andyh wrote:
I should have put augmented in quotes, and/or italicized it. That would have indicated the sarcasm I intended.

andyh wrote:
What makes you say that? You've already concurred that EMF and things like that harm us, what if we do away with that technology? That interference? Would that help us to realize our potential, having no "limiters" like electric wires, and EMF surrounding us, bombarding us?
andyh wrote:
This sounds like a commercial for iPhone or iPad. The technology exists outside of our brains already. We don't need that much instantaneous transfer of info. We just don't. Oh, the iPhone has a built in translator, face time, 1080p camera.... all the things you described. Adding that to us makes us more robotic than we already are.

andyh wrote:
There is no separation between that kind of tech and "control". I'm not sure how you can't see that.
andyh wrote: Evidence exists that shows human beings used to live at a much higher level of consciousness and communication. Then we drastically declined into what we are now. Like I said, just dwell on the concept that you are a being of the universe. There is no doubt of this or argument against. Take it from there.....
andyh wrote:
We have been dumbed down through many different means. We already talked about EMF, electricity, television, technology.... lots of kids can't do long division by hand and they aren't encouraged to. Calculators.... Lots of kids can't tell time on a dial clock, because of digital clocks and watches.... Kids don't communicate with their peers outside of the group that has cell phones and text devices..... technology. It already makes us mentally and physically lazy, it already controls much of how we think, it has already made us reliant.... yet it's just a tool. Installing a device directly into the brain will not help anyone except those who run the program that controls it. It's too far gone at that point.

andyh wrote:
It's not just because of money. It's because it is invasive to the nth. It's because enough is enough. Get yourself an iPhone. It's outside of your brain and body. It will amaze you. You will depend on it. You'll find yourself absolutely terrified when it doesn't work. That's gone far enough, IMO.

dubmeup wrote:
Because the people who are developing or offering the technology probably aren't considering the majority, and probably aren't blind or deaf. Then again, they don't need to be. They only need a few test cases to seem legitimate.
dubmeup wrote:
Thank you.

Mrindigo wrote:
I'd disagree, I think you need to distinguish between civilization and our species, I don't think it would be possible, we are probably the most widely dispersed and adaptable species on the planet, humans have already survived very bad shit, however I'd agree with the idea there is less than 200years left for "Civilization" at least as we know it.

I would also say through civilization general culture of the human species has developed greatly, to a level whereby we have the real potential for international cooperation, we have demystified much of the world and developed very important frameworks for exploring the mysteries that still remain.

Also I have a quite optimistic perspective towards technology, commodity fetishism obvious reification etc, their mass availability and abundance gives rise to the awareness of the transience of everything, not to mention obvious class distinctions, and the inadequate spiritual content or even material sustainability of consumerism, eventually people are going to see the futility of upgrading their living room every year when people at the end of their road starve, that pattern on a wider scale is imo an inevitability, and the methods we have of creating abundance will be put to a worthwhile use, have you ever eaten so much of something that you're sick and never eat the thing again, I did with cherries one time now I can barely look at a cherry without feeling ill.

I get you ron and I'm no transhumanist advocate. I totally agree with a lot of what you've written in this thread. I do see that once you have pacemakers there's no ethical reason why you can't have sight restoring tech though. Personally I wouldn't have either, I'm prepared to take the cards I'm dealt and play my hand with them but it's an individual's choice (or bloody well should be).

I think sight tech for example is legitimate personally, though I can see that it's the thin end of a potentially very big bad wedge. One thing's for sure, this stuff is here and it's going to spread. How we as a race deal with it is the question.

ronisron wrote: Sure, if we could find ways of using technology that doesn't harm us I'm more for it than tech that does.

Bit of a pathetic answer to the question I put to you.
We don't need to communicate with people who speak a foreign language then?
Again, the question I aksed requires not just minutes but months of thought and research.
You can't give a decent answer without going through the full cognitive process.
Again a kneejerk emotional response without any kind of factual content.
Control is present via the economic model. Thats how it works.
It needn't necessarily be that way, my point was NOT meant to be about transhumanism within the current model but rather a viewpoint of humanitys future given choices which might or might not be made.
The overwhelming conclusion is that the current tech WILL be used in precisely the way you mention.
Bear in mind what I meant, that tech CAN be used for good purpose given the right intent. That right intent so to speak is definitely NOT present in todays paradigm.
What evidence?
Perhaps far too gone to make changes I woud agree as mentioned above.
However that does not mean the POSSIBILITY is not there, no matter how small, it IS there.
I have trained myself not to think that way, its the only way you can envision alternatives. Without applying the full spectrum thinking hat process you cannot see the same possibilities that Fresco can, instead you get a base emotional kneejerk response, call it communism and no longer give it any thought. This is all intended of course, children are not thought the full thinking process at school and the media also encourages emotional response and snap judgements, they are basically training the public to outsource their brainpower to someone else.



