Spares..., The dark side of SR biotech (LONG!) Options

[DrJest]

Here's another thought. We already know that spare parts can be... acquired in some less than savoury ways. But in a world where we CAN do radical major tranplants of pretty near anything, where does that lead?

I refer the interested reader to "The Long Arm of Gil Hamilton" and "The Patchwork Girl" by Larry Niven (there are other stories he wrote dealing with this, but those are the two most key). Niven speculated that criminals would, instead of being sentenced to death, be sentenced to the organ banks; ie, broken up for spares. It started off with only the really serious crimes like murder being organ bank crimes, but as time went by, the population voted an increasing number of crimes into organ bank status. The protagonist makes the telling observation at one point that he wonders how long before they work their way down to him...

[Crimson Jack]

[Elfie]

[algcs]

The clones are there for experimental brain transplants. Grow yourself a body on the farm. Once your meat body starts getting old just pop the brain into the new body. Sure it is expensive. Sure you might go crazy. But when you are this rich crazy is just known as excentric.

[Panzergeist]

They grow partial humans which don't have brains or anything. Or they can even grow individual body parts. It is totally unnecesary to grow actual, normal humans and use them as cattle. Pretty sick idea though.