Depending on your definition of the Lord Almighty, you can argue that mankind has done many things
which amount to us playing God; curing the sick, building nukes, dressing up in robes
and making a cloud fortress out of pillows.
But realistically, the acts of DNA editing, weather control and the creation of artificial
life do seem like the realm of deities more than men.
And can we legitimately include a mission to Mars in this list?
Oh yes we can, because, having taken a few tips on fear-mongering straight from Fox News,
we now present you this video on the seven times science played God.
Number 7: Resurrecting the Dead Animals go extinct for a reason; either they're naturally
too weak to survive changes to their habitat, they fail to adapt to the threat of predators,
or we humans find them too darn delicious when paired with a lovely dipping sauce.
But when an animal's demise is the fault of mankind, is this a natural occurrence, or
should we intervene and do something about it?
Should we go above Mother Nature's head and bring extinct species back from the dead?
Well we've tried to several times already.
The Pyrenean Ibex was a type of goat that died out in January 2000, but since then we've
tried to resurrect it using harvested DNA and cloning technology.
A clone of the last ever Ibex was born in 2003 but died 10 minutes after birth, however,
attempts are currently on-going to repeat the test, and scientists are hopeful that
improvements in cloning technology mean the next time proves successful.
Other candidates for revival include the Dodo, the Woolly Mammoth, Aurochs and the Toxodon
- but should we interfere with natural selection in this way, or are the dead best left well
alone?
And when are we getting dinosaurs?
Number 6: Weather Control The idea that man can manipulate the weather seems like comic-book
fare to many, but it's true, we humans can genuinely command the heavens above us.
Cloud seeding is a technique whereby silver iodide or other small particles are sprayed
onto clouds to increase or decrease rainfall, and this was used in January 2011 to create
50 artificial rainstorms in the United Arab Emirates, with similar methods also used by
the Chinese in 2008 to reduce rainfall for the Olympics.
Lasers, soot and liquid nitrogen have also been posed as possible ways of reducing the
ferocity of hurricanes and heavy storms, and although this technology is still in its infancy,
the power we do possess is enough to make the United Nations stand up
and take notice.
During the Vietnam War the United States' Operation Popeye used cloud seeding to extend
the Monsoon Season and hamper the Viet-Cong, with such actions now banned by the UN.
Not that this has stopped the US from continuing to develop weather modification weaponry,
as their HAARP system is apparently capable of triggering Earthquakes and Tsunamis on
the other side of the world.
And it's not just conspiracy theorists who are worried about this, as the European Union
has also expressed doubts about the safety of the HAARP program.
So what exactly are the world's superpowers capable of when it comes to controlling the
weather?
And will we only find out when it's already too late?
Number 5: Artificial Life In 2010 Biologist Dr Craig Venter was the only man on Earth
who could legitimately claim to have created life without the use of his penis, when he
used laboratory assembled genes to generate the world's first ever synthetic cell.
Dr Venter and his team achieved this by re-booting a microbe after transplanting into it a set
of genetic code sequences built entirely from scratch.
The completed chromosome was based on that of Mycoplasma mycoides, and when it was transplanted
into a different bacterium - Mycoplasma capricolum - its cells were brought to life completely
artificially.
To prove their work the scientists even signed their names in the DNA using coded strings,
also throwing a few famous quotes in there just for the heck of it.
This was a major breakthrough at the time, and in January 2017 scientists at the Scripps
Research Institute built upon this work by creating the first stable semi-synthetic organism;
combining the traditional G,T,A and C bases with two synthetic ones, X and Y.
So where does this stop?
Or do we keep on going until the lines between man and God are blurred completely.
Are we already on the road towards building our own custom life-forms to serve us for
work, entertainment and pleasure?
Oh I do hope so.
Number 4: The Hadron ColliderGee Brain, what do you wanna do tonight?
Same thing we do every night Pinky, try to recreate the conditions which occurred during
the formation of the universe.
Pinky and the Brain getting hold of the Large Hadron Collider is an episode I'd watch the
heck out of, but is this device yet another example of humanity playing God?
Creating life and faffing with clouds is one thing, but at CERN we've made our own mini
Big Bang, we have a machine that can potentially create a black hole, and if you believe reports
from August 2016 we might have ripped right through the very fabric
of time itself.
