The Political Thread - Burlamaqui edition

[Cpl Halsbart]

 

 

https://www.apnews.com/4997bb7aa36c45449b488e19ac83e86d

 

Guys for those of you who understand science is this story possible?

 

If this is potentially valid why would it be considered immoral?

 

It is possible

 

Moral objections against genome modification come usually either from religious grounds as genome modification are often seen as thing where humans are playing god, quite similar to issue as why cloning is seen as bad, or from societal grounds where there is fear that genome modifications would be used to pursue goal to achieve ultimate human and kill diversity from the population. Genetic modifications killing diversity and natural ability to adapt to changing conditions isn't necessary unfounded fear as it is something that has observed with genetically modified plants.

 

 

There's an 'objective' moral objection as well- CRISPR is not by any means perfect and has not worked particularly well on humans so far when tested. Not working well consistently is not so much a concern when you're dealing with lab rats or plant seeds (to an extent, there's potential for accidentally making superweeds), but if you end up splicing genes into the wrong place in a human you will also end up introducing defects instead of removing them.

 

Also, while it's certainly possible he has done it and his technical outline of how he did it was solid nobody is sure whether he really has edited genes as there's no independent evidence of it- it's illegal to do so in China so he would be in a fair bit of potential trouble if he has (and indeed, if recent reports are accurate he has 'disappeared' after going home).

 

 

I'm theoretically in favor of CRISPR-Cas9 human gene editing, but only when done under care and meticulous scrutiny of the entire scientific and medical community at large. Yes a lone genius might pioneer the boundaries, but they should still have their work vetted and guided careful oversight. It's both about the moral ramifications and it's about accurately mapping out what we know is possible in regards to gene-editing and where things fall apart.

Guys, he's been "missing" for a few days.

[injurai]

Yes... and?

[Cpl Halsbart]

Yes... and?

aaand I thought you should know the man making the claims is gone as fast as he appeared? Does there need to be an and?

[injurai]

That's been in the news, and had been posted earlier. I'm only talking about the pursuit in the larger scientific community. It seemed you were implying something and thus had something to say. Guess not.

[Gfted1]

I support the full modification of the human genome, but ultimately its a dead end imo. We need to learn how to tranfer our consiousness into machines.

[Mirandel]

https://www.apnews.com/4997bb7aa36c45449b488e19ac83e86d

 

Guys for those of you who understand science is this story possible?

 

If this is potentially valid why would it be considered immoral?

 

Sorry, Elerond, but it's not. Not yet (do hope we are heading there though).

Even the theoretical part is questionable - point mutations within the living cell is a very resent thing, while practical (in case of human) is close to impossible: all these experiments require a lost of repetitions, one success out of very many is the lucky event. But one that survives and continue to develop, yet maintaining changes - is a miracle. How many human embrions one can get to experiment on?

 

So far it's in the same league with head transplantation.

[Elerond]

 

https://www.apnews.com/4997bb7aa36c45449b488e19ac83e86d

 

Guys for those of you who understand science is this story possible?

 

If this is potentially valid why would it be considered immoral?

Sorry, Elerond, but it's not. Not yet (do hope we are heading there though).

Even the theoretical part is questionable - point mutations within the living cell is a very resent thing, while practical (in case of human) is close to impossible: all these experiments require a lost of repetitions, one success out of very many is the lucky event. But one that survives and continue to develop, yet maintaining changes - is a miracle. How many human embrions one can get to experiment on?

 

So far it's in the same league with head transplantation.

People have successfully inserted new DNA in plants and animal genomes which mean that it can be also be done for human genome, but because it is complex operation which can easily go wrong and it doesn't necessarily give beneficial results it is quite unlikely that anybody would get permission to do human trials in near future let alone it would actually used to do anything meaningful.

 

But anyway we know that it is possible to add or remove DNA from any genome including human genome and use that genome to grow new thing, but change to do unintended changes which can lead to make genome unsuitable to produce living thing. And experimentation becomes even more difficult when you can have only small number of test subject at time and it takes at least 9 months to see if genome change actually did the thing that you wanted to achieve.

