I am hopeful for this technology. I'm 27. Only found out 4 years ago I have a genetic heart arrhythmia. It's incurable, and I will eventually suffer from heart failure. I fear having children and passing it on to them. Hopefully gene editing can be used for benign purposes.
There are plenty of pace maker inventions that have less risks but I appreciate your caution in reproduction, it might make you an as considerate parent.
@@notthatguy4703 _"Well actually crisper came from the west, so it’s more like a proper product. Invented in America: made in China"_ CRISPR isn't an American product. It's been a work in progress since the 80's, starting in Japan, then moving to Europe in Spain and the Netherlands, then moved to the US with many American together with international research teams. Why do people often assume things like this are American?
I dont know why you need your son to have bat-like wings.... But asking for the child to be immune to venom means that you're an irresponsible parent who cant even watch over his own child.....
Yeah, scientisis actually love unethical experiments... when they're done by someone else. So they can both berate the bastard who did horrible things to people AND enjoy that useful data he produced.
The most cited incident of unethical science is during WW2 but it’s also been widely acknowledged that the research was fundamentally flawed. Especially those of mengela, his experiments were so thinly veiled in science that he had to keep two sets of note books to try and fool people if the Germans lost the war.
So many scientists I've spoken to or heard lectures from are still really callous about the treatment of lab animals and it makes me sick. Mice aren't even very good models for humans at all and we waste so much time torturing them to find out what affected them doesn't even work on humans. For them to call things unethical, especially something as relatively benign as this is ridiculous.
@Goroei Noble And so we must survive it. Unfortunately, humanity are too occupied in fighting among themselves. It will be a shame if they died again. If the do, then they do not deserve a second chance... Even after the two world wars. Pathetic.
@@criticalcontraption874 Nope... Just a human who grows tired of human strife. It is both amusing and a shame by this point in our history. As if they learned nothing. All is the same but on a different day. The cycle has yet to be broken. lol
I agree with the thesis of the video. Science must be careful. However a question brought up was "should we change human evolution" and the answer is absolutely yes. I would want my child to be free from things like Cystic Fibrosis, MND, Alzheimer's and hell I wouldn't even mind if their physical abilities were increased in a minor way. Just because humans evolved naturally doesn't mean we can't take control of our evolution
Ethics are a system of rules with which we agree on doing certain things. Its just a matter of time before CRISPR or future and more efficient and cheaper succesor becomes widely if not globaly accepted as moraly correct (due to the latter being meerly subjective and fluctuable over the span of the evolution of both the social species and concecuently their ethic and moral systems)
Yeah, it's going to happen, and we've already been actively fighting against our evolution for thousands of years, depending on how you view it. I would guess we're at least 5 years away from it becoming safe to try on humans.
On my last day of repro phys, my professor casually mentioned that he cured lupus with CRISPR like six year ago, but it still hasn't made it to human trials. He's pretty glad, because he doesn't do human medicine. "Oops, I cured a genetic disorder when I was playing with the new CRISPR we got" was the tone I got.
Lupus is an autoimmune disease, not a genetic disorder. Genes can make you more susceptible to developing autoimmune diseases of all stripes, but it seems highly unlikely gene editing could “cure” any of them. I suppose the treatment could sort of teach the immune system to stop misidentifying what to attack which would stop disease activity in something like Lupus.
I’d love some gene editing for my chronic illnesses. To wake up with energy and not be in pain already? To be able to do simple chores without exhaustion and numbness? I’d do anything
@@TheTechBite I'm still being tested for disorders but so far I've been diagnosed with fibromyalgia and peripheral neuropathy. I'm being tested for a disorder in which your body no longer knows how to get rid of fat so that even with diet and exercise you can't lose weight, and I'm having my genome sequenced to look for genetic disorders that could be influencing why I have a multitude of problems.
There's way too much paranoia over technologies like this, especially given that miscarriages and abortions are a regular thing already. oH nO, bAbIeS dOn'T cOnSeNt To BeInG mOdIfIeD... no one consents to existing or choosing particular biological parents, either. There're a lot of reasons to look into this further and try to lower its costs
@@MyNontraditionalLife What questions are left to be answered? We already know how to do it and we know what to change to prevent a huge range of genetic diseases? What question is still unanswered that we should wait for before we start using this to make healthier people?
@@koori049 Well, Hank just explained. I'm going to make a list for you: - Crispr cuts wrong places in the genome sometimes, which could lead to unknown mutations on ALL the cells of the person. - The tech needs to mature and the kinks have to be worked out. From this experiment alone, the mutation on the CCR5 gene is different from the wild type. Moreover, imperfect technique means the gene is not even in all her cells, which has defeated the purpose of having taken the risk in the first place. Things haven't gone exactly according to plan. - There could be disastrous consequences from this even if the unintended mutation (if it occurs) is not deadly. - These UNINTENDED mutations will be present in the germ line, meaning it will be passed on to descendants and spread. - IF disastrous consequences happen in early experiments like this, social resistance to the technology could set us back in this research in decades, maybe. I mean, I'm all for gene editing in living adults, as well as enhancing humans beyond our comprehension, but only if the protocols are effective, PRECISE and well established.
Koori049 To add to that, even if we know exactly which genes we need to alter, it's not as simple as just turning things on or off. Take the CCR5 gene for example, not only does it effect the HIV virus, it also controls white blood cell trafficking. People with this mutation are more susceptible to west nile virus, and possibly other similar diseases. So even assuming things go according to plan, it's not necessarily a win-win for the recipient.
@@leoceoliveira The Bar for accuracy in CRISPR is already pretty high. The off site edits are only 20% when done with the best technique and technology and with a germ line you can check to make sure the cells you use are the ones that were on site. Saying 20% therefore dont bother is kinda ridiculous. If its bad technique that we should be concerned about then why not let people who have good technique do it instead. The unintended mutations will absolutely not be present in all descendants you're just wrong here and so is hank because you have forgotten what we are talking about. In 20ish years when these kids want to start making babies of their own this tech will still be here in fact it will be better i would wager. If the technology we have already is used we can already eliminate most of the problems you listed. actually most of them are only problems because the tech is being held back by the moratorium. You worry about it being held back decades? well its too late for that we already did by restricting the research and now that the tech is ready we have to wait around for holdouts who will never change their mind while Dr He who didnt have all the knowledge/skills that CRISPR specialists already do is going to go out and make a bunch of designer babies without those skills. The chances of serious mistakes being made are much higher now then they would be if the moratorium was ended and the technology used by pros.
Sure, it's going to happen eventually, but there are safer ways to do this with incremental steps and oversight. Like once Sputnik happens in 1957, you know that eventually there will be people in space - that doesn't mean you strap a living cosmonaut/astronaut to the very next rocket
@@obiwac Actually the whole human genome system has been mapped out so we do. It's just the safety preccausions slowing research.In one way or another we have to alter genes.
@@littlesayonara3216 i think you misunderstand that info. We have it mapped out, but it doesnt mean we know what to change to achieve traits as complex as intelligence... As a metaphor we know what chemical reactions happen in our brain but that doesnt mean we know how our brain works
obiwac You could potentially cause defects to the myostatin producing genes to cause an increase in muscle production. This happened naturally with some cows and dogs, as well as rare cases in humans. This could increase strength.
read my post again. you seem to not understand what i said. they already exist. the best thing to do is to understand it scientifically and not pretend that it's not there.
Parents may not truly understand the impacts of genetic engineering, not even Scientists are 100% able to guarantee it works yet so i personally feel that more research into it is better than immediately jumping into it head first
The West was just pissed they didn't do it first. Harvard scientists are gonna CRISPR edit human sperm, *_WHERE'S THE OUTRAGE???_* ...oh yeah, Harvard's scientists are WHITE. When the West does something first, it's a Discovery! But, when anyone else does it first, it's Condemned! Besides, if you want X-Men, this is how you do it.
How ironic that this has been "universally condemned" when we probably know that every other country is also trying to achieve what this scientist did.
Dennis Koh crispr was invented in the US, not China. The only reason it didn’t happen there is because of moral reasons. Not because they weren’t able to.
@@dumbledorethered9513 did not know this so i went to read up more on it. Apparently the discovery of clustered DNA repeats occurred independently in three parts of the world. The first was at Osaka university in 1987. The second in The Netherlands in 1993 and the third was in Spain. However i still have not fully read through each research articles and you may be right that the US might be the first to do testing or something but i have not seen any mention of the US in the role of CRISPR in my 10 minutes of research. Will definitely read up more on this interesting topic.
Same old stigma. If the west does it, it’s supported both morally and scientifically but if the east does it, it’s “universally condemned” because of bias and jealousy.
I think that's most people's problem with it. We don't like the idea that someone could pay to gain an advantage over us (even though it happens all the time already)
@Proger13 10 That is a LOT harder to do The genetic change would have to take over all of your cells Or the scientists would have to replace the dna in every of your cells It is much easier to change the DNA is one stem cell and let a human grow out of it with the altered DNA
Ehh it's not really proof l mean you're looking at a very small portion of the world and their are a lot of scientist across the world and apparantly most of them were against doing this right now.
CancerousCyan Oh no it means a lot. People lots of the time have no clue how governments work, yet people are how the government stays running. Public opinion is everything.
I'm going to go against the flow here and say that it may be better for the future of edited babies that this happened. Pandora's box is open now, and no matter what happens to these babies, at least we will have something to look back on years ahead of when we plan to edit babies ethically. Imagine how much easier it will be to propose editing a baby now that it has already been done and we can look back on it with foresight. Maybe 100 years from now, He will be praised for the one scientist that decided to take a leap of faith.
Gene Editing doesn't just stop at cosmetic and curing diseases...Gene Editing can also be used to artificially enhance human physical and mental abilities....and it doesn't stop just there either; we could push science even more and create artificial genes to add to a human's gene pool to create even more genetically "perfect" super human being...although calling them human might not be accurate at this point because human are by nature supposed to be imperfect....these genetically perfect beings of the future will almost certainly mean human extinction (as we knew it), where only beings with the latest perfect gene editing technology will be able to survive and all others will be obsolete!!!
Fair enough, however if something does go wrong it could very easily set back progress. If regulatory institutions feel the need to put more restrictions on these types of experiments in concern for safety then development will slow down. Public Opinion is something that is important to consider as well (Any disaster could potentially turn people away from the technology not dissimilar to the way that Chernobyl has done for the nuclear industry despite our advancements since then). Hopefully they gleam a lot of valuable information from this test. I, too, am quite hopeful for this technology, but at the same time it's important to be cautious. So many experts are saying that we need more information before going ahead with this and it's difficult to see fault in that line of reasoning
TBH, we've been editing the babies for years now. The only controversy is that we didn't murder these ones. Even if they develop a mutation that medically is too dangerous to ethically allow them to reproduce, they still had a better life than the millions of humans that die in test tubes. We've already opened Pandora's box, at least let's learn as much as we can. Remember, at the bottom of Pandora's box was hope...
@@Ranstone There are very real ethical concerns with allowing embryos to come to term without fully understanding how the changes made to them will affect them and their quality of life. Keep in mind that the primary problem with CRISPR editing is that it is not particularly reliable. The targeted Gene is not always edited correctly and there is also the possibility of having genetic damage occur in areas that are intended to be unaffected (though the frequency of this occurring is currently being disputed, hence why more research is required). Even beyond that, even in the event that CRISPR does work perfectly, the human body is a complex thing. Biologists are working with an incomplete picture with how junk DNA, dormant Genes and Gene expression affect an organism, let alone how active coding DNA works in conjunction with other coding DNA. Needless to say, a child who could potentially have a very short life in constant agony would not be a preferable existence to a 'murdered' zygote which is physically incapable of thought or feeling. This field of research is important, and some risks will inevitably need to be taken eventually. But that does not mean going about it this way is best (neither ethically nor efficiently). Science is not advanced through 'leaps of faith'. It is done through research, observation, theorization, refinement, and patience.
@@doble-B I understand your point but we just have to be extra cautious and prepared when it comes to humans (I'm not necessarily referring to crisper I mean in general). There's just so much more we need to learn when it comes to genetics.
Walker every 26 seconds a baby died of hunger even though we have enough food to feed everyone and thru 20℅ but instead we thru 30-35℅ and let them died so if it's required the sacrifice of couples of baby to have the million I'm all for it.
you didn't get it do you? let say the experiment goes wrong, and these newborn babies get married with you in the future, and who knows, your kids might be born looks like alien or baby pig for example..
Everyone in this comment section seems to be so supportive of this technology and it's rapid implementation, but you're missing the fact that if there is even a minor slip up, that slip up can be transferred onto later generations if that genetically modified person is able to reproduce. The potential consequences are vast, meaning that we MUST be extremely careful about using this on humans. There are no "prototypes" or "drafts" with this. If scientists mess up, it's messing up a human's life forever, as well as thousands of others, potentially. Don't get me wrong, I think this innovation is revolutionary, and will no doubt be used in the future, but we must exercise extreme caution when dealing with human lives.
@Isaiah Hammond I agree, I'm just stating why it's so risky. Eventually, research will be done, no matter how controversial it may be. However, we do need to make sure that it isn't done haphazardly, as the guy did in this video.
The alternative would be to let millions of lives be taken by HIV, and others destroyed by Down syndrome, autism (which is genetically influenced) or even Huntington’s. You either let more lives be affected by these horrible conditions, or you take some risks and possibly save millions of lives in the long run.
Spreading it onto further generations is dangerous, however I don't think that saying it could ruin a human's life is a reasonable statement. So many other animals' lives were ruined by these experiments. It's easier to empathize with another human, but let's be honest, nothing makes the life of another species more valuable then any other.
@@sagi-dg8ht actually there are some anxiety disorders that can be passed on but evidences are still scarce. Anxiety also could be caused by environmental factors. So you're half right.
Sorry to dissappoint but I think anxiety doesn't get passed through genes, since it's (mostly) a hormonal disorder and usually was caused by environtment (traumatic events, stress, bad living place, etc) or other diseases. Anyway I wish your anxiety get better yo
only problem is that this is the HUMAN RACE we are talking about here. We're not good at getting along. Some people will take advantage of it. Rich and powerful people will get it first and also last. They won't let lesser people's obtain it because they would be superior. Thus begining a dystopian society.
Evolution in real life doesn't happen in "stages" like with pokemon or superheroes. It is a slow, gradual process. Gene-editing could be the end of evolution by natural selection acting upon random mutations and the beginning of artificial selection acting upon designed sequences. CRISPR could be used to either help or harm the human race, and if the development of new technologies in the past is any indication, it will be used for both.
Garnet S Word highly doubt that since majority of discoveries and advancements are accomplished by men, so unless you want progress to stagnate this won't happen
The germ line being edited in China isn't as risky as it would be in the West. This is because the Chinese government would be perfectly okay with castrating or purging gene-edited children ( and their offspring if they made the decision too late) if they decided they were a dangerous failed experiment. Obviously such a solution would be impossible in a liberal society, so we couldn't afford it coming to that.
