Nydra:

transhumanism tend to attract certain sorts of *people* and gender really doesn't factor into the equation much at all.

Market research [1,2] shows that it clearly is a factor. But why and how is completely unexplored at this time, and I believe it's about time someone trys to find out.

[1] Badger S "An Exploratory Survey Examining the Familiarity with and Attitudes Toward Cryonic Preservation" Journal of Evolution and Technology, Dec 1998

[2] Schloendorn J "Negative Data from the Psychological Frontline" Journal of Evolution and Technology, April 2005; 107-117

Well, quite honestly I'm a lot more interested in researching technologies and writing about things like population issues, transhumanist ethics, and longevity science than I am in trying to figure out gender imbalances in activity choice.

By my statement that "gender really doesn't factor into the equation", all I meant was that if someone is interested in transhumanism it usually isn't BECAUSE they're male or BECAUSE they're female -- but because of a more complex combination of factors probably pertaining to education, economic class, exposure to (or lack of exposure to) certain ideas and environmental influences while growing up, etc.  It's not "because I'm a woman" that I'm interested in transhumanism, just as transhumanist men probably aren't transhumanists because they're men. 

But this is getting into picky semantics at this point, so I will depart this thread hopefully having at least given the assurance that yes, some females ARE transhumanists.  I quite honestly don't feel like a freak inside my own head, so it always strikes me as extremely bizarre to find people that are surprised I exist.  It's not that bizarre.  Transhumanist females exist, and we're here to stay, and there are very few adolescent antics I haven't seen in my 16 years experience online (I've been using bulletin boards, etc., since the age of 11).  It would be really difficult to scare me away, and anything disturbing enough to actually scare me off would indicate to me that the person offering such disturbing attention probably isn't much of a transhumanist and therefore not worth communicating with. 

So, I rest my participation in this discussion. Thank you all and hope to see you in more interesting discussions.

Yes, there are probably many female transhumanists. I think Mr. Farlops is right to suggest that we need to encourage intelligent women to post here to get the ball rolling.

http://www.girlsgotech.org/

There are probably other sites.

I do oppose to even subtle manipulation of children and these people seem to think it's ok.

That's why I suggested that we have to offer people something so they'll come looking.

Those nanoparticle facial creams are a start...

That's why I suggested that we have to offer people something so they'll come looking.

Those nanoparticle facial creams are a start...

So the women will come for smoother skin to attract men with? Why wouldn't they come for the same sort of benefits that many of the men here seek, like potential immortality, health, intellectual stimulation and augmentation, and so forth? Most of the women I have discussed these issues with find discussion of more pertinent and practical subjects as reproductive rights and technologies of more interest, if they display any gender-bias that I can detect at all.

To be honest, if a woman became a transhumanist for no better reason than skin cream, and failed to investigate any of the deeper philosophical issues that permeate this body of thought, I doubt I'd enjoy chatting with her any more than I'd enjoy attempting to communicate with some lunkhead jock about the latest sporting event. These are stereotypes I think we should seek to avoid, and while stereotypes often have a kernel of truth to them (and we all know people that  we think are the walking, talking embodiments of certain stereotypes) we nonetheless do people a disservice when we lend stereotypes too much credence.

If we're going out of our way to attract women to the forum, should we--in the interests of fairness--be making an effort to attract homosexual men? Transvestites? Hermaphrodites? Bisexuals? Asexuals? We have at least one orchidectomy recipient amongst our ranks, if I'm not mistaken... As transhumanist ideas catch hold, the question of personal sexuality will become of less and less import, I hope.

crime_minister:

To be honest, if a woman became a transhumanist for no better reason than skin cream, and failed to investigate any of the deeper philosophical issues that permeate this body of thought, I doubt I'd enjoy chatting with her any more than I'd enjoy attempting to communicate with some lunkhead jock about the latest sporting event. These are stereotypes I think we should seek to avoid, and while stereotypes often have a kernel of truth to them (and we all know people that  we think are the walking, talking embodiments of certain stereotypes) we nonetheless do people a disservice when we lend stereotypes too much credence.

In fairness, the suggestion was regarding immediate advances which may attract women.  Certainly that shouldn't be a persons only interest, but I have no fault with it being what sparks interest.  I would imagine that many men, including myself, are initially attracted to transhumanism by science fiction.  I wouldn't want to discuss transhumanism with someone who simply wants to meet a Klingon one day.

