This topic ALWAYS misrepresents what evolution actually is. You guys realize evolution is not a linear progression towards some kind of illogical "super form" right?
When people say, "this is the next step in human evolution!" I want to strangle them.
Fine. It's no longer Evolution by Natural Selection (undirected process). It's evolution by genetic manipulation (directed process).
Would you consider domestic breeding falling under the umbrella of evolution (artificial selection)?
I can't stand homonym's is basically what I'm saying.
I just think it should be noted that evolution (natural selection) is not "working towards" anything, it doesn't move linearly towards an end. I think too many people have this idea that positive traits are absolute, that somehow evolution is an additive process designed to cram as much "good" shit into one organism as possible.
I mean, technically there is no difference genetically between artificial and natural selection. But you do run into a huge difference when intent is applied.
Domestic breeding might fall under the topic of evolution, but it isn't evolution. Evolution is literally the passing on of inherited traits within a population.
The language is just too transparent for me sometimes.
Hmm, yes I took biology as well and the cry that "evolution doesn't have a purpose" was always crammed into my head.
I think of it as an distributed algorithm for determining the best genetic match for an environment. In volatile environments, evolution occurs quickly as species are forced to adapt. Eventually a plateau will be reached via speciation, etc and evolution will slow down or nearly cease. This is why certain species (sharks, insects) have been around for millions of years.
Their genotype found a niche that worked well for them - in essence the process of evolution filled that niche.
This topic ALWAYS misrepresents what evolution actually is. You guys realize evolution is not a linear progression towards some kind of illogical "super form" right?
When people say, "this is the next step in human evolution!" I want to strangle them.
Fine. It's no longer Evolution by Natural Selection (undirected process). It's evolution by genetic manipulation (directed process).
Would you consider domestic breeding falling under the umbrella of evolution (artificial selection)?
I can't stand homonym's is basically what I'm saying.
I just think it should be noted that evolution (natural selection) is not "working towards" anything, it doesn't move linearly towards an end. I think too many people have this idea that positive traits are absolute, that somehow evolution is an additive process designed to cram as much "good" shit into one organism as possible.
I mean, technically there is no difference genetically between artificial and natural selection. But you do run into a huge difference when intent is applied.
Domestic breeding might fall under the topic of evolution, but it isn't evolution. Evolution is literally the passing on of inherited traits within a population.
The language is just too transparent for me sometimes.
Hmm, yes I took biology as well and the cry that "evolution doesn't have a purpose" was always crammed into my head.
I think of it as an distributed algorithm for determining the best genetic match for an environment. In volatile environments, evolution occurs quickly as species are forced to adapt. Eventually a plateau will be reached via speciation, etc and evolution will slow down or nearly cease. This is why certain species (sharks, insects) have been around for millions of years.
Their genotype found a niche that worked well for them - in essence the process of evolution filled that niche.
Right right, yeah yeah.
I'm just saying it bugs me when I see a movie that's all "wow check out those crazy powers! mankind's next step in evolution!" or "check out my new eye implant! I'm way more evolved than you! Suckkkkkkkkkk ittttttttttt"
etc, you get the idea. You can also see why I fucking hate the X-Men.
Just for my clarification - are you admitting or denying that unequal access to education did result in a huge, unfair advantage to people? It seems to me that historical inequality with regard to education, and the vast and continuing social problems that resulted from it, indicates we should be very concerned about unequal access to brain-enhancing technologies.
I'm admitting it, but also asserting that it's manageable. The advantage that the wealthy have over the poor with regards to education is by no means insurmountable, and a lot of the perks that an obscene amount of money can buy are pretty marginal. Dropping $200k on an education at Harvard isn't a huge advantage, in the long term, over going to a decent state school. It is very, very possible for a kid born to a poor family to become successful and prosperous, even if it's easier for Paris Hilton.
What I was saying is that if that's the kind of disparity we'd see from biological enhancements, I could deal with it, given the many benefits that would be granted to pretty much everyone, rich or poor.
And if the advantage was becoming 7 foot tall greek gods with photographic memories and super-genius level intelligence, then you couldn't deal with it? What would that mean?
