Hypothetically: The Legal Rights of Human/Animal Hybrids?

[Deleted]

Many creatures are self aware, should we give equal rights for all?

Like what creatures? Cause I know of none.

[Deleted]

Given that you are participating in an online form I assume you have access to the Internet. My advice to you would be to you said service, it's amazing what you can learn.

You're the one who challenged my statement, the burden of proof is on you.

[Techno-Druid]

Like what creatures? Cause I know of none.

Well one of the basic ideas of uplifting is to enhance the self-awareness of already self-aware species. Chimps, bonobos, magpies, elephants, dolphins, orcas, gorillas, orangutans.



This bonobo for example understands clear spoken English without reading into facial cues (something dogs do). He recognizes the ape in the mirror as himself.

[Techno-Druid]

Even though he can do these tasks, he doesn't necessarily perceive laws/rules, time, ethics and self in the way a human of his age (he's 31) would.

[Techno-Druid]

Laws are a man made construct. Do you really believe that the animal kingdom has any real concept of justice?

No the animal kingdom does not have a concept of justice, but he understands more complex rules compared to an animal like a dog or a cat.

[cubby]

In the hypothetical future, when hybrids containing both human or non-human genes are viable, what exactly would/should be the rights that parahumans or humanized animals enjoy? I guess it would depends on whether it was a baseline animal modified with human genes or a baseline human modified with the material of non-human animals. But I've often pondered this by myself, should they have rights similar to foster children? Or rather equal rights to humans?

I think you're having some real trouble with what would be an unusually good topic to discuss because you equated foster children with sub-humans. That kind of thing can really piss people off. I'll get to your topic in a sec, and I mean this with all respect, but I'm not sure you know what foster children are - here you go: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foster_care

Now, on to an interesting topic.

I think that when medical science gets around to being able to put animal genes into human beings (Old Man's War), concerns of classification will arise. The easiest way to do it would be to leave it alone - even with animal "enhancements", you remain classified as human with all rights and privileges.

If you don't do it that way, the classification would have to be some kind of highly complex percentage of human genes formula. Set the percentage required to retain "human" designation, and if you fall below that threshold with enhancements, you're no longer human. No idea what percentages would be appropriate.

[Techno-Druid]

I think you're having some real trouble with what would be an unusually good topic to discuss because you equated foster children with sub-humans. That kind of thing can really piss people off. I'll get to your topic in a sec, and I mean this with all respect, but I'm not sure you know what foster children are - here you go: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foster_care

Now, on to an interesting topic.

I think that when medical science gets around to being able to put animal genes into human beings (Old Man's War), concerns of classification will arise. The easiest way to do it would be to leave it alone - even with animal "enhancements", you remain classified as human with all rights and privileges.

If you don't do it that way, the classification would have to be some kind of highly complex percentage of human genes formula. Set the percentage required to retain "human" designation, and if you fall below that threshold with enhancements, you're no longer human. No idea what percentages would be appropriate.

It's actually the idea of another person on how to treat humanized animals without the full intelligence of an average human. I've sort of learned my error on that. However, I largely agree with your ideas on parahumans/posthumans. I'd be interested to hear your opinion on how humanized animals (animals that hypothetically could perceive time, morality, be capable of speech and high reasoning). I really don't support chimeras (50 human/50 animal) because those are random and you could end up with a horrendous creature).

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Oh yeah, maybe later I'll explain the viability of hybrid species being created through humans and non-humans. I'm tired now though

[Dispraise]

Anybody who uses the terms "parahuman" or "metahuman" unironically will be rounded up and shipped off to farms, zoos, or meat processing plants. All other sapient beings should be treated as we would any other sophont.

[Illuminance]

In the hypothetical future, when hybrids containing both human or non-human genes are viable, what exactly would/should be the rights that parahumans or humanized animals enjoy? I guess it would depends on whether it was a baseline animal modified with human genes or a baseline human modified with the material of non-human animals. But I've often pondered this by myself, should they have rights similar to foster children? Or rather equal rights to humans?

