Not necessarily a neuralink specifically, just any genre or type of cybernetic implants, if they were or will become available. I’m super hesitant on anything interfacing with my brain so I’d probably stay organic, except like if I lost my eyesight or hearing.
Yes. I’m chronically ill with a lot of issues. I’d go down to Maelstrom’s territory at night alone and wiggle seductively. “Oh no, please don’t force chrome on me Mr. Maelstrom guy.”
Realistically, I have ADHD so having a neural interface to make sure I didn’t forget shit would be so helpful. I wouldn’t trust most devices though. It’d have to be free of the possibility of being enshittified, so I’d only be comfortable with it if I controlled the software.
I get a kind of chafe, like that of clothes that don’t fit, for the normal function of my own body. Like some other arm I’ve never used is tied behind my back. So yes, but the cost matters more.
If I die younger for it, not worth it. If I give up my sovereignty to an amoral entity for it, not worth it.
So no hack jobs and no corporate bs, but non-invasive opensource projects like openbci and openmuscle? Awesome!
For it to be more mainstream I’d really support a well ran cooperative that supports these opensource projects and customers that have them.
I’d need to completely own it. I don’t want my extended memory storage to now also include product placement in my childhood memories or the cops can make my bionic legs stop working or whatever.
However, in the hypothetical situation where I completely own my augmentations, 100% I’m getting enhancements. In fact I would question the efficiency of giving me implants, it might just be easier to copy my brain into a completely robotic body.
The downside of copying your brain is that it’s a copy, you’ll have your original meat body and a separate mechanical body which minds which immediately start to diverge. They’re both still you, but meatman gets no upgrades. You could destroy your meat body as part of the transfer but then it’s reasonable to say you’re dead with a robot that thinks it’s you.
The closest you can get to a proper transfer would need an implant which works similar to how your body naturally replaces cells, the implant would gradually take over neurons until you have a fully mech brain which can be transplanted to a new body. You could argue that’s still just a destructive copy but I think it’s within most people’s tolerance.
Yeah but speaking as meatman I’m okay with meatman dying. Robot me will be the real me, meat me is ephemeral.
I don’t believe in souls. I view my existence as like a wave, I am briefly in this cohesive form and will inevitably break upon the shore and both cease to be a wave yet forever be the ocean. Continuously moved and reshaped and never the same wave I was.
A body that allows my perception of existence to continue would prevent that, I would be able to continue to “exist” as I perceive it for much longer.
So yeah for me at least you can skip the gradual stuff. Just ctrl + c, ctrl + v and recycle the original.
How would you feel about your continuity if more than one robot copy/replacement is made? (at the same time all based on the meat version I mean, not as future replacement/upgrade bodies)
I’d be cool with it as long as they’re all autonomous. From my sense of continuity I continue to exist and there are other copies who share my experiences as meatman up to the point in time where we received our respective robot bodies. It’d be like gaining siblings. From their point of view they continue to exist and there are other copies like myself out there as well.
I’m also okay if I woke up in my robot body and found out I’m not the first copy. Knowing myself it would be more of a “fun fact” that someone is the original rather than something that carries any sort of weight.
Which robot would be you and which would be “the other copies”? I would imagine that from the descendants’ pov they’re all “you”, but I wonder if you would identify yourself with one over the rest 🤔
If the descendants continue to collaborate in perpetuity, maybe “you” is the swarm.
I think we’d just view it as a matter of perspective. To me, I’m me and they’re them. To them, they’re me and I’m them. We’d each identify ourselves as me.
But we would probably also enjoy being considered a swarm, I know I would.
Imagine experiencing a scism with yourself 😅
most people’s tolerance.
Most people do not have an existential crisis over whether a teleporter is teleporting them or killing and remaking them. It’s mostly a small subset of people who have that worry.
I’d be like Mr. T in space. You’d never get me onto one of those transporters unless I was dragged there while unconscious.
meatman gets no upgrades
Frylock: Low voice c’mon, he heard you, Shake.
louder Be-because Meatwad is already top of the line! He needs no upgrades!
Meatwad: Yea! Meatwad’s number one!
Shake: Oh-hoh, it’s not like he doesn’t know he’s awful.
Meatwad: I do? I’m not–
Shake: You’re not stupid, are you? I mean, we all know Meatwad is pretty dumb but you’re not so dumb that you don’t even realize that you were fished out of the bottom of the bargain bin.
Frylock: Shake–
Meatwad: I’m not stupid!
Shake: So you know, then.
Meatwad: Yeah! Wait…
Shake: I knew it! Meatwad is the worst.
Frylock: Shake, enough! You’re going to make him cry!
Meatwad: sniffs
Shake: Oooh, fine, ya crybaby. Frylock has your upgrades that will make you almost as good as normal–
Frylock: Shake!
Meatwad: I’m getting upgraded?
Shake: --but he refuses to even admit he has it because he’s jealous! Of how great you’ll be!
Meatwad: Frylock…
Shake: The ultimate betrayal! He can’t handle being #3 so he’s keeping you down!
Frylock: Meatwad, you don’t believe I’d do that to you–
Meatwad: I thought we were friends.
Shake: Always competing for that #2 spot, it’s despicable!
Meatwad: Frylock!
Frylock: There IS NO UPGRADE. How do you upgrade a wad of meat anyways? Shake is just–
Shake: SEE!? Even Frylock agrees you can’t get better and that you’re the worst.
Frylock: eyes glowing Ok fine. Meatwad, how would you like an upgrade? I’ll give you a straw, how does that sound?
Shake: glowing, rising into the air Woah, wait! No, no, I was just kidding! Meatwad, you don’t want a straw, do you?
Meatwad: You know, a straw would be pretty cool.
