Terms Every "Intellectual" Should Know
George Dvorsky, the radical transhumanist--well, now there's a redundant phrase--has come up with a long list of terms of which "intellectuals" should be aware. These include:
"Cosmological Eschatology (aka physical eschatology): CE is the study of how the Universe develops, ages, and ultimately comes to an end. While hardly a new concept, what is new is the suggestion that advanced intelligence may play a role in the universe's life cycle. Given the radical potential for postbiological superintelligence, a number of thinkers have suggested that universe engineering is a likely activity for advanced civilizations. This has given rise to a number of theories, including the developmental singularity hypothesis and the selfish biocosm hypothesis." Like I have often said, transhumanism is religion.
"Extended Identity: Human activity is increasingly migrating to the digital realm. The rise in popularity of MMORPGs such as Second Life and World of Warcraft show that the self can, to a non-trivial degree, be transfered to an alternative medium. With the maturation of these technologies will come distributed personhood and new legal protections to guarantee safe and ubiquitous online activity." Or, to put it another way: "My Mother the Computer."
"Information Theoretic Death: New technologies will soon demand that we redefine what we mean by death. It is becoming increasingly unsatisfactory to declare death when the heart stops. As long as the information within the brain can be preserved and restored, a person should not be considered irrevocably dead. Given the potential for molecular nanotechnology and other future biotechnological advances, it is reasonable to suggest that most cognitive impairment will someday be repairable. Consequently, we will need to reconsider the status of persons frozen in cyronic stasis or hooked up to life support systems." Then, Dvorsky should oppose dehydrating those with profound cognitive disabilities, since he believes cures will be coming. But somehow, I'll bet he wasn't on the Schindlers' side in the Terri Schiavo fight.
"Memetic Engineering: This is the radical and controversial idea that the propagation and quality of information should be monitored and managed. Memetic engineering is a term coined by Richard Dawkins, and has been elaborated upon by such thinkers as James Gardner, Robert Wright, Daniel Dennett (who calls for increased cultural health) and William Sims Bainbridge (to enhance group and societal outcomes). For example, advocates of ME would argue that some religious memes are viral and and need to curbed. I have also argued along these lines. On a related note, a burgeoning movement is afoot to help people overcome their biases." Get those re-education camps ready! So much for the myth that transhumanists and radical secularists really believe in freedom and liberty of conscience.
Well, now we know how Dvorsky spends his nights. Check it out. It's pretty interesting. Far out, man.
posted by Wesley J. Smith @ 10:34 PM
26 Comments
26 Comments:
"Cosmological Eschatology":
Um, don't we have to have something physical to do the engineering with? According to the most popular theories (which I don't buy, but we'll go with them for right now), the Universe will expand to the point that everything will spread out until there's nothing but some free-floating hydrogen atoms, a few black holes, and maybe us if we can figure out how to stick our minds in something that will survive the expansion. IF we can figure that out, we still won't be able to build a universe because we don't and won't have the capability of creating new matter to make into new stuff, and the old matter that's out there supposedly will be inaccessable to us.
"Extended Identity":
Dude... they're computer games. They're like playing D&D 3rd Edition with people in other countries. It's make believe! Little kids play pretend - we're just extending the ability to play pretend to adults, to let them play! WoW as a container for my consciousness? Has this guy ever played WoW? There's no consciousness involved!
"Information Theoretic Death":
If the heart isn't functioning, the brain cannot function. Cell death doesn't necessarily start right when the heart dies, but the body cannot function without outside assistance. Therefore, anybody this guy wants to reconsider as far as classification for alive or dead would have to be based on cell death, not bodily death, and that means that nobody who's body isn't decaying should have the plug pulled on them.
"Memetic Engineering":
Yes, those pesky MODES OF THOUGHT are so viral, they spread around likea cold or flu and infect people... GET REAL! How the hell can a mode of thought desire to reproduce? Thoughts have no physical substance, they do not consume, they do not eliminate, and they do not reproduce. They're not things. A mode of thought cannot control anything or anyone. Period. To suggest that thoughts have some kind of weight, are able to be transfered like a virus, etc., is to leave the door open for ESP, telepathy, psychic experience, the existence of a soul (if a thought can pass on to other people doesn't that mean the thinker can also move around outside the body?), etc etc etc. All fo which these guys deny.
Now some of my favorite spiritualist philosophers also buy into memes. I spend a lot of my reading time trying not to roll my eyes.
