me: and so talking about the paradox within a cyberpunk context, i believe that far too many creators take the conundrum far too literally. "how many pieces of a human can you replace until youre not human" is a severely limited, and a touch annoying, approach to the problem of theseus's ship. a person getting prosthetics or ocular implants or other surgeries doesnt make them less human (and i doubt these people debated with themselves as to how "human" their great aunt who got a titanium hip is). i think while in specific contexts that narrative could work if it was critiquing the beauty industry and/or the obsession with youth and living forever (and how the wealthy have a monopoly on both), the focus on physicality doesnt work when allegorizing theseus's ship. the reason why the paradox surrounds the physicality of the ship is because that is what Defines a ship; physicality does not define humanity and human nature. humanity's version of theseus's ship should surround morality, compassion, community, dignity. the questions of how many people can you screw over, how many people can you kill, how much suffering can you ignore, how much suffering can you inflict, and how many people are you willing to let be subjugated before you are no longer human? the question of humanity is definitely a loaded one since cruelty is an unfortunate addition to human society, but even with the flaws presented its still a much more viable narrative than-