From jef at jefallbright.net Wed Nov 1 01:32:03 2006 From: jef at jefallbright.net (Jef Allbright) Date: Tue, 31 Oct 2006 17:32:03 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Survival tangent (was Just curious, it's not natural!) In-Reply-To: Message-ID: Heartland wrote: > Jef Allbright: > So you're saying > > (1) "Values, beliefs and memories (VBM) are not necessarily unique > (they're quite commonly shared) therefore they do not uniquely define > a person." > > (2) Therefore, to say that a person is defined by their VBM is > tantamount to saying that each person is all persons. > > (3) This is clearly absurd, therefore the unique essence of a thing > must be defined elsewise. > > Is this a correct summary of your statements? (2) should be, "Therefore, to say that a person is defined by their VBMs implies that a person can survive as long as these same VBMs distributed among other people's heads survive." So you appear to be saying that it follows from (1) that a set of values, beliefs and memories distributed throughout a set of persons is equivalent to a set of values, beliefs, and memories associated with a single person. Again this would be the fallacy of the undistributed middle. While I know of many who have asserted that one is effectively defined or distinguished by ones values, beliefs and memories, I know of no one (other than you) who has said that this implies values, beliefs and memories could be independently distributed as you say. So what are you arguing against here? A->B does not mean B->A and no on other than yourself has said that this is implied. > My response: > > (1) Note that this is logically consistent with what many of us have > been saying; that there can be a gradient of personal identity and > that there can be duplicates of personal identity. > But that's just like saying that 1 can also mean 2 or that "blue sky" can sometimes be red. The words imply certain conditions you must follow when assigning the referents. If you violate these conditions you're just end up using a wrong referent for a word and, consequently, should be using a different word. So, for example, there's no such thing as "duplicates of personal identity" or a "gradient of personal identity" just like there's no such thing as "two originals" or "23% of being pregnant." No, the point is that we can find other statements that are both contextually related and logically consistent with the first statement. The example I gave was relevant to the discussion since it is generally a part of the package of understanding which you are trying to refute. > (2) Non sequitur. Fallacy of the undistributed middle leading to > affirming the consequent (a form of circular reasoning). A->B does not > imply B->A. Also, same comments as (1). > Let's really get into this, Jef. Before I acknowledge my fault please state precisely what your A and B are. Slawomir, A and B are symbols representing antecedent and consequent in the form of a syllogism. The particulars don't matter if the form is logically invalid. In this particular case, A->B corresponds to the statement "any person is defined by values, beliefs and memories". This does not imply the statement B->A corresponding to "any values, beliefs and memories define a person" because not all values, beliefs and memories are associated with any given person. It's not symmetrical. > (3) Non sequitur. Affirming the consequent (circular). Where is it > logically shown that all persons must have unique identity? > Again. I've always assumed that, by definition, "identity" can have at most one referent. Are you really saying that we can stretch the meaning of this word to include more than one thing? HOW MANY PEOPLE HOW MANY TIMES HAVE SAID EXACTLY THAT TO YOU ON THIS LIST? Slawomir, THAT IS THE KEY POINT. You repeatedly make the logical error of affirming the consequent. Your reasoning is circular and thus proves nothing, regardless or whether you're right or wrong about what you believe. It appears that you don't understand and don't care to gain understanding of this point. A few weeks ago I said I would make the effort to respond to you as long as you seemed to reciprocate. As you know, I scanned and filtered my email archives and gave you about 168kB of your own statements (since April) with the first several pages marked up for your examination. I've posted careful criticism of recent examples and I've given you google search phrases in case you actually wanted to study the points that have been offered to you. What's especially ironic about this is that if you were ever able to get past the hurdle of logical argument, we would have found that there's still no way to prove whether you're right about the "specialness of a unique trajectory through space-time of the physical constituents of the mind-producing process" because it can't be proved absolutely within the context of our subjective experience. But we might have agreed on a model of what we do and don't know, and we might have applied Occam's razor to find the simplest explanation that fits our observations. I can't justify spending any more time on this. I'm done. - Jef From nvitamore at austin.rr.com Wed Nov 1 00:24:44 2006 From: nvitamore at austin.rr.com (nvitamore at austin.rr.com) Date: Tue, 31 Oct 2006 19:24:44 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] PHIL: Derrida and Deconstruction Message-ID: <380-22006113102444113@M2W040.mail2web.com> Has anyone spent time reading Jacques Derrida's philosophical views on Deconstruction? If so, do you recognize *any* crossovers between deconstructivism and extropy, or transhumanism in general. Thanks, Natasha -------------------------------------------------------------------- mail2web - Check your email from the web at http://mail2web.com/ . From fauxever at sprynet.com Wed Nov 1 02:40:25 2006 From: fauxever at sprynet.com (Olga Bourlin) Date: Tue, 31 Oct 2006 18:40:25 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Just curious, it's not natural! References: <20061031065242.90753.qmail@web51610.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <000b01c6fd5f$191a6b00$6600a8c0@brainiac> From: "Al Brooks" Sent: Monday, October 30, 2006 10:52 PM > But 86 percent of Americans believe in a God, > and from everything I've seen the religious still > dominate society. Yes, sad ... ain't it? From jef at jefallbright.net Wed Nov 1 03:25:22 2006 From: jef at jefallbright.net (Jef Allbright) Date: Tue, 31 Oct 2006 19:25:22 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] PHIL: Derrida and Deconstruction In-Reply-To: <380-22006113102444113@M2W040.mail2web.com> Message-ID: What might it mean to say, in the semblance of a question, that Derrida and Transhuman had some sort of crossover? If I were asked this in a personal sense, although not, of course, in the person of Derrida, but rather, as one who might have a sense of some aspect of being that is Derrida, I might answer that it is in large part unknowable, but in some small part I could say that the crossover, however small, gathers meaning from the context of the question, and the questioner. Transhumanism as transhumanism has both everything and nothing to do with Derrida, but crossover exists, and derives significance... Had enough? My personal view of Derrida is that he found a comfortable niche from which to exercise his considerable skills discovering patterns of text and meaning, obfuscating recursively his message that the meaning of the message is the meaning of the message which is essentially what we make of it and that by understanding this we gain some understanding of ourselves. Many people found him to be quite profound, whereas I found him merely deep. ;-) With regard to crossover with Transhumanism, his moral thinking was strongly influenced by Nietzsche with some obvious implications apropos individual empowerment and piercing the veils of society. His message of how meaning is derived from context has implications for those who contemplate how meaning might change with accelerating change of context. While he claimed not be a postmodernist, the similarities are all too apparent and I would hope to avoid the association much as I would avoid a very profound mound of dada. - Jef -----Original Message----- From: extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org [mailto:extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of nvitamore at austin.rr.com Sent: Tuesday, October 31, 2006 4:25 PM To: extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org Subject: [extropy-chat] PHIL: Derrida and Deconstruction Has anyone spent time reading Jacques Derrida's philosophical views on Deconstruction? If so, do you recognize *any* crossovers between deconstructivism and extropy, or transhumanism in general. Thanks, Natasha -------------------------------------------------------------------- mail2web - Check your email from the web at http://mail2web.com/ . _______________________________________________ extropy-chat mailing list extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat From ben at goertzel.org Wed Nov 1 03:40:22 2006 From: ben at goertzel.org (Ben Goertzel) Date: Tue, 31 Oct 2006 22:40:22 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] PHIL: Derrida and Deconstruction In-Reply-To: <380-22006113102444113@M2W040.mail2web.com> References: <380-22006113102444113@M2W040.mail2web.com> Message-ID: <638d4e150610311940u32b37e1en269a10ffb8f65016@mail.gmail.com> I don't know Derrida's work well, but I would recommend Jean Baudrillard's book "Simulations" as a very amusing work of postmodernism... Basically, Baudrillard's message is that the whole world is virtual anyway. Everything is a simulation, and this has been the psychological and cultural reality for decades now. So creating a physical simulation and uploading ourselves into it (something he does not discuss) would in his view not be a signficant deviation... -- Ben G On 10/31/06, nvitamore at austin.rr.com wrote: > Has anyone spent time reading Jacques Derrida's philosophical views on > Deconstruction? If so, do you recognize *any* crossovers between > deconstructivism and extropy, or transhumanism in general. > > Thanks, > Natasha > > > > -------------------------------------------------------------------- > mail2web - Check your email from the web at > http://mail2web.com/ . > > > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > From thespike at satx.rr.com Wed Nov 1 03:56:25 2006 From: thespike at satx.rr.com (Damien Broderick) Date: Tue, 31 Oct 2006 21:56:25 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] Survival tangent References: Message-ID: <7.0.1.0.2.20061031215425.02195248@satx.rr.com> At 05:32 PM 10/31/2006 -0800, Jef wrote: > > (2) Therefore, to say that a person is defined by their VBM is > > tantamount to saying that each person is all persons. >... > >(2) should be, "Therefore, to say that a person is defined by their VBMs >implies that a person can survive as long as these same VBMs distributed >among other people's heads survive." > >So you appear to be saying that it follows from (1) that a set of >values, beliefs and memories distributed throughout a set of persons is >equivalent to a set of values, beliefs, and memories associated with a >single person. Again this would be the fallacy of the undistributed >middle. > >While I know of many who have asserted that one is effectively defined >or distinguished by ones values, beliefs and memories, I know of no one >(other than you) who has said that this implies values, beliefs and >memories could be independently distributed as you say. So what are you >arguing against here? My understanding is that Slawomir 's saying *exactly the contrary*, and that this is what vexes him about your reading. Damien Broderick From jef at jefallbright.net Wed Nov 1 04:25:58 2006 From: jef at jefallbright.net (Jef Allbright) Date: Tue, 31 Oct 2006 20:25:58 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Survival tangent In-Reply-To: <7.0.1.0.2.20061031215425.02195248@satx.rr.com> Message-ID: Damien - I understand your point, but I think what you're getting is out of context. You'll probably need to go back one earlier in the thread to see this. Slawomir was saying that if someone asserts (1) that persons are defined by their VBM, then *they* must see that this implies (2) that their BVM could be distributed piecemeal among a large set of persons. He then points to the absurdity of (2) in an attempt to show that (1) must be false. If (2) did in fact follow from (1), and (2) were found to be absurd, then (1) would have to be false. However, I have been trying to show Slawomir that his argument doesn't hold because (2) doesn't follow from (1), and furthermore no one (other than he) suggested that it did follow from (1). In other words, I'm not saying that he believes (2) but I did make two attempts at getting him to clearly specify it. On the contrary, it is understood that he thinks it is an absurd consequent, to be used to prove the falsity of (1). Incidentally, I'm also not saying that I believe (1), because I think it's only a part of what defines a person, but again that is not the point. Does this make sense to you? - Jef -----Original Message----- From: extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org [mailto:extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Damien Broderick Sent: Tuesday, October 31, 2006 7:56 PM To: ExI chat list Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] Survival tangent At 05:32 PM 10/31/2006 -0800, Jef wrote: > > (2) Therefore, to say that a person is defined by their VBM is > > tantamount to saying that each person is all persons. >... > >(2) should be, "Therefore, to say that a person is defined by their >VBMs implies that a person can survive as long as these same VBMs >distributed among other people's heads survive." > >So you appear to be saying that it follows from (1) that a set of >values, beliefs and memories distributed throughout a set of persons is >equivalent to a set of values, beliefs, and memories associated with a >single person. Again this would be the fallacy of the undistributed >middle. > >While I know of many who have asserted that one is effectively defined >or distinguished by ones values, beliefs and memories, I know of no one >(other than you) who has said that this implies values, beliefs and >memories could be independently distributed as you say. So what are you >arguing against here? My understanding is that Slawomir 's saying *exactly the contrary*, and that this is what vexes him about your reading. Damien Broderick _______________________________________________ extropy-chat mailing list extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Wed Nov 1 04:41:27 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Tue, 31 Oct 2006 23:41:27 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] You must be willing to give up everything In-Reply-To: <4547AB5F.5060608@ramonsky.com> References: <7.0.1.0.2.20061031105302.021c3850@satx.rr.com> <4547AB5F.5060608@ramonsky.com> Message-ID: On 10/31/06, Alex Ramonsky wrote: > > "Forgo what is near; win what is afar" -in the I Ching is translated as > meaning something like this. Of course, nobody knows who wrote the I > Ching...it could have been Robert? > Unless it was a much earlier version of myself (or one in a parallel universe) I take no credit for the I Ching. I think my statement may have arisen from some combination of watching Kung Fu as a child, Karate Kid when I was much older and a bunch of Zen koans thrown in at various stages of my life. During the late '90s I realized that no matter how hard I might strive to achieve indefinite "human" longevity it was probably a struggle doomed to failure due to limits on the minimization of the external hazard function. Uploading offered a clear evolutionary strategy but would involve eliminating a rather strong mental attachment I have for my current instantiation (but hell, cut a few axons here, a few dendrites there, upload the rest and I'll probably find it amusing that I was once so "attached"). It could probably also be said that certain experiences over the last decade have made the concept a bit more real for me. Concepts are interesting but its experiences that give them wings. Robert -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Wed Nov 1 05:03:03 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Wed, 1 Nov 2006 00:03:03 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Just curious, it's not natural! In-Reply-To: <20061031062441.82209.qmail@web51610.mail.yahoo.com> References: <1089.86.130.24.207.1162270695.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> <20061031062441.82209.qmail@web51610.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: On 10/31/06, Al Brooks wrote: > > Anne, naturally you have the right to keep the word marriage. Hmmm.... Humpty dumpty comes to mind.... It's important to know why it is homosexuals want full marriage rights and > will not be satisfied with mere civil unions: homosexuals want the right of > making > serious medical decisions (as Terry Schiavo's husband had in her case); I think you can get this with a simple contract (power of medical decisions, power of attorney, etc.). they want full interitance rights; etc. This too can be specified by a last will & testament. What I think *isn't* covered is pension or surivorship rights since these depend on how the plan actually defines them. This would get sticky because even if a state allows same sex marriages (as MA does) federal entities may not have to recognize them. I suspect a pension plan might be free to provide benefits "for legal marriages or social unions involving to individuals of the opposite sex as specified by their having different sex chromosome combinations". Of course that would probably run afoul of various antidiscrimination laws in which case pensions would be free to specify benefits for only one single individual and no other family members (or uploads or molecular copies of said individual). Robert -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From lcorbin at rawbw.com Wed Nov 1 06:04:19 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Tue, 31 Oct 2006 22:04:19 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Survival tangent (was Just curious, it's not natural!) References: Message-ID: <03e801c6fd7b$9cb91da0$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Jef writes > While I know of many who have asserted that one is effectively defined > or distinguished by ones values, beliefs and memories, I know of no one > (other than you) who has said that this implies values, beliefs and > memories could be independently distributed as you say. But to some extent, values, beliefs, and memories *can* be independently distributed, in the sense of being distributed among a set of causally independent running processes. The case of physical duplicates, or near physical duplicates, is what of course I have in mind. (I realize that some have already stated this.) But we have to consider sliding scales. If your own VBM overlap to a tremendous extent those of "another person", then it seems to me that indeed to that same extend you are that other person. Of course, infinite care is required here to avoid begging the question of what a "person" is. That is, I mean that two physically distinct and causally separate processes ought to be regarded as the same person under the right circumstances. (Heartland, of course, regards this as absolutely contrary to what is meant by a "person", who he invariably sees as totally incapable of being in two places at once.) But people can be in two places at once, even though it seems uncanny to our evolutionarily derived notions of self. Nonetheless, once forking is a possibility (either after uploading or, less plausibly, via teleporters and copying machines), people will have to accustom themselves to the idea. And if that's true, then sliding scales can apply: there could be two separately running instances X and Y such that I am logically compelled to identify with X to about a 20% level and Y to about a 60% level. (Concrete cases might be my own selves at ages 5 and 15 respectively, and future tech could allow contemporaneous execution.) Heartland or Jef writes (the attribution isn't so easy for some reason) >> (1) Note that this is logically consistent with what many of us have >> been saying; that there can be a gradient of personal identity and >> that there can be duplicates of personal identity. That is so, whoever wrote it. > But that's just like saying that 1 can also mean 2 or that "blue sky" > can sometimes be red. The words imply certain conditions you must follow > when assigning the referents. If you violate these conditions you're > just end up using a wrong referent for a word and, consequently, should > be using a different word. So, for example, there's no such thing as > "duplicates of personal identity" or a "gradient of personal identity" > just like there's no such thing as "two originals" or "23% of being > pregnant." Well, blue skies can indeed contain shades of red, and just why aren't there "duplicates of personal identity"? I may be missing your logical point. Also, why can't there be a "gradient of personal identity"? Surely one is a lot more the same person one was at age 15 than one was at age 5. What worries me about survival in particular is that as it stands I am alas turning into someone else slowly but surely. But more of than later, in a different response I hope. Lee From spike66 at comcast.net Wed Nov 1 06:03:49 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Tue, 31 Oct 2006 22:03:49 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] You must be willing to give up everything In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <200611010619.kA16JeXF008282@andromeda.ziaspace.com> bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Robert Bradbury Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] You must be willing to give up everything ...? Concepts are interesting but its experiences that give them wings. Robert Thanks Robert, you have a certain virtuosity with words. spike Virtuous! That's the word I was searching for the other day, when I couldn't think of a workable opposite to evil. Good and righteous weren't working, but virtuous might do. OK then, body parts that start with V. Virtuous Vul... Virtuous Va... OK then, Righteous... {8^D Do forgive ExI-ers, humor is my way of dealing with the situation. s From lcorbin at rawbw.com Wed Nov 1 06:18:28 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Tue, 31 Oct 2006 22:18:28 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Just curious, it's not natural! References: <20061031034559.71308.qmail@web51603.mail.yahoo.com> <001401c6fcab$dbd3dd20$6600a8c0@brainiac> <021e01c6fcb7$fbbab5d0$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: <03f501c6fd7d$b84903d0$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Robert writes > On 10/31/06, Lee Corbin wrote: > > > But what happened to *me* in there? I'm more than my memes, pal. > > Don't forget my memories. > Well memories are memes and at least some of them are essential > components of the survival and reproduction processes. Memories are memes??? That does violence to the concept so far as I understand it. Memories are more like raw data; for one thing, they're very seldom contagious. Beliefs are something else, and are indeed memetic. > > That's me, maybe. I don't want to "become", especially if the end > > product is not me. I would rather "are". As you put it. > Then you will be fighting a continual and probably eventually lose the battle. Exactly! And I vastly prefer not being dead! I'm already dead almost everywhere, dead on Mars, dead on Pluto, dead in Australia, Texas, and more places than I can name. And it's no fun at all being dead in those places, I can tell you. Simplyh, it's definitely of no benefit to one whatsoever to be dead anywhere or at any time. > I have yet to see a strategy that guarantees avoidance of the external > hazard function. I've mentioned one on this list more times than I can remember, sigh. Once the technology is in place, all one has to do is to make sure that previous versions of one get adequate runtime. If we had a benevolent singularity tomorrow, I would request that new LC2006 versions be spawned every so often. That way, none of them (including this one) can logically look forward to never being alive again (pace Heartland and others who can't abide other instances being oneself). > For many the breaking point will be the decisions involving when and > how to upload. For others it may be managing the "self"-collective > after uploading. The problem is deciding when losing some part of > oneself (some genes, reproduction behaviors, ones tribe, some ideas, > etc.) constitutes "no longer surviving". Yes, but again, there is a simple solution! As I described above! > For some it involves the "destruction" of memes derived from very > old books programmed into them before they ever learned how > to *think* about them. Honestly, it sounds to me as though you are still wedded, though hidden at a deeper level, to the same notion: that that other thing over there cannot be me. Fully me. Provably me. But YES IT CAN: So you get your cake and get to eat it too: just run another, earlier copy of yourself who's still looking forward to eating the cake. It's really you. Physically you. Provably you. Lee From lcorbin at rawbw.com Wed Nov 1 06:21:16 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Tue, 31 Oct 2006 22:21:16 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] not humor: evil eye References: Message-ID: <03fa01c6fd7e$24112d90$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Amara chides me, with some justification: > Lee Corbin >>Yes, but keep in mind WHY [those evil eyes are] there and WHAT >> [they're] for! > > I think you missed the humor point of Spike's post. You changed the > subject title to make a different point and wrote that, and then you > proceed to pound your same message in Spike's humor thread too. Pardon my excess excitement. Sometimes new revelations seem like the most important thing in the world, and need to be shouted from rooftops. Sorry if I wrecked your fun. Lee From lcorbin at rawbw.com Wed Nov 1 06:38:33 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Tue, 31 Oct 2006 22:38:33 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Just curious, it's not natural! References: <20061031034559.71308.qmail@web51603.mail.yahoo.com> <001401c6fcab$dbd3dd20$6600a8c0@brainiac> <021e01c6fcb7$fbbab5d0$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: <040101c6fd80$abc3b990$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Robert also wrote > On 10/31/06, Lee Corbin wrote: > > Secondly, if the Singularity tarries, there won't be any people, > > me or like me either one, you or like you, se?or Bradbury. > > La ilaha ila Allah; Muhammadur-rasul Allah. > I've been thinking a lot about inertia. I like to remember there > are many more people leaning towards the saner primary meme > frameworks than the less sane frameworks. What a optimist! What is the basis of your optimism? (Except for your list of countries below.) All the posts you see in our little pathetically small extropian list? Those with what you'd call "un-saner" primary meme frameworks are reproducing themselves at an astonishing rate. > I'm not sure you could say that rational frameworks are > dominant yet but the populations leaning that way do > outnumber and carry significantly more throw weight than > those leaing in the other direction (E.g. Korea, Japan, > Taiwan, China, Thailand, much of Russia & India, AU, > NZ, Canada, a large fraction of Europe, the blue states > in the U.S., some significant parts of Africa (usually S. > of the equator) . As long as you can claim China, you may have a point. But don't confuse the small citified numbers of urban Chinese with the vast numbers in the foresaken countryside. As for others you mention, e.g. the U.S., Europe, and Canada, they're losing the demographic race. Extremely religious people are being born faster than we're converting them. It falls into just too clear a pattern: religion exists and works because it's an ESS. Nontribalism is not, and unless very high tech or a singularity saves us, nontribalism will be as quaint an historical offshoot as the Skoptsy or other castration sects. > The trick will be to shift things so one's near term survival interests > tend to trump the more ethereal "promises". Good luck shifting. Any notable progress lately? (Success getting something printed in some transhumanist journal really doesn't count!) > The human social and political components are the least well understood > parts of Kurzweil's "Law of Accelerating Returns". "We", for the most > part, haven't even started the discussion of how fast we should go. Yes, that sort of fantasizing (which hopefully is more that just fantasy) is really fun. I enjoy contemplating what I'll say to a GAI who tells me I've been uploaded, and specifying what portion of my alloted resources will go to running previous versions, running extremely IQ-advanced versions, and so on. Again, it can't be said too many times, they're all me. > I tend to be more worried about a backlash against the Singularity than > it not arriving soon enough. They're both risky, like terrorism and states that try to over-protect against terrorism. Hell, life is risky. But I agree: forces, social and religious, that forestall a singularity threaten my survival as much as a Singularity gone awry. Both are very dangerous! But at least I'm still alive. For now. Lee From avantguardian2020 at yahoo.com Wed Nov 1 06:38:39 2006 From: avantguardian2020 at yahoo.com (The Avantguardian) Date: Tue, 31 Oct 2006 22:38:39 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] humor: evil eye In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <20061101063839.51598.qmail@web60519.mail.yahoo.com> --- BillK wrote: > The 'righteous rectum' is probably the 'colossal > colon' that tours round the US. > > > "Coco," as the Colossal Colon(r) is affectionately > known, is a 40-foot > long, 4-foot tall oversized model of the human colon > that is designed > to educate about colorectal cancer and other > diseases of the colon. > Visitors who crawl through the Colossal Colon(r) . . . Only in America, folks. So I was wondering, would you call that a "turd's eye view"? ;) Stuart LaForge alt email: stuart"AT"ucla.edu "Believe nothing. No matter where you read it, or who said it, even if I have said it, unless it agrees with your own reason and your own common sense."- Siddhartha Guatama aka Buddha. ____________________________________________________________________________________ Get your email and see which of your friends are online - Right on the New Yahoo.com (http://www.yahoo.com/preview) From velvethum at hotmail.com Wed Nov 1 07:43:39 2006 From: velvethum at hotmail.com (Heartland) Date: Wed, 1 Nov 2006 02:43:39 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Survival tangent (was Just curious, it's not natural!) References: Message-ID: Jef, I'm really trying hard to understand what your point is and how it applies to the things I'm talking about. What is it exactly that you think that I'm proving here (if anything)? Have you noticed that this thread has the word "survival" in it as opposed to "identity?" I'm trying to establish some shreds of common ground here. J: > A->B does not mean B->A and no on other than > yourself has said that this is implied. Of all the things I've said, I certainly don't recall saying that "A->B means B->A." That is merely *your interpretation* of what I said. J: > Slawomir, A and B are symbols representing antecedent and consequent in > the form of a syllogism. The particulars don't matter if the form is > logically invalid. Of course, but who said I accepted that strawman form in the first place? Stating what you meant as A and B might have revealed what you missed. And yes, Jef, I'm familiar with what antecedents, consequents, syllogisms and rules of logic are, thanks. :) J: > Slawomir, THAT IS THE KEY POINT. You repeatedly make the logical error > of affirming the consequent. Your reasoning is circular and thus proves > nothing, regardless or whether you're right or wrong about what you > believe. Okay, so can you tell me what that consequent is? J: > It appears that you don't understand and don't care to gain > understanding of this point. A few weeks ago I said I would make the > effort to respond to you as long as you seemed to reciprocate. As you > know, I scanned and filtered my email archives and gave you about 168kB > of your own statements (since April) with the first several pages marked > up for your examination. I've posted careful criticism of recent > examples and I've given you google search phrases in case you actually > wanted to study the points that have been offered to you. And I did address your comments line by line and was able to discover quite quickly the source of the problem. Then I wrote: "Clearly, that pattern [of your criticism] consists of you highlighting not the circularity within assumed framework of what *I'm* saying, but merely pointing out things that are incompatible with patternism." In other words, you had already assumed that your map was *the only true* map and proceeded to show me why my map didn't match yours instead of pointing out which parts of my map weren't matching the territory or which parts of my map didn't fit with the other parts of my map. Slawomir From lcorbin at rawbw.com Wed Nov 1 07:51:57 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Tue, 31 Oct 2006 23:51:57 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] You must be willing to give up everything References: <7.0.1.0.2.20061031105302.021c3850@satx.rr.com><4547AB5F.5060608@ramonsky.com> Message-ID: <043e01c6fd8a$cc9aa980$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> As Alex quoted our sage Robert: You must be willing to give up everything you are for what you might become. But ask I, (Mark 8:36) For what shall it profit a man, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his soul? You should NOT be willing to give up EVERYTHING, or you won't be you any longer! > During the late '90s I realized that no matter how hard I might strive to > achieve indefinite "human" longevity it was probably a struggle doomed > to failure due to limits on the minimization of the external hazard function. It's a small point, but remember that you *do* succeed in some fraction of universes, if, that is, you follow the Holy MWI, Everitt, and his prophet Deutsch: La ilaha ila Everett; Deutsch-rasul Everett. (The Korbin) > Uploading offered a clear evolutionary strategy but would involve eliminating > a rather strong mental attachment I have for my current instantiation (but hell, > cut a few axons here, a few dendrites there, upload the rest and I'll probably > find it amusing that I was once so "attached"). Yes, so long as you're still you. Hell, I doubt if you are really attached anyway. If hundreds of test animals, and then hundreds of people got uploaded, and everyone agreed that they still seemed to be exactly the same people, I'd estimate your so-called "attachment" in atto-Newtons. About the same strength of Damien's and Slawomir's reluctance to teleport, if everyone else started doing it. Lee -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From velvethum at hotmail.com Wed Nov 1 08:16:30 2006 From: velvethum at hotmail.com (Heartland) Date: Wed, 1 Nov 2006 03:16:30 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] You must be willing to give up everything References: <7.0.1.0.2.20061031105302.021c3850@satx.rr.com><4547AB5F.5060608@ramonsky.com> <043e01c6fd8a$cc9aa980$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: Lee: "It's a small point, but remember that you *do* succeed in some fraction of universes, if, that is, you follow the Holy MWI, Everitt, and his prophet Deutsch: La ilaha ila Everett; Deutsch-rasul Everett. (The Korbin)" That's easily the funniest thing I've read on this list. :) ("The Korbin" - LOL!) Slawomir From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Wed Nov 1 14:12:04 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Wed, 1 Nov 2006 09:12:04 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] You must be willing to give up everything In-Reply-To: <043e01c6fd8a$cc9aa980$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> References: <7.0.1.0.2.20061031105302.021c3850@satx.rr.com> <4547AB5F.5060608@ramonsky.com> <043e01c6fd8a$cc9aa980$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: On 11/1/06, Lee Corbin wrote: > > > It's a small point, but remember that you *do* succeed in some fraction of > universes, if, that is, you follow the Holy MWI, Everitt, and his prophet > Deutsch: > * La ilaha ila Everett; Deutsch-rasul Everett. (The Korbin)* > This wasn't clear to me and Babelfish wasn't helping (spanish to english doesn't work presumably because it isn't Spanish (duh)), but a Google did turn up a page which made things clearer [1]. I have not read the entire page and so make no representations for the content. Robert 1. http://www.masmn.org/documents/Books/Syed_Qutb/Milestones/006.htm -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From iamgoddard at yahoo.com Wed Nov 1 16:13:14 2006 From: iamgoddard at yahoo.com (Ian Goddard) Date: Wed, 1 Nov 2006 08:13:14 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Calorie Restriction: "robust life extension" ? Message-ID: <20061101161314.44466.qmail@web52610.mail.yahoo.com> Another glimpse into ongoing primate CR research in a New York Times article: "'The preliminary indicators are that we're looking at a robust life extension in the [calorie] restricted animals,' Dr. Weindruch said." http://fairuse.100webcustomers.com/fuj/nytimes30a.htm http://IanGoddard.net "A proposition is a picture of reality. [...] A picture cannot, however, place itself outside its representational form. [...] No proposition can make a statement about itself, because a propositional sign cannot be contained in itself (that is the whole of the 'theory of types')." -- Ludwig Wittgenstein __________________________________________________________________________________________ Check out the New Yahoo! Mail - Fire up a more powerful email and get things done faster. (http://advision.webevents.yahoo.com/mailbeta) From jonkc at att.net Wed Nov 1 16:59:54 2006 From: jonkc at att.net (John K Clark) Date: Wed, 1 Nov 2006 11:59:54 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Survival tangent. References: Message-ID: <000401c6fdd7$934e3550$860a4e0c@MyComputer> Heartland, High Priest of the Unique Atom and Sacred Original Cult Wrote: > Again. I've always assumed that, by definition, "identity" can have at > most one referent. Well that's exactly the trouble with your argument; you're assuming the very thing you're trying to prove. > Are you really saying that we can stretch the meaning of this word to > include more than one thing? It's amazing, armchair philosophers try to tackle deep problems without the slightest nod to the revolution in physics over the last century, you're arguing as if it's 1906 not 2006. But even in 1906 you should have know better, even then you should have known that more than one thing could be fast or beautiful or red or small or Heartland. In closing let me ask you a very simple question: do you believe the Heartland of yesterday has continued into today? I'm not even asking you if he did or not, all I want to know is if you believe that he did. I don't need nine paragraphs of bafflegab as a response, a simple yes or no will do. I mean.... you must know if you believe it or not. John K Clark From jef at jefallbright.net Wed Nov 1 18:44:58 2006 From: jef at jefallbright.net (Jef Allbright) Date: Wed, 1 Nov 2006 10:44:58 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] PHIL: Derrida and Deconstruction In-Reply-To: <6.2.1.2.2.20061101105706.04a2b7b0@pop-server.austin.rr.com> Message-ID: Natasha - In all seriousness (this time) I spent some time a few years ago exploring postmodernism. I performed this study with the goal of understanding a worldview outside of my direct experience and outside my comfort zone, so as to better understand, relate and communicate with others who share my world, if not my understanding of it. My study was limited to research on the web, some representative books[1], interaction with a certain assistant professor of rhetoric familiar with both transhumanism and postmodernism and attending a documentary film with Q&A with people who knew Derrida intimately. Not a complete study, certainly, but enough to familiarize myself with the some of the substance, the broad outlines, and the style of postmodernist thought and behavior. I'm well aware of CP Snow's Two Cultures, and that I am strongly grounded in the Sciences side while you are strongly grounded in the Humanities, so I can appreciate that you are skeptical of any unfavorable criticism from across that great cultural divide. I don't know if my earlier parody of Derrida's style got in the way of my message, but I did also offer what I thought were practical pointers with regard to likely areas of crossover being (1) individual-based ethics and (2) meaning as completely dependent on interpreter and context. Unfortunately, I'm afraid that to go further would require slogging through text that is far from concise or rigorous in its exposition of a few truly valuable concepts. [1] Some relevant books from my exploration of postmodernist thinking: _How We Became Posthuman_ by Katherine Hayles _Representations of the Post-Human_ by Elaine Graham _Metal and Flesh_ by Joel Slayton _The Postmodern Adventure, Science, Technology, and Cultural Studies at the Third Millennium_ by Steven Best, Douglas Kellner (I think there was a second book by Best and Kellner but I can't find it in my library right now and I've run out of time to look.) - Jef -----Original Message----- From: Natasha Vita-More [mailto:natasha at natasha.cc] Sent: Wednesday, November 01, 2006 9:06 AM To: Jef Allbright Subject: RE: [extropy-chat] PHIL: Derrida and Deconstruction At 09:25 PM 10/31/2006, Jeff wrote: What might it mean to say, in the semblance of a question, that Derrida and Transhuman had some sort of crossover? If I were asked this in a personal sense, although not, of course, in the person of Derrida, but rather, as one who might have a sense of some aspect of being that is Derrida, I might answer that it is in large part unknowable, but in some small part I could say that the crossover, however small, gathers meaning from the context of the question, and the questioner. Transhumanism as transhumanism has both everything and nothing to do with Derrida, but crossover exists, and derives significance... Had enough? No, not really. What you said in your reply, however well stated, does not offer the depth that I was hoping for. :-) Surely you are accurate and I had already read all this on the Wikipedia site and elsewhere, but don't believe that Derrida was as much of a fool or machinist that his critiques said of him. Maybe I will learn that he is, but I am not so sure because I tend to rebel against the voice of critiques who pigeonhole philosophy or politics. With regard to crossover with Transhumanism, his moral thinking was strongly influenced by Nietzsche with some obvious implications apropos individual empowerment and piercing the veils of society. His message of how meaning is derived from context has implications for those who contemplate how meaning might change with accelerating change of context. Yes. While he claimed not be a postmodernist, the similarities are all too apparent and I would hope to avoid the association much as I would avoid a very profound mound of dada. Postmodernism, postsnodernism - - it is tiresome at best. Natasha Vita-More Cultural Strategist - Design Media Artist - Futurist PhD Candidate, Planetary Collegium Proactionary Principle Core Group, Extropy Institute Member, Association of Professional Futurists Founder, Transhumanist Arts & Culture If you draw a circle in the sand and study only what's inside the circle, then that is a closed-system perspective. If you study what is inside the circle and everything outside the circle, then that is an open system perspective. - Buckminster Fuller From pj at pj-manney.com Wed Nov 1 18:37:34 2006 From: pj at pj-manney.com (pjmanney) Date: Wed, 01 Nov 2006 13:37:34 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Just curious, it's not natural! Message-ID: <19214692.400831162406254732.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> >Robert writes > >> On 10/31/06, Lee Corbin wrote: >> >> > But what happened to *me* in there? I'm more than my memes, pal. >> > Don't forget my memories. > >> Well memories are memes and at least some of them are essential >> components of the survival and reproduction processes. > >Memories are memes??? That does violence to the concept so far >as I understand it. Memories are more like raw data; for one thing, >they're very seldom contagious. Beliefs are something else, and >are indeed memetic. > >> > That's me, maybe. I don't want to "become", especially if the end >> > product is not me. I would rather "are". As you put it. What about Martine Rothblatt's concept of "bemes?" www.imminst.org/conference/Martine.ppt PJ From velvethum at hotmail.com Thu Nov 2 00:03:04 2006 From: velvethum at hotmail.com (Heartland) Date: Wed, 1 Nov 2006 19:03:04 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Survival tangent. References: <000401c6fdd7$934e3550$860a4e0c@MyComputer> Message-ID: S: >> Again. I've always assumed that, by definition, "identity" can have at >> most one referent. John Clark: > Well that's exactly the trouble with your argument; you're assuming the very > thing you're trying to prove. Oh, so that's what you and Jef ("the J's?") thought I've been doing all this time? Well, that certainly wasn't my intention. If it was my intention to prove *that* I would have certainly picked a better argument, wouldn't I (stay tuned)? Except I wasn't proving that. My sole focus has been to have a meta-discussion about what it means to live and survive. Yes, I admit that while doing that I assumed that life was an instance, not a type, just like I assumed that 1 isn't 2, the Earth is round, 3AM yesterday comes before 5PM tomorrow, and that little kittens are cute (I know, you're going to fight me to death on that last one :)) not realizing that all this time you were still stuck on trying to figure out how many things it takes to have one thing. So, here's a quick observation that might help you. 1kg + 1kg != 1kg. (Regardless of whether you understand the implications of this or not, this basically rules out that cute "afterlife through duplication" fairy tale. There's no such thing as afterlife. I'm really sorry about that.) S: >> Are you really saying that we can stretch the meaning of this word to >> include more than one thing? John Clark: > It's amazing, armchair philosophers try to tackle deep problems without the > slightest nod to the revolution in physics over the last century, you're > arguing as if it's 1906 not 2006. But even in 1906 you should have know > better, even then you should have known that more than one thing could be > fast or beautiful or red or small or Heartland. When will you understand that "life" is not an adjective but a noun and "live" is a verb? Stop inventing arbitrary referents for clearly defined terms. John Clark: > In closing let me ask you a very simple question: do you believe the > Heartland of yesterday has continued into today? There's no such thing as you-at-t1 and you-at-t432. A mind is nothing more or less than a single instance of a *process* defined across all ts during an interval. I guess in your language that would translate to "yes." (I might also add for the millionth time that what *I think* has absolutely no influence on *what I am* physically. Thank you.) Slawomir From kerry_prez at yahoo.com Wed Nov 1 03:29:46 2006 From: kerry_prez at yahoo.com (Al Brooks) Date: Tue, 31 Oct 2006 19:29:46 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Just curious, it's not natural! In-Reply-To: <20061031065242.90753.qmail@web51610.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <20061101032946.52126.qmail@web51603.mail.yahoo.com> Olga, you are correct concerning agnostics & atheists having lower divorce rates than xians however the number of xians in this country is so large that even with a roughly fifty percent divorce rate, xian marital unions are still a potent factor. Not that I accept xian mythology (cf Brookhiser's "dying and reviving gods, the myths of agriculture"). All the same, xian mythology gives frightened families peace of mind, in fact I would say those xian families who are not fundamentalists are remarkably-- considering the pressures they are under-- kind and cheerful; if they are not optimists then they do possess a resilience. This is what I in effect say to them: "I cant dispute with you that Jesus is the son of God because doing so would negate your whole faith, rendering the discussion a nonstarter, yet I don't accept Jesus' resurrection". They invariably reply: "being the Son of God, he was able to resurrect". So the logic is entirely circular but at least they understand the debate is not immediately a total rejection of their faith but rather is based on doubt of the ability of their savior to have resurrected from death. > Begging your pardon - I'm not certain if you meant > this seriously or not. Presently, families of > agnostics and atheists have lower divorce rates that > Christians ... especially evangelical Christians... --------------------------------- Cheap Talk? Check out Yahoo! Messenger's low PC-to-Phone call rates. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From kerry_prez at yahoo.com Wed Nov 1 03:44:47 2006 From: kerry_prez at yahoo.com (Al Brooks) Date: Tue, 31 Oct 2006 19:44:47 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Just curious, it's not natural! In-Reply-To: <000b01c6fd5f$191a6b00$6600a8c0@brainiac> Message-ID: <20061101034447.57396.qmail@web51615.mail.yahoo.com> Agreed, it is sad, but it may be possible to reach a modus vivendi with more optimistic and openminded xians, that is, without misleading them into thinking we accept their faith. We can say, for instance, " 'forgive thy enemy' was and is an original and unusual precept", without actually committing to it-- my long & very unpleasant experience with those at the bottom of society has demonstrated they respect only strength, and forgiveness is perceived as weakness. Olga Bourlin wrote: > But 86 percent of Americans believe in a God, > and from everything I've seen the religious still > dominate society. Yes, sad ... ain't it? --------------------------------- Everyone is raving about the all-new Yahoo! Mail. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From pzonik at gmail.com Wed Nov 1 12:35:44 2006 From: pzonik at gmail.com (pzonik at gmail.com) Date: Wed, 01 Nov 2006 13:35:44 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] PHIL: Derrida and Deconstruction In-Reply-To: <380-22006113102444113@M2W040.mail2web.com> References: <380-22006113102444113@M2W040.mail2web.com> Message-ID: <454894A0.6010503@gmail.com> I read, I don't see. Polish Lvov-Warsaw School and Cracow Circle (analytic and science philosophy) better relate to think about world. nvitamore at austin.rr.com napisa?(a): > Has anyone spent time reading Jacques Derrida's philosophical views on > Deconstruction? If so, do you recognize *any* crossovers between > deconstructivism and extropy, or transhumanism in general. > > Thanks, > Natasha > > > > -------------------------------------------------------------------- > mail2web - Check your email from the web at > http://mail2web.com/ . > > > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > > From fortean1 at mindspring.com Thu Nov 2 01:31:44 2006 From: fortean1 at mindspring.com (Terry Colvin) Date: Wed, 1 Nov 2006 18:31:44 -0700 (GMT-07:00) Subject: [extropy-chat] FWD [SK] Re: Just curious, it's not natural! Message-ID: <24483912.1162431104763.JavaMail.root@mswamui-chipeau.atl.sa.earthlink.net> -----Forwarded Message----- > >On 01/11/2006, at 12:32 PM, James H.G. Redekop wrote: > >> On 10/31/06, Terry Colvin forwarded: >>> > >>> >I think that gay people should have every right to be >>> >"married", i'm just not sure whether it should be >>> >called a "marriage"?. >>> > >>> >The word "marriage" is described as a union, joined >>> >for life, creating a family, it's been around >>> >for centuries, it's scriptural, and so on, it's >>> >already been named. Why change it? >>> > >>> >Why wouldn't the gay communities want their own >>> >word for their union and still keep the basic >>> >laws for spouse and marital? >> >> Maybe because they're forming a union, joined for life, and creating >> a family -- so there's a perfectly good word for that already in >> existence. >> >> In any case, it's not "scriptural" -- the institution predates and is >> independent of any particular scripture. >> >>> >I can't pressume to understand the relationship >>> >between 2 men or 2 women and who am I to judge what >>> >"Union" they want but as a heterosexual woman, don't I >>> >have every right to keep the word "marriage"?. >> >> Sure you do. Your marriage won't suddenly become a "flerm" just >> because someone else got married. Did all heterosexual marriages >> suddenly change somehow in 1989, when Denmark recognized gay marriage? >> >> What you don't necessarily have is the right to deny the word to >> other people. > >You might like to consider the pragmatic solution that is likely to >happen in Oz in the near future. > >While legal discrimination against homosexuals was outlawed long ago, >there remained a number of areas in which gay couples suffered >serious disadvantages when compared to heterosexual couples, whether >married of in a de facto relationship. It involved inheritance law, >and a wide variety of other matters where couples can gain a >financial break by appearing as a family. > >A backbench MP in the federal; parliament then sought leave to >present a "private member's bill" (ie, not a government policy >matter) and the major parties allowed a conscience vote (ie members >did not have to conform to the party whip) to remove all these >disadvantages . It is very likely to pass by a large majority and >should be law before long. Incidentally it will also help non-gay >peoples (mainly elderly people) such as siblings or old friends >sharing a home in their dotage, etc. > >An interesting sidelight is that the MP proposing the bill is a >married senior ex-Army officer who once made a living catching wild >bulls, is a member of the government party and who represents a rural >constituency in arguably our most conservative state (Queensland - >nothing should be read into the name). > >Sure, it isn't marriage, but it removes (almost) all discrimination >that previously distinguished homo- from heterosexual relationships, >which should help. As it happens none of my gay acquaintances (and >quite a few hetero ones too) would get married even if was legal. >One of the downsides, of course, is that accepting the marriage laws >means also accepting the divorce laws, which can be quite fraught. > >PS It looks as though we will also get pretty reasonable therapeutic >cloning laws as well following another private member's bill onn >which the conscience vote has been allowed by all major parties. >Latest figures suggest it will pass in both the Senate (where there >was some doubt) and the Reps easily. > > >Barry Williams From nvitamore at austin.rr.com Thu Nov 2 02:03:49 2006 From: nvitamore at austin.rr.com (nvitamore at austin.rr.com) Date: Wed, 1 Nov 2006 21:03:49 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] EDU: Lecture on Transhumanism Message-ID: <380-2200611422349876@M2W022.mail2web.com> A "Biotechnology Futures" graduate school prof. asked me to speak to his students on transhuamnism. If you have available online writings which would enrich their knowledge, please send your urls to me and I will give to the class. Thanks, Natasha -------------------------------------------------------------------- mail2web - Check your email from the web at http://mail2web.com/ . From spike66 at comcast.net Thu Nov 2 02:40:13 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Wed, 1 Nov 2006 18:40:13 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] humor: evil eye In-Reply-To: <20061101063839.51598.qmail@web60519.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <200611020256.kA22ugXV022497@andromeda.ziaspace.com> > bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of The Avantguardian > Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] humor: evil eye > > --- BillK wrote: > > The 'righteous rectum' is probably the 'colossal > > colon' that tours round the US. > > > > > > "Coco," as the Colossal Colon(r) is affectionately > > known, is a 40-foot > > long, 4-foot tall oversized model of the human colon > > that is designed > > to educate about colorectal cancer and other > > diseases of the colon. > > Visitors who crawl through the Colossal Colon(r) . . . > > Only in America, folks. So I was wondering, would you > call that a "turd's eye view"? ;) > > Stuart LaForge Ja, I was thinking about the person who had to sell this idea to the venture capitalists or the board of directors. "We propose an educational tool: an enormous colon, that visitor's crawl through..." How would you like that job? spike From nvitamore at austin.rr.com Thu Nov 2 02:07:00 2006 From: nvitamore at austin.rr.com (nvitamore at austin.rr.com) Date: Wed, 1 Nov 2006 21:07:00 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] 415 for lectgure Message-ID: <380-2200611422705@M2W009.mail2web.com> I am not alone in the universe. Gooble recognizes 415 references to lectgure on the net. Natasha -------------------------------------------------------------------- mail2web - Check your email from the web at http://mail2web.com/ . From spike66 at comcast.net Thu Nov 2 04:08:52 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Wed, 1 Nov 2006 20:08:52 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] transhumanism as slippery slope In-Reply-To: <03fa01c6fd7e$24112d90$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: <200611020411.kA24B9jw001186@andromeda.ziaspace.com> Macleans reviews the book America Alone by Mark Steyn: http://www.macleans.ca/culture/books/article.jsp?content=20061023_134898_134 898 The following comment caught my eye: ...As the most advanced society with the most advanced demographic crisis, Japan seems likely to be the first jurisdiction to embrace robots and cloning and embark on the slippery slope to transhumanism... spike From spike66 at comcast.net Thu Nov 2 04:11:40 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Wed, 1 Nov 2006 20:11:40 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] 415 for lectgure In-Reply-To: <380-2200611422705@M2W009.mail2web.com> Message-ID: <200611020413.kA24DnaZ005731@andromeda.ziaspace.com> > bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of nvitamore at austin.rr.com > Subject: [extropy-chat] 415 for lectgure > > I am not alone in the universe. Gooble recognizes 415 references to > lectgure on the net. > > Natasha I would rather they had called it Gooble. I don't like having perfectly good math terms gobbled by Google. spike From thespike at satx.rr.com Thu Nov 2 04:48:30 2006 From: thespike at satx.rr.com (Damien Broderick) Date: Wed, 01 Nov 2006 22:48:30 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] 415 for lectgure In-Reply-To: <200611020413.kA24DnaZ005731@andromeda.ziaspace.com> References: <380-2200611422705@M2W009.mail2web.com> <200611020413.kA24DnaZ005731@andromeda.ziaspace.com> Message-ID: <7.0.1.0.2.20061101224505.021f6888@satx.rr.com> At 08:11 PM 11/1/2006 -0800, spike wrote: >I don't like having perfectly >good math terms gobbled by Google. What math term has Google gobbled? Map? Sign? Groups? Hey, I can throw a googol of them at ya. Damien Broderick From lcorbin at rawbw.com Thu Nov 2 05:07:44 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Wed, 1 Nov 2006 21:07:44 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Juicy Classical Physics Problem Involving Gravitational Potential Message-ID: <046a01c6fe3d$3a108860$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> First of all, a clock at the Earth's north pole runs *exactly* at the same rate as does one on the equator. Did you know that? Yet the polar radius is about 13 miles less than the equatorial radius, so the first supposition might be that the polar clock would run more slowly. It is, after all, immersed more deeply in the Earth's gravitational field (by general relativity). But the speed of the clock on the equator, by special relativity, is less because of its motion. Amazingly, these two effects exactly cancel, and the clocks progress at the same rate! (I actually worked this out a year or two ago, and found that the difference was less than 10^-16.) Now this isn't really unexpected, I suppose, because of the shape of the Earth. Newton understood that ocean water at the equator was at the same "gravitational potential" as water at a pole; he had a memorable diagram of a well that went down from the north pole to the center of the Earth, and another well dug to the same point ninety degrees away at a point on the equator. He argued that you wouldn't expect water to flow "downhill" from the equator to the pole. (A reason is, of course, the centrifugal force that keeps the equatorial water 13 miles higher.) Newton---but not I---was able to calculate the spherical oblateness of the Earth by carefully regarding this notion of gravitational potential. (He'd be wonderfully jazzed by the generalization to relativity theory spoken of above.) But my Newtonian calculation---problematical in some way---is off by a factor of two! Perhaps someone here who really likes classical physics can see what is going wrong. Of course, I *could* find some alternate derivations on the web, or find some in a book somewhere, but that would take all the fun out of it. Nothing like trying to work through something yourself to really master the concepts. Let r be the equatorial radius and R the polar radius. The facts are that R is 6357000 meters (or 6357 km), and r is 6378 km, a twenty-one kilometer difference. But my calculations below show that r "should" be only 6368 km, that is, just 11 km more than R instead of the correct value of 21 more. (One may point out that as a cc of water is raised by a hypothetical elevator shaft to the equator, it gets kinetic energy from the walls of the shaft. This ends up being some momentum, (1/2)mv^2.) Now v equals omega * r, or, as I write it, wr. The next equation, and what I'm trying to go by, reads "the sum of the K.E. of a particle at the equator and the remaining energy it needs to get to infinity must equal the energy that the particle at the pole would need to acquire to get to infinity". Is there a problem with that? It certainly raises questions in my mind, and one's that I don't have clear answers for. Anyway, in symbols (wr)^2 + IntegralFromrToInfinity[ GM/r^2 ] = IntegralFromRToInf[ GM/R^2 ] where velocity = wr, and I suppress m (the mass of the particle) from both sides of the equation. (A note on GM: we have F = GMm/r^2 from Newton's formula, and so stripping m gives force per mass, or GM/r^2.) The integral of 1/r^2 is -1/r, so (wr)^2 - [GM/r] eval from r to Inf = - [GM/R] eval from R to Inf or (wr)^2 + GM/r = GM/R What is cool about this is that it allows one to solve for r, the equatorial radius, in terms of R, the polar radius. The only problem is omega, w, the frequency of the Earth's rotation, which must be taken into account. We have w = 2pi/T (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angular_frequency) Now T is the period of the Earth's rotation, which is not quite 86,400 seconds because we must consider the sidereal day, not the solar day. This turns out to be 86,160 seconds, because it's four minutes a day different, or 4x60 = 240 seconds. Then 2pi/86160 is, by my calculator, 7.2924x10^-5 What is GM? G is 6.67 x 10^-11, and the Earth's mass is M = 6x10^24 kg approximately. When I do it carefully, I get GM = 3.9885 x 10^14, using values I found online. So then the equation (wr)^2 + GM/r = GM/R becomes w^2Rr^3 - 2GMr + 2RGM = 0 which is unfortunately a cubic. Nonetheless, some calculators and some on-line programs solve it. The answer is, alas, r = 6368000 meters only, not the hoped for 6378 km. Lee P.S. Here is an intermediate step in the above calculation: 6.2742x10^7 = 3.9885x10^14/r + 5.318x10^-9xr^2 / 2 From lcorbin at rawbw.com Thu Nov 2 05:23:55 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Wed, 1 Nov 2006 21:23:55 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] PHIL: Derrida and Deconstruction References: Message-ID: <049501c6fe3f$1b8f03b0$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Jef writes > In all seriousness (this time) I spent some time a few years ago > exploring postmodernism. I performed this study with the goal of > understanding a worldview outside of my direct experience and outside my > comfort zone, so as to better understand, relate and communicate with > others who share my world, if not my understanding of it. > > My study was limited to research on the web, some representative > books[1], interaction with a certain assistant professor of rhetoric ... > [1] Some relevant books from my exploration of postmodernist thinking: > > _How We Became Posthuman_ by Katherine Hayles That was very good, though it has been too many years since I read it, and I ought to go back and look at it again. As for a good introduction to postmodernism that seems to make sense to those of us who come from the sciences is "On Deconstruction" by Jonathan Culler. Everyone I know who's read it agrees that it's a great intro to this mess. Lee > _Representations of the Post-Human_ by Elaine Graham > _Metal and Flesh_ by Joel Slayton > _The Postmodern Adventure, Science, Technology, and Cultural Studies at > the Third Millennium_ by Steven Best, Douglas Kellner > > (I think there was a second book by Best and Kellner but I can't find it > in my library right now and I've run out of time to look.) > > - Jef From spike66 at comcast.net Thu Nov 2 05:39:43 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Wed, 1 Nov 2006 21:39:43 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] 415 for lectgure In-Reply-To: <7.0.1.0.2.20061101224505.021f6888@satx.rr.com> Message-ID: <200611020541.kA25fpZg015120@andromeda.ziaspace.com> > -----Original Message----- > From: extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org [mailto:extropy-chat- > bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Damien Broderick > Sent: Wednesday, November 01, 2006 8:49 PM > To: ExI chat list > Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] 415 for lectgure > > At 08:11 PM 11/1/2006 -0800, spike wrote: > > >I don't like having perfectly good math terms gobbled by Google. > > What math term has Google gobbled? Map? Sign? Groups? Hey, I can > throw a googol of them at ya. > > Damien Broderick Google gobbled the goofed version of googol. Many mathmeisters are not meticulous masters of linguistic mechanics. {8^D Good catch Damien. I saw the term google so often, I had forgotten how to spell 10^100. I retract my Google accusation, with apologies to the non-evil corporation. The scary part is that Damien actually trusted me to proofread one of his books, oy. {8^D spike From lcorbin at rawbw.com Thu Nov 2 05:54:17 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Wed, 1 Nov 2006 21:54:17 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] 415 for lectgure References: <200611020541.kA25fpZg015120@andromeda.ziaspace.com> Message-ID: <04a201c6fe43$5e637c80$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Spike writes > Google gobbled the goofed version of googol. Many mathmeisters are not > meticulous masters of linguistic mechanics. > > {8^D > > Good catch Damien. I saw the term google so often, I had forgotten how to > spell 10^100. > > I retract my Google accusation, with apologies to the non-evil corporation. No, it was still evil. Or ignorant. The whole world has been and will go on mispelling 10^100 thanks to them. They ought to have chosen something different for their browser. I'm afraid to google for googleplex. :-( Lee From spike66 at comcast.net Thu Nov 2 06:01:43 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Wed, 1 Nov 2006 22:01:43 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Juicy Classical Physics Problem InvolvingGravitational Potential In-Reply-To: <046a01c6fe3d$3a108860$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: <200611020603.kA263quT012311@andromeda.ziaspace.com> > bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Lee Corbin ... > Subject: [extropy-chat] Juicy Classical Physics Problem > InvolvingGravitational Potential > > First of all, a clock at the Earth's north pole runs *exactly* at the same > rate as does one on the equator. Did you know that? Yet the polar radius > is about 13 miles less than the equatorial radius... > Lee ... Thanks Lee, this is so cool! spike From thespike at satx.rr.com Thu Nov 2 06:03:44 2006 From: thespike at satx.rr.com (Damien Broderick) Date: Thu, 02 Nov 2006 00:03:44 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] 415 for lectgure In-Reply-To: <04a201c6fe43$5e637c80$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> References: <200611020541.kA25fpZg015120@andromeda.ziaspace.com> <04a201c6fe43$5e637c80$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: <7.0.1.0.2.20061102000316.02272900@satx.rr.com> At 09:54 PM 11/1/2006 -0800, Lee wrote: >I'm afraid to google for googleplex. It's a place, Lee, not a number. Damien Broderick From lcorbin at rawbw.com Thu Nov 2 06:12:22 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Wed, 1 Nov 2006 22:12:22 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] You must be willing to give up everything References: <7.0.1.0.2.20061031105302.021c3850@satx.rr.com><4547AB5F.5060608@ramonsky.com> <043e01c6fd8a$cc9aa980$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: <04ae01c6fe45$e5b91b70$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Heartland writes > Lee [wrote] > > "It's a small point, but remember that you *do* succeed in some fraction of > > universes, if, that is, you follow the Holy MWI, Everitt, and his prophet Deutsch: > > > > La ilaha ila Everett; Deutsch-rasul Everett. (The Korbin)" > > > > That's easily the funniest thing I've read on this list. :) ("The Korbin" - LOL!) Thanks, but you'll only encourage me. By Jove, I think I'll start a new religion! Ron Hubbard did, and (as he predicted) got rich. The name of the new religion will be I S L A M E What does "Islame" mean, you ask? It means "sublimation". This will further the study of chemistry, a noble science. We worship at the shrine of Everett, with David Deutsch as our holy profit. Now the only hard part will be to convince Deutsch to co-author "The Korbin" with me: the holy book must have the Prophet at least as one of the authors. It will consist of all my email posts to Extropians, ordered from the longest to the shortest. Each is called a "yessirah!". Lee From lcorbin at rawbw.com Thu Nov 2 06:17:15 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Wed, 1 Nov 2006 22:17:15 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] 415 for lectgure References: <200611020541.kA25fpZg015120@andromeda.ziaspace.com> <04a201c6fe43$5e637c80$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <7.0.1.0.2.20061102000316.02272900@satx.rr.com> Message-ID: <04b401c6fe46$ad364a60$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Damien writes > At 09:54 PM 11/1/2006 -0800, Lee wrote: > >>I'm afraid to google for googleplex. > > It's a place, Lee, not a number. You're quite right--- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Googleplex It's a few miles away in Mountain View and I've driven past it many, many times. It's a feature attraction in Google Earth. Perhaps unconsciously I refused to accept YET ANOTHER MATH TERM DESTROYED BY THESE INFIDELS. Lee From lcorbin at rawbw.com Thu Nov 2 06:20:16 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Wed, 1 Nov 2006 22:20:16 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] transhumanism as slippery slope References: <200611020411.kA24B5XQ018796@mail0.rawbw.com> Message-ID: <04ba01c6fe47$193ed880$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Mark Steyn is the most articulate person I've ever heard. I'll print this article out right now and read it. Thanks, Spike. Lee ----- Original Message ----- From: "spike" To: "'Lee Corbin'" ; "'ExI chat list'" Sent: Wednesday, November 01, 2006 8:08 PM Subject: transhumanism as slippery slope > Macleans reviews the book America Alone by Mark Steyn: > > http://www.macleans.ca/culture/books/article.jsp?content=20061023_134898_134898 > > The following comment caught my eye: > > ...As the most advanced society with the most advanced demographic crisis, > Japan seems likely to be the first jurisdiction to embrace robots and > cloning and embark on the slippery slope to transhumanism... > > spike From iamgoddard at yahoo.com Thu Nov 2 06:27:35 2006 From: iamgoddard at yahoo.com (Ian Goddard) Date: Wed, 1 Nov 2006 22:27:35 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Identity (was: Survival tangent) Message-ID: <20061102062735.57668.qmail@web52612.mail.yahoo.com> Jef Allbright wrote: > Where is it logically shown that all persons must > have unique identity? The classical definition of 'identity' in logic is found in the second-order statement quantifying over objects (x, y) and properties of objects (P): AxAy[(x = y) <-> AP(Px <-> Py)] Literally: for all objects x and y, x is y if and only if for all properties P, P is a property of x if and only if P is a property of y. More simply: x is y just in case every property of x is a property of y and vice versa. Now, given the logical definition of 'identity', if there is a perfect copy of my brain with all its encoded contents and possible states, that copy still lacks at least: (1) the property of being 'the original', (2) the property of being in the location that the original is, and (3) the property of being encoded on the physical substrate that the original is encoded on. Ergo, there exists at least one property that the original has but the copy lacks, and thus, by the definition of 'identity', any claim that "the original = the copy" is false. QED > Slawomir, A and B are symbols representing > antecedent and consequent in the form of a > syllogism. The particulars don't matter if the > form is logically invalid. > In this particular case, A->B corresponds to the > statement "any person is defined by values, beliefs > and memories". This does not imply the statement > B->A corresponding to "any values, beliefs and > memories define a person" because not all values, > beliefs and memories are associated with any given > person. It's not symmetrical. By denoting 'Any person', your statement "Any person is defined by values, beliefs and memories" *quantifies* over the set of all people. So the proposed formula of propositional logic 'A->B' is not an indicated model. The statement instead points to a quantified model in predicate logic, something more like: "For all x, if x is a person, then x is defined by values, beliefs and memories." Consider also, in that statement you quantify over the set of all people, but in your interpretation of its converse 'B->A' you quantify over the set of all values, beliefs, and memories, saying: "Any values, beliefs and memories define a person." Apart from my previous observation about 'identity', I'm not taking a side in all aspects of the discussion, but it might be helpful to explicitly articulate the analytic model you're proposing. ~Ian http://IanGoddard.net "A proposition can be true or false only in virtue of being a picture of reality." - Wittgenstein ____________________________________________________________________________________ We have the perfect Group for you. Check out the handy changes to Yahoo! Groups (http://groups.yahoo.com) From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Thu Nov 2 08:53:43 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Thu, 2 Nov 2006 03:53:43 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Calorie Restriction: "robust life extension" ? In-Reply-To: <20061101161314.44466.qmail@web52610.mail.yahoo.com> References: <20061101161314.44466.qmail@web52610.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: On 11/1/06, Ian Goddard wrote: > "'The preliminary indicators are that we're looking at a robust life > extension in the [calorie] restricted animals,' Dr. Weindruch said." I know Richard, and he is a good scientist. He and I however have quite different definitions of the term "robust". Robert -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Thu Nov 2 10:10:13 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Thu, 2 Nov 2006 05:10:13 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] PHIL: Derrida and Deconstruction In-Reply-To: References: <380-22006113102444113@M2W040.mail2web.com> Message-ID: On 10/31/06, Jef Allbright wrote: > > If I were asked this in a personal sense, although not, of course, in the > person of Derrida, but rather, as one who might have a sense of some aspect > of being that is Derrida, I might answer that it is in large part > unknowable, but in some small part I could say that the crossover, however > small, gathers meaning from the context of the question, and the questioner. > [snip] > Being unfamiliar with Derrida (and much "philosopy" for that matter [I know a little about Chomsky]) I briefly scanned his Wikipedia entry. One thing I wondered (given how long his entry is) is *why* do people care so much about this stuff? As a total aside, when one gets into these "transhumanist" vs. "postmodernist", vs. xyzzy-ist "type" discussions, I am struck by some of the similarities between fields like philosophy and computer science. For example programmers can have long and passionate debates over the relative merits of C++ vs. Perl vs. Python vs. Java (and don't even mention Lisp or Smalltalk). One difference between computer science and philosophy is that in the former the discussions can rely on some generally agreed upon definitions that mean the same thing to everyone. In the later I'm less sure that that is the case. With computers a 1 is a 1, a 0 is a 0, an "and" and an "or" are certain things you can do with them. With philopsophy, at least at some levels, those things are still being defined and debated. It seems that much of the discussion originated before any modern hunderstanding of what the brain is and how it works (neuroscience) which in turn is developing in parallel with the understanding of the hardware itself (molecular and genomic biology). With philosophers, not only do you have this *huge* body of knowledge, represented by relatively nondeterministic and highly unique neural patterns but its running on top of hardware (genetic polymorphisms) which may have sufficient differences that it may be relatively impossible for the individuals to "think" the same way. In computer science one would look at it and say its simple -- machine X executes the X instruction set and machine Y executes the Y instruction set and there is no way that either of them is ever going to execute each other's instructions [1]. The best you can do is create sort of an abstraction (which is what higher level languages are) that let machine X and machine Y accomplish specific tasks in their own way. One has to wonder if the entire area of philosophy is nothing more than a complex variation of this. It will be interesting to see how philosophy deals with differences in genetic polymorphisms and neural structures that explain precisely why Chomsky could never have understood Derrida, why a postmodernist can never understand a humanist, etc. Robert 1. One could consider spoken languages, written languages and perhaps cultures to be parallels to computer languages and computer instruction sets -- but they are *so* much less precise that one would wonder whether people not educated in computer science (presumably most philosophers) can even begin to comprehend the degree to which they are communicating with play-doh? -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Thu Nov 2 11:29:42 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Thu, 2 Nov 2006 06:29:42 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] transhumanism as slippery slope In-Reply-To: <200611020411.kA24B9jw001186@andromeda.ziaspace.com> References: <03fa01c6fd7e$24112d90$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <200611020411.kA24B9jw001186@andromeda.ziaspace.com> Message-ID: On 11/1/06, spike wrote: > Macleans reviews the book America Alone by Mark Steyn: > > > http://www.macleans.ca/culture/books/article.jsp?content=20061023_134898_134 > 898 > Works better when the URL isn't munged by the mailer (:-|). http://www.macleans.ca/culture/books/article.jsp?content=20061023_134898_134898 It is interesting given the pessimistic analysis of the demography of an Islamic population in Europe that there is a counterbalancing trend in the U.S. which is the continual immigration from Mexico and Latin America (Catholics vs. Islam). The open question remains whether we (the leading edge) will simply choose to emigrate (to the oceans, to the ocean floors, to Antarctica, to outer space)? Leave the planet to the believers -- just as we leave parts of Pennsylvania to the Amish, parts of Maine to the Shakers, etc. So the jihad takes over Europe -- its a small fraction of the planet. It is interesting that the concept is about one tribe controlling real estate or political systems or perhaps nuclear weapons -- rather than about energy or technology. If you take into account the land area of places like Russia, Canada and Australia (with relatively small Islamic population fractions and less than open arms immigration polices) then one perhaps sees over the next 30-50 years is shift of perhaps 10-20% of the land area being under Islamic control to something like 20-30%. The larger countries more distant from Mecca have sufficient energy resources (once they get off the oil addiction) that they can adopt a Japanese solution to the near term demographic crisis (avoiding the path the Europeans have chosen). The analysis also doesn't seem to appreciate how biotech and/or nanotech and/or robotics (or AI) completely change this analysis [1]. The only question might be what happens if we get Catholic or Islamic AIs? R. 1. The European's don't need to allow the immigration they currently allow if biotechnology extends healthy lifespan and the elderly choose to return to work (rather than be a burden on the state) or if nanotechnology makes need for state support unnecessary or if robots replace the functions performed by immigrants (or some combination of these). The picture painted is *only* a done deal assuming societies remain organized as they currently are. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From femmechakra at yahoo.ca Thu Nov 2 08:23:08 2006 From: femmechakra at yahoo.ca (Anna Taylor) Date: Thu, 2 Nov 2006 03:23:08 -0500 (EST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Survival tangent (was Just curious, it's not natural!) Message-ID: <20061102082308.30427.qmail@web37204.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Tue Oct 31, Jef Albright wrote: >So you appear to be saying that it follows from (1) >that a set of values, beliefs and memories >distributed throughout a set of persons is equivalent >to a set of values, beliefs, and memories associated >with a single person. Again this would be the >fallacy of the undistributed middle. I can't seem to grasp this dispute. I believe that there have been very minor groups that have set values, beliefs and memories and that have historically changed the meme belief but I don't recall reading that "one" particular "single person" ever changed anything. Am I not understanding the conversation? Please let me know. Just curious, thanks Anna:) "It requires wisdom to understand wisdom: the music is nothing if the audience is deaf." -- Walter Lippman __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com From femmechakra at yahoo.ca Thu Nov 2 09:14:30 2006 From: femmechakra at yahoo.ca (Anna Taylor) Date: Thu, 2 Nov 2006 04:14:30 -0500 (EST) Subject: [extropy-chat] FWD [SK] Re: Just curious, it's not natural! Message-ID: <20061102091430.60569.qmail@web37208.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Anna wrote on Mon Oct 30: >>> >Why wouldn't the gay communities want their own >>> >word for their union and still keep the basic >>> >laws for spouse and marital? On 10/31/06, Terry Colvin forwarded: >> Maybe because they're forming a union, joined for >>life, and creatin a family -- so there's a perfectly >>good word for that already in existence. That word is already taken. It describes the "Union" between male and female. >>In any case, it's not "scriptural" -- the >>institution predates and is independent of any >>particular scripture. No. Laws are institutions that predate. If gays want to be married, I again will repeat, I have no problem with that. I believe they should have every right to the same benefits and laws as a "married" couple should have but I think it should be defined by a different word. >>>I can't pressume to understand the relationship >>>between 2 men or 2 women and who am I to judge what >>>"Union" they want but as a heterosexual woman, >>>don't I have every right to keep word "marriage"?. >> Sure you do. Your marriage won't suddenly become >>a "flerm" just because someone else got married. Did >>all heterosexual marriages suddenly change somehow >>in 1989, when Denmark recognized gay marriage? It's not about recognizing gay marriage. I have the upmost respect for gays, I would never disrespect any choice of sexual behavior unless it violates rights. I feel using the word "marriage" as a symbol of the union between 2 men or 2 women violates my right as a heterosexual female. Why is that so wrong? >> What you don't necessarily have is the right to >>deny the word to other people. Why? If the word had already been established, why wouldn't I have the right to keep it just the way it is? The "Union" between man and woman. What I don't understand is why the gay community would not choose to represent itself as a self-sufficient member of society and choose a word that describes what their future "union" may one day represent. I am aware that most don't believe in the sanction of a woman and a man. That's their choice. I do. Not the laws, not the piece of paper but the choice to want to procreate with somebody and evolve as humans. It's not my scenario, at the present time, but I do believe that it should be a right and that "right" is the term defined by the word "marriage". Just an opinion. Anna __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com From natasha at natasha.cc Thu Nov 2 15:52:24 2006 From: natasha at natasha.cc (Natasha Vita-More) Date: Thu, 02 Nov 2006 09:52:24 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] ARTICLE: AnOtherMan Magazine Message-ID: <6.2.1.2.2.20061102094131.04b26078@pop-server.austin.rr.com> My article on the transhuman man ("The Perfecting of Man") is now available in the high-gloss "AnOtherMan" magazine (UK). In a few days the website most likely will have all the articles available to read; but you can look at the magazine here: http://www.anotherman.co.uk/issue1/index.html Sorry for the late notice for anyone in the UK who wants to look at it, but I just received my copies. Natasha Natasha Vita-More Cultural Strategist - Design Media Artist - Futurist PhD Candidate, Planetary Collegium Proactionary Principle Core Group, Extropy Institute Member, Association of Professional Futurists Founder, Transhumanist Arts & Culture If you draw a circle in the sand and study only what's inside the circle, then that is a closed-system perspective. If you study what is inside the circle and everything outside the circle, then that is an open system perspective. - Buckminster Fuller -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From natasha at natasha.cc Thu Nov 2 16:01:28 2006 From: natasha at natasha.cc (Natasha Vita-More) Date: Thu, 02 Nov 2006 10:01:28 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] 415 for lectgure In-Reply-To: <7.0.1.0.2.20061101224505.021f6888@satx.rr.com> References: <380-2200611422705@M2W009.mail2web.com> <200611020413.kA24DnaZ005731@andromeda.ziaspace.com> <7.0.1.0.2.20061101224505.021f6888@satx.rr.com> Message-ID: <6.2.1.2.2.20061102095941.04c106c0@pop-server.austin.rr.com> >Spike and Damien ... > > >I don't like having perfectly > >good math terms gobbled by Google. > >What math term has Google gobbled? Map? Sign? Groups? Hey, I can >throw a googol of them at ya. hahaha! hahah. LOL! Natasha -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jef at jefallbright.net Thu Nov 2 16:50:15 2006 From: jef at jefallbright.net (Jef Allbright) Date: Thu, 2 Nov 2006 08:50:15 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Survival tangent (was Just curious, it's not natural!) In-Reply-To: <20061102082308.30427.qmail@web37204.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Message-ID: Anna - > I can't seem to grasp this dispute. I believe that there have been > very minor groups that have set values, beliefs and memories and that > have historically changed the meme belief but I don't recall reading > that "one" particular "single person" ever changed anything. Am I not > understanding the conversation? Please let me know. No, you are not understanding that conversation. (By the way, your English writing keeps getting better and better. It's amazing to me.) My point in that conversation was the use of valid logic. It so happens that I didn't fully agree with any of the assertions being made. I don't agree that persons, in the very general sense of independent agents, are well defined by their "values, beliefs, and memories", but I wasn't supporting or denying that assertion. My point was that Heartland makes invalid logical inferences almost continually when he argues for his belief regarding survival of a person based on his concept of "a unique trajectory through space-time of the physical constituents of the mind-producing process". My concern is that we strive to maintain fairly high standards on the extropy list such that people will tend to stick around for intelligent and stimulating discussions. Many of us feel that repetition and circular argument degrade the quality of the list, so I made the effort to highlight some examples and I provided key terms for anyone interested to google for further information. Those terms include "affirming the consequent", "denying the antecedent", "circular reasoning", "logical fallacy". Wikipedia has some good concise descriptions of these, but the writing style may be a little too academic for the general reader. I'm sure that other pages exist with plenty of good examples of logical fallacies, in particular the fallacy of circular reasoning. Note again that I was not arguing here for or against any particular assertion; only for clarity and logical coherence. ---------------------------------------- As to the substance of your intended question, there are those who think (or feel) that a person is necessarily unique. That is certainly our observation to date, and that is certainly our personal experience. We certainly feel unique and we don't seem to have any examples in normal life that contradict this. Furthermore, our linguistic idioms and our culture strongly reinforce the idea of unique identity and make it difficult to imagine or discuss alternatives without very careful attention to our use of the linguistic symbols by which we represent our thoughts. But with advancing technologies we can imagine situations where the usual, common-sense order may be disrupted, and since this is the extropy list, we explore and discuss these ideas. [Actually this occurs in cycles as new people join the list. [It would be highly desirable to have an easily accessible repository of these ideas and arguments, but that's another project.] So, for example, we talk about what it would mean if/when we could make exact physical duplicates of a person, and what it really means to be a person in a broader than common sense. Philosophers have been dealing with the question of personal identity for thousands of years already. Anyone seriously interested in discussing the topic should be familiar with previous thinking including "ship of Theseus", Max More's thesis on the "diachronic self", and Derek Parfit's _Reasons and Persons_ in order to avoid rehashing. Buddhist thinking adds another perspective as it shows why even the concept of an individual self may be incoherent within any reasonably broad context. And of course there are many works of fiction that explore this idea in an inspiring but less than rigorous manner. Two things about this topic remain interesting to me: (1) Even after people have become quite familiar with the logical arguments, they tend to stay with whatever belief *feels* right to them. This has immense implications for effective decision-making under accelerating change, and so is of increasingly practical importance to our lives and well-being. (2) Some people have "moved up" beyond the common-sense description of personal identity to embrace the broader "patternist" definition but have yet to embrace an even more general description based on agency rather than physical/functional similarity. In my opinion this is where our thinking graduates from the "aha, it should be possible" stage to the more practical level of how we might deal with the social and moral ramifications of multiple instances of a personal identity. Anna, as usual I've packed too much into too few paragraphs. If you have questions after googling the search terms I've suggested, let me (or others) know. I'll do my best to respond on or offlist as appropriate for list quality. - Jef From jef at jefallbright.net Thu Nov 2 17:02:20 2006 From: jef at jefallbright.net (Jef Allbright) Date: Thu, 2 Nov 2006 09:02:20 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Identity (was: Survival tangent) In-Reply-To: <20061102062735.57668.qmail@web52612.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: Ian - Unfortunately, this discussion became fragmented, with the result that it might appear that I was arguing a point of view, when actually I was arguing only for the use of valid logic. I don't in fact believe that a person is fully and effectively defined by their values, beliefs and memories. I think that a more general and useful definition rests on the concept of shared agency, regardless of physical form and function. As to your point about the rigorous meaning of identity, I fully agree. That being said, within the topic of "personal identity" we are specifically allowing for the case when two objects, recognized as persons, appear to be *effectively* the same within a given context. - Jef -----Original Message----- From: extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org [mailto:extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Ian Goddard Sent: Wednesday, November 01, 2006 10:28 PM To: extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org Subject: [extropy-chat] Identity (was: Survival tangent) Jef Allbright wrote: > Where is it logically shown that all persons must have unique > identity? The classical definition of 'identity' in logic is found in the second-order statement quantifying over objects (x, y) and properties of objects (P): AxAy[(x = y) <-> AP(Px <-> Py)] Literally: for all objects x and y, x is y if and only if for all properties P, P is a property of x if and only if P is a property of y. More simply: x is y just in case every property of x is a property of y and vice versa. Now, given the logical definition of 'identity', if there is a perfect copy of my brain with all its encoded contents and possible states, that copy still lacks at least: (1) the property of being 'the original', (2) the property of being in the location that the original is, and (3) the property of being encoded on the physical substrate that the original is encoded on. Ergo, there exists at least one property that the original has but the copy lacks, and thus, by the definition of 'identity', any claim that "the original = the copy" is false. QED > Slawomir, A and B are symbols representing antecedent and consequent > in the form of a syllogism. The particulars don't matter if the form > is logically invalid. > In this particular case, A->B corresponds to the statement "any person > is defined by values, beliefs and memories". This does not imply the > statement > B->A corresponding to "any values, beliefs and > memories define a person" because not all values, beliefs and memories > are associated with any given person. It's not symmetrical. By denoting 'Any person', your statement "Any person is defined by values, beliefs and memories" *quantifies* over the set of all people. So the proposed formula of propositional logic 'A->B' is not an indicated model. The statement instead points to a quantified model in predicate logic, something more like: "For all x, if x is a person, then x is defined by values, beliefs and memories." Consider also, in that statement you quantify over the set of all people, but in your interpretation of its converse 'B->A' you quantify over the set of all values, beliefs, and memories, saying: "Any values, beliefs and memories define a person." Apart from my previous observation about 'identity', I'm not taking a side in all aspects of the discussion, but it might be helpful to explicitly articulate the analytic model you're proposing. ~Ian http://IanGoddard.net "A proposition can be true or false only in virtue of being a picture of reality." - Wittgenstein ________________________________________________________________________ ____________ We have the perfect Group for you. Check out the handy changes to Yahoo! Groups (http://groups.yahoo.com) _______________________________________________ extropy-chat mailing list extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat From hkhenson at rogers.com Thu Nov 2 17:03:09 2006 From: hkhenson at rogers.com (Keith Henson) Date: Thu, 02 Nov 2006 12:03:09 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] You must be willing to give up everything (2nd try) Message-ID: <5.1.0.14.0.20061102120259.03d2eee0@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> At 09:59 AM 10/31/2006 -0800, Jef wrote: snip >While Scientology and Avatar promise (and deliver) growth within a >limited, internal, context, they are dangerous because they restrict >growth beyond their own context. [I know, they have polished and >emotionally persuasive arguments to the contrary.] I don't know that much about Avatar except it is a scientology splinter like EST/Landmark. But I do know scientology and a *long* list of former scientologists. The main psychological mechanism used by scientology and (as far as I know, *all* cults) is a perversion of attention reward. In the stone age, people got attention for activity that fed the tribe or otherwise improved genetic survival for self and kin. Over evolutionary time attention became extremely rewarding. It is still a good part of the drive that makes Nobel prize winners. But cults pervert it with "empty" attention, such as scientology "auditing." I wrote a lengthy article you can find with sex drugs cults in Google or here: http://human-nature.com/nibbs/02/cults.html (Google claims 11,800 links on that article.) >Buddhism, on the other hand (if you can escape the traditional >trappings), provides similar benefits of realization while insisting on >openness to the greater, external context. L. Ron and Harry Palmer >might say (as did Buddha) that "it's not about me", but the Buddha never >insisted on secrecy and payments. Scientology gets huge amounts of money out of people (essentially for releasing brain chemicals with the same effect as addictive drugs). They spend a lot of it harassing the media and people like me who try to expose them. (Google my name and look at the Wikipedia page about my adventures with the clam cult.) They have spent upwards of a million, on me by their own admission. Keith Henson From jef at jefallbright.net Thu Nov 2 17:46:27 2006 From: jef at jefallbright.net (Jef Allbright) Date: Thu, 2 Nov 2006 09:46:27 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] PHIL: Derrida and Deconstruction In-Reply-To: Message-ID: Robert - I took a chance with my perceived credibility by writing an opening paragraph parodying the style of Derrida. It contained virtually zero direct content, but many allusions to profundity. I received offlist comments that were *very* appreciative of the humor, but I'm afraid others may have taken a quick look and thought something like "there's Jef being inscrutable again." As I said to Natasha, I spent some considerable time looking into postmodernism, for the purpose of understanding, relating, and better communicating with those who view the world from that mindset. Over the years I have taken a similar approach to understanding beliefs about Christianity, other religions, Buddhism, other philosophies, paganism, parapsychology, occult practices, drug use and abuse and other less than rational areas. Hell, a few days ago, I spent a half hour in conversation with a clearly deranged homeless person camping in a public park. Our conversation was almost entirely bereft of substance, but I came away with a deeper understanding of his world. But back to postmodernism. My bottom-line and crude assessment is that postmodernism represents essentially a bottomless pit of navel-gazing, mental masturbation and academic in-fighting. I think Derrida did have a valuable point about the contextual relativity of meaning and how the contextual sphere extends to the reader and even beyond, and quite probably he made some other good points, but the [IMHO] self-inflicted vagueness and obfuscation makes it an anti-extropic use of time. And let's not forget the Sokal hoax as another important indicator on this topic. It reminds me of certain forms of "abstract" art which some people (by virtue of their "sophistication") will find to be very profound, while others may observe that this says more about the person and society than it does about the actual work of art We should also recognize that there is a certain response in the brain that can trigger a very real sense of awe and profundity regardless of the stimulus providing any real substantial content. Examples include feelings of profound significance induced by drugs, directed intercranial magnetic fields, epileptic fits, hormonal fluctuations or even the hypnotic influence of being part of a large crowd. That said, I value very highly the freedom of individuals to follow these paths, I appreciate the diversity generated by such "unproductive" efforts, and I trust that overall, that which is more effective will tend to persist and grow to our benefit. - Jef ________________________________ From: extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org [mailto:extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Robert Bradbury Sent: Thursday, November 02, 2006 2:10 AM To: ExI chat list Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] PHIL: Derrida and Deconstruction On 10/31/06, Jef Allbright wrote: If I were asked this in a personal sense, although not, of course, in the person of Derrida, but rather, as one who might have a sense of some aspect of being that is Derrida, I might answer that it is in large part unknowable, but in some small part I could say that the crossover, however small, gathers meaning from the context of the question, and the questioner. [snip] Being unfamiliar with Derrida (and much "philosopy" for that matter [I know a little about Chomsky]) I briefly scanned his Wikipedia entry. One thing I wondered (given how long his entry is) is *why* do people care so much about this stuff? As a total aside, when one gets into these "transhumanist" vs. "postmodernist", vs. xyzzy-ist "type" discussions, I am struck by some of the similarities between fields like philosophy and computer science. For example programmers can have long and passionate debates over the relative merits of C++ vs. Perl vs. Python vs. Java (and don't even mention Lisp or Smalltalk). One difference between computer science and philosophy is that in the former the discussions can rely on some generally agreed upon definitions that mean the same thing to everyone. In the later I'm less sure that that is the case. With computers a 1 is a 1, a 0 is a 0, an "and" and an "or" are certain things you can do with them. With philopsophy, at least at some levels, those things are still being defined and debated. It seems that much of the discussion originated before any modern hunderstanding of what the brain is and how it works (neuroscience) which in turn is developing in parallel with the understanding of the hardware itself (molecular and genomic biology). With philosophers, not only do you have this *huge* body of knowledge, represented by relatively nondeterministic and highly unique neural patterns but its running on top of hardware (genetic polymorphisms) which may have sufficient differences that it may be relatively impossible for the individuals to "think" the same way. In computer science one would look at it and say its simple -- machine X executes the X instruction set and machine Y executes the Y instruction set and there is no way that either of them is ever going to execute each other's instructions [1]. The best you can do is create sort of an abstraction (which is what higher level languages are) that let machine X and machine Y accomplish specific tasks in their own way. One has to wonder if the entire area of philosophy is nothing more than a complex variation of this. It will be interesting to see how philosophy deals with differences in genetic polymorphisms and neural structures that explain precisely why Chomsky could never have understood Derrida, why a postmodernist can never understand a humanist, etc. Robert 1. One could consider spoken languages, written languages and perhaps cultures to be parallels to computer languages and computer instruction sets -- but they are *so* much less precise that one would wonder whether people not educated in computer science (presumably most philosophers) can even begin to comprehend the degree to which they are communicating with play-doh? -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From thespike at satx.rr.com Thu Nov 2 19:02:00 2006 From: thespike at satx.rr.com (Damien Broderick) Date: Thu, 02 Nov 2006 13:02:00 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] PHIL: Derrida and Deconstruction References: Message-ID: <7.0.1.0.2.20061102124441.021ac220@satx.rr.com> At 09:46 AM 11/2/2006 -0800, Jef wrote: >My bottom-line and crude assessment is that postmodernism represents >essentially a bottomless pit of navel-gazing, mental masturbation >and academic in-fighting. The last-mentioned is crucial, especially when parsed as "ladder-climbing" (into the professoriate). One should not underestimate the sheer combative brilliance and mental agility of the best deconstructors, the capacity to take a stone and wring not just water but sparkling fountains of multi-colored streams from it, all without getting wet. For those who can bear it, here's a bit from my book THEORY AND ITS DISCONTENTS, which might convey something of the texture of the process. Damien Broderick ====== The pun is mightier than the word/s. Don't quibble. (A quibble, the dictionary tells us, is a pun. The shortest distance between two puns is a straight-line.) Still--and one recalls Steiner's preference for author over critic--both New Critic W. K. Wimsat and deconstructor Howard Felperin borrow as epigraph this radiant fragment from Kafka: "Leopards break into the temple and drink to the dregs what is in the sacrificial pitchers; this is repeated over and over again; finally it can be calculated in advance, and it becomes a part of the ceremony." Post-structuralists (especially the patriarchal prophets, hovering always on the edge of glossolalia: Lacan, Foucault, Derrida, Baudrillard) burst into the temple. They savage the canon. They mark it with their reeking urine. They desecrate sheets and signatures. In time their terrifying charisma is stolen by bureaucrats, routinised and institutionalised (the grinding verbs fill their own forms). Aporia indeed. Perhaps the most poignant paradox is how conscientious, how hard-working and scholarly, these high-wire gamesters are. Are they the last of the Protestant-ethic anarchists, tutting at their obediently disobedient children cavorting in atrocious disinhibition? `By scrutinizing the words on the page harder than new criticism ever had,' Felperin writes, `deconstruction discovered not their translucent and free-standing autonomy but, in a radical defamiliarization, their dark, even opaque, character as writing... not the organic unity that binds together irony, paradox and ambiguity in a privileged, indeed redeemed and redeeming language, but unrecuperable rhetorical discontinuity' (p. 110). What, practically speaking, does this mean that is not obvious to anyone alert to modernist and postmodernist texts, from Brecht to Barth, David Caute to (ahem) my own novel Transmitters (1984)? Felperin sets out to Show by Doing not Telling, accepting a text pawed over in 1980, in a parody of deconstruction, by a hostile Denis Donoghue: Robert Frost's `Acquainted with the Night' (Felperin, pp. 115). Felperin confounds scorn with a learned display in the mode of Harold Bloom and Geoffrey Hartman (who, alas, balky Donoghue would not agree are the genuine deconstructive article). In the end, a `Derridean' reading is essayed (`actually a rewriting of an inspired reading by my colleague Dr Simon During... very much a palimpsest of intertextuality' [fn. 21, p. 129]) in which Frost's terza rima `means' virtually anything but what it says. " `I have been one acquainted with the night,' the poem confesses, but for During this is a cover-up, and when `an interrupted cry... came over houses from another street, /But not to call me back or say good-by;' this doubt is confirmed. Frost's text is, plainly, refusing the ghosts of unborn, repressed texts: it is, at a deeper level, `acquainted with delight'. The cry does not not say good-by, but actually not not say `"you'll die" '. And so on. `The controlled, formal, fully socialised language of the poem is at once concealing and revealing the libidinous energy behind or beneath its care and caution... What such a "reading" ultimately deconstructs of course is any possible recuperation of the text as a unitary utterance' " (p. 128). Aaron Green, the 46-year-old New York Freudian who Virgils Janet Malcolm through her writing of Psychoanalysis: the Impossible Profession, made distressing discoveries of his own during training analysis. `"Well, I'll be frank. It's the desire to be a beautiful woman. You find all kinds of surprises in analysis... It bothered me, I can tell you." ' (Malcolm, 1982, p. 57). Felperin's long and quite enthralling full-dress analysis of Shakespeare's Sonnets bothered me, I can tell you. But just as we dispute with Freud only at the risk of unseemly revelations, the reader (I am not trying to get away) stands under some pressure to applaud or grin or even yawn in the face of such funambulating gymnastics. Felperin throws out a line at the last instant: " `Therefore I lie with her and she with me, /And in our faults by lies we flattered be.' The point cannot be made too strongly, however, against those textualists and grammatologists who would like to proclaim the end of representation, that representation does not, because it cannot, cease. What ceases is the dream of univocal representation, which now becomes multivocal, in something of the way the Roman Empire does not so much cease as become Europe. [The deconstructed text arises] from the hyperactivity of the pun... generating numerous objective correlatives." (Felperin, p. 197) Behind and about each poem and fiction, then (but also, presumably, shadowing each scientific text as well), drift or loom the shades of other texts, just as Saussurean language, deconstructed still further by Lacan and Derrida, is made of floating signifiers and sliding signifieds. For much of his life, like the elder Newton scratching at alchemy and astrology, Ferdinand de Saussure searched the poems of antiquity for nominal anagrams he felt certain were secreted there. James Thurber's friend Jordon made a similar discovery and kept everyone awake all night: `There are lips in pistol /And mist in times, /Cats in crystal, /And mice in chimes' (Thurber, 1961, p. 104). "What if the poem is always already the writerly foreknowledge... of all possible readerly or critical constructions or misprisions of it?... These other poems are not, strictly speaking, `readings' or interpretations that offer themselves to particular critics or poets in particular contexts at particular times.... They are other poems that this poem writes and erases in a single moment, writes and erases in a moment of fear and desire: fear of being what they are, and desire to be what they are." (Felperin, pp. 127 8) The upshot of this desperate polyphonic ingenuity seems inevitably to be an abstention from action or commitment (Marxism and other `contextualist' doctrines having been subverted at source by their vulnerable status as texts). It is not only `contextualists' who collapse under this onslaught, of course; so too do the deconstructors themselves. Luckily, theory is at hand with one last reversal of expectations. Literary studies is an academic discipline, after all, within a certified interpretative community. It must `offer its reasons for saying and doing what it does, reasons which will be deemed valid or invalid, embraced or rejected, only according to the norms of the historical community within which they are offered' (Felperin, p. 222). Remarkable. When the Bakhtinian carnival has left town, those who remain turn regretfully from the empty, elephant-dung spattered fairground and press their suits for work. While it cannot--despite the rear-view mirror of a Las Meninas--give us sight in the blindspots of our own episteme (implicit in the social construction of our splintered, only-apparently unitary selves), `this counsel of liberal scepticism--some would call it pragmatism,' spares us any intemperate plunge into `some monistic and overarching theory of theories.' The best we can hope for, `beyond deconstruction', is a cross-disciplinary Pidgin in which, given the vulgar mercantile reality of life, `the new tribe of literacy [sic; literary?] theorists, more multinational and entrepreneurial in spirit, will negotiate their mergers and puff their products...' (p. 222 3). Glossolalia has a long tradition in religion and the academy both. An innovator makes her mark as much by introducing a fresh lexicon as by convincing us of her startling point of view, her barrage of surprising evidence. Often this cascade of jargon is altogether justified, and cannot be avoided: we think with words, and new words, even new syntax, help us to think new things. But that very fact makes us vulnerable to its abuse. The generosity we evince toward those who offer us a renewed discourse should not be allowed to blur into the delirious enthusiasm, captured rather aptly in Mark 16:17-18, of modish converts: `And these signs shall follow them that believe... they shall speak with new tongues... and if they drink any deadly thing, it shall not hurt them...' Swallowing a dram of Heidegger, Baudrillard and their ululating poststructural followers may very easily teach you the use of new tongues but is likely, for all that, to leave you (as Althusser's odd Marxism did for many theorists a decade or two back) with a nasty hangover. From jonkc at att.net Thu Nov 2 18:52:51 2006 From: jonkc at att.net (John K Clark) Date: Thu, 2 Nov 2006 13:52:51 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Survival tangent. References: <000401c6fdd7$934e3550$860a4e0c@MyComputer> Message-ID: <001401c6feb0$3623c190$05094e0c@MyComputer> Heartland, High Priest of the Unique Atom and Sacred Original Cult Wrote: > When will you understand that "life" is not an adjective but a noun So you believe that when someone dies something must go away. The name of that something is the soul. I know you'd prefer a more scientifically sounding word but that doesn't change the fact it's the same idea. I think that is nonsense, I believe the difference between a 180 pound man and a corpse is not that something has gone away but that something has changed in that 180 pounds of protoplasm, it's organized differently and so requires a different adjective. And to answer your question, I will believe in the soul when my IQ declines to double digits due to Alzheimer's disease. > here's a quick observation that might help you. > 1kg + 1kg != 1kg. Big + Big = Big Me: >>let me ask you a very simple question: do you believe the Heartland of >>yesterday has continued into today? You: > I guess in your language that would translate to "yes." So if somehow you knew you'd feel the same way tomorrow there would be no reason to fear you'd die today. I'd be willing to parachute over Niagara Falls blindfolded in a barrel full of snakes. > I might also add for the millionth time that what *I think* has absolutely > no influence on *what I am* Absolutely none? Not even a little? Are you sure? Oh sorry, I shouldn't have asked that last question, what you think doesn't matter. So if you had all my thoughts and none of your own it still wouldn't change what you are. If you had no thoughts at all it still wouldn't change what you are as long as the proper rituals had been performed on the sacred original atoms. You don't think it matters if you think you're alive or dead, thinking doesn't matter, all that matters is matter. As for me, I call someone who is incapable of thought dead and I don't give a damn about his idiot atoms. One last thing, if you decide to respond to this send me your ORIGINAL E mail. For all I know you may actually agree with me because I've never seen an original from you and all the E mail copies floating around on the net have a different identity. John K Clark From pj at pj-manney.com Thu Nov 2 19:37:21 2006 From: pj at pj-manney.com (pjmanney) Date: Thu, 02 Nov 2006 14:37:21 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] humor: evil eye Message-ID: <25455990.52161162496240993.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> >--- BillK wrote: >> The 'righteous rectum' is probably the 'colossal >> colon' that tours round the US. >> The Avantguardian wrote: >Only in America, folks. So I was wondering, would you >call that a "turd's eye view"? ;) You bet your ass only in America. The Mall of America, in Minneapolis, MN, to be precise. From our Christmas Card, 2003: http://www.russellrukin.co.uk/tempimages/2003%201%20of%203.JPG http://www.russellrukin.co.uk/tempimages/2003%202%20of%203.JPG [Thanks Russell for finding a temporary home to send them to!] My personal favorite is my daughter posing prettily next to external hemmoroids! PJ From msd001 at gmail.com Thu Nov 2 21:08:15 2006 From: msd001 at gmail.com (Mike Dougherty) Date: Thu, 2 Nov 2006 16:08:15 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] You must be willing to give up everything In-Reply-To: <04ae01c6fe45$e5b91b70$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> References: <7.0.1.0.2.20061031105302.021c3850@satx.rr.com> <4547AB5F.5060608@ramonsky.com> <043e01c6fd8a$cc9aa980$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <04ae01c6fe45$e5b91b70$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: <62c14240611021308u341c66beo3e84e8e5cdc89d24@mail.gmail.com> On 11/2/06, Lee Corbin wrote: > > > The name of the new religion will be > > I S L A M E > > Is Lame? Yes. The same problem the "Lame Ain't (an) MP3 Encoder" has, "If it's lame, why would we want it? Definately need a good name for your new religion, it's all about marketing you know... -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From nvitamore at austin.rr.com Thu Nov 2 22:46:32 2006 From: nvitamore at austin.rr.com (nvitamore at austin.rr.com) Date: Thu, 2 Nov 2006 17:46:32 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] PHIL: Derrida and Deconstruction Message-ID: <380-220061142224632968@M2W103.mail2web.com> Max left two papers on the breakfast table from me this morning: 1. "Postmodernism disrobed" by Richard Dawkins http://www.physics.nyu.edu/faculty/sokal/dawkins.html and, 2. "The Broken House: The postsemanticist paradigm of discourse and textural objectivism" (on Baudrillardist hyperreality and dialectic desublimation) by John J.R. Scuglia, Department of English, Yale University. [Afraid I cannot give you a link to this one because it was created by the Postmodernism Generator (Bulhak) software which turns any muck into what Alan Sokal and Jean Briemont would call a m?lange of banal philosophical jargon. But it gave me a really great laugh! http://www.elsewhere.org/pomo "The essay you have just seen is completely meaningless and was randomly generated by the Postmodernism Generator. To generate another essay, follow this link. If you liked this particular essay and would like to return to it, follow this link for a bookmarkable page." Natasha Natasha Vita-More http://www.natasha.cc -------------------------------------------------------------------- mail2web - Check your email from the web at http://mail2web.com/ . From velvethum at hotmail.com Fri Nov 3 00:01:07 2006 From: velvethum at hotmail.com (Heartland) Date: Thu, 2 Nov 2006 19:01:07 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Survival tangent. References: <000401c6fdd7$934e3550$860a4e0c@MyComputer> <001401c6feb0$3623c190$05094e0c@MyComputer> Message-ID: S: >> When will you understand that "life" is not an adjective but a noun and "live" >> is a verb? Stop inventing arbitrary referents for clearly defined terms. John Clark: > So you believe that when someone dies something must go away. The name of > that something is the soul. Honestly, you must have graduated from Karl Rove's School of Spin. :) Last time I checked with people who believe this stuff souls were eternal and could exist in absence of physical implementation. I claim something completely opposite. No function/process/life can exist in absence of physical implementation and when the hardware that implements that function/process/life disintegrates, that function/process/life on that hardware ceases to exist. What's not to understand here? Your "patterns" are actually a lot more similar to souls in a sense that, when a body disintegrates, life (function/process) continues as if nothing happened *just because* the same brain pattern might exist in some other body. That's a quite a leap of faith, if you ask me, probably motivated by an overwhelming desire to make "afterlife" work at all cost. I know, it's hard to deal with inevitability of death, but at some point you have to realize that there's no such thing as afterlife. When you die, you stay dead, and no amount of "spin" can save you. John Clark: > I believe the difference between a 180 pound man and a > corpse is not that something has gone away but that something has changed in > that 180 pounds of protoplasm, it's organized differently and so requires a > different adjective. The important difference between a living person and a corpse is that they are "organized differently?" :) S: >> 1kg + 1kg != 1kg. John Clark: > Big + Big = Big So, according to you, a diamond is made up of letters "C" instead of atoms of carbon? Symbols are more important than material things they refer to? S: >> I might also add for the millionth time that what *I think* has absolutely >> no influence on *what I am* John Clark: > So if you had all > my thoughts and none of your own it still wouldn't change what you are. If you paint a white car black, will that cause the car to morph into a toaster oven? (The *function* of a car remains stable regardless of whether that function is produced by a black Toyota or white Honda. Get it?) John Clark: > If > you had no thoughts at all it still wouldn't change what you are Whoa, hold your horses. Who said something about having no thoughts? As usual, you're jumping to conclusions without knowing what you are referring to. (No, it's not "matter" you should be referring to.) John Clark: > as long as > the proper rituals had been performed on the sacred original atoms. You > don't think it matters if you think you're alive or dead, thinking doesn't > matter, all that matters is matter. Atoms don't matter! Any mind is a process (what I am) so the process is the only thing that matters. As long as this process continues to produce output it makes no difference *how and what* implements it. It might as well be falling dust, I don't care. Obviously that would make sense to you if you grasped what process is, let alone "instance of a process." Instead, you continue to substitute "process" with "atoms" and pretend to know exactly what I'm talking about. Slawomir From austriaaugust at yahoo.com Thu Nov 2 23:50:19 2006 From: austriaaugust at yahoo.com (A B) Date: Thu, 2 Nov 2006 15:50:19 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Survival tangent (was Just curious, it's not natural!) In-Reply-To: <03e801c6fd7b$9cb91da0$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: <20061102235019.83835.qmail@web37409.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Hi Lee, Lee writes: "But people can be in two places at once, even though it seems uncanny to our evolutionarily derived notions of self. Nonetheless, once forking is a possibility (either after uploading or, less plausibly, via teleporters and copying machines), people will have to accustom themselves to the idea." Personally, I'm not ready to reject Slawomir's ideas and conceptions. But, in this particular example, I agree with you Lee. That the intricate weave of *consciousness* of a person can effectively "exist" at two places simultaneously. An easy and tangible example is the binocular vision of humans; where the two spatially separated eyes recieve separate data streams from different locations, are processed, and "emerge" in the same "conscious moment" as standard vision, complete with parralax and depth perception. Of course, it is not true simultaneity in a strict physical sense, but it does seem to be truly simultaneous "consciousness", if that makes any sense. Although, choosing to upload or teleport is still strongly causally linked. Best Wishes, Jeffrey Herrlich Lee Corbin wrote: Jef writes > While I know of many who have asserted that one is effectively defined > or distinguished by ones values, beliefs and memories, I know of no one > (other than you) who has said that this implies values, beliefs and > memories could be independently distributed as you say. But to some extent, values, beliefs, and memories *can* be independently distributed, in the sense of being distributed among a set of causally independent running processes. The case of physical duplicates, or near physical duplicates, is what of course I have in mind. (I realize that some have already stated this.) But we have to consider sliding scales. If your own VBM overlap to a tremendous extent those of "another person", then it seems to me that indeed to that same extend you are that other person. Of course, infinite care is required here to avoid begging the question of what a "person" is. That is, I mean that two physically distinct and causally separate processes ought to be regarded as the same person under the right circumstances. (Heartland, of course, regards this as absolutely contrary to what is meant by a "person", who he invariably sees as totally incapable of being in two places at once.) But people can be in two places at once, even though it seems uncanny to our evolutionarily derived notions of self. Nonetheless, once forking is a possibility (either after uploading or, less plausibly, via teleporters and copying machines), people will have to accustom themselves to the idea. And if that's true, then sliding scales can apply: there could be two separately running instances X and Y such that I am logically compelled to identify with X to about a 20% level and Y to about a 60% level. (Concrete cases might be my own selves at ages 5 and 15 respectively, and future tech could allow contemporaneous execution.) Heartland or Jef writes (the attribution isn't so easy for some reason) >> (1) Note that this is logically consistent with what many of us have >> been saying; that there can be a gradient of personal identity and >> that there can be duplicates of personal identity. That is so, whoever wrote it. > But that's just like saying that 1 can also mean 2 or that "blue sky" > can sometimes be red. The words imply certain conditions you must follow > when assigning the referents. If you violate these conditions you're > just end up using a wrong referent for a word and, consequently, should > be using a different word. So, for example, there's no such thing as > "duplicates of personal identity" or a "gradient of personal identity" > just like there's no such thing as "two originals" or "23% of being > pregnant." Well, blue skies can indeed contain shades of red, and just why aren't there "duplicates of personal identity"? I may be missing your logical point. Also, why can't there be a "gradient of personal identity"? Surely one is a lot more the same person one was at age 15 than one was at age 5. What worries me about survival in particular is that as it stands I am alas turning into someone else slowly but surely. But more of than later, in a different response I hope. Lee _______________________________________________ extropy-chat mailing list extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat --------------------------------- Low, Low, Low Rates! Check out Yahoo! Messenger's cheap PC-to-Phone call rates. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From emlynoregan at gmail.com Fri Nov 3 00:33:39 2006 From: emlynoregan at gmail.com (Emlyn) Date: Fri, 3 Nov 2006 11:03:39 +1030 Subject: [extropy-chat] humor: evil eye In-Reply-To: <200611020256.kA22ugXV022497@andromeda.ziaspace.com> References: <20061101063839.51598.qmail@web60519.mail.yahoo.com> <200611020256.kA22ugXV022497@andromeda.ziaspace.com> Message-ID: <710b78fc0611021633w1fa10ba1l8b2b32ff441483a0@mail.gmail.com> On 02/11/06, spike wrote: > > > bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of The Avantguardian > > Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] humor: evil eye > > > > --- BillK wrote: > > > The 'righteous rectum' is probably the 'colossal > > > colon' that tours round the US. > > > > > > > > > "Coco," as the Colossal Colon(r) is affectionately > > > known, is a 40-foot > > > long, 4-foot tall oversized model of the human colon > > > that is designed > > > to educate about colorectal cancer and other > > > diseases of the colon. > > > Visitors who crawl through the Colossal Colon(r) . . . > > > > Only in America, folks. So I was wondering, would you > > call that a "turd's eye view"? ;) > > > > Stuart LaForge > > > Ja, I was thinking about the person who had to sell this idea to the > venture > capitalists or the board of directors. "We propose an educational tool: > an > enormous colon, that visitor's crawl through..." How would you like that > job? > > spike I wonder if someone did it as a bet or a dare (put forward the proposal). I would hire that person ;-) Emlyn -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Fri Nov 3 00:56:35 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Thu, 2 Nov 2006 19:56:35 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] PHIL: Derrida and Deconstruction In-Reply-To: <7.0.1.0.2.20061102124441.021ac220@satx.rr.com> References: <7.0.1.0.2.20061102124441.021ac220@satx.rr.com> Message-ID: On 11/2/06, Damien Broderick wrote: > > At 09:46 AM 11/2/2006 -0800, Jef wrote: > > >My bottom-line and crude assessment is that postmodernism represents > >essentially a bottomless pit of navel-gazing, mental masturbation > >and academic in-fighting. > > The last-mentioned is crucial, especially when parsed as > "ladder-climbing" (into the professoriate). One should not > underestimate the sheer combative brilliance and mental agility of > the best deconstructors, the capacity to take a stone and wring not > just water but sparkling fountains of multi-colored streams from it, > all without getting wet. > > From my perspective... Jef expresses it Damien translates it. (though Jef's expressions were pretty clear). :-; The complexity of the human mind dicates that one can generate something from nothingness. It would be extopic to clearly label shit as shit. You may be wrong from a generalization perspective, But is that knowledge or are those procedures extropic? One can admire "generation", particularly "novel" generation -- it is the basis of much of "academia". The questions are whether it is productive or typical aspects of that thread? Inventing ideas is great. Inventing useless ideas isn't. How do you distinguish them? -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From iamgoddard at yahoo.com Fri Nov 3 01:04:26 2006 From: iamgoddard at yahoo.com (Ian Goddard) Date: Thu, 2 Nov 2006 17:04:26 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Identity (was: Survival tangent) Message-ID: <20061103010426.62496.qmail@web52611.mail.yahoo.com> John said to Heartland: > One last thing, if you decide to respond to this > send me your ORIGINAL E mail. For all I know you > may actually agree with me because I've never seen > an original from you and all the E mail copies > floating around on the net have a different > identity. Let me offer semantic and syntactic logical proofs that different copies of a file posses unique identities under the classic definition of 'identity'. Because 'identity' is a partial ordering it is transitive. Consequently this is a universal truth: if x = y, then x relates to z iff y relates to z. In second-order logic (where 'R' denotes any 'relation' and 'Rxz' means "x has a Relation to z"): AxAyAz[ (x = y) -> AR(Rxz <-> Ryz) ] Now, at any given moment any computer file has a unique relation to a unique block of memory -- the physical substrate upon which it is encoded. So given a domain with files and memory blocks, if 'x' denotes a file and 'z' denotes a memory block, 'Rxz' means: "File x has a Relation to memory block z." But now we can easily see that for any two copies (x, y) of a file, if 'Rxz' is true, then 'Ryz' is false since each copy has a unique relation to a unique memory block. Therefore, the consequent above 'AR(Rxz <-> Ryz)' is false in the given domain, and thus, since the whole logical statement above is true in all domains (proof below), by the truth conditions for '->' (an if-then statement is false iff its antecedent is true and its consequent false, but is true if both antecedent and consequent are false), the antecedent 'x = y' must also be false. So n copies of a file represent n unique identities (hence 'copies' is plural), even if they are all similar in just the ways that matter. QED Syntactic proof: Derive: AxAyAz[(x = y) -> AR(Rxz <-> Ryz)] from: x = y 1. x = y assume 2. Rxz assume 3. Ryz 1,2 identity 4. Rxz -> Ryz 2-3 deduction theorem 5. Ryz assume 6. Rxz 1,5 identity 7. Ryz -> Rxz 5-6 deduct theorem 8. Rxz <-> Ryz 4,7 def. of '<->' 9. AR(Rxz <-> Ryz) 8, universal gen 10. (x = y) -> AR(Rxz <-> Ryz) 1-9 deduct theorem 11. AxAyAz[(x = y) -> AR(Rxz <-> Ryz)] 10, univer gen This proves that 11 is in fact a universal truth. So, pointing back once again to our semantic domain of interpretation, if any file x and any file y are the same, then they must be encoded on exactly the same memory block (ie, physical elements). ~Ian http://IanGoddard.net "Propositions show the logical form of reality. They display it." -- Wittgenstein ____________________________________________________________________________________ Access over 1 million songs - Yahoo! Music Unlimited (http://music.yahoo.com/unlimited) ____________________________________________________________________________________ Everyone is raving about the all-new Yahoo! Mail (http://advision.webevents.yahoo.com/mailbeta/) From velvethum at hotmail.com Fri Nov 3 02:03:39 2006 From: velvethum at hotmail.com (Heartland) Date: Thu, 2 Nov 2006 21:03:39 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Survival tangent (was Just curious, it's not natural!) References: <20061102235019.83835.qmail@web37409.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Message-ID: > Lee writes: > "But people can be in two places at once, even though it seems uncanny > to our evolutionarily derived notions of self. Nonetheless, once forking > is a possibility (either after uploading or, less plausibly, via teleporters > and copying machines), people will have to accustom themselves to the > idea." Jeffrey: "Personally, I'm not ready to reject Slawomir's ideas and conceptions. But, in this particular example, I agree with you Lee. That the intricate weave of *consciousness* of a person can effectively "exist" at two places simultaneously. An easy and tangible example is the binocular vision of humans; where the two spatially separated eyes recieve separate data streams from different locations, are processed, and "emerge" in the same "conscious moment" as standard vision, complete with parralax and depth perception." --- But these two streams of data are merely components in a single instance of mind. I suspect that when Lee says that, "people can be in two places at once," he means that, "people can *see* two places at once" which is certainly possible, as you say. However, *seeing* two places at the same time and *being* in two places at the same time are two different things. What is also important to point out is that each stream of visual data is not equivalent to a complete mind just like a single neuron firing is not equivalent to a full mind. In the end, all these different subprocesses that happen inside a brain still add up to a single instance of mind. So two streams of visual data don't produce two minds. There's still only one mind there. Incidentally, that 2 things cannot be at the same place and time has nothing to do with "evolutionarily derived notions of self" (what I'm saying just happens to apply to notions of "self" as well) but everything to do with the law of conservation of mass/energy. Two brains weighing 1.4kg cannot share the same spatiotemporal location and still weigh 1.4kg. Two unconnected instances of mind cannot be a single instance of mind. Slawomir From iamgoddard at yahoo.com Fri Nov 3 02:27:28 2006 From: iamgoddard at yahoo.com (Ian Goddard) Date: Thu, 2 Nov 2006 18:27:28 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Identity (was: Survival tangent) Message-ID: <20061103022728.293.qmail@web52614.mail.yahoo.com> I wrote: > Because 'identity' is a partial ordering it is > transitive. D'oh! Edit: Because 'identity' is an equivalence relation it is transitive. All else follows... http://lists.extropy.org/pipermail/extropy-chat/2006-November/030142.html ____________________________________________________________________________________ Access over 1 million songs - Yahoo! Music Unlimited (http://music.yahoo.com/unlimited) From velvethum at hotmail.com Fri Nov 3 03:58:35 2006 From: velvethum at hotmail.com (Heartland) Date: Thu, 2 Nov 2006 22:58:35 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Identity (was: Survival tangent) References: <20061103022728.293.qmail@web52614.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: Ian Goddard: "Literally: for all objects x and y, x is y if and only if for all properties P, P is a property of x if and only if P is a property of y. More simply: x is y just in case every property of x is a property of y and vice versa." What you describe is, of course, Leibniz's law. "1" and "1" are different instances of "1" since the first "1" has a property of being to the left of "and" while the other "1" has a property of being to the right of "and". Multiple instances of anything are "automatically" different. Slawomir From kerry_prez at yahoo.com Thu Nov 2 21:24:53 2006 From: kerry_prez at yahoo.com (Al Brooks) Date: Thu, 2 Nov 2006 13:24:53 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Just curious, it's not natural! In-Reply-To: <20061102091430.60569.qmail@web37208.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <20061102212453.53791.qmail@web51602.mail.yahoo.com> Agreed. We could arrive at an expression such as "gayiage" in the place of marriage. It would make sense on grounds of diversity as well-- a diversity of terminology. It's not about recognizing gay marriage. I have the upmost respect for gays, I would never disrespect any choice of sexual behavior unless it violates rights. I feel using the word "marriage" as a symbol of the union between 2 men or 2 women violates my right as a heterosexual female. Why is that so wrong?[...] Why? If the word had already been established, why wouldn't I have the right to keep it just the way it is? The "Union" between man and woman. What I don't understand is why the gay community would not choose to represent itself as a self-sufficient member of society and choose a word that describes what their future "union" may one day represent[...] I am aware that most don't believe in the sanction of a woman and a man. That's their choice. I do. Not the laws, not the piece of paper but the choice to want to procreate with somebody and evolve as humans. It's not my scenario, at the present time, but I do believe that it should be a right and that "right" is the term defined by the word "marriage". Just an opinion. Anna --------------------------------- Access over 1 million songs - Yahoo! Music Unlimited Try it today. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From ps.udoname at gmail.com Thu Nov 2 21:35:03 2006 From: ps.udoname at gmail.com (ps udoname) Date: Thu, 2 Nov 2006 21:35:03 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] transhumanism as slippery slope In-Reply-To: References: <03fa01c6fd7e$24112d90$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <200611020411.kA24B9jw001186@andromeda.ziaspace.com> Message-ID: <28553f510611021335t7d5c2555s8f0e464ad122bd0b@mail.gmail.com> > > > 1. The European's don't need to allow the immigration they currently allow > if biotechnology extends healthy lifespan and the elderly choose to return > to work (rather than be a burden on the state) or if nanotechnology makes > need for state support unnecessary or if robots replace the functions > performed by immigrants (or some combination of these). The picture painted > is *only* a done deal assuming societies remain organized as they currently > are. > Perhaps the question is whether these technologies appear before we get swamped under a wave of resurgent religious fundamentalism, these technologies get banned and liberal secular democracy becomes a thing of the past.... -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From mmbutler at gmail.com Fri Nov 3 04:38:28 2006 From: mmbutler at gmail.com (Michael M. Butler) Date: Thu, 2 Nov 2006 20:38:28 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] You must be willing to give up everything (2nd try) In-Reply-To: <5.1.0.14.0.20061102120259.03d2eee0@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> References: <5.1.0.14.0.20061102120259.03d2eee0@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> Message-ID: <7d79ed890611022038s743cac9j2cb647ee9a432ac4@mail.gmail.com> On 11/2/06, Keith Henson wrote: > At 09:59 AM 10/31/2006 -0800, Jef wrote: > > snip > > >While Scientology and Avatar promise (and deliver) growth within a > >limited, internal, context, they are dangerous because they restrict > >growth beyond their own context. [I know, they have polished and > >emotionally persuasive arguments to the contrary.] I guess I should de-lurk about this. A while back, I did the Avatar materials, got benefit from them, and didn't cult out. YMMV, of course. I'm not going to argue or try to persuade. I'll simply state: no one associated with Avatar has ever done anything to restrict my growth. Believe it or don't. My "context" does not particularly include those folks today, so I don't see how my context can be "internal" by Jef's meaning. Maybe they have really _sophisticated_ orbital mind control lasers? I used to say that Avatar was the least-fscked-up human-potential thingy I'd checked out so far -- *but* that I could say nothing about the "Wizards" ("advanced" Avatar) material but was/am concerned about it being somehow doctrinaire or inflexible or bogus. Recently, I appear to have info that it is-was. Too bad. The (re)directed attention stuff I learned to practice still works for me. Am I kidding myself? Well, isn't everyone, where belief systems are concerned? _And_ attention? Remember all that Psych 101 stuff about seeing what is expected? > I don't know that much about Avatar except it is a scientology splinter > like EST/Landmark. Splinter or squirrel den, it's all how you look at it. > But I do know scientology and a *long* list of former scientologists. > > The main psychological mechanism used by scientology and (as far as I know, > *all* cults) is a perversion of attention reward. Welp. The Avatar stuff I did was mostly about (re)directing attention and I didn't get Moonie-style-love-bombed (*or* Stockholm-syndromed) AFAIK. So, not a lot of cult function in evidence, as such things go. And I could run down (sorry!) a list as long as my arm of more-cultish groups than that that I have direct experience with. Checked 'em out, didn't drain the cup of Kool-Aid; am still standing. WRT Avatar, I didn't get a big-assed flaming letters "CULT" readout at any point. Nobody was vying for the honor of polishing the brightwork on anyone's yacht (and yes, people did that for Elron and Werner, too). Maybe a hint of a "Stairway to Florida" with "cult?" in cursive on a sign next to it. When I studied, and when I reviewed, the Avatar materials, I paid close attention to (and was annoyed by) some of the residual terminology reminiscent of the Co$, but can report that what I did was not dissimilar to some stuff written about by, e.g., Tarthang Tulku (and, oddly enough, Nietzche!); and I did *not* get handed _any_ of the Co$ hooey (based on my extensive readings regarding same, both before and after). The good news about Avatar's upper level seems to be that they're *not* funneling money to the Co$, even though they're not far away in Florida. The bad news seems to be that Harry and his close asociates are? were? not as enlightened as they put forth. Sigh. 'Twas ever thus. To some degree, whether due to better ethics or less-extreme megalomania, Harry Palmer is not Elron, not by a long chalk. Does he wish he were? Quien sabe? I'm not gonna tell anyone else how to spend their money. And I don't know what is *really* up with Star's Edge International, in the US, France or elsewhere. As someone said, the lotus growing in the sewage is still a lotus. *shrug* -- Michael M. Butler : m m b u t l e r ( a t ) g m a i l . c o m 'Piss off, you son of a bitch. Everything above where that plane hit is going to collapse, and it's going to take the whole building with it. I'm getting my people the fuck out of here." -- Rick Rescorla (R.I.P.), cell phone call, 9/11/2001 From russell.wallace at gmail.com Fri Nov 3 04:42:21 2006 From: russell.wallace at gmail.com (Russell Wallace) Date: Fri, 3 Nov 2006 04:42:21 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] transhumanism as slippery slope In-Reply-To: <28553f510611021335t7d5c2555s8f0e464ad122bd0b@mail.gmail.com> References: <03fa01c6fd7e$24112d90$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <200611020411.kA24B9jw001186@andromeda.ziaspace.com> <28553f510611021335t7d5c2555s8f0e464ad122bd0b@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <8d71341e0611022042s75b45dfah2067feea401dfad5@mail.gmail.com> On 11/2/06, ps udoname wrote: > > Perhaps the question is whether these technologies appear before we get > swamped under a wave of resurgent religious fundamentalism, these > technologies get banned and liberal secular democracy becomes a thing of the > past.... Which is one reason why there is every need for the most desperate hurry imaginable and being "cautious" is the most dangerous thing we can do. I think it's not impossible we'll make progress fast enough, but at best it'll be a close call. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From avantguardian2020 at yahoo.com Fri Nov 3 05:23:32 2006 From: avantguardian2020 at yahoo.com (The Avantguardian) Date: Thu, 2 Nov 2006 21:23:32 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Juicy Classical Physics Problem Involving Gravitational Potential In-Reply-To: <046a01c6fe3d$3a108860$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: <20061103052332.13505.qmail@web60512.mail.yahoo.com> --- Lee Corbin wrote: > Newton---but not I---was able to calculate the > spherical oblateness of > the Earth by carefully regarding this notion of > gravitational potential. (He'd > be wonderfully jazzed by the generalization to > relativity theory spoken of > above.) > > But my Newtonian calculation---problematical in some > way---is off by a > factor of two! Perhaps someone here who really likes > classical physics > can see what is going wrong. Of course, I *could* > find some alternate > derivations on the web, or find some in a book > somewhere, but that > would take all the fun out of it. Nothing like > trying to work through > something yourself to really master the concepts. > > > Let r be the equatorial radius and R the polar > radius. The facts are > that R is 6357000 meters (or 6357 km), and r is 6378 > km, a > twenty-one kilometer difference. > > But my calculations below show that r "should" be > only 6368 km, > that is, just 11 km more than R instead of the > correct value of 21 more. I did not actually do the calculation myself however there are two possible errors which may have led to the discrepancy. 1. Did you remember the factor (1/2) in your kinetic energy term? i.e. KE = (1/2)mv^2 for your particle. 2. The mass of the earth that contributes to the gravitational field at the poles is LESS than the mass contributing to the field at the equator. The reason for this is Guass' Law in gravitation. At any point, a given distance from the barycenter of an extended body, the only mass that contributes to the gravitational field at that point is that portion of the mass that is closer to the barycenter. In other words, the mass of the earth that is included as M in GM/R should be the portion of the mass that is contained within a perfect sphere of radius R. If R is the polar radius this will be the total mass of the earth minus the mass of those parts of the earth that bulge out past the polar radius at the equator. Now mind you the mass of the bulge will be very small compared to the total mass of the earth. But 10 km is not a very large error at the scale of distances you are considering. > The next equation, and what I'm trying to go by, > reads "the sum of > the K.E. of a particle at the equator and the > remaining energy it > needs to get to infinity must equal the energy that > the particle at the > pole would need to acquire to get to infinity". Is > there a problem > with that? It certainly raises questions in my mind, > and one's that > I don't have clear answers for. I am curious as to what those questions are. As far as whether your equation is problematic, I don't think so, at least not classically. What you stated is pretty much the mathematical definition of a gravitational equipotential (guassian) surface. Now I have a puzzle for you guys: What is the maximum value of g, the acceleration of earth's gravitational field, and where is this maximum g located? Hint: Don't get stuck in two dimensions. :) Stuart LaForge alt email: stuart"AT"ucla.edu "Believe nothing. No matter where you read it, or who said it, even if I have said it, unless it agrees with your own reason and your own common sense."- Siddhartha Guatama aka Buddha. ____________________________________________________________________________________ Low, Low, Low Rates! Check out Yahoo! Messenger's cheap PC-to-Phone call rates (http://voice.yahoo.com) From mmbutler at gmail.com Fri Nov 3 06:01:24 2006 From: mmbutler at gmail.com (Michael M. Butler) Date: Thu, 2 Nov 2006 22:01:24 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Identity (was: Survival tangent) In-Reply-To: References: <20061103022728.293.qmail@web52614.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <7d79ed890611022201k522c6986v809c18f4f6593a2b@mail.gmail.com> On 11/2/06, Heartland wrote: > What you describe is, of course, Leibniz's law. "1" and "1" are different instances > of "1" since the first "1" has a property of being to the left of "and" while the > other "1" has a property of being to the right of "and". > Multiple instances of anything are "automatically" different. > > Slawomir > For some reason, I feel obliged to reminisce: "We may note that in these experiments the symbol = stands for 'is confused with'." G. Spencer Brown, "Laws of Form" (quote is only approximate: I sold my copy years ago). -- Michael M. Butler : m m b u t l e r ( a t ) g m a i l . c o m 'Piss off, you son of a bitch. Everything above where that plane hit is going to collapse, and it's going to take the whole building with it. I'm getting my people the fuck out of here." -- Rick Rescorla (R.I.P.), cell phone call, 9/11/2001 From spike66 at comcast.net Fri Nov 3 05:54:26 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Thu, 2 Nov 2006 21:54:26 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] polls again In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <200611030609.kA369dKc008585@andromeda.ziaspace.com> A couple weeks ago we had a discussion on how paperless voting machines may be causing loss of confidence in the outcomes of elections, which I commented is a serious threat to democracy, perhaps the most serious threat we have seen in some time. A new twist I saw today. The local newspaper, the San Jose Mercury, reported in big bold headlines the outcome of next week's elections. The outcome was based on some poll that someone did. There are a number of ways to look at this. The Merc and the newspaper industry is in decline, for reasons that are no surprise: the internet offers more material, more quickly, at no cost, content that can be more controlled by the user and effectively searched. Even the classified ads are in steep decline due to the same services, actually superior advertising services offered by eBay, Craig's List and others, for free or nearly so. Declining revenue leads to layoffs in the news room, thinner papers and fewer readers, spiraling downwards. Newspapers once made endorsements of candidates and propositions before the biannual elections. Now with fewer readers, this is a new way to state an endorsement. No need to pay for a poll when one can simply dream one up that matches one's endorsements. Another way to look at these headlines is that as confidence in elections declines, the difference is made up by making the local news poll the de facto standard by which the honesty of the election may be verified. Thus a process with unknown controls is supplanted by another process with known but suspect controls. Politics is full of paradox. spike From iamgoddard at yahoo.com Fri Nov 3 07:07:26 2006 From: iamgoddard at yahoo.com (Ian Goddard) Date: Thu, 2 Nov 2006 23:07:26 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Identity (was: Survival tangent) Message-ID: <20061103070726.85382.qmail@web52611.mail.yahoo.com> Heartland wrote: >> Literally: for all objects x and y, x is y if and >> only if for all properties P, P is a property of x >> if and only if P is a property of y. More simply: >> x is y just in case every property of x is a >> property of y and vice versa." > What you describe is, of course, Leibniz's law. "1" > and "1" are different instances of "1" since the > first "1" has a property of being to the left > of "and" while the other "1" has a property of > being to the right of "and". Multiple instances of > anything are "automatically" different. Right, the definition of 'identity' in logic matches Leibniz's Identity of Indiscernibles. And if we're talking about 'identity', our conclusions should derive from its logical definition. Doing so shows that if x and y are identical, then all the properties of x and of y are identical and all the relations of x to z and of y to z are identical. But as I believe I've shown, due to physical reality, all the properties and relations of copies (be they copies of brains or computer files) are not identical. Indeed, the fact that 'copies' is as a plural term denotes that there are differences between them. ~Ian ____________________________________________________________________________________ Get your email and see which of your friends are online - Right on the New Yahoo.com (http://www.yahoo.com/preview) From avantguardian2020 at yahoo.com Fri Nov 3 06:48:14 2006 From: avantguardian2020 at yahoo.com (The Avantguardian) Date: Thu, 2 Nov 2006 22:48:14 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] polls again In-Reply-To: <200611030609.kA369dKc008585@andromeda.ziaspace.com> Message-ID: <20061103064814.56398.qmail@web60511.mail.yahoo.com> --- spike wrote: > > Another way to look at these headlines is that as > confidence in elections > declines, the difference is made up by making the > local news poll the de > facto standard by which the honesty of the election > may be verified. Thus a > process with unknown controls is supplanted by > another process with known > but suspect controls. > > Politics is full of paradox. Yes, Spike, I agree with this observation. I think the reason that politics seems so paradoxical is that it is by far the most complicated dynamic on the planet. If you are uncertain of this point, think of it this way: We have yet to be able to mathematically model a single conscious entity. Politics however is the resultant vector of the "will vector" of any number of such concious entities. Yet bizarrely, for the simple concept of "space" in physics, we have three dimensions" x,y, and z. But for politics there seems to exist a notion that there is but a single dimension: X. Now along the X dimension of politics, a given "platform" is assigned a value of some magnitude which is either positive or negative. A political concept is always classified as either being politically "left" or "right". Thus politics is a space of N-dimensions, yet for some reason all that matters in society is whether the projection of the N-dimensional reality of politics onto a line of a single dimension. The right or left of center. This completely infuriates me because my politics is a point in at least four dimensional space if not more. That I somehow have to figure out which three out of four dimensions of my politics I am forced to ignore every election cycle, in order to have any say in a two party system is ridiculous. I say: Down with the two party system! To try to reconcile the tropics with the North Pole or Antartica is silly. It is stupid that I convince myself to vote for Coke or Pepsi when what I really crave is orange juice. Stuart LaForge alt email: stuart"AT"ucla.edu "Believe nothing. No matter where you read it, or who said it, even if I have said it, unless it agrees with your own reason and your own common sense."- Siddhartha Guatama aka Buddha. ____________________________________________________________________________________ We have the perfect Group for you. Check out the handy changes to Yahoo! Groups (http://groups.yahoo.com) From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Fri Nov 3 10:55:59 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Fri, 3 Nov 2006 05:55:59 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] transhumanism as slippery slope In-Reply-To: <8d71341e0611022042s75b45dfah2067feea401dfad5@mail.gmail.com> References: <03fa01c6fd7e$24112d90$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <200611020411.kA24B9jw001186@andromeda.ziaspace.com> <28553f510611021335t7d5c2555s8f0e464ad122bd0b@mail.gmail.com> <8d71341e0611022042s75b45dfah2067feea401dfad5@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On 11/2/06, Russell Wallace wrote: > I think it's not impossible we'll make progress fast enough, but at best > it'll be a close call. > Indeed. Moore's Law trumps human replication time (by a wide margin). Human memesets cannot adapt at the rate technology is evolving unless they are focused on doing so [1]. Particularly memesets which involve the setting aside of "rational thought" upon which the technology is based [2]. Robert 1. Memesets focused on static laws (as most religions are) are inherently non-adaptive in nature. 2. Though I will admit that the human mind is relatively adept at the simultaneous maintenance of conflicting memesets (denial of reality). Makes you wonder whether "Core Duo" could have been pushed as "Core conflicted". -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Fri Nov 3 11:26:53 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Fri, 3 Nov 2006 06:26:53 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] polls again In-Reply-To: <20061103064814.56398.qmail@web60511.mail.yahoo.com> References: <200611030609.kA369dKc008585@andromeda.ziaspace.com> <20061103064814.56398.qmail@web60511.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: On 11/3/06, The Avantguardian wrote: > I say: Down with the two party system! To try to reconcile the tropics > with the North Pole or Antartica is silly. It is stupid that I convince > myself to vote for Coke or Pepsi when what I really crave is orange juice. Having voted outside of the box in several national elections I can only beat my shoe on the table in agreement. The reality, unfortunately, and one which "we" may not adapt to easily is that while many people on the list are adept at balancing N-dimensional spaces, the "public" (which is buying those newspapers) is not. Now, this leads to an interesting question -- is the destiny of humanity multispatial? Does the direction and politics and news of Smartski (Deepski?), CA differ significantly from the direction and politics of Slowski (Shallowski), CA? [1] You can view it as an orthogonal vector to red v. blue. A second interesting question is whether the power brokers can afford to allow humanity to become multispatial? [2] Robert 1. For those outside of New England, Comcast (cableco) has been raking Verizon (phoneco) over the coals with a very aggressive advertising campaign with respect to people who have DSL connections (the "slow"skis) vs. people with cable internet connections (the "fast"skis). 2. Oh those "slowskis" back on Earth aren't doing anything productive with their materials -- "All their materials are belong to us." -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Fri Nov 3 11:44:41 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Fri, 3 Nov 2006 06:44:41 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Identity (was: Survival tangent) In-Reply-To: <7d79ed890611022201k522c6986v809c18f4f6593a2b@mail.gmail.com> References: <20061103022728.293.qmail@web52614.mail.yahoo.com> <7d79ed890611022201k522c6986v809c18f4f6593a2b@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On 11/3/06, Michael M. Butler wrote: > > "We may note that in these experiments the symbol > = > stands for > 'is confused with'." > [snip] Now, now, now Michael teasing the young'uns [1] in public can be viewed as nonproductive [2] R. 1. Given the depth of the discussion the descriptive term is a misapplication -- but it may suffice for the comment. 2. I am relearning my education in logic through the discussion so diss'ing it may have negative consequences IMO. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Fri Nov 3 12:27:03 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Fri, 3 Nov 2006 07:27:03 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] You must be willing to give up everything (2nd try) In-Reply-To: <7d79ed890611022038s743cac9j2cb647ee9a432ac4@mail.gmail.com> References: <5.1.0.14.0.20061102120259.03d2eee0@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> <7d79ed890611022038s743cac9j2cb647ee9a432ac4@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On 11/2/06, Michael M. Butler wrote: > Harry Palmer is not Elron, not by a long chalk. Of course, he does not have the Vilya ring. If one takes steps back from all of this (xyzzyCo) one can wonder whether their might be some unique combination of human traits (a leader?) [1] or discovered compu-bio-synthetics (hopefully implantable) that will eventually lead us to true "self-actualization" (for lack of a better term) Of course this gets all messed up by the copies one has pursuing different future vectors and the problem of reintegration of self-derivatives. Tolkien did not anticipate this or chose to ignore it. Robert 1. And for the readers, I am not anticipating this happening. The unique combination of memes that would have to be manifested in a single human could indeed be labeled as a "miracle". -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From kerry_prez at yahoo.com Fri Nov 3 07:15:22 2006 From: kerry_prez at yahoo.com (Al Brooks) Date: Thu, 2 Nov 2006 23:15:22 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] polls again In-Reply-To: <200611030609.kA369dKc008585@andromeda.ziaspace.com> Message-ID: <20061103071522.41697.qmail@web51615.mail.yahoo.com> Does anyone understand the tax propositions on ballots? don't you have to be an accountant to grasp them? Why doesn't a state empanel twelve economists as a jury to arbitrate decisions on taxes rather than let less educated or uneducated voters do so? That's why I like gay issues; sex-related issues aren't really important, but at least anyone can comprehend them. --- spike wrote: >[...] Politics is full of paradox. > > spike ____________________________________________________________________________________ We have the perfect Group for you. Check out the handy changes to Yahoo! Groups (http://groups.yahoo.com) From davidishalom1 at gmail.com Fri Nov 3 14:48:51 2006 From: davidishalom1 at gmail.com (david ish shalom) Date: Fri, 3 Nov 2006 16:48:51 +0200 Subject: [extropy-chat] You must be willing to give up everything - the self identity quest Message-ID: "*I see Robert's statement as very powerful because it highlights the very general principle that there is no growth without change, despite popular sentiment to the contrary.."* ** Around three months ago I have posted to this list about a new strategy of digital immortality through identity capture that can be performed now, to achieve now a good backup copy of ourselves, to increase our personal chances of survival to the transhumanist future. I brought a strategy backed by serious theories and research of the self, like Max More, W.S. Bainbridge and Kurzweil insights, yet the final conclusions oblige me alone. The argumentation raised was never seriously related by this list participants, not disputed earnestly, yet since then my postings to this list has been placed into the moderation list until now and basically the method was ignored. Aren't some of you even here refusing to think outside the box ? frightened by the innovation ? some participants reaction to new scientifically based procedure of survival was conceit and unimaginative refrain without even bothering to review the material. if it can be shown that by reliable self-identity capture, we can capture now the salient information regarding the self- identity, in other words, the identity-critical-information, that means that future information technologies will be able to upload that information into personalized-artificial-intelligence to the effect of your survival. This is uploading, but not through full neural scanning but by way of identity capture, the capture of your self identity, a process which it is claimed that can soon be perfected and performed. So the critical question is, can I reliably and seriously capture my identity ? Max More in The Diachronic Self argue that the content of self-transformation is itself a primary component connecting our former self with our new self phase and that* *transformation content will compensate for the reduction in other connections it causes". From this respect it is clarified that a person is, for a large extent, a matter of self definition. *Thus, I am not mainly what I am, but I am rather what I will be able to be. * *Please check seriously for yourself, before ignoring or ridiculing that opportunity, the material is clear and compelling. Death is our prime threat and any rationally based strategy of self identity capture and survival hopefully will not be totally overlooked by transhumanists*. a revised edition of this option of immortality. *http://davidishalom1.googlepages.com/home * Jef Allbright" Philosophers have been dealing with the question of personal identity for thousands of years already. Anyone seriously interested in discussing the topic should be familiar with previous thinking including "ship of Theseus", Max More's thesis on the "diachronic self", and Derek Parfit's _Reasons and Persons_ in order to avoid rehashing ?..two things about this topic remain interesting to me: (1) Even after people have become quite familiar with the logical arguments, they tend to stay with whatever belief *feels* right to them. This has immense implications for effective decision-making under accelerating change, and so is of increasingly practical importance to our lives and well-being??some people have "moved up" beyond the common-sense description of personal identity to embrace the broader "patternist" definition but have yet to embrace an even more general description based on agency rather than physical/functional similarity. In my opinion this is where our thinking graduates from the "aha, it should be possible" stage to the more practical level of how we might deal with the social and moral ramifications of multiple instances of a personal identity. as to your point about the rigorous meaning of identity, I fully agree. That being said, within the topic of "personal identity" we are specifically allowing for the case when two objects, recognized as ?..persons, appear to be *effectively* the same within a given context. Now, given the logical definition of 'identity', if there is a perfect copy of my brain with all its encoded contents and possible states, that copy still lacks at least: (1) the property of being 'the original', (2) the property of being in the location that the original is, and (3) the property of being encoded on the physical substrate that the original is encoded on. Ergo, there exists at least one property that the original has but the copy lacks, and thus, by the definition of 'identity', any claim that "the original = the copy" is false Don't let what you are being get in the way of what you might become. - Robert Bradbury wrote: > > *You must be willing to give up everything* you are for what you might > > become. > Excellent statement! Before I add this to my quote file with attribution to > Robert, can anyone tell me of the existence of a more original source of > this powerful insight? Jef Allbright" You must be willing to give up everything .. *I see Robert's statement as very powerful because it highlights the very general principle that there is no growth without change, despite popular sentiment to the contrary.*** (1) Note that this is logically consistent with what many of us have been saying; that there can be a gradient of personal identity and that there can be duplicates of personal identity. ? the rate of change increases (the singularity) it is likely that only > those who adopt the path of greatest flexibility will survive. > You must be willing to give up everything you are for what you might > become: Unfortunately very very few individuals in the world today > grasp this -- they are more concerned with being who or what they > "are" than simply "being". *"First they ignore you,** then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win." Mohandas Gandhi* -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jef at jefallbright.net Fri Nov 3 16:20:25 2006 From: jef at jefallbright.net (Jef Allbright) Date: Fri, 3 Nov 2006 08:20:25 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] You must be willing to give up everything (2ndtry) In-Reply-To: <7d79ed890611022038s743cac9j2cb647ee9a432ac4@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: Michael M. Butler wrote: > On 11/2/06, Keith Henson wrote: > > At 09:59 AM 10/31/2006 -0800, Jef wrote: > > >While Scientology and Avatar promise (and deliver) growth > > >within a limited, internal, context, they are dangerous > > >because they restrict growth beyond their own context. > > >[I know, they have polished and emotionally persuasive > > >arguments to the contrary.] > > I guess I should de-lurk about this. A while back, I did the > Avatar materials, got benefit from them, and didn't cult out. I see that my statement might appear to lump the two organizations together as equals, while my intention was only to show certain similarities. My knowledge of Scientology comes from personal experience in my twenties and what I know of the experiences of others. I had read Dianetics and found L Ron's engram theory interesting but an overly simplified model of cognitive processing. [I did take away and still use one practice from that book, which is to minimize verbal stimulus when the other person is feeling highly emotional because of their increased susceptibility to imprinting.] So one day in a shopping mall I was approached by a pretty girl who invited me to attend a "communications course." Intrigued (for various reasons), I went inside and spent a few months observing a fairly well-organized process of mind control and identification of susceptible individuals. Having seen enough, I left, but a quarter century later postal mail from the COS still arrives at my old mailing address. Incidentally, a year or so later while walking in San Francisco I was approached and invited to visit the Moonies. That was a different sort of experience, with food and singing and showering of love from everyone there. By the end of the evening I was invited to take the bus to their farm, which I declined. My knowledge of Avatar is close but second-hand through the experiences of my SO, who spent many thousands of dollars on their ladder of programs. She found great benefit from the initial Resurfacing program, followed it with the main Avatar program, and then two sessions of the weeklong Masters program in Florida. She came under a lot of pressure for many months to enroll in the next level, called Wizards, with promises of (secret) advanced knowledge of how to modify reality, but she declined. It took her a few years after leaving before she was able to look back and see the web of influence that had held her. >From my reading and conversations on Avatar, I observed the key Scientology tactic of using arcane terminology for common concepts in philosophy and psychology. This has the direct effect of building a strong in-group/out-group mentality. I observed that their teachings (which do indeed provide growth for many people) consisted of repackaging the same teachings that can be found in eastern religion, psychology, philosophy, and self-help books, but without references, attribution or rigor, and all with the implication of deriving from the wisdom of Harry Palmer, who of course acknowledged studying in all these areas before he came to his grand realization. I see more commonalities than differences, but I do agree that Avatar (Star's Edge) appears to be more benign than Scientology. > > YMMV, of course. I'm not going to argue or try to persuade. > I'll simply state: no one associated with Avatar has ever > done anything to restrict my growth. Believe it or don't. Michael, I don't know how many steps up the ladder you paid for and took, but I meant restricted in the sense of a path turning inward with the wisdom of Harry Palmer always at its center, as opposed to a path growing outward among many competing and evolving sources of knowledge. The first steps of any path to self-knowledge are similar, with increasing realization of the nature of attention, self, and ones relationship with the surrounding world. > My "context" does not particularly include those folks today, > so I don't see how my context can be "internal" by Jef's > meaning. Maybe they have really _sophisticated_ orbital mind > control lasers? THAT was supposed to be kept secret! > I used to say that Avatar was the least-fscked-up > human-potential thingy I'd checked out so far -- *but* that I > could say nothing about the "Wizards" ("advanced" Avatar) > material but was/am concerned about it being somehow > doctrinaire or inflexible or bogus. > > Recently, I appear to have info that it is-was. Too bad. So you are supporting my point that there is initial growth, but it turns increasingly inward? > The (re)directed attention stuff I learned to practice still > works for me. Am I kidding myself? Well, isn't everyone, > where belief systems are concerned? _And_ attention? Remember > all that Psych 101 stuff about seeing what is expected? Again it seems that you are supporting my point about the early growth provided by all such paths to self-awareness. > > I don't know that much about Avatar except it is a scientology > > splinter like EST/Landmark. > > Splinter or squirrel den, it's all how you look at it. > > > But I do know scientology and a *long* list of former > scientologists. > > > > The main psychological mechanism used by scientology and > (as far as I > > know, > > *all* cults) is a perversion of attention reward. > > Welp. The Avatar stuff I did was mostly about (re)directing > attention and I didn't get Moonie-style-love-bombed (*or* > Stockholm-syndromed) AFAIK. So, not a lot of cult function in > evidence, as such things go. > And I could run down (sorry!) a list as long as my arm of > more-cultish groups than that that I have direct experience > with. Checked 'em out, didn't drain the cup of Kool-Aid; am > still standing. Sounds like we have a fair amount in common here. Probably my initial statement comparing the two groups gave the wrong impression. > WRT Avatar, I didn't get a big-assed flaming letters "CULT" > readout at any point. Nobody was vying for the honor of > polishing the brightwork on anyone's yacht (and yes, people > did that for Elron and Werner, too). > > Maybe a hint of a "Stairway to Florida" with "cult?" in > cursive on a sign next to it. > > When I studied, and when I reviewed, the Avatar materials, I > paid close attention to (and was annoyed by) some of the > residual terminology reminiscent of the Co$, but can report > that what I did was not dissimilar to some stuff written > about by, e.g., Tarthang Tulku (and, oddly enough, > Nietzche!); and I did *not* get handed _any_ of the Co$ hooey > (based on my extensive readings regarding same, both before > and after). > > The good news about Avatar's upper level seems to be that they're > *not* funneling money to the Co$, even though they're not far > away in Florida. The bad news seems to be that Harry and his > close asociates are? were? not as enlightened as they put > forth. Sigh. 'Twas ever thus. To some degree, whether due to > better ethics or less-extreme megalomania, Harry Palmer is > not Elron, not by a long chalk. Does he wish he were? Quien sabe? > > I'm not gonna tell anyone else how to spend their money. And > I don't know what is *really* up with Star's Edge > International, in the US, France or elsewhere. > > As someone said, the lotus growing in the sewage is still a lotus. Very true, but one might still ask "why all this sewage?" > *shrug* From jef at jefallbright.net Fri Nov 3 17:16:20 2006 From: jef at jefallbright.net (Jef Allbright) Date: Fri, 3 Nov 2006 09:16:20 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] You must be willing to give up everything - the selfidentity quest In-Reply-To: Message-ID: It seems odd to find various pieces of my comments the last few days tacked onto David's message. I'm not sure what relevance is implied, other than possibly the implication that I, Max More, Kurzweil and others think it's a topic worth discussing, therefore David's writing should be worth discussing? David, I've seen your writing, mainly on WTA-Talk, and my impression (trying to give allowance for the language barrier) is one of breathless enthusiasm but relatively little substance. For me personally, it would help if you would use a format that doesn't come across as a sales pitch. For example, if you were to make some statement (preferably something novel, insightful or controversial within the context of the extropy list), and follow it will some concise supporting statements and perhaps a statement as to why others might see it as significant. By doing so, I think you would be very likely to get a meaningful response. - Jef -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jonkc at att.net Fri Nov 3 18:57:02 2006 From: jonkc at att.net (John K Clark) Date: Fri, 3 Nov 2006 13:57:02 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Survival tangent. References: <000401c6fdd7$934e3550$860a4e0c@MyComputer><001401c6feb0$3623c190$05094e0c@MyComputer> Message-ID: <00fd01c6ff79$f94ee220$ba084e0c@MyComputer> Heartland, High Priest of the Unique Atom and Sacred Original Cult Wrote: Me: >> you believe that when someone dies something must go away. The name of >> that something is the soul. > Last time I checked with people who believe this stuff souls were eternal The soul concept is common in all human cultures but in many of them the soul is not eternal, it's not a defining attribute. > I claim something completely opposite. You say life is a noun so when you die something must leave or be destroyed. Whatever that something is it must be very important, even more important than thinking, even more important than believing you are alive, even more important than remembering being you yesterday. However as huge as this something is it's completely undetectable by the scientific method. There is a word in English for a something like that. > No function/process/life can exist in absence of physical implementation True, but any physical implementation will do because the scientific method can not detect a difference between one hydrogen atom and another. > Your "patterns" are actually a lot more similar to souls In a previous post I already listed the similarities and differences between the soul and information, the biggest difference being that information can be studied with the scientific method but the soul and your Sacred Original Atoms can not be. > in a sense that, when a body disintegrates, life (function/process) continues as if nothing happened *just because* the same brain pattern might exist in some other body. That's a quite a leap of faith, if you ask me It takes no leap of faith to deduce you Sacred Original Atoms theory is pure nonsense. > If you paint a white car black, will that cause the car to morph into a > toaster oven? No. > probably motivated by an overwhelming desire to make "afterlife" work at > all cost. I know, it's hard to deal with inevitability of death, but at > some point you have to realize that there's no such thing as afterlife. > When you die, you stay dead, and no amount of "spin" can save you. I'm sure you picture yourself as tragic hero, bravely staring into the face of death and refusing to turn away from grim reality. However I see you in a somewhat less epic light. I see you as a man who is terrified of the dentist because he fears he might slip him a anesthetic which he believes is equivalent to death, a man who has an irrational fetish for Original Atoms, a man who has views a well educated child in the 18'th century would be very comfortable with but are hopelessly old fashioned today. >The important difference between a living person and a corpse is that they >are "organized differently?" :) Do you really have to ask this question? The ONLY difference between a 16 year old boy a 90 year old man and a corpse is the way the atoms are organized, and there is simply no doubt about it. There is no reason you couldn't turn one into the other at will, there is no reason you couldn't turn me into you; all you'd need is Nanotechnology and information. > When you die, you stay dead When you die you may stay dead, probably will actually, but no law of physics would demand it. Me: >> You think if you had no thoughts at all it still wouldn't change what you >> are You: >Who said something about having no thoughts? You did: "I might also add for the millionth time that what *I think* has absolutely no influence on *what I am*" > Atoms don't matter! Then why did you spend about 6 posts talking about Original Atoms and going on and on about timelines and space time coordinates to make sure you could distinguish the High Holy Original hydrogen atoms from the imposters. > Any mind is a process A process is a series of actions and actions can be stopped, started up again, reversed and duplicated. John K Clark From asa at nada.kth.se Fri Nov 3 20:43:11 2006 From: asa at nada.kth.se (Anders Sandberg) Date: Fri, 3 Nov 2006 21:43:11 +0100 (MET) Subject: [extropy-chat] PHIL: Derrida and Deconstruction In-Reply-To: <7.0.1.0.2.20061102124441.021ac220@satx.rr.com> References: <7.0.1.0.2.20061102124441.021ac220@satx.rr.com> Message-ID: <2213.208.181.209.209.1162586591.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> Damien Broderick wrote: > At 09:46 AM 11/2/2006 -0800, Jef wrote: > >>My bottom-line and crude assessment is that postmodernism represents >>essentially a bottomless pit of navel-gazing, mental masturbation >>and academic in-fighting. > > The last-mentioned is crucial, especially when parsed as > "ladder-climbing" (into the professoriate). I'm at the 4S (Society for Social Studies of Science) conference in Vancouver right now, surrounded by amazing amounts of postmodern thought (and other styles I don't even know what to call). It is great fun, especially since I don't have a great stake in it. This morning the session about the military enhancement of human bodies was revealing. The speakers picked apart underlying assumptions of the improved soldier and the "militarized citizen". A woman held a talk in high postmodern that was beautiful poetry. The main thrust of it all was of course a deep suspicion of the military-industrial-academic machine producing all this normalization and enhancement to further its own agenda. But at the same time it was so clear that this was done from the perspective of *another* machine, this one producing analysis, concerns and criticism for a living. Just as the military industrial complex is a business so is academia. But admitting it is impossible for either, since both have to hide their essential self-servingness under the image of "protecting democracy" or "intellectual inquiry" (of course, some people in these respective machines actually strive for these goals, but to thrive you have think about the bottom line, whether it is counted in dollars or tenure probability). As for myself, I have given a little talk here picking apart narratives of the social effects of enhancement (be they transhuman or bioconservative). With some luck it will become a book chapter. More on that later. -- Anders Sandberg, Oxford Uehiro Centre for Practical Ethics Philosophy Faculty of Oxford University From nvitamore at austin.rr.com Fri Nov 3 19:27:46 2006 From: nvitamore at austin.rr.com (nvitamore at austin.rr.com) Date: Fri, 3 Nov 2006 14:27:46 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Edge: Thank Goodness! By Daniel C. Dennett Message-ID: <380-220061153192746796@M2W040.mail2web.com> Daniel C. Dennet wrote: "Two weeks ago, I was rushed by ambulance to a hospital where it was determined by c-t scan that I had a "dissection of the aorta"-the lining of the main output vessel carrying blood from my heart had been torn up, creating a two-channel pipe where there should only be one. Fortunately for me, the fact that I'd had a coronary artery bypass graft seven years ago probably saved my life...." THANK GOODNESS! by Daniel C. Dennett But isn't this awfully harsh? Surely it does the world no harm if those who can honestly do so pray for me! No, I'm not at all sure about that. For one thing, if they REALLY wanted to do something useful, they could devote their prayer time and energy to some pressing project that they CAN do something about. For another, we now have quite solid grounds (e.g., the recently released Benson study at Harvard) for believing that intercessory prayer simply doesn't work. Anybody whose practice shrugs off that research is subtly undermining respect for the very goodness I am thanking. If you insist on keeping the myth of the effectiveness of prayer alive, you owe the rest of us a justification in the face of the evidence. Pending such a justification, I will excuse you for indulging in your tradition; I know how comforting tradition can be. But I want you to recognize that what you are doing is morally problematic at best." This EDGE edition is available online at: http://www.edge.org/documents/archive/edge195.html -------------------------------------------------------------------- mail2web - Check your email from the web at http://mail2web.com/ . From user at dhp.com Fri Nov 3 21:47:34 2006 From: user at dhp.com (Ensel Sharon) Date: Fri, 3 Nov 2006 16:47:34 -0500 (EST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Edge: Thank Goodness! By Daniel C. Dennett In-Reply-To: <380-220061153192746796@M2W040.mail2web.com> Message-ID: (FYI, I am agnostic on the subject of God / religion) On Fri, 3 Nov 2006, nvitamore at austin.rr.com wrote: > But isn't this awfully harsh? Surely it does the world no harm if those who > can honestly do so pray for me! No, I'm not at all sure about that. For one > thing, if they REALLY wanted to do something useful, they could devote > their prayer time and energy to some pressing project that they CAN do > something about. For another, we now have quite solid grounds (e.g., the > recently released Benson study at Harvard) for believing that intercessory > prayer simply doesn't work. Anybody whose practice shrugs off that research > is subtly undermining respect for the very goodness I am thanking. If you > insist on keeping the myth of the effectiveness of prayer alive, you owe > the rest of us a justification in the face of the evidence. Pending such a Wrong. They owe you NOTHING. If they wish to think about hooters girls and sports cars, so be it. If they want to direct their time and thought energy to their hamster, so be it. If they want to pray for your well-being[1] (or perhaps for you to mind your own business), so be it. > justification, I will excuse you for indulging in your tradition; I know > how comforting tradition can be. But I want you to recognize that what you > are doing is morally problematic at best." Wrong. No thought whatever is morally problematic. The time, energy and will that I expend are my own and require no justification - from me or anyone else. If Dennett is such a fucking genius, why doesn't he recognize the problem of labeling things "thoughtcrime" ? Further, how dare he suggest that I do anything with my time and kilowatts, or dispose of my own property in any way, other than exactly as i see fit ? The notion that he would impose upon others some kind of minimum acceptable level of function and efficiency in their thoughts and actions is absurd. If certain time, energy and kilowatts belong to me, I will dissipate them in any way I see fit, and as efficiently as I see fit. [1] Or encourage others, possibly with non-scientific, non refutable evidence to do the same. From russell.wallace at gmail.com Fri Nov 3 22:39:22 2006 From: russell.wallace at gmail.com (Russell Wallace) Date: Fri, 3 Nov 2006 22:39:22 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Edge: Thank Goodness! By Daniel C. Dennett In-Reply-To: References: <380-220061153192746796@M2W040.mail2web.com> Message-ID: <8d71341e0611031439w5d25b799k1dc4618d05e054a4@mail.gmail.com> On 11/3/06, Ensel Sharon wrote: > > If Dennett is such a fucking genius, why doesn't he recognize the problem > of labeling things "thoughtcrime" ? Further, how dare he suggest that I > do anything with my time and kilowatts, or dispose of my own property in > any way, other than exactly as i see fit ? The notion that he would > impose upon others some kind of minimum acceptable level of function and > efficiency in their thoughts and actions is absurd. If certain time, > energy and kilowatts belong to me, I will dissipate them in any way I see > fit, and as efficiently as I see fit. > Seconded. This sort of junk from people like Dennett is exactly isomorphic to "it's a mortal sin to deny the existence of God" from religious fundamentalists, only the labels have been switched around. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From russell.wallace at gmail.com Fri Nov 3 22:44:08 2006 From: russell.wallace at gmail.com (Russell Wallace) Date: Fri, 3 Nov 2006 22:44:08 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Survival tangent (was Just curious, it's not natural!) In-Reply-To: References: <20061102082308.30427.qmail@web37204.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <8d71341e0611031444w6b27e817o85cd287a58458c2c@mail.gmail.com> On 11/2/06, Jef Allbright wrote: > > (2) Some people have "moved up" beyond the common-sense description of > personal identity to embrace the broader "patternist" definition but > have yet to embrace an even more general description based on agency > rather than physical/functional similarity. I'm curious, what's your definition of identity based on agency? (I remember your general "wider contexts" philosophy and there's some validity in it, but not sure how it bears on the question of identity.) -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From eugen at leitl.org Fri Nov 3 22:58:27 2006 From: eugen at leitl.org (Eugen Leitl) Date: Fri, 3 Nov 2006 23:58:27 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] Firefox 2 [was: The End of Science] In-Reply-To: <8d71341e0610311328v15381f51k4701ec66fccc13f9@mail.gmail.com> References: <4542BBDB.40704@surriel.com> <8d71341e0610271923j1d06b614t5fdf463cf9382ad0@mail.gmail.com> <8d71341e0610311328v15381f51k4701ec66fccc13f9@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <20061103225826.GD6974@leitl.org> On Tue, Oct 31, 2006 at 09:28:37PM +0000, Russell Wallace wrote: > > Installed Firefox 2 last night on the promise of the "restore session" > feature, and _very_ well worth it for that alone! No more having to Firefox is absolutely useless without extensions, and SessionSaver/SessionManager are an item on a pretty short list of essentials. > try to manually recover tens of tabs on every reboot. (If you install > it, make sure to set the option for restore session on regular > shutdown as well as crash.) > It's a nice example of a general point: Technological progress isn't > just about making things possible that weren't before; Firefox 2 can't > do anything earlier web browsers couldn't do in principle. It's also, > very much, about increasing the range of things you can _take for > granted_ so you don't have to worry about them anymore and you can use > them as building blocks. I'm personally pretty much disgusted with Firefox. But then, all alternatives but Safari (Saft/PithHelment) suck even more. -- Eugen* Leitl leitl http://leitl.org ______________________________________________________________ ICBM: 48.07100, 11.36820 http://www.ativel.com 8B29F6BE: 099D 78BA 2FD3 B014 B08A 7779 75B0 2443 8B29 F6BE -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: signature.asc Type: application/pgp-signature Size: 191 bytes Desc: Digital signature URL: From sentience at pobox.com Fri Nov 3 23:39:55 2006 From: sentience at pobox.com (Eliezer S. Yudkowsky) Date: Fri, 03 Nov 2006 15:39:55 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Edge: Thank Goodness! By Daniel C. Dennett In-Reply-To: <8d71341e0611031439w5d25b799k1dc4618d05e054a4@mail.gmail.com> References: <380-220061153192746796@M2W040.mail2web.com> <8d71341e0611031439w5d25b799k1dc4618d05e054a4@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <454BD34B.6070504@pobox.com> Russell Wallace wrote: > On 11/3/06, *Ensel Sharon* > > wrote: > > "If Dennett is such a fucking genius, why doesn't he recognize the > problem of labeling things "thoughtcrime" ? Further, how dare he > suggest that I do anything with my time and kilowatts, or dispose of > my own property in any way, other than exactly as i see fit ? The > notion that he would impose upon others some kind of minimum > acceptable level of function and efficiency in their thoughts and > actions is absurd. If certain time, energy and kilowatts belong to > me, I will dissipate them in any way I see fit, and as efficiently as > I see fit." > > Seconded. This sort of junk from people like Dennett is exactly > isomorphic to "it's a mortal sin to deny the existence of God" from > religious fundamentalists, only the labels have been switched around. http://www.edge.org/documents/archive/edge195.html#dd No. Isomorphism would be "You prayed to God so now I'm going to kill you / put you in jail / fine you, for your thoughtcrime." As for Dennett suggesting that people are doing something wrong by praying instead of helping - that they are thereby committing a moral sin, in need of forgiveness - why, yes, you're right, that is somewhat like a theologian who *peacefully argues with you*, for what he conceives to be your own benefit, that you are committing a mortal sin by denying the existence of God. Of course, Dennett lives by a higher standard of rationality than a theologian - it would be going much too far to say that the theologian is simply committing an innocent mistake. It is not innocent. The theologian could and should know better, and others are harmed by the laxity. Like my grandparents, who will die without being frozen. As is shown easily enough by Dennett's example of the medical industry, you don't need to use violence to promote your beliefs, in order to harm people with wrong beliefs. Yes, you *can* hurt other people by being lax with yourself, forgiving yourself your nonsense, holding yourself to too low a standard. It is this understanding of strictness that makes modern medicine effective. But that Dennett is allowed to peacefully argue that people *should not* pray, that they harm others by praying, that they harm themselves by praying, that it's a stupid idea and humanity should get the hell over it already - no, it's not so different from a theologian being allowed to peacefully argue to you that you are committing a mortal sin by denying God. The support justifying the two beliefs are very different, and it so happens that the first is right and the second is wrong. But how would we know that if people were not allowed to publicly debate their reasons? It happens to be true that the Earth goes around the Sun, and false that the Sun goes around the Earth. But the sin of Galileo's inquisitors was not that they happened to pick the wrong side of the factual dispute - everyone makes mistakes. Their lesser and forgiveable sin was that they chose their side irrationally (rather than making the mistake because of e.g. experimental error). Their greater and unforgiveable sin was that they enforced their beliefs with a sword. To compare Dennett to a religious fundamentalist is silly; if you wish to insult him with some trace of plausibility, compare him to an academic theologian. And to suggest that they are automatically on the same level, or committing the same mistake, because they dare to air their views and advise others on what to think - that is foolish. (It is written: "The fifth virtue is argument.") The theologian has chosen his belief irrationally, and yes, others are harmed by that, and yes, he is responsible for the results, just as a doctor would be. But that he and Dennett should both put forth their views openly, and argue about them, is only right and proper. A doctor must, in the end, treat a patient based on whatever diagnosis seems most probable. If he chooses wrongly and based on sloppy thinking, then he is at fault, and his sin is very grave. But a doctor cannot do better in general by treating patients based on diagnoses that seem less probable, or by refusing to treat patients. -- Eliezer S. Yudkowsky http://singinst.org/ Research Fellow, Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence From russell.wallace at gmail.com Sat Nov 4 00:03:44 2006 From: russell.wallace at gmail.com (Russell Wallace) Date: Sat, 4 Nov 2006 00:03:44 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Edge: Thank Goodness! By Daniel C. Dennett In-Reply-To: <454BD34B.6070504@pobox.com> References: <380-220061153192746796@M2W040.mail2web.com> <8d71341e0611031439w5d25b799k1dc4618d05e054a4@mail.gmail.com> <454BD34B.6070504@pobox.com> Message-ID: <8d71341e0611031603t5e86a6c8r315894f13309c6a1@mail.gmail.com> On 11/3/06, Eliezer S. Yudkowsky wrote: > > As for Dennett suggesting that people are doing something wrong by > praying instead of helping - that they are thereby committing a moral > sin, in need of forgiveness - why, yes, you're right, that is somewhat > like a theologian who *peacefully argues with you*, for what he > conceives to be your own benefit, that you are committing a mortal sin > by denying the existence of God. Yes, that's what I was referring to. The equivalent of the religious fundamentalists who kill infidels for not believing in God would be those who did the same thing in the name of the atheist ideology of communism. As for who's being more irrational, whatever your opinion of religion, it worked. Look at the results once religion is gone: the prime examples of evolution in action are precisely those who believe in evolution. If I believed in God I'd say He had a wicked sense of humor. As for who's doing harm by ill-considered words, consider _why_ so many people are rejecting evolutionary biology (in a way that they don't reject, say, physics or chemistry). It's because they've been taught they _have_ to reject it or give up everything they hold dear and find themselves in an empty universe with empty lives. What fanatical religious preachers taught them this, you may wonder? Why, some of the names are quite familiar. Gould, Dawkins, Dennett. Now if people want to preach atheism, that's their right; and if they want to preach nihilism, well I suppose even that's their right. It's when they do so _with their scientist hats on_, when they abuse their reputation as scientists to advance those personal philosophies, that the rest of us in the scientific community should speak up and disown them. Because if we fail to do so, then their words reflect on us and blacken our names. They tarnish our enterprise of science, technology, rationality itself. A world where science and reason are dirty words has a bleak future indeed. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From iamgoddard at yahoo.com Sat Nov 4 02:23:30 2006 From: iamgoddard at yahoo.com (Ian Goddard) Date: Fri, 3 Nov 2006 18:23:30 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Identity Message-ID: <20061104022331.83850.qmail@web52614.mail.yahoo.com> Michael M. Butler wrote: > For some reason, I feel obliged to reminisce: > > "We may note that in these experiments the symbol > = > stands for > 'is confused with'." > > G. Spencer Brown, "Laws of Form" (quote is only > approximate: I sold my copy years ago). There are generally two semantic interpretations of '=', one being 'is similar to'. In that case the left- and right- hand symbols in 'a = b' point to two different referents and '=' denotes some important set of similarities between the two referents. The strong interpretation of '=' asserts that the left- and right-hand symbols point to the *same* referent. So given the statement 'a = b', the interpretation of 'a' is the thing it points to, which is often denoted by 'I(a)' and the referent of 'b' by 'I(b)'. So in the strong interpretation of '=', the statement 'a = b' is true just in case I(a) is the same thing as I(b). 'I' is an interpretation function mapping symbols in a language to objects in a domain of discourse such as: I 'cat' -------> (an actual cat) = I(cat) 'c' -------> I(c) 'e' -------> I(e) . . . A semantic interpretation of strong '=' runs as follows, [*] where 'I' maps symbols to a domain of discourse 'D' (note that uses of '=' in the following indented metalanguage expressions switch from object- to meta-language, and are as presented in the cited text [*]): I(=) = { in D^2 | d = e} That means: the interpretation of '=' is a set of ordered pairs in D^2 (the cross product of D) such that d = e. So I(=) is a subset of D^2. Now, taking the simpler of two explanatory routes in the text: V[M](a = b) = 1 iff is in I(=) iff I(a) = I(b) That means: a valuation function (V) on a given model (M) maps the statement 'a = b' to 'true' (ie, to '1') iff the ordered pair containing the interpretation of 'a' and the interpretation of 'b' (denoted as an ordered pair by '' ) is in the set of identical pairs (ie, is in I(=)), which is the case iff I(a) is the same object as I(b), ie: I(a) = I(b). Short n simple: the statement 'The King = Elvis Presley' is true just in case I(The King) is the same entity as I(Elvis Presley) in some domain of discourse. ~Ian _____________________________________________________ [*] Gamut, LTF. "Logic, Language, and Meaning, Volume 1: Introduction to Logic." University of Chicago Press, 1991. http://www.press.uchicago.edu/cgi-bin/hfs.cgi/00/7087.ctl ____________________________________________________________________________________ Get your email and see which of your friends are online - Right on the New Yahoo.com (http://www.yahoo.com/preview) From hkhenson at rogers.com Sat Nov 4 03:57:33 2006 From: hkhenson at rogers.com (Keith Henson) Date: Fri, 03 Nov 2006 22:57:33 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Edge: Thank Goodness! By Daniel C. Dennett In-Reply-To: <8d71341e0611031439w5d25b799k1dc4618d05e054a4@mail.gmail.co m> References: <380-220061153192746796@M2W040.mail2web.com> Message-ID: <5.1.0.14.0.20061103224339.03c13fa8@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> At 10:39 PM 11/3/2006 +0000, Russell wrote: snip >Seconded. This sort of junk from people like Dennett is exactly isomorphic >to "it's a mortal sin to deny the existence of God" from religious >fundamentalists, only the labels have been switched around. Besides, it's the wrong way to approach the problem. Ranting against epidemic disease didn't save a single life. What was needed was to understand what causes infectious diseases. People have religions like they have chicken pox. But unlike diseases, we don't understand why people have religions at all. Rants against them are no more helpful than ranting against chicken pox. Evolutionary psychology makes the case that every psychological trait was either directly selected or is a side effect of something that was selected. I have a tentative origin for humans having religions at all, but it's awful paranoid. Keith From mmbutler at gmail.com Sat Nov 4 05:15:36 2006 From: mmbutler at gmail.com (Michael M. Butler) Date: Fri, 3 Nov 2006 21:15:36 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] You must be willing to give up everything (2ndtry) In-Reply-To: References: <7d79ed890611022038s743cac9j2cb647ee9a432ac4@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <7d79ed890611032115t5baa537fh3aae376349754832@mail.gmail.com> Jef: Sorry to hear about your SO's experience. Indeed, "why all this sewage?" The funniest part is of course that Harry, in a not very veiled allusion to the OT stuff about recapitulating a personal "past life memory" of the big nukes-in-volcanoes/Xenu-Xemu thingy... more or less mentions the same question: To paraphrase: "Is this [head-]trip really necessary?" (I could probably find the page in ReSurfacing but why bother?) I'll take it as true based on your say-so that they turn up the heat once you start delivering the courses. It makes sense. And it's too bad. All best, always, Mike -- Michael M. Butler : m m b u t l e r ( a t ) g m a i l . c o m 'Piss off, you son of a bitch. Everything above where that plane hit is going to collapse, and it's going to take the whole building with it. I'm getting my people the fuck out of here." -- Rick Rescorla (R.I.P.), cell phone call, 9/11/2001 From mmbutler at gmail.com Sat Nov 4 05:28:41 2006 From: mmbutler at gmail.com (Michael M. Butler) Date: Fri, 3 Nov 2006 21:28:41 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] You must be willing to give up everything - the selfidentity quest In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <7d79ed890611032128s29669b02ka486338d83893270@mail.gmail.com> On 11/3/06, Jef Allbright wrote: > For me personally, it would help if you > would use a format that doesn't come across as a sales pitch. For example, > if you were to make some statement (preferably something novel, insightful > or controversial within the context of the extropy list), and follow it will > some concise supporting statements and perhaps a statement as to why others > might see it as significant. > > By doing so, I think you would be very likely to get a meaningful response. > > - Jef I agree with the above, and add to it that all the HTML formatting and yellow highlighting makes it very hard for me to bring my attention to bear. It's rather like flashing text on a web page. My first several impulses are to do away with the visual clutter -- by not reading it. I recommend that you find your voice, speak simply and boldly -- and perhaps more people will hear. -- Michael M. Butler : m m b u t l e r ( a t ) g m a i l . c o m 'Piss off, you son of a bitch. Everything above where that plane hit is going to collapse, and it's going to take the whole building with it. I'm getting my people the fuck out of here." -- Rick Rescorla (R.I.P.), cell phone call, 9/11/2001 From lcorbin at rawbw.com Sat Nov 4 06:21:31 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Fri, 3 Nov 2006 22:21:31 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Juicy Classical Physics Problem InvolvingGravitational Potential References: <20061103052332.13505.qmail@web60512.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <050a01c6ffd9$b5bf0a20$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Stuart, our Avantguardian writes > Now I have a puzzle for you guys: What is the maximum > value of g, the acceleration of earth's gravitational > field, and where is this maximum g located? What a fine question, thanks! Since I am totally unable to think about anything else since having read this a while ago (and I've tried), then attend to it first I must. I also appreciate your crafty > Hint: Don't get stuck in two dimensions. :) Not to spoil this for anyone, I'll give my answer at the very bottom of this reply. > --- Lee wrote: >> Newton---but not I---was able to > > calculate the spherical oblateness of >> the Earth by carefully regarding this >> notion of gravitational potential. >> >> But my Newtonian calculation...is off >> by a factor of two! Perhaps someone >> here who really likes classical physics >> can see what is going wrong. > I did not actually do the calculation myself however > there are two possible errors which may have led to > the discrepancy. > > 1. Did you remember the factor (1/2) in your kinetic > energy term? i.e. KE = (1/2)mv^2 for your particle. Well, I think so. Writing "w" for omega, I used the value (wr)^2 divided by two, as you can check in my original post. > 2. The mass of the earth that contributes to the > gravitational field at the poles is LESS than the mass > contributing to the field at the equator. The reason > for this is Gauss' Law in gravitation. Maybe I can understand how this could be true if by "gravitational field" you mean something involving potential. Because insofar as the *force* is concerned, that surely cannot be right. At the poles, the force on you is the perfect sphere beneath your feet plus the "winged" material at the equatorial bulge, that also contributes to a "downward" pull. > In other words, the mass of the earth that is included > as M in GM/R should be the portion of the mass that is > contained within a perfect sphere of radius R. If R is > the polar radius this will be the total mass of the > earth minus the mass of those parts of the earth that > bulge out past the polar radius at the equator. Remarkable. Your term, "GM/R" is gravitational potential, and I can only presume that I was in error to think about the *force* in my previous paragraph. [For God's sake I hope no one thinks that I'm being sarcastic. I've been in trouble writing like this before.] Hmm, so Gauss's Law applies to the non-spherical Earth? I suppose. But I can't say I understand it. > At any point, a given distance from the barycenter of > an extended body, the only mass that contributes to > the gravitational field at that point is that portion > of the mass that is closer to the barycenter. Well, that's a nice result about gravitational *potential*, I suppose. I can't credit it for a statement about forces though. I'll have to think about Gauss' Law some more. Now for your puzzle: > Now I have a puzzle for you guys: What is the maximum > value of g, the acceleration of earth's gravitational > field, and where is this maximum g located? > Hint: Don't get stuck in two dimensions. :) Well, Stuart, I was going to write that it was maximal at the poles, but then I thought of a neat way to prove it to myself: I would find out the value of g at the equator, then subtract off the centrifugal force. So I tried to look up the two values of g, but instead ran into http://forums.randi.org/archive/index.php/t-1104.html (page down to Iconoclast's contribution) : Iconoclast 18th February 2003, 02:46 AM OK, here's (http://www.lns.cornell.edu/spr/1999-02/thrd3.html#0014 446) a thread on the subject from the sci.physics.research newsgroup from a few years ago, the thread in question is entitled "Baltimore Sun Says Gravity Inside Sphere is Uncalculable" (the thread title is misleading, that's not what the article was implying). From this discussion it appears that: - For a homogeneous sphere, gravity is always at a maximum at a point on the surface, it falls off above and below that point. Gravity falls off faster as we move outwards from the surface than than it does as we move inwards. - It is believed that the earth has a much higher density at the core than at the surface, thus gravity on earth will increase for quite a few hundred miles as we descend. I didn't know either of those things. So that wrecks it for me; I wouldn't have thought of the variable density factor. It says elsewhere on that page that someone heard in high school that it's maybe a thousand miles beneath the pole. Lee From lcorbin at rawbw.com Sat Nov 4 06:38:56 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Fri, 3 Nov 2006 22:38:56 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Survival tangent (was Just curious, it's not natural!) References: <20061102235019.83835.qmail@web37409.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <052901c6ffdc$3e3eaa20$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Heartland writes > [Jeffrey wrote] >> Lee writes: >> "But people can be in two places at once, even though it seems uncanny >> to our evolutionarily derived notions of self. Nonetheless, once forking >> is a possibility (either after uploading or, less plausibly, via teleporters >> and copying machines), people will have to accustom themselves to the >> idea." > > Jeffrey [wrote]: > "Personally, I'm not ready to reject Slawomir's ideas and conceptions. But, in this > particular example, I agree with you Lee. That the intricate weave of > *consciousness* of a person can effectively "exist" at two places simultaneously. Right, Jeffrey, but we'll still have to convince Heartland :-) I love pincer attacks. John Clark is coming at him from the north while we hammer away from the west > An easy and tangible example is the binocular vision of humans; where the two > spatially separated eyes recieve separate data streams from different locations, > are processed, and "emerge" in the same "conscious moment" as standard vision, > complete with parralax and depth perception." Yes, Slawomir, that's an interesting observation, but I don't think pertinent. > But these two streams of data are merely components in a single instance of mind. I > suspect that when Lee says that, "people can be in two places at once," he means > that, "people can *see* two places at once" which is certainly possible, as you > say. No---I did mean *being*. Now, first, please understand that these are two totally and completely separate physical processes with absolutely no knowledge of each other. Think of one of them, you, here on Earth and the other on a very similar Earth that lies 10^10^29 light-years from here (much, much further away than light has had time to travel since the BB). But you do happen to have the same memories. (By the way, I did not pull 10^10^29 out of my nether regions---it is a figure presented by Tegmark in the April 2003 Scientific American, where he points out that one will expect an identical person at about that range in an infinite universe.) > However, *seeing* two places at the same time and *being* in two > places at the same time are two different things. Right. > What is also important to point out is that each stream of visual > data is not equivalent to a complete mind just like a single neuron firing is not > equivalent to a full mind. In the end, all these different subprocesses that happen > inside a brain still add up to a single instance of mind. So two streams of visual > data don't produce two minds. There's still only one mind there. But I'm claiming (along with several other people here) that while there are two instances, two minds, two brains, there is only one person. What is a person? I'm going to be arguing against Jef Albright shortly, but to me it's values, beliefs, and memories, which someone began to call VBM or something here not long ago. > Incidentally, that 2 things cannot be at the same place and time has nothing to do > with "evolutionarily derived notions of self" (what I'm saying just happens to > apply to notions of "self" as well) but everything to do with the law of > conservation of mass/energy. Two brains weighing 1.4kg cannot share the same > spatiotemporal location and still weigh 1.4kg. Two unconnected instances of mind > cannot be a single instance of mind. Yes, but the concept of *person* that you dispute includes the proposition that you are the same person you were ten years ago even though we are speaking of two minds, two brains, two spatial locations, and two temporal locations. But still *one* person. Lee From lcorbin at rawbw.com Sat Nov 4 06:59:50 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Fri, 3 Nov 2006 22:59:50 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Survival tangent (was Just curious, it's not natural!) References: <20061102082308.30427.qmail@web37204.mail.mud.yahoo.com> <8d71341e0611031444w6b27e817o85cd287a58458c2c@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <057501c6ffdf$33394920$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Russell writes > On 11/2/06, Jef Allbright wrote: > > (2) Some people have "moved up" beyond the common-sense > > description of personal identity to embrace the broader > > "patternist" definition but have yet to embrace an even more > > general description based on agency rather than > > physical/functional similarity. > I'm curious, what's your definition of identity based on agency? > (I remember your general "wider contexts" philosophy and there's > some validity in it, but not sure how it bears on the question of identity.) I second the motion. Lee P.S. Okay, overcome with guilt, I'll add some substance to my post here. Jef earlier wrote: "I don't in fact believe that a person is fully and effectively defined by their values, beliefs and memories." All right then, provide an example. From avantguardian2020 at yahoo.com Sat Nov 4 06:50:40 2006 From: avantguardian2020 at yahoo.com (The Avantguardian) Date: Fri, 3 Nov 2006 22:50:40 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] 2-party-system = 1-dimensional politics (was polls again) In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <20061104065040.6836.qmail@web60518.mail.yahoo.com> --- Robert Bradbury wrote: > Having voted outside of the box in several national > elections I can only > beat my shoe on the table in agreement. High praise from you Robert. > > The reality, unfortunately, and one which "we" may > not adapt to easily is > that while many people on the list are adept at > balancing N-dimensional > spaces, the "public" (which is buying those > newspapers) is not. That is because there are those that profit immensely by the current state of affairs at our expense. They resist allowing a serious third party because they have the current system completely hacked. "All your economy is belong to us.", as you and Eugen are fond of saying. To allow a third party into serious contention is like the three-body problem. It would throw off their tried and true calculations. > Now, this leads to an interesting question -- is the > destiny of humanity > multispatial? Do you believe in destiny? I will tell you one thing. If American politics does not become at least a little more multidimensional soon, the Great Experiment will have failed. Having burned itself out in just over 200 years. The reasons I think this are several fold: 1. The quickly growing wealth gap in the United States poses a grave danger to the life, liberty, and happiness of millions of Americans. This growing divide between the rich and the poor is due to the middle class shrinking. If the middle-class does react soon, it will no longer be a significant demographic in politics. 2. This decline of the middle class is the direct result of a rigid two-party system. A system where one political party heavily taxes the middle class to give the money to the wealthy. The other political party similarly taxes the hell out of the middle class in order to give the money, (after skimming some off the top of course) to the poor. Obviously this state of affirs hangs the middle-class out to dry of course no matter which way they vote. I bet I don't have to tell you which party is which do I? 3. In a more general sense, the two party system is one-dimensional politics. It leads to less adaptability than a three party system which would at least be two-dimensional. From the evolutionary standpoint this is a serious problem. If you are stuck walking back and forth along the same line all the time, there are a lot of places you can't go. Rewalking all the same old tired ground is annoying enough by itself. But if there is a truck headed your way, you are REALLY screwed. > Does the direction and politics and > news of Smartski > (Deepski?), CA differ significantly from the > direction and politics of > Slowski (Shallowski), CA? [1] I don't think so. I doubt one's choice of Internet connection is correlated to the politics of the individual, unless one is appreciably more expensive than the other. Unless you mean something else, in which case elaborate. Then again I may not be getting your gist. > A second interesting question is > whether the power brokers can > afford to allow humanity to become multispatial? [2] No they can't, not if they don't care to deserve their power. If they did deserve their power, they would try to lead us somewhere and not just back and forth, tax and spend, war and peace. Since the percieve the greatest threat to their privelaged position come not from the poor whom they distract with bread and circuses but from the middle-class wherein fall most professionals and intellectuals. Thus they seek to widen the gap to secure their own position. The short-sightedness of their plan is that they won't realize that they NEED the techies to figure stuff out for them, fix their fancy cars, and give them new heart valves until it is too late. Stuart LaForge alt email: stuart"AT"ucla.edu "Believe nothing. No matter where you read it, or who said it, even if I have said it, unless it agrees with your own reason and your own common sense."- Siddhartha Guatama aka Buddha. __________________________________________________________________________________________ Check out the New Yahoo! Mail - Fire up a more powerful email and get things done faster. (http://advision.webevents.yahoo.com/mailbeta) From andrew at ceruleansystems.com Sat Nov 4 08:39:34 2006 From: andrew at ceruleansystems.com (J. Andrew Rogers) Date: Sat, 4 Nov 2006 00:39:34 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] polls again In-Reply-To: <20061103071522.41697.qmail@web51615.mail.yahoo.com> References: <20061103071522.41697.qmail@web51615.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <4F693F8F-C5DC-4349-BBC8-604DC7B1F981@ceruleansystems.com> On Nov 2, 2006, at 11:15 PM, Al Brooks wrote: > Does anyone understand the tax propositions on > ballots? don't you have to be an accountant to grasp > them? Why doesn't a state empanel twelve economists as > a jury to arbitrate decisions on taxes rather than let > less educated or uneducated voters do so? > That's why I like gay issues; sex-related issues > aren't really important, but at least anyone can > comprehend them. Some states have good proxies for tax policy, and a few states essentially have no tax policy to speak of. It is a regional issue. In California, one of the sanest voices with respect to tax propositions is Tom McClintock. Also one of the most respected and liked politicians in California, perhaps ironically because he is basically an old school conservative in a liberal state but is arguably one of the most intelligent and well-educated politicians out there when it comes to fiscal policy. If I'm lazy, I assume McClintock has a rational perspective of tax propositions, regardless of what I think of his other policy positions. I would note that he is not reflexively anti-tax despite being of the small government persuasion. He will grudgingly support new tax initiatives if they are clearly efficient or the only way to accomplish something critical (i.e. the existing problem does not stem from gross waste and corruption in the use of current funds). His position is always sufficiently nuanced and thoughtful that it is hard to criticize it without being overtly ideological. There are a number of tax foundations throughout the country. Places like taxfoundation.org are among the best, covering both Federal and State issues and having no obvious party bent. Cheers, J. Andrew Rogers From benboc at lineone.net Sat Nov 4 10:27:53 2006 From: benboc at lineone.net (ben) Date: Sat, 04 Nov 2006 10:27:53 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Just curious, it's not natural! In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <454C6B29.3060305@lineone.net> Anna said: > I feel using the word "marriage" as a symbol of the > union between 2 men or 2 women violates my right as a > heterosexual female. This is interesting. Are you sure you mean what you say here? You actually feel that somebody's use of a word in a way that you disagree with, is a violation of your rights? If this is true, i don't understand it. What rights are you talking about? I mean, i feel that the American use of the word 'tire' to mean 'tyre' is a number of things - stupid, confusing, unnecessary, even ignorant (I'm no fan of Webster, you can guess), but one thing it isn't, is a violation of any of my rights. Now, if there was a proposal to change the law and make me use the word 'tire' to mean the thing that goes round the outside of a wheel, as well as (or even instead of) what happens when i use up all my energy, that would be different. I don't know if i could say that 'my rights were being violated', but i would certainly object to any attempt to criminalise my use of 'proper english'. What i can't object to, though (although i can certainly dislike it), is the American use of the word. They can mangle their language any way they like, it doesn't violate any of my rights. I think the point of the gay marriage thing is that 'marriage' has a legal status, and gay people want to be able to have a legally sanctioned relationship with exactly the same status as a marriage. So why confuse things by having a different name for it? What about transgender people? Does a couple consisting of an XY male who is anatomically female (with an official sex of female) and another XY male who is anatomically male, need a different term for their marriage? What about some future couple who are both hermaphrodites, or both neuters, who want to live together as a married couple with all the same legal rights? Would you propose creating yet more new terms for them? What about a couple where one is human and the other a machine? A neuter and a male? Two people who can change their sex at will? etc., etc. (And that's without even thinking about relationships involving more than 2 people!) ben zaiboc From jef at jefallbright.net Sat Nov 4 11:26:18 2006 From: jef at jefallbright.net (Jef Allbright) Date: Sat, 4 Nov 2006 03:26:18 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Agency as Prime Determinant of Personal Identity In-Reply-To: <057501c6ffdf$33394920$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: > Russell writes > > > On 11/2/06, Jef Allbright wrote: > > > (2) Some people have "moved up" beyond the common-sense > description > > > of personal identity to embrace the broader "patternist" > definition > > > but have yet to embrace an even more general description based on > > > agency rather than physical/functional similarity. > > > I'm curious, what's your definition of identity based on agency? > > (I remember your general "wider contexts" philosophy and > there's some > > validity in it, but not sure how it bears on the question of > > identity.) > > I second the motion. > > Lee > > P.S. Okay, overcome with guilt, I'll add some substance to > my post here. Jef earlier wrote: "I don't in fact believe > that a person is fully and effectively defined by their > values, beliefs and memories." All right then, provide an example. Alrighty then. Here's an example intended to show that values, beliefs and memories don't necessarily or sufficiently define a person. -------------------- Alice at the age of six loved playing with dolls but boys were icky. She wasn't sure whether she believed in Santa Claus, and her memories were like those of most little girls, revolving around events in her home and with the neighbor kids, and she especially remembered her fourth birthday party (birthdays are great!) when grandma came to visit all the way from... someplace far away. When Alice turned sixteen, playing with dolls was long since pass? and boys were the most important focus of her life. She didn't believe in Santa Claus, but she believed very strongly that anyone should be allowed to do whatever they want, as long as they don't hurt anyone else, and she really really really wished people would leave her alone! Her memories were mostly of friends and social events over the last several years, but she didn't remember a lot about her early childhood years. When Alice was twenty-six, she was very active in her local chapter of United World, and it frustrated her to no end how people were so blind to the importance, rather the necessity, of being involved and working together for a common cause. Her memories were full of momentous world events and she could hardly remember being the sixteen year old who so often said "leave me alone" when people offered to help. At thirty-six, Alice couldn't understand how people could find time for idealistic dreams like "saving the world" when she and her husband had their hands more than full with two jobs, two mortgages and two kids. She believed strongly that family (especially the children) comes first, and that free time was among the most valuable things in the universe. She had fond memories of being sixteen, when life was so simple and free. At eighty-six, Alice and her partner stayed almost entirely at home due to the ongoing bioterrorist threats. It wasn't so bad though, and in fact she was more active and involved than ever before using the latest telepresence technology. It allowed her to be in more than one place at the same time, and while her multiple projects were very important to her, even with mental augmentation she sometimes felt she might explode from all the in-rushing information. Being so plugged into the net it was often hard to discern where "Alice" ended and the rest of the world began, and she could "remember" almost anything instantly. On their one hundred thirty-sixth birthday Alice's variants and doubles noted their anniversary in passing but were much too engaged with multiples of projects to choose to allocate an attentional resource branch for a dedicated celebration. AlicePrime would have wanted it that way, and it's not like anyone's going to forget anything these days. ------------- I'll follow up later with the next part, about how threads of agency (single or multiple) are a more general basis for determination of personal identity. - Jef From velvethum at hotmail.com Sat Nov 4 13:22:39 2006 From: velvethum at hotmail.com (Heartland) Date: Sat, 4 Nov 2006 08:22:39 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Identity (Survival tangent) References: <20061102082308.30427.qmail@web37204.mail.mud.yahoo.com><8d71341e0611031444w6b27e817o85cd287a58458c2c@mail.gmail.com> <057501c6ffdf$33394920$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: S: >> What you describe is, of course, Leibniz's law. "1" >> and "1" are different instances of "1" since the >> first "1" has a property of being to the left >> of "and" while the other "1" has a property of >> being to the right of "and". Multiple instances of >> anything are "automatically" different. Ian: > Right, the definition of 'identity' in logic matches > Leibniz's Identity of Indiscernibles. And if we're > talking about 'identity', our conclusions should > derive from its logical definition. Doing so shows > that if x and y are identical, then all the properties > of x and of y are identical and all the relations of x > to z and of y to z are identical. *nods* Ian: > But as I believe > I've shown, due to physical reality, all the > properties and relations of copies (be they copies of > brains or computer files) are not identical. Indeed, > the fact that 'copies' is as a plural term denotes > that there are differences between them. ~Ian Correct! That this is so is indeed "due to physical reality" as Leibniz's law is basically a necessary consequence of the law of conservation of mass/energy. In the above I would only replace "all the properties" with "some properties." Obviously, it would be sufficient to point to a single inconsistent property to show that two things were not identical. Slawomir P.S. For some reason only 1 out of your last 5 messages found its way to my inbox. I could find the other four only in the archives. From mbb386 at main.nc.us Sat Nov 4 13:50:36 2006 From: mbb386 at main.nc.us (MB) Date: Sat, 4 Nov 2006 08:50:36 -0500 (EST) Subject: [extropy-chat] You must be willing to give up everything - the selfidentity quest In-Reply-To: <7d79ed890611032128s29669b02ka486338d83893270@mail.gmail.com> References: <7d79ed890611032128s29669b02ka486338d83893270@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <32906.72.236.103.114.1162648236.squirrel@main.nc.us> > > I agree with the above, and add to it that all the HTML formatting and > yellow highlighting makes it very hard for me to bring my attention to > bear. > ... and if you use, for safety's sake, a plain text email reader, that stuff doesn't even show up so there's no clue who said what or what might be emphasized. Big nuisance and posts like that get deleted as soon as I realize I can't "get" the flow. Regards, MB From eugen at leitl.org Sat Nov 4 14:44:28 2006 From: eugen at leitl.org (Eugen Leitl) Date: Sat, 4 Nov 2006 15:44:28 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] You must be willing to give up everything - the selfidentity quest In-Reply-To: <32906.72.236.103.114.1162648236.squirrel@main.nc.us> References: <7d79ed890611032128s29669b02ka486338d83893270@mail.gmail.com> <32906.72.236.103.114.1162648236.squirrel@main.nc.us> Message-ID: <20061104144428.GI6974@leitl.org> On Sat, Nov 04, 2006 at 08:50:36AM -0500, MB wrote: > ... and if you use, for safety's sake, a plain text email reader, that stuff doesn't > even show up so there's no clue who said what or what might be emphasized. Big > nuisance and posts like that get deleted as soon as I realize I can't "get" the > flow. As periodic plug of http://www.netmeister.org/news/learn2quote.html can't hurt. (If you don't follow these rules, not only are you risking looking illiterate, you're guaranteed to have a considerable comprehension handicap). -- Eugen* Leitl leitl http://leitl.org ______________________________________________________________ ICBM: 48.07100, 11.36820 http://www.ativel.com 8B29F6BE: 099D 78BA 2FD3 B014 B08A 7779 75B0 2443 8B29 F6BE From eugen at leitl.org Sat Nov 4 14:46:19 2006 From: eugen at leitl.org (Eugen Leitl) Date: Sat, 4 Nov 2006 15:46:19 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] Identity (Survival tangent) In-Reply-To: References: <057501c6ffdf$33394920$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: <20061104144619.GJ6974@leitl.org> On Sat, Nov 04, 2006 at 08:22:39AM -0500, Heartland wrote: > P.S. For some reason only 1 out of your last 5 messages found its way to my inbox. > I could find the other four only in the archives. I suspect (but can't prove) that the reason is hotmail. Try resubbing using a different email provider, and see whether the missed messages will wind up there. If they do, it's a yet another reason to ditch hotmail. -- Eugen* Leitl leitl http://leitl.org ______________________________________________________________ ICBM: 48.07100, 11.36820 http://www.ativel.com 8B29F6BE: 099D 78BA 2FD3 B014 B08A 7779 75B0 2443 8B29 F6BE -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: signature.asc Type: application/pgp-signature Size: 191 bytes Desc: Digital signature URL: From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Sat Nov 4 15:05:32 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Sat, 4 Nov 2006 10:05:32 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] META: list delivery [was: Identity (Survival tangent)] Message-ID: On 11/4/06, Heartland wrote: > P.S. For some reason only 1 out of your last 5 messages found its way to > my inbox. I could find the other four only in the archives. > This concerns me. I too have noticed from time to time threads which I can't find the start of or seem to have lost the middle of. Now, I assume since I'm using gmail that Google's end of things doesn't drop stuff. But I don't regularly go through my SPAM folder to look for "pseudo-drops". In nearly a year of using gmail I am only aware of one instance where a post from Keith got mislabeled. The question *is* -- are statistics kept on non-delivered or dropped emails? Or is there some way of putting a trace on messages or threads? One would wonder why in this day and age there are not active web pages which report in real time "list state", i.e. daily or hourly -- "messages received, messages delivered, messages pending delivery, messages failed delivery, etc." Providers like gmail or hotmail or AOL must have this stuff for internal problem analysis. Couldn't we get something like that for the ExI list but have it be "public" so people can to some extent do "self-diagnosis" when they are having a problem? I ask this because this problem comes up from time to time and there doesn't appear to be any way to determine whether we should be blaming the "sending" machine(s) or the "receiving" machine(s) (or perhaps the recipient). Robert -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From lcorbin at rawbw.com Sat Nov 4 15:06:28 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Sat, 4 Nov 2006 07:06:28 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Agency as Prime Determinant of Personal Identity References: Message-ID: <059501c70023$17c091a0$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Jef writes to provide the best description I've ever seen of the danger to one's personal identity posed by simply becoming different over time. > Here's an example intended to show that values, beliefs and > memories don't necessarily or sufficiently define a person. There follows an extremely good example of how a single legal person can change rather dramatically over decades into who I'd call "someone else" (see Jef's *full* explication below). > Alice at the age of six loved playing with dolls but boys > were icky. She wasn't sure whether she believed in Santa > Claus, and her memories were like those of most little girls, > revolving around events in her home and with the neighbor > kids, and she especially remembered her fourth birthday > party (birthdays are great!) when grandma came to visit > all the way from... someplace far away. > At eighty-six, Alice and her partner stayed almost entirely > at home due to the ongoing bioterrorist threats. It wasn't so > bad though, and in fact she was more active and involved > than ever before using the latest telepresence technology. > It allowed her to be in more than one place at the same > time, and while her multiple projects were very important > to her, even with mental augmentation she sometimes felt > she might explode from all the in-rushing information. Being > so plugged into the net it was often hard to discern where > "Alice" ended and the rest of the world began, and she could > "remember" almost anything instantly. So why the devil do you think that the person who the six year old was is still alive, or can still be said to exist? Just what is it that they have in common that justifies saying so? (What if, though, we *each* project our own histories into this question? And derive our assumptions and doctrines therefrom? At age 6 I did a few things that are exactly the kind of thing that distinguishes me from everyone I know; also I am able to still very strongly identify with who I was at age 16. But those are the *only* reasons that I think I'm still the same person. I.e., I haven't been changing as quickly as your Alice.) As so many do and have done, you appear here to be placing a lot of emphasis on simple continuity. Maybe not; we'll wait for your explication of "agency". But I've always been against simple continuity as a determinant of personal identity. In 1991 I wrote an article for the cryonics magazine "The Immortalist" in which one gradually grows and ages and turns into a frog. Now it is clear at the end of this process YOU are dead, and there is a new frog in the world. Likewise if you gradually changed into Lee Corbin, then Jef would be dead: there would be 2 Lee Corbins in the world and 0 Jefs. The title of my piece was: "Continuity, the Last Refuge of the Soul". But, as you know, souls do not exist. Lee > Alice at the age of six loved playing with dolls but boys were icky. She wasn't sure whether she believed in Santa Claus, and her > memories were like those of most little girls, revolving around events in her home and with the neighbor kids, and she especially > remembered her fourth birthday party (birthdays are great!) when grandma came to visit all the way from... someplace far away. > > When Alice turned sixteen, playing with dolls was long since pass? and boys were the most important focus of her life. She didn't > believe in Santa Claus, but she believed very strongly that anyone should be allowed to do whatever they want, as long as they > don't hurt anyone else, and she really really really wished people would leave her alone! Her memories were mostly of friends and > social events over the last several years, but she didn't remember a lot about her early childhood years. > > When Alice was twenty-six, she was very active in her local chapter of United World, and it frustrated her to no end how people > were so blind to the importance, rather the necessity, of being involved and working together for a common cause. Her memories > were full of momentous world events and she could hardly remember being the sixteen year old who so often said "leave me alone" > when people offered to help. > > At thirty-six, Alice couldn't understand how people could find time for idealistic dreams like "saving the world" when she and her > husband had their hands more than full with two jobs, two mortgages and two kids. She believed strongly that family (especially > the children) comes first, and that free time was among the most valuable things in the universe. She had fond memories of being > sixteen, when life was so simple and free. > > > > At eighty-six, Alice and her partner stayed almost entirely at home due to the ongoing bioterrorist threats. It wasn't so bad > though, and in fact she was more active and involved than ever before using the latest telepresence technology. It allowed her to > be in more than one place at the same time, and while her multiple projects were very important to her, even with mental > augmentation she sometimes felt she might explode from all the in-rushing information. Being so plugged into the net it was often > hard to discern where "Alice" ended and the rest of the world began, and she could "remember" almost anything instantly. > > > > On their one hundred thirty-sixth birthday Alice's variants and doubles noted their anniversary in passing but were much too > engaged with multiples of projects to choose to allocate an attentional resource branch for a dedicated celebration. AlicePrime > would have wanted it that way, and it's not like anyone's going to forget anything these days. > > ------------- > > I'll follow up later with the next part, about how threads of agency (single or multiple) are a more general basis for > determination of personal identity. From velvethum at hotmail.com Sat Nov 4 16:03:07 2006 From: velvethum at hotmail.com (Heartland) Date: Sat, 4 Nov 2006 11:03:07 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] META: list delivery References: Message-ID: Heartland: >> P.S. For some reason only 1 out of your last 5 messages found its way to >> my inbox. I could find the other four only in the archives. Robert: > This concerns me. I too have noticed from time to time threads which I > can't find the start of or seem to have lost the middle of. Looking at my inbox and the archives, the delivery rate seems to hover somewhere around 80% which is not good at all. The problem with these mailing lists is that they are so decentralized. The error could have occurred at any point along the delivery chain. I suspect that switching from mailing list to a message board format would have prevented this from happening. Besides, IMHO, message boards are a lot more convenient than mail-based fora. It's much easier to choose and track the threads you care about and you don't get "the whole list" in your inbox every time you open it. Finally, it would be nice to free up that precious inbox space for private communication only (and spam). Slawomir From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Sat Nov 4 16:17:20 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Sat, 4 Nov 2006 11:17:20 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Humor: Gmail [was: Agency as Prime Determinant of Personal Identity] Message-ID: On 11/4/06, Lee Corbin wrote: > > Jef writes to provide the best description I've ever seen > of the danger to one's personal identity posed by simply > becoming different over time. > ... > > Alice at the age of six loved playing with dolls but boys > > were icky. [assorted snips] I've noticed from time to time that the ads/links gmail provides can range from simply interesting to extremely humorous. But the email above generating a link to "Peter Potty" -- "The only flushable toddler urinal. Easiest way to train boys!" had me ROTFL. Immediately after that was "Personalized Potty Song" -- "Encourage toddlers to use the potty Put some fun into potty training!" This got connected in my mind to recent episodes from "Boston Legal" where the aggressive lawyer rakes a flagrant (gay?) "pervert" over the coals in court. The pervert subsequently labels the lawyer as a "potty mouth" and sues him for defamation. So my mind was connecting Google's link selection with Lee (or Jef) being "potty mouths" [1]. I'm assuming the potty links are being generated by the discussion of "Alice at the age of six", but one would presume that at six one is beyond potty training. So is Google's "best match" poor in this instance? The humor goes further when you consider that the lead in link which appears above the message is to "The McKnight Endowment Fund for Neuroscience" so Jef & Lee are "brainy potty mouths". Related to this might the question of what kind of "intelligence" Google is using to select links? One would presume with billions of dollars at stake that this is a very non-trivial question. I don't think I've ever seen any academic or public discussion of this but perhaps I've simply not been paying attention. People might want to follow up with their favorite Gmail "things that make you go hmmmm..." or perhaps "Intelligent advertising" (though that might want to be a different thread). And a third thread might be whether we can expect such corporate efforts to generate "intelligence" [2]. I do know that without gmail having been created and my choosing to use it I would not have these interesting views of reality from a different perspective. Robert P.S. I've still got a lot of gmail invites if anyone needs one. 1. No reason this association would have occured had Google not selected *those* links and the Boston Legal writers not come up with *that* particular phrase. Serendipity at work. 2. Perhaps this has been discussed at length on other lists and I'm just unaware of those discussions. