I don't think OP deserved to be downmodded, though. He may have been arrogant, but he was no worse than the typical background noise that exists at score 1. I don't think he was being belligerent enough to warrant a troll moderation.
I personally think people are WAY to quick to downmod.
It is probably a premature optimization that will slow computations down. I imagine they ran some profiling tools and found that they were spending a substantial amount of time in calls to sqrt(), and figured that the division was also time-consuming and for an operation that is performed on so many pixels, it was worthwhile to optimize this particular routine.
This is John Carmack we're talking about. I imagine he knows how to use a code profiler.
The approximations it involve are likely to cause bugs. Floating point always involves approximations. If you don't like them, use a better approximation (double precision). But if you're just trying to, say, figure out which pixel to color, and you approximate the pixel to a few decimal places...I think you're good to go.
I mean, it's not like they're running scientific simulations with this. It's Quake3.
Furthermore, converting floating-points to integers and then doing calculations on them is a trick that has been known for years, long before Quake3. They weren't converting floats to ints. They manipulated the bitwise representation of the float. I'm not sure if that's what you meant, though.
Good observation on dividing the exponent by two to get the square root.
Right-shifting i also affects the sign bit if you use a logical right shift, so that takes care of the "can't square root a negative" problem.
Recall that the mantissa is normalized (1 = mantissa 2; the non-fractional portion is also implied, so the bits of the mantissa are actually just the fractional portion). I would theorize that subtracting the result from the appropriate magic number corrects the exponent bit that got shifted into the mantissa, as well as probably handling the reciprocal operation.
Outlawing pretexting and other fraudulent activity is a workaround.
The solution is as you propose; better information security.
Unfortunately, sometimes better information security will impede the customer, making life more difficult for them because inevitably some of them will lack one of the various necessary credentials for good information security. So, I suppose it wouldn't be a bad idea to outlaw pretexting and implement better security practices with phone/bank/etc records.
Pardon me for dealing with the stuff that I feel we can actually come to a civil agreement about.I didn't intend to be aggressive or demeaning. I just have an interest in everything, and I always try to challenge what people say in order to have them explain things. I love learning.
The only change in the "burden" in the health care system will be when new groups (C, D, E, etc) gain treatment and the cost spikes. It will remain level after that spike, since the percentage of people in each group will not change.Health care doesn't cure percentages of people if we have a finite resource that doesn't scale with population. Say, for instance, glasses need to be made from a special rare earth metal. While population B is low, it is possible to make glasses for the entire population. As population B scales with population A, we may reach a point where we don't have enough of the resource for all of population B.
Though, I suppose at this point the A=/=B anymore, since there's now (some) pressure to not have a kid who will belong to population B and as a result may not be able to be treated.
Fitness is all about having surviving offspring - nothing to do with what happens at a later point in time.Okay, so fitness is the wrong word to use. But I think every reasonable person would rather be not-asthmatic than asthmatic, if given a choice where all other things are equal. My goal is to find something that, without killing people, prevents descendants from having to suffer the genetically-linked diseases of their parents.
We don't even have to target all diseases, just highly debilitating (M.S.) or pervasive (heart disease) ones. I would think that if we could find the genetic marker for "predisposition to heart disease" and started preventing the conception of individuals with that marker, our health care system would be better in a generation. And, best of all, individuals who were screened before conception to ensure a healthy human would probably not have to screen their egg/sperm when they go to have a kid, so after a few generations everyone should be descended from almost perfectly healthy humans.
I used to work in an arcade for a while (then I got a real job doing hardware engineering). I made a lot of friends in the HS/college kid crowd, and all of them are on myspace.
It definitely allows me to keep tabs on people far more than normal. A lot of friends just post random bulletins about how their day went - that's information I would otherwise not have had.
That, and several old HS friends have found me through myspace. It actually is really good for keeping in touch with people. I wouldn't expect a troll like you to understand, though. Sometimes you have to, you know, actually see how something is used before bashing it.
I see that you're a hardware engineer. I'm a biologist. How about I don't lecture you on physics and you don't lecture me on population genetics?
Who turned you into an asshole? I'm not lecturing you on your populations genetics. I'm giving my point of view, not like it's a law, but like it's speculation. Note the prevalence of "I think", etc. in my post.
You're allowed to think electrons work in any way you want. I'm allowed to explain the currently accepted model to you. I would do so without getting an attitude, though. Or would you rather I show absolutely no interest in your field?
Now, moving on.
Please read the WP sections on epidemiology and pathogenesis. There are certainly genetic factors, but to suggest that asthma (and allergies in general) wouldn't be a problem if the genes were "culled" is uninformed.
I'm using this asthma example, but it works for the others. Allergies wouldn't be a problem because the allergic people would be dead. Genes don't get "culled", people get culled. If there is an asthma gene, natural selection should choose against it, assuming that it depreciates the fitness of the organism, right? Or am I misunderstanding something?
