Speaker 1: Welcome to you Stuff you should Know from house Stuff
Speaker 1: Works dot com. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm
Speaker 1: Josh Clark. There's Charles W. Tucky Bryant. This is stuff
Speaker 1: you should know the podcast. This will be done all
Speaker 1: in sing song. You don't want to hear me sing songs,
Speaker 1: because I've heard he sings songs. Your heart will melt,
Speaker 1: glasses will break, my heart will go on, birds with sure,
Speaker 1: and uh, grown men will kiss each other on the mouth.
Speaker 1: So inspiring. That'd be pretty cool if you could do
Speaker 1: that just by singing, Yeah, like you kiss him now,
Speaker 1: glass you break. What you're talking about is Chevy Chase
Speaker 1: in Modern Problems. I never saw that one. He didn't
Speaker 1: have to sing, but he gained telekinetic abilities. You can
Speaker 1: make things happen just by thinking them. I shouldn't even
Speaker 1: say I never saw that one. That's not that much
Speaker 1: of a surprise. Everyone knows how my dad raised me,
Speaker 1: but I've never even heard of that one since now
Speaker 1: eighties movie Modern Problems it was. It was very dumb,
Speaker 1: but it was one of those early HBO movies for me.
Speaker 1: So I just sat around watched it like constantly, and
Speaker 1: I had a couple of dirty jokes. Oh I got you? Yeah, Um, yeah,
Speaker 1: how do we get on that? It was me so chuck. Yes, Josh,
Speaker 1: we are now UM friends. I guess you could say
Speaker 1: after four years, we finally crossed that cusp. No, I'm
Speaker 1: not talking about us. We're not for INDs. Still, you
Speaker 1: and I are friends, Yes, we are. We're friends with
Speaker 1: Science Channel and UM. As such, we are pretty excited
Speaker 1: that they have something going on pretty soon. Yeah, and
Speaker 1: this relates to our podcast topic, which is the reason,
Speaker 1: very reason we chose this podcast topic. UM. Science Channel
Speaker 1: is UM bringing Fringe, the cult classic television show Fringe
Speaker 1: UM to its airwaves starting November twenty ye. They're gonna
Speaker 1: show all five seasons. And uh, we were even lucky
Speaker 1: enough to meet meet the guy, the guy at at
Speaker 1: Comic Con. Yeah not Joshua Jackson, Dr Fringe. Yeah, that's
Speaker 1: not his name, Mr Noble, and he was very nice
Speaker 1: and uh, because he's not just on Fringe, he's on
Speaker 1: Dark Matters too, he's the host of Dark Matters on
Speaker 1: Science Channel. But I personally watched Fringe. I watched all
Speaker 1: the first season, me and Emily did. Emily and I
Speaker 1: excuse me, and um, I really enjoyed it and just
Speaker 1: it was one of those things that I didn't watch
Speaker 1: season two Beyond and Beyond because it just, you know,
Speaker 1: life got in the way or something. But it wasn't
Speaker 1: because it didn't like it was really good. I sort
Speaker 1: of had a X Files vibe. Oh yeah, and the
Speaker 1: twist that they've managed to work in there. Yeah, but
Speaker 1: the science was more predominant. So I liked it. And
Speaker 1: I'm totally gonna watch seasons. We'll probably start with sas
Speaker 1: and one again. Well, then you should tune in November
Speaker 1: and I'm gonna watch seasons two through five now and
Speaker 1: Science Channel. I'm pretty stoked about that, right, Um? And
Speaker 1: uh well yeah, in honor of fringe, we chose kind
Speaker 1: of a fringe science topic. You did, That's right. I
Speaker 1: think it's a good one. Chuck Yeah. Um. Designing Women,
Speaker 1: I mean Designing Children? Where did that show? Oh? Yeah? Man?
Speaker 1: What was the one that followed it with Burt Reynolds
Speaker 1: Evening Shade? Was that tiede? Was that a spinoff? No?
Speaker 1: But I think they were packaged together. It's like Tuesday
Speaker 1: Night Redneck Hour, Sugar Bakers. Yeah right, Yeah, I watched
Speaker 1: Designing Women. I didn't watch evening shade though, which surprises
Speaker 1: me because I love Burt Reynolds. I yeah, I didn't
Speaker 1: see it either, but yeah, designing Women, it was a
Speaker 1: good show. Um that we're talking about designing children and
Speaker 1: not just designing children, designer children. That's right. Uh, the
Speaker 1: idea that one day in the very very very near
Speaker 1: future now UM will be able to make kids ready
Speaker 1: to order, made to order. Yeah, in certain ways, like
Speaker 1: I think right now you we have the ability to
Speaker 1: select eye and hair color. But they're just not doing
Speaker 1: it yet because they try that in Los Angeles and
Speaker 1: people are like, who woa, whoaa do you remember that? Yeah,
Speaker 1: we don't like this. We shouldn't be doing this. And
Speaker 1: I think that's really significant that that happened. Like the
Speaker 1: first real commercial attempt for basically just saying hey you
Speaker 1: want a blonde kid, we can give you a blond kid.
