Transhumanism / Bioengineering and Cybernetics

[Baron Sidur Haski]

I have an agent character in a play by post that got the "augment" result. Overall, I think it works well, and I can't wait to get at that crime scene with my bionic peepers.

A supplement would be great! Would this include bio-augmentation stuff as well?

 

[Golan2072]

I still have problems with the basic idea, why would I want to replace a perfectly good arm (well a bit ugly at he moment because of sunburn) with a metal one?

Aren't people already doing this with their noses or breasts?

And, of course, an augmentation doesn't have to look like a robotic part. Many would have synthetic pseudo-skin cover, or be completely biological in the fist place. Ugly cyber is for cheap prosthetics... And back-street cyberclinics.

 

[-Daniel-]

I still have problems with the basic idea, why would I want to replace a perfectly good arm (well a bit ugly at he moment because of sunburn) with a metal one?

Aren't people already doing this with their noses or breasts?

More then that. Calf and pectoral inserts, some muscle sculpting, among others.

Yes, today the idea of replacing a good working item with a cyber one may seem unreal, but there could be economic as well as social reasons. In one of the GitS TV series episodes they had folks getting full body prosthetics so they could work in a high radiation environment. They got the body and a good paycheck in exchange for working for a period of time.

Just a thought.

Daniel

 

[Klaus Kipling]

Why replace your arm when you could just add another one.

Look up Stelarc and Orlan.

Cyborgism could become a new fetishism. In fact, it already is with some folk (and here the Extropians come to mind).

 

[Baron Sidur Haski]

I had just a smidge of what is going on with the advances in prosthetics right as I got out of CAD school. It is unbelievable. Runners with replacement legs running faster than they did with thier natural one. These things are realities.

For us culturally, there is no choice. I would much rather have a functional metal arm than nothing.

My own experience? While returning some rental tools to a warehouse in NYC, my co-worker and I nearly crashed our truck on seeing probably one of the most gorgeous women I have ever seen walking down the street down on 10th, coming from shopping. I am not the lecher type, but this young lady practically had bluebirds carrying her parcels for her.

We only saw her for a breif instant, but in that instant we noticed that from the knees down, she had beautifully engineered spring-react piston replacement lower legs. We both went from jackass girl watching to gasp mode in a nanosecond. There was no telling from the woman's movements that she had prosthetics, at all. My coworker turned to me and said : "Was that a hot cyborg?" , he said? I said, "Yes, an incredibly hot cyborg." and we drove on.

I am not trying to objectify this person or her accident, but for neither of us, there was no "oh, that poor amuptee girl" or "oh, that poor handicapped girl". Later in the pub, we both we talking about how we were both astonished at the advances in it. More than once the phrase "all of that sci fi stuff you're into comin' true!" and he was right. We also were saying "only in New York" a lot!

 

[Baron Sidur Haski]

Gamewise?

It should vary from world to world. and from tech to tech.
Anyone coming from a TL 15 culture that wanted TL 9 bionics for example, in his body, would be some sort of fetishist or weirdo.

Of course if youre on a TL 9 world, and thats all you got, you still have it a darn sight better than TL 4 or 5. Might as well get the arm with Buzzsaw attachment.

I always thought Cybernetics in some form was a good fit for Traveller, due to the battles, survival roll events, all that. A smidge here and there is no big deal. Having a system for it would be a great help.

 

[klingsor]

No argument about the medical use of cybernetics - a very good point (and a nice real world example). Not convinced otherwise - augmenting is one thing, as has been pointed out this already happens but outright replacement? It would have to be very good - allowing full touch and function but I suppose that is what we are talking about. I am just being conservative.

I can imagine a planet with cybenetically altered serfs - off hand I don't think the Imperium has any minimal set of human, sorry sophent, rights rules so nasty rules could do nasty things to their people. What might be done with hookers does not bear imagining (guess who has been reading China Mieville recently).

 

[Klaus Kipling]

The new SM has explicitly stated that Imperial High Law bans slavery.

However, there are gray areas; I'd imagine replicant love-bots might be hard to classify as sophonts or an invention, ie: device.

And while slavery might be verboten, caste isn't.

Then there's all sorts of other incentives and intimidations that could coerce people into such surgical solutions; Hollywood and fake boobies is a good example.

 

[zozotroll]

Or Brazil and modified everything.

