Originally posted by Jager:
Answer these questions, please:
Are Novas human beings?
1. Tell me, do you wear clothing? Use a computer keyboard/microphone, or if some luddite throwback, a pen. Does $100.00 USD seem of greater value than $1.00 USD? Does it seem ridiculous or grotesque to you that someone might keep some specific types of animals as pets but not others? Or that they might have a preference for specific types of animals as food without regard for flavor, nutritional value or texture?

You're human.

2. If Novas are not the same thing as human beings, then what part do they play in society and the ecology of earth?
See one above.

3. Do you follow laws and social traditions of society because you must, or because you want to?
See one above and think on the meaning of the words 'outlaw', 'criminal' and 'outcast'.

4. If you chose to violate the law, could normal humanity catch you at it?
Potentially or definitively?

5. If they could catch you at it, could they punish you for what you had done?
May I presume this question presupposes to ask whether I could defy society and live to tell the tale?

Could you live outside of society, if you wished?
Could I live outside of society or would I wish to?

Originally posted by Jager:
1. Tell me, do you wear clothing?
No.
How liberating for you. I hadn't intended to pry into your personal affairs, though I must say the mental image conjured by this response is marginally less disturbing than the earlier mention of sailor suits.

Alex approaches the matter from a somewhat different point of view and makes many good points. Instead of restating his conclusions I'll simply deal with the differences. The heart of the question in my mind is one of terms and their use. To say homo sapien sapiens or homo sapiens novus says nothing about humanity. The terms are merely intellectual bookmarks. Human is a social term. The latin and term 'human' were considered synonymous only because no other species existed to bring the matter into question.

To say you are nova is all well and good. To say you cannot be human because you are nova is at best a misuse of the terms. I am open to the possibility that you aren't and awaiting something to demonstrate this.

Originally posted by Vixen:
In it, the good doctor sets out to prove that consciousness is a quantum-related phenomenon, that anything with consciousness manipulates the quantum environment just by thinking, and that the M-R node is only an externalization of this process.

I've read that article. It's very interesting speculation but nothing more than that at this point. I do think you may be misinterpreting her speculation on the nature of consciousness and drawing unwarranted conclusions.

Or perhaps its a question of standards. Business and Ivory Tower mentalities are rarely sympatico.

Originally posted by Alex Craft:
I am curious as to what you would consider to be "not human."

A man is born with no arms or legs. He is completely unable to transport himself from place to place. He is human.

Yes.

A man is born perfectly within the human 'norms.' He is capable of anything a 'baseline' human is capable of. He is human.

Yes.
A man is born with the genetic potential to manipulate quantum energies, unlike baseline humans. He is also human.


Incorrect. The loss of limbs, either by accident or while forming in the womb, is something that can occur to any member of the human species. How it manifests isn't important, only that it can happen is.

Walking, and using arms, is a facet of the human animal that is simply part of their being. If one is born without these limbs, for whatever reason, it is no less human. If it is born with an extra limb, it is no human. The addition or removal of traits common to the species as a whole does not change the intrinsic nature of what that species is.

The potential to manipulate quantum, however, cannot be attained or lost by a "normal" human. It is not a trait present in "normal" humans. The presence of this potential doesn't make said normal human abnormal.

This trait is intrinsic to a particular species and only that species. You can make as many comparisons as you wish trying to equate this to social advantage, physical aptitude, mental capacity, or lack thereof due to some condition of birth as you like. None of these allow a human to manifest a new biological facet that is absent in, and cannot be acquired by, the remainder of the baseline species.

Quantum manipulation is an ability.

Ability as you are defining it is an incorrect label.

It is an impressive ability, but its capacity to define 'humanity' is not any greater than that of the ability to walk.

Again, incorrect. A human is not defined by its ability to walk. A Nova, however, is defined by the ability to manipulate quantum. A baseline, unable to manipulate quantum, cannot be defined in the same terms.

What makes us human is our behavioral patterns - our way of dealing with the world around us. Being able to do more than another human doesn't change that.

Being able to do more than 100% of all humans, however, does. The only reason Novas and Baselines have similar behavioral patterns is because at this time latent Novas are often raised as baselines, and a facet of both species being sentient.

However, quantum manipulation does provide the potential to become something other the human. Some novas do undergo such fundamental changes that they are not longer human. However, this isn't some kind of inevitable shift - it is a choice. Consciously or unconsciously, the choice to be different is made. An inhuman nova is like that because he or she wanted to be.