Speaker 1: UM received public outcry, international outcry, so much of it.
Speaker 1: The people are like, okay, sorry, we opened our mouths
Speaker 1: and just forget we said anything. Here's your brunette, you know, yeah, exactly,
Speaker 1: roll the dice, jerks. We don't care. UM. But I
Speaker 1: find that significant, you know, because I wonder, um, you
Speaker 1: know how it's gonna go. How when it does become
Speaker 1: really commercially viable to really make your kid a different
Speaker 1: person than they would have been natural? Really like, how
Speaker 1: people will accept that? Yeah? I mean this is the
Speaker 1: stuff of science fiction that is really happening now. Um,
Speaker 1: the movie Gatica, this reference in this article really good
Speaker 1: movie is really good. Yeah, man, it's good. It's like
Speaker 1: a thinking man's science Uh. I don't know if you
Speaker 1: call it a thriller. Maybe a thriller intrigue at the
Speaker 1: very least, But yeah, it's good. And basically the synopsis
Speaker 1: there is without spoiling anything. Is that not the not
Speaker 1: too distant future we are able to in Gatica two
Speaker 1: build designer children that will grow into designer adults that
Speaker 1: are like, disease free and highly athletic and very intelligent.
Speaker 1: And then the rest of the shlobs of the world
Speaker 1: are you know, sorry t s for them? Basically go
Speaker 1: with your potato chips. So see, Gatica's a good one.
Speaker 1: Like it? Yeah, every time you say like this isn't
Speaker 1: gonna spoil things, I tried really hard to spoiler. I
Speaker 1: was watching an episode of Breaking Bad the other day
Speaker 1: human and I were and Um, I was like, how
Speaker 1: do I know what's about to happen that? I was like, Chuck, yeah.
Speaker 1: And the Math episode, Oh I thought you. I thought
Speaker 1: you meant the one in Breaking Bad that was about meth.
Speaker 1: I was like, they're all about man, right right, I
Speaker 1: didn't spoil that, Yeah, I got you. Yeah, all right,
Speaker 1: So sorry that was not a spoiler for Gatica though.
Speaker 1: UM so, chuck, yes, let's talk about all this you're say.
Speaker 1: In two thousand nine, they came out against that fertility
Speaker 1: clinic in Los Angeles. That's a good example of a
Speaker 1: commercial business saying hey, we can do this now. A
Speaker 1: good example of a government saying, hey, you can do
Speaker 1: this now, we need to do something about it. Was
Speaker 1: the UK proposing a bill and we couldn't find out
Speaker 1: whether it passed or not. So frustrating how hard it
Speaker 1: is to find out things like this sometimes. Um, if
Speaker 1: if you write an article about something that is big
Speaker 1: enough for somebody else to use in an article, you
Speaker 1: better follow up. Yeah, that's what I'm duty journalist. So
Speaker 1: what we know is it was protested at least, so
Speaker 1: I'm not sure if I went through well, and the
Speaker 1: reason it was protested was protested um largely by the
Speaker 1: deaf and heart of hearing community over there, because this
Speaker 1: bill would have or did prohibit um selecting kids for
Speaker 1: disease or disability, right, So if you it allowed you
Speaker 1: to select against that. So if you if you have
Speaker 1: a kid that has a disability, you can be like,
Speaker 1: I don't want that kid. But it prohibited selecting forum
Speaker 1: and the deaf community said, hey, um, if hearing parents
Speaker 1: can select hearing kids, deaf parents should be able to
Speaker 1: select deaf kids. So if you're gonna call deafness a disability,
Speaker 1: you need to change this this bill, which is a
Speaker 1: pretty cool thing to protest, if you ask me. I
Speaker 1: don't know how it felt about it. I thought it's
Speaker 1: still the no, Wow, this is gonna be a good
Speaker 1: one that I was utterly confused. That was like, why
Speaker 1: would you want your child to be deaf and be
Speaker 1: at a disadvantage straight out of the gate in life?
Speaker 1: But then I thought, well, is it a disadvantage exactly?
Speaker 1: That is a great, great question. So I don't know.