I mean, I'm totally ready to do the time warp again if you guys are game, but you have to
wonder if these experiments are the kind of thing that repeatedly wipes out life across
the universe.
Is this the reason we've yet to meet extra-terrestrial civilizations?
Before they get a chance to venture off for a cosmic meet and greet, do advanced life-forms
have the propensity to get too big for their boots and destroy themselves?
Number 3: Louise Joy Brown The work of Dr Craig Venter was somewhat pre-empted by Lesley
and John Brown, who in 1978 also created a life in an artificial manner courtesy of their
daughter Louise.
Louise Joy Brown was the world's first test tube baby, with her birth coming as the result
of In Vitro Fertilization treatment.
IVF involves the manual combination of a human sperm and egg in a laboratory dish, with the
successful embryo thenbeing transplanted into the woman's uterus.
You know how you sometimes get your cat and dog to kiss by forcing their faces together?
It's like that...except more sciencey.
Louise Joy Brown was born via Caesarean Section just before midnight on July 25th1978, and
this development was so shocking to 1970's folk that her mother Lesley received blood-spattered
hate-mail afterwards, with one package even including a plastic foetus.
The Pope at the time had himself expressed doubts about where this technology was heading,
with the papers full of talk of Frankenbabies and women's wombs being used as human baby
factories.
But in the years since this development there have been millions of successful IVF births,
and Louise Brown continues to live happily to this day with two naturally born children
of her very own.
I guess playing God can have a happy ending after all.
Number 2: Customised Humans The CRISPR-Cas9 gene editing tool is something we've spoken
about several times on this channel, as this revolutionary technique offers humanity its
first real chance to genetically manipulate life in a way that's fast, cheap and easy.
Just like your mom.
But unlike your dear mother this tool has the potential to be useful, and dangerous
too, with the creation of new cures and new diseases both entirely plausible.
We're also on the cusp of being able to genetically engineer human babies, allowing mankind to
customise its kids for the first time in history.
The next Louise Brown moment will probably come in the form of the world's first genetically
edited child, and based on recent developments, it seems more than likely that he or she will
be Chinese.
In October 2016 a team based at Sichuan University became the first to inject CRISPR-Cas9 edited
cells into a human being as part of a clinical trial aimed at curing the patient's lung cancer.
This event was seen as the first step in a biological equivalent of the Space Race, with
a genetic competition now fully underway between China and the United States, with the winner's
prize being a race of genetically altered supermutant babies.
Hooray!
Number 1: Mission to Mars This final one is just a quick entry, as it not so much veers
on the theoretical, but fully dives headfirst into a ridiculously incredible concept.
When mankind first ventured into space we were fighting against the laws of gravity,
and in doing so we left the confines of our home planet for the very first time.
Taking steps on the Moon was a continuation of this story, and if the fragrantly named
super-villain Elon Musk has his way, then the next chapter will involve a trip to Mars.
But will we be allowed to stray so far from Earth?
The entire premise of this video is based on the idea of God, and if he exists, are
we stepping on his or her toes?
If humanity is controlled by someone or something, be it a supernatural being, an advanced civilization
or the confines of a simulated world, then at what point will we be stopped from exploring
our surroundings?
Is it Mars?
Is it our Solar System?
Where is the line drawn?
Because if humanity is indeed the creation of something greater than ourselves, there
surely will be a limit to how far we can go, meaning that we humans are nothing more than
a dog unable to stray too far from its owner.
(insert a clip of that viral Fenton!
video here if you can / if you think it's appropriate.
Specifically the bit where he shouts Fenton at the dog) And that's our list.
But there were many more examples of man playing God that we could've included if we'd had
the time.
NASA has created artificial interstellar dust, a Chinese experiment managed to produce working
human sperm outside of a nutsack, and an American company called BioQuark is currently attempting
to resurrect brain-dead people.
Do you wanna see a sequel to this video with those stories and more?
Then sweet talk us in the comments below and maybe we'll treat you real nice.
But in the meantime why not take a look at our recent video of January's craziest scientific
breakthroughs, where we cover the semi-synthetic organism story and the problems it poses to
the title of the movie Gattaca.