I can see how this is a great step forward.
Sarcasm hasnāt changed since pre-internet days either.
Information flow is faster, and it is easier to find special interest groups, but humanity is pretty much the same as it ever was, both good and bad.
In the biological sense, the current āHomo sapiensā if nothing a continuous mutation by mixing and adapting, not even a quarter of 1M years ago, our species split from H. Heidelbergensis. After how many mutations that dated millions of years.
The English archers on medieval times had their bones deformed.
Enlarged necks in Myanmar, enlarged lips of Suri tribe, binding feet in China
What is human if not a self-aware, self-experimenting curious creature.
So far that with the help of tools we are able to communicate trough great distances, with the help of materials and the knowledge gathered trough experimentation we are able to alter our environment (for good or bad) and our selves even.
Penicillin, Anaesthesia, Immunotherapy, Organ transplants, Artificial Inteligence prostetics, allow fellow humans to continue living instead of being doomed by the limitations of their bodies due to genetic malformation, accidents or illnesses contracted.
Someone can extend their lifespan with the help of an implant that helps him regulate a failing heart. Or even an artificial heart.
And not just that, but some patients find that hey could use the device to lower his heart rate to help falling sleep.
Now thatās just about basic tendencies, to use and experiment and modify.
Humans have during the pass of time, created and destroyed, others, themselves, history, civilizations, anything they can reach, including the concepts of beauty, right and wrong, love, friendship, loyalty. Reality as a playground.
Being a cyborg, or using technologies to enhance the human body, or lifestyle is not being ānot humanā but is actually being the BEST example of what a Human is.
Now, being āHumanitarianā is another thing, completely unrelated.
āConcerned with or seeking to promote human welfareā
How much anyone in this century can avoid utilizing anything man-made?
Nothing made by a machine or other humans? No internet, no phones, no cars, no clothes, no medicine, no processed food, no cultivated food, no reading or writing.
Just anything you can go hunt or pull from plants WITH YOUR HANDS and eat. To me that sounds more animal than āhumanā.
Being comfortable with āour currentā technology is not defining who we should be. We are the makers of the change, and is trough curiosity, experimentation and development that every option that we have in our hands should be considered and look after. That is being human to me.
A curious experimenting explorer creature.
The moment you stop being curious, stop experimenting, stop exploring you enter a ādecaying humanā state, settling down is the beginning of the demise, and is just natural, your experimentation hit their limits and new horizons will be discovered by new generations with the energy necessary to continue where you have stopped.
True, but I think this forum worksā¦ the opposite way, somehow. Weāre all brought here by one common, little interest - chip implants for humans. Okay. So we all have a similar, echo-chamber-y opinion about those implants, sure. But since this forum is very polite, very open to frequent derails and very (positively!) little moderated, it is the total opposite of the usual echo chamber found in social media and the like. I never had the chance to speak with American rifle owners before. Or with people who learned bodymodding in a far-away country. With people who live somewhere in the Finnish woods and have tons of technical knowledge, yet refuse to drive a car unless totally neccessary. And so on. Talking to people whom I agree with, or to some whom I deeply disagree with, and both is fine.
So the immense diversity here, combined with a generally positive and tolerant (in the best way) vibe, actually helps to widen the horizon of anyone willing to participate.
I just quote one part here, but think about the whole post. I agree with what you wrote, but not with the conclusions. Every living being on earth uses whatever evolution gave them to survive. Thatās the reason why we have highly specialised creatures on earth, with impressive skills that just perfectly fit the way those creatures live (like ultrasound stuff, sensing the magnetic field of the earth, specialised viewing or hearing skills and all that stuff).
We humans have this opposable thumb and a brain able to very abstract thinking, so we use those tools to survive, more or less. To change our environment, as well as ourselves (thanks for the nice bodmod-examples, you knew Iād like them! ). And I totally agree that all this cyborg-y stuff is just the logical next step in our personal evolution, helping us to survive a bit better in the technical age we created ourselves.
But still, I donāt think any of this puts us above the other animals. Every animal does its best to survive, to live a happy and peaceful life, with the tools it has to reach that goal.
Donāt get me wrong - itās not that I think of humans as āworthlessā, itās just that I think every living being on earth has basically the same merit and that we humans are just not entitled to feel āspecialā, since this usually leads to exploitation of anything ābelowā the state of humankind.
