Frozen corpses are dead. No one's bodily incarnated self will ever "migrate" into cyberspace or get nanotransubstantiated into a shiny robot body, thereupon to be techno-immortalized or sooper-longevized under the sooper-parental ministrations of a post-biological Robot God. Extraordinary claims to the contrary on the part of techno-immortalist sects of the Robot Cult indulging in faith-based initiatives involving imaginary nanobotic revivals of frozen corpses or trans-migrations of digi-souls into cyberspatial heaven, offered up wildly against the grain of the warranted consensus science in the relevant disciplines connected, as it were, to these claims, demand from their advocates extraordinary proofs delivered in patient, qualified, prominently published and widely cited and tested arguments, not strident unqualified assertions of confidence and authority from within the circled wagons of marginal sub(cult)ures of True Believers and denunciations of skeptics as rampaging irrationalists or murderous gleeful ghouls.
Sensible secular democrats should certainly struggle to universalize access to healthcare, struggle to get access to clean water -- the closest thing to a real "miracle medicine" in the actual world -- to the overexploited people of the world, and increase funding of medical research to remediate diseases and increase public access to reliable information (including information about dangerous pharmaceuticals and bogus anti-aging therapies and cryonics scams) so that people actually make informed and hence comparatively more consensual healthcare decisions. But Robot Cultists have no distinctive role to play in such struggles, while they are at once defined by the effort to derange and distract these efforts into faith-based initiatives organized by their wish-fulfillment fantasies.
Every single person reading these words is going to die. Reconciling oneself to this fact is an indispensable precondition for sanity, it seems to me. Death-denialists -- either in the common or garden varieties of workoholics or risk-junkies or cosmetic surgery addicts or panicky fundamentalists trembling in their pews -- or in the kooky fancies of the techno-transcendentalizing sects of the Robot Cult pinning their denialism on nanobots or sooper-computers -- whatever form their denialism takes will not extend their lives by a single hour through their denialism.
But in all too many instances the energy diverted into death denialism yields a diminution of aliveness in life or plays out in death-dealing disconnection and aggression among the living. Robot Cultism isn't just palpably ridiculous -- especially as measured against actually warranted consensus science, of which Robot Cultists like to pretend to represent a summit rather than a skew -- neither is it just a dangerous ideology distracting the application of intelligence, peer-to-peer, to actually urgent shared planetary problems of social injustice and climate catastrophe while providing cozy rationalizations for incumbent authoritarian interests, but it looks to me quite simply to be terribly unhealthy for its adherents. That last part isn't really my business, and so I tend to focus on the first two points in most of my critiques, but from time to time it isn't the worst thing in the world to point out that I honestly believe the Robot Cultists with whom I am sparring here are actively damaged by their denialism and hyperbole as well as damaging others. I hate to see it, I really do.
Needless to say, mortal though we all of us, I wish the best of luck to us all in managing some measure of sense and happiness and some contribution to the work of justice in our shared world, peer to peer, in the meantime.
17 comments:
Fereidoun M. Esfandiary, the father of transhumanism, defiantly declared that he wanted to live forever and even changed his name to FM-2030, in part, to reflect his faith that he would live to celebrate his 100th birthday in 2030. On July 8, 2000, he died from pancreatic cancer.
I'm surprised that transhumorists (and their critics) don't see his life and death as the best cautionary tale...
Not to gloat or anything. . . I mean, nobody **deserves** to die,
although the great evils associated with dying are not, I think
(as many transhumanists seem to think) the dying itself, but:
1) the pain involved in getting there: whether from injury, disease,
or the degeneration of old age itself; and 2) the unhappy fact
that humans **anticipate** death with such dread and fear.
From my e-mail archive:
Subject: In 2010, he nonexists too.
"Around 2010 the world will be at a new orbit in history. . . Life expectancy
will be indefinite. Disease and disability will nonexist. Death will be rare and
accidental -- but not permanent. We will continuously jettison our obsolescence
and grow younger." F.M. Esfandiary, "Up-Wing Priorities" (1981).
