January 06, 2009

How would you feel about a half-human half-chimp hybrid?
posted by homunculus 15 years ago
  • Would he have lasers? I think I'd need him to have lasers. In all seriousness, though, I'm not sure even governments more liberal than mine would be less than reluctant to allow such research to go forward. Religious conservatism aside, there is something about such a development that I dare say wouldn't sit well with the average person. Maybe concerns about "playing God," maybe memories of Frankenstein movies, but I don't think Chimp-men (Hu-chimps? Humpanzees? Chimpanzumans?) will be happening anytime soon.
  • I thought we called them footballers?
  • Only if we allow them to vote, especially on environmental issues.
  • Yeah, right. As a species we can't even take care of what's living on this earth now, let alone care properly for something new. Our species can't even get along with itself--there's hatred over religion, color, sexual orientation--heaven forbid we get a Chimpanzman. We'd send it straight to the ovens.
  • Bootstrap before uplift.
  • i could use some new friends, as long as they're obedient...
  • Oliver The Humanzee He drank Seven-and-Sevens, which is an obvious sign that he wasn't fully human.
  • Next. No, really, the book by Michael Crighton, Next, used the humanzee possibility as a plot point. Crighton gets slagged a lot for his writing by some people but I always found him entertaining.
  • I wouldn't feel too good about it. I know how cruel humans are. Cordwainer Smith called them underpeople.
  • Crighton gets slagged a lot for his writing by some people but I always found him entertaining. Well, his stuff is sometimes dismissed as airplane fiction, but I think the real criticism is of some of his scientific views and his weird thing about "ecoterrorists." The head-in-the-sand global warming deniers hold him up (bizarrely) as an expert. He's even testified to Congress about the "myths" of global warming, despite being an MD, not a climatologist. But I love Al Gore's response from that wikipedia entry: "The planet has a fever. If your baby has a fever, you go to the doctor [...] if your doctor tells you you need to intervene here, you don't say 'Well, I read a science fiction novel that tells me it's not a problem'."
  • On the other hand, if your baby has a fever, you get medicine that will kill the little nasties that are giving him the fever. ... Long live the Chimpzman! (PotA reference in 5...4...)
  • Such a creature would probably move to New Zealand and start up a community web log. *Hides*
  • And call it chimpfilter, yeah.
  • What, no Bush jokes? I guess his era really is over.
  • Bush jokes? Why here you go.... To celebrate the Inauguration, Ben and Jerry's has issued a new ice cream flavor, Yes, PeCan, with profits donated to the Common Cause Education Fund. There's a Reddit thread for suggestions for flavors commemorating Bush/Cheney. Chock and Awe Stolen right outta the Blue. I have no shame.