Indeed, when you add an intelligent designer with the ability to precisely and globally edit genes, you’ve stepped outside the design space available to natural selection, and you can end up with some pretty weird results! I think you could also use gene drives to get an IGF-boosting gene to fixation much faster than would occur naturally.
I don’t think gene drives are the kind of thing that would ever occur via iterative mutation, but you can certainly have genetic material with very high short-term IGF that eventually kills its host organism or causes extinction of its host species.
Indeed, when you add an intelligent designer with the ability to precisely and globally edit genes, you’ve stepped outside the design space available to natural selection, and you can end up with some pretty weird results! I think you could also use gene drives to get an IGF-boosting gene to fixation much faster than would occur naturally.
I don’t think gene drives are the kind of thing that would ever occur via iterative mutation, but you can certainly have genetic material with very high short-term IGF that eventually kills its host organism or causes extinction of its host species.