The US House of Representatives is wading into the debate over whether human embryos should be modified to introduce heritable changes. Its fiscal year 2016 spending bill for the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) would prohibit the agency from spending money to evaluate research or clinical applications for such products.
In an unusual twist, the bill—introduced on June 17—would also direct the FDA to create a committee that includes religious experts to review a forthcoming report from the US Institute of Medicine (IOM). The IOM's analysis, which considers the ethics of creating embryos that have three genetic parents, was commissioned by the FDA.
The House legislation comes during a time of intense debate on such matters, sparked by the announcement in April that researchers in China had edited the genomes of human embryos. The US National Institutes of Health (NIH) moved quickly to remind the public that a 1996 law prevents the federal government from funding work that destroys human embryos or creates them for research purposes.
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/u-s-congress-moves-to-block-human-embryo-editing/
[Source]: http://www.nature.com/news/us-congress-moves-to-block-human-embryo-editing-1.17858
We covered a related story, Three-Person Babies Could Be Possible in Two Years just over a year ago.
Original Submission
Related Stories
It could soon be possible to create a baby from three people, if it is made legal.
The technique, using eggs from two women and one man's sperm, would be used to prevent deadly mitochondrial diseases. The UK fertility regulator said there was no evidence that it would be unsafe, but called for extra checks. Changes to fertility regulations are being considered by government.
The illnesses are caused by damage to the tiny power stations in every cell of the body called mitochondria. One in every 6,500 babies are born with severe mitochondrial disease which means they have insufficient energy to function it leads to muscle weakness, blindness, heart failure and even death.
The National Institutes of Health (NIH) is planning to lift its moratorium on chimeric embryo research:
The National Institutes of Health is proposing a new policy to permit scientists to get federal money to make embryos, known as chimeras, under certain carefully monitored conditions. The NIH imposed a moratorium on funding these experiments in September because they could raise ethical concerns.
[...] [Scientists] hope to use the embryos to create animal models of human diseases, which could lead to new ways to prevent and treat illnesses. Researchers also hope to produce sheep, pigs and cows with human hearts, kidneys, livers, pancreases and possibly other organs that could be used for transplants.
To address the ethical concerns, the NIH's new policy imposes several restrictions. The policy prohibits the introduction of any human cells into embryos of nonhuman primates, such as monkeys and chimps, at their early stages of development. Previously, the NIH wouldn't allow such experiments that involved human stem cells but it didn't address the use of other types of human cells that scientists have created. In addition, the old rules didn't bar adding the cells very early in embryonic development. The extra protections are being added because these animals are so closely related to humans. But the policy would lift the moratorium on funding experiments involving other species. Because of the ethical concerns, though, at least some of the experiments would go through an extra layer of review by a new, special committee of government officials.
You can submit a response to the proposal here up until the end of the day on September 4.
Related: NIH Won't Fund Human Germline Modification
U.S. Congress Moves to Block Human Embryo Editing
China's Bold Push into Genetically Customized Animals
Human-Animal Chimeras are Gestating on U.S. Research Farms
(Score: 2, Disagree) by TheLink on Tuesday June 30 2015, @03:16PM
Resources in this world are limited. I'd personally think we should work on stuff like the "space colony" tech tree while we still have fossil fuels. But there are others - renewable energy.
Rather than be foolish, work on this "tech tree" (and similar - human-animal hybrids, maybe even very strong AI) and end up forcing ourselves to deal with the question "what/who" is human and what can we do to humans, hybrids, post-humans, "homo superior" at a level that most of society is clearly not ready for yet. We already have difficulty deciding what rights and responsibilities humans should have. And we're already not treating other animals that well.
There are other ways to cure diseases and treat people, we don't have to go down this path yet.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by ikanreed on Tuesday June 30 2015, @03:36PM
No, and we didn't have to fly before we developed nuclear power.
That doesn't mean people should've been shouting at the Wright brothers to stop their research.
(Score: 1, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 30 2015, @03:58PM
Flying didn't raise any ethical questions, did it?
(Score: 2) by ikanreed on Tuesday June 30 2015, @04:07PM
Maybe not flight, but certainly nuclear power.
Or chemotherapy.
So did the Internet.
The number of technologies that idiots would ban because of imagined problems is huge.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by kurenai.tsubasa on Tuesday June 30 2015, @04:24PM
Humanity as it is today can barely handle nuclear power, and the internet is sufficiently advanced technology which is indistinguishable from magic.
I don't think we're ready for designer babies. My main concerns are economical. The wealthy elite Masters of the Universe already have enough tools to vacuum up the economy and crown themselves as new kings and queens. Let's go through a few more feudal ages until we understand that concentrating power in the hands of the few is not a good idea. Then we can have designer babies.
That and KAAAAAAAHN!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 30 2015, @04:32PM
So no one can have nice things unless everyone can have nice things?
