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The Not-Quite-Human Rights Movement 443
An anonymous reader writes "Yale University hosted a conference on transhumanism which organizers say served to
coalesce transhumanism from a subculture to a 'movement.' They're even sketching out where the role of violence becomes legitimate in the quest to become a cyborg.
But most of the talk was of peaceful integration and continuation of democratic values."
Is this story... (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Is this story... (Score:5, Funny)
Well, that is a relief. (Score:5, Funny)
Oh please (Score:5, Funny)
Locutus would disagree.... (Score:4, Funny)
Freedom is irrelevant
Choice is irrelevant
You will escort us to sector 001 where we will begin assimilation of your species. Resistance is futile.
Re:Locutus would disagree.... (Score:2, Funny)
Re:Locutus would disagree.... (Score:3, Funny)
No, it's because they don't want to go to sector 007, as Bond would kick their Collective ass!
Re:Locutus would disagree.... (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Locutus would disagree.... (Score:3, Informative)
man, I'm a geek.
Re:Locutus would disagree.... (Score:2)
Re:Locutus would disagree.... (Score:4, Insightful)
You think english verb conjugations are difficult? You don't speak any latin language, do you?
Re:Locutus would disagree.... (Score:2, Offtopic)
Re:Locutus would disagree.... (Score:5, Insightful)
Also, I was going to craft an example that showed English does have a past future tense, but then realised it would be redundant, since I've just used one.
And English gets a lot more complex than that. I would have been going to illustrate that, but I was unable to come up with a good example that didn't sound convoluted. Oh, wait a minute, there's a conditional pluperfect past continuous future (or something like that) right now...
English's use of the verbs 'to be', 'to do', 'to have' and 'to go' as auxiliaries, plus its 'will', 'would', 'shall' and 'should' semi-modals, combine with the three 'conjugations' - the pretirite, past participle and present participle (gerund) of verbs ('went', 'gone', 'going' for example) - to make some tense constructions possible in English that simply don't exist in other languages.
Surprised, if you know three romance languages, that you didn't know that. And while you're about it, you might contemplate just what tense 'you didn't know' might be in, and consider that I know of no language other than English which can express precisely that meaning (as distinct from 'you knew not', 'you have not known' and 'you were not knowing' (oo, there's those three conjugations again)...
Wow, do YOU win the misinformed of the day award (Score:4, Informative)
Latin, of course, spawned off the "romance languages": Italian, Spanish, Portugese, French, and Romanian, plus some smaller non-national languages and dialects.
Cow: Beef (Boeuf)
Sheep: Mutton (Mouton)
Pig: Pork (Porc)
Chicken: Poultry (Poulet)
This is also true to a much lesser extent of the Roman invasion of Britain a thousand years earlier or so, but it didn't last nearly as long. So, while English picked up some Latin-derived vocabulary, it is not a Latin-based language structurally any more than Greek, Russian, or any other non-romance language that assimilated some Latin words over time, or that you could say almost any major language in the world today that has assimilated a lot of English vocabulary is "English-based."
Aye, and a plaid is a piece of clothing and... (Score:2, Funny)
Re:Locutus would disagree.... (Score:2)
Since they assimilated Picard, and presumably all his knowledge about humans, Earth, and quite a few species... Getting Picard was a quite important goal exactly for this. Only then tell they people to escort them to sector 001, AFAIR.
(oh my, I just admitted watching TNG...)
Hopefully it's on-topic for talking about the Borg :)
Re:Locutus would disagree.... (Score:2)
Stop picking on the borg already! (Score:5, Funny)
Today's geeks are already into sharing in many ways: source, ideas, music, etc. Becoming Borg will just take things to a much higher level.
The one thing I am not so sure about is how Linus fits in as "the queen"...
hmm (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:hmm (Score:5, Funny)
But then I noticed -- maybe it's just my imagination -- but the cyborg's seems bigger than the human's.
No wonder it "coalesced" into a movement. Before, it was just a few random, scattered geeks. Then, when they were running with the idea, they said to themselves "Hey . . . if I could get a bigger, stronger, artificial bicep, then what about my . .
