Unless we experience a Luddite revolution within the next decade or so and civilization collapses, it is inevitable that some parents will choose to have their children genetically engineered, legally or illegally. At first it will just be the removal of genes for diseases, which could possibly include Autism and Aspergers unless I have something to say about it, but at some point there will be experiments to improve physical or mental abilities through genetic manipulation.
The first attempts to improve intelligence will probably have side effects, some of which could be similar to Autism, Schizophrenia, or something completely different than anything known. The point is that they will probably be completely alien to us, especially if the experiments are successful in creating super geniuses. But most people throughout history that have been described as geniuses have been somewhat "strange" to other people, at least some of them have been Autistic like Einstein may have been, or were diagnosed with more serious mental disorders such as John Nash.
Of notable mention are Artificial Intelligences, being completely non-human they would seem even more alien than genetically enhanced humans or mundane Autistics and Aspergarians.
I've presented what will happen in the future, unfortunately I have no idea how people will handle it, but I hope they will learn to accept the odd quirks displayed by those who can greatly benefit society.
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2 comments:
What kind of coursework have you done in genetics so far?
I just graduated from High School really, so aside from splicing plasmids for Bioluminescence into E. coli in Junior year Biotech, nothing so far. Who is this.
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