by Jason Taylor
She had received a Masters Degree in Molecular Biology and a Ph.D. in Genetics, but she didn’t conceptualize DNA the way she’d been taught at university. She had been taught to think of biology in terms of proteins unfolding and chemical equations to be solved, but when she looked at DNA she saw code. It was like looking at the world’s messiest, most poorly written program, created by a madman and lacking any comments whatsoever to explain itself.
Evolution had taken what had started as a simple, elegant biological system and had layered on so much crap that the result was an incredible mess, nearly impossible to make any sense of. Early genetics research had operated on the assumption that every human trait was controlled by one or two genes. If a dominant gene overruled a recessive gene, the dominant trait would manifest. Early in the 21st century it was discovered that this was not the case. To their dismay, researchers found that most traits were expressed across the entire genetic structure. Height, for instance, was expressed across ninety percent of the active DNA sequence. There was no tall gene. No short gene. It didn’t work that way. If you wanted to change someone’s height, you would need to make an exacting set of changes across tens of thousands of alleles.
Then there was RNA. If DNA was the code, then RNA was the runtime interpreter. It was the mechanism by which DNA was interpreted into physical structures and traits. The exact same DNA sequence could result in a bewildering variety of outcomes depending upon the RNA that processed it. If that wasn’t enough, the RNA could change continuously as a result of environmental and behavioral factors. It had taken one of the most powerful AI constructs in the world two full years to create a working model of a single DNA/RNA combination that accounted for any sort of environmental variability.
She knew the answer to human cloning had to be out there somewhere, and she wanted to be the one to find it. Somewhere in that mess of DNA and RNA was the key that would unlock unlimited genetic engineering.
The ability to genetically modify humans had grown in leaps and bounds over the past century. Most of the symptoms of aging had been pushed back to the very end of life. Teeth didn’t decay, wrinkles didn’t form, and muscles didn’t weaken; humanity was in the midst of a golden age of health and vitality. And genetic engineering was what primed the brain stem for the neural implant that everyone received at birth. Without the progress that had been made in the past decades, implant tech wouldn’t be possible. Jill struggled to imagine what life would have been like before everyone had access to an interface. The ability to focus inward and instantly connect to network nodes felt so natural, it was as if it were an innate human capability now, even though Jill knew it had only been invented in the past generation.
A wide variety of genetic engineering modifications were possible on human subjects, but if a critical threshold was passed the result was always a catastrophic failure of the modified tissue. Sometimes if felt like genetic researchers were a group of hackers nibbling at the edges of a system they didn’t fully understand. Some unknown factor continued to prevent them from making progress beyond a certain point. Jill dreamed of a future in which unlimited genetic engineering truly unlocked human potential. The possibilities were so much greater than what had been achieved so far.
There were some who opted out of the entire idea, who lived ‘close to the genome’ as they called it. They believed in staying true to what they saw as the original human form, living close to nature, choosing to suffer and die like their ancestors. Their belief in the purity of the human genome was cult-like. The percentage of people who took it that far was minuscule, but there were many more who sympathized.
Genetic engineering wasn’t without negative side effects. People lived longer, healthier lives, but the result was that overpopulation on this depleted planet had become an issue again. It was hard to get used to. Not since the Great Unrest had anyone had to worry about there being too many people. The die-off during that time had been so large, the human race had experienced a measurable reduction in genetic diversity. It was one of the reasons Jill had decided to enter the field. She not only wanted to improve individual lives, she wanted to ensure her species as a whole survived and thrived.
Unfortunately, the ability to engineer the genome had resulted in less diversity, not more. Giving parents the ability to engineer their children had resulted in a convergence toward what society had decided was the ideal child. One of the unexpected results was that there weren’t enough men left in the world. Not only were a huge number of men killed during the Great Unrest, once the world regained stability, it had become a cultural assumption that boys were less desirable than girls. After all, men had led the human race to the very precipice of extinction. No one had the desire to repeat that particular experiment in self-destruction.
There had even been talk of legislating a solution – requiring each state to meet a male quota for instance – but so far there hadn’t been any significant progress. The upshot was that for every male there were now three females. The world had long given up on an even ratio between the sexes. The battle now was merely to preserve what was left.
Jill shifted her body so her back was up against the side of the car and she was looking out the opposite side window. Her head was cocked to the side, index finger tapping absentmindedly on her lips. Maybe she hadn’t taken the computer science analogy far enough. Something about thinking like a hacker was making the itch in her mind grow stronger. She could feel it intensifying, like a solution on the verge of revealing itself to her.
So far she’d been conducting her research as if the system she was studying was acting in good faith. She had assumed that the obfuscation in the genome was caused by the chaos inherent in natural selection, and had always believed that her failures were because she hadn’t understood the interactions between the genes well enough, her strategy focused on cataloging the result of each individual genetic change. At the lab, she applied a brute force approach to testing each combination in turn, moving toward a critical mass of knowledge, hoping for an ‘Aha!’ moment that would open the floodgates of understanding. Meanwhile, the horizon moved steadily further away.
