[HN Gopher] Toxic people could become a reality, scientists rese...
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Toxic people could become a reality, scientists researching snake
venom say
Author : booleandilemma
Score : 61 points
Date : 2021-03-30 20:06 UTC (2 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.irishexaminer.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.irishexaminer.com)
| airhead969 wrote:
| There are some venomous mammals.
|
| Coincidentally, there was a posting today about it earlier.
|
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26635391
| k__ wrote:
| Aren't human bites toxic for humans already?
| malwarebytess wrote:
| >Scientists have found the genetic foundation needed for oral
| venom to evolve is present in both reptiles and mammals, and
| said their study shows the first concrete evidence of a link
| between venom glands in snakes and salivary glands in mammals.
|
| You're talking about oral bacteria. Article is talking about
| actual venom.
| gruez wrote:
| They are?
| arthurcolle wrote:
| Yes. Mouth bacteria and viruses in human mouths are the
| factors. Not something I'd be super worried about in general.
| (That being said, I was bitten by a psycho when I was 8 and
| didn't die so that's cool.)
|
| https://www.mayoclinic.org/first-aid/first-aid-human-
| bites/b....
| jimbob45 wrote:
| Yeah, if you get bitten by a homeless individual (or any
| individual), you need to be rushed to the ER to ensure you
| don't get dangerous bacteria in your bloodstream running
| free.
|
| Edit: there appears to be debate over my wording but just
| please don't miss the lesson here: seek medical attention if
| bitten.
| louwrentius wrote:
| > if you get bitten by a homeless individual (or any
| individual)
|
| I think that's quite a bad remark. I believe you can do
| better.
| airhead969 wrote:
| Bruh. Poverty-shaming ain't cool.
| xwdv wrote:
| Except it's true, and could save someone's life. If a
| homeless person with bad dental hygiene were to bite you
| deep enough to sink their teeth into a blood vessel you
| might not live happily ever after, you're almost
| certainly looking at an infection if left untreated.
| eeZah7Ux wrote:
| Then say "person with bad dental hygiene".
|
| Don't single out homeless people: one can have bad dental
| hygiene without being homeless.
|
| (speaking about toxic language...)
| libria wrote:
| If _any_ person were to bite you. I 'm not aware of data
| that suggests significant variance in mouth bacteria
| among impoverished vs affluent, i.e. if Bezos were to
| bite me right now, I'd still go to the ER. Anyway, I'd
| guess biting is more common among preschoolers than
| homeless people.
| dumpsterdiver wrote:
| Referencing the realities and plight of homeless folks is
| not shaming. Should we instead not talk about the fact
| that they don't have running water to brush their teeth
| with?
|
| When you brush aside the truth in order to be politically
| correct it only hurts those who are most vulnerable. Our
| sensibilities will survive, but in the meantime an
| absessed tooth can absolutely prove fatal to anyone not
| willing or able to seek treatment (guess who).
|
| Being homeless comes with a lot of bad things, and one of
| those things is exposure to diseases that are passed upon
| skin contact. Pretending that homeless folks are just
| "normal folks like the rest of us" truly does them a
| disservice. They need help, and by pretending that they
| don't (or rather, by shunning such conversations out of
| "politeness") we are hurting them for the benefit of our
| own conscience. We are only being polite to our own
| sensibilities when we ignore the plight of homeless
| people, and pretend to put them on equal footing when
| they are truly nowhere close. Instead of taking personal
| offense to the statement I just made, think about them
| instead. It's become very tiring to see people "stand up"
| for others, when they are really only standing up to make
| themselves feel better about mostly ignoring the problem.
| Teknoman117 wrote:
| They are probably talking about how deep bites from humans
| have a high chance of becoming infected if not treated.
|
| Our mouths are quite dirty in general.
| airhead969 wrote:
| With the advent of genetic design and designer babies, I don't
| see how ethics alone can prevent "soldier" and "assassin"
| specialists from being born that have all sorts of enhancements.
| ravenstine wrote:
| What if that's better? Everyone could have a purpose and not
| need to search for it, often in futility.
