Past Marks in Human-Animal DNA Mixing and Critique

Clearly what I've been doing was focused on what might happen as a result of our ongoing research into recombinant DNA. What was the motivation behind it, and what might happen in the next year. This is more of a tangent with the recent work and how viable it is, and not much a theme into consciousness


Insulin

One of the least controversial methods of implanting DNA into nonhumans was featuring the work of putting human insulin DNA into bacteria. Normally, the shortage for insulin was widespread and was dependent on blood and insulin donors. And now, we are able to, through the power of millions of bacteria, harvest and distill insulin in enough quantities for an inexpensive cost. (Ignoring the artificial price hike from the distributor company management.)

This raises nearly no questions of ethics because bacteria, some of the simplest organisms on Earth, are not capable of assembling themselves to work through to create a consciousness. That comes with another interesting development that only happened last year.


Pig Chimera

The need for a human pig chimera draws from the relatively known ability for human tissues and pig tissues to emulate one another. The strange fact is pigs and humans are relatively close in many ways, intelligence, physiology, including teeth. (very commonly, human and pig teeth get mixed up. A missing link once thought to be predecessor to man was actually a fossilized pig tooth.) So then in the Wired Magazine, a chimera was produced by mixing pig and human stem cells in an embryo and allowing for them to slowly develop. The purpose of this was to create a way to grow 

human organs for trauma victims who are waiting on donor organs.

They are taking steps to avoid creating a true questionable human-pig hybrid by only using 1 out of a thousand cells in the embryo. And the question arises where does the ethics come up that the organism becomes more human than pig. Should we start worrying about it when it's 1 cell in 50? 1 in ten? How about 2 human cells per five? So far, this isn't pliable to do, for many reasons including biology and bioethics.


My Own Concern

My own concern is this. If the endpoint is to somehow have a framework to grow organs on their own for donation, then the benefit lies there, and I support the system and development.

As for the alternative, keeping a pig alive to harvest organs for it. That I don't see as constructive. Ignoring the argument of whether it's humane or not, because that would be the 'fall-back' argument that can't really be proven. But bear with me. It would be better with the default plan to grow organs outside the body in a stasis vessel, that could keep it alive in a sterile environment that could also somehow stress it to handle normal body operations. To grow a body to only harvest a heart, liver, or lung would be waste, and to sustain the body once the essential organ is gone, is a waste in a different way.

Obviously, this is a tangent from the topic of animal consciousness, but the driving force for developing these experiments is the lack of resources for humans who are medically compromised. This more or less shines light on the total need for such research with combining DNA. The cost is dwarfed by the need to help people

As for creating a new species that can communicate, the problem may be ten-fold the success. The success is bittersweet as the controversy would possibly any destroy any chances of continuing research for the subject. So bottom line, the avenues we take are very particular, and the endpoint determines the means.

It's all well intentioned to create new chimeras. And yet, it seems we are skirting through paths from which any fork can create massive changes.

Good night to all, and Happy Thinking!