[ClearCase_guy]

Bruce Sterling did some interesting science fiction work, imagining that a "post-human" future takes two philosophical paths. On the one hand, there are Mechanists who end up with artificial eyes and limbs and who use prosthetics to live longer and be better. On the other hand, there are Shapers who use genetic technology to eliminate disease and aging and maximize the body's inherent potential.

Of course, a combination of the two may be the most realistic path forward. But for Sterling, it became almost a religious war between the Mechanists and the Shapers are to who was an abomination and who were the rightful heirs to the old human societies.

[RoosterRedux]

I could see such a war early on. But I think, rightly or wrongly, the cyborgs will leave the purists in the dust.

I think I would choose to be a purist.

[who_would_fardels_bear]

Besides Mechanists and Shapers we could have non-conscious AI, conscious AI, and AI with souls provided by God.

I'm sure all of these possibilities have been explored in countless Sci-Fi books.

The scariest will probably be the non-conscious AI; basically sociopaths with "mad skillz". If consciousness is just an emergent property of sufficiently complex machines then conscious AI might develop reasons for not exterminating us. However, non-conscious AI with self-programming might just develop algorithms that cause them to exterminate mankind either specifically or as a mere side-effect of something else they're trying to accomplish.