All of kanzure's Comments + Replies

I have a few other genetic interventions and modifications in the comments, but see also https://diyhpl.us/wiki/genetic-modifications/ for a list.

One thing that I see is that people are concerned about a loss of genetic diversity or we all become a mono-culture. I don't see that as a reasonable fear. Have you tried to stomp out human diversity before? People are very resilient. They are creative and diverse. They will figure out all kinds of new weird forms and ways to live, even if you don't like it. Only way I see a mono-culture is if we somehow have a world government enforcing it or something, and why would we want that anyway?

How much of an issue are off target mutations?

It really depends on your technique. If you are doing CRISPR microinjection (which is very simple, and you should probably not do, because there are other better techniques) then there will likely be off-target mutations. However, in other techniques, you can do quality control, screening, and sequencing before the cells divide or before the embryo implants etc. There are lots of quality control things that can be done which haven't been done yet for human embryo modification.

How many IQ points could be gained

how many IQ points could a "CRISPR-baby" gain with modern technology?

If by "CRISPR baby" you mean "every available means" and not specifically "CRISPR microinjection", then I think there's some IQ points, like the copy number variation one that showed an increase of 2-3 IQ points per copy, but I think we can get some good results even without focusing on IQ. For example, with short sleep you can dramatically increase the number of useful waking hours throughout an entire lifespan. There's also a single mutation that seems likely to improve working memory c... (read more)

I would also say that there isn't really VC for ambitious biotech. The way that VC works in biotech is that it's mostly about funding the professor and his 12 postdocs that invented something (call it X) and then they spin out of a university and you fund the company doing X. That's basically the main model. It doesn't leave a lot of room for biology projects that aren't spin outs. "Techbio" has been a recent improvement but it seems to be a lot of software startups? I'm not sure.

On longevity, I should add that I think more people working on ending aging w... (read more)

Well, look, if someone wants to join a community that is interested in building cool things then consider hplusroadmap: https://diyhpl.us/wiki/hplusroadmap we recently added a discord bridge. We've been going for 15 years at this point. We have funding available for cool wacky projects, or for not-so-wacky projects, and people are always interested in collaborating or at least providing some input on ideas or what's up. I think the problem is that the extropians, as much as I like them, didn't keep going, and they didn't continue to build or learn or educa... (read more)

It's interesting how many of these questions are about regulators. I wouldn't have expected that. I think that what's most important is progress, innovation, followed by safety and quality assurance testing, and then getting things out into the markets, followed by fitting it into the forms that regulators expect & working with regulators to create a sane environment for innovation.

Having worked in regulated fintech, I strongly believe that the only way to do good work is by doing good high quality work. Yeah, sure, sometimes you luck out and you get a... (read more)

Human and agricultural work is held back somewhat. Golden rice was actually rather simple but the biologists took 14 years of safety testing before it was deployed. Several million people went blind in the meantime. This was completely avoidable. GMO rice is not going to take over the world and should not require 14 years of "safety testing". The precautionary principle gives people brain worms. Not the fun genetically modified kind of brainworms either.

Regulation in general holds back a lot of progress in biology. During the pandemic, the FDA suspended th... (read more)

There is definitely a bizarre social taboo surrounding the pursuit of some of these projects. Another constraint is that even if someone is doing the work, they can't exactly be public especially in germline because the privacy of the child is of utmost importance.

Researchers in academia are mostly focused on grants for curing various diseases because that's what appeals to the appetite of federal funding agencies and the philanthropic organizations. The academic biologists tend to be extremely sensitive to public opinion because the public controls much o... (read more)