When you finally can... will you look like your SL self?

Some time in the future...

Genetic medicine, so recently the talk of science fiction... becomes fact. Our enemy, the virus, has been harnessed as a genetic tool to deploy the promise of both genetic engineering and nanotechnology. The human genome has been decoded, as well as the ape, the mouse, numerous other animals. What ethics concerns there are, are debated... but ultimately ignored. Because what people can do... they will.

The field of bioinformatics, a powerful blend of high end computing and genetic biology, is poised to dominate science for centuries to come with a new, golden age unlike anything we've ever seen before. A new breed of hacker, the biohacker, slices and splices genetics in secret, often in dirty and completely unsupervised underground labs.

But that's not the future. In fact, that's all old news.

http://singularityhub.com/2009/04/28/do-it-yourself-biohacking/

* * * * *

Technology and culture, inextricably linked, cut a new divide between the generations.


"When he first came home, I thought it was just goth makeup, like the other kids were wearing. Now he tells me that he's going to pass that deathly pale skin on to all his offspring."

"In my day, I had twelve piercings... but... grow a tail? OMG, I told her no! But she saved up for it on her own, and after eight months it was impossible to hide any more."

"Everybody thought my fangs were cool, but one day I had a meeting with the senior executive staff. They said that my persona wasn't fitting with the image they wanted to project as a company. I don't care though, I just signed on to rep for an energy drink company for five times as much."

"Okay, my parents loved her... but then she forgot, she slipped just for a second and forgot her contacts. When they saw her cat eyes, reflecting dark gold at the engagement barbeque, everything changed."

"Before, I was just another ordinary blonde. I couldn't get a second notice at casting calls. Now, one flash of my claws can get me a starring role on a Superbowl commercial. Men notice me. I'm the most controversial, edgy girl in the room."


It's 2019.

Any skin type you want is 2000 dollars, one deep breath on an inhaler, and about three days of mild, flu~like symptoms. Four weeks later you are a different tone from head to toe.

Any body form you want, from musclebound to elegantly thin and tall is about 1500 dollars, plus a few months of waiting. Oh, and you are constantly hungry for about six months until your cells slow down and stop rearranging themselves.

Another very popular one is the 8000 USD metabolic treatment, which is said to shorten lifespan but gives you catlike reflexes and heightened awareness. A few who have undergone this say that they no longer sleep, but don't miss it. The Olympics and most major sports have banned athletes who do this, but the standard human athletic records are now laughable by comparison.

Gender treatments... still tricky, but with the recent developments in genetics and stem cells, a 10,000 dollar treatment plus a 90 day managed care stay would make you whatever gender (or combination thereof) you wished to be. The results are so thorough that current law requires documentation of the change for proper identification purposes.

Exospecies treatments are still fairly expensive, due to the radical genetic factors... but you could have ears, tail, nose, whiskers, fur, claws and other features for about 15 to 30,000 dollars. There is a half percent risk that it will go wrong and kill you, and current law in the western world requires that you not have offspring if you elect for the treatment. Those who have done it are typically extremely beautiful, extremely controversial, and many fundamentalist groups feel they are an abomination. Up the risk of death tenfold, and you can get nearly the same treatment for 1500 dollars from a biohacker lab in Bangkok, or Tijuana, or the eastern side of Berlin. But when it goes right... the results are *exactly* what you want.


So... do you dare to indulge in any of these yourself?

Would you marry someone who had?

Would you allow your children to do it?


Look at your Second Life self, and ask yourself what you'd really be willing to do, to have that life... for real.

Yes.

In a flash.

I spent my first week trying to look like me in world...thought that is what was supposed to be, but then again I was so naive when I was new and only really knew one person too. The only thing different is me beewbs a bit er enhanced huh now.

I think i'm just gonna stay the way i am hehehe..
After seeing Surrogates it totally reminded me of Second life come to life..
It was actually kind of a scary thought and really depressing..
It wasn't the murders and people dying that was scary or depressing..it was everyone being plugged in and their human bodies just falling apart and nobody ever knowing what anyone looked like or if they were male or female..no physical contact in the real world..

I don't want to live longer than i am supposed to or try to be someone i'm not..after seeing that movie i want to stay as much of me as i can..it seriously had me thinking of quitting sl..but i know i am not on it as much these day and building is too much fun..
but wow did it ever remind me of SL more than any other movie or story i have ever seen or read...gives me chills thinking of the world having a possibility of turning like that..

here is the trailer if nobody has seen it yet..
Surrogates
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KC5TrKNIDHQ

Ummm...

<.<

And who all is waiting for the movie Avatar to be released?

1. Not especially. I very much like my SL self, but it's only an aspect of the whole being. That being sits behind the keyboard. Would some of the above things intrigue me? You bet - but that's a bit different from being a RL version of my SL self.

