From: Chris Hind (chind@juno.com)
Date: Tue Jan 07 1997 - 01:08:46 MST
>So what sort of motivations did you have in mind for uploading? I'm
>honestly curious.
As uploaded entertainment I will enjoy satisfying my God ego having legions
of AI peasants kneeling before me, consuming great wealths of inspiring
knowledge, and exploring incredibly detailed worlds beyond my wildest
dreams. It WILL be cool. Basically I want to live in the Sunken Ship level
of Super Mario64. :)
(Just got N64, incredible graphics I might add, I find the environments in
it the ideal example of how art in an uploaded or virtual world will be.)
Start designing your fantasy environments now because anything designed in
virtual reality can be easily ported to uploaded reality. If you jot down
some ideas on paper today and continue to add detail and start designing
them on a PC, when the tools become more user-friendly and processing power
becomes cheaper you will be able to design these dream worlds which you
will someday live in as an uploaded being. I see being in an uploaded world
akin to living the life of Ghen in the book "Myst: The Book of Atrus" which
is a prequel to the game "Myst" and explains in depth the civilization that
created the island of Myst and how they would 'write' things into reality.
>While many in this "Machine Stops" world are fully satisfactory with
>telepresence, I am not, except when unavoidable, for the important
>experiences. Some would say that having a camera link is the same as
>having a link to your own eyes, but I say nay for now. Skiing knee deep
>powder at Alta live and in person is nothing like anything telepresence
>would offer. IF you think otherwise, prove me wrong. Telepresence and
>other remote sensing technologies are great for expanding ones sensory
>awareness, but for now cannot replace one's existing awareness. Sure
>having remote probes to do advance scouting are great, especially when
>exploring space, at least in the sense of reducing risks and maximizing
>time utility by culling out negative possibilities (i.e. stars with no
>planets, etc), but they will not replace actually setting your own foot
>down on an alien beach, meeting alien life forms in person, or skiing
>ammonia glaciers on the moons of gas giants....
Thats easy! Build genengineered drones for the particular environment with
brain boxes you can upload into so you can experience it firsthand. Just
because you're an upload doesn't mean you're forced to leave the body. You
can have any body you want. The likelyhood is that we will never leave the
physical world for a very long time because we need macroscopic engineering
still. You could genengineer these biological drones to be or look however
you want and flip between the virtual and physical seamlessly. We will need
to sacrifice nothing! You can keep your old body Mike, alter it in anyway
you wish or keep it as it is, but you will also be able to flip between
reality and virtuality effortlessly.
>Another variation:- John Varley wrote a short story about someone
>vacationing as a lion. The personality is downloaded into a controller
>implant in the lion's brain (I think, or I might have just made that up).
> The life of a lion, with the proprioceptive feedback of a lion,
> simplifies the thoughts in a meditative kind of way.
Exactly what I'm talking about!
"Every obstacle is a stepping stone to your success."
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Chris Hind (chind@juno.com) Upward, Outward, ACTION!
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