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Scanning Embryos For Super-Intelligent Kids Is On the Horizon
An anonymous reader writes: Stephen Hsu, a professor in theoretical physics at Michigan State University, has an article discussing the genetic underpinnings of intelligence, and how our understanding of it will eventually lead to smarter children. Researchers have detected genes that influence cognitive ability, but the effect of any one gene is very small — less than 1 IQ point at best. Genetically modifying such genes is unlikely to happen any time soon, but our ability to analyze an embryo's genome is becoming quick and cheap. As we isolate more and more genes that affect intelligence, this means prospective parents will soon be able to analyze a batch of zygotes and figure out which ones are likely to be the smartest. Hsu says a batch of 10 zygotes will probably have an IQ range of 15 points or more. As our understanding of intelligence genetics grows, that range will only expand. He adds, "The corresponding ethical issues are complex and deserve serious attention in what may be a relatively short interval before these capabilities become a reality."
...what happens when they can detect which genes make you more likely to be a Republican.
Khaaaaaaaan!
Is 15 IQ points really a meaningful difference "in the real world'?
Now we can get back to to the slippery slope. What about killing off girl embryos or blacks or obese, etc etc.
Even if we do figure out even a few of the hundreds of factors that contribute to our (currently valued form of) intelligence, without a way to effectively cause the optimal configuration to happen, you're at best encouraging abortions of otherwise genetic-defect-free children in favor of another chance at one that would be smarter.
So pretty soon society will contain 60% autists with serious psychological problems, 20% aspergers and other forms of high functioning autism, and 10% normal human beings? Yep. We must really select on IQ only ...
Dr. Mengele's ghost just had and orgasm.
Fine, so we can't prove when life begins. Therefore, we can equally say we don't know that genetic researchers' lives have yet begun as human life, and cull them at will with the same logical basis.
Ah, but then we can also just select for embryos that will be apathetic about the ethical issues surrounding this procedure. In a few generations... problem solved!
We need a few more Einsteins, I say. But if we start designer babies... Let me be the first to say... Khaaaaan!!!!!!!!!
If I were to choose a child from a huge batch of zygotes, I'd want the one that's generally disposed to be happy - easy going, social, even tempered, and not too fussy growing up. But apparently, geneticists aren't working on identifying the genetic correlates of those traits, even though we know that they are just as heritable as intelligence.
I don't think that I'll have kids, but if I did, the thing I'd want most is that they grow up happy. I would work hard to make sure they grow up in an environment that encourages it. But genetics contributes a lot to happiness outcomes, and if I were offered well-tested genetic help, I wouldn't refuse it. Maxing out their intelligence would not be at all high on my list of priorities. Is this a weird attitude? I thought it was a kind of typical parent attitude, but apparently, geneticists have different ideas.
I just hope the "in-valids" will still be able to find nice janitorial positions...
For anyone that hasn't seen Gattaca, you can catch a small clip here: http://www.wingclips.com/movie...
Surely that is worth 25-40 IQ points right there.
Gattaca was a cautionary tale, not a blueprint for future eugenics. What if someone like Newton or Einstein didn't have the perfect genetic signature for IQ (as we *think* we understand it), and instead the parents select for a more 'intelligent' specimen with a higher IQ, but one that lacks creativity and 'genius' or a million other factors that would be important for a child's success?
Example: Hawking: 150ish IQ, John Sununu 190. (Granted those are 'internet' numbers, so take with a grain of salt.) Point being, IQ is not everything.
Now we can get back to to the slippery slope. What about killing off girl embryos --
That would be gay.
One of the ethical questions (and there are multiple here) is with discarding embryos after they are created. Do we have the technology to filter the sperm and eggs before creating the embryos to achieve the same effect? Or do you need the whole genome together to make a good evaluation? Filtering ahead of time would alleviate some of the abortion concerns with such technologies.
