Ojuice5001

Science fiction has thought of this idea ever since its beginning. Will it someday be possible to genetically engineer a race like humans, but with better capabilities and much fewer frailties?

I don't support this concept, but I can think of many upsides to it. The new race could be less violent. It could have better control over its sexual urges. It could eat and sleep only as much as necessary, and even the necessary amount of food and sleep would be less than that of a human. It could work hard and obediently, thus making it the perfect slave. It might even have massive physical strength. (And although I do not consider this an advantage, the scientists who engineered this race would probably be naturalistic atheists, and thus the new race would be atheistic. Hell, even Christians could be easily persuaded that the new race, being soulless, has no need for religion.)

Also, assuming this master race were possible, wouldn't they sooner or later replace humans? They would be slaves at first, but it seems that you can't count on this race being slaves forever if they have all the advantages humans don't. Sooner or later, this new race would replace humanity. (Not necessarily through violence, it would probably be a bloodless affair.) Some people wouldn't mind this, but plenty of others would.

I wouldn't want this to happen. I love this gluttonous, horny, time-wasting, TV-watching, religious, superstitious species. I would welcome an end to war, poverty, and alcohol, but the price might be too high.

Jesse

I would guess it would be very difficult to engineer complex behavioral changes in humanity--see this earlier thread about Steven Pinker's comments on the issue. It might eventually be possible, but my hunch is that we're more likely to create "transhuman" beings through technologies like cybernetic implants and mind uploading rather than genetic engineering.

Soyin Milka

I like the idea of "Belief in the ability to genetically modify behavior" being controlled by genes

But seriously, nothing's impossible but I highly doubt humanity will ever be able to shape its behavior simply by playing with its genes. Education and culture are likely to remain our best tool in shaping behavior for a while.

Some "temperamental" problems, like a predisposition to depression for exemple, could be linked to some cluster of genes. But these same genes could also be part of other clusters influencing personality or other biological gizmos. It could prove dificult to genetically alter behavior without triggering some side effects.

Then there's the morality factor. Not everybody will agree on what should be the criterias to determine what behaviors ought to be modified. Christians might think that "sexual urges" should be dampened by playing with genes (Urgh). Others might be looking for a "faith in God" predisposition genes cluster. Eugenics in the hands of an authoritarian world is a concept unattractive to most people.

Hopefully, that's one thing that can't be altered

Soyin

johngalt

I think that your idea is on the same wavelength with building robots smart enough that they will eventually replace humans. This master race that you talk about sounds really cool, but i think it would eventually wipe out the human race. This also gets into the issue on cloning, and whether it would be possible to do this. We still haven't cloned a human being, despite what the Raelians say. There would be many defective human clones before we would get the so called "master race".

Well, i can just say that i am for cloning, including reproductive cloning, but i don't think that we should just start pumping out genetically modified human beings.

ps418

The answer to your question is basically yes. There is every reason to believe that many human traits, both physiological and behavioral, can be reliably manipulated/enhanced to some, limited extent by genetic manipulation. This has been going on for a long time in other organisms.

Whether this is desirable or not of course is a different question.

What would possibly justify enslaving genetically-modified humans, just because they're genetically modified?

Sure, they could be. But they often aren't. For any two phenotypes, you can determine whether or not they are both influenced by the same genes using bivariate genetic analyses. For instance, there is preliminary evidence suggesting that schizophrenia and bipolar disorder are influenced in part by the same genes.

I agree. I dont think anyone would find an authoritarian system of this type desirable, any more desirable than the eugenics of the early twentieth century. Voluntary genetic manipulation by parents is a different story, though. I certainly have no problem with stacking the deck in favor of my children in terms of things like cancer, diabetes and heart disease, nor in terms of major depression, schizophrenia, and so on. Beyond that, it gets more fuzzy.

Patrick