 

One big ongoing HIV cure research projects which is closing human trials is looking way to use genome editing to cut genetic material of HIV from human genome and same time change in the genome would give immunity for HIV. In this study changes are only meant to do in cells that have been infected by HIV.

https://www.the-scientist.com/news-opinion/genome-editing-cuts-out-hiv-37148

https://www.jax.org/news-and-insights/jax-blog/2016/july/battling-hiv-with-crispr

 

 

Edited December 8, 2018 by Elerond

[Mirandel]

 

 

https://www.apnews.com/4997bb7aa36c45449b488e19ac83e86d

 

Guys for those of you who understand science is this story possible?

 

If this is potentially valid why would it be considered immoral?

Sorry, Elerond, but it's not. Not yet (do hope we are heading there though).

Even the theoretical part is questionable - point mutations within the living cell is a very resent thing, while practical (in case of human) is close to impossible: all these experiments require a lost of repetitions, one success out of very many is the lucky event. But one that survives and continue to develop, yet maintaining changes - is a miracle. How many human embrions one can get to experiment on?

 

So far it's in the same league with head transplantation.

People have successfully inserted new DNA in plants and animal genomes which mean that it can be also be done for human genome, but because it is complex operation which can easily go wrong and it doesn't necessarily give beneficial results it is quite unlikely that anybody would get permission to do human trials in near future let alone it would actually used to do anything meaningful.

 

But anyway we know that it is possible to add or remove DNA from any genome including human genome and use that genome to grow new thing, but change to do unintended changes which can lead to make genome unsuitable to produce living thing. And experimentation becomes even more difficult when you can have only small number of test subject at time and it takes at least 9 months to see if genome change actually did the thing that you wanted to achieve.

 

One big ongoing HIV cure research projects which is closing human trials is looking way to use genome editing to cut genetic material of HIV from human genome and same time change in the genome would give immunity for HIV. In this study changes are only meant to do in cells that have been infected by HIV.

https://www.the-scientist.com/news-opinion/genome-editing-cuts-out-hiv-37148

https://www.jax.org/news-and-insights/jax-blog/2016/july/battling-hiv-with-crispr

 

 

Things you mentioned (and linked) have nothing to do with single gene modification in an embrio. For now it's a direction to move on but far from an end point. So, no, I do not believe that scientist truly altered genes in those embrions (and there are no evidences supporting his claim either, which is mentioned in the paper). So, moralists can sleep safe and sound - it's not here yet. And official science will not get there any time soon. There is always biohacking, of course, like DIYbio, but as much as I want human gene modification happen, I would not hope to see it happening for real.

[Elerond]

 

 

 

https://www.apnews.com/4997bb7aa36c45449b488e19ac83e86d

 

Guys for those of you who understand science is this story possible?

 

If this is potentially valid why would it be considered immoral?

Sorry, Elerond, but it's not. Not yet (do hope we are heading there though).

Even the theoretical part is questionable - point mutations within the living cell is a very resent thing, while practical (in case of human) is close to impossible: all these experiments require a lost of repetitions, one success out of very many is the lucky event. But one that survives and continue to develop, yet maintaining changes - is a miracle. How many human embrions one can get to experiment on?

 

So far it's in the same league with head transplantation.

People have successfully inserted new DNA in plants and animal genomes which mean that it can be also be done for human genome, but because it is complex operation which can easily go wrong and it doesn't necessarily give beneficial results it is quite unlikely that anybody would get permission to do human trials in near future let alone it would actually used to do anything meaningful.

 

But anyway we know that it is possible to add or remove DNA from any genome including human genome and use that genome to grow new thing, but change to do unintended changes which can lead to make genome unsuitable to produce living thing. And experimentation becomes even more difficult when you can have only small number of test subject at time and it takes at least 9 months to see if genome change actually did the thing that you wanted to achieve.

 

One big ongoing HIV cure research projects which is closing human trials is looking way to use genome editing to cut genetic material of HIV from human genome and same time change in the genome would give immunity for HIV. In this study changes are only meant to do in cells that have been infected by HIV.

https://www.the-scientist.com/news-opinion/genome-editing-cuts-out-hiv-37148

https://www.jax.org/news-and-insights/jax-blog/2016/july/battling-hiv-with-crispr

 

 

Things you mentioned (and linked) have nothing to do with single gene modification in an embrio. For now it's a direction to move on but far from an end point. So, no, I do not believe that scientist truly altered genes in those embrions (and there are no evidences supporting his claim either, which is mentioned in the paper). So, moralists can sleep safe and sound - it's not here yet. And official science will not get there any time soon. There is always biohacking, of course, like DIYbio, but as much as I want human gene modification happen, I would not hope to see it happening for real.

