babies made from 3 people

[dragon]

he UK looks set to become the first country to allow the creation of babies using DNA from three people, after the government backed the IVF technique.

It will produce draft regulations later this year and the procedure could be offered within two years.

Experts say three-person IVF could eliminate debilitating and potentially fatal mitochondrial diseases that are passed on from mother to child.

Opponents say it is unethical and could set the UK on a "slippery slope".

They also argue that affected couples could adopt or use egg donors instead.

Mitochondria are the tiny, biological "power stations" that give the body energy. They are passed from a mother, through the egg, to her child.

Defective mitochondria affect one in every 6,500 babies. This can leave them starved of energy, resulting in muscle weakness, blindness, heart failure and death in the most extreme cases.
Research suggests that using mitochondria from a donor egg can prevent the diseases.

It is envisaged that up to 10 couples a year would benefit from the treatment.

However, it would result in babies having DNA from two parents and a tiny amount from a third donor as the mitochondria themselves have their own DNA.
Earlier this year, a public consultation by the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority (HFEA) concluded there was "general support" for the idea and that there was no evidence that the advanced form of IVF was unsafe.

The chief medical officer for England, Prof Dame Sally Davies, said: "Scientists have developed ground-breaking new procedures which could stop these disease being passed on, bringing hope to many families seeking to prevent their future children inheriting them.

"It's only right that we look to introduce this life-saving treatment as soon as we can."

She said there were "clearly some sensitive issues here" but said she was "personally very comfortable" with altering mitochondria.

Scientists have devised two techniques that allow them to take the genetic information from the mother and place it into the egg of a donor with healthy mitochondria.
The result is a baby with genetic information from three people.

They would have more than 20,000 genes from their parents and 37 mitochondrial genes from a donor.

It is a change that would have ramifications through the generations as scientists would be altering human genetic inheritance.

Objections to the procedure have been raised ever since it was first mooted.

Dr David King, the director of Human Genetics Alert, said: "These techniques are unnecessary and unsafe and were in fact rejected by the majority of consultation responses.
'Designer baby'

"It is a disaster that the decision to cross the line that will eventually lead to a eugenic designer baby market should be taken on the basis of an utterly biased and inadequate consultation."

One of the main concerns raised in the HFEA's public consultation was of a "slippery slope" which could lead to other forms of genetic modification.

Draft regulations will be produced this year with a final version expected to be debated and voted on in Parliament during 2014.

Newcastle University is pioneering one of the techniques that could be used for three-person IVF.

Prof Doug Turnbull, the director of the Wellcome Trust Centre for Mitochondrial Research at the university, said he was "delighted".

He said: "This is excellent news for families with mitochondrial disease.

"This will give women who carry these diseased genes more reproductive choice and the opportunity to have children free of mitochondrial disease. I am very grateful to all those who have supported this work."

The fine details of the regulations are still uncertain, yet it is expected to be for only the most severe cases.

It is also likely that children would have no right to know who the egg donor was and that any children resulting from the procedure would be monitored closely for the rest of their lives.

Sir John Tooke, the president of the Academy of Medical Sciences, said: "Introducing regulations now will ensure that there is no avoidable delay in these treatments reaching affected families once there is sufficient evidence of safety and efficacy.

"It is also a positive step towards ensuring the UK remains at the forefront of cutting-edge research in this area."

link

[madd0ct0r]

A sensible and useful advance that provokes a gut reaction from some older idiots. The world keeps turning and is a slightly better place.

[Eternal_Freedom]

Yeah I really don't see a problem with this. It's allowing people to raise children without fear of passing on debilitating conditions. Hopefully they can go from this step to a process that prevents other genetic disorders being passed on, which would be great news for me since I don't want my kids suffering from my shit eyesight if possible.

[B5B7]

Opponents say it is unethical and could set the UK on a "slippery slope".

They are the ones who are unethical (& irrational). Plus, Ye good olde "slippery slope" argument.
I can envisage them creating a cult that worships genetic disorders, and praises "natural-origin" humans.

