Rottweilers Ate My Laptop

Rottweilers. Computers. Cameras. World Domination. Not necessarily in that order.

Rottweilers.
Computers. Cameras.
World Domination.
Not necessarily in that order.

Transgenic animals again

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First mice, then beagles, and now marmosets.

These fluorescent transgenic monkeys differ from those developed last year in that they apparently are able to pass on the modified gene to their offspring. According to an article in UK’s Telegraph, having a non-human primate model for disease research could be extremely valuable due to the close genetic relationship of the marmosets with humans.

If, as most of the reporting on this type of research indicates, these animals are able to help us more quickly find cures to currently incurable neurological diseases such as Huntington’s Disease and Parkinson’s Disease, then perhaps it makes sense for we humans to play God.

There is still something about genetic modification that bothers me on a gut feeling, can’t say exactly why level.

(NaBloPoMo | May ‘09: 31 of 31 | 75% Challenge: 127 of 274)

Send in the clones

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Canine cloning experiments have both fascinated and repelled me since the start of the Missyplicity Project in 1998. I am not a very religious person, but the element of playing God just does not sit right with me. Everyone wishes their beloved pet could live forever, but cloning will never be the way to get there. Genetics is important, but so is environment. There is no way to duplicate all of the external events that helped to shape any creature’s life.

Genetic modification smacks even further of playing God. This week’s announcement of the cloned fluorescent beagles left me with a whole gamut of conflicting feelings. The thought of planting disease-related genes in these dogs makes me very uncomfortable. But the thought that these techniques will be used to find cures for human genetic disease intrigues me and gives me hope. Then my feelings go in the opposite direction when I wonder what would happen if someone with a lot of money, no brains and no ethics wanted to buy one of these fluorescent dogs as a novelty item or status symbol. Notice I do not say “pet.”

Back in 2001 during a visit to Honolulu’s Bishop Museum, I saw the fluorescent mice from an earlier cloning experiment. They left me with this same vaguely uneasy feeling. Again, the technology and science angle was fascinating. The ethical implications, fascinating in a very different way.

I would be so much more able to accept all of this if there was some more public and visible evidence that progress was being made, and to see that we are in fact approaching a cure to any one of the genetic diseases that affect so many human lives. I guess all we can do is wait and see.

(NaBloPoMo | May ’09: 1 of 31 | 75% Challenge: 97 of 274)