mankind' and you should be covered.

      --
      Understanding the scope of the problem is the first step on the path to true panic.
    7. Re:Tell me I'm not the only one... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0
    8. Re:Tell me I'm not the only one... by Nursie · · Score: 1

      I've read those. There are two books called rediscovery; the first one I got was missing those things you mention, then I found out about the bigger volume. Looks like I've got it all :(

      I like 81-Q, though I'd be hard pushed to name a favourite. From Gustible's Planet is ace, as a standalone, comical short story. I think one of the things I love about his stuff is that it describes a (semi) coherent future/world/universe over a period of many thousands of years. The way it's just told in snippets of story, little pertinent episodes, leaving this feeling of a great deal that's unexplored and left to you to explore or just wonder at.

      I think it might be time I read it again.

    9. Re:Tell me I'm not the only one... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      No, you are not the only one, but never before this thread did I realize that Cordwainer Smith was essentially a furry. Yeugh!

    10. Re:Tell me I'm not the only one... by 21mhz · · Score: 1

      I don't know, the rest of us recall The Island of Dr. Moreau. Classic.

      --
      My exception safety is -fno-exceptions.
  56. XKCD... by LunarEffect · · Score: 1

    has an interesting proposal on how to treat them:
    Here

  57. Re:Exactly! -- MOD PARENT UP by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Tomacco, on the other hand, was a huge sucesss.

  58. H.G. Wells to the rescue by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Perhaps reading the Island of Dr. Moreau is in order.

  59. Sadly, DNA is not Lego. by Nekomusume · · Score: 2, Funny

    And more to the point, if we can't use the technology to give ourselves night-vision eyesight, superstrength and the like, what's the point?

  60. meet my sociopathic identical twin! by peter303 · · Score: 1

    But I'm pretty sure nothing went wrong in the womb.

  61. Don't be Sheepish by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    So what, the Welsh have been been trying for 2000 years, and the Welshman I met the other day suggests that they have been successful!

  62. Re:Exactly! -- MOD PARENT UP by zooblethorpe · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Part of why I mentioned the pomato is that the potato and tomato are both members of the same genus, Solanum, a.k.a. the deadly nightshade family. For that matter, tobacco is part of the same grouping, making the apocryphal tomacco another intra-genus hybrid. Yet none of these intra-genus hybrids is viable.

    Now, what the article is talking about is hybridization of species even further apart, walking back up the taxonomic tree by several nodes. If we cannot even produce viable intra-genus hybrids, we sure aren't going to be producing viable intra-family, intra-order, or intra-class hybrids any time soon. FWIW, my own guess is that it'll take us 10-20 years to get an intra-genus hybrid, and much longer for hybrids of species further apart -- partial genetic borrowing notwithstanding, such as the glow-in-the-dark pigs crafted using certain jellyfish genes.

    Basically, my point is that, in the absence of any hybrid between humans and chimps or bonobos, the two other extant species widely regarded as the most closely related to H. sapiens, we should not be the least bit surprised that hybrids with species that aren't even *primates* should fail in utero, and I would go so far as to say that their failure would fall firmly in the "No shit, Sherlock" category of unsurprising. (No offense meant, just stating my personal view of the article.)

    Cheers,

    --
    "What in the name of Fats Waller is that?"
    "A four-foot prune."
  63. By Neruos by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

    Of course it will fail. Gene's, DNA and proteins are not 'plug n play'. If you want cat eyes, there is a lot more then trying to mix cat eye dna with human eye dna. The brain has no clue how to use a cat eye, the body has no idea how to maintain it.

    It is possible, but not by some nub methods like these.

    1. Re:By Neruos by moteyalpha · · Score: 1

      Of course it will fail. Gene's, DNA and proteins are not 'plug n play'. If you want cat eyes, there is a lot more then trying to mix cat eye dna with human eye dna. The brain has no clue how to use a cat eye, the body has no idea how to maintain it.

      It is possible, but not by some nub methods like these.

      I think you are spot on there. The complexity of the system is so great that it is like putting a RISC processor in an Intel socket and expecting some kind of mutation to ensue. You can plug in a USB device to either and expect some results, however. I do think that neural stem cells have been used in such a way that hybrids have been generated and there seems to be a great deal more moral ambiguity in that process than just replacing a hand with a claw.

  64. i totally agree by first_tracks · · Score: 1

    Whatever happened to doing things because we *could*, rather than because we should?

    I totally agree. Also, if I felt someone who is creating suffering sentient mutants needed to be killed, I *could* do that.

    But seriously, all morals are obviously relative. I mean what if it turns out humans are to be a very bad addition to the universe. Like all other intelligent aliens out there are magnitudes more peaceful and we are like the equivalent of Species 8472. So, any actions leading to the destruction of the human race would be considered a "good" thing.

    1. Re:i totally agree by greenreaper · · Score: 1

      You could try, anyway. My legion of giant hamster-men might have something to say about it . . .

    2. Re:i totally agree by first_tracks · · Score: 1

      You could try, anyway. My legion of giant hamster-men might have something to say about it . . .

      All i can picture is an army of internet-dancing-hamster men slowly marching across the plains in formation blaring that hamster dancing song on mega-speakers destroying everything in their path.

  65. Mandatory by Timberwolf0122 · · Score: 1

    I for one would of welcomed our new sub-humanoid overlords.

    --
    In the not too distant future, next Sunday A.D.
  66. How we would treat sub-humans? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Timothy I believe it is time for you to turn in your BOFH license if you do not know how to treat sub-humans.

    I'll have someone head right over to rebuild your machine with Vista.

  67. Meat by zooblethorpe · · Score: 1

    While certainly gross and disturbing on many levels, it does remind me of a particular Doctor Who quote from the episode, The Doctor Dances, where the venerable Doc states:

    "Life is just nature's way of keeping meat fresh."

