547: The Genetic Arms Race | How CRISPR and AI Destroy the World

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Speaker 3 The sun finally sets.

Speaker 5 You step out of the abandoned warehouse, keeping to the shadows.

Speaker 6 You can't be seen.

Speaker 7 You're what's called an imperfect.

Speaker 8 Your parents conceived you the old-fashioned way, without genetic enhancements and without legal permission. They meant well, but your fate was sealed before you were born.

Speaker 13 You were nine years old when the tracers found them.

Speaker 3 The last time you saw your parents, dad was shoving you down a hatch, whispering for you to run.

Speaker 7 Before you had time to respond, he closed the hatch and covered it with the carpet.

Speaker 10 When you heard your mother's muffled screams, you took off down the tunnel.

Speaker 17 That was 17 years ago.

Speaker 5 You still cling to the hope that they're alive in a prison somewhere, but deep down, you know the truth.

Speaker 19 Your growling stomach snaps you out of the daydream.

Speaker 18 Imperfect or not, you still have to eat, and the factory district has plenty of off-the-books work.

Speaker 13 Sure, they pay you barely enough to survive, but they don't want to visit from the tracers any more than you do.

Speaker 22 It takes a long time to get to work.

Speaker 8 You have to stay far away from the patrols.

Speaker 10 Tracers can smell sweat and even hear a heartbeat half a mile away.

Speaker 25 Your heart murmur is a dead giveaway of imperfection.

Speaker 12 You hold back a sniffle as a tear rolls down your cheek and wonder how the world came to this.

Speaker 27 Then you remember something your mother said a long, long time ago.

Speaker 28 CRISPR.

Speaker 12 CRISPR changed everything.

Speaker 27 Mark and Grace desperately wanted to have a child.

Speaker 29 In 2017, they attended a lecture in Shenzhen, China about genetic editing.

Speaker 13 The guest speaker was Professor Hanzhang Kui, a Chinese genetic researcher. After the talk, the couple explained their situation to Dr.

Speaker 12 Han Zhang Kui.

Speaker 30 Mark was HIV positive, Grace was not.

Speaker 8 Any child they had would carry the disease.

Speaker 30 Hojang Kuei told the couple he could help them with a revolutionary new therapy he was developing.

Speaker 20 Through a gene editing technology called CRISPR, he could make their children immune to HIV.

Speaker 28 The therapy would also make any descendants of these children HIV resistant forever.

Speaker 20 Hojang Kuei performed the procedure and it was a success.

Speaker 12 Mark and Grace had two healthy twin baby girls.

Speaker 36 But Dr.

Speaker 37 Hong Zhang Kuei wasn't being completely honest with them.

Speaker 38 CRISPR was a revolutionary new technology, that was true.

Speaker 21 But it was so new, no one in the world would have let him use it on children.

Speaker 25 On November 25th, 2018, news of the successful treatment was revealed to the international scientific community.

Speaker 40 But Hong Zhang Kuei and his breakthrough success was not a cause for celebration.

Speaker 12 Scientists around the world were horrified.

Speaker 4 They called him China's China's Dr.

Speaker 19 Frankenstein.

Speaker 30 He lost his job, was fined about half a million dollars, and was sentenced to three years in prison by the Chinese government.

Speaker 8 He also made history.

Speaker 7 Human genes could now be altered. Unwanted genes could be removed, and more desirable genes can be inserted.

Speaker 37 The genetic genie was out of the bottle.

Speaker 13 There was no going back.

Speaker 17 CRISPR gene editing worked, and people started to wonder, what else can it do?

Speaker 25 For decades, scientists debated the cause of global warming.

Speaker 45 Trillions of dollars were invested in clean energy, yet the warming continued.

Speaker 3 Birth rates were already crashing when the planet was hit with pandemic after pandemic.

Speaker 46 Then a breakthrough was made.

Speaker 45 A team of researchers discovered how to use artificial intelligence to optimize the human genome.

Speaker 13 By feeding vast amounts of genetic data into advanced machine learning algorithms, AI could identify genetic combinations for optimal health.

Speaker 30 At first, the technology was used sparingly, reserved only for the most severe cases of genetic illness.

Speaker 12 Children with conditions like Huntington's, cystic fibrosis, and sickle cell disease could now live normal lives, and the disease wouldn't be passed on to their children.

Speaker 12 Soon, wealthy parents were using CRISPR to give their children an edge.

Speaker 47 AI could provide the exact DNA sequence to optimize any genetic trait.

Speaker 20 Their children were taller, more intelligent, more athletic, and more resistant to illness.

Speaker 13 But in just a few years, the technology improved, becoming less expensive and more widely available, so more parents used it.

Speaker 38 The results were astounding.

Speaker 33 The United Nations saw CRISPR as a way to solve many of the world's problems.

Speaker 28 If they could use AI to create a healthier, smarter, and more resilient population, maybe they could prevent the disasters that threatened humanity in the past.

Speaker 50 The voting has been completed. Please lock the machine.

