Intergalactic Summit

And how do you know that it is not God's intention that they should be genegineered?

I mean, you're discussing the ineffable almighty here. Somehow I doubt that the grand cosmic plan is going to be ruinously disrupted if your child is cured of a potentially fatal predisposition to ovarian cancer before she is more than a few cells wide.

By the way, if your planned response is: "If God gave her such a predisposition then it would surely be part of His plan" then I invite you to remember that the plan could equally involve testing you to see if you do the ethical thing and correct the defect before she comes to harm.

Neither of us know for certain whether there is even such a thing as The Divine Plan, nor what the substance of any such Plan might be. The only recourse available to a sensible person, therefore, is to act on secular ethics, reasoning and and the facts in front of them and hope for the best.

Then there in gentlemen is where we disagree. For me, it's a slippery slope that seems to have no end. Where do we begin and end, how far is it ethical to tamper with the genome before we change our fundamental humanity? Are we to become as the Jove did?

I know it is hypocritical of me to pose these questions when fundamentally our clones are given gene therapy to as closely match our original templates as possible. I suppose in hind sight I, perhaps, was unwise to undertake the programme with such haste. But still, I feel these questions need to be asked.

Thank you for your timely words my Lord, but I do worry and I do fear. Yes, we have science, but what of the costs? Was it not God's will I was born the way I am? If it were not, then why be born in the first place? Would a scientist have tossed me aside if I were born from a tube on account of my genes, my mixed heritage? Am I not able to fulfill a pupose in His Will without some form of engineering to myself? Am I not worthy?

These are the worries on my mind of late, and that is why I do fear genengineering.

Genetic engineering is a crime against God.

I've already addressed that first question: You don't know what God's will is.

It could equally well be that it is God's will for your parents to act and engineer you. It could be that God didn't deliberately engineer you right down to the genetic level and is perfectly happy for mutations, defects and inherited conditions to exist as they enrich the tapestry and fullness of life, and is equally happy when such defects are created.

the Way of the Winds paints the Maker as being a passive observer, one who set the forces of the universe in motion and now sits back and watches without interference, interested only in what happens. This "Gardener God" is a scientist observing an ongoing experiment, rather than a game player micromanaging the pieces.

The problem with any discussion about what God wants is that the entity in question never actually shows up and tells anybody what his/her/their actual desires and motives are. Such conversations are inevitably pure speculation. To my knowledge, there's not a single passage in the Scriptures where God actually talks about genetic engineering and expresses any views about it. He's usually more busy with crowns and blood skies and sending angels and visions and suchlike.

As to the second question: Well, okay, why be born? If God isn't telling you your purpose in life then go figure it out for yourself. Maybe the gardener god's not interested in dictating what you are but prefers to watch what you become. Why would a Guanine here as opposed to an Adenin there matter?

It seems absurd to me to believe that the divine game is so finely micromanaged, with every last little detail being watched and influenced by an omnipotent master, that the disposition of individual molecules or, frankly, the life story of a whole human being is going to make that big a difference. And that's assuming we're able to act against the divine game plan in the first place, in which case that's not compatible with claims of an omnipotent God.

I was bored and wanted entertainment, thus I gave you all free will, intelligence, and started you all off with different perspectives on life. It's been entertaining so far.

Verin was espousing Caldari philosophy in which The Maker is a somewhat distanced creator who gave us more interested spirits such as Cold Wind who take a more "hands on" role in our development.

Per definition, in Caldari understanding, it is impossible to have any sort of comprehension of what the Maker's Plan is. In fact, one school of thought refuses to commit to The Maker even having one.

"Also: Bwahahaha."

Gods and spirits....

Damnit, why do they let you out of the asylum Nauplius?

Gallente don't wear masks so much as veils. You'll be able to see what's happening beneath it, but all the details will be obscure and the intent difficult to read.