# Re-engineering the human body- how good could we make it? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [May 22, 2012, 3:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/re-engineering-the-human-body-how-good-could-we-make-it/622719 "2012-05-22T15:04:06Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 10\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![MLS](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/919ad9/32.png) [@MLS](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MLS)\ **Post date:** [May 23, 2012, 6:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/re-engineering-the-human-body-how-good-could-we-make-it/622719/61 "2012-05-23T18:37:47Z")
Just having severed nerves able to rejoin would be a big plus. ---
**Author:** ![Lumpy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lumpy/32/446_2.png) [@Lumpy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lumpy)\ **Post date:** [May 23, 2012, 9:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/re-engineering-the-human-body-how-good-could-we-make-it/622719/62 "2012-05-23T21:22:09Z")
> [@Der\_Trihs](#): > > One idea I’ve run across is adding a pair of joints in the female hipbones. Normally they are locked in place, but during birth they unlock and let the hips spread as wide as necessary. And while we’re at it, figure out some better way of separating the placenta from the uterus than \ ---
**Author:** ![Bookkeeper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bookkeeper/32/281_2.png) [@Bookkeeper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bookkeeper)\ **Post date:** [May 24, 2012, 3:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/re-engineering-the-human-body-how-good-could-we-make-it/622719/63 "2012-05-24T03:09:20Z")
Make sure that anything you do doesn’t degrade the ability to adapt to a different environment, such as a collapse of civilization. Reducing digestive efficiency to eliminate obesity is just going to kill you faster in a famine or even a temporary food shortage like being lost in the woods for a few days. Better to improve the “full” appetite cut-off feedback system. Ideally you want things that are: a) not going to increase the energy and resource drain on the mother during fetal development, so that pregnancy is not going to impair \*\*her \*\*survival chances, b) be advantageous in all, or the great majority of situations, not just in US urban living or on a snorkelling vacation, c) isn’t a disadvantage in other significant situations (how do you keep your gills from drying out when you’re not in the water), and d) doesn’t demand trade-offs such as increased energy/food requirements that would be a disadvantage in other environments (gills would be a huge drain of energy to develop and maintain if we are not going to be actually living in the water for most of the time). ---
**Author:** ![\_cc](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/_/e19b73/32.png) [@\_cc](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/_cc)\ **Post date:** [May 25, 2012, 1:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/re-engineering-the-human-body-how-good-could-we-make-it/622719/64 "2012-05-25T13:54:58Z")
> [@thelurkinghorror](#): > > > [@](#): > > > > Just checking, is the OP talking only about genetic engineering biological enhancements, or are cyborg enhancements allowed, such as replacing joints with higher efficiency mechanical joints. > > 1. To where? Acuity is limited by a bottleneck at several points. Obviously the solution is just _more eyes_, of different types, sensitivity, ranges, color receptors, wider field of view, etc. We’d have to see if the brain needed any significant modifications to process the input, though I hypothesize the answer is “not really”. ---
**Author:** ![thelurkinghorror](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/7c8e57/32.png) [@thelurkinghorror](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/thelurkinghorror)\ **Post date:** [May 25, 2012, 7:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/re-engineering-the-human-body-how-good-could-we-make-it/622719/65 "2012-05-25T19:49:00Z")
That’s what other species do. Like jumping spiders: the two big eyes are their “fancy” eyes, while the others are for just movement, etc. Some of the things you mention we might have the infrastructure for, e.g. it has been shown that 2-cone monkeys can be given 3 cone types and make use of it in a useful way. ---
**Author:** ![KarlGauss](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/karlgauss/32/3713_2.png) [@KarlGauss](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KarlGauss)\ **Post date:** [May 25, 2012, 9:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/re-engineering-the-human-body-how-good-could-we-make-it/622719/66 "2012-05-25T21:43:33Z")
One idea would be to create an immune system that doesn’t destroy its host while it kills of “invaders”. I refer not just to autoimmunity, but to the very common and potentially very lethal effects of merely fighting off a simple bacterial infection (i.e. eliminate things like [SIRS](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SIRS)/[sepsis](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sepsis) and [ARDS](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acute_Respiratory_Distress_Syndrome). ---
