Science and Inquiry discussion
Issues in Science
>
Will technology replace evolution?
PS: the phrase "proper go" was meant to be facetious, not a comment on "natural is better than synthetic." Thank you :)
Mod
Humans have been evolving themselves for centuries (millennia?) through the use of cultural memes. We pass down information from generation to generation, giving our descendants greater chance of survival.
But if you mean using technology to literally change our genes, we don't understand genetics well enough, yet. But I'm sure that will be coming someday, when the science of genetics has advanced. My guess is that someday, humans will "engineer" their genes to minimize birth defects and diseases, and maximize intelligence, appearance, athleticism, and so on.
Adding to David's comment, I see the evolution of humanity as occurring at three rates. Core changes to DNA and hence, transition to a new species is slow, so much so that we are the same as our Stone Age ancestors. Cultural evolution is very fast, particularly now we have subcontracted computers to do some of our brains work. The middle ground, enabling quick (generational) change whilst still fraught with complexity, is held by epigenetics. So my question is how much change is epigenetics capable of, and how much of this 'potential' will be available for synthetic modification with net positive outcomes. The Kim Stanley Robinson book '2312' is a fun take on gender and longevity augmentation, but an optimistic one I suspect.
Assuming we don't kill ourselves off, I believe we will become our machines. A short blog post here from about a year ago: http://kennyachaffin.blogspot.com/201...
Oh and there was a recent paper on creation of a synthetic chromosome: http://www.bbc.com/news/science-envir...
IMHO the real question is the evolution of humans after they have left the confines of gravity. A lot of SF writers have speculated on this theme, and the more we learn, the more this kind of evolution seems likely.
David: Yes, I meant technology to change our genes, and other things (think Ghost in the Shell, cyborgs, etc) Any changes that basically 'hijack,' if you will, the evolutionary process as we know it. Although we will no doubt 'know it' differently by the time we get to such things. Hopefully we will also 'know' capitalism differently as well, although I don't see such a strong animal instinct as greed disappearing any time soon. I am sure you are right about the future of genetic engineering. Again, hopefully our economic concepts have also radically changed by then, as well as (actual) racial equality.
Angus: Have WE subcontracted the computers? Or only those with the means to do so? I know that was not your point--the fact is computers HAVE been tasked with thinking for us, since they are patterned after the human mind. They have also been tasked, especially with the Internet's arrival--with meme-ing us up REAL good....in the direction of the profit of others. Obviously this has gone on forever, as one of the most basic animal instincts is to Territorially Take Over The Other. So why would technology do anything besides hasten that process, since that process itself is what is driving the development and advancement of said technology. Hence, the reins are tightened and the bit is pulled on our very minds. Kenny: I agree that becoming our machines is a likely scenario. Interesting to see if we ever get to the point of uploading a person's consciousness as data--couple of sci fi stories I love suggested copying said data over and over--will "you" be everywhere at once then?
I am interested in the longevity factor as well, since that will ultimately require the abandonment of reproduction. The same....people.....living......together.....for......Aeons.
How LOVELY!!!! :P
Kenny wrote: "Oh and there was a recent paper on creation of a synthetic chromosome: http://www.bbc.com/news/science-envir..."
Sweet. I am totally checking that out. Thanks :) Spooky!!!!
Stan wrote: "IMHO the real question is the evolution of humans after they have left the confines of gravity. A lot of SF writers have speculated on this theme, and the more we learn, the more this kind of evol..."Definitely a thought. Our characteristics were built around the gravity of our home, after all......
I don't think we can hijack evolution per se because evolution isn't about changing genetics; that's just a side-effect of life forms trying to pass their genes along. It doesn't mean we won't modify ourselves in the future, but if we choose poorly, evolution will be there to point it out. :)
Kevin wrote: "I don't think we can hijack evolution per se because evolution isn't about changing genetics; that's just a side-effect of life forms trying to pass their genes along. It doesn't mean we won't modi..."Ha! So true.
Kevin wrote: "I don't think we can hijack evolution per se because evolution isn't about changing genetics; that's just a side-effect of life forms trying to pass their genes along. It doesn't mean we won't modi..."Arguably, the evolution itself driving the entire process, which means the logical conclusion is we will get much meaner before we get nicer.......'hijack' just meant a synthetic process sidelining.....even though the synthetic process arguably can only be a REALIZATION of the natural one.
(Sorry, apologies up front, this post got out of hand and is too long!)Mel wrote: "Angus: Have WE subcontracted the computers? Or only those with the means to do so?"
Depends what you mean. Clearly, the 99.99% do not have access to computers doing e.g. high-speed trading. On the other hand, I don't think that is what people mean when they talk about computers augmenting intelligence; they mean access Wikipedia or having your phone able to remember your grocery list for you, etc. And while those with means have access to all this much more so, that number is approaching 85% (taking internet penetration as a proxy) for the US, as good an example as any for simultaneous 'high-tech' plus 'income inequality.'
"...the fact is computers HAVE been tasked with thinking for us, since they are patterned after the human mind."
Perhaps you are being a little facetious here, but computers most definitely don't do our thinking for us. And they most *definitely* are not patterned after the human mind.
At least as things currently stand you could argue that computers do an amount of filtering and selective promotion for us. This in turn very probably affects the views, tastes, and so on that you form. This is the 'filter bubble' of popular discussion. But thinking? Or not thinking, as the case may be? That is still squarely on the shoulders of us humans, as much as it was 10, 20, 100, or 500 years ago. For good and bad.
