a new super race?

[rosieglo]

Re the article in the guardian about the baby that was successfully screened for the breast cancer gene and the controversy about 'designer babies' - what's the fuss? I'm thinking that breeding out illness and disabilty is a great thing. Improving intelligence also; hopefully the smarter the future generations are the more likely they will find ways to halt our destruction of the planet and stop fighting. What's wrong with wanting fitter, stronger, cleverer and healthier children? And I think it is so wrong for a deaf or blind parent to actively seek out a way to pass their disability on, I cannot begin to understand how they could want to deprive their child of the ability to hear music or see the world around them.
hmmn - for me it's a pretty straight forward matter.

Improving intelligence also; hopefully the smarter the future generations are the more likely they will find ways to halt our destruction of the planet and stop fighting.

It is mans intelligence that is leading to the destruction of the planet. YOu don't see animals messing it up.

I'm presuming you are a troll rosieglo, so I don't waste my time explaining why I wouldn't want any of my DC's "inmperfections" to magically disapear.

Except DD's sticky out ears, maybe.

Sorr I forgot to add;

By rosieglo on Sun 18-Jan-09 02:56:52

"Improving intelligence also; hopefully the smarter the future generations are the more likely they will find ways to halt our destruction of the planet and stop fighting"

Just incase you thought I was saying that.

this could actually (and very scarily) be a genuine question......I have people in my family (my side, the ones who disowned me for daring to have 5 children!), that think like this.

it is actually terrifying thinking about how many people think this way, that it is a good thing to weedle out the 'undesirables' from the population.

problem is that if they based it on the type of people I know, then we would end up with a race of insufferable smug fuckwits who are very very ugly!!(much like the OP I would imagine)

Regression to the mean applies to human beings, you know. Smart parents don't equal smart descendants - although middle class advantages like knowing your way round the school system and being able to use Mummy or Daddy's contacts to get work experience help average or even below-average children to do well.

There's no single 'gene' for anything complicated like intelligence, or sexual preference, or even eye colour, so I doubt very much we'd ever be able to control those things.

Clever doesn't equal good, either. There are plenty of intelligent people who have done terrible things.

riven, there are also a lot of people who think that addicts should be sterilised, or that the mentally ill among us should not be able to have children.

if that was the case I too would not be here!

and ergo, nor my children.

Socrates, Plato and Julius Caesar are said by some researchers to have had epilepsy. Beethoven was deaf. Christy Brown had cerebal palsy. Would you rather Stephen Hawking, Andy Hamilton, Ian Drury, John Milton, Stevie Wonder, Richard Pryor, William Hartnell had never been born? I could go on, and on, and on...

AS for screening for MS, even though I had a parent who had MS, I like to think I would be here anyway, as my Grandparents would have welcomed a baby into thier lives egardless.

Sorry that was badly phased but DH is bothering me.

We do it anyway. We pick the healthy partner rather than the ill one subconciously. It's how the human race prevailed over neanderthals. We're programmed to breed with better looking taller healthy men (and vice versa) so in a sense this is all pretty natural and what the uman race has always been about in evolutionary terms anyway. Simpyl a continuing of survival of the fittest which is how God if you believe in her/him set us all up anyway. It's the reason we take folic acid in pregnancy to avoid birth defects which presumably most of us think is wise and why we're glad today most children live whereas in English history most children died before the age of 5. We are very lucky we have these continuous improvements.

Aside from the OP's point I would be really worried if I though PhD students were doing their research on MN. I wonder if their funding bodies know that is how they are wasting their money. Jeepers, whatever happened to empirical research

But the partner choosing is subconscious and the folic acid prevets edvelopemnt of certain disorders- big difference between that and choosing to deselct an existing embryo imo.

Well actually if I could have had my daughter without her having to have her condition, I would have chosen that option.

I hate it that every time she swallows she is in pain and that sometimes she has spasms of pain like a heart attack which can last for hours and there is FA that can be done about it.

I still would want her, I'd just rather have her without the condition

I'm not sue that's entirely true nowadays Xenia, I think psychology and society gets in the way. People don't always go for the best looking person, but more the best looking person they think they can get. Doesn't exactly hold true with that hypothesis otherwise only the hot people would be having sex!

I think nowadays people prize other values beyond physical fitness because physical fitness isn't the most imprortant thing any more, we don't have to fight for food. Sorry, that's a bit garbled, it's sunday and I've already been up for four hours!

Sue I wuld definitelys ay the same about my boys needs

But funding seems directed at prevention not cure.

Every time I see research on ASD its about identifying embryos before birth so the Mum can terminate.

Why isn't it about providing screening much younger, adequate salt, more respite.... the things that give the kids their potential?

About treating children like your dd?

It seems so out of kilter.

'I'm not sue that's entirely true nowadays Xenia, I think psychology and society gets in the way. People don't always go for the best looking person, but more the best looking person they think they can get. Doesn't exactly hold true with that hypothesis otherwise only the hot people would be having sex!'

I thought the idea is that we screen other people for immune systemns that complement ours and are likely to maximise resistance of offspring? Looks etc come into it but because as a species we have learned to value what's a sign of health- so tall means good infant nutrition etc.

The idea we pick good looking is flawed: I woldn't touch Brad Pitt with a bargepole, or 99% of these so called stunningb types: we all like different people.

I read of study years ago which siad that folic acid caused more spontaneous abortions leading to fewer birth defects. So not that it makes embryos develop properly but that it prevents those that don't form properly from developing further.

Never followed it up though. Will see if I can find out more

edam - is something abnormal with Andy Hamilton? (He's on the short side but "normally" so.)

Folic acid write-up. Most user-friendly info I can find with refs

Clarissimo DD's condition not widespread enough for anyone to bother about it.

She was the first child ever treated with it in Nottingham, when she was diagnosed in 2002.

I wish I could win the lottery so I could take her to the US where there are people who have more experience but even there, their experience is not particular vast. And now she has had two ops here, one of which went wrong and had to be patched, they wouldn't be dealing with 'raw state' iyswim

Clarissimo - what do you mean by the salt and ASD?(Genuine question)

I personally think that if you have a condition that is potentially genetic you should just be sterilised. Hitler was definately on to something.

(must remember to put have tubes tied at top of my to do list I create any more potential 'defects')