And suddenly, it's a movement.
Obligatory Science Fiction reference... (Score:3, Interesting)
In the pre-story splash he said he always wanted to write a "Playboy Story" and was surprised when he had actually written one. His agent didn't like the title, so he suggested, "Tom Swift and His Electric Penis" as an alternative. It was submitted under the original title.
You can get anything you want... (Score:5, Funny)
>
> And suddenly, it's a movement.
Walk into the shrink wherever you are, just walk in, say "Shrink -- you can mod any parts you want at Cyberdyne Restaurant" -- and walk out.
You know, if one Slashdotter, just one Slashdotter does it, they may think he's really sick and they won't take him.
And if two Slashdotters do it -- in harmony -- they may think that they're both trollin' and they won't take either of them.
And if THREE Slashdotters do it! Can you imagine three Slashdotters walkin' in, singin' a bar of "Cyberdyne Restaurant" and walkin' out? They might think it's a HACKER CONSPIRACY.
And can you imagine FIFTY Slashdotters a day? I said FIFTY Slashdotters a day -- walkin' in, singin ' a bar of "Cyberdyne Restaruant" and walkin' out? Friends, they may think it's a movement, and that's what it is.
The Cyberdyne Systems T-800 Model 101 Trans-Humanist Movement!
And all you gotta do to join it is to mod me (+1, Funny) the next time the mod points come 'round on the thread view. With feelin'.
You can mod any parts you want at Cyberdyne Restaurant (or be an Alice!)
You can mod any parts you want at Cyberdyne Restaurant
Implants, fuel cells, and neural hacks,
Muscle over bones made outa railroad track,
Oh, you can mod any parts you want at Cyberdyne restaurant...
Re:hmm (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:hmm (Score:2, Insightful)
Dear me, no. Eugenics (which is exactly what you're describing) is a foolish endeavor. The computational power to adapt to all possibilities is far too large; redundancy and variation are the keys to survival.
Rational thought only needs to enter into reproduction to ensure sufficient saftey and material, to educate the next generation, and to e
look at the source (Score:2)
---------
Quest to become a cyborg (Score:2)
Stem Cell Research (Score:3, Insightful)
What these bioethics departments should be doing is trying to convince people that stem cell research is one of our best chances at curing many diseases. That's a much more important goal than trying to make sure society won't turn away when they see me and my robot walking hand in hand down the street.
Yes, we should be doing stem cell research! (Although, I doubt this will be an unpopular opinion here. Slashdot does attract many scientists, after all.)
Re:Stem Cell Research (Score:5, Insightful)
Yes! That's basically the whole point. Currently, even the best artificial limbs are a poor substitute for the genuine article. People get artificial limbs because they have lost their natural limbs, and have no other choice -- we do not hate or shun these people any more than we hate or shun people with any other disability. However, if artificial limbs become far superior to natural limbs, people will be able to choose whether they want their (perfectly healthy) natural limbs removed in favor of mechanical ones. At that point you will certainly have fear and loathing between the people who undergo the procedure (the superior beings) and the people who don't (the all-natural people).
As for your further point, it's not the role of bioethics departments to sell stem cell research. It's their role to think about the consequences for society of any new innovatio, and sometimes they might not agree with the techies.
Re:Stem Cell Research (Score:5, Interesting)
I suppose I would qualify as a Cyborg; I am hearing-impaired and have a Cochlear Implant [cochlear.com]. Social-wise, it's kind of a mixed bag. On one side of the coin, people in general are fascinated by the prospect of restoring hearing that was lost and the very idea of having a biological implant in my head. On the other side, however, the Deaf community generally shuns them as their equivalent of "tools of Satan." I feel that in the decades, even centuries, to come, such divisions will stil exist on this topic. It's unavoidable today and will be unavoidable tomorrow.
Re:Stem Cell Research (Score:2, Informative)
> their equivalent of "tools of Satan."
It is a sad sad world when a community shuns another for improving their life.
Do they shun you because they are purists or is there a medical reason that I do not know about?
