Mitre/JASONs Advise Pentagon to Collect DNA and Complete Human Genome Sequences for All Military Personnel
January 14th, 201123andme.mil?
Don’t laugh. Anne Wojcicki, co-founder of 23andMe, was one of the briefers on this. As you may or may not know, Wojcicki is married to Google’s Sergey Brin.
I don’t know what’s more terrifying to consider: What the military is going to do with this, or what Google is going to do with this.
Via: Federation of American Scientists:
The technology for sequencing human DNA is advancing so rapidly and the cost is dropping so quickly that the number of individuals whose DNA has been mapped is expected to grow “from hundreds of people (current) to millions of people (probably within three years),” according to a new report to the Pentagon (pdf) from the JASON defense science advisory panel. The Defense Department should begin to take advantage of the advances in “personal genomics technology” by collecting genetic information on all military personnel, the panel advised.
…
For military purposes, it will be up to the Department of Defense “to determine which phenotypes… have special relevance to military performance and medical cost containment” and then presumably to select for those. “These phenotypes might pertain to short- and long-term medical readiness, physical and medical performance, and response to drugs, vaccines, and various environmental exposures…. More specifically, one might wish to know about phenotypic responses to battlefield stress, including post-traumatic stress disorder, the ability to tolerate conditions of sleep deprivation, dehydration, or prolonged exposure to heat, cold, or high altitude, or the susceptibility to traumatic bone fracture, prolonged bleeding, or slow wound healing.”
“Both offensive and defensive military operations may be impacted by the applications of personal genomics technologies through enhancement of the health, readiness, and performance of military personnel. It may be beneficial to know the genetic identities of an adversary and, conversely, to prevent an adversary from accessing the genetic identities of U.S. military personnel.”
I have suspected for a long time the reason for collecting DNA is to identify psychopaths amongst us. Using this testing for military personnel makes sense – unfortunately, more individuals with psychopathic traits will be fast-tracked and put into leadership positions (if my intuition is correct).
@ Jill
I hadn’t thought of that. What a horrible idea.
Of course, they wouldn’t be called psychopaths. They’d be classified as ACIs, W1Cs, PRMs or HEROs: ‘Authority Coherent Individuals’, ‘Warrior-1st Class’, ‘Personal Reward Motivated’, ‘HypEr-rational Results Oriented’)