To those that have, shall be given

http://www.economist.com/displaystory.cfm?story_id=10311266

by mynameishere • 19 years ago

13 7 19 years ago

bayareaguy• 19 years ago

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/f/f8/Internet_dog.j...

vitaminj• 19 years ago

I think that sometime in the future (<50 years perhaps?), advancements in cosmetic surgery will come to a level of sophistication and low cost where practically everyone in rich countries can look anyway they want. Like second life.

Perhaps by that stage, the cultural stigmas associated with augmenting appearances will have weakened sufficiently so that everyone does it. At which point people will be judged on merit/personality instead of looks. A world where everyone can look the same... Utopia or dystopia?

__2• 19 years ago

I suspect that in a world where people can have their appearances overhauled, people will display their wealth by getting expensive body-modifications.

jimbokun• 19 years ago

Like today?

mynameishere• 19 years ago

To the extent that beauty's advantage is a "cultural stigma" that's all well and good, but the point of the article is that beauty is a somewhat credible measure of other qualities, like health and intelligence. When people get plastic surgery, they're gaming other people's sexual instincts and so rendering them invalid.

Cosmetic surgery gives you "beauty" in the same way that processed sugar gives you "nutrition"...that is, it doesn't. Eventually, people will evolve some other antennae that can't be corrupted so easily.

cellis• 19 years ago

And we all know how long "eventually" takes. Millennia

To those that have, shall be given

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