Even if there is no such thing as an asthma gene and it is 100% environmentally activated, asthmatics would still probably be selected against by nature (i.e. eaten by a tiger because they can't run or something).
Bzuh? We certainly used to have (animal) predators, and we still do in certain parts of the world. Diseases can be considered predators (and rather good ones, too). The weather is quite capable of killing us as well. Also, see physical injury and/or death inflicted by other humans.
Please. You know what I meant. You even admit that, realistically, we have no animal predators anymore. I'm sorry I didn't qualify that statement with a time frame of "these days".
Disease and weather are predators? Isn't there a formal definition of predator? I wouldn't know it, since I'm a hardware engineer. Maybe you can help me out?
I would imagine there's also some kind of data that determines when a predator is actually doing anything effective to the population. For example, in a given area, if only one part per million of the population dies due to predation by an entity (disease, violent crime, whatever), is that still considered predation? Is the effect of such predation even appreciable to the genetics of the populations?
I'm not exactly sure what you're getting at, but I have no problem with screening for genetic defects.
I was getting at what was basically the essence of my original post. Natural selection by things like predation was the driving force in keeping our genetics free of inherited diseases. We effectively have no predators anymore, with modern medicine and weapons. Sure, every now and then a tiger eats someone or someone else dies of the flu, but I don't think that has any effect on keeping the gene pool clean.
In order to make up for the fact that the majority will never be for killing sick people/retards/insert-genetic-flaw-here, I believe the only option is to prevent the conception of individuals who have what we consider genetic flaws that we would prefer not to pass on to our children. I would like to choose and make sure that my one offspring get the best genes possible, as opposed to creating many offspring so that only the strongest one (or few, whatever) survives.
Please read about Hardy-Weinberg genetics. If genetic defects have no bearing on one's ability to reproduce (as you say) and who one reproduces with, then it's the same as any other gene and the percentage will remain stable in a population. It will not increase.
I'm really more interested in this. Basically, you're saying that the percentage of the population with a certain genetic flaw will be constant, since there will be no selection pressure against the exis
The three examples you have chosen are highly influenced by upbringing.I don't buy that myopia is a result of environment.
I'll buy diabesity (diabetes + obesity) being related to upbringing, but I really think we're starting to have a genetic disposition towards obese people, which obese genes would probably have been culled.
Asthma is probably the biggest one that's a result of upbringing, and I'll bet there's still a genetic component.
You didn't pick anything that actually has an impact. when it comes to reproduction.Humans have no natural predators, so we have no one to cull the herd for us. This, combined with the "every life is precious" view, means that the only solution is to prevent the conception of individuals who would have been culled if not for the marvels of modern society, which I suggest doing by screening for genetic defects before doing in vitro fertilization. Otherwise, we will reach a point where the health care system implodes trying to accommodate the poor genetic code that remains.
As far as having an impact on whether someone can reproduce, the only things I'm aware of are low fertility or sterility. Even someone like Rain Man could impregnate someone these days.
If it is basic, then it would be easy to produce.Not necessarily. I just spent the last week trying to chase down a bug that was fixed by changing one character of code. When dealing with very large, complicated systems, a small bug can be very difficult to find. Several small bugs can add plenty of time to development.
While the resulting algorithm may be basic to copy, it is not considered something that most professional programmers can write themselves - especially when it took a whole team of scientists a large amount of time to produce such an algorithm.You know, I bet Dijkstra took a long time to make his algorithm, and I doubt many others could have written it themselves - or they would have. And boy am I glad that he didn't patent it, but decided to share it with the rest of humanity to further the art of Computer Science.
I am glad to hear that I misunderstood that you wish "defective" individuals exterminated, however, you must see that this is indeed the end result of your philosophy. Though Hitler went about it in a less sophisticated manner, I believe that indeed, it is the same basic thought you share.
The only reason that "defective individuals" would be exterminated is because the human life span is limited. I am not advocating the destruction of anything. I am advocating that we do what we can to prevent "defective individuals" from being conceived in favor of "nondefective individuals". Defects will still occur (mutations in vivo, for instance) and must be dealt with.
However, I believe that genetic selection is, at the very least, borderline acting like God. [snip] When we are deciding whether or not something is right, we go first to the Bible and then to our scientific capabilities.
Could you cite the Bible where it says we must not modify our own genetic code?
Yes, thank you for persuing such a thought-provoking discussion with me. Most people react very negatively to what I say (OMG YOU WANT TO KILL PPL).
The health care point you bring up is excellent. I understand that we are on slope that's as slippery as a Pittsburgh street in the winter. This is why I believe the parents should choose what is and is not screened for. It's like keeping the government at the state/local level.
You are right, this Downs child would incur significant expenses, but if, say, half of our population chose screening, imagine the relief on the health care system. It would be much easier to devote significantly better resources to taking care of sick people when there are way fewer sick people.