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From natasha at natasha.cc Sat Nov 4 16:37:37 2006 From: natasha at natasha.cc (Natasha Vita-More) Date: Sat, 04 Nov 2006 10:37:37 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] World Future Society Presents - Extreme Democracy Message-ID: <6.2.1.2.2.20061104103319.04636d18@pop-server.austin.rr.com> Our good friend Jon Lebkowsky will be speaking at the WFS in Austin on December 5th. >Extreme Democracy >The World Future Society will hold it's next monthly meeting in Austin on >Tuesday, December 5, 2006. It will be held at the meeting room at 9503 >Research Blvd. # 400., Austin, TX 78759 (512.349.7151) at 6:00 p.m. > >Jon Lebkowsky will be speaking on "Extreme Democracy" > >"In the 1990s online activists experimented with the Internet and the >World Wide Web as a platform for a new kind of politics, leveraging >interactive "many-to-many" tools to support both advocacy and >deliberation. Early online activism focused on issues that were relevant >to the Internet's strong "geek" element,"cyber liberties" issues of free >speech and privacy. However in 2000, as Internet penetration was >mainstreaming and reaching critical mass, the web became relevant to >political campaigns. In the presidential campaign for election 2004, the >Internet became an essential part of the political process. Howard Dean's >short-lived front-runner status, a product of his campaign's effective use >of Internet tools, proved that the Internet could have an effect. Though >Dean was unsuccessful in his bid for the Democratic nomination, he >continued to use web-based tools effectively to take control of the >Democratic Party. Jon will answer the question, how is the Internet's role >in politics evolving, and what are the implications for 2008? > >Jon has been online since the 1980s, when he learned that computers could >form networks, and that computer networks are environments for >communication, group-forming, and community-building. Since then he's done >diverse work as a writer, publisher, consultant, community developer, >project manager, and technology director. He just ended five years as CEO >of Polycot Consulting, Inc., a company he co-founded in 2001. He is >currently writing, working as an independent consultant, and helping build >a nonprofit called AssistOrg, which will provide web development and >consulting services to NPOs. > >Jon Lebkowsky is an authority on, and evangelist for, computer-mediated >communications, social software, virtual communities, community >technology, and online social networks. He has served variously as a CEO, >technology director, project manager, systems analyst, and online >community developer. His current consulting practice focuses on web >usability and strategy and effective use of online social technologies. He >is knowledgeable of Internet policy and trends, and is a strong proponent >of universal broadband access to computer networks. > >He has written about technology and culture for publications such as Mondo >2000, 21C, boingboing, Whole Earth Review, FringeWare Review, Wired >Magazine, and the Austin Chronicle. > >His blog is at >www.weblogsky.com, >and he contributes to other blogs at >www.worldchanging.com, >www.smartmobs.com, and >www.austin.metblogs.com. > >A longtime proponent of online tools for civic engagement, he co-edited >Extreme Democracy, a book on technology, democracy, and advocacy, and >served on the organizing committee for O'Reilly's Digital Democracy Teach-In. > >Copies of Extreme Democracy will be available for sale at the meeting. > >Attendance fee is $20 per person, for members, $25 for nonmembers, cash or >checks only. (Make checks payable to CenTexWFS.) The fee includes a meal >but is charged for attendance. The meeting room is at the back of the >restaurant on the right. > >Seating is limited so please reserve your place >here. > >For more information about the Central Texas Chapter of the World Future >Society, visit >www.CenTexWFS.org. > > >For more information about the World Future Society, visit >www.wfs.org." Natasha Vita-More Cultural Strategist - Design Media Artist - Futurist PhD Candidate, Planetary Collegium Proactionary Principle Core Group, Extropy Institute Member, Association of Professional Futurists Founder, Transhumanist Arts & Culture If you draw a circle in the sand and study only what's inside the circle, then that is a closed-system perspective. If you study what is inside the circle and everything outside the circle, then that is an open system perspective. - Buckminster Fuller -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From velvethum at hotmail.com Sat Nov 4 16:42:02 2006 From: velvethum at hotmail.com (Heartland) Date: Sat, 4 Nov 2006 11:42:02 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Agency as Prime Determinant of Personal Identity References: <059501c70023$17c091a0$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: Jef: > Here's an example intended to show that values, beliefs and > memories don't necessarily or sufficiently define a person. Lee: "There follows an extremely good example of how a single legal person can change rather dramatically over decades into who I'd call "someone else" (see Jef's *full* explication below)." Lee, wasn't that obvious? That's what you get for reducing your "self" to VMBs. Eventually you realize that almost none of your VMBs at 2 are the same as your VMBs at 80 which forces you to admit that someone has died sometime between 2 and 80. Then you either admit this or choose to give up the idea that "VMBs = Self." :) Lee: "So why the devil do you think that the person who the six year old was is still alive, or can still be said to exist? Just what is it that they have in common that justifies saying so?" Right. While I've had definite answers to these questions for a long time, let's see what Jef comes up with. So far so good. Slawomir From davidishalom1 at gmail.com Sat Nov 4 12:37:59 2006 From: davidishalom1 at gmail.com (david ish shalom) Date: Sat, 4 Nov 2006 14:37:59 +0200 Subject: [extropy-chat] the self identity quest - reply to Jef Message-ID: David, I've seen your writing, mainly on WTA-Talk,... For me personally, it would help if you would use a format that doesn't come across as a sales pitch. For example, if you were to make some statement (preferably something novel, insightful or controversial within the context of the extropy list), and follow it will some concise supporting statements and perhaps a statement as to why others might see it as significant. By doing so, I think you would be very likely to get a meaningful response. - Jef David reply to Jef Allbright: I think you, and most transhumanist, would agree that if we could capture reliably the identity critical information, than this information could be uploaded to future conscious artificial intelligence, or even to a clone of the same person that carry this identity, to the outcome that the future entity carrying the same self identity as the original person. To that second phase person I call the info-resurrected person and the claim is that A(original) is survived in B (his duplicate) as long as they both carry the same self identity and that they are not mutually existent. So the critical query here is whether one can really capture now the salient information regarding his self identity? According to most reductionist theories of the self including Max More The Diachronic Self, the self or the person just is connectedness, continuity and the right kind of cause. connectedness means the content that connect the different stages or phases of person's life ; continuity means the degree of change between consecutive phases of the same person and the right kind of cause leading from a phase to its consecutive phase. In this line of argumentation, the salient query that remains is whether we can preserve much connectedness between the original and his duplicate? since it is clear that we can never gather all the information about person's life, memories, intrinsic nuances and unconscious material. Yet as is clarifies in length in my work in the part on the transformation project see * http://davidishalom1.googlepages.com/home* the very desire and intention to transform, to enhance and ascend oneself in the transhuman future, is in itself a primary connectedness component that more than compensate for some reduction in connectedness, which is inevitable anyway if we want transformation. On this line of argumentation we can clearly understand that the salient information regarding our self identity, which holds much of our ideal self and transformation intention, can be personally captured through elaborate procedure that can soon be perfected and see for that W.S. Bainbridge work on personality capture. I do recommend to you Jef and others who really want to check this option of info survival to review carefully my work albeit its imperfection. I am sure you could gather something there. My motivation to spread this notion of info-resurrection comes from my realization that for this procedure to be practical and instrumental, it has to gather some social and memetic spreading. I will be thankful if you can issue more concrete remarks to be answered. David Ish-Shalom -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From spike66 at comcast.net Sat Nov 4 16:38:43 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Sat, 4 Nov 2006 08:38:43 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Just curious, it's not natural! In-Reply-To: <454C6B29.3060305@lineone.net> Message-ID: <200611041647.kA4GlGvo010459@andromeda.ziaspace.com> > bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of ben > Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] Just curious, it's not natural! > > Anna said: > > > I feel using the word "marriage" as a symbol of the > > union between 2 men or 2 women violates my right as a > > heterosexual female. ... > Does a couple consisting of an XY male > who is anatomically female (with an official sex of female) and another > XY male who is anatomically male, need a different term for their > marriage? I know of an example of this, two XYs, both anatomically ambiguous, one raised male, the other raised female, the state of Oregon asked no questions. > What about some future couple who are both hermaphrodites, or both > neuters, who want to live together as a married couple with all the same > legal rights? Would you propose creating yet more new terms for them? > What about a couple where one is human and the other a machine? A neuter > and a male? Two people who can change their sex at will?... ben zaiboc Good questions all, ben. Since there has been talk of a constitutional amendment to define marriage as a contract between a man and a woman, let us see what that amendment would actually look like. During the time my wife and I were doing fertility treatments, the medics had us study up on all the things that can go wrong with the spawning process, perhaps so we would not automatically blame IVF if something did go wrong. One such error is trisomy, where instead of getting the usual chromosome pairs, there are three. In some rare cases a single chromosome results in a survivable configuration, which is called a monosomy. In all the debates on same sex marriage, seldom is mentioned anything about those who have a trisomy on 23, resulting in something other than the two common arrangements, XX (female) and XY (male). Genetically there are five genders, with XXX (or monosomy X), XXY and XYY in addition to the common two. Granted the trisomies are rare; I do not expect to see public buildings with five restrooms any time soon. If one ignores the three trisomies, there are three possible pairings of two persons, XX and XX, XY and XY, XX and XY. We say the last of these three possibilities may marry, but not the other two. If we do not ignore the trisomies, then there are 15 possible pairings of two humans. Do we allow some of those possible pairs to marry? Actually current law does allow many of those pairs. The XXX trisomy is considered indistinguishable from the common female XX, and the XYY is considered unambiguously male. Those with the ambiguous gender XXY are generally ignored by current law. Let us list the possibilities. For simplicity, even if not rigorous accuracy, let us lump together the trisomy XXX and monosomy X and call that F*. The trisomy XYY let us call M*, and the XXY let us call K for Klinefelter syndrome. This reduces the alphabet soup a bit. There are fifteen possible combinations: 1. M F 2. M M 3. M M* 4. M K 5. M F* 6. F F 7. F M* 8. F K 9. F F* 10. M* M* 11. M* K 12. M* F* 13. K K 14. K F* 15. F* F* This is only the possible genetic combinations, still ignoring the many (possibly more common than genetic non bisome) gestational gender ambiguities. The genetic trisomy can prove he or she is the way he or she is because of nature, and so cannot ethically be the victim of discrimination. One would think the amendment would list the above and then claim that only combination 1 is legal, but that is not the case. Since neither F* nor M* are considered ambiguous gender, combinations 1, 5, 7, 12 are currently legal and presumably unchallenged. The anti-gay-marriage crowd would then presumably object to combinations 2, 3, 6, 9, 10, 15 but not necessarily combinations 4, 8, 11, and 14 but possibly combination 13, since two ambiguous-gender persons would fit the definition of the dreaded "same sex." So the 13s status hangs on the wording of the marriage amendment. If it defines marriage between a man and a woman, the 13s are good to go since they can be defined as either. If it specifically bans same sex marriage, the 13s are out of luck. Since law must be defined, the amendment must also exactly define the status of gender-reassigned persons, before, during and after the actual surgeries. If all the necessary details are covered, including monosomies, trisomies, gestational ambiguous gender, transgender etc, that amendment would be longer than the rest of the US constitution with all the other amendments combined. Its teaching would appropriately be moved from the civics class to the biology class. I predict that the saner lawmakers will prevail and they will leave the constitution alone. Eventually society will accept a person as whatever gender that person says they are. spike From kerry_prez at yahoo.com Sat Nov 4 00:18:52 2006 From: kerry_prez at yahoo.com (Al Brooks) Date: Fri, 3 Nov 2006 16:18:52 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] it's all understandable, except In-Reply-To: <8d71341e0611031444w6b27e817o85cd287a58458c2c@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <20061104001852.48435.qmail@web51613.mail.yahoo.com> A high crime rate is understandable, in a free society criminals have freedom as well as law abiders. Trash culture & overcommercialization are understandable, too, because it is a matter of subjective taste. Even government corruption is understandable; though much more corruption overall exists in government than in business, government corruption is in part a reflection of corruption in business. But what doesn't make sense is a mediocre educational system-- why not let the children stay home and watch educational TV or use computers rather than send them to second or third rate schools? It's been widely known about the quality of schools for years, at least three decades, but here we are six years into the 21st century. Rafal Smigrodzki told me not to worry about education, the singularity negates the problem, yet what about in the meantime? would any of you like to be sent to a crummy, meaningless job six or seven hours a day with time off in a playground full of bullies? Everything else makes some sense however the current school system doesn't make ANY sense. None, unless for some hidden purpose, say, to make a certain number of young guys vicious so some of them will be more inclined to join a branch of the Service. --------------------------------- We have the perfect Group for you. Check out the handy changes to Yahoo! Groups. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From pharos at gmail.com Sat Nov 4 16:54:12 2006 From: pharos at gmail.com (BillK) Date: Sat, 4 Nov 2006 16:54:12 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Humor: Gmail [was: Agency as Prime Determinant of Personal Identity] In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On 11/4/06, Robert Bradbury wrote: > > I've noticed from time to time that the ads/links gmail provides can range > from simply interesting to extremely humorous. But the email above > generating a link to "Peter Potty" -- "The only flushable toddler urinal. > Easiest way to train boys!" had me ROTFL. Immediately after that was > "Personalized Potty Song" -- "Encourage toddlers to use the potty Put some > fun into potty training!" > Install the CustomizeGoogle extension to Firefox and tick the 'Remove ads' boxes. You won't see gmail ads any more. They can stick their 'intelligent advertising' so far as I'm concerned. (Also Adblock Plus and NoScript and Proxomitron / Privoxy really help to clean up the web environment). BillK From spike66 at comcast.net Sat Nov 4 16:46:47 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Sat, 4 Nov 2006 08:46:47 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Juicy Classical Physics ProblemInvolvingGravitational Potential In-Reply-To: <050a01c6ffd9$b5bf0a20$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: <200611041655.kA4GtEmA008307@andromeda.ziaspace.com> Lee this is a terrific puzzle thanks. > -----Original Message----- > From: extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org [mailto:extropy-chat- > bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Lee Corbin ... > > So that wrecks it for me; I wouldn't have thought of the > variable density factor. It says elsewhere on that page > that someone heard in high school that it's maybe a > thousand miles beneath the pole. > > Lee We had a discussion on this several years ago. Damien and I worked some calculations, and I think Eugen, Robert and some others chipped in, wherein I estimated the variable density factor. I kept getting wrong answers until I actually looked it up and found that the density gradient was much larger than I had assumed. Given sufficient pressure, one really can compress molten iron. I wouldn't have thought that either. Perhaps you recall that fifth force misadventure the physicists spoke of back in the 80s. As I recall the anomalous readings were eventually traced to inaccuracies in modeling the density gradient of the earth. Duty calls, more later. spike From rafal.smigrodzki at gmail.com Sat Nov 4 16:56:16 2006 From: rafal.smigrodzki at gmail.com (Rafal Smigrodzki) Date: Sat, 4 Nov 2006 11:56:16 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] 2-party-system = 1-dimensional politics (was polls again) In-Reply-To: <20061104065040.6836.qmail@web60518.mail.yahoo.com> References: <20061104065040.6836.qmail@web60518.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <7641ddc60611040856t51a97100kb8a8a6e3430351fe@mail.gmail.com> I have to take issue with most of what you said, Stuart. I think that the current two party system is the result not so much of one-dimensional thinking, or other causes you mention. It is better explained by economies of scale in a form of marketing that strongly relies on our tribal tendencies. As the history of the two major parties shows, their policies and image have been shifting over the landscape continuously, with the Republicans occupying at times the role of Democrats and vice versa, on questions of faith, foreign policy, and economy. The Democrats used to be the hawks, who embroiled the US in world wars, and presided over the greatest expansions of military spending ever. The Republicans are now in the midst of the greatest expansion of state spending and state power in the last 70 years, unrivaled since the Democratic takeover of the Supreme Court in the 1930's. Both parties have marketed themselves as champions of the poor, pacifists, hawks, small(er) government advocates, champions of progress and defenders of the faith, frequently at the same time. The need for marketing is paramount in a democratic system: you have to appeal to the largest number of voters and you do that by identifying how large constituencies would vote, both for (which is not really what they want but the analysis of the "irrational voter" is another issue), or against. You have to carefully balance your promises and image to attract the most and turn off the fewest at the same time. There are few solutions to the problem since tradeoffs abound and are quite multidimensional. A party has to balance the appearances of toughness, charity, frugality, generosity, piety, progressiveness, elitism, populism, all competing in various ways for attention, and not surprisingly, the final marketable products, the political platforms of mass-appeal parties, are likely to be remarkably homogeneous over time: I fail to see any substantive differences between the major parties on important issues, if averaged over periods of twenty years or more. And, of course, there are economies of scale in selling ideology: a large organization trying to maximize their appeal has an advantage over smaller sellers of exactly the same ideology. That's why there is only one party per large niche: there is no small Democratic party, since this large supplier outcompetes any comers. Now this leads to the second element: tribalism. The most important predictor of voting Rep vs. Dem is what your parents used to vote. It is all about belonging, and signaling allegiance to your kin, in a situation where nepotism is made difficult by institutions and traditions. But then, children are not quite like parents either, and the new members of a family have different opinions about specific issues than the old folks. This imposes seemingly impossible demands on political parties: being different while staying the same. The young Republican cubs want to be Republican like daddy but they want to be a different shade of Republican. Very importantly, for a tribe to exist, there has to be at least one out-group to identify yourself against. Without the outsider to rally against, the tribe is likely to splinter on its own, making outsiders out of its own flesh. Now combine the strictures of mass marketing in a democratic system that existed for a few generations with tribalism, and you get a solution: at least two, but not more than three major parties, that differ in minor details and shift their image over periods of twenty years or more. There are some countries with dozens of parties: this is where tribal affiliation goes not to the party of your parents, but to the extended family or clan. There are some countries with only one party but they are less likely to be true democracies. The two party system seems to be a common outcome in stable democracies due at least in part to the mechanisms that I described. Now, I admit that this is a rather boring explanation: there are no cliques scheming to keep new political vendors out, there is no connection between the two-party system and the fictional "decline of the middle class" (which actually enjoyed the largest ever increase in numbers and in political power in the last century), no relation to the "growing inequality" (which is yet another marketing gimmick used by every mass political party since time immemorial to appeal to the common envy). There is no master plan by power wielders to destroy the middle class and support the poor (in fact, no serious democratic politician ever cares about the poor, because hardly any voters care about the poor, and of course the middle class that votes does not want to destroy themselves either). It's the outcome of hundreds of millions of people making decisions, embedded in institutionalized tradition and guided by various inborn propensities. Rafal From user at dhp.com Sat Nov 4 16:57:21 2006 From: user at dhp.com (Ensel Sharon) Date: Sat, 4 Nov 2006 11:57:21 -0500 (EST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Edge: Thank Goodness! By Daniel C. Dennett In-Reply-To: <454BD34B.6070504@pobox.com> Message-ID: On Fri, 3 Nov 2006, Eliezer S. Yudkowsky wrote: > without being frozen. As is shown easily enough by Dennett's example of > the medical industry, you don't need to use violence to promote your > beliefs, in order to harm people with wrong beliefs. Yes, you *can* > hurt other people by being lax with yourself, forgiving yourself your > nonsense, holding yourself to too low a standard. It is this > understanding of strictness that makes modern medicine effective. There's a big difference between hurting someone, and not helping them as much as you could. If I hit you with my car, you have reason to complain. If I fail to push you completely out of the way of the car that was going to hit you, too bad. Further, this notion that we are at the "end of history" or the "end of science" and therefore can make broad statements (as you did above) about "wrong beliefs" is absurd. Even a cursory study of history shows that every people attach the same importance to their current understanding of the world, and the next generation always looks back with a smile. Our generation will _not be any different_. > To compare Dennett to a religious fundamentalist is silly; if you wish > to insult him with some trace of plausibility, compare him to an > academic theologian. And to suggest that they are automatically on the > same level, or committing the same mistake, because they dare to air > their views and advise others on what to think - that is foolish. It's very ironic that Dennett would chastise others for wasting time and kilowatts on "foolish" pursuits - and label "inefficient" mental activities as morally negative ... yet he chooses to spend his time plucking _very low_ philosophical fruit. I've read Voltaire, I've read Diderot, I've read d'Alembert. I don't need someone from "edge.org" to give me some lame rehash 250 years later. From ben at goertzel.org Sat Nov 4 17:04:14 2006 From: ben at goertzel.org (Ben Goertzel) Date: Sat, 4 Nov 2006 12:04:14 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] it's all understandable, except In-Reply-To: <20061104001852.48435.qmail@web51613.mail.yahoo.com> References: <8d71341e0611031444w6b27e817o85cd287a58458c2c@mail.gmail.com> <20061104001852.48435.qmail@web51613.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <638d4e150611040904j2986029bw5c2f196bf5defac7@mail.gmail.com> > But what doesn't make sense is a mediocre educational system-- why not let > the children stay home and watch educational TV or use computers rather than > send them to second or third rate schools? It's been widely known about the > quality of schools for years, at least three decades, but here we are six > years into the 21st century. Home schooling is an option ... so, the parents' attitudes are the real issue, not just the school system.... If more parents recognized the relatively destructive nature of the US public school system, they'd just pull their kids out.. ;-) -- Ben From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Sat Nov 4 17:05:56 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Sat, 4 Nov 2006 12:05:56 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] SOC: Nano-santas and society [was: PHIL: Derrida and Deconstruction] Message-ID: On 11/3/06, Anders Sandberg wrote: > I'm at the 4S (Society for Social Studies of Science) conference in > Vancouver right now, surrounded by amazing amounts of postmodern thought > (and other styles I don't even know what to call). It is great fun, > especially since I don't have a great stake in it. Some people get to have all the fun... :-( But at the same time it was so clear that this was done from the > perspective of *another* machine, this one producing analysis, concerns > and criticism for a living. Just as the military industrial complex is a > business so is academia. But admitting it is impossible for either, since > both have to hide their essential self-servingness under the image of > "protecting democracy" or "intellectual inquiry" (of course, some people in > these respective machines actually strive for these goals, but to thrive you > have think about the bottom line, whether it is counted in > dollars or tenure probability). This little paragraph says a lot! Because both machines can pay a lot for the "stars" one has to wonder how it will play out as the siege machines begin to disassemble the castles. One is seeing the start of this, as Spike and others have mentioned, with the disassembly of the traditional "media" (news & 3-channel TV) by (a) cable; (b) Satellite and/or Internet radio; (c) blogs; (d) consumer specific advertising (google & gmail). I haven't yet seen it creep into Academia -- MIT & Stanford seem to have some online courses but one has to wonder *why* I can't sit in a house in MA (or India) and have Nobel prize winning physicists or Pulitzer Prize winning writers teach me and in return I make a deposit via PayPal based on my perceived quality of the lecture [1]. This would take apart the *entire* structure of undergraduate education around the world. The only "real" work in academia seems to be at the edges (in the graduate world) where one is taking apart stuff which has yet to be understood or inventing stuff from scratch. Q: Much of academia seems ripe to have the rug pulled out from under it -- why doesn't this seem to be happening? The Military-Industrial Complex is a different can of worms. But its raison d'etre largely goes away once the nano-santas arrive (at least one can hope). Why does one want to "conquer" (or "destroy") anything if all of ones survival needs are easily met [2]. One can imagine certain individuals who have a mindset that seeks to "control" everything but if these are kept in check then everyone else simply gets to go "play". For example once I live in a relocatable "nano-home" in international waters with my own personal defense system (remember my discussion about "simple mass defense") I am (a) not paying taxes to support said complex; and (b) could care less about the survival of the U.S. Q: Will sufficient numbers of people buy into this that the MIC will decay from within (i.e. why would one work for them if one didn't have to?) or without (i.e. the market for ones services has evaporated?) One has to wonder about this given the tendency of the M.I.C. to take emotion out of the equation (remotely piloted planes, self-driving cars, etc.). Will it become something that keeps going and going and going due to its own inertia? (AIs managing AIs that do the "killing"?) Robert 1. I've had professors that were or would be Nobel prize winners, listened to some at conferences and actually had dinner with one. Some were impressive some were not. 2. This is a doubling time question. Once the technology for "meeting human needs" exists and it can produce itself faster than the rate at which humans can reproduce (assuming one doesn't enable unlimited uploading & copying) then one is effectively living in "paradise". -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From spike66 at comcast.net Sat Nov 4 17:12:21 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Sat, 4 Nov 2006 09:12:21 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] it's all understandable, except In-Reply-To: <20061104001852.48435.qmail@web51613.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <200611041710.kA4HAUmN024627@andromeda.ziaspace.com> ________________________________________ bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Al Brooks [kerry_prez at yahoo.com] ... however?the current school system doesn't make ANY sense. None, unless for some hidden purpose, say, to make a certain number of young guys vicious so?some of them?will be more inclined to join a branch of the Service. ... Al, I notice your email address is kerry_prez. The irony here is that senator Kerry destroyed any remnants of his possiblity to become president with a single comment similar in spirit to this one. spike From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Sat Nov 4 18:00:23 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Sat, 4 Nov 2006 13:00:23 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Humor: Gmail [was: Agency as Prime Determinant of Personal Identity] In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On 11/4/06, BillK wrote: > Install the CustomizeGoogle extension to Firefox and tick the 'Remove > ads' boxes. You won't see gmail ads any more. > > They can stick their 'intelligent advertising' so far as I'm concerned. Ones mileage may vary. I can cite numerous occasions where I've been doing medical research, corporate development research, etc. (Using Google vs. Gmail) and the ads have actually been useful. The cost is very low (I don't have to ask the question or type in the keywords) -- the value of the "answers" is of course open to debate. So for some the advertising is *always* noise. For others the advertising is semi-useful. I am surprised however that there has not sprung up, at least that I'm aware of, someplace a blog or equivalent on "wierd things google connects". Robert -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Sat Nov 4 18:13:24 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Sat, 4 Nov 2006 13:13:24 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] 2-party-system = 1-dimensional politics (was polls again) In-Reply-To: <7641ddc60611040856t51a97100kb8a8a6e3430351fe@mail.gmail.com> References: <20061104065040.6836.qmail@web60518.mail.yahoo.com> <7641ddc60611040856t51a97100kb8a8a6e3430351fe@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On 11/4/06, Rafal Smigrodzki wrote: > Now, I admit that this is a rather boring explanation... It doesn't have to read like a blockbuster movie script (at least on this list) if it demonstrates insight. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Sat Nov 4 18:18:16 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Sat, 4 Nov 2006 13:18:16 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Edge: Thank Goodness! By Daniel C. Dennett In-Reply-To: References: <454BD34B.6070504@pobox.com> Message-ID: On 11/4/06, Ensel Sharon wrote: > Further, this notion that we are at the "end of history" or the "end of > science" and therefore can make broad statements (as you did above) about > "wrong beliefs" is absurd. Even a cursory study of history shows that > every people attach the same importance to their current understanding of > the world, and the next generation always looks back with a smile. Our > generation will _not be any different_. Yes, but for the first time in human history, the "next generation" may be us! We are potentially the first who will have to deal with self-criticism over and over and over again. R. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jonkc at att.net Sat Nov 4 18:36:47 2006 From: jonkc at att.net (John K Clark) Date: Sat, 4 Nov 2006 13:36:47 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Survival tangent. References: <20061102235019.83835.qmail@web37409.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <006401c70040$3a1acb90$bb084e0c@MyComputer> Heartland, High Priest of the Unique Atom and Sacred Original Cult Wrote: > *seeing*two places at the same time and *being* in two places at the same > time are two different things. If the concept of "place" has any meaning at all when your talking about a mind it's where the sense organs are. In human beings that place is not far from the brain but that is just a historical accident. > Two brains weighing 1.4kg cannot share the same spatiotemporal > location and still weigh 1.4kg. Two unconnected instances of > mind cannot be a single instance of mind. So mind weighs 1.4kg, how much does green weigh? > that 2 things cannot be at the same place and time has nothing to do with > "evolutionarily derived notions of self" (what I'm saying just happens to > apply to notions of "self" as well) but everything to do with the law of > conservation of mass/energy. We've known for over 70 years, ever since the 2 slit experiment was done with electrons, that one thing can be in 2 places at once. And we know that 2 things can be in the same place and time, in fact it has been proven experimentally that 3600 can. And that was 3 years ago. http://www.aip.org/pnu/2003/split/626-1.html John K Clark From pharos at gmail.com Sat Nov 4 18:58:49 2006 From: pharos at gmail.com (BillK) Date: Sat, 4 Nov 2006 18:58:49 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Humor: Gmail [was: Agency as Prime Determinant of Personal Identity] In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On 11/4/06, Robert Bradbury wrote: > > Ones mileage may vary. I can cite numerous occasions where I've been doing > medical research, corporate development research, etc. (Using Google vs. > Gmail) and the ads have actually been useful. The cost is very low (I don't > have to ask the question or type in the keywords) -- the value of the > "answers" is of course open to debate. > Well that's worth a note in the history books. Someone actually found something useful in Google automated ads! I'm not even in the same country as their ads. See: Quote: Check out this site: search of eiqz2q.org ? depending which datacentre you hit, you will see between 3.8 and 5.5 BILLION RESULTS. Even worse? the domain is EIGHTEEN DAYS OLD. That's right, in under 3 weeks, one person has managed to get one domain 5 billion pages indexed in Google. And they are ranking, too. That particular domain has an Alexa ranking of under 7,000. Another domain owned by the same person, t1ps2see.com, has between 1.7 and 2.4 billion indexed pages and an Alexa ranking of under 2,000? after 4 weeks. Coincidentally, the sites also have 3 blocks of Adsense ads on each page. I wonder how much that one person is earning per day with billions and billions of pages indexed and ranking? ----------------- It's all a load of crap. I don't want to see any of it. BillK From jef at jefallbright.net Sat Nov 4 19:02:10 2006 From: jef at jefallbright.net (Jef Allbright) Date: Sat, 4 Nov 2006 11:02:10 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] the self identity quest In-Reply-To: Message-ID: David wrote: > I think you, and most transhumanist, By the way, I consider myself more a humanist than a transhumanist, but the difference is subtle. > would agree that if we could capture reliably the identity > critical information, than this information could be uploaded > to future conscious artificial intelligence, or even to a > clone of the same person that carry this identity, to the > outcome that the future entity carrying the same self identity > as the original person. To that second phase person I call > the info-resurrected person and the claim is that A(original) > is survived in B (his duplicate) as long as they both carry > the same self identity and that they are not mutually existent. > So the critical query here is whether one can really capture now > the salient information regarding his self identity? This idea is familiar within transhumanist and cryonics groups. It is mentioned in fiction; Joe Halpern, Greg Egan, Linda Nigata come to mind. There is also Tipler's version of the "Omega Point" where everyone who ever lived could be effectively reconstituted via latent information and near-infinite computational power. I recall Robert Bradbury (on this list) and John Smart in the last year talking about how personality capture might be valuable to the survivors, if not for the deceased. > According to most reductionist theories of the self including > Max More The Diachronic Self, the self or the person just is > connectedness, continuity and the right kind of cause. > connectedness means the content that connect the different > stages or phases of person's life ; continuity means the degree > of change between consecutive phases of the same person and the > right kind of cause leading from a phase to its consecutive > phase. In this line of argumentation, the salient query that > remains is whether we can preserve much connectedness between > the original and his duplicate? since it is clear that we can > never gather all the information about person's life, memories, > intrinsic nuances and unconscious material. I think many of us here would agree that incomplete information can be sufficient and that in any case complete information is never attainable. > Yet as is clarifies > in length in my work in the part on the transformation project > see http://davidishalom1.googlepages.com/home the very desire > and intention to transform, to enhance and ascend oneself in > the transhuman future, is in itself a primary connectedness > component that more than compensate for some reduction in > connectedness, which is inevitable anyway if we want > transformation. I read your web page some time ago, and again yesterday, but I don't see how such a "desire and intention" fills in any essential gaps in the information constituting personal identity. You seem to be saying that the "desire and intention" specifies a future identity and that it is that future identity which matter most, but that seems to imply a convergence of all individuals toward an imagined abstract future identity. It seems to me this constitutes less information rather than more. > On this line of argumentation we can clearly > understand that the salient information regarding our self > identity, which holds much of our ideal self and transformation > intention, can be personally captured through elaborate > procedure that can soon be perfected and see for that > W.S. Bainbridge work on personality capture. I looked at the description of the personality survey program and thought it might be very interesting to see it used to gather anonymous results from a large sample population for the purpose of understanding shared perceptions and values. As a means of extended survival I think it aims in the right direction but falls short. Are you sure you mean it will be "perfected" or do you mean "improved"? > I do recommend to you Jef and others who really want to check > this option of info survival to review carefully my work albeit > its imperfection. I am sure you could gather something there. > My motivation to spread this notion of info-resurrection comes > from my realization that for this procedure to be practical and > instrumental, it has to gather some social and memetic spreading. > I will be thankful if you can issue more concrete remarks to be > answered. Thanks David for resubmitting your thoughts here. Now if you could switch to plain text...? ;-) - Jef From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Sat Nov 4 19:16:11 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Sat, 4 Nov 2006 14:16:11 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Pure Gossip: Who will Anders marry? Message-ID: Ok, I will freely admit that I'm potentially abusing the list, causing discomfort to some individuals, being "bad", etc. Live with it (unless the list "gods" censor this...). I happen to know Anders and I have an extremely deep respect for him and his work and so I hope he will not view this thread negatively. But it has struck me that with the demise of the Extropy Institute there will be no more Extropy conferences, there is no more Extropy "Board of Directors" that one might look to for guidance (as ill-defined as that might be) and no more opportunities to discuss the "details" of personal lives of the players and S.O.s. The last point being the key one (given recent discussion of "tribalism"). Tribes to at least some extent coalesce around the key players and what they are doing or seem to be doing. Watching from a distance the lives of Spike and Eugen which are "partnered" and having been through experiences over the last several years where one could debate endlessly how things might have been different had their been a partner involved the topic of "two as one" comes to mind. (Particularly given the potential problems of these syntheses.) One may ask under what conditions are survival probabilities enhanced by partnering? The list is obviously male biased, and so one has to ask why? Why are there not more XX people on the list? Setting aside that fact -- should we seek to correct it? Returning to the "gossip" part of this. I know nothing about Anders' preferences (my "conventional wisdom" is that people from Sweden may be notoriously lax in these areas.) But in observing Anders, the world, the Internet, etc. the question of *whom* would be the best partner(s) with Anders does arise [1]. Should "we" make it a mission to find one for Anders? [2, 3] Robert 1. Given that this is written from a distance it may be the case that Anders is already partnered and I don't know about it. In which case the discussion merely shifts from him to the next person on the list. 2. If one makes the assumptions that (a) Anders is useful for the future intelligent direction of humanity (which on my good days I would subscribe to) and (b) that being partnered increases ones survival probabilities (iffy I'll admit if one is watching prime time television) then it is logical to conclude we need to partner Anders. (Side note to Anders -- humanity trumps your feelings -- maybe.) 3. For those that object -- assume that I've already spent some time thinking about this message (I have). Assume that I've balanced it from my perspective (I have). Also assume it is written from the framework of considering "What is the greater good?". "Do no harm" or "Do no evil" don't cut it in my book. One has to think in a forward perspective and be dealing with sustainability and the minds which can support that. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Sat Nov 4 19:31:02 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Sat, 4 Nov 2006 14:31:02 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Humor: Gmail [was: Agency as Prime Determinant of Personal Identity] In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On 11/4/06, BillK wrote: > > Well that's worth a note in the history books. > Someone actually found something useful in Google automated ads! > I'm not even in the same country as their ads. Then one is dealing with the question of targeting, not "ads" per se. Have you told Google where you live? [I would expect the targeting to have a destination specific component -- if not then they need to implement this.] Quote: > Check out this site: search of eiqz2q.org ? depending which datacentre > you hit, you will see between 3.8 and 5.5 BILLION RESULTS. Even worse? > the domain is EIGHTEEN DAYS OLD. So all your are arguing is that its possible to "play" google. One can "play" *any* reality -- its a question of what the reality values at a point in time. One can play google and get statistics on it faster than they can adapt. That does *not* negate the question of when Google Ads are relevant and/or useful? (I'm not exactly typing in Brittney Spears and getting what one would expect as sales pitches). Picking extreme examples of the system falling apart are not useful from an ExICh reader list perspective because we are somewhat (significantly) outside of the standard box. Robert -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From moulton at moulton.com Sat Nov 4 22:38:29 2006 From: moulton at moulton.com (Fred C. Moulton) Date: Sat, 04 Nov 2006 14:38:29 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Edge: Thank Goodness! By Daniel C. Dennett In-Reply-To: <5.1.0.14.0.20061103224339.03c13fa8@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> References: <380-220061153192746796@M2W040.mail2web.com> <5.1.0.14.0.20061103224339.03c13fa8@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> Message-ID: <1162679909.4912.78.camel@localhost.localdomain> On Fri, 2006-11-03 at 22:57 -0500, Keith Henson wrote: > Besides, it's the wrong way to approach the problem. > Ranting against epidemic disease didn't save a single life. > What was needed was to understand what causes infectious diseases. > People have religions like they have chicken pox. There are several different ways of viewing religion. If one views religion as being infected by a set of bad memes then ranting can make a difference if the ranting has an impact on the bad memes. Consider the decline of infectious disease with the advent of better sanitation. Dennett, Dawkins, Harris and others are hopefully causing a more critical focus on the memes associated with religion. Fred From thespike at satx.rr.com Sat Nov 4 19:52:57 2006 From: thespike at satx.rr.com (Damien Broderick) Date: Sat, 04 Nov 2006 13:52:57 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] it's all understandable, except In-Reply-To: <200611041710.kA4HAUmN024627@andromeda.ziaspace.com> References: <20061104001852.48435.qmail@web51613.mail.yahoo.com> <200611041710.kA4HAUmN024627@andromeda.ziaspace.com> Message-ID: <7.0.1.0.2.20061104133527.0219d988@satx.rr.com> At 09:12 AM 11/4/2006 -0800, spike wrote: >________________________________________ > Al Brooks [kerry_prez at yahoo.com]: > >... however the current school system doesn't make ANY sense. None, unless >for some hidden purpose, say, to make a certain number of young guys vicious >so some of them will be more inclined to join a branch of the Service. >... > >Al, I notice your email address is kerry_prez. The irony here is that >senator Kerry destroyed any remnants of his possiblity to become president >with a single comment similar in spirit to this one. Careful, Spike. What you should have written is "with a single ironic comment at Bush's expense that was maliciously and misleadingly spun by his opponents as a comment similar in spirit to this one." This is not a party-political observation (I don't get a vote in the States). It's a matter of comprehending the context. Of course, maybe I'm wrong about this and Kerry just happened to utter a remark in public equivalent to Bush or Cheney, say, blurting out in public that Halliburton is corrupt and all elected politicians are morons. Seems unlikely. Nor am I even convinced that he "told the joke wrong"--I suspect he assumed his audience was smart enough to make the leap to his ironic intent: "Hey, guess who's got himself mired in Iran... it's that booze-sucking brainless frat boy in the White House!" (I keep making that kind of mistake myself, assuming people will understand and laugh at my ironic quips when all too often they tend to stare open-mouthed and aghast.) Damien Broderick From moulton at moulton.com Sat Nov 4 22:34:12 2006 From: moulton at moulton.com (Fred C. Moulton) Date: Sat, 04 Nov 2006 14:34:12 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Edge: Thank Goodness! By Daniel C. Dennett In-Reply-To: <8d71341e0611031603t5e86a6c8r315894f13309c6a1@mail.gmail.com> References: <380-220061153192746796@M2W040.mail2web.com> <8d71341e0611031439w5d25b799k1dc4618d05e054a4@mail.gmail.com> <454BD34B.6070504@pobox.com> <8d71341e0611031603t5e86a6c8r315894f13309c6a1@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <1162679652.4912.72.camel@localhost.localdomain> On Sat, 2006-11-04 at 00:03 +0000, Russell Wallace wrote: > Yes, that's what I was referring to. The equivalent of the religious > fundamentalists who kill infidels for not believing in God would be > those who did the same thing in the name of the atheist ideology of > communism. Communism is not necessarily an atheist ideology. Historically there have been Communists of religious conviction; for example Catholic Communists during the early part of the 20th Century. Atheism refers to the absence of belief in a deity. Communism refers to a political/economic system. Let us not sully the fine term "atheism" by improperly linking it with the term "communism". Fred From James.Hughes at trincoll.edu Sat Nov 4 20:45:06 2006 From: James.Hughes at trincoll.edu (Hughes, James J.) Date: Sat, 4 Nov 2006 15:45:06 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Pure Gossip: Who will Anders marry? Message-ID: <8CF6A92CB628444FB3C757618CD2803901C47E01@exbe1.cmpcntr.tc.trincoll.edu> Perhaps, Robert, to get the ball rolling, you should tell us your sexual preference, mating behavior and breeding pattern just to get the ball rolling. For myself I'm a Kinsey 2, married once and with this wife for the last 26 years, with two children 10 and 13. I plan to have more after rejuvenation but will gladly offer my genome to anyone interested in using it in the meantime. More seriously, I wrote about marriage and longevity a while ago in Betterhumans: http://archives.betterhumans.com/Columns/Column/tabid/79/Column/229/Defa ult.aspx The broader issue of the relative fertility rates of seculars (low) versus the highly religious (high) should concern all transhumanists. As a culture and movement, however, I suspect we should prioritize memetic reproduction over genetic - more bang for the buck. After all reproduction also reduces longevity. As to finding places to gossip, bring it to the Transvision conferences. Next one will be in Chicago July 26-28, 2007, with Kurzweil and de Grey as keynotes. ------------------------ James Hughes Ph.D. Secretary, World Transhumanist Association http://transhumanism.org Institute for Ethics and Emerging Technologies http://ieet.org Editor, Journal of Evolution and Technology http://jetpress.org Williams 229B, Trinity College 300 Summit St., Hartford CT 06106 (office) 860-297-2376 director at ieet.org From asa at nada.kth.se Sat Nov 4 20:49:39 2006 From: asa at nada.kth.se (Anders Sandberg) Date: Sat, 4 Nov 2006 21:49:39 +0100 (MET) Subject: [extropy-chat] Pure Gossip: Who will Anders marry? In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <3803.208.181.209.230.1162673379.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> LOL! As some of you have seen, I actually do wear a kind of marriage ring. It is my doctoral ring, and actually symbolizes being married to Science. I guess that shows just how liberated we Swedes are - it is not an opposite-sex, same-species or even same ontology marriage. :-) As for reproduction, I'm more into memes than genes. Hmm, maybe that reveals my real preferences :-) Robert Bradbury wrote: > 2. If one makes the assumptions that (a) Anders is useful for the future > intelligent direction of humanity (which on my good days I would subscribe > to) and (b) that being partnered increases ones survival probabilities > (iffy > I'll admit if one is watching prime time television) I'm writing a paper right now about chemically improving marriage and love, and the data seems to support that marriage or long term stable relationships are indeed healthy (and divorces/breakups unhealthy). > then it is logical to > conclude we need to partner Anders. (Side note to Anders -- humanity > trumps > your feelings -- maybe.) Ha! I'm a selfish, atomistic libertarian! Just try! :-) > 3. For those that object -- assume that I've already spent some time > thinking about this message (I have). Assume that I've balanced it from > my > perspective (I have). Also assume it is written from the framework of > considering "What is the greater good?". "Do no harm" or "Do no evil" > don't > cut it in my book. One has to think in a forward perspective and be > dealing > with sustainability and the minds which can support that. Actually, creating familial ties is likely to stabilize and cement any social group. Lots of precendent. A risk that personal and group agendas hijack the the intellectual agenda, of course. -- Anders Sandberg, Oxford Uehiro Centre for Practical Ethics Philosophy Faculty of Oxford University From jef at jefallbright.net Sat Nov 4 20:50:00 2006 From: jef at jefallbright.net (Jef Allbright) Date: Sat, 4 Nov 2006 12:50:00 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Effective relationships In-Reply-To: Message-ID: Robert Bradbury wrote: > One may ask under what conditions are survival probabilities enhanced by partnering? ago I posted what I thought was a provocative and insightful idea, but didn't get much feedback. I'd like to try again here: Might it be that the most effective relationship structure in terms of cost/benefit might be the triad? I'm not talking about polyamory or m?nage ? trois but rather a stable, committed triadic relationship between three individuals in any combination of genders. I recognize that this would require individuals of greater than average self-awareness to avoid destructive two-against-one dynamics. I also recognize that nature settled on binary relationships in most cases, but I think human culture represents a more highly developed phase that may support and reward more highly developed relationship structures at various scales. The advantages I see are significantly increased synergies, built-in tie-breaking, and possibly an inherent 3D structural stability similar to that of a tetrahedron over a planar object. Comments? - Jef From ben at goertzel.org Sat Nov 4 21:07:41 2006 From: ben at goertzel.org (Ben Goertzel) Date: Sat, 4 Nov 2006 16:07:41 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Effective relationships In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <638d4e150611041307hfa88d4ia61be18a52953a44@mail.gmail.com> > The advantages I see are significantly increased synergies, built-in tie-breaking, and possibly an inherent 3D structural stability similar to that of a tetrahedron over a planar object. > > Comments? As any good Buckminster Fuller fan should know, to get the famed tetrahedral stability, you'd need *four*, not three... ;-) Regarding your main point.... In terms of pragmatic and intellectual synergies, I agree that long-term interpersonal partnerships involving more than two individuals might well be optimal.... However, this doesn't really matter much, because human emotional tendencies are strong, and due to the nature of human emotions interpersonal partnerships with >2 members are just not very stable.... Ben From jef at jefallbright.net Sat Nov 4 21:06:22 2006 From: jef at jefallbright.net (Jef Allbright) Date: Sat, 4 Nov 2006 13:06:22 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Effective relationships [Resend] In-Reply-To: Message-ID: Robert Bradbury wrote: > One may ask under what conditions are survival probabilities enhanced by partnering? Some time ago I posted what I thought was a provocative and insightful idea, but didn't get much feedback. I'd like to try again here: Might it be that the most effective relationship structure in terms of cost/benefit might be the triad? I'm not talking about polyamory or m?nage ? trois but rather a stable, committed triadic relationship between three individuals in any combination of genders. I recognize that this would require individuals of greater than average self-awareness to avoid destructive two-against-one dynamics. I also recognize that nature settled on diadic relationships in most cases, but I think human culture represents a more highly developed phase that may support and reward more highly developed relationship structures at various scales. The advantages I see are significantly increased synergies, built-in tie-breaking, and possibly an inherent 3D structural stability similar to that of a tetrahedron over a planar object. Comments? - Jef From jef at jefallbright.net Sat Nov 4 21:18:20 2006 From: jef at jefallbright.net (Jef Allbright) Date: Sat, 4 Nov 2006 13:18:20 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Effective relationships In-Reply-To: <638d4e150611041307hfa88d4ia61be18a52953a44@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: Ben Goertzel wrote: > As any good Buckminster Fuller fan should know, to get the > famed tetrahedral stability, you'd need *four*, not three... ;-) Ouch. Major embarrassment. Of course, I should have said the inherent stability of a triangle over a two dimensional string, but a tetrahedron is sooo cool. > Regarding your main point.... In terms of pragmatic and > intellectual synergies, I agree that long-term interpersonal > partnerships involving more than two individuals might well > be optimal.... However, this doesn't really matter much, > because human emotional tendencies are strong, and due to the > nature of human emotions interpersonal partnerships with >2 > members are just not very stable.... Speaking pragmatically, I think you're right. Now, how to justify a tetrahedral 4-way relationship... - Jef From user at dhp.com Sat Nov 4 21:40:18 2006 From: user at dhp.com (Ensel Sharon) Date: Sat, 4 Nov 2006 16:40:18 -0500 (EST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Edge: Thank Goodness! By Daniel C. Dennett In-Reply-To: <1162679909.4912.78.camel@localhost.localdomain> Message-ID: On Sat, 4 Nov 2006, Fred C. Moulton wrote: > On Fri, 2006-11-03 at 22:57 -0500, Keith Henson wrote: > > Besides, it's the wrong way to approach the problem. > > Ranting against epidemic disease didn't save a single life. > > What was needed was to understand what causes infectious diseases. > > People have religions like they have chicken pox. > > There are several different ways of viewing religion. If one views > religion as being infected by a set of bad memes then ranting can make a > difference if the ranting has an impact on the bad memes. Consider the > decline of infectious disease with the advent of better sanitation. > Dennett, Dawkins, Harris and others are hopefully causing a more > critical focus on the memes associated with religion. I agree. I have no problem with the ranting - as I mentioned above, I am agnostic on the subject of religion, and my feelings certainly aren't hurt. The problem is Dennett claiming that harboring X meme is morally negative, and that one "owes" it to some third party or parties to either justify ones beliefs or change them. And that is incorrect. It's just as incorrect as the inquisition or The Terror or McCarthyism. Not to mention my previous point that this is all extremely low hanging philosophical fruit that was beaten to death 250 years ago. I can't believe Dennett has nothing better to do ... [1] [1] But I'll fight to the death to allow him to do it blah blah blah... From randall at randallsquared.com Sat Nov 4 18:09:07 2006 From: randall at randallsquared.com (Randall Randall) Date: Sat, 4 Nov 2006 13:09:07 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Survival tangent (was Just curious, it's not natural!) Message-ID: Lee Corbin wrote: > Heartland writes > > > [Jeffrey wrote] > >> Lee writes: > >> "But people can be in two places at once, even though it seems > uncanny > >> to our evolutionarily derived notions of self. Nonetheless, once > forking > >> is a possibility (either after uploading or, less plausibly, via > teleporters > >> and copying machines), people will have to accustom themselves > to the > >> idea." > > > > Jeffrey [wrote]: > > "Personally, I'm not ready to reject Slawomir's ideas and > conceptions. But, in this > > particular example, I agree with you Lee. That the intricate > weave of > > *consciousness* of a person can effectively "exist" at two places > simultaneously. > > Right, Jeffrey, but we'll still have to convince Heartland :-) > I love pincer > attacks. John Clark is coming at him from the north while we hammer > away from the west Well, Mr. Clark isn't so much debating or arguing as ridiculing, which may be fun for those who already agree with him, but doesn't do much to explain his position to those who don't. There is no phrasing of an idea so clear that no separate stupid idea cannot be assumed to have been meant by it. > > But these two streams of data are merely components in a single > instance of mind. I > > suspect that when Lee says that, "people can be in two places at > once," he means > > that, "people can *see* two places at once" which is certainly > possible, as you > > say. > > No---I did mean *being*. Now, first, please understand that these are > two totally and completely separate physical processes with absolutely > no knowledge of each other. In which case, you appear to have conceded the point to Heartland. ;) Of course, you're arguing that two distinct and completely separate processes can nevertheless be the same "person", but that's just a matter of definition, really. I don't think that Heartland would argue (and *I* certainly wouldn't) against the point that two copies of him would each be *a* Heartland, but only the idea that they're somehow the same process. > > Two unconnected instances of mind > > cannot be a single instance of mind. > > Yes, but the concept of *person* that you dispute includes the > proposition that you are the same person you were ten years ago > even though we are speaking of two minds, two brains, two > spatial locations, and two temporal locations. But still *one* person. If and only if one process. In the view that the process is the person, other processes with bit-for-bit similar values, beliefs, memories, habits, and so forth, are simply instances of a very restricted *type* of person. Since we only have one person of each type (in this sense) to date, the distinction between the type of person and the person themselves is often lost in these discussions. -- Randall Randall "You don't help someone by looking at their list of options and eliminating the one they chose!" -- David Henderson From randall at randallsquared.com Sat Nov 4 21:47:43 2006 From: randall at randallsquared.com (Randall Randall) Date: Sat, 4 Nov 2006 16:47:43 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Effective relationships In-Reply-To: <638d4e150611041307hfa88d4ia61be18a52953a44@mail.gmail.com> References: <638d4e150611041307hfa88d4ia61be18a52953a44@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On Nov 4, 2006, at 4:07 PM, Ben Goertzel wrote: >> The advantages I see are significantly increased synergies, built- >> in tie-breaking, and possibly an inherent 3D structural stability >> similar to that of a tetrahedron over a planar object. >> >> Comments? > > As any good Buckminster Fuller fan should know, to get the famed > tetrahedral stability, you'd need *four*, not three... ;-) That depends on the dimensionality of human relationships, doesn't it? The reason a tetrahedron is maximally stable is that our world has three dimensions. A triangle is maximally stable in two dimensions, and (I guess?) a pair in one. So are social relationships three dimensional? I don't see any reason to think so, but I do see an argument for one dimensional, in that a person can only interact with one other person at any single time... or since that person can either be talking or listening, perhaps human relationships are really "half" a dimension, and the maximally stable "group" is one? :) -- Randall Randall "This is a fascinating question, right up there with whether rocks fall because of gravity or being dropped, and whether 3+5=5+3 because addition is commutative or because they both equal 8." - Scott Aaronson From davidishalom1 at gmail.com Sat Nov 4 20:49:47 2006 From: davidishalom1 at gmail.com (david ish shalom) Date: Sat, 4 Nov 2006 22:49:47 +0200 Subject: [extropy-chat] the self identity quest - another reply to Jef Allbright Message-ID: Thank you Jef for your detailed reply. you say: "but I don't see how such a "desire and intention" fills in any essential gaps in the information constituting personal identity." my reply: Suppose I am now timid and introverted person, my scientific capabilities are limited yet my ideal self which I seek very seriously is of a warm and friendly person, extrovert and outgoing, even charismatic person, very fluent in English and with huge scientific knowledge and acumen etc. now for me personally who I am? The answer is, my identity is not determined by what I am now with my limitations and faulty nature, but my identity is mainly determined by what I am going to be in the future, enhanced human being or even post human being. Yet I will always remember from within who I was, the salient information regarding my former existence, my past limited abilities etc. so naturally in the capturing of my personal identity I will place more importance to my future enhanced self than to my far from perfect present self. That means apparently much reduction in connectedness, yet, it is not so much reduction since my enhanced self already constitute great deal of my present self identity, thus compensating for this apparent reduction in connectedness. the self identity is the most dynamic component of the personality and enable us to go through much change in our life without loosing our self identity. This by no means "imply a convergence of all individuals toward an imagined abstract future identity" since firstly much of my older self will be preserved and remembered and experienced from within, thus differentiating myself from any other person; but yes in the future, when we will all be connected to super intelligence and to all knowledge and information of humanity and machines together and synchronously connected to each other at will, there will certainly be some convergence of all intelligent beings of the future. I call this future Self/s as me keeping my complete individuality, but at the same time being connected to the whole and to others, achieving convergence and my personal uniqueness at the same time. "gather anonymous results from a large sample population for the purpose of understanding shared perceptions and values." Bainbridge Personality Capture is just the contrary, to gather individual information from a large number of questioner questions, to gather the salient information about that unique personality. "Are you sure you mean it will be "perfected" or do you mean "improved"? I mean it will be much improved to comply with reliable identity capture procedure. After all, Bainbridge did not meant to capture the self identity but the capture of the personality and understanding the difference in these two different albeit resembling notions itself can lay the base for this improvement to be achieved quite soon, if enough resources will be diverted to that matter. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From ilsa.bartlett at gmail.com Sat Nov 4 21:26:38 2006 From: ilsa.bartlett at gmail.com (ilsa) Date: Sat, 4 Nov 2006 13:26:38 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Book Launch Invitation- First Oakland Travel Guide Message-ID: <9b9887c80611041326q3fb2e170vcdf2fb4e38d67965@mail.gmail.com> Subject: Book Launch Invitation- Oakland Travel > Guide > > COME JOIN US! November 9th For the EXCLUSIVE Launch > Party of... > GrassRoutes Travel?s first book, Oakland: The Soul > of the City Next Door > > > > > > FREE Food from great local restaurants, LIVE DJ > and lots of Oakland love! > > GrassRoutes Travel promotes Urban Eco-Travel, > featuring > > environmentally, economically and socially > sustainable > > businesses in their travel guides. > > > > Join local residents, business owners and > politicians to celebrate > > Oakland?s many wonders! > > > > EXTRAORDINARY RAFFLE GIVEAWAY! > > Win NUMEROUS GIFTS and PRIZES from local > businesses featured in the guide. > > Raffle tickets are INCLUDED with the purchase of a > personally signed > > commemorative > > edition of GrassRoutes Guide to Oakland - only > available at the launch. > > Extra raffle tickets available for $2 > > > > > > When: Thursday, November 9th from 6pm on... > > Where: Oakland?s Air Lounge, 492 9th Street, down > the sidewalk staircase > > Who: GrassRoutes Travel Publishing, Oakland?s > sustainable businesses, > > residents, and politicians > > What: Party, DJ, mixer, finger food and the best > raffle Oakland could offer! > > > > Come one, come all, bring your friends and fellow > Oakland-lovers and join > > us for an evening of fun and Oakland pride, > celebrating Urban Eco-Travel! > > RSVP sbartlett at grassroutestravel.com > > > > Serena Bartlett, Founder > > GrassRoutes Travel Publishing > > Oakland: The Soul of the City Next Door is in > stores and online now! > > www.GrassRoutesTravel.com > > sbartlett at grassroutestravel.com > .com/angel.htm -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From natasha at natasha.cc Sat Nov 4 21:33:07 2006 From: natasha at natasha.cc (Natasha Vita-More) Date: Sat, 04 Nov 2006 15:33:07 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] Pure Gossip: Who will Anders marry? In-Reply-To: <3803.208.181.209.230.1162673379.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.s e> References: <3803.208.181.209.230.1162673379.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> Message-ID: <6.2.1.2.2.20061104153149.04519ef0@pop-server.austin.rr.com> At 02:49 PM 11/4/2006, you wrote: >LOL! > >As some of you have seen, I actually do wear a kind of marriage ring. It >is my doctoral ring, and actually symbolizes being married to Science. I >guess that shows just how liberated we Swedes are - it is not an >opposite-sex, same-species or even same ontology marriage. :-) LOLing! Natasha Vita-More Cultural Strategist - Design Media Artist - Futurist PhD Candidate, Planetary Collegium Proactionary Principle Core Group, Extropy Institute Member, Association of Professional Futurists Founder, Transhumanist Arts & Culture If you draw a circle in the sand and study only what's inside the circle, then that is a closed-system perspective. If you study what is inside the circle and everything outside the circle, then that is an open system perspective. - Buckminster Fuller -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From spike66 at comcast.net Sat Nov 4 22:39:18 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Sat, 4 Nov 2006 14:39:18 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Pure Gossip: Who will Anders marry? In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <200611042257.kA4MvX53004233@andromeda.ziaspace.com> ________________________________________ From: extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org [mailto:extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Robert Bradbury Sent: Saturday, November 04, 2006 11:16 AM To: ExICh Subject: [extropy-chat] Pure Gossip: Who will Anders marry? Ok, I will freely admit that I'm potentially abusing the list, causing discomfort to some individuals, being "bad", etc.? Live with it (unless the list "gods" censor this...). Ja, consider it censored. list god. ...The list is obviously male biased, and so one has to ask why?? Why are there not more XX people on the list?? Setting aside that fact -- should we seek to correct it?... Noted. Open to suggestion sir. ...? But in observing Anders, the world, the Internet, etc. the question of *whom* would be the best partner(s) with Anders does arise [1].? Should "we" make it a mission to find one for Anders? [2, 3] Robert "We" should not. Inappropriate, desist forthwith, thanks. ...1. Given that this is written from a distance it may be the case that Anders is already partnered and I don't know about it.? In which case the discussion merely shifts from him to the next person on the list... Or not. Desist forthwith thanks. ...2.? (Side note to Anders -- humanity trumps your feelings -- maybe.)... Or maybe not. Like Huck Finn's former slave Jim, Anders owns himself. As much as humanity would like to own him, Anders still owns himself. ... 3. For those that object -- assume that I've already spent some time thinking about this message (I have).? Assume that I've balanced it from my perspective (I have).? Also assume it is written from the framework of considering "What is the greater good?"... In Anders' case, he is the one who decides the greater good where his partnering is concerned. ? ..."Do no harm" or "Do no evil" don't cut it in my book... They cut it in my book. ? ...One has to think in a forward perspective and be dealing with sustainability and the minds which can support that... Minds like those of Anders are a cheerful accident of evolution. We cannot legitimately urge him to spawn or clone himself, regardless of how much we love the man. spike From eugen at leitl.org Sat Nov 4 23:28:22 2006 From: eugen at leitl.org (Eugen Leitl) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 00:28:22 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] META: list delivery In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <20061104232822.GL6974@leitl.org> On Sat, Nov 04, 2006 at 11:03:07AM -0500, Heartland wrote: > Looking at my inbox and the archives, the delivery rate seems to hover somewhere > around 80% which is not good at all. The problem with these mailing lists is that Yeah, hotmail really sucks mossy rocks. You should ditch it. > they are so decentralized. The error could have occurred at any point along the That's not a bug, it's a feetchur. > delivery chain. I suspect that switching from mailing list to a message board > format would have prevented this from happening. Besides, IMHO, message boards are Ugh. Not a good idea. BBSses are a single point of failure (they don't automatically result in distributed archiving), and they encourage the cancer of rich content. > a lot more convenient than mail-based fora. It's much easier to choose and track > the threads you care about and you don't get "the whole list" in your inbox every Don't blame the medium if your mail client can't handle threads. > time you open it. Finally, it would be nice to free up that precious inbox space > for private communication only (and spam). We've been through this before. Yes, email is dying, but only because the new kids don't use it. There is no reason for a seasoned user to blame the limitations of their personal environment on the medium. The medium is really rich and mature, but the implementation quality varies widely. If it hurts, you're almost certainly doing it wrong. -- Eugen* Leitl leitl http://leitl.org ______________________________________________________________ ICBM: 48.07100, 11.36820 http://www.ativel.com 8B29F6BE: 099D 78BA 2FD3 B014 B08A 7779 75B0 2443 8B29 F6BE From velvethum at hotmail.com Sat Nov 4 23:37:16 2006 From: velvethum at hotmail.com (Heartland) Date: Sat, 4 Nov 2006 18:37:16 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Survival tangent. References: <20061102235019.83835.qmail@web37409.mail.mud.yahoo.com> <006401c70040$3a1acb90$bb084e0c@MyComputer> Message-ID: S: >> that 2 things cannot be at the same place and time has nothing to do with >> "evolutionarily derived notions of self" (what I'm saying just happens to >> apply to notions of "self" as well) but everything to do with the law of >> conservation of mass/energy. John Clark: > We've known for over 70 years, ever since the 2 slit experiment was done > with electrons, that one thing can be in 2 places at once. And we know that > 2 things can be in the same place and time, in fact it has been proven > experimentally that 3600 can. And that was 3 years ago. > > http://www.aip.org/pnu/2003/split/626-1.html I believe we've gone over this before and my response is still the same. Yes, but so what? Would you be able to implement 2 working minds with these ultracold atoms? No, you say? Well, then why should I care about these atoms? Besides, does BEC cause these 3600 atoms to collapse in such a way that when you return the energy to a normal level the closed system contains only a single atom at 1/3600th of the initial mass of 3600 atoms? Of course it doesn't. It can't. Slawomir From eugen at leitl.org Sat Nov 4 23:43:01 2006 From: eugen at leitl.org (Eugen Leitl) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 00:43:01 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] it's all understandable, except In-Reply-To: <638d4e150611040904j2986029bw5c2f196bf5defac7@mail.gmail.com> References: <8d71341e0611031444w6b27e817o85cd287a58458c2c@mail.gmail.com> <20061104001852.48435.qmail@web51613.mail.yahoo.com> <638d4e150611040904j2986029bw5c2f196bf5defac7@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <20061104234301.GM6974@leitl.org> On Sat, Nov 04, 2006 at 12:04:14PM -0500, Ben Goertzel wrote: > Home schooling is an option ... so, the parents' attitudes are the > real issue, not just the school system.... If more parents recognized > the relatively destructive nature of the US public school system, > they'd just pull their kids out.. ;-) Homeschooling is an excellent idea, in theory. In practice, there's the problem of wingnuts, who tend to homeschool in order to protect the poor young'n's from nefarious indoctrination (and fluoridization, which corrupts their precious body fluids). Paying decent wages tends to draw quality personnel, and gets rid of the problem quite naturally. Education is about the most important item there is, so there's no point in getting cheapskate on that. Allright, I agree that current peer climate is poisonous, but it is above practice that got it there where it is. Hiring private tutors for everbody until the memetic pool eventually detoxes is not really an option. Also, most of the problems are in poor parenting, which is firmly an issue of the modern job market. Schools can't moderate toxic children dumped into the system by a slave-driving job market (which in no way takes away the burden of the parental units to actually make parenting a priority in their lives, of course). -- Eugen* Leitl leitl http://leitl.org ______________________________________________________________ ICBM: 48.07100, 11.36820 http://www.ativel.com 8B29F6BE: 099D 78BA 2FD3 B014 B08A 7779 75B0 2443 8B29 F6BE -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: signature.asc Type: application/pgp-signature Size: 191 bytes Desc: Digital signature URL: From ben at goertzel.org Sat Nov 4 23:59:08 2006 From: ben at goertzel.org (Ben Goertzel) Date: Sat, 4 Nov 2006 18:59:08 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] it's all understandable, except In-Reply-To: <20061104234301.GM6974@leitl.org> References: <8d71341e0611031444w6b27e817o85cd287a58458c2c@mail.gmail.com> <20061104001852.48435.qmail@web51613.mail.yahoo.com> <638d4e150611040904j2986029bw5c2f196bf5defac7@mail.gmail.com> <20061104234301.GM6974@leitl.org> Message-ID: <638d4e150611041559y7720c38dyfdbed659f65021f5@mail.gmail.com> > Homeschooling is an excellent idea, in theory. In practice, there's > the problem of wingnuts, who tend to homeschool in order to protect > the poor young'n's from nefarious indoctrination (and fluoridization, > which corrupts their precious body fluids). Homeschooling worked well for my kids for a few years... Unfortunately, I can't do it anymore due to having gotten divorced and having only 50% custody of the kids ... these day, homeschooling would require cooperation of my ex, which is unlikely to happen.... But while it lasted, it was pretty good. The kids learned more, and had more fun, and most critically their spirit of creativity and independent exploration was encouraged rather than discouraged... Now, my oldest son is at a good college; my middle child is in a middle school that he really hates and learns litlte from; and my daughter is in a magnet elementary school that is pretty academically intensive but does little to allow let alone encourage independent thought.... Of course, my kids will all grow up as creative and independent thinkers anyway -- they spend a fair bit of their non-school time reading, and doing creative projects.... But I still think it sucks that they have to spend such a significant fraction of their time in such a boring, mind-numbing environment. I did it too, during my childhood, and I thought it sucked at the time. It is survivable of course ... but why should this sort of ordeal be necessary? BTW, David Deutsch, the quantum computing pioneer, is a very radical advocate of home schooling and children's liberation in general... -- Ben G From russell.wallace at gmail.com Sun Nov 5 00:18:04 2006 From: russell.wallace at gmail.com (Russell Wallace) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 00:18:04 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] the self identity quest - reply to Jef In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <8d71341e0611041618y5a6dd9a3n2f57056c71a8a34d@mail.gmail.com> On 11/4/06, david ish shalom wrote: > I do recommend to you Jef and others who really want to check this option > of info survival to review carefully my work albeit its imperfection. I am > sure you could gather something there. My motivation to spread this notion > of info-resurrection comes from my realization that for this procedure to be > practical and instrumental, it has to gather some social and memetic > spreading. I will be thankful if you can issue more concrete remarks to > be answered. > Why does it have to gather any such thing? You're just talking about text, pictures, sound and video, which we already have the technology to store. Just get a nice big chunk of web space and start uploading everything about yourself (and whoever you want to preserve who will consent to such) that you can get hold of. Lead by example. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From russell.wallace at gmail.com Sun Nov 5 00:22:41 2006 From: russell.wallace at gmail.com (Russell Wallace) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 00:22:41 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] the self identity quest - reply to Jef In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <8d71341e0611041622k6b3a467nc851d27b8a4ba9f6@mail.gmail.com> I'll add: if you haven't got a single person on extropy-chat of all places to believe this literally constitutes personal survival, you won't get anyone anywhere to believe it :) You're better off to put the spin that it's metaphorical immortality through one's works - that's a familiar enough concept. Sort of the digital equivalent of getting a statue of yourself. But the thing about statues is, they get done because people think they look cool. So go ahead and create a digital monument to yourself, and do it in such a way that it looks cool - nice site layout and suchlike. Then point people to it and say "wouldn't you like one of these for yourself?" -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From eugen at leitl.org Sun Nov 5 00:27:25 2006 From: eugen at leitl.org (Eugen Leitl) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 01:27:25 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] it's all understandable, except In-Reply-To: <638d4e150611041559y7720c38dyfdbed659f65021f5@mail.gmail.com> References: <8d71341e0611031444w6b27e817o85cd287a58458c2c@mail.gmail.com> <20061104001852.48435.qmail@web51613.mail.yahoo.com> <638d4e150611040904j2986029bw5c2f196bf5defac7@mail.gmail.com> <20061104234301.GM6974@leitl.org> <638d4e150611041559y7720c38dyfdbed659f65021f5@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <20061105002725.GR6974@leitl.org> On Sat, Nov 04, 2006 at 06:59:08PM -0500, Ben Goertzel wrote: > Homeschooling worked well for my kids for a few years... I believe you readily. Unfortunately, you're not representative, as far as I can tell (which is admittedly, not much). > But while it lasted, it was pretty good. The kids learned more, and > had more fun, and most critically their spirit of creativity and > independent exploration was encouraged rather than discouraged... I understand most public schools in USia are in a really bad shape. There's no problem with public education e.g. in Finland, though, so it doesn't seem an intrinsic issue. Even the best system can't shine if it's not being managed right. We need to figure out how to manage things right. Actually, we already know, it's just that that knowledge hasn't percolated into the right political motorics cortex, or that rotten site is cheerfully ignoring that information because it has to deal with really important things (like, which pork barrel to open up next). So if the system is failing, it should not penalize homeschoolers who're providing good care (as periodically measured with unbiased benchmarks). If the benchmarks are good, they will weed out the wingnuts, because they can't deliver a rounded, high quality education -- not because of their wingnut biases. > during my childhood, and I thought it sucked at the time. It is > survivable of course ... but why should this sort of ordeal be > necessary? It shouldn't, absolutely. Good education isn't that hard, but in practice it's crippled by anorexic budgets and systemic idiocy (as about anything in the current downfall of democracies, which actually used to work for a surprisingly long while). It would be so ironic if demographics and education would shoot down our chance for Singularity within the narrow launch horizon. If we mess it up real good this time, our grandchildren might not have an opportunity for another shot. That sucks so much, it is our duty to get this done right. -- Eugen* Leitl leitl http://leitl.org ______________________________________________________________ ICBM: 48.07100, 11.36820 http://www.ativel.com 8B29F6BE: 099D 78BA 2FD3 B014 B08A 7779 75B0 2443 8B29 F6BE -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: signature.asc Type: application/pgp-signature Size: 191 bytes Desc: Digital signature URL: From thespike at satx.rr.com Sun Nov 5 00:41:51 2006 From: thespike at satx.rr.com (Damien Broderick) Date: Sat, 04 Nov 2006 18:41:51 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] the self identity quest In-Reply-To: <8d71341e0611041618y5a6dd9a3n2f57056c71a8a34d@mail.gmail.co m> References: <8d71341e0611041618y5a6dd9a3n2f57056c71a8a34d@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <7.0.1.0.2.20061104184013.022a0148@satx.rr.com> >My motivation to spread this notion of info-resurrection comes from >my realization that for this procedure to be practical and >instrumental, it has to gather some social and memetic spreading. Haven't been reading this (I don't want to see HTML on exichat), but has anyone noticed yet that this just recapitulates Rudy Rucker's Lifebox proposal? Damien Broderick From transhumanist at goldenfuture.net Sun Nov 5 00:26:39 2006 From: transhumanist at goldenfuture.net (Joseph Bloch) Date: Sat, 04 Nov 2006 19:26:39 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] it's all understandable, except In-Reply-To: <638d4e150611041559y7720c38dyfdbed659f65021f5@mail.gmail.com> References: <8d71341e0611031444w6b27e817o85cd287a58458c2c@mail.gmail.com> <20061104001852.48435.qmail@web51613.mail.yahoo.com> <638d4e150611040904j2986029bw5c2f196bf5defac7@mail.gmail.com> <20061104234301.GM6974@leitl.org> <638d4e150611041559y7720c38dyfdbed659f65021f5@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <454D2FBF.8070009@goldenfuture.net> My wife (a professional teacher) and I (who have experience as an adult educator) have discussed homeschooling our daughter. We'd do it, if the economics work out right, and I can pretty much guarantee that there'd be no "young Earth creationism" or other such whackjobbery in that particular curriculum... People do mention the socialization factor, and it is something to consider. But socialization can take place in lots of venues (martial arts, dance, non-school-sponsored-sports), and we've already got her involved in such things. Although I must say that I, personally, choose to avoid fluoride. The damn stuff's toxic if ingested, and over the course of decades, I'd rather not risk it if I have a choice. I avoid alumnium-based deodorants for the same reason. There're enough toxins out there that I can't choose to avoid, I might as well choose to avoid the ones I can. If it's good enough for Ray Kurzweil, it's good enough for me. Joseph Ben Goertzel wrote: >>Homeschooling is an excellent idea, in theory. In practice, there's >>the problem of wingnuts, who tend to homeschool in order to protect >>the poor young'n's from nefarious indoctrination (and fluoridization, >>which corrupts their precious body fluids). >> >> > >Homeschooling worked well for my kids for a few years... > >Unfortunately, I can't do it anymore due to having gotten divorced and >having only 50% custody of the kids ... these day, homeschooling would >require cooperation of my ex, which is unlikely to happen.... > >But while it lasted, it was pretty good. The kids learned more, and >had more fun, and most critically their spirit of creativity and >independent exploration was encouraged rather than discouraged... > >Now, my oldest son is at a good college; my middle child is in a >middle school that he really hates and learns litlte from; and my >daughter is in a magnet elementary school that is pretty academically >intensive but does little to allow let alone encourage independent >thought.... Of course, my kids will all grow up as creative and >independent thinkers anyway -- they spend a fair bit of their >non-school time reading, and doing creative projects.... But I still >think it sucks that they have to spend such a significant fraction of >their time in such a boring, mind-numbing environment. I did it too, >during my childhood, and I thought it sucked at the time. It is >survivable of course ... but why should this sort of ordeal be >necessary? > >BTW, David Deutsch, the quantum computing pioneer, is a very radical >advocate of home schooling and children's liberation in general... > >-- Ben G >_______________________________________________ >extropy-chat mailing list >extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org >http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > > > > From ben at goertzel.org Sun Nov 5 00:54:35 2006 From: ben at goertzel.org (Ben Goertzel) Date: Sat, 4 Nov 2006 19:54:35 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] it's all understandable, except In-Reply-To: <20061105002725.GR6974@leitl.org> References: <8d71341e0611031444w6b27e817o85cd287a58458c2c@mail.gmail.com> <20061104001852.48435.qmail@web51613.mail.yahoo.com> <638d4e150611040904j2986029bw5c2f196bf5defac7@mail.gmail.com> <20061104234301.GM6974@leitl.org> <638d4e150611041559y7720c38dyfdbed659f65021f5@mail.gmail.com> <20061105002725.GR6974@leitl.org> Message-ID: <638d4e150611041654g5d25a025q7aba36ddbfd4e25e@mail.gmail.com> Hi, > I understand most public schools in USia are in a really bad shape. > There's no problem with public education e.g. in Finland, though, > so it doesn't seem an intrinsic issue. Even the best system can't shine > if it's not being managed right. We need to figure out how to > manage things right. Actually, we already know, it's just that > that knowledge hasn't percolated into the right political motorics cortex, The US public education system is highly erratic. There is very little centralization.... So, some public school systems are great, some are miserable, most are OK. Where I live, in Montgomery County Maryland, the schools are pretty strong in terms of the quantity of information transmitted, but pretty weak in terms of encouraging individual investigation or creation. There is a rigorous tracking system, so that bright kids who perform well are tracked into various "magnet" or "gifted" programs and get taught a lot of information. In this sense the schools where I live are way better than the vast majority of US school systems. However, rapidly cramming a bunch of mostly useful knowledge into kids' brains is still not the best way of shaping their minds for future productive achievements... Home schooling allowed my kids to learn self-motivatedly according to their own tastes and interests, with guidance from me, and in my view this sort of approach is far better preparation for e.g. a career in research or creative arts... -- Ben From velvethum at hotmail.com Sun Nov 5 01:42:02 2006 From: velvethum at hotmail.com (Heartland) Date: Sat, 4 Nov 2006 20:42:02 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] the self identity quest - reply to Jef References: <8d71341e0611041618y5a6dd9a3n2f57056c71a8a34d@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: > On 11/4/06, david ish shalom wrote: >> I do recommend to you Jef and others who really want to check this option >> of info survival to review carefully my work albeit its imperfection. I am >> sure you could gather something there. My motivation to spread this notion >> of info-resurrection comes from my realization that for this procedure to be >> practical and instrumental, it has to gather some social and memetic >> spreading. I will be thankful if you can issue more concrete remarks to >> be answered. Russell Wallace: > Why does it have to gather any such thing? You're just talking about text, > pictures, sound and video, which we already have the technology to store. > Just get a nice big chunk of web space and start uploading everything about > yourself (and whoever you want to preserve who will consent to such) that > you can get hold of. Lead by example. I usually file these kinds of "info-ressurection" ideas under "SBA" (suicide by abstraction). Just take a picture of yourself and keep a diary - it's the true essence of immortality! :-) Slawomir From ben at goertzel.org Sun Nov 5 01:49:16 2006 From: ben at goertzel.org (Ben Goertzel) Date: Sat, 4 Nov 2006 20:49:16 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] it's all understandable, except In-Reply-To: <20061105013219.90607.qmail@web51615.mail.yahoo.com> References: <638d4e150611041654g5d25a025q7aba36ddbfd4e25e@mail.gmail.com> <20061105013219.90607.qmail@web51615.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <638d4e150611041749n1a3c2907xd32d00ff60a11df6@mail.gmail.com> The main problem with the US school system is that most US parents are anti-intellectual --- they don't encourage their kids to learn intellectual things, and don't encourage the teachers to encourage their kids to learn such things.... This problem is indeed more rampant in some ethic groups than others, but for sure no ethnic group has a monopoly on it... The school system has adapted itself to uncreative, anti-intellectual parents and their spawn, to an excessive degree.... So that even when it's presented with parents and kids who do favor and encourage intellect and learning, in many cases the system is incapable to adapt to this situation.... I can see that the Montgomery County school system genuinely tries really hard to provide a high quality education -- and it does succeed to a reasonable degree ... kids coming out of the advanced tracks in high school know a lot of stuff ... e.g. in math they do calculus, linear algebra, statistics, basic differential equations, bla bla bla, which is more than they did in high school in the US back in my day... However, they seem to draw the line at offering advanced content, they have no idea how to really foster creativity. Every now and then they give open-ended assignments -- say, letting the students choose their own paper topics for National History Day papers or some such ... but the scope is still pretty restricted, and such occasions where freedom of choice is permitted are fairly rare. My middle child spends most of his nonschool waking hours studying and doing animation, which is his particular passion -- learning to use various software, writing scripts, drawing on his graphics tablet, etc. -- and the amount of enthusiasm he has for this sooooo vastly exceeds his joy in what he does in school, it's ridiculous. If I were home schooling him now, I would teach him more serious computer programming in an animation context; I would encourage him to write more polished scripts for his animations (thus improving his writing, which is pretty good already); I would teach him how algebra is used to calculate various quantities for computer graphics, which would interest him more in math, which he hates.... It's amazing how much more kids enjoy learning things when presented in the context of something they are passionate about. But the school system just does not work this way at all -- information is presented impersonally and homogeneously, so as to make it seem as uninteresting as possible ;-) .... As it is I try to show him how various subjects of study tie in with his passion, but given how many hours school takes, he wants to spend most of his free time actually making animations rather than doing extra study of other topics... [BTW, his work is still childish, but creative nonetheless. If you want a sample check out RoboTurtle II, which is about an evil AI that I create. Search Goertzel, or roboturtle, on Google Video ;-) ] Does the Singularity obsolete the need to improve education? Sure, in a grand sense.... But looking more deeply, the reason the Singularity hasn't occurred already is because our society actively discourages creativity and learning to such an extent -- which is the same essential reason our school system is not better than it is.... As usual, a problem that looks like an institutional problem ultimately boils down to a problem of the idiocy and patheticness of individual and cultural human nature... -- Ben G On 11/4/06, Al Brooks wrote: > Yes, and it could be America is too large for the > problem to be solved, it can only perhaps be lessened. > What I wonder is: can it be one reason student > performance is overall pretty low is because teachers > and administrators not only inflate grades but also > don't want to flunk ethnic students? One hesitates to > write this, however if too many ethnics washed out of > the system it would not only look extremely bad, but > also the students, families, and activists would > deeply resent all the flunking and seek revenge. > Let's be frank-- America is a complicated, overheated > ethnic stew-pot, and such undoubtedly affects the > school system. > > > > > The US public education system is highly erratic. > > There is very > > little centralization.... So, some public school > > systems are great, > > some are miserable, most are OK. > > > > > > ____________________________________________________________________________________ > Want to start your own business? Learn how on Yahoo! Small Business > (http://smallbusiness.yahoo.com) > > From spike66 at comcast.net Sun Nov 5 01:43:21 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Sat, 4 Nov 2006 17:43:21 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Pure Gossip: Who will Anders marry? In-Reply-To: <3803.208.181.209.230.1162673379.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> Message-ID: <200611050149.kA51nvNN006535@andromeda.ziaspace.com> > bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Anders Sandberg > Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] Pure Gossip: Who will Anders marry? > > > LOL! > > As some of you have seen, I actually do wear a kind of marriage ring. It > is my doctoral ring, and actually symbolizes being married to Science... > Anders Sandberg, Anders, thanks for being such a cool guy, man! {8-] spike From kerry_prez at yahoo.com Sun Nov 5 00:45:08 2006 From: kerry_prez at yahoo.com (Al Brooks) Date: Sat, 4 Nov 2006 16:45:08 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] it's all understandable, except In-Reply-To: <638d4e150611040904j2986029bw5c2f196bf5defac7@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <20061105004508.67552.qmail@web51603.mail.yahoo.com> You got it, this is probably the inner core of the problem-- how can we have a smart educational system with 'dumb' parents? Ben Goertzel wrote: Home schooling is an option ... so, the parents' attitudes are the real issue, not just the school system.... If more parents recognized the relatively destructive nature of the US public school system, they'd just pull their kids out.. ;-) -- Ben --------------------------------- Everyone is raving about the all-new Yahoo! Mail. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From kerry_prez at yahoo.com Sun Nov 5 00:18:50 2006 From: kerry_prez at yahoo.com (Al Brooks) Date: Sat, 4 Nov 2006 16:18:50 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] all that concerns me is the future of education In-Reply-To: <7.0.1.0.2.20061104133527.0219d988@satx.rr.com> Message-ID: <20061105001850.59776.qmail@web51603.mail.yahoo.com> It was a foolish remark on Kerry's part, an aborted attempt to gain a higher percentage of anti-war votes for Tuesday's election, however there is some validity in what he said, having to more with below-the-threshold pressures than education. Certain clueless young men (do you remember clearly how you felt at age 18?) are strongly pressured in many ways including via school, a certain number of male youths are if not manipulated then at least severely pressured into proving their old-fashioned manhood by joining the Service. When you think about it, unless someone is subliminally pressured why would they risk not only being shot and blown up in combat, but also risk getting third degree burns on large areas of them? Such is not the everyday risk we incur by driving a car, but is a radical risk, and as you know much of our behavior is influenced by what we are barely aware of or unaware of-- traditions, remnants of the past, peer & family pressures, and so forth. But to take off the amateur psychology hat, all that really concerns me is the future of education, can it be substantially improved? Now, there is one if not *good* then maybe excusable reason for having a lesser school system, and this is not a reference to higher ed, which is acceptable. As regards K-12, there could possibly be a fear of de-linking the races, if students were held more accountable for improving their performance the gap in performance between the races/ethnicities might become more pronounced. This might sound as far out a theory as severe pressures, including lack of education, causing youths to join the Service, yet there are many personal and societal threads, conscious or not, in inexperienced adolescents lives that influence their behaviors. What I want to discover is can mass education be improved or are demographics against it? If I find out the latter is the case then I will forget about it and switch to some other obsession. If we don't worry about one thing then it is something else. >Al, I notice your email address is kerry_prez. The irony here is that >senator Kerry destroyed any remnants of his possiblity to become president >with a single comment similar in spirit to this one. >Careful, Spike. What you should have written is "with a single ironic >comment at Bush's expense that was maliciously and misleadingly spun >by his opponents as a comment similar in spirit to this one." >This is not a party-political observation (I don't get a vote in the >States). It's a matter of comprehending the context. Of course, maybe >I'm wrong about this and Kerry just happened to utter a remark in >public equivalent to Bush or Cheney, say, blurting out in public >that Halliburton is corrupt and all elected politicians are morons. >Seems unlikely. Nor am I even convinced that he "told the joke >wrong"--I suspect he assumed his audience was smart enough to make >the leap to his ironic intent: "Hey, guess who's got himself mired in >Iran... it's that booze-sucking brainless frat boy in the White >House!" (I keep making that kind of mistake myself, assuming people >will understand and laugh at my ironic quips when all too often they >tend to stare open-mouthed and aghast.) >Damien Broderick --------------------------------- Low, Low, Low Rates! Check out Yahoo! Messenger's cheap PC-to-Phone call rates. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From kerry_prez at yahoo.com Sun Nov 5 01:32:19 2006 From: kerry_prez at yahoo.com (Al Brooks) Date: Sat, 4 Nov 2006 17:32:19 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] it's all understandable, except In-Reply-To: <638d4e150611041654g5d25a025q7aba36ddbfd4e25e@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <20061105013219.90607.qmail@web51615.mail.yahoo.com> Yes, and it could be America is too large for the problem to be solved, it can only perhaps be lessened. What I wonder is: can it be one reason student performance is overall pretty low is because teachers and administrators not only inflate grades but also don't want to flunk ethnic students? One hesitates to write this, however if too many ethnics washed out of the system it would not only look extremely bad, but also the students, families, and activists would deeply resent all the flunking and seek revenge. Let's be frank-- America is a complicated, overheated ethnic stew-pot, and such undoubtedly affects the school system. > The US public education system is highly erratic. > There is very > little centralization.... So, some public school > systems are great, > some are miserable, most are OK. > ____________________________________________________________________________________ Want to start your own business? Learn how on Yahoo! Small Business (http://smallbusiness.yahoo.com) From kerry_prez at yahoo.com Sun Nov 5 01:49:06 2006 From: kerry_prez at yahoo.com (Al Brooks) Date: Sat, 4 Nov 2006 17:49:06 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] the choice to get out of a bad situation In-Reply-To: <454D2FBF.8070009@goldenfuture.net> Message-ID: <20061105014906.19553.qmail@web51611.mail.yahoo.com> :) that is correct. "you see, Mandrake, it was during the physical act of love-- I was seized with a feeling of fatigue; at first I could not ascertain the source of my inability but, fortunately, I discovered the cause was the sapping of my pure natural vital essence, Purity Of Essence [POE] due to the fluoridation of my precious bodily fluids" --Jack D. Ripper, 'Dr. Strangelove'. Seriously, I don't know what to do concerning education, no one does. But we can safely say those parents sending their children to shall we say lesser schools in bad neighborhoods have to receive the choice about how to remove the students from their situations; they need the ability to get out by way of vouchers, charter schools, homeschooling-- whatever it takes-- and fast. A 'lesser' school in a bad neighborhood is no place to be. > Ben Goertzel wrote: > > >>Homeschooling is an excellent idea, in theory. In > practice, there's > >>the problem of wingnuts, who tend to homeschool in > order to protect > >>the poor young'n's from nefarious indoctrination > (and fluoridization, > >>which corrupts their precious body fluids). ____________________________________________________________________________________ Get your email and see which of your friends are online - Right on the New Yahoo.com (http://www.yahoo.com/preview) From rhanson at gmu.edu Sun Nov 5 01:29:50 2006 From: rhanson at gmu.edu (Robin Hanson) Date: Sat, 04 Nov 2006 20:29:50 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] it's all understandable, except In-Reply-To: <638d4e150611041559y7720c38dyfdbed659f65021f5@mail.gmail.co m> References: <8d71341e0611031444w6b27e817o85cd287a58458c2c@mail.gmail.com> <20061104001852.48435.qmail@web51613.mail.yahoo.com> <638d4e150611040904j2986029bw5c2f196bf5defac7@mail.gmail.com> <20061104234301.GM6974@leitl.org> <638d4e150611041559y7720c38dyfdbed659f65021f5@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <0J8800IEXHHQ2910@caduceus2.gmu.edu> At 06:59 PM 11/4/2006, Ben Goertzel wrote: >my daughter is in a magnet elementary school that is pretty >academically intensive but does little to allow let alone encourage >independent thought.... Of course, my kids will all grow up as >creative and independent thinkers anyway -- they spend a fair bit >of their non-school time reading, and doing creative projects.... >But I still think it sucks that they have to spend such a significant >fraction of their time in such a boring, mind-numbing environment. >I did it too, during my childhood, and I thought it sucked at the time. >It is survivable of course ... but why should this sort of ordeal be >necessary? Schools perform many functions, and the function of promoting creative independent thinkers may have a pretty low priority. It seems to me that most jobs in our economy require a bit less creativity and independence than most humans would naturally exercise without schooling. So perhaps schools train and select people for the mostly boring and mind-numbing world of work. Robin Hanson rhanson at gmu.edu http://hanson.gmu.edu Associate Professor of Economics, George Mason University MSN 1D3, Carow Hall, Fairfax VA 22030-4444 703-993-2326 FAX: 703-993-2323 From moulton at moulton.com Sun Nov 5 05:37:14 2006 From: moulton at moulton.com (Fred C. Moulton) Date: Sat, 04 Nov 2006 21:37:14 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Edge: Thank Goodness! By Daniel C. Dennett In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <1162705034.4932.70.camel@localhost.localdomain> On Sat, 2006-11-04 at 16:40 -0500, Ensel Sharon wrote: > The problem is Dennett claiming that harboring X meme is morally negative, > and that one "owes" it to some third party or parties to either justify > ones beliefs or change them. Perhaps there is a misunderstanding of the point(s) that Dennett is making. As I read the passage covering this in http://www.edge.org/3rd_culture/dennett06/dennett06_index.html I think that Dennett is actually making several points and ran them together in a single paragraph which might be the source of some of the confusion. As I read Dennett the points are briefly as follows. The first point is that persons who advocate a position need to provide a justification if they want to be taken seriously and be part of an intellectual dialog. Thus Dennett has the following sentence: "If you insist on keeping the myth of the effectiveness of prayer alive, you owe the rest of us a justification in the face of the evidence." Note that the evidence that Dennett refers to is the Benson study at Harvard to which he had just referred. Consider what would happen if I started a new thread with a message that I was convinced that eating a diet high in salt, fat and sugar would lead to a long and healthy life; I expect that there would be a call for me to justify my statement particularly since it flies in the face of current evidence. That is; the list members would feel that I owed them a justification for my assertion. Note that if you do not want to use the phrase "that I owed them a justification" then you can easily construct an alternative wording, but the use of the term "owing a justification" is commonly used in this context. Thus the first point Dennett is making is about intelligent discourse. The second point Dennett is making is that propagating a false idea can undermine the respect for what Dennett calls "the very goodness I am thanking"; that is all of the medical staff, those who developed the medical tools, etc. A moral problem of hypocrisy arises when an individual wants to hold one standard for themselves and a different standard for someone else. That is why Dennett has the discussion about suing when there is an adverse outcome in a medical setting. Note also Dennett's example of the drug company whose response to a problem with their drugs is that they prayed really hard. I think that perhaps Dennett might have constructed his examples a little more clearly and with more explanation so that they would be more readily grasped. Also implied but not as explicitly stated is that undermining the rational approach to medicine could cause persons to avoid proper medical treatment for a disease such as cancer. Thus this second point is about the practical implications of promoting a false idea and the possible moral problems that can arise. A third point that Dennett is making is that prayer for the purpose of causing a deity improve his health is a waste of time and effort and Dennett is criticizing wasting time and effort. Now there are those that would claim that prayer is actually for the benefit of the person offering the prayer rather than the object of the prayer. But this is a bait and switch because as far as the object of the prayer is concerned either prayer works and is useful or it is a waste of time. [Note that for the moment we are not considering the case when the object of the prayer actually believes that prayer works; that would lead us into a long discussion of everything from faith healing to Voodoo.] [Also note that any possible benefit (or harm) to the person offering the prayer are a different discussion.] Thus this third point is about being frugal with our resources and not wasting them praying for Dennett. I hope I have read Dennett correctly and have clearly explained my interpretation. My feeling is that the services of a good editor would have helped with Dennett's essay. But I will cut Dennett some slack since he has been through a tough medical situation. At least he did not try to denounce those who believe in prayer by referring to the http://whywontgodhealamputees.com/ website which often comes up in these discussions. Fred From iamgoddard at yahoo.com Sun Nov 5 03:03:22 2006 From: iamgoddard at yahoo.com (Ian Goddard) Date: Sat, 4 Nov 2006 19:03:22 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Survival tangent. Message-ID: <20061105030322.68246.qmail@web52611.mail.yahoo.com> John K Clark wrote: >> that 2 things cannot be at the same place and time >> has nothing to do with "evolutionarily derived >> notions of self" (what I'm saying just happens to >> apply to notions of "self" as well) but everything >> to do with the law of conservation of mass/energy. > > We've known for over 70 years, ever since the 2 > slit experiment was done with electrons, that one > thing can be in 2 places at once. It's a big leap from that to the view that one mind/self can be in two locations at once. When an electron passes through two slits, its behavior is wave-like, and a wave can be in two places at once. But macroscopic analogies like 'particle' and 'wave' don't lend themselves to the subatomic. You need to justify that leap... Why should properties of a mind/self resemble quantum properties of electrons? I suspect one day a copy of a brain could be made, containing a synthetic sentient being. And it's likely that for the copy, it recalls the life of the original as if it where its own. But I see no reason to assume that the self of the original brain would be somehow connected to its copy. The copy brain would just be someone else out there. So if 'I' was uploaded just before I died, it would only ensure that there'd be someone else who accesses a database (ie, memory) that implies they were me. But for me, I'd be as dead as I'd be without the upload. ~Ian ____________________________________________________________________________________ Access over 1 million songs - Yahoo! Music Unlimited (http://music.yahoo.com/unlimited) From spike66 at comcast.net Sun Nov 5 02:52:18 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Sat, 4 Nov 2006 18:52:18 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] kerry remark In-Reply-To: <20061105001850.59776.qmail@web51603.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <200611050304.kA534vn1019337@andromeda.ziaspace.com> >Al, I notice your email address is kerry_prez. The irony here is that >senator Kerry destroyed any remnants of his possiblity to become president >with a single comment similar in spirit to this one. >Careful, Spike. What you should have written is "with a single ironic >comment at Bush's expense that was maliciously and misleadingly spun >by his opponents as a comment similar in spirit to this one." ... >Damien Broderick Damien you may very well be right on this one. Here is why I think Kerry's comment is significant. We have seen cases where the mainstream news media decide to dogpile on some otherwise insignificant incident. Two such incidents come to mind instantly. The first is when Dan Quayle misspelled potato while playing spelling bee with the school kids. He read it off the card, which said "potatoe". The press used this to show he was the biggest idiot in history, when in fact it was a minor error that any one of us could have made. He is merely the biggest idiot in *recent* history. The second incident which pops into my mind is Howard Dean's screaming into the microphone at a rally. Again a rather minor gaffe, but the press had a field day with it. Again, Dean is not the craziest politician in history, merely the craziest in recent history. In both cases, the press decided they would no longer take those politicians seriously. In both cases future historians may record those days as the high water mark for each, the beginning of a steady decline thereafter. Quayle faded into obscurity, Dean is still around but no one takes seriously his chances for even maintaining leadership of the DNC. Perhaps the mainstream press has now decided to retire Kerry as it did with the other two. Time will tell, but I expect he will begin a slide starting 31 October 2006, and little will come of his bid for the white house in 2008. It worries me that the mainstream media have this much influence on history. spike From hkhenson at rogers.com Sun Nov 5 03:31:26 2006 From: hkhenson at rogers.com (Keith Henson) Date: Sat, 04 Nov 2006 22:31:26 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Effective relationships [Resend] In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <5.1.0.14.0.20061104222011.03d8dd30@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> At 01:06 PM 11/4/2006 -0800, you wrote: >Robert Bradbury wrote: > > > One may ask under what conditions are survival probabilities enhanced > by partnering? > >Some time ago I posted what I thought was a provocative and insightful >idea, but didn't get much feedback. I'd like to try again here: > >Might it be that the most effective relationship structure in terms of >cost/benefit might be the triad? I'm not talking about polyamory or m?nage >? trois but rather a stable, committed triadic relationship between three >individuals in any combination of genders. > >I recognize that this would require individuals of greater than average >self-awareness to avoid destructive two-against-one dynamics. I also >recognize that nature settled on diadic relationships in most cases, but I >think human culture represents a more highly developed phase that may >support and reward more highly developed relationship structures at >various scales. > >The advantages I see are significantly increased synergies, built-in >tie-breaking, and possibly an inherent 3D structural stability similar to >that of a tetrahedron over a planar object. > >Comments? Geometry is the wrong place to look. The combination of 2 (or even more) women with a man of high status is fairly common and often stable. The only place where more than one man (2 and sometimes more brothers) entered into a marriage contract with one woman was in Tibet, where it was a population limitation in a place where the farming plots could be reduced no further--and for some reason they didn't use the more normal mechanism of killing each other off in wars. The natural organization at levels higher than family is the band or tribe. Those usually top out at 100 people. And a high fraction of what goes on in relations happens well below the conscious level. Read up on evolutionary psychology to get the background. Keith Henson From lcorbin at rawbw.com Sun Nov 5 03:29:41 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Sat, 4 Nov 2006 19:29:41 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] it's all understandable, except References: <638d4e150611041654g5d25a025q7aba36ddbfd4e25e@mail.gmail.com><20061105013219.90607.qmail@web51615.mail.yahoo.com> <638d4e150611041749n1a3c2907xd32d00ff60a11df6@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <05ec01c7008a$ab914660$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Ben writes > The main problem with the US school system is that most US parents > are anti-intellectual --- they don't encourage their kids to learn > intellectual things, and don't encourage the teachers to encourage > their kids to learn such things.... Actually, the real and horrible problem is that most kids really just aren't bright enough to learn advanced material or to fill the jobs that will need filling or to profit from the educational opportunities that really do exist now. > I can see that the Montgomery County school system genuinely tries > really hard to provide a high quality education -- and it does succeed > to a reasonable degree ... kids coming out of the advanced tracks in > high school know a lot of stuff ... e.g. in math they do calculus, Yes! Exactly. I've been working with extremely bright kids since the 1960s, and the kids---some kids!---are even smarter than their exact opposite numbers from one, two, or three decades ago. But there are too few of them. The schools in the Santa Clara Valley and Fremont here in northern California, I do know from personal experience are doing excellent jobs with the brightest kids. (There are some unfortunate counter- examples: the Palo Alto high school district has been taken over by some levellers who have taken the pressure off the brightest kids to such an extent that parents I know have withdrawn their kids and are sending them to private schools. One teaching math spot remains open because the primary job qualification is that the teacher be black. The main focus (goal) in that high school district now---I kid you not ---to have everyone perform at the same level insofar as it is possible.) But even in botched districts, the kids are amazing. Controlling for IQ, they're doing work a year ahead of the 1980s and two years ahead of the 1960s (very roughly). Their enthusiasm for math, computers, and physics is nothing less than RED HOT. But there are too few of them. And the problem will only get worse. > Does the Singularity obsolete the need to improve education? Sure, in > a grand sense.... But looking more deeply, the reason the Singularity > hasn't occurred already is because our society actively discourages > creativity and learning to such an extent -- which is the same > essential reason our school system is not better than it is.... It's possible---as your anecdotes relate---that in a number of instances our educational systems do discourage creativity and learning. But even if that's true (and I have seen no evidence of it myself), it doesn't matter. The bright kids and the creative kids go far anyway. There is just---yes, again---too few of them relative to the vast, vast numbers of kids who aren't so bright and really couldn't care less about the things we would like them to care about. The Singularity (or its preceding technological innovations) need above all to get people smarter, especially the great hordes of children today who simply are incapable of difficult technical work, and who will (because of IQ limitations) perform rather poorly whatever they try to do that is of any use. Lee > On 11/4/06, Al Brooks wrote: >> Yes, and it could be America is too large for the >> problem to be solved, it can only perhaps be lessened. >> What I wonder is: can it be one reason student >> performance is overall pretty low is because teachers >> and administrators not only inflate grades but also >> don't want to flunk ethnic students? One hesitates to >> write this, however if too many ethnics washed out of >> the system it would not only look extremely bad, but >> also the students, families, and activists would >> deeply resent all the flunking and seek revenge. >> Let's be frank-- America is a complicated, overheated >> ethnic stew-pot, and such undoubtedly affects the >> school system. From lcorbin at rawbw.com Sun Nov 5 03:33:57 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Sat, 4 Nov 2006 19:33:57 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Agency as Prime Determinant of Personal Identity References: <059501c70023$17c091a0$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: <05f901c7008b$848bff50$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Heartland writes > Lee: > "There follows an extremely good example [in Jef's post] of how > a single legal person can change rather dramatically over decades > into who I'd call "someone else" (see Jef's *full* explication below)." > > Lee, wasn't that obvious? That's what you get for reducing your "self" to VMBs. What!? You're not understanding. What is *different* between the nine year old and the ninety year old in Jef's example is that the VMBs *did* change. It fits perfectly with the fact that we are so tempted (and rightfully so) to question whether they are the same person. > Eventually you realize that almost none of your VMBs at 2 are the same as your VMBs > at 80 which forces you to admit that someone has died sometime between 2 and 80. > Then you either admit this or choose to give up the idea that "VMBs = Self." :) I *admit* that! Too much change kills one. It changes you into someone else. Lee From nanogirl at halcyon.com Sun Nov 5 03:28:00 2006 From: nanogirl at halcyon.com (Gina Miller) Date: Sat, 4 Nov 2006 19:28:00 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Computer animation Message-ID: <01e701c7008a$76d9a390$0200a8c0@Nano> This piece was the most sequential animation that I have done. It was generated for the film2music competition in which registrants are asked to select a track from the composers cd and create a video to accompany it. Previous to this competition I had been busy producing "The Mark" for the aniboom contest. This meant that I had only a couple weeks to create and complete this one. As elaborate as a concept this piece was, the time line wasn't feasible but I crunched through nights without sleep to get it in on time. I just barely made it, but I made it! So the prize for this one is not only money but meetings with a famous producer and agent! And this time, it's no sweat to vote, you don't have to sign up or register for anything, no typing at all, it's just one click and "send", okay so technically that's two clicks, but that's all just clicks! So please come vote for me friends. Come watch dandelion here - an animation about hope and faith in ones future dreams. Thank you all! 'animator for hire' Gina "Nanogirl" Miller Nanotechnology Industries http://www.nanoindustries.com Personal: http://www.nanogirl.com/index2.html Animation Blog: http://maxanimation.blogspot.com/ Craft blog: http://nanogirlblog.blogspot.com/ Foresight Senior Associate http://www.foresight.org Nanotechnology Advisor Extropy Institute http://www.extropy.org Email: nanogirl at halcyon.com "Nanotechnology: Solutions for the future." -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From lcorbin at rawbw.com Sun Nov 5 03:49:44 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Sat, 4 Nov 2006 19:49:44 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] the self identity quest - another reply to JefAllbright References: Message-ID: <061801c7008d$a17a6410$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> David ish shalom writes > Thank you Jef for your detailed reply.... my reply: Suppose I am now timid and > introverted person, my scientific capabilities are limited yet my ideal self [is] > The answer is, my identity is not determined by what I am now with my limitations > and faulty nature, but my identity is mainly determined by what I am going to be > in the future, enhanced human being or even post human being. Again, my caution is that if you change enough, you won't be yourself. > Yet I will always remember from within who I was, the salient information regarding > my former existence, my past limited abilities etc. Yes, that's necessary, but it may not be sufficient. My solution, which I've said quite a few times on this list but which you probably have not heard, is to give previous versions of yourself ample runtime. This requires above all that one understand that duplicates are self. But there is also a strong psychological motivation: just why will future versions of you bother running such an ancient and decrepit fetal version of themselves? The answer is, as I call it, "the logic of cryonics". Namely, we reanimate those who are frozen so that when the time comes we are ourselves reanimated. It proceeds by (mathematical) induction. Your vast future self (who hardly resembles you but who has the most power) will see this logic, and if he (it) evilly denies you runtime, then by the same logic he'll be denied runtime by even more advanced versions. So we must vigorously push this meme: All previous versions---that we can fix or capture---are to get runtime so long into the future as we or our future versions shall live. Lee From lcorbin at rawbw.com Sun Nov 5 03:58:57 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Sat, 4 Nov 2006 19:58:57 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] the self identity quest - reply to Jef References: <8d71341e0611041618y5a6dd9a3n2f57056c71a8a34d@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <061f01c7008e$e6388bd0$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Heartland and Russell write > [Russell wrote] >> On 11/4/06, david ish shalom wrote: >>> I do recommend to you Jef and others who really want to check this option >>> of info survival to review carefully my work albeit its imperfection. I am >>> sure you could gather something there. My motivation to spread this notion >>> of info-resurrection comes from my realization that for this procedure to be >>> practical and instrumental, it has to gather some social and memetic >>> spreading. I will be thankful if you can issue more concrete remarks to >>> be answered. > > Russell Wallace: >> Why does it have to gather any such thing? You're just talking about text, >> pictures, sound and video, which we already have the technology to store. But all these things will help fix who you are now. This problem has been discussed in cryonics circles for decades. Fred and Linda Chamberlain used to offer a service in which one is interviewed at length on camera. When you're revived---or uploaded---all this information can be extremely important in getting "you" right. >> Just get a nice big chunk of web space and start uploading everything about >> yourself (and whoever you want to preserve who will consent to such) that >> you can get hold of. Lead by example. Yes, it's a start. And for all I know David is going beyond this somehow. But certainly all the records that you can leave behind that help specify your identity are useful. Slawomir (Heartland) writes > I usually file these kinds of "info-ressurection" ideas under "SBA" (suicide by > abstraction). Just take a picture of yourself and keep a diary - it's the true > essence of immortality! :-) Yes, it *is* just suicide unless an actual causal process is reconstituted and given runtime. The pictures and data alone (of course) experience nothing. We don't differ with you about the importance of *process*. Our only difference with you appears to be that any interruption of process or any duplication destroys (so far as you see it) your identity. As for me, I want to be *both* unfrozen and uploaded. The more places I run the better. Lee From fauxever at sprynet.com Sun Nov 5 03:44:42 2006 From: fauxever at sprynet.com (Olga Bourlin) Date: Sat, 4 Nov 2006 19:44:42 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] it's all understandable, except References: <20061105013219.90607.qmail@web51615.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <20ef01c7008c$baa95730$6600a8c0@brainiac> From: "Al Brooks" Sent: Saturday, November 04, 2006 5:32 PM > Yes, and it could be America is too large for the > problem to be solved, it can only perhaps be lessened. > What I wonder is: can it be one reason student > performance is overall pretty low is because teachers > and administrators not only inflate grades but also > don't want to flunk ethnic students? I don't know how relevant this is in 2006 - but when I was an "ethnic" student back in the late 1950s (I was an immigrant, and had just spent my first two school years in Rio de Janeiro, only knowing how to speak Portuguese and Russian when I arrived in the USA), I was surprised at how everyone in our American grammar school classes simply went on to the next grade - whether or not they could read, spell, do arithmetic, or behave - and as I remember it, there was nothing "ethnic" about the students in my class who were the laggards (I have a visual memory of them to this day ...). The school I attended in Rio was much stricter, and much, much more advanced in terms of scholastics - I was doing long division and multiplication, until I came to America ... when kids my age had barely gotten into long addition. I was also surprised that schools in America taught art - to me, it was "playtime" not school (I wasn't - and am not - complaining about this - just pointing out the differences in my early school experiences). For all I know, schools in Rio have become more like North American schools now ... but when I went, it was like "military school" time - we wore uniforms, and unambiguous class rankings ... and the #1 student had to give up his or her "#1 medal" to another student if they got bested by another student in the class during the school year - the report cards we got several times during the year showed one's ranking, and that was that. In Rio, it seemed like almost half my first grade class had to repeat that class - and I remember seeing rather tall boys in some of the classes (indicating to me they were put back once or twice or ...?). Olga (ahem ... to this day, possessor of two #1 medals with Brazilian flag colors ...(lol!)) From lcorbin at rawbw.com Sun Nov 5 04:14:19 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Sat, 4 Nov 2006 20:14:19 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] all that concerns me is the future of education References: <20061105001850.59776.qmail@web51603.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <062801c70091$02bb8490$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Al Brooks writes > Certain clueless young men (do you remember clearly how you felt at age 18?) > are strongly pressured in many ways including via school, a certain number of > male youths are if not manipulated then at least severely pressured into proving > their old-fashioned manhood by joining the Service. Without such idealism, sacrifice, and patriotism there would not be free, western nations for you to express such unappreciative sentiments! Would it have been "foolisth" to have followed Washington at Valley Forge? Foolish to have landed on the shores of Guadalcanal? From the perspective of a majority on this list---alas---the answer is probably "yes". They're interested in saving their own skins (which is highly commendable) but not interested in doing anything whatsoever for the survival of their group or tribe. > When you think about it, unless someone is subliminally pressured why > would they risk not only being shot and blown up in combat, but also risk ... Why would they? Because groups that did not contain such individuals, cultures that could not or did not foster such attitudes, didn't survive. Oh, sure, you can point to modern Scandinavia and find any sort of example. But they won't be around for very much longer, as has been well-discussed here. > But to take off the amateur psychology hat, all that really concerns me is > the future of education, can it be substantially improved? I'm telling you that it won't matter if it is or not! You could spend a million dollars per year educating someone with an IQ of 90 and you still end up with someone with an IQ of 95 or so. > As regards K-12, there could possibly be a fear of de-linking the races, > if students were held more accountable for improving their performance > the gap in performance between the races/ethnicities might become more > pronounced. Sure, that's part of it, but only part of it. Even in Minnesota the average IQ of white people is only 105. But when it's 95 in a few decades, the situation will simply be worse. > This might sound as far out a theory as severe pressures, including lack > of education, causing youths to join the Service, The services simply don't accept people with IQs less that 80. And for each of us who is above 120, remember, there is one who is less than 80. Moreover, the services are much more racially integrated than society at large; young men and women there mix freely while their counterparts on college campuses self-segregate. Just visit your local college or university and go into commons or cafeteria room to see what I mean. Lee From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Sun Nov 5 04:26:13 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Sat, 4 Nov 2006 23:26:13 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Pure Gossip: Who will Anders marry? In-Reply-To: <8CF6A92CB628444FB3C757618CD2803901C47E01@exbe1.cmpcntr.tc.trincoll.edu> References: <8CF6A92CB628444FB3C757618CD2803901C47E01@exbe1.cmpcntr.tc.trincoll.edu> Message-ID: On 11/4/06, Hughes, James J. wrote: > > Perhaps, Robert, to get the ball rolling, you should tell us your sexual > preference, mating behavior and breeding pattern just to get the ball > rolling. Ok, to lay it all out my background is hetero, am oriented towards someone who would accept me for who I am and support that. My best experiences to date seem to indicate that a feminine complement for my perspective has merit. I have rarely had men come "on to me" and been uninterested relative to partnerships with women. To the best of my knowledge I am XY. But I did live in NYC for a number of years in such a time when being "in the closet" vs."out of the closet" were hot topics. So one could presume I have more awareness of or sensitivity to such topics. One could also ask from a transhumanist perspective.. Who can Anders trust? (Science may not be the universal answer and one should know when it is failing) Who would contribute to "post-Anders"? (And how should one do so?) There are various lines upon which one would take this apart. My hat is off to Anders (seriously) for potentially being a subject of the experiment. Robert -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From russell.wallace at gmail.com Sun Nov 5 04:43:09 2006 From: russell.wallace at gmail.com (Russell Wallace) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 04:43:09 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] the self identity quest - reply to Jef In-Reply-To: <061f01c7008e$e6388bd0$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> References: <8d71341e0611041618y5a6dd9a3n2f57056c71a8a34d@mail.gmail.com> <061f01c7008e$e6388bd0$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: <8d71341e0611042043k39f677b0yce03ab55f9907055@mail.gmail.com> I'll add that while I still don't believe you'll get enough detail to constitute personal immortality, this idea does have the virtue that you can do it incrementally. Start now with all the text, video, audio etc you can create. Add information as it becomes available. When personal DNA sequencing becomes affordable, do that and add the sequence. Get a brain scan at highest available resolution (even if not close to uploading-grade) and put that on the site. When higher resolution becomes available, get another one. Etc. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From hkhenson at rogers.com Sun Nov 5 04:50:32 2006 From: hkhenson at rogers.com (Keith Henson) Date: Sat, 04 Nov 2006 23:50:32 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] the self identity quest (2) Message-ID: <5.1.0.14.0.20061104235018.03c06b10@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> At 11:02 AM 11/4/2006 -0800, you wrote: >David wrote: > > > I think you, and most transhumanist, > >By the way, I consider myself more a humanist than a transhumanist, but >the difference is subtle. Perhaps it is today, but I can remember back in the mid 1980s when Alcor had a presence at a Humanist convention in San Jose. We were tossed out at the request of the main speaker. Snip Re the rest of this post, I discussed "info-resurrection" with (or in the context of) Hans Moravec and cryonics. The quality control problem is so bad that I expressed extreme doubt anyone would attempt such a thing. I looked for it, but no luck. Perhaps it was on the old Extropy mailing list. As I recall, I talked about using all the available information to simulate Hans Moravec and the world around him to the point he wrote _Mind Children_--discarding the versions that did not generate the manuscript word for word. I proposed that you would have to discard a lot of versions, and expressed hope that the discard process would not be painful. The conclusion was that cryonics was much less trouble. Keith Henson From hkhenson at rogers.com Sun Nov 5 04:35:41 2006 From: hkhenson at rogers.com (Keith Henson) Date: Sat, 04 Nov 2006 23:35:41 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Edge: Thank Goodness! By Daniel C. Dennett In-Reply-To: <1162679909.4912.78.camel@localhost.localdomain> References: <5.1.0.14.0.20061103224339.03c13fa8@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> <380-220061153192746796@M2W040.mail2web.com> <5.1.0.14.0.20061103224339.03c13fa8@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> Message-ID: <5.1.0.14.0.20061104231911.03f35940@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> At 02:38 PM 11/4/2006 -0800, you wrote: >On Fri, 2006-11-03 at 22:57 -0500, Keith Henson wrote: > > Besides, it's the wrong way to approach the problem. > > Ranting against epidemic disease didn't save a single life. > > What was needed was to understand what causes infectious diseases. > > People have religions like they have chicken pox. > >There are several different ways of viewing religion. If one views >religion as being infected by a set of bad memes then ranting can make a >difference if the ranting has an impact on the bad memes. For reasons I don't completely understand, but are rooted in the stone age, I don't expect ranting against religions to have a positive effect and it might well be counter productive, switching off rational thought by mechanisms that originated in wars between hunter gatherer bands. >Consider the >decline of infectious disease with the advent of better sanitation. >Dennett, Dawkins, Harris and others are hopefully causing a more >critical focus on the memes associated with religion. You might note that better sanitation memes are an outgrowth of *understanding* infectious disease, particularly what *causes* it. Ranting against religions might be really effective if religions were understood to the level we understand infectious disease. As it is, what this crew is doing is like ranting against fevers without the least understanding of what causes fevers. I have been doing a bit of ranting on this subject myself on the Harris page. http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/20060916_sam_harris_rottweiler_barks/ I can transplant it here if you want. Frankly I suspect that if people understood the origin of the human capacity for religions they would be horrified. Best wishes and give my best to the Silicon Valley crew. Keith From iamgoddard at yahoo.com Sun Nov 5 04:34:08 2006 From: iamgoddard at yahoo.com (Ian Goddard) Date: Sat, 4 Nov 2006 20:34:08 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Post-Carbon Survival? Message-ID: <20061105043408.32971.qmail@web52606.mail.yahoo.com> Earlier today I was at a figure-drawing session and noticed someone's sketch of the model's face that bore a stunning resemblance to her! It was so good that at some abstract level not only did it seem as if the artist had captured her likeness, but that he'd captured 'her' -- There *she* is! The neural substrates of that sense of artistic 'capture' may be output of a pattern-recognition function that maps perceived patterns to conceived identities. In other words, we naturally associate pattern with identity, perhaps even more than we associate raw physical matter with identity. As such, even charcoal smeared on paper can suddenly 'capture' a flesh-and-blood human identity... but *only* if the charcoal has been placed in the right pattern. This then raises the question: In what sense is 'pattern' real? That question seems to underlie questions arising from the hypothesis of post-carbon survival. Would a copy of me merely capture my identity in the way a charcoal sketch captures a model? It's my sense that both forms of 'capture' are just the output of neural pattern-recognition functions mapping patterns to identities *in the minds of those thinking about self-copies*. Likewise, I suspect that recognition of one's own identity is also nothing more than such output. In short, I suspect that the illusion of 'self' underlies an illusion of 'self-copy'. ~Ian http://iangoddard.net "Our greatest illusion is to believe that we are what we think ourselves to be." -- Henri Amiel ____________________________________________________________________________________ Get your email and see which of your friends are online - Right on the New Yahoo.com (http://www.yahoo.com/preview) __________________________________________________________________________________________ Check out the New Yahoo! Mail - Fire up a more powerful email and get things done faster. (http://advision.webevents.yahoo.com/mailbeta) From kerry_prez at yahoo.com Sun Nov 5 05:58:43 2006 From: kerry_prez at yahoo.com (Al Brooks) Date: Sat, 4 Nov 2006 21:58:43 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] here's how complicated it is Message-ID: <20061105055843.98856.qmail@web51605.mail.yahoo.com> Lee, your pessimism is probably justified. Here's how complicated it is: when minority students are flunked, their families and activists often blame not students and schools but the larger society for oppressing the students into flunking classes/sometimes dropping out. So the dilemma is: if academic standards are raised and grade inflation is reduced then not infrequently the students in question, their families, and demogogic activists blame society; But if the status quo is retained many students, many families, and all taxpayers bear the consequences. ____________________________________________________________________________________ Everyone is raving about the all-new Yahoo! Mail (http://advision.webevents.yahoo.com/mailbeta/) From lcorbin at rawbw.com Sun Nov 5 07:38:07 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Sat, 4 Nov 2006 23:38:07 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] here's how complicated it is References: <20061105055843.98856.qmail@web51605.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <065101c700ad$61831030$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Al writes > Here's how > complicated it is: when minority students are flunked, > their families and activists often blame not students > and schools but the larger society for oppressing the > students into flunking classes/sometimes dropping out. > So the dilemma is: if academic standards are raised > and grade inflation is reduced then not infrequently > the students in question, their families, and > demogogic activists blame society; Here is my solution: segregation. Segregation today, segregation tomorrow, and segregation forever. Right now in California, everyone needs segregating: because the white kids can't keep up with the Asians, and many of them conclude that math, English, and science are for smart kids, not them. As the whites can't keep up with the Asians, the Hispanics can't keep up with the whites, and the blacks can't keep up with the hispanics, so we ought to go back to... yes, segregation. Segregation of the sexes would also keep more girls going in math and science. But last time someone suggested the "today, tomorrow, and forever" formula, he ended up getting shot and spending the rest of his life in a wheelchair! Lee From sentience at pobox.com Sun Nov 5 07:43:08 2006 From: sentience at pobox.com (Eliezer S. Yudkowsky) Date: Sat, 04 Nov 2006 23:43:08 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] it's all understandable, except In-Reply-To: <05ec01c7008a$ab914660$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> References: <638d4e150611041654g5d25a025q7aba36ddbfd4e25e@mail.gmail.com><20061105013219.90607.qmail@web51615.mail.yahoo.com> <638d4e150611041749n1a3c2907xd32d00ff60a11df6@mail.gmail.com> <05ec01c7008a$ab914660$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: <454D960C.2020504@pobox.com> Lee Corbin wrote: > > The schools in the Santa Clara Valley and Fremont here in northern > California, I do know from personal experience are doing excellent > jobs with the brightest kids. (There are some unfortunate counter- > examples: the Palo Alto high school district has been taken over by > some levellers who have taken the pressure off the brightest kids to > such an extent that parents I know have withdrawn their kids and are > sending them to private schools. One teaching math spot remains > open because the primary job qualification is that the teacher be black. > The main focus (goal) in that high school district now---I kid you not > ---to have everyone perform at the same level insofar as it is possible.) Current in-house SIAI research personnel: Marcello Herreshoff - recently graduated from Gunn high school, in the Palo Alto district. If they took any pressure off him to perform, it sure doesn't show. Eliezer Yudkowsky - gave up on the dying American educational system after completing eighth grade. Went to a private religious school for K-8. Would things have gone differently if I'd been in Palo Alto with decently atheist parents? Maybe, but in that case I probably wouldn't be me. Sometimes the System works. Sometimes it doesn't. -- Eliezer S. Yudkowsky http://singinst.org/ Research Fellow, Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence From davidishalom1 at gmail.com Sun Nov 5 08:36:38 2006 From: davidishalom1 at gmail.com (david ish shalom) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 10:36:38 +0200 Subject: [extropy-chat] Effective relationships and self identity Message-ID: Jef Allbright" wrote: Might it be that the most effective relationship structure in terms of cost/benefit might be the triad? I'm not talking about polyamory or mriage ? trois but rather a stable, committed triadic relationship between three individuals in any combination of genders. Jef Allbright write: "I recognize that this would require individuals of greater than average self-awareness to avoid destructive two-against-one dynamics. I also recognize that nature settled on binary relationships in most cases, but I think human culture represents a more highly developed phase that may support and reward more highly developed relationship structures at various scales. The advantages I see are significantly increased synergies, built-in tie-breaking, and possibly an inherent 3D structural stability similar to that of a tetrahedron over a planar object. Comments?" Amazing what you say Jef, i am married to an Indian woman, I love here,a few months ago i came to live in Israel and have new lover, my wife is supposed to come soon to live with me, and i intend and hope to maintain a trio, which i "naturally" there are some personal and social difficulties, especially in conservative Jerusalem, yet some personal advantages, but your claim is encouraging, will you elaborate please ? secondly to the issue of self identity: who wrote this text about Alice changing life? i find it very illuminating to the issue of huge changes in the self connectedness component, yet keeping the self identity intact to the effect that young Alice survive in old Alice, which strongly support our ability to capture the identity critical information now, while our attention is mainly diverted to our self transformation content. i will with your permission integrate that text in my website http://davidishalom1.googlepages.com/home -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From pgptag at gmail.com Sun Nov 5 09:34:37 2006 From: pgptag at gmail.com (Giu1i0 Pri5c0) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 10:34:37 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] Pure Gossip: Who will Anders marry? In-Reply-To: <8CF6A92CB628444FB3C757618CD2803901C47E01@exbe1.cmpcntr.tc.trincoll.edu> References: <8CF6A92CB628444FB3C757618CD2803901C47E01@exbe1.cmpcntr.tc.trincoll.edu> Message-ID: <470a3c520611050134x1584793byf871bd54e84c60c2@mail.gmail.com> So let's plan a special session at Chicago dedicated to finding a girlfriend, boyfriend, aifriend, vrfriend or whateverfriend for Anders! But on second thought, I believe he is quite able to manage on his own. G. On 11/4/06, Hughes, James J. wrote: > As to finding places to gossip, bring it to the Transvision conferences. > Next one will be in Chicago July 26-28, 2007, with Kurzweil and de Grey > as keynotes. > > ------------------------ > James Hughes Ph.D From davidishalom1 at gmail.com Sun Nov 5 09:53:11 2006 From: davidishalom1 at gmail.com (david ish shalom) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 11:53:11 +0200 Subject: [extropy-chat] the self identity quest - reply to Russel Wallace Message-ID: ** **Russel Wallace write: "*Why does it have to gather any such thing? You're just talking about text, pictures, sound and video, which we already have the technology to store. Just get a nice big chunk of web space and start uploading everything about yourself (and whoever you want to preserve who will consent to such) that you can get hold of. Lead by example. * * **Thank you Russell Wallace, "Lead by example" is very good advice Yet, for info-resurrection to actually happen, remembering the gap between now and emergence of conscious artificial intelligence, i may in the meantime disintegrate physically, I need the cooperation of future conscious artificial intelligences, and this can be achieved if we establish say an ongoing organization or installation, like cryonics installations but for info-reanimation. we need institutionalized project for that, we need some format acceptance, at least among transhumanist, we need to widespread the meme for effective future implementation; and we need good inspirations like yours, Jef Albright and Lee Corbin to begin with, that already contributed to this issue, mind storming, inspiration, support, long term responsibility, we are still social creatures aren't we? and even the info-resurrected person's rights. and this is the logic behind the info-Resurrection project, it's a job that can't be achieved alone*. *Now as for your "if you haven't got a single person on extropy-chat of all places to believe this literally constitutes personal survival, you won't get anyone anywhere to believe it :)" frankly, I have got some positive personal messages in the last two days, after posting here, which is encouraging* *enough. Now as for your advice to* "*You're better off to put the spin that it's metaphorical immortality through one's works - that's a familiar enough concept. Sort of the digital equivalent of getting a statue of yourself. But the thing about statues is, they get done because people think they look cool. **So go ahead and create a digital monument to yourself, and do it in such a way that it looks cool - nice site layout and suchlike. Then point people to it and say "wouldn't you like one of these for yourself?" I find this a inspirative idea, and it surely encourages me and hopefully others to implement your advice, yet with some delays due to my incapability in web-building, but I am going to improve my technical skills in that respect and personally invest in this idea. Nevertheless, when more mature digital simulation of persons will be achieved in the cyberspace, due to more advanced GAI, next decade or so, it will be easy for everyone to digitally simulate himself/herself with so many enhancement, like me appearing there and being there in the cyberspace ? not yet conscious but very convincing and vivid and young, still me but so much more loving and charismatic and handsome and more intelligent simulation of myself. This vivid simulation tech will immensely contribute to this info-resurrection meme and strategy, I can't wait, but we need patience for the GAI to emerge.* -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From russell.wallace at gmail.com Sun Nov 5 10:17:54 2006 From: russell.wallace at gmail.com (Russell Wallace) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 10:17:54 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] the self identity quest - reply to Russel Wallace In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <8d71341e0611050217g4cbea713k9e1bd0666d52cd3f@mail.gmail.com> On 11/5/06, david ish shalom wrote: > *Now as for your " if you haven't got a single person on extropy-chat of > all places > to believe this literally constitutes personal survival, you won't get > anyone anywhere to believe it :)" frankly, I have got some positive > personal messages in the last two days, after posting here, which is > encouraging* *enough.* > Great! Good luck with progress on your idea, then. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Sun Nov 5 10:32:19 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 05:32:19 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Survival tangent. In-Reply-To: <20061105030322.68246.qmail@web52611.mail.yahoo.com> References: <20061105030322.68246.qmail@web52611.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: On 11/4/06, Ian Goddard wrote: > I suspect one day a copy of a brain could be made, > containing a synthetic sentient being. And it's likely > that for the copy, it recalls the life of the original > as if it where its own. But I see no reason to assume > that the self of the original brain would be somehow > connected to its copy. The copy brain would just be > someone else out there. So if 'I' was uploaded just > before I died, it would only ensure that there'd be > someone else who accesses a database (ie, memory) that > implies they were me. But for me, I'd be as dead as > I'd be without the upload. ~Ian > Interesting. Someone maintaining nonidentity. Of course I'll fall into the camp that 1 = 1 = 1 = 1... at least for the instant that the copies are activated. I would be interested in whether there are others who are operating within this framework. (An interesting "aside" question might be whether such a view would dictate a different agenda in the current "real" world -- given that copying is only a potential and not a reality. And taking this in a completely different direction given recent points -- *how* do I explain this to my nephews (who are currently < 6 y.o). Robert -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From russell.wallace at gmail.com Sun Nov 5 11:02:31 2006 From: russell.wallace at gmail.com (Russell Wallace) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 11:02:31 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Computer animation In-Reply-To: <01e701c7008a$76d9a390$0200a8c0@Nano> References: <01e701c7008a$76d9a390$0200a8c0@Nano> Message-ID: <8d71341e0611050302p320e5d37p3a152efb0a65d944@mail.gmail.com> I like it! Vote sent. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Sun Nov 5 11:12:28 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 06:12:28 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] the self identity quest - reply to Russel Wallace In-Reply-To: <8d71341e0611050217g4cbea713k9e1bd0666d52cd3f@mail.gmail.com> References: <8d71341e0611050217g4cbea713k9e1bd0666d52cd3f@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On 11/5/06, Russell Wallace wrote: > > On 11/5/06, david ish shalom wrote: > > > *Now as for your " if you haven't got a single person on extropy-chat > > of all places to believe this literally constitutes personal survival, you > > won't get anyone anywhere to believe it :)" frankly, I have got some > > positive personal messages in the last two days, after posting here, > > which is encouraging* *enough.* > > > Now, now, now.. At the risk of opening myself up to lord knows what objections I am willing to go on record as stating that info-identity is a legitimate process of preserving oneself. Most people considering "identity" are doing so in an information constrained world (i.e. it is impossible to copy oneself). But this will not always be the case. A copy of information imprinted on 3 lbs of wet matter will not always be "unique". So David's choice of selling point aside one has to deal with 1 = 1 = 1... and you can apply it to the left of or to the right of as selling points but you still have to get back to "is it identical". I have no problem with people treating copies of Robert as if they were Robert. I would like to hear comments from those who would object to Robert surrogates (copies) filling in for me. In particular I would like to know *who* would be so presumptuous as to claim knowing when I have been replaced by one of my copies and how they would know such. 1 = 1 = 1 = 1 (be it on the left or the right) R. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From velvethum at hotmail.com Sun Nov 5 12:40:28 2006 From: velvethum at hotmail.com (Heartland) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 07:40:28 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Survival tangent. References: <20061102235019.83835.qmail@web37409.mail.mud.yahoo.com> <006401c70040$3a1acb90$bb084e0c@MyComputer> Message-ID: On 11/4/06, Ian Goddard wrote: > I suspect one day a copy of a brain could be made, > containing a synthetic sentient being. And it's likely > that for the copy, it recalls the life of the original > as if it where its own. But I see no reason to assume > that the self of the original brain would be somehow > connected to its copy. The copy brain would just be > someone else out there. So if 'I' was uploaded just > before I died, it would only ensure that there'd be > someone else who accesses a database (ie, memory) that > implies they were me. But for me, I'd be as dead as > I'd be without the upload. ~Ian Robert Bradbury: "Interesting. Someone maintaining nonidentity. Of course I'll fall into the camp that 1 = 1 = 1 = 1... at least for the instant that the copies are activated. I would be interested in whether there are others who are operating within this framework." Ian is 100% correct. Slawomir From James.Hughes at trincoll.edu Sun Nov 5 13:48:41 2006 From: James.Hughes at trincoll.edu (Hughes, James J.) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 08:48:41 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Pure Gossip: Who will Anders marry? Message-ID: <8CF6A92CB628444FB3C757618CD2803901C47E23@exbe1.cmpcntr.tc.trincoll.edu> > So let's plan a special session at Chicago dedicated to > finding a girlfriend, boyfriend, aifriend, vrfriend or > whateverfriend for Anders! Since he's a fan of market-based solutions perhaps we could auction him off? Surely the person willing to pay the most for him is the person who loves him the most, and what more can a man want than the love of a devoted consumer? J. From amara at amara.com Sun Nov 5 13:52:49 2006 From: amara at amara.com (Amara Graps) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 05:52:49 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] extropian grandchildren (was: it's all understandable, except) Message-ID: Eugene: >It would be so ironic if demographics and education would shoot down our >chance for Singularity within the narrow launch horizon. If we mess it >up real good this time, our grandchildren might not have an opportunity >for another shot. If I may interject ... And Eugene is interested indeed in children's education and his grandchildren. His baby boy, Laurin Leitl, was born 2 November. Mother Kiki and little Laurin are happy and healthy. Amara (godmother) From mbb386 at main.nc.us Sun Nov 5 14:41:54 2006 From: mbb386 at main.nc.us (MB) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 09:41:54 -0500 (EST) Subject: [extropy-chat] extropian grandchildren (was: it's all understandable, except) In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <33593.72.236.103.23.1162737714.squirrel@main.nc.us> > > And Eugene is interested indeed in children's education and his grandchildren. > His baby boy, Laurin Leitl, was born 2 November. Mother Kiki and little > Laurin are happy and healthy. > Very good news! Congratulations all 'round. Amara, you will be a *fine* godmother! :) Regards, MB From brentn at freeshell.org Sun Nov 5 14:54:16 2006 From: brentn at freeshell.org (Brent Neal) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 09:54:16 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] extropian grandchildren (was: it's all understandable, except) In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On Nov 5, 2006, at 8:52, Amara Graps wrote: > Eugene: >> It would be so ironic if demographics and education would shoot >> down our >> chance for Singularity within the narrow launch horizon. If we >> mess it >> up real good this time, our grandchildren might not have an >> opportunity >> for another shot. > > If I may interject ... > > And Eugene is interested indeed in children's education and his > grandchildren. > His baby boy, Laurin Leitl, was born 2 November. Mother Kiki and > little > Laurin are happy and healthy. > Congratulations and well-wishes to the whole family! Brent -- Brent Neal Geek of all Trades http://brentn.freeshell.org "Specialization is for insects" -- Robert A. Heinlein From lcorbin at rawbw.com Sun Nov 5 14:57:50 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 06:57:50 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] it's all understandable, except References: <638d4e150611041654g5d25a025q7aba36ddbfd4e25e@mail.gmail.com><20061105013219.90607.qmail@web51615.mail.yahoo.com> <638d4e150611041749n1a3c2907xd32d00ff60a11df6@mail.gmail.com><05ec01c7008a$ab914660$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <454D960C.2020504@pobox.com> Message-ID: <066001c700ea$fb396b60$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Eliezer writes > Lee Corbin wrote: >> >> The schools in the Santa Clara Valley and Fremont here in northern >> California, I do know from personal experience are doing excellent >> jobs with the brightest kids. (There are some unfortunate counter- >> examples: the Palo Alto high school district has been taken over by >> some levellers who have taken the pressure off the brightest kids to >> such an extent that parents I know have withdrawn their kids and are >> sending them to private schools. One teaching math spot remains >> open because the primary job qualification is that the teacher be black. >> The main focus (goal) in that high school district now---I kid you not >> ---to have everyone perform at the same level insofar as it is possible.) > > Current in-house SIAI research personnel: > > Marcello Herreshoff - recently graduated from Gunn high school, in the > Palo Alto district. If they took any pressure off him to perform, it > sure doesn't show. I would not expect it to! Not at all, even if when he was at Gunn standards had fallen. (And it's not Gunn I was talking about; my data is from another one.) You missed my point, which was my fault: I should have stressed this: the very brightest (the ones that I complain are too few) make out well NO MATTER WHAT. You can't wreck them. It's just sad when they can coast their last few years in the school system, and the parents (of these very few) often won't stand for it. > Eliezer Yudkowsky - gave up on the dying American educational system > after completing eighth grade. Went to a private religious school for > K-8. Would things have gone differently if I'd been in Palo Alto with > decently atheist parents? I don't think that it would have made any big difference; you'd be slightly ahead of where you are or very slightly behind, that's all. Lee From davidishalom1 at gmail.com Sun Nov 5 15:50:08 2006 From: davidishalom1 at gmail.com (david ish shalom) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 17:50:08 +0200 Subject: [extropy-chat] The self-identity quest reply to Wallace, Corbin .. Message-ID: "Russell Wallace write: I'll add that while I still don't believe you'll get enough detail to constitute personal immortality, this idea does have the virtue that you can do it incrementally. Start now with all the text, video, audio etc you can create. Add information as it becomes available. When personal DNAn sequencing becomes affordable, do that and add the sequence. Get a brain scan at highest available resolution (even if not close to uploading-grade)and put that on the site. When higher resolution becomes available, get another one. Etc" David reply: Russel what you say is important and also remember that in ten years +- vivid and convincing simulation of real people in the cyber space will be available and people will tend to simulate themselves and to improve that simulations with time, until when conscious personalized AI will emerge, that high fidelity simulations, enhanced virtual humans, and at the same time retain all the relevant information of their past self, these people will wake up, even if their original has already demised, to be the first info-survived personalities, the first info-resurrected ones. I argue that these persons with their unimaginable capabilities and powers will have to exercise high moral code, much higher than in our present Darwinian stage, for the safety and wellbeing of old humanity and the imminent singularity. more about it in http://davidishalom1.googlepages.com/home Lee Corbin write in his article Duplicates are Self , 1988 http://www.leecorbin.com/dupproof.html "Why is it easy to believe that someone could be at the same place at two different times, but very hard to believe that someone could be at the same time in two different places? ..... So why do they always find "being in two places at the same time" extraordinarily counter-intuitive? ? "They will claim, for example, that minor differences accumulated in the last minute are crucial, conveniently forgetting that the remote duplicate is "closer" to them than is the person they were yesterday."?"but that night a merging process copies 'your' memories of the day into 'his' brain and 'his' memories into 'yours' David Ish-Shalom reply: the reductionist theories of the self assume that If A is the original person and B is his duplicate, A's survival in B is maintained as long as they are not mutually existent! Yet, this condition of not being mutually existent for survival to take place, will not necessarily be required in the future, since then, various manifestations of the same person at the same time, like cyborg entities, virtual forms, forglet forms, and nano-engineered manifestation and other forms, does not impede these selves being one and the same person, as long as these various manifestations are synchronously info-connected and thus keeping the same diachronic identity. Synchronous connection is achieved when human and machines *are online broad band, connected such as all the various experiences are online recalled and merged to all of them at the same time or even once a day as you mention. This support your view, in the future we will be able to be one and many at the same time, as long as we are synchronously connected*. Lee writes: "Yes, that's necessary, but it may not be sufficient. My solution, which I've said quite a few times on this list but which you probably have not heard, is to give previous versions of yourself ample runtime. ?..But there is also a strong psychological motivation: just why will future versions of you bother running such an ancient and decrepit fetal version of themselves? The answer is, as I call it, "the logic of cryonics". Namely, we reanimate those who are frozen so that when the time comes we are ourselves reanimated. It proceeds by (mathematical) induction. Your vast future self (who hardly resembles you but who has the most power) will see this logic, and if he (it) evilly denies you runtime, then by the same logic he'll be denied runtime by even more advanced versions. So we must vigorously push this meme: All previous versions---that we can fix or capture---are to get runtime so long into the future as we or our future versions shall live." David reply: Basically I agree with you about that point and even suggest something similar in my methodology of reanimation, to firstly reanimate the old selfhood ? enough runtime - but with built-in drive to shortly after second wake-up to launch the transformation project thus retaining securely most of the past experience, abilities and limitation, but as well strongly facilitating the most important augmentation project to turn into post humans.** -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From spike66 at comcast.net Sun Nov 5 16:03:04 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 08:03:04 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Effective relationships and self identity In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <200611051601.kA5G1BWi019467@andromeda.ziaspace.com> bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of david ish shalom Subject: [extropy-chat] Effective relationships and self identity . ... i am married to an Indian woman, I love here,a few months ago i came to live in Israel and have new lover, my wife is supposed to come soon to live with me, and i intend and hope to maintain a trio... David are your wife and your sweetheart as enthusiastic about this arrangement as you are? Often when presented with the proposed arrangement, the Mrs. Davids of this world counter-propose bringing in another man for your sweetheart, and still another man to entertain Mrs David during the day while you go off to work to support the five of you. ... "naturally" there are some personal and social difficulties... Ja "naturally", but your wife will surely help with these. She will have surprisingly little difficulty finding two additional men, and a second job for you to cover the increased expenses. Honest to jahweh, David, I would be very surprised if the ladies go for this notion. Even really rich guys can seldom pull it off. But if you work it out, congratulations. Do report back. Even if not, do report back anyway. We want to hear what your Indian wife hit you with when you suggested it. spike From pgptag at gmail.com Sun Nov 5 16:35:23 2006 From: pgptag at gmail.com (Giu1i0 Pri5c0) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 17:35:23 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] extropian grandchildren (was: it's all understandable, except) In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <470a3c520611050835j5264a3d1v78fc00dcaf1d9832@mail.gmail.com> CONGRATULATIONS EUGEN!!!!! G. On 11/5/06, Amara Graps wrote: > Eugene: > >It would be so ironic if demographics and education would shoot down our > >chance for Singularity within the narrow launch horizon. If we mess it > >up real good this time, our grandchildren might not have an opportunity > >for another shot. > > If I may interject ... > > And Eugene is interested indeed in children's education and his grandchildren. > His baby boy, Laurin Leitl, was born 2 November. Mother Kiki and little > Laurin are happy and healthy. > > Amara > (godmother) From jef at jefallbright.net Sun Nov 5 17:07:03 2006 From: jef at jefallbright.net (Jef Allbright) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 09:07:03 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Effective relationships and self identity In-Reply-To: Message-ID: david ish shalom wrote: > Jef Allbright" wrote: >> Might it be that the most effective >> relationship structure in terms of cost/benefit might be the triad? >> I'm not talking about polyamory or mriage ? trois but rather a >> stable, committed triadic relationship between three individuals >> in any combination of genders. > > Amazing what you say Jef, i am married to an Indian woman, I love > here,a few months ago i came to live in Israel and have new lover, > my wife is supposed to come soon to live with me, and i intend and > hope to maintain a trio, which i "naturally" there are some personal > and social difficulties, especially in conservative Jerusalem, yet > some personal advantages, but your claim is encouraging, will you > elaborate please ? David, when I suggested that triadic relationships might provide inherent advantages, I hinted (strongly, I thought), but did not make fully make explicit, that I thought this form might rise to predominance within a more highly developed (and more highly competitive) culture with individuals possessing a higher degree of awareness than the present situation. As Keith Henson mentioned, evolutionary psychology provides a good basis for understanding much of the dynamics of human relationships at the individual and group level. There are strong reasons why such relationships are not stable within the social context. [Note to Keith: I studied Cosmidies and Toobey and others several years ago, but thanks anyway for the suggestion. ;-)] In your particular case, I wish you luck maintaining your relationship(s). Perhaps you and your partners should read Heinlein for inspiration. Note that a high degree of openess and honesty is recommended, but rarely achieved over the course. > secondly to the issue of self identity: who wrote this text about > Alice changing life? i find it very illuminating to the issue of > huge changes in the self connectedness component, yet keeping the > self identity intact to the effect that young Alice survive in old > Alice, which strongly support our ability to capture the identity > critical information now, while our attention is mainly diverted to > our self transformation content. i will with your permission > integrate that text in my website http://davidishalom1.googlepages.com/home I wrote that little series of vignettes to highlight an internal contradiction in a certain mode of thinking about self-identity, and to prepare the way for a more encompassing understanding that provides a coherent basis for thinking about new personal freedoms and new issues of moral and legal responsibility with the arrival of radical new technological capabilities. Since this project is not yet complete, it might be best if you hold off on quoting the first part of my argument since you may not agree with the next part. In general, I support your right to refer to my writing or anyone else's writing on the web as long as authorship and original context remain clearly intact. - Jef From msd001 at gmail.com Sun Nov 5 17:08:23 2006 From: msd001 at gmail.com (Mike Dougherty) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 12:08:23 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] here's how complicated it is In-Reply-To: <065101c700ad$61831030$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> References: <20061105055843.98856.qmail@web51605.mail.yahoo.com> <065101c700ad$61831030$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: <62c14240611050908i5032dca3n78c18badec3aaabb@mail.gmail.com> On 11/5/06, Lee Corbin wrote: > > > Here is my solution: segregation. Segregation today, > segregation tomorrow, and segregation forever. > > Right now in California, everyone needs segregating: > because the white kids can't keep up with the Asians, > and many of them conclude that math, English, and > science are for smart kids, not them. As the whites can't > keep up with the Asians, the Hispanics can't keep up > with the whites, and the blacks can't keep up with the > hispanics, so we ought to go back to... yes, segregation. > Why does it have to be racist and sexist? Why can't we 'segregate' (to use your negatively overloaded term) along dimension of performance capability? There ARE white kids who are smarter than the "average" asian, so why hold them to a lower standard due to genetics? Even within a demographic, there will be natural tendencies toward excellence within specific subjects - capitalize on and enhance them. Do we really need a people to be so "well rounded" that they don't appear to be 'sharp' in any subject? Or would fostering specialization be the right course in our increasingly specialized fields of expertise? Why does a CS/Math major need X credits of history from a liberal arts school? Unless you are suggesting that someone's ethnic background or gender defines their potential.... but you wouldn't be saying that, right? -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From spike66 at comcast.net Sun Nov 5 17:18:10 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 09:18:10 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] extropian grandchildren (was: it's all understandable, except) In-Reply-To: <33593.72.236.103.23.1162737714.squirrel@main.nc.us> Message-ID: <200611051716.kA5HGSNE006105@andromeda.ziaspace.com> > bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of MB > Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] extropian grandchildren (was: it's all > understandable, except) > > > > > > And Eugene ... > > His baby boy, Laurin Leitl, was born 2 November. Mother Kiki and little > > Laurin are happy and healthy. > > Wooohooo! A most happy thing is this. Congrats Eugene and Kiki, and congratulations Laurin! For some odd reason, society has developed the habit of failing to congratulate the infant. But it is he who has successfully accomplished the hazardous transition from embryo to fetus to infant. > Amara, you will be a *fine* godmother! :) Regards, MB Wholeheartedly I agree, but we need to derive a new atheist-friendly term which eliminates the whole god thing. Nothing-mother doesn't work, nor does Evolution-parent or Nada-Nana. Backup-guardian sounds like something you would use for surge protection on your hard disk. Suggestions? spike From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Sun Nov 5 17:22:53 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 12:22:53 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] extropian grandchildren (was: it's all understandable, except) In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On 11/5/06, Amara Graps wrote: > > Eugene: > >It would be so ironic if demographics and education would shoot down our > chance for Singularity within the narrow launch horizon. If we mess it up > real good this time, our grandchildren might not have an opportunity for > another shot. We would *really* have to mess it up if this were to be a probable future tangent. If I may interject ... > > And Eugene is interested indeed in children's education and his > grandchildren. His baby boy, Laurin Leitl, was born 2 November. Mother Kiki > and little Laurin are happy and healthy. Nods of respect and acknowledgement all around. I am struck by my reaction to this information. Gee Amara gets to godmother (very cool (my godmother wasn't a dust astrophysicist) but that isn't the right word to contain my complex mixture of admiration and perhaps jealousy), Gee, Spike and now Eugen are making babies (one way or another). Shit, I'm going to have to teach these children and they are going to be stuck right in the middle of the singularity ramp (is this bad timing or what?). And of course if Spike is making babies and Eugen is making babies then one has to put the possibility of Eliezer or Anders making babies on the table. There are a lot of "Oh no Mr. Bill" humor lines that fall out of this but I will not go there. R. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From msd001 at gmail.com Sun Nov 5 17:26:58 2006 From: msd001 at gmail.com (Mike Dougherty) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 12:26:58 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] all that concerns me is the future of education In-Reply-To: <062801c70091$02bb8490$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> References: <20061105001850.59776.qmail@web51603.mail.yahoo.com> <062801c70091$02bb8490$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: <62c14240611050926l6a87c935p582c1dfe61c34f81@mail.gmail.com> On 11/4/06, Lee Corbin wrote: > > Moreover, the services are much more racially integrated than society at > large; young men and women there mix freely while their counterparts > on college campuses self-segregate. Just visit your local college or > university and go into commons or cafeteria room to see what I mean. > It may be that you are seeing what you want to see based on your own bias. The same could be said about a homogeneous group of white European-descendant Americans - they are likely to segregate themselves into groups of Irish, German, French, etc. Is the Caucasian element the issue? Try a large population of Indian-Americans, they'll probably self-segregate along cultural lines dependant on what district their family originated from in India. The same is probably true with a statistically valid sample of African Americans segregating themselves along regional ancestry. (for example, the cultural ideology of a South African is probably as different to an Egyptian as Mexican would be to Canadian) We learn first from our families. The concept of community can be as inclusive or divisive as you learn it to be. I have been raised with diversity and appreciate it; perhaps you have not. Even with a family, there are groups with common interests (Old/young, male/female, cousins you see frequently/those you don't, Drinkers/non, etc.) Does that make those members of your family who you choose to associate with less often at your family reunion are (in your opinion) worth less than those you do? We may actually be in agreement, but I am having difficulty with the terms you are using and how you are presenting your ideas. I hope I am misreading your intentions. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From msd001 at gmail.com Sun Nov 5 17:35:06 2006 From: msd001 at gmail.com (Mike Dougherty) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 12:35:06 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] the self identity quest - reply to Russel Wallace In-Reply-To: References: <8d71341e0611050217g4cbea713k9e1bd0666d52cd3f@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <62c14240611050935g58297fc4xd6671a16ac9dea6e@mail.gmail.com> On 11/5/06, Robert Bradbury wrote: > > I would like to hear comments from those who would object to Robert > surrogates (copies) filling in for me. In particular I would like to know > *who* would be so presumptuous as to claim knowing when I have been replaced > by one of my copies and how they would know such. > I have no idea how many copies of you have already had the audacity to post messages here. I have little interest in investigating this, so I will statistically average all the behaviors exhibited to date and assume the composite of all the posts under your email address to constitute "Robert Bradbury" - If/when I have a sufficiently detailed model to detect sufficiently non-normative posts, I may question their authenticity. Until then I will have to assume you are capable of mood swings or otherwise possess an acceptable/tolerable variance in identity model. This doesn't take any advanced technology for uploading or copy simulation - I make this analysis of posts every day :) -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From fauxever at sprynet.com Sun Nov 5 17:29:50 2006 From: fauxever at sprynet.com (Olga Bourlin) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 09:29:50 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] extropian grandchildren (was: it's allunderstandable, except) References: <200611051716.kA5HGSNE006105@andromeda.ziaspace.com> Message-ID: <001101c70100$004702b0$6600a8c0@brainiac> From: "spike" Sent: Sunday, November 05, 2006 9:18 AM >> Amara, you will be a *fine* godmother! :) Regards, MB > > Wholeheartedly I agree, but we need to derive a new atheist-friendly term > which eliminates the whole god thing. Nothing-mother doesn't work, nor > does Evolution-parent or Nada-Nana. Backup-guardian sounds like something > you would use for surge protection on your hard disk. Suggestions? Er ... Nanatech? :) ... and congratulations to Eugen, Kiki and Laurin! (big welcome to the world, Kid). Olga From george at betterhumans.com Sun Nov 5 17:53:49 2006 From: george at betterhumans.com (George Dvorsky) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 12:53:49 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Pure Gossip: Who will Anders marry? In-Reply-To: <8CF6A92CB628444FB3C757618CD2803901C47E23@exbe1.cmpcntr.tc.trincoll.edu> References: <8CF6A92CB628444FB3C757618CD2803901C47E23@exbe1.cmpcntr.tc.trincoll.edu> Message-ID: On 11/5/06, Hughes, James J. wrote: > Since he's a fan of market-based solutions perhaps we could auction him > off? Surely the person willing to pay the most for him is the person who > loves him the most, and what more can a man want than the love of a > devoted consumer? I'll start the bidding at US$10.00 ;-) Cheers, George From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Sun Nov 5 17:55:34 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 12:55:34 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] here's how complicated it is In-Reply-To: <62c14240611050908i5032dca3n78c18badec3aaabb@mail.gmail.com> References: <20061105055843.98856.qmail@web51605.mail.yahoo.com> <065101c700ad$61831030$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <62c14240611050908i5032dca3n78c18badec3aaabb@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On 11/5/06, Mike Dougherty wrote: > > On 11/5/06, Lee Corbin wrote: > > > > > > Here is my solution: segregation. Segregation today, > > segregation tomorrow, and segregation forever. > > Lee has a point. Witness recent performance in schools segregated by sex. Yep, remove the boy-girl part of the equation and both do better. Why does it have to be racist and sexist? Because it *works* -- if one removes the disparities of the playing field then it is "level". No discussion at to whether it should be perceived to be level -- it is simply level. Why can't we 'segregate' (to use your negatively overloaded term) along > dimension of performance capability? There ARE white kids who are smarter > than the "average" asian, so why hold them to a lower standard due to > genetics? [yes] And as a sweeping genealization it is derived from in the Asian culture where one *will* learn that which is inside of the box. And learn it very very well. We "westerners" do not have a good understanding of the extent to which they will master things we consider to be "fluff". Whether that will play out on top remains an open question. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From ben at goertzel.org Sun Nov 5 18:00:12 2006 From: ben at goertzel.org (Ben Goertzel) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 13:00:12 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Pure Gossip: Who will Anders marry? In-Reply-To: References: <8CF6A92CB628444FB3C757618CD2803901C47E23@exbe1.cmpcntr.tc.trincoll.edu> Message-ID: <638d4e150611051000l99be97s604ffc807c8face0@mail.gmail.com> I bid $100.00 in Novamente LLC stock ;-) On 11/5/06, George Dvorsky wrote: > On 11/5/06, Hughes, James J. wrote: > > Since he's a fan of market-based solutions perhaps we could auction him > > off? Surely the person willing to pay the most for him is the person who > > loves him the most, and what more can a man want than the love of a > > devoted consumer? > > I'll start the bidding at US$10.00 ;-) > > Cheers, > George > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > From jonkc at att.net Sun Nov 5 18:02:25 2006 From: jonkc at att.net (John K Clark) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 13:02:25 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Survival tangent. References: <20061102235019.83835.qmail@web37409.mail.mud.yahoo.com><006401c70040$3a1acb90$bb084e0c@MyComputer> Message-ID: <001901c70104$9b7bd770$450a4e0c@MyComputer> Heartland, High Priest of the Unique Atom and Sacred Original Cult Wrote: > I believe we've gone over this before and my response is still the same. Atoms. > Would you be able to implement 2 working minds with these ultracold atoms? Possibly, there is talk of using something like that in a Quantum Computer, but at any rate you could certainly use a BEC to erase the history of the atoms journey through space time that you think is so very very very important. So if atoms have no individuality they can't confer individuality to us. And you can certainly use electrons to make a mind and they can be in two places at once too, the 2 slit experiment proves it. But that was 75 years ago, just recently someone did the two-slit experiment with buckminsterfullerene and that is made of 60 carbon atoms. > does BEC cause these 3600 atoms to collapse in such a way that when you > return the energy to a normal level the closed system contains only a > single atom at 1/3600th of the initial mass of 3600 atoms? Huh, is that a Zen Koan or something? John K Clark From nlbarna at gmail.com Sun Nov 5 18:17:58 2006 From: nlbarna at gmail.com (Nathan Barna) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 12:17:58 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] Effective relationships In-Reply-To: References: <638d4e150611041307hfa88d4ia61be18a52953a44@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <761b6df90611051017y5628e19bm3c1fe9c71fba9be3@mail.gmail.com> This is reminiscent of the Pythagoreans, who also identified basic mathematical structures with elaborately qualitative ones. Jef Allbright wrote: > Speaking pragmatically, I think you're right. Now, how to justify a > tetrahedral 4-way relationship... An n-way relationship is perhaps best justified with any well-represented game that recognizes each of n participants. Unless you're really searching for something deeper. From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Sun Nov 5 18:19:16 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 13:19:16 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Pure Gossip: Who will Anders marry? In-Reply-To: References: <8CF6A92CB628444FB3C757618CD2803901C47E23@exbe1.cmpcntr.tc.trincoll.edu> Message-ID: On 11/5/06, George Dvorsky wrote: > I'll start the bidding at US$10.00 ;-) Oh now come on -- Anders is worth at least 1000x perhaps 10,000x that much on the open market. (provided one can enroll him in ones perspective). Anders' children would be a much different discussion vector. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jonkc at att.net Sun Nov 5 18:44:15 2006 From: jonkc at att.net (John K Clark) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 13:44:15 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Identity (was: Survival tangent) References: <20061102062735.57668.qmail@web52612.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <015601c7010a$6a7d5d50$450a4e0c@MyComputer> "Ian Goddard" Wrote: > the definition of 'identity' in logic matches > Leibniz's Identity of Indiscernibles. Leibniz's Identity Of Indiscernibles is the idea that if you exchange the position of two things and there is no change in the system then the two things are the same. If I place you (the copy) and the original an equal distance from the center of a symmetrical room so you see the same things and then instantly swap your bodies position with the original then neither you nor the original nor any outside observer could detect the slightest change. There was no change because although there were 2 bodies in the room there was only one person. John K Clark From lcorbin at rawbw.com Sun Nov 5 18:42:45 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 10:42:45 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Racism (was: here's how complicated it is) References: <20061105075947.28211.qmail@web51608.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <06a301c7010a$37647660$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Al writes, ----- Original Message ----- From: "Al Brooks" To: "Lee Corbin" ; "ExI chat list" Sent: Saturday, November 04, 2006 11:59 PM > We just have to make the distinction between between > overt and covert racism-- nearly everyone has covert > racist tendencies, but not to be militant about it. > Only blockheaded Marxists think we can end racism. > Academic segregation? Let's give it a try. I disagree. True racism can be eliminated, (and with sufficient rationality it is absent). True racism involves stereotypic thinking and prejudice to the extent that one cannot see the individual behind his color or ethnicity. The *truth* is very simple: one's race is an extremely small part of one's actual individuality. For example, Hirohito was Japanese all right, but he was a vast and complex human individual. There were a huge and very specific number of items that demarked him as an *individual*. Anyone who'd guess at most of this information solely based on race is simply ignorant, or blinded by prejudice ("dirty Japs"). The blockheaded Marxists you refer to, and their allies, have unfortunately had great success in redefining "racism" to include any honest notice or acknowledgment of real statistical differences between groups, alas. Lee From lcorbin at rawbw.com Sun Nov 5 18:56:47 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 10:56:47 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] here's how complicated it is References: <20061105055843.98856.qmail@web51605.mail.yahoo.com> <065101c700ad$61831030$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <62c14240611050908i5032dca3n78c18badec3aaabb@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <06ab01c7010c$5bfa8ad0$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Mike writes > On 11/5/06, Lee Corbin wrote: > > Here is my solution: segregation. Segregation today, > > segregation tomorrow, and segregation forever. > > Right now in California, everyone needs segregating: > > because the white kids can't keep up with the Asians, > > and many of them conclude that math, English, and > > science are for smart kids, not them. As the whites can't > > keep up with the Asians, the Hispanics can't keep up > > with the whites, and the blacks can't keep up with the > > hispanics, so we ought to go back to... yes, segregation. > > Why does it have to be racist and sexist? Why can't we > 'segregate' (to use your negatively overloaded term) along > dimension of performance capability? Oh, I agree. I was being a bit flippant, but as Robert has just said, there is a point at least insofar as gender is concerned. As for racial segregation, it really isn't practical anymore. For one thing, it would just be politically (and probably socially) impossible. For another, unlike the case of sex (gender), there are a lot of people who are intermediary between races. And you know what problems that would create! > There ARE white kids who are smarter than the "average" > asian, so why hold them to a lower standard due to genetics? Of course. But the point is that kids in schools can tend to identify their capabilities in terms of everyone around them. Not all kids to be sure. The extremely capable will be fine no matter what. > Unless you are suggesting that someone's ethnic background > or gender defines their potential.... but you wouldn't be saying > that, right? Correct. It is simply a fact that a person's race is overwhelmed and dwarfed by his or her individual capabilities. I gave a talk on transfinite numbers recently to a few extremely gifted 8th graders. As it was finishing up, a parent asked, "Why is it that when my son was in elementary school the kids who were good at math were mostly girls, and now they're mostly boys?" I had to craft my answer carefully because there was a very bright 8th grade girl there who had kept up with the boys in the seminar just fine. But I also had to tell the truth. So I began by making exactly this statement about individuals, and how generalities do not apply to individuals, but are statistical in nature. I mentioned the extremely competant physicist Lisa Randall at Harvard. Then I told the rest of the truth: following puberty, boys leap ahead of girls in the higher reaches of performance, and I speculated upon evolutionary reasons for why this is so. The girl didn't seem to care or notice. She is so bright and confident that her inner soul told her that whatever I was saying didn't apply to her. Lee From randall at randallsquared.com Sun Nov 5 18:44:56 2006 From: randall at randallsquared.com (Randall Randall) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 13:44:56 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Survival tangent. In-Reply-To: References: <20061102235019.83835.qmail@web37409.mail.mud.yahoo.com> <006401c70040$3a1acb90$bb084e0c@MyComputer> Message-ID: <277AC067-3152-4038-B60D-0BEA7ABB790F@randallsquared.com> On Nov 5, 2006, at 7:40 AM, Heartland wrote: > On 11/4/06, Ian Goddard wrote: >> But for me, I'd be as dead as >> I'd be without the upload. ~Ian > > Robert Bradbury: > "Interesting. Someone maintaining nonidentity. Of course I'll > fall into the > camp that 1 = 1 = 1 = 1... at least for the instant that the copies > are > activated. I would be interested in whether there are others who are > operating within this framework." > > Ian is 100% correct. As a further point of data, I'll add my agreement. -- Randall Randall "Hey, Mr. Record Man, your system can't compete; It's the new artist model: File Transfer Complete..." - MC Lars, "Download This Song" From kerry_prez at yahoo.com Sun Nov 5 07:59:47 2006 From: kerry_prez at yahoo.com (Al Brooks) Date: Sat, 4 Nov 2006 23:59:47 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] here's how complicated it is In-Reply-To: <065101c700ad$61831030$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: <20061105075947.28211.qmail@web51608.mail.yahoo.com> Right. George Wallace. We just have to make the distinction between between overt and covert racism-- nearly everyone has covert racist tendencies, but not to be militant about it. Only blockheaded Marxists think we can end racism. Academic segregation? Let's give it a try. > [...]But last time someone suggested the "today, > tomorrow, > and forever" formula, he ended up getting shot and > spending the rest of his life in a wheelchair! > > Lee > __________________________________________________________________________________________ Check out the New Yahoo! Mail - Fire up a more powerful email and get things done faster. (http://advision.webevents.yahoo.com/mailbeta) From lcorbin at rawbw.com Sun Nov 5 19:07:15 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 11:07:15 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] META: list delivery References: <20061104232822.GL6974@leitl.org> Message-ID: <06b101c7010d$a42d3fe0$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Eugen and Heartland wrote ----- Original Message ----- From: "Eugen Leitl" > On Sat, Nov 04, 2006 at 11:03:07AM -0500, Heartland wrote: > >> Looking at my inbox and the archives, the delivery rate seems to hover somewhere >> around 80% which is not good at all. The problem with these mailing lists is that > > Yeah, hotmail really sucks mossy rocks. You should ditch it. Well, I'm getting straight delivery through subscription to an established address. Horribly enough, for all I can really say, maybe *my* miss rate may also be 20%! I suspect this because Al Brooks copied me---just as I'm going on this message to Slawomir and Eugen---and so I could see that I had missed his message to the list. Hmm... so this is one reason why people "Copy to all". Heretofore, I thought that it was silly to do so, and even unfair to other recipients. No more. Resolved: from now on I'll "Reply to All". Lee P.S. And sorry if I've ignored some posts where some direct question has been asked me, or for which I was supposed to answer. (I do have one outstanding post to answer, and that's from pjmanney. I needed to research the question he asked and will send my reply today or tomorrow.) From randall at randallsquared.com Sun Nov 5 19:32:18 2006 From: randall at randallsquared.com (Randall Randall) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 14:32:18 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Identity (was: Survival tangent) In-Reply-To: <015601c7010a$6a7d5d50$450a4e0c@MyComputer> References: <20061102062735.57668.qmail@web52612.mail.yahoo.com> <015601c7010a$6a7d5d50$450a4e0c@MyComputer> Message-ID: On Nov 5, 2006, at 1:44 PM, John K Clark wrote: > If I place you (the copy) and the original an > equal distance from the center of a symmetrical room so you see the > same things and then instantly swap your bodies position with the > original then neither you nor the original nor any outside observer > could detect the slightest change. There was no change because > although there were 2 bodies in the room there was only one person. This appears to be the argument that had the Soviets been perfectly successful in erasing all records of Trotsky, he would really not have been there. In your room, there are two person-processes* of the same person-type, but only one person-type. You feel that all processes of the person-type you call John K Clark are equivalent for all purposes, where we would say that they are only equivalent for non-subjective purposes. But here's a question for you: in a Tegmark universe, as I understand it, there are an infinite number of John K Clark bodies, widely separated by space, but in your view all with an equal claim to being *you*, right? (In a MWI universe, the same is true but without the spacial separation). So, when you walk across the street, why dodge a car that almost hits you? Lee Corbin would say, I believe, that the important thing is increase Lee-Corbin-runtime, and that this dictates saving this particular Lee-Corbin-process, but I don't think this mild preference (for the actual runtime lost by losing this particular process would be infinitesimal) explains the great lengths that I imagine you guys would go to if this process' runtime were in danger. If you don't agree that the runtime lost would indeed be infinitesimal, we can introduce a random number generator based on decay rates or some other apparently random source, and then reason only about the reactions of the one in a zillion John K Clark or Lee Corbin. * Assuming that everyone can agree that each body which is a person is a separate process. -- Randall Randall "This is a fascinating question, right up there with whether rocks fall because of gravity or being dropped, and whether 3+5=5+3 because addition is commutative or because they both equal 8." - Scott Aaronson From mbb386 at main.nc.us Sun Nov 5 19:36:58 2006 From: mbb386 at main.nc.us (MB) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 14:36:58 -0500 (EST) Subject: [extropy-chat] extropian grandchildren (was: it's all understandable, except) In-Reply-To: <33593.72.236.103.23.1162737714.squirrel@main.nc.us> References: <33593.72.236.103.23.1162737714.squirrel@main.nc.us> Message-ID: <33690.72.236.102.119.1162755418.squirrel@main.nc.us> When our children were born we selected godparents who could also stand as guardians should anything happen to us. They were named as the guardians *in our wills*. The term "godparent" was used socially because our parents *really* cared that there be some religious involvement, it mattered to them, and their feelings mattered to us. The religious aspect did not matter to *us*, but the selection process was very important. So there is a term, I think which could be used. Guardian. The meaning may be somewhat broadened because we commonly think of guardians only when there are no longer active parents, but it was more than that in our family. Our children grew up with close association with their guardians - some of them, because it's always easy to select a guardian who doesn't work out for some reason. Remember: whenever there's a birth, death, marriage, divorce, or coming of age, the wills should be re-examined for current accuracy. That's what my dad always said, and I think it quite wise. Best regards, MB From randall at randallsquared.com Sun Nov 5 19:37:00 2006 From: randall at randallsquared.com (Randall Randall) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 14:37:00 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] META: list delivery In-Reply-To: <06b101c7010d$a42d3fe0$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> References: <20061104232822.GL6974@leitl.org> <06b101c7010d$a42d3fe0$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: <8E6B98EE-051E-45AF-9159-075D70C4EF9A@randallsquared.com> On Nov 5, 2006, at 2:07 PM, Lee Corbin wrote: > ----- Original Message ----- > From: "Eugen Leitl" >> Yeah, hotmail really sucks mossy rocks. You should ditch it. > > Well, I'm getting straight delivery through subscription to an > established > address. Horribly enough, for all I can really say, maybe *my* > miss rate may > also be 20%! > > I suspect this because Al Brooks copied me---just as I'm going on this > message to Slawomir and Eugen---and so I could see that I had missed > his message to the list. > > Hmm... so this is one reason why people "Copy to all". Heretofore, > I thought that it was silly to do so, and even unfair to other > recipients. > No more. > > Resolved: from now on I'll "Reply to All". > > Lee > > P.S. And sorry if I've ignored some posts where some direct question > has been asked me, or for which I was supposed to answer. (I do have > one outstanding post to answer, and that's from pjmanney. I needed to > research the question he asked and will send my reply today or > tomorrow.) You may want to use http://lists.extropy.org/pipermail/extropy-chat/2006-November/date.html for that research, as several more posts than I got in the last coupla days have shown up there. I don't use Hotmail, either, of course. Part of the drop rate to me might be explainable due to some quirk of the list, since I just joined (I've been absent since the list was "extropians@"). -- Randall Randall Software isn't really a product; it's a service: the service of arranging bits on a customer's computer. Trying to pound software into a 'product' niche is the fount of many licenses. From natasha at natasha.cc Sun Nov 5 18:43:47 2006 From: natasha at natasha.cc (Natasha Vita-More) Date: Sun, 05 Nov 2006 12:43:47 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] Pure Gossip: Who will Anders marry? In-Reply-To: References: <8CF6A92CB628444FB3C757618CD2803901C47E23@exbe1.cmpcntr.tc.trincoll.edu> Message-ID: <6.2.1.2.2.20061105123424.047f9b10@pop-server.austin.rr.com> At 12:19 PM 11/5/2006, Robert wrote: >I'll start the bidding at US$10.00 ;-) >>I bid $100.00 in Novamente LLC stock ;-) >Oh now come on -- Anders is worth at least 1000x perhaps 10,000x that much >on the open market. (provided one can enroll him in ones perspective). >Anders' children would be a much different discussion vector. Like fine wine, fine art and fine ideas, Anders is priceless. It is not a matter of owning these fine elements that brings about happiness, but a matter of appreciating them for their full worth and value by tasting the fruits of their bouquet, their quality and character, style and technique, and where they, because of these characteristics, allow us to venture-to grow and explore-in our own minds. This my friends is priceless. Natasha Natasha Vita-More Cultural Strategist - Design Media Artist - Futurist PhD Candidate, Planetary Collegium Proactionary Principle Core Group, Extropy Institute Member, Association of Professional Futurists Founder, Transhumanist Arts & Culture If you draw a circle in the sand and study only what's inside the circle, then that is a closed-system perspective. If you study what is inside the circle and everything outside the circle, then that is an open system perspective. - Buckminster Fuller -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From sentience at pobox.com Sun Nov 5 19:59:07 2006 From: sentience at pobox.com (Eliezer S. Yudkowsky) Date: Sun, 05 Nov 2006 11:59:07 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] it's all understandable, except In-Reply-To: <066001c700ea$fb396b60$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> References: <638d4e150611041654g5d25a025q7aba36ddbfd4e25e@mail.gmail.com><20061105013219.90607.qmail@web51615.mail.yahoo.com> <638d4e150611041749n1a3c2907xd32d00ff60a11df6@mail.gmail.com><05ec01c7008a$ab914660$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <454D960C.2020504@pobox.com> <066001c700ea$fb396b60$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: <454E428B.4090109@pobox.com> Lee Corbin wrote: > > You missed my point, which was my fault: I should have stressed > this: the very brightest (the ones that I complain are too few) make > out well NO MATTER WHAT. You can't wreck them. It's just > sad when they can coast their last few years in the school system, > and the parents (of these very few) often won't stand for it. I think the school system came within inches of wrecking me permanently, and if I'd actually been forced through high school, especially a non-Gunn-class high school, that might have been it. Selection bias, Lee. You don't see the wrecked ones. They don't look like the "very brightest" any more. -- Eliezer S. Yudkowsky http://singinst.org/ Research Fellow, Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence From eugen at leitl.org Sun Nov 5 20:11:12 2006 From: eugen at leitl.org (Eugen Leitl) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 21:11:12 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] it's all understandable, except In-Reply-To: <20ef01c7008c$baa95730$6600a8c0@brainiac> References: <20061105013219.90607.qmail@web51615.mail.yahoo.com> <20ef01c7008c$baa95730$6600a8c0@brainiac> Message-ID: <20061105201112.GG6974@leitl.org> On Sat, Nov 04, 2006 at 07:44:42PM -0800, Olga Bourlin wrote: > ...). The school I attended in Rio was much stricter, and much, much more > advanced in terms of scholastics - I was doing long division and > multiplication, until I came to America ... when kids my age had barely I can provide a similiar data point for the Russian school system (I crossed over from 7th grade in 1980 UdSSR to 7th grade 1980 Germany, and found that many things were lagging over here. I've heard similiar experiences about direct comparisons with Germany and US for mid-1980s (public schools, I presume, and the comparison was similiarly disastrous). Of course, things have gone considerably downhill since, about everywhere. -- Eugen* Leitl leitl http://leitl.org ______________________________________________________________ ICBM: 48.07100, 11.36820 http://www.ativel.com 8B29F6BE: 099D 78BA 2FD3 B014 B08A 7779 75B0 2443 8B29 F6BE -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: signature.asc Type: application/pgp-signature Size: 191 bytes Desc: Digital signature URL: From mbb386 at main.nc.us Sun Nov 5 20:17:14 2006 From: mbb386 at main.nc.us (MB) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 15:17:14 -0500 (EST) Subject: [extropy-chat] it's all understandable, except In-Reply-To: <454E428B.4090109@pobox.com> References: <638d4e150611041654g5d25a025q7aba36ddbfd4e25e@mail.gmail.com><20061105013219.90607.qmail@web51615.mail.yahoo.com> <638d4e150611041749n1a3c2907xd32d00ff60a11df6@mail.gmail.com><05ec01c7008a$ab914660$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <454D960C.2020504@pobox.com> <066001c700ea$fb396b60$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <454E428B.4090109@pobox.com> Message-ID: <33720.72.236.103.101.1162757834.squirrel@main.nc.us> Eliezer wrote: > > I think the school system came within inches of wrecking me permanently, > and if I'd actually been forced through high school, especially a > non-Gunn-class high school, that might have been it. > > Selection bias, Lee. You don't see the wrecked ones. They don't look > like the "very brightest" any more. > I fear this is true. Instead they often look like the worst. Drugs, drinking, other maladaptive behaviours - anything to kill the frustration and boredom and pointlessness of their daily lives. Regards, MB From george at betterhumans.com Sun Nov 5 20:26:43 2006 From: george at betterhumans.com (George Dvorsky) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 15:26:43 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Pure Gossip: Who will Anders marry? In-Reply-To: <6.2.1.2.2.20061105123424.047f9b10@pop-server.austin.rr.com> References: <8CF6A92CB628444FB3C757618CD2803901C47E23@exbe1.cmpcntr.tc.trincoll.edu> <6.2.1.2.2.20061105123424.047f9b10@pop-server.austin.rr.com> Message-ID: > I'll start the bidding at US$10.00 ;-) > >>I bid $100.00 in Novamente LLC stock ;-) Sorry, Ben -- with all due respect to the value of Novamente stock, I think my opening bid still stands. I could use a polymath around the house. Cheers, George From spike66 at comcast.net Sun Nov 5 20:33:31 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 12:33:31 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] extropian grandchildren (was: it's allunderstandable, except) In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <200611052031.kA5KVd4M023387@andromeda.ziaspace.com> bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Robert Bradbury ...? And of course if Spike is making babies and Eugen is making babies then one has to put the possibility of Eliezer or Anders making babies on the table... R Robert we tried the making-babies-on-the-table routine, but in my opinion it is overrated. It was interesting as a change of pace, but less comfortable than the more conventional settings for making babies. spike From eugen at leitl.org Sun Nov 5 20:31:58 2006 From: eugen at leitl.org (Eugen Leitl) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 21:31:58 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] it's all understandable, except In-Reply-To: <05ec01c7008a$ab914660$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> References: <638d4e150611041749n1a3c2907xd32d00ff60a11df6@mail.gmail.com> <05ec01c7008a$ab914660$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: <20061105203158.GJ6974@leitl.org> On Sat, Nov 04, 2006 at 07:29:41PM -0800, Lee Corbin wrote: > The Singularity (or its preceding technological innovations) need > above all to get people smarter, especially the great hordes of > children today who simply are incapable of difficult technical work, > and who will (because of IQ limitations) perform rather poorly > whatever they try to do that is of any use. I try to avoid me-toos, but above passage can't be overemphasized. The issue isn't differences in issued equipment between the ears. Motivation is the key, and almost all current education environments (nevermind prior poor parenting) actively demotivate. And everybody seems to think that's god-given! What an awful waste of human life. Not only does demographics limit the quantity, the quality has been going down monotonously since middle last century, or even before. The job market does the rest to discourage entering technical fields. The message is certainly loud and clear enough, and it's being heard. This is no way to drive progress forward, or event to sustain it. Many places are regressing, but slowly enough that it isn't too obvious. And The Great Depression v2.0 (new and improved, now with even more suckage) seems to be ante portas in earnest. What we here need to do is to figure out how to prevent the coming crash, that is looming clearer with each passing year. -- Eugen* Leitl leitl http://leitl.org ______________________________________________________________ ICBM: 48.07100, 11.36820 http://www.ativel.com 8B29F6BE: 099D 78BA 2FD3 B014 B08A 7779 75B0 2443 8B29 F6BE -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: signature.asc Type: application/pgp-signature Size: 191 bytes Desc: Digital signature URL: From moulton at moulton.com Sun Nov 5 23:42:26 2006 From: moulton at moulton.com (Fred C. Moulton) Date: Sun, 05 Nov 2006 15:42:26 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Edge: Thank Goodness! By Daniel C. Dennett In-Reply-To: <5.1.0.14.0.20061104231911.03f35940@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> References: <5.1.0.14.0.20061103224339.03c13fa8@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> <380-220061153192746796@M2W040.mail2web.com> <5.1.0.14.0.20061103224339.03c13fa8@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> <5.1.0.14.0.20061104231911.03f35940@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> Message-ID: <1162770146.4935.99.camel@localhost.localdomain> On Sat, 2006-11-04 at 23:35 -0500, Keith Henson wrote: > > For reasons I don't completely understand, but are rooted in the stone age, > I don't expect ranting against religions to have a positive effect and it > might well be counter productive, switching off rational thought by > mechanisms that originated in wars between hunter gatherer bands. It seems to me that we might have different understanding of the phrase "ranting against religions". I had assumed that it was a short hand reference to "arguing against memes such as the existence of hell, heaven and supernatural deity or deities"; this assumption was based on my understanding of Dennett. I think it is important to remember that telling someone that they have chickenpox is not "ranting against chickenpox" but rather an attempt to convey information and similarly telling someone that they hold religious views which are false is not "ranting against religion". > >Consider the > >decline of infectious disease with the advent of better sanitation. > >Dennett, Dawkins, Harris and others are hopefully causing a more > >critical focus on the memes associated with religion. > > You might note that better sanitation memes are an outgrowth of > *understanding* infectious disease, particularly what *causes* it. I agree that understanding the mechanisms in which harmful memes take hold is important. My opinion is that this is a very complex subject and that Dennett, Dawkins and Harris (along with many others) are just beginning to make progress in this area. > Ranting against religions might be really effective if religions were > understood to the level we understand infectious disease. As it is, what > this crew is doing is like ranting against fevers without the least > understanding of what causes fevers. I think I found more value in what Dennett, Dawkins and Harris are doing than you do. For one thing they are providing momentum to a long overdue response to some of the nonsensical attacks on atheism which many religious persons have been doing for years. > I have been doing a bit of ranting on this subject myself on the Harris > page. > http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/20060916_sam_harris_rottweiler_barks/ The URL worked and I will take a look at it. > Frankly I suspect that if people understood the origin of the human > capacity for religions they would be horrified. Of course there were people who were horrified when Darwin and others began to publish their ideas on evolution. > Best wishes and give my best to the Silicon Valley crew. Thanks and I hope all is going well with you. Fred > Keith > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat From moulton at moulton.com Mon Nov 6 00:00:10 2006 From: moulton at moulton.com (Fred C. Moulton) Date: Sun, 05 Nov 2006 16:00:10 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Kurzweil on TV Message-ID: <1162771210.4935.111.camel@localhost.localdomain> Ray Kurzweil is on the C-Span Book TV this weekend and rebroadcast next weekend. It airs again tonight [(Midnight Eastern / 9:00PM Pacific)] and again Saturday Nov 11 [(9:00AM Eastern / 6:00AM Pacific)] Check the schedule at: http://www.booktv.org/ Fred From asa at nada.kth.se Sun Nov 5 21:18:31 2006 From: asa at nada.kth.se (Anders Sandberg) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 22:18:31 +0100 (MET) Subject: [extropy-chat] Effective relationships In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <2258.208.181.209.209.1162761511.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> Can't quote my paper right now (still in internet cafe mode), but most evidence suggests that humans form metastable, fairly monogamous dyads in all societies. In societies where polygamy is accepted it is still less than 20% of the men who do it. Adultery occurs in monogamous relations, but it seems to be less than 20% of people who do it. Incidence of children genetically unrelated to their official fathers appears to be relatively low, on the order of 3%. The romantic love system appears to be geared towards exclusivity; the lust and attachment systems allow multiple partners, but not the mate selection system. If another form of organisation was more stable or produced more happiness it would likely be fairly prevalent. Since triads or tetrads do not occur that often I would conclude that they are not stable in general. -- Anders Sandberg, Oxford Uehiro Centre for Practical Ethics Philosophy Faculty of Oxford University From sentience at pobox.com Sun Nov 5 21:35:02 2006 From: sentience at pobox.com (Eliezer S. Yudkowsky) Date: Sun, 05 Nov 2006 13:35:02 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Effective relationships In-Reply-To: <2258.208.181.209.209.1162761511.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> References: <2258.208.181.209.209.1162761511.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> Message-ID: <454E5906.10003@pobox.com> Anders Sandberg wrote: > Can't quote my paper right now (still in internet cafe mode), but most > evidence suggests that humans form metastable, fairly monogamous dyads in > all societies. In societies where polygamy is accepted it is still less > than 20% of the men who do it. Adultery occurs in monogamous relations, > but it seems to be less than 20% of people who do it. Incidence of > children genetically unrelated to their official fathers appears to be > relatively low, on the order of 3%. The romantic love system appears to be > geared towards exclusivity; the lust and attachment systems allow multiple > partners, but not the mate selection system. > > If another form of organisation was more stable or produced more happiness > it would likely be fairly prevalent. Since triads or tetrads do not occur > that often I would conclude that they are not stable in general. Second paragraph does not follow logically from first paragraph. Since when is "happiness" a primary optimization target of the patterning processes in question? -- Eliezer S. Yudkowsky http://singinst.org/ Research Fellow, Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence From asa at nada.kth.se Sun Nov 5 21:40:17 2006 From: asa at nada.kth.se (Anders Sandberg) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 22:40:17 +0100 (MET) Subject: [extropy-chat] Pure Gossip: Who will Anders marry? In-Reply-To: <8CF6A92CB628444FB3C757618CD2803901C47E23@exbe1.cmpcntr.tc.trincoll.ed u> References: <8CF6A92CB628444FB3C757618CD2803901C47E23@exbe1.cmpcntr.tc.trincoll.edu> Message-ID: <2472.208.181.209.209.1162762817.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> Hughes, James J. wrote: >> So let's plan a special session at Chicago dedicated to >> finding a girlfriend, boyfriend, aifriend, vrfriend or >> whateverfriend for Anders! > > Since he's a fan of market-based solutions perhaps we could auction him > off? Surely the person willing to pay the most for him is the person who > loves him the most, and what more can a man want than the love of a > devoted consumer? Of course! This makes a lot of sense. I'm honored to see that the bidding war has already started. And that it is an English auction and not a Dutch one :-) If one studies love, it seems that it has three main components on the low neural level: an attraction system finding the best mate and causing a passionate "clicking together", an attachment system for creating a lasting pair bond and a lust system for mating with the partner (or anybody else suitable). At least in some people attraction is influenced by social status and wealth, so signalling desire through auction might work. I'm less sure about how one could make a marketbased pair bond, except of course of the general observation that marriage stability is affected by the relative utility of staying together vs apart. Market based lust is no problem if one is a red-blooded capitalist, just think of all those lovely stock options! (for those of you who can read Swedish, you might want to see Waldemar's hillarious Ayn Rand porn parody http://www.eudoxa.se/techne/archives/lem.pdf "He put on the protection of vulcanized rubber that only a rational capitalist society could mass produce so that men and women would be able to give each other pleasure without the fear that is the fuel for the infernal construction of guilt that the mystics had created and fed with their hateful jabbering") -- Anders Sandberg, Oxford Uehiro Centre for Practical Ethics Philosophy Faculty of Oxford University From asa at nada.kth.se Sun Nov 5 21:50:48 2006 From: asa at nada.kth.se (Anders Sandberg) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 22:50:48 +0100 (MET) Subject: [extropy-chat] Effective relationships In-Reply-To: <454E5906.10003@pobox.com> References: <2258.208.181.209.209.1162761511.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> <454E5906.10003@pobox.com> Message-ID: <2546.208.181.209.209.1162763448.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> Eliezer S. Yudkowsky wrote: > Anders Sandberg wrote: >> If another form of organisation was more stable or produced more >> happiness >> it would likely be fairly prevalent. Since triads or tetrads do not >> occur >> that often I would conclude that they are not stable in general. > > Second paragraph does not follow logically from first paragraph. Since > when is "happiness" a primary optimization target of the patterning > processes in question? OK, more properly: humans tend to move out of social relations that make them unhappy (especially when there are alternatives around) with a higher probability. So if a state of relationsship has probability P1 of ending due to inherent instability, to this one can add an extra probability P2 of ending due to unhappiness. My model would be a small Markov chain with three states: S, single, T, triad/tetrad, and D for dyad. S can move to T with P(s->t) and D with P(s->d). If there are transitions between all three it is nicely ergodic and we can get a stable long term distribution just by calculating the biggest eigenvalue of the transition matrix. I'm sitting in an internet cafe right now so I can't prove anything strictly, but I'm pretty sure that one can prove that if the steady state distribution overwhelmingly promotes S and D over T, it implies that either the probabilities leading to T are extremely low or that P(T->T) is lower than P(D->D) and/or P(S->S). Hmm, sounds like entertainment for my flight home. -- Anders Sandberg, Oxford Uehiro Centre for Practical Ethics Philosophy Faculty of Oxford University From James.Hughes at trincoll.edu Sun Nov 5 21:52:48 2006 From: James.Hughes at trincoll.edu (Hughes, James J.) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 16:52:48 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Effective relationships Message-ID: <8CF6A92CB628444FB3C757618CD2803901C47E4E@exbe1.cmpcntr.tc.trincoll.edu> > If another form of organisation was more stable or produced > more happiness it would likely be fairly prevalent. I tried to grapple with the instability of non-monogamous subcultures within a rational choice framework in this paper: "Monogamy as a Prisoners Dilemma: Non-Monogamy as a Collective Action Problem" (1990) James J. Hughes Ph.D. http://www.changesurfer.com/Acad/Monogamy/Mono.html ------------------------ James Hughes Ph.D. Executive Director, Institute for Ethics and Emerging Technologies http://ieet.org Editor, Journal of Evolution and Technology http://jetpress.org Williams 229B, Trinity College 300 Summit St., Hartford CT 06106 (office) 860-297-2376 director at ieet.org From asa at nada.kth.se Sun Nov 5 21:55:30 2006 From: asa at nada.kth.se (Anders Sandberg) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 22:55:30 +0100 (MET) Subject: [extropy-chat] extropian grandchildren (was: it's allunderstandable, except) In-Reply-To: <001101c70100$004702b0$6600a8c0@brainiac> References: <200611051716.kA5HGSNE006105@andromeda.ziaspace.com> <001101c70100$004702b0$6600a8c0@brainiac> Message-ID: <2566.208.181.209.209.1162763730.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> My brother's children both have my sister-in-law's brother as godfather, not me. The reason is that the godfather is actually supposed to give some christian education (of course, people largely ignore this in Sweden anyway), but it didn't feel appropriate to ask me. So I'm officially the nongodfather of the kids, responsible for telling them the stuff they won't get from their parents or godfather :-) This week I think I will introduce them to RFID and some beginner greek mythology. Hmm, a an awful lot of family talk right now. Oxytocin is in the air! -- Anders Sandberg, Oxford Uehiro Centre for Practical Ethics Philosophy Faculty of Oxford University From nanogirl at halcyon.com Sun Nov 5 21:47:22 2006 From: nanogirl at halcyon.com (Gina Miller) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 13:47:22 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Computer animation References: <01e701c7008a$76d9a390$0200a8c0@Nano> Message-ID: <005901c70124$0a748f90$0200a8c0@Nano> Hello! I received an email from someone about my previous email to you, apparently when they clicked the links that were attached to the words they did not work, so here in this email, I have the links typed out and clickable for you, just in case you had the same problem. This will resolve it. This happens to some folks probably due to the different email settings and how they interpret reading links. Thank you for all your help! New begin - My new animation "dandelion" was the most sequential animation that I have done. It was generated for the film2music (http://www.film2music.com/) competition in which registrants are asked to select a track from the composers cd and create a video to accompany it. Previous to this competition I had been busy producing "The Mark" (http://www.nanogirl.com/personal/themark.htm) for the aniboom contest (http://www.aniboom.com/pages/application/Animations/UserZoneZ1.aspx?zoneID=3495 ). This meant that I had only a couple weeks to create and complete this one. As elaborate as a concept this piece was, the time line wasn't feasible but I crunched through nights without sleep to get it in on time. I just barely made it, but I made it! So the prize for this one is not only money but meetings with a famous producer and agent! And this time, it's no sweat to vote, (http://www.cinematiccd.com/votedandelion/) you don't have to sign up or register for anything, no typing at all, it's just one click and "send", okay so technically that's two clicks, but that's all just clicks! So please come vote for me friends. Come watch dandelion here: http://www.nanogirl.com/personal/dandelion.htm - an animation about hope and faith in ones future dreams. Thank you all! Blog comments about this animation are invited: http://maxanimation.blogspot.com/2006/11/dandelion.html Hope you all had a happy Hallows Eve! 