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Does Transhuman Begin Where Monkey-brained ends?
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I've given a tremendous amount of thought to The Singularity and how my view of it is affecting my perspective personally. I have read of the fear of being hijacked by computers smarter than humans, of how hybridized humans will not put up with the antics of how humans are behaving now and of how we're still rather limited to our womb-like planet as we continue to gestate.
Having been raised in a religious household that forecast "The Rapture", I remembered feeling that people who didn't get the whole “born again” thing were destined for eternal damnation. As I am now a freethinker and a secular humanist, I now regard that view as pitifully naive in its attempt, however unconscious, to give undue reinforcement to a myth-based belief system.
Now, with the growing certainty that a technological singularity will occur in my lifetime, I am finding another type of elitism beginning to manifest in my thinking. It emerged first as a sort of libertarianism but now it's manifesting in such a way where I am concerned that a number of humans will consciously (or out of fear) resist the next evolutionary step in our species—that of becoming non-biological. If that is the case, if a Luddite-style resistance shows up where the fearful become zealous in a destructive and malevolent way, what choices will advanced, rational hybrids have?
There's leaving the planet. Once one is not carbon-based, oxygen and gravity reliant or whose consciousness is not attuned to the orbit cycle of the planet, silicon-based bodies with extended duty cycles more practical for long distances might replace the rate at which we currently perceive physical reality. Transhumans may simply decide to leave Earth to those who vehemently cling to staying here. We may even upload our consciousness into the vehicle (Hello Dave!) for our intergalactic journeys.
But if we're inclined to stay for whatever period of time with a resistance movement to transhumanism, then we there's a potential for yet another turf/culture war. But will transhumans take an offensive or defensive stand if their welfare is threatened by fearful myth-clinging homo sapiens?
I believe war is about fear. Control and ego gratification stem from that fundamental emotion. Fear is a natural response to what we perceive is a threat to our well-being, physically or emotionally. Transhumans, in the most idyllic sense, should not have any use for fear. Ego should theoretically not need to be indulged. However, with that spike in rational thought, will transhumans be inclined to throw out the baby with the bathwater? Will the steps toward being more godlike reduce our level of compassion for those who behave irrationally? Right now, our sense of ethics causes (or should cause) us to value life, diversity of opinion of those less fortunate or less educated. But if in this culture we can shrug off a genocide or famine in Africa and crack open a pint of Ben & Jerry's as we hang out in front of the tube, is it such a stretch to consider that our compassion as transhumans would naturally reach its limits with those that logically appear to “not get it”?
We have observed over the last few generations as war continues to proliferate, poverty and disease are still rampant, greed and profit overshadow benevolence and stewardship for each other and for our environment. Will transhumans with their superior bodies and intellects put up with "the bullies on the playground" or will we consider them no different than the monkeys who hurl their feces at one another as if their expressions of malice and irrationality would somehow still be blithely regarded as an expression of their "free will"?
It seems to me that with these bio and nanotech breakthroughs only about a generation away, we should be making concerted and serious efforts to prepare ourselves and the coming generation emotionally and sociologically so that the transition doesn't unnecessarily lead us to more conflict and perhaps irrevocable harm. An entirely new set of ethics may be in order.
Transhumans will invariably decide to leave the planet if there are no physical limitations to doing so. The romantic notions of staying steadfastly, biologically human will be as quaint as it being considered more natural to be a hermit and stay in a cave warmed by fire rather than live in modern society in a house with climate control and protection from the elements. It simply won't make sense to a transhuman, would it?
My concern is at what point do superior and more rationally driven transhumans lose their patience and forbearance with their primitive and resistant brethren with whom, at least for a time, we will continue to share the planet.
I ask these questions and realize that the candor opens me up to some heavy scrutiny. I am not seeking to rattle the cage here but genuinely engage in a discussion about how our ethics will evolve along with our bodies and lifespans. |
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Re: Does Transhuman Begin Where Monkey-brained ends?
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Ok, this is a small part of an essay that I intend to post...
Consider one of the components of the radical future; the coming era of nanotechnology. There have been many papers published recently that explain how total relinquishment of this coming era will result in an INCREASING likelihood of disaster.
Actually, to halt the advancement towards this future technology would inevitably result in a tragedy identical to a grey-goo catastrophe. In 1798, Thomas Malthus realised that animal populations increased geometrically- by a factor of 2, 4, 8, 16 and so on. Food production, on the other hand, could only increase arithmetically- by a factor of 1, 2,3...
