has been to free ourselves from the limitations of our physical bodies. Why else would we invent tools, machines, motors, boats, ships, aircraft, spacecraft?

So, in a philosophical sense, as crazy as GoldenViper sounds sometimes, wouldn't it make sense if our eventual destiny was to discard the human body entirely?

Discuss.

6/20/2008 2:30:46 PM

Not entirely. In theory, we would still need our brains.

6/20/2008 2:33:15 PM

why. After all, circuit boards are faster, more accurate, and... replaceable.

[Edited on June 20, 2008 at 2:34 PM. Reason : .]

6/20/2008 2:34:32 PM

Well the argument goes that our organic brains would slowly be replaced by networked silicone brains. Which raises the obvious question of how "human" and "individual" would we be if we were merely a network of interconnected sensory nodes.

But then again, the entire progress of the human race has been a product of our having language as a means of communicating complicated tasks from one organism to another relatively rapidly and without the cumbersome apparatus of "monkey see, monkey do."

6/20/2008 2:35:51 PM

i take it you really liked the weed i sold you

6/20/2008 2:45:46 PM

Mmmm, I wish. I've been tested regularly for the last 10 years.

Sadly these thoughts are completely non-drug induced.

6/20/2008 2:46:39 PM

How about cloned organ repositories with accelerated/decelerated genetic growth cycles? That way you can live within your human body forever, because your replaceable organs would be forever young, only your brain would age. Maybe stem cell research could become advanced enough to reverse the aging process of the brain itself, allowing humans the possibility of being immortal, but not invulnerable.

6/20/2008 2:49:41 PM

Well what would be the point of a human body when you could have a mechanical whose physical capabilities far outstrip that of the human and, potentially, required less energy to operate.


I'm not advocating these things, or saying I agree with them, just speculating.

6/20/2008 2:53:21 PM

Well what would be the point of a mechanical body when you could have a natural one whose physical capabilities are more trusted than that of the machine and, potentially, are less risky to the individual.

;p

[Edited on June 20, 2008 at 3:27 PM. Reason : -]

6/20/2008 3:26:08 PM

Quote :

"i take it you really liked the weed i sold you"

LAWL!

6/20/2008 3:26:53 PM

That is the question I'm asking. I'm not sure.

How would you argue that our human bodies would be any more or less threatening to humanity than a mechanical one? What defines humanity, I guess, is the essential question here.

6/20/2008 3:27:50 PM

genetic engineering will eventually split the human species. probably along the lines of class and economics. the rich will afford genetic engineering for themselves and their offspring, the poor will not.

6/20/2008 3:29:55 PM

Even if it were possible, I would never "transfer" my mind into circuitry.

I suspect that basically it would simply copy your consciousness into the machine, destroying your true consciousness.

So while there would be a sentient being exactly like me with all of my thoughts, memories, and feelings, I would be dead.

6/20/2008 3:33:58 PM

That is very likely. I think that some who see the Singularity as a bright future for a disrupted world fail to look deeply into the very real problems that will arise in the transition.

So that leaves two questions now. One, is this likely, and two, assuming it happens, what becomes of the non-enhanced?

Quote :

"I suspect that basically it would simply copy your consciousness into the machine, destroying your true consciousness."

OK, that brings up a third question. What is human consciousness? This is something that has never really been defined so, as of now, we can't define it as out of the realm of possibilities, even for robots.

6/20/2008 3:35:09 PM

Unnatural Natural Selection.

6/20/2008 3:41:32 PM

Quote :

"and two, assuming it happens, what becomes of the non-enhanced?"

