Slashdot Mirror
Using Technology to Enhance Humans
Roland Piquepaille writes "It's a well-known fact that technology can improve our lives. For example, we can reach anyone and anywhere with our cellphones. And people who can't walk after an accident now can have smart prosthesis to help them. But what about designing our children on a computer or having a chip inside our brain to answer our email messages? Are we ready for such a future? In 'Robo-quandary,' the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reports that many researchers are working on the subject. And as a professor of neuroscience said, "We can grow neurons on silicone plates; we can make the blind see; the deaf hear; we can read minds." So will all we become cyborgs one day?"
"Can you hear me now? No? How about now?"
Your Honor, I rest my case.
communication is a great thing, don't get me wrong... but who plans on being that important to justify being accesable 24/7 via a brain implant?
i don't have a mobile phone, and rarely is it the case that someone was trying to get ahold of me and couldn't... people can wait for me to return a message on the answering machine.
I think the source of this problem that researchers are trying to solve is the impatience that everyone seems to have nowadays...
~/.sig: No such file or directory
And its already been answered.
Yes, of course! Its not complete without the robots though.
While I doubt we'll end up in some Ghost In The Shell - like world anytime soon, the urge to improve ourselves to the point of modification and beyond is a part of our own adaptability.
Quo usque tandem abutere, Nimbus, patientia nostra?
I was a hardcore geek for a long time. I've been using less and less the last few years however due to personal choice and quality of life choices. The more technology we seem to use these days the less social we seem to become. Answer honestly, when was the last time you had a chat with your neighbor? Do you even know their names? In my sociology class less than 5% of the students could answer yes to that last question or remember the last conversation they had. In most countries it's normal to know those around you, to have a sense of community. Here in America we're becoming estranged from one another, not completely because of technology, but it's a large contributing factor. I'll pass on the transplants. I prefer the natural me. These all seem like breast implants for technology nerds anyway.
"Gentlemen, we can rebuild him. We have the technology. We have the capability to make the world's first bionic man. Steve Austin will be that man. Better than he was before. Better...stronger...faster."
We're all going to die. i intend to deserve it.
will almost certainly involve adult entertainment.
I hope they're working on growing a spam filter now, otherwise I doubt the trials will go well
Scientists are saying that in the future we will be able to have sex with robots. I tried that once. It was horrible. Right in the middle I had to call tech support.
Valkyrie is about to die! Wizard needs food -- badly!
Now, what was that question, again?
If this tech should enable a perfect lie detector it raises some interesting questions.
Should it be required in criminal cases?
Required of those under suspicion of a criminal act?
In civil suits?
Of candidates applying for political office?
Could employers use it in connection with workplace security?
Etc., etc.
If it is noninvasive, easy, fast, and cheap, it it going to be difficult to draw the line.
Enhancing humans?
could it be a waste of time?
i hope someone who shows me a different meaning...
someone could get angry, but woman does not need any enhance,
just imagine a man with breasts,
other cases would be the enhance of my left eye which is almost blind
?
In theory, a nice idea. I mean, interfacing easier with the computer, all good and fine.
But when I look at today's systems and the surveillance surrounding them, who wants to tell me that whatever is plugged into my cranium is really "mine"? And the manufacturer doesn't think that he's still the one owning it?
We have operating systems that require you to let them phone home to see if you're no crook. We got content restricted with DRM (or DCE or whatever the buzzword of the week is). We even got corporations that don't even consider infecting your computer with a trojan to protect their precious.
And I should trust them with my thoughts? In today's society, I'd be wary with such an idea.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Oh great, here comes the "The next fucker who interrupts my evening out by yammering on their cellphone..." flame war.
No sig for you!!
In the No Squishy Left Behind Act of 2043, all remaining "Squishies" will have their bodies replaced with synthetic material...unless we run out of money. Then you get an arm, or a leg, maybe a torso if you're lucky.
Thinking about this in relation to the previous story, what will happen if MS or some other company has tons of patents on the technology that helps you? What happens when patents restrict innovations in that area? What happens if your prosthetic arm BSOD's and causes you to veer into oncoming traffic but the EULA you signed to wear it means you can't sue MS?
That's exaggerating what role MS might play, but the question is valid.
Support NYCountryLawyer RIAA vs People
I keep getting emails all the time how I can add inches to my penis and enlarge my breasts.
I have always been fascinated by the notion of hive mind and I truly wish that one day, humans will have their brains connected to the net by wifi or something. Each time we have a question, instead of thinking we could access the net of minds. We could have one big hive mind with all of the knowledge or have a distributed system where the knowledge is distributed among our brains. Also, only the most advanced researchers could access the core to change the official knowledge database. We could always have a core that works like the current Wikipedia too. Who knows what's the best way to manage a hive mind?
I'm already answering tons of queries in my job thanks to Wikipedia and Google. I just wish we could go one step further...
Tag 'boycottroland'
[lonely geek]: Hello? Are you human?
[support]: Yes dearie, I am human...
[lonely geek]: Oh good, I'm speaking with a real techie girl! My LoverBot v6.2 beta just crashed in the middle of some awesome robolovin', and I can't get her rebooted. Can you help me?
[support]: {chewing gum sound} Have you tried plugging her in, givin' her some juice?
[lonely geek]: Oh yes, Lots!! but, for some reason she doesn't respond? Whats's going on???
[support]: ....I mean of the electricity kind...
[lonely geek]: oh yes, that too. But she won't start up!
[support]: haven't you tried readin' the manual?