The grim conclusion was that the human race must outgrow the capacity to feed itself. However, the Malthusian catastrophe always seems to be pushed further and further into the future. Why? Because we continually find ways to refine the mechanization process: To increase the efficiency of our industries to provide the essentials and luxuries of life with ever-diminishing resources and waste. Allow this trend to continue, and you eventually arrive at an era where things are built atom by atom.
The coming nanotech era, then, is merely the result of a general trend pervading all of technology. John Smart has taken this trend further, suggesting that the universe itself somehow seeks to improve the efficiency of computations through ever decreasing resources of Matter, Energy, Space and Time ('MEST' compression) and that technology-creating species like humans are just part of this on-going process.
Notice that, here on Earth, it is this trend that continues to postpone the nightmare scenario imagined by Malthus. Halt this progression...and his nightmare will come true. We will not be able to feed the global population and there will be famines the likes of which we have never before encountered.
Perhaps, then, Drexlerian nanotechnology is not some future possibility that we can choose to pursue or ignore, but the end result of a path we MUST follow if we are to avoid the Malthusian catastrophe.
Furthermore, there seems to be evidence that the drive to push Malthus's prediction further and further out won't stop with the advent of atomistic construction, nor with the advent of the singularity...But like I said, these are issues I go into at greater length in the full essay.
Anyway, to leap ahead to the conclusion, if we stop or limit MEST compression, the result seems to be an unavoidable catastrophe. Allow it to continue, and a point is reached where we are transformed beyond all recognition, to the point where we cannot be described as 'human'...or left behind to die, or even devoured as raw material by singularity civillizations borne of the technologies we unleashed.
The ultimate fate of the human race is extinction. Whether we end up as a dead-end on the tree-of-life, or as the branch from which grander life-forms diverge and flourish is a question that will be answered in the coming decades. |
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Re: Does Transhuman Begin Where Monkey-brained ends?
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There is something else that is worth remembering. I dare say it's a truth you have grasped already, but quite a few people on this site fall into this trap..so I'll spell it out.
When people talk about living in virtual reality, or becoming symbiotic with robots, we are NOT talking about the kind of VR or robots that exist today.
Put it this way. Imagine going back to the time when the only cartoons in existence were those in which you spun that drum, peered through the slits and saw a looping cartoon of a clown juggling. You know, zoetropes.
If you were to tell people of this era that future generations will be enthralled by animations, watching them for hours on end, they would think you mad. The simply wouldn't grasp that to you, 'animation' means 'Finding Nemo' a cartoon so far in advance with the 'juggling clown' that it hardly bares any comparison.
The robots that will exist in the future, the VR worlds we will immerse ourselves in one day, will make the robots and videogames of today seem as limited and crude as the zoetrope looping animation. Indeed, given the fact that the rate of change is itself accelarating, the gap is almost certain to be larger. So large, maybe, that even 'real' life seems like a pale shadow in comparison to life as an upload... |
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Re: Does Transhuman Begin Where Monkey-brained Ends?
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First of all, I am pleased that my first contribution to the discussion has warranted a reply by you. Having read some of your responses previous to jumping in, I feel I am in good company (ah, the gratification of ego, however fleeting!).
Secondly, I like the zoetrope analogy quite a bit (or maybe it's because I really liked "Finding Nemo" and am chomping at the bit for "Cars" this spring). But yes, an excellent point. In so many instances, if we were able to go back and describe future innovations to our forebears, the skepticism would be rampant and the perception of us would border on that of being a lunatic.
I'd like to keep it light-hearted but I'm compelled, in the light of what I perceive as a race between freethinking innovation and a myopic, final-inning, theocratic smackdown. Consider the recent decision in South Dakota to criminalize abortions under any circumstance (including rape/incest). Here we have the “leaders” telling their constituents what is right and appropriate with their bodies. It likely doesn't inconvenience South Dakotans with resources, connections and mobility, only the poor. Even the folly of the “war on drugs” is near-Draconian in its implementation with a Nancy Reagan-like "just say no" automaton as drum major leading the mindless lemmings towards a safe and secure society. Consider the enormous social triggers of gay marriage or polygamy and their ability to shape and sway the political conversation away from relevant matters and the effects that traditional religion play in deciding what is legal, legitimate, allowable, or abhorrent. Now consider what would happen if the shoe were on the other foot. What if the hybridized humans of the future (which, by the way I am likely to be one of) know by means of logic rather than belief what is best for their fellow unmodified humans. What if the issues of global warming, the poverty and the disease press in so dangerously close so as to clearly and unfavorably point to the desperate clinging to myth-based belief systems that those continuing to carry their cross refuse to relinquish. And what if they are not the meek martyrs of ancient Rome but a new brand of entitled terrorists to thwart the natural evolution and usher in their beloved and prophesied Apocalypse? Essentially, what if both sides end up lacking sufficient tolerance for the other?