This guy is a hyper-optimistic loony.
He also coined the term "postgenderism", in fact, the Wikipedia entry on Postgenderism seems to equate Postgenderism with George Dvorsky himself.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Postgenderism
George Dvorsky is a transhumanist thinker who coined the term "postgenderism" to describe a social philosophy which seeks the elimination of gender in the human species through the application of advanced biotechnology and assisted reproductive technologies.
We don't have to stand by and watch as scientists try to eliminate gender by developing same-sex conception. We can push for a law that limits conception to natural meiosis of a man and a woman's gametes. These scientists are moving very fast, they could attempt to create a human baby from a same-sex couple's genes any day now, it has already been done in mice. It isn't anti-gay to oppose using genetic engineering, or to point out that same-sex conception requires genetic engineering and should not be allowed. This little fact could stop the divisive marriage debate, and we could use the need for federal recognition of civil unions as part of a compromise to enact the egg and sperm law, prohibiting genetic engineering and cloning at the same time.
Yes, it would leave ESCR legal, but it would not strengthen it in any way, it would be at least as easy to ban it after we prohibit conception of people via GE.
TE Fine: "Dude... they're computer games. They're like playing D&D 3rd Edition with people in other countries. It's make believe!"
Exactly! If this represents transferring the "self" to an "alternative medium", what kind of self-expression *doesn't*? If online games qualify, so too would a conference phone call, for example -- but who would consider that "extended personhood" in any meaningful sense?
His justification for seeing MMOPRGs as this "transfer" is quite odd too: their "rise in popularity"! So because people like them, they are a new form of selfhood?!
We seem doomed to constantly enact old stories. In this case, I see Dvorsky and the other cheering transhumanists as playing Victor Frankenstein, while John Howard and many others around here represent the angry mob with torches and pitchforks. Technology is the monster.
I guess I have some measure of sympathy and disdain for both sides. Certainly there are some good reasons to want to control the applications of biotechnology. But this monster is unstoppable. Unlike nuclear technology, which is difficult and expensive and requires a huge industrial apparatus to support, biotech procedures are quite simple and easy to replicate on the cheap, and that only gets more true with time. You can ban procedures you don't like, but that just means they'll happen in other parts of the world, or underground.
mtraven: I think that is not quite right. I do think there are some who have become technology ubber alles types. And I think many in the scientific intelligentsia seek a blank check for funding and ethics. But, when you think about it, there are very few areas where there are attempts to flat-out stop research. Human cloning, yes. Human enhancements, as opposed to therapies, perhaps. But not much else.
Mainly people want proper ethical parameters and regulations and are using democratic processes in order to promote their views. This is hardly Luddism that opposes technology and seeks to prevent all change.
Exactly, it's a question of priorities, of how to use technology and spend our resources. It's not as if the biotech industry would have to pack it in if we prohibited conceiving people using genetic engineering. They would work on medicine. Am I wrong, mtraven? Is the biotech industry going to go under if it cannot genetically engineer people?
Today is the day to find MLK quotes all over the internet. Here is one from the Birmingham jail:
a just law is a code that a majority compels a minority to follow and that it is willing to follow itself. This is sameness made legal.
So, a law banning genetic engineering would be a just law, because people against genetic engineering are a majority and they are willing to follow the law themselves. They would compel a minority (transhumanists and postgenderists and eugencists) to follow it also. We should all be made the same way, by the natural union of a man and a woman. We should not allow any of us to be genetically engineered or cloned. This is sameness made legal.
It is not just a matter of safety, but of sameness.
Good god, John, you scare me more every time you post. What a misreading of MLK you have there. Not all laws that impose "sameness" are just or fit in with our legal system, which puts a very high value on individual liberty -- the freedom to be different, rather than the same. You sound like you would be happier in North Korea or Maoist China, where the law enforced sameness.
Anyway, my point here was not that genetic engineering is good or even that it should be legal -- the point was that it is going to be very difficult to control. It's not the large-scale biotech industry I would worry about, it's the upcoming availability of biotech on the street level. I personally worry more about bioterrorism than genetic engineering, but the underlying issues aren't all that different. Biotech is going to be ubiquitous and hackable the way computer technology is today. If you outlaw it here the practitioners will move elsewhere.
If you outlaw it here the practitioners will move elsewhere.