Sure, the first thought most people have, consciously or subconsciously, is "Would my parents have kept me if they'd had this option?" and the whole concept thus makes us very uncomfortable...
However, looking at humanity as a whole and taking into account that we pretty much switched natural selection off... can we actually afford not to do this?
I mean, billions of sperm and thousands of eggs never get to be a fertilized anything. Of the fertilized eggs, about a third or so actually manage to become a clump of cells trying to become an embryo and of the actual embryos, quite a few never make it any further. Choosing them for looks isn't very ethical, seeing as look are very much dependent on the current fashion, but physical fitness and intelligence aren't quite the same thing. Seeing as most 'potential' human beings never make it, I don't quite share the moral dilemma in choosing the best of the best.
Raising not only humanities average intelligence but much more importantly the lower end seems a phenomenal gain to me.
Where's your citation for the study that shows this correlation?
Positive side: Heinlein's "Beyond this Horizon"
Negative side: Kornbluth's "The Marching Morons"
If we don't do the first, we get the second. There's a reasonable argument that natural selection isn't working anymore, and in fact may have been reversed. At one point, poor eyesight or ADD meant the sabre-tooth edited you out of the gene pool. So, we'll have to add the chlorine ourselves. I'm not sure we should be editing genes directly, but selecting the best gametes from the available pool (for a given set of parents) à la Heinlein almost HAS to be done at some point.
Example: Hawking: 150ish IQ, John Sununu 190. (Granted those are 'internet' numbers, so take with a grain of salt.) Point being, IQ is not everything.
That's true. Even though wasn't the smartest person, John Snu Snu died with a smile on his face.
In all honesty, why aren't we already doing this? The problem with the world is dumb people. If we can selectively breed out dumb people, how would the world be worse?
Genetically modifying such genes is unlikely to happen any time soon
Alpha children wear grey. They work much harder than we do, because they're so frightfully clever. I'm really awfuly glad I'm a Beta, because I don't work so hard. And then we are much better than the Gammas and Deltas. Gammas are stupid. They all wear green, and Delta children wear khaki. Oh no, I don't want to play with Delta children. And Epsilons are still worse. They're too stupid to be able to read or write. Besides they wear black, which is such a beastly colour. I'm so glad I'm a Beta.
That only happens when someone matures. Many people are making it well into their 40's and 50's without maturing and growing up enough to become a conservative.
I'm 51 years old. I "matured" into a fiscal conservative a long ago. I registered to vote when I turned 18, and have voted in every election since.
In 2012, and now again in 2010, I am voting a straight Democratic ticket. What the Republican party has become, makes me sick.
Quantifying something as dubious as IQ ... and then linking to genes ... makes astrology look respectable.
Fuck systemd. Fuck Redhat. Fuck Soylent, too. Wait, scratch the last one.
In 2012, and now again in 2010...
Wow. It is still early in my time zone, but wow. Did I really just post that???
They're called "European Kids". Unlike your failed state, we do not allow inferior races into our genetic pool, eliminate defective individuals during gestation and now actively euthanize the handicapped, who gladly accept death as the ultimate contribution to Great Europe. The future belongs to us, the Europaeisches Herrenvolk! HEIL EUROPA!
I'm sure that Slashdot is full of munchkins who always try to max out the stats of their characters, but please, don't bring that attitude with you when you're designing a baby. If you want the best for your kids - and I hope you do - you should basically do the opposite of what you would do for D&D - prioritize charisma, wisdom and health (CON). Don't worry so much about STR, DEX and INT. All of these traits have genetic correlates.
Wouldn't the embryos change by the simple action of observing it?
So environment has a bigger influence that what we've measured in the Genome.
If only we tackled the less expensive solutions first.
http://science.slashdot.org/st...
Stuff like this is a pretty stark reminder that we're just a bag of chemicals, even though we've evolved the capability to do things like...post on Slashdot.