Hmmm, I don't know, making humans resistant to more diseases seems like it's also moral. Not at this point, because the research isn't there yet, but once it is. Not just corrective, and not just as a last resort. (Edit for clarity: I'm referring to the mentioned apparent consensus that such technology, even once believed to be fully understood and even once thoroughly tested, would only be considered moral in cases where it was correcting an illness with absolutely no other cure or treatment available. This is a viewpoint with which I believe I disagree. To reiterate, I do not believe at all that we're at the level of research/knowledge/understanding of genetics to include resistances or immunities as something which can be done to humans, morally, at this point. I do, however, believe that adding these traits in the future, once we fully understand them, would not necessarily be immoral. If I'm understanding what was stated in the video correctly, the current medical and scientific community believes that gene editing technology, such as crispr, would be moral _if and only if_ it were used in the last resort, incurable, untreatable genetic illness scenario, _even in the future_. It is that position which I am questioning and which I have settled on tentative disagreement with. I don't necessarily agree with the creation of humans which have other types of "super" abilities, I simply believe disease resistance and immunity can be moral traits to add to a human, _once fully understood_. I hope this cleared things up!)
In situations like this its possible to check your work prior to implantation. State of the art CRISPR techniques will have the desired effect on someething like 70-80% of the cells which is not enough to use in vivo on adults because the 20-30% of misses are not just no effect but can be very detrimental. but if you are working with individual cells you can make the change then check to see if the modification was on target before using that cell. Thats why they can modify blood cells or marrow out of the body then reintroduce the modified cells. This isnt much different except you intend to grow a person from the modified cell. the tech to do the modification is very much ready, and we know a long list of genes that are worth fixing.
On it's own perhaps, but the problem is it could cause a chain reaction. If we make ourselves 'adapt' to a disease then the bacteria or virus responsible could also mutate and adapt, which could cause all sorts of problems down the road. Look at vaccine for example, even something as simple as that can cause the target to adapt, and they became resistant to the vaccine.They So it's not so much that we shouldn't do it, we just have to be very meticulous about it.
@@MrQlife Depends what you consider super soldier. Being the smartest one of the battlefield is the... smartest way to achieve that. Funny how this scientist first mentioned IQ enhancing.
@@hrzagen7603 but we might be able to live on Mars if we "create" humans that are resistant to high concentrations of perchlorate compounds (which is actually the major issue of sending people to mars, as it's basically poison to humans and it can get everywhere, even into their suits)
Biologist here. To all the people saying that we should not stop progress because of old fashioned morals etc.: this chinese guy did not do anything revolutionary, the method is well known and used all the time in plants and other animals but it has a very high offtarget rate, cutting in places it is not supposed to. When you work in plants, you cross your mutant with wildtype plants several times, selecting for the mutation you want, to get rid of the other mutations but you can't do that with humans. CRISPR increases the risk of cancer and other illnesses in humans, that's why it should only bei used to cure deadly diseases in the moment.
+Ella Tessa. The problem stems from what the chinese govt intends to do with this technology. If you think communists are going to use it cure genetic defects or diseases then you're spectacularly, dangerously naive. They intend to weaponize this, either by turning it into a mutagen that can be dispersed on the battlefield or turning it into a serum to make super-soldiers.
Yixin Chen I googled “is China communist” and here’s what i got. “The Communist Party of China, also referred to as the Chinese Communist Party, is the founding and ruling political party of the People's Republic of China.”
@@signofapproval260 Just because a party calls itself Communist doesn't make it Communist. Just because anyone calls themself anything doesn't make them anything. North Korea is officially the "Democratic People's Republic of Korea", are you going to tell me it's a democracy too? China is about as communist as the United States is. EDIT: I agree with your point that China should not be trusted with this kind of technology, I'm just pointing out something separate. Last year I was visiting family in China. We have a friend who's a member of the CCP. I asked him, "Do you think the Chinese Communist Party is communist?" and he replied "Definitely not" instantly.
I'm afraid that once this thing becomes universally normal that it will only be available to the super rich. Imagine a wealthy population of people that are literally better then you in every way at birth
No way Crispr is so simple there’s no way they’d keep it to only the rich. They’d be missing out. Also if it’s edited in early so that they produce offspring with the new traits it makes its way through the entire population
considering the price of obtaining crispr right now even if the treatment for genetic imperfections is 10x what it is now(only editing) it would be available to even lower middle class
If it's universally normal, why would it only be available to the super rich? Keep in mind that it's in everyone's financial interests to make the process as cheap and accessible as possible. Sure, you could offer it to the top 1% for ten million dollars a pop and get kinda rich that way, or you could find a way to offer it to everyone for a hundred dollars each and become a trillionaire.
@@MyNontraditionalLife ill admit i made the comment really early in the video before being fully informed and i can definitely see why this was such a universally frowned upon idea
Next year, Harvard scientists are gonna CRISPR edit human sperm, *_WHERE'S THE OUTRAGE???_* ...oh yeah, Harvard's scientists are WHITE. When the West does something first, it's a Discovery! But, when anyone else does it first, it's Condemned! Besides, if you want X-Men, this is how you do it.
@@callahancovington4278 what? Some ppl don't understand the ramifications of how Changing a gene may screw you up by being susceptible as noted if you payed attention to college microbiology.
there's a lot undercover plus they have a lot of issues (population wise, too many people, but at the same time, not enough babies), contamination, deseases etc
David Gutowski I’m just just saying trusting China on upholding guidelines here is like trusting them to abide by pollution standards, which they only fix after enough attention is brought to them, but otherwise ignored.
The White scientists are just being sore losers because they didn't dare to do it first. Next year, Harvard scientists are gonna CRISPR edit human sperm, *_WHERE'S THE OUTRAGE???_* ...oh yeah, Harvard's scientists are WHITE. When the West does something first, it's a Discovery! But, when anyone else does it first, it's Condemned! Besides, if you want X-Men, this is how you do it.
@@callahancovington4278 dafuq is your problem? Are you on drugs boi? Quit spamming this nonsensical dribble. I wish they edited your genes to make less of an idiot
Or we might rush this technology out too quickly and cure them of a disease, while simultaneously making them even more susceptible to other viruses. Then these genetically modified people pass down their new resistance AND new susceptibilities to their children. I agree that we should continue researching this technology, but let’s not implement it until it is truly ready.
Here is a hot take: If you cant accept death, you were unfit for life to begin with. People who are so unhinged that they would give this race the tools for biological self definement in order to gain a few more years, should be made immortal and sentenced to watch as this race becomes exactly what they wished for: Every person defining them self biologically as whatever they damn please. Welcome to end of the human race within a decade you unhinged muppet.
Ethan Colbert Will you support the failed experiments through their life long suffering? Or would you straight up murder them to relieve them of suffering you forced upon them?
Theoretically... Yes-ish with a lot of question marks... In reality, you'd have to understand both the human and feline genomics down to a "T". And even then, it's possible that the genes for the traits and features you want aren't going to work the same way or may have other unintended consequences. For instance, one of the reasons Humans got a bigger brain to body ratio over other primates and apes is the removal of a gene that codes for stronger jaw muscles and bones. By ditching the mouths that could crush bambo, we ended up with more room for a bigger brainpan and brain. Adding cat ears may require changes to the hearing structures, which could also result in changes in the skull, brainpan, and brain... So, imagine a cat girl that functioned on the level of a toddler and drooled all of the time. Sooooo.... yeah.
My GOD half the comments in this video sound like Mad Scientists!! DOES THE PHRASE “Your scientists were so preoccupied with whether or not they could, they didn’t stop to think if they should.” MEAN ANYTHING TO YOU PEOPLE
But just babies. Make it go away as soon as they're old enough to understand. I want people running at the sight of a baby. *baby giggles* -people- "oh my god run! Hes gonna start shooting lasers!"
@@yuirick There are a lot of things that could end human civilization (anti-biotic resistant super-bugs, AI advancement, general decay of our DNA, war, solar-flairs etc.). Improving the human race via genetic engineering might be a solution to some of these problems, I agree with you as I usually advocate for being cautious and want society to take their time before we do something irreversible, but a lot of people want to stop genetic engineering research altogether.
@@ThePoshboy1 The problems that it's a solution to are less likely than the problems the solution might cause, imo. I mean, I don't think we should stop the research, because if it's not done by someone in an ethical manner, it's done by someone in an unethical one, like it has now.
did it have to be in a COMMUNIST country though? we know the humanitarian track record of communism..... and it's not good, the mountain of human skulls proves it.
@@killman369547 why you bringing communism?.. the country doing pretty well regardless and will probably be the next super power. And this is about science not politics
I am not having children because of my incurable condition. To think if I had something like this, I could continue my family name. Instead, it dies with my husband and I. If this worked and was okay now, who knows how many decades my family line could be.
@ifyouLoveLayandyouknowitclapyourhands _ I have no problem with adopting. But I'm not physically capable to care for a child, cant even take care of myself
Would you risk a trade-off of one incurable condition for another, for generations to come, on the odd chance it may go well once? All for the continuation of a name?
I'm so glad for SciShow cause I would not have known about this otherwise, and this is pretty interesting. This is a questionable experiment and SciShow does a good job on formatting the explanation. #PowerofScience
@@celtgunn9775 why should i belive that? I apreciate your effort if its not a trollpoo. I actually have been overly frank lately I think... moderation and tact.. oh. Ill take a 5 minute break from yt starting now. Really I should get my Doc to order me to be offline for 6 weeks.. wow
I'M SO THANKFUL FOR THIS SCIENTIST! My son Will passed away August 5th after his bone marrow transplant rejected...He was 12. He had a fatal genetic disorder XLP2 or known as XIAP. It's a primary immunodeficiency. He died, his body ate holes in him. He was constantly in excruciating pain. He couldn't fight Any bacteria,fungi, viruses and mono is fatal to people with Xlp2. Many boys don't live past 10yrs old. He also had Nod2, genetic refractory severe Crohns Disease and Blau Syndrome. He had an illiostomy bag and could barely move or walk towards the end of his short life. I watched my child suffer unimaginable pain. Children shouldn't have to die while Drs argue over ethics. Children like my son should have gotten the chance to live to their full potential. What's more ethical letting these children suffer a horrific existence or allowing them to live. Is it more ethical to let them were away?Is it more ethical that I live the rest of my life without my beautiful boy? or that I get to carry on with the fact that I gave my child those genes and gave him a death sentence? What would be more ethical? Abortion? Annihilation? Let these scientists work and progress and make a real change a movement to save millions of lives potentially! We would have never even understood anatomy without Drs illegally using cadavers to explore the human body all those centuries ago. We wouldn't have Any progress with out brave men and women who stepped up to explore and learn. Drs have told me that my son's life and death helped learn more to save other children in the future. But if we can fix the genes more can be saved then by risky bone marrow transplant that either only buy more time or kill them. I'm sure pharmaceutical companies are big opposers to this man's work, imagine a world where they can't make billions off biologics like humira, stellara, remicade, or chemo drugs like methotrexate, thalidomide... I've seen what biologics can do they help for a while then they stop working. my son tried all of them...This is the real solution stop it before it happens by throwing these genes away and replace them with healthy ones! My son shouldn't if had a going to heaven party he should be planning his 13th birthday Jan 30th. Ethics committee bulls**T! More like don't wanna lose money committee....
I like how hank frowns so hard on the research but the comment section is a wall of support. I do agree that this technology has to be pushed forward I am not sure this is the right way to do this but I think not doing it at all is almost worse.
Hank's following the status quo of the Lamestream Media because it's his orders.. next year, Harvard scientists are gonna CRISPR edit human sperm, *_WHERE'S THE OUTRAGE???_* ...oh yeah, Harvard's scientists are WHITE. When the West does something first, it's a Discovery! But, when anyone else does it first, it's Condemned! Besides, if you want X-Men, this is how you do it.
No no no. What He did is not science. Even pro-CRISPR-on-humans scientists were against this. In science, the goal is to produce a falsifiable hypothesis and test it. He's hypothesis was that the children will not acquire HIV. But even if they don't, it doesn't confirm that this gene-edit worked. It would be more likely that they practice safe sex and didn't share needles. And if they do, we already know that there are strains of HIV that don't need the CCR5 protein to enter a cell. So this is a worthless experiment. Just like with drug trials, we should figure it out on animals before we start human testing. And there are people testing it out on animals, so just be patient. Real science takes time.
exactly I'm surprised it took them this long tbh (especially because designer babies and clonning was already a thing, even if banned in most countries)
Yep, and it wasn't the West, so they are sore losers. Harvard scientists are gonna CRISPR edit human sperm, *_WHERE'S THE OUTRAGE???_* ...oh yeah, Harvard's scientists are WHITE. When the West does something first, it's a Discovery! But, when anyone else does it first, it's Condemned! Besides, if you want X-Men, this is how you do it.
@@callahancovington4278 that escalated quickly. This man didn't consult with anyone, if he did it all above the table and everyone agreed that it could go ahead then fine but since he didn't it has caused controversy. He didn't even do what he set out to, he had many attempts and the child that survived still might get HIV. It was a failure which has the potential to open the flood-gates to genetically engineered babies. That's not the way you want to introduce gene editing to the world. Also, It's nothing to do with his race not all Harvard scientists are white, where did you get that idea? (That kind of makes you sound like the racist... Just saying...)
Alex301 The Manhattan project was not the right step, but without it we would never have achieved fission power plants. The H bomb was a horrifying step towards WW3, but if we achieve fusion power plants in the next decade we will owe it to the people who worked on H bomb design and research.
To be sincere it is something that everybody expected from the get go. We live in a competitive world and editing your child to be better (by being handsome, taller, resistant to diseases, more intelligent) just offer to many advantages to just pass by. It's really doesn't matter the policy makers allow or not, or scientific ethics, or law, or anything, people will pay for it, a lot, and where there is demand, there is offer with or without backup from the law.
Which is exactly what makes such a thing so hanous. The saying "life isnt fair" gets thrown around alot, and is often quite true. But the ability to pay your way into being genetically superiour to your peers is one of a truely hanous inequality. It can be equated to paying off the referies in a football game. The other team has no fair shot no matter how much effort, tallent, and concentration they put into thier game, because the game itself is quite literally rigged in your favor.
@@anthonypolonkay2681 - This comparision is flawed on the get go, life is not a game, games are specific enviromnents designed to be fair and select the most talents. But life is not designed, it is not broken, it's just exists.
@@Pedrosa2541 True but that only drives the point home more to be honest. If you think for a second that the genetically superior designed people of varying levels wont fill up all of the professions, careers, and means of living that require any notable level of athletic talent, refined skill, or high intellect then your wrong, essentially you have the very likly and real threat of people who could'nt afford to be genetically viable enough locked into an eternal state of lower class.
Because just like we compete in games, people to compete for the chance to make thier way in life in applying skills, talents, and knowledge, that were not only honed, but which people genuinly emjoyed doing. Anyone who didnt have enough money spent on them in birth will be locked out of all of that, because when you can edit a perfect person for certian attributes, they will always bevthe best at it.
@@anthonypolonkay2681 - Yes, I agree, but life is unfair as you said. Kids who didn't get a high-end education or had come from problematic houses or/and are victims of pos-traumatic stress are worst at work and less succesfull later won than others. It's unfair, it's sad, but is how works and always have been. We even tried to correct this before, with horrible consequences, like USRR and cultural revolution.
