This is a really bad analogy. We bred those animals to be commercially useful to humans, but often at the expense of their health, adaptability, and quality of life.
Which leads to the key question you're not answering: What does it mean, exactly, for eugenics to "work"?
Which leads to the key question you're not answering: What does it mean, exactly, for eugenics to "work"?
I don't know of any scientist who disputes what Dawkins is saying here: we *physically could* genetically engineer humans with prodigious strength, speed, agility etc.
But that's not the important question. The question is, who decides what we should change about our genes?
But that's not the important question. The question is, who decides what we should change about our genes?
The problem is that no change you make to the human genome will happen in a vacuum. Any "improvement" we could make will come with tradeoffs. Humans who could run at 40mph would need vastly more caloric intake, suffer greater skeletal and muscular damage, etc.
We see a million of these kinds of tradeoffs even just in natural evolution.
Humans with darker skin are resistant to burns and cancer but more reliant on dietary vitamin D to prevent bone disease. Humans without certain blood proteins resist malaria but risk sickle-sell anemia.
Humans with darker skin are resistant to burns and cancer but more reliant on dietary vitamin D to prevent bone disease. Humans without certain blood proteins resist malaria but risk sickle-sell anemia.
It's biologically *expensive* to solve an evolutionary problem. Nature has spent millions of years selecting for traits in humans, and across human populations, that give them traits that are suited to their environment.
Why would our artificial selection be better?
Why would our artificial selection be better?
What about the ethics of breeding humans who are unquestionably suited for one task over others, precisely so that can be their task. Super-soldiers who can punch through metal or take a bullet, for instance.
Would it not be a form of slavery to create such people?
Would it not be a form of slavery to create such people?
And that's before we even get into who gets to decide whether certain traits are diseases or diversity.
I'm autistic. Should that be bred out of my germ line? I'm proud of how my neurodiverse brain solves problems and processes its environment.
How about gayness? Race?
I'm autistic. Should that be bred out of my germ line? I'm proud of how my neurodiverse brain solves problems and processes its environment.
How about gayness? Race?
Dawkins is an accomplished biologist. He's not a stupid man.
He really ought to know by now that these are the problems people are worried about when we talk about eugenics. Not "is it physically possible?"
He really ought to know by now that these are the problems people are worried about when we talk about eugenics. Not "is it physically possible?"
