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[Xantalos]

A transhumanism thread? I'm camping here.

[MetalSlimeHunt]

A transhumanism thread? I'm camping here.

You shouldn't be so cheery about it. This is step one to becoming a Mythos-tier species.

[Person]

This interests me, but I can't help but feel putting magnets in my fingers would be less than wise in the computer industry.

Edit: Never mind, the field isn't strong enough apparently?

[MetalSlimeHunt]

Yes, the field isn't strong enough. It quite simply just takes more power to wipe a hard drive.

[Frumple]

A transhumanism thread? I'm camping here.

You shouldn't be so cheery about it. This is step one to becoming a Mythos-tier species.

Said like we aren't already one to every other living thing we've encountered.

[Owlbread]

All references however to religion, genocide, murder, greed, capitalism, the general cruelty of man and Fife would be removed.

Excluding any part of our known history would be unethical and a disservice to our descendents. Your beard should at least go over why you believe these things are harmful to humanity.

Dear god man, the survivors of the apocalypse have been through more than enough. The last thing they need is for my beard to lay upon them something so soul destroying, so emotionally crushing as the existence of Fife.

[Baffler]

*looks around*

I suppose I'm the only one.

I don't think, cool as it is, that any of this stuff is really a good idea beyond the extremely basic stuff like the magnets in your fingertips, or maybe replacing missing digits. For one thing, the more advanced things probably won't be all that accessible to the general population, and I'm not sure I'm comfortable with the idea of a superhuman upper class. We also run into all kinds of ethical snarls, like the use of these things to get an edge over competitors for a promotion, or in sports. I also don't think anyone expects governments to allow these things to go unregulated, all but assuring a whole new layer of stratification. They might be cool, but they don't exist in a vacuum.

[Eric Blank]

It's inevitable that everything gets run through the wealthiest buyers first, but you should remember that new technologies do eventually become much cheaper. I don't see any real reason to be concerned that wealthy people will be playing with these things first: they get to find out first-hand what can go wrong, afterall, then force the manufacturers to work out those issues.

[Remuthra]

Posting to spy on the cyborgs.

[Eagleon]

It's inevitable that everything gets run through the wealthiest buyers first, but you should remember that new technologies do eventually become much cheaper. I don't see any real reason to be concerned that wealthy people will be playing with these things first: they get to find out first-hand what can go wrong, afterall, then force the manufacturers to work out those issues.

Said, no doubt, from a first-world country Devil's advocate mode engaged!

A lot of cyberpunk is meant to be a reflection of modern problems, honestly - you have some cheap old iPods and the like trickling into West Africa, but it's still a terrible place despite how amazing our technology has become, not helped any by the fact that a lot of the minerals for it come from the lowest bidder, which is usually the one with the most wage-slave miners and manufacturers at their disposal in places that can't afford to care. So yeah, your new cyberarm is probably going to come from some armless kid in Ghana. Yes, even if it's 3D printed - the armless kid will just be mining. With his teeth.

At the same time, this is solved not at all by rejecting new technology. Businesses just wait until it's cheaper and keep making the old stuff, or drop prices further until people can't afford to resist, as enough people have it that it becomes crucial in some way to the market (smartphones). The world market very effectively feeds off of the psychology of the masses on every level. It's one big meat-grinder, and yes, I am full of cheer and sunshine today.

At the same time, I do think we've got the best chance yet to lift ourselves out of that in this era, by giving the lowest of the low disruptive technologies (particularly low-yield, lower-investment energy producing materials and facilities/education for cheap biotechnology far, far away from Monsanto's patent lawyers) that could make it less attractive to devote all resources to making widgets to trade. Then they could afford to make their own cyborg armies

[Xantalos]

A transhumanism thread? I'm camping here.

You shouldn't be so cheery about it. This is step one to becoming a Mythos-tier species.

Call me back when you've breached an interuniversal void, then we can talk.

[mastahcheese]

PTW

This interests me greatly.

[penguinofhonor]

Neodymium implants fascinate me. They're an (admittedly pretty crude) way to perceive an entirely new sense. I feel like that's the way to expand our perceptions - imagine implants to be able to see new wavelengths of light or hear new pitches of sound. Entirely new avenues of perception open up.

Evolution gave us the tools we needed to survive, but nothing more. We don't need math, art, and science for survival, but we want our society to be more than that. I think a similar process should happen to our bodies as well.

[Vattic]

PTW.

A student from the same department as Kevin Warwick came to my school to advertise going to Reading University. He ended up mostly talking about his cyborg teacher and the VR cave they have there.

[Max White]

If you can find a way to stop me going blind I'm all for it.
Bionic eyes? Sure! do I get to pick the color?