Genetic Discrimination

[j. d. worthington]

Originally Posted by iansales

A cynic might point out that your founding fathers' definition of bad government was one that didn't include themselves. And their attitude has created an expectation of bad government, which has only resulted to a self-fulfilling propecy :-)

British attitudes are different, possibly because government here was traditionally the perquisite of the land-owning class.

I'd argue against that, Ian, as such a definition of government (as I noted) reaches back at least to the ancient Greeks, who formed a considerable influence on the model the founding fathers designed. The problem is that governments are run by people, and are prey to the same venalities and determination to maintain power as one sees in individuals as well as groups. The only thing that makes a government work even moderately well is when they have built-in safeguards to prevent them from running amuck.

And I'm not so sure that British attitudes (overall) are/have been all that different, at least historically, perhaps for the very reason you cite.....

Point being... any such technology is open to abuse and will almost certainly be abused by any government, anywhere, anytime. The most we can hope for is that there will be enough scrutiny to make such abuses more difficult, and less pervasive....

[Creator]

Err aren't we going a little out of my question? Well so far the only reason why a government good or bad would do a eugenics programme would be the eradication of genetic diseases but what disease could prompt any govt to do so? Cancer is widespread enough to wipe out our species, Obesity? Hmm....

What do ya guys think?

[Dave]

You forget Aryanism! That had a wide following, and not just in Germany.

We are all of us, naturally tribal in our instinctive behaviour. That's what Chrispenycake was saying:

almost all discrimination has genetic roots. The further from your immediate family group he falls, the more suspect an individual is, and when this is made obvious by skin colour or "little slitty eyes" discrimination is a given.

But I say again, who gives anyone the right to determine what the perfect human specimen is? And isn't such a concept false anyway?

Take autism as an example - characterized by impairments in social interaction and communication, and restricted and repetitive behavior - that makes them unable to have "normal" social interactions - and our society likes people to conform otherwise they don't fit into the "normal" work and play patterns. But is it a disorder or a condition? And what about autistic savants who can perform mind-boggling mathematical gymnastics? It seems that we are all of us somewhere on the autistic spectrum, and although research is on-going, it appears that the same connections in the right hemisphere of the brain that cause savants, may also lead to autistic behaviour.

If we are able to pick the genetic make-up of our children, or to alter it with gene-therapy, I expect most people would not choose an autistic child. If there were no autistic children anymore, who could say how many maths geniuses would also be lost?

Now apply the same thing to other genetic disorders. Who knows yet what conditions are associated with which genes, and which genes are associated with other genes, but my example earlier about blue eyes and intelligence would naturally lead to people choosing blue-eyed children. What happens if brown eyes are found to be associated with poise and balance? No more dancers and gymnasts anymore?

There is a massive, and I mean really huge, market in skin-whitening products for people with dark skins. The reality of discrimination means that these people would choose to have white children if a choice was possible. Can that ever be considered right?

Having a choice in your genetic make-up, or having governments making rules governing it, will only lead to one thing for certain, and that is the reduction in the overall gene pool of the human race. I think I said in an earlier post that if it had been possible a few years ago, all the 6 years olds would now look like "Posh and Becks". This can never be a good thing to happen.

[Creator]

What Dave described about Autism is quite true I shared your sentiments.

[Delvo]

Originally Posted by Dave

If we are able to pick the genetic make-up of our children, or to alter it with gene-therapy, I expect most people would not choose an autistic child. If there were no autistic children anymore, who could say how many maths geniuses would also be lost?

Zero. Autism is not savantism, nor even particularly connected to it; it affects people of "normal" intelligence or "regardless" of intelligence. People have just come to expect savantism to apply to mental/neurological conditions in general because of the inordinate amount of attention that is given to the few exceptions to the rule (and perhaps because it appeals to a somewhat denialistic sense of cosmic fairness). But the reason those few cases get the attention is precisely that they are so exceptional and far from normal.

