What? Your Humanity is Evolving?!

[Skylar1]

Chairman and CEO of Biotechonomy (http://www.biotechonomy.com/), Enriquez says that humanity is on the verge of becoming a new and utterly unique species, which he dubs Homo Evolutis. What makes this species so unique is that it "takes direct and deliberate control over the evolution of the species." Calling it the "ultimate reboot," he points to the conflux of DNA manipulation and therapy, tissue generation, and robotics as making this great leap possible.
We are already in the midst of minor improvements to the human body and mind; Enriquez gave examples of growing new tissues (http://arstechnica.com/science/news/2009/01/programming-cancer-vaccines-in-your-body.ars) for successful transplant, programmable cells (http://arstechnica.com/science/news/2007/12/stem-cell-breakthrough-put-to-use-against-sickle-cell-anemia.ars), and augmenting our abilities through robotics (http://arstechnica.com/old/content/2006/07/7262.ars). As this trend accelerates, more and more aspects of the human experience, of the human life, will be capable of scientific manipulation. While some improvement may come post-birth, our understanding of DNA and biology may lead to something much bigger.
The day may come when we are able to take the best biology of the known animal kingdom and make it part of our own. This isn't just about being a bit stronger, or having perfect eyesight our whole lives. All of our organs and limbs have weaknesses that can be addressed, and there are also opportunities to go beyond basic fixes and perform more elaborate enhancements. At a private lunch on Thursday, Enriquez spoke of a young girl who, after suffering a knee injury, received tendon replacement therapy centered around tendons grown in a lab. It not only fixed her knee, but made it stronger than normal. Later in life as she pursued life as a professional skier, the coach actually asked that she have the same surgery on her other knee to increase her abilities.

[.........]

http://arstechnica.com/science/news/2009/02/we-are-becoming-a-new-species-we-are-becoming-homo-evolutis.ars


Yeah~! Go Science!

[alexshim]

yep you got it exactly my point
quiet awesome sense of humor *salutes*

[Aku no Hikari]

Press B to stop evolution!!

Sorry, couldn't help it...

Anyway, this is just awesome.

[Eris]

Transhumanism (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transhumanism) for great success.

[alexshim]

it's goes beyond concept's morality of science and imagination and it will happen in future as the way humanity is going it will for sure.

[Skylar1]

Transhumanism (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transhumanism) for great success.

This excites me very much. Some of the key points I found in there I would like to show for example. Just a few of the things I found to be most interesting.



Postgenderism (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Postgenderism), a social philosophy which seeks the voluntary elimination of gender (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gender) in the human species through the application of advanced biotechnology and assisted reproductive technologies (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reproductive_technology).[48] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transhumanism#cite_note-Dvorsky_2008-47)

While some transhumanists take an abstract and theoretical approach to the perceived benefits of emerging technologies, others have offered specific proposals for modifications to the human body, including heritable ones. Transhumanists are often concerned with methods of enhancing the human nervous system (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nervous_system). Though some propose modification of the peripheral nervous system (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peripheral_nervous_system), the brain (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_brain) is considered the common denominator of personhood and is thus a primary focus of transhumanist ambitions.[63] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transhumanism#cite_note-Walker_2002-62)

Transhumanists support the emergence (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emerging_technologies) and convergence (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Converging_technologies) of technologies such as nanotechnology (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nanotechnology), biotechnology (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biotechnology), information technology (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Information_technology) and cognitive science (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognitive_science) (NBIC (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NBIC)), and hypothetical future technologies such as simulated reality (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simulated_reality), artificial intelligence (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Artificial_intelligence), superintelligence (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Superintelligence), mind uploading (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mind_uploading), and cryonics (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cryonics). They believe that humans can and should use these technologies to become more than human (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Superhuman).[66] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transhumanism#cite_note-Naam_2005-65) They therefore support the recognition and/or protection of cognitive liberty (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognitive_liberty), morphological freedom (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Morphological_freedom), and procreative liberty (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Procreative_liberty) as civil liberties (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_liberties), so as to guarantee individuals the choice of using human enhancement technologies (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_enhancement_technologies) on themselves and their children.[67] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transhumanism#cite_note-Sandberg_2001-66) Some speculate that human enhancement techniques and other emerging technologies may facilitate more radical human enhancement by the midpoint of the 21st century.[40] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transhumanism#cite_note-Kurzweil_2005-39)