This kind of thing is done in a somewhat limited fashion with high-risk pregnancies/IVF to select for embryos that don't have Down syndrome or other profound mental handicaps. And if an ultrasound indicates something wrong further along, amniocentesis is performed. Those tests are easier because it's the absence or malformation of a chromosome, and they're less controversial because the difference between a kid with 10 fewer IQ points in the normal range and a Down syndrome or Fragile X kid is huge. Someone who is otherwise normal might not be as smart, but someone with a mental handicap is never going to have a full life and be a hardship on their family.
Given what we know about genetics now, I actually don't think selecting out traits that are clearly undesirable is a bad thing as long as there's some randomization and some things left to chance. 100 years ago, we only understood that "something" was responsible for traits, not that a particular sequence of nucleotides in your DNA causes the cells they create to behave differently. The problem is that there are still lots of religious people who reject all of this and blame diseases and defects on God's will. Not that Gattaca's a good example, but the main character's defects were a direct result of his parents rejecting genetic engineering and having kids the "old fashioned way," similar to religious people having a huge family, getting a couple of kids with issues, and just shrugging it off as unavoidable because, well, you know, God.
Do you live in Florida by chance? ;)
I only look human.
My mother is a halfling and my dad is an ogre, so that makes me an Ogreling
I know some scary smart people but they seem to lack day to day common sense and sometimes act like twits. Now imagine a beowulf cluster of these running the country. Were doomed....
by TheSpoom (715771) Uncaring Linux user here. I have nothing to add to this but please continue. *munches popcorn*
Using a 15 SD scale, with Einsten-level IQ person coming up every 31560 cases, we are at the moment at about 228136 Einsteins.
http://www.iqcomparisonsite.co...
But screw Einsteins.
We are currently at about 27.6 MILLION people with an IQ of 140.
That's like something between a Nepal and Peru of 140 IQ people.
And that's not counting those with the IQ above that.
Mit der Dummheit kämpfen Götter selbst vergebens
If you do not know your requirements, how do you know what you are supposed to do? Enough said....
putting the 'B' in LGBTQ+
Just as cameras put on ten pounds.
My ability to optimize a character in video games can finally translate to parenthood.
Sounds like Gattaca is coming true. Life will soon consist of those that are genetically selected, and the ones who aren't (aka space station janitors).
if the crash of 2008 has taught us anything its that we really dont value intelligence. ask an unemployed biologist or chemist how their career choice worked out, or better yet, a recently graduated yet unemployed due to lack of experience computer programmer. In the future we can scan for the most intelligent minds on the planet but that still wont prevent them from being birthed into a society where they'll be a Ph.D stuffing food into a burger trench sack until 3 in the morinng or stacking shit tickets at wallyworld.
Good people go to bed earlier.
ok, so it may be a good idea to buy into glass jar manufacturing.
The brains will be found to not even need a body...Stephan Hawking being one example.
If genius is genetically linked with a sense of humour that could best be described as "Perverted Three Stooges", I'm Einstein's smarter offspring.
I've calculated my velocity with such exquisite precision that I have no idea where I am.
When the country is owned and operated by the stupid, does it really help to be smart? If you're full of a room of people where the "leader" says that 1+1 = 3, and everyone else says "yes sir, you are correct". If you're the smart one and say that 1+1 actually equals 2 - in some sense you're actually going to be wrong. We don't respect the thinkers. We elect the charismatic ones with the team mentality that don't have half a brain in their head. Those who get ahead are the ones who actually follow the rules the best - not the ones that buck the trend and show that things aren't necessarily as they seem. I have school aged children, and I can tell you that success in school has to do more with conformity than it does with intelligence. The teachers reward the kids that sit there and take notes (even if they're useless). You get rewarded for doing the problem on the test exactly as the teacher outlined. If you were to solve the problem with some brilliant and novel approach, you might be penalized. If Einstein were alive today, he wouldn't even be recognized. he'd be some bum working on a team just like the rest of us. We've modified the system so that "anyone can do it" - whatever "it" may be - and if you don't follow the procedure, then you're not doing your job well.
