The technology advances when it can advance, no matter what. The raise of surveillance would have happened even without NSA.  The Deep Learning advancements happened because of faster computers, even though humans have discovered some of the best ideas 20+ years ago.<p>&lt;rant&gt;<p>There is potential for achieving superhuman intelligence by genetic selection. By scanning millions of people&#x27;s DNA and their personal traits (predicting phenotype characteristics from genotype), they want to build a classifier that would rate a DNA before it got developed. Then they would be able to select embryos before IVF. This is done today too, but only to filter out some simple genetic defects.<p>A selection of 1:2 gives a 5 IQ point boost. A selection of 1:1000 embryos gives a boost of 40 IQ points. If we repeat this over a few generations, humanity will evolve much faster.<p>This iterative improvement by AI rating of genomes could be sped up by creating sperm and ova directly from embryo stem cells. This way we don&#x27;t need to wait for a generation to pass to have the kids become parents. In a few years many DNA selection -&gt; embryo iterations could be tested and selected and evolution would be sped up even more.<p>In the short run, 40 to 80 years, we face the appearance of AGI and human-computer interfaces. We will evolve together with it, and this kind of DNA synthesis would be an essential tool for the future. Even if a few people have been enhanced, when they have kids with non-enhanced people the new genetic advancements could be passed to the whole population in a few generations. The final aim is to extend life, intelligence and perhaps gain immortality and become much more than we were before.<p>Even if we don&#x27;t do AI based DNA enhancement, we still need to prepare for the possible catastrophe at the point of singularity. We need to create databases of human embryos so we could create humanity back in case it is destroyed. I&#x27;d also put in these databases a copy of all the human produced data and culture, just in case they need to start from scratch. These databases would have to be hidden and remain incommunicado for long enough to make sure we didn&#x27;t get wiped out. They could even be cared for by robots for millions of years before opening up, as an insurance ticket that we survive.<p>&lt;&#x2F;rant&gt;<p>My point is that we don&#x27;t really control the evolution of these technologies. They will be developed because they can be developed. In the past they weren&#x27;t developed because it was impossible. We, humans, created even the a-bomb immediately after we understood nuclear physics. We spied on people as soon as the internet (and even telephone) was available. Why would we be able to stop from making synthetic DNA? The temptation to prolong life or to enhance future children exists, the means also exist.