Quote :

"Long ago, the galaxy had known peace. Paradise was ruled with the hand of science, and the hand was that of the galactic governing body known as the Core. Ironically, it was the Core's ultimate victory, the victory over death itself, that brought about the downfall of its paradise and started the war that would decimate a million worlds. The immortality process, known as "patterning," involved the electronic duplication of brain matrices, allowing the transfer of consciousness into durable machines. Effectively it meant immortality, and the Core decreed the process mandatory for all citizens in order to ensure their safety. However, there were many citizens unwilling to toss aside their bodies so casually, many indeed who regarded patterning as an atrocity. They fled to the outer edges of the galaxy, forming a resistance movement that became known as the Arm. War began, though it was never officially declared by either side. The Arm developed high-powered combat suits for its armies, while the Core transferred the minds of its soldiers directly into similarly deadly machines. The Core duplicated its finest warriors thousands of times over. The Arm countered with a massive cloning program. The war raged on for more than 4,000 years, consuming the resources of an entire galaxy and leaving it a scorched wasteland. Both sides lay in ruins. Their civilizations had long since vanished, their once vast military complexes were smashed. Their armies were reduced to a few scattered remnants that continued to battle on ravaged worlds. Their hatred fueled by millenia of conflict, they would fight to the death. For each, the only acceptable outcome was the complete and utter annihilation of the other."

6/20/2008 3:49:05 PM

I

Quote :

"wouldn't it make sense if our eventual destiny was to discard the human body entirely?"

I don't see that happening because some people want to stay taller than 5 ft.

6/20/2008 4:02:36 PM

Quote :

"i take it you really liked the weed i sold you "

ftw

6/20/2008 4:14:16 PM

^^ what?

6/20/2008 4:29:19 PM

Not sure why any of this seems crazy.

Beats devoting our resources to ending life.

6/20/2008 5:35:33 PM

^I agree, we need to make abortion illegal now.

6/20/2008 5:45:51 PM

holy derail

6/20/2008 5:52:40 PM

Which came first? The Cybermen on Dr. Who or the Borg on TNG?

6/20/2008 6:00:23 PM

in which universe?

6/20/2008 9:08:22 PM

the premise of this thread is talking about "Singularity", most recently popularized by Ray Kurzweil in the early 90s.
This month's issue of IEEE Specturm has a special feature on Singularity
http://www.spectrum.ieee.org/singularity

The Scientific American Podcast this week talked about it with several potential ideas, and some likely hurdles we'll run into
http://www.sciam.com/podcast/episode.cfm?id=99DBC638-FEF6-00F4-FC311CB7375CC44F

6/20/2008 10:51:27 PM

I'll check those articles out.

I've read some Kurzweil's work and find it far too optimistic, not only on time frame constraints but also in the general application of singularity once the technology exists.

I'm asking this less as a question of scientific inevitability and more of something of a philosophical question.

6/20/2008 10:56:15 PM

Singularity is not gonna happen. I base this conclusion on a variation of the Fermi paradox. It seems to me that if machines could become fully autonomous and self-replicating, and if they were capable of spreading through space at even a tiny fraction of the speed of light, then they would have overrun the entire galaxy a long time ago. Since we haven't been colonized by extraterrestrial machine overlords, It seems like such an event is a remote possibility.

On the other hand, we could simply be the first race to ever reach the verge of technological singularity...

6/20/2008 11:08:17 PM

^ yeah, listen to the SciAm podcast - they spend 5 minutes talking about the incredible potential of Singularity and what will happen when machines gain consciousness, etc, then the guests basically say "yeah, well - too bad that will never happen. Here's what will happen"

there will be some really incredible tech, though, with electronic implants and human/machine interfaces and genetic engineering and such

6/20/2008 11:32:56 PM

The present doesn't care about our assessments of what will and will not happen.

I doubt the future works any differently...

6/21/2008 12:41:11 AM

Any word on the Singularity being human? The definition as I understand it is that when something becomes smart enough to make itself smarter, and does, the cycle continues on, right? Is there any word on genetically enhancing intelligence, since we're working on other attributes?

6/21/2008 3:35:54 AM

6/21/2008 3:42:48 AM

no computer programmer is that buff

6/21/2008 2:14:34 PM

fo real.

make him fat and balding, with a bunch of empty Mt. Dew cans and honey bun wrappers.

