this post was submitted on 17 Mar 2025
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Science Memes

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submitted 1 day ago by fossilesque@lemmy.dbzer0.com to c/science_memes@mander.xyz
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[โ€“] ulterno@programming.dev 2 points 8 hours ago (1 children)

He also had a bizarre contract he made the parents sign that if they changed their minds they had to reimburse him the financial costs of the experiment

Here's a scenario.

  • Parent gets modded baby
  • Parent is approached by a corporation to take over the baby for their exp instead
    • Corporation is willing to pay parent for it
  • Parent later goes and says no to Dr. He
  • Parent takes baby to the corporation instead, which now gets to step ahead of Dr. He
  • Dr. He gets no resultant data but is stuck with the costs of doing whatever he did.

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[โ€“] JacksonLamb@lemmy.world 0 points 45 minutes ago

I think you're suffering from a form of justification bias. That sounds like something out of a dystopian sci fi.

Here's the MUCH more realistic scenario that makes his contract unethical:

  • Scientists try to introduce mutation into embryo

  • Mother for whatever reason decides she doesn't want to have the embryo implanted.

  • Who knows, maybe they can't afford kids. Or her and the father are about to break up. Or she has found out she's at risk of complications.

  • Or maybe they overhear that the experiment didn't go as planned and the mutation is useless or possibly harmful.

Anyway if they say no they're suddenly in debt millions of yuan.

Implanting an embryo into a person under those conditions would be coercion.