If it were scientifically possible to determine that your unborn child had an 87% chance at becoming a psychopath, but you had the option of genetically correcting it, would you do it?
Hypothetically let say in the near future genome mapping takes big leaps. They can determine off certain gene sequences which unborn child will have more than 87% chance of eventually being a psychopath. There was a mix up at the lab, your child was screened for it instead of the intended child and your child had the ”psycho sequence”. They tell you that they have an experimental procedure where they can genetically alter the developing child to make him/her more docile and less likely to end up a killer, supposedly. Would you go for it, or take your chances with a regular birth and just be more diligent checking for any hint of psychopathology, or acute aggression?
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What are the list of things that could potentially go wrong with the experimental procedure? That would have a lot of weight in my decision.
My anthro teacher touched up on this today. I hate that idea. It’s playing God and pre determining something not 100%. Sad thing is, the world will be like GATTACA one day because companies don’t want to pay, “weak” gene people health care.
Yes, I would take the chance.
I wouldn’t meddle with it but I’d have no problem with someone else who wants to. As for the “playing god” aspect, I really don’t see the issue there.
@King_Pariah Playing God in the sense, that we will pre-determine and mess around with the Genome in the first place. Like were machines. I think a child becoming a psychopath is far less dangerous than a sociopath, which I think you’re referring to @Hypocrisy_Central Because a pyschopath usually has problems with themselves, sociopaths have no regard for others and tend to be killers.
@ANef_is_Enuf What are the list of things that could potentially go wrong with the experimental procedure? Myself, I would imagine the likely side effects could/might be, but not limited to:
• It just would not work at all.
• It could cause them to be aggressive where they might not have.
• Stunt their grown, giving them less than normal height and weight.
• Narcolepsy.
• Insomnia
• The very least, mental retardation.
Science is science, but I never really thought they would do something like that if death was greater than 1.09%
@dreamwolf I know what “playing god” is, I just have no problem with people doing it. Hell, I want to become a bio/genetic engineer because I like “playing god” as you call it.
I would consider abortion.
@King_Pariah I don’t have a problem with it either, except when you start messing with genomes and artificially enhance a human being from its embryonic state. I’m just down with nature like that. I’m not against people getting prosthetics or anything like that. But will I stand for a world that says, “ah lets genetically enhance this kid to be a football player, ah lets enhance this kids fine motor skills so he’ll shred on a guitar and be a legend, ah, ah ah etc…”
@dreamwolf genetic alterations and enhancements sounds fun to me, even idealistic, I think a few other jellies can testify that I am perhaps obsessed with HeLa cells and biological immortallity, so as you can see, I find genetic alterations/enhancements to be utterly fascinating.
@King_Pariah well then get off fluther and hit the books harder, your future is about 5 years away, theyre already selling stem cells. good luck with your findings. just remember this, with out electricity, nothing works. random yes, fact, yes.
Better to keep our grubby paws out of our genes.
@dreamwolf I’m very well aware of that. I’m also aware that by roughly 2035–2050 mankind will probably obtain biological immortality thanks to HeLa and genetic tampering. I’m also aware that the rich already have a toe in the door to biological immortality since telomerase is being sold.
Telling me to hit the books harder, how amusing… Tell me, is West Point hard enough?
@King_Pariah What’s hard enough is your time spent. I didn’t mean to offend you. Immortality? Sounds like something a virus could easily, “man handle.”
No I would enjoy the company… but I would consider the geneticist as worse than a psychopath. Like Geordi La Forge said about his blindness that everyone should have a chance at life and the technology to make him see helped save one of the Enterprise’s missions… (Someone please find the exact quote please?) I think all of nature is eventually useful in solving problems… even the stuff we don’t like now.
Hmm..I think I’d go ahead without any intervention. I wouldn’t take the risk of those side effects in a million years. There’s still a possibility that the baby will be fine and healthy.
@King_Pariah I shudder to think. Immortality sounds like the King ‘mare of nightmares ;)
It sounds way to close to the days when Lobotomies were the ground breaking procedure to fix mental illness. When you make them more docile, how much personality do they lose? Rent the movie ‘Francis’ (a 1982 movie about the actress Francis Farmer). It may make you think twice about your answer.
After considering any potential risks, yes.