    Cheers,

    --
    "What in the name of Fats Waller is that?"
    "A four-foot prune."
  68. vegetarian + meat eaters = ? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    If people concerned about meat become vegetarians, then what will the plant hybrid person eat?

  69. I ate your mom by hydromike2 · · Score: 1

    puts a new twist when you say, "I ate your mom last night" ..."on a bun with your aunt porky"

  70. Why no chloroplasts for humans -- by zooblethorpe · · Score: 1

    I have a one-word answer for why this won't happen any time soon:

    Monsanto.

    Seriously. This company (along with a few others) is doing everything within its capabilities, legal, ethical, or otherwise (mostly otherwise), to monopolize food production. Talk about power! There's simply *no way* they would support the development of any technology that would allow humans to avoid having to eat.

    Cheers,

    --
    "What in the name of Fats Waller is that?"
    "A four-foot prune."
  71. Mandatory by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    yiff! yiff! yiff!

  72. Literacy should matter at a nerd site by mcgrew · · Score: 1

    Breading something means to coat it in flour and egg before cooking. You meant BRED, the past tense of breed.

    To meet someone is to say "hi", meat is muscle tissue.

    I suspect you misspelled on purpose to troll the spelling nazis (which would be different than the spelling nasties).

    And your ideas are no better; animals don't have a "natural immunity" to disease, they just catch different ones than we do. You don't get parvo or distemper, for example. Different species digest different food because they evolved in ecological niches where that food was abundant.

    Humans aren't getting fat because they eat meat, no matter what PETA says. We are omnivores, and as such we need nutrients found in meat just as we need the nutrients in nuts, fruits, and vegetables.

    Vegetarians don't live any longer than omnivores.

    We are getting fat because we evolved in a world with a scarce food supply, and are now in a world with plentiful food and fattening drinks that don't take away hunger. How many fat people do you see in those pictures of Somalia?

    I mentioned spelling nazis earlier, now I'm really going to pull a Godwin on you - the types of genetic modifications you are suggesting are little different than the eugenics the Germans were attempting to practice.

  73. a less vague thought by Cajun+Hell · · Score: 1

    Maybe we should resolve the ethical concerns before we perform the science ..

    [emphasis mine]

    Maybe they have resolved those concerns. Maybe they even tried to put those "concerns" into words, and once they did (they tried to explicitly state the problem that you (and everyone else on slashdot, whenever biotech stories come up) neglected to state but merely cryptically aluded to) they realized they had little to be concerned about.

    --
    "Believe me!" -- Donald Trump
  74. Robert Heinlein by mcgrew · · Score: 1
    1. Re:Robert Heinlein by jollyreaper · · Score: 1

      Jerry Was a Man [wikipedia.org]

      I thought he was a race car driver?

      --
      Kwisatz Haderach
      Sell the spice to CHOAM
      This Mahdi took Shaddam's Throne
  75. What one earth? by xerxesVII · · Score: 3, Funny

    SailorSpork writes "Fans of furries and anime-style cat girls ..."

    I call bullshit on this right out the gate.

    There is NO SUCH THING as a fan of a furry.

    None.

    Furries are mocked and persecuted throughout the internets. In real life, parents (realizing that it is too late to leave them hobbled in the woods) disown them. The feeble-minded openly deride them. Even juggaloes cannot abide the presence of furries.

    I understand the occasional grammar or spelling mixup. I really do. But to allow such an egregious error to be posted is on par with a summary detailing the efforts of General Fred Rogers leading his unicorn cavalry against the Mongolian horde.

    --
    "We shall grapple with the ineffable, and see if we may not eff it after all." - Douglas Adams
    1. Re:What one earth? by Carbon016 · · Score: 1

      Much less to conflate them with catgirls. If there was going to be a joke there, the infamous Bush human-animal hybrid quote would have been a lot better.

  76. Roe v Wade said viability. by HornWumpus · · Score: 1

    Whatever happened to that?

    --
    John McAfee 'It was like that time I hired that Bangkok prostitute; to do my taxes, while I fucked my accountant'
    1. Re:Roe v Wade said viability. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Whatever happened to that?

      I'm not quite sure. I will say that I think its an undefinable point. There's a window at which viability is entirely dependent on the pregnancy and cannot be determined at all. The problem with "viability" is it is a gray area, not legally truly definable. I argue that you need to pick either the start point or the end point of the pregnancy, conception or delivery. If you want to pick "viability" then you must necessarily prohibit all abortions and require the procedure be akin to a c-section, where the fetus is delivered and reasonable measures are taken to see to the infant's survival. If the infant was delivered prior to 20 weeks, death is almost a certainty. If the infant was delivered after 27 weeks, survival is fairly certain, and the parents would have to choose between keeping the child or adoption. The cost to the community for this sort of procedure is high, however, and doesn't handle the issue in a healthy manner.

      Personally, I think abortion should be safe, legal, and rare. I think every effort should be made to prevent anyone from feeling they have need of an abortion, but in the end, the state should be protecting the life of the child, and I argue that the fetus becomes the child upon delivery from the womb into the world. Churches of any type must also be free to prohibit their believers from engaging in abortion, should the church teachings so choose, but those teachings should not be enshrined in law.

  77. what if we already are hybrids? by CranberryKing · · Score: 1

    It seems more plausible than preservation of favoured races. Why did we stop questioning this?

  78. Article mistakes the production of "cat-girls" by plasmacutter · · Score: 1

    Cat-girls involve humans who have been genetically altered to have these features, not animals who have been spliced with human genes.

    By the way, hybrids have been shown to work between plant and fly and plant and worm, among others.

