How human are humans?

[Nyotarules]

Human history shows superior ambition does not need superior ability, or genetic enhancements. What was superior about the dictators that exist in our past and present apart from having loads of money, being able to whip up a crowd to hate the other, or having access to natural resources that the rest of the planet needs?

 

[Kemaiku]

If anything, a lot of the worst people in history have been driven by the fact that they're inferior to begin with.

 

[Christopher]

I am not for genetic enhancements at all because as Spock rightly pointed out, superior ability breeds superior ambition. Those augments were who they were because of those enhancements.

That's nonsense. Trek is full of people with superior ability who use it positively, including Spock himself, not to mention Bashir. As Arik Soong made clear in the Augment trilogy, what made Khan's Augments so dangerous was that their engineers chose to amplify their aggression rather than more positive traits. It wasn't genetic engineering per se that did it, it was the particular priorities of their creators.

There are things we shouldn't be screwing with, like messing with genes or adding devices into our brains.

By that logic, nobody should wear glasses or get their teeth straightened or get treatment for arthritis or cataracts or cancer. All those things are technological interventions in natural biological processes, intended to improve on nature. Good grief, humans have been enhancing ourselves since we started wearing clothes and using tools.

For that matter, human technology has been altering our genetics for thousands of years already. We've developed smaller, weaker jaws because of the invention of cooking millennia ago. The genes for lactose tolerance in adulthood have spread widely through the population since we began herding livestock. It's naive to think that the advancements of the past are okay while the advancements of the future are immoral. The only difference is in whether we're used to them or not.

Human history shows superior ambition does not need superior ability, what was superior about the dictators that exist in our past and present apart from having loads of money, being able to whip up a crowd to hate the other, or having access to natural resources that the rest of the planet needs?

Exactly. It's generally the weaker, stupider people who need to dominate and victimize others in order to feel worthwhile -- as anyone who follows current American politics can see clearly. By the same token, Hitler was widely mocked by the German people in his early years, seen as a pathetic joke because he wasn't particularly bright or competent. He was anything but a superior human.

 

[Farscape One]

But adding those superior abilities just amplifies those bad traits.

 

[Christopher]

But adding those superior abilities just amplifies those bad traits.

And it amplifies the good traits in good people. Ever heard of a guy called Superman?

Power is intrinsically neutral. Whether it's used positively or negatively depends on the intent and responsibility of the user. I saw an article a while back (can't remember where, sadly) about a study that analyzed the saying "power corrupts" and found that it isn't actually true -- in practice, whether power is used positively or negatively depends on whether the person who gained the power was corrupt to begin with. The greater power only amplified whatever positive or negative leanings they already had.

 

[Farscape One]

You can't really compare putting on glasses or fixing a tooth with altering the very building blocks of life.

 

[Christopher]

You can't really compare putting on glasses or fixing a tooth with altering the very building blocks of life.

The only difference, as I said, is that you're used to the former and unfamiliar with the latter. You're reacting from kneejerk fear of novelty rather than taking the long view. Every new technological advance, including the ones you take for granted, was denounced as an unacceptable change to the human way of life when it was new, because people instinctively fear the unfamiliar. The way of living that seems "natural" to you is actually shaped by thousands of years of innovation and aleration of nature, so it's really quite arbitrary to say "Every change that created the life I'm used to was good but every change away from the life I'm used to is bad." It's the height of egocentrism to insist that the norm for your particular generation should dictate what is good or evil for people centuries after you're gone. A lot of the stuff you take for granted would've been denounced in the exact same way by your ancestors.

And humans have been "altering the very building blocks of life" for thousands of years. Every plant and animal product you eat has been genetically altered from its natural form -- it's called domestication. Modern genetic engineering is simply a more precise, controlled way of doing the exact same thing, and the Luddite panic that gets stirred up about GMOs is pure ignorance that's already been debunked by science. Yes, there were valid concerns about the safety of GMO foods early on, but those concerns have been addressed and their safety has been established, but that doesn't get reported because it's more lucrative for the media and marketers to stir up people's fears of change than it is to educate them.