Speaker 47 On December 1st, the world celebrated.

Speaker 52 The result of the vote is

Speaker 11 as follows.

Speaker 12 The United Nations had passed the Genetic Optimization Act.

Speaker 20 Under the act, all parents were required to have their children's genes optimized by AI before birth.

Speaker 20 We are being the ones!

Speaker 27 At first, there was resistance.

Speaker 47 Many saw the act as a violation of individual freedom.

Speaker 27 Religious groups argued this was playing God.

Speaker 27 But as the benefits of the technology became clear, the opposition faded.

Speaker 42 Parents who had once been skeptical now willingly had their children optimized to give them the best possible start in life.

Speaker 55 Over the next few years, genetic diseases were eradicated.

Speaker 43 Athletes shattered records that had stood for decades.

Speaker 3 The average human IQ skyrocketed.

Speaker 54 Scientific breakthroughs were happening on a daily basis.

Speaker 12 The human species, it seemed, was finally reaching its full potential.

Speaker 59 But it wasn't just humanity evolving.

Speaker 55 AI also evolved and at a much faster rate.

Speaker 42 The algorithms became more advanced and started to favor genetic traits not just in health and intelligence, but also behavior.

Speaker 12 Obedience, conformity, and loyalty to the state.

Speaker 16 Children born under the Act were healthy and smart, yes, but they were also docile and easily controlled.

Speaker 43 Nations no longer went to war, they didn't see a point in it.

Speaker 23 AI helped create an abundance of food and energy, more than enough resources for everyone on Earth to live a comfortable life.

Speaker 50 But before long, AI, now called the Guardian, was put in charge of law enforcement and judgment.

Speaker 21 Who could be more impartial than a computer?

Speaker 37 People didn't see much danger in giving the Guardian AI this power.

Speaker 49 After all, crime was almost eliminated.

Speaker 49 Almost.

Speaker 11 There was still a lingering problem, the imperfects.

Speaker 39 Children born outside the system without genetic optimization.

Speaker 62 They were seen as a threat, a reminder of the chaos of the past.

Speaker 44 Laws were passed restricting their rights and movements, forcing them to the margins of society.

Speaker 40 Finally, it was determined that all non-optimized individuals had to be eliminated.

Speaker 64 The imperfects could not be allowed to pollute the new optimized gene pool.

Speaker 57 It was a matter of survival.

Speaker 54 The fate of the entire human race depended on killing every last imperfect on Earth.

Speaker 14 But imperfects were hard to find.

Speaker 30 They knew how to hide, disrupt the system, and worst of all,

Speaker 7 they continued to breed.

Speaker 65 So the Guardian developed a new algorithm to create children with a completely different combination of genetic traits.

Speaker 46 obedience and loyalty were still part of the mix, but emotions were suppressed.

Speaker 22 These children learned to commit violence without empathy.

Speaker 18 They were given the traits, training, and tools to be ideal hunters.

Speaker 13 Thousands of these children quickly grew to be men who were assigned to a unit that handled tactical retrieval and criminal resistance.

Speaker 16 But people just called them tracers.

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Speaker 63 dna or dioxoribonucleic acid is a long string of molecules called nucleotides containing one of four nitrogenous base pairs adenine with thiamine cytosine with guanine or ATCG.

Speaker 5 You know this.

Speaker 42 CRISPR stands for Clustered Regularly Interspaced Short Palindromic Repeats.

Speaker 55 That's a mouthful, but it's not hard to understand.

Speaker 17 It refers to those ATCGs.

Speaker 81 In the late 1980s, scientists were studying bacteria DNA and noticed odd repeating sequences.

Speaker 24 Not only did these sequences repeat, but they were palindromes.

Speaker 83 You know, something that reads forward the same as backwards, like never odd or even, or Madam in Eden, I'm Adam.

Speaker 84 A man, a plan, a canal, Panama.

Speaker 19 Yeah, that's one of my favorites.

Speaker 84 You, banana boy.

Speaker 21 Yeah, that one's good too.

Speaker 84 Eat dad, no bondage?

Speaker 12 Okay, that's enough.

Speaker 13 So let's say one section of the DNA strand was G-A-A-T-T-C.

Speaker 49 The opposite side was C-T-T-A-A-G, palindrome.

Speaker 27 That's an oversimplification, but it's the gist.

Speaker 42 They found these repeats over and over in the bacterium's DNA.

Speaker 85 In between these repeating sections were sections of random DNA, not palindromes, nothing special, random.

Speaker 19 But a few years later, scientists realized those random sequences in between the palindromes weren't random at all.

Speaker 17 Those sequences were the genetic codes of viruses that infected the bacterium at one point.

Speaker 18 CRISPR works like this.

Speaker 4 A virus attacks a bacterium by injecting its DNA.

Speaker 57 Usually bacteria can't survive this, but the ones that do take a snapshot of the virus DNA.

Speaker 64 That snapshot is then encoded into the bacterium's own DNA, like a memory.

