Android: Would you mind being one?

[Ultima22689]

So alot of scientist seem to be agreeing with Kurzweil and others like him about the future. So according to that whole prediction humans won't truly have a life expectancy anymore and we will all be able to get new bodies Ghost in the Shell style or something like that. If you had the choice to have a body that will most likely be superior in every way to your human body would you do it? The few theist I've asked this question say of course not, they think someone would only do this because they fear death, personally I just think it would be a waste to just die. I don't fear death but I do fear no longer existing. I don't want to cease to think. I'll be first in line the moment it's ideal to get a body designed to be superior to our standard biological ones. What about you guys? Would you be willing to make the switch? If not, then why?

[Big Mac]

So replace what is natural and good with what is tainted with too much tech? I hate sissies like this. Death is a part of life. Expect, plan, and accept it. Who wants to really live forever?!? Seriously!?

[Ultima22689]

So replace what is natural and good with what is tainted with too much tech? I hate sissies like this. Death is a part of life. Expect, plan, and accept it. Who wants to really live forever?!? Seriously!?

I do, I'm not satisfied with a century or so of life, I want to see the end of humanity if there will be one, that or I get bored with existing. What's so good about the human body anyway? If we can eventually build something superior why not? Sounds like a great thing to me anyway. Isn't that the typical answer? Why not?

[Big Mac]

So replace what is natural and good with what is tainted with too much tech? I hate sissies like this. Death is a part of life. Expect, plan, and accept it. Who wants to really live forever?!? Seriously!?

I do, I'm not satisfied with a century or so of life, I want to see the end of humanity if there will be one, that or I get bored with existing. What's so good about the human body anyway? If we can eventually build something superior why not? Sounds like a great thing to me anyway. Isn't that the typical answer? Why not?

Better to live a natural life that ends quickly than a protracted one empty of real humanity. I may hate my fellow humans but being alive is pretty amazing.

[Ultima22689]

So replace what is natural and good with what is tainted with too much tech? I hate sissies like this. Death is a part of life. Expect, plan, and accept it. Who wants to really live forever?!? Seriously!?

I do, I'm not satisfied with a century or so of life, I want to see the end of humanity if there will be one, that or I get bored with existing. What's so good about the human body anyway? If we can eventually build something superior why not? Sounds like a great thing to me anyway. Isn't that the typical answer? Why not?

Better to live a natural life that ends quickly than a protracted one empty of real humanity. I may hate my fellow humans but being alive is pretty amazing.

Being synthetically means I won't be human? How do you define alive? Just because a body is artificially created does that mean it can't be alive? (according to the theorists) I'll still be able to feel pain, feel pleasure, have all the emotions I had before, human is human in the head, no?

[Big Mac]

No, if you were not naturally made like the womb, you are not human. Robots don't have real feelings. I say we treat them like all other tech, to be their for our own beneift.

[Ultima22689]

No, if you were not naturally made like the womb, you are not human. Robots don't have real feelings. I say we treat them like all other tech, to be their for our own benefit.

I disagree, if a being is sentient and develops  emotions and independent thought  and what not right do we have to treat it like an appliance? Doing so would make us just as bad as the man in the sky. That's just cruel.

[Will]

Learning to live with death is a part of being mortal. If you're immortal, there's no need to learn to live with death.

I'd like to watch the macroevolution of various species, ourselves included, over millennia. I'd like to explore the whole world and when I'm done I'd like to explore the universe. Imagine spending hundreds of years in stasis between star-systems only to awaken at the same physical level you were when you started the journey. Imagine spending millions of years, being the first human (or artificial human) to visit Andromeda or Triangulum. Imagine seeing for yourself if the universe drifts apart or collapses in on itself again.

How is that not incredibly tempting?

[Ultima22689]

Learning to live with death is a part of being mortal. If you're immortal, there's no need to learn to live with death.

I'd like to watch the macroevolution of various species, ourselves included, over millennia. I'd like to explore the whole world and when I'm done I'd like to explore the universe. Imagine spending hundreds of years in stasis between star-systems only to awaken at the same physical level you were when you started the journey. Imagine spending millions of years, being the first human (or artificial human) to visit Andromeda or Triangulum. Imagine seeing for yourself if the universe drifts apart or collapses in on itself again.

How is that not incredibly tempting?