Also, every time a doctor saves a life or cures a disease, he is “playing god” as well. Every time someone gets a prosthetic limb, he is “playing god” by altering the fate that “god” has ordained form him (being limbless). Every time a doctor saves a baby and puts it in an incubation pod that would otherwise have died in a miscarriage, he is “playing god”. The “playing god” card is not a valid argument.
I’m curious to know how those of you who said “no,” would plan to deal with it if/when your child began to act strangely. 87% is pretty significant, and to the best of my knowledge there is currently no treatment considered to be effective.
Nope. But if the kid starts to show signs then I will sleep with a gun under my pillow. The day he tries to saunter in my room with a knife in his hands is the last day he has. LOL
No but no. If they can’t figure it out than they can figure out a way after he is born and maybe do some adjusting then.
That would be wife’s my choice, unless the genetic modification would endanger her. If it did, then I’d voice my choice for abortion.
However, the decision would ultimately be her’s, and I’d try to support her in whatever one she made.
No. Being a psychophat is not in his genes ONLY. It is influenced but the urges can be corrected by a good education. And I’m not talking about school but parents and friends who help him deal with it.
@ANef_is_Enuf I wouldn’t care if my kids acted strange. If they acted like everyone else, oh boy, we’d have trouble then, I’d have to straighten them out and teach them about individuality.
@dreamwolf I’m not talking about just being “strange,” I’m talking about indications that the 87% chance of becoming a psychopath were likely happening.
@ANef_is_Enuf OH haha. Well if my kid were to become a pyschopath, I couldn’t blame him. I live in the greatest nation on the world. To know more than half the world can not obtain hot water, clean drinking water, food, macbooks, internet, to finally take that all in is enough to make one go psychotic if they thought about it enough.
@dreamwolf being psychotic and psychopathy are not the same thing.
Psychosis indicates a problem differentiating between reality and fantasy.
Psychopathy is a disorder with common traits like a lack of empathy, an inability to love or feel guilt, an absence of connection to other living things, reckless and irresponsible behavior, a tendency to lie and deflect blame, and often a penchant for violence or crime… usually while being very good at appearing “normal.” Many, or most, notable serial killers were considered to be psychopathic.
@ANef_is_Enuf I always thought sociopath meant lack of empathy or feelings towards others. At least, thats what I learned in college.
@dreamwolf that’s accurate. Both disorders share similar traits, including a lack of empathy.
I would send Junior to live with my mother in law after taking my chances.
I always wonder about people who think that employing precise generic engineering is “playing god.” I wonder if you would accept having a mate randomly assigned to you. If not, then in my mind, you are hypocrites. When you choose a mate, you are engaging in genetic engineering. Modern science just allows us to be a teeny bit more precise.
The key here is the “teeny.” I would not let anyone mess with my kids’ genes yet. I am unwilling to accept the premise. Development of a mental illness requires both a generic and environmental component. The 87% figure is bogus. No one can know because no one can predict the environment. As a parent, forewarned is forearmed. I would take my chances on being able to use education to keep my kid from turning into a psychopath.
I do not believe the genetic configuration for mental illness will ever be understood as well as, say, the genetic understanding of eye color. There are too many variables.
I am more than an interested bystander. I carry genes for both cystic fibrosis and for bipolar disorder. i also have children, at least one of whom carries the cf gene.
@wundayatta I thought psychopathy was thought to be far more likely to be determined by genetic, rather than environmental, factors.
I’m 87% certain I would maybe choose to genetically correct my unborn child.
I wouldn’t. Psychopathism and sociopathism is as much a product of upbringing as genetics, so I would just make sure my kid is raised well.
@ddude1116 I respectfully submit that I doubt that is true. Parenting may well have an effect on pathology but is not likely to be a major cause.
To answer the question: There are many defects that I would not want to alter but I would not want to have a sociopathic or psychopathic child. I would abort or possibly, genetically alter the child.
@ddude1116: genetics have proven to have a pretty good impact on all kinds of things. I couldn’t live with myself bring a child into the world with such a great chance of harming others.
@janbb Well, it hasn’t had any conclusive evidence as to whether or not that is true, but it is what I believe of the matter.
