Physically Becoming Na'vi - The Na'vi Genome Project

[Toruk Makto]

Alexander,
Since you apparently didn't follow my last post, I won't belabor it.

I do want to ask though, isn't this just another O'Neill Colony concept, but just without the space travel?

ta Markì

[xXJakeSullyXx]

Alexander,
Since you apparently didn't follow my last post, I won't belabor it.

I do want to ask though, isn't this just another O'Neille Colony concept, but just without the space travel?

ta Markì

I am not sure I understand the first part of your message.  How did I not follow your last post? 

And what is the O'Neille Colony?  I am not familiar with this term. 

-Alexander

[Vawm tsamsiyu]

well of course its impossible with that attitude, if you just say "all humans are horrible and we cant change things because there hard" then it is impossible, but because you made it impossible. if i say that its impossible to cross the street then for me it is because i wont even try and therefore have no chance of success.
as far as using alternative fuels other than gas, the biggest challenge is the fact that there is already a large scale infrastructure for gasoline so its easy to refuel you gas powered car, but hydrogen and electric cars aren't so lucky so before those can go large scale we need more fuel stations for it to be practical. of course if we give up and say its impossible then it will be, not because it cannot be done but because we believe it is. if you want to stick to the quitter talk then for you it is impossible.

[ToktorGrace]

I fear you completely missed or ignored my main point, which was bolded to be made clear. I suppose there is no use in trying to sway you with this issue. I just hope one day you find a desire to help many people in a big way instead of playing with genetic experiments that will only provide superficial changes to a select few.

[Brainiac]

@Eyamsiyu:  You admit, then, that it is difficult to get the majority to be constructive instead of destructive.  I will take that one step further.  It is impossible.  Humans are like a virus, like a parasite.  They consume everything around them and then, when there is nothing left, they move on to another area. 

...we have no choice but to continue as planned. Deploy the sentinels. Immediately.

[Eyamsiyu]

@Eyamsiyu:  You admit, then, that it is difficult to get the majority to be constructive instead of destructive.  I will take that one step further.  It is impossible.  Humans are like a virus, like a parasite.  They consume everything around them and then, when there is nothing left, they move on to another area. 

I can't agree that it is impossible.  It will be EXTREMELY difficult, but in case you haven't noticed, changes ARE being made, and they are being made on a MUCH larger scale than you seem to acknowledge.  However, wen we finally reach the point where modern human civilization and Mother Nature can coexist, we probably won't be alive.  However, that shouldn't mean that we rush the process, for that would only make it worse.

If you actually want to do this project, go ahead.  But do it in conjunction of the things you can do NOW to stop further deterioration of nature and civilization.

[ToktorGrace]

@Eyamsiyu:  You admit, then, that it is difficult to get the majority to be constructive instead of destructive.  I will take that one step further.  It is impossible.  Humans are like a virus, like a parasite.  They consume everything around them and then, when there is nothing left, they move on to another area.  

I can't agree that it is impossible.  It will be EXTREMELY difficult, but in case you haven't noticed, changes ARE being made, and they are being made on a MUCH larger scale than you seem to acknowledge.  However, wen we finally reach the point where modern human civilization and Mother Nature can coexist, we probably won't be alive.  However, that shouldn't mean that we rush the process, for that would only make it worse.

If you actually want to do this project, go ahead.  But do it in conjunction of the things you can do NOW to stop further deterioration of nature and civilization.

Lol that quote sounds oddly familiar. I think Im experiencing deja vu...

[Eyamsiyu]

@Eyamsiyu:  You admit, then, that it is difficult to get the majority to be constructive instead of destructive.  I will take that one step further.  It is impossible.  Humans are like a virus, like a parasite.  They consume everything around them and then, when there is nothing left, they move on to another area. 

I can't agree that it is impossible.  It will be EXTREMELY difficult, but in case you haven't noticed, changes ARE being made, and they are being made on a MUCH larger scale than you seem to acknowledge.  However, wen we finally reach the point where modern human civilization and Mother Nature can coexist, we probably won't be alive.  However, that shouldn't mean that we rush the process, for that would only make it worse.

If you actually want to do this project, go ahead.  But do it in conjunction of the things you can do NOW to stop further deterioration of nature and civilization.

Lol that quote sounds oddly familiar. I think Im experiencing deja vu...

If it is, it was coincidence... 

[Toruk Makto]

Alexander,
Since you apparently didn't follow my last post, I won't belabor it.

I do want to ask though, isn't this just another O'Neill Colony concept, but just without the space travel?

ta Markì

I am not sure I understand the first part of your message.  How did I not follow your last post?  

And what is the O'Neille Colony?  I am not familiar with this term.  