Shake: Nononono, don’t–just think about how dumb you’d look with a straw just sticking out! Maybe you’d prefer a fry!? glowing intensifies AH!
Meatwad: Yeah, you’re right, that would look pretty dumb.
Shake: relaxes Oh thank you, Meatwad, you’re a good buddy.
Meatwad: Frylock, could I have a lid, too, maybe? Then my straw won’t look so dumb?
Crack my skull and spine open, pull out my brain and nervous system and put it in the robot.
Lotsa old people get hip replacements.
Stick to mechanical stuff that cant become enshittified later.
RIP if you need a pacemaker
Better pay your subscription
Hip replacements with a step counter coming soon
Is the hardware and software open source or otherwise not owned by a corporation. Then maybe.
No.
I’ve seen how often tech breaks, gets controlled, becomes unsupported, and can never really get things “right.”
But like you said, if it’s that or blindness, sure. But I’m not chopping off good parts.
I’ll take blindness… at least I can still tell them to feknoff when they try to sell me more trash
I would need a few things met:
- No data flow back to my brain
- Open source
- Not flagged as disallowed by TSA
- Programmable (kind of goes with OSS)
- Actually useful
- Extremely minimal maintenance
If all of these were met, HEEELLLL YEA
Can’t wait to accidentally brick my eyes trying to install an ad blocker lol
Oh man, I just wish I had an eye based blocker right now. These political ads in the states are bleeding into my no ad watching life
No data flow back to my brain
Isn’t that just a current generation prosthetic?
My father ran a prosthetics clinic for 35 years. Before that he worked for his father doing very much the same thing for a decade prior.
His words of wisdom were, “The real thing is always better because you can feel with it.”
We may be able to make materials that far exceed the capabilities of the human body, but until you can wire up every single nerve and use the thing exactly like you would a real limb, prosthetics will ALWAYS be lesser, no matter their capabilities. There’s no point in having sword arms if you can’t be proficient overnight with swinging a blade with your elbow.
But, in good faith, yeah, I’d gladly swap my eyes for something better. Astigmatism sucks, and I’m damn near legally blind as it is. Not having to wear glasses would be amazing. Gimme some Kiroshi Optics any day! But, the only reason I’d want them is because they’d be better than what I have. Wearing glasses isn’t a huge deal.
Astigmatism in both eyes over here!
As a kid who grew up on TNG, I always wished my glasses were like Geordi’s VISOR….
Gimme some Kiroshi Optics any day!
I’d settle for some second-hand Hannibal Chews. Bifocals suck.
Looked into Lasik surgery? My mom had severe astigmatism, and before surgery she couldn’t see the big E on the eye chart without her glasses. She did need reading glasses a few years after surgery though which is why I’ve never looked into it, I’d rather not play the “where are my reading glasses?” game.
Yes, to solve a medical issue or to genuinely improve my existence.
But if we’re talking about something really advanced with software in it I need open source. I’ve already read real news articles about ocular implants where the company that supports them went out of business. Second Sight Medical Products.
I can’t imagine what it must be like to have an implant in my body that’s been bricked due to some corporate bullshit.
It depends.
If it is somehow able to be powered by the sugars in my body, doesn’t need external recharging, and does not have any network connectivity, especially if it’s an upgrade to what I currently have, probably.
If it fails any of those three tests, then probably not.
Not unless it was medically necessary, and they had open hardware and software for the parts. Otherwise, I don’t trust companies and the US government to properly regulate it, and I really don’t feel like having to play whack-a-mole with adblockers or whatever to keep my cybernetic parts from beaming ads straight into my brain, or doing other crazy stuff. I’d also be wary of companies just discontinuing support for the implants when it became too expensive for them to maintain, and being left with a useless bunch of metal somewhere in my body.
For Funsies? Likely not, no.
For medical reasons like steering a prostetic, yeah, maybe.
I used to be really deep into this rabbit hole. Theres a community of “biohackers” who do stuff like inserting rfid chips and magnets under the skin.
The magnet in the finger tip is what always interested me, but im too much of a chicken to seriously consider doing it because its not a medical procedure (you can’t just go to a doctor afaia and request to have it implanted - theyll just refuse to do it) so you need to do it with local anaesthetics that you can legally acquire, yourself or with a friend.
People who have done it have reported they became able to sense electromagnetic fields once they got used to its sensitivity, which is bizarre and awesome at the same time. They literally gave themselves a “sixth sense”
The magnet definitely intrigues me but I’ve had several fingertip injuries and the pain is not something I’m interested in voluntarily experiencing even though I’m good friends with someone with the surgical skills and anaesthetics.
RFID is also cool but tech moves fast.
RFID is also cool but tech moves fast.
Just install a zipper so you can hot swap
RFID is also cool but tech moves fast.
the golden age of mifare classic is not yet over
Someone hasn’t played the Deus Ex series…
No. Restoring human-like capability following some kind of traumatic event, sure.
“Nothing voluntary” and “nothing that grants superhuman abilities” are the bare minimum to make sure it doesn’t turn into an arms race, leading to a tiered society with the enhanced elite ruling over the organic poor.
Thats more a capitalism problem though. Literally any technology increases human capability in some way, its just usually not as visceral a way as something that modifies one’s body, and then you still get the issue that those with wealth end up owning that thing and controlling what it is used for to their own ends, which generally dont include sharing that control with everyone else. Theres not some distinction between that capacity increase being external or internal that makes the latter lead to inequality but not the former.
I’m so tired of not being able to have amazing things because a few hundred assholes want to cosplay as Smaug…
Both of those lines will be crossed of they haven’t already
You mean like glasses 250 years ago?
As long as it doesn’t require a fucking WiFi connection and corporate account to use.
