CaptainBeowulf wrote:Do we know to what extent the brain regulates the growth of the body? Would it even be feasible to grow a human with no brain? Or would it be more problematic than just trying to clone individual tissues/organs?
Anencephaly.
Skipjack wrote:
Notably, consider the film from just a few years ago, "The Island" with Ewan McGreggor and Scarlet Johansson.
Again, a typical ideologically motivated Hollywood propaganda movie.
Terrible!
Contra. Interesting. The potential to rapidly force-grow humans and flash-program minds could redefine the nature of the human species.
The potential to rapidly force-grow humans and flash-program minds could redefine the nature of the human species.
Yeah, the thing is that what they described there is horribly inefficient and a silly way to do it. As I said, stem cells would be the better way to do it (because it would not take years to grow the organs to a sufficient size).
Anyway the movie was just made to show genetics (once again) in a negative light. The stupid movie audience buys it and believes it without questioning. Stem cell research and genetics stay on the list of highly regulated research.
GIThruster wrote:Is it okay to grant yourself relative immortality by sticking your consciousness again and again in bodies prepared in a vat for this?
Since our understanding of consciousness is rudimentary at best:
A. Don't worrying about transfering it anytime soon.
B. In the longer term, is consciousness like a digital file where a copy is exactly like original? We don't know, but given the non-digital nature of our biology and biological processing devices, don't bet our consciousness is like a digital file.
C. And if one cannot make an exact copy, how can one stick one's consciousness into another body? By definition, if the transfered consciousness is not an exact copy, it is not yours.
Anyway the movie was just made to show genetics (once again) in a negative light. The stupid movie audience buys it and believes it without questioning. Stem cell research and genetics stay on the list of highly regulated research.
Oh come on. One of the purposes of science fiction is to explore both the positive and negative possibilities of new technologies. It's also often to explore current problems with society in a fictional setting. You could just as well argue that The Island is criticizing commercialism and the way that technologies are commercialized rather than the technology itself.
I enjoyed The Island and I am not against stem cell research. I also enjoyed the first two Terminator movies, and I am not against further development of information technology, or military technologies like UAVs.
I enjoyed the first two Alien movies and I would still like to see near-light speed or possibly FTL travel turn out to be possible so we can explore other star systems.
Looks like someone else thinks the software analogy is valid.
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