Ok, let me try this one...
on
Planet Gattaca
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· Score: 2
While Jon's articles have been the inspiration for much debate amongst my friends and myself, this article was a trifle obvious and overstated. Yes, the possibility of being able to analyze a person's genome and tell them X amount of things about their life could lead to abuse, and yes, we now think we know how to create life, or at least where to start. This does not mean the world will end.
To be quite honest, I don't think a "Gattaca" style future can ever be implemented, for two reasons: there are too many powerful people who would not be included in the "elite", and number two, we already have a discriminatory scale in place, that of money.
The rich and elite already have a power lock (this includes corporations). Even if this were to happen (and not all the rich people in the world are beautiful, perfect genetic specimens. For references, see Gates, Bill and Forbes, Steve), how would anything change? The rich could afford this, while the poor and middle-class would hope and strive and struggle and still not crack into this world where how pure your genetic makeup is has an effect on your outcome in life. This technology will not be cheap enough to truly cause the devastating impact you speak of for many years (say, 20-40 years at present...don't forget, the HGP uses massive computer power to brute-force this stuff right now).
What this comes down to is a simple matter of economics. Is it in anyone's best economic interest to do this at present? No! Within the next 10 years? Only if major breakthroughs are made, and analyzing your genome doesn't continue to take days/weeks/months. Perhaps my children will have to deal with this, but I also hope that by then, this debate will have taken place, and cooler, more moderate heads prevail.
Finally, Jon, while I appreciate these articles, please give them substance. Otherwise, what could be a powerful tool to convince people of the necessity of this debate turns into an almost evening-news quality scare report.
Get a bag, then, cause some A.C. posted that already...www.freechaddavis.com. Yeah great. This kid is stupid. "hmmm, let's see, the FBI knows I'm into cracking, they've confiscated my computer once...maybe they stopped watching me!!! Yeah, that's it!". Seriously, this kid deserves a nice speedy trial by jury to get his dumb-a$$ in jail. To attack a gov't. site is inviting the FBI to come after you. Now, the gov't. shouldn't get away scott-free either. If he was truly "unskilled", it must have been the 31337 scripts that he downloaded that allowed him to crack a gov't. server, right? Try improving the security before wasting more of my tax money on prosecuting some kid who's just trying to prove he's cool too. Bah! The whole thing is stupid. And only barely comparable to the Mitnick case.
To address your point about reading the bible, my senior year of high school, part of my reading for my English class was to read the King James Bible, in particular Genesis. And there were actually two versions of creation, one of which was the popular Adam and Eve story (creationist viewpoint), and then there was another version of it (although this led into Adam and Eve) describing something that could almost be interpreted as evolution. I cannot remember line numbers or sections, but I remember my English teacher pointing that out to us. Quite amusing, actually...
Now, as to the why this is dangerous part. No, it won't cause school shootings, although I think that argument is silly and simply put, extraneous. The reason it is dangerous is that if a valid scientific theory, which is, at present, the best theory we have to describe the development of life on earth (according to most international scientific bodies) is dropped from the science curriculum in grades k-12, these children will be missing a rather important section of science. Much of biology (or at least the way change occurs in such) is based upon this theory, and thus will harm the children when they enter college. They'll be lacking an understanding of a theory that most colleges in this country will assume they've already been exposed to it. That is the danger...a loss of knowledge due to a group, which without consultation or expert knowledge, decided that the child did not need this theory. That is my problem with it.
Evolution is only a theory, and I agree it should be taught as such. But I think it's a bit excessive to say that evolution was sold to us by people who hate God. IIRC, Darwin was a fairly religious guy, and he created it. And to call a idea that you disagree with a lie is almost the same as someone calling your theory a lie. If you want to think that, go ahead. I won't agree with you, but I would expect you to at least respect my right to have this opinion.
Wow...Reno truly is the pitbull of the morons in government. "Go get 'em boy! That's it!"
I must say, though, that this confuzzes me. Last I looked, the Attorney General has no power to deal with foreign governments. All interactions must go through the Prez, Congress, or the State Dept. So where does she get off doing this?