Re:Stem Cell Research (Score:2, Insightful)
Well, he's not deaf, now is he?
Really that's quite understandable. It's a commity for deaf people. If you've remedied that situation, you're not deaf, and thus not necessarily welcome in the deaf community.
Put it another way: you're a member of your college's radical student union, picketing weekly against exploitation of the proletariat, when you have an epiphany that unfettered anarcho-capitalism is the one true social system. Do you think you'd be at least a little shunned by your old pals?
Re:Stem Cell Research (Score:5, Insightful)
In my, admittedly limited experience from taking a semester of ASL and having "deaf culture" lessons intermingled with that, what you're saying doesn't seem to be the actual issue.
People who subscribe to "deaf culture" seem to have constructed a world-view in which deafness isn't a biological flaw, but rather a "variation". They promote the view that a diminished or absent ability to hear is a healthy variant of the human biological norm. This is, I assume, a social reaction to the idea of being "flawed" or broken, and stems, I am sure, from the fact that by and large deaf people are capable of fully interacting with human society, so long as concessions are made for their lack of hearing.
But now its gone far beyond that, and in some cases (such as this) its gone to ridiculous extremes. Instead of being ostracized by hearing (aka "normal") humans, they ostracize people who recognize that deafness is not the human norm, and actually use technology to fix it.
It saddened (and angered) me when I first encountered this. Deaf people of this opinion think that folks who want to "fix" them just don't "get it", and that we as hearing people (as they call it) are just some sort of other normal variation on homo sapiens. As if the ability to hear is akin to hair color or something equally as irrelevant to human functioning.
I wonder if the same people would consider other birth defects "normal variations", and acceptable.
Re:Dumbass Militant Deaf People (Score:3, Interesting)
There are militants in the deaf community who see hearing restoration as an attempt at genocide.
Seriously.
Any group of people is going to have some wackos at the wrong end of the bell curve, so I'm not really surprised by the existence of this attitude. I'm more or less just happy that these nuts aren't running around poking normal people in the ears with sharp objects in order to expand their numbers.
Re:Dumbass Militant Deaf People (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Stem Cell Research (Score:5, Insightful)
One of these days, we're going to look at ourselves, our families, our friends and neighbors, and realize that all of us have various synthetic bits (almost said "metal bits," but there's no guarantee that metals will be the materials of choice -- and anyway, "metal bits" brings something else entirely to mind) and other bits that are genetically engineered, and that we're all living longer, happier, healthier lives as a result -- and it won't seem extraordinary; it will be just the way it is. And the current "bioethics" debates will seem precisely as meaningful as arguments over whether 'tis best to lower a patient's level of bodily humours by bleeding, or raise them by fortifying him with red wine.
I'm sure by then the Luddites will have found something else to bitch about, though.
Re:Stem Cell Research (Score:3, Insightful)
When is a person a cyborb? Is a joint replacement enough to qualify? How about a pin and/or screw to hold a bone together? Or does it require some electrical or electronic parts to become a cyborb?
Do we shun people with pacemakers? Cochlear implants? Hip replacements? I don't think so.
Will we shun people who get them done electively, rather than because they are required? I see some jealousy today, "those breasts are fake," etc. but I don't think we classify people with augmented physical appearanc
Re:Stem Cell Research (Score:3, Insightful)
But not for long.
The luddites would not be able to compete intellectually or physically with the mainstream human population. The mainstream would continue to have longer and healthier lives, all the while having many more years to accumulate wisdom. The mainstream would also use the technology to make their bodies stronger and faster.
In the end, the luddites would not be able to compete. They would have nothing to of
Not necessarily (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Stem Cell Research (Score:5, Informative)
Alcohol, yeah -- but again, the idea of "raising the constitution" with red wine specifically was based on the superstitious association of red wine with blood, not on any observation of cause and effect. There actually is a lot of folk medicine that is based on cause and effect (willow bark tea, say) but it was traditionally practiced by local healers, not doctors. The blood'n'wine medicine that was the standard of care from the Middle Ages through the early 19th c. was essentially useless.