Just for my clarification - are you admitting or denying that unequal access to education did result in a huge, unfair advantage to people? It seems to me that historical inequality with regard to education, and the vast and continuing social problems that resulted from it, indicates we should be very concerned about unequal access to brain-enhancing technologies.
I'm admitting it, but also asserting that it's manageable. The advantage that the wealthy have over the poor with regards to education is by no means insurmountable, and a lot of the perks that an obscene amount of money can buy are pretty marginal. Dropping $200k on an education at Harvard isn't a huge advantage, in the long term, over going to a decent state school. It is very, very possible for a kid born to a poor family to become successful and prosperous, even if it's easier for Paris Hilton.
What I was saying is that if that's the kind of disparity we'd see from biological enhancements, I could deal with it, given the many benefits that would be granted to pretty much everyone, rich or poor.
Okay. The disparity I was referring to, specifically, was the sort you described in the first part of your post, when only the rich taught their children to read, etc. That level of disparity was not acceptable then, and there's no reason we should be willing to accept it now.
And we all understand that education is only a very rough analogy to the kind of enhancements we're potentially talking about. Today there's no particular reason that a high school dropout who makes $25k a year has to feel he's inherantly inferior to Bill Gates, since he can assume that they're more alike than unlike, and that he also theoretically has the potential for Gates-level achievement; he can attribute the fact that he didn't accomplish what Gates did at least partly to his own choice, and he can even feel secure and valuable in that, since the lifestyle he's chosen, however modest, can still reflect his power over his own destiny. Many of the cherished ideals of our society rest on that principle. Educational disparity threatens it only indirectly; biological enhancements, administered in the womb, could feel like an all-out assault. Once we have those, an unenhanced child loses more than the hope he can ever achieve at society's top level; he loses the ability to believe that his social class is really under his control. That could be socially devastating.
The other thing to remember is that even if these enhancements actually provide only modest improvements, they'd still become easy ways of choosing between applicants for work and education, since the folks who have them would have every reason to make that fact as public as possible. We could see disparity that's greatly disproportionate to whatever actual advantages the technology provides.
Quite the opposite. The final stage of evolution is suicide.
Care to explain? Or are you just blabbering?
ElJeffe on
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Educational disparity threatens it only indirectly; biological enhancements, administered in the womb, could feel like an all-out assault. Once we have those, an unenhanced child loses more than the hope he can ever achieve at society's top level; he loses the ability to believe that his social class is really under his control. That could be socially devastating.
Agreed, if the sort of enhancements we're talking about are dramatic and only available to the creme de la creme. But as technology improves, it could very well be that everyone winds up getting some sort of womb-cocktail, and the super-rich can afford one that's only minimally superior, for example. If the difference between what the poor can obtain and what the rich can obtain is tiny, the effect is far less destabilizing. That's why I used the example of education. The difference between someone who gets a serious int-boost and someone who doesn't may well be on par with the difference between a modern Harvard graduate and an uneducated slave in ancient Rome. But that doesn't mean that education is a bad thing, because the poor can still get pretty good educations. Similarly, if modest enhancements are obtainable by everyone, the existence of slightly better ones might not be a big deal.
The other thing to remember is that even if these enhancements actually provide only modest improvements, they'd still become easy ways of choosing between applicants for work and education, since the folks who have them would have every reason to make that fact as public as possible. We could see disparity that's greatly disproportionate to whatever actual advantages the technology provides.
Perhaps, but that could be dealt with via legislation. We could seal medical records such that they can't be released to employers - claim you're genetically engineered all you want, but if you can't prove it, so what? Also, consider that one's education, for example, is still only part of the story. Just because you have an Ivy league degree doesn't mean you'll invariably be hired over someone who doesn't. Similarly, just because you're equipped with Genes of Intellect +3, you won't necessarily be the best man for any given job.
ElJeffe on
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Perhaps, but that could be dealt with via legislation. We could seal medical records such that they can't be released to employers - claim you're genetically engineered all you want, but if you can't prove it, so what?