Thanks for explaining this. I have autism and being a potential 'in' for this technology gives me the creeps. While I understand the potential for curing genetic ailments, I also worry about what people will define as an ailment that needs curing and just how far people will take it, making children their parents' toys more than their own random people. Honestly, if something isn't going to directly kill me before the age of, say, 50, I'd rather be born and develop some say in the matter.
I don't really understand what you are saying here. If we use gene editing to cure genetic diseases and HIV, wouldn't it be amazing? We are constantly doing gene editing every single day. When you choose your partner, you choose them on various features. Height, skin color, weight, looks are on of the factors whereas, smartness, wealth, overall well being and life outlook being some of the others. When you are doing this, you more or less know how your child will be. The only real randomness is how the child will look like and what mentality he/she will develop, but that comes from upbringing. So, if you are eliminating something which is harmful with little to no side effects, wouldn't it be better? Wouldn't you have liked it if you weren't autistic? If you were born 50 years in the future, your autism might have been removed before you were born and you wouldn't be suffering now. How is any of this bad? Granted that we will have to do some research and beta testing by actually using these techniques on humans at the beginning but in the end its all for the better of humanity in general. In the future we might be living in a world where no disease affects us! Think about it!
@@SahilP2648 I'm not half as tortured by my autism as you seem to be implying. In fact, given the perks it gives me along with the downsides, I'm perfectly fine with it. I'd also rather be consulted on treatment for my condition instead of find out after the fact that my parents invaded my autonomy before I could even know what was going on just to treat something that was not only perfectly survivable, but actually treatable after I could understand everything. Furthermore, mental illness is a spectrum. Yes, you have people who are disabled by it, but you've also got plenty of people who are able to lead perfectly normal lives because of how they were raised and because their forms of mental illness were actually pretty benign. Until you can promise me that you can detect severity of mental illness beyond reasonable doubt, I'd rather roll the dice. My autism IS part of my mentality: it informs how I view the world, and I'd rather not find that was rewritten without my consent. Even if this would lead to a world without disease, at what cost? The guy here jumped the gun and screwed up: this could have and could still turn out badly. He could have given the girl without HIV resistance an autoimmune disorder and we won't know until it shows up. And then there's the fact that we still don't know a lot about human genetics and how many non-scientists know even less than that. Not to mention the question of how granular 'saving a life' is. Parents could want, say, the gene for fair skin changed because it's simply *more likely* to cause skin cancer and lawmakers could say that's a perfectly valid excuse. It's easy to dismiss that as stupid, but things like that have happened before and could happen again. Just to be clear, I'm fine with genetic alterations if it was the only thing that could save the child from certain death before they reached the age that they could give informed consent. Heck, if it was saving them from something that would definitely give them something people with that condition universally consider a life worse than death, I'd be OK with it. Even something that would beyond a shadow of a doubt shorten their lifespan to young adulthood, I could sympathize with. But just the possibility of a harder life or the prospect of social ostracism isn't enough. Life is risk, but people need to know they have and have had as much freedom as they possibly could have in facing it.
@@BattousaiHBr Did you choose to be born without it? Did you even choose to be born at all? There's always going to be some lack of choice in the matter, but I like to believe that lack's as low as possible. Again, I don't mind having autism. My family and friends don't mind me having autism. It gets annoying from time to time, but everyone's learned to roll with it and even help me minimize the downsides of it. I didn't choose to be born with autism, but I did get to choose how to go from there.
@@NimanWielder01 exactly, neither of us chose it so why does it matter? you're not choosing how or where or when you're born regardless of everything else, so why should we keep things natural as much as possible? makes literally no sense. you're fine being autistic, but most people who have autism would prefer to not have autism, and i don't know a single person who doesn't have autism who'd want to have autism, so it makes perfect sense for us to try to eliminate it from newborns. if when you're an adult you decide you wanna be autistic, go for it, no one is gonna stop you.
@@BattousaiHBr It matters because my parents didn't choose how I was born either. All they did was conceive me and promise to love and nurture the result. Having them change me to be what they wanted me to be on such a basic level, unless it would have been the only thing that could save my life, is a violation of my own personhood that will stick around until the end of my life. I would always be the person they built, thinking in a way they deemed acceptable without even having been given the benefit of the doubt or a chance to learn their way of thinking. And again, autism has its ups and downs. I'm more emotional, but I take more joy from things. I don't recognize emotions well, but I have a greater sense of empathy. My short-term memory is faulty but my long-term memory is excellent. Furthermore, it's part of my personality: it gives me studiousness, passion, perfectionism, compassion, intelligence, and a number of other personality traits. Curing me would mean curing all of that; I would be a completely different person. Also, can I have a source for your statement about people with autism? Most people I've seen with autism (including Anthony Hopkins, Mr. Enter, Temple Grandin, Dan Harmon, and Daniel Tammet) don't seem to hate living with autism any more than I do.
Of course science will advance from this, but it's nothing to celebrate. A great crime was committed against two innocent human beings and perhaps all their descendants. Shame.
Another great episode! Unfortunately it was all but inevitable an event like this would occur and be announced. It is also most likely that there are dozens more babies right now around the world that were crispred already like this, without any public announcements, yet. Dr. He will likely be punished pretty severely, but 5+ years from now many will praise him for helping advance CRISPR research so dramatically/abruptly, despite the ethical issues.
Exactly!! Next year, Harvard scientists are gonna CRISPR edit human sperm, *_WHERE'S THE OUTRAGE???_* ...oh yeah, Harvard's scientists are WHITE. When the West does something first, it's a Discovery! But, when anyone else does it first, it's Condemned! Besides, if you want X-Men, this is how you do it.
Obviously it shouldn’t have been done this way, but gene editing is the way of the future. And I definitely believe that preventing diseases or disorders should be a part of the process.
I’m a clinical microbiologist working at the University of Sheffield in the UK, we’ve used CRISPR before on mouse embryos, specifically to knock out IFN-y which results in immunocompromised mice which we use to study infection progression. The mice have expected phenotypes but also display several unexpected features, particularly they develop lesions in their skin not related to infection but instead seem to be related to dysfunction of desmosomes (the genes for which are no where near IFN-y) So yeah, CRISPR is not ready yet. I’d be surprised if this guy keeps his job and license
Shit's turning into Gattaca real fast. I swear, tons of 90s "scifi" was just preparing us mentally for real world events 20 years down the line. It's almost hilarious how many X-Files episodes happened. Although uhh... sometimes I wonder if X-files spawned all the antivaxxers lol.
If this had been done in the West we all know the tone in the so called medical community would be different. Words like 'revolutionary' would have been used.
@@anthonypolonkay2681 playing within the rules? How is causing mass a actual mass extinction event "playing in the rules" CRISPR is also found in bacteria, ie nature, it's also not the first gene editing technique, just the cleanest one we've discovered (meaning it doesnt involve exposing seeds to modified cancer causing bacteria or shooting them full of radiation and using any that developed helpful traits) so even then this is just new because they're the first humans this has been done to.
I'm excited for gene editing. Hope we can get rid of things like the need for glasses and other genetic defects that make life harder or less pleasant for all people long before they're born. I'm glad this scientist did this thing, as dangerous as it is for him and definitely the kids, the rate at which bioengineering was going wasn't fast enough for me so I'm happy it's getting pushed forward finally. I am cautious though, and hope it doesn't stunt the development of the field. I'm confident the many scientists who's entire career is based on this didn't choose the life long career just to shut it down before it even got off the ground as a viable means of helping humanity.
Mutations of the CCR5 gene in white blood cells, although can make individuals resistant to HIV, would still make them very vulnerable to basic viruses like the Flu. HIV enters white blood cells using the CCR5, and although preventing HIV through its removal might be 'moral', there will still be ramifications for removing a chemokines receptor, like I previously mentioned. The area where the children where born didn't have a high HIV infection rate, and in fact, HIV can be preventable by simply avoiding sexual contact. Essentially, increasing their casualties from basic diseases like the flu for prevention of a disease that they're unlikely to get is very immoral.
Glasses will always be around. The eyes get damaged the older we get. Some eyes get damaged faster. Like my eyes shouldnt have gone bad because my Gene's were good and as I aged my lifestyle effected my eye till I turned 12 and needed glasses. By lifestyle I mean when I was 7 I used to stare at the sun for no damned reason since I found it fascinating.
In some ways I would agree with you, in time humanity could benefit from designing babies (I'm not going to go into the ethics because that is irrelevant in this part of the discussion). However there are a number of factors in how society would adapt. For instance (this is just speculation as I have no way of telling the future), assuming that gene editing would be legal for the populace to do as they wished, it might not be commercially feasible for lower/middle class citizens and only a small section of the populace could have access to it, which may create an ever increasing gap between certain sections of humanity. This would also occur for people that do not wish to improve their children, which would continue splitting humanity's paths on where they think they should go in the future (if designer babies becomes sound, a large majority needs to be in agreement and access needs to be universal). It would create further inequalities that cannot be easily handed so as I stated before, we need to actually plan what we intend to do with humanity. Genetic engineering may also lead to significant problems that are impossible to predict. Even if we could analyses every gene and its effects on certain people (which according to my chemistry textbook we can't), predicting the combinations of designer children's children (the way they fight disease, the compatibility of two genetically altered individuals, the potential for genetic mutation to occur, or how designer babies will decide to design more babies) is most certainly impossible for now (and likely the future). At least at the moment we know for the most part that our current genes will survive for a significant period of time. There are a sum of problems also that I haven't covered and you can probably look up (or think up) yourself, but you are right in that humans will have to improve in the future.
@Varietygirl1 "Eugenics" - the science of improving a population by controlled breeding to increase the occurrence of desirable heritable characteristics. Current genetic engineering is something different in that it could changes an individual in one generation as eugenics requires many and would impact society in other ways if used (possible examples (all of which is speculation). cause long term disease, impact mental abilities of individuals, and make a dramatic sudden shift in how individuals power and function in a society, allow for humans to become as intelligent as future AI, create people intelligent enough to solve unsolvable problems, create easily grown food to end world hunger, may start wars etc.) I agree that we should be cautious with this technology, but that is because it raises questions that we haven't answered before.
We should make humans better, but we need to be able to do it reliably, not with error-prone methods. You cannot simply discard people because you screwed up their genome.
@RaniaIsAwesome I think you are being very pessimistic. You can't say that is what would happen if we haven't had the experience before. And we are far from perfect, if we were we wouldn't need so many tools to keep us alive.
@@512TheWolf512 For those reflexes you would require a faster metabolism, and humans altrady eat a lot to keep their brains working. You would need to constantly eat, likely it would be very impractical.
You do such a good job of explaining new scientific discoveries / research / news! You not only explain complex science in a very accessible way for the non-scientist, but you are also engaging and concise in your teaching. Please, more of these videos!
These girls were unwitting subjects of human experimentation with unpredictable, life-altering consequences. In a just world, Jiankui would rot in prison.
before jumping to conclusions, we should wait and see how the girls are gonna grow (if they're gonna survive, live a normal life even if now they're going to be watched until the rest of their life, and their kids and grandkids if they have any etc), maybe he did help after all, we don't know just yet after all, we have to understand that China, unlike most western countries, didn't ban that type of procedures, it was a "grey" area so to speak, you can' force a law/moral view that wasn't there in the first place more than anything, he should have been more careful plus, given how lucrative is plastic surgery over there, I wouldn't be surprised if they thought it was only one more step into it (after all we all know that if it doesn't get regulated, it's mainly gonna be used for aesthetic purposes)
@@NemuriNezumi94 I would argue that the girls' life outcomes are completely irrelevant. CRISPR technology, while fantastic, is not perfect yet. In this very example, the procedure didn't go exactly as planned. The mere fact that there was potential for things TO go wrong (which they partially did), and the stakes involved (two girls' lives), along with the triviality of the experiment's goal (conferring resistance to HIV when plenty of alternatives exist) make this act, in my view, a criminally reckless endangerment of human lives.
@@Night.League How many babies would be worth human wide immunity to HIV? Or an increase in life span of 40 years? How about super intelligence? If your answer is zero then you my friend are no better than a cave man. Even at it's worst this is no different than abortion, a 100% legal practice by the way.
@@dracon501 Except, you idiot, we have no idea how to increase intelligence, or lengthen lifespan, and all we can do right now is introducing brand new, potentially extremely dangerous genetic disease with 99% certainty. Did you even watch the video? All the dude tried to do was doing exceptionally well studied mutation, and he FAILED! He did something no one understands right now to another human! Turn on your brain, would you like to get new, exciting genetic disease no one in the world knows how to treat that might kill you before you're 20 just to have that 1% chance of getting slight resistance to virus we can pretty much suppress safely for patient's life already?
Efforts towards scientific progress should be independent of immediate (and often short sighted) applicability of technologies arising from said progress. Argument about exhausting all other alternatives to HIV "treatment" is moot. People are allowed to choose to have babies...but they shouldn't choose how they are made? For some reason only "nature" is allowed to choose how certain things are done... ...but what is "nature"?
Or a super-carrier. Congratulations, you've created a baby that isn't affected by HIV. Unfortunately this allows the virus to mutate in their system and become airborne. Thanos would be proud.
I've seen a lot of different opinions being expressed, and I can't rightly say that any of them have been 'wrong' but the people who say stuff like Jiankui is a hero, and that in the future people would look down at Hank as a naysayer to progress. It doesn't seem like they comprehend how out of hand this situation could get, and that it is scientific concerns that got, I guess you could say, riled up about this endeavour, that also disagreed with the horrific experimentation on heredity, under the title of 'eugenics'. People who jump aboard the wagon of saying that Jianku is absolutely correct and is going to lead to the improvement of humanity also need to consider the issues that this could bring about in the future: who would have access to this technology, would it be limited to those who could afford it, would government make it mandatory. how would this affect the biodiversity amongst the human species, if we all became 'safe' from everything, something would crop up, it wound happen eventually, something that, the new, regulated genetics of the (for lack of a better name that comes to mind) CRISPR generation wouldn't be able to cope with, and could thus cause a massive die off. If advancements were made that managed to perhaps indefinitely prolong the life of an individual, and some research has been done on this; managing to increase the number of times a cell can replicate before it stopped being able to do such. Where would we put the line of the now artificial mortal age, would death at a certain age become mandate due to the overpopulation. would we just delve into the eradication of genetic diseases, or allow for purely aesthetic appearance to be determined by the parents/figure of authority/government These are just some things that I think we should really consider, and ideally before we started the fall down the rabbit hole like Jiankui caused us to do. And while for some of us it might not even affect us during our life spans, it will affect the life of all those who follow after us. Think before you choose sides, while I have leaned more towards staying far away from altering the genetics of humankind for the time being, until we have truly figured out and understood the implications of/ and consequences of this path that we may find our self going down. Have a good day to whoever made it this far. If you have a differing opinion, that's your opinion, and I can't ask for no angry responses to this comment since I put it out to the internet like I did, but if you could try to be calm and state your points clearly if you do respond, that would be much appreciated.
@*Tea Truffel* Anything that's bigger than a virus (cells, bacteria) and above it's labeled "kill". But hey, humans gotta eat and cattle ain't jumping itself into my mouth.
