Is the question clear?

I'm afraid the question is not clear at all, Colin.

Transhumanism may be conceptually stimulating, but does it propose now for people in a hurry to solve health problems? Some people place a lot of hope in it. Is this clearer, Machael?

In that case, the answer is probably no, simply because transhumanists are not interested in solving people's health problems. They are interested in suggesting ways to overcome our human condition and become something better (presumably something that, among other things, has less health problems).

So I see now that health problems are at least in the conceptual package of it all. What is not in the conceptual package of transhumanism?

Gabi is right, of course: Kurzweil is almost obsessed with health issues, but for him health is not an end, but a means: live long enough to live forever. Improving or preserving one's health is a way of buying time. It is an elevator to the future.

Ok, partially complete your argument Michael, and a nice addition to the excellent comment made by Gabi just above. We all wish to stay healthy longer. Health is the means as you say, but also an end in itself. Aubrey de Grey spoke about this at our conference in LavalVirtual2012: Living forever=no death=healthy society because deceased individuals stats is at 0. Not logical to you?

Colin

I think Transhumanism is premature (or perhaps mislabeled). We need humanism as a foundation before building a viable Transhumanist ethos. That means we must first grasp what it is to be human--the sort of thinking you are offering and the taxonomic work I am doing on thee-online.com Otherwise the whole AI/AGI/Singularity effort impoverishes us. I shudder when I read some of the claims and accounts. Rationality and science has been taken over by a mathematical-materialistic-mechanistic ideology. Academia is largely in thrall to the politics of funding, so fashion ends up playing a large role and cannot be resisted. Neuroscience denies volition or even personal existence, and deals with trivial psychosocial phenomena. Reflective thought comes second place.

What do you think?

Warren

Shuddering in the face of "mathematical-materialistic-mechanistic ideology" as you put it may well be the right thing to do. I appreciate your writing, very interdisciplinary and thus has high scientific "kred" as they say in business. The fundings issues is very problematic, to the point that I am responding to calls to get CNRS funding in order to gather people to talk about the relation between scientific credentials and funding! Not really what I had in mind at the start, but it could turn out to be interesting. Or enthrallingly boring. Warren, you have not totally "high-jacked" the original question I put forth as you give interesting leads to though about it on your site; you also have not done so as I have been thinking, as you can see, about e-reputation and the Slow Science and SlowThought propositions for some time now. May I refer you to my question related to this? Cf. then:

https://www.researchgate.net/post/Is_a_ResearchGate_score_scientific_clout_Is_it_a_commodity

https://www.researchgate.net/post/Is_a_ResearchGate_score_scientific_clout_Is_it_a_commodity

You link generates a "post inaccessible" result:

https://www.researchgate.net/topics/#postUnaccessible

Can you check and fix?

Cheers

Warren

Try again? It works for me. Or go here:

https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Colin_Schmidt/questions/?ev=prf_que

or go type my name Colin T. Schmidt and see the 1st question about scientific clout in the contributions section.

Your Profile says you have asked 5 Questions, but only 4 Questions are visible on my screen and the Q about scientific clout is missing. Not sure why, but that is how it is: see screenshot. I notice that you published some thoughts about Redesigning Man. Could you email me a pdf at: [email protected] Thanks.

I see you don't see so I uploaded it again. Today it had already 28 views since yesterday and no response at all. Strange. Asked it in Philosophy, statistics and economics. You should now see 6 questions.

https://www.researchgate.net/post/Is_a_ResearchGate_score_scientific_clout_Is_it_a_commodity_Un_score_dinfluence_ResearchGate_constitue-t-il_un_poids_scientifique

QUESTION REPHRASED. Here is the revamped question : "Does INCREASED PRESENCE on scientific social networks yield a greater scientific clout factor (GSCF)? Why does a researcher need this? or seek it?

Colin--the system just won't show me your question. But I see it above.

Naturally, I can't tell you why researchers seek social media. I doubt it gives anyone much clout. It seems to be largely a waste of time. Having said that, I got a magic reply to one of my questions that really got me going in the right direction.

But that was a little blessing from heaven. It is not why I am here.

I can tell you my position. I am out of academe now and I like to see what others are up to. My work is now developing my discovery of a taxonomy of human elements (being posted at thee-online.com )

I have found (painfully) that this taxonomy discovery is unacceptable for senior people in social sciences and philosophy--they have worked hard to think as they do and something like THEE violates their self-interest and is too much effort. They just look away.

So I am seeking young people who can intuitively see there is something wrong with current scientism, the reduction of human experience to neurons, and fraudulent objective social sciences (for which the poster child is economics)--and want to do something positive rather than just complain and posture.

Researchgate.net is full of young people....but many seem caught up with the academic rat-race. They are useless for me.

I need some people with open minds and readiness to be part of an extraordinary discovery (as judged by themselves) even if it is not currently fashionable. There is much work to be done on THEE that is beyond my ability to do. Perhaps they exist on the Researchgate network, perhaps not.

Meanwhile I enjoy leaving comments here and there and seeing what happens.

I agree, being in the "academic rat race" (to freedom? to success? into oblivion?) as you put it can be tryingly hard on one's ability to select the correct moves to make. Not knowing which to take, people take up stances, perhaps as a defence mechanism. But by taking stabs in the dark as it were in psychotherapy, I am going off from my scientific areas. And apart from what we seem to agree on here, people do seek clout in whatever area they may be, and in the present system, the numbers to come down hard on at least some researchers.

Transhumanism : the belief in the possibility and desirability of fundamentally transforming the human condition by developing and making widely available technologies to greatly enhance human intellectual, physical, and psychological capacities.

The invention of writing did transformed the human condition.

Source: http://adrianakouliasblog.blogspot.ca/2010/05/on-hermes-pharaohs-and-art-of-writing.html