That would be a pretty dramatic shift in current laws concerning the release of medical records. There's a lot in HIPAA that tells healthcare providers how they can handle medical records and who they can't release them to, but all of it is toward giving the patient primary access to them and control over who sees them. Telling the recipient of the enhancements that he can't have access to his own medical records and show them to whomever he wants might be seen as a pretty clear violation of his freedoms.
Yeah, that occurred to me, as well. There's probably a more elegant solution, but I was trying to come up with a means of outlawing discrimination based on medical enhancements in a way that would actually be effective. Maybe in practice, it wouldn't be a big enough issue to even warrant legislative action.
ElJeffe on
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Heh, I don't think so. I think I just started out voicing my worst fears, and then went on to expand upon a less-than-worst-case-scenario.
ElJeffe on
I submitted an entry to Lego Ideas, and if 10,000 people support me, it'll be turned into an actual Lego set!If you'd like to see and support my submission, follow this link.
You might be joking, but honestly I expect that we'll see this sort of thing way before the Gattica scenario El_Jeffe is understandably concerned about.
I'm surprised; usually the token Gattica reference in threads like this comes after the token Brave New World reference.
What if you don't want it, though? Personally, I imagine that when we can afford to use universal genetic modifications (or cybernetics if you prefer that route,) we'll start seeing little communities that intentionally avoid any modifications, much like you currently see the Amish. Actually, imagining the Amish in general in this scenario is pretty interesting. How long will they last in the future? Will they have little farms next to orbital towers, flying cars, and all the crap the future damn well better have at some point?
EmperorSeth on
You know what? Nanowrimo's cancelled on account of the world is stupid.
What if you don't want it, though? Personally, I imagine that when we can afford to use universal genetic modifications (or cybernetics if you prefer that route,) we'll start seeing little communities that intentionally avoid any modifications, much like you currently see the Amish. Actually, imagining the Amish in general in this scenario is pretty interesting. How long will they last in the future? Will they have little farms next to orbital towers, flying cars, and all the crap the future damn well better have at some point?
We'll eventually launch a plague to get rid of them. By then they wont be missed.
I don't understand why this is such a big deal. This is just the next step in medicine, and the rich-poor gap will increase as the rich get stronger and smarter, just like all technological increases.
Quite the opposite. The final stage of evolution is suicide.
Care to explain? Or are you just blabbering?
No I'm not fucking blabbering.
Suicide of the species will happen. See, creatures are always in competition with other creatures of their own species, trying to get the best and most mates. If this comptetition continues, they will eventually evolve so much that they will utterly devestate those who they are in competition with. As the weakest groups die off, the only ones remaining are just more and more powerful. And eventually, that group too will become strifed.
Having no one to compete with but themselves, the entire species will become extinguished from the universe. Forever.
Tigers, Lions, Sharks... at no point is any one group of these creatures in danger of wiping out the entire species.
Humans? More advanced than tigers, lions, and sharks, and if we possess the ability to blow ourselves out of existance entirely right NOW, imagine a future where we are even more subjected to the effects of evolution.
This reminds me of a controversy I saw recently about a man who had a prosthetic leg that was kind of like a flipper that was designed for running. He was smoking the competition, and wanted to race in the normal events with everyone else, and people argued that it wasn't fair because his prosthetic leg gave him an unfair advantage. That's going to become more and more of an issue as prosthetic become more and more advanced and in some occassions start to surpass their original creator.
Oh, and Crossfire, while we can nullify our existence with our growing existence, our intelligence allows us to realize that it would be suicide to continue raping the earth, and begin to move towards environmentally sustainable habitation.
Oh, and Crossfire, while we can nullify our existence with our growing existence, our intelligence allows us to realize that it would be suicide to continue raping the earth, and begin to move towards environmentally sustainable habitation.
Yes, essentially that is the day we tell ourselves to stop evolving.
Which you could argue, we have already done for quite some time. We don't breed the smartest and strongest people exclusively with each other for instance. Nor are the weak utterly fucked in our society. Children who are born sickly and misshapen aren't discarded, they are embraced, and continue to breed.