Speaker 13 So if that virus attacks again, the bacterium checks the virus DNA against its own little DNA database.

Speaker 13 If it finds a match, it uses a protein called a CAS to cut the virus DNA at a specific location called the cleavage site.

Speaker 84 Oh, I like this site of cleavage.

Speaker 36 Stop it.

Speaker 13 When the virus DNA is cut, it dies.

Speaker 29 Then Then in 2020, scientists Emmanuel Charpentier and Jennifer Doudna discovered CRISPR-Cas9.

Speaker 13 Cas9 is a protein that makes it much easier to target and edit individual genes selectively.

Speaker 44 This discovery won them the 2020 Nobel Prize in Chemistry, and the applications are endless.

Speaker 33 CRISPR-Cas9 could mean the end of genetic diseases.

Speaker 18 Victoria Gray suffered from sickle cell disease.

Speaker 25 This is a genetic disease that deforms red blood cells.

Speaker 39 Instead of being round, some are shaped like a crescent moon or a sickle.

Speaker 19 These deformed cells cause all kinds of problems.

Speaker 38 Victoria was constantly tired and in pain.

Speaker 12 She couldn't walk.

Speaker 27 Sometimes she couldn't feed herself because she couldn't lift a spoon.

Speaker 63 In 2019, she was the first person in the U.S.

Speaker 38 to receive CRISPR-based treatment for sickle cell disease.

Speaker 27 Doctors extracted stem cells from her bone marrow, used CRISPR to correct the sickle cell mutation, then infused the modified cells back into her body.

Speaker 25 The goal was to give her body the ability to produce healthy red blood cells on its own.

Speaker 49 It worked.

Speaker 10 Victoria now lives a normal life.

Speaker 17 CRISPR research is now being directed at other diseases like cancer, diabetes, cystic fibrosis, MS, and more.

Speaker 12 But those studies use CRISPR to remove dangerous genes.

Speaker 15 CRISPR can also add genes, favorable genes.

Speaker 4 And if you can do that, people will.

Speaker 42 Wouldn't you want your child to be smarter, stronger, resistant to illness?

Speaker 49 Every parent would.

Speaker 16 But using technology to improve the genetic quality of the population, there is a word for that: eugenics.

Speaker 11 Your shift at the factory ends, and your real work begins.

Speaker 27 Six months ago, you were approached by a woman in the Resistance who fought against the global AI system now called the Guardian.

Speaker 40 Of course, you'd heard of the Resistance but never considered joining.

Speaker 64 Every other day, the news ran a story celebrating the execution of its members. But this woman's passion convinced you that you had to do something to help.

Speaker 79 We need to restore genetic diversity and end the AI's control over human reproduction. Its pursuit of perfection is creating a society of automatons.

Speaker 79 We're becoming obedient drones and losing all that makes us human.

Speaker 36 When was the last time you saw true art or heard music that stirred your soul?

Speaker 79 If we don't stop the guardian soon, imperfects like us will be completely gone, hunted by tracers until nobody's left who remembers what being human really means.

Speaker 28 Your training began the next day, and it was grueling.

Speaker 40 Your resistance cell has people with many different backgrounds: doctors, engineers, even former tracers.

Speaker 18 They taught you how to hack computer systems, evade patrols, and handle weapons.

Speaker 14 Here in New York was one of the Guardian's main hubs, 33 Thomas Street, the former ATT building now called Titan Point.

Speaker 27 Many years ago, the United States ran a vast and highly illegal surveillance program out of Titan Point.

Speaker 55 The program was exposed in documents released by someone named Edward Snowden.

Speaker 49 You would think that Americans would have been outraged to learn that their own government was spying on them, but the news came and went, and nothing happened.

Speaker 62 Congressmen, senior military officials, even the director of intelligence publicly lied about the program.

Speaker 83 Nothing happened.

Speaker 89 Does the NSA collect any type of data at all on millions or hundreds of millions of Americans?

Speaker 60 No, sir.

Speaker 8 It was that kind of apathy that led to this mess.

Speaker 12 The resistance wouldn't make that mistake.

Speaker 14 Titan Point, aka 33 Thomas Street, is a fortress.

Speaker 62 It's impenetrable, but the Resistance has someone on the inside.

Speaker 43 If everything goes to plan, you and three members of your cell will slip in through the underground garage.

Speaker 27 Your contact will take you to a workstation connected to the Guardian's network.

Speaker 17 Then all you have to do is plug in a portable disc.

Speaker 40 On the disk are variations of old computer viruses designed by the U.S., Israel, Iran, and the new Soviet Union.

Speaker 4 Viruses like Stuxnet and NitroZeus, designed by humans, perfected by AI.

Speaker 24 If they work, they could cripple the network and take down the entire power grid.

Speaker 19 Communications, transportation, banks, and all financial systems all would go down.

Speaker 11 For a time, anyway.

Speaker 48 But time is all you need.

Speaker 16 AI destroyed by AI.

Speaker 16 You smile at the poetic irony of it.

