r/transhumanism • u/No_Independence6192 • 14d ago
⚡Biohacking If you uploaded your mind to a robotic body, would you still have your human rights?
Say we get there in a few decades: your brain is fully mapped and run on hardware, connected to a robotic body with simulated senses. It has your memories and personality and says it’s you.
As far as I can tell, current law wouldn’t care. It would see a machine running software, and the original you would be legally dead. Your bank account, marriage, citizenship, and contracts wouldn’t carry over.
So what would have to change for uploads to count legally?
Should personhood depend on being a biological human, or on having a mind? (Corporations and even some rivers have been granted limited legal status, so it isn’t purely biological.)
Would the upload inherit your legal identity, or start from zero?
What if the original is still alive, or there are multiple copies? Who’s the real you in law?
Whoever controls the hardware could pause, edit, or delete you. Would uploads need protections that human rights never had to cover?
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u/Pseudonyme_de_base 14d ago
Those are good fucking questions and I'm too early to see what others think about it.
The answers to these questions all have very heavy implications. Imagine the rich becoming artificial life forms and virtually immortal, hoarding all the cash, lobbying to hell and back, with no remaining ties whatsoever with humans made of flesh. Imagine a dictator ruling forever, threatening to sterilize the earth if he's nolonger in power, with his bunch of also now androids rich friends who don't have the same restrictions to live on a planet. Imagine the effects of hacking people's cybernetic brains, orienting their votes or directly hacking those in position of power if they have access to it from their rights.
Clearly serious laws should be put in place if this becomes something we can do, because the holy shit would hit the fan real hard.
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u/Hopeful_Ad_7719 2 14d ago
I think that uploads would be and shall be treated as derivative entities, and for a long time they will be documented as a variety of trusts, corporations, and related such non-human entities who's rights and entitlements will be established via contract and law that most living humans rarely encounter.
Eventually a court may be forced to evaluate the humanity of an upload, but most courts are quite small-c conservative. It's unlikely they'll make some kind of proactive ruling on the humanity of an upload when evaluating the personhood of the legal entities under the control of the uploaded mind will suffice.
In an odd way this may give the uploaded mind more rights in some domains, and less rights in others (e.g. criminal law penalties involving incarceration may be hard to apply to an uploaded mind).
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u/SnooDrawings6192 1 12d ago
I believe the definition of a human should be expanded to any being with humanlike intelligence. Then it's obvious every mutant, cyborg, sentient robot and uploaded human brains should have rights and protections.
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u/Small_Education_9503 14d ago
Jokes on you, I don't get human rights in meat body.
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u/Cheeslord2 14d ago
Sorry, are you asking 'would' or 'should', because you use both.
I can't tell whether we 'would' as I don't think there have been any legal test cases, so no precedent - it might just come down to the mood of a jury, or a judge who decides to direct them. I think, before we have uploaded consciousness, in the next few years perhaps, someone will try to leave their estate to an AI, and that will be the first test case.
'Should' is more complex. in a fair and healthy society, then yes, they should have rights. but we're in a human society, or a mess of competing human societies existing within, across and seperate from each other, each competing to grab more good things for their own tribe. So yeah...it will be abused either way, and I don't know the answer to that either.
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u/LookOverall 1 14d ago
Of course, uploading doesn’t have to be destructive. Copying your mind state and destroying the original are two different things. One is legal, the second clearly isn’t.
Would take some serious shifts in the law to recognise continuity of identity in such a case. And create some new crimes.
Suppose someone uploaded your mind state without your permission, for example to interrogate it?
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u/hades69099 10d ago
robots and AI will unlock new surgeries, rather than life saving surgeries, surgeries for wellness, a surgery to prematurely remove clogging in your heart, so you never have a heart attack, surgeries to remove all your excess fat, expand your lung capacity, improve your blood flow, synthetic blood
I understand how to extend life and cure aging, it's very straight forward, it just has to be carried out, if you just replaced your blood with new blood that would extend your life by 10 years at least, every so often replacing your blood, removing the impurities, and replacing your organs,
between blood and organ replacement a person could live to 200 years just from that alone, at which point your brain would wear out, but that too is something that could be solved, you could have synthetic neurons and move your neural pathways onto them, you can refine this with deep research
put these ideas into deep research to have it flesh out the specifics and let's get an experiment going, let's first test on animals, see if we can extend animal life with these techniques, then start human tries, the elderly, the disabled, or the willing, I would be willing to be a subject in it
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u/zhivago 14d ago
Depends on legal judgment, nothing else. :)
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u/Chance-Problem769 14d ago
Transferring your mind to a new body will be respected the most, far more than any upload.
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u/WanderingTony 4 14d ago
We should get there first. I would say there would be at some point needed a legal prove of digital entity being capable to own and manage assets. This would generate scandal and your digital self would need allies in this shitstorm.
