CA Blogging Assignment 7

 "Technological progress is like an axe in the hands of a pathological criminal."- Albert Einstein, letter to a friend, 1917

   I think what Einstein meant in this term is that technological progress and technology always involve the risk of danger and destruction, and future are handed to human's hands, human which also always involve the risk of danger and destruction. As it can be seen in quotes like "Two things are infinite: the universe and human stupidity; and I'm not sure about the the universe” and “It is easier to denature plutonium than to denature the evil spirit of man”, Einstein left many words that refer to human's evilness; he thought evilness as human nature, and deplored about it. The quote itself seems to say that technology is too dangerous because of the firm human nature. However, from other quotes like “We cannot despair of humanity, since we ourselves are human beings”, it seems that even Einstein was anxious about humans future, he was willing to change people and did not lose hope for that. I wonder how Einstein think about the nowadays world, filled up with nuclear problems, since he said "The release of atom power has changed everything except our way of thinking...the solution to this problem lies in the heart of mankind. If only I had known, I should have become a watchmaker."

CA Blogging Assignment 6

  Garreau gives "The Law of Unintended Consequences" as a name for the scenario of having three types of human in the world; "Natural", "Enhanced", and "The Rest". For me, the term itself means that some decision could bring the consequences which were not predicted. These consequences could be positive, negative, or neither.  For example, when I went to U.K. as SEA program, I had to stay with a family for 3 weeks, and stay with other ICU students for another 3 weeks. I thought the staying would be a disaster because of my shyness, and my terrible interpersonal skills. However, I had a great experience there, and I felt desolation than freedom when I made my farewells, which was  unexpected to me. This is my positive example of "The Law of Unintended Consequences". This is a rare case for me, because usually I try to predict possible consequences as many as I can, so I usually do not have unexpected consequences unless if the situation itself was unexpected.

CA Blogging Assignment 5

 My topic for Essay 2 is about the active euthanasia in Japan. I chose this topic because I thought euthanasia would be a more common issue in the near future. The development of medical technology enabled people to live much more longer than they used to, and the end of life, and the right of self-determination started to be a problematic issue than before. My thesis statement for the moment is " Euthanasia should be allowed and the patient should be able to make the decision when they have consciousness, because of the self-determination rights, or when the patient does not have the consciousness, the people who are in charge of mental, physical and financial support should be able to make the decision, because the support could be a load. However, the case should be limited when the disease is impossible to cure, and the doctors should be involved in the decision making."

CA Blogging Assignment 4

 When I read about the "enhanced" children in Radical Evolution, I thought it is very interesting, and very attractive. If I had a choice, I think I would like to be "enhanced", because I want to use more time for using the knowledge or abilities rather than trying to achieve them, even I enjoy the progress. I think even people are "enhanced", there would be a chance to improve. For example, even people are "enhanced", and could achieve almost every knowledge, there are some that they could not achieve, like something that does not exist yet. Creating new things must be one form of improvement, and people would still have a chance for it. I imagine if every people were same, it would be boring, but "enhancement" itself sounds enchanting for me.

CA Blogging Assignment 3

  The modifications to the human genome currently being studied and experimented with will eventually change human nature in the following ways.Modifications could make people able to make their own babies as ideal as possible. This could be seen as a blaspheme against  humans "personality", nature, and god, in some religion. However, there are several reasons that modification could not be thought as blaspheme without any objections.  First of all, ethnics varies in age, country, religion and other aspects. Ethnics is a strong reason, but it seems that it could not be the only reason. Second, the idea of modification comes from bacterium. Blaspheme against nature is not only too emotional, but also it does not have consistency. Finally, modification could help people from disease. Hereditary diseases, like Huntington's disease could be solved.  It is true, that modification could be a dangerous technology, but with careful thoughts and rules, there are many possibility to save many people. Technology itself is neither black nor white, it depends on the people.