"Is there not a blurry line between these two - what is it to be human beyond our behaviour?"

Human behavior is anything we do...thus, if we are imbedded with machines (as opposed to our current state of being surrounded by machines) we will not be less human...we will simply be humans adapting to a different environment, providing that the base decision-making/emotional-response portion of our brains is intact.

Once we start artificially modifying our response mechanisms...then I question...then you have, by definition, a brain-damaged human.

"your unique consciousness will be extinguished, just like every other human who ever lived." - but uniqueness will be undermined the closer we get to perfect copying.

Still i think it will be closer immoratlity through having a child, than uploading just before dying and living on...

Still the current trend of stem cell technology and neuroplasticity for helping repair degenerating brains could already see slow replacement of parts of a 'unique' consciousness and brain, with relearning after a stroke and rebuilding lost personality - in some sense this could result in the creation of jew people with some continuity from the original, no clear cut off of death, but stroke damage or massive head trauma leaving so little of the 'original' left that it is very hard to tell the difference...

"but uniqueness will be undermined the closer we get to perfect copying."

Perfect...as faulty a word in any discussion as "exact"

You will never *perfectly* copy a human. Period. For one, if you are going to flesh to machine...it ain't a perfect copy. At best it's a reallllly good model.

"Human behavior is anything we do...thus, if we are imbedded with machines we will not be less human..."

But different - if the brain of a human has developed to survive thus can't understand how to operate outside of a machine it will he a different human - because it will behave differently when you pull it out and leave it lying on the street.

But we're likely to actually see smaller changes and adaptions covering a huge mess of grey areas...

'You will never *perfectly* copy a human. Period.' - but we will, undobtedly get closer... Which is what i suggested. How close, i don't know, will it signifigantly undermine uniqueness of an individual in our life time, i don't know, but in the extremely advanced future most probably.

Still that is why i suggest cures for stroke and personality changes being more interesting to comprehend, i expect they will have a big impact on our own lives.

MY mother had a titanium piece in her arm. Before the titanium repair, she needed to behave in a certain way. After the titanium piece...her golf slice disapeared....

She's also about to get new titanium knees, which will change the way she lives her life.

These are not direct brain interface devices....but the loss of pain (a signal to the brain) will change the way she thinks and acts...her brain chemistry will be different...thus, she is different.

By the way, perfect ro iperfect, I'm *all* for the eternal web-krellin....heh heh...

Upload me now, baby! And do it every time the technology improves!

"'Because school isn't just about learning to memorise facts - or it certainly shouldn't be. School is about learning how to interpret and use information, not just about memorising data. School is also about learning to be part of society. Google can't provide everything, nor should it.'

"Our thoughts, though, are just chemical reactions in our brain."

Although Invictus is right that it would change a ton of things, jamiet is totally right that education is more than just facts, and just having access to Google would not obviate education, although it might make it impossible unfortunately. Just because you have access to a whole lot of facts does not mean you reason well at all. Exhibit A: webdip.

And I'm not really sure what the relevancy is of our thoughts being physical things in our brains, Invictus. That's not what gives them their legitimacy. It's their immaterial, rational aspect that gives them that, and that must be learned.

"Just because you have access to a whole lot of facts does not mean you reason well at all. Exhibit A: webdip."

Hey now, I heard that.

I just mean it would be way more revolutionary in every aspect of human life than these people seem to acknowledge, semck83.

"And I'm not really sure what the relevancy is of our thoughts being physical things in our brains, Invictus."

Our thoughts being physical is what makes their integration with technology possible. Already we've seen paraplegics move mouse cursors with their brain after sensors were installed through surgery. There's further potential here. How far? I don't know, but it's only possible at all because consciousness has a physical aspect.

@invictus - i think internet acces in school, with peer-to-peer learning and a teacher leading activities will be a big change, but not revolutionary.

People will still be people, will still socialise, accept/make arguements, fight over leadership... And children in education will still develop ideas, from peers, parents and the public.

What is this, 1998? Schools already have that. I'm talking about people integrating their very thoughts with the internet. That's an unprecedented kind of change, should it happen.

http://www.reddit.com/r/Futurology/comments/144ksw/if_you_put_a_tiny_chip_in_your_brain_which_is/c79tv4a

This is worth a read. Honestly, if this would become possible, we would still be human, but we would be expanding and redefining what it means to be human.

And honestly, I'd rather be an incurable optimist about the future than a complete pessimist. Gunfighter might be happy hiding out in rural Wyoming at his fortified compound, but I wouldn't mind finding out exactly what "transcending" would entail.

"I'm talking about people integrating their very thoughts with the internet."

How? We don't know how to integeate thoughts apart from using language, we currently use words and there has been no great breakthrough in undwrstanding brain activity.

Any technology even suggested above is reading/hearing things at (perhaps) a faster rate; and would likel have the same connection isses that your average wi-fi connection has today.