[lonely geek]: You mean that damn phone book sized thing that came in the box? ...no...
[support]: Well, once you git 'round to readin' it', {chewing gum sound} give us a call, willya? Thanks... [CLICK, dead air...]
[lonely geek]: Noo!! Don't hang up on me, I only want to be carressed... that is all! Sigh, where's that manual?
No. There will always be reformists and there will always be purists. I prefer to have technology outside my body, not inside. Thank you.
I'm a big fan of technology assisting our daily lives. However where do you draw the line? Technology is a multi-faceted tool of efficiency. When used correctly it can overcome disabilities. At the other end of the spectrum, technology can be used to kill. At neither of these spectrums is another option: control. Governments and corporations would love nothing more than to know what every person is doing at any time of the day. Once that happens, say goodbye to freedom of speech and privacy (if they haven't been taken already).
I couldn't agree more with you. My cell is useless while on the john.
This reminds me of a popular Japanese anime movie called Ghost in the Shell, which already raised these questions. The setting is futuristic Japan, where many people are full cyborgs or have cybernetic implants. One of the central issues in the movie is the main character's struggle for an identity: She is fully cybernetic, with only something called a "ghost" to distinguish her from a robot. Throughout the movie, she asks herself if she is still human, The question is never fully resolved, and I think the director (Masamune Shirow) purposely made it that way.
While it is impossible right now, I believe that (unless there is an apocalypse) we will eventually invent the technology needed to become fully cybernetic. However, we need to start asking these questions now, so that when the time comes we will be prepared.
I could type a very long comment why it is/will be, but it has been said and written so many times before. Advancement is great, but if you start meddling with what makes us human, it doesn't matter how good, noble or ethically correct your intentions are. You will lose.
It only takes one man to change the Wisdom of the Crowd to Tyranny of the Masses.
People don't realize how primitive medicine is. 90% of medicine is, "We kept tried random things and found some things that work. Half of this stuff we don't even know why it works, but it does. So we use it."
And
There is no such things as a flashing LED that makes everything better controlled by an AI that knows you need treatment before you do.
The roland issue was covered over a year ago. Stop with this spam.
I'm up for it so long as none of the components include an uplink to US Robotics.
We can reach anyone anywhere who wants to be contacted with our cellphones.
When you don't want to be contacted, turn it off. When someone you don't want contacting you calls, hit the ignore button, or ban them on your phone. It isn't that hard.
We're no longer forced to socialize only with those in close proximity to me. I don't like my neighbours. I don't particularity want to socialize with them. They're fine people and I occasionally chat with them, but we have nothing in common aside from location, and they aren't terribly interesting.
Why do people thing that timeliness and quantity is the same as quality when it comes to human-to-human communication? People have only so much capacity to take in information - why would I want to fill my life with junk. One well reasoned, concise and consistent message (be it email, phone, or face to face) is usually priceless compared to hundreds of unfinished ideas, mumbles or rants.
With wiretapping rampant, little kids on terrorist watchlists, ... you want them to install something in your brain... so that
corporations and government working together in collecting data
on people, kids charged thousands of dollars for
downloading a bunch of mp3s, DRM, MPAA+RIAA copyright squads,
cctv cameras going up all over the place and cops beating you
to a pulp for even bring up your constitutional rights,
google filing for patents on creating psychological profiles
from online gaming...
you can get into "your" email account even faster..?
NWO scumbags: fuck you.
The Amish can get away with it now, but I imagine there will come a time were depriving children of technology will be considered abuse.
Ronnie Coleman will require one when he's 60, just like one governator. Not me, I ain't into chemical bodybuilding. Natural is best. Screw with nature and nature will screw you. Now this'll get modded as off-topic, but hey, I'm just replyin to the good man above.
I have this new human enhancement technology. I call it a club.
One line blog. I hear that they're called Twitters now.
...but can we run linux?
We've had only a few hundred years of tech development so far, and yet our technology already provides considerable body enhancement beyond what nature provided, not just outside but inside as well (pacemakers, hip replacements, dentures, grafts, and a hundred other items). Now think what will happen over a thousand years, or dozens of thousands. Natural humanity will be no longer.
You won't really have a choice. Either you embrace our evolution (which is in our hands now, not in the hands of nature), or you will be left behind, as an inferior subhuman species. Good luck.
I tell you what. Turn me into a hyper-intelligent immortal half machine god-being first, and then I'll tell you the answer to the question.
Fascism trolls keeping me up every night. When I starts a preachin', he HITS ME WITH HIS REICH!
How about a human that won't wage war in the Middle East? That would be a huge improvement of mankind.
These are used in many different ways in Greg Egan's book Quarantine. Where the hero says I looked up the name (or some other useful function) with an implant from so and so company for $xx.xx. Worth the read.
Technology is kind of scary, because you have to realize that the unthinkable will eventually become real.
If you asked a scientist who worked with ENIAC some 50 years ago if he believed that you could put a billion transistors into a 1cm^2 chip, would he believe you? After all, a single transistor was the size of a light bulb back then.
This is why we have to think the unthinkable when speaking of technology. We all know that having a chip inside our head sounds weird and kind of repulsive, but once we have 10 guys doing this, we will have 100 following them, and 10,000 following the first 110.
I personally don't know or care what the outcome will be, but I am sure that we can eventually create organic computers. For example, your left finger nail could in fact be a small computer.
