Virtue engineering

[ribozyme]

I found some of the comments on that thread interesting:

I think that this is the key. God doesn’t need our suffering. We do.

What do you call a child who grows up with no adversity whatever, and gets whatever he wants? Spoiled.

On the other hand, love does entail suffering, and brings us out of ourselves.

and

I always try to get people who don’t understand the concept of sanctifying suffering to describe a world in which there is no suffering or possibility of suffering. That includes not just physical suffering but also mental and emotional suffering. Essentially, we can’t be hurt and we can’t hurt anybody else. How would we then behave? Would we be good? Self-giving? Why bother, since nobody needs anything, physically, mentally, emotionally? Or would we be the worst kind of selfish pigs?

forums.catholic-questions.org/showthread.php?t=196682&page=2

The point of quoting this posts is to show that Catholics (well, at least with my sample size (n=2)) believe that conduct is more important than consequences. But what if we can make people to do good? What if people were naturally charitable and loving? It is often argued that God allows suffering to evoke such sentiments.

I originally wanted to title the thread “virtue eugenics” as I think it would be a rather apt title to the proposal here.

No this is NOT going to be another pleonasm about the heritability of intelligence or about intelligence enhancement.

I’ll quote from a Citizen Cyborg a rather influential book in my life:

Another theorist who argues that egalitarians should embrace subsidized germinal choice technology, including enhancement, is the Princeton University Bioethicist Peter Singer. In Singer’s 2001 A Darwin Left: Politics, Evolution, and Cooperation, he argues that the Left has ignored and denied the sociobiological constraints on politics to its down detriment. Singer contends that there is a biologically rooted tendency towards selfishness and hierarchy in human nature that undermines egalitarian social reforms. If ambitious egalitarian programs of social reform and democratic cooperation are to succeed, Singer argues, we must employ the new genetic and neurological sciences to identify and modify the aspects of of human nature that cause conflict and competition. “In a more distant future we can still barely glimpse, it may turn out to be a prerequisite for a new kind of freedom: the freedom to shape our genes, we can build the kind of society we judge best.” Toward that end Singer advocates a program of volutary, socially subsidized genetic enhancement.

Emphasis mine…

I suppose we can genetically engineer humans be more charitable, altruistic, compassionate, and empathetic. Would anyone express antipathy towards using genetic engineering for that purpose? So this is one way those virtues can be elicited without the presence of suffering. I wonder if you find that proposal palatable since Catholics value those virtues itself, while I value them (as a utilitarian) only because they are a means to an end as they help ameliorate suffering.

One possible application is eliminating the predilection towards excessive racism, which might have genetic etiology (mentioned at 11:30).

ieet.org/index.php/IEET/more/hughestv06virtue/ (it also discusses the idea conveyed in this post in depth)

I also wonder if Catholics would endorse the use of MDMA (assuming it has no side effects, of course, empirical evidence contradicts that assumption) as it increases our capacity to be empathetic and perhaps charitable. No, I am not endorsing the use of MDMA here.

 

[rwoehmke]

I once encouraged all my children to get a University education. I thought that it would prepare them for lives of use to themselves and society. However my fourth son upon graduation told his cousins,“Dad told me to get an education, but he never told me what to do next.” His older female cousin said,“Get a job John, get a job.”

If genetics are your interest, go and do likewise. Get an education and then speculate.

 

[Contarini]

I found some of the comments on that thread interesting:

and

forums.catholic-questions.org/showthread.php?t=196682&page=2

The point of quoting this posts is to show that Catholics (well, at least with my sample size (n=2)) believe that conduct is more important than consequences. But what if we can make people to do good? What if people were naturally charitable and loving? It is often argued that God allows suffering to evoke such sentiments.

I originally wanted to title the thread “virtue eugenics” as I think it would be a rather apt title to the proposal here.

No this is NOT going to be another pleonasm about the heritability of intelligence or about intelligence enhancement.

I’ll quote from a Citizen Cyborg a rather influential book in my life:

Emphasis mine…

I suppose we can genetically engineer humans be more charitable, altruistic, compassionate, and empathetic. Would anyone express antipathy towards using genetic engineering for that purpose? So this is one way those virtues can be elicited without the presence of suffering. I wonder if you find that proposal palatable since Catholics value those virtues itself, while I value them (as a utilitarian) only because they are a means to an end as they help ameliorate suffering.

One possible application is eliminating the predilection towards excessive racism, which might have genetic etiology (mentioned at 11:30).

ieet.org/index.php/IEET/more/hughestv06virtue/ (it also discusses the idea conveyed in this post in depth)

I also wonder if Catholics would endorse the use of MDMA (assuming it has no side effects, of course, empirical evidence contradicts that assumption) as it increases our capacity to be empathetic and perhaps charitable. No, I am not endorsing the use of MDMA here.

I find the naive faith of people like Prof. Singer touching–or would if there were no chance that powerful people might listen to him.