Speaker 1: That's where I ended up was did you know that
Speaker 1: percent that's the highest most recent figure I've seen of
Speaker 1: all down syndrome fetuses are aborted. I believe that right,
Speaker 1: And that's the same question. It's like some people are like, well,
Speaker 1: why would you want your kid to be disadvantaged? And
Speaker 1: we are or not not selected through IBF a boarded um,
Speaker 1: and so some people would say, why would you want
Speaker 1: your kid to have you know, your kids going to
Speaker 1: have a disadvantage And other people say, like, have you
Speaker 1: ever met a person with down syndrome? Like they're pretty
Speaker 1: awesome people, you know, And I think that that is
Speaker 1: That's just one argument throughout this idea of designing children
Speaker 1: savior siblings was also included in the bill in England
Speaker 1: let parents select embryos that would make suitable savior siblings.
Speaker 1: Very controversial. I read a couple of articles on this.
Speaker 1: Saviors Savior siblings are basically kids that you conceive initially
Speaker 1: with the purpose of being able to act as donors
Speaker 1: for their older brother or sister. Like you're you're the
Speaker 1: kid that you love is born with like bad kidneys.
Speaker 1: Have another kid that's gonna be a suitable tissue doner
Speaker 1: because you know ahead of time, before the kids even born,
Speaker 1: that it will be, yeah, so that they can give
Speaker 1: them one of their kidneys. Yeah, there was a article
Speaker 1: that I read where these parents had had had a
Speaker 1: quote unquote savior child and used you know, they said,
Speaker 1: what we ended up using was a teaspoon of umbilical
Speaker 1: blood that would have been thrown in the trash and
Speaker 1: that's what saved our other kids life. And this is
Speaker 1: not the designer child, it's not some freak of science.
Speaker 1: This is the reason we have this child. But doesn't
Speaker 1: make it any less valid. So I think ultimately it's
Speaker 1: how you treat the child after they're born. Well, you
Speaker 1: treat them as like your regular child. You put them
Speaker 1: in a closet and wait for the kidney. Sure, you'd hope.
Speaker 1: But at the same time, I mean like you can
Speaker 1: go down the road and say, well, having a savior
Speaker 1: sibling is also having a kid to strip for parts. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you know, there's there's another interpretation of the whole thing.
Speaker 1: So I mean, like, if if you are going to
Speaker 1: have your kid like that, is it valid for society
Speaker 1: to be like, well, well you can't do that. How
Speaker 1: are you going to treat your kid afterwards? Like? Is
Speaker 1: that one of the worries? How would they would treat
Speaker 1: the kid? I've never heard that as an argument. Yeah,
Speaker 1: because it's not like you can have a kid use
Speaker 1: all of their harvest all of their organs and kill them.
Speaker 1: Of course not so. I think it's it's like the
Speaker 1: effect that the impact it's going to have on that
Speaker 1: child and their own identity is like a human being
Speaker 1: and and unique individual human being, rather than a walking
Speaker 1: organ bank for their brother. I would I would think
Speaker 1: I would appreciate that growing up knowing that I was
Speaker 1: born with a higher purpose of potentially saving my older
Speaker 1: brother if he ever needed it. You know, sure, depending
Speaker 1: on how you're raised, you know, are you like Danny
Speaker 1: DeVito and twins right, or are you like the savior sibling.
Speaker 1: It's a great way to put it, like you're the
Speaker 1: savior of this other sibling. It just all depends to
Speaker 1: me on how the parents raised those those children in
Speaker 1: that abnormal dynamic that's fostered through our technology. Yeah. I
Speaker 1: can't imagine though, that a parent who would care enough
Speaker 1: about their one child to have another to save them
Speaker 1: would mistreat or shun the other child in any way.
Speaker 1: That just didn't make sense to me. I just opened
Speaker 1: my hands in a gesture of I don't know everybody,
Speaker 1: all right, um, so let let's talk about this, Chuck,
Speaker 1: let's talk genetics for a little bit. I had to
Speaker 1: go back and do some um genetics one oh one
Speaker 1: priming UM, and I did that. As I did, I
Speaker 1: realized that I wasn't going back and remembering it. I
Speaker 1: was teaching myself for the first time. In a lot
Speaker 1: of ways, I've never really gotten genetics. Even though it's
Speaker 1: so straightforward and cut and dried, there's always like, even
Speaker 1: if you read this Designer Children article, like these are
Speaker 1: two of our best writers, and like, it just doesn't
Speaker 1: come across quite right. Maybe it's just me so like
Speaker 1: me in numbers. So back in two thousand three, UM,
Speaker 1: the Human Genome Project announced that it had fulfilled its
Speaker 1: destiny and successfully mapped the human genome. And the human
Speaker 1: genome is the sum total of the information contained in
Speaker 1: the human DNA. That's right, right, Um, you're gonna say
Speaker 1: the word what DNA stands for, Oh, dioxy ribot clayic acid.
