Transhumanism and you

[AgedGrunt]

Ethics has never been an impenetrable barrier to scientists in their quest to improve humanity. But at some point the time will come when scientists re-define what being human is, and invariably determine our humanity. I feel the most unfiltered, unregulated embracing of this course is exponential hubris.

Technology certainly has a defining role in our lives, but in my opinion we shouldn't let ourselves go so far as to have it literally replace us. To be sure there is a lot of good that it can do, but there is a line that needs to be drawn somewhere.

Far more troubling, in my view, isn't tech but mucking about with genetics, especially with how it relates to reproduction. The thought of choosing gender, customizing and/or cleansing DNA to make "ideal" offspring, or granting supernatural enhancement (think athletes on steroids or engineering a woman's figure) makes my skin crawl.

And for what it's worth, can we decouple this idea that people waving caution and stoppage in this general domain have to be nature-huggers and/or God-fearing old men? Ethical reasoning shouldn't discriminate, it's actually good science to be critical of methodology and maintain discourse, especially when what we're examining is essentially taking control of our evolution.

 

[Gatx]

They are both me though, so I would answer the other me and so would he. How would you know which me is "me" anyway. We are both thinking, acting and reacting the same way. The point is when discussing "people" we are talking about a personality that is assumed unique, if there is a exact copy then there is two of you. When I die this copy of the consciousness dies sure but "I" don't. The entity that is Bealzibob continues.

It's the question posed by The Prestige right. When you're copied, are you going to be the one that dies or the one that lives? Obviously when you're copied you can't "be in" both individuals at the same time and only one "you" will exist, but even if one dies, the other will live and the existence that is "Bealzibob" will continue, but the question is - is that enough? The whole point of immortality is because people want to live forever/are afraid of dying. If people want to ensure the existence of "you" then the whole copying thing misses the point if "you" as the consciousness dies anyway, that's more suited to leaving a legacy, in which case, they should just have a kid or something.

 

[CrimsonBlaze]

As I've mentioned in another topic which dealt with human augmentation via cybernetics and prosthetic limbs as a form of "technical evolution for humans," I wouldn't want to be involved with it too much and if it becomes mandatory, then I would only be involved in the lowest form possible.

I don't know; I've seen what I can do as a human and no doubt that I'd be able to do more if technology was more apart of me (be it cybernetics or cerebral download), but unless absolutely necessary, I wouldn't want to be apart of it. Maybe I'd be some of the few who are left behind to turn the nobs and levers, if it comes to that. I just want to live and die as a human for as long as naturally possible.

How devoted would you say I'd be? I've been considering NOT taking medication to keep me alive past my senior years if it comes down to it.

 

[OneOfTheMichael's]

this is the real question here:
Quoting lewis black "Even if we could achieve [immortality], do you think we're the generation that deserves it?"
Which is true because I personally don't think the human race needs it or deserves it, as deaths the only thing that prevents us from over population.

 

[Vale]

Transhumanism is when you expire and your body gets broken down into its basic components and subsequently reused within the world we inhabit. That's about as transcendent as it gets.

Oh, wait. That's just good ol' death.
Hm.

 

[Flatfrog]

But how is that different from the you of two seconds ago? The only thing that makes a continuity of you-ness is memory: you remember being in your own body a few seconds ago so you feel like the same person. If you and I were to swap brains, it's the brains that would remain the same people, not the bodies.

It's different in the way a complete copy of my computer is different.

And it's the physical brains that make the person you.

Says a person through the medium of a computer screen! As far as anyone else is concerned, it's your personality that makes you you, not your brain.

When I die, I will still not be seeing out of the eyes of my copy so there is a distinct separation between us. My consciousness will end and will not continue. A new identical one will, but mine is dead. Useless to me to have a copy since what I want is to prolong my ability to experience the world.

And if there were an exact copy of you, *it would feel exactly the same way*. After all, who is this 'I' of which you speak, who 'sees through the eyes' of your head? It's a collection of personality traits, memories and emotional responses which happens to be moving round in a physical body.

