[ExI] Fwd: The avatar revolution: Here come the new humans

[Bryan Bishop]

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Bob Keyes <keyesbob at yahoo.com>
Date: Sun, Jun 6, 2010 at 11:03 PM
Subject: Re: The avatar revolution: Here come the new humans
To: diybio at googlegroups.com


What hasn't been revealed is the destiny of humanity. We are animals,
but we are starting to become something else. We are now, or very
shortly will, create life patterned by our own will. We will modify
ourselves, as individuals and in our 'offspring', and this will enable
us to do further modification, i.e. it will be recursive. In a
millenium, humans will little resemble what we are now.

Some will find this horrible, sinful, something which must be stopped.
I can understand the discomfort. But it cannot be stopped. Humans will
do what we can. We adapt and compete and change our environment and we
change ourselves. We will just hone this trait to perfection.

Look around us as the richest and most highly educated in the modern
world fail to reproduce at the rate of 'replacement value'. Yet others
reproduce without any chosen restraint, it is only malthusian pressure
that keeps their numbers low. This will split the human race, as the
few and the rich become less mortal.

Nothing is unnatural. It is our nature to want to defeat death. Some
of us will detach from our mortal shells. Others of us will draw the
line at what we find acceptable in life extension and transformation.
Will we have wars, mutants or superhumans against the mere-humans?
Probably.

Am I mad to say what I have said above? Certainly some people fear it,
and fear that those in DIYbio will be the first to do so, beyond and
in spite of laws meant to restrain our trans-human impulses. There are
probably people in the DIYbio community who feel that the essence of
humanity is different than I have described, and may think of such
exposition as dangerous. So be it. To regulate DIYbio will not change
the fundemental desires present in so many humans: the desire to be
trans-human.

--- On Sun, 6/6/10, Daniel Sander Hoffmann <transplexity at gmail.com> wrote:

> From: Daniel Sander Hoffmann <transplexity at gmail.com>
> Subject: Re: The avatar revolution: Here come the new humans
> To: "DIYh+" <diytranshumanist at googlegroups.com>
> Cc: diybio at googlegroups.com
> Date: Sunday, June 6, 2010, 6:27 PM
> Hi Natasha,
>
> You are right! (I posted the link just to polemize.)
>
> Mimesis presupposes that behavioral match entails identity
> (like e.g.
> in the Turing Test.) Naïfs should have known better,
> looking instead
> for the causal underpinnings, i.e., behavior generation in
> physical/
> biological systems (as true science does, as most DIYBio
> practitioners
> seem to do, and as opposed to mimetic wishful thinking like
> computer-
> based ALife, "mind uploading" and the like.)
>
> The failure of the mimetic approach is a huge shadow
> falling upon some
> of the most daring transhuman hopes.
>
> Take thy beak from out my heart, and take thy form from off
> my door!
> Quoth the raven, `Nevermore.'
>
> Thanks, Poe  :-)
>
> Daniel
>
>
> On 2 jun, 18:32, nata... at natasha.cc
> wrote:
> > Thanks for the article. I enjoyed reading it.
> >
> > But do they continue as us after we die?  Thus, the
> link from the
> > article regarding a back-up brain.  This idea is not
> new, but it seems
> > to be quite premature.  The entire philosophical
> issue of identity and
> > "self" is forgotten in this article.
> >
> > My concern is that this growing field of human
> replacement engines is
> > out of touch with "life" - the ecology of being alive.
>  I am not a
> > dualist, but my "self" has experiences that are
> reflective of my
> > biology.  No matter how many Primo Posthuman's I
> design with
> > nanomedicine and other systems, we cannot forgo our
> senses and how
> > awareness/consciousness is developed through cognitive
> and perceptual
> > properties.
> >
> > Best,
> > Natasha
> >
> > Quoting Daniel Sander Hoffmann <transplex... at gmail.com>:
> >
> >
> >
> > >http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg20627632.100-the-avatar-revolut...
> >
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-- 
- Bryan
http://heybryan.org/
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