[LaCroix]

Don't you know, children have an inalienable right to be born blind, ill and probably die before their first birthday.

[The Duchess of Zeon]

The real fear here is that it could lead to babies born only of two women in due time, I suspect.

[kc8tbe]

Hopefully they can go from this step to a process that prevents other genetic disorders being passed on, which would be great news for me since I don't want my kids suffering from my shit eyesight if possible.

They have been able to do this for a long time, it's called Preimplantation Genetic Diagnosis. The Brits have even established a set of ethical standards on when and how you can use it.

[Eternal_Freedom]

Hopefully they can go from this step to a process that prevents other genetic disorders being passed on, which would be great news for me since I don't want my kids suffering from my shit eyesight if possible.

They have been able to do this for a long time, it's called Preimplantation Genetic Diagnosis. The Brits have even established a set of ethical standards on when and how you can use it.

That I did not know. Thanks very much for the link!

Don't you know, children have an inalienable right to be born blind, ill and probably die before their first birthday.

Well fuck that.

[Broomstick]

Actually, quite a few mitochondrial diseases don't manifest until after adulthood. After all, if they manifested in infancy they wouldn't be as likely to be passed on.

I think reviewing new reproductive procedures is a good thing. However, "review" is not the same as "forbid ever after". It seem this has been reviewed sufficiently to make a reasonable prediction as to safety. If we are going to allow IVF (rather than simply telling all of those infertile people to just suck it up and adopt) then I see no reason not to proceed.

[K. A. Pital]

IVF could already now eliminate most monogenetic diseases; so this is a welcome step forward.

Next - extracorporeal pregnancy in artificial wombs, of course, to avoid damaging the woman.

[Lord of the Abyss]

The real fear here is that it could lead to babies born only of two women in due time, I suspect.

Or two men, a female mitochondrial donor, and a surrogate mother for a total of two mothers and two fathers for those who insist on trying to squeeze such non-traditional reproductive methods into the traditional mold.

[Arthur_Tuxedo]

How close are we to the designer babies that everyone freaks out about? ie the ability to selectively combine genes from the best thinkers, athletes, mathematicians and other luminaries into one super-zygote who will inevitably be named Khan?

[Simon_Jester]

Absurdly far away, still. We are not close to identifying the "genes for ability," and it seems likely that if there are such genes, they are too complex for us to just tailor them into people.

We'd have to be able to more or less write someone's genetic code from scratch and accurately predict all the consequences of the new combinations to do that- I doubt it'll be possible for many decades.

[K. A. Pital]

Other than sheer butthurt, nothing indicates a Khan is necessarily bad. High intellect is not necessarily correlated with violence and cruelty. It is a great fear in America and smart people are hated, quite literally, which is manifested in a grand anti-intellectual frustration that produces shitloads of stories where STRONG heruz take on SMART supervillains, but there's nothing bad about it as it is.

Designed humans are not a bad idea - unless you design them to be slaves and workhorses - but I must admit we are really, terrifically far from it.

[Broomstick]

It's not just a matter of assembling desirable genes - they are require the proper environment for optimum expression.

[Simon_Jester]

Stas, you will note that probably the single most popular superhero in America today, as measured by box office sales, is Iron Man- who has no superpowers whatsoever other than his own supergenius-level technical intelligence.

If we look back to the original Khan concept, this was at a time when WWII was well within living memory, and the fear of the genetically engineered 'superior man' was descended from Nazi propaganda about the übermensch. Khan himself was presented as being both physically and mentally superior: he could pick up Kirk and toss him around one-handed, and he could absorb complex technical documents just by glancing at the pages.

On the other hand, he was also compared not to Hitler, but to Napoleon- a conqueror who, like Alexander, has a more ambiguous and less universally loathed position in Western culture. What makes him bad in the context of Star Trek is that he provokes war, regardless of whether he was right to be fighting it or not.


I think the fear of the superman is complex because in modern culture we fear being replaced not by people stronger than ourselves, but by people (and machines) that are smarter.

[The Romulan Republic]

If we had "designer babies", they would probably be expensive and therefore they would potentially only be an option for the rich. So we could have a genetically superior upper class, which would give the rich even more of an advantage over everyone else than they already have.