I think the more of it becomes available, the more it will mix into social norms. Look at the Net. To me, the net is very cool and so much better than it was before. But to my kids, the net is no more cool than air. It just is, and has always been. They look at me when I get all excited that I exchanged posts with Brian or Martin.

When I was young, that would have been impossible. Yet now, it is almost taken for grant4d except by old fogies like me.

It will likely be the same with the first cyber arms and eyes. Weird to the first generation, just part of life to the second. Of course that hinges upon makeing cyber that is better than normal function. But that may well happen.

 

[EDG]

The new SM has explicitly stated that Imperial High Law bans slavery.

However, there are gray areas; I'd imagine replicant love-bots might be hard to classify as sophonts or an invention, ie: device.

Transhumanist concepts can cause people to have very... odd reactions. One well-known Traveller grognard openly despises me because I don't find the idea of owning a bioroid in Transhuman Space to be abhorrent, because to him it's slavery and that's that. I don't see it that way at all - if they're programmed and created to serve you, and are incapable of operating outside of that paradigm, then how can it be slavery to own one? I wouldn't dream of mistreating them either - I'd treat them with the respect I'd show any intelligent being, but he still thinks I'm some kind of monster because of my tolerance for the concept.

 

[captainjack23]

The new SM has explicitly stated that Imperial High Law bans slavery.

However, there are gray areas; I'd imagine replicant love-bots might be hard to classify as sophonts or an invention, ie: device.

Its not new to the new version of SM, and dealt with in a few places previously; all living sentient creatures within the empire are citizens, and protected from slavery; robots may be sentient, but are not alive, and thus property. Clones are both alive and sentient, so thus cannot be property. Clones grown without brains (as a parts car, for instance) would presumably fall into the category of non-sentient but alive, so could be property....as with pets and domestic animals.

Love-bots, regardless of programming and other limits, are sentient and either alive if biological, non alive if not.

The grey area is indeed in cyborging; it seems that prosthesis (medical issues) are okay - artificial augments are iffy. In MT there was some discussion that in general, past a certain point you counted as a machine, and thus not a citizen; and different areas/planets set the limit differently.

Clearly, at some point or replacement, society decides you are no longer alive -and voluntary replacement clearly counts more against one than medically necessary replacement. It's important to remember, too that in the OTU, one assumes that in any of the spacefaring societies have access to organic replacement - so avoidable mechanical prosthesis may be seen as a statement, perhaps, of antihumanism.

And as to the Transhuman space biorad love toy stuff ? Slavery, or the appearance of slavery is somewhat of an emotional issue...and thus often not governed by logic. Plus, we here in the USA are still dealing with it and its social consequences...every goddam day....so if the Grognard in question is a Yank, bear with him.

My opinion ? Yeah, it does seem reprehensible; but even more reprehensible is creating a living sentient being with those limits. And besides, until you actually do have access to a love slave....well, lets just say that action and previously stated opinion often differ when the chips are down. Drives us Psych types crazy, in fact.

 

[EDG]

And as to the Transhuman space biorad love toy stuff ? Slavery, or the appearance of slavery is somewhat of an emotional issue...and thus often not governed by logic. Plus, we here in the USA are still dealing with it and its social consequences...every goddam day....so if the Grognard in question is a Yank, bear with him.

I half wonder what he'd make of the film A.I... maybe some of it was cultural, but I was surprised by how vehemently he reacted (and it wasn't just to me, it was to anyone who didn't immediately denounce the concept). I mean, I'm squicked out by some of the concepts in Transhuman Space (Sentient Snacks being one... though I think Hitch-hikers Guide To The Galaxy prepped me for that one. Funnily enough, people don't have problems biting heads of jelly-babies all the time while they're inanimate, but as soon as you make them 'alive' then it becomes something wholly terrible).

Quite a few people think Transhuman Space is a wholly dystopian future (helped in part by the art, but don't get me started on that). Even the author has stated that it's not supposed to be though - just like our world today there are "bright" bits and "dark" bits.

But... this is the point of good sci-fi - it extrapolates from today and makes us really think of the consequences and re-examine how we look at things today. Some will embrace that projected future, and others won't.