Oh, and Crossfire, while we can nullify our existence with our growing existence, our intelligence allows us to realize that it would be suicide to continue raping the earth, and begin to move towards environmentally sustainable habitation.
Yes, essentially that is the day we tell ourselves to stop evolving.
Which you could argue, we have already done for quite some time. We don't breed the smartest and strongest people exclusively with each other for instance. Nor are the weak utterly fucked in our society. Children who are born sickly and misshapen aren't discarded, they are embraced, and continue to breed.
Some projections are that the human race will split along those lines, and we will have a distinctly upper-class species and a distinctly lower-class species. The strongest do breed with the strongest at 95% exclusivity, however. It's just that the weak breed with the weak along those same lines. Fat families have fat kids, fit families have fit kids, or at least it breaks down that way most of the time.
Oh, and Crossfire, while we can nullify our existence with our growing existence, our intelligence allows us to realize that it would be suicide to continue raping the earth, and begin to move towards environmentally sustainable habitation.
Yes, essentially that is the day we tell ourselves to stop evolving.
Which you could argue, we have already done for quite some time. We don't breed the smartest and strongest people exclusively with each other for instance. Nor are the weak utterly fucked in our society. Children who are born sickly and misshapen aren't discarded, they are embraced, and continue to breed.
Some projections are that the human race will split along those lines, and we will have a distinctly upper-class species and a distinctly lower-class species. The strongest do breed with the strongest at 95% exclusivity, however. It's just that the weak breed with the weak along those same lines. Fat families have fat kids, fit families have fit kids, or at least it breaks down that way most of the time.
Yea I think I remember seeing something about that some time ago. Basically they say in the future one race of humans may be strong, smart, healthy, have huge penises and the other race will be fat, ugly, dumber, have shorter lifespans, etc.
Which you could argue, we have already done for quite some time. We don't breed the smartest and strongest people exclusively with each other for instance. Nor are the weak utterly fucked in our society. Children who are born sickly and misshapen aren't discarded, they are embraced, and continue to breed.
ITT people think that "evolution" and "natural selection" are synonyms. Evolution with arguably negative results is still evolution.
Which you could argue, we have already done for quite some time. We don't breed the smartest and strongest people exclusively with each other for instance. Nor are the weak utterly fucked in our society. Children who are born sickly and misshapen aren't discarded, they are embraced, and continue to breed.
ITT people think that "evolution" and "natural selection" are synonyms. Evolution with arguably negative results is still evolution.
Look, lets not get caught up much in what the fuck it's called.
Whatever the fuck it is, it's end result is the species being extinct by it's own members.
Look, lets not get caught up much in what the fuck it's called.
Whatever the fuck it is, it's end result is the species being extinct by it's own members.
Edited because of the next post.
Can you cite some examples of this happening in the wild?
Because on its face, the notion that we all become so awesome that we kill each other in a metaphorical Thunderdome doesn't sit well with me. Intraspecies competition isn't really pitting human versus human in a life or death struggle. It's not like when I go down to Wendys to grab a burger I'm bludgeoning to death the person in line in front of me and stealing his.
ElJeffe on
I submitted an entry to Lego Ideas, and if 10,000 people support me, it'll be turned into an actual Lego set!If you'd like to see and support my submission, follow this link.
Look, lets not get caught up much in what the fuck it's called.
Whatever the fuck it is, it's end result is the species being extinct by it's own members.
Edited because of the next post.
Can you cite some examples of this happening in the wild?
Because on its face, the notion that we all become so awesome that we kill each other in a metaphorical Thunderdome doesn't sit well with me. Intraspecies competition isn't really pitting human versus human in a life or death struggle. It's not like when I go down to Wendys to grab a burger I'm bludgeoning to death the person in line in front of me and stealing his.
It doesn't happen. The only species I can think of slowly going extinct off its own bat is the Panda, and that's because they're too dopey to fuck. Hardly a thunderdome scenario.
I can't imagine being too lazy to get it on with the hot chick next to me, even as everyone is all, "Hey Jeff, you should totally bang that girlie-girl!" I mean, wtf?
