Some people are interpreting that more broadly than I intended it. I'm squeamish about this kind of medical gene editing in specific.
There is a genetic disorder that runs in my family. I used to be on a bunch of email lists for the condition. People with the condition routinely volunteer for drug studies in a desperate attempt to get help that current medical science can't provide them and/or to get free care for a condition that's very medically expensive.
People with serious medical conditions are all too often treated like lab rats whose lives don't really matter. Treating people like me humanely isn't a real high priority. Quality of life is not much part of the discussion. Keeping us alive a little longer is the only metric that seems to count and horrifying things get done in the name of it.
Not OP, but something just feels unnatural and unsettling about changing humans, and especially for changing yourself. It feels like the uncanny valley where it just doesn't feel right. I'm agnostic so it's not for a particularly religious reasons, and it's purely an emotional response for me that's not grounded in logic at all, so I also just describe it as squeamish for no reason.
Thank you for a honest response. I think this is an underexplored topic - how many of our broad social policies were shaped mostly on the basis of sufficiently broadly shared visceral feeling.
Should we base ultimately coercive society-wide regulatory framework on mere "squeamishness", appropriately rationalized, or should we instead embrace a non-discriminatory, laissez-faire approach in this domain?
Have you ever tried making changes to a large, incredibly complex codebase with zero comments? Sometimes the changes you make don't have the expected results.
Not the OP, but I think there are ethical concerns about genetic manipulation that do not amount to catastrophizing (e.g. 20th century eugenics is back!).
The problem with old school eugenics was that it wasn't consensual. Like forced sterilizations and abortions.
If gene tech can make future generations healthier and smarter with informed choice by the parents, those future generations will look back in horror at the barbaric pro death & disease lobby of the 2020s.
Forcing no, but those who could afford to do it would engineer superior children, and society would rather quickly devolve into a caste-type social system or worse.
It is inevitable that more people will be able to exert more control over their reproduction. I agree that this is likely to amplify the human tribalism that already causes so many problems. I still don't see how that inevitably leads to “20th century eugenics” nor why we should discourage or fear research.
You haven't had children, have you? They don't neatly fit into plans or develop to top down desires.Thinking the children will be superior is extreme arrogance even if it all works out and they are born immune to cancer. It puts too much faith in one advantage determining all.
Under that catastrophic social model the elite should have been descendants of the elite from before the Bronze Age collapse, and heavy cavalry should have maintained their combat effectiveness over the masses even during the Infantry Revolution.
Simple put people think "its a slippery slope". Every step closer to the evolution of a new technology makes people think about all the bad ways it could be used. Many past leaders in chemistry probably thought their advances would lead to the holocaust.
Its not bad to think/talk about the possible negative consequences of bringing a new technology into this world.
>Can you elaborate on what makes you squeamish about research?
Yes, I for one can't imagine why editing the genes of humans would cause alarm. After all, who wouldn't want to have children that are smarter, more docile, and healthier? Or, for other people's children, who have qualities that make you uncomfortable and can't be edited out, like dark skin or homosexuality, you have the option to edit their reproductive ability so that such qualities can come to an end humanely, without violence.
In the same way, I can't understand are those people against longevity research. Who wants to die? Not me, and certainly not those in power. You know, the people in power earned their positions, they are good at it, and mortality just means someone new and inexperienced will fumble around at the job. For continuity and safety, immortal leaders will do a better job and keep us safe. I don't see why anyone would consider this a bad thing.
Can you elaborate on what makes you squeamish about research?