I am only asking these questions because I am considering whether a block of transhuman-endorsing humans today should begin (if they haven't already) developing ethical considerations to make sure our technological journey from adolescence into young adulthood isn't fraught with knee-jerk reactions but rather with thoughtful and noble execution. As the saying goes “Catch more flies with honey...”. And the horses (or more appropriately sheep) I'd imagine we'd be trying to “lead to water” have had secure blinders on that they have no intention of removing or having anyone else touch out of concern that they might be exposed to something they don't understand (i.e. RFID tag = Mark of the Beast).
It would appear we are in some point of reckoning and a major shift is in store. It would be unfortunate if the shakeout meant many humans had to/continue to die as a result of violence or indifference once we cross the next threshold. We can barely muster up enough genuine empathy for victims of last year's gulf storms or the tsunami victims in Southeast Asia the year before that much less the human rights violations and outright neglect we see in oppressive regimes, particularly those in the third world.
Geez, I feel like Chicken Little here but that's not where I mean to be going. I am very optimistic about the future but my perspective has always been one of accounting for contingencies and the proverbial “what if” scenario. I hope you (Extropian) and whoever else joins this thread will not be put off by the positing of these rather dark questions. I'm not trying to generate fear or worry (which for the most part is a waste of energy). I am actually, truth be told, trying to get some equilibrium in my own heart and mind about where I will choose to direct my thoughts and energy in the coming decade that will usher in the singularity. Perhaps it's the good-old-time-religion-style guilt that still lingers in my psyche. Misled people can still be very sincere even if the creeds they cling to are self-destructive. But ultimately, it doesn't seem to be nature's way that everyone is saved from themselves and maybe that's a idealistic notion I need to release. |
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Re: Does Transhuman Begin Where Monkey-brained Ends?
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A few things really showed up in this last observation of yours: the difference between the sexes, between virtual and “real” reality, the matter of “self”.
While I give you an obligatory nod for the humbling assertion of your lack of qualification to speculate, it's all speculation at this point and I don't know if the most profound qualifications put anyone at the front of the queue. At this point, we're still just mapping the terrain and a rough map it is.
The difference between the sexes. Well, I have an interesting take on this. I was married, came out, have spent most of my life being same-sex attracted but without any definitive endearment to my “community”. Consequently, my closest friends are often hetero couples or single females. I remember the novelty of the “sharing ourselves” concept in the film Cocoon. Of course, it was still a female and a male character doing it even though there was no touching or physical contact. But what I really liked was that this alien race seemed to have gotten to the point where they were attracted to essence, not physical beauty. The rather quaint notion (at least in these times of wanton objectification) that “beauty is only skin deep” was actually realized by these beings. So, frankly, as far as communing with other sentient creatures, I'd much rather have a broader affinity than a narrowed carnality, fun and recreational though sex is, it's rather terrestrial (in a pedestrian way) and consequently I feel it, like our other subjective experience, due for an overhaul (and improvement). Sex started out being a means to an end for keeping the genetic legacy machine puffing away. Self-aware creatures have attached all other meaning to it as having a higher or divine aspect. But all in all, it's limbic-triggered pleasure seeking which may explain why “love” makes you rather “stupid” in the rational-state-of-mind sense of the word.
Virtual and Physical reality: I think the experiences we'll get to have without the attachment to physical danger or social consequences will be enormously emancipating. Having done psychedelics briefly (and in my 30s, not my teens), I found the experiences extraordinarily mind-expanding. And while, in our present “monkey brain” state, we could still give over to destructive and addictive tendencies with respect to VR, I am hopeful that the technology will show up closer to our own higher-level epiphanies that will better facilitate our transition into a transhuman state (hearkening back to my concerns about the shake-up of ethics as they presently exist—or don't—in our culture/world). And while there are plenty of arguments that the physical world supersedes the probabilistic world in terms of where our material focus should be, I have to speculate as to whether that “blurring” may end up being a necessary process to wean us away from the physicality that dominates our thinking as it has had to to evolve on this sheltered and hospitable planet. But perhaps as the mystics profess, consciousness is not bound by physicality and we will see a feasible connection between the logical and empirical and the seemingly unknowable and impossible.