ElJeffe on
I submitted an entry to Lego Ideas, and if 10,000 people support me, it'll be turned into an actual Lego set!If you'd like to see and support my submission, follow this link.
I mean, species eventually become something new and sometimes their previous forms become extinct. I would agree on that much and all it entails, thunderdome not so much.
One of the biggest problems with this sort of endeavor is that it creates a sharply pronounced division between the wealthy and the poor. Right now, the wealthy have distinct advantages and opportunities that are harder to come by for the poor. If something like this took off, then wealthy people would not only have more money, more power, and better educations, they'd also be engineered to be smarter, stronger, and better looking. Getting a good job can be hard enough without having to go up against the fucking Six Million Dollar Man.
The whole thing is just a clusterfuck waiting to happen.
The rich already go to better schools with private tutoring if needed, have the capacity and the time to eat great food and go to the gym when they feel like it, and can have cosmetic surgery. There's already a massive divide between the rich and poor. I don't see how this makes it any worse, and as someone else said, it's not like it's not going to get cheaper over time, like all tech does.
In a more general sense, I see no problem with this. Anyone who wants to acquire some upgrades has my blessing.
I would give up an amazing number of human comforts to experience a lifetime spanning thousands of years.
I do not believe this technology will be expensive, because technology has a way of improving it's own production. If for example we can augment large portions of the human anatomy and brain with nano-bots. We can certainly build nano-bots on a production scale unheard of by todays standards. With advancement in almost any aspect of robotics and bio-chemistry we improve our ability to create product.
Edit: As for the division between the rich and poor... yes, maybe you increase the rich's capacity for super-computer like calculation and wealth generation. You would also get cheaper easier to expand upon ways of improving the abilities of the poor. If you could create a soup that made people smarter, eventually everyone would be better off than before.
Sure, some people will be even "more" better off. But this has always been the case, at least if they reach the pinnacle of human consciousness we wont have to worry about them being useless lifesacks taking up all the air as a good number of them are right now.
Look, lets not get caught up much in what the fuck it's called.
Whatever the fuck it is, it's end result is the species being extinct by it's own members.
Edited because of the next post.
Can you cite some examples of this happening in the wild?
Because on its face, the notion that we all become so awesome that we kill each other in a metaphorical Thunderdome doesn't sit well with me. Intraspecies competition isn't really pitting human versus human in a life or death struggle. It's not like when I go down to Wendys to grab a burger I'm bludgeoning to death the person in line in front of me and stealing his.
It doesn't happen -- in the wild or otherwise.
Crossfire just doesn't know what the fuck he is talking about.
The fact anyone here is talking about us extinguishing ourselves proves that there is no way that will happen, because we know so and will take steps to prevent it. Look at what we're doing now. I guarantee that in ~200 years , barring a nuclear apocalypse, we will stabilize the planet's environment, expanded our cities incredibly skyward to accomodate so many more people, and have prospects on creating sustainable environments on other planets.
The fact anyone here is talking about us extinguishing ourselves proves that there is no way that will happen, because we know so and will take steps to prevent it. Look at what we're doing now. I guarantee that in ~200 years , barring a nuclear apocalypse, we will stabilize the planet's environment, expanded our cities incredibly skyward to accomodate so many more people, and have prospects on creating sustainable environments on other planets.
The thing is that even a nuclear apocalypse wouldn't be enough to kill every single human being on the planet. For one thing, nuclear missiles during such a catastrophe would only target cities. There are a shitload of people living on islands, in rain forests, in underground, in the mountains, etc. Yeah, it would set the human civilization back quite a bit, but it is hardly something from which we can never recover.
Does anyone else think that "Tranzhumanizm" would be the greatest name for a techno group ever?
I don't know -- it's hard for me to distinguish between turds. :P
But seriously, folks, I'd imagine that there will be a rather rough acclimation period where the differences between rich and poor will be noticable -- but I just ultimately don't think it will last.
