tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19346366.post6190938746695142837..comments2024-03-28T21:56:51.675-04:00Comments on Face to Face: Is a plastic surgery dystopia possible?agnostichttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12967177967469961883noreply@blogger.comBlogger4125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19346366.post-83296673718873306402010-07-06T15:39:59.710-04:002010-07-06T15:39:59.710-04:00If you have a way for money to get something that ...If you have a way for money to get something that otherwise you can't get, then money getting traits will gain a relative advantage relative to that other trait. I don't really think there's much of a way around that. <br /><br />If you posit that good looks are the only trait people could select for then of course, people will select for good looks, but otherwise they will only have relative value to other traits, and (at least for that subset of traits that are alterable by surgery) plastic surgery will lower the relative value. I mean, if things worked like you seem to be saying, people caring about good clothes or cosmetics would be impossible, because they'd just choose good looking mates instead and natural selection.<br /><br />In practice good looks and many other generally positive traits have a positive of course (for whatever reason http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg20727674.200-if-youve-got-great-genes-it-pays-to-be-extrovert.html).<br /><br />I think it's fairly trivial to automate making versions of peoples faces that look better to the average person. The space of possible faces isn't really anything like as open as possible fashion garments, which is the analogy, and there's already automated software that does this to some degree. Sample attractive and unattractive rated faces, find persistant relationships, quantify a given face among the space, identify the features that people find most "distinct" about faces and apply the relationship, weighting change against distinctive features. The hard part would be integrating this with the physical possibilities of surgery, which is relatively hard to automate and does have an on the fly aspect. I think building a robot that then works off this plan would probably be an even harder step still. Technologically you could reduce the barrier to entry to practice plastic surgery quite a bit, but you're right not enough to make it common, barring, you know, mind emulations or anything.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19346366.post-65481116187948885782010-07-05T01:30:00.251-04:002010-07-05T01:30:00.251-04:00You apparently read different dystopias than I do....You apparently read different dystopias than I do.<br /><br />In my experience, the futuristic beauty dystopias are based on genetic engineering (generally of existing alleles), robotic and/or nanotechnic surgery, virtual reality beauty warfare, artificial selection by breeding, and remote-controlled robotic avatars, roughly in that order of frequency. The only ordinary medical beauty dystopia I can remember is the movie <i>Brazil</i>.<br /><br />Most dystopian writers don't overestimate the relative strength of technological change. They just don't have the skill or time it takes to change many parameters at the same time. So they pick one or two interesting things, dial them up to 11, and use them to punish the characters for our amusement. Naturally the characters have to triumph over Evil, because editors get grumpy if you kill the plucky underdog.<br /><br />There are a good number of polemic dystopian stories, but I have not had any trouble finding ones that are not. However I generally stick to the more science fictional stuff and pick authors that don't suck. I'm quite sure the pop authors do it suitably badly. (E.g., the Uglies books.)Daniel Newbyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16447547303783134514noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19346366.post-60337386649339811992010-07-05T00:29:42.765-04:002010-07-05T00:29:42.765-04:00Agnostic,
Getting those better looking people is e...Agnostic,<br />Getting those better looking people is easier said than done. Isn't getting plastic surgery all about attracting a better person than they otherwise would get? At least for women who are strongly judged by this?Dahlianoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19346366.post-49691226707371904802010-07-04T13:45:12.293-04:002010-07-04T13:45:12.293-04:00It may not quite be plastic surgery, but consider ...It may not quite be plastic surgery, but consider the way hair removal has become nearly universal among women - at least 75% of women in the 18-50 age range are completely hairless :(<br /><br />PeterAnonymousnoreply@blogger.com