Synthetic human embryos created in groundbreaking advance | Hacker News Reader

Synthetic human embryos created in groundbreaking advance

theguardian.com

30 pointssamwillis9 comments

This research needs to stop. Do we need to do everything just because it's possible? What is next? Connect an LLM model to a human embryos synthetic supply chain? Set it up in a remote external jurisdiction? North Korea? A Lab in Earth Orbit?

I have to admit, even though the article read like background set-up in the start of a SF dystopia, reading it did make me morbidly curious as to where this could go.

Viable human embryos made the old fashioned way are fairly easy to create or come by, what is the difference? Except having more flexibility in who can have children?

This doesn't seem to be aimed at treating infertility, it seems to bypass the issue altogether.

If the end goal is to give wanting parents children, there is already a huge excess of children without parents in the world.

For people in the U.S., international adoption is both logistically difficult and morally fraught. Domestic adoption is less difficult, but it's very hard to adopt infants, which is what most adoptive parents are hoping for (and willing to pay lots of money for).

I'm not necessarily arguing in favor of creating more children, but your implied "just adopt" doesn't meet most potential parents' desires.

I didn't say "just adopt". I said we already have an abundance of parentless kids in the world. Providing less friction in the adoption space sounds easier (and a hell of a lot less ethically gray) than making synthetic human embryos.

Yes and always.

Apart from true medical conditions, I am always a fan of "do it if you can". What better way to advance the species?

Infertility is a medical condition as well. Why shouldn't we be looking for better ways to treat it?

"The structures do not have a beating heart or the beginnings of a brain, but include cells that would typically go on to form the placenta, yolk sac and the embryo itself."

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