The iphone is already an example of something that is negative rather than positive imho.
It has some microwave radiation that can be quite harmful (just like all mobile phones) when used for more than a minute or two.
It is cheaper to produce such an item though than one that is less harmful, quick and dirty is profitable, ergo I am quite correct to state that everything boils down to money, again

If technology is not harmful then that is merely a sales bonus, its not the PRIMARY driver behind the technology is it?
Just calm yourself, detatch yourself from it, try to view it without any personal attachment to it, try to think about all possible angles and don't be afraid to spend a long time thinking about it. Spending time to reply is not a sign of weakness imho.

dubmeup wrote:
Yes indeed.
The issue I have with it all the most is that we will not really have a choice in the matter.
If we want to compete socio-economically then we will be forced to take it or emigrate to some remote region and try to stay away from the authorities and again thats going to be almost impossible as they hunt down more and more resources in their hunt for permanent profit.

im too poor to worry about people putting expensive computer shit in me. maybe i can just extract other people's and sell it as scrap and original human body parts.

batou wrote:
lol when the time comes, it'll be cheaper than you think.
Thats the way its always been. AN iphone was something like 500 or 600 quid when it first came out, mobile companies offered iphones for free on 18 and 24 month contract. Which kinda makes top up phones pointless (unless you want the privacy etc in which case top ups still have some merit)

im going to buy ex military arms from the ussr and maybe one of those bd big dog units for my lower half. i'll be a centaur.

andyh wrote: The current model is harmful. That's basically it. How would an inter-brain electronic device communicate with it's server? Would the server be built in? Etc...
andyh wrote:
What you asked in the post and eg's you gave can all be done on the iPhone. Voice recognition translation, instantly beaming a news story in 1080p.....all there. You are talking about having these capabilities "installed " in our brain. How do people communicate outside of technology now? By learning new languages. It's much better for you in the long run than a quick fix bit of software and device interaction. The question does not require full cognition and months of research to answer.... it requires an informed opinion.
andyh wrote:
We have no choice but to use today's tech and intent as the model. My idea is that in the future we will do away with technology and get back to a bit more of an esthetic where we are able to make the most and best of what we already have in the way of brain function and sensory awareness, and have them be able to achieve their full potential. Again.
andyh wrote:
The pyramids. Stonehenge. Ancient civilizations that had advanced technology at their disposal, and apparently advanced awareness and understanding of our place in the universe. We can't build the pyramids now, we don't have the technology
andyh wrote:
Did you just say "outsource their brain power to someone else"? I would say you do understand what I'm getting at, though you may be in such a haste to explain your side that you are missing my point. andy, I have a very open mind. i am used to thinking outside the box. I will admit I am very dismissive about transhumanism, both current models of, and potential future ideas as well. But it's not a kneejerk, uninformed opinion or stance. I have thought about it. I may have even agreed 20 years ago. I just don't agree anymore.


andyh wrote:
Money is only a part of the reason for cellular phones. The iPhone has what is considered by many to be convenient, yet somewhat invasive applications. Facebook makes money, but it just so happens to be a great database of personal info, and is a great way to update your every movement. It also gets people fired, because workplaces screen it. The control I was referring to goes beyond money. It's about knowing your every movement. We're already there.

No need to be so smug, you're not as right as you're giving yourself credit for being.

Guevarista wrote:
I'm not sure how you got me being unable to distinguish the difference between species and civilizations out of the short/vague sentence I posted. I know the difference, and I still stand behind my initial thoughts. Civilization pertains to both cultural and technological advances utilized within a given geographical demography. I was writing about Homosapien, modern man. It is very possible that we could be wiped out in an instant, as we're still at the whim of natural disasters, both terrestrial and celestial. We're also still very susceptible to disease and pandemics like any other creature. Modern humans have been around for less than a blink of an eye. 90% of the creatures on this planet have become extinct, many of them more adaptable and successful than we are. Dinosaurs are a good example that Feather and WUB were going over.