 

 

It is easier to change genome in embryo than in thousands cells all around adult body. 

 

EDIT: To add, editing genome in embryo's cells is possible, getting that editing to fix some specific problem in that genome is of course more difficult especially if you need to change multiple parts in the genome in order to achieve what you want. So in other words we have technology to have genetically edited babies, but that does not mean that those edits make anything better in said possible babies and there is also change that said edits will actually cause harmful changes for said babies genome.

Edited December 8, 2018 by Elerond

[injurai]

holy ****... I had no idea such a racket was going on...

 

[Blarghagh]

Can anyone explain the yellow vest thing, specifically why it's still happening and everyone from QAnon morons to I-joined-Antifa-only-for-the-looting shirtheads are calling on people to join even though the instigating tax hike was already dropped?

[HoonDing]

Guess it beats working.

[Malcador]

It's spread to Canada too. Seems to be just about the migration resolution and how it's basically the NWO, here.

Edited December 9, 2018 by Malcador

[Zoraptor]

Can anyone explain the yellow vest thing, specifically why it's still happening and everyone from QAnon morons to I-joined-Antifa-only-for-the-looting shirtheads are calling on people to join even though the instigating tax hike was already dropped?

 

That was only one of many tax increases, though particularly ill thought out one at that. Radical people joining in is the least surprising, though quasi fascists and anarchists doing so without significantly fighting each other as well is unusual and probably does show how much people hate what's going on.

 

The reasons are much the same as elsewhere, just coupled to France's enormous tradition of protest. Macron's ideas of reform are precisely what you'd expect from a neoliberal World Bank type- privatise profits, collectivise costs. He's cut taxes for the rich and brought in massively regressive taxes* that disproportionately target poor working people while cutting things like money for public transport at the same time. The fuel tax was great, if you could afford to buy an electric car out of hand; if you couldn't it was awful and came after years of being told to buy diesel by the government same as they're now saying to buy electric. And in ten years they'll work out that the batteries in electrics are awful and cannot be disposed of properly so you should buy hydrogen, and you can pay 10k Euro to scrap your electric car you bought for 5k after saving for a decade now the previous owner decided hydrogen was the future after a tip off.

 

Macron was also nowhere near as popular as media made him out to be to start with. Media love Narrative, and much like Trudeau and Ardern here Macron is a corporate friendly nu gen nu wave anti Trump, and that's what counts rather than being objective about his strengths and weaknesses. He didn't do that well against an awful opponent who would probably have lost to anyone including Mr 2% popularity Hollande if it came to it, and 1/8 of those who voted deliberately spoiled their ballots. His party won the parliamentary election, but with only slightly more votes than the 2nd placed party in the previous election with that result being a moderate landslide for the socialist winners so 2nd place wasn't that close. The reason the protests continue is, to paraphrase what one mayor allegedly told Macron to his face: they out and out hate him and everything he stands for.

 

*why they're regressive: if you're rich you buy an electric car with cash or low interest loan and thus never pay the fuel tax; if you're poor you can't afford to do so, are more likely to be driving an old, cheap, inefficient car that uses more fuel so pay more even in absolute terms and you cannot replace it since you're, well, poor; and you are way more likely to live somewhere with poor or no public transport (and remember, Macron cut funding to public transport) because typically poorer areas don't lobby well for such things and decisions are made by rich people who either think rich people are most important, are pig ignorant and don't have a clue about anyone outside their bubble, andor are terrified of people from the banlieu invading their locale. There's also the problem of public transport in poorer areas typically being unreliable and unpleasant, so you never know when or if you'll get to work on time or in what state.

