[extropy-chat] ENOUGH already

[David Lubkin]

At 08:32 AM 12/25/2003 -0500, Matus wrote:

>You can debate about the specific ways a war might be carried out, and
>can surely figure some to be anti-extropic, but to absolutely assert
>that *any* war is automatically anti-extropic is egregious.

There are certainly ways a war could be conducted that are more
humane or effective or cheaper than the ways government does, beyond
what Vinge discusses in "The Ungoverned" and what we've observed
here, as when the ethics and effectiveness of political assassination
was discussed.

As interesting as that conversation might be, it is apt to draw a bit more
attention than discussing M-brains. I've been reading the new free-arms
list, where a few proto-extropians have banded, and there's a sad
awareness that GS-11 Brother is watching.

I'm leaving in a few minutes to take my daughter to the airport, and I just
emptied my pockets of everything that's ordinarily there that security
will balk at.

Did you know that bringing a typical pocket knife into a post office is a
Federal crime?  (And was, pre-9/11.)

>And if a society is ideologically opposed to creativity and construction
>(as many communist regimes have pretty much been) then going to war with
>them is still not extropic? Do you consider WWII to have been extropic
>or anti-extropic?

Since we, regrettably, can't know how alternative histories would really
have turned out, I'm not sure. Yes, removing Hitler and freeing Europe
were worthy causes, as such things go, but the ripple effect of our
expedient alliance with Stalin and domestic blindness to communist
infiltration of the US was losing Eastern Europe and decades of
struggle and warfare to free them.

As the powerkills site details, more people were killed under Stalin than
Hitler. I'm not sure who otherwise abridged freedom more. It's harder to
compare, beyond gulag vs. concentration camp.

At the time, we decided Stalin was the lesser of two evils, as we'd
sided with Saddam over Khomeini. Looking back, it isn't clear.


-- David Lubkin.