A slight aside, but this makes me think of the 'filter bubble'. It can be viewed as less of a new, technological issue than a return to a norm: for a long time, people existed in a bubble of friends, family, perhaps a few long-distance contacts. Granted, this was due to a lack of access to information, but it was nonetheless a 'filter bubble.' This was the norm for almost all of human existence. Then over the last, say, 100 years from 1900 to 2000, this changed. When massive quantities of cheap periodicals, newspapers, and books were available and you, the reader, had to the 'do the hard work' of reading your way though them (presumably with your ample free time.) Hence, you were (supposedly) exposed to lots of alternative ideas. If this was ever true, it is clearly an historical aberration.
Anyway, this has wandered a bit off topic, but for the purpose of calling into question the idea that technology fundamentally changes things nearly as much as people think.
You touched on this a bit with your comment about territoriality: human drives and desires don't change. I've heard of this as the 'caveman principle,' basically that with all the high-technology in the world piled on top of us, at core we are the exact same people we were 50,000 years ago: we don't like strangers or the dark, and we want lots of sex and cake.
When we get to the point of having really detailed level control over genomes, or computers that rival the complexity of the human brain (and hence have even the possibly of containing a human consciousness or something of comparable complexity) this could all change. Maybe we decided that we want people to all love each other. Or maybe we sell hyper-intelligence and longevity to the highest bidders. Though I bet the most popular (and bargain priced) change will be orgasms on-demand. Which no-one will admit to having had 'installed,' because some things never change.
Or maybe e.g. a newly-risen successor theocracy to some Middle Eastern state figures out how to make a virus that kills (presumably only Ashkenazi or some other genetically identifiable subset) of Jews, or a rouge Chinese biological weapons scientist releases a virus that only kills Japanese people. Maybe we make docile sex-slaves. In other words, why does this wonderful technology only lead to either (a) paradise or (b) a particular kind of economic dystopia? It seems just as likely that it would enable some good ol' ethnic cleansing, or some disappointingly banal ending like easy-orgasms-on-demand.
Don't be sorry, I'm sure I've written longer AND way less coherent posts in my time. Specially if I was high :D You're just fine! Depends what you mean. Clearly, the 99.99% do not have access to computers doing e.g. high-speed trading. On the other hand, I don't think that is what people mean when they talk about computers augmenting intelligence; they mean access Wikipedia or having your phone able to remember your grocery list for you, etc. And while those with means have access to all this much more so, that number is approaching 85% (taking internet penetration as a proxy) for the US, as good an example as any for simultaneous 'high-tech' plus 'income inequality.'
"depends on what you mean"--I am referring to ad campaigns and corporate media, for one. As well as search prompts. I would say that it is becoming a world of Prompts from Other People, but it already is. However, before the Internet, it was not as subliminally sophisticated. Example: said filter bubble :) It behooves the classes to keep the masses as divided as possible. Hence, I suggest you keep a running count of how many images, articles, "prompts" and headlines you see that encourage division and paranoia among the people. Is the 1% more likely to encourage or discourage things like fallacious "either-or" memes? ;) That is what I mean by thinking for us. While it is still up to us to reject things like that (we are not THAT brainwashed), it is still disturbing that prompting and suggestions become more trigger happy AS division is encouraged AND people become more reliant on computers. Couple that with the fact that the 1% benefits from such a thing AND has the means to increase/tweak it based on gathered statistics of said masses. Doomsday, no. Disturbing, yes. and YES people have chosen to "bubble" themselves, one way or another, since forever.....it's also called a comfort zone. However, I think technology, while not a bad thing, makes it easier than it ever was for others to create and decide your bubble for you in the name of power. but I agree that as of right now it's still up to us, and we still do think for ourselves. Somewhat!!!!
And they most *definitely* are not patterned after the human mind.
How are they not, dear? Mind you, they are not a clone. But how are they not patterned after it? Think about what they do. What we WANT them to do for us. Yes, even the mechanics. How are they not a toy brain? Yes, I said it. Toy brain. Your brain cannot do what the computer does, but that was the idea. You cannot outrun a car either, but is it NOT a toy pair of legs? Is a car NOT based on where we want to walk and what our legs can and can't do? Just as the chariot was? Ever since beasts of burden, we want something that does our bidding better than we can do it ourselves, and a computer is no different. It remembers and finds things for us, like a dear little genius PA with no free will ;P How ideal. I was not joking :)
You touched on this a bit with your comment about territoriality: human drives and desires don't change. I've heard of this as the 'caveman principle,' basically that with all the high-technology in the world piled on top of us, at core we are the exact same people we were 50,000 years ago: we don't like strangers or the dark, and we want lots of sex and cake.
Yup! We are--look no further than the fact that any modern conveniences you can think of would appeal greatly to an ancient person, once shown what they do and how to use them. As I usually put it, we still want the bath to be hotter and the meat to taste better. We want the same damn things, and Royalty is no different. What does that mean for us, hmmm?
or some disappointingly banal ending like easy-orgasms-on-demand.
Is it bad this made me picture the society from Wall-E??? Even tho orgasms, of course, weren't mentioned????? haha
Hopefully this doesn't double post--I'm having computer problems. Mouthy little b**** computer needs to get on it and THEN MAKE ME SOME COFFEE WHILE I GRAB ITS SKIRT.
Come on, tell me I'm wrong :)
hahahahaha I screwed up the "dividing fonts" again. Oh well!There, all better.