-Alexander

1: My first post referred to venues for garnering proper support for a large or ambitious project. No offense, but you apparently don't grok this concept well, given presented evidence to the contrary and your lack of understanding thereof.

2: An O'Neill colony is a theoretical constructed habitat in space that is supposed to perpetuate, and be be populated by, a super-race of genetically "enhanced" humans. This habitat to be funded and built by individuals that feel that humans suck hugely and deserve to die en masse. It is a favorite of science fiction, which I thought might be appropriate here. (Don't you love when people connect hidden dots when you're not looking?  )

Incidentally, since you brought up things that insult people, I find being compared to a virus and/or parasite insulting.  I'm just sayin'...


ta Markì

[Brainiac]

Alexander,
Since you apparently didn't follow my last post, I won't belabor it.

I do want to ask though, isn't this just another O'Neill Colony concept, but just without the space travel?

ta Markì

I am not sure I understand the first part of your message.  How did I not follow your last post?  

And what is the O'Neille Colony?  I am not familiar with this term.  

-Alexander

1: My first post referred to venues for garnering proper support for a large or ambitious project. No offense, but you apparently don't grok this concept well, given presented evidence to the contrary and your lack of understanding thereof.

2: An O'Neill colony is a theoretical constructed habitat in space that is supposed to perpetuate, and be be populated by, a super-race of genetically "enhanced" humans. This habitat to be funded and built by individuals that feel that humans suck hugely and deserve to die en masse. It is a favorite of science fiction, which I thought might be appropriate here. (Don't you love when people connect hidden dots when you're not looking?  )

Incidentally, since you brought up things that insult people, I find being compared to a virus and/or parasite insulting.  I'm just sayin'...


ta Markì

1. This î

2. I am not amused by the implication that I am plugged into the matrix.

3. Isn't it time you stopped playing this for serious? It's neither working nor fooling anyone.

[ExLibrisMortis]

Reading through some of this has had me come to a simple something that I had learned rather recently regarding genetics. Isn't it that up until recently, scientists believed that the human genome consisted of 60,000 codes or cells(I forget the actual name), and that now it really is only 20,000 cells. Which really means that when you manipulate one, it can have consequences unknown? Like a malformation of a certain strain, causing things like the movie "I am Legend" to happen.

[ExLibrisMortis]

Woah woah woah.... wait a second. I just read more than I did before my last post and if I am gathering correctly, you want to play God really? You want to make a massive reset button and have everyone start again?

Well, I'm gonna tell you something about human sociology. You would literally have to take new born babies, and keep them completely isolated from current culture to change anything about current sociological behaviors. Complete and utter isolation. Without that, there are too many things are are too deeply ingrained into our current psyche that would disallow for this "Utopia" to ever exist.

I am simply offering an option for people to start again.  To try again.  To perhaps succeed this time, because humans failed miserably, in my opinion.  If you do not wish to take my option, that is your choice.  I hope there are enough people who would like to start again, though, and establish a world that coexists in perfect harmony with nature. 

The thing about humans is that we are the most adaptable creatures known by us. Over the years its been proven that we have no limit in what we can do. Yet, history has also shown that dramatic and drastic change only comes when we are at the brink of destruction. If and only we are in our most dire moments of peril do we actually really change.

And never, EVER, say that an institution is too power and too large to fall. Because throughout history we have changed many great and powerful insitutions and brought them crashing down. If you want recent evidence, look at Egypt, Tunisia, Jordan. Hell, even look at the American revolution. So yes, even the oil companies can be destroyed.

[Tsuksìm atsawl (KaPTan)]

Well mein "friend", you cannot change a human by changing his body; a person's mind is will not change with his body.  also, we are adapted to this planet and to the climates we live in.  if you want to f*** up how nature has made us to live in our given regions, the pursue at your own risk.  if you were to do anything with genetics i suggest you augment what we already are given, instead of trying to turn people into a race of fictional beings not made for earth.

[xXJakeSullyXx]

@Eyamsiyu:  Well-put.  I am doing things to help the world now.  I donate to environmental projects.  I  recycle always.  I yell at people when they litter.  I do my best to make a difference, but it is rarely enough.  I will continue doing my best, but in conjunction with this project.  I have more faith in the project than I do in humanity. 

@Marki:  I am not going to be starting an O'Neille colony, then.  I am not out to let humans die en masse.  I am only here to start something different that works better.  Perhaps on a new planet, if I live to see that happen.  Who knows; in fifty years, they might be able to go to a life-supporting planet in the Alpha Centauri system. 

I apologize if my comment was insulting.  I am very passionate, I suppose one could say, regarding this issue.  By the way, I am not comparing you to a virus.  Nor am I comparing anyone else on these forums.  I am talking about the human species in general, not every human in existence.  There is a minority of humans who are actually decent. 