'animator for hire' Gina "Nanogirl" Miller Nanotechnology Industries http://www.nanoindustries.com Personal: http://www.nanogirl.com/index2.html Animation Blog: http://maxanimation.blogspot.com/ Craft blog: http://nanogirlblog.blogspot.com/ Foresight Senior Associate http://www.foresight.org Nanotechnology Advisor Extropy Institute http://www.extropy.org Email: nanogirl at halcyon.com "Nanotechnology: Solutions for the future." ----- Original Message ----- From: Gina Miller To: ExI chat list Sent: Saturday, November 04, 2006 7:28 PM Subject: [extropy-chat] Computer animation This piece was the most sequential animation that I have done. It was generated for the film2music competition in which registrants are asked to select a track from the composers cd and create a video to accompany it. Previous to this competition I had been busy producing "The Mark" for the aniboom contest. This meant that I had only a couple weeks to create and complete this one. As elaborate as a concept this piece was, the time line wasn't feasible but I crunched through nights without sleep to get it in on time. I just barely made it, but I made it! So the prize for this one is not only money but meetings with a famous producer and agent! And this time, it's no sweat to vote, you don't have to sign up or register for anything, no typing at all, it's just one click and "send", okay so technically that's two clicks, but that's all just clicks! So please come vote for me friends. Come watch dandelion here - an animation about hope and faith in ones future dreams. Thank you all! 'animator for hire' Gina "Nanogirl" Miller Nanotechnology Industries http://www.nanoindustries.com Personal: http://www.nanogirl.com/index2.html Animation Blog: http://maxanimation.blogspot.com/ Craft blog: http://nanogirlblog.blogspot.com/ Foresight Senior Associate http://www.foresight.org Nanotechnology Advisor Extropy Institute http://www.extropy.org Email: nanogirl at halcyon.com "Nanotechnology: Solutions for the future." -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- _______________________________________________ extropy-chat mailing list extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From nanogirl at halcyon.com Sun Nov 5 21:57:03 2006 From: nanogirl at halcyon.com (Gina Miller) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 13:57:03 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Computer animation References: <01e701c7008a$76d9a390$0200a8c0@Nano> <8d71341e0611050302p320e5d37p3a152efb0a65d944@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <00fa01c70125$afea8af0$0200a8c0@Nano> Thank you Russell! I really appreciate it : ) G` ----- Original Message ----- From: Russell Wallace To: ExI chat list Sent: Sunday, November 05, 2006 3:02 AM Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] Computer animation I like it! Vote sent. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ _______________________________________________ extropy-chat mailing list extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From sentience at pobox.com Sun Nov 5 22:12:11 2006 From: sentience at pobox.com (Eliezer S. Yudkowsky) Date: Sun, 05 Nov 2006 14:12:11 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Effective relationships In-Reply-To: <2546.208.181.209.209.1162763448.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> References: <2258.208.181.209.209.1162761511.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> <454E5906.10003@pobox.com> <2546.208.181.209.209.1162763448.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> Message-ID: <454E61BB.4000707@pobox.com> Anders Sandberg wrote: > > My model would be a small Markov chain with three states: S, single, T, > triad/tetrad, and D for dyad. S can move to T with P(s->t) and D with > P(s->d). If there are transitions between all three it is nicely ergodic > and we can get a stable long term distribution just by calculating the > biggest eigenvalue of the transition matrix. > > I'm sitting in an internet cafe right now so I can't prove anything > strictly, but I'm pretty sure that one can prove that if the steady state > distribution overwhelmingly promotes S and D over T, it implies that > either the probabilities leading to T are extremely low or that P(T->T) is > lower than P(D->D) and/or P(S->S). Hmm, sounds like entertainment for my > flight home. But people die all the time, alas. So triads or tetrads might have low formation probabilities, very low breakup probabilities due to unhappiness, but with the ergodic state still dominated by death. Make people immortal and *then* we'll draw conclusions. -- Eliezer S. Yudkowsky http://singinst.org/ Research Fellow, Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence From lcorbin at rawbw.com Sun Nov 5 22:17:29 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 14:17:29 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Identity (was: Survival tangent) References: <20061102062735.57668.qmail@web52612.mail.yahoo.com><015601c7010a$6a7d5d50$450a4e0c@MyComputer> Message-ID: <06c701c70128$57f91610$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Randall writes > On Nov 5, 2006, at 1:44 PM, John K Clark wrote: >> If I place you (the copy) and the original an >> equal distance from the center of a symmetrical room so you see the >> same things and then instantly swap your bodies position with the >> original then neither you nor the original nor any outside observer >> could detect the slightest change. There was no change because >> although there were 2 bodies in the room there was only one person. > > ... > But here's a question for you: in a Tegmark universe, as I > understand it, there are an infinite number of John K Clark > bodies, widely separated by space, but in your view all with > an equal claim to being *you*, right? (In a MWI universe, > the same is true but without the spacial separation). So, > when you walk across the street, why dodge a car that almost > hits you? > > Lee Corbin would say, I believe, that the important thing is > increase Lee-Corbin-runtime, and that this dictates saving > this particular Lee-Corbin-process, Right you are! Proof that we *do* understand each other, occasionally :-) > but I don't think this mild preference (for the actual runtime > lost by losing this particular process would be infinitesimal) > explains the great lengths that I imagine you guys would go > to if this process' runtime were in danger. Here is a scenario. There are a million copies of me in the inner solar system, all having been made from the original in the last ten minutes and have been placed into identical or near-identical physical circumstances. But there is also an understanding that one of them must be eaten by a Bengal tiger! It is not efficient for each to worry about a 1 in 1,000,000 possibility, so our minds turn to other things. But in one place, a Bengal tiger leaps into the room. By sheer reflex, that copy will try to escape and will no doubt be terrified. But I say that these are only "lower-order" aspects of one, and are not representative of who I truly am. If the scenario becomes less graphic, and one of them must press a button and be disintegrated, then all of us would be indifferent as to who did so. If the button were in the room, we'd all reach for it, with the understanding that the last 999,999 would not be disintegrated. No instance would actually care a whit. > If you don't agree that the runtime lost would indeed be > infinitesimal, But it's not infinitesimal: it's one whole unit of John Clark or Lee Corbin. > we can introduce a random number generator based on > decay rates or some other apparently random source, > and then reason only about the reactions of the one in a > zillion John K Clark or Lee Corbin. Not sure I understand, but I'll give it a swing. Okay, in each of the rooms where I've been copied, we are each subject to hearing a bong go off that says that our 1/1,000,000 chance from the random number generator actually happened, and the individual instances who hear the bong know that they're about to be zapped. We'd each be unhappy that *so many* of us were unlucky, even if it was only one. But none of us (speaking for myself only, not John) would feel his life imperiled in the slightest. Lee From lcorbin at rawbw.com Sun Nov 5 22:25:41 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 14:25:41 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] it's all understandable, except References: <638d4e150611041654g5d25a025q7aba36ddbfd4e25e@mail.gmail.com><20061105013219.90607.qmail@web51615.mail.yahoo.com> <638d4e150611041749n1a3c2907xd32d00ff60a11df6@mail.gmail.com><05ec01c7008a$ab914660$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <454D960C.2020504@pobox.com><066001c700ea$fb396b60$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677><454E428B.4090109@pobox.com> <33720.72.236.103.101.1162757834.squirrel@main.nc.us> Message-ID: <06da01c70129$9d973d90$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> MB writes > Eliezer wrote: > >> I think the school system came within inches of wrecking me permanently, >> and if I'd actually been forced through high school, especially a >> non-Gunn-class high school, that might have been it. >> >> Selection bias, Lee. You don't see the wrecked ones. They don't look >> like the "very brightest" any more. > > I fear this is true. Instead they often look like the worst. Drugs, drinking, other > maladaptive behaviours - anything to kill the frustration and boredom and > pointlessness of their daily lives. You guys have to remember the twin studies. If twins had turned out radically, radically different as you're suggesting, we'd have heard about it. Now I'll grant that it *can* happen, but I claim it's unusual. Judith Rich Harris has looked into all this in "The Nurture Assumption", and even has a new book out about it: "No Two Alike". I haven't read that, but I can't really take the title entirely seriously. In The Nurture Assumption, it's related---and Pinker endorses this---that your adult personality is determined half by genes and half by your peer group (as you're growing up). So I retort that the "wrecked ones" MB speaks of---having succumbed to drugs, drinking, and other maladaptive behaviors---are a small minority. Almost everyone turns out (as in the twin studies) pretty much the same as if they'd been raised hundreds of miles apart by entirely different families. Lee From lcorbin at rawbw.com Sun Nov 5 22:38:04 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 14:38:04 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] The self-identity quest reply to Wallace, Corbin .. References: Message-ID: <06ea01c7012b$4e94e1f0$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> David address what Russell said, and I what I said. I'll leave Russell to deal with his half. > Lee Corbin write in his article Duplicates are Self , 1988 > http://www.leecorbin.com/dupproof.html > > "Why is it easy to believe that someone could be at the same > > place at two different times, but very hard to believe that > > someone could be at the same time in two different places?" > > my point being that you can be alive in two places at the > > same time. One person, even. David replies > the reductionist theories of the self assume that If A is the original > person and B is his duplicate, A's survival in B is maintained as > long as they are not mutually existent! Well, I've never heard of that, or at least I don't believe it at all. What in the world could the existence or non- existence of a copy of me at Alpha Centauri have to do with an instance here? They cannot communicate. If one dies, the other lives, and in either case I still live. > Yet, this condition of not being mutually existent for > survival to take place, will not necessarily be required > in the future, That's right. But many of us on this list never required that in the first place. As I say, I can be alive at the same time in two *very* different places, far outside each other's light cone. > since then, various manifestations of the same person at > the same time, like cyborg entities, virtual forms, forglet > forms, and nano-engineered manifestation and other forms, > does not impede these selves being one and the same > person, as long as these various manifestations are > synchronously info-connected and thus keeping the same > diachronic identity. I don't think that they need to be connected in this way. Duplicates are selves already. Lee > Synchronous connection is achieved when human and machines are > online broad band, connected such as all the various experiences > are online recalled and merged to all of them at the same time or > even once a day as you mention. This support your view, in the > future we will be able to be one and many at the same time, as > long as we are synchronously connected. From ben at goertzel.org Sun Nov 5 22:42:26 2006 From: ben at goertzel.org (Ben Goertzel) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 17:42:26 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] it's all understandable, except In-Reply-To: <454E428B.4090109@pobox.com> References: <638d4e150611041654g5d25a025q7aba36ddbfd4e25e@mail.gmail.com> <20061105013219.90607.qmail@web51615.mail.yahoo.com> <638d4e150611041749n1a3c2907xd32d00ff60a11df6@mail.gmail.com> <05ec01c7008a$ab914660$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <454D960C.2020504@pobox.com> <066001c700ea$fb396b60$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <454E428B.4090109@pobox.com> Message-ID: <638d4e150611051442n582d6411la4b68cbbf452ace6@mail.gmail.com> On 11/5/06, Eliezer S. Yudkowsky wrote: > Lee Corbin wrote: > > > > You missed my point, which was my fault: I should have stressed > > this: the very brightest (the ones that I complain are too few) make > > out well NO MATTER WHAT. You can't wreck them. It's just > > sad when they can coast their last few years in the school system, > > and the parents (of these very few) often won't stand for it. Hmmm... I feel that, in this point of yours, "making out well" is poorly-defined. For instance, one of the brightest, most creative, most broadly thoughtful math physics/students I knew in college, stopped studying technical subjects after getting his BS in physics from Stanford, and became a lawyer. He just got frustrated with the need to work on boring, conformist topics for N years in order to get tenure, before you get to work on the stuff that really interests you. He's a damn good labor lawyer, working in DC, but had the university system been of a different nature, I bet he would have been pushed in a different direction, and study with his early interest in science, and IMO the world would have benefited considerably. (And, yeah, of course I wish he had chosen to fight against the stupider aspects of the academic establishment, like myself and many others ... but not every very bright person makes this choice...) In another (very different) case I remember, there was a friend of a friend of my mother's who was very gifted in mathematics, but from a very poor neighborhood in Philadelphia. He did well in high school and got a scholarship to go to a university in Oklahoma; but he was living off campus and his roommate committed suicide and he couldn't cover the rent himself and wound up coming back home to Philly. To make the $$ to go back to school again he took up an occupation suiting his math ability and the local neighborhood: "numbers running", i.e. managing an illegal sports-betting operation.... This wound up being so lucrative he never went back to school; he now has 9 kids and is making a really good living, far more $$ than most professors ... so, yeah, he's using his brains to "make out OK" too... ;-) Ben g > > I think the school system came within inches of wrecking me permanently, > and if I'd actually been forced through high school, especially a > non-Gunn-class high school, that might have been it. > > Selection bias, Lee. You don't see the wrecked ones. They don't look > like the "very brightest" any more. > > -- > Eliezer S. Yudkowsky http://singinst.org/ > Research Fellow, Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > From ben at goertzel.org Sun Nov 5 22:44:53 2006 From: ben at goertzel.org (Ben Goertzel) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 17:44:53 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] it's all understandable, except In-Reply-To: <06da01c70129$9d973d90$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> References: <638d4e150611041654g5d25a025q7aba36ddbfd4e25e@mail.gmail.com> <20061105013219.90607.qmail@web51615.mail.yahoo.com> <638d4e150611041749n1a3c2907xd32d00ff60a11df6@mail.gmail.com> <05ec01c7008a$ab914660$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <454D960C.2020504@pobox.com> <066001c700ea$fb396b60$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <454E428B.4090109@pobox.com> <33720.72.236.103.101.1162757834.squirrel@main.nc.us> <06da01c70129$9d973d90$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: <638d4e150611051444w57670e42n951806aa3359f426@mail.gmail.com> > So I retort that the "wrecked ones" MB speaks of---having succumbed > to drugs, drinking, and other maladaptive behaviors---are a small > minority. Almost everyone turns out (as in the twin studies) pretty much > the same as if they'd been raised hundreds of miles apart by > entirely different families. I believe these "twin studies" only hold up for separated twins who are raised in roughly the same cultural and socioeconomic conditions... -- Ben From thespike at satx.rr.com Sun Nov 5 22:44:48 2006 From: thespike at satx.rr.com (Damien Broderick) Date: Sun, 05 Nov 2006 16:44:48 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] it's all understandable, except In-Reply-To: <06da01c70129$9d973d90$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> References: <638d4e150611041654g5d25a025q7aba36ddbfd4e25e@mail.gmail.com> <20061105013219.90607.qmail@web51615.mail.yahoo.com> <638d4e150611041749n1a3c2907xd32d00ff60a11df6@mail.gmail.com> <05ec01c7008a$ab914660$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <454D960C.2020504@pobox.com> <066001c700ea$fb396b60$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <454E428B.4090109@pobox.com> <33720.72.236.103.101.1162757834.squirrel@main.nc.us> <06da01c70129$9d973d90$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: <7.0.1.0.2.20061105163941.02249ad8@satx.rr.com> At 02:25 PM 11/5/2006 -0800, Lee wrote: >The Nurture Assumption, >it's related---and Pinker endorses this---that your adult personality is >determined half by genes and half by your peer group (as you're growing >up). > >So I retort that the "wrecked ones" MB speaks of---having succumbed >to drugs, drinking, and other maladaptive behaviors---are a small >minority. Almost everyone turns out (as in the twin studies) pretty much >the same as if they'd been raised hundreds of miles apart by >entirely different families. The assumption of homogeneity in peer groups begs the question at issue. It might in practise be the case that separated median twins in a white-bread culture turn out much the same, but if one potentially brilliant twin grew up with well-educated peers and the other grew up among violent and stupid scumbags, that 50% due to peer influence would have a marked differentiating influence. Not to say *what* influence--maybe the trash surrounds would bring out genius, while the comfortable violin lessons with polyglot chums would induce complacency and oar-resting. Damien Broderick From mbb386 at main.nc.us Sun Nov 5 22:46:38 2006 From: mbb386 at main.nc.us (MB) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 17:46:38 -0500 (EST) Subject: [extropy-chat] it's all understandable, except In-Reply-To: <06da01c70129$9d973d90$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> References: <638d4e150611041654g5d25a025q7aba36ddbfd4e25e@mail.gmail.com><20061105013219.90607.qmail@web51615.mail.yahoo.com> <638d4e150611041749n1a3c2907xd32d00ff60a11df6@mail.gmail.com><05ec01c7008a$ab914660$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <454D960C.2020504@pobox.com><066001c700ea$fb396b60$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677><454E428B.4090109@pobox.com> <33720.72.236.103.101.1162757834.squirrel@main.nc.us> <06da01c70129$9d973d90$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: <33762.72.236.102.75.1162766798.squirrel@main.nc.us> > > So I retort that the "wrecked ones" MB speaks of---having succumbed > to drugs, drinking, and other maladaptive behaviors---are a small > minority. Almost everyone turns out (as in the twin studies) pretty much > the same as if they'd been raised hundreds of miles apart by > entirely different families. > Perhaps it is that I do not know if the ones I see dragging about were actually "the brightest" - really they probably were not, but they were bright and bored and not challenged or meaningfully encouraged. Also, my perception is skewed by the dyslexic child problem... a bright child who cannot seem to move ahead in the "school-approved" fashion. And they *do* become discouraged and they do tend to get into trouble. Acting out, boredom, considered stupid and knowing they really aren't but everybody thinks they are... frustration. We need to nurture the bright ones, all of them, not simply the very top ones, because who on earth will the very top ones find to help them at their work? Do we notice how many of the very brightest seem to have had non-traditional schooling? I'm bitter on the dyslexic thing, my son is one of them. My brother is another. Looks like my great-nephew is also one. The schools (public schools, USA) often have nothing much to offer. Regards, MB From lcorbin at rawbw.com Sun Nov 5 22:50:21 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 14:50:21 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] all that concerns me is the future of education References: <20061105001850.59776.qmail@web51603.mail.yahoo.com><062801c70091$02bb8490$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <62c14240611050926l6a87c935p582c1dfe61c34f81@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <06f401c7012c$ffbfb0d0$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Mike writes > On 11/4/06, Lee Corbin wrote: > > Moreover, the services are much more racially integrated than society at > > large; young men and women there mix freely while their counterparts > > on college campuses self-segregate. Just visit your local college or > > university and go into commons or cafeteria room to see what I mean. Well, this is an objective question. I admit that this is what I have heard, not seen. A high school a few miles north of hear even had segregated parking lots, or so a newspaper article in the San Jose Mercury said. There was an Asian parking lot, a white parking lot, a black parking lot and a hispanic parking lot. Presumably these were divisions within the single high school lot. The reporter asked a kid if something bad would happen if he didn't park in his group's lot. "Probably nothing," came the reply, "but I just wouldn't feel comfortable doing so." > It may be that you are seeing what you want to see based on your own bias. As I say, this is a completely objective question. We need folks to randomly drop in on high school and college campuses. Hmm, there was even a book about this a couple of years back, IIRC, written by a black woman sociologist. I glanced through it at a bookstore. She made the same claim that I'm repeating. > The same could be said about a homogeneous group of white European- > descendant Americans - they are likely to segregate themselves into > groups of Irish, German, French, etc. And, in America, they did. They did, that is, until they all actually assimilated by virtue of the now defunct melting pot. I don't *know* if any self-segregation along racial lines is principally because of cultural differences, or physical differences. But the latter *could*, you surely admit, be a possibility. Even fully assimilated people might have a feeling that they don't *know* if people are going to react to their racial appearance---and so they might self- segregate just to avoid that feeling of uncertainty. > We may actually be in agreement, but I am having difficulty with > the terms you are using and how you are presenting your ideas. > I hope I am misreading your intentions. Could be :-) Let's be open, frank, and honest, and---naturally--- write as clearly as we can about our conjectures. Lee From natasha at natasha.cc Sun Nov 5 23:27:58 2006 From: natasha at natasha.cc (Natasha Vita-More) Date: Sun, 05 Nov 2006 17:27:58 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] FILM: "Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan" Message-ID: <6.2.1.2.2.20061105171759.048e0f90@pop-server.austin.rr.com> Saw it last night. Refreshing, fun ride. The pentagostal scene was hilarious, and also the US etiquette training and dinner party scene. Only one scenes disturbed me - the frat-bus scene with the drunk college students, which I could have done without. Interesting to read the current Fox executive decision to reduce distribution, for now anyway. Natasha Natasha Vita-More Cultural Strategist - Design Media Artist - Futurist PhD Candidate, Planetary Collegium Proactionary Principle Core Group, Extropy Institute Member, Association of Professional Futurists Founder, Transhumanist Arts & Culture If you draw a circle in the sand and study only what's inside the circle, then that is a closed-system perspective. If you study what is inside the circle and everything outside the circle, then that is an open system perspective. - Buckminster Fuller -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jef at jefallbright.net Sun Nov 5 23:34:33 2006 From: jef at jefallbright.net (Jef Allbright) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 15:34:33 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Agency as Prime Determinant of Personal Identity In-Reply-To: <05f901c7008b$848bff50$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: Lee wrote: > Heartland writes >> What!? You're not understanding. What is *different* between the >> nine year old and the ninety year old in Jef's example is >> that the VMBs *did* change. It fits perfectly with the fact that we >> are so tempted (and rightfully so) to question whether they are the >> same person. >> >> Eventually you realize that almost none of your VMBs at 2 >> are the same as your VMBs at 80 which forces you to admit that >> someone has died sometime between 2 and 80. >> Then you either admit this or choose to give up the idea >> that "VMBs = Self." :) > > I *admit* that! Too much change kills one. It changes you > into someone else. [For those who are already tired of this discussion, you might enjoy going straight to the examples further below.] This discussion becomes dull and sometimes frustrating to a large extent due to confusion between the ontological and epistemological domains. I often despair of us climbing out of that morass so we can explore higher vistas. One might say such is the reality of attempting philosophical discussions in a public forum via email, but I see much the same limitations, albeit on a more ponderous scale, in regard to academic philosophical discourse from Plato to John Locke to present-day thinkers. We're not professional philosophers here, and we often make mistakes of domain and category confusion, invalid logical inference, and simple failure to rigorously define our terms. And at a meta level, how many of us keep in mind while debating that we can only "prove" inconsistency, but never consistency within an open context? In this discussion we often unwittingly confuse categories such as "what does it mean to be a unique person?", with "what does it mean to be the same unique person over time?" We often confuse domains, arguing over the statement "two different copies can be the same", where one person argues on the ontological basis that to say there are two copies logically mandates a difference between them, while another person argues just as consistently on the epistemological basis that a difference that makes no difference is no difference at all. And then we have conflict between contrasting point of view and motivations. Following in the tradition of Descartes, there are those who reason from the point of view that reality is defined in terms of the subjective observer, and then there are those who reason from the point of view that there is no privileged point of view. Those of one viewpoint have a strong tendency to assume that unique identity must truly and necessarily exist, those of the other viewpoint tend to see "unique" identity as a useful fiction. As for the bias of motivation, it is apparent that some argue the issue of personal identity from a sense of mathematical or scientific purity, some argue from a sense of pragmatic utility, and others argue from a sense of desperately hoping to escape an end to their personal existence. Nevertheless, we see potential for growth of understanding, and we see practical application of that understanding with the imminence of new technological capabilities that would challenge popular understanding of personal identity. As I consider how to present a theory of personal identity based on agency, I see many possibilities for the discussion to become a phyrric one, with any valid point likely to succumb to attacks which might succeed not due to their aim but their number. I observe that the more general a new principle, the greater its exposure, and I wonder what strategy is best for such an effort. There's the direct frontal attack, likely to succumb as described above, there is the pincers maneuver--a favorite of Lee's--but one finds there is always a escape (if only through a previously unknown dimension of discursive reality ;-) ), there is the Socratic method, and there is infiltration from within. Hmmm. ------------------------------- Well, let's begin. Lee, I presented the little story of Aging Alice in order to demonstrate the incompleteness of the "patternist" view that personal identity is essentially defined in terms of ones values, beliefs and memories, i.e. in terms of their physical/functional attributes. While I agree that this holds for any given instant (t=0), and that it supports the view that an identical copy of a person is essentially that same person, this definition appears to fail *immediately* and progressively with increasing divergence of two instances of the same person. While many of us would say that a person's identity remains constant as they change with age, and thus your definition seems wrong or at least incomplete, you claim that your definition is mathematically and logically correct and it is the common-sense understanding of personality that is flawed. I will attempt to show that your assertion is correct only at t=0, and while it usefully demonstrates the possibility of multiple instances of a personal identity, it says nothing about the extended practicality of such a narrow concept. (1) You have stated that as change accumulates with age, at some point a person must be considered to have become a different person. (2) You have stated that one should consider any copies of oneself as being exactly the same person regardless of some non-zero amount of space, time and accumulated experience, so it is clear that in your theory, personal identity persists through some significant amount of change. (3) So in your theory it seems either that there must be some t>0 dividing point, or that your definition of personal identity is internally contradictory. (3a) You seem to claim a sort of mathematical or objective purity to your theory, so I would ask you, at what point is a person no longer the same person? (4)Failing (3a), would you agree that personal identity (other than for the trivial case at t=0) can not be stated essentially in terms of some objective physical measure (ideal or practical), but that personal identity must necessarily be assigned as the result of some subjective evaluation (which of course is likely to have a strong correspondence with observables)? Please let me know your response to the preceding and of your agreement or disagreement with any of its premises or conclusions. ---------------------- Following Robert Bradury's wise counsel that one should not attempt to destroy another's belief without offering a replacement, I will now offer the following: Given that an objective measure of personal identity is incoherent (other than the case of the mathematically valid identity at t=0), I will propose that a more encompassing concept of personal identity can be based on agency, namely that multiple agents (can be said to) share the same personal identity to the extent that they (are observed to) act on behalf of a particular entity. To head off an anticipated early objection, consider the following: We are all familiar with the idea of a commercial agent, such as one who represents the seller of real estate, or the author of a book, or a film star. We are accustomed to the idea that this agent can act on behalf of the principle in certain limited ways, and in doing so, assumes moral and legal responsibility for such acts as authorized. This is agency, but to a very limited extent relative to what promises to be possible with future technologies. If we extend the concept of agency, we see the agent taking on more and more resemblance to the principle, in terms of knowing the principle's values, beliefs and memories and being able to choose and take action in all such respects. Logically, I am my own agent. This instantiation acts in all ways as an agent of the entity known as Jef. Consider the following scenarios: #1 With the intention of increasing my working bandwidth, I step into the duplicator box. A short time later two agents acting on behalf of the entity known (by everyone including himself) as Jef go to work. They happen to be physically (and thus functionally) the same as the original so the results are coincidentally the same as the patternist view. #2 With the intention of increasing my working bandwidth I step into the duplicator box. To avoid some confusion, I set the controls so that one copy will have blue skin, but be identical in all other respects. The two agents of Jef go to work. Would the patternist say they are not the same personal identity since there's an obvious physical difference? >From the point of view of agency, it's the same personal identity, but with different skin colors. If Jef's skin color were to change would we say he's a different person? #3 With the intention of temporarily increasing my working bandwidth I step into the duplicator box. To avoid confusion and dispute later on, I set the controls such that one copy will have blue skin and will also not feel hunger or boredom, and incidentally it will die within a short time (maybe due to not eating.) From the patternist point of view there are two different persons physically, functionally, and in terms of values. From the point of view of agency it's two of Jef, with one of them significantly modified. If Jef were in the hospital with a skin condition and a brain anomaly that caused lack of boredom would we say it isn't Jef? Note that the functions and actions of someone in hospital may be severely modified but they continue to act solely and entirely on behalf of the same entity. #4 With the intention of contributing to the worthwhile social cause of asteroid mining, but not being able to send my firstborn son, I step into the duplicator box. I send my duplicate off as a free agent to contribute to the cause, knowing that he will get a good pension and I probably won't ever see him again. The patternist view would insist that I was sending myself. The agency point of view would say I was sending a different person with an extremely strong resemblance, carrying my knowledge and skills. Note that if I had in fact sent my son, no one would think of doubting that he was ultimately a free agent, even though I was the sole direct cause of his enlistment. #5 Ten years after sending said free agent to the asteroid mines, he returns, informs me that he was converted to patternist thinking while away, and now claims equal share of my property, my projects and my wife. A patternist might claim (I remember Lee claiming this) that he would in fact be me, and I should be happy to have doubled my runtime and gladly find a way to share. #6 A few days later, I learn that the real reason he returned from the asteroid mines is that he had been accused of a plot to blow up an asteroid belonging to the Bush family and had therefore been charged with terrorism under penalty of death. Under patternist thinking, should I turn myself in, or under agent-based thinking, should I tell him he's in big trouble and might consider making a large political contribution while in hiding? #7 Remember Alice? Under patternist thinking according to Lee, she died at some point even though someone continued on with her property, her relationships, and her name. Under agent-based personal identity, there's no question that we should see the 86 year old woman as a late instantiation of the entity known to all, including herself, as Alice. Furthermore, fifty years later, we would gladly interact with her variants and doubles exactly as if they were Alice in various alternate forms and places. I look forward to your thoughtful comments. - Jef From spike66 at comcast.net Mon Nov 6 00:02:27 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 16:02:27 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Edge: Thank Goodness! By Daniel C. Dennett In-Reply-To: <1162770146.4935.99.camel@localhost.localdomain> Message-ID: <200611060000.kA600Yfr002991@andromeda.ziaspace.com> > -----Original Message----- > From: extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org [mailto:extropy-chat- > bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Fred C. Moulton > Sent: Sunday, November 05, 2006 3:42 PM > To: ExI chat list > Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] Edge: Thank Goodness! By Daniel C. Dennett > > On Sat, 2006-11-04 at 23:35 -0500, Keith Henson wrote: ... > > > Frankly I suspect that if people understood the origin of the human > > capacity for religions they would be horrified... Ja. Fred and I, along with several of the local usual suspects enjoyed a talk by Dawkins last weekend. I had expressed concern that the local religionistas would recognize that the venue was very limited in capacity, and so would attack via displacers. They could organize via the internet, get a bunch of them to attend the talk, thereby using up all the room that would otherwise be occupied by us flaming atheists. They could make the talk unprofitable to Kepler's by simultaneously not buying books. As it turns out, I needn't have worried, or if so I was worried about the wrong thing. I saw no evidence of displacers, and no one heckled Dawkins. Perhaps the others looked at me with my decades-outdated clothing and hairstyle, probably thought I was one of the displacers. {8^D I bought a book. > Of course there were people who were horrified when Darwin and others > began to publish their ideas on evolution...Fred Ja, especially those who didn't actually read Origin of Species. That is a marvelous book, which amazes me at how modern the ideas sound today, a century and a half down the road. Darwin had such a clear and wonderful way of stating things, he can be considered the 19th century prototype of Sagan, Dawkins, Asimov, Gould, Broderick, et al. > > > Best wishes and give my best to the Silicon Valley crew. Keith Thanks Keith! spike From hkhenson at rogers.com Mon Nov 6 00:40:20 2006 From: hkhenson at rogers.com (Keith Henson) Date: Sun, 05 Nov 2006 19:40:20 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] it's all understandable, except In-Reply-To: <33762.72.236.102.75.1162766798.squirrel@main.nc.us> References: <06da01c70129$9d973d90$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <638d4e150611041654g5d25a025q7aba36ddbfd4e25e@mail.gmail.com> <20061105013219.90607.qmail@web51615.mail.yahoo.com> <638d4e150611041749n1a3c2907xd32d00ff60a11df6@mail.gmail.com> <05ec01c7008a$ab914660$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <454D960C.2020504@pobox.com> <066001c700ea$fb396b60$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <454E428B.4090109@pobox.com> <33720.72.236.103.101.1162757834.squirrel@main.nc.us> <06da01c70129$9d973d90$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: <5.1.0.14.0.20061105192604.03f4c948@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> At 05:46 PM 11/5/2006 -0500, MB wrote: snip >I'm bitter on the dyslexic thing, my son is one of them. My brother is >another. >Looks like my great-nephew is also one. The schools (public schools, USA) >often have >nothing much to offer. A *few* of those with dyslexia can be effectively "cured" by external symmetry breaker. Put a cheap plastic ring on a hand and ask if reading toward or away from it helps. Worth trying. Keith From avantguardian2020 at yahoo.com Mon Nov 6 00:48:35 2006 From: avantguardian2020 at yahoo.com (The Avantguardian) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 16:48:35 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Effective relationships In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <20061106004835.86004.qmail@web60511.mail.yahoo.com> --- Jef Allbright wrote: > Robert Bradbury wrote: > > > One may ask under what conditions are survival > probabilities enhanced by partnering? > > ago I posted what I thought was a provocative and > insightful idea, but didn't get much feedback. I'd > like to try again here: > > Might it be that the most effective relationship > structure in terms of cost/benefit might be the > triad? I'm not talking about polyamory or m?nage ? > trois but rather a stable, committed triadic > relationship between three individuals in any > combination of genders. > > I recognize that this would require individuals of > greater than average self-awareness to avoid > destructive two-against-one dynamics. I also > recognize that nature settled on binary > relationships in most cases, but I think human > culture represents a more highly developed phase > that may support and reward more highly developed > relationship structures at various scales. > > The advantages I see are significantly increased > synergies, built-in tie-breaking, and possibly an > inherent 3D structural stability similar to that of > a tetrahedron over a planar object. > > Comments? I tend to like the idea in general. There has been a lot of fuss lately over the concepts like "gay marriage" and "family values" these days. Yet it is my observation that the traditional American model of the "nuclear family" of man, wife, and children is showing signs of impracticality in the modern world. These days child-rearing has become a nearly lost art-form since typically both parents work and children are essenstially brought up by television. The phenomenon of "latch key" children that surfaced in the eighties has, in the 21st century, become the rule rather than the exception. I do not feel this is not a healthy situation physically, mentally, or socially for our children. Developing children need realistic role models during their formative years and TV, including "reality tv" doesn't really fit the bill. I believe that a larger family unit of genetically related or unrelated breeding age adults should be the typical model. There is no reason why any combination of consenting adults of any gender/orientation should not be able to enter into mutually beneficial marriage-like domestic partnerships for purposes procreating and raising children while making ends meet. Sort of the human equivalent of a pack or pride. Bigger than a standard marriage but smaller than a tribe. Stuart LaForge alt email: stuart"AT"ucla.edu "Believe nothing. No matter where you read it, or who said it, even if I have said it, unless it agrees with your own reason and your own common sense."- Siddhartha Guatama aka Buddha. ____________________________________________________________________________________ Everyone is raving about the all-new Yahoo! Mail (http://advision.webevents.yahoo.com/mailbeta/) From mfj.eav at gmail.com Mon Nov 6 01:28:18 2006 From: mfj.eav at gmail.com (Morris Johnson) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 19:28:18 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] Transvision 2007 on Oprah? Message-ID: <61c8738e0611051728p24c8f2d9pb4896925828cf64d@mail.gmail.com> On 11/4/06, Hughes, James J. wrote: > As to finding places to gossip, bring it to the Transvision conferences. > Next one will be in Chicago July 26-28, 2007, with Kurzweil and de Grey > as keynotes. > > ------------------------ > James Hughes Ph.D Isn't Chicago the home of Harpo Productions ... Oprah Winfrey? How about providing Oprah with some advance warning and perhaps an extropian/transhumanist program topic can make its way to mainstream USA? It would certainly broaden the audience .... Aubrey De Grey made it to 60 minutes quite nicely. Perhaps an audience dotted with futurists from around the globe would be refreshing change of pace. Morris Johnson -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jrd1415 at gmail.com Mon Nov 6 01:39:22 2006 From: jrd1415 at gmail.com (Jeff Davis) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 17:39:22 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] truth machine Message-ID: Extropes, Perhaps you will recall Halperin's "Truth Machine". Science fiction, right? Science fiction, as in nerd boy vaporware. As in ***just*** science fiction. I haven't read "The Truth Machine", but I'd heard about it, on this list, (back when Halperin was coming out with "The First Immortal"). Heard that it depicted a world radically transformed by a robust capability to detect lying and discern the truth. Fast forward five or six years. I was reading this article: U.S. says terror suspect shouldn't talk to civilian lawyer http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2006-11-04-interrogation_x.htm The first paragraph states: "A suspected terrorist who spent years in a secret CIA prison should not be allowed to speak to a civilian attorney, the Bush administration argues, because he could reveal the agency's closely guarded interrogation techniques." Which made me think back to this article which I read about two years ago: MRI lie detector may tell fact from fiction http://www.temple.edu/temple_times/2-10-05/lies.html So a year after the announcement of the research, an application comes to market: Brain Scan Lie Detectors Come To Market http://www.futurepundit.com/archives/003548.html >From which I offer a couple of excerpts: Two companies plan to market the first lie-detecting devices that use magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) and say the new tests can spot liars with 90% accuracy. Both rely in part on recent research funded by the federal government aimed at producing a foolproof method of detecting deception. Lie detection will become a huge market. It will change personal relationships, marriages, the criminal justice system (I love tools that can exonerate the innocent), the hunt for terrorists, and raise honesty in business dealings. ******************************************* So I'm wondering -- assuming really -- is the CIA is using this tech in its interrogation protocol? Brave new world. -- Best, Jeff Davis "Always tell the truth. You'll please some people, and astonish the rest." Mark Twain From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Mon Nov 6 01:46:47 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 20:46:47 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Transvision 2007 on Oprah? In-Reply-To: <61c8738e0611051728p24c8f2d9pb4896925828cf64d@mail.gmail.com> References: <61c8738e0611051728p24c8f2d9pb4896925828cf64d@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On 11/5/06, Morris Johnson wrote: > It would certainly broaden the audience .... Aubrey De Grey made it to 60 > minutes quite nicely. Yes and without investing six figures in the process. There is an argument to be presented that Aubrey is more clever than I. But it does not trump that I had the vision first. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From hkhenson at rogers.com Mon Nov 6 01:53:41 2006 From: hkhenson at rogers.com (Keith Henson) Date: Sun, 05 Nov 2006 20:53:41 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Edge: Thank Goodness! By Daniel C. Dennett In-Reply-To: <200611060000.kA600Yfr002991@andromeda.ziaspace.com> References: <1162770146.4935.99.camel@localhost.localdomain> Message-ID: <5.1.0.14.0.20061105204636.03f91248@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> At 04:02 PM 11/5/2006 -0800, spike wrote: (Fred wrote) snip > > Of course there were people who were horrified when Darwin and others > > began to publish their ideas on evolution...Fred > >Ja, especially those who didn't actually read Origin of Species. That is a >marvelous book, which amazes me at how modern the ideas sound today, a >century and a half down the road. Darwin could not account to ants, bees and the like. Accounting for altruistic behavior through inclusive fitness took about a hundred years and the genius of William Hamilton. It accounts for much weirdness and irrational behavior (such as suicide bombers) when the "interest" of a person and their genes diverge. Keith Henson From mbb386 at main.nc.us Mon Nov 6 02:00:45 2006 From: mbb386 at main.nc.us (MB) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 21:00:45 -0500 (EST) Subject: [extropy-chat] it's all understandable, except In-Reply-To: <5.1.0.14.0.20061105192604.03f4c948@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> References: <06da01c70129$9d973d90$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <638d4e150611041654g5d25a025q7aba36ddbfd4e25e@mail.gmail.com> <20061105013219.90607.qmail@web51615.mail.yahoo.com> <638d4e150611041749n1a3c2907xd32d00ff60a11df6@mail.gmail.com> <05ec01c7008a$ab914660$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <454D960C.2020504@pobox.com> <066001c700ea$fb396b60$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <454E428B.4090109@pobox.com> <33720.72.236.103.101.1162757834.squirrel@main.nc.us> <06da01c70129$9d973d90$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <5.1.0.14.0.20061105192604.03f4c948@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> Message-ID: <33848.72.236.103.204.1162778445.squirrel@main.nc.us> Keith wrote: > > A *few* of those with dyslexia can be effectively "cured" by external > symmetry breaker. > > Put a cheap plastic ring on a hand and ask if reading toward or away from > it helps. > > Worth trying. > > Indeed it is. Another other technique that helps is the index card underneath the line being read. This helps keep the eyes tracking along that line and helps when coming back to the beginning of the next line. One of the complaints has been that the eyes track back and the child re-reads the same line several times, which is quite disruptive to the flow of the material. Whole body movements can be used to try to avoid the glitch from brain to fingers for writing. Arm movements in air, making the letter shapes. Drawing the letters in a sand tray, feeling the letters made of different materials. All these things can help, but the difficulty is still annoyingly there, just better dealt with. I guess it's like being color blind: one can describe it but it really doesn't quite click unless one suffers from it. One learns to compensate, tricks tricks tricks. My son complained that reading was like translating. All the time. And that certainly breaks the flow of the content. I am delighted that he has gotten as far as he has, but he has yet to find his niche. My brother succeeded, but he is far brighter. Regards, MB From hkhenson at rogers.com Mon Nov 6 01:40:21 2006 From: hkhenson at rogers.com (Keith Henson) Date: Sun, 05 Nov 2006 20:40:21 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Edge: Thank Goodness! By Daniel C. Dennett In-Reply-To: <1162770146.4935.99.camel@localhost.localdomain> References: <5.1.0.14.0.20061104231911.03f35940@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> <5.1.0.14.0.20061103224339.03c13fa8@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> <380-220061153192746796@M2W040.mail2web.com> <5.1.0.14.0.20061103224339.03c13fa8@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> <5.1.0.14.0.20061104231911.03f35940@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> Message-ID: <5.1.0.14.0.20061105194323.03d73838@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> At 03:42 PM 11/5/2006 -0800, Fred wrote: >On Sat, 2006-11-04 at 23:35 -0500, Keith Henson wrote: snip > > > > You might note that better sanitation memes are an outgrowth of > > *understanding* infectious disease, particularly what *causes* it. > >I agree that understanding the mechanisms in which harmful memes take >hold is important. I agree with you on the importance of understanding. But "harmful" needs to be carefully examined as to what is harmed and what is helped. Take the 9/11 hijackers as an example. No doubt about them harming others and dying in the process or about them being motivated by some religious class meme. But how about their *genes*? Don't forget that most or all of them had lots of relatives who shared their genes. I can't state with confidence that the relatives of the 19 hijackers are doing better in terms of status and other perks that make it more likely for there to be a more copies of those hijacker's genes in the next generation, but these psychological traits were selected in the Stone Age. The relatives of warriors (i.e., copies of their genes) who fought neighbors for resources on average did better than those who did not. We know that the brain even has dedicated "religious feeling" circuits in the temporal lobe. That indicates genes build a PROM like religious meme receptor area. My (paranoid) claim is that wars were the origin of the psychological traits that manifest as religious memes. >My opinion is that this is a very complex subject >and that Dennett, Dawkins and Harris (along with many others) are just >beginning to make progress in this area. I wish it were true, but I don't even see them moving in the right direction. Evolutionary psychology states that every psychological trait resulted from direct selection or it is a side effect of something that was selected. I strongly suspect that the psychological trait that causes humans to have religions at all was selected as a result of incessant warfare. It wouldn't be hard to show with some hopped up war buffs and functional MRI. Viewed this way, religions are seed xenophobic memes that are brought to a fever pitch by the conditions leading to wars. > > Ranting against religions might be really effective if religions were > > understood to the level we understand infectious disease. As it is, what > > this crew is doing is like ranting against fevers without the least > > understanding of what causes fevers. > >I think I found more value in what Dennett, Dawkins and Harris are doing >than you do. For one thing they are providing momentum to a long >overdue response to some of the nonsensical attacks on atheism which >many religious persons have been doing for years. I suspect that wide understanding the function of religions as a part of the war complex might be more effective. On the other hand, if my paranoid thoughts on the function of religions are right, we might *need* them. If some vast religious population insists on going to war with the western world, some bunch of our warriors, hopped up on memes of the religious class, will have to kill huge numbers of them. :-( The alternative I see to megadeath is high tech rapidly improving the "income per capita" and shutting off the psychological mechanisms that lead to war or related social disruption. It's too late for a reduced birth rate (as happened in Ireland) to shut off the drive to war. Have fun at Hacker's Keith From avantguardian2020 at yahoo.com Mon Nov 6 01:45:19 2006 From: avantguardian2020 at yahoo.com (The Avantguardian) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 17:45:19 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Effective relationships In-Reply-To: <638d4e150611041307hfa88d4ia61be18a52953a44@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <20061106014519.79695.qmail@web60520.mail.yahoo.com> --- Ben Goertzel wrote: > However, this > doesn't really matter much, because human emotional > tendencies are > strong, and due to the nature of human emotions > interpersonal > partnerships with >2 members are just not very > stable.... Well neither is the traditional marriage these days. According to http://www.divorcepeers.com/stats05.htm The median life of a first marriage is 7 years and subsequent marriages last even less. While an extended domestic partnership may not be very stable, it probably is not that much lower than a traditional marriage. Furthermore most such long-term relationships ought to be based on mutual self-interest rather than on fickle fleeting emotions any way. Stuart LaForge alt email: stuart"AT"ucla.edu "Believe nothing. No matter where you read it, or who said it, even if I have said it, unless it agrees with your own reason and your own common sense."- Siddhartha Guatama aka Buddha. ____________________________________________________________________________________ We have the perfect Group for you. Check out the handy changes to Yahoo! Groups (http://groups.yahoo.com) From hkhenson at rogers.com Mon Nov 6 03:28:30 2006 From: hkhenson at rogers.com (Keith Henson) Date: Sun, 05 Nov 2006 22:28:30 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Edge: Thank Goodness! By Daniel C. Dennett In-Reply-To: <5.1.0.14.0.20061104231911.03f35940@pop.bloor.is.net.cable. rogers.com> References: <1162679909.4912.78.camel@localhost.localdomain> <5.1.0.14.0.20061103224339.03c13fa8@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> <380-220061153192746796@M2W040.mail2web.com> <5.1.0.14.0.20061103224339.03c13fa8@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> Message-ID: <5.1.0.14.0.20061105222433.03f96578@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> > >I have been doing a bit of ranting on this subject myself on the Harris >page. >http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/20060916_sam_harris_rottweiler_barks/ Only about 1/4 of this made it to the comments log, so here is the whole thing; Joan wrote: I have been stepping back from our dialogue to get sort of an overview, instead of tripping over specifics too much. Keith, it seems you are proposing a psychology of evolutionary behavior of man's warlike behavior. In a nutshell, when faced with bleak prospects imminently or in the far distance, such as Iran, you claim that man will resort to war to enhance his probability of survival. Close, but not exactly on the mark. You have to be extremely careful with the wording in models if you want them to be useful for predicting the future. And, you have to keep in mind that the psychological traits leading to wars evolved in the Stone Age. Going to war (as Azar Gat points out) wasn't always the only option. Sometimes people under resource pressure could move far away. "Enhance his probability of survival" isn't the right way to state it either. War is a chancy business today and was no less so when high tech was sharp rocks. For the individual, and even the kin group, war only came about because the alternative was worse. What resulted is the evolved psychological mechanisms we have for amplifying xenophobic memes and going out to kill neighbors when our ancestors perceived "hard times a-coming. In the Stone Age such traits statistically and over a long time worked to enhance "inclusive fitness." Inclusive fitness has genes "winning" even if many carriers of the genes die, provided there are more carriers of the genes after a war than would be the case taking an alternate course. Perhaps an example from history would help. Consider the Spartans at Thermopylae: " . . . as well as a symbol of courage against extremely overwhelming odds. The heroic sacrifice of the Spartans and the Thespians has captured the minds of many throughout the ages and has given birth to many cultural references as a result." . . . "Knowing the likely outcome of the battle, Leonidas selected his men on one simple criterion: he took only men who had fathered sons that were old enough to take over the family responsibilities of their fathers. The rationale behind this criterion was that the Spartans knew their death was almost certain at Thermopylae. Plutarch mentions, in his Sayings of Spartan Women, that after encouraging her husband before his departure for the battlefield, Gorgo, the wife of Leonidas I asked him what she should do when he had left. To this, Leonidas replied: 'Marry a good man, and have good children.'" ****** Spooky! Almost as if the Greeks understood EP and genetics. Perhaps living closer to the Stone Age and incessant war they would find it easier to understand compared to modern people. Leonidas' death did,/b> save Greek genes, specifically the Spartans', more specifically his genes through his children and even more specifically the genes of his male children who would have been killed by the invaders. Along with the preceding victory at Marathon some ten years earlier, "their victory endowed the Greeks with a faith in their destiny that was to endure for three centuries, during which western culture was born." Maybe because of certain universal moral precepts, such as in the NY Times article Maani cited like the prohibition against unjustified killing, men develop certain ideologies that give a sort of morally acceptable permission to suspend these precepts to engage in war. Communism and religions are two such ideologies. You refer to such ideologies as memes that people adapt and act on to preserve their self- interest of survival. You make it sound conscious, it's not. EP seems to be an inter-disciplinary study of sorts encompassing psychology, anthropology, and biology Not exactly, you are mixing levels. Biology (that is evolutionary biology) is the level upon which EP builds, like biology builds on the chemistry level. Anthropology (and the rest of the social sciences) are at a higher level. EP is essentially putting a foundation under a lot of formerly free-floating disciplines. "Evolutionary psychology is an approach to psychology, in which knowledge and principles from evolutionary biology are put to use in research on the structure of the human mind. It is not an area of study, like vision, reasoning, or social behavior. It is a way of thinking about psychology that can be applied to any topic within it. "In this view, the mind is a set of information-processing machines that were designed by natural selection to solve adaptive problems faced by our hunter-gatherer ancestors. This way of thinking about the brain, mind, and behavior is changing how scientists approach old topics, and opening up new ones. http://www.psych.ucsb.edu/research/cep/primer.html as I gather you are suggesting that these memes may reflect certain chemical dispositions. Some musings If memes do not reflect a biology, how are they different from belief systems? Memes are at a higher level yet. They depend on the existence of creatures able to learn information patterns from each other. And beliefs are memes. Can one animal pass along information patterns (often behaviors) to another? Memes are what they pass, pure replicating information, elements of culture, ideas, beliefs--all fit the concept of a meme. This brings me to my broader question-What does this meme theory give us that prior theories have not? Clear, accurate models are of vast importance in reducing human misery. Consider the germ theory of disease as an example. Very little progress was made before Pasteur and Koch developed that theory. Anthropologists already speak about how belief systems develop, spread, assist man and die out in tribes. When you use "meme" instead of "idea" the replication aspect is important. It's a model to help explain the persistence of elements of culture. In one of my earliest meme papers I noted (without a biological or EP explanation) that economic downturns are accompanied by upswings in neo-Nazi movements in the US. The essence of memetics has been around at least a century. It is encapsulated in "Ideas have a life of their own." If you take that serious and apply what we know about living things to ideas, you have memetics. Another musing all wars minimally are wars of perceived self-interest. Close again, but not exactly on the mark. It's hard to do, but to understand this you need to get your mind to look at the world from the "viewpoint of genes." _Selfish Gene_ and the more difficult _Extended Phenotype_ by Richard Dawkins are still a very good place to get this essential but alien viewpoint. Hunter-gatherer wars were in the self-interest of genes. More recent wars, particularly the southwest corn farmers 800 years ago, may not be. (Side effects due to a different level of technology caused them to die out over a vast area.) All wars need perceived moral permission prior to engagement and during engagement. History tells us that there have been religious wars. And there have been wars that do not pertain to religion per se. My sense is that you are claiming that no matter the smokescreen that gives permission, all wars are fought with the bleak future motivation as the paramount one for the war. It isn't just permission, it is an essential part of synching hunter-gatherer warriors up into a killing frenzy. Now I can agree theoretically but it is a stretch Iran being a case in point Every case (post agriculture) has to be considered very carefully. While humans still have the psychological traits honed in the Stone Age, the environment is very different. For example, the vast majority of human evolution was when our ancestors lived in bands of under 100 people. The last really big war (WW II) involved hundreds of millions. It is not obvious if or how this difference in scale modulates the traits. Certainly a million times more population to draw leaders from is going to get ones further out on the bell curve, for example, Genghis Khan, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genghis_Khan, Iran has the option of developing nuclear energy peaceably with IAEA inspections etc, to prepare for the day that the oil wells run dry but Iran has not opted to do so it has opted for belligerence Palestinians have not opted for security and prosperity but have also opted for belligerence... Option and opted imply rational thinking. The essence of the theory is that the ability of humans to think rationally gets trashed as they go into war mode. This is one of the sad legacies out of our hunter-gatherer past. If either of your examples were thinking rationally, there would be a major push for birth control. perhaps the bleak theory has to be expanded to not only include material survival, i.e., gathering your protein but also perceived psychological survival i.e., a bleak psychological future theory of war.. In _Influence: the new psychology of modern persuasion_ (1984 and more recent editions) Robert Cialdini, goes into a great deal of psychological background. One of these (using the three bucket experiment) is the importance of relative changes. It is clear from the lack of revolts in India that grinding poverty (the lifelong prospect for a large segment of the population) won't spark war mode. Why? Because the future looks no bleaker than the conditions they have lived in all their lives, and people tend to respond to relative change. This may explain Kim Jong Il, Ahmadinejad, Caesar and Alexander . Perhaps. We should not forget that our view of wars are highly biased, essentially our knowledge of wars is since the invention of writing, which is to say 6000 years of the 6 million since we and the chimps parted ways. Lastly, although religions are exploited to give permission to engage in war, it is important to note that religions are not founded with the primary end to give man permission to fight wars. I think there have been cases where religions were founded to support wars. They have other more immediate functions and are generally called upon to meet other of man's complex needs. Religions are bastardized. It is crucial in scholarly study to give an authentic depiction of the intent of religion and other ideologies, distinguishing their paramount intent from their misuse or corruption when making judgments about value of these ideologies. I seriously think your concern is directed to the wrong level. Persisting at that level will get you no further than being concerned about fever would have prevented epidemic diseases. Religions are a consequence of human psychological traits. Where, did those come from? " My contention, simply put, is that the evolutionary approach is the only approach in the social and behavioral sciences that deals with why, in an ultimate sense, people behave as they do. As such, it often unmasks the universal hypocrisies of our species, peering behind self-serving notions about our moral and social values to reveal the darker side of human nature." (Silverman 2003) You can say that religions arise from human needs, but it's the same question, where did those "needs" come from? Pascal Boyer doesn't take it far enough, but I suggest he is taking steps in the right direction. " . . . anthropologist Pascal Boyer that discusses the evolutionary origins of religious concepts. Through an examination of the mind's inference systems - how they work and how they have been shaped over time - Boyer explains how it is that we have the religious concepts we do, and why they have been so culturally successful. Boyer presents evidence from many specialized disciplines including anthropology, cognitive science, linguistics, and evolutionary biology to support the idea that a naturalistic explanation of religion is possible; moreover, such an approach is necessary if the field and study of religion is going to make any progress." http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Religion_Explained Otherwise they are misrepresented. We have seen some heinous tragedies in science but we would not want to say that because of them that these tragedies were this is the purpose of science. Think thalidomide here. True, though there is more to the story. "In 1964, a French physician named Jacob Sheskin was trying to help a critically-ill male patient with erythema nodosum leprosum (ENL), a very painful complication of leprosy. He looked throughout his small hospital for anything that might help his patient stop aching long enough to sleep. He came across a bottle of thalidomide tablets, and remembered that the drug had been effective in helping mentally ill patients sleep - and also that it was banned. Thinking he had nothing to lose, Sheskin gave the man two tablets of thalidomide. The patient slept for hours, and he felt good enough to get out of bed without aid when he woke up. The result was soon followed by more favorable experiences, followed by a clinical trial. Dr. Sheskin's drug of last resort revolutionized the care of leprosy, and led to the closing of most leprosy hospitals." It was my engineer husband's idea about the earthquakes and tsunami's as a type of nature's population control I think this could be right because in the grand scheme of things, population control does not have to be causally linked to a given population, just the way of nature. As a guess he is a civil engineer. Most of the other engineering specialties tend to be more restrictive using of the word. Hepburn/Tracy...humor, but perhaps as women's attention turns from childbearing and home to the corporate sector etc there will be rise in female aggression and hence in the total amount of aggression in society think of it like the pressure/ volume law governing gas, as one decreases, the other increases and vice versa It could be. But you would have to factor in fewer wars to see if the net result was desirable. The danger with the decrease in reproduction as a way to stem war is that reproduction is a delicate balance. If reproduction declines too much, the bleak future again emerges and then war, according to your theory. That would be really perverse. I can't think of an example where a country with a declining population went to war. In any case, Japan will provide a test case shortly. Russia may be a good crucible to study here Possibly. I have not given a lot of thought to the problems in Russia. Some of them are probably genetic such as sensitivity to alcohol. Alcohol seems to have come late to the Russians and they are still in the process of genetically getting used to it. (Unexposed populations range up to 95% alcoholics--if they can get it.) and the more affluent European nations like Sweden and Germany whose many immigrants are not melding and working to bolster the economy but actually are causing more of a threat to their viability. France has certainly had problems of this sort. Keith Henson (sorry about the HTML tags) From spike66 at comcast.net Mon Nov 6 03:29:42 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 19:29:42 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Effective relationships In-Reply-To: <20061106014519.79695.qmail@web60520.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <200611060327.kA63RoDK001639@andromeda.ziaspace.com> > -----Original Message----- > From: extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org [mailto:extropy-chat- > bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of The Avantguardian > Sent: Sunday, November 05, 2006 5:45 PM > To: ExI chat list > Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] Effective relationships > > --- Ben Goertzel wrote: > > > ... due to the nature of human emotions > > interpersonal partnerships with >2 members are just not very > > stable.... > > Well neither is the traditional marriage these days. > According to http://www.divorcepeers.com/stats05.htm > The median life of a first marriage is 7 years and > subsequent marriages last even less... > Stuart LaForge > alt email: stuart"AT"ucla.edu Wow that is a mind blower Avant. When this question came up before, about 6 yrs ago, I estimated the half-life of marriages at about 15 yrs. Looks like I was off by a factor of 2. It amazes me to think my own union has already lasted three half-lives and we are just now starting on the spawning process. I have personally witnessed an apparent three-way relationship. A friend married while we were still in college, took up a one-bedroom apartment across the street. A mutual friend of theirs, female, was always visiting over at their place, and eventually was living with them. Of course there was some curiosity as to whether he was actually sleeping with both women, but no one asked. Perhaps we were not sure we wanted to hear the answer. Within a year he had moved out and the women stayed together in that apartment. Again, no one asked and no one volunteered any info. I don't see how that arrangement could possibly work long term, but I recognize my deplorable lack of imagination when it comes to human relationships. spike From asa at nada.kth.se Mon Nov 6 03:33:16 2006 From: asa at nada.kth.se (Anders Sandberg) Date: Mon, 6 Nov 2006 04:33:16 +0100 (MET) Subject: [extropy-chat] Effective relationships In-Reply-To: <20061106004835.86004.qmail@web60511.mail.yahoo.com> References: <20061106004835.86004.qmail@web60511.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <1401.142.179.110.23.1162783996.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> Just a few preliminary observations on the Markov approach to relationships: If one state is less stable than the others, the number of people found there in stationary distribution is significantly lower than the others. It is roughly an 1/(1-p) curve. Hence even a slight difference in stability might be enough to make a social pattern rare. The lower the transition probability between the states, the more pronounced this effect is. Eliezer pointed out that there is a state one cannot get out of, being dead. One can of course run the whole thing with a constant inflow of new singles and people dropping off, but given that the death probability appears to be one order of magnitude smaller than the divorce probability these days I think it can be safely ignored. Even if triads may be less stable than dyads, that doesn't mean it has to be like that. With the right social context, and perhaps some chemical or neural tweaking we could invent entirely new forms of relationships. -- Anders Sandberg, Oxford Uehiro Centre for Practical Ethics Philosophy Faculty of Oxford University From velvethum at hotmail.com Mon Nov 6 03:34:21 2006 From: velvethum at hotmail.com (Heartland) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 22:34:21 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Detectives and red herrings (was Survival tangent) References: <20061102082308.30427.qmail@web37204.mail.mud.yahoo.com><8d71341e0611031444w6b27e817o85cd287a58458c2c@mail.gmail.com> <057501c6ffdf$33394920$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: > Jeffrey [wrote]: > "Personally, I'm not ready to reject Slawomir's ideas and conceptions. But, in > this particular example, I agree with you Lee. That the intricate weave of > *consciousness* of a person can effectively "exist" at two places simultaneously. Lee: "Right, Jeffrey, but we'll still have to convince Heartland :-) I love pincer attacks. John Clark is coming at him from the north while we hammer away from the west" No worries, mate. I've got the mini-nukes set up along the perimeter. Besides, it's apparent that virtually no one can even locate the continent I'm on, let alone can identify which buildings to bomb. But I'll say this. Few months ago Jeffrey was able to send an EMP that seriously disrupted my defense systems for few minutes. The shockwaves were being felt long after the incident. That was by far the closest I came to having "a problem". As for Clark, he continues to bomb the hell out of some imaginary ghost town in some parallel universe. :-) ---- Lee, I believe that now I have a full comprehension of what you've been saying. Taking also into account Jef Allbright's recent proposal of "agency" as a determinant of personal identity finally gives me the complete picture of all the points of view in this debate. So, let's zoom out to see the big picture of what we've got so far. At this meta-level the philosophers of personal identity implicitly or explicitly answer this single fundamental question: "What defines a person?" The task of answering this question is usually being undertaken, as it should, in the spirit of reductionism. But despite agreement on the choice of investigative tools, the philosophers of PI still find different suspects responsible for the essence of what a person is. How can this happen? Well, sometimes these detectives grab the first thing they find that *might* be responsible for that "essence" and stop there. But, as in all good mystery novels, the first suspects are rarely guilty. It turns out that some detectives are also mystery novel writers and are skilled at identifying "red herrings". Instead, they dig deeper, gather more evidence, spend years on trying to understand the motive and finally find some other guy with even less alibi then the previous suspect. But there are also those detectives who never close the case as long as there's a shadow of a doubt that someone else might be responsible. ;-) Philosophers searching for the essence of what a person really is follow the reductive process that initially goes something like this: Things->Body->Brain But then, someone like Lee Corbin comes along and claims this is not enough and extends the process: Things->Body->Brain->Pattern->VBMs But then, Jef Allbright comes along and says this is not enough/correct and decides to extend this process further still until it looks like this: Things->Body->Brain->Pattern->VBMs->Agency Meanwhile, I look at both of these reductive processes and can't help but comment: "You've already missed a crucial exit and are heading for an inevitable dead end." Here's my version of the reductive process: Things->Body->Brain->Mind->Process->Presence At this moment you, dear reader, are probably asking yourself: "What the hell is Presence?" Well, the short version is that it's an "instance of awareness, perception, sensation, etc". I might provide more details if there's enough demand. I know from experience that these ideas are quite hard to convey since it requires the reader that he think in 4-D *and* abandon the habit of thinking that Person=VMBs, among other things. The most important thing to realize is that Presence supervenes on the physical. I want to make sure this is clear right from the start to counter knee-jerk accusations of promoting existence of "souls". There are no souls, okay? (That goes especially for you, John K Clark.) --- Lee: "But I'm claiming (along with several other people here) that while there are two instances, two minds, two brains, there is only one person. What is a person? I'm going to be arguing against Jef Albright shortly, but to me it's values, beliefs, and memories, which someone began to call VBM or something here not long ago." Right, *to you* a person is equivalent to a specific collection of VBMs. Apparently, Jef and I don't share this view for the same exact reasons (so I'd be happy to outsource arguing with you about this to Jef :-)) even though Jef's value of "X" in "person reduces to X" is not the same value of my "X". (Incidentally, if I thought that any person reduced to VBMs I would have no problems embracing "The Luckiest Person in the Universe" scenario described in Max More's "The Diachronic Self"). Lee: "Yes, but the concept of *person* that you dispute includes the proposition that you are the same person you were ten years ago even though we are speaking of two minds, two brains, two spatial locations, and two temporal locations. But still *one* person." Well, that's the thing. You have a different referent for "person"; a different value of X in "Person=X". Slawomir From asa at nada.kth.se Mon Nov 6 03:39:35 2006 From: asa at nada.kth.se (Anders Sandberg) Date: Mon, 6 Nov 2006 04:39:35 +0100 (MET) Subject: [extropy-chat] Effective relationships In-Reply-To: <200611060327.kA63RoDK001639@andromeda.ziaspace.com> References: <200611060327.kA63RoDK001639@andromeda.ziaspace.com> Message-ID: <1403.142.179.110.23.1162784375.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> spike wrote: > Wow that is a mind blower Avant. When this question came up before, about > 6 > yrs ago, I estimated the half-life of marriages at about 15 yrs. Looks > like > I was off by a factor of 2. It amazes me to think my own union has > already > lasted three half-lives and we are just now starting on the spawning > process. Which makes it very likely it is going to last much longer. In the UK the median length of marriages that break up is 10 years, but the peak is about 5-6 years. Risk factors involve being young when married, previous marriages... and in the UK, children. This is a very odd thing, because most US evidence and data from the 70's in the UK show that children protect marriage. But children increase divorce probability in the UK now. Why this has changed nobody knows. This research paper is turning me into some kind of Dr Love, brimming with helpful statistics... -- Anders Sandberg, Oxford Uehiro Centre for Practical Ethics Philosophy Faculty of Oxford University From asa at nada.kth.se Mon Nov 6 03:49:01 2006 From: asa at nada.kth.se (Anders Sandberg) Date: Mon, 6 Nov 2006 04:49:01 +0100 (MET) Subject: [extropy-chat] truth machine In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <1413.142.179.110.23.1162784941.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> Jeff Davis wrote: > So I'm wondering -- assuming really -- is the CIA is using this tech > in its interrogation protocol? My guess is that they are funding research and maybe testing it. But it is not part of standard protocols because 1) MRI equipment is expensive and requires particular facilities with staff. Not even the Firm has the budget to put it everywhere, and bussing suspects around to such sites is troublesome. 2) the method is rather experimental. You really want to know everything about what it can and cannot do before trusting its results. It is very similar to the P300 brain fingerprinting idea: without a good questioning methodology it is pretty useless for finding truth. Of course, it would not be the first time big agencies spend money and effort on useless methods that everybody then claims work wonderfully. And as the various torture scandals have shown, inefficient truth-finding methods are indeed used. A far more likely explanation IMHO is that the suspect could tell yet another Abu Graib/Quran in toilet/whatever embarrasment. But give them a few years to work. Maybe it is time to get those magnet implants - or learn to control your anterior cingulate gyrus by biofeedback. -- Anders Sandberg, Oxford Uehiro Centre for Practical Ethics Philosophy Faculty of Oxford University From avantguardian2020 at yahoo.com Mon Nov 6 03:53:39 2006 From: avantguardian2020 at yahoo.com (The Avantguardian) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 19:53:39 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] 2-party-system = 1-dimensional politics (was polls again) In-Reply-To: <7641ddc60611040856t51a97100kb8a8a6e3430351fe@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <20061106035339.37606.qmail@web60513.mail.yahoo.com> --- Rafal Smigrodzki wrote: > I have to take issue with most of what you said, > Stuart. I think that > the current two party system is the result not so > much of > one-dimensional thinking, or other causes you > mention. That's ok. If my post got you to delurk, it did its job. ;) > It is better > explained by economies of scale in a form of > marketing that strongly > relies on our tribal tendencies. The problem with economies of scale is that they tend toward monopolies and collusive duopolies quite frequently. Monopoly in turn reduces competition which reduces innovation and exchanges the free-market for the "mega-market". > Both parties have > marketed themselves > as champions of the poor, pacifists, hawks, > small(er) government > advocates, champions of progress and defenders of > the faith, > frequently at the same time. Yes, which just goes to show that they embrace no true lasting vision, principle, or philosophy and instead just seek to maintain their duopolistic grip on the American people. > I fail to see any > substantive > differences between the major parties on important > issues, if averaged > over periods of twenty years or more. And, of > course, there are > economies of scale in selling ideology: a large > organization trying to > maximize their appeal has an advantage over smaller > sellers of exactly > the same ideology. That's why there is only one > party per large niche: > there is no small Democratic party, since this large > supplier > outcompetes any comers. Yes and also serverely limits the available types of idealogy on the market. The point of espousing an idealogy at all is that it should promote ones biological and economic survival. > > Now this leads to the second element: tribalism. The > most important > predictor of voting Rep vs. Dem is what your parents > used to vote. That is not a very rational reason to vote for a particular party. I can see why people do it because it exploits the in-born tendency to mimic ones parents as a model of successful survival behavior. But the ground in politics shifts so quickly compared to the natural environment, it is hardly an adaptive behavior to run a 21st century nation. Throwing stones at tigers may have been a great suvival tactic back in the days of my glorious ancestor Og, but it isn't a very adaptive behavior in the modern age when there is a speeding bus barreling down upon you. > This imposes seemingly > impossible demands > on political parties: being different while staying > the same. >The > young Republican cubs want to be Republican like > daddy but they want > to be a different shade of Republican. Very > importantly, for a tribe > to exist, there has to be at least one out-group to > identify yourself > against. Without the outsider to rally against, the > tribe is likely to > splinter on its own, making outsiders out of its own > flesh. Hmm. This is a better point. But I am worried that the homogeneity we both observe of the two parties is the result of the development of a homogenous "political class" that merely tries to maintain the illusion of an "outgroup" for the sake of maintaining the illusion that they are being elected democratically. The republocrats seem to just recycle old rhetoric, without meaning a word of it, in order to line the pockets of their bed-fellows from the ranks of special interest. I can however see how having multiple parties may contribute to greater factionalization of society than exists now. Then again a viable third party may be able to operate as to consolidate all of the minor-third parties. Thus leading to more societal cohesion by mopping up the misfits so to speak. > Now combine the strictures of mass marketing in a > democratic system > that existed for a few generations with tribalism, > and you get a > solution: at least two, but not more than three > major parties, that > differ in minor details and shift their image over > periods of twenty > years or more. There are some countries with dozens > of parties: this > is where tribal affiliation goes not to the party of > your parents, but > to the extended family or clan. This seems to be a good solution for America. America seems less a "melting pot" than a "pot of stew" with all manner of tribes bound together loosely by the broth of freedom. Freedom, which need I remind you, we are losing because my hypothesized collusion of the duopolistic republocrats. > There are some > countries with only one > party but they are less likely to be true > democracies. The two party > system seems to be a common outcome in stable > democracies due at least > in part to the mechanisms that I described. And in part perhaps to the mechanisms that I described. They are hardly mutually exclusives and the actions of individual players in key positions can hijack so called market forces for their own benefit. > Now, I admit that this is a rather boring > explanation: there are no > cliques scheming to keep new political vendors out, Admittedly I may have made it sound like the biggest conspiracy since the cyanobacteria tried to poison their neighbors with oxygen, but it need not be orchestrated by a handful of masterminds in order to have evolved. > there is no > connection between the two-party system and the > fictional "decline of > the middle class" (which actually enjoyed the > largest ever increase in > numbers and in political power in the last century), > no relation to > the "growing inequality" Well I make it a point not to believe everything I read, but I can see it on the streets as well. Check out: http://money.cnn.com/2006/08/29/news/economy/wealth_gap/index.htm Do you have contradictory statistics you would like to offer? > There is no master plan by power > wielders to destroy the > middle class and support the poor (in fact, no > serious democratic > politician ever cares about the poor, because hardly > any voters care > about the poor, Don't the poor voters care about the poor? Of course they do, which is why you have to use sheriff officers to keep them away from the ballot boxes. and of course the middle class that > votes does not > want to destroy themselves either). Yet surprisingly, if it came out as a ballot measure here in Taxifornia, it might actually pass: Proposition 99: Ban H2O- people drown in it you know. > It's the outcome > of hundreds of > millions of people making decisions, embedded in > institutionalized > tradition and guided by various inborn propensities. It is the reduction of a vast human mind generated by billions of neurons down to a single bit of information: Blue or Red. Stuart LaForge alt email: stuart"AT"ucla.edu "Believe nothing. No matter where you read it, or who said it, even if I have said it, unless it agrees with your own reason and your own common sense."- Siddhartha Guatama aka Buddha. ____________________________________________________________________________________ We have the perfect Group for you. Check out the handy changes to Yahoo! Groups (http://groups.yahoo.com) From velvethum at hotmail.com Mon Nov 6 04:44:08 2006 From: velvethum at hotmail.com (Heartland) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 23:44:08 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Identity (was: Survival tangent) References: <20061102062735.57668.qmail@web52612.mail.yahoo.com> <015601c7010a$6a7d5d50$450a4e0c@MyComputer> Message-ID: > "Ian Goddard" Wrote: >> the definition of 'identity' in logic matches >> Leibniz's Identity of Indiscernibles. John K Clark: > Leibniz's Identity Of Indiscernibles is the idea that if you exchange the > position of two things and there is no change in the system then the > two things are the same. If I place you (the copy) and the original an > equal distance from the center of a symmetrical room so you see the > same things and then instantly swap your bodies position with the > original then neither you nor the original nor any outside observer > could detect the slightest change. Then I'm afraid you don't really understand Leibniz's law. Regardless of the arrangement, you can always come up with *at least one arbitrary* property (measurement of the distance from a non-equidistant point, for example) with respect to which two material things are going to be different; a sufficient evidence for assigning different identities. Just because the copy subjectively "feels" the same doesn't influence the fact that objectively it isn't and never will be identical to the original as this would violate the law of conservation of mass/energy. I basically agree with what Ian and Randall told you so far. Slawomir From sentience at pobox.com Mon Nov 6 04:53:34 2006 From: sentience at pobox.com (Eliezer S. Yudkowsky) Date: Sun, 05 Nov 2006 20:53:34 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Effective relationships In-Reply-To: <1401.142.179.110.23.1162783996.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> References: <20061106004835.86004.qmail@web60511.mail.yahoo.com> <1401.142.179.110.23.1162783996.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> Message-ID: <454EBFCE.2070505@pobox.com> Anders Sandberg wrote: > > Eliezer pointed out that there is a state one cannot get out of, being > dead. One can of course run the whole thing with a constant inflow of new > singles and people dropping off, but given that the death probability > appears to be one order of magnitude smaller than the divorce probability > these days I think it can be safely ignored. Even ignoring death, the ergodic distribution of dyads, triads, and tetrads does not give you information about the relative stability of dyads, triads, and tetrads unless you also know the formation probabilities of dyads, triads, and tetrads. E.g: Assume that all changed relationships are from x-ad to single or vice versa (i.e., ignore transition probabilities between relationships.) 6 people have a 99% chance of forming three dyads and a 1% chance of forming two triads. A dyad is stable for 7 years. A triad is stable for 63 years. Ergodic ratio of dyads to triads will be on the loose order of 16 to 1 (I would think), but triads are 9 times as stable. -- Eliezer S. Yudkowsky http://singinst.org/ Research Fellow, Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence From pj at pj-manney.com Mon Nov 6 05:33:34 2006 From: pj at pj-manney.com (pjmanney) Date: Mon, 06 Nov 2006 00:33:34 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Sex, Power and Single H+er Message-ID: <15616726.275921162791214745.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From amara at amara.com Mon Nov 6 05:40:31 2006 From: amara at amara.com (Amara Graps) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 21:40:31 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Graps Seminar at USC on November 6 Message-ID: (From 5 weeks ago) >I'll send another notice when the date gets closer. Time is running too fast, apologies. Time / Place: 4:15pm, Building / Room SLH 102 Abstract: http://physics.usc.edu/Colloquia/ViewTalk.php?t=2294 Amara -- Amara Graps, PhD www.amara.com Istituto di Fisica dello Spazio Interplanetario (IFSI), Roma, ITALIA Associate Research Scientist, Planetary Science Institute (PSI), Tucson From russell.wallace at gmail.com Mon Nov 6 06:17:33 2006 From: russell.wallace at gmail.com (Russell Wallace) Date: Mon, 6 Nov 2006 06:17:33 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] extropian grandchildren (was: it's all understandable, except) In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <8d71341e0611052217j51be79jffb33b9a936e1b52@mail.gmail.com> On 11/5/06, Amara Graps wrote: > > And Eugene is interested indeed in children's education and his > grandchildren. > His baby boy, Laurin Leitl, was born 2 November. Mother Kiki and little > Laurin are happy and healthy. > Excellent news, congratulations to parents, child and godmother! (I don't think I have to literally believe in the existence of God to use that last term, any more than I have to literally believe in a geocentric universe to note that the sun's going to rise in an hour or so :)) -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From c.hales at pgrad.unimelb.edu.au Mon Nov 6 01:00:29 2006 From: c.hales at pgrad.unimelb.edu.au (Colin Geoffrey Hales) Date: Mon, 06 Nov 2006 12:00:29 +1100 (EST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Hi folks In-Reply-To: <20061106004835.86004.qmail@web60511.mail.yahoo.com> References: <20061106004835.86004.qmail@web60511.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <2071.128.250.225.217.1162774829.squirrel@webmail.student.unimelb.edu.au> Hello all, You probably don't remember me. I've been off list since 2003. I thought I'd have a look at things extropian and ....all the troops are still at it! I trust you are all well.... cheers Colin Hales From sjatkins at mac.com Mon Nov 6 07:06:21 2006 From: sjatkins at mac.com (Samantha Atkins) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 23:06:21 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Edge: Thank Goodness! By Daniel C. Dennett In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On Nov 3, 2006, at 1:47 PM, Ensel Sharon wrote: > > > (FYI, I am agnostic on the subject of God / religion) > > > On Fri, 3 Nov 2006, nvitamore at austin.rr.com wrote: (Daniel Dennett > speaking actually) > >> But isn't this awfully harsh? Surely it does the world no harm if >> those who >> can honestly do so pray for me! No, I'm not at all sure about that. >> For one >> thing, if they REALLY wanted to do something useful, they could >> devote >> their prayer time and energy to some pressing project that they CAN >> do >> something about. For another, we now have quite solid grounds >> (e.g., the >> recently released Benson study at Harvard) for believing that >> intercessory >> prayer simply doesn't work. Anybody whose practice shrugs off that >> research >> is subtly undermining respect for the very goodness I am thanking. >> If you >> insist on keeping the myth of the effectiveness of prayer alive, >> you owe >> the rest of us a justification in the face of the evidence. Pending >> such a > > > Wrong. They owe you NOTHING. If they wish to think about hooters > girls > and sports cars, so be it. If they want to direct their time and > thought > energy to their hamster, so be it. If they want to pray for your > well-being[1] (or perhaps for you to mind your own business), so be > it. > I don't believe Daniel Dennett said that anyone owed him anything. So what are you yelling about anyway? He says that he is not sure the practice does no harm. In the sense that it keeps a lot of folks befuddled and thinking they are doing good when they are doing little but further befuddling themselves he has a point. He does not say above that people should in any way be forced to do anything other that what they wish to. > >> justification, I will excuse you for indulging in your tradition; I >> know >> how comforting tradition can be. But I want you to recognize that >> what you >> are doing is morally problematic at best." > > > Wrong. No thought whatever is morally problematic. The time, > energy and > will that I expend are my own and require no justification - from me > or > anyone else. > Not wrong. It is morally problematic to ignore reality and instead engage in feel good fantasies and it is especially problematic to claim that doing so is "good". He did not require anyone to justify anything. He also has the right to voice his opinion about the choices of others. He is not "Wrong" to do so. It is actually a very good thing when people speak out about collective unsane behavior. > If Dennett is such a fucking genius, why doesn't he recognize the > problem > of labeling things "thoughtcrime" ? He never did any such thing. When you get through foaming at the keyboard perhaps we could have a better discussion. > Further, how dare he suggest that I > do anything with my time and kilowatts, or dispose of my own > property in > any way, other than exactly as i see fit ? Where did he do that? > The notion that he would > impose upon others some kind of minimum acceptable level of function > and > efficiency in their thoughts and actions is absurd. If certain time, > energy and kilowatts belong to me, I will dissipate them in any way > I see > fit, and as efficiently as I see fit. Where did he do that? - samantha From sentience at pobox.com Mon Nov 6 07:14:18 2006 From: sentience at pobox.com (Eliezer S. Yudkowsky) Date: Sun, 05 Nov 2006 23:14:18 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Edge: Thank Goodness! By Daniel C. Dennett In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <454EE0CA.4050609@pobox.com> Ensel Sharon wrote: > > If Dennett is such a fucking genius, why doesn't he recognize the problem > of labeling things "thoughtcrime" ? Further, how dare he suggest that I > do anything with my time and kilowatts, or dispose of my own property in > any way, other than exactly as i see fit ? The notion that he would > impose upon others some kind of minimum acceptable level of function and > efficiency in their thoughts and actions is absurd. If certain time, > energy and kilowatts belong to me, I will dissipate them in any way I see > fit, and as efficiently as I see fit. How dare you complain about how Dennett expends his kilowatts? -- Eliezer S. Yudkowsky http://singinst.org/ Research Fellow, Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence From sjatkins at mac.com Mon Nov 6 07:27:27 2006 From: sjatkins at mac.com (Samantha Atkins) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 23:27:27 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Edge: Thank Goodness! By Daniel C. Dennett In-Reply-To: <8d71341e0611031603t5e86a6c8r315894f13309c6a1@mail.gmail.com> References: <380-220061153192746796@M2W040.mail2web.com> <8d71341e0611031439w5d25b799k1dc4618d05e054a4@mail.gmail.com> <454BD34B.6070504@pobox.com> <8d71341e0611031603t5e86a6c8r315894f13309c6a1@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On Nov 3, 2006, at 4:03 PM, Russell Wallace wrote: > On 11/3/06, Eliezer S. Yudkowsky wrote: > As for Dennett suggesting that people are doing something wrong by > praying instead of helping - that they are thereby committing a moral > sin, in need of forgiveness - why, yes, you're right, that is somewhat > like a theologian who *peacefully argues with you*, for what he > conceives to be your own benefit, that you are committing a mortal sin > by denying the existence of God. > > Yes, that's what I was referring to. The equivalent of the religious > fundamentalists who kill infidels for not believing in God would be > those who did the same thing in the name of the atheist ideology of > communism. Did you actually read the piece? It is beyond me how you go from the gentle thoughtful ruminations on actual good that just saved this man's life as compared to the claimed good of religious acts like prayer to the evils of communism. There in nothing whatever of force in Dennett's remarks yet you act as if there is. This I find very puzzling and of some concern. > > As for who's being more irrational, whatever your opinion of > religion, it worked. Look at the results once religion is gone: the > prime examples of evolution in action are precisely those who > believe in evolution. If I believed in God I'd say He had a wicked > sense of humor. > What do you mean "it worked"? What worked exactly? I am really at a loss as to what you meant by this paragraph. > As for who's doing harm by ill-considered words, consider _why_ so > many people are rejecting evolutionary biology (in a way that they > don't reject, say, physics or chemistry). It's because they've been > taught they _have_ to reject it or give up everything they hold dear > and find themselves in an empty universe with empty lives. > Really? I know an awful lot of atheists who are very delighted with life and this universe and consider life extremely full. > What fanatical religious preachers taught them this, you may wonder? > Why, some of the names are quite familiar. Gould, Dawkins, Dennett. > This is beyond the pale. > Now if people want to preach atheism, that's their right; and if > they want to preach nihilism, well I suppose even that's their right. Preach? There is no rational reason for believing in God that I am aware of. Why is it "preaching" to say so? Theism has done a great deal of harm. Superstitious and irrational thinking does even more. How is it preaching to say this is so? Again, what is your beef? I don't see anything you seem to be saying in the actual article. Are you claiming that those who say what they honestly thing about religion and theism should be despised or censored for saying it? If so then I would suggest you look up the meaning of "projection". > It's when they do so _with their scientist hats on_, when they abuse > their reputation as scientists to advance those personal > philosophies, that the rest of us in the scientific community should > speak up and disown them. Not one of these people says that science proves there is no god. So how are they doing anything wrong as scientists? Yes, you want to disown them. Is that enough or do they need a good flogging to satisfy your anger? - samantha -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Mon Nov 6 07:34:36 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Mon, 6 Nov 2006 02:34:36 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Sex, Power and Single H+er In-Reply-To: <15616726.275921162791214745.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> References: <15616726.275921162791214745.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> Message-ID: On 11/6/06, pjmanney wrote: > > Well, after what must have been the most active posting period in recent > memory, this weekend has only proven once again the verities of life: > Master, we are here for the purpose of affirming your realities. > Sex sells. (And somehow Sex + Anders sells even more. Why is that, > Anders?) > Oh you know, its that whole Swedish thing. I suspect we all want something different and Anders is from Sweeden and is merely a surrogate for that. I suspect someplace downstream there will be papers written on the topic of "Anders vs. Swedish cultural history. Good or bad?" The paradoxical part is that there are going to be minds which will *think* about this. > Power corrupts. (Absolutely!) > And the thing you have to be concerned with is whether Anders or I or Eliezer will have it first. > And no one knows who they are. (If they did, they wouldn't be looking so > hard for their identity!) > That is of course an interesting observation -- which of A.S./R.B./E.Y. would give up their identity freely (or lay it out on the table for one to fiddle with it?) > Is there a correlation between dysfunctional dualistic sexual unions > leading to divorce and dysfunctional 2-party politics leading to... > Armageddon? Have both groups lost their sense of identity? Or could it > just be that they involve the number 2? Or is it some vast conspiracy? ;-) > I will state that as of this date (6 Nov 2006) there is no conspiracy that I am to my knowledge involved in. R. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From sjatkins at mac.com Mon Nov 6 07:34:41 2006 From: sjatkins at mac.com (Samantha Atkins) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 23:34:41 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] FWD [SK] Re: Just curious, it's not natural! In-Reply-To: <20061102091430.60569.qmail@web37208.mail.mud.yahoo.com> References: <20061102091430.60569.qmail@web37208.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <2FF526CC-7685-4734-8931-EE047A3A2102@mac.com> On Nov 2, 2006, at 1:14 AM, Anna Taylor wrote: > Anna wrote on Mon Oct 30: >>>>> Why wouldn't the gay communities want their own >>>>> word for their union and still keep the basic >>>>> laws for spouse and marital? > > On 10/31/06, Terry Colvin > forwarded: >>> Maybe because they're forming a union, joined for >>> life, and creatin a family -- so there's a perfectly >>> good word for that already in existence. > > That word is already taken. It describes the "Union" > between male and female. > Says who? The Law? The law is a matter of societal convention. The law once said that no female could vote and that slavery was ok. That did not make it right. >>> In any case, it's not "scriptural" -- the >>> institution predates and is independent of any >>> particular scripture. > > No. Laws are institutions that predate. Predate what? See the above. > If gays want > to be married, I again will repeat, I have no problem > with that. I believe they should have every right to > the same benefits and laws as a "married" couple > should have but I think it should be defined by a > different word. > What for? >>>> I can't pressume to understand the relationship >>>> between 2 men or 2 women and who am I to judge what >>>> "Union" they want but as a heterosexual woman, >>>> don't I have every right to keep word "marriage"?. > >>> Sure you do. Your marriage won't suddenly become >>> a "flerm" just because someone else got married. Did >>> all heterosexual marriages suddenly change somehow >>> in 1989, when Denmark recognized gay marriage? > > It's not about recognizing gay marriage. I have the > upmost respect for gays, I would never disrespect any > choice of sexual behavior unless it violates rights. I > feel using the word "marriage" as a symbol of the > union between 2 men or 2 women violates my right as a > heterosexual female. Why is that so wrong? > Because you have no such right. You have no right to decide the word marriage is only for people like yourself and not others. >>> What you don't necessarily have is the right to >>> deny the word to other people. > > Why? If the word had already been established, why > wouldn't I have the right to keep it just the way it > is? Why should you have any such right? What makes you think you do? - samantha From sjatkins at mac.com Mon Nov 6 07:49:38 2006 From: sjatkins at mac.com (Samantha Atkins) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 23:49:38 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Edge: Thank Goodness! By Daniel C. Dennett In-Reply-To: <1162679909.4912.78.camel@localhost.localdomain> References: <380-220061153192746796@M2W040.mail2web.com> <5.1.0.14.0.20061103224339.03c13fa8@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> <1162679909.4912.78.camel@localhost.localdomain> Message-ID: <9755FABB-18A8-4E96-86DF-A705C53D2C86@mac.com> On Nov 4, 2006, at 2:38 PM, Fred C. Moulton wrote: > On Fri, 2006-11-03 at 22:57 -0500, Keith Henson wrote: >> Besides, it's the wrong way to approach the problem. >> Ranting against epidemic disease didn't save a single life. >> What was needed was to understand what causes infectious diseases. >> People have religions like they have chicken pox. > > There are several different ways of viewing religion. If one views > religion as being infected by a set of bad memes then ranting can > make a > difference if the ranting has an impact on the bad memes. Consider > the > decline of infectious disease with the advent of better sanitation. > Dennett, Dawkins, Harris and others are hopefully causing a more > critical focus on the memes associated with religion. > There are many of us in the world who were deeply and systematically infected with said religious memes and had much too many recurrences of related maladies. People such as Dennett, Dawkins, Harris, Bertrand Russell and many more who spoke up against the prevailing memeset have been a very tremendous help and curative. The world could use a great deal more like them. I for one feel deepest gratitude and admiration for their efforts. - samantha From sjatkins at mac.com Mon Nov 6 07:59:50 2006 From: sjatkins at mac.com (Samantha Atkins) Date: Sun, 5 Nov 2006 23:59:50 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] young Leitl is born! (was extropian grandchildren..) In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <9A920D3D-54BD-4675-9114-947554DFFD75@mac.com> Eugen, Congratulations to you, to Kiki and to Laurin! Amara, congratulations also on godmotherhood. - samantha On Nov 5, 2006, at 5:52 AM, Amara Graps wrote: > Eugene: >> It would be so ironic if demographics and education would shoot >> down our >> chance for Singularity within the narrow launch horizon. If we mess >> it >> up real good this time, our grandchildren might not have an >> opportunity >> for another shot. > > If I may interject ... > > And Eugene is interested indeed in children's education and his > grandchildren. > His baby boy, Laurin Leitl, was born 2 November. Mother Kiki and > little > Laurin are happy and healthy. > > Amara > (godmother) > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat From russell.wallace at gmail.com Mon Nov 6 08:05:45 2006 From: russell.wallace at gmail.com (Russell Wallace) Date: Mon, 6 Nov 2006 08:05:45 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Edge: Thank Goodness! By Daniel C. Dennett In-Reply-To: References: <380-220061153192746796@M2W040.mail2web.com> <8d71341e0611031439w5d25b799k1dc4618d05e054a4@mail.gmail.com> <454BD34B.6070504@pobox.com> <8d71341e0611031603t5e86a6c8r315894f13309c6a1@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <8d71341e0611060005g5ac79cdeie540449406ec95b7@mail.gmail.com> On 11/6/06, Samantha Atkins wrote: > Did you actually read the piece? It is beyond me how you go from the gentle thoughtful ruminations on actual good that just saved this man's life as compared to the claimed good of religious acts like prayer to the evils of communism. There in nothing whatever of force in Dennett's remarks yet you act as if there is. > > I did not claim there was anything of force in Dennett's remarks; in the text you quoted, I was agreeing with Eliezer that the most precise analogy would be with "a theologian who *peacefully argues with you*, for what he conceives to be your own benefit, that you are committing a mortal sin by denying the existence of God." > As for who's being more irrational, whatever your opinion of religion, it > worked. Look at the results once religion is gone: the prime examples of > evolution in action are precisely those who believe in evolution. If I > believed in God I'd say He had a wicked sense of humor. > > > > What do you mean "it worked"? What worked exactly? I am really at a loss as to what you meant by this paragraph. > Religion worked for survival. Look at what happens to modern cultures where religion is gone: they fall apart into self-hatred and nihilism, birth rates plummeting below extinction level, their people rapidly headed for oblivion. The greatest civilization that ever existed on this planet is dying, in what should have been its hour of triumph - dying not of any external threat, but of its own parasite memes; and who will pick up the torch once we are gone? Really? I know an awful lot of atheists who are very delighted with life and this universe and consider life extremely full. > > If that works for them, great, though I will note that most people who give up belief in God, in order to find meaning in life, need to substitute some equivalent belief: aliens, the Singularity, reincarnation or whatever. > What fanatical religious preachers taught them this, you may wonder? Why, > some of the names are quite familiar. Gould, Dawkins, Dennett. > > > This is beyond the pale. > I'm sorry it offends you to see things called by their right names. Preach? There is no rational reason for believing in God that I am aware of. > There's no rational reason for believing in the Singularity either (yes, like most myths it was inspired by some nuggets of truth, but the vast bulk of what's written about it is as much a fable as Noah bringing two of each animal aboard the ark). I don't see you going around proclaiming this to be irrational. Theism has done a great deal of harm. > But far more good than harm. A parable, quoting from memory so the wording may not be accurate, but the gist of it is: Young man: "I can see no use for that fence, let's get rid of it." Old man: "Certainly not. Go and study the problem some more, and when you come back and tell me you _can_ see a use for it... _then_ we can start talking about whether to get rid of it." Superstitious and irrational thinking does even more. How is it preaching to say this is so? Again, what is your beef? I don't see anything you seem to be saying in the actual article. > It isn't about Dennett's article - if it were just him, I wouldn't have said anything. It's about the prevailing meme in Western intellectual circles these days that tearing down Christianity and its value system is somehow a rational or wise thing to do. Are you claiming that those who say what they honestly thing about religion and theism should be despised or censored for saying it? > I have not advocated censoring anyone. What I think should be done is this: when Dawkins goes around using his science to preach atheism, someone - it'd have to be someone who'd be listened to, something like a professor of evolutionary biology at a well-known university would be ideal - should stand up and say: "Dawkins is of course entitled to preach his religious beliefs - in his capacity as a private citizen. Science says nothing whatsoever about the existence or nonexistence of God, and it is a fallacy to claim it as authority on either side of that debate." We all agree teaching science is important. I claim it is equally important to teach that science is compatible with pro-survival value systems. Not one of these people says that science proves there is no god. > Have you actually read any of Gould or Dawkins' recent works? -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jrd1415 at gmail.com Mon Nov 6 08:06:44 2006 From: jrd1415 at gmail.com (Jeff Davis) Date: Mon, 6 Nov 2006 00:06:44 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] extropian grandchildren (was: it's all understandable, except) In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On 11/5/06, Amara Graps wrote: > And Eugene is interested indeed in children's education and his grandchildren. > His baby boy, Laurin Leitl, was born 2 November. Mother Kiki and little > Laurin are happy and healthy. Congrats, Eugen, Kiki, and Laurin. -- Best, Jeff Davis "We're a band of higher primates stuck on the surface of an atmosphere-hazed dirtball. I can associate with that. I certainly can't identify with which patch of the dirtball I currently happen to be on, and which monkey tribe happens to reside therein. Only by taking the big view we can make it a common dream, and then a reality. It's worth it." Eugen Leitl From amara at amara.com Mon Nov 6 08:12:09 2006 From: amara at amara.com (Amara Graps) Date: Mon, 6 Nov 2006 00:12:09 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Effective relationships Message-ID: Avantgardian: >Well neither is the traditional marriage these days. >According to http://www.divorcepeers.com/stats05.htm >The median life of a first marriage is 7 years and >subsequent marriages last even less. For the US ... To go further (for the U.S.), 50.2 percent of people are living either as single moms (14 million), single dads (5 million), or in unmarried gay or hetero households (37 million). from my favorite columnist Mark Morford : http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/g/a/2006/10/25/notes102506.DTL&hw=morford&sn=001&sc=1000 Amara From sjatkins at mac.com Mon Nov 6 08:16:57 2006 From: sjatkins at mac.com (Samantha Atkins) Date: Mon, 6 Nov 2006 00:16:57 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] here's how complicated it is In-Reply-To: <06ab01c7010c$5bfa8ad0$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> References: <20061105055843.98856.qmail@web51605.mail.yahoo.com> <065101c700ad$61831030$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <62c14240611050908i5032dca3n78c18badec3aaabb@mail.gmail.com> <06ab01c7010c$5bfa8ad0$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: <6A1AAFF4-6433-4118-B3F0-8EEB0A9D81EF@mac.com> On Nov 5, 2006, at 10:56 AM, Lee Corbin wrote: > Mike writes > >> On 11/5/06, Lee Corbin wrote: > >>> Here is my solution: segregation. Segregation today, >>> segregation tomorrow, and segregation forever. >>> Right now in California, everyone needs segregating: >>> because the white kids can't keep up with the Asians, >>> and many of them conclude that math, English, and >>> science are for smart kids, not them. As the whites can't >>> keep up with the Asians, the Hispanics can't keep up >>> with the whites, and the blacks can't keep up with the >>> hispanics, so we ought to go back to... yes, segregation. >> >> Why does it have to be racist and sexist? Why can't we >> 'segregate' (to use your negatively overloaded term) along >> dimension of performance capability? > > Oh, I agree. I was being a bit flippant, but as Robert has > just said, there is a point at least insofar as gender is concerned. > As for racial segregation, it really isn't practical anymore. For > one thing, it would just be politically (and probably socially) > impossible. For another, unlike the case of sex (gender), there > are a lot of people who are intermediary between races. And > you know what problems that would create! Guess again on gender being completely binary. > >> There ARE white kids who are smarter than the "average" >> asian, so why hold them to a lower standard due to genetics? > > Of course. But the point is that kids in schools can tend to > identify their capabilities in terms of everyone around them. > Not all kids to be sure. The extremely capable will be fine > no matter what. > No, I don't think so. I went through a "good" public school system that had nearly nothing for me. It was geared to some average, more numerous students' needs. I am not even at the stratospheric top of the intelligence chart. I knew more than a few really bright kids who dropped out out of boredom, frustration, feeling utterly alien to the entire scene and most of their "peers". A minority of them managed to release their brilliance into world to some (but I can't help believe diminished) degree regardless. Many of the withered or became very misshapen long before they even discovered what their capabilities were. By the time you can label the "extremely capable" in a non-mundane environment where their capabilities get noticed you have begged the question. Much potential is wasted before it can ever get to such an environment. - samantha - samantha From eugen at leitl.org Mon Nov 6 11:16:54 2006 From: eugen at leitl.org (Eugen Leitl) Date: Mon, 6 Nov 2006 12:16:54 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] punchscan: see your vote count Message-ID: <20061106111654.GU6974@leitl.org> Here's a low-tech way to route around vote fraud. http://punchscan.org/faq.php Frequently Asked Questions 1. Does Punchscan really remove the need for the public to trust any hardware or software as far as election results, while lowering costs and improving reliability compared to other voting systems? Yes! Briefly: Punchscan provides full transparency of the whole election process, from mandatory pre-election public audit, through to voters who wish checking the printing of the paper receipt they keep and the recording of the votes coded on it, all the way to the mandatory public post-election audit. Although each voter can verify online definitively that his or her vote is counted as cast, voters cannot show how they voted to anyone else. Lower cost results from commodity hardware and open source software, but backdoors are not an issue because anyone who wishes can choose to run and even write full audit software. If significant cheating were to be present, it would be detected with near certainty. But deliberate cheating or errors can be kept from necessitating a re-vote, considerably more effectively than with other system. (See the ?sections? below for elaboration and the ?learn more? page for complete system details.) 2. GENERAL Don?t paper receipts and online checking facilitate vote selling or coercion of voters? 3. Couldn?t a clever hacker or a corrupt software insider, perhaps by gaining control of the election computers, change the election outcome undetectably? 4. Does each voter have to make an extra effort in order to protect his or her vote or to check the election outcome? 5. Isn?t the cryptography too hard for most people to understand? 6. If someone, maybe a code breaking agency or clever hacker, were to break the cryptography, couldn?t they then choose the winner? 7. Isn?t the larger issue in elections, rather than integrity of the outcome, really confidence in the overall election process including registration and participation? 8. Wouldn?t all this high security cost too much? 9. Could this type of system work for general elections in large US counties? 10. VOTER PROTECTIONS What about the ?Florida problem,? where voters thought they were voting for one candidate but ended up voting for another? 11. Isn?t it difficult or time consuming for those marking a ballot to find the letter through the hole that matches the letter next to the desired candidate? 12. What if voters are paid or coerced to mark their receipts in particular ways? 13. What if those operating a polling place were corrupt and could locally learn how people vote and thereby help enforce vote buying or coercion schemes? 14. Can?t the secret keys of those running the election be used centrally to spy on how people voted? 15. Can?t voters sell votes by allowing their votes to be identified through voting for a pre-arranged pattern of down-ballot candidates or issues? 16. What if a ballot were to be smuggled out of the polling place and then used in a chain scheme, where each voter casts a pre-marked ballot provided to them before they go inside the polling place and then brings out the unmarked fresh one they were given inside so that it can be used as the next link in the chain? 17. What if the same ballot serial number is given to more than one voter? 18. RELIABILITY Couldn?t fake receipts be used to discredit the integrity of an election? 19. What if some of those running an election were to try and block publication of the outcome? 20. If cheating by the system were actually to be detected, would the whole voting process have to be repeated? 21. ALTERNATIVE SYSTEMS Wouldn?t good old-fashioned paper ballots counted by hand in each polling place provide a higher level of integrity for election outcomes? 22. Aren?t systems that keep an electronic record as well as a voter-viewed paper record, and that include mandatory hand recount of a sampling of the paper, more practical and just as capable of engendering as much voter confidence? -- Eugen* Leitl leitl http://leitl.org ______________________________________________________________ ICBM: 48.07100, 11.36820 http://www.ativel.com 8B29F6BE: 099D 78BA 2FD3 B014 B08A 7779 75B0 2443 8B29 F6BE From lcorbin at rawbw.com Mon Nov 6 11:15:18 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Mon, 6 Nov 2006 03:15:18 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] it's all understandable, except References: <638d4e150611041749n1a3c2907xd32d00ff60a11df6@mail.gmail.com><05ec01c7008a$ab914660$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <20061105203158.GJ6974@leitl.org> Message-ID: <077d01c70195$28852dc0$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Eugen wrote > On Sat, Nov 04, 2006 at 07:29:41PM -0800, Lee Corbin wrote: > > The Singularity (or its preceding technological innovations) need > > above all to get people smarter, especially the great hordes of > > children today who simply are incapable of difficult technical work, > > and who will (because of IQ limitations) perform rather poorly > > whatever they try to do that is of any use. > > I try to avoid me-toos, but above passage can't be overemphasized. > The issue isn't differences in issued equipment between the ears. > Motivation is the key, and almost all current education environments > (nevermind prior poor parenting) actively demotivate. Since Eugen wrote this, a number of people have chimed in to agree. I ask, where is the evidence that the key problems are current educational environments or poor parenting? Are there studies? The studies---your anecdotes aside---report what I said they did, namely that it's genes 50%, peers 50%, parents 0%, and schools, 0%. (I should add, to be careful, that these are determinants of adult personality. But I think that it applies to contributing technically to society too.) And furthermore, contrary to what Eugen states, the limiting factor *is* what is between the ears. Researchers on intelligence admit, however, that intelligence is like money. It really doesn't matter how much you have so long as you have enough. But the overwhelming part of the populace does *not* have enough cognitive ability, not enough for today's technical needs. And even in your anecdotes, from dyslexia to "boredom and frustration" causing dropping out, we could segregate :-) those with certain proclivities and try to specialize the instruction they're given. That would be a good idea. But many kids simply rebel, and unless you provide very expensive tutoring (with a touch of compulsion), they're not going to use all their potential anyway. You can suggest remedies. That would be nice. But why not point to somewhere among the 6 billion people where the problem as you see it *has* been solved? Eugen continues, rather obscurely: > Not only does demographics limit the quantity, the quality has been > going down monotonously since middle last century, or even before. What do you mean by this? IQ has been going up (cf. Flynn effect). > The job market does the rest to discourage entering technical fields. > The message is certainly loud and clear enough, and it's being heard. How does the job market discourage entering technical field? I'm not following you. Lee > This is no way to drive progress forward, or event to sustain it. > Many places are regressing, but slowly enough that it isn't too > obvious. And The Great Depression v2.0 (new and improved, > now with even more suckage) seems to be ante portas in earnest. > What we here need to do is to figure out how to prevent the coming > crash, that is looming clearer with each passing year. From brentn at freeshell.org Mon Nov 6 11:25:17 2006 From: brentn at freeshell.org (Brent Neal) Date: Mon, 6 Nov 2006 06:25:17 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Effective relationships In-Reply-To: <200611060327.kA63RoDK001639@andromeda.ziaspace.com> References: <200611060327.kA63RoDK001639@andromeda.ziaspace.com> Message-ID: <669C3965-A4AD-4646-B93F-7022E37FC6BC@freeshell.org> On Nov 5, 2006, at 22:29, spike wrote: > I have personally witnessed an apparent three-way relationship. A > friend > married while we were still in college, took up a one-bedroom > apartment > across the street. A mutual friend of theirs, female, was always > visiting > over at their place, and eventually was living with them. Of > course there > was some curiosity as to whether he was actually sleeping with both > women, > but no one asked. Perhaps we were not sure we wanted to hear the > answer. > Within a year he had moved out and the women stayed together in that > apartment. Again, no one asked and no one volunteered any info. I > don't > see how that arrangement could possibly work long term, but I > recognize my > deplorable lack of imagination when it comes to human relationships. I had a prof in college who lived in a stable triad, and had for almost a decade. Last I heard, they were still living that way, making their relationship almost 20 years old. The opposite of data is anecdote. :) But, I think Eliezer's comment on formation probabilities is insightful. One thing that it well-known in the polyamory community is that the polyamory community is not well-known - that is, many people just don't know that there is a reasonably large group of people who eschew the traditional monogamous-dyad model of partnering and do not have the will to actively go against their cultural programming. This, as I have seen in multiple cases (we've approached data here, not just anecdote...), does act as an inhibitor to the formation of stable polyamorous relationships. If you want some statistics, the National Coalition for Sexual Freedom may have some survey results. It'd be interesting to see. Brent -- Brent Neal Geek of all Trades http://brentn.freeshell.org "Specialization is for insects" -- Robert A. Heinlein From lcorbin at rawbw.com Mon Nov 6 11:45:49 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Mon, 6 Nov 2006 03:45:49 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Edge: Thank Goodness! By Daniel C. Dennett References: <380-220061153192746796@M2W040.mail2web.com><8d71341e0611031439w5d25b799k1dc4618d05e054a4@mail.gmail.com><454BD34B.6070504@pobox.com><8d71341e0611031603t5e86a6c8r315894f13309c6a1@mail.gmail.com> <8d71341e0611060005g5ac79cdeie540449406ec95b7@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <079401c70199$64625b20$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Russell writes > Religion worked for survival. Look at what happens to modern > cultures where religion is gone: they fall apart into self-hatred and > nihilism, birth rates plummeting below extinction level, their people > rapidly headed for oblivion. The greatest civilization that ever existed > on this planet is dying, in what should have been its hour of triumph - > dying not of any external threat, but of its own parasite memes; > and who will pick up the torch once we are gone? You bring up the gravest problem of all, a real one that is not going away, unless a technological miracle happens quickly. Europe is finished. A Muslim civilization will replace it. But in North America, the situation is less clear. An elite in North America can continue to "run things" for a very long time yet. This is because as the class structure of the country becomes more pronounced, the lower classes shall respond to direction, just as they do in Mexico today, whereas in Europe, the Muslims have superior cohesion and superior will. Now, more and more people in the west are coming to see the danger, and so resistence, even in Europe, may mount, and in interesting ways. Prognostications, anyone? But it's too late IMO to defend religion as you're doing. You're right about its original value, but the damage has been done, and we just can't believe lies anymore. Lee From russell.wallace at gmail.com Mon Nov 6 12:12:40 2006 From: russell.wallace at gmail.com (Russell Wallace) Date: Mon, 6 Nov 2006 12:12:40 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Edge: Thank Goodness! By Daniel C. Dennett In-Reply-To: <079401c70199$64625b20$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> References: <380-220061153192746796@M2W040.mail2web.com> <8d71341e0611031439w5d25b799k1dc4618d05e054a4@mail.gmail.com> <454BD34B.6070504@pobox.com> <8d71341e0611031603t5e86a6c8r315894f13309c6a1@mail.gmail.com> <8d71341e0611060005g5ac79cdeie540449406ec95b7@mail.gmail.com> <079401c70199$64625b20$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: <8d71341e0611060412s444bd0cp8be626d624b7106f@mail.gmail.com> On 11/6/06, Lee Corbin wrote: > > But it's too late IMO to defend religion as you're doing. You're right > about its original value, but the damage has been done, and we just > can't believe lies anymore. > Maybe, though I'm not so sure; it's still strong in America which, as you say, may endure for a long time yet to come. But in any event I think it is not too late to point out the value of what is being lost, and the consequences thereof. And now, back to trying to make use of whatever time we do have left. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From pharos at gmail.com Mon Nov 6 12:20:30 2006 From: pharos at gmail.com (BillK) Date: Mon, 6 Nov 2006 12:20:30 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Edge: Thank Goodness! By Daniel C. Dennett In-Reply-To: <079401c70199$64625b20$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> References: <380-220061153192746796@M2W040.mail2web.com> <8d71341e0611031439w5d25b799k1dc4618d05e054a4@mail.gmail.com> <454BD34B.6070504@pobox.com> <8d71341e0611031603t5e86a6c8r315894f13309c6a1@mail.gmail.com> <8d71341e0611060005g5ac79cdeie540449406ec95b7@mail.gmail.com> <079401c70199$64625b20$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: On 11/6/06, Lee Corbin wrote: > Europe is finished. A Muslim civilization will replace it. > > But in North America, the situation is less clear. > An elite in North America can continue to "run things" for a very long > time yet. This is because as the class structure of the country becomes > more pronounced, the lower classes shall respond to direction, just as > they do in Mexico today, whereas in Europe, the Muslims have superior > cohesion and superior will. > > Now, more and more people in the west are coming to see the danger, > and so resistence, even in Europe, may mount, and in interesting ways. > Prognostications, anyone? > The FT had a contrary opinion article recently which says that Europe is now waking up to the problem of an aggresive Muslin minority. Currently, of the 456m people of the EU, just 15m to 16m are Muslim. US prophets of Europe's doom are half wrong By Gideon Rachman Published: October 16 2006 European governments are acutely aware of this and are changing policies in response. The British are rethinking their "multicultural" approach to immigration; the French are considering positive discrimination; the Danes have cracked down on arranged marriages. Who knows ? some of these policies may even work. If they do not, politics and policies will change again. Of all the many scenarios for the future of Europe, perhaps the least likely is that Europeans simply sleep-walk off a cliff. ---------------- BillK From eugen at leitl.org Mon Nov 6 13:25:48 2006 From: eugen at leitl.org (Eugen Leitl) Date: Mon, 6 Nov 2006 14:25:48 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] it's all understandable, except In-Reply-To: <077d01c70195$28852dc0$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> References: <20061105203158.GJ6974@leitl.org> <077d01c70195$28852dc0$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: <20061106132548.GW6974@leitl.org> On Mon, Nov 06, 2006 at 03:15:18AM -0800, Lee Corbin wrote: > Since Eugen wrote this, a number of people have chimed in to agree. > I ask, where is the evidence that the key problems are current educational > environments or poor parenting? Are there studies? If you've got poorly socialized children with a migrant background as a majority, you will not be able to start schooling at a decent level. It only goes downhill from there. I presume the answer to that is to start saving for a private school -- but you will notice that e.g. most of the U.S. doesn't do that, they do in fact quite the opposite. A few days ago on the commute I heard on the propaganda channel radio about the current grand coalition slapping each other on the back, mutually congratulating themselves on their grand achievement. That being, that they have reduced the amount of new debt this year. To "only" 30 GEUR. Perhaps too many people misunderstand what exponential functions (compounded interest) means, especially if each third EUR already silently vanishes into the debt hole. > The studies---your anecdotes aside---report what I said they did, > namely that it's genes 50%, peers 50%, parents 0%, and schools, 0%. Genes are meaningless, if you're looking at poorly socialized kids with a migrant background entering the school system, which is already contaminated with a couple of decades of similiar toxic problems. Teaching is traditionally a well-paid high-prestige job in Germany, but the schools have gotten so bad it's hard to find new personnel, especially in hard sciences. For genes to wield their full potential you need a stable, supportive environment even pre-birth, and an educational system which challenges each kid individually. The genes have remained basically the same, it's the parenting and schools (peers are an integral part of the school) which have been failing. > And furthermore, contrary to what Eugen states, the limiting factor > *is* what is between the ears. Researchers on intelligence admit, Correct, but irrelevant. The bottlenecks are elsewhere. As long as the environment is the same no amount of perfect genes will matter. You don't need perfect genes to be a highly productive individual. Yes, for some things you need genius, but only in trace amounts. Unlike Galt's Gulch and Vinge's visions a small group of supergeniuses without the vast pyramid of support can do only very little. Our concerns are that that supportive structure is failing. It's hard to build buckyball circuits if there's almost no industry and the state is effectively bankrupt (well, the state isn't, but the citizens are left with the bill). > But the overwhelming part of the populace does *not* have enough > cognitive ability, not enough for today's technical needs. Jobs in R&D are negligible in the old West. What's the point in entering a challenging technical field if you know that 1) the job market will be brutal 2) you're entering a field which is not even lower middle class, by salary standards? Bright people are not stupid. Who in their right minds would study e.g. chemistry right now? Who would enter something so overhyped as nanotechnology? > > Not only does demographics limit the quantity, the quality has been > > going down monotonously since middle last century, or even before. > > What do you mean by this? IQ has been going up (cf. Flynn effect). If Flynn shows things are stellar yet you agree that the practical experience it telling us the opposite, then something is wrong with your metrics. Ability to play WoW doesn't make yourself good workplace material. > How does the job market discourage entering technical field? Have you looked at an engineer's entry level salaries? You have noticed that the middle class is shrinking fast? And that a Second Great Depression is at the door, and there's not deus ex machina just-in-time fix to pull us out? -- Eugen* Leitl leitl http://leitl.org ______________________________________________________________ ICBM: 48.07100, 11.36820 http://www.ativel.com 8B29F6BE: 099D 78BA 2FD3 B014 B08A 7779 75B0 2443 8B29 F6BE From jonkc at att.net Mon Nov 6 14:57:28 2006 From: jonkc at att.net (John K Clark) Date: Mon, 6 Nov 2006 09:57:28 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Identity (was: Survival tangent) References: <20061102062735.57668.qmail@web52612.mail.yahoo.com><015601c7010a$6a7d5d50$450a4e0c@MyComputer> Message-ID: <008101c701b4$37b35870$250b4e0c@MyComputer> Me: >> If I place you (the copy) and the original an equal distance >>from the center of a symmetrical room so you see the same >>things and then instantly swap your bodies position with the >>original then neither you nor the original nor any outside >>observer could detect the slightest change. There was no >>change because although there were 2 bodies in the room >>there was only one person. Randall Randall" > This appears to be the argument that had the Soviets been perfectly > successful in erasing all records of Trotsky, he would really not have > been there. That's true, it you erased all records of Trotsky then Trotsky would never have been, however it is physically imposable to do so. Recently Stephen Hawking finally conceded that noting, not even a Black Hole, can destroy information. I don't believe the Soviets could do what a Black Hole could not. Does this contradict my earlier statement that a BEC can erase the individual history of an atom? No. Before the BEC is formed we know that one particular atom, lets call him Bob the Hydrogen atom, did this that and the other thing, it had a history. After the BEC forms you still know a particular atom had this history, but it's imposable to know even in theory which atom is Bob. No information is lost because it doesn't matter under ANY circumstances which atom is Bob. > there are an infinite number of John K Clark bodies, widely separated by > space, but in your view all with an equal claim to being *you*, right? Certainly. > So, when you walk across the street, why dodge a car that almost hits you? If cars are coming toward all my copies and none of us decides to move to safety then we're all dead. If I'm the only one with a killer car after me then my "exact" copies are no longer even approximately exact, I'm having a terrifying and traumatic experience and they are not. But to be honest I doubt if any of those thoughts would enter my head in the split second I had to jump to safety. The real reason I'd get out of the way is because that's the way my brain is wired, and it's wired that way because if it were not creatures like me would never have evolved. > You feel that all processes of the person-type you call John K Clark are > equivalent for all purposes, where we would say that they are only > equivalent for non-subjective purposes. But there is no way you can be correct, absolutely positively no way. In my thought experiment I had you (the copy) and the original standing an equal distance from the center of a symmetrical room. I use a Star Trek brand transporter to instantly exchange your positions, or if you prefer I leave your bodies alone and just exchange the two brains. There is no way subjectively you would notice that anything had happened, and objective outside observers would not notice anything had happened. There would not even be a way to tell if the machine was actually working. If objectively it makes no difference and subjectively if makes no difference then I conclude it just makes no damn difference. John K Clark From rafal.smigrodzki at gmail.com Mon Nov 6 16:12:08 2006 From: rafal.smigrodzki at gmail.com (Rafal Smigrodzki) Date: Mon, 6 Nov 2006 11:12:08 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] 2-party-system = 1-dimensional politics (was polls again) In-Reply-To: <20061106035339.37606.qmail@web60513.mail.yahoo.com> References: <7641ddc60611040856t51a97100kb8a8a6e3430351fe@mail.gmail.com> <20061106035339.37606.qmail@web60513.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <7641ddc60611060812v53ca1e64ob21140dacf399473@mail.gmail.com> Stuart, this time I mostly agree with your remarks, especially insofar as you say that politicians tend to be assholes, but I still think they are not really the problem - the real problem is insufficient intelligence of the average citizen and antedeluvian emotional presets which lead to voter irrationality. I do not approve of the way things are - but I see it as the result not so much of organized evil but rather widespread ignorance, negligence, short-sightedness, etc. I also have a different perspective on the importance of the poor - there are very few of them left anyway, and they are either not interested in voting, or, being on average even less intelligent than average, they cheerfully vote in support of the programs that actively harm them, like Social Security (which is a regressive taxation scheme transferring money e.g. from young working blacks to rich retired whites). It's a pity that so far most humans can't learn to reject tribal politics (or religion, the other major form of mass irrationality). Probably there will be droves of flag-waving evangelicals on the day the AI announces TEOTWAWKI :/ but whatever, Singularity ftw! Rafal From jonkc at att.net Mon Nov 6 16:59:58 2006 From: jonkc at att.net (John K Clark) Date: Mon, 6 Nov 2006 11:59:58 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Survival tangent. References: <20061105030322.68246.qmail@web52611.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <00e901c701c5$03f3c180$250b4e0c@MyComputer> "Ian Goddard" > Why should properties of a mind/self resemble quantum properties of > electrons? A mind does not have the quantum properties of an electron, but a brain does. > It's a big leap from that to the view that one > mind/self can be in two locations at once. Mind is not macroscopic (or microscopic) and mind is not an object, so being at two places at once is simple, in both meanings of the word simple. I believe the position of a mind is a concept of very limited value, if it has any meaning at all it's the place the mind is thinking about. > But I see no reason to assume that the self of the original brain would be > somehow connected to its copy. In thought experiments people always take the part of the original, but try being the copy. Yesterday I copied you and then instantly destroyed the original. Do you feel dead? You still remember being you yesterday and last year and when you were nine, you can see no discontinuity between yesterday and today. You had no last thought so you have no reason to complain,. And if I didn't tell you I'd made the copy you'd never had known anything unusual had happened. What more do you expect from survival? It's true I can't ask the you of yesterday his opinion on the matter, but that is ALWAYS true even without my pesky copying. John K Clark From rafal.smigrodzki at gmail.com Mon Nov 6 17:01:41 2006 From: rafal.smigrodzki at gmail.com (Rafal Smigrodzki) Date: Mon, 6 Nov 2006 12:01:41 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] it's all understandable, except In-Reply-To: <20061106132548.GW6974@leitl.org> References: <20061105203158.GJ6974@leitl.org> <077d01c70195$28852dc0$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <20061106132548.GW6974@leitl.org> Message-ID: <7641ddc60611060901l15ea6bcdh3fd4bbc138c99f58@mail.gmail.com> On 11/6/06, Eugen Leitl wrote: Ability to play WoW doesn't make yourself good workplace > material. ### OMG WTF! Warlocks own the workplace! Horde FTW! ------------------------------------------- > Have you looked at an engineer's entry level salaries? You > have noticed that the middle class is shrinking fast? And > that a Second Great Depression is at the door, and there's > not deus ex machina just-in-time fix to pull us out? > ### Jeez, Eugen, you sound depressed. Reading libertarian-leaning economics blogs (Cafe Hayek, Marginal Revolution, Econlog) gives me a totally different outlook, with the middle class shrinking by steady attrition into the affluent class, and an economical revolution due to disappearing manufacturing costs in the offing. I may be the inveterate optimist seeing a silver lining everywhere ("The UFAI ante portas? Cool, it will fry all the guys I hate, too!") so maybe I am prone to missing the dark clouds on the horizon but, really, where is the evidence for doom (aside from the risk of UFAI in the next 20 - 50 years, which is the only major existential threat I am aware of)? Rafal From benboc at lineone.net Mon Nov 6 19:15:18 2006 From: benboc at lineone.net (ben) Date: Mon, 06 Nov 2006 19:15:18 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] extropian grandchildren In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <454F89C6.807@lineone.net> spike asked for: > Suggestions? My understanding is that a godparent is supposed to be a mentor, at least in the religious context (i actually declined to be a godfather to my nephew, because the only advice i would be able to give him would be "there is no god, you've got to think for yourself, mate" and that wasn't acceptable, unfortunately), so something based around this mentor concept would be appropriate, like, er... Mentor? ben zaiboc From randall at randallsquared.com Mon Nov 6 19:32:24 2006 From: randall at randallsquared.com (Randall Randall) Date: Mon, 6 Nov 2006 14:32:24 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Identity (was: Survival tangent) In-Reply-To: <06c701c70128$57f91610$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> References: <20061102062735.57668.qmail@web52612.mail.yahoo.com><015601c7010a$6a7d5d50$450a4e0c@MyComputer> <06c701c70128$57f91610$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: On Nov 5, 2006, at 5:17 PM, Lee Corbin wrote: > Randall writes >> Lee Corbin would say, I believe, that the important thing is >> increase Lee-Corbin-runtime, and that this dictates saving >> this particular Lee-Corbin-process, > > Right you are! Proof that we *do* understand each other, > occasionally :-) Once in a while, perhaps. :) > But I say that these are only "lower-order" aspects of one, > and are not representative of who I truly am. If the scenario > becomes less graphic, and one of them must press a button > and be disintegrated, then all of us would be indifferent as to > who did so. If the button were in the room, we'd all reach > for it, with the understanding that the last 999,999 would > not be disintegrated. No instance would actually care a > whit. Whereas all million units of Randall (using the below exchange as my guide) would be trying to figure out how to avoid button pressing at all. >> If you don't agree that the runtime lost would indeed be >> infinitesimal, > > But it's not infinitesimal: it's one whole unit of John Clark or > Lee Corbin. If you're willing to use this argument, then everything I would say can be rephrased as "unit" rather than "person", and my own concern is that this particular unit of Randall Randall continue. I'm not sure that this terminology change actually adds anything, however. -- Randall Randall "One thing that makes me tired is people who whine about the prospect of restoring youth. I want to tell them to get a life, but the point seems to be that they?re not really sure they want one." -- Perry Willis From randall at randallsquared.com Mon Nov 6 19:49:43 2006 From: randall at randallsquared.com (Randall Randall) Date: Mon, 6 Nov 2006 14:49:43 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Identity (was: Survival tangent) In-Reply-To: <008101c701b4$37b35870$250b4e0c@MyComputer> References: <20061102062735.57668.qmail@web52612.mail.yahoo.com><015601c7010a$6a7d5d50$450a4e0c@MyComputer> <008101c701b4$37b35870$250b4e0c@MyComputer> Message-ID: <3C5E9884-5CD8-46CC-9841-28C6980CE600@randallsquared.com> On Nov 6, 2006, at 9:57 AM, John K Clark wrote: > Me: >>> If I place you (the copy) and the original an equal distance >>> from the center of a symmetrical room so you see the same >>> things and then instantly swap your bodies position with the >>> original then neither you nor the original nor any outside >>> observer could detect the slightest change. There was no >>> change because although there were 2 bodies in the room >>> there was only one person. > > Randall Randall" > >> This appears to be the argument that had the Soviets been perfectly >> successful in erasing all records of Trotsky, he would really not >> have >> been there. > > That's true, it you erased all records of Trotsky then Trotsky > would never > have been, however it is physically imposable to do so. It's possible, hypothetically, to erase all record to the level at which no person can ever know that Trotsky existed, and that's all that's required for this thought experiment. I find it deeply weird that you suggest that if no one knows or has the capability to find out a fact, that fact ceases to exist. But the assertion that you believe this does point out the futility of trying to show otherwise, doesn't it? > But to be honest I doubt if any of those thoughts would enter my > head in the > split second I had to jump to safety. The real reason I'd get out > of the way > is because that's the way my brain is wired, and it's wired that > way because > if it were not creatures like me would never have evolved. And that's why I included the bit you snipped about the random number generator. Of course, you may be saying that "this unit" of John K Clark with which I'm speaking would try to continue to exist regardless of the fate of other units, but if so, then your position reduces to mine. >> You feel that all processes of the person-type you call John K >> Clark are >> equivalent for all purposes, where we would say that they are only >> equivalent for non-subjective purposes. > > But there is no way you can be correct, absolutely positively no > way. In my > thought experiment I had you (the copy) and the original standing > an equal > distance from the center of a symmetrical room. I use a Star Trek > brand > transporter to instantly exchange your positions, or if you prefer > I leave > your bodies alone and just exchange the two brains. There is no way > subjectively you would notice that anything had happened, and > objective > outside observers would not notice anything had happened. There > would not > even be a way to tell if the machine was actually working. If > objectively it > makes no difference and subjectively if makes no difference then I > conclude > it just makes no damn difference. If you remove one unit (by not reconstituting it on one swap, for example), then it's clear that the number of units of "Randall Randall" has decreased by half, yes? In this case, announcing you're going to do this ahead of time means *each unit* has a fifty percent chance of continuing to exist. Let me assure you that this would cause both units great concern, and no amount of pleading that the surviving unit wouldn't notice anything wrong would help. -- Randall Randall "If we have matter duplicators, will each of us be a sovereign and possess a hydrogen bomb?" -- Jerry Pournelle From randall at randallsquared.com Mon Nov 6 20:02:21 2006 From: randall at randallsquared.com (Randall Randall) Date: Mon, 6 Nov 2006 15:02:21 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Survival tangent. In-Reply-To: <00e901c701c5$03f3c180$250b4e0c@MyComputer> References: <20061105030322.68246.qmail@web52611.mail.yahoo.com> <00e901c701c5$03f3c180$250b4e0c@MyComputer> Message-ID: <4D4BF25D-62DE-4257-93BB-47F9554B0191@randallsquared.com> On Nov 6, 2006, at 11:59 AM, John K Clark wrote: > "Ian Goddard" >> Why should properties of a mind/self resemble quantum properties of >> electrons? > > A mind does not have the quantum properties of an electron, but a > brain > does. But a mind is merely a process running on a brain. >> It's a big leap from that to the view that one >> mind/self can be in two locations at once. > > Mind is not macroscopic (or microscopic) and mind is not an object, > so being > at two places at once is simple, in both meanings of the word simple. > I believe the position of a mind is a concept of very limited > value, if it > has any meaning at all it's the place the mind is thinking about. I would expect that this view of "mind" as something which doesn't require any physical component (as physical components have a position, of course), and in which a mind can actually *be* in some other place just by thinking about that other place is not widely held around here. Of course, that doesn't mean it's wrong; it's just wrong. :) >> But I see no reason to assume that the self of the original brain >> would be >> somehow connected to its copy. > > In thought experiments people always take the part of the original, > but try > being the copy. Yesterday I copied you and then instantly destroyed > the > original. Do you feel dead? You still remember being you yesterday > and last > year and when you were nine, you can see no discontinuity between > yesterday > and today. You had no last thought so you have no reason to > complain,. And > if I didn't tell you I'd made the copy you'd never had known anything > unusual had happened. What more do you expect from survival? No one is disputing that the copy survives, John. It's tautological that the one that survives survived; it's the cessation of the one that didn't that worries us. -- Randall Randall "It's alright, it's alright, 'cause the system never fails; The good guys are in power, and the bad guys are in jail." From iamgoddard at yahoo.com Mon Nov 6 20:05:29 2006 From: iamgoddard at yahoo.com (Ian Goddard) Date: Mon, 6 Nov 2006 12:05:29 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Some of my Recent Creations Message-ID: <20061106200529.99006.qmail@web52608.mail.yahoo.com> FYI: here's some of my recent output... * After an eight-year hiatus I picked up pad n pencil and began attending some local figure-drawing sessions. See some results: Short poses http://iangoddard.net/sketchesQuick.htm Long poses http://iangoddard.net/sketches.htm * Out-of-Body Experiences (OBEs), what are they? Here's a review I wrote on recent OBE research and the effect of such research on explanatory models. This also appears in 'Noesis' no. 182: http://iangoddard.net/OBEs.htm * My analysis of the mysterious red rains of Kerala, India received positive notice by the University of Wisconsin's 'The Why Files' : http://whyfiles.org/shorties/207red_rain * What the hay, here's some simple proofs I did in a math class: http://iangoddard.net/proofs.htm I'd add more proofs, but it's too time consuming! So here I am, still striving for perfection, which I see as rigorously accurate modeling of reality... explicit rendering. Almost surely I'll never reach such a goal, but as they say, if you don't try you probably won't even get close. ~Ian ____________________________________________________________________________________ Sponsored Link Degrees online in as fast as 1 Yr - MBA, Bachelor's, Master's, Associate Click now to apply http://yahoo.degrees.info From kerry_prez at yahoo.com Mon Nov 6 20:57:32 2006 From: kerry_prez at yahoo.com (Al Brooks) Date: Mon, 6 Nov 2006 12:57:32 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] not to forget teachers' unions In-Reply-To: <20061106132548.GW6974@leitl.org> Message-ID: <20061106205732.4112.qmail@web51603.mail.yahoo.com> We suffer a financial problem with "migrant" (often PC for illegal) student funding, there's limited funds for educating native American students to begin with, funding education for illegals doesn't help matters. Then too is the problem of teachers' unions; most teachers & their unions do care about students and care about schools, yet they are conflicted as along with limits on funding and the unaccountability associated with funding the education of illegals, teachers also have to concern themselves with their own pension and medical plans. Teachers' medical plans are good and their pensions are frequently excellent (or many teachers would have chosen other careers to begin with). So teachers have to look out for their own interests in an expensive educational system that also looks out for the interests of students who aren't even citizens. Also-- how to say this nicely-- some teachers aren't precisely teacher material, a certain percentage of them chose the teaching profession because teaching in a classroom and grading papers is sure a whole lot better than cleaning the deep frying mechanisms at Wendy's and Burger King. --------------------------------- Everyone is raving about the all-new Yahoo! Mail. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From pj at pj-manney.com Mon Nov 6 21:35:58 2006 From: pj at pj-manney.com (pjmanney) Date: Mon, 06 Nov 2006 16:35:58 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] it's all understandable, except Message-ID: <14545876.369241162848958726.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> Please let me preface this to say that I happen to fall in the Gould/Postman camp that believes IQ is a bogus measure of intelligence. So whether IQ is going up or down (i.e. the Flynn effect) is largely irrelevent. To me, what is relevant is how the supposedly intelligent are applying their intelligence and are adapting to a changing world. And as always, some people rise to the occasion and others don't, regardless of their supposed IQ scores or talents or the success or failure of their own parents or their parents expectations of them. I have noticed (ancedotally of course) a certain rise in some kinds of intelligence and a remarked drop in others. But that's for another thread. (Full disclosure: Having said the above, I seemed -- at least as a kid -- to have excelled at certain kinds of IQ testing, which is probably why I have such strong beliefs in IQ's irrelevance!) However... In my research on persons with high IQ (for the book), I came across the essays of Grady Towers. Some of you may know of him. He died, quite tragically, a number of years ago. But he had a multi-faceted intelligence and knew the world of ultra-high IQ intimately. His essay, "The Outsiders," is considered a classic analysis into the world of ultra-high IQ. http://www.prometheussociety.org/articles/Outsiders.html In it, he describes the work of Lewis Terman, who demonstrated the behavioral thresholds between levels of tested intelligence and the sad fact that after certain IQ thresholds are past -- in the case of this work, an IQ of 170 -- the odds of "success" as defined as using one's IQ in your life/work that benefits both the person and/or society and brings self-satisfaction, are few. Frankly, the number of ultra-high IQ people who burn out is amazing. I witnessed a number myself. So maybe "School" wasn't the culprit. Maybe these kids had other issues that led to their "failure to perform." And let's not forgot other psychological issues. Substance abuse, depression, bi-polar, schizophrenia, etc. I've know a few who fell off the supposed IQ ramp because of these. And I'm sure those with more acute autistic spectrum disorders have a hard time, too. Questions like 'So why did I/my child fail?' 'Why was I/they so unhappy at school?' are never answered adequately. We so easily fall into the role of accuser. Especially parents and as one, I can see my own tendencies to it in both myself and others. Obviously, we want what is best for our children. But do we always really know what is best? And are our personal experiences, and subsequent disappointments, always applicable to our children? And are they actually bad for us? I don't believe they are. In my own case, I hated public school, until high school, when I joined the 'theater kids.' There I had an outlet. Otherwise, school was just a disappointment. It wasn't until college that I felt I found my place. But I also believe that that which doesn't destroy me makes me stronger. Life is suffering. Move on. (I can come up with any number of cliched sayings...) But my kids are more socially well adjusted than I was. School isn't hell for them. They have different personalities than me. So I can't apply my experiences to them. I tend to believe that school is school. It is NOT an education. School exists to create cogs in the socio-economic machine. This doesn't make me happy, becasue it's not the 'ideal,' but that's the way it is. However, it is an important tool for socialization, simply because of the diversity involved in the school demographic. It is also an effective way to take in the cultural memes, which allow you to connect on a cultural level with your peers, which is important. I know the social aspects of primary and secondary school probably sucked for most of us. Really smart people often don't function well with people who don't understand what we're talking about. But that doesn't mean it isn't important to try. Because the world is filled with the average. And if you don't learn how to deal with them, what are you going to do? Stay home? Miss out on life? That's not an option to me. I know the arguments about the advantages of home-schooling, but having been involved with a cub scout pack with both home-schooled kids and regularly schooled kids, the home-schooled kids seemed pretty lonely and some had some problems socializing. Really effective home-schooling, that feeds both the brain and the individual in society, is beyond the logistical reach of most modern parents. To those who can pull off the trick -- Congratulations. It is not a public (or private) school's job to create a functional, well-honed mind. It is the job of the parents and the child. Both have to want it. If you have the mind and mental health to succeed, school only 'kills' if you let it. You can do both -- attend public school and still get the education you or your child deserve. It just might not be at school. Both my parents and I made sure I did. Whether you think it did any good, of course, is your own opinion! Respectfully, PJ p.s. -- You want a 'killer school' story? How about this one: I was 15 before I found out I had dyslexia. I only found out when I got to see my secret school file, which I wasn't supposed to see, but my guidence councelor snuck to me. In it, teachers as far back as 2nd grade had diagnosed me correctly with dyslexia. But they never told me OR MY PARENTS! Why? The notes in my file indicated they planned on using it to reign me back -- I was so advanced, they had to bring materials from the upper schools for me and I created a lot of work for my teachers. They figured leaving the dyslexia as it was would put some breaks on me and make me easier to manage. I created coping mechanisms myself, at a very young age, coming up with a lot of the dyslexia methods that I read about now, although mathematics and music notes still dance all over the page unless I'm relentless. I guess their plan didn't work, because I ended up skipping 6th grade anyway, which was the best thing they ever did for me. But I don't blame them. Not really. They were doing the best they could for the greatest number. And it was my responsibility to do the best for me. Which we both did. From hkhenson at rogers.com Mon Nov 6 22:04:08 2006 From: hkhenson at rogers.com (Keith Henson) Date: Mon, 06 Nov 2006 17:04:08 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Triad question? In-Reply-To: <454F89C6.807@lineone.net> References: Message-ID: <5.1.0.14.0.20061106170240.03d106d8@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> Transferred from another mailing list since this has been a topic here: From: "Chattoe-Brown, Dr E." Subject: Kirk and Coleman ... To: SIMSOC at JISCMAIL.AC.UK Dear All, Does anybody know whether the work by Jerome Kirk and James Coleman "Interaction in a 3-Person Group" which is often cited as "mimeo, Johns Hopkins Department of Social Relations" was substantively published elsewhere? If not, has anyone ever seen the mimeo? JSK seems to have gone through a phase of discussing simulations in rather little detail (perhaps work with his grad students?) in batches to make methodological points in the sixties and, because they are unpublished and/or "batched" into general methodology papers, it is hard to find out whether this work has been developed: cites of the overall papers aren't necessarily cites for any particular model. All the best, Edmund From eugen at leitl.org Mon Nov 6 22:16:11 2006 From: eugen at leitl.org (Eugen Leitl) Date: Mon, 6 Nov 2006 23:16:11 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] it's all understandable, except In-Reply-To: <7641ddc60611060901l15ea6bcdh3fd4bbc138c99f58@mail.gmail.com> References: <20061105203158.GJ6974@leitl.org> <077d01c70195$28852dc0$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <20061106132548.GW6974@leitl.org> <7641ddc60611060901l15ea6bcdh3fd4bbc138c99f58@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <20061106221611.GC6974@leitl.org> On Mon, Nov 06, 2006 at 12:01:41PM -0500, Rafal Smigrodzki wrote: > ### Jeez, Eugen, you sound depressed. Reading libertarian-leaning No, just not irrationally exhuberant. You might or might not remember that just prior to the .bomb I wasn't exactly exhuberant, either. Where others saw the gleaming outskirts of the Singularity, I only saw a bubble about to pop. Well, I hate to repeat myself, but this one is going to be a really Big One. The only thing I don't know for sure is when exactly. Some say as early as 2007, some put that at 2012. It's hard to tell, because it's punctuated equilibrium psychology thing. In a number of different universes it has happened already. > economics blogs (Cafe Hayek, Marginal Revolution, Econlog) gives me a > totally different outlook, with the middle class shrinking by steady Yeah, the flavor varies widely, depending on which brand of koolaid you drink. > attrition into the affluent class, and an economical revolution due to I don't know the source of your numbers, but I'm hearing the entire middle class is taking a mud slide downwards. The situation only reverses in multiple megabuck (still single-digit, probably) country. I.e., the cutoff threshold is really high. The situation in the rural U.S. is arguably really dismal. > disappearing manufacturing costs in the offing. Yes, outsourcing production to hellholes which have no environmental nor labor protection really makes things cheap, at least as long energy is cheap enough so that transport doesn't figure much. On the plus side of things, we see lots of long-ailing societies in the process of bootstrap. As long as the ecosystem can still take it, that's a good thing. I'm not sure the ecosystem is taking it at all well, though. > I may be the inveterate optimist seeing a silver lining everywhere > ("The UFAI ante portas? Cool, it will fry all the guys I hate, too!") > so maybe I am prone to missing the dark clouds on the horizon but, > really, where is the evidence for doom (aside from the risk of UFAI in > the next 20 - 50 years, which is the only major existential threat I > am aware of)? There is no existential risks short-term, but most world economies are at the threshold of collapse, and the entire house of cards is entirely interconnected. The reasons are boring and manifold, and I'm sure you haven't missed them. The only thing which can pull us out is a concerted disruptive technology series, but I just don't see any signs for it. -- Eugen* Leitl leitl http://leitl.org ______________________________________________________________ ICBM: 48.07100, 11.36820 http://www.ativel.com 8B29F6BE: 099D 78BA 2FD3 B014 B08A 7779 75B0 2443 8B29 F6BE -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: signature.asc Type: application/pgp-signature Size: 191 bytes Desc: Digital signature URL: From davidishalom1 at gmail.com Mon Nov 6 22:19:01 2006 From: davidishalom1 at gmail.com (david ish shalom) Date: Tue, 7 Nov 2006 00:19:01 +0200 Subject: [extropy-chat] =?windows-1252?q?the_self_identity_quest_=96_summa?= =?windows-1252?q?tion_to_Bradbury=2C_Wallace_and_Jef?= Message-ID: Robert Bradbury write: ?.. I am willing to go on record, as stating that info-identity is a legitimate process of preserving oneself. Most people considering "identity" are doing so in an information constrained world (i.e. it is impossible to copy oneself). But this will not always be the case. A copy of information imprinted on 3 lbs of wet matter will not always be "unique". So David's choice of selling point aside one has to deal with 1 = 1 = 1... and you can apply it to the left of or to the right of as selling points but you still have to get back to "is it identical". I have no problem with people treating copies of Robert as if they were Robert. surrogates (copies) filling in for = substituting - me. In particular I would like to know *who* would be so presumptuous as to claim knowing when I have been replaced by one of my copies and how they would know such. Robert through your inspiration and others here, I could have come to phrase this new angle, and this is also a kind of summation to the discussion about identity capture and reanimation from my point of view: info-resurrection can be defined as minimal and maximal option. Firstly, on its minimal viewpoint INRES is an impressive virtual statue of oneself, as Russel Wallace phrased it: "metaphorical immortality through one's works - that's a familiar enough concept. Sort of the digital equivalent of getting a statue of yourself But the thing about statues is, they get done because people think they look cool. So go ahead and create a digital monument to yourself, and do it in such a way that it looks cool - nice site layout and suchlike. Then point people to it and say "wouldn't you like one of these for yourself?" Russel this is a fantastic vision which I wholeheartedly adopt, Yet I would add your view is the minimal option. mine is the maximal option that it is going to be your true virtual immortality, So why not support it anyway, even if you don't think it will be totally your self identity, - and see my work http://davidishalom1.googlepages.com/home for the contrary - yet, even if you are not sure about that, even if you don't believe that it will be you, who will wake up, nevertheless, why not capture your personality and create vivid and convincing simulation of yourself, someone/s who talk like you, think like you ? and million times faster as well ? look like you ? only your improved and enhanced you in the cyber space; and as Jef holds be your true and full agent, and even if you don't think it will be you, surely it will be your mind child, and since we inclined to wish good to our genetic children, isn't it time we originate, create, and wish all the best to our mind children, to our mind clone? Yet as is mentioned in my work about info-resurrection (my site is cleaned from yellowish highlights thanks to some advice here) only after emergence of really intelligent AI next decade, we will be able to run these vivid and convincing simulation about ourselves, probably more than one simulation synchronously, vivid and convincing avatar/s of ourselves, and this will gain huge popularity in the Net, while everyone will have his virtual self there ?self agent/s, according to Jef Allbright theory - not only to live, experience and evolve, but to exercise improving fidelity and identification of oneself with your virtual self. At this stage, I am not talking yet about conscious personalized AI of yourself, but as long as you continue to live, the intimacy and identification between you and your virtual you, your true and complete agent, in the cyberspace is just growing, later conscious artificial intelligence will emerging, until one day if you exidentally die phisically? and hopefully that will never happen :)- than instantly you wake up as your info-resurrected self or at least your mind clone. To Jef Allbright, your theory of agency as the source of personal identity " namely that multiple agents (can be said to) share the same personal identity to the extent that they (are observed to) act on behalf of a particular entity". is a thoughtful ingenuity no doubt. I tend to adopt this theory of "agency" to my eclectic repertoire of theories of the self identity, and I will integrate parts of your text here as well as Alice's story in my website: http://davidishalom1.googlepages.com/home all represented under your name for sure. I would advise you to check Joe Strout Fuzzy experience theory of the self - a summary in my site - since it is complementary to your theory. Yet I would suggest that your "agency theory of the self" is strongly contributing to representing the self from the outside point of view and maybe only partly so from the inside qualia- "is it me who will wake up" point of view - yet I have to delve on this more - and from this respect, maybe Max Mores The Diachronic Self, come better for our rescue. Further I would suggest that all these theories of the self are complimentary and all of them, including yours give credence to the identity capture feasibility. Why so? you state "? If we extend the concept of agency, we see the agent taking on more and more resemblance to the principle, in terms of knowing the principle's values, beliefs and memories and being able to choose and take action in all such respects" and this parallel to what I mentioned above "only after emergence of really intelligent AI next decade, we will be able to run these vivid and convincing simulation about ourselves to their fullest, probably more than only one simulation synchronously, vivid and convincing avatar/s of ourselves, and this will gain huge popularity in the Net, while everyone will have his virtual self there ? self agent/s, doing his work and representing him there according to Jef Allbright - not only to live, experience and evolve, and represent us there, but to exercise improving fidelity and identification of oneself with your virtual self, your virtual agent. Moreover, who is my true and complete agent as you hold? This is something that can surely be captured, mainly more thoroughly with next decade personalized AI but even now for large extent. I would dare to say that Jef Allbright's "Agency Theory of the Self" do give more credence to the identity capture option and to the info-resurrection strategy. Jef, I was laughing like anything from your "he had been accused of a plot to blow up an asteroid belonging to the Bush family and had therefore been charged with terrorism under penalty of death." And much impressed by your imaginative plot and illuminative abilities". I look forward to your thoughtful comments. David Jef Allbright "Agency theory of the self" I will propose that a more encompassing concept of personal identity can be based on agency, namely that multiple agents (can be said to) share the same personal identity to the extent that they (are observed to) act on behalf of a particular entity. ?.This is agency, but to a very limited extent relative to what promises to be possible with future technologies. If we extend the concept of agency, we see the agent taking on more and more resemblance to the principle, in terms of knowing the principle's values, beliefs and memories and being able to choose and take action in all such respects? Consider the following scenarios: #1 With the intention of increasing my working bandwidth, I step into the duplicator box. A short time later two agents acting on behalf of the entity known (by everyone including himself) as Jef go to work. They happen to be physically (and thus functionally) the same as the original so the results are coincidentally the same as the patternist view. #2 With the intention of increasing my working bandwidth I step into the duplicator box. To avoid some confusion, I set the controls so that one copy will have blue skin, but be identical in all other respects. The two agents of Jef go to work. Would the patternist say they are not the same personal identity since there's an obvious physical difference? >From the point of view of agency, it's the same personal identity, but with different skin colors. If Jef's skin color were to change would we say he's a different person? #3 With the intention of temporarily increasing my working bandwidth I step into the duplicator box. To avoid confusion and dispute later on, I set the controls such that one copy will have blue skin and will also not feel hunger or boredom, and incidentally it will die within a short time (maybe due to not eating.) From the patternist point of view there are two different persons physically, functionally, and in terms of values. From the point of view of agency it's two of Jef, with one of them significantly modified. If Jef were in the hospital with a skin condition and a brain anomaly that caused lack of boredom would we say it isn't Jef? Note that the functions and actions of someone in hospital may be severely modified but they continue to act solely and entirely on behalf of the same entity. #4 With the intention of contributing to the worthwhile social cause of asteroid mining, but not being able to send my firstborn son, I step into the duplicator box. I send my duplicate off as a free agent to contribute to the cause, knowing that he will get a good pension and I probably won't ever see him again. The patternist view would insist that I was sending myself. The agency point of view would say I was sending a different person with an extremely strong resemblance, carrying my knowledge and skills. Note that if I had in fact sent my son, no one would think of doubting that he was ultimately a free agent, even though I was the sole direct cause of his enlistment. #5 Ten years after sending said free agent to the asteroid mines, he returns, informs me that he was converted to patternist thinking while away, and now claims equal share of my property, my projects and my wife. A patternist might claim (I remember Lee claiming this) that he would in fact be me, and I should be happy to have doubled my runtime and gladly find a way to share. #6 A few days later, I learn that the real reason he returned from the asteroid mines is that he had been accused of a plot to blow up an asteroid belonging to the Bush family and had therefore been charged with terrorism under penalty of death. Under patternist thinking, should I turn myself in, or under agent-based thinking, should I tell him he's in big trouble and might consider making a large political contribution while in hiding? #7 *Remember *Alice*? Under patternist thinking according to Lee, she died at some point even though someone continued on with her property, her relationships, and her name. Under agent-based personal identity, there's no question that we should see the 86 year old woman as a late instantiation of the entity known to all, including herself, as *Alice. *Furthermore, fifty years later, we would gladly interact with her variants and doubles exactly as if they were *Alice* in various alternate forms and places. * -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From davidishalom1 at gmail.com Mon Nov 6 22:37:04 2006 From: davidishalom1 at gmail.com (david ish shalom) Date: Tue, 7 Nov 2006 00:37:04 +0200 Subject: [extropy-chat] trio relationship, reply to Spike and Jef Message-ID: Spike your humor and sarcasm hold much truth known to me already, but this is another experience of a "an experimenter" as myself, and I am 57 now, but I have clues to success and then we'll three info-resurrect ourselves :) , and love and compassion and moral, can even be instantiated in three, and so often is not found in pair, so wish me good luck and I surely do report back. By the way, once I came across a nice book about MD... etc" BY Spike, is it you ?:) Ja "naturally", but your wife will surely help with these. She will have surprisingly little difficulty finding two additional men, and a second job for you to cover the increased expenses. Honest to jahweh, David, I would be very surprised if the ladies go for this notion. Even really rich guys can seldom pull it off. But if you work it out, congratulations. Do report back. Even if not, do report back anyway. We want to hear what your Indian wife hit you with when you suggested it. spike Jef Allbright" wrote: >> Might it be that the most effective >> relationship structure in terms of cost/benefit might be the triad? >> I'm not talking about polyamory or mriage ? trois but rather a >> stable, committed triadic relationship between three individuals >> in any combination of genders. > > Amazing what you say Jef, i am married to an Indian woman, I love > here,a few months ago i came to live in Israel and have new lover, > my wife is supposed to come soon to live with me, and i intend and > hope to maintain a trio, which i "naturally" there are some personal > and social difficulties, especially in conservative Jerusalem, yet > some personal advantages, but your claim is encouraging, will you > elaborate please ? David, when I suggested that triadic relationships might provide inherent advantages, I hinted (strongly, I thought), but did not make fully make explicit, that I thought this form might rise to predominance within a more highly developed (and more highly competitive) culture with individuals possessing a higher degree of awareness than the present situation. Jef, true, but personally I strive for higher awareness but only sometime achieve it, yet in the future, I intend to permanently be there and we are training ourselves to that future J As Keith Henson mentioned, evolutionary psychology provides a good basis for understanding much of the dynamics of human relationships at the individual and group level. There are strong reasons why such relationships are not stable within the social context. [Note to Keith: I studied Cosmidies and Toobey and others several years ago, but thanks anyway for the suggestion. ;-)] In your particular case, I wish you luck maintaining your relationship(s). Perhaps you and your partners should read Heinlein for inspiration. *Note that a high degree of openess and honesty is recommended, but rarely achieved over the course*." My reply: honesty and high degree of openness is a must, yet it sometimes should come gradually. . -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From kerry_prez at yahoo.com Mon Nov 6 22:37:15 2006 From: kerry_prez at yahoo.com (Al Brooks) Date: Mon, 6 Nov 2006 14:37:15 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] it's all understandable, except In-Reply-To: <20061106221611.GC6974@leitl.org> Message-ID: <20061106223715.58139.qmail@web51601.mail.yahoo.com> Rafal, hope the housing bubble bursts big-time because the prices are IMO inflated. > [...]economics blogs (Cafe Hayek, Marginal Revolution, Econlog) gives me a > totally different outlook, with the middle class shrinking by steady >attrition[...] >Rafal --------------------------------- Want to start your own business? Learn how on Yahoo! Small Business. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jonkc at att.net Mon Nov 6 23:08:24 2006 From: jonkc at att.net (John K Clark) Date: Mon, 6 Nov 2006 18:08:24 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Identity (was: Survival tangent) References: <20061102062735.57668.qmail@web52612.mail.yahoo.com><015601c7010a$6a7d5d50$450a4e0c@MyComputer><008101c701b4$37b35870$250b4e0c@MyComputer> <3C5E9884-5CD8-46CC-9841-28C6980CE600@randallsquared.com> Message-ID: <059a01c701f8$841e1670$bb0a4e0c@MyComputer> "Randall Randall" > It's possible, hypothetically, to erase all record to the level at which > no person can ever know that Trotsky existed Absolutely true. > and that's all that's required for this thought experiment. Absolutely false. > I find it deeply weird that you suggest that if no one knows > or has the capability to find out a fact, that fact ceases to exist. Yes, that would be indeed be deeply weird, if I had suggested it. > And that's why I included the bit you snipped about the random number > generator. I snipped that bit for 2 reasons: 1) I wasn't entirely sure I knew what the hell you were talking about. I'm not to this day. 2) This random number stuff, as near as I can tell, was designed to counter the runtime theory, a theory NOT proposed by me, therefore I felt no great need to defend it. Personally I can't see why running the same program a million trillion billion times is much better than running it just once. > Of course, you may be saying that "this unit" of John K Clark with >:which I'm speaking would try to continue to exist regardless of the > fate of other units, but if so, then your position reduces to mine. Bullshit. Why do I get out of the way of a runaway killer car? I gave you a logical reason, an emotional reason, and a evolutionary reason. All three reasons are absolutely ironclad and only one needed to do the trick. You're toast. You think I'm just bragging? Come on, try to pick apart my reasoning, I dare you! > If you remove one unit [....] No no no, I'm not letting you off the hook that easily. In my thought experiment I removed precisely nobody, I EXCHANGED the position of the brain of you and your "vastly different" copy, and guess what; subjectively nobody noticed, objectively nobody noticed, and even the universe didn't notice! Leibniz says that means they are the same thing and if it's good enough for Leibniz it's good enough for me. > a mind is merely a process running on a brain. Yes, and your point being ... > I would expect that this view of "mind" as something which doesn't require > any physical component [.....] I would never be so foolish as to say mind doesn't require a physical component, but the physical part is generic, anything will do. Asking for the position of mind is like asking what the number 4 smells like. And I'll make you a deal, if you tell me exactly where mind is I'll tell you exactly where the number 42 is hiding. > No one is disputing that the copy survives, John. The original, discuss, the copy, discuss; for God's sake people grow up! If you really believe in this putrid crap then one of 2 things about you must be true: 1) You reject the Scientific Method as Heartland does and believes in the sanctity of certain atoms. 2) You believe in the soul and you believe even Nanotechnology cannot duplicate the soul. I believe both beliefs are incredibly fantastically comically stupid, but that's just my opinion I could be wrong. But I'm not. John K Clark From emlynoregan at gmail.com Mon Nov 6 23:13:23 2006 From: emlynoregan at gmail.com (Emlyn) Date: Tue, 7 Nov 2006 09:43:23 +1030 Subject: [extropy-chat] young Leitl is born! (was extropian grandchildren..) In-Reply-To: <9A920D3D-54BD-4675-9114-947554DFFD75@mac.com> References: <9A920D3D-54BD-4675-9114-947554DFFD75@mac.com> Message-ID: <710b78fc0611061513y7d5abe3dh54fbb4a8ac901230@mail.gmail.com> Congratulations Eugen! Emlyn On 06/11/06, Samantha Atkins wrote: > > Eugen, > > Congratulations to you, to Kiki and to Laurin! > > Amara, congratulations also on godmotherhood. > > - samantha > > On Nov 5, 2006, at 5:52 AM, Amara Graps wrote: > > > Eugene: > >> It would be so ironic if demographics and education would shoot > >> down our > >> chance for Singularity within the narrow launch horizon. If we mess > >> it > >> up real good this time, our grandchildren might not have an > >> opportunity > >> for another shot. > > > > If I may interject ... > > > > And Eugene is interested indeed in children's education and his > > grandchildren. > > His baby boy, Laurin Leitl, was born 2 November. Mother Kiki and > > little > > Laurin are happy and healthy. > > > > Amara > > (godmother) > > > > _______________________________________________ > > extropy-chat mailing list > > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From iamgoddard at yahoo.com Mon Nov 6 22:48:51 2006 From: iamgoddard at yahoo.com (Ian Goddard) Date: Mon, 6 Nov 2006 14:48:51 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Survival tangent. Message-ID: <20061106224851.77734.qmail@web52615.mail.yahoo.com> John K Clark wrote: >> Why should properties of a mind/self resemble >> quantum properties of electrons? > > A mind does not have the quantum properties of an > electron, but a brain does. Have all quantum properties that defy macroscopic behaviors been observed in atoms or their components when they're embedded in some material? It seems all (of the little) I've read on QM involves atoms or their components separated from any atomic grouping, as, for example, electrons or photons flying across 'open' space. So I've wondered if nonlocal behavior is a potential result of being separated from some atomic grouping, and so when atoms are bound together, such nonlocality may not be the case. Delving into QM is one of those things that sits too long on my back burner. I've made some preliminary study of quantum logic, which looks like the best place to start... and I'll get back to it asap. ;^) >> But I see no reason to assume that the self of the >> original brain would be somehow connected to its >> copy. > > In thought experiments people always take the part > of the original, but try being the copy. Yesterday > I copied you and then instantly destroyed the > original. Do you feel dead? You still remember > being you yesterday and last year and when you were > nine, you can see no discontinuity between yesterday > and today. You had no last thought so you have no > reason to complain,. And if I didn't tell you I'd > made the copy you'd never had known anything > unusual had happened. What more do you expect from > survival? It's true I can't ask the you of > yesterday his opinion on the matter, but that is > ALWAYS true even without my pesky copying. I agree that the copy living on would be satisfied that it survived and was 'me'. Maybe too, in line with your argument, every time I go into deep sleep, the 'I' of before dies, and a new 'I' emerges upon waking up. Notice that the logical identity analyses I posted may run into trouble with respect to any person over time. Today I have properties I lacked yesterday, does that mean I'm not that Ian? Personal identity may call upon a dynamic intensional model of identity, rather than the static one I proposed. Consider deep sleep further. It would seem that each time I'm in deep sleep, 'I' cease to exist, or exist only as the potential of being reanimated when the brain wakes up. So suppose the neuro-electric signal to 'wake up' was rerouted into a perfect copy of my brain exactly as it was when I went to sleep. Will 'I' wake up? Or suppose a copy brain was attached to me like: http://www.nicolaas.net/dvorak/future/zaphod.jpg and suppose one or both could be active. Do 'I' exist in two locations? Hmmm... I'm still inclined to answer both questions with 'no'. It just seems to me that each brain (or brain copy) is its own machine. Even if the output of each is indistinguishable to an observer, they're still distinguishable in that they're two machines (hearkening back to Leibniz's Law). Perhaps analogies can be found that blur that line more... what about if half of my brain was a copy of half removed... ? Then I'd see the whole as one 'me'. But then suppose the remaining half was replaced is a copy of that half too. Then what? Perhaps better still (and someone's probably already raised this). Just suppose for the sake of argument that it's possible that as each brain cell died during normal aging, a copy is put in its place. Now keep supposing until no carbon-based cell is left. Well, what we have is in effect a copy of a brain that existed. And this copy was always in the same location as the original. Now my inclination seems to shift to believing that copy would be me. But am I justified in shift my view at this point? Hmmm... ~Ian http://iangoddard.net "Our greatest illusion is to believe that we are what we think ourselves to be." -- Henri Amiel ____________________________________________________________________________________ Sponsored Link $200,000 mortgage for $660/mo - 30/15 yr fixed, reduce debt, home equity - Click now for info http://yahoo.ratemarketplace.com From davidishalom1 at gmail.com Mon Nov 6 23:23:08 2006 From: davidishalom1 at gmail.com (david ish shalom) Date: Tue, 7 Nov 2006 01:23:08 +0200 Subject: [extropy-chat] Religion worked for survival - Russel Wallace Message-ID: *Russel you write:..."there's no rational reason for believing in the Singularity either (yes, like most myths it was inspired by some nuggets of truth, but the vast bulk of what's written about it, is as much a fable as Noah bringing two of each animal aboard the ark). I don't see you going around proclaiming this to be irrational. David comment: for believing in the Singularity there are absolutely rational reasons, yet to all the rest of what you say here I heartily harmonize with, its wise and out of the box. i would add that this tendency of many transhumanist to go against religion is not contributing to transhumanism spreading to the vast masses of humanity and just holding this crucial meme as marginal and rejected by humanity at large. *i am much surprised at Samantha, who has taken a leading role in the transhuman religion group and now turns so vehemently against what she was supporting there ?! > What do you mean "it worked"? What worked exactly? I am really at a loss as to what you meant by this paragraph. *"Religion worked for survival. Look at what happens to modern cultures where religion is gone: they fall apart into self-hatred and nihilism, birth rates plummeting below extinction level, their people rapidly headed for oblivion. The greatest civilization that ever existed on this planet is dying, in what should have been its hour of triumph - dying not of any external threat, but of its own parasite memes; and who will pick up the torch once we are gone?" * Really? I know an awful lot of atheists who are very delighted with life and this universe and consider life extremely full > *If that works for them, great, though I will note that most people who give up belief in God, in order to find meaning in life, need to substitute some equivalent belief: aliens, the Singularity, reincarnation or whatever*. > What fanatical religious preachers taught them this, you may wonder? Why, > some of the names are quite familiar. Gould, Dawkins, Dennett. > > This is beyond the pale. I'm sorry it offends you to see things called by their right names. Preach? There is no rational reason for believing in God that I am aware of. There's no rational reason for believing in the Singularity either (yes, like most myths it was inspired by some nuggets of truth, but the vast bulk of what's written about it is as much a fable as Noah bringing two of each animal aboard the ark). I don't see you going around proclaiming this to be irrational. * * Theism has done a great deal of harm. But far more good than harm. A parable, quoting from memory so the wording may not be accurate, but the gist of it is: Young man: "I can see no use for that fence, let's get rid of it." Old man: "Certainly not. Go and study the problem some more, and when you come back and tell me you _can_ see a use for it... _then_ we can start talking about whether to get rid of it." Superstitious and irrational thinking does even more. How is it preaching to say this is so? Again, what is your beef? I don't see anything you seem to be saying in the actual article. > It isn't about Dennett's article - if it were just him, I wouldn't have said anything. It's about the prevailing meme in Western intellectual circles these days that tearing down Christianity and its value system is somehow a rational or wise thing to do. Are you claiming that those who say what they honestly thing about religion and theism should be despised or censored for saying it? > *I have not advocated censoring anyone. What I think should be done is this: when Dawkins goes around using his science to preach atheism, someone - it'd have to be someone who'd be listened to, something like a professor of evolutionary biology at a well-known university would be ideal - should stand up and say: "Dawkins is of course entitled to preach his religious beliefs - in his capacity as a private citizen. Science says nothing whatsoever about the existence or nonexistence of God, and it is a fallacy to claim it as authority on either side of that debate." * We all agree teaching science is important. I claim it is equally important to teach that science is compatible with pro-survival value systems. Not one of these people says that science proves there is no god. > Have you actually read any of Gould or Dawkins' recent works? -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://lists.extropy.org/pipermail/extropy-chat/attachments/20061106/6c0b944b/attachment-0001.html ------------------------------ -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From c.hales at pgrad.unimelb.edu.au Mon Nov 6 23:27:42 2006 From: c.hales at pgrad.unimelb.edu.au (Colin Geoffrey Hales) Date: Tue, 07 Nov 2006 10:27:42 +1100 (EST) Subject: [extropy-chat] it's all understandable, except In-Reply-To: <20061106221611.GC6974@leitl.org> References: <20061105203158.GJ6974@leitl.org> <077d01c70195$28852dc0$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <20061106132548.GW6974@leitl.org> <7641ddc60611060901l15ea6bcdh3fd4bbc138c99f58@mail.gmail.com> <20061106221611.GC6974@leitl.org> Message-ID: <3247.139.168.42.79.1162855662.squirrel@webmail.student.unimelb.edu.au> > On Mon, Nov 06, 2006 at 12:01:41PM -0500, Rafal Smigrodzki wrote: > >> ### Jeez, Eugen, you sound depressed. Reading libertarian-leaning > > No, just not irrationally exhuberant. You might or might not remember > that just prior to the .bomb I wasn't exactly exhuberant, either. > Where others saw the gleaming outskirts of the Singularity, I only saw a > bubble about to pop. Well, I hate to repeat myself, but this one is > going to be a really Big One. The only thing I don't know for sure is > when exactly. Some say as early as 2007, some put that at 2012. > It's hard to tell, because it's punctuated equilibrium psychology > thing. In a number of different universes it has happened already. > Hi Eugene... I am still aiming for 2012. Although it is looking a little opimistic at the moment. So put me down for the 2012 timeslot with an option for 2015. My chip design proof of principle simulations will be done 2010 (end of my PhD - it's my project). Then chip fabrication for the first experiments to prove the chips are having experiences. After that it'll get let loose on humanity and 7 billion pairs of hands might give it a leg up. Although I still think we're gonna have trouble wanting them to be alive! The first creatures will be sort of single-cell-scientists. A bridge of them comparing notes, doing science on novelty (novelty to them, anyway). The scientists are all inside each other, able to compare experiences. Grafting human brains together to do the equivalent on humans has a few ethical hurdles! It all depends on whther the AGI that results can sort out the nanotech required for the subsequent versions of the chips. Until that is done they'll all be made with existing fabrication/embodiment techniques and no self-replication will be involved. So the exact timing is a bit debatable. There's going to be a big change to science next year, tho. A sort of Kuhnian shake-out. I'm madly pressing all those buttons right now. I suppose I'm pressing it here too. It's slowly sinking in. I'm hammering 3 other email forums (fora?) as best I can. I am on a leave of absence from my PhD until Jan and after that I won't have time to press that button any more. Don't think the science thing counts as a singularity, however. Although historians might view it that way. All good fun, regardless. :-) Colin Hales From randall at randallsquared.com Mon Nov 6 23:41:24 2006 From: randall at randallsquared.com (Randall Randall) Date: Mon, 6 Nov 2006 18:41:24 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Identity (was: Survival tangent) In-Reply-To: <059a01c701f8$841e1670$bb0a4e0c@MyComputer> References: <20061102062735.57668.qmail@web52612.mail.yahoo.com><015601c7010a$6a7d5d50$450a4e0c@MyComputer><008101c701b4$37b35870$250b4e0c@MyComputer> <3C5E9884-5CD8-46CC-9841-28C6980CE600@randallsquared.com> <059a01c701f8$841e1670$bb0a4e0c@MyComputer> Message-ID: <3826AF26-6E76-4BB9-AA08-3EF4103D6E01@randallsquared.com> On Nov 6, 2006, at 6:08 PM, John K Clark wrote: > "Randall Randall" >> No one is disputing that the copy survives, John. > > The original, discuss, the copy, discuss; for God's sake people > grow up! If > you really believe > in this putrid crap then one of 2 things about you must be true: > > 1) You reject the Scientific Method as Heartland does and believes > in the > sanctity of certain atoms. > > 2) You believe in the soul and you believe even Nanotechnology cannot > duplicate the soul. > > I believe both beliefs are incredibly fantastically comically > stupid, but > that's just my opinion I could be wrong. But I'm not. As far as I know, no one in this conversation believes in either your (1) or (2). One of three things must be true: 1) it may be that you didn't realize this (and that you need to ask Heartland what beliefs he actually *does* hold) 2) it may be that you are unwilling to accept any other position than they one you expect he holds, no matter what anyone says 3) it may be that you already knew that he doesn't really believe that (I'm including this one for completeness) For myself, I would say that the particular running process of Randall Randall that is now typing this email (which you'll see a copy of shortly) is the one that matters most to me, even if there are identical copies elsewhere. The fact that this copy and some other copy are bit for bit identical will not matter to me if this copy were to have something bad happen to it, any more than I would be consoled by the existence of other copies of a CD I own, were my copy to be broken in two. Nothing about the specific atoms matters; it's the process. The atoms in this process change out constantly, but the process continues. -- Randall Randall "'The police got all the best stuff. They?re crookeder than us,' one man said." - http://tinyurl.com/85ltr From msd001 at gmail.com Mon Nov 6 23:49:56 2006 From: msd001 at gmail.com (Mike Dougherty) Date: Mon, 6 Nov 2006 18:49:56 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] all that concerns me is the future of education In-Reply-To: <06f401c7012c$ffbfb0d0$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> References: <20061105001850.59776.qmail@web51603.mail.yahoo.com> <062801c70091$02bb8490$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <62c14240611050926l6a87c935p582c1dfe61c34f81@mail.gmail.com> <06f401c7012c$ffbfb0d0$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: <62c14240611061549l10bf33d1r6668cb4dd9686b87@mail.gmail.com> On 11/5/06, Lee Corbin wrote: > > > We may actually be in agreement, but I am having difficulty with > > the terms you are using and how you are presenting your ideas. > > I hope I am misreading your intentions. > > Could be :-) Let's be open, frank, and honest, and---naturally--- > write as clearly as we can about our conjectures. > I think you clarified your position in another post to someone else. I remember thinking, "Ok, I WAS misunderstanding Lee." Thanks for responding to my last post on this topic though... Do you think "we" (ExI-members) are an exclusive bunch? Do you think there is reason to be so? I feel I am still on a probation of sorts with regard to posting here. I'm not really sure what the list mission is (vs. CSS-d for example) becuase the point is intentionally more broad-brush. I do enjoy socializing with the smart(er) kids because I so rarely get to do so in my day-to-day life. :) -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From msd001 at gmail.com Mon Nov 6 23:53:53 2006 From: msd001 at gmail.com (Mike Dougherty) Date: Mon, 6 Nov 2006 18:53:53 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Sex, Power and Single H+er In-Reply-To: References: <15616726.275921162791214745.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> Message-ID: <62c14240611061553o35f899c3n995444d91063232f@mail.gmail.com> On 11/6/06, Robert Bradbury wrote: > > I will state that as of this date (6 Nov 2006) there is no conspiracy that > I am to my knowledge involved in. > Isn't that the problem with conspiracies? The ones you know about probably aren't conspiracies -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From sentience at pobox.com Mon Nov 6 23:59:26 2006 From: sentience at pobox.com (Eliezer S. Yudkowsky) Date: Mon, 06 Nov 2006 15:59:26 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] An advance prediction for Tuesday Message-ID: <454FCC5E.1070808@pobox.com> I offer the following advance prediction: Initially, pollsters will predict that Democrats will take the House, but not the Senate. When the actual election results are reported, it will turn out that Republicans kept control of the House by a significant margin. There will be much anguished recrimination among Democrats, but few mainstream media sources will suggest that the election was stolen. Later, an eminent statistician will publish a study showing that there were significantly wider differences between polls and reported results in districts that use electronic voting machines. The story will not be taken up by the mainstream media. It will make a brief flurry in the blogosphere, then vanish. I could be wrong about all this. I hope I am. -- Eliezer S. Yudkowsky http://singinst.org/ Research Fellow, Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence From kerry_prez at yahoo.com Mon Nov 6 23:59:42 2006 From: kerry_prez at yahoo.com (Al Brooks) Date: Mon, 6 Nov 2006 15:59:42 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Religion worked for survival - Russel Wallace In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <20061106235942.21550.qmail@web51610.mail.yahoo.com> No shortage of religion in the Mideast yet the region possesses an equal measure of nihilism & self hatred to ours. But as you imply, the Mideast birthrate is robust-- plenty of young boys born into religious families today to choose as their fate suicide bombing in the decade between 2020 and 2030. The greatest civilization that ever existed is "dying"? Can you prove it is "dying"? >Look at what happens > to modern cultures > where > religion is gone: they fall apart into self-hatred > and nihilism, birth rates > plummeting below extinction level, their people > rapidly headed for oblivion. > The greatest civilization that ever existed on this > planet is dying, in what > should have been its hour of triumph - dying not of > any external threat, but > of its own parasite memes; and who will pick up the > torch once we are gone?" > * > > > Really? I know an awful lot of atheists who are > very delighted with > life and this universe and consider life extremely > full > > > *If that works for them, great, though I will note > that most people who give > up belief in God, in order to find meaning in life, > need to substitute some > equivalent belief: aliens, the Singularity, > reincarnation or whatever*. > > > What fanatical religious preachers taught them > this, you may wonder? Why, > > some of the names are quite familiar. Gould, > Dawkins, Dennett. > > > > This is beyond the pale. > > I'm sorry it offends you to see things called by > their right names. > > Preach? There is no rational reason for believing > in God that I am aware > of. > > There's no rational reason for believing in the > Singularity either (yes, > like most myths it was inspired by some nuggets of > truth, but the vast bulk > of what's written about it is as much a fable as > Noah bringing two of each > animal aboard the ark). I don't see you going around > proclaiming this to be > irrational. * > * > Theism has done a great deal of harm. > > But far more good than harm. > > A parable, quoting from memory so the wording may > not be accurate, but the > gist of it is: > > Young man: "I can see no use for that fence, let's > get rid of it." > Old man: "Certainly not. Go and study the problem > some more, and when you > come back and tell me you _can_ see a use for it... > _then_ we can start > talking about whether to get rid of it." > > Superstitious and irrational thinking does even > more. How is it > preaching to say this is so? Again, what is your > beef? I don't see > anything you seem to be saying in the actual > article. > > > > It isn't about Dennett's article - if it were just > him, I wouldn't have said > anything. It's about the prevailing meme in Western > intellectual circles > these days that tearing down Christianity and its > value system is somehow a > rational or wise thing to do. > > Are you claiming that those who say what they > honestly thing about > religion and theism should be despised or censored > for saying it? > > > > *I have not advocated censoring anyone. What I think > should be done is this: > when Dawkins goes around using his science to preach > atheism, someone - it'd > have to be someone who'd be listened to, something > like a professor of > evolutionary biology at a well-known university > would be ideal - should > stand up and say: "Dawkins is of course entitled to > preach his religious > beliefs - in his capacity as a private citizen. > Science says nothing > whatsoever about the existence or nonexistence of > God, and it is a fallacy > to claim it as authority on either side of that > debate." > * > We all agree teaching science is important. I claim > it is equally important > to teach that science is compatible with > pro-survival value systems. > > Not one of these people says that science proves > there is no god. > > > > Have you actually read any of Gould or Dawkins' > recent works? > -------------- next part -------------- > An HTML attachment was scrubbed... > URL: > http://lists.extropy.org/pipermail/extropy-chat/attachments/20061106/6c0b944b/attachment-0001.html > > ------------------------------ > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > ____________________________________________________________________________________ Cheap talk? Check out Yahoo! Messenger's low PC-to-Phone call rates. http://voice.yahoo.com From rhanson at gmu.edu Tue Nov 7 00:36:39 2006 From: rhanson at gmu.edu (Robin Hanson) Date: Mon, 06 Nov 2006 19:36:39 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] An advance prediction for Tuesday In-Reply-To: <454FCC5E.1070808@pobox.com> References: <454FCC5E.1070808@pobox.com> Message-ID: <0J8C006D94D29060@caduceus2.gmu.edu> At 06:59 PM 11/6/2006, Eliezer S. Yudkowsky wrote: >I offer the following advance prediction: >Initially, pollsters will predict that Democrats will take the House, >but not the Senate. >When the actual election results are reported, it will turn out that >Republicans kept control of the House by a significant margin. You have assigned no probability to your forecast. Betting markets now give a 20% chance to the Republicans keeping the House, so if you assign a higher probability you should expect to make money betting on your prediction. Robin Hanson rhanson at gmu.edu http://hanson.gmu.edu Associate Professor of Economics, George Mason University MSN 1D3, Carow Hall, Fairfax VA 22030-4444 703-993-2326 FAX: 703-993-2323 From velvethum at hotmail.com Tue Nov 7 01:04:17 2006 From: velvethum at hotmail.com (Heartland) Date: Mon, 6 Nov 2006 20:04:17 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Identity (was: Survival tangent) References: <20061102062735.57668.qmail@web52612.mail.yahoo.com><015601c7010a$6a7d5d50$450a4e0c@MyComputer><008101c701b4$37b35870$250b4e0c@MyComputer><3C5E9884-5CD8-46CC-9841-28C6980CE600@randallsquared.com> <059a01c701f8$841e1670$bb0a4e0c@MyComputer> Message-ID: John K Clark (in response to Randall Randall): > In my thought experiment I removed precisely nobody, I EXCHANGED the position of > the brain > of you and your "vastly different" copy, and guess what; subjectively nobody > noticed, objectively nobody noticed, and even the universe didn't notice! > Leibniz says that means they are the same thing and if it's good enough for > Leibniz it's good enough for me. What is so holy about somebody noticing? If I didn't notice back in 2004 that Bush was reelected would that change the fact that he was reelected? And, yet again, I remind you that Leibniz never claimed any such thing (although I realize that these attempts are probably futile). John K Clark: > The original, discuss, the copy, discuss; for God's sake people grow up! If > you really believe > in this putrid crap then one of 2 things about you must be true: > > 1) You reject the Scientific Method as Heartland does and believes in the > sanctity of certain atoms. That is a lie and you know it. Apparently you invent this nonsense just so you can safely argue against it so when others read your posts you trick them into taking your side with the added bonus that the person who disagrees with you looks like a fool and you look like a hero. [and below is just one of many examples of what I'm talking about] John K Clark: > 2) You believe in the soul and you believe even Nanotechnology cannot > duplicate the soul. > > I believe both beliefs are incredibly fantastically comically stupid, but > that's just my opinion I could be wrong. But I'm not. Gee, you must be such a good guy for fighting these evil soul-believers. Meanwhile, I doubt Randall (or I) who you accuse of this believes in souls. Why can't you just accept that you just don't get it and move on? One, you're confused as to what "person" is. Two, you don't (or refuse to) understand the definition of "identity" yet none of this stops you from talking about "personal identity". If you recall, at the beginning of this particular chain of threads, I suggested you read this introductory and objective article on personal identity. You've almost certainly ignored it but I think you would benefit from familiarizing yourself with the topic before you start arguing about PI with other people. http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/identity-personal/ Slawomir From velvethum at hotmail.com Tue Nov 7 01:23:04 2006 From: velvethum at hotmail.com (Heartland) Date: Mon, 6 Nov 2006 20:23:04 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] An advance prediction for Tuesday References: <454FCC5E.1070808@pobox.com> Message-ID: Eliezer: >I offer the following advance prediction: > > Initially, pollsters will predict that Democrats will take the House, > but not the Senate. > > When the actual election results are reported, it will turn out that > Republicans kept control of the House by a significant margin. There > will be much anguished recrimination among Democrats, but few mainstream > media sources will suggest that the election was stolen. > > Later, an eminent statistician will publish a study showing that there > were significantly wider differences between polls and reported results > in districts that use electronic voting machines. The story will not be > taken up by the mainstream media. It will make a brief flurry in the > blogosphere, then vanish. > > I could be wrong about all this. I hope I am. Yes, I've thought about this recently and came to similar conclusions although I don't think Republicans will take the House by a significant margin. It would just look too ridiculous when compared with polling data. Another prediction. After Republicans take both House and the Senate by slim margins, Bush will start talking about the "political capital" again and how he intends to spend it. Slawomir From kerry_prez at yahoo.com Tue Nov 7 01:28:29 2006 From: kerry_prez at yahoo.com (Al Brooks) Date: Mon, 6 Nov 2006 17:28:29 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] An advance prediction for Tuesday In-Reply-To: <454FCC5E.1070808@pobox.com> Message-ID: <20061107012829.18542.qmail@web51601.mail.yahoo.com> You are probably right, even if not, then in a later election someone like a Newt Gingrich-- only younger-- will come along to mobilize the more cohesive Republicans. The conservatism of America in general and red states in particular is consistently underestimated by its nonconservative opponents. BTW what Kerry said was dumbass & asinine, but it will have a negligible effect on the election. I live in a red state and in some ways it is a 20th century state, and in some ways a 19th century state. It sure aint 21st century. > I offer the following advance prediction: > > Initially, pollsters will predict that Democrats > will take the House, > but not the Senate. > > When the actual election results are reported, it > will turn out that > Republicans kept control of the House by a > significant margin. There > will be much anguished recrimination among > Democrats, but few mainstream > media sources will suggest that the election was > stolen. > > Later, an eminent statistician will publish a study > showing that there > were significantly wider differences between polls > and reported results > in districts that use electronic voting machines. > The story will not be > taken up by the mainstream media. It will make a > brief flurry in the > blogosphere, then vanish. > > I could be wrong about all this. I hope I am. > > -- > Eliezer S. Yudkowsky > http://singinst.org/ > Research Fellow, Singularity Institute for > Artificial Intelligence > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > ____________________________________________________________________________________ Want to start your own business? Learn how on Yahoo! Small Business. http://smallbusiness.yahoo.com/r-index From nvitamore at austin.rr.com Mon Nov 6 23:57:24 2006 From: nvitamore at austin.rr.com (nvitamore at austin.rr.com) Date: Mon, 6 Nov 2006 18:57:24 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] young Leitl is born! (was extropian grandchildren..) Message-ID: <380-220061116235724667@M2W006.mail2web.com> CONGRATUATIONS 'gene! > > His baby boy, Laurin Leitl, was born 2 November. Mother Kiki and > > little Laurin are happy and healthy. > > > > Amara > > (godmother) Natasha -------------------------------------------------------------------- mail2web - Check your email from the web at http://mail2web.com/ . From mbb386 at main.nc.us Tue Nov 7 01:51:13 2006 From: mbb386 at main.nc.us (MB) Date: Mon, 6 Nov 2006 20:51:13 -0500 (EST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Some of my Recent Creations In-Reply-To: <20061106200529.99006.qmail@web52608.mail.yahoo.com> References: <20061106200529.99006.qmail@web52608.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <34098.72.236.103.228.1162864273.squirrel@main.nc.us> > FYI: here's some of my recent output... > > * After an eight-year hiatus I picked up > pad n pencil and began attending some local > figure-drawing sessions. See some results: > > Short poses > http://iangoddard.net/sketchesQuick.htm > > Long poses > http://iangoddard.net/sketches.htm > Hm. *I'm* impressed! :) My mom used to do watercolors. Very pretty things. Have a number of them here in my home. Me, I can barely write! :))) Regards, MB From sentience at pobox.com Tue Nov 7 02:27:11 2006 From: sentience at pobox.com (Eliezer S. Yudkowsky) Date: Mon, 06 Nov 2006 18:27:11 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] An advance prediction for Tuesday In-Reply-To: <0J8C006D94D29060@caduceus2.gmu.edu> References: <454FCC5E.1070808@pobox.com> <0J8C006D94D29060@caduceus2.gmu.edu> Message-ID: <454FEEFF.6070108@pobox.com> Robin Hanson wrote: > > You have assigned no probability to your forecast. Betting markets > now give a 20% chance to the Republicans keeping the House, so if > you assign a higher probability you should expect to make money > betting on your prediction. That's fair. Where would I put a quick bet on my prediction, legally? (If you happen to know.) -- Eliezer S. Yudkowsky http://singinst.org/ Research Fellow, Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence From neuronexmachina at gmail.com Tue Nov 7 02:22:10 2006 From: neuronexmachina at gmail.com (Neil H.) Date: Mon, 6 Nov 2006 18:22:10 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] An advance prediction for Tuesday In-Reply-To: <20061107012829.18542.qmail@web51601.mail.yahoo.com> References: <454FCC5E.1070808@pobox.com> <20061107012829.18542.qmail@web51601.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: On 11/6/06, Al Brooks wrote: > BTW > what Kerry said was dumbass & asinine, but it will > have a negligible effect on the election. A tangential note: I guess my being in grad school tends to make me live in kind of a bubble -- I had no idea what this comment about Kerry was referring to until I looked it up just now. The particularly funny thing is that I live a half-mile from Pasadena City College (where Kerry made the comment), and pass by it every day on my way to lab. I didn't even realize until now that Kerry had been in town. Hmm. -- Neil From jef at jefallbright.net Tue Nov 7 02:45:05 2006 From: jef at jefallbright.net (Jef Allbright) Date: Mon, 6 Nov 2006 18:45:05 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] the self identity quest - summation to Bradbury, Wallace and Jef In-Reply-To: Message-ID: David, I'll mention again that your messages are at risk of being ignored if you don't use plain text (it's a gmail setting) and be as concise as possible. david ish shalom wrote: > I would advise you to check Joe Strout Fuzzy experience theory I'm pretty sure I came across his writing already and found it to be too fuzzy. Fuzzy or multivalued logic is okay with me, as long as it's crisply defined. > of the self - a summary in my site - since it is complementary > to your theory. Yet I would suggest that your "agency theory of the self" I proposed a theory of personal identity based on agency, but I don't say anything (there) about the nature of self. You are displaying the category confusion mentioned in my preface. It's a bit ironic that you, Slawomir, and others refer to Max's "Diachronic Self" as if you understand it but don't seem to understand the meaning or the significance of the word "diachronic" in the title. You need only ask Google and receive enlightenment (with a bit of serious analytical thinking on your part). > is strongly contributing to representing the self from the outside point of view Yes, I prefer the scientific method of describing systems from an increasingly objective "outside" point of view. I utilize the subjective point of view for issues of value and meaning. > and maybe only partly so from the inside qualia A key point of personal identity based on agency is that it provides a coherent framework with no need for any immeasurable externalities while recognizing the valid role of subjectivity in assigning meaning. "Qualia" is similar to "phlogiston" or "?lan vital" in that it serves no useful purpose other than to represent a particular erroneous or superfluous concept. Thinking in terms of qualia is related to the Cartesian bias I mentioned in the essay. > -"is it me who will wake up" point of view As mentioned in the essay, one can argue logically from the ontological basis that you are not the same as before you went to sleep. Perfectly valid -- within the ontological domain. Does it apply in real life? No not really--because how we perceive reality is a different domain. If you don't understand this you might want to google, or even just play around with examples in your mind. "Is that a cat?" No, because any observable cat is only an approximation of a Platonic ideal..., or "I can't know, since my only information is through my imperfect senses..." But we have no trouble recognizing a cat in a useful and effective way. If you get comfortable with thinking in terms of systems rather than Cartesian minds, most, if not all of these confusions fall away. We can never know a Self, but we certainly can model, predict, and respond to stimuli within our environment. > - yet I have to delve on this more - and from this respect, > maybe Max Mores The Diachronic Self, come better for our rescue. > Further I would suggest that all these theories of the self are > complimentary and all of them, including yours give credence to > the identity capture feasibility. I think identity capture *does* make sense. So do many people on this list. It's easy for me because I don't have to wonder how you're going to capture the soul or unique essence of a person. You don't have to sell us on the idea. Note that I responded earlier saying that I think you're aiming in the right direction but falling short of the target. But I AM NOT aware of any technology at hand, other than possibly cryonic preservation, that has a reasonable chance of capturing the essential complexity of a human identity. That's why I asked you whether you really believed that this software that you are promoting is going to be "perfect" solution. - Jef From kerry_prez at yahoo.com Tue Nov 7 03:27:52 2006 From: kerry_prez at yahoo.com (Al Brooks) Date: Mon, 6 Nov 2006 19:27:52 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] An advance prediction for Tuesday In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <20061107032752.59745.qmail@web51601.mail.yahoo.com> Don't worry about it-- only autodidact futurists such as myself care about an unconscionable remark a washed-up (Kerry is now finished) politician makes. But here's a prediction for the 2008 election: even if a Democrat or Independent wins the executive branch that year, the other branches will remain conservative because the red states dominate the US; how many states are there that are not red? several n. eastern seaboard states (NY; NJ; MA; CT; VT; RI) and a few other states scattered around the country. Not too good. "Neil H." wrote: A tangential note: I guess my being in grad school tends to make me live in kind of a bubble -- I had no idea what this comment about Kerry was referring to until I looked it up just now. The particularly funny thing is that I live a half-mile from Pasadena City College (where Kerry made the comment), and pass by it every day on my way to lab. I didn't even realize until now that Kerry had been in town. Hmm. -- Neil --------------------------------- Access over 1 million songs - Yahoo! Music Unlimited. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From rhanson at gmu.edu Tue Nov 7 02:29:56 2006 From: rhanson at gmu.edu (Robin Hanson) Date: Mon, 06 Nov 2006 21:29:56 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] An advance prediction for Tuesday In-Reply-To: <454FEEFF.6070108@pobox.com> References: <454FCC5E.1070808@pobox.com> <0J8C006D94D29060@caduceus2.gmu.edu> <454FEEFF.6070108@pobox.com> Message-ID: <0J8C003UQ9LV4V00@caduceus1.gmu.edu> > > You have assigned no probability to your forecast. Betting markets > > now give a 20% chance to the Republicans keeping the House, so if > > you assign a higher probability you should expect to make money > > betting on your prediction. > >That's fair. Where would I put a quick bet on my prediction, legally? >(If you happen to know.) http://www.biz.uiowa.edu/iem/markets/ But there may not be time for you to get an account before the election is over. Robin Hanson rhanson at gmu.edu http://hanson.gmu.edu Associate Professor of Economics, George Mason University MSN 1D3, Carow Hall, Fairfax VA 22030-4444 703-993-2326 FAX: 703-993-2323 From hibbert at mydruthers.com Tue Nov 7 03:07:13 2006 From: hibbert at mydruthers.com (Chris Hibbert) Date: Mon, 06 Nov 2006 19:07:13 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] An advance prediction for Tuesday In-Reply-To: <454FEEFF.6070108@pobox.com> References: <454FCC5E.1070808@pobox.com> <0J8C006D94D29060@caduceus2.gmu.edu> <454FEEFF.6070108@pobox.com> Message-ID: <454FF861.9090109@mydruthers.com> > That's fair. Where would I put a quick bet on my prediction, legally? > (If you happen to know.) For play money, you could start at foresight exchange and trade as quick as you can set up an account, though the initial allowance is low. http://www.ideafutures.com/ And they have claims on who will control the senate, but not the house: http://www.ideafutures.com/fx-bin/Claim?claim=RSen06 For real money, quick isn't possible. The real-money betting sites all require deposits (by mail or bank transfer) before betting. The main sites are: Iowa Electronic Markets (IEM). Apparently legal; they have a no-action letter from the CFTC. You can deposit up to $500. http://www.biz.uiowa.edu/iem TradeSports, in Ireland, supports Americans betting on politics. They believe they are legal, but it's not possible to say so with confidence. The recent federal gambling law only explicitly applies to gambling on sports, but there are lots of other laws. https://www.tradesports.com/ Betfair is British or Irish, I think. They seem to have decided that their focus on sports makes them too attractive a target, and they're not currently accepting deposits from Americans. Unless you're an experienced gambler, their interface won't make any sense to you. (They use American-style gambling odds rather than percentages.) http://betfair.com Chris -- C. J. Cherryh, "Invader", on why we visit very old buildings: "A sense of age, of profound truths. Respect for something hands made, that's stood through storms and wars and time. It persuades us that things we do may last and matter." Chris Hibbert hibbert at mydruthers.com Blog: http://pancrit.org http://mydruthers.com From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Tue Nov 7 03:38:41 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Mon, 6 Nov 2006 22:38:41 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Its going to be a done deal soon Message-ID: I will not comment on the recent EY vs. RH discussion. I will claim the platform of "I don't know (now)" I will point out that it will be known about 24 hours from now. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From transhumanist at goldenfuture.net Tue Nov 7 03:39:32 2006 From: transhumanist at goldenfuture.net (Joseph Bloch) Date: Mon, 06 Nov 2006 22:39:32 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] An advance prediction for Tuesday In-Reply-To: <20061107032752.59745.qmail@web51601.mail.yahoo.com> References: <20061107032752.59745.qmail@web51601.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <454FFFF4.2000909@goldenfuture.net> For those who are interested in what the 2008 election might look like (according to the electoral college, not just a popular vote), take a gander here: http://www.surveyusa.com "on *Monday, 11/13/06*, SurveyUSA will release the results 60 presidential pairings, in 50 states. That?s 3,000 separate, exclusive, copyrighted statewide poll combinations ? results that handicap the 2008 presidential election with breathtaking, and sometimes unexpected, clarity, to a level of precision never before contemplated. Some head-to-head pairings produce Electoral landslides. Other pairings produce the closest Electoral College results since Reconstruction. But there is learning from every match-up. And this learning is indispensable if you have a stake in who will be the *44th President of the United States*." 6 days and counting... Joseph Al Brooks wrote: > Don't worry about it-- only autodidact futurists such as myself care > about an unconscionable remark a washed-up (Kerry is now finished) > politician makes. > But here's a prediction for the 2008 election: even if a Democrat or > Independent wins the executive branch that year, the other branches > will remain conservative because the red states dominate the US; how > many states are there that are not red? several n. eastern seaboard > states (NY; NJ; MA; CT; VT; RI) and a few other states scattered > around the country. Not too good. > > > */"Neil H." /* wrote: > > A tangential note: I guess my being in grad school tends to make me > live in kind of a bubble -- I had no idea what this comment about > Kerry was referring to until I looked it up just now. The particularly > funny thing is that I live a half-mile from Pasadena City College > (where Kerry made the comment), and pass by it every day on my way to > lab. I didn't even realize until now that Kerry had been in town. > > Hmm. > > -- Neil > > ------------------------------------------------------------------------ > Access over 1 million songs - Yahoo! Music Unlimited. > > > >------------------------------------------------------------------------ > >_______________________________________________ >extropy-chat mailing list >extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org >http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > > From msd001 at gmail.com Tue Nov 7 03:40:38 2006 From: msd001 at gmail.com (Mike Dougherty) Date: Mon, 6 Nov 2006 22:40:38 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Identity (was: Survival tangent) In-Reply-To: References: <20061102062735.57668.qmail@web52612.mail.yahoo.com> <015601c7010a$6a7d5d50$450a4e0c@MyComputer> <008101c701b4$37b35870$250b4e0c@MyComputer> <3C5E9884-5CD8-46CC-9841-28C6980CE600@randallsquared.com> <059a01c701f8$841e1670$bb0a4e0c@MyComputer> Message-ID: <62c14240611061940r77d39112xc174c827d9f4e795@mail.gmail.com> On 11/6/06, Heartland wrote: > almost certainly ignored it but I think you would benefit from > familiarizing > yourself with the topic before you start arguing about PI with other > people. > "arguing about pi" there's nothing to argue about, it's the ratio of the circumference to the diameter of a circle :) My wife's aunt is a physics teacher who often hosts thanksgiving dinner, so a few years ago I asked: What's the formula for determining thanksgiving dessert? Answer: 2(pi)r > 1 (She has no understanding of a "small slice" of pie, so I must request an arc of the whole measuring 22.5 degrees) -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jef at jefallbright.net Tue Nov 7 03:54:25 2006 From: jef at jefallbright.net (Jef Allbright) Date: Mon, 6 Nov 2006 19:54:25 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] I apologize for being snappish Message-ID: I want to publicly apologize for my overly critical tone in some of my most recent emails. I allowed my frustration over years of apparent lack of progress on some very old topics to cause me to be excessively and generally critical in response to individuals who are in no way responsible for the weight of my frustration. I'll try to tone it down now. - Jef -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From kerry_prez at yahoo.com Tue Nov 7 03:57:31 2006 From: kerry_prez at yahoo.com (Al Brooks) Date: Mon, 6 Nov 2006 19:57:31 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] [private message] speaking of electoral college In-Reply-To: <454FFFF4.2000909@goldenfuture.net> Message-ID: <20061107035731.10776.qmail@web51615.mail.yahoo.com> Bush as you know didn't steal the election in 2000, the rules on a tie allow for an election to be settled in court. My commie friends say "but that's so subjective"; of course it is-- that's what politics is mostly, the whims of the electorate the moment they are in the voting booths; then they change a little by the next election until after many generations the situation does substantially change. You're old enough to remember the '80s, right? Things have changed little since then. Joseph Bloch wrote: For those who are interested in what the 2008 election might look like (according to the electoral college, not just a popular vote), take a gander here --------------------------------- Sponsored Link Free Uniden 5.8GHz Phone System with Packet8 Internet Phone Service -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From austriaaugust at yahoo.com Tue Nov 7 03:32:37 2006 From: austriaaugust at yahoo.com (A B) Date: Mon, 6 Nov 2006 19:32:37 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] here's how complicated it is In-Reply-To: <6A1AAFF4-6433-4118-B3F0-8EEB0A9D81EF@mac.com> Message-ID: <20061107033237.14537.qmail@web37405.