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[i2amroy]

This is a bit late, but on the DNA "polluting" thing what would you consider things that wouldn't be passed down to descendants? We have plenty of gene therapies nowadays that can alter your DNA to change things (up to and including restoring color vision in monkeys). Take that a little farther and you could do just about any sort of genetic modifications you want, none of which would actually be passed down to your descendants in any way, shape, or form. Would a person who was modified to have night vision later in their life and who wouldn't pass it down still be less of a human?

A lot of the world already works in slave-like conditions, and has for centuries. The international community "allows" it, because it can't really do anything about it. In a lot of cases it even directly benefits from it. If workers in China had the same rights they have in, say, the Great Lakes area (old industrial/manufacturing center of the US), how expensive do you think the goods manufactured there would become, compared to now? That was mostly what my "ongoing industrial revolution" comment was aimed at.

Something a lot of people also forget is that many times sweat-shops work as a stepping stone to better conditions within a country. Take Taiwan for instance. Conditions there used to be much worse then they are today, but because of the work they did in that time they were eventually able to purchase the machines needed for the more basic work, leading to an overall condition improvement (not that it's as good as many other places, but it's still better). You don't "help" people by taking away the best of their (bad) options; so far the best proven way to help sweatshops is to buy as many sweatshopped things as possible, since that means more production will be allotted to them and therefore increase their overall wealth thus improving conditions (which is totally backwards from the way many people think of it, but it's so far been the only way to actually make a positive change on said conditions).

That said I totally agree that machine labor is going to beat out any sort of human labor in the long run.

[Descan]

That sounds like the basis for a charity. Purchasing basic machinery for sweat-shops so that the workers can use those instead of rudimentary tools.

[i2amroy]

That sounds like the basis for a charity. Purchasing basic machinery for sweat-shops so that the workers can use those instead of rudimentary tools.

True, though I can't think of any currently existing charities that are taking that route.

[Gukag]

"Sweatshop Investing for the Future". It's a hard sell tbh, although I completely get your point. The "west"'s own industrial revolution wasn't exactly all roses and hugs either. It may just be an obligatory phase, growing pains of a modern industrial nation.

To come back to the physical modification thing, I think we're really underselling it. The height advantage example was a good one, but I think we can go further. Eye color, for one. Really exotic colors. I can think of a few women who wouldn't mind having Elizabeth Taylor purple. Eliminate any genetic predispotion for obesity would be a given. Let's go cruder, how about a gigantic dick? Who wouldn't want his own son to be packing? How much do these superficial physical things really affect someone's chances in life, really? Maybe not to the level improved intelligence would, but we can't ignore that they would be desired traits, and maybe even evolutionary advantages (as far as procreating goes), or at least perceived as such.

[Bauglir]

I think the most important thing is "How many of these things need to be done before adulthood to function?"

The degree to which you're able to consent to these sorts of things is crucial. If your IQ booster shot only works on infants, you'll have a boatload of people who resent never having the opportunity to get it because of their parents' decision, and an equally frustrated bunch of people who resent the forced pressure of having a gift they never wanted. It's not like we don't have these sorts of problems already with education, the existing genetic lottery, and such, but it certainly does exacerbate the whole issue. EDIT: And unlike most of the existing similar scenarios, it's totally under the parents' control, finance aside until the next paragraph.

As for competition, that's a totally valid argument that is best handled by adjusting society in order to render it moot. As I see it, there are three possible futures. Ignoring, for the moment, the one where we're extinct, we can either get used to the idea of a dystopian hellhole where you're expected to do entirely pointless work for your entire life to justify your existence, or a much nicer world where you don't have to justify your existence in the first place because we have the technology and resources to support you anyway. This is independent of transhumanism, though, and is more a consequence of technology's inevitable forward march in general; where we end up seems to be largely dependent on politics and the functionality of space travel (gotta have 'dem extraterrestrial resources), and both are looking mighty dismal these days. It winds up being pretty off-topic, though, as a consequence of being more of a parallel issue. In any case, the effects of transhumanism would mirror the world it winds up coming about in - if we're in the stratified hellhole world, it's just going to make things worse for the non-oligarchy folk. Then again, in that case, us plebs are fucked anyway.

[Knit tie]

I think the most important thing is "How many of these things need to be done before adulthood to function?"

The degree to which you're able to consent to these sorts of things is crucial. If your IQ booster shot only works on infants, you'll have a boatload of people who resent never having the opportunity to get it because of their parents' decision, and an equally frustrated bunch of people who resent the forced pressure of having a gift they never wanted. It's not like we don't have these sorts of problems already with education, the existing genetic lottery, and such, but it certainly does exacerbate the whole issue. EDIT: And unlike most of the existing similar scenarios, it's totally under the parents' control, finance aside until the next paragraph.

My point exactly, Bauglir. I am of firm opinion that all modifications to a human's body, aside from, perhaps, elimination of disease-causing genes, need to be under said human's complete control. Otherwise, we have the potential of recreating/reinforcing an oppressive caste society, where your life position is determined by whatever genes your parents put in you.

[Baffler]

If we can already modify somatic cells' DNA, it can't be long before we can modify germ-line cells as well, if we haven't already figured it out. That's where I predict the biggest investment will be: repairing genes that could cause disease down the line. This could be an end, if not a cure, per se, for lots and lots of chronic diseases. And all that's assuming that we can't figure out how to remove those mutations in somatic cells reliably, a pretty big assumption indeed.

My issue is that even though everyone deserves to have their crippling diseases cured regardless of their circumstances, there's a decent possibility that isn't going to happen. I'm NOT saying that we shouldn't do this because only rich people could actually afford it, the wealthy are just as much people as the poor, and a partial solution is still better than no solution at all. I'm saying that the effectiveness is severely diminished if any commitment less than that put toward vaccinations now is made. You won't ever get rid of the problem if you don't do anything but keep it from affecting a certain part of the population.

tl;dr: whatever my reservations regarding augmenting strength or intelligence, gene therapy's potential to wipe out disease makes it worth exploring. We just have to do it very carefully.

[Helgoland]

As happened in the industrial revolution, for example. PTW.

EDIT: As the definition of 'human' is blurry at best, let me propose an alternative question: Does it matter what's human and what's not?

dude that's what I asked

why does everyone ignore me

i love you guys plz don't haet

; - ;

It's not about you personally, see?