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[LucasMaxBros]

This has always interested me, since the possibility in the future is real. But I'd also like to make a game where it happens/happened.

Oh, and if you don't know what Animal Uplift means, basically it's the process of an intelligent species raising/altering another to become intelligent. Like modifying a dogs genes and physiology to become as smart as a human and talk. Planet of the Apes essentially. Of course, doing this isn't easy let alone in the realm of possibilities...currently.

There's a lot of ethnics involved, but other questions I have is if it did happen, how do you think this would affect us? What would the relationships be like if any? Would we get along or would we kill them/they kill us? What species would get uplifted and could they get along? What would they think of themselves and of the fact humans did this to their species? What would our culture be like if they were integrated into our society? And of course, if it suddenly happened right now, how would you react?

[ProgramGamer]

[Magurp244]

Animals are already intelligent, Corvids and other birds have twice the neuron density of mammals, complex languages, and social structures. The main limiting factor for them at this point is physiology, its kinda hard to mine or smelt ore without arms, hands, or opposable thumbs. :/

(snip)

All the cookies 4 u.

[Schoq]

corvids can manipulate objects just fine though. a bigger problem I think would be the (perhaps marginal) extra brain weight limiting their flight

[s0]

im a dog irl and im doing just fine without humans "uplifting" me thank you very much

[surt]

Shouldn't we finish uplifting humanity first.
We've still got all those conservatives to go yet.

[Schoq]

I find coming home to my cat very uplifting

[s0]

im a dog irl and im doing just fine without humans "uplifting" me thank you very much

actually humans lifting me is kinda uncomfortable and i would appreciate if they asked first.

[valrus]

Even in the Uplift novels, the biggest change that Uplift did wasn't so much cognitive as communicative.  Various species are already pretty intelligent, but we can't really build a civilization together until we're more successful at communicating.  I don't think this will happen by changing around their genes until they can make human sounds, though, and giving them opposable thumbs.  This would be an absurdly inefficient way to go about it. 

It's more likely that, as we become cyborgs to a greater degree and make improvements on mind-machine interfacing and machine-augmented intelligence, we'll bring some animals along with us.  Our uplifted animal companions won't literally be saying "hello" and opening doors with their modified appendages; they'll say "hello" and open doors by thinking through the internet just like humans will.

We usually talk about cetaceans and primates being uplifted, but cats and dogs will probably be first, and if not them, parrots and crows, just for economic and accessibility reasons.

They'll probably be some uplifted more-exotic animals in research or sanctuary situations, stuffed full of interfaces for medical and quality-of-life reasons, just like ourselves.  A lot of already-intelligent animals are in precarious ecological situations, and there will probably be a point in the future where the bulk of them remaining are under human care.  And anything that's under human care will probably come along with us into this new world of CRISPR, machine-augmented intelligence, etc.

Although rarer, cetaceans and primates will probably be politically important when it comes to questions of uplifted animals and rights, though, because even now some humans feel they're people with rights.  Even after uplift, humans will probably still feel that cats and dogs "belong to us", and their rights will probably lag behind species that were thought of as "people" before the uplift age.  There will probably be some conflict between the Big Smarts (cetaceans, primates, elephants, etc.) and the Little Smarts (dogs, cats, parrots, crows, etc.) because of this.  The Big Smarts, being closer to full rights, have a vested interest in leaving the Little Smarts behind rather than wait for all uplifted animals to have equal rights, and probably some of them genuinely believe that the Little Smarts aren't people the way Big Smarts are.  Humans are on the fence about granting more rights -- many feel that Big Smarts really are people but don't want to set a precedent that any animal is a person.  Meanwhile, the Little Smarts are ignored and politically disenfranchised, but are very numerous and have greater daily access to human society and technology.  That, I think, is the big interesting conflict.

[LucasMaxBros]

Maybe, though I suspect Mice and possibly even Raccoons might be some of the first ones. Of course the problem there is they don't have the physiology for the grey matter needed, at least as far as we know. Monkeys and Dolphins seem to be the biggest candidates, but how mice are bred is what leads me to think they might be the first.