Ah yes, so that makes him an expert on any and every field of science.
Do you live in Florida by chance? ;)
No, smartypants, a couple of hours west of there...
Except that the Republican party in its current incarnation is more akin to a special interest group for the wealthy and multinational corporations. To that end their politics and governing style is pretty radical.
But you seem to think that Republicans are conservative in the same way they were 40 years ago, when that's just not the case. Furthermore, equating maturity with getting your facts from Fox News is pretty immature.
This Sig does not Exist.
Wide adoption of this kind of gene-tampering would probably more likely help reduce the number of stupid than increase the number of high-IQ individuals.
It's not a pill that a woman would take and instantly give birth to a (well adjusted) genius baby.
It's a time and money sink for the family, and somewhat of a torture procedure for women.
On top of that, it is recognition and acceptance of one's own inferiority - for both parents.
And then there's the whole thing regarding the abortion issues.
Those dumb enough to try to fine-tune their future families through this procedure would probably end up never forming a family.
Either through repeated attempts to "score higher" and thus delaying pregnancy, or through breakup of relationships due to one or more of the issues above.
And that's not taking in account the possibility of the procedure simply failing in any step from fertilization to the offspring growing up and becoming a productive member of the society.
Mit der Dummheit kämpfen Götter selbst vergebens
Typical Democrat - vote early and often; and late too.
...there won't be anyone to run supermarkets, farmers or truck drivers to deliver food to anyone. Thus, while the entire population is reading slashdot, they will starve, die and go extinct.
Perhaps the diversity of the gene pool as it exists today is smarter than any algorithm we could come up with to serve all the changing needs of our population to have the best chance of survival. It's clear to me that creating an entire generation of "geniuses", super models and super athletes is not going to do that.
We'll make great pets
While reading the article, one thought kept coming back: what if (some of) those genes coding for intelligence have some other negative effect? When you select all those highly intelligent embryos, will they grow up to all have e.g. crooked teeth, tiny penises, or autism?
Free, as in your money being freed from the confines of your account.
You're pretty fucking stupid then. Supporting either party is a travesty, and believing the democrats are less corrupt is some type of self-medicated faith healing of galactic proportions.
Is that the smarter babies will have higher incidences of schizophrenia, bi-polar disorder, depression, and drug addiction, things usually associated with genius. Even Einstein had his problems. Source: http://www.medicaldaily.com/wh...
Selecting for kids with even higher intelligence might mean they have more severe mental problems.
This Sig does not Exist.
This won't make any difference in IQ if everyone starts doing it.
If you really want kids with a high IQ just change the way the test is normalized, or travel to country where there are no schools and take the test there.
I dunno if that's the point. The "they" is the parent, not society. If they can select for something as complicated as intelligence they can select for other complicated patterns, like those that would allow you to "fit in" better with the religious or social strata you were born into. Highly self-rightous people will choose this over intelligence any day of the week. They want followers and clones, not actual, wonderfully randomized children.
"... a professor in theoretical physics... article discussing the genetic underpinnings of intelligence..."
And I'm done reading.
Because this is how you get Lex Luthors!
I browse on +1 so AC's need not respond, I won't see it.
Every parent will have a "Sheldon Cooper" as a child . . .
Maybe the selection will go the other way . . . sometimes a smart child is more of a challenge than the parents are looking for.
Every month or so we get a new article on a new eugenics topic. Detecting "smart" embryos is a lie. Brain development may start in the embryonic phase, but this article from today demonstrates very clearly that development continues long after birth. It further indicates that childhood development has far greater impact on IQ than the embryonic phase. In other words, which scientist is lying?