Lastly, self. Self as a concept seems so isolated. And while we like to scare ourselves with notions of an unfeeling, assimilating “hive mind” of Star Trek “Borg” (wonderful concept of that group to bring up for our consideration!), what if there were a natural merging of the individual with the collective and we weren't so inclined to equate “freedom” with the egoic self? Seemingly distracting issues like self-worth and loneliness become moot when a conscious entity isn't dependent on the expressed perceptions of others to sort it all out but instead is part of a shared understanding. And seeing as how a phrase like “crime of passion” is on the same wavelength as “act of god”, perhaps moving away from the primitive impulses and deriving pleasure from higher pursuits, might be a natural course for more highly evolved beings who let go of their mythical gods and their mammalian impulses. Perhaps shared experiences (like those in the Kubrick-esque final scenes of Spielberg's A.I.) are just as potent, just as fascinating as ones experienced at a personal and individual level. |
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Re: Does Transhuman Begin Where Monkey-brained Ends?
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I have often commented that the cutting-edge of evolution is defined by co-operation and that the next step in this process will be for our separate minds (biological and synthetic) to merge, just as single-celled forms merged to become those vast societies of cells known as animals. A common response to this possibility is that we will loose our individuality, a scenario ilustrated with the phrase: Borg!
But this whole Borg business is based on a percpetion of computers as they exist today: Mass produced with the same specifications, mechanically performing their tasks efficiently but without variation nor insight. I don't know how true that is, but certainly most people think of a computer in this way.
Brains are not like that. The human brain randomly connects/disconnects its nueral pathways as the individual goes about his/her business, resulting in a control centre that views reality in a unique way. The goal of technological evolution, at least in the short-term of bringing about the singularity, is to combine the best qualities of the human brain with the advantages of machine thinking.
Each brain develops in its own way, reflected in the unique path each of us takes through life (obviously we each share some things in common, although can you really know if you see 'red' as I see it, even if we agree object A is that colour?'). Yet right now, our opportunities to sculpt the mind are severly limited by the human condition. Our bodies and brains mature for only so long, and then it is the descent to senility and death. With a lifespan of under a century, that is nowhere near enough time to expeience anything but a fraction of part of the system that comprises reality.
But once we have merged with our machine intelligence, the means of self-sculpting our minds will explode. We will be able to hold millions of conversations at once, each one a different topic and be more than able to keep up. We will be able to consider the alternatives inherent in any decision by willing the existence of virtual life-forms that live out the scenario for subjective days,months, millenia, reporting back to us by adding their stream of consciousness into our society of mind. Our minds will have been embodied in physical forms that can live indefinitely, allowing us to experience all the richness life has to offer. We will be able to link our minds with that of robotic or software intelligences, soaring over the mountains as a robotic eagle, exploring fantastic realms beyond physical reality in forms unimaginable to humans who currently lack the ability to see dimensions beyond three.
Once we can live a reasonable amount of time, once we have the ability to connect with virtual worlds as easily and intimately as we connect with reality, once we expand the ways in which the mind can model what-if situations and process information, and combine that with the qualities of human intelligence that we would definitely be impoverished to loose, I severly doubt that the result will be anything like Borg.
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Re: Does Transhuman Begin Where Monkey-brained Ends?
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It's interesting that you refer to a future time when people are attracted to essence and not form. In my experience, that is precisely how a lot of people connect with others in the virtual world of Second Life. One thing that SL allows you to do is to create your own avatar (or have someone else create it for you) and the result is a world where every avatar is unique. Typically, two fashions exist in SL. There are those like me (Who, btw I consider seperate to the person typing this, something that is a source of confusion outside of SL but generally accepted within) who create a perfect representation of themselves and merely change their clothing. There are those who inhabit a different avatar each day.