Also, some shits would certainly try to eliminate things like blackness and gayness.

[Tasoth]

Ooooh, a designer baby argument!

I'm not for the concept of designer babies for a couple reasons. First, it's going to limit genetic diversity among humans. All your kids are going to be packing the same genes so what happens when something comes along that no one really has an effective defense against because genes were limited? Secondly, most kids are going to be made from a template. This leads back to point one and really points out that your kid is not really your kid. That's probably more a philosophical argument. And finally, by engineering your kid for a specific 'goal', you're limiting what they can do. Is it fair to remove a child's choice by designing them to be professional pianists, athletes, models, etcs? A freedom of choice in your life is a huge component of Western thought.

I also would like to say I am not against removing genetic maladies from children before their born. I think that is probably something we really should be striving for.

[Starglider]

And finally, by engineering your kid for a specific 'goal', you're limiting what they can do. Is it fair to remove a child's choice by designing them to be professional pianists, athletes, models, etcs? A freedom of choice in your life is a huge component of Western thought.

Genetics doesn't work like that; the only thing it influences directly is biochemisty. Everything else has a complex expression path and depends on environment & chance for how it will turn out. If we had total knowledge of the genome, then yes we could significantly increase the likelihood of particular talents or physical features being present, which would be an advantage. It would in no way force people to take up a particular career; e.g. the ability to sing well as a teenager does not force one to persue a career as a pop star. Predisposing people to take a specific career Brave New World style would require actual redesign of human neurology with significant new genetic content, a vastly harder (and for now, effectively impossible) task.

That said you might be able to achieve the same result via cybernetics; grow some nanowire electrodes into the child's pleasure centers and/or implanted dopamine releases, connect to computer that determines if child is doing something relevant to target activity / measures task performance, presto they are motivated to train specified skills / move into a certain profession via cybernetics. Obviously this is a horrible breech of human rights and is only something a totalitarian dystopia would do.

[Broomstick]

If we had "designer babies", they would probably be expensive and therefore they would potentially only be an option for the rich. So we could have a genetically superior upper class, which would give the rich even more of an advantage over everyone else than they already have.

Or else we'll have a bunch of rich people who are pretty ornaments but not extraordinary intellects, or who are jocks but, again, with no other talents. "Superior" is defined in so many ways, we may not wind up with ubermensch who are superior in all ways. Also, there are tradeoffs in biological systems. Engineer your kids to be really tall and they might wind up with all sorts of back and joint problems down the line, as an example.

Also, some shits would certainly try to eliminate things like blackness and gayness.

Certainly. And there will be some who will try to engineer in stuff like unique skin, hair, or eye colors or combinations of same, or pointed ears, or some other sort of nonesense that will effectively make the kids freaks.

Secondly, most kids are going to be made from a template. This leads back to point one and really points out that your kid is not really your kid.

Given the lengths to which people go to have a child with their genes this may not ever become common. Certainly, early on it's going to be combining egg and sperm then modifying the result, which will retain some, probably most, of the genetic diversity and genetic mixing we have had up until now. Manufacturing a genome from scratch is unlikely to be feasible or desirable.

And finally, by engineering your kid for a specific 'goal', you're limiting what they can do. Is it fair to remove a child's choice by designing them to be professional pianists, athletes, models, etcs? A freedom of choice in your life is a huge component of Western thought.

Part of the issue with that is that the traits of a professional pianist, athlete, model, etc. are just traits and would require the proper environment in which to be developed. It's not enough to simply engineer that into the genome (even if we knew enough to manage all the complex variables), you then need to guide the kid into the "proper" channels with no guarantee the kid will cooperate or continue in that trade once they reach adulthood and can make their own decisions.

I also would like to say I am not against removing genetic maladies from children before their born. I think that is probably something we really should be striving for.

So you are for genetic engineering and "designer" babies?

No, I get what you mean - engineering, but focused on the benefit of the child, not the whims and desires of others. If I recall, we've had prior threads on similar topics.

