Monkey Embryo Mashup Results In First Primate Chimeras

Take that, creationism! Who's your god now, eh?

^ Nobody is their god, because god doesnt exist. Duhh.

Well, let's consider this now. No life was created. These chimeras were designed using living cells. That's life begetting life. All that man did in this equation was direct that life where to go. No life was created spontaneously.

Charlton Heston knows where this sort of science leads.

They should have named them "Frank" and "Stein".

If I am reading this right, each monkey started as a collection of stem cells from 6 different embryos, thus there is six different sets of genes in each monkey. Why do the immune cell from one gene set attack all the cells from the other gene sets?

@eregorn8. This is building a house with already made bricks. You were a bit quick to link this article to your religious issues.

Planet of the apes coming maybe?

As cholin3947 is asking, the monkeys should have terrible autoimmune conditions, shouldn't they?

After all, what is the difference between a chimera and an animal containing a parasitic dizygotic twin? And parasitic twins are... well, parasites.

Does anyone know? Are the chimeric monkeys being medicated against autoimmune conditions?

"Nobody would ever create a chimeric human,"
LoL thats so funny. Let's list other things nobody would ever do. I'll go first.

Nobody would ever build a nuclear bomb!

eregorn8 and WalgWors scientists already created life from scratch last year. You must have missed that.
God does exist, we are god and always have been.

Oh my @ "we are god." I must've forgotten that when I misplaced my thunderbolt. Either you believe in God or your don't, but placing man on the altar AS god... well thats just wrong. I admit, I am a Christian and will always be. But I'm a 'live-and-let-live' kinda person and not believing is your choice.

But lets assume you're coming from a scientific philosophy. If true, then you know man has only existing a tiny fraction of the total time of the Universe. How could man possibly be god? Like I said, believe or don't believe, but don't call yourself god. Because none of us embody what the concept of a god is... we aren't immortal, we don't wield super-powers, and we can't create things from nothingness.

lawsonrw you are free to rank yourself as low as you want in the universe.
I will continue to pile glory on the rest of us humans (and aliens).
At least until another god challenges our supremacy.

For your information human chimeras already exist, they happen naturally.

@lawsonrw
with killerT's statement of thought we are gods, gods of our world and time, we can create and destroy our world, create life and beings at will, we can create worlds and suns,(if only for a fractions of a second) and harness power so strong that it doesn't even exist in nature. Can't wield super powers? As a being i say we can and do wield these powers daily.

What some of the others said is true. The only gods in the universe are humans and similarly intelligent lifeforms. By definition, there is nothing outside of nature.

Hopefully we can use our godhood, at least on this planet, to create a better life for us and the rest of the biosphere.

I'm a humanist, and I'm inclined to believe that despite all of our faults, we are capable of improving things.

Delusions of grandeur. “We are God”, yes if god is a weak, feeble being. No we are not god, god created the universe and everything in it. All we are doing is mimicking god. Ask a terminally ill HIV or cancer patient if they are god. LMAO, the arrogance of that statement. 1/2 of you can barely control your own destiny, let alone the rest of humanity. Get of the drugs.

Religion aside, I wonder if these embryonic cells can be harvested without injuring a fetus. Perhaps nano-technology will provide an answer in the future. In the meantime however, I believe in continuing the embryonic stem cell research.

Off topic but relevant to these comments: Given that many of the answers that physics gives us about the creation and condition of the universe are mere philosophy - ie: the multiverse, alternate reality, the theory that our exhistence may be nothing but a hologram projected onto a 2D surface, the flow of time, etc... - is it wise to denounce faith?

@killerT Yes, we are GODs:

Group Of Drunks

It's all relative to your views and beliefs. If your religion involves higher powers, then you can say that we are using tools and materials given to us by them. if you don't, then you can say humans are gods. The comment about the patient with HIV is strange to me, because if humans are gods, then gods can fall. The poster says that humans are not gods though, but gods have fallen in other religions, and so have beliefs. Which leads me to believe that they are an opinionated monotheist. Under this assumption I say "Loosen up."

Humankind needs to evolve some day. Why not start now instead of 1 million years from now?

Very cool icon Shodan. SPOOKY!

..........................................
See life in all its beautiful colors, and
from different perspectives too!

@Cookiees453, Do you really think humans have the foreshight to be able to predict what kind of evolution will be beneficial to our species. Choosing the wrong evolutionary path would be a disaster. Also it's a little bit foolish to compare our species to gods. Theres a lot more to this universe than meets the eye my friends.

@cholin3947, I think it may have to do with the cells differentiating soon after the embryo was stitched together. As the embryo continues dividing, the cells will begin to specialize based on their spatial relationship to each other. Perhaps only one of the original cells, and thus only one set of genes, will give rise to a lineage that will dictate how the immune system develops. This would mean there is only one kind of immune cells to worry about. I could be totally wrong, but it's an interesting question nonetheless!

All this religious debates on popsci is getting ridiculous, though if I had to choose, I'd choose faith sans organized religions.

That aside, @richx082: your autoimmune theory sounds plausible, but what intrigues me are the factors that dictates which cells becomes dominant?

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"The cells — from totally different sources — didn’t fuse, but worked together in harmony, forming fully fledged, normal, healthy animals."

So does this mean more junk dna? I wonder how 'junk' dna actually affects the evolution of a species in the long run.

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"A totipotent cell can give rise to a whole animal."

So can we eventually fuse different species? Great white sharks running around on cheetah legs ought to be loads of fun though.. hehe..

So you want to say "I am God?"

No. You are Hubris.

Heh!

I laughed when the monkey grabbed the camera. You can see it at 7:35.

@space Thank you.

@Shodan, I know completely off topic, but in the major monotheistic religions (Jewish, Christian, Muslim) which holds the majority of believers....God doesn't fall, some of his angels did. It’s 1 form of blasphemy to denounce God, but then to announce that you are in fact God is ludicrous.

For all non-believers, 1 word Teebow! :D

Only according to your religion. Besides, why does god get to announce he's god? What made him god? Don't spout any of that forever and always crap, it's too cliche. If you can, give me a deep thought out answer or defend your belief without being a sensationalist. (That's not a jab at you, but I've always had trouble getting people away from the god loves you bit and more towards the why, where and how.) Also, why do you believe in god? And what religion are you backing?

P.S. You spelled Tebow wrong. :D