 

[SnowDog]

Transhuman Space seems to me to be a much brighter place than any Cyberpunk setting. If you are thinking about bioroid 'slaves' as a positive thing in a game setting then I have no problem with it. If you think about it this way in RW I would reserve my opinion to the point until/if there actually are such things. So, I don't have an opinion of such things in real life as I think of them as scifi so far and I have too much to think/worry about in my current life that I would bother with that kind of stuff

Anyway, as Traveller is designed to be a game engine for other setting than OTU, too I would really like to see a book about this kind of stuff. It would really help me realize some setting ideas that I have got from reading Alastair Reynolds (Revelation Space series of books) and Richard Morgan (Takeshi Kovacs and Black Man/13).

 

[Golan2072]

I could imagine some corporations saying that if they've replaced more than 50% of your body at their own expense, then technically they own you... Opening the way for high-tech slavery. On the other hand, owning anything which is incapable of true independent thought won't be slavery - it would be like owning a machine or a pet.

 

[captainjack23]

Quite a few people think Transhuman Space is a wholly dystopian future (helped in part by the art, but don't get me started on that). Even the author has stated that it's not supposed to be though - just like our world today there are "bright" bits and "dark" bits.

Which is likely why it seems dystopian...

...I mean, I'm sure If I looked forward from the early seventies to today I'd agree that the future isn't what it used to be.... :?

 

[Jeff Hopper]

Unfortunately (?), the TLL will prevent explorations of the sexaroid theme in published material.

18. The nature of all material You use or distribute that incorporates the Licensed Articles must comply with all applicable laws and regulations, as well as community standards of decency, as further described below. You must use Your best efforts to preserve the high standard and goodwill of the Licensed Trademarks. In order to assure the foregoing standard and quality requirements, Mongoose shall have the right, upon notice to You, to review and inspect all material released by You that uses the Licensed Articles. You shall fully cooperate with Mongoose to facilitate such review and inspection, including timely provision of copies of all such materials to Mongoose. Mongoose may terminate this License immediately upon attempted notice to you if it deems, in its sole discretion, that your use of the Licensed Articles does not meet the above standards.

Violence and Gore – Descriptions of combat are acceptable in a covered product. However art or text depicting excessively graphic violence or gore is not acceptable.

Sexual Themes - Sexual situations—including abuse and pornography—may not appear graphically in art or text. When depicting the human form—or creatures possessing humaniform features—gratuitous nudity, the depiction of genitalia, bare female nipples, and sexual or bathroom activity is not acceptable. While sensuality and sexuality may appear in a covered product, it must not be the focus nor can it be salacious in nature.

Prejudice - Covered products can not depict existing real-world minorities, nationalities, social castes, religious groups, genders, lifestyle preferences, or people with disabilities as a group inferior to any other group. Current, real-world religions and religious groups and/or practices will not be portrayed in any way that promotes disrespect for these religions or their participants. A covered product can not endorse or promote any specific religion or religious practice.

And I can understand the inclusion, because do we really want to see on shelves The Book of Erotic Science Fiction, Powered by Traveller? It would probably cause more harm than good.

 

[Deniable]

The only thing the TLL will prevent will be the use of the Traveller logo on such material. The OGL doesn't have any such restrictions.

 

[rgd]

While sensuality and sexuality may appear in a covered product, it must not be the focus nor can it be salacious in nature.

If it's a book on artificials, cyborgs, androids, bots, etc., and the "love-bot" is just one of many kinds presented and issues explored, and it's not prurient, I think it would be allowed.

(As I've been reading the TLL and SRD, I'm beginning to see the possibilities of TLL or OGL books based on Traveller (the SRD), beyond the OTU. Which, since the OTU has been my favorite for many years, is saying something.
Somehow, with D&D it was always about creating my own settings, but with Traveller it was always the OTU that held my interest. But getting additional books (from Mongoose or third-parties) that detail things like this, it could be different.)

 

[Dyrewulf]

While sensuality and sexuality may appear in a covered product, it must not be the focus nor can it be salacious in nature.

If it's a book on artificials, cyborgs, androids, bots, etc., and the "love-bot" is just one of many kinds presented and issues explored, and it's not prurient, I think it would be allowed.

Yup, love bots, so long as they were not a focus of a AI type book would and should be acceptable, it wouldn't be a focus, and you just don't use crude images to portray them.

 

[Rikki Tikki Traveller]

Agreed, you can have Love-Bots, but don't get too graphic on what they are capable of doing or show R-Rated pictures of what they can do.

If you can show it on public TV in the US, it is probably OK. Not sure what the nudity laws are in other countries, so I cannot speak for them.