You also bring up an excellent point about private health care. I believe that would happen in Capitalist Pigdog America. Don't mind me, I believe Capitalism is a major source of evil in the world (yes, I know, what do I suggest is better, blahblahblah, doesn't mean it's good to encourage humanity to be greedy). Personally, I don't mind paying some taxes to know that my fellow Americans are getting health care coverage they might not otherwise be able to attain. I'm sure there are other countries whose governments agree with me.
Again, though, for those situations where health care is still needed it will be available. If the child accidentally has it, or the parent chooses to have a child with a known flaw, again, the health care system will be there and it will be under much less stress if a significant portion of the population uses screening. I also find it hard to believe they could enforce prescreening, because people are still going to make babies the traditional way.
As far as "failing to fix it", I'm not saying fix it. I'm saying don't choose that sperm/egg to form an embryo. As to whether it is child abuse, I believe that knowingly creating a child who will be forced to suffer is child abuse in the same way that it would be child abuse to purposefully introduce this genetic flaw into a child. Again, though, who draws the line where? This is why I believe it should be handled at the state/local level.
And yes, it would create classes of screened babies and traditional babies and an associated stigma. Society would have to deal with this, painfully, like it did before the majority of people needed glasses ("Four eyes!"). From the standpoint of the human genetic code, though, it would be getting cleaned up, and the screened babies probably wouldn't even have to have screening when they have their kids. In fact, I think a mixture of no prescreening, light prescreening (no Down syndrome, no color blindness, less risk of heart disease), and full prescreening (chosen hair color/eye color/sex) is the right solution. In this way, everyone can have whatever they want. I honestly think most people would choose light prescreening, leaving the hair/eye color and sex up to fate, while ensuring that this child would be born healthy.
You have the same reaction that a lot of people have. Unfortunately, it's the wrong reaction.
And their children that wear glasses? I think that they are both glad that they were not "culled" nor were their parents.
Yes, and I am sure they are glad they were not culled. I can say this faithfully because I do wear glasses and without them I would not be able to function in society.
then WHO do you think you are saying that we, the creation, should make decisions about who should and should not live? Hitler would have agreed with your philosophy, however I don't think the MILLONS of Jews or "defective" Germans he murdered would have.
No, Hitler would not have agreed with me. I don't want to kill anyone! I repeat, I do not want to kill anyone. Not even retards. In fact, I don't even promote sterilization.
God is in control of these genes and will select the ones that will make the individual that HE wants created. For whatever purpose.
I have a question for you. If your God (and I normally don't capitalize that, but out of respect for you I will for now) is all-powerful, all-knowing, and all-loving, why would suffering exist? What if He gave His creation the power to end most of their own suffering, and they refused to do so because they misunderstood His will?
Who are you to say that God doesn't want us playing with our genetic code? Are you a prophet? What if we are supposed to - what if this is part of His design, and part of our destiny as His creation? If we weren't supposed to modify our own code, would He not prevent us from doing so with His power, or prevent us from ever reaching the point where we could? (e.g. Tower of Babel)
What would you do if, even following the selection process, somehow, you accidentally got a Downs child? What do you do then? Kill it before it has a chance to live at all?
Why does everyone think I want to kill people?
No. What do you do now if you get a Downs child? Why would that action change just because we can drastically reduce the incidence rate of the disease?
Also, what if that Downs child wanted to have children, but decided not to because they don't want to risk having a child who has to suffer the same fate they did? What if we could screen their eggs/sperm for the genetic marker and guarantee, say, with 99% accuracy that they can have a Downs-free child? I believe that someone who wants kids but refuses to have any based upon the inheritance of a genetic disease would want this type of screening.
My God, please use the correct unit of charge. You can use either the Coulomb or the Farad, they are slightly different. An amp is not used to measure capacitance, please do not confuse it with the real units.
*cough*
1) A farad is not a unit of charge; charge cannot be expressed directly in terms of farads. In order to relate farads to coulombs, you need to use the equation
1 farad = 1 coulomb / volt
2) Are you sure an amp isn't a real unit? Last time I checked,
So why shouldn't we be using our abilities to overcome as well? It still amounts to natural selection.
Isn't that what I'm advocating? I would argue that using our ability to harness technology to guarantee that a healthy sperm meets a healthy egg to create an embryo is still a form of natural selection.
Never once did I dare insinuate that people must choose this screening or are not allowed to reproduce in the traditional manner.
Also, they could have their eggs/sperm screened to prevent passing down their genetic defects (because not all of their eggs/sperm will necessarily have the bad gene), thus resulting in a generation of Jews/Amish without the genetic defects you allege to be a hallmark of their ethnicity.
First, have you seen or are you subtly referring to Gattaca?
No, but I do find that interesting. Thank you for the reference.
How are we, as a society, going to agree on the genetic engineering that counts as better?
I don't believe that is something that we, as a society, should choose, but the parents should choose (see below). But given that we do make a choice it will work out in the end. For example, the infanticide that happened in China, where female babies were killed in favor of male babies. I remember hearing that now females are important because there aren't very many of them left, and the situation is correcting itself.
We've identified a child to be born with six fingers on each hand. Is this better for humanity? Should we remove the gene b/c of the social stigma this child will undergo?
