Genetic Enhancments and society

[Keiko]

What could some of the societal impact (positive and negative) be from the development and swift (but reasonable) unregulated release TL10-11 genetic enhancements and bio-modification into Earth's various societies (at expected prices) be in your opinion?

[gilbertocarlos]

At what TL would that happen?

[Keiko]

Originally Posted by gilbertocarlos

At what TL would that happen?

The current one; say about about 2008. I'm working on setting idea.

[DangerousThing]

As always: some people would love the idea, and some would hate it I'd also extend this to religion where some of the more fundamentalist ones might hate it because "they're meddling in God's work" and some might embrace it.

Of course some cultures and countries would be polarized one side or the other with almost uniform acceptance or fear.

I would expect in the US that there would be demonstrations, some random killings, and a few organized killings from the more fanatical groups, but for the most part acceptance *if* the technology is used in medicine to improve quality and length of life.

Other countries may be different, especially if their shared culture keeps them mainly together on this issue

[Nereidalbel]

Honest thoughts? Porn in 99% of the world gets weirder; Japan just stops using cheap props. Otherwise, sports now separate genetically engineered humans from "natural" humans. Otherwise, the costs prevent the average Joe from going crazy.

[NineDaysDead]

Originally Posted by Keiko

The current one; say about about 2008. I'm working on setting idea.

Do you mean in 2008 TL11 Bio-Tech became available, at the prices listed in Bio-Tech? And it is now the year 2014?

[David Johnston2]

All right, let's make a list. We should start with biomods because there's a timelag before human germline engineering will make a difference.

First of all, Every person with a net income in excess of, say, 200,000 becomes functionally immortal. They will only die from mishap, murder or suicide. This will not soothe the resentment others feel at tax breaks for the wealthy. Additionally, I'd say there's a fairly high chance that turnover in the United States Senate and some other legislatures will virtually come to a halt. Not to mention the effect on the makeup of Supreme Courts... Grassroots pressure for term limits increases.

We'll also start to see some very exotic porn stars and prostitutes out there.

By far the most pernicious bio-mod will be Hot Shotting. Lower income people will find their employers subsidizing their procedures and those who refuse to make their work their life will have difficulty competing in the marketplace.

[Flyndaran]

Originally Posted by Nereidalbel

Honest thoughts? Porn in 99% of the world gets weirder; Japan just stops using cheap props. Otherwise, sports now separate genetically engineered humans from "natural" humans. Otherwise, the costs prevent the average Joe from going crazy.

Like how they now separate the artificially enhanced and "natural" humans?

You would have to have perfectly reliable methods of telling them apart. And many realistic enhancements could conceivably occur in nature anyway.

[Nereidalbel]

Originally Posted by Flyndaran

Like how they now separate the artificially enhanced and "natural" humans?

You would have to have perfectly reliable methods of telling them apart. And many realistic enhancements could conceivably occur in nature anyway.

One would hope that such enhancements come with the technology to test for the modified genes. After all, any sensible company would patent them, ala Monsanto.

[Otaku]

Originally Posted by Keiko

What could some of the societal impact (positive and negative) be from the development and swift (but reasonable) unregulated release TL10-11 genetic enhancements and bio-modification into Earth's various societies (at expected prices) be in your opinion?

I feel like this statement has self contradictions: swift but reasonable unregulated release of genetic enhancements and bio-modification.

When it comes to such things, that still means a time span of several decades, maybe a century. Fictional future tech is fictional future tech; even though we can start out "knowing" it will work as intended, the society involved won't. There is also the ethics involved with how such developments occur; how much human experimentation is required? With things being unregulated, how much human experimentation and alteration will happen because of the profits to be made?

In modern TL8 we still have a terrible human trafficking problem; how does a sudden and unregulated influx of ultra tech biomods make it anything but worse?

Honest questions, as I don't have most of these source materials handy.