Entries by tag: evolution
Betreffend der Übermenschen
,,The overman...Who has organized the chaos of his passions, given style to his character, and become creative. Aware of life's terrors, he affirms life without resentment.''
- Friedrich Nietzsche
,,Digressions, objections, delight in mockery, carefree mistrust are signs of health; everything unconditional belongs in pathology.''
- Friedrich Nietzsche
,,There is always some madness in love. But there is also always some reason in madness.''
- Friedrich Nietzsche
,,What else is love but understanding and rejoicing in the fact that another person lives, acts, and experiences otherwise than we do…?''
- Friedrich Nietzsche
,,To forget one's purpose is the commonest form of stupidity.''
- Friedrich Nietzsche
,,To predict the behavior of ordinary people in advance, you only have to assume that they will always try to escape a disagreeable situation with the smallest possible expenditure of intelligence.''
- Friedrich Nietzsche
,,The overman...Who has organized the chaos of his passions, given style to his character, and become creative. Aware of life's terrors, he affirms life without resentment.''
- Friedrich Nietzsche
,,Digressions, objections, delight in mockery, carefree mistrust are signs of health; everything unconditional belongs in pathology.''
- Friedrich Nietzsche
,,There is always some madness in love. But there is also always some reason in madness.''
- Friedrich Nietzsche
,,What else is love but understanding and rejoicing in the fact that another person lives, acts, and experiences otherwise than we do…?''
- Friedrich Nietzsche
,,To forget one's purpose is the commonest form of stupidity.''
- Friedrich Nietzsche
,,To predict the behavior of ordinary people in advance, you only have to assume that they will always try to escape a disagreeable situation with the smallest possible expenditure of intelligence.''
- Friedrich Nietzsche
- Current Location:air matress in Gebirgsland
- Emotional State:
inspired - Musik:Christian Death (w/ Rozz Williams) + Qntal
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/6057734.stm : Humans may evolve into two sub-species "in 100,000 years". It's happening faster than that, however.
http://www.johnson.cornell.edu/faculty/profiles/waldman/autpaper.html : article on television and autism, regarding a correlation between the two. Haven't read it yet so no comments from me.
http://yahoo.reuters.com/news/articlehybrid.aspx?storyID=urn:newsml:reuters.com:20061017:MTFH81983_2006-10-17_01-12-03_N16392412&type=comktNews&rpc=44 : Google going hightech green! Those neo=ludites who use 'environmentalism' as an excuse to disslike new tech and futuretech as well as transhumanism really don't know what they're talking about. The higher tech groups understand the need for green tech! It's the lower tech, money hungry idiots that you need to watch out for. Petrol, old style corp., etc.
http://www.johnson.cornell.edu/faculty/profiles/waldman/autpaper.html : article on television and autism, regarding a correlation between the two. Haven't read it yet so no comments from me.
http://yahoo.reuters.com/news/articlehybrid.aspx?storyID=urn:newsml:reuters.com:20061017:MTFH81983_2006-10-17_01-12-03_N16392412&type=comktNews&rpc=44 : Google going hightech green! Those neo=ludites who use 'environmentalism' as an excuse to disslike new tech and futuretech as well as transhumanism really don't know what they're talking about. The higher tech groups understand the need for green tech! It's the lower tech, money hungry idiots that you need to watch out for. Petrol, old style corp., etc.
- Current Location:upstairs
- Musik:strings
Being a large proponent of Transhumanism, and the resultant state of being Posthuman in the future, I feel there are some issues which need to be addressed. These may have been covered by some other people at other times already, but as yet I have yet to see this issue addressed.
While we may yearn for the Posthuman and work on the Transhuman transition to this state, many people neglect that fact that to start out with we are Human, with our Human bodies, however in need of evolution they may be. But this is what we all start from. Depending on genetics, mutation, diet, among other variables, we all have somewhat different versions of the Human model, but more or less the same. Unfortunatley many Humans, and even some of those who are Transhumanists, do not apparently know how to care for and maintain that body. Obesity, malnutrition, sedintary lifestyles, eating dissorders, general neglect, and abuse are rampant problems, especially in 'modernised' Western countries. In the age of fast food we have devolved, trading luxury for health and quality of life. How can individuals, not to mention Humanity on a whole, be expected to care for their Posthuman bodies if they do not care for that which the Human body they start out with? How can someone in such a situation feel that they have really evolved in anyway? They may benefit from the advances but they, themselves, have undergone no evolution, as they will treat their Posthuman bodies with the same care they treated their original Human shape.
The National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey of 1999-2000 discovered that at least 64.5%, or more than 120 million people, are overweight and/or obese (for definition of terms see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Obesity#Definition in America. That study was concluded over 5 years ago, one can only imagine what the numbers would be today. The following is a brief breakdown of the study :
* 31%, or about 59 million adults older than 20, are obese. Obese is defined as 30 or more pounds over a healthy body weight; overweight is roughly 10 to 30 pounds over a healthy weight.
* 33% of adult women are obese, compared with 28% of men.
* 50% of black women are obese compared with 40% of Mexican-American women and 30% of white women. (The survey doesn't have a category labeled Hispanics.) There is virtually no difference in obesity among men based on race.
* 5% of people overall are extremely obese. That's up from about 3% in the early 1990s. But 15% of black women are extremely obese.
* About 15% of children ages 6 to 19, or about 9 million children, are overweight.
Based on this alone the majority of Americans would more than likeley not be able to maintain a Posthuman state without developing new problems as they have not outgrown them yet.