**Author:** ![Folacin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/folacin/32/3195_2.png) [@Folacin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Folacin)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2012, 12:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/re-engineering-the-human-body-how-good-could-we-make-it/622719/67 "2012-05-26T00:47:56Z")
> [@Gagundathar](#): > > In this article, S. Matthew Liao, professor of philosophy and bioethics at New York University, proposes (among other less radical ideas) that genetic engineering be used to reduce individual human’s carbon footprint by reducing their physical size. > > On the surface, this seems like a pretty good idea. Smaller humans mean smaller required caloric intake, if nothing else. This looked like a good article. Let me know what y’all think, please. Vonnegut cover this in his novel [Slapstick](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slapstick_(novel)). If I remember correctly, the Chinese eventually become so small that they basically become viruses, lethal to full-size humans. ---
**Author:** ![eburacum45](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eburacum45/32/8690_2.png) [@eburacum45](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/eburacum45)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2012, 10:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/re-engineering-the-human-body-how-good-could-we-make-it/622719/68 "2012-05-26T10:27:29Z")
> [@Dr.Strangelove](#): > > One nice idea I’ve come across is the [respirocyte](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Respirocyte). Basically, it’s an engineered red blood cell that stores highly pressurized oxygen. A managable quantity in the bloodstream could allow you to hold your breath for hours at a time. They require nanotechnology, but only that of a fairly basic kind, and could probably be built today if we had a molecular-precision “printer”. I’m quite fond of the respirocyte idea, myself, but this would fall into the category of ‘cyborgisation’ or ‘prosthetics’ rather than genetic engineering. Other possible prosthetic enhancements could be bones made from aggregared carbon nanorods (hyperdiamond) > **[Aggregated diamond nanorod](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aggregated_diamond_nanorod)** > > Aggregated diamond nanorods, or ADNRs, are a nanocrystalline form of diamond, also known as nanodiamond or hyperdiamond. > Nanodiamond or hyperdiamond was produced by compression of graphite in 2003 by a group of researchers in Japan and in the same work, published in Nature, it was shown to be much harder than bulk diamond. Later, it was also produced by compression of fullerene and confirmed to be the hardest and least compressible known material, with an isothermal bulk modulus of 491 gigapasca... and artficial muscle fibres stronger than muscle cells. There might be a role for genetic engineering in all this, however; removing biological organs and replacing them with artificial ones would interfere with a myriad different interconected biological systems, and the remaining tissues would need to be adjusted to compensate. ---
**Author:** ![eburacum45](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eburacum45/32/8690_2.png) [@eburacum45](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/eburacum45)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2012, 10:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/re-engineering-the-human-body-how-good-could-we-make-it/622719/69 "2012-05-26T10:43:18Z")
This .pdf article from Scientific American gives a few interesting ideas concerning improvements to the human frame; [http://www.eebweb.arizona.edu/michod/Classes/182/182%202006/Better%20human%20design.pdf](http://www.eebweb.arizona.edu/michod/Classes/182/182%202006/Better%20human%20design.pdf) assuming humans could be genetically engineered to live longer, the body could do with some improvements to ensure that they don’t suffer from wear and tear as much as unimproved people… ---
**Author:** ![JustinC](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/justinc/32/8083_2.png) [@JustinC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JustinC)\ **Post date:** [May 26, 2012, 3:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/re-engineering-the-human-body-how-good-could-we-make-it/622719/70 "2012-05-26T15:38:06Z")
\<69th reply\>No one mentioned double-jointed back bones and a longer tongue yet?\ [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/re-engineering-the-human-body-how-good-could-we-make-it/622719.md?page=3)