What ever happened to the transhumanists? • Hacker News Board

Re: What ever happened to the transhumanists?

#391

Post by daoist_shaman » Sat, Aug 06, 2022, 4:29 PM UTC

alexvoda wrote: post #353

daoist_shaman wrote: post #148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I guess when I say “natural,” what I truly mean is “that which is not made by man.” Any substance which is found in the natural environment and mechanically altered does not count in my definition of man-made; this is essentially the same notion of natural that revolvingocelot points out. I think the crusade against “natural bias” is unfounded. Of course there are plenty of natural things that are not good for us—suc…

You are still anthropomorphousising nature. Nature does not intend to protect us from anything, much less from overpopulation. Nature does not intend anything as a whole. Each living creature simply intends to survive and multiply. Not changing anything about nature will also lead to our demise. Most non-human organisms (maybe all other than domesticated dogs and lifestock) are either ambivalent or opportunistically…

Absolutely. Anthropomorphizing is just a metaphorical way to simplify the highly complex system that is formally known as natural selection. It also alludes to the notion of Earth as one big organism, popularly known as the Gaia hypothesis.

I don’t think there’s any harm in this. Ships that humans build are also addressed as feminine. It’s just a thing that we do.

Re: What ever happened to the transhumanists?

#392

Post by zemvpferreira » Sat, Aug 06, 2022, 4:31 PM UTC

bart_spoon wrote: post #379

cycomanic wrote: post #347

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Quoted post unavailable.

> Argue based on some extreme strawman You yourself are arguing based on an extreme straw man here. Does that make you a neo-nazi as well? Interestingly, I think you illustrate another important factor in anti-transgender resistance: a subsection of proponents are extremely quick on the trigger to accuse any disagreement of being bigoted, hateful, violent, and, as you have, fascist. This does nothing but drive increa…

Hear hear. bart_spoon shaped a thought I had but could never crystallize. I'm a hetero cisgendered man that is positive to neutral on trans issues. But I cringe whenever I hear most pro-trans speech and will not stand behind it. Why be so quick to paint anyone who has any reservations about this as genocidal? This is literally the behaviour that pushes me further to the right.

Re: What ever happened to the transhumanists?

#393

Post by jl6 » Sat, Aug 06, 2022, 4:48 PM UTC

kuschku wrote: post #389

jl6 wrote: post #387

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I sure hope you’re right, but the point is that we just don’t know. Reviews of that evidence have determined it to be low quality: https://www.bbc.com/news/health-56601386.amp Read Cass for more details. I also 110% oppose circumcision.

The fact that the consensus differs so heavily between countries where this topic has become a political issue, and countries where it’s not yet become one (e.g., Germany), leads me to suspect these sources are biased. This applies especially to british sources on this topic. The NHS and BBC have become heavily influenced by the Tories in recent years, so I’ll have to question your sources.

I keep mentioning Cass because it is a breath of fresh air in this bitterly polarised subject area, compared to news sources. It is level-headed and compassionate, and I encourage you to try reading it, if you can excuse its Britishness.

Re: What ever happened to the transhumanists?

#394

Post by kbenson » Sat, Aug 06, 2022, 5:02 PM UTC

simonh wrote: post #388

kbenson wrote: post #384

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And their takeaway was that there needs to be some advances to smooth out the annoyances, not that the idea itself was flawed. Think of glasses. Glasses are used to increase people's ability to see up to the human norm, not beyond it, but besides that difference there's very little to distinguish eyeglasses from an embedded magnet on a fundamental level. Both are about increasing your capability, but nobody is attrib…

The argument against transhumanism is that conventional 'external' technology is more flexible and convenient, and glasses are clearly in the latter category. I'm not against transhumanism as such, to an extent it's inevitable for medical reasons. I expect we'll gradually build up experience from medical implants and a minority experimenting with body modification, and eventually a consensus on useful mods will emerg…

To me, that's less an argument against transhumanism than it is people drawing an arbitrary line and deciding the things they don't like can get one label while the things they do don't, so they can easily point out problems even though the line is mostly arbitrary.

