I've heard about technology now where you can change the genes of a baby still in the womb of a pregnant woman to make it what you want it to look like. That seems kind of weird to me. Some might find it morally wrong because God created us all how he wanted us.

But then again, if you found out that your baby had a certain disorder or disease, wouldn't you want to fix that?

Do you find this right or wrong?

I'm leaning more toward natural birth.
If my child had a disorder or disease, I think I would try to embrace that, and not try to change his/her genes before they're born. But that's just my opinion.

i think it depends on what the disease was? if it was life threatening then maybe i would try to change that. but if the baby would be able to lead a normal life with the disorder, then i second what mini says.

it doesn't seem wrong. if it's a disease i understand, but if you just want to change your baby's appearance i think that's wrong.

Oh geez. Us ugly kids should be ugly if we were created that way. Gosh. Leave us ugly kids in peace already.

designer babies are made by altering genes in the sperm, egg, or very early embroyos. it usually done in a little dish in the laboratory.

a lot of people having designer babies use genetic engineering to stop the passing on of diseases and disorders. i suppose there are some vain people out there who mix and match the parents best genes into the child and some use it to determine the sex of the child.

there's two types. one makes changes that do not become hereditary and target specific areas. i suppose genetic engineering is okay if it's to change life threatening disorders/diseases. my family has a history of diabetes. if i can somehow prevent my children from developing it... i wouldn't mind. however, it's it to make like a prefect baby then that's a little excessive. i don't know if we are capable of making super smart or super attractive babies from genetic engineering yet but i hope we never get to that point.

I've never actually heard of that.

Where did you hear it from?

But then.. They don't exactly know which strain of DNA gives you a disease. Sure, they know for a few, but many are yet to be found.

exacly what she said



by the way i love the title it's so funny

I think that it's ok if you are trying to prevent a birth defect, disease or other health-related issue. I don't agree with changing the sex and possible physical attributes.

Actually, sometimes after birth children are affected physically by there environment. They actually can slightly change in appearance from what they originally were. And when I say slightly, I mean it to the literal sense. It's a very small change, but still a change in that.

I agree. If there was a history of diabetes for example, I'd want to change that so my child wouldn't have a greater chance of getting it.

But then how would they be able to change the genes?
They think that variations in the sequence of the CTLA-4 gene might cause diabetes, but they don't know for sure. And how would they be able to correct it?

I don't think I would fix anything..
I still believe God made people a certain way for a reason.

See: harlequin ichthyosis
God's a cruel mofo.

The only thing that should be changed is .... acne ;]

REMOVE ACNE PROBLEMS ! SO TEENAGERS WOULDNT BE SO DEPRESSED!

^ Y'know that's usually not why teenagers are depressed. It's usually the hormones + drama + bad days.

I really don't think they should change anything.
And as my last post in here says, they don't have the technology to cure diseases through altering DNA yet. It'll probably take quite a few years to figure everything out.

Nope.

There are people who avoid social. They are afraid of themselves. (Anti-social)

There are people who are not open to others.

There are people who buy a lot of makeup to cover their pimples. (Wasting money)



There are some theories that stress, chocolate, and oily food causes pimple. Many people assume that it could be the problem to acne. Therefore, a great amount of people avoid these foods as possible.

Ok, so maybe bad days and drama are sometimes caused by acne (I still don't really get it..), but they're not comletely related. Depends on the person's self-esteem/how self-concious they are.

Uhh, yeah. Getting slightly off topic here.. =/

OMG I'm so sick of technology right now it's not even funny, a lot of this stuff is not even called for. People do not realize that with stupid, easy, shit like this they take the freakin purposes out of life more and more until one day it will just be so bland and there is nothin to work for, look foward to, or to be surprised or enthused about. Stupid effers.

So no, I do not agree with shit. :)

I watched a movie in science class about parents who were trying to make there child smart- a young Einstein. And another set who were aspring for there child to be tall.

As much as that sounds interesting, I think it is kind of wrong. You shouldn't mess with the nature of your child. Yes it would be cool- and probably make lots of money- if your child was a prodigy. But you should let your child be there own person and let nature take its part and see what your child would grow up to be on its own.

However on another note how people fix there children- if they have spina difida- I think that is okay. Not that it's torture or.. that your just doing to so your child won't get teased. But I would want my child to have a healthy life. If my child has Down's and I could fix it- without harming my baby- then I would do it. But I would NEVER terminate it or not love it just because of it. In fact when I get pregnant I would check for things- so I could be prepared. I guess it depends on the paerson or the situation.