Full Tilt
We cannot read minds, period. We see a correlation between brain activity in certain areas based on behavior or what the subject is seeing, etc, but it is purely a correlation. This Neuroscientist should have his PhD revoked for not understanding that correlation doesn't imply causation!!!
There is more to science than physics!
www.iomalfunction.blogspot.com
Answering my email in the palm of my hand is good enough. I don't need major surgery for hardware upgrades.
Well, all these years later, I for one, still think this joke is funny... Now imagine the future malware that infects someone's cranial implant with a synthetic experience that makes them experience goatse in a way that is indistinguishable from really being there? or better yet, experience being goatse, bending over by the mirror, feeling the gapingness, and shoving things up there. If firewall tech is anything like it is today, I think I'll pass on the implants. But the possibilities for pushing people over the edge are tantalizing in the cybernetic future.
Then we get to our assumptions about animals. It was thought that if we sequence a genome, all would be revealed. We now know that the story is very much more complex that simply saying this gene sequence does this. The orientation of the genes seems to be an issue. Genes seem to activate or not depending on the presence of other genes. The high school analysis of genetics seems quite inadequate, and the old yarns about improvement through cross pollination seems as antiquated as staying home to make sure one doesn't miss a phone call.
I don't think we are anywhere near the point where we can predict the side effects of messing with complex natural systems. We can't even predict the side effects of delivering psychotropic drugs to kids. We do so because we want our kids to be 'normal' and succeed in school and life, and then get angry when the negative side effects emerge. Of course they will be negative side effects. Nothing is free. Entropy is always increasing, and nature will have her way. I have no doubt we will engineer our children. I just hope that our courts are not tied up by the whiny parents with fantastic dreams of the perfect kid, and we approach the process to create a more holistic child, and not just to further the Aryan state.
"She's a scientist and a lesbian. She's not going to let it slide." Orphan Black
Do you honostly trust big corporations implanting chips in your brain? I don't care what ability it gives me, that is just something that can be used to supress our rights further. I don't need to be on call 24/7, I check my email every other day, and if I'm deaf/blind I'll stick with the hearing aid and seeing eye dog. I grew up with technology, as most people did who read slashdot, however it is getting scary to see where it is going. It's getting too advanced for our own good. Pretty soon we are going to be dependant on technology for every day to day task that may depend on some outside service (power/network). That is the day I move to the middle of nowhere, build my own solar panel array, plow my own fields, and live a self sustaining life not dependant on outside services.
622677120
It is only a matter of time before we become The Culture.
P.S. And do you realize what technology is doing for governance right now.
It's funny to read an article like this after reading how technology makes people drive their cars off a cliff or into a speeding train.
I can imagine the news:
Suzy, 23, said her bionic implants made her drink boiling water until her jaw dropped. "The implant said it's room temperature, and I have absolute trust in my bionic implants".
When things really take off (they've obviously already begun) there won't just be simple enhancements like integrated email and genetic corrections. There are so many other possibilities that the article hasn't brought up. Once nanomachines become practical, they could become part of us, reconstructing any damaged DNA, destroying cancer cells and unwanted pathogens, reversing aging, and augmenting the brain or even replacing biological neurons and synapses as the substrate of our minds. As computers increase in speed and become more and more parallel, we'll be able to move our consciousness to the digital realm, eventually allowing us to experience subjective years in a second, rewire the way we think, and literally expand our minds. This is way past merely having a cell phone in your head, but it's a bit much for most people to conceive of.
Not bad being in the same family with 7 of 9
You forgot the greatest augmentation of all. How would anybody survive without society and social interaction? Living in a cabin in Montana and purchasing bullets does not count!
My take is that we are going to go through an enormous re-urbanization soon for a variety of reasons. Cities are already the engines that drive entire regions. We may find ourselves increasingly relying on others' intellectual specializations. Think of a city as a giant brain and you as a neuron.
We are not nature.
There's a great deal of concern for enchancing our capacity for experiencing the world, or durability to experience it longer, but very little for enhancing our internal mental experience, which is what this all seems to be about in the end.
We know that all of our experiences are the result of the workings of and inputs into our nervous and sensory systems, and ultimately our brains. If the goal is to enhance our own experience, it seems that ultimately direct input to our nervous and sensory systems and even the brain by electrical signals is the most effective, most efficient, most sustainable means of enchancing our own experiences.
There is no jet fuel to pollute our water and air when you fly across the world in an airplane in your mind. There are no natural disasters in this world if you do not want there to be. There is no death to see or experience if you do not want there to be.
And there is no reason to believe that experiences grounded in physical reality are the most enjoyable experiences to have. Evolution and geological processes are not directed to enchancing the quality of human mental experience, and to the extent they have enhanced it, by no means do we have reason to believe they have maximized it. And it may be technically very difficult to simulate the fullness of experience of the real sensory world to the mind. But perhaps raw emotions and sensations coupled with abtract realities can be every bit or more enjoyable.
There is also the matter of induced dreaming. Dreaming is a very cheap way to simulate experiencing the world - or some other - in a way that often seems very enjoyable to many people. If we could find ways through technology to induce and enhance the dreaming experience, we could relatively cheaply improve the quality of experience for many people.
Dreaming seems to consist in very real and compelling experiences, or at least the sense of having had real and compelling experiences. I retain very little of what I dream about, but at the moment I awake or perhaps just before, if I have had a dramatic dream, I have the very real experience of remembering having just had real and compelling experiences (whether I have or not I do not know).
If enhancing quality and duration of experience is our aim, then I think these will be ultimately the most rewarding courses to pursue.