I was very careful in how I phrased my example. If it was found that an egg or sperm would pass along a genetic code for the generation of six fingers, the parents would have the option of choosing to use that egg/sperm or not. If they think hey, cool, I'll have a six fingered kid, then that's their perogative, and it could have happened naturally because, and I stress this, we are not manufacturing or modifying genetic code, we are only screening it. If they want their child to avoid the social stigma of being raised with six fingers, again, this is their choice. In fact, I want everyone to have a choice as to whether or not they even want to screen their eggs/sperm.
So in your perfect world, Stephen Hawking (ALS), Issac Newton (Epilepsy) and Albert Einstien (Aspergers Syndrome) would never be born? Do you believe genetically "flawed" individuals have nothing to contribute to society?In my perfect world, you have the choice to screen your eggs and sperm for genetic patterns that you find undesirable. For every person in the world there is a different set of wants, and we are not "creating" humans from raw genetic code. We are just preventing eggs and sperm which have what the donor deems as negative genetic codes from ever making it to conception.
So Newton's specific genetic pattern would not have been "born" if 1) his parents opted to have their eggs and sperm screened 2) for epilepsy. But I contend that someone would have been named Isaac Newton, and there's still an equal statistical probability in my perfect world that he would have had the proper mixture of genetics and environment to realize that apples fall because of gravity.
And who is to say that epilepsy is responsible for Newton being intelligent? If so, why aren't all epileptics geniuses? There will still be randomness and variation in the genetic code, because the egg and sperm still come from people, manufactured by the process of meiosis.
You know how your experience went. Who are you to say everyone feels the same?
What if those people you mention avoided procreating for fear of giving birth to a child who will suffer the same fate? What if this genetic screening could promise them a healthy child? Why would you deny them the access to this opportunity, which may I remind you is opt-in?
but you are making the assumption that caring for the sick or less fortunate is not itself a trait that has been selected for in previous generations.I didn't necessarily imply that assumption. It does make sense that the ability to avoid Natural Selection would indeed be selected for. However, I do believe this is one of the reasons our health care system is overburdened with people dying of e.g. heart disease, etc. Isn't genetics ("does your family have a history of..") the biggest risk factor in a lot of diseases?
Humans have escaped the phenomenon of Natural Selection, for the most part.
All of us who wear glasses? We should have been culled. All these people developing diabetes from eating too much sugar? Selected against. Asthma? You get the picture.
Running with the idea that there is a higher power that created the world, I would say that Natural Selection is the method that higher power uses to figure out what works. But now with health care and a strong sense of altruism, errors in the genetic code are propagating throughout our species and wrecking havoc. In other words, we're playing god by saving lives that should have been selected against and allowing them to pass on their flawed genes.
I also contend that if we were created by a higher power, and that higher power enabled us with the ability to modify our genetic code, then it is our right (nay, our duty) to do so; otherwise, we would lack this ability. I believe that we should selectively erase genes which cause a predisposition to things like Down Syndrome or diabetes or cancer, etc. This would effectively select against all detrimental mutations.
This could also be the limit of Natural Selection as it tends toward infinitely fast; beneficial mutations in one human (for instance, the HIV resistance that elite supressors have) could be propagated throughout the species' genetic code in a single generation.
Perhaps I should leave you with an example, one that even a Christian might be able to tolerate. Imagine a future where you and your s/o collect your eggs and screen them for genetic defects, like Down Syndrome. Once a viable egg has been found (and you don't have to look up what the hair color or eye color will be, you could just leave that to fate), start screening some sperm. Produce a viable fetus which will grow up to be healthy.
Now imagine that you were one of those people who didn't do that for your kid. And now your kid is born with a gene that means they're 80% likely to die from some horrible disease by the age of 30. If I were that kid, I would be pissed at my parents for not choosing the screening option.
Um. Maybe we're talking about the charge buildup on the tube itself
Maybe you are, but I was just trying to share my knowledge of capacitors to the fellow who couldn't properly name the electrical component. I did, you know, name the subject of my post appropriatey.
This is more like a giant, badass leyden jar - that 8th-grade science hazard which sends clasmates leaping - technically a cap, but containing no magic smoke
There's no "technically" about it; a leyden jar is a capacitor.
Oh, and I didn't say anything about magic smoke. I actually happen to know how capacitors are built and how they work. Hence why my post discusses the uses of capacitors, and not the high voltages needed to accelerate electrons towards a screen.
You know. People who actually know what they're talking about.
*sniffs*
Is that a troll I smell?
If you believe that I have mislead anyone in any manner by not knowing what I am talking about, then please (for my sake, and everyone else on slashdot) correct me where I am wrong.
Slashdot Mirror
I don't think OP deserved to be downmodded, though. He may have been arrogant, but he was no worse than the typical background noise that exists at score 1. I don't think he was being belligerent enough to warrant a troll moderation.
I personally think people are WAY to quick to downmod.
