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[WillowLuman]

Stem cells are amazing, but if you want to stick someone's head on another person's body, you might as well use the cells to fix their old one instead. That way you don't have to chop someone else's head off. Or use a cadaver, because who wants to be transferred to a body that's already had a critical operational failure?

[smirk]

Something something stem cells, something magical something something.

See, no problem!

Heh, my thoughts exactly =P  At the very least, the brain is kinda-sorta-not-really immunologically privileged. From what I gather it's actually not, but at the same time there's no inflammatory response so it's not as bad as it could be.

Also, things could be easier if we're talking about attaching spinal columns to a series of electrodes rather than another human spine. Then you'd get that nice human-brain-in-a-cyborg-jar effect.

[hops]

PTW.

Also, on the subject of implants (Yes I'm sloooooooow), I'd rather use accessories like electronic gloves or some detecting machine to detect magnetic field, since it allows for more flexibility in case I decide an implant is not very important in my life. Sure, it's less cool than using your augmented body sense, but it's functionally the same. I mean, we're using computers, but we don't have them jammed into our brain, do we? If brain-computers become a thing, I'd rather wait out until we get some proper mind reading devices that let me use them without having a foreign material in my grey matter.

[Another]

On one hand I had that laser eye surgery that corrected my vision.* And implanting a tiny magnet under skin to get some sensitivity to magnetic fields does not sound like a bad idea to me. (Though certainly not into fingertips - I imagine that would interfere with typing (and somehow I don't want direct neural connection instead of a keyboard) - but back side of the palm seems reasonable.)

On the other hand - [ETHICS:BODY_MODIFICATION:PERSONAL_MATTER] but am surely not going to get any tattoos or piercings. That stuff just appears as damage to functional tissues for no good reason.

I would first train and utilize what biological systems I already possess to their full potential before considering getting an upgrade. And since my work or hobbies do not require to be physically at the leading edge and that currently and for the foreseeable future direct neural information interfaces are way inferior to natural senses - it seems that I would not take any significant steps in transhumanism direction even given an option to.

Also consider that the brain feels frequently used tools in essentially the same way as your own limbs. (I've read about a scientific study on this once.) Tactile feedback from some precision tools can be comparable in information richness to tactile feedback from your own fingers. Humans became transhumanists when they first took a stick to augment their bodies in bashing things from a greater distance and with greater force than with bare knuckles. By now clothes augment almost everybody's skin to say nothing about devices in a pocket that enable us to speak over large distances and help us remember images with great precision among other things.

*One cool thing I learned along the way is that some people who had some types of intraocular lens implants (always because of cataract or other serious medical conditions) reported their perceptible spectrum widened slightly into near ultraviolet range. That has potential for some not insignificant practical applications as well as being totally compatible with the experiment to get near IR vision with special diet as linked earlier in this thread.

[alway]

to say nothing about devices in a pocket that enable us to speak over large distances and help us remember images with great precision among other things.

And that's not even getting into pockets themselves. Pockets are awesome. You can now hold things without using your hands or being encumbered in any way. And yet the modern pocket goes back only about 300 years, and their origins only a millenia longer.

(and somehow I don't want direct neural connection instead of a keyboard)

Why not both. http://scifiinterfaces.wordpress.com/2013/07/24/the-secret-of-the-tera-keyboard/

Many characters in Ghost in the Shell have a particular cybernetic augmentation that lets them use specially-designed keyboards for input.

What’s nifty about the keyboard itself is not the number of keys. Modern keyboards have about that many. What’s nifty is that you can see these keyboards are massively chorded, with screen captures from the film showing nine keys being pressed at once.

The only thing that nears this level of data on a human scale is the human brain. With a common estimate of 100 billion neurons, the keyboard could be expressing the state of it’s users brain, 24 times a second, distinguishing between 10 different states of each neuron.

Because of the form factor of hands and keyboard, it looks like a manual input device. But looking at the data throughput, the evidence suggests that it’s actually a brain interface, meant to keep the computer up to date with whatever the user is thinking at that exact moment and responding appropriately.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

[misko27]

Wait, if I'm wearing contact lenses, am I not a technologically augmented individual?

[Frumple]

I think the general rule of thumb requires some form of more substantial attachment. Like surgery, or some sort of interface (i.e. prosthetics that can be swapped out). Contact lenses are the full body saran wrap of vision correction, but like saran wrap, are just a tool.

[alway]

I think the general rule of thumb requires some form of more substantial attachment.

Says who?

To discount wearable tech and similar in such discussions is to discount 95% of what transhumanism will really be.

Contact lenses, for example, could well be seen as even more transhumanist than surgical enhancement through laser procedures; they not only correct your vision, but can also be used to modify the appearance of your body. Even allowing you to change your eye color whenever you wish.

In order for discussion of transhumanism/cyborgs to be more than a shallow future-fashion-style discussion, the question of how must be relatively unimportant. All things being equal, having instant internet access via a smartphone is the same as having it directly implanted in your brain so long as data throughput and ease of access is comparable. Only when the differences are functional, like implanted internet being subconscious and coming with other side-effects, does it actually matter. Otherwise, it simply becomes a steampunk-like exercise, in which aesthetics trump reality.

[Frumple]

Aesthetics trimp a tramp tromp your trampa trump trimp trump.

Also called I am distracted/tired/etc. and wasn't reading well enough. Contacts definitely make you a technologically augmented individual, I just wouldn't go so far as to call you a cyborg, yet

[WillowLuman]

A pacemaker makes you a cyborg. Contacts don't.

[notquitethere]

If anyone wants to have a more informed discussion about cyborgs and cyborgism, here's a place to start: 50 posts About Cyborgs.

[LordBucket]

It's not impossible that you could do it on yourself, but that would take either
seriously hardcore willpower or high-strength painkillers.

...Wow.. Just...wow. I just found a video of a someone cutting open their own fingertips with a scalpel and inserting magnets into the wound. Seriously...bandaged fingers and blood pooling under one hand, and he's cutting open unbandaged fingers using his other hand...fumbling around with metal tweezers while the magnet sticks to it...jams it into the wound...

...wow.

This is like straight of Shadowrun. Here's the page with the video. It's not for not for the squeemish.

http://io9.com/what-you-need-to-know-about-getting-magnetic-finger-imp-813537993

[10ebbor10]

That seems like a very easy way to get some kind of very dangerous infection.

[Max White]

Yeeeeeeaaaaaaaa...... Not watching that.
Sounds like somebody is very silly.

[WillowLuman]

Downsides: wiping hard drives and generally screwing up electronics when you try to use them.