And if we don't outlaw it here, the practioners will practice it here, and they will practice it elsewhere, much sooner and much more than if we outlaw it here. Perhaps you feel we should not outlaw bioterrorism also, since if we outlaw it, they will move elsewhere? We wouldn't want to lose the "bioterrorism race", now would we?
And the "sameness" that scares me is the one imposed by eugenicist fertility doctors who can't wait to start giving us all perfect genes. Perhaps they will allow us to pass on some innocuous traits like facial structure and eye color, so that we can claim some relation to "our" child, but in all other respects, they want us to all be the same, their idea of perfect.
I hope you can see that my idea of "sameness" is diametrically opposite to that, my idea of "sameness" is that all of us be different, the result of the natural joining of our parents who chose each other to love, and neither they nor anyone else had any control over our genes, no one designed any of us to be a certain way.
And hey - what do you all make of "Postgenderism"? I think we have to this one seriously, not only are they working on ways to allow same-sex conception, but postgenderism is having a huge impact on our culture way in advance of any actual biological changes. It is like we are already acting as though gender and sex are on the way out. It would do a world of good to refute "postgenderism" and affirm the permenance of gender. We could do that with the egg and sperm law, which only needs people to push for it for it to be enacted.
You are confusing two separate points: whether we should regulate biotechnology, and whether we can regulate it. I am not opposed to all regulation (although I'm sure I'd regulate it less than you would) but I'm pessimistic about the ability of society to repress illegal activity.
I don't see any eugenicists who want to make us all the same. Can you provide some references?
As for postgenderism, that can mean several different things, but in general I would be all for it, as long as it represents an option for people who choose to practice it. You seem to be buying into the transhumanist rhetoric, that somehow enabling same-sex reproduction will "eliminate gender". Of course, it does nothing of the kind for the vast majority of people. Just like gay marriage in no way threatens heterosexual marriage.
And a warning flag is down: Let's please not argue about gay marriage. Thank you.
Wesley, re: Gay Marriage -
It's a non-issue here; it's a legal status that doesn't affect bioethics, and therefore is outside the realm of this discussion.
Now then...
mtraven:
" You seem to be buying into the transhumanist rhetoric, that somehow enabling same-sex reproduction will "eliminate gender". Of course, it does nothing of the kind for the vast majority of people. Just like gay marriage in no way threatens heterosexual marriage."
The problem is that while the majority are fine with their own genders and with the divisions in gender, there are a lot of people who mistakenly think that gender and gender preference are something that can be controlled in an adult, and too many people want to monkey around with our programming.
The brain develops either as male or female, regardless of how the body develops (though most of the time the two line up). Someone starts talking about "equality amongst the sexes through elimination of the sexes" and they're talking about getting rid of the physical aspects without respecting that the brain will develop in its own way; the only way to really eliminate sexuality is to reprogram the brain itself in the uterus, and therein lies the problem.
People will start to think of same-sex reproduction (or genderless, should they succeed in making people who have no gender) as a means to getting rid of sexual differences, and you just end up with a ton of problems with the kids that develop. The brain won't be quieted. It needs certain levels of hormones to develop properly - more of one will cause a masculine brain, less will cause a feminine one. There's no way to wipe that out, and then you've got a child who's going to go through a lot of misery in a body that won't cooperate with his mind.
Go to any transgender website and you'll read some terribly heartbreaking stories about what these people went through as kids, girls and boys stuck in the wrong bodies when puberty sets in.
This is one danger of same-sex reproduction, and it's a danger of the postgender movement.
I'm pessimistic about the ability of society to repress illegal activity.
The first step is to make the activity illegal. Then we'll see how bad the problem is, if any people try to do it anyway. I think scientists are generally law-abiding people, and they would be thankful we have given them clear boundaries. Most scientists are affiliated with universities and they have to account for their activities.
And if there are still people who feel compelled to try it, they'd have to be so secretive that they wouldn't be able to advertise for clients, they wouldn't be able to publish or claim any credit, and the people that want to genetically engineer their own kids won't be able to find any doctors to do it. Maybe we'd do sting operations to snuff out people that we suspect are offering or looking for the services. And we'd hit them with jail time and huge fines just like if they were looking for prostitutes. (I suppose you think that shouldn't be prohibited either, since it can't really be completely repressed either. Murder and rape, too, right?)
Of course we can prohibit genetic engineering, and I think it won't be hard at all to actually prevent it. But we definitely can't prevent it if we don't even make it illegal.