If we followed that approach we'd never have advanced out of the stone age.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by kurenai.tsubasa on Tuesday June 30 2015, @04:51PM
Not entirely. It's about a level of perhaps cultural evolution to understand the ethical implications of doing something, and I think that would involve a longer history showing empires rising and falling and perhaps a political evolution to a more equitable system. Don't get me wrong; the poor will always be with us, and while capitalism is horrible, everything else we've come up with is worse.
Well, maybe that is what I'm saying. Let me propose a litmus test for when a civilization is ready. Get to post-scarcity without destroying yourself, and you may have designer babies.
(I might be flying off the handle if this is just mitochondrial DNA that's involved; if that's the case feel free to mod down.)
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 30 2015, @05:01PM
> post-scarcity
Scarcity is relative. And the more we advance as a society, the higher that bar is set.
(Score: 2) by morgauxo on Tuesday June 30 2015, @07:23PM
Are you for real? Do you really think that doing the same things over and over will eventually teach people to do better?
Or is this just a troll?
(Score: 2) by takyon on Tuesday June 30 2015, @08:01PM
Barely handle nuclear power and the Internet? Seems to be working just fine to me.
http://nextbigfuture.com/2015/06/carnival-of-nuclear-energy-267.html [nextbigfuture.com]
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by kurenai.tsubasa on Tuesday June 30 2015, @10:57PM
My apologies. I should have expanded on that statement.
My concern wrt nuclear technology is NIMBYs. I'm not an expert, but it sounds like we've got a lot of old power plants, and while, sure, they don't explode like in SimCity after 50 years, we've pretty much put the brakes on research into designs that would be inherently safe (nothing's 100%). Then there's cost-cutting and other things that make existing designs less safe than they should be. Maybe China will lead the way.
Personally, I'm all for nuclear power. It's a proven technology, and it sounds like there are proposed reactor designs that can even deal with nuclear waste from existing designs. That sounds to me like a win-win. However, superstition seems to be winning.
As for the internet, sure, it works just fine from here in full IPv6 glory. Most of us on this site understand that when we load a webpage, the device in front of us has to communicate with another device somewhere else.
I work with people who literally cannot understand that sometimes that other device is down or misconfigured, and there's little we can do about it. Likewise maybe it's just down for us, but for reasons beyond our control (had some truly bizarre DNS issues just last week that made it look like the problem was on our end but only for that website, but then other companies that accessed that website were reporting problems with it as well) is inaccessible. Then sometimes the whole internet is inaccessible. It's simply impossible to get some people to understand that there are simple ways to determine whether being unable to reach a website means OMG INTERNET DOWN or hmm, that's odd, let's send a ticket over to the help desk. Even if you give them a checklist that says what to do.
So ok, maybe that's just arrogance on my part. End users will be end users. I'm one of the lucky ones, and they pay me by the hour (wouldn't have it any other way unless I were buying high-end sports cars with cash).
What really kills me is when that manifests itself in the form of customers angrily demanding to know why we're not able to query their websites for certain information or especially why we can't get data out of or into $amazing_bling_web_20_service they're spending thousands of dollars a month on but forgot to ask about web interfaces for 3rd parties.
There was one customer I went back and forth with, including talking to the CEO of their $amazing_bling_web_20_service, for years. The service vendor wanted us to partner with them, but my boss' boss said no to that (might have been a good opportunity, but who knows). So we kept going for years. They'd ask, “What do you need to get the information yet and why aren't you already?” I'd say, “Ask $amazing_bling_web_20_service for a web service interface, and I'll get you a quote the next day.” Eventually I did get the API I needed, which had apparently been available since day 1, just not available to me. Three hours later we were getting the information. Go figure.
Many more war stories where that came from about integration projects needlessly delayed by business-types who would not understand that just because it's in the cloud doesn't mean I can magically wave a wand and get access to it.
Another important point is all of the unintended consequences of the terabytes of personal information being hoovered up by sites like Facebook. Doxxing, revenge porn, SWATing, etc, etc. Then there's ransomware and other crapware. Then there's social engineering and the PHB that needs way too much access over an under-secured channel. That's not even to mention the petabytes collected by TLAs leading to parallel construction and other nasty things.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Anne Nonymous on Tuesday June 30 2015, @04:28PM
If God had meant for Man to fly he would have given us wings.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Thexalon on Tuesday June 30 2015, @04:51PM
Sure it did: When a plane crashes on top of a completely innocent person who had no opportunity to make any choices regarding what was directly over his head, is that a fair cost to pay for the advantages of flying?
The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.
(Score: 2) by frojack on Tuesday June 30 2015, @07:11PM
Probably it is a fair cost to pay.
Otherwise the lawyers would have drained the bank accounts of airlines, aircraft manufacturers, and the FAA.
