From: Simon Laub Date: May 09 2006 NewsGroups: rec.arts.sf.written, rec.arts.sf.science, comp.ai.philosophy, comp.society.futures Keywords: Consciousness, Brain modifications, Future, Robot, Nightmares, SF author Greg Egan Subject: How about an alien Mind-fck? The future is here! (thanks to Axiomatic by Greg Egan) How about an alien Mind-fck? The future is here! ----------------------------------------------------- Surely, in the future we will need brain implant technology to provide instant language skills for business people and tourists etc. And after that a new generation of implants - Egan calls them Axiomatics - rewiring the brain to crave new things in much the same as the old brain craved sweets, sex, affection, food etc. And to top it all - when implant technoloy is firmly in the hands of entertainment conglomerates - "the Alien Mind-fck": "a mental state so bizarre that even as you experience it, you won't know what it is like!". The mental states might be bizarre, still there is a certain logic to the Egan universe. Take Death - Death has always been rather unwelcomed in human society - So surely we will want some kind of high resolution imaging technique that gives a detailed map of the body, down to the cellular level - a map which includes, among other things, a description of every neuron in the bran, every synaptic connection. That way we purchase a kind of immortality. Whatever happens to an original, a copy can always be resurrected in virtual reality. We would have a double which would share all our memories, all our beliefs, all our goals and all desires. Someone to live in that castle - in RAM - we always dreamed of. And surely our friends and families can also be transferred to virtual reality. After all - all what we can have of each other is an imitation, an idea in our heads. But what about our bodies and its slow and unstopping decay? What to do if we really want to go on for ever? If we want something out here in "reality". Obviously there is an Egan fix: "My organic brain was removed and discarded and control of my body was handed over to my "jewel" - a computer that has learned to imitate my brain down to the levels of neurons. My old biological brain was a kind of bootstrap device, nothing more, and to mourn its loss would be as absurd as mourning my emergence from some primitive stage of embryological development. Switching to the dual was something everybody did now". The brain is removed, discarded and replaced with a spongy tissue-cultured object. Replaced by an immortal jewel=dual. A little upsetting for children when parents are switched: "My parents were now machines. Actually, my parents were gods. Gods that will live for a billion years." Anti-progress people will perhaps think it is better to die at 90, than kill yourself at 30 and have some machine marching around, taking your place, pretending to be you. But thats the nature of anti-progress people. You , on the other hand, will eagerly await your wife returning from the operation: "There was nothing to fear after all. I'm exactly the person I've always been. Your loving robot wife Daphne." Really, what is there to fear: "Yesterday, they scraped my scull clean, and inserted my new, non sentient, spacefilling mock brain." And if it gets all to much we can all, ALL, have new biological children: "A patch of skin and muscle was locally anaesthesised, and then a quicky plunging needle delivered the prepackaged biological complex for the abdominal cavity. And he was pregnant". If it gets to scary we can always catch the latest play to make sense of it all: "....We went to the theater for a performance of "Waiting for Godot" by augmented parots". ...... We don't have to wait for the future - Egan gave it to us now! What a wonderful book Axiomatic is!!! FUT: rec.arts.sf.written -Simon XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX Simon Laub http://silanian.tripod.com/ http://www.fortunecity.com/skyscraper/lol/1165/ http://home18.inet.tele.dk/silanian/ Ps. See Egans Quarantine for more on Brain mods: Before going to bed you spray some vial content into your nostrils, and clever nanomachines are carried into your brain. You lie awake a little thinking about the nanorobots finding their way inside your brain. Whether they will make a perfect mod, - or make vital brain centers into neural spaghetti.... When the nanomachines have rewired parts of your brain - You'll be the same you've always been - with a new career, and new allegiances, new values, new capabilities - that's all.... Lets face it, everything you do changes who you are. Eating changes who you are. As does not eating. So, neural mods change peoples values. So, a little moral nanosurgery creates a whole new person - hey, its a free world? Following Greg Egans lead its pretty clear that some brain mods are pretty impossible to live without: "P3", which is designed to confine your thinking to certain useful states of minds - making boredom, distraction, emotional agitation a thing of the past. "Boss", which helps you decide what is good for you. "Hypernova", which takes online gaming to new levels. "RedNet", which makes it possible for you to see infrared and plug into mainframes. Or whatever they gave our hero of "Quarentine" - something that makes you join the police force, lose your spouse - and rewire your brain, so you don't give a fuck.