    Maybe they're just doing it wrong.

    --
    VLC FOR MAC IS DYING! IF YOU DEVELOP, PLEASE SAVE IT!!
  79. Attribution? by HornWumpus · · Score: 1

    George Carlin IIRC.

    --
    John McAfee 'It was like that time I hired that Bangkok prostitute; to do my taxes, while I fucked my accountant'
  80. Re:Exactly! -- MOD PARENT UP by plasmacutter · · Score: 1

    We've known for *decades* that radical hybridization simply don't work.

    the jackass is a crossbreed of a donkey and a horse.

    It's been around since we had metal tools.

    --
    VLC FOR MAC IS DYING! IF YOU DEVELOP, PLEASE SAVE IT!!
  81. I am doing my own experiments by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Well I, for one, will continue my somewhat more primitive attempts at creating a half man/half sheep, half man/half horse, and half man/half cow hybrid.

    These are the sacrifices I make in the name of science.

    1. Re:I am doing my own experiments by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Aaaaaah ... Welsh.

  82. Bad summary, again. by Lockblade · · Score: 1

    TFA isn't about creating fully-formed hybrids, it's talking about putting human DNA into animal embryos and getting stem cells with that person's DNA.

  83. Re:Exactly! -- MOD PARENT UP by el3mentary · · Score: 1

    And again Tobacco is of the genus Solanum, along with belladonna and aubergines, the defining feature being the ability to produce bitter alkaloids such as solanine where it gets the name from.

    Thats why you shouldn't eat green potatoes, they'll give you nerve damage in sufficient quantities (fairly low quantities)

    --
    I reject your reality and substitute my own.
  84. Published Results by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    More on this in the next issue of "The New England Journal of Evil"

  85. Inheritance of acquired characters . . . by PolygamousRanchKid+ · · Score: 1

    . . . anyone remember Lamarck (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lamarck)?

    His approach would be simple, and would only require 13 cats, 1 chick (of child-bearing age), a gallon of Elmer's glue, and yourself.

    The step-by-step:

    1. Kill cats and skin them. Alternatively you could skin them, and then kill them, but that would be cruel.
    2. Anoint chick with Elmer's glue.
    3. Press cat skins on chick.
    4. Wait until dry.
    5. Mate with chick.
    6. Wait until the offspring comes, or until you are placed in a psychiatric prison.

    Damn, that Darwin, and his "Natural Selection" hooey . . . life would be more interesting under Lamarck.

    --
    Schroedinger's Brexit: The UK is both in and out of the EU at the same time!
  86. Oh hell yeah... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Informative

    Modern armies are increasingly making use of Unmanned Ariel Vehicles (UAVs) that have high-res thermal cameras on them - and sometimes laser target designators and missiles too.

    Most of the footage is boring, but sometimes interesting stuff happens. And sometimes clips of the interesting stuff leaks out onto the Interwebs.

    These clips are colloquially known as "Predator Porn" - so one day, I and a colleague Googled that term, looking for UAV clips.

    What we got was TOTALLY unexpected.

    It seems there are people out there who really like the movie "Predator". I mean, REALLY like it....

    *shudder*

    DG

  87. Haven't you heard? by greenreaper · · Score: 2, Informative
  88. Re:This is NOT bad news. by el3mentary · · Score: 1

    Wasn't it humans trying to breed with monkeys that (at least in theory) was the cause of AIDS?

    No don't be stupid much more likely the initial transfer was caused by the widespread practice of eating bush meat in Sub-Saharan Africa (from whence it is believed AIDS originated. Now I might be wrong given the pretext of the article but isn't that a tad more likely than transference by someone sodomising an ape.

    --
    I reject your reality and substitute my own.
  89. The only "hybrid" part this approach has... by nimblebrain · · Score: 2, Informative

    It has been known for a while now that enucleating an egg (i.e. removing its nucleus) and putting the nucleus of an adult cell inside it seems to do somewhat of a reset. This makes a little sense, since mammalian eggs have chemicals and chemical gradients necessary to uncover the right genes to start off the process.

    Given how hard it is to get eggs from humans, other animals would be ideal.

    The thing is, the nuclei of these eggs are removed. There is one thing of the animals' genes that would remain, though: the mitochondria. That's why you can trace just your maternal line through your mitochondria - they are provided almost exclusively by the egg. If this ever gets used for actual cloning, imagine how this could screw up a deep ancestry project!

    Mitochondria do pretty much the same job and have done so for aeons. They do mutate faster, though, so there *might* be other jobs that they are doing for us that are slightly incompatible. On the whole, though, probably not. In the end, chances are that the only fantasy "hybrid" part of this is human cells with animal batteries.

    There's a lot of basic research left to do to see how cow and rabbit eggs (especially the ever-copious rabbit eggs!) differ from human eggs in terms of the chemical environment they provide, but once we figure that out, we will have another avenue of making stem cell equivalents, valuable for all sorts of things including spinal cord repair.

    Cloning is a little different than therapeutic stem cell application would be, however. You cannot just throw cloned 'stem' cells into a body - you will get a teratoma: a disgusting ball of flesh with all the body tissues in it. You need to coax it down other development paths first. You can wait for a cloned embryo to develop and take out that particular kind of tissue, which is where some ethical considerations come in, or you can apply hormones and other chemicals to do the job.

    --
    Binary geeks can count to 1,023 on their fingers :)
  90. Re:Exactly! -- MOD PARENT UP by drinkypoo · · Score: 1

    the jackass is a crossbreed of a donkey and a horse. It's been around since we had metal tools.

    And it's been blaming its poor work on them ever since.

    --
    "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
  91. Diphallic Terata by cekander · · Score: 1

    Unless you want to share with your friends, two vaginas and four breasts are useless.

