Pentagon Ignores the Warnings of 'Splice' and 'Jurassic Park' in Breeding Artificial Life

[David Farber <dave () farber net>]

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From: dewayne () warpspeed com (Dewayne Hendricks)
Date: February 27, 2010 9:40:47 PM EST
To: Dewayne-Net Technology List <xyzzy () warpspeed com>
Subject: [Dewayne-Net] Pentagon Ignores the Warnings of 'Splice' and 'Jurassic Park' in Breeding Artificial Life

Pentagon Ignores the Warnings of Splice and Jurassic Park in Breeding Artificial Life
By Christine Fall
<http://blogs.amctv.com/scifi-scanner/2010/02/pentagon-synthetic-organism-splice.php>

I was prepared for a robot revolution. Now I fear a different kind of man-made monster, one more akin to the Chimera 
seen on The Island of Dr. Moreau and in this year's Sundance flick Splice. Why? Robots have fallen on hard times. While 
the military is scrapping plans for its own autonomous killing machines, guess what the Pentagon is up to? Trying to 
breed an army of synthetic organisms that can live forever.

In its 2011 budget, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) has allocated $6 million for BioDesign, a 
project to create artificial life. The unclassified document doesn't say how the new life-forms will be used, but I'm 
guessing they won't be making biofuels or absorbing greenhouse gases. More likely, the agency is aiming for Moreau's 
ungodly brand of "divine human."

Here's what we know: they want to develop "a robust understanding of the collective mechanisms that contribute to cell 
death," so as to "enable a new generation of regenerative cells that could ultimately be programmed to live 
indefinitely." This could lead to one badass super-soldier.

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