People are not scarce. If we lose a few along the way, some other people cry, life goes on.
Is the occasional lightning strike to the head a fair cost to pay for having both Rain AND Golf?
Nobody saw any of these ethical questions, of if they did, they dismissed them out of hand.
Airplanes crashing are naturally avoided, not due to risk of unfortunate people on the ground, but rather due to fear of death of pilots and passengers. Solving that crashing problem, to a degree of certainty sufficient to get people to board the aircraft pretty much solved all other objections.
Rain Gulf, on the other hand went through no more stringent analysis than: "Woot mon, ye silly bastard, you'll catch your death of cold if ye doo na come in ooout of the rain and ave a toddy with us sensible folk!"
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 30 2015, @05:01PM
The Heavens are God's domain, humans should not be trying to imitate God by stepping into His domain!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 30 2015, @03:46PM
will the government ban and arrest amateur biology lab users?
(Score: 2) by scruffybeard on Tuesday June 30 2015, @04:07PM
This is just a restriction on federal funding. The lab setup in your mom's basement is free to explore any kind of research you want.
(Score: 4, Funny) by DECbot on Tuesday June 30 2015, @04:49PM
Oh, I've got my experiments all ready to go. I'm just having troubles finding a date ^h^h^h^h^h willing test subject.
cats~$ sudo chown -R us /home/base
(Score: 2) by kaszz on Tuesday June 30 2015, @07:14PM
Grow a date. Then enjoy the farce like the one depicted in Repli-Kate [wikipedia.org] from 2002.
(Score: 2) by takyon on Tuesday June 30 2015, @08:13PM
Try the cemetery or the morgue. Sometimes they aren't even dead.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 3, Interesting) by morgauxo on Tuesday June 30 2015, @06:35PM
"till society is ready to deal with the consequences"
Human society evolves just like everything else... out of necessity. Any form of science and technology that you want to say "we aren't ready for"... we aren't going to wake up one day 100 years from now suddenly ready to address these issues and make all the right choices. We could wait until the heat death of the universe and it would never happen. It doesn't work that way. With no pressure we don't get any better.
Instead we will stumble around, do some things right, make some mistakes and learn as we go once somebody forces the issue by doing the procedure. If the US government (and likely many of it's citizens) don't want it to happen here then it will happen elsewhere. Or.. it will happen in secret. Eventually, humanity will be forced to deal with the repercussions and that is how we will grow. The question is really one of how many generations must suffer in the mean-time.
"There are other ways to cure diseases and treat people"
Sure.. some people. It depends on what their issue is. Some could live fulfilling lives given a simple drug. Some could not. Others might be treatable but only with expensive drugs or with bad side effects. Why should we keep passing this burden to future generations?
(Score: 2) by TheLink on Sunday July 12 2015, @07:04PM
Instead we will stumble around, do some things right, make some mistakes and learn as we go once somebody forces the issue by doing the procedure.
At a certain level of tech, stumbling around could prove fatal. For example if we start developing more and more tech that could easily be used by very few people to kill huge amounts of people. So before we do that society needs to evolve and grow-up till it stops stumbling around.
It doesn't work that way. With no pressure we don't get any better.
Hence my post - I'm trying to apply some pressure so that we get better and stop stumbling around so much. Not like anyone listens to me, but at least I can say I've tried.
If we can't get to that stage then we would remain forever like retarded children instead of grown-ups who can make more and more decisions without having to make the stupid mistakes first.
Why should we keep passing this burden to future generations?
We don't have to. The same tech that tells people that their embryos might need editing is the same tech that can tell the affected people to not reproduce in the first place or to reproduce using someone else's DNA.
And the same laws, ethics and morality that say its fine to abort embryos for whatever reason are the same laws, ethics and morality that can be used to let parents abort those that have the defect. See above paragraph if you're against abortion.
With 7 billion people already on this overloaded planet, don't tell me that the world really needs children with their faulty DNA so much. So why not just get the whole egg/sperm from someone else instead? If your DNA is crap please accept that it is crap and move on. If it makes you feel better, pretend that the donated DNA is like your DNA but edited to not have any of your flaws at all ( I seem to recall some humor video where some girl was cheating with a doctor and telling her significant other that the resulting kid won't be bald or stupid like him, etc etc). It seems very popular to say that everyone's DNA is so similar, blacks are no different from whites etc, so what's the big deal of using someone else's DNA completely? ;)
The odds that their never conceived children would actually be that wonderful for the World are similar to some dead starved/diseased kid in Africa being that wonderful too. So I'm not going to weep many tears for them.
(Score: 3, Touché) by nitehawk214 on Tuesday June 30 2015, @07:37PM
This isn't Civilization, we can research multiple technologies at the same time.