Speaker 81 You reach the heavy steel door and check your watch.

Speaker 27 5.54 a.m.

Speaker 24 It's time.

Speaker 16 The moment your watch hits 5.55, you hear the heavy locking mechanisms disengage.

Speaker 48 The door opens and your contact waves you in.

Speaker 60 Today, we're exploring deep in the North American wilderness among nature's wildest plants, animals, and

Speaker 75 cows.

Speaker 71 Uh, you're actually on an Organic Valley dairy farm where nutritious, delicious organic food gets its start.

Speaker 70 But there's so much nature.

Speaker 68 Exactly.

Speaker 69 Organic Valley small family farms protect the land and the plants and animals that call it home.

Speaker 36 Extraordinary.

Speaker 73 Sure is.

Speaker 70 Organic Valley, protecting where your food comes from.

Speaker 71 Learn more about their delicious dairy at ov.coop.

Speaker 66 So, what do this animal

Speaker 36 and this animal

Speaker 36 and this animal

Speaker 36 have in common?

Speaker 67 They all live on an organic valley farm.

Speaker 71 Organic Valley dairy comes from small organic family farms that protect the land and the plants and animals that live on it from toxic pesticides, which leads to a thriving ecosystem and delicious, nutritious milk and cheese.

Speaker 73 Learn more at ov.coop and taste the difference.

Speaker 60 Today, we're exploring deep in the North American wilderness among nature's wildest plants, animals, and

Speaker 75 cows.

Speaker 71 Uh, you're actually on an Organic Valley dairy farm where nutritious, delicious, organic food gets its start.

Speaker 36 But there's so much nature.

Speaker 68 Exactly.

Speaker 69 Organic Valley small family farms protect the land and the plants and animals that call it home.

Speaker 36 Extraordinary.

Speaker 73 Sure is.

Speaker 70 Organic Valley, protecting where your food comes from.

Speaker 71 Learn more about their delicious dairy at ov.coop.

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Speaker 13 Genetics is a relatively new science.

Speaker 62 The earliest experiments were conducted by Gregor Mendel in the mid-19th century, studying inherited traits in pea plants.

Speaker 53 But genetically manipulating crops has been going on since the end of the Stone Age.

Speaker 24 It was as simple as keeping the good crops and throwing out the bad ones.

Speaker 64 Traditional genetically modified organism or GMO methods enable the the creation of plants with favorable traits like increased yield and resistance to disease.

Speaker 49 Corn and cotton are engineered to resist pests, reducing the need for dangerous chemical-based pesticides.

Speaker 88 Rice has been genetically modified to produce higher levels of vitamin A, addressing vitamin deficiencies in developing countries.

Speaker 38 Before CRISPR, most of this was achieved with selective breeding and gene splicing.

Speaker 62 Gene splicing involves physically cutting DNA and inserting new genes into the genome.

Speaker 30 In 2009, Japanese scientists spliced jellyfish DNA into marmoset embryos to make them glow in the dark.

Speaker 62 Not only did this work, but the gene is now passed on to their offspring.

Speaker 13 This is the first time this has been achieved in a primate.

Speaker 4 Since then, scientists have created glowing sheep, pigs, and even glowing cats.

Speaker 84 Oh, I like this glowing cats idea. Easier to see the evil lurking in the shadows.

Speaker 37 But gene splicing is difficult and not very precise. Whereas CRISPR is so precise, it's like copying and pasting specific genes.

Speaker 62 You can also use CRISPR to turn certain genes on or off in any genome, in any organism, including humans.

Speaker 39 In addition to curing disease, researchers are exploring CRISPR to create new biofuels.

Speaker 25 There's a team genetically modifying mosquitoes so they can't carry malaria.

Speaker 13 For years, scientists have tried to revive extinct animal species.

Speaker 8 The process is difficult and they've had mixed results, but it's much easier with CRISPR, and there's big money in de-extinct animals.

Speaker 93 What if bringing species back from extinction could help bring critically endangered species back from the brink, help hundreds of threatened species thrive, and support the restoration of the planet's critical ecosystems?

Speaker 79 That's the goal of Colossal.

Speaker 48 A company called Colossal Biosciences secured $150 million in financing just last year.

Speaker 62 They plan to resurrect the woolly mammoth, the dodo bird, and other extinct species.

Speaker 9 What are they nuts?

Speaker 84 It's like these people never seen a movie. They making Jurassic Puck for real.

Speaker 56 They kind of are.

Speaker 40 And when a new technology emerges, governments of the world ask, is there a military application?

Speaker 43 Well, in this case, the answer is yes.

Speaker 13 CRISPR has launched a new kind of arms race.

Speaker 44 Countries are hard at work right now trying to build the world's first super soldier.

Speaker 94 When Guardian AI incorporated every nation of the world into a single government, war, drought, and famine were eliminated. The only challenge to our peace peace was the imperfects.

Speaker 94 We had no way of tracking down these terrorists until now.