Now, I truely find this stuff to be absolutely amazing really. The very fact that a person, 1. not only has to almost never worry again about things like age, death, and deisese; but also becuase we'll be able to actually customize our own bodies to be fit as we want them in ways we never before could even thought possible.

I'm also curious to see where this will all go with human/computer realations. If people become more and more technologically intergrated, while computers become more human like, perhaps one day we will see something like a uniform hybrid of both brought together. To where we will be both human and computer perfectly combined into one single entity.

[alexshim]

But as the simulation of this lamination is done by scientist there will be no nature 0%
not a single flower
well it still is a simulation anything can happen

[Eris]

Yeah. I find the ideals of trans-humanism to be appealing as well. Some people have ethical qualms about it, but I feel it's the people of the future who should deal with them, and it would be terribly unjust of us to avoid this kind of research because it -might- cause problems down the line.

[Aizen-sama]

hahaha!!!!!!

humans no matter how much you modd yourselves..hahaha!!! you will neevr achieve anything...*sighs*...to think humans feel science is the way to become stronger, better,more intellegent...does that measn you want to prolong your lives as well HA!..i will make sure you humans never advance throught these ridiculous things like science...*snickers*..hahahaha!!

[Forgotten Show]

Humans as a whole will voluntarily "give up" their sex right about when they voluntarily give up sex. Not gonna happen.


Bad Memory

[Skylar1]

Yeah. I find the ideals of trans-humanism to be appealing as well. Some people have ethical qualms about it, but I feel it's the people of the future who should deal with them, and it would be terribly unjust of us to avoid this kind of research because it -might- cause problems down the line.
Not that far into the future though. According to Ray Kurzwiel's The Singularity is Near (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Singularity_is_Near) he explains that the rate at which technology advances is a muliplive effect, and not an additional one.

Basically, the faster technology advances, the faster technology advances. This is just according to his data findings, but he has charted and observed that this "singularity", in which technology progresses faster than the pariadigm it it's self created. [Edit:Whoops, messed up on dating there. my bad, it's been a few years since I read the book]

I made an earily thread on this, I'm suprised no one responded to that one actually.

[Eris]

Singularity may or may not happen, though. It relies on the assumption that new technological advancements are continuously available in from a limitless pool of undiscovered technology, and the returns are proportional to the investment. If this is true, singularity is near. If, on the other hand, we will start seeing diminishing returns (from e.g. the computational brick wall we are very close to hitting with silicon technology), it will probably not.

The fact is that our technological prowess has stemmed from our continued ability to make things smaller. But unfortunately, there is a limit to how small you can make something before the laws of physics change so radically, and previously negligible phenomena like quantum tunneling become so dominant that the technology no longer works.

[Skylar1]

The fact is that our technological prowess has stemmed from our continued ability to make things smaller. But unfortunately, there is a limit to how small you can make something before the laws of physics change so radically, and previously negligible phenomena like quantum tunneling become so dominant that the technology no longer works.
Which is why I was thinking that you would need something that could actually compress space-time enough to compensate for the restriction. But I have no clue as to how far off something like that would be, or even how one would go about doing such a task.

[Zedekiah]

Transhumanism (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transhumanism) for great success.

Beat meh to it : <

[-Batman-]

http://presstheactionbutton.files.wordpress.com/2008/08/magneto.jpg

It seems the Homo Sapien menace has finally accepted their genetic destiny.