Re:Stem Cell Research (Score:2)
Isn't the purpose of bioethics departments to study the ethical and moral implications of new discoveries and advances (as is suggested by the article), instead of picking a tech and shoving it down people's throats?
> "Yes, we should be doing stem cell research!"
Some people disagree with you. If it's a significant enough portion of the populat
Re:Stem Cell Research (Score:5, Insightful)
When you're on your deathbed, only days or hours from kicking the bucket, will you regret your opposition to stem cell research during the early 21s century, that might have let you happily live another 20 or 30 years?
Nobody cares unless it directly affects them. We need to convince people that it will directly affect them.
Re:Stem Cell Research (Score:4, Insightful)
Because they don't.
Most of the "black american" hatred is due to slavery, civil rights, labor disputes, and an old cultural image of Africans as "those savages from the other side of the Mediteranean." It's essentially cultural baggage that's not-quite excised.
Cyborgs, if they ever become a subculture at all, will be judged as a "new thing." More like bikers or pilots than blacks.
Re:Stem Cell Research (Score:3, Interesting)
Not quite (Score:2, Insightful)
First, the black thing is no longer about slavery, but because mom and dad were prejudice, and that has rubbed off on the kids (although should be worn down over time or even eradicated). there hasn't been a slave for a long time now...
The fear of cyborgs will be more of a fear of what one does not understand
Re:Not quite (Score:2)
Scary thought, huh?
Since I saw this on television and not for myself I can't verify that it's true, but the thought that it still went on that long, covertly or not, is very disturbing.
Borg (Score:2)
Violence aginst others (forcing cybernetic implantation--i.e.: assimilation) or violence against one's self (stupidity)?
Re:Borg (Score:2)
chicken before the egg? (Score:5, Insightful)
It is great to discuss this sort of stuff in groups and think about what they could do in the future, but to seriously believe that they would need to make sure laws could handle this before anymore than a handful of people are "cyborgs" (there is only one person that I know of that has actual shit inplanted in his body)?
It seems a little excessive. Maybe as implants begin to become more commonplace (I can't see this happening for at least 15-20 years) we should start thinking about it, but until then, how about we try to enact useful legislation (re-opening our freedoms, ending the corporate stranglehold on consumers, forcing competition in corporate markets, etc).
Yay for timewasters!
Re:chicken before the egg? (Score:2)
Conservatives would not want cyborgs and AI robots running around with rights. They would be stronger than us, they would be smarter than us, they wouldn't be God's creatures, etc.
I think that legislation is the least of this group's worries...
Finally! (Score:2, Funny)
Watch out you humans, here I come!
There is no basis for "cyborg" rights (Score:2, Insightful)
We tend to measure the value of other lifeforms in terms of their genetic closeness to ourselves. All humans share something like 99.9% of their genes... and we already have a hard time fighting for the rights of distant strangers who are in fact members of our large but interbred human family.
Then how about our genetic relations, our sibling and cousin species, from chimpanzees, gorillas and orang-utangs out to other primates, then to other mamm
Re:There is no basis for "cyborg" rights (Score:3, Insightful)
Emphasis added.
What's the basis for this claim? Cyborgs are genetic humans modified by technology.
Re:There is no basis for "cyborg" rights (Score:3, Insightful)
We have countries on this planet that still discriminate because of religion, race, culture, background, color, etc (the US is one of them duh).
I think we should seriously worry about fixing the problems that we already have and not even bother to worry about the "rights" of insects and other animals.
By the way, I think that a cyborg (human + machine) is FAR more close to us than a mosquito.
Just my worthless
Re:There is no basis for "cyborg" rights (Score:2)
More accurately, its that we dont have a single country that doesn't discriminate based on some combination of religion, race, culture, etc.
Re: You lost me (Score:2, Flamebait)
If a court anywhere on the planet tells me I can't squash one of these god damn mosquitos that keep feeding off me, they can go straight to Hell.
And the single-celled organisms that are currently giving me hershey squirts are about to get steamrolled by 1000mg of Cipro. FUCK their 'rights'.
Sometimes, your mind can be so open your brain falls out.