"Don't you ever miss the days when you used to be nostalgic?" -Loiosh
(Score: 4, Insightful) by ikanreed on Tuesday June 30 2015, @03:30PM
Roping off an entire branch medical science as what man is not meant to know is exactly the sort of playing god that they seek to stop.
They're going to be killing people for the sake of imagined science fiction plots, while medical ethics already forbids unnecessary surgery and treatment. That leaves this law only one target: people with treatable genetic disorders.
And I'm not gonna feign ignorance and pretend this is bipartisan fuckery either.
(Score: 1) by deathlyslow on Tuesday June 30 2015, @03:58PM
How does it target only people with treatable disorders? If you are meaning creating them to then harvest the stem cells I can sort of understand it, but if you aren't I don't see the connection beyond tweaking an embryo so the then person never the get the disease in the first place. The last I checked the test's aren't 100% on if you will get the disease but more of you have a higher probability to get it.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by ikanreed on Tuesday June 30 2015, @04:10PM
In this particular case, we're talking about maternal inherited mitochondrial disorders.
These diseases are 95% or more heritable. And they're treatable by just using a different host egg for the genetic information from the mother and father. No more complicated than standard in vitro fertilization, really.
I dare you to tell one patient suffering from one of these diseases that your moral system demands others suffer like them [wikipedia.org]
(Score: 1, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 30 2015, @05:06PM
It is God's will that you suffer. God made you that way, therefore it is His will and you must suffer, for that is God's Plan™ for you. Similarly, it was God's will that you be raped, and since you were raped you MUST carry the child to term and spend the next 18+ years raising it, for it is God's will, else you would not have been raped and impregnated.
(Score: 1) by deathlyslow on Tuesday June 30 2015, @06:21PM
If that last link was directed at me and I offended you sorry, I thought I was asking out of ignorance not malice. That's why I listed the things that I could see and asked for you/someone else to fill me in on those I couldn't. Damn it Jim, I'm an IT manager not a doctor... - it's a joke get it... I'm a doctor not a (insert profession here) kind of funny. :)
(Score: 3, Interesting) by ikanreed on Tuesday June 30 2015, @06:41PM
I read your tone as harsher than it was. I think my point is still relevant to the larger discussion, but it didn't need to be so pointed in the conversation we were having.
An apology is due. Sorry.
(Score: 1) by deathlyslow on Tuesday June 30 2015, @11:12PM
No problem. There's no inflection on typed words. I appreciate the apology though. It never hurts to be civil to each other. I appreciate the link to. I always enjoy learning things. I'm actually an odd ball in that I have Ehlers-Danlos and can see some of the benefits of adjusting for if not outright removing it from the genepool. My poor sister has it much worse than I do in that it affects her heart as well as her connective tissue. Mine only really affects my skin and joints. I've already had both knees done twice both shoulders done once each and about ready to get them done again. I bruise easily as it is. I actually have low pressure glaucoma due to it and have minir optic nerve damage as well.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 30 2015, @10:10PM
And yet they could also just adopt, rather than having kids when they know the kids will inherit problems like that.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by kurenai.tsubasa on Tuesday June 30 2015, @04:27PM
medical ethics already forbids unnecessary surgery and treatment
Circumcising infants because of the fear of sexually transmitted diseases. We can't even wait until they're 5 or 10 or just leave it be as a decision between a man and his partner.
(Score: 2) by ikanreed on Tuesday June 30 2015, @04:34PM
Let's not get into the whole "religious bullshit tends to give exemptions to good ethical practices" and "preventative care is care" squabbles.
Instead, let's say you're approximately right, but also focusing on an extreme red herring.
We can also talk about adult voluntary surgeries, like plastic surgery, because that comes closer to home. But those two adjectives(i.e. adult and voluntary) I've included reflect an important attribute of those technologies.
(Score: 2) by kurenai.tsubasa on Tuesday June 30 2015, @06:24PM
I can see using viable mitochondrial DNA instead of diseased DNA in the 3 parent child approach. Anything more than that gets creepy, and I wasn't confident that TFA or the Chinese research referenced was limited to that.
I think “cosmetic” genetics will be tempting. A guy I know once told me that his parents tried to get their doctor to prescribe him testosterone HRT to make him taller. The doctor was able to talk them out of it.
Now imagine we find a way to guarantee a male child will grow to at least 6'6". We all know that tall is an important skill for a leader, so those parents would have opted for cosmetic genetics if it were available. Now let's say as a child, he dreams of being an air force fighter pilot. I picked 6'6" because that's one inch taller than allowed [afrotc.com]. The example is a bit contrived, but that kid's gonna be ticked at his parents when he finds out why he's too tall to be a fighter pilot.
That's not even talking to the cosmetic arms race that will happen among those who can afford cosmetic genetics. Cosmetic here also including other factors such as intro- or extroversion, intelligence, etc.
