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"If hooking some monkey's testicles up to a car battery can save a kid from dying of cancer in ten years, I've got two things to say: the red is the positive, a

"If hooking some monkey's testicles up to a car battery can save a kid from dying of cancer in ten years, I've got two things to say: the red is the positive, and the black is the negative." - David Spade, paraphrased badly

lm28469 4y ago
What if you replaced "save a kid from dying of cancer in ten years" by "having an implant that lets you buy toilet paper on amazon if you blink twice", because we all know that's where we're going to end up
- traverseda 4y ago
  Listen, no one is going to defend these excesses of capitalism, the tracking the increasingly user hostile designs, the anti-competitive consolidation and rent seeking behavior. But seriously, you're going to take research into actual human-machine interfaces and boil them down to "implant that lets you buy toilet paper by blinking"? I mean maybe the entire field of computing goes ethically bankrupt, even if the walled gardens and coercive algorithms win forever, the concept of a computer as a "bicycle for the mind" falling to the wayside as computers become only used as a tool for control. Assuming that you have no faith that anyone will ever use it to build a "bicycle for the mind". Even if you assume that it will mostly be used for Evil commercially it can still be used for dumb prosthetics and increase the quality of life for a lot of people.
  - lm28469 4y ago
    > it can still be used for dumb prosthetics and increase the quality of life for a lot of people. Who and how ? Virtually every megacorp is busy showing you ads or taking your money when you buy the shit you saw in their ads. Everything has been corrupted, no one can assume good faith anymore
    - traverseda 4y ago
      By that logic is there any point in doing any sort of research on anything?
    - CactusOnFire 4y ago
      You lost me here. My gut feeling from reading the article and this thread has been that the monkeys should have been better taken care of. But the idea that every human advancement will only result in a win for the capitalist hellscape is some blackpill bullshit. There are people who are trapped inside their own bodies due to neurological disabilities. Even if neuro-interfacing technology is used to huck consumer convenience devices, there are likely positive impacts on devices used to help these people. I don't really care about the 90% of people who are lining up to buy the neurolink equivalent of an iphone. I care about what those implications have for a disabled minority, as do many other people here who are commenting. You don't have to feel like the trade-off is worth it, but if you aren't going to acknowledge that maybe technological process presents opportunities to help people, than you are being willfully ignorant.

lm28469 4y ago

What if you replaced "save a kid from dying of cancer in ten years" by "having an implant that lets you buy toilet paper on amazon if you blink twice", because we all know that's where we're going to end up

traverseda 4y ago
Listen, no one is going to defend these excesses of capitalism, the tracking the increasingly user hostile designs, the anti-competitive consolidation and rent seeking behavior. But seriously, you're going to take research into actual human-machine interfaces and boil them down to "implant that lets you buy toilet paper by blinking"? I mean maybe the entire field of computing goes ethically bankrupt, even if the walled gardens and coercive algorithms win forever, the concept of a computer as a "bicycle for the mind" falling to the wayside as computers become only used as a tool for control. Assuming that you have no faith that anyone will ever use it to build a "bicycle for the mind". Even if you assume that it will mostly be used for Evil commercially it can still be used for dumb prosthetics and increase the quality of life for a lot of people.
- lm28469 4y ago
  > it can still be used for dumb prosthetics and increase the quality of life for a lot of people. Who and how ? Virtually every megacorp is busy showing you ads or taking your money when you buy the shit you saw in their ads. Everything has been corrupted, no one can assume good faith anymore
  - traverseda 4y ago
    By that logic is there any point in doing any sort of research on anything?
  - CactusOnFire 4y ago
    You lost me here. My gut feeling from reading the article and this thread has been that the monkeys should have been better taken care of. But the idea that every human advancement will only result in a win for the capitalist hellscape is some blackpill bullshit. There are people who are trapped inside their own bodies due to neurological disabilities. Even if neuro-interfacing technology is used to huck consumer convenience devices, there are likely positive impacts on devices used to help these people. I don't really care about the 90% of people who are lining up to buy the neurolink equivalent of an iphone. I care about what those implications have for a disabled minority, as do many other people here who are commenting. You don't have to feel like the trade-off is worth it, but if you aren't going to acknowledge that maybe technological process presents opportunities to help people, than you are being willfully ignorant.