For this reason it really makes no sense to pursue a friendship or romantic interest based on physical appearance. I am not gay but have slept with women in SL (although sex is pretty pathetic in VR at this point in time) and might end up partnered to someone whose appearance is not even human. A big blob, say. The point is that, should I get 'married' in SL, it will be to a person whose mind and personality compliment my own. The best comparison would be the way Scully's viewpoint was the opposite of Mulder's, but in a way that resulted in effective teamwork and mutual respect.
In a world where appearance is easily changed, where anonymous people can write sentences like 'I am gay but have not slept with women' which may be all true, half true, or complete fabrication, it makes no sense to limit your aquaintances in ways that you might limit them in RL.
It would be a mistake to assume VR=fantasy. Of course it can provide imaginary worlds, God knows I've fought enough Star-Wars-esque battles in my time. But beyond that it is primarily a means of communication. It allows communication between groups separated geographically, or separated by cultural, religious, or sexual orientation in RL. It will one day include the oppotunity to dialogue with sentient artificial intelligences. It allows the exploration of different facets of the self, perhaps repressed since they are impossible to express with our RL appearance and the limitations of reality. It is my hope that communication will continue to be the primary reason for VR evolution, although a little bit of fantasy has been the source of rich entertainment, ever since we told tales around the campfire.
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Re: Does Transhuman Begin Where Monkey-brained Ends?
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I'm enjoying this exchange immensely, primarily because it is exactly that: an exchange of ideas, not some brow-beating debate with the emphasis on being right. And that, I believe, is the fundamental core of effective communication. When self-serving impulses are put aside for the simple pleasure/experience of discovery.
People in the present age tend to look at and assess their world in very dualistic terms: right wing, left, good and evil, moderate and fundamentalist, gay and straight, male and female, black and white. It is almost as if they need to quickly categorize something and get it out of the way of having to devote anymore synaptic firing to the issue.
At one point, I looked forward to a day when I didn't even want there to be a distinction between gay and straight, a sort of "everybody's everything" concept that I suppose would be most like how people regard food and how diverse that area of preference is. You have to go outside cultural norms before people's resistance and judgment shows up. Start talking about eating big bugs or monkey brains and the average westerner's lips will curl up in disgust (as would mine).
But the dualistic nature of things, the light and dark, the on and off, the one and zero actually seem to comprise the essence of the universe. It's binary and it expresses itself in binary ways over and over again. Sure that essence manifests in more complex ways that aren't as "black and white" but there's a certain flow to that fundamental state that is almost (dare I say it) magical in its simple perfection...particle and wave, rest and quest.
I have not developed any online personality as yet for entertainment. I suppose my lack of interest is similar to the audiophile of yesteryear who'd simply dismiss a cassette Walkman as anything worth listening to for the sake of actual enjoyment. I've been waiting for VR to manifest for 15 years. When Jaron Lanier was talking it up big time in the late 80s and early 90s, I took him at his word. But..like flying cars and orbiting space stations, both the technology and the motivation were not there to synergize. And perhaps, if there's any such thing as destiny, the illuminating power that VR represents was something we were not yet ready (or willing) to step forward into, like many a high schooler is not ready for the paradigm shift that takes him/her towards the first real requirements of adulthood.
I regard VR as a phenomenal way of transcending old habits and perceptions that we have held to these many millennia since we learned to walk upright and peer over the tall savanna grasses, since we learned to control our impulses and temper our interactions, and as we are learning to assess our narcissism and balance self-interest with more benevolent acts.
“Avatarism” (I'm sure there's probably an existing word that doesn't require me to coin this one) is starting out in the online world of games and instant messaging, but I regard it is a harbinger of a concept that may ultimately be able to fuse with physical reality. As you pointed out, in the real world, we have various expressions of who we are by how we attire, paint the face, role play and interact. Those are our present ways of expressing the “avatar”. In an online world, where the limitations are removed, we can become something that is less absolute and definable. We become conceptual and thereby receive more opportunities to expand our experience.
That's what it's all got to be about: experience. The whole universe simply “desires”. And experience is a fundamental result of that innate drive in us, that desire. Desire, when properly channeled and expressed, can manifest such marvelous creation. Desire can invent a light bulb, paint a Mona Lisa, create a life, even deprioritize self. There's a darker side as we all well know. And the dark manifestations, though they have lead to harm, grief, backwardness, provide a contrast that helps our present senses distinguish and discern.
“Cold-hearted orb that rules the night, removes the colours from our sight. Red is gray and yellow white, but we decide which is right and which is an illusion.”
And you are very right, in the human experience, it's all about the story... |
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