The difference here is if you kill it it won't suffer the through the horrors of life, but if you botch the modification AND damn the being to life it's much worse.
completely different things, embryos are killed and is "mostly" accepted as they technically aren't conscious yet, or alive, a fetus, however, is conscious as it has developed all of the main organs and its heart has started beating
sure, lets start by letting a communist country experiment on it's own people (and probably turn them into mindless slaves by disabling genes responsible for intelligence)
I really don't think this is a good thing at the moment. I used to be very pro-gene editing but after writing papers for uni I've realised that things really aren't as clear cut as they seem. Especially since we obviously don't know everything there is to know about genetics, it's not ethical either.
So you don't believe AI can do this to us in the future? It's an impossibility in your mind? Let me remind you that DNA has already done this to RNA in the past.
@@Rekovnii you weren't really the person I was inviting to talk but sure... Perhaps but that's not the discussion for now, we don't have AI (the kind that has its own motives, consciousness or any reason to 'enslave humanity') and we don't have reliable gene-editing. It's not impossible but it is improbable that we would ever give this kind of power to a machine. Can you explain what you mean with DNA and RNA please I don't follow.
@@Alex-ik8pr This happend 4 billion years ago when RNA gave DNA the access to write it's genetic code. It's called a phenotypic revolution where DNA ended up becoming a replicator itself. Now we are DNA based lifeforms and the AI will hijack our reproduction to favor itself. It is the only possible outcome once humans surrender the responsibility to AI. It is in fact more probable than you think given the nature of humanity. These chinese twins are proof of that. The AI will make your child even better than a human ever will. Don't you want better childeren? Etc.
@@Rekovnii we are DNA based because DNA is more stable than RNA. DNA has to replace the RNA in the Okazaki fragments (which is what I'm guessing your talking about) otherwise our genome would be a jumbled mess of DNA and RNA. DNA is not favouring itself. DNA is a collection of molecules not parasites. DNA polymerase II is an enzyme (which RNA 'helped' to make) so i still don't understand why you're saying hijacked as if there's some kind of consciousness. Also what does this have to do with AI?
@@Alex-ik8pr The point is that DNA was not a replicator. After DNA had access to write the genetic code for RNA it became a replicator. The same will happen with AI once it get's access to write our genetic code. It will design humans in order to replicate itself.
I have a genetic condition called Neurofibromatosis (Type 1.) Because of this, I have tumors both internally and externally throughout my body. They’re unsightly and painful. Cancer is also a risk and the disease gets worse over time. CRISPR could cure me. Literally. It won’t get rid of the tumors I have but will prevent more ones. That would be life changing. NF impacts my life in a major way and having it taken away...man I can’t fathom it.
I support the genetic modification of the babies. There will always be more research to do. Also, how are scientists supposed to do more research if they aren't even allowed to use the technology? Testing CRISPR in lab cells is like learning to swim on land. You can spend an infinite amount of time doing it, but it won't help you with the real thing. The scientist in question took the first plunge and I hope others will follow his example. Yes, he made a mistake but it was the first attempt ever for crying out loud. If the first spearmaker had given up because they messed up the first time or if the first farmer had given up because their first harvest failed, what kind of world would we be living in right now? We're not going to get the perfect technology instantly. We have to let it evolve. We didn't go from room-sized computers to smartphones overnight. It took many decades of work, research and hardwork to make that happen. But the main point is that we *did* let it happen. Imagine if we'd condemned the person who built the first computer and decided to ban any further computer production. That's exactly what we're doing now. Reminds me of the story of Prometheus.
The issue with this is, if people are allowed to design thier children to be "perfect" then there is no question that those who can afford to pay the most will end up with the best genetics in thier offspring. And being able to pay enough to be genetically superior to your peers is flat out wrong. It can be equated to paying of the refery of a sports game. You are desitined to win no matter what anyone else does. It takes the one true equality that exists amongst us, that not you, nor anyone gets to choose how they are born, and riggs it in favor of a select few. And once that gaps is there. Nothing short of a species wide civilzational destruction would be able to close it.
@Anthony Polonkay Lol look around you, my friend. You're already living in a world like that. We have been living in a world like that for thousands of years. Even now, the rich have access to better healthcare, education and on average live longer than the rest of the people. This gap you mention has always existed and will always exist. It's inevitable. However, there has never been true equality between us in terms of genes. Some people have excellent genes: they look good, or are sick less often or are more intelligent than average. Some people have bad genes. Genetic diversity is the entire point of sexual reproduction, which means that we aren't a homogeneous mix of the same genes as you suggest we are. Besides, just because someone is rich now doesn't mean their offspring will continue to stay rich forever. In most of the cases, the family wealth gets squandered by the third generation. Meaning the superior genes eventually reach the common populace, which they do anyway since rich people have to reproduce too and in doing so pass on their genes to the next generation. But that's the beauty of it. Even if one person, no matter rich or poor, gets modified to have better genes, those genes eventually spread throughout the gene pool. There's no reason to resist this technology.
@@feynstein1004 The equality lies not in the results of someones genetics, but via the fact that nobody, not even thier parents had the ability to pick which genes they were born with. The fact that it is up to chance to more or less of a degree for everyone. That is the equality lies. Nobody got to pick thier cards or have them picked for them. They were simply dealt a hand and have to play with it. Is there inequality in the results of this absolutly. But id rather the inequality be random than have a lineage be able to cheat thier way to genetic prosperity. And to address your point of the rich losing thier wealth after generations, this is true enough. But that tends to have alot to do with the fact that dadday had a head for business while the son or grandson does not. Amd under the managememt of someone not cut out for it, it crumbles. This factor becomes a non issue when you can literally select the genes that makes sure the persons mental apptitude lies in whatever maintains the riches. With designer humans anyone you eliminate the gamble of not having children suited to continue the legacy. This only leaves hubris to be the downfall of a wealthy lineage. And while human hubris is powerful, its not hard to simply make sure your children are born with genes antithetical to it. Youed never be able to eliminate it comlletely. But you can get close. At any rate. The main point stays that just because the rich have always had better access to most stuff due to thier riches, does not mean they SHOULD have access to all things. Genetic manipulation being definatly off the table to all, the wealthy included
@@feynstein1004 also to clear something else up , i never stated we are a homogenois mix of all the same genes. Though youed be suprised just how alike vastly seperated peoples genetics likly are. . The equality still lies in the randomness because even amongst the healthiest/most desirable genetic lineages those people still contain a magnitude of bad/undesirable genetics that have just as much chance to show up in thier offspring as any other genes. And the amount that even eugenics can influence that is so minute that it honestly doesnt really matter. So the point of a one universal untouchable equality in peoples being in the uncontroled nature of which genes they will get still holds up.
Quentin Curry Yeah, but the way he did wad kinda immoral. Don’t get me wrong, i do support Crispr, but he did it without authorization if i understood correct
Matheus Sandbakk If the couple wanted him to do that I believe that’s the authorization he needs, I think we have been moving kinda slow on this. We have created full bacteria genes synthetically but lots of people are nervous to move foreword with anything human. If the couple didn’t consent on it then yes it would be wrong
the chinese government cares, because now the door is open for them to one day make super-soldiers, or worse an aerosolized mutagen that can be dispersed on unaware subjects.
This guy is the future! Anything new and groundbreaking will always needs more research.. space needs more research.. why isn't it unethical to go to Mars when we are so much in the dark about it history and current status.. but Elon (along with plenty of other big names) out here pissing his money away on trying to get to Mars.. why no one says it's unethical then?
Because going to mars won’t change what it means to be human. When you start messing with what makes you YOU, you’re messing with some potentially dangerous stuff. The worst thing that could happen if people go to mars is everybody in mars ends up dying and we’ve wasted a lot of resources. The worst thing that could happen with gene editing is a genetic flaw that propagates through the population and potentially kills or diseases billions of people. It’s not something we want to rush into
There are people who think it's unethical to go to Mars. There could be microscopic life on Mars that is not used to dealing with Earth microbes and they could hitch a ride on one of our machines and infect and kill all the remaining life on Mars. Watch Vsauce's video on "Is It Okay to Touch Mars?".
The astronauts signed up for their experiment, but the enormous numbers of embryos that are being destroyed in the name of research didn't. That's the moral difference.
Literally life hacks
@@lodge8073 zombie babies balance patch
Ol9ll loop 0 loop ll oolœlœœœ ok ll lol ll lol ok ll l9
Achievements disabled
I am hopeful for this technology. I'm 27. Only found out 4 years ago I have a genetic heart arrhythmia. It's incurable, and I will eventually suffer from heart failure. I fear having children and passing it on to them. Hopefully gene editing can be used for benign purposes.
damn son dont drink Monster energy drink
There are plenty of pace maker inventions that have less risks but I appreciate your caution in reproduction, it might make you an as considerate parent.
I am similar, I was born with Cystic fibrosis. It's probably why I wasn't instantly against this when I first heard it although I am now.
Maybe adopt instead?
@@Kittyxandra19 Maybe he and his partner just want a birth child?
We can edit genes but still cannot edit tweets
...it's re-edits the USA needs to be interested in!
...and he Tweets too much!
iconic
Priorities 🤷♀️
That face when you're literally designed and made in China.
I bet the babies will all be tainted with lead.
Well actually crisper came from the west, so it’s more like a proper product. Invented in America: made in China
Chinese logic "we have a baby death room for post birth abortions, whats altering a couple genes gonna hurt?"
@@notthatguy4703 everything made in china is like that
@@notthatguy4703 _"Well actually crisper came from the west, so it’s more like a proper product. Invented in America: made in China"_
CRISPR isn't an American product. It's been a work in progress since the 80's, starting in Japan, then moving to Europe in Spain and the Netherlands, then moved to the US with many American together with international research teams. Why do people often assume things like this are American?
If the first baby isn't named "Eugene", then I don't know what the point of all of this was
Oh my God I almost choked on myself. This the dumbest funniest thing ever.
German Trujillo I don't get it
That is funny....
@@FarhanAli-qo9we Eu-gene: New Gene
@@CarlosRios1 Technically it would mean: "Good" or "Correct Gene"
i want my son to have retractable bat-like wings with resistance to dark scorpion venom
Lol, you'd probably have to very rich to pay for that in the far future.
Same, with four arms and chloroplasts to derive energy from the sun.
That’s edgy af
I dont know why you need your son to have bat-like wings....
But asking for the child to be immune to venom means that you're an irresponsible parent who cant even watch over his own child.....
I want my son to be able to consume and digest raw human flesh and to be able to self-replicate.
JAILBREAKING BABIES.
LIFE HACK! (literally)
Yes dr id like to see about getting my fetus rooted
Haha
Doctors hate this man, 1 easy trick to jail break yo baby!
CRITICAL BUG!
What happens if they got bricked? I doubt reflashing fw is available...
Most scientists: *"Just because you can doesn't mean you should"*
He Jiankui: **proceeds to do it anyway**
Absolute madlad
The hero mankind needs.
That is a true courageous man right there.
Yeah big hero until something bad happens. Then its "Hey I had nothing to do with it"
Most scientists: 😮
Sugar, spice, everything nice and then chemical X.
Terry Taber powderpuff girls
Mojo JoJo is not impressed😉
"I DISAVOW THIS EXPERIMENT!!!"
said the scientists, salivating in anticipation of the results.
unethical science has played a large and arguably beneficial part in science as a whole.
Yeah, scientisis actually love unethical experiments... when they're done by someone else. So they can both berate the bastard who did horrible things to people AND enjoy that useful data he produced.
The most cited incident of unethical science is during WW2 but it’s also been widely acknowledged that the research was fundamentally flawed. Especially those of mengela, his experiments were so thinly veiled in science that he had to keep two sets of note books to try and fool people if the Germans lost the war.
Hilariously ironic but true. Bad science also makes for interesting results
So many scientists I've spoken to or heard lectures from are still really callous about the treatment of lab animals and it makes me sick. Mice aren't even very good models for humans at all and we waste so much time torturing them to find out what affected them doesn't even work on humans. For them to call things unethical, especially something as relatively benign as this is ridiculous.
Want perfect babies? Just get your seed from Daddy Hank.
Muscle Hank as a lesbian who may want children in the future, thank you for your service
I LOVE YOU DADDY
PLEASE don't say seed
@@ohfrickitsvic seeeeeed
Fake muscle hank
He did it, hes the first step, he will cause more people to study crispr on humans, he lit the flames.
I see what you did there
@Goroei Noble
And so we must survive it. Unfortunately, humanity are too occupied in fighting among themselves. It will be a shame if they died again. If the do, then they do not deserve a second chance... Even after the two world wars. Pathetic.
He*
@@absolstoryoffiction6615 "They" um... okay I suppose you're an alien simply ridiculing humanity from some outside window
@@criticalcontraption874
Nope... Just a human who grows tired of human strife. It is both amusing and a shame by this point in our history. As if they learned nothing. All is the same but on a different day. The cycle has yet to be broken. lol
I agree with the thesis of the video. Science must be careful. However a question brought up was "should we change human evolution" and the answer is absolutely yes.
I would want my child to be free from things like Cystic Fibrosis, MND, Alzheimer's and hell I wouldn't even mind if their physical abilities were increased in a minor way. Just because humans evolved naturally doesn't mean we can't take control of our evolution
then one day the zombie apocalypse will happen and the zombies will be ripped as heck
I have many mixed feelings
Ethics are a system of rules with which we agree on doing certain things. Its just a matter of time before CRISPR or future and more efficient and cheaper succesor becomes widely if not globaly accepted as moraly correct (due to the latter being meerly subjective and fluctuable over the span of the evolution of both the social species and concecuently their ethic and moral systems)
Coconut oil on that last one
Yeah, it's going to happen, and we've already been actively fighting against our evolution for thousands of years, depending on how you view it. I would guess we're at least 5 years away from it becoming safe to try on humans.
On my last day of repro phys, my professor casually mentioned that he cured lupus with CRISPR like six year ago, but it still hasn't made it to human trials. He's pretty glad, because he doesn't do human medicine. "Oops, I cured a genetic disorder when I was playing with the new CRISPR we got" was the tone I got.
Lupus is an autoimmune disease, not a genetic disorder. Genes can make you more susceptible to developing autoimmune diseases of all stripes, but it seems highly unlikely gene editing could “cure” any of them. I suppose the treatment could sort of teach the immune system to stop misidentifying what to attack which would stop disease activity in something like Lupus.
I’d love some gene editing for my chronic illnesses. To wake up with energy and not be in pain already? To be able to do simple chores without exhaustion and numbness? I’d do anything
If you don't mind answering, what disease do you have?
@@TheTechBite I'm still being tested for disorders but so far I've been diagnosed with fibromyalgia and peripheral neuropathy. I'm being tested for a disorder in which your body no longer knows how to get rid of fat so that even with diet and exercise you can't lose weight, and I'm having my genome sequenced to look for genetic disorders that could be influencing why I have a multitude of problems.
There's way too much paranoia over technologies like this, especially given that miscarriages and abortions are a regular thing already. oH nO, bAbIeS dOn'T cOnSeNt To BeInG mOdIfIeD... no one consents to existing or choosing particular biological parents, either. There're a lot of reasons to look into this further and try to lower its costs
CRISPR, making apples crispier.
CRISPR, the air frier of tour dreams.
But what does zink fingers do?
Hahaha
Safir Got Apples?? (Not even close to got milk)
Technically the truth
I'm all for this type of research. Just because we have to suffer through incurable genetic diseases doesn't mean our grand-kids should too.