Originally Posted by Dave

Who knows yet what conditions are associated with which genes, and which genes are associated with other genes, but my example earlier about blue eyes and intelligence would naturally lead to people choosing blue-eyed children. What happens if brown eyes are found to be associated with poise and balance? No more dancers and gymnasts anymore?

The more we learn about genetics, the more we'll not only be able to answer the "who knows" questions, but also be able to identify which things are and aren't linked to each other like that. For example, some brain development genes have already been identified and some certain alleles of those genes have been found which must confer an advantage to their bearers because evolution's been selecting in favor of them, making them more widespread in less time than random drift would have. So there are definite, inarguable "advantageous brain genes", even if one chooses to resist calling them "intelligence genes". And they do not influence eye color. Meanwhile, the eye color genes have been known for a while, and they don't influence brain development or function. So precautions based on speculation of hypothetical possibilities aren't needed in that case, and are progressively being eliminated from other cases as we speak; knowledge of genetic facts replaces such speculations.

Originally Posted by Dave

There is a massive, and I mean really huge, market in skin-whitening products for people with dark skins. The reality of discrimination means that these people would choose to have white children if a choice was possible. Can that ever be considered right?

How about if they had children that were not made to be of another race (which would require altering/replacing hundreds of genes, most of which don't have visible effects), but were of the same race with just somewhat lighter skin? (All races have some variation in that anyway.)

Originally Posted by Dave

Having a choice in your genetic make-up, or having governments making rules governing it, will only lead to one thing for certain, and that is the reduction in the overall gene pool of the human race.

In some cases it will reduce it by getting rid of gross genetic defects. In other cases it will increase it by leading to new ones and/or increasing the commonness of relatively uncommon traits.

And neither an increase nor a decrease is necessarily good or bad based on that alone anyway. To go with your expectation of racially-motivated engineering, for example, making lighter hair & eye colors more common or coming up with new genes for new kinds of hair/eye lightness would actually increase diversity, but it would do so in a way that you presumably would find bad because of the racial issue.

And that's not the only racial issue waiting in this field. Remember those "advantageous brian genes" I mentioned earlier? They're far more common in Eurasian lineages than in African or Australian ones. And future genetic engineers didn't make it that way. There are a lot more genes out there that are more common in one race than another or even absent from one or more races, many still with unknown effects, and only a few of them can be for the obvious undeniable visible differences. The more of them whose effects we identify, the more of them will turn out to be for things we don't want to think of as racial differences.

[Dave]

Originally Posted by Delvo

Zero. Autism is not savantism, nor even particularly connected to it.

I didn't mean to (nor do I think I actually did) give the impression that all autistic individuals were also savants. But there IS a connection, and one which has been noted for centuries. It may not be a genetic connection, I was merely saying 'what if it was?' Maybe it wasn't a good example to use. There is currently research into this and as you rightly say we will learn more about what alleles are connected to each other.

It could be that the inability of autistic individuals to alter the focus of their attention is also related to their ability to selectively direct all of their attention onto one activity. As savant abilities tend to be related to the five primary senses (visual, auditory, olfactory, tactile, and taste), it can be hypothesized that these senses are developed in the right cerebral hemisphere at the expense of the left cerebral hemisphere.

Originally Posted by Delvo

So there are definite, inarguable "advantageous brain genes", even if one chooses to resist calling them "intelligence genes". And they do not influence eye color. Meanwhile, the eye color genes have been known for a while, and they don't influence brain development or function.

I don't profess to know anything about it other that what was reported in the press two weeks ago. All the major newspapers and online sources were reporting the opposite: that there is a link.

Originally Posted by Delvo

How about if they had children that were not made to be of another race but were of the same race with just somewhat lighter skin?

No doubt that would happen, yes.

Originally Posted by Delvo

In other cases it will increase it by leading to new ones and/or increasing the commonness of relatively uncommon traits...

...coming up with new genes for new kinds of hair/eye lightness would actually increase diversity, but it would do so in a way that you presumably would find bad because of the racial issue.