Detecting a deficiency in an embryo is surely possible, but this is not the same as detecting high IQs which does not relate to "intelligence" which is subjective. As you point out, we don't even know what "high IQ" would really look like. Albert Einstein was not a great student or model person early on, Aristotle was known as a prick, and Archimedes by all accounts was completely frigging nuts.
My idea of a highly intelligent person is Socrates and I think Hawking is average. That is my opinion, and I surely hope that there are theoretical physicists that have a different opinion of who is smarter. The world needs different people to be smart at different things. What we don't need is people buying into this bullshit which ultimately leads to population control. We have enough morality to argue about for that already without a fabrication.
-The wise argue that there are few absolutes, the fool argues that there are no probabilities.
"No mom I don't need to do my homework, the doctor says I'm already a genius."
They're called "European Kids". Unlike your failed state, we do not allow inferior races into our genetic pool, eliminate defective individuals during gestation and now actively euthanize the handicapped, who gladly accept death as the ultimate contribution to Great Europe. The future belongs to us, the Europaeisches Herrenvolk! HEIL EUROPA!
I would attempt no landings there.
That's not called maturing, that's called accumulating enough stuff that you're more concerned with your own selfish needs than the good of society.
At that age, most people are old enough that they're no longer receiving the benefits intended to help people get ahead and have enough stuff that they're more concerned with being forced to help provide people with the same help they received.
In other words, that's about the time when a lot of people become spoiled brats.
What does being sick about the Republican party have to do with voting straight-ticket Democrat?
The answer is, "nothing." There is absolutely never any excuse whatsoever to vote "straight ticket" anything, except coincidentally because you independently evaluated the candidates for each office and your favorite candidates in each case happened to all be from the same party.
"[Regarding the 'cloud,'] ownership was what made America different than Russia." -- Woz
Did anyone else notive the fact that this dude's a professor in theoretical physics? He wouldn't know a genome from a hole in the wall, why is everyone taking what he says for granted.
The bare facts are we have no clear definition for intelligence yet, never mind being able to accurately predict this difficult to define trait in a developing embryo.
How about we look for the gene's that cause one to be an uncooperative jerk? I'd be more likely to have a kid if I had some assurance they wouldn't inherit the rather prevalent trait of being anti-social jerks on my father's side of things (and his father). It seems to be getting attenuated through the generations, but I honestly am in the camp of wanting my kid to take after my wife and not me.
So I guess anyone who doesn't believe in the IQ bogosity doesn't deserve to live? At least they're honest about it. It's like a cult.
if you are young and a conservative you have no heart and that if you are old and a liberal you have no brain.
I might add that mothers are far more conservative politically than single unmarried women.
The answer is, "nothing." There is absolutely never any excuse whatsoever to vote "straight ticket" anything, except coincidentally because you independently evaluated the candidates for each office and your favorite candidates in each case happened to all be from the same party.
Yes, there most certainly is a reason to do so--to affect the balance of power between the parties.
Prior to 2012, I always evaluated candidates individually. The last two elections, no. The last two elections, I felt it was more important to try to send a message to the Republican party about continuing to nominate idiots obsessed with irrelevant outdated right-wing religious beliefs.
If the election has runoffs (rather than immediately awarding the win to a candidate with only a plurality of votes) then voting for a third-party accomplishes that just as well.
"[Regarding the 'cloud,'] ownership was what made America different than Russia." -- Woz
Just like the movie Gattaca
I can barely handle the smart kids I already have...and got them without tilting the odds. Do you know what it's like to lose an argument to your four-year-old?
The problem I have with any of this gene selection science is that humans are fools. We're smart enough to split the atom and have wonderful abilities to abstract the problems of the universe so that we can solve them. But when it comes making choices, we're idiots. Take a look at what we've done to the dog! We have dogs that, by the very nature of their breed, cannot breathe normally or are expected to have hip problems at a certain age. What about the potato famine or crops that are almost completely killed off because of the mono-cultures we encourage. Think this doesn't apply to children? Count how many Ashelys were born in the 1980s or 1990s?