All though that leads to another interesting scenario. Say enough people chase that kind of vanity and they find themselves with very little biodiversity. All it would take is the right virus to wipe them out. Another scenario is the fate of Stargate's Asgard [wikia.com] race. It would be funny and ironic as hell if the Masters of the Universe one day just started dying out from having cloned themselves one too many times, but otherwise somewhat far-fetched imo.
Likelier is that cosmetic genetics would be subtler, but it would still give the children of the wealthy elite yet another unfair advantage. I'm guessing that it will not be cheap or covered by insurance.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 30 2015, @05:14PM
Since when does circumcision have to do with STDs? We have better hygene and medical treatments today, but historically problems like phimosis [wikipedia.org], balanoposthitis [wikipedia.org], and others were best treated with preventative measures like circumcision. I've never heard of circumcision provably leading to lower rates of STD infections.
(Score: 1) by kurenai.tsubasa on Tuesday June 30 2015, @05:48PM
Not to go too far off topic, but provably is the key word there. I think the AAP is using “new math” or something, but here you go [aappublications.org].
(no karma bonus checked)
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 30 2015, @07:36PM
And even if it did, violating someone's fundamental bodily rights would be unethical. The ends don't justify the means.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 30 2015, @07:39PM
while medical ethics already forbids unnecessary surgery and treatment
I have a hard time trusting that:
http://www.surgery.org/sites/default/files/2014-18yearcomparison.pdf [surgery.org]
Too lazy didn't click summary:
In the past 18 years, the number of cosmetic procedures for men has increased more than 273%
and the number of cosmetic procedures for women has increased more than 429%.
(Score: 2) by kurenai.tsubasa on Tuesday June 30 2015, @08:59PM
Ah, but that's necessary from the point of view of the patient.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 30 2015, @03:56PM
i guess "the race is one" to find the best mitochondrial DNA and then off to that james bond island clinic in cuba.
i also hope that the naked motherly DNA that is being transferred into the mitochondria-healthy dna-less egg isn't pre-programmed to make the same mistakes again .. thus again leading "somehow" to damaged mitochondria a few generations down the line.
if the mitochondria damaging effect is actually located in the transferred DNA then the family should really take out a "multi-generation" service agreement, you know, for future damaged mitochondria that will/might crop up later on?
(Score: 2) by ikanreed on Tuesday June 30 2015, @04:01PM
The thing you're describing are called "mutations".
And they're mostly random. And frequently fatal before even one cellular division. Getting the exact same (survivable until birth) mitochondrial mutations that you replaced would be a one in 1.5698423615949392083076736687661e+9994 shot.
i.e. not going to happen. This kind of treatment being widely applied would totally eradicate these diseases within a few generations. And they wouldn't be back for thousands upon thousands of generations of the entire human population of earth.
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 30 2015, @04:20PM
Are you really sure about that last 1 in the mantissa?
(Score: 2) by ikanreed on Tuesday June 30 2015, @04:29PM
It's the 4^x where x is the number of base pairs(16,600) in the mitochondrial genome.
Now, you can spot that that number actually cuts off at 3 sig-figs.
Buuuuuuuuuuuuut. The bigger problem is the e+9994, actually. Because a lot of these mutations actually involve multiple changed base pairs. I could see it being even less likely.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 30 2015, @05:23PM
That's the whole point. That many-digit monster surely looks impressive, but it is completely meaningless to provide all those digits.
Not that your number gives even a rough approximation of the probability anyway (it would if the mutation would generate a completely random new genetic sequence from scratch; that's quite obviously not what happens).
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 30 2015, @05:45PM
With 7+ billion people infesting this over-burdened planet it might be a good time to focus on quality instead of quantity and having babies just because you can. And no it's very unlikely that your genes are that wonderful to keep around (especially with those flaws already present). Even if they were great, as I said there are 7 billion others, I'm sure we'd eventually have one about as good but without your flaws.
p.s. in case you ask, no I do not intend to have kids. The world is fucked up enough as it is, no need to have more assholes like me.
(Score: 2) by ikanreed on Tuesday June 30 2015, @06:05PM
Yes, yes, the "let the anonymous idiot on the internet select who can breed" solution to the overpopulation problem.
I choose you instead.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by kanweg on Tuesday June 30 2015, @04:03PM
"In an unusual twist, the bill—introduced on June 17—would also direct the FDA to create a committee that includes religious experts"
How is religious expert defined?
1) a religious person, or
2) someone who recognizes that there are many religions, that they can't be all true, that thus at most one of them is not made up by man, and that all religions are not only unsubstantiated but also contain verifiably wrong statements and are thus not suggestive of any higher power being involved. So, someone who recognized that religion should have no bearing on such a discussion.
If religious people want their off-spring unedited, that is their right, I guess.