Speaker 1: I would say the oxy. Yeah, I've always heard dioxy,
Speaker 1: and then I was looking at that E. So either way,
Speaker 1: well done. Though. D N A and d N A
Speaker 1: is simply a couple of strands of sugar that form
Speaker 1: a helix of double helix, and they're joined by what
Speaker 1: looks like wrongs on the ladder sugar and phosphate. Yeah,
Speaker 1: okay um. And these wrongs are made up of nucleotides,
Speaker 1: one coming off of each of these strands, the little
Speaker 1: twisty ladder that we all love now. Um. So the
Speaker 1: wrongs of the ladder are made of these nucleotides, and
Speaker 1: when they come together, one on each side, they form
Speaker 1: this full wrong and those are called base pairs. And
Speaker 1: there's four types of nucleotides, right, that's right. There is
Speaker 1: uh at a nine sita scene, thymine, and guanine, and
Speaker 1: you put them together and what you come up with,
Speaker 1: ultimately is a four letter language for the blueprint of
Speaker 1: an organism. Pretty cool, not just making an organism, but
Speaker 1: maintaining it as well. And if you look along the
Speaker 1: strand of DNA, you're going to find little segments where
Speaker 1: this combination, if read by a ribosome uh can be
Speaker 1: used to explain how a cell can make a certain
Speaker 1: kind of protein, usually about three proteins on average, and
Speaker 1: proteins are what are used as the building blocks of
Speaker 1: cellular life and its functions, like everything from our behavior
Speaker 1: to like the structure of your eye is based on proteins, right,
Speaker 1: and your your genes. These little segments that are encoded
Speaker 1: along the d NA um that express these proteins are
Speaker 1: are blueprints for how to express the proteins. That's how
Speaker 1: they're made. That's what they do. That's right, right, that's right.
Speaker 1: We have betweens as a human. Everybody's so happy. You
Speaker 1: just do that. Human that just mess it up? Hmm,
Speaker 1: how about that? Had you've been designed properly, it wouldn't
Speaker 1: have happened. So what I thought was interesting that out
Speaker 1: of the three billion BASS bearers, it's about half and
Speaker 1: half of useful DNA and the rest are junk DNA.
Speaker 1: Yea junk DNA. And they don't think that it's like
Speaker 1: junk DNA, like it's it's totally useless. They think that
Speaker 1: possibly we haven't found the use yet, or they think
Speaker 1: that possibly one of the uses is that it says
Speaker 1: it tells um like stop like here's where, here's where
Speaker 1: this gene stops, or um, this is how much of
Speaker 1: this protein you should express, and this this adjacent gene
Speaker 1: that this junk DNA is next to, or it just
Speaker 1: provides like structure, like actual structure to the to the
Speaker 1: double helix. It's also possible that this is just um
Speaker 1: DNA left over that was deposited by viruses eons ago
Speaker 1: that that don't that don't express themselves any longer enough,
Speaker 1: because that's what viruses too. They insert their own d N,
Speaker 1: A and rs. It's right, they um. So you've got
Speaker 1: this DNA, it's making up chromosomes. You've got twenty three
Speaker 1: in your body. And as complex and as massive as
Speaker 1: the sounds, chuck, twenty pairs pairs, thank you, um, as
Speaker 1: as massive and complex as this whole thing sounds. Every
Speaker 1: cell except for a mature red blood cell, has a
Speaker 1: full human genome and many chromosomes in it, every cell.
Speaker 1: And that's just in the nucleus. That's crazy. It is crazy.
Speaker 1: So you've got all this. We've got a pretty good
Speaker 1: handle on this. The human genome. We've we've mapped it.
Speaker 1: Now we go back and figure out where the genes are.
Speaker 1: And they used to think that it was like nineties
Speaker 1: six percent of DNA was junk, and then they found
Speaker 1: out that, like if you look at the human genome,
Speaker 1: some areas are gene rich, there's a lot of genes.
Speaker 1: Other areas of gene deserts where there's very few. Right,
Speaker 1: we have to go back and look at this map
Speaker 1: and basically crack this code of this four letter line
Speaker 1: Widge and figure out what genes are, what what they do,
Speaker 1: and then ultimately how to manipulate them. And once we
Speaker 1: do that, we effectively have taken humanity out of evolution.