@Neizvestnaya But also keep in mind that there is a 13% chance of not having a psychopath, and the added knowledge of the possibility would mean that as the child reaches adulthood, he or she could have a psychological exam, in addition to regular physicals, to determine the state they’re in.
@ddude1116 Not good enough odds for me and as for the idea of testing, there is very little mediation that could be done if the child were found to be a psychopath.
I can think of very few things more painful in life than to be the parent of a murderer or anyone with no moral conscience.
Depending on how far along I was, I’d sooner consider an abortion.
If the child had a 87% of having another type of handicap, I would take my chances.
But while I think that I have a right to make my own (and my child’s) choice(s);
I don’t think it’s fair to take a chance with other people’s lives.
I’d like to think that it’s more nurture than nature,
but I don’t know which one is stronger.
@ANef_is_Enuf I don’t believe anyone knows with any great accuracy how much of any particular mental disorder is related to genetics or environment. What I am almost certain of, is that either one on their own is not enough. You have to have some environmental factors to trigger a genetic susceptibility.
Therefore, if you can control the environmental factors well enough, the genetic susceptibility doesn’t matter. The hypothetical 87% is therefore movable. How far it can be moved, I don’t know.
Genes contain multiple programs. The program that runs depends on how the body needs to respond to the environment, which depends on environmental conditions.If the environmental conditions that trigger a specific response never occur, then the response is never triggered, and that program is never run. Genetic programs can’t run all by themselves. They can only run when the genes get information that the program needs to run. Of course, they gene may perceive environmental conditions where they don’t actually exist, so there is error in the process.
We can’t, at this stage of knowledge, sort out nature vs nurture. I don’t think we will ever be all that accurate, although I’m sure the accuracy will improve. At least for some things. Mental illnesses will always be too complex for accurate predictions, I bet. You might abort or mess with the genes based on this assessment, but I think it’s just as likely you will make things worse no matter what remedy you take. If you abort, you have no idea what the next child will be like, if you can even conceive again. If you take the genetic manipulation—well, you have no idea what it will do and what the unintended or unnoticed consequences will be.
@ddude1116: I’d much rather err on the side of caution. With tests like these then I could have more viable children.
I am completely against genetic engineering on children. If it can be PROVEN that the child will be a danger to society, it should be aborted. If there is any doubt otherwise, warn the parents and step aside.
Killing is better than tweaking genetically? Guess that gives new meaning to throwing the baby out with the bath water.
@Hypocrisy_Central
I don’t necessarily disagree with you. But if you could increase the intelligence of the unborn baby by 30–40 points, would you? Or is it only defects that cause you grief.
@Hypocrisy_Central if the procedure were guaranteed to work, or was unlikely to cause harm, I might consider it. The problem for me isn’t with genetic “tweaking,” it’s with the odds against a positive outcome for the child.
@Jaxk But if you could increase the intelligence of the unborn baby by 30–40 points, would you? If I knew there was going to be with great certainty the child would be born with dullness, 80–75 IQ, it would make a better case for me barring any for sure handicaps or disabilities. If the child would otherwise be normal, I still see tweaking as miles better than killing it, a child alive is always better. You never know what you might be able to accomplish. If I had the thought science was more than sure I would have a kid left unaltered would be a killer, I would go for some fine tuning.
@ANef_is_Enuf The problem for me isn’t with genetic “tweaking,” it’s with the odds for a positive outcome for the child. With a child that is no longer alive to be born the lack of a possitive outcome is 100% not. I would take my chances with a live child, at least there is some percent of a positive outcome.
@ANef_is_Enuf It wasn’t. The question was do you have a normal child with the likelihood of becoming a killer, or do you tweak the DNA gentetically to try to erase or overwrite that thinking. People decided those two options were not good enough and injected abortion into it. Abortion was never intended to be apart of the discussion. The whole ideal was to have a child, not distroy it because situations after the birth would be too hard.
@Hypocrisy_Central I don’t like the 87%, and the experimental procedure was not convincing, either. I would abort. Nowhere in the hypothetical question did it say that I had to have the child.
Whether or not 13% is a good enough chance for another parent, well that’s up to them. It’s not a set of odds that I’m comfortable with bringing a child into the world under. That’s my prerogative.
Off topic, but does anyone else think it’s neat seeing Hypo’s Neffie drawing right above her avatar? :)
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