However, I don't want religious people to decide this issue for other people/people of more permissive religions. No harm is intended to the person involved and society as a whole when we try to fix hereditary diseases.
Yes, scientists may get it wrong a couple of times before they get it right. Not unlike a phase I trial of a promising drug. They probably can know the answer after just a couple of cell divisions. And there will be lots of experiments with various mammals to see how it works out before this is tried on humans.
Bert
(Score: 2) by kaszz on Tuesday June 30 2015, @04:28PM
Defined as a representatives for large religious groups that can make a lot of people vote like they tell them too .. :P
(unless they get a nice donation..)
(Score: 2) by physicsmajor on Tuesday June 30 2015, @04:35PM
Separation of Church and State essentially means any such legislation would (should...) immediately be voided by the courts. Specifically requiring religious insight on a Federal committee is blatantly out of line.
(Score: 4, Informative) by ikanreed on Tuesday June 30 2015, @04:43PM
Our courts have actually been pretty forgiving of this class of infringement, much as I feel like it specifically sets out atheist views as worthless.
The most recent case I can recall is the "faith based initiatives" of the Bush administration, where federal money for housing and urban development was re-channeled in a "non denominational" way to help people in need. How that actually turned out was tons of money was wasted on combining evangelism with that charity. And in at least one case, a bush-aligned pastor got over $1 million personally, with little oversight to where it went.
It wasn't until 2 years later that an appeals court made the obvious decision and shut the program down.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 30 2015, @05:25PM
There's a homeless shelter in my area that gets government funding that forces people to go to a Christian Church as a mandatory condition of staying there. If that doesn't say "violation of rights" I don't know what does. This budding Christian theocracy overthrowing our constitutional form of government needs to be squashed as quickly as possible.
(Score: 2) by kurenai.tsubasa on Tuesday June 30 2015, @07:11PM
The “budding Christian theocracy” is only a symptom of the disease.
A lot of times I wonder if the Masters of the Universe even follow a religion and if it has even a shred of Judeo-Christian mythology in it.
(Score: 2) by ah.clem on Tuesday June 30 2015, @08:41PM
This is an interesting statement - are you willing to provide the name of the org and the city it's located in, Anon? If the statement turns out to be accurate, I will certainly do followup research on this.
(Score: 1) by ese002 on Tuesday June 30 2015, @11:09PM
"In an unusual twist, the bill—introduced on June 17—would also direct the FDA to create a committee that includes religious experts"
That's awesome! That means that even if the bill does manage somehow to pass both chambers of congress and get the president's signature, it will be promptly overturned as unconstitutional by the Supreme Court.
(Score: 5, Touché) by TrumpetPower! on Tuesday June 30 2015, @04:36PM
Just effin' great.
So, in the most advanced medical research ever undertaken, we're going to give veto power to people who take seriously the proposition that the first humans were lovingly hand-crafted mud sculptures created by an angry wizard in an enchanted garden with talking animals.
Okay, okay. So maybe they won't all be as fundamentalist as Catholics [vatican.va]...but that just means that they think that same angry wizard telepathetically communicated that same story about the mud people to the shamans of a Bronze Age warrior cult, and that some sort of deep and significant transcendental truth is contained therein.
What's next? Consulting astrologers before the next NASA mission? Having alchemists review the plans for the NIF? Maybe putting exorcists in charge of the NIMH?
Cheers,
b&
All but God can prove this sentence true.
(Score: 1) by kanweg on Tuesday June 30 2015, @05:58PM
"So, in the most advanced medical research ever undertaken, we're going to give veto power to people who take seriously the proposition that the first humans were lovingly hand-crafted mud sculptures created by an angry wizard in an enchanted garden with talking animals."
That sharp observation is brilliantly phrased.
Bert
(Tips the hat in admiration)
PS I don't think they'll be given veto power but still
(Score: 2) by morgauxo on Tuesday June 30 2015, @07:08PM
Hmm.. That's an interesting document you got there.
I'm not sure how representative of current day Catholicism it really is though. Check this one out..
http://www.newsweek.com/pope-franciss-remarks-evolution-are-not-controversial-among-roman-catholics-281115 [newsweek.com]
Now.. if you replaced Catholics with Protestants... especially US Protestants... your statement would make a whole lot of sense.
(Score: 2) by kurenai.tsubasa on Tuesday June 30 2015, @11:17PM
If you're making a motion to nominate Pope Francis, I second that.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by kaszz on Tuesday June 30 2015, @04:58PM
Great now other countries can a have a field day exploring research in this area at state funded universities. Dunno if the USA will be left behind but it sure doesn't help.
Something similar is already approved in the UK:
UK Approves "3 Parent Baby" Technique [iflscience.com]
And China tend to have no problem with testing ethically questionable procedures so they aren't likely to have any problem with this. Can do, will do idiom?