Speaker 1: That's right, scary, is it? I think? So our friend
Speaker 1: David Pierce would beg to different who the guy from
Speaker 1: the Happiness audiobook? We should ratchet up human happiness because
Speaker 1: we can. Boy, that's it's a interesting argument, That's all
Speaker 1: I'm gonna say. So, Um, we're already kind of at
Speaker 1: a very primitive form of this, aren't we. Uh Well, yeah,
Speaker 1: like I said, we we feasibly could choose eye color
Speaker 1: and hair color if we wanted to. Um, And then
Speaker 1: one thing we can definitely do is well, I guess
Speaker 1: we should explain about ib F for those of you
Speaker 1: who don't know. UM. In we first perform in vitro fertilization,
Speaker 1: which basically means when you're a couple and you're having
Speaker 1: trouble having a kid. They're a bunch of different steps.
Speaker 1: You can take a bunch of different routes you can take,
Speaker 1: and one of them is IVF, which means you take
Speaker 1: the sperm from the man, egg from the lady and
Speaker 1: you get them together outside of the human body to
Speaker 1: form a z eyegoat and then you put it back
Speaker 1: in the woman, uh and then she takes it from there.
Speaker 1: And it is can be expensive. It can be very
Speaker 1: hard on the woman, um on her body and and
Speaker 1: emotionally emotionally. I think it's probably hard on the couple emotionally,
Speaker 1: But dudes aren't pump full of hormones, you know. Um.
Speaker 1: So that that is what IVF is, and that is
Speaker 1: one way that you can have a baby if you're
Speaker 1: having trouble having babies. UH. With IVF came something called
Speaker 1: preimplantation genetic diagnosis p g D, which basically means, hey,
Speaker 1: we can look at at your stuff here, and if
Speaker 1: you are predisposed in your fanly to certain things like
Speaker 1: hemophilia A down syndrome tas sac syndrome, we can we
Speaker 1: can stop this process now and try again, right we
Speaker 1: can scream for it. Yeah, fine, And some of its intuitive,
Speaker 1: like with hemophilia A UH, if you and your husband
Speaker 1: both have that, that usually tends to strike boys more
Speaker 1: than girls, so they probably not use embryos that were male,
Speaker 1: likely male. They would use female embryos instead, which brings
Speaker 1: up the sticky point of choosing your gender. Yeah, um,
Speaker 1: some others we can you can find that evidence of
Speaker 1: that disease that say, um, I guess malfunctioning gene that
Speaker 1: creates that disease, because that's what disease is, UM and
Speaker 1: not use those embryos either. So we are we are
Speaker 1: kind of at this primitive state. But it's selective, it is,
Speaker 1: and these are tough decisions that couple's face in life. Uh,
Speaker 1: A lot of thought should go into this if you're
Speaker 1: out there going through this process, it's um, it ain't easy.
Speaker 1: And don't let anyone else tell you what you should
Speaker 1: or shouldn't do. You know there's a personal thing. Oh
Speaker 1: yeah sure, Um, so that's what's that's what's going on
Speaker 1: on the ib F tip. So yeah, the point is
Speaker 1: from that came um PG dye pre implantation genetic diagnosis,
Speaker 1: which is UM kind of right now the most widely
Speaker 1: available type of genetic engineering for couples looking to have
Speaker 1: a baby, right right, And like we said, the sticky
Speaker 1: point of potentially being able to choose your gender if
Speaker 1: you really want a boy, you've got three girls, and
Speaker 1: man I really wanted a boy. Um. And then in
Speaker 1: countries like China where they definitely want boys, it's like
Speaker 1: this could be the future that might upset the balance
Speaker 1: of of nature and how many boys and girls are
Speaker 1: born and what does that mean for the future. So
Speaker 1: I heard to UM to have a soft landing from
Speaker 1: their one child policy, which they're now starting to like
Speaker 1: relax they should have stopped at about twenty years ago. Yeah. Yeah,
Speaker 1: Does that mean they're in trouble? Does that mean we
Speaker 1: need to follow up like we recommended writers do on
Speaker 1: our podcast. Sure, I guess you just did. Oh okay,
Speaker 1: there was heard, UM, So chuck, we've got this. We've
Speaker 1: got this genetic screening. That's one way to do it.
Speaker 1: There's also another way, um that is a little further
Speaker 1: out as far as humans go, UM, and that is
Speaker 1: transgenderic therapy, which is where you take the gene of
Speaker 1: something else that desirous trait and inserted into some into
Speaker 1: the human right. So, what is actually adding a gene
Speaker 1: right where What we've been talking about to this point
Speaker 1: is unnatural selection. But it's been selection. It's like this
Speaker 1: is this is it appeared naturally, but we're gonna take
Speaker 1: away all of the other We're gonna reduce the chances
Speaker 1: that it won't happen, or we're gonna increase the chances
Speaker 1: that that will happen. This is straight up copying and
Speaker 1: pasting or cutting and pasting genes to create something desirable
Speaker 1: or new. That's right, And they already do this in animals, UM.