Unfortunately, perhaps, I stubbornly believe there is much more to life than enhancing the quality and duration of experience.
I haven't seen a comment on this viewpoint yet:
At some point in the near future, people will figure out how to make a machine that can learn. At that point, it will only be a matter of time before there are machines that will be more intelligent than a typical human, and will be able to build bodies for themselves which are far superior to our biological bodies.
If we haven't learned how to evolve ourselves, either through genetics and/or cybernetics at that stage, we _will_ be replaced as the dominant life form in this region of space.
Whatever happens, it will probably progress slowly and isn't anything we need to be worried about. We will find ways to link our brains with machines, we will invent new ways to communicate, which is something humans always have done, and we will slightly mesh our brains and bodies with implanted neural tissue and sometimes electrical devices, but I don't think there will be a demand for things that are too invasive to our lives and our ability to stabilize and control ourselves. We might have the ability to create all of these fancy chips and neural tissue, but if there is no demand, there won't be any money to be made. Of course for someone like Stephen Hawking, being able to hook your brain up to a mouse on a computer and type with your thoughts would be a great improvement to his quality of life, and is something I'd like to see happen. But for the average person to receive "upgrades", I think it's something that is unnecessary and isn't something we should be too worried about. Besides, with the rising risk of oil running out, global warming, and nuclear warfare, I think we'd be better off spending this money enjoying life while it still exists, or helping people in other countries stabilize their economies and educational systems. Feeding hungry kids and helping poor families get an education... Oh wait... we can't even do that in America yet... Sorry guys....
"Will we remain human?" isn't really an interesting question, because we will always consider "human" whatever happens to be accepted as normal at the time.
... "Can we afford not to upgrade?", once a particular replacement has become very popular and widely accepted and inexpensive. Because to say "No" to upgrades on the basis of some rather retro urge to remain "natural" is a recipe for being left behind.
Today we don't regard a person with breast implants or metal+plastic hip replacements as anything other than human, and this trend will continue as replacement technology improves and our rather crappy protein organs get upgraded bit by bit.
A far better question though is
Do that for long enough and you've destined your family for extinction.
"The question of whether machines can think is no more interesting than [] whether submarines can swim" - Dijkstra
What about Transhumanism? Using technology to make us MORE human? More moral? More ethical? Maybe transhumanism would open us the way to new order of society/government, because this fake-brainwashed-democracy/capitalism/polluting-sh ort-term-thinking-corporatocracy shit is starting to show its drawbacks more and more.
Not all Sci-Fi/possible futures is about robots running around wanting to genocide all humanity. Robots/cybernetic enhancements could actually be good for us.
I look back and I wonder what happened. Belief in science and progress is all but gone. What went wrong? We went from society of people with a vision of bright future and grand goals to a society of sheep that sees nothing more than getting a paycheck and buying some latest most-marketed useless shit. Was it the cold war? Was it because advancement of science wasn't rapid enough or didn't offer enough improvement of daily life? Or am I just looking at the past with rose-colored glasses?
--Coder
Have you seen it? Go watch it, even if you don't especially like anime :)
:)
Then come back and tell me what you think
--Coder
I make it clear that I answer and return calls at my own convenience. I almost never answer my cell phone if I'm physically with other people, because they get first priority. If they want a call back, they can leave a message. If it's important, they can send me a text message telling so. Otherwise, I assume it can just wait until the next time I see them.
Technology, like everything else, can only control you if you choose to allow it to.
That I can have a Railgun installed on my arm. That would ROCK.
Only two things concern me about "human enhancements": 1) Will my boss be able to tell if I'm spending the afternoon with my wife instead of at work? 2) Will my wife be able to tell if I'm spending the evening at the bar instead of at home?
Living in a cabin in Montana and purchasing bullets does not count!
... that's a little more difficult.
Actually, if you're living in a cabin in Montana, you probably already know that you can cast your own bullets, preferably from the ones recovered from yesterday's dinner.
Now, modern gunpowder
"Ladies and gentlemen, my killbot features Lotus Notes and a machine gun. It is the finest available."
MILLIE in Oath of Fealty. Supercomputer that people (executives of the arcology in this case) connect to via wireless network from an implant to have instant access to whatever information they might need. Just as people can pretend to be more intelligent than they really are online by pulling information off the net, I would now be able to do the same so long as I have connectivity. Oh, and an push button off switch located just behind my ear, just in case of the equivalent goatse or white noise hack that occurs.
---- Liquid was a patriot ----
Now that completely reminds me of Ghost in the Shell...
Advancement is great, but if you start meddling with what makes us human, it doesn't matter how good, noble or ethically correct your intentions are. You will lose.
Spoken like a true Luddite. However, what I think you don't take into account is that "what makes us human" is always changing -- it's always just beyond our ability to change at any given moment.
E.g.: in the mid-19th century, the idea of swapping blood with someone else was pretty macabre. After all, "the blood is the life," right? Hence, it got used as a plot device in Dracula (among other novels), as a way of showing the 'human essence.'
But, once it became possible to routinely pump blood from one person to another, so that they didn't always die, and their personality didn't change, the criteria of 'what makes us human' got pushed back a little further. Okay, so we can now swap blood -- nope, that doesn't make us human; it's not what makes us unique. Suddenly, a blood transfusion doesn't seem so bizarre anymore.