2. Don't see why not. Love is love.

3. Probably. Would depend, I suppose.

I already do.

Pep (No further enhancements required - rl or sl.)

PS It's already been done of course- and let that be a warning to you.

Black Like Me - John Howard Griffin

http://www.studyworld.com/newsite/reportessay/socialissues/Racial%5CBlack_Like_Me-401454.htm

".... John Howard Griffin began this novel as a white man on
October 28, 1959 and became a black man (with the help of a
noted dermatologist) on November 7. He entered black
society in New Orleans through his contact Sterling, a shoe
shine boy that he had met in the days prior to the
medication taking full effect. Griffin stayed with Sterling
at the shine stand for a few days to become assimilated
into the society and to learn more about the attitude and
mindset of the common black man. After one week of trying
to find work other than menial labor, he left to travel
throughout the Southern states of Mississippi, Alabama, and
Texas.
............."

Yes

Absolutely.

This semi reminds me of a young adult series of books by Scott Westerfeld, except in that world, you don't get to choose, becoming pretty is required. In order to be different, "pretties" start opting to get radical "surges." I read these books about 2 years ago (at the age of 22 and loved them).



" Tally took a steadying breath, the room spinning again, but in a good way. She gestured for the windows to transpare a little more, and in the sunlight she saw the new additions.

“Ooh, pretty-making.”

Bolder than all the other implanted glitter, twelve tiny rubies ringed each of Shay’s pupils, glowing softly red against emerald irises.

“Bubbly, huh?” "



http://scottwesterfeld.com/blog/?cat=6
Really good books, by the way. And you may just hear of them yet, word from the blog says they are creating a movie of the first book in the series "Uglies," and if it does well, they will be creating a series of the movies.

Yes, yes and yes. Funny you should bring that topic up as I've sensed for quite some time that is one of the inevitable outcomes of current genetics and retroviral biotech research. It's only a matter of time. Goodness knows what the pricing will be like though.

And to answer your question, I would absolutely change myself around


..but I'd go the biohacker route! lmao ;D

As little as I trust people or medicine in general, I'm gonna let someone slice and dice my genetic structure like a drunken frat boy with a weed whacker? Not on yer life, fella.



If Hollywood is testimony to what messing with mother nature can cause, no thank you. If people look odd when over-botoxed and collagened, imagine Frankengenes.

It's going the other way for me, or it will do. I froze my age in a SL at 26 when I joined 3 years ago. So I will never age here. But I can't stop myself ageing in real life so as time goes by I'll look less and less like my avatar.

I originally created my avatar to attend an in-world educational conference, and I am likely to meet up with others in my profession when in SL, so I created an avatar that looks very much like myself, just with a better wardrobe budget. I would love to have some of my SL frock coats in RL.

Unfortunately having a body with a tail and bum like a kangaroo would cause a lot of issues with seating in vehicles etc.
Imagine the changes to seating a lone this would cause in society, furry & non -furry seating?

No, i'm who i am (rl) and changing my appearances whould also change me.
RL speaking, i'm not changing my appearances anymore (shape/skin).

accept who you are, and see the beauty of it. (and the uniqueness).

for RL:
There is only one exeption: If some appearance errors are drastically impacting your life.
(e.g. way to large boobs (= severe backpains), or loose eyelashes that fold over your eyes and hinders your vision)

Young, thin, well toned, unwrinkled, energetic, like my avatar is- yes, I'd be that way if I could.

Most definitely YES.

Yes. I've already undergone a number of treatments that change my appearance, and I plan on more. As they become available and safe, and I can afford them, I'll take them.

Yes, with a but. As long as that someone wasn't damaging themselves in the process, and as long as it wasn't something that made them physically unattractive to me.

Yes, with a huge proviso. They have to be old enough to make a responsible judgement for themselves. If I had kids, I wouldn't let them get a tattoo if they were under 18, and I wouldn't really approve of it until they were older than that. Same goes for gene-spliced snake eyes and demon tails. So technically, they have to be old enough that they are no longer children. If the technology had gone so far that these things were as safe and reversible as changing ones clothes, my attitude would relax accordingly. Assuming I gave them enough pocket-money to afford it.

Of course - I have always wanted to be a little pony!

Well, much as I like being a beautiful female anthropomorphic fox with three tails...

No, I wouldn't become one in the Real World, unless it was common and accepted for people to become a non-Human species. And even then, the novelty and fun would pale too quickly in the light of prejudice and fear from others. And it wouldn't be fair to my RL mate to change what they married so radically. So for me, even though I might enjoy it, I'm at too late a point in my lifetime to make such a change.

Now, if I could arrange for my _next incarnation_ to be in this form, born into a world where furries were common and accepted members of society, and where I could enjoy a full lifetime of experiences in that form? Yes, I'd sign up for that sort of reincarnation.