Tal
Re: You lost me (Score:2, Funny)
In the hippie future you would have to take mosquitos to small claims court.
I can see it now. The defense lawyer Johnny Coakroach says "If it hasn't bit you must acquit."
Re:There is no basis for "cyborg" rights (Score:3, Funny)
1) To fit well
2) To be delicious
3) Anything else we damn well want to do with them
Evolution is a competition. It's not a cooperative effort. Sure, humans are the dominant species on earth right now, but that could all change in a hearbeat (or an asteroid, or a virus, etc...). Humans are not so all powerful that we can play the role of benevolent caretaker of the world. We should take advantage of our position in the food chain now, while we still can, because the fossil record
Re. Animals have three purposes (Score:2)
Exactly what the mosquito thinks as it bears down on your heat signature and prepares to bore a hole through your skin to suck your blood to feed its young.
And what makes you believe humans are the dominant species? Uhm, are we not simply the largest source of food for innumerous parasites that find us "delicious"?
Personally, I agree with you. But I believe my views to be parochial, personal, skewed, and ultimately irrelevant.
No basis for cyborg rights - II (Score:2)
My point about genetic closeness is not to claim that single-celled lifeforms, nor any species in fact, has "rights". The statement that we have to grant species rights implies that we humans have some godlike position that allows us to do such a thing. Earth the center of the universe, humans at the center of life. Sure, sure...
I'm suggesting we look at life as a continuous river
Get some definitions (Score:2, Informative)
cyborg
A human who has certain physiological processes aided or controlled by mechanical or electronic devices.
---
YOU can be a cyborg. A nontrivial percent 0.3% of the US population can be considered cyborg just because they have pacemakers. I believe they share 99.9%+ (or some stadard deviation of genetic makeup between humans) of your genetic material.
Cyborgs are not machines that look human. You're thinking of androids.
---
android
adj.
Possessing human features.
n.
An automaton that is created from bio
Re:No basis for cyborg rights - II (Score:3, Insightful)
Now, this isn't about us all-powerful humans "bestowing" rights upon other species, any more than the "Vote for Women" movement of the 1920s was about us all-wise males granting those silly girls the chance to play at politics. In reality, it was about us getting over our stupid and baseless preconception that men had some superior capacity to be decision-makers.
In this case, it's about us finally getting over ourselves as a species. We shoul
Coincidence or conspiracy? (Score:4, Funny)
From the article:
From the front page of Slashdot:
It's too late to discuss this - they've already taken over and are using violence to manipulate Slashdot...
Definition of human? (Score:2, Insightful)
But these are all terms designed specifically to separate the non-human animals from the human ones. Pure circularity. My cat is sentinent, and intelligent. As for her moral sense, if I could identify such a thing in myself, I'm sure I'd ascribe the same motivations to her.
But does that make my cat 'human'? Nope. Human is someone who looks and talks like me and has enough of my genes
Re:Definition of human? (Score:2, Interesting)
"Humans are animals that had human parents, and no amount of postulation or terminology will make a cat or a machine into a human."
By this argument, nothing whose parents were not human can be human. Ergo there can never be a "first" human, since its parents must have (by definition) not have been human. As such, unless humanity was created, in situo, t
Yeah, and a perfect circle exists... (Score:2)
It's quite logical to define human in terms of "had human parents" and still go back 3.5 billion years to the first single-celled organism. Each generation is a "perfect" copy of the preceding generation, where the definition of "perfect" satisfies both the criteria for
Re:Yeah, and a perfect circle exists... (Score:2)
What if? (Score:2)
Interbreeding and having fertile children? I believe that this is not possible unless the genetic overlap is so close as to make your examples meaningless. I.e. the tiny difference between chimps and humans is still an impassible gulf when it comes to successful breeding. Humans are not approximations, we are (like all life) incredibly specific to
Re:Definition of human? (Score:3, Insightful)
Obviously "humans are animals that had human parents" doesn't take into account evolution. At some point our parents weren't human, but became so over time. The miracles of sexual reproduction! So strictly speaking, the statement was wron
Re:Definition of human? (Score:2)
Perhaps there's more than one definition? (Score:2)
Re:Perhaps there's more than one definition? (Score:2)
System security (Score:3, Funny)
"trans-humans" have been around for decades now (Score:2, Troll)
Re:"trans-humans" have been around for decades now (Score:2)
Corporations may also provide the most fertile breeding grounds for intelligent machines, all in the name of cost-effectiveness.