Whether I get some small extra perception because of a simple small magnet or because of a complex microchip is irrelevant to the point if they provide the same new abilities and have similar levels of risk and robustness.

Similarly, whether we think getting social media embedded in your consciousness or getting a gun embedded in your arm are good ideas has little to do with the prior examples, so to me they aren't examples of problems of transhumanism as much as examples of problems with humans.

Re: What ever happened to the transhumanists?

#395

Post by trasz » Sat, Aug 06, 2022, 5:32 PM UTC

NateEag wrote: post #207

trasz wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

Heh - this sounds kind of like theism. :)

Except that I'm not talking about some mythical "supreme beings", I'm talking about things that we've ourselves created. When you look at politics, you'll see that in many countries, from USA to Russia, "collective interest" matter more than those of humans; from corporations "sponsoring" regulations, to steadily lowering life quality and, at the same time, skyrocketing company income.

Re: What ever happened to the transhumanists?

#396

Post by grog454 » Sat, Aug 06, 2022, 5:35 PM UTC

alexvoda wrote: post #349

grog454 wrote: post #217

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's useful to distinguish things that are made with human influence and things that aren't, and it can be done without value judgments (one is superior or inferior). It's useful because of the disproportionate effect of synthetic things vs. natural things. No species prior to humans had the ability to obliterate all life on earth.

On the contrary, some species have already obliterated most other life on earth namely cyanobacteria during the great oxigenation event. Possibly others have done the same. They certainly did not care at all about the destruction they caused. All of this was perfectly "natural". That of course does not mean we should follow their example. It just means that "natural" is not a useful term.

This is still a far cry from a global nuclear winter or a deliberately redirected asteroid, or any other number of things that only humans are capable of.

Re: What ever happened to the transhumanists?

#397

Post by raffraffraff » Sat, Aug 06, 2022, 5:37 PM UTC

ianbicking wrote: post #234

toofy wrote: post #210

We currently have a massive chunk of society who are losing their collective minds about people engaging in the very early iterations of transhumanism—transgender folks. I still regularly encounter people who are spitting angry against transgender folks and then later in the conversation will completely unironically talk about how much they love the cyberpunk genre. Not many of them realize they would be the weird cu…

Putting aside the debate and controversy around transgender folks, if I just step back and think about the act itself, it is truly an incredible act of will over self... redefining yourself, redefining your relationship to society, acting so strongly against the defaults of your life... I'm not sure I could do it. As an act of tremendous will over self I genuinely respect it.

One can exercise tremendous change over ones self, but one cannot redefine ones relationship with society since relationships aren't one-way. That's always going to be a potential source of friction.

Re: What ever happened to the transhumanists?

#398

Post by alexvoda » Sat, Aug 06, 2022, 5:40 PM UTC

daoist_shaman wrote: post #391

alexvoda wrote: post #353

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are still anthropomorphousising nature. Nature does not intend to protect us from anything, much less from overpopulation. Nature does not intend anything as a whole. Each living creature simply intends to survive and multiply. Not changing anything about nature will also lead to our demise. Most non-human organisms (maybe all other than domesticated dogs and lifestock) are either ambivalent or opportunistically…

Absolutely. Anthropomorphizing is just a metaphorical way to simplify the highly complex system that is formally known as natural selection. It also alludes to the notion of Earth as one big organism, popularly known as the Gaia hypothesis. I don’t think there’s any harm in this. Ships that humans build are also addressed as feminine. It’s just a thing that we do.

I would argue there is great cognitive harm in anthropomorphizing. And it very much does not simplify anything, quite the opposite.

I do believe the notion of metaorganisms is useful. A human can be considered an emerging metaorganism formed from millions of cells of various origin including human, bacteria, viruses, giruses, parasites, etc. We are also possibly part of larger metaorganisms, probably in the form of cities. And the entire planet can be considered a metaorganism. Terraforming another planet can be interpreted as a planet having offspring.