(Score: 1) by dingus on Tuesday June 30 2015, @05:42PM
There should be a congressional hearing on this issue where they just watch Gattaca.
In seriousness though, I think there are only two ways to do this: make it mandatory for all embryos to be disease-free or banning the practice altogether. I don't want to live in a Gattaca situation where people without edits are discriminated against for stuff like health insurance.
(Score: 2) by takyon on Tuesday June 30 2015, @08:07PM
Genetic transhumanity is hardly the end goal post of health care. Your fancy modified genome won't be able to resist the inevitable effects of genetic decay forever. Everyone needs nanobots that can constantly remodel the human body at the cellular level.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by krishnoid on Tuesday June 30 2015, @07:01PM
As long as they provide some sort of revision control mechanism -- otherwise it's just chaos.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 30 2015, @07:06PM
The US government should be banned from funding all scientific research. It destroys everything it touches. There has been a steady degradation of research quality since they got involved in medical research until today when only 5-30% of it can even be replicated. Science should be seperate from the state, same as religion.
http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/03/28/us-science-cancer-idUSBRE82R12P20120328 [reuters.com]
(Score: 2) by morgauxo on Tuesday June 30 2015, @07:15PM
>>The US government should be banned from funding all scientific research.
This would save the government some money. Most of it would go to other sorts of pork barrel projects that make the congressmens' friends (and indirectly themselves) money because hey.. that's what politicians do. Some of the remainder would go directly into their paychecks and a tiny portion might actually make it into tax cuts. The tax cut money would then allow people to buy more junk food, watch more TV (yay Comcast) and do other self-destructive things because hey... that's what average citizens do.
Virtually none of the money would make it back into science.
So.. tell us what you really want to accomplish A/C?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 30 2015, @07:26PM
I never mentioned saving money. My real motivation is to raise the signal to noise ratio so I don't have to dig through 80 papers of questionable, biased, politically driven crap to find the bit of useful information that's out there. Another problem is you find 30 papers on a topic filled with p-values or "one group higher than the other" until the one that reports actually useful physical measurements (eg how long does a measles virus survive in the air, how many viral particles per sneeze/cough, etc).
I can go back and read the literature from before the governments got involved here and see these issues were not present. The good science continued even into the early days, which masked the toxic effect of government influence. However, as those people retired the ones trained in the "new way" took over. Now we are reaping the full benefits.
(Score: 2) by takyon on Tuesday June 30 2015, @08:09PM
Correlation is not causation!
Pick another culprit to blame for the "degradation of research"?
Maybe the real problem is that research is more complex and we are beginning to attempt to replicate more invalid trials than before.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 30 2015, @08:27PM
Yea, I know there could be other influences (science is hard!). But I've worked in a government lab, I have seen what goes on. This anecdotal experience has lead to my placing a very strong prior on the government funding influence as being responsible.
(Score: 2) by morgauxo on Tuesday June 30 2015, @08:46PM
Sorry I wasn't clear but saving money wasn't my point. My point was that the money is not going to go back into any science at all. Dropping science from the government's budget isn't going to bring on some sort of Libertarian wet dream where private enterprise funds a Singularity . It would just mean that there would be virtually no money going into science. All we would have to look forward to is human civilization getting a little bit better at building large third homes (or whatever politicians spend their money on) and filling the masses with transfat and reality television.
But hey... you wouldn't have to read anything! You win!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 30 2015, @09:13PM
That would be a good thing, money in general is a corrupting influence. Government money doubly so. We have tried this experiment, the effects have been devastating. From what I've seen, the point of no return has been crossed. The general public will probably have to wait one or two generations before realizing what has happened though. The combination of PR along with privately funded technological advances will allow this to continue for some time.
I do hope that parallel institutions will grow up before the complete loss of trust in the current batch. The internet makes many things possible that were not previously.
You just described 2000-2015, there was plenty of govt funded science. If that is your dystopia, then a change can only improve matters.
(Score: 2) by kurenai.tsubasa on Tuesday June 30 2015, @11:25PM
At least government funding has a chance at encouraging objective results. What are you proposing? Letting big pharma and big chemical (including big oil) fund research? That's been proven to work wonderfully. not.
I would propose a “minimum” basic income high enough to allow private citizens to pool their extra cash into funding research. These funds certainly wouldn't be unbiased, but it would put the different biases on an even playing field (or at least give the underdog research team some oomph). I'm thinking something like how R&D is handled in Project Australia (Marshal Brain's Manna). So this proposal is tainted by utopian dreaming, but hey, we can dream, can't we?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 01 2015, @12:29AM
I don't know what the solution is. Friendly competition between independent universities along with some less friendly competition between those in different countries seemed to work well. There was no monolithic funding source, and the universities that outputted the most financially successful people were then able to devote more funding to science. A crappy university would fold. The US government has taxes as a funding mechanism so it is very difficult for negative feedback signals to get through.
