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Tim Cavanaugh | June 30, 2006

Ronald Bailey looks at a Senate attempt to block human/animal chimeras and says No Spill Blood!

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|6.30.06 @ 5:30PM|#

Why do you expect Congress to have a better grasp of biology than they do economics?

|6.30.06 @ 5:37PM|#

Why does Ronald Bailey insist on using logic and science to combat emotional, pandering congressional positions?

|6.30.06 @ 5:38PM|#

In any political debate, no mention of chimaeras should exclude the chimaeric nature of limited government Republicans (and/or sane Democrats).

And in any debate regarding genetic manipulation, one must remember Khan Noonien Singh and the
Eugenics wars of the late twentieth century.

|6.30.06 @ 6:00PM|#

How will this affect the future of the Marvel / DC characters like Spiderman and Dolphin?

|6.30.06 @ 6:17PM|#

bubba has the Line Of The Year...

|6.30.06 @ 6:38PM|#

Why does the Senate hate chimeras?

|6.30.06 @ 6:53PM|#

"Still one can imagine that adding a substantial number of human neurons to fetal primates might end up producing a creature that could be regarded as a diminished human being."

Resulting in a creature with cognitive abilities not unlike that of your average senator.

|6.30.06 @ 6:56PM|#

NoStar, it's because the damn things are so deadly. One of the few magical beasts in J.K. Rowling's beastiary to be feared by everyone in wizardkind (so we Muggles should certainly fear them).

Garth|6.30.06 @ 8:00PM|#

We in the lycanthrope community are up in arms about this.

|6.30.06 @ 9:29PM|#

Already, Stanford University researcher Irving Weissman has injected human neurons into mouse fetuses producing mice with brains composed of 1 percent human neurons. Weissman next wants to create a strain of mice with brains made almost entirely of human neurons.

I take it that he's forgotten what happened with the rats of NIMH.

|6.30.06 @ 10:47PM|#

I'd like to know the name of the painting used on the home page next to the article.

Oh, and yeah, I agree with Ron.

|6.30.06 @ 10:51PM|#

|7.1.06 @ 12:29AM|#

|7.1.06 @ 12:30AM|#

This is the stuff of recent Dean Koontz novels.

|7.1.06 @ 5:23AM|#

"Would you really want to see such a thing?"

Sure, why not? People have been doing all sorts of freaky body modification for centuries.

But honestly, I think the real entertainment value is to be had in watching the reaction of uptight stiffs who would rail against that sort of thing.

|7.1.06 @ 6:47AM|#

Mephesto: "It's thanks to the wonders of genetic engineering that soon there will be an end to hunger, disease, pollution, even war. I have created things that will change the world for the better. For instance, here is a monkey with four asses."

Sen. Brownback (R-Kansas): "Those better not be human asses! Because that would be banned by the Human Chimera Prohibition Act, and could be punishable by a fine of $1 million or ten years in prison or both."

Mephesto: "Sir, if making mutant animals spliced with humans is crazy? then? uhhhhh? hmmm?oh, nevermind. I'm afraid there's been a bit of an incident at the ranch."

|7.1.06 @ 7:12AM|#

And what does this bode for my kind?

|7.1.06 @ 9:02AM|#

I support well over 90 percent of libertarian positions. And I support research that could help people with various diseases or syndromes. Yet, theoretically at least, I do wonder if the line should be drawn some where. Really, do we want chimeras, that would be diminished human beings? Or beings that would give human beings dangerous insect or savage mammalian features? Does such a scenario not give more libertarians pause?

My guess is that very few people out there are going to support research into Frankenstein like creations. Possibly a weak point in the libertarian platform?

|7.1.06 @ 9:38AM|#

Frankenstein was not a chimera, he was 100% human.

I would want my kid to have a dinosaur penis. That would make sure he got all the girls he wanted. I mean, really, who wouldn't do a guy with a dinosaur penis? No-one. That's the point.

Man, it would be cool to have a dinosaur penis.

|7.1.06 @ 10:11AM|#

I didn't literally mean, "the Frankenstein" of the Mary Shelly novel. I meant man made creatures, tailored to our specifications - like a chimera of some sort. Made just for entertainment, not for research purposes for curing cancer or something like parkinson's. But the creation of a diminished human being - another mammal but with human neurons, for any purpose, strikes me as a scary scenario.

|7.1.06 @ 10:57AM|#

I have to admit, the far reaches of genetic experimentation does give me pause. But a little of that is admittedly just my own prejudices at work. Next thing you know, chimeras will be moving in next door, taking our jobs, drinking our water, having all those chimeric babies, speaking chimerian, etc.

Larry A|7.1.06 @ 11:26AM|#

So once again we have Representatives and Senators banning something we can't do yet to solve problems we've only speculated about in SciFi stories.