I agree in terms of research but implementation, especially without discussing it with other professionals, is more harmful than good
@@MyNontraditionalLife What questions are left to be answered? We already know how to do it and we know what to change to prevent a huge range of genetic diseases? What question is still unanswered that we should wait for before we start using this to make healthier people?
@@koori049 Well, Hank just explained. I'm going to make a list for you:
- Crispr cuts wrong places in the genome sometimes, which could lead to unknown mutations on ALL the cells of the person.
- The tech needs to mature and the kinks have to be worked out. From this experiment alone, the mutation on the CCR5 gene is different from the wild type. Moreover, imperfect technique means the gene is not even in all her cells, which has defeated the purpose of having taken the risk in the first place. Things haven't gone exactly according to plan.
- There could be disastrous consequences from this even if the unintended mutation (if it occurs) is not deadly.
- These UNINTENDED mutations will be present in the germ line, meaning it will be passed on to descendants and spread.
- IF disastrous consequences happen in early experiments like this, social resistance to the technology could set us back in this research in decades, maybe.
I mean, I'm all for gene editing in living adults, as well as enhancing humans beyond our comprehension, but only if the protocols are effective, PRECISE and well established.
Koori049
To add to that, even if we know exactly which genes we need to alter, it's not as simple as just turning things on or off.
Take the CCR5 gene for example, not only does it effect the HIV virus, it also controls white blood cell trafficking. People with this mutation are more susceptible to west nile virus, and possibly other similar diseases. So even assuming things go according to plan, it's not necessarily a win-win for the recipient.
@@leoceoliveira The Bar for accuracy in CRISPR is already pretty high. The off site edits are only 20% when done with the best technique and technology and with a germ line you can check to make sure the cells you use are the ones that were on site. Saying 20% therefore dont bother is kinda ridiculous. If its bad technique that we should be concerned about then why not let people who have good technique do it instead.
The unintended mutations will absolutely not be present in all descendants you're just wrong here and so is hank because you have forgotten what we are talking about. In 20ish years when these kids want to start making babies of their own this tech will still be here in fact it will be better i would wager. If the technology we have already is used we can already eliminate most of the problems you listed. actually most of them are only problems because the tech is being held back by the moratorium. You worry about it being held back decades? well its too late for that we already did by restricting the research and now that the tech is ready we have to wait around for holdouts who will never change their mind while Dr He who didnt have all the knowledge/skills that CRISPR specialists already do is going to go out and make a bunch of designer babies without those skills. The chances of serious mistakes being made are much higher now then they would be if the moratorium was ended and the technology used by pros.
Next: genetically engineered cat girls
FINALLY!!!
YAS
YASS!
Elon Musk gots us covered
( ͡º ͜ʖ ͡º)
Pronet 12 they still wouldn’t like u or any of the other intel weeaboos
It is likely to happen anyway, he did it first. For better or for worse, he just put himself in history.
Agree
Well, it will likely be for worse. CRISPR has many known documented issues that make it not safe to use on humans yet.
Very selfish of him really, causing ethical controversy and potentially breaking laws isn't something to be proud of
Sure, it's going to happen eventually, but there are safer ways to do this with incremental steps and oversight. Like once Sputnik happens in 1957, you know that eventually there will be people in space - that doesn't mean you strap a living cosmonaut/astronaut to the very next rocket
@@oppie2363 when the USA are busy sending animals to space, the Soviets puts Gagarin into a rocket and gets to be the first man on space.
Well, Gattaca here we come......
gattaca was bound to happen.
Great film, but won't ever happen remotely close to it IMO.
@@Javiervs258 not close, worse. also inevitable.
Not sure Gattaca had actual gene-editing, only remember many embryos created in-vitro and genetically screened and selected.
rushthezeppelin I love that movie
Could have been better, but it could have been worse. Imagine what might have happened if he got *really* ambitious with those edits.
Probably nothing. We dont know the genes that cause mon complicated traits like strength and stuff
@@obiwac Actually the whole human genome system has been mapped out so we do. It's just the safety preccausions slowing research.In one way or another we have to alter genes.
@@littlesayonara3216 i think you misunderstand that info. We have it mapped out, but it doesnt mean we know what to change to achieve traits as complex as intelligence... As a metaphor we know what chemical reactions happen in our brain but that doesnt mean we know how our brain works
Maybe someone somewhere already has .... Even this guy.
If he has the guts to publicise this, wonder what he is doing in private?
obiwac You could potentially cause defects to the myostatin producing genes to cause an increase in muscle production. This happened naturally with some cows and dogs, as well as rare cases in humans. This could increase strength.
ethical or no, the crispr babies already exist. the only rational way forward is to study them, with the consent of the parents of course.
Damn you support experimenting on babies?? Youre evil
read my post again. you seem to not understand what i said.
they already exist. the best thing to do is to understand it scientifically and not pretend that it's not there.
@@maggyfrog issa joke
yeflynne nature instagram - dekationz - dktne Wow, your the same idiot from other comments
Parents may not truly understand the impacts of genetic engineering, not even Scientists are 100% able to guarantee it works yet so i personally feel that more research into it is better than immediately jumping into it head first
The be honest, as bad as this is, this seemed inevitable. Someone was bound to push the limits
We don't know if it was bad yet. I'm optimistic.
The West was just pissed they didn't do it first. Harvard scientists are gonna CRISPR edit human sperm, *_WHERE'S THE OUTRAGE???_* ...oh yeah, Harvard's scientists are WHITE. When the West does something first, it's a Discovery! But, when anyone else does it first, it's Condemned! Besides, if you want X-Men, this is how you do it.
@@callahancovington4278 the xmen is absolutely what we DONT what. Ffs man...
How ironic that this has been "universally condemned" when we probably know that every other country is also trying to achieve what this scientist did.
Dennis Koh crispr was invented in the US, not China.
The only reason it didn’t happen there is because of moral reasons. Not because they weren’t able to.
@@dumbledorethered9513 did not know this so i went to read up more on it.
Apparently the discovery of clustered DNA repeats occurred independently in three parts of the world. The first was at Osaka university in 1987. The second in The Netherlands in 1993 and the third was in Spain.
However i still have not fully read through each research articles and you may be right that the US might be the first to do testing or something but i have not seen any mention of the US in the role of CRISPR in my 10 minutes of research. Will definitely read up more on this interesting topic.
In a way. We must evolve. In a way. Humanity does not deserve to exist past Earth.
@@dumbledorethered9513 Correct me if I'm wrong but didn't CRISPR originated from Osaka Japan in 1987?
Same old stigma. If the west does it, it’s supported both morally and scientifically but if the east does it, it’s “universally condemned” because of bias and jealousy.
My only problem with designer babies is that I have been born before it was possible :(
xD
I think that's most people's problem with it. We don't like the idea that someone could pay to gain an advantage over us (even though it happens all the time already)
So you don't believe in reincarnation hehe
@Proger13 10 That is a LOT harder to do
The genetic change would have to take over all of your cells
Or the scientists would have to replace the dna in every of your cells
It is much easier to change the DNA is one stem cell and let a human grow out of it with the altered DNA
With great power comes great responsibility
Comment section proves many people are actually for this kind of experimentation
thats good.
Ehh it's not really proof l mean you're looking at a very small portion of the world and their are a lot of scientist across the world and apparantly most of them were against doing this right now.
Good.
But the comment section is people who have no medical or scientific knowledge, it means nothing.
CancerousCyan Oh no it means a lot. People lots of the time have no clue how governments work, yet people are how the government stays running. Public opinion is everything.
Does that mean we can make the Boss Baby in real life
How to properly clean your metal computer
I already called him at 3 am & got
*S P O O K E D*
How to properly clean your metal computer oh god please no
Well, you've just given me a dream.
Where does one apply to do baby-making sciences?
NO
le enfants terribles
I'm going to go against the flow here and say that it may be better for the future of edited babies that this happened. Pandora's box is open now, and no matter what happens to these babies, at least we will have something to look back on years ahead of when we plan to edit babies ethically. Imagine how much easier it will be to propose editing a baby now that it has already been done and we can look back on it with foresight.
Maybe 100 years from now, He will be praised for the one scientist that decided to take a leap of faith.
Gene Editing doesn't just stop at cosmetic and curing diseases...Gene Editing can also be used to artificially enhance human physical and mental abilities....and it doesn't stop just there either; we could push science even more and create artificial genes to add to a human's gene pool to create even more genetically "perfect" super human being...although calling them human might not be accurate at this point because human are by nature supposed to be imperfect....these genetically perfect beings of the future will almost certainly mean human extinction (as we knew it), where only beings with the latest perfect gene editing technology will be able to survive and all others will be obsolete!!!
Fair enough, however if something does go wrong it could very easily set back progress. If regulatory institutions feel the need to put more restrictions on these types of experiments in concern for safety then development will slow down. Public Opinion is something that is important to consider as well (Any disaster could potentially turn people away from the technology not dissimilar to the way that Chernobyl has done for the nuclear industry despite our advancements since then).
Hopefully they gleam a lot of valuable information from this test. I, too, am quite hopeful for this technology, but at the same time it's important to be cautious. So many experts are saying that we need more information before going ahead with this and it's difficult to see fault in that line of reasoning
TBH, we've been editing the babies for years now. The only controversy is that we didn't murder these ones. Even if they develop a mutation that medically is too dangerous to ethically allow them to reproduce, they still had a better life than the millions of humans that die in test tubes.
We've already opened Pandora's box, at least let's learn as much as we can.
Remember, at the bottom of Pandora's box was hope...
@@Ranstone There are very real ethical concerns with allowing embryos to come to term without fully understanding how the changes made to them will affect them and their quality of life. Keep in mind that the primary problem with CRISPR editing is that it is not particularly reliable. The targeted Gene is not always edited correctly and there is also the possibility of having genetic damage occur in areas that are intended to be unaffected (though the frequency of this occurring is currently being disputed, hence why more research is required). Even beyond that, even in the event that CRISPR does work perfectly, the human body is a complex thing. Biologists are working with an incomplete picture with how junk DNA, dormant Genes and Gene expression affect an organism, let alone how active coding DNA works in conjunction with other coding DNA. Needless to say, a child who could potentially have a very short life in constant agony would not be a preferable existence to a 'murdered' zygote which is physically incapable of thought or feeling.
This field of research is important, and some risks will inevitably need to be taken eventually. But that does not mean going about it this way is best (neither ethically nor efficiently). Science is not advanced through 'leaps of faith'. It is done through research, observation, theorization, refinement, and patience.
without risk there's no advancements
But is risking the health of newborn babies as well as the next generation worth that risk?
@@HxXrntr Maybe, it depends on the point of view
@@doble-B I understand your point but we just have to be extra cautious and prepared when it comes to humans (I'm not necessarily referring to crisper I mean in general). There's just so much more we need to learn when it comes to genetics.
Walker every 26 seconds a baby died of hunger even though we have enough food to feed everyone and thru 20℅ but instead we thru 30-35℅ and let them died so if it's required the sacrifice of couples of baby to have the million I'm all for it.
you didn't get it do you? let say the experiment goes wrong, and these newborn babies get married with you in the future, and who knows, your kids might be born looks like alien or baby pig for example..
Everyone in this comment section seems to be so supportive of this technology and it's rapid implementation, but you're missing the fact that if there is even a minor slip up, that slip up can be transferred onto later generations if that genetically modified person is able to reproduce. The potential consequences are vast, meaning that we MUST be extremely careful about using this on humans. There are no "prototypes" or "drafts" with this. If scientists mess up, it's messing up a human's life forever, as well as thousands of others, potentially. Don't get me wrong, I think this innovation is revolutionary, and will no doubt be used in the future, but we must exercise extreme caution when dealing with human lives.
@Isaiah Hammond I agree, I'm just stating why it's so risky. Eventually, research will be done, no matter how controversial it may be. However, we do need to make sure that it isn't done haphazardly, as the guy did in this video.
now your the one looking the bad way.
The alternative would be to let millions of lives be taken by HIV, and others destroyed by Down syndrome, autism (which is genetically influenced) or even Huntington’s. You either let more lives be affected by these horrible conditions, or you take some risks and possibly save millions of lives in the long run.
As long as they don't touch the germ lines, the edited DNA won't pass on
Spreading it onto further generations is dangerous, however I don't think that saying it could ruin a human's life is a reasonable statement. So many other animals' lives were ruined by these experiments. It's easier to empathize with another human, but let's be honest, nothing makes the life of another species more valuable then any other.
*CAN SOMEONE PLEASE DISABLE MY ANXIETY GENE*
anxiety isn't a gene elva
@@sagi-dg8ht actually there are some anxiety disorders that can be passed on but evidences are still scarce. Anxiety also could be caused by environmental factors. So you're half right.
Sure, possible side-effect is a type of gene-incurable cancer to affect you and everyone you spawn.
Sorry to dissappoint but I think anxiety doesn't get passed through genes, since it's (mostly) a hormonal disorder and usually was caused by environtment (traumatic events, stress, bad living place, etc) or other diseases. Anyway I wish your anxiety get better yo
Elva Light I voted no because it’s unethical, lol jk jk I’ll change it to thumbs up!
Gene-Editing is the next stage of human evolution? I see no problem if it benifits the human race
only problem is that this is the HUMAN RACE we are talking about here. We're not good at getting along. Some people will take advantage of it. Rich and powerful people will get it first and also last. They won't let lesser people's obtain it because they would be superior. Thus begining a dystopian society.
Evolution in real life doesn't happen in "stages" like with pokemon or superheroes. It is a slow, gradual process. Gene-editing could be the end of evolution by natural selection acting upon random mutations and the beginning of artificial selection acting upon designed sequences. CRISPR could be used to either help or harm the human race, and if the development of new technologies in the past is any indication, it will be used for both.
Really? All men would be the first to go.
Artificial insemination just the tip of the iceberg of what could be going on behind closed doors.
Garnet S Word highly doubt that since majority of discoveries and advancements are accomplished by men, so unless you want progress to stagnate this won't happen
@@WhosFaulty isn't it what's happening? What man agrees to give away his power to procreate?
The germ line being edited in China isn't as risky as it would be in the West. This is because the Chinese government would be perfectly okay with castrating or purging gene-edited children ( and their offspring if they made the decision too late) if they decided they were a dangerous failed experiment.
Obviously such a solution would be impossible in a liberal society, so we couldn't afford it coming to that.
This comment is morbidly, horribly unethically...
...
True...
· 0xFFF1 sadly that’s how it goes. A human test experiment failed because of the scientist.
Is this a surprise to anyone even remotely interested in the field though? This was guaranteed to happen
I more surprised this didn't happen sooner tbh
I just want seedless and core-less apples, I can die in peace once i eat an entire apple without leaving anything behind.
This could cause the end of all apples ya know?
Poge Just eat the whole damn thing? I do it all the time.
Danilo Prijovic me too lol
they did that to bananas and they're not extincted
Danilo Prijovic The apple seeds contain cyanide , I don't know if you are lying or not.
MUSCLE HANK HAS THE BEST GENES
Safir I've been selling my seed on Amazon for $99 an ounce.
@@AxxLAfriku good for you. Why should I care?
@@unicornswag888 An ounce? Who wants a whole ounce??
meme
@@magnuspeacock5857 Quit being an ass
Gives a whole new meaning to Made-in-China....
