34 replies to this topic

[SG-1]

Even though this post is old, I think its interesting and I've never read it before.

Yeah they would have rights. Can you even imagine all the rage from everyone if they found out that people were being deleted or denied rights as humans? A video posted here showed an artificial life after death and depending on your money you would have to suffer through loosing copyrighted memories, or advertisements in the sky.

If that ever happened, it would be worse than slavery and I don't think it would last. At all.

[Italian Ufo]

transfering your mind while keeping your body alive while without conciousness..
however any physical body will be regarded as temporary in the culture of the future.
Pepole will have more than one body. What is consider to be static, it is just our mind.
As long as your mind is alive no one will comitt suicede.

[zen_mutiny]

But will it really be YOU, or just a copy of you?

[SG-1]

That was the whole conversation that was being talked about.
I can't think of a better way to become a machine than to replace neurons one by one. The "progressive transformation" is what I'll call it from now on haha.

Cells die, so consciousness is a pattern of information. Which means you could create a clone, or you could convert the original progressively.

[zen_mutiny]

Of course, if cell repair and genetic (purely biological) augmentation are successful and sustainable, why bother with mind uploading or mechanical replacement at all? Sure, machine parts may be more durable and more efficient than biological parts, but depending on how the disciplines of computer technology and genetic modification progress, the inverse could also be true. I would be ok with replacing just about any part of my body with synthetic parts other than my brain, and only then, provided that the synthetic parts offer an equal, or better, experience than my original biological parts. I think that myself, and many others who originated in this pre-transhumanist age would probably have a great deal of difficulty in parting completely from their original bodies, much less their original brains. At the very least, mechanical brain cells would have to impress me GREATLY in order for me to replace all of my biological grey matter with them. And even then, there is still the question; once you have replaced every last one of your original brain cells, will the you that is you right now continue to live and experience life, or would you essentially be dead, replaced by a synthetic copy of you? Even if you gradually have your brain cells replaced with synthetic cells, who's to say that you won't experience death upon the removal of the last cell?

[Alric]

I do believe there is some real dangers to this, which is why I think it is extremely important to preserve continuity of mind. I believe you can do almost anything as long as you do it in gradual steps. The real question is how gradual do you have to go? Obviously replace your brain one atom a time isn't going to effect you, but replacing half your brain at once does.

[SG-1]

I agree. I would do it when I was older. I think all of us will find it hard to resist when are fragile lives are staring us in the face

[themethod]

For me the case is simple; we are our conscience, independent of substrate; transferring conscience through substrates would not be, according to me, considered suicide. Philosophical questions regarding soul (and lack thereof) will always linger, independent of how astute we become.

I thrust digitalized consciences will be awarded the same rights as biological humans; otherwise we will start seeing people transferring their minds to different substrates to avoid paying taxes and child support .

[Raklian]

There will be a trillion-dollar industry for mind prisons, I suppose.

I would be extremely careful not to be charged with something serious and be sentenced to 10,000 years in a mind prison. Simply shutting down your mind for the duration won't be enough to subdue the victims of your crime, so they'll want you to be painfully aware of the passage of time.

Am I opening a can of worms?

[SG-1]

I never thought of that before. I would bet that is cruel and unusual punishment. Serious crimes would be more like 100 years than 10,000. Even in jails today solitary confinement is only given as a punishment when they screw up in prison, and its no more than a few days or weeks.

The worst thing that could happen is either you are floating blackness for 100s of years or living in a simulated hell with fire and all that. I wonder how much the public would know about it if it happened, and no one can see what is going on in their heads.

Maybe I am giving people to much credit to be human, but I hope we don't use cruelty as punishment - death penalty could actually be needed if people have an eternity to commit crimes. Its really hard to judge.

[Alric]

I think in the future we will just change peoples mind. For example if one part of your mind has an imbalance, we go in and correct that. If one part of your mind is overactive and it is causing you be aggressive, we go in and fix that. By going in an altering your brain you can fix a great number of issues that eventually result in crime and stuff.

[zen_mutiny]

I think in the future we will just change peoples mind. For example if one part of your mind has an imbalance, we go in and correct that. If one part of your mind is overactive and it is causing you be aggressive, we go in and fix that. By going in an altering your brain you can fix a great number of issues that eventually result in crime and stuff.

