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DARPA Aims for Synthetic Life With a Kill Switch
jkinney3 writes to mention that DARPA's mad scientists have undertaken a new program designed to create synthetic organisms, complete with a "kill switch." The project, dubbed BioDesign, is dumping $6 million into "removing the randomness of evolutionary advancement" by creating genetically engineered masterpieces. "Of course, Darpa's got to prevent the super-species from being swayed to do enemy work — so they'll encode loyalty right into DNA, by developing genetically programmed locks to create 'tamper proof' cells. Plus, the synthetic organism will be traceable, using some kind of DNA manipulation, 'similar to a serial number on a handgun.' And if that doesn't work, don't worry. In case Darpa's plan somehow goes horribly awry, they're also tossing in a last-resort, genetically-coded kill switch."
I can see this as a movie entitled "Kill Switch" with Arnold Schwarzenegger.......
"The average reporter we talk to is 27 years old......They literally know nothing." - Ben Rhodes
History has no evidence of any organism managing to evolve away from a lethal or maladaptive feature.
Well, you're more right than you know. Baby seals haven't evolved to withstand harder clubs. Cows haven't managed to evolve into anything other than steak. Us humans haven't manage evolve away from war.
So yeah, I don't see why a killswitch would fail.
I always have the impression it would be better to use robotic technology as body implants to improve human capabilities. Read: Why should we create robots instead of us becoming the robots/cyborgs? Wouldn't this sort of solve the controlling problem at the root? Of course such a choice might have it's own perhaps unpleasant implications, which I haven't thought of yet...
DARPA: if you will put a kill-switch inside politicians, I am ready to send you some money by PayPal.
Rich And Stupid is not so bad as Working For Rich And Stupid.
Gary Larson, The Far Side, was way ahead of his time.
The analogue for vegetarians would be maize, arguably the most successful species in the history of human civilization. To bring this conversation fork back on topic, it's interesting to note that modern corn is the result of several mutations that make the plant much less viable in the wild, and dependent upon humans for survival. Even with an engineered "kill switch" there's no guarantee that these artificial organisms won't encounter some other microorganism that finds it beneficial to keep 'em around and figures out some way to do so.
Pseudogenes are junk DNA. They no longer have a function. Perhaps the killswitch could be in a RuBisCo-type enzyme. RuBisCo is a plant enzyme that fixes carbon dioxide to make glucose. It also fixes oxygen, however, which is hypothesized to be a remnant from the early atmosphere where oxygen was rare. Oxygen fixation by RuBisCo, or photorespiration, results in ammonia, which the plant must use energy to detoxify. My idea: an enzyme based on RuBisCo, which is part of an essential boichemical pathway, but causes problems in the presence of a specific substance. This substance would be manmade and very rare, and the effects on the organism would be fatal.
Consider this: the way plants are arranged in virgin forest is natural, whereas the way plants are arranged in my backyard garden is not. But, my desire to order what seems chaotic is natural. Not just natural for a human, but a part of nature. When (American) football is played on artificial turf it seems unnatural, but my point is that the human ability to create artificial turf exists within the realm of nature, because there is no way for anything to exist outside of nature. This is in my opinin a fundamental aspect of Darwin's discovery.
Gary Dunn
Open Slate Project
Cows are successful because of humans domesticating them. You seem to be confusing that with natural selection.