I like the idea of a minimum income, but the negative feedback problem would remain. It is not easy to tell when scientists are doing a good or bad job, it is not like engineering where either the rocket explodes or not.
(Score: 2) by morgauxo on Wednesday July 01 2015, @06:52PM
Citizens are going to pool their extra cash into funding science? Did you actually type that with a straight face?
Most will spend any "extra" money on eating out more and buying a bigger TV. The closest you are going to get to the public voluntarily supporting science is the Bible thumpers donating to people like Ken Ham to push pseudo-science.
(Score: 2) by morgauxo on Wednesday July 01 2015, @06:54PM
>> >>It would just mean that there would be virtually no money going into science.
>>That would be a good thing, money in general is a corrupting influence.
Then nothing would be accomplished. I'm pretty sure we are well beyond the point where ascetic monks with no equipment budget are going to discover or produce much that is new.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 01 2015, @07:21PM
Something will be accomplished. Less misinformation will be generated. Look, I don't care how it is done. I want less misinformation being pushed as science. Shutting down NIH, etc will accomplish this. However, as mentioned elsewhere, services like pubmed and databases of disease incidence are useful to the extent political meddling is avoided. These should be kept.
(Score: 2) by morgauxo on Thursday July 02 2015, @08:57PM
If you want less misinformation it's the 'History' Channel and the Creation Museum.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 04 2015, @07:11AM
Yea, sure... I am being serious. I believe the current incentive system motivating (at least medical, which I personally experienced) research is so problematic it should be shut down. I am being serious. I do not expect you to believe just some AC, but only hope to prime you for when/if you hear it from others whom you trust.
(Score: 2) by morgauxo on Monday July 06 2015, @03:11PM
It's one thing to suggest that it needs replaced with a better system and some idea what that system would be. It's entirely another to suggest just shutting it down altogether with no clear path towards something better. What we don't need is to just stop researching.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 01 2015, @08:49AM
You wouldn't raise the signal to noise ratio. You'd kill off the little signal that's left.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 01 2015, @04:45PM
Nope, humans are naturally curious animals. Once those who are most curious are the only ones remaining (all the careerists, political plants, and frauds have left) the signal to noise ratio will be skyhigh.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 30 2015, @08:25PM
I'd add that I do think the government can *possibly* play a useful role in running projects that collect data. For example, SEER (one of the worlds largest cancer databases) is highly useful. But they just couldn't help themselves, they had to mess it up by taking a non-representative samples:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3694153/ [nih.gov]
Similarly, the CDC releases weekly reports that are helpful (assuming they are accurate). I think the government can, in principle, successfully play a monitoring, data collection, and dissemination role. Only if we can ensure the data isn't being affected by political temptations. Bad data is worse than no data. They need to be pushed out of all theory development and testing aspects of research though.
(Score: 2) by kaszz on Tuesday June 30 2015, @11:46PM
And that mess can't be countered by using clever filtering techniques?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 01 2015, @12:21AM
This is an euphemism for "making assumptions". I still think the data is probably useful (as I said, I consider this to be an area where the government could excel), but have my concerns. A major issue is not the racial differences, but the difference in coverage by age this causes (see figure 1 of that paper). That drop in coverage from 40-65 tracks the rising incidence of many cancers very, very well.
The problem isn't really that the sample is non-representative of the US, because we can still study the SEER population in and of itself. Rather, it may be that people are leaving the SEER regions when at an age they are likely to get certain cancers. This could cause a large degree of under-counting. I can't see how we can tell though.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 30 2015, @11:54PM
Says the guy typing on the computer that came out of government research projects while connected to the Internet which was a government research project, connected to a web server via a web browser, the first of which were both government sponsored research projects.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 30 2015, @11:57PM
That's tech development, not scientific research. These are two totally different processes.
(Score: 2) by penguinoid on Wednesday July 01 2015, @05:15AM
We need to do this sort of research as soon as possible, it is dangerous and irresponsible to leave it for later. So long as it remains unpopular, genetically engineered humans will be very rare. However, once we think we know what we're doing, everyone will be jumping on the bandwagon. Imagine in a few decades we develop genetically engineered humans who, as children have (or are marketed as having) an IQ of 200, are healthy, fit, strong, dextrous, charismatic, responsible, and respectful of their parents and elders. Almost every parent decides that they must do the best for their children (after all, what job prospects would an unenhanced child have). Then we learn that an unforeseen side-effect is that at around age 40 they develop an especially violent form of schizophrenia. Oops.
This is going to be a real problem -- who's going to want to wait for 100 years of testing, after which a particular tweak might be proven both safe and obsolete?
RIP Slashdot. Killed by greedy bastards.