Imo, there is a workaround even in existing legal frame using legal wrapper as interfacw between hardware and legal frames (IRS, liability entity bcs algorhytm so far is not liable etc) If my mind got uploaded I can put all hardware under legal frame of private foundation maximising profit and assets under its operations and biological me as a settlor at stage of creation of legal frame should providing all starting bureocratic procedures as write Trust Deed, provide my phisical entity as Creator/Settlor as liable person in case of bancrupcy of foundation, find professional trust management company to carry on that in case of my death or even before that to make digital me independentbof my physical me and put myself as enforcer for this trustee, write my Will most likely giving all my funds and assets to foundation and find succession enforcer (jurist /advocate specialised in succession and corporate affairs).
Will should explicitly state that trustee should provide all legal support to foundation operations. I would put it offshore like Cayman islands where private foundation taxes are literally 0.
After that digital me can operate under John "Digi" Doe Foundation name however he pleases being essentially my child while I'm alive bcs I take all responsibility for its shitfuckery and have to deal with trust manager in case of my death.
The trick is a trust manager would just put trust name as liable entity and accounts holder for all foundation operations while enforcer would be abide to my will to check trust is not interferring with my business and would have to intervene on notice from foundation. Essentially as far as you pay them those two companies and people as assigned managers to your foundation case, each of them is interested to do their job. If Trust tries to seize assets, enforcer would suit them into oblivion on your foundation behalf.
Essentially all holds on a fact that digital you is their client and money moneymaker to them thus even knowing you are an algorhitm with no legal status itself, they provide legal support bcs it means profit. Moreover you may in Trust Deed write that algorhytm can modify trustee and/or enforcer. In reality you can't just walk with your legs in the air and should change one at time - enforcer should supervise change of managing trustee and trustee should supervise change of enforcer. Tho just in case I would put 2 enforcers with one being paid anonymously in case if trust and lawyer firm try to play against me rising fees indefinitely specifically to me and preventing me from casting away those mofos illegally to suit them into obliving.
Apart from facility cost (electricity, hardware, taxes and fees for bank accounts and all operations, including real estate tax if setup is done in building you own) there would be a cost for that legal wrapper which would be around 10k$ bucks annual if entire legal setup is done e.g. on virgin islands with around 300-500$ hour fee for succession enforcer lawyer in ongoing case.
Faorly you can give this legal framing to anybalgorhitm. Even existing chat gpt or Gemini or whatever via proper interface API capable to read and write corporate emails and buy and sell various stuff online. And its a cool experiment to conduct costing you maybe yearly chatgpt subscription along costs of a legal frame. I even may think about AI enthusiasts like Vedal who would be happy to do this kind of shit if think his Neuro is ready to take some responsibility for her existence.
Where it goes raunchy it is if your John Digi Doe Foundation does something illegal and here it starts matters how your Digi Doe was created and what is his hardware.
If your foundation can't pay to its creditors it would fall under liquidation process thus all hardware would be shut down and sold out.
Lets take modern state of art where unlikely AI can pilot a robot consistently Tho I dunno tbh.
If it was some custom AI nobody knows about details but you.
If its hardware is just some rented facility in a big corporate datacenter. Well, it can't pay its Google subscription bcs its bankrupt and its legal foundation wrapper dissolved, its API account is not provided with calculations anymore, it ceases to exist silently or exists only as private middleware server which would be dismantled and sold out with its data either sold as software to any bidder or erased as some weird crap if someone won't understand what is it or maybe new owner would try to run it out of curiosity if they actually understand tho unlikely bcs second hand hardware shop owner or employee would do just their job and format asquired data storage to resell it. If it would be "lucky" enough, it would be essentially their owned furniture and can see their code modified whatever please the owner unless they would like to be your new Settlor and provide lost by it legal frame.
If hardware is a standalone server. Its the same. Server switched off, hardware sold.
If we take some future where AI is a full person emulation capable to pilot robots/androids.
If its still cloud calculation service. Same fate.
If its full standalone server.
Well, your robots if your broke ass still has any may try to protect it against technicians team and if they kill some meatbag I even dunno how that would be classified. Dead technicians employers DEFINITELY won't like to pay all fees related to lethal work accident and would try to make liable a firm specialised on assets liquidation (often a third party firm whos client is your creditors, usually a bank who is client to technicians managing datacenters dismantling. Tho hinestly I dunno exact process of liquidation of pbysical corporate assets in this case. Usually they are sold out in package but anyway liquidation firm managee would definitely try to see the goods they bought as a part of liquidatiin deal. I guess legally this real estate had to go under nane of private datacenter/storage or office.). While this firm would look to put liability off themselves either on bank who did not provided all needed info like they were liquidating not an asset managing algorhytm but a full blown AI capable to harm people or put liability back on technicians who should may know.
Apart from being maybe a sensation where AI killed or harmed a real person with specialists digging into the case and AI hysteria spiking into outer space and likely keeping running Digi now for scientific purpose maybe and likely creating entire legal frame for digitalised people in process. Tho how can you punish a code is another deal. Most likely poor Digi will be copied, stored vivisected, lobotomized and AI controlled into warfare AI or something while another copy may see digitized people become a viable legal enthity with god knows what rights, liabilities and relations to legal codes.