Every other animal in the world could be engineered in extraordinary ways. Entirely new species of animals had been created in the lab, optimized for human use. So there was clearly something special about human genetic code that was uniquely blocking progress.
She closed her eyes and triggered her interface, focusing it on her own biological parameters. The interface sprung to life in front of her, displaying a glowing representation of her body. She focused on her limbic system and the interface zoomed in, the limbus of her brain highlighted. She paused for a moment, thinking it through. Then she nudged her entorhinal cortex, modifying her associative memory system’s response to cortisol and epinephrine. The color of her brain changed, shading closer toward blue. Her attachment to past ideas fell away. Her willingness to accept novel solutions increased. She found herself in the center of a radius of calm, the world around her muted and subdued.
And then it unfurled like an exquisite flower, the realization blooming in her mind. She knew what she’d been missing. She finally understood what they’d all been missing.
Chapter 4
“Joining me in the studio today are two of the leading voices of our time. On my left is Megan Duncan, a bio-ethicist from the Berkeley school of Reason. On my right is Lisa Albright, a Senior Mentor at the Sunrise Congregation in Livingston, Virginia. Lisa is also a Distinguished Fellow of the Pure Genome Project and a repeat guest on this show. I’d like to extend a warm welcome to you both and thank you for joining me tonight.”
Holly turned toward Megan with a well-practiced, serious expression. “Today we are talking about the ongoing efforts to clone a human. Let’s dig into the reasons why the attempts have been unsuccessful so far. Do you, like many, believe that this is a technology we are not meant to have?”
Megan raised one eyebrow and smiled into the camera, “No Holly, I don’t believe th
at. When I look at the history of our species, I see an unbroken track record of exploration and discovery, starting with the invention of language and fire, culminating in the highly advanced society that we enjoy today. Without technology, this planet’s limited carrying capacity wouldn’t be capable of sustaining our current quality of life. We should never forget the dark years during the Great Unrest. We owe a huge thanks to our parent’s generation for getting us back on our feet to where we are today. I believe we have an obligation to future generations to push the frontiers of science ever forward.”
Holly smiled prettily and turned to Lisa. “What would you say to that Lisa? Should we hurtle ourselves toward a golden technological future, or are there boundaries we should fear to cross?”
Lisa’s face crinkled into a smile, warm and charismatic. “Megan raises a good point. I would like to start by saying I truly respect and honor the achievements of the scientific community, but we should understand that technology is nothing more than a tool. It is a means of achieving that which will bring further glory to God. Technology should never become an end in and of itself. It only takes a brief review of humanity’s sorry history of war and conflict to see the twisted ways in which scientific achievement has been used to destroy and condemn our fellow man.”
Megan leaned forward, a glossy braid falling over her shoulder. “Lisa, you are ignoring a critical fact. All of that bloodshed was caused by men in the pursuit of power and conquest. There are so few men left, we’ve moved beyond that stage in our history. Our species has matured. We’ve grown up. We can be trusted now to advance our technology, without the need for prior restraints. We no longer need to set the kind of limits on progress that may have made sense in the past. Can you imagine a woman leading the Khmer Rouge to commit genocide? A woman in charge of the Nazi holocaust? A woman starting a nuclear war over religious misunderstandings? I know that I can’t imagine it.”
Lisa crossed her arms, looking thoughtful, before she replied, “I’ve heard this argument before and I find it unconvincing. Aren’t we all human? Maybe we can’t imagine a woman committing these types of atrocities because we simply haven’t witnessed it yet?”
“That’s a circular argument, Lisa. It’s a fact that women are less aggressive than men and we know they are more willing to resolve conflicts verbally rather than physically. This is exactly why we’ve enjoyed such unprecedented peace over the past decades,” Megan responded.
Holly cut in, “We are wandering away from the subject of tonight’s program. Let’s get back to the specific example of human cloning that we started the program with. Why hasn’t human cloning been successful? Should we even attempt to create a human clone?”
“The lack of success is a fascinating question,” noted Megan, “one that is being investigated in labs, in many countries around the world. We’ve all seen how powerful genetic engineering can be. Our entire post-capitalist system is tied to the ability to modify the genome. What we don’t yet understand is why we’ve run into hard limits in our quest for generalized genetic modifications on humans, including cloning.”
Lisa broke in, “But what about the ethical question? Cloning a human will lead us to question the very idea of a soul. Is it right for us to make copies of something as precious and singular as a human being? By doing so, do we devalue humanity? I am very concerned that cloning will result in humans becoming disposable.”
“You are breaking in on my territory,” Megan said with a laugh. “These are all excellent questions, and they are exactly the right things to be thinking about, in my opinion. It doesn’t mean we shouldn’t move forward in our research, but we should do so very carefully, while considering these important issues from every possible angle.”
Lisa broke in, looking solemn. “Consider from every angle? Forgive me for saying so, but that is an extremely patronizing attitude toward those of us who have grave concerns about this entire line of research. You can’t downplay the significant roadblocks that scientists have encountered. Many in my congregation believe that God is actively blocking our progress. Maybe we aren’t meant to advance our knowledge of human genetics past a certain point. The Tower of Babel is an ancient lesson that holds important lessons for us even today. At what price will we realize the cost of human arrogance, and when will we recognize the dire consequences of reaching too far.”
