Are you unsettled by microchip implants in humans?

It does feel lke a further dehumanization and a shredding of any illusions of any illusions of privacy left.

I am a Christian but I don’t see this as a sign of the end of times. I am not reading this as the mark of the beast. However, I am disturbed by this as “big brother” is always watching and knowing what I am doing, seeing, eating, buying. If this continues, I don’t see that there will be a shred of privacy left.

As the great Bill Burr said in a routine several years ago….

“Count on it…...whatever they’re doing to dogs, they’ll be doing to us in ten years”.

Is this question spurred by the recent news article about a company that’s using a microchip to conduct transactions? I’ve been hearing so much buzz about that and it really feels to me like people are overreacting. It’s not even mandatory for employees at that company.

I’m generally not freaked out by this kind of stuff. I don’t care if Google knows what I do and where I go based on my cell phone activity. It just doesn’t bother me. I don’t know if it should, but it doesn’t.

I would have a problem with it if any of it were mandatory.

Absolutely. I’m 100% opposed.

Depends on what the chip is supposed to do, what it is technically capable of being used for, and if it is voluntary.
Realistically though, it will be mandatory, and will be used to track your every move and action to keep you and your fellow cattle under state/corporate control, under the excuse of “protecting us from terrorists”.
So the first thing you should do after you get this chip implanted, is get a taser and fry that thing.

@ragingloli Is that the best you can come up with?
Fry the chip?
When I started that sentence I was sure there would be much blood and torn muscles and tissue, caused by an axe or a circular saw…~

I was assigned far too many Ray Bradbury stories as a public school student to be comfortable with the idea.

@Mariah – Yes, of course it’s about the recent news, which is precisely why USA Today had this odd story today, which I suppose they thought was important.

It is true that there is no “mandatory” implanting, and I can’t see a medical procedure like this being forced upon anyone but convicted criminals (which totally would happen if some people have their way). We should remember that “mandatory” comes in different forms. Remember when it was ok not to have a cell phone? Remember when it was ok to forbid your child from owning a cell phone? E-mail? As technology moves, we are expected to keep up. You can resist, but you just get left behind.

For myself, I’m most concerned about security vulnerabilities. As we automate more things, and centralize their “keys”, it becomes both easier to hack people, and potentially more damaging.

@chyna – I don’t think it’s any more big brothery than anything that currently exists. It’s just under your skin now. Guess you can always wear a tinfoil glove!

Fear of the unknown.
We don’t know what that does, so we don’t want it.
Also, the “new technology is bad” approach; people had the same reaction to almost every new technology that came before: radios were abhorent, telehones meant we won’t leave our houses and have personal conversations anymore, telegraphs were accused of marking the end of era of long letters and creative writing, television was ruining our kids, internet is still seen as the evil that is corrupting our youth. Hell, Socrates taught writing ruins one’s memory and he refused to write down his lessons.

Every time a new technology appears, people see is as the danger that will destroy society. Then they accept it. Then it advances our society. Then we laugh at our silly ancestors that feared it.

@Sneki2 A reasonable perspective, but certainly all technology comes with risks. I’m sure many people were electrocuted and buildings randomly burned down before we figured out the electrical standardization necessary to keep people safe. People had to burn to death before fire codes for large buildings were established. More people had to burn to death before enforcement became a priority. Hell, cars didn’t have seatbelts for forever. Technology might be good in the long run, but it also seems inevitable that people will be hurt while we figure out the kinks.

*thought

@Smashley So? People die every day, all the time. Some of them are dying because we don’t have technology that would help them.
Some people will experience the bad side of new technology, that is true. But if that never happened, we’d never know how to improve and make technology even better. If those people didn’t get burned, we’d never create safety laws. If someone didn’t get hurt in a cart crash, we’d never come up with seatbelts and traffic laws.
Deaths are unfortunate, but just because someone might die does not mean we should hide in caves and stop any progress.

@Sneki2 – cool. Just don’t sign me up for early trials.

^If you’re going to make an omlet, you gotta break a few eggs….

Just not mine, K?

If you want to be a farmer…

Fist they chipped the kitties, and I said nothing.

Then they chipped the puppies and cows and chimps, and I said, “but they’re not human.”

Then they chipped us, but there were no animals left to guard us…

I’ll get excited about implants when they contain all of the remote/telephone/computer workings.

@Sneki2 – I was thinking today about this topic a little more, and I keyed in more closely to my problem. It’s that safety precautions should be better anticipated. Is it really so unreasonable that a car should have a seatbelt? I find it hard to believe that we need people to be hurt before we can wrap our minds around the inherent dangers in new technology.

Is that just what it means to be an innovator? If you wait to implement things safely, you will just be passed by less scrupulous capitalists?

You could be more concerned by WWW which really is the sign of the antichrist rather than 666.

Lol. I’ll stick to being concerned about rising sea levels and debt that exceeds 100% of GDP than some fairy tale’s rushed ending.