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Sam Altman and husband reportedly working to genetically engineer babies from having hereditary disease (www.the-independent.com)
submitted 11 months ago by to c/technology@lemmy.world
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[–] 22 points 11 months ago (17 children)

I'm not sure I get the universal negativity to this. Like sure, Altman sucks as a person, and an individual having enough money to significantly bankroll research like this is a sign of an economic failure, but surely curing or preventing genetic disease is just about the most uncontroversial use human genetic modification could have?

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  • [–] 43 points 11 months ago (6 children)

    It'll only be available for the super rich, will expand to other augmentations/engineering, and will result in further reinforcing social mobility boundaries.

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  • [–] 8 points 11 months ago (4 children)

    The response to something beneficial being only available to the rich shouldn't be to avoid developing that thing, it should be to make it available to everyone. The failures of the US healthcare and economic systems don't suddenly make developing new medical techniques a bad thing. Human augmentation is another issue from curing genetic disease, though I'd personally argue that wouldn't be a bad cause either, with the same caveat about it availability. It at least has more potential to improve somebody's life somewhere down the line than just buying a yacht with his ill gotten gains or some other useless rich person toy would.

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  • [–] 35 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago) (2 children)

    If you can't share basic healthcare with everyone, you're not going to share genetic healthcare, either.

    The government shouldn't subsidize the development of super-healthcare (or pass conveniently targeted policies that enable its development at the expense of citizens) when all the non-billionaires get nothing but promises of I'll-totally-share-it-you-guys from the same guy who says we're-almost-at-AGI-we-just-need-another-trillion-dollars-I-swear.

    The solution to billionaires having "ill-gotten gains" isn't "well, let's make sure he spends it responsibly". It's give the damn money back.

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  • [–] 6 points 11 months ago (1 child)

    You misunderstand, I am not saying "make sure he spends it responsibly". Nobody has has "made" him do this at all, and I didn't advocate for a policy of doing so. What I'm saying is that I don't think this particular use is worthy of condemnation the way his other actions are, because in the long run I think that this specific thing will end up benefiting people other than him no matter if he intends for that to happen or not (even if the American healthcare system prevents access, which I'm not confident it will do completely, not every country has that system, and it's statistically improbable that the US will have it forever, and research results are both durable and cross borders). That sentiment isn't saying that it excuses his wealth, just that I think people are seeing only the negatives in this merely because of the association with Altman's name and ignoring the potential benefits out of cynicism. The concept is just as valid with him funding it as it would be had he been condemning it instead.

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  • [–] 4 points 11 months ago*

    I think people are seeing only the negatives in this merely because of the association with Altman's name and ignoring the potential benefits out of cynicism.

    I don't know about what other people see, but I see negatives because it's associated with a billionaire.

    If Taylor Swift put her name on it, my opinion would not change.

    Billionaires don't build, they finance machines that extract value from human beings.

    Actual scientists have been working on using CRISPR to fight hereditary disease in the US and around the world.

    This money should have gone to them instead of into yet another billionaire’s pet designer baby startup.

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  • [–] 7 points 11 months ago

    Generally speaking (by theory subscription), moral evaluations of an action consider the state of the agent.

    "Is this a good technology?" And "Is Sam Altman doing good?" Are two radically different questions with radically different answers.

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  • [–] 3 points 11 months ago (1 child)

    Because the US health care system already serves the wealthy and abandons the poor, any expensive treatments are seen as just further steps into a Gattaca future of even more dystopian disparity, especially when driven by a rich asshole personally.

    Universal negativity is also kind of the norm around here. A lot of folks on Lemmy believe we are slaves sucking Satan’s cock for breakfast, and anything that isn’t a complete burn down of our system and way of life is a negative.

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  • [–] 1 point 11 months ago (3 children)

    Please review the glimpse into our future titled "Gattaca" to see why people might be concerned.

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  • [–] -1 points 11 months ago (2 children)

    It's fiction.

    You can find actual discrimination based on genetics or wealth or class into the present and past of the real world.

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  • [–] 3 points 11 months ago (1 child)

    You entirely missed the point of the movie if you think it's only about genetic discrimination. It's about creating a permanent underclass of people who weren't wealthy enough to have had their parents make them genetically perfect. Exactly like what will happen once the rich have the ability to make themselves into the 'ubermensch' that they've been telling themselves they are for centuries.

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  • [–] 1 point 11 months ago

    Well it's science fiction. Being 'genetically perfect' (rofl) will impart less of an advantage than actually existing, mundane factors such as wealth and which country you were born in. Hell, the biggest advantage they could get is making sure their children is of the 'right' color.

    I do not even think the biggest assholes like say Musk would genetically modify their children. He already thinks he is perfect.

    I can also think of a few factors that would disadvantage poor people more than lack of eugenics.

    Lack of healthcare. Climate change leading to people having to abandon their homeland and also exacerbating another factor. Bad nutrition. Bad education in combination with disinformation by wealth controlled media.

    Genetic modification is not really a problem. It could also help some people if we fix our politics and make sure people get access to healthcare based on needs rather than means.

    Seriously, fiction is not necessarily a good guide for politics.

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