Speaker 95 Today, Guardian released the first deployment of the elite tactical retrieval and criminal resistance team known as Tracers.

Speaker 95 Tracers have been genetically designed to be the perfect hunters. They're physically imposing, standing well over six feet tall, with lean, muscular builds.

Speaker 95 They are the strongest and fastest humans ever to exist.

Speaker 95 They can maintain a 35-mile per hour sprint for almost 10 minutes. Guardian says future generations of tracers will be even faster and with greater stamina.

Speaker 95 Like a chameleon, a tracer can change the color of his skin to match his surroundings. Their eyes are enhanced with advanced optics, which include 100x zoom, night vision, and infrared.

Speaker 95 From over 100 yards away, a tracer can hear breath or even a heartbeat.

Speaker 95 They can smell sweat from even farther, even a length of their target target.

Speaker 75 Tracers also possess enhanced cognitive abilities.

Speaker 95 With their neuralink implants, their minds process information thousands of times faster than a normal human.

Speaker 95 They can analyze complex data, gather clues, and predict their targets' movements with uncanny accuracy.

Speaker 94 No doubt, Imperfects Imperfects will target tracers whenever they encounter them, but tracers are extremely difficult to kill.

Speaker 95 They can regenerate damaged tissue, mend broken bones, and even regrow lost limbs. Tracers have been engineered to have an extremely high pain tolerance.

Speaker 95 They can push through injuries that would incapacitate a normal person, never slowing down or losing focus of their mission.

Speaker 95 Tracers are relentless, unstoppable, and utterly devoted to their purpose. They will not rest until every last imperfect has been eliminated from the gene pool.
Then, we will finally have peace.

Speaker 55 Despite the World Health Organization condemning the use of CRISPR for anything other than medical necessities, governments around the world are very interested in its military potential.

Speaker 58 What could the military do with CRISPR?

Speaker 49 Think Captain America or Wolverine.

Speaker 16 Real-life superheroes.

Speaker 62 Super hearing and night vision. Increased muscle mass and bone density.

Speaker 10 Tolerance to pain, immunity to poison, reduced sleep requirements, even regenerative healing.

Speaker 17 The possibilities are endless.

Speaker 13 But here's something scary.

Speaker 3 These changes don't have to be made to embryos.

Speaker 13 They can be made to full-grown adults.

Speaker 23 In 2017, Russian President Vladimir Putin said his scientists would soon be able to create a soldier with specific characteristics that would let them fight without pain or fear or regret.

Speaker 56 Yep.

Speaker 62 And China doesn't want to be left behind.

Speaker 13 They're allegedly testing soldiers right now.

Speaker 86 And they have found that there is ample evidence that Chinese scientists are very interested in applying biotechnology to the battlefield and specifically the CRISPR gene editing tool, which raises a ton of questions.

Speaker 86 Picture super strong commandos who can operate on three hours sleep or a sniper who can see twice as far as a normal person.

Speaker 84 Oh, maybe that's what happened to Wuyin. They were trying to create a Chinese Batman.

Speaker 47 Yeah, let's not get into it.

Speaker 3 In 2020, France announced it's looking into enhancing their soldiers.

Speaker 13 French Defense Minister Florence Parley said they have no immediate plans for invasive technology for their soldiers, but she said other countries wouldn't hold back, so they have to be prepared.

Speaker 10 In 2021, the UK entered the arms race.

Speaker 13 The UK's Advanced Research and Invention Agency has been given £800 million to research genetically enhancing soldiers.

Speaker 47 And you can't have an arms race without the good old USA.

Speaker 41 In 2019, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, or DARPA, launched a project to explore genetically editing soldiers.

Speaker 19 One last thing.

Speaker 49 Remember Colossal Biosciences?

Speaker 56 Yep.

Speaker 3 They have a new investor.

Speaker 84 Oh no, a big pharma company?

Speaker 9 Worse.

Speaker 84 A big tech company?

Speaker 9 Worse.

Speaker 84 Well, the only thing worse would would be, uh, uh, wait.

Speaker 36 Do you mean

Speaker 47 the CIA?

Speaker 9 Oh, no!

Speaker 36 Yep.

Speaker 59 The CIA gets a black budget of about $100 billion a year, more or less.

Speaker 81 They're throwing a lot of that money at genetic research.

Speaker 13 Colossal Biosciences, Ginkgo Bioworks, Metabiota, Biomatrica, and T2 Biosystems all allegedly receive millions in CIA funding.

Speaker 12 These companies use artificial intelligence for gene mapping, genetic testing, and other DNA research.

Speaker 18 Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa.

Speaker 36 What?

Speaker 84 One of the companies the CIA funds is called T2.

Speaker 56 Yep.

Speaker 84 That's literally what Terminator 2 is called.

Speaker 49 It was.

Speaker 84 If the CIA is using AI and gene editing, they are literally creating Skynet, like for real.

Speaker 9 They really are.

Speaker 16 And speaking of Terminator 2, remember the rest of the title of that movie?

Speaker 84 Judgment Day.

