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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."
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?
Such an ugly term. How about Parahuman?
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?
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.
... that ever read the Ballad of Lost C'Mell?
Or the Dead Lady of Clown Town?
The Underpeople?
Come on slashdot...
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.
But fission bombs were just fine?