Kevin wrote: "I don't think we can hijack evolution per se because evolution isn't about changing genetics; that's just a side-effect of life forms trying to pass their genes along. It doesn't mean we won't modi..."I think we already HAVE hijacked evolution, when we selectively breed cows, dogs, apples, corn ... all kinds of domesticated plants and animals. We can certainly do the same with our own species. Natural selection (survival of the fittest) might not coincide with societal pressures and government policies.
Mel wrote: "Self explanatory. Will we be modifying ourselves to the 'next levels' before evolution has a proper go? Seems the most inevitable scenario to me. Wouldn't necessarily be a bad thing EXCEPT the mod..."The rich people get all the new stuff first. Then the price goes down and things generally become available to the rest of us.
Nancy wrote: "Mel wrote: "Self explanatory. Will we be modifying ourselves to the 'next levels' before evolution has a proper go? Seems the most inevitable scenario to me. Wouldn't necessarily be a bad thing EX..."True that! Makeup! Clothing dye! To name a few. Compared to the past, the poor now are richer than the rich back then. There IS, though, the added dynamic of technology phasing out the working class...........it is a very slow process, but definitely there.
Seriously, I'm not half as pessimistic about all this as I sound. Really!!!
PS: About selective breeding--exactly! Our attempts to hijack/control evolution are definitely already here, so it's only a matter of time before we DO. However, if it is our own already-there animal instincts that are driving those attempts, isn't a hijacking/revision just an evolutionary stage itself? At any rate, societal pressures and government policies do fall into both communal and domination categories, as far as survival instinct, no?
"The rich people get all the new stuff first. Then the price goes down and things generally become available to the rest of us."Seems like that is true for everything but the medical industry and insurance, perhaps genetic engineering might make a break from this pattern if it is run by engineers and not by doctors and accountants? Until we do get off of this planet people will probably just be getting traits that others already have, not new "features" never seen before.
Robert wrote: ""The rich people get all the new stuff first. Then the price goes down and things generally become available to the rest of us."Seems like that is true for everything but the medical industry and..."
Engineers are just as capable of greed, unfortunately....the catch-22 is the control will be had by the ones who want it the most. Because we do still want the same things as our ancestors, and even the modern world is the realization of THEIR ambitions as well as ours.
Case in point--Tell an ostentatious ancient king/queen "this magic sorcery bathtub will get really awesome and bubbly when you push this button," they will respond "F***in' A, I want like 100. Do they come with slaves to clean them?" Change is lack of change at the same time. Or perhaps it just hasn't been long enough. Thousands of years are relatively short in the eyes of space.
But there is progress. The medical industry may still suck, but we are moving TOWARD, rather than away from Health Care For Everyone. Not there yet, but I understand France is. Scandinavian lands too, if I'm not mistaken. Canada is as well, but it takes too long if you have a sudden injury, vs just needing ongoing treatment for something. But it is certainly better than before. I don't know if the processing of immediate injury has similar problems in those countries, but even if so, the mere fact that you go to the doctor for free is a major step in the right direction. As are welfare programs--tell a poor person from back then how a welfare program works, and they will innocently say "Wow, your king is nice!" I know all too well that public aid is not without its problems, but it is a move in a direction that suggests hope. Very slow moving, though, especially when you include situations outside of the First World :( But a lot of processes will be slow to mayflies like us.
Oh and, depends on what you mean by "traits that others already have." Sometimes I cringingly think that as we figure out how to harness natural laws more and more (cause that's what we wanna do is HARNESS things)--we'll try to pimp ourselves out like Superman, and he who has the gold shall......be faster than a speeding bullet. :( Hope not!
Mel wrote: "Robert wrote: ""The rich people get all the new stuff first. Then the price goes down and things generally become available to the rest of us."Seems like that is true for everything but the medic..."
Mel also wrote: "... Sometimes I cringingly think that as we figure out how to harness natural laws more and more (cause that's what we wanna do is HARNESS things)--we'll try to pimp ourselves out like Superman, and he who has the gold shall......be faster than a speeding bullet. :( Hope not! "
I share some of Mel's concerns about the new technology allowing us to modify our DNA, but I also think this poses a very real danger that a new eugenics movement may develop. The American eugenics movement of the early 20th century inspired the Nazi genocide. The new technological promise doesn't *have* to go in that direction, but it almost certainly will happen that way unless we develop the wisdom and ethical maturity to deal with it responsibly *before* we get carried away with what technology makes possible. Just because scientific developments say we *can* do something doesn't mean we *should* do it. Unfortunately, as some already have pointed out, those with money and power often don't see it that way.
Mod
Witness the debate on cochlear implants. They seem to be a marvelous technological solution, but many in the deaf community resent being treated as a "problem" that needs a solution.
Kenny wrote: "Assuming we don't kill ourselves off, I believe we will become our machines. A short blog post here from about a year ago: http://kennyachaffin.blogspot.com/201..."Already, according to Thoreau, "men have become tools of their tools!"
Betsy wrote: "Laura wrote: "Just because scientific developments say we *can* do something doesn't mean we *should* do it."Witness the debate on cochlear implants. They seem to be a marvelous technological so..."
This brings up the question of personal freedom and what we mean by "we." Just because others don't feel that cochlear implants are necessary should not mean that I cannot have them if I feel I need them. (Or any kind of implants, for that matter :-)
Robert wrote: ""The rich people get all the new stuff first. Then the price goes down and things generally become available to the rest of us."Seems like that is true for everything but the medical industry and..."
