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Genetically Engineered Slow Maturing Humans

They grow up too fast? This changes that.
  (+2, -4)
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Here's a potential bone target. Any parent will tell you that kids grow up too fast. It's true, you're rocking them in your arms one moment in time and way too soon after that you're writing checks for tens of thousands of dollars colleges you don't even trust to not be run by crazy people.

So the idea is to genetically engineer humans that would mature at half the speed. 36 years of having your wonderful kids at home.

(That rumbling in the distance? That's a bone storm.) Now hold your bones! It would be part of a life extension program to double the life expectancy to say... 160 years.

See links for how this could be accomplished.

doctorremulac3, Dec 15 2021

Do some of this... https://www.123rf.c...and-microscope.html
[doctorremulac3, Dec 15 2021]

a little of this maybe... https://www.shutter...ntist-lab-475109239
[doctorremulac3, Dec 15 2021]

Hold up a beaker and look at it till science happens. https://www.dreamst...ubes-image138895062
[doctorremulac3, Dec 15 2021]

Study this too https://en.wikipedi...ic_complex_syndrome
Very strange condition, mostly in women; basically stops aging. [neutrinos_shadow, Dec 15 2021]

Neanderthals vs humans time to reach maturity https://www.science...11/101115161143.htm
Something to put in a beaker and hold up to a light here? [doctorremulac3, Dec 16 2021]

[link]






       There's "Sydrome X" aka "neotenic complex syndrome" which causes growth/maturation to more-or-less stop. There are a few cases, mostly women. Generally, it seems that different parts of the body age at different rates (comments like "brain like a 1 year old, bones like a 10 year old, teeth like an 8 year old"...). Figuring out why sufferers of this DIE is almost as important as the condition that changes how they LIVE.
neutrinos_shadow, Dec 15 2021
  

       Seems like a 'magic genetic engineering thing' kind of post to me. Sorry.   

       Can I have 2 years of baby, 2 years of toddler, 10 years of little-ish kid, and ~6 months of teenager?
RayfordSteele, Dec 15 2021
  

       Ray, I respectfully disagree. I clearly put links to the steps we'd take to achieve this.   

       But as long as the scientistitionists have their beakers out, I'd ask them to skip the baby part and go right to the cute toddler. I love being a father but the newborn thing... uh... yea, uh.. it's great, love that too. Ahem.   

       Well, maybe a baby for the birth thing due to comfort issues for the mother, but let's get out of that needy, constant crying thing in a few weeks and right to the toddler deal. Maybe speed up a couple of those teenage years while we're at it.
doctorremulac3, Dec 15 2021
  

       //There's "Sydrome X" aka "neotenic complex syndrome" which causes growth/maturation to more- or-less stop. There are a few cases, mostly women. Generally, it seems that different parts of the body age at different rates (comments like "brain like a 1 year old, bones like a 10 year old, teeth like an 8 year old"...)//   

       So okay, like that but less monsterry.
doctorremulac3, Dec 15 2021
  

       Slow matured beef tastes nicer, would these humans be similar?
pocmloc, Dec 15 2021
  

       Excellent.
pocmloc, Dec 15 2021
  

       //hanging it up for a while after the kill//   

       ... as one does with a whale in the Serengeti.
pertinax, Dec 15 2021
  

       From the help file under mfd "......to make any organic matter do anything (just add genetics or, once people complain about the use of genetics as magic, "selective breeding")...."
xenzag, Dec 16 2021
  

       [xenzag]; except research in this direction IS being done, all over the world. Not so much with the focus of "36 years of having your wonderful kids at home" but anti-aging nonetheless.
neutrinos_shadow, Dec 16 2021
  

       Marked For Deletion should be a term the court uses in some futuristic dystopia.   

       (Lizardy looking judge) "Doctorremulac the third. You stand before the court of planet Remulon. You have been charged with suggesting the holding up of beakers while wearing lab coats until science happens. For this you have been MARKED FOR DELETION! What say you?!"   

       "Eh, it's a fair cop."   

       But wait a moment, if it pleases the court, the rules state:   

       //to make any organic matter do anything (just add genetics or, once people complain about the use of genetics as magic, "selective breeding");//   

       I interpret "anything" to mean absurd or impossible, like "Make people fly using genetics" or "Make celery sing using selective breeding."   

       This is an idea to adjust life spans by looking at beakers and wearing lab coats. Wait... let me work on my presentation.   

       Aww screw it. Guilty as charged.
doctorremulac3, Dec 16 2021
  

       If this is to suffer an [m-f-d], it is for the lack of "how" in the idea, not for "genetic magic", because (as I've said) this stuff is now good science.
neutrinos_shadow, Dec 16 2021
  

       Yea, I'm pretty sure this could be done. The rules as I interpret them are about suggesting some pie in the sky idea and saying "solve it somehow".   