 

eg, our local government fuel tax here is primarily being used to put in public transport in... high income areas close enough to the city that people actually could cycle and the city centre plus some tourist routes, while mostly being paid by rural people who have dreadfully maintained roads clogged by trucks carrying stuff that could be better carried by the trains which aren't in the plan (and with 1800 truck movements a day approved by ex industry consultants when the road design stipulates 100 a day; council has to pay for road maintenance of course), and poor factory workers and the like who want to go from low income housing to industrial areas, not visit The Viaduct Harbour, Remuera Foodtown or the banking headquarters and Prada outlets of central Auckland- good luck surviving a cycle from Mangere to Penrose too even if it didn't take an hour each way, for some reason the entire route is designed for and clogged by trucks. Yet all transport consultants making the suggestions have offices in central Auckland, used to work for truck companies (hmm, wonder if that's why the whole transport system is designed for trucks, might be a connection?), are lobbied by and mostly know people in 1.5 million dollar houses who drive Cayenne's without caring about tax because it's a fricking 150k$ car what's $10 a week more or have Volvos, Teslas or other premium electrics, and pass decisions on to politicians who used to be paid as much as a teacher 30 years ago but now get paid nearly five times as much thanks to their 'independent' remuneration authority, and in terms of who they care about can add only tourists to the list.

[Blarghagh]

Consider me enlightened. Thanks.

[Chilloutman]

Seems like Western EU catching yellow fewer, it was about time

[BruceVC]

https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2018/dec/10/un-states-agree-historic-global-deal-to-manage-refugee-crisis

 

Guys I honestly emotionally  and logically vacillate around these types of well meaning but economically and socially flawed initiatives 

 

I would like to support the countries who signed up but I dont as my own country has been heavily targeted by millions of illegal refugees from countries whose leaders and governments  have utterly or seriously destroyed  any meaningful economic transformation. Some of the illegal immigrants come from failed governments or war zones so they have no real future in there own countries ....but why should millions of these people become South Africa's problem ?

 

We can barely deliver services to our own citizens and we have massive debt due to public sector and the previous presidents corruption and now we  get lectured by the failed African Union about " not being Xenophobic " but the AU has never bothered to address the group of failed countries to stop there citizens immigrating to places like the EU or south to South Africa ...SA is almost overrun, read the link below and you will see how we have illegal refugees occupying buildings that should be allocated to local people but somehow we cant seem to effectively evict these refugees.....its very frustrating 

 

 

 https://www.sapeople.com/2016/12/13/mayor-meets-home-affairs-joburgs-hijacked-buildings-illegal-immigrants/

 

https://www.iol.co.za/news/south-africa/gauteng/undocumented-immigrants-nabbed-inside-hijacked-joburg-buildings-12046715

[Cpl Halsbart]

That's been in the news, and had been posted earlier. I'm only talking about the pursuit in the larger scientific community. It seemed you were implying something and thus had something to say. Guess not.

The USSR's penchant for disappearing people in their space program after bogus claims.

 

Besides that, anybody under the delusion gene editing will trickle down is only kidding themselves.

 

*why they're regressive: if you're rich you buy an electric car with cash or low interest loan and thus never pay the fuel tax; if you're poor you can't afford to do so, are more likely to be driving an old, cheap, inefficient car that uses more fuel so pay more even in absolute terms and you cannot replace it since you're, well, poor; and you are way more likely to live somewhere with poor or no public transport (and remember, Macron cut funding to public transport) because typically poorer areas don't lobby well for such things and decisions are made by rich people who either think rich people are most important, are pig ignorant and don't have a clue about anyone outside their bubble, andor are terrified of people from the banlieu invading their locale. There's also the problem of public transport in poorer areas typically being unreliable and unpleasant, so you never know when or if you'll get to work on time or in what state.

Not to mention trucks, tractors, combines, backhoes, etc. Someone might take out a loan on an electric sedan for the missus, but if you own any of this equipment, farming for example, you'll still be paying the tax for going green anyhow.

 

This fella's angry because his generation were promised certain things, lo and behold those promises dried up before his retirement:

Edited December 10, 2018 by Cpl Halsbart

[Chilloutman]

https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2018/dec/10/un-states-agree-historic-global-deal-to-manage-refugee-crisis

 

Guys I honestly emotionally  and logically vacillate around these types of well meaning but economically and socially flawed initiatives 

 

I would like to support the countries who signed up but I dont as my own country has been heavily targeted by millions of illegal refugees from countries whose leaders and governments  have utterly or seriously destroyed  any meaningful economic transformation. Some of the illegal immigrants come from failed governments or war zones so they have no real future in there own countries ....but why should millions of these people become South Africa's problem ?

