Do you think that modern technology and public service announcements are harming the populations gene pool? With all the required safety equipment and safety regulations and laws and such, stupid poeple who should die in accidents as a part of natural selection are surviving long enough to spread stupid genes into the gene pool. Aren't we overriding natural selection? Isn't it all counterproductive?
125743
OSHA has nothing to do with it but if people follow the standard the insurance premiums I pay go down
316974
What about medicine?  Aren't we "interfering with evolution" whenver we try to cure someone of a disease or heal them?  What about vaccines?  What about insulin?  \n\nNot only that, aren't we "interfering with evolution" when we feed people who are starving in other countries?  If they can't get to the food, they should die, right?  Because "evolution" must go on...\n\nSigh.  I'm sorry I'm being sarcastic it's just that people who want heartless "natural selection" to be the governing force of our lives are trying to remove all vestiges of mercy and kindness from society.  \n\nDid you know Hitler used "natural selection" to justify the holocaust?  \n\nIn Mein Kampf, Hitler used the German word for evolution (Entwicklung) many times, citing "lower human types." He criticized the Jews for bringing "Negroes into the Rhineland" with the aim of "ruining the white race by the necessarily resulting ization." He spoke of "Monstrosities halfway between man and ape" and lamented the fact of Christians going to "Central Africa" to set up "Negro missions," resulting in the turning of "healthy . . . human beings into a rotten brood of s." In his chapter entitled "Nation and Race," he said, "The stronger must dominate and not blend with the weaker, thus sacrificing his own greatness. Only the born weakling can view this as cruel, but he, after all, is only a weak and limited man; for if this law did not prevail, any conceivable higher development (Hoherentwicklung) of organic living beings would be unthinkable." A few pages later, he said, "Those who want to live, let them fight, and those who do not want to fight in this world of eternal struggle do not deserve to live."\n\nIf you believe this you are in awful company... Check out the link...
130699
I completely see your point.  It seems like you have really put some thought into this, and you seem very intelligent.  If everyone in the world survives, no evolution will take place for sure.  So at the very least we will be at a standstill.  You sound like someone with good genes though, we should meet and maybe we could improve the gene pool together.
316518
Are you suggesting that with improving technology we are living less long?\nIf so I can think of nowhere to find evidence to say you are correct.\nGenerally, improving technology goes hand in hand with greater lifespans, although the relationship is far from causal in every case.
497139
First off I am pro-genetic research.  I think it is the key to understanding the way the human body works so we can combat diseases and perhaps cure AIDS and cancer if we understand how they affect the body at a genetic level.  Anyone who doesn't see the potential benefit of this and the REAL practical aspects to advancing  our knowledge as a whole for the betterment of our standard of living is blind.  If we want a future with cheaper and more effective medicine and more efficient ways to treat diseases including some now considered terminal or incurable then it's better to research than not to research.\n\nSecondly, genetic "coding" goes on whether we want it to or not.  In fact, all living things are a product of genetic coding so if you are against it, then you are against reproduction. ;)\n\nAs for checking to see if there is a "crime gene"...  First we need to find out if one exists before worrying about the possible "Minority Report" scenario coming true.  I don't know if there is one but I also believe people have control over their own actions and shouldn't be held accountable for something they have not yet committed IF such a scenario existed...  However, as it sits now, this would be a poor argument against genetic research given the real world potential applications that can be used today vs. the far-fetched notion of preemptive crime prevention based on one's genetic makeup.  Who knows?  Maybe they can find a cure to crime in the form of a pill instead of a cell.  Why not?  The chances of that happening would be just as plausible and good for humanity.
385645
My opinion is that it is messing with things that we don't understand.\nNobody really knows how life works, or how procreation really takes place.\nBy messing around we are destroying natural evolution, and creating potential situations for the spread of incurable disease.\nAny of the pros can be examined, and the question 'Why?' asked.\nThere is almost always a logical answer.\nWhy do we need more food? Because the nutrition of present food has been destroyed by the fore-runner of genetic engineering - unnatural farming in order to make more profit.\nAlmost always there is an answer which ends up with - to make more profit.\nOur current society is run on the idea that profit is essential. If we examined all these things down to the root we would see that society is definitely headed in the wrong direction, and genetic engineering is a part of that.\nIt's of no long term benefit to the human race.