Any particular features you have in mind?
Photographic memory or total recall would be helpful for everyone.
Mel wrote: "PS: About selective breeding--exactly! Our attempts to hijack/control evolution are definitely already here, so it's only a matter of time before we DO. However, if it is our own already-there anim..."I not sure. It seems to me that the US government's agenda is to "breed" a dependent class of people, through its economic policies and social programs. The extinction of the American working class is (hopefully) not the conscious goal of our esteemed elected officials, but it certainly seems to be accomplishing this. Wealthy folks, of course, may do as they like, and those defined by the system as "poor" or labeled as having something "wrong" with them may avail to numerous safety nets (various types of welfare, SSI, etc.) many of which expand along with one's family. The working and middle classes--those who traditionally keep the machine running and have over the centuries accomplished most of the production, and many of whom retain the traditional values of self-reliance and responsibility--are being squeezed out. Of course, we are talking meme-wise, for the present, but over the centuries the phenotype may change also. In nature this occurs very slowly, but in cases where, say, farmers or dog-breeders selectively breed for or against certain traits, I understand that significant changes may occur surprisingly fast. Remember that Russian scientist who specifically bred the tamest and friendliest foxes ? If memory serves me correctly, within 13 generations he had a pack of spotted, friendly, doglike critters. (The spots were a side effect.)
Laura wrote: "Mel wrote: "Robert wrote: ""The rich people get all the new stuff first. Then the price goes down and things generally become available to the rest of us."Seems like that is true for everything b..."
YES!!!! thank you. I believe this as well--especially when the majority of wealth and power is held by the same skin color, and can easily be witnessed. I would like to believe this will have changed by the time we get to this technological level. BUT since "unofficial" racism remains rampant right now (racial discrimination is illegal, but very hard to prove, etc) it only stand to reason sophisticated genetic engineering WILL be eugenics by a different name. They will cite other reasons for ACCIDENTALLY having certain genes "just so happen" to be preferable, the same way BS reasons are currently cited for passing a black person over for a promotion. Despite, of course, that each rung on the corporate ladder is whiter than the one below it. Ohhhhhh, there MUST be OTHER reasons they are more accomplished. I am referring to a real company by the way ;)
Example 2: My friend's son, who is black, did some vandalism, and it was called a felony. Before the SAME JUDGE there was a white man who had PUNCHED A CAB DRIVER THROUGH HIS WINDOW, and it was a MISDEMEANOR. The judge is not the one who brings the charges, but he/she can call BS on them, and that racist did not even bat an eye at what the other racists had decided. Yet every day people naively take a higher felony rate among blacks at face value. The name of the charge makes all the difference.
If we continue like this, with anti-discrimination laws functioning more as a way for white people to say "It's ok, guys, there's no problem anymore, so shut up," what WOULD genetic engineering bring about? I can't see how there would not be a eugenics project that would never be CALLED eugenics, because "other reasons" are being cited to the very end.
A current state of unofficial racism, plus current attempts at genetic engineering, will inevitably lead to unofficial eugenics projects. Unless there is a seriously large change, I don't see it happening any other way :(
I mean, it's already commonplace to officially justify racial profiling! It is also quite trendy and hip to "unofficially" hate Mexicans because "they took our jobs, and it's such a bad economy." Germany used to blame Jews for the same thing, because they banked in a bad economy. Never mind that was the only thing they were allowed to do at the time :(
Blah! I talk too much. Sorry!
PS: However, since things, again, have improved since the past in many way, I have to hold out hope the necessary changes will have happened by then :)
Not all discrimination is racial. If you run with the trailer park crowd, you will see your friends and neighbors dealt with much more harshly for the same offenses than "respectable" members of society whose Dads play golf with the judge and hobnob with the D.A. I have a good friend who is now a convicted felon because the skank fell off the back of his motorcycle and he left her is a bar with friends while he went home to get the car. (Not to say he wasn't drinking, but they had no evidence of it.) The skank even testified on his behalf. I had a harmless but semi-literate friend who got 6 months for growing 2 pot plants on her porch. (Different trailer park, different state.) If these folks had had fancier addresses they probably wouldn't have even had their wrists slapped. Finally -- O.J. Simpson.And I can't see any eugenics project happening on human beings in the US in the near future. China, maybe. But here, although cops seem to enjoy beating up on minorities and the underclasses, politicians are too busy being politically correct and pandering to "minorities" to risk anything resembling eugenics. Just my assessement, for what it's worth.
Robert wrote: "Photographic memory or total recall would be helpful for everyone."Yes! Although I think that could be accomplished using small computer chips implanted in or around the brain, controlled or accessed using the same technology used by paralyzed people who are able to use brain impulses to control the curser on the computer.
I was thinking about achieving a symbiotic relationship with algae or some chloroform-endowed life form, in the way that flatworm (or is it a planaria) do. That way one could directly turn sunlight into energy and wouldn't have to eat. Or at least, eat as much. I am told that this is not feasible because chloroform is toxic to humans, but I kind of like the idea anyway.
Nancy wrote: "Not all discrimination is racial. If you run with the trailer park crowd, you will see your friends and neighbors dealt with much more harshly for the same offenses than "respectable" members of so..."True--I know plenty of "trailer park crowd" myself--and the legal system revolves around one's economic status. Racial demographics in the states will make such an economic system racist by default.