| dillondoyle wrote:
| I've thought about it and there are for sure small physical
| things I'd love to change from birth to benefit my
| sport/hobbies.
|
| But the problem is parents would be making that decision. Or
| in this case a dictator's military haha.
|
| There are already hover parents living vicariously through
| sports, music, chess whatever.
|
| I can imagine this going to extremes with parents making
| these forever physical decisions.
|
| Elite athletes can chose to endanger their health for the
| sport they love.
|
| But I'm not sure about the ethics of a parent deciding to say
| give lower resting heart rates/higher vo2 max with cycling in
| mind, even though it could be deadly slow.
| brendoelfrendo wrote:
| What if they aren't interested in, or worse, resent their
| "purpose," but can't change it due to some societal and
| genetic pigeon-holing? That sounds worse than searching for a
| purpose for myself, tbh.
| sneak wrote:
| There's no indication that someone's genetically-specialized
| vocation would be something that that person would personally
| be interested in pursuing. There are numerous counterexamples
| of a person's choices in life being orthogonal or even
| entirely opposed to their parents' hopes and desires for
| their life.
|
| I wouldn't be that into assassination as a vocation even if I
| had superpowers that made me an extremely good assassin, for
| example.
|
| Obligatory: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brave_New_World
| hayst4ck wrote:
| It sounds like you are very much in the party of nurture
| over nature. Either could result in a person "being into"
| something. You are taking your genetics and your upbringing
| and projecting them onto future scientific possibilities,
| and I don't think that makes much sense.
|
| What if you sequence the great computer scientists and
| average ones and find some genes that really make a
| difference? What if you sequence sociopaths and discover a
| series of genes that correlate heavily with it? Sexuality,
| flight or flight responses, physical aptitude, mental
| aptitude.
|
| We've spent millennia doing a less advanced form of this on
| dogs, can you honestly say a lot of these dogs we've bred
| for specific jobs aren't "into them"?
| sneak wrote:
| > _It sounds like you are very much in the party of
| nurture over nature._
|
| No, this entirely different to that. I'm saying that a
| person's physical attributes are orthogonal to that
| person's personality. I'm not discussing if their
| personality is a result of nature or nuture, just the
| fact that if you're, for example, physically predisposed
| to, say, being able to grow large muscles, that has no
| bearing whatsoever on whether or not you are personally
| interested in, say, competitive weightlifting (regardless
| of whether or not that personal interest (or lack
| thereof) is a result of nature or nuture).
|
| The fact that you are predisposed to be able to grow
| large muscles is obviously nature; the circumstances
| surrounding whether or not you actually _do_ grow large
| muscles is open to the nature /nurture debate, as well as
| the psychological manifestations that might lead one to
| engage in (or avoid) bodybuilding, competition, et c.
| JellyBeanThief wrote:
| Not everyone wants a purpose, many people who have purposes
| imposed on them by parents or other authority figures later
| reject them, and not everybody who does want a purpose thinks
| of it as a search.
|
| Purposes are tools humans use to give their own lives
| meaning, if they desire. Purposes should serve humans, not
| the other way around.
| SerLava wrote:
| That's horrible. I think you don't know what a meaningful
| life is.
| simcop2387 wrote:
| I think we'll be fine as long as nobody names one of them Khan
| Noonien Singh. But seriously, I agree, someone will do it and
| then it'll be another multi-armed race.
| airhead969 wrote:
| Anti-critters crawling into ears armor.
|
| I want a prehensile tail and feet. Maybe some gene therapy
| can make that happen to grow and remodel existing tissue?
| SamoyedFurFluff wrote:
| It would take at least several years of development to create
| one vaguely effective venomous human assassin, with probably
| over a decade of development until the human developed vaguely
| enough dexterity to actually assassinate people. Unless we
| figure out a way to make humans grow faster at scale? I've
| always felt that enhancing human genetics to make them into
| weapons strikes me as more expensive and less scalable than
| inventing machinery that humans can use as weapons.
|
| What would be more scalable- a human born venomous or the
| ability to install a venom gland in a human sinus, replacing at
| least one tooth?