@Brainiac:  I am just going to ignore this one.  Everyone here already knows that I am 100% serious. 

@ExLibrisMortis:  I am not hitting a reset button.  I am starting again, but letting humans continue on.  I refuse to be a part of a civilization which destroys itself, though.  I intend to live on an island completely separate and watch from afar.  I hope that humans learn to be better, but I know that such hope is illogical.  I will probably be here to see detrimental occurrences in human society.  Who knows; humans might not even be here in 5000 years.  Have you ever seen the show, Life After People?  Maybe that will happen; Earth will regenerate and everything will return to its formerly wonderful state. 

Most adaptable creatures, hmmm?  To be honest, that sounds a bit arrogant.  Humans are going to burn themselves out, but if you want to delude yourself, that's fine.  Have you ever read the Gypsy Morph by Terry Brooks?  The first chapter encompasses what will probably happen to the world upon the near extinction of humans.  Then everything will regenerate and be new again. 

@Tsuksim atsawl:  Yes, I can.  A physical change yields a mental one.  At least, that is my hope.  And I would never let someone into the program that did not care for the environment.  The last thing we need is a war-crazy, nuclear-bomb-loving idiot in a Na'vi body.  I will not allow that to happen. 

I will gladly "f*** up how nature has made us to live".  Maybe I will actually get somewhere, because the human species is not changing for the better.  That is one of the reasons that I am stepping in.  Hopefully the Na'vi will propagate on earth and humans will eventually die out.  Then everything can improve over time. 


Signed,
Alexander Allegrant. 

[Kì'eyawn]

Hey all, sorry i'm late to the party.

@Truro:  Do you think I am going to let just anyone join the program?  Not a chance.  I am trying to create Na'vi, which means I will only allow people to enter the program if I deem them as psychologically mouldable.  I am not going to just let some war-crazy person become a Na'vi so he can wield a bigger gun and kill more people.  I am only letting people in who want to better this world.

Ever played the video game Bioshock?  Look up what happened to the fictional would-be utopia of Rapture, would you kindly?  That'll tell you exactly what i think will happen to any human-made utopia—and yes, ma tsmukan, for better or for worse, you are a human.  And unless your genetic alteration comes with a reset button on your brainstem, there's no changing that.

...And the consciousness can be measured scientifically.  It is contained within the neocortex, which is part of the cerebral cortex (the gray matter coating both hemispheres of the cerebrum.

Sorry, as somebody with a master's degree in psychology and a year toward a neuroscience PhD, i cry bull****.  You can't "measure consciousness," and it's not contained anywhere.  Scientists have been arguing about what consciousness is and where it happens in the brain (short answer: pretty much everywhere) for decades, and there's no agreement.  If the smartest, most knowledgeable neuroscientists in the world can't answer the whats, wheres, and hows of consciousness, where the hell did you get this startling revelation from—and would you mind publishing your staggering research results to this effect, so that the rest of the scientific community can benefit from your paradigm-shifting discovery? 

@Vawm tsamsiyu:  There are many people who would willingly be tested.  Why?  Because if it worked, they would get a free 'transformation' and become Na'vi.

Yeah, and if you screw up, they'll be every kind of dead.  You said you're planning on getting yourself a lawyer to sort out the legalities of all this?  Better be a damn good laywer—or you'd better establish yourself in a third-world hell hole with no pesky government oversight to keep you from your grand plans. 

Ma tsmukan, your heart is in the right place, i think.  If you take the time to get to know everyone here, you'll find the same passion and frustration and anger is shared by us all.  We look at this world, what we've done to it (Yes, we; to find someone to blame, look no further than your mirror.  We all have had a hand in this), and it is maddening.  But if there's one thing i know about humanity, know more than i know anything else, i know that there's nothing you can control in this world but your mind, and no one you can change but yourself.  Be the best of humanity, and by your example encourage others to choose the same course.  That is all the power we have.

If you really wanted to abandon the human race to its destruction, you'd channel your energies into feasible interstellar travel, so the wise could get off this rock and escape—or, better yet, pack up those humans who are the problem, and ship their butts into orbit 

In all seriousness, you can turn people ten feet tall and blue, and move them to an island; but they'll be ten-foot-tall blue humans, abandoned on an island surrounded by a world gone insane.  You can't turn your back on this world—there isn't another one waiting for us.  But a man who changes himself changes the whole universe, one small corner of the world at a time.

[Tsuksìm atsawl (KaPTan)]

@Tsuksim atsawl:  Yes, I can.  A physical change yields a mental one.  At least, that is my hope.  And I would never let someone into the program that did not care for the environment.  The last thing we need is a war-crazy, nuclear-bomb-loving idiot in a Na'vi body.  I will not allow that to happen. 