Sorry, I missed your last post completely before--and the breeding of a dependent class is exactly what is happening. People who are not Old Money are deliberately set up to fail. Education being insanely expensive, yet a prerequisite to make money above the poverty level, is nothing more than a system to unofficially keep an Old Money system in place. Keep wealth where it "belongs," and those not born into wealth in their place.
As to the extinction of the working class, I think that will happen at the same rate as, well, robotics. "Do engines get rewarded for their steam?" ;) Combine that with the overpopulation rhetoric that is used to justify greed by perpetuating the idea that There Isn't Enough, and you get......genocide of the lower class once they are no longer needed because we have robots. Only one possibility, of course, and I admit that one was influenced by the movie Hardware ;)
Good point about the dogs. Even the "ooh I love you" loyalty that we all know was bred into them. The aim was for adult dogs to retain a puppy mentality.
Nancy wrote: "Robert wrote: "Photographic memory or total recall would be helpful for everyone."Yes! Although I think that could be accomplished using small computer chips implanted in or around the brain, con..."
Remote control working class? ;)
If you could boost peoples ability to "think" naturally, then I think the purpose of the internal chips would be used to transmit and receive the information. People at the top would issue orders, people at the bottom would receive orders. Discrimination is perpetuated by giving people a shoddy education. It keeps people arguing about pointless points so they do not unite. The same goal was accomplished by drawing country borders that included groups that historically disliked each other.
The top 1 percent group is composed of people of all colors, creeds, beliefs, etc. This is because each country has it's own group of elite people pulling the strings and all these people are partners in the same 1 percent. The only way these people stay in power is by not investing in education for everyone but instead letting a shoddy education keeping the other 99 percent torn apart by petty feuds based on color, creed, beliefs, etc.
Was away for a couple of days and I see this thread has blown up!Mel wrote: "People who are not Old Money are deliberately set up to fail. Education being insanely expensive, yet a prerequisite to make money above the poverty level, is nothing more than a system to unofficially keep an Old Money system in place. Keep wealth where it "belongs," and those not born into wealth in their place."
I tend to disagree with this characterization. A lot of threads are leading to rising education costs that have next to nothing to do with Old Money, the 1%, New Money, etc.
1.) "Education the key," as has been the mantra for many decades. Certainly some kinds of education, or some amount... but, from an economic standpoint, do we need to graduate more e.g. communications majors? Not to pick on the humanities, since there is a lot of clamoring that we need more STEM majors, but I've seen arguments made that much of this education is wasted as the STEM jobs don't actually exist. (Full disclosure, I left a software/tech career and am back in school studying physics... so this didn't stop me.)
2.) Since "everyone knows" that you must get an education, the cost keeps going up to match demand, while the value returned on a degree has declined or stagnated. E.g. You will still earn more with a bachelors, but would you earn 90% as much of that "education bump" with 25% of the cost if we had a better system of e.g technical training and retraining?
3.) As far as "Old Money": Education has created a massive amount of "New Money." The "Internet revolution" is decades old now, and the "silicon revolution" predates that. Some of the most hard core e.g. libertarian politics you hear in California comes from this new (and in same cases, very, very new) money.
4.) The developing "biotech revolution" (did they not announce this a decade ago... it has been a slow build) seems to be mimicking the silicon and Internet revolutions. It will quite possibly be the e.g. "heros" who develop the first really workable biofuel process or life-extension treatment or whatever who will next take on the mantel of hard libertarianism.
Mel also wrote: "Combine that with the overpopulation rhetoric that is used to justify greed by perpetuating the idea that There Isn't Enough...
Hmm... rhetoric? The Earth is a finite system. Technology will advance, no doubt, but the planet has a carrying capacity.
If you don't consider humans polluting our own water and arable land, then you must still consider that our farming/food production still relies on the ecosystem as a whole functioning. If you also want to approximate past that, you still have to look at the material (phosphate and nitrogen fertilizers, etc.) and energy (oil, oil, oil.) that sustains modern agriculture.
If you want to solve that by just waving your hands and saying, "organic!", then realize that organic methods just don't realistically have a hope of matching "modern" agricultural output. Unless we massively increase the manpower used: in which case pay would probably improve, but cost would rise substantially. There *are* working examples of this: India is one. But as that example makes clear, the reality of organic farming isn't rainbows and dancing ponies. It does work, but low-tech/low-input farming is very (very!) labor intensive.
Which might solve the education problem above, but probably not in the way most people would want. It would also be a way to re-purpose labor displaced by automation, but again, I don't think going back to the fields is what 99.999% of people are looking for.
Anyway, back to the Earth: if you approximate past all this, you still have energy and rare materials for non-agriculture. Fusion has been "about 20 years off" for 70 years: we will, I believe, eventually get there, but don't make any plans around it. That still doesn't solve making energy portable; we will likely still need chemical and/or battery storage. These take us back to rare materials, though: eventually, always, you run into chemistry and physics.
And, remember, to get to those limits, we ignored pollution, ecosystem damage, farming inputs and economics, and didn't even bother to mention climate change.
You hear a lot of versions of "it will be better in the future." I tend to look at those technological utopias with about the same level of grim suspicion I look at promised political (or religious) utopias.
