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NEWS AND VIEWS THAT IMPACT LIMITED CONSTITUTIONAL GOVERNMENT

"There is danger from all men. The only maxim of a free government ought to be to trust no man living with
power to endanger the public liberty." - - - - John Adams

Tuesday, June 16, 2015

Scientists genetically engineering animals for war.



Beware the beast Man
"Beware the beast Man, for he is the Devil's pawn. Alone among God's primates, he kills for sport or lust or greed. Yea, he will murder his brother to possess his brother's land. Let him not breed in great numbers, for he will make a desert of his home and yours. Shun him; drive him back into his jungle lair, for he is the harbinger of death."
Cornelius


(Foreign Policy)  -  The United States’ military has already set off down the road toward genetically engineering animals for war.

In 2006, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency asked scientists “to develop technology to create insect-cyborgs” capable of carrying surveillance equipment or weapons, journalist Emily Anthes wrote in her 2013 book, Frankenstein’s Cat: Cuddling Up to Biotech’s Brave New Beasts. The agency quickly realized that tiny flying machines were impossible to build well — but that insects, already abundant in nature, were better than whatever humans might make. 

So DARPA changed its approach: In the past decade, the agency has encouraged and funded research into methods that can let humans control insects and mammals through electronic impulses to the brain, and through genetic modifications to the nervous systems of insects to make them easier to manipulate, with surprising success. 

Scientists would never genetically living creatures for war would they?

So DARPA changed its approach: In the past decade, the agency has encouraged and funded research into methods that can let humans control insects and mammals through electronic impulses to the brain, and through genetic modifications to the nervous systems of insects to make them easier to manipulate, with surprising success. 

Researchers are already able to hijack the brains of beetles and order them to stop, start, and turn, with more fine-tuned control in the works. Insects created by humans, loaded with spy technology and controlled by drone operators, are on the horizon. Scientists in Korea over the past decade have used viruses to deliver payloads of jellyfish genes to felines, thereby creating glow-in-the-dark catsScientific American reported — much like the chameleon-born camouflage genes scientists give Indominus rex in Jurassic World.

“Future generations are going to grow up tinkering not with computers, but with life itself,” Anthes wrote. “There is a growing community of ‘biohackers,’ science enthusiasts who are experimenting with genes, brains, and bodies outside the confines of traditional laboratories, working on shoestring budgets in their garages and attics, or joining the community labs that are springing up around the globe.” Given the possibilities, it’s not hard to imagine private companies using these breakthroughs for their own dubious purposes — on an island off Costa Rica, say, far from government scrutiny.

Jurassic World may be off base about what reincarnated dinosaur species would look like, but it’s right about where biotech is going. We already live in a world of unfolding genetic engineering possibilities, and militarization — already underway — seems inevitable. And science fiction has a long history of predicting (and influencing) the future of technology, from the tablet computers in 2001: A Space Odyssey to William Gibson’s “cyberspace” in Neuromancer and surveillance drones in Robert Sheckley’s Watchbird.

Read More . . . .


The real danger is crazy-ass bastard scientists working in small teams developing a new Black Death.  In the movie 12 Monkeys a deadly man made virus wipes out almost all of humanity forcing the survivors to live underground. 

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