It's all too easy to dismiss the future. People confuse what's impossible today with what's impossible tomorrow.
George M. ChurchRead
At some point, someone will come up with an airtight argument as to why they should have a cloned child. At that point, cloning will be acceptable.
Interpretation
The quote emphasizes that societal acceptance of cloning will depend on the strength of arguments supporting it.
George M. Church highlights the idea that technological advancements, such as cloning, often face ethical scrutiny until a compelling argument is presented that aligns with societal values. As humans, we tend to accept new scientific possibilities when they are framed in a way that addresses our concerns and resonates with our morals, suggesting that the evolution of technology is often shaped by societal discourse.
In practice
In a debate about genetic engineering, this quote can be used to illustrate how public opinion can shift with persuasive arguments.
It's all too easy to dismiss the future. People confuse what's impossible today with what's impossible tomorrow.
You can't just hoard your ideas inside the ivory tower. You have to get them out into the world.
Clearly, we are a species that is well connected to other species. Whether or not we evolve from them, we are certainly very closely related to them. A series of mutations could change us into all kinds of intermediate species. Whether or not those intermediate species are provably in the past, they could easily be in our future.
We have a love affair with the idea of the 'natural,' even though we, as a species, are about as unnatural as you can imagine.
Most people are excited about themselves. Personal genome will deliver for inexpensively something about science to which you can relate. Just like computers are becoming something to which you can relate. It should be even easier to relate to your own biology, and I hope that will be one of the ways we get broader literacy in science.
Every cell in our body, whether it's a bacterial cell or a human cell, has a genome. You can extract that genome - it's kind of like a linear tape - and you can read it by a variety of methods. Similarly, like a string of letters that you can read, you can also change it. You can write, you can edit it, and then you can put it back in the cell.
We and other groups are seeing clear statistical links between telomere shortness and risk for a variety of diseases that are becoming very common, such as cardiovascular disease, diabetes and certain cancers.
I am on the edge of mysteries and the veil is getting thinner and thinner.
One aim of physical sciences had been to give an exact picture the material world. One achievement of physics in the twentieth century has been to prove that that aim is unattainable.
Even your chin is made up of exploded stars.
All crises begin with the blurring of a paradigm and the consequent loosening of the rules for normal research. .. Or finally, the case that will most concern us here, a crisis may end with the emergence of a new candidate for paradigm and with the ensuing battle over its acceptance.
A science is not mere knowledge, it is knowledge which has undergone a process of intellectual digestion. It is the grasp of many things brought together in one, and hence is its power; for, properly speaking, it is Science that is power, not Knowledge.
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