I will gladly "f*** up how nature has made us to live".  Maybe I will actually get somewhere, because the human species is not changing for the better.  That is one of the reasons that I am stepping in.  Hopefully the Na'vi will propagate on earth and humans will eventually die out.  Then everything can improve over time. 


Signed,
Alexander Allegrant. 

sorry if I take from my personal experience (as i beleive you are as well)  but it is my experience that anyone who isn't a "war-crazy, nuclear-bomb-loving idiot" and actually has money is going to side with the majority of "us" in that we should make better and fix what we already have than doing glorified plastic surgery.  And also, a island separate from everything else?  not sure if you know this, but if the human's (which you apparently don't think you are) die out, its going to be because we we have effed over the entire planet and we can't fix it in time.  your "island" isn't going to help you unless its in space.  And i can assure you, your genetically altered humans that look like na'vi aren't going to fair any better than us humans when it comes to a catastrophe.

[Toruk Makto]

Alexander:  I guess I still don't see why a physical alteration of such dramatic scope is necessary to affect the kind of cultural or mental change you are describing. And why Na'vi? The Na'vi are a product of Jim Cameron's imagination. Using them as a template for this kind of thing seems almost plagiarist in my opinion. If really you want to start out fresh, why not design your new beings from your own imagination? I think Jim would appreciate it.

I also wish to point out that your passion for this project is causing many of your statements to sound patronizing or grandiose to the others on the forum and is likely the reason for the opposition you are getting here. People are more receptive when they don't feel they are being talked down to. Just an admin's eye view on that.  

BTW, my O'Neill colony comparison was a bit of a poke at you that you actually followed up on and clarified fairly nicely.

ta Markì

[Ekirä]

Alexander:  I guess I still don't see why a physical alteration of such dramatic scope is necessary to affect the kind of cultural or mental change you are describing. And why Na'vi? The Na'vi are a product of Jim Cameron's imagination. Using them as a template for this kind of thing seems almost plagiarist in my opinion. If really you want to start out fresh, why not design your new beings from your own imagination? I think Jim would appreciate it.

Agreed. And if you did attempt this (which it seems pretty clear you are) I'm almost positive Cameron would take all the legal action he could against your project.

[xXJakeSullyXx]

@Ki'eyawn:  I know I am human right now.  I am not deluding myself to that.  However, I do not intend to remain so for the rest of my days. 

That was insulting.  And I have not made a huge discovery.  However, I am able to read.  Have you ever actually used Google?  It's a wonderful thing.  Look at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neocortex - it says directly that the neocortex is "involved in higher functions such as sensory perception, generation of motor commands, spatial reasoning, conscious thought, and language."  The consciousness is in the neocortex, according to Wikipedia and many other sources. 

If there are any problems in surgery, the patient will be revived, the partially-done surgery will be reversed, and more research will be done to yield a method that does not cause problems.  I do not intend to have death on my hands.  If it comes to that, then that was the choice of the volunteer, but I will do everything in my power to prevent it. 

That is your belief, and I respect that.  Leave me to mine, please.  I believe that I can change more than my own mind. 

Interstellar travel is already being researched by NASA.  Anything I can do would be paled in comparison.  And I have no intention of shipping humans out into space.  If anything, I want to get off this planet.  I wonder if I will live to see that become possible...

I am not turning my back.  I am starting anew.  I am also trying to improve the world at the same time.  And your last statement there proves my point.  You said, "But a man who changes himself changes the whole universe, one small corner of the world at a time."  I am going to change myself.  Into an environmentally-sound Na'vi.  Case and point. 

@Tsuksim atsawl:  Believe what you wish.  I vehemently disagree with all of that, but I respect your opinion.  And if I establish a pseudo-Pandoran island, I am not going to let humans march in and plow it down to make condominiums.  There would have to be security to protect against that. 

@Marki:  You have a good point.  The reason, though, that I chose the Na'vi is because of the general feeling of envy for them across the world.  Avatar had a sensational impact, and tapping into that would be fantastic.  As for Jim not appreciating my use of his idea as a template, I don't think he'll mind.  He's a visionary out to change the world, and I am here to change it.  If he asked, I would even let him into the project free of charge. 

You're probably right.  Thanks for the pointer; I will consider it when writing future messages. 

Thank you; I appreciate that you wish me luck with my endeavor.  Maybe you'll have a change of heart eventually, in ten years or so.  Then again, maybe not.  Either way, best of luck, ma tsmukan. 

@Ekira:  Read the first paragraph of my response to Marki.  It encapsulates why Jim Cameron will not legally prosecute me. 


Signed,
Alexander Allegrant

[Toruk Makto]

Please tell me you did not just predicate your whole thesis on info from Wikipedia.


Please.