Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums THINKING BIG About Gifted Education PRC Genetic Eugenics

http://www.vice.com/read/chinas-taking-over-the-world-with-a-massive-genetic-engineering-program

Just sayin'. If true, for better or worse, its under the THINKING BIG category. Does raise more than a few moral, ethical, and philosophical questions.

And well, later they'll have to educate them. I don't think of the stereotypical Asian education system, dependent on exams that test memorization of facts, and suppressing autonomy and questions, as particularly suited to GT kids, or the internet age. I wonder if this program will then lead to any educational reform there.

I don'tknow the news provider but given the tone of the article I think I will wait until someone else picks it up.

Three words: Brave New World.

That's the title of Aldous Huxley's 1932 book. Some links that may be of interest -
Wikipedia- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brave_New_World
Spark notes- http://www.sparknotes.com/lit/bravenew/
The book is actually a short, quick read.

Some have said that "science fiction becomes science fact". That may be happening in the OP's article. There are sympathizers who purport this may be creation of a utopia (rather than a dystopia) and their range of views may be easily found through online searches, including a series of BLTC weblinks which came up when looking for Huxley's Brave New World.

The Utopia/Dystopia philosophical question is an important one and careful consideration and reflection on this may help individuals clarify their personal morals, ethics, and values. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dystopia

This reminds me of one of my favorite movies, Gattaca, which envisions a future where the naturally born kids are considered "invalid" and face discrimination from the genetically selected kids.

Gattaca is one of my favorite movies, too! But I've been thinking lately about the fact that highly intelligent children have more and more opportunities to socialize together these days, through talent searches, admission to competitive colleges, and because gifted families are more and more likely to live in the same zipcode. Would it stand to reason that assortative mating will become more and more precise (er... accurate?) in future generations... Basically, given that people have more opportunities to marry their intellectual equals, will intelligence and LOG stabilize within blood lines in the future, without the "need" for artificial selection?

I don't know... I'm not a hard science person and I'm still on my first cup of coffee, so I don't even know if that was coherent. :-) I will add that I am not sure if it's a good or bad thing to have "purebred gifties", but it is an interesting thought. My parents have widely differing abilities and the same is true for my siblings. But my DH and I have very similar abilities due to the way we met in college, so I wonder if our children will be more similar to us and each other. Could be fun to get a wild card... :-)

I find the paradox to be deliciously ironic myself.

Charles Murray discusses the trend toward assortative mating in his recent book "Coming Apart".

That's very interesting. Thanks for the tip. I'm exploring some of the earlier threads discussing that Murray book. Seems like a can of worms

In the later books of the Ender's Game series, there is a planet with a disproportionately large number of HG+ people... No spoilers, I'll just say that severe 2E issues keep that population "in check". (I find this interesting, as a person that happens to deal with 2e issues irl.)

Interesting read, thanks!


Even if we could somehow raise intelligence through DNA engineering or all babies were born with the genius potential it is only part of the concept.

Environment and education play a profound role, IMO even bigger than genetics. Experience, especially those from the care givers shape the wiring of the brain and thus the nature of reality processing.

IMO, we should focus more on unconditional love and unlimited educational resources rather than classifying incredibly complex genetic systems which are entirely contingent on the environment, ie the environment changes gene expression.

My point is I don't believe eugenics alone will be of any help rather more counter productive.

Just my thoughts

It's not just an issue for the Chinese:

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/02/24/opinion/genetically-modified-babies.html
Genetically Modified Babies
By MARCY DARNOVSKY
New York Times
February 23, 2014

...

Developers of these modification techniques say they are a way for women with mitochondrial disease to give birth to healthy children to whom they are related genetically. Some are also promoting their use for age-related infertility. These are worthy goals. But these procedures are deeply problematic in terms of their medical risks and societal implications. Will the child be born healthy, or will the cellular disruptions created by this eggs-as-Lego-pieces approach lead to problems later on? What about subsequent generations? And how far will we go in our efforts to engineer humans?

These sorts of concerns were first voiced decades ago, well before the human genome had even been “mapped.” Those were the days when our accelerating knowledge about genetics led to over-optimistic hopes for quick fixes to an array of afflictions and grandiose visions of designing genetically enhanced babies to be more intelligent, athletic, musically talented and the like.

More recently, many scholars, scientists and policy makers have urged a different approach: We should carefully and thoughtfully apply the tools of human genetic engineering to treat medical conditions in people, but we should not use them to manipulate the genetic traits of future children. Genetic modifications of sperm, eggs and early embryos should be strictly off limits. Otherwise, we risk venturing into human experimentation and high-tech eugenics.