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What ever happened to the transhumanists?

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Re: What ever happened to the transhumanists?

#131

Post by danjoredd »

philipkglass wrote: post #123
danjoredd wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My main area of concern is people who can exploit these augmentations for political, personal, and profit reasons. Even in the best scenario possible, these things are going to happen. All code is flawed in some fashion. Unless we plan on keeping these augmentations completely offline, they can and WILL be exploited by hackers. Imagine how giddy North Korea would be to be able to mess with the President's body, or ha…

Even in the best scenario possible, these things are going to happen. All code is flawed in some fashion. Unless we plan on keeping these augmentations completely offline, they can and WILL be exploited by hackers. I think that companies are capable of making secure systems when they have the right incentives. The Xbox One, launched 9 years ago, has never had its security broken such that it could play copied games.…

While you are correct about the xbox, it will eventually be cracked one of these days. Its not a matter of if, but when. But would you seriously trust that when it is your own body we are talking about? What is the incentive for companies to continue supporting old parts? Good will? Maybe if there is regulation, but if it is more profitable to pay the fees than issue a recall or consider continuing support, then why bother?

Even Microsoft's security isn't perfect...a group of hackers found the full specs and software for the Xbox One months before it was released or details were announced. Look up "XBox Underground." Even if the device itself is safe, there are other alternative ways of jacking things up. Imagine if the eyes you use are safe...but the server they connect to isn't, and some creep decides to watch you and your lover having sex.

Re: What ever happened to the transhumanists?

#132

Post by jholman »

photochemsyn wrote: post #91

To become transhuman or posthuman, you'd first have to understand what it is to be human, and we're not anywhere near that. Some of the enthusiasm about the hopes for such a transition were raised by this: > "The Human Genome Project finally released a complete human genome sequence in 2003, in a project that took 13 years to complete." The most remarkable thing about that accomplishment was how little it resulted in…

> To become transhuman or posthuman, you'd first have to understand what it is to be human

What? Why?

I'm post-adolescent (at least biologically, please don't bring up all of my emotional immaturity), and I still don't (and definitely didn't then) understand what it is to be adolescent.

I live in a post-feudal society, and while I think we understand a few things about what it means to be feudal, I wouldn't bet on us having a full and complete understanding.

There's a plant on my balcony that's post-living, and as far as I know it never understood anything at all, much less understood what it was to be living.

Why is transhuman-ness or posthuman-ness a special exception to the general rule that surpassing (or at least passing) something does not in fact require understanding it?

Re: What ever happened to the transhumanists?

#133

Post by JoeAltmaier »

revolvingocelot wrote: post #117
JoeAltmaier wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not sure that's accurate. Animals aren't trying to create things that break down easily; they're not trying to do anything but survive. The argument is circular: if animals make it, it's part of Gaia else it's 'unnatural'. Animals didn't make plastics, so they're 'unnatural'. By definition I guess, not by any real difference between them and bone or termite mounds or dinosaur bones or geodes...you know, things that c…

>The argument is circular: if animals make it, it's part of Gaia else it's 'unnatural'. Animals didn't make plastics, so they're 'unnatural'. Er, this is your argument, not mine. Mine is: "if animals make it, and it is unmade (or remade, or recycled, or broken down [0]) by something else, then this is 'natural'." Plastics nor PFAS meet that standard. Those matter types stay static. The animals called 'humans' make pl…

Granite breaks down about as fast as plastic. No, plastic is not very different from, well, almost the entirety of the planet earth. But for a thin skin of muck.

Geodes and dissolved heavy metals and salts and on and on -all entirely 'natural' and been there forever - don't chemically interact, much.

Natural poisons exist nearly everywhere. Nature is not some wonderful synchrony of cooperative organisms. Everything is doing its best to kill something else through poison, acid, lye, violence etc. That apricot pit wants to kill you with cyanide so it's pit can thrive in your decaying body.

Heck, an imbalance in ordinary creatures (think invasive species) can do untold harm.

Examples abound. It's not about kind, just concentration and rate.

It's a complex system, and the dichotomy 'natural' doesn't contribute much to the discussion. That's my thinking anyway.

Re: What ever happened to the transhumanists?

#134

Post by trasz »

coenhyde wrote: post #10
danjoredd wrote: post #2

Does anyone working in tech ACTUALLY thin transhumanism is a good idea? It seems like a field ripe for criminal exploitation and hacking, even in an optimistic future. Unless I lose a limb, or an eye, keep my body offline.

I'll be keeping my body offline. But I think fusion with AGI is inevitable if we want to remain somewhat in control of our future. Otherwise we will be super ceded by super intelligent AI and become their pets.

We wouldn’t even notice we’ve become pets of any kind of superintelligence; one can’t notice intelligence vastly superior to their own, same way your cat can’t even remotely grasp what the code on your screen is for.

Re: What ever happened to the transhumanists?