Speaker 1: So you know, if you can do it in animals,
Speaker 1: it's not gonna be long before you can do it
Speaker 1: with humans. And uh long term, maybe that means we
Speaker 1: can eliminate certain diseases by correcting this stuff along the way,
Speaker 1: right like before it happens. So that could be good.
Speaker 1: So so when you take a gene from one animal
Speaker 1: and UM and planted into another, that's um that's become
Speaker 1: a transgenic animal or a chimera, which is based on
Speaker 1: the goat, serpent, lion, fire breathing animal of legend from Greece. Um.
Speaker 1: They call it a chimera, which is kind of hurtful,
Speaker 1: I think, especially if you're a human and know what
Speaker 1: a chimera is, and you're a chimera, I'm sure you
Speaker 1: probably hurt your feelings. But um, thus far there aren't
Speaker 1: any human caimeras as far as I know. It's mostly
Speaker 1: the big one that we've actually talked about unknowingly before
Speaker 1: is a bio steel. The goat with the spider. Remember
Speaker 1: we were trying to figure out how they got spider
Speaker 1: silk from a goat and the one turns out. It
Speaker 1: turns out that spiders and goats share enough traits to
Speaker 1: where this ultra strong spider silk can be produced in
Speaker 1: the goat's milk. They have similar proteins. And they said,
Speaker 1: I don't know how they came across that. I'm sure
Speaker 1: they had some hint. I don't know why they would
Speaker 1: start with a goat's milk. Yeah, I don't know either,
Speaker 1: but the protein, you know, what would happen if we
Speaker 1: put the spider silk in this goat's milk? What rhymes
Speaker 1: with spider silk goat's milk. Let's try to start there. Um, yeah,
Speaker 1: it worked, but they figured out that like the spider,
Speaker 1: the protein and spider silk is similar to a protein
Speaker 1: and goats milk identical. And well, once you inject the
Speaker 1: goats jeans with that spider me like a glove. It
Speaker 1: starts producing a ton of that protein UM and its milk,
Speaker 1: and you harvest that protein and then start weaving spider
Speaker 1: silk and make the stuff called bio steel, which is
Speaker 1: really really good body armor. Yeah, and that's where we
Speaker 1: talked about it, right, Yeah, Body Armor podcast that you
Speaker 1: can find on our RSS feed. Yeah, which also happened
Speaker 1: to be our first ever UM listener request. Oh really Yeah,
Speaker 1: someone requested that and we acquiesced and we started getting
Speaker 1: all these emails. UM. So the point of that is
Speaker 1: is they're doing this in animals. There are scenarios where
Speaker 1: we could potentially do this with humans, but UM and
Speaker 1: another follow up article we read turns out that enhancing
Speaker 1: ourselves genetically could eventually lead to UM unknown consequences down
Speaker 1: the road. Uh. Specifically, in this case, we have learned
Speaker 1: that our human brain is evolving, it's getting larger, it's
Speaker 1: gaining more cognitive abilities as we evolve, and if you
Speaker 1: start to bring with natural selection via genetic modification, these
Speaker 1: things might not show up right away. It might show
Speaker 1: up generations later. So you might be doing something you
Speaker 1: think will help when and in fact, years from now,
Speaker 1: it might keep your brain from growing. Like everyone else's
Speaker 1: and this is just one example of something that could
Speaker 1: go wrong. Organisms evolve right through mutations. Well, we lack
Speaker 1: the foresight to know what mutation will be beneficial in
Speaker 1: what will be harmful years down the line. So even
Speaker 1: something that may be harmful immediately or somewhat harmful could
Speaker 1: be extremely beneficial decades, hundreds, thousands, millions of years from now.
Speaker 1: We would never know. That's too late. Once you've done it,
Speaker 1: Yeah you're done. No. I kind of had the impression that, like,
Speaker 1: once you start tampering, you could conceivably, you know, keep improving,
Speaker 1: but it would have to be constant. Well, and what
Speaker 1: this article points out, which is a good point, is
Speaker 1: natural selection is at its best when you've got a
Speaker 1: large gene pool. And if you're narrowing that gene pool
Speaker 1: for a reason you think is great, you're still narrowing
Speaker 1: the gene pool. And I think proponents of genetic engineering
Speaker 1: would say, well, that's fine, we're narrowing the gene pool.