I hadn't even considered that, but you are completely right. While many people will want their kids to conform and look just like everyone else's kids, there will be just as many people who will want to give them a more unconventional look. Try adding Jellyfish fluorescence as has been done to mice and pigs for the ultimate punk hairstyle!

Originally Posted by Delvo

"advantageous brian genes"

You flatter Brian too much.

Originally Posted by Delvo

They're far more common in Eurasian lineages than in African or Australian ones.

The is what was being hinted at by the reports I read on blue-eyes and intelligence. You obviously know more about that subject than me, so tell me, is that statement a proven one, or just an attempt at a modern day Ayrianism by some people with an agenda?

I do know a little about human migrations, enough to know that there were several different migrations from Africa to Asia, and Asia to Europe. There were many different migrations into Europe followed by clustering due to climate changes. But the migrants who colonised Africa and Australia were the first and have the oldest clades.

If it is true that the "advantageous brain genes" are more common amongst the migrants who were naturally selected to survive under the difficult conditions resulting from Ice Age expansion and retreat, then it doesn't really matter if it not Politically Correct to say so.

[Delvo]

Originally Posted by Dave

I don't profess to know anything about it other that what was reported in the press two weeks ago. All the major newspapers and online sources were reporting the opposite: that there is a link.

They reported a link between two phenotypes, not genotypes. A phenotype is the final result: the body and behavior. Genotype is just the DNA. Phenotype can be affected by genotype and by other factors in the environment.

For example, kids of all races start out lighter in the eyes, hair, and skin than adults of the same race, then darken up. How much an individual darkens up over the long term, especially in the eyes more so than in the skin (because skin darkness fluctuates more quickly in an individual's life) is already known to be influenced by how much sunlight (s)he is exposed to in the early years. How much exposure a kid gets to sunlight could be based on his/her personality or on how the parents raised him/her, and both of those things are known to affect behaviors that influence success later on.

General quality of diet, such as plentiful protein and carbohydrates, is another environmental factor that is known to help intelligence, and it might have some effect on appearance of darkness/lightness.

Another possible factor some people are sure to believe in is cultural: that there's a prejudice in favor of light coloring and against dark coloring, even within the narrowed spectrum of just the white race or even a particular white nationality, and not even considering other races. Then the successful people they're talking about were given an easier time, better education, more credit for their accomplishments, and such because of the way they looked. Plenty of people already believe that and would jump on these recent reports as "just yet another example", and if they're right, then that's another non-genetic explanation for the observed link.

Here's another one: light eyes are associated with light skin and hair because they all have the same cause, that being low melanin... and light skin is better than dark skin at producing vitamin D, so generally people with lighter pigmentation can get more vitamin D when all else is equal. (In high-sunlight environments, dark skin doesn't lead to deficiency because the skin gets so much more sunlight anyway; this is a problem they face when they move to low-sunlight environments.) Vitamin D regulates the utilization of calcium, so a shortage of D, which darker people are more likely to be short of, means you aren't able to make proper use of the calcium you're getting. Severe cases of D deficiency are normally associated with bone and tooth problems, but brains use calcium too, so this could be a previously unmeasured effect of D deficiency, especialy at early stages or in mild cases (before bone/tooth problems call attention to the deficiency).

Is there an either causative or coincidental tendency for lighter people to live near coasts or for any other reason eat more fish? Our brains are high in fatty acids, which fish are the best source of.

An explanation I saw being given in comments to the stories online was that blue eyes are common in northern white people and rare in non-white and even in some southern white people, so this reveals nothing more than differences in the success rates of the races, which was a fact sociologists were already aware of as a racial issue by itself rather than really an eye-color issue; thus the eye color is incidental, just an irrelevant indicator of the real cause, which is race. This presumes that the "researchers" were dumb enough not to cancel that factor out by only comparing people of the same race/nationality to each other, but I can't say they weren't, since there's no description of what their "study" was like.

