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The Holy Grail of Science
Imagine playing football at the age of 239 with your
grand-grand-grand children. Imagine donating blood at the age of
172. Imagine traveling into an inter-galactic spaceship to the
andromeda galaxy. Imagine not getting common cold at all. And
imagine not having to see those AIDS awareness ads because AIDS
being a history, taught in Medieval History-101. And imagine
living to see Indian football team qualify for FIFA world cup.
No, you are not being taken to utopia; instead, Im trying to
propel your minds towards the future, which is nearer than ever
before.
The fear of death is the most common of the all phobias we know.
No one wants to die. To imagine death is the worst punishment
one can ever give. History has seen many heroes abandoning their
quests just because they feared death. People may spend their
fortune on treatments without guarantees of 100% recoveries. Now
the question arises, if death is so dreadful then why it is so
common?
Death rides following reasons:
* Hunger: This factor is a major cause of deaths in poorer
nations. There are many organizations working to free the food
distribution process from bureaucracy but a lot of work still
needs to be done.
* Accidents: These are mainly caused to negligence and
carelessness. In this high-tech convergent world everyone is
busy with his personal bunch of gizmos, unaware of the
precautionary measures. This carelessness isnt safe. In
nutshell, individuals are just too busy.
* Wars: This is the most shameful aspect of human species. Wars
can be avoided and with them million of deaths. Only some social
engineering is needed. Governments spend most of their GDP on
defense research. This money can be put into more useful
bio-researches leading to fewer diseases and lower mortality
rate.
* Natural disasters: The inevitable factor. At present we can
only predict but can not prevent natural disasters. We are left
at mercy of our so called Mother Earth unless we colonize other
planets.
* Ageing: Evolution made the homo sapiens mortal. Our bodies are just
here to reproduce and nurture our kids to a level where they can
reproduce. Then, biologically, our bodies become worthless
Telomeres have to shed its size. They are not required by the
evolutionary process anymore, so we die.
* Diseases: Survival of the fittest. Charles Darwin gave the
world this famous theory. It implied that we survive to be fit.
And if were diseased we cannot be fit. When those tiny
pathogenic agents attack our body we fall sick. This is because
they are genetically fitter than, us, the mighty humans. Our
bodies were not made to fight these agents and we fall prey to
their attack. There are two ways to attack the disease. Either
change our bodies (genome) to be able to fight or hinder the
functioning of the agents or eliminate them. Either way it is
difficult so, presently, we are left with our sickening genome
which we are unable to edit. Its mutation is left to evolution
alone.
Well accidents can be prevented if awareness about their
prevention is spread. This is the area where mass media has to
play its role. And Wars can be prevented by peace movements and
social engineering. And as far as natural disasters are
concerned we can only plead to engineers to make structures
safer. It is their duty to make structures capable of coping
with the natural disasters suffering minimum damage to lives.
But, it is the last two factors namely ageing and diseases,
which are being portrayed as The Holy Grail of Science.
As we all know, our bodies are governed by genes which control
just about everything about our body. Be it our physical
appearance or resistance to diseases or intelligence (much
debated) or inner functioning, every damn thing is controlled by
our genes. It is said that if we can control genes we can
control the course of evolution. It is like riding the car of
evolution, the human species being driver, passenger being earth
and genes as its steering wheel.
It has been scientifically proven that every cell in our body
has a type of biological clock called telomere. This clock tells
the cell when to stop dividing. If a cell is unable to reproduce
then new cells are not born, hence our body dies. This is called
ageing. The scientists today are trying to edit the genes thus
instructing cells to make longer telomere or altogether abandon
the concept of telomere which can result in indefinite life
span. If scientists are ever able to achieve this then it could
bring a revolution. Then well be able to hold body
deteriorating effects of age at a bay and enjoy the full
energetic life of youth at the age of 100. But even then, job
would be half done.
The next front of the battle would be Diseases. Even if were
able to live up to 100 or more then what will hold our body
protected from all those silly disease causing agents? The
current method of medication will become useless very soon as
more and more virus, bacteria, etc. are developing immunity
against our body mechanism and the medicines. The fact that
these agents mutate very rapidly makes them survive longer and
longer. But the homo sapiens have not changed at all. We are not able
to mutate/change naturally as rapidly as these agents. So, it
proves to be a disadvantage to us.
One way to get over this issue is to change our genes
artificially. As a positive note the complete human genome has
been mapped and now it is the duty of the genetic engineers to
make use of it and find a way to develop a fool-proof mechanism
against these agents. Once we do this we can have very own
personalized medicines or would be requiring no medicines at
all. The personalized medicines will work in coordination with
our immunity system. It would change the immunity system to make
it capable of immunizing us to all new pathogens which our body
does not know of. Then slowly, according to survival of the
fittest, all the pathogens will be wiped out of existence.
The infinite life span raises many ethical questions. Also,
genetic engineering has raised moral/ethical issues world wide.
But it is for socialists and politicians to sort out these
issues. Scientists only know one way, which is the future. No
matter how hard these politicians try to prevent them from
achieving this but one day or the other they will achieve this.
And then we will live indefinitely and who knows this
breakthrough might happen within our lifetime. And after that,
we see Indian soccer team win FIFA world cup in 2147 AD.
Article Source: http://articles.directorygold.com
About the author:
Paras Chopra was born in Patiala, Punjab, India on 3rd June
1987. His interests decieve in subjects ranging from Nanotechnology
to Biotechnology to Artificial Intelligence. His goal in life is
to achieve immortality.
Visit him at: www.paraschopra.com
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Keywords:
agents genes imagine body diseases death medicines natural disasters b