:0 Rather than merely responding to comments:I think a certain amount of modification will be inevitable. Let's assume the entire world ends up agreeing that direct genetic modification is 'bad' and it is strictly banned: it seems unlikely that at least some countries wouldn't still allow selecting embryos from in vitro fertilization that don't contain some known genetic abnormality (this is already done, I believe, for a few things like Down's Syndrome.) Right there you've got some level of technological direction over what genes get passed down. (Yes, I realize Down's is perhaps a bad example to pair with 'passing down genes,' its Saturday morning.)
I think, as already said somewhere above, the price for basics (a menu of genetic abnormality tests, perhaps a few actual modifications) will drop until they are available to everyone. The competition among the rich will be for the latest cutting edge (is "bleeding edge" a bad pun in this?), 'designer', etc. modifications. I believe this for basic economic reasons: it will be far more profitable to sell e.g. basic beauty/life extension/health enhancements to everyone than to artificially limit these to the rich. The weird/'haute'/medically rare will probably remain exclusive to the rich.
Instead of genes, think of jeans. Levi's makes bank off of selling lots of $30 and $40 jeans; they gave up the high end market. But you can go buy a $350 pair of designer jeans, just to show that you are willing to pay $350 for f'ing jeans. Same thing will apply to genes. The one exception, slipped in above, will probably be for rare medical issues; then as now, if you have some very odd disease, you will pay a disproportionately high cost, or there will simply be no cure/fix/adjustment/etc. available, for any price.
I will note, finally, that this is all predicated on the idea that genes control outcomes of intelligence/physique/cheekbone height/etc. like buttons on a control panel. Which is already known to not be true. It may be possible to increase intelligence, but only just. Suppose a greater change comes with the cost of a high likelihood of crushing depression or psychosis, which only develops in the 20's or 30's (I'm thinking of schizophrenia.) Or a lifetime of increased healing leads to a cancer explosion at age 130, which can't be kept in check. Or life-long skinniness leads to early onset dementia because you've mucked with how fats are processed? And these are my silly examples, and I've skewed to degenerative/age related conditions, not e.g. lifestyle conditions (lets say that some tweak makes you smell a bit 'off.')
Nancy wrote: "I not sure. It seems to me that the US government's agenda is to "breed" a dependent class of people, through its economic policies and social programs. The extinction of the American working class is (hopefully) not the conscious goal of our esteemed elected officials, but it certainly seems to be accomplishing this. "Nancy's comment pushes some buttons for me. I don't think the problem is some kind of conscious or unconscious desire to "breed dependence." I think it's a dismissive attitude toward those affected by these programs.
I used to work on public policy issues, especially those concerning economics and people with disabilities. One of the biggest problems with many of our social programs is that they build in the wrong incentives, but the problems with these incentives are far more complicated than just encouraging poor people to become dependent. In many cases (disability programs for sure, but also other poverty programs), people who want to work are punished by losing survival benefits if they try. For example, most people on state and federal disability programs need a lot of medical items and services. Yet their health coverage has been linked to their benefits programs. If they work and/or save enough to pass the income or assets limits for their programs, they lose health coverage. Under such conditions, they would be foolish to seek work, even assuming that they could get jobs. (The disproportionately large unemployment rate for people with disabilities is another, very relevant problem.) The health care disincentive may change now, thanks to Obamacare, but there are other similar problems with other poverty programs.
My point is that many of these programs could be changed to provide support to poor people who are trying to get back into the work force instead of being treated as a done deal--support it as is or oppose it as is. I know that the disability community has worked very hard to change some of those programs here in my state of California, but the economic woes of the past several years have put that on a back burner as the public funding necessary to kick-start the changes became harder to get, business interests became more resistant to making necessary changes, and many people with disabilities were simply scrambling to survive.
One key point here is that the people who are affected by government (and private) social programs should be *active participants* in the development and management of programs that affect them. As a disability rights adage goes, "Nothing about us without us."
If public policy makers followed that guideline, I think we would wind up with much better programs--programs that would be both humane and ultimately cost-effective.
Sorry this is such a long post, but as I said, Nancy's comment pushed some buttons for me, especially since I live with a disability myself.
Daniel wrote: "Was away for a couple of days and I see this thread has blown up!Mel wrote: "People who are not Old Money are deliberately set up to fail. Education being insanely expensive, yet a prerequisite t..."
I share many of Mel's concerns about the future, which is one of the reasons I had fun writing my novel, The Reality Matrix Effect. The Reality Matrix Effect deals, in part, with an alternate reality in which plentiful, clean energy is provided by nitinol-based generators. The book is science fiction, but nitinol is very real. At one time, I thought some folks were actively working to develop it as an alternative energy source, but I guess that hasn't happened. I tried to find out why, but wasn't really able to get any answers. Nitinol still has its uses, but in our reality, at least, not as a significant energy source. If anybody is interested, I made a video (not very good quality, I'm afraid) demonstrating the key property of nitinol. You can find my video at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WlyOJ.... If you google "nitinol videos," you probably can get better examples. For a 1970s documentary on nitinol as a potential energy source, check out [http://foundationcanada.ca/nitinol-vi...].
Mel wrote: "Nancy wrote: "Not all discrimination is racial. If you run with the trailer park crowd, you will see your friends and neighbors dealt with much more harshly for the same offenses than "respectable"..."Good point about the robotics. I was thinking in more immediate terms (jobs going overseas) but if and when we run out of "developing" countries wherein labor is sufficiently cheap, then much more labor will be delegated to machines.