Inhuman as defined how? And in what sense? Physically? Mentally? How is a Nova that has "made" the choice to become "inhuman" less or more human than the Nova that does not. If the potential exists to transcend humanity, by your argument, then the species by its very potential has already done so. Whether the choice to do it on an individual level is made becomes irrelevant at that point. On the same terms, how does one chose to "not" become inhuman? Where does this line exist? Does the change that you're allotting for occur at the moment the choice is made, at the moment of eruption, or at some point down the line, and where down the line is it considered to be "inhuman?"

If I were a baseline human, and I chose to, say, kill several members of my family and spread their parts around the room, that would be dealt with harshly. If I am a nova and I do similar, the Teragen seems to say that is acceptable - that it is simply how I choose to deal with the world.

We are now venturing into morality and philosophy. Some members of the Teragen say it is acceptable to do so because Nova society has not decreed it wrong to do so. One species cannot make expect another species to abide by its norms and laws simply because they existed first.

That's bullshit. Any such nova was human and - before, during, or after eruption - made the choice to change into something that was not human. Since you made this choice as a human any consequences of that choice should be dealt with under human law and custom.

Really? How can you hold something that is no longer human accountable by human standards? What if a child, for the sake of argument, erupted in the womb? Or erupted as an infant? Raised by parents who, in your perception, were no longer human because of a choice made before this child was conceived? Is this child human? Was it ever? It wasn't educated by or with human law and custom, it never made the choice to become anything other than it was. It has been able to manipulate quantum since it was self-aware, and has never known a life without it. What if this change occurs for a child of eight? Ten? What if the unconscious decision, as you say, was made then? Are you going to say that these now inhuman parents have an obligation to raise the child human? How far down the lineage does this obligation occur? At what point, in your method of thinking, does being other than human indicate that the species is different, and not the individual?

In any event, your argument is dependant upon the idea that latent Novas are human until the time of their eruption, instead of a sentient species that resembles a human that hasn't fully awakened to its potential yet. At eruption, they become human with an extra ability. Later, they may choose to become something else, or they may choose to only be a human with an extra ability.

A final question, then. What if all current Novas made the choice to become other than human? Is this a choice being made by individuals, or an inevitability of a first-generation of a new species accepting that it is no longer part of the parent species? And if that is true, in your estimation, why it is negated if a few of them refuse to accept it? Are they, instead, in denial of what always was?

Originally posted by Alex Craft:

Humans with the 'nova gene' are no different than humans. You may argue that the genetic capacity to manipulate quantum renders them separate, but there is no practical reason to do so. They look the same, act the same, and think the same as any baseline human. Most of them will never actually erupt.

Let's change my initial example around. For this purpose, let's use an unerupted, quantum-capable human as the baseline. One human varies from that baseline in that he does not have the genetic capacity to manipulate quantum. Another does have those genes, but does not have the genetic capacity to see. Why is one deficiency greater than the other? Genetic definitions are tricky, since individual genetic templates vary widely.

An unrelated, but comparable example: the genetic difference between human males and human females is about the same as the genetic difference between human males and chimpanzee males. Why are both human males and females considered human? Because of their capacity to breed? A baseline human male can breed with a quantum-capable human female.

Inhumanity is not less or more - it is simply different. The human condition is, for most purposes, practical because it allows one to be part of the dominate species on the planet. Becoming inhuman has theoretical uses, but doing so does not exclude you from human judgement.

On one hand, humans will judge you whether you are human or not - and your inhumanity will not prevent them from acting upon this judgement if they wish to. On the other, your choice to become inhuman was made while human, so that choice and its consequences are under the domain of human law.

The example of the child is interesting and requires further thought. However, I will point out now that infants are not human, sociologically speaking. Catch them early enough, and they aren't even sentient or self-aware. Most mental and social development occurs well after birth. I tentatively accept the possibility that a child may grow up inhuman. My comments should, for the time being, be only applied to those who were not born or brought up under such circumstances. This would be most or all of the planet's population.

Originally posted by Ashnod:


I am not human. This isn't something I "feel" or "believe." It is a fact. The how and the why of this you can debate freely, whether or not it is a matter of genetics, of possessing the ability to manipulate reality, or having made an unconscious choice (as Alex here would say) to go beyond humanity.