In what direction do you see our species headed?

I don't see our species lasting beyond 200 more years (I'm being generous with this estimate).

Unfortunately, unless the Earth itself dies (or is blown up), humans are gonna survive to reek havoc on the planet unless they change their ways and actually live in tune with the Earth.

I see several trends, any one of which may become the dominant path.

As a 'natural' evolution I see the possibility of the separate hemispheres of the brain becoming far more united. Which I think would lead to a more holistic relationship with life.

As a 'directed' evolution I see the possibility of the transhumanists fulfilling their desires.

The other main trend would be toward annihilation.

Those are the three main possible paths that I see.

Even though the majority of it goes way over my head, I get the basics of transhumanism and I reckon that this alone will play a major part in what eventually brings about our demise as a species... though this could technically just be part of evolution.

That's as far as my brain is capable of going today

Well, dinosaurs lasted 100 million years, so I like to think we could manage a few more yet.

dubmeup wrote:
Transhumanism and /or widescale destruction are two possible paths I see.

I'm not sure about the workings of the natural evolutionary path you describe, but I do see the possibility of either a jump in our evolution due to external influences, perhaps on our DNA and / or a diminution of evil due to basically the energetic rug being pulled from under the evil one's horny feet. The bad guys work very hard to keep energy shitty, but there are people working hard to improve energy levels, and there may be some external cosmic type event that will just blow evil away.

Most of the prophecies of "End Times" from various cultures include a "happy end" that often takes the form of a new stage in a great cycle. We seem to be living in a period of darkness, but there are hopeful signs as well. I had the great pleasure of witnessing one of them earlier this week. Personal experiences are often difficult to share and sometimes it's not a good idea to even try to do so, but they can give us hope and strength even when there seems to be so much evil in the world.

wake_up_bomb wrote: Although the dinosaurs inability to piss around with; biotoxins, thermonuclear devices, industrialisation and resources squandering for temporary profit may have tilted the scales in their favour when it came to longevity.

feather wrote: Maybe we should try to find a source of dinosaur DNA, perhaps preserved in fossilised amber for example, grow some dinosaurs, and then confine them to a sort of amusement park in a small island off the coast of Costa Rica, and see what we can learn from them. I'm sure it'll all work out really well.

wake_up_bomb wrote: We'd need to be very careful though.
That concept has the potential to go all kinds of wrong.

feather wrote:


That you know of...

Anthony65 wrote:
That's how I see it, an end of a dark age, and the beginning of a light one. Moving back towards spirituality and harmony with nature. I think this is what the elite class is trying to quell by bombarding us with so much shit. I know people are waking up to this. I see it all the time. The Mayan calendar only predicts the end of one cycle and the beginning of another, not doomsday. It's about planetary and star alignments that come and go in cycles. This time happens to coincide with past cycles, a 6000 year cycle and an @ 26,000 year cycle. I like this; it really resonates with me for some reason.

Mrindigo wrote:
I don't know

I'd like to see an age arrive when we're not hurting each other and killing each other. Not like some transhuman hive mind of course. I'd like us to be balanced, and to be in harmony with nature as opposed to harming nature. We are nature, we're part of it.

I'd like to see humans one day exploring space, to explore strange new worlds, to seek out new life and new civilisations, to boldly go... you know what I mean

As we as a species grow and evolve, get "bigger" kind of thing, the world will shrink and get smaller, (it's already happening IMO) and so we'll further transcend our limitations and I think we'll have more of a hunger to get out there and open up and expand the possibilities. Am I wording this right? Feels like I'm talking a bit of shit I think this planet and what's possible is getting too small and limited for us. Above all, what I'd like to see is freedom.

I don't see transhumanism as being a 'bad' thing as such.
Its the driving agenda behind it thats the problem, the rest of it is just technology, just as a gun is merely technology.

The line in the sand for a lot of people with transhumanism is the augmentation of the brain. People can quite happily accept all sorts of prosthetic devices but nothing that touches the brain. I can understand too, because once we mess with that we do actually change ourselves, our 'soul' for want of a better word.

If you look at it dispassionately, purely from a logical standpoint then it is nothing more than inevtiable technological progression and our destiny. If you look at it from a viewpoint of knowing that psychos manipulate the way the world works and therefore technology...you know that it's not going to be a 'good' thing.

The worlds human system of society works via dissemination of information. If the exact same information was available to everyone then they would all be of the same belief of the same information, so any controlling agenda would be to control that information.
The mormons for example quite literally see it as a way of changing everyone to their religion because it is 'compatible' with transhumanism.

