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US startup charging couples to ‘screen embryos for IQ’
(www.theguardian.com)
oh great, commercial eugenics
That's not how IQ works you idiots.
Wait. Who's the idiots? The ones selling the service, the ones falling for the service, or the embryos that they decide to have low IQ?
I'd say the first two, and if the parents are responsible for the education of the kid, all three.
Re one, what is worse? People selling anti wifi amulets that they know don't work? Or people who sell them while not understanding (nor believing) that they dont work? (More likely it doesnt matter as it remains a scam. Ow god, im getting close to doing actual ethical thinking here).
Reminds me of the Wi-Fi blocking Faraday cages to "protect" modems a few years ago. Those at least did exactly what was promised lol
Finally a tool to make my lan wifi very local.
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"Given these three steps, what's the logical fourth one?"
"..."
"God this embryo is an idiot."
Doesn’t even know the basic strats for these pattern questions, SMH, Do You Even IQ Test? (trying to start DYEIQT)
Good luck having an embryo pass an iq test. Most of them can't even read.
Legitimately though, it's a nonsensical metric to screen on.
The thing with IVF is that it's already incredibly weirdly eugenicist.
Like, read some of the parameters they'd screen you for if you wanted to donate sperm. You get bonus points for having a PhD? I'm sorry? You're looking for a better-educated sperm?
And when you apply for IVF and choose a donor you get their education and job. "I want my cum to be a pilot!" The fuck.
Lamarckian eugenics!
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I didn't understand how the hell the "pro-life" crowd would cheer for IVF since it entails destroying plenty of embryos. Now I understand: it's the opportunity for some good old fashioned eugenics.
They’re not cheering. Evangelical anti-abortion activists have long targeted IVF and it’s been practically banned in at least one US state.
Some days ago Trump came out saying he loves IVF and he's the "father of IVF" so I assumed the evangelicals are at least OK with it, considering how the Republican are extremely close with them.
He will say what he thinks needs to be said, and the forced-birthers understand this. They haven’t defeated abortion yet and aren’t going to split their efforts, but they will continue to put pressure on ivf in the meantime. Remember, they weren’t always anti-abortion, and didn’t switch to it overnight! Their current position that life begins at conception necessarily conflicts with current ivf practises, and they’ll say they don’t disapprove of ivf in principle, and they might even have a friend who’s getting ivf, but talk is cheap and they’ll absolutely oppose any legislation that tries to guarantee access to it. Which is precisely what is happening.
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Reminds me of how marriage advice has its roots in white supremacy. (CW: a lot. self harm, SA, abuse)
IQ is so incredibly complicated, and we really don't know how it works, and what genes allow for the possibility of high IQ. So what are they even screening for? If they're just looking at broad trends in population IQ compared to genetics, then what they're actually seeing are environmental factors, which play an immense role in whether or not potential is ever reached.
@HelixDab2 @sue_me_please I'd go a step further and say it doesn't work. It's an inherently flawed concept that you can reduce human thought, skill, ability, and behaviour to a number and then rank people by it. The legacy of general intelligence itself is that of people assuming it exists and seeking to justify their assumptions.
But on the plus side, the people capable of paying for this bullshit are going to have significantly higher chance of proper nutrition for their kids, access to good education, and ability to avoid environmental toxins, so they just have to compare their "handpicked sperm" to the population as a whole and they'll show great results.
Yeah this is an obvious scam lol.
(It's not about IQ specifically, but to anyone interested in how many different environment factors play a role in human behavior/outcomes, Behave by Robert Sapolsky is an excellent overview of research in a broad variety of fields. It's definitely not a light read, but it doesn't assume too much prior knowledge, and is one of my favorite books on what makes us tick.)
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I would definitely hate to be burdened with an IQ. Such a terrible thing to be born with
Only if burdened with emotional intermittence, as well.
GATTICA! GATTICA! GATTICA!
Won't one crucial difference be that Gattaca's genetic selection actually worked? This will be a techbro "move fast and break things" con job.
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GATTACATS would be the most cursed musical possible and every day I give thanks that we live in a world where it doesn't exist.
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Scott Alexander pokes his head up out of the astroturf and whispers, "It's showtime."
If I only have about fifty embryos, can I pay $50k to have them scanned now and have another 50 embryo scans left on my account or do I have to have all of them on hand immediately?
Gross, but I'm not shocked. IVF and prenatal genetics screening is big business, it was really only a matter of time until someone tried pulling this. As much as it shouldn't be the case, the 'line must go up' edict holds in the medical business too. I know some large lab services companies that are likely watching groups like this with great interest (but letting them take the risks first, which is smart because this is a con).
My hope is that someone squashes this and we keep screening limited to risks for severe developmental disorders (which, even still, is at least a little ethically problematic) and conditions that lower the probability of the pregnancy coming to term. But we'll see - there's gold in dem der embryos.
training your sperm to pass raven's progressive matrices
At least corvids are smart. Better that than some birdbrain's progressive matrices.
I actually read a Red Dwarf fanfic about this once where Rimmer's parents had paid for embryo selection to make sure all their kids had high IQs and good genes because they wanted to make sure they all got into the Space Corps
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this post was submitted on 21 Oct 2024
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