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Hi Samantha, Samantha writes: ..."No, I don't think so. I went through a "good" public school system that had nearly nothing for me. It was geared to some average, more numerous students' needs. I am not even at the stratospheric top of the intelligence chart. I knew more than a few really bright kids who dropped out out of boredom, frustration, feeling utterly alien to the entire scene and most of their "peers". A minority of them managed to release their brilliance into world to some (but I can't help believe diminished) degree regardless. Many of the withered or became very misshapen long before they even discovered what their capabilities were. By the time you can label the "extremely capable" in a non-mundane environment where their capabilities get noticed you have begged the question. Much potential is wasted before it can ever get to such an environment." I couldn't agree more. The current American public school system is a monumental disaster of epic proportions. Having graduated from a typical high school not too long ago, I can admit that my "hard time" in that prison nearly managed to sap the very last ounce of my intellectual curiosity. Frankly, it's remarkable that I have retained *any* scholarly interest whatsoever. I definitely don't think I'm a genius, but I have no doubt that I could have achieved far more by this time, if I had not been driven to levels of near-hatred for the various subjects being "taught" (read: "forced on me"). I'm not saying that public education in general is a bad thing. I do believe it's important. But our system needs *major* changes at the fundamental level. We need to start experimenting *now* with wreckless abandon - I don't think it could possibly get much worse than it currently is. Best Wishes, Jeffrey Herrlich Samantha Atkins wrote: On Nov 5, 2006, at 10:56 AM, Lee Corbin wrote: > Mike writes > >> On 11/5/06, Lee Corbin wrote: > >>> Here is my solution: segregation. Segregation today, >>> segregation tomorrow, and segregation forever. >>> Right now in California, everyone needs segregating: >>> because the white kids can't keep up with the Asians, >>> and many of them conclude that math, English, and >>> science are for smart kids, not them. As the whites can't >>> keep up with the Asians, the Hispanics can't keep up >>> with the whites, and the blacks can't keep up with the >>> hispanics, so we ought to go back to... yes, segregation. >> >> Why does it have to be racist and sexist? Why can't we >> 'segregate' (to use your negatively overloaded term) along >> dimension of performance capability? > > Oh, I agree. I was being a bit flippant, but as Robert has > just said, there is a point at least insofar as gender is concerned. > As for racial segregation, it really isn't practical anymore. For > one thing, it would just be politically (and probably socially) > impossible. For another, unlike the case of sex (gender), there > are a lot of people who are intermediary between races. And > you know what problems that would create! Guess again on gender being completely binary. > >> There ARE white kids who are smarter than the "average" >> asian, so why hold them to a lower standard due to genetics? > > Of course. But the point is that kids in schools can tend to > identify their capabilities in terms of everyone around them. > Not all kids to be sure. The extremely capable will be fine > no matter what. > No, I don't think so. I went through a "good" public school system that had nearly nothing for me. It was geared to some average, more numerous students' needs. I am not even at the stratospheric top of the intelligence chart. I knew more than a few really bright kids who dropped out out of boredom, frustration, feeling utterly alien to the entire scene and most of their "peers". A minority of them managed to release their brilliance into world to some (but I can't help believe diminished) degree regardless. Many of the withered or became very misshapen long before they even discovered what their capabilities were. By the time you can label the "extremely capable" in a non-mundane environment where their capabilities get noticed you have begged the question. Much potential is wasted before it can ever get to such an environment. - samantha - samantha _______________________________________________ extropy-chat mailing list extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat --------------------------------- Sponsored Link For just $24.99/mo., Vonage offers unlimited local and long- distance calling. Sign up now. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From brian at posthuman.com Tue Nov 7 03:48:10 2006 From: brian at posthuman.com (Brian Atkins) Date: Mon, 06 Nov 2006 21:48:10 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] An advance prediction for Tuesday In-Reply-To: <454FF861.9090109@mydruthers.com> References: <454FCC5E.1070808@pobox.com> <0J8C006D94D29060@caduceus2.gmu.edu> <454FEEFF.6070108@pobox.com> <454FF861.9090109@mydruthers.com> Message-ID: <455001FA.3090108@posthuman.com> Chris Hibbert wrote: > > For real money, quick isn't possible. The real-money betting sites all > require deposits (by mail or bank transfer) before betting. > > The main sites are: > > TradeSports, in Ireland, supports Americans betting on politics. They > believe they are legal, but it's not possible to say so with confidence. > The recent federal gambling law only explicitly applies to gambling on > sports, but there are lots of other laws. > https://www.tradesports.com/ > I was just looking at this site and they say you can do instant deposits with a credit card. But I don't have an account with them or have any experience with so YMMV. -- Brian Atkins Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence http://www.singinst.org/ From brian at posthuman.com Tue Nov 7 03:46:20 2006 From: brian at posthuman.com (Brian Atkins) Date: Mon, 06 Nov 2006 21:46:20 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] An advance prediction for Tuesday In-Reply-To: <454FEEFF.6070108@pobox.com> References: <454FCC5E.1070808@pobox.com> <0J8C006D94D29060@caduceus2.gmu.edu> <454FEEFF.6070108@pobox.com> Message-ID: <4550018C.7050409@posthuman.com> tradesports.com is also running an active GOP Senate control item in their Politics section. This is based in the UK. -- Brian Atkins Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence http://www.singinst.org/ From brian at posthuman.com Tue Nov 7 03:49:23 2006 From: brian at posthuman.com (Brian Atkins) Date: Mon, 06 Nov 2006 21:49:23 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] An advance prediction for Tuesday In-Reply-To: <454FEEFF.6070108@pobox.com> References: <454FCC5E.1070808@pobox.com> <0J8C006D94D29060@caduceus2.gmu.edu> <454FEEFF.6070108@pobox.com> Message-ID: <45500243.8050609@posthuman.com> I forgot your claim was regarding the House not Senate. Tradesports also has a House bet still active. -- Brian Atkins Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence http://www.singinst.org/ From ken at javien.com Tue Nov 7 03:26:11 2006 From: ken at javien.com (Ken Kittlitz) Date: Mon, 06 Nov 2006 20:26:11 -0700 Subject: [extropy-chat] An advance prediction for Tuesday In-Reply-To: <454FEEFF.6070108@pobox.com> References: <0J8C006D94D29060@caduceus2.gmu.edu> <454FCC5E.1070808@pobox.com> <0J8C006D94D29060@caduceus2.gmu.edu> Message-ID: <4.3.2.7.2.20061106201906.041d9870@127.0.0.1> At 06:27 PM 11/6/2006 -0800, Eliezer S. Yudkowsky wrote: >Robin Hanson wrote: > > > > You have assigned no probability to your forecast. Betting markets > > now give a 20% chance to the Republicans keeping the House, so if > > you assign a higher probability you should expect to make money > > betting on your prediction. > >That's fair. Where would I put a quick bet on my prediction, legally? >(If you happen to know.) If you'll settle for reputation karma rather than real money, you can try the Washington Stock Exchange: Disclaimer: I'm a co-founder. --- Ken Kittlitz http://www.javien.com From kerry_prez at yahoo.com Tue Nov 7 04:35:29 2006 From: kerry_prez at yahoo.com (Al Brooks) Date: Mon, 6 Nov 2006 20:35:29 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] here's how complicated it is In-Reply-To: <20061107033237.14537.qmail@web37405.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <20061107043529.89402.qmail@web51605.mail.yahoo.com> What makes it even sadder is educators mean well but they can't comprehend how a system that might work well for tractor parts and deep frying vats at fast food franchises doesn't work well for education. You install a new clutch on a tractor and it works fine. Install students in a motley classroom, with disruptive behavior not uncommon, and you cannot expect uniformly favorable results. I talked with an old man who taught school in the 1940s and was very enthusiastic about education-- didn't have the heart to tell him today isn't 1949, what worked when Truman was president doesn't necessarily work now. ____________________________________________________________________________________ Sponsored Link Free Uniden 5.8GHz Phone System with Packet8 Internet Phone Service http://www.getpacket8.net/yahoo2 From lcorbin at rawbw.com Tue Nov 7 04:50:04 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Mon, 6 Nov 2006 20:50:04 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Identity (was: Survival tangent) References: <20061102062735.57668.qmail@web52612.mail.yahoo.com><015601c7010a$6a7d5d50$450a4e0c@MyComputer> <06c701c70128$57f91610$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: <07b901c70228$4cf94360$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Randall writes >> But I say that these [very low order pain & fright reactions] >> are only "lower-order" aspects of one, >> and are not representative of who I truly am. If the scenario >> becomes less graphic, [no tiger bounding into the room or >> no Nurse Ratchet with a big needle] and one of [Lee's >> duplicates or the Lee original] must press a button >> and be disintegrated, then all of us would be indifferent as to >> who did so. If the button were in the room, we'd all reach >> for it, with the understanding that the last 999,999 would >> not be disintegrated. No instance would actually care a >> whit. > > Whereas all million units of Randall (using the below exchange > as my guide) would be trying to figure out how to avoid button > pressing at all. By hypothesis, one would be selected at random and perish, as of course you understand. >>> If you don't agree that the runtime lost would indeed be >>> infinitesimal, >> >> But it's not infinitesimal: it's one whole unit of John Clark or >> Lee Corbin. > > If you're willing to use this argument, then everything I would > say can be rephrased as "unit" rather than "person", and my own > concern is that this particular unit of Randall Randall continue. Slawomir and you agree with at least one other poster whose name I've temporarily forgotten: you value the instance rather than the pattern. But you do have to contend, I still think, with all sorts of crafty experiments drawn up by John Clark and those like us. True, Randall, I have seen you try to rebut these. But look at John Clark's posts just now; they clearly do away with your instance, but it's still clear that you survive by any normal meaning of words. > I'm not sure that this terminology change actually adds anything, > however. "Unit" (which I just used) is the same as the more common "instance". It does clarify. It states what you and the people who agree with you would do in certain thought experiments. Lee From lcorbin at rawbw.com Tue Nov 7 05:06:40 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Mon, 6 Nov 2006 21:06:40 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Identity (was: Survival tangent) References: <20061102062735.57668.qmail@web52612.mail.yahoo.com><015601c7010a$6a7d5d50$450a4e0c@MyComputer><008101c701b4$37b35870$250b4e0c@MyComputer><3C5E9884-5CD8-46CC-9841-28C6980CE600@randallsquared.com> <059a01c701f8$841e1670$bb0a4e0c@MyComputer> Message-ID: <07e501c7022a$d2c1d9b0$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> John, getting really acerbic, writes > 2) This random number stuff, as near as I can tell, was designed to counter > the runtime theory, a theory NOT proposed by me, therefore I felt no great > need to defend it. Personally I can't see why running the same program a > million trillion billion times is much better than running it just once. So if it's true that there is an extremely similar (only a trillion or so atoms different with slightly different pattern) copy of you running on a planet of Alpha Centauri, it's okay if it or you die? Surely you demur. Okay, so it's only 3 atoms different, and the difference in pattern is also incredibly tiny. This is in effect running the same program twice, once here and once at Alpha Centauri. You don't think that it benefits your pattern to have both instances continue? And if there is, a billion years from now, a certain-to-execute EXACTLY identical copy of you that leads 10^10^145 light years from here an EXACTLY similarly life, then it's okay for you here, now, to die? After all, your words: "I can't see why running a program [twice] is better than running it once." You're sure now? Lee From lcorbin at rawbw.com Tue Nov 7 05:16:22 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Mon, 6 Nov 2006 21:16:22 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] all that concerns me is the future of education References: <20061105001850.59776.qmail@web51603.mail.yahoo.com><062801c70091$02bb8490$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677><62c14240611050926l6a87c935p582c1dfe61c34f81@mail.gmail.com><06f401c7012c$ffbfb0d0$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <62c14240611061549l10bf33d1r6668cb4dd9686b87@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <07f601c7022c$1a525b50$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Mike writes > ----- Original Message ----- > From: Mike Dougherty > Sent: Monday, November 06, 2006 3:49 PM > On 11/5/06, Lee Corbin wrote: > > > Let's be open, frank, and honest, and---naturally--- > > write as clearly as we can about our conjectures. > > I think you clarified your position in another post to > someone else. I remember thinking, "Ok, I WAS > misunderstanding Lee." Thanks for responding to > my last post on this topic though... You're very welcome. > Do you think "we" (ExI-members) are an exclusive bunch? > Do you think there is reason to be so? Yes to both. But only "exclusive" in that most people are either bored by these subjects or don't have the technical background for them or are too dumb to grapple with them. But everyone is free to come and contribute, of course, and hopefully they will---like I have---learn something from it. > I feel I am still on a probation of sorts with regard to posting here. Really? I can't fathom why. > I'm not really sure what the list mission is (vs. CSS-d for example) > becuase the point is intentionally more broad-brush. CSS-d? What's that? See---I may get to learn something already from you. > I do enjoy socializing with the smart(er) kids because I so rarely > get to do so in my day-to-day life. :) You're probably too modest. In any case, I would expect that every time one joins a new list, it takes a while to get "up to speed" with the ideas being focused on by the old-timers. The fact that I haven't time to get on others lists, and undergo a utterly different new learning experience, is only sad for me. Lee From lcorbin at rawbw.com Tue Nov 7 05:34:31 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Mon, 6 Nov 2006 21:34:31 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] here's how complicated it is References: <20061107033237.14537.qmail@web37405.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <083e01c7022e$a2bc2960$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Jeffrey writes---there are several equally good narratives I could could enquire further about, but his is handy--- > Having graduated from a typical high school not too long ago, I can > admit that my "hard time" in that prison nearly managed to sap the > very last ounce of my intellectual curiosity. Frankly, it's remarkable > that I have retained *any* scholarly interest whatsoever. I definitely > don't think I'm a genius, but I have no doubt that I could have > achieved far more by this time, if I had not been driven to levels > of near-hatred for the various subjects being "taught" (read: "forced on me"). What sort of ideal situation do you have in mind? Would you enjoy the way they teach in Russia or Japan (the results there are pretty impressive in many ways). Again, I fear we have the usual phenomenon when idealists speak up. They compare the real against the ideal, and--- guess what?---the real always falls short of their imaginings. Where in the world, or in what historical epoch, do you think that things would have been better for you? Here I am taking a *realist* approach: don't compare the real against a nebulously imagined ideal, but compare the real to any other real anywhere or at any time. > I'm not saying that public education in general is a bad thing. > I do believe it's important. But our system needs *major* > changes at the fundamental level. We need to start experimenting > *now* with wreckless abandon - I don't think it could possibly > get much worse than it currently is. Couldn't get worse than it is? Now *I'm* the idealist. I can easily imagine it being much worse. But I'm mainly a realist still: you think that almost all education in history wasn't much much worse? Well, think again. It was. And it's worse throughout most of the world too (some very significant and interesting countries excepted). Lee P.S. to all the rest of you idealists. Just tell me anything real where education was or is so much better than here, or in the west generally. We should do it here like it was done where? Or by whom? From kerry_prez at yahoo.com Tue Nov 7 05:57:40 2006 From: kerry_prez at yahoo.com (Al Brooks) Date: Mon, 6 Nov 2006 21:57:40 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] here's how complicated it is In-Reply-To: <083e01c7022e$a2bc2960$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: <20061107055740.14028.qmail@web51605.mail.yahoo.com> Having a weak stomach, hearing about metal detectors in schools makes me queasy. So let's say in the decade of the '20s metal detectors might not work anymore because students are bringing new plastic weapons into school. Not to be alarmist, the situation may very well stabilize or improve during the next decade; yet given how we wait until a situation gets really gnarly, perhaps bad schools in bad neighborhoods-- do good schools exist in bad neighborhoods?-- will assume SF proportions. > Couldn't get worse than it is? Now *I'm* the > idealist. I can > easily imagine it being much worse. But I'm mainly > a realist > still: you think that almost all education in > history wasn't much > much worse? Well, think again. It was. And it's > worse throughout > most of the world too (some very significant and > interesting countries > excepted). > > Lee > > P.S. to all the rest of you idealists. Just tell me > anything real where > education was or is so much better than here, or in > the west generally. > We should do it here like it was done where? Or by > whom? > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > ____________________________________________________________________________________ Sponsored Link Mortgage rates near historic lows: $150,000 loan as low as $579/mo. Intro-*Terms https://www2.nextag.com/ From lcorbin at rawbw.com Tue Nov 7 05:57:27 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Mon, 6 Nov 2006 21:57:27 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Detectives and red herrings (was Survival tangent) References: <20061102082308.30427.qmail@web37204.mail.mud.yahoo.com><8d71341e0611031444w6b27e817o85cd287a58458c2c@mail.gmail.com> <057501c6ffdf$33394920$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: <087401c70231$b31d8da0$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Slawomir wrote ----- Original Message ----- From: "Heartland" To: "Lee Corbin" ; "ExI chat list" Sent: Sunday, November 05, 2006 7:34 PM > At this meta-level the philosophers of personal identity implicitly or explicitly > answer this single fundamental question: "What defines a person?" > > Philosophers searching for the essence of what a person really is follow the > reductive process that initially goes something like this: > > Things->Body->Brain > > But then, someone like Lee Corbin comes along and claims this is not enough and > extends the process: > > Things->Body->Brain->Pattern->VBMs > > But then, Jef Allbright comes along and says this is not enough/correct and decides > to extend this process further still until it looks like this: > > Things->Body->Brain->Pattern->VBMs->Agency Mind you, apparently Jef is still working on his statement, which a number of us are eager to hear, unless I missed it. > Meanwhile, I look at both of these reductive processes and can't help but comment: > "You've already missed a crucial exit and are heading for an inevitable dead end." > Here's my version of the reductive process: > > Things->Body->Brain->Mind->Process->Presence > > At this moment you, dear reader, are probably asking yourself: "What the hell is > Presence?" Well, the short version is that it's an "instance of awareness, > perception, sensation, etc". I might provide more details if there's enough > demand. I know from experience that these ideas are quite hard to > convey since it requires the reader that he think in 4-D *and* abandon the habit of > thinking that Person=VMBs, among other things. The most important thing to realize > is that Presence supervenes on the physical. I want to make sure this is clear > right from the start to counter knee-jerk accusations of promoting existence of > "souls". There are no souls, okay? (That goes especially for you, John K Clark.) I'm sorry to say so, but I am wary of investing time in a new abstract theory about all this. The right road is to undertake simple thought experiments. This is because real philosophy is *prescriptive*. It should tell us what to do. The elaborate theories, in my opinion, come later, are merely descriptive, and are of secondary importance. Are you sure that you are satisfied with your answers to some of our scenarios? I had the feeling---probably wrong since there have been so many emails---that we didn't get to the bottom of the scenarios involving you being replaced by a copy in the middle of the night on each night for the preceding three years. Now, accepting that this is the case---we have videotape proof that this has been going on---you then go to bed tonight with great, great trepidation? I guess you do, because by your lights you are about to die. But guess what: tomorrow you wake up after all---(or, that is, your copy does). But this goes on day in and day out, day in and day out, week after week, month after month, and year after year. Very soon you do *not* go to bed each night scared to death that you're going to die. You find that you have other problems in life. The whole being-copied thing (despite the video proof) comes to feel a bit academic. Eventually you'd be willing to have an extra replacement occur in an afternoon nap, in exchange for say, $100,000, money that you might need to have an important medical operation performed a few weeks hence, or to save a cousin's life. Your intuition would soon change, and even these video-taped records of you being replaced each night by a duplicate would fade into a kind of irrelevancy. When you thought about what happened yesterday, your intuition would scream at you "THAT HAPPENED TO *ME*, NOT TO SOMEONE ELSE". You would not be able resist this intuition for long. The end result is that you'd become a patternist. Lee From pj at pj-manney.com Tue Nov 7 06:18:43 2006 From: pj at pj-manney.com (pjmanney) Date: Tue, 07 Nov 2006 01:18:43 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] here's how complicated it is Message-ID: <12174561.407491162880323993.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> Lee Corbin wrote: >Again, I fear we have the usual phenomenon when idealists >speak up. They compare the real against the ideal, and--- >guess what?---the real always falls short of their imaginings. Lee, are you tarring everyone with the idealist's brush? Boy, and here I thought I had made a case for 1) "School" is for "schooling" the masses -- get what you need and get the rest of your education elsewhere and 2) Maybe the problem is not within the institution, but within ourselves... But it would be nice to allow people to vent their experiences and traumas as well. And if you can't do it on a list like this, where could you? Like the high-IQ societies I researched, I would guess most of us felt misunderstood by family and/or peers through most of our childhoods. And maybe still do now. If not, then you were damned lucky. But I don't disagree with you. Education everywhere is fraught with problems. And we're not the majority. We're a tiny, tiny minority. I had an education vent on my blog when I was recuperating from the back thing. With two kids in the CA public system, you just can't help it sometimes. I just re-read it and it's not my best work to date, that's for sure. And I can't even blame the Hillbilly Heroin -- I was off it! But it does cover some of the issues we're covering. It's called "Son of Sunrise Semester." Did anybody on the list watch that as a kid? I'd love to know how it affected you if you did. http://pj-manney.blogspot.com/ Respectfully, PJ From lcorbin at rawbw.com Tue Nov 7 06:19:47 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Mon, 6 Nov 2006 22:19:47 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] it's all understandable, except References: <14545876.369241162848958726.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> Message-ID: <08a701c70235$101089b0$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Pjmanney writes > Please let me preface this to say that I happen to fall in the Gould/Postman > camp that believes IQ is a bogus measure of intelligence. Among psychometricians, those of Gould's opinions are a tiny minority. Read Pinker's "The Blank Slate" for a completely unbiased analysis. But read Jensen, or Richard Lynn, or several other books I could recommend if you want the tables, charts, and rigorous stats. I especially recommend the reviews of Jensen's book "The g-Factor" on Amazon, if you don't want to plow through the statistics yourself. Read through the reviews over and over until they cease to shock you. And the correlation with other abilities really isn't disputable any longer. > So whether IQ is going up or down (i.e. the Flynn effect) is largely irrelevent. > To me, what is relevant is how the supposedly intelligent are applying their > intelligence and are adapting to a changing world. And as always, some > people rise to the occasion and others don't, regardless of their supposed IQ > scores or talents or the success or failure of their own parents... Quite so. But you really cannot get away from this truth: people with IQs less than 110 or 120 can very, very seldom handle any kind of cognitively demanding work at all well. > "The Outsiders," is considered a classic analysis into the world of ultra-high IQ. > > http://www.prometheussociety.org/articles/Outsiders.html > > In it, he describes the work of Lewis Terman, who demonstrated the behavioral > thresholds between levels of tested intelligence and the sad fact that after certain > IQ thresholds are past -- in the case of this work, an IQ of 170 -- the odds of > "success" as defined as using one's IQ in your life/work that benefits both the > person and/or society and brings self-satisfaction, are few. Frankly, the number > of ultra-high IQ people who burn out is amazing. I witnessed a number myself. First point: IQs above 170 are so rare that nothing that is true about them matters. Second point: is it really true (not that it matters, really) that there is a *greater* chance of burnout if your IQ is above 170 than if it is above 150? Failure to reach potential, and washing up one way or another, happens in every statum. That is, is the *probability* really greater for stratospheric IQs? > So maybe "School" wasn't the culprit. Maybe these kids had other > issues that led to their "failure to perform." I suspect that that's mostly the case. > And let's not forgot other psychological issues. Substance abuse, > depression, bi-polar, schizophrenia, etc. I've know a few who fell > off the supposed IQ ramp because of these. And I'm sure those > with more acute autistic spectrum disorders have a hard time, too. Absolutely. > I know the social aspects of primary and secondary school probably > sucked for most of us. Really smart people often don't function well > with people who don't understand what we're talking about. RIGHT YOU ARE! This is a very important point. Dean Keith Simonton in his book "Greatness" explains that it is seldom that people who are about 20 IQ points lower than you are can even understand you. He uses this idea very convincingly to explain why British PMs are smarter on average than U.S. presidents. The former need to impress other MPs, the latter only to impress the average American voter. Lee > It is not a public (or private) school's job to create a functional, > well-honed mind. It is the job of the parents and the child. Both > have to want it. If you have the mind and mental health to succeed, > school only 'kills' if you let it. From lcorbin at rawbw.com Tue Nov 7 06:33:08 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Mon, 6 Nov 2006 22:33:08 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] it's all understandable, except References: <20061105203158.GJ6974@leitl.org><077d01c70195$28852dc0$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <20061106132548.GW6974@leitl.org> Message-ID: <08ad01c70236$c111fea0$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Eugen writes first about education. In another post I'll reply to his remarks concerning how totally Doomed we are. > Genes are meaningless, if you're looking at poorly socialized kids > with a migrant background entering the school system, which is already > contaminated with a couple of decades of similiar toxic problems. > Teaching is traditionally a well-paid high-prestige job in Germany, > but the schools have gotten so bad it's hard to find new personnel, > especially in hard sciences. I have to take your word for it in the case of Germany. Very interesting. Perhaps others will comment. But bad in what way? Compared to German schools of the 80s? Of the 50s? Just how have they deteriorated. Dropping standards to accomodate immigrants? > For genes to wield their full potential you need a stable, supportive > environment even pre-birth, and an educational system which challenges > each kid individually. Ah, another idealist off in dream-land. Please, stick to what is feasible. > The genes have remained basically the same, Yes the genes have stayed the same. But the skills that are needed have not. We don't need manual laborers so much anymore. >> And furthermore, contrary to what Eugen states, the limiting factor >> *is* what is between the ears. Researchers on intelligence admit, > > Correct, but irrelevant. The bottlenecks are elsewhere. As long as > the environment is the same no amount of perfect genes will matter. > You don't need perfect genes to be a highly productive individual. > Yes, for some things you need genius, but only in trace amounts. Right. I'm not talking IQ 150 and above. There are so few of them anyway. And they're very idiosyncratic to boot. I'm talking about the great dearth of people between 120 and 150 that are in such short supply. Only 1 person in 20 is as smart as George Bush (IQ about 125 or so). And you can dream-up all the ideal schools you want, and you aren't going to change this. Only GE or eugenics can change this. If in the 1870s the west had listened to Francis Galton instead of Karl Marx, the west wouldn't be in the predicament it's in. Lee From kerry_prez at yahoo.com Tue Nov 7 06:49:15 2006 From: kerry_prez at yahoo.com (Al Brooks) Date: Mon, 6 Nov 2006 22:49:15 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] here's how complicated it is In-Reply-To: <12174561.407491162880323993.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> Message-ID: <20061107064915.1037.qmail@web51603.mail.yahoo.com> Sure it's within ourselves-- but when ten year olds bring weapons to numerous schools you might tend to wonder: 'are there specific systemic problems that need remedies from those authorized to make changes in the school system? ' >[...] 2) Maybe the problem is not within the > institution, but within ourselves... > Respectfully, > PJ ____________________________________________________________________________________ Sponsored Link For just $24.99/mo., Vonage offers unlimited local and long- distance calling. Sign up now. http://www.vonage.com/startsavingnow/ From jef at jefallbright.net Tue Nov 7 06:51:52 2006 From: jef at jefallbright.net (Jef Allbright) Date: Mon, 6 Nov 2006 22:51:52 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Detectives and red herrings (was Survivaltangent) In-Reply-To: <087401c70231$b31d8da0$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: Lee wrote: > Slawomir wrote > > Things->Body->Brain > > > > But then, someone like Lee Corbin comes along and claims > this is not > > enough and extends the process: > > > > Things->Body->Brain->Pattern->VBMs > > > > But then, Jef Allbright comes along and says this is not > > enough/correct and decides to extend this process further > still until it looks like this: > > > > Things->Body->Brain->Pattern->VBMs->Agency I feel silly even considering such a precarious ontology, let alone refuting it. Slawomir, it's the category error again. I said nothing about *synchronic* personal identity, namely how we determine a unique person. I did propose a theory based on agency providing a more coherent and encompassing understanding of *diachronic* personal identity, namely how we determine that two separate observations are of the same person. As I said earlier, it is ironic that people glibly refer to Max's thesis while demonstrating lack of understanding of this key title word. > > Mind you, apparently Jef is still working on his statement, > which a number of us are eager to hear, unless I missed it. Lee, I sent it to the list Sunday afternoon. Looking forward to your comments. - Jef From femmechakra at yahoo.ca Tue Nov 7 05:57:27 2006 From: femmechakra at yahoo.ca (Anna Taylor) Date: Tue, 7 Nov 2006 00:57:27 -0500 (EST) Subject: [extropy-chat] A Diversity Re: Just curious, it's not natural! Message-ID: <20061107055728.71135.qmail@web37213.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Al Brooks wrote: >Homosexuals want the right of making serious medical >decisions (as Terry Schiavo's husband had in her >case); they want full inheritance rights; >etc. They want, in short, complete marital parity with >straights. Why shouldn't they get them? I didn't object to the legal rights of homosexuals as much as I wouldn't object against a transgender that lives with a guy or a girl for 10 years. Nobody can argue that any coupling generates better spending habits, shared responsibilities as well as an easier lifestyle. >But 86 percent of Americans believe in a God, >and from everything I've seen the religious still >dominate society. So by saying, "great, i'm smarter, i know better, i have an IQ of this, my opinion is better, it's more logical", it won't change a damn thing. Until you are able to reach a majority, you can't accomplish anything. Choosing to ignore or criticize a behavior is not going to make it any wiser. Finding relevant associations within a pattern will generate the best answer. What I am arguing is the relevant factor between the word "marriage" and a male/female relationship. Don't you associate the word "marriage" with procreation? I do and until a transgender can give birth, I, as a heterosexual female, have every right to decide that I don't want that word changed. This is from a historical point of view. Can X+X create Y? No. X+Y=Y+X. Everything else under is simply formality. With future technology, my opinion might change. When a trangender gives birth then I could see how the equation would change. >In the back of my mind I always-- every day-- think of >what Richard Brookhiser wrote, "...the intrusion of >previous eras into their successors... our notions of >warfare and masculinity were shaped by the era of >hunting and gathering". The definitions of masculinity and femininity change all the time. Not all masculinity was shaped by the era of hunting and gathering. Many sorts of different male figures lived that bared no comparison to the hunting and gathering age. Bill K: * What is the real work to be done on this planet?...It's to make ourselves more aware, to remind ourselves that our essential nature is nonviolent, and to increase the amount of compassion and cooperation on the planet. * Fear is a belief in your inadequacy to deal with something. * A limit can be either a frontier or a boundary. * Because your existence in time and space is unique, there are lives that only you can touch. * Don't let what you are being get in the way of what you might become. * What a fabulous moment, to realize that no word or thought can truly describe you. Ofcourse, in a "Unique" sense. I would call this poetry. Olga Bourlin wrote: Al Brooks wrote: >But 86 percent of Americans believe in a God, >and from everything I've seen the religious still >dominate society. >>Yes, sad ... ain't it? Why sad? Do you have a better solution? Do you think science will spontaneously explode and people will suddenly just believe in cryonics? No preaching, no believing, no memes, no memories..poof, science prevails? I find that highly unlikely. How do you propose to explain to the population that regards religion in such a high esteem that " yes, sad..ain't it, that your not as smart as me, I know better,", how is that explaining anything but looking for a contradiction? >Agreed. We could arrive at an expression such >as "gayiage" in the place of marriage. It would make >sense on grounds of diversity as well-- a diversity >of terminology. I don't think it would be my right to name their "Union". I'm not in that circumstance. Ben wrote: >>>Are you sure you mean what you say here? You >>>actually feel that somebody's use of a word in a >>>way that you disagree with, is a violation of your >>>rights? Yes I do. I'm assuming then that you can tell me what your thoughts are regarding the word "marriage". Is it just a word without any symbols or associations? It doesn't bother you in the least that a "Union" can represent transgender marriage, gay marriage, lesbian marriage, heterosexual marriage, whatever goes..as long as the legal ramifications remain the same? Throughout history, did the word "marriage" ever refer to 2 men or 2 women? If you want to create evolution don't use names that have been around for 2000 years and try to change, use the word "Singularity" to create something different. Spike wrote: >I know of an example of this, two XYs, both >anatomically ambiguous, one raised male, the other >raised female, the state of Oregon asked no questions. Your point being? Samantha wrote: >Says who? The Law? The law is a matter of societal >convention. The law once said that no female could >vote and that slavery was ok. >That did not make it right. Actually, it is my right "now" to say that I can vote. My point was that "procreation", the last I heard is still a woman's choice. My definition of procreation is the choice that I and my partner, (who are both heterosexual) have chosen to engage in a partnership based on love, respect, honesty and have chosen to procreate to keep my meme, belief and memories alive. Are you saying that this is not associated with the word "marriage"? Samantha wrote: >Because you have no such right. You have no right to >decide the word marriage is only for people like >yourself and not others. and what "right" do they have to decide that it has numerous definitions? >Why should you have any such right? What makes you >think you do? and what makes it ok to think that "they" do? Just curious Anna:) ?Learn from yesterday, live for today, hope for tomorrow. The important thing is not to stop questioning.? Albert Einstein __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com From austriaaugust at yahoo.com Tue Nov 7 06:44:09 2006 From: austriaaugust at yahoo.com (A B) Date: Mon, 6 Nov 2006 22:44:09 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] here's how complicated it is In-Reply-To: <083e01c7022e$a2bc2960$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: <20061107064409.47192.qmail@web37411.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Hi Lee, First of all, I'll 'fess up to being an idealist. :-) Under unremarkable circumstances I would probably choose to lean closer to being a hybrid idealist-realist. ;-) But when a Singularity may be in the wings, I feel compelled to fully and openly express my ideals because it is not impossible that some of them may be independently duplicated or at least approximated at some point in the future. And I admit to exaggerating when I wrote: "We need to start experimenting > *now* with wreckless abandon - I don't think it could possibly > get much worse than it currently is." You are correct. It could obviously become much worse ... ranging to non-existent. I was mostly just trying to emphasize the desperate need to improve the situation which you can be sure is very, very far from "ideal". ;-) Perhaps, one of the first changes could be an optional specialization program beginning around 7th grade or so, where a student can choose to focus on a specific "strand" of study (eg. science, engineering, arts, writing, etc. - depending on their interests) that would comprise most of the classroom time. If I'm not mistaken, Australia already uses a mild version of this program. Another large target is the excessive and tedious "busy work" that all to many teachers seem to rely upon. Best Wishes, Jeffrey Herrlich P.S. I do realize that there *are* caring and hard-working teachers and administrators here in America, and I'm grateful for their efforts. Lee Corbin wrote: Jeffrey writes---there are several equally good narratives I could could enquire further about, but his is handy--- > Having graduated from a typical high school not too long ago, I can > admit that my "hard time" in that prison nearly managed to sap the > very last ounce of my intellectual curiosity. Frankly, it's remarkable > that I have retained *any* scholarly interest whatsoever. I definitely > don't think I'm a genius, but I have no doubt that I could have > achieved far more by this time, if I had not been driven to levels > of near-hatred for the various subjects being "taught" (read: "forced on me"). What sort of ideal situation do you have in mind? Would you enjoy the way they teach in Russia or Japan (the results there are pretty impressive in many ways). Again, I fear we have the usual phenomenon when idealists speak up. They compare the real against the ideal, and--- guess what?---the real always falls short of their imaginings. Where in the world, or in what historical epoch, do you think that things would have been better for you? Here I am taking a *realist* approach: don't compare the real against a nebulously imagined ideal, but compare the real to any other real anywhere or at any time. > I'm not saying that public education in general is a bad thing. > I do believe it's important. But our system needs *major* > changes at the fundamental level. We need to start experimenting > *now* with wreckless abandon - I don't think it could possibly > get much worse than it currently is. Couldn't get worse than it is? Now *I'm* the idealist. I can easily imagine it being much worse. But I'm mainly a realist still: you think that almost all education in history wasn't much much worse? Well, think again. It was. And it's worse throughout most of the world too (some very significant and interesting countries excepted). Lee P.S. to all the rest of you idealists. Just tell me anything real where education was or is so much better than here, or in the west generally. We should do it here like it was done where? Or by whom? _______________________________________________ extropy-chat mailing list extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat --------------------------------- Sponsored Link Free Uniden 5.8GHz Phone System with Packet8 Internet Phone Service -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From andrew at ceruleansystems.com Tue Nov 7 07:23:58 2006 From: andrew at ceruleansystems.com (J. Andrew Rogers) Date: Mon, 6 Nov 2006 23:23:58 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] it's all understandable, except In-Reply-To: <08a701c70235$101089b0$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> References: <14545876.369241162848958726.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> <08a701c70235$101089b0$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: <21AA27CF-5EA0-4D8E-AD33-99FEBCF62525@ceruleansystems.com> On Nov 6, 2006, at 10:19 PM, Lee Corbin wrote: > RIGHT YOU ARE! This is a very important point. Dean Keith Simonton > in his book "Greatness" explains that it is seldom that people who > are about > 20 IQ points lower than you are can even understand you. He uses this > idea very convincingly to explain why British PMs are smarter on > average > than U.S. presidents. The former need to impress other MPs, the > latter > only to impress the average American voter. Here's a serious question then with respect to this hypothesis: is there evidence that the average US President was more intelligent prior to 1913, and if so what kind of average discrepancy are we talking about? And does it account for basic differences in the process that determines who gets to be an MP and who gets to be a Congressman that bias the selection of the two populations a PM or President had to interact with? J. Andrew Rogers From jonkc at att.net Tue Nov 7 07:22:48 2006 From: jonkc at att.net (John K Clark) Date: Tue, 7 Nov 2006 02:22:48 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Identity (was: Survival tangent) References: <20061102062735.57668.qmail@web52612.mail.yahoo.com><015601c7010a$6a7d5d50$450a4e0c@MyComputer><008101c701b4$37b35870$250b4e0c@MyComputer><3C5E9884-5CD8-46CC-9841-28C6980CE600@randallsquared.com><059a01c701f8$841e1670$bb0a4e0c@MyComputer> <3826AF26-6E76-4BB9-AA08-3EF4103D6E01@randallsquared.com> Message-ID: <003b01c7023d$95c7ac20$25094e0c@MyComputer> Randall Randall Wrote: > I would say that the particular running process of > Randall Randall that is now typing this email > (which you'll see a copy of shortly) A copy? A copy! That just won?t do, send me your ORIGINAL E mail! And tell me, are you satisfied with what happened to you from yesterday to today, and would you be horrified to know the same sort of thing was going to happen between today and tomorrow? > The fact that this copy and some other copy are bit for bit identical will > not matter to me Well then explain to me exactly what will matter to you. What exactly do you mean by survival? I have told you exactly precisely what I mean, I have survived into tomorrow if there is someone there who remembers being me and he sees no subjective discontinuity. For me that?s the end of the story, but it?s not good enough for you, so tell me what am I?m missing? Don?t just tell me you want that future person to be ME, don?t tell me you want ME to continue, I want to know what the hell that means. I want you to be as crystal clear in your survival specifications as I am. I have offered this challenge on this list for over a decade and all I hear is ?but it just wouldn?t be me?. Childish. > Nothing about the specific atoms matters Glad to hear you say that, even though I know you don?t really believe it. > it's the process. So what process is your identical copy that thinks it?s you missing? No need to answer I already know, it?s missing certain sacred atoms. John K Clark From velvethum at hotmail.com Tue Nov 7 08:09:30 2006 From: velvethum at hotmail.com (Heartland) Date: Tue, 7 Nov 2006 03:09:30 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Detectives and red herrings (was Survival tangent) References: Message-ID: Slawomir wrote: >> > Things->Body->Brain >> > >> > But then, someone like Lee Corbin comes along and claims >> this is not >> > enough and extends the process: >> > >> > Things->Body->Brain->Pattern->VBMs >> > >> > But then, Jef Allbright comes along and says this is not >> > enough/correct and decides to extend this process further >> still until it looks like this: >> > >> > Things->Body->Brain->Pattern->VBMs->Agency Jef: > I feel silly even considering such a precarious ontology, let alone > refuting it. > > Slawomir, it's the category error again. I said nothing about > *synchronic* personal identity, namely how we determine a unique person. > I did propose a theory based on agency providing a more coherent and > encompassing understanding of *diachronic* personal identity, namely how > we determine that two separate observations are of the same person. But Jef, I *know* that you are talking about diachronic personal identity, and I *know* that your logic allows identity sharing among *many* agents. I also strongly suspect your motivation for "agency" which is to save "patternism" from failing when considering identity with respect to (changing) patterns over time. That's why Things->Body->Brain->Pattern->VBMs->Agency is warranted. Your "agency" is just another layer of abstraction or an "improvement" on top of the heap of "improvements" constructed by patternists. Even though I applaud your motivation for "agency" I'm afraid I have to file it under SBA (suicide by abstraction), sorry. I simply can't accept survival as intangible and abstract as this. Slawomir From jonkc at att.net Tue Nov 7 08:10:02 2006 From: jonkc at att.net (John K Clark) Date: Tue, 7 Nov 2006 03:10:02 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Identity (was: Survival tangent) References: <20061102062735.57668.qmail@web52612.mail.yahoo.com><015601c7010a$6a7d5d50$450a4e0c@MyComputer><008101c701b4$37b35870$250b4e0c@MyComputer><3C5E9884-5CD8-46CC-9841-28C6980CE600@randallsquared.com><059a01c701f8$841e1670$bb0a4e0c@MyComputer> Message-ID: <005e01c70244$26a64110$25094e0c@MyComputer> Heartland, High Priest of the Unique Atom and Sacred Original Cult Wrote: > What is so holy about somebody noticing? If anything in the universe is holy it's believing you're not dead. In my thought experiment objectively nobody noticed anything, subjectively nobody noticed anything, and even the universe noticed nothing, but trivial stuff like that is not good enough for Heartland. OK I left out God, but I don't believe in God. Me: >>You reject the Scientific Method as Heartland does and believes in the >>sanctity of certain atoms. You: >That is a lie and you know it. It's not a lie. You maintain there is this huge astronomical difference between you and your copy but the scientific method can see no difference at all, zero squat nada zilch goose egg. > If you recall, at the beginning of this particular chain of threads, I > suggested you read this > http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/identity-personal/ I started to read it but then I encountered 7, count them, 7 sentences in a row that ended in question marks! I plowed on but after about 2 minutes it was clear to me that whoever had written this was not wiser about these matters that I am so there was no reason to read further. John K Clark From eugen at leitl.org Tue Nov 7 08:14:23 2006 From: eugen at leitl.org (Eugen Leitl) Date: Tue, 7 Nov 2006 09:14:23 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] it's all understandable, except In-Reply-To: <08ad01c70236$c111fea0$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> References: <20061106132548.GW6974@leitl.org> <08ad01c70236$c111fea0$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: <20061107081423.GJ6974@leitl.org> On Mon, Nov 06, 2006 at 10:33:08PM -0800, Lee Corbin wrote: > Eugen writes first about education. In another post I'll reply to his > remarks concerning how totally Doomed we are. You know, I always chuckle when I leaf through "Collapse". Those fools, they never saw it coming, despite the signs being so damn obvious. It was always so predictable. But, hey, it can't happen to us, because we all have read the book and track the ecology, economy and social stats daily, and collectively act intelligently and proactively, and have been doing it for a while. Right? > I have to take your word for it in the case of Germany. Very > interesting. Perhaps others will comment. Most of Germany has the triple Hauptschule, Realschule and Gymnasium system. I'm only dealing with problems in Gymnasium, which are really mild using U.S. public school standards for a yardstick. But still, much has changed since I exited the system 1987. I am told the same applies to the decade or two that have gone before. > But bad in what way? Compared to German schools of the 80s? Yep. > Of the 50s? Just how have they deteriorated. Dropping standards I don't know where exactly the peak was, I presume it was 1950s/1960s. > to accomodate immigrants? Immigrants are driving the problem, but there are several other reasons for the current malaise. I don't have much time to cover them here, I'm afraid. > > For genes to wield their full potential you need a stable, supportive > > environment even pre-birth, and an educational system which challenges > > each kid individually. > > Ah, another idealist off in dream-land. Please, stick to what is > feasible. Hey, I thought my standards of having stable families, low crime and violence rate were reasonable. I'm glad I didn't grow up where you did. As to personal educational system, it can't be too hard to bin kids, and treat high-potentials accordingly. And, you know, we have this personal notebooks by now required at an earlier and earlier age, and of course I don't have to tell you what really good educational software (caveat: I have never seen something remotely approaching that description yet) can do. > > The genes have remained basically the same, > > Yes the genes have stayed the same. But the skills that are needed To recap, my point was that genes are good enough, since constant gene pool and deteriorating capabilities illustrate the problems lie elsewhere. Completely ordinary, even slightly dumb people can do wonderful things, if properly motivated. Don't tell me you don't know that most of a Ph.D. e.g. in life sciences is hard human servo work. Ph.D. these days means only a seal of approval that the person can learn, and work hard, so he probably can be further taught on the job in an industrial research environment. Little more. > have not. We don't need manual laborers so much anymore. Funny, I don't have seen too many busy robots on the street lately. And I *have* heard that the industry has been complaining about the quality of Gymnasium folks lately. You probably don't realize how damning that statement is. Believe me: this is *bad*. Really Bad. These are manual labor slots which can't be filled because young people don't have the skills. > Right. I'm not talking IQ 150 and above. There are so few of them > anyway. And they're very idiosyncratic to boot. I'm talking about > the great dearth of people between 120 and 150 that are in such > short supply. You're still looking only a single scalar as a metric. I wish we had IQ 100 people who were motivated and capable. From what I see in the job market (I can't help, since I happen to be stuck in a reasonably menial, low-paid position), the requirements are a set of a very specific skills, a particular age, and willingness to work hard very long hours for as little as possible (don't tell me you don't know wages have been falling in numerical value, nevermind such irrelevant things that EUR has lost half of its value in only six years -- if you look at its relative value to the US$ you will realize just how deep into the crapper US$ has gone since 1971, or so). So, if IQ is not relevant in the broad job market, we're obviously looking at niches -- I wouldn't mind a hyperbright PI one bit, obviously. In fact, I wouldn't mind a reasonably bright politician at all, provided she's reasonably capable. > Only 1 person in 20 is as smart as George Bush (IQ about 125 or so). Excellent. Would you hire George Bush, and trust him with anything important? See, IQ is not worth so very much now, isn't it. > And you can dream-up all the ideal schools you want, and you aren't > going to change this. Only GE or eugenics can change this. What can I say, you're still missing the mark widely. Look at Ashkenazi eugenics. You'll probably think the results like http://www.masada2000.org/nobel.html are sure due to IQ alone. But please read http://www.masada2000.org/Powerful-Jews.html especially the very last line. Yeah, sometimes it's that simple. > If in the 1870s the west had listened to Francis Galton instead of > Karl Marx, the west wouldn't be in the predicament it's in. The Old West (EU and North America) has exactly the same structural problems. Asian tigers/dragons are not yet burdened with them, and I'm really looking forward to what they will do in the next three decades. However, if we pull a new and improved rehash on 1930s, they wouldn't do so very much, and resulting ecological decline and warfare (very possibly biological and nuclear) will make progress difficult at best. Such things don't happen overnight, so anyone with a bit of statistics, economics and history should have figured it out at least 25 years ago. No doubt many did, but nobody cared, and guess what -- collectively, we still don't give a damn. Now that unfortunately gives "Collapse" more signficance than you're willing to give it credit. -- Eugen* Leitl leitl http://leitl.org ______________________________________________________________ ICBM: 48.07100, 11.36820 http://www.ativel.com 8B29F6BE: 099D 78BA 2FD3 B014 B08A 7779 75B0 2443 8B29 F6BE From jonkc at att.net Tue Nov 7 08:32:08 2006 From: jonkc at att.net (John K Clark) Date: Tue, 7 Nov 2006 03:32:08 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Identity (was: Survival tangent) References: <20061102062735.57668.qmail@web52612.mail.yahoo.com><015601c7010a$6a7d5d50$450a4e0c@MyComputer><008101c701b4$37b35870$250b4e0c@MyComputer><3C5E9884-5CD8-46CC-9841-28C6980CE600@randallsquared.com><059a01c701f8$841e1670$bb0a4e0c@MyComputer> <07e501c7022a$d2c1d9b0$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: <014801c70247$5ca26a70$25094e0c@MyComputer> "Lee Corbin" > So if it's true that there is an extremely similar (only a trillion or so > atoms different with slightly different pattern) copy of you running on a > planet > of Alpha Centauri, it's okay if it or you die? Yea yea Alpha Centauri, I've been hearing this argument for years. I'll just repeat a post I sent to the list way back in 1999: An exact duplicate of the earth, and it's entire ecosystem, is created a billion light years away. The duplicate world would need some sort of feedback mechanism to keep the worlds in synchronization, non linear effects would amplify tiny variations, even quantum fluctuations, into big differences, but this is a thought experiment so who cares. In the first two cases below the results would vary according to personalities, remember there's a lot of illogic even in the best of us. 1) I know all about the duplicate world and you put a 44 magnum to my head and tell me in ten seconds you will blow my brains out. Am I concerned? You bet I am because I know that your double is holding an identical gun to the head of my double and making an identical threat. 2) I find out that for the first time since the Big Bang the worlds will diverge, in 10 seconds you will put a bullet in my head but my double will be spared. Am I concerned? Yes, and angry as well, in times of intense stress nobody is very logical. My double is no longer exact because I am going through a traumatic experience and my double is not. I'd be looking at that huge gun and wondering what it will be like when it goes off and if death will really be instantaneous. I'd be wondering if my philosophy was really as sound as I thought it was and I'd also be wondering why I get the bullet and not my double and cursing the unfairness of it all. My (semi) double would be thinking "it's a shame about that other fellow but I'm glad it's not me". 3) I know nothing about the duplicate world, a gun is at both our heads and we both are convinced we're going to die. One gun goes off, making a hell of a mess, but the other gun, for inexplicable reasons misfires. In this case NOBODY died and except for undergoing a terrifying experience I am completely unharmed. The real beauty part is that I don't even have to clean up the mess. The bottom line is we don't have thoughts and emotions, we are thoughts and emotions, and the idea that the particular hardware that is rendering them changes their meaning is as crazy as my computer making the meaning of your post different from what it was on yours. John K Clark From russell.wallace at gmail.com Tue Nov 7 09:28:06 2006 From: russell.wallace at gmail.com (Russell Wallace) Date: Tue, 7 Nov 2006 09:28:06 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Identity (was: Survival tangent) In-Reply-To: <003b01c7023d$95c7ac20$25094e0c@MyComputer> References: <20061102062735.57668.qmail@web52612.mail.yahoo.com> <015601c7010a$6a7d5d50$450a4e0c@MyComputer> <008101c701b4$37b35870$250b4e0c@MyComputer> <3C5E9884-5CD8-46CC-9841-28C6980CE600@randallsquared.com> <059a01c701f8$841e1670$bb0a4e0c@MyComputer> <3826AF26-6E76-4BB9-AA08-3EF4103D6E01@randallsquared.com> <003b01c7023d$95c7ac20$25094e0c@MyComputer> Message-ID: <8d71341e0611070128p3484c6ccj9420ca7e656e1123@mail.gmail.com> On 11/7/06, John K Clark wrote: > > So what process is your identical copy that thinks it's you missing? No > need > to answer I already know, it's missing certain sacred atoms. > In fairness, John, while I agree with you that the patternist view is true [1], there's more to the threadist view than you're seeing. It's not about the atoms, or a supernatural soul. It's about unbroken continuity of thought process. And the rationale, as far as I can see, is that it's the closest match to the usual/intuitive meaning of "identity". And it's a fair attempt at that, I just don't subscribe to it because I think like with the whole "why don't we feel motion when the Earth goes around the Sun" thing, intuition isn't the right tool here in philosophical principle even though it is for practical purposes. But I don't think the threadists are being hopelessly irrational, I just disagree with them. I've had a friendly conversation with a threadist, where we both agreed the following: 1) He admitted his philosophy maybe meant he died each night when he went to sleep. In practice he simply ignores this for obvious reasons, but he admits the logic. 2) He wants gradual rather than destructive-scan uploading, and if it's ever in my power to provide it for him I will. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From russell.wallace at gmail.com Tue Nov 7 09:28:44 2006 From: russell.wallace at gmail.com (Russell Wallace) Date: Tue, 7 Nov 2006 09:28:44 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Identity (was: Survival tangent) In-Reply-To: <8d71341e0611070128p3484c6ccj9420ca7e656e1123@mail.gmail.com> References: <20061102062735.57668.qmail@web52612.mail.yahoo.com> <015601c7010a$6a7d5d50$450a4e0c@MyComputer> <008101c701b4$37b35870$250b4e0c@MyComputer> <3C5E9884-5CD8-46CC-9841-28C6980CE600@randallsquared.com> <059a01c701f8$841e1670$bb0a4e0c@MyComputer> <3826AF26-6E76-4BB9-AA08-3EF4103D6E01@randallsquared.com> <003b01c7023d$95c7ac20$25094e0c@MyComputer> <8d71341e0611070128p3484c6ccj9420ca7e656e1123@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <8d71341e0611070128u622b5ea2ud7d77ad1c98b9101@mail.gmail.com> I forgot the footnote: [1] I don't agree that changes in the last few seconds make a difference - my view is closer to Lee Corbin's on that - but that's another matter. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From russell.wallace at gmail.com Tue Nov 7 09:34:02 2006 From: russell.wallace at gmail.com (Russell Wallace) Date: Tue, 7 Nov 2006 09:34:02 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Identity (was: Survival tangent) In-Reply-To: <8d71341e0611070128p3484c6ccj9420ca7e656e1123@mail.gmail.com> References: <20061102062735.57668.qmail@web52612.mail.yahoo.com> <015601c7010a$6a7d5d50$450a4e0c@MyComputer> <008101c701b4$37b35870$250b4e0c@MyComputer> <3C5E9884-5CD8-46CC-9841-28C6980CE600@randallsquared.com> <059a01c701f8$841e1670$bb0a4e0c@MyComputer> <3826AF26-6E76-4BB9-AA08-3EF4103D6E01@randallsquared.com> <003b01c7023d$95c7ac20$25094e0c@MyComputer> <8d71341e0611070128p3484c6ccj9420ca7e656e1123@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <8d71341e0611070134l5a0618c1h476815c3a42818@mail.gmail.com> ...of course intuition is _not_ the right tool for practical purposes, for many values of intuition. Meh. But I hope my meaning is semi-clear anyway. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Tue Nov 7 09:49:00 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Tue, 7 Nov 2006 04:49:00 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] [private message] speaking of electoral college In-Reply-To: <20061107035731.10776.qmail@web51615.mail.yahoo.com> References: <454FFFF4.2000909@goldenfuture.net> <20061107035731.10776.qmail@web51615.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: On 11/6/06, Al Brooks wrote: > > You're old enough to remember the '80s, right? Things have changed little > since then. > Oh but some of us remember the '70's and even the '60s and we are longing to bring back those days -- when people truely cared and positioned themselves as such. R. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jonkc at att.net Tue Nov 7 10:00:06 2006 From: jonkc at att.net (John K Clark) Date: Tue, 7 Nov 2006 05:00:06 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Identity (was: Survival tangent) References: <20061102062735.57668.qmail@web52612.mail.yahoo.com><015601c7010a$6a7d5d50$450a4e0c@MyComputer><008101c701b4$37b35870$250b4e0c@MyComputer><3C5E9884-5CD8-46CC-9841-28C6980CE600@randallsquared.com><059a01c701f8$841e1670$bb0a4e0c@MyComputer><3826AF26-6E76-4BB9-AA08-3EF4103D6E01@randallsquared.com><003b01c7023d$95c7ac20$25094e0c@MyComputer> <8d71341e0611070128p3484c6ccj9420ca7e656e1123@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <006a01c70253$89a40f40$25094e0c@MyComputer> Russell Wallace Wrote: > It's about unbroken continuity of thought process. I agree. Stop a brain from operating for a billion years and then start it up again and subjectively nothing has happened, it's as continuous as continuity can be. > intuition isn't the right tool here I agree yet again. Intuition whines "but it just wouldn't be me" but logic and the Scientific Method says it is you. I'll put my money on logic and science. > He admitted his philosophy maybe meant he died each night when he went to > sleep. If true then dieing is a trivial phenomenon. I don't believe death is trivial. > He wants gradual rather than destructive-scan uploading That superstition is almost as silly as the sacred atoms crap. John K Clark From sjatkins at mac.com Tue Nov 7 10:11:28 2006 From: sjatkins at mac.com (Samantha Atkins) Date: Tue, 7 Nov 2006 02:11:28 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] it's all understandable, except In-Reply-To: <077d01c70195$28852dc0$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> References: <638d4e150611041749n1a3c2907xd32d00ff60a11df6@mail.gmail.com> <05ec01c7008a$ab914660$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <20061105203158.GJ6974@leitl.org> <077d01c70195$28852dc0$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: <26B1670E-0EBC-407E-AC2B-A654492C6FA1@mac.com> On Nov 6, 2006, at 3:15 AM, Lee Corbin wrote: > Eugen wrote > >> On Sat, Nov 04, 2006 at 07:29:41PM -0800, Lee Corbin wrote: > >>> The Singularity (or its preceding technological innovations) need >>> above all to get people smarter, especially the great hordes of >>> children today who simply are incapable of difficult technical work, >>> and who will (because of IQ limitations) perform rather poorly >>> whatever they try to do that is of any use. >> >> I try to avoid me-toos, but above passage can't be overemphasized. >> The issue isn't differences in issued equipment between the ears. >> Motivation is the key, and almost all current education environments >> (nevermind prior poor parenting) actively demotivate. > > Since Eugen wrote this, a number of people have chimed in to agree. > I ask, where is the evidence that the key problems are current > educational > environments or poor parenting? Are there studies? > What is the worth of these studies though? How has their methodology been vetted? > The studies---your anecdotes aside---report what I said they did, > namely that it's genes 50%, peers 50%, parents 0%, and schools, 0%. > (I should add, to be careful, that these are determinants of adult > personality. But I think that it applies to contributing technically > to society too.) This seems highly unlikely and suspicious. How would genes be that well separated out from environmental factors. In environmental factors how exactly would the contribution from parents and schools be teased out so cleanly from that of peers? It looks a good deal to pat on the face of it, doesn't it? > > And furthermore, contrary to what Eugen states, the limiting factor > *is* what is between the ears. Researchers on intelligence admit, > however, that intelligence is like money. It really doesn't matter > how much you have so long as you have enough. > > But the overwhelming part of the populace does *not* have enough > cognitive ability, not enough for today's technical needs. > So, a bit down the road we can fix that, yes? > And even in your anecdotes, from dyslexia to "boredom and > frustration" causing dropping out, we could segregate :-) those > with certain proclivities and try to specialize the instruction > they're > given. That would be a good idea. But many kids simply rebel, They simply rebel with no reason at all? > and unless you provide very expensive tutoring (with a touch of > compulsion), they're not going to use all their potential anyway. > You can suggest remedies. That would be nice. But why not > point to somewhere among the 6 billion people where the problem > as you see it *has* been solved? > > Eugen continues, rather obscurely: > >> Not only does demographics limit the quantity, the quality has been >> going down monotonously since middle last century, or even before. > > What do you mean by this? IQ has been going up (cf. Flynn effect). > You could fool me by what I see of people around me in multiple walks of life. Maybe they started scoring IQ on the curve. >> The job market does the rest to discourage entering technical fields. >> The message is certainly loud and clear enough, and it's being heard. > > How does the job market discourage entering technical field? > I'm not following you. > If you want to do cutting edge R&D the well-renumerated opportunities are thin on the ground. - samantha From sjatkins at mac.com Tue Nov 7 10:24:17 2006 From: sjatkins at mac.com (Samantha Atkins) Date: Tue, 7 Nov 2006 02:24:17 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Edge: Thank Goodness! By Daniel C. Dennett In-Reply-To: <079401c70199$64625b20$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> References: <380-220061153192746796@M2W040.mail2web.com> <8d71341e0611031439w5d25b799k1dc4618d05e054a4@mail.gmail.com> <454BD34B.6070504@pobox.com> <8d71341e0611031603t5e86a6c8r315894f13309c6a1@mail.gmail.com> <8d71341e0611060005g5ac79cdeie540449406ec95b7@mail.gmail.com> <079401c70199$64625b20$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: <45D0A95C-CCDF-46F9-849E-1A3EDE839FBC@mac.com> On Nov 6, 2006, at 3:45 AM, Lee Corbin wrote: > Russell writes > >> Religion worked for survival. Look at what happens to modern >> cultures where religion is gone: they fall apart into self-hatred and >> nihilism, birth rates plummeting below extinction level, their people >> rapidly headed for oblivion. The greatest civilization that ever >> existed >> on this planet is dying, in what should have been its hour of >> triumph - >> dying not of any external threat, but of its own parasite memes; >> and who will pick up the torch once we are gone? > Civilization rise up and die in certain predictable political and economic, especially economic patterns. Many countries in Europe have already risen, fallen and managed to rise to some extent again. Just because the US is rounding the cusp toward a downturn does not mean it is TEOTWAWKI. It certainly does not mean that the cycle reaches this point because religion has lost its hold. That is a laughable theory. > You bring up the gravest problem of all, a real one that is not > going away, > unless a technological miracle happens quickly. > > Europe is finished. A Muslim civilization will replace it. > No way. This is utter nonsense. The Muslims can't manage to come into the 21st century. Science and technology is too hard to reconcile with the faith, especially as it blends with law and politics. Without that the Muslims will never be strong enough to prevail. There is too much admiration for blind fate and utter vengeance toward all who seem to threaten it. I am saddened to see it here of all places. > But in North America, the situation is less clear. > > An elite in North America can continue to "run things" for a very long > time yet. This is because as the class structure of the country > becomes > more pronounced, the lower classes shall respond to direction, just as > they do in Mexico today, whereas in Europe, the Muslims have superior > cohesion and superior will. > Really you think Muslims are superior? In what way? They band together? The threaten, kill and destroy when angered? This is superior in a way that matters in this time of accelerating change? How so? The Muslims as Muslim statists are a dying culture unable to cope with the speed and type of changes around them. The must either transform into something quite different and far less religiously based or become irrelevant. This seeming belief in raw human mass and unreasoning zealotry is very unsettling. > Now, more and more people in the west are coming to see the danger, > and so resistence, even in Europe, may mount, and in interesting ways. > Prognostications, anyone? > Yes. Religion will be seen more and more in Europe especially as senseless and not to be afforded automatic respect. Religious based violence and intolerance will come to be opposed vigorously. > - samantha From eugen at leitl.org Tue Nov 7 10:36:08 2006 From: eugen at leitl.org (Eugen Leitl) Date: Tue, 7 Nov 2006 11:36:08 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] KILLTHREAD: Re: Identity (was: Survival tangent) In-Reply-To: References: <059a01c701f8$841e1670$bb0a4e0c@MyComputer> Message-ID: <20061107103608.GO6974@leitl.org> On Mon, Nov 06, 2006 at 08:04:17PM -0500, Heartland wrote: > That is a lie and you know it. Apparently you invent this nonsense just so you can > safely argue against it so when others read your posts you trick them into taking > your side with the added bonus that the person who disagrees with you looks like a > fool and you look like a hero. > > Gee, you must be such a good guy for fighting these evil soul-believers. Meanwhile, > I doubt Randall (or I) who you accuse of this believes in souls. Why can't you just > accept that you just don't get it and move on? One, you're confused as to what > "person" is. Two, you don't (or refuse to) understand the definition of "identity" > yet none of this stops you from talking about "personal identity". Folks, this periodically recurring thread has run well beyond diminishing returns, and I declared it terminated for time being. Please don't post further in this thread. -- Eugen* Leitl leitl http://leitl.org ______________________________________________________________ ICBM: 48.07100, 11.36820 http://www.ativel.com 8B29F6BE: 099D 78BA 2FD3 B014 B08A 7779 75B0 2443 8B29 F6BE From brentn at freeshell.org Tue Nov 7 11:05:43 2006 From: brentn at freeshell.org (Brent Neal) Date: Tue, 7 Nov 2006 06:05:43 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] A Diversity Re: Just curious, it's not natural! In-Reply-To: <20061107055728.71135.qmail@web37213.mail.mud.yahoo.com> References: <20061107055728.71135.qmail@web37213.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Message-ID: On Nov 7, 2006, at 0:57, Anna Taylor wrote: > My point was that "procreation", the last I heard is > still a woman's choice. My definition of procreation > is the choice that I and my partner, (who are both > heterosexual) have chosen to engage in a partnership > based on love, respect, honesty and have chosen to > procreate to keep my meme, belief and memories alive. > Are you saying that this is not associated with the > word "marriage"? What makes me curious is this: your whole post seemed to hinge on the fact that somehow procreation deserves some protected sandbox in which to happen, that sandbox referred to as 'marriage.' This, as I understand your opinion, justifies denying certain legal rights to couples that are not m/f pairings. Do you then also recommend denying the protection of marriage to childless couples or couples who are proven infertile? What about late-life marriages? (i.e. people who get married in their 60s) As a litmus for life-pairing and partnership, procreation seems like a pretty silly yardstick (says the guy with the 3-year old) Brent -- Brent Neal Geek of all Trades http://brentn.freeshell.org "Specialization is for insects" -- Robert A. Heinlein From alex at ramonsky.com Tue Nov 7 12:20:31 2006 From: alex at ramonsky.com (Alex Ramonsky) Date: Tue, 07 Nov 2006 12:20:31 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Hi folks References: <20061106004835.86004.qmail@web60511.mail.yahoo.com> <2071.128.250.225.217.1162774829.squirrel@webmail.student.unimelb.edu.au> Message-ID: <45507A0F.8010003@ramonsky.com> I remember you : ) Glad you're still around, hope you're still having fun. Best, AR ********** Colin Geoffrey Hales wrote: >Hello all, > >You probably don't remember me. I've been off list since 2003. I thought >I'd have a look at things extropian and ....all the troops are still at >it! > >I trust you are all well.... > >cheers > >Colin Hales > > > >_______________________________________________ >extropy-chat mailing list >extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org >http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > > > > From brentn at freeshell.org Tue Nov 7 15:05:49 2006 From: brentn at freeshell.org (Brent Neal) Date: Tue, 7 Nov 2006 10:05:49 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] it's all understandable, except In-Reply-To: <26B1670E-0EBC-407E-AC2B-A654492C6FA1@mac.com> References: <638d4e150611041749n1a3c2907xd32d00ff60a11df6@mail.gmail.com> <05ec01c7008a$ab914660$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <20061105203158.GJ6974@leitl.org> <077d01c70195$28852dc0$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <26B1670E-0EBC-407E-AC2B-A654492C6FA1@mac.com> Message-ID: <2FD77D6D-923A-4507-88A5-EF9458A286D0@freeshell.org> On Nov 7, 2006, at 5:11, Samantha Atkins wrote: > > On Nov 6, 2006, at 3:15 AM, Lee Corbin wrote: > >> Eugen wrote >> >> >>> Not only does demographics limit the quantity, the quality has been >>> going down monotonously since middle last century, or even before. >> >> What do you mean by this? IQ has been going up (cf. Flynn effect). >> > > You could fool me by what I see of people around me in multiple walks > of life. Maybe they started scoring IQ on the curve. IQ is, as others have pointed out, an incomplete measurement. Someone here, perhaps Eugen, suggested a concept of 'effectiveness' as a complement to IQ. I think that what Samantha is observing is not so much a dumbing down of society as a 'motivating down' of society. > >>> The job market does the rest to discourage entering technical >>> fields. >>> The message is certainly loud and clear enough, and it's being >>> heard. >> >> How does the job market discourage entering technical field? >> I'm not following you. >> > > If you want to do cutting edge R&D the well-renumerated opportunities > are thin on the ground. Oh, and its even worse than that! :) Remuneration is the least of your worries. No matter where you do R&D, you're becoming increasingly constrained in how you do it and what you do it on. I am a researcher in the central R&D facility in a medium-sized private company. Any research I do has a less than 1% chance of ever being published - patents and trade secrets only, please! - and I am financially incentivized to only focus on short-term product-focused development. The fact that I'm working on a long-term research project is because of sheer cussedness and a belief that ultimately, my research will pay off big for the company - but that's my and my colleagues' choice to gamble with our careers. Add to that the disparity in pay even between an experienced, successful inventor/ researcher and a entry-level "profitable-growth strategist," and the result is a huge flight in manpower and talent out of R&D and into more lucrative positions. That, to me, is a clear example of how the job market discourages entry into a technical field - although, more properly, it discourages remaining in a technical field. You also see a lot of bachelor's level engineers and scientists opting for law and business schools these days, without any intervening stint working in a technical field. This trend has been commented on in C&E News as well as in Physics Today. All little off topic for this - I'm also one of the folks at my company who have a responsibility for licensing and acquiring intellectual property. What I observe is that universities are increasingly pressuring professors to focus on patentable research, in order to generate revenue for the university. The anarchocapitalist take would be that this is a good thing, since these institutions should be self-funding, but I argue, with ample evidence, that investments in basic and fundamental research have been necessary to drive these more applications focused advances. With the universities biasing themselves this way, I have become quite concerned with future progress in science and technology -- Brent Neal Geek of all Trades http://brentn.freeshell.org "Specialization is for insects" -- Robert A. Heinlein From fauxever at sprynet.com Tue Nov 7 15:01:07 2006 From: fauxever at sprynet.com (Olga Bourlin) Date: Tue, 7 Nov 2006 07:01:07 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] A Diversity Re: Just curious, it's not natural! References: <20061107055728.71135.qmail@web37213.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <009901c7027d$8e65c3f0$6600a8c0@brainiac> From: "Anna Taylor" Sent: Monday, November 06, 2006 9:57 PM > What I am arguing is the relevant factor between the word "marriage" and a male/female relationship. Don't you associate the word "marriage" with procreation? No. Some heterosexual couples cannot procreate; furthermore, there are plenty of heterosexual couples who do not want to rear children. And, besides, heterosexual women past menopause are still allowed to marry, n'est-de pas? Olga From jef at jefallbright.net Tue Nov 7 16:41:02 2006 From: jef at jefallbright.net (Jef Allbright) Date: Tue, 7 Nov 2006 08:41:02 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Detectives and red herrings (was Survivaltangent) In-Reply-To: Message-ID: Slawomir wrote: > I also strongly suspect your motivation for "agency" > which is to save "patternism" from failing when considering > identity with respect to (changing) patterns over time. That's why > Things->Body->Brain->Pattern->VBMs->Agency is warranted. Your > "agency" > Things->Body->Brain->Pattern->VBMs->is just > another > layer of abstraction or an "improvement" on top of the heap > of "improvements" > constructed by patternists. Even though I applaud your > motivation for "agency" I'm afraid I have to file it under > SBA (suicide by abstraction), sorry. I simply can't accept > survival as intangible and abstract as this. Slawomir, once again, we're talking about two different things. I've recognized your point all along, and I've demonstrated (with your agreement) that I can state your point back to you, perhaps more concisely than you can state it yourself. My goal in this discussion is not to prove you're right or wrong; such is not possible even in principle. My goal is to improve the clarity and breadth of our thinking on this topic and it's a frustratingly wasteful (to me) effort to keep sliding back and rehashing the same rickety old conceptual structures thinly disguised under a coat of new words. Let me state (my understanding of) our positions so we all feel clearly heard, and perhaps to lay a clean solid foundation upon which future discussion can *grow*. Slawomir's position: Survival of one's personal identity is strictly dependent on continuation of the physical constituents of the mind-producing process. While some people talk as if they could survive indefinitely by means of copies of themselves to overcome loss due to aging or accident, they overlook or deny the simple ontological truth that a copy is, by its very definition, not the same as the original. John's position: Survival of one's personal identity is quite perfectly achievable in theory, and will become so in practice when we have acquired the technological means to make an effective working copy of a person's identity. Neither substrate nor continuity matter in this endeavor, as long as the process which constitutes one's mind is faithfully reproduced and running. Copy and Original *are* identical when there is no measurable functional difference. Lee's position: Survival of one's personal identity is absolutely possible in theory and will become absolutely achievable if and when we have technology enabling us to run copies of the pattern that constitutes the mind including (but not necessarily limited to) its values, beliefs and memories. While it's an obvious mathematical truism that a copy is absolutely identical to the original (in all ways that matter) at the instant of copying, it is also true that values, beliefs and memories naturally change over time so it is vitally important to survival of one's personal identity that copies be made before too much change has accumulated. Beyond that point, the original person should be considered effectively lost and dead. Jef's position: The Self that one imagines might survive independently of changes in its environment is an illusion (albeit a convenient one) because the self exists only in terms of its interactions with its environment. As an agent acting within a given environmental context, what is best from the point of view of that agent is not necessarily survival but that it influences its environment so as to promote its own values into the future, in effect acting to create a future world matching the model it would like to see. To the extent that the future world contains an entity representing Self, then it can be said that Self "survived." To the extent that multiple agents represent Self, then it can be said that they are indeed Self. Corrections, questions, comments...dirty jokes? - Jef From jef at jefallbright.net Tue Nov 7 16:57:12 2006 From: jef at jefallbright.net (Jef Allbright) Date: Tue, 7 Nov 2006 08:57:12 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Identity (was: Survival tangent) In-Reply-To: <8d71341e0611070128p3484c6ccj9420ca7e656e1123@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: Russell Wallace wrote: > I've had a friendly conversation with a threadist, > where we both agreed the following: > > 1) He admitted his philosophy maybe meant he died > each night when he went to sleep. In practice he > simply ignores this for obvious reasons, but he > admits the logic. > > 2) He wants gradual rather than destructive-scan > uploading, and if it's ever in my power to provide > it for him I will. The moral problem with accepting others' irrational thinking (and yes, we all do it, for fundamental reasons of limited knowledge and computational resources) is that irrational thought leads to less than optimum actions which effect the world that we all share. This is not to say that we should demand rationality (again, it's fundamentally limited) but it is to say that we should discard the na?ve belief that the irrationality of others is solely "their own business." - Jef From george at betterhumans.com Tue Nov 7 17:11:36 2006 From: george at betterhumans.com (George Dvorsky) Date: Tue, 7 Nov 2006 12:11:36 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Art projects on the moon Message-ID: Here's an exhaustive list of potential art projects on the moon: http://mobile.orbit.zkm.de/?q=orbitnavigation/tag/439 I discovered the link via this article on Moon Activism: http://www.we-make-money-not-art.com/archives/009092.php Cheers, George From sjatkins at mac.com Tue Nov 7 18:31:58 2006 From: sjatkins at mac.com (Samantha Atkins) Date: Tue, 7 Nov 2006 10:31:58 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Edge: Thank Goodness! By Daniel C. Dennett In-Reply-To: <8d71341e0611060005g5ac79cdeie540449406ec95b7@mail.gmail.com> References: <380-220061153192746796@M2W040.mail2web.com> <8d71341e0611031439w5d25b799k1dc4618d05e054a4@mail.gmail.com> <454BD34B.6070504@pobox.com> <8d71341e0611031603t5e86a6c8r315894f13309c6a1@mail.gmail.com> <8d71341e0611060005g5ac79cdeie540449406ec95b7@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <0E091F9A-4E68-49A7-83C5-A99826711CA3@mac.com> On Nov 6, 2006, at 12:05 AM, Russell Wallace wrote: > On 11/6/06, Samantha Atkins wrote: > Did you actually read the piece? It is beyond me how you go from > the gentle thoughtful ruminations on actual good that just saved > this man's life as compared to the claimed good of religious acts > like prayer to the evils of communism. There in nothing whatever > of force in Dennett's remarks yet you act as if there is. > > I did not claim there was anything of force in Dennett's remarks; in > the text you quoted, I was agreeing with Eliezer that the most > precise analogy would be with "a theologian who *peacefully argues > with you*, for what he conceives to be your own benefit, that you > are committing a mortal sin by denying the existence of God." This is not the tone of your earlier remarks. I am glad you are calming down. > >> As for who's being more irrational, whatever your opinion of >> religion, it worked. Look at the results once religion is gone: the >> prime examples of evolution in action are precisely those who >> believe in evolution. If I believed in God I'd say He had a wicked >> sense of humor. >> > > What do you mean "it worked"? What worked exactly? I am really at > a loss as to what you meant by this paragraph. > > Religion worked for survival. What worked was largely the demise or defanging of religion. Individual and market freedom, freedom of thought, science and technological progress all owed some of their existence to religion losing power. To rewrite history as religion being what made things work is rather remarkable. If this is so then societies with the deepest religious cohesion should be most successful. This is not what history generally shows. > Look at what happens to modern cultures where religion is gone: they > fall apart into self-hatred and nihilism, birth rates plummeting > below extinction level, their people rapidly headed for oblivion. > The greatest civilization that ever existed on this planet is dying, > in what should have been its hour of triumph - dying not of any > external threat, but of its own parasite memes; and who will pick up > the torch once we are gone? > Many factors start the decline of a civilization. I see no evidence that a decline in religiosity is in the least primary. > Really? I know an awful lot of atheists who are very delighted with > life and this universe and consider life extremely full. > > If that works for them, great, though I will note that most people > who give up belief in God, in order to find meaning in life, need to > substitute some equivalent belief: aliens, the Singularity, > reincarnation or whatever. Yeah? Show some data. > >> What fanatical religious preachers taught them this, you may >> wonder? Why, some of the names are quite familiar. Gould, Dawkins, >> Dennett. >> > > This is beyond the pale. > > I'm sorry it offends you to see things called by their right names. > I see a ranting opinion backed by nothing but hand-wringing and bluster. - samantha -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From natasha at natasha.cc Tue Nov 7 17:38:14 2006 From: natasha at natasha.cc (Natasha Vita-More) Date: Tue, 07 Nov 2006 11:38:14 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] Art projects on the moon In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <6.2.1.2.2.20061107113609.0451d258@pop-server.austin.rr.com> At 11:11 AM 11/7/2006, you wrote: >Here's an exhaustive list of potential art projects on the moon: >http://mobile.orbit.zkm.de/?q=orbitnavigation/tag/439 > >I discovered the link via this article on Moon Activism: >http://www.we-make-money-not-art.com/archives/009092.php Just goes to show that postmodernism didn't infect the future-oriented brains of Nam June Paik and Rauschenberg :-) Cheers Natasha Natasha Vita-More Cultural Strategist - Design Media Artist - Futurist PhD Candidate, Planetary Collegium Proactionary Principle Core Group, Extropy Institute Member, Association of Professional Futurists Founder, Transhumanist Arts & Culture If you draw a circle in the sand and study only what's inside the circle, then that is a closed-system perspective. If you study what is inside the circle and everything outside the circle, then that is an open system perspective. - Buckminster Fuller -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From amara at amara.com Tue Nov 7 19:05:44 2006 From: amara at amara.com (Amara Graps) Date: Tue, 7 Nov 2006 11:05:44 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] The bone-dry Moon (was: Art projects on the moon) Message-ID: As an aside to the Art Projects on the Moon post, if you hear a space agency (NASA, ESA, ASI, ...) official say that we can use the resources on the Moon such as WATER for our lunar bases, then call him on it. Few planetary scientists believe that there is water on the Moon to use (and it is significant that no subsequent mission has confirmed Clementine's findings). The background to that story is here: http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2005/14apr_moonwater.htm Amara From sentience at pobox.com Tue Nov 7 19:10:52 2006 From: sentience at pobox.com (Eliezer S. Yudkowsky) Date: Tue, 07 Nov 2006 11:10:52 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] An advance prediction for Tuesday In-Reply-To: <4550018C.7050409@posthuman.com> References: <454FCC5E.1070808@pobox.com> <0J8C006D94D29060@caduceus2.gmu.edu> <454FEEFF.6070108@pobox.com> <4550018C.7050409@posthuman.com> Message-ID: <4550DA3C.9030000@pobox.com> FYI: I didn't get around to making the bet, partially because there didn't seem to be time, but also because I was looking over the historical track records of these markets and was re-impressed by their apparent accuracy. If the assessed probability is 20% that the Republicans keep the House, the bettors must not be taking any electronic shenanigans into account, and maybe neither should I... I guess we'll see. -- Eliezer S. Yudkowsky http://singinst.org/ Research Fellow, Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence From sentience at pobox.com Tue Nov 7 19:19:38 2006 From: sentience at pobox.com (Eliezer S. Yudkowsky) Date: Tue, 07 Nov 2006 11:19:38 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] The Myth of the Rational Voter Message-ID: <4550DC4A.7090900@pobox.com> http://www.cato-unbound.org/2006/11/06/bryan-caplan/the-myth-of-the-rational-voter/ -- Eliezer S. Yudkowsky http://singinst.org/ Research Fellow, Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence From hkhenson at rogers.com Tue Nov 7 20:24:20 2006 From: hkhenson at rogers.com (Keith Henson) Date: Tue, 07 Nov 2006 15:24:20 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Schools, was speaking of electoral college In-Reply-To: References: <20061107035731.10776.qmail@web51615.mail.yahoo.com> <454FFFF4.2000909@goldenfuture.net> <20061107035731.10776.qmail@web51615.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <5.1.0.14.0.20061107135915.03d1bff0@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> At 04:49 AM 11/7/2006 -0500, you wrote: >On 11/6/06, Al Brooks <kerry_prez at yahoo.com> >wrote: >>You're old enough to remember the '80s, right? Things have changed little >>since then. > >Oh but some of us remember the '70's and even the '60s and we are longing >to bring back those days -- when people truely cared and positioned >themselves as such. I can one-up you a bit. I was born in 1942. So some of my memories go back to the late and even the mid 40s. Informed by my interest in EP, I am not so sure that "people truely cared and positioned themselves as such" more in the past than they do today. In some cases (such as the FBI) the myth and the reality as we now know it were miles apart. Times certainly have changed since the late 40s in a number of ways, particularly with schools. (My experience with public school spanned from fall of 1948 to spring of 1960.) Because my Dad was in the military I was in 8 schools during this time. 48 1st Barnet, Arlington VA. 49 2nd 50 3rd Stonewall Jackson Arlington VA. 51 4th Texas near Lubbock and Washington Heights in Japan 52 5th Washington Heights 53 6th Sagama Hara Japan 54 7th Wakefield Jr/Sr High School Arlington, Virginia 55 8th 56 9th 57 10th Tombstone AZ 58 11th Prescott AZ 59 12th School teacher was one of the few occupations smart women could go into in those days and the children benefited from it. The quality of the schools varied considerable. The worst was Tombstone where one morning the FBI took our chemistry teacher away. 5th was the most fun because the class had a set of encyclopedias and the teacher let me sit quitely in the back are read them. 9th I read an organic chemistry textbook I still have. 11th grade English for some (probably random) reason was packed with the smartest kids in the school. Fascinating discussions. My oldest kids started school in the mid 70s, my youngest graduated from Palo Alto High School in 2000. I could write more or possibly get the kids to write about their experiences if there is interest. Keith Henson PS. I went through about a dozen high school libraries in the San Jose area around 1995 looking at the books of my childhood (Heinlein, Clarke, Asimov and others) to see if the failure of those books to be read after some point in the early 70s was widespread, similar to what I had noticed in my daughter's middle school. It was. I have no theory as to why. From hkhenson at rogers.com Tue Nov 7 20:30:46 2006 From: hkhenson at rogers.com (Keith Henson) Date: Tue, 07 Nov 2006 15:30:46 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Cults and evolutionary psychology (2) Message-ID: <5.1.0.14.0.20061107153038.03ddabf8@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> As some of you know, I have been engaged in a project for the last eleven years that (among other things) made me a refugee and has cost a lot more than your average PhD. It motivated me to study EP and the strange things that can happen to human minds sort of like a cancer patient might learn a lot about his particular flavor of cancer. Among other things I have followed the adventures of a relatively young Australian woman for several years talking to her through IRC. She is now out of the cult. She and her daughter are doing fine. http://groups.google.com/group/alt.religion.scientology/msg/61744a9f93620dc8?hl=en& Down the thread there is a very interesting analysis of the cult coercions by another one who escaped. http://groups.google.com/group/alt.religion.scientology/msg/c60c3de47f8442b4?hl=en& Of course all this need explanation in terms of psychological traits that evolved during the time our ancestors lived in hunter gatherer bands. I thought some of you might be interested in the source material for my postings here. Keith Henson From thespike at satx.rr.com Tue Nov 7 20:38:55 2006 From: thespike at satx.rr.com (Damien Broderick) Date: Tue, 07 Nov 2006 14:38:55 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] School libraries and skiffy References: <20061107035731.10776.qmail@web51615.mail.yahoo.com> <454FFFF4.2000909@goldenfuture.net> <20061107035731.10776.qmail@web51615.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <7.0.1.0.2.20061107143737.0215eea8@satx.rr.com> At 03:24 PM 11/7/2006 -0500, Keith Henson wrote: >PS. I went through about a dozen high school libraries in the San Jose >area around 1995 looking at the books of my childhood (Heinlein, Clarke, >Asimov and others) to see if the failure of those books to be read after >some point in the early 70s was widespread, similar to what I had noticed >in my daughter's middle school. It was. I have no theory as to why. The stories, settings and "Golden Age" voice were too antique? No cool kid, nor even a nerd, wanted to read skool library books? Those books were by then abundantly available in 2nd hand pb form, and had already been read or acquired or handed down? Bah--them kids today? Damien Broderick From iamgoddard at yahoo.com Tue Nov 7 20:42:27 2006 From: iamgoddard at yahoo.com (Ian Goddard) Date: Tue, 7 Nov 2006 12:42:27 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Some of my Recent Creations Message-ID: <20061107204227.93087.qmail@web52603.mail.yahoo.com> MB wrote: >> Short poses >> http://iangoddard.net/sketchesQuick.htm >> >> Long poses >> http://iangoddard.net/sketches.htm >> > > Hm. *I'm* impressed! :) My mom used to do > watercolors. Very pretty things. Have a > number of them here in my home. Me, I can barely > write! :))) Thanks! I've never been able to deal with watercolor and admire people who can! The water has a mind of its own and you have to learn to work with it. For me, if I'm not happy with a piece, I feel terrible. So I've never put myself through the anguish necessary to master watercolors. BTW, from this computer on campus I can see that one of the pages that viewed okay for me at home does not show the graphic from here. So I corrected the code (btw, you can use Explorer to access and edit your website via FTP, which comes in handy when you're away from home). Here's the corrected page: http://iangoddard.net/nude09.htm It's a bad habit I have of usually ignoring hair. ~Ian ____________________________________________________________________________________ Sponsored Link Mortgage rates near 39yr lows. $420k for $1,399/mo. Calculate new payment! http://www.LowerMyBills.com/lre From kerry_prez at yahoo.com Tue Nov 7 21:51:03 2006 From: kerry_prez at yahoo.com (Al Brooks) Date: Tue, 7 Nov 2006 13:51:03 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] preliminary consensus is... In-Reply-To: <7.0.1.0.2.20061107143737.0215eea8@satx.rr.com> Message-ID: <20061107215103.10732.qmail@web51603.mail.yahoo.com> Due to a lack of intelligence and variation in the intelligence of students, not much can be done with education. However the alienation involved in education can be ameliorated with: vouchers. charter schools. homeschooling. Since extropians want maximum choice, having school choice is self-evidently desirable; therefore this motion is passed, session is adjourned until the next election. --------------------------------- Sponsored Link Get a free Motorola Razr! Today Only! Choose Cingular, Sprint, Verizon, Alltel, or T-Mobile. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From amara at amara.com Tue Nov 7 22:15:38 2006 From: amara at amara.com (Amara Graps) Date: Tue, 7 Nov 2006 14:15:38 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Some of my Recent Creations Message-ID: I agree, congratulations on your fine artwork, Ian. Ian Goddard iamgoddard at yahoo.com >Thanks! I've never been able to deal with watercolor and admire people >who can! The water has a mind of its own and you have to learn to work >with it. For me, if I'm not happy with a piece, I feel terrible. So >I've never put myself through the anguish necessary to master >watercolors. But watercolor can be such fun (maybe you take the medium too seriously) My Zoo: (with advice from (1)) http://www.amara.com/zoo/zoo.html Amara (1) Watercolor for the Artistically Undiscovered (Klutz S.) http://www.amazon.com/Watercolor-Artistically-Undiscovered-Klutz-S/dp/1878257447/ From pj at pj-manney.com Tue Nov 7 22:43:40 2006 From: pj at pj-manney.com (pjmanney) Date: Tue, 07 Nov 2006 17:43:40 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] it's all understandable, except Message-ID: <21684711.482321162939420353.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> >What can I say, you're still missing the mark widely. Look >at Ashkenazi eugenics. You'll probably think the results like >http://www.masada2000.org/nobel.html are sure due to IQ alone. But >please read http://www.masada2000.org/Powerful-Jews.html >especially the very last line. Yeah, sometimes it's that simple. As an Ashkenazi, I can say, Yes. It is that simple. Take a good look at that Nobel list. Beyond being mind boggling, it demonstrates that you have to be motivated to want it. And the entire Jewish culture is based on the concept of motivated education -- be it studying the Talmud or the physics book. We are motivated to learn at the earliest ages. And defend our knowledge and our thoughts, be it in the classroom or around the dinner table. Frankly, my dinner table was way tougher than any classroom. A punchline to my "killer school" dyslexia story: As you can imagine, my parents were beyond horrified to find out I had this problem that we could have been dealing with all these years, but were unaware of it. Beyond wanting to murder the teachers, my grandmother said: "Ach mein Gott, you COULD have been a doctor!" My father said: "Oh my God, you COULD have been a rocket scientist!" Nobody, not even my mother, wanted me to be a lawyer. Such were their expectations for me, as good Jews. I didn't have the heart to tell them that either scenario would have still been pretty unlikely... PJ From benboc at lineone.net Tue Nov 7 22:32:57 2006 From: benboc at lineone.net (ben) Date: Tue, 07 Nov 2006 22:32:57 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] A Diversity Re: Just curious, it's not natural! In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <45510999.5010102@lineone.net> Anna wrote: Ben wrote: >>Are you sure you mean what you say here? You >>actually feel that somebody's use of a word in a >>way that you disagree with, is a violation of your >>rights? >Yes I do. I'm assuming then that you can tell me what >your thoughts are regarding the word "marriage". >Is it just a word without any symbols or associations? Well then, i'm sorry, but i'm going to have to violate your rights! My thoughts regarding the word? - well, of course the word has symbols and associations, in my mind, otherwise i wouldn't be able to use it. But they are very personal to me, in the sense that these symbols and associations are useful only to me, and would likely be incomprehensible to anyone else. Apart from that, yes, it's just a word. What it means is a matter of consensus. Language changes all the time, even the French can't change that. No one of us has any 'right' to determine what a word should mean to other people. > It doesn't bother you in the least that a "Union" can >represent transgender marriage, gay marriage, lesbian >marriage, heterosexual marriage, whatever goes..as >long as the legal ramifications remain the same? Absolutely. I fail to see why anyone could object to that. Why should it bother me, or anyone else? A 'Union' is the business of the parties involved, and nobody else. If they want their association to have a legal status, why should anyone try to prevent it? If a commonly understood word is applied to that union, then everyone will know what legal status it has. It grieves me that someone who has been living with a partner for many years, in a loving and caring relationship, can be denied things like visiting rights in hospital if their partner is ill, just because they aren't 'married', because they both happen to be male (or female). This concept of marriage makes you belong in a family together. Why on earth would anyone want to deny people this if they want it? It's beyond me. >Throughout history, did the word "marriage" ever refer >to 2 men or 2 women? Is that relevant? Look at the word 'gay'. It has changed with time. Things change. Bloody good thing too, or Transhumanism would be totally meaningless. >If you want to create evolution don't use names that >have been around for 2000 years and try to change, use >the word "Singularity" to create something different. Do you think the word 'marriage' has been around that long? and with the same meaning all that time? I don't know if it has or not, but i'd tend to doubt it. Still, it's irrelevant, as i said above. This has got nothing to do with the singularity, it's just about common humanity. ben zaiboc From pj at pj-manney.com Tue Nov 7 23:18:06 2006 From: pj at pj-manney.com (pjmanney) Date: Tue, 07 Nov 2006 18:18:06 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] here's how complicated it is Message-ID: <12771592.485741162941486366.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From velvethum at hotmail.com Wed Nov 8 00:09:06 2006 From: velvethum at hotmail.com (Heartland) Date: Tue, 7 Nov 2006 19:09:06 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Detectives and red herrings (was Survivaltangent) References: Message-ID: > Slawomir wrote: > >> I also strongly suspect your motivation for "agency" >> which is to save "patternism" from failing when considering >> identity with respect to (changing) patterns over time. That's why >> Things->Body->Brain->Pattern->VBMs->Agency is warranted. Your >> "agency" >> Things->Body->Brain->Pattern->VBMs->is just >> another >> layer of abstraction or an "improvement" on top of the heap >> of "improvements" >> constructed by patternists. Even though I applaud your >> motivation for "agency" I'm afraid I have to file it under >> SBA (suicide by abstraction), sorry. I simply can't accept >> survival as intangible and abstract as this. Jef: > Slawomir, once again, we're talking about two different things. I've > recognized your point all along, and I've demonstrated (with your > agreement) that I can state your point back to you, perhaps more > concisely than you can state it yourself. Jef, I can report back to you that this frustration is mutual. I feel that whenever I write X, you read G; I write Y, you read C (and keep insisting I support G and C). I'll quickly add that, IMO, this is probably an honest mistake. In any case, when you say that, "I can state your point back to you, perhaps more concisely than you can state it yourself" you're assuming unbelievably high degree of confidence in your correct understanding of what I'm saying, and I must tell you that the longer we talk to each other the more I realize that this high confidence that you display is unwarranted. When you tell me that I don't understand your point, I tend to accept that as sufficient evidence that I don't understand what you're saying. And if I tell you that you don't understand what I'm talking about, perhaps it would be a good idea to treat this as evidence that you don't understand. It's just a suggestion. It's hard to achieve progress in any discussion when people fail to realize what they argue about in the first place. Jef: > Let me state (my understanding of) our positions so we all feel clearly > heard, and perhaps to lay a clean solid foundation upon which future > discussion can *grow*. > > Slawomir's position: > Survival of one's personal identity is strictly dependent on > continuation of the physical constituents of the mind-producing process. First of all, "personal identity" is a bit of a red herring. Ultimately I'm interested in defining life and necessary conditions to extend life which is at least one meta-level above discussions about personal identity. Second of all, I fear that someone might read "physical constituents" and think "atoms" (J.K.Clark) instead of "energy across space and time." So a less misleading message should be: "Life is an *instance* of process. It exists for the duration of that instance. Subsequent instantiations of the same *type* of process do not extend existence of previous instances." Jef: > While some people talk as if they could survive indefinitely by means of > copies of themselves to overcome loss due to aging or accident, they > overlook or deny the simple ontological truth that a copy is, by its > very definition, not the same as the original. That part is fine. Slawomir From kerry_prez at yahoo.com Wed Nov 8 01:18:03 2006 From: kerry_prez at yahoo.com (Al Brooks) Date: Tue, 7 Nov 2006 17:18:03 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] here's how complicated it is In-Reply-To: <12771592.485741162941486366.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> Message-ID: <20061108011803.53177.qmail@web51610.mail.yahoo.com> Do schools need to teach arts and sports at all?-- can't students learn those subjects in their free time? [...]a student can choose to focus on a specific "strand" of study (eg. science, engineering, arts, writing, etc. __________________________________________________________________________________________ Sponsored Link Talk more and pay less. Vonage can save you up to $300 a year on your phone bill. Sign up now. http://www.vonage.com/startsavingnow/ From brentn at freeshell.org Wed Nov 8 01:29:18 2006 From: brentn at freeshell.org (Brent Neal) Date: Tue, 7 Nov 2006 20:29:18 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] here's how complicated it is In-Reply-To: <20061108011803.53177.qmail@web51610.mail.yahoo.com> References: <20061108011803.53177.qmail@web51610.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: On Nov 7, 2006, at 20:18, Al Brooks wrote: > Do schools need to teach arts and sports at all?-- > can't students learn those subjects in their free > time? > There is ample evidence that music, e.g., complements growth of math skills. This is anecdotally comfirmed by the fact that a large number of my colleagues at my alma mater, the NC School of Science and Math, were band geeks. B -- Brent Neal Geek of all Trades http://brentn.freeshell.org "Specialization is for insects" -- Robert A. Heinlein From kerry_prez at yahoo.com Wed Nov 8 01:42:46 2006 From: kerry_prez at yahoo.com (Al Brooks) Date: Tue, 7 Nov 2006 17:42:46 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] here's how complicated it is In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <20061108014246.95547.qmail@web51605.mail.yahoo.com> What about sports?; don't children get plenty of exercise and teamwork skills on their own, after hours? Is it wise to spend hundreds (or is it thousands?) per capita on gymnasiums, fields, equipment, and phys ed instructors? > There is ample evidence that music, e.g., > complements growth of math > skills. This is anecdotally comfirmed by the fact > that a large number > of my colleagues at my alma mater, the NC School of > Science and Math, > were band geeks. > > B ____________________________________________________________________________________ Sponsored Link $200,000 mortgage for $660/mo - 30/15 yr fixed, reduce debt, home equity - Click now for info http://yahoo.ratemarketplace.com From pj at pj-manney.com Wed Nov 8 01:50:05 2006 From: pj at pj-manney.com (pjmanney) Date: Tue, 07 Nov 2006 20:50:05 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] here's how complicated it is Message-ID: <29288068.490681162950605734.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> You're kidding us. Right? PJ >What about sports?; don't children get plenty of >exercise and teamwork skills on their own, after >hours? >Is it wise to spend hundreds (or is it thousands?) per >capita on gymnasiums, fields, equipment, and phys ed >instructors? From kerry_prez at yahoo.com Wed Nov 8 02:29:12 2006 From: kerry_prez at yahoo.com (Al Brooks) Date: Tue, 7 Nov 2006 18:29:12 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] here's how complicated it is In-Reply-To: <29288068.490681162950605734.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> Message-ID: <20061108022912.27082.qmail@web51606.mail.yahoo.com> No, am not kidding. I honestly do not know if government provided physical education is necessary. Not everyone knows these things. --- pjmanney wrote: > You're kidding us. Right? > > PJ ____________________________________________________________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? Everyone is raving about the all-new Yahoo! Mail. http://new.mail.yahoo.com From nvitamore at austin.rr.com Wed Nov 8 02:06:01 2006 From: nvitamore at austin.rr.com (nvitamore at austin.rr.com) Date: Tue, 7 Nov 2006 21:06:01 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] here's how complicated it is Message-ID: <380-220061138261795@M2W103.mail2web.com> From: pjmanney >>What about sports?; don't children get plenty of >exercise and teamwork skills on their own, after >>hours? >>Is it wise to spend hundreds (or is it thousands?) per >>capita on gymnasiums, fields, equipment, and phys ed >>instructors? >You're kidding us. Right? Sports and athleticism are essential for a solid, complete curriculum of knowledge-gaining, interaction, and developing technical skill as well as personal and social skils. _______________________________________________ extropy-chat mailing list extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat -------------------------------------------------------------------- mail2web - Check your email from the web at http://mail2web.com/ . From brentn at freeshell.org Wed Nov 8 03:12:56 2006 From: brentn at freeshell.org (Brent Neal) Date: Tue, 7 Nov 2006 22:12:56 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] here's how complicated it is In-Reply-To: <20061108014246.95547.qmail@web51605.mail.yahoo.com> References: <20061108014246.95547.qmail@web51605.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: On Nov 7, 2006, at 20:42, Al Brooks wrote: > What about sports?; don't children get plenty of > exercise and teamwork skills on their own, after > hours? That depends on the socioeconomic status of the children you're talking about. B -- Brent Neal Geek of all Trades http://brentn.freeshell.org "Specialization is for insects" -- Robert A. Heinlein From brentn at freeshell.org Wed Nov 8 03:23:29 2006 From: brentn at freeshell.org (Brent Neal) Date: Tue, 7 Nov 2006 22:23:29 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] here's how complicated it is In-Reply-To: <380-220061138261795@M2W103.mail2web.com> References: <380-220061138261795@M2W103.mail2web.com> Message-ID: On Nov 7, 2006, at 21:06, nvitamore at austin.rr.com wrote: > > > Sports and athleticism are essential for a solid, complete > curriculum of > knowledge-gaining, interaction, and developing technical skill as > well as > personal and social skils. > > Agreed, wholeheartedly. Overall bodily health affects the mind and its development. B -- Brent Neal Geek of all Trades http://brentn.freeshell.org "Specialization is for insects" -- Robert A. Heinlein From transhumanist at goldenfuture.net Wed Nov 8 03:24:53 2006 From: transhumanist at goldenfuture.net (Joseph Bloch) Date: Tue, 07 Nov 2006 22:24:53 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] [private message] speaking of electoral college In-Reply-To: <20061107035731.10776.qmail@web51615.mail.yahoo.com> References: <20061107035731.10776.qmail@web51615.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <45514E05.2040706@goldenfuture.net> Huh? I was just pointing out a site that is about to give electoral college results for potential candidates. The whole "private message" thing in the subject line is confusing me. Joseph Al Brooks wrote: > Bush as you know didn't steal the election in 2000, the rules on a tie > allow for an election to be settled in court. My commie friends say > "but that's so subjective"; of course it is-- that's what politics /is > /mostly, the whims of the electorate the moment they are in the voting > booths; then they change a little by the next election until after > many generations the situation does substantially change. You're old > enough to remember the '80s, right? Things have changed little since then. > > > > > */Joseph Bloch /* wrote: > > For those who are interested in what the 2008 election might look > like > (according to the electoral college, not just a popular vote), take a > gander here > > ------------------------------------------------------------------------ > Sponsored Link > > Free Uniden 5.8GHz Phone System with Packet8 Internet Phone Service > > >------------------------------------------------------------------------ > >_______________________________________________ >extropy-chat mailing list >extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org >http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > > From c.hales at pgrad.unimelb.edu.au Wed Nov 8 03:34:07 2006 From: c.hales at pgrad.unimelb.edu.au (Colin Geoffrey Hales) Date: Wed, 08 Nov 2006 14:34:07 +1100 (EST) Subject: [extropy-chat] it's all understandable, except Message-ID: <1952.128.250.225.217.1162956847.squirrel@webmail.student.unimelb.edu.au> > On Mon, Nov 06, 2006 at 12:01:41PM -0500, Rafal Smigrodzki wrote: > >> ### Jeez, Eugen, you sound depressed. Reading libertarian-leaning > > No, just not irrationally exhuberant. You might or might not remember that just prior to the .bomb I wasn't exactly exhuberant, either. Where others saw the gleaming outskirts of the Singularity, I only saw a bubble about to pop. Well, I hate to repeat myself, but this one is going to be a really Big One. The only thing I don't know for sure is when exactly. Some say as early as 2007, some put that at 2012. > It's hard to tell, because it's punctuated equilibrium psychology thing. In a number of different universes it has happened already. > Hi Eugene... I am still aiming for 2012. Although it is looking a little opimistic at the moment. So put me down for the 2012 timeslot with an option for 2015. My chip design proof of principle simulations will be done 2010 (end of my PhD - it's my project). Then chip fabrication for the first experiments to prove the chips are having experiences. After that it'll get let loose on humanity and 7 billion pairs of hands might give it a leg up. Although I still think we're gonna have trouble wanting them to be alive! The first creatures will be sort of single-cell-scientists. A bridge of them comparing notes, doing science on novelty (novelty to them, anyway). The scientists are all inside each other, able to compare experiences. Grafting human brains together to do the equivalent on humans has a few ethical hurdles! It all depends on whther the AGI that results can sort out the nanotech required for the subsequent versions of the chips. Until that is done they'll all be made with existing fabrication/embodiment techniques and no self-replication will be involved. So the exact timing is a bit debatable. There's going to be a big change to science next year, tho. A sort of Kuhnian shake-out. I'm madly pressing all those buttons right now. I suppose I'm pressing it here too. It's slowly sinking in. I'm hammering 3 other email forums (fora?) as best I can. I am on a leave of absence from my PhD until Jan and after that I won't have time to press that button any more. Don't think the science thing counts as a singularity, however. Although historians might view it that way. All good fun, regardless. :-) Colin Hales From pj at pj-manney.com Wed Nov 8 03:45:13 2006 From: pj at pj-manney.com (pjmanney) Date: Tue, 07 Nov 2006 22:45:13 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] here's how complicated it is Message-ID: <4637134.499241162957513893.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> >No, am not kidding. I honestly do not know if >government provided physical education is necessary. >Not everyone knows these things. Websites and papers: http://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/mm5336a5.htm http://www.aahperd.org/NASPE/pdf_files/pos_papers/pe_critical.PDF http://www.wirral.gov.uk/atoz/documents/The%20Health%20Benefits%20of%20Physical%20Education%20and%20Sport.pdf http://www.pecentral.org/professional/defending/benefits.html http://www.cde.ca.gov/re/pn/fd/documents/pefrwk.pdf There is not much mention of the 'privitzation' issue of sports in these papers. But I can tell you from having had children in association league sports, like Little League and AYSO (American Youth Soccer Organization), that 1) not all kids can participate because of the costs involved; 2) not all parents can let them participate because of the parental involvement requirements or time commitments; 3) depending on the sport, the coach, etc., they can take up an amazing amount of a kid's time outside of school, which some kids might find difficult if they are involved in other pursuits, like the arts or tutoring or scouting or have excessive homework issues; 4) some of the parent-run leagues are very intense and some kids hate them. [My own son quit soccer and wouldn't join basketball because of the @#$hole parents involved in both in our town. One dad, who coached the opposing team, actually insulted my son after a game by telling him his successful blocking of all their attempted goals was bad, because his son's team lost. After the dad walked away, my son turned to me, with a look of total disgust and said, "I'm not playing next year." And that was that. I just wish these dads (and they are all dads in my experience) would let their kids be kids and stop living out their own dashed dreams. Ironically, my son is waiting for Jr. High and High School to join school football. He knows the players' parents are less involved in school sports and thinks he'll enjoy it more then.] If kids don't get physical activity at school, many kids won't get it at all. And they obviously need them, physically, mentally and emotionally. Respectfully, PJ From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Wed Nov 8 04:18:12 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Tue, 7 Nov 2006 23:18:12 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] POL: Dems will take the house Message-ID: This has been in the wind for a while, but its satisfying to see CNN make it "official". They are now predicting the Democrats will take the U.S. House of Representatives. The Senate may still be possible as well though it appears to be more difficult. Robert -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From kerry_prez at yahoo.com Wed Nov 8 05:09:42 2006 From: kerry_prez at yahoo.com (Al Brooks) Date: Tue, 7 Nov 2006 21:09:42 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] speaking of electoral college In-Reply-To: <45514E05.2040706@goldenfuture.net> Message-ID: <20061108050942.21982.qmail@web51602.mail.yahoo.com> Sorry, Joseph, tried to send you a private message but it went to extropy-chat as well. Anyway so much conspiracy theory exists that to this day millions (yes, millions) think Bush stole the 2000 election. It may be ancient history yet it demonstrates how so many don't understand America isn't a democracy, it's a democratic republic-- the electoral college is part of this. >Joseph Bloch wrote: > Huh? I was just pointing out a site that is about to > give electoral > college results for potential candidates. > > The whole "private message" thing in the subject > line is confusing me. > > Joseph > > > Al Brooks wrote: > > > Bush as you know didn't steal the election in > 2000, the rules on a tie > > allow for an election to be settled in court. My > commie friends say > > "but that's so subjective"; of course it is-- > that's what politics /is > > /mostly, the whims of the electorate the moment > they are in the voting > > booths; then they change a little by the next > election until after > > many generations the situation does substantially > change. You're old > > enough to remember the '80s, right? Things have > changed little since then. > > > > > > > > > > */Joseph Bloch /* > wrote: > > > > For those who are interested in what the 2008 > election might look > > like > > (according to the electoral college, not just > a popular vote), take a > > gander here > > > > > ------------------------------------------------------------------------ > > Sponsored Link > > > > Free Uniden 5.8GHz Phone System with Packet8 > Internet Phone Service > > > > > >------------------------------------------------------------------------ > > > >_______________________________________________ > >extropy-chat mailing list > >extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > >http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > > > > > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > ____________________________________________________________________________________ Want to start your own business? Learn how on Yahoo! Small Business. http://smallbusiness.yahoo.com/r-index From iamgoddard at yahoo.com Wed Nov 8 05:10:35 2006 From: iamgoddard at yahoo.com (Ian Goddard) Date: Tue, 7 Nov 2006 21:10:35 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Some of my Recent Creations Message-ID: <20061108051035.84282.qmail@web52601.mail.yahoo.com> Amara wrote: > I agree, congratulations on your fine artwork, Ian. Thanks Amara! I enjoyed viewing your photos. http://www.amara.com/photo/photo.html They're truly stunning and show such a sophisticated sense of balance and design. And concurrent poetic content, such as here http://www.amara.com/photo/mistsoftime.html , makes for a powerful full-sensory experience! >> I've never put myself through the anguish necessary >> to master watercolors. > > But watercolor can be such fun (maybe you take the > medium too seriously) You're right! I should approach art with a more playful attitude. In my teens and early twenties I did a lot of freewheeling abstract art. I just let my imagination fly free, never knowing where it might go. I don't have any of that online. Of course forms of visionary-enhancement popular back in those days made non-abstract art almost impossible to do! %^) > My Zoo: (with advice from (1)) > http://www.amara.com/zoo/zoo.html Such a combination of free-style artistic design and thought pointing to a higher dimension of art as a medium of inner self-exploration and realization. Truly inspirational! Thanks again Amara! ~Ian ____________________________________________________________________________________ Sponsored Link For just $24.99/mo., Vonage offers unlimited local and long- distance calling. Sign up now. http://www.vonage.com/startsavingnow/ From kerry_prez at yahoo.com Wed Nov 8 05:15:39 2006 From: kerry_prez at yahoo.com (Al Brooks) Date: Tue, 7 Nov 2006 21:15:39 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] here's how complicated it is In-Reply-To: <4637134.499241162957513893.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> Message-ID: <20061108051539.59705.qmail@web51613.mail.yahoo.com> Great reply, PJ, never would expected anything so comprehensive. Thankyou. I brought this all up after reading Milton Friedman's statement concerning school performance being "deplorable". Friedman is a solid economist, not a crank, so when he says 'deplorable' it's disturbing. > Websites and papers: > > http://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/mm5336a5.htm > > http://www.aahperd.org/NASPE/pdf_files/pos_papers/pe_critical.PDF > > http://www.wirral.gov.uk/atoz/documents/The%20Health%20Benefits%20of%20Physical%20Education%20and%20Sport.pdf > > http://www.pecentral.org/professional/defending/benefits.html > > http://www.cde.ca.gov/re/pn/fd/documents/pefrwk.pdf > > There is not much mention of the 'privitzation' > issue of sports in these papers. But I can tell you > from having had children in association league > sports, like Little League and AYSO (American Youth > Soccer Organization), that 1) not all kids can > participate because of the costs involved; 2) not > all parents can let them participate because of the > parental involvement requirements or time > commitments; 3) depending on the sport, the coach, > etc., they can take up an amazing amount of a kid's > time outside of school, which some kids might find > difficult if they are involved in other pursuits, > like the arts or tutoring or scouting or have > excessive homework issues; 4) some of the parent-run > leagues are very intense and some kids hate them. > [My own son quit soccer and wouldn't join basketball > because of the @#$hole parents involved in both in > our town. One dad, who coached the opposing team, > actually insulted my son after a game by telling him > his successful blocking of all thei! > r attempted goals was bad, because his son's team > lost. After the dad walked away, my son turned to > me, with a look of total disgust and said, "I'm not > playing next year." And that was that. I just wish > these dads (and they are all dads in my experience) > would let their kids be kids and stop living out > their own dashed dreams. Ironically, my son is > waiting for Jr. High and High School to join school > football. He knows the players' parents are less > involved in school sports and thinks he'll enjoy it > more then.] > > If kids don't get physical activity at school, many > kids won't get it at all. And they obviously need > them, physically, mentally and emotionally. > > Respectfully, > PJ > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > ____________________________________________________________________________________ Sponsored Link Try Netflix today! With plans starting at only $5.99 a month what are you waiting for? http://www.netflix.com/Signup?mqso=80010030 From lcorbin at rawbw.com Wed Nov 8 05:44:27 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Tue, 7 Nov 2006 21:44:27 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Agency as Prime Determinant of Personal Identity Message-ID: <093501c702f8$f88577f0$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> On Sun Nov 5 15:34:33, Jef posted the analysis we'd been looking to. I wish to deal with it in two parts, one now and one tomorrow. Although Jef wrote a later absolutely marvelous post that mostly skillfully summarized differences between our various positions---and one that I think was exceedingly accurate---it's clear (to me) that in *this* essay here he didn't understand *my* position. To wit, Jef writes in his Sunday Nov 5 piece, http://lists.extropy.org/pipermail/extropy-chat/2006-November/030329.html , > Lee wrote > > I *admit* that! Too much change kills one. It changes you > > into someone else. Notice here I did say "too *much* change". > Lee, I presented the little story of Aging Alice in order to demonstrate > the incompleteness of the "patternist" view...While I agree that > this holds for any given instant (t=0), and that it supports the view > that an identical copy of a person is essentially that same person, this > definition appears to fail *immediately* and progressively with > increasing divergence of two instances of the same person. > (1) You have stated that as change accumulates with age, > at some point a person must be considered to have become > a different person. I never intended to say at *some* particular point t=t0. > (2) You have stated that one should consider any copies of > oneself as being exactly the same person regardless of some > non-zero amount of space, time and accumulated experience, > so it is clear that in your theory, personal identity > persists through some significant amount of change. Yes, but only to a *degree*, which is a continuous variable. > 3) So in your theory it seems either that there must be some t>0 > dividing point, or that your definition of personal identity is > internally contradictory. Why can't it be a slow continuous change? I have always emphasized "close duplicates" as being you more than significantly different duplicates, e.g. ones made from you many years ago. > (3a) You seem to claim a sort of mathematical or > objective purity to your theory, so I would ask > you, at what point is a person no longer the > same person? And I would retort, "at what exact point during dusk does it become dark?", or "at what point does one become middle-aged?" > (4)Failing (3a), would you agree that personal identity > (other than for the trivial case at t=0) can not be > stated essentially in terms of some objective physical > measure (ideal or practical), but that personal identity > must necessarily be assigned as the result of some subjective > evaluation (which of course is likely to have a strong > correspondence with observables)? No, I do not agree. First, it *can* be stated in objective terms, just as in my example "nighttime" and "middle age" are objective phenomonena. Just because some quality lacks a *precise* point of definition does not detract from its reality. "Hot" and "cold" have been replaced, and objectively so, by the temperature scale. But this does not mean that "hot" and "cold" are meaningless. I draw your attention to *similarity*. Similarity of state, I contend, is objective, and metrics can be defined that attempt to capture the degree of objective similarity between two things. True, we may have different metrics, but they tend to be themselves similar in the measurements they yield. Thus an earlier version of you, say from last month, is objectively different from you now, and is objectively less different from you than was your ten year old self. (P.S. sorry if I've repeated myself too much in this post.) Lee > Please let me know your response to the preceding and > of your agreement or disagreement with any of its premises > or conclusions. From lcorbin at rawbw.com Wed Nov 8 05:52:36 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Tue, 7 Nov 2006 21:52:36 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Detectives and red herrings (was Survivaltangent) References: Message-ID: <094401c702fa$3e74f3c0$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Here is Jef's very fine analysis of our positions: > Let me state (my understanding of) our positions so we all feel clearly > heard, and perhaps to lay a clean solid foundation upon which future > discussion can *grow*. [Hear, hear!] > > Slawomir's position: > Survival of one's personal identity is strictly dependent on continuation > of the physical constituents of the mind-producing process. While some > people talk as if they could survive indefinitely by means of copies of > themselves to overcome loss due to aging or accident, they overlook > or deny the simple ontological truth that a copy is, by its very definition, > not the same as the original. > > John's position: > Survival of one's personal identity is quite perfectly achievable in theory, > and will become so in practice when we have acquired the technological > means to make an effective working copy of a person's identity. Neither > substrate nor continuity matter in this endeavor, as long as the process > which constitutes one's mind is faithfully reproduced and running. Copy > and Original *are* identical when there is no measurable functional difference. > > Lee's position: > Survival of one's personal identity is absolutely possible in theory and will > become absolutely achievable if and when we have technology enabling us > to run copies of the pattern that constitutes the mind including (but not > necessarily limited to) its values, beliefs and memories. While it's an obvious > mathematical truism that a copy is absolutely identical to the original (in all > ways that matter) at the instant of copying, it is also true that values, beliefs > and memories naturally change over time so it is vitally important to survival > of one's personal identity that copies be made before too much change has > accumulated. Beyond that point, the original person should be > considered effectively lost and dead. Bravo! It seems that *here* you've ennuciated my position with great accuracy! > Jef's position: > The Self that one imagines might survive independently of changes in its > environment is an illusion (albeit a convenient one) because the self > exists only in terms of its interactions with its environment. As an > agent acting within a given environmental context, what is best from the > point of view of that agent is not necessarily survival but that it > influences its environment so as to promote its own values into the > future, in effect acting to create a future world matching the model it > would like to see. To the extent that the future world contains an > entity representing Self, then it can be said that Self "survived." To > the extent that multiple agents represent Self, then it can be said that > they are indeed Self. > > Corrections, questions, comments...dirty jokes? I think that skillful efforts like this one someone's part are incredibly helpful, so thanks! Lee P.S. Apologies if I've made the formatting worse: it occurred to me while I was doing it that I'm not using fixed-font, and many readers probably are. From lcorbin at rawbw.com Wed Nov 8 06:02:54 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Tue, 7 Nov 2006 22:02:54 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Identity (was: Survival tangent) References: <20061102062735.57668.qmail@web52612.mail.yahoo.com><015601c7010a$6a7d5d50$450a4e0c@MyComputer><008101c701b4$37b35870$250b4e0c@MyComputer><3C5E9884-5CD8-46CC-9841-28C6980CE600@randallsquared.com><059a01c701f8$841e1670$bb0a4e0c@MyComputer> <07e501c7022a$d2c1d9b0$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <014801c70247$5ca26a70$25094e0c@MyComputer> Message-ID: <094d01c702fb$f09a2830$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> John writes > "Lee Corbin" > >> So if it's true that there is an extremely similar >> (only a trillion or so atoms different with slightly >> different pattern) copy of you running on a planet >> of Alpha Centauri, it's okay if it or you die? > > An exact duplicate of the earth, and it's entire ecosystem, is created a > billion light years away. The duplicate world would need some sort of > feedback mechanism to keep the worlds in synchronization, No! I'm talking about a complete accident (cf. "Luckiest Man in the Universe" by Max More). For my purposes they do *not* need to be kept in synch (and how could they be, as you say?) It just so happens that at *this* moment, the John Clark there and the John Clark here differ by only a few trillion atoms. Like you and the you of half an hour ago. > 2) I find out that for the first time since the Big Bang the worlds will > diverge, in 10 seconds you will put a bullet in my head but my double will > be spared. Am I concerned? Yes, and angry as well, in times of intense > stress nobody is very logical. I admitted the same a few days ago about a Bengal Tiger jumping into my room. > My double is no longer exact because I am going through a traumatic > experience and my double is not. I'd be looking at that huge gun Oh, let's please revert to just the abstract knowledge that one of you is to be disintegrated instantly. > My (semi) double would be thinking "it's a shame about that other fellow but > I'm glad it's not me". He shouldn't think that. He should say instead, "It's a pity that my runtime has just been halved. (I'm not even sure yet that I'm the one on Earth or the one near Alpha Centauri.)". It *was* you. It was just "you" at a different place, but an exceedingly *similar* you. It's a red-herring, really, to discuss absolutely "exact" duplicates. Lee From lcorbin at rawbw.com Wed Nov 8 06:16:50 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Tue, 7 Nov 2006 22:16:50 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Intelligence of Leaders (was Re: it's all understandable, except) References: <14545876.369241162848958726.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> <08a701c70235$101089b0$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <21AA27CF-5EA0-4D8E-AD33-99FEBCF62525@ceruleansystems.com> Message-ID: <095301c702fd$a09d3ff0$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Andrew writes > On Nov 6, 2006, at 10:19 PM, Lee Corbin wrote [to PJ] >> RIGHT YOU ARE! This is a very important point. >> Dean Keith Simonton in his book "Greatness" explains >> that it is seldom that people who are about 20 IQ points >> lower than you are can even understand you. He uses >> this idea very convincingly to explain why British PMs >> are smarter on average than U.S. presidents. The former >> need to impress other MPs, the latter >> only to impress the average American voter. > > Here's a serious question then with respect to this hypothesis: is > there evidence that the average US President was more intelligent > prior to 1913, and if so what kind of average discrepancy are we > talking about? I don't know! And I sure wish I did. But the change probably came with the election of Jackson, which was more democratic. We may surmise---as I think Simonton did---that before 1828 the Presidents were smarter. Now, in my opinion, incidentally, this is not necessarily a defect in the American system. The president is not God. He or she has policy formulations determined by the best staffs that he or she can find. A good judge of character and ability to delegate is probably more important than a very high IQ. Reagan was more successful than Carter, and Roosevelt was more successful than Hoover, though in each case I strongly suspect the last mentioned in each case of having a much lower IQ than the former. Hoover was probably the brightest U.S. president of all, but he embraced even before Roosevelt the same government-meddling policies that caused the great depression. (This is the Austrian view.) If only Harding or Coolidge could have remained president just a bit longer (so writes Paul Johnson, IMO the world's greatest living historian), a great deal of evil in the 20th century would have been averted. > And does it account for basic differences in the process that > determines who gets to be an MP and who gets to be a > Congressman that bias the selection of the two populations > a PM or President had to interact with? I'm assuming that Simonton was suggesting that MPs are very parallel to Congresspeople. Both need to impress their constituents and be understandable to them. The only difference I think there is, as I mentioned, is the secondary one of how the final leader is determined. Lee From lcorbin at rawbw.com Wed Nov 8 06:35:20 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Tue, 7 Nov 2006 22:35:20 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Educational Environments (was Re: it's all understandable, except) References: <638d4e150611041749n1a3c2907xd32d00ff60a11df6@mail.gmail.com> <05ec01c7008a$ab914660$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <20061105203158.GJ6974@leitl.org> <077d01c70195$28852dc0$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <26B1670E-0EBC-407E-AC2B-A654492C6FA1@mac.com> Message-ID: <095601c70300$285bd9e0$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Samantha writes > ...Lee Corbin wrote: > >> Since Eugen wrote, a number of people have chimed >> in to agree. I ask, where is the evidence that the key >> problems are current educational environments or poor >> parenting? Are there studies? > > What is the worth of these studies though? How has their > methodology been vetted? The IQ studies are extremely solid. Again, I suggest people read the Amazon reviews of "The g-Factor" over and over until they ceased to be shocked by them. I infer that the Judith Rich Harris studies are absolutely solid too. She makes a terrific case in her book "The Nurture Assumption", and it's a fact that the researchers all applaud. See "The Blank Slate" by Pinker for a summary, or, I'm sure web references exist. >> The studies---your anecdotes aside---report what I said they did, >> namely that it's genes 50%, peers 50%, parents 0%, and schools, 0%. >> (I should add, to be careful, that these are determinants of adult >> personality. But I think that it applies to contributing technically >> to society too.) > > This seems highly unlikely and suspicious. How would genes be that > well separated out from environmental factors[?]. It's marvelous to read about, say in "The g-Factor" how cleverly it can be done. There are all manner of ingenious studies crafted by numerous researchers over the last century, and by comparing them, a great deal can be deduced. Moreover, it all paints the same picture. So something similar must be arousing the admiration of the academics who support Judith Rich Harris. > In environmental factors how exactly would the contribution from > parents and schools be teased out so cleanly from that of peers? One huge tool is twin-studies of course. It's amazing how many there have been. Also, very clever studies have shown that SES does not at all strongly contribute to IQ. As I'm reading Jensen, I'm really impressed with his open-mindedness and thorough testing of alternate hypotheses. > It looks a good deal too pat on the face of it, doesn't it? I confess that I had more reservations---yes, it does look pat--- before I read "The g-Factor" than after. And Jensen's is by no means the only book. There are horror stories about how hard it is to find a publisher. After "The Bell Curve", they're all scared to death. >> And furthermore, contrary to what Eugen states, the limiting factor >> *is* what is between the ears. Researchers on intelligence admit, >> however, that intelligence is like money. It really doesn't matter >> how much you have so long as you have enough. >> >> But the overwhelming part of the populace does *not* have enough >> cognitive ability, not enough for today's technical needs. > > So, a bit down the road we can fix that, yes? We hope. First. people have to admit it's a problem. Even if they did---which they do not---we are talking what? the usual thirty years for anything to happen? Lee From lcorbin at rawbw.com Wed Nov 8 06:46:37 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Tue, 7 Nov 2006 22:46:37 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Detectives and red herrings (was Survivaltangent) References: Message-ID: <095f01c70301$da6b8a80$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Jef also wrote a summary of his own position: ----- Original Message ----- Sent: Tuesday, November 07, 2006 8:41 AM > Jef's position: > The Self that one imagines might survive independently of changes in its > environment is an illusion (albeit a convenient one) because the self > exists only in terms of its interactions with its environment. Well, you may qualify this in the next statements, but this does make it sound that if I take a sudden vacation to Tokyo (where I've never been), and immerse myself as much as I can with what's going on there---including intensely studying the language---then while I am there I am someone else. But I say, on the contrary, that because the VBM are still so much the same, it's really *me* in Tokyo, not someone else. > As an agent acting within a given environmental context, what is > best from the point of view of that agent is not necessarily > survival but that it influences its environment so as to promote its > own values into the future, in effect acting to create a future world > matching the model it would like to see. Wow! That sounds very idealistic to me (in the sense of willing to give up something). "Survival" is what I'm talking about, as you know. Suppose that I determine that Eliezer or someone can more effectively "promote my values into the future" than I can. So I should agree to stop being me, and let there be two of him? No way! Call me selfish, but these VBM are going to stick around if they can help it, especially the memories. > To the extent that the future world contains an > entity representing Self, then it can be said that > Self "survived." To the extent that multiple agents > represent Self, then it can be said that > they are indeed Self. I agree. But it's absolutely mandatory from my perspective that things supposed to be Myself have my *memories* in order to be me. The values and beliefs are definitely secondary, though important, in my opinion. Lee From lcorbin at rawbw.com Wed Nov 8 06:59:32 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Tue, 7 Nov 2006 22:59:32 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Edge: Thank Goodness! By Daniel C. Dennett References: <380-220061153192746796@M2W040.mail2web.com> <8d71341e0611031439w5d25b799k1dc4618d05e054a4@mail.gmail.com> <454BD34B.6070504@pobox.com> <8d71341e0611031603t5e86a6c8r315894f13309c6a1@mail.gmail.com> <8d71341e0611060005g5ac79cdeie540449406ec95b7@mail.gmail.com> <079401c70199$64625b20$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <45D0A95C-CCDF-46F9-849E-1A3EDE839FBC@mac.com> Message-ID: <097001c70303$b858c8c0$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Samantha writes > [Lee wrote] >> Europe is finished. A Muslim civilization will replace it. > > No way. This is utter nonsense. The Muslims can't manage to come > into the 21st century. Science and technology is too hard to > reconcile with the faith, especially as it blends with law and > politics. Without that the Muslims will never be strong enough to > prevail. But in western democratic countries, all they need are votes. And they're getting them, and already have many politicians courting those votes. In a contest between one side with higher tech but lower willpower, the higher-technological, more sophisticated side always wins IF the contest is brief. But long contests are historically always won by the side with greater will power. (E.g. America's difficulty winning in Iraq, Britain's difficulty winning against Colonial America, etc., etc.) >> But in North America, the situation is less clear. >> >> An elite in North America can continue to "run things" >> for a very long time yet. This is because as the class >> structure of the country becomes more pronounced, >> the lower classes shall respond to direction, just as >> they do in Mexico today, whereas in Europe, the >> Muslims have superior cohesion and superior will. > > Really you think Muslims are superior? In what way? They band > together? The threaten, kill and destroy when angered? This is > superior in a way that matters in this time of accelerating change? > How so? You could be right: the technological changes could come so soon and be so abrupt that you and I get uploaded, and the reigning AIs of Earth parent the Muslims as much as they parent you and me. But if it doesn't happen soon, then it won't be the first time that a more backward people overcame a more advanced one (e.g. Mongols and China, Huns and Romans, etc., etc.) > The Muslims as Muslim statists are a dying culture > unable to cope with the speed and type of changes > around them. Who says they're dying? Look at Lebanon. It used to be Christian. Not any more. Look at France; soon it'll go the way Lebanon did. Lee From jonkc at att.net Wed Nov 8 07:09:22 2006 From: jonkc at att.net (John K Clark) Date: Wed, 8 Nov 2006 02:09:22 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Some of my Recent Creations References: <20061106200529.99006.qmail@web52608.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <019101c70305$1b250800$64084e0c@MyComputer> Ian you're good, you're damn good. I'd give a million bucks to have half your talent, and that's not just a figure of speech I mean it quite literally. One of my most painful memories was me in the first grade when the teacher asked us to draw something, I forget what. I thought I'd done a pretty good job but then the teacher told us to hand in our pictures by passing them to the student ahead of us. I was at the head of the class so I saw what my fellow students had drawn and my heart filled with despair, each and every drawing was better than mine, not just a little bit better but INCOMPARABLY better. Up to then I'd been a argent little bastard but suddenly I learned I was not the best at everything, in fact I sucked world class. If the gods were kind they would have given me a hell of a lot more artistic ability or just a bit little less; as it is I had just enough to realize how badly I sucked but not enough to do anything about it. Salieri was to Mozart as I was to Salieri. Fortunately I have other talents but if art was all there was in the world I'd be in a home for the retarded right now. John K Clark From pj at pj-manney.com Wed Nov 8 07:15:07 2006 From: pj at pj-manney.com (pjmanney) Date: Wed, 08 Nov 2006 02:15:07 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Intelligence of Leaders (was Re: it's allunderstandable, except) Message-ID: <15677946.506311162970107667.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> Lee wrote: >> Here's a serious question then with respect to this hypothesis: is >> there evidence that the average US President was more intelligent >> prior to 1913, and if so what kind of average discrepancy are we >> talking about? > >I don't know! And I sure wish I did. But the change probably came >with the election of Jackson, which was more democratic. We may >surmise---as I think Simonton did---that before 1828 the Presidents >were smarter. > >Now, in my opinion, incidentally, this is not necessarily a defect in >the American system. The president is not God. He or she has policy >formulations determined by the best staffs that he or she can find. >A good judge of character and ability to delegate is probably more >important than a very high IQ. Reagan was more successful than >Carter, and Roosevelt was more successful than Hoover, though >in each case I strongly suspect the last mentioned in each case of >having a much lower IQ than the former. Hoover was probably >the brightest U.S. president of all, but he embraced even before >Roosevelt the same government-meddling policies that caused the >great depression. (This is the Austrian view.) If only Harding or >Coolidge could have remained president just a bit longer (so writes >Paul Johnson, IMO the world's greatest living historian), a great >deal of evil in the 20th century would have been averted. Actually, I'd vote for the first Roosevelt, Teddy, as the smartest US President after the Founding Fathers period. He was a true polymath -- a historian, a scientist, a naturalist, a writer. He was a great communicator, able to talk to anyone, of any type, and be understood. And an unbelievably savvy politician and diplomat to boot, who actually listened to the people and did what he believed they wanted and needed doing. His progressive stances were downright prescient. And he had balls of steel to stand up against his entire Republican party and Gilded-Age Wall Street, who owned them even back then, to do what he believed was right. If I could clone a politician right now and run him for president in 2008, it'd be him. I'd even vote Republican for the first time in my life. TR, where are you??? There is much to be said that the electorate in the past was smarter as well and it had nothing to do with IQ. It had to do with the fact that the electorate read and paid what we might view today as excessive attention to politics. Political debates could be days long affairs in the 19th C. and were attended widely and reported on avidly. Consider the Lincoln-Douglas debates, for example. The issues were complex and divisive and both men held the attention of the crowd for an entire day of debating, where each man could talk for up to 3 hours at a time! More importantly, they actually understood what the hell Douglas and Lincoln were arguing about! Neil Postman writes extensively on this subject in "Amusing Ourselves to Death." Read the chapters "Typographic America" and "The Typographic Mind." It's a beautiful, brilliant analysis of just how verbally literate the pre-visual (movie/TV/advertising) world was and how they actively used their literacy. This was the final flowering of the Enlightenment mind, here in the US. The downhill slide began with visual advertising at the turn of the 19th C. and its coffin was nailed by television. Before the slide, however, almost every free-born American could read and the political system took this as an assumption. And politics was played out accordingly. Of course, there was negative campaigning and mud slinging going on. I'm sure there was in Ancient Athens. But in the televisual world, instead of substantive debate, we now live on the sound-bite and the image. There's not much political substance there, because it's simply impossible to transmit the necessary information in those types of formats. We vote on the best smile, now. Just like Miss America. Even tonight's results are not about real substance. They are about "getting the bums out." No IQ necessary, from either voters or politicians. Just pure emotion. Respectfully, PJ From sjatkins at mac.com Wed Nov 8 09:52:48 2006 From: sjatkins at mac.com (Samantha Atkins) Date: Wed, 8 Nov 2006 01:52:48 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] it's all understandable, except In-Reply-To: <20061106132548.GW6974@leitl.org> References: <20061105203158.GJ6974@leitl.org> <077d01c70195$28852dc0$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <20061106132548.GW6974@leitl.org> Message-ID: <2DCC473D-A00D-4AD0-8D0C-645F76195076@mac.com> On Nov 6, 2006, at 5:25 AM, Eugen Leitl wrote: > On Mon, Nov 06, 2006 at 03:15:18AM -0800, Lee Corbin wrote: > >> Since Eugen wrote this, a number of people have chimed in to agree. >> I ask, where is the evidence that the key problems are current >> educational >> environments or poor parenting? Are there studies? > > If you've got poorly socialized children with a migrant background > as a majority, you will not be able to start schooling at a decent > level. It only goes downhill from there. Do you mean starting at K or 1st grade or later. If started early enough I don't think mere migrant background is such a problem. > I presume the answer to > that is to start saving for a private school -- but you will notice > that e.g. most of the U.S. doesn't do that, they do in fact quite > the opposite. Sending kids to private school packs a double penalty for the parents. Yet there are studies showing that private schools on average deliver about twice the education per dollar than public schools. > > A few days ago on the commute I heard on the propaganda channel > radio about the > current grand coalition slapping each other on the back, mutually > congratulating > themselves on their grand achievement. That being, that they have > reduced > the amount of new debt this year. To "only" 30 GEUR. Perhaps > too many people misunderstand what exponential functions (compounded > interest) means, especially if each third EUR already silently > vanishes into > the debt hole. > >> The studies---your anecdotes aside---report what I said they did, >> namely that it's genes 50%, peers 50%, parents 0%, and schools, 0%. > > Genes are meaningless, if you're looking at poorly socialized kids > with a migrant background entering the school system, which is already > contaminated with a couple of decades of similiar toxic problems. > Teaching is traditionally a well-paid high-prestige job in Germany, > but the schools have gotten so bad it's hard to find new personnel, > especially in hard sciences. > Again I don't think being from a migrant family means you are poorly socialized on poor school material per se. > For genes to wield their full potential you need a stable, supportive > environment even pre-birth, and an educational system which challenges > each kid individually. The genes have remained basically the same, > it's the parenting and schools (peers are an integral part of the > school) which have been failing. > It is largely government run schooling, cultures where no one is left to be with the kids much of the time, and a culture that is becoming ever more cynical and apathetic that are imho primary factors in the problem. >> And furthermore, contrary to what Eugen states, the limiting factor >> *is* what is between the ears. Researchers on intelligence admit, > > Correct, but irrelevant. The bottlenecks are elsewhere. As long as > the environment is the same no amount of perfect genes will matter. > You don't need perfect genes to be a highly productive individual. > Yes, for some things you need genius, but only in trace amounts. > Unlike Galt's Gulch and Vinge's visions a small group of supergeniuses > without the vast pyramid of support can do only very little. > Our concerns are that that supportive structure is failing. It's > hard to build buckyball circuits if there's almost no industry > and the state is effectively bankrupt (well, the state isn't, > but the citizens are left with the bill). > So what can we do to make things as much better as is possible? >> But the overwhelming part of the populace does *not* have enough >> cognitive ability, not enough for today's technical needs. > > Jobs in R&D are negligible in the old West. What's the point in > entering a challenging technical field if you know that 1) the > job market will be brutal 2) you're entering a field which is > not even lower middle class, by salary standards? > It is worse than that. The majority of the people by a considerable margin are incapable of understanding many of the issues they vote on. I don't think it is so largely a matter of raw intelligence as of severe undertraining and imho systematic mistraining. It does not help that the people have been conditioned and/or conditioned themselves to spend much of their free time being passively entertained by the idiot box or endlessly playing some video or computer game. The distribution of intelligence in say the US was no greater 100 years ago than today. Yet we used to be an extremely literate society where even the "common" person read books of some substance. > Bright people are not stupid. Who in their right minds would study > e.g. chemistry right now? Who would enter something so overhyped > as nanotechnology? > I would. In a heartbeat. Or what I did enter, Computer Science. If there is one thing I have learned in these decades of work it is that the amount of money is the least important part, within reason, for how you end up feeling about your life and what you have done with it. > > Have you looked at an engineer's entry level salaries? You > have noticed that the middle class is shrinking fast? And > that a Second Great Depression is at the door, and there's > not deus ex machina just-in-time fix to pull us out? > Given that a very large monetary crisis is imminent, what can we do individually and in small to large groups to insure as much of our own wellbeing and the preservation / continuation of as much of what is really important to us as possible. I believe and was one of the first here to say that a major financial crash is imminent. I believe that most of the so-called "war on terror" is a convenient excuse to jockey for hard assets while building up the capacity for draconian levels of power over the people at home before the s**t really hits the fan. So what can we do to make things better? What shall we do in preparation if it is too late to do much to stop it? What can we preserve and how? How can we increase the odds that as much as possible of what we most care about will not be lost? - samantha From sjatkins at mac.com Wed Nov 8 09:57:19 2006 From: sjatkins at mac.com (Samantha Atkins) Date: Wed, 8 Nov 2006 01:57:19 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] it's all understandable, except In-Reply-To: <7641ddc60611060901l15ea6bcdh3fd4bbc138c99f58@mail.gmail.com> References: <20061105203158.GJ6974@leitl.org> <077d01c70195$28852dc0$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <20061106132548.GW6974@leitl.org> <7641ddc60611060901l15ea6bcdh3fd4bbc138c99f58@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <345660FC-6CEA-4D25-B06B-0A3428C8EDCB@mac.com> On Nov 6, 2006, at 9:01 AM, Rafal Smigrodzki wrote: > On 11/6/06, Eugen Leitl wrote: > > Ability to play WoW doesn't make yourself good workplace >> material. > > ### OMG WTF! Warlocks own the workplace! Horde FTW! > > ------------------------------------------- > >> Have you looked at an engineer's entry level salaries? You >> have noticed that the middle class is shrinking fast? And >> that a Second Great Depression is at the door, and there's >> not deus ex machina just-in-time fix to pull us out? >> > > ### Jeez, Eugen, you sound depressed. Reading libertarian-leaning > economics blogs (Cafe Hayek, Marginal Revolution, Econlog) gives me a > totally different outlook, with the middle class shrinking by steady > attrition into the affluent class, and an economical revolution due to > disappearing manufacturing costs in the offing. Hayek and von Mises taught that the prevailing economics of today lead state to massive economic tragedy of necessity. Did you miss that part? - samantha From sjatkins at mac.com Wed Nov 8 10:34:19 2006 From: sjatkins at mac.com (Samantha Atkins) Date: Wed, 8 Nov 2006 02:34:19 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Religion worked for survival - Russel Wallace In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On Nov 6, 2006, at 3:23 PM, david ish shalom wrote: > Russel you write:..."there's no rational reason for believing in the > Singularity either (yes, like most myths it was inspired by some > nuggets of truth, but the vast bulk of what's written about it, is > as much a fable as Noah bringing two of each > animal aboard the ark). It is perfectly rational to note that > human intelligence is possible and quite likely in the not too distant future (unless we screw up badly). It is also perfectly rational to believe that a Vingean singularity will eventually result from such intelligence, especially if it is self-improving. Thus it is rational to be of the opinion that a Singularity is possible and possibly fairly soon. Thus the statement that there is no rational reason for believing such is demonstrably false. That some people get carried away is a different matter entirely. > I don't see you going around proclaiming this to be irrational. > David comment: for believing in the Singularity there are absolutely > rational reasons, yet to all the rest of what you say here I > heartily harmonize with, its wise and out of the box. i would add > that this tendency of many transhumanist to go against religion is > not contributing to transhumanism spreading to the vast masses of > humanity and just holding this crucial meme as marginal and rejected > by humanity at large. i am much surprised at Samantha, who has taken > a leading role in the transhuman religion group and now turns so > vehemently against what she was supporting there ?! > Yes, I worked for some time to wield religion into a tool consistent with and leading to transhuman goals. I came to the conclusion that religion is far too broken and loaded down with poisonous elements to be used this way. YMMV but I will live by what I have found by my own investigation. I do not give a fig whether "the public" shuts me out because I don't automatically respect their "revealed truth" (aka authoritarian fantasies) or not. The memes that need to be spread are not spread by tiptoeing around massive systematic delusion. I can only stand for what I perceive as true as I understand it. When my understanding changes the particulars of what I stand for must change. At no time did I believe that religion is primarily responsible for most of the good in the world or for "things working" generally. I was out to rewrite religion, to create a new religion that was not based on perpetuation of some dogma bit that used all the best in spiritual practices and religion to different ends. I even attempted to convince myself and others that such could be seen as the fulfillment and refinement of that which was essential in religions. I came to disbelieve that most of this was so. I came to the conclusion that only a more direct tying of our best aspirations to the reality and reason without a lot of religious inflation, much less casting the work in terms familiar to existing religions, even less trying to make common cause with them, will make the kind of difference I dream of seeing. I came to see existing religion as largely that which is in the way of most of our best hopes and dreams. I cannot make common cause with those sworn to oppose most of what we care about without putting ourselves and our share dreams at risk. I cannot seek the highest that I can honestly conceive of by perpetuating such a web of falsehoods and pretentious ignorance. > > We all agree teaching science is important. I claim it is equally > important > to teach that science is compatible with pro-survival value systems. > I don't believe religions are primarily pro-survival of anything especially but themselves. I don't believe that useful value systems are generally the invention or property of religions. > >Not one of these people says that science proves there is no god. > > > > Have you actually read any of Gould or Dawkins' recent works? Sure. They make some (partially flawed, partially reasonable) science based arguments about the very low probability of their being a God. That is not at all the same as a claim that science proves there is not. - samantha -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From pharos at gmail.com Wed Nov 8 10:49:08 2006 From: pharos at gmail.com (BillK) Date: Wed, 8 Nov 2006 10:49:08 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] it's all understandable, except In-Reply-To: <2DCC473D-A00D-4AD0-8D0C-645F76195076@mac.com> References: <20061105203158.GJ6974@leitl.org> <077d01c70195$28852dc0$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <20061106132548.GW6974@leitl.org> <2DCC473D-A00D-4AD0-8D0C-645F76195076@mac.com> Message-ID: On 11/8/06, Samantha Atkins wrote: > Given that a very large monetary crisis is imminent, what can we do > individually and in small to large groups to insure as much of our own > wellbeing and the preservation / continuation of as much of what is > really important to us as possible. I believe and was one of the > first here to say that a major financial crash is imminent. I believe > that most of the so-called "war on terror" is a convenient excuse to > jockey for hard assets while building up the capacity for draconian > levels of power over the people at home before the s**t really hits > the fan. > > So what can we do to make things better? What shall we do in > preparation if it is too late to do much to stop it? What can we > preserve and how? How can we increase the odds that as much as > possible of what we most care about will not be lost? > In the sense that the economy is always changing through the normal cycle of boom and slump, and investment sectors are always moving in and out of fashion, then there is always a financial crisis on the horizon somewhere. Some crises are worse than others, of course. If you are poor, or a wage slave with little savings, then there is little you can do. Just the normal state of trying to improve your situation, better job, better education, live more economically, etc. If you have some savings, then try to do the same as the rich folk, but to a lesser extent, obviously. The rich always get richer, regardless of the economic problems, because they have spare resources to take advantage of the situation. Politics is pretty irrelevant to them, apart from creating a secure environment within which they can operate to their best advantage. If the currency is heading for a collapse, then move out of cash and into real assets, or buy into a stronger currency. If property is over-valued and heading for a price crash, then sell your property portfolio before the price drops. If the share market is headed for a crash, then sell shares before the crash. If every investment in the country is going south, then invest abroad. After the crash happens, buy up loads of the now cheap stuff, shares, property, whatever. This is all business as usual for the rich folk. Buy cheap, sell dear. Crisis, what crisis? BillK From lcorbin at rawbw.com Wed Nov 8 14:43:09 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Wed, 8 Nov 2006 06:43:09 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Agency as Prime Determinant of Personal Identity References: <093501c702f8$f88577f0$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: <098401c70344$391d7600$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> This is part II of my response to Jef's Sunday Nov 5 piece, http://lists.extropy.org/pipermail/extropy-chat/2006-November/030329.html , Jef presents seven scenarios there. First, about scenario 3. Here is an excerpt: > #3 ...one copy will have blue skin and will also not feel hunger or > boredom, and incidentally it will die within a short time. From the > patternist point of view there are two different persons physically, > functionally, and in terms of values. I'm sorry to be bringing this up at this late date, but it's quite important to recognize the *primacy* of memories in the patternist view. The author Mike Perry, in his book "Forever For All", who believes as firmly as do I in the information theory of identity, puts quite a premium on memories as do I. Our moods can change, but we are still the same people. The change in a few superficial values or beliefs doesn't make one into someone else (in the patternist view). Even if the beliefs and values undergo rather drastic change, we say something like "you have renounced God", or "you have become so ruthless in the last years". I used to reiterate *memories* and *behavior dispositions* as vital to the patternist view. But VBM is close enough, IMO, so long as the primacy of memories is understood. In the case of #3, there is still just one person, who admittedly has changed some; perhaps he's as close to you as "the you of a few years" ago was. > #4 With the intention of contributing to the worthwhile social cause of > asteroid mining, but not being able to send my firstborn son, I step > into the duplicator box. I send my duplicate off as a free agent to > contribute to the cause, knowing that he will get a good pension and I > probably won't ever see him again. The patternist view would insist that > I was sending myself. The agency point of view would say I was sending > a different person with an extremely strong resemblance, carrying my > knowledge and skills. But he still remembers being you, mainly because he has all your memories. Suppose that after mining for a year, he learns that the original on Earth died, and he must return to take up Jef's role. This would then devolve to being nothing but a long vacation or work-assignment in another country. It happens to people all the time. They don't believe---and rightly so---that they're different people when they come back, or when they're gone away. Do you really think that the patternist view here is wrong? > #5 Ten years after sending said free agent to the asteroid mines, he > returns, informs me that he was converted to patternist thinking while > away, and now claims equal share of my property, my projects and my > wife. A patternist might claim (I remember Lee claiming this) that he > would in fact be me, and I should be happy to have doubled my runtime > and gladly find a way to share. Yes, it's still you, but only up to some percentage. Clearly he and the original have started to diverge. Would people tend to say "Oh, he's a almost entirely a different person now" or "He's still Jef, but wow, what a lot of strange behavior". > #6 A few days later, I learn that the real reason he returned from the > asteroid mines is that he had been accused of a plot to blow up an > asteroid belonging to the Bush family and had therefore been charged > with terrorism under penalty of death. Under patternist thinking, > should I turn myself in, or under agent-based thinking, should I tell > him he's in big trouble and might consider making a large political > contribution while in hiding? In my opinion, you'd never resort to terrorism or violence. So, again, it's a matter of degree. When you listen to him, perhaps he makes sense, or perhaps he really has gone off the deep end. You might think "he's still, like 60% me" or "he's only, like, about 20% me". Of course these numbers are only a poor attempt to render your feelings. Objectively speaking, there are differences here that are *real*, but we cannot at this time have a truly objective measure of them. Only you can answer your own question there---and even you probably have not provided yourself enough information. > #7 Remember Alice? Under patternist thinking according to Lee, she died > at some point even though someone continued on with her property, her > relationships, and her name. Under agent-based personal identity, > there's no question that we should see the 86 year old woman as a late > instantiation of the entity known to all, including herself, as Alice. > Furthermore, fifty years later, we would gladly interact with her > variants and doubles exactly as if they were Alice in various alternate > forms and places. I repeat my earlier correction (sorry). Under the patternist view, there was no *particular* point; it's completely gradual. As for me, I have great difficulty as would most people, in thinking of the 6 year old Alice and the 86 year old as one and the same person. They simply have too little in common. Or in scientific language, the similarity of structure is too sparse. But I don't really follow your "agency based" view in this example. Is it really true that they perform the same role in society? Please elaborate. Also, what if the 86 year old immersed herself for a few weeks doing asteroid mining, and spending all her spare time learning Japanese. When she returns, how likely is it that she'll say to the 6 year old version of herself, "Well my dear, you and I are the same person, of course, but while I was gone I was someone else entirely." The six year old will be baffled by even the claim---I think---that they are the same person at all. And be totally lost by this latest claim. Apologies for the places where I've not understood your views. Lee From natasha at natasha.cc Wed Nov 8 15:28:19 2006 From: natasha at natasha.cc (Natasha Vita-More) Date: Wed, 08 Nov 2006 09:28:19 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] Some of my Recent Creations In-Reply-To: <20061107204227.93087.qmail@web52603.mail.yahoo.com> References: <20061107204227.93087.qmail@web52603.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <6.2.1.2.2.20061108092710.048f9610@pop-server.austin.rr.com> At 02:42 PM 11/7/2006, Ian wrote: > >> Short poses > >> http://iangoddard.net/sketchesQuick.htm Nice. Reminiscent of Degas sketches. Well done. Natasha Natasha Vita-More Cultural Strategist - Design Media Artist - Futurist PhD Candidate, Planetary Collegium Proactionary Principle Core Group, Extropy Institute Member, Association of Professional Futurists Founder, Transhumanist Arts & Culture If you draw a circle in the sand and study only what's inside the circle, then that is a closed-system perspective. If you study what is inside the circle and everything outside the circle, then that is an open system perspective. - Buckminster Fuller -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From eugen at leitl.org Wed Nov 8 17:21:49 2006 From: eugen at leitl.org (Eugen Leitl) Date: Wed, 8 Nov 2006 18:21:49 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] [James.Hughes@trincoll.edu: [>Htech] Most 2003 US science grads not working in science] Message-ID: <20061108172149.GV6974@leitl.org> Since we were discussing IQ and job markets outside of manual labor. ----- Forwarded message from "Hughes, James J." ----- From: "Hughes, James J." Date: Wed, 8 Nov 2006 11:20:39 -0500 To: transhumantech at yahoogroups.com Subject: [>Htech] Most 2003 US science grads not working in science Reply-To: transhumantech at yahoogroups.com More than half of those who graduated with science bachelor's degrees in 2001 or 2002 were either employed outside of science and engineering or unemployed non-students by October 2003, according to a report released by the National Science Foundation. The report features numerous tables on the post-graduation work and education histories of science graduates. http://www.nsf.gov/statistics/nsf06329/ ----- End forwarded message ----- -- Eugen* Leitl leitl http://leitl.org ______________________________________________________________ ICBM: 48.07100, 11.36820 http://www.ativel.com 8B29F6BE: 099D 78BA 2FD3 B014 B08A 7779 75B0 2443 8B29 F6BE -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: signature.asc Type: application/pgp-signature Size: 191 bytes Desc: Digital signature URL: From phoenix at ugcs.caltech.edu Wed Nov 8 17:58:39 2006 From: phoenix at ugcs.caltech.edu (Damien Sullivan) Date: Wed, 8 Nov 2006 09:58:39 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] An advance prediction for Tuesday In-Reply-To: <20061107032752.59745.qmail@web51601.mail.yahoo.com> References: <20061107032752.59745.qmail@web51601.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <20061108175839.GA4138@ofb.net> On Mon, Nov 06, 2006 at 07:27:52PM -0800, Al Brooks wrote: > But here's a prediction for the 2008 election: even if a Democrat or > Independent wins the executive branch that year, the other branches > will remain conservative because the red states dominate the US; how > many states are there that are not red? several n. eastern seaboard Irrevelant to the House, which tracks population; the question is not how many states are 'red' but how many people live in the 'blue' states. > states (NY; NJ; MA; CT; VT; RI) and a few other states scattered CA, the most populous state in the country. IL, which is fairly high up there. If you go by regions, the usual breakdown is NE and Pacific Coast vs. South and Plains. -xx- Damien X-) From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Wed Nov 8 18:36:05 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Wed, 8 Nov 2006 13:36:05 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] [James.Hughes@trincoll.edu: [>Htech] Most 2003 US science grads not working in science] In-Reply-To: <20061108172149.GV6974@leitl.org> References: <20061108172149.GV6974@leitl.org> Message-ID: On 11/8/06, Eugen Leitl wrote:. > The report features numerous tables on the post-graduation work and > education histories of science graduates. But what do those tables say about those of us who selected not to graduate? Must Bill and I remain forever the unsurveyed outlyers? We don't get no respect. :-( Robert -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jef at jefallbright.net Wed Nov 8 19:40:32 2006 From: jef at jefallbright.net (Jef Allbright) Date: Wed, 8 Nov 2006 11:40:32 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] A vignette on incongruent points of view Message-ID: Respectful of (and in agreement with) the killthread, here's an excerpt from an offlist exchange with Lee that I thought might be of interest to the list. Two friends went to the ocean and later talked about their day. The first man talked about the wonderful feeling of the wind and the spray, exploring the fascinating tide pools, sea life and shells, and how he felt great joy in the experience bringing him such a feeling of being alive. He'd felt a bit concerned though, that his friend seemed almost as if he wasn't even there. The second man replied that he had reveled in the experience; that it stimulated thoughts of the power and immensity of the ocean in ironic contrast to the puny conceits of humankind, the realization that this great body of water both separated and connected the various peoples of the world, and how it provided the catalyst not only for biological life, but for the growth of culture and commerce. The first man thought "wtf?" and felt great pity for his friend. Is it possible to bridge such a gap in understanding of each other's point of view? Is there some way to show the the second man that he's living only a shallow imitation of a life? Oops, I meant the first man. - Jef -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jef at jefallbright.net Wed Nov 8 19:54:10 2006 From: jef at jefallbright.net (Jef Allbright) Date: Wed, 8 Nov 2006 11:54:10 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] [James.Hughes@trincoll.edu: [>Htech] Most 2003US science grads not working in science] In-Reply-To: Message-ID: Feel free to add me to your club roster. - Jef ________________________________ From: extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org [mailto:extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Robert Bradbury Sent: Wednesday, November 08, 2006 10:36 AM To: ExI chat list Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] [James.Hughes at trincoll.edu: [>Htech] Most 2003US science grads not working in science] On 11/8/06, Eugen Leitl wrote: . The report features numerous tables on the post-graduation work and education histories of science graduates. But what do those tables say about those of us who selected not to graduate? Must Bill and I remain forever the unsurveyed outlyers? We don't get no respect. :-( Robert -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From sentience at pobox.com Wed Nov 8 20:24:33 2006 From: sentience at pobox.com (Eliezer S. Yudkowsky) Date: Wed, 08 Nov 2006 12:24:33 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] An advance prediction for Tuesday In-Reply-To: <4550DA3C.9030000@pobox.com> References: <454FCC5E.1070808@pobox.com> <0J8C006D94D29060@caduceus2.gmu.edu> <454FEEFF.6070108@pobox.com> <4550018C.7050409@posthuman.com> <4550DA3C.9030000@pobox.com> Message-ID: <45523D01.1000003@pobox.com> Okay, looks like this hypothesis is falsified. At least for now, there are still real elections in the US. -- Eliezer S. Yudkowsky http://singinst.org/ Research Fellow, Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence From c.hales at pgrad.unimelb.edu.au Wed Nov 8 22:33:01 2006 From: c.hales at pgrad.unimelb.edu.au (Colin Geoffrey Hales) Date: Thu, 09 Nov 2006 09:33:01 +1100 (EST) Subject: [extropy-chat] A vignette on incongruent points of view In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <1253.128.250.225.217.1163025181.squirrel@webmail.student.unimelb.edu.au> > Two friends went to the ocean and later talked about their day. The > first man talked about the wonderful feeling of the wind and the spray, > exploring the fascinating tide pools, sea life and shells, and how he > felt great joy in the experience bringing him such a feeling of being > alive. He'd felt a bit concerned though, that his friend seemed almost > as if he wasn't even there. The second man replied that he had reveled > in the experience; that it stimulated thoughts of the power and > immensity of the ocean in ironic contrast to the puny conceits of > humankind, the realization that this great body of water both separated > and connected the various peoples of the world, and how it provided the > catalyst not only for biological life, but for the growth of culture and > commerce. The first man thought "wtf?" and felt great pity for his > friend. > > Is it possible to bridge such a gap in understanding of each other's > point of view? > > Is there some way to show the the second man that he's living only a > shallow imitation of a life? > > Oops, I meant the first man. > > - Jef Like two isotopes of carbon.... which one is the 'real' carbon? One lives in qualia. The other lives in concepts and abstractions from qualia. Personally I like them both. :-) Colin From gts_2000 at yahoo.com Wed Nov 8 23:37:26 2006 From: gts_2000 at yahoo.com (gts) Date: Wed, 08 Nov 2006 18:37:26 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] A vignette on incongruent points of view In-Reply-To: <1253.128.250.225.217.1163025181.squirrel@webmail.student.unimelb.edu.au> References: <1253.128.250.225.217.1163025181.squirrel@webmail.student.unimelb.edu.au> Message-ID: > The first man talked about the wonderful feeling of the wind and the > spray... An empiricist. > The second man replied that he had reveled in the experience; that it > stimulated thoughts of... A rationalist. > Is it possible to bridge such a gap in understanding of each other's > point of view? Let them each study Kant, that they might at least cite a common source of their confusions. :) -gts From rhanson at gmu.edu Thu Nov 9 00:21:39 2006 From: rhanson at gmu.edu (Robin Hanson) Date: Wed, 08 Nov 2006 19:21:39 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] A vignette on incongruent points of view Message-ID: <0J8F00INRT02X000@caduceus2.gmu.edu> At 02:40 PM 11/8/2006, Jef Allbright wrote: >Two friends went to the ocean and later talked about their day. The >first man talked about the wonderful feeling of the wind and the >spray, exploring the fascinating tide pools, sea life and shells, >and how he felt great joy in the experience bringing him such a >feeling of being alive. He'd felt a bit concerned though, that his >friend seemed almost as if he wasn't even there. The second man >replied that he had reveled in the experience; that it stimulated >thoughts of the power and immensity of the ocean in ironic contrast >to the puny conceits of humankind, the realization that this great >body of water both separated and connected the various peoples of >the world, and how it provided the catalyst not only for biological >life, but for the growth of culture and commerce. The first man >thought "wtf?" and felt great pity for his friend. >Is it possible to bridge such a gap in understanding of each other's >point of view? >Is there some way to show the the second man that he's living only a >shallow imitation of a life? >Oops, I meant the first man. Why should how we feel or what we think about be determined by where we are? Why shouldn't two friends at the same place at the same time not think about different topics with different goals, if they have different personalities and backgrounds? You don't have to be the same as me to be my friend. Robin Hanson rhanson at gmu.edu http://hanson.gmu.edu Associate Professor of Economics, George Mason University MSN 1D3, Carow Hall, Fairfax VA 22030-4444 703-993-2326 FAX: 703-993-2323 From thespike at satx.rr.com Thu Nov 9 00:28:53 2006 From: thespike at satx.rr.com (Damien Broderick) Date: Wed, 08 Nov 2006 18:28:53 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] A vignette on incongruent points of view In-Reply-To: References: <1253.128.250.225.217.1163025181.squirrel@webmail.student.unimelb.edu.au> Message-ID: <7.0.1.0.2.20061108182458.021a0768@satx.rr.com> At 06:37 PM 11/8/2006 -0500, gts wrote: > > The first man talked about the wonderful feeling of the wind and the > > spray... > >An empiricist. an ESFP > > The second man replied that he had reveled in the experience; that it > > stimulated thoughts of... > >A rationalist. an INTJ (Yo!) > > Is it possible to bridge such a gap in understanding of each other's > > point of view? I doubt it. Damien Broderick From lcorbin at rawbw.com Thu Nov 9 00:41:30 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Wed, 8 Nov 2006 16:41:30 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Intelligence of Leaders References: <15677946.506311162970107667.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> Message-ID: <09b501c70398$2a6a4b70$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> PJ writes > There is much to be said that the electorate in the past was smarter as well > and it had nothing to do with IQ. It had to do with the fact that the > electorate read and paid what we might view today as excessive > attention to politics. Yes, what changed it was sports, in the 1910s and 1920s as I understand it. Before sports became huge, the typical man's hobby was politics. > Political debates could be days long affairs in the 19th C. and were attended > widely and reported on avidly. Consider the Lincoln-Douglas debates, for > example. The issues were complex and divisive and both men held the attention > of the crowd for an entire day of debating, where each man could talk for up > to 3 hours at a time! More importantly, they actually understood what the hell > Douglas and Lincoln were arguing about! > > Neil Postman writes extensively on this subject in "Amusing Ourselves to Death." Yes, I recognized your description of the Lincoln-Douglas debates as emanating from that book. I too was struck by the *length* of the debates: First one man would speak for three hours, then the other for four, and then the first speaker had an hour to rebut. But over the years I've become a little more skeptical that when I read "Amusing Ourselves to Death." For one thing, remember the part where Postman describes the debates as big social events? The farmers would come for miles around to hear the speakers, but there were children running around everywhere, and I'm guessing that very few of the women listened at all. I go further to wonder just how attentive the men were. After six days straight planting or reaping, who can really say how much of those complex 19th century sentences were really understood by the audience? > Read the chapters "Typographic America" and "The Typographic Mind." > It's a beautiful, brilliant analysis of just how verbally literate the pre-visual > (movie/TV/advertising) world was and how they actively used their literacy. > This was the final flowering of the Enlightenment mind, here in the US.The > downhill slide began with visual advertising at the turn of the 19th C. and > its coffin was nailed by television. Okay, thanks for the pointer. Samantha added (at 1:52 am today in the thread "it's all understandable, except) > It does not help that the people have been conditioned and/or > conditioned themselves to spend much of their free time being > passively entertained by the idiot box or endlessly playing some > video or computer game. The distribution of intelligence in say > the US was no greater 100 years ago than today. True. > Yet we used to be an extremely literate society where even the > "common" person read books of some substance. I still very much doubt it, (having yet to read PJ's recommendation.) Not all that many people finished high school, as I recall. Yes, by 1906 literacy had improved upon 1856, but still poorer than today, I'd say. Lee > Read the chapters "Typographic America" and "The Typographic Mind." It's a beautiful, brilliant analysis of just how verbally literate the pre-visual (movie/TV/advertising) world was and how they actively used their literacy. This was the final flowering of the Enlightenment mind, here in the US. The downhill slide began with visual advertising at the turn of the 19th C. and its coffin was nailed by television. > > Before the slide, however, almost every free-born American could read and the political system took this as an assumption. And > politics was played out accordingly. Of course, there was negative campaigning and mud slinging going on. I'm sure there was in > Ancient Athens. But in the televisual world, instead of substantive debate, we now live on the sound-bite and the image. There's > not much political substance there, because it's simply impossible to transmit the necessary information in those types of > formats. We vote on the best smile, now. Just like Miss America. > > Even tonight's results are not about real substance. They are about "getting the bums out." No IQ necessary, from either voters > or politicians. Just pure emotion. > > Respectfully, > PJ From pj at pj-manney.com Thu Nov 9 01:09:37 2006 From: pj at pj-manney.com (pjmanney) Date: Wed, 08 Nov 2006 20:09:37 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Intelligence of Leaders Message-ID: <11571133.621691163034577585.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> Samantha said: >> Yet we used to be an extremely literate society where even the >> "common" person read books of some substance. Lee Said: >I still very much doubt it, (having yet to read PJ's recommendation.) >Not all that many people finished high school, as I recall. Yes, by >1906 literacy had improved upon 1856, but still poorer than today, >I'd say. In the mid-19th C., they could all read the Bible, Lee. Every last one of them. Or they weren't goin' ta Heaven, 'cause in the beginning, there was the word. Immigration at the turn of the 20th century increased/skewed illiteracy percentages. Everyone also read "Uncle Tom's Cabin." You did hear about the American Civil War, didn't you? ;-) PJ From iamgoddard at yahoo.com Thu Nov 9 01:11:54 2006 From: iamgoddard at yahoo.com (Ian Goddard) Date: Wed, 8 Nov 2006 17:11:54 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Some of my Recent Creations Message-ID: <20061109011154.85645.qmail@web52615.mail.yahoo.com> John K Clark wrote: > Ian you're good, you're damn good. I'd give a > million bucks to have half your talent, and that's > not just a figure of speech I mean it quite > literally. Wow, a million thanks John! ;) > One of my most painful memories was me in the first > grade when the teacher asked us to draw something, > I forget what. I thought I'd done a pretty good job > but then the teacher told us to hand in our > pictures by passing them to the student ahead of > us. I was at the head of the class so I saw what my > fellow students had drawn and my heart filled with > despair, each and every drawing was better than > mine, not just a little bit better but INCOMPARABLY > better. Up to then I'd been a argent little bastard > but suddenly I learned I was not the best at > everything, in fact I sucked world class. If the > gods were kind they would have given me a hell of a > lot more artistic ability or just a bit little > less; as it is I had just enough to realize how > badly I sucked but not enough to do anything about > it. Salieri was to Mozart as I was to Salieri. > Fortunately I have other talents but if art was all > there was in the world I'd be in a home for the > retarded right now. Before I go off sounding like a total egomaniac in my observations below, let me note that there are problems in each of my drawings, and the more I look at them the more I notice and thereby the more I learn what I need to do and avoid in the future. Perhaps I'm wrong, but talent may be only or mostly a result of practice. I used to draw all the time when I was a kid. I recall around age 11 trying more challenging drawings and the results not looking like accurate representations of their referents. So I felt bad about it and tried to understand what do I need to do to make them right, then I really worked at it. Later I also learned a lot from art professors. And of course I still have a lot of progress to make and there are so many illustrators far better than I can imagine. But my point is, I'm inclined to believe that 'talent' is mostly, if not entirely, acquired through consistent practice rather than being an innate gift. In recent years I've put myself in your seat (described above), but wrt to mathematics. Believe it or not, I managed to graduate high school without understanding what those letters are doing in math equations in algebra class. I'm totally serious! To be nice, the teacher gave me a C when I should have been given an F. I hated math and resisted all efforts to learn it. By all appearances I was 'math impaired'. I truly believed that I just couldn't do math. But the truth was that I simply refused to try. When facing some new math I confused the initial "I don't understand this" with "I *can't* understand this," and so I'd immediately throw in the towel. But in my late thirties I realized so many questions I had require a grounding in math. So a few years ago I went back to the local community college where I'd taken art classes previously. On my placement exam I scored in the high 90s, except for the math portion where I scored in the 27th percentile! And it wasn't because I'd forgotten math skills, it was because I never had them. Yet there I was with, of all things, the intention of focusing on math. Then I Aced all my math classes from prealgebra, through algebra, trig, up to calculus 1 (which is as high as I've gone). I've also Aced discrete math courses and 12 credits in logic (though I got a B in one logic course due to missing two big exam problems). To be sure, I'm still far from being mathematically adept(!!), and what I learn quickly fades if not reinforced (whereas I can go without drawing for 8 years and then pick up right where I left off). But my point is that it seems to me that being able to do something well is largely a function of effort and practice, and having 'talent' is what the output can look like given enough input. Ironically, everything in the philosophy section of my website I wrote before I ever really took a math or logic course. I hope to update that section sometime soon! My long-term goal is to contribute to the ongoing effort to capture human cognitive processes (thought, language, and maybe even consciousness) within a computational framework. I expect this is an effort that may take humanity a few more centuries. But I believe ultimately it can be done since I believe our brains are organic machines doing just that right now. I think logic research has a lot more to do with synthetic cognition than numerical mathematics. ~Ian http://iangoddard.net "A proposition can be true or false only in virtue of being a picture of reality." -- Wittgenstein ____________________________________________________________________________________ Want to start your own business? Learn how on Yahoo! Small Business. http://smallbusiness.yahoo.com/r-index From kerry_prez at yahoo.com Thu Nov 9 01:42:58 2006 From: kerry_prez at yahoo.com (Al Brooks) Date: Wed, 8 Nov 2006 17:42:58 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Intelligence of Leaders In-Reply-To: <11571133.621691163034577585.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> Message-ID: <20061109014258.73747.qmail@web51615.mail.yahoo.com> This country could elect a president in 2008 who is as smart as Herbert Hoover or Lincoln, someone who doesn't bounce around on a mattress with a White House intern, or something. Americans have to get over their nostalgia, so they don't feel obligated to vote for a guy, like Reagan or Bob Dole, who reminds them of their grandfathers. --------------------------------- Sponsored Link Mortgage rates near 39yr lows. $420,000 Mortgage for $1,399/mo - Calculate new house payment -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From pj at pj-manney.com Thu Nov 9 01:43:11 2006 From: pj at pj-manney.com (pjmanney) Date: Wed, 08 Nov 2006 20:43:11 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Martine Rothblatt and "bemes" Message-ID: <28386055.624701163036591097.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From velvethum at hotmail.com Thu Nov 9 01:54:42 2006 From: velvethum at hotmail.com (Heartland) Date: Wed, 8 Nov 2006 20:54:42 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Agency as Prime Determinant of Personal Identity References: <093501c702f8$f88577f0$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <098401c70344$391d7600$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: Lee: > I'm sorry to be bringing this up at this late date, but it's quite > important to recognize the *primacy* of memories in the > patternist view. The author Mike Perry, in his book "Forever > For All", who believes as firmly as do I in the information theory > of identity, puts quite a premium on memories as do I. [snip] > I used > to reiterate *memories* and *behavior dispositions* as vital to the > patternist view. But VBM is close enough, IMO, so long as the > primacy of memories is understood. I sense that you and Jef are finally beginning to steer this debate in the right direction. So far you've argued about the conclusions which only revealed your positions and how these viewpoints differ, and now you are slowly moving towards discovery (or acknowledgment) of underlying assumptions that motivate your thinking. Eventually, this process should lead you to arguments not about the conclusions that follow from these assumptions but to arguments about these base assumptions. Hopefully, you'll discover that these assumptions are not sound and this will cause you to reexamine the foundation of your thinking in this area. Right now, it seems like you, Lee, claim that it is "M" in VBM (Values, Beliefs, Memories) that deserves the most attention while Jef insists that the "VB" part is more crucial. These are interesting choices and each perspective demands different conclusions. However, before you devote a lot of time and energy on getting tangled up in details, I would like to point out that these choices are completely arbitrary. Choosing arbitrary criterions for what constitutes a person is a widespread problem. The arguments I keep seeing here and elsewhere look something like this: "I choose X to be the most precious thing about me. You're wrong about conclusions that stem from Y because they differ from conclusion that stem from X and we all know that X is most important." (X is assumed to be correct before it is shown it is correct). I strongly believe that there should be *no room* for arbitrary choices at any point along the chain of logical inference. If X is more important than Y, then, before I can accept any conclusions *based* on X, I need to see the argument that comes before that which explains why X should matter most. Would it be possible to see such an argument from you, Jef or Lee? If you continue to debate each other long enough, the odds are pretty good that you'll have to construct and show these arguments to each other anyway. I hope you found these comments valuable. Slawomir From velvethum at hotmail.com Thu Nov 9 02:14:16 2006 From: velvethum at hotmail.com (Heartland) Date: Wed, 8 Nov 2006 21:14:16 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] A vignette on incongruent points of view References: <1253.128.250.225.217.1163025181.squirrel@webmail.student.unimelb.edu.au> <7.0.1.0.2.20061108182458.021a0768@satx.rr.com> Message-ID: Jef: >> > Is it possible to bridge such a gap in understanding of each other's >> > point of view? I suggest evaluation of each point of view exclusively with respect to the *amount of tangible benefit* to the agent who adopts and acts according to that view. Slawomir From jef at jefallbright.net Thu Nov 9 02:51:24 2006 From: jef at jefallbright.net (Jef Allbright) Date: Wed, 8 Nov 2006 18:51:24 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] A vignette on incongruent points of view In-Reply-To: Message-ID: Slawomir wrote: > Jef: > >> > Is it possible to bridge such a gap in understanding of each > >> > other's point of view? > > I suggest evaluation of each point of view exclusively with > respect to the *amount of tangible benefit* to the agent who > adopts and acts according to that view. Slawomir, wasn't the key point that each person's view of the value of that day was completely subjective? Would you please give an example of how you would perform tangible evaluation in such a case? - Jef From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Thu Nov 9 03:04:21 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Wed, 8 Nov 2006 22:04:21 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] POL: And the senate may go too! Message-ID: The news in Boston is that the senate is predicted to go to the democrats. Maybe wishful thinking. You be the judge. Robert From jef at jefallbright.net Thu Nov 9 03:42:36 2006 From: jef at jefallbright.net (Jef Allbright) Date: Wed, 8 Nov 2006 19:42:36 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] A vignette on incongruent points of view In-Reply-To: <0J8F00INRT02X000@caduceus2.gmu.edu> Message-ID: Robin wrote: > At 02:40 PM 11/8/2006, Jef Allbright wrote: >> Is it possible to bridge such a gap in understanding of each other's >> point of view? >> Is there some way to show the second man that he's living only a >> shallow imitation of a life? >> Oops, I meant the first man. > > Why should how we feel or what we think about be determined by where > we are? Why shouldn't two friends at the same place at the same > time not think about different topics with different goals, > if they have different personalities and backgrounds? You > don't have to be the same as me to be my friend. In my relationships, as a heterosexual male INTJ, I have always been attracted to female ENFPs because their strengths are complementary to my own. It's not always easy, but the synergies are wonderful. ;-) As a technical manager I've always hired for complementary viewpoints and capabilities as well, but most qualified candidates in this field start with *NT*. As a related aside, I had intended in my recent reply to Russell to mention the rationalist appreciation of dissent and diversity. ****But how best to create a bridge to understanding across incongruent world views**** As an INTJ, I would prefer something similar to the mathematical work being done with fair division (cake slicing theory) but there I go exposing my Pythagorean tendencies again. - Jef From msd001 at gmail.com Thu Nov 9 04:05:17 2006 From: msd001 at gmail.com (Mike Dougherty) Date: Wed, 8 Nov 2006 23:05:17 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Detectives and red herrings (was Survivaltangent) In-Reply-To: <095f01c70301$da6b8a80$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> References: <095f01c70301$da6b8a80$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: <62c14240611082005w15573471h41c32599280f2233@mail.gmail.com> On 11/8/06, Lee Corbin wrote: > > know. Suppose that I determine that Eliezer or someone can more > effectively "promote my values into the future" than I can. So I > should agree to stop being me, and let there be two of him? No > way! Call me selfish, but these VBM are going to stick around > if they can help it, especially the memories. > > > To the extent that the future world contains an > > entity representing Self, then it can be said that > > Self "survived." To the extent that multiple agents > > represent Self, then it can be said that > > they are indeed Self. > > I agree. But it's absolutely mandatory from my perspective that > things supposed to be Myself have my *memories* in order to > be me. The values and beliefs are definitely secondary, though > important, in my opinion. > > If you lose memories, do you lose your self? If as you age, you release your childhood attachments - even to the point where that which is traditionally referred to as wisdom prevails and you come to stop caring about others' definitions of PI because they have no bearing on your own - and that you have stated your own beliefs as clearly as can ever be expressed by language - is there a point where you turn away from the group and strive for a transcendent perspective? * you = the reader, rather than specifically Lee (having been the last one to post to this thread before I caught up) -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From iamgoddard at yahoo.com Thu Nov 9 04:26:11 2006 From: iamgoddard at yahoo.com (Ian Goddard) Date: Wed, 8 Nov 2006 20:26:11 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Some of my Recent Creations Message-ID: <20061109042611.77077.qmail@web52604.mail.yahoo.com> Natasha wrote: >> Short poses >> http://iangoddard.net/sketchesQuick.htm > > Nice. Reminiscent of Degas sketches. Well done. Thanks Natasha! As pro-modern as I am, there's something irreplaceable about look and feel of classical media. I'll be taking a course taught by Robert Liberace, one of the masters of our day whose work has the classical look and feel: http://robertliberace.com/ Check out this piece of his: http://www.theartleague.org/school/images/class_images/1356_11afigures%20copy.jpg A benchmark toward which I aspire! Thanks again Natasha. I'm honored to have such positive feedback from so many high-order folks here such as yourself. The path you've been blazing into the future is an inspiration! You and Max don't only talk the talk, but walk the walk, defining the Extropic life. Indeed, whenever I think of positive futures, I think of you two. It occurs to me that I can see you and Max as the stars of a philosophically meaningful and future-defining sci-fi movie. I hope someone in Hollywood can see that too! ~Ian http://iangoddard.net "A proposition can be true or false only in virtue of being a picture of reality." -- Wittgenstein ____________________________________________________________________________________ Sponsored Link Get a free Motorola Razr! Today Only! Choose Cingular, Sprint, Verizon, Alltel, or T-Mobile. http://www.letstalk.com/inlink.htm?to=592913 ____________________________________________________________________________________ Sponsored Link Mortgage rates near 39yr lows. $420k for $1,399/mo. Calculate new payment! http://www.LowerMyBills.com/lre From kerry_prez at yahoo.com Thu Nov 9 05:00:52 2006 From: kerry_prez at yahoo.com (Al Brooks) Date: Wed, 8 Nov 2006 21:00:52 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] And the senate may go too! In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <20061109050052.45894.qmail@web51612.mail.yahoo.com> The House is the main deal. Good news is for a few states, it looks promising, but those in red states don't care about the 21st century; don't care about life extension, transhumanism, posthumanism or extropianism; to them the 21st century is an abstraction-- while alcoholic beverages, baseball, football, and God are real. --- Robert Bradbury wrote: > The news in Boston is that the senate is predicted > to go to the democrats. ____________________________________________________________________________________ Sponsored Link Free Uniden 5.8GHz Phone System with Packet8 Internet Phone Service http://www.getpacket8.net/yahoo2 From sjatkins at mac.com Thu Nov 9 09:10:34 2006 From: sjatkins at mac.com (Samantha Atkins) Date: Thu, 9 Nov 2006 01:10:34 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] it's all understandable, except In-Reply-To: References: <20061105203158.GJ6974@leitl.org> <077d01c70195$28852dc0$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <20061106132548.GW6974@leitl.org> <2DCC473D-A00D-4AD0-8D0C-645F76195076@mac.com> Message-ID: On Nov 8, 2006, at 2:49 AM, BillK wrote: > On 11/8/06, Samantha Atkins wrote: > >> Given that a very large monetary crisis is imminent, what can we do >> individually and in small to large groups to insure as much of our >> own >> wellbeing and the preservation / continuation of as much of what is >> really important to us as possible. I believe and was one of the >> first here to say that a major financial crash is imminent. I >> believe >> that most of the so-called "war on terror" is a convenient excuse to >> jockey for hard assets while building up the capacity for draconian >> levels of power over the people at home before the s**t really hits >> the fan. >> >> So what can we do to make things better? What shall we do in >> preparation if it is too late to do much to stop it? What can we >> preserve and how? How can we increase the odds that as much as >> possible of what we most care about will not be lost? >> > > In the sense that the economy is always changing through the normal > cycle of boom and slump, and investment sectors are always moving in > and out of fashion, then there is always a financial crisis on the > horizon somewhere. Some crises are worse than others, of course. Yes. We are talking about one at least as bad although a good deal different from the Great Depression. > > If you are poor, or a wage slave with little savings, then there is > little you can do. Just the normal state of trying to improve your > situation, better job, better education, live more economically, etc. > I am not so sure. Even those with modest means and prospects may have talents that can be employed to shore up infrastructure and information resources safety to at least a small degree. Pooling resources with others could also make a lot of sense as a practice to master. > If you have some savings, then try to do the same as the rich folk, > but to a lesser extent, obviously. > In the event of a major disruption and at least potential social chaos we stand to lose a lot of information and technology and communications with one another. There are things that can perhaps be done to partially mitigate that that are not what rich folk generally do. > The rich always get richer, regardless of the economic problems, > because they have spare resources to take advantage of the situation. > Politics is pretty irrelevant to them, apart from creating a secure > environment within which they can operate to their best advantage. > This isn't very relevant to what I was hoping to get into. > If the currency is heading for a collapse, then move out of cash and > into real assets, or buy into a stronger currency. One part is protecting wealth as best as is possible. But I am also very concerned with protecting knowledge and infrastructure. This also can include plans for and producing alternative infrastructure. > If property is over-valued and heading for a price crash, then sell > your property portfolio before the price drops. > If the share market is headed for a crash, then sell shares before > the crash. > If every investment in the country is going south, then invest abroad. > > After the crash happens, buy up loads of the now cheap stuff, shares, > property, whatever. > > This is all business as usual for the rich folk. Buy cheap, sell dear. > Crisis, what crisis? > Crisis when social chaos is followed by martial law. Crisis when science and technology get blamed and a theocracy or "cultural revolution" blooms. Crisis when the "rich" are scapegoats and there are no concentrations of wealth left to recover with. Crisis when the financial infrastructure melts down making investment and trade on anything but a very small scale extremely difficult. Crisis through major warfare. Crisis if in the chaos a great deal of important capital goods (means of production), infrastructure (especially the Net) and knowledge are loss. It is about a hell of a lot more than being a savvy investor surfing whatever comes financially. - samantha From mbb386 at main.nc.us Thu Nov 9 14:10:21 2006 From: mbb386 at main.nc.us (MB) Date: Thu, 9 Nov 2006 09:10:21 -0500 (EST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Intelligence of Leaders In-Reply-To: <11571133.621691163034577585.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> References: <11571133.621691163034577585.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> Message-ID: <35037.72.236.102.94.1163081421.squirrel@main.nc.us> I suspect that literacy was rather more sharply divided into those who *did* read and those who did not - could not. Nowadays "everybody" *can* read a bit. Many can't read much. Witness the newspaper articles of 1900 or earlier vs. today. Heck, just look at magazine articles from the 40s or 50s vs. today. :( Check out the McGuffey readers... I do not think many of our public highschool students today would be able to make much sense of the Sixth Eclectic Reader, alas. Books were greatly valued, unlike today when most ordinary second hand books are sold by the box-lot at auction for mnimum bid... $5 or less. In the past, books were sometimes even listed for probate, because they were desirable, valuable, and treasured. Finishing highschool has little to do with being able to read, IMHO. There have been many fine writers and successful businessmen who never finished school. People can be quite well educated without official or government schooling. Regards, MB From pj at pj-manney.com Thu Nov 9 17:41:50 2006 From: pj at pj-manney.com (pjmanney) Date: Thu, 09 Nov 2006 12:41:50 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Intelligence of Leaders Message-ID: <24653130.692361163094110100.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> MB wrote: >I suspect that literacy was rather more sharply divided into those who >*did* read >and those who did not - could not. Nowadays "everybody" *can* read a bit. Many >can't >read much. Witness the newspaper articles of 1900 or earlier vs. today. Heck, >just >look at magazine articles from the 40s or 50s vs. today. :( MB is correct. But many people still can't read at all. I hate sending people to my blog over and over, but I wrote a blog called "Sisyphus in Mississippi" about an amazing article in the LA Times on Ronnie Wise, the retiring chief librarian of Bolivar County, Mississippi and the staggering illiteracy rates he has battled for decades. It will blow your mind, especially if you assume at least a base level of education is accomplished in the US. It's a wonderful piece (the article, that is!). I also ask a number of questions about the roll of literacy and future technology in this blog. >Books were greatly valued, unlike today when most ordinary second hand books >are >sold by the box-lot at auction for mnimum bid... $5 or less. In the past, >books >were sometimes even listed for probate, because they were desirable, valuable, and treasured. My father, who was a famous rare book collector, would absolutely agree with you in regards to the treatment of books in the past. They were treasured objects, because they were the keys to the imagination and knowledge. And they were expensive! >Finishing highschool has little to do with being able to read, IMHO. >There have been >many fine writers and successful businessmen who never finished school. People can >be quite well educated without official or government schooling. In fact, a huge percentage of the US pop. in the 19th c. had little to no formal schooling. Schooling and education, depending on the society involved, can have no relationship to one another. US history is filled with autodidacts. My own father is one. PJ From sjatkins at mac.com Thu Nov 9 18:08:42 2006 From: sjatkins at mac.com (Samantha Atkins) Date: Thu, 9 Nov 2006 10:08:42 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Intelligence of Leaders In-Reply-To: <35037.72.236.102.94.1163081421.squirrel@main.nc.us> References: <11571133.621691163034577585.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> <35037.72.236.102.94.1163081421.squirrel@main.nc.us> Message-ID: <0DB2F870-5750-429D-AC6A-0E4E4E0F7EE9@mac.com> On Nov 9, 2006, at 6:10 AM, MB wrote: > > I suspect that literacy was rather more sharply divided into those > who *did* read > and those who did not - could not. Nowadays "everybody" *can* read a > bit. Many can't > read much. Witness the newspaper articles of 1900 or earlier vs. > today. Heck, just > look at magazine articles from the 40s or 50s vs. today. :( Actually, according to some historical sources that I don't have at hand at the moment, iteracy was well over 90% at the turn of the last century in the US. - samantha From natasha at natasha.cc Thu Nov 9 16:31:49 2006 From: natasha at natasha.cc (Natasha Vita-More) Date: Thu, 09 Nov 2006 10:31:49 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] Martine Rothblatt and "bemes" In-Reply-To: <28386055.624701163036591097.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> References: <28386055.624701163036591097.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> Message-ID: <6.2.1.2.2.20061109092334.047c0d48@pop-server.austin.rr.com> At 07:43 PM 11/8/2006, you wrote: >Hey, was anyone going to answer my question about Martine Rothblatt's >concept of "bemes" as a valid concept of future identity? Just some morning thoughts, but probably nothing of consequence to answer your question PJ: To be or not to be? We have to "be" to be a future identity. It seems that Bemes can take any form - and, because of this the very concept of how "identity" is configured is an issue. Identity as a set of "information pattern" or set of "information patterns" is an exciting topic. My talk at the Fourth Alcor Technology Conference on " A Talent for Living: Cracking Myths of Mortality" opened with and continued to focused on Shakespeare's line: http://www.natasha.cc/techtalk.htm ""To be, or not to be" wrote William Shakespeare in Hamlet in Act III, scene 1, "that is the question: ..."In my presentation at the aforementioned technology conference, I made a poetic statement based on my practice at that time, which was media-animation and poetry: "... To be?to live?is what we do. It is our talent, our business and our pursuit of well-being which we must carry out. The refinement of this built-in talent currently separates us from other life forms. It is our native, intrinsic talent, calling for the creative challenge to do something?anything?as long as we are "doing." To be, we must do. If not, we are busy dying. ... (pause with algorithmic images on scene) "When I think of our culture, I see it as a body of electronically connected data filtering messages into its appendages. Out into the capillaries of culture, our technology has become far more exacting and more robust than our biological bodies. Our biological bodies are far too inadequate to keep up with our ideas and the new landscapes we venture. From the telegraph to telecommunications, from the Net into Space, it is no longer just the written symbol?the word?being transported, we are the new transportees." I do not necessarily see identity as transportees or Martin's excellent Bemes as an entirely separate philosophical outlook than the transhumanist life view, but as an integral part of a complex extropic system. For example, Automorph Art is an extropic subset of Transhumanist Arts which developed in the 1990s and is intently based on "being as art." http://www.nada.kth.se/~asa/art.html Because it is within the extropic genre, it is understood that his automorph being as art is the actually practice of improving oneself, which is inclusive of the positive ideas presented and described in Martine's philosophy of Bemes. So, as you can see, I see that Martine has a valuable idea. :-) However, I do not think it is separate from or counter to transhumanism, but included within transhumanism as a constructed category of interrelations, or at least a complimentary, valuable aspect thereof. Right now I am writing a paper on "SEx - Skin (as a symbol of the boundaries of identity) Exobody" for a conference in Brazil on the future of identity. ... Beme-ing forward - Natasha >PJ > > > >Robert writes > > > >> On 10/31/06, Lee Corbin > <lcorbin at rawbw.com> > wrote: > >> > >> > But what happened to *me* in there? I'm more than my memes, pal. > >> > Don't forget my memories. > > > >> Well memories are memes and at least some of them are essential > >> components of the survival and reproduction processes. > > > >Memories are memes??? That does violence to the concept so far > >as I understand it. Memories are more like raw data; for one thing, > >they're very seldom contagious. Beliefs are something else, and > >are indeed memetic. > > > >> > That's me, maybe. I don't want to "become", especially if the end > >> > product is not me. I would rather "are". As you put it. > >What about Martine Rothblatt's concept of "bemes?" > >www.imminst.org/conference/Martine.ppt > > >PJ >_______________________________________________ >extropy-chat mailing list >extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org >http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat Natasha Vita-More Cultural Strategist - Design Media Artist - Futurist PhD Candidate, Planetary Collegium Proactionary Principle Core Group, Extropy Institute Member, Association of Professional Futurists Founder, Transhumanist Arts & Culture If you draw a circle in the sand and study only what's inside the circle, then that is a closed-system perspective. If you study what is inside the circle and everything outside the circle, then that is an open system perspective. - Buckminster Fuller -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From mbb386 at main.nc.us Thu Nov 9 19:55:19 2006 From: mbb386 at main.nc.us (MB) Date: Thu, 9 Nov 2006 14:55:19 -0500 (EST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Intelligence of Leaders In-Reply-To: <24653130.692361163094110100.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> References: <24653130.692361163094110100.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> Message-ID: <35189.72.236.103.253.1163102119.squirrel@main.nc.us> > But many people still can't read at all. I hate sending people to > my blog over and over, but I wrote a blog called "Sisyphus in Mississippi" about an > amazing article in the LA Times on Ronnie Wise, the retiring chief librarian of > Bolivar County, Mississippi and the staggering illiteracy rates he has battled for > decades. It will blow your mind, especially if you assume at least a base level of > education is accomplished in the US. It's a wonderful piece (the article, that > is!). I also ask a number of questions about the roll of literacy and future > technology in this blog. > > I would very much like to read this. Where is it? Sure there are illiterate folks in the US, that's why I put "everybody" in quotes... ;) In my childhood I knew an illiterate man (native US citizen) who could not write his name, had jobs and drove cars, fixed farm machinery, and had an ordinary IQ and life and family, but reading was something either he'd never been taught or never mastered, I don't know which. It was not a case of dyslexia, AFAIK, it was simply not learned. Never seemed to bother him. I cannot imagine being/staying illiterate. Regards, MB From pj at pj-manney.com Thu Nov 9 20:16:14 2006 From: pj at pj-manney.com (pjmanney) Date: Thu, 09 Nov 2006 15:16:14 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Intelligence of Leaders Message-ID: <10812988.714391163103374861.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> >>I also ask a number of questions about the roll of literacy and >> future technology in this blog. >I would very much like to read this. Where is it? I'm a ninny. http://pj-manney.blogspot.com/ PJ From hkhenson at rogers.com Thu Nov 9 20:04:50 2006 From: hkhenson at rogers.com (Keith Henson) Date: Thu, 09 Nov 2006 15:04:50 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Just curious, it's not natural! (2) Message-ID: <5.1.0.14.0.20061109150438.0370d078@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> At 10:18 PM 10/31/2006 -0800, Lee wrote: >Robert writes > > > On 10/31/06, Lee Corbin wrote: > > > > > But what happened to *me* in there? I'm more than my memes, pal. > > > Don't forget my memories. > > > Well memories are memes and at least some of them are essential > > components of the survival and reproduction processes. >Memories are memes??? That does violence to the concept so far >as I understand it. The essence of a meme is can the information be transferred. So a meme about how to tie shoes in a person's brain is a memory and a meme because the information can be transferred. But the other way around does not work because I cannot transfer my memory of looking out over the Grand Canyon to anyone else. Keith Henson From asa at nada.kth.se Thu Nov 9 21:05:58 2006 From: asa at nada.kth.se (Anders Sandberg) Date: Thu, 9 Nov 2006 22:05:58 +0100 (MET) Subject: [extropy-chat] Sex, Power and Single H+er In-Reply-To: References: <15616726.275921162791214745.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> Message-ID: <1521.213.112.92.120.1163106358.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> Robert Bradbury wrote: >> Sex sells. (And somehow Sex + Anders sells even more. Why is that, >> Anders?) It is because humor also sells. I'm one big, walking joke. Add me to sex (and maybe something with calories) and I'm irresistible. > I > suspect someplace downstream there will be papers written on the topic of > "Anders vs. Swedish cultural history. Good or bad?" The paradoxical part > is > that there are going to be minds which will *think* about this. Poor minds. >> Power corrupts. (Absolutely!) >> > And the thing you have to be concerned with is whether Anders or I or > Eliezer will have it first. Gigawatts of power! Muhahahaha! >> And no one knows who they are. (If they did, they wouldn't be looking >> so >> hard for their identity!) >> > That is of course an interesting observation -- which of A.S./R.B./E.Y. > would give up their identity freely (or lay it out on the table for one to > fiddle with it?) I think I might open-source at least parts of my identity. When I said at Extro 3 that I wanted to become an Internet standard or a search engine, I meant it. > I will state that as of this date (6 Nov 2006) there is no conspiracy that > I > am to my knowledge involved in. The best conspiracies are secret even to their members. Today's achievements: demonstratic static electricity and Newton's first and third law to my niece. -- Anders Sandberg, Oxford Uehiro Centre for Practical Ethics Philosophy Faculty of Oxford University From asa at nada.kth.se Thu Nov 9 21:01:12 2006 From: asa at nada.kth.se (Anders Sandberg) Date: Thu, 9 Nov 2006 22:01:12 +0100 (MET) Subject: [extropy-chat] 2-party-system = 1-dimensional politics (was polls again) In-Reply-To: <7641ddc60611060812v53ca1e64ob21140dacf399473@mail.gmail.com> References: <7641ddc60611040856t51a97100kb8a8a6e3430351fe@mail.gmail.com> <20061106035339.37606.qmail@web60513.mail.yahoo.com> <7641ddc60611060812v53ca1e64ob21140dacf399473@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <1398.213.112.92.120.1163106072.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> I don't think 1D politics is due to 2 party systems. I did a PCA analysis of Swedish politics (a 7 party system with proportional representation) and found that it was dominated by just a single principal component (see diagram at http://www.eudoxa.se/politics/dimensioner.html, text unfortunately in Swedish). This component was the block structure of the ruling center-left alliance, and the much smaller subsequent components may hold ideological differences but could as well just be particular patterns of party alliances. My basic setup was similar to this http://www.ex-parrot.com/~chris/wwwitter/20040203-which_parliamentary_co-ordinate_are_you.html analysis of British politics, which uses majority voting and has a pretty strong tory-labour dimensionality. Here politics is also pretty 1D, but along simple left-right lines. Looking at co-sponsored bills in Sweden showed a far more complex network between the parliamentarians: http://www.eudoxa.se/politics/motioner.html When it comes to voting the policies have become 1D, but when they are still ideas and ideology they are quite multidimensional. -- Anders Sandberg, Oxford Uehiro Centre for Practical Ethics Philosophy Faculty of Oxford University From hkhenson at rogers.com Thu Nov 9 21:22:06 2006 From: hkhenson at rogers.com (Keith Henson) Date: Thu, 09 Nov 2006 16:22:06 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] School libraries and skiffy In-Reply-To: <7.0.1.0.2.20061107143737.0215eea8@satx.rr.com> References: <20061107035731.10776.qmail@web51615.mail.yahoo.com> <454FFFF4.2000909@goldenfuture.net> <20061107035731.10776.qmail@web51615.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <5.1.0.14.0.20061109161332.035eaae0@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> At 02:38 PM 11/7/2006 -0600, Damien wrote: >At 03:24 PM 11/7/2006 -0500, Keith Henson wrote: > > >PS. I went through about a dozen high school libraries in the San Jose > >area around 1995 looking at the books of my childhood (Heinlein, Clarke, > >Asimov and others) to see if the failure of those books to be read after > >some point in the early 70s was widespread, similar to what I had noticed > >in my daughter's middle school. It was. I have no theory as to why. > >The stories, settings and "Golden Age" voice were too antique? No >cool kid, nor even a nerd, wanted to read skool library books? Those >books were by then abundantly available in 2nd hand pb form, and had >already been read or acquired or handed down? Bah--them kids today? I have no idea. It sure would be an interesting project to research and find out. While science fiction fandom is not the same as science fiction readers, fandom has been aging only a bit less than a year/year. Keith PS One thing I didn't mention is the shear number of kids who were armed in my high school. In those days nobody thought a thing about knives and while not that many carried guns, I was among those who did. Especially during deer season, virtually all the guys who had pickup trucks had a gun rack with a rifle in it. Of course to *use* a gun or even a knife without extreme and justified provocation was unthinkable. From pj at pj-manney.com Thu Nov 9 21:21:24 2006 From: pj at pj-manney.com (pjmanney) Date: Thu, 09 Nov 2006 16:21:24 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Martine Rothblatt and "bemes" Message-ID: <26113169.722631163107284594.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From mbb386 at main.nc.us Thu Nov 9 21:58:21 2006 From: mbb386 at main.nc.us (MB) Date: Thu, 9 Nov 2006 16:58:21 -0500 (EST) Subject: [extropy-chat] School libraries and skiffy In-Reply-To: <5.1.0.14.0.20061109161332.035eaae0@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> References: <20061107035731.10776.qmail@web51615.mail.yahoo.com> <454FFFF4.2000909@goldenfuture.net> <20061107035731.10776.qmail@web51615.mail.yahoo.com> <5.1.0.14.0.20061109161332.035eaae0@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> Message-ID: <35222.72.236.102.121.1163109501.squirrel@main.nc.us> > PS One thing I didn't mention is the shear number of kids who were armed > in my high school. In those days nobody thought a thing about knives and > while not that many carried guns, I was among those who did. Especially > during deer season, virtually all the guys who had pickup trucks had a gun > rack with a rifle in it. > > Of course to *use* a gun or even a knife without extreme and justified > provocation was unthinkable. > My father had an unlocked gun rack full of various (unlocked) long guns. We used them for target practice, but never ever without permission... explicit permission for *that particular* time. It never occurred to us to take one and use it without permission. The very concept of using a gun for attack of any sort was beyond comprehension. I don't think anybody even considered such a thing. I certainly never heard anything like that. There were rifle teams at many public schools. A friend of mine from Mass. says he remembers going to school with his rifle for practice later. It was no big deal. Nobody got shot either. And all the guys had knives, even the quiet studious ones! Strange how times have changed. Are the students safer? duh... Regards, MB From nvitamore at austin.rr.com Thu Nov 9 22:11:07 2006 From: nvitamore at austin.rr.com (nvitamore at austin.rr.com) Date: Thu, 9 Nov 2006 17:11:07 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] SEX! (Re: Martine Rothblatt and bemes) Message-ID: <380-22006114922117195@M2W030.mail2web.com> Now that I have your attention - (Anders are your reading ..? Robert?) Can someonebody answer PJ's question? I want to hear your answers. N Original Message: ----------------- From: pjmanney pj at pj-manney.com Date: Thu, 09 Nov 2006 16:21:24 -0500 To: extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] Martine Rothblatt and "bemes"