Genocide should certainly not be necessary to limit population growth. We have many reliable ways to accomplish that. I do think limiting population growth would go a long way toward improving the quality of life for people and other living things on this planet. With such efficient technology, we will not need the labor force and taxpayers to take care of us in our old age like we did previously. Hopefully reproductive responsibility can be encouraged through intelligent policy, not heavy-handed as they do in China. The first obvious move might be for government to stop subsidizing people who have children they are unable to educate or care for.
Mel wrote: "Nancy wrote: "Robert wrote: "Photographic memory or total recall would be helpful for everyone."Yes! Although I think that could be accomplished using small computer chips implanted in or around ..."
Ha ha! I was thinking more of the implantee controlling not being controlled. For example, recording or downloading input that one might find useful in the future. Directly into a little flash drive thing somewhere in or on one's own body. To be played back or referred to in the mind's eye as desired. Old people like me could use it to remember what it was I was supposed to be doing, or what I promised whom 2 weeks ago, or the quadratic equation, or the spanish translation for "there is no hot water in this room" ...kids of course would wastefully jam it full of music and games. That faraway look in people's eyes would be a dead giveaway that they are accessing their "chip."
Mod
Sounds almost exactly like "Intelligence", a new series on TV this season. The hero has a chip implanted in his brain which connects his mind directly to the internet. It's pretty well done, I think. A little out there, but it obvious some people are thinking about this kind of enhancement.
To my way of thinking a better education is when a person learns to treat others in a respectful way without scheming to remove all their natural resources at a reduced price NOT getting the knowledge to get the job that makes a rosy future without giving back to the system that made it all possible in the first place. Learning to share doesn't hurt either.The time of individual group interactions happening after weeks of travel with hundreds or thousands of miles of insulating space so bad decisions made by one group effected only that one group are long gone. Best to treat countries as independent states much as the US is set up. There are going to be countries pushing genetic engineering on humans while other countries will create laws to severely restrict the practice. It's going to happen.
Chips that allow you to send and receive data don't make you think better, they only allow you to respond better.
Sometimes one can change the chemical bath the brain sits in the same way you change the oil in your car to make it function better. To change the way the mind "thinks" I think one needs to change the instructions the "brain" cells are receiving from other cells and that requires genetic change from within.
Nancy wrote: "Mel wrote: "Nancy wrote: "Robert wrote: "Photographic memory or total recall would be helpful for everyone."Yes! Although I think that could be accomplished using small computer chips implanted i..."
Oh, yes. I understood, but say "microchip implant" to ME and I will immediately picture a remote control in the hands of someone who wants you to fetch them a fresh monogrammed towel :)
Laura wrote: "Nancy wrote: "I not sure. It seems to me that the US government's agenda is to "breed" a dependent class of people, through its economic policies and social programs. The extinction of the American..."Not to butt in, but I had kind of interpreted it as meaning to keep a large serving class. It's possible I was defining "dependent class" differently--dependent upon wage labor. It's also quite convenient how many of those not born into wealth end up in debt. To the government and to banks.
And encouraging the working class to have lots of kids is a historically documented tactic that is at least as old as the Catholic Church :) That, combined with keeping the rich rich and the poor poor, makes for an ample serving class.
Had to jump in cause the way I read it had nothing to do with disabilities.....
I tend to disagree with this characterization. A lot of threads are leading to rising education costs that have next to nothing to do with Old Money, the 1%, New Money, etc.
Key words are "next to." Of course there are other factors, but when a powerful person benefits from something, that is important because they have the means to control it.
1.) "Education the key," as has been the mantra for many decades. Certainly some kinds of education, or some amount... but, from an economic standpoint, do we need to graduate more e.g. communications majors?
Call me dummkopf, but I was never clear on what that major did. However--exactly! Two things are seen here:
a) An education system with economically impractical fields. NOW. Why would that be? Who would benefit from such a thing? Could you really say this is not deliberate??? :)
b) An economic system that shapes its own parameters by creating a false sense of need for specific products. Hang on, I am NOT Adam Smith-ing it here. WHO SELLS THESE PRODUCTS? WHO COMES UP WITH THEM? People who have around the clock statistics gathering going on, that the Internet makes that much easier. Click, you are a statistic for the pink car. Click again, you are a Scorpio, and you like astrology blurbs. That logged info doesn't just sit there, trust me. Someone wants it, and someone else wants their money, that's all it takes. This also is what ultimately decides which fields are the most economically practical. Yet, although the sciences will remain practical no matter what, they aren't necessarily prioritized (hellow, governmental NASA slashing)
Also notice trends moving way faster than college terms. Not an accident! :)
Not to pick on the humanities, since there is a lot of clamoring that we need more STEM majors, but I've seen arguments made that much of this education is wasted as the STEM jobs don't actually exist. (Full disclosure, I left a software/tech career and am back in school studying physics... so this didn't stop me.)
I actually don't remember what STEM stood for, or what was included in that category. I shall look it up and continue responding in awhile. I have to catch a train to mommy's :P so I will not be finishing this reply all the way.
2.) Since "everyone knows" that you must get an education, the cost keeps going up to match demand, while the value returned on a degree has declined or stagnated.
Indeed. Universities got greedy, for one. Just for ONE.
E.g. You will still earn more with a bachelors, but would you earn 90% as much of that "education bump" with 25% of the cost if we had a better system of e.g technical training and retraining?
Yup yup. Now think of this in light of that neat, tidy little system I described above. :)
3.) As far as "Old Money": Education has created a massive amount of "New Money." The "Internet revolution" is decades old now, and the "silicon revolution" predates that. Some of the most hard core e.g. libertarian politics you hear in California comes from this new (and in same cases, very, very new) money.