 

We can barely deliver services to our own citizens and we have massive debt due to public sector and the previous presidents corruption and now we  get lectured by the failed African Union about " not being Xenophobic " but the AU has never bothered to address the group of failed countries to stop there citizens immigrating to places like the EU or south to South Africa ...SA is almost overrun, read the link below and you will see how we have illegal refugees occupying buildings that should be allocated to local people but somehow we cant seem to effectively evict these refugees.....its very frustrating 

 

 

 https://www.sapeople.com/2016/12/13/mayor-meets-home-affairs-joburgs-hijacked-buildings-illegal-immigrants/

 

https://www.iol.co.za/news/south-africa/gauteng/undocumented-immigrants-nabbed-inside-hijacked-joburg-buildings-12046715

 

its called clash of ideals with reality

[Zoraptor]

 

That's been in the news, and had been posted earlier. I'm only talking about the pursuit in the larger scientific community. It seemed you were implying something and thus had something to say. Guess not.

The USSR's penchant for disappearing people in their space program after bogus claims.

 

 

In the gene manipulation case he's more likely to be disappeared if it was a genuine claim, since it's illegal in China. I don't think telling westerners a load of bollocks is illegal in China, they'd have to jail just about every business exec and Communist Party member if it were (and applied evenly, of course).

 

Soviets barely disappeared anyone in their space program, it was too important to do that and was post Stalin (who, unsurprisingly, had swept up a lot of its members earlier in his purges though obviously they survived). Some disappeared from public life, but that would be like Bethesda deciding that Todd Howard or Pete Hines needs a break from promotional work after the Fallout 76 trainwreck. Their biggest failure was the manned lunar mission, and the heads of that lived into their 80s and one ended up heading their space agency after his rocket's earlier failure.

 

Not to mention trucks, tractors, combines, backhoes, etc. Someone might take out a loan on an electric sedan for the missus, but if you own any of this equipment, farming for example, you'll still be paying the tax for going green anyhow.

Yeah, that doesn't happen so much here at least.

 

Firstly commercial users just pass on the costs to their clients, and with no proper rail we have no alternatives but to suck it up. Ultimately, that cost is again borne disproportionately by the poor whose food and other essentials' costs go up front those freight costs.

 

Secondly our diesel fuel tax set up is reversed from what you'd expect- the less efficient your engine the less, relatively, you pay. I drove a small engine diesel for 5 years and paid the same road tax as a large SUV, the same diesel price, the same licensing costs despite having 3x the fuel efficiency of said SUV and a third the weight ripping up the road. That meant I was subsidising every single large one occupant SUV that hit a cyclist because it was too big for the road and had massive blind spots, stopped half way through another car at the lights or rolled when someone turned the wheel more than 10 degrees while driving over 50kph- and the closest most got to off road was avoiding puddles in the local supermarket.

 

Thirdly, businesses (including farms) have accountants who will set up a beneficial tax regime for any added costs, which isn't available to non businesses and mitigates the costs.

[213374U]

This fella's angry because his generation were promised certain things, lo and behold those promises dried up before his retirement:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qJYZ-JRrT2Y&t=1s

Can you believe that Baby Boomer? How entitled can you be? Take a page from the Greatest Generation, pull yourself up by your bootstraps and stop asking for hand-outs, you whiny (old) manbaby.

 

I swear, between this and millennials not spending the money they should be saving, this country supranational monstrosity is going down the drain.

[Cpl Halsbart]

The so-called greatest generation voted for most of the failing systems biting us in the ass today. It was alright for them, because they wouldn't be alive to reap the effects.

[HoonDing]

Maybe he should've worked harder.

[Hurlshort]

Racists just can't get a break in this country.

 

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-virginia-protests/life-in-prison-looms-for-neo-nazi-in-virginia-protest-killing-idUSKBN1OA1I0

[Gfted1]

Is he being imprisioned for racism?