This. Rehabilitation is preferable to punishment. Granted, I don't think the punishment aspect would be entirely eliminated, some degree of punishment would probably be mandatory, but I could see far more advanced forms of rehabilitation than are available today being offered to criminals as a voluntary alternative to at least a portion of their punishment. I couldn't see operations on one's brain being involuntary, and I couldn't see punishments going away when they're needed as a deterrent to prevent people from comitting crimes in the first place. After all, if someone knows that they won't be punished, only rehabilitated, what would motivate them to not commit crimes in the first place?

Conversely, there could be motivations for those who feel they may commit crimes to seek out treatment before they act. Generally, I feel that the advances that would facilitate actually operating on one's brain in order to rehabilitate them would only come about as a result of the same advances that would grant better overall mental health to the populace, which would, in my opinion, most likely severely reduce crime rates as it is. Also, with many of humanity's problems solved at that point, I imagine that a greater focus could be put on crime prevention and rehabilitation in ways other than medical intervention.

Edited by zen_mutiny, 19 May 2012 - 08:19 PM.

[themethod]

I never thought of that before. I would bet that is cruel and unusual punishment. Serious crimes would be more like 100 years than 10,000. Even in jails today solitary confinement is only given as a punishment when they screw up in prison, and its no more than a few days or weeks.

The worst thing that could happen is either you are floating blackness for 100s of years or living in a simulated hell with fire and all that. I wonder how much the public would know about it if it happened, and no one can see what is going on in their heads.

Maybe I am giving people to much credit to be human, but I hope we don't use cruelty as punishment - death penalty could actually be needed if people have an eternity to commit crimes. Its really hard to judge.

Actually, as we reach a platform of age conquering, death sentences and life sentences will be abolished.

This. Rehabilitation is preferable to punishment. Granted, I don't think the punishment aspect would be entirely eliminated, some degree of punishment would probably be mandatory, but I could see far more advanced forms of rehabilitation than are available today being offered to criminals as a voluntary alternative to at least a portion of their punishment. I couldn't see operations on one's brain being involuntary, and I couldn't see punishments going away when they're needed as a deterrent to prevent people from comitting crimes in the first place. After all, if someone knows that they won't be punished, only rehabilitated, what would motivate them to not commit crimes in the first place?

Conversely, there could be motivations for those who feel they may commit crimes to seek out treatment before they act. Generally, I feel that the advances that would facilitate actually operating on one's brain in order to rehabilitate them would only come about as a result of the same advances that would grant better overall mental health to the populace, which would, in my opinion, most likely severely reduce crime rates as it is. Also, with many of humanity's problems solved at that point, I imagine that a greater focus could be put on crime prevention and rehabilitation in ways other than medical intervention.

I also see these methods taking place, bu I must say I have no idea how a neurologist would be able to identify someones violent tendencies and "fix" it through surgery.

[Alric]

I don't think you need punishment at all if you remove the reasons for crime. Punishment came from a point if history when we didn't know much about humans, but now we know a lot, and every day we are learning more. If you think about it, everyone has a reason for committing crimes. If you can solve those reasons, punishment is totally irrelevant.

If someone commits a crime and you rehabilitate them so they never do it again, then why do they need punishment? Punishment doesn't solve anything. When we resort to punishment it is a failure on our part to recognize the reasons for why a person did something.

A lot of the issues can probably be solved as we learn more about the human brain. Some of the issues we can even solve today with medication and stuff. A lot of the problems we could probably also solve if there was like a free counseling service that anyone could use.

To sum up, if a person is a healthy, well adjusted individual, and all their needs are being met, they would never commit a crime. If they commit a crime, it is because they are suffering from some issue, if we correct that issue we solve the problem.

[Kombaticus]

This is all just speculation, but I'll take a crack at it.

I believe that we are all talking about consciousness when we should really be referring to ego. Consciousness is not something that is owned by any entity...there are not different consciousnesses floating around in reality. It is a phenomenon that is produced by the brain. It is what the brain (or some other device) does, a verb, not a noun.

Ego, on the other hand, is somewhat different. Ego, to me, is consciousness plus biography. I think what everyone hopes to preserve is the ego, the biographical self.

We feel that we are seperate consciousnesses walking around simply because I can't experience your mind and you can't experience mine. But at the same time, I currently can't experience my past selves or future selves...so does that essentially make them different selves? I believe that we only have a sense of continuity based off of our memories.