I wasn't talking about civilization ending, I was talking about Homosapien. As Feather has mentioned, we've been delving into some wickedly powerful and destructive technology, of which there is no responsible use or containment. The nuclear armament and power industries are significant dangers not just to our species, but to others as well. We're not consciously developed enough to utilize the atom with wisdom. If these facilities lose total power, we'll have more Fukushima incidences. I'm not sure what they would in the event of a global EMP distributed via a large Solar CME. If they all lost electronic capability, even the back up diesel engines, it's game over. There's also the various biochemistry labs synthesizing microbes which serve no other purpose than that of death. All it takes is a single instance of infection. Nature can't be caged for long, eventually they'll mutate beyond controllable levels. There doesn't appear to be very much concern in forming some sort of preventative counter or contingency plan for any of these. Couple that with various forms of fanaticism and extremism, and we have several thousand powder kegs dotted across the globe.

I think our species had great potential, but I think that window of importunity has closed. I also think the opportunity for global co-operation has come and gone personally. The nations of the world are run by unreasonable nationalistic egocentric fools who wouldn't know greater purpose if it bit them on the ass. They're more concerned over pointless trivialities like consumer economics, utterly insane monetary systems that create immense living condition divides and large unsustainable populations. We allow large scale deforestation, pollution, and large scale obliteration of terrestrial biodiversity not seen since the end of the Jurassic epoch. What's it all for? So we can wipe our ass with flower scented loo paper and iPads. Yeah... makes perfect sense. There have been many viable alternatives to the utter ludicrousness that we utilize today in the name economics and the continuity of conglomerates hiding behind the mask of a country title. Potentially one of the greatest technological contributors to our species ended his days in a hotel, broke, his work stolen, and his academic career and good name besmirched. That was all to preserve dated and primitive technology we still to this day utilize, because some fatcats have large shares in the copper wire industry. As long as there are people like that, our species will never see it's true potential. That's not a cultural thing either, it's global. It works by them essentially dropping a few scraps the rest of us scoop up, and others still getting the crumbs from those scraps. It effects our entire species. I've read articles and blogs claiming that these types are being targeted for mass arrests. If that does happen, I'll gladly retract everything I've said here and issue an apology. I don't see that happening anytime soon, if ever. The masses look up to them, many of them aspiring to be like them. A few people protesting drone production in Florida won't make start wearing rose tinted glasses either. Everything I've seen thus far points to our species meeting it's inevitable demise at it's own hand.

Mrindigo wrote: It's not hard to reach that conclusion i guess, I don't think mass arrests would change anything myself, i'm sure the next man would be equally as profit motivated as the current financial operators.

I wasn;t implying you don't know the difference I was just saying I think you're being needlessly pessimistic at the prospect of change, you can tell the material conditions for change are as good as they've ever been, but the proliferation of doom(tm) and it's increase in the last decade seems to give pessimism/nihilism eminence in the development of your perspective as to what shape the imminent changes will take, i'd just say I have been there too, but at the end of the day anything like that is entirely hypothetical so why let the worst case scenario obfuscate from the very real positive developments taking place, i don;t think it's much of a change required either, in terms of the species and our natural proclivity toward cooperation, the bigger the task we face the more likely we are to cooperate to achieve change, this is not mere platitudes, the governments of the world already are doing this, afterall they have children and a vested interest in the future too, it's just the ideological and material motivations that govern that process don't really serve the interests of the majority of people (you or I at least not completely, but more in a compromising sort of way, like the compromise between people and profit or capitalism with a human face), the framework though is there, and people do have different ideological and material motivations, none of the political or societal framework is fixed in stone imo so I'm not saying you're wrong, i'm just saying that is a fairly unlikely outcome based on fairly unlikely events occuring and thus should remain merely a highly unlikely possibility, or become a hollywood moneymaker that exploits our deep instinctive fears

ronisron wrote: The universe is a wonderful thing, we've probably only scratched the surface of whats actually possible...with research thats geared towards a profit motive.

Ever tried communicating effectively using text alone?
Translations are always an approximation, communicating direct thought would be a whole new ballgame.


Sure you have a choice to think about different models than merely todays paradigm.
I just did

Or perhaps simply not the right thought process?
Its perfectly possible to build the pyramids given enough human labour, the time and no worry about monetary issues.
A scientist recently showed how it was possible to make bricks for the pyramids from the local regolith in-situ.
Us being the stupid humans we are made 'assumptions' like they were all blocks cut by hand from a quarry.
Assume makes an ass out of u and me

Also the pyramids have nothing to do with this 'high level of consciousness' that you mention, so the answer is again irrelevant.

