
We’re treating self-improvement like a software upgrade - tomhoward
https://medium.com/team-human/were-treating-self-improvement-like-a-software-upgrade-b25a8e3a80c6
======
PragmaticPulp
The anti-self-improvement arguments usually devolve into weird strawman
arguments and non sequiturs. In this case, the author is trying to portray
modern technology and companies as the enemy because he wrote a series of
books on the subject.

> It’s that we humans should be making active choices about what it is we want
> to do to ourselves, rather than letting the machines, or the markets
> propelling them, decide for us.

Self-improvement isn't synonymous with buying products or following companies.
In fact, two of the most common self-improvement goals are to reduce the
amount of time spent in front of screens and to spend more time with friends
and family.

This article reads more like an anti-technology or anti-corporate piece
disguised as a criticism of self-improvement.

Ironically, the author of this post would like to sell you his thinly-veiled
self help books such as "Program or Be Programmed: Ten Commands for a Digital
Age" and "Get Back in the Box: How Being Great at What You Do Is Great for
Business". This blog post is marketing material for his specific brand of
self-improvement.

~~~
crispyambulance
Rushkoff has been a digerati pundit for a very long time. He is definitely NOT
a self-help guru. He's a legit academic at CUNY/Queens who has written quite a
few books, writes articles, has a podcast, and gets paid to give talks when
invited.

Yes, he can get preachy sometimes, but he's not part of what I call "the self-
help-industrial-complex". He doesn't use ponzi-like levels of ever more
expensive training seminars, that garbage people like Tony Robbins and all
their ilk on youtube use to make money.

Rushkoff makes compelling and sincere arguments, he admits it when he's wrong
(eg like the "Program or be Programmed" book) and, yes, he's certainly a
lefist. He puts himself out there and isn't afraid to break consistency with
his previous views. I admire all of that.

This particular article makes some good points. I don't agree with all of it,
but it's a solid point of view and not disingenuous marketing.

------
awillen
There are a lot of leaps of logic here - somehow he jumps from the fact that
wristbands that count our heartbeats and footsteps are trying to improve
health to the idea that our humanity is reducible to a bunch of data points.

Then somehow we've jumped to digital implants that don't exist yet and some
extremely theoretical ideas of how they might be terrible for society.

Just a whole lot of doom and gloom with no real substance behind it.

------
blueyes
When really it's more like a SaaS product. You need to keep paying for the
self-improvement, month after month, with your time...

~~~
elchin
Yes, success is rented, not bought, and the rent is due every day.

~~~
thealienthing
Never heard this before. Good rule of life.

------
antonzabirko
> Your value is not utility.

Lol let your value feed you when you run out of money with that line of
thinking. Once you are wealthy, then sure; but not till then do humans have
value in these systems were born into.

------
jungletime
On the specific mechanism of self improvement. Cycles of Intense focus,
activity, followed by deep rest. Checkout Andre Huberman's podcast "a
neuroscientist and tenured professor in the Department of Neurobiology at the
Stanford University School of Medicine"

[http://podcasts.joerogan.net/podcasts/andrew-
huberman](http://podcasts.joerogan.net/podcasts/andrew-huberman)

~~~
drivers99
Video version
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gLJowTOkZVo](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gLJowTOkZVo)

------
sidkhullar
We _are_ objects. Our humanity comes from how we're used and for whom. One of
the purposes of meditation is to separate the ego from the self and be able to
look upon ourselves dispassionately and objectively, for the purposes of
improving both, the spirit and its current vehicle.

~~~
xg15
Yeah, I'm very happy to be using myself for myself (and for others), thank you
very much.

------
tomrod
I played Gris recently. An absolutely artistic, captivating platformer. But it
was still deterministic along several dimensions. I feel that it is a
counterexample to the all-encompassing claims made by the article. Why can't
_parts_ of self improvement be like a software upgrade?

------
ggggtez
> gender fluidity would disappear

Transhumanism would result in the opposite. The very idea of a gender binary
should be called into question when you reach the level of augmenting and
transcending the limits of your flesh.

The author seems to have a very narrow understanding of Transhumanism.

------
maerF0x0
in a sense it's really hard to create a being that is superior in all
scenarios rather than superior in specific scenarios.

For example, roughly speaking, being a tall and very muscular person can be a
disadvantage in a famine. Or being much much smarter than your peers can be a
disadvantage in certain social scenarios that get you expelled for non-
conformity...

I imagine we will see a similar issue with transhumanism, where the resultant
products are better in some scenarios, but also worse in others.

------
noble_pleb
Off-topic but medium has almost turned into a paywall these days, it won't
allow you to read more than 5 articles without subscribing to their paid
service. Should HN and Google be promoting such a walled garden, especially
when creative commons content is found aplenty on the interwebs?

~~~
erikerikson
They kept bugging me to log in. When I did, they started throwing things about
limits around. So I deleted data related to the site and never log in. Since
then I get to read as much as I want.

------
ecmascript
> Self-improvement of the transhumanist sort requires that we adopt an
> entirely functional understanding of who and what we are: All of our
> abilities can be improved upon and all of our parts are replaceable.
> Upgradable.

Yeah right, but we're so far away from creating even a single "upgrade" that's
comparable with the human body. For example, even the best cameras would never
even be in the same competing arena as the human eye. No sensors come close to
our sense of touch.

The transhumanist ideology is nothing else but some kind of perverted ideology
that we somehow would be upgraded with a usb port sticking out from the skin.

Even the very best tools we have today to save lives and help our bodies sucks
in comparison with the biological counterpart. Sure there may be a future that
we would "upgrade" ourselves, but when that time is here (which would be very,
very far into the future) everyone will instantly do it because it will be so
much better. There wouldn't be some kind of discussion about it since the
result is so obvious.

For it to happen, whatever we replace something with will have to have all the
features that we currently enjoy + a lot more.

~~~
ggggtez
> even the best cameras would never even be in the same competing arena as the
> human eye

All it takes is looking at photos from space telescopes, or electron
microscopes... It should be obvious that technology can make better cameras
than human eyes. Or slow motion video cameras... Infrared cameras...

The only thing about human eyes that is superior is that they come connected
to the brain.

For now, technological augmentation is "air-gapped". It's incorrect to ignore
air-gapped augmentations. Hell, even _glasses_ could be considered the first
step, and have existed for hundreds of years.

Using glasses is essentially the "no brainer" conclusion that you are looking
for. People already accept that it's ok to try to do better than nature
provided for you.

~~~
ecmascript
Just being able to see something is just a small part of an eye.

You have "instant" focus, muscles that can turn the eye in almost every
direction except where the skull is. We have self repairment to some degree if
you get hurt. Automatic cleaning.

Sure other cameras that humans have built could be a good extension to the
body if we somehow could send it wireless to our brains. Because all ways we
have to date when it comes with integrating with biological matter is the part
that is hard.

If we could have a chip inserted into our brains that accepted wireless
communication, then sure it would be very useful. The issue is we have nothing
that even comes close to that today afaik. Using glasses could also be a
useful tool, but that isn't really "upgrading" the human body or being a
transhuman in the sense that the article brings up.

My point is sure we have tools that could potentially upgrade our bodies but
they aren't good and it seems it is a long way before anyone would operate
some cables into their brain in order to accept infrared video.