YES! How could anyone not be tempted by this? The very idea that this is possible in OUR lifetime is mind bending and tickles me crazy. I wonder why is being biological so amazing? I don't get it. Aside from the fact of being alive since that technology is very infantile right now when it finally does get here, if you're an atheist, aside from wanting to have offspring why would you want to remain biological?

[Ultima22689]

On another note, can you imagine how intelligent you would be after all of those years? Not to mention incredibly wise, we'd be like walking beacons of every accomplishment ever done by man to an exact detail. When you have a synthetic brain I'm sure it will be vastly more efficient than a organic one when it comes to retaining and accessing data .


Does no one else have an opinion? This stuff is being predicted by a lot of people (not just Kurzweil and the weilites but other people that happen to be many scientist) to be very real and available in the next 15-30 years and the technology that is supposed to do it is already around in infantile forms.

[Will]

Actually, I suspect when we start rebuilding ourselves we'll be doing it using organic technologies. The mechanical thing might be en vogue for a bit, but looking like a Borg really doesn't seem like the final incarnation of human self-improvement. If I had to guess, I'd say we're going to be similar to how we appear now, just with little tweaks here and there to make us better: eyes that can take in the entire spectrum of light and energy and can see anywhere from millions of miles away down to atoms, senses of taste, smell, hearing and feeling that incorporate a higher quality and efficiency, a brain that can work much faster, run trillions of computations, is incredibly intuitive, and can remember everything perfectly, maybe even senses that we're not even aware of yet.

And yeah, I'd be very happy to live for eternity, always improving myself, always learning... maybe even initiating abiogenesis elsewhere.

[Ultima22689]

Actually, I suspect when we start rebuilding ourselves we'll be doing it using organic technologies. The mechanical thing might be en vogue for a bit, but looking like a Borg really doesn't seem like the final incarnation of human self-improvement. If I had to guess, I'd say we're going to be similar to how we appear now, just with little tweaks here and there to make us better: eyes that can take in the entire spectrum of light and energy and can see anywhere from millions of miles away down to atoms, senses of taste, smell, hearing and feeling that incorporate a higher quality and efficiency, a brain that can work much faster, run trillions of computations, is incredibly intuitive, and can remember everything perfectly, maybe even senses that we're not even aware of yet.

And yeah, I'd be very happy to live for eternity, always improving myself, always learning... maybe even initiating abiogenesis elsewhere.

Ha ha! indeed, I don't think anyone wants to look like a borg. I always thought it would be something akin to ghost in the shell where they are still in many ways organic but just synthetic and not so much incredibly mechanical.

[Big Mac]

YES! How could anyone not be tempted by this? The very idea that this is possible in OUR lifetime is mind bending and tickles me crazy. I wonder why is being biological so amazing? I don't get it. Aside from the fact of being alive since that technology is very infantile right now when it finally does get here, if you're an atheist, aside from wanting to have offspring why would you want to remain biological?

Because it's natural and pure. This is disgusting and I hope any facility doing this research burns down. We already have a population problem as it is without increasing a life-span to the point of nigh infinite. If I met any android people I'd attack their artificial parts out for the greater good. Non-human freaks.

What if they decide you're obsolete and try to conquer you? No one person should be too powerful like that.

[Will]

Because it's natural and pure.

Like cancer, flesh-eating bacteria or hemlock?

This is disgusting and I hope any facility doing this research burns down. We already have a population problem as it is without increasing a life-span to the point of nigh infinite. If I met any android people I'd attack their artificial parts out for the greater good. Non-human freaks.

I'm already bionic. I was born with a coarctation of the aorta, so a very gifted surgeon put in a dacron tube. Watch out, I might just conqour you! Muhahahahaha!!!  

[Big Mac]

Because it's natural and pure.

Like cancer, flesh-eating bacteria or hemlock?

This is disgusting and I hope any facility doing this research burns down. We already have a population problem as it is without increasing a life-span to the point of nigh infinite. If I met any android people I'd attack their artificial parts out for the greater good. Non-human freaks.

I'm already bionic. I was born with a coarctation of the aorta, so a very gifted surgeon put in a dacron tube. Watch out, I might just conqour you! Muhahahahaha!!!  

I don't know what all that faggy science talk is but prepare to be assaulted, broseph!!! I watched the Terminator....Austrians are going to kill off humanity!!!