This has nothing do with anything, but I just gotta ventā¦
So Iāve been working flat out at work for the past four weeks to deliver a fairly complex, quite delicate and difficult to build laser testing station. When I mean flat out, I mean early morning at work, late evening or night at work, week-ends at work, the whole nine yards.
I was very close to being done. The testing equipment has a 3x3 power sensor array, and all I had left to do today was wire and calibrate the 3 remaining sensors on the bottom row. Long and tedious, but easy to do and after that, Iām done, I can take vacations and work on Amalās gadget.
Well lo and behold, I just realized my colleage who was in charge of machining the sensorsā fixture made a mistake and spaced them all 5 mm too far apart. Net result: the bottom row is below the optical viewing port of the temperature chamber, and all 6 sensors above it are misaligned and require complete reconfiguration and recalibration. 4 weeks of work down the crapper
Fuck this shit Iās gonna get drunk nowā¦
That is a bummer, it also explains why you have been so quiet for so long.
Was it the colleague that was possibly going to āJoin usā?
Enjoy your KALSARIKĆNNIT
No, not him. Itās an older employee who does all the 3D drawings for our in-house testing equipment - or any kind of in-house equipment. And he bothers the shit out of me too: whenever I pass by his office while running around to try and meet the deadlines, heās slouching in his fucking chair reading the fucking newspaper or something. I suppose thatās the privilege of age or seniority cuz nobody says anything, but Iām not impressed.
I donāt know what happened with the other dudeās sudden passion for implants. Iām guessing it was a temporary fad.
Oh I think I see in what part you disagree.
Love the way you write btw.
Love for animals and plants or nature has nothing to do with who is above or below.
Undeniably, humans have the power to alter considerably the environment at will, and animals have no form to state their opinions inside the society we have created.
Humans have for centuries farmed animals to take advantage of their products, from fur, eggs, meat, to use them for their strength, abilities, etc.
Just like my cat had me working extra shifts because he would only eat expensive food.
Mind-reading device for a dog, cat, parrot, snake, tarantula. Itās been a dreams of humans to be able to communicate with their pets easier.
The natural state of the world and all biological things living in it has been affected time after time by the effects of humans.
Yet again, one tinny virus mutates and can PWN a large part of humanity.
One medium size ball of whatever falls into the ground from space and mass extinction all over again.
As much as humans have the ability to create, control and destroy at will, based on their own made concepts of worth, holiness, rights, they are also incapable to beat many natural events that we know exist, and will inevitably happen someday. Simple as avoiding ādeathā.
Better or above animals? Nah, I canāt just flap my arms and cross the city. Shake my butt and cross the ocean.
Damn, a couple of degrees change in temperature and my human body is already giving me issues. Not to even mention how grumpy, depressed or plain crazy some get when they are hungry, sleepy or horny.
Iām a cat lover, and I seem to be able to understand them just fine without any translator. Or rather, they seem to be able to order me around without any difficulty I rarely wonder why they meow or act the way they do.
Iām absolutely a cat person too.
I am sorry to hear it. At least you caught the mistake before it was deployed.
It was supposed to be in operation next week to start production. Now weāll have to tell the customer weāll run late.
If I was the customer I would rather get a working item late than a useless piece of junk on time. Itās just a pity I am not the customer.
It sounds like the guy who screwed up shouldnāt get paidā¦ After all he doesnāt sound like he is working.
Slainte.
Now I gotta wonder if itās anything thatās been hinted at recentlyā¦
Not really. Itās a fatigue testing machine for flex implants that I promised Amal - that I havenāt had time to make good on yet.
The problem is, we pay penalties for every day weāre late. We could deliver at 2/3 production capacity, but at some point weāll have to pull everything apart and redo it anyway.
Do you own the company? Do you pay the late fees personally? I understand that this situation is frustrating, but you have done everything you can for the moment.
Relax, have a drink, and then tomorrow or Monday you can start to fix things.
Yeah yeah, Iām not at fault and I did what I had to. No issues there But I have my professional pride: I promised the damn thing on time and it wonāt be. Not my fault and all, and I know my boss knows it, but it still sucks
As for the drink, way ahead of you there
Itās 2:50 AM here, I am on-call for work, and I am sitting drinking a New Belgium Trippel (because I couldnāt find any real Belgian beers last weekend).
I know how you feel.
Ah! Iām in Finland yet I still manage to be working my way through a Rochefort 10