This is John Carmack we're talking about. I imagine he knows how to use a code profiler. The approximations it involve are likely to cause bugs. Floating point always involves approximations. If you don't like them, use a better approximation (double precision). But if you're just trying to, say, figure out which pixel to color, and you approximate the pixel to a few decimal places...I think you're good to go.
I mean, it's not like they're running scientific simulations with this. It's Quake3. Furthermore, converting floating-points to integers and then doing calculations on them is a trick that has been known for years, long before Quake3. They weren't converting floats to ints. They manipulated the bitwise representation of the float. I'm not sure if that's what you meant, though.
Good observation on dividing the exponent by two to get the square root.
Right-shifting i also affects the sign bit if you use a logical right shift, so that takes care of the "can't square root a negative" problem.
Recall that the mantissa is normalized (1 = mantissa 2; the non-fractional portion is also implied, so the bits of the mantissa are actually just the fractional portion). I would theorize that subtracting the result from the appropriate magic number corrects the exponent bit that got shifted into the mantissa, as well as probably handling the reciprocal operation.
We called it Numerical Analysis at Penn State. I didn't have to take it, I was only getting a minor in Comp Sci, and a major in Comp Eng.
...in high school.
But...I learned how to approximate using Newton's method in Calc 1.
Actually, I think the genius is the guy who came up with the magic bit sequence.
I believe you meant to say x^(-1/2)
Too bad the people modding you up don't have math degrees. =P
This is exactly the problem.
Outlawing pretexting and other fraudulent activity is a workaround.
The solution is as you propose; better information security.
Unfortunately, sometimes better information security will impede the customer, making life more difficult for them because inevitably some of them will lack one of the various necessary credentials for good information security. So, I suppose it wouldn't be a bad idea to outlaw pretexting and implement better security practices with phone/bank/etc records.
Pardon me for dealing with the stuff that I feel we can actually come to a civil agreement about.I didn't intend to be aggressive or demeaning. I just have an interest in everything, and I always try to challenge what people say in order to have them explain things. I love learning.
The only change in the "burden" in the health care system will be when new groups (C, D, E, etc) gain treatment and the cost spikes. It will remain level after that spike, since the percentage of people in each group will not change.Health care doesn't cure percentages of people if we have a finite resource that doesn't scale with population. Say, for instance, glasses need to be made from a special rare earth metal. While population B is low, it is possible to make glasses for the entire population. As population B scales with population A, we may reach a point where we don't have enough of the resource for all of population B.
Though, I suppose at this point the A=/=B anymore, since there's now (some) pressure to not have a kid who will belong to population B and as a result may not be able to be treated.
Fitness is all about having surviving offspring - nothing to do with what happens at a later point in time.Okay, so fitness is the wrong word to use. But I think every reasonable person would rather be not-asthmatic than asthmatic, if given a choice where all other things are equal. My goal is to find something that, without killing people, prevents descendants from having to suffer the genetically-linked diseases of their parents.
We don't even have to target all diseases, just highly debilitating (M.S.) or pervasive (heart disease) ones. I would think that if we could find the genetic marker for "predisposition to heart disease" and started preventing the conception of individuals with that marker, our health care system would be better in a generation. And, best of all, individuals who were screened before conception to ensure a healthy human would probably not have to screen their egg/sperm when they go to have a kid, so after a few generations everyone should be descended from almost perfectly healthy humans.
One US Liter.
I used to work in an arcade for a while (then I got a real job doing hardware engineering). I made a lot of friends in the HS/college kid crowd, and all of them are on myspace.
It definitely allows me to keep tabs on people far more than normal. A lot of friends just post random bulletins about how their day went - that's information I would otherwise not have had.
That, and several old HS friends have found me through myspace. It actually is really good for keeping in touch with people. I wouldn't expect a troll like you to understand, though. Sometimes you have to, you know, actually see how something is used before bashing it.
I see that you're a hardware engineer. I'm a biologist. How about I don't lecture you on physics and you don't lecture me on population genetics?
Who turned you into an asshole? I'm not lecturing you on your populations genetics. I'm giving my point of view, not like it's a law, but like it's speculation. Note the prevalence of "I think", etc. in my post.
You're allowed to think electrons work in any way you want. I'm allowed to explain the currently accepted model to you. I would do so without getting an attitude, though. Or would you rather I show absolutely no interest in your field?
Now, moving on.
Please read the WP sections on epidemiology and pathogenesis. There are certainly genetic factors, but to suggest that asthma (and allergies in general) wouldn't be a problem if the genes were "culled" is uninformed.
I'm using this asthma example, but it works for the others. Allergies wouldn't be a problem because the allergic people would be dead. Genes don't get "culled", people get culled. If there is an asthma gene, natural selection should choose against it, assuming that it depreciates the fitness of the organism, right? Or am I misunderstanding something?
Even if there is no such thing as an asthma gene and it is 100% environmentally activated, asthmatics would still probably be selected against by nature (i.e. eaten by a tiger because they can't run or something).