I imagine if it were to occur, they wouldn't get uplifted at the same rates. So some species could be intelligent but others would be superior. Perhaps even within the same species there'd be variations.

I also think this will eventually happen, regardless of the ethnics. I imagine illegal or not in the future, someone will do it. Whether it's a group, government, the people, extremists, or something else entirely. Though no way we'll ever be able to tell.

[valrus]

I knew someone working on some hybridization of raccoon subspecies, trying to breed some of the adaptability of the familiar urban raccoon into another more wild subspecies that wasn't resilient in the face of human encroachment.  (But working with raccoons is hard because of the males; most of them turn on you when they hit puberty.)  That idea could be adapted into another kind of uplift motivation: giving animals the ability to navigate a future world that's almost entirely technologized.

Another kind of conflict: do uplifted animals get any say in what other animals are uplifted?  Because (and the Uplift trilogy kind of touches on this) there'd be a lot of potential uplifted species opposed to uplifting orcas, who prey on lots of pretty-intelligent species.  Humpback whales apparently *hate* orcas, going out of their way to frustrate their hunts even when it doesn't directly affect the humpbacks themselves.

[LucasMaxBros]

Not sure, but we have ourselves as a reference for stuff like that. Humans are instinctively afraid of some things but that doesn't make us all hate those things or the same things. Just because we may have been preyed on by tigers long ago doesn't mean we all hate them (despite the fact they're critically endangered because of us). It feels like it could be a case by case basis for stuff like that, but there would definitely be some form of "animal racism", depending on how social the species is.

But it also depends on how they're uplifted. Is it simply giving them human intelligence? As in our genes? In which case the animals would be semi-human hybrids to a degree. Or they're uplifted by giving them something that allows the ability to grow something like an intelligent brain. Which would mean they'd become intelligent... but in a different way, possibly having different instincts affecting the development or how they interact. I imagine the former would be most likely.

[Cobralad]

why wont you just give them a bible

[MeshGearFox]

can i yiff it

[skaz]

Cats already did. They just understood that humans accepted to be their slaves and go to work to feed them, without anything in return but the privilege to pet them. So they keep their mouth shut, in fear we ask them to go to work, too.

Lazy bastards.

[Schoq]

cats provide efficient pest control which is a vital service to human civilization. there's a good reason they were held in such high regard in ancient egypt

[JWK5]

Cats already did. They just understood that humans accepted to be their slaves and go to work to feed them, without anything in return but the privilege to pet them. So they keep their mouth shut, in fear we ask them to go to work, too.

Lazy bastards.

Cats do give you something in return, they patronize you with dead mice and birds because they realize that as a human you are a pathetic hunter and need to have prey brought to you like one of their young.

There's also this: "Cat Owners Have Lower Heart Attack Risk, Study"

[skaz]

cats provide efficient pest control which is a vital service to human civilization. there's a good reason they were held in such high regard in ancient egypt

My cat only used to hunt for fun, then released living mice in the house. My cat actually BRING THE PEST in the house.

Cats do give you something in return, they patronize you with dead mice and birds because they realize that as a human you are a pathetic hunter and need to have prey brought to you like one of their young.

There's also this: "Cat Owners Have Lower Heart Attack Risk, Study"

Yeah, I'm sure they find it really funny.

They found a solution to prevent humans from dying, what did they do? They kept the secret all for themselves, in fear of loosing very well tamed slaves.

[s0]

cats provide efficient pest control which is a vital service to human civilization. there's a good reason they were held in such high regard in ancient egypt

pet cats are actually bad for the local ecosystem

[Schoq]

not as bad as a the presence of a human society without cats would be (for the local ecosystem) (I may or may not be making this up)
alt. so is agriculture but that's also vital, what's ur point
alt. #2 why do you value the lives of squirrels over humans? why do you hate christmas?