Speaker 1: Who cares. We're taking full control of evolution, so evolution
Speaker 1: can kiss off. But this raises all sorts of questions,
Speaker 1: like some of which we've already touched upon, but like
Speaker 1: who decides what's ideal? Who decides what traits are good
Speaker 1: and what are bad? What happens when this becomes you know,
Speaker 1: commercially viable, but it's still extremely expensive than just the
Speaker 1: wealthy have designer children? Well, I mean, what kind of
Speaker 1: designer children do do we make that? I read this
Speaker 1: one ethicist who said that we have a moral obligation
Speaker 1: two genetically engineer and modify our kids so that they're
Speaker 1: not a harm to themselves or other people, which makes
Speaker 1: a lot of sense. Like I can see how that
Speaker 1: is a moral obligation. Like, if you have the technology
Speaker 1: to improve people and improve society like that, you have
Speaker 1: to do it, you know. But then of course there's
Speaker 1: like the other side, it's like God, I don't know,
Speaker 1: we don't really know what we're doing here playing god? Yeah,
Speaker 1: because I mean, what happens if you make a kid
Speaker 1: that's awful little bit and like they're like just totally
Speaker 1: messed up, But they wouldn't have been if you hadn't
Speaker 1: tampered with them. Who's responsible for that? And in what
Speaker 1: ways are you responsible for it? Well? And more well,
Speaker 1: not more importantly, but additionally, where the line is drawn?
Speaker 1: You know, is it okay to say like, that's kind
Speaker 1: of like my baby had blue eyes? Right, No big deal? Right? Yeah?
Speaker 1: Was that the line? Or is the line? Like, um,
Speaker 1: maybe it'd be cool if they were athletic, right and
Speaker 1: super smart and had blue eyes and blond hair and
Speaker 1: then boom boys from Brazil? But what's the again, what's
Speaker 1: what are the problems with those things? Well? Yeah, you
Speaker 1: know it's gonna be athletic and smart, right. Or Happy
Speaker 1: is another one that David pointed out that I find
Speaker 1: tough to to to disagree with, Like, if you have
Speaker 1: the technology to make your kids happier, like ratchet up
Speaker 1: their baseline happiness is how we put it, Why wouldn't
Speaker 1: you do that? If you can make society a better
Speaker 1: place because everybody's happier, why wouldn't you do it? Well,
Speaker 1: just this is just a lot ee to me saying,
Speaker 1: you know, there's always far reaching consequences. There's always ripples,
Speaker 1: every stone you're throwing a lake, you know, like, what
Speaker 1: what else is going to happen? If everybody's happy? Are
Speaker 1: there downfalls or their setbacks? And there what's going on?
Speaker 1: I know it is a tricky, tricky subject. Anytime we
Speaker 1: bring up jeans, it becomes a tricky subject. It does,
Speaker 1: which is why they're fascinating, that's right, and why people
Speaker 1: really get up on their soapbox when they you know,
Speaker 1: this means a lot to a lot of people. Religious circles,
Speaker 1: scientific circles. A lot of folks are weighing in from
Speaker 1: different you know, circles. But you know what that means.
Speaker 1: It's it was just stupid. Okay. If you want to
Speaker 1: learn more about genetics, how stuff works is loaded with
Speaker 1: them articles on them on it. Yeah. Um, you can
Speaker 1: type in genetics, gens, designer babies, whatever you want in
Speaker 1: the handy search bar and it's gonna bring up some
Speaker 1: pretty cool articles. Do you recommend you wasted a year
Speaker 1: or two meeting them? Um? And I said handy search bar.
Speaker 1: I think so that means its time for listener mail.
Speaker 1: It's right, Josh, I am going to call this plug
Speaker 1: for our friends at q s a C. Remember meeting
Speaker 1: uh Sandra at trivia night in New York. She give
Speaker 1: us the hats the baseball Caps. Yeah, what what is
Speaker 1: the qu s a C Is the Quality Services for
Speaker 1: the Autism Compati. So this from uh Sandra. She's super sweet,
Speaker 1: very nice, and she says this, guys, thanks so much
Speaker 1: for humoring my over enthusiasm for my cause. Uh and
Speaker 1: my over enthusiasm for meeting you guys at trivia night
Speaker 1: who I look up to. It was an amazing night
Speaker 1: of randomness. All the other people on our second place
Speaker 1: team met in line total strangers. After my initial star
Speaker 1: struck nous died down, which never happens to me because
Speaker 1: I worked with famous people all the time and couldn't
Speaker 1: care less. I just felt like, Uh, it just felt
Speaker 1: like a night where I was hanging out with a
Speaker 1: few buddies I've known for a while. Um. She still
Speaker 1: about us start We're very partritable. It was just silly,
Speaker 1: Um she said, I felt that way about my whole
Speaker 1: table of strangers. Actually. Uh So, anyway, she told us
Speaker 1: that night about U S a c M organizaization she's with,
Speaker 1: and she says, I'm very passionate about QU S a
Speaker 1: C because they changed my life. Literally. I did a
Speaker 1: five k to support them because it was local and
Speaker 1: my nephew was autistic and I wanted to see if
Speaker 1: I could actually walk that far. She had broken both
Speaker 1: her ankles the previous year. Okay, I thought that was
Speaker 1: funny too. Um Man, I wonder if she was. Was
Speaker 1: it called cobbled? Cobbled? Was that in misery? Oh yeah,
Speaker 1: that's there's a name for the cobble. She hobbled. Hobbled
Speaker 1: cobbled would be if you just than I might even
Speaker 1: called hobbling. How yeah, you're hobbled, but that's like a
Speaker 1: a state. No, but the process by which Kathy Bates
Speaker 1: like broke the ankles, I don't want to talk about it.