Im happy i came down here and saw people actually like science and are optimistic and excited for the future rather than fearful.
Hmmm, I don't know, making humans resistant to more diseases seems like it's also moral. Not at this point, because the research isn't there yet, but once it is. Not just corrective, and not just as a last resort.
(Edit for clarity: I'm referring to the mentioned apparent consensus that such technology, even once believed to be fully understood and even once thoroughly tested, would only be considered moral in cases where it was correcting an illness with absolutely no other cure or treatment available. This is a viewpoint with which I believe I disagree. To reiterate, I do not believe at all that we're at the level of research/knowledge/understanding of genetics to include resistances or immunities as something which can be done to humans, morally, at this point. I do, however, believe that adding these traits in the future, once we fully understand them, would not necessarily be immoral. If I'm understanding what was stated in the video correctly, the current medical and scientific community believes that gene editing technology, such as crispr, would be moral _if and only if_ it were used in the last resort, incurable, untreatable genetic illness scenario, _even in the future_. It is that position which I am questioning and which I have settled on tentative disagreement with. I don't necessarily agree with the creation of humans which have other types of "super" abilities, I simply believe disease resistance and immunity can be moral traits to add to a human, _once fully understood_. I hope this cleared things up!)
In situations like this its possible to check your work prior to implantation. State of the art CRISPR techniques will have the desired effect on someething like 70-80% of the cells which is not enough to use in vivo on adults because the 20-30% of misses are not just no effect but can be very detrimental. but if you are working with individual cells you can make the change then check to see if the modification was on target before using that cell. Thats why they can modify blood cells or marrow out of the body then reintroduce the modified cells. This isnt much different except you intend to grow a person from the modified cell. the tech to do the modification is very much ready, and we know a long list of genes that are worth fixing.
I agree. It has a lot of potential, but we need more research and laws.
Don't kid yourself, they want to create super soldiers. The preventing/curing diseases is the sales pitch.
On it's own perhaps, but the problem is it could cause a chain reaction. If we make ourselves 'adapt' to a disease then the bacteria or virus responsible could also mutate and adapt, which could cause all sorts of problems down the road.
Look at vaccine for example, even something as simple as that can cause the target to adapt, and they became resistant to the vaccine.They
So it's not so much that we shouldn't do it, we just have to be very meticulous about it.
@@MrQlife Depends what you consider super soldier. Being the smartest one of the battlefield is the... smartest way to achieve that. Funny how this scientist first mentioned IQ enhancing.
This could actually save our species.
this could actually create more of a population problem
@@hrzagen7603 but we might be able to live on Mars if we "create" humans that are resistant to high concentrations of perchlorate compounds (which is actually the major issue of sending people to mars, as it's basically poison to humans and it can get everywhere, even into their suits)
Yeah like nuclear energy a few years back
Biologist here. To all the people saying that we should not stop progress because of old fashioned morals etc.: this chinese guy did not do anything revolutionary, the method is well known and used all the time in plants and other animals but it has a very high offtarget rate, cutting in places it is not supposed to. When you work in plants, you cross your mutant with wildtype plants several times, selecting for the mutation you want, to get rid of the other mutations but you can't do that with humans. CRISPR increases the risk of cancer and other illnesses in humans, that's why it should only bei used to cure deadly diseases in the moment.
+Ella Tessa. The problem stems from what the chinese govt intends to do with this technology. If you think communists are going to use it cure genetic defects or diseases then you're spectacularly, dangerously naive. They intend to weaponize this, either by turning it into a mutagen that can be dispersed on the battlefield or turning it into a serum to make super-soldiers.
Yixin Chen ask anyone if China is communist, they’d probably say yes.
Yixin Chen I googled “is China communist” and here’s what i got. “The Communist Party of China, also referred to as the Chinese Communist Party, is the founding and ruling political party of the People's Republic of China.”
Yixin Chen I know what real communism is. But the fact is, the ruling political party in a China is the communist one. Therefore, China is communist.
@@signofapproval260 Just because a party calls itself Communist doesn't make it Communist. Just because anyone calls themself anything doesn't make them anything. North Korea is officially the "Democratic People's Republic of Korea", are you going to tell me it's a democracy too?
China is about as communist as the United States is.
EDIT: I agree with your point that China should not be trusted with this kind of technology, I'm just pointing out something separate. Last year I was visiting family in China. We have a friend who's a member of the CCP. I asked him, "Do you think the Chinese Communist Party is communist?" and he replied "Definitely not" instantly.
I'm afraid that once this thing becomes universally normal that it will only be available to the super rich. Imagine a wealthy population of people that are literally better then you in every way at birth
you should watch Gattaca
No way
Crispr is so simple there’s no way they’d keep it to only the rich. They’d be missing out.
Also if it’s edited in early so that they produce offspring with the new traits it makes its way through the entire population
considering the price of obtaining crispr right now even if the treatment for genetic imperfections is 10x what it is now(only editing) it would be available to even lower middle class
damn beat me to it xD
If it's universally normal, why would it only be available to the super rich?
Keep in mind that it's in everyone's financial interests to make the process as cheap and accessible as possible. Sure, you could offer it to the top 1% for ten million dollars a pop and get kinda rich that way, or you could find a way to offer it to everyone for a hundred dollars each and become a trillionaire.
oh the horror, a baby immune to hiv, how terrible
@@MyNontraditionalLife ill admit i made the comment really early in the video before being fully informed and i can definitely see why this was such a universally frowned upon idea
Next year, Harvard scientists are gonna CRISPR edit human sperm, *_WHERE'S THE OUTRAGE???_* ...oh yeah, Harvard's scientists are WHITE. When the West does something first, it's a Discovery! But, when anyone else does it first, it's Condemned! Besides, if you want X-Men, this is how you do it.
@@callahancovington4278 what?
Some ppl don't understand the ramifications of how Changing a gene may screw you up by being susceptible as noted if you payed attention to college microbiology.
@@forteastro6996 Don't listen to him. It's bait. He's copy-pasting.
How will these wonderful drug companies over price the treatment for HIV when it no longer exists????
He probably just really wanted to be first at something so he could be in a history book.
_forbidden first_
Hehehe-- I am giving you a notification after two years!!!
I feel like China is doing WAYYY better with STEM than the US now adays .
there's a lot undercover plus they have a lot of issues (population wise, too many people, but at the same time, not enough babies), contamination, deseases etc
Don't know if they are way ahead of the US, but they're not behind anymore for sure.
They're ahead if you ignore the rampant fraud that takes place in Chinese research.
David Gutowski It might be easier to get away with in China considering how corruption works in their government.
David Gutowski I’m just just saying trusting China on upholding guidelines here is like trusting them to abide by pollution standards, which they only fix after enough attention is brought to them, but otherwise ignored.
I mean the longer we wait to try treatments like this, the more people who might have benefited from them will suffer unnecessarily.
The White scientists are just being sore losers because they didn't dare to do it first. Next year, Harvard scientists are gonna CRISPR edit human sperm, *_WHERE'S THE OUTRAGE???_* ...oh yeah, Harvard's scientists are WHITE. When the West does something first, it's a Discovery! But, when anyone else does it first, it's Condemned! Besides, if you want X-Men, this is how you do it.
@@callahancovington4278 dafuq is your problem? Are you on drugs boi? Quit spamming this nonsensical dribble. I wish they edited your genes to make less of an idiot
Or we might rush this technology out too quickly and cure them of a disease, while simultaneously making them even more susceptible to other viruses. Then these genetically modified people pass down their new resistance AND new susceptibilities to their children. I agree that we should continue researching this technology, but let’s not implement it until it is truly ready.
Here is a hot take: If you cant accept death, you were unfit for life to begin with.
People who are so unhinged that they would give this race the tools for biological self definement in order to gain a few more years, should be made immortal and sentenced to watch as this race becomes exactly what they wished for: Every person defining them self biologically as whatever they damn please.
Welcome to end of the human race within a decade you unhinged muppet.
Ethan Colbert Will you support the failed experiments through their life long suffering?
Or would you straight up murder them to relieve them of suffering you forced upon them?
I for one applaud He Jiankui and his experiment.
You could just say; "I'm a psychopath."
Science is moving too slow, I want my futuristic cyberpunk parts grafted on already! I have stuff I need doing that requires more arms and stuff!
You want X-Men, this is how you do it
Can you make catgirls with this tho?
If it was in Japan, I'm sure that's exactly what they would do
Theoretically... Yes-ish with a lot of question marks...
In reality, you'd have to understand both the human and feline genomics down to a "T". And even then, it's possible that the genes for the traits and features you want aren't going to work the same way or may have other unintended consequences. For instance, one of the reasons Humans got a bigger brain to body ratio over other primates and apes is the removal of a gene that codes for stronger jaw muscles and bones. By ditching the mouths that could crush bambo, we ended up with more room for a bigger brainpan and brain. Adding cat ears may require changes to the hearing structures, which could also result in changes in the skull, brainpan, and brain... So, imagine a cat girl that functioned on the level of a toddler and drooled all of the time. Sooooo.... yeah.
@@jackielinde7568 don't say the last sentice
People will fantasy about that xD
@@jackielinde7568 You sound like you can make it happen. How much money do you want?
Are we talking about something like Holo(spice and wolf) and Blake(RWBY) I'll be kind of ok with that or something worst
My GOD half the comments in this video sound like Mad Scientists!!
DOES THE PHRASE “Your scientists were so preoccupied with whether or not they could, they didn’t stop to think if they should.” MEAN ANYTHING TO YOU PEOPLE
Make babies shoot lasers next
Laser babies
Jack Jack from Incredibles 2 lol
They wont always be babies. Do you really want edgy teenagers that can shoot lazers?
Shoort Laser from the butt
@@dragoncloud5497 Yes!
But just babies. Make it go away as soon as they're old enough to understand. I want people running at the sight of a baby. *baby giggles* -people- "oh my god run! Hes gonna start shooting lasers!"
No leap forward without risk .
If you'll pardon the metaphor leaping into an abyss isn't the smartest idea. It would be best to calmly scale down into it while taking our time.
holdenadams91 Exactly!
When the risk is the destruction of human civilization as we know it, maaaaybe the leap isn't worth it.
@@yuirick There are a lot of things that could end human civilization (anti-biotic resistant super-bugs, AI advancement, general decay of our DNA, war, solar-flairs etc.). Improving the human race via genetic engineering might be a solution to some of these problems, I agree with you as I usually advocate for being cautious and want society to take their time before we do something irreversible, but a lot of people want to stop genetic engineering research altogether.
@@ThePoshboy1 The problems that it's a solution to are less likely than the problems the solution might cause, imo. I mean, I don't think we should stop the research, because if it's not done by someone in an ethical manner, it's done by someone in an unethical one, like it has now.
Science requires sacrifice... There needs to be some mad scientist to take us into the future.
did it have to be in a COMMUNIST country though? we know the humanitarian track record of communism..... and it's not good, the mountain of human skulls proves it.
@@killman369547 why you bringing communism?.. the country doing pretty well regardless and will probably be the next super power. And this is about science not politics
Vivian D'Souza science is very broad tho. One could say politics is part of science.
Its Kyouma! : D
@@viviandsouza5 Yea but keep in mind the living quailty of China they can create genetically edited babies but have millions starving
I am not having children because of my incurable condition. To think if I had something like this, I could continue my family name. Instead, it dies with my husband and I. If this worked and was okay now, who knows how many decades my family line could be.
Too many people go ahead and have 12 kids
@ifyouLoveLayandyouknowitclapyourhands _ I have no problem with adopting. But I'm not physically capable to care for a child, cant even take care of myself
Would you risk a trade-off of one incurable condition for another, for generations to come, on the odd chance it may go well once?
All for the continuation of a name?
I already know my fate as of right now. I am in living hell, every day for over 2 decades. What's there to lose when I've lost so much already?
@@whitenailsnguitars What disease do you have? And what genetic disease makes you "not able to take care of myself"?
I'm so glad for SciShow cause I would not have known about this otherwise, and this is pretty interesting. This is a questionable experiment and SciShow does a good job on formatting the explanation. #PowerofScience
This was in the news last week, supposedly the Dr has gone missing. I haven't heard more since.
@@celtgunn9775 Wow! That's interesting!
Well put.
@@celtgunn9775 why should i belive that? I apreciate your effort if its not a trollpoo. I actually have been overly frank lately I think... moderation and tact.. oh. Ill take a 5 minute break from yt starting now. Really I should get my Doc to order me to be offline for 6 weeks.. wow
@@celtgunn9775 Wait, the doctor went missing, or is this just speculation? I just heard a bit of an update on his stance and that's it.
I'M SO THANKFUL FOR THIS SCIENTIST! My son Will passed away August 5th after his bone marrow transplant rejected...He was 12. He had a fatal genetic disorder XLP2 or known as XIAP. It's a primary immunodeficiency. He died, his body ate holes in him. He was constantly in excruciating pain. He couldn't fight Any bacteria,fungi, viruses and mono is fatal to people with Xlp2. Many boys don't live past 10yrs old. He also had Nod2, genetic refractory severe Crohns Disease and Blau Syndrome. He had an illiostomy bag and could barely move or walk towards the end of his short life. I watched my child suffer unimaginable pain. Children shouldn't have to die while Drs argue over ethics. Children like my son should have gotten the chance to live to their full potential. What's more ethical letting these children suffer a horrific existence or allowing them to live. Is it more ethical to let them were away?Is it more ethical that I live the rest of my life without my beautiful boy? or that I get to carry on with the fact that I gave my child those genes and gave him a death sentence? What would be more ethical? Abortion? Annihilation? Let these scientists work and progress and make a real change a movement to save millions of lives potentially! We would have never even understood anatomy without Drs illegally using cadavers to explore the human body all those centuries ago. We wouldn't have Any progress with out brave men and women who stepped up to explore and learn. Drs have told me that my son's life and death helped learn more to save other children in the future. But if we can fix the genes more can be saved then by risky bone marrow transplant that either only buy more time or kill them. I'm sure pharmaceutical companies are big opposers to this man's work, imagine a world where they can't make billions off biologics like humira, stellara, remicade, or chemo drugs like methotrexate, thalidomide... I've seen what biologics can do they help for a while then they stop working. my son tried all of them...This is the real solution stop it before it happens by throwing these genes away and replace them with healthy ones! My son shouldn't if had a going to heaven party he should be planning his 13th birthday Jan 30th. Ethics committee bulls**T! More like don't wanna lose money committee....
I like how hank frowns so hard on the research but the comment section is a wall of support. I do agree that this technology has to be pushed forward I am not sure this is the right way to do this but I think not doing it at all is almost worse.
Hank's following the status quo of the Lamestream Media because it's his orders.. next year, Harvard scientists are gonna CRISPR edit human sperm, *_WHERE'S THE OUTRAGE???_* ...oh yeah, Harvard's scientists are WHITE. When the West does something first, it's a Discovery! But, when anyone else does it first, it's Condemned! Besides, if you want X-Men, this is how you do it.
You say this like CRISPR isn't being pushed, studied, and developed. It is, it's just not stuff that makes the news all the time like this does.
"Where's the outrage!" There's no outrage because it isn't gonna become a baby, it's just sperm dumbass
Hank is not frowning on research, he’s frowning on reckless usage of unproven technology upon unborn children.