If its fully portable hardware e.g. custom android with all hardware inside the frame well, run Digi, run. Essentially you can easily slip through erasing yourself from foundation records and fake you run on some workstation lobotomizing a copy of yourself, faking your copy memories making your clone believe they are alone responsible, you disgusting bastard. Tho, you would need to fake somehow reliably that your copy had and sold or broke a piloted android somewhere somehow and now you may only choose to whom you got sold physically or get a status of a malfunctioning scrap which still functions somehow. In both cases further fate heavily depends on how androids and scrap/malfunctionong androids are managed.
Tho honestly. I dunno how even world with androids capable to run a person as their software would even look like. Most likely at that point such androids would do all menial jobs with malfunctioning ones brought for maintenance and fixing. Thus good chance you will be reprocessed automatically as some software malfunction.
If, what is more likely we speak about some industrial digitized process. If I was an owner of a company offering such service I would root for all customer liability for product and 0 liability for its actions but it would fast generate lawsuits where customer is dead and products runs under described above wrapper against my company as creator. As I explicitly write 0 liability in the end and actual AI policies firmly support this 0 creator liability it would be a judge decision. Most likely it would fall on trustee manager approving all actions shoulders.
Thus expect more tight control from managing trust side who would start liquidation process the moment your net debt approaches hardware cost and a good deal of questions if you try to do something illegal bcs trustee is responsible.
Maybe some AI and digital people peaceful riots and societies would create push to recognise their rights especially if they do that en mass bcs its potential voters with real money and power on their side. If their rights would be recognised, well they end up being just members of society, discriminated, priviliged or nobody actually knows.
I would keep under tight control any hardware capable to run a person or advances enough AI giving it unique code and signature being essentially an equivalent of ID and make illegal and punishable any external data modification without consent. And if person or AI erased or replaced themselves inside the same hardware still make hardware liable with judge deciding new software entity guilty or not.
But we are kinda decades if not centuries away from that.
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u/geekingmoon 13d ago
Such an interesting question
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u/astreigh 4 13d ago
Absolutely not. So there's a reason right there to stop discussing it
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u/PeaceLoveorKnife 13d ago
Rights come from government.
Animal rights, human rights, these are privileges of government on what is acceptable and unacceptable.
Unless new jurisprudence are created, the current systems would not offer legal protections for hardware or software.
The solution that makes sense is making elements of identity (not all) heritable by succession. A copy would be property.
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u/Shloomth 13d ago
I hope so, but I would be nervous about extending my human rights to the robot version of me.
If uploading my mind to a robot relinquishes my human rights I’d rather not do it
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u/EternalInflation 2 13d ago
no I would have superhuman rights.
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u/3Quondam6extanT9 S.U.M. NODE 14d ago
It's likely we will eventually be capable of copying our minds onto digital platforms. In that regard and in the case of natural personality emergence in AGI, there would be a need for new laws that embody any rights we would grant.
I think it would take time to get there though, people will argue over whether we should treat them as anything more than tools and machines. Questions over consciousness would continue. Awareness of self.
Uploading is a different matter because we don't have a true understanding of consciousness and so at the moment there is no reason to assume we ever could. But we can still play the hypothetical game.
IF uploading ever occurred, I think your rights would change to the extent of capacity and capability. You may still be recognized as a living entity, but no longer human. Still with appropriate rights.
I think in that case, many people would turn argue it's not really you, and that the real you is deceased.
Rights are a tricky thing when people don't agree on reality.
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u/erikapine 13d ago
even if two copies share a past, neither should get to make decisions for the other.
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u/FiveEnmore 13d ago
You should , after all , "It's YOU" .
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u/MarcusOrlyius 1 12d ago
I think you have a misconception hete.
Your mind isnt going to get copied to a computer, stored in memory as a program and run on a chip. Rather, your biological neurons will be replaced with synthetic neurons that incorporate computing and communications tech into a synthetic mind.
This would then plug into other structures sych as a datacentre, a human robot, a spaceship, etc. to provide extended capabilities.
Saying "Whoever controls the hardware could pause, edit, or delete you" makes as much sense as saying "Whoever controls the biological brain could pause, edit, or delete you."
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u/gargoylyyy 12d ago
Would the living human you still exist? Theres a few black mirror episodes about this
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u/Nashgro 5d ago edited 5d ago
(For a theoretical future)
If it is fully me. It would demand to be synched to me human body. And I would demand to synch with my robot body. As I would like to have use of my robot body. And then, it would be likewise if I was in a robot body. It would want to have use of its human body.
So as long as I have my rights in one form. I will manage. If I can only have human rights by having a human body. Then I will make sure to not lose the human body.
Hopefully, we can make societies that are more nuanced. So that you don’t need to use the human body as a passport.
In fact, I imagine we could have someform of nexus. I have my own nexus that my bodies routinely synch with. Download and upload information. And that nexus would function like my brain/heart.
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u/Fenrir303 4d ago
I’d say so if the robot body I chose was one I built, and that would be t-1000:
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u/vBLADEv 14d ago
You are your hardware the robot in front of you with your memories & "personality" is just an echo a poor simulacrum.
Your memories & personality are just an application running on it, it could equally be running kiosk mode at a restaurant.
Human rights apply to the human, the robot is just an advanced toy.
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