Imagine for a second that humans have very powerful thought communication skills. What implications do you think this would induce? My guess would be that individuality would be lost, and people would become a part of something bigger, just like neurons and the brain. That brain is just much more capable; again compare the simplicity of a neuron and the complexity of the brain. Now is there any hope on such a communication process between people?

Quote: Original post by arithma
Imagine for a second that humans have very powerful thought communication skills. What implications do you think this would induce?

Would this communication be active ("talking" to the minds of others) or passive ("listening" to the minds of others) ? Active communication would not change a lot of things, it would only allow for secret conversations without having to isolate first. And there might be fewer misunderstandings, but people still think in very different ways.

Passive communication would change the way in which people are evaluated, since once could check the mind of a person to determine if she has the required skills for a given task.

Quote: My guess would be that individuality would be lost, and people would become a part of something bigger, just like neurons and the brain.

What prompts you to believe this?

Quote: That brain is just much more capable; again compare the simplicity of a neuron and the complexity of the brain.

The whole is not always greater than the sum of its parts. Look at a tiled floor to convince yourself of this.

Quote: Now is there any hope on such a communication process between people?

A Very Powerful Thought Communication Skill? It is almost bound to arise sooner or later. What we don't know is when it will appear, and how it will work (active/passive considerations being the least of our questions).

We don't need to imagine such skills because we already have quite a few of them (e.g. Speech and writing)

People are already a part of different layers of "something bigger". Societies and nations are examples of extremely complex structures that are more capable than the individual human.

As for loss of individuality, I doubt it. People with compatible minds will tend to cluster together. People with different minds will tend to avoid or antagonize each other. This has been happening since the dawn of humanity.

Peace Out!