Since this community is dead I will just make this post that I’m not even sure fits.
Back to the post itself, I’ve noticed in myself that my interest in transhumanism is focused more on getting rid of shitty parts of the human experience (disease, injuries, aging, going to the bathroom, having to sleep and eat so much, those things…) more than things like “mind uploading”/“brain-computer interfaces”/“intelligence enhancenment”/whatever. Essentially I want to still be a good old human, just without having the shitty parts of it.
Again if this doesn’t fit I can’t remove it (if someone even sees this)
This is largely how I feel. Mostly towards the eyes. They are incredibly fragile and it’s scary how easily they can be permanently damaged and how much that can affect your life, alone.
My dad suffered through cancer and some of the medications he was taking had the side effect of practically blinding him. He said it was like having a fog in front of him most of the time. The way he talked about it, I don’t think he cared about the cancer and would have rather suffered through it and kept his sight until the end.
The issue was that it damaged his optic nerve and we constantly were searching for cures, treatments, or even clinical trials to get him in just for the hope of fixing it. But nothing is out yet that can help repair your optic nerve. Once they go, they’re gone until science can figure out a cure. It’s the same thing for diabetics where their optic nerves can be destroyed from the disease.
That made me really scared just knowing how important sight is yet not having any sort of cure for this. But transhumanism, in theory, would solve this with bionic eye sight or some other new way for humans to visually experience the world around them again.
Sorry about what you and your dad had to go through. I have a similar concern with memory loss in older adults, the very thought of it is scary and another of many flaws of the human body. The only problem is whether the technologies that could improve the human condition are even something that can exist, I seriously hope so.