You’re layering several hypotheticals on top of each other, which leads to progressively distant possibilities. Good on you for caring about humans though

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tskj 2 hours ago | parent | next [-]

I think this is decisively the wrong way to think about it. Yes, layering hypotheticals like that means that any one scenario is extremely unlikely to be the thing that gets you, but that doesn't mean the shape of the problem is wrong.

It's like arguing with someone who doesn't believe in using seat belts when driving. "Why should I put them on?" they say, and when you try to explain what might go wrong they won't listen to any explanation that isn't a hyper-concrete hypothetical. So finally you give in and say, "Well, when we get onto the highway, a truck might lose control and hit us", and their response is "I don't think that's very likely, it seems highly improbable that today we will be hit by a truck when getting on the highway".

I agree with OP that this seems like the kind of thing where the unknown unknowns are so great that the correct approach is serious caution, and that any demand to know exactly how or why it will go wrong, falls in the trap where every specific example is very unlikely to be the thing that goes wrong, but still in total there's like an 80% chance that it goes horribly wrong. I don't know if we have the terminology to talk about this kind of failure mode. "You shouldn't play God" maybe? At least you shouldn't ask for specific examples of how things could go wrong, if you're going to turn around and claim each one highly improbable.

	▲	xi_studio 8 minutes ago \| parent [-]
		"I don't know if we have the terminology to talk about this kind of failure mode." We actually have and is called RISK. RISK = Probability * Damage. Applied to the seatbelt event we have a death level damage and a high probability of happening given recent studies, so using a simple belt could easily save you from deadly accidents. Applied to any unrealistic scenario we have insane level damages but also an incredibly low probability (near 0) so RISK = ~0%

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zigzag312 an hour ago | parent | prev | next [-]

But many of the listed hypotheticals are not dependent (on top) on others, and since there are multiple that actually increases probability of an undesirable outcome.

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Davidzheng 2 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

But it reads to me like the thread parent's point is that there are many unknown risks which can exist? I also wonder about long term effects to the health of the genome from IVF and other forms of fertility treatment as infertility could be acting as some sort of protection mechanism of the genome. But I suppose such objections form a continuum which extends to treatment of all genetic diseases or diseases in general--all of which probably applies some evolutionary pressure towards more healthy individuals but which we as a society have to balance against wellbeing of individuals and their human rights.

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tskj an hour ago | parent | next [-]

This seems distantly impossible right now, but for this reason, I predict that any species that survives this kind of "great filter" effect of accidentally messing up their genome long term, will develop a strong taboo against fertility treatments and treatment of genetic diseases.

Like it seems horrible not to help the individual, when we have the technology to; but it's also horrible to hurt your species by selfishly propagating faulty genes. And this seems like the kind of problem cultural taboos are good at solving, and I don't really see any other mechanism by which a species can avoid this filter trap.

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londons_explore 2 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

There is precedent for infertility being beneficial for a species in the animal kingdom. For example the vast majority of ants and bees are infertile. Yet the infertile ones still contribute meaningfully to society.

Humans could easily be successful with a similar model, and did so in the past before fertility treatments.

	▲	close04 an hour ago \| parent [-]
		If I understand your point correct it could work as easily as communism: theoretically sound but undermined by human psychology. Natural evolution is slow and gives the species time to adapt to anything. Artificial evolution by comparison is very fast. But the real issue is that humans have intelligence, individuality, and egotism. We don’t see ourselves as just part of a collective. Societies functioned in the past while taking away some rights from its citizens (like ownership) but nothing as fundamental as only a few able to reproduce.