Additionally, many humans don't consider the long term. You can always count on evolution to plan for the long term. Thank God!
Any public money this guy is getting should be taken away. We need to be curing cancer.
Maybe the Democrats aren't less corrupt, but they don't constantly say hateful and stupid things the way the extremists that drove everyone who's remotely sane out of the Republican party do. At this point Republicans need to be marginalized until they marginalize the extremist base that they currently pander to. Either the Republicans will become more mainstream, or they'll be replaced by another second party outside the deep south.
America is a de facto two party system. A vote for the republicans is a vote against the democrats, and vice versa. Third parties and independence have only a small presence in state politics, and a negligible presence at the national level.
No, that's what socks are for.
Oh no! We can't have the truth coming out - that the average IQ of an African is only 70 - that's the AVERAGE IQ.
You're pretty fucking stupid then
That'll win hearts and minds in a political debate. (Though I happen to agree with you.) Voting either Republican or Democrat is a sign of either ignorance, or a lack of personal ethics.
My other UID is three digits.
Intelligence is a lot like money.
Those who've always had an abundance generally either think its no big deal, because they've never suffered the limitations of not having enough, or look down on those with less and consider them inferior.
Those in the middle have enough to see the benefits of having more, and want to improve themselves in order to get more.
At the bottom this analogy falters, but I think the point remains. It's easy to dismiss making the rest of the population smarter when you're already smart and not suffering the limitations imposed on those with less to work with. I find the notion that we shouldn't meddle and just leave those who draw the short genetic-straw to be cruel and self-serving. If the lowest common denominator is raised, chance are the whole society benefits, the world becomes a better, more thoughtful place, and the overall pie grows accordingly.
The Future of Human Evolution: Autonomy
The future history of the world will play out like this:
There will be societies like the liberal West that refuse to adopt eugenics and instead have social programs in place that encourage the least fit members of society to have the most children, all the time convinced that genes don't play any role in intellectual ability or health, that making smart children is all a matter of environment and how much you spend on education.
And there will be societies like China that understand the importance of genetics and of pursuing eugenics programs; and these societies will become increasingly intelligent and healthy until they overcome all the societies that did not pursue eugenics. They might win out through warfare, or they might win out through economic competition, gradually taking economic control of lesser societies. When they win they will introduce eugenics programs into the societies they defeated; in the extreme case they will completely replace the defeated populations with their own genetics.
Either way, we're going to have eugenics. I just hope it's us who pursue eugenics first. After all, we pioneered eugenics research back in the late 19th century.
then there would be no more slashdot commenters.
Fat kids, skinny kids and kids who climb on rocks?
That only happens when someone matures. Many people are making it well into their 40's and 50's without maturing and growing up enough to become a conservative.
I'm 51 years old. I "matured" into a fiscal conservative a long ago. I registered to vote when I turned 18, and have voted in every election since.
In 2012, and now again in 2010, I am voting a straight Democratic ticket. What the Republican party has become, makes me sick.
So, you're pulling hard on that Democratic lever and voting straight down the line no matter how bad one of the candidates might be as a sign of your maturity in politics.
Well, it sure is a good thing you were counting backwards in your years, since your pull-the-lever voting mentality is straight from my Grandparents era.
Have fun bathing in your ignorance. I'm sure there's plenty more Hope and Change to hang your hat on in that fucking party.
With both parties largely supporting things like the NSA's mass surveillance, the TSA, constitution-free zones, unfettered border searches, and ridiculous wars, I can't see how anyone could be dumb enough to vote for Republicans *or* Democrats. Nothing is going to change if you vote for evil scumbags.
It's still far superior to voting for evil scumbags. Besides, part of the cause is that people vote for evil scumbags and it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. If enough people vote for third parties, at the very least, it will send a message to The One Party.
KHAAAAAAAAANNN!!!