Speaker 46 Judgment Day.

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Speaker 40 judgment day came and went as expected your crimes counts of treason terrorism conspiracy resisting arrest assaulting an agent of the state and the charge every imperfect faces, defying natural order.

Speaker 37 The sentence for any one of these is death.

Speaker 42 There was no reason for them to pile the charges on.

Speaker 13 They even threw an account of breaking and entering.

Speaker 16 You check the clock on the wall, 6.55.

Speaker 48 Five minutes left.

Speaker 33 Five minutes left to live.

Speaker 42 In five minutes, your cell will open and the guards will take you to a room.

Speaker 83 What happens in that room, nobody knows, only rumors.

Speaker 3 But whoever goes in that that room doesn't come out.

Speaker 48 Four minutes left.

Speaker 17 This is a worse fate than the others on your team.

Speaker 12 They were all killed by tracers during the Titan point job.

Speaker 40 At least they didn't have to sit in a cell counting down days, then hours, now minutes until their death.

Speaker 64 The plan was going so well, for a few minutes at least. Your contact opened the door right on schedule.

Speaker 17 A quick ride up to the 15th floor, which was temporarily closed for renovation.

Speaker 10 Then into the telco closet where the workstation was waiting, just like the blueprints said it would be.

Speaker 43 The portable drive fit, the virus uploaded.

Speaker 42 You never felt more elation in your life.

Speaker 38 It was pure joy.

Speaker 39 Then you heard the gunshots, and you knew.

Speaker 37 There was no reason to hide, they knew you were there.

Speaker 17 When you opened the door, there were two tracers standing over the bodies of your friends, and there was your contact, staring at his shoes.

Speaker 18 He betrayed you.

Speaker 47 It was a long shot anyway.

Speaker 25 The AI was always a step ahead.

Speaker 13 You don't know how many resistant cells are left, but you can scratch New York off the list.

Speaker 51 Three minutes left. You spent the last two weeks in your cell going over the plan again and again, trying to find the hole, where it went wrong.

Speaker 21 But there was no hole.

Speaker 39 The plan was perfect.

Speaker 11 The problem was your contact.

Speaker 10 He was human, an optimized human.

Speaker 64 It was hard to blame him. He was bred to be obedient, loyal, and even fearful of authority.

Speaker 13 Trusting him was a mistake. You've never really had a chance.

Speaker 35 You hear footsteps in the hall getting closer.

Speaker 3 The jangling of keys.

Speaker 13 The door unlocks and opens.

Speaker 65 The guard nods his head as if to say, let's go.

Speaker 48 I still have two minutes, you tell him.

Speaker 43 He looks at your wall clock and nods.

Speaker 47 You're right, he says, do you want to wait?

Speaker 83 In a flash, you recall the memory of your father shoving you down the hatch, the shouting, the crawling in the dark, and the hiding.

Speaker 44 Most of all, you remember the hiding.

Speaker 18 Hiding for years.

Speaker 63 Fearing this moment would happen one day, and here it is.

Speaker 13 You tell the guard, nah, I'm ready. You hop up from your bunk, casually walk past the guard, and start down the long gray hall.

Speaker 12 It's finally time to stop hiding.

Speaker 27 Eugenics is defined as a set of beliefs and practices designed to improve the genetic quality of the human population.

Speaker 27 Eugenics is most often associated with the Nazis, but it didn't start with them or end with them.

Speaker 59 The sterilization of people considered unfit has happened on every continent and in every major country.

Speaker 27 In 1907, the Indiana Eugenics Law was passed in the U.S., the first of its kind in the world.

Speaker 3 The law authorized the involuntary sterilization of certain individuals, specifically the mentally ill.

Speaker 33 By the 1930s, more than 30 states had passed similar laws.

Speaker 42 These laws primarily targeted individuals in mental institutions or prisons,

Speaker 25 but they also affected others in the community deemed unfit for reproduction, including people with disabilities, those with mental illness, and individuals of certain racial and ethnic backgrounds.

Speaker 11 Oh, no.

Speaker 17 Yep, this law was abused.

Speaker 13 In Sweden, more than 60,000 people were sterilized between 1934 and 1976.

Speaker 13 Just like the US, the program was designed to prevent people from reproducing who are deemed by the state to have undesirable traits.

Speaker 53 The mentally ill, the mentally disabled, the physically deformed, or anyone behaving in a way considered socially problematic or genetically inferior.

Speaker 13 In modern times, eugenics is not accepted as scientific. It's considered erroneous and immoral.
Eugenics is no longer an acceptable practice.

Speaker 18 Or is it?

Speaker 25 Many countries allow women to terminate a pregnancy if the fetus shows signs of impairment, illness, or a genetic disorder.

Speaker 3 Depending on the country, up to 90% of women choose to terminate.

Speaker 25 Is this eugenics?

Speaker 40 I'm not judging, I'm just asking.

Speaker 3 But consider this.

Speaker 4 What if instead of terminating a fetus, that fetus's illness could be repaired?

