Scientist #1: I just coined a new term I wanted to run past you… ready? “Genome Mutilation.”
Scientist #2: Has a nice ring, but doesn’t exactly scream “useful” does it? Sounds like that stuff they do to girls in Africa that Human Rights Watch is all on about.
Scientist #1: That would be “genital mutilation”, that’s different, and not new. The basic idea is stopping just short of DNA FUBAR, not all the way to “beyond all recognition” but still seriously “fucked up.”
Scientist #2: And that’s useful… how again?
Scientist #1: I’ve been thinking…
Scientist #2: Oh bloody hell, not again…
Scientist #1: Shut up for a minute and learn something… What if we take an insect that is a transmission vector for a HUGE number of viri to people and other species, like, oh, say the mosquito, and seriously fuck with its DNA, so severely as to render an entire generation of wild mosquitoes less than viable?
Scientist #2: Oh now I get it, but toward what end, reducing the insect’s population in the wild? Brilliant! What’s your expectation of efficacy?
Scientist #1: According to my models, near-eradication, population reduced by 95%+!
Scientist #2: Wow that’s huge! But if we eradicate it, won’t the food chain be impacted?
Scientist #1: Chain, schmain, what are you, some kind of hippie tree-hugger? They’re mosquitoes, they suck, good riddance! If we study every silly little detail nothing will ever get done.
Scientist #2: Ok, works for me, I’m down… How are we going to make sure any resulting larva die before they can breed, and create new problems, the magnitude of which we can’t even imagine?
Scientist #1: We’ll fuck with its immunities at the DNA level — what could possibly go wrong with that?
Scientist #2: What if the insect’s immunities, with which we will be fucking, are keeping some of the nasty viral shit this bug spreads, in check? Isn’t that an extremely dangerous possibility, that could lead to any number of entirely unpredictable, potentially destructive scenarios?
Scientist #1: Yeah probably… I suppose, but who cares, the insect will be all but eradicated! Without a large population they will cease to be a vector, the spread of countless diseases will be halted, it will be a boon to mankind! We will be rewarded accordingly!
Scientist #2: I don’t suppose that risk is represented in *your* model?
Scientist #1: No, *our* model isn’t nearly that sophisticated, and besides, even if it was it would take dog’s years to run.
Scientist #2: Well… This could be huge… what the hell, toss the dice, count me in — what’s the worst that could happen?
Nature: Oh, 3500 children born with fucking brain deformities inside of 6 months, caused by a virus that likely never would’ve mutated to such a dangerous form if you hadn’t fucked with it (with reckless abandon, I might add!) You’ll create a new kind of living hell on earth for those 3500 families, plus every family in the region with child in-utero, and it will escalate from there. It might even spread to become a global pandemic, given the massive influx of international travelers expected by the region you’ve chosen for this very risky experiment. Other than that, meh…
Scientist #1: Either way we gain notoriety, as successful implementers of a cutting-edge technology, or as leading scientists working to solve a global problem…
Scientist #2: Um, that we will have sort of created…
Scientist #1: Yeah that… let’s leave that part out. Besides is it really fair to say we “created” anything? All we’re doing is taking what Nature provided, and giving it a toss, more like rearranging than creating.
Scientist #2: There was something they used to talk about in school, I think the term was “ethics”?
Scientist #1: An antiquated concept, rendered obsolete by ginormous profits and a pervasive lack of concern for the common folk that bear the brunt of our malfeasance.
Nature: Another unintended consequence you’ll be unable to mitigate. Another scientific mega-failure to minimize, discount and sweep under the rug. Another convenient excuse to restrict free speech and demonized the well-informed — at least you can limit the spread of information, after failing to impede the spread of anything else. Another huge bill incurred by “scientists” on behalf of the population of earth, to be paid in large amounts of pain and suffering, by newborn babies and their families (plus, of course, in unfathomably huge amounts of money, but that goes without saying.).
Scientist #1: We believe the common folk were actually put here specifically for us to use as lab rats, if that were not the case, why would there be billions of them?
Scientist #2: We work towards the betterment of all mankind, yet when the tiniest thing goes even minutely wrong we’ve got activists up our asses, sniveling about health this or environment that — soooo selfish. Science is important, imagine what the world would be like without it.
Nature: Tiniest thing? Minutely wrong? I guess a baby born with half of its brain missing is tiny, but it’s anything other than minutely wrong. Are you even aware of the mayhem you so casually cause, you murderous, geeky bastards? Science without accountability is just a sadistic game, it is the holy mother of existential threats to the earth.