       If humans could be genetically engineered to mature more slowly, and I think they could, this would be within the rules. And wouldn't study along these lines be a different approach to life extension? Why repair the effects of aging if you can postpone that aging?   

       Here's a link about how humans mature more slowly than neanderthals. That divergence could be studied and possibly adjusted.
doctorremulac3, Dec 16 2021
  

       Personally I not only think that it is about to happen to our species on its own, I think that this is known and the cause of much fear.   

       As a parent, do you really want to be responsible for the actions of children remaining prebuescent into their second decade of life?
I know mine didn't.
  

       Now times that by millions.   

       Melatonin can keep a child prepubescent as long as you'd like.
The therapy is used to retard puberty in hermaphrodidic and trans-gender children so that their age of consent can be reached before gender reassignment surgery.
Hypermelatoninism from an enlarged pineal gland can also cause delayed puberty for the same reason.
  

       Enter fluoridation to calcify pineal glands and snip all that potential right in the bud.   

       "Let me tell you an extremely captivating story about my favorite axe that I loved to grind..."
RayfordSteele, Dec 16 2021
  

       Damn defective genetic copying algorithms. Someone should come up with a better method to reproduce with more quality control.
RayfordSteele, Dec 16 2021
  

       //Melatonin can keep a child prepubescent as long as you'd like. The therapy is used to retard puberty in hermaphrodidic and trans-gender children so that their age of consent can be reached before gender reassignment surgery. Hypermelatoninism from an enlarged pineal gland can also cause delayed puberty for the same reason.//   

       Whoa! Holy cow how do you know all this stuff? Did you study it at one time? Is it on line or are you in the medical profession?   

       Actually never mind the last question, don't want to pry.
doctorremulac3, Dec 16 2021
  

       And may I point out that all of the chemicals used to do these things have probably been put in a beaker and looked at by a scientist in a lab coat at some point.   

       Just sayin'.
doctorremulac3, Dec 16 2021
  

       //"Let me tell you an extremely captivating story about my favorite axe that I loved to grind..."//   

       It's my axe. I'll grind it to as sharp a blade as I want.   

       //Damn defective genetic copying algorithms. Someone should come up with a better method to reproduce with more quality control.//   

       I think that's the stage we're at now.   

         

       //Whoa! Holy cow how do you know all this stuff? Did you study it at one time? Is it on line or are you in the medical profession?   

       Actually never mind the last question, don't want to pry//   

       Pry away. I'm one of the few with nothing to hide.   

       I know all of this stuff because I didn't go through puberty until I was twenty and none of the doctors could tell my parents why so I did my own research as to causes... and I'm intuitive so I found the word hypermelatoninism just before it was about to be scrubbed from our language.   

       I lived what you're talking about.   

       If I am right, then the onset of puberty has been regulated to retard the evolution of our species but it wasn't realized when this decision was made that while bodies can be made to mature chemically, minds can not...   

       ...and now we have a majority of the latest generation that just can't seem to adult, yet they have voting authority, and they are scared and looking for someone to tell them what they should do...   

       ...and they are ripe pickins just as planned.   

       Nope. How could I know that?   

       You discount my own personal experience out of hand, but that's all I've ever had.   

       The more evolved a species gets, the longer its gestation/ childhood/ lifespan.
If we as a species evolve further than our current stage then some generation or other, (perhaps several generations) will be required to cope with that transition.
  

       Given how reluctant those in power are to embrace change...
... suppression would be the obvious choice.
  

       I have no evidence, I just know what my gut tells me.
The prevailing theory is that precocious puberty is caused by hormones being added to milk. I think that is false.
When the FDA cut the recommended daily adult intake of fluoride in half yet products like pablum contain more than the old adult recommended dosage per serving... and then, (depending on where you live) mixed using fluoridated water it is not surprising that puberty would be affected when the pineal gland is a regulator of onset and fluoride cause its premature calcification.
The effects of fluoride have been well known since before WW2.
  

       "They" want kids to mature faster, to be sickly little cash-cows, and to die young not live for centuries.   

       Imagine the envy of reaching your 90th birthday, knowing you're nearing the finish line, and your best friend from grade school looks and acts as though still in their 40's with another half century to go before they catch up to your stage of life.   

       "They" don't want any of that shit. Even if you could prove what happened and somehow nail it to fluoride, shit happens without some nefarious scheme. Did "they" put out DDT because they wanted to kill all the birds?   

