The SynBio Revolution

'We can redesign you. We have the biotechnology. 

We have the capability to make the world's first synthetic human.

Better than before; better, stronger, faster.' - Oscar Goldman

 

 

I.

 

People who think the World Economic Forum's Great Reset initiative is simply about restructuring capitalism, have failed to realise the scope of their vision. For central to their ambitious plan to build back better is the radical development of synthetic biology; i.e., the redesigning of organisms for what are designated as more useful or productive ends. 

 

According to articles and reports on the WEF website, the future of life on earth - including human life - can no longer be left to evolutionary chance and the process of natural selection. Due to climate change, environmental degradation, and the pressures exerted by a rapidly growing population, it's time for scientists to step in and open the way towards a bioeconomy that incorporates (and coordinates) all sectors that rely upon the exploitation of biological resources (and that pretty much includes every major industrial sector).         

 

II. 

 

Synthetic biology - or SynBio as proponents and those working within the field like to call it - is a multidisciplinary area of research that aims to create new biological parts, devices, and systems, or to redesign systems already found in nature; a rapidly expanding world where genetic engineers meet computer engineers, and evolutionary biology meets big business [1]. There are now hundreds of companies around the world actively investing resources in synthetic biology and hoping to make (billions of dollars profit from) new and improved life forms.       

 

Now, whilst, I'm usually all for medical and scientific advances - who doesn't want clean energy and new drugs to fight disease? - I have to admit that increased state control over the bodily autonomy of the individual during the coronavirus pandemic has made me slightly anxious about where things are heading. 

 

Mandatory masks and vaccines are bad enough, but synthetic biology opens up a whole new can of worms and ethical issues and I'm not sure I want governments, organisations like the WEF, or giant tech companies, redesigning the natural world and reprogramming the human genome in the name of healthcare, enhancement, or sustainability. 

 

And it seems that there are an increasing number of people who feel the same and who are calling for a global moratorium (if not an outright ban) on the creation and commercial use of synthetic organisms until more robust regulations (or biosafety measures) are put in place. These people don't just include all the usual suspects - ecofascists, religious lunatics, conspiracy theorists, etc. - but even some leading scientists who are particularly concerned about the creation of so-called designer babies [2].   

Do Klaus Schwab and his billionaire friends promoting the Davos Agenda not understand that Brave New World was a dystopian science fiction novel and not a social blueprint for the 21st-century?  

 

Notes

 

[1] Despite the fact that the phrase biologie synthétique has been around for over a century (coined by the French biologist Stéphane Leduc in 1910), there is no fixed and agreed definition of synthetic biology. Essentially, it's an expanded (and far more elaborate) form of what used to be called biotechnology, with the ultimate goal of being able to design and engineer live biological systems that process information, manipulate chemicals, fabricate materials and structures, produce energy, provide food, and maintain and enhance human health. The first international conference for synthetic biology - SB1.0 - was held at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 2004. 

 

[2] See the article by Ian Sample - 'Scientists call for global moratorium on gene editing of embryos' - in The Guardian (13 March 2019): click here.  

 

 

Suggested further reading: 'The Bio Revolution: Innovations transforming economies, societies, and our lives', a McKinsey Global Institute report by Michael Chui, Matthias Evers, James Manyika, Alice Zheng, and Travers Nisbet, (May 13, 2020): click here to read online. 

Take a Walk Into a Future of Diminished Reality with Amy Webb ...

Photo of Amy Webb 

by Elena Seibert (2018)

 

In a recent video released on Twitter by the World Economic Forum, three leading futurists predict what the world will be like after the Great Reset has been accomplished and human life completely enframed within technology ... [1]

Stuart Russell, the British computer scientist known for his contributions to the field of AI, predicts that the age of manual labour will finally come to an end, freeing us up to engage in more fulfilling activities that make greater use of our abilities (such as online shopping and video games, presumably). 

 

Mike Bechtel, on the other hand, who is chief crystal ball gazer at the professional services network Deloitte, looks forward to a world in which ambient technology is integrated into the environment and ever-ready to lend support and obey our commands, enabling us to live without discontinuity or disruption (never losing our connection to the network again).

 

But it is a remark made by the founder of the Future Today Institute, Professor Amy Webb, that really caught my attention ... [2]

 

After predicting the increased use of gene editing technologies in order to redesign organisms for beneficial purposes (which sounds sinister enough), Webb went on to speak of diminished reality glasses, which would allow the wearer to remove unwanted objects from their field of view - such as garbage or other people.

 

It's nice to discover that Professor Webb equates her fellow human beings - or is she only referring to those who, in the future, haven't been genetically enhanced? - with waste material and how she finds the world so unsightly and distracting that she wishes not to see and not to know. 

 

I suppose diminished reality glasses work best when worn with noise-cancelling headphones and an old-fashioned peg on your nose, so that you can be virtually deaf as well as virtually blind, and not have to smell the garbage or other people either ...  

 

Notes

 

[1] The Great Reset refers to a fundamental transformation of society, leading to the zen fascist utopia in which no one owns anything (but all are happy), as dreamed of by Klaus Schwab (Chairman of the WEF) and others who subscribe to his globalist agenda. To find out more, go to the WEF Great Reset website: click here. To watch the video I refer to on Twitter, click here.

 

[2] Those interested in knowing more about Amy Webb can visit her website: amywebb.io / Those interested in knowing more about the Future Today Institute should click here.  

 

On Synthetic Biology (With Reference to the Case of the Spider-Goat)

Illustration by Benjamin Karis-Nix

As regular readers will know, I've long been fascinated by molecular bestiality and the creation of interspecies hybrids. 

And, thanks to astonishing advances in what is known as synthetic biology, the perverse fantasy of all organisms being able to promiscuously swap genes with one another - and not just fuck with their own kind - is fast becoming a reality.

Indeed, we can already marvel at the fact that we live in a world in which spider-goats are producing large quantities of incredibly strong silk in their milk thanks to a transplanted gene from an orb weaving arachnid. 

Such a procedure - described by opponents as Frankenstein science, or a crime against Nature - works because of the convenient truth that all life rests upon the same fourfold protein molecule arranged in various sequences. Thus the genetic code for making silk in a spider is written in exactly the same language as the genetic code for making milk in a goat. Since we now know the language, we can splice bits of code from one species to another.  

This effectively enables us not only to rewrite old forms of life, but to create previously unimagined new forms - things that Nature failed to conceive of despite having millions of years to do so.  

Now, it might be the case that there are important questions concerning this issue which deserve to be carefully and intelligently addressed. But I would invite those with moral concerns and anti-scientific prejudices to examine the facts, think of the potential, and dare to become just a little more bio-curious.