6/21/2008 5:06:00 PM

DIET Mt. Dew cans.

6/21/2008 5:14:55 PM

Quote :

"fo real. make him fat and balding, with a bunch of empty Mt. Dew cans and honey bun wrappers."

Hhahaha Joe Schmoe for the win. The honebun wrappers nailed it. Because if you're working on a deadline, you're not going to drive to fucking Arby's you're going to run to the vending machine. And honeybuns are always the better deal because they have the highest weight to $ ratio.

I know because I did the calculations.

[Edited on June 21, 2008 at 5:48 PM. Reason : ``]

6/21/2008 5:43:56 PM

spoken like a true programmer

6/21/2008 5:52:54 PM

but not all the time! I have on occasion written a statistical "program" in SAS or STATA, but I am officially an "economic research analyst". We're kinda like programmers, pasty and tied to a computer, but we get paid much less and suck at WOW.

6/21/2008 5:58:44 PM

Quote :

"Is there any word on genetically enhancing intelligence, since we're working on other attributes?"

LOL

Now why would a government or marketplace want an intelligent population?

You think we'd go on buying shit we don't need and paying taxes for shit only a few will ultimately benefit from if we were all Einsteins and Teslas?

Puhshaw...

6/21/2008 6:35:14 PM

Considering intelligent people buy stuff they don't need and pay taxes.. probably.

6/21/2008 6:45:20 PM

Intelligent people or Einsteins and Teslas?

Also, what %age of the population would you consider intelligent?

6/21/2008 6:52:48 PM

einstein bought goods and i can only assume he paid taxes.

6/21/2008 6:58:21 PM

Goods he didn't need?

Can't wait to see the arguments for our good friend Nikola "I'm not interested in money" Tesla...

6/21/2008 7:33:11 PM

i'm not an expert on either. but i know einstein sailed. did he need to do that?

but really what about intelligence mandates that the person not spend some of their wealth on frivolous things?

6/21/2008 7:38:25 PM

Not doing it at all is one thing.

I'd argue positively that neither Einstein nor Tesla made consumption, especially frivolous consumption, a central part of their lives AT ALL.

An intelligent population is more difficult to keep under control. I'd love to see genetically enhanced humans who can crunch numbers like a TI-83+ and spit Shakespeare like it's the latest Lil' Wayne, but I sure as fuck wouldn't count on it happening here. South Korea maybe, but definitely not here.

[Edited on June 21, 2008 at 7:59 PM. Reason : ...]

6/21/2008 7:57:30 PM

let's assume that this is true (i'm not really buying it completely), you act as if there's some sort of monolithic force keeping america frivolous consumers.

all it would take is one business to start genetically enhancing folks. the other businesses might not like it, but whatever.

and if people elsewhere in the world are doing it, then americans would be retarded to ignore what could be a competitive advantage.

hell this would be perfect for any firm that needs hard-working smart individuals.

6/21/2008 8:19:41 PM

Quote :

"all it would take is one business to start genetically enhancing folks. the other businesses might not like it, but whatever."

This would explain the present prohibition on such work...

6/22/2008 12:43:34 AM

i think the fact that we're not there yet is closer to why we're not doing it.

anyhow, i didn't say specifically in this country. and once one country has done it, any country that falls behind will be fucked in the long run.

if it was experimented upon and found to be safe, it wouldn't take long before americans embraced it.

6/22/2008 12:56:49 AM

Quote :

"Well the argument goes that our organic brains would slowly be replaced by networked silicone brains. Which raises the obvious question of how 'human' and 'individual' would we be if we were merely a network of interconnected sensory nodes."

Perhaps this quotation anticipates humanity's ultimate end: the point at which we give up our souls--willingly.

6/22/2008 1:01:09 AM

who ever said we had souls to begin with?

6/22/2008 1:24:25 AM

^ Are you saying we don't?

6/22/2008 1:30:23 AM