Deep Spirits

Stepping away from the illias ('cause what you do with your illio is just none of my business) for a moment, I think the topic brings to light another highly debated ethical debate. Now mind you, I haven't had much time to dedicate to the investigation of this particular technology, so I'm making some pretty lengthy assumptions here based on, well, nothing in particular. If I'm way off base based on the accurate information, my apologies in advance.

The thing that caught my attention most in this particular thought, however, is the potential ramifications of just such technology to the planet itself. This is not a particularly popular opinion/thought (hopefully I won't get kicked off the boards for my second post ever) but there is a certain natural selection to life that this could significantly effect. To explain just a bit, I am not apathetic to life... quite the opposite... but I am a firm believer that there is a balance to life... the planet itself can only support so much life existence... and in effort to support that balance nature does what it must to balance the birth/death experience. Disease, as much as I hate the idea of some (as a diabetic myself) is a part of that. Now I am all for trying to find a cure to diseases... but, I also tend to believe that when one is cured another exists.

So... how would this... odd... view relate to the aforementioned discussion? The potential here is to essentially cure most of the diseases that we have out there. Diabetic? Print up a new pancreas and off to the nearest bakery... early found cancer of the _______? Print up a new _______ and off ya go... The question that brings to mind personally, then, is, is this one of those situations where it would be best if we used the technology at all? Is this, like some of the supposed Atlantean technology (don't get me started) going to create for us a situation worse than we have now?

Just my insomnia induced thoughts... please don't kick me out!

I think we're already too far enough into a global population crisis to be concerned with how perfect medical care could exacerbate that. This isn't quite the immortality pill just yet. =]

Also, as mentioned, methinks it should be stipulated that we're largely talking about those paraphilia sufferers who have very black & white tendencies; that is those people who have sexual attractions to non-sexual stimuli and none of the psychological hoo-ha to go with it.
I think that's interesting in itself, if we consider the possible near future which operates under this awesome technology we start to see the very paraphilia definitions themselves break into further sub-categories. Suddenly the hypothetical future society begins to integrate with those who occasionally chow-down on a printed out arm whilst continuing to burn those at the stake who demand that their arms come exclusively from previously living people. Of course it's all speculation but fun to think about nonetheless no?

It is an interesting thought in theory, yes.

However, the thing is that the described sexual attractions would mostly, if not exclusively, be directly connected to the "psychological hoo-ha".

For instance, why else would one be attracted to corpses, in general, if not for the fact that they are dead (after having previously lived, so dead as opposed to living & breathing & thinking)?

I was curious myself, so I checked and found this:

Rosman and Resnick (1989) reviewed information from 34 cases of necrophilia describing the individuals' motivations for their behaviors: these individuals reported:
- the desire to possess an unresisting and unrejecting partner (68%)
- reunions with a romantic partner (21%),
- sexual attraction to corpses (15%)
- comfort or overcoming feelings of isolation (15%)
- seeking self-esteem by expressing power over a homicide victim (12%)

Based on that, the 21% who are tempted in order to reunite with a romantic partner is the only group that stands out. All the other explanations sound like variations of the same, do they not?
At the base of the "the desire to possess an unresisting and unrejecting partner", "sexual attraction to corpses", "comfort or overcoming feelings of isolation", "seeking self-esteem by expressing power over a homicide victim" are all general feelings of being "unfit" for a sexual relationship with a living person in general.
Only the case of "reunions with a romantic partner" is different because the tendency only appears due to previous feelings for that person (the romantic partner) when they were alive.

Seems to me that the large percentage in your example would fit the hypothetic then. Surely, paraphilia being the broad spectrum that it is, it'd be silly to presume that there aren't at least a sizeable portion of people to which these ideas apply.

Also psychological studies into paraphilia are enormously swung by cultural bias and their sample selection strategies a bit of a joke. It's not like you can get significant and reliable findings from the general public in regards to such heavily stigmatised subject material so they usually end up having to pick from the pool of institutionalised and extreme cases. I'm not a fan of those statistics to say the least.

Interesting aspect though, some people consider post-humous copulation with their partners and loved ones? That's new to me. I wonder if those are just romantic cases or instances of obsession or what.

As an aside, help seeking paraphilia sufferers make for highly interesting conversational partners. There's a lot of bastardised ethics surrounding the subject. If you ever get the highly irregular chance to talk to one about their condition I recommend hearing them out.