^Ditto. I'm all for natural birth. Unless I can save my kid's life by altering his/her genes, I'm leaving my baby the way they were meant to be.

yes i would change it. Like blue eyes or a better nose.

^ Why? That's a bit.. superficial, don't you think?

I suppose its kind of wrong to change someone from who they really are. Although if something was horribly wrong with them, I suppose it would be nice to fix that. Mostly I find it wrong, to change the genes of someone, sounds like its making it so its not even your kid anymore. -shrugs- I wouldn't exactly want to carry someone elses kid in me.

You guys arent being realistic.

I see where you are all coming from but what happens when this actually occurs, you get to choose from the parents which traits he/she can or cant have but are you going to leave his autism alone, are you gonig to let him/her be blind deaf and mute.

"I want her to have green eyes and black hair, but leave her with diabetes, i dont want to alter her."

In the future i think this will be an option, but its either stick with the baby you have or change everything about your baby. Once everyone has green blue eyes and blonde hair, the special ones are the minorities, the ones with freckles, that have sicknesses.

This reminds me of the book "Uglies" (forgot who it's by...) Everyone in the world is expected to turn 'pretty' at 16 by a full blown operation. it becomes the only thing the people in the world aspire to, to become pretty. then everything will be perfect. i haven't finished yet but... it would be kind of a creepy way to live.

as for the baby thing, it'd be great to prevent diseases, but i'm not exactly sure about the looks part. you should love your children no matter what right? but maybe you'd want them to have an easier future by 'looking better'. no one can argue that looks DO count for something.

yea but what happens when you see asians having green eyes and african people having white skin, and white people having black skin. people are going to look irregular and you cant help but wonder, was she genetically altered.

just like play boy shows, where they dont want girls with fake boobs but real boobs, on mtv i meant playboy.

Um. Wtf are you even talking about? I read the posts and most people are saying that the choice to alter babies would be great if it could prevent diseases... how is that not being realistic?

What's eventually going to happen is that science will find a way to alter genetic disorders that are passed down through the chromosome pairings that contain the nucleic acid sequencing. Or something to that effect. I wasn't really paying all that much attention in BioTech today. Anyways... they'll be able to trace the disorders, change them, whatever, and there will be a big hype because voila! Science cures genetic horrors!

But as always, whatever can be applied to sicknesses can be applied cosmetically to perfectly normal people, and sooner or later, the rich people in Hollywood will be interested in making their ideal child. The thing is, there's really not that much you can do... You can't take a child from two brown-eyed parents and change the DNA around to make her have blue eyes. There's a limit to what science can do.

Granted, this will be in the very FAR future and even then, procedures will probably be incredibly expensive and regular people like us will call those rich people idiots and there'll be protests and blah blah blah.

Personally, I don't think you should mess with nature. I mean if a kid's born with Down Syndrome, that's really sad, but that's the way it was meant to be... he or she shouldn't be any less loved because of it. It might be just me but I view so-called "defects" as obstacles to climb. Society's not meant to be filled with perfectly created people, no matter how hard we strive for it. I guess with me, altering the genes of an embryo crosses that ethical line of what you can and can't mess with.

But seriously? None of us are going to be around whenever scientists figure out how to do this. Human genome = very f**king complicated.

Or something to that effect.

yeah so. If i could change me, i would.

People can do what they want, but I personally never would. It's not natural... it's not what you and your partner created. It just doesn't seem fair. Though I would like to change some of my features, I wouldn't feel like myself. If it's for health reasons, however, that's different.

but if you change it in the womb, there would be no need to change it later on in life.

Like i would get veneer, lasik, straighter and smaller nose, less plumb lips, and smaller forehead.

Hah, when I read pandamonium, it made me think of the Uglies as well. Its by Scott Westerfeld, one of my favorite books. Its about our world 3 decades from now I think it is, and they have this operation you have when your 16, they turn you pretty and make you perfect in a sense, you don't ever get sick and you have a perfect body of what society believes it to be. Although they brain wash you because in our time we almost kill everyone and something effects the fuel and it pretty much destroys our time. Doctors come together and make this operation to brainwash you so you live on a certain way and everything is prefect that this new world won't ever fall apart. I probably could have explained that better, but you have to read the pretties to learn some on what I said.