Yes, people do literally outsource their thinking. They don't want to think, let alone do physical labour for example.
There's a lot of things people outsource now. You can see it everywhere you look, there's literally millions of people in management who literally do nothing but get others to do the thinking for them so that they can take the credit for it.
The thinking outside the box I mention is to look at transhumanism as a pure concept alone, without any of the present paradigm.
You can then see other possibilities that might arise from it (albeit ridiculously remote possibilities) given a different scenario.
You can then make not only better decisions but also better questions on the topic to do further research to make better decisions about it down the line.
I get paid for my analytical skills at work for example, a lot of IT is about solving business problems by applying tech to it but sometimes the problems can be solved without spending a penny or even bothering with tech in the 1st place...its also up to me to spot that and make the solutions known when I'm asked to help out with certain business processes.

I like the joke (real or not it doesn't matter) that the Americans developed a million dollar biro that would work in space, the Russians took a pencil.
Sometimes the obvious isn't that obvious because your mind is entrained to think in a certain pattern due to repetition of that pattern.


All the above have been done for profit by private business. Nothing you mention above has been done for free.
Indeed there are for example 'free' open source 'apps' that never get used as much as ones for profit quite simply because they don't get advertised. Again that harps back to what I said about the brain thinking in a set pattern because its used to it.
The profit motive is at the top of the tree sat on everything. I'm not smug about it at all, its just fact is all.

Mrindigo wrote:

I think it depends on whether or not we get ourselves together. Maybe we did have much potential in our ancient past. Perhaps we still do today. I think as a young species, we just may have arrived at the fork in the road. We are learning the dangers of tinkering with nuclear energy and possibly with the many breakthroughs we are having, we can finally put those dangerous toys away for good and make wiser choices.

Yes, as someone stated already, it may be true we aren't using our brain's full capacity, but we still use enough to learn and we are intelligent so we start thinking for ourselves.

For starters, we have to stop letting outside influences sway us away with their material goodies, we have to stop depending on systems that aren't in our best interests and we have to begin making more effort helping one another in more ways than one. Then, I think it is possible we can really blossom.

Transumanism has the potential to be an amazing leap forward. As Andy says, we could potentially have a Star Trek universal translator jobbie, be able to connect with our friends and family online, but in an almost psychic capacity. We could even have our brains augmented so that we can do most of our boring work, while we concentrate on fun stuff. Of course, anyone who watched Tomorrow's World (old UK TV show) knows full well that nothing as exciting as this will happen. It's like when they told us that by the year 2000 we would all be working a 3 day week while robots did everything for us.

Besides, the rich elite will get all the cool transumanist tech and end up like some sort of master race.

I've changed my mind about the whole carbon debate. Anything that gets people to lessen their drain on the Earth's resources is a good thing. Hopefully we'll see more and more recycling of goods, renewable energy and ethical consumption. Things are definitely moving in that direction and people are increasingly thinking about what they buy and who or what it effects in the global economic scheme of things. Will it be too little too late though?

Guevarista wrote:
Ahh okay. You're right, I can be pessimistic. I won't make the cop-out statement of being a realist either. I'm not trying to sell doom and gloom. It's just difficult to put emphasis on positive endeavors with so much mind-numbing stupidity and self-serving initiatives. I'm certainly no shining example of intelligence by any means, but a lot of what goes on is as appalling as it is awe-inspiring. I've heard it all, and yet very little of what's said ever comes to fruition. There's always some excuse. I guess I'm just tired of being sold snake oil.

I'm not spinning some Michael Bay script here, the threat to our species is already under way. Having a care-free mindset about it, I think is a large part of the problem. The rate at which we take from nature can't be sustained for much longer. I won't bother outlining what could, in my opinion, and likely will happen. Yes there are some people who are starting to see the proverbial light, but I think it's too little too late. Unless something on a massive scale takes place to immediately change common conscious perception, I see no reason to adopt an optimistic stance on this topic. You're of-course entitled to your opinion. I'll also add that I appreciate you sharing your thoughts on the subject.

Mrindigo wrote:
Some people are going in the right direction, and some are going in the wrong directions.

Im sure they said we would all be extinct 200 years ago, but life goes on.

RealAmerican wrote:
They also didn't have the ability to weaponize the atom.

Mrindigo wrote:
Who would use those types of weapons?