Bzuh? We certainly used to have (animal) predators, and we still do in certain parts of the world. Diseases can be considered predators (and rather good ones, too). The weather is quite capable of killing us as well. Also, see physical injury and/or death inflicted by other humans.
Please. You know what I meant. You even admit that, realistically, we have no animal predators anymore. I'm sorry I didn't qualify that statement with a time frame of "these days".
Disease and weather are predators? Isn't there a formal definition of predator? I wouldn't know it, since I'm a hardware engineer. Maybe you can help me out?
I would imagine there's also some kind of data that determines when a predator is actually doing anything effective to the population. For example, in a given area, if only one part per million of the population dies due to predation by an entity (disease, violent crime, whatever), is that still considered predation? Is the effect of such predation even appreciable to the genetics of the populations?
I'm not exactly sure what you're getting at, but I have no problem with screening for genetic defects.
I was getting at what was basically the essence of my original post. Natural selection by things like predation was the driving force in keeping our genetics free of inherited diseases. We effectively have no predators anymore, with modern medicine and weapons. Sure, every now and then a tiger eats someone or someone else dies of the flu, but I don't think that has any effect on keeping the gene pool clean.
In order to make up for the fact that the majority will never be for killing sick people/retards/insert-genetic-flaw-here, I believe the only option is to prevent the conception of individuals who have what we consider genetic flaws that we would prefer not to pass on to our children. I would like to choose and make sure that my one offspring get the best genes possible, as opposed to creating many offspring so that only the strongest one (or few, whatever) survives.
Please read about Hardy-Weinberg genetics. If genetic defects have no bearing on one's ability to reproduce (as you say) and who one reproduces with, then it's the same as any other gene and the percentage will remain stable in a population. It will not increase.
I'm really more interested in this. Basically, you're saying that the percentage of the population with a certain genetic flaw will be constant, since there will be no selection pressure against the exis
Anyone remember when Capcom did the Duck Tales and Chip and Dale games for the NES?Hell yeah I remember. Duck Tales and Chip and Dale are classics.
*reminisces* Oh, to be young again...
The three examples you have chosen are highly influenced by upbringing.I don't buy that myopia is a result of environment.
I'll buy diabesity (diabetes + obesity) being related to upbringing, but I really think we're starting to have a genetic disposition towards obese people, which obese genes would probably have been culled.
Asthma is probably the biggest one that's a result of upbringing, and I'll bet there's still a genetic component.
You didn't pick anything that actually has an impact. when it comes to reproduction.Humans have no natural predators, so we have no one to cull the herd for us. This, combined with the "every life is precious" view, means that the only solution is to prevent the conception of individuals who would have been culled if not for the marvels of modern society, which I suggest doing by screening for genetic defects before doing in vitro fertilization. Otherwise, we will reach a point where the health care system implodes trying to accommodate the poor genetic code that remains.
As far as having an impact on whether someone can reproduce, the only things I'm aware of are low fertility or sterility. Even someone like Rain Man could impregnate someone these days.
If it is basic, then it would be easy to produce.Not necessarily. I just spent the last week trying to chase down a bug that was fixed by changing one character of code. When dealing with very large, complicated systems, a small bug can be very difficult to find. Several small bugs can add plenty of time to development.
While the resulting algorithm may be basic to copy, it is not considered something that most professional programmers can write themselves - especially when it took a whole team of scientists a large amount of time to produce such an algorithm.You know, I bet Dijkstra took a long time to make his algorithm, and I doubt many others could have written it themselves - or they would have. And boy am I glad that he didn't patent it, but decided to share it with the rest of humanity to further the art of Computer Science.
I am glad to hear that I misunderstood that you wish "defective" individuals exterminated, however, you must see that this is indeed the end result of your philosophy. Though Hitler went about it in a less sophisticated manner, I believe that indeed, it is the same basic thought you share.
The only reason that "defective individuals" would be exterminated is because the human life span is limited. I am not advocating the destruction of anything. I am advocating that we do what we can to prevent "defective individuals" from being conceived in favor of "nondefective individuals". Defects will still occur (mutations in vivo, for instance) and must be dealt with.
However, I believe that genetic selection is, at the very least, borderline acting like God. [snip] When we are deciding whether or not something is right, we go first to the Bible and then to our scientific capabilities.
Could you cite the Bible where it says we must not modify our own genetic code?
Yes, thank you for persuing such a thought-provoking discussion with me. Most people react very negatively to what I say (OMG YOU WANT TO KILL PPL).
The health care point you bring up is excellent. I understand that we are on slope that's as slippery as a Pittsburgh street in the winter. This is why I believe the parents should choose what is and is not screened for. It's like keeping the government at the state/local level.
You are right, this Downs child would incur significant expenses, but if, say, half of our population chose screening, imagine the relief on the health care system. It would be much easier to devote significantly better resources to taking care of sick people when there are way fewer sick people.