(Quoted at
http://www.cryonet.org/cgi-bin/dsp.cgi?msg=31519 )
-------------------------
Teaching children about cryonics
By Shannon Vyff on July 4th, 2008
( http://www.depressedmetabolism.com/2008/07/04/teaching-children-about-cryonics/ )
My book “21st Century Kids”, set in the year 2008, is about
two children who ‘die’ now but are cryonically preserved and
then reanimated 200 years in the future. . . The book is
of course science fiction, but it is based on things that
scientists see as possible now. When I talk to an eager
classroom of 9- & 10-year-olds at a school about my book, I. . .
make sure the subject of cryonics comes up. I’ve talked
with dozens of classrooms, and hundreds of children at my
own church about cryonics. . . [D]eath is a reality -- it
is a fear for children, or it is a sadness when someone they
loved died. . . [W]hen cryonics comes up, the children
become animated sharing stories, and what they think.
I love children for their open-mindedness.
-------------------------
Well, I suppose I would have enjoyed such a talk when
I was 10, too.
ReadCoolDude: Right, you can take all the vitamins and supplements that you want, avoid red meat, smoking, drinking, whatever, and the enviro-genetic lottery could still randomly select you for obliteration.
On the other hand, FM-2030 is an anecdote, and generalizing from his case is a fallacy. One could make the argument that belief in future technological immortalization makes people practice healthier lifestyles and live longer, whether those technological outcomes are plausible or not.
Whistling past the Soccer Stadium, Dale? You have more important things to fear than cryonicists. I don't think the coming Strict Fathers' counter-revolution will bother to plant a pear tree over wherever they "disappear" your body.
Every death-denialist will die, and that is not an anecdotal argument. I would hesitate to claim that Robot Cultists actually expedite their deaths due to their participation in these highly marginal pseudo-scientific faith-based initiatives, even if it is easy enough to imagine an empirical study that could produce compelling data on this score -- I don't think it is going out on too tenuous a limb to wonder whether the same lack of critical standards that impels death-denialists into Robot Cults in the first place also inspire many of them to take up odd ineffectual enthusiasms like supplementation regimes ivolving substances or quantities frowned upon by more mainstream wellness research as well as taking up quirky devices that bathe them in radiation or infuse their tapwater with would-be longevizing properties via arguments that would make aura therapists and homeopathists blush (they're cranks, too, in case you didn't catch my drift), whereas taking seriously the health advice in mainstream and government health, nutrition and fitness sources would probably do most anybody a world of good, no Robot Cult required.
What an odd comment "Mark Plus." I daresay it is true that as an atheist queer vegetarian anti-racist anti-militarist green theoryhead humanities academic and rampaging pro-choice left-wing democrat there are plenty of folks who would like me dead or nicely trundled off to a concentration camp besides the occasionally overzealous Robot Cultist. Needless to say, I do not choose the objects of my critique according to an assessment of proximate danger to my person from adherents of the variously irrationalist, funbdamentalist, authoritarian sociocultural positions I decry, but according to whether or not I regard my contribution to their critique as distinctive, relevant, attuned to my personal concerns, edifying for various reasons, and so on. But thanks for the reminder that kooks of more persuasions than one might crave my death forthwith!
Aren't the 'Strict Fathers' the closeted gay guys like George Rekers who follow James Dobson and his Focus on the Family group around?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strict_father_model
> . . .taking up quirky devices that bathe them in radiation or
> infuse their tapwater with would-be longevizing properties. . .
Ah yes, the radium water craze of a century ago.
http://www.museumofquackery.com/devices/radium.htm
Even Madame Curie bought into this:
"Marie Curie predicted that radiation would prolong life
(this was in 1904). Ironically, she died from leukemia
due to overexposure to radiation."
-- Seidensticker, _Future Hype_, Chapter 2
"The Perils of Prediction"
Speaking of which -- in 1871, a quarter of a century before
Henri Becquerel discovered radioactivity, a novel was published
by a very popular author of the time, whose legacy consists
primarily in having coined a number of phrases that continue in
use today, long after the author himself has been largely forgotten,
such as "the pen is mightier than the sword". (He also actually
wrote a novel with the opening line "It was a dark and stormy night.")
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_Bulwer-Lytton
Anyway, the 1871 novel was an early example of what is today
called science fiction, and the title was _The Coming Race_.
It's kind of cool, actually. It's something of an echo of
Verne's _Journey to the Center of the Earth_ and also
anticipates Edgar Rice Burroughs' later Pellucidar books.
http://www.gutenberg.org/etext/1951
The power of the superhuman subterranean race in the novel
(the "Vril-ya") comes their ability to harness an invisible
cosmic energy they call "vril" (shades of The Force).
But some readers were apparently so taken with the idea of
"vril" that they persuaded themselves that it must really exist,
and set about trying to discover it. This went on for decades.
