🚀 go-pugleaf

mmm@cup.portal.com (Mark Robert Thorson) writes:

>So what exactly has you bothered about the chimpman?  Is it that some human
>DNA would be used, and you feel a sharp line should be drawn around humanness?
>What if the hybrid was 99.99% chimp and 0.01% human?  Would that help?


	The *idea* of the chimpman is not what bothers me so much as what
the life of the creature would be like.  You would be bringing an assumedly
sentient life form into a world which would reject it.  The life of the 
chimpman would be like the life of the elephantman.  His differences would
set him so far apart from society that he abhorred.  No one has the right
to create sentience when he knows that sentience could never live a happy
life.

	Attempting to draw a line about humanness is impossible.  Considering
humanity's diversness and the constant effect of evolution, there can never
be a line drawn about humanity, not to such a degree of accuracy.  Trans-
planting human genes into other life forms is not the same.  That is merely 
using other life forms to produce human products, such as insulin.  Where it
is applicable, this practice is certainly better than using animal substitutes,
like we use animal insulin to treat diabetes.  

	There is an obvious difference here.  What is being discussed here is
a human-chimp mule.  If it is possible, then the creature might possess 
sentience.  It would not be a *human*, but it would be a *being*, a 
*sentience*.  I hold that all sentients possess the rights of humans, and that
they should be treated just as we treat humans.  The creation of these 
mules would be mere exploitation of them.  Exploitation is immoral, illegal.
That is why child pornography is illegal.  This would possibly be worse than
child pornography, if that can be imagined.  That is why I draw a line.  

>Would it be okay if the experiment was done with totally non-human DNA, like
>chimp/dog?  Or chimp/CAD-generated?

	Neither dogs nor chimps possess sentience.  They are incapable of 
complex thought.  They have simple social structures.  If one argues that
chimpanzees posses very complex social structures, then I would like to
introduce you to human society - a world of not only personal inter-
relationships, but also of governments, corporations, money, and religions
of every imaginable kind.  All human societies have complex social structures.
Even nomadic tribes still in the prehistoric era show obviously complex
societies.  The character of sentience should be obvious.  

	Without the sentience, the animals possess no rights.  Just as 
we use animals for every kind of research imaginable already, I do not 
see how hybrids would be immoral.  How many animals right's activists
protest mules?  Not even they see the hybridization of animals to be immoral.
Going a little further, I have no objections to species engineering
either.  In fact, engineering larger cows, better grains, and new animals
that fill new niches in the economy (Has anyone read _West of Eden_?) would
be a tremendous development for mankind.  I doubt animals right's activists
would agree here, of course.

>Does your uncomfort extend to non-DNA components of humanness, such as the
>mind?  If I discovered a way to upload a copy of human consciousness, then
>download it into a chimp brain, would you find that objectionable?
>How about if the brain was made out of integrated circuits?

	Indeed, the mind makes gives us the sentience which is central to
our humanaity.  No chimp brain could hold the mind of a human They
should already be maximizing the potential of their brain.  I wouldn't
find the transferring of the mind of a person to another medium unless it
was against their will.  If someone wished it, I do not feel it is my 
choice to decide.  The only exception would be if everyone wanted themselves
uploaded to computers, which might have an interesting effect on the power 
consumption of civilization...
 
>Or is your uncomfort connected to the technology involved?  If I could produce
							     ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>a sentient chimp solely through selective breeding, could I count on your
 ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>approval?
 ^^^^^^^^

	Yes and no.  Creating a new being would not be bad in itself, but
your intentions may make it so.  If you create them for exploitative reasons,
you have created a permanent underclass expressly for exploitation.  This 
is immoral.  It is sort of the old question - is a gun immoral?  It depends
on your intentions.

__
Bryan