As to postgenderism, my point was that even now, before anyone has tried same-sex conception in humans, the mere future possibililty of it for some people has had a harmful effect on everyone. It has affected the norms of the culture, we already act as though gender is irrelevent for everyone.
As to arguments about marriage and sexuality, I completely understand and agree to abide by that rule. I do think we should discuss the bioethics of alternatives to natural sexual reproduction and whether or not there is a right to attempt it, For example, the President's Council's report was able to recommend that Congress prohibit non egg and sperm conception without worrying about the implications in any cultural debates. We should be able to speak freely about it also. although, I do think that we shouldn't be so afraid of getting into that argument that we don't talk about the bioethics of non egg and sperm conception at all.
TE said: Go to any transgender website and you'll read some terribly heartbreaking stories about what these people went through ...This is one danger of same-sex reproduction, and it's a danger of the postgender movement.
Sorry, I am missing something here. How does same-sex reproduction make the situation of transgendered people any worse?
The aim of the sane part of any "postgender movement" is to relax rigid social preconceptions of what gender is and what an individual's gender role is. This is where society is heading anyway, much to the disgust of social conservatives like John. Very few people are interested in getting rid of gender entirely. I would think that the increasing acceptance of transgendered people is entirely compatible with this trend.
If only they could get rid of gender entirely, then postgenderism would be perfectly fine. The problem is that there will still be women getting pregnant naturally for a little while longer, there will still be people born without genetic enhancements and screening, there will still be men relying on women to reproduce, and yet the laws and cultural norms and the "social preconceptions" are already passing these people over, in favor of people that don't even exist yet. We still haven't had one male pregnancy or female father, yet it seems that in order to not be a "social concervative", we have to agree to scrap the expectations and social support for gender that virtually everyone still needs. Even transgendered and intersexed people are intensely focused on gender and gender roles, moreso than people firmly stuck in their biological gender.
If not being a transhumanist makes one a social conservative, there are a lot more social conservatives out there than most people admit.
You know what would be funny? Maggie Gallagher and Wesley Smith going out to dinner together. Maggie would refuse to discuss biotechnology, and Wesley would refuse to discuss the rights of same-sex couples, and there would be this chill in the air as both of them worried that the other might bring up the ethics and rights of same-sex couples conceiving children together. It's too bad, because I know them both pretty well and they're good people who ought to get along fine. I'm sure they would both agree about the ethics and rights, too. But we'd never know because apparently they hate each other's fields and don't want to associate with each other.
mtraven:
"Sorry, I am missing something here. How does same-sex reproduction make the situation of transgendered people any worse?
The aim of the sane part of any "postgender movement" is to relax rigid social preconceptions of what gender is and what an individual's gender role is."
Ick, yeah, let me clarify what I was trying to say. I should just enumerate everything anyway - it's the only way I can keep track of what's in my head, I swear.
1) I was using transgendered people as an example of physical sexuality versus brain sexuality. Babies (whether the body is male of female is irrelevant here) will develop male brains if they experience a strong burst of testosterone and other developmental hormones in utero, and will develoop female brians if that burst is weak. It comes after the development of the body sex.
2) No matter what happens, a baby needs to have certain chemical "bursts" in order to survive. This isn't about moms carrying babies, this is about developing little people that can live past birth, meaning that even if we somehow got the technology to gestate babies in artificial wombs, they'd still need these hormones to survive.
3) No matter what kind of body you're in, if your brain develops as male or female, then you are effectively male or female. Period. Male brains are very differnet from female brains. Girls focus sooner, they have greater verbal skills sooner, etc. Males have a different way of focusing on things, a different way of dealing with problems, and all of that is programmed depending on how the brain develops.
4) The "sane" side of the transgender movement: gender role is all brain based. That means if you're trying to relax the standards based on sex, you're trying to fight internal programming. Guys are going to be different from gals. They are going to have different ways of looking at problems and different ways of dealing with problems. In many areas, women are superior than men (empathy, certain types of logic skills, communication abilities) and men superior to women (comprehension, other types of logic skills, decoding abilities).
5) Therefore, if you try to relax certain standards, what you're doing is making people who respond to their inner workings "bad" if they don't follow a relaxed code of behavior. It's already happening - corporate women look down on homemakers, and nevermind that a homemaker is as happy as a corporate chick in her natural environment. The traditional "man's man" is seen as threatening to those of a more sensitive nature, and are often ridiculed for being "macho." Nevermind that that's how they're programmed.
