mighty mouse to mighty man

This is pretty shocking news. Scientists have created a kind of "super mouse" that can eat twice as much as a normal mouse yet not gain weight, as well as run twice as fast for much longer than your average rodent.

I happened to see this news on TV the other night. To illustrate, they showed two mice running on a treadmill at 20m/min. The mouse furthest from the front of the screen was the wild mouse, and the one at the front was the PEPCK-mouse. As time wears on, you can observe the normal (wild) mouse tiring, as it starts sliding towards the back of the treadmill. Numerous times the wild mouse almost falls off the treadmill, only to force its way back on by running hard, continuing to try and keep pace. Eventually the mouse falls off, and only the 'mighty mouse' is left running.. and running.. and running. It's like a Duracell ad with the energetic toy rabbit. The mighty mouse runs faultlessly for a good 4.9km at the 20m/min speed! It's incredible!

And I thought they'd only created one mighty mouse, but it turns out they've already created at least 500 of these freakish beings. I couldn't help but think "What the hell are they doing?!"

I discussed this story with a few mates of mine last night and we all think it's pretty messed up. Especially because this raises questions for the human race, questions which have already been asked by the scientists. One day, there may not be one superman, but a whole city of supermen, women, and children! Kind of like the Incredibles from the Pixar film. To me this is like playing God to the extreme. It's pretty scary, the speed at which science is advancing in this realm. If this technology DOES flow into the human medical arena, I can only imagine the level of controversy it may generate between the Church and the scientists. Not only the Church, but all those who believe this altering of enzymes is an unethical practice.


A response to the article "Mighty Mouse – he’ll make champions of us all"