This is why Star Trek's hostility to genetic engineering is so incongruous. In most respects, ST has always been a franchise that's optimistic about the potential of technological progress, rather than giving into kneejerk Luddite fears. Okay, TOS had the same kneejerk paranoia toward artificial intelligence, but TNG corrected that. And really, DS9 critiqued the fear of genetic engineering even while it established it, because Bashir proved that the fears were unfounded.

 

[FormerLurker]

Multilingualism (even to high numbers of languages) is actually not at all unusual in human history. In fact, the smartest people in some tribal societies are capable of mental feats of memory that dwarf 90% of what the rest of us are capable of, simply because they have to rely on their brain rather than writing things down/saving computer files. And if you're simply talking about them reading panels on ships that have been previously unknown, the dialogue around that makes it clear that Star Trek ships all tend to have the same basic design features which must relate to one another in a limited number of possible ways - so they should be easy to figure out for anyone who is well versed in how starships work (and we do see people who can't figure that sort of thing out, as well).

SCOTTY: Where's the damn anti-matter inducer?
CHEKOV: This? No, this!

Power is intrinsically neutral. Whether it's used positively or negatively depends on the intent and responsibility of the user. I saw an article a while back (can't remember where, sadly) about a study that analyzed the saying "power corrupts" and found that it isn't actually true -- in practice, whether power is used positively or negatively depends on whether the person who gained the power was corrupt to begin with. The greater power only amplified whatever positive or negative leanings they already had.

VOLDEMORT: There is no good or evil. There is only power, and the will to use it.

 

[dswynne1]

Here is something that no one has considered: the involvement of the Vulcans. How involved were they in not only helping the humans to develop their space program, but also to help the humans repair both their home planet and their species? Remember, WW3 just happened ten years prior to FC. You would have had horrible injuries and genetic damage occuring within a sizeable percentage of the population. Whose to say that Vulcan interference did much to create the kind of human beings that would exist in the TNG era, albeit indirectly?

 

[rahullak]

VOLDEMORT: There is no good or evil. There is only power, and the will to use it.

What Voldy missed out: There's only power, the will to use it, the ends and the means of that use.

That last part determines good or evil to a significant extent.

 

[Farscape One]

I'm not a fan of GMO in food, either. It's not a coincidence that so many of the health issues have become so prevalent in recent years... lactose intolerance, allergies to EVERYTHING, cancer in pretty much every family.

And the more technological humans get, the less real interaction occurs. Parents aren't really raising their kids... the devices are.

As a society, we have regressed. Humans have become such lazy, entitled, prissy, weak creatures. The older I have gotten, the less I want to be around people because so many of them are pretty rotten. In my experience, at least where I live.

 

[johnnybear]

The devices in our brains and bodies has already started and will be embraced I should dare to say by 65% of the population! The amount of people who live with their phone is staggering, it's all that seems to matter to them! Along with the radiation such things emit!
JB

 

[Timo]

Here is something that no one has considered: the involvement of the Vulcans. How involved were they in not only helping the humans to develop their space program, but also to help the humans repair both their home planet and their species?

Well, the slightest suggestion of Vulcan tampering with human genes (to wit, a Vulcan-human child) was considered abhorrent in the 2150s still. If most people had Vulcan genetic engineering to thank for the fact that their great-grandparents survived to have viable offspring, it would probably be more difficult for Terra Prime to fan up the racist indignation.

Whose to say that Vulcan interference did much to create the kind of human beings that would exist in the TNG era, albeit indirectly?

Vulcans might have done a lot covertly, of course. Might tie in to that merging of Star Trek and Larry Niven's Known Space in TAS "The Slaver Weapon": Vulcans are Star Trek's Puppeteers, secretly manipulating mankind and other species for greater utility in their schemes of world domination. Or at least of making the universe a safer place for Vulcans, with the manipulated humans now volunteering in droves to defend Vulcan via Starfleet.