(The fact that the book was reprinted as _Vril: The Power of
the Coming Race_ suggests that the author, or his publisher,
had no wish to discourage this misconception.)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vril
Kurzweil for one seems to have an odd idea or two about what will sooper-longevize his own ugly bag of mostly water...
Speaking of Kurzweil, he likes to peddle his own brand of nonsense with the alkaline water filter. He won't tell you how much it costs, but about 5 years ago I sent off for a brochure. It was $1200.
Yep, $1200 for a filter that increases the pH of your water, which of course, has not been proven to do anything beneficial to your health.
For a critique of alkaline water, see for example here: http://j.mp/aOsuAr
He's also known to eat megadoses of vitamins and supplements, which are also not proven to do anything beneficial (unless you're suffering from a vitamin deficiency to begin with, but just because drinking water is beneficial when you're dehydrated, that doesn't mean drinking excess water will make you super-well. In fact, you'll just get bloated). He likes to tout the fact that he has the physiology of a 39 year old, or somesuch. I guess he'll be a good test case to see how useful those indicators are.
"... corpses are dead. "
Excellent point. And one I'll daresay many transhumanists need to hear. However, the distinction between a corpse and a being with rights still has to do with the degradation of essential and irreplaceable structures responsible for identity. It does not have to do with public opinion (including yours, wonderful and sophisticated though those may be) as to whether the object is corpse or not.
Currently, at least so far as my techno-literate, software-coding self has thus far been able to determine, science has not ruled this out for cryonically preserved humans under ideal conditions shortly following clinical death. Even sub-ideal conditions represent a spectrum of destruction, where it is impossible to say with certainty which individuals future technologies will find irrecoverable. For all current science can tell us, perhaps Charles Babbage's dissected brain fixed in alcohol is still alive, merely comatose, by some distant future standard. The only way to be even relatively sure is to put several more centuries of history -- this time with advanced bioscience -- into the equation.
Personally, I can, without the aid of any uninvented intervention, expect to benefit from another 40+ years of scientific investigation into how to create these ideal conditions, before my natural lifespan ends. In fact, if we consider reaching 100 years to be more likely in the 21st century I my not die until 2083. So I think this justifies significant investment on my part into investigating and remaining open to this possibility. At the very least, I think it is misguided to ridicule my generation for so doing.
For Boomers, who are now starting to feel their age, it looks like they've pretty much got a choice between today's "best amateurs money can buy" and a hole in the ground. That is a tragedy and reason for legitimate dismay. But it doesn't mean boomers can force their sour grapes on us, nor that we can do so for the next generation should our lot appear as dire. The prospect of "immortality" is (though it is as I have noted in the past, hardly a cure for death, only a means of introducing an indeterminate delay) still as positive and as attractive as it ever was to Egyptian pharaohs and Spanish explorers, while far more likely to be obtainable than he has been at any point in the past thanks to the existence of modern science.
Shorter "Luke," Shorter Robot Cultists: Tech-Heaven = Science = Clap Louder. Keep up that can-do attitude, guys, those nano-elves will immortalize you lickety-split! Why, I hear, AI is just twenty years away (after all, it always is) and the Robot God will appear soon after, glory halleluja!
Martin: "I guess he [Ray Kurzweil] will be a good test case to see how useful those indicators are."
And I for one wish him all the best!
I still remember how excited I got about Ray's eccentricities -- and I say "eccentricity" with a very high level of fondness -- when I read the now-classic "Just how old can he go?" (http://tinyurl.com/27tpoh8 *) in the NYT.
And Kurzweil/Grossman responded on several occasions to critics of their endorsement of alkaline water. For example: http://www.fantastic-voyage.net/ReaderQandA.htm#alkaline
I admit, though, that I haven't done much research about the argumentative subtleties re alkine water.
* Or http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9E05EEDE1F30F934A15751C1A9629C8B63&sec=health
> [With regard to] the [prevention of the] degradation of essential and irreplaceable
> structures responsible for identity. . . [S]cience has not ruled this out for
> cryonically preserved humans under ideal conditions shortly following clinical death.
> Even sub-ideal conditions represent a spectrum of destruction, where it is
> impossible to say with certainty which individuals future technologies will find
> irrecoverable.
Hey, if you believe Frank Tipler (has science ruled him out?), all you have to
do is wait 'til the end of time, when everything that has ever lived will be
reinstatiated in the Omega Point computer. Why worry? Resurrection may,
in fact, be inescapable (many religions believe that, after all -- you'll
get your Karmic desserts in the end [I'll take a double dip of mint chip on
a sugar cone, please]).