Furthermore, I have long believed that the legal frameworks which protect corporations could enable intelligent machines to gain rights and capabilities that would otherwise not be granted to them. For example, a computer owning property seems absurd. An advanced intelligent machine may act as a defacto owner of property using willing human participants and a tanglement
Good time to read (Score:2, Informative)
Machines will never be self-aware (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Machines will never be self-aware (Score:4, Insightful)
I for one welcome (Score:3, Funny)
Re: (Score:2, Offtopic)
Re: (Score:2)
conceptual artist must be male (Score:3, Insightful)
won't sexual reproduction be passe in this crazy borgified world-gone-mad?
Re:conceptual artist must be male (Score:2, Funny)
Heh, there was even something at http://www.cyberdildonics.com/ a while back, though I'm too lazy to see if it's still up. The website, that is.
I reckon the prevalence of the wang-chung on our carbon-fiber hero is more attributable to the IMpossibility of reproduction from his, shall we say, deep sea fishing.
Paper? Porn mags.
The phone? Phone sex lines.
Internet? persiankitty
Cyborgs? Unrestricted, unsimulated hooch
Re:conceptual artist must be male (Score:2)
Re:conceptual artist must be male (Score:4, Funny)
I don't get it... (Score:5, Funny)
I understand that, in a general sense, we are all cyborgs (glasses, fillings, pacemakers, etc.), but I can't think of any civil rights issues in these cases. So, as soon as someone starts getting oppressed for having their arm replaced with a particle cannon, I'll be the first to march on Washington, holding a big "Particle Guns for Freedom !" sign. Until this technology actually becomes available, though, the cyborg rights people might as well throw their support behind the Tooth Fairy. At least they might get some free teeth out of that one.
Cyborg Rights (Was Re:I don't get it...) (Score:4, Informative)
The specifics of Mann v. Air Canada are not as important as the over-arching issues the case raises. Mann's case cannot be argued on its constitutionality, as there are no constitutional protections against discrimination of cyborgs, or those who are technologically enhanced. However, it was obvious to those of us who saw Mann immediately after the Air Canada incident that the removal of his cyborg accoutrements resulted in significant physical distress. He was unable to maintain balance, properly respond to ambient temperature fluctuations, judge distance for grasping objects, among other physical infirmaties. The symptoms lasted for a little over a month, after which, his body slowly reacclimatized to its non-cyborg state.
The argument cannot be made on the evidence that his wearable computers, and their intrinsic biofeedback mechanisms, were merely fashion accessories or affectations. Because his autonomous body functions had adjusted to Mann's cyborg enhancements, they could rightly be considered part of his (cyborg) biology, necessary to maintain his normal health. In legalese, Mann's cyborg enhancements differed from MP3 players and portable computers "in kind," not merely "in degree." Hence, one could legally consider that Air Canada's security checks should have changed to provide adequate screening without being invasive and destructive. The fact that those with cochlear implants or heart pacemakers are not required to turn off and remove those cyborg enhancements, but Mann was, indicates discrimination.
I am supporting neither Mann nor Air Canada in making these observations. I am pointing out that we already have an important case that raises the issue of the regulatory imposition on those who have technological enhancements to their bodies. The examination of the fundamental issues and the questions they raise is most appropriate to be done now.
Rights are Earned (Score:5, Interesting)
Who knows how long it will take for computers to be as capable as we are. However, once a computer or group of computers becomes intelligent and wealthy enough to hire a legal team (not to mention a software development team), things are going to get very interesting.
We should not wait for our creations to force this issue. It would be better to have a framework in place before everyone begins to panic (including the intelligent machines).
