Dawn of superhumans: genetically engineering humans to superhumans.
We see them in the movies, and science fiction stories, from superman to the x-men, with abilities such as enhanced physical strength, agility, or senses and many more, but are they just fiction and fantasies, or could this be the next step in human evolution.
Thanks to biotechnology and genetic engineering it is now possible for man to design and control his own evolution. Scientists today can pinpoint many specific genes such as, living a long life, being lean, having an improved memory, and improved healing among many other astonishing traits. Some traits such as night vision, amazing agility, supersonic hearing, and the ability to breath underwater are traits of the animal kingdom that humans miss out on.
For example, it is known that many animals do not have the ability to see in colors, such as mice, in an experiment done by University of Munich, succeeded to give mice the human ability to see in color, therefore is human traits can be engineered into animals, it is possible that humans could be mutated to have desirable animal traits. The theory now is that if the gene wanted exists in specie, then it could be transformed to humans.
This all goes under human enhancement technologies (HET), which are techniques that can be used not simply for treating diseases, disability, and even for enhancing human characteristics. By overcoming the limitations of the human body, examples are reproductive technology, human performance enhancing drugs, and plastic sugary.
Enhancing humans to superhuman maybe theory for the mean time, yet there is still a big possibility, for more studies have to be done on it, regarding side effects, like if enhancing cretin trait will lead to an error of another, and not just that side of the topic also on the ethical side of it.
Links:
http://www.geneticsandsociety.org/article.php?id=
http://www.springerlink.com/content/w014r648k66p3m38/