No no no. What He did is not science. Even pro-CRISPR-on-humans scientists were against this. In science, the goal is to produce a falsifiable hypothesis and test it. He's hypothesis was that the children will not acquire HIV. But even if they don't, it doesn't confirm that this gene-edit worked. It would be more likely that they practice safe sex and didn't share needles. And if they do, we already know that there are strains of HIV that don't need the CCR5 protein to enter a cell. So this is a worthless experiment.
Just like with drug trials, we should figure it out on animals before we start human testing. And there are people testing it out on animals, so just be patient. Real science takes time.
There is always someone who makes first step.
exactly
I'm surprised it took them this long tbh (especially because designer babies and clonning was already a thing, even if banned in most countries)
It's not always a step in the right direction though
Yep, and it wasn't the West, so they are sore losers. Harvard scientists are gonna CRISPR edit human sperm, *_WHERE'S THE OUTRAGE???_* ...oh yeah, Harvard's scientists are WHITE. When the West does something first, it's a Discovery! But, when anyone else does it first, it's Condemned! Besides, if you want X-Men, this is how you do it.
@@callahancovington4278 that escalated quickly.
This man didn't consult with anyone, if he did it all above the table and everyone agreed that it could go ahead then fine but since he didn't it has caused controversy.
He didn't even do what he set out to, he had many attempts and the child that survived still might get HIV.
It was a failure which has the potential to open the flood-gates to genetically engineered babies. That's not the way you want to introduce gene editing to the world.
Also, It's nothing to do with his race not all Harvard scientists are white, where did you get that idea?
(That kind of makes you sound like the racist... Just saying...)
Alex301 The Manhattan project was not the right step, but without it we would never have achieved fission power plants. The H bomb was a horrifying step towards WW3, but if we achieve fusion power plants in the next decade we will owe it to the people who worked on H bomb design and research.
Agent Smith: “...that is the sound of inevitability.”
To be sincere it is something that everybody expected from the get go. We live in a competitive world and editing your child to be better (by being handsome, taller, resistant to diseases, more intelligent) just offer to many advantages to just pass by. It's really doesn't matter the policy makers allow or not, or scientific ethics, or law, or anything, people will pay for it, a lot, and where there is demand, there is offer with or without backup from the law.
Which is exactly what makes such a thing so hanous.
The saying "life isnt fair" gets thrown around alot, and is often quite true. But the ability to pay your way into being genetically superiour to your peers is one of a truely hanous inequality. It can be equated to paying off the referies in a football game. The other team has no fair shot no matter how much effort, tallent, and concentration they put into thier game, because the game itself is quite literally rigged in your favor.
@@anthonypolonkay2681 - This comparision is flawed on the get go, life is not a game, games are specific enviromnents designed to be fair and select the most talents. But life is not designed, it is not broken, it's just exists.
@@Pedrosa2541
True but that only drives the point home more to be honest.
If you think for a second that the genetically superior designed people of varying levels wont fill up all of the professions, careers, and means of living that require any notable level of athletic talent, refined skill, or high intellect then your wrong, essentially you have the very likly and real threat of people who could'nt afford to be genetically viable enough locked into an eternal state of lower class.
Because just like we compete in games, people to compete for the chance to make thier way in life in applying skills, talents, and knowledge, that were not only honed, but which people genuinly emjoyed doing. Anyone who didnt have enough money spent on them in birth will be locked out of all of that, because when you can edit a perfect person for certian attributes, they will always bevthe best at it.
@@anthonypolonkay2681 - Yes, I agree, but life is unfair as you said. Kids who didn't get a high-end education or had come from problematic houses or/and are victims of pos-traumatic stress are worst at work and less succesfull later won than others. It's unfair, it's sad, but is how works and always have been. We even tried to correct this before, with horrible consequences, like USRR and cultural revolution.
Thanks for explaining this. I have autism and being a potential 'in' for this technology gives me the creeps. While I understand the potential for curing genetic ailments, I also worry about what people will define as an ailment that needs curing and just how far people will take it, making children their parents' toys more than their own random people. Honestly, if something isn't going to directly kill me before the age of, say, 50, I'd rather be born and develop some say in the matter.
I don't really understand what you are saying here. If we use gene editing to cure genetic diseases and HIV, wouldn't it be amazing? We are constantly doing gene editing every single day. When you choose your partner, you choose them on various features. Height, skin color, weight, looks are on of the factors whereas, smartness, wealth, overall well being and life outlook being some of the others. When you are doing this, you more or less know how your child will be. The only real randomness is how the child will look like and what mentality he/she will develop, but that comes from upbringing. So, if you are eliminating something which is harmful with little to no side effects, wouldn't it be better? Wouldn't you have liked it if you weren't autistic? If you were born 50 years in the future, your autism might have been removed before you were born and you wouldn't be suffering now. How is any of this bad? Granted that we will have to do some research and beta testing by actually using these techniques on humans at the beginning but in the end its all for the better of humanity in general. In the future we might be living in a world where no disease affects us! Think about it!
@@SahilP2648 I'm not half as tortured by my autism as you seem to be implying. In fact, given the perks it gives me along with the downsides, I'm perfectly fine with it. I'd also rather be consulted on treatment for my condition instead of find out after the fact that my parents invaded my autonomy before I could even know what was going on just to treat something that was not only perfectly survivable, but actually treatable after I could understand everything. Furthermore, mental illness is a spectrum. Yes, you have people who are disabled by it, but you've also got plenty of people who are able to lead perfectly normal lives because of how they were raised and because their forms of mental illness were actually pretty benign. Until you can promise me that you can detect severity of mental illness beyond reasonable doubt, I'd rather roll the dice. My autism IS part of my mentality: it informs how I view the world, and I'd rather not find that was rewritten without my consent.
Even if this would lead to a world without disease, at what cost? The guy here jumped the gun and screwed up: this could have and could still turn out badly. He could have given the girl without HIV resistance an autoimmune disorder and we won't know until it shows up. And then there's the fact that we still don't know a lot about human genetics and how many non-scientists know even less than that. Not to mention the question of how granular 'saving a life' is. Parents could want, say, the gene for fair skin changed because it's simply *more likely* to cause skin cancer and lawmakers could say that's a perfectly valid excuse. It's easy to dismiss that as stupid, but things like that have happened before and could happen again.
Just to be clear, I'm fine with genetic alterations if it was the only thing that could save the child from certain death before they reached the age that they could give informed consent. Heck, if it was saving them from something that would definitely give them something people with that condition universally consider a life worse than death, I'd be OK with it. Even something that would beyond a shadow of a doubt shorten their lifespan to young adulthood, I could sympathize with. But just the possibility of a harder life or the prospect of social ostracism isn't enough. Life is risk, but people need to know they have and have had as much freedom as they possibly could have in facing it.
@@BattousaiHBr Did you choose to be born without it? Did you even choose to be born at all? There's always going to be some lack of choice in the matter, but I like to believe that lack's as low as possible. Again, I don't mind having autism. My family and friends don't mind me having autism. It gets annoying from time to time, but everyone's learned to roll with it and even help me minimize the downsides of it. I didn't choose to be born with autism, but I did get to choose how to go from there.
@@NimanWielder01 exactly, neither of us chose it so why does it matter?
you're not choosing how or where or when you're born regardless of everything else, so why should we keep things natural as much as possible? makes literally no sense. you're fine being autistic, but most people who have autism would prefer to not have autism, and i don't know a single person who doesn't have autism who'd want to have autism, so it makes perfect sense for us to try to eliminate it from newborns. if when you're an adult you decide you wanna be autistic, go for it, no one is gonna stop you.
@@BattousaiHBr It matters because my parents didn't choose how I was born either. All they did was conceive me and promise to love and nurture the result. Having them change me to be what they wanted me to be on such a basic level, unless it would have been the only thing that could save my life, is a violation of my own personhood that will stick around until the end of my life. I would always be the person they built, thinking in a way they deemed acceptable without even having been given the benefit of the doubt or a chance to learn their way of thinking.
And again, autism has its ups and downs. I'm more emotional, but I take more joy from things. I don't recognize emotions well, but I have a greater sense of empathy. My short-term memory is faulty but my long-term memory is excellent. Furthermore, it's part of my personality: it gives me studiousness, passion, perfectionism, compassion, intelligence, and a number of other personality traits. Curing me would mean curing all of that; I would be a completely different person.
Also, can I have a source for your statement about people with autism? Most people I've seen with autism (including Anthony Hopkins, Mr. Enter, Temple Grandin, Dan Harmon, and Daniel Tammet) don't seem to hate living with autism any more than I do.
And like the starting gun in the olympic games, the race for gene editing is off! This will be amazing for science!
Of course science will advance from this, but it's nothing to celebrate. A great crime was committed against two innocent human beings and perhaps all their descendants. Shame.
Another great episode! Unfortunately it was all but inevitable an event like this would occur and be announced. It is also most likely that there are dozens more babies right now around the world that were crispred already like this, without any public announcements, yet. Dr. He will likely be punished pretty severely, but 5+ years from now many will praise him for helping advance CRISPR research so dramatically/abruptly, despite the ethical issues.
Exactly!! Next year, Harvard scientists are gonna CRISPR edit human sperm, *_WHERE'S THE OUTRAGE???_* ...oh yeah, Harvard's scientists are WHITE. When the West does something first, it's a Discovery! But, when anyone else does it first, it's Condemned! Besides, if you want X-Men, this is how you do it.
Obviously it shouldn’t have been done this way, but gene editing is the way of the future. And I definitely believe that preventing diseases or disorders should be a part of the process.
I’m a clinical microbiologist working at the University of Sheffield in the UK, we’ve used CRISPR before on mouse embryos, specifically to knock out IFN-y which results in immunocompromised mice which we use to study infection progression. The mice have expected phenotypes but also display several unexpected features, particularly they develop lesions in their skin not related to infection but instead seem to be related to dysfunction of desmosomes (the genes for which are no where near IFN-y)
So yeah, CRISPR is not ready yet. I’d be surprised if this guy keeps his job and license
just IMAGINE if the twins are immune to HIV as a result!
No you are mistaken. Torture and experimentation cause diseases like HIV in the first place
Shit's turning into Gattaca real fast.
I swear, tons of 90s "scifi" was just preparing us mentally for real world events 20 years down the line. It's almost hilarious how many X-Files episodes happened. Although uhh... sometimes I wonder if X-files spawned all the antivaxxers lol.
If this had been done in the West we all know the tone in the so called medical community would be different. Words like 'revolutionary' would have been used.
Pretty sure we have been editing our Ecosystem for a VERY long time.
Yes, but always playing within the rules. Genetic editing is breaking the fair playing field everything plays in.
@@anthonypolonkay2681 playing within the rules? How is causing mass a actual mass extinction event "playing in the rules"
CRISPR is also found in bacteria, ie nature, it's also not the first gene editing technique, just the cleanest one we've discovered (meaning it doesnt involve exposing seeds to modified cancer causing bacteria or shooting them full of radiation and using any that developed helpful traits) so even then this is just new because they're the first humans this has been done to.
No people do not experiment on everything in a lab
All before Extinction.
@@john-michaelcollier4409
Evolve or face Extinction.
I'm excited for gene editing. Hope we can get rid of things like the need for glasses and other genetic defects that make life harder or less pleasant for all people long before they're born. I'm glad this scientist did this thing, as dangerous as it is for him and definitely the kids, the rate at which bioengineering was going wasn't fast enough for me so I'm happy it's getting pushed forward finally. I am cautious though, and hope it doesn't stunt the development of the field. I'm confident the many scientists who's entire career is based on this didn't choose the life long career just to shut it down before it even got off the ground as a viable means of helping humanity.
Yup. Gattaca plot isn't so bad is it ?
Experimenting on babies is what caused bad eyesight in the first place
yeflynne nature instagram - dekationz - dktne Source?
Mutations of the CCR5 gene in white blood cells, although can make individuals resistant to HIV, would still make them very vulnerable to basic viruses like the Flu.
HIV enters white blood cells using the CCR5, and although preventing HIV through its removal might be 'moral', there will still be ramifications for removing a chemokines receptor, like I previously mentioned.
The area where the children where born didn't have a high HIV infection rate, and in fact, HIV can be preventable by simply avoiding sexual contact. Essentially, increasing their casualties from basic diseases like the flu for prevention of a disease that they're unlikely to get is very immoral.
Glasses will always be around. The eyes get damaged the older we get. Some eyes get damaged faster. Like my eyes shouldnt have gone bad because my Gene's were good and as I aged my lifestyle effected my eye till I turned 12 and needed glasses. By lifestyle I mean when I was 7 I used to stare at the sun for no damned reason since I found it fascinating.
"We won't try this until it's researched further" - scientists
And when someone researchs it we condemn them
👏....👏.....👏
we should make humans better. designer babies sounds like a good idea to me.
In some ways I would agree with you, in time humanity could benefit from designing babies (I'm not going to go into the ethics because that is irrelevant in this part of the discussion). However there are a number of factors in how society would adapt.
For instance (this is just speculation as I have no way of telling the future), assuming that gene editing would be legal for the populace to do as they wished, it might not be commercially feasible for lower/middle class citizens and only a small section of the populace could have access to it, which may create an ever increasing gap between certain sections of humanity. This would also occur for people that do not wish to improve their children, which would continue splitting humanity's paths on where they think they should go in the future (if designer babies becomes sound, a large majority needs to be in agreement and access needs to be universal). It would create further inequalities that cannot be easily handed so as I stated before, we need to actually plan what we intend to do with humanity.
Genetic engineering may also lead to significant problems that are impossible to predict. Even if we could analyses every gene and its effects on certain people (which according to my chemistry textbook we can't), predicting the combinations of designer children's children (the way they fight disease, the compatibility of two genetically altered individuals, the potential for genetic mutation to occur, or how designer babies will decide to design more babies) is most certainly impossible for now (and likely the future). At least at the moment we know for the most part that our current genes will survive for a significant period of time.
There are a sum of problems also that I haven't covered and you can probably look up (or think up) yourself, but you are right in that humans will have to improve in the future.
@Varietygirl1 "Eugenics" - the science of improving a population by controlled breeding to increase the occurrence of desirable heritable characteristics.
Current genetic engineering is something different in that it could changes an individual in one generation as eugenics requires many and would impact society in other ways if used (possible examples (all of which is speculation). cause long term disease, impact mental abilities of individuals, and make a dramatic sudden shift in how individuals power and function in a society, allow for humans to become as intelligent as future AI, create people intelligent enough to solve unsolvable problems, create easily grown food to end world hunger, may start wars etc.)
I agree that we should be cautious with this technology, but that is because it raises questions that we haven't answered before.
We should make humans better, but we need to be able to do it reliably, not with error-prone methods. You cannot simply discard people because you screwed up their genome.
@RaniaIsAwesome I think you are being very pessimistic. You can't say that is what would happen if we haven't had the experience before. And we are far from perfect, if we were we wouldn't need so many tools to keep us alive.
@RaniaIsAwesome Just because you're conservative doesn't mean you can or should be able to force everyone to think like you.
I'm okay with editing humans genes if that can give us Cat Girls.
