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Katie Hasson, Biopolitical Times | 09.29.2023
A recent high-profile article on heritable genome editing in The New Yorker showcases the significance of the ongoing debate about the prospect of editing the genes of future generations. But is the conversation drifting in concerning directions?
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Natalism and Hipster Eugenics
Pete Shanks, Biopolitical Times | 09.14.2023
Some tech elites who espouse effective altruism and longtermism are also promoting a pronatalist agenda at an upcoming “Natal Conference.” A veneer of concern about falling birth rates masks their support for techno-eugenics.
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GENE EDITING | EUGENICS | GENOMICS
ASSISTED REPRODUCTION | SURROGACY360 | ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE
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Genetically Modified Pig’s Heart Is Transplanted Into a Second Patient
Roni Caryn Rabin, The New York Times | 09.22.2023
Surgeons in Baltimore have transplanted the heart of a genetically altered pig into a man with terminal heart disease. It is the second such procedure performed by the surgeons, whose first patient died two months after the pig-heart transplant procedure.
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New paper lays out problems of developing gene-edited GM crops
Claire Robinson, GMWatch | 08.30.2023
Despite a new paper that outlines the many technical problems with crop gene editing, scientists advising the UK government and the EU Commission on their GMO deregulatory agenda appear to overlook these cautionary facts.
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The Young Conservatives Trying to Make Eugenics Respectable Again
Adam Serwer, The Atlantic | 09.15.2023
The resurgence of eugenic logics on the right demonstrates the stubborn appeal of scientific racism. Pernicious stereotypes are used to justify a lack of attention to historical and ongoing harms done to minoritized populations.
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China’s quest for human genetic data spurs fears of a DNA arms race
Joby Warrick and Cate Brown, The Washington Post | 09.22.2023
The Covid-19 pandemic gave China the chance to collect human genetic information from several foreign countries. The effort seems to be part of a broader effort to advance its biotech sector and develop strategic intelligence advances through highly suspect methods for amassing DNA information.
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The Aftermath of a ‘Miracle Cure’ for a Rare Cancer
James Tabery, Wired | 09.04.2023
The leukemia drug Gleevec was hailed as a step forward for precision medicine. In fact, it has paved the way for drug companies to dramatically raise the prices of oncology and gene therapy drugs to boost their profits, while reducing access for patients.
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One in 18 babies born in Australia are conceived via IVF, latest data shows
Natasha May, The Guardian | 09.22.2023
According to a new report, Australia is one of the countries most dependent on assisted reproduction. The number of IVF cycles in Australia increased by 17% from 2020 to 2021, and a record 18,594 babies were born in Australia as a result of IVF treatment in 2021.
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Waiting Room
Alison Motluk, Hazlitt | 08.30.2023
The lack of regulations governing Canadian surrogacy arrangements allows clinics to adopt shady practices that leave surrogates and families vulnerable to costly exploitation. Despite some intended parents’ attempts to alert authorities to potentially illegal conduct at one clinic over the past decade, neither extensive investigations of clinic practices nor legislative review has resulted.
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‘Ghost parents’: Same-sex couples in Italy are losing their rights
Lara Bullens, France24 | 09.14.2023
Italy’s right-wing Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni has demanded local councils only list biological parents on birth certificates. Same-sex couples who may lose their parentage rights discuss the dangerous impacts their families will face.
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The AI heretic
Aki Ito, Insider | 09.18.2023
A prominent MIT economist is sounding the alarm that AI innovations may do more harm than good. Massive power disparities between workers and their employers make it unlikely that AI will benefit more than an elite few.
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What OpenAI Really Wants
Steven Levy, Wired | 09.05.2023
Founded as a nonprofit that promised to make AI safe by "sharing it with the world," OpenAI is now a for-profit company reportedly valued at almost $30 billion. It sees its products ChatGPT and GPT-4 as "just the start" to "thrusting humanity into an era of unimaginable bounty." Critics and some insiders point to the risks of AI-driven job loss, misinformation, and even human extinction.
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The fight over a ‘dangerous’ ideology shaping AI debate
AFP, France24 | 08.28.2023
Longtermism, along with linked ideologies like transhumanism and effective altruism, hold huge sway in Silicon Valley. They have helped to frame the debate on artificial intelligence around the idea of human extinction, obscuring their own ties to eugenics and directing attention away from the harms of AI on marginalized communities.
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