    Hey now, don't forget about us: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diphallia

  92. Re:Exactly! -- MOD PARENT UP by zooblethorpe · · Score: 1

    Cheers plasmacutter, but the key term here is "*radical* hybridization". The donkey and the horse are quite closely related, both belonging to the genus Equus. (I'm a bit surprised to learn that they aren't regarded as taxonomically closer, to be honest. :) Consequently, your comment misses the mark WRT my problem with the article -- that the failed hybridization of widely distanced species should come as no surprise.

    That said, your comment here would make a good rejoinder to part of my other post in this thread.

    Cheers,

    --
    "What in the name of Fats Waller is that?"
    "A four-foot prune."
  93. Stop this research! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny

    We cannot handle the truth. It is us who are hybrids of apes and pigs.

  94. When is it a person? by qbzzt · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Because then I could argue that" Yes, they may be experimenting on their own kids but at least they did not abort them.

    Where do you draw the line?

    Hard to say, which is precisely why I have a problem with abortion. At some point, between conception and the age of legal majority, we have a legally protected person. But birth seems arbitrary.

    --
    -- Support a free market in the field of government
    1. Re:When is it a person? by Twanfox · · Score: 1

      It is truely difficult to point to a day and state that is when conception actually occurs. Even at the second of conception, said new entity is truly on it's own and not leeching nourishment from the womb. Only after it commits it's first act of aggression, by assaulting the woman it's within possibly against her will, does it become capable of growing into a full fledged adult. However, when the two are bonded together like that, who's rights take priority? The adult, who is capable of existing on without the child, or the child, that might kill the adult in the process of being born? Gestation is a highly dangerous affair for both mother and child, and even though we've advanced so far from our club-wielding ancestors, we STILL have infant and maternal fatalities in the process of bringing new life into the world.

      It might be that a birth is an arbitrary milestone to measure a valid legal entity, but whether that child lives or dies after birth is really the deciding factor on whether that child can grow up to be a member of society. It may be nice to think that a fertilized egg is a legal entity that has rights, but most people forget that legal entities also have responsibilities that prohibit actions that a fertilized egg must take in order to further life. When deciding when abortions are palatable by society, I would argue that the idea of 'likelihood to survive' might be applicable. If the child is likely to survive on it's own (usually no earlier than 20-22 weeks of gestation), then it probably shouldn't be done. Earlier than that? Even nature induces abortions (miscarriages), often for a good reason such as the failure of the fetus to develop properly.

      I'd like to think that one statement I heard about abortion would become our morality on it. That they should be allowed, and rarely used.

    2. Re:When is it a person? by qbzzt · · Score: 1

      It may be nice to think that a fertilized egg is a legal entity that has rights, but most people forget that legal entities also have responsibilities that prohibit actions that a fertilized egg must take in order to further life.

      Adults have responsibilities. Kids do not. My three year old cannot be help legally responsible for his actions. Does this mean he is not a legal entity, entitled to protection of the law?

      He doesn't have to use my wife and me for support, but he does have to use somebody. He is unlikely to survive without an adult taking care of him.

      I'd like to think that one statement I heard about abortion would become our morality on it. That they should be allowed, and rarely used.

      If they are allowed, why should they be used only rarely? Who gets to decide if a particular situation merits it? If it's the pregnant woman, then isn't that identical to the situation today when they are not rare?

      --
      -- Support a free market in the field of government
    3. Re:When is it a person? by mpeskett · · Score: 1

      First off, you're a legally protected person before age of majority, and abortions very late in the pregnancy are (generally speaking) banned even when abortions are allowed.

      Second, there are milestones in foetal development that you can use to draw a line between conception and birth, being able to survive independently of the mother being the one I'd support as a separator. That being about 24 weeks, the legal limit here in the UK

      Well... I learned something new from Wikipedia when I was looking that up, turns out you can't get an abortion on request in the UK - has to be approved by 2 doctors either to protect the physical/mental health of the mother/existing children, or if the child is likely to be severely handicapped, or for "socio-economic reasons" or in the case of rape... it's not tightly restricted, but it's more restricted than I thought it was.

    4. Re:When is it a person? by mstahl · · Score: 1

      That's why it's not defined at birth. In most US jurisdictions life is defined to begin when a fetus can survive by itself outside the womb (roughly six months into a pregnancy).

  95. Better rats than snakes. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Oh they're using rats and bunnies today? Looking at the _SCUM_ running the world today, they must have used snakes and lizards before.

  96. Ya right. by sunking2 · · Score: 1

    Of course they said it failed, because the outcry of people against doing it would be massive. I can hear them now, 'Take your stinking paws off me, you damned dirty ape!', all the while denying the whole thing.

  97. M'ling by Dragged+Down+by+the · · Score: 1

    I'm sitting here amid my human-animal hybrids and am getting a real kick out of these replies. Dr. Moreau

  98. Full Metal Alchemist by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    They tried to make a chimera and failed!

    Next the British scientist's daughter and the family dog misteriously disappear a day prior to a visit from the research agency that would evaluate whether to keep his grant or not...

  99. Give us that old-time religion by Ugly+American · · Score: 1

    So I'd say that the Christian Trinitarian God defines right and wrong. And he defines that there are no subhumans.

    Well, no subhumans except for the Amelekites - "Now go and smite Amalek, and utterly destroy all that they have, and spare them not; but slay both man and woman, infant and suckling [ed. note: a suckling is what you refer to as a "just-born child"], ox and sheep, camel and ass." (I Samuel 15:2-3.) The Ammonites are likewise done to death in II Samuel 12:31, the people of Jericho in Joshua 6:19, the whole population of Ai in Joshua 8:25, and of course all the firstborn of Egypt (again including the cattle) in Exodus 12:29-30.