6) Likewise, a transgendered male-to-female is a girl stuck in a boy's body. She's going to respond differently to stimuli - she'll be female in everything except her body. Forcing her into a role she's not suited for is *exactly* what people in the "relaxed society" do to folks who live a traditional lifestyle, and nevermind if that's what makes them comfortable. That girl should be able to live her life as a girl, a homemaker should be able to raise her babies without ridicule, and a man's man should be able to enjoy sports and hunting and what have you without being portrayed as a cave man.
7) That won't happen, however, unless people are willing to accept that some folks follow rigid gender rules because that's how they are. Instead, we get Alanis Morissette singing "I Am A Man" and bemoaning being an "enlightened" male living amongst the Neanderthals. You end up in a society that's no better, and possibly worse, than the more conservative one we live in now.
8) As to the insane side, where folks want to get rid of gender altogehther, remember that I said that a baby's brain must receive certain stimulation to develop into a little person that can live outside a womb (real or artificial). At the absolute least, if these folks "succeeded," then they'd produce generations of all females, terribly homogeneous and without much variation, and anyone born with masculine traits will be looked down upon if they're lucky. At worst, you'll end up with a generation of people whose engendered brains don't match their bodies, they're uncomfortable inside their own skins, and any display of gender difference will be considered a transgression, meaning both males and females will be tormented. Think of that Star Trek: TNG episode where Riker fell in love with a sexless "woman" and you'll see what I'm talking about.
That sums it all up. There's no good way out of any of this.
Bernhardt Varenius :
"Exactly! If this represents transferring the "self" to an "alternative medium", what kind of self-expression *doesn't*? If online games qualify, so too would a conference phone call, for example -- but who would consider that "extended personhood" in any meaningful sense?"
Absolutely not! Is talking a medium of my consciousness? Is sign language? MMORPGS are nothing more than massive communication that shares "adventuring" among the players. It's not an alternate reality, it's not a housing for thought, it's a game that many people can play and it simply has mass communication technology to let as many people play at the same time as possible. Popularity does not a cybernetic body make.
John Howard, re: Maggie Gallagher and Wesley Smith going out to dinner --
I don't necessarily agree with your take on what would happen at that dinner. You're talking about two civilized adults who do have some common grounds, and any arguments they have against each other are purely professional - they're entitled to their private opinions but they don't let those interfere with their fields, so anything they argue about comes from within their fields, and their opinions based on the facts presented to them.
Look at the two of us. We don't necessarily agree on certain sexuality issues, but that doesn't stop us from supporting each other concerning the ethics of same-sex reproduction. You and I respect each others opinions, even though we disagree, and we don't let our disagreement hinder us in seeking just and appropriate use of biotechnology, right?
I'm sure Wesley and Maggie, despite their opinions, would be able to either civily agree to disagree, or would be able to find a common ground that they could build on from their different perspectives.
And John, I have a deep respect for you and your opinion, even though we don't have the same ideas on everything.
TE, you seem to suffer from the same weird logic as John. Transhumanists want to increase available options; somehow this gets transmuted in your mind into homogenization and intolerance. This seems exactly backwards to me. It's the conservatives who are intolerant of new options and want to enforce rigid stereotypes.
I want a diverse world with lots of options, lots of different types of people, and tolerance for those who are different. That's why I say, let people be whatever gender they like, and if they want to modify their brain or body in the process, go for it. I fail to see how increasing their freedom somehow limits my own.
mtraven:
Please feel free to call me Tabs.
I love diversity, too, and unlike some of the more conservative, who have trouble understanding God made the human brain work, I have no problem with sexual identity or preference.
My problem is from my own experience on campus, at work, and around my neighborhood. I hang out with a lot of Pagans of various stripes, for example (I'm Christian but most of my family is Pagan, go figure), and the heavy Christian-bashing I have encountered is usually not based on any kind of personal experience the bashers have, but on percieved harm. These guys aren't looking to broaden mindsets - they're looking to establish themselves as the new Status Quo.
Therein lies my problem with transhumanism. You have the "sane" folk who want to create a broader gene pool, for example, but that's not really what's going on. What's really happening is a turn-over. They want to become the new Status Quo, they want to be in the position of power, and you can say anything about how "noble" the ideals of transhumanism are, but really, they're very narrow. They don't like conservatives, no matter what our reasons for existing, they don't like Christians, and nevermind if we've had revelatory experiences or not, and they don't like not being free to do whatever they want without having to answer to someone.