The only thing that comes close to a new level of understanding is the algorithm google uses to associate search terms with results, and if this association of knowledge is a new level of integrated understanding we can't access it as humans without the mundane text/sound input currently use to access google.

@ All

You guys need to think about the practical implications of transhumanism. Who gets to manufacture this technology? Where will they get the resources to manufacture it? What is preventing the manufacturer from sabotaging their own product? Who is responsible for implanting it? Will there be some sort of control on the amount of information available? If so, who/what gets to control that information? What is preventing that entity from abusing their power?

I'd rather die quiet and happy in the mountains (or go out guns blazing fighting against the jack-booted cyborgs in black helicopters) than slave my brain/body to a computer chip, especially without knowing the implications of such a change.

It's amazing how you can just ignore everything I've said, orathiac. Reread and what I'm saying will be clear.

Have any of you read the work of Pierre Teilhard de Chardin? It seems relevant at this point.

It says something about your own mindset that you start out assuming that technology is to be used for malevolent purposes. Certainly its possible, but to default to that position?

That says a great deal about how you interact with the world.

@invictus you said: 'I really think you're all underestimating the changes that would happen to society and our individual psychologies if people's thoughts were integrated with the internet. '

Yes, a hive-mind would be very different. But we have no way to come close to that at tue moment, it is beyond our current understanding (as far as i understand) so yeah, huge but not how our brains work...

Of course not at the moment. No one's saying at the moment. We're talking about future implication of potential technological advances. Get it together, dude.

@ 'You guys need to think about the practical implications of transhumanism.'

This will be seen as a service not a right, people without access to this service will be considered 'poor', companies offering this service will be bound by laws similar to current ones on information and privacy.

We are unlikely to have human-to-human connections forming a new private internet (with individuals being nodes in a network and each one freely accessing anything their neighbours have kept public) but this level of individual empowerment could be cool - especially once 3 printers can make electronic ciruits and micro-processors... An open source community of designs without central corporate regulation, public domain information design by non-profit actors and shared with the world, would function very nicely but is not what i imagine the future to be.

@'Of course not at the moment. No one's saying at the moment. We're talking about future implication of potential technological advances. '

And i don't think our future tech has the potential to advance in this way, as i outlined above.

Human minds with massive interconnectivity could develop on their own to become different, but not as chips added to modern adult humans. You could take 1 million embryos and link all their cortexes with two-way fibre optics (and we can make neurons sensitive to light, though they sometimes suffer from bleaching - at least in rats) but it wouldn't be people.

We could evolve a learning AI to run everything, build a system which can write itself to all microprocessors (or add an input which it can use to overdie instructions) but it wouldn't be trans-human.

I can't see a new brain-machine interface which doesn't rely on words, or images. Those 'move a mouse cursor with you mind' is literally mind-reading, but the input is visual (seeing the cursor move) and at best replicating things we already have. It replaces on little bit or output, choosing signals to mean up/down and left/right, but it doesn't 'integrate thoughts' - we think in language, and even getting this mind reading to directly read off our thoughts (which might be nice as my thumbs are getting tired typing this) that does nothing to integrate my words into your mind.

"Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom" by Cory Doctorow -- immortality by uploaded brains.

@ Jack_Klein

When is the last time that technology *hasn't* been used for malevolent purposes, even if the malevolence is unintentional?

@ orathaic

"This will be seen as a service not a right, people without access to this service will be considered 'poor', companies offering this service will be bound by laws similar to current ones on information and privacy."

What's to stop those companies from ignoring, repealing, or otherwise circumventing those laws. What if Company X gets a DoD contract to implant microchips into every soldier to enhance mental performance? What's to stop Company X from taking over the world?

Also, if poor people have limited/no access to this proposed/hypothetical technology, wouldn't that give the wealthy a tremendous advantage over the poor? If you think we have a plutocracy now, imagine how much worse it will get when the rich people have microchips and the poor people don't. Then we'll *really* have plutocracy. Furthermore, what if this turns into a nationalistic mess? For example, if the red Chinese develop this technology first, what's to stop red China from creating a generation of superhumans and kicking the shit out of everyone else?

'What's to stop those companies from ignoring, repealing, or otherwise circumventing those laws.' - What stopped the East India company from exploiting the sub-continent of India (with a private army and effective trade monopoly) ? What was to stop the East India company from taking over the world?

'Also, if poor people have limited/no access to this proposed/hypothetical technology, wouldn't that give the wealthy a tremendous advantage over the poor?' - well I was saying that by definition, those without access to this tech will be poor.

But yes, it will increase the advantage of rich over poor. (and China, of any colour, will continue to do what it always has, try to win) - most 'best case' scenarios involve a collective of minds 'winning', which means the more minds you include that better, also limiting things based on national lines is crazy and stupid - free trade of ideas will be the fastest route to super-humanity/post-human thinking

Huh....I must have Jack Klein silenced....how delightful...

I'm even saying nice things about you for a change.