351730
Evolution doesn't cease to exist simply because there is no need for it.  Genetic variation and mutation are always going to occur.  However, the 'natural selection' aspect of it may not be applicable.
308259
i like the way you think man. the fact is howver that failure to reproduce is concidered unnatural HOWEVER! there could be a small overlooked message in the DNA that says once every so and so years people will be gay, to decrease the surplus population...i neer saw it that way im glad you enlightenemd mee
269957
Jim im just reading the link that Nikki posted and here is a quote for that page: \n\n"The education system teaches children not to think. Any student that uses logic and solid scientific evident to question the Theory of Evolution is ridiculed and insulted into submission. The students that submit become non thinking robots that dare not question the dogma presented."\n\nHuh? Dont you think that they are turning they're own problems of illogical thought on to us as they are trying to grasp some form of reason as to why they should continue to believe? \n\nOh and another on that made me chuckle\n\n"A forth grade elementary school class was observed at the park playing a three-legged race game. The kids thought it was great fun. The teacher told them they were being trained to cooperate. Actually it was brainwashing kids into conforming to the system where they are not allowed to have individual thoughts or opinions."\n\nObviously doesnt understand what gene mutations are and that they are not neccesiarly a change for the better. Also dogs.....\n\n" The process of natural selection is not an evolutionary process. The DNA in plants and animals allows selective breeding to achieve desired results. Dogs are a good example of selective breeding. The DNA in all dogs has many regressive traits. A desired trait can be produced in dogs by selecting dogs with a particular trait to produce offspring with that trait."\n\nerm hello?? Why drag poor little fossils into this when they know nothing about them\n\n"Schools should be teaching that the earth, all life on earth and the entire cosmos was created by God because it is more scientifically consistent with science and the fossil record. Intelligent design can easily be seen in every detail of nature. The theory of evolution falls short consistently in the absence of intermediate species, the sudden appearance of giant dinosaurs and basic science."\n\nHaha the funniest one to date and most rediculous\n\n"Evolutionists claim environmental factors cause small changes in the offspring in the evolutionary chain. However, the environmental experience of the female cannot change the chromosomes within her eggs and cannot have any effect upon her offspring. Her body cannot go into the eggs contained within her ovaries at her birth to make an intelligent genetic changes. Females cannot be a part of the evolutionary theory for these reasons."\n\nIm getting bored of this now, I think its time for me bed. Jim read that link its too funny!
122891
goes right back tio evolutionary theory. males are hardwired to reproduce with as many mates as possible to ensure the genetic pool being secured and passing on the genes. Females are hardwired to be caregivers and protect their young. Im not saying its right or wrong just what genetic research would suggests. Social morales dictates tha rest
10494
Ahh, another Nature vs Nurture discussion.  Of course it is both.  If we didn't have the genetic component, our early anscestors would have eaten non-healthy food and the human race would have died out.  For the environmental aspect, we learn to like what is around us and is easy to get.  If pig farmers couldn't get used to the stench, then no one would be pig farmers.
157980
well, the last two answers here are what idealists would say, but (and this is not my thinking) the reason we're here is simply to pass on our genes to the next generation, and the next, and the next, and the next, and the next........until something else happen (i.e. meteorite???)