I could probably name a few other possible non-genetic causes for the phenotype connection, but the point is that, as they say in some of the online articles about it, it's an observation, not an explanation, and genes aren't a part of the observation.

And I'm doubtful of even the observation. Just saying "Look at all of these successful people of this eye color" isn't a study; it's a set of anecdotes, and those are so prone to overextrapolation and selection bias (the observer thinking a pattern is there that isn't, or picking only examples that fit it and ignoring the ones that don't) as to be worthless. For example, one of their few examples is Stephen Hawking. He's famous among laypeople, but not a very big deal in the world of theoretical physics. Yes, he was good enough to get in to an exclusive profession, but so were hundreds of other people whose eye color distribution isn't mentioned, nor are the eye colors of that profession's true stand-outs who aren't as famous as Hawking despite having contributed more to their field. If there was a true study of IQ distribution or something like that behind these articles, then there should have been at least some kind of description of the methods and some numerical details about the results. The absence of both makes me suspect that there isn't even a real observation here to need to explain at all, with a genetic explanation or any other kind.

Originally Posted by Dave

No doubt that would happen, yes.

Well, then, since you seemed negative about darker people's alleged preference for white babies, what would you say about dark parents having a baby modified in just the skin color gene and leaving the other hundreds of racially-distinct genes alone? Is that still a race-relations (sociological/psychological) problem?

Originally Posted by Dave

The is what was being hinted at by the reports I read on blue-eyes and intelligence.

No, that was an unexplained report of a phenotype connection where a genetic issue is no more than implied at best, and I'm talking about cases in which the genotype is the reported observation itself. Here and here are two copies of an article that came out more than two years ago about a couple of the first cases of "brain genes" with uneven racial distributions; here is a thread I started at another forum about them and two other different articles about the same thing which are now gone, but which are still quoted in my first post.

That was followed up more recently with another article I can't find at the moment, describing how humans are actually separated into genetic groups with very little overlap which match conventional concepts of the races, each of which has dozens to over a hundred of alleles that are common in that race but rare or completely absent in others. That article was talking about any genes, coding for any traits, including obvious things like skin color and lactose tolerance, not just brain genes. It also said that the exact traits that most of the other racially-distinguished alleles code for are not yet known. But it did mention one or two more "brain genes" in addition to the first two I mentioned in the above paragraph, and those again had the same pattern of distribution between races as the first two (with the added twist that, within Eurasia, at least one of them isn't equally common in easterners and westerners). I don't know where that article was for now, but I'll try to find it tomorrow.

Originally Posted by Dave

is that statement a proven one, or just an attempt at a modern day Ayrianism by some people with an agenda?

The fact is a fact; even those who argue against the "politically incorrect" interpretation don't deny the fact itself; it's just a matter of how they interpret it. Interpretation is where agendas come in, and the articles I've seen about the brain genes seem to be straining to emphasize that they are NOT concluding racial intellectual inequality. (But you could say it's hollow, because such a disclaimer is essentially an obvious requirement for anyone to be taken seriously today even if they were racists. I've seen opponents of other authors in other cases with racially sensitive implications lambaste them as racists trying to hide behind cheap obligatory disclaimers of non-racism and reluctance which they didn't really mean.)

[dustinzgirl]

I don't care which "race" (I don't believe in "race") is smarter, stronger, faster, or can make the better latte. I really don't. What I care about, and what you should all be caring about, is not so much genetic discrimination (esp in America, right? LOL) but GENETIC CONTROL.

Nature has her ways. I am of firm belief that screwing with them will piss mother nature off. Thats probably a bad idea.

Not to mention the ability of governments and corporations (which are ever becoming one and the same) to create genetic markers, retainers, and sleepers, which will be able to function in a employable (for lack of a better term) sector of the gov/corp specifically for the gov/corp without betrayal or care for what is right.

You all know as well as me that the gov/corps will use genetic control to create thier own race of followers, new police/mercs with no ties to anything but the gov/corps.