| SubiculumCode wrote:
| yes. And in the meantime, simple drones that fling poisoned
| darts, or even toss venomous snakes, is much more feasible
| than mutant ninja warriors.
| jetbooster wrote:
| Biting people isn't particularly discreet, and a person
| that gets captured can't dispose of a gland. A similarly
| deadly poison in the tip of a mundane item that a person
| might reasonably be carrying seems much more practical,
| much more likely to succeed, and much more likely to remain
| undetected
| afarrell wrote:
| I think raising a child is a lot more effort than giving a
| trained operative weaponized dentures.
| warent wrote:
| LOL this is basically the Juicero of weaponizing humans.
| Absurdly over-engineered solution searching for a problem.
| mc32 wrote:
| How do they ensure being venomous to others while remaining
| immune themselves?
| pantalaimon wrote:
| Why bother with super soldiers when you can have robots and
| drones?
| mgarfias wrote:
| Toxic headline is toxic.
| libria wrote:
| Yeah, obvious clickbait. An animal is venomous, the venom is
| toxic (a toxin). I wouldn't call a cobra "toxic" unless it was
| constantly starting flamewars on Facebook.
| dumbfoundded wrote:
| Apparently you haven't heard of Cobra Kai
| mrfusion wrote:
| How would laws evolve to handle this?
| temp0826 wrote:
| I'll try adding it when I have to update the registration for
| my fists as lethal weapons.
| airhead969 wrote:
| My tongue is lethal, but not how you think.
|
| Edit: SMH. I end up spraying more than I say.
| anigbrowl wrote:
| Some police departments already classify body parts as
| 'personal weapons'. I recall a case in california a few years
| ago where a pre-teen was mistakenly arrested over an alleged-
| but-not-remotely-plausible resemblance to a burglary suspect.
|
| I can't remember the exact location or details sufficiently
| well to look it up but I remember the bit about personal
| weapons as an odd fact that jumped out at me from a copy of
| the arrest report.
| wincy wrote:
| I'm not sure they'd even need to evolve, it's already illegal
| to bite people. It probably wouldn't even need to be made more
| illegal than it already is.
| mrfusion wrote:
| A single bite would be deadly though. Could they force you to
| produce an anti-venom?
| airhead969 wrote:
| It would be a murder charge if they died, so the suspect's
| interests are probably to comply and produce venom for
| anti-venom.
|
| Probably yes. Forced collection of blood samples for
| substance testing and cheek swabs for DNA collection.
| pasquinelli wrote:
| a single bite can kill now.
| type0 wrote:
| It's good to know if you ever end up in a Mad TV Playstation
| 3 situation.
| simonhamp wrote:
| There are already toxic people. And they don't even need genetic
| manipulation to achieve it.
|
| The good news is, they weren't born that way and they can change.
| echelon wrote:
| > The good news is, they weren't born that way and they can
| change.
|
| Not according to some members of cancel culture. Once you've
| wronged someone, your career is over.
| p1necone wrote:
| Name 5 people whose careers were ended because of "cancel
| culture".
| anigbrowl wrote:
| _The good news is, they weren 't born that way and they can
| change._
|
| Debatable. See
| https://advances.sciencemag.org/content/2/8/e1600451 and
| particularly the supplementary materials about age
| distribution. I held the same opinion as you and was quite
| surprised by these results.
| platty wrote:
| I knew a ton of toxic people in high school, can't believe the
| research is catching up
| colineartheta wrote:
| Look at this guy, only a ton in high school. If only we could
| all be so luck...
| namenotrequired wrote:
| This detail intrigues me:
|
| > "...then in a few thousand years, we might encounter venomous
| mice."
|
| A female mouse can give birth at the age of two and a half
| months. In a few thousand years, you can have some 10 000
| generations.
|
| Would it really take 10 000 generations for mice to become
| venomous?
| dumbfoundded wrote:
| I don't think there's a good enough understanding of genetics
| to know how many generations. I'm guessing the estimate of a
| few thousand years was a complete guess. Many things impact the
| timing and these systems are chaotic. Even selective breeding
| is fairly uncertain. I don't know if geneticists could predict
| how many generations it would take if we selectively breed gray
| wolves to look like pugs.
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