3 ms·

What does a non-libertarian transhumanist future look like?

13 points by ivankirigin 17y ago

ivankirigin 17y ago
Note that non-libertarian != Leninism, but that aside, it's an interesting question. Or perhaps the nature of human enhancement itself will cause those that partake to become extreme individualists.
- patio11 17y ago
  The flipside of human enhancement is human dehancement, right? What is to stop your favorite totalitarian dictator from taking cheap and durable genetic modification and using it to cow the populace? I don't mean "cow" like "make them quake in terror", I mean "cow" like "make them herd animals who cannot even conceive of threatening him or forming bases for wanting to do so in the first place". Think of a technical caste populated by people with a 100% genetic disposition to high-functioning autism: they're perfect for using for the Great Leader's projects. They're smart enough to do the work, totally dedicated to the task at hand, don't ask for pay or object to abuse, and if you work one until he dies well, hey, human life is cheap. For a moderately less dystopian future, imagine a future where genetic modification is hella-expensive (lets say $1 million to play design-your-baby) but fairly effective (a designer baby is guaranteed to look as good as the prettiest girl in your high school class and be about as smart as your valedictorian). Economically rational parents unconstrained by moral qualms would fall over themselves to buy this procedure: after all, it is just a pre-emptive and expensive version of college. Why is this future dystopian? Because access to the $1 million design-your-baby technology is highly differentiated across class lines, and the designer babies are essentially designed to roflstomp over any sort of meritocratic competition. It would be a virtually permanent caste system -- 25 years after introduction a natural-born human (and there will be a word for them, mark my words) would be at Harvard as either a curious fluke or, more likely, an affirmative action sop to the little people.
100k 17y ago
Read Ken MacLeod. In particular, The Sky Road. (Though I guess the transhumanists are kind of libertarians in that one.)
- zzkt 17y ago
  Except for the anarcho-syndicalist transhumanists. ..
deleted 17y ago
[deleted]
rms 17y ago
Something like Doctorow's Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom? It's a transhumanist future with no scarcity and a reputational economy. I am certainly afraid that the corporations will run the world enough that even after (practical scarcity of energy for the average person) that consumer goods and necessities will still be kept artificially scarce.

13 points by ivankirigin 17y ago

Note that non-libertarian != Leninism, but that aside, it's an interesting question. Or perhaps the nature of human enhancement itself will cause those that partake to become extreme individualists.

patio11 17y ago
The flipside of human enhancement is human dehancement, right? What is to stop your favorite totalitarian dictator from taking cheap and durable genetic modification and using it to cow the populace? I don't mean "cow" like "make them quake in terror", I mean "cow" like "make them herd animals who cannot even conceive of threatening him or forming bases for wanting to do so in the first place". Think of a technical caste populated by people with a 100% genetic disposition to high-functioning autism: they're perfect for using for the Great Leader's projects. They're smart enough to do the work, totally dedicated to the task at hand, don't ask for pay or object to abuse, and if you work one until he dies well, hey, human life is cheap. For a moderately less dystopian future, imagine a future where genetic modification is hella-expensive (lets say $1 million to play design-your-baby) but fairly effective (a designer baby is guaranteed to look as good as the prettiest girl in your high school class and be about as smart as your valedictorian). Economically rational parents unconstrained by moral qualms would fall over themselves to buy this procedure: after all, it is just a pre-emptive and expensive version of college. Why is this future dystopian? Because access to the $1 million design-your-baby technology is highly differentiated across class lines, and the designer babies are essentially designed to roflstomp over any sort of meritocratic competition. It would be a virtually permanent caste system -- 25 years after introduction a natural-born human (and there will be a word for them, mark my words) would be at Harvard as either a curious fluke or, more likely, an affirmative action sop to the little people.

100k 17y ago

Read Ken MacLeod. In particular, The Sky Road. (Though I guess the transhumanists are kind of libertarians in that one.)

zzkt 17y ago
Except for the anarcho-syndicalist transhumanists. ..

deleted 17y ago

[deleted]

rms 17y ago

Something like Doctorow's Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom? It's a transhumanist future with no scarcity and a reputational economy. I am certainly afraid that the corporations will run the world enough that even after (practical scarcity of energy for the average person) that consumer goods and necessities will still be kept artificially scarce.