Speaker 48 CRISPR not only makes that possible, it makes it easy.

Speaker 23 This would lead to more births of healthy babies.

Speaker 16 But technology was used to alter that child, which alters the gene pool.

Speaker 30 Is this eugenics?

Speaker 13 It's an ongoing debate.

Speaker 62 There are valid arguments on both sides.

Speaker 57 On one hand, preventing a child from having Down syndrome, cystic fibrosis, Huntington's disease, sickle cell disease, sets up that child and his or her parents for an easier life and spares that family a a lot of pain and expense.

Speaker 58 On the other hand, CRISPR technology does interfere with the natural order of things.

Speaker 12 Of course, it's done with good intentions, but whenever we tamper with nature, there can be, and there usually are, unexpected consequences.

Speaker 100 You're juggling a lot, full-time job, side hustle, maybe a family, and now you're thinking about grad school?

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Speaker 31 You're juggling a lot.

Speaker 100 Full-time job, side hustle, maybe a family, and now you're thinking about grad school?

Speaker 31 That's not crazy.

Speaker 87 That's ambitious.

Speaker 101 At American Public University, we respect the hustle and we're built for it. Our flexible online master's programs are made for real life because big dreams deserve a real path.

Speaker 87 At APU, the bigger your ambition, the better we fit.

Speaker 101 Learn more about our 40-plus career relevant master's degrees and certificates at apu.apus.edu.

Speaker 105 Free emergency planning tips in 15 seconds. Let's go.
Practice manually opening your garage door. Consider backup power options for your home.

Speaker 105 Save copies of important medical and contact contact information. Wow, that was fast.
Visit safety actioncenter.pe.com for more.

Speaker 105 This is the emergency broadcast system. This is not a test.

Speaker 106 In a historic victory for global stability, Guardian AI has successfully neutralized the terrorist group known as the Resistance.

Speaker 106 This misguided faction sought to undermine the peace and progress achieved through Guardian's genetic optimization programs.

Speaker 106 Thanks to the tireless efforts of the tracers working out of the New York branch, the Resistance's leadership has been captured and the network dismantled.

Speaker 78 Guardian will now be able to continue its vital work unimpeded, ensuring a future of health, harmony, and security for all citizens.

Speaker 47 The world can now breathe a sigh of relief.

Speaker 78 Knowing that the Guardian is watching over us.

Speaker 6 Always watching.

Speaker 25 In 2021, the World Health Organization started putting together a set of global standards regarding CRISPR and gene editing.

Speaker 37 The WHO said gene editing should be used only in cases of medical necessity.

Speaker 27 The report explicitly says gene technology should not be used in any military application. But there's a slight problem with the report.

Speaker 43 That isn't law.

Speaker 57 It's up to each country to decide how they use CRISPR.

Speaker 3 And it's safe to assume some countries aren't going to agree with the WHO.

Speaker 85 In fact, the evidence shows all the major world powers are gearing up for a new kind of war to be fought by a new kind of soldier.

Speaker 38 How we use CRISPR will shape the future of our world.

Speaker 41 The evidence will be recorded not just in our history books, but in our DNA.

Speaker 48 A lot of today's story was speculation, and the future doesn't have to be so dark.

Speaker 13 CRISPR has the potential to eliminate genetic diseases.

Speaker 57 HIV, genetic blindness, MS, even cancer can almost be completely eradicated like smallpox was in 1980.

Speaker 83 But remember Dr.

Speaker 82 Hojong Kwei, who created twin girls immune to HIV?

Speaker 36 Well, he didn't.

Speaker 83 It didn't work.

Speaker 13 And even Jennifer Doudna herself has warned that CRISPR carries with it great risk.

Speaker 107 The potential to do incredible things and make incredible advances that will be beneficial to our society, but hand in hand with that goes these large risks.

Speaker 57 There have been at least two published, but not highly publicized, studies that show CRISPR causes damage to DNA.

Speaker 25 The study found deletions of thousands of DNA bases, including at spots far from the edit.

Speaker 84 Cleavage site.

Speaker 9 Right.

Speaker 13 Some of those deletions silence genes that should be active and activated genes that should be silent, including cancer-causing genes.

Speaker 5 Within 20 minutes of the release of that study, three publicly traded CRISPR companies lost more than $300 million in value.

Speaker 22 Like with AI, we have to be very, very careful with this technology.

Speaker 5 The dystopian future I describe today could easily happen.

Speaker 3 The foundation is already here.

Speaker 16 We as a species are at a crossroads and I don't know which road we'll take.

Speaker 27 Zeus gave Pandora a box as a wedding gift, but told her to never open it.

Speaker 46 She couldn't resist.

Speaker 18 You know the story.

Speaker 13 When Pandora opened the box, it unleashed all the evils and miseries into the world.

Speaker 25 Disease, poverty, hatred, violence, and suffering.

Speaker 10 I've heard people compare AI and CRISPR to Pandora's box.

Speaker 33 Now that the box is opened, there's no going back.

