[ExI] far future

[William Flynn Wallace]

Far future - year 50,000 a.d. There is no economy - everything is free.
Robots do everything except think.  No politics - democratic socialism -
takes 95% approval for any genetic changes.  Humans do not participate in
making babies - all done by computer and genemaking equipment.  Gene design
borrowed from all sort of animals and plants.  Immune system, muscle
design, etc.  Vision better and I don't know what to make of enhancing
smell.  Do we really want to smell like a dog?  (so to speak)  We would
likely have to redesign our disgust responses.  All humans have basically
the same genetic makeup except for external features - why deprive newborns
of any good genes? (thus making children far more genetically similar to
existing adults than today's parent and child)  Improving humans by
implants etc. has been left way behind.  Not considered natural.

So, everyone is a genius of all sorts.  All medical and psychological
problems related to genes have been eliminated.  Personalities are sunny in
disposition, eager to work, devoid of any competitive impulses, unable to
even think of hurting another person, and so on.

bill


On Mon, Dec 30, 2013 at 3:30 AM, Anders Sandberg <anders at aleph.se> wrote:

> On 2013-12-30 02:34, William Flynn Wallace wrote:
>
>> I am writing a book on the far future based on eugenics.  Then, genetics
>> has been nearly perfected and many changes have been made to humans, both
>> physical and mental.
>>
>> I would like to find out  fellow members' ideas on just what changes
>> should be made in us if that were possible and discuss them.  And yes, I
>> might include them in my book and give you credit.
>>
>
> The problem here is "far future". If that were just 40 years, then things
> are pretty simple: enough time for about two generations, social mores are
> not going to be totally alien, people enhance for reasons we recognize
> today, and biotechnology might be powerful but it is still likely nowhere
> near the ultimate limits. But give things a few centuries or millennia, and
> the book might be rather hard to read.
>
> Are you going to base it on just biological changes? Because there is only
> so far you can push biology, and everything needs to be retrofitted to the
> existing mess. If you also include non-biological enhancements like
> alternate biochemistry synthetic biology, implanted nanotechnology,
> outsourced biology, not to mention external collective intelligence (either
> from AI, smartly networked people or brain emulations) then things can get
> *very* different and potentially alien, especially once neurotechnology
> allow people to modify their minds. At that point not only bodies but minds
> and kinds of individuals (if any) become cultural artefacts.
>
>
> Looking at what people today like to change, it is pretty clear that
> people primarily want better health for their children (= likely early
> enhancement). While people talk a lot about appearance and athletics in
> regards to genetic change, I think the safe bet is that early aims will be
> general purpose goods (intelligence, social skill, happiness, longevity).
> The development speed is modulated by how quickly enhancement of GPGs can
> actually be developed, safety tested and evaluated - genetics is slow
> compared to medical implants, drugs or software, and natural variations
> typically has small effect sizes. An interesting issue I am currently
> looking into is moral enhancement (see the work of Savulescu, Persson and
> Douglas), which might or might not be very useful or very socially
> destabilizing. Note that already at this point - a society with cohorts of
> smart, energetic and moral people - the sociology gets rather alien.
>
> Note that drastic morphologic change is unlikely to be popular among
> mainstream parents: few parents today dress their kids as lizards outside
> fancy dress parties, and most morphologic changes are too specific to be
> useful. Better to implement them using surgery, implants, attachments or
> external devices.
>
>
>
>
>
>
> --
> Dr Anders Sandberg
> Future of Humanity Institute
> Oxford Martin School
> Oxford University
>
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