Re: Nanotech control systems (was Re: Transhuman Beach Party)

J. R. Molloy (jr@shasta.com)
Fri, 10 Sep 1999 12:51:53 -0700

From: Bryan Moss <bryan.moss@dial.pipex.com>
>As funny as this sounds, why is it any
>different from 'curing' homosexuality or skin colour?

The difference lies in superficial variables. An identical principle applies: The principle of emotional inertia.

Blind people want to stay blind, because gaining vision may mean losing some old friends, and the ties that bind. Homosexuals, concerned that former lovers may see switching sexual orientation as betrayal, prefer to stay the same. Similarly, unenlightened brains fear that they would lose the familiar comfort of their habitual thinking if they enter choiceless awareness.

Experience justifies all these concerns, because personal transformation often does entail losing contact with old friends and familiar places.

As for skin colour, well let's not get carried away, but... "Michael Jackson began as a poor black boy, and ended up as a rich white woman."
--Jay Leno

Jackson probably made some enemies by doing that. Bionic and/or symbiotic humans will probably experience similar difficulties. I think they call it envy, jealousy, or schradenfraude (on the part of those left behind), and nostalgia, sentimentality, or remorse (on the part of those who change). EOM