Too bad we can't get Congress interested in the many SciFi novels about the dangers of overregulated nanny-states, and encourage action to solve that problem.

|7.1.06 @ 12:09PM|#

The failure of many libertarians to take the boundaries of their positions seriously (should private citizens be allowed to own nuclear weapons, raise private armies, or one day in the future create man/beast monstrosities?) is one of the reasons libertarians are not taken seriously by the mainstream, and continue to just keep collecting less than 1 percent of the vote in elections.

|7.1.06 @ 12:33PM|#

Deucalion,
Well, it looks like you won't be winning any Prometheus awards.

|7.1.06 @ 12:57PM|#

There's a distinct difference between allowing for scientific research for the purpose of curing diseases and science for the purpose to make war on human nature itself, just as there's a distinct difference between the right to defend oneself with a handgun and the right to own a nuclear weapon.

When a difference in degree reaches a significant point it becomes a difference in kind.

|7.1.06 @ 1:36PM|#

Get real people; throw off the libertarian blinders , and imagine seeing down the street: a human being with horns and fangs; a creature as smart as a average human being but crawlng on all fours; a human/insect hybrid. Would you really want to see such a thing?

That sounds fuckin' sweet!

Yet, theoretically at least, I do wonder if the line should be drawn some where.

No... you don't wonder if the line should be drawn somewhere. The line will ALWAYS be drawn. What you want is the government to draw the line based on the reactionary and hysterical fears of an easily frightened public... instead of voluntary moral and ethical standards of the scientists involved.

The failure of many libertarians to take the boundaries of their positions seriously (should private citizens be allowed to own nuclear weapons, raise private armies, or one day in the future create man/beast monstrosities?) is one of the reasons libertarians are not taken seriously by the mainstream, and continue to just keep collecting less than 1 percent of the vote in elections.

Gee, and I thought it was because elections are gerimandered into zones where one of the two major parties are garanteed control, the members of the two parties control all the voting process, the members of the two parties have a vast government funded propoganda machine programing children from the age of 5, the the two parties have total control of all political advertisments and public political discourse through the FCC and campaign finance reform laws, and in many places non-democrat and republican parties are essentially banned outright.

Yet despite the Soviet style political system, the vast majority say they would not vote Democrat or Republican if they thought the other guy would actually have a chance of winning.

The fact that Libertarians are able to get 1 or 2 percent of the vote is, in fact, a miracle.

|7.1.06 @ 3:40PM|#

"What you want is the government to draw the line based on the reactionary and hysterical fears of an easily frightened public... instead of voluntary moral and ethical standards of the scientists involved."

Nice straw man. No, I think law should be based on basic human rights, mostly negative rights to protect us against aggression, fraud, nuisances, and externalities that infringe upon our own rights to liberty.

My sense is that the scientific work being done now in genetics is done morally and ethically. But what I'm saying is that there could be potential work that could actually raise ethical concerns, to threaten our liberty or the liberty or sense of dignity of future beings. The creation of diminished human beings, perhaps one with greatly enhanced and dangerous physical abilities but lacking the mental or moral apparatus to control themselves, could be one such threat to liberty and to the dignity of the creation itself. Even if we are decades from such possibilities, the fact that it is a possibility should at least raise a concern - just as someone else pointed out that just because you have a right to protect yourself with a handgun, should that extend to having the right to own a nuclear weapon. Does that count as the right to 'bear arms'?

And P.S. Scientists, just like anyone else, can be used for political purposes or have hidden agendas, just witness the global warming debate.

|7.1.06 @ 3:43PM|#

Frankenstein was not a chimera, he was 100% human.

Yes, Frankenstein was the doctor's name. Mary Shelly did not offer a name for the doctor's creation.

According the movie, the chimera do get names in "The Island of Dr. Moreau". I haven't read H.G. Wells' novel to confirm this, but it has just jumped to the top of my reading list.

|7.1.06 @ 3:51PM|#

There are differences bewteen 1. using science to cure diseases; 2. a person volutnarily using technology to modify one's body, and 3. creating weird human/beast hybrids. I have no problem with the first two. As to the third option, and to those who wouldn't mind it, you are just posturing.

|7.1.06 @ 4:10PM|#

Is it always the fate of scientists to be crucified by know-nothing idiots who have a religious zealotry that precludes progress for generations because of their abject stupidity? This country should be in the forefront of genetic research to improve the human condition, not cowering at the feet of radical right religious phonies who don't know or understand science but feel qualified to tell real researchers what they can and can't research. What this country needs is a law that defines if a politician doesn't know anything about a subject he/she can't bitch about it or vote on it. Otherwise we will watch the research going on overseas and our lives will be marginalized in the future.

|7.1.06 @ 4:35PM|#

For a website supposedly devoted to 'reason' I find it curious that there is an extreme lack therof in some of these posts.
Bones attacks a strawman. For one thing, I am not a religous zealot. For another thing, the view that techonlogy may have some bad consequences can be attacked based on argument, but calling such people ignorant know-nothings is an illegitamate form of argument. Some people around here ought to....reason better.

|7.1.06 @ 4:42PM|#

3. creating weird human/beast hybrids.