    Last, but not least, there's the Biblical authorization of slavery in Leviticus 25:44 - "As for the male and female slaves whom you may have, it is from the nations around you that you may aquire male and female slaves."

    Come to think of it, the set of "subhumans" would appear to be "everyone who isn't in the tribe," so there's quite a few of them around.

    --
    For sale: one sig space, gently used. Inquire for details.
  100. Very glad by Eravnrekaree · · Score: 1

    I am actually happy this happened. This sort of atrocity should be completely banned. These would be conscience beings, it is not the right of another person to manipulate the bodies of artifically engineer bodies that would be inhabited by other conscious beings. There are too many ethical questions, and especially from intentional and unintentional manipulation of intelligence and as well life experience, we are esseentially engineering their lives which we should not havea right to do that. Something such as life should be left to the randomness of nature, which does not have an agenda or any evil schemes. Animals and people have a right to be unique, to be their own people, and uniquely created by the randomness of nature rather than have their identity and characterists defined and dominated by someone else. This is very little different from surgically altering animals or people to suit the agenda of some scientist, for whatever evil purpose, to make them more subservant or docile, or what have you. The right to physical autonomy over ones body extends to the right to a natural body randomly generated from nature for a unique one of a kind, autonomous identity out of the control of anyone else.

    1. Re:Very glad by Ash-Fox · · Score: 1

      Animals and people have a right to be unique, to be their own people, and uniquely created by the randomness of nature rather than have their identity and characterists defined and dominated by someone else. This is very little different from surgically altering animals or people to suit the agenda of some scientist, for whatever evil purpose, to make them more subservant or docile, or what have you.

      I beleive such technology can be used for "good", developing ways to ensure people/animals are truely independent, where as in their nature, they aren't. I am not close minded enough to consider this forbidden territory. I am tired of people who prevent technological progress.

      --
      Change is certain; progress is not obligatory.
  101. Re:Exactly! -- MOD PARENT UP by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    What the hell is a pornato and where can I get one?

  102. What makes you think it'll stop at embryos? by MikeRT · · Score: 1

    What makes you think that this research will be used just to create brain-dead sources of stem cells? What makes you think that scientists won't also try to let hybrids become viable children to see what happens when they grow up?

    1. Re:What makes you think it'll stop at embryos? by Hatta · · Score: 1

      If they do that, then we'll have some ethical problems to talk about it. Until they do that, there are no ethical problems. We're talking about the research that is being done today, not research that might be done 20 years down the road.

      --
      Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
  103. Even as a furry, it's not really a bright idea. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    These experiments mostly entail shooting human nuclei into animal cells. On a small scale, in a petri dish, it can be useful to "see how things work," but brought to term, if nothing goes horribly wrong, you'd just end up with a human with the cell membranes of the donor animal -- likely susceptible to all sorts of new zoonoses, at little benefit to anyone.

    Then, what happens when this person you've created, who's just a regular guy or girl except for his/her stunning susceptibility to hoof-and-mouth disease or FIV or swine flu or something, wants to have kids? In theory a little diversity can't hurt, but in practice, it sure can if the result is a 'bridge' for some awful virus with "animal" hosts to start mingling with human DNA.

  104. A geneticist would know better than me, but... by Ichinisan · · Score: 1

    ...how does putting human DNA into an egg cell make the resulting cells partly animal? Basically, the egg cell isn't much more than a container for the human DNA in the nucleus. If the cells reproduce, and keep duplicating the *human* DNA, and the human DNA determines how those cells develop and form specific functions, then it's still human. I just don't see where DNA-coded information from the animal's DNA gets mixed.

  105. Medicine is not playing God by MikeRT · · Score: 0, Redundant

    The fundamental difference is that these scientists are fabricating new lifeforms in a laboratory. By your ridiculous standard, I'm playing God whenever I change the oil in my car because I am sustaining its viable existence.

    1. Re:Medicine is not playing God by the_humeister · · Score: 1

      How is that standard ridiculous? In any event, it's what Christian Science followers adhere to as well.

      Additionally, your car is not alive.

  106. Re:Exactly! -- MOD PARENT UP by tmosley · · Score: 1

    Wouldn't that just cause a plant to make fruit like a tomato that has roots like a potato? Or did it make fruit like a potato, with roots like a tomato?

    Personally, I preferred the tomato-tobacco hybrid. It produced enough nicotine to kill a man after half a tombacco sandwich!

  107. Why try the hard way? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    They should just ask George and Barbara Bush for advice. But then again, one simian is enough.

  108. Re:Exactly! -- MOD PARENT UP by zooblethorpe · · Score: 1

    It's not very well known among non-spud-farming types, but most potato varieties *already* produce fruit very much like a tomato -- only too rich in toxic solanine to be edible. Have a look here for a picture.

    The pomato graft uses a potato rootstock with a tomato top, so yes, the idea is to get both tomatoes and potatoes from one plant. The pomato genetic hybrid was ostensibly a weird attempt at producing a tomato with a thicker skin and longer shelf-life. Pomato grafts work, but apparently don't taste too good. However, genetic hybrids don't work -- they don't live long enough to grow very big before their genetic oddities produce too many mistakes, and the plant dies -- assuming it even germinates.

