From: Twink (neptune@mars.superlink.net)
Date: Wed Nov 19 1997 - 17:04:45 MST
>At 01:49:17 Wed, 19 Nov 1997 -0800 (PST) Alex Tseng
<alextseng@rocketmail.com> wrote:
>>>UPLIFT [big snip]
>>Though one might ask, why one wants to change the species in the
>>first place, is there any practical benefits from that?
a) it would help us to understand how to uplift ourselves,
b) it would expand our culture -- i.e., we would have new, sentient and
non-human flavors added to our social stew,
and
c) just for the fun of it (a life without fun would be not be
practical:).
>>Also if one uplifts human intelligence into dangerous animals ,...
So far, no one on this list has suggested any dangerous animals. I
gather it could be done. But given this argument, why augment
humans? Certainly, they are the most dangerous -- in terms of
raw killing capacity (from guns to NBC weapons) -- of all animals
we know.
>>WOW.., Won't that be something like Aliens Resurrection.....
If I recall that series correctly, the organisms had nothing like human
intelligence. The danger was they were smart enough, they were
extremely hardy, and needed to kill humans to reproduce. (Nothing
on what they eat, but I assume they were not strict vegans.:)
>>I'd serious consider the re-percussions of such a move ,
That is part of the purpose of this discussion.
>>or hold a referrendum on this issue....?!
I would be strongly against that. I bet most people would be against
the
Bill of Rights if we voted on it today. There would, of course, be some
rational discussion, but, from what I've seen, those with the best
doomsday scenarios, however unlikely or even impossible, would win
the majority over.
>>>UPLOAD[big snip]
>>
>>This makes more extropian sense, if you are to gather more
>>information about our universe ; explore it and colonize
>>it,....with self-replicating machines with Uploaded Human
>>Intelligence in them or many-times; manifold mega-human
>>intelligence onboard
No reason to choose one or the other. However, I think uplifting can
be achieved now, while uploading is decades away.
>>I'd always thought of the current space probes like Cassini etc..
>>they are robots which have extended human senses ,...which
>>is like a piece of you and me out there in harsh environment,...
>>doing measurement and collecting data in our place,....
A good image.
>>Uploaded Machines can do much much much more,....
>>That's great,... providing you have eliminated the destructive
>>tendencies / low-reptitian etc etc aspect of our Human makeup
>>Agreed?
I don't know. Can these tendencies be parceled and expunged so
easily? And, if so, is it desireable? Might they not serve a purpose
even for posthumans?
>>Or else we'll end up with a situation far worst than a
>>runaway Uplifting scenario...Any suggestions ? ....headways ?
Mine is, for now, experiment more and more.
Verily,
Daniel Ust
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