The Great Debate: Animal-Human Embryos
We are on the edge of a precipice. Or the dawn of a new day.
One of the two.
Animal-human embryo research may herald the greatest ever medical advances against long incurable diseases like cancer, which have for so long haunted humanity. Or it may lead to a Franken-future in which we will see the birth of a little boy with a tiger's tail, a rhino with a child's face and a panda with the aggressive heart of Michael Portillo.
Hopefully both.
Safer streets?
Today a good friend of mine told me about a vigilante in America. Imagine how excited I was. Finally, I thought, a dark knight or vigilant avenger has awoken. Somewhere a millionaire playboy, whose parents were slain before his young eyes, has come of age. Somewhere a young farm boy, who always knew it was too easy to out-run a train, has found his city.
I could barely contain myself. We all knew it had to happen, that they had to be here, that they were just awaiting their opportunity. We knew that the crime-stained streets and corrupt power merchants were living on borrowed time. Today is a good day - no natural disasters, no late trains, no one starving; today we are born anew, into a life of hope and opportunity, with heroes in our world to whom we can aspire, to help us grow together so we can all work towards the greater good.
Or at least that was what I thought. Imagine my disappointment when upon further investigation I discovered that the aforementioned vigilante was in fact a bar owner in America who patrols the streets with a remote controlled security robot.
However, even this might have been exciting. Let's be honest, when I say Security Robot we're all thinking about ED-209 from Robocop and getting very excited, assuming he's worked out that whole shooting innocent people glitch - although that said it's not something the police on either side of the ocean seem to have sorted out so maybe it's not going to be a priority in the future.
However, even this was not to be, the reality of the situation is that the 'Security Robot' looks more like a dustbin on wheels, with a camera and a big water pistol... disappointing picture disappointing video.
Strangely enough though this thing, which is about as much a robot as I am fire-breathing centipede and which is about as terrifying as pens, seems to work. Apparently the dealers do disperse, although they come back later. Which is weird because I would have thought that drug dealers are a bit tougher than that. Or maybe it's the drugs? Maybe we see a wobbly dustbin roll up and hear a bloke tell them to leave the area with a crackly loud speaker but what their crack-addled minds perceive is a forty foot vampire-bot, with twin machine-guns and ear piercing death threats in the voices of their mothers.
Or maybe they're just really polite and they've gone somewhere quiet to laugh.
I know he means well but it's so disappointing. This was supposed to be the future. When you read about the year 2008 or similar in literature it's always accompanied by pictures of happy families teleporting or a man chatting to his six-armed alien neighbour as he plucks vegetables from his garden on Mars.
Then you hear about something like this, you get all excited but it turns out to be R2-D2's special-needs half-cousin. When it's locked up alone at night it probably tries to send R2 emails about his 'crime fighting', carefully highlighting the similarities with the Jedi cause. I bet he's on R2's 'blocked' list.
In The Name of Science
When I was a little boy I used to enjoy taking apart old radios and stuff to see how they worked. Once I got hold of an old black and white TV, that was great. I must stress I wasn’t a vandal but I was inquisitive. Not in the sort of way serial killers are inquisitive about their victim’s insides. Or maybe in exactly the same way.
I wasn’t a freak. I must stress I wasn’t a freak. I really wasn't. I didn’t, for example, once use my Lego to build a little car with a little driver and a little passer by on the street, who was waving to them and I didn’t put firework bangers underneath them all and watch them blow up. Or film it.
OK, I did.
Don’t be frightened. It’s not like I ever did anything crazy, like burn a house down. Well, actually I did. No not really.
Well, yeah OK, really; just the top floor and roof. Imagine my dark eyes…see the fire…watch it burn. No seriously, I wasn’t some psychopath, it was an accident on the road of inquiry. Scientific inquiry. Or at least the eight year old equivalent.
The kind of desire for knowledge which makes you cut open a battery is, I’m sure, common with children; but it really is really something you need to grow out of. I speak from experience. There’s a name for it now I’m a grown up, it’s called ‘Invalidating the Warranty’.