Not too many years later, you have people getting their organs swapped. Although not too many rational folks really thought this would change one's personality, there was still some squeamishness on the part of the public, initially. But over time, it became accepted. Just because you have someone else's liver inside you, and maybe somebody else's heart and lungs, you're not them. Whatever makes you human? Not sure, but haven't hit it yet.
What about brains? We know that can cause personality changes. Seems pretty ghoulish. But there are thousands of people in the world today running around with implanted electrodes in their brains, allowing them to hear better, or not have seizures, or see -- are they still human? Yep.
The fear that we'll change "what makes us human" is the same sort of vague uneasiness that caused cartographers to draw giant sea creatures at the edges of their maps. It's a fear of the unknown, of change. But when you get close to it, suddenly it doesn't seem quite so scary anymore. That's how change happens. We'll make a change, realize we're still human, still here, afterwards, and push the "what makes us human" mark out a little beyond our current grasp. Repeat, over and over, and even if the end product isn't recognizable as a "person" to us today (just like Steven Hawking would probably be written off as some sort of carnival freak by anyone born in the 18th or early 19th century), people will never really question their humanity.
That thing that "makes us human" will always be one or two discoveries away, just like the sea monsters were always a little beyond the edge of the known map.
"Ladies and gentlemen, my killbot features Lotus Notes and a machine gun. It is the finest available."
Why is bad being a cyborg, anyway? Why is everyone scared of losing the so-called human nature? Do you lose it when you place a heart pacemaker if you have arrhythmias or a metal plate after a head trauma? Are we sure we will become less human because we would use technology [let's say] to monitor our physiological or other parameters or interface with other humans and machines around us?
This IS evolution fellows, not "natural" evolution, mind you, but still evolution.
Thus... assimilate or perish!
(if being human means staying with recognized "design flaws" then it's ok for some of us to be called another species)
"Sum Ergo Cogito"
Hmm. Sounds like some scope for bullshit and vaporware here... Paging Professor Warwick!
"We are the Borg, Resistance is futile, We will add your biological and technological distinctiveness to our own." - I guess thats the only way to achieve peace among us humans
Have you ever made a real-life mistake where your first instinct was "undo!"?
Yes, except I call that button "Oh, Shit."
"Ladies and gentlemen, my killbot features Lotus Notes and a machine gun. It is the finest available."
Anyone seen him recently..? http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/6/63/Laug hing-man.gif
improved spectrum vision that reaches into the IR/UV wavelengths.
Would make nighttime driving safer and I would understand technological equipment an thermodynamic processes better.
Weak the flesh is. But even weaker it will become, as it seeks to correct a weakness, with technology.
Is that a joke? No, seriously.
I'm sorry, but in all job interviews I've been, nothing even starts to move in less than a month. They'll want a CV first, then send you some forms/questionnaire/whatever to fill, wait some time as they wait for candidates and/or process the mountain of resumes, then you're one of a hundred or more guys interviewed, and only then anything actually happens.
The scenario you describe is nothing short of some company's making it a lottery. They skipped everything and just went with the first guy who had the cell phone on. I'm sorry, unless it's a janitor job, it just won't happen. And even for janitors, they still might talk to more than one, just to see who wants less money.
For a high paying job? Heh. Not even in your dreams. High paying jobs are also important jobs, one way or another. You don't hire your next software architect or even manager by lottery. Even if you didn't care about their qualifications (unlikely already), the very definition of "high paying" means that there's room for a lot of savings by interviewing more than one person and maybe excluding the ones with exorbitantly unreasonable demands.
Also, all job interviews I've been in, were preceeded by aggreeing on a reasonable time. Even if the company does have the upper hand there, it is generally understood that there might be times that simply aren't an option. Maybe on day X I'm scheduled in court, or maybe it's mom's funeral, or whatever, you know? It might have to be scheduled on the next day, or even next week.
Even if (ad absurdum) someone was that brain dead to make their request "I want you for the job interview here _now_, in 5 minutes!", would I want to work for that company? No, not really. It's just an indication of their general attitude, and that more unreasonable demands will come.
So basically, the example is akin to telling me "wear a Roman armour all the time, just in case you get your once-in-a-lifetime chance to travel 2000 years back in time and be elected Emperor!" Well, no, thank you very much, I'll take my chances and wear my usual outfit. The chances of that happening are close enough to nil, and I wouldn't lose _that_ much sleep even if that chance came and I missed it.
Yes, I know it was just an example, but that's the whole problem: all the examples on this topic are scenarios that are (A) extremely unlikely, and (B) silly. If the best reasons for being a full time telephone operator all the time, are such contrived scenarios that will never happened anyway, then excuse me if I do turn my cell phone off anyway. Between (a) having some privacy and time to myself, and (b) the unlikey chance that something like that happens, I'll choose the former every single time.
A polar bear is a cartesian bear after a coordinate transform.
Look at Arab States - they ENHANCED themselves without any technology. ;-)
Have you done it? Go do it even if you think drilling holes in your head is a bad thing :)
Then come back and tell me what you think :)
PS, it annoys me when people just ask you to exert considerable effort without explaining why you should do so."We can grow neurons on silicone plates; we can make the blind see; the deaf hear; we can read minds."
Growing neurons on silicone plates! Awesome! Just what we need, smarter breast implants!
If this guy can't even tell the difference between silicon and silicone, then why on earth should anyone take his tech prognosticating seriously?
Someone suggesting such thing obviously has not been drunk too often in his/her life. Just imagine upsetting your significant other, your business partners and friends every time you get out for drinks....