Technology just improves so rapidly that at some point, all the benefits will come down to the poor, though they might have to wait an extra generation or two, but it will happen, and odds are that the differences between rich and poor, once all have access to such advancements, won't be so great after all. Much in the same way that if I have a sweet-ass Quad Xeon MacPro, and you have a Macbook, there is a difference between us, but ultimately the most dramatic difference is between us and people who didn't even have access to personal computers at all.
I would think that government regulation might be necessary to avoid any kind of artificial interference that would keep prices beyond the reach of the poor, but barring any sort of trust-like nonsense, I think the scenarios presented by darthnix would not be realized. But certainly it would be something for the government to keep an eye on, at the very least.
Also, how the hell did this thread dodge the "why are the poor entitled to anything" bullet that Crossfire put out there?
Also also -- man, Crossfire, are you stoned, or is your hobby to make unfounded assertions?
While the idea is certainly interesting, I think we're putting too much emphasis on the generational effect of transhumanism, especially in terms of a class divide between the super-wealthy and the rest of us.
While the idea of generational improvements at the upper levels of society is definitely worrying, I think the idea of some aristocratic ruling class is being blown out of proportion. Even taking as a given augmented humans would be superior and there would be no downsides, there has always been a small percentage of humanity that was superior in every way to the rest of humanity, they simply arose naturally and were called geniuses, athletic superstars, what have you.
For 99.99% repeating of humanity, there always have been and always will be people who are simply better than you. As long as we're talking about small groups of people things will proceed as they always have, with the difference that a different group of people will be the best. The Rule of Comparative Advantage says that pretty much regardless of what the mix of abilities is, there will always be something that it is productive for anyone to be doing, if for no other reason than everyone else has more valuable things to do (You might not be a rocket scientist, but you could still be a college professor or accountant).
And as the ratio shifts more towards the augmented versus naturals, there will be less jobs available for naturals (once there are enough augmented to fill job X, naturals would nominally be unable to compete and move to other jobs), but there'll also be less people willing to do those jobs so wages may well rise.
The only thing that'll determine whether how disruptive or smooth the change will be is the details (how quickly the price of the process drops, when in life it can be done, and whether or not it puts someone beyond the competition of someone without the procedure, etc) and we can't know those until we actually see it happen.
Posts
Hmm, yes I took biology as well and the cry that "evolution doesn't have a purpose" was always crammed into my head.
I think of it as an distributed algorithm for determining the best genetic match for an environment. In volatile environments, evolution occurs quickly as species are forced to adapt. Eventually a plateau will be reached via speciation, etc and evolution will slow down or nearly cease. This is why certain species (sharks, insects) have been around for millions of years.
Their genotype found a niche that worked well for them - in essence the process of evolution filled that niche.
|daydalus.net|
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Right right, yeah yeah.
I'm just saying it bugs me when I see a movie that's all "wow check out those crazy powers! mankind's next step in evolution!" or "check out my new eye implant! I'm way more evolved than you! Suckkkkkkkkkk ittttttttttt"
etc, you get the idea. You can also see why I fucking hate the X-Men.
And if the advantage was becoming 7 foot tall greek gods with photographic memories and super-genius level intelligence, then you couldn't deal with it? What would that mean?
And we all understand that education is only a very rough analogy to the kind of enhancements we're potentially talking about. Today there's no particular reason that a high school dropout who makes $25k a year has to feel he's inherantly inferior to Bill Gates, since he can assume that they're more alike than unlike, and that he also theoretically has the potential for Gates-level achievement; he can attribute the fact that he didn't accomplish what Gates did at least partly to his own choice, and he can even feel secure and valuable in that, since the lifestyle he's chosen, however modest, can still reflect his power over his own destiny. Many of the cherished ideals of our society rest on that principle. Educational disparity threatens it only indirectly; biological enhancements, administered in the womb, could feel like an all-out assault. Once we have those, an unenhanced child loses more than the hope he can ever achieve at society's top level; he loses the ability to believe that his social class is really under his control. That could be socially devastating.
The other thing to remember is that even if these enhancements actually provide only modest improvements, they'd still become easy ways of choosing between applicants for work and education, since the folks who have them would have every reason to make that fact as public as possible. We could see disparity that's greatly disproportionate to whatever actual advantages the technology provides.