Do you seriously think that if we give humans the power to design the next generation of humans, that that power will be used only for good? It’s the old problem: who watches the watchers? Or in this case: who designs the designers?

Read C. S. Lewis’s The Abolition of Man. He pointed out the horrific consequences of this way of thinking decades before Prof. Singer came up with his particular brand of idolatrous madness.

Edwin

 

[freesoulhope]

The point of quoting this posts is to show that Catholics (well, at least with my sample size (n=2)) believe that conduct is more important than consequences. But what if we can make people to do good? What if people were naturally charitable and loving? It is often argued that God allows suffering to evoke such sentiments.

In theory, though I doubt it, maybe we could make a kind of ***Good Gene ***which encouraged one to do well; and we would be good people on the outside. But wouldn’t that be a form of totalitarian slavery? Programming ourselves, taking shortcuts, manipulating human desires, these paths to righteousness, though done in good faith, totally misses the point of being good, and is imperfect in reflection of God.

Man gains virtue and strong character through choice, by going against the grain; actualizing choices that contradicts selfish desires, and in doing so, strengthening the spiritual muscles. The people who believe in Character Genes, do not believe that we have free will; they believe that we are actually forced by are genes to act in ways that we consider to be evil. At the end of the day, though there may be evil “influences” in the world, there is absolutely no justifying reason why a man or women, who has the ability to choose, shouldn’t choose to be perfectly good or strive for Perfection. Why choose to be selfish?

Taking a good pill only serves to create the illusion that one is a good person, where as otherwise one would be evil. It’s just like wearing a ***condom ***to preserve ones value for pleasure; worshiping pleasure in the desguise of preventing a terrible desiese, instead of valuing ones sexuality and seeing it as a sacred privilege. We Catholics believe that Sex is something which should be saved only for the one you will marry and journey the rest of your life with. Both of these sexual methods can work to a good degree, in virus prevention, if implemented properly, but only one of them is the “perfect Ideal” in the objective sense of a sacred humanity and sexuality. Only one of them serves the Perfect Good. The concept of a condom, though it promotes “safe” sex (which merely seems to be a good thing), reduces sexuality to nothing but a mere pleasure that must be dominated and used. I say this because a condom, in being a condom, promotes nothing about the sacredness of sexuality or the person, but only gives an opportunity to prevent some kind of consequence that arises out of human irresponsibility.This is a testament to mans indifference to the unity of love which is experienced in Marriage, and his desire, instead, to be selfish. I say selfish, because a “person” should be ***“freely loved”***for the rest of there lives. To treat a person as a sexual object (even if both partys agree to do so), is to deny humanity its “Personal Value and Nature” and therefore, it is to deny them love. Hence, sex for the sake of sex is an “imperfect act” which leads to even deeper imperfections within society as a whole. Good works, devoid of free choice, is also imperfect. So condoms, though good in a sense (if you think of it as preventing a virus), is ultimately imperfect, because it inspires perversion and warped perceptions of human beings and human sexuality. The concept of marriage on the other hand, when there is a genuine companionship based on personhood, in the union of God, there is an unavoidable an automatic fulfillment of human dignity, because one is able to see the value of human sexuality and a human person through the eyes of God, rather then just the pleasure that one may experience from a sexual encounter. Marriage is an expression of a “perfect unity” between Human beings and God. Therefore marriage is the greater good that man should aspire to.

One must value the free choice no matter what evil comes from it; because free-choice is the “Perfect Ideal”, the “Perfect Good”. Somebody that is genetically modified to be good, is no more good then a robot that is programmed to be good.
On a spiritual level, once man becomes totally dependent on finite things for his needs, he’s ultimately placing himself in a trap, because once these things pass away, there is nothing left that will fulfill his desires and wants. There will only be a perfect God which one has turn away from for things that ultimately never belonged to him in the first place. Man can only be perfect through God, because it is God that is the root of all things, not DNA.

 

[kentuckyliz]

Why would anyone assume that genetic engineering for charity, goodness, altruism, etc. would be a worthy pursuit? As determined by the overlords who decide to pursue this policy and practice.

Because you might have some overlords thinking that’s worthy, yet others are Ayn Rand fans and think those goals are worthless and weak. That pursuing their own self-interest vigorously ultimately benefits everyone the most. So their engineering project is to make themselves stronger and smarter. They ascend to dominance.

Now, they might engineer the ordinary mass of people to be selfless and generous and meek, because they’d be easier to control. It would be easier to exploit them if you’re smarter and stronger and they seem so eager to give you their money and time and stuff.

That seems far more realistic of a picture to me…of what would actually happen in the world that we really live in.

 

[freesoulhope]

Now, they might engineer the ordinary mass of people to be selfless and generous and meek, because they’d be easier to control. It would be easier to exploit them if you’re smarter and stronger and they seem so eager to give you their money and time and stuff.

That seems far more realistic of a picture to me…of what would actually happen in the world that we really live in.

Coooooool.