If you haven't read Auldous Huxley's book, it's time to do so and draw the parallels.
From an ideal standpoint it looks as if super-intelligent kids is something every parent would want. However there are some drawbacks. First, IQ is only a rough measure of intelligence, there are many factors involved and success in life is not immediately linked to IQ. See Unabomber, etc. Also super intelligent kids may not be that easy to handle. They typically hate school and may actually do poorly in school. They demand much more attention from parents (more activities, more time with them, etc). There is plenty of evidence that IQ is also linked to the environment kids grow in, so simply selecting the gene stuff and thinking this may be enough will not work. Intelligence is also linked to curiosity and independence and so perhaps to more risky behaviours. Finally there is a correlation with very high IQ and some severe forms of mental illness.
All in all, there is a cluster of reasons why the average IQ of the population is 100. High intelligence is not always that comfortable. Think of Sir Winston Churchill, hero of the battle of England, most effective Prime Minister in a time of war, Nobel prize winner in litterature. He had severe depression all his life (his "black dog"). I agree we should raise the general IQ though, cautiously.
Reminds me of Dr. Bashir.... But would our society be more willing to embrace genetically enhanced people than in the Star Trek universe? If I recall correctly, it was outlawed in the federation.
Having an intelligent kid is pointless without a parent that gives it attention in the proper way.
Politics; n. : A religion whereby man is god.
republicans and democrats are the same exact entity working for international banking and dynastic bloodline families
enjoy your mind control
Gotta get back in time...da na nana nana nana nana back in time...
Seeing as most 'potential' human beings never make it, I don't quite share the moral dilemma in choosing the best of the best.
Raising not only humanities average intelligence but much more importantly the lower end seems a phenomenal gain to me.
You are assuming that parents would choose the embryo with the highest IQ. I'm wondering if a lot of people wouldn't be more likely to pick the one in the middle, because they don't want their child to be a "nerd".
we would be all set! If have worked with a lot of people in my time and IQ and making the correct decision does not go hand in hand.
Voting either Republican or Democrat is a sign of either ignorance, or a lack of personal ethics.
I thought it was a consequence of the stupid first-past-the-post voting system used in the US.
Me, I think the majority just lack morals.
My other UID is three digits.
Which is why I'd absolutely love to see something besides plurality of votes in US elections. My city has a ranked-choice voting system (although, without primaries, the number of choices got out of hand last election), and I'd love to see it on higher levels. After the Minnesota gubernatorial election that Jesse Ventura won (as an independent), I heard a lot of people starting sentences with "At least it wasn't", with either the Democrat or Republican candidate following.
"When you have eliminated the unacceptable, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truthiness" - Holmes
Goodbye outsourcing, hello subhuman automatons.
It would seem you answered your own question.
Given the absolute What AGW? position required for all Republican politicians, those who view AGW with any degree of worry at all are pretty much compelled to vote against them, unless the opposition supports something like explicit genocide.
Star Trek transporters are just 3d printers.
Except that the Republican party in its current incarnation is more akin to a special interest group for the wealthy and multinational corporations. To that end their politics and governing style is pretty radical. But you seem to think that Republicans are conservative in the same way they were 40 years ago, when that's just not the case. Furthermore, equating maturity with getting your facts from Fox News is pretty immature.
Good point; given the shifts in party position, I'd say that any genetic influence on party affiliation has shifted from comfort or discomfort with novelty, to decision making by authority vs decision making by individual judgement.
Star Trek transporters are just 3d printers.
This will generate a lot of competition and cause a lot of abortions!
I think you missed my point: the universe of possibilities for voting "against Republicans" encompasses more than just Democrats.
"[Regarding the 'cloud,'] ownership was what made America different than Russia." -- Woz
I think you missed my point: the universe of possibilities for voting "against Republicans" encompasses more than just Democrats.
touche.
Star Trek transporters are just 3d printers.