Holly swiveled her head back and forth as the guests spoke, her interest piqued beyond what could be expected from gracious professionalism. “I’d be very interested in hearing your response to that question Megan, but first let’s take a break and hear from our sponsors.”
Jill twitched her finger in the air to trigger the controls for the virtual screen and turned off the live-cast. It was all crap. The talking heads could blather on for a hundred years and still no progress would be made. The debates made for good entertainment, but they didn’t bring anybody closer to the answers. In the end, it didn’t matter. She was doing what she was doing for the good of mankind. She imagined a future free of disease. A future in which people could choose who they wanted to be in a multitude of physical forms. A future free of pain and suffering. Maybe even a future freed from death. That’s why she had devoted her life to this problem. She had always dreamed of setting humanity free.
This line of thinking brought up painful memories for Jill. It always did. She hadn’t lived through the Great Unrest, but she had lived with its consequences. She’d never gotten to meet her grandfather. He had died in the firestorm that had swept San Diego. All that was left of him were the stories that Grandma Annie had shared before she too had died. Jill had sat by her bed as she had coughed out her last breaths, the cancers having spread too far to be fought any longer. Another legacy of the Great Unrest, a sickness so pervasive that nothing could be done to stop it.
If Jill had her way, it would all be a thing of the past. Not only the cancers and diseases of the body that had afflicted her grandmother, but the tendencies toward war and violence that had afflicted her grandfather and the millions more like him. That was the oath she had sworn on her grandmother’s deathbed. She had dedicated the rest of her life to fulfilling it.
She stood up and padded from her bedroom to the communal kitchen. Pepe followed her, purring, brushing up against the doorframe with his fluffy grey back, his tail waving back and forth in excitement.
“Hey Pepe, are you hungry too?” Jill spoke quietly so she wouldn’t wake anyone up.
Pepe looked up at her and meowed, his tiny teeth sharp and translucent.
“Hold on, I’ll get some milk for you. Warm I suppose?”
Once they were in the kitchen, Jill bent down and triggered her interface to place a virtual bowl of warm milk on the floor in front of him. He meowed once more then lowered his head into the bowl, lapping up the creamy milk with gusto.
Jill sighed. She wasn’t actually in the mood for this right now. Her ideas from earlier in the night hung in her mind. The more she toyed with them, the more they unraveled around the edges. She was trying to hold it all together, but she just wasn’t sure. She had felt so excited, but was this line of research going to get her any closer to a solution? She’d start her investigation first thing in the morning, but right now she just needed to relax. She needed to let her mind settle. Pepe wasn’t smart enough to notice her mood and leave on his own, so she triggered her interface again and both Pepe and the bowl of milk disappeared.
She walked to the food synthesizer and requested a cup of chamomile tea. She was sitting at the table nursing her cup when Jacob walked in. “Hey Jill, need some company?”
When she didn’t respond, he sat down next to her and put a foot up on the chair next to him. “Tough day at work?”
“I don’t feel like talking about it,” she said, her hand wrapped around the comforting warmth of the mug. She stared through the steam curling off the top of the hot liquid, her eyes losing their focus.
“Sorry Jill, I didn’t mean to intrude.” He shut himself down, the sp
ace where he was sitting flickering back into emptiness.
What she wouldn’t give for a real person to talk to right now.
Chapter 5
Jill lifted her head, peeling her face off the slick surface of the table. She must have fallen asleep, her cup of tea cold beside her. She checked her internal self-diagnostics and saw that she’d gotten a full four hours of sleep. Falling asleep at the kitchen table? She hadn’t done that for years. The stress at work must be getting to her.
“Well, that was weird,” she said to the empty room.
The light was shimmering behind the auto-blinds, so she gave them the command for transparency and took a moment to look outside. It was windy this morning, tree limbs shaking, leaves blowing past in cascades of yellow and brown. Occasionally, a small stick would bounce off the window, but no sound penetrated through the thick pane.
She asked the synthesizer to get started on her breakfast while she kept her eyes on the scene outside. No animals of course, but she could see to the horizon where land met sea, small clouds scudding prettily across the sky. She adjusted the filter and buildings filled the view. They were huddled close together, dark and forbidding, the closest just ten feet across the lane from her. As always, they were grim and grey, massive, dirty, and depressing to look at. They were not maintained for aesthetics; all that mattered was that they kept the elements out and the humans in.
She had made a habit of looking at the real world once in a while. It was easier to keep the filters on, and it was certainly more pleasant, but there was no substitute for reality. She raised her hands up over her head, stretching once to the left, once to the right, feeling the pull all the way down her legs. A ball of conglomerated rubbish bounced down the lane and stuck itself to a wall. Jill ignored it. A cleaning drone would get to it eventually, and in the meantime no one else would even notice it was there. Most everyone kept their filters up at all times.