I suppose my next question would be what can be done on this issue? Even though I've only recently started to follow the debates on encryption, I know that this is a bad thing. Public domain keys, which were not, if I read this right, covered by this agreement, are now going to be included because Reno and the US govt. are a bunch of paranoid loonies? Ridiculous. Any suggestions for a way to protest this (other than writing my congressmen/women to yank her dog-chain back in line) are most welcome...
Apparently, greed outweighed common sense here. How does this company expect this patent to be approved (if it is still pending, as it appears to be)??? I would have thought companies would have learned by now that vague, incredibly broad patents have this strange habit of going "POOF!" whenever they're challenged? If I wasn't already sure the world was full of idiots, I'd be smashing my head against table too...
A more realistic Quake? That would be awesome. And the effects on an X-Wing vs. TIE Fighter style game...whoah. That game was cool enough. If this allowed it to become more like the movies...Sign me up!
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To be quite honest, I don't think a "Gattaca" style future can ever be implemented, for two reasons: there are too many powerful people who would not be included in the "elite", and number two, we already have a discriminatory scale in place, that of money.
The rich and elite already have a power lock (this includes corporations). Even if this were to happen (and not all the rich people in the world are beautiful, perfect genetic specimens. For references, see Gates, Bill and Forbes, Steve), how would anything change? The rich could afford this, while the poor and middle-class would hope and strive and struggle and still not crack into this world where how pure your genetic makeup is has an effect on your outcome in life. This technology will not be cheap enough to truly cause the devastating impact you speak of for many years (say, 20-40 years at present...don't forget, the HGP uses massive computer power to brute-force this stuff right now).
What this comes down to is a simple matter of economics. Is it in anyone's best economic interest to do this at present? No! Within the next 10 years? Only if major breakthroughs are made, and analyzing your genome doesn't continue to take days/weeks/months. Perhaps my children will have to deal with this, but I also hope that by then, this debate will have taken place, and cooler, more moderate heads prevail.
Finally, Jon, while I appreciate these articles, please give them substance. Otherwise, what could be a powerful tool to convince people of the necessity of this debate turns into an almost evening-news quality scare report.
Now, as to the why this is dangerous part. No, it won't cause school shootings, although I think that argument is silly and simply put, extraneous. The reason it is dangerous is that if a valid scientific theory, which is, at present, the best theory we have to describe the development of life on earth (according to most international scientific bodies) is dropped from the science curriculum in grades k-12, these children will be missing a rather important section of science. Much of biology (or at least the way change occurs in such) is based upon this theory, and thus will harm the children when they enter college. They'll be lacking an understanding of a theory that most colleges in this country will assume they've already been exposed to it. That is the danger...a loss of knowledge due to a group, which without consultation or expert knowledge, decided that the child did not need this theory. That is my problem with it.
Evolution is only a theory, and I agree it should be taught as such. But I think it's a bit excessive to say that evolution was sold to us by people who hate God. IIRC, Darwin was a fairly religious guy, and he created it. And to call a idea that you disagree with a lie is almost the same as someone calling your theory a lie. If you want to think that, go ahead. I won't agree with you, but I would expect you to at least respect my right to have this opinion.
Wow...Reno truly is the pitbull of the morons in government. "Go get 'em boy! That's it!"
I must say, though, that this confuzzes me. Last I looked, the Attorney General has no power to deal with foreign governments. All interactions must go through the Prez, Congress, or the State Dept. So where does she get off doing this?
I suppose my next question would be what can be done on this issue? Even though I've only recently started to follow the debates on encryption, I know that this is a bad thing. Public domain keys, which were not, if I read this right, covered by this agreement, are now going to be included because Reno and the US govt. are a bunch of paranoid loonies? Ridiculous. Any suggestions for a way to protest this (other than writing my congressmen/women to yank her dog-chain back in line) are most welcome...
Apparently, greed outweighed common sense here. How does this company expect this patent to be approved (if it is still pending, as it appears to be)??? I would have thought companies would have learned by now that vague, incredibly broad patents have this strange habit of going "POOF!" whenever they're challenged? If I wasn't already sure the world was full of idiots, I'd be smashing my head against table too...
A more realistic Quake? That would be awesome. And the effects on an X-Wing vs. TIE Fighter style game...whoah. That game was cool enough. If this allowed it to become more like the movies...Sign me up!