There is also an angle that I think a lot of peope have not considered. If everyone can instantly communicate their true thoughts and feelings with anyone else they choose then there could be a new awareness dawning with humanity and a refusal to co-operate anymore with 'the system' of law,economics, war etc.
Lies and secrets would be difficult to maintain under such a setup, such points are worth considering to get the whole picture so to speak, so I do not see this as all being 'bad'. It might backfire in a way that some psychos didn't expect it to.

downward

down the shitter

what i mean is its our destiny , more like in our nature to wipe , destroy everthing out but we have a tendency to blame other things for our wrongs, Religion, War, Greed, Ickes Mullet Reptilians Governments Power, etc and when it come down to it, its us

andyh wrote:
I think our brains have been augmented enough by cell phones, wi fi, television, electric wires that surround us..... it's done nothing good for us, or our environment. We haven't realized the full potential of what is arguably the greatest computing device on earth naturally yet, why would we want to augment that? We already share immediate thoughts with a worldwide audience through the internet....... this is far enough. There is no way there will be a positive outcome to adding things to our brain, or by getting RFID chips installed under our skin. How can there be? We exist on a planet that exists in a space that is connected to infinity -- our full potential is being stifled, not realized. Technology is not anything but a tool; we are already robots, albeit organic ones. We need to get away from that, not rush towards it.

I understand where you're coming from but I wholeheartedly disagree. We've gone far enough with technology. Any more invasive technology and we are driven further away from who we could be.

ronisron wrote:
I think you're slightly misunderstanding andy's viewpoint there ron.
It's an ethical minefield. Take the recent tech that is starting to restore sight to the blind and hearing to the deaf for example. This tech though not quite there, is leading toward direct brain interface. I for one have no ethical problem with that. Foetus cells are not being used, it's done with the recipients consent etc. My only ethical issue would be with the inevitable animal testing that goes alongside.
Then if we get in to things like the genetic manipulation that darpa are working on with soldiers, things go into a very different ballpark. One I have huge ethical issues with.
There is no black and white answer to transhuman questions. The applications need addressing on their individual merit/demerit.

dubmeup wrote:
"Brain augmentation". Through technology. I didn't misunderstand a thing.

Specific applications, like pacemakers, like inner ear devices, like replacement hips, all of these things are accepted by most people. They are effective. As for what they are doing to rstore "sight" to blind people..... that's a slippery slope as far as I go. Seems wonderful, but that does involve "brain augmentation". Sight is subjective. You may or may not see exactly what I do when looking at something. We may both agree it's "yellow" or "green" but we may both have a different version of what that is, of how we interepret it. It's all light refraction and optic nerve interaction. They can give you a version of sight.... Blindness is a great example of how a brain can compensate for deficiencies. Blind people become more acute in other areas. Touch, hearing, awareness of their surroundings, when someone else is nearby.

If someone wants to have an interface in their brain so they can have a "version" of hearing, or a "version" of seeing, that's their choice. I wonder how many blind or deaf people would go for it? I'd be surprised if it was a majority in favor. We're given a lot of interesting choices. I don't like the idea of interfacing or altering our brains with technology any more than we already have. I wouldn't go for it myself. It's my opinion, my choice on how I feel.

ronisron wrote: Thats damaged, not augmented.
Eg EMF could potentially be harming human bodies. Thats not augmenting them at all.
To do just what you said- get the full potential out of it. Most of the brain is dormant and unused, only technology either genetic manipulation or tech enhancement would change that short of random genetic mutation over millenia.
What if you could communicate with anyone in the world across all language barriers instantly and they could see what you see, feel what you feel at any moment anywhere in the world?
Think about it carefully before you use any emotional rapid response, consider all the variables.
What are both the positive and negative impacts of such a thing?
Imagine you are a journalist in a foreign country somewhere and you see the army gunning people down, unarmed citizens for no reason and everyone in the world could witness it?
What if you could gain new insight and understanding into other peoples cultures and beliefs without the language barrier present?
Where is the chance for bias or lies in such a setup?
I've not even gone into the economic outcomes actually, this thing is BIG make no mistake.
Thats completely different and again an example of the obviously BAD side of things, its tied in to money, the above mentioned stuff though need not necessarily be that way but it could be biased or restricted for the masses, therein lies its weakness.
I've ranted at length about how money can skew decent use of technology etc.
Stifled in what way?
What is our full potential?
Technology is simply a tool. It can burn you or it can cook your food, it can heal you or it can kill you.
To say otherwise is to suggest that technology has a completely different meaning.
It doesn't
The human mind is what makes teh choices about the application, technology does not have a mind of it's own Ron.

Like I said, its only the brain where people draw the line in the sand and for precisely the reasons I explained earlier.

ronisron wrote:
What difference does it make to the individual that chooses to have it if there is a majority in favour or not?

Fair shout