Arguing for the existence of metaorganisms is not the same as arguing that the mataorganism is aware and influences its own internal processes affecting its lower level member organisms. You (your conscious self) do not tell your kidney what to do.

Natural selection is very much not self aware and it is not trying to achieve an end goal, much less so a goal with regards to humanity. Nature has not "thought" neither ahead nor behind nor to the side of us.

From Wikipedia:

"The Gaia hypothesis proposes that living organisms interact with their inorganic surroundings on Earth to form a synergistic and self-regulating, complex system that helps to maintain and perpetuate the conditions for life on the planet."

Do not confuse the Gaia hypothesis with a Gaia god. By anthropomorphizing that is what you do. Gaia does not answer your prayers, nor hear them, nor care for them.

I consider, anthropomorphizing to be the root mechanism at the formation of all religions. Humans were exposed to uncontrollable phenomena. In their attempt to influence them they anthropomorphizied the phenomena. As a result they could attemp to bargain with it, plead with it, threaten it, beg it, blame it, thank it, etc. . We have just repurposed the neural pathways used to communicate with other humans in order to communicate with the environment. Probably for the same reason a nerural net will missrecognise a leopard print sofa as a leopard. The unknown, unpredictability, is more terrifying than anything else, and definitely more terrifying than being wrong. Anthropomorphizing is also one of the things that will stand in our way towards developing AI. We will continue to redefine intelligence in order to maintain human exceptionality.

I believe anthropomorphizing is fundamentally wrong.

Re: What ever happened to the transhumanists?

#399

Post by space_fountain » Sat, Aug 06, 2022, 5:42 PM UTC

ungamedplayer wrote: post #276

space_fountain wrote: post #271

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ok, so are you also against birth control and or opt in sterilization, otherwise your position is inconsistent and I don’t claim morals are logic, but they should at least be consistent. Oh also since we’re on a technicality forum. Trans hormones don’t necessarily cause permanent sterilization. Plenty of trans people have children

Citation for plenty needed.

I don’t think there is great science on this but here’s a paper focusing on tactics to preserve fertility https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6626312/. It gives rates as high as 100% for mtf fertility (and as low as 25). And I may have missed it, but doesn’t seem to for trans men. Stories of trans men pausing hormones to have a kid are anecdotally pretty common though

Re: What ever happened to the transhumanists?

#400

Post by kuschku » Sat, Aug 06, 2022, 5:47 PM UTC

jl6 wrote: post #393

kuschku wrote: post #389

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The fact that the consensus differs so heavily between countries where this topic has become a political issue, and countries where it’s not yet become one (e.g., Germany), leads me to suspect these sources are biased. This applies especially to british sources on this topic. The NHS and BBC have become heavily influenced by the Tories in recent years, so I’ll have to question your sources.

I keep mentioning Cass because it is a breath of fresh air in this bitterly polarised subject area, compared to news sources. It is level-headed and compassionate, and I encourage you to try reading it, if you can excuse its Britishness.

I've read it, but its arguments are still at odds with what's done based on it.

e.g., the Cass Review explicitly says "The rationale for use of puberty blockers at Tanner Stage 2 of development was based on data that demonstrated that children, particularly birth-registered boys who had early gender incongruence, were unlikely to desist once they reached early puberty" and only recommends reviewing puberty blockers for AFAB people.

Yet your comments and british politics instead call for ending the use of puberty blockers for everyone, including AMAB people (and the recent tavistock case actually accomplished that).

Most of the other issues the report finds are entirely local to the UK, due to the way healthcare systems differ heavily between countries, and can't be applied elsewhere.

I'll be entirely honest, the british system is an absolute mess and needs to be entirely rebuilt (and any british trans person is going to agree), but just stopping all care entirely for years until a new system exists is the worst possible option, and one that's going to cost countless lives.