#135

Post by peteradio »

nickff wrote: post #121
peteradio wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You could potentially make a thing that acts like you, that's it. The only reason our existence is tolerable is that we agree with the guy that when he goes to bed he is dead and I take over in the morning and I make the same deal tomorrow.

I quite like that phrasing (in your second sentence); did you come up with it yourself, or did you catch it somewhere?

I think I've read it somewhere but I never keep track of citations. Might have been Michael Keaton in that movie, moral of the story, if you copy yourself then your copy is gonna bang your wife.

Re: What ever happened to the transhumanists?

#136

Post by foobiekr »

marcosdumay wrote: post #113

With our current relationship with tech, nobody on their right mind would want to anticipate transhumanism. Fix tech first, then people will start to hype it again.

This is the true and underappreciated answer.

People do not trust technology and technology companies.

And they are right in that thinking. Almost all of the big tech companies are straight up evil almost to the point of being impossible to satire and tech workers defend them due to the high compensation.

Re: What ever happened to the transhumanists?

#138

Post by nemo44x »

revolvingocelot wrote: post #127
nemo44x wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Obviously “post-modern”.

>>they classify certain beliefs as true (i.e., successful, superior) and other beliefs as false (i.e., failed, inferior) You think that this describes post-modernism ? I thought post-modernism was all about, well, relativism. Upon looking it up, I'm amazed to discover that Kaczynski wrote "leftists", because the excerpted paragraph sure as hell describes the modern conservative. Raging against science and rationality…

I was going to say leftists of more federally liberals but settled on post modernism since it’s taken up by those groups.

Post modernists say there is no truth and that everything comes down to power structures and control. That everything is made up anyways so feel free to throw away all grand narratives and indulge in whatever decadence you want. Because truth doesn’t exist and is a function of power structures.

I think modern liberals are against science and rationality just as much as conservatives. They’re just think they aren’t. Liberals tend to be smart and conservatives tend to be wise.

Re: What ever happened to the transhumanists?

#139

Post by revolvingocelot »

JoeAltmaier wrote: post #133
revolvingocelot wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>The argument is circular: if animals make it, it's part of Gaia else it's 'unnatural'. Animals didn't make plastics, so they're 'unnatural'. Er, this is your argument, not mine. Mine is: "if animals make it, and it is unmade (or remade, or recycled, or broken down [0]) by something else, then this is 'natural'." Plastics nor PFAS meet that standard. Those matter types stay static. The animals called 'humans' make pl…

Granite breaks down about as fast as plastic. No, plastic is not very different from, well, almost the entirety of the planet earth. But for a thin skin of muck. Geodes and dissolved heavy metals and salts and on and on -all entirely 'natural' and been there forever - don't chemically interact, much. Natural poisons exist nearly everywhere. Nature is not some wonderful synchrony of cooperative organisms. Everything i…

You aren't reading, or possibly understanding, what I'm writing.

Granite seems fine to me, and even if it isn't, it is localized in ways plastic and PFAS aren't. Plastic is very different from almost the entirety of the planet earth. It doesn't occur naturally, and doesn't break down naturally; just like PFAS. You can obscure this fact all you like, but it's trivially true.

>Natural poisons exist nearly everywhere. Nature is not some wonderful synchrony of cooperative organisms. Everything is doing its best to kill something else through poison, acid, lye, violence etc. That apricot pit wants to kill you with cyanide so it's pit can thrive in your decaying body.

Natural poisons (wait, now you're fine with invoking "natural"?!) are broken down over time -- they're natural. That apricot pit doesn't "want" anything, unlike the humans that make plastics or PFAS, and its cyanide "pollution" is contained physically by virtue of its properties, unlike the plastics and PFAS made by humans. Plus, the pit is easily metabolized by the various systems of microbes and fungus and rot that keep things from the natural world participating in the great cycle, like cyanide and apricot pits and apricot flesh and absolutely everything related to or created by apricots ever. I repeat, "every example provided in the parent is, and has been, a part of the world for so long that they're not disruptive to other systems, or at least are physically contained".

The system is complex, yes, so let's not go polluting almost the entire environment with things that haven't existed long enough for the various naturally-occurring garbagemen to notice, let alone adapt to them. Are unnaturally occurring materials vital to modern human life? Yes! Do we absolutely need to blanket the ecosystem in them, to our cancerous detriment? No!

Re: What ever happened to the transhumanists?

#140

Post by orthecreedence »

marcosdumay wrote: post #113

With our current relationship with tech, nobody on their right mind would want to anticipate transhumanism. Fix tech first, then people will start to hype it again.

Right, this is my sentiment exactly. Give me open-source, modular devices created by people operating outside the incentive structures of a capitalist mode of production and I'll take a look.

As far as the devices of the current order, I keep that dirty bullshit as far away from my body (and home) as I reasonably can.

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