It's been a while since I heard about it but I believe that with a non-poisonous magnetic dye, you can track the change in blood flow inside the brain by use of a specialized scanner. Since different parts of the brain are responsible for different general areas of thought, you can make an educated guess about what a person is thinking by observing these changes.
How do you kill that which has no life?
I can only wish for the day that my arthritis ridden body can be replaced by a robot one!
PLEASE DO IT SOON!!!
from TFA, referring to our descendants:
>They are incredibly alien to us.
He certainly has my teenagers pegged...
The problem is not cellphones - you just have to take control and you can have it both ways.
I tell my family and friends that I turn my phone off or to silent if I don't want to be contacted - it's usually in a conversation about the downsides of 24/7 connectivity in the modern world. Nobody has ever disagreed that it's a completely reasonable approach. Then they just accept that you're not always contactable, just like it used to be - they leave voicemail if it's important, just as they would on your home phone if you didn't have a cellphone.
If you don't answer their cellphone voicemail within a reasonable time, it's no different from not answering emails or home answering machine messages.
How upset are you if try to call someone at home, cellphone, or email, and can't get a response? Not very, I'd suggest. It's not such a big deal. People's enslavement to constant communication is entirely voluntary.
Q: why would the issue of "control" be relevant at all?
A: Control of body implants is an issue because our whole society is based on the idea that people control their own body without any outside agency being able to interfere.
Even more to the point, large parts of the constitution seem to depart from that idea especially where it talks about freedom. An extreme is the right to bear arms, which guarantees our right to wield deadly force in exerting control over our immediate surroundings if we so choose. Now we aren't speaking of our surroundings here, but about our bodies.
As I understand it, one of the fundamental ideas in the constitution is that it seeks to ensure freedom by ensuring individuals control over their own body and their own destiny. Now there is absolutely no trace of any (legal) guarantee, let alone one on par with a constitutional amendment, that would guarantee us control over what is implanted in our own bodies. Without that control our freedom may be compromised by whoever does have control over those implants.
Q: What's the difference between an implant and a piece of paper with the same information? ... a piece of paper would typically require your knowledge and cooperation for anyone to read. Plus you would know that is being read. Electronic implants can typically communicate with the outside without you being aware of the fact, or giving your permission.
A: Well
And that's only the issue of the talking implants. Suppose you would implant something like a mobile phone in your body. How would you like it to be "hacked"? And supposing you had a blood-sugar control mechanism inside you that dispenses insulin when needed, but one that can communicate with the outside world, have it's firmware updated, and upload performce data to the doctor's computer. How would you like *that* thingy to be hacked?
Q: who might possibly want to have control over our implants?
A: That would be impossibly hard to map out in detail. However, every single person or agency out there has his/her/its own agenda which may or may not coincide with your best interests. Even when their interests are perfectly legal and legitimate.
Their interest may be in being automatically aware of your identity when you enter a specific space, knowing whether you entered a specific space, being able to access information placed in your implants by others, etc..
Think of your employer (ID, access information, health information). Think of your insurance company (health information, information on medical visits). Think of your bank (your account information stored into your body and readable at the desk by any teller clerk or bank manager). Think of credit-card organisations (were you there when that contested transaction took place?). Think of marketeers (e.g. personalised bill-board content).
Now when you're done with that, think of pranksters, script kiddies, students and your average teenager. Practically no malicious intent there, just a pressing desire to test the limits.
And finally think of how real criminals (e.g. the Russian mob) might be able to make use of some gizmo inside your body that will talk to the outside without your knowledge or consent.
The problem is that with implants you can't easily wipe them, turn them off, or replace them. Definitely not by an end-user.
Q: Huh? That sounds alarmist. Why should I expect perfectly respectable companies to leave me vulnerable to anything like that? Let them try and I would sue the six ways from Sunday. And others too.
A: That's what you might think. But have you ever pictured a company such as Microsoft in charge of the software on your implants? Control of intimate par
... only the best of us.
I certainly hope so. According to some very reliable sources, all cyborgs will look and be able to fight like Van Damme, and who doesn't want that?
In Soviet Russia jokes are formulaic and decidedly non-humorous.
What's next, smart boobies? Please don't start growing neurons on anything made of silicone.
Tiller's Rule: Never use a word in written form that you've only heard and never read. You will end up looking foolish.
Now that completely reminds me of Ghost in the Shell...
Goatse in the Shell?
There are a lot of things to trust. Not just the possibility of media in your brain, but things like
a) Putting ideas in your head: brainwashing
b) Wiping ideas from your head: memory-erasure
c) Swiping ideas from your head: You think contracts that say "we own what you think" in terms of IP/ideas are bad, wait until they can lift them right from your brain
While the thought of direct-interface with machines is pretty cool, the thought of involving other humans with their own agendas is scary when you consider the possibility in direct-to-brain contact.
Okay... which "human"?
You seem to have failed to grasp the point made in the post to which you are replying. It's an evolving definition.
Google could index all of the information in my brain, and all for free!
You seem to have failed to grasp the point made in the post to which you are replying. It's an evolving definition.
Quite the contrary: I realize that anyone can stretch the definition to fit whatever encompasses their particular situation. But - everyone will have their own definition, and it is likely that this definition will exclude individuals who might have otherwise fit.
Once upon a not-so-distant past, individuals were considered by then-respectable authorities to be "sub-human" (that is, not quite a member of the full human race) because of the color of their skin, their culture, the way they prayed (or who they prayed to), and a whole host of other cosmetic reasons. I have no reason to believe that humanity, being what it is, will refuse to do so in the future, especially since differences will likely be far more fundamental (and very real) than the flimsy pseudo-scientific ones pointed at in the past.
