I’m concerned there may be an alignment problem for superbabies.
Humans often have contempt for people and animals with less intelligence than them. “You’re dumb” is practically an all-purpose putdown. We seem to assign moral value to various species on the basis of intelligence rather than their capacity for joy/suffering. We put chimpanzees in zoos and chickens in factory farms.
Additionally, jealousy/”xenophobia” towards superbabies from vanilla humans could lead them to become misanthropes. Everyone knows genetic enhancement is a radioactive topic. At what age will a child learn they were modified? It could easily be just as big of a shock as learning that you were adopted or conceived by a donor. Then stack more baggage on top: Will they be bullied for it? Will they experience discrimination?
I feel like we’re charging headlong into these sociopolitical implications, hollering “more intelligence is good!”, the same way we charged headlong into the sociopolitical implications of the internet/social media in the 1990s and 2000s while hollering “more democracy is good!” There’s a similar lack of effort to forecast the actual implications of the technology.
I hope researchers are seeking genes for altruism and psychological resilience in addition to genes for intelligence.
I’m concerned there may be an alignment problem for superbabies.
Humans often have contempt for people and animals with less intelligence than them. “You’re dumb” is practically an all-purpose putdown. We seem to assign moral value to various species on the basis of intelligence rather than their capacity for joy/suffering. We put chimpanzees in zoos and chickens in factory farms.
Additionally, jealousy/”xenophobia” towards superbabies from vanilla humans could lead them to become misanthropes. Everyone knows genetic enhancement is a radioactive topic. At what age will a child learn they were modified? It could easily be just as big of a shock as learning that you were adopted or conceived by a donor. Then stack more baggage on top: Will they be bullied for it? Will they experience discrimination?
I feel like we’re charging headlong into these sociopolitical implications, hollering “more intelligence is good!”, the same way we charged headlong into the sociopolitical implications of the internet/social media in the 1990s and 2000s while hollering “more democracy is good!” There’s a similar lack of effort to forecast the actual implications of the technology.
I hope researchers are seeking genes for altruism and psychological resilience in addition to genes for intelligence.