Not sure exactly what the OP was getting at, but humanized animals have existed for quite awhile

See: http://www.pnas.org/content/111/39/14253 for example

[Techno-Druid]

Anybody who uses the terms "parahuman" or "metahuman" unironically will be rounded up and shipped off to farms, zoos, or meat processing plants. All other sapient beings should be treated as we would any other sophont.

Parahuman, Posthuman, Transhuman and any of those are ACTUAL hypothetical terms to describe them.

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Not sure exactly what the OP was getting at, but humanized animals have existed for quite awhile

See: http://www.pnas.org/content/111/39/14253 for example

Yes, this is correct. Humanized animals in many forms are created (obviously for now not extremes) in experimentation for a while now. It's just most of the embryos we experiment on are usually terminated with many exceptions, including if they need to study the affects of it (assuming it doesn't show in the Embryonic stages).

https://today.duke.edu/sites/default...ain1_small.jpg

[Dispraise]

Parahuman, Posthuman, Transhuman and any of those are ACTUAL hypothetical terms to describe them.

Straight to the abattoir.

[Techno-Druid]

Straight to the abattoir.

What do you call them? There's a lot more words (humanimal) which sounds much worse.

[Powerogue]

That'll definitely bring up some issues. Will we just weigh it as human as long as it has human-like intelligence? What about sub-human intelligence, equivalent to a mentally retarded person? What about a dog (so not a hybrid, just a dog) with a hyperadvanced brain that can do calculus and speak seven different languages?

[Aurabolt]

Laws are a man made construct. Do you really believe that the animal kingdom has any real concept of justice?

There's plenty of evidence they do. Once I've had a couple hours of sleep, I will present a few recent case examples.

The world would be a much more dangerous place if people viewed vengeance the same way Crows do: If you make the mistake of pissing one off, they will tell all their buddies about it and stalk the shit out of you, waiting for the perfect moment to strike. It could be days, weeks, months or even years. Even after they've gotten back at you they will continue you stalk you or places you frequent to make sure you never forget. Why? Because they don't. Even if the primary crow dies, as far as they care you're the little shit that pissed off their buddy so...yeah.

[NuLogic]

Those groups were still humans, they just weren't recognised as being humans, whereas the OP is talking about creatures that wouldn't be classified as human, so it's a false equivalency.

Why are you oppressing animal people!

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is it finally time?

Too soon!
/tencatgirls

[Bushtuckrman]

In the hypothetical future, when hybrids containing both human or non-human genes are viable, what exactly would/should be the rights that parahumans or humanized animals enjoy? I guess it would depends on whether it was a baseline animal modified with human genes or a baseline human modified with the material of non-human animals. But I've often pondered this by myself, should they have rights similar to foster children? Or rather equal rights to humans?

first you need to read about genetics and biology then realise you're a fucking idiot for thinking it.

[Techno-Druid]

first you need to read about genetics and biology then realise you're a fucking idiot for thinking it.

Oh, trust me, I know more about genetics than you think. Let's say you wanted to humanize a dog, you'd insert the desired genes within the embryo (much like the mouse below) or you could modify the sperm cell (a harder process). Genes like HARE5 which increase cranial volume, the human-strand of FOXp2 which is responsible for the necessary biological/neurological characteristics of human speech, the gene enhancer HACNS1 responsible for the regulation of the thumbs, wrist and ankles in humans. Those are just a few genes out of a dozen.

Let's say you do a chimera, combining two zygotes and kick starting embryogenesis. The most controversial and likely most dangerous procedure, because it randomly selects different characteristics, so you might end up getting something looking like Nina from Fullmetal Alchemist. It would be 50% of the animal species and 50% of the human, with their characteristics randomly mixed and being unable to reproduce.

Let's say you want to do a parahuman, you could modify an already alive person by getting one of their stem cells and modifying that, inserting it back into the body. You could give humans a Tapetum Lucidum, the layer of tissue responsible for what many refer to as "night vision" amongst animals like cats and rabbits. Only a select few of human-modified hybrids have been created (none born however), with all being destroyed once they become an embryo.