Now beyond that, I think if we start MAKING people anything but what they are supposed to be, we will create a world that will destroy itself. Why? Because to create, we, as humans, need discontent and malady. To be passionate about something, we need to feel the pain of loss. How many people do you know took up a fight against something after one of their family members, or themselves, fought and won/lost? Damn near every charity and medical research facility began this way.

If we are all the same there will be no passion, no love, and nothing will become better.

And aren't diseases in place as part of mother nature to keep down an ever rising and earth destroying population as it is? Seriously, how many people are there on earth? More than there are trees, almost! Diseases and illness and death are there for a reason. Yes it hurts the individual persons but it protects the whole. If we eradicate diseases combined with our current rate of growth we will over populate and starve to death on a global scale. Then where will your aryian blue eyes be? Hungry and dead.

Also, the next time I hear someone say that blue eyed people are more intelligent than others I will freaking scream.

Look, I know science, somewhere, had tried to show that. But when you take people of a different culture and give them tests of the other culture, do you expect them to pass? Could any blue eyed aryian dude survive in the wilds of Africa for a month? No, and the opposite, forcing a test for aryians onto non aryians is biased, regardless of if it is in school or over time or whatever, even just counting up how many blue eyed geniuses there are compared to non aryian, because you would only be counting in the western world, completely ignoring how intelligent the members of another culture are in their culture.

And Delvo, anytime someone publishes something that says a certain "race" is genetically different and therefore not as worthy as another I would take offense, because they are only looking for their own similar characteristics, only judging based on what they currently know within their "race" and not even looking at other markers that would be important to further the world.

It takes all kinds, not just biased smart people, to make a world go around.

[Delvo]

Here's either the other article I couldn't find before, or at least one that's pretty close to it and uses some of the same references and the same big image:

Humans Have Spread Globally, and Evolved Locally - New York Times

[Dave]

Puting aside the race issue for one moment, I was wondering today why I feel so strongly about genetic modification in humans anyway. I mean, it's already commonplace in farm animals and crop plants. I seem to see moral and ethical issues that others don't think are so important. Human-animal chimeras were green-lighted in the UK only yesterday, something I thought I would never see. It seems that if it is possible, then someone will do it.

I decided that it was to do with the fact that you are making the choice for another person -namely your children and your children's children. If I went out and had my genes changed so I had fluorescent blue hair, then there is little difference to dyeing it, or getting a tattoo. But if I choose a child with fluorescent blue hair then that is completely different.

I feel the say way about people naming their kids Fiffi Trixibelle Peaches Apple Banana, or after the entire Liverpool Football Squad. It's just wrong.

On Dustinzgirl's point about governments and corporations - she could have added genetic weapons. The genetic bomb that can kill everyone in one race but leave another - what kind of fun could they have in ethnic cleansing with one of those?

[dustinzgirl]

Originally Posted by Dave

On Dustinzgirl's point about governments and corporations - she could have added genetic weapons. The genetic bomb that can kill everyone in one race but leave another - what kind of fun could they have in ethnic cleansing with one of those?

Sadly all too possible. Governments have (as far as I believe, anyways) used viruses to diminish a population, or provided weapons for one faction to destroy another (as I believe is true in Darfur, I mean seriously--where did they get all those GUNS?) So a genetic weapon is not too far off. It will be a sad, sick day, but its coming.

Our world is spiraling into insanity because we, as the human race, have turned away from what is natural and right in the name of greed.

[Creator]

Originally Posted by dustinzgirl

Our world is spiraling into insanity because we, as the human race, have turned away from what is natural and right in the name of greed.

Ah Dustingirl..... nice to see you on this thread... I created this thread with Alpha Omega in mind actually..... Well I had to agree on the world insanity part..... I think I should mix that insanity you describe with normal life.... hmm intrigueing.....

[Dave]

I never answered this before but I think that now I know why I feel like I do.

