Clone Army

[AreaCode707]

Originally posted by: grasshopper26

Originally posted by: HotChic
You're supposing DNA could be altered to remove those things. That's a far leap from just making clones.

We already are altering DNA with the use of genetic viruses, this isn't new. Within 20 years we should have the ability to edit DNA at will and insert that edited DNA into eggs and grow them.

Humans after all are not that far removed from house plants when it comes to their DNA and the ability to edit it.

Grasshopper

Are hopes and dreams and such genetic?

 

[SSP]

Originally posted by: grasshopper26

Originally posted by: HappyPuppy
That's pretty sick.

It is an honest question.

Ok, look at it from the reverse. What if we figured out how to grow adult clones and could skip the growing up process. Then we could simply implant everything they need to know in the memory ingrams of their brains and they could be combat ready within hours of being "born".

Are they still human? If so, does it continue to matter?

I'm not arguing one way or another, I honestly haven't given it enough thought yet, but it does present an interesting point.

Grasshopper

What if you were born in to lifeless pos clone? Would you want that over your current autonomous self? You think of some pretty sh!tty ideas. Totally dehumanizing what ever merit cloning has.

 

[Deleted member 4644]

Here is another major issue: Even if we could make a million people into a clone army of genetically engineered warriors, the enemy could easy make a virus that would kill the clones, and only the clones...

🙂

 

[Grasshopper27]

Originally posted by: HotChic
Are hopes and dreams and such genetic?

Everything at some point is genetic. The functions of the brain that provide for hopes and dreams can be controlled, if not the thoughts themselves. Same effect.

The idea is to remove emotions from the clones. You want to create a soldier that is obedient, loyal, free from fear and other such concerns.

The first batches would be rough, there probably would be loses due to flaws and other unforseen events. It might take a half dozen tries or more before we make a batch that is combat worthy.

The question is this. What is better in battle, a robot that is fighting via computer software or a human that is fighting with a brain? Trying to duplicate what nature has spent 3 million years creating seems wasteful. Why not just use the machines we already have, our bodies.

That is the thought process behind this idea.

Grasshopper

 

[Grasshopper27]

Originally posted by: SSP
What if you were born in to lifeless pos clone? Would you want that over your current autonomous self? You think of some pretty sh!tty ideas. Totally dehumanizing what ever merit cloning has.

??? Born in to? I wouldn't be me then. You're thinking that you'd still be you, just in a clone following orders.

You wouldn't know any of this, wouldn't know any other existance. The issue of putting yourself in their shoes would have to go, since you're not in their shoes and they don't know any better.

Think of the movie Soldier with Kurt Russel. They were not even clones, but the idea was to show what the state could do if they took the child from birth and raised them to be nothing but combat soldiers. They don't know any better, that is all of existance to them.

Grasshopper

 

[Grasshopper27]

Originally posted by: LordSegan
Here is another major issue: Even if we could make a million people into a clone army of genetically engineered warriors, the enemy could easy make a virus that would kill the clones, and only the clones...

🙂

True, but could they do it in enough time to matter?

If we dropped a million clones into Iraq right now, what could they come up with in a week that would make a difference?

Grasshopper

 

[AreaCode707]

I think it is more likely that world affairs will be settled by Counter-Strike matches than this described clone army will actually ever happen.

 

[Tallgeese]

Hitler...is that you?

 

[Grasshopper27]

Originally posted by: HotChic
I think it is more likely that world affairs will be settled by Counter-Strike matches than this described clone army will actually ever happen.

LOL! Ok, I'll go for that... There was a lame movie called Robot Wars or Robot Jox or something. They stopped fighting normal wars and instead decided conflits with large robot battles in staged events.

Just so long as real people were not killed as in that episode of Star Trek so many years ago where the computer would simulate deaths and people would report to the death chambers.

Grasshopper

 

[Grasshopper27]

Originally posted by: TallGeese
Hitler...is that you?

LOL! 🙂

Like I said, "leaving out the moral issues" for the purposes of this discussion.

Would you prefer we just built machines to do this instead?

Ok, here is another idea... What if we built thinking machines, computers that could finally pass the Turing test. Would it then be unethetical to send them into battle to "die"

Where does the line get drawn?

Grasshopper