Care to explain? Or are you just blabbering?
Agreed, if the sort of enhancements we're talking about are dramatic and only available to the creme de la creme. But as technology improves, it could very well be that everyone winds up getting some sort of womb-cocktail, and the super-rich can afford one that's only minimally superior, for example. If the difference between what the poor can obtain and what the rich can obtain is tiny, the effect is far less destabilizing. That's why I used the example of education. The difference between someone who gets a serious int-boost and someone who doesn't may well be on par with the difference between a modern Harvard graduate and an uneducated slave in ancient Rome. But that doesn't mean that education is a bad thing, because the poor can still get pretty good educations. Similarly, if modest enhancements are obtainable by everyone, the existence of slightly better ones might not be a big deal.
Perhaps, but that could be dealt with via legislation. We could seal medical records such that they can't be released to employers - claim you're genetically engineered all you want, but if you can't prove it, so what? Also, consider that one's education, for example, is still only part of the story. Just because you have an Ivy league degree doesn't mean you'll invariably be hired over someone who doesn't. Similarly, just because you're equipped with Genes of Intellect +3, you won't necessarily be the best man for any given job.
What if you don't want it, though? Personally, I imagine that when we can afford to use universal genetic modifications (or cybernetics if you prefer that route,) we'll start seeing little communities that intentionally avoid any modifications, much like you currently see the Amish. Actually, imagining the Amish in general in this scenario is pretty interesting. How long will they last in the future? Will they have little farms next to orbital towers, flying cars, and all the crap the future damn well better have at some point?
I don't understand why this is such a big deal. This is just the next step in medicine, and the rich-poor gap will increase as the rich get stronger and smarter, just like all technological increases.
No I'm not fucking blabbering.
Suicide of the species will happen. See, creatures are always in competition with other creatures of their own species, trying to get the best and most mates. If this comptetition continues, they will eventually evolve so much that they will utterly devestate those who they are in competition with. As the weakest groups die off, the only ones remaining are just more and more powerful. And eventually, that group too will become strifed.
Having no one to compete with but themselves, the entire species will become extinguished from the universe. Forever.
Tigers, Lions, Sharks... at no point is any one group of these creatures in danger of wiping out the entire species.
Humans? More advanced than tigers, lions, and sharks, and if we possess the ability to blow ourselves out of existance entirely right NOW, imagine a future where we are even more subjected to the effects of evolution.
Oh, and Crossfire, while we can nullify our existence with our growing existence, our intelligence allows us to realize that it would be suicide to continue raping the earth, and begin to move towards environmentally sustainable habitation.
Yes, essentially that is the day we tell ourselves to stop evolving.
Which you could argue, we have already done for quite some time. We don't breed the smartest and strongest people exclusively with each other for instance. Nor are the weak utterly fucked in our society. Children who are born sickly and misshapen aren't discarded, they are embraced, and continue to breed.
Some projections are that the human race will split along those lines, and we will have a distinctly upper-class species and a distinctly lower-class species. The strongest do breed with the strongest at 95% exclusivity, however. It's just that the weak breed with the weak along those same lines. Fat families have fat kids, fit families have fit kids, or at least it breaks down that way most of the time.
Yea I think I remember seeing something about that some time ago. Basically they say in the future one race of humans may be strong, smart, healthy, have huge penises and the other race will be fat, ugly, dumber, have shorter lifespans, etc.
ITT people think that "evolution" and "natural selection" are synonyms. Evolution with arguably negative results is still evolution.
Look, lets not get caught up much in what the fuck it's called.
Whatever the fuck it is, it's end result is the species being extinct by it's own members.
Edited because of the next post.
But yeah, whatever man. Whatever.
Quite aptly said, if I may say so myself.
Can you cite some examples of this happening in the wild?
Because on its face, the notion that we all become so awesome that we kill each other in a metaphorical Thunderdome doesn't sit well with me. Intraspecies competition isn't really pitting human versus human in a life or death struggle. It's not like when I go down to Wendys to grab a burger I'm bludgeoning to death the person in line in front of me and stealing his.
