[extropy-chat] [Memetic Bomb] Re:Runaway consumerism explains the Fermi Paradox.

[The Avantguardian]

Wow, this post overloaded my truth meter. Great first
post, Harry, even if it was forwarded from Julian. ;)
So how is Slippery Jim these days or do I have you
confused with someone else?

Kudos, Julian, this completely deconstructs the
nameless dread I have of consumerism and tried to
fumble around for with my posts on the NeoCon Mind
Trick. Use technology to manipulate the emotions of
the people and, even in a democracy, they will oppress
themselves. 

--- Harry Harrison <xyz at iq.org> wrote:

> 
> On Thu, 12 Jan 2006 07:24:14 +1100, "Julian Assange"
> <me at iq.org> said:
> > Dear Unsheeple,
> > 
> > What do guitars, lollies, lipstick, tamagotchis,
> padded bras,
> > pornography, movies, opium, Ever Quest, and 98% of
> any Australian
> > newspaper in common? They are all technologies of
> emmotional
> > manipulation which distort our perceptions for the
> benefit of their
> > masters. Language centres in our neocortex may
> claim to "know" they
> > are fake, but these words only feebly supress
> those primitive areas of
> > the brain which give rise to our feelings, colour
> our memories and
> > command our attention. These non-verbal areas of
> the brain haven't yet
> > evolved to deal such sensory sophistry. For them,
> sensing IS believing.
> > 
> > Hence the feelings in a young woman's breast
> buffeted by the flashing
> > lights and impossibly sonorous tones of the
> amplified rock star; master
> > of a 20 KiloWatt Adam's apple and by inference a
> super man having the
> > chest cavity of God. Hence the dilated pupils and
> other organs of a man
> > glancing at photons from the gentle curves of
> pigments on matted wood
> > fibres, a pattern of vision that once meant love
> was not only in the air
> > but ready and willing, prostrate on the ground.
> Hence the wariness of
> > the horror movie attendee when returning home and
> opening the door of
> > what was, and infact still is, a pefectlty
> innocent closet. Hence
> > understanding
> > Neighbors instead of neighbors and having Friends
> instead of friends.
> > Hence the poker machine addict. Hence the dramatic
> rise in the economic
> > take of powerful industries built around using
> advances in technology to
> > stuff our heads with false feelings and memories.
> Not content to be zero
> > sum, in exchange for our wealth and time these
> industries generally
> > leave us less able to function by decalibrating
> our emotional and
> > intellectual repore with reality.
> > 
> > "But, I like it you cold hearted Lutheran, you
> Stoic, you stone mason,
> > you Zeno loving stick in the mud!". Well
> naturally, since the whole game
> > is to manipulate your feelings, it is not
> suprising that you have
> > positive feelings about your perceptual opium, is
> is, after all, what
> > keeps you going back to your dealer.
> > 
> > Such deceptions, previously known as "Art", as in
> "Artifice" or
> > "Artful" have a long history of successful human
> parasitation. But the
> > industrial control of and rapid advances in the
> ability to successfully
> > falsify sense data has no historical analog. I
> have gloomily argued
> > that a possible explanation for the Fermi Paradox
> (why don't there seem
> > to be any aliens, dude) is the existence of a
> developmental ceiling
> > created by technological advances flowing into the
> perceptual
> > manipulation industry till it gobbles up through
> diversion and wealth
> > destruction all economic growth.
> > 
> > Geoffy Milner from the University of Mexico
> recently wrote this cool
> > essay for The Edge on the same topic:
> > 
> > Runaway consumerism explains the Fermi Paradox.
> > 
> > 
> > The story goes like this: Sometime in the 1940s,
> Enrico Fermi was
> > talking about the possibility of extra-terrestrial
> intelligence with
> > some other physicists. They were impressed that
> our galaxy holds 100
> > billion stars, that life evolved quickly and
> progressively on earth, and
> > that an intelligent, exponentially-reproducing
> species could colonize
> > the galaxy in just a few million years. They
> reasoned that extra-
> > terrestrial intelligence should be common by now.
> Fermi listened
> > patiently, then asked simply, "So, where is
> everybody?". That is, if
> > extra-
> > terrestrial intelligence is common, why haven't we
> met any bright aliens
> > yet? This conundrum became known as Fermi's
> Paradox.
> > 
> > The paradox has become more ever more baffling.
> Over 150 extrasolar
> > planets have been identified in the last few
> years, suggesting that
> > life-hospitable planets orbit most stars.
> Paleontology shows that
> > organic life evolved very quickly after earth's
> surface cooled and
> > became life-hospitable. Given simple life,
> evolution shows progressive
> > trends towards larger bodies, brains, and social
> complexity.
> > Evolutionary psychology reveals several credible
> paths from simpler
> > social minds to human-level creative intelligence.
> Yet 40 years of
> > intensive searching for extra-terrestrial
> intelligence have yielded
> > nothing. No radio signals, no credible spacecraft
> sightings, no close
> > encounters of any kind.
> > 
> > So, it looks as if there are two possibilities.
> Perhaps our science
> > over-
> > estimates the likelihood of extra-terrestrial
> intelligence evolving. Or,
> > perhaps evolved technical intelligence has some
> deep tendency to be
> > self-
> > limiting, even self-exterminating. After
> Hiroshima, some suggested that
> > any aliens bright enough to make colonizing
> space-ships would be bright
> > enough to make thermonuclear bombs, and would use
> them on each other
> > sooner or later. Perhaps extra-terrestrial
> intelligence always blows
> > itself up. Fermi's Paradox became, for a while, a
> cautionary tale about
> > Cold War geopolitics.
> > 
> > I suggest a different, even darker solution to
> Fermi's Paradox.
> > Basically, I think the aliens don't blow
> themselves up; they just get
> > addicted to computer games. They forget to send
> radio signals or
> > colonize space because they're too busy with
> runaway consumerism and
> > virtual-
> > reality narcissism. They don't need Sentinels to
> enslave them in a
> > Matrix; they do it to themselves, just as we are
> doing today.
> > 
> > The fundamental problem is that any evolved mind
> must pay attention to
> > indirect cues of biological fitness, rather than
> tracking fitness
> > itself. We don't seek reproductive success
> directly; we seek tasty foods
> > that tended to promote survival and luscious mates
> who tended to produce
> > bright, healthy babies. Modern results: fast food
> and pornography.
> > Technology is fairly good at controlling external
> reality to promote our
> > real biological fitness, but it's even better at
> delivering fake fitness
> > — subjective cues of survival and reproduction,
> without the real-world
> > effects. Fresh organic fruit juice costs so much
> more than nutrition-
> > free soda. Having real friends is so much more
> effort than watching
> > Friends on TV. Actually colonizing the galaxy
> would be so much harder
> > than pretending to have done it when filming Star
> Wars or Serenity.
> > 
> > Fitness-faking technology tends to evolve much
> faster than our
> > psychological resistance to it. The printing press
> is invented; people
> > read more novels and have fewer kids; only a few
> curmudgeons lament
> 
=== message truncated ===


The Avantguardian 
is 
Stuart LaForge
alt email: stuart"AT"ucla.edu

"The most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the source of all true art and science. He to whom this emotion is a stranger, who can no longer wonder and stand rapt in awe, is as good as dead: his eyes are closed. . ."

- Albert Einstein, "What I Believe" (1930)

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