Legal Definition of Human

I see a lot of the same arguments I used against him. Basically his argument was that the only humans are those that are unaltered by artificial means. Say we figure out how to remove the blading gene, make the kids smarter, and throw in some anti-senesence. He would say that that is no longer human, no matter what.
 
What is legally considered a human being?
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Talk about taking humanity out of humanity. Legally drunk, legally married, legally possesses, legally tired, legally crazy, legally frustrated....I hope congress one day enacts a legally tired clause...maybe I can call into work and say I'm legally tired. Supposing we perfect artificial wombs, will people of this birth be legally human? What about a clone?
 
Thats the argument. It really boils down to me arguing against his ridiculous support of every law based on morality of a specific sub-group systimatically limiting the freedom of americans.
 
A human being isnt something that is exact, that is what we consider as human beings can vary greatly...However what defines human biologically/physically is human's DNA...those creatures that have human DNA are humans, human DNA however varies from person to another person. Something that is defined as human changes its characteristics overtime, as a result of evolution. Humans however have an ability to replicate during this time, this however future if what will evolve from us will not have an ability to replicate or we will have divergent evolution then we have entirely new species forming. Humans are those who have human DNA and make up same group of species.
 
So youre saying that we can edit a humans DNA so long as he can interbreed, and still be able to call hi human?
 
Fafnir665 said:
So youre saying that we can edit a humans DNA so long as he can interbreed, and still be able to call him human?
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That wouldn't pass the species test. Animals only have to belong to the same genus to be able to interbreed. Dogs and coyotes, horses and donkeys, scarlet macaws and military macaws, etc.

Humans and Neanderthals could interbreed, and it's widely accepted among anthropologists that they did. Although I don't know whether they have enough Neanderthal DNA to be able to test either hypothesis. It's been suggested that modern humans never actually killed off the Neanderthals or even ran them out of the more easily survivable territories, but rather just assimilated them into the larger gene pool.
 
Fraggle Rocker said:
Humans and Neanderthals could interbreed, and it's widely accepted among anthropologists that they did.
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No it isn't. This already unpopular view has become a definite minority one as a consequence of mitochondrial DNA analysis.

Krings, et al DNA sequence of the mitochondrial hypervariable region II from the Neandertal type specimen PNAS Vol. 96, Issue 10, 1999

The DNA sequence of the second hypervariable region of the mitochondrial control region of the Neandertal type specimen, found in 1856 in central Europe, has been determined from 92 clones derived from eight overlapping amplifications performed from four independent extracts. When the reconstructed sequence is analyzed together with the previously determined DNA sequence from the first hypervariable region, the Neandertal mtDNA is found to fall outside a phylogenetic tree relating the mtDNAs of contemporary humans. The date of divergence between the mtDNAs of the Neandertal and contemporary humans is estimated to 465,000 years before the present, with confidence limits of 317,000 and 741,000 years. Taken together, the results support the concept that the Neandertal mtDNA evolved separately from that of modern humans for a substantial amount of time and lends no support to the idea that they contributed mtDNA to contemporary modern humans.

The complete paper may be read here: http://www.pnas.org/cgi/content/full/96/10/5581
 
Communist Hamster said:
Bullshit
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Here a preview of how I am gona make U humans extinct.

I am wokring on a virus that will be used to infect large populations women, this virus is designed to infiltrate the womans egg with my DNA and get them pregnant. Within next century Humans will be replaced with my desendents,

Human 2.0

specie : Hetro Sapien :D
 
I want U not to believe in it, and I have succeded in that first step, now no one will suspect let alone stop me.
 
Thanks for the help Avatar.

I know why U chose that name, U thought thats what U are supposed to type when U registered in SciForums as your friend told U ,

Thats one hell of a funny fact.
 
If I were to sum up what everyones been saying, would a likely sum read "As of now there is no method for determining what is legally human. No precedent has yet been set, and it is not concievable that one shall be set in the near future." ?
 
I remember that some archaeologists in France, I think, discovered remains of a 4 year old child that had both homo sapiens and neanderthal characteristics. At that time they told that more research is needed on the remains and that it could be a genetic anomaly, but still - the question remains open.
Maybe someone has some more recent factual input regarding this subject?
 
I thought homo sapiens were the result of some intermixing between neanderthal and cro-magnon...
 
Incorrect thought.
Neanderthals inhabited Europe and parts of western Asia from about 230,000 to 29,000 years ago, during the Middle Paleolithic period.
Homo sapiens came to Europe from Africa long after Neanderthals already lived there.

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Here is the article from 1999 summarising the find and evidence that might support the idea that Neanderthals did indeed mate with Homo sapiens (that is not proven (that N. were a subspecies) as far as I know, there is data that supports it, and other that doesn't):
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/323657.stm

What would be wonderful is if we got our hands on some neanderthal DNA, it would be an incredebly lucky find though, if it happened.
 
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