What Voldy missed out: There's only power, the will to use it, the ends and the means of that use.That last part determines good or evil to a significant extent.

Wouldn't the greatest significance come from those who judge, rather than from those who do? The same deed (say, carpet-bombing) can be good or evil, depending on whom you ask.

I'm not a fan of GMO in food, either. It's not a coincidence that so many of the health issues have become so prevalent in recent years... lactose intolerance, allergies to EVERYTHING, cancer in pretty much every family.

Or then it is.

But what suggestion is there that these health issues would be more prevalent? Previously, people just died in horrible ways before they had time to worry about allergies.

And as pointed out above, lactose intolerance is one of those things that the modern world has made virtually disappear. It used to be a global problem before we invented "global". Now we travel, and fuck strangers from afar, and soon enough everybody can drink milk.

And the more technological humans get, the less real interaction occurs. Parents aren't really raising their kids... the devices are.

How is that different from the past where, at various times, the kids have been raised by grandparents, strangers or nobody at all, because there did not yet exist anything one could call free time?

The older I have gotten, the less I want to be around people because so many of them are pretty rotten. In my experience, at least where I live.

Weren't you worried about "less real interaction" just a sentence before, though?

Timo Saloniemi

 

[rahullak]

Wouldn't the greatest significance come from those who judge, rather than from those who do? The same deed (say, carpet-bombing) can be good or evil, depending on whom you ask.

The ends and the means of the use of power would be the greatest significance. Carpet-bombing by anyone on anyone is bad. At best it is a necessary evil. We tolerate it because our ends (ending or curtailing terrorism) are nobler than the terrorists' ends (wiping out civilization as we know it), and we have not been able to find (or been inadequate at) less evil means of stopping terrorism.

 

[Timo]

So it has nothing to do with deeds, but with justifications.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[rahullak]

So it has nothing to do with deeds, but with justifications.

Timo Saloniemi

No. It has to do with deeds and their justifications and their means.

This was the post I was responding to:

VOLDEMORT: There is no good or evil. There is only power, and the will to use it.

If the only thing that matters is grabbing as much power as one wants and using that power as one wishes, no justifications, no ends, no means, no dealing with the results of deeds...that's the recipe for war and the end of civilizations.

 

[Tenacity]

The humans we see in Trek are not just polymaths, able to read alien control panels, undertake complex warp theory calculations etc but also beat the tar out of a Klingon in physical combat.

Tasha Yar was a polymath?

I figure (somehow) the universal translator also works with text too, in addition to sounds. Providing that the UT is a implant, It translates what you see.

Probably relatively few Starfleet personnel actually understand the complexity of warp theory. Yes they can operate the controls that send a starship into warp, but the underlying theory is beyond the majority of them.

With the exception of a few Klingons (Kurge, Worf) most Klingons don't seem to be particularly strong, or even that good of fighters. They (imho) acquired a empire through technology and cultural drive.

ALL Trek humans' ancestors survived World War III

Not all, it would be like saying that all Humans survived the first world war. Europeans survived the first world war. The third world war killed about six and a half percent of the Human population, and we as a species recovered in half century. Likely the war was (like the first) in a certain region of the Earth and not in any way "world wide."

the Eugenic Wars

Some deal as above.

We're a whole lot taller and healthier, on average

Modern day Japanese are considerable bigger and healthier than their great-grandparents. Better and more food, better health. Not genetics.

those who are engineered will become the privileged upper class

Today most "superior" (physical and intelligence) people are not the upper class, the upper class are just people from the regular population who worked themselves (or were born) into a better societal position.

If someone was genetically enhanced to have (one example) the intelligence of Albert Einstein, how that in of itself move them into the "privileged upper class?" Einstein wasn't particularly rich, just comfortably middle class. While people of power did occasionally listen to his opinions, he wasn't a person of power.

People who were genetically "superior" would in all likelihood be working for people who weren't.