Anyway in the future more than likely this will be a full option, to be able to change how a kid look and weather or not its gets one thing or the other. The world is falling apart, and we can't really stop it.

lmfao.


i don't really like the idea of it..

^Yea but why don't you?

Sorry, this is the debate forum, I suppose I expect people to elaborate on what their opinion is?

As I was reading over the posts, this is what I was thinking: Everyone is saying how it would change who your child really is and among other things. Well, you don't even know who your baby is because that is impossible. Your baby has not developed any specific features that you would want to change and much less a personality. You wouldn't have anything to compare to in the first place, and your baby most certainly won't either, so why not set the genes the way you want them?

But then Pandamonium had a point:



I suppose that after awhile, people would only start to prefer, say, one color of hair and one color of eyes. Perhaps people would eventually feel obliged to make their baby's the same... And then more minorities and discrimination would arise. And of course, that's the last thing we need. That and becoming a bunch of clones. Natural birth gives the world its diversity, and let's keep that.

As for the diseases and disorders, of course I would change it. Yes, if my baby had Down's Syndrome or something similar and I could change it, I'd do it. It would be taking a huge burden off my child, letting him or her live a normal life. You don't think it would be a good thing to not only wipe out conditions such as diabetes, but autism and Down Syndrome, too? I'm not saying to kill the people who have it, but to just prevent them from having it in the first place?

I don't see it as wrong. As long as you are murdering, or killing. I deffinitly wouldn't change my baby's appearance though.

i don't really know i'm torn between it i think i would if my child had a horrible illness that would just cause them pain and suffering for their entire life

"Life is sweet"

not that sweet if you have progeria. with that, you can be 5 but have the body and appearance of a 70 year old. you die before you can hit your teens.

whatever happened to nature and evolution?

shrug. my family has a history of diabetes but it's not that devastating. with the truly awful, painful disease, then we could find a way to cure it or at least, make the person comfortable.

What does, "Life is sweet" means to you?

life can be sweet even if it's a short period of time, as long as lived to the fullest.

however, many of the most serious, hereditary diseases causes immense pain and severly limits how well one can live.

true, a sick person can be happy if their family and friends are supportive and make everything great while it last but their life still revolves around the hospital stays and the unknown but imminent death. i would never wish it on any person, let alone child.

Morally wrong. No.

Yeah, I read an article and it was like "Design you're own baby, bit by bit!!" Woah wtf?

This reminds me of Gattaca, and the book Pretties.

I know God creates us the way he wants, and a lot of times diseases end up being blessings in the long run, but if i could cure my child's disability i sure would.

^omg, someone else has seen that movie. I feel less geeky now!

ive spent many summers working with mentally and physically disabled kids, and ive seen so many that are too sick to be kids. i have to be honest. if i knew my child would be disabled, whether mentally or physically, i would change that. if i knew i would be having conjoined twins, who frequently die hours after birth, i might even not have them. i for one do not want to make my child's life harder than it has to be.

i would never change my child's appearance though, beyond what i've already said.

i agree with it.

it's not the woman's fault for carrying a baby with a disorder. and it's not like you want your baby living with it.

why not?

QUOTE(JakeKKing @ Sep 16 2006, 8:06 AM)

Actually, sometimes after birth children are affected physically by there environment. They actually can slightly change in appearance from what they originally were. And when I say slightly, I mean it to the literal sense. It's a very small change, but still a change in that.

Yeah. If you put identical twins in different environments, they end up looking different from eachother (more so than average identical twins). I'm living proof :)

I think this whole thing is just weird. If my baby had some horrible disease, I'd want to change it, but many babies in the past have had horrible diseases and society's been able to deal with it. I don't know, I'd like nature to do its thing instead of messing with the grand design. And I find that people, with diseases/disabilities, that are able to overcome their hardships have amazing stories to tell... and it really inspires the average folks.

I'd want to take away the disease, but it isn't really up to me to decide how the baby looks... It's a matter of priorites, I suppose. Some people would say it goes against God, but I just think it's the child's life and not mine.

Of course, what if the kid grows up to be ugly, and then blames me and papa forever?

It reminds me of this movie I saw, about this society in which everyone was genetically engineered at birth to be beautiful. This one couple decides to do it naturally, and their kid grows up to be the one ugly kid among millions of pretty ones.