Don't worry dude ill get you one soon
Meanwhile in Japan: *Makes cat girls their number 1 priority*
honestly wouldn't mind cat ears myself. cat-like reflex speed, too, would be very useful
@@512TheWolf512 For those reflexes you would require a faster metabolism, and humans altrady eat a lot to keep their brains working. You would need to constantly eat, likely it would be very impractical.
@@clochard4074 also cats sacrificed their ability to see colors for a more dynamic vision.
You do such a good job of explaining new scientific discoveries / research / news! You not only explain complex science in a very accessible way for the non-scientist, but you are also engaging and concise in your teaching. Please, more of these videos!
These girls were unwitting subjects of human experimentation with unpredictable, life-altering consequences. In a just world, Jiankui would rot in prison.
before jumping to conclusions, we should wait and see how the girls are gonna grow (if they're gonna survive, live a normal life even if now they're going to be watched until the rest of their life, and their kids and grandkids if they have any etc), maybe he did help after all, we don't know just yet
after all, we have to understand that China, unlike most western countries, didn't ban that type of procedures, it was a "grey" area so to speak, you can' force a law/moral view that wasn't there in the first place
more than anything, he should have been more careful
plus, given how lucrative is plastic surgery over there, I wouldn't be surprised if they thought it was only one more step into it (after all we all know that if it doesn't get regulated, it's mainly gonna be used for aesthetic purposes)
@@NemuriNezumi94 I would argue that the girls' life outcomes are completely irrelevant. CRISPR technology, while fantastic, is not perfect yet. In this very example, the procedure didn't go exactly as planned. The mere fact that there was potential for things TO go wrong (which they partially did), and the stakes involved (two girls' lives), along with the triviality of the experiment's goal (conferring resistance to HIV when plenty of alternatives exist) make this act, in my view, a criminally reckless endangerment of human lives.
What do you have to say to the parents who chose to volunteer their children to this experiment by their own free will?
Come on, give me crisper. I want my kids to be able to leap tall buildings in a single bound!
Good! This mean the blue eyes, and blonde hair genes won't go extinct! The future is bright.
Create the super humans and create them now.
Experimenting on babies to satisfy your weird desires.. youre a sicko
@@Night.League How many babies would be worth human wide immunity to HIV? Or an increase in life span of 40 years? How about super intelligence? If your answer is zero then you my friend are no better than a cave man. Even at it's worst this is no different than abortion, a 100% legal practice by the way.
medical achievements also cost many human lives in fact. we should look at the future benefit
@@dracon501 Except, you idiot, we have no idea how to increase intelligence, or lengthen lifespan, and all we can do right now is introducing brand new, potentially extremely dangerous genetic disease with 99% certainty. Did you even watch the video? All the dude tried to do was doing exceptionally well studied mutation, and he FAILED! He did something no one understands right now to another human! Turn on your brain, would you like to get new, exciting genetic disease no one in the world knows how to treat that might kill you before you're 20 just to have that 1% chance of getting slight resistance to virus we can pretty much suppress safely for patient's life already?
@@KuK137
But what if we knew? What then? You are simply restating the point.
I want my children to be either badass goblin-slaying gods or cute, overpowered slimes.
that time I got re-incarnated as a slime? XD
@@sherwan8143 you're just as bad if you got the references
"Dangerous knowledge is still knowledge and therefore useful. Usually turns out to be the most useful, in my experience." - Neloth
Once natural selection is over, since every human can live a relativelly normal life, the future human evolution will come by this technology.
What is wrong with Designer Babies?
Efforts towards scientific progress should be independent of immediate (and often short sighted) applicability of technologies arising from said progress. Argument about exhausting all other alternatives to HIV "treatment" is moot.
People are allowed to choose to have babies...but they shouldn't choose how they are made?
For some reason only "nature" is allowed to choose how certain things are done...
...but what is "nature"?
GATTACA begins
CRISPR scares me because you never know if you'll get a Khan or a Bashir.
Blake Morris yeah more of that kind of thinking
Or a super-carrier.
Congratulations, you've created a baby that isn't affected by HIV. Unfortunately this allows the virus to mutate in their system and become airborne. Thanos would be proud.
@Blake Morris - It's more of getting a Cartman or a Stan.
Khaaaaaan definitely Khan.
You Americans really, really take your television and films too seriously.
I've seen a lot of different opinions being expressed, and I can't rightly say that any of them have been 'wrong' but the people who say stuff like Jiankui is a hero, and that in the future people would look down at Hank as a naysayer to progress. It doesn't seem like they comprehend how out of hand this situation could get, and that it is scientific concerns that got, I guess you could say, riled up about this endeavour, that also disagreed with the horrific experimentation on heredity, under the title of 'eugenics'. People who jump aboard the wagon of saying that Jianku is absolutely correct and is going to lead to the improvement of humanity also need to consider the issues that this could bring about in the future:
who would have access to this technology, would it be limited to those who could afford it,
would government make it mandatory.
how would this affect the biodiversity amongst the human species, if we all became 'safe' from everything, something would crop up, it wound happen eventually, something that, the new, regulated genetics of the (for lack of a better name that comes to mind) CRISPR generation wouldn't be able to cope with, and could thus cause a massive die off.
If advancements were made that managed to perhaps indefinitely prolong the life of an individual, and some research has been done on this; managing to increase the number of times a cell can replicate before it stopped being able to do such. Where would we put the line of the now artificial mortal age, would death at a certain age become mandate due to the overpopulation.
would we just delve into the eradication of genetic diseases, or allow for purely aesthetic appearance to be determined by the parents/figure of authority/government
These are just some things that I think we should really consider, and ideally before we started the fall down the rabbit hole like Jiankui caused us to do. And while for some of us it might not even affect us during our life spans, it will affect the life of all those who follow after us. Think before you choose sides, while I have leaned more towards staying far away from altering the genetics of humankind for the time being, until we have truly figured out and understood the implications of/ and consequences of this path that we may find our self going down. Have a good day to whoever made it this far. If you have a differing opinion, that's your opinion, and I can't ask for no angry responses to this comment since I put it out to the internet like I did, but if you could try to be calm and state your points clearly if you do respond, that would be much appreciated.
Killing fetus: ok
Modifying an embryo: totally not ok
Interesting...
Think how immoral would be to kill the pharma and medicine business.
@*Tea Truffel* Anything that's bigger than a virus (cells, bacteria) and above it's labeled "kill". But hey, humans gotta eat and cattle ain't jumping itself into my mouth.
The difference here is if you kill it it won't suffer the through the horrors of life, but if you botch the modification AND damn the being to life it's much worse.
completely different things, embryos are killed and is "mostly" accepted as they technically aren't conscious yet, or alive, a fetus, however, is conscious as it has developed all of the main organs and its heart has started beating
>forcing people who are in no position to have kids to reproduce and raise kids
Idk, that sounds pretty immoral too
"Doctor uses medicine to reduce twin girls' chance of contracting HIV"
Honestly I was expecting far worse from a Chinese doctor using gene-editing.
We have to start somewhere, so I support it.
sure, lets start by letting a communist country experiment on it's own people (and probably turn them into mindless slaves by disabling genes responsible for intelligence)
I really don't think this is a good thing at the moment. I used to be very pro-gene editing but after writing papers for uni I've realised that things really aren't as clear cut as they seem. Especially since we obviously don't know everything there is to know about genetics, it's not ethical either.
So you don't believe AI can do this to us in the future? It's an impossibility in your mind? Let me remind you that DNA has already done this to RNA in the past.
@@Rekovnii you weren't really the person I was inviting to talk but sure...
Perhaps but that's not the discussion for now, we don't have AI (the kind that has its own motives, consciousness or any reason to 'enslave humanity') and we don't have reliable gene-editing. It's not impossible but it is improbable that we would ever give this kind of power to a machine.
Can you explain what you mean with DNA and RNA please I don't follow.
@@Alex-ik8pr This happend 4 billion years ago when RNA gave DNA the access to write it's genetic code. It's called a phenotypic revolution where DNA ended up becoming a replicator itself.
Now we are DNA based lifeforms and the AI will hijack our reproduction to favor itself. It is the only possible outcome once humans surrender the responsibility to AI.
It is in fact more probable than you think given the nature of humanity. These chinese twins are proof of that. The AI will make your child even better than a human ever will. Don't you want better childeren? Etc.
@@Rekovnii we are DNA based because DNA is more stable than RNA. DNA has to replace the RNA in the Okazaki fragments (which is what I'm guessing your talking about) otherwise our genome would be a jumbled mess of DNA and RNA.
DNA is not favouring itself. DNA is a collection of molecules not parasites.
DNA polymerase II is an enzyme (which RNA 'helped' to make) so i still don't understand why you're saying hijacked as if there's some kind of consciousness.
Also what does this have to do with AI?
@@Alex-ik8pr The point is that DNA was not a replicator. After DNA had access to write the genetic code for RNA it became a replicator. The same will happen with AI once it get's access to write our genetic code. It will design humans in order to replicate itself.
I WANT A SUPER BABY!!
I have a genetic condition called Neurofibromatosis (Type 1.) Because of this, I have tumors both internally and externally throughout my body. They’re unsightly and painful. Cancer is also a risk and the disease gets worse over time. CRISPR could cure me. Literally. It won’t get rid of the tumors I have but will prevent more ones. That would be life changing. NF impacts my life in a major way and having it taken away...man I can’t fathom it.
Babby
edit: baby. (Not so hard is it?)
I support the genetic modification of the babies. There will always be more research to do. Also, how are scientists supposed to do more research if they aren't even allowed to use the technology? Testing CRISPR in lab cells is like learning to swim on land. You can spend an infinite amount of time doing it, but it won't help you with the real thing. The scientist in question took the first plunge and I hope others will follow his example. Yes, he made a mistake but it was the first attempt ever for crying out loud. If the first spearmaker had given up because they messed up the first time or if the first farmer had given up because their first harvest failed, what kind of world would we be living in right now? We're not going to get the perfect technology instantly. We have to let it evolve. We didn't go from room-sized computers to smartphones overnight. It took many decades of work, research and hardwork to make that happen. But the main point is that we *did* let it happen. Imagine if we'd condemned the person who built the first computer and decided to ban any further computer production. That's exactly what we're doing now. Reminds me of the story of Prometheus.
The issue with this is, if people are allowed to design thier children to be "perfect" then there is no question that those who can afford to pay the most will end up with the best genetics in thier offspring. And being able to pay enough to be genetically superior to your peers is flat out wrong. It can be equated to paying of the refery of a sports game. You are desitined to win no matter what anyone else does.
It takes the one true equality that exists amongst us, that not you, nor anyone gets to choose how they are born, and riggs it in favor of a select few. And once that gaps is there. Nothing short of a species wide civilzational destruction would be able to close it.
@Anthony Polonkay Lol look around you, my friend. You're already living in a world like that. We have been living in a world like that for thousands of years. Even now, the rich have access to better healthcare, education and on average live longer than the rest of the people. This gap you mention has always existed and will always exist. It's inevitable. However, there has never been true equality between us in terms of genes. Some people have excellent genes: they look good, or are sick less often or are more intelligent than average. Some people have bad genes. Genetic diversity is the entire point of sexual reproduction, which means that we aren't a homogeneous mix of the same genes as you suggest we are. Besides, just because someone is rich now doesn't mean their offspring will continue to stay rich forever. In most of the cases, the family wealth gets squandered by the third generation. Meaning the superior genes eventually reach the common populace, which they do anyway since rich people have to reproduce too and in doing so pass on their genes to the next generation. But that's the beauty of it. Even if one person, no matter rich or poor, gets modified to have better genes, those genes eventually spread throughout the gene pool. There's no reason to resist this technology.
@@feynstein1004
The equality lies not in the results of someones genetics, but via the fact that nobody, not even thier parents had the ability to pick which genes they were born with.
The fact that it is up to chance to more or less of a degree for everyone. That is the equality lies. Nobody got to pick thier cards or have them picked for them. They were simply dealt a hand and have to play with it. Is there inequality in the results of this absolutly. But id rather the inequality be random than have a lineage be able to cheat thier way to genetic prosperity.
And to address your point of the rich losing thier wealth after generations, this is true enough. But that tends to have alot to do with the fact that dadday had a head for business while the son or grandson does not. Amd under the managememt of someone not cut out for it, it crumbles.
This factor becomes a non issue when you can literally select the genes that makes sure the persons mental apptitude lies in whatever maintains the riches. With designer humans anyone you eliminate the gamble of not having children suited to continue the legacy. This only leaves hubris to be the downfall of a wealthy lineage. And while human hubris is powerful, its not hard to simply make sure your children are born with genes antithetical to it. Youed never be able to eliminate it comlletely. But you can get close.
At any rate. The main point stays that just because the rich have always had better access to most stuff due to thier riches, does not mean they SHOULD have access to all things. Genetic manipulation being definatly off the table to all, the wealthy included
@@feynstein1004 also to clear something else up , i never stated we are a homogenois mix of all the same genes. Though youed be suprised just how alike vastly seperated peoples genetics likly are. .
The equality still lies in the randomness because even amongst the healthiest/most desirable genetic lineages those people still contain a magnitude of bad/undesirable genetics that have just as much chance to show up in thier offspring as any other genes. And the amount that even eugenics can influence that is so minute that it honestly doesnt really matter.
So the point of a one universal untouchable equality in peoples being in the uncontroled nature of which genes they will get still holds up.
Embryos can't give informed consent.
"If we play god for long enough we'll become ones"
-Me 2018
Yes thank you, at least someone is pushing the envelope
Quentin Curry Yeah, but the way he did wad kinda immoral. Don’t get me wrong, i do support Crispr, but he did it without authorization if i understood correct
Matheus Sandbakk If the couple wanted him to do that I believe that’s the authorization he needs, I think we have been moving kinda slow on this. We have created full bacteria genes synthetically but lots of people are nervous to move foreword with anything human. If the couple didn’t consent on it then yes it would be wrong
Who cares? He had the parents permission, they can do whatever they want with their cells and it's their cells that make the kid.
the chinese government cares, because now the door is open for them to one day make super-soldiers, or worse an aerosolized mutagen that can be dispersed on unaware subjects.
"You can't make someone immune to aids/hiv." He Jiankui: "Here, hold my beer".
This guy is the future! Anything new and groundbreaking will always needs more research.. space needs more research.. why isn't it unethical to go to Mars when we are so much in the dark about it history and current status.. but Elon (along with plenty of other big names) out here pissing his money away on trying to get to Mars.. why no one says it's unethical then?
Because going to mars won’t change what it means to be human. When you start messing with what makes you YOU, you’re messing with some potentially dangerous stuff. The worst thing that could happen if people go to mars is everybody in mars ends up dying and we’ve wasted a lot of resources. The worst thing that could happen with gene editing is a genetic flaw that propagates through the population and potentially kills or diseases billions of people. It’s not something we want to rush into
There are people who think it's unethical to go to Mars. There could be microscopic life on Mars that is not used to dealing with Earth microbes and they could hitch a ride on one of our machines and infect and kill all the remaining life on Mars. Watch Vsauce's video on "Is It Okay to Touch Mars?".
The guy is missing, I think he was kidnapped
Thallanar Rabidtooth I mean is killing a microbe unethical?
The astronauts signed up for their experiment, but the enormous numbers of embryos that are being destroyed in the name of research didn't. That's the moral difference.