Re: [DIYbio] Privately funded designer babies

On Thu, Feb 14, 2019 at 7:30 AM 'qetzal' via DIYbio
<diybio@googlegroups.com> wrote:
>
> I worked in biotech startups for 30 years. A big chunk of that has been in gene therapy. So I think I can reasonably claim a fair understanding of the challenges. And no, I wouldn't be OK if they just bumped up the numbers. I would be OK if these guys showed an adequate appreciation for what they're trying to do before they start trying to generate engineered babies who might have to suffer terrible consequences due to their naivete and hubris.

Bryan's participation on this DIYbio mailing list for the last decade
seems pretty adequate for me to think he's well intentioned and
concerned about quality control. It looks like you've only
participated in 6 discussions here, so it's understandable that you
are not familiar with his general style and approach. Some folks on
here originally thought he was a bot because of how much information
he collects, reads, reviews, and regurgitates with annotations and
insights. That media article seems to inherently have a negative view
of this idea and wants to appeal as clickbait, so it's understandable
that the whole situation hasn't been presented.

>
> And frankly, I find your previous comment a bit horrifying: that the parents would suffer too from having to take care of affected infants. How would that in any way justify any of this?

It wasn't a justification at all, just a response. Though now that you
bring it up, parents already have it hard enough raising a normal kid,
they aren't going to step ignorantly into making more work for
themselves.

>
> Let me be clear, however. If we can get to the point where engineering babies has sufficiently low risk, I have no general objections to doing it. I just don't see any evidence that these guys have enough of an understanding to a) reach the point of sufficiently low risk, or b) restrain themselves until then.

Read the DIYbio archives, if you want. It should give you a bit better
understanding... it will take some time though, as after me, he's the
second most-active poster of all time (having 2352 posts):
https://groups.google.com/forum/#!aboutgroup/diybio

--
-- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups DIYbio group. To post to this group, send email to diybio@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to diybio+unsubscribe@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at https://groups.google.com/d/forum/diybio?hl=en
Learn more at www.diybio.org
---
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "DIYbio" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to diybio+unsubscribe@googlegroups.com.
To post to this group, send email to diybio@googlegroups.com.
Visit this group at https://groups.google.com/group/diybio.
To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/diybio/CA%2B82U9JOXKT6gg8JN8cnZpj5PtyAzD7D3dJKoA%2BM2vmV-fJfCw%40mail.gmail.com.
For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.