[Simon_Jester]

Predisposing people to take a specific career Brave New World style would require actual redesign of human neurology with significant new genetic content, a vastly harder (and for now, effectively impossible) task.

Nitpick: Brave New World predates the invention of genetics as we know it, and predates the discovery of DNA by 15 years. There's massive manipulation of children to make them grow up as desired in the book, but it's almost all done by 'nurture,' not nature. Such as deliberately exposing fetuses to Fetal Alcohol Syndrome while in the artificial womb, to make sure the Epsilons, Deltas, and Gammas grow up to varying degrees of stuntedness and stupidity.

If we had "designer babies", they would probably be expensive and therefore they would potentially only be an option for the rich. So we could have a genetically superior upper class, which would give the rich even more of an advantage over everyone else than they already have.

Or else we'll have a bunch of rich people who are pretty ornaments but not extraordinary intellects, or who are jocks but, again, with no other talents. "Superior" is defined in so many ways, we may not wind up with ubermensch who are superior in all ways. Also, there are tradeoffs in biological systems. Engineer your kids to be really tall and they might wind up with all sorts of back and joint problems down the line, as an example.

On the other hand, engineer your kids to have a mean IQ of 140, a metabolism that keeps them physically fit even if they can't or don't take time to exercise, and need no more than four hours of sleep a night, and they will probably have a workplace advantage over the normals. And all those things are probably at least vaguely possible for genetic engineering, since there are people who already do have those traits. We know it's possible.

Which is more of the concern.

Basically, if you can plunk down a million dollars to get a baby with that list of enhancements, then you will see a LOT of millionaires having children like that. Who then proceed to inherit their parents' money and become the next generation of elite, with both financial and genetic advantages of their own.

You may also see a class of "genetic indentured servants" whose parents took out monster loans against the child's future earnings to engineer them that way. It's frightening, but it's not all that much different from what we now do with college loans.

[Lord of the Abyss]

On the other hand, what happens when you have these societies that have only a tiny genetically engineered elite in a sea of "normals", and then they look at their more socialist-minded competitors who have decided to instead go with "designer babies for everyone!" ? That'll likely cause unrest against the "elite" in many places, and put such societies at a huge disadvantage.

[Simon_Jester]

Given the current global order, there may not be any such societies for the next several decades, which are willing to plunk down massive sums of money per child to give them genetic augmentation. At least, not any with the resources to do that much genetic engineering.

The only exception I can think of off the top of my head might be China. Not because "rargh they are COMMUNIST;" they really aren't anymore. But because the existing Chinese technocracy, while it has many many faults, has one significant virtue. It's shown that it's willing to build and do whatever it must build and do to make sure China is a more prosperous and successful country 20-30 years down the line.

Mandatory birth control to prevent overpopulation? New system of capitalist investment that contradicts everything Mao and Enlai wanted? Massive grid of nuclear reactors to anticipate rising costs of fossil fuel? Entire new cities that will predictably be needed by future generations of immigrants moving from the countryside to the cities?

Whatever it takes.

[Starglider]

There's massive manipulation of children to make them grow up as desired in the book, but it's almost all done by 'nurture,' not nature.

That was what made it a good reference, even though it would not work as written it illustrates that genetics alone are insufficient to determine career.

Which is more of the concern. Basically, if you can plunk down a million dollars to get a baby with that list of enhancements,

Oh get over it. New technology is almost always expensive to start with, but if it's popular the cost will quickly come down to mass-market affordability. The basic procedures involved are not inherently expensive, the genetics part is almost completely automatable.

[K. A. Pital]

Let's not kid ourselves - the only real good which interests the upper class is dominance (Orwell said - the goal of power is power, the goal of torture - torture); if current demonstrations of dominance are not enough, technology (even a widely available one) can be used to create essentially a caste society, a permanently locked hierarchic Disneyland with a death penalty, in the words of Gibson.

So please do not refer to the lack of inherent technological limitations for universal trans- or posthumanism. That is irrelevant if the upper class wants a good which they will not be able to have in a society of mass-created superior humans - dominance.