And yes, that doesn't make death any easier. After all, as soon as we make another copy, we become separate people again (neither of whom has any claim to be more 'the original' than the other, of course) and each one of them fears death in just the same way. On the other hand, knowing that most of your memories live on elsewhere makes some difference. Frankly, I feel that way about death now in the more regular sense - yes, my mother is dead, but there is still a low-resolution copy of her personality kicking around in my brain and the brains of others she knew and loved, just as there are copies of her genes in my cells and fragments of her material body in her ashes. And when I dream of her, to some extent a small part of her lives again in that low-resolution emulation.

 

[Mangod]

Deus Ex: Human Revolution centralizes the the debate surrounding Transhuman augmentation.

"Would you" it asks "supplement your body with machinery?" "What do you mean, 'would I?' I already wear spectacles, and a wristwatch, and I always carry a phone which I'm currently in the process of ducttaping to the side of my head."

Anyone who talks about technological development being "unnatural" deserves to be abandoned in the wilderness wearing nothing but a figleaf!
- Ben "Yahtzee" Croshaw.

 

[Neurodisiac]

So first, if presented Option 1 (grow old [if you're lucky], endure myriad physiological/mental failings, then suffer the utter annihilation of your consciousness) or Option 2 (augment your body/mind and/or transfer your consciousness to a new "brain" that does not age, wither, perish, etc., spend exponentially more time with people you want to spend exponentially more time with, experience moments [either directly or indirectly] such as interstellar travel, possible First Contact with an alien civilization, full-blown VR, galactic colonization, etc., and ultimately not #($&#*(@ dying), I'm going for Option 2 'til Option 1 is forced upon me.

I am a total layman, but it seems at some point within the next decade we are going to treat patients who have brain damage, birth defects, and disorders with engineered tissue, synthetic implants, nanotherapy, etc. How long before we're replacing a damaged/defective visual cortex with a perfectly functioning replica? 10 years? 15? 20?

Progressing, it's going to get tricky when we get to memory storage and recall, and all the goodies of the prefrontal cortex. I don't know how long it's going to take, but it seems inevitable that we unravel all this jazz. I read an article a few years ago regarding accessing one's mind via machine, copying memories, recording dreams, and eventually uploading/transferring one's consciousness (not COPYING it, mind you), and the researcher stated that, positing you, your mind, is a brain-state, that all of these things will be possible. If you have a memory of your first kiss and are recalling it right now while reading this sentence, the data that is that memory is not only physically stored in your mind, but physically "recalled" as well. If this is true, then it stands to reason that it can be manipulated. This would apply to the rest of the brain and all of its functions (providing, still, that we are on a materialistic view of consciousness).

Perhaps consciousness is some sort of sparked ether, but most scientists and researchers doubt this. If it is really, as Antonio Damasio brilliantly put, "a feeling of what happens," then our civilization is going to make one hell of a leap this century.

 

[AgedGrunt]

Anyone who talks about technological development being "unnatural" deserves to be abandoned in the wilderness wearing nothing but a figleaf!
- Ben "Yahtzee" Croshaw.

There is a massive difference between developing technology to assist and benefit humankind and integrating (changing) the human body with it beyond its natural ability.

Imagine someone greeting you while taking video, facial recognition and perhaps even recording everything you say, completely integrated in their body and invisible to the naked eye. Is that the same as holding a phone in hand? People are already freaking out over Google Glass.

Do people like cameras on every street corner? How about walking and talking to them everywhere you go? We're a far cry away from the iron age, locomotives and microwave ovens. It's time to stop pretending like this is no different.

 

[UniversalRonin]

My view on it, is as long as I get to decide when to delete my mind without needing the approval of a committee, I'm down. I could live out all my fantasies in VR (The ones I was either too poor, or in a real world, and thus unable to do) and then switch myself off.

The one thing that I immediately think about with this though: Holy f.....g s..tstorm of a database. And the queries would be great and terrible.

EDIT-This is on an 'after my natural lifespan has ended' basis. I live out my life, mind upload, live out my fantasies, die.

 

[DudeistBelieve]

What is even the point of uploading your brain to a computer?

Well, you can...um...why not?

Generally the idea is that you put your mind in it after your original body dies, but that sounds more like making a computer copy of you. You still get to be dead.

This. And I really wouldn't feel too comfortable dying knowing a copy of my being still exists. I don't even think I'd be okay with augmenting my body.... maybe with like a mechanical heart or something so I can't die, but it seems risky to me. Can't even go online without some sort of computer virus bug catching on, can you imagine the pandemic we would have?