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No response?

[Wilian]

I'm an copterkin, attack helicopter by designation.

I demand equal rights for humans and mechanical hybrids as our lifes have been oppressed too long.

Long live freedom for copters!

[Deleted]

Oh, trust me, I know more about genetics than you think. Let's say you wanted to humanize a dog, you'd insert the desired genes within the embryo (much like the mouse below) or you could modify the sperm cell (a harder process). Genes like HARE5 which increase cranial volume, the human-strand of FOXp2 which is responsible for the necessary biological/neurological characteristics of human speech, the gene enhancer HACNS1 responsible for the regulation of the thumbs, wrist and ankles in humans. Those are just a few genes out of a dozen.

Let's say you do a chimera, combining two zygotes and kick starting embryogenesis. The most controversial and likely most dangerous procedure, because it randomly selects different characteristics, so you might end up getting something looking like Nina from Fullmetal Alchemist. It would be 50% of the animal species and 50% of the human, with their characteristics randomly mixed and being unable to reproduce.

Let's say you want to do a parahuman, you could modify an already alive person by getting one of their stem cells and modifying that, inserting it back into the body. You could give humans a Tapetum Lucidum, the layer of tissue responsible for what many refer to as "night vision" amongst animals like cats and rabbits. Only a select few of human-modified hybrids have been created (none born however), with all being destroyed once they become an embryo.

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No response?

You watch too much TV

[Yvaelle]

@OP

The problem with your understanding of genetics is that you think a single gene gives someone that trait, and that might be because we tell kids that sometimes in highschool biology to make life easier - but really it's not true: and that's the major reason why modern genetics is much harder than just decoding the human genome.

Instead, sometimes one gene causes many traits - and sometimes a trait is the product of many genes. Then add on top of that the problem of when genes choose to express themselves or not.

Psychopathy is a great example, there are at least seven genes - spread all across your DNA - that can result in psychopathy. It's not just one rogue gene out there that causes it to happen. So when you mention a single gene that has been identified as connected to some trait, it may not be the only one, and separate genes may be required to activate those gene expressions. It's almost never just 'find the one gene that causes X and flip the switch'. Then on top of the seven psychopathy genes, there are other genes still hidden that can impact whether each of those genes express - and then we have environmental triggers layered on top of that too. So you can have all seven genes and never become a psychopath, or you can have just one of them and an abusive early childhood - and become a serial killer.

It's not as simple as you seem to think.

With that said, I believe we could increase the intelligence of say - a dog or a cat - significantly without dramatically altering its physiological needs/shape. To the point where we could have house cats with near-human intelligence, rudimentary language perhaps, etc. So I'm not trying to shoot down your idea as much as some others - but it wouldn't be as simple as introducing human intelligence genes into cat DNA: that would probably just make a severely defective cat. We could achieve it though by making smarter cats, but they would think like cats - cat neurochemistry and brain activity - cat instincts - etc.

The other way to go about it is a bit more Island of Dr. Moreau, could we transplant a human brain into an extensively altered Lion's body or something? No idea, we manufacture so much of our neurochemistry outside of our brains - that we might then need to replace all the Lion's muscle with human muscle tissue... it'd get pretty weird and complex: the live brain transplant surgery would be the easiest part.

The philosophy: I'm a strong believer in the term Non-Human Persons - and I think that applies to the more intelligent species, whether natural (whales/dolphins, primates) or artificial (whatever we happen to create). That doesn't necessarily grant them citizenship though - which some of your implications seem to be more about when an animal could become a national citizen, rather than merely when it should have legal rights of bodily autonomy and liberty (which some of us argue they already should have).

I think as soon as a genetically modified super-house-cat can pass a citizenship test, not only should it have non-human personhood, but it should also be allowed to be a citizen. That part seems pretty straight-forward to me, much easier than the genetics of getting there