Cool!? Thanks for your perspective.? Very groovy stuff!

I agree that Martine's ideas are transhuman and I like her take on "bemes"?a lot.? I caught her presentation at the IEET conference at Stanford in May?and thought it was?the most visionary and provocative thing I saw there.? But I also?thought I might run the idea by the "Identity Police" on the list and get their (varied)?opinions, because I know that no logical?inconsistancies would get past their eagle eyes.? ;-)

But I guess I got no takers.? :-(

Hope all is well with you, Natasha.

Thanks again,
PJ

? At 07:43 PM 11/8/2006, you wrote:

Hey, was anyone going to answer my question about Martine Rothblatt's concept of "bemes" as a valid concept of future identity?

Just some morning thoughts, but probably nothing of consequence to answer your question PJ:

To be or not to be?? We have to "be" to be a future identity.? It seems that Bemes can take any form - and, because of this the very concept of? how "identity" is configured is an issue.? Identity as a set of "information pattern" or set of "information patterns" is an exciting topic.

My talk at the Fourth Alcor Technology Conference on "

A Talent for Living: Cracking Myths of Mortality"? opened with and continued to focused on Shakespeare's line:???

http://www.natasha.cc/techtalk.htm

""To be, or not to be"
wrote William Shakespeare in Hamlet in Act III, scene 1,
"that is the question: ..."In my presentation at the aforementioned technology conference, I made a poetic statement based on my practice at that time, which was media-animation and poetry:

"... To be?to live?is what we do. It is our talent, our business and our pursuit of well-being which we must carry out. The refinement of this built-in talent currently separates us from other life forms. It is our native, intrinsic talent, calling for the creative challenge to do something?anything?as long as we are "doing." To be, we must do. If not, we are busy dying. ...

(pause with algorithmic images on scene)

"When I think of our culture, I see it as a body of electronically connected data filtering messages into its appendages. Out into the capillaries of culture, our technology has become far more exacting and more robust than our biological bodies. Our biological bodies are far too inadequate to keep up with our ideas and the new landscapes we venture. From the telegraph to telecommunications, from the Net into Space, it is no longer just the written symbol?the word?being transported, we are the new transportees."


I do not necessarily see identity as transportees or Martin's excellent Bemes as an entirely separate philosophical outlook than the transhumanist life view, but as an integral part of a complex extropic system.? For example, Automorph Art is an extropic subset of Transhumanist Arts which developed in the 1990s and is intently based on "being as art."? http://www.nada.kth.se/~asa/art. html?? Because it is within the extropic genre, it is understood that his automorph being as art is the actually practice of improving oneself, which is inclusive of the positive ideas presented and described in Martine's philosophy of Bemes.

So, as you can see, I see that Martine has a valuable idea.? :-)? However, I do not think it is separate from or counter to transhumanism, but included within transhumanism as a constructed category of interrelations, or at least a complimentary, valuable aspect thereof.

Right now I am writing a paper on "SEx - Skin (as a symbol of the boundaries of identity) Exobody" for a conference in Brazil on the future of identity.? ...

Beme-ing forward -

Natasha






PJ

?
>Robert writes
>
>> On 10/31/06, Lee Corbin < lcorbin at rawbw.com> wrote:
>>
>> > But what happened to *me* in there? I'm more than my memes, pal.
>> > Don't forget my memories.
>
>> Well memories are memes and at least some of them are essential
>> components of the survival and reproduction processes.
>
>Memories are memes??? That does violence to the concept so far
>as I understand it. Memories are more like raw data; for one thing,
>they're very seldom contagious. Beliefs are something else, and
>are indeed memetic.
>
>> > That's me, maybe. I don't want to "become", especially if the end
>> > product is not me. I would rather "are". As you put it.

What about Martine Rothblatt's concept of "bemes?"

www.imminst.org/confere nce/Martine.ppt

PJ
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Natasha Vita-More Cultural Strategist - Design Media Artist - Futurist PhD Candidate, P lanetary Collegium Proactionary Principle Core Group, Extropy Institute Member, Association of Professional Futurists Founder, Transhumanist Arts & Culture

If you draw a circle in the sand and study only what's inside the circle, then that is a closed-system perspective. If you study what is inside the circle and everything outside the circle, then that is an open system perspective. - Buckminster Fuller