Yes indeed. The way it is RIGHT NOW unofficially keeps wealth within families AS MUCH AS POSSIBLE. A lot like the Old/New Money dynamic of the 1900s-1920s, no? Of course we've got some little upstarts who make their own way with some nifty little doohickey they dreamed up, and then it makes them rich (sound a bit 1920s already? Thought so lol) Just enough that we can say "oh things have changed we don't do that Old Money thing anymore" uh-uh!!!!
4.) The developing "biotech revolution" (did they not announce this a decade ago... it has been a slow build) seems to be mimicking the silicon and Internet revolutions. It will quite possibly be the e.g. "heros" who develop the first really workable biofuel process or life-extension treatment or whatever who will next take on the mantel of hard libertarianism.
Let's hope! See previous paragraph :)
Hmm... rhetoric? The Earth is a finite system. Technology will advance, no doubt, but the planet has a carrying capacity.
Yes indeed. I am not saying it doesn't. I'm saying certain individuals insist on keeping a small nation's, or at least an army's worth, to themselves for shits and giggles. Do the math, bro. Overpopulation paranoia is being shoved at us for a reason.
And on that note, gotta go for now, but planning to answer the rest of this.
Mel wrote: "Laura wrote: "Nancy wrote: "I not sure. It seems to me that the US government's agenda is to "breed" a dependent class of people, through its economic policies and social programs. The extinction o..."Laura, I may have gone off on a tangent ... I was actually thinking just the opposite--the (unintentional) extinction of the "working class," by which I mean those who actually produce a tangible product, in manufacturing, agriculture, whatever. Through outsourcing (my pet peeve) and automation (as Mel points out), we seem to be in a decline. I realize that our genes will not mutate overnight into some kind of sluggish non-working species, but my wild guess would be that first the meme goes, then the genes go, and possibly faster than one might think. I am probably not articulating very well, but to put it bluntly I can foresee after a few more generations a proliferation of humans, in he US anyway, who have been "bred" for their ability to adapt to existing as farm-fed catfish. Our system encourages the survival of the "unfittest." And no, I am not suggesting in any way that social policy should strive to breed or eliminate any particular classification of people. However, that is exactly what it is doing by extending benefits to those who reproduce irresponsibly. If the government is in charge of raising and supporting one's family, providing food, housing and medical care, those who tend to have more offspring will be those who adapt well to this system, as opposed to those struggling to make their own way.
And people do pass their genes along.
If you don't consider humans polluting our own water and arable land, then you must still consider that our farming/food production still relies on the ecosystem as a whole functioning. If you also want to approximate past that, you still have to look at the material (phosphate and nitrogen fertilizers, etc.) and energy (oil, oil, oil.) that sustains modern agriculture.No argument here!
If you want to solve that by just waving your hands and saying, "organic!",
Trust me, I don't.
then realize that organic methods just don't realistically have a hope of matching "modern" agricultural output. Unless we massively increase the manpower used: in which case pay would probably improve, but cost would rise substantially. There *are* working examples of this: India is one. But as that example makes clear, the reality of organic farming isn't rainbows and dancing ponies. It does work, but low-tech/low-input farming is very (very!) labor intensive.
Check out the book The Sheep Look Up by John Brunner if you haven't already. You will not be able to believe it was written in 1972. The world he describes is NOW.
Which might solve the education problem above, but probably not in the way most people would want.
Prolly right about that one too.
It would also be a way to re-purpose labor displaced by automation, but again, I don't think going back to the fields is what 99.999% of people are looking for.
Too late to worry about what people are looking for, I'd say. I think we may not have a choice. I'm glad people (at least seem to be) getting more into gardening, though. That is not a bad thing to know how to do.
Anyway, back to the Earth: if you approximate past all this, you still have energy and rare materials for non-agriculture. Fusion has been "about 20 years off" for 70 years: we will, I believe, eventually get there, but don't make any plans around it.
Agreed
That still doesn't solve making energy portable; we will likely still need chemical and/or battery storage. These take us back to rare materials, though: eventually, always, you run into chemistry and physics.
Agreed again. Hopefully we knock off the uhhhh "NASA treatment" with funding.
And, remember, to get to those limits, we ignored pollution, ecosystem damage, farming inputs and economics, and didn't even bother to mention climate change.
Yes we did. No argument here. Most of that can easily be traced back to greed. You know, the old Once-ler ;P Ya resenting the overpopulation rhetoric yet? :) Cause basically the old once-ler is saying all the trees he cut down are gone because there are too many people in the world. When you boil it down, that is what is going on.
You hear a lot of versions of "it will be better in the future." I tend to look at those technological utopias with about the same level of grim suspicion I look at promised political (or religious) utopias.
"It will be better" does not equal utopia, it means better. Since it used to be worse according to our preferences, it's only logical to think it will get better according to our preferences. And yet, since the comfort level has increased, one could argue we eventually COULD live in idyllic "dream-pods" that are sold at Wal-Mart. With a battery, a feeding tube and catheter that beeps when you need to change one of the above. Hey, that would just be an advanced video game. I'm not even joking, but that is only one of many possible futures :)
Science and Inquiry
Books mentioned in this topic
The Reality Matrix Effect (other topics)The Reality Matrix Effect (other topics)
Extra boiled down example: "You need a permit for that superpower, but we can definitely work something out for ms kardashian here."
Discuss?