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if you could combine your genes with any
animal in the world which one would you
choose would you want the power of wolf
field
the agility of a cat or the wings of a
bird well you better make up your mind
quickly because this technology is right
around the corner this is whatever and
here's what would happen if we created
human-animal hybrids borrowing traits
from our neighbors in the animal kingdom
might seem like a good way to advance
our species but it could also create a
lot of problems for starters we've seen
how some humans treat people who are
different so you can imagine how they
would react to the first human animal
hybrids
on top of that it would only be a matter
of time before armed forces started to
weaponize the hybrids using them as a
new kind of technology but would it all
be worth it if this breakthrough could
save thousands of lives
in the scientific community human-animal
hybrids are referred to as chimeras
organisms that contain genetic material
from two or more sources for years
humans have experimented with placing
human cells into different animals such
as rats mice and pigs each with varying
degrees of success these kinds of
experiments used to be done without any
government support or funding but that
all changed due to a biologist named
hiromitsu na Kochi in 2019
he was approved by the Japanese
government to grow human cells in animal
embryos the embryos can later be
transported into surrogate animals and
brought to term the intended goal is to
develop a new way to approach organ
transplantation for humans to take out
the need to rely on humans in the first
place the idea is that animals could
safely act as hosts for human organs due
to the human cells in the embryos this
concept is called xenotransplantation
right now the plan is to make an animal
embryo missing the gene required to make
a specific organ human stem cells would
be injected into the animal embryo to
form a human compatible replacement
organ that could then be harvested and
transplanted this would provide a
massive relief for people in need of
organ transplants to put it in
perspective
in the United States there are 100,000
people on the organ transplant waitlist
every year 8000 of them die due to no
donor being available despite the
positive prospects of these experiments
some scientists and governments remain
hesitant
one of their main concerns is avoiding
any potential for human cells to
contribute to the animal embryos brain
they want to avoid creating an ethical
dilemma they don't want animals to have
human consciousness or intellectualize
any pain or suffering and that's not the
only ethical dilemma that comes along
with all of this if the technology
progressed to the point of humans
inheriting animal traits
we'd be reaching uncharted territory as
a species we could see industries
struggling to fulfill the requirements
of a population with animal DNA
especially one that might have people
living well past the age of 100 food
suppliers pharmaceuticals and medical
treatments doctors and the insurance
industry would all see significant
changes could we start taking ourselves
to the vet then there'd be the risk of
countries militarizing this idea
imagine soldiers with wings flying
around with the ability to run 100
kilometres an hour when they hit the
ground so maybe we're better off not
going too far down this route maybe we
could learn to grow an endless supply of
organs in a lab instead of in animals
and we could perform full-body
transplants but that's a story for
another what if
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