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Human Language Gene Changes How Mice Squeak
archatheist writes "Researchers at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig, Germany have engineered a mouse whose FOXP2 gene has been swapped out for a different (human) version. This is interesting because the gene is implicated in human language, and this has changed how mice squeak. 'In a region of the brain called the basal ganglia, known in people to be involved in language, the humanized mice grew nerve cells that had a more complex structure. Baby mice utter ultrasonic whistles when removed from their mothers. The humanized baby mice, when isolated, made whistles that had a slightly lower pitch, among other differences, Dr. Enard says. Dr. Enard argues that putting significant human genes into mice is the only feasible way of exploring the essential differences between people and chimps, our closest living relatives.' The academic paper was published in Cell."
I'm assuming most people here won't have a problem with this research. But truly, where is the line? What about injecting human brain cells into mice? How about into chimps? Do we have any moral obligations not to cross this line? I am in awe and at the same time terrified about the future.
This article raises some of these questions. It's quite interesting that it was written in 2004. It even mentions the FOXP2 gene.
http://www.reason.com/news/show/34941.html
Sounds like a job for... better tools. :)
Mod me down, my New Earth Global Warmingist friends!
Suppose that this mouse is actually now sentient. Do we commit a crime when we imprison it in a laboratory or mangle its body (for the sake of some test)?
When we create chimera, we are playing god.
And the mice will suddenly start to develop extreme communication skills and figure out how to upset the results of the scientists.
This is an interesting part of science, even if it's not always morally "right". The outcome should be that we will learn more about ourselves and to design better drugs to treat illnesses.
But the more worrying kind of action here is that it also invites to tampering with genes that can make humans meek and controllable. A new level of slavery can be developed. Just imagine a totalitarian state with zombie slaves to do all the dirt work. If the Nazis had had this technology they would have used it! And super-humans that can exceed all current Olympic records.
Let's just say that we live in interesting times!
If builders built buildings the way programmers wrote programs, then the first woodpecker would destroy civilization.
"This is of course until the EU gets their hands into them, and they will be born without an ability to browse.'
I think this would have been more accurate: And they no longer have a browser-pellet forcefed to them, but are made concious that they are free to browse as they like.
Bert
What I wouldn't pay for a mouse that could curse. Or good god a monkey. Give me a cursing monkey and I'll tithe you every paycheck 'til I die.
A marker of language as opposed to verbal signaling is that speech is 'productive'. That is, it evolves. This can be done by compounding -- simplifying multiple elements into a single one. An example of Koko the gorilla doing comes from Penny Patterson's dissertation. Koko took the signs for 'apple' and 'drink' and formed a single compound sign for 'apple juice'. This example has been passed around for years as good evidence Koko was actually using language.
Another example from the same source but not made as public was Koko's compounding 'dirty', 'toilet' and 'stink' into a sign referring to feces. Not terribly surprising in normal use. But she used it in another context. When her intended mate Mike was introduced, Koko didn't care for him at all. One time when Penny was trying to cajole Koko into accepting Mike, she said "Mike is a smart gorilla. I like Mike." Unimpressed, Koko replied "Mike dirty-toilet-stink", ie. 'Mike is shit'.
There's your cursing monkey (actually, ape). You can find it in her dissertation, "Linguistic Capabilities of a Lowland Gorilla", Stanford, 1979. Or you can call Koko's humans at 1-800-ME-GO-APE (634-6273), I dirty-toilet-stink you not. If you're serious about your paycheck to even the slightest degree, feel free to visit koko.org and donate to her Conservation Education Project: Koko is teaching sign language in Cameroon, to deaf children as well as to hearing children interested in becoming sign language interpreters. If anyone still doubts Koko's linguistic abilities in light of this fact, I would doubt their linguistic comprehension more than I would Koko's.
"I may be synthetic, but I'm not stupid." -- Bishop 341-B