If we're going out of our way to attract women to the forum, should we--in the interests of fairness--be making an effort to attract homosexual men? Transvestites? Hermaphrodites? Bisexuals? Asexuals? We have at least one orchidectomy recipient amongst our ranks, if I'm not mistaken... As transhumanist ideas catch hold, the question of personal sexuality will become of less and less import, I hope.

With the exception of hermaphrodites, those are all vague boundaries which are immediately picked up when you have large numbers of both men and women.  I think we should have all of them.  When our grand transhumanist future arrives, they'll be there.  They should be there to shape the ideas as well.

"In fairness, the suggestion was regarding immediate advances which may attract women.  Certainly that shouldn't be a persons only interest, but I have no fault with it being what sparks interest.  I would imagine that many men, including myself, are initially attracted to transhumanism by science fiction.  I wouldn't want to discuss transhumanism with someone who simply wants to meet a Klingon one day."

I agree, we have to be realistic about human behavior and motivation. Myself - I was initially attracted by stories of pleasure and paradise... We also want to get the young people who have yet to become too burdoned with programming and responisibilities/vested interests to be able to question their beliefs with reason. Hopefully we can steer minds in the right direction using pleasure rather than aversive experience.

In fairness, the suggestion was regarding immediate advances which may attract women.  Certainly that shouldn't be a persons only interest, but I have no fault with it being what sparks interest.  I would imagine that many men, including myself, are initially attracted to transhumanism by science fiction.  I wouldn't want to discuss transhumanism with someone who simply wants to meet a Klingon one day.

We each have personal motivations for our interest in transhumanism, it's just that someone who's more concerned with cosmetic details than the meat of the subject is more of an alien to me than a four-armed silver-eyed nano-juice-swilling post-human. :)

And I don't think it necessarily hurts to question people's motivations. Surely there are or will come transhumanists that salivate at the thought of being able to use biotech to sicken or kill others, who want to upload themselves into personal fiefdoms populated with AI slaves, who think nanotech will be awful handy for engineering the last piece of the mighty big bomb they've got half-assembled on crates in a shack in the woods...

I'm interested in the technological program of transhumanism, of course, but I don't think we can afford not to--in some sense--police ourselves. If we don't spend the time and effort to identify the cranks, the shallow opportunists, or the dangerous nuts drawn to some of the things we espouse, those people will eventually be used against us. Every one will serve as another strawman by opponents of transhumanism, to be knocked down in fiery rhetoric before the press. And when enough people begin to believe that we're all like that, laws will get passed that we won't like very much. Simply pointing to a long list of respectable transhumanists with Ph.D.s will not be sufficient defense; the laity is (perhaps justly) distrustful of the intelligentsia, and there is a strong current of anti-intellectualism here in North America that could cause a backlash.

I guess the point here is that I think we should avoid marketing, and let our core ideas speak for themselves. "If we build it, they will come." (I can't believe I just used that quote)

With the exception of hermaphrodites, those are all vague boundaries which are immediately picked up when you have large numbers of both men and women.  I think we should have all of them.  When our grand transhumanist future arrives, they'll be there.  They should be there to shape the ideas as well.

I agree that we can and will have all these types of people, and more besides, in the transhumanist camp--if we don't already. Having been bludgeoned with advertising my whole life, having been a "key demographic," I just find the process of trying to attract people to our "product offering" somewhat distasteful. In any case I certainly won't complain if more women choose to join the discussion here, but I can't help imagining a similar conversation taking place on a hypothetical transhumanist forum, frequented mostly by women, elsewhere on the net:

A: This place is too estrogen-laden. We really need to get some guys up in this joint, give us a fresh perspective on all these issues.

B: And how do you propose we do that?

A: Well, a lot of transhumanists are skinny nerd-boys, I'm sure they'd welcome a little genetic engineering to put the 'ol pituitary into overdrive making human growth factor. Or maybe some gengineered bacteria-produced supersteroids would appeal to the ones that are afraid to monkey with the works at the genetic level.

B: Or maybe we could just put some pictures of boobs on the homepage, that'll hook 'em for sure...

Okay, okay, a little over the top. :)

No ... I'm a woman. Women are probably not on this site or not postin as much becuase they are probably more interested in shopping. : )

ideal:

In fairness, the suggestion was regarding immediate advances which may attract women.  Certainly that shouldn't be a persons only interest, but I have no fault with it being what sparks interest.  I would imagine that many men, including myself, are initially attracted to transhumanism by science fiction.  I wouldn't want to discuss transhumanism with someone who simply wants to meet a Klingon one day.