-------------------------------------------------------------------- mail2web - Check your email from the web at http://mail2web.com/ . From asa at nada.kth.se Thu Nov 9 22:27:22 2006 From: asa at nada.kth.se (Anders Sandberg) Date: Thu, 9 Nov 2006 23:27:22 +0100 (MET) Subject: [extropy-chat] SEX! (Re: Martine Rothblatt and bemes) In-Reply-To: <380-22006114922117195@M2W030.mail2web.com> References: <380-22006114922117195@M2W030.mail2web.com> Message-ID: <4650.213.112.92.120.1163111242.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> nvitamore at austin.rr.com wrote: > Now that I have your attention - (Anders are your reading ..? Robert?) > > Can someonebody answer PJ's question? I want to hear your answers. I liked the presentation a lot, and it was indeed the most visionary one. But I have a problem with the bemes concept which is actually kind of sex related: are bemes really replicators like genes or memes? Already memes are problematic as replicators since they are hard to delineate from surrounding cognitive structures, and bemes seem even harder to distinguish from other "being-like" things. Units of beingness is a great idea, but I'm not sure how to treat them. I think the concept would probably benefit by having a few analytic philosophers pick it apart and polish it. -- Anders Sandberg, Oxford Uehiro Centre for Practical Ethics Philosophy Faculty of Oxford University From kerry_prez at yahoo.com Thu Nov 9 22:18:19 2006 From: kerry_prez at yahoo.com (Al Brooks) Date: Thu, 9 Nov 2006 14:18:19 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] it's all understandable, except In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <20061109221819.8593.qmail@web51609.mail.yahoo.com> "...knowledge are loss"? This is complete alarmism. Crisis if in the chaos a great deal of important capital goods (means of production), infrastructure (especially the Net) and knowledge are loss. It is about a hell of a lot more than being a savvy investor surfing whatever comes financially. - samantha --------------------------------- Access over 1 million songs - Yahoo! Music Unlimited. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From mbb386 at main.nc.us Thu Nov 9 22:48:45 2006 From: mbb386 at main.nc.us (MB) Date: Thu, 9 Nov 2006 17:48:45 -0500 (EST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Intelligence of Leaders In-Reply-To: <10812988.714391163103374861.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> References: <10812988.714391163103374861.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> Message-ID: <35356.72.236.102.121.1163112525.squirrel@main.nc.us> >>>I also ask a number of questions about the roll of literacy and >>> future technology in this blog. > >>I would very much like to read this. Where is it? > > I'm a ninny. > > http://pj-manney.blogspot.com/ > Thank you. The article on Mr. Wise was *fascinating*. The delta people owe him a great deal. Very impressive. I hope his future is happy, he's certainly done more than most. :) Regards, MB From velvethum at hotmail.com Thu Nov 9 23:58:05 2006 From: velvethum at hotmail.com (Heartland) Date: Thu, 9 Nov 2006 18:58:05 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] A vignette on incongruent points of view References: Message-ID: >> Jef: >> >> > Is it possible to bridge such a gap in understanding of each >> >> > other's point of view? Slawomir: >> I suggest evaluation of each point of view exclusively with >> respect to the *amount of tangible benefit* to the agent who >> adopts and acts according to that view. Jef: > Slawomir, wasn't the key point that each person's view of the value of > that day was completely subjective? > Would you please give an example of > how you would perform tangible evaluation in such a case? As it is, it's not a good enough example to illustrate the difference between these two points of view because amount of tangible benefit is probably similar for each person after they returned from the beach, so let me extend this example further to the point where the difference should be visible. A year later the second guy finally makes a stunning observation: "The 'beauty' I saw on that day can be abstracted to beauty commonly experienced by people when they look at a painting or when they listen to music. Beauty is being experienced by millions of people everyday so my continued existence is not necessary to preserve beauty in the world." [and shoots himself in the head]. The first guy, however, continues to visit the beach where he enjoys sights and sounds of the ocean and playing with the soft yellow sand. After the second guy commits suicide the amount of tangible benefit for each guy will look like this: Guy #1: Amount of tangible benefit > 0 Guy #2: Amount of tangible benefit = 0 It would be irrational to adopt second guy's point of view because acting according to that view would inevitably lead to a smaller amount of tangible benefit over time when compared to the amount of tangible benefit that could be derived by embracing the first guy's point of view. Slawomir From velvethum at hotmail.com Fri Nov 10 00:04:31 2006 From: velvethum at hotmail.com (Heartland) Date: Thu, 9 Nov 2006 19:04:31 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Agency as Prime Determinant of Personal Identity References: <095f01c70301$da6b8a80$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: Jef Allbright: >> As an agent acting within a given environmental context, what is >> best from the point of view of that agent is not necessarily >> survival but that it influences its environment so as to promote its >> own values into the future, in effect acting to create a future world >> matching the model it would like to see. Lee Corbin commenting on Jef's proposal: > Wow! That sounds very idealistic to me (in the sense of willing > to give up something). "Survival" is what I'm talking about, as you > know. Suppose that I determine that Eliezer or someone can more > effectively "promote my values into the future" than I can. So I > should agree to stop being me, and let there be two of him? No > way! I couldn't agree more. Jef's model is so abstract that it fails to capture the essence of survival. I tried to ask Jef about his definition of survival very early on in this discussion precisely because I knew he would run into this problem. We could say that the kind of survival Jef is talking about is being "experienced" by dead philosophers, for example, whose ideas, beliefs and values survive to this day by means of books and people who adopt beliefs and values contained in these books. The readers/followers live and act as philosopher's "agents" so it is suggested that the philosopher "survives" as well. Jef Allbright commenting on Lee's model: > Lee, I presented the little story of Aging Alice in order to demonstrate > the incompleteness of the "patternist" view...While I agree that > this holds for any given instant (t=0), and that it supports the view > that an identical copy of a person is essentially that same person, this > definition appears to fail *immediately* and progressively with > increasing divergence of two instances of the same person. Correct. What Jef is pointing out here is that Lee's model fails with respect to identity over time. If we compare two patterns of the same active brain at two different times, say, 1s apart, these two patterns are almost certainly going to be different. And if so, then we must either accept that we're dying every second or that we're not dying every second because patterns do not determine personal identity in the first place. In summary, Lee's objection pretty much disqualifies Jef's model while Jef's objection does the same to Lee's model. But, even though I see no tangible value in Jef's "agency", I can see how Lee's model could be modified to account for time and differences between patterns across time. Lee, let me know if you're interested in what that modification is. Slawomir From austriaaugust at yahoo.com Fri Nov 10 00:31:32 2006 From: austriaaugust at yahoo.com (A B) Date: Thu, 9 Nov 2006 16:31:32 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] A quick AGI question In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <20061110003132.92410.qmail@web37415.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Hey y'all, I'm trying to develop a personal understanding of the (very) elementary theory behind AGI, such that a mere mortal like me can understand intuitively, without having to digest mountains of literature. So I have a basic question, that I'll state using informal (and I'm sure inaccurate) terminology, but I hope I can get the idea across all the same. Q) If I understand correctly, the algorithms responsible for human thought are supplied by the physical arrangement of the "active" hardware of the human brain. So, is the premise behind AGI that the active *software* functions by pre-specifying the physical arrangement of the hardware (by specifying which transistors are active at what time for example) and that the AGI "thoughts" follow from this point onward? In other words, the actual "thoughts" of the AGI are always secondary to the hardware arrangement supplied by the software, and that in both cases it is *ultimately* the *hardware* that results in the mind? Is this an accurate basic understanding, or is this all just bass - ackwards? Best Wishes, Jeffrey Herrlich --------------------------------- Want to start your own business? Learn how on Yahoo! Small Business. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From brentn at freeshell.org Fri Nov 10 01:50:57 2006 From: brentn at freeshell.org (Brent Neal) Date: Thu, 9 Nov 2006 20:50:57 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Extropians at the EAS Message-ID: If any folks will be attending the Eastern Analytical Symposium next week, drop me a line. I'm giving an invited talk on stereology on Thursday afternoon. Brent -- Brent Neal Geek of all Trades http://brentn.freeshell.org "Specialization is for insects" -- Robert A. Heinlein From msd001 at gmail.com Fri Nov 10 02:27:35 2006 From: msd001 at gmail.com (Mike Dougherty) Date: Thu, 9 Nov 2006 21:27:35 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Just curious, it's not natural! (2) In-Reply-To: <5.1.0.14.0.20061109150438.0370d078@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> References: <5.1.0.14.0.20061109150438.0370d078@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> Message-ID: <62c14240611091827q4357a979i314a2e89ede2c610@mail.gmail.com> On 11/9/06, Keith Henson wrote: > > because I cannot transfer my memory of looking out over the Grand Canyon > to > anyone else. > And the moment that becomes possible, it will find its way into a commercial and we'll all become sick of your memory of the Grand Canyon - no matter how beautiful or awe-insiping the original moment was to you. (sadly) -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From c.hales at pgrad.unimelb.edu.au Fri Nov 10 02:46:00 2006 From: c.hales at pgrad.unimelb.edu.au (Colin Geoffrey Hales) Date: Fri, 10 Nov 2006 13:46:00 +1100 (EST) Subject: [extropy-chat] A quick AGI question In-Reply-To: <20061110003132.92410.qmail@web37415.mail.mud.yahoo.com> References: <20061110003132.92410.qmail@web37415.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <2621.128.250.225.217.1163126760.squirrel@webmail.student.unimelb.edu.au> > Hey y'all, > > I'm trying to develop a personal understanding of the (very) elementary > theory behind AGI, such that a mere mortal like me can understand intuitively, without having to digest mountains of literature. So I have a basic question, that I'll state using informal (and I'm sure > inaccurate) terminology, but I hope I can get the idea across all the same. > > Q) If I understand correctly, the algorithms responsible for human > thought are supplied by the physical arrangement of the "active" hardware of the human brain. So, is the premise behind AGI that the active *software* functions by pre-specifying the physical arrangement of the hardware (by specifying which transistors are active at what time for example) and that the AGI "thoughts" follow from this point onward? In other words, the actual "thoughts" of the AGI are always secondary to the hardware arrangement supplied by the software, and that in both cases it is *ultimately* the *hardware* that results in the mind? > > Is this an accurate basic understanding, or is this all just bass - > ackwards? > > Best Wishes, > > Jeffrey Herrlich > Hi Jeffrey, I'm not sure I have translated Jeff-speak into Colin-speak correctly, but I think your question may be answered as follows: Currently all artificial intelligence projects (AI and AGI) are based on software and are developed/operate without any knowledge of the physics of subjective experience or its role in learning, knowledge and intelligence. To have this information would require a solution to the physics of phenomenal consciousness (the so-called 'hard problem'). That physics is unknown. It is a property of brain material currently without any explanatory basis in science. Nor has its role been accounted for. So, whatever abstractions are enacted computationally in AI or AGI project software, currently the intelligence that results has either a) no internal life b) the internal life of a hot electrically noisy silicon rock (the computer hardware/substrate) c) an internal life that is related to the software in some way that the engineers involved cannot predict or have no idea about. and in all cases a role that is assumed irrelevent without a justified reason, for there's nothing else you can do whilst the physics remains mysterious. I hope that covers it. I think it does... regards, Colin Hales From pj at pj-manney.com Fri Nov 10 03:37:46 2006 From: pj at pj-manney.com (pjmanney) Date: Thu, 09 Nov 2006 22:37:46 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] SEX! (Re: Martine Rothblatt and bemes) Message-ID: <618670.751911163129866298.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> Anders said: >I liked the presentation a lot, and it was indeed the most visionary one. >But I have a problem with the bemes concept which is actually kind of sex >related: are bemes really replicators like genes or memes? Already memes >are problematic as replicators since they are hard to delineate from >surrounding cognitive structures, and bemes seem even harder to >distinguish from other "being-like" things. Units of beingness is a great >idea, but I'm not sure how to treat them. I think the concept would >probably benefit by having a few analytic philosophers pick it apart and >polish it. I am the farthest thing from a philosopher that I can imagine, but I agree. I had an instinctual feeling that the metaphor behind "beme" was not really accurate from a 'reproductive' sense, but I don't trust my own opinions on philosophical subjects. My mind isn't wired that way. This is why I wanted to throw the idea into the pot, especially given the prexisting identity debate and our own armchair philosophy squad. There is something wonderful about bemes, and discussion-worthy, and yet it isn't quite right. Thank you, Anders! Anybody else want to give it a crack? PJ From extropy at unreasonable.com Fri Nov 10 03:44:25 2006 From: extropy at unreasonable.com (David Lubkin) Date: Thu, 09 Nov 2006 22:44:25 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] The evolution of intelligence Message-ID: <6.2.3.4.2.20061109215012.08133f40@unreasonable.com> I'm trying to understand what the evolution of intelligence might have been, and am in search of pointers to background sources. This seemed like a logical place to ask, given our shared interests. In some cognitive models, there's the idea of distinct capabilities, each having a biological basis. Each of which presumably conferred a reproductive advantage, in its first through its final forms, although it may not be clear that that advantage is wholly independent of the pre-existence of another of the capabilities. What is the set of cognitive subsystems known to exist in some species? Which species have which subsystems? Why do they have those and why not the others? What does this look like in a taxonomic or timeline tree? I've dusted off my sf writer hat lately so I'm mostly looking for a plausible framework to draw on in creating lifeforms for stories I'm working on. It would also be nice to find folks in the pertinent fields who wouldn't mind if I asked stupid questions or ran ideas by. -- David. From ben at goertzel.org Fri Nov 10 04:48:33 2006 From: ben at goertzel.org (Ben Goertzel) Date: Thu, 9 Nov 2006 23:48:33 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] The evolution of intelligence In-Reply-To: <6.2.3.4.2.20061109215012.08133f40@unreasonable.com> References: <6.2.3.4.2.20061109215012.08133f40@unreasonable.com> Message-ID: <638d4e150611092048l4931278ej4b59394086c19e4d@mail.gmail.com> For a view of the evolution of human intelligence involving the integration of distinct cognitive modules, check out Mithen's excellent book "The Prehistory of Mind", referenced here among other places: http://www.anth.ucsb.edu/projects/esm/Mithen_00.html -- Ben On 11/9/06, David Lubkin wrote: > I'm trying to understand what the evolution of intelligence might > have been, and am in search of pointers to background sources. This > seemed like a logical place to ask, given our shared interests. > > In some cognitive models, there's the idea of distinct capabilities, > each having a biological basis. Each of which presumably conferred a > reproductive advantage, in its first through its final forms, > although it may not be clear that that advantage is wholly > independent of the pre-existence of another of the capabilities. > > What is the set of cognitive subsystems known to exist in some > species? Which species have which subsystems? Why do they have those > and why not the others? What does this look like in a taxonomic or > timeline tree? > > I've dusted off my sf writer hat lately so I'm mostly looking for a > plausible framework to draw on in creating lifeforms for stories I'm > working on. It would also be nice to find folks in the pertinent > fields who wouldn't mind if I asked stupid questions or ran ideas by. > > > -- David. > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Fri Nov 10 04:52:21 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Thu, 9 Nov 2006 23:52:21 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] School libraries and skiffy In-Reply-To: <5.1.0.14.0.20061109161332.035eaae0@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> References: <454FFFF4.2000909@goldenfuture.net> <20061107035731.10776.qmail@web51615.mail.yahoo.com> <7.0.1.0.2.20061107143737.0215eea8@satx.rr.com> <5.1.0.14.0.20061109161332.035eaae0@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> Message-ID: On 11/9/06, Keith Henson wrote: > At 02:38 PM 11/7/2006 -0600, Damien wrote: > >At 03:24 PM 11/7/2006 -0500, Keith Henson wrote: > > > > >PS. I went through about a dozen high school libraries in the San Jose > > >area around 1995 looking at the books of my childhood (Heinlein, Clarke, > > >Asimov and others) to see if the failure of those books to be read after > > >some point in the early 70s was widespread, similar to what I had noticed > > >in my daughter's middle school. It was. I have no theory as to why. I suspect it would be due to the rise of cable TV (lots of channels) and/or VCRs and DVD players (and the costs for renting these to be relatively low). Video game consoles is probably another factor. Kids simply have too much competition for their time. Now-a-days it would be computers and the internet (for many). Back in the days when there was only 1 TV in a home one had more competition for what you could watch (and the selections weren't as interesting to kids). So reading was an enjoyable way to pass the time. I would expect that this should have been studied by educators. One thing that surprised me recently was to discover that the Cabot Science Library at Harvard has tons and tons of programming language books, operating system books, etc. Robert From ben at goertzel.org Fri Nov 10 05:08:08 2006 From: ben at goertzel.org (Ben Goertzel) Date: Fri, 10 Nov 2006 00:08:08 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] School libraries and skiffy In-Reply-To: <7.0.1.0.2.20061107143737.0215eea8@satx.rr.com> References: <454FFFF4.2000909@goldenfuture.net> <20061107035731.10776.qmail@web51615.mail.yahoo.com> <7.0.1.0.2.20061107143737.0215eea8@satx.rr.com> Message-ID: <638d4e150611092108t6a6a9a6cy28bd5bf811a74b4e@mail.gmail.com> On 11/7/06, Damien Broderick wrote: > At 03:24 PM 11/7/2006 -0500, Keith Henson wrote: > > >PS. I went through about a dozen high school libraries in the San Jose > >area around 1995 looking at the books of my childhood (Heinlein, Clarke, > >Asimov and others) to see if the failure of those books to be read after > >some point in the early 70s was widespread, similar to what I had noticed > >in my daughter's middle school. It was. I have no theory as to why. Well, as a case study, my son loves SF, but he tends to find much of this older SF relatively lame in terms of writing and character development. The truth is, the standard of writing in SF has improved a lot over the decades. And, the plot cliches of older SF (space battles, time travel) have become **too** cliche' these days due to film, TV, etc. You don't need to read SF to find out about time travel paradoxes, it's all over South Park year after year... Newer SF novels on average tend have more currently culturally apropos plot cliches (virtual reality, AI's, etc.) , as well as slightly better writing... When I pointed out to my son some of the gems among older SF novels (Lem, Dick, Williamson, Clarke, etc.), he read and enjoyed them. But there is an awful lot of repetitive "space opera" stuff out there to wade through, to get to the good stuff. -- Ben G From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Fri Nov 10 05:24:41 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Fri, 10 Nov 2006 00:24:41 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] A quick AGI question In-Reply-To: <20061110003132.92410.qmail@web37415.mail.mud.yahoo.com> References: <20061110003132.92410.qmail@web37415.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Message-ID: On 11/9/06, A B wrote: > Q) If I understand correctly, the algorithms responsible for human thought > are supplied by the physical arrangement of the "active" hardware of the > human brain. So, is the premise behind AGI that the active *software* > functions by pre-specifying the physical arrangement of the hardware (by > specifying which transistors are active at what time for example) and that > the AGI "thoughts" follow from this point onward? In other words, the actual > "thoughts" of the AGI are always secondary to the hardware arrangement > supplied by the software, and that in both cases it is *ultimately* the > *hardware* that results in the mind? No this doesn't sound right at all. I was just reading today about the specific "hardware" neurons that are responsible for dictating being asleep and being awake and the feedback loops that must be involved -- your brain knows it has a sleep deficit to wake up. Minsky's Society of Mind is good at pointing out how many complex algorithms may be evolved into brains to do even some of the simple things we manage to do. But whether you are implementing the algorithims in software or hardware is a speed-cost tradeoff. You can think of machines like the Transmeta chips which as I understand it could compile "better" code on the fly. I would suggest you read the books by William Calvin. They are some of the best I've encountered that explain how "thinking" may work. They are also quite readable without having to know a lot of neuroscience. (Brain structure (anatomy) hurts my brain). What I like to think of being an "AGI" is being able to have lots of information at your disposal and select some of it which has an "unusual" pattern. Precisely what part(s) of the brain play the key role in selecting something of interest or having that "ah-ha" moment I am unsure. There has to be some discrimination going on in the brain to prevent all of the bad ideas overwhelming the few good ideas. Robert From thespike at satx.rr.com Fri Nov 10 05:28:38 2006 From: thespike at satx.rr.com (Damien Broderick) Date: Thu, 09 Nov 2006 23:28:38 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] School libraries and skiffy In-Reply-To: <638d4e150611092108t6a6a9a6cy28bd5bf811a74b4e@mail.gmail.co m> References: <454FFFF4.2000909@goldenfuture.net> <20061107035731.10776.qmail@web51615.mail.yahoo.com> <7.0.1.0.2.20061107143737.0215eea8@satx.rr.com> <638d4e150611092108t6a6a9a6cy28bd5bf811a74b4e@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <7.0.1.0.2.20061109232342.02253bf0@satx.rr.com> At 12:08 AM 11/10/2006 -0500, Ben G wrote: >When I pointed out to my son some of the gems among older SF novels >(Lem, Dick, Williamson, Clarke, etc.), he read and enjoyed them. Williamson? Really? Which? Writers I liked as a kid whom I can't read any longer would include, say, Cliff Simak and Asimov. Sheckley's brilliance has been overtaken by time and stylistics, and all the filching by Douglas Adams. But crazy, dream-struck van Vogt still works, even if I have to grit my teeth. I wonder if a kid today could bear to read SLAN or the Weapon Shops books? I imagine Alfie Bester might still strike a spark or three, again making allowance for the last 50 years of lifestyle change. Sturgeon's still very readable, at his best. Damien Broderick From lcorbin at rawbw.com Fri Nov 10 05:56:16 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Thu, 9 Nov 2006 21:56:16 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Agency as Prime Determinant of Personal Identity References: <093501c702f8$f88577f0$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <098401c70344$391d7600$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: <0a0c01c7048d$57728010$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Heartland writes > Right now, it seems like you, Lee, claim that it is "M" in VBM (Values, Beliefs, > Memories) that deserves the most attention while Jef insists that the "VB" part is > more crucial. These are interesting choices and each perspective demands different > conclusions. However, before you devote a lot of time and energy on getting tangled > up in details, I would like to point out that these choices are completely > arbitrary. > > Choosing arbitrary criteria for what constitutes a person is a widespread > problem.... Now if someone does say "Personal identity is X" and that's what it means to me, I can't really do anything but comment that this is not what everyone else means. When we attempt to go beyond today's capabilities, as the SF writers always do, we must *smoothly* extend the meanings we use daily into these new directions. They must be compatible with our old meanings, even if they now apply to new things. In daily life, we all know what it means to die: you don't get to live anymore. No one is around who acts like you, talks like you, remembers what you remembered and so on. Any sensible notions of what *future* survival and "personal identity" mean must maintain these fundamentals. So it's not arbitrary: our concept even when applied to new items must still make sense according to the old. So to claim, for example, "Oh, I'll still be alive if enough people read my books and belief my ideas" is nonsense, because we all know that despite all the effort, Jesus is no longer alive and kicking (was crucified or something, as everyone knows). > I strongly believe that there should be *no room* for arbitrary choices at any > point along the chain of logical inference. If X is more important than Y, then, > before I can accept any conclusions *based* on X, I need to see the argument that > comes before that which explains why X should matter most. I agree. > Would it be possible to see such an argument from you, Jef or Lee? Hopefully, despite my severly limited time the next day or two, I have made such an argument above. Lee From lcorbin at rawbw.com Fri Nov 10 06:01:14 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Thu, 9 Nov 2006 22:01:14 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Agency as Prime Determinant of Personal Identity References: <095f01c70301$da6b8a80$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: <0a0d01c7048d$c3d5b150$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Slawomir writes > Jef Allbright: >>> As an agent acting within a given environmental context, what is >>> best from the point of view of that agent is not necessarily >>> survival but that it influences its environment so as to promote its >>> own values into the future, in effect acting to create a future world >>> matching the model it would like to see. > > Lee Corbin commenting on Jef's proposal: >> Wow! That sounds very idealistic to me (in the sense of willing >> to give up something). "Survival" is what I'm talking about, as you >> know. Suppose that I determine that Eliezer or someone can more >> effectively "promote my values into the future" than I can. So I >> should agree to stop being me, and let there be two of him? No >> way! > > I couldn't agree more. Jef's model is so abstract that it fails to capture the > essence of survival... You and I agree on that , :-) yes. > Jef Allbright commenting on Lee's model: >> Lee, I presented the little story of Aging Alice in order to demonstrate >> the incompleteness of the "patternist" view...While I agree that >> this holds for any given instant (t=0), and that it supports the view >> that an identical copy of a person is essentially that same person, this >> definition appears to fail *immediately* and progressively with >> increasing divergence of two instances of the same person. > > Correct. What Jef is pointing out here is that Lee's model fails with respect to > identity over time. If we compare two patterns of the same active brain at two > different times, say, 1s apart, these two patterns are almost certainly going to be > different. Yes, for the NTH TIME, the patterns at one second apart are *slightly* different. IT IS A MATTER OF DEGREE. (Sorry for losing my temper, but I have to keep saying this, in order for people to include it in their model of my view!) > And if so, then we must either accept that we're dying every second PREPOSTEROUS! > or that we're not dying every second because patterns do not determine personal > identity in the first place. Rubbish. As your pattern *gradually* changes over time, you cease to retain your identity to the same DEGREE, that's all. Everyone knows this! Why should I be explaining it? Everyone knows that an 80 year old is hardly the same person he was at 8. But everyone knows that he is *very much* the same person that he was at 79. This is not rocket science. Lee From austriaaugust at yahoo.com Fri Nov 10 06:38:11 2006 From: austriaaugust at yahoo.com (A B) Date: Thu, 9 Nov 2006 22:38:11 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] A quick AGI question In-Reply-To: <2621.128.250.225.217.1163126760.squirrel@webmail.student.unimelb.edu.au> Message-ID: <20061110063811.34522.qmail@web37405.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Hi Colin, Thank you for responding. Even though I have only the most preliminary and limited understanding of AI, the information you have provided certainly sounds good to me (FWIW) :-) But, I think that I managed to articulate my question in a sufficiently obscure way, that I think it's intent may have been lost. I'll try to rearrange the question the best I can, with the limited understanding that I have. It seems to me that the human brain as a physical object, can and does produce intelligence and consciousness without what is commonly understood to be software. "Software" is just an invented human noun, typically used to describe computer code that may be recorded in any number of ways (eg. on a hard drive, within a program, or scribbled with crayon on a piece of paper). IOW, the algorithms that produce human intelligence seem to be supplied solely by the physical arrangement of the hardware of the brain. So my question is: Is the premise behind AGI (or really any software program, I suppose) that the active (running) software *pre-specifies* the physical arrangement of the hardware (eg. by specifying which transistors are active at what time) - and that this newly pre-specified hardware arrangement is what then "produces" the mind, moment by moment? IOW, isn't it ultimately the *hardware* that produces the mind, even though it is the software which is dictating the physical arrangement of the hardware, moment by moment? Sorry if this question is still clear as mud, I'm having a hard time of it. Best Wishes, Jeffrey Herrlich Colin Geoffrey Hales wrote: > Hey y'all, > > I'm trying to develop a personal understanding of the (very) elementary > theory behind AGI, such that a mere mortal like me can understand intuitively, without having to digest mountains of literature. So I have a basic question, that I'll state using informal (and I'm sure > inaccurate) terminology, but I hope I can get the idea across all the same. > > Q) If I understand correctly, the algorithms responsible for human > thought are supplied by the physical arrangement of the "active" hardware of the human brain. So, is the premise behind AGI that the active *software* functions by pre-specifying the physical arrangement of the hardware (by specifying which transistors are active at what time for example) and that the AGI "thoughts" follow from this point onward? In other words, the actual "thoughts" of the AGI are always secondary to the hardware arrangement supplied by the software, and that in both cases it is *ultimately* the *hardware* that results in the mind? > > Is this an accurate basic understanding, or is this all just bass - > ackwards? > > Best Wishes, > > Jeffrey Herrlich > Hi Jeffrey, I'm not sure I have translated Jeff-speak into Colin-speak correctly, but I think your question may be answered as follows: Currently all artificial intelligence projects (AI and AGI) are based on software and are developed/operate without any knowledge of the physics of subjective experience or its role in learning, knowledge and intelligence. To have this information would require a solution to the physics of phenomenal consciousness (the so-called 'hard problem'). That physics is unknown. It is a property of brain material currently without any explanatory basis in science. Nor has its role been accounted for. So, whatever abstractions are enacted computationally in AI or AGI project software, currently the intelligence that results has either a) no internal life b) the internal life of a hot electrically noisy silicon rock (the computer hardware/substrate) c) an internal life that is related to the software in some way that the engineers involved cannot predict or have no idea about. and in all cases a role that is assumed irrelevent without a justified reason, for there's nothing else you can do whilst the physics remains mysterious. I hope that covers it. I think it does... regards, Colin Hales _______________________________________________ extropy-chat mailing list extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat --------------------------------- Everyone is raving about the all-new Yahoo! Mail beta. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From velvethum at hotmail.com Fri Nov 10 07:48:03 2006 From: velvethum at hotmail.com (Heartland) Date: Fri, 10 Nov 2006 02:48:03 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Agency as Prime Determinant of Personal Identity References: <095f01c70301$da6b8a80$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <0a0d01c7048d$c3d5b150$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: >> Jef Allbright commenting on Lee's model: >>> Lee, I presented the little story of Aging Alice in order to demonstrate >>> the incompleteness of the "patternist" view...While I agree that >>> this holds for any given instant (t=0), and that it supports the view >>> that an identical copy of a person is essentially that same person, this >>> definition appears to fail *immediately* and progressively with >>> increasing divergence of two instances of the same person. Slawomir: >> Correct. What Jef is pointing out here is that Lee's model fails with respect to >> identity over time. If we compare two patterns of the same active brain at two >> different times, say, 1s apart, these two patterns are almost certainly going to >> be >> different. Lee: > Yes, for the NTH TIME, the patterns at one second apart are *slightly* > different. IT IS A MATTER OF DEGREE. Yes, we fully realize that, but "slightly different" is still "different," no? If it's indeed a matter of degree then you need to explain what degree of change is allowed before someone turns into someone else and why this is important. Slawomir From lcorbin at rawbw.com Fri Nov 10 07:42:12 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Thu, 9 Nov 2006 23:42:12 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Detectives and red herrings (was Survivaltangent) References: <095f01c70301$da6b8a80$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <62c14240611082005w15573471h41c32599280f2233@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <0a3c01c7049c$07919860$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Mike writes > [Lee wrote] > > It's absolutely mandatory from my perspective that things > > supposed to be Myself have my *memories* [in order to > > be me]. The values and beliefs are definitely secondary, > > though important, in my opinion. > If you lose memories, do you lose your self? Yes. > If as you age, you release your childhood attachments - even to > the point where that which is traditionally referred to as wisdom > prevails and you come to stop caring about others' definitions of > PI because they have no bearing on your own - and that you have > stated your own beliefs as clearly as can ever be expressed by > language - is there a point where you turn away from the group > and strive for a transcendent perspective? You ask, "Is there a point where you can turn away from the group and strive for a transcendent perspective?" Sure there is. People strive for all sorts of things, and I'm glad they do. What is at issue here is whether or not they remain the same person. If they don't retain the same memories, they gradually change into someone else. Suppose that this kept happening to you for 500 years, so that there was no longer *any* overlap. Say you even speak French by then, instead of your native language. PROVIDED WE DO NOT BELIEVE IN SOULS AND HAVE DESTROYED EVERY LAST VESTIGE OF SUCH BELIEF, THEN WE MUST CONCLUDE THAT YOU HAVE BECOME SOMEONE ELSE. Sorry my caps key got stuck there for a minute. If you and I gradually over the years slowly become more and more advanced, but somehow we both manage to remember Lee Corbin's childhood, teenage years, fascination with chess, the close game with David Bronstein in a simul, the years writing under the name "Lee Corbin" on the Fabric of Reality list, and so on and on, then you are dead, and there are *two* Lee Corbins. Surely, if you value your survival, you do not want this to happen. Keep your own memories, stay alive! Lee From velvethum at hotmail.com Fri Nov 10 07:58:21 2006 From: velvethum at hotmail.com (Heartland) Date: Fri, 10 Nov 2006 02:58:21 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Agency as Prime Determinant of Personal Identity References: <093501c702f8$f88577f0$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <098401c70344$391d7600$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <0a0c01c7048d$57728010$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: Slawomir: >> Right now, it seems like you, Lee, claim that it is "M" in VBM (Values, Beliefs, >> Memories) that deserves the most attention while Jef insists that the "VB" part >> is more crucial. These are interesting choices and each perspective demands >> different conclusions. However, before you devote a lot of time and energy on >> getting tangled up in details, I would like to point out that these choices are >> completely arbitrary. >> >> Choosing arbitrary criteria for what constitutes a person is a widespread >> problem.... Lee: > When we attempt to go beyond today's capabilities, as the SF writers > always do, we must *smoothly* extend the meanings we use daily > into these new directions. They must be compatible with our old > meanings, even if they now apply to new things. > In daily life, we all know what it means to die: you don't get to live > anymore. No one is around who acts like you, talks like you, remembers > what you remembered and so on. Any sensible notions of what *future* > survival and "personal identity" mean must maintain these fundamentals. Yes! Nobody should attempt to form arguments about things like that without clear understanding of the difference between life and death. This difference is not arbitrary and never will be. The rest of the argument should follow *from* non-arbitrary definition of life, and never *to* some new definition of life that's implied by arbitrary assumptions that "felt" right at the time. A non-arbitrary definition of life should be our starting point, not the finish line. Lee: > So it's not arbitrary: our concept even when applied to new items must > still make sense according to the old. So to claim, for example, "Oh, I'll still > be alive if enough people read my books and belief my ideas" > is nonsense, because we all know that despite all the effort, Jesus is > no longer alive and kicking (was crucified or something, as everyone > knows). *nods* (This is a good example of the type of argument that implies some new definition of life.) Slawomir: >> I strongly believe that there should be *no room* for arbitrary choices at any >> point along the chain of logical inference. If X is more important than Y, then, >> before I can accept any conclusions *based* on X, I need to see the argument >> that comes before that which explains why X should matter most. Lee: > I agree. I'm glad to hear that. Slawomir: >> Would it be possible to see such an argument from you, Jef or Lee? Lee: > Hopefully, despite my severly limited time the next day or two, I have > made such an argument above. Not yet, Lee. So far you've identified the correct criterion (capacity to preserve life) by which we should judge importance of X vs. Y. Next part is the evaluation of your X (memories) with respect to that criterion. In other words, using a non-arbitrary definition of life (this is crucial) please show me how "preservation of memories" implies "preservation of life?" Slawomir From pharos at gmail.com Fri Nov 10 08:54:47 2006 From: pharos at gmail.com (BillK) Date: Fri, 10 Nov 2006 08:54:47 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Agency as Prime Determinant of Personal Identity In-Reply-To: References: <093501c702f8$f88577f0$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <098401c70344$391d7600$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <0a0c01c7048d$57728010$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: On 11/10/06, Heartland wrote: > Not yet, Lee. So far you've identified the correct criterion (capacity to preserve > life) by which we should judge importance of X vs. Y. Next part is the evaluation > of your X (memories) with respect to that criterion. In other words, using a > non-arbitrary definition of life (this is crucial) please show me how "preservation > of memories" implies "preservation of life?" > If you had ever lived for years with an old person who was developing Alzheimer's disease with gradually failing memory, you would appreciate that after a certain stage in the disease the 'mind' has died. The body is still 'alive' and walking around but the person that you knew for years has died. BillK From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Fri Nov 10 13:42:15 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Fri, 10 Nov 2006 08:42:15 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] A quick AGI question In-Reply-To: <20061110063811.34522.qmail@web37405.mail.mud.yahoo.com> References: <2621.128.250.225.217.1163126760.squirrel@webmail.student.unimelb.edu.au> <20061110063811.34522.qmail@web37405.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Message-ID: On 11/10/06, A B wrote: > > It seems to me that the human brain as a physical object, can and does > produce intelligence and consciousness without what is commonly understood > to be software. "Software" is just an invented human noun, typically used to > describe computer code that may be recorded in any number of ways (eg. on a > hard drive, within a program, or scribbled with crayon on a piece of paper). > IOW, the algorithms that produce human intelligence seem to be supplied > solely by the physical arrangement of the hardware of the brain. So my > question is: Is the premise behind AGI (or really any software program, I > suppose) that the active (running) software *pre-specifies* the physical > arrangement of the hardware (eg. by specifying which transistors are active > at what time) - and that this newly pre-specified hardware arrangement is > what then "produces" the mind, moment by moment? IOW, isn't it ultimately > the *hardware* that produces the mind, even though it is the software which > is dictating the physical arrangement of the hardware, moment by moment? Jeffrey, here is how I think of it. The genome is hardware which codes for the hardware that supports the mind (neurons) [1]. The dozens, or maybe, more different types of neurons in the brains, some have which have very specific functions (say the pituitary or hypothalamus) can be thought of as hardware as well. The fine patterning of the axons and dendrites and neurotransmitter weightings at the synapses can be thought of as firmware, similar to FPGAs. These are extremely plastic in young babies and become increasingly static as one learns (imprints) the patterns until one reaches adulthood. These patterns and weightings for at least some neurons or some parts of the brain can change on the timescale of days to weeks (in part on their own and in part due to neuronal stem cell additions to the configuration). The electrical network of neurons firing (releasing neurotransmitters) changes on a millisecond by millisecond basis and can be viewed as the "active state" of ones computer. For example, right now my computer is running Linux and its system processes, Apache, Firefox, Epiphany, Nvu, RealPlayer, and a number of xterms. Now most people are unaware of these "processes" in their mind. One might consider them "subconscious" thoughts. Now, what I would probably consider the "software" of the brain (the programs) is written in the underlying hardware of the genome that determines the fundamental layout of the neurons into specific patterns and to communicate using specific neurotransmitters. There are a fundamental set of these that neuroscientists have and are continue to work out (which is why neuroscience textbooks are so large). Ray Kurzweil briefly discusses some of this in Chapter 4 of TSIN. Nature evolved these programs to solve specific types of problems (just as computer programs do) using as a basis the fundamental computational hardware of the neuron. The programs like "remember where the food sources are", "remember how to mate", "the fight or flight response", etc. are probably hundreds of millions of years old but have been varied somewhat in all species. Now, GI "program", seems to be a relatively recent development, probably driven by the expansion of the human brain and the need for humans to adapt to a very large variety of environments. William Calvin discusses some aspects of this and I'm sure there are other that people might recommend. I gave my view of what GI might be. Yours may be different. I am sure people have tried to prune general summaries of the current literature for things like "intelligence", "AI", "mind", etc. in Wikipedia with references to more extended sources. Robert 1. It is worth noting that this neurons are complex bionanotechnology. One of the important differences between bionanotech and robust molecular nanotechnology is that because most of it is operating in water and diffusion is controlling a significant fraction of what molecules go where (though cells do have active transport processes) there is somewhat of a more random nature to bionanotechnology. In computer chips the tansistors are controlling location of electrons and holes to a much finer level than the small molecules in cells are controlled. From msd001 at gmail.com Fri Nov 10 14:00:15 2006 From: msd001 at gmail.com (Mike Dougherty) Date: Fri, 10 Nov 2006 09:00:15 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Detectives and red herrings (was Survivaltangent) In-Reply-To: <0a3c01c7049c$07919860$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> References: <095f01c70301$da6b8a80$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <62c14240611082005w15573471h41c32599280f2233@mail.gmail.com> <0a3c01c7049c$07919860$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: <62c14240611100600w55f3c51t87076697cd834ae9@mail.gmail.com> On 11/10/06, Lee Corbin wrote: > > If you and I gradually over the years slowly become more and more > advanced, but somehow we both manage to remember Lee Corbin's > childhood, teenage years, fascination with chess, the close game with > David Bronstein in a simul, the years writing under the name "Lee > Corbin" on the Fabric of Reality list, and so on and on, then you are > dead, and there are *two* Lee Corbins. Surely, if you value your > survival, you do not want this to happen. Keep your own memories, > stay alive! > I think I understand your position (considering how frequently it has been restated) Suppose you have keepsakes from each of the vacations you have been on (refrigerator magnets, shot glasses, marginally evil tiki dolls, primitive masks, pottery, etc. etc.) These are all physical tokens which cue your memory of those events. Their placement around your home (general definition of home; the space you inhabit, whatever) gives some clue to an observer the relative priority of each of these tokens. I imagine some of those treasures end up in a box at the back of the garage. At that point, the memory-triggering value of that item has been decreased to almost zero. Suppose I have a garage sale without your consent and clean out the clutter. Have I "killed" some part of you? Of course you might be able to recall the memories without the physical tokens, but if you have been uploaded and the garage I have cleaned out is an failing old RAID - then you might be arguing that I have in fact destroyed some of your identity, correct? -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From c.hales at pgrad.unimelb.edu.au Fri Nov 10 14:44:09 2006 From: c.hales at pgrad.unimelb.edu.au (Colin Geoffrey Hales) Date: Sat, 11 Nov 2006 01:44:09 +1100 (EST) Subject: [extropy-chat] A quick AGI question In-Reply-To: <20061110063811.34522.qmail@web37405.mail.mud.yahoo.com> References: <20061110063811.34522.qmail@web37405.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <2970.139.168.42.79.1163169849.squirrel@webmail.student.unimelb.edu.au> > Hi Colin, > > Thank you for responding. Even though I have only the most preliminary > and limited understanding of AI, the information you have provided certainly sounds good to me (FWIW) :-) But, I think that I managed to articulate my question in a sufficiently obscure way, that I think it's intent may have been lost. I'll try to rearrange the question the best I can, with the limited understanding that I have. > > It seems to me that the human brain as a physical object, can and does > produce intelligence and consciousness without what is commonly > understood to be software. "Software" is just an invented human noun, typically used to describe computer code that may be recorded in any number of ways (eg. on a hard drive, within a program, or scribbled with crayon on a piece of paper). IOW, the algorithms that produce human intelligence seem to be supplied solely by the physical arrangement of the hardware of the brain. So my question is: Is the premise behind AGI (or really any software program, I suppose) that the active (running) software *pre-specifies* the physical arrangement of the hardware (eg. by specifying which transistors are active at what time) - and that this newly pre-specified hardware arrangement is what then "produces" the mind, moment by moment? IOW, isn't it ultimately the *hardware* that produces the mind, even though it is the software which is dictating the > physical arrangement of the hardware, moment by moment? > > Sorry if this question is still clear as mud, I'm having a hard time of > it. > > Best Wishes, > > Jeffrey Herrlich > OK. These sorts of questions are good. What they are not is quick! :-) I need all the practice I can get at articulation of ideas. It's one thing to understand, another to explain and yet another to 'build one'. The computer metaphor for the brain is very pervasive and can be very useful in one context and quite misleading in another. I think I'm getting closer to your question, which relates to the difference between abstracted computation and that 'computation' done by brain material and what may be different between the two as chunks of the universe doing something. Firstly is a matter of "physical arrangement of hardware" as determined by software. Peripheral devices are irrelevant in this. It is the central processor which matters. The hardware is not changing physically in the sense of matter creation/deletion or even rearrangement of atoms. All these things are fixed in modern semiconductor technology. Sub-atomic particles get maniulated (electrons/holes). Rather the hardware is changing 'electrical state'. In a computer the specific electrical state of the processor and the logical state of the program are not directly related in any predefined systematic way. For example a subroutine may be invoked many times, each in a different area of memory. One invocation may be in static RAM, another in dynamic RAM. (There is the role of the operating system inserted in all of this, too.) The electrical state of the hardware in each case is completely different in physical location and temporal behaviour (eg speed)....but it's all the same program. A software-based (abstracted) AGI programmer would claim that the program is determining the 'mind' thus created, not the hardware. Secondly is the notion of a program in the case of brain material. Which is where the computer metaphor does us a disservice. I now see that Robert Bradbury has chimed in on this! I'll try not to double up. The brain is a self constructed learning engine. Neurogenesis - the initial creation of the brain (nervous system), its basic structure and certain innate 'knowledge' (such as how to breath, for example) are the result of 'programming' in the form of DNA and the interaction this has throughout development through the role of expressed genes, intimately co-ordinated until...voila....we have something capable of learning how to learn things. The situated brain is now stimulated with sensory feeds and the stimulation participates in the development of faculties needed to learn (learning how to learn). Having finished learning how to learn (development...around age 25 for humans, when the great neural dieback has completed) what you end up with is a machine that is innately programmed to learn. The capacity to learn is hardwired by the structural/cellular/molecular biological reality of the situation. "That which is learned" is represented in the moment-to-moment reconfiguration of the existing structure of the brain in the sense of connections, not cellular birth/death. A very complex molecular dance indeed. So there is no 'program' in a brain except it's innate learning capacity. A perfectly healthy brain can, when exposed to the appropriate stimulus, come to learn (believe) in diametrically opposed views, both views are valid beliefs. The process of learning is the same. For example I could believe in the great galactic pumpkin as the source of all natural laws. You can believe the tooth fairy does that job. Both beliefs are rational in the sense that they have been acquired by a healthy brain (healthy learning biochemical algorithm). So, whilst conceptually the computer metaphor is useful in some contexts, computer and brain are actually very very different critters. How are we doing thus far? regards, Colin From c.hales at pgrad.unimelb.edu.au Fri Nov 10 15:08:18 2006 From: c.hales at pgrad.unimelb.edu.au (Colin Geoffrey Hales) Date: Sat, 11 Nov 2006 02:08:18 +1100 (EST) Subject: [extropy-chat] A quick AGI question In-Reply-To: <2970.139.168.42.79.1163169849.squirrel@webmail.student.unimelb.edu.au> References: <20061110063811.34522.qmail@web37405.mail.mud.yahoo.com> <2970.139.168.42.79.1163169849.squirrel@webmail.student.unimelb.edu.au> Message-ID: <3011.139.168.42.79.1163171298.squirrel@webmail.student.unimelb.edu.au> A quick post-script.... 1) The alteration of brain 'hardware' in the form of new neurons/astrocytes does occur, but more in the role of repair than in learning. It is only relatively recently that the details of neural/astrocyte cell genesis/apoptosis have emerged. The picture is not complete. 2) The electrical 'state' of the brain is a very complex 3D electrical field pattern. It literally is the "mind" in the sense that the manipulation of it is what the brain is doing. This is the main computer/brain distinction. In the computer the electrical field pattern is irrelevant. cheers colin From eugen at leitl.org Fri Nov 10 17:47:58 2006 From: eugen at leitl.org (Eugen Leitl) Date: Fri, 10 Nov 2006 18:47:58 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] A quick AGI question In-Reply-To: <3011.139.168.42.79.1163171298.squirrel@webmail.student.unimelb.edu.au> References: <20061110063811.34522.qmail@web37405.mail.mud.yahoo.com> <2970.139.168.42.79.1163169849.squirrel@webmail.student.unimelb.edu.au> <3011.139.168.42.79.1163171298.squirrel@webmail.student.unimelb.edu.au> Message-ID: <20061110174758.GX6974@leitl.org> On Sat, Nov 11, 2006 at 02:08:18AM +1100, Colin Geoffrey Hales wrote: > A quick post-script.... > > 1) The alteration of brain 'hardware' in the form of new > neurons/astrocytes does occur, but more in the role of repair than in > learning. It is only relatively recently that the details of Shape changes and their property changes (minute/hour/day) determine the short-term (ms/s) processes. In practice there is no sharp distinction data/program/hardware nor clean layer separation as in human-designed systems. > neural/astrocyte cell genesis/apoptosis have emerged. The picture is not > complete. The picture is is very fuzzy, and damn complicated. > 2) The electrical 'state' of the brain is a very complex 3D electrical > field pattern. It literally is the "mind" in the sense that the Spatiotemporal patterns of electric gradients are only a facet of the entire process. There are chemical gradients, machinery modulation, gene pattern activity changes, and similiar. > manipulation of it is what the brain is doing. This is the main > computer/brain distinction. In the computer the electrical field pattern > is irrelevant. "The" computer doesn't exist. FPGA defines gate connectivity by SRAM cell state, and spintronics can define a logic element by a spin configuration. People will use whatever works best. -- Eugen* Leitl leitl http://leitl.org ______________________________________________________________ ICBM: 48.07100, 11.36820 http://www.ativel.com 8B29F6BE: 099D 78BA 2FD3 B014 B08A 7779 75B0 2443 8B29 F6BE -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: signature.asc Type: application/pgp-signature Size: 191 bytes Desc: Digital signature URL: From hkhenson at rogers.com Fri Nov 10 18:12:07 2006 From: hkhenson at rogers.com (Keith Henson) Date: Fri, 10 Nov 2006 13:12:07 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] SEX! (Re: Martine Rothblatt and bemes) In-Reply-To: <4650.213.112.92.120.1163111242.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se > References: <380-22006114922117195@M2W030.mail2web.com> <380-22006114922117195@M2W030.mail2web.com> Message-ID: <5.1.0.14.0.20061110125722.035b41d0@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> At 11:27 PM 11/9/2006 +0100, Anders wrote: snip > Already memes >are problematic as replicators since they are hard to delineate from >surrounding cognitive structures, Hi Anders In my opinion, the only logical way to consider memes is as pure information. True, they have to be in a brain to have effects, just like a gene has to be in a cell or a computer virus has to be in a computer. But the essence of a meme is the information. So memes are replicating information patterns, elements of culture, ideas, beliefs, etc, etc. But it all comes down to the same thing, information measurable in bits. I have been seriously annoyed at people who tried to mystify such a simple subject. They distract from the really interesting interface between evolutionary psychology and memetics which elucidates subjects as important to humans as germ theory. Keith Henson From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Fri Nov 10 19:52:59 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Fri, 10 Nov 2006 14:52:59 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Detectives and red herrings (was Survivaltangent) In-Reply-To: <0a3c01c7049c$07919860$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> References: <095f01c70301$da6b8a80$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <62c14240611082005w15573471h41c32599280f2233@mail.gmail.com> <0a3c01c7049c$07919860$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: On 11/10/06, Lee Corbin wrote: > Mike writes > > > If you lose memories, do you lose your self? > > Yes. It might be interesting to know whether you can ask the same thing about beliefs? If you lose beliefs, do you lose your self? I can cite the point when I was perhaps 14 or 15 and had to choose between science and catholicism. The person who ended up choosing science was *not* the same individual as the one who believed in catholicism. But I still have vague memories of his existance and his beliefs. As I've observed myself evolve over the last decade (yes, I'm am now more than a decade old in extropian terms) I see myself losing more and more of my attachment to the current physical embodiement and more and more comfort with memory states and computational vectors derived mostly or even partly from my "self". Robert From benboc at lineone.net Fri Nov 10 19:48:30 2006 From: benboc at lineone.net (ben) Date: Fri, 10 Nov 2006 19:48:30 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] META: HTML posts In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4554D78E.30805@lineone.net> An observation: Those people who post in HTML don't get their posts read as much as those who don't. Here's an example of why: From: pjmanney Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] Martine Rothblatt and "bemes" To: Message-ID: <26113169.722631163107284594.JavaMail.servlet at perfora> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" An HTML attachment was scrubbed... (which i could follow, if i could be arsed, but usually i can't) I'm guessing i'm not the only one who's reading a daily digest of the posts. A suggestion: Don't post in HTML. Up to you, of course, but if you do, i ain't gonna read them. And i don't know how many other people, too. ben zaiboc From benboc at lineone.net Fri Nov 10 19:54:24 2006 From: benboc at lineone.net (ben) Date: Fri, 10 Nov 2006 19:54:24 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Martine Rothblatt and bemes In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4554D8F0.1040501@lineone.net> Scuse me! What are Bemes? In simple language please? I can't make sense of this. (I am familiar with Genes and Memes, so you don't need to explain those) ben zaiboc From spike66 at comcast.net Fri Nov 10 20:18:46 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Fri, 10 Nov 2006 12:18:46 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] all that concerns me is the future of education In-Reply-To: <20061105001850.59776.qmail@web51603.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <200611102032.kAAKWIvi004219@andromeda.ziaspace.com> bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Al Brooks ... When you think about it, unless someone is subliminally pressured why would they risk not only being shot and blown up in combat, but also risk getting third degree burns on large areas of them? ... To protect the lives, rights and freedoms of people like us? Happy Veterans Day Al. {8-] spike From benboc at lineone.net Fri Nov 10 20:23:10 2006 From: benboc at lineone.net (ben) Date: Fri, 10 Nov 2006 20:23:10 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] A quick AGI question In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4554DFAE.1060002@lineone.net> Yup, i reckon your donkey is in reverse gear all right. Oops, sorry, i mean your fish is, erm, ackwards. Sort of. And then, again, not. This is the way i think of it: Imagine you want an oscillator. That is, you want something that will mark time with a regular beat. You could do it by wiring up some capacitors, resistors and transistors. Or you could do it by typing a few lines of your favourite programming language. Does it make a difference? The 'thoughts' of the AGI/Human/whatever are patterns of information processing. How they are achieved is totally irrelevant. You could /probably/ make a mind out of water clocks, if you were clever enough (and had the necessary resources/time/patience). Or you could make it out of a high-level programming language that was as far removed from the transistors of the computer it was running on, as Shakespeare is from Quarks. So an AGI could be implemented in anything that was capable of supporting the necessary complexity of information processing - silicon transistors, rod-logic nanocomputers, optical processors, vats of chemicals, maybe even clouds of plasma laced with magnetic fields. You may think 'ah, but all those things are arranging physical objects in some way', and it's true. But there's nothing to stop you creating a simulated world in a suitably powerful computer that models, say, molecules, that interact to create computing elements, that act as the information-processing substrate of a virtual brain that runs a mind. You are 2 or 3 levels of abstraction away from the 'physical movements' that are probably always going to be necessary for any kind of information processing. And you'd have a bloody hard time actually predicting what thoughts the system was having, from examining the state of the transistors. It might actually be impossible. So i think the effort to create AGI is going to concentrate on understanding the patterns of information themselves, not the physical stuff that will implement them. Of course, at the end of the day, there has to be some kind of physical process, but it's of minimal importance, compared to the patterns of processing being implemented. I hope that makes some kind of sense. ben zaiboc A B puzzled: > Hey y'all, > > I'm trying to develop a personal understanding of the (very) > elementary theory behind AGI, such that a mere mortal like me can > understand intuitively, without having to digest mountains of > literature. So I have a basic question, that I'll state using > informal (and I'm sure inaccurate) terminology, but I hope I can get > the idea across all the same. > > Q) If I understand correctly, the algorithms responsible for human > thought are supplied by the physical arrangement of the "active" > hardware of the human brain. So, is the premise behind AGI that the > active *software* functions by pre-specifying the physical > arrangement of the hardware (by specifying which transistors are > active at what time for example) and that the AGI "thoughts" follow > from this point onward? In other words, the actual "thoughts" of the > AGI are always secondary to the hardware arrangement supplied by the > software, and that in both cases it is *ultimately* the *hardware* > that results in the mind? > > Is this an accurate basic understanding, or is this all just bass - > ackwards? > > Best Wishes, > > Jeffrey Herrlich From andrew at ceruleansystems.com Fri Nov 10 20:30:13 2006 From: andrew at ceruleansystems.com (J. Andrew Rogers) Date: Fri, 10 Nov 2006 12:30:13 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] META: HTML posts In-Reply-To: <4554D78E.30805@lineone.net> References: <4554D78E.30805@lineone.net> Message-ID: <256E2FB6-42E5-4FD5-81FC-C7CA37BCD288@ceruleansystems.com> Yes, it is both general policy and good manners to NOT post HTML email on this (or any other) mailing list. Personally, HTML email gets shunted to /dev/null for the most part, and I am using a client that renders it just fine. Ignoring arguments of utility, the majority of people who send HTML email send badly thought out formatting hash that makes their email nigh unreadable, so the real world practice is even worse than the theory. Every couple years for as long as HTML has been supported in an email client, some individuals on this list have to be reminded that plaintext is the formatting standard for the list. If the HTML formatting is very clean and tasteful it usually does not bother me enough to say anything, but lately there has been some pretty ugly HTML hash being posted to the list. Adhering to the plaintext standards is strongly encouraged for those who want their email to be read. Cheers, J. Andrew Rogers On Nov 10, 2006, at 11:48 AM, ben wrote: > An observation: > Those people who post in HTML don't get their posts read as much as > those who don't. Here's an example of why: > > > From: pjmanney > Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] Martine Rothblatt and "bemes" > To: > Message-ID: <26113169.722631163107284594.JavaMail.servlet at perfora> > Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" > > An HTML attachment was scrubbed... > (which i could follow, if i could be arsed, but usually i can't) > > > I'm guessing i'm not the only one who's reading a daily digest of > the posts. > > A suggestion: > Don't post in HTML. > Up to you, of course, but if you do, i ain't gonna read them. And i > don't know how many other people, too. > > ben zaiboc From spike66 at comcast.net Fri Nov 10 20:24:38 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Fri, 10 Nov 2006 12:24:38 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Hi folks In-Reply-To: <2071.128.250.225.217.1162774829.squirrel@webmail.student.unimelb.edu.au> Message-ID: <200611102045.kAAKjZmQ021469@andromeda.ziaspace.com> > Subject: [extropy-chat] Hi folks > > Hello all, > > You probably don't remember me. I've been off list since 2003. I thought > I'd have a look at things extropian and ....all the troops are still at > it! > Colin Hales We remember you, and we welcome you back Colin! {8-] We have had several old time ExI posters come back recently. spike From benboc at lineone.net Fri Nov 10 20:53:37 2006 From: benboc at lineone.net (ben) Date: Fri, 10 Nov 2006 20:53:37 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] A quick AGI question In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4554E6D1.5020908@lineone.net> OK, i think i see what you mean, and i doubt if my previous reply was very useful. Simply put, i think that you do have it backwards when you say it seems that software specifies the state of the hardware, which is what produces mind. I'd put it thusly: Hardware implements the software which constitutes mind. A striking image that i remember from Steve Grand's book "Life and how to create it" (i think that's the title, anyway), is that of an eddy in a stream. It doesn't matter that it's a stream, or that it's made of water. What matters is the eddy itself. The dynamic pattern which wouldn't be there without the stream, but could equally have been in liquid nitrogen or hot plasma or numbers in a computer or a cloud of butterflies or a dust storm on Mars, solitons on a sheet of platinum, etc., etc... A mind is a very complex eddy. ben zaiboc A B reshuffled and dealt again: > ... I'll try to rearrange the question the best I can, with the limited understanding that I have. > It seems to me that the human brain as a physical object, can and does produce intelligence and consciousness without what is commonly understood to be software. "Software" is just an invented human noun, typically used to describe computer code that may be recorded in any number of ways (eg. on a hard drive, within a program, or scribbled with crayon on a piece of paper). IOW, the algorithms that produce human intelligence seem to be supplied solely by the physical arrangement of the hardware of the brain. So my question is: Is the premise behind AGI (or really any software program, I suppose) that the active (running) software *pre-specifies* the physical arrangement of the hardware (eg. by specifying which transistors are active at what time) - and that this newly pre-specified hardware arrangement is what then "produces" the mind, moment by moment? IOW, isn't it ultimately the *hardware* that produces the mind, even though it is the software which is dictating the physical arrangement of the hardware, moment by moment? > Sorry if this question is still clear as mud, I'm having a hard time of it. From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Fri Nov 10 21:27:01 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Fri, 10 Nov 2006 16:27:01 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Martine Rothblatt and "bemes" In-Reply-To: <28386055.624701163036591097.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> References: <28386055.624701163036591097.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> Message-ID: On 11/8/06, pjmanney wrote: > Hey, was anyone going to answer my question about Martine Rothblatt's > concept of "bemes" as a valid concept of future identity? I've only granted the presentation [1] a small time allotment [2] but I believe I would tend to agree with others that these are splitting hair arguments. Many of the slides I saw seemed to rest on a focus on "transhumanisn" on a narrow definition of "human" and then using "transbemanism" to differentiate positions ("be"-ingness vs. "human"-ness). I instead would choose to focus the emphasis on "trans" (or "post") and I think many on this list with long experience (witness all of the "trans-" vs "post-" discussions) might agree with that. There appear to be two aspects of this -- "beme" which seems to be poorly defined and "transbeman(ism)" (which seems to be focused on ethical treatment of anything of human or greater "intelligence"). Classical "memes" are thought patterns (ideas) that can be communicated between two entities in such a way that the "essence" is recreated (you *aren't* creating an exact duplicate) [3]. From that point they can mutate and selected for (like genes) [4]. I think she may be trying to apply aspects of "being" (such as identity, consciousness, freedom, etc.) in a similar way but it isn't clear that they can actually be separated from their instantiations. The problem may involve the effort to distill things into labels we can talk about and communicate. Lets consider one person is 80% long term memories (typically a Luddite) and 20% short term "beingness" (their jokes, their priorities, their stories). On the other hand another person is 80% their short term memories (a Zen monk [though this is iffy because you've got long traditions of beliefs] or maybe an actor). Then there is a classical transhumanist who is 80% the ideas within their head about what the future will be like. How can one apply simplifying labels (small words [5]) to recipes which are this different? But having not seen the talk (or the entire conference environment) I could be missing quite a bit. > >Robert writes > > > >> On 10/31/06, Lee Corbin wrote: > >> > >> > But what happened to *me* in there? I'm more than my memes, pal. > >> > Don't forget my memories. Well *I* can forget them because I don't have my hands on them. :-) But your point is taken. *But* what about of those neuroscience disease puzzles involve illnesses like when you can "be" (retain and manipulate) short term memories but not long term and vice versa (I don't know the technical terms, perhaps someone could go dig in Wikipedia). Is a person who lacks one of those capabilities less "human" than Lee? > > > >> Well memories are memes and at least some of them are essential > >> components of the survival and reproduction processes. > > > >Memories are memes??? That does violence to the concept so far > >as I understand it. Memories are more like raw data; for one thing, > >they're very seldom contagious. Beliefs are something else, and > >are indeed memetic. Short term memories and conscious thoughts are IMO "memes", See William Calvin's explanation for this. Long term memories are contagious aren't "contagious" at the thought level but they are at the story level. (Doesn't have to involve "beliefs" -- think good jokes or "can you believe that" stories.) > >> > That's me, maybe. I don't want to "become", especially if the end > >> > product is not me. I would rather "are". As you put it. Can you be without becoming? Is everything not change? Robert 1. http://www.imminst.org/conference/M artine.ppt 2. Observation: if you are going to introduce a new term to the complex set this list already has you may wish to define *your* impression of it. For the people who don't have office or equivalent installed pointing them at such may not be the best way to get "mind-time". (Presentation (an openoffice component) does appear to open the document but I can't review it as fast as I could if I were still using Powerpoint). A Wikipedia URL might have been better but I doubt you could get "beme" or "transbemanism" into it as an accepted (academic) term. 3. One has to be careful to differentiate between internal memes and external (societal) memes, neural pattern (memes), verbal memes and written memes. They cannot be treated the same way without a lot of abstraction. 4. It might be interesting to discuss the error rate in the copying of genes (which is generally very low) and the error rate in the copying of ideas (which can be quite high). Thus endless debates on the list about *what* did they really mean by that... 5. We have a hard time about standard definitions for *old* words like consciousness or identity -- how can we agree on new ones like "bemes"? -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Fri Nov 10 21:43:22 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Fri, 10 Nov 2006 16:43:22 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] all that concerns me is the future of education In-Reply-To: <200611102032.kAAKWIvi004219@andromeda.ziaspace.com> References: <20061105001850.59776.qmail@web51603.mail.yahoo.com> <200611102032.kAAKWIvi004219@andromeda.ziaspace.com> Message-ID: On 11/10/06, spike wrote: > To protect the lives, rights and freedoms of people like us? I'm sure that is what *many* of them would like to believe. But I'm also sure, at least from watching recent Armed Forces advertisements, that some of them are doing it because they get to play with *way* cooler video games. And then there are a few who do it because you get to play with weapons that simply cannot be obtained at the local gun store. But given recent actions by the executive grant one really has to wonder if we are not losing *our* rights (Britian is already a pseudo "big brother" state). When it was my relatives fighting my other relatives (I'm half English) it was a relatively level playing field. But as Tienamen Square showed it takes real moxy for a single *unarmed* individual to go up against a tank. I wouldn't know how to begin to face down an aircraft carrier (without firepower that cannot easily be obtained by anyone other than nation-states at this time). Robert -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From c.hales at pgrad.unimelb.edu.au Fri Nov 10 21:58:01 2006 From: c.hales at pgrad.unimelb.edu.au (Colin Geoffrey Hales) Date: Sat, 11 Nov 2006 08:58:01 +1100 (EST) Subject: [extropy-chat] META: HTML posts In-Reply-To: <256E2FB6-42E5-4FD5-81FC-C7CA37BCD288@ceruleansystems.com> References: <4554D78E.30805@lineone.net> <256E2FB6-42E5-4FD5-81FC-C7CA37BCD288@ceruleansystems.com> Message-ID: <3888.139.168.42.79.1163195881.squirrel@webmail.student.unimelb.edu.au> I am forced to use squirrel mail web client by the uni (current circumstances)...there doesn't appear to be an option for sending HTML, but I can't tell if it strips out the markers or merely makes them invisible in the editor, which looks like raw text. All I know is I have no control over it and reformatting what squirrelmail's edits do to HTML wastes a lot of time. grrr to squirrelmail. Colin > > Yes, it is both general policy and good manners to NOT post HTML > email on this (or any other) mailing list. Personally, HTML email > gets shunted to /dev/null for the most part, and I am using a client > that renders it just fine. Ignoring arguments of utility, the > majority of people who send HTML email send badly thought out > formatting hash that makes their email nigh unreadable, so the real > world practice is even worse than the theory. > > Every couple years for as long as HTML has been supported in an email > client, some individuals on this list have to be reminded that > plaintext is the formatting standard for the list. If the HTML > formatting is very clean and tasteful it usually does not bother me > enough to say anything, but lately there has been some pretty ugly > HTML hash being posted to the list. Adhering to the plaintext > standards is strongly encouraged for those who want their email to be > read. > > Cheers, > > J. Andrew Rogers > > > On Nov 10, 2006, at 11:48 AM, ben wrote: >> An observation: >> Those people who post in HTML don't get their posts read as much as >> those who don't. Here's an example of why: >> >> >> From: pjmanney >> Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] Martine Rothblatt and "bemes" >> To: >> Message-ID: <26113169.722631163107284594.JavaMail.servlet at perfora> >> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >> >> An HTML attachment was scrubbed... >> (which i could follow, if i could be arsed, but usually i can't) >> >> >> I'm guessing i'm not the only one who's reading a daily digest of >> the posts. >> >> A suggestion: >> Don't post in HTML. >> Up to you, of course, but if you do, i ain't gonna read them. And i >> don't know how many other people, too. >> >> ben zaiboc > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > From hkhenson at rogers.com Fri Nov 10 22:03:24 2006 From: hkhenson at rogers.com (Keith Henson) Date: Fri, 10 Nov 2006 17:03:24 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] The evolution of intelligence (3) Message-ID: <5.1.0.14.0.20061110170314.035d5508@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> At 10:44 PM 11/9/2006 -0500, you wrote: >I'm trying to understand what the evolution of intelligence might >have been, and am in search of pointers to background sources. This >seemed like a logical place to ask, given our shared interests. > >In some cognitive models, there's the idea of distinct capabilities, >each having a biological basis. Each of which presumably conferred a >reproductive advantage, in its first through its final forms, >although it may not be clear that that advantage is wholly >independent of the pre-existence of another of the capabilities. One of the more divergent viewpoints is that of William Calvin. Calvin's thinks that humans came to occupy the projectile hunter niche starting from close to chimp abilities and working up. He has a remarkable good web site with all his books on it. His view is that much of the other capacities such as speech reused the sequencing hardware originally for throwing. Incidentally, with social animals in kin groups you have to consider Hamilton's inclusive fitness. Some of the large evolutionary drivers such as wars are dependant on the reproduction of relatives of those who get killed in the process. >What is the set of cognitive subsystems known to exist in some >species? Which species have which subsystems? Why do they have those >and why not the others? What does this look like in a taxonomic or >timeline tree? > >I've dusted off my sf writer hat lately so I'm mostly looking for a >plausible framework to draw on in creating lifeforms for stories I'm >working on. It would also be nice to find folks in the pertinent >fields who wouldn't mind if I asked stupid questions or ran ideas by. I question if intelligence at the human level could emerge in a non social species. So much of our smartness is due to memes . . . Keith Henson From spike66 at comcast.net Fri Nov 10 22:20:42 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Fri, 10 Nov 2006 14:20:42 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] it's all understandable, except In-Reply-To: <21684711.482321162939420353.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> Message-ID: <200611102222.kAAMMwFc024890@andromeda.ziaspace.com> > bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of pjmanney > Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] it's all understandable, except > ... > >http://www.masada2000.org/nobel.html are sure due to IQ alone. But > >please read http://www.masada2000.org/Powerful-Jews.html > >especially the very last line. Yeah, sometimes it's that simple. > > As an Ashkenazi, I can say, Yes. It is that simple. Take a good look at > that Nobel list. ... my grandmother said: "Ach mein Gott, you > COULD have been a doctor!" My father said: "Oh my God, you COULD have > been a rocket scientist!" Nobody, not even my mother, wanted me to be a > lawyer. > > Such were their expectations for me, as good Jews. ... > PJ Thanks PJ. Your comments were a kick for me: my mother's side were Ashkenazi, but had assimilated into the christian culture around 1910. The value system somehow survived: top of the heap for a promising child is to become a doctor, or a science professor at a college. Next was a lawyer or an accountant. Below that on the respectability scale was a businessman or builder, but only if you are wildly successful and made a ton of money. An engineer is below that, but still way above an entertainer or professional athlete. {8^D spike From c.hales at pgrad.unimelb.edu.au Fri Nov 10 22:26:33 2006 From: c.hales at pgrad.unimelb.edu.au (Colin Geoffrey Hales) Date: Sat, 11 Nov 2006 09:26:33 +1100 (EST) Subject: [extropy-chat] A quick AGI question References: <20061110063811.34522.qmail@web37405.mail.mud.yahoo.com> <2970.139.168.42.79.1163169849.squirrel@webmail.student.unimelb.edu.au> Message-ID: <3923.139.168.42.79.1163197593.squirrel@webmail.student.unimelb.edu.au> <3011.139.168.42.79.1163171298.squirrel at webmail.student.unimelb.edu.au> <20061110174758.GX6974 at leitl.org> In-Reply-To: <20061110174758.GX6974 at leitl.org> > On Sat, Nov 11, 2006 at 02:08:18AM +1100, Colin Geoffrey Hales wrote: >> A quick post-script.... >> 1) The alteration of brain 'hardware' in the form of new >> neurons/astrocytes does occur, but more in the role of repair than in learning. It is only relatively recently that the details of > > Shape changes and their property changes (minute/hour/day) determine the short-term (ms/s) processes. In practice there is no sharp > distinction data/program/hardware nor clean layer separation > as in human-designed systems. > >> neural/astrocyte cell genesis/apoptosis have emerged. The picture is not >> complete. > > The picture is is very fuzzy, and damn complicated. > >> 2) The electrical 'state' of the brain is a very complex 3D electrical field pattern. It literally is the "mind" in the sense that the > > Spatiotemporal patterns of electric gradients are only a facet of the entire process. There are chemical gradients, machinery modulation, gene pattern activity changes, and similiar. > >> manipulation of it is what the brain is doing. This is the main computer/brain distinction. In the computer the electrical field pattern >> is irrelevant. > > "The" computer doesn't exist. FPGA defines gate connectivity > by SRAM cell state, and spintronics can define a logic element > by a spin configuration. People will use whatever works best. > Hi! >From Jeff's perspective... note the great variation in the range of views on the role of hardware in conmputation and then in intelligence and cognition... yours and Ben Zaiboc display one view of the relationship between the 'computer' and 'computation'....I differ greatly... ....which is I would claim that an fpGA based AGI (I originally thought it ould do!), for example, would have no 'mind' in the sense that we have. Nor would it have intellect like ours. Nevertheless it could be a useful device applied to something domain/habitat specific. The empirical prediction would be fragility/maladaptation outside that domain/habitat. I am quite close to mathematical proof of this (which is a kind of oxymoron, but there you go) and my PhD project is computationally exploring the mechanism details. In the end, special hardware is needed... there's a huge background (3 years of analysis) to this... too much for here, now. All in good time. Meanwhile, another view of computation for Jeff: Try this: pick up a nearby . Hold it in your hand, look at it and say "the universe has computed the ". That is the notion of computation important to me. In humans, the universe has actually computed a learning (= computing) machine called the brain and has made full use of the innate circumstances of situatedness within the universe-as-computation, not any abstraction constructed by the brain thus reified in hardware or software........ So have we broken your brain yet, Jeff? :-) It's so nice to be back in a place where people get this stuff. So much of academia is lost in dogma and paradigmatic industrialised mega-scale science...I'm finding it refreshing here....I've been in the midst of wet neuroscience for several years... amazing. email forums full of dogma, frightened to explore beyond the financially/professionally threatening boundaries of the received view...Computation is the _last_ thing the bulk of mainstream neuroscientists think about. Other than figuring out statistical significances of their data(is my N big enough?)...These are the poor devils intent on figuring out the details of molecular-pathway X, developmental issue Y details, pathology W origins/progression mechanisms, knockout mouse Z gene expression etc.... important, support it, gotta be done...but sooooooo boring! And of course they think I am from the planet zork, speaking in tongues. I seem to have digressed somewhat. Ooops. cheers, Colin Hales From c.hales at pgrad.unimelb.edu.au Fri Nov 10 22:48:57 2006 From: c.hales at pgrad.unimelb.edu.au (Colin Geoffrey Hales) Date: Sat, 11 Nov 2006 09:48:57 +1100 (EST) Subject: [extropy-chat] The evolution of intelligence (3) In-Reply-To: <5.1.0.14.0.20061110170314.035d5508@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> References: <5.1.0.14.0.20061110170314.035d5508@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> Message-ID: <3961.139.168.42.79.1163198937.squirrel@webmail.student.unimelb.edu.au> > At 10:44 PM 11/9/2006 -0500, you wrote: >>I'm trying to understand what the evolution of intelligence might >>have been, and am in search of pointers to background sources. This >>seemed like a logical place to ask, given our shared interests. >> >>In some cognitive models, there's the idea of distinct capabilities, >>each having a biological basis. Each of which presumably conferred a >>reproductive advantage, in its first through its final forms, >>although it may not be clear that that advantage is wholly >>independent of the pre-existence of another of the capabilities. > One very recent book by Derek Denton "The Primordial emotions: The Dawning of Consciousness" This is an empirical science outcome (Derek is a physiologist, and expert in blood salt/thirst). It traces the origins of subjective experiences to the highly conserved brain basal region in the form of the 'primordial emotions'. These emotions are the darwinian 'essentials' - the subjective experience of thirst, breathlessness, hunger, sexual appetite and others. The drive (he calls 'imperious') provided by the emotions results in a survival benefit. ie. you don't need a cortex to have experiences. You merely need a small (maybe 1 cell) cohort of cells 'doing the experience dance'. The implications are that all vertebrates (including reptiles) can have experiences and needed to in order that they survive. Derek is very old-school...he's 83! and has a blizzard of letters after his name....It's a good read. Enjoy. Colin Hales From spike66 at comcast.net Fri Nov 10 23:05:25 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Fri, 10 Nov 2006 15:05:25 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Intelligence of Leaders (was Re: it's allunderstandable, except) In-Reply-To: <095301c702fd$a09d3ff0$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: <200611102307.kAAN7gSv016082@andromeda.ziaspace.com> > bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Lee Corbin ... > Roosevelt the same government-meddling policies that caused the > great depression. (This is the Austrian view.) If only Harding or > Coolidge could have remained president just a bit longer (so writes > Paul Johnson, IMO the world's greatest living historian), a great > deal of evil in the 20th century would have been averted... > Lee If one reads what Calvin Coolidge actually said, he would be ranked among the best presidents, if not the very best. That for which he is quoted now is the goofy stuff, evidence that the nation didn't follow him. Tragic, for he was a great one. Coolidge or Reagan may be the closest to an actual libertarian president we will ever see. spike From mbb386 at main.nc.us Fri Nov 10 23:25:56 2006 From: mbb386 at main.nc.us (MB) Date: Fri, 10 Nov 2006 18:25:56 -0500 (EST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Agency as Prime Determinant of Personal Identity In-Reply-To: References: <093501c702f8$f88577f0$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <098401c70344$391d7600$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <0a0c01c7048d$57728010$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: <35523.72.236.103.182.1163201156.squirrel@main.nc.us> > > If you had ever lived for years with an old person who was developing > Alzheimer's disease with gradually failing memory, you would > appreciate that after a certain stage in the disease the 'mind' has > died. The body is still 'alive' and walking around but the person that > you knew for years has died. > This is exactly what my old boss said about his mother. "She" died years before her body quit. It was a very painful time for everybody. Regards, MB From spike66 at comcast.net Sat Nov 11 00:12:24 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Fri, 10 Nov 2006 16:12:24 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] School libraries and skiffy In-Reply-To: <5.1.0.14.0.20061109161332.035eaae0@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> Message-ID: <200611110031.kAB0Vhd3019899@andromeda.ziaspace.com> > bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Keith Henson ... > > While science fiction fandom is not the same as science fiction readers, > fandom has been aging only a bit less than a year/year. Keith I did notice that, thought I might be just imagining it. On a business trip in Huntsville about 8 years ago, went to a Star Trek schmooze across the street from the hotel. Most of the Trekkies were 40ish and older. > > PS One thing I didn't mention is the shear number of kids who were armed > in my high school. In those days nobody thought a thing about knives... Second that. We didn't really think of them as weapons. A lot of students carried them, no one ever told us we weren't supposed to have them. > ...Especially > during deer season, virtually all the guys who had pickup trucks had a gun > rack with a rifle in it... Again, we didn't actually think of them as weapons, but more as cultural identifiers, or a decoration for the back window of our trucks. Certainly they could have been used as weapons, but I never heard of students shooting or knifing each other back in the 70s. spike From CHealey at unicom-inc.com Fri Nov 10 18:32:58 2006 From: CHealey at unicom-inc.com (Christopher Healey) Date: Fri, 10 Nov 2006 13:32:58 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] The evolution of intelligence Message-ID: <5725663BF245FA4EBDC03E405C854296855F9C@w2k3exch.UNICOM-INC.CORP> David, You might want to have a look at Terrance Deacon's "The Symbolic Species: The Co-evolution of Language and the Brain." It may not address the entire scope of what you're asking for here, but it's sure to offer a great deal of insight toward more specific inquiries to fill in those gaps. -Chris > -----Original Message----- > From: extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org > [mailto:extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of > David Lubkin > Sent: Thursday, November 09, 2006 10:44 PM > To: extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > Subject: [extropy-chat] The evolution of intelligence > > I'm trying to understand what the evolution of intelligence > might have been, and am in search of pointers to background > sources. This seemed like a logical place to ask, given our > shared interests. > > In some cognitive models, there's the idea of distinct > capabilities, each having a biological basis. Each of which > presumably conferred a reproductive advantage, in its first > through its final forms, although it may not be clear that > that advantage is wholly independent of the pre-existence of > another of the capabilities. > > What is the set of cognitive subsystems known to exist in > some species? Which species have which subsystems? Why do > they have those and why not the others? What does this look > like in a taxonomic or timeline tree? > > I've dusted off my sf writer hat lately so I'm mostly looking > for a plausible framework to draw on in creating lifeforms > for stories I'm working on. It would also be nice to find > folks in the pertinent fields who wouldn't mind if I asked > stupid questions or ran ideas by. > > > -- David. > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > From velvethum at hotmail.com Sat Nov 11 01:04:56 2006 From: velvethum at hotmail.com (Heartland) Date: Fri, 10 Nov 2006 20:04:56 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Survival (was Agency...) References: <093501c702f8$f88577f0$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677><098401c70344$391d7600$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677><0a0c01c7048d$57728010$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: Slawomir: >> Not yet, Lee. So far you've identified the correct criterion (capacity to >> preserve life) by which we should judge importance of X vs. Y. Next part is the >> evaluation of your X (memories) with respect to that criterion. In other words, >> using a non-arbitrary definition of life (this is crucial) please show me how >> "preservation of memories" implies "preservation of life?" BillK: > If you had ever lived for years with an old person who was developing > Alzheimer's disease with gradually failing memory, you would > appreciate that after a certain stage in the disease the 'mind' has > died. The body is still 'alive' and walking around but the person that > you knew for years has died. I have an even better example. People with dissociative fugue are known to suddenly forget some or all their past, including who they are, yet their minds continue to exist and function. Somehow, they continue to live in absence of personal memories. I count that as strong evidence (actually a proof) that maintaining the same personal memories is not necessarily required for someone to live. *This* instance of mind would rather suffer from dissociative fugue than die. Slawomir From velvethum at hotmail.com Sat Nov 11 01:22:26 2006 From: velvethum at hotmail.com (Heartland) Date: Fri, 10 Nov 2006 20:22:26 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] A quick AGI question References: <4554E6D1.5020908@lineone.net> Message-ID: ben: > Simply put, i think that you do have it backwards when you say it seems > that software specifies the state of the hardware, which is what > produces mind. > > I'd put it thusly: > Hardware implements the software which constitutes mind. Let's try this. Hardware and software are different ways of looking at the same thing. Slawomir From hkhenson at rogers.com Sat Nov 11 01:59:02 2006 From: hkhenson at rogers.com (Keith Henson) Date: Fri, 10 Nov 2006 20:59:02 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Meme/gene error rates In-Reply-To: References: <28386055.624701163036591097.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> <28386055.624701163036591097.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> Message-ID: <5.1.0.14.0.20061110204737.0372f8d8@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> At 04:27 PM 11/10/2006 -0500, Robert wrote: snip >Classical "memes" are thought patterns (ideas) that can be communicated >between two entities in such a way that the "essence" is recreated (you >*aren't* creating an exact duplicate) [3]. From that point they can >mutate and selected for (like genes) [4]. snip >4. It might be interesting to discuss the error rate in the copying of >genes (which is generally very low) and the error rate in the copying of >ideas (which can be quite high). Thus endless debates on the list about >*what* did they really mean by that... Even if a communication channel is noisy between a transmitter and a receiver, you can get extremely low error rates if you are willing to put in enough effort (CRC, multiple transmissions, etc.) Error rates depend a lot on the particular meme(s) or genes(s). For example baseball memes such as the number of strikes or balls have been replicated hundreds of millions of times without changing. The meme of the year Columbus crossed the Atlantic is almost as error free. HIV and stressed bacteria have rather high rates of mutation but that's an adaption. Keith Henson From pj at pj-manney.com Sat Nov 11 03:51:56 2006 From: pj at pj-manney.com (pjmanney) Date: Fri, 10 Nov 2006 22:51:56 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] META: HTML posts Message-ID: <25711519.840811163217116858.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> You do realize that some of us don't know what the hell you're talking about when you say "/dev/null", "HTML hash" etc., so maybe a general message somewhere BEFORE people join the list would be appropriate. I had no idea there was an issue or a choice. Sorry for the supposed bad manners. It was certainly unintentional and clearly from ignorance. Please remember that not all of us are techies, although I realize we may be in the extreme minority on this list. Maybe even a minority of one! However, most of the world simply uses technology as it's handed to them. Me included. PJ >Yes, it is both general policy and good manners to NOT post HTML >email on this (or any other) mailing list. Personally, HTML email >gets shunted to /dev/null for the most part, and I am using a client >that renders it just fine. Ignoring arguments of utility, the >majority of people who send HTML email send badly thought out >formatting hash that makes their email nigh unreadable, so the real >world practice is even worse than the theory. > >Every couple years for as long as HTML has been supported in an email >client, some individuals on this list have to be reminded that >plaintext is the formatting standard for the list. If the HTML >formatting is very clean and tasteful it usually does not bother me >enough to say anything, but lately there has been some pretty ugly >HTML hash being posted to the list. Adhering to the plaintext >standards is strongly encouraged for those who want their email to be >read. > >Cheers, > >J. Andrew Rogers > > >On Nov 10, 2006, at 11:48 AM, ben wrote: >> An observation: >> Those people who post in HTML don't get their posts read as much as >> those who don't. Here's an example of why: >> >> >> From: pjmanney >> Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] Martine Rothblatt and "bemes" >> To: >> Message-ID: <26113169.722631163107284594.JavaMail.servlet at perfora> >> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >> >> An HTML attachment was scrubbed... >> (which i could follow, if i could be arsed, but usually i can't) >> >> >> I'm guessing i'm not the only one who's reading a daily digest of >> the posts. >> >> A suggestion: >> Don't post in HTML. >> Up to you, of course, but if you do, i ain't gonna read them. And i >> don't know how many other people, too. >> >> ben zaiboc >_______________________________________________ >extropy-chat mailing list >extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org >http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat From thespike at satx.rr.com Sat Nov 11 04:15:24 2006 From: thespike at satx.rr.com (Damien Broderick) Date: Fri, 10 Nov 2006 22:15:24 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] META: HTML posts In-Reply-To: <25711519.840811163217116858.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> References: <25711519.840811163217116858.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> Message-ID: <7.0.1.0.2.20061110220631.0222fed8@satx.rr.com> At 10:51 PM 11/10/2006 -0500, PJ wrote: >You do realize that some of us don't know what the hell you're >talking about when you say "/dev/null", That's why dog gave us google. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki//dev/null > "HTML hash" etc., I think that was a metaphor rather than a techie term. >so maybe a general message somewhere BEFORE people join the list >would be appropriate. I had no idea there was an issue or a choice. It's there, or used to be. Let's see... http://www.extropy.org/emaillists.htm Hmm. Not. But plain or vanilla text is customary netiquette, or used to be. http://www.gweep.ca/~edmonds/usenet/ml-etiquette.html is a decade old and *too* strict; e.g., requests "a mono-spaced font (as opposed to proportionally spaced)," which is now silly, but does sensibly say: "and avoid anything other than the most basic text you can use to get your message across." Damien Broderick From jonkc at att.net Sat Nov 11 05:12:58 2006 From: jonkc at att.net (John K Clark) Date: Sat, 11 Nov 2006 00:12:58 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] (no subject) References: <20061102062735.57668.qmail@web52612.mail.yahoo.com><015601c7010a$6a7d5d50$450a4e0c@MyComputer> Message-ID: <002201c70550$3d8d9540$c20a4e0c@MyComputer> ME: >> Leibniz's Identity Of Indiscernibles is the idea that if you exchange >> the >> position of two things and there is no change in the system then the >> two things are the same. If I place you (the copy) and the original an >> equal distance from the center of a symmetrical room so you see the >> same things and then instantly swap your bodies position with the >> original then neither you nor the original nor any outside observer >> could detect the slightest change. Then I'm afraid you don't really >> understand Leibniz's law. Heartland" Wrote: > Regardless of the arrangement, you can always come up with >*at least one arbitrary* property (measurement of the distance > from a non-equidistant point, for example) No, you are quite wrong, if 2 identical objects are on either side of a point you can not say one particular object is to the right or the left because you have no way of knowing if the objects exchanged positions. If you were right then the laws of chemistry would be quite different. Curiously I once write a play and this fact was one of the plot elements: Alf: Big deal. I'm not talking about some un-provable idea in pure philosophy, I'm talking about practical questions, like whether it's worth paying extra for an original, or even more practical, if a copy of you is really you. Maybe Religion can help us with questions like that, but not Science. Bob: Actually Science can help us, and Leibniz's idea turned out to be very practical, although until the 20th century nobody realized it, before that his idea had no observable consequences because nobody could find two things that were exactly alike. Things changed dramatically when it was discovered that atoms have no scratches on them to tell them apart. By using The Identity Of Indiscernibles you can deduce one of the foundations of modern physics the fact that there must be two classes of particles, bosons like photons and fermions like electrons, and from there you can deduce The Pauli Exclusion Principle, and that is the basis of the periodic table of elements, and that is the basis of chemistry, and that is the basis of life. If The Identity Of Indiscernibles is wrong then this entire chain breaks down and you can throw Science into the trash can. Alf: That's an awful long chain of reasoning, if it has one weak link perhaps you should put it in the trash can, how can you base it all on The Identity of Indiscernibles? Bob: I wish Zed was here, he knows a lot more about this than I do, but let's start with one of the first and greatest discoveries in Quantum Mechanics, The Schr?dinger Wave Equation. It proved to be enormously useful in accurately predicting the results of experiments, and as the name implies it's an equation describing the movement of a wave, but embarrassingly it was not at all clear what it was talking about. Exactly what was waving? Schr?dinger thought it was a matter wave, but that didn't seem right to Max Born. Born reasoned that matter is not smeared around, only the probability of finding it is. Born was correct, whenever an electron is detected it always acts like a particle, it makes a dot when it hit's a phosphorus screen not a smudge, however the probability of finding that electron does act like a wave so you can't be certain exactly where that dot will be. Born showed that it's the square of the wave equation that describes the probability, the wave equation itself is sort of a useful mathematical fiction, like lines of longitude and latitude, because experimentally we can't measure the quantum wave function F(x) of a particle, we can only measure the intensity (square) of the wave function [F(x)]^2 because that's a probability and probability we can measure. Let's consider a very simple system with lots of space but only 2 particles in it. P(x) is the probability of finding two particles x distance apart, and we know that probability is the square of the wave function, so P(x) =[F(x)]^2. Now let's exchange the position of the particles in the system, the distance between them was x1 - x2 = x but is now x2 - x1 = -x. The Identity Of Indiscernibles tells us that because the two particles are the same, no measurable change has been made, no change in probability, so P(x) = P(-x). Probability is just the square of the wave function so [ F(x) ]^2 = [F(-x)]^2 . From this we can tell that the Quantum wave function can be either an even function, F(x) = +F(-x), or an odd function, F(x) = -F(-x). Either type of function would work in our probability equation because the square of minus 1 is equal to the square of plus 1. It turns out both solutions have physical significance, particles with integer spin, bosons, have even wave functions, particles with half integer spin, fermions, have odd wave functions. Alf: Wait a minute. Are you saying that an electron, something that can not be pinned down and doesn't even have a diameter in the usual sense of the word, is spinning around like a child's top. Bob: No, not really. It's called "spin" for historical reasons and it's true you can make an analogy with the everyday meaning of "spin", but the analogy is no better than mediocre. For example, it is possible to tip the axis of spin of an electron with a magnetic field, you might think that if you turn an electron by 360 degrees it would end up just as it was before, after all, if you make one complete turn you end up looking in the same direction, but that's not true for an electron. Turn an electron once and it's different, you need to turn it twice, 720 degrees, before it's the same as it was before. Alf: So if I spin around twice, the world would look exactly the same to me after one revolution or two, but for an electron it would look different. Do you think that means we can only see half the universe that an electron can see? Bob: I don't know, when Zed gets here why don't you ask him, but I was trying to show that we must assume that atoms are interchangeable or modern Physics becomes incomprehensible. If we put two fermions like electrons in the same place then the distance between them, x , is zero and because they must follow the laws of odd wave functions, F(0) = -F(0), but the only number that is it's own negative is zero so F(0) =0 . What this means is that the wave function F(x) goes to zero so of course [F(x)]^2 goes to zero, thus the probability of finding two electrons in the same spot is zero, and that is The Pauli Exclusion Principle. Two identical bosons, like photons of light, can sit on top of each other but not so for fermions, The Pauli Exclusion Principle tells us that 2 identical electrons can not be in the same orbit in an atom. If we didn't know that then we wouldn't understand Chemistry, we wouldn't know why matter is rigid and not infinitely compressible, and if we didn't know that atoms are interchangeable we wouldn't understand any of that. Atoms have no individuality, If they can't even give themselves this property I don't see how they can give it to us. John K Clark From kerry_prez at yahoo.com Sat Nov 11 06:27:48 2006 From: kerry_prez at yahoo.com (Al Brooks) Date: Fri, 10 Nov 2006 22:27:48 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] all that concerns me is the future of education In-Reply-To: <200611102032.kAAKWIvi004219@andromeda.ziaspace.com> Message-ID: <20061111062748.44403.qmail@web51609.mail.yahoo.com> No doubt they are-- but as Robert Bradbury writes there's more to it. Spike, hope you're not suggesting that an eighteen or twenty year old knows what is going on in the world. > To protect the lives, rights and freedoms of people > like us? > > Happy Veterans Day Al. >spike ____________________________________________________________________________________ Yahoo! Music Unlimited Access over 1 million songs. http://music.yahoo.com/unlimited From asa at nada.kth.se Sat Nov 11 09:55:41 2006 From: asa at nada.kth.se (Anders Sandberg) Date: Sat, 11 Nov 2006 10:55:41 +0100 (MET) Subject: [extropy-chat] SEX! (Re: Martine Rothblatt and bemes) In-Reply-To: <5.1.0.14.0.20061110125722.035b41d0@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> References: <380-22006114922117195@M2W030.mail2web.com> <5.1.0.14.0.20061110125722.035b41d0@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> Message-ID: <1398.213.112.92.120.1163238941.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> Keith Henson wrote: > At 11:27 PM 11/9/2006 +0100, Anders wrote: >> Already memes >>are problematic as replicators since they are hard to delineate from >>surrounding cognitive structures, ... > So memes are replicating information patterns, elements of culture, ideas, > beliefs, etc, etc. > > But it all comes down to the same thing, information measurable in bits. I have a problerm with measuring memes in bits. Look at the following joke: "This is a passenger announcement. The train on platform one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten, eleven and twelve has come in sideways." How many bits are that? We can measure it in ASCII, but clearly it is dependent on an enormous among of mental context. Telling it to a martian or someone unfamiliar with what trains look like and how stations work will not elicit a chuckle. But worse, when I re-tell the joke I have changed it slightly (like translating it to English in this case). If you re-tell it it will also be changed, perhaps with a greater or lesser number of platforms, a bit of setting information at the start or changing it to an airport and airplane. Now, is that the same meme? We can certainly see the similarities and the "sameness", but we can distinguish different retellings and not all are equally funny. Memes may be like parasites in that their "genetic code" is pretty small and requires the right context to be executed and produce effects. But it seems to me that they do not have sharp borders. This does not invalidate the meme concept but it does make it hard to use in a strict sense since it is only approximate copying going on, and the sameness metric is highly dependent on complex subjective judgements. > I have been seriously annoyed at people who tried to mystify such a simple > subject. They distract from the really interesting interface between > evolutionary psychology and memetics which elucidates subjects as > important > to humans as germ theory. If germs behave like sharp or fuzzy objects you need different approaches to them. After all, viral quasispecies and transposomes are pretty different in action from good old bacteria. I have the impression that real memetic research these days (haven't followed it closely over the last years) actually has dealt with many of these methodological and definitional problems. But it took a bit of philosophical footwork. If bemes are going to be conceptually useful ideas they also need a bit of clarification, otherwise they will just be handwaving. After all, if I invent the term "argemes" to denote the units of argumentness, for that to be useful we need to figure out whether this entire post, this paragraph or the idea embodied in it is the argeme. That also involves thinking of what use we plan to have for them - are they going to analyse argument techniques, discuss online discourses or elucidate the evolution of arguments (or all three)? -- Anders Sandberg, Oxford Uehiro Centre for Practical Ethics Philosophy Faculty of Oxford University From pharos at gmail.com Sat Nov 11 09:58:55 2006 From: pharos at gmail.com (BillK) Date: Sat, 11 Nov 2006 09:58:55 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Survival (was Agency...) In-Reply-To: References: <093501c702f8$f88577f0$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <098401c70344$391d7600$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <0a0c01c7048d$57728010$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: On 11/11/06, Heartland wrote: > I have an even better example. People with dissociative fugue are known to suddenly > forget some or all their past, including who they are, yet their minds continue to > exist and function. Somehow, they continue to live in absence of personal memories. > I count that as strong evidence (actually a proof) that maintaining the same > personal memories is not necessarily required for someone to live. > > *This* instance of mind would rather suffer from dissociative fugue than die. Yes, I'm sure you would. But that example is a very selective memory loss. 'Dissociative Fugue' is usually caused by an overwhelming stress situation where people want to 'get away from it all'. Quote: "A person in a Dissociative Fugue adopts a new identity after leaving their previous living arrangements and forgetting or being confused about their previous identity. They are able to perform well enough to survive under the new identity. These episodes are generally are caused by a severe stressor and are time limited to a few days, but may last up to months. When the fugue ends, the person is unable to recall what occurred during this state." This is like 'acting' or 'pretending to be someone else' (but for real) for a period of time. A bit similar to how under hypnosis you can be instructed not see something and your brain refuses to allow your consciousness to 'see' it. Mental problems aside, it is not that unusual for people to get really fed up with their circumstances (problems, debts, etc.) and run away to start a new life, with a new job, new friends and new hobbies. They still remember their past life, they just want to get rid of all the problems. Selective or partial memory loss is not usually a terminal problem. The human brain is good at workarounds so life can continue. But as more and more of the memory fails, more and more of the 'person' dies. When memory failure becomes severe you are unable to survive without help. As well as forgetting past events and people, you cannot even remember the meaning of words. You have difficulty reading or speaking or understanding. You forget how to tie your shoelaces or brush your teeth. Eventually you even forget to eat regularly. Total memory failure is the end of a mind. Memory really is essential to survival. BillK From mbb386 at main.nc.us Sat Nov 11 13:09:59 2006 From: mbb386 at main.nc.us (MB) Date: Sat, 11 Nov 2006 08:09:59 -0500 (EST) Subject: [extropy-chat] META: HTML posts In-Reply-To: <7.0.1.0.2.20061110220631.0222fed8@satx.rr.com> References: <25711519.840811163217116858.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> <7.0.1.0.2.20061110220631.0222fed8@satx.rr.com> Message-ID: <35851.72.236.102.67.1163250599.squirrel@main.nc.us> Damien wrote: > > http://www.gweep.ca/~edmonds/usenet/ml-etiquette.html is a decade old > and *too* strict; e.g., requests "a mono-spaced font (as opposed to > proportionally spaced)," which is now silly, but does sensibly say: > "and avoid anything other than the most basic text you can use to get > your message across." > I don't use monospace any longer, but if you're trying to send something that has columns or an ascii pic monospace sure makes a *big* difference! :))) Now my best bet for reading such posts is to edit/copy/paste them into a text file and look at them with monospace. Usually not worth the trouble, though. I changed ISP when it became clear that my old one no longer offered plain text as an email option. My email lists and contacts were too important to inflict html with vari-colored quote bars instead of ">" on them. I hope my stuff comes out ok now. I don't get to see it as others do! :))) Regards, MB From asa at nada.kth.se Sat Nov 11 13:50:41 2006 From: asa at nada.kth.se (Anders Sandberg) Date: Sat, 11 Nov 2006 14:50:41 +0100 (MET) Subject: [extropy-chat] Detectives and red herrings (was Survivaltangent) In-Reply-To: <62c14240611100600w55f3c51t87076697cd834ae9@mail.gmail.com> References: <095f01c70301$da6b8a80$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <62c14240611082005w15573471h41c32599280f2233@mail.gmail.com> <0a3c01c7049c$07919860$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <62c14240611100600w55f3c51t87076697cd834ae9@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <1977.213.112.92.120.1163253041.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> Mike Dougherty wrote: > Suppose you have keepsakes from each of the vacations you have been on > (refrigerator magnets, shot glasses, marginally evil tiki dolls, primitive > masks, pottery, etc. etc.) These are all physical tokens which cue your > memory of those events. Their placement around your home (general > definition of home; the space you inhabit, whatever) gives some clue to an > observer the relative priority of each of these tokens. Reminds me of the excellent webcomic Dresden Codac: http://dresdencodak.com/cartoons/dc_021.htm (some other excellent strips unrelated to this thread are http://dresdencodak.com/cartoons/dc_014.htm http://dresdencodak.com/cartoons/dc_022.htm http://dresdencodak.com/cartoons/dc_027.htm http://dresdencodak.com/cartoons/dc_029.htm ) > I imagine some of > those treasures end up in a box at the back of the garage. At that point, > the memory-triggering value of that item has been decreased to almost > zero. > Suppose I have a garage sale without your consent and clean out the > clutter. Have I "killed" some part of you? I think identity is very much an ongoing process, where we bind and lose referents to our selves. Some people are more dependent on a personal narrative than others, and the relationship between the real past and the remembered/reconstructed one is often pretty loose. Whatever happens we seem to quite quickly construct a new self that still remains as "self-ish" as the previous ones, even when the change is quite radical. I would expect the victim of the homicidal yard sale would be upset that a loss had occured, yet claim that he was the same he always was - even if his previous self would have claimed that a future self without the memories in the box would not be him. Our personal histories are backwards-linked lists, but we select our actions to make future links be like what we currently think they should be. When they fail to be that we tend to reassess our past instead of thinking we are bad selves. -- Anders Sandberg, Oxford Uehiro Centre for Practical Ethics Philosophy Faculty of Oxford University From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Sat Nov 11 14:26:27 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Sat, 11 Nov 2006 09:26:27 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] A quick AGI question In-Reply-To: References: <4554E6D1.5020908@lineone.net> Message-ID: The analysis in Wikipedia goes on for about 6 pages: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Artificial_general_intelligence Robert -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From spike66 at comcast.net Sat Nov 11 16:59:37 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Sat, 11 Nov 2006 08:59:37 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] all that concerns me is the future of education In-Reply-To: <20061111062748.44403.qmail@web51609.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <200611111712.kABHCtmZ020596@andromeda.ziaspace.com> > bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Al Brooks > Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] all that concerns me is the future of > education > > No doubt they are-- but as Robert Bradbury writes > there's more to it. > Spike, hope you're not suggesting that an eighteen or > twenty year old knows what is going on in the world. Not at all, nor do they need to. We adults don't really know what is going on this world either. Much of what we think we know is wrong. Your wondered why anyone would join the military, given the risk of death or third degree burns etc. Humans take risk just for fun. I could take you to the local rock face where every weekend, young men and a few young women climb that rock utterly without protective equipment, no ropes, no bolts, just hands, feet, and skill. One slip and it is over, or possibly paralysis. Every weekend they are out there, risking it all just for fun. Any night of the week, people are pulled over by the constabulary and charged with being intoxicated as they attempt to guide their detroits. Huge risk, taken just for fun. In comparison, the risk of being in the military is not so great. The numbers of those slain in battle compared to the totals, they are probably safer in the service than out. If you wish to craft your arguments that 18 year olds know not what they are being asked to fight for, well, I would dispute that too. However if it is a question only of risk, we will find plenty of takers. If one ignores the service to country aspect of it and looks at just the risk vs payoff, the military is not a bad deal for an aimless young person. It carries opportunity to get with the establishment, to learn how things work, to be part of something significant, option to retire after 20 years with a pension and plenty of time to start a new career, etc. One could definitely do worse. spike From lcorbin at rawbw.com Sat Nov 11 18:51:17 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Sat, 11 Nov 2006 10:51:17 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Agency as Prime Determinant of Personal Identity References: <095f01c70301$da6b8a80$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <0a0d01c7048d$c3d5b150$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: <0a9201c705c2$84cf2230$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Slawomir writes >>> What Jef is pointing out here is that Lee's model fails with respect to >>> identity over time. If we compare two patterns of the same active brain at two >>> different times, say, 1s apart, these two patterns are almost certainly going to >>> be different. > > Lee [writes] >> Yes, for the NTH TIME, the patterns at one second apart are *slightly* >> different. IT IS A MATTER OF DEGREE. > > Yes, we fully realize that, but "slightly different" is still "different," no? If > it's indeed a matter of degree then you need to explain what degree of change is > allowed before someone turns into someone else and why this is important. No, I do *not* need to explain exactly what degree of change is allowed before someone turns into someone else. I will do so only after you specify 1. how much loss of light is required before day turns into night? 2. how much mass is required for a molehill to gradually become a mountain? 3. at what temperature cold becomes warm (as in "cold days" vs. "warm days"? 4. the precise charateristics that separate cars from trucks? 5. the integer number of stones requires before one or two stones becomes a heap? 6. the cutoff in melatonin levels that makes a person either "black" or "white"? 7. the exact point in the animal kingdom at which consciousness exists? 8. how much clearance through a jungle before a tangle becomes a path? and on, and on, and on, and on. Slawomir, honestly, I am beginning to experience the frustration with you that John Clark and Jef did. Personhood *has* to be a matter of degree, as is everything outside logic, mathematics, and quantum mechanics. And I do mean *everything*, as my eight challenges above illustrate. Since you think that something either *is* or *is-not* you as something is 1 or 0, then I'm even further convince that you believe in souls, or their equivalent. Yes: something either has your soul or it doesn't. Except that souls don't exist. Lee From lcorbin at rawbw.com Sat Nov 11 19:00:05 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Sat, 11 Nov 2006 11:00:05 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Detectives and red herrings (was Survivaltangent) References: <095f01c70301$da6b8a80$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677><62c14240611082005w15573471h41c32599280f2233@mail.gmail.com><0a3c01c7049c$07919860$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <62c14240611100600w55f3c51t87076697cd834ae9@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <0a9501c705c3$cf584a60$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Mike writes > On 11/10/06, Lee Corbin wrote: > > If you and I gradually over the years slowly become more and more > > advanced, but somehow we both manage to remember Lee Corbin's > > childhood, teenage years, fascination with chess, the close game with > > David Bronstein in a simul, the years writing under the name "Lee > > Corbin" on the Fabric of Reality list, and so on and on, then you are > > dead, and there are *two* Lee Corbins. Surely, if you value your > > survival, you do not want this to happen. Keep your own memories, > > stay alive! > I think I understand your position (considering how frequently it has been restated) Thanks! And sorry for the restating, but there has been *so* much misunderstanding. > Suppose you have keepsakes from each of the vacations you have been > on (refrigerator magnets, shot glasses, marginally evil tiki dolls, primitive > masks, pottery, etc. etc.) These are all physical tokens which cue your > memory of those events. Their placement around your home (general > definition of home; the space you inhabit, whatever) gives some clue to > an observer the relative priority of each of these tokens. I imagine some > of those treasures end up in a box at the back of the garage. At that point, > the memory-triggering value of that item has been decreased to almost zero. > Suppose I have a garage sale without your consent and clean out the clutter. > Have I "killed" some part of you? By selling off the items, you haven't affected me at all. This is because I may have been miles away at the time of sale. But: > Of course you might be able to recall the memories without the physical tokens, Let's say not, just to make your case stronger. >but if you have been uploaded and the garage I have cleaned out is an failing > old RAID - then you might be arguing that I have in fact destroyed some of > your identity, correct? By the destruction of stored cues, or destruction of my journals and diaries that *do* contain information that I can't recall, you have indeed made impossible the recovery of some parts of my earlier identity. In that sense, by destroying that information, you have destroyed my earlier (but now forgotten) identity---but of course, only to a certain *degree*. Gradual loss of early memory does for sure slowly destroy older parts of your identity. In the familiar example, if an 80 year old can no longer remember anything about being 8, and has no memory overlap with the 8 year old that he used to be, then that 8 year old is dead and gone. Lee From lcorbin at rawbw.com Sat Nov 11 19:14:38 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Sat, 11 Nov 2006 11:14:38 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Detectives and red herrings (was Survivaltangent) References: <095f01c70301$da6b8a80$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677><62c14240611082005w15573471h41c32599280f2233@mail.gmail.com><0a3c01c7049c$07919860$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677><62c14240611100600w55f3c51t87076697cd834ae9@mail.gmail.com> <1977.213.112.92.120.1163253041.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> Message-ID: <0a9a01c705c5$ebd66120$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Anders writes >> Suppose you have keepsakes from each of the vacations you have been on >> (refrigerator magnets, shot glasses, marginally evil tiki dolls, primitive >> masks, pottery, etc. etc.) These are all physical tokens which cue your >> memory of those events.... >> Suppose I have a garage sale without your consent and clean out the >> clutter. Have I "killed" some part of you? > > I think identity is very much an ongoing process, where we bind and lose > referents to our selves. Some people are more dependent on a personal > narrative than others, and the relationship between the real past and the > remembered/reconstructed one is often pretty loose. Whatever happens we > seem to quite quickly construct a new self that still remains as "self-ish" as > the previous ones, even when the change is quite radical. It's in the best interest of the currently "new" living agent to selfishly go with who he is now. Recall the over-used SF movie plot where a secret agent with new memories finds out that he used to be a bad guy. (E.g. "Total Recall"). He rightfully and logically identifies with who he is *now*. > I would expect the victim of the homicidal yard sale would be upset that a > loss had occured, yet claim that he was the same he always was And that is, of course, an error, since no one who changes is *always* who he was. The victim of the "homicidal yard sale", as you so humorously put it, has to be concerned that a certain backup plan that his former self used didn't work, and be forewarned accordingly. Of course, I exaggerate by making it black and white "former self" vs. "current self", as if they had nothing in common. It is precisely because they undoubtendly have a *huge* part in common that gave rise to his conviction, as you put it, that "he was the same as he always was". > - even if his previous self would have claimed that a future self without > the memories in the box would not be him. Which in all normal, typical cases that Mike was trying to raise, would be an error. No one should suppose that his identity depends *entirely* on just some small list of specific memories. If someone steals $100 from you, then you're not broke, unless you weren't worth very much in the first place. > Our personal histories are backwards-linked lists, but we select our > actions to make future links be like what we currently think they should > be. When they fail to be that we tend to reassess our past instead of > thinking we are bad selves. We have to realize that we are "bad selves" as you put it (with some exaggeration) when we have changed. Of course "bad self" should be replaced with "slightly different self". But just because people do, as you write, tend to ignore the fact that they've changed, doesn't make it any less true. And if they don't realize that substantial future change is a threat to who they are, they're making a potentially fatal mistake. Lee From lcorbin at rawbw.com Sat Nov 11 19:22:58 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Sat, 11 Nov 2006 11:22:58 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Detectives and red herrings (was Survivaltangent) References: <095f01c70301$da6b8a80$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <62c14240611082005w15573471h41c32599280f2233@mail.gmail.com> <0a3c01c7049c$07919860$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: <0aa901c705c7$30544b90$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Robert writes > On 11/10/06, Lee Corbin wrote: >> Mike writes >> > If you lose memories, do you lose your self? >> Yes. > > It might be interesting to know whether you can ask the same thing > about beliefs? > > If you lose beliefs, do you lose your self? Of course, it's a matter of degree, but: change your beliefs, change your self. Yes, some part of you has indeed changed, a part that for most of us is linked to his or her identity. But suppose a salesman firmly believes that his company's product X is infinitely superior to another company's Y. Then he's fired by his company and hired by the other one. Somehow within a day or two he now believes that Y is superior to X. We can say in this case that his beliefs are hardly any part of his identity at all. > I can cite the point when I was perhaps 14 or 15 and had to choose > between science and catholicism. The person who ended up choosing > science was *not* the same individual as the one who believed in > catholicism. But I still have vague memories of his existance and his > beliefs. But isn't it an exaggeration to say that who you were at 16 was not the same person that you were at 13? Identity consists of more than just beliefs, even in your case, wouldn't you agree? > As I've observed myself evolve over the last decade (yes, I'm am now > more than a decade old in extropian terms) I see myself losing more > and more of my attachment to the current physical embodiment and more > and more comfort with memory states and computational vectors derived > mostly or even partly from my "self". That makes total sense. Nobody ought to identify with his body :-) That is, a poor man who's been recently injured in a traffic accident who is now a paraplegic, would be right to say that he's still the same person, but just needs a new body. I totally agree: you mainly are your "memory states", as you write. Lee From lcorbin at rawbw.com Sat Nov 11 19:44:50 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Sat, 11 Nov 2006 11:44:50 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] META: HTML posts References: <25711519.840811163217116858.JavaMail.servlet@perfora><7.0.1.0.2.20061110220631.0222fed8@satx.rr.com> <35851.72.236.102.67.1163250599.squirrel@main.nc.us> Message-ID: <0abb01c705ca$26e43090$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> MB writes > I changed ISP when it became clear that my old one no longer offered plain text as > an email option. My email lists and contacts were too important to inflict html with > vari-colored quote bars instead of ">" on them. Thanks for the effort, MB! It's appreciated. I've figured that some people don't have an option, or just haven't figured out how to set their mailers to SEND in HTML. If they can't figure it out, they might just ask the list for help. Also, I hope that others will join me in making a quick off-line "suggestion to switch" to those who continue to post in HTML. > I hope my stuff comes out ok now. I don't get to see it as others do! :))) Thanks also for checking with us. It looks fine to me! Lee > > It is both general policy and good manners to NOT post HTML > > email on this (or any other) mailing list. Personally, HTML email > > gets shunted to /dev/null for the most part, and I am using a client > > that renders it just fine. Ignoring arguments of utility, the > > majority of people who send HTML email send badly thought out > > formatting hash that makes their email nigh unreadable, so the real > > world practice is even worse than the theory. > > > > Every couple years for as long as HTML has been supported in an email > > client, some individuals on this list have to be reminded that > > plaintext is the formatting standard for the list. If the HTML > > formatting is very clean and tasteful it usually does not bother me > > enough to say anything, but lately there has been some pretty ugly > > HTML hash being posted to the list. Adhering to the plaintext > > standards is strongly encouraged for those who want their email to be > > read. > > > > J. Andrew Rogers From lcorbin at rawbw.com Sat Nov 11 20:19:25 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Sat, 11 Nov 2006 12:19:25 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Memes and Identity (was Martine Rothblatt and "bemes") References: <28386055.624701163036591097.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> Message-ID: <0ada01c705ce$cac3f430$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Robert writes [P.S. Robert, your text comes out HTML here, I've reformatted it] > On 11/8/06, pjmanney wrote: > > Hey, was anyone going to answer my question about Martine Rothblatt's > > concept of "bemes" as a valid concept of future identity? My apologies to PJ---I got the slides printed out, and looked them over, but was not able to come to any concise conclusions. Hence I appreciate Robert tackling the points. Then, afterwards, Robert wrote > The problem may involve the effort to distill things into labels we can talk > about and communicate. Lets consider one person is 80% long term > memories (typically a Luddite) and 20% short term "beingness" (their jokes, > their priorities, their stories). I object, your honor! If you took away my *entire* last year's memories, especially including my current thoughts, then I'd be identical to what I was last year! And by my measure, that's about 99% Lee Corbin. > >> On 10/31/06, Lee Corbin < lcorbin at rawbw.com> wrote: > >> > >> > But what happened to *me* in there? I'm more than my memes, pal. > >> > Don't forget my memories. > Your point is taken. > *But* what about of those neuroscience disease puzzles involve illnesses > like when you can "be" (retain and manipulate) short term memories but > not long term and vice versa (I don't know the technical terms, perhaps > someone could go dig in Wikipedia). Is a person who lacks one of those > capabilities less "human" than Lee? Ask the people who know and love them, not me. I *think* they'll say that they're still human, and even chatise you for wondering. Moreover, I'll predict that they'll say that their loved ones are still the same people, but something profoundly important is missing, that's all. > >> Well memories are memes and at least some of them are essential > >> components of the survival and reproduction processes. > > > >Memories are memes??? That does violence to the concept so far > >as I understand it. Memories are more like raw data; for one thing, > >they're very seldom contagious. Beliefs are something else, and > >are indeed memetic. > Short term memories and conscious thoughts are IMO "memes", See > William Calvin's explanation for this. In which book? Or where? Calvin says that short term memories and conscious thoughts are memes?? It's an unusual usage, I'm pretty sure. > That's me, maybe. I don't want to "become", especially if the end > product is not me. I would rather "are". As you put it. Can you be without becoming? Is everything not change? Yes, you can "be" without becoming. It's a tradeoff, in my opinion. I want to learn and so "become". But I also want to remain basically me. And until the backup strategy I recommend ("always give previous versions plenty of runtime") becomes an option, I slowly die a tiny bit every day. I wish that I were not slowly becoming someone else; but it's (a) unavoidable, given the current technology, and (b) too attractive, in the sense of wanting to know more and do more. Mike Perry, in his book "Forever For All", gives the position that I think mostly correct. Consider that there is a "core" you, consisting of your long term memories, beliefs, behavior dispositions, and values. Then there is a more superficial-you, which gets layered onto the core-you. Mike claims that arbitrarily many layers can be added without threat to one's core identity. I, myself, am a little skeptical; that's why I've gone for the "give backups runtime" solution. Lee From pj at pj-manney.com Sat Nov 11 20:59:16 2006 From: pj at pj-manney.com (pjmanney) Date: Sat, 11 Nov 2006 15:59:16 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] META: HTML posts Message-ID: <18479097.851351163278756469.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> Damien wrote: >http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki//dev/null That would presuppose I actually understood the entry. Greek, my friend. Greek. As I have said many times before, some of us speak different languages. My English is fluent. My "Computer" isn't. I have, however, found 'netiquette' on the Wikipedia, so I now know the issues. Don't get me wrong. I am a stickler for etiquette. I believe the world's devaluation of manners represents societal devolution, not evolution. But I am also aware etiquette is culture specific. I am endeavoring to understand your culture. I feel like Margaret Mead. So I did some detective work. My new email system defaults HTML, so I changed it. It should plain text from now on. Then I checked my Sent file. Yes, I had generated a few of the HTMLs inadvertantly myself, and I apologize, but I replied to other people's HTMLs as well. At least I was in good company. This email address is used by me exclusively for H+ stuff. I've checked my trash from over a half-dozen lists (about 1800 messages right now -- only a month's worth!). HTML abounds. On many lists, it's the norm. So what does that mean? And what would Emily Post or Miss Manners say? PJ From msd001 at gmail.com Sat Nov 11 21:56:23 2006 From: msd001 at gmail.com (Mike Dougherty) Date: Sat, 11 Nov 2006 16:56:23 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Detectives and red herrings (was Survivaltangent) In-Reply-To: <0aa901c705c7$30544b90$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> References: <095f01c70301$da6b8a80$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <62c14240611082005w15573471h41c32599280f2233@mail.gmail.com> <0a3c01c7049c$07919860$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <0aa901c705c7$30544b90$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: <62c14240611111356r7153803et108e44c0f50b56b2@mail.gmail.com> On 11/11/06, Lee Corbin wrote: > > Of course, it's a matter of degree, but: change your beliefs, > > But isn't it an exaggeration to say that who you were at 16 was not > the same person that you were at 13? Identity consists of more than > just beliefs, even in your case, wouldn't you agree? > I think the matter of degree is illustrated between the comparison of the 16 year old to his 'current' self vs. his 13 yr old self. The moment-to-moement change in state is negligible compared to the net effect of 3 years worth of changes. It seems a problem arises when the absolute change from moment to moment is regarded as two different identities, with the whole "killing your earlier self" craziness. I see the definition of self inclusive of the entire time dimension as inherent to object model being examined. Comparing PI models at t=1 vs t=2 or t=3600 is as arbitrary and confusing as talking about the artistic value of a painting at x=0, y=0 vs x=1, y=1. So if the PI model includes the temporal dimension, isn't the model going to be inherently inclusive of the process of state-change? (I haven't even started thinking about the various clone situations in this context) -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From pharos at gmail.com Sat Nov 11 22:46:48 2006 From: pharos at gmail.com (BillK) Date: Sat, 11 Nov 2006 22:46:48 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] META: HTML posts In-Reply-To: <18479097.851351163278756469.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> References: <18479097.851351163278756469.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> Message-ID: On 11/11/06, pjmanney wrote: > I have, however, found 'netiquette' on the Wikipedia, so I now know the issues. Don't get > me wrong. I am a stickler for etiquette. I believe the world's devaluation of manners > represents societal devolution, not evolution. But I am also aware etiquette is culture > specific. I am endeavoring to understand your culture. I feel like Margaret Mead. > > So I did some detective work. My new email system defaults HTML, so I changed it. > It should plain text from now on. Then I checked my Sent file. Yes, I had generated a > few of the HTMLs inadvertantly myself, and I apologize, but I replied to other people's > HTMLs as well. At least I was in good company. > > This email address is used by me exclusively for H+ stuff. I've checked my trash from > over a half-dozen lists (about 1800 messages right now -- only a month's worth!). HTML > abounds. On many lists, it's the norm. > > So what does that mean? And what would Emily Post or Miss Manners say? > It depends on the members of each mailing list. If everyone on a particular mail list is using Windows and/or Outlook and HTML mail then everyone is in the same boat. You won't often find computer technical experts on lists like that though. Windows and HTML mail open up many security issues that computer experts prefer to avoid. Some do this by avoiding Windows software altogether and assembling their own collection of software and using simple text-only emails. As you have discovered, this means that when these people receive HTML mail, it looks like jumbled garbage in their text mail software. It is polite to check that people can read HTML mail before sending it to them and most modern mail software do this by having the default setting to reply in the same format as the original mail. This is fine for private emails. But when you send an HTML mail to a mailing list this can cause a cascade of HTML responses to the list from software set up in this fashion, causing even more annoyance to the text email readers. Many users here use gmail (google mail) for their mail lists as they can store thousands of emails in gmail without using up space on their own pc, mail threads are grouped together and they can access their gmail from any pc with internet access. gmail has the option for 'plain text' or 'rich formatting' at the top of each email, so it is a one-click change if you want send HTML mail to someone privately. BillK From lcorbin at rawbw.com Sat Nov 11 23:34:22 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Sat, 11 Nov 2006 15:34:22 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Just curious, it's not natural! (2) References: <5.1.0.14.0.20061109150438.0370d078@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> Message-ID: <0aff01c705ea$3a369410$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Keith writes > At 10:18 PM 10/31/2006 -0800, Lee wrote: >>Memories are memes??? That does violence to the concept so far >>as I understand it. > > The essence of a meme is can the information be transferred. So a meme > about how to tie shoes in a person's brain is a memory and a meme because > the information can be transferred. But the other way around does not work > because I cannot transfer my memory of looking out over the Grand Canyon to > anyone else. Sorry I missed this post earlier---it was not in a thread I was attending to.You are saying that any information that can be transferred qualifies as a meme. This would include vast amounts of electronic data, the output of random number generators, and so forth. My usual belief is that this would be too broad. And according to Blackmore (The Meme Machine, p.6) Dawkins wrote "We need a name for the new replicator, a noun that conveys the idea of a unit of cultural transmission, or a unit of *imitation*." Blackmore goes on to write As examples, he [Dawkins] suggested 'tunes, ideas, catch-phrases, clothes fashions, ways of making pots or of building arches'. This would seem to be a narrower definition than yours (i.e. "any information that can be transferred"). Blackmore unfortunately fails to provide any definition. She also writes Dawkins said that memes jump from 'brain to brain via a process which, in the broad sense, can be called imitation'. [Blackmore gives an illustration where you pass on the gist of a story you heard.] This is the 'broad sense' in which we must understand teh term 'imitation'. If in doubt, remember that something must have been copied. As an aside, this is still looking bad, IMO, for memories qualifying as memes. Everything that is passed from person to person in this way is a meme. This includes all the words in your vocabulary, [stories], [skills], [games], [songs]... Each of these memes has evolved in its own unique way with its own history, but each of them is using your behavior to get itself copied. This would argue, IMO, for a narrower view of what a meme is. Let's see what wikipedia says: The term "meme", coined in 1976 by Richard Dawkins, refers to a unit of cultural information transferable from one mind to another. Dawkins said, Examples of memes are tunes, catch- phrases, clothes fashions, ways of making pots or of building arches. A meme propagates itself as a unit of cultural evolution and diffusion - analogous in many ways to the behavior of the gene (the unit of genetic information). Often memes propagate as more-or-less integrated cooperative sets or groups, referred to as memeplexes or meme-complexes. The article http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meme goes on to admit that there is a lot of controversy surrounding the concept, but it doesn't seem to mention that there is controversy surrounding the definition, or meaning of the term Lee From mmbutler at gmail.com Sun Nov 12 00:38:14 2006 From: mmbutler at gmail.com (Michael M. Butler) Date: Sat, 11 Nov 2006 16:38:14 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] META: HTML posts In-Reply-To: <18479097.851351163278756469.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> References: <18479097.851351163278756469.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> Message-ID: <7d79ed890611111638x323ab1e3vb0725df46fb924ac@mail.gmail.com> On 11/11/06, pjmanney wrote: > Damien wrote: > >http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki//dev/null > > That would presuppose I actually understood the entry. Greek, my friend. Greek. As I have said many times before, some of us speak different languages. My English is fluent. My "Computer" isn't. PJM: Perhaps your eyes glazed over quickly; Wikipedia isn't the best reference for jargon translations, as the entries get puffed out of shape by "unending" edits. However, in the first line of the ref'd Wikipedia entry, please note: " ...discards all data written to it[.]" So the utterance "I direct {all x} to /dev/null" is intended to be read "I delete {all x}, without paying other attention to it." There you go. -- Michael M. Butler : m m b u t l e r ( a t ) g m a i l . c o m From thespike at satx.rr.com Sun Nov 12 02:27:29 2006 From: thespike at satx.rr.com (Damien Broderick) Date: Sat, 11 Nov 2006 20:27:29 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] secular heaven awaits extropes In-Reply-To: <1977.213.112.92.120.1163253041.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se > References: <095f01c70301$da6b8a80$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <62c14240611082005w15573471h41c32599280f2233@mail.gmail.com> <0a3c01c7049c$07919860$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <62c14240611100600w55f3c51t87076697cd834ae9@mail.gmail.com> <1977.213.112.92.120.1163253041.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> Message-ID: <7.0.1.0.2.20061111202535.02160ac0@satx.rr.com> At 02:50 PM 11/11/2006 +0100, Anders wrote: >Reminds me of the excellent webcomic Dresden Codac Good Dog, what a *treat* that site is! http://dresdencodak.com/cartoons/dc_019.htm Damien Broderick From avantguardian2020 at yahoo.com Sun Nov 12 02:46:18 2006 From: avantguardian2020 at yahoo.com (The Avantguardian) Date: Sat, 11 Nov 2006 18:46:18 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] secular heaven awaits extropes In-Reply-To: <7.0.1.0.2.20061111202535.02160ac0@satx.rr.com> Message-ID: <20061112024618.76609.qmail@web60524.mail.yahoo.com> Thanks, Damien. :) This is genius. --- Damien Broderick wrote: > At 02:50 PM 11/11/2006 +0100, Anders wrote: > > >Reminds me of the excellent webcomic Dresden Codac > > Good Dog, what a *treat* that site is! > > http://dresdencodak.com/cartoons/dc_019.htm > > Damien Broderick > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > Stuart LaForge alt email: stuart"AT"ucla.edu "Believe nothing. No matter where you read it, or who said it, even if I have said it, unless it agrees with your own reason and your own common sense."- Siddhartha Guatama aka Buddha. ____________________________________________________________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? Everyone is raving about the all-new Yahoo! Mail beta. http://new.mail.yahoo.com From nanogirl at halcyon.com Sun Nov 12 03:09:49 2006 From: nanogirl at halcyon.com (Gina Miller) Date: Sat, 11 Nov 2006 19:09:49 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] The Nanogirl News~ References: Message-ID: <010701c70608$839c92d0$0200a8c0@Nano> The Nanogirl News November 11, 2006 'Nanorust' Cleans Arsenic From Drinking Water. The discovery of unexpected magnetic interactions between ultrasmall specks of rust is leading scientists at Rice University's Center for Biological and Environmental Nanotechnology (CBEN) to develop a revolutionary, low-cost technology for cleaning arsenic from drinking water. The technology holds promise for millions of people in India, Bangladesh and other developing countries where thousands of cases of arsenic poisoning each year are linked to poisoned wells. The new technique is described in the Nov. 10 issue of Science magazine.(Playfuls 11.11.06) http://www.playfuls.com/news_002874_Nanorust_Cleans_Arsenic_From_Drinking_Water.html Legos give kids a leg up on nanotechnology. The U.S. Patent Office might want to hear about this: John Hurd and a team of researchers have built a "nanoprobe" he says can clean clogged arteries. "The nanoprobe swims through the arteries and pushes out all the cholesterol and fat," explained the 9-year-old inventor. There is a caveat. The machine is only in the minds of the pint-sized designers who have spent eight weeks studying nanotechnology - the science of making super-small machines - while crafting robots out of Legos. The Crestwood Elementary School fourth-grader is among more than 200 students from Madison, Milwaukee and elsewhere in Wisconsin participating in this year's FIRST Lego League Badgerland Regional Competition, which starts today at Madison's Memorial High School.(Wisconsin State Journal 11.11.06) http://www.madison.com/wsj/home/local/index.php?ntid=107020&ntpid=3 Bridging neurons and electronics with carbon nanotubes. New implantable biomedical devices that can act as artificial nerve cells, control severe pain, or allow otherwise paralyzed muscles to be moved might one day be possible thanks to developments in materials science. Writing today in Advanced Materials, Nicholas Kotov of the University of Michigan and colleagues describe how they have used hollow, submicroscopic strands of carbon, carbon nanotubes, to connect an integrated circuit to nerve cells. The new technology offers the possibility of building an interface between biology and electronics. (PhysOrg Nov. 06) http://www.physorg.com/news82116028.html New biomedical device uses nanotechnology to monitor hip implant healing, may reduce wait times. It is so small, you can barely see it, but a microsensor created by University of Alberta engineers may soon make a huge difference in the lives of people recovering from hip replacement surgery. The U of A research team has invented a self-powered wireless microsensor for monitoring the bone healing process after surgery -- it is so tiny it can fit onto the tip of a pen. (EurekAlert 10.17.06) http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2006-10/uoa-nbd101706.php Now, a 'DNA machine' that can sound a virus alert. Researchers have made a 'DNA machine' from a single molecule that detects a virus by reading its genome, and then produces an alarm signal, in the form of a visible glow. Itamar Willner of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and his co-workers say that their DNA device can provide a readout within an hour and a half, whereas existing methods for identifying viruses or bacteria from their DNA generally require many complicated chemical steps. (Nature 11.10.06) http://www.nature.com/news/2006/061106/full/061106-19.html A nanoplasmonic molecular ruler for measuring nuclease activity and DNA footprinting. Researchers have a new tool for studying interactions between proteins and nucleic acids: a nanoscale optical ruler than can detect small changes in the size of a given piece of DNA. This work is reported in the inaugural issue of the journal Nature Nanotechnology. (News-medical.net 10.16.06) http://www.news-medical.net/?id=20495 Nanoparticle Shows Promise In Reducing Radiation Side Effects. With the help of tiny, transparent zebrafish embryos, researchers at the Kimmel Cancer Center at Thomas Jefferson University and Jefferson Medical College are hoping to prove that a microscopic nanoparticle can be part of a "new class of radioprotective agents" that help protect normal tissue from radiation damage just as well as standard drugs. Reporting November 7, 2006 at the annual meeting of the American Society for Therapeutic Radiology and Oncology in Philadelphia, they show that the nanoparticle, DF-1 - a soccer ball-shaped, hollow, carbon-based structure known as a fullerene - is as good as two other antioxidant drugs and the FDA-approved drug, Amifostine in fending off radiation damage from normal tissue. (Sciencedaily 11.10.06) http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2006/11/061108154306.htm Nanoparticle Sheets Form Spontaneously - CdTe nanocrystals mimic proteins. Crystalline nanoparticles of cadmium telluride, a semiconducting material used to make thin films for solar cells, spontaneously assemble into two-dimensional free-floating sheets in water without a template to guide them. Nicholas A. Kotov, Sharon C. Glotzer, and their colleagues at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, report this unexpected finding and explain how it occurs through a combination of interactive forces between the nanoparticles-the same way that some protein structures form in living systems 'Science 2006, 314, 274'. (C&E 10.16.06) http://pubs.acs.org/cen/news/84/i42/8442notw7.html Damage Control. Combination of carbon nanofibers and stem cells can regenerate lost neurons in rats. A cocktail of carbon nanofibers and stem cells can heal neural tissue in rats damaged by a stroke, according to a recent study. Thomas J. Webster, an engineering professor at Brown University, presented the results on Sept. 11 at the American Chemical Society national meeting in San Francisco. (C&E 9.12.06) http://pubs.acs.org/cen/news/84/i38/8438nanofibers.html MIT materials scientists tame tricky carbon nanotubes. Based on a new theory, MIT scientists may be able to manipulate carbon nanotubes -- one of the strongest known materials and one of the trickiest to work with -- without destroying their extraordinary electrical properties. The work is reported in the Sept. 15 issue of Physical Review Letters, the journal of the American Physical Society. (MIT 9.15.06) http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2006/nanotubes.html Ancient Hair-Dyeing - A Nanoscience? Scientists have discovered that an ancient method used to darken hair, dating back more than 4,000 years, is based on a chemical process that takes place at the nanoscale. This may be one of the earliest examples of nanoscience at work in a practical application. The research team is led by Dr. Philippe Walter, a chemist with the Centre Nationale de Recherche Scientifique (National Center for Scientific Research) in Paris, France. For the past 10 years, he and his group have collaborated with the research department at L'Oreal, studying the history of cosmetic science. (PhysOrg Nov 06) http://www.physorg.com/news81427508.html Nanotechnology: Check out the 2006 Nano Quest Challenge. The first organization - inspired by inventor Dean Kamen - and the Lego Group are sponsoring the 2006 Nano Quest Challenge, and sadly for the rest of us, it seems to be limited to kids 9-14 years old, plus 6 to 9-year-olds in the junior league in US and Canada. But wait - all the teams need adult guides, so some of us grown-ups have found a way to get in on this. There are 169 teams competing in California alone, and 32 countries are listed on the international page. (Nanodot 10.17.06) http://www.foresight.org/nanodot/?p=2344 Penn researcher shows that DNA gets kinky easily at the nanoscale. Scientists have answered a long-standing molecular stumper regarding DNA: How can parts of such a rigid molecule bend and coil without requiring large amounts of force? According to a team of researchers from the United States and the Netherlands, led by a physicist from the University of Pennsylvania, DNA is much more flexible than previously believed when examined over extremely small lengths. They used a technique called atomic force microscopy to determine the amount of energy necessary to bend DNA over nano-size lengths (about a million times smaller than a printed letter). (U of Penn 11.3.06) http://www.upenn.edu/pennnews/article.php?id=1048 Breaking the nanometer barrier in X-ray microscopy. Argonne National Laboratory scientists in collaboration with Xradia have created a new X-ray microscope technique capable of observing molecular-scale features, measuring less than a nanometer in height. Combining x-ray reflection together with high resolution x-ray microscopy, scientists can now study interactions at the nanometer-scale which often can exhibit different properties and lead to new insights. Improving our understanding of interactions at the nanoscale holds promise to help us cure the sick, protect our environment and make us more secure. (Eurekalert 11.9.06) http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2006-11/dnl-btn110906.php Carbon Nanotubes You Can Live With. Carbon nanotubes, or CNTs, are hollow wires of pure carbon about 50,000 times narrower than the finest human hair but stronger than steel. CNTs have enormous potential in a variety of biological applications, including medical diagnostics and treatments. There's a problem, however, and until now it has been what technologists call a "stopper." For reasons not entirely known, CNTs are cytotoxic - contact with them kills cells. This is one stopper that may have been solved. A team of researchers with Berkeley Lab, the University of California at Berkeley, and the Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI) have developed a means of making CNTs biocompatible. (Science Berkeley Lab 8.26.06) http://www.lbl.gov/Science-Articles/Archive/sabl/2006/Jul/01.html Anti Aging Medical Group Corp. Establishes Collaboration With AlphaRx and Leading Neurologists for Alzheimer's Disease. The collaboration has selected a well-known compound which in various pre-clinical studies have demonstrated low toxicity and proven to be highly effective in reducing brain inflammation, protecting neuronal cells, restoring cognitive function and preventing the development of Alzheimer's. This has not been a priority by the major pharmaceutical companies due to various formulation issues. In addition, the collaboration believes its approach of using nanotechnology to deliver such compound through the blood brain barrier is viable and will attempt to screen 2 to 3 formulations in Alzheimer's animal models to determine the right dosage for human trials. (Marketwire 11.9.06) http://www.marketwire.com/mw/release_html_b1?release_id=182304 Still Dyeing After 2,000 Years - Ancient formula, now re-created, darkens locks with lead sulfide nanoparticles. Nanotechnology may seem like the latest fad in beauty products, but a new report suggests that people have been using nanomaterials to improve upon nature for at least 2,000 years. According to researchers in France, an ancient hair-coloring concoction turns tresses black via the formation of lead sulfide nanoparticles within the hair shaft 'Nano Lett., DOI: 10.1021/nl061493u'. (C&E 9.11.06) http://pubs.acs.org/cen/news/84/i37/8437notw7.html Bio-nanotechnology to kill cancer cells. The University of Surrey has been awarded a grant of ?420,000 to utilize nanotechnology to develop cancer treatments. The grant is part of an international project: "Multifunctional Carbon Nanotubes for Biomedical Applications (CARBIO)" supported by the European Union under the Marie Curie scheme. (Nanotechnology 11.6.06) http://www.nanotechnology.com/news/?id=9329 Nanotech eyed for help with outages. Area residents are still talking about the October snowstorm that knocked out power to hundreds of thousands of homes and business. So are researchers at the University at Buffalo. Engineers at UB's Energy Systems Institute, in fact, have been studying how nanotechnology a branch of engineering that designs and builds extremely small electronic circuits and devices -- can be used to build a more reliable, efficient power system. (SmallTimes 11.6.06) http://www.smalltimes.com/news/display_news_story.cfm?Section=WireNews&Category=HOME&NewsID=140666 'artist & animator for hire' Gina "Nanogirl" Miller Nanotechnology Industries http://www.nanoindustries.com Personal: http://www.nanogirl.com/index2.html Animation Blog: http://maxanimation.blogspot.com/ Craft blog: http://nanogirlblog.blogspot.com/ Foresight Senior Associate http://www.foresight.org Nanotechnology Advisor Extropy Institute http://www.extropy.org Email: nanogirl at halcyon.com "Nanotechnology: Solutions for the future." -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From transhumanist at goldenfuture.net Sun Nov 12 03:24:44 2006 From: transhumanist at goldenfuture.net (Joseph Bloch) Date: Sat, 11 Nov 2006 22:24:44 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] secular heaven awaits extropes In-Reply-To: <20061112024618.76609.qmail@web60524.mail.yahoo.com> References: <20061112024618.76609.qmail@web60524.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <455693FC.70405@goldenfuture.net> Indeed! I am humbled that this has escaped my notice before now. Many thanks! Joseph The Avantguardian wrote: >Thanks, Damien. :) This is genius. > >--- Damien Broderick wrote: > > > >>At 02:50 PM 11/11/2006 +0100, Anders wrote: >> >> >> >>>Reminds me of the excellent webcomic Dresden Codac >>> >>> >>Good Dog, what a *treat* that site is! >> >>http://dresdencodak.com/cartoons/dc_019.htm >> >>Damien Broderick >> >>_______________________________________________ >>extropy-chat mailing list >>extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org >> >> >> >http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > > > > >Stuart LaForge >alt email: stuart"AT"ucla.edu > >"Believe nothing. No matter where you read it, or who said it, even if I have said it, unless it agrees with your own reason and your own common sense."- Siddhartha Guatama aka Buddha. > > > >____________________________________________________________________________________ >Do you Yahoo!? >Everyone is raving about the all-new Yahoo! Mail beta. >http://new.mail.yahoo.com >_______________________________________________ >extropy-chat mailing list >extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org >http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > > > > From spike66 at comcast.net Sun Nov 12 04:00:42 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Sat, 11 Nov 2006 20:00:42 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] secular heaven awaits extropes In-Reply-To: <20061112024618.76609.qmail@web60524.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <200611120402.kAC42uXu021942@andromeda.ziaspace.com> Anders, how do you find this stuff? It's as if there is some cosmic law that demands that anything cool that happens, one must tell Anders, who then tells the rest of us. Thanks man! spike > -----Original Message----- > From: extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org [mailto:extropy-chat- > bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of The Avantguardian > Sent: Saturday, November 11, 2006 6:46 PM > To: ExI chat list > Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] secular heaven awaits extropes > > Thanks, Damien. :) This is genius. > > --- Damien Broderick wrote: > > > At 02:50 PM 11/11/2006 +0100, Anders wrote: > > > > >Reminds me of the excellent webcomic Dresden Codac > > > > Good Dog, what a *treat* that site is! > > > > http://dresdencodak.com/cartoons/dc_019.htm > > > > Damien Broderick > > > > _______________________________________________ > > extropy-chat mailing list > > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > > > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > > > > > Stuart LaForge > alt email: stuart"AT"ucla.edu > > "Believe nothing. No matter where you read it, or who said it, even if I > have said it, unless it agrees with your own reason and your own common > sense."- Siddhartha Guatama aka Buddha. > > > > __________________________________________________________________________ > __________ > Do you Yahoo!? > Everyone is raving about the all-new Yahoo! Mail beta. > http://new.mail.yahoo.com > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Sun Nov 12 04:30:21 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Sat, 11 Nov 2006 23:30:21 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Memes and Identity (was Martine Rothblatt and "bemes") In-Reply-To: <0ada01c705ce$cac3f430$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> References: <28386055.624701163036591097.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> <0ada01c705ce$cac3f430$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: On 11/11/06, Lee Corbin wrote: > > Robert writes [P.S. Robert, your text comes out HTML here, I've > reformatted it] Hmmm... I thought Gmail was sending it out "mixed", I'll check that. I object, your honor! If you took away my *entire* last year's > memories, especially including my current thoughts, then I'd > be identical to what I was last year! And by my measure, > that's about 99% Lee Corbin. That's because *most* of "Lee" got formed someplace between the ages of about 6 months and 15 or so. After that its mostly patches and losses. There might be some exceptions (people who very actively educate themselves for 6-8 hours a day 6 days a week). I *think* they'll say that they're still human, and even chatise you for > wondering. Moreover, I'll predict that they'll say that their loved ones > are still the same people, but something profoundly important is missing, > that's all. Yes, there are definitely some parts missing from the automobile. > Mike Perry, in his book "Forever For All", gives the position that I > think mostly correct. Consider that there is a "core" you, consisting > of your long term memories, beliefs, behavior dispositions, and values. > Then there is a more superficial-you, which gets layered onto the > core-you. Mike claims that arbitrarily many layers can be added > without threat to one's core identity. I, myself, am a little skeptical; > that's why I've gone for the "give backups runtime" solution. Interesting. I'd probably agree with that view as would most neuroscientists who focus on development. With respect to William Calvin, it would require a long note to go into his ideas and I wouldn't want to misexplain them as its been a while since I've read them. But the two books sitting on my shelf are "How Brains Think" and "The Cerebral Code". I think if you read them you would understand why I am saying that one can treat neural patterns as memes. I think he may have written some more recent books as well but I haven't read them. See [1]. Robert 1. http://www.williamcalvin.com -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From velvethum at hotmail.com Sun Nov 12 05:53:53 2006 From: velvethum at hotmail.com (Heartland) Date: Sun, 12 Nov 2006 00:53:53 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Agency as Prime Determinant of Personal Identity References: <095f01c70301$da6b8a80$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677><0a0d01c7048d$c3d5b150$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <0a9201c705c2$84cf2230$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: Lee: > Since you think that something either *is* or *is-not* you as something > is 1 or 0, then I'm even further convince that you believe in souls, or their > equivalent. Yes: something either has your soul or it doesn't. > > Except that souls don't exist. (Whenever someone starts telling me I believe in souls it's a sure sign that whatever I've said so far must have completely gone to waste.) Lee, I still don't think you realize what this is about. I'm talking exclusively about preservation of life, not about preservation of personal identity (in a sense of preservation of memories, beliefs and values). Yes, there's a huge difference between the two even though it seems like I'm the only one here who has thought about this long enough to spot it (there might be others but I simply don't know). So while we can talk endlessly about degrees to which we can preserve memories, beliefs, and values, all of this psychological identity stuff is completely orthogonal and irrelevant to the issue of life extension, FOR THEY ARE TWO DIFFERENT THINGS! (Apologies for the caps but sometimes you need to yell to be heard) :-) So just like you can't be "little" pregnant, you can't be "little" alive. Yes, life/existence *is* binary; you're either alive or dead. (At least that's the short version.) Lee, this post http://lists.extropy.org/pipermail/extropy-chat/2006-November/030557.html and the one before that was designed to steer you onto the path at the end of which the difference between preservation of personal identity and preservation of life should be visible and undeniable. Unless you can show me how preservation of personal memories (or values or beliefs) implies preservation of life, I'm afraid that extending this dialog will not bring any more progress. In any case, I still consider the discussion we've had as interesting and useful. Thanks. Slawomir From kerry_prez at yahoo.com Sun Nov 12 08:00:14 2006 From: kerry_prez at yahoo.com (Al Brooks) Date: Sun, 12 Nov 2006 00:00:14 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] all that concerns me is the future of education In-Reply-To: <200611111712.kABHCtmZ020596@andromeda.ziaspace.com> Message-ID: <20061112080014.47583.qmail@web51602.mail.yahoo.com> Actually, spike, there is not that much real disagreement on this subject between us. I never denied the Service could be a good deal for most who enlist. The point was, as you write in another paragraph even the older & experienced don't know what is going on in the world, enlistment-age youths know even less; being only partially aware of why they are enlisting and what is occuring in the larger world they are almost entirely out of touch, they are to put it bluntly fighting machines, the military is about reducing the enemy, servicemen are trained to fight, the purpose of their training isn't exactly nation-building, peacekeeping, or defending the US Constitution. In our narrowly-focused nationalistic world the military is in service mostly of a national interest, not so much of in a higher purpose-- often not at all. I don't accept the virtue of it, I go by Churchill's dictum our nationalistic way is pernicious, but the totalist (or extreme authoritarian) enemy is worse. That is the judgment call, and we don't change our minds every five minutes, every time the wind blows in another direction. We accept a bad situation and make the best of it. It's a fiction, a necessary one, that servicemen are fighting for truth, justice, the 'American' way, such is a sanitized way of looking at it. Truth, justice, and all the rest are part of it but as you know there is a dark, nationalistic side to it as well. Everyone has a combination of good & bad intentions, we are in pursuit of truth, justice; but we are also in pursuit of familial, dynastic, and of course nationalistic interests as well. As long as conscription isn't reintroduced my conscience isn't disturbed. > > bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Al Brooks > > Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] all that concerns me > is the future of > > education > > > > No doubt they are-- but as Robert Bradbury writes > > there's more to it. > > Spike, hope you're not suggesting that an eighteen > or > > twenty year old knows what is going on in the > world. > > > Not at all, nor do they need to. We adults don't > really know what is going > on this world either. Much of what we think we know > is wrong. > > Your wondered why anyone would join the military, > given the risk of death or > third degree burns etc. Humans take risk just for > fun. I could take you to > the local rock face where every weekend, young men > and a few young women > climb that rock utterly without protective > equipment, no ropes, no bolts, > just hands, feet, and skill. One slip and it is > over, or possibly > paralysis. Every weekend they are out there, > risking it all just for fun. > Any night of the week, people are pulled over by the > constabulary and > charged with being intoxicated as they attempt to > guide their detroits. > Huge risk, taken just for fun. > > In comparison, the risk of being in the military is > not so great. The > numbers of those slain in battle compared to the > totals, they are probably > safer in the service than out. If you wish to craft > your arguments that 18 > year olds know not what they are being asked to > fight for, well, I would > dispute that too. However if it is a question only > of risk, we will find > plenty of takers. > > If one ignores the service to country aspect of it > and looks at just the > risk vs payoff, the military is not a bad deal for > an aimless young person. > It carries opportunity to get with the > establishment, to learn how things > work, to be part of something significant, option to > retire after 20 years > with a pension and plenty of time to start a new > career, etc. One could > definitely do worse. > > spike > > > > > > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > ____________________________________________________________________________________ Yahoo! Music Unlimited Access over 1 million songs. http://music.yahoo.com/unlimited From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Sun Nov 12 13:38:25 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Sun, 12 Nov 2006 08:38:25 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Agency as Prime Determinant of Personal Identity In-Reply-To: References: <095f01c70301$da6b8a80$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <0a0d01c7048d$c3d5b150$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <0a9201c705c2$84cf2230$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: On 11/12/06, Heartland wrote: > > > Lee, this post > http://lists.extropy.org/pipermail/extropy-chat/2006-November/030557.htmland the > one before that was designed to steer you onto the path at the end of > which the > difference between preservation of personal identity and preservation of > life > should be visible and undeniable. Unless you can show me how preservation > of > personal memories (or values or beliefs) implies preservation of life, I'm > afraid > that extending this dialog will not bring any more progress. I've avoided this discussion because it looked like it was going to go over and over through things we have already through over and over for over a decade. It never hurts to reexamine these things in light of progress in genetics, neuroscience, preservation methods, etc. but I'm not sure I see that being done here. I do know that there are a large number (80,000?) individuals alive today whose precursor material was frozen. So they are clearly defined as having "returned from the dead" (unless being frozen is not the same as being dead). I looked at the message cited above and didn't see anything there making it clear to me what "life" is. I also realize that there there are people who believe it to be something other than what I believe it to be (an organized and *potentially* functioning set of information). So, Slawomir, if you are willing to provide a statement "Life is ______" (fill in the blank) I'll be happy to consider it. Otherwise I think this discussion has been about "I believe life is ______". You cannot change the "mind" of a believer, you can only transform it [1]. That can rarely be achieved through classical debate or discussion. Robert 1. That was something I learned from Est. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From velvethum at hotmail.com Sun Nov 12 15:33:14 2006 From: velvethum at hotmail.com (Heartland) Date: Sun, 12 Nov 2006 10:33:14 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Agency as Prime Determinant of Personal Identity References: <095f01c70301$da6b8a80$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677><0a0d01c7048d$c3d5b150$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677><0a9201c705c2$84cf2230$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: Robert, My previous post was supposed to serve as my final statement in this debate, but since you've shown interest in my challenge let me add few more words. Robert: > It never hurts to reexamine these things in light of progress in > genetics, neuroscience, preservation methods, etc. but I'm not sure I see > that being done here. Some views need to be reexamined simply because their logic is flawed. That is what this challenge is designed to expose. Robert: > I looked at the message cited above and didn't see anything there making it > clear to me what "life" is. I also realize that there there are people who > believe it to be something other than what I believe it to be (an organized > and *potentially* functioning set of information). I realize that patternists could conveniently "fix" their definition of life in such a way as to avoid the consequences of this challenge. Obviously, I'm not interested in the arguments that assume whatever they need to prove. This can *only* work with a non-arbitrary definition of life. Robert: > So, Slawomir, if you are willing to provide a statement "Life is ______" > (fill in the blank) I'll be happy to consider it. Otherwise I think this > discussion has been about "I believe life is ______". Life is a mind process. Even though I consider this to be a safe and non-arbitrary definition I fear that patternists might still find some reason to deny this. Proceed only if you can accept this definition (even "life is a process" will do). Otherwise your effort will just go to waste. Slawomir From lcorbin at rawbw.com Sun Nov 12 16:32:28 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Sun, 12 Nov 2006 08:32:28 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Calvin and Memes (was Memes and Identity) References: <28386055.624701163036591097.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> <0ada01c705ce$cac3f430$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: <0b6001c70678$4573af00$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Robert writes > With respect to William Calvin, it would require a long note to > go into his ideas and I wouldn't want to misexplain them as its > been a while since I've read them. But the two books sitting > on my shelf are "How Brains Think" and "The Cerebral Code". > I think if you read them you would understand why I am saying > that one can treat neural patterns as memes. Well, on page 82 of "The Cerebral Code" he writes In [Dawkins's] 1976 book, "The Selfish Gene", he extended the notion of copying genes to copying memes (cultural entities such as words and tunes). It took awhile before anyone realized its implications for copying inside a single brain. While Calvin goes on and on about copying, he doesn't use the word "meme" to describe the process. And we see from his parenthetical explanation, above, that he endorses the usual narrower use of the term. There are only two places in Calvin's other book "How Brains Think" where the term is used. One is on page 104 where he lists six key characteristics of a darwinian process necessary to keep it going: * It involves a pattern. Classically, this is a string of DNA bases called a gene. As [Dawkins] pointed out, the pattern could also be a cultural one such as a melody, and he usefully coined the term *meme* for such patterns. The pattern [Calvin's] could also be the brain activity patterns associated with thinking a thought. Notice he's saying that the darwinian process could be a meme or it could also be brain activity patterns, evidently not regarding one as a kind of the other. * Copies are somehow made of this pattern... * Patterns occasionally change... * Copying competitions occur.... * The relative success of the patterns is influenced by a multi- faceted environment. * The next generation is based on which variants survive to a reproductive age and successfully find mates. So there is little evidence that Calvin would call his patterns "memes", and nowhere does he say that his patterns are examples of memes. Here is why I don't want the meaning of meme to expand any further. Originally it began as in Dawkins' classic phrase referring to cultural replicators. Then it expanded to include beliefs. I was (and am) okay with this. Then it expanded to include any idea whatsoever. I didn't object, but maybe I should have (I don't know). It threatens to keep on expanding until the term has lost all utility whatsoever. To include *memories* and *any information that can be copied* seems like going way too far. I think that it may be a lost cause to remove "ideas" from being memes. Haven't we just seen that usage in too many places? But if we can restrict its meaning, in my opinion we should. Lee > I think he may have written some more recent books as well but I haven't > read them. See [1]. > 1. http://www.williamcalvin.com From lcorbin at rawbw.com Sun Nov 12 16:41:30 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Sun, 12 Nov 2006 08:41:30 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Agency as Prime Determinant of Personal Identity References: <095f01c70301$da6b8a80$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677><0a0d01c7048d$c3d5b150$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <0a9201c705c2$84cf2230$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: <0b6901c70679$8a3691b0$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Slawomir writes > Lee, I still don't think you realize what this is about. I'm talking exclusively > about preservation of life, not about preservation of personal identity (in a sense > of preservation of memories, beliefs and values). We are both most concerned with *survival*, i.e., not dying. Staying alive, that is. It's just that I believe it only requires runtime incorporating preserved memories, behavior dispostions, beliefs, and values. For you, it means "instance of a running process", where you define instance so that it doesn't involve either temporary suspension or replacement by other atoms. > So just like you can't be "little" pregnant, you can't be "little" alive. Yes, > life/existence *is* binary; you're either alive or dead. (At least that's the short > version.) Yup, we totally disagree. Was there, by the way, an exact instant at which you came to be? That is, one millisecond earlier, there was no Slawomir, and one millisecond later there was? > Unless you can show me how preservation of personal memories > (or values or beliefs) implies preservation of life, I'm afraid > that extending this dialog will not bring any more progress. All I can do is say that most people would get used to teleporting, and consider worries about it causing *death* to be oldfashioned relics of outmoded philosophies, much as no one today would consider a heart transplant as constituting itself a threat to survival. Lee From asa at nada.kth.se Sun Nov 12 16:51:32 2006 From: asa at nada.kth.se (Anders Sandberg) Date: Sun, 12 Nov 2006 17:51:32 +0100 (MET) Subject: [extropy-chat] secular heaven awaits extropes In-Reply-To: <200611120402.kAC42uXu021942@andromeda.ziaspace.com> References: <200611120402.kAC42uXu021942@andromeda.ziaspace.com> Message-ID: <3539.217.43.88.82.1163350292.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> spike wrote: > Anders, how do you find this stuff? It's as if there is some cosmic law > that demands that anything cool that happens, one must tell Anders, who > then > tells the rest of us. I'm training for my next incarnation as a search engine. BTW, another quite good webcomic in the same cluster: http://www.kiwisbybeat.com/minus13.html And Pixel has such great insights: http://www.pixelcomic.net/258.shtml http://www.pixelcomic.net/238.shtml http://www.pixelcomic.net/236.shtml http://www.pixelcomic.net/232.shtml ... -- Anders Sandberg, Oxford Uehiro Centre for Practical Ethics Philosophy Faculty of Oxford University From extropy at bayesianinvestor.com Sun Nov 12 16:41:38 2006 From: extropy at bayesianinvestor.com (Peter McCluskey) Date: 12 Nov 2006 16:41:38 -0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] A vignette on incongruent points of view In-Reply-To: <0J8F00INRT02X000@caduceus2.gmu.edu> References: <0J8F00INRT02X000@caduceus2.gmu.edu> Message-ID: <20061112164138.30953.qmail@pallas3.usifex.com> rhanson at gmu.edu (Robin Hanson) writes: >Why should how we feel or what we think about be determined by where >we are? Why shouldn't two friends at the same place at the same >time not think about different topics with different goals, if they >have different personalities and backgrounds? You don't have to be >the same as me to be my friend. Steven Mithen's book The Singing Neanderthals has a partial answer to this. He claims that music evolved in part as a means of synchronizing the thoughts of a group. This was important to promote cooperation. The more people think alike, the easier it is predict each others future behavior, which makes it easier to predict whether they will cooperate or defect in tasks such as sharing food with those who had bad luck hunting recently. In particular, sharing emotions is important because it helps create a group identity. If one person's joy helps the group feel joy, and one person's pain causes the group to feel pain, then it's more likely that people will act to maximize the group's welfare when it otherwise wouldn't coincide with the individual's welfare. Mithen makes this argument about a time period before our ancestors had anything like modern language, so he doesn't try to say whether these desires are relics of past needs that modern communication has made obsolete. I can imagine that language, contracts, etc. have opened up new ways of promoting cooperation, and that the benefits of having a diversity of worldviews has changed over time. I have a review of The Singing Neanderthals here: http://www.bayesianinvestor.com/blog/index.php/2006/10/26/singing-neanderthals/ -- ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Peter McCluskey | Science is the belief in the ignorance of experts. www.bayesianinvestor.com| - Richard Feynman From jonkc at att.net Sun Nov 12 17:53:28 2006 From: jonkc at att.net (John K Clark) Date: Sun, 12 Nov 2006 12:53:28 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Agency as Prime Determinant of Personal Identity. References: <095f01c70301$da6b8a80$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677><0a0d01c7048d$c3d5b150$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677><0a9201c705c2$84cf2230$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: <001c01c70683$8f23a9b0$170a4e0c@MyComputer> "Heartland" > I'm talking exclusively about preservation of life, not about preservation > of personal identity Then you are talking about something that is trivial. A man who's brain has been destroyed is still alive, so is a redwood tree, but neither of those things interest me. The thing that identifies with me does interest me, it interests me a lot. > Whenever someone starts telling me I believe in souls it's a sure sign > that whatever I've said so far must have completely gone to waste. You are talking about something that is far more important than personal identity but that can not be detected subjectively or objectively or even by the Scientific Method. Change the name all you want but of course you're talking about a soul, a soul that will permanently leave the body if you have anesthesia. John K Clark From thespike at satx.rr.com Sun Nov 12 18:37:12 2006 From: thespike at satx.rr.com (Damien Broderick) Date: Sun, 12 Nov 2006 12:37:12 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] secular heaven awaits extropes In-Reply-To: <3539.217.43.88.82.1163350292.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> References: <200611120402.kAC42uXu021942@andromeda.ziaspace.com> <3539.217.43.88.82.1163350292.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> Message-ID: <7.0.1.0.2.20061112123551.021dc8c8@satx.rr.com> At 05:51 PM 11/12/2006 +0100, Anders wrote: >And Pixel has such great insights: >http://www.pixelcomic.net/258.shtml Yes, and Chris's deathday melody is wonderful: http://chrisdlugosz.net/music/evil_birthday.mp3 (is there an algorithm for the choir you can just plug in?) Damien From natasha at natasha.cc Sun Nov 12 18:08:03 2006 From: natasha at natasha.cc (Natasha Vita-More) Date: Sun, 12 Nov 2006 12:08:03 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] secular heaven awaits extropes In-Reply-To: <3539.217.43.88.82.1163350292.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> References: <200611120402.kAC42uXu021942@andromeda.ziaspace.com> <3539.217.43.88.82.1163350292.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> Message-ID: <6.2.1.2.2.20061112120202.041b3158@pop-server.austin.rr.com> At 10:51 AM 11/12/2006, you wrote: >spike wrote: > > Anders, how do you find this stuff? It's as if there is some cosmic law > > that demands that anything cool that happens, one must tell Anders, who > > then > > tells the rest of us. (Psst... Anders must be borrowing Ellen DeGenere's phone line to god ... ) Natasha Vita-More Cultural Strategist - Design Media Artist - Futurist PhD Candidate, Planetary Collegium Proactionary Principle Core Group, Extropy Institute Member, Association of Professional Futurists Founder, Transhumanist Arts & Culture If you draw a circle in the sand and study only what's inside the circle, then that is a closed-system perspective. If you study what is inside the circle and everything outside the circle, then that is an open system perspective. - Buckminster Fuller -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Sun Nov 12 20:43:34 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Sun, 12 Nov 2006 15:43:34 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Fwd: Calvin and Memes (was Memes and Identity) In-Reply-To: References: <28386055.624701163036591097.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> <0ada01c705ce$cac3f430$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <0b6001c70678$4573af00$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: On 11/12/06, Lee Corbin wrote: > > > It threatens to keep on expanding until the term has lost all utility > whatsoever. Only to those items it can be applied to. Think of how many words there are in the English language which mean the same thing, "part" for example, you have body parts, car parts, nano parts, etc. If you want me to use the term RCNPFUEM (Replicating Cortex Neural Patterns Fundamentally Underlying External Memes) I'm happy to do so, but I don't think people will understand what I'm saying in front of a conference room (at least until Google has indexed this message and people have agreed upon the definition and put it in Wikipedia... I like being Humpty Dumpty. In this case it is *I*, not Calvin, who may be allowing the word to mean "more". You are simply arguing for "less". To include *memories* and *any information that can be copied* seems like > going way too far. Not when the cultural memes have a real physical basis in the neural patterns that are going on in the brains (IMO). I think that it may be a lost cause to remove "ideas" from being memes. > Haven't we just seen that usage in too many places? But if we can > restrict its meaning, in my opinion we should. Ok, I'll use RCNPFUEM from now on when I'm talking about the topic of internal neural patterns that behave like memes. But the newbies will be lost and a lot of people will be taking up valuable conference time asking me to explain how to spell rec-nep-fuem and what it means. :-) Robert -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From thespike at satx.rr.com Sun Nov 12 21:20:32 2006 From: thespike at satx.rr.com (Damien Broderick) Date: Sun, 12 Nov 2006 15:20:32 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] Fwd: Calvin and Memes (was Memes and Identity) In-Reply-To: References: <28386055.624701163036591097.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> <0ada01c705ce$cac3f430$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <0b6001c70678$4573af00$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: <7.0.1.0.2.20061112151620.02167120@satx.rr.com> At 03:43 PM 11/12/2006 -0500, Robert wrote: >Ok, I'll use RCNPFUEM from now on when I'm talking about the topic >of internal neural patterns that behave like memes. Neuremes? Or hexemes (since Calvin's neural gadgets are hexagons)? Or ideomemes (they're idea-memes)? Or idiomemes (they're proliferating one-offs)? (Fred Jameson, Marxist literary theorist of note, coined "ideologemes" as persistent structural components of social thought patterns.) Damien Broderick From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Sun Nov 12 22:22:11 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Sun, 12 Nov 2006 17:22:11 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Fwd: Calvin and Memes (was Memes and Identity) In-Reply-To: <7.0.1.0.2.20061112151620.02167120@satx.rr.com> References: <28386055.624701163036591097.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> <0ada01c705ce$cac3f430$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <0b6001c70678$4573af00$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <7.0.1.0.2.20061112151620.02167120@satx.rr.com> Message-ID: On 11/12/06, Damien Broderick wrote: > > At 03:43 PM 11/12/2006 -0500, Robert wrote: > > >Ok, I'll use RCNPFUEM from now on when I'm talking about the topic > >of internal neural patterns that behave like memes. > > Neuremes? Or hexemes (since Calvin's neural gadgets are hexagons)? Or > ideomemes (they're idea-memes)? Or idiomemes (they're proliferating > one-offs)? (Fred Jameson, Marxist literary theorist of note, coined > "ideologemes" as persistent structural components of social thought > patterns.) Damien, your are a fountian of stuff I do not know! If you cross, you and I and spike after the upload age arrives boy do we have one interesting metabrain. Separate thread: "Best extropian mind meld...? Or have we done this before? As a separate note (relating to the AI discussions), the NY Times today has an article on "Web 3.0" which is the generation of "intelligence" from the web [1]. Robert 1. "Entrepreneurs See a Web Guided by Common Sense" by John Markoff (12 Nov 2006) http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/12/business/12web.html -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From msd001 at gmail.com Sun Nov 12 23:02:50 2006 From: msd001 at gmail.com (Mike Dougherty) Date: Sun, 12 Nov 2006 18:02:50 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Fwd: Calvin and Memes (was Memes and Identity) In-Reply-To: References: <28386055.624701163036591097.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> <0ada01c705ce$cac3f430$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <0b6001c70678$4573af00$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <7.0.1.0.2.20061112151620.02167120@satx.rr.com> Message-ID: <62c14240611121502y2e142d63n11f2e5e54115a227@mail.gmail.com> On 11/12/06, Robert Bradbury wrote: > > Separate thread: "Best extropian mind meld...? > Or have we done this before? > wouldn't the 'best' mind meld be effectively everyone? Or are you suggesting that the addition of some of the list members would result in a sub-optimal brain? :) I know... that's not how you meant it. You were of course talking about the fewest members required to maximize potential while minimizing instability due to differences of opinion. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From thespike at satx.rr.com Sun Nov 12 23:21:30 2006 From: thespike at satx.rr.com (Damien Broderick) Date: Sun, 12 Nov 2006 17:21:30 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] Fwd: Calvin and Memes (was Memes and Identity) In-Reply-To: <62c14240611121502y2e142d63n11f2e5e54115a227@mail.gmail.com > References: <28386055.624701163036591097.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> <0ada01c705ce$cac3f430$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <0b6001c70678$4573af00$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <7.0.1.0.2.20061112151620.02167120@satx.rr.com> <62c14240611121502y2e142d63n11f2e5e54115a227@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <7.0.1.0.2.20061112172010.021715a8@satx.rr.com> At 06:02 PM 11/12/2006 -0500, Mike Dougherty wrote: >You were of course talking about the fewest members required to >maximize potential while minimizing instability due to differences >of opinion. Differences of expertise, I think, while maintaining sufficient congruence of interests. *Opinions*... well, often, not so much. :) Damien Broderick From nanogirl at halcyon.com Sun Nov 12 23:14:44 2006 From: nanogirl at halcyon.com (Gina Miller) Date: Sun, 12 Nov 2006 15:14:44 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] The Nanogirl News~ References: <6.2.1.2.2.20061107113609.0451d258@pop-server.austin.rr.com> Message-ID: <00b301c706b0$a53bf810$0200a8c0@Nano> The Nanogirl News November 11, 2006 'Nanorust' Cleans Arsenic From Drinking Water. The discovery of unexpected magnetic interactions between ultrasmall specks of rust is leading scientists at Rice University's Center for Biological and Environmental Nanotechnology (CBEN) to develop a revolutionary, low-cost technology for cleaning arsenic from drinking water. The technology holds promise for millions of people in India, Bangladesh and other developing countries where thousands of cases of arsenic poisoning each year are linked to poisoned wells. The new technique is described in the Nov. 10 issue of Science magazine.(Playfuls 11.11.06) http://www.playfuls.com/news_002874_Nanorust_Cleans_Arsenic_From_Drinking_Water.html Legos give kids a leg up on nanotechnology. The U.S. Patent Office might want to hear about this: John Hurd and a team of researchers have built a "nanoprobe" he says can clean clogged arteries. "The nanoprobe swims through the arteries and pushes out all the cholesterol and fat," explained the 9-year-old inventor. There is a caveat. The machine is only in the minds of the pint-sized designers who have spent eight weeks studying nanotechnology - the science of making super-small machines - while crafting robots out of Legos. The Crestwood Elementary School fourth-grader is among more than 200 students from Madison, Milwaukee and elsewhere in Wisconsin participating in this year's FIRST Lego League Badgerland Regional Competition, which starts today at Madison's Memorial High School.(Wisconsin State Journal 11.11.06) http://www.madison.com/wsj/home/local/index.php?ntid=107020&ntpid=3 Bridging neurons and electronics with carbon nanotubes. New implantable biomedical devices that can act as artificial nerve cells, control severe pain, or allow otherwise paralyzed muscles to be moved might one day be possible thanks to developments in materials science. Writing today in Advanced Materials, Nicholas Kotov of the University of Michigan and colleagues describe how they have used hollow, submicroscopic strands of carbon, carbon nanotubes, to connect an integrated circuit to nerve cells. The new technology offers the possibility of building an interface between biology and electronics. (PhysOrg Nov. 06) http://www.physorg.com/news82116028.html New biomedical device uses nanotechnology to monitor hip implant healing, may reduce wait times. It is so small, you can barely see it, but a microsensor created by University of Alberta engineers may soon make a huge difference in the lives of people recovering from hip replacement surgery. The U of A research team has invented a self-powered wireless microsensor for monitoring the bone healing process after surgery -- it is so tiny it can fit onto the tip of a pen. (EurekAlert 10.17.06) http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2006-10/uoa-nbd101706.php Now, a 'DNA machine' that can sound a virus alert. Researchers have made a 'DNA machine' from a single molecule that detects a virus by reading its genome, and then produces an alarm signal, in the form of a visible glow. Itamar Willner of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and his co-workers say that their DNA device can provide a readout within an hour and a half, whereas existing methods for identifying viruses or bacteria from their DNA generally require many complicated chemical steps. (Nature 11.10.06) http://www.nature.com/news/2006/061106/full/061106-19.html A nanoplasmonic molecular ruler for measuring nuclease activity and DNA footprinting. Researchers have a new tool for studying interactions between proteins and nucleic acids: a nanoscale optical ruler than can detect small changes in the size of a given piece of DNA. This work is reported in the inaugural issue of the journal Nature Nanotechnology. (News-medical.net 10.16.06) http://www.news-medical.net/?id=20495 Nanoparticle Shows Promise In Reducing Radiation Side Effects. With the help of tiny, transparent zebrafish embryos, researchers at the Kimmel Cancer Center at Thomas Jefferson University and Jefferson Medical College are hoping to prove that a microscopic nanoparticle can be part of a "new class of radioprotective agents" that help protect normal tissue from radiation damage just as well as standard drugs. Reporting November 7, 2006 at the annual meeting of the American Society for Therapeutic Radiology and Oncology in Philadelphia, they show that the nanoparticle, DF-1 - a soccer ball-shaped, hollow, carbon-based structure known as a fullerene - is as good as two other antioxidant drugs and the FDA-approved drug, Amifostine in fending off radiation damage from normal tissue. (Sciencedaily 11.10.06) http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2006/11/061108154306.htm Nanoparticle Sheets Form Spontaneously - CdTe nanocrystals mimic proteins. Crystalline nanoparticles of cadmium telluride, a semiconducting material used to make thin films for solar cells, spontaneously assemble into two-dimensional free-floating sheets in water without a template to guide them. Nicholas A. Kotov, Sharon C. Glotzer, and their colleagues at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, report this unexpected finding and explain how it occurs through a combination of interactive forces between the nanoparticles-the same way that some protein structures form in living systems 'Science 2006, 314, 274'. (C&E 10.16.06) http://pubs.acs.org/cen/news/84/i42/8442notw7.html Damage Control. Combination of carbon nanofibers and stem cells can regenerate lost neurons in rats. A cocktail of carbon nanofibers and stem cells can heal neural tissue in rats damaged by a stroke, according to a recent study. Thomas J. Webster, an engineering professor at Brown University, presented the results on Sept. 11 at the American Chemical Society national meeting in San Francisco. (C&E 9.12.06) http://pubs.acs.org/cen/news/84/i38/8438nanofibers.html MIT materials scientists tame tricky carbon nanotubes. Based on a new theory, MIT scientists may be able to manipulate carbon nanotubes -- one of the strongest known materials and one of the trickiest to work with -- without destroying their extraordinary electrical properties. The work is reported in the Sept. 15 issue of Physical Review Letters, the journal of the American Physical Society. (MIT 9.15.06) http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2006/nanotubes.html Ancient Hair-Dyeing - A Nanoscience? Scientists have discovered that an ancient method used to darken hair, dating back more than 4,000 years, is based on a chemical process that takes place at the nanoscale. This may be one of the earliest examples of nanoscience at work in a practical application. The research team is led by Dr. Philippe Walter, a chemist with the Centre Nationale de Recherche Scientifique (National Center for Scientific Research) in Paris, France. For the past 10 years, he and his group have collaborated with the research department at L'Oreal, studying the history of cosmetic science. (PhysOrg Nov 06) http://www.physorg.com/news81427508.html Nanotechnology: Check out the 2006 Nano Quest Challenge. The first organization - inspired by inventor Dean Kamen - and the Lego Group are sponsoring the 2006 Nano Quest Challenge, and sadly for the rest of us, it seems to be limited to kids 9-14 years old, plus 6 to 9-year-olds in the junior league in US and Canada. But wait - all the teams need adult guides, so some of us grown-ups have found a way to get in on this. There are 169 teams competing in California alone, and 32 countries are listed on the international page. (Nanodot 10.17.06) http://www.foresight.org/nanodot/?p=2344 Penn researcher shows that DNA gets kinky easily at the nanoscale. Scientists have answered a long-standing molecular stumper regarding DNA: How can parts of such a rigid molecule bend and coil without requiring large amounts of force? According to a team of researchers from the United States and the Netherlands, led by a physicist from the University of Pennsylvania, DNA is much more flexible than previously believed when examined over extremely small lengths. They used a technique called atomic force microscopy to determine the amount of energy necessary to bend DNA over nano-size lengths (about a million times smaller than a printed letter). (U of Penn 11.3.06) http://www.upenn.edu/pennnews/article.php?id=1048 Breaking the nanometer barrier in X-ray microscopy. Argonne National Laboratory scientists in collaboration with Xradia have created a new X-ray microscope technique capable of observing molecular-scale features, measuring less than a nanometer in height. Combining x-ray reflection together with high resolution x-ray microscopy, scientists can now study interactions at the nanometer-scale which often can exhibit different properties and lead to new insights. Improving our understanding of interactions at the nanoscale holds promise to help us cure the sick, protect our environment and make us more secure. (Eurekalert 11.9.06) http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2006-11/dnl-btn110906.php Carbon Nanotubes You Can Live With. Carbon nanotubes, or CNTs, are hollow wires of pure carbon about 50,000 times narrower than the finest human hair but stronger than steel. CNTs have enormous potential in a variety of biological applications, including medical diagnostics and treatments. There's a problem, however, and until now it has been what technologists call a "stopper." For reasons not entirely known, CNTs are cytotoxic - contact with them kills cells. This is one stopper that may have been solved. A team of researchers with Berkeley Lab, the University of California at Berkeley, and the Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI) have developed a means of making CNTs biocompatible. (Science Berkeley Lab 8.26.06) http://www.lbl.gov/Science-Articles/Archive/sabl/2006/Jul/01.html Anti Aging Medical Group Corp. Establishes Collaboration With AlphaRx and Leading Neurologists for Alzheimer's Disease. The collaboration has selected a well-known compound which in various pre-clinical studies have demonstrated low toxicity and proven to be highly effective in reducing brain inflammation, protecting neuronal cells, restoring cognitive function and preventing the development of Alzheimer's. This has not been a priority by the major pharmaceutical companies due to various formulation issues. In addition, the collaboration believes its approach of using nanotechnology to deliver such compound through the blood brain barrier is viable and will attempt to screen 2 to 3 formulations in Alzheimer's animal models to determine the right dosage for human trials. (Marketwire 11.9.06) http://www.marketwire.com/mw/release_html_b1?release_id=182304 Still Dyeing After 2,000 Years - Ancient formula, now re-created, darkens locks with lead sulfide nanoparticles. Nanotechnology may seem like the latest fad in beauty products, but a new report suggests that people have been using nanomaterials to improve upon nature for at least 2,000 years. According to researchers in France, an ancient hair-coloring concoction turns tresses black via the formation of lead sulfide nanoparticles within the hair shaft 'Nano Lett., DOI: 10.1021/nl061493u'. (C&E 9.11.06) http://pubs.acs.org/cen/news/84/i37/8437notw7.html Bio-nanotechnology to kill cancer cells. The University of Surrey has been awarded a grant of ?420,000 to utilize nanotechnology to develop cancer treatments. The grant is part of an international project: "Multifunctional Carbon Nanotubes for Biomedical Applications (CARBIO)" supported by the European Union under the Marie Curie scheme. (Nanotechnology 11.6.06) http://www.nanotechnology.com/news/?id=9329 Nanotech eyed for help with outages. Area residents are still talking about the October snowstorm that knocked out power to hundreds of thousands of homes and business. So are researchers at the University at Buffalo. Engineers at UB's Energy Systems Institute, in fact, have been studying how nanotechnology a branch of engineering that designs and builds extremely small electronic circuits and devices -- can be used to build a more reliable, efficient power system. (SmallTimes 11.6.06) http://www.smalltimes.com/news/display_news_story.cfm?Section=WireNews&Category=HOME&NewsID=140666 'artist & animator for hire' Gina "Nanogirl" Miller Nanotechnology Industries http://www.nanoindustries.com Personal: http://www.nanogirl.com/index2.html Animation Blog: http://maxanimation.blogspot.com/ Craft blog: http://nanogirlblog.blogspot.com/ Foresight Senior Associate http://www.foresight.org Nanotechnology Advisor Extropy Institute http://www.extropy.org Email: nanogirl at halcyon.com "Nanotechnology: Solutions for the future." -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From mbb386 at main.nc.us Mon Nov 13 00:11:50 2006 From: mbb386 at main.nc.us (MB) Date: Sun, 12 Nov 2006 19:11:50 -0500 (EST) Subject: [extropy-chat] META: HTML posts In-Reply-To: <0abb01c705ca$26e43090$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> References: <25711519.840811163217116858.JavaMail.servlet@perfora><7.0.1.0.2.20061110220631.0222fed8@satx.rr.com> <35851.72.236.102.67.1163250599.squirrel@main.nc.us> <0abb01c705ca$26e43090$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: <36507.72.236.103.68.1163376710.squirrel@main.nc.us> >> I hope my stuff comes out ok now. I don't get to see it as others do! :))) > > Thanks also for checking with us. It looks fine to me! > Thanks, Lee, it's good to know it looks right on other computers! :))) Regards, MB From hkhenson at rogers.com Sun Nov 12 23:55:35 2006 From: hkhenson at rogers.com (Keith Henson) Date: Sun, 12 Nov 2006 18:55:35 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Just curious, it's not natural! (2) In-Reply-To: <0aff01c705ea$3a369410$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> References: <5.1.0.14.0.20061109150438.0370d078@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> Message-ID: <5.1.0.14.0.20061112183736.03594308@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> At 03:34 PM 11/11/2006 -0800, you wrote: >Keith writes > > > At 10:18 PM 10/31/2006 -0800, Lee wrote: > >>Memories are memes??? That does violence to the concept so far > >>as I understand it. > > > > The essence of a meme is can the information be transferred. So a meme > > about how to tie shoes in a person's brain is a memory and a meme because > > the information can be transferred. But the other way around does not > work > > because I cannot transfer my memory of looking out over the Grand > Canyon to > > anyone else. > >Sorry I missed this post earlier---it was not in a thread I was attending >to.You are >saying that any information that can be transferred qualifies as a meme. >This would >include vast amounts of electronic data, the output of random number >generators, >and so forth. > >My usual belief is that this would be too broad. Snip No, it is a *restriction*. The original question was about memories being memes, and *some* memories, for example how to chip a hand ax, or put a person on cardiac bypass are memes in that people can learn them from another person. Memes, genes and computer viruses are the more general class of "replicators." At the root of it, all of them are information, and you can measure the lot of them in bits. They differ in where they have to be to have real world effects (brains, cells, computers). Memes *are* information, when you speak of the baseball meme, the only thing that is common among the hundreds of millions of places the baseball meme can be found (in brains, on paper and other media) is the information. And there are vast numbers of ways to define memes, elements of culture being one, replicating information patterns (hosted in brains implied), beliefs, ideas. It is worth considering when an idea is *not* a meme. If you have an idea and are immediately struck by lightening and killed, whatever you had was an idea, but at best only a potential meme since it never was transferred, and that's the defining quality of memes, replication. Arguing over a tight definition is a waste of electrons. Over the years there have been several thousand posting on the subject. Aaron Lynch and I went at this on alt.memetics years ago and there is much about it on the memetics mailing list. Keith Henson From spike66 at comcast.net Mon Nov 13 01:58:24 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Sun, 12 Nov 2006 17:58:24 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] dawkins on c-span book-tv In-Reply-To: <3539.217.43.88.82.1163350292.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> Message-ID: <200611130158.kAD1wdFv002450@andromeda.ziaspace.com> Remarkable! Last week I posted a comment on Richard Dawkins' talk at Kepler's books in Menlo Park. I suggested that religionistas could come in and take up limited seating, displacing the real Dawkins fans. As I was flipping channels this evening, I came upon Dawkins giving a talk at Randolph-Macon Woman's College, recorded on 23 October in Lynchburg Virginia, the home of Jerry Falwell's Liberty Baptist University. The talk mostly matched the one he made at Kepler's talk, but the question/answer session came out very differently in Virginia than it did a week later out here in Taxifornia. Of the 12 questioners, 10 of them either overtly identified themselves as from Liberty Baptist or made it clear that they were religious. Dawkins was brilliant. We must have been a great relief for him after his Lynchburg experience. spike From sentience at pobox.com Mon Nov 13 02:29:02 2006 From: sentience at pobox.com (Eliezer S. Yudkowsky) Date: Sun, 12 Nov 2006 18:29:02 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] secular heaven awaits extropes In-Reply-To: <3539.217.43.88.82.1163350292.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> References: <200611120402.kAC42uXu021942@andromeda.ziaspace.com> <3539.217.43.88.82.1163350292.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> Message-ID: <4557D86E.7070506@pobox.com> Anders Sandberg wrote: > spike wrote: > >>Anders, how do you find this stuff? It's as if there is some cosmic law >>that demands that anything cool that happens, one must tell Anders, who >>then tells the rest of us. > > I'm training for my next incarnation as a search engine. > > BTW, another quite good webcomic in the same cluster: > http://www.kiwisbybeat.com/minus13.html I am convinced that this is the greatest webcomic ever. http://www.kiwisbybeat.com/minus37.html -- Eliezer S. Yudkowsky http://singinst.org/ Research Fellow, Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence From andrewcburrows at hotmail.com Thu Nov 9 01:21:21 2006 From: andrewcburrows at hotmail.com (Andrew Burrows) Date: Thu, 09 Nov 2006 01:21:21 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] A vignette on incongruent points of view Message-ID: One may ask, How can a being understand a new experience while retaining the old experience? A being may think: I live in the present state because I am derived from the past. While after some time this being decides: This conscious instance is momentary, reality is formed from a stream of chaos, jumping from random state to random state. Both are rational thoughts, but they contradict each other. Can we not understand both at the same time? One may understand both, but can only enact one's actions based on one belief. There are so many ambiguities in reality, that some ideas are never going to be held by consensus. The best we can hope to achieve is to context switch at the right time, afterall no one wants to be in a stagnant state for too long. _________________________________________________________________ Windows Live? Messenger has arrived. Click here to download it for free! http://imagine-msn.com/messenger/launch80/?locale=en-gb From femmechakra at yahoo.ca Mon Nov 13 02:44:48 2006 From: femmechakra at yahoo.ca (Anna Taylor) Date: Sun, 12 Nov 2006 21:44:48 -0500 (EST) Subject: [extropy-chat] secular heaven awaits extropes In-Reply-To: <7.0.1.0.2.20061112123551.021dc8c8@satx.rr.com> Message-ID: <20061113024448.78242.qmail@web37202.mail.mud.yahoo.com> --- Damien Broderick wrote: > Yes, and Chris's deathday melody is wonderful: > > http://chrisdlugosz.net/music/evil_birthday.mp3 I really enjoyed it, thanks for the link. Anna:) The finest emotion of which we are capable is the mystic emotion. ~Albert Einstein __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com From c.hales at pgrad.unimelb.edu.au Mon Nov 13 04:23:58 2006 From: c.hales at pgrad.unimelb.edu.au (Colin Geoffrey Hales) Date: Mon, 13 Nov 2006 15:23:58 +1100 (EST) Subject: [extropy-chat] A vignette on incongruent points of view In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <2422.128.250.225.217.1163391838.squirrel@webmail.student.unimelb.edu.au> > One may ask, > How can a being understand a new experience while retaining the old > experience? > > A being may think: > I live in the present state because I am derived from the past. > While after some time this being decides: > This conscious instance is momentary, reality is formed from a stream of > chaos, jumping from random state to random state. > > Both are rational thoughts, but they contradict each other. Can we not > understand both at the same time? > One may understand both, but can only enact one's actions based on one > belief. > There are so many ambiguities in reality, that some ideas are never going > to > be held by consensus. > The best we can hope to achieve is to context switch at the right time, > afterall no one wants to be in a stagnant state for too long. > Put it this way.... the only complete autobiography of 'you' is your whole life. Everything else is a condensed version. Throw away info to get the condensed version and you end up with errors and ambiguities.... comes with the terrtory. Colin From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Mon Nov 13 04:33:15 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Sun, 12 Nov 2006 23:33:15 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] secular heaven awaits extropes In-Reply-To: <20061113024448.78242.qmail@web37202.mail.mud.yahoo.com> References: <7.0.1.0.2.20061112123551.021dc8c8@satx.rr.com> <20061113024448.78242.qmail@web37202.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Message-ID: On 11/12/06, Anna Taylor wrote: > > --- Damien Broderick wrote: > > Yes, and Chris's deathday melody is wonderful:> > > http://chrisdlugosz.net/music/evil_birthday.mp3 > I really enjoyed it, thanks for the link.Anna:) > > The finest emotion of which we are capable is the > mystic emotion. ~Albert Einstein Within limits. (Yes I also liked(!) the mp3). Assertion: Albert did not really understand the mind states which were possible. Albert was not a neuroscientist. A challenge. Define the characteristics of mind states which generate mind states for all of humanity -- first those "on the charts" and then secondarily those 'off the charts'. (homework, homework, homework -- what am I to say?) Mind you the DMSO has many pages devoted to such topics... Robert -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From lcorbin at rawbw.com Mon Nov 13 04:45:45 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Sun, 12 Nov 2006 20:45:45 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Calvin and Memes (was Memes and Identity) References: <28386055.624701163036591097.JavaMail.servlet@perfora><0ada01c705ce$cac3f430$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677><0b6001c70678$4573af00$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: <0b9e01c706de$9a479f80$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Robert writes > [Lee writes] > > I think that it may be a lost cause to remove "ideas" from being memes. > > Haven't we just seen that usage in too many places? But if we can > > restrict its meaning, in my opinion we should. > Ok, I'll use RCNPFUEM from now on when I'm talking about the topic > of internal neural patterns that behave like memes. But the newbies will > be lost and a lot of people will be taking up valuable conference time > asking me to explain how to spell rec-nep-fuem and what it means. :-) Well, you could just follow Calvin and say "brain activity patterns", or, as you do above, "neural patterns". And I see that there have been other suggestions that seem somewhat less peculiar than RCNPFUEM :-) Lee From spike66 at comcast.net Mon Nov 13 04:48:27 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Sun, 12 Nov 2006 20:48:27 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Buying votes. [Was: ... Vote Early!] In-Reply-To: <200610211652.k9LGqXoC009406@andromeda.ziaspace.com> Message-ID: <200611130448.kAD4meWW017598@andromeda.ziaspace.com> Hey cool, we have some actual numbers on that US election last week: http://www.electoral-vote.com/ Scroll to the bottom. I added up the numbers on the various pollsters and found something interesting: from their pre-election polls, seven of the eight agencies predicted the republicans would do better than they did. Only Polimetrix overestimated the democrat-ward swing. Zogby missed by a mile. Quinn was almost right on in total, but interesting to note that they predicted more republican for every state except Florida, in which they over-predicted democrat-ward enough to nearly cancel all their other errors. This is another data point in favor of the contention that elections tend to come out to the left of where the pre-election polls would predict. spike From lcorbin at rawbw.com Mon Nov 13 04:52:11 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Sun, 12 Nov 2006 20:52:11 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Just curious, it's not natural! (2) References: <5.1.0.14.0.20061109150438.0370d078@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> <5.1.0.14.0.20061112183736.03594308@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> Message-ID: <0bb001c706df$df24e800$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Keith writes > The original question was about memories being > memes, and *some* memories, for example how to chip a hand ax, or put a > person on cardiac bypass are memes in that people can learn them from > another person. Yes, *some* memories are memes. What I was objecting to was describing memories as memes. Only *some* are. Hardly all. In fact, very few of one's memories are memes, especially, I suppose if you're not into "group think". And specifically---to return to the prior question---when I state that memories are vital to personal identity, it is hopefully clear that this does not simply include the ones that happen to be memes. Poor will I be, if I am at all, if my memories are only the memes I happened to be harboring when suspended or uploaded. Lee From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Mon Nov 13 04:57:18 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Sun, 12 Nov 2006 23:57:18 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] A vignette on incongruent points of view In-Reply-To: <20061112164138.30953.qmail@pallas3.usifex.com> References: <0J8F00INRT02X000@caduceus2.gmu.edu> <20061112164138.30953.qmail@pallas3.usifex.com> Message-ID: On 12 Nov 2006 16:41:38 -0000, Peter McCluskey wrote: > > rhanson at gmu.edu (Robin Hanson) writes: > >Why should how we feel or what we think about be determined by where we > are? Having recently gone through perrhaps one of the more extreme ends of the perspective of "reality" I will speak to this -- Summarily: Most (98% to pick an arbitrary number) do *not* understand "where we are"!!! Thus you are free to think or feel anything. But one has to deal with 'What "humanity" "is"' placing a distinctive impression on my raison d'etre. I *know* what causes aging, I *know* how to extend longevity yet I see few benefits on the publishing of such knowledge. The discussions are pointless because the system is unwilling to adapt to a radically different framwork. Everytime you visit a doctor you should ask yourself "Are you going to kill me sooner *or* later?" because they *do not have* a concept of *who* you are. Robert -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From lcorbin at rawbw.com Mon Nov 13 04:56:00 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Sun, 12 Nov 2006 20:56:00 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] A vignette on incongruent points of view References: Message-ID: <0bb601c706e0$4b940020$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Andrew writes > One may ask, How can a being understand a new experience > while retaining the old experience? > > A being may think: > I live in the present state because I am derived from the past. Yes, that seems okay. > While after some time this being decides: > This conscious instance is momentary, reality is formed from a stream of > chaos, jumping from random state to random state. That too. > Both are rational thoughts, but they contradict each other. How so? Perhaps you resolve it---or see how they don't conflict---in what followed. Lee > Can we not understand both at the same time? > One may understand both, but can only enact one's actions based on one > belief. > There are so many ambiguities in reality, that some ideas are never going to > be held by consensus. > The best we can hope to achieve is to context switch at the right time, > afterall no one wants to be in a stagnant state for too long. From lcorbin at rawbw.com Mon Nov 13 05:04:42 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Sun, 12 Nov 2006 21:04:42 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] A vignette on incongruent points of view References: <0J8F00INRT02X000@caduceus2.gmu.edu> <20061112164138.30953.qmail@pallas3.usifex.com> Message-ID: <0bbd01c706e1$906eb090$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Peter writes > rhanson at gmu.edu (Robin Hanson) writes: >>Why should how we feel or what we think about be determined by where >>we are? Why shouldn't two friends at the same place at the same >>time not think about different topics with different goals, if they >>have different personalities and backgrounds? You don't have to be >>the same as me to be my friend. > > Steven Mithen's book The Singing Neanderthals has a partial answer to > this. He claims that music evolved in part as a means of synchronizing > the thoughts of a group. This was important to promote cooperation. > The more people think alike, the easier it is predict each others > future behavior, which makes it easier to predict whether they will > cooperate or defect in tasks such as sharing food with those who had > bad luck hunting recently. In particular, sharing emotions is important > because it helps create a group identity. That's going to go over like a lead balloon here, I think. This list is thick with individualists who give a damn about the group only in the abstract. (I myself just posted a negative comment about those who engage in group-think.) This is a perfect example of how most of us in fact "reason". Consciously or unconsciously, we take in a new idea and quickly see if it implies something we agree with or not. When it does not, our agile minds have already produced any number of rationalizations against it, usually before we're aware that this is what we're doing. Survival of the group was an important determinant of our genes, but few will be the people you talk to who really care if their group is around in century or two. It's not the same, however, in many other parts of the world, nor within certain groups already infesting the west. Lee From lcorbin at rawbw.com Mon Nov 13 05:15:28 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Sun, 12 Nov 2006 21:15:28 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] secular heaven awaits extropes References: <200611120402.kAC42uXu021942@andromeda.ziaspace.com><3539.217.43.88.82.1163350292.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> <4557D86E.7070506@pobox.com> Message-ID: <0bc901c706e2$d56fadb0$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Eliezer writes > I am convinced that this is the greatest webcomic ever. > http://www.kiwisbybeat.com/minus37.html I looked at the first two: http://www.kiwisbybeat.com/minus1.html http://www.kiwisbybeat.com/minus2.html Surely I am not the only person who "doesn't get it". The first is some kind of fantasy revenge going on in a little girl's mind, perhaps, or.... something? The second seemed like petty revenge for a comment given kindly by someone. Thanks for any help---I realize the possible cultural gap here, but someone has to be uncool, so it might as well be me. Lee From sentience at pobox.com Mon Nov 13 06:47:25 2006 From: sentience at pobox.com (Eliezer S. Yudkowsky) Date: Sun, 12 Nov 2006 22:47:25 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] secular heaven awaits extropes In-Reply-To: <0bc901c706e2$d56fadb0$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> References: <200611120402.kAC42uXu021942@andromeda.ziaspace.com><3539.217.43.88.82.1163350292.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> <4557D86E.7070506@pobox.com> <0bc901c706e2$d56fadb0$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: <455814FD.8010304@pobox.com> Lee Corbin wrote: > Eliezer writes > > >>I am convinced that this is the greatest webcomic ever. >>http://www.kiwisbybeat.com/minus37.html > > > I looked at the first two: > > http://www.kiwisbybeat.com/minus1.html > http://www.kiwisbybeat.com/minus2.html > > Surely I am not the only person who "doesn't get it". The first > is some kind of fantasy revenge going on in a little girl's mind, > perhaps, or.... something? > > The second seemed like petty revenge for a comment given > kindly by someone. > > Thanks for any help---I realize the possible cultural gap here, > but someone has to be uncool, so it might as well be me. 1) What makes you think any of this takes place in Minus's *imagination*? 2) It might help to read more than 2 pages. 3) It might also help to have had some previous experience with webcomics; this one might be an acquired taste. -- Eliezer S. Yudkowsky http://singinst.org/ Research Fellow, Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence From sparkle_robot at yahoo.com Mon Nov 13 07:46:54 2006 From: sparkle_robot at yahoo.com (Anne Corwin) Date: Sun, 12 Nov 2006 23:46:54 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] secular heaven awaits extropes In-Reply-To: <455814FD.8010304@pobox.com> Message-ID: <20061113074654.19393.qmail@web56515.mail.re3.yahoo.com> For what it's worth, I really really like this comic so far. It's quite engaging. Webcomics can be extremely surreal, and yes, there is something of a cultural context when interpreting them. 1) What makes you think any of this takes place in Minus's *imagination*? 2) It might help to read more than 2 pages. 3) It might also help to have had some previous experience with webcomics; this one might be an acquired taste. -- Eliezer S. Yudkowsky http://singinst.org/ Research Fellow, Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence _______________________________________________ extropy-chat mailing list extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat --------------------------------- Check out the all-new Yahoo! Mail beta - Fire up a more powerful email and get things done faster. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From pharos at gmail.com Mon Nov 13 09:25:45 2006 From: pharos at gmail.com (BillK) Date: Mon, 13 Nov 2006 09:25:45 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] secular heaven awaits extropes In-Reply-To: <0bc901c706e2$d56fadb0$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> References: <200611120402.kAC42uXu021942@andromeda.ziaspace.com> <3539.217.43.88.82.1163350292.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> <4557D86E.7070506@pobox.com> <0bc901c706e2$d56fadb0$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: On 11/13/06, Lee Corbin wrote: > I looked at the first two: > > http://www.kiwisbybeat.com/minus1.html > http://www.kiwisbybeat.com/minus2.html > > Surely I am not the only person who "doesn't get it". The first > is some kind of fantasy revenge going on in a little girl's mind, > perhaps, or.... something? > > The second seemed like petty revenge for a comment given > kindly by someone. > > Thanks for any help---I realize the possible cultural gap here, > but someone has to be uncool, so it might as well be me. > You might be showing your age, Lee. There seems to be a generation gap in much of modern comedy. In the 1970s in the UK the 'alternative comedy' movement appeared which involved a lot of swearing, political comment, sexual jokes and lots of previously forbidden material. That movement has become more mainstream now. But much of modern TV 'comedy' (a few exceptions, of course) seems to have kept the swearing, sexual material, cruelty and general nastiness, but forgotten about the 'funny' part of comedy routines. Modern TV 'comedy' does appear to be popular with the under 35 age group. But this may be taken as a judgement on that age group. Being 'different' doesn't mean 'better'. Just as you can appreciate clever writing and skillful design, but not necessarily 'funny' as we used to know it. BillK From pharos at gmail.com Mon Nov 13 10:10:34 2006 From: pharos at gmail.com (BillK) Date: Mon, 13 Nov 2006 10:10:34 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] US election prediction markets failure Message-ID: Before the latest US election, pundits were noting that the Irish prediction market Tradesports.com was surprisingly accurate at predicting US election results. After the election, The Register has a very cutting article detailing how the prediction markets failed in this case. Quotes: In Silicon Valley this year, "collective intelligence" is the mandatory piece of psycho-babble necessary to open a Venture Capitalist's cheque book. Surowiecki's faith in prediction markets appears unshakeable. Writing in Slate three years ago, in an attempt to save Admiral Poindexter's "Terror Casino" - punters were invited to bet on the probability of state leaders being assassinated, for example - Mystic Jim begged for understanding: "Even when traders are not necessarily experts, their collective judgment is often remarkably accurate because markets are efficient at uncovering and aggregating diverse pieces of information. And it doesn't seem to matter much what markets are being used to predict." "Whether the outcome depends on irrational actors (box-office results), animal behavior (horse races), a blend of irrational and rational motives (elections), or a seemingly random interaction between weather and soil (orange-juice crops), market predictions often outperform those of even the best-informed expert. Given that, it's reasonable to think a prediction market might add something to our understanding of the future of the Middle East." A heart-warming fable, then, for a population robbed of their pensions, and beset by uncertainty after the dot.com bubble. Suroweicki failed to mention however that experts are regularly outperformed by chimps, or dartboards - but no one talks about "The Wisdom of Chimps". This week however the people spoke - and the markets failed. ----------------- The problem with predicting trends, whether by computer software or by markets, is that a trend is only a trend until it isn't. Drastic changes are notoriously difficult to predict. BillK From emlynoregan at gmail.com Mon Nov 13 10:46:49 2006 From: emlynoregan at gmail.com (Emlyn) Date: Mon, 13 Nov 2006 21:16:49 +1030 Subject: [extropy-chat] Unskilled and Unaware of It: How Difficulties in Recognizing One's Own Incompetence Lead to Inflated Self-Assessments Message-ID: <710b78fc0611130246n17a93e27yd62b3ee71e0c1c7e@mail.gmail.com> Just got sent this, thought it'd make a few people laugh. ----- Unskilled and Unaware of It: How Difficulties in Recognizing One's Own Incompetence Lead to Inflated Self-Assessments (Justin Kruger and David Dunning, Cornell University) http://www.apa.org/journals/features/psp7761121.pdf People tend to hold overly favorable views of their abilities in many social and intellectual domains. The authors suggest that this overestimation occurs, in part, because people who are unskilled in these domains suffer a dual burden: Not only do these people reach erroneous conclusions and make unfortunate choices, but their incompetence robs them of the metacognitive ability to realize it. Across 4 studies, the authors found that participants scoring in the bottom quartile on tests of humor, grammar, and logic grossly overestimated their test performance and ability. Although their test scores put them in the 12th percentile, they estimated themselves to be in the 62nd. Several analyses linked this miscalibration to deficits in metacognitive skill, or the capacity to distinguish accuracy from error. Paradoxically, improving the skills of participants, and thus increasing their metacognitive competence, helped them recognize the limitations of their abilities. --- Emlyn From rafal.smigrodzki at gmail.com Mon Nov 13 14:20:08 2006 From: rafal.smigrodzki at gmail.com (Rafal Smigrodzki) Date: Mon, 13 Nov 2006 09:20:08 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] 2-party-system = 1-dimensional politics (was polls again) In-Reply-To: <1398.213.112.92.120.1163106072.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> References: <7641ddc60611040856t51a97100kb8a8a6e3430351fe@mail.gmail.com> <20061106035339.37606.qmail@web60513.mail.yahoo.com> <7641ddc60611060812v53ca1e64ob21140dacf399473@mail.gmail.com> <1398.213.112.92.120.1163106072.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> Message-ID: <7641ddc60611130620i42b534b2g5b36414aadaae58b@mail.gmail.com> Just to clarify, while I posted under the subject of 1-D politics, my concern was not with the dimensionality of US politics but rather with the genesis of the two-party system. I wish I could read Swedish... :) Rafal On 11/9/06, Anders Sandberg wrote: > I don't think 1D politics is due to 2 party systems. I did a PCA analysis > of Swedish politics (a 7 party system with proportional representation) > and found that it was dominated by just a single principal component (see > diagram at http://www.eudoxa.se/politics/dimensioner.html, text > unfortunately in Swedish). This component was the block structure of the > ruling center-left alliance, and the much smaller subsequent components > may hold ideological differences but could as well just be particular > patterns of party alliances. > > My basic setup was similar to this > http://www.ex-parrot.com/~chris/wwwitter/20040203-which_parliamentary_co-ordinate_are_you.html > analysis of British politics, which uses majority voting and has a pretty > strong tory-labour dimensionality. Here politics is also pretty 1D, but > along simple left-right lines. > > Looking at co-sponsored bills in Sweden showed a far more complex network > between the parliamentarians: http://www.eudoxa.se/politics/motioner.html > When it comes to voting the policies have become 1D, but when they are > still ideas and ideology they are quite multidimensional. > > > -- > Anders Sandberg, > Oxford Uehiro Centre for Practical Ethics > Philosophy Faculty of Oxford University > > > -- Rafal Smigrodzki, MD-PhD Chief Clinical Officer, Gencia Corporation 706 B Forest St. Charlottesville, VA 22903 tel: (434) 295-4800 fax: (434) 295-4951 This electronic message transmission contains information from the biotechnology firm of Gencia Corporation which may be confidential or privileged. The information is intended to be for the use of the individual or entity named above. If you are not the intended recipient, be aware that any disclosure, copying, distribution or use of the contents of this information is prohibited. If you have received this electronic transmission in error, please notify us by telephone (434-295-4800) or by electronic mail (fportell at genciabiotech.com) immediately. From brentn at freeshell.org Mon Nov 13 14:36:26 2006 From: brentn at freeshell.org (Brent Neal) Date: Mon, 13 Nov 2006 09:36:26 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] US election prediction markets failure In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <98ECA8C5-56EB-475F-9D07-066C719EC7D8@freeshell.org> -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1 On Nov 13, 2006, at 5:10, BillK wrote: > > > The problem with predicting trends, whether by computer software or by > markets, is that a trend is only a trend until it isn't. Drastic > changes are notoriously difficult to predict. > I wonder if it was really a failure to "predict a drastic change" or whether it was a problem with an ill-posed question. The question that Orlowski used in his article was posed as something like "GOP retains Senate." That's a binary proposition and one that we understand now (and I believe we understood before the election) to have been a very close thing. I wonder if the question had been posed as "Number of Seats lost by GOP" if the idea market would have given a more accurate result. My experience with the ideas futures through the Foresight Exchange is that many questions are posed in binary fashion - all or nothing. I would be interested in seeing how accurate those are as a category compared to questions that have a range of answers. Off topically, I would be intrinsically distrustful of Orlowski's articles, as it has been shown that his intellectual integrity will often take 2nd place to his desire to write sensationalist stories. Brent - -- Brent Neal Geek of all Trades http://brentn.freeshell.org "Specialization is for insects" -- Robert A. Heinlein -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v1.4.5 (Darwin) iD8DBQFFWILu0Sh4Y5m/F5kRAiTDAKDfcoKDCvMh6oTs1YAEIk85xNeCAACgyrXc cxnUUOXibaZkOV5vvw1g5cE= =/WHU -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- From rafal.smigrodzki at gmail.com Mon Nov 13 14:47:02 2006 From: rafal.smigrodzki at gmail.com (Rafal Smigrodzki) Date: Mon, 13 Nov 2006 09:47:02 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Sex, Power and Single H+er In-Reply-To: <1521.213.112.92.120.1163106358.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> References: <15616726.275921162791214745.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> <1521.213.112.92.120.1163106358.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> Message-ID: <7641ddc60611130647n27fcbfccnb41081cd997c5b9@mail.gmail.com> On 11/9/06, Anders Sandberg wrote: > >> > > That is of course an interesting observation -- which of A.S./R.B./E.Y. > > would give up their identity freely (or lay it out on the table for one to > > fiddle with it?) > > I think I might open-source at least parts of my identity. When I said at > Extro 3 that I wanted to become an Internet standard or a search engine, I > meant it. ### I would even consider offering zero-interest loans, mail-in rebates and other buyer incentives to boost interest in my mind content. This could be a rough and tough competition, with only a few personality templates taking over significant portions of many markets (mainly due to inter-personality compatibility issues). Probably there will be a distinction between using full copies of minds, somewhat analogous to hiring a person (but possibly with the option of deleting for subpar performance, which is usually not a part of today's employment arrangements), and buying plug-ins, specialized modules derived from a mind, directly controllable by the buyer. At present my user-friendliness and competence may not be very attractive but as soon as possible I will initiate a program of autopsychoengineering, to improve my marketability, to make myself useful for the greatest number of projects by the greatest number of users. Whatever sells, I'll offer it. "RAFAL - The Mind to Go for Process Control!" Rafal From femmechakra at yahoo.ca Mon Nov 13 05:15:57 2006 From: femmechakra at yahoo.ca (Anna Taylor) Date: Mon, 13 Nov 2006 00:15:57 -0500 (EST) Subject: [extropy-chat] secular heaven awaits extropes In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <20061113051557.18826.qmail@web37212.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Anna used the quote: The finest emotion of which we are capable is the mystic emotion. ~Albert Einstein --- Robert Bradbury wrote: > Assertion: Albert did not really understand the mind > states which were possible. > Albert was not a neuroscientist. I don't know if Albert really understood the mind states or if he was a neuroscientist. (Probably not, considering at that time, the word didn't exist in that exact form. ) I liked the harmony because of "Happy Birthday to..". It gave a unique description of what "a Happy Birthday" could mean to someone that hasn't had a "Happy Birthday". It's all about the emotions. That's what I liked about the quote. It made me reflect against a certain emotion/vision. It was all about me:) > Define the characteristics of mind states which > generate mind states for all > of humanity -- > first those "on the charts" and then secondarily > those 'off the charts'. > (homework, homework, homework -- what am I to say?) I am willing to learn and that gives me knowledge enough to know that if you have the answers to these thoughts then I would prefer to listen to your opinions at the present time. Just my thoughts. Thanks Anna:) __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com From hkhenson at rogers.com Mon Nov 13 14:58:12 2006 From: hkhenson at rogers.com (Keith Henson) Date: Mon, 13 Nov 2006 09:58:12 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] secular heaven awaits extropes In-Reply-To: <0bc901c706e2$d56fadb0$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> References: <200611120402.kAC42uXu021942@andromeda.ziaspace.com> <3539.217.43.88.82.1163350292.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> <4557D86E.7070506@pobox.com> Message-ID: <5.1.0.14.0.20061113093756.0373e0f0@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> At 09:15 PM 11/12/2006 -0800, you wrote: >Eliezer writes > > > I am convinced that this is the greatest webcomic ever. > > http://www.kiwisbybeat.com/minus37.html > >I looked at the first two: > > http://www.kiwisbybeat.com/minus1.html > http://www.kiwisbybeat.com/minus2.html > >Surely I am not the only person who "doesn't get it". The first >is some kind of fantasy revenge going on in a little girl's mind, >perhaps, or.... something? No. This reminds me of one of the more influential things I ever saw when I was about 14. It was a Mad Magazine article on "How to be Different." The end of the article made the point in three frames that if you didn't want to be different, don't hassle those who are--they might turn out to be a Martian! (with unknown but dangerous powers--ZAP!). The first one in the series has a very similar message. In the first two frames she is not touching the ball to play with it. This is obvious a kid with very special powers. When the boys come along and give her trouble, what happens is expected. In the light of this background, the strip Eliezer pointed us to has a rather different meaning. It isn't just defiance, the little girl *is* the miracle that will save the earth. >The second seemed like petty revenge for a comment given >kindly by someone. > >Thanks for any help---I realize the possible cultural gap here, >but someone has to be uncool, so it might as well be me. If you don't notice her not touching the ball, it wouldn't make sense. Keith From pharos at gmail.com Mon Nov 13 15:16:46 2006 From: pharos at gmail.com (BillK) Date: Mon, 13 Nov 2006 15:16:46 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] US election prediction markets failure In-Reply-To: <98ECA8C5-56EB-475F-9D07-066C719EC7D8@freeshell.org> References: <98ECA8C5-56EB-475F-9D07-066C719EC7D8@freeshell.org> Message-ID: On 11/13/06, Brent Neal wrote: > Off topically, I would be intrinsically distrustful of Orlowski's > articles, as it has been shown that his intellectual integrity will > often take 2nd place to his desire to write sensationalist stories. > WHAAAATT !!!! Sensationalist stories in The Register!! Surely not ??? ;) Even ignoring Orlowski's rant, he does seem to have a point in the detail he quotes in his article, in this case. BillK From brentn at freeshell.org Mon Nov 13 15:33:20 2006 From: brentn at freeshell.org (Brent Neal) Date: Mon, 13 Nov 2006 10:33:20 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] US election prediction markets failure In-Reply-To: References: <98ECA8C5-56EB-475F-9D07-066C719EC7D8@freeshell.org> Message-ID: -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1 On Nov 13, 2006, at 10:16, BillK wrote: > On 11/13/06, Brent Neal wrote: >> Off topically, I would be intrinsically distrustful of Orlowski's >> articles, as it has been shown that his intellectual integrity will >> often take 2nd place to his desire to write sensationalist stories. >> > > > WHAAAATT !!!! Sensationalist stories in The Register!! Surely > not ??? ;) LOL > > Even ignoring Orlowski's rant, he does seem to have a point in the > detail he quotes in his article, in this case. > Yes, but I still wonder if he's just ranting about what happens when you get close to the edge of a step function. I should go back through the Foresight Exchange propositions and see if the accuracy is affected by how the question is posed in that sense. B - -- Brent Neal Geek of all Trades http://brentn.freeshell.org "Specialization is for insects" -- Robert A. Heinlein -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v1.4.5 (Darwin) iD8DBQFFWJBB0Sh4Y5m/F5kRArHeAKDCJQ8bv7LUxsMpIpSTugxo93CzOQCg2nh9 o685AZBBbH9qg1tWrIwA9XM= =M2Wg -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- From natasha at natasha.cc Mon Nov 13 16:16:49 2006 From: natasha at natasha.cc (Natasha Vita-More) Date: Mon, 13 Nov 2006 10:16:49 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] CONF: Call for papers: CADE2007 in Perth Message-ID: <6.2.1.2.2.20061113101550.045f7df0@pop-server.austin.rr.com> >First Call for Papers and Abstract Submissions: abstract submission for >refereed papers - deadline 12 January 2007 > >STILLNESS: 2007 Biennale of Electronic Arts Perth >Education Program: International Conference > >==================================== >CADE: Computers in Art and Design Education >==================================== > >12 - 14 September 2007, Perth, Western Australia > >Conference website: http://www.beap.org/ >Follow link to conferences for > > >The Biennale of Electronic Arts Perth (BEAP) is Australia's pre-eminent >festival dedicated to showcasing innovative works of art in the areas of >new media, electronic screen, sound and interactive media and is the >largest and most visionary electronic arts event in the region. > >Through a broad program of exhibitions, conferences and public talks, BEAP >provides a focus for discussion and exploration of the emergent aesthetic, >social and technological implications that surround the electronic arts, >in all its possible forms, whether visual, audio, interactive, temporal, >experiential, digital, 'bio' or 'nano'. > >The Computers in Art and Design Education (CADE) conference is a major >international event for those interested in the exploration of ideas at >the intersection of pedagogy, arts, design, science, and technology. The >2007 conference will provide a focus for shared learning, dialogue and >interaction that directly informs professional methodologies and practice. > >In 2007 CADE partners with the Biennale for its first conference outside >Europe, creating a new focus for exploring the latest research and >practice within creative arts education at the point where the 'digital' >is both a challenge and a strength. > >Perth, the capital of the state of Western Australia, has a distinct >creative community that celebrates the uniqueness of Western Australia's >stunning bio-diverse environment and combines Indigenous, European and >Southeast Asian cultures. > >Internationally recognised for its commitment to research in bio and >electronic arts in tertiary education, Perth welcomes delegates to explore >and reflect on global perspectives from a pivotal point within the >Asia-Pacific region. > >============== >Conference theme >============== > >We invite educators, theorists and creative arts practitioners to meet in >Perth, Australia, to explore the paradox of "Stillness." > >"Stillness" is the theme for the 2007 Biennale. The concept of "stillness" >will become an anchor for events in the ceaseless flows of data and >provide a reflective moment for new ideas to emerge and interact, explode >or coalesce, blossom or fade. > >BEAP will be supporting and encouraging a community of artists to explore: > * Stillness as Sound > * Stillness as Bio > * Stillness as Data > * Stillness as Duration > >CADE will challenge you to confront these conceptual issues. > >=========== >Call for papers >=========== >We invite contributions for paper presentations, posters and panel >discussions that address the conference theme of "stillness." Papers >should provide theoretical understanding, analysis and documentation of >creative arts and digital technologies and related contexts for >educational development. > >The term creative arts includes: new media, multimedia, web design, >interactive arts, computer games and mixed media performance and >traditional disciplines (such as fine arts, sculpture, photography, >printmaking, fashion and textiles, graphic design, illustration, 3D >design, product design interior design, architecture, drama, theatre, >dance and music). > >All submitted abstracts, poster submissions and papers will be double >blind peer reviewed by an international panel. Submissions accepted and >presented at the conference will be published in the conference proceedings. > >500-word abstracts required by 12 January 2007 >Full submission can be made through the conference website. > >Follow link to conferences for > > > >Join us in Perth - 12 - 14 September 2007. > >Conference Convenors >Suzette Worden, Professor of Design, Curtin University of Technology, >s.worden at curtin.edu.au >Lelia Green, Professor of Communications, Edith Cowan University, >l.green at ecu.edu.au >Paul Thomas, Artistic Director, Biennale of Electronic Arts Perth, >paul.thomas at beap.org > > > > > >Lone Malmborg >IT University >Rued Langgaards Vej 7 >2300 Copenhagen S >Denmark >Phone: +45 72 18 50 23 >Mobile: +45 26 16 50 31 >Email: malmborg at itu.dk > IT-University of Copenhagen > InC ? Innovative Communication > Natasha Vita-More Cultural Strategist - Design Media Artist - Futurist PhD Candidate, Planetary Collegium Proactionary Principle Core Group, Extropy Institute Member, Association of Professional Futurists Founder, Transhumanist Arts & Culture If you draw a circle in the sand and study only what's inside the circle, then that is a closed-system perspective. If you study what is inside the circle and everything outside the circle, then that is an open system perspective. - Buckminster Fuller -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From rhanson at gmu.edu Mon Nov 13 15:37:55 2006 From: rhanson at gmu.edu (Robin Hanson) Date: Mon, 13 Nov 2006 10:37:55 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] US election prediction markets failure In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <0J8O00MXNE38N970@caduceus2.gmu.edu> At 05:10 AM 11/13/2006, Bill K wrote: >After the election, The Register has a very cutting article detailing >how the prediction markets failed in this case. > >This week however the people spoke - and the markets failed. If a prediction mechanism is said to be a failure if it ever assigns less than 50% chance to the event that happened, then every prediction mechanism will be a failure. A more reasonable standard is to compare mechanisms and see which ones are on average more accurate. Robin Hanson rhanson at gmu.edu http://hanson.gmu.edu Associate Professor of Economics, George Mason University MSN 1D3, Carow Hall, Fairfax VA 22030-4444 703-993-2326 FAX: 703-993-2323 From asa at nada.kth.se Mon Nov 13 16:44:17 2006 From: asa at nada.kth.se (Anders Sandberg) Date: Mon, 13 Nov 2006 17:44:17 +0100 (MET) Subject: [extropy-chat] secular heaven awaits extropes In-Reply-To: <0bc901c706e2$d56fadb0$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> References: <200611120402.kAC42uXu021942@andromeda.ziaspace.com><3539.217.43.88.82.1163350292.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> <4557D86E.7070506@pobox.com> <0bc901c706e2$d56fadb0$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: <50581.86.140.225.158.1163436257.