27617
Ow!  My toes!  ;) (kidding)\n\nI think it's ludicrous that people are treating the theory as if there's any real debate among scientists on the matter.  Global Warming is far, far, far more contested than is evolution; yet in the popular press, you'd never know it.\n\nWhat I get sick of is all the crap about "missing links" or whatever.  Quite frankly, I don't give a rats @$$ about the fossil record.  Sure, it was important to Darwin when he formulated the theory, but one can't really expect that the fossil record should be any where near complete, and all the arguments against evolution focus on this field.  I studied molecular biology, and it is in molecular biology that you'll find way, way stronger support for the theory.\n\nWhen I list the sorts of evidence that come from molecular biology (Homologous proteins, the near universality of the genetic code (eg the relation between codons and amino acids), genetic drift in non-essential parts of homologous proetiens, DNA technology that can show relationship, developmental homology (ie ontogeny and it's relationship to phylogeny), etc) I get people acting like I presented no evidence because they couldn't even understand that the list I've given actually is evidence.  It takes a long time to understand the manner in which DNA becomes a protein, and the way that proteins fold, the way they work, and the way their related.  Until you understand that, the "Big Picture" is not clear.  But to those that *do* understand the Big Picture, it becoems obvious.\n\nI can't explain to a starving thrid world farmer why it's in his interests to become literate, along with the rest of his village, so they can better understand how to, say, help prevent epidemics in the short term (by being able to understand routes of transmission better) or bring about democracy in the long term.  But living in the industrialized west, the benefits of literacy are manifest.  The person who doesn't understand science seems to me in many ways to be like that starving farmer.\n\nPeople who understand science will dictate the fate of much in the world, and they will have the power to do much good.  By not making an effort to learn science, you set yourself back greatly.  But by actively attacking science--like the starving farming burning a public library, or like the Haitian who steals the copper wires set up to build an electrical infrastructure that would bring long-term prosperity in exchange for a short-term benefit in selling scrap metal--the skeptic zealots do themselves and the entire Christian faith a great disservice.\n\nIn response to your additional questions:\n1-4 are NOT--repeat, they are NOT--aspects of the theory of evolution by natural selection.  This is exactly what I'm talking about--people are criticizing a theory they don't even begin to understand.\n\n1) refers to the Big Bang theory, not evolution by natural selection.  2) is a theory of planetary formation, not a theory of speciation.  3) and 4) are aspects of a theory of abiogenesis, which is different from evolution.  Only 5) actually regards evolution.\n\nEvolution by natural selection dictates that small variations between members of a species accumulate over the long term to become major changes, resulting in speciation.  And yes, I believe that that happened.\n\nI have issues with the big bang, but those are not relevant here--they are for reasons of physics that go beyond what I can explain right here.\n\nPlanetary formation, while not a part of evolution, is largely unavoidable.  All matter has mass, and this results in gravitational attraction.  If dust is in space, it will collapse in on itself.  Physics-wise, this is about as mind-blowing as the fact that water + dirt = mud.  It would be a greater stretch of the imagination to imagine such formation not occuring, because the laws that dictate such a formation are at work all around us all the time.\n\n
32964
No, that's why wars happen and massive epidemic viruses. Nature has its way of underpopulating, but if science continues keeping people that should die at their old stages from dying maybe someday we could get overpopulated. Therefore we should move to another planet...hehe
619263
The problem with this theory is that the "gay gene" is not being passed on to the next generation, because reproduction does not transpire.  All evolutionary traits depend upon the trait being passed on to the successive generation.
665219
Big steps forward in knowledge, understanding and the advance of humanity requires great risks to be taken.\n\nWould the pilgrim fathers have set out in a rickety little wooden ship if the same question was asked?\n\nWhat about the dangers of electricity, flying, medical testing? The list is endless and lots of people have died or been seriously injured making the discoveries that have improved all our lives so much.
479448
You have asked some huge questions.  In my opinion, I believe that copying DNA is something we do in research everyday.  Some of that DNA is human.  That principle is the basis for mass produced human insulin.  However that does not make it a good idea to mass-produce new humans from copied DNA even if it were possible.  (currently it is not possible).  As for culturing cells for transplants, I think maybe you are referring to creating viable replacement organs for transplant from tissue culture.  This is a remarkable notion and one that should be strived for.  Again, right now that is only so much science fiction but strides are being made in that direction.  There is the production of artificial blood and replacement skin for burn victims that is happening right now.  There are scientists that are working to create a functional bladder from tissue culture to replace bladders damaged by disease or injury.\nLastly, there will always be faith that needs to be addressed.  Peoples' personally held beliefs dictate how they should behave.  I don't think religion should dictate the direction that science goes but faith and morals certainly have a direct impact on how some scientists proceed in their work.