I don’t know if anyone has ever seen this show (it is the best show I have ever seen). It just premiered today on NBC, but it has a very interesting premise.
The premise of the show is that biologically people have the same pattern of DNA, but a few people might end up having a different setup of DNA with unimaginable powers. Powers that might lead to the complete understanding of the universe such as being able to teleport and such.
What is everyone’s thoughts about this? Do you believe there could be an instant in the human evolution where we could possibly, genetically that is, through our DNA be able to somehow have ‘mutated’ genes to be able to do what normal humans cannot possibly do?
I just watched the show and thought it fairly good. I enjoyed how they had people from all over the world as characters.
Mutants:
I’m fairly sure that mutants exist in the form of amazing singers, athletes, and people with extreme abilities. Last week I saw a show on the science channel about a young Englishman with a super memory. He learned Icelandic in one week, and that is supposed to be a very difficult tongue.
“Far more lies in heaven and earth than those wrought of your philosophies…”
-Hamlet
We have all heard stories of miraculous actions or people with power. Why would it simply be whimsical fairy tales? The human potential is so unrefined that who is to say what the limits are when we cannot see our own borders?
if your thinking X-men, real powers, i’d say it just wont happen without genetic engineering. thats right,‘evil’ genetic engineering. and genetic engineering wont happen because…
(c’mon,evolutionists say it takes millions of years. that’s simply too long. humanity would have reached it’s ultimatum far before 1000000 years is up.we act too fast. we’ve only had 6000 years and this happens… OK maybe about 4000 years of recoreded history for the skeptics out there…
evolution in those standards is simply too slow to be taken seriously with our speed of “progress”.)
Well thats a completely negative and unhumanistic way of thinking. I talked to my biology professor who studies DNA, and he said that it IS possible for us to be capable of telepathy and the like, but he said before that ever happens humans would end up changing physical form alltogether.
To gain any certain ‘powers’ like telepathy or being able to walk in fire (which my professor said that would be almost impossible) must mean that a certain portion of DNA must change structure completely, which would take thousands and thousands of years to happen (maybe even millions). He said that we have little changes in DNA every once in awhile, but for a whole portion of DNA to change would take lifetimes to occur. Therefore, there is no way that in this lifetime we would see any sort of interesting changes in the human DNA.
He also mentioned that if any change did happen, before any special skills like telepathy would occur, we would have already changed as human beings tremendously. This meaning we would probably look extremely different than we do now. But you have to remember that this is all theory. Who knows where evolution will take us. It could take us in a whole other direction for what we know.
P.S. Dan I don’t think you mean “metaphysical” form, I think you mean physical. I’m not quite sure what you mean by a “metaphysical form”
when i speak,i mean relative to us, as in this lifetime. if i wanted powers,i’d damnsure want them now,other wise we’d be talking about ‘them’ that is unknown future generations i’ll never be able to enjoy.
but still i see no where near the amount of progress* nessecary haveing the human race been given thousands of years already. so i conclude it would take so much time that say,some thing small like the planetary ecosystem collapseing would probably occur first.
I’m not quite sure what a materialist thinks like. Except for my perception of someone who loves money, but I do not see how that relates at all to the subject. Anyway, this is not my view this is my professor’s (a person who studies DNA and has gone through more research than you could imagine).
Well all the telekentics, empaths, and telepaths you met weren’t really what you thought they were, considering it is scientifically and basically proven that it is 99.99999% impossible to have those abilities. Sorry friend, I think they’re out to take your money. Light into my eyeballs? No that’s not what I was looking for…
Shows like “Heroes” are fun as they mindlessly allow us to project our own insecurities and wish for greater personal power onto the characters and take the super ride with them.
If we are lucky we thereby become more concsiously aware of our own limitations … and hopefully become motivated to change the things we can.
However, it is best to accept the things we cannot change, such as the reality of our mortality and associated vulnerabilities.
There won’t ever be any genetic superman mutation.
I think that if you want to look at it realistically, no change in human DNA, no amount of human evolution, could accomplish what evolution, as a process on Earth, has not done.
I would have to agree that walking on fire is too Hollywood. Sharper eyesight? Sure. Faster or stronger? Certainly. But these are qualities that Nature herself has made possible in others.
Although, it does makes one wonder…
If there are specimens living at ridiculous depths and boiling heat, could they survive an open flame? I imagine that bacteria has evolved to live in acid and perhaps there are even in the Earth’s molten rock mantle. But because their size is so, one might say that they are but a couple of molecules away from being inert. At their size, surviving a fire or heat, might be an easier feat than for a more complex organism such as us, or other mammals.
Surviving fire was the one thing that my professor said would be impossible. I don’t remember what he quoted but he said something especially about fire for some reason. But telepathy on the other hand was possible.
Do you think such a thing could be possible?
I guess we do not know enough of the brain to rule it out but thoughts are very private matters and from a philosophical perspective, I think that actually reading other people thoughts would entail much of the same as when we read what they wrote or hear what they say is going on. In both, we make generalizations and run with the faith that they mean what we would mean. Because the observer of my thoughts never becomes me, never lives my events, but reads about them, from a paper, my mind itself, etc, his perspective never achieves such a unity as to say that he knows my thoughts in the way that I know them. he may perceive them, like a man using a machine that reveals activity in my brain, but what does that activity represents is still open to interpretation.
But, if all we mean by “Thoughts” here is simple atoms of data, such as “seeing” the card’s number (the card hidden from your eyes) in another’s mind. Yet, this is a reduction in possibilities and thus gives an advantage to whomever thinks he can read minds.
What might still be of interest to us here is that in both an actual case of a mind-reader and only one who pretends to be, the manner in which they achieve either the deed or the illusion would be the same. Statistics, probability, inference, educated guesses, and generalizations.
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