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[Knit tie]

Good evening, ladies and gentlemen.

Due to the science thread coming dangerously close to derailing, the second Bay12 Transhumanism thread is now officially open!

All topics related to the various improvements of human mind and body are welcome, but please remember that civility is mandatory.

Religion is strictly prohibited due to it being extremely toxic for this type of threads and not really appropriate for internet discussions in general. 

[Lagslayer]

Posting to monitor.

[Putnam]

please remember that civility is mandatory.

PLEASE

[Descan]

your mother was a hamster >:T

[MaximumZero]

Posting to monitor.

Here, as well.

[Knit tie]

Anyway, let's begin.

Today's topic, fresh from the science thread:

What makes one human?

[Descan]

A corollary to that: What does it mean to be or not to be human? That is the real question.

If you are declared not-human, what does that mean for you?

I.E. human rights for "non-human" sentients sapients. >:T

[Owlga]

I.E. human rights for "non-human" sentients.

No, really. No.

Sentient doesn't mean that, a dog or a cat, or a cow is sentient. Sapience is more tied to the ability to reason or think critically, which is currently what defines humanity. Not sentience.

[MaximumZero]

I, for one, believe that all sentients sapients (yeah, I made that mistake, too,) should be treated equally. Period. Humans are only special because we've not found anything else sapient. Neil deGrasse Tyson said it best, though. Our search for life in space is kind of like scooping a cupful of water out of the ocean and declaring that there's nothing in the oceans because there are no whales in the cup.

[Descan]

* Descan shrug.

Whatever You knew what I meant! The question stands!

And when I said non-human, I was thinking more in terms of... changed humans. Artificial intelligences. Uplifted animals with equal intelligence.

Aliens too, but not just human.

[Mictlantecuhtli]

PTW

[Lagslayer]

What makes one human?

1. Biological integrity, I feel, is the most defining part of a human. The health of the body and mind affect each other, and their mechanisms and materials determine the function. Who you are, in large part, grows out of what you are. To consciously alter or manipulate it's basic functions is to degrade your very being. Genetic material, the blueprints from which your body is built, is the most basic biological component, and to consciously alter or manipulate that is to degrade the entire species.

2. The mind. Thought processes, grown out of your biological component, and shaped by environment. To forcefully alter the mind of another is to remove all dignity they have, a terrible fate.

The brain, being both a biological organ and the center of thought, is the single most important part of a human.

I, for one, believe that all sentients sapients (yeah, I made that mistake, too,) should be treated equally. Period. Humans are only special because we've not found anything else sapient. Neil deGrasse Tyson said it best, though. Our search for life in space is kind of like scooping a cupful of water out of the ocean and declaring that there's nothing in the oceans because there are no whales in the cup.

I believe that friendly cooperation with other sapient species could be great, and benefit all factions involved. But if it comes down to "them or us", I'm going to side with us. Because, often unfortunately, you have to choose a side. And I choose my side. Hopefully, it would not come to such a situation.


so many ninjas.

[MaximumZero]

If we do it right, though, there won't have to be any sides. There's no reason for it to come to that. We won't do it right, I imagine, but we could.

[Owlga]

There's no reason for it to come to that.

There's also literally no actual justified reason for organized wars that couldn't of been resolved peacefully, yet human history is full of them. If we find another sapient species we wont even know they're sapient till we've been killing eachother for a while.

[Propman]

I can tell you that the chances that at least one object you identified as a person was actually an illusion of some description to be above 0%, unless you counted illusions of a certain authenticity to be human regardless. Though, that leads to the question on whether an "conscious" illusion is more human then a real person that is in a vegetative state, assuming there was ever a sure way to figure out either of them was "real".