Other problems are eating dissorders ( Wikipedia Eating Disorders Article, NIMH Article) and malnutrition. (Wikipedia Malnutrition, UN World Nutrition Reports) These are as much a problem, even if not as prevelent, as the above. Eating Disorders, especially Anorexia Nervosa, have the highest fatality rate of any Mental Disorders. Lately there has been an movement encouraging eating disorders, "pro-ana", "pro-ed", among others. This promotes not only an unhealthy body treatment with possible long standing side-effects, but an unhealthy mental state as well. And then to encourage others along this path. We can view it as a form of extreme Social Darwinism, or an extrordinarily dangerous meme. Whatever the cause though, it still indicates a lack of management of the Human form, and therefore less chance of successful evolution beyond the Human state. Many people suffer from malnutrition in some fashion without even realizing it, a condition that is not dependent on lack of food, but lack of proper balance in food and nutrients. This can be merely the result of ignorance of one's diet, lack of time set aside to manage one's diet, or general apathy. For whatever reason though, again this would be detremental to any attempts at evolution.
The last issue I wish to address in the present form of this is a sedintery lifestyle. Studies have shown that a sedintery lifestyle, becoming more and more common in American society, has a more detrimental affect on the body than smoking two packs of ciggarettes a day. If that is not a reason to get up and move around what is? We are not evolving into Sloths, the Posthuman should be active, should be more active than the average modern Human is capable of, and on average able to be more physically active than a modern day Human athlete. This can not be achieved if we allow our bodies and their ability for movement to atrophy.
I see this as a moment to take stock of what and where we are evolving to, what may or may not be lacking and then continue from there with whatever changes are necessary. These problems are just a few among many, and like these any such problems must be dealt with at the root or a similair problem will spring forth from the dorment seed of the problem at some point in the future. Before proceeding to the Posthuman, let's make sure we can handle what we wish to outgrow and work on that, as mentioned above, that is where we are starting from, a launching platform so to say.
Just a few thoughts on the subject, please comment.
While we may yearn for the Posthuman and work on the Transhuman transition to this state, many people neglect that fact that to start out with we are Human, with our Human bodies, however in need of evolution they may be. But this is what we all start from. Depending on genetics, mutation, diet, among other variables, we all have somewhat different versions of the Human model, but more or less the same. Unfortunatley many Humans, and even some of those who are Transhumanists, do not apparently know how to care for and maintain that body. Obesity, malnutrition, sedintary lifestyles, eating dissorders, general neglect, and abuse are rampant problems, especially in 'modernised' Western countries. In the age of fast food we have devolved, trading luxury for health and quality of life. How can individuals, not to mention Humanity on a whole, be expected to care for their Posthuman bodies if they do not care for that which the Human body they start out with? How can someone in such a situation feel that they have really evolved in anyway? They may benefit from the advances but they, themselves, have undergone no evolution, as they will treat their Posthuman bodies with the same care they treated their original Human shape.
The National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey of 1999-2000 discovered that at least 64.5%, or more than 120 million people, are overweight and/or obese (for definition of terms see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Obesity#Definition in America. That study was concluded over 5 years ago, one can only imagine what the numbers would be today. The following is a brief breakdown of the study :
* 31%, or about 59 million adults older than 20, are obese. Obese is defined as 30 or more pounds over a healthy body weight; overweight is roughly 10 to 30 pounds over a healthy weight.
* 33% of adult women are obese, compared with 28% of men.
* 50% of black women are obese compared with 40% of Mexican-American women and 30% of white women. (The survey doesn't have a category labeled Hispanics.) There is virtually no difference in obesity among men based on race.
* 5% of people overall are extremely obese. That's up from about 3% in the early 1990s. But 15% of black women are extremely obese.
* About 15% of children ages 6 to 19, or about 9 million children, are overweight.
Based on this alone the majority of Americans would more than likeley not be able to maintain a Posthuman state without developing new problems as they have not outgrown them yet.
Other problems are eating dissorders ( Wikipedia Eating Disorders Article, NIMH Article) and malnutrition. (Wikipedia Malnutrition, UN World Nutrition Reports) These are as much a problem, even if not as prevelent, as the above. Eating Disorders, especially Anorexia Nervosa, have the highest fatality rate of any Mental Disorders. Lately there has been an movement encouraging eating disorders, "pro-ana", "pro-ed", among others. This promotes not only an unhealthy body treatment with possible long standing side-effects, but an unhealthy mental state as well. And then to encourage others along this path. We can view it as a form of extreme Social Darwinism, or an extrordinarily dangerous meme. Whatever the cause though, it still indicates a lack of management of the Human form, and therefore less chance of successful evolution beyond the Human state. Many people suffer from malnutrition in some fashion without even realizing it, a condition that is not dependent on lack of food, but lack of proper balance in food and nutrients. This can be merely the result of ignorance of one's diet, lack of time set aside to manage one's diet, or general apathy. For whatever reason though, again this would be detremental to any attempts at evolution.
The last issue I wish to address in the present form of this is a sedintery lifestyle. Studies have shown that a sedintery lifestyle, becoming more and more common in American society, has a more detrimental affect on the body than smoking two packs of ciggarettes a day. If that is not a reason to get up and move around what is? We are not evolving into Sloths, the Posthuman should be active, should be more active than the average modern Human is capable of, and on average able to be more physically active than a modern day Human athlete. This can not be achieved if we allow our bodies and their ability for movement to atrophy.
I see this as a moment to take stock of what and where we are evolving to, what may or may not be lacking and then continue from there with whatever changes are necessary. These problems are just a few among many, and like these any such problems must be dealt with at the root or a similair problem will spring forth from the dorment seed of the problem at some point in the future. Before proceeding to the Posthuman, let's make sure we can handle what we wish to outgrow and work on that, as mentioned above, that is where we are starting from, a launching platform so to say.
Just a few thoughts on the subject, please comment.
- Musik:Course of Empire - "Information"
Comments
Yeah, cause they give away so much…