       Seeing as how most all of the thousands of chemicals and food additives we come in contact with on a daily basis didn't exist 80 years ago, maybe start there?
RayfordSteele, Dec 17 2021
  

       I'm seeing some evidence that plastic is causing problems but I'm currently in the early stages of being convinced. So far many of the claims are in the "seems like it might be plausible" category.   

       And by the way, me not being 100% convinced of something doesn't mean I don't believe that's the case, I just know I'm not smart enough to judge without seeing at least two to three metric shit-tons of information before being 100% on board. I wouldn't even call it skeptical, I'd call it... slow to learn.   

       But in my defense, my dull, slow brain is only partially to blame, I've been burned by accepting "universally accepted truth" so many times I know the universe can be full of shit sometimes.
doctorremulac3, Dec 17 2021
  

       //But this seems the opposite of what I inferred from your post yesterday - that "they" (who, unspecified) decided long ago (when, also unspecified) to cause people to take longer to physically mature - and that your own late puberty and intuiton led you to this belief.//   

       mwha?... You inferred incorrectly.   

       My own late puberty lead me to learning about hypermealtoninism and the effects of fluoride on the pineal gland.
I never implied that anybody wants kids to take longer to mature.
  

       Yes I think there's a They. Yes I think that we are being chemically retarded in our evolution purposefully.   

       There's more than one They
pocmloc, Dec 17 2021
  

       I'm thinking that general paranoia was also a side- effect.
RayfordSteele, Dec 17 2021
  

       //There's more than one They.//   

       Always...   

       //general paranoia was also a side- effect.//   

       Yep.
When you are forced to be completely self reliant before puberty general paranoia is an essential life skill. I wouldn't still be here without it.
  

         

       //My apologies. In response to Doc's suggestion of making people mature later, you said you thought this was already being done or about to be done. And from that screed I thought you meant your own prolonged immaturity was somehow a product of some scheme. But okay, you really meant the scheme was to make people mature faster - and you having the EXACT OPPOSITE LIFE EXPERIENCE is what got you interested in the subject (and despite your own experience being a data point contrary to the hypothesis).//   

       Again you infer incorrectly.
I said, "Personally I not only think that it is about to happen to our species on its own, I think that this is known and the cause of much fear."
Meaning that, as a species, our children naturally will have longer childhoods, and that it should already have begun if it weren't for the introduction of substances which prevent late onset of puberty.
  

       I'm just a little early... at being a lot late.
The irony is killing me.
  

       //Total bollocks either way.//   

       I guess if you say so it must be true.   

       A hunch or suspicion is anything but a belief. It is a niggling doubt, like an itch you can't quite reach.   

       ...and my hunches kick ass. They've allowed me to not only navigate the real world as a child, without a safety net or diploma relatively unscathed, they've caused me to prosper physically, emotionally, mentally, and financially by relying on them.   

       When you've never had the luxury of waiting for data before making decisions... you learn to trust your gut.
That you do not possess this ability does negate the fact that I do.
  

       It's all I've ever had to go by.   

       tis   

       The idea has been preheated in fiction - For a fun read see Jonathan Lethem's "Gun, With Occasional Music".
normzone, Dec 19 2021
  

       //'The idea has been preheated//   

       [Marked for tagline]
doctorremulac3, Dec 19 2021
  

       //I interpret "anything" to mean absurd or impossible, like "Make people fly using genetics" or "Make celery sing using selective breeding//   

       Well that's my next two ideas sorted then ;)   

       Both may be pretty doable actually, for a given value of doable, depending on exactly how you define 'flying' & 'singing', there may be a few trifling moral issues to ignore with that first one as well.   

       The only real problem I foresee is coming up with a suitable implausible reason why we would want to do either, particularly the first one the way I'm thinking of, you know those people with elastic skin? we might do something with that (it's going to need to be a lot more elastic which is where the genetic tweaking will come in), and then add some hydrogen producing bacteria to their human microbiome.   

       How do human blimps grab you?
Skewed, Jan 10 2022
  

       ^ Dirigibley.   

       And gonflablablably, of course.
pertinax, Jan 10 2022
  

       //How do human blimps grab you?//

They lurk on rooftops at night, armed with nets, & swoop down on you from behind.
DrBob, Jan 10 2022
  

       Nonsense; blimps can't swoop: you're thinking of the Sussex Coddling Owl, Bubo retiarius, and they're easily kept down provided you hose off the rafters before Candlemas.   

       It's customary to give them back the nets again by the end of Lent.   

       {Memorial pastiche attempted, but it's not quite the same, is it? Sorry}
pertinax, Jan 10 2022
  

       Well I recognised the style straight away. So it was a pretty good effort, I think. :)
DrBob, Jan 11 2022
  

       Ditto ^
Skewed, Jan 13 2022
  
      
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