From: Ben Goertzel (ben@goertzel.org)
Date: Wed Jan 30 2002 - 22:54:57 MST
> You can't have it both ways.
> You can't both claim to be human and be an upload. As much as your ego
> would like to hold on to the old comfortable blanket of "human" in his
> cold hard Cray, wishing won't make it so. You will have to create a new
> essence to match your existance.
I suspect there is some deep truth to this statement. I think the novel
Diaspora is unrealistic in attributing so many human characteristics to
bodiless software programs. I think intelligent software will rapidly
become far more different from human beings than Diaspora projects --
and far more different than we can now understand.
I think it is not a terrible thing to wish to preserve the aesthetic
integrity of one's own human mind by retaining a humanly embodied
existence.
I will not be saddened if the majority of humans make this choice.
Neither would I be saddened if the majority of dogs chose to remain
dogs instead of being transmogrified into humans (if dogs were given
the choice, and somehow made to doggishly comprehend the choice).
Diversity is a good thing, in my personal aesthetics. I am fine with
the fact that not all parts of the universe display maximal intelligence.
Rocks need not prove theorems in order to satisfy me.
I doubt that I personally would choose to permanently retain a human
body when the opportunity for vastly increased intelligence and freedom
were there, but that's *me*, I'm an adventurer.
-- Ben G
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