Right now, nearly any random man can mate with any random woman, and are almost statistically certain to have normal, genetically healthy children. If I, a (mostly) caucasian male in North America, mated with any random woman from any continent, culture, region, religion, what-have-you, I could readily expect with 99% statistical certainty that the resulting children would be born without defects or problem caused by the intermixing of genetic lineage between her and myself.
Now fast-forward 10,000 years... think we could still do the same? If not, then what happens and what definitions apply? Sure, each grouping could still readily call themselves "human", but the genetic ties would have likely differentiated enough to cause problems - maybe. Then again, maybe not, if there is some sort of standard that everyone adheres to. We simply do not know, which is why I asked in the first place.
In a general sense, GP may be right. But then, while Neanderthals were considered on a technical level to be human, I'm willing to bet that you'll find few folks today who would look upon them as being 'fully' human. Try this simple thought experiment: If you were transported back in time and presented with two potential mates, One Cro-Magnon and the other Neanderthal, which would you choose? Why?
I suspect that future people will likely group themselves off in similar fashion, and for similar reasons. Over the long-view of time (we're talking lots of millennia now), these differences may become great enough to actually form separate and biologically incompatible species. So which will be the actual humans, and which will have a prefix or suffix appended to the title?
Quo usque tandem abutere, Nimbus, patientia nostra?
Sandler: I'm sorry everybody, I'm too preoccupied to do anything but stuffing my face with twinkies while I work all day and night. I don't want to spend time with my parents, Julie Kavner and Henry Winkler, or my wife and kids. My son will never notice if I show up late to his swim meet. But hey - my dog likes humping things! IT'S FUNNY! Also, I need a universal remote control because I'm a feeb. I have a great idea, I'll buy one at Bed, Bath, and... BEYOND!
(And the cat's in the cradle and the silver spoon...)
Walken: Before you take this I have some very grave warnings.
Sandler: Uh-huh, yeah. I'm gonna fast-forward through this part. Oh, no! I'm missing my own life!
(...little boy blue and the man in the moon...)
Sandler: Oh my god! I'm fat! I'm old! I'm divorced! Chris Walken is really mean! My dog died and they got another dog who also humps things! It's still funny! I guess being fat is automatically funny, too! I mean, fat suits are always funny. It was funny in Mrs. Doubtfire and in the Eddie Murphy version of "The Nutty Professor" and so this will be every bit as funny. But the remote keeps fast-forwarding past stuff even though I don't want it to! How come rewind doesn't let me do-over, but fast-forward puts the remote in control of all my life decisions? Isn't that a little bit of a disparity? Oh, I know, it's a metaphor for my life, wrapped up in a tidy plot device that lets me explore difficult concepts without having to really face them in the story.
(...when ya comin' home dad? I don't know when, we'll be together then...)
Sandler: And as I hung up the phone, it occurred to me, he'd grown up just like me! My boy was just like me! I want to take it all back! Jacob Marley, you were right! Clarence, it is a wonderful life! Son, don't be a douche like your dad! Spirit, assure me that I yet may change these shadows you have shown me, by an altered life!
(dooblie-dooblie-dooblie...)
Sandler: It was all a dream... OR WAS IT? Young man, what day is it today?
Kid: Why, it's Christmas day, sir!
Sander: Oh, joy of joys. Buy a big fat turkey. "Click", perhaps! It'll be on DVD before you know it. My dog is still humping things! AND IT'S STILL FUNNY! I'm going to yell at my wife so I can pull a switcheroo! It's heartwarming, except that I'm still basically yelling at my wife... I'm going to pile up all the lessons I've learned into an incoherent ball and throw them at everybody I see so they think I'm a mental case! I'm gonna call Julie Kavner and Henry Winkler! Henry's coin trick will continue to be the core of our father-son relationship!
The End.
---GEC
I'm but the humble pupil, seeking to snatch the scratchbuilt pebble from the master's fully articulated hand
I dunno. "Will all we"? Or perhaps we all will.
Imagine the SPAM... 8-)
How long would it be before your brain shuts down due to too much spam... 8-)
We're definitely going to need to overhaul our copyright laws.
What happens to copyright when your neural implants can record and transmit everything you see and hear with perfect digital fidelity?
At that point, going to a movie and making a copy of the movie are the same thing.
The only way to avoid that would require copy protection inside our implants, and I'm not standing for MPAA Untrusted Computing in MY brain.
Now suppose you plop a modern 21st C, wired geek into the middle of this. (For purposes of this simulation, assume that access to the supporting networks is available through the time-slip*.)
Now imagine him walking down the street with his Bluetooth mobile phone headset chatting to tech support with his hands empty. Even if a native of the 1950's sees the thingy clamped to the geeks ear, will they consider it a phone or just a seriously weird earring? And what will they think of him as he walks by talking to thin air?
My assumption is that they will think either, "Wierdo!" or "ESPER!!!"
The future is now!
I all in favor of cyborg enhancements as long as they increase individual freedom -- for example, increasing strength, flexibility, coordination, speed, stamina, eyesight, dexterity, intelligence, memory -- but not "enhancements" to personality. Sure, one can argue that enhanced humans should all have personalities that make them efficient and happy contributors to society, but society's only purpose is to ensure survival and comfort. If we manage to build robots do all the work in society, humans won't need to contribute and should have the freedom and leisure to be they want to be.
