Chinese scientist who produced genetically altered babies sentenced to 3 years in jail

submitted by iraelmossadreddit from sciencemag.org

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[–]Canbot 7 insightful - 1 fun7 insightful - 0 fun8 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

He was given jail time for publishing his results. He did that out of vanity, wanting the history books to have his name as the first to do it. He is not actually the first, and most certainly not even in a small group of people doing this. His vanity exposed China's genetic engineering program.

This field of study is an arms race and everyone wants to pretend they aren't in it because that would encourage others to be more aggressive with their programs. Everyone who thinks they are the only one working on it will be cautious and thus slow. If they see it as a race they will throw caution to the wind. If you can convince your opponent in a race that you aren't racing they will stop running and you have a better chance of beating them.

[–]soyboy77 6 insightful - 1 fun6 insightful - 0 fun7 insightful - 1 fun -  (1 child)

The Gattaca age has begun.

[–]lordNikon 3 insightful - 1 fun3 insightful - 0 fun4 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Excellent film reference!

[–][deleted] 3 insightful - 2 fun3 insightful - 1 fun4 insightful - 2 fun -  (2 children)

the genetically altered babies have all been given jobs in a textile mill.

https://youtu.be/uB6NmhOy4Io?t=15

[–]iraelmossadreddit[S] 2 insightful - 1 fun2 insightful - 0 fun3 insightful - 1 fun -  (1 child)

mhmm I love eating stem cells from flipper babies

[–]hennaojichan 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

I'm waiting for brain stem cells. They have them I'm sure but first the Mayo Clinic uses their techniques on only the rich. I want to drive in, have a cortical injection and drive out.

[–]weirdthorn 3 insightful - 1 fun3 insightful - 0 fun4 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

WTF?

A court in Shenzhen found that He and two collaborators forged ethical review documents and misled doctors into unknowingly implanting gene-edited embryos into two women, according to Xinhua, China’s state-run press agency. One mother gave birth to twin girls in November 2018

In November 2018, He announced that he had modified a key gene in a number of human embryos in a way thought to confer resistance to HIV. The modification might be passed on to the descendants of children born with it. He recruited couples in which the father was infected with HIV and the mother was not. In a talk at the International Summit on Human Genome Editing in Hong Kong, China, He said he wanted to spare the babies the possibility of becoming infected with HIV later in life. The technique could be used to reduce the HIV/AIDS disease burden in much of Africa, he argued, where those infected often face severe discrimination.

Yeah, I'm sure a lot of people in african countries can afford IVF and genetic manipulation for their prospective children.

[–]lordNikon 3 insightful - 1 fun3 insightful - 0 fun4 insightful - 1 fun -  (1 child)

I feel like this is 100% Beijing approved and they are only punishing them to appease international eyes on the subject. Tidy payoff to the scientists after.

Maybe they'll make an Icheb from Voyager, genetically weaponised child who doesn't know it.

[–]hennaojichan 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

This could be a way of announcing all this to the world. Then if you have a few billion bitcoins you can have your baby put on the waiting list. What alterations would you try first? Size of cortex, height, weight, musculature, heightened ability to communicate since most of don't know what the other, unmodified human, is talking about. Also a good feature would be rapid maturation so by the time he is twelve, you can put him to work and retire.

If they can do this, what other reason would they have to make this announcement? Smells very fishy to me.

And if they can do this, there is no putting this genie (jinn) back in the bottle.