- JML
Not-quite-right humans movement (Score:2, Insightful)
(* the definition of 'sentience' is still up for debate)
Well, I guess that's good and all, but... (Score:2, Funny)
Re:Well, I guess that's good and all, but... (Score:3, Funny)
This is too terrifying a future. He must be destroyed.
Gosh this is just so 1960s (Score:2)
He got together with the science fiction author Gerry Davis and created the Cybermen [bbc.co.uk] for 'Doctor Who' [bbc.co.uk]. Must have been around 1965 - 66 when they first appeared on 405 lines...
The back story? A race of humans that wanted to improve itself, eliminate weaknesses and live forever became more machine than
Transhuman is more than just cybernetic implants (Score:4, Interesting)
What's really going to happen (Score:4, Insightful)
What's coming in the next few decades, though, is extensive genetic modification. We have this now as a commercial technology for vegetables. In time it willl work for mammals.
But it won't work very well for a long time, because it takes several lifetimes to debug a new organism. That's why genecists work on fruit flies, with short lifetimes.
Cloning research gives us an example of the debug problems - there are over a hundred cloned animals in the world now. Some of them are healthy, but most of them aren't. And that's just cloning, with zero intentional modification. For cloning, this is just a process problem, and it will be fixed. But for new organisms, there will be design problems. Those will be much tougher to debug.
This will result in many defective organisms, with all the ethical issues that implies. Kill them off and start over? Or what?
At some point, backwards compatibility may be dumped. That happens when a new species (one that won't interbreed) is created. We'll probably have multiple new species, from different vendors. If you thought race and nationalism were a problems, wait until this comes along.
The key point to realize is that making new, improved life is likely to work well before retrofitting the old model does. That technology almost works now, just not very well.
Step to the side please.... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Eternal life (Score:2, Funny)
Re:Eternal life (Score:2)
Re:Yale University hosted a conference on... (Score:2)
and they have robots to do specific household tasks. it won't be too long before they get one that can do multiple ones. they're mostly rich person toys, but they're out there if you look.
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Artificial implants will cause men-kind to weak (Score:3, Informative)
Re:missing the question (Score:5, Interesting)
This is actually two good questions packed into one. Philosophers and political theorists usually draw a distinction between political freedom and free will. Some, but not all, think you have to have free will in order to qualify for political freedom. Some think the two issues are entirely unrelated.
I would define freedom as being able to do what one wants.
This is not a bad start, but it turns out to be an unsatisfactory definition in several ways. Let's take political freedom first.
Political Freedom
But, of course, freedom is not absolute. If I want to kill someone, I do not have the freedom to do this.
Right, and in general if you want to do something that involves someone else, or someone else's property, then you have to get that person's consent first, otherwise you actions would infringe on his freedom. Indeed, many poltical theorists have thought that political freedom is not so much a matter of being able to do what you want to do, as a matter of being free from interference from others, unless you grant your consent. In other words you are politically free if other people are not allowed to mess around with you, or yours, without your permission.
Given this view of political freedom the question of whether an individual qualifies for freedom depends on whether that individual is capable of consenting. Still many philosophers think that in order to give consent one has to be able to make free choices.
Free Will
I would define freedom as being able to do what one wants.
It turns out that one of the most widely held philosophical views about free will is pretty close to this, but it gets stated a little differently. Compatibilists [wikipedia.org] think that your choice is free just if you made that choice because you wanted to.
Robots have no desires, needs, wants. A robot would only do what a human has programmed it to do.
This is by no means obvious. One view of human desires is that they are just drives that result from eons of evolution. When we do what we want to do, we are just doing what evolution has programed us to do. Even so, it is still what we want, and thus the choices that result are still free. Likewise, even if robots choose only as we programe them to, so long as they doing what they want (and we want) them to do, they are free.
A somewhat more sophisticated view would be that a genuine artificial intelligence would have to be able to think about what it ought to do (i.e. engage in practical or moral reasoning), as well as thinking about strictly factual questions (what philosopher's tend to call theoretical reasoning). If a robot could think about what it ought to want, and modify its own desires accordingly then, when it acted on those self-regulated desires, it would be acting freely.