    Cheers,

    --
    "What in the name of Fats Waller is that?"
    "A four-foot prune."
  109. Right way to do it by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Ha you fools !
    You don't hybridize rabbits and humans all in one step. first u add lots of human genes to rabbits.
    cross breed those rabbits that have expressed the most human genes if you're so lucky and then add more human genes again and repeat.
    Do the reverse with some humans (this step may take a long time so you may need some life extension formula unless you figure out how to speed the human part using hybridized cells to make other hybridized cells adding more rabbit cells each time. after say 20 generations in vitro, you may if things go well have hybrid cells which may need to be converted to stem or sperm cells...which should then be used with the hybrid rabbit eggs.)
    Another technic perhaps should be to succesively hybridized the rabbit in vitro with creatures closer to humans one step at a time. say dog, pig, monkey...human. A more direct method is to skip all this dabbling and creating an artificial genome by copying desired sequence from he human genome into the rabit... somehow i fear its easier to put the rabbit into the human than the other way around. ethics aside, this will be more useful 'ahem cough cough' to evil lords everywhere.
    Imagine transferring the genes expressing growth and machority to human hybrid...
    Now grow yourself a slave army or mob or laborer in a few months. In this case we still have a problem of course because a rabbit cannot bear the offspring so... In any case, a pig would make a better all around candidate for a human animal hybrid.
    There ;-)
    Wally the dabbler.

  110. Sheep stories by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    So are all those all sheep stories just myth, or is that what the researches were doing?

  111. Re:This is NOT bad news. by Titoxd · · Score: 1

    Now I might be wrong given the pretext of the article but isn't that a tad more likely than transference by someone sodomising an ape.

    You might be appalled by this, but in third world countries, people are taught that the initial AIDS transmission occurred after someone "had relations" with an ape. At least I was taught that by a "abstinence only" group that gave a lecture back when I used to go to middle school in Mexico...

  112. Re:Exactly! -- MOD PARENT UP by PaganRitual · · Score: 1

    Part of why I mentioned the pomato is that the potato and tomato are both members of the same genus, Solanum [wikipedia.org], a.k.a. the deadly nightshade family.

    Does any of this have anything to do with the fact that at Expert Alchemy, potatoes and tomatoes suddenly gain Damage Health stats? Cause, you know, there is that vampire cave outside of Skingrad that I really want to clear out.

  113. Wait wait wait by Benfea · · Score: 1

    You mean to tell me that squirting random chunks of DNA into the zygote of another species doesn't result in a viable crossbreed? No! Get out of here!

  114. ..overlords by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I, for one, welcome our new Human-Animal Hybrids overlords!

  115. I'm tired of sophomoric idiots by DrVomact · · Score: 1

    Your absolute definition is, to me, simply one of many relative definitions of right and wrong. Without a supreme authority there can be no absolute definition.

    I assume you assume there is no supreme authority. OK—granted for the sake of argument. Now, why do you think that if the God of Abraham doesn't exist, then relativism is the only possible alternative?

    It can't be, because no sensible person could possibly embrace a view as naive as the one you express, if he gave it even a little thought. Relativism means that we have no common moral ground. You can screw anybody you want to, and I can screw you—and you will have no right to complain about it. Are you sure you want to hold this position?

    The segue into "might makes right", followed by "it's OK, as long as it doesn't hurt anyone else" is left as an exercise for the undergraduate reader.

    If every view is equally correct, then everything I do in accordance with my own view is correct in my own system, and that's as good as it can ever get. To live is to tread on others. You can try to minimize that if you wish, but you will hurt others, and no justification will make that hurt go away. You just make do.

    What absolute twaddle; what a waste of perfectly good words. You, sir, are one of the reasons I don't teach any more. It's too tempting to introduce students like you to Mr. Glock. "Do you really want to argue for relativism, young man? That's a 148 grain Black Talon up the barrel, and I'm having one of my gullible days, so think carefully before you answer."

    You must admit, and armed philosopher concentrates the mind.

    --
    Great men are almost always bad men--Lord Acton's Corollary
    1. Re:I'm tired of sophomoric idiots by fastest+fascist · · Score: 1

      Seems to me you argue for absolute morals because it is convenient. Where, pray tell, do such morals come from, if we leave out an authority above mankind? The closest we come is the combination of genetics and upbringing, which certainly leaves us with a lot of moral common ground. To deny that almost all of us share a great deal of moral beliefs would be absurd. But operating under the assumption of no supreme judge to set the parameters of "right" and "wrong", these belief systems represent no moral value outside their own frame of reference.

      When you posit I have, under my views, no "right" to complain about the actions of others, you are bringing an absolutist judgment into a relativistic system. You are trying to compare my moral space, if you will, against that of a hypothetical oppressor of mine, in a "higher" space, where both can be viewed and objectively evaluated. This is not possible. There is no such higher moral space. For me, my set of morals is everything, although they are not set in stone, and although I am aware that every other person carries similarly important personal beliefs with them. Most of the time these do not conflict severely. As noted before, there is a lot of common ground. Sometimes the beliefs do conflict, in which case, if the differences can not be peacefully resolved, the side with the greater ability to oppress wins.

      Two examples can be made of this: A lone psychopath killer versus the members of the society they live in, and one state versus another in a war sparked by a moral issue. (Let's assume the latter actually happens.) In the first case, the psychopath is dealt with according to whatever customs the society has, and few would argue the killer was in the right. In the latter case, two large groups of people have critically conflicting views of morality. Probably the war is not about an abstract statement of morals, but rather actions resulting from them. In any case, you either accept that both sides have their own, equally important views, or you evaluate the views and decide that one side is more in the "right" than the other. To do the latter, either you need a supreme judge as a source of moral code, or you need to rely on your own set of morals, probably backed up by most of the people of your society. (Actually, in the last case it is possible to both accept the "right" of the one party to their views and to believe their views are wrong and therefore act against them.)

      Now, here's the thing. Relativism doesn't do away with "right" and "wrong". Almost all of us have a strong emotional response to wrongful actions, as we perceive them. Almost all of us will, in some circumstances, act upon our personal morals to the detriment of others, even if we do believe their moral choices are just as correct to them as ours to ourselves. The difference to an absolutist system is that the responsibility for such choices can not be deferred to any external party. There is the individual and the choices they make, and they have to live with them.