The minute you put someone like that in enough power that they can threaten the mainstream, they try to take over the mainstream. It's not the peacable revolution you envision, mtraven. They're talking total turnover, and whenever that happens, start looking for the relocation camps and the ovens.
Tabs, see the comment I just made on the embryo-selling thread, which may be more apt here. I don't believe there is a turn-over, but if there is, so be it. If we have a system that truly respects individual decisions then it doesn't matter who is in charge.
And yes, I believe people ought to be "free to do whatever they want without having to answer to someone", up to the point where there is a clear (not hypothetical) infringement on the rights of others. Individual self-determination is a sacred principle of our system of government, and you folks seem to have a very unhealthy interest in controlling what other people do.
mtraven:
"...and you folks seem to have a very unhealthy interest in controlling what other people do."
I'm a Catholic, but there's one area of my life that's probably out-and-out Pagan, and it's this: in my life, I've seen it over and over again, everything you do you get back three-fold. This is where my concern is; every time we do something, it has an impact further down the road and it isn't always a good thing. If I have an urge to "control" what people do, it's based on this - what's like to cause the most amount of harm and how do I work to stop it?
That's it. That's what I'm thinking about. It's why I'm very pro-environment (up to the point where people start getting hurt), it's why I'm into conservation of forest land and animal sanctuaries, it's why I'm into target shooting and gun freedom, and it's why I'm into bioethics. Certain things that you lump me with, I don't agree with at all, and I'm totally with you on issues that we're not allowed to discuss, but I feel strongly about anything that has the potential for harm.
Although I have to admit my violent distaste for the term "meme" is highly irrational (and I wrote spiritualist Ken Wilbur a nasty email about his use of "green meme" before!).
But this isn't "The Land of Take What You Want" or "The Land of Do As You Please." Every action affects someone down the road, and eventually someone has to be held responsible for the problems that we create. And all human beings create problems; we're not gods, and we're not perfect. Something's got to give at some point. If we continue to develop along these lines it won't be long before someone does come to power who is in it for himself and we end up with another Hitler.
I don't care if culture changes - one thing I love is that the US has such *broad* culture diversity! - but when someone warps cultural values to his own ends (as happened in the US when slavery was allowed), evil things happen. That's the point I'm trying to make.
You said, "If we have a system that truly respects individual decisions then it doesn't matter who is in charge," and that's absolutely correct, but the problem is that's never going to happen. It's not in human nature.
I would rather everyone in science take one step back and take a long, hard look at both the potential value and potential harm of their works, and only proceed when the path of least harm becomes open. I don't mean stop advances, I mean look as hard as you can for any alternatives that are equal to what we have, and go with them.
It's like using hemp in place of oil or coal. Our government has an unfair biased against it because it can be smoked, but burning hemp can produce a goodly amount of energy, comparable to coal, and is a renewable resource. Instead of plunging ahead with plans to drill in Alaska, they should take a step back and look at all the viable alternatives.
That's just an example, but you see what I mean? Biotechnology has great potential for both good and harm, and people seem to be so caught up in the frenzy they're willing to risk quite a lot to make advances, and they almost violently oppose any alternatives to their own ideas.
There are so many dangers out there that not thinking things through can swamp us with. That's my biggest concern.
mtraven: Are civil rights laws "controlling what other people do?" Sure. Is there a good reason? Yes
Wesley: I'm not a libertarian, and in fact I've spent a lot of energy in the past arguing against libertarians in other contexts. I support civil rights laws. Society can constrain individual action where there is demonstrably great harm caused, as was the case with racial discrimination.
But people here are proposing to outlaw acts based on only the vaguest and most tenuous theories about what they think might happen as a consequence, or because they view a particular practice with distaste. That's not enough to justify government interference with individual freedom, in my book.
I just got back from the future, and it turns out that there is clear damage caused to the human condition from genetic engineering. Good thing I brought back the brain spectroptoscope to measure happiness now to compare to what it was in the future, and an gaiactical thermometer to measure exactly how healthy the ecosystem is now. And in the future, we figured out how to compare reality to alternate parallel realities. Turns out happiness is 11% worse after we allow genetic engineering, and the ecosystem suffers a whooping 28% health hit because of it. Satisfied?
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