I can definitely empathize with that, I'm happy with what's being achieved as well. Seing how SpaceX and Tesla are routinely achieving their goals and arguably change the world, I often can't get over the fact that the output of our civilization seems to hinge on the iron will of a few billionaires.
Elon Musk (and SpaceX as his tool) is just an extremely illustrative example of this, because we can directly see what our space capabilities and ambitions would look like without him.
I wish there was a Musk-like figure focused on transhumanism, but sadly it may genuinely be too early for that in my lifetime. Or not. And that's the frustrating thing: we wouldn't know until one appears.
I know this sounds like I'm writing a love letter, but it's really not meant that way. I would rather live in a civilization that has its own momentum and a better-distributed capacity for achievement, as opposed to putting my hope for the future on a few tenuous human pivot points and their whims.
The momentum of civilisation is meandering and spread. The few humans burning their own path are straightforward and fateful, there seems to be more change happening once there's a single individual behind it, but perhaps only because more change in every direction seems less than the pure firethrodden path of the single individual.
Unfortunately, the science and technology involved is nowhere near ready for a Starship-style push to be feasible. That's not even mentioning the legal environment.
Let’s hypothesise sufficient brain scans. I think even that is a way off yet?
Is a backup of your mind protected by the right to avoid self-incrimination? What about the minds of your pets?
Does a backup need to be punished (e.g. prison) if the person it is made from is punished? What if the offence occurred after the backup was made?
If the mind state is running rather than offline cold-storage, how many votes do all the copies get? What if they’re allowed to diverge?
If you memorise something and then get backed up, is that copyright infringement?
If a mind can run on silicon for less than the cost of food to keep a human healthy, can anyone other than the foremost mind in their respective field ever be employed?
If someone is backed up then the original is killed by someone who knows they were backed up, is that murder or the equivalent of a serious assault that causes a small duration of amnesia?
I can definitely empathize with that, I'm happy with what's being achieved as well. Seing how SpaceX and Tesla are routinely achieving their goals and arguably change the world, I often can't get over the fact that the output of our civilization seems to hinge on the iron will of a few billionaires.
Elon Musk (and SpaceX as his tool) is just an extremely illustrative example of this, because we can directly see what our space capabilities and ambitions would look like without him.
I wish there was a Musk-like figure focused on transhumanism, but sadly it may genuinely be too early for that in my lifetime. Or not. And that's the frustrating thing: we wouldn't know until one appears.
I know this sounds like I'm writing a love letter, but it's really not meant that way. I would rather live in a civilization that has its own momentum and a better-distributed capacity for achievement, as opposed to putting my hope for the future on a few tenuous human pivot points and their whims.