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> Apropos reality imitating art, or in this case art imitating art: http://dresdencodak.com/cartoons/dc_025.htm and http://www.theblackcubes.com/ -- Anders Sandberg, Oxford Uehiro Centre for Practical Ethics Philosophy Faculty of Oxford University From neuronexmachina at gmail.com Mon Nov 13 18:48:42 2006 From: neuronexmachina at gmail.com (Neil H.) Date: Mon, 13 Nov 2006 10:48:42 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] US election prediction markets failure In-Reply-To: <98ECA8C5-56EB-475F-9D07-066C719EC7D8@freeshell.org> References: <98ECA8C5-56EB-475F-9D07-066C719EC7D8@freeshell.org> Message-ID: On 11/13/06, Brent Neal wrote: > I wonder if it was really a failure to "predict a drastic change" or > whether it was a problem with an ill-posed question. The question > that Orlowski used in his article was posed as something like "GOP > retains Senate." That's a binary proposition and one that we > understand now (and I believe we understood before the election) to > have been a very close thing. I wonder if the question had been > posed as "Number of Seats lost by GOP" if the idea market would have > given a more accurate result. Intrade had a number of contracts for the number of seats gained by the Democrats, although I'm not sure how to access their stats now that the tickets have closed. Also, I'm pretty sure the claim isn't that prediction markets are somehow perfect psychics, just that they're better on average than other methods. -- Neil From pharos at gmail.com Mon Nov 13 20:02:14 2006 From: pharos at gmail.com (BillK) Date: Mon, 13 Nov 2006 20:02:14 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] 2-party-system = 1-dimensional politics (was polls again) In-Reply-To: <7641ddc60611130620i42b534b2g5b36414aadaae58b@mail.gmail.com> References: <7641ddc60611040856t51a97100kb8a8a6e3430351fe@mail.gmail.com> <20061106035339.37606.qmail@web60513.mail.yahoo.com> <7641ddc60611060812v53ca1e64ob21140dacf399473@mail.gmail.com> <1398.213.112.92.120.1163106072.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> <7641ddc60611130620i42b534b2g5b36414aadaae58b@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On 11/13/06, Rafal Smigrodzki wrote: > Just to clarify, while I posted under the subject of 1-D politics, my > concern was not with the dimensionality of US politics but rather with > the genesis of the two-party system. > > I wish I could read Swedish... :) > Swedish to English machine translation is not popular. :) Google and Babelfish don't offer it. InterTran and WorldLingo are prepared to make a valiant attempt, with WorldLingo producing overall better results, though InterTran caught some phrases that WorldLingo missed. Use WorldLingo if you just want a quick fix. The English translation was a bit weird and the software didn't know some of Anders' Swedish political words. But, anyway, here is their translation of Anders' paper. (With a little help from me who doesn't speak a word of Swedish). If nothing else, it should give Anders a laugh. :) --------------------- How many dimensions does Swedish policy have? How many additional components play a role in r?stningsm?nstren? Below is shown "the strength" (how much of the variation everybody is showing) for the main 100 components, there we have shown the first three. (Chart 1) As can be seen, most are very small. This year the policy has had approximately four - five dimensions, but the first component plays by far the biggest role - 92%. The five largest are 92.2%, 4.3%, 1.4%, 0.4% and 0.3% daily. The parliament's r?stningsm?nster is entirely dominated by the government alliance, overriding all ideology. This can be compared with a study of the American congress, which found two big components corresponding to 45.3 and 29.6%, with the rest smaller than 1.6%. Swedish policy is more one dimensional even than the American! A similar analysis of Great Britain's policy also shows one outstanding strong component, and the distribution of the members is our similar result. Norway demonstrates a more multi-dimensional policy than Sweden. Variants of the method can also be used in order to map the structure in parliament where the members do not have formal party alignment, as, for example, Finland. (Chart 2) Above we have coloured the endowed members for different components (batch colours up left). Component 1 and 2 has earlier been treated. The third component appears to divide between moderate and Folkpartistisk policy: it indicates certain questions where the people have crucial differences. Component 4 divides out Swedish Christian Democrats while component 5 has Centre Party and green party on same side against the other batches - maybe an environmental issue indicator. Component 6 divides the average centre and green party but places the centre together with Left Party. Component 7 seems only to depend on the number of votes. Only component 8, corresponding to 0.03% of the variation in voting, describes a difference within a batch, in this case Socialdemokraterna. Am I seeing the political landscape similar in all questions? No, local politics persuades to break the main pattern. (Chart 3) Here, the analysis has been done for voteringar from different committees. For several committees the structure approached the similar total policy (for example Parliamentary Committee on Justice, The standing committee on social affair, Parliamentary Committee on Cultural Affairs and Parliamentary Committee on Civil-Law Legislation). In others the structure is noticeably different (for example in Parliamentary Committee on Finance, Parliamentary Committee on the Constitution, Parliamentary Committee on Agriculture and the Environment, Parliamentary Committee on Industry and Trade, Parliamentary Committee on Taxation, Parliamentary Committee on Foreign Affairs and Parliamentary Committee on Defence). Parliamentary Committee on the Labour Market shows how the green party has joined with Socialdemokraterna and left Left Party in certain ballots. The agriculture committee shows an exceptional split between Socialdemokraterna and Parliamentary Committee on Defence and Parliamentary Committee on Finance with exceptionally individual r?stningsm?nster. Perhaps, just Parliamentary Committee on Defence and The agriculture committee and Parliamentary Committee on Transport and Communications are examples of how local politics pursues a path separate from party politics. Compared with earlier year however the foreign policy has been considerably more party orientated. ------------------ BillK From thespike at satx.rr.com Mon Nov 13 21:56:55 2006 From: thespike at satx.rr.com (Damien Broderick) Date: Mon, 13 Nov 2006 15:56:55 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] Steorn flack announcement Message-ID: <7.0.1.0.2.20061113155548.021a8d40@satx.rr.com> Steorn Announces End of Selection Process for Scientists to Test its Free Energy Technology Steorn Press Release DUBLIN -- Steorn, the technology development company, has announced that it has completed its selection process for appointing scientists to an independent jury that will test its free energy technology. Steorn issued the challenge via an advertisement in the Economist to the world's scientists in August 2006 and received more than 5,000 responses by the deadline of 12 midnight, September 8th. Steorn's technology is based on the interaction of magnetic fields and allows the production of clean, free and constant energy. The technology can be applied to virtually all devices requiring energy, from cellular phones to cars. Steorn will complete the signing of contracts with the chosen scientists by Friday December 1st at the latest. Sean McCarthy, CEO of Steorn, commented: "We have been thrilled by the excellent response we received as a result of our challenge. We are now confident that we have found the most qualified scientists and we are looking forward to the start of the validation process itself." Steorn anticipates that testing will begin early in the New Year. The precise timetable for the testing phase will be determined by the jurors, as will the location and format of the test process. Once the testing is complete the results will be made public via the Steorn website www.steorn.com. From mindspillage at gmail.com Mon Nov 13 22:39:06 2006 From: mindspillage at gmail.com (Kat Walsh) Date: Mon, 13 Nov 2006 17:39:06 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] US election prediction markets failure In-Reply-To: <98ECA8C5-56EB-475F-9D07-066C719EC7D8@freeshell.org> References: <98ECA8C5-56EB-475F-9D07-066C719EC7D8@freeshell.org> Message-ID: <8e253f560611131439qd751281nefce2397113bc574@mail.gmail.com> On 11/13/06, Brent Neal wrote: > I wonder if it was really a failure to "predict a drastic change" or > whether it was a problem with an ill-posed question. The question > that Orlowski used in his article was posed as something like "GOP > retains Senate." That's a binary proposition and one that we > understand now (and I believe we understood before the election) to > have been a very close thing. I wonder if the question had been > posed as "Number of Seats lost by GOP" if the idea market would have > given a more accurate result. [snip] > Off topically, I would be intrinsically distrustful of Orlowski's > articles, as it has been shown that his intellectual integrity will > often take 2nd place to his desire to write sensationalist stories. I concur with this. Most articles Orlowski's written about subjects I have some knowledge of, I've found to be irresponsible journalism at best and plain trolling at worst. (If he's the most intellectually formidable critic something has, it's probably not too bad an idea.) Considering the actual majority came down to the wire (she says, from Northern Virginia, where a chunk of the action was) I'd say the idea markets didn't do too badly; I'd be shocked if they never failed. The article's failure to consider the actual question asked -- when a journalist should be well aware of the effect of wording -- is either laziness or intellectual dishonesty. -Kat briefly delurking again -- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Mindspillage | G/AIM:LucidWaking mindspillage or mind|wandering on irc.freenode.net | email for phone From nanogirl at halcyon.com Mon Nov 13 23:45:13 2006 From: nanogirl at halcyon.com (Gina Miller) Date: Mon, 13 Nov 2006 15:45:13 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] test - ? References: <200611120402.kAC42uXu021942@andromeda.ziaspace.com><3539.217.43.88.82.1163350292.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se><4557D86E.7070506@pobox.com> <5.1.0.14.0.20061113093756.0373e0f0@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> Message-ID: <008301c7077e$308cb530$0200a8c0@Nano> I sent the Nanogirl News two days in a row and have not seen it - did anyone get it? 'artist & animator for hire' Gina "Nanogirl" Miller Nanotechnology Industries http://www.nanoindustries.com Personal: http://www.nanogirl.com/index2.html Animation Blog: http://maxanimation.blogspot.com/ Craft blog: http://nanogirlblog.blogspot.com/ Foresight Senior Associate http://www.foresight.org Nanotechnology Advisor Extropy Institute http://www.extropy.org Email: nanogirl at halcyon.com "Nanotechnology: Solutions for the future." -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From thespike at satx.rr.com Tue Nov 14 00:32:48 2006 From: thespike at satx.rr.com (Damien Broderick) Date: Mon, 13 Nov 2006 18:32:48 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] lick your wounds Message-ID: <7.0.1.0.2.20061113183144.021fd440@satx.rr.com> http://www.cosmosmagazine.com/node/846 A natural painkiller more powerful than morphine has been discovered in human saliva, and may lead to improvements in the clinical treatment of pain, French scientists say. The compound, called opiorphin, acts on pathways involving not just pain, but also emotional responses, according to the researchers. etc From avantguardian2020 at yahoo.com Tue Nov 14 00:17:52 2006 From: avantguardian2020 at yahoo.com (The Avantguardian) Date: Mon, 13 Nov 2006 16:17:52 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] test - ? In-Reply-To: <008301c7077e$308cb530$0200a8c0@Nano> Message-ID: <20061114001752.49604.qmail@web60518.mail.yahoo.com> Hi Gina, I got it. Thanks. :) Have you checked your spam filter? I find stuff I send in my spam filter from time to time. --- Gina Miller wrote: > I sent the Nanogirl News two days in a row and have > not seen it - did anyone get it? > > > > > > > > 'artist & animator for hire' > Gina "Nanogirl" Miller > Nanotechnology Industries > http://www.nanoindustries.com > Personal: http://www.nanogirl.com/index2.html > Animation Blog: http://maxanimation.blogspot.com/ > Craft blog: http://nanogirlblog.blogspot.com/ > Foresight Senior Associate http://www.foresight.org > Nanotechnology Advisor Extropy Institute > http://www.extropy.org > Email: nanogirl at halcyon.com > "Nanotechnology: Solutions for the future."> _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > Stuart LaForge alt email: stuart"AT"ucla.edu "Believe nothing. No matter where you read it, or who said it, even if I have said it, unless it agrees with your own reason and your own common sense."- Siddhartha Guatama aka Buddha. ____________________________________________________________________________________ Cheap talk? Check out Yahoo! Messenger's low PC-to-Phone call rates. http://voice.yahoo.com From amara at amara.com Tue Nov 14 00:36:37 2006 From: amara at amara.com (Amara Graps) Date: Mon, 13 Nov 2006 16:36:37 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Aubrey de Grey on BoingBoing (again) Message-ID: Another nice mention of Aubrey de Grey on BoingBoing: http://www.boingboing.net/2006/11/13/life_extension_resea.html Amara From mbb386 at main.nc.us Tue Nov 14 01:29:38 2006 From: mbb386 at main.nc.us (MB) Date: Mon, 13 Nov 2006 20:29:38 -0500 (EST) Subject: [extropy-chat] test - ? In-Reply-To: <008301c7077e$308cb530$0200a8c0@Nano> References: <200611120402.kAC42uXu021942@andromeda.ziaspace.com><3539.217.43.88.82.1163350292.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se><4557D86E.7070506@pobox.com> <5.1.0.14.0.20061113093756.0373e0f0@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> <008301c7077e$308cb530$0200a8c0@Nano> Message-ID: <36888.72.236.102.95.1163467778.squirrel@main.nc.us> > I sent the Nanogirl News two days in a row and have not seen it - did anyone get it? > > > I got it twice. :) Thanks, Gina. Regards, MB From fauxever at sprynet.com Tue Nov 14 01:30:40 2006 From: fauxever at sprynet.com (Olga Bourlin) Date: Mon, 13 Nov 2006 17:30:40 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Aubrey de Grey on BoingBoing (again) References: Message-ID: <000b01c7078c$7f6638d0$6600a8c0@brainiac> From: "Amara Graps" To: Sent: Monday, November 13, 2006 4:36 PM > Another nice mention of Aubrey de Grey on BoingBoing: > http://www.boingboing.net/2006/11/13/life_extension_resea.html ... and have you all seen this one?: It's on google video, here: http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=3847943059984264388 Olga From nanogirl at halcyon.com Tue Nov 14 01:34:54 2006 From: nanogirl at halcyon.com (Gina Miller) Date: Mon, 13 Nov 2006 17:34:54 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] test - ? References: <200611120402.kAC42uXu021942@andromeda.ziaspace.com><3539.217.43.88.82.1163350292.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se><4557D86E.7070506@pobox.com><5.1.0.14.0.20061113093756.0373e0f0@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com><008301c7077e$308cb530$0200a8c0@Nano> <36888.72.236.102.95.1163467778.squirrel@main.nc.us> Message-ID: <00bb01c7078d$a50f3950$0200a8c0@Nano> You did, hmm, must be on my end, funny I didn't get my own email! Thank you for your response. Gina` ----- Original Message ----- From: MB To: ExI chat list Sent: Monday, November 13, 2006 5:29 PM Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] test - ? > I sent the Nanogirl News two days in a row and have not seen it - did anyone get it? > > > I got it twice. :) Thanks, Gina. Regards, MB _______________________________________________ extropy-chat mailing list extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From c.hales at pgrad.unimelb.edu.au Tue Nov 14 00:39:02 2006 From: c.hales at pgrad.unimelb.edu.au (Colin Geoffrey Hales) Date: Tue, 14 Nov 2006 11:39:02 +1100 (EST) Subject: [extropy-chat] lick your wounds In-Reply-To: <7.0.1.0.2.20061113183144.021fd440@satx.rr.com> References: <7.0.1.0.2.20061113183144.021fd440@satx.rr.com> Message-ID: <4351.138.217.71.90.1163464742.squirrel@webmail.student.unimelb.edu.au> > http://www.cosmosmagazine.com/node/846 > > A natural painkiller more powerful than morphine has been discovered > in human saliva, and may lead to improvements in the clinical > treatment of pain, French scientists say. > > The compound, called opiorphin, acts on pathways involving not just > pain, but also emotional responses, according to the researchers. > etc > Which bit works when you lick someone else's wounds? <> to the new triage procedures! Paramendics salivating out the wondows as they scream down the highway! eeeeeuw! From thespike at satx.rr.com Tue Nov 14 04:08:18 2006 From: thespike at satx.rr.com (Damien Broderick) Date: Mon, 13 Nov 2006 22:08:18 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] lick your wounds References: <7.0.1.0.2.20061113183144.021fd440@satx.rr.com> Message-ID: <7.0.1.0.2.20061113220431.0220ae10@satx.rr.com> At 11:39 AM 11/14/2006 +1100, Colin Geoffrey Hales wrote: >Which bit works when you lick someone else's wounds? I trust you read far enough to note that this might yet prove to be medically indicated as "a new weapon in the battle against male erectile dysfunction." Not sure how *new*, but hey... Damien Broderick From mmbutler at gmail.com Tue Nov 14 04:28:56 2006 From: mmbutler at gmail.com (Michael M. Butler) Date: Mon, 13 Nov 2006 20:28:56 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] secular heaven awaits extropes In-Reply-To: <3539.217.43.88.82.1163350292.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> References: <200611120402.kAC42uXu021942@andromeda.ziaspace.com> <3539.217.43.88.82.1163350292.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> Message-ID: <7d79ed890611132028i5e7b37b1hc3dba1e96e7864de@mail.gmail.com> On 11/12/06, Anders Sandberg wrote: > > I'm training for my next incarnation as a search engine. Better I should listen to you than to Doug Lenat and Cyc... :) -- Michael M. Butler : m m b u t l e r ( a t ) g m a i l . c o m From c.hales at pgrad.unimelb.edu.au Tue Nov 14 06:07:02 2006 From: c.hales at pgrad.unimelb.edu.au (Colin Geoffrey Hales) Date: Tue, 14 Nov 2006 17:07:02 +1100 (EST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Unskilled and Unaware of It: How Difficulties in Recognizing One's Own Incompetence Lead to Inflated Self-Assessments In-Reply-To: <710b78fc0611130246n17a93e27yd62b3ee71e0c1c7e@mail.gmail.com> References: <710b78fc0611130246n17a93e27yd62b3ee71e0c1c7e@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <4897.138.217.71.90.1163484422.squirrel@webmail.student.unimelb.edu.au> > Just got sent this, thought it'd make a few people laugh. > > ----- > > Unskilled and Unaware of It: How Difficulties in Recognizing One's Own > Incompetence Lead to Inflated Self-Assessments > (Justin Kruger and David Dunning, Cornell University) > > http://www.apa.org/journals/features/psp7761121.pdf > > People tend to hold overly favorable views of their abilities in many > social and intellectual domains. The authors suggest that this > overestimation occurs, in part, because people who are unskilled in > these domains suffer a dual burden: Not only do these people reach > erroneous conclusions and make unfortunate choices, but their > incompetence robs them of the metacognitive ability to realize it. > Across 4 studies, the authors found that participants scoring in the > bottom quartile on tests of humor, grammar, and logic grossly > overestimated their test performance and ability. Although their test > scores put them in the 12th percentile, they estimated themselves to > be in the 62nd. Several analyses linked this miscalibration to > deficits in metacognitive skill, or the capacity to distinguish > accuracy from error. Paradoxically, improving the skills of > participants, and thus increasing their metacognitive competence, > helped them recognize the limitations of their abilities. > > --- > > Emlyn Knowing that you don't know something is perhaps the most poweful aspect of our cognitive processes. You can be wrong - must be wrong - to be creative and the payback is you get to be right - sometimes. Ready- fire- aim. But if you don't know you don't know, you are paddling up the proverbial. But then you all knew that, didn't you? I didn't. I knew that I didn't know that I didn't know it, so that's alright then. Wait. No I didn't. I think. Now I do though. meta-Colin The actual Colin is in the toilet, so I'm here instead. From lcorbin at rawbw.com Tue Nov 14 06:22:02 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Mon, 13 Nov 2006 22:22:02 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] secular heaven awaits extropes References: <200611120402.kAC42uXu021942@andromeda.ziaspace.com> <3539.217.43.88.82.1163350292.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> <4557D86E.7070506@pobox.com> <5.1.0.14.0.20061113093756.0373e0f0@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> Message-ID: <0c1501c707b5$33783760$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Keith writes >>I looked at the first two: >> >> http://www.kiwisbybeat.com/minus1.html >> http://www.kiwisbybeat.com/minus2.html >> >>Surely I am not the only person who "doesn't get it". The first >>is some kind of fantasy revenge going on in a little girl's mind, >>perhaps, or.... something? > ... > If you don't notice her not touching the ball, it wouldn't make sense. That's it! I failed to see that she had special powers. BillK writes > ...much of modern TV 'comedy' (a few exceptions, of course) > seems to have kept the swearing, sexual material, cruelty and > general nastiness, but forgotten about the 'funny' part of comedy > routines. Hopefully that doesn't apply to these comics under discussion :-) > Modern TV 'comedy' does appear to be popular with the under 35 age > group. But this may be taken as a judgement on that age group. Being > 'different' doesn't mean 'better'. Yeah, you have to keep that in mind. Eliezer wrote > 1) What makes you think any of this takes place in Minus's *imagination*? Pure desperation. It wasn't making sense till today, when Keith pointed out she wasn't touching the balls. Now I have to figure out why the old couple had a snowball coming from the "little miracle that will save Earth", sigh. Lee From sentience at pobox.com Tue Nov 14 07:38:11 2006 From: sentience at pobox.com (Eliezer S. Yudkowsky) Date: Mon, 13 Nov 2006 23:38:11 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] secular heaven awaits extropes In-Reply-To: <0c1501c707b5$33783760$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> References: <200611120402.kAC42uXu021942@andromeda.ziaspace.com> <3539.217.43.88.82.1163350292.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> <4557D86E.7070506@pobox.com> <5.1.0.14.0.20061113093756.0373e0f0@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> <0c1501c707b5$33783760$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: <45597263.8050104@pobox.com> Lee Corbin wrote: > > Now I have to figure out why the old couple had a snowball coming from > the "little miracle that will save Earth", sigh. I think the Minus webcomic might actually be Pure Art, which is why you're having trouble getting it. A couple of times, lately, I've suddenly realized: "Hey, I just had a pure artistic experience." That is, I appreciated the beauty of something, and then realized that it wouldn't have made any sense to someone not already steeped in the form. It may be that you've got to read a whole bunch of webcomics before you encounter Minus and appreciate it as Art; which makes it Pure Art. Similarly, after watching the "Reflections of Style" series, which struck me as highly refined, purely stylistic, and executed with exceptional competence, I realized that it would probably have made no sense and created no aesthetic experience for someone who had never previously watched an anime music video. It may even be that I, who have always considered myself a complete cultural barbarian, am beginning to appreciate Pure Art. Ah, well; at least my pure artistic experiences are of anime music videos and webcomics. A cultural barbarian has his pride, after all. For a webcomic that is High Art but not Pure Art, try "Ozy and Millie". -- Eliezer S. Yudkowsky http://singinst.org/ Research Fellow, Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence From russell.wallace at gmail.com Tue Nov 14 07:48:42 2006 From: russell.wallace at gmail.com (Russell Wallace) Date: Tue, 14 Nov 2006 07:48:42 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] secular heaven awaits extropes In-Reply-To: <45597263.8050104@pobox.com> References: <200611120402.kAC42uXu021942@andromeda.ziaspace.com> <3539.217.43.88.82.1163350292.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> <4557D86E.7070506@pobox.com> <5.1.0.14.0.20061113093756.0373e0f0@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> <0c1501c707b5$33783760$6701a8c0@homeef7b612677> <45597263.8050104@pobox.com> Message-ID: <8d71341e0611132348w21ab429fh3db3d53ed05d2cc8@mail.gmail.com> On 11/14/06, Eliezer S. Yudkowsky wrote: > > For a webcomic that is High Art but not Pure Art, try "Ozy and Millie". > After that, try 'Mansion of E'. But before both, if you've ever been into Dungeons and Dragons, try 'Order of the Stick'. Similarly in anime, if you've ever been into Tolkien/D&D style fantasy, 'Slayers' is a good candidate to start with. Then 'Blue Seed' (a simple 11 on a scale of 1 to 10). Then 'Neon Genesis Evangelion' (a complex 11 where 10 means the mind burns out before it can finish the creation - you'll see what I mean if you watch it). -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From eugen at leitl.org Tue Nov 14 09:58:26 2006 From: eugen at leitl.org (Eugen Leitl) Date: Tue, 14 Nov 2006 10:58:26 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] test - ? In-Reply-To: <00bb01c7078d$a50f3950$0200a8c0@Nano> References: <36888.72.236.102.95.1163467778.squirrel@main.nc.us> <00bb01c7078d$a50f3950$0200a8c0@Nano> Message-ID: <20061114095825.GU6974@leitl.org> On Mon, Nov 13, 2006 at 05:34:54PM -0800, Gina Miller wrote: > You did, hmm, must be on my end, funny I didn't get my own email! It's not funny at all. It's a mix of a rotten but fossilized standard, and tragedy of the commons which is busily ruining a perfectly good communication medium -- which has to be reinvented again, but poorly. -- Eugen* Leitl leitl http://leitl.org ______________________________________________________________ ICBM: 48.07100, 11.36820 http://www.ativel.com 8B29F6BE: 099D 78BA 2FD3 B014 B08A 7779 75B0 2443 8B29 F6BE From pharos at gmail.com Tue Nov 14 10:36:36 2006 From: pharos at gmail.com (BillK) Date: Tue, 14 Nov 2006 10:36:36 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] test - ? In-Reply-To: <00bb01c7078d$a50f3950$0200a8c0@Nano> References: <200611120402.kAC42uXu021942@andromeda.ziaspace.com> <3539.217.43.88.82.1163350292.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> <4557D86E.7070506@pobox.com> <5.1.0.14.0.20061113093756.0373e0f0@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> <008301c7077e$308cb530$0200a8c0@Nano> <36888.72.236.102.95.1163467778.squirrel@main.nc.us> <00bb01c7078d$a50f3950$0200a8c0@Nano> Message-ID: On 11/14/06, Gina Miller wrote: > You did, hmm, must be on my end, funny I didn't get my own email! Thank you > for your response. Gina` > If anyone is ever wondering whether their message got to Exi-chat OK, just look in the archives at: If your message is there, then the list software received it and tried to send it to everyone. There may still be problems en-route which mean than some list members fail to receive messages occasionally, so it is probably a good idea for everybody to look in the archives from time to time. I never receive my own messages back from the list. I thought that was a feature, not an error. BillK From hemm at openlink.com.br Tue Nov 14 11:51:06 2006 From: hemm at openlink.com.br (Henrique Moraes Machado (oplnk)) Date: Tue, 14 Nov 2006 09:51:06 -0200 Subject: [extropy-chat] dawkins on c-span book-tv References: <200611130158.kAD1wdFv002450@andromeda.ziaspace.com> Message-ID: <13ad01c707e3$2c7b57c0$fe00a8c0@cpd01> Is There any transcription available, or a video record, or an audio record? ----- Original Message ----- From: "spike" To: "'ExI chat list'" Sent: Sunday, November 12, 2006 11:58 PM Subject: [extropy-chat] dawkins on c-span book-tv > > Remarkable! > > Last week I posted a comment on Richard Dawkins' talk at Kepler's books in > Menlo Park. I suggested that religionistas could come in and take up > limited seating, displacing the real Dawkins fans. > > As I was flipping channels this evening, I came upon Dawkins giving a talk > at Randolph-Macon Woman's College, recorded on 23 October in Lynchburg > Virginia, the home of Jerry Falwell's Liberty Baptist University. The > talk > mostly matched the one he made at Kepler's talk, but the question/answer > session came out very differently in Virginia than it did a week later out > here in Taxifornia. Of the 12 questioners, 10 of them either overtly > identified themselves as from Liberty Baptist or made it clear that they > were religious. Dawkins was brilliant. We must have been a great relief > for him after his Lynchburg experience. > > spike > > > > > > > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > From mbb386 at main.nc.us Tue Nov 14 12:15:02 2006 From: mbb386 at main.nc.us (MB) Date: Tue, 14 Nov 2006 07:15:02 -0500 (EST) Subject: [extropy-chat] test - ? In-Reply-To: References: <200611120402.kAC42uXu021942@andromeda.ziaspace.com> <3539.217.43.88.82.1163350292.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> <4557D86E.7070506@pobox.com> <5.1.0.14.0.20061113093756.0373e0f0@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> <008301c7077e$308cb530$0200a8c0@Nano> <36888.72.236.102.95.1163467778.squirrel@main.nc.us> <00bb01c7078d$a50f3950$0200a8c0@Nano> Message-ID: <37067.72.236.102.97.1163506502.squirrel@main.nc.us> BillK writes; > > I never receive my own messages back from the list. > I thought that was a feature, not an error. > Hm. IIRC there is a setting - maybe in how you susbscribe to the list? - to specify whether you want your own messages back... I know I get all my own messages back on all my lists, which I find helpful for keeping a coherant thread and confirming that my message was actually sent and not simply thought about! :))) And I'm quite sure I've *selected* this as an option, somewhere... ;) Regards, MB From asa at nada.kth.se Tue Nov 14 12:53:00 2006 From: asa at nada.kth.se (Anders Sandberg) Date: Tue, 14 Nov 2006 13:53:00 +0100 (MET) Subject: [extropy-chat] 2-party-system = 1-dimensional politics (was polls again) In-Reply-To: References: <7641ddc60611040856t51a97100kb8a8a6e3430351fe@mail.gmail.com> <20061106035339.37606.qmail@web60513.mail.yahoo.com> <7641ddc60611060812v53ca1e64ob21140dacf399473@mail.gmail.com> <1398.213.112.92.120.1163106072.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> <7641ddc60611130620i42b534b2g5b36414aadaae58b@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <53233.86.140.225.158.1163508780.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> BillK wrote: > > InterTran and WorldLingo are prepared to make a valiant attempt, with > WorldLingo producing overall better results, though InterTran caught > some phrases that WorldLingo missed. Use WorldLingo if you just want a > quick fix. I'm impressed anyway, that translation wasn't half as hillarious as I expected. I could even recognize it! > The English translation was a bit weird and the software didn't know > some of Anders' Swedish political words. But, anyway, here is their > translation of Anders' paper. Some parts were quite fun: "Theirs v?nsterpartistiska equivalences Gunilla Wall?n and Tasso Stafilidis engages together social democrat, the aid batches and the opposition. It is interesting to note that green party lacks these bridge construction workers. " "The the classic right left scale is not it defining in Swedish policy (unlike British) but the policy is deeply uniting dimensional. To a large extent, one can see Socialdemokraterna as a middle uniting batch the average non-Socialist party and ?the the red green mess?." Next year (I hope to make this report annual) I'll make an English version too. -- Anders Sandberg, Oxford Uehiro Centre for Practical Ethics Philosophy Faculty of Oxford University From austriaaugust at yahoo.com Tue Nov 14 13:12:13 2006 From: austriaaugust at yahoo.com (A B) Date: Tue, 14 Nov 2006 05:12:13 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] A quick AGI question In-Reply-To: <3923.139.168.42.79.1163197593.squirrel@webmail.student.unimelb.edu.au> Message-ID: <20061114131213.47125.qmail@web37411.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Hi Colin, Colin asked: ..."So have we broken your brain yet, Jeff?" Yes, indeed. My brain has been broken many times since joining this list. :-) But it's not really so bad, bouncing off of my own ill-conceived notions always sends me in a new, unfamiliar direction. ;-) Best Wishes, Jeffrey Herrlich --------------------------------- Check out the all-new Yahoo! Mail beta - Fire up a more powerful email and get things done faster. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From spike66 at comcast.net Tue Nov 14 14:36:00 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Tue, 14 Nov 2006 06:36:00 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] dawkins on c-span book-tv In-Reply-To: <13ad01c707e3$2c7b57c0$fe00a8c0@cpd01> Message-ID: <200611141451.kAEEovPJ016567@andromeda.ziaspace.com> > -----Original Message----- > From: extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org [mailto:extropy-chat- > bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Henrique Moraes Machado (oplnk) > Sent: Tuesday, November 14, 2006 3:51 AM > To: ExI chat list > Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] dawkins on c-span book-tv > > Is There any transcription available, or a video record, or an audio > record? > ... > > As I was flipping channels this evening, I came upon Dawkins giving a > talk > > at Randolph-Macon Woman's College... > > > > spike Unfortunately I didn't record it. Anyone? spike From natasha at natasha.cc Tue Nov 14 16:06:50 2006 From: natasha at natasha.cc (Natasha Vita-More) Date: Tue, 14 Nov 2006 10:06:50 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] Question re shedding identity on net, etc. Message-ID: <6.2.1.2.2.20061114100637.04797d00@pop-server.austin.rr.com> If I had been following all the threads on identity I would know if my question has been answered. Sorry if this is repetitive, but please spare me a moment if you can: What interfaces are used to follow us around the net and pick up the remains of all our presence everywhere we go? For example, if every place we go and everything we say is shed vis-a-vis all the codes we communicate with, what are the latest and greatest high tech software/hardware devices that track us? I am writing on skin exobody and a small section on identity. In this section I am making a comparison between Gattaca and the central character being careful about the millions of dead skin cells that fall from his body and how he has to be meticulous about not letting any of them get detected, in which case would reveal his real identity. In my skin exobody I am referring to code as the a metaphor of skin and how every time we log in and send a message, or appear in simulated environments, we are shedding part of our identity through linkages to our home base computer, which for this purpose becomes a boundary between us and all else. Thanks, Natasha Natasha Vita-More Cultural Strategist - Design Media Artist - Futurist PhD Candidate, Planetary Collegium Proactionary Principle Core Group, Extropy Institute Member, Association of Professional Futurists Founder, Transhumanist Arts & Culture If you draw a circle in the sand and study only what's inside the circle, then that is a closed-system perspective. If you study what is inside the circle and everything outside the circle, then that is an open system perspective. - Buckminster Fuller -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From thespike at satx.rr.com Tue Nov 14 17:22:43 2006 From: thespike at satx.rr.com (Damien Broderick) Date: Tue, 14 Nov 2006 11:22:43 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] Panspermia lives, maybe Message-ID: <7.0.1.0.2.20061114112138.02167e40@satx.rr.com> Searching for 'our alien origins' By Andrew Thompson BBC Horizon In July 2001, a mysterious red rain started falling over a large area of southern India. Locals believed that it foretold the end of the world, though the official explanation was that it was desert dust that had blown over from Arabia. But one scientist in the area, Dr Godfrey Louis, was convinced there was something much more unusual going on. Not only did Dr Louis discover that there were tiny biological cells present, but because they did not appear to contain DNA, the essential component of all life on Earth, he reasoned they must be alien lifeforms. "This staggering claim is that this is possibly extraterrestrial. That is a big claim I know, but all the experiments are supporting this claim," said Dr Louis. His remarkable work has set in motion a chain of events with scientists around the world debating the origin of these mysterious cells. The main reason why Dr Louis's ideas have not been immediately laughed out of court is because they tie in with a theory promoted by two UK scientists ever since the 1960s. Space qualified The late Sir Fred Hoyle and Professor Chandra Wickramasinghe have been the champions of "Panspermia", the idea that life on Earth originated on another planet. They speculate that life was first brought here on the back of a comet. Over the last decade, Panspermia is being taken ever more seriously. The US space agency (Nasa) is now increasingly interested in searching for extra-terrestrial life. A new robotic submarine is being developed to explore the oceans of one of Jupiter's moons. This submarine is on test at the moment in a lake in Texas. Finding life elsewhere in the Solar System would be a vital bolster to the Panspermia theory. Another section of Nasa is devoted to the study of bacteria found on Earth that can survive extreme conditions. Finding these types of bacteria makes it more likely that micro-organism could survive the hardships of travelling through space on the back of a meteoroid. Professor Wickramasinghe explained: "Bacteria have got to endure the extreme cold of space, the vacuum of space, ultraviolet radiation, cosmic rays, X-rays. "That sounds like a tall order but bacteria do that. From what we know survival out in space is more or less ensured. Bacteria seem to me to be born space travellers." From another place Last summer, Horizon had exclusive access to a trip taken by Professor Wickramasinghe to India to investigate at first hand the red rain phenomenon. He met Dr Louis and together they visited the people who had witnessed the red rain. He was able to see the recent work of Dr Louis which shows that the red rain can replicate at 300C, an essential attribute of a space micro-organism that might have to endure extreme temperatures. All this has convinced Professor Wickramasinghe that the red rain is a form of alien life. "Before I came I had grave doubts as to whether the red rain was really an indication of life coming from space; new life coming from space," he said. "But on reflection and after talking to Godfrey, I think I would now fairly firmly believe that it did represent an invasion of microbes from space." Many scientists remain highly sceptical, however, but if Wickramasinghe and Louis are correct it will be the strongest evidence so far that the theory of Panspermia might be true. It also raises the intriguing possibility that if life first originated on another planet then it must mean all Earth organisms, including humans, evolved from alien life. Horizon - We Are The Aliens is broadcast on BBC Two on Tuesday 14 November at 2100 GMT Story from BBC NEWS: http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/science/nature/6146292.stm Published: 2006/11/14 10:58:35 GMT ? BBC MMVI From listsb at infinitefaculty.org Tue Nov 14 17:49:34 2006 From: listsb at infinitefaculty.org (Brian M. Delaney) Date: Tue, 14 Nov 2006 18:49:34 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] 2-party-system = 1-dimensional politics (was polls again) In-Reply-To: <1398.213.112.92.120.1163106072.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> References: <7641ddc60611040856t51a97100kb8a8a6e3430351fe@mail.gmail.com> <20061106035339.37606.qmail@web60513.mail.yahoo.com> <7641ddc60611060812v53ca1e64ob21140dacf399473@mail.gmail.com> <1398.213.112.92.120.1163106072.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> Message-ID: <455A01AE.1020309@infinitefaculty.org> 2006-11-09 22:01 skrev Anders Sandberg: > I don't think 1D politics is due to 2 party systems. I did a PCA analysis > of Swedish politics (a 7 party system with proportional representation) > and found that it was dominated by just a single principal component (see > diagram at http://www.eudoxa.se/politics/dimensioner.html, text > unfortunately in Swedish). Anders- Well done! But who are the likely readers such that an exclamation point would be needed here? -- "Svensk politik ?r mer endimensionell ?n den amerikanska!" [Swedish politics/political views are more unidimensional than American politics.] :) Seriously, I will cite this next time my Stockholm colleagues lob their stereotypical views of American political culture my way. Best, Brian From brian at posthuman.com Tue Nov 14 18:13:02 2006 From: brian at posthuman.com (Brian Atkins) Date: Tue, 14 Nov 2006 12:13:02 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] Panspermia lives, maybe In-Reply-To: <7.0.1.0.2.20061114112138.02167e40@satx.rr.com> References: <7.0.1.0.2.20061114112138.02167e40@satx.rr.com> Message-ID: <455A072E.3050701@posthuman.com> The "red rain" is just normal algae or fungus spores. I blame New Scientist for bringing this back from the dead earlier this year. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_rain_in_Kerala -- Brian Atkins Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence http://www.singinst.org/ From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Tue Nov 14 18:41:59 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Tue, 14 Nov 2006 13:41:59 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Panspermia lives, maybe In-Reply-To: <455A072E.3050701@posthuman.com> References: <7.0.1.0.2.20061114112138.02167e40@satx.rr.com> <455A072E.3050701@posthuman.com> Message-ID: On 11/14/06, Brian Atkins wrote: > > The "red rain" is just normal algae or fungus spores. I blame New > Scientist for bringing this back from the dead earlier this year. I'd just add that if there were a cache of dried up Deinococcus radioduranssomeplace on the planet and a wind were to loft them into the air at the same time rain was falling one could well get "red rain". But I've never heard of anyone finding that much Deinococcus in one place (though desert sands might be a good place to look since the radiation resistance goes hand in hand with dessication resistance). Robert -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From amara at amara.com Tue Nov 14 20:23:32 2006 From: amara at amara.com (Amara Graps) Date: Tue, 14 Nov 2006 12:23:32 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] dawkins on c-span book-tv Message-ID: There are some videos from that presentation here: http://richarddawkins.net/home Amara -- Amara Graps, PhD www.amara.com Istituto di Fisica dello Spazio Interplanetario (IFSI), Roma, ITALIA Associate Research Scientist, Planetary Science Institute (PSI), Tucson From asa at nada.kth.se Tue Nov 14 20:43:23 2006 From: asa at nada.kth.se (Anders Sandberg) Date: Tue, 14 Nov 2006 21:43:23 +0100 (MET) Subject: [extropy-chat] 2-party-system = 1-dimensional politics (was polls again) In-Reply-To: <455A01AE.1020309@infinitefaculty.org> References: <7641ddc60611040856t51a97100kb8a8a6e3430351fe@mail.gmail.com> <20061106035339.37606.qmail@web60513.mail.yahoo.com> <7641ddc60611060812v53ca1e64ob21140dacf399473@mail.gmail.com> <1398.213.112.92.120.1163106072.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> <455A01AE.1020309@infinitefaculty.org> Message-ID: <1961.163.1.72.81.1163537003.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> Brian M. Delaney wrote: > Anders- Well done! > > But who are the likely readers such that an exclamation point would be > needed here? Most swedes find this conclusion totally baffling. After all, we have so much *nuance* and *complexity* in our politics. Unlike all those representatives and senators who only come in two colors. ;-) The report was written rather informally for a lay audience, and got a quite nice coverage in the Swedish blogosphere as well as a color page spread in one of the largest newspapers. -- Anders Sandberg, Oxford Uehiro Centre for Practical Ethics Philosophy Faculty of Oxford University From natasha at natasha.cc Tue Nov 14 15:11:15 2006 From: natasha at natasha.cc (Natasha Vita-More) Date: Tue, 14 Nov 2006 09:11:15 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] Comedy: Chris Bliss blisses out Message-ID: <6.2.1.2.2.20061114085908.04575a90@pop-server.austin.rr.com> http://marketplace.espeakers.com/movie.php?sid=5290&aid=10558 Natasha Vita-More Cultural Strategist - Design Media Artist - Futurist PhD Candidate, Planetary Collegium Proactionary Principle Core Group, Extropy Institute Member, Association of Professional Futurists Founder, Transhumanist Arts & Culture If you draw a circle in the sand and study only what's inside the circle, then that is a closed-system perspective. If you study what is inside the circle and everything outside the circle, then that is an open system perspective. - Buckminster Fuller -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From asa at nada.kth.se Tue Nov 14 21:15:16 2006 From: asa at nada.kth.se (Anders Sandberg) Date: Tue, 14 Nov 2006 22:15:16 +0100 (MET) Subject: [extropy-chat] MATH: Minimal surface index? Message-ID: <2533.163.1.72.81.1163538916.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> Perhaps a bit too math-nerdy, but does anybody know this minimal surface? http://www.flickr.com/photos/87547772 at N00/296867895/ I came up with it recently and it is so simple that it ought to be in the literature but I have not seen anything close. All minimal surface sites I have seen have lists of interesting surfaces, but no real attempt to list them all (sure, they are uncountably many). Overall, I wonder how to best search for theorems and mathematical concepts you know ought to exist but you lack the name of, or even the related terminology. We are getting search engines that can search image databases using drawn pictures (http://shape.cs.princeton.edu/search.html) or examples in photos (http://www.like.com/). It ought to be possible to create a math search engine (a truth mine) allowing you to look for theorems based on structure or the use of special functions. -- Anders Sandberg, Oxford Uehiro Centre for Practical Ethics Philosophy Faculty of Oxford University From moulton at moulton.com Tue Nov 14 23:50:39 2006 From: moulton at moulton.com (Fred C. Moulton) Date: Tue, 14 Nov 2006 15:50:39 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] dawkins on c-span book-tv In-Reply-To: <200611141451.kAEEovPJ016567@andromeda.ziaspace.com> References: <200611141451.kAEEovPJ016567@andromeda.ziaspace.com> Message-ID: <1163548239.4914.148.camel@localhost.localdomain> http://richarddawkins.net/article,303,Reading-of-The-God-Delusion-in- Lynchburg-VA,Richard-Dawkins--C-SPAN2 Or try: http://makeashorterlink.com/?Y2852203E From nanogirl at halcyon.com Tue Nov 14 23:04:45 2006 From: nanogirl at halcyon.com (Gina Miller) Date: Tue, 14 Nov 2006 15:04:45 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] test - ? References: <200611120402.kAC42uXu021942@andromeda.ziaspace.com><3539.217.43.88.82.1163350292.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se><4557D86E.7070506@pobox.com><5.1.0.14.0.20061113093756.0373e0f0@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com><008301c7077e$308cb530$0200a8c0@Nano><36888.72.236.102.95.1163467778.squirrel@main.nc.us><00bb01c7078d$a50f3950$0200a8c0@Nano> <37067.72.236.102.97.1163506502.squirrel@main.nc.us> Message-ID: <001701c70841$9cacb850$0200a8c0@Nano> Yes, usually I do get all of my messages back (never selected anything - on any of my lists - I am using Outlook Express). I did get my test message as well, but for some reason this last Nanogirl News I could not see or receive. Regards, 'artist & animator for hire' Gina "Nanogirl" Miller Nanotechnology Industries http://www.nanoindustries.com Personal: http://www.nanogirl.com/index2.html Animation Blog: http://maxanimation.blogspot.com/ Craft blog: http://nanogirlblog.blogspot.com/ Foresight Senior Associate http://www.foresight.org Nanotechnology Advisor Extropy Institute http://www.extropy.org Email: nanogirl at halcyon.com "Nanotechnology: Solutions for the future." ----- Original Message ----- From: MB To: ExI chat list Sent: Tuesday, November 14, 2006 4:15 AM Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] test - ? BillK writes; > > I never receive my own messages back from the list. > I thought that was a feature, not an error. > Hm. IIRC there is a setting - maybe in how you susbscribe to the list? - to specify whether you want your own messages back... I know I get all my own messages back on all my lists, which I find helpful for keeping a coherant thread and confirming that my message was actually sent and not simply thought about! :))) And I'm quite sure I've *selected* this as an option, somewhere... ;) Regards, MB _______________________________________________ extropy-chat mailing list extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From emlynoregan at gmail.com Wed Nov 15 01:32:52 2006 From: emlynoregan at gmail.com (Emlyn) Date: Wed, 15 Nov 2006 12:02:52 +1030 Subject: [extropy-chat] MATH: Minimal surface index? In-Reply-To: <2533.163.1.72.81.1163538916.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> References: <2533.163.1.72.81.1163538916.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> Message-ID: <710b78fc0611141732l64e17c26hdd1116423b8903ab@mail.gmail.com> I don't know about an engine for searching for maths theorems. Google has a code specific search: http://www.google.com/codesearch Emlyn On 15/11/06, Anders Sandberg wrote: > > > Perhaps a bit too math-nerdy, but does anybody know this minimal surface? > http://www.flickr.com/photos/87547772 at N00/296867895/ > I came up with it recently and it is so simple that it ought to be in the > literature but I have not seen anything close. All minimal surface sites I > have seen have lists of interesting surfaces, but no real attempt to list > them all (sure, they are uncountably many). > > Overall, I wonder how to best search for theorems and mathematical > concepts you know ought to exist but you lack the name of, or even the > related terminology. We are getting search engines that can search image > databases using drawn pictures (http://shape.cs.princeton.edu/search.html) > or examples in photos (http://www.like.com/). It ought to be possible to > create a math search engine (a truth mine) allowing you to look for > theorems based on structure or the use of special functions. > > -- > Anders Sandberg, > Oxford Uehiro Centre for Practical Ethics > Philosophy Faculty of Oxford University > > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From spike66 at comcast.net Wed Nov 15 02:19:40 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Tue, 14 Nov 2006 18:19:40 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] dawkins on c-span book-tv In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <200611150235.kAF2ZAeO002477@andromeda.ziaspace.com> > bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Amara Graps > Subject: [extropy-chat] dawkins on c-span book-tv > > There are some videos from that presentation here: http://richarddawkins.net/home > Amara Graps, PhD Thanks Amara! Reading Dawkins' account of his experience at Lynchburg was a hoot. During the Q/A, a Liberty Baptist student mentioned a natural history museum on the Liberty campus that featured a dinosaur. It was claimed that the fossil was only a few thousand years old. Dawkins commented that if this is indeed the case, the students should resign immediately and apply to a proper university. I nearly wet my diapers laughing at that comment. {8^D The audience liked it too. Do read: http://richarddawkins.net/home spike From spike66 at comcast.net Wed Nov 15 02:28:06 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Tue, 14 Nov 2006 18:28:06 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Comedy: Chris Bliss blisses out In-Reply-To: <6.2.1.2.2.20061114085908.04575a90@pop-server.austin.rr.com> Message-ID: <200611150249.kAF2nENC007809@andromeda.ziaspace.com> Woohooo! Terrific thanks Natasha! How many jugglers do we have out there? I am one. {8-] spike _____ From: extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org [mailto:extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Natasha Vita-More Sent: Tuesday, November 14, 2006 7:11 AM To: extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org; ART-TAC at yahoogroups.com Subject: [extropy-chat] Comedy: Chris Bliss blisses out http://marketplace.espeakers.com/movie.php?sid=5290 &aid=10558 -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From hal at finney.org Wed Nov 15 04:24:02 2006 From: hal at finney.org (Hal Finney) Date: Tue, 14 Nov 2006 20:24:02 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] US election prediction markets failure Message-ID: <20061115042402.7F38E14F6BC@finney.org> Keep in mind that if a prediction market puts the odds of an event happening at 70%, as was roughly the case for the Republican Senate issue, it should come out the other way 30% of the time. If a market with those kind of odds were to get it right 100% of the time, that would actually be a failure of the prediction. Hal From spike66 at comcast.net Wed Nov 15 05:20:16 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Tue, 14 Nov 2006 21:20:16 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] US election prediction markets failure In-Reply-To: <20061115042402.7F38E14F6BC@finney.org> Message-ID: <200611150531.kAF5VdG2012222@andromeda.ziaspace.com> > bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of "Hal Finney" > Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] US election prediction markets failure > > Keep in mind that if a prediction market puts the odds of an event > happening at 70%, as was roughly the case for the Republican Senate issue, > it should come out the other way 30% of the time... > Hal Hey cool. This election site showed how the pollsters predictions compared with the outcome. Yesterday they did the senate predictions, today the house of reps: http://www.electoral-vote.com/ I counted the total number of polls and the overall predictions. I found that for the senate the polls were about 2.4% republican-ward. IOW, the democrat party did 2.4% better than the pollsters collectively predicted in the senate. Today they published the senate results, which came out about 0.6% democrat-ward, or the republicans did 0.6% better than the pollsters predicted in the house. We might be able to make some "money" off of this info in the next elections in Ideas Futures IFX. I had heard that elections seem to come out slightly to the left of the poll-based predictions. Now for the first time I have some hard numbers, and this seems to have come true, altho not by much. Next time I will check out the pre-election polls, then invest 2% to the left of the collective prediction. I wonder if that rule of thumb works in Europe? Do you guys have elections coming up? spike From brian at posthuman.com Wed Nov 15 05:55:21 2006 From: brian at posthuman.com (Brian Atkins) Date: Tue, 14 Nov 2006 23:55:21 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] US election prediction markets failure In-Reply-To: <200611150531.kAF5VdG2012222@andromeda.ziaspace.com> References: <200611150531.kAF5VdG2012222@andromeda.ziaspace.com> Message-ID: <455AABC9.7080902@posthuman.com> Unfortunately Spike now that you and the electoral-vote site have publicized this "2% effect" it may well be taken into account by the other market participants next time around, so your edge may already be gone. -- Brian Atkins Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence http://www.singinst.org/ From pgptag at gmail.com Wed Nov 15 16:44:38 2006 From: pgptag at gmail.com (Giu1i0 Pri5c0) Date: Wed, 15 Nov 2006 17:44:38 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] "After Life" novel Message-ID: <470a3c520611150844p26ee8768hdf5b555d7f25e19@mail.gmail.com> Read this, it is *excellent*! http://sentientdevelopments.blogspot.com/2006/10/simon-funks-after-life.html From scerir at libero.it Wed Nov 15 18:05:19 2006 From: scerir at libero.it (scerir) Date: Wed, 15 Nov 2006 19:05:19 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] ART: trompe l'oeil References: <470a3c520611150844p26ee8768hdf5b555d7f25e19@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <000501c708e0$9d5442b0$62941f97@nomedxgm1aalex> http://www.hemmy.net/2006/10/03/elevator-floor-illusion/ http://users.skynet.be/J.Beever/pave.htm (go for 'anamorphic illusions') From mmbutler at gmail.com Wed Nov 15 20:35:41 2006 From: mmbutler at gmail.com (Michael M. Butler) Date: Wed, 15 Nov 2006 12:35:41 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Nootropic-H+-Positive Canadian Doctors? Message-ID: <7d79ed890611151235gcb8935bmed32066fb4621e0@mail.gmail.com> Anyone know any Canadian doctors who are nootropic-positive? Please mail me OFF list. Thanks! -- Michael M. Butler : m m b u t l e r ( a t ) g m a i l . c o m From nvitamore at austin.rr.com Wed Nov 15 22:24:18 2006 From: nvitamore at austin.rr.com (nvitamore at austin.rr.com) Date: Wed, 15 Nov 2006 17:24:18 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] The 7th Swiss Biennial on Science, Technics + Aesthetics, Lucerne, Museum of Transport, January 20-21, 2007 / Programme Message-ID: <380-2200611315222418738@M2W011.mail2web.com> The 7th Swiss Biennial on Science, Technics + Aesthetics, January 20-21, 2007, Swiss Museum of Transport, Lucerne, Switzerland 7. Schweizer Biennale zu Wissenschaft, Technik + ?sthetik, 20./21. Januar 2007, Verkehrshaus der Schweiz, Luzern, Schweiz Partners: Swiss Museum of Transport, Lucerne, D4 Business Center Lucerne, Technopark Lucerne, City and Canton Lucerne, Federal Office of Culture, Migros Culture Percentage, Swiss National Science Foundation, and Private Donors. Partner: Verkehrshaus der Schweiz, Luzern, D4 Business Center Luzern, Technopark Luzern, Stadt und Kanton Luzern, Bundesamt f?r Kultur, Migros Kulturprozent, Schweizerischer Nationalfonds zur F?rderung der wissenschaftlichen Forschung und private Donatoren. Organised by: New Gallery Lucerne / Veranstalter: Neue Galerie Luzern TOPIC 2007: CONSCIOUSNESS AND QUANTUMCOMPUTERS Information / Registration: http://www.neugalu.ch/e_bienn_2007.html TOPIC 2007: BEWUSSTSEIN UND QUANTENCOMPUTER Information / Anmeldung: http://www.neugalu.ch/d_bienn_2007.html PROGRAMME / PROGRAMM Samstag, 20. Januar 2007 Saturday, January 20, 2007 Verkehrshaus der Schweiz / Swiss Museum of Transport 12.00 - 12.15 Begr?ssung / Welcome Address Programm?berblick / Presentation of the Programme 12.15 - 12.45 BRIAN JOSEPHSON Quantenphysik Cambridge IS QUANTUM MECHANICS OR COMPUTATION MORE FUNDAMENTAL? IST DIE QUANTENMECHANIK ODER DAS RECHNEN FUNDAMENTALER? 12.55 - 13.25 RAINER BLATT Quantenphysik Innsbruck QUANTENCOMPUTER ? TRAUM UND REALISIERUNG QUANTUMCOMPUTERS ? DREAM AND REALIZATION 14.00 - 14.45 JEAN-CHRISTOPHE AMMANN Kunstgeschichte Frankfurt am Main KREATIVIT?T UND INNOVATION CREATIVITY AND INNOVATION 15.00 - 15.30 KLAUS HEPP Theoretische Physik / Neurowissenschaften Z?rich QUANTENMECHANIK UND H?HERE GEHIRNFUNKTIONEN: ERFAHRUNGEN AUS DEM QUANTUM COMPUTING UND AUS DER NEUROBIOLOGIE QUANTUM MECHANICS AND HIGHER BRAIN FUNCTIONS: LESSONS FROM QUANTUM COMPUTING AND NEUROBIOLOGY 15.40 - 16.10 HENRY STAPP Physik Berkeley HOW OUR THOUGHTS CAN INFLUENCE OUR ACTIONS WIE UNSERE GEDANKEN UNSERE HANDLUNGEN BEEINFLUSSEN K?NNEN 16.45 - 18.00 DO QUANTUMCOMPUTERS MAKE MINDS? Podiumsgespr?ch und Diskussion 1. Tag / Panel Discussion 1st Day mit / with JEAN-CHRISTOPHE AMMANN, RAINER BLATT, HANS-PETER D?RR, KLAUS HEPP, BRIAN JOSEPHSON, KARL KNOP, DEAN RADIN, INGEBORG REICHLE, HENRY STAPP Leitung / chaired by Peter Weibel Kunst- und Medientheorie Karlsruhe Sonntag, 21. Januar 2007 Sunday, January 21, 2007 Verkehrshaus der Schweiz / Swiss Museum of Transport 12.00 - 12.15 Programm?berblick / Presentation of the Programme 12.15 - 12.45 HANS-PETER D?RR Quantenphysik M?nchen CARTE BLANCHE 12.55 - 13.25 GESHE LOBSANG TENZIN Atlanta CONSCIOUSNESS IN TIBETAN BUDDHISM BEWUSSTSEIN IM TIBETISCHEN BUDDHISMUS 14.00 - 14.45 CHRISTIAN THOMAS KOHL Buddhismus und Philosophie der Wissenschaften Freiburg im Breisgau BUDDHISMUS UND QUANTENPHYSIK BUDDHISM AND QUANTUM PHYSICS 15.00 - 15.30 DEAN RADIN Bewusstseinsforschung Petaluma / USA ENTANGLED MINDS: CONTEXT, EVIDENCE, AND THE FUTURE VERSCHR?NKTE MINDS: KONTEXT, BEWEISE UND ZUKUNFT 15.40 - 16.10 COURTNEY BROWN Mathematik und Hellsehen Atlanta REMOTE VIEWING, NONLOCAL CONSCIOUSNESS, AND THE NATURE OF TIME AND SPACE HELLSEHEN, NICHTLOKALES BEWUSSTSEIN UND DIE NATUR VON ZEIT UND RAUM 16.45 - 18.00 DO BRAINS MAKE MINDS? Podiumsgespr?ch und Diskussion 2. Tag / Panel Discussion 2nd Day mit / with COURTNEY BROWN, HANS-PETER D?RR, CHRISTINA LJUNGBERG, CHRISTIAN THOMAS KOHL, JOSEF MITTERER, DEAN RADIN, GESHE LOBSANG TENZIN, WOLFGANG TSCHACHER Leitung / chaired by Peter Weibel Kunst- und Medientheorie Karlsruhe **************************************************************************** ******** THE 7th SWISS BIENNIAL ON SCIENCE, TECHNICS + AESTHETICS 7. SCHWEIZER BIENNALE ZU WISSENSCHAFT, TECHNIK + ?STHETIK Consciousness and Quantumcomputers Bewusstsein und Quantencomputer January 20-21, 2007, Lucerne / Switzerland 20./21. Januar 2007, Luzern / Schweiz Official Partners / Offizielle Partner Swiss Museum of Transport / Verkehrshaus der Schweiz D4 Business Center / Technopark Lucerne http://www.neugalu.ch Organization / Organisation: NEW GALLERY LUCERNE NEUE GALERIE LUZERN P.O. Box 3901 Postfach 3901 CH - 6002 LUCERNE / SWITZERLAND Tel. / Fax: ++ 41 (0) 41 370 38 18 stettler at centralnet.ch -------------------------------------------------------------------- mail2web - Check your email from the web at http://mail2web.com/ . From asa at nada.kth.se Wed Nov 15 22:38:54 2006 From: asa at nada.kth.se (Anders Sandberg) Date: Wed, 15 Nov 2006 23:38:54 +0100 (MET) Subject: [extropy-chat] ART: trompe l'oeil In-Reply-To: <000501c708e0$9d5442b0$62941f97@nomedxgm1aalex> References: <470a3c520611150844p26ee8768hdf5b555d7f25e19@mail.gmail.com> <000501c708e0$9d5442b0$62941f97@nomedxgm1aalex> Message-ID: <3258.163.1.72.81.1163630334.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> scerir wrote: > http://www.hemmy.net/2006/10/03/elevator-floor-illusion/ :-) I had the chance to visit Palazzo Arese-Borromeo in Milano for a conference, and there were trompe l'oeil everywhere, some of it quite good. I especially like the virtual sculptures. http://www.flickr.com/photos/87547772 at N00/237214284/in/set-72157594200934564/ http://www.flickr.com/photos/87547772 at N00/237214282/in/set-72157594200934564/ http://www.flickr.com/photos/87547772 at N00/237214280/in/set-72157594200934564/ http://www.flickr.com/photos/87547772 at N00/237214278/in/set-72157594200934564/ http://www.flickr.com/photos/87547772 at N00/237214275/in/set-72157594200934564/ http://www.flickr.com/photos/87547772 at N00/237224812/in/set-72157594200934564/ http://www.flickr.com/photos/87547772 at N00/237224811/in/set-72157594200934564/ One thing the elevator picture does is to work both from the side and when standing on top of it (if the pictures are true). I wonder how one should go about painting that, since it is not just a matter of true perspective but making affordances in the picture so that it works from several angles. Any ideas of what goes into good trompe l'oeil? And what kind of trompe l'oeil++ can we do for posthuman eyes using smart materials? -- Anders Sandberg, Oxford Uehiro Centre for Practical Ethics Philosophy Faculty of Oxford University From natasha at natasha.cc Tue Nov 14 18:33:35 2006 From: natasha at natasha.cc (Natasha Vita-More) Date: Tue, 14 Nov 2006 12:33:35 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] Mastectomy Hospital Bill in Congress Message-ID: <6.2.1.2.2.20061114123333.03efcc90@pop-server.austin.rr.com> From a friend: >If you know anyone who has had a mastectomy, you may know that there is a >lot of discomfort and pain afterwards. Insurance companies are trying to >make mastectomies an outpatient procedure. > >There's a bill called the Breast Cancer Patient Protection Act which will >require insurance companies to cover a minimum 48-hour hospital stay for >patients undergoing a mastectomy. It's about eliminating the >"drive-through mastectomy" where women are forced to go home just a few >hours after surgery, against the wishes of their doctor, still groggy from >anesthesia and sometimes with drainage tubes still attached. > >Lifetime Television has put this bill on their web page with a petition >drive to show support. Last year over half the House signed on. Please, >sign the petition by clicking on the web site below. > >http://www.lifetimetv.com/health/breast_mastectomy_pledge.html > >This takes about 10 seconds. Please pass this on to your friends and >family, and on behalf of all women. Thanks. > > >"Well, what if there is no tomorrow? There wasn't one today." >Bill Murray as Phil Connors > > Natasha Vita-More Cultural Strategist - Design Media Artist - Futurist PhD Candidate, Planetary Collegium Proactionary Principle Core Group, Extropy Institute Member, Association of Professional Futurists Founder, Transhumanist Arts & Culture If you draw a circle in the sand and study only what's inside the circle, then that is a closed-system perspective. If you study what is inside the circle and everything outside the circle, then that is an open system perspective. - Buckminster Fuller -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From thespike at satx.rr.com Thu Nov 16 05:01:35 2006 From: thespike at satx.rr.com (Damien Broderick) Date: Wed, 15 Nov 2006 23:01:35 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] non-radiative wireless energy Message-ID: <7.0.1.0.2.20061115225953.0217e008@satx.rr.com> Maybe this is old news; certainly it's been a staple of sf since Heinlein's WALDO in the early '40s, if not before: http://www.cosmosmagazine.com/node/849 Instead of irradiating the environment with electromagnetic waves, a power transmitter would fill the space around it with a 'non-radiative' electromagnetic field. Energy would only be picked up by gadgets specially designed to 'resonate' with the field, and most of the energy not picked up by a receiver would be reabsorbed by the emitter. While rooted in well-known laws of physics, non-radiative energy transfer is a novel application that no one seems to have pursued before. And figuring out the details was not easy, Soljacic said - something he and his colleagues did through theoretical calculations and computer simulations. "It certainly was not clear or obvious to us in the beginning how well it could actually work, given the constraints of available materials, extraneous environmental objects, and so on. It was even less clear to us which designs would work best," said Soljacic. With the proposed designs, non-radiative wireless power would have limited range, but Soljacic and colleagues calculate that an object the size of a laptop could be recharged within a few metres of the power source. Placing one source in each room would be sufficient for coverage throughout your home. Wireless energy could also be adapted to industrial applications, for example powering freely-roaming robots within a factory. From asa at nada.kth.se Thu Nov 16 11:59:29 2006 From: asa at nada.kth.se (Anders Sandberg) Date: Thu, 16 Nov 2006 12:59:29 +0100 (MET) Subject: [extropy-chat] non-radiative wireless energy In-Reply-To: <7.0.1.0.2.20061115225953.0217e008@satx.rr.com> References: <7.0.1.0.2.20061115225953.0217e008@satx.rr.com> Message-ID: <1737.86.130.27.173.1163678369.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> I usually tend to bunch this kind of stuff together with people believing Tesla solved all our problems at the turn of the century, but this time it seems to be some good physics behind it. I found this paper by Soljacic: http://eprintweb.org/S/article/physics/0611063 Interesting approach of using evanscent tails, and it looks like it might work nicely even when there are other dielectric objects around. What I find lacking is an analysis of what happens when conducting objects get close. -- Anders Sandberg, Oxford Uehiro Centre for Practical Ethics Philosophy Faculty of Oxford University From rafal.smigrodzki at gmail.com Thu Nov 16 16:15:52 2006 From: rafal.smigrodzki at gmail.com (Rafal Smigrodzki) Date: Thu, 16 Nov 2006 11:15:52 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Mastectomy Hospital Bill in Congress In-Reply-To: <6.2.1.2.2.20061114123333.03efcc90@pop-server.austin.rr.com> References: <6.2.1.2.2.20061114123333.03efcc90@pop-server.austin.rr.com> Message-ID: <7641ddc60611160815o672ebadbtdbd5332eefe1db51@mail.gmail.com> It would appear that the Congresscritters are again trying to win votes by shamelessly exploiting an emotionally charged issue, trying to position themselves as defenders of poor women, while in fact acting to make their situation worse. Where without the bill women had the option of choosing a cheaper plan with no hospital stay coverage (but better than having no plan), now they will have to pay for a more expensive one, even if early discharge to home was something they would opt for. As a result, poor women will be less likely to be insured while the rich ones will enjoy redistribution of resources from other insured persons, even if they could afford paying for an extended stay out of pocket. This is a very inefficient, and frankly disgusting situation, which is why I and my family have opted out of conventional health insurance in favor of a health savings account, where we ourselves decide whether to spend our money or keep it. Rafal On 11/14/06, Natasha Vita-More wrote: > > From a friend: > > > If you know anyone who has had a mastectomy, you may know that there is a > lot of discomfort and pain afterwards. Insurance companies are trying to > make mastectomies an outpatient procedure. > > There's a bill called the Breast Cancer Patient Protection Act which will > require insurance companies to cover a minimum 48-hour hospital stay for > patients undergoing a mastectomy. It's about eliminating the "drive-through > mastectomy" where women are forced to go home just a few hours after > surgery, against the wishes of their doctor, still groggy from anesthesia > and sometimes with drainage tubes still attached. > > Lifetime Television has put this bill on their web page with a petition > drive to show support. Last year over half the House signed on. Please, > sign the petition by clicking on the web site below. > > http://www.lifetimetv.com/health/breast_mastectomy_pledge.html > > This takes about 10 seconds. Please pass this on to your friends and > family, and on behalf of all women. Thanks. > > > > "Well, what if there is no tomorrow? There wasn't one today." > Bill Murray as Phil Connors > > > > Natasha Vita-More Cultural Strategist - Design Media Artist - Futurist PhD > Candidate, Planetary Collegium Proactionary Principle Core Group, Extropy > Institute Member, Association of Professional Futurists Founder, > Transhumanist Arts & Culture > > If you draw a circle in the sand and study only what's inside the circle, > then that is a closed-system perspective. If you study what is inside the > circle and everything outside the circle, then that is an open system > perspective. - Buckminster Fuller > > > > > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > > > -- Rafal Smigrodzki, MD-PhD Chief Clinical Officer, Gencia Corporation 706 B Forest St. Charlottesville, VA 22903 tel: (434) 295-4800 fax: (434) 295-4951 This electronic message transmission contains information from the biotechnology firm of Gencia Corporation which may be confidential or privileged. The information is intended to be for the use of the individual or entity named above. If you are not the intended recipient, be aware that any disclosure, copying, distribution or use of the contents of this information is prohibited. If you have received this electronic transmission in error, please notify us by telephone (434-295-4800) or by electronic mail (fportell at genciabiotech.com) immediately. From scerir at libero.it Thu Nov 16 16:40:48 2006 From: scerir at libero.it (scerir) Date: Thu, 16 Nov 2006 17:40:48 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] ART: trompe l'oeil References: <470a3c520611150844p26ee8768hdf5b555d7f25e19@mail.gmail.com><000501c708e0$9d5442b0$62941f97@nomedxgm1aalex> <3258.163.1.72.81.1163630334.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> Message-ID: <001901c7099d$f9acb7f0$37b81f97@nomedxgm1aalex> Anders writes: > Any ideas of what goes into good trompe l'oeil? No, unfortunately. Paintings like this by Andrea Pozzo [1] in Sant'Ignazio (Rome) http://flickr.com/photo_zoom.gne?id=62278449&size=l or the Borromini's architectural trompe l'oeil (the gallery is very short, in reality) at Palazzo Spada (Rome) http://www.flickr.com/photo_zoom.gne?id=125649087&size=l seem to suggest the artists were playing with dimensions, perspectives, and sometimes also (in case of anamorphosis [2]) http://www.math.nus.edu.sg/aslaksen/teaching/holbein.html http://www.mathsyear2000.org/explorer/anamorphic/ with hidden informations. Of course, also modern natural sciences are playing with extra dimensions (since SR, its operationism, its spacetime) and different perspectives (the role of the observer in QM; noncommutativity of density matrices that convey the knowledge different people might have about the same physical system) and informations which remain hidden in the usual realistic spacetime perspective but become evident in a more abstract representation, based more on relations between systems than on systems themselves [3][4][5][6]. But this is a completely different topic, interesting though. > And what kind of trompe l'oeil++ can we do > for posthuman eyes using smart materials? A very good question! s. [1] "Since Perspective is but a Counterfeiting of the Truth, the Painter is not obliged to make it appear real when seen from Any part, but from One determinate Point only." (Andrea Pozzo quoted in M. H. Pirenne, 'Optics, Painting and Photography', page 90). [2] 'Anamorphic images', J.L. Hunt, B.G. Nickel, C. Gigault American Journ. of Physics, March 2000, V.68, 3, p.232-237 American Journ. of Physics, Jan. 2006, V.74, 1, p.83-84 [3] "Quite independently of Einstein, it appears to me that, in providing a systematic foundation for quantum mechanics, one should start more from the composition and separation of systems than has until now (with Dirac, e.g.) been the case. - This is indeed - as Einstein has correctly felt - a very fundamental point in quantum mechanics, which has, moreover, a direct connection with your reflections about the cut and the possibility of its being shifted to an arbitrary place." (W. Pauli, Scientific Correspondence with Bohr, Einstein, Heisenberg, etc., vol. 2, 1985, pages 402-404, Springer Verlag) [4] http://www.arxiv.org/abs/quant-ph/0503007 [5] http://www.arxiv.org/abs/quant-ph/0212078 [6] http://www.arxiv.org/abs/quant-ph/0508042 From kerry_prez at yahoo.com Thu Nov 16 18:42:43 2006 From: kerry_prez at yahoo.com (Al Brooks) Date: Thu, 16 Nov 2006 10:42:43 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Mastectomy Hospital Bill in Congress In-Reply-To: <7641ddc60611160815o672ebadbtdbd5332eefe1db51@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <20061116184246.60028.qmail@web51605.mail.yahoo.com> but poor women can't afford paying deductibles when using HDHPs? > [...]a health savings account, where we > ourselves decide whether > to spend our money or keep it. > > Rafal ____________________________________________________________________________________ Sponsored Link Compare mortgage rates for today. Get up to 5 free quotes. Www2.nextag.com From kerry_prez at yahoo.com Thu Nov 16 23:20:19 2006 From: kerry_prez at yahoo.com (Al Brooks) Date: Thu, 16 Nov 2006 15:20:19 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Creationists attack secular education in Russia Message-ID: <531172.93808.qm@web51613.mail.yahoo.com> This is an essay that even creationists can relate to: http://www.nationalreview.com/22dec97/mcginnis122297.html --------------------------------- Check out the all-new Yahoo! Mail beta - Fire up a more powerful email and get things done faster. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From rafal.smigrodzki at gmail.com Fri Nov 17 00:58:00 2006 From: rafal.smigrodzki at gmail.com (Rafal Smigrodzki) Date: Thu, 16 Nov 2006 19:58:00 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Mastectomy Hospital Bill in Congress In-Reply-To: <20061116184246.60028.qmail@web51605.mail.yahoo.com> References: <7641ddc60611160815o672ebadbtdbd5332eefe1db51@mail.gmail.com> <20061116184246.60028.qmail@web51605.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <7641ddc60611161658r1840d7fdqd4b07a8ae44800e0@mail.gmail.com> On 11/16/06, Al Brooks wrote: > but poor women can't afford paying deductibles when > using HDHPs? > ### If you start a high-deductible health plan (aka catastrophic health insurance) as the average young person, you have almost no expenses (since the average young person is quite healthy) and even with a low income you can accumulate substantial funds in your HSA. This is certainly possible if you have enough money for a classical plan but choose the HSA instead - the money you save on premiums is a lot and within five years you should have a comfortable sum ready to spend. As an example, you can reduce monthly premium from 700$ for a family to about 150$ per month, and keep saving the difference. After five years you will have enough to cover all your deductibles for years. Rafal From thespike at satx.rr.com Fri Nov 17 04:35:19 2006 From: thespike at satx.rr.com (Damien Broderick) Date: Thu, 16 Nov 2006 22:35:19 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] Human enhancement: what would you improve? Message-ID: <7.0.1.0.2.20061116223432.02409b78@satx.rr.com> hmmm http://www.cosmosmagazine.com/node/851 From lcorbin at rawbw.com Fri Nov 17 06:50:31 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Thu, 16 Nov 2006 22:50:31 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Human enhancement: what would you improve? References: <7.0.1.0.2.20061116223432.02409b78@satx.rr.com> Message-ID: <005b01c70a14$f38e2030$6601a8c0@homeef7b612677> Damien writes > hmmm > http://www.cosmosmagazine.com/node/851 Hmmm? Anybody here *not* wanna be a cyborg? Lee From eugen at leitl.org Fri Nov 17 07:41:21 2006 From: eugen at leitl.org (Eugen Leitl) Date: Fri, 17 Nov 2006 08:41:21 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] Human enhancement: what would you improve? In-Reply-To: <005b01c70a14$f38e2030$6601a8c0@homeef7b612677> References: <7.0.1.0.2.20061116223432.02409b78@satx.rr.com> <005b01c70a14$f38e2030$6601a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: <20061117074121.GY6974@leitl.org> On Thu, Nov 16, 2006 at 10:50:31PM -0800, Lee Corbin wrote: > Damien writes > > > hmmm > > http://www.cosmosmagazine.com/node/851 > > Hmmm? Anybody here *not* wanna be a cyborg? Me. I want to be a distributed system. Cyborg is only monkey makeup. -- Eugen* Leitl leitl http://leitl.org ______________________________________________________________ ICBM: 48.07100, 11.36820 http://www.ativel.com 8B29F6BE: 099D 78BA 2FD3 B014 B08A 7779 75B0 2443 8B29 F6BE -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: signature.asc Type: application/pgp-signature Size: 191 bytes Desc: Digital signature URL: From pharos at gmail.com Fri Nov 17 09:30:25 2006 From: pharos at gmail.com (BillK) Date: Fri, 17 Nov 2006 09:30:25 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Human enhancement: what would you improve? In-Reply-To: <7.0.1.0.2.20061116223432.02409b78@satx.rr.com> References: <7.0.1.0.2.20061116223432.02409b78@satx.rr.com> Message-ID: On 11/17/06, Damien Broderick wrote: > hmmm > > http://www.cosmosmagazine.com/node/851 > There is already a system which lists everything that the mass of the population want to improve and are prepared to spend money on. It's called Spam. BillK From asa at nada.kth.se Fri Nov 17 10:52:38 2006 From: asa at nada.kth.se (Anders Sandberg) Date: Fri, 17 Nov 2006 11:52:38 +0100 (MET) Subject: [extropy-chat] Human enhancement: what would you improve? In-Reply-To: <7.0.1.0.2.20061116223432.02409b78@satx.rr.com> References: <7.0.1.0.2.20061116223432.02409b78@satx.rr.com> Message-ID: <1565.163.1.72.81.1163760758.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> Damien Broderick wrote: > hmmm > > http://www.cosmosmagazine.com/node/851 "Last one to become a monolith is a lump of protoplasm!" I'm with Eugene on this, although I'd like to keep a nicely conditioned monkey body for festive occasions. I have actually been thinking of doing a semiserious survey of this question for my project (but likely limited to cognitive enhancement). Online surveys are horribly biased but easy to do and at least give you data "from out there" to talk about (unlike a lot of bioethics). So if I were to go ahead with that, what kind of questions would you think were useful or would produce interesting data? One fun game we played at the Beijing bioethics congress was choosing between enhancements and traits: would you want enhanced charisma more than enhanced attention? Would you trade 5 years of life for 50 IQ points? And so on. I'm a bit uncertain whether this kind of comparisions could actually give us a good ranking (since I have no doubt there might be a few cycles), but it might tell us a bit about local priorities. -- Anders Sandberg, Oxford Uehiro Centre for Practical Ethics Philosophy Faculty of Oxford University From jay.dugger at gmail.com Fri Nov 17 13:13:02 2006 From: jay.dugger at gmail.com (Jay Dugger) Date: Fri, 17 Nov 2006 07:13:02 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] LINKS: Milton Friedman Died Yesterday. Message-ID: <5366105b0611170513u3a52c632o53df0f2be3a2e0bd@mail.gmail.com> Friday, 17 November 2006 Hello all, For those of you who've not yet heard the news, Milton Friedman died yesterday at age 94. The Cato Institute, the Financial Times, Forbes, the Hoover Institution, the Wall Street Journal also have commentaries and obituaries. Most links would probably break soon and belong on a social bookmarking service anyway. You can check Google's news with this link. http://news.google.com/news?q=milton+friedman+dies&oi=news -- Jay Dugger http://jaydugger.suprglu.com Sometimes the delete key serves best. From kerry_prez at yahoo.com Fri Nov 17 14:45:44 2006 From: kerry_prez at yahoo.com (Al Brooks) Date: Fri, 17 Nov 2006 06:45:44 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Friedman site: school choice In-Reply-To: <20061117144056.30417.qmail@web37507.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <946517.1391.qm@web51610.mail.yahoo.com> http://www.friedmanfoundation.org/schoolchoice/index.html --------------------------------- Sponsored Link Mortgage rates near 39yr lows. $420,000 Mortgage for $1,399/mo - Calculate new house payment -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From hkhenson at rogers.com Fri Nov 17 14:50:08 2006 From: hkhenson at rogers.com (Keith Henson) Date: Fri, 17 Nov 2006 09:50:08 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] 'a process of non-thinking called faith' 2 (2) Message-ID: <5.1.0.14.0.20061117094643.03842438@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> At 01:21 AM 11/16/2006 -0500, Anna wrote: >At 11:31 PM 2/22/2006 -0500, Anna wrote: >snip > >Well then: > >Eliezer I believe you can give me a scientific > >explanation of faith? > > >>If Eliezer does not respond in a few days, ask me. > > >>Keith > >I gave him a year. >Can you give me a scientific explanation of faith? > >Just curious. >Anna:) Faith is a manifestation of the psychological mechanism that (in appropriate conditions) leads to wars. Wars were the evolved hunter gatherer mechanism for keeping the human population in bounds that could be supported by the ecosystem. The reason a mechanism evolved at all was that humans became the top predator at least by the time we had fire and probably by the time our remote ancestors had sharp rocks. Since nothing else controlled humans numbers, and humans reproduced at more than replacement we had to become our own predator. (That is prior to effective birth control.) Under non stressed circumstances the ability to think rationally is an asset. But at times, when facing starvation and the need to make war on neighbors, the interest of the individual and his genes diverge (because of copies in relatives). Under such circumstances gene constructed mental mechanisms switch off rational thinking and lead to attacks (like the Rwanda genocide). Just as BDSM sex is a side effect of capture-bonding (look it up) non-thinking faith is a side effect of rational thought suppressing mechanisms selected because of population growth and wars that functioned to limit the population in the stone age. This is, of course, an evolutionary psychology approach to the question of faith. Keith Henson From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Fri Nov 17 17:39:32 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Fri, 17 Nov 2006 12:39:32 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] 'a process of non-thinking called faith' 2 (2) In-Reply-To: <5.1.0.14.0.20061117094643.03842438@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> References: <5.1.0.14.0.20061117094643.03842438@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> Message-ID: On 11/17/06, Keith Henson wrote: > > > Faith is a manifestation of the psychological mechanism that (in > appropriate conditions) leads to wars. Wars were the evolved hunter > gatherer mechanism for keeping the human population in bounds that could > be supported by the ecosystem. > Keith, I think the evidence for prehistoric "population control" were slim to none. As the dominant and migratory population in ancient times if humans exhausted the local resources they just got up and migrated (which is why we are all over the planet). Wars are more fundamentally about spreading ones genes. You can cite everything from the current situation in the Sudan where the Arabs are specifically raping the non-Arab women to (a) impregnate them with their genes and (b) make them undesirable to non-Arab men. Men do not like to dedicate resources to children which are clearly not theirs or at least not closely related to them (children of brothers or sisters). Another example is the recent evidence that American Indians may have engaged in hunting parties for the purpose of capturing women. Indeed in war one general outcome for the losers is that the men are killed but the women are broubht back to make *more* babies. This is entirely a consequence of the fact that men have greater abilities to go out and get resources and making babies is cheap while for women making babies is both resource intensive and tends to diminish their ability to care for children they already do have. Wars are due to the desire to get resources to have more sex and produce more children thus spreading ones genes. If one has ever watched two males (elephants, lions, etc.) fighting for dominance one realizes its all about who gets the harem. Robert -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From kevin at kevinfreels.com Fri Nov 17 19:22:42 2006 From: kevin at kevinfreels.com (kevinfreels.com) Date: Fri, 17 Nov 2006 13:22:42 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] 'a process of non-thinking called faith' 2 (2) References: <5.1.0.14.0.20061117094643.03842438@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> Message-ID: <021801c70a7d$c14542c0$660fa8c0@kevin> I have to agree with Robert. I studied this a great deal and found no evidence to support such a population control idea. It's all about the women. At the time resources were plentiful and human over-population has never been a problem. Even now, there are more resources than there are people. Get a window seat on your next cross-country flight to see what I mean. You would think that material wealth would play a role such as buildings and tools, but village burning (or bombing) is far too common for that to be a factor. When you remove all the things that don;t work out, all you have left if the competition for mates. You can see similar behaviour in wild dogs and cats. ----- Original Message ----- From: Robert Bradbury To: ExI chat list Sent: Friday, November 17, 2006 11:39 AM Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] 'a process of non-thinking called faith' 2 (2) On 11/17/06, Keith Henson wrote: Faith is a manifestation of the psychological mechanism that (in appropriate conditions) leads to wars. Wars were the evolved hunter gatherer mechanism for keeping the human population in bounds that could be supported by the ecosystem. Keith, I think the evidence for prehistoric "population control" were slim to none. As the dominant and migratory population in ancient times if humans exhausted the local resources they just got up and migrated (which is why we are all over the planet). Wars are more fundamentally about spreading ones genes. You can cite everything from the current situation in the Sudan where the Arabs are specifically raping the non-Arab women to (a) impregnate them with their genes and (b) make them undesirable to non-Arab men. Men do not like to dedicate resources to children which are clearly not theirs or at least not closely related to them (children of brothers or sisters). Another example is the recent evidence that American Indians may have engaged in hunting parties for the purpose of capturing women. Indeed in war one general outcome for the losers is that the men are killed but the women are broubht back to make *more* babies. This is entirely a consequence of the fact that men have greater abilities to go out and get resources and making babies is cheap while for women making babies is both resource intensive and tends to diminish their ability to care for children they already do have. Wars are due to the desire to get resources to have more sex and produce more children thus spreading ones genes. If one has ever watched two males (elephants, lions, etc.) fighting for dominance one realizes its all about who gets the harem. Robert ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ _______________________________________________ extropy-chat mailing list extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From kevin at kevinfreels.com Fri Nov 17 19:28:15 2006 From: kevin at kevinfreels.com (kevinfreels.com) Date: Fri, 17 Nov 2006 13:28:15 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] Human enhancement: what would you improve? References: <7.0.1.0.2.20061116223432.02409b78@satx.rr.com> Message-ID: <023e01c70a7e$87f64810$660fa8c0@kevin> Interesting how most people either want all or nothing....... ----- Original Message ----- From: "Damien Broderick" To: "'ExI chat list'" Sent: Thursday, November 16, 2006 10:35 PM Subject: [extropy-chat] Human enhancement: what would you improve? > hmmm > > http://www.cosmosmagazine.com/node/851 > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Fri Nov 17 21:16:42 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Fri, 17 Nov 2006 16:16:42 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Human enhancement: what would you improve? In-Reply-To: <023e01c70a7e$87f64810$660fa8c0@kevin> References: <7.0.1.0.2.20061116223432.02409b78@satx.rr.com> <023e01c70a7e$87f64810$660fa8c0@kevin> Message-ID: On 11/17/06, kevinfreels.com wrote: > > Interesting how most people either want all or nothing....... Actually, no, if you cruise on over to Born Rich [1], you will find quite an assortment of items which individuals range from "cool" to "yech" depending on ones tastes. If everyone has it all it gives you nothing to discuss at the party. In life there is only "more, different and better". The more sophisticated tend to prefer different and better while the less sophisticated simply want more. How one morphs the commodity between one the realms depends upon the sophistication of the marketing people, the sales people and the purchaser trying to justify why something is "cool", "boring" or "yech". Nothing is simply "more" "different" with a dash of "better". Robert 1. http://www.bornrich.org/ -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From hkhenson at rogers.com Fri Nov 17 20:32:55 2006 From: hkhenson at rogers.com (Keith Henson) Date: Fri, 17 Nov 2006 15:32:55 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Origin of wars (was origin of faith) In-Reply-To: References: <5.1.0.14.0.20061117094643.03842438@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> <5.1.0.14.0.20061117094643.03842438@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> Message-ID: <5.1.0.14.0.20061117140536.0395ae30@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> At 12:39 PM 11/17/2006 -0500, Robert wrote: >On 11/17/06, Keith Henson ><hkhenson at rogers.com> wrote: >> >>Faith is a manifestation of the psychological mechanism that (in >>appropriate conditions) leads to wars. Wars were the evolved hunter >>gatherer mechanism for keeping the human population in bounds that could >>be supported by the ecosystem. > >Keith, I think the evidence for prehistoric "population control" were slim >to none. As the dominant and migratory population in ancient times if >humans exhausted the local resources they just got up and migrated (which >is why we are all over the planet). That's not exactly about the connection between war mechanisms (for whatever reasons wars happen) and faith so I changed the subject line. With regard to migration, I think you are seriously out of date on your anthropology. See below. > Wars are more fundamentally about spreading ones genes. You can cite > everything from the current situation in the Sudan where the Arabs are > specifically raping the non-Arab women to (a) impregnate them with their > genes and (b) make them undesirable to non-Arab men. Men do not like to > dedicate resources to children which are clearly not theirs or at least > not closely related to them (children of brothers or sisters). Correct. >Another example is the recent evidence that American Indians may have >engaged in hunting parties for the purpose of capturing women. Indeed in >war one general outcome for the losers is that the men are killed but the >women are broubht back to make *more* babies. This is entirely a >consequence of the fact that men have greater abilities to go out and get >resources and making babies is cheap while for women making babies is both >resource intensive and tends to diminish their ability to care for >children they already do have. That's not entirely correct. In *hunter* gatherer bands the men supplied critical protein. How hard that was depended largely on territory and how many others were hunting it. >Wars are due to the desire to get resources to have more sex and produce >more children thus spreading ones genes. I don't think that is exactly the case. Wars among hunter gatherers are mostly when the situation is such that wars are the least awful avenue available. I have read a lot in this area and the most sensible writer I know is Azar Gat. His paper might not even be in Google cashe by now, but email me if you want a copy. Published in Anthropological Quarterly, 73.1 (2000), 20-34. THE HUMAN MOTIVATIONAL COMPLEX : EVOLUTIONARY THEORY AND THE CAUSES OF HUNTER-GATHERER FIGHTING Azar Gat Part I: Primary Somatic and Reproductive Causes At the centre of this study is the age-old philosophical and psychological inquiry into the nature of the basic human system of motivation. Numerous lists of basic needs and desires have been put together over the centuries, more or less casually or convincingly. The most recent ones show little if any marked progress over the older, back to Thomas Hobbes's Leviathan, 6 (e.g. Maslow 1970 [1954]; Burton 1990 In the absence of an evolutionary perspective, these lists have always had something arbitrary and trivial about them. They lacked a unifying regulatory rationale that would suggest why the various needs and desires came to be, or how they related to one another. Arguing that the human motivational system as a whole should be approached from the evolutionary perspective, this study focuses on the causes of fighting. It examines what can be meaningfully referred to as the 'human state of nature', the 99.5 percent of the genus Homo's evolutionary history in which humans lived as hunter-gatherers. In this 'state of nature' people's behaviour patterns are generally to be considered as evolutionarily adaptive. They form the evolutionary inheritance that we have carried with us throughout later history, when this inheritance has constantly interacted and been interwoven with the human staggering cultural development. snip For instance, one critic (McCauley 1990: 3) queried why, if fighting was beneficial for inclusive fitness, was it not continuous and ubiquitous. He failed to realize that fighting, like any other behaviour, could be only one possible tactic for inclusive fitness, depending for its success, and activation, on the presence of specific conditions. Another cluster of often-voiced criticisms was that it was not true that people were motivated by the desire to maximize the number of their offspring; that the Page 3 3 widespread occurrence of infanticide among primitive people was one example that belied this idea; and that women were sought for economic as well as sexual purposes, as a labour force (McCauley 1990; Ferguson 1995: 358-9). The flaws in these criticisms can be pointed out only briefly here. It is not that people consciously 'want' to maximize the number of their children; although there is also some human desire for children per se and a great attachment to them once they exist, it is mainly the desire for sex - Thomas Malthus's 'passion' - which functions in nature as the powerful biological proximate mechanism for maximizing reproduction; as humans, and other living creatures, normally engage in sex throughout their fertile lives, they have a vast reproductive potential, which, before effective contraception, mainly depended for its realization on environmental conditions. Infanticide typically takes place when a new-born in conditions of resource scarcity threatens the survival chances of his elder siblings, as, for example, of an elder nursing infant; for inclusive fitness is not about maximizing offspring number but about maximizing the number of surviving offspring. The fact that women may sometime also be valued for economic, as well as reasons is strictly in line with evolutionary theory; people must feed, find shelter, and protect themselves (somatic activities) in order to reproduce successfully. snip In fact, the 'human state of nature' was not that different from the general state of nature. Both somatic and reproductive struggles were an integral part of it. Cultural diversity in human societies is stressed by social scientists and historians for excellent reasons, but all too often to the point of losing sight of our easily observed large core of species specificity. 4 It has long been assumed by many in these disciplines that people may be moved to action ? including fighting ? for practically any reason. However, as this study will claim, hunter-gatherers, and other primitive societies, manifested a remarkably similar set of reasons for fighting, regularly observed by anthropologists everywhere they went. As Sumner put it (1965 [1911]: 212; 1906: para 22; Davie, 1929: 65; also Goldschmidt 1988): the great motives that move people to social activity - including fighting - are hunger, love, vanity, and fear of superior powers. It is the intricate interactions and manifold refraction of these reasons in humans, exponentially multiplied by cultural development, that are responsible for the staggering wealth and complexity of our species' behaviour patterns, including that of fighting. Although I shall now go through the reasons for warfare among hunter-gatherers (as observed by anthropologists) seemingly one by one, it is not the intention here to provide yet another 'list' of separate elements. Instead, I shall seek to show how the various 'reasons' come together in an integrated motivational complex. This complex has been shaped by the logic of evolution and natural selection for billions of years, including the millions-year history of our genus Homo, and the tens of thousands of years of our species, Homo sapiens sapiens. Subsistence resources: hunting territories, water, shelter, raw materials Resource competition is a prime cause of aggression, violence, and deadly violence in nature. The reason for this is that food, water, and, to a lesser degree, shelter against the elements are tremendous selection forces. As Darwin ([1871] 428-30), following Malthus, explained, living organisms, including humans, tended to propagate rapidly. Their numbers are constrained and checked only by the limited resources of their particular ecological habitats and by all sort of competitors, such as cospecifics, animals of other species which have similar consumption patterns, predators, parasites, and pathogens. Some anthropologists have disputed that this rationale applied to humans, pointing out that hunter-gatherers, both recent and during the Pleistocene, exhibited on average little if any demographic growth over long periods of time and constantly regulated their numbers through infanticide. However, as we have already seen, infanticide is generally used to maximize the number of surviving offspring precisely when people push against the resource walls of their particular environment. When these environments suddenly expand, an unusual event in nature, demographic growth is dramatic. One of the best known examples of this is the rapid proliferation of Old World wildlife into new territories in the wake of the European age of discovery. Humans propagated equally dramatically in similar circumstances. More than a million years ago, Homo erectus broke out of his original habitat in Africa and filled up large parts of the Old World. From about one hundred thousand years ago Homo sapiens sapiens repeated that process on an even wider scale. As recently as the last tens of thousands of years, the small groups that crossed from Asia into North America propagated into hundreds of thousands and millions of people, even prior to the introduction of agriculture, filling up the Americas. Similarly, the small Page 5 5 ?founder groups? that arrived in the Pacific islands during the last two millennia, in most cases probably no more than a few tens of people on each island, rapidly filled up their new habitats, increasing in numbers to thousands and tens of thousands. These dramatic cases only demonstrate that as a rule, and contrary to the Rousseauite belief, our Palaeolithic ancestors had no empty spaces to move to. Normally, species quickly fill up their particular habitat and soon push against its boundaries. As some scholars have pointed out, even low population densities and relative mobility over low-yield terrain do not necessarily mean lack of competition and territoriality. Low-yield environment simply requires larger territories for subsistence. Many animal species that also require very large territories for subsistence and are therefore widely spaced out - such as, for example, lion prides - hotly defend their territories against intruders who try to improve their lot. The same applies to humans. Hunter-gatherers? mobility and nomadism were practised within a circumscribed territory. Contrary to a lingering popular impression from the 1960s, evidence of territoriality exists for most hunter-gatherer societies examined. Indeed, some territories are better, have richer wildlife, than other, and are, therefore, much coveted (Bigelow 1975: 247-8; Eibl-Eibesfeldt 1979: 129; E. Wilson 1978: 107-9; Anders 1994: 230-2). Anthropological thinking on hunter-gatherers was dominated for some time by the study of the Kalahari Bushmen in the 1950s and ?60s (Wilmsen and Denbow1990). But during the Pleistocene, hunter-gatherers inhabited not only isolated arid areas but also, indeed mainly, the world's most fertile environmental niches, which had much denser populations. This resulted in much greater contact and much more competition with other groups. Ausis our largest, continent-size, ?pure? laboratory of simple hunter-gatherers, which before Western arrival was totally unaffected by contact with farmers or herders. The focus on the Kalahari Bushmen has resulted in a relative neglect of this methodologically and empirically far superior ?laboratory? in recent anthropological literature. In Australia, even in the desert areas of the central regions, where population densities were often as low as one person per 20 square miles, or less, let alone in the resource-rich and more densely populated areas, group territories existed and their boundaries were well defined and kept on penalty of death. These boundaries cris-crossed the continent and by and large were apparently very old. There was no 'vast common land'. Rather than free-rangers, the Aborigines (like the Greenland Eskimo, another good, isolated 'laboratory' of simple hunter-gatherers) were in fact 'restricted nomads', or 'centrally based wanderers', confined for life to their ancestral home territories. 5 The human - like animal - tendency for maximizing reproduction was constantly checked by resource scarcity and competition, largely by cospecifics. This competition was partly about nourishment, the basic and most critical somatic activity of all living creatures, which often causes dramatic fluctuations in their numbers. Resource competition, and conflict, is not, however, a given quantity but a highly modulated variable. They change over time and place in relation to the varying nature of the resources available and of human population patterns in diverse ecological habitats (Durham 1976; Dyson-Hudson and Smith 1978; Dawson 1996: 25). The basic question, then, is what the factors that act as the main brakes on human populations in any particular habitat are; what Page 6 6 the main scarcities, stresses, and hence objects of human competition, are. Again, the answer to this question is not fixed but varies considerably in relation to the conditions. In extreme cases like the mid-Canadian arctic, where resources are highly diffused and human population density is very low, resource competition and resource conflict may barely exist. In arid and semi-arid environments, like those of Central Australia, where human population density was also very low, water holes were often the main cause of resource competition and conflict. They were obviously critical in times of drought, when whole groups of Aborigines are recorded to have perished. For this reason, however, there was a tendency to control them even when stress was less pressing. For example, as Meggitt recorded (1962: 42), between the Walbiri and Waringari hunter-gatherers of the mid-Australian Desert, whose population density was as low as one person per 35 square mile, relatively large-scale fighting, to the order of ?pitched battles? with a ?score or more dead?, took place, among other reasons, in order to 'occupy' and monopolize wells. In well-watered environments, food often became the chief cause of resource competition and conflict, especially at times of stress, but also in expectation of and preparation for stress. 6 As Lourandos, for example, has written with respect to the Australian Aborigines (1997: 33): ?In southwestern Victoria, competition between groups involved a wide range of natural resources, including territory . competition between groups is expressed in the elaborate material culture of weaponry (shields, clubs and the like) used for display and combat.? Resources meant mainly food. The nature of the food in question obviously varied with the environment. Still, it seems safe to conclude that it was predominantly meat of all sorts that was hotly contested among hunter-gatherers. This fact, which is simply a consequence of nutritional value, is discernible throughout nature. Herbivores rarely fight over food, for the nutritious value of grass is too low for effective monopolization. To put it in terms of the model (Dyson-Hudson and Smith 1978) that relates defended territoriality and violent competition to resource density: grass' nutrition is simply too 'defused' to make the effort to monopolize it cost-effective. Fruit, roots, seeds, and some plants are considerably more nutritious than grass and are often the object of competition and fighting, both among animals and humans. Meat, however, represents the most concentrated nutritional value in nature and is the object of the most intense competition. Animals may defend territories to monopolize mates or food, or both. The higher the nutritional value of their food, the more the food element of territorial behaviour would be present in addition to the reproductive element. At the top of the food chain, meat eaters would not only defend their hunting territories against cospecifics; whenever they had the opportunity, they would act against predators from other species to weed out competitors. Lions, for example, would kill leopard and hyena cubs whenever they can find them. Game resources are the principal factor determining predators' spacing out in nature. Indeed, before and during the 'protein controversy', game resources have been consistently shown in a series of studies to play a similar role across a whole range of primitive human societies examined. Chagnon was right that there were other, and perhaps even more important, (reproductive) reasons for Yanomamo warfare, but he was wrong in claiming that game competition was not a reason at all. As his protagonists reminded him, he himself had noted that 'game animals are not abundant, and an area is rapidly hunted out'. His protagonists accepted that the Yanomamo suffered from no 'protein deficiency'. But they pointed out that the minimum levels of consumption achieved were only secured Page 7 7 by a static population level, kept static inter alia by the high mortality rates in fighting recorded among the Yanomamo, as well as among other primitive peoples. A rise in human population level would easily be translated into game depletion. 7 snip In conclusion, let us understand more closely the evolutionary calculus that can make the highly dangerous activity of fighting over resources worthwhile. In our societies of plenty, it might be difficult to comprehend how precarious people's subsistence in pre- modern societies was (and still is). The spectre of hunger and starvation always loomed over their heads. Effecting both mortality and reproduction (the latter through human sexual appetite and women's fertility), it constantly, in varying degrees, trimmed down their numbers, acting in combination with disease. Thus, struggle over resources was very often evolutionarily cost-effective. The benefits of fighting must also be matched against possible alternatives (other than starvation). One of them was to break contact and move elsewhere. This, of course, often happened, especially if one's enemy was much stronger, but this strategy had clear limitations. As we have already noted, by and large, there were no 'empty spaces' for people to move to. In the first place, space is not even, and the best, most productive habitats were normally already taken. snip ****** Evolutionary psychology and its applications is, IMNSHO, utterly critical for any group such as Extropians who want to know *why* things happen (perhaps in the hope we can guide them or at least stay out of the jaws of death). My article EP memes and war is based on this kind of background. I highly recommend reading Gat's paper. Keith Henson From acy.stapp at gmail.com Fri Nov 17 21:47:14 2006 From: acy.stapp at gmail.com (Acy Stapp) Date: Fri, 17 Nov 2006 15:47:14 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] 'a process of non-thinking called faith' 2 (2) In-Reply-To: References: <5.1.0.14.0.20061117094643.03842438@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> Message-ID: Human children naturally believe most everything their parents tell them. This is obviously adaptive as it is something of a prerequisite for the transmission of human culture and also allows children to learn from rare experiences their parents or tribe have had (eg 'Call for help if you see a lion') before they have had a chance to experience things for themselves. Religion is a memetic virus which rides on top of this. Faith is the component which teaches that to question the nature of things is bad and that to accept what you are taught is true and complete. It's basically an immune system for religious memes. Dawkin's new book "The God Delusion" is quite informative and well written and I recommend it to all here. Acy On 11/17/06, Robert Bradbury wrote: > > > On 11/17/06, Keith Henson wrote: > > > > > > Faith is a manifestation of the psychological mechanism that (in > > appropriate conditions) leads to wars. Wars were the evolved hunter > > gatherer mechanism for keeping the human population in bounds that could > > be supported by the ecosystem. > > > > Keith, I think the evidence for prehistoric "population control" were slim > to none. As the dominant and migratory population in ancient times if > humans exhausted the local resources they just got up and migrated (which is > why we are all over the planet). Wars are more fundamentally about > spreading ones genes. You can cite everything from the current situation in > the Sudan where the Arabs are specifically raping the non-Arab women to (a) > impregnate them with their genes and (b) make them undesirable to non-Arab > men. Men do not like to dedicate resources to children which are clearly > not theirs or at least not closely related to them (children of brothers or > sisters). > > Another example is the recent evidence that American Indians may have > engaged in hunting parties for the purpose of capturing women. Indeed in > war one general outcome for the losers is that the men are killed but the > women are broubht back to make *more* babies. This is entirely a > consequence of the fact that men have greater abilities to go out and get > resources and making babies is cheap while for women making babies is both > resource intensive and tends to diminish their ability to care for children > they already do have. > > Wars are due to the desire to get resources to have more sex and produce > more children thus spreading ones genes. If one has ever watched two males > (elephants, lions, etc.) fighting for dominance one realizes its all about > who gets the harem. > > Robert > -- Acy Stapp "When I'm working on a problem, I never think about beauty. I think only how to solve the problem. But when I have finished, if the solution is not beautiful, I know it is wrong." -- R. Buckminster Fuller (1895 - 1983) -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Fri Nov 17 22:19:36 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Fri, 17 Nov 2006 17:19:36 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] 'a process of non-thinking called faith' 2 (2) In-Reply-To: <021801c70a7d$c14542c0$660fa8c0@kevin> References: <5.1.0.14.0.20061117094643.03842438@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> <021801c70a7d$c14542c0$660fa8c0@kevin> Message-ID: On 11/17/06, kevinfreels.com wrote: > > When you remove all the things that don;t work out, all you have left if > the competition for mates. You can see similar behaviour in wild dogs and > cats. > It is more than "competition for mates" -- something that you might see in any school or corporation or other typical developed world social environment (that which most readers are used to). It is a low level gene driven higher intellectual capacity supported program of genocide. The special news report I saw, which I believe was by one of the major news networks, was about Arab militiamen explicitly engaging in raping native African women and explicitly marking their bodies to indicate that they had been raped (and therefore undesired as partners). It is no secret that genocide is occurring at a level just below that which might attract an aggressive response (which is a sad comment on our "state" as a "civilization"). It is one thing to try and settle differences between groups of relatively equal parties (Sunni's & Shia) -- something which may be relatively impossible. It is another thing to ignore differences between people incapable of equivalent engagement (militia and refuges). What is surprising is that we debate endlessly day in and day out what happens after nanotechnology arrives and we all upload or the fine points of what it means to be an individual and it seems we place little value on thousands to millions of lives being lost due to the actions of a few we choose to ignore (e.g. Sudan president Omar Al-Bashir). It makes me wonder if "we" deserve to be uploaded. I for one would view the rationalization as difficult. If we cannot make good judgements now, how can we be expected to make them in the future? The CBS citation is particularly revealing, "*I'm sorry to say I'm going to sit here with you in two years time and I'm gonna tell you the same sad story. People will say, 'Ich habe nicht gewusst,' which is German for 'I didn't know."'"* " Robert 1. http://www.genocideintervention.net/about/press/coverage/index.php/archives/date/2006/09/ 2. http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2006/10/20/60minutes/main2111909.shtml 3. http://blogs.ushmm.org/index.php/COC2/C10/P30/ -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From kevin at kevinfreels.com Fri Nov 17 23:39:49 2006 From: kevin at kevinfreels.com (kevinfreels.com) Date: Fri, 17 Nov 2006 17:39:49 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] Human enhancement: what would you improve? References: <7.0.1.0.2.20061116223432.02409b78@satx.rr.com><023e01c70a7e$87f64810$660fa8c0@kevin> Message-ID: <002401c70aa1$ac875070$660fa8c0@kevin> I was referring to the survey..... ----- Original Message ----- From: Robert Bradbury To: ExI chat list Sent: Friday, November 17, 2006 3:16 PM Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] Human enhancement: what would you improve? On 11/17/06, kevinfreels.com wrote: Interesting how most people either want all or nothing....... Actually, no, if you cruise on over to Born Rich [1], you will find quite an assortment of items which individuals range from "cool" to "yech" depending on ones tastes. If everyone has it all it gives you nothing to discuss at the party. In life there is only "more, different and better". The more sophisticated tend to prefer different and better while the less sophisticated simply want more. How one morphs the commodity between one the realms depends upon the sophistication of the marketing people, the sales people and the purchaser trying to justify why something is "cool", "boring" or "yech". Nothing is simply "more" "different" with a dash of "better". Robert 1. http://www.bornrich.org/ ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ _______________________________________________ extropy-chat mailing list extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From kevin at kevinfreels.com Sat Nov 18 00:14:03 2006 From: kevin at kevinfreels.com (kevinfreels.com) Date: Fri, 17 Nov 2006 18:14:03 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] 'a process of non-thinking called faith' 2 (2) References: <5.1.0.14.0.20061117094643.03842438@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com><021801c70a7d$c14542c0$660fa8c0@kevin> Message-ID: <006b01c70aa6$74adbae0$660fa8c0@kevin> Amen brother Robert. I am completely with you there. Unfortunately "we" only have limited power to solve these problems. Most people don't have the stomach to do what needs to be done. That can be seen in Iraq. But you need to have some faith in yourself Robert. You would not do these kinds of things. And you would stop them if you had the power. I know you would. You are the kind of person who would deserve to be uploaded. If I were a god of the future, I would resurrect you. Maybe one day through technology we can find a way to deal with these bad people without hurting and killing hundreds and thousands of good people in the process. Then it will be easier to fix it. But I do not subscribe to your notion of a lower level gene driven program of genocide. If anything it's a defense mechanism where they feel that if they do not kill, they will be killed. I think that even if they were all genetic clones, after years of being taught different things, living in different cultures and experiencing different lives, they would still be killing each other. ----- Original Message ----- From: Robert Bradbury To: ExI chat list Sent: Friday, November 17, 2006 4:19 PM Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] 'a process of non-thinking called faith' 2 (2) On 11/17/06, kevinfreels.com wrote: When you remove all the things that don;t work out, all you have left if the competition for mates. You can see similar behaviour in wild dogs and cats. It is more than "competition for mates" -- something that you might see in any school or corporation or other typical developed world social environment (that which most readers are used to). It is a low level gene driven higher intellectual capacity supported program of genocide. The special news report I saw, which I believe was by one of the major news networks, was about Arab militiamen explicitly engaging in raping native African women and explicitly marking their bodies to indicate that they had been raped (and therefore undesired as partners). It is no secret that genocide is occurring at a level just below that which might attract an aggressive response (which is a sad comment on our "state" as a "civilization"). It is one thing to try and settle differences between groups of relatively equal parties (Sunni's & Shia) -- something which may be relatively impossible. It is another thing to ignore differences between people incapable of equivalent engagement (militia and refuges). What is surprising is that we debate endlessly day in and day out what happens after nanotechnology arrives and we all upload or the fine points of what it means to be an individual and it seems we place little value on thousands to millions of lives being lost due to the actions of a few we choose to ignore ( e.g. Sudan president Omar Al-Bashir). It makes me wonder if "we" deserve to be uploaded. I for one would view the rationalization as difficult. If we cannot make good judgements now, how can we be expected to make them in the future? The CBS citation is particularly revealing, "I'm sorry to say I'm going to sit here with you in two years time and I'm gonna tell you the same sad story. People will say, 'Ich habe nicht gewusst,' which is German for 'I didn't know."'" " Robert 1. http://www.genocideintervention.net/about/press/coverage/index.php/archives/date/2006/09/ 2. http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2006/10/20/60minutes/main2111909.shtml 3. http://blogs.ushmm.org/index.php/COC2/C10/P30/ ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ _______________________________________________ extropy-chat mailing list extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From hkhenson at rogers.com Sat Nov 18 04:45:50 2006 From: hkhenson at rogers.com (Keith Henson) Date: Fri, 17 Nov 2006 23:45:50 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] 'a process of non-thinking called faith' 2 (2) In-Reply-To: References: <5.1.0.14.0.20061117094643.03842438@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> Message-ID: <5.1.0.14.0.20061117231920.03a63858@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> At 03:47 PM 11/17/2006 -0600, Acy wrote: >Human children naturally believe most everything their parents tell them. That not entirely true, as anyone who has raised a few kids can tell you. Also see below. >This is obviously adaptive as it is something of a prerequisite for the >transmission of human culture and also allows children to learn from rare >experiences their parents or tribe have had (eg 'Call for help if you see >a lion') before they have had a chance to experience things for themselves. > >Religion is a memetic virus which rides on top of this. Faith is the >component which teaches that to question the nature of things is bad and >that to accept what you are taught is true and complete. It's basically an >immune system for religious memes. I agree that religions are memes and that the religious meme receptor site is remarkably PROM like. But that characteristic (the result of gene based mental mechanisms) was either directly selected or a side effect of something that was directly selected. So you need to account for this capacity. Like virtually all psychological trait is must be rooted in the way stone age hunter gatherer bands lived and relative reproductive success. So how do you account for people having the capacity to have religions? Note that people don't pick up religions (and faith) as young children. >Dawkin's new book "The God Delusion" is quite informative and well written >and I recommend it to all here. Dawkins is one of the most influential people in my life. But I think he is going off in the wrong direction in directly fighting religions without making an effort to understand why the capacity for religions was adaptive in the past. I find the result like being against fevers when that is not the root cause of the problem but a symptom. Keith Henson ****** Young children don't believe everything they hear Childhood is a time when young minds receive a vast amount of new information. Until now, it's been thought that children believe most of what they hear. New research sheds light on children's abilities to distinguish between fantasy and reality. Through conversation, books, and the media, young children are continually exposed to information that is new to them. Much of the information they receive is factual (e.g., the names of the planets in the solar system), but some information is not based in truth and represents nonexistent entities (e.g., the Easter bunny). Children need to figure out which information is real and which is not. By age 4, children consistently use the context in which the new information is presented to determine whether or not it is real. That's one of the major findings in new studies conducted by researchers at the Universities of Texas and Virginia and published in the November/December 2006 issue of the journal Child Development. In three studies, about 400 children ages 3 to 6 heard about something new and had to say whether they thought it was real or not. Some children heard the information defined in scientific terms ("Doctors use surnits to make medicine"), while others heard it defined in fantastical terms ("Fairies use hercs to make fairy dust"). The researchers found that children's ability to use contextual cues to determine whether the information is true develops significantly between the ages of 3 and 5. Moreover, when new information is presented to children in a way that relates the information in a meaningful way to a familiar entity, they are more likely to use the contextual cues to make a decision about whether the new information is true than if the new information is simply associated with the entity. "These studies provide new insight into the development of children's ability to make the fantasy-reality distinction," explains Jacqueline D. Woolley, lead author of the studies and a professor at the University of Texas. "It is clear from the present studies that young children do not believe everything they hear, and that they can use the context surrounding the presentation of a new entity to make inferences about the real versus fantastical nature of that entity." Source: Society for Research in Child Development http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2006-11/sfri-ycd110906.php From msd001 at gmail.com Sat Nov 18 05:53:58 2006 From: msd001 at gmail.com (Mike Dougherty) Date: Sat, 18 Nov 2006 00:53:58 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] 'a process of non-thinking called faith' 2 (2) In-Reply-To: <006b01c70aa6$74adbae0$660fa8c0@kevin> References: <5.1.0.14.0.20061117094643.03842438@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> <021801c70a7d$c14542c0$660fa8c0@kevin> <006b01c70aa6$74adbae0$660fa8c0@kevin> Message-ID: <62c14240611172153u2d4f5f03qe18914d50e5b7a33@mail.gmail.com> On 11/17/06, kevinfreels.com wrote: > > But I do not subscribe to your notion of a lower level gene driven > program of genocide. If anything it's a defense mechanism where they feel > that if they do not kill, they will be killed. I think that even if they > were all genetic clones, after years of being taught different things, > living in different cultures and experiencing different lives, they would > still be killing each other. > I also wonder about the "genes made us do it" explanation for every problem in the world. It may be a good working model, especially when told by the likes of Dawkins et al - but in the retelling there seems to be a bit of hubris. "I am above those irrational, god-loving breeders because I am spreading memes rather than genes." It seems to me that this model needs a more encompassing 'unified theory.' The AI of our future may look disgustedly upon the recalcitrant members of the Church of Meme as they currently look upon god-following breeders. Faith is a belief in something for which you don't (yet) have sufficient proof or explanation. If I am testing three hypothesis using the scientific method, but have a strong bias towards the one that I intuitively expect to the the best fit solution - then I suggest there is an element of faith in the outcome of testing to corroborate that intuition. If there is not at least some probability of success then there would be no reason to continue fitness testing. So before the fittest solution has been found, faith provides the impetus to continue examination. Granted, there is a big different between rabid belief in a solution's fitness without testing (cultish worship) and being open to change in light of a new perspective or evolving information. This may just be a matter of degree? -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From hkhenson at rogers.com Sat Nov 18 05:07:14 2006 From: hkhenson at rogers.com (Keith Henson) Date: Sat, 18 Nov 2006 00:07:14 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Somewhat pessimistic view of teaching EP In-Reply-To: <5.1.0.14.0.20061117140536.0395ae30@pop.bloor.is.net.cable. rogers.com> References: <5.1.0.14.0.20061117094643.03842438@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> <5.1.0.14.0.20061117094643.03842438@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> Message-ID: <5.1.0.14.0.20061118000250.0397c0e0@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> http://chronicle.com/temp/reprint.php?id=xm3c4mgmb8b6fhkn54zhzwxfcgbzpjdl The Social Responsibility in Teaching Sociobiology By DAVID P. BARASH Socrates was made to drink hemlock for having "corrupted the youth of Athens." Is sociobiology or ? as it is more commonly called these days ? "evolutionary psychology" similarly corrupting? Although the study of evolution is, in my opinion, one of the most exciting and illuminating of all intellectual enterprises, there is at the same time, and not just in my opinion, something dark about the implications of natural selection for our own behavior. Should we revise Pink Floyd's anthem "Another Brick in the Wall" ? with its chorus "No dark sarcasm in the classroom/Teachers leave them kids alone" ? to "No dark sociobiology in the classroom"? To answer this, we need first to examine that purported darkness. Basically, it's a matter of selfishness. For a long time, evolution was thought to operate "for the good of the species," a conception that had a number of pro-social implications; that may be one reason why "species benefit" was so widely accepted, and why its overthrow took so long and was so vigorously resisted. Thus, if evolution somehow cares about the benefit enjoyed by a species, or by any other group larger than the individual, then it makes sense for natural selection to favor actions that contribute positively to that larger whole, even at the expense of the individual in question. Doing good therefore becomes doubly right: not just ethically correct but also biologically appropriate. In a world motivated by concern for the group rather than the individual, altruism is to be expected, since it would be "only natural" for an individual to suffer costs ? and to do so willingly ? so long as other species members come out ahead as a result. Then came the revolution. Beginning in the 1960s with a series of paradigm-shifting papers by William D. Hamilton, a notable book by George C. Williams (Adaptation and Natural Selection), and with further clarifications in the early 1970s, especially by Robert L. Trivers and John Maynard Smith, and magisterially summarized in Edward O. Wilson's Sociobiology, the conceptual structure of modern evolutionary biology was changed ? maybe not forever (it's a bit premature to conclude that), but into the foreseeable future. Sociobiology was born on the wings of this scientific paradigm shift, whose underlying manifesto holds that the evolutionary process works most effectively at the smallest unit: that of individuals and genes, rather than groups and species. At first glance, none of this seems especially threatening. Moreover it has been liberating in the extreme, shedding new light on a wide range of animal and human social behavior. But at the same time, the individual- and gene-centered view of life offers, in a sense, a perspective that is profoundly selfish; hence Richard Dawkins's immensely influential book, The Selfish Gene. The basic idea has been so productive that it has rapidly become dogma: Living things compete with each other (more precisely, their constituent genes struggle with alternative copies) in a never-ending process of differential reproduction, using their bodies as vehicles, or tools, for achieving success. The result has been to validate a view of human motivations that seems to approve of personal selfishness while casting doubt on any self-abnegating actions, seeing a self-serving component behind any act, no matter how altruistic it might appear. Sociobiologists have thus become modern-day descendants of the cynical King Gama, from Gilbert and Sullivan's Princess Ida, who proudly announces his cynicism: "A charitable action I can skillfully dissect; And interested motives I'm delighted to detect." Scientifically, such "detection" works. Ethically, however, it stinks: If the fundamental nature of living things ? human beings included ? is to joust endlessly with each other, each seeking to get ahead, then we're all mired in selfishness ? a dark vision indeed. It might ease the blow by noting that such a vision of human nature is hardly unique to modern evolutionary science. Thus, in An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding (1748), David Hume wrote that "should a traveller, returning from a far country, bring us an account of men wholly different from any with whom we were ever acquainted ... who were entirely divested of avarice, ambition, or revenge; who knew no pleasure but friendship, generosity, and public spirit; we should immediately, from these circumstances, detect the falsehood, and prove him a liar, with the same certainty as if he had stuffed his narration with stories of centaurs and dragons, miracles and prodigies." Hume also noted, albeit playfully, "It is not irrational for me to prefer the destruction of half the world to the pricking of my finger." More than 200 years ago, people were made uncomfortable by such sentiments, and they still are. Just as nature is said to abhor a vacuum, it abhors true altruism. Society, on the other hand, adores it. Most ethical systems advocate undiscriminating altruism: "Virtue," we are advised, "is its own reward." Such sentiments are immensely attractive, not only because they are how we would like other people to behave, but probably because at some level, we wish that we could do the same. As Bertolt Brecht notes in The Threepenny Opera, "We crave to be more kindly than we are," so much so that purveyors of good news ? those who proclaim the "better angels of our nature" ? nearly always receive a more enthusiastic reception than do those whose message is more dour. Although people are widely urged to be kind, moral, altruistic, and so forth, which suggests that they are basically less kind, moral, altruistic, etc., than is desired, it is also common to give at least lip service to the precept that people are fundamentally good. It appears that there is a payoff in claiming ? if not acting ? as though others are good at heart. "Each of us will be well advised, on some suitable occasion," wrote Freud, in Civilization and Its Discontents, "to make a low bow to the deeply moral nature of mankind; it will help us to be generally popular and much will be forgiven us for it." Why are people generally so unkind to those who criticize the human species as being, at heart, unkind? Maybe because of worry that such critics might be seeking to justify their own unpleasantness by pointing to a general unpleasantness on the part of others. And maybe also because most people like to think of themselves as benevolent and altruistic, or at least, to think that other people think of them that way. It seems likely that a cynic is harder to bamboozle. In Civilization and Its Discontents, perhaps his most pessimistic book, Freud went on to lament that one of education's sins is that "it does not prepare [children] for the aggressiveness of which they are destined to become the objects. In sending the young into life with such a false psychological orientation, education is behaving as though one were to equip people starting on a Polar expedition with summer clothing and maps of the Italian Lakes. In this it becomes evident that a certain misuse is being made of ethical demands. The strictness of those demands would not do so much harm if education were to say: 'This is how men ought to be, in order to be happy and to make others happy; but you have to reckon on their not being like that.' Instead of this the young are made to believe that everyone else fulfills those ethical demands ? that is, that everyone else is virtuous. It is on this that the demand is based that the young, too, shall become virtuous." At the same time, we can expect that society will often call for real altruism, not because it is good for the altruist but because it benefits those who receive. (If it were clearly good for the altruist, then society wouldn't have to call for it! In fact, cynics point out that it is precisely because altruism is generally not good for the altruist that social pressures are so often focused on producing it.) Friedrich Nietzsche was probably the most articulate spokesman for the view that society encourages self-sacrifice because the unselfish sucker is an asset to others: "Virtues (such as industriousness, obedience, chastity, piety, justness) are mostly injurious to their possessors. ... If you possess a virtue, ... you are its victim! But that is precisely why your neighbor praises your virtue. Praise of the selfless, sacrificing, virtuous ... is in any event not a product of the spirit of selflessness! One's 'neighbor' praises selflessness because he derives advantage from it." If Nietzsche is correct, then there is probably a distressingly manipulative quality to morals, to most religious teachings, to the newspaper headlines that celebrate the hero who leaps into a raging river to rescue a drowning child, to local Good Citizenship Awards and PTA prizes. "That man is good who does good to others," wrote the 17th-century French moralist Jean de La Bruy?re. Nothing objectionable so far; indeed, it makes sense (especially for the "others"). But La Bruy?re goes on, revealing a wicked pre-Nietzschean cynicism: "If he suffers on account of the good he does, he is very good; if he suffers at the hands of those to whom he has done good, then his goodness is so great that it could be enhanced only by greater suffering; and if he should die at their hands, his virtue can go no further; it is heroic, it is perfect." Such "perfect" heroism can only be wished on one's worst enemies. Exhortations to extreme selflessness are easy to parody, as not only unrealistic but also paradoxically self-serving insofar as the exhorter is likely to benefit at the expense of the one exhorted. Yet the more we learn about biology, the more sensible becomes the basic thrust of social ethics, precisely because nearly everyone, left to his or her devices, is likely to be selfish, probably more than is good for the rest of us. The philosopher and mathematician Bertrand Russell pointed out that "by the cultivation of large and generous desires ... men can be brought to act more than they do at present in a manner that is consistent with the general happiness of mankind." Society is therefore left with the responsibility to do a lot of cultivating. Seen this way, a biologically appropriate wisdom begins to emerge from the various commandments and moral injunctions, nearly all of which can at least be interpreted as trying to get people to behave "better," that is, to develop and then act upon large and generous desires, to strive to be more amiable, more altruistic, less competitive, and less selfish than they might otherwise be. Enter sociobiology. With its increasingly clear demonstration that Hume, Freud, Brecht, and Nietzsche (also Machiavelli and Hobbes) are basically onto something, and that selfishness resides in our very genes, it would seem not only that evolution is a dispiriting guide to human behavior, but also that the teaching of sociobiology (or evolutionary psychology) should be undertaken only with great caution. The renowned primatologist Sarah Hrdy accordingly questioned "whether sociobiology should be taught at the high-school level ... because it can be very threatening to students still in the process of shaping their own priorities," adding: "The whole message of sociobiology is oriented toward the success of the individual. ... Unless a student has a moral framework already in place, we could be producing social monsters by teaching this." What to do? One possibility ? unacceptable, I would hope, to most educators ? would be to refrain altogether from teaching such dangerous truths. Teacher, leave them kids alone! Preferable, I submit, is to structure the teaching of sociobiology along the lines of sex education: Teach what we know, but do so in age-appropriate stages. Just as we would not bombard kindergartners with the details of condom use, we probably ought not instruct preteens in the finer points of sociobiology, especially since many of those are hidden even to those expected to do the teaching. For one thing, a deeper grasp of the evolutionary biology of altruism reveals that even though selfishness may well underlie much of our behavior, it is often achieved, paradoxically, via acts of altruism, as when individuals behave in a manner that enhances the ultimate success of genetic relatives. Here, selfishness at the level of genes produces altruism at the level of bodies. Ditto for "reciprocity," which, as Robert Trivers elegantly demonstrated more than three decades ago, can produce seemingly altruistic exchanges and moral obligations even between nonrelatives. Yet genetic selfishness underlies it all. Alexander Pope concluded, with some satisfaction, "That Reason, Passion, answer one great aim; That true Self-love and Social are the same." Sociobiologists understand that there is an altruistic as well as a selfish side to the evolutionary coin. A half-baked introduction to the discipline, which pointed only to the latter, would therefore do students a substantial disservice. Moreover, gene-centered evolutionary thinking can also expand the sense of self and emphasize interrelatedness: Altruism aside, just consider all those genes for cellular metabolism, for neurotransmitters and basic body plans, all of them shared with every living thing, competing and pushing and somehow working things out on a small and increasingly crowded planet. There, by the grace of evolution, go a large part of "ourselves." "Gene-centered theories are often reviled," writes the gene theorist David Haig, "because of their perceived implications for human societies. But even though genes may cajole, deceive, cheat, swindle, or steal, all in pursuit of their own replication, this does not mean that people must be similarly self-interested. Organisms are collective entities (like firms, communes, unions, charities, teams) and the behaviors and decisions of collective bodies need not mirror those of their individual members." To some extent, in short, we may even possess ? gulp! ? free will. Beyond the question of what our genes may be up to and the extent to which we are independent of them, those expected to ponder the biology of their own "natural" inclinations ought also to be warned (more than once) about the "naturalistic fallacy," the presumption that things natural are, ipso facto, good. I'd even suggest pushing this further, and that the real test of our humanity might be whether we are willing, at least on occasion, to say no to our "natural" inclinations, thereby refusing go along with our selfish genes. To my knowledge, no other animal species is capable of doing that. More than any other living things, we are characterized by an almost unlimited repertoire; human beings are of the wilderness, with beasts inside, but much of the beastliness involves gene-based altruism no less than selfishness. (Recall the paradox that genetic selfishness is often promoted via altruism toward other individuals insofar as these recipients are likely to carry identical copies of the genes in question.) Moreover, as Carl Sandburg put it, each human being is "the keeper of his zoo." Even that is not evidence of a lack of evolutionary influence; rather, it is a result of selection for being a good zookeeper. Socrates, we are told, elected to drink the hemlock when he could have followed a different path. Human beings are capable not only of understanding what the evolutionary process hath wrought, but also of deciding, in the clear light of reason as well as ethics, whether to follow. David P. Barash is a professor of psychology at the University of Washington. (I have a considerable list of objections to the article. Can any of you guess where? HKH) From avantguardian2020 at yahoo.com Sat Nov 18 06:00:43 2006 From: avantguardian2020 at yahoo.com (The Avantguardian) Date: Fri, 17 Nov 2006 22:00:43 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] 'a process of non-thinking called faith' 2 (2) In-Reply-To: <5.1.0.14.0.20061117231920.03a63858@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> Message-ID: <20061118060043.46536.qmail@web60511.mail.yahoo.com> --- Keith Henson wrote: > Faith is the > >component which teaches that to question the nature > of things is bad and > >that to accept what you are taught is true and > complete. It's basically an > >immune system for religious memes. Self-enforced ignorance is not the same as faith. Faith can move mountains, ignorance can't even pay the bills. > Dawkins is one of the most influential people in my > life. But I think he > is going off in the wrong direction in directly > fighting religions without > making an effort to understand why the capacity for > religions was adaptive > in the past. I find the result like being against > fevers when that is not > the root cause of the problem but a symptom. Perhaps he has considered that and still finds fundamentalist religion (not really fundamentalism at all but enforced ignorance) too risky to tolerate. I can't really blame him. I am there myself. . . and I am a mystic. Stuart LaForge alt email: stuart"AT"ucla.edu "Believe nothing. No matter where you read it, or who said it, even if I have said it, unless it agrees with your own reason and your own common sense."- Siddhartha Guatama aka Buddha. ____________________________________________________________________________________ Sponsored Link Degrees online in as fast as 1 Yr MBA, Bachelor's, Master's, Assoc http://yahoo.degrees.info From c.hales at pgrad.unimelb.edu.au Sat Nov 18 06:40:50 2006 From: c.hales at pgrad.unimelb.edu.au (Colin Geoffrey Hales) Date: Sat, 18 Nov 2006 17:40:50 +1100 (EST) Subject: [extropy-chat] 'a process of non-thinking called faith' 2 (2) In-Reply-To: <20061118060043.46536.qmail@web60511.mail.yahoo.com> References: <20061118060043.46536.qmail@web60511.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <4894.60.230.145.11.1163832050.squirrel@webmail.student.unimelb.edu.au> > > --- Keith Henson wrote: >> Faith is the >> >component which teaches that to question the nature >> of things is bad and >> >that to accept what you are taught is true and >> complete. It's basically an >> >immune system for religious memes. > > Self-enforced ignorance is not the same as faith. > Faith can move mountains, ignorance can't even pay the > bills. > >> Dawkins is one of the most influential people in my >> life. But I think he >> is going off in the wrong direction in directly >> fighting religions without >> making an effort to understand why the capacity for >> religions was adaptive >> in the past. I find the result like being against >> fevers when that is not >> the root cause of the problem but a symptom. > > Perhaps he has considered that and still finds > fundamentalist religion (not really fundamentalism at > all but enforced ignorance) too risky to tolerate. I > can't really blame him. I am there myself. . . and I > am a mystic. > > Dawkins gets asked that very question here: http://www.abc.net.au/rn/scienceshow/default.htm have a listen to the SAT 04 Nov show..... regards, Colin From brian at posthuman.com Sat Nov 18 07:01:00 2006 From: brian at posthuman.com (Brian Atkins) Date: Sat, 18 Nov 2006 01:01:00 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] Somewhat pessimistic view of teaching EP In-Reply-To: <5.1.0.14.0.20061118000250.0397c0e0@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> References: <5.1.0.14.0.20061117094643.03842438@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> <5.1.0.14.0.20061117094643.03842438@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> <5.1.0.14.0.20061118000250.0397c0e0@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> Message-ID: <455EAFAC.4020306@posthuman.com> http://www.newscientist.com/channel/being-human/mg19225772.500-survival-of-the-nicest.html Survival of the nicest * 11 November 2006 Lee Alan Dugatkin ALTRUISM - helping others at a cost to oneself - has been a stubborn thorn in the side of evolutionary biologists. If natural selection favours genes that produce traits which increase the reproductive success of the individuals in which they reside, then altruism is precisely the sort of behaviour that should disappear. Darwin was acutely aware of the problem that altruism posed for his theory of natural selection. He was particularly worried about the self-sacrificial behaviour that social insects display: how could natural selection explain why a worker bee will defend its hive by stinging an intruder and dying in the process? In On the Origin of Species, he summarised the topic of social insect altruism as "one special difficulty, which at first appeared to me to be insuperable, and actually fatal to the whole theory". But then he came up with an explanation. Since worker bees were helping blood relatives - especially their queen - Darwin hypothesised that natural selection might favour altruism at the level of blood kin. One hundred and four years later, the biologist Bill Hamilton would formalise Darwin's idea, but the path from Darwin to Hamilton was not smooth. The nature of altruism and its similarities to the human trait of goodness make it susceptible to political, philosophical and religious subjectivity. Studying the structure of an atom isn't personal: studying altruism can be. It certainly was for the next two figures in the history of altruism, Thomas Huxley and Peter Kropotkin. Huxley, also known as "Darwin's bulldog", outlined his thoughts on this topic in an 1888 essay entitled "The struggle for existence": "From the point of view of the moralist, the animal world is on about the same level as the gladiator's show... Life [for prehistoric people] was a continuous free fight, and beyond the limited and temporary relations of the family, the Hobbesian war of each against all was the normal state of existence." For Huxley, altruism was rare, but when it occurred, it should be between blood relatives. Kropotkin, once a page to the tsar of Russia and later a naturalist who spent five years studying natural history in Siberia, thought otherwise. In Siberia he thought that he saw altruism divorced from kinship in every species he came across. "Don't compete!" Kropotkin wrote in his influential book Mutual Aid: A factor of evolution (1902). "That is the watchword which comes to us from the bush, the forest, the river, the ocean. Therefore combine - practice mutual aid!" How could two respected scientists come to such radically different conclusions? In addition to being a naturalist, Kropotkin was also the world's most famous anarchist. He believed that if animals could partake in altruism in the absence of government, then civilised society needed no government either, and could live in peace, behaving altruistically. Kropotkin was following what he saw as "the course traced by the modern philosophy of evolution... society as an aggregation of organisms trying to find out the best ways of combining the wants of the individuals with those of co-operation". He saw anarchism as the next phase of evolution. Huxley was no less affected by events around him. Shortly before he published "The struggle for existence", his daughter, Mady, died of complications related to a mental illness. In his despair over Mady's passing he wrote, "You see a meadow rich in flower... and your memory rests upon it as an image of peaceful beauty. It is a delusion... not a bird twitters but is either slayer or slain... murder and sudden death are the order of the day." It was in the light of nature as the embodiment of struggle and destruction - the antithesis of altruism - that Huxley saw the death of his daughter and it was in that mindset that he penned his essay. A suite of other fascinating characters would follow Huxley and Kropotkin. In the US there was the Quaker ecologist Warder Clyde Allee, who did the first real experiments on altruism in the 1930s and whose religious and scientific writings on the subject were often indistinguishable; in fact, he would often swipe text from one and add it to the other. Around the same time in the UK, J.B.S. Haldane, one of the founders of population genetics, was talking of altruism and kinship, and came close to developing a mathematical theory on the subject. But he stopped short - nobody quite knows why. A mathematical theory for the evolution of altruism and its relation to blood kinship would come a generation later with Bill Hamilton, who was both a passionate naturalist and a gifted mathematician. While working on his PhD in the early 1960s, he built a complex mathematical model to describe blood kinship and the evolution of altruism. Fortunately, the model boiled down to a simple equation, now known as Hamilton's rule. The equation has only three variables: the cost of altruism to the altruist (c), the benefit that a recipient of altruism receives (b) and their genetic relatedness (r). Hamilton's rule states that natural selection favours altruism when r ? b > c. Hamilton's equation amounts to this: if a gene for altruism is to evolve, then the cost of altruism must be balanced by compensating benefits. In his model, the benefits can be accrued by blood relatives of the altruist because there's a chance (the probability r) that such relatives may also carry that gene for altruism. In other words, a gene for altruism can spread if it helps copies of itself residing in blood kin. A generation of biologists were profoundly affected by Hamilton's rule. One them was the population geneticist George Price, an eclectic genius who became depressed when he came across Hamilton's work. He had hoped that goodness was exempt from scientific analysis, but Hamilton's theory seemed to demonstrate otherwise. Price went through the mathematics in the model and realised that Hamilton had underestimated the power of his own theory. While working with Hamilton on kinship and altruism, the atheist Price underwent a religious epiphany. In an irony that turns the debate about religion and evolution on its head, Price believed that his findings on altruism were the result of divine inspiration. He became a devout Christian, donating most of his money to helping the poor. At various times he lived as a squatter; at other times he slept on the floor at the Galton Laboratory of University College London, where he was working. Price lived the life of the altruists that he had modelled mathematically. Since Hamilton published his model, thousands of experiments have directly or indirectly tested predictions emerging from his rule, and the results are encouraging. Hamilton's rule doesn't explain all the altruism we see but it explains a sizeable chunk of it. With time, Hamilton himself began to realise the power of his model, as well as its implications, and was somewhat dismayed that altruism could be boiled down to a simple equation: "I like always to imagine that I and we are above all that, subject to far more mysterious laws," he noted in volume 1 of his book Narrow Roads of Gene Land. "In this prejudice, however, I seem, rather sadly, to have been losing more ground than I gain. The theory I outline... has turned out very successful. It... illuminates not only animal behaviour but, to some extent as yet unknown but actively being researched, human behaviour as well." From issue 2577 of New Scientist magazine, 11 November 2006, page 56-57 -- Brian Atkins Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence http://www.singinst.org/ From amara at amara.com Sat Nov 18 07:23:23 2006 From: amara at amara.com (Amara Graps) Date: Fri, 17 Nov 2006 23:23:23 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] LINKS: Milton Friedman Died Yesterday. Message-ID: Here is another article... Amara ----------------------------------------------------------------- Milton Friedman RIP By Walter Block Posted on 11/16/2006 Milton Friedman died today at age 94. May he rest in peace. I don't want to discuss the Reagan and Thatcher "revolutions" he supposedly inspired. Nor his "Free to Choose" series, his many years with the University of Chicago and the Hoover Institution, or his Nobel Prize in Economics. These will be covered, I expect, by others, and in great detail. Nor in this recollection do I want to touch upon his monetarism, his championing of school vouchers, the negative income tax, flexible exchange rates, anti-trust laws, his opposition to the gold standard and to privatizing roads and oceans. Libertarians have long disagreed with him on these issues, and this is not the time to delve into such longstanding controversies. Instead, I wish to focus on the positive, and to relate a few personal experiences I have had with him. I shall end with a joke that gives a taste of the kind of embattled professional life he led. Here's the positive. Milton was a beacon of light on issues such as the minimum wage law, free trade, and rent control. This might not seem like much to radical libertarians, but, what with the Democrats recently seizing more power, and promising to impose wage levels on those who can least afford them, the unskilled poor, and with hundreds of economists signing a petition in support of this truly vicious and pernicious legislation, Milton's valiant, witty, wise, eloquent and yes, I'll say it, inspirational analysis on this issue must stand out as an example to us all. Another of the high points of his career, for me, was his "Open Letter" to then drug czar Bill Bennett" (Wall Street Journal, September 7, 1989) in which he alienated many of his conservative followers with his clarion call for drug legalization. The US government has truly unleashed the whirlwind on this matter. It is responsible for untold incarcerations of innocent people and tens of thousands of needless deaths around the world. When one day we as a society come to our senses and repeal drug prohibition as we previously did for alcohol prohibition, we will owe that happy day to Professor Friedman as much as to any man. My favorite essay in his Capitalism and Freedom is chapter 9, where Milton rips into the AMA for its policies of restrictive entry into the field of medicine. With the Democrats taking over both houses of congress, and with that harridan Hillary the front runner for its presidential ticket in 2008, we will likely face some mighty battles against the imposition of fully socialized medicine. Thanks to this insightful analysis of Milton's, we will not be without intellectual ammunition in this regard. Here's the personal. The honor once befell me in the 1980s to serve as Milton Friedman's chauffeur. I drove him around Vancouver, British Columbia during the day of one of his speaking engagements there that evening. The trip was part tourist and part business: pick up at the airport, lunch, a few radio and television interviews during the day, setting up the podium for his evening's speech, etc. I was amazed and delighted at his pugnaciousness in defense of liberty. He would engage seemingly everyone in debate on libertarian issues: waitresses, cameramen, the person placing the microphone on his lapel. He was tireless, humorous, enthusiastic. Another vignette. He once made a statement at a meeting of the American Economic Association that made me very proud indeed to be an economist. He stated (this is a paraphrase from memory) as follows: "Thanks to economists, all of us, from the days of Adam Smith and before right down to the present, tariffs are perhaps one tenth of one percent lower than they otherwise would have been." Dramatic pause goes here. A very long pause. He then continued: "And because of our efforts, we have earned our salaries ten-thousand fold." What could put matters in better perspective? Another personal recollection. Once, at a Mont Pelerin Meeting, there was a panel discussion entitled "How to win a Nobel Prize in economics." The panelists were James Buchanan, George Stigler, and, of course, Milton Friedman. This was pretty fast company. I don't remember any of the specifics but I remember coming away from that event with the thought that "Milton Friedman is an intellectual tiger," so overwhelming was he in that discussion. Speaking of overwhelming, I once had the experience of leading a Liberty Fund Colloquium where we discussed empirical measures of economic freedom. I won't mention all the sixteen or so participants, all of whom were powerful speakers, witty, highly articulate and knowledgeable. But I'll mention this: aside from Milton Friedman, there was his wife Rose and their son David. As can be expected, it was difficult apportioning scarce time amongst so many top theorists on this issue; a hard and fast rule in such events is that only one person could speak at a time. Anyone who knows them knows that Milton, Rose, and David would have dominated our deliberations. Things came to such a pass that I remember screaming out, perhaps the wittiest comment I ever made in my entire life: "One Friedman at a time!" I regard Milton as my intellectual grandfather. He was Gary Becker's dissertation advisor, and Gary was mine. I am one of literally thousands of his intellectual grandchildren by this way of calculating such matters, since Milton guided literally several hundred graduate students through their Ph.D. dissertations during his tenure at the University of Chicago. Virtually all of them went on to accomplished academic careers of their own at research universities. Here's the joke. I hope and trust that no one will take it amiss to tell a joke at a time like this. I do so because I think it helps my goal here: to celebrate the life of a distinguished intellectual by giving a peek into his life that might not be readily available elsewhere. I certainly mean to offend no one. In any case, here goes: One day an economist looked up and saw a little girl being attacked by a vicious dog, just down the street. He rushed over and saved the girl by strangling the dog. A reporter interviews him and says, "Sir, this is a wonderful thing you have done. Did you say you are an economist?" "Yes, I am," says the economist. "Very good, sir," says the reporter, "this will be our lead story tomorrow, and the headline will be 'Radical libertarian economist saves little girl from vicious dog.'" "Well, I'm not that radical," says the economist. "I'm really more of a classical liberal." The reporter scratches his head and says, "Well, we'll come up with something. Whose views would you say you are closest to?" "Oh, I suppose it would be Milton Friedman," says the economist. Next day, the economist buys the paper. Across the front page is splashed: "CHICAGOITE KILLS FAMILY PET!" Walter Block is Harold E. Wirth Eminent Scholar, Endowed Chair of Economics Loyola University, and senior fellow of the Mises Institute. Send him mail. See his archive. Comment on the blog. From c.hales at pgrad.unimelb.edu.au Sat Nov 18 06:15:02 2006 From: c.hales at pgrad.unimelb.edu.au (Colin Geoffrey Hales) Date: Sat, 18 Nov 2006 17:15:02 +1100 (EST) Subject: [extropy-chat] 'a process of non-thinking called faith' 2 (2) In-Reply-To: <5.1.0.14.0.20061117231920.03a63858@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> References: <5.1.0.14.0.20061117094643.03842438@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> <5.1.0.14.0.20061117231920.03a63858@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> Message-ID: <4797.60.230.145.11.1163830502.squirrel@webmail.student.unimelb.edu.au> > At 03:47 PM 11/17/2006 -0600, Acy wrote: > >>Human children naturally believe most everything their parents tell them. > There is a recent version of this in MILLER "Out of Error". He solves the problem of induction. The key message is, however: "There is no such thing as rational belief, only belief acquired through a rational process" The 'rational process' is called a healthy brain. A healthy brain exposed to the input A can acquire belief ta. Another healthy brain, with the right input B, can acquire belief tb, where tb = not-ta. diametrically oppising views. i.e. Relentless garbage in, garbage believed. It's how advertising works. The brain is innately capable of extracting regularity from phenomenal fields, including indirectly through language. You can;t help it, it operates subconsciously. It's how science works. cheers colin hales From pgptag at gmail.com Sat Nov 18 11:18:15 2006 From: pgptag at gmail.com (Giu1i0 Pri5c0) Date: Sat, 18 Nov 2006 12:18:15 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] What does it mean to be Human? (anti-transhumanist rant) Message-ID: <470a3c520611180318i18a38742s37f87dbf653461a7@mail.gmail.com> The John Templeton Foundation has issued an anti-transhumanist rantand will hold a Research Lecture on "Facing the Challenges of Transhumanism". The arguments here are shoddy and reactionary, surprising for both Templeton and Metanexus have a history of balance but they are obviously treading into territory where they have little history. There is the usual appeal to a vague and nebulous concept of "human nature", which is of course never defined and sounds like an apology of suffering, stupidity and death, and the usual references to the "the belief that humans are created by God in the image of God". -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From msd001 at gmail.com Sat Nov 18 14:47:43 2006 From: msd001 at gmail.com (Mike Dougherty) Date: Sat, 18 Nov 2006 09:47:43 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] What does it mean to be Human? (anti-transhumanist rant) In-Reply-To: <470a3c520611180318i18a38742s37f87dbf653461a7@mail.gmail.com> References: <470a3c520611180318i18a38742s37f87dbf653461a7@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <62c14240611180647q3679cbf7gf942b64950777e4c@mail.gmail.com> On 11/18/06, Giu1i0 Pri5c0 wrote: > > The John Templeton Foundation has issued an anti-transhumanist rantand will hold a Research Lecture on "Facing the Challenges of > Transhumanism". The arguments here are shoddy and reactionary, surprising > for both Templeton and Metanexus have a history of balance but they are > obviously treading into territory where they have little history. There is > the usual appeal to a vague and nebulous concept of "human nature", which is > of course never defined and sounds like an apology of suffering, stupidity > and death, and the usual references to the "the belief that humans are > created by God in the image of God". > Does it matter which side of the issue we approach from if the goal is to bring the picture into better focus? Having any foundation willing to spend money to raise awareness about transhumanism should ultimately be a good thing. If the concepts are sound they will hold up to scrutiny. If the general population decides to pass on the offer, then transhumans will eventually migrate without them. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From kerry_prez at yahoo.com Sat Nov 18 15:31:09 2006 From: kerry_prez at yahoo.com (Al Brooks) Date: Sat, 18 Nov 2006 07:31:09 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] LINKS: Milton Friedman Died Yesterday. In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <198772.72893.qm@web51604.mail.yahoo.com> Block is probably wrong to write "instead I want to focus on the positive"; Friedman's controversial (what isn't controversial in a world of turf-warrior academics?) advocacy of vouchers, flexible exchange rates, anti-trust laws, opposing the gold standard and so forth was positive. Friedman was very positive in his outlook and sincerely wanted freedom for all-- a rare trait one might say. > Nor in this recollection do I want to > touch upon his > monetarism, his championing of school vouchers, the > negative income tax, > flexible exchange rates, anti-trust laws, his > opposition to the gold > standard and to privatizing roads and oceans. > Libertarians have long > disagreed with him on these issues, and this is not > the time to delve > into such longstanding controversies. > Instead, I wish to focus on the positive[...] ____________________________________________________________________________________ Sponsored Link Mortgage rates near 39yr lows. $420k for $1,399/mo. Calculate new payment! www.LowerMyBills.com/lre From brian at posthuman.com Sat Nov 18 17:27:41 2006 From: brian at posthuman.com (Brian Atkins) Date: Sat, 18 Nov 2006 11:27:41 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] What does it mean to be Human? (anti-transhumanist rant) In-Reply-To: <470a3c520611180318i18a38742s37f87dbf653461a7@mail.gmail.com> References: <470a3c520611180318i18a38742s37f87dbf653461a7@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <455F428D.2020404@posthuman.com> Point them at this and see if it has any effect: http://www.nickbostrom.com/ethics/statusquo.pdf -- Brian Atkins Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence http://www.singinst.org/ From sjatkins at mac.com Sat Nov 18 21:18:04 2006 From: sjatkins at mac.com (Samantha Atkins) Date: Sat, 18 Nov 2006 13:18:04 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Human enhancement: what would you improve? In-Reply-To: <005b01c70a14$f38e2030$6601a8c0@homeef7b612677> References: <7.0.1.0.2.20061116223432.02409b78@satx.rr.com> <005b01c70a14$f38e2030$6601a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: <69C5868A-5F56-4D8A-AEA2-4A06CB1ABA4B@mac.com> I want to be a "cyborg" for some understandings of what that can be. Given the limited choices in the silly poll cyborg is probably the best unless the brain was made so much better that there was a more considerable range of possibilities. On Nov 16, 2006, at 10:50 PM, Lee Corbin wrote: > Damien writes > >> hmmm >> http://www.cosmosmagazine.com/node/851 > > Hmmm? Anybody here *not* wanna be a cyborg? > > Lee > > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat From max at maxmore.com Sat Nov 18 21:28:46 2006 From: max at maxmore.com (Max More) Date: Sat, 18 Nov 2006 15:28:46 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] Suicide the Green way In-Reply-To: <455F428D.2020404@posthuman.com> References: <470a3c520611180318i18a38742s37f87dbf653461a7@mail.gmail.com> <455F428D.2020404@posthuman.com> Message-ID: <200611182130.kAILU81a029058@ms-smtp-04.texas.rr.com> Just a little amusement, with a slight Jonathan Swift quality: 'What is the most ethical way to commit suicide?' New on spiked: 'Ask Ethan'. Our columnist Ethan Greenhart answers your soul-searching questions about how to live the green and ethical life. Dear Ethan, After careful consideration I have decided to end my life. Things haven't been going very well for me lately, but more importantly I am keen to reduce my carbon impact on the planet. Like the average Briton I probably produce around 9.3 tonnes of carbon each year. I am 26 years old, and reckon I could live for another 60 years; if I end things now I will save a total of 558 tonnes of carbon, for which I believe future generations should be grateful. But I have a question: what is the most ethical way to commit suicide? I don't want my self-destruction to be destructive to the planet! Yours faithfully, Zach Montague Richmond-upon-Thames Dear Zach, I empathise with your selfless decision. All responsible studies show that there are just too many people living on this planet for life to be sustainable. At least you have had the courage to do something about it, in a small and local way. continued: http://www.spiked-online.com/index.php?/site/earticle/2100/ Max Max More, Ph.D. Strategic Philosopher www.maxmore.com max at maxmore.com From c.hales at pgrad.unimelb.edu.au Sat Nov 18 22:24:23 2006 From: c.hales at pgrad.unimelb.edu.au (Colin Geoffrey Hales) Date: Sun, 19 Nov 2006 09:24:23 +1100 (EST) Subject: [extropy-chat] 'a process of non-thinking called faith' 2 (2) Message-ID: <2098.60.230.145.11.1163888663.squirrel@webmail.student.unimelb.edu.au> > > --- Keith Henson wrote: >> Faith is the >> >component which teaches that to question the nature >> of things is bad and >> >that to accept what you are taught is true and >> complete. It's basically an >> >immune system for religious memes. > > Self-enforced ignorance is not the same as faith. > Faith can move mountains, ignorance can't even pay the > bills. > >> Dawkins is one of the most influential people in my >> life. But I think he >> is going off in the wrong direction in directly >> fighting religions without >> making an effort to understand why the capacity for >> religions was adaptive >> in the past. I find the result like being against >> fevers when that is not >> the root cause of the problem but a symptom. > > Perhaps he has considered that and still finds > fundamentalist religion (not really fundamentalism at > all but enforced ignorance) too risky to tolerate. I > can't really blame him. I am there myself. . . and I > am a mystic. > > Dawkins gets asked that very question here: http://www.abc.net.au/rn/scienceshow/default.htm have a listen to the SAT 04 Nov show..... regards, Colin From benboc at lineone.net Sat Nov 18 23:02:22 2006 From: benboc at lineone.net (ben) Date: Sat, 18 Nov 2006 23:02:22 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] 'a process of non-thinking called faith' 2 In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <455F90FE.2090208@lineone.net> "Robert Bradbury" said: > If we cannot make good judgements now, how can we be expected to make > them in the future? I though this was a rather odd thing for a transhumanist to say. Don't you expect your ability to make good judgements to improve in the future? ben zaiboc From mbb386 at main.nc.us Sat Nov 18 23:22:14 2006 From: mbb386 at main.nc.us (MB) Date: Sat, 18 Nov 2006 18:22:14 -0500 (EST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Human enhancement: what would you improve? In-Reply-To: <69C5868A-5F56-4D8A-AEA2-4A06CB1ABA4B@mac.com> References: <7.0.1.0.2.20061116223432.02409b78@satx.rr.com> <005b01c70a14$f38e2030$6601a8c0@homeef7b612677> <69C5868A-5F56-4D8A-AEA2-4A06CB1ABA4B@mac.com> Message-ID: <33089.72.236.102.114.1163892134.squirrel@main.nc.us> > I want to be a "cyborg" for some understandings of what that can be. > Given the limited choices in the silly poll cyborg is probably the > best unless the brain was made so much better that there was a more > considerable range of possibilities. > That was my selection too, although I don't think it's what I really want. I would like to be a Better Human... ;) But geez, that didn't mean stronger arms or legs - although no doubt I could use them, nor did it mean simply a better brain - though everyone agrees that would be an improvement. I mean, what good are stronger legs if your internals are failing? Silly questions... silly answers. Regards, MB From lcorbin at rawbw.com Sun Nov 19 00:43:48 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Sat, 18 Nov 2006 16:43:48 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Origin of Wars References: <5.1.0.14.0.20061117094643.03842438@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> Message-ID: <00df01c70b73$e9ad9400$6601a8c0@homeef7b612677> Robert writes (Sent: Friday, November 17, 2006 9:39 AM) > On 11/17/06, Keith Henson wrote: > > Wars were the evolved hunter gatherer mechanism > > for keeping the human population in bounds that > > could be supported by the ecosystem. I think that Keith has a very good, but hardly unique, description of the basic process. I'm conjecturing that no description so far postulated here, however, covers all the known cases. For example, there are just too many damn wars in which population pressure was not a cause. Robert says > Keith, I think the evidence for prehistoric "population control" > were slim to none. As the dominant and migratory population > in ancient times if humans exhausted the local resources they > just got up and migrated (which is why we are all over the > planet). This doesn't seem to be true in all cases. I can easily exhibit many cases that do conform to Keith's postulated mechanism. > Wars are more fundamentally about spreading ones genes. And so you have a second description, which, again, I claim is not comprehensive. Wars are not *fundamentally* about anything, in my opinion. (See below for my own suggestion.) > You can cite everything from the current situation in the Sudan > where the Arabs are specifically raping the non-Arab women... > Another example: ... American Indians may have engaged in > hunting parties for the purpose of capturing women. This is indeed true. But by no means was this always an explanation, either proximal or distant. > Wars are due to the desire to get resources to have more > sex and produce more children thus spreading ones genes. Yes, but your writing almost seems calculated to elicit demurs :-) To say "desire" without using qualifications and explanations is confusing. Let me add this: primates and other animals at an early stage acquired mutations for aggressive behavior. Under the majority of circumstances this resulted in wider dispersal of genes. For example, tribes, nations, and other social groups that can utilized some means to spread at the expense of other groups have an obvious Darwinian advantage. In other circumstances memes arise which inhibit aggression, and there are cases where *this* is what best spreads the genes (e.g. large Quaker families). Lee From lcorbin at rawbw.com Sun Nov 19 01:23:14 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Sat, 18 Nov 2006 17:23:14 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Origin of wars (was origin of faith) References: <5.1.0.14.0.20061117094643.03842438@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com><5.1.0.14.0.20061117094643.03842438@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> <5.1.0.14.0.20061117140536.0395ae30@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> Message-ID: <00ef01c70b79$64092de0$6601a8c0@homeef7b612677> Keith writes > [Robert writes] > > >Wars are due to the desire to get resources to have more > > sex and produce more children thus spreading ones genes. > > I don't think that is exactly the case. Wars among hunter gatherers are > mostly when the situation is such that wars are the least awful avenue > available. Yes, but many HG tribes engage in war (a) for sport (b) to secure more mates (c) to expand their dominance over other tribes, and (d) for economic reasons. And these are just the conscious, rational, deliberative mechanisms! In addition, we have the descriptions from another, teleological level: wars result from competition over economic resources, over women, and simply over prestige (e.g. Greek city-state contests sometimes fell into the latter category). Note that here I'm emphasizing the unconscious explanations, the more "systemic" explanations. I gather from Keith's post that Azar Gat wrote > email me [Keith] if you want a copy. > > Published in Anthropological Quarterly, 73.1 (2000), 20-34. > THE HUMAN MOTIVATIONAL COMPLEX : > EVOLUTIONARY THEORY AND THE CAUSES OF > HUNTER-GATHERER FIGHTING > Azar Gat > Part I: Primary Somatic and Reproductive Causes > At the centre of this study is the age-old > philosophical and psychological inquiry into the > nature of the basic human system of motivation. > Numerous lists of basic needs and desires have > been put together over the centuries, more or less > casually or convincingly. That's what I'm suggesting too > The most recent ones show little if any marked > progress over the older, back to Thomas Hobbes's > Leviathan, 6 (e.g. Maslow 1970 [1954]; Burton 1990 Rather surprising, especially in light of your claim that Robert's anthropology is out of date. But you and the author do seem to refute the "moving on" notion. But anyway, the newer teleological memetic and genetic explanations were not available to Hobbes. Most what Azar Gat writes seems right on > Cultural diversity in human societies is stressed > by social scientists and historians for excellent > reasons, but all too often to the point of losing > sight of our easily observed large core of > species specificity. > > It has long been assumed... in these disciplines > that people may be moved to action - including > fighting - for practically any reason. However, > as this study will claim, hunter-gatherers, and > other primitive societies, manifested a remarkably > similar set of reasons for fighting, regularly observed > by anthropologists everywhere they went. ... the > great motives that move people to social activity - > including fighting - are hunger, love, vanity, and > fear of superior powers. Hmm, yes, one or two of those was not among my examples, but should have been. > It is the intricate interactions and manifold refraction > of these reasons in humans...that are responsible for > the staggering wealth and complexity of our species' > behaviour patterns, including that of fighting. Although I > shall now go through the reasons for warfare among > hunter-gatherers (as observed by anthropologists) > seemingly one by one, it is not the intention here to > provide yet another 'list' of separate elements. Yeah? Well, it looks like another list :-) > Instead, I shall seek to show how the various 'reasons' come > together in an integrated motivational complex... > ... > Subsistence resources: > hunting territories, water, shelter, raw materials > > Resource competition is a [!] prime cause of aggression, > violence, and deadly violence in nature. Notice carefully that he says "a" prime cause of aggression, by no means a sole cause of aggression (or, I may add, of war). > ... food, water, and, to a lesser degree, shelter against the > elements are tremendous selection forces. He then explains that, for example, once unleashed from the old world, human numbers greatly multiplied in the new world. (He doesn't mention that this was because of European agro-technology that supported more people per unit area.) Snipping a great deal, > The basic question, then, is what are the factors that act > as the main brakes on human populations in any particular > habitat; what the main scarcities, stresses, and hence > objects of human competition, are. Again, the answer > to this question is not fixed but varies considerably in > relation to the conditions. Thank you! That is *exactly* right. He then gives many examples, culminating in > In conclusion, let us understand more closely > the evolutionary calculus that can make > the highly dangerous activity of fighting > over resources worthwhile. I reiterate his concession that this is only "a" prime cause of aggression. > The benefits of fighting must also be matched against > possible alternatives (other than starvation). One of > them was to break contact and move elsewhere. This, > of course, often happened, especially if one's enemy was > much stronger, [e.g. Huns] but this strategy had clear > limitations. As we have already noted, by and large, > there were [usually] no 'empty spaces' for people to > move to. Keith ends with > Evolutionary psychology and its applications is, IMNSHO, utterly critical > for any group such as Extropians who want to know *why* things happen > (perhaps in the hope we can guide them or at least stay out of the jaws of > death). EP is vital to anyone's understanding of human nature. Lee > My article EP memes and war is based on this kind of background. I highly > recommend reading Gat's paper. From lcorbin at rawbw.com Sun Nov 19 01:29:53 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Sat, 18 Nov 2006 17:29:53 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] 'a process of non-thinking called faith' 2 (2) References: <5.1.0.14.0.20061117094643.03842438@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com><021801c70a7d$c14542c0$660fa8c0@kevin> Message-ID: <010901c70b7a$3c2fcdf0$6601a8c0@homeef7b612677> Robert writes > What is surprising is that we debate endlessly day in > and day out what happens after nanotechnology arrives > and we all upload or the fine points of what it means > to be an individual and it seems we place little value > on thousands to millions of lives being lost due to the > actions of a few we choose to ignore ( e.g. Sudan > president Omar Al-Bashir). Shit happens. > It makes me wonder if "we" deserve to be uploaded. > I for one would view the rationalization as difficult. Oh, come now. I join Ben Zaiboc who wrote > I though this was a rather odd thing for a transhumanist > to say. Don't you expect your ability to make good > judgements to improve in the future? But even if our ability to make good judgments does not improve, is our extinction really preferable? From what insane (most likely God-given) standard does that obtain? Let's keep a sense of perspective, for heaven's sake! Lee From lcorbin at rawbw.com Sun Nov 19 01:33:12 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Sat, 18 Nov 2006 17:33:12 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Human enhancement: what would you improve? References: <7.0.1.0.2.20061116223432.02409b78@satx.rr.com> <005b01c70a14$f38e2030$6601a8c0@homeef7b612677> <69C5868A-5F56-4D8A-AEA2-4A06CB1ABA4B@mac.com> Message-ID: <011101c70b7b$14b0ea10$6601a8c0@homeef7b612677> Samantha writes >I want to be a "cyborg" for some understandings of what that can be. > Given the limited choices in the silly poll cyborg is probably the > best unless the brain was made so much better that there was a more > considerable range of possibilities. Of course. None of the options included things greater than or more preferable to being a cyborg. Advancing to the cyborg level would be unmistakeably an improvement from a transhumanist perspective. Lee From hkhenson at rogers.com Sun Nov 19 02:46:14 2006 From: hkhenson at rogers.com (Keith Henson) Date: Sat, 18 Nov 2006 21:46:14 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] 'a process of non-thinking called faith' 2 (2) In-Reply-To: <006b01c70aa6$74adbae0$660fa8c0@kevin> References: <5.1.0.14.0.20061117094643.03842438@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> <021801c70a7d$c14542c0$660fa8c0@kevin> Message-ID: <5.1.0.14.0.20061118200729.0360de48@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> At 06:14 PM 11/17/2006 -0600, Kevin wrote: snip > >But I do not subscribe to your notion of a lower level gene driven program >of genocide. Ok, though you might note that chimps practice genocide on neighbors. >If anything it's a defense mechanism where they feel that if they do not >kill, they will be killed. And that defense mechanism is *not* the result of genes that build brains? >I think that even if they were all genetic clones, after years of being >taught different things, living in different cultures and experiencing >different lives, they would still be killing each other. Oh. I misunderstood your meaning. What I guess you mean is a disinclination to kill those closely related even when there is a massive resource crunch. Humans don't have genetic analyzers so we make do with proxy information that was reliable enough when we lived in hunter gather bands. All those in the band could be considered related, family members were close relatives. Easter Island was settled by about 20 people, probably already closely related. There followed about 400 years of peaceful population growth, reaching perhaps as many as 20,000 people and grossly over exploiting the resources of the island. One day they downed the tools they had been using to make the statues, and went at each other with rocks till 95% of the population was dead. At that point the wars ended. A generation or two later Europeans visited (a disaster in itself). The point here is that there was a *long* period with little or no warfare. What turned it on and what turned it off? Keith From lcorbin at rawbw.com Sun Nov 19 03:55:56 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Sat, 18 Nov 2006 19:55:56 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] 'a process of non-thinking called faith' 2 (2) References: <5.1.0.14.0.20061117094643.03842438@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> Message-ID: <012001c70b8e$ed2169c0$6601a8c0@homeef7b612677> Keith earlier wrote > Under non stressed circumstances the ability to think rationally is an > asset. But at times, when facing starvation and the need to make war on > neighbors, the interest of the individual and his genes diverge (because of > copies in relatives). It is generally true that although there is a great overlap, the interests of an individual and the interests of his genes do diverge---but this is true whether or not times are tough. I heartily recommend Stanovich's "The Robot's Rebellion". > Under such circumstances gene constructed mental > mechanisms switch off rational thinking and lead to > attacks (like the Rwanda genocide). Please explain why the Rwanda genocide is irrational: It serves the interests not only of the genes of one tribe, but also the interests of the individuals of that group. Lee From lcorbin at rawbw.com Sun Nov 19 04:09:26 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Sat, 18 Nov 2006 20:09:26 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Origin of Wars References: <5725663BF245FA4EBDC03E405C854296984D28@w2k3exch.UNICOM-INC.CORP> Message-ID: <012401c70b90$9eb77d90$6601a8c0@homeef7b612677> Chris writes > Lee Corbin wrote: >> >> there are just too many damn wars in which >> population pressure was not a cause. > > Wouldn't the important factor involve whether the indicators of > "population pressure in the EEA" were themselves present in the > pre-war/war scenario, independently of the cause of those indicators? I'm having trouble parsing your sentence. Please correct me if the following is an incorrect re-phrasing. Question: Might it not be important whether "Population pressure in the EEA", or at least the indicators of such pressure, are present before the start of wars? Absolutely! That is, the kinds of indicators, or conditions, actually present in the EEA that fostered intertribal conflict are either present before the start of a modern war, or they are not. I claim that although actual stomach-gnawing hunger is seldom any longer present before the start of modern wars, analogous resource shortages *sometimes* are the indeed the basic causes of a some wars, e.g., Japan was running out of oil in 1941. Lee From hkhenson at rogers.com Sun Nov 19 04:13:02 2006 From: hkhenson at rogers.com (Keith Henson) Date: Sat, 18 Nov 2006 23:13:02 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Origin of Wars In-Reply-To: <00df01c70b73$e9ad9400$6601a8c0@homeef7b612677> References: <5.1.0.14.0.20061117094643.03842438@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> Message-ID: <5.1.0.14.0.20061118225644.038449c0@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> At 04:43 PM 11/18/2006 -0800, you wrote: >Robert writes (Sent: Friday, November 17, 2006 9:39 AM) > > > On 11/17/06, Keith Henson wrote: > > > > Wars were the evolved hunter gatherer mechanism > > > for keeping the human population in bounds that > > > could be supported by the ecosystem. > >I think that Keith has a very good, but hardly unique, >description of the basic process. I'm conjecturing that >no description so far postulated here, however, covers >all the known cases. For example, there are just too many >damn wars in which population pressure was not a cause. I define population pressure in the post stone age as falling income per capita or (perhaps more important) the future prospects of falling income per capita. I am not aware of a war where (if you looked) this was not the situation. Which wars do you offer as being cases where there was rising income per capita and bright economic future? (For the side that started the war.) snip Keith From lcorbin at rawbw.com Sun Nov 19 04:36:10 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Sat, 18 Nov 2006 20:36:10 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Origin of Wars References: <5.1.0.14.0.20061117094643.03842438@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> <5.1.0.14.0.20061118225644.038449c0@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> Message-ID: <012a01c70b94$6a055c30$6601a8c0@homeef7b612677> Keith writes > [Lee wrote] > >>I think that Keith has a very good, but hardly unique, >>description of the basic process. I'm conjecturing that >>no description so far postulated here, however, covers >>all the known cases. For example, there are just too many >>damn wars in which population pressure was not a cause. > > I define population pressure in the post stone age as falling income per > capita or (perhaps more important) the future prospects of falling income > per capita. I am not aware of a war where (if you looked) this was not the > situation. Which wars do you offer as being cases where there was rising > income per capita and bright economic future? (For the side that started > the war.) The American Civil war is one, the U.S. war with Mexico, Hitler and Stalin's war on Poland are a couple of others. The American Revolution is another: the Colonialists may have been the world's richest people, at least as noticed by regular British troops ("John Adams", by McCullough). And would you claim that France was attacked by Austria and Prussia on February 7, 1792 because of resource scarcity or population pressure? The leaders of Austria and Prussia were simply scared of anti-royalist revolutions in general. We can start with these, and I'd appreciate any information about them that you have that supports your thesis. Lee From hkhenson at rogers.com Sun Nov 19 04:38:25 2006 From: hkhenson at rogers.com (Keith Henson) Date: Sat, 18 Nov 2006 23:38:25 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Origin of wars (was origin of faith) (2) Message-ID: <5.1.0.14.0.20061118233735.0392fb18@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> At 05:23 PM 11/18/2006 -0800, Lee wrote: snip >He then explains that, for example, once unleashed from >the old world, human numbers greatly multiplied in the new >world. (He doesn't mention that this was because of European >agro-technology that supported more people per unit area.) No, although that also happened, he is talking about 10 or 12 thousand years ago when the ancestors of the American Indians crossed into North America. The best that can determine (carbon dates) is that it took less than 1000 years for the North and South American ecosystems to be filled up tight with people. And, of course, most of the big game gone. Keith From hkhenson at rogers.com Sun Nov 19 05:42:37 2006 From: hkhenson at rogers.com (Keith Henson) Date: Sun, 19 Nov 2006 00:42:37 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Origin of wars (was origin of faith) (2) Message-ID: <5.1.0.14.0.20061119004219.03afd300@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> At 05:23 PM 11/18/2006 -0800, Lee wrote: snip >He then explains that, for example, once unleashed from >the old world, human numbers greatly multiplied in the new >world. (He doesn't mention that this was because of European >agro-technology that supported more people per unit area.) No, although that also happened, he is talking about 10 or 12 thousand years ago when the ancestors of the American Indians cross into North America. The best that can determine (carbon dates) is that it took less than 1000 years for the North and South American ecosystems to be filled up tight with people. And, of course, all the big game gone. Keith From kevin at kevinfreels.com Sun Nov 19 06:10:15 2006 From: kevin at kevinfreels.com (kevinfreels.com) Date: Sun, 19 Nov 2006 00:10:15 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] 'a process of non-thinking called faith' 2 (2) References: <5.1.0.14.0.20061117094643.03842438@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com><021801c70a7d$c14542c0$660fa8c0@kevin> <5.1.0.14.0.20061118200729.0360de48@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> Message-ID: <002c01c70ba1$634fc1c0$660fa8c0@kevin> > >But I do not subscribe to your notion of a lower level gene driven program > >of genocide. > > Ok, though you might note that chimps practice genocide on neighbors. > Is it true genocide? Or is it something else entirely? Is the killing done for genetic reasons or are there cultural considerations? What genotypes do they seek to kill? Do they go after groups that are more genetically similar to themselves? Or do they seem those that are less similar? Or do they seek to destroy those that are closer by or further away? Is it genocide when a chimp kills a bonobo? Or a baboon or monkey? Where exactly are those lines that trigger it? Is genocide even a real phenomenon? I'm sorry if I am not very clear in what I am saying. I have had a tough week and am having a difficult time focusing. > >If anything it's a defense mechanism where they feel that if they do not > >kill, they will be killed. > > And that defense mechanism is *not* the result of genes that build brains? No. It would be similar to the fight or flee instinct. Many animals have various defense mechanisms without any brain building going on. This "brain building genocide" requires that the more intelligent people are also the most violent.......And "genocide" could work just as easily to shrink the brain as it could to build a brain. Dumber, more violent and less rational minds could win over the slightly smarter but less violent people which allows their less sophisticated brains to reproduce more children. After all, it's the tough football players in high school that get the girls, not the geeks........... > > >I think that even if they were all genetic clones, after years of being > >taught different things, living in different cultures and experiencing > >different lives, they would still be killing each other. > > Oh. I misunderstood your meaning. What I guess you mean is a > disinclination to kill those closely related even when there is a massive > resource crunch. Humans don't have genetic analyzers so we make do with > proxy information that was reliable enough when we lived in hunter gather > bands. All those in the band could be considered related, family members > were close relatives. > > Easter Island was settled by about 20 people, probably already closely > related. There followed about 400 years of peaceful population growth, > reaching perhaps as many as 20,000 people and grossly over exploiting the > resources of the island. One day they downed the tools they had been using > to make the statues, and went at each other with rocks till 95% of the > population was dead. At that point the wars ended. A generation or two > later Europeans visited (a disaster in itself). > > The point here is that there was a *long* period with little or no > warfare. What turned it on and what turned it off? Maybe a sudden loss of good quality women? Maybe through disease? Or maybe that sibling rivalry that grows into a family dispute splitting the family and then people take sides and after so many generations they are always suspicious of each other, then someone does something stupid or evil, or an accident occurs which is blamed on someone else.........Heck, the list goes on. Can you not think of any other reason than to say it's embedded in the genes? You need not assume that something was "turned on". People get angry about all sorts of stuff and they have the capacity to kill. Then as they become desensitized to it killing becomes easier and easier. Things escalate until such time that there are much fewer people and they look back and see what they did and go "maybe we should thing about peace". This process plays over and over throughout history. If you continue to add fuel and air, eventually a small spark sets off a big flame. Then when there is nothing left but rubble, people recognize how badly they need each other and start to play nice again. If genocide were truly embedded in our genes, then you could drop 10 people of various races with various skills on an island from a shipwreck and expect them to kill each other. I thnk they would choose to work together for their own survival. From mmbutler at gmail.com Sun Nov 19 11:20:01 2006 From: mmbutler at gmail.com (Michael M. Butler) Date: Sun, 19 Nov 2006 03:20:01 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Somewhat pessimistic view of teaching EP In-Reply-To: <5.1.0.14.0.20061118000250.0397c0e0@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> References: <5.1.0.14.0.20061117094643.03842438@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> <5.1.0.14.0.20061118000250.0397c0e0@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> Message-ID: <7d79ed890611190320l74d7ebf2g54a3cf993b712e7a@mail.gmail.com> On 11/17/06, Keith Henson wrote: > http://chronicle.com/temp/reprint.php?id=xm3c4mgmb8b6fhkn54zhzwxfcgbzpjdl > > The Social Responsibility in Teaching Sociobiology ...snippage... > (I have a considerable list of objections to the article. Can any of you > guess where? HKH) Why ask, when I'll bet you can point is to a Fisking URL? PS: I'm not sure *what* I think of the main thrust of the article. That's one big reason I'd rather see your actual critique than try to construct it. -- Michael M. Butler : m m b u t l e r ( a t ) g m a i l . c o m 'Piss off, you son of a bitch. Everything above where that plane hit is going to collapse, and it's going to take the whole building with it. I'm getting my people the fuck out of here." -- Rick Rescorla (R.I.P.), cell phone call, 9/11/2001 From neomorphy at gmail.com Sun Nov 19 11:22:45 2006 From: neomorphy at gmail.com (Olie Lamb) Date: Sun, 19 Nov 2006 22:22:45 +1100 Subject: [extropy-chat] Suicide the Green way In-Reply-To: <200611182130.kAILU81a029058@ms-smtp-04.texas.rr.com> References: <470a3c520611180318i18a38742s37f87dbf653461a7@mail.gmail.com> <455F428D.2020404@posthuman.com> <200611182130.kAILU81a029058@ms-smtp-04.texas.rr.com> Message-ID: Hrmmm... might have been funnier if they'd actually get their facts something resembling correct. To indicate that "there is as yet no environmentally-friendly flammable liquid to match petrol" is to totally ignore the possibilities for bio-sourced hydrocarbons. As for "Think of the children you might have had, and what CO2 vandalism they could have done," well, that reminds me of this little comic: http://www.vhemt.org/biobreed.htm#instinct -- Olie On 11/19/06, Max More wrote: > > Just a little amusement, with a slight Jonathan Swift quality: > > 'What is the most ethical way to commit suicide?' > New on spiked: 'Ask Ethan'. Our columnist Ethan Greenhart answers > your soul-searching questions about how to live the green and ethical > life. > > > Dear Ethan, > > After careful consideration I have decided to end my life. Things > haven't been going very well for me lately, but more importantly I am > keen to reduce my carbon impact on the planet. Like the average > Briton I probably produce around 9.3 tonnes of carbon each year. I am > 26 years old, and reckon I could live for another 60 years; if I end > things now I will save a total of 558 tonnes of carbon, for which I > believe future generations should be grateful. But I have a question: > what is the most ethical way to commit suicide? I don't want my > self-destruction to be destructive to the planet! > > Yours faithfully, > Zach Montague > Richmond-upon-Thames > > Dear Zach, > > I empathise with your selfless decision. All responsible studies show > that there are just too many people living on this planet for life to > be sustainable. At least you have had the courage to do something > about it, in a small and local way. > > continued: > http://www.spiked-online.com/index.php?/site/earticle/2100/ > > > Max > > > > Max More, Ph.D. > Strategic Philosopher > www.maxmore.com > max at maxmore.com > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From CHealey at unicom-inc.com Sun Nov 19 03:35:41 2006 From: CHealey at unicom-inc.com (Christopher Healey) Date: Sat, 18 Nov 2006 22:35:41 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Origin of Wars Message-ID: <5725663BF245FA4EBDC03E405C854296984D28@w2k3exch.UNICOM-INC.CORP> > Lee Corbin wrote: > > there are just too many damn wars in which > population pressure was not a cause. > I just wanted to chime in on a small point that may have relevance in the larger discussion. Wouldn't the important factor involve whether the indicators of "population pressure in the EEA" were themselves present in the pre-war/war scenario, independently of the cause of those indicators? -Chris From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Sun Nov 19 14:47:04 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Sun, 19 Nov 2006 09:47:04 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] 'a process of non-thinking called faith' 2 In-Reply-To: <455F90FE.2090208@lineone.net> References: <455F90FE.2090208@lineone.net> Message-ID: On 11/18/06, ben wrote: > > "Robert Bradbury" said: > > > If we cannot make good judgements now, how can we be expected to make > > them in the future? > > I though this was a rather odd thing for a transhumanist to say. > Don't you expect your ability to make good judgements to improve in the > future? I'm not sure. One could cite the war in Iraq as an example. Why was it not instead a war in the Sudan? [the question is rhetorical... lets not fall into a political rehashing pit.] Because almost all people perceive of themselves as quite attached to their position and because the nano-santas will generally eliminate classical "positions" I expect that many people will become lost and that a lot of bad judgements will result. It is somewhat worse if AGIs develop. As I've stated before I don't really want to live in a world where I know that an AGI is running around climbing the curve at the limits imposed by the laws of physics. It forces me into a position of giving up my "position" so as to effectively become equivalent to the the AGI (where the past me is probably becoming a microfraction of myself at an extremely rapid rate) or choose to position myself someplace in the middle of the range from luddite human to AGI-at-the-limits (a *very* large range). You generally do *not* have that choice today and so you don't have to deal with that problem. If the choice develops rapidly as might well be the case one will hardly know what choices wil be best. A Las Vegas "all you can eat" buffet is not necessarily a good thing. Robert -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From spike66 at comcast.net Sun Nov 19 16:13:59 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Sun, 19 Nov 2006 08:13:59 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Suicide the Green way In-Reply-To: <200611182130.kAILU81a029058@ms-smtp-04.texas.rr.com> Message-ID: <200611191624.kAJGOc38019367@andromeda.ziaspace.com> I would have answered Zach's question differently: > -----Original Message----- > From: extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org [mailto:extropy-chat- > bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Max More ... > > Dear Ethan, > > After careful consideration I have decided to end my life. Things > haven't been going very well for me lately, but more importantly I am > keen to reduce my carbon impact on the planet. Like the average > Briton I probably produce around 9.3 tonnes of carbon each year... Actually Zach, this is not correct. You *produce* exactly *no* carbon. In fact one can argue that you actually reduce the amount of carbon thus: the abundance of carbon 14 in your body is about a part per trillion in the usual carbon 12. If you are a big guy with a mass of 100 kg (this makes assumption single digit calcs easier) then you have about a tenth of a microgram of carbon 14. You are 26 years old, then that's about five milli-half lives of carbon 14, and you grew from perhaps 4 kg as an infant, so you would have been carrying approximately 50 kg mass on average, of which perhaps 20% by mass is carbon, so you will have destroyed carbon, or rather converted it to nitrogen in your body, about .02 nanograms of it, or 20 picograms if you would rather look at it that way. If that doesn't sound like much contribution, think of it as getting rid of about 10 trillion carbon 14 atoms in your short life. Congratulations! If you want the culprit that is actually *creating* carbon, go outside in the daytime and look at the sky. The sun makes carbon 14 by bombarding nitrogen with cosmic rays. If a square meter on the ground sees a pressure of about 10E5 newtons, then the mass of atmosphere is about 10E4 kg per meter, and the radius of the earth is about 6.4e6 meters, so the surface area is about 3.6e14 m^2 so the mass of the atmosphere is about 3.6E18 kg and carbon dioxide is about 380 parts per million by volume, so that is about 600 ppm by mass and of that carbon dioxide, about a quarter of the mass is actual carbon, so about 160 parts per million by mass in the atmosphere is carbon, so thats about 6e14 kg of carbon in the atmosphere, and the part of the biosphere that interacts with the atmosphere is probably a good twice that, so lets just assume about 1e15 kg of carbon, and one part per trillion of that is carbon 14, so thats about 1000 kg of carbon 14 in environmental equilibrium (it is being made as fast as it decays). So if half that 1000 kg of carbon goes away in about 6000 years, then the sun must be making the stuff at about 100 grams a year just to maintain that equilibrium. So you have rid this planet of 20 picograms of carbon in a sense, but the sun creates about 100 grams a year, so the amount of carbon that you removed is created by the sun about every 10 microseconds. > I am > 26 years old, and reckon I could live for another 60 years; if I end > things now I will save a total of 558 tonnes of carbon... Actually you wouldn't *save* any carbon by removing yourself, but rather would destroy another perhaps 50 to 80 picograms of carbon in that time by living, depending on your size and how you want to look at it. spike From pharos at gmail.com Sun Nov 19 16:49:51 2006 From: pharos at gmail.com (BillK) Date: Sun, 19 Nov 2006 16:49:51 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] 'a process of non-thinking called faith' 2 In-Reply-To: References: <455F90FE.2090208@lineone.net> Message-ID: On 11/19/06, Robert Bradbury wrote: > > I'm not sure. One could cite the war in Iraq as an example. Why was it > not instead a war in the Sudan? [the question is rhetorical... lets not > fall into a political rehashing pit.] > The war in Iraq was partly to stop Sadaam's genocide against the Kurds and his other killing sprees against anyone he thought of as an enemy. How many wars against genocide do you want at the same time? > Because almost all people perceive of themselves as quite attached to their > position and because the nano-santas will generally eliminate classical > "positions" I expect that many people will become lost and that a lot of bad > judgements will result. It is somewhat worse if AGIs develop. > > As I've stated before I don't really want to live in a world where I know > that an AGI is running around climbing the curve at the limits imposed by > the laws of physics. It forces me into a position of giving up my > "position" so as to effectively become equivalent to the the AGI (where the > past me is probably becoming a microfraction of myself at an extremely rapid > rate) or choose to position myself someplace in the middle of the range from > luddite human to AGI-at-the-limits (a *very* large range). You generally > do *not* have that choice today and so you don't have to deal with that > problem. If the choice develops rapidly as might well be the case one will > hardly know what choices wil be best. A Las Vegas "all you can eat" buffet > is not necessarily a good thing. > Certainly, if transhumans just think 'faster', then they won't necessarily think any 'better' or 'differently' than at present. They will just reach the same poor conclusions a bit quicker. Some might suggest that extra processing speed would enable transhumans to take more factors into account in their decision-making and thus make better decisions. But while that is true, it won't actually happen unless some form of mental training in how to think logically is also added. This seems to be assumed in a lot of discussion about transhumans. That by some magic, these superhumans will be really nice and moral and care for the poor ordinary humans left behind. Whereas it seems just as likely to me that they will be equally as brutal and nasty as ordinary humans given a bit more power. Leap twenty years ahead and we might have transhumans that can watch the ball game, read a comic, listen to rap music, chat to their friends, trade on ebay, plagiarise an essay for college work, schedule social activities, etc. all at the same time. That's progress for you. BillK From hkhenson at rogers.com Sun Nov 19 17:26:41 2006 From: hkhenson at rogers.com (Keith Henson) Date: Sun, 19 Nov 2006 12:26:41 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] 'a process of non-thinking called faith' 2 (2) In-Reply-To: <002c01c70ba1$634fc1c0$660fa8c0@kevin> References: <5.1.0.14.0.20061117094643.03842438@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> <021801c70a7d$c14542c0$660fa8c0@kevin> <5.1.0.14.0.20061118200729.0360de48@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> Message-ID: <5.1.0.14.0.20061119111540.0363dcc8@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> At 12:10 AM 11/19/2006 -0600, you wrote: > > >But I do not subscribe to your notion of a lower level gene driven >program of genocide. > > > > Ok, though you might note that chimps practice genocide on neighbors. > > >Is it true genocide? Or is it something else entirely? Is the killing done >for genetic reasons or are there cultural considerations? What genotypes do >they seek to kill? In spite of both germs sharing the related Greek roots genea and genos, genocide is not related to genes, at least not directly: gene 1911, from Ger. Gen, coined 1905 by Dan. scientist Wilhelm Ludvig Johannsen (1857-1927), from Gk. genea "generation, race" (see kin). De Vries had earlier called them pangenes. genocide Coined in 1944 from Greek genos ('race,' 'kind') and -cide, from Latin -cidere, 'to kill'. 1. The systematic killing of substantial numbers of people on the basis of ethnicity, religion, political opinion, social status, or other particularity. 2. Acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnic, racial or religious group. >Do they go after groups that are more genetically similar >to themselves? Or do they seem those that are less similar? Like human (before gene sequencing) they have no way to know. >Or do they seek >to destroy those that are closer by or further away? Neighbors. >Is it genocide when a >chimp kills a bonobo? Since genocide is only defined for humans it's a bit of a stretch to apply the term to one chimp group exterminating another. But they are (along with the bonobos) our closest relatives. >Or a baboon or monkey? Where exactly are those lines >that trigger it? Is genocide even a real phenomenon? I'm sorry if I am not >very clear in what I am saying. I have had a tough week and am having a >difficult time focusing. On line dictionaries are a good place to start. > > >If anything it's a defense mechanism where they feel that if they do not > > >kill, they will be killed. > > > > And that defense mechanism is *not* the result of genes that build brains? > >No. It would be similar to the fight or flee instinct. Instincts are evolved, hardwired, nerve circuits. The details of their construction comes from instructions provided by genes. >Many animals have >various defense mechanisms without any brain building going on. I can't think of any ones based on behavior that don't involve a brain. >This "brain >building genocide" requires that the more intelligent people are also the >most violent.......And "genocide" could work just as easily to shrink the >brain as it could to build a brain. Dumber, more violent and less rational >minds could win over the slightly smarter but less violent people which >allows their less sophisticated brains to reproduce more children. After >all, it's the tough football players in high school that get the girls, not >the geeks........... It would take more time than I have to walk you through advanced evolutionary psychology. For background, I suggest William Calvin's excellent web site. His books are on line or you can pick them up at a library. > > >I think that even if they were all genetic clones, after years of being > > >taught different things, living in different cultures and experiencing > > >different lives, they would still be killing each other. > > > > Oh. I misunderstood your meaning. What I guess you mean is a > > disinclination to kill those closely related even when there is a massive > > resource crunch. Humans don't have genetic analyzers so we make do with > > proxy information that was reliable enough when we lived in hunter gather > > bands. All those in the band could be considered related, family members > > were close relatives. > > > > Easter Island was settled by about 20 people, probably already closely > > related. There followed about 400 years of peaceful population growth, > > reaching perhaps as many as 20,000 people and grossly over exploiting the > > resources of the island. One day they downed the tools they had been >using > > to make the statues, and went at each other with rocks till 95% of the > > population was dead. At that point the wars ended. A generation or two > > later Europeans visited (a disaster in itself). > > > > The point here is that there was a *long* period with little or no > > warfare. What turned it on and what turned it off? > >Maybe a sudden loss of good quality women? Maybe through disease? Easter Island is the most isolated human habitation on earth. >Or maybe that sibling rivalry that grows into a family dispute splitting the >family and then people take sides and after so many generations they are >always suspicious of each other, then someone does something stupid or evil, >or an accident occurs which is blamed on someone else.........Heck, the list >goes on. Can you not think of any other reason than to say it's embedded in >the genes? You need not assume that something was "turned on". People get >angry about all sorts of stuff and they have the capacity to kill. Then as >they become desensitized to it killing becomes easier and easier. Things >escalate until such time that there are much fewer people and they look back >and see what they did and go "maybe we should thing about peace". This >process plays over and over throughout history. If you continue to add fuel >and air, eventually a small spark sets off a big flame. Then when there is >nothing left but rubble, people recognize how badly they need each other and >start to play nice again. More like the reduced load on the environment make the future look brighter. In such times it is more rewarding for genes for people to quit fighting and raise kids. >If genocide were truly embedded in our genes, then >you could drop 10 people of various races with various skills on an island >from a shipwreck and expect them to kill each other. I thnk they would >choose to work together for their own survival. You have a misunderstanding of what genocide is. Rwanda is a fairly pure example of genocide. Genocide (and war) are set off by perception of future conditions (mostly economic) that are worse than the current. I make the case that the mechanisms evolved during the millions of years human ancestors lived as Very often this is the result of population growth in excess of that the environment can support. (For a given technology.) Keith Hensom From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Sun Nov 19 17:40:17 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Sun, 19 Nov 2006 12:40:17 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Suicide the Green way In-Reply-To: <200611191624.kAJGOc38019367@andromeda.ziaspace.com> References: <200611182130.kAILU81a029058@ms-smtp-04.texas.rr.com> <200611191624.kAJGOc38019367@andromeda.ziaspace.com> Message-ID: On 11/19/06, spike wrote: > > > Actually Zach, this is not correct. You *produce* exactly *no* carbon. [snip one of Spike's extensive BotE calculations indicating he must be seeking to exercise that part of his mind...] It isn't whether or not Zach is producing or not producing carbon that is the question. Its the form it ends up in (CO2, CH4, CaCO3, C, etc.) and *where* that form effectively resides. Currently the economic environment (esp. human activity) is oriented around taking carbon stored in relatively benign forms underground and transforming it into non-benign forms in the atmosphere. The contribution of humans to atmospheric greenhouse gas concentrations far exceeds the Sun's contribution. Now, if you are really bored Spike, we can go back to the "How much mass could we have landed on Pluto at sufficiently low velocity that it would have remained in a functional state?" question. If the Israeli's are doing R&D on developing bee sized robots that can observe (and potentially kill) terrorists, then one has to return to the question of whether or not we could have delivered a "bee orbiter" to Pluto? You don't get away with throwing away $400M (or whatever New Horizons cost) *that* easily. Robert -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From lcorbin at rawbw.com Sun Nov 19 19:00:18 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Sun, 19 Nov 2006 11:00:18 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Why Identify With That Which is Different? (was Re: a process of non-thinking called faith) References: <455F90FE.2090208@lineone.net> Message-ID: <015901c70c0d$292d20c0$6601a8c0@homeef7b612677> Robert writes > As I've stated before I don't really want to live in a world > where I know that an AGI is running around climbing the > curve at the limits imposed by the laws of physics. You'd rather be dead??? Or did you simply mean, "I'd *prefer* to live in a world in which no AGI is running around climbing the curve..."? > It forces me into a position of giving up my "position" so as > to effectively become equivalent to the the AGI (where the > past me is probably becoming a microfraction of myself at > an extremely rapid rate) I note your use of the word "my" in the first phrase, and your use of "past me" as something distinct from "myself" in the last phrase. If you are going to "be" in a future world, I'm sorry, but it makes far more logical and rational sense to identify with versions that are closer to who you are now than with versions that are more different. Moreover, identification with versions that are less similar is almost surely erroneous and false to facts. Lee From lcorbin at rawbw.com Sun Nov 19 19:25:30 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Sun, 19 Nov 2006 11:25:30 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Somewhat pessimistic view of teaching EP References: <5.1.0.14.0.20061117094643.03842438@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com><5.1.0.14.0.20061118000250.0397c0e0@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> <7d79ed890611190320l74d7ebf2g54a3cf993b712e7a@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <016501c70c10$8e388fb0$6601a8c0@homeef7b612677> Michael writes > On 11/17/06, Keith Henson wrote: >> http://chronicle.com/temp/reprint.php?id=xm3c4mgmb8b6fhkn54zhzwxfcgbzpjdl >> >> The Social Responsibility in Teaching Sociobiology > ...snippage... >> (I have a considerable list of objections to the article. Can any of you >> guess where? HKH) > > Why ask, when I'll bet you can point is to a Fisking URL? > > PS: I'm not sure *what* I think of the main thrust of the article. > That's one big reason I'd rather see your actual critique than try to > construct it. All he was asking is at what *point* in the "Social Responsibility" article one might suppose he himself demurred :-) I know where I disagree with it---and I'll post that. It may turn out that Keith disagrees with it in exactly the same spots! Wouldn't that be progress! :-) Lee From lcorbin at rawbw.com Sun Nov 19 19:58:04 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Sun, 19 Nov 2006 11:58:04 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Somewhat pessimistic view of teaching EP References: <5.1.0.14.0.20061117094643.03842438@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com><5.1.0.14.0.20061117094643.03842438@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> <5.1.0.14.0.20061118000250.0397c0e0@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> Message-ID: <016b01c70c15$422b77e0$6601a8c0@homeef7b612677> Keith wondered where one might disagree with > http://chronicle.com/temp/reprint.php?id=xm3c4mgmb8b6fhkn54zhzwxfcgbzpjdl > > The Social Responsibility in Teaching Sociobiology > By DAVID P. BARASH Here is where it bothered me: > At first glance, none of this [sociobiology, EP] this especially threatening. > Moreover it has been liberating [sic] in the extreme, shedding new light > on a wide range of animal and human social behavior. But at the same time, > the individual- and gene-centered view of life offers, in a sense, a perspective > that is profoundly selfish; hence Richard Dawkins's immensely influential book, > The Selfish Gene. The basic idea has been so productive that it has rapidly > become dogma: Living things compete with each other (more precisely, their > constituent genes struggle with alternative copies) in a never-ending > process of differential reproduction, using their bodies as vehicles, or > tools, for achieving success. The result has been to validate a view of > human motivations that seems to approve of personal selfishness while > casting doubt on any self-abnegating actions, seeing a self-serving > component behind any act, no matter how altruistic it might appear. > Sociobiologists have thus become modern-day descendants of the > cynical King Gama, from Gilbert and Sullivan's Princess Ida, who > proudly announces his cynicism: "A charitable action I can skillfully > dissect; And interested motives I'm delighted to detect." Of course, provided one refrains from making the naturalistic fallacy and confusing "is" with "ought", then there is no problem. (The author probably realizes this.) I just can't resist requoting this marvelous Hume quote: > It might ease the blow by noting that such a vision of human nature is > hardly unique to modern evolutionary science. Thus, in An Enquiry > Concerning Human Understanding (1748), David Hume wrote that "should a > traveller, returning from a far country, bring us an account of men wholly > different from any with whom we were ever acquainted ... who were entirely > divested of avarice, ambition, or revenge; who knew no pleasure but > friendship, generosity, and public spirit; we should immediately, from > these circumstances, detect the falsehood, and prove him a liar, with the > same certainty as if he had stuffed his narration with stories of centaurs > and dragons, miracles and prodigies." > > Why are people generally so unkind to those who criticize the > human species as being, at heart, unkind? Maybe because of > worry that such critics might be seeking to justify their own > unpleasantness by pointing to a general unpleasantness on the part of > others. And maybe also because most people like to think of themselves as > benevolent and altruistic, or at least, to think that other people think of > them that way. It seems likely that a cynic is harder to bamboozle. No, that's not it at all! It makes us justly and rightly uncomfortable for it to be said how innately wicked people are, because some people will blur the is/ought distinction. It makes the work harder for the moralizing conservatives---who already believe people are wicked---because in their view too many liberals or freethinkers who resist their preaching will now become selfish. (And they're right! Notice how some, e.g. Ayn Rand, glorified selfishness to the point that it weakens the bonds of social cohesion.) But even more than conservatives, who---at least the religious ones--- freely admitted Mankind's Wickedness, it bothered and upset liberals and freethinkers to no end, especially during the 1980s and 1990s. Stephen Jay Gould and many others denounced Sociobiology so vociferously that the entire field had to be renamed! > In Civilization and Its Discontents, perhaps his most pessimistic book, > Freud went on to lament that one of education's sins is that "it does not > prepare [children] for the aggressiveness of which they are destined to > become the objects. In sending the young into life with such a false > psychological orientation, education is behaving as though one were to > equip people starting on a Polar expedition with summer clothing and maps > of the Italian Lakes. In this it becomes evident that a certain misuse is > being made of ethical demands. The strictness of those demands would not do > so much harm if education were to say: 'This is how men ought to be, in > order to be happy and to make others happy; but you have to reckon on their > not being like that.' Instead of this the young are made to believe that > everyone else fulfills those ethical demands - that is, that everyone else > is virtuous. It is on this that the demand is based that the young, too, > shall become virtuous." The author seems to be agreeing with that horrible and awful fool Sigmund Freud. Damitol, but if you tell children that everyone is evil, just how you expect them to behave? Christ! > Bertrand Russell pointed out that "by the cultivation of large and > generous desires ... men can be brought to act more than they do > at present in a manner that is consistent with the general happiness of > mankind." Society is therefore left with the responsibility to do a lot of > cultivating. That's right! The author sees the light. > Seen this way, a biologically appropriate wisdom begins to emerge from the > various commandments and moral injunctions, nearly all of which can at > least be interpreted as trying to get people to behave "better," that is, > to develop and then act upon large and generous desires, to strive to be > more amiable, more altruistic, less competitive, and less selfish than they > might otherwise be. Yes. > Enter sociobiology. With its increasingly clear demonstration that Hume, > Freud, Brecht, and Nietzsche (also Machiavelli and Hobbes) are basically > onto something, Any old-fashioned preacher could have told you that, and they did > and that selfishness resides in our very genes, it would > seem not only that evolution is a dispiriting guide to human behavior, but > also that the teaching of sociobiology (or evolutionary psychology) should > be undertaken only with great caution. The renowned primatologist Sarah > Hrdy accordingly questioned "whether sociobiology should be taught at the > high-school level ... because it can be very threatening to students still > in the process of shaping their own priorities," adding: "The whole message > of sociobiology is oriented toward the success of the individual. ... > Unless a student has a moral framework already in place, we could be > producing social monsters by teaching this." > > What to do? One possibility - unacceptable, I would hope, to most educators > - would be to refrain altogether from teaching such dangerous truths. Oh, leave the poor children alone! They don't need it drilled into them how despicable so many people really are and how much violence seems to reside in human nature itself. Nor need they be taught the exactly best way to fit condoms onto penises, nor how to safely inject drugs (yes, yes, they'll use drugs anyway and have sex anyway etc., etc., yawn), or how to safely hit only the people you are shooting at during your gang skirmishes. Let's leave gun safely, sex education, optimal meth dosages, and so on to their peers and parents. > Teacher, leave them kids alone! Preferable, I submit, is to structure the > teaching of sociobiology along the lines of sex education: Teach what we > know, but do so in age-appropriate stages. Just as we would not bombard > kindergartners with the details of condom use, we probably ought not > instruct preteens in the finer points of sociobiology, especially since > many of those are hidden even to those expected to do the teaching. When most kids "graduate" high school unable to read at the sixth grade level, I think there are *more* important things to concentrate on. But who can resist putting politics and ideology into the schools? Keith concludes > (I have a considerable list of objections to the article. Can any of you > guess where? HKH) Probably not at all the same places where I demur! :-) Lee From benboc at lineone.net Sun Nov 19 23:25:23 2006 From: benboc at lineone.net (ben) Date: Sun, 19 Nov 2006 23:25:23 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] 'a process of non-thinking called faith' 2 In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4560E7E3.9090809@lineone.net> "Robert Bradbury" wrote: [me] >> I though this was a rather odd thing for a transhumanist to say. >> Don't you expect your ability to make good judgements to improve in >> the future? > I'm not sure > ... > It forces me into a position of giving up my "position" so as to > effectively become equivalent to the the AGI (where the past me is > probably becoming a microfraction of myself at an extremely rapid > rate) OK, we all fall under the 'tranhumanist' umbrella, but that seems to embrace some radically different stances. "climbing the curve at the limits imposed by the laws of physics" "The past me becoming a microfraction of myself at an extremely rapid rate" They sound like the kind of thing that would be eminently desirable to me. I see the current me as little more than a foetus, comparatively speaking, in terms of intelligence, understanding, ability (including the ability to make 'good judgments'), etc. I certainly don't want to stay that way. I want to grow up! As somebody once said "We're all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars". I find it odd that you personally seem to expect or want to 'stay in the gutter', if i understand you right. Then BillK said: > Certainly, if transhumans just think 'faster', then they won't > necessarily think any 'better' or 'differently' than at present. They > will just reach the same poor conclusions a bit quicker. > > Some might suggest that extra processing speed would enable > transhumans to take more factors into account in their > decision-making and thus make better decisions. But while that is > true, it won't actually happen unless some form of mental training in > how to think logically is also added. This seems to be assumed in a > lot of discussion about transhumans. That by some magic, these > superhumans will be really nice and moral and care for the poor > ordinary humans left behind. Whereas it seems just as likely to me > that they will be equally as brutal and nasty as ordinary humans > given a bit more power. > > Leap twenty years ahead and we might have transhumans that can watch > the ball game, read a comic, listen to rap music, chat to their > friends, trade on ebay, plagiarise an essay for college work, > schedule social activities, etc. all at the same time. That's > progress for you. Wow. This is really pessimistic. If that's what we're headed for, what's the point? I mean, it's possible that there is nothing beyond our current mental horizons (i don't believe it, but that doesn't mean it isn't possible), but i'd sure like to find out. Do you really think that our future is just 'bigger bananas'? Won't we be entering a new arena, where the things that lead humans to be brutal and nasty have been overcome? I'm not saying post-humans will be automatically super-benevolent, but at least the rules of the game should change so much that the game becomes something different altogether. I should imagine that ball games, comics and rap music would have about as much appeal (and relevance) as catching termites with a stick has for us now. ben zaiboc From acy.stapp at gmail.com Sun Nov 19 23:56:34 2006 From: acy.stapp at gmail.com (Acy Stapp) Date: Sun, 19 Nov 2006 17:56:34 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] 'a process of non-thinking called faith' 2 (2) In-Reply-To: <5.1.0.14.0.20061117231920.03a63858@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> References: <5.1.0.14.0.20061117094643.03842438@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> <5.1.0.14.0.20061117231920.03a63858@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> Message-ID: Dawkins discusses a study by Isreali psychologist George Tamarin wherein he presents to more than a thousand Israeli schoolchildren the account of the battle of Jericho, in particular the quote "Then they [Joshua's soldiers] utterly destroyed all in the city, both men and women, young and old, exen, sheep, and asses, with the edge of the sword... And they burned the city with fire, and all within it; only the silver and gold, and the vessels of bronze and of iron, they put into the treasury of the house of the LORD." Tamarin then asked the children whether Joshua and the Israelites acted morally or not. 66% expressed total approval, and 26% total disapproval. The justifications given for approval were religious in every case, and even some of those who expressed disapproval objected on backhanded religious grounds. Now what is especially interesting is the control group, who were given the same text with "Joshua" replaced by "General Lin" and "Isreal" replaced by "A Chinese kingdom 3000 years ago". In Dawkins words, "Only 7 per cent approved of General Lin's behaviour, and 75 per cent disapproved. In other words, when their loyalty to Judaism was removed from the calculation, thje majority of the children agreed with the moral judgements that most modern humans would share." Perhaps there is a difference between making factual and moral judgements. Acy On 11/17/06, Keith Henson wrote: > > > So you need to account for this capacity. Like virtually all > psychological > trait is must be rooted in the way stone age hunter gatherer bands lived > and relative reproductive success. So how do you account for people > having > the capacity to have religions? Note that people don't pick up religions > (and faith) as young children. > > -- Acy Stapp "When I'm working on a problem, I never think about beauty. I think only how to solve the problem. But when I have finished, if the solution is not beautiful, I know it is wrong." -- R. Buckminster Fuller (1895 - 1983) -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From spike66 at comcast.net Mon Nov 20 04:28:40 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Sun, 19 Nov 2006 20:28:40 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Suicide the Green way In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <200611200439.kAK4d3iM001814@andromeda.ziaspace.com> bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Robert Bradbury ...Now, if you are really bored Spike, we can go back to the "How much mass could we have landed on Pluto at sufficiently low velocity that it would have remained in a functional state?" question...Robert An even more interesting question was discussed by Amara Graps and me when she was here for Richard Dawkins' talk in Menlo Park. Someone noted that Gene Roddenberry had arranged to have himself cremated upon his demise and have his remains launched into space. But my observation is that unless the orbit is sufficiently high, one would eventually re-enter the atmosphere, so this would be no more satisfying than having one's ashes scattered about the globe in the usual (and far cheaper) fashion. The question then becomes: how high would one need to launch ones mortal remains in order to insure that one would not wind up eventually falling back down the earth's gravity well? The next question is can we assure ourselves that we would not eventually fall into the sun? I had some thoughts on this topic, which ties in nicely with the topic of green suicide and reaching out to touch the stars. If one grinds one's ashes finely, the ballistic coefficient is very low, so one would need to clear the atmosphere by a long distance. This would necessitate circularizing the orbit, which means carrying a second thrust capability and a guidance system out to apogee, which is expensive. Alternately one could achieve earth escape velocity in the initial burn, again very expensive. But there may be another way. One could reduce one's remains to carbon dioxide, then at apogee the spacecraft could heat the CO2 and fire it forward, giving it some extra delta V. Then, even if the CO2 molecules do not have escape velocity, the light pressure from the sun would provide the extra energy needed to lift it on out of the sun's gravity well, and off into the vast empty abyss you go. This need not interfere with one's cryonics plans, and for that matter need not wait until one perishes. One could use one's toenails for instance, as the source of carbon dioxide, or in some cases a semen sample, thus to collect carbon that was once one's DNA, not to mention being less painful than using a blood sample. The previous posts on this subject noted that the sun is producing perhaps 100 grams of carbon 14 a year (I would welcome some extro-cluemeister checking my estimates on this). How cool it would be to launch into space an amount of carbon from one's person equal to the amount of carbon thus created in one's lifetime. In my case this is 4.6 kg, which is a lot of semen, but sacrifices must be made I suppose to achieve this form of immortality. The latter approach of launching while we are still living has the advantage of allowing a high-risk launch, since arbitrarily much DNA or personal carbon is still available should the rocket fail. Actually I would settle for a far smaller fraction of mass to orbit if I could get a few complete DNA strands into the cosmos. I propose we write to Space Services Inc. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_burial and ask how we might be launched in such a way as to insure eventual escape from the sun's orbit. Then Dr. Graps could offer consulting services to do the calculations for the mission. SSI offers canisters that eventually re-enter like an asteroid. Well how lame is that? I counter-propose that the canisters are made of some material that sublimes in deep space to avoid additional space debris, and a small explosive device that would scatter one's remains or DNA widely, so that the solar light pressure could act on individual DNA molecules. So then cluey ones, how do we get DNA strands in a form that can be launched and separated into individual strands? And if so, will light pressure be sufficient to push them away from the earth and sun? Without breaking them to pieces? How high would we need to go? Are there any alternatives, such as putting a facility into solar orbit, reading our DNA here, synthesizing a copy of it there, and launching gently from that vantage point? spike From spike66 at comcast.net Mon Nov 20 04:32:05 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Sun, 19 Nov 2006 20:32:05 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Suicide the Green way In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <200611200450.kAK4oqCS022593@andromeda.ziaspace.com> bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Robert Bradbury ...? Currently the economic environment (esp. human activity) is oriented around taking carbon stored in relatively benign forms underground and transforming it into non-benign forms in the atmosphere... Ja, that is one way of looking at it. Another way is that human activity is taking carbon trapped in relatively useless forms underground and transforming it into forms that can be incorporated by living matter, or providing the opportunity for bored sequestered carbon to get out and have some fun again. spike From jef at jefallbright.net Mon Nov 20 05:12:49 2006 From: jef at jefallbright.net (Jef Allbright) Date: Sun, 19 Nov 2006 21:12:49 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Primates dreams and posthuman futures In-Reply-To: <4560E7E3.9090809@lineone.net> Message-ID: I still feel my buttons getting pushed--even with years of exposure to the diversity of opinions and viewpoints on this list--when someone starts talking about posthuman futures, all the while juxtaposing their current self-image with future ecologies (or perhaps "economies" might be the better word) that would eat them up in an instant, if in fact they merited even that much attention. Of course, getting one's buttons pushed is the point of this discussion, for we define ourselves in terms of what sets us off, and gets us off, in our relationships to society and our environment. But is it a failure of imagination, or rather a resounding success of self-assurance, that the worlds we imagine always seem to contain a version of the Self we know and love? Don't worry... You will NOT be assimilated. Who would assimilate you, let alone want to employ you, or even interact with you, in a world where the pace of production is thousands (or millions) of times faster than today? Lizbeth and I went to the zoo yesterday, and I was repeatedly struck by how every animal species demonstrated its competitive traits--territoriality and domination at every level--and how every instance of cooperation is (in the bigger picture) a more effective means of competition within a hostile coevolutionary environment. Of course, all the people at the zoo are quite contentedly aware that humans and animals aren't really comparable, I mean, look at who's caged and then who's actually free to enjoy life... So when transhumanists dream of fantastic futures, with "highly advanced" lifestyles including a multitude of novel sexual modes, unimagined sensory feasts, and amazing feats of physical and mental prowess (for peaceful purposes only, of course), they might do well to consider a nice out of the way space or undersea community, or perhaps a virtual reality simulation providing all the comforts of their native habitat while remaining relatively safe from predators. The good news is that the long tail of the accelerating technological growth curve may provide plenty of niches for entities such as ourselves to enjoy those aspects of life that deep down we know make it truly worth living. The only alternative would be to lose ourselves in change, abandoning all dignity and respect much as certain lowly larva unthinkingly give up everything that matters to them, for their transformation to a butterfly. - Jef > Ben wrote: > "Robert Bradbury" wrote: > > [me] > >> I though this was a rather odd thing for a transhumanist to say. > >> Don't you expect your ability to make good judgements to > improve in > >> the future? > > > I'm not sure > > ... > > It forces me into a position of giving up my "position" so as to > > effectively become equivalent to the the AGI (where the past me is > > probably becoming a microfraction of myself at an extremely rapid > > rate) > > OK, we all fall under the 'tranhumanist' umbrella, but that > seems to embrace some radically different stances. > > "climbing the curve at the limits imposed by the laws of physics" > "The past me becoming a microfraction of myself at an > extremely rapid rate" > > They sound like the kind of thing that would be eminently > desirable to me. I see the current me as little more than a > foetus, comparatively speaking, in terms of intelligence, > understanding, ability (including the ability to make 'good > judgments'), etc. I certainly don't want to stay that way. I > want to grow up! > > As somebody once said "We're all in the gutter, but some of > us are looking at the stars". > I find it odd that you personally seem to expect or want to > 'stay in the gutter', if i understand you right. > > > Then BillK said: > > > Certainly, if transhumans just think 'faster', then they won't > > necessarily think any 'better' or 'differently' than at > present. They > > will just reach the same poor conclusions a bit quicker. > > > > Some might suggest that extra processing speed would enable > > transhumans to take more factors into account in their > decision-making > > and thus make better decisions. But while that is true, it won't > > actually happen unless some form of mental training in how to think > > logically is also added. This seems to be assumed in a lot of > > discussion about transhumans. That by some magic, these superhumans > > will be really nice and moral and care for the poor ordinary humans > > left behind. Whereas it seems just as likely to me that > they will be > > equally as brutal and nasty as ordinary humans given a bit > more power. > > > > Leap twenty years ahead and we might have transhumans that > can watch > > the ball game, read a comic, listen to rap music, chat to their > > friends, trade on ebay, plagiarise an essay for college > work, schedule > > social activities, etc. all at the same time. That's > progress for you. > > > Wow. > > This is really pessimistic. > If that's what we're headed for, what's the point? > > I mean, it's possible that there is nothing beyond our current mental > horizons (i don't believe it, but that doesn't mean it isn't > possible), > but i'd sure like to find out. > > Do you really think that our future is just 'bigger bananas'? > > Won't we be entering a new arena, where the things that lead humans to > be brutal and nasty have been overcome? I'm not saying > post-humans will > be automatically super-benevolent, but at least the rules of the game > should change so much that the game becomes something different > altogether. I should imagine that ball games, comics and rap > music would > have about as much appeal (and relevance) as catching termites with a > stick has for us now. From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Mon Nov 20 06:44:22 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Mon, 20 Nov 2006 01:44:22 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Suicide the Green way In-Reply-To: <200611200439.kAK4d3iM001814@andromeda.ziaspace.com> References: <200611200439.kAK4d3iM001814@andromeda.ziaspace.com> Message-ID: On 11/19/06, spike wrote: > So then cluey ones, how do we get DNA strands in a form that can be > launched > and separated into individual strands? And if so, will light pressure be > sufficient to push them away from the earth and sun? Without breaking > them > to pieces? How high would we need to go? Are there any alternatives, > such > as putting a facility into solar orbit, reading our DNA here, synthesizing > a > copy of it there, and launching gently from that vantage point? Ok, I hereby certify Spike as a "god". Gods are not recognized by their answers but by whether or not they ask the right questions (solutions are easy, questions are hard). So, in answer to the questions (I'm doing the easy part)... The individual strands question becomes moot in the light of the functional translation question. Do you have actual information content and does it do something? Light pressure is not important. Survival of the information content is. The information content is useless without a reader (this is an interesting perspective from an extropic standpoint). So, spike you not only have to preserve the information but you have to translate it into a form which does something with it -- i.e. you have to define (and drive?) a path forward. La de da de da "We have upteen gazillion bits of Anders and Eliezers minds "on ice", we can resurrect them at any point in time, of what use is such a retroperspective given the currennt state of the universe?" Robert Robert -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From rhanson at gmu.edu Mon Nov 20 11:20:50 2006 From: rhanson at gmu.edu (Robin Hanson) Date: Mon, 20 Nov 2006 06:20:50 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Somewhat pessimistic view of teaching EP References: <5.1.0.14.0.20061117094643.03842438@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> <5.1.0.14.0.20061117094643.03842438@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> Message-ID: <0J91007BE0UQLCD0@caduceus1.gmu.edu> I have a new web forum that goes public today: OvercomingBias.com My first post there comments on this interesting article. On At 12:07 AM 11/18/2006, Keith Henson wrote: >http://chronicle.com/temp/reprint.php?id=xm3c4mgmb8b6fhkn54zhzwxfcgbzpjdl > >The Social Responsibility in Teaching Sociobiology > >By DAVID P. BARASH .. Robin Hanson rhanson at gmu.edu http://hanson.gmu.edu Associate Professor of Economics, George Mason University MSN 1D3, Carow Hall, Fairfax VA 22030-4444 703-993-2326 FAX: 703-993-2323 From femmechakra at yahoo.ca Mon Nov 20 05:14:20 2006 From: femmechakra at yahoo.ca (Anna Taylor) Date: Mon, 20 Nov 2006 00:14:20 -0500 (EST) Subject: [extropy-chat] 'a process of non-thinking called faith' 2 (2) In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <20061120051420.64115.qmail@web37205.mail.mud.yahoo.com> --- Acy Stapp wrote: >In other words, when their loyalty to Judaism was >removed from the calculation, the majority of the >children agreed with the moral judgements that most >modern humans would share." Do you realize how hard it is to remove "moral judgement" within the realm of Judaism? >Perhaps there is a difference between making factual >and moral judgements. I agree that there are significant differences between making factual and moral judgements. Just curious and my opinion. Anna:) __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com From asa at nada.kth.se Mon Nov 20 15:13:04 2006 From: asa at nada.kth.se (Anders Sandberg) Date: Mon, 20 Nov 2006 16:13:04 +0100 (MET) Subject: [extropy-chat] Suicide the Green way In-Reply-To: <200611200439.kAK4d3iM001814@andromeda.ziaspace.com> References: <200611200439.kAK4d3iM001814@andromeda.ziaspace.com> Message-ID: <54518.81.129.213.148.1164035584.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> (As for the original question in this thread, I have always thought burial at a tower of silence http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Towers_of_Silence would be the most eco-friendly, although one has to tweak it to fit the local ecology: http://arxiv.org/abs/nlin/0610043 ) spike wrote: > So then cluey ones, how do we get DNA strands in a form that can be > launched > and separated into individual strands? Do you really need them individually separated? Extracting DNA from tissue is fairly easy (classic classroom demonstration that produces a gooey fibrous solution), and one could easily dry that out to small light fibre mats. Maybe a bit of gel electrophoresis, and then we freeze the gel or turn it into an aerogel? > And if so, will light pressure be > sufficient to push them away from the earth and sun? Without breaking > them > to pieces? The UV radiation is bad for DNA, so if you want to keep it intact it oought to be protected. Aluminium foil perhaps, and why not make it a tiny solar sail? If you just want to make sure your carbon leaves, maybe you should get it integrated into a carbon fiber solar sail: http://www.space.com/businesstechnology/technology/carbonsail_000302.html As long as it is less than 0.78 g/m^2 it will tend to drift outwards. > How high would we need to go? Are there any alternatives, > such > as putting a facility into solar orbit, reading our DNA here, synthesizing > a > copy of it there, and launching gently from that vantage point? If we are sending DNA as messages in bottles on solar sails, why not encode other information on the sail? A good aluminium sail is supposed to have half wavelength holes, and one could easily think of writing messages with the holes like on a CD. Maybe a big macroscopic "how to read this" pattern, and then a distributed error-correcting code with some repetitions (to deal with micrometeorites) with the message. Since a human genome fits when compressed nearly on a CD, I guess we could send our genomes to the stars using microsails the size of a CD. -- Anders Sandberg, Oxford Uehiro Centre for Practical Ethics Philosophy Faculty of Oxford University From mmbutler at gmail.com Mon Nov 20 20:23:54 2006 From: mmbutler at gmail.com (Michael M. Butler) Date: Mon, 20 Nov 2006 12:23:54 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Suicide the Green way In-Reply-To: <54518.81.129.213.148.1164035584.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> References: <200611200439.kAK4d3iM001814@andromeda.ziaspace.com> <54518.81.129.213.148.1164035584.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> Message-ID: <7d79ed890611201223u4e429d58x45a668b273ea32cd@mail.gmail.com> On 11/20/06, Anders Sandberg wrote: > A good aluminium sail is supposed to have half wavelength holes Interesting. I hadn't heard that. Source, please? -- Michael M. Butler : m m b u t l e r ( a t ) g m a i l . c o m From asa at nada.kth.se Mon Nov 20 21:15:42 2006 From: asa at nada.kth.se (Anders Sandberg) Date: Mon, 20 Nov 2006 22:15:42 +0100 (MET) Subject: [extropy-chat] Suicide the Green way In-Reply-To: <7d79ed890611201223u4e429d58x45a668b273ea32cd@mail.gmail.com> References: <200611200439.kAK4d3iM001814@andromeda.ziaspace.com> <54518.81.129.213.148.1164035584.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> <7d79ed890611201223u4e429d58x45a668b273ea32cd@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <2257.163.1.72.81.1164057342.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> Michael M. Butler wrote: > On 11/20/06, Anders Sandberg wrote: >> A good aluminium sail is supposed to have half wavelength holes > > Interesting. I hadn't heard that. Source, please? I saw it on Wikipedia, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_sail I think it follows quite naturally from electromagnetic considerations. The more sail material removed, the lighter the sail, but high frequency radiation get through the narrow holes. If the spacing is a half wavelength then you get particularly good reflection. Playing around a bit with http://www.falstad.com/ripple/ seems to support this. -- Anders Sandberg, Oxford Uehiro Centre for Practical Ethics Philosophy Faculty of Oxford University From sjatkins at mac.com Mon Nov 20 23:14:38 2006 From: sjatkins at mac.com (Samantha Atkins) Date: Mon, 20 Nov 2006 15:14:38 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] 'a process of non-thinking called faith' 2 In-Reply-To: <455F90FE.2090208@lineone.net> References: <455F90FE.2090208@lineone.net> Message-ID: <1164064478.15944.29.camel@localhost> On Sat, 2006-11-18 at 23:02 +0000, ben wrote: > "Robert Bradbury" said: > > > If we cannot make good judgements now, how can we be expected to make > > them in the future? > > I though this was a rather odd thing for a transhumanist to say. > Don't you expect your ability to make good judgements to improve in the > future? > It seems to me that I have the "ability to make good judgements", at any rate better judgements than I appear to make by my actions, now. It is not at all clear that simply a much faster brain with vastly more capacity and wondrous capabilities for self-examination and change will automatically result in better judgements in practice. - samantha From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Mon Nov 20 22:13:01 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Mon, 20 Nov 2006 17:13:01 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Suicide the Green way In-Reply-To: <2257.163.1.72.81.1164057342.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> References: <200611200439.kAK4d3iM001814@andromeda.ziaspace.com> <54518.81.129.213.148.1164035584.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> <7d79ed890611201223u4e429d58x45a668b273ea32cd@mail.gmail.com> <2257.163.1.72.81.1164057342.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> Message-ID: On 11/20/06, Anders Sandberg wrote: > Michael M. Butler wrote: > > On 11/20/06, Anders Sandberg wrote: > >> A good aluminium sail is supposed to have half wavelength holes > > > > Interesting. I hadn't heard that. Source, please? This makes sense to me but manipulating the amount of material required for a useful solar sail with holes in it is presumably a rather dicey task. (Anders jumping off the diving board into the deep end of the pool which has had the water drained from it when he wasn't looking...) Of course as a piece of trivia one might want to read [1]... Design of a high performance solar sail system. Drexler, Kim Eric 1979, MIT Masters Thesis I've only read parts of it but as I recall Eric was doing the calculations based on thin films, not thin films with holes. Of course this entire corpus of scientific thought needs to be rewritten once you have nanorobots which can do nanoassembly in free space. Completely unexplored -- the best sail driven by a free electron laser tuned to the optimal wavelength to accelerate the sail (a) as fast as possible; (b) as efficiently as possible. (The optimal wavelength for energy conversion may not be the same as the optimal wavelength for sail construction). Offhand, does anyone know why boron doesn't reflect light? Or whether we can have hydrogen mirrors? Why do we have to constrain ourselves to aluminum? Robert 1. https://dspace.mit.edu/handle/1721.1/16234 -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From msd001 at gmail.com Mon Nov 20 23:46:58 2006 From: msd001 at gmail.com (Mike Dougherty) Date: Mon, 20 Nov 2006 18:46:58 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Suicide the Green way In-Reply-To: References: <200611200439.kAK4d3iM001814@andromeda.ziaspace.com> <54518.81.129.213.148.1164035584.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> <7d79ed890611201223u4e429d58x45a668b273ea32cd@mail.gmail.com> <2257.163.1.72.81.1164057342.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> Message-ID: <62c14240611201546i7361ac9ax48de54a3ca4945e6@mail.gmail.com> On 11/20/06, Robert Bradbury wrote: > > > Offhand, does anyone know why boron doesn't reflect light? Or whether we > can have hydrogen mirrors? Why do we have to constrain ourselves to > aluminum? > Is the purpose to spread the data into space, or to remove carbon from the earth? Spreading the data would be easier just pulsing a laser, wouldn't it? And if we have nanotech reassembly at our disposal, why be concerned with removing carbon? We'll be using it to build more diamondoid nanobots, right? -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From kerry_prez at yahoo.com Mon Nov 20 23:30:30 2006 From: kerry_prez at yahoo.com (Al Brooks) Date: Mon, 20 Nov 2006 15:30:30 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] 'a process of non-thinking called faith' 2 In-Reply-To: <1164064478.15944.29.camel@localhost> Message-ID: <999437.75022.qm@web51603.mail.yahoo.com> Yep. Imagine a Richard Nixon android as president. > It is not at all clear that simply a much faster brain with vastly more >capacity and wondrous capabilities for self-examination and change will >automatically result in better judgements in practice. >- samantha --------------------------------- Sponsored Link Degrees for working adults in as fast as 1 year. Bachelors, Masters, Associates. Top schools -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From asa at nada.kth.se Mon Nov 20 23:58:39 2006 From: asa at nada.kth.se (Anders Sandberg) Date: Tue, 21 Nov 2006 00:58:39 +0100 (MET) Subject: [extropy-chat] Suicide the Green way In-Reply-To: References: <200611200439.kAK4d3iM001814@andromeda.ziaspace.com> <54518.81.129.213.148.1164035584.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> <7d79ed890611201223u4e429d58x45a668b273ea32cd@mail.gmail.com> <2257.163.1.72.81.1164057342.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> Message-ID: <49348.86.144.175.46.1164067119.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> Landis has done some work on alternative materials for solar sails, focusing on dielectrics: http://www.niac.usra.edu/files/studies/final_report/4Landis.pdf Robert Bradbury wrote: > This makes sense to me but manipulating the amount of material required > for > a useful solar sail with holes in it is presumably a rather dicey task. True. Even unfolding the darn things have proven hard. I'm rather fond of the idea of using a plastic backing that evaporates in UV light, but I don't know if anybody has even got it to work. > (Anders jumping off the diving board into the deep end of the pool which > has > had the water drained from it when he wasn't looking...) Oops! Time to try to develop levitation! :-) > Offhand, does anyone know why boron doesn't reflect light? Isn't this due to the pi bonds in the atom sheets? A EM wave arrives, sets the mobile electrons in movement and is absorbed. But this would only work for the sheet allotrope, the rhomboedral ought to have other optical effects. Does anybody know what color it is? As for non-aluminium, according to Landis people looked at beryllioum but it wasn't so good. And it is hard to get many stable metals on the top of the periodic table. Landis also points out that for the laserdriven sail low resistance may actually beat lightness. Maybe we will go to the stars on gold foil? -- Anders Sandberg, Oxford Uehiro Centre for Practical Ethics Philosophy Faculty of Oxford University From pj at pj-manney.com Tue Nov 21 04:18:37 2006 From: pj at pj-manney.com (pjmanney) Date: Mon, 20 Nov 2006 23:18:37 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] LA Times article on hallucinogens Message-ID: <9992875.1652911164082717445.