Speaker 1: She it was called something like you're it was hobbling somebody.
Speaker 1: Maybe I'll look that up. That was so nasty. Anyway,
Speaker 1: I don't think Sandra was cobbled or hobbled. Uh So
Speaker 1: at the time, I had no clue who they were.
Speaker 1: Cusack made friends with everyone there and many people who
Speaker 1: worked there, and then three months later I actually started
Speaker 1: work there as an employee. I was in corporate television
Speaker 1: as a video editor for ten years and it beat
Speaker 1: down my soul. I was always volunteering and donating what
Speaker 1: I could, and I felt like, maybe nonprofit is what
Speaker 1: I should be doing. The opportunity arose and I took
Speaker 1: it and it has been life changing. Dudes, Since you
Speaker 1: guys are so excellent being philanthropic, I decided to see
Speaker 1: if he would be interested in knowing more. So, Josh
Speaker 1: mentioned you guys were considering doing a podcast on autism.
Speaker 1: I'm sure we'll get around of that at some point, right, Um,
Speaker 1: if you do, I have plenty of people that could
Speaker 1: answer a lot of questions and gladly pass along addresses
Speaker 1: and phone numbers. Q Sack has been around for over
Speaker 1: thirty years, truly amazing in helping the New York City
Speaker 1: and Long Island areas. So do you guys want to
Speaker 1: help support this great uh cause for autism? You can
Speaker 1: go to q s a c dot com or she
Speaker 1: has a bowling page and I think you do. Like
Speaker 1: she gets like a fundraisers going through bowling at www
Speaker 1: dot first giving dot com slash fundraiser slash Sandra sroka
Speaker 1: slash bowl and that is Sandra s O r O
Speaker 1: k A s um Sandra. And yeah she was. She
Speaker 1: was super nice and she's working for autism now. Very cool? Man? UM,
Speaker 1: can I give one more side out? We heard from
Speaker 1: another listener of course, Um, a listener named Emily Eisenman
Speaker 1: is run for LifeStraw. Did you see this to you?
Speaker 1: I did, and now I was gonna read that later
Speaker 1: let's let's go ahead do it now? Okay, yeah, alright, So, um,
Speaker 1: Emily is running for Life strow. She heard our podcast
Speaker 1: from two thousand ten on LifeStraw and she decided to
Speaker 1: raise a thousand dollars to buy lifestraws by running a
Speaker 1: thousand miles. Yeah. Um, and she is going to cross
Speaker 1: a thousand mile mark for the year this week. She
Speaker 1: may have already done it. Um. And she's proving to
Speaker 1: be a better funder than a better runner than a fundraiser,
Speaker 1: she says. So if everybody who listens to Stuff you
Speaker 1: Should Know would go help help her fundraise, it would
Speaker 1: be fantastic. You can go to www dot fundly f
Speaker 1: u n d l y dot com slash run for
Speaker 1: Life straw um, and you guys can go check that
Speaker 1: out and help Emily raise some money for LifeStraw. And
Speaker 1: if you are unfamiliar with LifeStraw, go listen to our
Speaker 1: podcast on that subject, which you can probably are going
Speaker 1: to have to find on our RSS feed as well. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Is um just you know what you do? You you
Speaker 1: Google or you get your favorite search bar and you
Speaker 1: type and stuff you should know rss feed and it's
Speaker 1: like boom right there, all of our shows ever, Yep,
Speaker 1: Stuff you Should Know RSS every single one. It's good stuff. Um,
Speaker 1: all right, well I guess that's it, right, That is it? Sir?
Speaker 1: All right? Uh. If you want to contact us, you
Speaker 1: can tweet to us at s Y s K Podcast,
Speaker 1: join us on Facebook dot com slash stuff we Should Know,
Speaker 1: and you can send us a good old fashioned email
Speaker 1: to Stuff Podcast at Discovery dot com. For more on
Speaker 1: this and thousands of other topics, is it how Stuff
Speaker 1: Works dot com