    2. Re:I'm tired of sophomoric idiots by spiralx · · Score: 1

      Morals are what we call the expression of inherent drives that come from our genes. They're absolute in one sense - we all share the same basic set of drives and thus moral urges - but they're just another mechanism to enable us to better pass our genes along. Most of them are readily identifiable as mechanisms for social living, tending to drive us towards the tit-for-tat solution to the iterated Prisoner's Dilemna... it's a fascinating subject, it basically boils down to the fact that given natural selection, we've evolved the morals necessary for our genes to have the best chance of being passed on.

      Between game theory and evolutionary genetics, we can explain why we have morals... and why any kind of socially-living creature would most likely have similar qualities (the caveat being that intelligence brings with it an amazing ability to interpret things in all kinds of ways!) Sure beats God as a theory, which can't explain evil, let alone good.

    3. Re:I'm tired of sophomoric idiots by DrVomact · · Score: 1

      Seems to me you argue for absolute morals because it is convenient.

      No, you are quite mistaken. I don't argue for "absolute morals"—I'm not at all sure I even understand what "absolute morals" are. I also don't understand why you think that you have only two choices: either morality is "absolute" or it's "relative". Above all, I wasn't trying to provide an answer, I was merely pointing out that your position is completely untenable in the sense that you yourself cannot consistently hold it. Unless, of course, you are actually a "fascist"; then I may, once again, have to refer you to Mr. Glock.

      When you posit I have, under my views, no "right" to complain about the actions of others, you are bringing an absolutist judgment into a relativistic system.

      No. I'm not "positing" it, I'm stating the obvious consequences of your own view, inasmuch as I find that view intelligible at all. If you're going to assert that everyone is free to make up their own notions about right and wrong, and that each person's judgment in these matters carries the same weight as anyone else's, then any discussion of "right" (or "wrong")becomes pointless. At best, we're talking about personal preferences, like a taste for chocolate or a preference in wines. I'm too busy for that.

      Now, here's the thing. Relativism doesn't do away with "right" and "wrong". Almost all of us have a strong emotional response to wrongful actions, as we perceive them. Almost all of us will, in some circumstances, act upon our personal morals to the detriment of others, even if we do believe their moral choices are just as correct to them as ours to ourselves.

      I don't follow you. You say that your position is pleased to leave us with "right" and "wrong", and that these consist of "emotions". I take this to mean that some of us are revolted by child rape and murder like certain people are repelled by steak tartare; others have more positive feelings about such things. But why are these feelings of the slightest importance—unless, of course, they're my own?

      Enough of this, Mr. Relatively Slow Fascist, you have convinced me. I shall devise my very own Moral System. Its Prime Directive is: Thou Shalt Not Suffer a Fool to Live.

      --
      Great men are almost always bad men--Lord Acton's Corollary
  116. Gives a whole new meaning to... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Mommas, don't let your babies grow up to be cow-boys!

  117. Don't give up hope! by GameboyRMH · · Score: 1

    There's still the possibility of:

    - Fembots

    - Matrix-like VR

    - Deceiving meatspace women with AR hacks (prerequesite: ubiquitous optical implants)

    - Pop culture fashion trend where intelligence is sexy (hey, it could happen)

    - A future economy where geek jobs pay well

    --
    "When information is power, privacy is freedom" - Jah-Wren Ryel
    1. Re:Don't give up hope! by twilightzero · · Score: 1

      - A future economy where geek jobs pay well

      This is a myth that was already busted :\

      --

      "Christ what a design! I could eat a handful of iron filings and PUKE a better emergency pump than that!"
  118. Re: "And how does a furry shave?" by Joce640k · · Score: 2, Funny

    I'm not too sure you understand the premise.

    --
    No sig today...
  119. The mistake they made in JP by coryking · · Score: 1

    The big mistake was using Apple Computers to control the whole park. Had they used a proven system, maybe the dinosaurs would have never escaped containment. Maybe somebody here should write the director and find out.

    On the same token, it was the Apple Computer who uploaded the virus onto the alien spacecraft in Independence Day. Some here would argue Windows would have been more effective, but I'm not so certain.

    I dont really know where I'm going with this, but according to the product placement I've seen in movies, macs tend to be in the middle of tricky movie situations. This should be considered when creating your own private human-animal hybrid.

  120. Why by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Why would we want to do this sort of thing?
    I can't think of any logical reason.

  121. This "failure" story is DISINFORMATION by Roark+Meets+Dent · · Score: 1

    Efforts to create cross species have been successful in the covert world for decades, including with humans. Stories of the actual application of this type of genetic engineering are only now beginning to be published, and certainly not for any cases involving humans. One recently published story involves the creation of goats with spider genes, allowing the goats to create silk: http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&ct=res&cd=1&url=http%3A%2F%2Fnews.bbc.co.uk%2F1%2Fhi%2Fsci%2Ftech%2F889951.stm&ei=vQqJSaGsHpmQsQOpzY2mBg&usg=AFQjCNHvc8y53tq9HFonHsM3RDNxB1RrWg&sig2=mL3a3essg9tEAaZz85YcKw

  122. Re:Exactly! -- MOD PARENT UP by Fritz+the+CopyCat · · Score: 1

    Actually, a jackass is just a male donkey (ass). You seem to be thinking of either the mule (offspring of a male donkey and female horse), or the hinny (offspring of a female donkey and a male horse).

  123. Re:Exactly! -- MOD PARENT UP by omnichad · · Score: 1

    Yeah. I really like Ubuntu, but I'd like the UI of my Mac. I think I'll just put their binary code in a big pile and mix it up real good. Maybe we'll get a new operating system!

