Would you be 'cyborged'?
 

Here is something I've thought about a lot of times, even concidered writing a story about it... hell even got started on it, though never finished it.

Say the technology existed to put a human brain in a vat and keep it alive for a couple of centuries.
Off course understanding of the brain and robotics have not yet advanced enough to make someone a perfect cyborg. Instead they would just hook the vat with brain up to a couple of electrodes so the person could communicate in a rudimentary way with the outside world. Presumably they would improve on this in time.

The thing is, to improve they need someone to test this on. Off course the scientists first think of the greatest minds alive, to preserve them. But what if the procedure fails?
So they decide to get a guinea pig, and place an advertisement. Would you apply? If you would, why? If not, why not?
Also who would you love to see cyborged, their wisdom preserved for the ages?

Sign me up but not until I am old and about to die. I must have the option to decide when I want the plug pulled & if I am alive as a veggie I want the plug pulled quickly.

My first question would be "Are you using metal that attacts magnets?"

Why? Cause that'd be the prank I'd pull on cyborgs!!! Just throw a magnet on them! heh, Aside from that, Probly not. Right now I'm good, tho if I lost a leg or an arm or something, or my body was horribly mutilated due to a fire or something, Sure. I'd research it up a lot first, but I think I might just have to try it out. Of course this also depends on what exactly I'd be going through. Given the circumstances and the technology, I think I would give it an honest thought about it.

Personally, due to my great affinity with technology and introvert nature would love it. I'd jump at the chance. The only thing is that I would like the scientists to work on setting me up with a library of ebooks. Just something to occupy my mind.
Also I'd love to see total invalids or people like that cyborged. Or deaf/blind people. Only if they wanted it themselves off course, but how wonderfull would it be for a blind/deaf person to be able to talk to human beings, albeit via electrodes.

No, I would not take advantage of this. There is too much out here, in the land of the living and breathing, that I've yet see and experience.

For those who have been there and done that, or are ready to give up on real life, I am sure having a high-speed internet connection and a thought-to-keyboard mapper will sweeten the deal. Hey, if they could spend their disembodied days learning and creating, I am sure it will be worth it, if there's nothing more to get from real life.

Not to mention the awesome gaming possibilities. I am sure there are people out there who would give their left nut and more to be the ultimate low-ping bastards....

Yes of course, I would.
I'm interested in humans evolving into technology as soon as possible.

If you're meaning a brain with out a body, no way. Yea, thinking is fun and all, but nothing beat's playing out in the grass or walks by beautiful scenery.

I'd like to see out top scientists and philosophers "cyborged" so they could help others continue their work on important things (cures for cancer, fast processors, ect.). Maybe some of our great entertainers as well. I'd almost say Bob Dylan, but his genius wouldn't be as great without him performing it.

That's what I was thinking. They could also check with people who are supposed to die of some kind of disease or ailment and see if they would want to try. I'm sure they would get few to say no. After they got it working well, then I would want to be cyborged. Imagine being able to log on to the internet in your mind! and we could use bluetooth technology to go wireless!

As for who I would like to see preserved, I'd like to have great physicists and mathematicians preserved and put into brain farms where they would work day and night trying to crack the secrets of the universe!

exact same thing is in a roald dahl short story...great stuff, he writes.

It sounds by your desciption, you are talking about cryogenics...preserving a body after death at sub degree tempuratures.....Anyway, as far as cyborgenics go...most definently. If I got my arm caught up in a cement mixer and lost it, I would want some sort of replacement. It would be better than nothing ya know?

Definitely!
I want to live forever! What have you got to lose?

When my times up thats my lot. A big no thank you to what would be a life support machine but forever and a day.

Just somthing I heard, if you ride your bike then that makes you a cyborg because your'e connected to machine!

Do I get the badass weapons involved in most cyborgs of death

mmmmmm....the icing on an already sweet cake!

Death-Rays for all!

see I would only do it as a enhancement factor.

enhanced eyesight, (im already damaged there) enhanced hearing (again, 70% loss both ears) some sort of input device to the brain would be sweet. just upload a library. whoa.

some sort of music and data organization and image recognition would be nice as well.

and you know. if cybernetics ever started rolling out, EVERYONE would have to pretty much go that way, can you imagince the job market? competing with an enhanced human with the mental capacity of a computer?

yeah, there would probably be purists as well. but I wouldn't be in that camp. though it would suck to be one of those guys who could die just by gathering too much static electricity ;p

No. I'm a firm believer in some sort of "afterlife", and am curious as to what that may be. Extending my life like the way you describe above isn't natural, and not for me.

Now, if we're talking about using cybergenics to create perfect artificial limbs, recreate eyesight or hearing in the blind/deaf, and that sort of thing - then yes, I'm for it.

well your brain is still organic matter, so i imagine your shelf life on that would rot after so many years.

I dunno, i see those crazy numbers in the bible about how some people lived for thousands of years....

could be nice ;p

I'll parrot what Art said.

For human evolution, for sheer speceis survival, we need this kind of thing as quickly as possible.

i am not sure about the original question, but this has been on my mind........ nanomachines.

considering how they work...... or what i understand (veeeeerrrrrryyyyyyy little) there should be a way to trick the my nervous system, if not override it, to discontinue atrophy.

imagine..... muscles being dead for 2 and a half decades... then power.

it's far ftetched. but me living this long would have been considered science fiction.

i'm up fort experimentation as long as i'm informed.

Nah. I wouldn't want to live longer than a normal life span. I'm pretty ADD and I think I'd get bored of this world pretty quick.

Only if I was going to die before a really good movie was to come out. Then I want my brain and eyeballs floating in a jar carried into the theater.

I might do it if I became quadrapalegic in some horrible accident and no longer had a will to live.

Only if they swore to use my awesome brain power for good rather than evil.

No, seriously, the idea is intriguing, but what if you were driven insane by the solitude. Would you be able to sleep or nap? I definitely would want to be able to sleep.

On one hand: Why not? Our bodies are already full of artificial parts.

On the other hand: When it's time to die, I'd rather die. The other side isn't bad.

I'd go for it, but only when i'm about to shuffle off our mortal coil.

I'd also want to have a clause that if I showed significant mental degradation, they'd cut me loose...living can be worse than dying.

The only other problem I see is what happens when they change interface types as technology advances....you eventually get left in the dust as something early in the tech tree clobbers some biological part that is needed later.

hobo: dammit, every time I see your icon I get more and more sexually frustrated. I love her :)

Do you go to the doctor to get medical treatment?
Is that natural?

(not trying to challenge your opinion, just throwing something out into the discussion)