By Bryan Walsh
Publication Date: 2026-06-10 12:30:00
How do we know when the world has changed?
On June 1, a team of scientists published a pre-print scientific paper claiming they had edited human embryonic DNA more precisely than in any previous attempt. As a technical achievement, the work is undoubtedly impressive and largely avoids the errors that had accompanied previous attempts at genetic editing of embryos. With further development, such embryonic editing could free future children from deadly or debilitating genetic diseases, but as veteran science journalist Carl Zimmer reported in the New York Times later that week, the real headline was that the work could “pave the way for babies designed with certain characteristics” – in other words, designer children.
On the same day the Times article was published, AI company Anthropic published a post claiming that AI was already accelerating AI development, which the authors believe could represent an early step toward recursive self-improvement (RSI) – AI systems that… design and build…