You also bring up an excellent point about private health care. I believe that would happen in Capitalist Pigdog America. Don't mind me, I believe Capitalism is a major source of evil in the world (yes, I know, what do I suggest is better, blahblahblah, doesn't mean it's good to encourage humanity to be greedy). Personally, I don't mind paying some taxes to know that my fellow Americans are getting health care coverage they might not otherwise be able to attain. I'm sure there are other countries whose governments agree with me.
Again, though, for those situations where health care is still needed it will be available. If the child accidentally has it, or the parent chooses to have a child with a known flaw, again, the health care system will be there and it will be under much less stress if a significant portion of the population uses screening. I also find it hard to believe they could enforce prescreening, because people are still going to make babies the traditional way.
As far as "failing to fix it", I'm not saying fix it. I'm saying don't choose that sperm/egg to form an embryo. As to whether it is child abuse, I believe that knowingly creating a child who will be forced to suffer is child abuse in the same way that it would be child abuse to purposefully introduce this genetic flaw into a child. Again, though, who draws the line where? This is why I believe it should be handled at the state/local level.
And yes, it would create classes of screened babies and traditional babies and an associated stigma. Society would have to deal with this, painfully, like it did before the majority of people needed glasses ("Four eyes!"). From the standpoint of the human genetic code, though, it would be getting cleaned up, and the screened babies probably wouldn't even have to have screening when they have their kids. In fact, I think a mixture of no prescreening, light prescreening (no Down syndrome, no color blindness, less risk of heart disease), and full prescreening (chosen hair color/eye color/sex) is the right solution. In this way, everyone can have whatever they want. I honestly think most people would choose light prescreening, leaving the hair/eye color and sex up to fate, while ensuring that this child would be born healthy.
You have the same reaction that a lot of people have. Unfortunately, it's the wrong reaction.
And their children that wear glasses? I think that they are both glad that they were not "culled" nor were their parents.
Yes, and I am sure they are glad they were not culled. I can say this faithfully because I do wear glasses and without them I would not be able to function in society.
then WHO do you think you are saying that we, the creation, should make decisions about who should and should not live? Hitler would have agreed with your philosophy, however I don't think the MILLONS of Jews or "defective" Germans he murdered would have.
No, Hitler would not have agreed with me. I don't want to kill anyone! I repeat, I do not want to kill anyone. Not even retards. In fact, I don't even promote sterilization.
God is in control of these genes and will select the ones that will make the individual that HE wants created. For whatever purpose.
I have a question for you. If your God (and I normally don't capitalize that, but out of respect for you I will for now) is all-powerful, all-knowing, and all-loving, why would suffering exist? What if He gave His creation the power to end most of their own suffering, and they refused to do so because they misunderstood His will?
Who are you to say that God doesn't want us playing with our genetic code? Are you a prophet? What if we are supposed to - what if this is part of His design, and part of our destiny as His creation? If we weren't supposed to modify our own code, would He not prevent us from doing so with His power, or prevent us from ever reaching the point where we could? (e.g. Tower of Babel)
What would you do if, even following the selection process, somehow, you accidentally got a Downs child? What do you do then? Kill it before it has a chance to live at all?
Why does everyone think I want to kill people?
No. What do you do now if you get a Downs child? Why would that action change just because we can drastically reduce the incidence rate of the disease?
Also, what if that Downs child wanted to have children, but decided not to because they don't want to risk having a child who has to suffer the same fate they did? What if we could screen their eggs/sperm for the genetic marker and guarantee, say, with 99% accuracy that they can have a Downs-free child? I believe that someone who wants kids but refuses to have any based upon the inheritance of a genetic disease would want this type of screening.
My God, please use the correct unit of charge. You can use either the Coulomb or the Farad, they are slightly different. An amp is not used to measure capacitance, please do not confuse it with the real units.
*cough*
1) A farad is not a unit of charge; charge cannot be expressed directly in terms of farads. In order to relate farads to coulombs, you need to use the equation
1 farad = 1 coulomb / volt
2) Are you sure an amp isn't a real unit? Last time I checked,
1 ampere = 1 coulomb / second
3) Charge can be measured in mAh.
1 mAh = (0.001 coulomb / second) * 3600 seconds
= 3.6 coulombs
So why shouldn't we be using our abilities to overcome as well? It still amounts to natural selection.
Isn't that what I'm advocating? I would argue that using our ability to harness technology to guarantee that a healthy sperm meets a healthy egg to create an embryo is still a form of natural selection.
Never once did I dare insinuate that people must choose this screening or are not allowed to reproduce in the traditional manner.
Also, they could have their eggs/sperm screened to prevent passing down their genetic defects (because not all of their eggs/sperm will necessarily have the bad gene), thus resulting in a generation of Jews/Amish without the genetic defects you allege to be a hallmark of their ethnicity.
First, have you seen or are you subtly referring to Gattaca?
No, but I do find that interesting. Thank you for the reference.
How are we, as a society, going to agree on the genetic engineering that counts as better?