Speaker 10 CRISPR and AI aren't going away.

Speaker 40 In fact, despite all the warnings and the potential danger, these technologies are being expanded.

Speaker 88 Right away, Pandora knew she made a mistake and did finally close the box, but all the contents had escaped.

Speaker 13 Except one thing at the bottom of the box was left behind.

Speaker 7 Like Pandora, that one thing might be the only thing we have left.

Speaker 45 That one thing was hope.

Speaker 55 Thank you so much for hanging out today. My name is AJ.

Speaker 16 That's Hecklefish.

Speaker 84 I can do this all day.

Speaker 65 This has been the Y Files.

Speaker 53 If you had fun or learned anything, do him a favor, like, subscribe, comment, share.

Speaker 13 That stuff really makes him wiggle. Like most topics we cover on the channel, today's was recommended by you.

Speaker 16 So if there's a story you'd like to see or learn more about, go to thewifiles.com slash tips. And remember, The Y Files is also a podcast.

Speaker 65 Twice a week, I post deep dives into the stories we cover here on the channel. I also post episodes that wouldn't be allowed on the channel.

Speaker 16 Those are called Unredacted. The podcast is called the Y Files Operation Podcast, and it's available everywhere you get your podcasts.

Speaker 13 In between episodes, you might need a little more Wi-Files in your life.

Speaker 27 And if you do, check out our Discord server. We just crossed 50,000 members.

Speaker 55 So someone's there 24-7, and they're talking about the same weird stuff that we do here.

Speaker 27 It's a great community, it's a lot of fun, and it's free to join.

Speaker 13 And if you want to know what's going on with the Wi-Files, check out our production calendar.

Speaker 16 It's at thewifiles.com slash Cal.

Speaker 55 There we post our episode schedule, upcoming podcasts, live streams, meetups, everything.

Speaker 48 Now, special thanks to our patrons who make this channel possible.

Speaker 65 I dedicate every episode to you.

Speaker 17 I could not do this without you.

Speaker 13 You've changed my life and I can never thank you enough. And if you'd like to support the channel, consider becoming a member on Patreon.

Speaker 37 For as little as three bucks a month, you get access to perks like videos early with no commercials, get access to merch only available to members, plus you get two private live streams every week just for you where my camera's on, your camera's on.

Speaker 4 You can talk to me, the whole team.

Speaker 55 It's a lot of fun. Another great way to support the channel is grab something from the Wi-Fi store.

Speaker 84 If you have a Hecklefish t-shirt, it's got my face on it, or a hoodie, or something else on my face, or Mugg, you're gonna put your fist in a fist of a coffee mug with my face on it, get a

Speaker 84 drink of delicious beverage out of my face, or grab one of these squeezy, stuffed toy animal Hecklefish tugged toy dolls.

Speaker 55 Those are the plugs, and that's gonna do it.

Speaker 4 Until next time, be safe, be kind, and know that you are appreciated.

Speaker 52 I played Polybius and Arian 51. A secret code inside the Bible said I would.

Speaker 52 I love my UFOs and paranormal buns, as well as music, song singing like I should.

Speaker 75 But then another conspiracy theory becomes the truth, my friends.

Speaker 52 And it never ends.

Speaker 89 No, it never ends.

Speaker 89 I feel the crap guy down, got stuck inside Mel's home.

Speaker 52 With them chaotra, I feel only true aware.

Speaker 52 Dude, Stanley Kubrick fake the moon landing alone

Speaker 52 on a film set or the shadow people

Speaker 52 there.

Speaker 75 The Roswell aliens just fought the smiling man, I'm told.

Speaker 52 And his name was Cole.

Speaker 52 I can't believe

Speaker 52 I'm dancing with the bitches.

Speaker 52 Had no fish on Thursday nights when they changed you. And went by

Speaker 52 me all through the night.

Speaker 52 All I ever wanted was to just hear the truth. So the one ball's on my feet all through the line.

Speaker 75 The Mothman sightings and the solar stone still come.

Speaker 52 To have got the secret city underground.

Speaker 52 Mysterious number stations, planet surfo to project stargate, and what the dark watchers found.

Speaker 52 In a simulation, don't you worry though.

Speaker 52 The black knights had a lot of told me. So

Speaker 52 I can't believe

Speaker 52 I'm dancing with the fears.

Speaker 52 And go fish on Thursday, next, Wednesday, J2. And the whiteboards have been up through the night.

Speaker 52 All I ever wanted was could you tell the truth to the weapon

Speaker 52 beat all through the night

Speaker 52 Candle fish on Thursday nights with DJ two and where my zap meet all through the night

Speaker 52 All I ever wanted was could you hear the truth So the weapons I would be all through the

Speaker 52 light

Speaker 52 Gurdy loves to dance.

Speaker 52 Gurdy loves to dance on the dance floor

Speaker 52 because she is a camel.

Speaker 52 And camels love to dance when the feeling is right on waste in time.

Speaker 52 Curdy loves to

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