Originally Posted by Delvo

Well, then, since you seemed negative about darker people's alleged preference for white babies, what would you say about dark parents having a baby modified in just the skin color gene and leaving the other hundreds of racially-distinct genes alone? Is that still a race-relations (sociological/psychological) problem?

There is a difference between having your own baby with a partner, and adopting a baby. I haven't adopted a child, but I've heard this from people who have, and it gives an explanation for those many people to want IVF treatments rather than adopting. When your children are genetically similar to yourself, your see parallels in them from your own childhood, you see yourself, your partner, your siblings, your mother or your father in them. This is even more poignant if you have lost one of those to an early death. You excuse things they do, because you did them yourself or your siblings did them and got away with it.

I think for someone to feel forced not to have a child with their own genetics, but some other genetic make-up, purely because of the discrimination it will feel, and that you felt yourself in your own childhood, is a terrible indictment of our society. I don't see it as any special race-relations (sociological/psychological) problem, just evidence that our society has some way further to go before everyone is equal (but you knew that!)

It isn't going to be long before some of the tests we've talked about, and these ethical and philosophical implications on our society are no longer science fiction:

(from Lost Cousins.com December2007 Newsletter)

DNA TESTING REACHES THE NEXT LEVEL

Sequencing the entire human genome, with 3 billion letters, took several
years and costs billions of dollars, but in October this year Craig Venter, who
headed one of the projects, predicted that the cost will fall to just $100,000 by
2010.

At present DNA tests, even those used by the police, look at just a few dozen
markers. But two announcements made since our last newsletter threaten to
transform DNA testing.

deCODE genetics, based in Iceland, and 23andMe, a California start-up
company, are each offering a new service that for around $1000 will scan an
individual's entire genome looking at markers that indicate susceptibility to
medical conditions.

Although 23andMe is a start-up company, one of the founders is Anne
Wojcicki, the wife of Sergey Brin, the co-founder of Google. Their test uses a
3in by 1in silicon wafer with over half a million detectors, each of which
detects a different SNP.

[Single Nucleotide Polymorphisms are points where one letter of the genetic
code has been replaced with another.]

It's not immediately clear what direct implications these announcements have
for genetic DNA testing, but one thing is clear - over the next few years DNA
tests are going to become cheaper and more powerful!

http://www.23andme.com
deCODEme

[Creator]

Whoa..! I thought this thread has been forgotten! Anyway to the topic, I wonder if the opposite of eugenics can happen? As in if people are so "merciful" and allow genetically unfit to breed and multiply. What kind of world will it be like.

IN my upcoming fic, The Goddess, humans got too merciful and allowed more and more genetically unfit people to multiply. This was the reason why the main character in Goddess decided to start a campaign to curb the spread of bad genes.

Babies with made-to-order defects? - Pregnancy - MSNBC.com

But will this become a trend?

[Dave]

Originally Posted by Creator

But will this become a trend?

My first impression was that I would hope not, and I will skip over the ethical considerations expressed by the woman who said "You cannot tell me that I cannot have a child who’s going to look like me," and explain why.

There are costs to society. It is more expensive to educate deaf children. You need more highly trained teachers and a lower pupil-teacher ratio. Their are health care costs, Dwarfs do not have as high a life expectancy.

Whether she has a right or not is irrelevant to that. Just as I don't want my taxes and insurance to pay for the children of single mothers on benefits, I don't want to pay more for the education and health care of her children which she created through her own choice. I would feel different if they occurred naturally.

But now I see that contradicts comments I made earlier and I'm in a real dilemma. Am I really saying that only because I feel pity for the Deaf and for Dwarfs? That is something they would really not wish, and probably the very reason they want this, is so that it should be considered perfectly normal. In reality, I can't have it both ways, if I want a society where I don't want people forced by eugenics and insurance companies to have children with 'better' genes, then I have to accept one where we provide much more for those remaining people, however they came about. Thanks for the challenging ideas.