  124. SUB-humans? by Donovon · · Score: 1

    Imagine the ire of an entire new species at the implications of that.

    D

  125. Human-Animal Hybrids Fail by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    "how we would treat sub-humans" might not be the relevant question. What if they turned out better than us? It wouldn't be too impossible..,.

  126. Dark Angel by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Does this mean Jessica Alba is not real? I'm gonna go cry now.

  127. Re:Exactly! -- MOD PARENT UP by plasmacutter · · Score: 1

    ah, my mistake then.

    --
    VLC FOR MAC IS DYING! IF YOU DEVELOP, PLEASE SAVE IT!!
  128. omg furry by Ash-Fox · · Score: 1

    Fans of furries and anime-style cat girls will be disappointed by the news that attempts to create human animal hybrids have failed.

    I am a furry and... I couldn't care less?

    The human-animaal fiction I enjoy is not related to this research at all.

    The idea even disturbs me a little.

    --
    Change is certain; progress is not obligatory.
    1. Re:omg furry by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Every time (well, most of the time) there a new Slashdot article is posted or commented on with any vague furry connotation, I see you incessantly whining about the representation of your sexual fetish (as if anyone cares). Don't get your diapers in a bunch just because someone made a easy joke.

    2. Re:omg furry by Ash-Fox · · Score: 1

      Every time (well, most of the time) there a new Slashdot article is posted or commented on with any vague furry connotation, I see you incessantly whining about the representation of your sexual fetish (as if anyone cares).

      The amusing thing about many anti-furry trolls is that they are often jelous of the fact furs can find amusement in doing little things, however, they also love the fact that they can get a rise out of a few of them easily. I think this AC didn't get enough love and attention as a child and I feel sorry for him, one can only hope the future gets better for him.

      I bawww for you, Mr. Anonymous Coward.

      --
      Change is certain; progress is not obligatory.
  129. Enforcing morality without a personal stake by qbzzt · · Score: 1

    There really is a point at which, no matter what your personal opinion on the matter is, unless you can prove a personal stake in the matter, you should just let it go

    I agree that this point exists, and my child rearing techniques could land me in jail in Germany. However, just because a point exists doesn't mean that there aren't things beyond it.

    To take another thing, what about slavery? Did people in the North have a personal stake in the matter? If not, what gave them the right to force abolition?

    --
    -- Support a free market in the field of government
  130. Dear Slashdot by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Why is this not tagged X-Files. You should be ashamed of yourselves.

  131. Old news... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I though the general population of Alabama had pretty much proven this already. Human/sheep, human/goat, human/cow, etc... Then there are several examples in the porn industry with women and dogs or horses, which haven't produced any results either...

  132. Quit oversimplifying by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Conditional logic does not make black and white issues into any shade of gray. You say it's a bad thing to be deprived of your freedom. I agree. Let's not stop there though, continue to "drill down." If there exists in some arbitrary society an individual whose actions are considered a danger to that society or its members, a reasonable person would conclude that it is "right" for the violating member to be locked up. (Necessary caveats: it should be required for the imprisoned to have a chance of self-fulfillment as well. The current practice of locking someone up without any rehabilitation or training is "wrong" imo.)

    What looks from a distance to be varying shades of gray is most likely the alternating black and white of a tree built on a set of conditional rules.

    Furthermore, _complete_ relativists should be actively promoting anarchy as it is the only societal model that fits their views. Reasonable people have a "bedrock" morality that is really very stable across cultures.

  133. Cows eggs never made sense by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    While these are cheap to come by. Bovines and rabbits are both herbivores with some serious differences in their metabolisms. This is an issue because, donor eggs have donor mitochondria. Cows, for example, have nucleated red blood cells for oxygen transport. This is a more primitive energy system and less efficient. Rabbits and cows, unlike humans, both rely on several chemosynthesis paths for making various proteins that are not present in plant material and cannot synthesize several nutrients that are always in present in their food. Chances are their mitochondria are slightly more adapted than primates to these traits being presence. This may be what is causing the problems as the mitochondrial DNA may not code for traits that it expects to exist in its host. It could also be something as simple as a hormone in their eggs that is slightly modified from human proteins, which is more likely for these animals because herbivores make more of their own proteins than we do and thus are more likely to have a mutation in these pathways. I suspect that we need to use more primate like creatures or test various primate hormones to see if any bypass the issue.

  134. "Neuter" would technically be correct by abbyful · · Score: 1

    Spay refers only to removal of the female sex organs.

    Neuter refers to removal of sex organs and is technically gender-neutral, but is most commonly used to refer to the removal of male sex organs. Probably because "neuter" sounds better than "castrate".

  135. The previous ethical posts re: because we could... by KinakeM · · Score: 1

    "I am am become death, destroyer of worlds." Ring any bells?!

    I was just wondering... isn't part of being human having a moral system?

    What's funny to me is the classic egghead response that goes into the moral relativism quagmire. I used to be like that. Then I grew up. Being wise means you have learned from things you should have done; or better yet, NOT done.

    The simple replies with Nazi examples and atomic bombs etc were perfect. There really is no need to take things to the "Ivory Tower." I mean, seriously, just try to live a complete moral-relativist lifestyle and see how far you go. Most eggheads are not all too physical if you know what I mean? Thus, chances of surviving this "because-I-can" world greatly diminish if you did not have a moral system that trumps the "because-I-can" instinct of the physically and biologically superior human to just walk up and smash you weaker ones and remove you from the gene pool.

    Be thankful that we can act according to some ethical and moral standards. And be worried that many people dont!

    --
    All science is either physics or stamp-collecting.