It doesn't happen. The only species I can think of slowly going extinct off its own bat is the Panda, and that's because they're too dopey to fuck. Hardly a thunderdome scenario.
The rich already go to better schools with private tutoring if needed, have the capacity and the time to eat great food and go to the gym when they feel like it, and can have cosmetic surgery. There's already a massive divide between the rich and poor. I don't see how this makes it any worse, and as someone else said, it's not like it's not going to get cheaper over time, like all tech does.
In a more general sense, I see no problem with this. Anyone who wants to acquire some upgrades has my blessing.
I do not believe this technology will be expensive, because technology has a way of improving it's own production. If for example we can augment large portions of the human anatomy and brain with nano-bots. We can certainly build nano-bots on a production scale unheard of by todays standards. With advancement in almost any aspect of robotics and bio-chemistry we improve our ability to create product.
Edit: As for the division between the rich and poor... yes, maybe you increase the rich's capacity for super-computer like calculation and wealth generation. You would also get cheaper easier to expand upon ways of improving the abilities of the poor. If you could create a soup that made people smarter, eventually everyone would be better off than before.
Sure, some people will be even "more" better off. But this has always been the case, at least if they reach the pinnacle of human consciousness we wont have to worry about them being useless lifesacks taking up all the air as a good number of them are right now.
It doesn't happen -- in the wild or otherwise.
Crossfire just doesn't know what the fuck he is talking about.
So you might say he is blabbering.
The thing is that even a nuclear apocalypse wouldn't be enough to kill every single human being on the planet. For one thing, nuclear missiles during such a catastrophe would only target cities. There are a shitload of people living on islands, in rain forests, in underground, in the mountains, etc. Yeah, it would set the human civilization back quite a bit, but it is hardly something from which we can never recover.
I don't know -- it's hard for me to distinguish between turds. :P
But seriously, folks, I'd imagine that there will be a rather rough acclimation period where the differences between rich and poor will be noticable -- but I just ultimately don't think it will last.
Technology just improves so rapidly that at some point, all the benefits will come down to the poor, though they might have to wait an extra generation or two, but it will happen, and odds are that the differences between rich and poor, once all have access to such advancements, won't be so great after all. Much in the same way that if I have a sweet-ass Quad Xeon MacPro, and you have a Macbook, there is a difference between us, but ultimately the most dramatic difference is between us and people who didn't even have access to personal computers at all.
I would think that government regulation might be necessary to avoid any kind of artificial interference that would keep prices beyond the reach of the poor, but barring any sort of trust-like nonsense, I think the scenarios presented by darthnix would not be realized. But certainly it would be something for the government to keep an eye on, at the very least.
Also, how the hell did this thread dodge the "why are the poor entitled to anything" bullet that Crossfire put out there?
Also also -- man, Crossfire, are you stoned, or is your hobby to make unfounded assertions?
Wait, that's how it is now!
While the idea of generational improvements at the upper levels of society is definitely worrying, I think the idea of some aristocratic ruling class is being blown out of proportion. Even taking as a given augmented humans would be superior and there would be no downsides, there has always been a small percentage of humanity that was superior in every way to the rest of humanity, they simply arose naturally and were called geniuses, athletic superstars, what have you.
For 99.99% repeating of humanity, there always have been and always will be people who are simply better than you. As long as we're talking about small groups of people things will proceed as they always have, with the difference that a different group of people will be the best. The Rule of Comparative Advantage says that pretty much regardless of what the mix of abilities is, there will always be something that it is productive for anyone to be doing, if for no other reason than everyone else has more valuable things to do (You might not be a rocket scientist, but you could still be a college professor or accountant).
And as the ratio shifts more towards the augmented versus naturals, there will be less jobs available for naturals (once there are enough augmented to fill job X, naturals would nominally be unable to compete and move to other jobs), but there'll also be less people willing to do those jobs so wages may well rise.
The only thing that'll determine whether how disruptive or smooth the change will be is the details (how quickly the price of the process drops, when in life it can be done, and whether or not it puts someone beyond the competition of someone without the procedure, etc) and we can't know those until we actually see it happen.