I'm all for replacing the human body.
But only one thing is really in the way.
Resources to do the job properly.
It takes a lot of talent, multiple disciplines, and time.
It's going to take "test" subjects.
I would love to be more stronger, smarter, faster, etc.
Who wouldn't???
The bionic olympics would be a damn good show.
The human body is garbage imo.
It takes too long to heal, too slow to learn, blah blah blah.
Long story short....its time for change.
Some people really like their body......lol.
Whatever. You can stay "human" if you want too.
rofl.
Maybe it's a cultural thing. I rarely run into poor phone etiquette that extreme. When I do, it's fairly simple to just take them aside and explain polite phone behaviour to them.
I've never gotten a "Where are yoooooou" message, unless I'm not somewhere I'm supposed to be, and in that case I've usually called them to let them know what's happening.
I'd always thought the "Canadians are more polite" thing was a myth.
To quote Greg Egan, the 21st century the biggest conflict will be over the definitions of two words, health and humanity.
If someone has a prosthetic leg, few would argue they're no longer human, but what about if their whole body is prosthetic? Or half their brain is stored in silicon? Is someone who is permanently brain damaged no longer human, and therefore we have no moral imperitive to sustain their life?
Is a self-sufficient and satisfied sociopath unhealthy, and therefore in need of being 'cured'? How about a happy, but mentally handicapped child? By treating either of these people, and changing them essentially into some other person, are we depriving them on their humanity?
What makes us human is very simple: our DNA. Cat DNA makes a cat a(n iteration of) cat. Can we blame Star Trek for this idea that being human is something other than being meat configured by a certain set of DNA instructions? i think "what it means to be human" is a self indulgent question until we get a real basis of comparison; some sort of alien sentience. As for identity, refer to the identity property, you are you. That's it. You can't be anyone else and you can't be no one. i've always been annoyed with people saying that they don't know who they are or need to figure out who they are. Look in the mirror. That's you. Remember your life, all that you've done and had done to you. That's you.
Utilizing the synergization of benchmark e-solutions to pre-workaround action items!
(1) Could someome please tell me how to configure Opera to skip this man's posts?
(2) Be sure I won't RTFA, so I'll list a few technogical fixes to the individual human condition:
Spectacles for old/odd eyeballs
False teeth for the soup classes
Hearing aids for those who haven't heard it all
Clothing for those living outside equatorial climes
Braces/suspenders for the waist-challenged
Pen/pencil and paper for the forgetful
It's things like these that are destroying humanity.
I started to reach for the foe button but after a second thought hit the reply instead. By the way, I rate my foes up in my preferences, I tend to mark people as foes because I disagree with them, not because I want to ignore them.
Back to the issue at hand; Poverty exists because people are willfully ignorant and lazy. Not every person in poverty is one or the other, but you can bet that either the impoverished individual or at least one parent is. Note that I use the word poverty, not poor. Poverty sticks, poor comes and goes. I've been poor, I've never been in poverty.
It should be pointed out that poverty is a term used to describe both individuals and communities. I am strictly speaking of individuals in the same context that I believe you were, as people who live in areas where poverty is not a direct result of the potential resources, but as a result of their circumstance.
I've seen a lot of well intentioned people fall into this same line of thinking. Wanting nothing but to improve the circumstances of others, they observe that some people are chronically impoverished, while others are wealthy and deduce that there is something wrong with the system. Nobody wants to be without the basic essentials, so therefore they must be where they are because something, or someone, forces them to be there. This is where the mistake is made, simply wanting to be wealthy does not make a person wealthy. Almost anyone can change their status at least a little bit, but many do not and the reasons they do not are not due to lack of opportunity, but lack of actual desire to do the things necessary to do it.
You're right when you say "...its fundamentally a human problem" but you're wrong in assuming it is primarily one of people causing the circumstance of others.
You can test this for yourself, the next time you see someone who needs help, offer them your own money in return for hard labor. You'll quickly find that those who take your offer are also the ones who have a decent life and some self respect, and those that refuse are the same ones that complain about how unfair their circumstances are.
No technology can fix the person who will not change their circumstance. Perhaps someday? I seriously doubt it, not that I cannot imagine a world where those who are lazy are given a pill to make them industrious, but because I cannot honestly believe that any society we see is moving toward the attitude that we should make someone work against their will. That is chemically induced slavery and the world isn't big on slavery in any form. Want to get right down to brass tacks? Slavery is probably, sadly, the only way to fix poverty, forcing people who don't want to work where it is needed to do what is best for society and themselves against their will would fix it, and is unconscionable. Be it pill induced or legally induced, I don't foresee any government setting it up in my lifetime, especially in a manner that would be beneficial to the slaves. There are bad people who take advantage of other people, and the worst possible thing that could happen to eliminate poverty is to allow those who are most likely to be willing to take responsibility and authority over the impoverished to do it. It could be done, and would be a lot easier with involuntary physical technology modifications, if there were someone with the authority and power to set it up to be beneficial to the slave and still the greater societal good. I am not, however, volunteering for either the role of tyrant or slave.
I'm going AC on this one because I speak of slavery and the potential for a benevolent tyranny, neither of which would do my karma any good. Our society views any slavery as evil, but it is not in itself, it is the practices that have been evil, not the concept. Our society views all tyranny as evil, but again, it is not. It is the practices of (most) tyrants that have been evil. I doubt most see that and expect that my karma would suffer.