 

[Farscape One]

Well, the slightest suggestion of Vulcan tampering with human genes (to wit, a Vulcan-human child) was considered abhorrent in the 2150s still. If most people had Vulcan genetic engineering to thank for the fact that their great-grandparents survived to have viable offspring, it would probably be more difficult for Terra Prime to fan up the racist indignation.



Vulcans might have done a lot covertly, of course. Might tie in to that merging of Star Trek and Larry Niven's Known Space in TAS "The Slaver Weapon": Vulcans are Star Trek's Puppeteers, secretly manipulating mankind and other species for greater utility in their schemes of world domination. Or at least of making the universe a safer place for Vulcans, with the manipulated humans now volunteering in droves to defend Vulcan via Starfleet.



Wouldn't the greatest significance come from those who judge, rather than from those who do? The same deed (say, carpet-bombing) can be good or evil, depending on whom you ask.



Or then it is.

But what suggestion is there that these health issues would be more prevalent? Previously, people just died in horrible ways before they had time to worry about allergies.

And as pointed out above, lactose intolerance is one of those things that the modern world has made virtually disappear. It used to be a global problem before we invented "global". Now we travel, and fuck strangers from afar, and soon enough everybody can drink milk.



How is that different from the past where, at various times, the kids have been raised by grandparents, strangers or nobody at all, because there did not yet exist anything one could call free time?



Weren't you worried about "less real interaction" just a sentence before, though?

Timo Saloniemi

Lactose intolerance has not been cured or even pushed back. More and more people cannot drink dairy milk. That allergy has gotten far worse, not better.

And people still die horribly today. Yes, we have eliminated some diseases, but the remaining ones have become far more deadly. And people seem to have weaker immunity to simple things, more so than before. Plus, we have CREATED diseases in labs that could very well wipe out civilization. Would you call that progress?

And as for parents not having free time... I'm sorry, but I have seen far too many examples of parents having time to spare to be with their kids, only to just land a tablet or game system in front of them while they just go do other things. Not saying they can't have an outside life, but to do that EVERY DAY AND NIGHT of the week? That is not being a parent, that is passing off your responsibilities.

And about less real interaction... I do have my interactions with actual people. But I choose my amount of interaction because I know how to have a regular conversation in person. Many get completely lost in the internet and forget HOW to conversate with real humans. They get trapped behind a screen and never learn how to read simple gestures, body language, or just plain look at someone while talking.

 

[Nyotarules]

And it amplifies the good traits in good people. Ever heard of a guy called Superman?

Power is intrinsically neutral. Whether it's used positively or negatively depends on the intent and responsibility of the user. I saw an article a while back (can't remember where, sadly) about a study that analyzed the saying "power corrupts" and found that it isn't actually true -- in practice, whether power is used positively or negatively depends on whether the person who gained the power was corrupt to begin with. The greater power only amplified whatever positive or negative leanings they already had.

Example compare Nelson Mandela to Zuma

 

[Christopher]

Here is something that no one has considered: the involvement of the Vulcans. How involved were they in not only helping the humans to develop their space program, but also to help the humans repair both their home planet and their species?

On the contrary, Enterprise established that the Vulcans resisted humanity's efforts to develop its warp program, for fear of the damage that violent, emotional humans would do if they were unleashed on the galaxy before they matured as a society. That's why it took nearly a century after First Contact before NX-01's major exploration push into the galaxy, and why Archer resented the Vulcans so much at the start of the series.

Remember, WW3 just happened ten years prior to FC. You would have had horrible injuries and genetic damage occuring within a sizeable percentage of the population. Whose to say that Vulcan interference did much to create the kind of human beings that would exist in the TNG era, albeit indirectly?

Again, that's a huge overstatement of the prevalence of the damage as a percentage of the overall population of Earth. Even if we assume the number of genetically damaged people was, say, twice the death toll, that's 1.2 billion people out of maybe 9.2 billion survivors, which means that some 87% of the human population would still be unaffected.