This is kind of a tangent, and I can't articulate it very well right now, but I do think you are on to something - to get more mass appeal, transhumanism needs near-term, down-to-earth, non-threatening gains (including nano-skin cream, if that can really be considered a transhumanist technology). So this is something that needs to be considered. But I hardly think it's any more necessary to attract women than to attract men - actually, I think people who will come to transhumanism without these sort of near-term gains are a minority in both sexes.

I think the lack of women on this site is just due to the obvious factors that have been previously mentioned: women being a minority among serious Internet users and especially forum posters, transhumanism having an ultra-left-brain-techno-geeky image (as far as this is from the truth) that appeals more to men than women (or perhaps repels men less than women ;-)), the unfortunate minority of people who sound like sexist pigs (even if they don't intend to). I can't really think of any solutions, aside from massive PR to counter the negative image (which is obviously worth doing for reasons completely independent of gender), but dumbing down/superficializing transhumanism isn't necessary to attract women (although it may be necessary to attract a large proportion of the populace of both sexes; did that make any sense?).

crime_minister:

I'm interested in the technological program of transhumanism, of course, but I don't think we can afford not to--in some sense--police ourselves. If we don't spend the time and effort to identify the cranks, the shallow opportunists, or the dangerous nuts drawn to some of the things we espouse, those people will eventually be used against us. Every one will serve as another strawman by opponents of transhumanism, to be knocked down in fiery rhetoric before the press. And when enough people begin to believe that we're all like that, laws will get passed that we won't like very much. Simply pointing to a long list of respectable transhumanists with Ph.D.s will not be sufficient defense; the laity is (perhaps justly) distrustful of the intelligentsia, and there is a strong current of anti-intellectualism here in North America that could cause a backlash.

This is exactly what I've been trying to say. Look, for instance, at this guy.

I guess the point here is that I think we should avoid marketing, and let our core ideas speak for themselves. "If we build it, they will come." (I can't believe I just used that quote)

Wait, how does that follow? Don't you think we need as much PR as possible to counter the strawmen?

No ... I'm a woman. Women are probably not on this site or not postin as much becuase they are probably more interested in shopping. :)

I'm *really* glad you included a smiley face at the end of that sentence. I was about to run outside and step into traffic, give up on the species entirely.

Besides, don't all those women know that the best deals are on the 'net anyways? Haven't they heard of ebay?

:)

Felidae297:

No ... I'm a woman. Women are probably not on this site or not postin as much becuase they are probably more interested in shopping. : )

It certainly seems more of a male tendency to gather and discuss things like science and politics in order to take control of the future.

EschewObfuscation:

crime_minister:

I'm interested in the technological program of transhumanism, of course, but I don't think we can afford not to--in some sense--police ourselves. If we don't spend the time and effort to identify the cranks, the shallow opportunists, or the dangerous nuts drawn to some of the things we espouse, those people will eventually be used against us. Every one will serve as another strawman by opponents of transhumanism, to be knocked down in fiery rhetoric before the press. And when enough people begin to believe that we're all like that, laws will get passed that we won't like very much. Simply pointing to a long list of respectable transhumanists with Ph.D.s will not be sufficient defense; the laity is (perhaps justly) distrustful of the intelligentsia, and there is a strong current of anti-intellectualism here in North America that could cause a backlash.

This is exactly what I've been trying to say. Look, for instance, at this guy.

I guess the point here is that I think we should avoid marketing, and let our core ideas speak for themselves. "If we build it, they will come." (I can't believe I just used that quote)

Wait, how does that follow? Don't you think we need as much PR as possible to counter the strawmen?

IMO : Yes as much communication and contact with the world as possible, while maintaining our integrity.

Now not having read all of the posts on here (and in my eagerness to respond to what I have read)...I am a female and someone who is interested in transhumanism and have been since around 2000. I don't subscribe to it as a philosophy or a set of particular goals for myself. Nevertheless...

I, like Nydra, have posed as gender neutral online, if only to allow myself full participation in whatever is going on and not be hindered by a) men thinking I am there just to "pick up" and b) looking like I am making some sort of statement by being a woman in "their domain".

The other problem is that it is near impossible (outside of an academic setting) to have two women speak to one another on an intellectual level. Now these are just my observations. Perhaps some other women out there have been more fortunate than I. It is sad, really.

I haven't been to the site in months and have almost never participated in these here forums, but thought I'd return after hearing George Dvorsky say on one of his podcasts that it is difficult to attract women to transhuman events.

All-out rant: Well, when every guy I talk to has to bring up his wife/girlfriend out of the blue (because I just can't resist him)...it gets awfully tiring. I would rather stay home than deal with that nonsense. Just talk to me and don't fucking flatter yourself!!

Argh.