I think ron would be sending Mr. Ed to glue factory toot sweet.

|7.1.06 @ 5:02PM|#

I really like the idea of a right to "bear arms".

As for a diminished "human" with no moral sense and natural weaponry... sort of like, a tiger? We know how to handle tigers.

Anyway, it seems to me that there *are* potential dangers of genetic engineering technology, but are there such terrible consequences for waiting until we see the reality of it before we write restrictive laws? If some monster is actually created, how destructive could it be? So, aside from folks who object on religious grounds, shouldn't we all agree that legislation on this sort of thing is premature?

|7.1.06 @ 5:04PM|#

Ron, I think everyone would agree with you that humans shouldn't be involutarily turned into retarded half-animals (I only think the idea is cool if chimeras have 100% human intellect). But I think the liklihood of that is smaller than that of a nuclear powered spacecraft exploding and falling to earth during takeoff.

I think the overall libertarian position is that just because some people will misuse a power doesn't necessarily mean that no one should be allowed to have that power.

|7.1.06 @ 5:44PM|#

Mary Shelly did not offer a name for the doctor's creation.

And the creation was also not a chimera, it was all-human. Analogous to a transpalnt recipient, I think.

|7.1.06 @ 6:28PM|#

Sy,

I think it's kinda interesting (and off-topic)that Mary Shelly did not name the 'monster'. Everyone names his dog. Some people name their cars, airplanes, boats, and genitals. Give a child the ugliest stuffed animal you can find and he/she will have a name for it within 10 minutes. What's up with not giving the monster a name ?

Darned, I can't remember who. Part of a popular comedian's routine was to make fun of the song "A Horse with no Name" by the group America. Something like this: 'If you've been riding through the dessert on the back of horse with no name for three days and nothing else to do, you might want to name the horse.'

|7.1.06 @ 6:53PM|#

JK,

I think there were two reasons the monster wasn't named... with no name, you can call it "the monster" and that sounds scarier than, say, "Mike".

But I like to think it was more important as part of the theme that "the monster" was actually a *good* person, but turned to evil because he was abandoned and alienated. Dr. Frankenstein ditched the monster as soon as he made it, and the only point it was accepted as a person by anyone was a brief period with a blind man, who immediately rejected the monster as soon as he knew what it was. If the Dr. had given the monster a name and accepted it as a person, the monster would have been a hero rather than a villain.

|7.1.06 @ 7:00PM|#

Yes, Frankenstein was the doctor's name. Mary Shelly did not offer a name for the doctor's creation.

I thought his name was Adam. Perhaps that was just in the movie.

Anyway, everyone seems caught up on human animal hybrid fantasis. The real uses of chimeras are a lot further from this - using human genes to make animal organs more compatible with human transplantation, for example, or raising human cells in tissue culture with other cells. These are "real" chimeras. English-speaking crocodiles are just a nonsense fantasy that shouldn't be taken seriously for another thousand years or so.

Larry A|7.1.06 @ 7:01PM|#

'If you've been riding through the dessert on the back of horse with no name for three days and nothing else to do, you might want to name the horse.'

Depends. If you're in the desert there's the rule, "Don't name your food." OTOH it would be okay if you're riding through dessert. ;-)

The SF story I keep remembering is the one where all food in the society is created in vitro. One variety turns out to be immensely more popular than the others. But it has to be recalled when researchers discover they've accidentally created the laboratory equivalent of human flesh.

|7.2.06 @ 12:33AM|#

Because someone could misuse power shouldn't mean that no one should be allowed to have that power? That makes sense as a general rule of thumb but should it be applied axiomatically? This line of thinking makes more sense to me: because someone could abuse the right to bear arms doesn't mean that no one should have the right to protect himself. However, it doesn't mean that the right to bear arms extends out to cover any sort of weapon at all: your right to protect your house and family with a gun against an attack does not necessarily extend to allowing you to own a nuclear weapon, which could threaten all of our lives and liberty. Similarly, for genetic engineering, its power to do enormous good as well as potential harm should suggest that at least in theory the right to do any sort of experiment at all, should be weighed against what it suggests for human beings' rights to life, liberty and dignity.

|7.2.06 @ 3:09AM|#

Yes, I think Smith clarifies some of my thinking about some of these issues. It goes further than the specific science of genetic engineering to the deeper philosophic question of the tension between such a robust interpretation of individual rights, where the most triumphalist and fundamentalist view does not consider that adoption of such rights, axiomatically and in the extreme, regardless of issues of externalities or occasionally blurred boundaries between individuals and their property, could actually lead to a less free and more dangerous society.

|7.2.06 @ 2:40PM|#

|7.4.06 @ 3:26AM|#

Wasn't someone awhile back suggesting experimenting on human libertarians and democrats to form a new species? Something like, "homo libertarius democritus erectus." Now, that would make for an interesting, though possibly dangerous, chimera. But add bat sonar to it and I'd pay for the operation myself.

|7.4.06 @ 6:35PM|#

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