I don't believe that is something that we, as a society, should choose, but the parents should choose (see below). But given that we do make a choice it will work out in the end. For example, the infanticide that happened in China, where female babies were killed in favor of male babies. I remember hearing that now females are important because there aren't very many of them left, and the situation is correcting itself.
We've identified a child to be born with six fingers on each hand. Is this better for humanity? Should we remove the gene b/c of the social stigma this child will undergo?
I was very careful in how I phrased my example. If it was found that an egg or sperm would pass along a genetic code for the generation of six fingers, the parents would have the option of choosing to use that egg/sperm or not. If they think hey, cool, I'll have a six fingered kid, then that's their perogative, and it could have happened naturally because, and I stress this, we are not manufacturing or modifying genetic code, we are only screening it. If they want their child to avoid the social stigma of being raised with six fingers, again, this is their choice. In fact, I want everyone to have a choice as to whether or not they even want to screen their eggs/sperm.
So in your perfect world, Stephen Hawking (ALS), Issac Newton (Epilepsy) and Albert Einstien (Aspergers Syndrome) would never be born? Do you believe genetically "flawed" individuals have nothing to contribute to society?In my perfect world, you have the choice to screen your eggs and sperm for genetic patterns that you find undesirable. For every person in the world there is a different set of wants, and we are not "creating" humans from raw genetic code. We are just preventing eggs and sperm which have what the donor deems as negative genetic codes from ever making it to conception.
So Newton's specific genetic pattern would not have been "born" if 1) his parents opted to have their eggs and sperm screened 2) for epilepsy. But I contend that someone would have been named Isaac Newton, and there's still an equal statistical probability in my perfect world that he would have had the proper mixture of genetics and environment to realize that apples fall because of gravity.
And who is to say that epilepsy is responsible for Newton being intelligent? If so, why aren't all epileptics geniuses? There will still be randomness and variation in the genetic code, because the egg and sperm still come from people, manufactured by the process of meiosis.
You know how your experience went. Who are you to say everyone feels the same?
What if those people you mention avoided procreating for fear of giving birth to a child who will suffer the same fate? What if this genetic screening could promise them a healthy child? Why would you deny them the access to this opportunity, which may I remind you is opt-in?
but you are making the assumption that caring for the sick or less fortunate is not itself a trait that has been selected for in previous generations.I didn't necessarily imply that assumption. It does make sense that the ability to avoid Natural Selection would indeed be selected for. However, I do believe this is one of the reasons our health care system is overburdened with people dying of e.g. heart disease, etc. Isn't genetics ("does your family have a history of..") the biggest risk factor in a lot of diseases?
Humans have escaped the phenomenon of Natural Selection, for the most part.
All of us who wear glasses? We should have been culled. All these people developing diabetes from eating too much sugar? Selected against. Asthma? You get the picture.
Running with the idea that there is a higher power that created the world, I would say that Natural Selection is the method that higher power uses to figure out what works. But now with health care and a strong sense of altruism, errors in the genetic code are propagating throughout our species and wrecking havoc. In other words, we're playing god by saving lives that should have been selected against and allowing them to pass on their flawed genes.
I also contend that if we were created by a higher power, and that higher power enabled us with the ability to modify our genetic code, then it is our right (nay, our duty) to do so; otherwise, we would lack this ability. I believe that we should selectively erase genes which cause a predisposition to things like Down Syndrome or diabetes or cancer, etc. This would effectively select against all detrimental mutations.
This could also be the limit of Natural Selection as it tends toward infinitely fast; beneficial mutations in one human (for instance, the HIV resistance that elite supressors have) could be propagated throughout the species' genetic code in a single generation.
Perhaps I should leave you with an example, one that even a Christian might be able to tolerate. Imagine a future where you and your s/o collect your eggs and screen them for genetic defects, like Down Syndrome. Once a viable egg has been found (and you don't have to look up what the hair color or eye color will be, you could just leave that to fate), start screening some sperm. Produce a viable fetus which will grow up to be healthy.
Now imagine that you were one of those people who didn't do that for your kid. And now your kid is born with a gene that means they're 80% likely to die from some horrible disease by the age of 30. If I were that kid, I would be pissed at my parents for not choosing the screening option.
Um. Maybe we're talking about the charge buildup on the tube itself
Maybe you are, but I was just trying to share my knowledge of capacitors to the fellow who couldn't properly name the electrical component. I did, you know, name the subject of my post appropriatey.
This is more like a giant, badass leyden jar - that 8th-grade science hazard which sends clasmates leaping - technically a cap, but containing no magic smoke
There's no "technically" about it; a leyden jar is a capacitor.
Oh, and I didn't say anything about magic smoke. I actually happen to know how capacitors are built and how they work. Hence why my post discusses the uses of capacitors, and not the high voltages needed to accelerate electrons towards a screen.
You know. People who actually know what they're talking about.
*sniffs*
Is that a troll I smell?
If you believe that I have mislead anyone in any manner by not knowing what I am talking about, then please (for my sake, and everyone else on slashdot) correct me where I am wrong.