In any case, cryonic suspension today: 1) does not mean you'll
escape the unpleasantness of dying 2) does not mean you'll escape
the pain and humiliation of cancer, or stroke, or Alzheimer's, if it
comes to that 3) does not mean you'll escape the loss of vitality,
loss of mental acuity, loss of physical attractiveness, and
loss of social connection and relevance that accompany old
age -- if you last that long 4) does not mean that you'll escape
the bereavement of losing friends and family members, if you last
that long 5) does not mean that your own friends and family members
will not suffer bereavement from **your** illness or death.
All the above still has to happen (if you're "lucky" enough to
last that long) **before** your cryonic suspension.
You won't even have the satisfaction of knowing in advance whether
that suspension will be performed competently, or whether the
money you've turned over to the cryonics company will pay for your
liquid nitrogen for any significant length of time, or whether the economy,
the technological infrastructure, the political climate, or
even the planetary climate itself will be stable enough for 10 or 50 or
100 (let alone 500 or 1000) years to keep that cryonics outfit
in business (even if they are honest and well-intentioned).
And if by some miracle you are resurrected, you may well find
(I'm speaking here in the quasi-science-fictional mode beloved
of transhumanists) that 1) the physical process of being "rebooted"
may be just as painful, disorienting, and terrifying as the process of
dying was in the first place 2) the purpose for which you
have been resurrected has no resemblance to the reasons
for which you **expected** to be resurrected (it may not be
for **your** benefit at all) 3) the world into which you've
been reborn may not be at all to your taste. (Again, this is
not unlike what many religions predict for the afterlife!)
> In fact, if we consider reaching 100 years to be more likely in the
> 21st century I may not die until 2083.
I remember very distinctly standing in the bathroom one Saturday morning --
I think it was in the spring of 1964 (I would have been 11 1/2), with
a Bantam paperback copy of Arthur C. Clarke's _Profiles of the Future_,
gazing at the "Chart of the Future" in the back of the book
( http://www.digitallantern.net/McLuhan/course/spring96/profiles.gif )
and wondering how likely it would be for me to live to
the date at which Clarke predicted "Immortality" (he puts it
ca. 2050, which would make me 98). I do **not** expect to
reach 98 (no males in my family have lived that long, though
one of my father's sisters made it to 99), and I no longer
think Clarke was anywhere near the mark with his predictions
(it's already 2010 -- look at some of the **other** predictions
in that chart!).
> [I]t doesn't mean boomers can force their sour grapes on us. . .
Hopefully, some of you will grow up on your own.
> Frank Tipler (has science ruled him out?)
Current cosmology favors an open rather than a closed universe, so his whole scenario doesn't apply.
Apart from the later theological and sophistical aspects of his thought, the whole wellspring of the Omega Point cosmology is the idea that the collapse into a Big Crunch singularity can be highly uneven and that this provides an opportunity for intelligent life to survive. The universe in its final moments is a shrinking hypersphere filled with a dense hot plasma. Tipler's idea is to have the plasma flowing first in one cosmic direction and then another, so violently that it makes the hypersphere oscillate, and then the subsidence of these oscillations will itself drive the next orthogonal flow of plasma... something like that. The idea is actually theoretical engineering rather than metaphysics, in the sense that a Dyson sphere is theoretical engineering; you can't actually go and build one, but you can try to calculate whether it makes sense, assuming current physical theory. Tipler started out as a theoretical cosmologist, and in fact the idea of an unevenly oscillating Big Crunch is not his invention, so that part seems to be OK, or at least not an obvious absurdity. The real "engineering" problem is the idea of some sort of intelligence or mechanism or process in this final plasma, controlling these oscillations. Neither Tipler nor anyone else has described how that would work.
Ooh, this game. Lemme try.
Short "Dale,"
Cryo = dead, Earth = flat.
[For all we kn[o|e]w.]
Nano = elves, Memory = magic.
[Human !machine.]
Huh. Perhaps I should stick to programming.
Anyway, I get ya dude. But of course I secretly hope the singularity doesn't come too soon otherwise I won't get to try out my ice coffin.
It would appear that young Luke is ready for elevation into the transhumanoidal Brain Trust. With a head like that you don't have to be a futurologist to guess that boy's gonna go far, fella.
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