Kratesis

Frokane's Mildly Politcal Hangout Thread

@POOHEAD189 I feel like I've driven your goalposts before me and am hearing the lamentations of your strawmen so I'm pretty satisfied with my end of things lol. I'll give you the last word :-)

Frokane's Mildly Politcal Hangout Thread

@POOHEAD189 I am finding some of your statements so vague that it is hard for me to understand precisely what you want to communicate to me.

All I was saying was, making your baby (or anyone) conventionally attractive is not an inherent good because of a lot of factors. Maturity can be one. Character can be one.

So what you are saying, if I am understanding you correctly, is that making your children attractive isn't always good because there is an element of chance to life. They -could- end up immature. They -could- end up with a bad character. They -could- end up in a field where they -might- be discriminated against for their appearance.

That is like saying that leveling up in D&D isn't, how did you put it.. 'inherently good'.. because you could still roll a low number on your dice. So what if you get +5 attack! You have a 50% chance to roll a 10 or less! Obviously this is a non sequitur.

Frokane's Mildly Politcal Hangout Thread

@POOHEAD189

The first trait is arguable and the other two traits are generalities.

This statement is so vague I struggle to find your intended meaning.
"The world is round" "That's arguable"
"Humans have four limbs" "That's a generality"

Everything is arguable Poohead. And generalities are a linguistic expression of an average, frequency distribution or rate of change. A trend.

A. It's the norm, not a low percentage. But I never said I want them to be ugly.

So the 'norm' for people who are considered unattractive is to become more intelligent, develop stronger character and find true love more frequently than those who are considered attractive?

B. No one said to make them ugly. But even if that were the case, that's my point. This is their life, and do I want them to have a higher percentage chance of being mature and having character or do I want them to have 'facial symmetry.'

So just to be clear.. unattractiveness = better chance of being 'mature'?

C. You...what? You doubt... how. As in you think it's impossible? Do you really hold physical appearance at such a high standard that you cannot fathom someone loving someone else romantically for their personality? I'm not actually assuming this of you but I don't know how else to take that.

You have completely lost me here. I doubt that the hardships that come with unattractiveness make people into kinder or more intelligent people and I strongly doubt that it does anything positive for their chances of finding true love. I mean have you seen /r/incels?

Simply using it as an example. Difficulties are good. Parents not making things too easy for a child helps them grow. Then again, while difficulties are good, so is healthy choices. Which is just one more reason why I don't want to touch genetics other than halting diseases.

So your premise is that struggle against life's hardships makes one a better person and by increasing the amount of hardships our children face we can make them into better people?

Excellent. We can look at the world and find cases were one group of people is faced with a hardship while another group has it easy and we can see if the people who are faced with these hardships are more mature, more intelligent and more likely to find meaningful love than the people who have it easy. This shouldn't be too challenging; after all today we have entire countries filled with people whose lives are waking nightmares. If your theory holds true they should be saints with intellect and virtue to shame Gandi!

But we don't have to get so extreme. After all there are plenty of places in the world that are not awful, just disadvantaged compared to other people in the same region. And if your theory is correct those disadvantaged people should be more intelligent, more mature and more likely to find happiness with a romantic partner.

Do you think that is what we are going to find when we compare the populations of 'hardshipped' and the so called 'privileged'?

Frokane's Mildly Politcal Hangout Thread

@KratesisWhat's physically attractive to you doesn't mean it's attractive to others. What's physically attractive now might not be in 20 years when it will actually matter.

@POOHEAD189

Just as their are variations between the traits individuals find attractive there is also a general trend. In short, the features humans find attractive are a scatter plot but there is also a trend line and that line correlates strongly with high cheekbones, secondary sexual characteristics and facial symmetry.

A lot of people get smarter because they weren't physically attractive to begin with. A lot of people grow character because they weren't physically attractive to begin with. A lot of people find true happiness with someone else because they saw each other as beautiful rather than by going with societies standards.

What does "a lot" mean Poohead? Are we talking one percent of unattractive people? Two percent? Maybe ten? I'm just spitballing numbers here but-
A: 'Maybe if I make him ugly he'll become a better person and get smarter!' sounds like a low percentage bet.
B: It's also a pretty crappy thing to do to a human being who you care about. This is someone's life we are talking about here.
C: I doubt it's even true.

If I have a child, I want them to have difficulties. Not to say I necessarily want them to be unappealing physically, or that I wouldn't provide for them, but a lack of difficulties is a lack of actual character. I'm the biggest critic of my parents but even when we weren't struggling for money, my mom didn't give us anymore than we needed and it helped me to live by myself as an adult.

While your satisfaction with one element of your parents approach to raising you is a positive I don't really see what that has to do with genetics. (Though I agree with their choice to not spoil their children.)

Some people find me conventionally attractive now, but growing up they did not. I wouldn't have changed that. Being seen as unappealing helped me be more mature later in life when I became appealing.

That maturity is why you named yourself Poohead, I assume? Forgive me if I am not quite persuaded of the validity of your logic here ;-P

Frokane's Mildly Politcal Hangout Thread

The argument of genetic augmentation and alteration is that once you start down that path, where does it end?

@The Harbinger of Ferocity

Frankly, it doesn't end. Genetic engineering is a continuation of natural selection by other means. Cognition is an expression of the genome and the aim of that expression is to propagate genetic information. Cognition was and is used to select for optimal genetic combinations in partners by biases toward certain features when choosing reproductive partners, such as high cheekbones, height, secondary sexual characteristics and facial symmetry. But those heuristics will become outdated with the advent of genetic engineering and we will 'skip the middleman' and devise the optimal gene combinations directly. I don't think the genie can be put back in the bottle and to be honest I do not see any reason to try.

Frokane's Mildly Politcal Hangout Thread

<Snipped quote by Kratesis>
Oh we're just talking aesthetically. Like parent's choosing gender, eye color, hair color, etc. But yes, I think we'd all choose good genetic traits for them for their health.

@POOHEAD189

I mentioned health but I didn't just mention health Poohead.
I don't see any reason to not select traits considered attractive by the society I currently live in because a person who is conventionally attractive has better life outcomes on average than someone who is unattractive. Thus I would also select for aesthetic traits so they would have the most options when selecting a partner and the best odds of enjoying a satisfying relationship. Aesthetics aren't just cosmetics in our society. On average physically attractive people make more money, are seen as more capable by their peers and have an easier time making friends.

Frokane's Mildly Politcal Hangout Thread

If I had the option to genetically tailor my child I would take it in a heartbeat. The chances of mental illness could be dramatically reduced and their life outcomes could be improved by selecting genes related to intelligence and health. They would be happier, healthier and wealthier. Were I a parent I would find myself obligated to do everything I could to give them the best chance in life and DNA is no exception to the responsibilities of motherhood.

Frokane's Mildly Politcal Hangout Thread

@POOHEAD189 I have the best gifs

Frokane's Mildly Politcal Hangout Thread

It's just racist dog whistling anyway.

@Penny

Policy that you don't agree with? It's racist. Politics you don't like? Racist. Opposing political views? Racist. Someone has the audacity to disagree in [current year]? Racist. But if you defend yourself against these accusations? That's proof of racism, of course.

You could set your watch by it at this point.

Frokane's Mildly Politcal Hangout Thread

@The Harbinger of FerocityJudging someone is against my religion. While I vehemently disagree with you, it makes me sad. And I think changing your mind is fairly impossible, so that is that.

@POOHEAD189