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> I'm very surprised such mediocre writing made it to the front page of the Sunday paper. It feels like their editor hacked at it with a machete. But I'm glad it made it because of the subject matter. It's about time this research got some mainstream play. PJ http://www.latimes.com/news/printedition/la-sci-mushroom19nov19,1,6831099.story Mushrooms take a trip back to the lab Banned hallucinogens may have medical benefits, but results are unpredictable. By Denise Gellene Times Staff Writer November 19, 2006 Resting on a hospital bed beneath a tie-dyed wall hanging, Pamela Sakuda felt a tingling sensation. Then bright colors started shimmering in her head. She had been depressed since being diagnosed with colon cancer two years earlier, but as the experimental drug took hold, she felt the sadness sweep away from her, leaving in its wake an overpowering sense of connection to loved ones, followed by an inner calm. "It was like an epiphany," said Sakuda, 59, recalling the 2005 drug treatment. Sakuda, a Long Beach software developer, was under the influence of the hallucinogen psilocybin, which she took during a UCLA study exploring the therapeutic effects of the active compound in "magic" mushrooms. Although illegal for general use, the drug has been approved for medical experiments such as this one. Scientists suspect the hallucinogen, whose use dates back to ancient Mexico, may have properties that could improve treatments for some psychological conditions and forms of physical pain. Long dismissed as medically useless, the banned mushrooms ? a staple of the psychedelic 1960s ? are taking a long, strange trip back to the lab. The medical journal Neurology in June reported on more than 20 cases in which mushroom ingestion prevented or stopped cluster headaches, a rare neurological disorder, more reliably than prescription pharmaceuticals. In July, researchers at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore reported that mushrooms could instill a sense of spirituality and connection, a finding that scientists said could lead to treatments for patients suffering from mental anguish or addiction. The research has been driven in part by the success of mood-altering pharmaceuticals, such as the antidepressant Prozac, which work on the same brain chemicals and pathways. Nothing scientists have learned so far indicates that recreational use of mushrooms is safe. The psychological effects remain unpredictable. Deaths have been linked to mushroom intoxication. A Ventura County teen was killed by a car two years ago as she wandered naked across the 101 Freeway after eating mushrooms. Even under the tightly controlled conditions of a clinical trial, some patients have had terrifying experiences marked by anxiety and paranoia; two people in the Johns Hopkins study likened the experience to being in a war. The drug "takes your thoughts through a prism and turns them around," Sakuda said. Her drug trip left her with a sense of peace ? a serenity she hadn't felt since her diagnosis. "It was like rebooting a computer," she said. Drugs' medical history Forty years ago, the study of hallucinogens in therapy was a mainstream endeavor. The Swiss drug company Sandoz provided pharmaceutical-grade tablets of psilocybin and various researchers explored its use as a treatment for depression and other psychological problems. Used for centuries during spiritual ceremonies by the Mazatec Indians in southern Mexico, mushrooms helped fuel the counterculture of the 1960s. Author Carlos Castaneda, while a graduate student at UCLA, wrote of his "magical time" with a Mexican shaman who introduced him to mushrooms and other hallucinogens. In 1970, Congress made it illegal to posses hallucinogens, including psilocybin and LSD, by classifying them as Schedule I, meaning they had no legitimate medical use. "All research was shut down," said UCLA psychiatrist Dr. Charles S. Grob. In the late 1990s, regulators began approving experiments again, sparked by discoveries in neuroscience that illuminated the biochemical basis of mood and consciousness. The advances focused on the complex role of the brain chemical serotonin ? a neurotransmitter that passes signals between cells. Spread throughout the brain are a variety of receptors that respond to serotonin. In some instances, a flow of serotonin can alter moods, such as depression, euphoria, anxiety and aggression. The chemical is also believed to be involved with nausea, body temperature and appetite control. Many hallucinogens, including psilocybin, mimic the action of serotonin on various receptors. When the drugs circulate in the brain, they can amplify, distort and cross signals. Sounds have colors, and motions become out-of-body experiences. The drugs can trigger emotionally charged states and potentially dangerous behavior. Even the most optimistic psychedelic researchers acknowledge that at best psilocybin will become a special-purpose drug administered under tight supervision because reactions vary. In addition to the sensory effects, hallucinogens create mental states in which patients become unusually open to suggestion, Grob said. He wanted to test whether that ability could be used to alleviate the suffering of terminal cancer patients overcome with a sense of hopelessness. Grob modeled his study after one conducted at Spring Grove Medical Center, a psychiatric hospital near Baltimore. The Spring Grove patients took LSD. Grob is using psilocybin, which is shorter-acting and considered somewhat less risky. The drug is produced in small quantities under special Drug Enforcement Administration permits. Grob has given the drug to seven terminally ill cancer patients. In Sakuda's case, weeks of counseling planted a desire to overcome her fears and sense of isolation. Since her diagnosis, she had avoided friends and kept her feelings bottled up. The experiment took place in a comfortable hospital room, under the close watch of a medical team. She wore eyeshades and headphones with soft music playing. Sakuda recalled sensing her husband's sadness over her illness and feeling a burden lifted from her. "It is not logical. It comes to you like that," she said. Sakuda died Nov. 10. Her husband, Norbert Litzinger, feels that the drug made a difference. "There was a rebirth around her and it didn't stop." The power of the drug extends beyond psychological effects. Dr. John Halpern and colleagues at McLean Hospital in Boston have been looking at the ability of magic mushrooms to treat cluster headaches, which affect about 1 million Americans, mostly men. The pain can be so severe that they are known as "suicide" headaches, occurring like clockwork at the same time each day, or the same month each year. No treatment has been shown to extend remissions from pain. Halpern examined medical records of 48 patients who had taken hallucinogenic mushrooms and reported in Neurology that the majority of them found partial or complete relief from cluster attacks. He speculated that the drug acts on the thalamus, a brain region populated with serotonin receptors. A clinical trial is needed to establish whether the mushrooms really work, Halpern said. "These are not people you'd expect from the drug culture," he said. "They are lawyers, teachers, business owners. They have a painful and debilitating condition, and found meaningful relief." Clandestine self-treatment Those who have used hallucinegenic mushrooms in the U.S. to ease their headaches are all lawbreakers. They have become part of a new mushroom underground. Many of its denizens are like Bob Wold ? a 53-year-old maintenance worker and Little League coach who had never taken hallucinogenic drugs before. He knew they could be dangerous. Wold, who lives near Chicago, said his headaches felt like an ice pick being jammed through his eye. Once, they made him drive his fist through a plaster wall at home. Another time he pounded his head against the shower tiles so hard some of them cracked. Seeking help, Wold stumbled across a website for cluster headache sufferers touting hallucinogenic mushrooms. A man he met on the Internet mailed Wold 20 dried brown mushrooms. The recipe called for a very light tea, not strong enough to cause hallucinations. After that, Wold started growing his own mushrooms. Wold has formed an organization to fund research aimed at developing a pharmaceutical version of psilocybin. But at home, he must make sure his crop is well hidden from his young grandchildren. Former Washington lobbyist Stuart Miller, 49, described his secret life as a mushroom user as "bizarre." Miller had frequent cluster headaches and carried capsules containing ground mushrooms everywhere. As he passed through security daily on Capitol Hill, or made his way through an airport, Miller worried that a search would uncover the capsules "and my career would be gone." He was never caught. He has moved to Mexico to care for an aging parent. Magic mushrooms grow wild in a nearby field. * -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- denise.gellene at latimes.com From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Tue Nov 21 04:42:09 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Mon, 20 Nov 2006 23:42:09 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Suicide the Green way In-Reply-To: <49348.86.144.175.46.1164067119.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> References: <200611200439.kAK4d3iM001814@andromeda.ziaspace.com> <54518.81.129.213.148.1164035584.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> <7d79ed890611201223u4e429d58x45a668b273ea32cd@mail.gmail.com> <2257.163.1.72.81.1164057342.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> <49348.86.144.175.46.1164067119.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> Message-ID: On 11/20/06, Anders Sandberg wrote: > > Offhand, does anyone know why boron doesn't reflect light? > > Isn't this due to the pi bonds in the atom sheets? A EM wave arrives, sets > the mobile electrons in movement and is absorbed. But this would only work > for the sheet allotrope, the rhomboedral ought to have other optical > effects. Does anybody know what color it is? Not I. But questions could involve why Be is reflective while B is not? And why is Al which is right above B in the PTE reflective but B is not? And then why are Ag and Au the best reflectors and why are they different in their reflectivity? (Ag is better than Au at most visible wavelengths). As for non-aluminium, according to Landis people looked at beryllioum but > it wasn't so good. And it is hard to get many stable metals on the top of > the periodic table. Landis also points out that for the laserdriven sail > low resistance may actually beat lightness. Maybe we will go to the stars > on gold foil? The mirror on the JWST is Be so it can't be that bad. I would be curious to know why low resistance beats lightness -- do the photons charge the sail? Robert -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From spike66 at comcast.net Tue Nov 21 04:41:21 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Mon, 20 Nov 2006 20:41:21 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Suicide the Green way In-Reply-To: <54518.81.129.213.148.1164035584.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> Message-ID: <200611210452.kAL4qDKq009383@andromeda.ziaspace.com> > -----Original Message----- > From: extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org [mailto:extropy-chat- > bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Anders Sandberg ... > > spike wrote: > > So then cluey ones, how do we get DNA strands in a form that can be > > launched and separated into individual strands? > > Do you really need them individually separated? Extracting DNA from tissue > is fairly easy (classic classroom demonstration that produces a gooey > fibrous solution), and one could easily dry that out to small light fibre > mats. Ja, very thin mats might work. I had in mind individual DNA strands because then it would drift outwards by light pressure regardless of its orientation in space or angular momentum upon release. Consider a thin piece of foil drifting randomly in interplanetary space without any guidance system. It might orient itself to reflect the light in the direction opposite to its velocity vector. Then it would pick up momentum from the photons and spiral outward. But it might rotate around and reflect in the direction of travel, thus spiral inward. It might be slowly rotating so that it accelerates part of the time and decelerates part of the time with no net gain or loss in distance from the sun. There is no guarantee of eventually climbing out of the sun's gravity well. My notion was that if we manage to isolate our DNA into strands, then perhaps somehow plate on a few atoms thickness of aluminum, it would be thin and light enough that it would be pushed away from the sun regardless of its orientation. Amara could do the actual calcs on that, or I can estimate them to single digit precision. > Maybe a bit of gel electrophoresis, and then we freeze the gel or turn it > into an aerogel? Possibly, but again I am thinking of the minimum mass. > > The UV radiation is bad for DNA, so if you want to keep it intact it > oought to be protected. Aluminium foil perhaps, and why not make it a tiny > solar sail? If you just want to make sure your carbon leaves, maybe you > should get it integrated into a carbon fiber solar sail: > http://www.space.com/businesstechnology/technology/carbonsail_000302.html Cool idea, but the usual solar sail requires some kind of guidance system to keep the proper orientation. I have a much simpler and lighter scheme in mind: getting the mortal remains or DNA to leave the neighborhood completely without further assistance. > > As long as it is less than 0.78 g/m^2 it will tend to drift outwards... Anders Sandberg Anders, that number applies if the sample is out of the earth's gravity well. I am looking at the possibility of using light pressure to actually escape earth gravity as well as the sun's, and possibly even the galaxy's gravity and the supercluster, altho Amara would need to help me with that calculation. I am not certain that last part can be done practically. spike From spike66 at comcast.net Tue Nov 21 04:54:41 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Mon, 20 Nov 2006 20:54:41 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Suicide the Green way In-Reply-To: <2257.163.1.72.81.1164057342.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> Message-ID: <200611210454.kAL4sptw009199@andromeda.ziaspace.com> > Michael M. Butler wrote: > > On 11/20/06, Anders Sandberg wrote: > >> A good aluminium sail is supposed to have half wavelength holes > > > > Interesting. I hadn't heard that. Source, please? > > I saw it on Wikipedia, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_sail > I think it follows quite naturally from electromagnetic considerations... >Anders Sandberg The Wiki article included this comment which drove me nuts until I heard the Doppler shift explanation: ..."Another common claim is that the radiation pressure is an unproven effect that may violate the thermodynamical Carnot rule. This criticism was raised by Thomas Gold of Cornell, leading to a public debate in the spring of 2003. [2] The solution is that when reflected by a solar sail, a photon undergoes a Doppler shift; its wavelength increases (and energy decreases) by a factor dependent on the velocity of the sail, transferring energy from the sun-photon system to the sail..." That Carnot rule sounded solid, but I already knew that stuff does definitely get pushed away from the sun by light pressure from Amara's PhD thesis. Thanks Amara, for writing about such a cool topic! {8^] spike From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Tue Nov 21 04:55:16 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Mon, 20 Nov 2006 23:55:16 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Suicide the Green way In-Reply-To: <62c14240611201546i7361ac9ax48de54a3ca4945e6@mail.gmail.com> References: <200611200439.kAK4d3iM001814@andromeda.ziaspace.com> <54518.81.129.213.148.1164035584.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> <7d79ed890611201223u4e429d58x45a668b273ea32cd@mail.gmail.com> <2257.163.1.72.81.1164057342.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> <62c14240611201546i7361ac9ax48de54a3ca4945e6@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On 11/20/06, Mike Dougherty wrote: > Is the purpose to spread the data into space, or to remove carbon from the > earth? Spreading the data would be easier just pulsing a laser, wouldn't > it? Sorry Mike, we are jumping across several lanes (due to Spike, bad bad Spike...). We shifted from ecology and global warming to space development (don't ask me how, it just happens...). The bottom line is that global warming is a red herring (I wrote parts of a paper on this 5+ years ago). There are ample solutions to global warming without people having to go and use it to justify committing suicide (which was what started this thread). And if we have nanotech reassembly at our disposal, why be concerned with > removing carbon? We'll be using it to build more diamondoid nanobots, > right? Yes. Which is what makes the entire discussion of global warming pointless. You have to discuss global warming within at least two different constraints: 1) Global warming up until the point where bionanotechnology can remove all atmospheric CO2. 2) Global warming up until the point where "real" (diamondoid) nanotechnology can remove all atmospheric CO2. There has also recently been in the news discussion of putting enough sulfur into the atmosphere to reduce global warming (as volcanos do naturally). As I have said before, there is an argument that more CO2 in the atmosphere is good because it becomes a "free" carbon source for people wishing to harvest it to build more diamondoid nanorobots. I've also stated that making Canada and much of Russia more habitable are "good" from the perspective of more land area that humans can comfortably occupy. There are of course opinions of an opposite nature but one generally doesn't get the positions laid out side by side. The "conventional wisdom" is that global warming is "bad". Robert -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From spike66 at comcast.net Tue Nov 21 04:46:10 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Mon, 20 Nov 2006 20:46:10 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Suicide the Green way In-Reply-To: <7d79ed890611201223u4e429d58x45a668b273ea32cd@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <200611210457.kAL4vxWJ028324@andromeda.ziaspace.com> > bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Michael M. Butler > > On 11/20/06, Anders Sandberg wrote: > > A good aluminium sail is supposed to have half wavelength holes > > Interesting. I hadn't heard that. Source, please? > > -- > Michael M. Butler : m m b u t l e r ( a t ) g m a i l . c o m Mike this allows the sail to lose mass without significant loss of reflectivity. spike From thespike at satx.rr.com Tue Nov 21 05:05:51 2006 From: thespike at satx.rr.com (Damien Broderick) Date: Mon, 20 Nov 2006 23:05:51 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] Flagrant self-promotion Message-ID: <7.0.1.0.2.20061120230117.022ffce8@satx.rr.com> A new guaranteed-singularity-free crime novel: I Suppose a Root's Out of the Question? by (as amazon insist) Damien, Broderick, Rory, Barnes (1 Nov 2006) http://www.amazon.com/I-Suppose-Roots-Out-Question/dp/0809557991/sr=1-17/qid=1164084508/ref=sr_1_17/104-5778650-8261528?ie=UTF8&s=books HC List Price: $29.95 (but there's a less expensive trade pb, I've seen a copy). Shows up as well on amazon.co.uk, http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/0809557991/ref=olp_product_details/026-9125957-0413211?ie=UTF8&seller= for Pounds 15.95 but still displayed as "forthcoming" on PointBlankPress's web-site. Weird. Also, camels. Damien Broderick From spike66 at comcast.net Tue Nov 21 05:17:42 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Mon, 20 Nov 2006 21:17:42 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Suicide the Green way In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <200611210541.kAL5fRR8021520@andromeda.ziaspace.com> ________________________________________ From: extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org [mailto:extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Robert Bradbury ... Offhand, does anyone know why boron doesn't reflect light? No, but for a light sail boron would have no advantage over lithium, which does reflect well in the lower frequencies. ? Or whether we can have hydrogen mirrors?? We couldn't keep them cold enough to stay solid. Even in deep space the atoms would pick up enough energy from stray photons to sublime. I think that stuff is gone as soon as it hits about 14 kelvin. Why do we have to constrain ourselves to aluminum? Robert We can make the mirrors on the deck if we use aluminum. If we take a large inflatable surface, we could probably vapor deposit pure lithium onto it in space, but I am not sure there is much weight advantage once one takes into account the structural strength of aluminum. Let me look this up tomorrow Robert. My reference material is at the office. My intuition is that for reflectivity and strength, aluminum packs a lotta bang for the buck in solar sails. spike From pj at pj-manney.com Tue Nov 21 05:45:43 2006 From: pj at pj-manney.com (pjmanney) Date: Tue, 21 Nov 2006 00:45:43 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Suicide the Green way Message-ID: <13210272.1657041164087943807.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> >(As for the original question in this thread, I have always thought burial >at a tower of silence http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Towers_of_Silence would >be the most eco-friendly, although one has to tweak it to fit the local >ecology: http://arxiv.org/abs/nlin/0610043 ) Just to bring the thread back to the beginning yet again (and I promise, it will only be a moment), I wanted to let you know about my friend, Michelle Cromer, and her fun, little book called "EXIT STRATEGY: Thinking Outside the Box." It's about all the ways we can dispose of our dead bodies. She covers Alcor, SSI, Life Gems, green burials and a host of other ways to creatively dispose of us, and does it all in a lighthearted manner. http://www.amazon.com/Exit-Strategy-Michelle-Cromer/dp/1585425052/sr=8-1/qid=1164087373/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1/102-0491878-4703357?ie=UTF8&s=books PJ From pj at pj-manney.com Tue Nov 21 05:51:32 2006 From: pj at pj-manney.com (pjmanney) Date: Tue, 21 Nov 2006 00:51:32 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Flagrant self-promotion Message-ID: <24690241.1657241164088292942.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> Damien wrote: >I Suppose a Root's Out of the Question? Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha! Thanks for the good giggle. As an honorary Kiwi back in LA, I don't get to hear pick-up lines like your title very much anymore, except from my Kiwi tv writing partner! And she's only kidding! Sadly, in the US, they'd never let us use the American equivalent for a book title... more's the pity... ;-) PJ From thespike at satx.rr.com Tue Nov 21 06:33:51 2006 From: thespike at satx.rr.com (Damien Broderick) Date: Tue, 21 Nov 2006 00:33:51 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] Flagrant self-promotion In-Reply-To: <24690241.1657241164088292942.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> References: <24690241.1657241164088292942.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> Message-ID: <7.0.1.0.2.20061121003101.0234ce70@satx.rr.com> At 12:51 AM 11/21/2006 -0500, PJ wrote: >Sadly, in the US, they'd never let us use the American equivalent >for a book title... more's the pity... ;-) Indeed, but then what do you reckon the Yank equivalent *is*? "Root" isn't quite as brutal as "fuck" but it's more earthy than "screw" and a great deal more direct than "with benefits" (unless that's already vanished...). BTW, the book is from a US publisher. Damien Broderick From ps.udoname at gmail.com Tue Nov 21 07:14:49 2006 From: ps.udoname at gmail.com (ps udoname) Date: Tue, 21 Nov 2006 07:14:49 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] mathimatical model for the singularity Message-ID: <28553f510611202314j4852b833m8df7eccf99bc8f22@mail.gmail.com> I was just thinking that I see a lot of people who say things like "the singularity WILL be exponential" and seem to think that the whole of human progress can be described as p=e^kt. This seems a little simplistic to say the least. I was going to say that I could come up with a better model, but I'm sure someone must have already done that somewhere.... -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From Thomas at thomasoliver.net Tue Nov 21 00:17:40 2006 From: Thomas at thomasoliver.net (Thomas) Date: Mon, 20 Nov 2006 17:17:40 -0700 Subject: [extropy-chat] 'a process of non-thinking called faith' 2 References: <455F90FE.2090208@lineone.net> <1164064478.15944.29.camel@localhost> Message-ID: <456245A4.8090202@thomasoliver.net> >>ben wrote: >> >> >>>If we cannot make good judgements now, how can we be expected to make >>>them in the future? >>> >>> >>Robert Bradbury said: >> >>I though this was a rather odd thing for a transhumanist to say. >>Don't you expect your ability to make good judgements to improve in the >>future? >> >Samantha Atkins wrote: > > >It seems to me that I have the "ability to make good judgements", at any >rate better judgements than I appear to make by my actions, now. It is >not at all clear that simply a much faster brain with vastly more >capacity and wondrous capabilities for self-examination and change will >automatically result in better judgements in practice. > >- samantha > > "Pray, Mr. Babbage, if you put into the machine wrong figures, will the right answers come out?" I expect ever wider brain bandwidth and channel capacity in the future. My brain will need upgraded sensory-perception filters for focus to prevent GIGO. Huge demand for custom focus algorithms could be predicted concurrent with increased intracranial information transmission rates. Maybe for lithium too! : ) Better judgements for short term problems (like a theatening traffic situation) will, I believe, surely be facilitated by wider perception and faster processing of input. Imagine concluding a complex rational decision and executing the optimum action in less time than my reflexes presently require. Better judgement for long term problems would be facilitated by speedy aquistion of a wide array of relevant viewpoints. Having the "spare" time to make a full paradigm shift (or two) will greatly enhance quality extrapolation, making me seemingly clarivoyant. I sympathize with Ben when he laments that "we cannot make good judgements now." Collective decision making is not strictly possible and, even allowing the sloppy concept, it's extremely slow and fallible. Our last presidential election was a glaring example. But you and I, as individuals, certainly can make good judgements. The trend in my personal life has been towards better and better judgement and I would guess it's been the same for you. That's a good enough indication for me. From eugen at leitl.org Tue Nov 21 07:47:54 2006 From: eugen at leitl.org (Eugen Leitl) Date: Tue, 21 Nov 2006 08:47:54 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] Suicide the Green way In-Reply-To: References: <200611200439.kAK4d3iM001814@andromeda.ziaspace.com> <54518.81.129.213.148.1164035584.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> <7d79ed890611201223u4e429d58x45a668b273ea32cd@mail.gmail.com> <2257.163.1.72.81.1164057342.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> Message-ID: <20061121074754.GR6974@leitl.org> On Mon, Nov 20, 2006 at 05:13:01PM -0500, Robert Bradbury wrote: > Design of a high performance solar sail system. > Drexler, Kim Eric > 1979, MIT Masters Thesis Things have progressed a bit since, at least in theory. > Offhand, does anyone know why boron doesn't reflect light? Or whether > we can have hydrogen mirrors? Why do we have to constrain ourselves > to aluminum? http://science.nasa.gov/NEWHOME/headlines/prop08apr99_1.htm ... Right: A "conventional" solar sail, fully deployed and cruising into interstellar space. Innovative ideas for "gray" and electromagnetic sails may leave this concept in the interstellar dust. (NASA) "A propellant-free system is very attractive because the main problem with interstellar travel is the weight of the propellant," said Geoffrey Landis of the Ohio Aerospace Institute at NASA's Glenn Research Center. He spoke Wednesday morning to the 10th annual Advanced Propulsion Research Workshop held by NASA, Marshall, the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, and the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics being held Tuesday-Thursday at the University of Alabama in Huntsville. Recent Headlines December 3: Mars Polar Lander nears touchdown December 2: What next, Leonids? November 30: Polar Lander Mission Overview November 30: Learning how to make a clean sweep in space The original notion of space sails is to unfold a large aluminum coated Mylar blanket, face it to the sun, and let sunlight and the solar wind push the craft deeper into space. But that takes a long time to get anywhere. In 1984, Dr. Robert Forward, , vice president of Tethers Unlimited in Seattle and an advocate of sails and tethers for space propulsion, proposed giving Mother Nature a hand by using high-power laser or microwave transmitters that would beam for a few days or weeks to speed the probe on its way. Gray sails could provide a better ride Forward's Starwisp concept would have used a mesh of superconducting aluminum wires to receive its "push" from microwave photons, and then reflect to produce an equal magnitude thrust. This would propel the craft from Earth orbit past Neptune, at 1/20th the speed of light, in just a week. Since then, Forward and others have been rethinking the concept. "My major message is, that's wrong, don't use it" said Forward as he pointed at the equation he used in his initial studies. Since 1984, he has determined that the sail material would absorb a significant amount of the energy, weakening the structure and possibly letting it collapse. Forward now proposes putting that absorption to work in a "gray sail" made of carbon. The sail would absorb the light, getting a push from it, and reradiate it as infrared energy. With the sail oriented properly to the source, this would generate a significant amount of thrust in the desired direction. A mission to interstellar space could be accomplished with a combination sail. An aluminum coating - just 70 atoms thick - would serve as a traditional reflective solar sail to boost the spacecraft out of Earth orbit, then cancel its solar orbital velocity so it plunges on a near-miss trajectory towards the sun. Right: The sunshade for the Next Generation Space Telescope is not as large as a sail for space propulsion, but will provide valuable technical lessons on how to build one. (NASA) As it passes just 3 solar diameters from the sun's visible surface, the aluminum would evaporate, exposing the carbon structure underneath. The carbon would absorb sunlight and heat to 2,000 K (almost 3,600 deg. F). Radiating infrared light would accelerate the craft at 14 times Earth's gravity (the Space Shuttle reaches a maximum of 3 G during launch). "The trajectory is nearly a straight line" away from the sun, Forward said. He is proposing a laboratory demonstration using a 1 kilowatt microwave beam to levitate a 2.5 cm (1 in.) square, 02.5 micron-thick carbon film in a vacuum chamber. A new use for radio Landis also finds carbon sails attractive in a reworked approach to Forward's Starwisp concept. Landis proposes using millimeter-wave radio to push a carbon sail. Millimeter-wave transmitters are more efficient than lasers, so less power would be needed to run the system. "If you're pushing terawatts into space," Landis said of the beaming system, "it's expensive." A lens to focus the millimeter waves (using techniques similar to those that steer phased-array radar beams) would only have to be 185 km wide, as compared to a 50,000 km fresnel lens that would be required for a system. The sail itself would be made of carbon fibers, or possibly with variants of the high-temperature superconductors that have been in development since the early 1990s. The transmitter technology already is becoming available through megawatt-power, 1,110 gigahertz (0.78 mm wavelength) gyrotrons developed for fusion power experiments. Landis suggested a laboratory demonstration using a 2 cm (4/5th inch) diameter cone. Shaping it so it would stay on the beam "is a tricky design problem, but it's a design problem with a solution," he said. A precursor space mission, carrying a 1 kg (2.2 lb) payload on a 10x10-meter sail would take 20 hours to accelerate. In three weeks, it would pass the orbit of Pluto and continue outward to the Oort cloud of comets surrounding the solar system. Reaching a star would take 400 years, so it's only good as a demonstration. "It's still science fiction," Landis said, "but it's near-term science fiction." Even closer at hand is a concept to sail without a deploying a sail, but throwing a switch and generating one around the spacecraft. In an approach called Mini-Magnetospheric Plasma Propulsion - or M2P2 - a probe would imitate nature to get the solar wind to push it into deep-space. "The enabling technology is pretty much available today," said Dr. R.M. Winglee of the University of Washington Winglee works in the geophysics program which studies the magnetosphere, the region of space around the Earth where the solar wind is deflected by the Earth's magnetic field. ... -- Eugen* Leitl leitl http://leitl.org ______________________________________________________________ ICBM: 48.07100, 11.36820 http://www.ativel.com 8B29F6BE: 099D 78BA 2FD3 B014 B08A 7779 75B0 2443 8B29 F6BE -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: signature.asc Type: application/pgp-signature Size: 191 bytes Desc: Digital signature URL: From eugen at leitl.org Tue Nov 21 09:08:58 2006 From: eugen at leitl.org (Eugen Leitl) Date: Tue, 21 Nov 2006 10:08:58 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] Suicide the Green way In-Reply-To: <200611210454.kAL4sptw009199@andromeda.ziaspace.com> References: <2257.163.1.72.81.1164057342.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> <200611210454.kAL4sptw009199@andromeda.ziaspace.com> Message-ID: <20061121090858.GW6974@leitl.org> On Mon, Nov 20, 2006 at 08:54:41PM -0800, spike wrote: > That Carnot rule sounded solid, but I already knew that stuff does > definitely get pushed away from the sun by light pressure from Amara's PhD Actually, it doesn't. It depends on where your reradiated photons go. You can raise the orbit or lower it, by way of e.g. tilting your orbiting mirror. (Doesn't apply to dust grains, which is an isodirectional radiator, at least averaged over time). > thesis. Thanks Amara, for writing about such a cool topic! {8^] -- Eugen* Leitl leitl http://leitl.org ______________________________________________________________ ICBM: 48.07100, 11.36820 http://www.ativel.com 8B29F6BE: 099D 78BA 2FD3 B014 B08A 7779 75B0 2443 8B29 F6BE -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: signature.asc Type: application/pgp-signature Size: 191 bytes Desc: Digital signature URL: From eugen at leitl.org Tue Nov 21 09:25:56 2006 From: eugen at leitl.org (Eugen Leitl) Date: Tue, 21 Nov 2006 10:25:56 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] Suicide the Green way In-Reply-To: <200611210541.kAL5fRR8021520@andromeda.ziaspace.com> References: <200611210541.kAL5fRR8021520@andromeda.ziaspace.com> Message-ID: <20061121092555.GX6974@leitl.org> On Mon, Nov 20, 2006 at 09:17:42PM -0800, spike wrote: > No, but for a light sail boron would have no advantage over lithium, which > does reflect well in the lower frequencies. Actually, boron has the vast advantage of forming temperature-resistant fibres (you have certainly heard of boron-reinforced aluminum composite). Whereas, lithium, why don't you try making a mirror from mercury with an operating temperature >>300 K? > We couldn't keep them cold enough to stay solid. Even in deep space the > atoms would pick up enough energy from stray photons to sublime. I think > that stuff is gone as soon as it hits about 14 kelvin. Why not making a mirror from clear silica? It is certainly a much better mirror than solid hydrogen. Btw, since you mentioned DNA in space, of course you know that UV would fragment it to bits, right? And that human ash doesn't contain at all much carbon, being calcinated minerals? > We can make the mirrors on the deck if we use aluminum. If we take a large > inflatable surface, we could probably vapor deposit pure lithium onto it in > space, but I am not sure there is much weight advantage once one takes into > account the structural strength of aluminum. Let me look this up tomorrow > Robert. My reference material is at the office. My intuition is that for > reflectivity and strength, aluminum packs a lotta bang for the buck in solar > sails. I'm rooting for rime-coated spider silk. Makes at least as much sense. -- Eugen* Leitl leitl http://leitl.org ______________________________________________________________ ICBM: 48.07100, 11.36820 http://www.ativel.com 8B29F6BE: 099D 78BA 2FD3 B014 B08A 7779 75B0 2443 8B29 F6BE -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: signature.asc Type: application/pgp-signature Size: 191 bytes Desc: Digital signature URL: From emlynoregan at gmail.com Tue Nov 21 11:03:20 2006 From: emlynoregan at gmail.com (Emlyn) Date: Tue, 21 Nov 2006 21:33:20 +1030 Subject: [extropy-chat] Atheist Hymn Book Message-ID: <710b78fc0611210303x5a706b32wd7fa10bade1441d7@mail.gmail.com> Hi all, I just watched those vids on youtube of Richard Dawkins talking about his new book "The God Delusion" [1], and was inspired. Imagine someone taking the case for Atheism out there in times like these, especially in the US! What a legend. I haven't read the book yet, unfortunately, still have to go get myself a copy. Anyway, it got me to thinking about one of the big things that Atheism lacks, which is the traditions and general apparatus of religion. Holidays, ceremonies, teachings, community. Culture. For those who don't know me, I'm a singer, and sing in a lot of christian churches, solo and choral, but I've been an atheist all my life Actually by Huxley's definition I'm an agnostic, but in the hard sense of "the existence of god is unknowable by definition", which is in practice a hardline atheist (in that for me theism falls in the santa clause, tooth fairy, etc camp, strictly unknowable and therefore by Occam's Razor to be sliced out of any model of reality). Yet I spend a lot of time in churches, as part of the church community, because it is the institution that most supports a type of music that I am involved in (church music, choral music, oratorio, etc). I don't attend church as part of the flock, only as part of the show. The culture that comes with religion is easy to deride, but I've been seeing it in detail as an outsider for many years now. The cultural/community side of the church clearly provides purpose and meaning to many people, and the labours of people involved in it seem to do an awful lot of good. There's a lot of feeding the poor, caring about injustices, working for a better future, going on in the grassroots of the churches (especially the old ones). I put this down to the focus of religion, which is to think about the basis for and reason for existence. Although they clearly get the answers dreadfully wrong, this focus, and the associated devotion to at least a couple of hours every week to getting together with other likeminded people and ruminating on the big questions, seems to create groups of people who can find it in their hearts to do something (even something miniscule) to improve the lot of other people who need help. Now, there are atheist equivalents of course - all secular endeavour could be classed in this way. I'm not saying that atheists are heartless uncaring bastards, far from it. However, there does seem to be a gap there, no sense of the unity, the community and culture, that religious people enjoy. Again, as far as culture goes, that doesn't matter so much a lot of the time, because all of secular culture counts as atheist culture by default (does it?). However, the acknowledgement of a scientific world view, and the way that ties in with the very human sense of wonder and appreciation of the universe, is something that doesn't really seem to get a run. Especially in a time when theists are more prevalent, and at times more oppressive, than they've been in a long while (people in the US might particularly resonate with this), it's a time when atheism as a world view could do with a bit more unity, a bit more cohesion. I think this requires some kind of establishment of culture/community/tradition. I think establishing atheist community is a hard problem. Dawkins says in one of the videos that organising atheists is like herding cats, and I believe there is a very good reason for this, which is that Atheism is not a belief system, it is a lack of belief. Contrary to many religious folks' contention that atheism is just another defacto belief system (and hence equivalent to religion), it is this aspect of it (that there is no culture/community) which most clearly shows that it is not. I think in the end, it is very much harder for people to rally around a lack of belief in something, than it is to rally around a positive belief. Furthermore, the *only* tenet of atheism is to be without god, so atheists differ greatly in their beliefs and values. Nevertheless, I think it would be a worthwhile thing to try to establish such community, now more so than ever. Atheism is a dirty word these days, it's a scary time to stand up and commit to being one. To this end, in my own little way I'd like to try to add a bit of celebratory culture, by way of some music. As I said above, I sing a lot of religious music[2], and would love to have music that had the same benefits (expressing the big issues of life) without the drawbacks (fundamentally flawed premise). So in my long winded way, I'm asking a question, which is, if there were to be an Atheist hymn book, what would be in it? New music, or existing songs, both are ok. What would the songs be about? What do we have to celebrate, and how would you like to hear it expressed? So, got ideas? Emlyn http://www.emlynoregan.com [1] Reading of The God Delusion in Lynchburg, VA http://richarddawkins.net/article,303,Reading-of-The-God-Delusion-in-Lynchburg-VA,Richard-Dawkins--C-SPAN2 [2] Godless Heathen (an article by me about why I sing religious music) http://emlynoregan.com/wu_Generic.aspx?PageName=showarticle&AID=1 From hkhenson at rogers.com Tue Nov 21 15:03:16 2006 From: hkhenson at rogers.com (Keith Henson) Date: Tue, 21 Nov 2006 10:03:16 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Flagrant self-promotion In-Reply-To: <7.0.1.0.2.20061121003101.0234ce70@satx.rr.com> References: <24690241.1657241164088292942.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> <24690241.1657241164088292942.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> Message-ID: <5.1.0.14.0.20061121100054.036414e8@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> At 12:33 AM 11/21/2006 -0600, you wrote: >At 12:51 AM 11/21/2006 -0500, PJ wrote: > > >Sadly, in the US, they'd never let us use the American equivalent > >for a book title... more's the pity... ;-) > >Indeed, but then what do you reckon the Yank equivalent *is*? "Root" >isn't quite as brutal as "fuck" but it's more earthy than "screw" and >a great deal more direct than "with benefits" (unless that's already >vanished...). It's not unknown in the US. See the last page here: http://www.rickubik.com/WonderWartHog.html Keith Henson From hkhenson at rogers.com Tue Nov 21 15:27:05 2006 From: hkhenson at rogers.com (Keith Henson) Date: Tue, 21 Nov 2006 10:27:05 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] mathimatical model for the singularity In-Reply-To: <28553f510611202314j4852b833m8df7eccf99bc8f22@mail.gmail.co m> Message-ID: <5.1.0.14.0.20061121102445.037c4d30@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> At 07:14 AM 11/21/2006 +0000, you wrote: >I was just thinking that I see a lot of people who say things like "the >singularity WILL be exponential" and seem to think that the whole of human >progress can be described as p=e^kt. >This seems a little simplistic to say the least. I was going to say that I >could come up with a better model, but I'm sure someone must have already >done that somewhere.... You can get the same curve by a bunch of stacked S curves. That's certainly what has happened with technology. Then the question becomes where the final S curve flattens. Keith From spike66 at comcast.net Tue Nov 21 15:45:15 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Tue, 21 Nov 2006 07:45:15 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Suicide the Green way In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <200611211546.kALFkPWG027298@andromeda.ziaspace.com> ________________________________________ From: extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org [mailto:extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Robert Bradbury Sent: Monday, November 20, 2006 8:42 PM To: ExI chat list Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] Suicide the Green way On 11/20/06, Anders Sandberg wrote: ... Maybe we will go to the stars on gold foil? The mirror on the JWST is Be so it can't be that bad.? I would be curious to know why low resistance beats lightness -- do the photons charge the sail? Robert Robert, it's from Maxwell's equations. Recall that when a material reflects a photon, the photon induces a circular magnetic field in the material. In general better conductors make better reflectors. Regarding gold, my understanding is that the reason it makes a good solar sail material is not that it is such a great reflector but rather that it can be made into thinner sheets than anything else. spike From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Tue Nov 21 16:11:42 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Tue, 21 Nov 2006 11:11:42 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] mathimatical model for the singularity In-Reply-To: <5.1.0.14.0.20061121102445.037c4d30@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> References: <5.1.0.14.0.20061121102445.037c4d30@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> Message-ID: On 11/21/06, Keith Henson wrote: > Then the question becomes where the final S curve flattens. It flattens significantly once you have disassembled everything but Saturn and Jupiter. After you have done them (which takes a minimum of hundreds of years) it flattens still further when you start disassembling the sun to lengthen its lifetime. There isn't enough energy in the solar system to do it any faster. You might get someplace by seeing what you could get if added sufficient mass from Saturn and the sun to Jupiter so you could get a second star but I've never done the calculations to see how long that might take. Of course if there happens to be a small black hole nearby and you could find a way to drag it into the local neighborhood all bets are off. Robert -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Tue Nov 21 16:17:13 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Tue, 21 Nov 2006 11:17:13 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] mathimatical model for the singularity In-Reply-To: <28553f510611202314j4852b833m8df7eccf99bc8f22@mail.gmail.com> References: <28553f510611202314j4852b833m8df7eccf99bc8f22@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On 11/21/06, ps udoname wrote: > > I was just thinking that I see a lot of people who say things like "the > singularity WILL be exponential" and seem to think that the whole of human > progress can be described as p=e^kt. > This seems a little simplistic to say the least. I was going to say that I > could come up with a better model, but I'm sure someone must have already > done that somewhere.... > Ray Kurzweil discusses it extensively in Chapter 2 of The Singularity is Near titled "A Theory of Technological Evolution" which goes on for 75 pages with lots of graphs (and a discussion of S-curves). -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Tue Nov 21 16:21:00 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Tue, 21 Nov 2006 11:21:00 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Suicide the Green way In-Reply-To: <200611211546.kALFkPWG027298@andromeda.ziaspace.com> References: <200611211546.kALFkPWG027298@andromeda.ziaspace.com> Message-ID: On 11/21/06, spike wrote: > Robert, it's from Maxwell's equations. Recall that when a material > reflects a photon, the photon induces a circular magnetic field in the > material. In general better conductors make better reflectors. [snip] > I strongly suspected that someday someone would come up with a good reason for me to go back to school... :-( R. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jef at jefallbright.net Tue Nov 21 17:10:27 2006 From: jef at jefallbright.net (Jef Allbright) Date: Tue, 21 Nov 2006 09:10:27 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] 'a process of non-thinking called faith' 2 In-Reply-To: <456245A4.8090202@thomasoliver.net> Message-ID: Thomas wrote: > I sympathize with Ben when he laments that "we cannot make good > judgements now." Collective decision making is not strictly possible > and, even allowing the sloppy concept, it's extremely slow > and fallible. Thomas, I'm curious about your thinking on collective decision-making. It appears that you are saying that collective decision-making is flawed in principle, and I wonder why. As the extropy list is composed of many smarter than average individuals, we can certainly think of examples where our individual effectiveness was impaired by regression to the mean, tyranny of the majority, or even simply group domination by a particular alpha personality. But such instances are countered by many examples of effective teams doing more than any individual could. While individual capabilities are effectively limited by local resources (especially bandwidth), group capabilities are effectively limited by organizational structure which is much more extensible. Curious to know your thinking on this. - Jef From jef at jefallbright.net Tue Nov 21 16:59:43 2006 From: jef at jefallbright.net (Jef Allbright) Date: Tue, 21 Nov 2006 08:59:43 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] LA Times article on hallucinogens In-Reply-To: <9992875.1652911164082717445.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> Message-ID: Pjmanney sent: > > ... It's about time this research got some mainstream play. > > > > Mushrooms take a trip back to the lab > Banned hallucinogens may have medical benefits, but results > are unpredictable. > > November 19, 2006 This article raises interesting questions with regard to personal liberties as well as the potential risks to society of hallucinogenic drug relevant to discussion on extropy-chat. It also comments on observed psychological benefits and associated effects on brain chemistry, which is the kind of fairly shallow observation expected and typical of popular media. What it doesn't mention is that a large part of the benefits of such an experience may have little to do with the direct pharmacological effects and much to do with perturbing the human system out of its present rut. People experience similar benefits from, for example, a sudden and intense life-threatening brush with danger (to themselves or loved ones), falling in love, getting religion, great sex (if they haven't had any for a long while), sexual abstinence (if they've had too much for too long), fasting (if they've always had plenty, and so on. On a smaller scale, laughter can completely change the dynamics of a tense business meeting, a brief walk in the park can refresh an engineer's problem-solving abilities, and temporarily doing something mundane can restore a writer's creativity. So yes, having a drug-induced hallucinogenic experience, enhanced by the rush of a significant flow of certain neurotransmitters and (for these drugs in particular) minor refractory impact, can easily lead to a shakeup in world view. But the results don't necessarily have much to do with chemicals. A systems-view of the world (including the humans in it) can provide powerful insights. Of course, as everyone knows, such thinking is totally dehumanizing. ;-) - Jef From ben at goertzel.org Tue Nov 21 17:26:29 2006 From: ben at goertzel.org (Ben Goertzel) Date: Tue, 21 Nov 2006 12:26:29 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] LA Times article on hallucinogens In-Reply-To: References: <9992875.1652911164082717445.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> Message-ID: <638d4e150611210926k5ea87eb1i389a82841fa6e852@mail.gmail.com> > So yes, having a drug-induced hallucinogenic experience, enhanced by the > rush of a significant flow of certain neurotransmitters and (for these > drugs in particular) minor refractory impact, can easily lead to a > shakeup in world view. But the results don't necessarily have much to > do with chemicals. Uhhh ... having taken hallucinogenic mushrooms at various points in the past myself, I find this explanation of their impact pretty unconvincing. Yeah, there is the element of "anything shocking can shake the mind out of its rut" ... but there is also much more to it than that. There is a large literature on psychedelic psychology so I won't repeat the basics here, though... -- Ben G From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Tue Nov 21 17:31:35 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Tue, 21 Nov 2006 12:31:35 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Stem cells may be core cause of cancers Message-ID: The Globe and Mail [1], based on Nature articles [2,3,4] has a long discussion about how it is looking more and more like stem cells (or at least cells that behave like stem cells) may be at the core of many, perhaps even most cancers. The net of it is that if this proves to be true then treating cancer is going to require a bit of a rewrite from a therapy standpoint. Now, the flip side of the coin is that scientists seem to be getting a handle on true dedifferentation by converting mature astrocytes *back* into neuronal stem cells [5]. Robert 1.Stem cells core of more cancers http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20061120.wxcancerstemcells20/BNStory/cancer/home/?pageRequested=all 2. A human colon cancer cell capable of initiating tumour growth in immunodeficient mice. O'Brien CA et al http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/vaop/ncurrent/abs/nature05372.html 3. Identification and expansion of human colon-cancer-initiating cells. Ricci-Vitiani L et al http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/vaop/ncurrent/abs/nature05384.html 4. Glioma stem cells promote radioresistance by preferential activation of the DNA damage response. Bao S et al http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/vaop/ncurrent/abs/nature05236.html 5. Transforming growth factor alpha promotes sequential conversion of mature astrocytes into neural progenitors and stem cells. Sharif A et al http://www.nature.com/onc/journal/vaop/ncurrent/abs/1210071a.html -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From pj at pj-manney.com Tue Nov 21 17:41:21 2006 From: pj at pj-manney.com (pjmanney) Date: Tue, 21 Nov 2006 12:41:21 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Flagrant self-promotion Message-ID: <24699303.1680861164130881278.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> Damien Wrote: >>Indeed, but then what do you reckon the Yank equivalent *is*? "Root" >>isn't quite as brutal as "fuck" but it's more earthy than "screw" and >>a great deal more direct than "with benefits" (unless that's already >>vanished...). Keith Wrote: >It's not unknown in the US. See the last page here: >http://www.rickubik.com/WonderWartHog.html Hmmmm... Indeed... But I would say they are using the word 'root' in the more traditional usage, not as in sexual intercourse, but as in digging around, like a pig roots for truffles. It's appropriate in this case! I had never heard of the phrase "with benefits" before, but my Kiwi friend has told me that "friends with benefits" it means people with whom you have sex with no emotional attachments. We Yanks would call them 'fuck buddies.' As for the flavor (or flavour?) of the antipodean 'root', I'd say Damien is correct. It lies between 'fuck' and 'screw.' 'Root' has no emotional attachment to it, either. It's all about 'the hole and the heartbeat' to quote Kiwi Gal (those kiwi gals are pretty earthy themselves). But Damien's title, which is the punch line to a failed pick-up joke, translates in Yankese thus: Guy sits down at a bar next to an attractive gal. Gestures to her empty glass. Guy: Wanna drink? Gal looks him over. Gal: Drop dead. Guy stares at her for a beat. Guy: Wanna fuck? And that joke is about as old as Methuselah. So my ultimate answer is "fuck." PJ From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Tue Nov 21 18:02:08 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Tue, 21 Nov 2006 13:02:08 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Fusion@Home Message-ID: Really! "Teen goes nuclear: He creates fusion in his Oakland Township Home" http://www.freep.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20061119/NEWS03/611190639&template=printart Robert -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jef at jefallbright.net Tue Nov 21 18:04:34 2006 From: jef at jefallbright.net (Jef Allbright) Date: Tue, 21 Nov 2006 10:04:34 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] LA Times article on hallucinogens In-Reply-To: <638d4e150611210926k5ea87eb1i389a82841fa6e852@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: Ben wrote: > Yeah, there is the element of "anything shocking can shake > the mind out of its rut" ... but there is also much more to > it than that. > > There is a large literature on psychedelic psychology so I > won't repeat the basics here, though... Ben - I think you mistook my point. Also it may help you to know that I am speaking from personal experience as well as being acquainted with a substantial amount of the literature. The drugs certainly do induce powerful effects. However, my point was that it is the *experience*, rather than the chemicals, that provides the lasting results. My point may be clearest with regard to LSD which is metabolized to undetectable levels with a few hours. The secondary effects (levels of neurotransmitters for example) may be detectable for a few days. The psychological effects, similar to those resulting from other experiences that "shock" one out of rut, can last a lifetime. Does this clarify? - Jef From ben at goertzel.org Tue Nov 21 18:09:53 2006 From: ben at goertzel.org (Ben Goertzel) Date: Tue, 21 Nov 2006 13:09:53 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] LA Times article on hallucinogens In-Reply-To: References: <638d4e150611210926k5ea87eb1i389a82841fa6e852@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <638d4e150611211009r66dd348bv9e7b21b9d4baea51@mail.gmail.com> Hi, > I think you mistook my point. Also it may help you to know that I am > speaking from personal experience as well as being acquainted with a > substantial amount of the literature. > > The drugs certainly do induce powerful effects. However, my point was > that it is the *experience*, rather than the chemicals, that provides > the lasting results. That is definitely true... However, I would suggest that the lasting experience induced by psychedelics is often quite qualitatively different from the lasting experience induced by the other things you cited... > My point may be clearest with regard to LSD which is metabolized to > undetectable levels with a few hours. The secondary effects (levels of > neurotransmitters for example) may be detectable for a few days. The > psychological effects, similar to those resulting from other experiences > that "shock" one out of rut, can last a lifetime. What I question is how similar the lasting psychological effects of psychedelics really are to the lasting psychological effects of other experiences that "shock one out of a rut" ... Obviously there are some commonalities, perhaps some interesting ones, but I wonder if the most interesting and valuable aspects of the lasting effects of psychedelics are NOT in the class of commonalities... -- Ben From Thomas at thomasoliver.net Tue Nov 21 17:10:12 2006 From: Thomas at thomasoliver.net (Thomas) Date: Tue, 21 Nov 2006 10:10:12 -0700 Subject: [extropy-chat] Atheist Hymn Book References: <710b78fc0611210303x5a706b32wd7fa10bade1441d7@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <456332F4.4040505@thomasoliver.net> Well, yes I have some ideas . . . in song form. One in particular comes to mind. It's called "There Is A Light" and the music is in a fun kind of "holy roller" gospel style. I agree with Ayn Rand that the sense of exaltation is not to be limited to the domain of religious expression. I am interested in a venue for this type of expression -- someplace where I'd feel more at home than in churches or bars. -- Thomas Oliver Emlyn wrote: >Hi all, > >I just watched those vids on youtube of Richard Dawkins talking about >his new book "The God Delusion" [1], and was inspired. Imagine someone >taking the case for Atheism out there in times like these, especially >in the US! What a legend. I haven't read the book yet, unfortunately, >still have to go get myself a copy. > >Anyway, it got me to thinking about one of the big things that Atheism >lacks, which is the traditions and general apparatus of religion. >Holidays, ceremonies, teachings, community. Culture. > >For those who don't know me, I'm a singer, and sing in a lot of >christian churches, solo and choral, but I've been an atheist all my >life Actually by Huxley's definition I'm an agnostic, but in the hard >sense of "the existence of god is unknowable by definition", which is >in practice a hardline atheist (in that for me theism falls in the >santa clause, tooth fairy, etc camp, strictly unknowable and therefore >by Occam's Razor to be sliced out of any model of reality). Yet I >spend a lot of time in churches, as part of the church community, >because it is the institution that most supports a type of music that >I am involved in (church music, choral music, oratorio, etc). I don't >attend church as part of the flock, only as part of the show. > >The culture that comes with religion is easy to deride, but I've been >seeing it in detail as an outsider for many years now. The >cultural/community side of the church clearly provides purpose and >meaning to many people, and the labours of people involved in it seem >to do an awful lot of good. There's a lot of feeding the poor, caring >about injustices, working for a better future, going on in the >grassroots of the churches (especially the old ones). I put this down >to the focus of religion, which is to think about the basis for and >reason for existence. Although they clearly get the answers dreadfully >wrong, this focus, and the associated devotion to at least a couple of >hours every week to getting together with other likeminded people and >ruminating on the big questions, seems to create groups of people who >can find it in their hearts to do something (even something miniscule) >to improve the lot of other people who need help. > >Now, there are atheist equivalents of course - all secular endeavour >could be classed in this way. I'm not saying that atheists are >heartless uncaring bastards, far from it. However, there does seem to >be a gap there, no sense of the unity, the community and culture, that >religious people enjoy. > >Again, as far as culture goes, that doesn't matter so much a lot of >the time, because all of secular culture counts as atheist culture by >default (does it?). However, the acknowledgement of a scientific world >view, and the way that ties in with the very human sense of wonder and >appreciation of the universe, is something that doesn't really seem to >get a run. Especially in a time when theists are more prevalent, and >at times more oppressive, than they've been in a long while (people in >the US might particularly resonate with this), it's a time when >atheism as a world view could do with a bit more unity, a bit more >cohesion. I think this requires some kind of establishment of >culture/community/tradition. > >I think establishing atheist community is a hard problem. Dawkins says >in one of the videos that organising atheists is like herding cats, >and I believe there is a very good reason for this, which is that >Atheism is not a belief system, it is a lack of belief. Contrary to >many religious folks' contention that atheism is just another defacto >belief system (and hence equivalent to religion), it is this aspect of >it (that there is no culture/community) which most clearly shows that >it is not. I think in the end, it is very much harder for people to >rally around a lack of belief in something, than it is to rally around >a positive belief. Furthermore, the *only* tenet of atheism is to be >without god, so atheists differ greatly in their beliefs and values. > >Nevertheless, I think it would be a worthwhile thing to try to >establish such community, now more so than ever. Atheism is a dirty >word these days, it's a scary time to stand up and commit to being >one. > >To this end, in my own little way I'd like to try to add a bit of >celebratory culture, by way of some music. As I said above, I sing a >lot of religious music[2], and would love to have music that had the >same benefits (expressing the big issues of life) without the >drawbacks (fundamentally flawed premise). > >So in my long winded way, I'm asking a question, which is, if there >were to be an Atheist hymn book, what would be in it? New music, or >existing songs, both are ok. What would the songs be about? What do we >have to celebrate, and how would you like to hear it expressed? > >So, got ideas? > >Emlyn >http://www.emlynoregan.com > >[1] Reading of The God Delusion in Lynchburg, VA >http://richarddawkins.net/article,303,Reading-of-The-God-Delusion-in-Lynchburg-VA,Richard-Dawkins--C-SPAN2 > >[2] Godless Heathen (an article by me about why I sing religious music) >http://emlynoregan.com/wu_Generic.aspx?PageName=showarticle&AID=1 >_______________________________________________ >extropy-chat mailing list >extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org >http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > > > From jef at jefallbright.net Tue Nov 21 18:53:28 2006 From: jef at jefallbright.net (Jef Allbright) Date: Tue, 21 Nov 2006 10:53:28 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] [wta-talk] LA Times article on hallucinogens In-Reply-To: <20061121181220.GF6974@leitl.org> Message-ID: Eugen wrote: > On Tue, Nov 21, 2006 at 10:04:34AM -0800, Jef Allbright wrote: > > > neurotransmitters for example) may be detectable for a few > days. The > > psychological effects, similar to those resulting from other > > experiences that "shock" one out of rut, can last a lifetime. > > Is this actually well-documented? Life-changing single doses > of hallucinogens, I mean? If you google <"changed my life" lsd> you will find many examples of people who believe that it can and did. My experience left me with a lasting appreciation of the malleability of consciousness and identity and how a person's subjective reality is, for all practical purposes their whole reality. As a side note, I've observed that people who have done a lot of LSD seem to be overly susceptible to making erroneous mental connections. I don't know if that's because people with that trait are attracted to LSD or that LSD enhances that trait, but its enough for me to advise restraint. I gained other insights as well, but the really life-changing effect was that I went from someone demonstrating a hardcore insistence on striving toward objective truth, to someone realizing that it's much more effective to try to understand another person's model of reality and then work on encompassing it with a larger, closer *approximation* to objective reality. Rinse, lather, repeat. - Jef From eugen at leitl.org Tue Nov 21 18:53:49 2006 From: eugen at leitl.org (Eugen Leitl) Date: Tue, 21 Nov 2006 19:53:49 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] Suicide the Green way In-Reply-To: References: <200611211546.kALFkPWG027298@andromeda.ziaspace.com> Message-ID: <20061121185349.GI6974@leitl.org> On Tue, Nov 21, 2006 at 11:21:00AM -0500, Robert Bradbury wrote: > > On 11/21/06, spike <[1]spike66 at comcast.net> wrote: > > Robert, it's from Maxwell's equations. Recall that when a material > reflects a photon, the photon induces a circular magnetic field in > the material. In general better conductors make better reflectors. > [snip] We have to be careful, when we reduce to what are actually quantum phenomena to macroscale approximations, which are frequently invalid. If you look at reflectance spectra of various mirror metals on http://www.kruschwitz.com/HR's.htm you'll see that approximations designed for classical optics, they can only take you that far. Also, careful with nanohole arrays, these things can misfire: http://flux.aps.org/meetings/YR04/MAR04/baps/abs/S3560.html [J36.001] Transmission properties of an array of sub-wavelength holes in a metal film Kwangje Woo, Sinan Selcuk, Arthur F. Hebard, David B. Tanner (Department of Physics, University of Florida, Gainesville, FL 32611) It is known that the intensity of light transmitted through an array of holes, which are of sub-wavelength scale, can be surprisingly high at certain wavelengths. The enhanced transmission is attributed to a coupling of surface plasmons on the two sides of the film. We have measured the transmission of an array of holes on a metal film that is sandwiched between two different dielectric materials. With this measurement we have analyzed the effects of metal-dielectric interfaces in transmission spectra. For example, in a sample with air-metal-fused quartz structure we have found that the surface plasmon modes of the quartz-metal interface are more dominant in the transmission spectrum than those of the air-metal interface. The transmittance at the surface-plasmon peak can be as high as 40%, about twice the open area of the hole array. The effect of different film thicknesses, different materials, the dependence on light polarization, and the dependence on the parameters of the hole array will be discussed. ... [J36.003] Single nanohole as a point source of the surface plasmons L. Yin, V. Vlasko-Vlasov, A. Rydh, J. Pearson, U Welp, S.K. Gray (Argonne National Laboratory), S.-H. Chung (Northwestern University), G.C. Schatz (Affiliation), D.E. Brown, C.W. Kimball (Northern Illinois University) It is found experimentally that subwavelength holes in thin metal films serve as point sources of the surface plasmon polaritons. Near Field Scanning optical microscope is used for imaging light patterns around individual nanoholes made by FIB in gold and silver films. The intensity distributions around the holes are qualitatively explained accounting for the interference between surface plasmons and attenuated transmitted wave. These results are supported by exact 3D finite-difference time-domain numerical simulations. The effect of the metal coated tip on the light pattern is explicitly accounted for and it is shown that the measured signal is correctly presenting the surface plasmon fields around the hole. It is also shown that the light pattern near the hole can be manipulated by the conditions of illumination and the choice of metal. etc. Not to forget the simple tensile stress of a gossamer assembly, pulling a kg-payload with many g's. Carbon nanotube ropes and (truss?) cloth appears about optimal here, whether metallized with membranes across mesh gaps, or not. > I strongly suspected that someday someone would come up with a good > reason for me to go back to school... :-( Going back to school needs a reason? -- Eugen* Leitl leitl http://leitl.org ______________________________________________________________ ICBM: 48.07100, 11.36820 http://www.ativel.com 8B29F6BE: 099D 78BA 2FD3 B014 B08A 7779 75B0 2443 8B29 F6BE -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: signature.asc Type: application/pgp-signature Size: 191 bytes Desc: Digital signature URL: From kerry_prez at yahoo.com Tue Nov 21 18:36:53 2006 From: kerry_prez at yahoo.com (Al Brooks) Date: Tue, 21 Nov 2006 10:36:53 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] LA Times article on hallucinogens In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <325084.29726.qm@web51606.mail.yahoo.com> But unfortunately you can get a different sort of message from psychedelics too, a Charles Manson can get the message: "in the name of God and the Beatles kill thy neighbor with a serrated steak knife". THAT comes from the deepest most intimate place as well. People experience similar benefits from, for example, a sudden and intense life-threatening brush with danger (to themselves or loved ones), falling in love, getting religion, great sex (if they haven't had any for a long while), sexual abstinence (if they've had too much for too long), fasting (if they've always had plenty, and so on. On a smaller scale, laughter can completely change the dynamics of a tense business meeting, a brief walk in the park can refresh an engineer's problem-solving abilities, and temporarily doing something mundane can restore a writer's creativity. So yes, having a drug-induced hallucinogenic experience, enhanced by the rush of a significant flow of certain neurotransmitters and (for these drugs in particular) minor refractory impact, can easily lead to a shakeup in world view. But the results don't necessarily have much to do with chemicals. A systems-view of the world (including the humans in it) can provide powerful insights. Of course, as everyone knows, such thinking is totally dehumanizing. ;-) - Jef _______________________________________________ extropy-chat mailing list extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat --------------------------------- Sponsored Link Rates near 39yr lows. $420,000 Loan for $1399/mo - Calculate new house payment -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From ben at goertzel.org Tue Nov 21 19:05:15 2006 From: ben at goertzel.org (Ben Goertzel) Date: Tue, 21 Nov 2006 14:05:15 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] [wta-talk] LA Times article on hallucinogens In-Reply-To: References: <20061121181220.GF6974@leitl.org> Message-ID: <638d4e150611211105v72bb27bct7478721458c0dbc5@mail.gmail.com> > > Is this actually well-documented? Life-changing single doses > > of hallucinogens, I mean? Yes, but what's better documented is that taking psychedelics repeatedly over a period of time, with the right "set and setting", can have positive life-changing effects... It also seems to be the case that after a certain point, most folks feel they've "gotten about all they can" out of the psychedelic experience, and lose desire to keep taking the drugs frequently... -- Ben G From eugen at leitl.org Tue Nov 21 19:30:55 2006 From: eugen at leitl.org (Eugen Leitl) Date: Tue, 21 Nov 2006 20:30:55 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] [wta-talk] LA Times article on hallucinogens In-Reply-To: References: <20061121181220.GF6974@leitl.org> Message-ID: <20061121193055.GK6974@leitl.org> On Tue, Nov 21, 2006 at 10:53:28AM -0800, Jef Allbright wrote: > If you google <"changed my life" lsd> you will find many examples of > people who believe that it can and did. I just did, and even as anecdotes, these are pretty thin. > My experience left me with a lasting appreciation of the malleability of > consciousness and identity and how a person's subjective reality is, for > all practical purposes their whole reality. I was not particularly impressed with acid (nor with other hallucinogens, for that matter). You see pretty pictures, you die, you see God. So what? Nothing but Disney on steroids. > As a side note, I've observed that people who have done a lot of LSD > seem to be overly susceptible to making erroneous mental connections. I > don't know if that's because people with that trait are attracted to LSD > or that LSD enhances that trait, but its enough for me to advise > restraint. > > I gained other insights as well, but the really life-changing effect was > that I went from someone demonstrating a hardcore insistence on striving > toward objective truth, to someone realizing that it's much more Never was on that particular trip. > effective to try to understand another person's model of reality and > then work on encompassing it with a larger, closer *approximation* to > objective reality. Rinse, lather, repeat. -- Eugen* Leitl leitl http://leitl.org ______________________________________________________________ ICBM: 48.07100, 11.36820 http://www.ativel.com 8B29F6BE: 099D 78BA 2FD3 B014 B08A 7779 75B0 2443 8B29 F6BE -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: signature.asc Type: application/pgp-signature Size: 191 bytes Desc: Digital signature URL: From ben at goertzel.org Tue Nov 21 19:53:41 2006 From: ben at goertzel.org (Ben Goertzel) Date: Tue, 21 Nov 2006 14:53:41 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] [wta-talk] LA Times article on hallucinogens In-Reply-To: <20061121193055.GK6974@leitl.org> References: <20061121181220.GF6974@leitl.org> <20061121193055.GK6974@leitl.org> Message-ID: <638d4e150611211153r62eb0d1ey7d46031e41e96052@mail.gmail.com> Well, another well-known fact about psychedelics is that the effect is highly variant, depending on the individual, their state of mind, and the circumstances they take it in... This is not really so surprising; something comparable could be said about a lot of other life experiences, e.g. meditation or marriage or sex.... "Sex ... hmmm .. yeah, I tried that once for a few minutes ... it was OK, but I don't see what the fuss is all about... ultimately all it did was get my sister mad at me... ;-p" ... "Meditation ... hmmm ... yah, I sat there and stared at the wall for a while ... just got bored ... guess those Zen masters are all fulla shit, yep..." ;-) Seriously: There is a lot of junk written about psychedelic experience, and there is a dearth of serious scientific evaluation due mainly to legal reasons. And, as a radical transhumanist, I don't find the tweaking of the current human brain with chemicals to be a maximally interesting pursuit. More interesting to go beyond the human brain entirely. However, there is no doubt in my mind that psychedelics have the capability to enable human minds to undergo fundamental positive transformations involving profound insights. They also have the capability to drive people nuts, and to bore people or provide people with shallow entertainment... They are very crude tools, with a diversity of effects. One day someone may create precision psychedelics (hey! there's a nice company name ;-) but I'm more acutely looking forward to the obsolescence of the human brain altogether, which will obviously give rise to far more interesting opportunities for fundamental transformation... -- BenG On 11/21/06, Eugen Leitl wrote: > On Tue, Nov 21, 2006 at 10:53:28AM -0800, Jef Allbright wrote: > > > If you google <"changed my life" lsd> you will find many examples of > > people who believe that it can and did. > > I just did, and even as anecdotes, these are pretty thin. > > > My experience left me with a lasting appreciation of the malleability of > > consciousness and identity and how a person's subjective reality is, for > > all practical purposes their whole reality. > > I was not particularly impressed with acid (nor with other > hallucinogens, for that matter). You see pretty pictures, you > die, you see God. So what? Nothing but Disney on steroids. > > > As a side note, I've observed that people who have done a lot of LSD > > seem to be overly susceptible to making erroneous mental connections. I > > don't know if that's because people with that trait are attracted to LSD > > or that LSD enhances that trait, but its enough for me to advise > > restraint. > > > > I gained other insights as well, but the really life-changing effect was > > that I went from someone demonstrating a hardcore insistence on striving > > toward objective truth, to someone realizing that it's much more > > Never was on that particular trip. > > > effective to try to understand another person's model of reality and > > then work on encompassing it with a larger, closer *approximation* to > > objective reality. Rinse, lather, repeat. > > -- > Eugen* Leitl leitl http://leitl.org > ______________________________________________________________ > ICBM: 48.07100, 11.36820 http://www.ativel.com > 8B29F6BE: 099D 78BA 2FD3 B014 B08A 7779 75B0 2443 8B29 F6BE > > > -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- > Version: GnuPG v1.4.2.2 (GNU/Linux) > > iD8DBQFFY1PvdbAkQ4sp9r4RApNqAJ4kWA2uqNq544FaOgqq6wV6RA5QUwCfQV0j > +qUWBQktRUDh4AbsN1sRjRE= > =gjT1 > -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- > > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > > > From asa at nada.kth.se Tue Nov 21 19:58:05 2006 From: asa at nada.kth.se (Anders Sandberg) Date: Tue, 21 Nov 2006 20:58:05 +0100 (MET) Subject: [extropy-chat] Suicide the Green way In-Reply-To: <200611211546.kALFkPWG027298@andromeda.ziaspace.com> References: <200611211546.kALFkPWG027298@andromeda.ziaspace.com> Message-ID: <49174.86.130.9.194.1164139085.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> spike wrote: > I would be curious > to > know why low resistance beats lightness -- do the photons charge the sail? I think it is not necessarily that it always beats lightness, but it improves efficiency. A photon hitting a good conductor is reflected, while a photon hitting a poor conductor heats it - less energy gets reflected. Landis has some calculations on this. -- Anders Sandberg, Oxford Uehiro Centre for Practical Ethics Philosophy Faculty of Oxford University From kerry_prez at yahoo.com Tue Nov 21 19:42:17 2006 From: kerry_prez at yahoo.com (Al Brooks) Date: Tue, 21 Nov 2006 11:42:17 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] LA Times article on hallucinogens In-Reply-To: <638d4e150611211105v72bb27bct7478721458c0dbc5@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <20061121194217.97031.qmail@web51608.mail.yahoo.com> You can get the same thing from meditation or tantric sex. As you might guess I took LSD and it was like killing a mosquito with a sledge hammer; there was something positive about it, but not life changing. Yes, but what's better documented is that taking psychedelics repeatedly over a period of time, with the right "set and setting", can have positive life-changing effects... It also seems to be the case that after a certain point, most folks feel they've "gotten about all they can" out of the psychedelic experience, and lose desire to keep taking the drugs frequently... -- Ben G --------------------------------- Sponsored Link $200,000 mortgage for $660/mo - 30/15 yr fixed, reduce debt, home equity - Click now for info -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From kerry_prez at yahoo.com Tue Nov 21 19:49:40 2006 From: kerry_prez at yahoo.com (Al Brooks) Date: Tue, 21 Nov 2006 11:49:40 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] LA Times article on hallucinogens In-Reply-To: <20061121193055.GK6974@leitl.org> Message-ID: <149090.17406.qm@web51612.mail.yahoo.com> Mind-expanding but also stomach-churning. And Tim Leary has his cremated remains shot into outer space as some sort of Big Statement about something-or-other. Whoopee do. How enlightened. How spiritual. >I was not particularly impressed with acid (nor with other >hallucinogens, for that matter). You see pretty pictures, you >die, you see God. So what? Nothing but Disney on steroids. --------------------------------- Sponsored Link Mortgage rates near 39yr lows. $420,000 Mortgage for $1,399/mo - Calculate new house payment -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From benboc at lineone.net Tue Nov 21 20:21:26 2006 From: benboc at lineone.net (ben) Date: Tue, 21 Nov 2006 20:21:26 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Primates dreams and posthuman futures In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <45635FC6.8020703@lineone.net> "Jef Allbright" said: > I still feel my buttons getting pushed-- ... > Of course, getting one's buttons pushed is the point of this discussion, Yay. ... > The only alternative would be to lose ourselves in change, abandoning > all dignity and respect much as certain lowly larva unthinkingly give up > everything that matters to them, for their transformation to a > butterfly. Yup, that's what i'm talking about. Quite happy to abandon 'dignity' - The very concept of 'human dignity' makes me laugh. Where is it when we're on the toilet? Respect - well, that's something that is earned, by your actions. It's not intrinsic or automatically due. The things i'd disagree with above are 'lose ourselves in change'. I prefer to think of it as 'finding ourselves in change', and the 'unthinkingly' bit. I'm very much thinking "I don't want to be a larva for a few decades, then die". Quite happy to live a full human lifespan, then, as an alternative to just ceasing to exist, go on to change into something else. Hopefully, something more. OK, you may be right about the predators and such. But finding out is preferable to just lying down and giving in. ben zaiboc From avantguardian2020 at yahoo.com Tue Nov 21 20:28:10 2006 From: avantguardian2020 at yahoo.com (The Avantguardian) Date: Tue, 21 Nov 2006 12:28:10 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Atheist Hymn Book In-Reply-To: <456332F4.4040505@thomasoliver.net> Message-ID: <507989.26916.qm@web60522.mail.yahoo.com> Here's one to the tune of "Battle Hymn of the Republic" http://www.spiritualhumanism.org/hymn.htm --- Thomas wrote: > Well, yes I have some ideas . . . in song form. One > in particular comes > to mind. It's called "There Is A Light" and the > music is in a fun kind > of "holy roller" gospel style. I agree with Ayn > Rand that the sense of > exaltation is not to be limited to the domain of > religious expression. > I am interested in a venue for this type of > expression -- someplace > where I'd feel more at home than in churches or > bars. -- Thomas Oliver > > Emlyn wrote: > > >Hi all, > > > >I just watched those vids on youtube of Richard > Dawkins talking about > >his new book "The God Delusion" [1], and was > inspired. Imagine someone > >taking the case for Atheism out there in times like > these, especially > >in the US! What a legend. I haven't read the book > yet, unfortunately, > >still have to go get myself a copy. > > > >Anyway, it got me to thinking about one of the big > things that Atheism > >lacks, which is the traditions and general > apparatus of religion. > >Holidays, ceremonies, teachings, community. > Culture. > > > >For those who don't know me, I'm a singer, and sing > in a lot of > >christian churches, solo and choral, but I've been > an atheist all my > >life Actually by Huxley's definition I'm an > agnostic, but in the hard > >sense of "the existence of god is unknowable by > definition", which is > >in practice a hardline atheist (in that for me > theism falls in the > >santa clause, tooth fairy, etc camp, strictly > unknowable and therefore > >by Occam's Razor to be sliced out of any model of > reality). Yet I > >spend a lot of time in churches, as part of the > church community, > >because it is the institution that most supports a > type of music that > >I am involved in (church music, choral music, > oratorio, etc). I don't > >attend church as part of the flock, only as part of > the show. > > > >The culture that comes with religion is easy to > deride, but I've been > >seeing it in detail as an outsider for many years > now. The > >cultural/community side of the church clearly > provides purpose and > >meaning to many people, and the labours of people > involved in it seem > >to do an awful lot of good. There's a lot of > feeding the poor, caring > >about injustices, working for a better future, > going on in the > >grassroots of the churches (especially the old > ones). I put this down > >to the focus of religion, which is to think about > the basis for and > >reason for existence. Although they clearly get the > answers dreadfully > >wrong, this focus, and the associated devotion to > at least a couple of > >hours every week to getting together with other > likeminded people and > >ruminating on the big questions, seems to create > groups of people who > >can find it in their hearts to do something (even > something miniscule) > >to improve the lot of other people who need help. > > > >Now, there are atheist equivalents of course - all > secular endeavour > >could be classed in this way. I'm not saying that > atheists are > >heartless uncaring bastards, far from it. However, > there does seem to > >be a gap there, no sense of the unity, the > community and culture, that > >religious people enjoy. > > > >Again, as far as culture goes, that doesn't matter > so much a lot of > >the time, because all of secular culture counts as > atheist culture by > >default (does it?). However, the acknowledgement of > a scientific world > >view, and the way that ties in with the very human > sense of wonder and > >appreciation of the universe, is something that > doesn't really seem to > >get a run. Especially in a time when theists are > more prevalent, and > >at times more oppressive, than they've been in a > long while (people in > >the US might particularly resonate with this), it's > a time when > >atheism as a world view could do with a bit more > unity, a bit more > >cohesion. I think this requires some kind of > establishment of > >culture/community/tradition. > > > >I think establishing atheist community is a hard > problem. Dawkins says > >in one of the videos that organising atheists is > like herding cats, > >and I believe there is a very good reason for this, > which is that > >Atheism is not a belief system, it is a lack of > belief. Contrary to > >many religious folks' contention that atheism is > just another defacto > >belief system (and hence equivalent to religion), > it is this aspect of > >it (that there is no culture/community) which most > clearly shows that > >it is not. I think in the end, it is very much > harder for people to > >rally around a lack of belief in something, than it > is to rally around > >a positive belief. Furthermore, the *only* tenet of > atheism is to be > >without god, so atheists differ greatly in their > beliefs and values. > > > >Nevertheless, I think it would be a worthwhile > thing to try to > >establish such community, now more so than ever. > Atheism is a dirty > >word these days, it's a scary time to stand up and > commit to being > >one. > > > >To this end, in my own little way I'd like to try > to add a bit of > >celebratory culture, by way of some music. As I > said above, I sing a > >lot of religious music[2], and would love to have > music that had the > >same benefits (expressing the big issues of life) > without the > >drawbacks (fundamentally flawed premise). > > > >So in my long winded way, I'm asking a question, > which is, if there > >were to be an Atheist hymn book, what would be in > it? New music, or > >existing songs, both are ok. What would the songs > be about? What do we > >have to celebrate, and how would you like to hear > it expressed? > > > >So, got ideas? > > > >Emlyn > >http://www.emlynoregan.com > > > >[1] Reading of The God Delusion in Lynchburg, VA > >http://richarddawkins.net/article,303,Reading-of-The-God-Delusion-in-Lynchburg-VA,Richard-Dawkins--C-SPAN2 > > > >[2] Godless Heathen (an article by me about why I > sing religious music) > >http://emlynoregan.com/wu_Generic.aspx?PageName=showarticle&AID=1 > >_______________________________________________ > >extropy-chat mailing list > >extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > >http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > > > > > > > > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > Stuart LaForge alt email: stuart"AT"ucla.edu "Believe nothing. No matter where you read it, or who said it, even if I have said it, unless it agrees with your own reason and your own common sense."- Siddhartha Guatama aka Buddha. ____________________________________________________________________________________ Sponsored Link Online degrees - find the right program to advance your career. www.nextag.com From thespike at satx.rr.com Tue Nov 21 21:15:15 2006 From: thespike at satx.rr.com (Damien Broderick) Date: Tue, 21 Nov 2006 15:15:15 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] Atheist Hymn Book In-Reply-To: <507989.26916.qm@web60522.mail.yahoo.com> References: <456332F4.4040505@thomasoliver.net> <507989.26916.qm@web60522.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <7.0.1.0.2.20061121151118.022e5f10@satx.rr.com> At 12:28 PM 11/21/2006 -0800, Avant quoth: >Here's one to the tune of "Battle Hymn of the >Republic" > >http://www.spiritualhumanism.org/hymn.htm O my There-Is-No-God! "From one cell to a primate, to our present bipedal forms" Must these attempts be so doGgone *awful* and gruesomely comical? Damien [I know, should try my own hand at it. But I suspect the enterprise is basically misguided. Although "Imagine" seems to have been worth a try, even if it has turned into "Kumbayah".] From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Tue Nov 21 22:06:35 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Tue, 21 Nov 2006 17:06:35 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Atheist Hymn Book In-Reply-To: <7.0.1.0.2.20061121151118.022e5f10@satx.rr.com> References: <456332F4.4040505@thomasoliver.net> <507989.26916.qm@web60522.mail.yahoo.com> <7.0.1.0.2.20061121151118.022e5f10@satx.rr.com> Message-ID: It may just be my mind connecting random things together but I have to believe that once the Singularity really start to cranking, "Thriller" with minor modifications could be quite appropriate. Robert 1. http://www.lyricsondemand.com/m/michaeljacksonlyrics/thrillerlyrics.html -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From avantguardian2020 at yahoo.com Tue Nov 21 22:21:44 2006 From: avantguardian2020 at yahoo.com (The Avantguardian) Date: Tue, 21 Nov 2006 14:21:44 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Atheist Hymn Book In-Reply-To: <7.0.1.0.2.20061121151118.022e5f10@satx.rr.com> Message-ID: <20061121222144.29683.qmail@web60511.mail.yahoo.com> --- Damien Broderick wrote: > [I know, should try my own hand at it. But I suspect > the enterprise > is basically misguided. Although "Imagine" seems to > have been worth a > try, even if it has turned into "Kumbayah".] Oooh. Please do try your hand, Damien. Stuart LaForge alt email: stuart"AT"ucla.edu "Believe nothing. No matter where you read it, or who said it, even if I have said it, unless it agrees with your own reason and your own common sense."- Siddhartha Guatama aka Buddha. ____________________________________________________________________________________ Sponsored Link Online or Campus degree Associate's, Bachelor's, or Master's in less than one year.www.findtherightschool.com From emlynoregan at gmail.com Tue Nov 21 22:55:05 2006 From: emlynoregan at gmail.com (Emlyn) Date: Wed, 22 Nov 2006 09:25:05 +1030 Subject: [extropy-chat] Atheist Hymn Book In-Reply-To: <7.0.1.0.2.20061121151118.022e5f10@satx.rr.com> References: <456332F4.4040505@thomasoliver.net> <507989.26916.qm@web60522.mail.yahoo.com> <7.0.1.0.2.20061121151118.022e5f10@satx.rr.com> Message-ID: <710b78fc0611211455g45101310r2bc12317241f55c7@mail.gmail.com> Hey, don't knock kumbayah! http://emlynoregan.com/files/music/Candela/Demo%20Feb%202005/Candela__kumbayah.mp3 Emlyn On 22/11/06, Damien Broderick wrote: > At 12:28 PM 11/21/2006 -0800, Avant quoth: > > >Here's one to the tune of "Battle Hymn of the > >Republic" > > > >http://www.spiritualhumanism.org/hymn.htm > > O my There-Is-No-God! > > "From one cell to a primate, to our present bipedal forms" > > Must these attempts be so doGgone *awful* and gruesomely comical? > > Damien > [I know, should try my own hand at it. But I suspect the enterprise > is basically misguided. Although "Imagine" seems to have been worth a > try, even if it has turned into "Kumbayah".] > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > From transhumanist at goldenfuture.net Tue Nov 21 23:05:01 2006 From: transhumanist at goldenfuture.net (Joseph Bloch) Date: Tue, 21 Nov 2006 18:05:01 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Atheist Hymn Book In-Reply-To: <7.0.1.0.2.20061121151118.022e5f10@satx.rr.com> References: <456332F4.4040505@thomasoliver.net> <507989.26916.qm@web60522.mail.yahoo.com> <7.0.1.0.2.20061121151118.022e5f10@satx.rr.com> Message-ID: <4563861D.1050504@goldenfuture.net> Look up "filking" and behold the horror therein unleashed. Joseph Damien Broderick wrote: >At 12:28 PM 11/21/2006 -0800, Avant quoth: > > > >>Here's one to the tune of "Battle Hymn of the >>Republic" >> >>http://www.spiritualhumanism.org/hymn.htm >> >> > >O my There-Is-No-God! > >"From one cell to a primate, to our present bipedal forms" > >Must these attempts be so doGgone *awful* and gruesomely comical? > >Damien >[I know, should try my own hand at it. But I suspect the enterprise >is basically misguided. Although "Imagine" seems to have been worth a >try, even if it has turned into "Kumbayah".] > >_______________________________________________ >extropy-chat mailing list >extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org >http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > > > > From mbb386 at main.nc.us Wed Nov 22 00:04:02 2006 From: mbb386 at main.nc.us (MB) Date: Tue, 21 Nov 2006 19:04:02 -0500 (EST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Atheist Hymn Book In-Reply-To: <710b78fc0611211455g45101310r2bc12317241f55c7@mail.gmail.com> References: <456332F4.4040505@thomasoliver.net> <507989.26916.qm@web60522.mail.yahoo.com> <7.0.1.0.2.20061121151118.022e5f10@satx.rr.com> <710b78fc0611211455g45101310r2bc12317241f55c7@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <34472.72.236.103.57.1164153842.squirrel@main.nc.us> There are a number of really good hymn tunes in The Sacred Harp. Many of them will surely be out of copyright as they're from the 1700s and 1800s. They have 4 parts, cool harmony, and are *great* to sing. Ear worms, many of them! :))) Regards, MB From asa at nada.kth.se Wed Nov 22 00:05:37 2006 From: asa at nada.kth.se (Anders Sandberg) Date: Wed, 22 Nov 2006 01:05:37 +0100 (MET) Subject: [extropy-chat] Atheist Hymn Book Message-ID: <58019.86.130.9.194.1164153937.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> Damien Broderick wrote: > At 12:28 PM 11/21/2006 -0800, Avant quoth: > >>Here's one to the tune of "Battle Hymn of the >>Republic" >> >>http://www.spiritualhumanism.org/hymn.htm > > O my There-Is-No-God! > > "From one cell to a primate, to our present bipedal forms" > > Must these attempts be so doGgone *awful* and gruesomely comical? I think so. A reason religious songs do not sound comical is that we have been conditioned to feel awe for their symbols. Quasi-religious pro-space songs like Ecklar's _The Phoenix_ are much better at sending shivers down the spine than fact based. But also, since statistically the number of atheist songwriters is much smaller than the number of religious writers there ought to be far more good religious music out there. Some other suggestions: The Science Gospel, based on "Golden Stairs" (Mr Lloyd, from the album Hum THIS!) - not a bad version actually, both pro-evolution and pro-space. Some Darwinist Dub: http://www.infection.bham.ac.uk/BPAG/Dub/dub.html Not quite doctrinal but IMHO on the right wavelength: http://www.sff.net/people/Julia.West/songs/actscrea.html And something to deal with luddites: http://www.roving-mouse.com/lyrics/songworm-parody/MoonIsAlsoaSatellite.html Maybe They Might Be Giant's "Mammal" also fits in: http://www.lyricsdepot.com/they-might-be-giants/mammal.html And maybe some immortalist metal: http://www.consortiumofgenius.com/lyrics/death.htm 311's Evolution might fit in too: http://www.lyrics007.com/311%20Lyrics/Evolution%20Lyrics.html "Evolution has expontential timing it?ll be Half as long til the next breakthrough that blows are mind It?s up to the people to brave on with experimentation Move forth the species by using our imagination" -- Anders Sandberg, Oxford Uehiro Centre for Practical Ethics Philosophy Faculty of Oxford University From nanogirl at halcyon.com Wed Nov 22 00:40:08 2006 From: nanogirl at halcyon.com (Gina Miller) Date: Tue, 21 Nov 2006 16:40:08 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Atheist Hymn Book References: <58019.86.130.9.194.1164153937.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> Message-ID: <007001c70dce$d87a8280$0200a8c0@Nano> Dear God - XTC http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GHmv15H-VGk&mode=related&search= Lyrics: http://www.lyricsfreak.com/x/xtc/dear+god_20147941.html 'artist & animator for hire' Gina "Nanogirl" Miller Nanotechnology Industries http://www.nanoindustries.com Personal: http://www.nanogirl.com/index2.html Animation Blog: http://maxanimation.blogspot.com/ Craft blog: http://nanogirlblog.blogspot.com/ Foresight Senior Associate http://www.foresight.org Nanotechnology Advisor Extropy Institute http://www.extropy.org Email: nanogirl at halcyon.com "Nanotechnology: Solutions for the future." -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From artillo at comcast.net Wed Nov 22 01:24:44 2006 From: artillo at comcast.net (Brian J. Shores) Date: Tue, 21 Nov 2006 20:24:44 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Atheist Hymn Book In-Reply-To: <58019.86.130.9.194.1164153937.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> Message-ID: <002c01c70dd4$fe05cf90$650fa8c0@BJSMain> My first thought was to redo Christmas songs: O Come, all ye Faithless Oh, [black]hole-y Night... Etc. -- No virus found in this outgoing message. Checked by AVG Free Edition. Version: 7.1.409 / Virus Database: 268.14.12/545 - Release Date: 11/21/2006 From kerry_prez at yahoo.com Wed Nov 22 01:51:02 2006 From: kerry_prez at yahoo.com (Al Brooks) Date: Tue, 21 Nov 2006 17:51:02 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] LA Times article on hallucinogens In-Reply-To: <638d4e150611211153r62eb0d1ey7d46031e41e96052@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <713492.42749.qm@web51612.mail.yahoo.com> In a word, using psychedelics is playing Russian Roulette with the mind. I found using it creates the most disheartening experiences, you realize everything is transitory and devoid of meaning-- all that means anything is darwinism. But for artists it can be great, like McCartney doing Sgt. Peppers. --- Ben Goertzel wrote: >They also have the > capability to drive people nuts, and to bore people > or provide people > with shallow entertainment... ____________________________________________________________________________________ Sponsored Link Online or Campus degree Associate's, Bachelor's, or Master's in less than one year.www.findtherightschool.com From emlynoregan at gmail.com Wed Nov 22 02:04:04 2006 From: emlynoregan at gmail.com (Emlyn) Date: Wed, 22 Nov 2006 12:34:04 +1030 Subject: [extropy-chat] Atheist Hymn Book In-Reply-To: <002c01c70dd4$fe05cf90$650fa8c0@BJSMain> References: <58019.86.130.9.194.1164153937.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> <002c01c70dd4$fe05cf90$650fa8c0@BJSMain> Message-ID: <710b78fc0611211804g5c351496qa99e82754ef27b21@mail.gmail.com> Monty Python's Galaxy Song http://www.lyricsdepot.com/monty-python/galaxy-song.html Emlyn On 22/11/06, Brian J. Shores wrote: > > My first thought was to redo Christmas songs: > > O Come, all ye Faithless > > Oh, [black]hole-y Night... Etc. > > -- > No virus found in this outgoing message. > Checked by AVG Free Edition. > Version: 7.1.409 / Virus Database: 268.14.12/545 - Release Date: 11/21/2006 > > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > From Thomas at thomasoliver.net Wed Nov 22 01:55:50 2006 From: Thomas at thomasoliver.net (Thomas) Date: Tue, 21 Nov 2006 18:55:50 -0700 Subject: [extropy-chat] Atheist Hymn Book References: <456332F4.4040505@thomasoliver.net> <507989.26916.qm@web60522.mail.yahoo.com> <7.0.1.0.2.20061121151118.022e5f10@satx.rr.com> <710b78fc0611211455g45101310r2bc12317241f55c7@mail.gmail.com> <34472.72.236.103.57.1164153842.squirrel@main.nc.us> Message-ID: <4563AE26.8060304@thomasoliver.net> I made an organ arrangement of "Beach Spring ," but I never thought to compose secular lyrics. Perhaps I'll try. -- Thomas Oliver MB wrote: >There are a number of really good hymn tunes in The Sacred Harp. Many of them will >surely be out of copyright as they're from the 1700s and 1800s. They have 4 parts, >cool harmony, and are *great* to sing. Ear worms, many of them! :))) > >Regards, >MB > >_______________________________________________ >extropy-chat mailing list >extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org >http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > > > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From emlynoregan at gmail.com Wed Nov 22 02:45:54 2006 From: emlynoregan at gmail.com (Emlyn) Date: Wed, 22 Nov 2006 13:15:54 +1030 Subject: [extropy-chat] Atheist Hymn Book In-Reply-To: <58019.86.130.9.194.1164153937.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> References: <58019.86.130.9.194.1164153937.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> Message-ID: <710b78fc0611211845m65eca965x19826a82bc43bedb@mail.gmail.com> On 22/11/06, Anders Sandberg wrote: > Damien Broderick wrote: > > At 12:28 PM 11/21/2006 -0800, Avant quoth: > > > >>Here's one to the tune of "Battle Hymn of the > >>Republic" > >> > >>http://www.spiritualhumanism.org/hymn.htm > > > > O my There-Is-No-God! > > > > "From one cell to a primate, to our present bipedal forms" > > > > Must these attempts be so doGgone *awful* and gruesomely comical? > > I think so. A reason religious songs do not sound comical is that we have > been conditioned to feel awe for their symbols. Yes, absolutely. I think that's actually a reason to try a bit harder with this; those symbols gained their connotations in the first place through a long history of exactly the culture building that I'm interested in here. > Quasi-religious pro-space > songs like Ecklar's _The Phoenix_ are much better at sending shivers down > the spine than fact based. But also, since statistically the number of > atheist songwriters is much smaller than the number of religious writers > there ought to be far more good religious music out there. > That plus the passage of time. Great swathes of the music of western civilisation was commissioned by the church or otherwise created inside religioun dominated social structures, so the great composers necessarily wrote religious music (and were often highly religious, eg Bach). btw Damien, this is a reason that you should try your hand at it ;-) Emlyn From pj at pj-manney.com Wed Nov 22 02:49:55 2006 From: pj at pj-manney.com (pjmanney) Date: Tue, 21 Nov 2006 21:49:55 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Atheist Hymn Book Message-ID: <7926722.1736431164163795907.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> But seriously, folks... To deal with Emlyn's direct question, I too was in his boat. Sang in a church choir as a kid because they played great music. I loved flying away on the wings of transcendental sound, which as you discussed, is the allure of great religious music. But as most of you know my schtick by now, "...born a jew, raised an agnostic... practice my own half-baked buddhism," I clearly wasn't there for the religion. Actually, the Presbyterians had the best music program in town and most of my friends were members. So I sang. And for my efforts, I still remember the entire score of Handel's Messiah by heart. Now that's music. As for secular music that might suit, I remember singing compositions by Randall Thompson at school (think Ralph Vaughan-Williams meets Aaron Copeland). He did a series of pieces called "Frostiana" based on the poems of Robert Frost. I especially remember loving "The Road Not Taken" which could as easily be an H+ anthem. It certainly is the iconoclast's anthem, which I assume most of us are. And at least they're great lyrics. Frost rocks. And Thompson's music is beautiful Together, they've nailed the transcendental-without-the-Almighty part. http://www.bartleby.com/119/1.html http://www.chem.yale.edu/~chem125/125/Star.html http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/B0006ZP2WK/ref=ord_cart_shr/102-0491878-4703357?%5Fencoding=UTF8&m=ATVPDKIKX0DER&v=glance >From Amazon: "In 1958, Randall Thompson was commissioned to compose a piece celebrating the 200th anniversary of the incorporation of the town of Amherst, Massachusetts. The townspeople suggested that Thompson set a poem by Robert Frost... Thompson, a friend of Frost's, agreed... he chose to compose a suite of seven poems, and titled it Frostiana... A common thread unites the poems, emphasizing the importance of the many small choices we are called to make throughout life. Through his sensitive settings of Frost's texts, Thompson gently counsels us to take the road less traveled, to keep our promises before we sleep, to stay our minds upon something like a star." As for orchestrating existing popular H+ music as choral works, I do have a problem imagining "Singular Indestructible Droid" by Papa Roach as a choral piece. Call me crazy. Jefferson Airplane's "Crown of Creation" as rock opera with chorus would work, though! PJ From mbb386 at main.nc.us Wed Nov 22 03:10:10 2006 From: mbb386 at main.nc.us (MB) Date: Tue, 21 Nov 2006 22:10:10 -0500 (EST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Atheist Hymn Book In-Reply-To: <4563AE26.8060304@thomasoliver.net> References: <456332F4.4040505@thomasoliver.net> <507989.26916.qm@web60522.mail.yahoo.com> <7.0.1.0.2.20061121151118.022e5f10@satx.rr.com> <710b78fc0611211455g45101310r2bc12317241f55c7@mail.gmail.com> <34472.72.236.103.57.1164153842.squirrel@main.nc.us> <4563AE26.8060304@thomasoliver.net> Message-ID: <34662.72.236.103.21.1164165010.squirrel@main.nc.us> > I made an organ arrangement of "Beach Spring > ," but I never thought to compose > secular lyrics. Perhaps I'll try. -- Thomas Oliver > :) I enjoyed listening to that - although it certainly was much more modern in harmony than the original. Dispersed harmony is different. I particularly enjoy the pieces by Billings and Read and others of that era. Singing Sacred Harp is as close as I can get to "church" now - and that's because I love to sing and these songs have harmonies and rhythms that speak to me. I cannot usually be comfortable with the theology, that's for sure. Regards, MB From ilsa.bartlett at gmail.com Wed Nov 22 01:56:35 2006 From: ilsa.bartlett at gmail.com (ilsa) Date: Tue, 21 Nov 2006 17:56:35 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] warm holiday greetings Message-ID: <9b9887c80611211756nd7d4a23tf1a2154b3dfbc760@mail.gmail.com> happy holiday greetings. this link says it all. my best wishes to you. with warm regards, ilsa http://www.globalco mmunity.org/ flash/wombat. shtml -- don't ever get so big or important that you can not hear and listen to every other person. john coletrane www.hotlux.com/angel.htm -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From thespike at satx.rr.com Wed Nov 22 04:00:37 2006 From: thespike at satx.rr.com (Damien Broderick) Date: Tue, 21 Nov 2006 22:00:37 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] Atheist Hymn Book Message-ID: <7.0.1.0.2.20061121215418.02194ad8@satx.rr.com> At 01:15 PM 11/22/2006 +1030, Emlyn wrote: >btw Damien, this is a reason that you should try your hand at it ;-) Well, in THE WHITE ABACUS, my gormless gayboy character Doony has a musical adventure: ======= Doony is dragged away on a whirlwind tour of the updeep, flailing in the air like a fish with legs. `The runs,' cries one bravo. Shouts of approval. Grinning, understanding nothing, Doony nods as well. A strong hand tightens on his shoulder, and a mouth bites his. He is delirious. `The runs!' he yells. They come upon a series of tunnels meshed with grille-work. High above them fly angels. Doony stares, heart stopping with a jolt, starting with another. The angels are glorious, wings two meters long from each vastly muscled shoulder, faces ruined and beautiful. All the angels are male, provocatively so. All the angels are singing. Doony watches them, listens, shaking his head. A score, two score of angels gather to perch in a massed choir. Music swells, and their voices are deeply resonant. They sing the famous blasphemous oratorio, `Seven Last Words From the Cross', and everyone stands pent and voiceless as their melody lifts through the run. `Bugger, bugger, bugger. Bugger, bugger! *Bugger.* SHIT!' The final soprano lingers like a palace of glass breaking, and when his voice has died away the run bursts into applause and hilarious jeering. The angels rise, driven upward upon their mighty wings, soar into the glimmering darkness, are gone. ================= And there's always the tender and sensitive lyric I wrote when I was first studying English poesy (as one does, or did): I know that Yeats and all his mates Have seen what madmen mean, When they cry out: "Oy! Up yer spout! "The world is God's Latrine!" Damien From pj at pj-manney.com Wed Nov 22 04:10:59 2006 From: pj at pj-manney.com (pjmanney) Date: Tue, 21 Nov 2006 23:10:59 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Atheist Hymn Book Message-ID: <965978.1741261164168659352.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> Damien wrote: > `Bugger, bugger, bugger. Bugger, bugger! *Bugger.* SHIT!' > >I know that Yeats >and all his mates >Have seen >what madmen mean, >When they cry out: >"Oy! Up yer spout! >"The world is God's Latrine!" Bloody Hell. How can you possibly top that? PJ From emlynoregan at gmail.com Wed Nov 22 04:15:52 2006 From: emlynoregan at gmail.com (Emlyn) Date: Wed, 22 Nov 2006 14:45:52 +1030 Subject: [extropy-chat] Atheist Hymn Book In-Reply-To: <7.0.1.0.2.20061121215418.02194ad8@satx.rr.com> References: <7.0.1.0.2.20061121215418.02194ad8@satx.rr.com> Message-ID: <710b78fc0611212015x723c7fe2y8e18b5fd55aaffe2@mail.gmail.com> `Bugger, bugger, bugger. Bugger, bugger! *Bugger.* SHIT!' ah by dog I cannot stop laughing at this. (loved the little poem too, lol) Emlyn On 22/11/06, Damien Broderick wrote: > At 01:15 PM 11/22/2006 +1030, Emlyn wrote: > > >btw Damien, this is a reason that you should try your hand at it ;-) > > Well, in THE WHITE ABACUS, my gormless gayboy character Doony has a > musical adventure: > > ======= > > Doony is dragged away on a whirlwind tour of the updeep, flailing in > the air like a fish with legs. > > `The runs,' cries one bravo. Shouts of approval. > > Grinning, understanding nothing, Doony nods as well. A > strong hand tightens on his shoulder, and a mouth bites his. He is delirious. > > `The runs!' he yells. > > They come upon a series of tunnels meshed with > grille-work. High above them fly angels. Doony stares, heart stopping > with a jolt, starting with another. The angels are glorious, wings > two meters long from each vastly muscled shoulder, faces ruined and > beautiful. All the angels are male, provocatively so. All the angels > are singing. > > Doony watches them, listens, shaking his head. > > A score, two score of angels gather to perch in a massed > choir. Music swells, and their voices are deeply resonant. They sing > the famous blasphemous oratorio, `Seven Last Words From the Cross', > and everyone stands pent and voiceless as their melody lifts through the run. > > `Bugger, bugger, bugger. Bugger, bugger! *Bugger.* SHIT!' > > The final soprano lingers like a palace of glass breaking, > and when his voice has died away the run bursts into applause and > hilarious jeering. The angels rise, driven upward upon their mighty > wings, soar into the glimmering darkness, are gone. > > ================= > > And there's always the tender and sensitive lyric I wrote when I was > first studying English poesy (as one does, or did): > > I know that Yeats > and all his mates > Have seen > what madmen mean, > When they cry out: > "Oy! Up yer spout! > "The world is God's Latrine!" > > Damien > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > From spike66 at comcast.net Wed Nov 22 04:44:28 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Tue, 21 Nov 2006 20:44:28 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Suicide the Green way In-Reply-To: <49174.86.130.9.194.1164139085.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> Message-ID: <200611220444.kAM4ib8q008401@andromeda.ziaspace.com> > bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Anders Sandberg > Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] Suicide the Green way > > > spike wrote: > > I would be curious to > > know why low resistance beats lightness -- do the photons charge the > sail? > > I think it is not necessarily that it always beats lightness, but it > improves efficiency. A photon hitting a good conductor is reflected, while > a photon hitting a poor conductor heats it - less energy gets reflected. > > Landis has some calculations on this. > > -- > Anders Sandberg Thanks Anders, it was actually Robert who asked this, but my answer to him was pretty similar to yours. spike From spike66 at comcast.net Wed Nov 22 05:11:21 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Tue, 21 Nov 2006 21:11:21 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Atheist Hymn Book In-Reply-To: <710b78fc0611211455g45101310r2bc12317241f55c7@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <200611220511.kAM5BTi2007975@andromeda.ziaspace.com> > Damien wrote: > > ... Although "Imagine" seems to have been worth a > > try, even if it has turned into "Kumbayah".] It helps to know the background of Kumbayah, the origin of the song, the meaning of the term, etc. It had its roots in an ancient language as recorded by a Christian missionary who went to an African village and met with great success in guiding souls to salvation. The missionary was inspired by the Christian youth of that village who used this term in their conversations during church functions, and thus wrote the song, which is known and loved in religious circles to this day. The native speakers of that language are always delighted to hear this term used in various parts of the world, for the actual meaning of the term "kumbayah" is "go fuck yourself." Now let us sing... spike {8^D From mmbutler at gmail.com Wed Nov 22 06:26:32 2006 From: mmbutler at gmail.com (Michael M. Butler) Date: Tue, 21 Nov 2006 22:26:32 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Atheist Hymn Book In-Reply-To: <200611220511.kAM5BTi2007975@andromeda.ziaspace.com> References: <710b78fc0611211455g45101310r2bc12317241f55c7@mail.gmail.com> <200611220511.kAM5BTi2007975@andromeda.ziaspace.com> Message-ID: <7d79ed890611212226x5868659aj5473b2afeeb17d90@mail.gmail.com> > It helps to know the background of Kumbayah, the origin of the song, the > meaning of the term, etc. It had its roots in an ancient language as > recorded by a Christian missionary who went to an African village and met > with great success in guiding souls to salvation. The missionary was > inspired by the Christian youth of that village who used this term in their > conversations during church functions, and thus wrote the song, which is > known and loved in religious circles to this day. The native speakers of > that language are always delighted to hear this term used in various parts > of the world, for the actual meaning of the term "kumbayah" is "go fuck > yourself." False, in fact. It is actually originally a song from the Carolinas that made its way over to Angola where missionaries with no scholarship assumed it was African patois. "Come by here" in "Gully" (aka Gullah) (from a mysterious subrace in the hinterlands of the US South) is, phonetically, coom bah hya. It's actually about being very near / in despair because God appears nowhere in evidence: "Someone's crying, my Lord, coom bah hya..." Etc. Loose translation: show the fsck up, God! > Now let us sing... > > spike > > > {8^D Well, now that you know what it means, do you really want to do the invocation? :) -- Michael M. Butler : m m b u t l e r ( a t ) g m a i l . c o m 'Piss off, you son of a bitch. Everything above where that plane hit is going to collapse, and it's going to take the whole building with it. I'm getting my people the fuck out of here." -- Rick Rescorla (R.I.P.), cell phone call, 9/11/2001 From sentience at pobox.com Wed Nov 22 07:05:57 2006 From: sentience at pobox.com (Eliezer S. Yudkowsky) Date: Tue, 21 Nov 2006 23:05:57 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Atheist Songs (was: Atheist Hymn Book) In-Reply-To: <7.0.1.0.2.20061121151118.022e5f10@satx.rr.com> References: <456332F4.4040505@thomasoliver.net> <507989.26916.qm@web60522.mail.yahoo.com> <7.0.1.0.2.20061121151118.022e5f10@satx.rr.com> Message-ID: <4563F6D5.5040108@pobox.com> Damien Broderick wrote: > > O my There-Is-No-God! > > "From one cell to a primate, to our present bipedal forms" > > Must these attempts be so doGgone *awful* and gruesomely comical? Yes. Laziness is a human universal; by default, would-be authors use their imaginations as little as possible. If they feel a vague twinge of envy for religious hymns, they'll write atheistic hymns in religious style. Line-by-line imitation is optional but preferred. One suspects that those who have the wonderful idea of writing atheistic versions of religious hymns, are too much in awe of their own audacity to concentrate on craftsmanship in prosody. Political diatribes are generally so loved, by their adherents, for being on Their Side, that they rarely rise to the level of art. The work is held only to the standard of being on Their Side. Who would dare call it doggerel? Wouldn't that insult the Cause? The thought that you might need to reach deep down and find something sincere and emotional and powerful, that would exist in its own right even if humanity had walked its path without ever blundering into religion - to create a work of art that would be art in its own right, even if no such thing as religion had ever existed - to let that art take the form it must take in its own right, by its own demands - most people, including atheists, don't make such routine use of their imaginations. Should atheists have songs too? Of course. Song is as old as the human species. When someone who happens to be an atheist sets words to music to celebrate something worthwhile, a celebration that would have been invented in its own right even if humanity had never stumbled into the trap of religion, then I will sing along. A rocket rising into the sky has the power to bring tears to my eyes. In its own way it is a very real atheist hymn; it is a glory that has no supernaturalism in it. > Damien > [I know, should try my own hand at it. But I suspect the enterprise > is basically misguided. Although "Imagine" seems to have been worth a > try, even if it has turned into "Kumbayah".] What do you feel deeply enough to write about? A space shuttle rising into the sky... The deaths of the many mortal generations, the ones forever lost to us... The inconceivable immensity of the unfolding story of humankind, and its hoped-for triumph, flowering across galaxies... The stern will of science, to find the truth whether or not it hurts... Isaac Newton who taught us so much, who knew full well that he was a child upon the seashore; and he died, and the worms ate his soul, and he never knew the answer to any of his questions... They would make fine subjects for songs, provided that you crafted the songs without ever once thinking about religion, without noticing that humanity had ever taken that wrong turn in its history. Just put some effort into craftsmanship. I would sing a song in our lost Darwin's memory and not be ashamed - if it were a good enough song to not shame Darwin, rather than nitwit doggerel. I don't pretend that I can write songs. I have not the prosodic talent to produce more than doggerel, whatever my will. But sometimes I write. -- Eliezer S. Yudkowsky http://singinst.org/ Research Fellow, Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence From moulton at moulton.com Wed Nov 22 09:46:40 2006 From: moulton at moulton.com (Fred C. Moulton) Date: Wed, 22 Nov 2006 01:46:40 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Atheist Hymn Book In-Reply-To: <710b78fc0611212015x723c7fe2y8e18b5fd55aaffe2@mail.gmail.com> References: <7.0.1.0.2.20061121215418.02194ad8@satx.rr.com> <710b78fc0611212015x723c7fe2y8e18b5fd55aaffe2@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <1164188800.4967.157.camel@lc2464> There are a some interesting pieces on the Dan Barker CD http://www.ffrf.org/shop/music/details.php?ID=CD2 Some songs I enjoy are:are: - Die Gedanken Sind Frei - Life Is Good - No Hurry To Die Someone has already mentioned filk. There are quite a few filk songs with a pro-space theme, Leslie Fish recorded several. Of course filk (like just about everything else) tends to reflects Sturgeon's Law. Some of you may remember Leonard Zubkoff (died about 4 years ago) from Bay Area Cryonics and Extropian events, Leonard published a small side line of recordings, Dandelion Digital. On one of the CDs he published was by a singing group called the Duras Sisters and it contains the song "The Stars Are Ours" http://www.angelfire.com/az2/durasbabes/ours.html As far as I can tell the recording group Duras Sisters and Dandelion Digital are no longer functioning. Fred From velvethum at hotmail.com Wed Nov 22 13:53:03 2006 From: velvethum at hotmail.com (Heartland) Date: Wed, 22 Nov 2006 08:53:03 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Atheist Hymn Book References: <7.0.1.0.2.20061121215418.02194ad8@satx.rr.com> <710b78fc0611212015x723c7fe2y8e18b5fd55aaffe2@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: >From a potential "God obviously does not exist" playlist... Lost in the stars - Martin Gore (originally by Maxwell Anderson & Kurt Weill) Blasphemous Rumours - Depeche Mode ("Imagine" would be there too, of course) S. From emlynoregan at gmail.com Thu Nov 23 00:50:42 2006 From: emlynoregan at gmail.com (Emlyn) Date: Thu, 23 Nov 2006 11:20:42 +1030 Subject: [extropy-chat] Fusion@Home In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <710b78fc0611221650p4c5d5f34mfb77ca6fe2b25d94@mail.gmail.com> That article's a joke, isn't it? This old one isn't: http://www.dangerouslaboratories.org/radscout.html Emlyn On 22/11/06, Robert Bradbury wrote: > > Really! > > "Teen goes nuclear: He creates fusion in his Oakland Township Home" > http://www.freep.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20061119/NEWS03/611190639&template=printart > > Robert > > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > > > From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Thu Nov 23 01:15:56 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Wed, 22 Nov 2006 20:15:56 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Fusion@Home In-Reply-To: <710b78fc0611221650p4c5d5f34mfb77ca6fe2b25d94@mail.gmail.com> References: <710b78fc0611221650p4c5d5f34mfb77ca6fe2b25d94@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On 11/22/06, Emlyn wrote: > > That article's a joke, isn't it? No, I think its the "real" thing. Now of course you are never going to get a positive energy yield out of it but it makes for great copy. I can imagine setting up Science Clubs at high schools to build projects like this (as I would like to see Science Clubs building DNA sequencers) [which is something that I know is feasible]. Robert -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From femmechakra at yahoo.ca Thu Nov 23 03:10:30 2006 From: femmechakra at yahoo.ca (Anna Taylor) Date: Wed, 22 Nov 2006 22:10:30 -0500 (EST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Atheist Hymn Book, naturalist point of view. In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <345829.67781.qm@web37214.mail.mud.yahoo.com> What I've learned about Music. >From a naturalist point of view: Music is only about what YOU hear. Whether you like the voice of the singer, the instruments being played or the harmony with the singers/instruments. Please let me know of other factors, I might be missing something. The chords and the lyrics are/or make, why people like to listen to music. My personal opinion: If I where going to write atheists (1) songs I would write about: Love, suffering, survival, patience, virtue, honesty, trust etc. These words inflict positive reinforcements. What I wouldn't pronounce: Religion, hate, prejudice, ignorance, greed, ego, power etc. Naturally, these thoughts could create damage. Although they exist, I don't feel a need to concentrate on them. I've heard enough music that penetrates this kind of behavior. I still haven't understood what's the point of telling a story that reflects misery. If you haven't experienced it, you won't understand it. If you have experienced it, why would you teach the negative instead of the positive? Please keep in mind this is a point of view based on creating an atheist song book. If someone has a different opinion, I would appreciate it. Just curious. Anna:) (1) Atheist meaning I don't reject the belief in God and/or/although, I don't abide by the exact points of the definitions given by religion. --- Heartland wrote: > >From a potential "God obviously does not exist" > playlist... > Lost in the stars - Martin Gore (originally by > Maxwell Anderson & Kurt Weill) > Blasphemous Rumours - Depeche Mode > > ("Imagine" would be there too, of course) > > S. > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com From emlynoregan at gmail.com Thu Nov 23 06:11:12 2006 From: emlynoregan at gmail.com (Emlyn) Date: Thu, 23 Nov 2006 16:41:12 +1030 Subject: [extropy-chat] Atheist Hymn Book, naturalist point of view. In-Reply-To: <345829.67781.qm@web37214.mail.mud.yahoo.com> References: <345829.67781.qm@web37214.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <710b78fc0611222211j3ebee97cw40efc1d4f808fd34@mail.gmail.com> Yep, concentrating on the positive is a good idea IMO. > (1) Atheist meaning I don't reject the belief in God > and/or/although, I don't abide by the exact points > of the definitions given by religion. This is not atheism! This is some kind of unspecified mysticism. Atheism is the "disbelief in or denial of the existence of God or gods" (got that from http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/atheism, which also lists some rather irritating definitions like "the doctrine or belief that there is no God", which I know a lot of atheists would disagree with). Emlyn From msd001 at gmail.com Thu Nov 23 06:18:14 2006 From: msd001 at gmail.com (Mike Dougherty) Date: Thu, 23 Nov 2006 01:18:14 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Atheist Hymn Book In-Reply-To: References: <7.0.1.0.2.20061121215418.02194ad8@satx.rr.com> <710b78fc0611212015x723c7fe2y8e18b5fd55aaffe2@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <62c14240611222218i63f3b69excf369749d677353e@mail.gmail.com> On 11/22/06, Heartland wrote: > > >From a potential "God obviously does not exist" playlist... > Lost in the stars - Martin Gore (originally by Maxwell Anderson & Kurt > Weill) > Blasphemous Rumours - Depeche Mode > > ("Imagine" would be there too, of course) > Imagine keeps getting quoted.. for what? "no religion too" ? It's a depressing vision of complete homeostasis where everyone just sits around oblivious to everyone and everything else. (that's dropping out without first turning on or tuning in) I keep thinking about "music" being generated in real time based on biofeedback. "Artists" would be considered successful if their input-to-output algorithm was pleasing to a large group of listeners - or perhaps self-seek an optimal enjoyment level. Seriously, why buy an ipod to hear the same old stuff done over and over the same way if you can have a personal experience drivin by your own internal state at the moment you 'plug in' to it - and let the music evolve to your mood/response? We would be discussing how quickly discord attenuates to harmony, or how soon the dynamicism is played out of a given algorithm. Good meta-composers will have longevity, bad will obviously not. The good/bad measure of meta-composition will be even more subjective than 'static' composition. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From emlynoregan at gmail.com Thu Nov 23 06:40:49 2006 From: emlynoregan at gmail.com (Emlyn) Date: Thu, 23 Nov 2006 17:10:49 +1030 Subject: [extropy-chat] Atheist Hymn Book In-Reply-To: <62c14240611222218i63f3b69excf369749d677353e@mail.gmail.com> References: <7.0.1.0.2.20061121215418.02194ad8@satx.rr.com> <710b78fc0611212015x723c7fe2y8e18b5fd55aaffe2@mail.gmail.com> <62c14240611222218i63f3b69excf369749d677353e@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <710b78fc0611222240mabcefedp1e179f9929fd7214@mail.gmail.com> > > I keep thinking about "music" being generated in real time based on > biofeedback. "Artists" would be considered successful if their > input-to-output algorithm was pleasing to a large group of listeners - or > perhaps self-seek an optimal enjoyment level. > > Seriously, why buy an ipod to hear the same old stuff done over and over the > same way if you can have a personal experience drivin by your own internal > state at the moment you 'plug in' to it - and let the music evolve to your > mood/response? We would be discussing how quickly discord attenuates to > harmony, or how soon the dynamicism is played out of a given algorithm. > Good meta-composers will have longevity, bad will obviously not. The > good/bad measure of meta-composition will be even more subjective than > 'static' composition. I was exposed to a lot of this kind of thing this year at the local conservatorium. It's a cool idea, the only trouble is that the result is always utter shite. IMNSHO. Emlyn From eugen at leitl.org Thu Nov 23 09:25:48 2006 From: eugen at leitl.org (Eugen Leitl) Date: Thu, 23 Nov 2006 10:25:48 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] Fusion@Home In-Reply-To: <710b78fc0611221650p4c5d5f34mfb77ca6fe2b25d94@mail.gmail.com> References: <710b78fc0611221650p4c5d5f34mfb77ca6fe2b25d94@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <20061123092548.GU6974@leitl.org> On Thu, Nov 23, 2006 at 11:20:42AM +1030, Emlyn wrote: > That article's a joke, isn't it? No, amateurs building Farnsworth fusors is a recent fad. Before, it was basement particle accelerators (aka "my magnet is bigger than yours"). Tesla coils are also an evergreen. > This old one isn't: > > http://www.dangerouslaboratories.org/radscout.html -- Eugen* Leitl leitl http://leitl.org ______________________________________________________________ ICBM: 48.07100, 11.36820 http://www.ativel.com 8B29F6BE: 099D 78BA 2FD3 B014 B08A 7779 75B0 2443 8B29 F6BE -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: signature.asc Type: application/pgp-signature Size: 191 bytes Desc: Digital signature URL: From sjatkins at mac.com Thu Nov 23 12:13:43 2006 From: sjatkins at mac.com (=?ISO-8859-1?Q?Samantha=A0_Atkins?=) Date: Thu, 23 Nov 2006 04:13:43 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] 'a process of non-thinking called faith' 2 (2) In-Reply-To: <006b01c70aa6$74adbae0$660fa8c0@kevin> References: <5.1.0.14.0.20061117094643.03842438@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> <021801c70a7d$c14542c0$660fa8c0@kevin> <006b01c70aa6$74adbae0$660fa8c0@kevin> Message-ID: On Nov 17, 2006, at 4:14 PM, kevinfreels.com wrote: > Amen brother Robert. I am completely with you there. Unfortunately > "we" only have limited power to solve these problems. Most people > don't have the stomach to do what needs to be done. That can be seen > in Iraq. Yes. Most don't have the stomach to admit we had no legitimate reason to invade Iraq, had no idea of what we were getting into and have no business remaining there. Most haven't the stomach to apologize profusely, pay some reparations and ask the UN to clean up the mess to the extent it can be cleaned up. Robert wrote: > P > What is surprising is that we debate endlessly day in and day out > what happens after nanotechnology arrives and we all upload or the > fine points of what it means to be an individual and it seems we > place little value on thousands to millions of lives being lost due > to the actions of a few we choose to ignore ( e.g. Sudan president > Omar Al-Bashir). > > It makes me wonder if "we" deserve to be uploaded. I for one would > view the rationalization as difficult. If we cannot make good > judgements now, how can we be expected to make them in the future? > I do not see why it follows that I personally or the US or some other group has to become involved in every nasty conflict on the face of the earth. I certainly don't see why our doing so or not determines if we are deserving of being uploaded. I also doubt very much based on the evidence of our past and current engagements that "we" are at all intelligent and wise enough to actually fix much in such conflicts. To the extent this is so working to raise intelligence levels is more important to actually making a difference than many types of intervention would be. - samantha -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From ilsa.bartlett at gmail.com Thu Nov 23 08:53:21 2006 From: ilsa.bartlett at gmail.com (ilsa) Date: Thu, 23 Nov 2006 00:53:21 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Shambala show In-Reply-To: <9b9887c80611230025n17edec73wce3d901c6648aec6@mail.gmail.com> References: <9b9887c80611230025n17edec73wce3d901c6648aec6@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <9b9887c80611230053i6bb5e856ncc9e05bc3f4404b4@mail.gmail.com> > > > Shambhala Art is art that springs from the meditative state of mind. It > > is based on a collection of teachings by Ch?gyam Trungpa that appreciate the > > uniqueness of everyday sensory experience, the art of everyday life. Seeing > > the simplicity of things as they are provides the ground for genuine > > creative expression. This retrospective covering 30 years of her Art > > evolves as a creative tension with a certain refinement to push and pull > > society. This is an experiment with here and there. A resolution of the > > romantic sensabilities with the creative seeing eye pointing to the > > direction forward from the first heart beat. > > > > Ilsa Bartlett's inspired works will hang at the Shambhala Art Gallery > > through December 31, 2006 > > > > > 1630 Taraval St > San Francisco, CA 94116 > (415) 731-4426 > > > > don't ever get so big or important that you can not hear and listen to > every other person. john coltrane > www.hotlux.com/angel.htm -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: image.gif Type: image/gif Size: 88667 bytes Desc: not available URL: From Thomas at thomasoliver.net Thu Nov 23 17:04:44 2006 From: Thomas at thomasoliver.net (Thomas) Date: Thu, 23 Nov 2006 10:04:44 -0700 Subject: [extropy-chat] Atheist Hymn Book, naturalist point of view. References: <345829.67781.qm@web37214.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <4565D4AC.60408@thomasoliver.net> Anna Taylor wrote: >[ . . . ] > >Music is only about what YOU hear. > I understand many deaf people enjoy the "feel" of music . . . the tactile sense of vibration and rhythm. The value of anything cannot be separated from who does the valuing. Some people only enjoy music with the right side of their brain. There was a time when I felt my enjoyment of music was diminished by my aquired ability to analyze it. Once the brain hemispheres start working together the overall pleasure is much enhanced. That's why music appreciation courses are offered. >The chords and the lyrics are/or make, why people >like to listen to music. > Chords and lyrics are less essential than melody -- rap notwithstanding. >[ . . . ] I still haven't understood what's >the point of telling a story that reflects misery. > > Well, the point is catharsis. I think the blues relieves the build up of negative pressure and perhaps sets the stage for enlightenment. On the other hand, if you are of the persuasion that your words have creative power, then you'd best be mindful of what you are chanting for, right? -- Gently, Thomas From Thomas at thomasoliver.net Thu Nov 23 18:14:10 2006 From: Thomas at thomasoliver.net (Thomas) Date: Thu, 23 Nov 2006 11:14:10 -0700 Subject: [extropy-chat] Atheist Hymn Book, naturalist point of view. References: <345829.67781.qm@web37214.mail.mud.yahoo.com> <710b78fc0611222211j3ebee97cw40efc1d4f808fd34@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <4565E4F2.2080707@thomasoliver.net> Emlyn wrote: >Yep, concentrating on the positive is a good idea IMO. > > > >>(1) Atheist meaning I don't reject the belief in God >>and/or/although, I don't abide by the exact points >>of the definitions given by religion. >> >> > >This is not atheism! This is some kind of unspecified mysticism. >Atheism is the "disbelief in or denial of the existence of God or >gods" (got that from http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/atheism, >which also lists some rather irritating definitions like "the doctrine >or belief that there is no God", which I know a lot of atheists would >disagree with). > >Emlyn >_______________________________________________ >extropy-chat mailing list >extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org >http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > > > I think Anna, like many of us, is not fully polarized on the God concept. Some may have a haunting "simulus" (Minsky's term) built up in the mind even though we've rejected the self contradictory concept we were handed. My father, at the time he pointed out the contradictions, also mentioned that religion has kept a lot of people from being bad. Is the unknowable really worth denying? Realistically, God, the delusion, has existed for a long time. I prefer to handle that fact as gracefully as possible, but I'm not above kicking dogma and hypocrisy in the butt. This Principia Cybernetica page offers an interesting disscussion of the (dis)belief in God spectrum. Gently, Thomas -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From eugen at leitl.org Thu Nov 23 21:29:26 2006 From: eugen at leitl.org (Eugen Leitl) Date: Thu, 23 Nov 2006 22:29:26 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] [hello@ianbell.com: [FoRK] Hotmail Problems...] Message-ID: <20061123212926.GL6974@leitl.org> ----- Forwarded message from Ian Andrew Bell ----- From: Ian Andrew Bell Date: Thu, 23 Nov 2006 11:16:11 -0800 To: FoRK Now Subject: [FoRK] Hotmail Problems... X-Mailer: Apple Mail (2.752.3) I can't send email reliably to people on Hotmail. Some messages end up in the InBox, some end up in the Quarantine, but a greater majority of them go nowhere. No fail code, no bounce, and no delivery: "Thanks for the message, please wait while I drop it into this bottomless pit." Behold the response from my email provider when I asked if he was aware of any problems... This begs the question: just who exactly does MSFT think they are? They've broken the OS, now they're fucking breaking SMTP (snide comments about SMTP having "broken" baked in not welcome here). -Ian. ------ Hey Ian, Hotmail is a big problem. http://status.tuffmail.net/index.php#060927A Recent test show its worse than I could have ever imagined. I created an address in one of my domains and subscribed that address to a dozen email lists techincal and non-technical none of which can be remotely classified as spam. I created a new Hotmail account and forwarded the address to my old Hotmail mailbox and to the new Hotmail mailbox. Forwarding to both is through the same SMTP server. At least half of the mail to the new mailbox does not arrive even though accepted by Hotmail. A message that does arrive in both mailboxes will wind up in the INBOX of one mailbox and the Junk box of the other mailbox and vice versa. Another test is equally disturbing. I subscribed an address in on of my domains to 2 FreeBSD mailing lists and 2 Linux mailing lists. I subscribed a new Hotmail mailbox to those same mailing lists. Only 80% of the mail that was forwareded to my mailbox showed up in the Hotmail mailbox that was subscribed directly. That could be a mailing list problem but I have no way of knowing that. 40% of what was delivered directly to the Hotmail mailbox wound up in the Junk folder. 20% of what was forwarded to my mailbox wound up in the Junk folder. Many other systems are having problems http://www.zenatode.org.uk/ian/internet/hotmail.xhtml http://www.e-consultancy.com/forum/102841-an-e--mail- deliverability-story-msn-hotmail-and-bonded-sender.html Google will turn up other horror stories. I don't have a solution to Hotmail's problems and I have wasted way too much time on it. I have tried sending mail to Hotmail from an IP address that has never ever sent any mail and some disappears and some winds up in the Junk box for no good reason. When my customers complain I offer a refund. None have requested one so far. That's all I can do. If Hotmail rejects a message I see the DSN. The only mail Hotmail rejects is mail to non-existent mailboxes or disabled mailboxes. If you give me a recipient addrses I will show you that Hotmail accepted the message and todded it on the floor. Regards, John Capo Tuffmail.com __________________________ http://www.linkedin.com/in/ianbell _______________________________________________ FoRK mailing list http://xent.com/mailman/listinfo/fork ----- End forwarded message ----- -- Eugen* Leitl leitl http://leitl.org ______________________________________________________________ ICBM: 48.07100, 11.36820 http://www.ativel.com 8B29F6BE: 099D 78BA 2FD3 B014 B08A 7779 75B0 2443 8B29 F6BE -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: signature.asc Type: application/pgp-signature Size: 191 bytes Desc: Digital signature URL: From c.hales at pgrad.unimelb.edu.au Fri Nov 24 00:17:03 2006 From: c.hales at pgrad.unimelb.edu.au (Colin Geoffrey Hales) Date: Fri, 24 Nov 2006 11:17:03 +1100 (EST) Subject: [extropy-chat] 'a process of non-thinking called faith' 2 (2) In-Reply-To: References: <5.1.0.14.0.20061117094643.03842438@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> <021801c70a7d$c14542c0$660fa8c0@kevin> <006b01c70aa6$74adbae0$660fa8c0@kevin> Message-ID: <1244.128.250.225.217.1164327423.squirrel@webmail.student.unimelb.edu.au> > > On Nov 17, 2006, at 4:14 PM, kevinfreels.com wrote: > >> Amen brother Robert. I am completely with you there. Unfortunately >> "we" only have limited power to solve these problems. Most people >> don't have the stomach to do what needs to be done. That can be seen >> in Iraq. > > Yes. Most don't have the stomach to admit we had no legitimate reason > to invade Iraq, had no idea of what we were getting into and have no > business remaining there. Most haven't the stomach to apologize > profusely, pay some reparations and ask the UN to clean up the mess to > the extent it can be cleaned up. > > Robert wrote: >> P >> What is surprising is that we debate endlessly day in and day out >> what happens after nanotechnology arrives and we all upload or the >> fine points of what it means to be an individual and it seems we >> place little value on thousands to millions of lives being lost due >> to the actions of a few we choose to ignore ( e.g. Sudan president >> Omar Al-Bashir). >> > Think how it feels to have followed you in there like a good little lap-dog. woof woof. Colin From kerry_prez at yahoo.com Fri Nov 24 18:55:05 2006 From: kerry_prez at yahoo.com (Al Brooks) Date: Fri, 24 Nov 2006 10:55:05 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] 'a process of non-thinking called faith' 2 (2) In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <737066.20927.qm@web51615.mail.yahoo.com> Okay, the Iraq invasion was a mistake and a failure but now the task is for the Allies to extricate in a way that avoids turning Iraq into another Cambodia. Let's look at the outlook for the war as a whole: it will continue for decades as we are attempting to impose our commercial Western values on the other side, the other side is attempting to impose their extreme authoritarian (or totalist) Islamic values on us-- which makes it irreconcilable. I give two cheers for the Allied side because the other side wants to kill by direct, political, means while our side wants to kill by indirect, economic, means. That's my judgment call. You have your own call. You don't think intellectuals in college towns and so forth know where to go from here with such an intractable situation, do you? I don't know what to do and don't think any of you po' fessors and po' fessionals know what to do either. Second guessing the fumbles the Bush administration has made since the Iraq war planning-stage doesn't help much; gloating about it doesn't comfort civilians in Iraq; no aspect of this hideous, ominous WWIII ought to be gloated over. Yes. Most don't have the stomach to admit we had no legitimate reason to invade Iraq, had no idea of what we were getting into and have no business remaining there. Most haven't the stomach to apologize profusely, pay some reparations and ask the UN to clean up the mess to the extent it can be cleaned up. - samantha --------------------------------- Want to start your own business? Learn how on Yahoo! Small Business. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From kerry_prez at yahoo.com Fri Nov 24 19:19:56 2006 From: kerry_prez at yahoo.com (Al Brooks) Date: Fri, 24 Nov 2006 11:19:56 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Atheist Hymn Book, naturalist point of view. In-Reply-To: <345829.67781.qm@web37214.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <389230.50805.qm@web51610.mail.yahoo.com> Out of the ordinary sounds; nonharmonic tones, bitonal juxtapositions, etc. Nothing wrong with soothing, pleasant music, however jarring music is an escape from musical cliches. For instance the song 'Yesterday' has been covered a thousand times so that around the 999th cover version it got real stale and the entire song IMO is now a musical platitude. Please let me know of other factors, I might be missing something. --------------------------------- Everyone is raving about the all-new Yahoo! Mail beta. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From Thomas at thomasoliver.net Sat Nov 25 00:30:11 2006 From: Thomas at thomasoliver.net (Thomas) Date: Fri, 24 Nov 2006 17:30:11 -0700 Subject: [extropy-chat] 'a process of non-thinking called faith' 2 (2) References: <737066.20927.qm@web51615.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <45678E93.9020009@thomasoliver.net> Al Brooks wrote: > Okay, the Iraq invasion was a mistake and a failure but now the task > is for the Allies to extricate in a way that avoids turning Iraq > into another Cambodia. > Let's look at the outlook for the war as a whole: it will continue for > decades as we are attempting to impose our commercial Western values > on the other side, the other side is attempting to impose their > extreme authoritarian (or totalist) Islamic values on us-- which makes > it irreconcilable. I give two cheers for the Allied side because the > other side wants to kill by direct, political, means while our side > wants to kill by indirect, economic, means. That's my judgment call. > You have your own call. > You don't think intellectuals in college towns and so forth know where > to go from here with such an intractable situation, do you? I don't > know what to do and don't think any of you po' fessors and po' > fessionals know what to do either. Second guessing the fumbles the > Bush administration has made since the Iraq war planning-stage doesn't > help much; gloating about it doesn't comfort civilians in Iraq; no > aspect of this hideous, ominous WWIII ought to be gloated over. > It's not a war, at least not our war. Why make it worse? Their civil war is none of our business. We don't need the oil. We have hydrogen. The Grand Oil Party has overstayed it's welcome. Immediate withdrawal is the obvious course when your hand is on a hot burner. This is not rocket science! -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Sat Nov 25 04:33:47 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Fri, 24 Nov 2006 23:33:47 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] 'a process of non-thinking called faith' 2 (2) In-Reply-To: <45678E93.9020009@thomasoliver.net> References: <737066.20927.qm@web51615.mail.yahoo.com> <45678E93.9020009@thomasoliver.net> Message-ID: On 11/24/06, Thomas wrote: > > We don't need the oil. We have hydrogen. The Grand Oil Party has > overstayed it's welcome. Immediate withdrawal is the obvious course when > your hand is on a hot burner. > While I do not have a problem with the conclusion (because one could reach this conclusion based on arguments that it might save more lives). *But* you cannot make the conclusion based on the argument "We don't need the oil. We have hydrogen.". Let me make this very clear -- both assertions are false. First, one can claim "We don't need the oil" if you *only* if in the same sentence you are willing to claim an "acceptable" decline in economic growth which would result from a doubling or a tripling of oil prices over periods of 2, 4, etc. years. A decline in availability of one of the fundamental energy resources would have severe economic consequences. What is unclear at this point is whether an elimination of all oil output in Iraq could not be compensated for by other oil producing nations. If oil production declines, there will be short term negative impacts throughout economies around the globe. You cannot make such a claim without in the same breath citing studies showing those impacts would be "insignificant". (I doubt such studies, if they exist, would be generally accepted.) Second, "We do *NOT* have hydrogen." We do not have the manufacturing capacity. We do not have the distribution facilities. We do not have the fundamental energy production capacity. We do not have the consumers. Anyone making such a claim has been sold a fantasy and they do *not* understand the fundamental mechanics of enegy production, distribution and consumption. Yes, in an ideal world hydrogen might be a better way to distribute an energy source but in reality it is a hard problem and we aren't anywhere close to solving it. So please make the arguments on a basis that the costs (Nx## $billion/year) do not justify the potential lives saved, particularly when taking into account the lives lost. Arguing this on the basis of other commonly put forward justifications (related to energy) demonstrates the lack of knowledge and understanding on both sides. Robert -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From hkhenson at rogers.com Sat Nov 25 04:32:23 2006 From: hkhenson at rogers.com (Keith Henson) Date: Fri, 24 Nov 2006 23:32:23 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] 'a process of non-thinking called faith' 2 (2) In-Reply-To: <737066.20927.qm@web51615.mail.yahoo.com> References: Message-ID: <5.1.0.14.0.20061124232657.0381dd38@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> At 10:55 AM 11/24/2006 -0800, you wrote: > Okay, the Iraq invasion was a mistake and a failure but now the task is > for the Allies to extricate in a way that avoids turning Iraq into > another Cambodia. It's not hard, but the only solution I know of is *mad*. >Let's look at the outlook for the war as a whole: it will continue for >decades as we are attempting to impose our commercial Western values on >the other side, the other side is attempting to impose their extreme >authoritarian (or totalist) Islamic values on us-- which makes it >irreconcilable. I give two cheers for the Allied side because the other >side wants to kill by direct, political, means while our side wants to >kill by indirect, economic, means. That's my judgment call. You have your >own call. >You don't think intellectuals in college towns and so forth know where to >go from here with such an intractable situation, do you? I don't know what >to do and don't think any of you po' fessors and po' fessionals know what >to do either. I know. Swap the population out. The *mess* is really the responsibility of the US. Therefore we should transport the whole of the population to Texas and replace them with Texans. Not a big logistics deal, take a few months. Long range consequences might be really strange though. Keith >Second guessing the fumbles the Bush administration has made since the >Iraq war planning-stage doesn't help much; gloating about it doesn't >comfort civilians in Iraq; no aspect of this hideous, ominous WWIII ought >to be gloated over. > > >Yes. Most don't have the stomach to admit we had no legitimate reason to >invade Iraq, had no idea of what we were getting into and have no business >remaining there. Most haven't the stomach to apologize profusely, pay >some reparations and ask the UN to clean up the mess to the extent it can >be cleaned up. >- samantha > > >Want to start your own business? Learn how on >Yahoo! >Small Business. >_______________________________________________ >extropy-chat mailing list >extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org >http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat From hkhenson at rogers.com Sat Nov 25 04:44:58 2006 From: hkhenson at rogers.com (Keith Henson) Date: Fri, 24 Nov 2006 23:44:58 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] 'a process of non-thinking called faith' 2 (2) In-Reply-To: <45678E93.9020009@thomasoliver.net> References: <737066.20927.qm@web51615.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <5.1.0.14.0.20061124233655.03825c28@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> At 05:30 PM 11/24/2006 -0700, Thomas wrote: snip >It's not a war, at least not our war. Why make it worse? Their civil >war is none of our business. Iraq is a war, we started it, and it is really our responsibility >We don't need the oil. That's not true. >We have hydrogen. Hydrogen is an energy storage and transport medium. Not an energy *source.* >The Grand Oil Party has overstayed it's welcome. Immediate withdrawal is >the obvious course when your hand is on a hot burner. This is not rocket >science! Rocket science (or rather evolutionary psychology science) would be to send a large fraction of the population to the US. Keith Henson From kerry_prez at yahoo.com Sat Nov 25 06:33:37 2006 From: kerry_prez at yahoo.com (Al Brooks) Date: Fri, 24 Nov 2006 22:33:37 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] 'a process of non-thinking called faith' 2 (2) In-Reply-To: <5.1.0.14.0.20061124232657.0381dd38@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> Message-ID: <20061125063337.12137.qmail@web51615.mail.yahoo.com> Yeah, great. How about this- we turn the Mideast into a Self Service oil access region. A tanker docks at port, fills up its tank, and the skipper pays Muhammad inside the station; plus the skipper can pick up a few snacks while he's there. And you know, with all the Arabs willing to work at 24 hour convenience shops and gas stations there will be no problem hiring employees. > The *mess* is really the responsibility of the US. > Therefore we should > transport the whole of the population to Texas and > replace them with Texans. ____________________________________________________________________________________ Want to start your own business? Learn how on Yahoo! Small Business. http://smallbusiness.yahoo.com/r-index From kerry_prez at yahoo.com Sat Nov 25 07:23:19 2006 From: kerry_prez at yahoo.com (Al Brooks) Date: Fri, 24 Nov 2006 23:23:19 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] 'a process of non-thinking called faith' 2 (2) In-Reply-To: <45678E93.9020009@thomasoliver.net> Message-ID: <70400.7720.qm@web51603.mail.yahoo.com> But the situation isn't comparable to the discrete situation in Southeast Asia where they could cut their losses and withdraw most of the forces. The enemy in the Mideast doesn't have a post office box. So say next year Iraq is in such chaos the allies are forced to withdraw, what then? Where do we take it from there? Just say enough dirt is dug up on the Bush administration that both Bush & Cheney are compelled to resign. What then? Who would be Chief Executive? Say po' fessors and think tanks get millions in grant money to figure out what to do in the region, what advice can they offer? It's not rocket science-- but what is it? You hear and read so much recrimination directed against the administration yet what now? And all these guys who hear 'Hail to the Chief' in their heads, like McCain, and by golly you vote for me in '08 and we'll send Defense to the 20 yard line and then do an end run. Shucks you vote for little ol' me and I'll clean up this mess in I-rack, yessiree. Plus retired military guys writing books titled "What I Would Have done In Iraq Had You Been Farsighted Enough to Entrust Me With The High Command-- But Now It Is Too Late Unless You Buy My Book". > It's not a war, at least not our war. Why make it > worse? Their civil > war is none of our business. We don't need the oil. > We have hydrogen. > The Grand Oil Party has overstayed it's welcome. > Immediate withdrawal > is the obvious course when your hand is on a hot > burner. This is not > rocket science! ____________________________________________________________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? Everyone is raving about the all-new Yahoo! Mail beta. http://new.mail.yahoo.com From Thomas at thomasoliver.net Sat Nov 25 10:15:46 2006 From: Thomas at thomasoliver.net (Thomas) Date: Sat, 25 Nov 2006 03:15:46 -0700 Subject: [extropy-chat] 'a process of non-thinking called faith' 2 (2) References: <70400.7720.qm@web51603.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <456817D2.8080905@thomasoliver.net> Al Brooks wrote: >But the situation isn't comparable to the discrete >situation in Southeast Asia where they could cut their >losses and withdraw most of the forces. The enemy in >the Mideast doesn't have a post office box. > >So say next year Iraq is in such chaos the allies are >forced to withdraw, what then? Where do we take it >from there? > Conflict requires at least two parties. Lets withdraw from coercive conflict. Lets pursue the only valid human relationship: Trade for mutual benefit. Lets rebuild the World Trade Center. Lets deal with terrorists as individual criminals instead of elevating them to warrior status. Lets lead the world toward freedom by making our own country more free. >Just say enough dirt is dug up on the Bush >administration that both Bush & Cheney are compelled >to resign. What then? Who would be Chief Executive? > Nancy Pelosi, Speaker of the House (democrat) . . . Hmm . . . >Say po' fessors and think tanks get millions in grant >money to figure out what to do in the region, what >advice can they offer? It's not rocket science-- but >what is it? > > It's cause and effect. The ends are consistent with the means. >You hear and read so much recrimination directed >against the administration yet what now? And all these >guys who hear 'Hail to the Chief' in their heads, like >McCain, and by golly you vote for me in '08 and we'll >send Defense to the 20 yard line and then do an end >run. Shucks you vote for little ol' me and I'll clean >up this mess in I-rack, yessiree. Plus retired >military guys writing books titled "What I Would Have >done In Iraq Had You Been Farsighted Enough to Entrust >Me With The High Command-- But Now It Is Too Late >Unless You Buy My Book". > > Extropian influence might mitigate hypocrisy, might it not? Surely there is a more functional order than taxation with misrepresentation. > > > >>It's not a war, at least not our war. Why make it >>worse? Their civil >>war is none of our business. We don't need the oil. >> We have hydrogen. >> The Grand Oil Party has overstayed it's welcome. >>Immediate withdrawal >>is the obvious course when your hand is on a hot >>burner. This is not >>rocket science! >> >> > > > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From Thomas at thomasoliver.net Sat Nov 25 09:37:23 2006 From: Thomas at thomasoliver.net (Thomas) Date: Sat, 25 Nov 2006 02:37:23 -0700 Subject: [extropy-chat] 'a process of non-thinking called faith' 2 (2) References: <737066.20927.qm@web51615.mail.yahoo.com> <5.1.0.14.0.20061124233655.03825c28@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> Message-ID: <45680ED3.8010401@thomasoliver.net> Keith Henson wrote: >At 05:30 PM 11/24/2006 -0700, Thomas wrote: > >snip > > > >>It's not a war, at least not our war. Why make it worse? Their civil >>war is none of our business. >> >> > >Iraq is a war, we started it, and it is really our responsibility > That's not true and I didn't start it! The U.S. already beat Saddam & his poor little army. It was publicized as a war. Looked like a muffed occupation to me. Are you responsible for stopping it? Or are you say you want to keep it going for some reason? >[ . . . ] > > >>We have hydrogen. >> >> > >Hydrogen is an energy storage and transport medium. Not an energy *source.* > > Okay. You burn oil. You burn hydrogen. The energy comes from the sun. Let's get more efficient. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From eugen at leitl.org Sat Nov 25 12:45:27 2006 From: eugen at leitl.org (Eugen Leitl) Date: Sat, 25 Nov 2006 13:45:27 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] 'a process of non-thinking called faith' 2 (2) In-Reply-To: <45678E93.9020009@thomasoliver.net> References: <737066.20927.qm@web51615.mail.yahoo.com> <45678E93.9020009@thomasoliver.net> Message-ID: <20061125124527.GX6974@leitl.org> On Fri, Nov 24, 2006 at 05:30:11PM -0700, Thomas wrote: > It's not a war, at least not our war. Why make it worse? Their > civil war is none of our business. We don't need the oil. We have > hydrogen. The Grand Oil Party has overstayed it's welcome. Immediate We don't have hydrogen, yet. We do have synfuel technology, which can take biomass or coal (or gas or oil), and which is a good entry into the hydrogen as energy currency. However, fossil volatility prevents long-term commits (investments into infrastructure), so it would need regulation (price ratchet, implemented by a tax) in order to work. And clearly, given the numbers like http://nationalpriorities.org/index.php?option=com_wrapper&Itemid=182 ($345176937000, and counting) such investments into renewable energy sources would clearly have a much better ROI than killing a large number of people, and ruining a country already damaged by prior meddlings. And I don't have to remind people about numbers like http://www.brillig.com/debt_clock/ (nevermind personal debt, which is some 85 k$/household) and that debt interest is an exponential function. Due to nature of fiat currencies with crooks behind the printing press and exponential nature of interest the growing gap between physical value and numerical value gets periodically readjusted. Given by the wideness of the gap, the coming readjustment seems to dwarf the 1930s one. I recommend bring your personal affairs in order soonish, or risk losing a lot. Not just wealth. > withdrawal is the obvious course when your hand is on a hot burner. > This is not rocket science! -- Eugen* Leitl leitl http://leitl.org ______________________________________________________________ ICBM: 48.07100, 11.36820 http://www.ativel.com 8B29F6BE: 099D 78BA 2FD3 B014 B08A 7779 75B0 2443 8B29 F6BE -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: signature.asc Type: application/pgp-signature Size: 191 bytes Desc: Digital signature URL: From kerry_prez at yahoo.com Sat Nov 25 17:13:15 2006 From: kerry_prez at yahoo.com (Al Brooks) Date: Sat, 25 Nov 2006 09:13:15 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] 'a process of non-thinking called faith' 2 (2) In-Reply-To: <456817D2.8080905@thomasoliver.net> Message-ID: <20061125171315.91968.qmail@web51601.mail.yahoo.com> Is the other side going to cease & desist? or will it continue its imperialist Islamic war? An open question. Alright, it appears the first step insisted upon is for the administration to admit its errors and dissembling; so, what is the step immediately after that one? And then where do you go from there? Thomas wrote: Conflict requires at least two parties. Lets withdraw from coercive conflict. --------------------------------- Want to start your own business? Learn how on Yahoo! Small Business. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jrd1415 at gmail.com Sun Nov 26 03:24:29 2006 From: jrd1415 at gmail.com (Jeff Davis) Date: Sat, 25 Nov 2006 19:24:29 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] 'a process of non-thinking called faith' 2 (2) In-Reply-To: <20061125171315.91968.qmail@web51601.mail.yahoo.com> References: <456817D2.8080905@thomasoliver.net> <20061125171315.91968.qmail@web51601.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: On 11/25/06, Al Brooks wrote: > Is the other side going to cease & desist? or will it continue its > imperialist Islamic war? The notion of Islam conducting an imperialist war is nonsense. Fox news flapdoodle. No truth in it at all. Southern baptists want everyone in the world to be baptists (and if you refuse, you'll burn in hell for all eternity), but that ain't gonna happen either. -- Best, Jeff Davis "Everything's hard till you know how to do it." Ray Charles From c.hales at pgrad.unimelb.edu.au Sun Nov 26 03:36:23 2006 From: c.hales at pgrad.unimelb.edu.au (Colin Geoffrey Hales) Date: Sun, 26 Nov 2006 14:36:23 +1100 (EST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Richard Dawkins..... Douglas Adams' Bulldog Message-ID: <1690.144.137.45.178.1164512183.squirrel@webmail.student.unimelb.edu.au> Hereby named by yours truly in honour of Huxley's similar canine representation of Darwin. Richard Dawkins radio program: http://www.abc.net.au/rn/backgroundbriefing/default.htm see also... http://www.abc.net.au/rn/encounter/default.htm on the design argument. cheers Colin Hales From pharos at gmail.com Sun Nov 26 08:33:00 2006 From: pharos at gmail.com (BillK) Date: Sun, 26 Nov 2006 08:33:00 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] 'a process of non-thinking called faith' 2 (2) In-Reply-To: <20061125124527.GX6974@leitl.org> References: <737066.20927.qm@web51615.mail.yahoo.com> <45678E93.9020009@thomasoliver.net> <20061125124527.GX6974@leitl.org> Message-ID: On 11/25/06, Eugen Leitl wrote: > And clearly, given the numbers like > http://nationalpriorities.org/index.php?option=com_wrapper&Itemid=182 > ($345176937000, and counting) such investments into renewable > energy sources would clearly have a much better ROI than killing > a large number of people, and ruining a country already damaged > by prior meddlings. > > And I don't have to remind people about numbers like > http://www.brillig.com/debt_clock/ > (nevermind personal debt, which is some 85 k$/household) > and that debt interest is an exponential function. > > Due to nature of fiat currencies with crooks behind the printing > press and exponential nature of interest the growing gap between > physical value and numerical value gets periodically readjusted. > Given by the wideness of the gap, the coming readjustment seems > to dwarf the 1930s one. I recommend bring your personal affairs > in order soonish, or risk losing a lot. Not just wealth. > Concerning personal finances, if you expect a period of high inflation and collapsing money, then it makes sense to borrow as much money as possible and buy real assets. Rampant inflation wipes out monetary debts as well as monetary assets. (Yes, interest rates will rise, but you are making interest payments in devaluing money). After the holocaust you will still have your land, property, diamonds, gold bars, whatever. However, current news reports indicate that the slowdown (readjustment?) in the US property market is not expected to cause an economic collapse. (But then they would say that, wouldn't they?). ;) BillK From eugen at leitl.org Sun Nov 26 12:05:45 2006 From: eugen at leitl.org (Eugen Leitl) Date: Sun, 26 Nov 2006 13:05:45 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] 'a process of non-thinking called faith' 2 (2) In-Reply-To: References: <737066.20927.qm@web51615.mail.yahoo.com> <45678E93.9020009@thomasoliver.net> <20061125124527.GX6974@leitl.org> Message-ID: <20061126120545.GC6974@leitl.org> On Sun, Nov 26, 2006 at 08:33:00AM +0000, BillK wrote: > Concerning personal finances, if you expect a period of high inflation > and collapsing money, then it makes sense to borrow as much money as Classical mix is 1/3rd Ag/Au/Pt/Pd bullion (1 kg bars, not dead tree), 1/3rd real estate (make sure you're not in a bubble -- not an option for most in the U.S.), 1/3rd stock (energy and natural resources in general). This assumes you're liquid, going into debt to purchase above is probably not a good idea. (Caveat: I'm just regurgitated advice from others I consider sensible. YMMV, if you disagree, I would like to know why). > possible and buy real assets. Rampant inflation wipes out monetary > debts as well as monetary assets. (Yes, interest rates will rise, but > you are making interest payments in devaluing money). After the > holocaust you will still have your land, property, diamonds, gold > bars, whatever. > > However, current news reports indicate that the slowdown > (readjustment?) in the US property market is not expected to cause an > economic collapse. Have you seen any prior Black Friday/Monday/$weekday announcements in the press? > (But then they would say that, wouldn't they?). ;) If you're doing what the press says, and what the bulk of investors does, you'll lose long-term. Whomever you listen to, consider Taleb's advice. -- Eugen* Leitl leitl http://leitl.org ______________________________________________________________ ICBM: 48.07100, 11.36820 http://www.ativel.com 8B29F6BE: 099D 78BA 2FD3 B014 B08A 7779 75B0 2443 8B29 F6BE -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: signature.asc Type: application/pgp-signature Size: 191 bytes Desc: Digital signature URL: From kerry_prez at yahoo.com Sun Nov 26 15:44:59 2006 From: kerry_prez at yahoo.com (Al Brooks) Date: Sun, 26 Nov 2006 07:44:59 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] the Renaissance and Enlightenment all rolled into one In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <987743.67563.qm@web51613.mail.yahoo.com> Jeff, no one here has said that Islam is conducting an imperialist war, there are those-- no one knows the exact number-- conducting a war in the name of Islam, with a large number of known and unknown sympathizers. For its part America is conducting an imperialist commercial war. Of course the US wants the petroleum in the Mideast, sure, petroleum is America's lifeblood. No one deep down thinks America is in this war to inculcate the forgiving love of Christ. Who would really think so, a Sean Hannity? The ambitious and industrious Islamic Republic of Iran is very active in this war, which admittedly is a rather indescribable, assymetrical, war. We can possibly discuss WWII as a war with three fronts, Eastern, Pacific, Western and Italian; but this war? It is hard to grasp even if one is a po' fessor. The Cold War continued for about 44 years, until finally all avenues of prosecuting the war were pretty much exhausted then Gorbachev and his associates decided to cut it short. It seems this war will also continue until all possibilities have been exhausted, unless we were all to change the way we think & act, like the Renaissance and Enlightenment all rolled into one and then some. The other day I was sitting at the Thanksgiving table thinking how trapped in the past it was. Naturally there is a reason for it, Thanksgiving is a tradition to link us with the past, to bring kin together in a shared experience. Strange as it may sound, war is also a 'tradition'; war, though is extremely ugly and wrenching, also links us to the past. You are not going to deny we are in many ways trapped in the past, are you? Jeff Davis wrote: Fox news flapdoodle. No truth in it at all. Southern baptists want everyone in the world to be baptists (and if you refuse, you'll burn in hell for all eternity), but that ain't gonna happen either. -- Best, Jeff Davis --------------------------------- Access over 1 million songs - Yahoo! Music Unlimited. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From rafal.smigrodzki at gmail.com Sun Nov 26 16:31:06 2006 From: rafal.smigrodzki at gmail.com (Rafal Smigrodzki) Date: Sun, 26 Nov 2006 11:31:06 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] 'a process of non-thinking called faith' 2 (2) In-Reply-To: <20061126120545.GC6974@leitl.org> References: <737066.20927.qm@web51615.mail.yahoo.com> <45678E93.9020009@thomasoliver.net> <20061125124527.GX6974@leitl.org> <20061126120545.GC6974@leitl.org> Message-ID: <7641ddc60611260831x20194e3eqd440975ba1277283@mail.gmail.com> On 11/26/06, Eugen Leitl wrote: > > If you're doing what the press says, and what the bulk of investors > does, you'll lose long-term. Whomever you listen to, consider Taleb's > advice. ### It is quite a common belief among economists that the rate of productivity growth is the single most important determinant of economic performance in the long term. Since productivity has been more or less steadily going up for a couple centuries, the bulk of investors who position themselves to benefit most closely from rising productivity have over the long term outperformed most other investors. This is especially striking in the last few decades, as productivity started growing even faster than before. Thanks mainly to productivity gains (which make investment a positive sum game), the bulk of investors gain rather than lose, which is why there are still investors around. Given the expected explosive growth in productivity in the next two to three decades right up to the singularity, the prudent investor should do what the bulk of investors do - buy index funds, especially the ones tied to countries and branches with the highest expected productivity growth. Rafal From pharos at gmail.com Sun Nov 26 16:44:43 2006 From: pharos at gmail.com (BillK) Date: Sun, 26 Nov 2006 16:44:43 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] 'a process of non-thinking called faith' 2 (2) In-Reply-To: <20061126120545.GC6974@leitl.org> References: <737066.20927.qm@web51615.mail.yahoo.com> <45678E93.9020009@thomasoliver.net> <20061125124527.GX6974@leitl.org> <20061126120545.GC6974@leitl.org> Message-ID: On 11/26/06, Eugen Leitl wrote: > Classical mix is 1/3rd Ag/Au/Pt/Pd bullion (1 kg bars, not dead tree), > 1/3rd real estate (make sure you're not in a bubble -- not an option > for most in the U.S.), 1/3rd stock (energy and natural resources in > general). This assumes you're liquid, going into debt to purchase > above is probably not a good idea. > > (Caveat: I'm just regurgitated advice from others I consider sensible. > YMMV, if you disagree, I would like to know why). > No problem in the long term with a mix of investments like that, in normal boom / slump business cycle conditions. Just continually adjust the proportions as required for market conditions. You have to try to achieve the buy low / sell high target so far as practically possible, while doing risk management so that you are not too much committed to one market. i.e. Don't put all your eggs in one basket. Though the really *big* winners and losers are those who commit everything to one option and either win big or lose big. If you *know for sure* that runaway inflation is coming then you should indeed borrow to the maximum to buy real assets. This happened accidentally to all the property owners in the UK in the period 1971 to 1982 when inflation was high, maxing out at 24.3% in 1975. People who were borrowed to the maximum anyway to buy their home found that after this period they were able to repay their 'maximum' mortgage with spare change. They were almost rich! Galloping inflation had wiped out their money debt, while property values and wages had increased along with inflation. But borrowing to the maximum to invest is normally a very risky strategy. If runaway inflation doesn't appear, then you are left with large debts and large interest payments and may be forced to sell assets at a loss to reduce your debt and you end up ruined financially. > > Have you seen any prior Black Friday/Monday/$weekday announcements in > the press? > There are always articles saying "We're all doooooooommmmmed!" Economic forecasts are full of contradictory opinions. Whatever your expectation, you can always find some economists to back your opinion. You have to try to be realistic. If something sounds too good to be true, then it usually isn't true. > If you're doing what the press says, and what the bulk of investors > does, you'll lose long-term. Whomever you listen to, consider Taleb's > advice. > True. Buffet avoided the dotcom boom, and endured much ridicule as tech shares soared upwards. But long term, after the crash, he ended up ahead. However, a few people did make millions in the dotcom boom by selling before the crash. And thousands of people lost everything by buying in and refusing to sell. Timing is everything. But active management takes a lot of time and effort. You have to make investment your main interest / hobby if you take the risky route. That life is not for everyone. I agree with Rafal's recommendation of Index funds for the stock market part of your investments. This enables cautious investors to track the long term index gains for very low management costs. BillK From kerry_prez at yahoo.com Sun Nov 26 16:31:30 2006 From: kerry_prez at yahoo.com (Al Brooks) Date: Sun, 26 Nov 2006 08:31:30 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] 'a process of non-thinking called faith' 2 (2) Message-ID: <879869.54599.qm@web51609.mail.yahoo.com> America may very well be more imperialist than Islam; though you might not want to go by world opinion, which can be propagandistic and fickle, please do not romanticize the world outside the US. The other countries are quite predatory as well. Perhaps America IS the most predatory nation however it is at the pinnacle of the heap. We live in a world not as nationalistic as before-- yet still quite nationalistic. As I wrote in another post, we are trapped in the past. You and I may dislike nationalism yet how many hundreds of millions (or is it billions?) are still nationalistic? America is playing along with the game albeit at a higher plane. World opinion doesn't hold much appeal. One statement of Jeremy Rifkin's made a great deal of sense: "we live in an Orwellian world where truth is lies and lies are truth" ('Entropy', 1980). Such a statement applies not only to the USA but also to the world at large. --------------------------------- Cheap Talk? Check out Yahoo! Messenger's low PC-to-Phone call rates. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From Thomas at thomasoliver.net Sun Nov 26 19:28:27 2006 From: Thomas at thomasoliver.net (Thomas) Date: Sun, 26 Nov 2006 12:28:27 -0700 Subject: [extropy-chat] the Renaissance and Enlightenment all rolled into one References: <987743.67563.qm@web51613.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <4569EADB.4040509@thomasoliver.net> Al Brooks wrote: > [ . . . ] > It seems this war will also continue until all possibilities have been > exhausted, unless we were all to change the way we think & act, like > the Renaissance and Enlightenment all rolled into one and then some. > The other day I was sitting at the Thanksgiving table thinking how > trapped in the past it was. Naturally there is a reason for it, > Thanksgiving is a tradition to link us with the past, to bring kin > together in a shared experience. Strange as it may sound, war is also > a 'tradition'; war, though is extremely ugly and wrenching, also > links us to the past. You are not going to deny we are in many ways > trapped in the past, are you. Turning negative effects from the past into positive causes in the present by marshalling resources and taking personal responsibility -- isn't that extropian SOP? I would add the Romantic movement to your "and then some" for a good dose of free will. From kerry_prez at yahoo.com Sun Nov 26 20:50:26 2006 From: kerry_prez at yahoo.com (Al Brooks) Date: Sun, 26 Nov 2006 12:50:26 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] the Renaissance and Enlightenment all rolled into one In-Reply-To: <4569EADB.4040509@thomasoliver.net> Message-ID: <393071.33359.qm@web51603.mail.yahoo.com> Fair enough. But to transform from this hightech national-barbarism we are in to real civilization has a time frame unimaginable. What worries me regarding the singularity is it is projected: it concerns nanofactories that haven't been built yet; wealth that hasn't been created, and so forth. In school forty years ago I heard about Moon bases, living over the age of 100, voyages to Mars. The Cold War ended but today we are at war with Islamics steeped in ideology from the middle ages, so optimistically one could say the future took a little bit of a detour. Thomas, you too have doubts-- don't you? Thomas wrote: Turning negative effects from the past into positive causes in the present by marshalling resources and taking personal responsibility -- isn't that extropian SOP? I would add the Romantic movement to your "and then some" for a good dose of free will. --------------------------------- Everyone is raving about the all-new Yahoo! Mail beta. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From kerry_prez at yahoo.com Sun Nov 26 20:26:17 2006 From: kerry_prez at yahoo.com (Al Brooks) Date: Sun, 26 Nov 2006 12:26:17 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] 'a process of non-thinking called faith' 2 (2) In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <676882.6372.qm@web51611.mail.yahoo.com> does anyone have a hint as to the forecast for real estate? How long ought one wait on receding home prices to buy? BillK wrote: On 11/26/06, Eugen Leitl wrote: > Classical mix is 1/3rd Ag/Au/Pt/Pd bullion (1 kg bars, not dead tree), > 1/3rd real estate (make sure you're not in a bubble -- not an option > for most in the U.S.), 1/3rd stock (energy and natural resources in > general). This assumes you're liquid, going into debt to purchase > above is probably not a good idea. > > (Caveat: I'm just regurgitated advice from others I consider sensible. > YMMV, if you disagree, I would like to know why). > No problem in the long term with a mix of investments like that, in normal boom / slump business cycle conditions. Just continually adjust the proportions as required for market conditions. You have to try to achieve the buy low / sell high target so far as practically possible, while doing risk management so that you are not too much committed to one market. i.e. Don't put all your eggs in one basket. Though the really *big* winners and losers are those who commit everything to one option and either win big or lose big. If you *know for sure* that runaway inflation is coming then you should indeed borrow to the maximum to buy real assets. This happened accidentally to all the property owners in the UK in the period 1971 to 1982 when inflation was high, maxing out at 24.3% in 1975. People who were borrowed to the maximum anyway to buy their home found that after this period they were able to repay their 'maximum' mortgage with spare change. They were almost rich! Galloping inflation had wiped out their money debt, while property values and wages had increased along with inflation. But borrowing to the maximum to invest is normally a very risky strategy. If runaway inflation doesn't appear, then you are left with large debts and large interest payments and may be forced to sell assets at a loss to reduce your debt and you end up ruined financially. > > Have you seen any prior Black Friday/Monday/$weekday announcements in > the press? > There are always articles saying "We're all doooooooommmmmed!" Economic forecasts are full of contradictory opinions. Whatever your expectation, you can always find some economists to back your opinion. You have to try to be realistic. If something sounds too good to be true, then it usually isn't true. > If you're doing what the press says, and what the bulk of investors > does, you'll lose long-term. Whomever you listen to, consider Taleb's > advice. > True. Buffet avoided the dotcom boom, and endured much ridicule as tech shares soared upwards. But long term, after the crash, he ended up ahead. However, a few people did make millions in the dotcom boom by selling before the crash. And thousands of people lost everything by buying in and refusing to sell. Timing is everything. But active management takes a lot of time and effort. You have to make investment your main interest / hobby if you take the risky route. That life is not for everyone. I agree with Rafal's recommendation of Index funds for the stock market part of your investments. This enables cautious investors to track the long term index gains for very low management costs. BillK _______________________________________________ extropy-chat mailing list extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat --------------------------------- Access over 1 million songs - Yahoo! Music Unlimited. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From brentn at freeshell.org Sun Nov 26 21:21:13 2006 From: brentn at freeshell.org (Brent Neal) Date: Sun, 26 Nov 2006 16:21:13 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] 'a process of non-thinking called faith' 2 (2) In-Reply-To: <676882.6372.qm@web51611.mail.yahoo.com> References: <676882.6372.qm@web51611.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: On Nov 26, 2006, at 15:26, Al Brooks wrote: > does anyone have a hint as to the forecast for real estate? How > long ought one wait on receding home prices to buy? What I'm seeing in the consensus estimates is that a correction of 10-20% is likely, lasting around 18 months (although some sites have tossed out the number of 3.5 years as 'typical' for these corrective cycles. There are a couple of articles I've read (there's one in particular I'll try to find to send) that point out that in order for housing to reach "historical affordability levels" (i.e., return to some arbitrarily chosen growth curve) that the correction would have to be around 30%. This article was sort of interesting in that they also chose to point out some ameliorating and otherwise optimistic assumptions being used by most of the "consensus" reports, and goes in with a deliberate bias towards choosing more pessimistic outcomes in order to get a worst-case-esque scenario. B -- Brent Neal Geek of all Trades http://brentn.freeshell.org "Specialization is for insects" -- Robert A. Heinlein From brentn at freeshell.org Sun Nov 26 21:27:22 2006 From: brentn at freeshell.org (Brent Neal) Date: Sun, 26 Nov 2006 16:27:22 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] 'a process of non-thinking called faith' 2 (2) In-Reply-To: <676882.6372.qm@web51611.mail.yahoo.com> References: <676882.6372.qm@web51611.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <763E6198-8A30-4D46-B2F4-2C349B8B3F12@freeshell.org> And, of course, I find the article right after I send the last email: http://www.safehaven.com/article-6329.htm Its chart-and-graph laden, and the "arbitrary growth curve" I mentioned happened to be "inflation." Maybe not so arbitrary. :) Here's an excerpt from the piece: > I continue to forecast a 25% fall in median single-family prices > nationwide. This sounds like a big drop, and is far larger than the > 5% to 10% decline that other housing bears foresee. But it would > take a 35% fall to bring house prices back in line with the CPI > (see Chart 1 from above) and a 40% plummet to re-establish the > stable level of real quality-adjusted house prices that held in the > previous post-World War II era (see Chart 2 from above). Enjoy. This made lively lunchtime conversation around the labs last week. Brent From msd001 at gmail.com Sun Nov 26 22:45:45 2006 From: msd001 at gmail.com (Mike Dougherty) Date: Sun, 26 Nov 2006 17:45:45 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] 'a process of non-thinking called faith' 2 (2) In-Reply-To: <763E6198-8A30-4D46-B2F4-2C349B8B3F12@freeshell.org> References: <676882.6372.qm@web51611.mail.yahoo.com> <763E6198-8A30-4D46-B2F4-2C349B8B3F12@freeshell.org> Message-ID: <62c14240611261445g39926aacm5a2815ec1e83c195@mail.gmail.com> Could someone please change the subject of this thread? It has been three conversations ago that this conversation made any sense with the subject line :) -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From sjatkins at mac.com Mon Nov 27 00:54:13 2006 From: sjatkins at mac.com (Samantha Atkins) Date: Sun, 26 Nov 2006 16:54:13 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] 'a process of non-thinking called faith' 2 (2) In-Reply-To: <737066.20927.qm@web51615.mail.yahoo.com> References: <737066.20927.qm@web51615.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <3B685BBD-282D-460F-B6A1-1A3E0812553E@mac.com> We royally fscked it up to the point where there isn't a damn thing that we (US) can do that will make it better except to get out of the way and give some aid from a distance. Our reputation has been made and it isn't good at all in those parts. Our continued presence is too much part of the problem. As for Bush calling him a moron would be being far too kind. This is the most patently evil administration we have had in at least half a century. They deserve execution for high treason against the American people and their oath of office. - samantha On Nov 24, 2006, at 10:55 AM, Al Brooks wrote: > Okay, the Iraq invasion was a mistake and a failure but now the > task is for the Allies to extricate in a way that avoids turning > Iraq into another Cambodia. > Let's look at the outlook for the war as a whole: it will continue > for decades as we are attempting to impose our commercial Western > values on the other side, the other side is attempting to impose > their extreme authoritarian (or totalist) Islamic values on us-- > which makes it irreconcilable. I give two cheers for the Allied side > because the other side wants to kill by direct, political, means > while our side wants to kill by indirect, economic, means. That's my > judgment call. You have your own call. > You don't think intellectuals in college towns and so forth know > where to go from here with such an intractable situation, do you? I > don't know what to do and don't think any of you po' fessors and po' > fessionals know what to do either. Second guessing the fumbles the > Bush administration has made since the Iraq war planning-stage > doesn't help much; gloating about it doesn't comfort civilians in > Iraq; no aspect of this hideous, ominous WWIII ought to be gloated > over. > > From sjatkins at mac.com Mon Nov 27 01:05:20 2006 From: sjatkins at mac.com (Samantha Atkins) Date: Sun, 26 Nov 2006 17:05:20 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] 'a process of non-thinking called faith' 2 (2) In-Reply-To: <20061125171315.91968.qmail@web51601.mail.yahoo.com> References: <20061125171315.91968.qmail@web51601.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: On Nov 25, 2006, at 9:13 AM, Al Brooks wrote: > Is the other side going to cease & desist? or will it continue its > imperialist Islamic war? An open question. > Alright, it appears the first step insisted upon is for the > administration to admit its errors and dissembling; so, what is the > step immediately after that one? And then where do you go from there? > You really should stop watching Fox. There is no "imperialist Islamic war" except the rantings of a few Muslim leaders and madmen. Check out the actual military logistics of countries ruled by such madmen. There is no credible military threat there. Move along. - s From sjatkins at mac.com Mon Nov 27 01:22:58 2006 From: sjatkins at mac.com (Samantha Atkins) Date: Sun, 26 Nov 2006 17:22:58 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] 'a process of non-thinking called faith' 2 (2) In-Reply-To: References: <737066.20927.qm@web51615.mail.yahoo.com> <45678E93.9020009@thomasoliver.net> <20061125124527.GX6974@leitl.org> Message-ID: <3F95193E-7460-43A7-B00E-F1A9FC0E7866@mac.com> On Nov 26, 2006, at 12:33 AM, BillK wrote: > On 11/25/06, Eugen Leitl wrote: >> And clearly, given the numbers like >> http://nationalpriorities.org/index.php?option=com_wrapper&Itemid=182 >> ($345176937000, and counting) such investments into renewable >> energy sources would clearly have a much better ROI than killing >> a large number of people, and ruining a country already damaged >> by prior meddlings. >> >> And I don't have to remind people about numbers like >> http://www.brillig.com/debt_clock/ >> (nevermind personal debt, which is some 85 k$/household) >> and that debt interest is an exponential function. >> >> Due to nature of fiat currencies with crooks behind the printing >> press and exponential nature of interest the growing gap between >> physical value and numerical value gets periodically readjusted. >> Given by the wideness of the gap, the coming readjustment seems >> to dwarf the 1930s one. I recommend bring your personal affairs >> in order soonish, or risk losing a lot. Not just wealth. >> > > Concerning personal finances, if you expect a period of high inflation > and collapsing money, then it makes sense to borrow as much money as > possible and buy real assets. Not unless you have fixed rate interest. That is increasingly difficult to come by. Besides what you are advocating is a rip off. Many types of interest are now pegged to various indices that rise with inflation and collapsing money. They will come after your assets to pay your depths plus exorbiant interest when their backs are against the wall. > Rampant inflation wipes out monetary > debts as well as monetary assets. (Yes, interest rates will rise, but > you are making interest payments in devaluing money). After the > holocaust you will still have your land, property, diamonds, gold > bars, whatever. > Don't bet on it. The Fed has said that it has every right to confiscate gold and anything else it wishes from the sheeple in the evident of a war or any declared emergency. Put some assets out of their reach if you want a bit of safety and there is still a legal or practical way to do so. Consider yourself warned. > However, current news reports indicate that the slowdown > (readjustment?) in the US property market is not expected to cause an > economic collapse. > (But then they would say that, wouldn't they?). ;) > Yep. Besides, the housing bubble is only one of the Horsemen of Econo- Apocalypse. - s > From Thomas at thomasoliver.net Mon Nov 27 01:45:21 2006 From: Thomas at thomasoliver.net (Thomas) Date: Sun, 26 Nov 2006 18:45:21 -0700 Subject: [extropy-chat] impeachment? References: <737066.20927.qm@web51615.mail.yahoo.com> <3B685BBD-282D-460F-B6A1-1A3E0812553E@mac.com> Message-ID: <456A4331.8030806@thomasoliver.net> Samantha Atkins wrote: >We royally fscked it up to the point where there isn't a damn thing >that we (US) can do that will make it better except to get out of the >way and give some aid from a distance. Our reputation has been made >and it isn't good at all in those parts. Our continued presence is >too much part of the problem. As for Bush calling him a moron would >be being far too kind. This is the most patently evil administration >we have had in at least half a century. They deserve execution for >high treason against the American people and their oath of office. > >- samantha > > Are you calling for impeachment? From sjatkins at mac.com Mon Nov 27 01:56:23 2006 From: sjatkins at mac.com (Samantha Atkins) Date: Sun, 26 Nov 2006 17:56:23 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] impeachment? In-Reply-To: <456A4331.8030806@thomasoliver.net> References: <737066.20927.qm@web51615.mail.yahoo.com> <3B685BBD-282D-460F-B6A1-1A3E0812553E@mac.com> <456A4331.8030806@thomasoliver.net> Message-ID: <7B01A9DD-992C-461F-AFD4-B1502CAF4A3D@mac.com> On Nov 26, 2006, at 5:45 PM, Thomas wrote: >> >> > Are you calling for impeachment? At least. - s From Thomas at thomasoliver.net Mon Nov 27 02:28:00 2006 From: Thomas at thomasoliver.net (Thomas) Date: Sun, 26 Nov 2006 19:28:00 -0700 Subject: [extropy-chat] impeachment? References: <737066.20927.qm@web51615.mail.yahoo.com> <3B685BBD-282D-460F-B6A1-1A3E0812553E@mac.com> <456A4331.8030806@thomasoliver.net> <7B01A9DD-992C-461F-AFD4-B1502CAF4A3D@mac.com> Message-ID: <456A4D30.4010305@thomasoliver.net> Samantha Atkins wrote: >On Nov 26, 2006, at 5:45 PM, Thomas wrote: > > > >>> >>> >>Are you calling for impeachment? >> >> > >At least. > >- s > > Putting Nancy Pelosi in the White House -- What do you think about that? -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From pj at pj-manney.com Mon Nov 27 02:47:08 2006 From: pj at pj-manney.com (pjmanney) Date: Sun, 26 Nov 2006 21:47:08 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Time Magazine on risk assessment Message-ID: <9299051.2013681164595628285.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> It's your trusty mainstream media scanner, bringing you the moments the media actually gets around to discussing something of interest to us! In this case, humanity's flawed risk assessment skills. At least Jeffrey Kluger (a writer I respect) has enough sense to lay some of the blame on the media-biased agendas of politicians, corporations and other groups with something to gain. http://www.time.com/time/magazine/printout/0,8816,1562978,00.html Also in the same issue (but I have not printed it below), "The Year in Medicine from A to Z": http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1562958,00.html?internalid=AOT_h_11-26-2006_the_year_in_med PJ Sunday, Nov. 26, 2006 Why We Worry About The Things We Shouldn't... ...And Ignore The Things We Should By JEFFREY KLUGER It would be a lot easier to enjoy your life if there weren't so many things trying to kill you every day. The problems start even before you're fully awake. There's the fall out of bed that kills 600 Americans each year. There's the early-morning heart attack, which is 40% more common than those that strike later in the day. There's the fatal plunge down the stairs, the bite of sausage that gets lodged in your throat, the tumble on the slippery sidewalk as you leave the house, the high-speed automotive pinball game that is your daily commute. Other dangers stalk you all day long. Will a cabbie's brakes fail when you're in the crosswalk? Will you have a violent reaction to bad food? And what about the risks you carry with you all your life? The father and grandfather who died of coronaries in their 50s probably passed the same cardiac weakness on to you. The tendency to take chances on the highway that has twice landed you in traffic court could just as easily land you in the morgue. Shadowed by peril as we are, you would think we'd get pretty good at distinguishing the risks likeliest to do us in from the ones that are statistical long shots. But you would be wrong. We agonize over avian flu, which to date has killed precisely no one in the U.S., but have to be cajoled into getting vaccinated for the common flu, which contributes to the deaths of 36,000 Americans each year. We wring our hands over the mad cow pathogen that might be (but almost certainly isn't) in our hamburger and worry far less about the cholesterol that contributes to the heart disease that kills 700,000 of us annually. We pride ourselves on being the only species that understands the concept of risk, yet we have a confounding habit of worrying about mere possibilities while ignoring probabilities, building barricades against perceived dangers while leaving ourselves exposed to real ones. Six Muslims traveling from a religious conference were thrown off a plane last week in Minneapolis, Minn., even as unscreened cargo continues to stream into ports on both coasts. Shoppers still look askance at a bag of spinach for fear of E. coli bacteria while filling their carts with fat-sodden French fries and salt-crusted nachos. We put filters on faucets, install air ionizers in our homes and lather ourselves with antibacterial soap. "We used to measure contaminants down to the parts per million," says Dan McGinn, a former Capitol Hill staff member and now a private risk consultant. "Now it's parts per billion." At the same time, 20% of all adults still smoke; nearly 20% of drivers and more than 30% of backseat passengers don't use seat belts; two-thirds of us are overweight or obese. We dash across the street against the light and build our homes in hurricane-prone areas--and when they're demolished by a storm, we rebuild in the same spot. Sensible calculation of real-world risks is a multidimensional math problem that sometimes seems entirely beyond us. And while it may be true that it's something we'll never do exceptionally well, it's almost certainly something we can learn to do better. AN OLD BRAIN IN A NEW WORLD Part of the problem we have with evaluating risk, scientists say, is that we're moving through the modern world with what is, in many respects, a prehistoric brain. We may think we've grown accustomed to living in a predator-free environment in which most of the dangers of the wild have been driven away or fenced off, but our central nervous system--evolving at a glacial pace--hasn't got the message. To probe the risk-assessment mechanisms of the human mind, Joseph LeDoux, a professor of neuroscience at New York University and the author of The Emotional Brain, studies fear pathways in laboratory animals. He explains that the jumpiest part of the brain--of mouse and man--is the amygdala, a primitive, almond-shaped clump of tissue that sits just above the brainstem. When you spot potential danger--a stick in the grass that may be a snake, a shadow around a corner that could be a mugger--it's the amygdala that reacts the most dramatically, triggering the fight-or-flight reaction that pumps adrenaline and other hormones into your bloodstream. It's not until a fraction of a second later that the higher regions of the brain get the signal and begin to sort out whether the danger is real. But that fraction of a second causes us to experience the fear far more vividly than we do the rational response--an advantage that doesn't disappear with time. The brain is wired in such a way that nerve signals travel more readily from the amygdala to the upper regions than from the upper regions back down. Setting off your internal alarm is quite easy, but shutting it down takes some doing. "There are two systems for analyzing risk: an automatic, intuitive system and a more thoughtful analysis," says Paul Slovic, professor of psychology at the University of Oregon. "Our perception of risk lives largely in our feelings, so most of the time we're operating on system No. 1." There's clearly an evolutionary advantage to this natural timorousness. If we're mindful of real dangers and flee when they arise, we're more likely to live long enough to pass on our genes. But evolutionary rewards also come to those who stand and fight, those willing to take risks--and even suffer injury--in pursuit of prey or a mate. Our ancestors hunted mastodons and stampeded buffalo, risking getting trampled for the possible payoff of meat and pelt. Males advertised their reproductive fitness by fighting other males, willingly engaging in a contest that could mean death for one and offspring for the other. These two impulses--to engage danger or run from it--are constantly at war and have left us with a well-tuned ability to evaluate the costs and payoffs of short-term risk, say Slovic and others. That, however, is not the kind we tend to face in contemporary society, where threats don't necessarily spring from behind a bush. They're much more likely to come to us in the form of rumors or news broadcasts or an escalation of the federal terrorism-threat level from orange to red. It's when the risk and the consequences of our response unfold more slowly, experts say, that our analytic system kicks in. This gives us plenty of opportunity to overthink--or underthink--the problem, and this is where we start to bollix things up. WHY WE GUESS WRONG Which risks get excessive attention and which get overlooked depends on a hierarchy of factors. Perhaps the most important is dread. For most creatures, all death is created pretty much equal. Whether you're eaten by a lion or drowned in a river, your time on the savanna is over. That's not the way humans see things. The more pain or suffering something causes, the more we tend to fear it; the cleaner or at least quicker the death, the less it troubles us. "We dread anything that poses a greater risk for cancer more than the things that injure us in a traditional way, like an auto crash," says Slovic. "That's the dread factor." In other words, the more we dread, the more anxious we get, and the more anxious we get, the less precisely we calculate the odds of the thing actually happening. "It's called probability neglect," says Cass Sunstein, a University of Chicago professor of law specializing in risk regulation. The same is true for, say, AIDS, which takes you slowly, compared with a heart attack, which can kill you in seconds, despite the fact that heart disease claims nearly 50 times as many Americans than AIDS each year. We also dread catastrophic risks, those that cause the deaths of a lot of people in a single stroke, as opposed to those that kill in a chronic, distributed way. "Terrorism lends itself to excessive reactions because it's vivid and there's an available incident," says Sunstein. "Compare that to climate change, which is gradual and abstract." Unfamiliar threats are similarly scarier than familiar ones. The next E. coli outbreak is unlikely to shake you up as much as the previous one, and any that follow will trouble you even less. In some respects, this is a good thing, particularly if the initial reaction was excessive. But it's also unavoidable given our tendency to habituate to any unpleasant stimulus, from pain and sorrow to a persistent car alarm. The problem with habituation is that it can also lead us to go to the other extreme, worrying not too much but too little. Sept. 11 and Hurricane Katrina brought calls to build impregnable walls against such tragedies ever occurring again. But despite the vows, both New Orleans and the nation's security apparatus remain dangerously leaky. "People call these crises wake-up calls," says Dr. Irwin Redlener, associate dean of the Mailman School of Public Health at Columbia University and director of the National Center for Disaster Preparedness. "But they're more like snooze alarms. We get agitated for a while, and then we don't follow through." THE COMFORT OF CONTROL We similarly misjudge risk if we feel we have some control over it, even if it's an illusory sense. The decision to drive instead of fly is the most commonly cited example, probably because it's such a good one. Behind the wheel, we're in charge; in the passenger seat of a crowded airline, we might as well be cargo. So white-knuckle flyers routinely choose the car, heedless of the fact that at most a few hundred people die in U.S. commercial airline crashes in a year, compared with 44,000 killed in motor-vehicle wrecks. The most white-knuckle time of all was post--Sept. 11, when even confident flyers took to the roads. Not surprisingly, from October through December 2001 there were 1,000 more highway fatalities than in the same period the year before, in part because there were simply more cars around. "It was called the '9/11 effect.' It produced a third again as many fatalities as the terrorist attacks," says David Ropeik, an independent risk consultant and a former professor at the Harvard School of Public Health. Then too there's what Ropeik and others call "optimism bias," the thing that makes us glower when we see someone driving erratically while talking on a cell phone, even if we've done the very same thing, perhaps on the very same day. We tell ourselves we're different, because our call was shorter or our business was urgent or we were able to pay attention to the road even as we talked. What optimism bias comes down to, however, is the convenient belief that risks that apply to other people don't apply to us. Finally, and for many of us irresistibly, there's the irrational way we react to risky behavior that also confers some benefit. It would be a lot easier to acknowledge the perils of smoking cigarettes or eating too much ice cream if they weren't such pleasures. Drinking too much confers certain benefits too, as do risky sex, recreational drugs and uncounted other indulgences. This is especially true since, in most cases, the gratification is immediate and the penalty, if it comes at all, comes later. With enough time and enough temptation, we can talk ourselves into ignoring almost any long-term costs. "These things are fun or hip, even if they can be lethal," says Ropeik. "And that pleasure is a benefit we weigh." If these reactions are true for all of us--and they are--then you might think that all of us would react to risk in the same way. But that's clearly not the case. Some people enjoy roller coasters; others won't go near them. Some skydive; others can't imagine it. Not only are thrill seekers not put off by risk, but they're drawn to it, seduced by the mortal frisson that would leave many of us cold. "There's an internal thermostat that seems to control this," says risk expert John Adams of University College London. "That set point varies from person to person and circumstance to circumstance." No one knows how such a set point gets calibrated, but evidence suggests that it is a mix of genetic and environmental variables. In a study at the University of Delaware in 2000, researchers used personality surveys to evaluate the risk-taking behavior of 260 college students and correlated it with existing research on the brain and blood chemistry of people with thrill-seeking personalities or certain emotional disorders. Their findings support the estimate that about 40% of the high-thrill temperament is learned and 60% inherited, with telltale differences in such relevant brain chemicals as serotonin, which helps inhibit impulsive behavior and may be in short supply in people with high-wire personalities. CAN WE DO BETTER? Given these idiosyncratic reactions, is it possible to have a rational response to risk? If we can't agree on whether something is dangerous or not or, if it is, whether it's a risk worth taking, how can we come up with policies that keep all of us reasonably safe? One way to start would to be to look at the numbers. Anyone can agree that a 1-in-1 million risk is better than 1 in 10, and 1 in 10 is better than 50-50. But things are almost always more complicated than that, a fact that corporations, politicians and other folks with agendas to push often deftly exploit. Take the lure of the comforting percentage. In one study, Slovic found that people were more likely to approve of airline safety-equipment purchases if they were told that it could "potentially save 98% of 150 people" than if they were told it could "potentially save 150 people." On its face this reaction makes no sense, since 98% of 150 people is only 147. But there was something about the specificity of the number that the respondents found appealing. "Experts tend to use very analytic, mathematical tools to calculate risk," Slovic says. "The public tends to go more on their feelings." There's also the art of the flawed comparison. Officials are fond of reassuring the public that they run a greater risk from, for example, drowning in the bathtub, which kills 320 Americans a year, than from a new peril like mad cow disease, which has so far killed no one in the U.S. That's pretty reassuring--and very misleading. The fact is that anyone over 6 and under 80--which is to say, the overwhelming majority of the U.S. population--faces almost no risk of perishing in the tub. For most of us, the apples of drowning and the oranges of mad cow disease don't line up in any useful way. But such statistical straw men get trotted out all the time. People defending the safety of pesticides and other toxins often argue that you stand a greater risk of being hit by a falling airplane (about 1 in 250,000 over the course of your entire life) than you do of being harmed by this or that contaminant. If you live near an airport, however, the risk of getting beaned is about 1 in 10,000. Two very different probabilities are being conflated into one flawed forecast. "My favorite is the one that says you stand a greater risk from dying while skydiving than you do from some pesticide," says Susan Egan Keane of the Natural Resources Defense Council. "Well, I don't skydive, so my risk is zero." Risk figures can be twisted in more disastrous ways too. Last year's political best seller, The One Percent Doctrine, by journalist Ron Suskind, pleased or enraged you, depending on how you felt about war in Iraq, but it hit risk analysts where they live. The title of the book is drawn from a White House determination that if the risk of a terrorist attack in the U.S. was even 1%, it would be treated as if it were a 100% certainty. Critics of Administration policy argue that that 1% possibility was never properly balanced against the 100% certainty of the tens of thousands of casualties that would accompany a war. That's a position that may be easier to take in 2006, with Baghdad in flames and the war grinding on, but it's still true that a 1% danger that something will happen is the same as a 99% likelihood that it won't. REAL AND PERCEIVED RISK It's not impossible for us to become sharper risk handicappers. For one thing, we can take the time to learn more about the real odds. Baruch Fischhoff, professor of social and decision sciences at Carnegie Mellon University, recently asked a panel of 20 communications and finance experts what they thought the likelihood of human-to-human transmission of avian flu would be in the next three years. They put the figure at 60%. He then asked a panel of 20 medical experts the same question. Their answer: 10%. "There's reason to be critical of experts," Fischhoff says, "but not to replace their judgment with laypeople's opinions." The government must also play a role in this, finding ways to frame warnings so that people understand them. John Graham, formerly the administrator of the federal Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs, says risk analysts suffer no end of headaches trying to get Americans to understand that while nuclear power plants do pose dangers, the more imminent peril to both people and the planet comes from the toxins produced by coal-fired plants. Similarly, pollutants in fish can be dangerous, but for most people--with the possible exception of small children and women of childbearing age--the cardiac benefits of fish easily outweigh the risks. "If you can get people to compare," he says, "then you're in a situation where you can get them to make reasoned choices." Just as important is to remember to pay proper mind to the dangers that, as the risk experts put it, are hiding in plain sight. Most people no longer doubt that global warming is happening, yet we live and work in air-conditioned buildings and drive gas-guzzling cars. Most people would be far likelier to participate in a protest at a nuclear power plant than at a tobacco company, but it's smoking, not nukes, that kills an average of 1,200 Americans every single day. We can do better, however, and leaders in government and industry can help. The residual parts of our primitive brains may not give us any choice beyond fighting or fleeing. But the higher reasoning we've developed over millions of years gives us far greater--and far more nuanced--options. Officials who provide hard, honest numbers and a citizenry that takes the time to understand them would not only mean a smarter nation, but a safer one. [This article contains a complex diagram. Please see hardcopy or pdf.] TOTAL ANNUAL DEATHS 2.5 MILLION Homicide 17,732 Suicide 31,484 Terrified of bees, snakes and swimming pools? ACCIDENTS 109,277 Maybe you should worry more about your heart DISEASES 2.3 million Other diseases 681,150 Diabetes 74,219 Chronic lower-respiratory disease 126,382 Stroke 157,689 Cancer 556,902 Heart disease 685,089 All other deaths 8,364 Sources: Centers for Disease Control and Prevention; National Transportation Safety Board With reporting by With reporting by David Bjerklie/New York, Dan Cray/Los Angeles From thespike at satx.rr.com Mon Nov 27 03:02:32 2006 From: thespike at satx.rr.com (Damien Broderick) Date: Sun, 26 Nov 2006 21:02:32 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] John C. Wright and his wife Jagi Lamplighter Message-ID: <7.0.1.0.2.20061126210144.021eb8a8@satx.rr.com> http://www.flickr.com/photos/kathryncramer/302702264/in/set-72157594385646087/ (I always wonder what people look like...) From transhumanist at goldenfuture.net Mon Nov 27 03:07:52 2006 From: transhumanist at goldenfuture.net (Joseph Bloch) Date: Sun, 26 Nov 2006 22:07:52 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] 'a process of non-thinking called faith' 2 (2) In-Reply-To: References: <20061125171315.91968.qmail@web51601.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <456A5688.7020208@goldenfuture.net> With all due respect, Sam, I don't believe you understand the situation regarding the threat posed to the West from the Jihadists. While it is true that not all Muslims subscribe to the Jihadist ideology, the plain fact is that the expansionist Jihadist ideology is the norm within the broad Islamic community. The vast majority of religious schools (which are just about the only schools in many Muslim nations) and mosques espouse that philosophy. It is not a fringe, or even a minority. The violent expansionist jihadist philosophy is mainstream Islam. We have our "friends" in Saudi Arabia, who have spent the last few decades spending their oil wealth building the infrastructure to propagate that interpretation of Islam, to thank. Comparisons to Christians (as others have made) are unsupportable. The Muslim world never underwent a Reformation as did Christianity, and is still mired in the mind-set of the Crusades which Christianity thankfully shook off several centuries ago. I will point out that Episcopalians and Baptists, while they do indeed share the vision of converting the world, stop short of exterminating those who, when presented with the choice, fail to choose to convert. Last time I looked, there weren't any Methodists flying planeloads of innocent people into buildings. They are not just "a few Muslim leaders", although I will admit they are indeed "madmen." They are the mainstream of the leadership and educational institutions of the worldwide Muslim community, and they have turned the jihadist philosophy into the mainstream of Muslim jurisprudence. I will be the first to admit that Christianity is not, as a rule, a friend of Transhumanist ideology. However, given a choice between Christianity and Islam, I will take the former any day of the week. At least they don't chop off the heads of people with whom they disagree. Joseph http://transhumanist.blogspot.com/ Samantha Atkins wrote: >On Nov 25, 2006, at 9:13 AM, Al Brooks wrote: > > > >>Is the other side going to cease & desist? or will it continue its >>imperialist Islamic war? An open question. >>Alright, it appears the first step insisted upon is for the >>administration to admit its errors and dissembling; so, what is the >>step immediately after that one? And then where do you go from there? >> >> >> > >You really should stop watching Fox. There is no "imperialist Islamic >war" except the rantings of a few Muslim leaders and madmen. Check >out the actual military logistics of countries ruled by such madmen. >There is no credible military threat there. Move along. > >- s > > > >_______________________________________________ >extropy-chat mailing list >extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org >http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > > > > From eugen at leitl.org Mon Nov 27 07:54:28 2006 From: eugen at leitl.org (Eugen Leitl) Date: Mon, 27 Nov 2006 08:54:28 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] 'a process of non-thinking called faith' 2 (2) In-Reply-To: References: <676882.6372.qm@web51611.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <20061127075427.GI6974@leitl.org> On Sun, Nov 26, 2006 at 04:21:13PM -0500, Brent Neal wrote: > What I'm seeing in the consensus estimates is that a correction of > 10-20% is likely, lasting around 18 months (although some sites have I think 30-40% would be more accurate. Oh, and how does Dow Jones of 2000-3000 sound like? > tossed out the number of 3.5 years as 'typical' for these corrective > cycles. This cycle is unprecedented in the magnitude, though. > There are a couple of articles I've read (there's one in particular > I'll try to find to send) that point out that in order for housing to > reach "historical affordability levels" (i.e., return to some > arbitrarily chosen growth curve) that the correction would have to be > around 30%. This article was sort of interesting in that they also > chose to point out some ameliorating and otherwise optimistic > assumptions being used by most of the "consensus" reports, and goes > in with a deliberate bias towards choosing more pessimistic outcomes > in order to get a worst-case-esque scenario. Everybody should cover for low-probability high-risk outcomes. -- Eugen* Leitl leitl http://leitl.org ______________________________________________________________ ICBM: 48.07100, 11.36820 http://www.ativel.com 8B29F6BE: 099D 78BA 2FD3 B014 B08A 7779 75B0 2443 8B29 F6BE -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: signature.asc Type: application/pgp-signature Size: 191 bytes Desc: Digital signature URL: From brentn at freeshell.org Mon Nov 27 11:19:36 2006 From: brentn at freeshell.org (Brent Neal) Date: Mon, 27 Nov 2006 06:19:36 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] 'a process of non-thinking called faith' 2 (2) In-Reply-To: <20061127075427.GI6974@leitl.org> References: <676882.6372.qm@web51611.mail.yahoo.com> <20061127075427.GI6974@leitl.org> Message-ID: <43E02205-A3A3-4601-A3F2-91C1CF094613@freeshell.org> -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1 On Nov 27, 2006, at 2:54, Eugen Leitl wrote: > On Sun, Nov 26, 2006 at 04:21:13PM -0500, Brent Neal wrote: > >> What I'm seeing in the consensus estimates is that a correction of >> 10-20% is likely, lasting around 18 months (although some sites have > > I think 30-40% would be more accurate. Oh, and how does Dow Jones > of 2000-3000 sound like? > You'll note that in the article I sent through right afterwards that the author claimed that 30% would bring housing in line with CPI and 40% would bring housing in line with historical affordabilities. I think affordability is probably not something that is reasonable to expect to remain constant. Your Dow numbers - do you have sources or some logic to support that? >> tossed out the number of 3.5 years as 'typical' for these corrective >> cycles. > > This cycle is unprecedented in the magnitude, though. Everything is unprecedented in magnitude. :) The size of the world economy is unprecedented. The number of houses on the market is unprecedented. > >> There are a couple of articles I've read (there's one in particular >> I'll try to find to send) that point out that in order for housing to >> reach "historical affordability levels" (i.e., return to some >> arbitrarily chosen growth curve) that the correction would have to be >> around 30%. This article was sort of interesting in that they also >> chose to point out some ameliorating and otherwise optimistic >> assumptions being used by most of the "consensus" reports, and goes >> in with a deliberate bias towards choosing more pessimistic outcomes >> in order to get a worst-case-esque scenario. > > Everybody should cover for low-probability high-risk outcomes. > > Of course. The interesting problem is estimating the probability to low-frequency events (humans suck at this, as PJ's article points out) and choosing an appropriate action on that basis (which humans also suck at.) B - -- Brent Neal Geek of all Trades http://brentn.freeshell.org "Specialization is for insects" -- Robert A. Heinlein -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v1.4.5 (Darwin) iD8DBQFFasnJ0Sh4Y5m/F5kRAr0zAKCJB8AXSNSfjtm1xh+NiuEYE4LJkACfXUOy EFlQRz0fdL79CNs9Xj3drsU= =aI7+ -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- From eugen at leitl.org Mon Nov 27 11:22:29 2006 From: eugen at leitl.org (Eugen Leitl) Date: Mon, 27 Nov 2006 12:22:29 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] 'a process of non-thinking called faith' 2 (2) In-Reply-To: <676882.6372.qm@web51611.mail.yahoo.com> References: <676882.6372.qm@web51611.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <20061127112229.GP6974@leitl.org> On Sun, Nov 26, 2006 at 12:26:17PM -0800, Al Brooks wrote: > > does anyone have a hint as to the forecast for real estate? How long > ought one wait on receding home prices to buy? I would wait until real estate reaches 30-40% devaluation. How soon this will happen is anyone's guess. -- Eugen* Leitl leitl http://leitl.org ______________________________________________________________ ICBM: 48.07100, 11.36820 http://www.ativel.com 8B29F6BE: 099D 78BA 2FD3 B014 B08A 7779 75B0 2443 8B29 F6BE -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: signature.asc Type: application/pgp-signature Size: 191 bytes Desc: Digital signature URL: From eugen at leitl.org Mon Nov 27 11:49:18 2006 From: eugen at leitl.org (Eugen Leitl) Date: Mon, 27 Nov 2006 12:49:18 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] 'a process of non-thinking called faith' 2 (2) In-Reply-To: <7641ddc60611260831x20194e3eqd440975ba1277283@mail.gmail.com> References: <737066.20927.qm@web51615.mail.yahoo.com> <45678E93.9020009@thomasoliver.net> <20061125124527.GX6974@leitl.org> <20061126120545.GC6974@leitl.org> <7641ddc60611260831x20194e3eqd440975ba1277283@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <20061127114918.GQ6974@leitl.org> On Sun, Nov 26, 2006 at 11:31:06AM -0500, Rafal Smigrodzki wrote: > ### It is quite a common belief among economists that the rate of > productivity growth is the single most important determinant of > economic performance in the long term. Since productivity has been > more or less steadily going up for a couple centuries, the bulk of Productivity certainly goes up, and of course the total integral over physical things of value goes up as well, but not exponentially as compound interest goes. After each readjustment it takes a while until the gap between both functions starts growing exponentially, ultimatively requiring a new readjustment. A new readjustment is at the door. > investors who position themselves to benefit most closely from rising > productivity have over the long term outperformed most other > investors. This is especially striking in the last few decades, as > productivity started growing even faster than before. Thanks mainly to There are some high-amplitude but rare events in the markets, which tend to vanish from individual investor and collective memory (things which happen each ~70 years or so). > productivity gains (which make investment a positive sum game), the > bulk of investors gain rather than lose, which is why there are still > investors around. > > Given the expected explosive growth in productivity in the next two to > three decades right up to the singularity, the prudent investor should > do what the bulk of investors do - buy index funds, especially the > ones tied to countries and branches with the highest expected > productivity growth. Usually, this is very good advice. However, it takes some 20 years for the markets to reach performance prior to the crash if you buy in just before the crash. All the signs are pointing to such a crash within a short (few years, less than a decade) time. A crash is also an opportunity, of course. I would still bet one third of my assets (easy for me to say, since I have no assets to game) on an index funds, but one with hand-picked companies and natural resource shares. -- Eugen* Leitl leitl http://leitl.org ______________________________________________________________ ICBM: 48.07100, 11.36820 http://www.ativel.com 8B29F6BE: 099D 78BA 2FD3 B014 B08A 7779 75B0 2443 8B29 F6BE -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: signature.asc Type: application/pgp-signature Size: 191 bytes Desc: Digital signature URL: From kerry_prez at yahoo.com Mon Nov 27 22:23:55 2006 From: kerry_prez at yahoo.com (Al Brooks) Date: Mon, 27 Nov 2006 14:23:55 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] 'a process of non-thinking called faith' 2 (2) In-Reply-To: <3B685BBD-282D-460F-B6A1-1A3E0812553E@mac.com> Message-ID: <685843.88940.qm@web51612.mail.yahoo.com> You're probably right, a great number are going to die in Iraq. Beyond that it's hard to know what to think. IMO Nixon's administration was far worse than Bush's, we're still living in Nixon's America. We could theorize Bush wouldn't be president had it not been for Nixon's legacy however speculative such is. I don't know what to think concerning Bush, the following might sound ludicrous given your opinion on Bush but it's too early for me to come to grips with Bush, he and his administration do not appear malignant as Nixon and his administration do to this day, but I could be wrong as so often in the past-- knowing the Mideast I surmised after the allies won the war they might lose the peace but the actual course of events is surprising to say the least. Again, simply do not know what to think, where to begin. One statement comes to mind: at the end of the Cold War circa 1991 a pundit declared "the world is up for grabs". Sure looks that way, doesn't it? Samantha Atkins wrote: We royally fscked it up to the point where there isn't a damn thing that we (US) can do that will make it better except to get out of the way and give some aid from a distance. Our reputation has been made and it isn't good at all in those parts. Our continued presence is too much part of the problem. As for Bush calling him a moron would be being far too kind. This is the most patently evil administration we have had in at least half a century. They deserve execution for high treason against the American people and their oath of office. - samantha --------------------------------- Everyone is raving about the all-new Yahoo! Mail beta. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From avantguardian2020 at yahoo.com Mon Nov 27 23:13:27 2006 From: avantguardian2020 at yahoo.com (The Avantguardian) Date: Mon, 27 Nov 2006 15:13:27 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Movie review- Renaissance: Paris 2054 Message-ID: <391387.58386.qm@web60513.mail.yahoo.com> I saw this movie a few months ago but all this talk about the inevitable clash between H+ and Muslim values reminded me of it. It was a gorgeous film essentially a cyberpunk-noir graphic novel come to life. The theme of the movie is the conflict between Islam and transhumanism in future France. I don't want to spoil it for you so that's all I will tell you for now. The site below is in French but the movie is in English. http://www.renaissance-lefilm.com/accueil.htm Stuart LaForge alt email: stuart"AT"ucla.edu "Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, doesn't go away." - Phillip K. Dick ____________________________________________________________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? Everyone is raving about the all-new Yahoo! Mail beta. http://new.mail.yahoo.com From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Tue Nov 28 01:48:42 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Mon, 27 Nov 2006 20:48:42 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Movie review- Renaissance: Paris 2054 In-Reply-To: <391387.58386.qm@web60513.mail.yahoo.com> References: <391387.58386.qm@web60513.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: On 11/27/06, The Avantguardian wrote: > > I saw this movie a few months ago but all this talk about the inevitable > clash between H+ and Muslim values reminded me of it. It was a gorgeous film > essentially a cyberpunk-noir graphic novel come to life. The theme of the > movie is the conflict between Islam and transhumanism in future France. I > don't want to spoil it for you so that's all I will tell you for now. Stuart, I am not sure whether you may be doing the "debate" a disservice by focusing on "Islam" (which is a gross label) vs. H+ (also a gross label). The debate and confrontation is much wider than that -- it is the one that Harris/Dennett/Dawkins are focused on. It is one of the fundamental questions enshrined in Max's extropian principles. Do you base your existence on "rational thought" or not? You can argue that a movie promoting the "in our faces" exhibition of the problem may be useful but I would argue that you might be better served to strike at the heart of the problem. So *long* as people believe and act on the basis of nothing more than their thought about a thought (a belief) we have problems. Robert -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From msd001 at gmail.com Tue Nov 28 03:14:13 2006 From: msd001 at gmail.com (Mike Dougherty) Date: Mon, 27 Nov 2006 22:14:13 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Movie review- Renaissance: Paris 2054 In-Reply-To: References: <391387.58386.qm@web60513.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <62c14240611271914i51428a20wb64becdaf3fe1e44@mail.gmail.com> On 11/27/06, Robert Bradbury wrote: > > one of the fundamental questions enshrined in Max's extropian principles. > Do you base your existence on "rational thought" or not? > > So *long* as people believe and act on the basis of nothing more than > their thought about a thought (a belief) we have problems. > Could you clarify? I took the first sentence to mean it is good to 'base existence' on "thought." The second sentence indicates that believe and action on "thought about a thought" is a problem. Do you believe... (hmm)... think... (hmm)... logically deduce (?) that someone like Hegel (&wikipedia) should be considered an extropian of the first case, or a trouble-maker of the second case? -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From avantguardian2020 at yahoo.com Tue Nov 28 06:04:22 2006 From: avantguardian2020 at yahoo.com (The Avantguardian) Date: Mon, 27 Nov 2006 22:04:22 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Movie review- Renaissance: Paris 2054 In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <20061128060422.37294.qmail@web60519.mail.yahoo.com> --- Robert Bradbury wrote: > Stuart, I am not sure whether you may be doing the > "debate" a disservice by > focusing on "Islam" (which is a gross label) vs. H+ > (also a gross label). Actually like I said the debate only drew associations in my mind to the movie. I am not saying that it is directly relevant to the debate. It is art and should be simply appreciated as such, without reading too much into the politics. (As it happens I can't decide whether the politics of the movie is truly luddite or transhumanist disguised as luddism) > The debate and confrontation is much wider than that > -- it is the one that > Harris/Dennett/Dawkins are focused on. Yes, I am aware of that, so much so that I am doing something about it beyond mere debate. I and others are forming a memetic antivirus marketed as a religion. It's primary directive is to outcompete all others by selling cleverly packaged reality instead of so-called "truth". The way I see it, the age of superstition is drawing to a close whether we like it or not. The next century will be a turning point for mankind. It all boils down to a simple decision. The decision is simply whether mankind cares more for "ideas" or "reality". Needless to say both are important in the grand scheme of things. But nature being the cruel bitch (a georgous one at that *wink*) that she is, doesn't care what you think. It only cares about the BEHAVIORS that promote your thermodynamic stability and those that don't. Our survival beyond the next hundred years will be in large part dependent on whether we understand that the only evolutionary value of "ideas" are in whether such an exorbiant investment of biological capital supports our survival or not. The evolutionary value of intelligence has yet to prove itself beside the trait of simple indestructible horniness. Even as we speak, cockroaches could be having sex on Bush's desk and not even sarin gas could stop them from doing it. (google "HRDC" if you doubt) > It is one of > the fundamental > questions enshrined in Max's extropian principles. > Do you base your > existence on "rational thought" or not? I base my existence on reality and thus empiricism. Rational thought is simply a tool in my shed so to speak. If I can make enough sense of a "pattern" of experimental data to put it into words then I will take the liberty to rationalize upon the "idea" for what it is and share it for the benefit of all. If I can't then I will operate on my intution of the "pattern" for what it is. > You can argue that a movie promoting the "in our > faces" exhibition of the > problem may be useful but I would argue that you > might be better served to > strike at the heart of the problem. Well I will leave it to the many brilliant philosophers on this list to discern the "utility" of art. For my part, I will contend that "beauty" is its own raison d'etre. As far as striking at the heart of the problem, I am gambling much on a memetic "Trojan horse" so rest assured I am not sitting on my laurels. > So *long* as people believe and act on the basis of > nothing more than their > thought about a thought (a belief) we have problems. I could not agree with you more. :) Stuart LaForge alt email: stuart"AT"ucla.edu "Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, doesn't go away." - Phillip K. Dick ____________________________________________________________________________________ Want to start your own business? Learn how on Yahoo! Small Business. http://smallbusiness.yahoo.com/r-index From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Tue Nov 28 10:46:36 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Tue, 28 Nov 2006 05:46:36 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Movie review- Renaissance: Paris 2054 In-Reply-To: <62c14240611271914i51428a20wb64becdaf3fe1e44@mail.gmail.com> References: <391387.58386.qm@web60513.mail.yahoo.com> <62c14240611271914i51428a20wb64becdaf3fe1e44@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On 11/27/06, Mike Dougherty wrote: > > On 11/27/06, Robert Bradbury wrote: > > > > one of the fundamental questions enshrined in Max's extropian > > principles. Do you base your existence on "rational thought" or not? > > > > So *long* as people believe and act on the basis of nothing more than > > their thought about a thought (a belief) we have problems. > > > > Could you clarify? I took the first sentence to mean it is good to 'base > existence' on "thought." The second sentence indicates that believe and > action on "thought about a thought" is a problem. I guess I should have put an emphasis on *rational* thought. Thoughts in and of themselves are relatively useless other than from the fact that they are the substrate that yields those which are ultimately valuable. Thoughts in general are like a gene pool. Applying the selection criteria "this is a good thought because everyone else believes it is a good thought" generally sucks. Applying the selection criteria "this is a good thought because it make logical sense and reality keeps demonstrating over and over and over again that it makes sense" is IMO a better approach. I wouldn't give you the time of day for a useless thought. Aaahhh, but for those that are rational *and* useful, those I'd be willing to pay cold hard cash for. Do you believe... (hmm)... think... (hmm)... logically deduce (?) that > someone like Hegel (& wikipedia) > should be considered an extropian of the first case, or a trouble-maker of > the second case? I'll leave trying to understand philosophers (or commenting on my perceptions of their understandings) to another day. Robert -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From nvitamore at austin.rr.com Tue Nov 28 12:16:43 2006 From: nvitamore at austin.rr.com (nvitamore at austin.rr.com) Date: Tue, 28 Nov 2006 07:16:43 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] MISSING: Full Coverage of Max and ExI in Wikipedia's Transhumanism Message-ID: <380-2200611228121643520@M2W007.mail2web.com> Greetings, I am traveling and in meetings in South America with people mostly from Europe and other varied locations throughout the world. Last night at one reception, several asked me why Wikipedia's entry on "transhumanism" places emphasis on a historical account of transhumanism that appears to intentionally leave out Max More and Extropy Institute, and much else. My answer was that no one from Extropy Institute or transhumanism in general has been proactive in making sure Max and ExI are covered or that this essay is accurate. I know from reports to me when president of ExI that there have been three to six writers who have dominated this entry/article. In all due respect, their work is well done and they deserve an applause for their stamina, but are they objectively reporting transhumanism outside of WTA and/or other fractions of transhumanism? Does the article spend enough time on the ExI and its conferences, magazines, and especially its email list? What about the speakers at the ExI conferences whose ideas were introduced and debated early on - before many of us joined in and which now we celebrate and which are now also mainstream issues? Now, looking at this from a different perspective: I met with an author who mentioned this to me and he said that the fact that FM used the term "transhuman" without prior knowledge of the term being used, and also that Max used the term "transhumanism" without prior knowledge of Huxley using the same word is totally acceptable in light of the fact that Huxley used the term transhumanism after probably reading the term Tran humanized in Dante's writings or even had heard a variation of the term by others in close proximity at that time. The real issue is what was meant by the term because it has been suggested and documented that who used it first has become the tool for taking the credit off of Max and placed on someone who is dead and has no current real-time presence or standing in transhumanism. I'd like to read what you all have to say. I don't know if Max will read this but my assumption is that he must be outraged if not terribly hurt and disappointed in this entire mess. Where are you all? Do you not care? I'd like to get your views. It is a shame that Riley Jones is not on the list now. agradece e bom por para agora, thanks and good by for now, Natasha -------------------------------------------------------------------- mail2web - Check your email from the web at http://mail2web.com/ . From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Tue Nov 28 13:43:45 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Tue, 28 Nov 2006 08:43:45 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] MISSING: Full Coverage of Max and ExI in Wikipedia's Transhumanism In-Reply-To: <380-2200611228121643520@M2W007.mail2web.com> References: <380-2200611228121643520@M2W007.mail2web.com> Message-ID: On 11/28/06, nvitamore at austin.rr.com wrote: > > Where are you all? Do you not care? I'd like to get your views. It is > a > shame that Riley Jones is not on the list now. I would say that I care, but may not be the best person to attempt to edit the entry as I wasn't around in the early days (I can only comment circa 1997 to present). I think it would require someone who predates me -- Keith, Anders, Russell and Spike come to mind. When it comes to wikipedia I try to make it a policy to avoid editing entries where I may be viewed as being biased (though I will comment in the discussion [tab] of such entries). That way the entry itself can be viewed as relatively independent of people directly involved (independent review). This can of course become problematic if there are only a few people in the world who can be considered authoritative sources on a topic. I would suggest that minimally points could be made in the discussions area by anyone and then it only becomes problematic if people start editing out others comments. [I don't believe that transhumanists would do this but my understanding is that in the political arenas things got pretty messy.] Wikipedia is always difficult from the perspective of trying to strike a balance between accuracy, brief summaries and a book length treatise on a topic. Robert -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From msd001 at gmail.com Tue Nov 28 14:29:13 2006 From: msd001 at gmail.com (Mike Dougherty) Date: Tue, 28 Nov 2006 09:29:13 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Movie review- Renaissance: Paris 2054 In-Reply-To: References: <391387.58386.qm@web60513.mail.yahoo.com> <62c14240611271914i51428a20wb64becdaf3fe1e44@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <62c14240611280629m628a89bbmfe11a91f3347321f@mail.gmail.com> On 11/28/06, Robert Bradbury wrote: > > On 11/27/06, Mike Dougherty wrote: > I wouldn't give you the time of day for a useless thought. Aaahhh, but > for those that are rational *and* useful, those I'd be willing to pay cold > hard cash for. > > I'll leave trying to understand philosophers (or commenting on my > perceptions of their understandings) to another day. > Very consistent answer. :) -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From pgptag at gmail.com Tue Nov 28 15:00:20 2006 From: pgptag at gmail.com (Giu1i0 Pri5c0) Date: Tue, 28 Nov 2006 16:00:20 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] MISSING: Full Coverage of Max and ExI in Wikipedia's Transhumanism In-Reply-To: <380-2200611228121643520@M2W007.mail2web.com> References: <380-2200611228121643520@M2W007.mail2web.com> Message-ID: <470a3c520611280700i7ef43deanf88f2a65272fc06a@mail.gmail.com> ???? >From the wikipedia article on transhumanism: "In 1988, philosopher Max More founded the Extropy Institute and was the main contributor to a formal transhumanist doctrine, which took the form of the Principles of Extropy in 1990.[11] In 1990, he laid the foundation of modern transhumanism by giving it a new definition..." Max, the Extropy Institute, and you all have Wikipedia entries. The good thing about wikipedia is that everyone can edit. G. On 11/28/06, nvitamore at austin.rr.com wrote: > Greetings, > > I am traveling and in meetings in South America with people mostly from > Europe and other varied locations throughout the world. Last night at one > reception, several asked me why Wikipedia's entry on "transhumanism" places > emphasis on a historical account of transhumanism that appears to > intentionally leave out Max More and Extropy Institute, and much else. > > My answer was that no one from Extropy Institute or transhumanism in > general has been proactive in making sure Max and ExI are covered or that > this essay is accurate. I know from reports to me when president of ExI > that there have been three to six writers who have dominated this > entry/article. In all due respect, their work is well done and they deserve > an applause for their stamina, but are they objectively reporting > transhumanism outside of WTA and/or other fractions of transhumanism? Does > the article spend enough time on the ExI and its conferences, magazines, > and especially its email list? What about the speakers at the ExI > conferences whose ideas were introduced and debated early on - before many > of us joined in and which now we celebrate and which are now also > mainstream issues? > > Now, looking at this from a different perspective: I met with an author > who mentioned this to me and he said that the fact that FM used the term > "transhuman" without prior knowledge of the term being used, and also that > Max used the term "transhumanism" without prior knowledge of Huxley using > the same word is totally acceptable in light of the fact that Huxley used > the term transhumanism after probably reading the term Tran humanized in > Dante's writings or even had heard a variation of the term by others in > close proximity at that time. > > The real issue is what was meant by the term because it has been suggested > and documented that who used it first has become the tool for taking the > credit off of Max and placed on someone who is dead and has no current > real-time presence or standing in transhumanism. > > I'd like to read what you all have to say. I don't know if Max will read > this but my assumption is that he must be outraged if not terribly hurt and > disappointed in this entire mess. > > Where are you all? Do you not care? I'd like to get your views. It is a > shame that Riley Jones is not on the list now. > > agradece e bom por para agora, > thanks and good by for now, > > Natasha > > > > -------------------------------------------------------------------- > mail2web - Check your email from the web at > http://mail2web.com/ . > > > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Tue Nov 28 15:37:06 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Tue, 28 Nov 2006 10:37:06 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Group mind exploration Message-ID: Ok, Christmas is coming and I've decided that I want people to send me some presents. One normally doesn't send presents to someone one does not know unless there is some perceived benefit. So here we go... 1. My Amazon.com wishlist is up for grabs [1]. 2. Books sent to me will be read and at least briefly reviewed [2]. 3. Sender gets 1 hour of discussion about the book (or the topic). Web Chats can be longer. If I get P2P phone calls setup I'd probably extend the discussion for as long as it is mutually interesting. 4. Pointers to reviews or discussions will be posted to the ExICh list. 5. I reserve the right to discontinue this at any point (if people were to send me the entire wish list it would involve years of effort). You don't have to send me a fresh off the press book, used is fine if you can find one. The time dedicated to the task (reading the book, posting the reviews, conversation about it) will significantly exceed in value the cost of the book. I don't charge lawyer rates for "real work" but I'm not cheap either. The topics in the wish list cover a wide range so I would expect that many may find something of interest if you choose to wade through it. Excluded from the list are sources that I've already read. I believe I have set things up so you can send books to me. If there are any problems do not hesitate to contact me offlist. I stress that this is an experiment. Presumably information is being produced at a rate faster than individuals can process it (there are more of 'them' than there are of 'you'). You are in effect "purchasing" a surrogate mind processor (a relatively astute one at that) (aka a 'research assistant'). Now, if you don't happen to find a book of interest in my wish list you should feel free to propose alternate books. If I would have added them to my wish list but simply did not know about them you get the review and discussion for the cost of the book. If not, then we may have some discussion over the relative value. Robert 1. http://www.amazon.com/gp/registry/wishlist/2GSFH5BAMIIP/ Its 20 pages long, if the URL doesn't work, you should be able to locate it by searching for my name and/or nanotechnology, 2. I reserve the right to post reviews either in my own list http://www.aeiveos.com:8080/~bradbury/ReadingList/index.html or Amazon.com or the ExiCh list. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From pj at pj-manney.com Tue Nov 28 16:39:21 2006 From: pj at pj-manney.com (pjmanney) Date: Tue, 28 Nov 2006 11:39:21 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] LA Times - Neurofeedback Message-ID: <32193013.2159171164731961181.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> "Researchers are now studying and refining the therapy ? with promising results. Neurofeedback is being used to treat a growing number of conditions, including chronic pain, attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder, asthma, migraines, post-traumatic stress disorder, substance abuse, autism and a variant of autism called Asperger's syndrome." [Eugen - if you forward this to the >Htech list, could you also send it to the WTA list for me? I've been caught in their server purgatory and my postings aren't getting through for some reason. Thanks!] PJ http://www.latimes.com/features/health/la-he-lab27nov27,1,1468311.story?coll=la-headlines-health IN THE LAB Physical therapy for the brain Treating certain ailments without drugs is possible with neurofeedback. It lets patients view and modify their mind's activity. By Eric Jaffe Special to The Times November 27, 2006 EVERY week for two years, Michael Hammett stared at a computer screen, trying to open a flower with his mind. Hammett had developed a case of carpal tunnel syndrome so severe he needed surgery. But being a former opiate abuser, he refused to use the medications that would be needed to control the resulting pain. Having already tried physical therapy, he set his mind on another alternative: neurofeedback. In neurofeedback, people with mental or psychological conditions learn to regulate and reduce their symptoms ? in Hammett's case, pain ? by monitoring their brain waves on a computer. The treatment is an increasingly popular cousin to biofeedback, in which people control physical stress by monitoring their heart rate or muscle tension. Hammett learned to do both. Electrodes attached to his scalp transmitted electrical signals from his brain to a computer displaying a closed white flower. Other sensors were attached to muscles in both his hands and arms. As Hammett learned what it felt like to relax these muscles, and therefore reduce his pain, the flower began to open. Over time, he trained his brain to calm his central nervous system whenever the pain recurred. "That image of the flower opening is so burned into my psyche, in conjunction with the moment of relaxation," the 48-year-old Santa Monica resident says, three years after finishing his therapy. Neurofeedback has been used for decades in private clinics, but few well-controlled research studies have been done ? giving it an unscientific reputation. That's beginning to change. Researchers are now studying and refining the therapy ? with promising results. Neurofeedback is being used to treat a growing number of conditions, including chronic pain, attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder, asthma, migraines, post-traumatic stress disorder, substance abuse, autism and a variant of autism called Asperger's syndrome. "We've done some definitive studies finally that show it works in important ways," says Eran Zaidel, a professor of behavioral neuroscience and cognition at UCLA's Brain Research Institute. "It's still considered an alternative approach to medicine, but some people won't do conventional medicine at all," he says. "Many, many people are very eager to use this method." Studies show the advantages Neurofeedback therapy emerged from work done in the 1960s by psychologist Barry Sterman, now professor emeritus at the UCLA School of Medicine. He wired electrodes to the heads of cats, then rewarded them whenever their brain waves reached a frequency that indicated a relaxed state. In subsequent experiments, Sterman found, cats that had learned to relax themselves this way had a higher resistance to the onset of seizures. The medical applications seemed obvious: If people learned to relax in such a way, they too might be able to stave off seizures or anxiety attacks. Such a method has advantages over simply taking a pill, says Rob Kall, a neurofeedback practitioner in Newtown, Penn. "When you're done with medication, it goes out of your system," Kall says. But when you're done with neurofeedback training, the benefits remain. Perhaps the most researched and accepted application of neurofeedback is with patients who suffer from ADHD. In 2002, a clinical team led by psychology professor Vincent J. Monastra, director of the FPI Attention Disorders Clinic in Endicott, N.Y., studied 100 children diagnosed with the condition. All the patients received Ritalin and counseling, but about half also received neurofeedback. Every week, Monastra hooked electrodes to the frontal cortex of these patients and taught them to increase arousal in that area. Heightened frontal cortex activity reflects a reduction in hyperactivity and improvements in attention. After a year, all the patients showed some improvement. But when the researchers discontinued treatment for a week and reevaluated the patients, only those who received neurofeedback retained those improvements. The neurofeedback appeared to actually change the patients' brain patterns, the research found, and neurological tests showed greater activity in the parts of the brain responsible for attention and behavioral control. The study was published in the December 2002 issue of the journal Applied Psychophysiology and Biofeedback. Between drugs and neurofeedback, only the latter can potentially offer long-lasting change, says clinical psychologist Roger deBeus of Eastern Virginia Medical School in Norfolk, Va. "As the brain becomes more normal, patients don't need as much or any medication," he says. Russ Ramsay, associate director of the Adult ADHD Treatment and Research Program at the University of Pennsylvania, says patients are intrigued by the possibilities. "More people are seeking it out and entering into the treatment," he says. Cravings can be lessened with neurofeedback too. Clinical psychologist Stephen Sideroff of the UCLA School of Medicine published the first controlled study examining neurofeedback as a tool to help substance abusers. The study enrolled 120 patients from a residential treatment program in Los Angeles; the group included those who were dependent on alcohol, heroin, crack and methamphetamine. In addition to counseling, half the patients received neurofeedback, in which they learned to stabilize certain brain waves related to stress that comes with the initial phases of substance abuse recovery. After a year of treatment, 77% of the users who had received neurofeedback training remained abstinent, compared with 44% of the control patients, according to research published in 2005 in the American Journal of Drug and Alcohol Abuse. Precision up for debate Some critics of neurofeedback have said it's too imprecise. Electrodes placed on the scalp can detect brain waves toward the surface of the brain, they say, but might fail to measure waves at sub-cortical levels, such as those involved in attention and arousal regulation. Several advances in neurofeedback, however, promise more precise readings. Monastra now uses a technique known as multi-channel neurofeedback. Instead of focusing on just one part of the brain, the technique gives readings from many brain regions. "As we become more aware of the different subtypes of neurological problems, we use specific protocols to address those problems," he says. "Chances are we'll start to get even more robust results." Multi-channel neurofeedback surveys the brain's surface to locate an abnormality, but another type of therapy actually looks into the core. The therapy ? low-resolution electromagnetic tomography ? can show clinicians signals from regions deep below the scalp. "The idea is, if we can get more specific, we can intervene faster and more effectively," says Leslie Sherlin, who is getting his doctorate in psychology at Capella University in Minnesota. In tests with obsessive-compulsive patients, Sherlin located increased neural activity in the cingulate gyrus, an area toward the brain's core that's involved in regulating attention and arousal. Over-arousal in this area causes patients to ruminate on germs or other obsessions, he says. Teaching patients to regulate the brain waves from the gyrus could lead to improved treatment of obsessive-compulsive disorder, according to an analysis of the technique that Sherlin published in Neuroscience Letters in 2005. Promising but not yet accepted Neurofeedback has yet to achieve widespread acceptance. "Many people out there feel threatened by it, because people are putting it out there as alternative," says psychologist Jeffrey Bone, who runs a private practice in Orange County and began using neurofeedback a year ago. "I see it as a complement to medicine or psychotherapy, not a challenge or alternative." But neurofeedback researchers expect acceptance of the therapy to grow. For starters, the therapy is cost effective, they say. In the case of asthma, for example, if a biofeedback session costs about $150 ? a typical rate in most clinics (neurofeedback costs about the same) ? then the patient has acquired an unlimited therapeutic tool for the price of about four months of steroid medication, says Paul Lehrer, professor of psychiatry at Robert Wood Johnson Medical School in New Jersey. Says UCLA's Sideroff: "There are a lot of obstacles. But it's an effective tool, so I think it will keep growing." From pgptag at gmail.com Tue Nov 28 17:26:05 2006 From: pgptag at gmail.com (Giu1i0 Pri5c0) Date: Tue, 28 Nov 2006 18:26:05 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] MISSING: Full Coverage of Max and ExI in Wikipedia's Transhumanism In-Reply-To: <470a3c520611280700i7ef43deanf88f2a65272fc06a@mail.gmail.com> References: <380-2200611228121643520@M2W007.mail2web.com> <470a3c520611280700i7ef43deanf88f2a65272fc06a@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <470a3c520611280926i98e7defi43dd58449168c9d8@mail.gmail.com> Interested in the reference to Dante, that I was not aware of, I did a quick research: Trasumanar significar per verba non si poria; per? l'essemplo basti a cui esperienza grazia serba. To represent transhumanise in words Impossible were; the example, then, suffice Him for whom Grace the experience reserves. (Paradise, I) http://dante.ilt.columbia.edu/comedy/ From hkhenson at rogers.com Tue Nov 28 19:02:28 2006 From: hkhenson at rogers.com (Keith Henson) Date: Tue, 28 Nov 2006 14:02:28 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Rational thinking was Movie review- (2) Message-ID: <5.1.0.14.0.20061128140220.036351f8@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> At 05:46 AM 11/28/2006 -0500, Robert wrote: snip >I guess I should have put an emphasis on *rational* thought. Thoughts in >and of themselves are relatively useless other than from the fact that >they are the substrate that yields those which are ultimately >valuable. Thoughts in general are like a gene pool. Applying the >selection criteria "this is a good thought because everyone else believes >it is a good thought" generally sucks. Applying the selection criteria >"this is a good thought because it make logical sense and reality keeps >demonstrating over and over and over again that it makes sense" is IMO a >better approach. Like everyone on this list, I value rational thoughts. But it is obvious this is a minority viewpoint for the population in general. Why? Can anyone answer this from an evolutionary psychology point of view? >I wouldn't give you the time of day for a useless thought. Aaahhh, but >for those that are rational *and* useful, those I'd be willing to pay cold >hard cash for. Heh. What would the rational thought that explained irrational thinking be worth? Keith Henson From pharos at gmail.com Tue Nov 28 19:41:53 2006 From: pharos at gmail.com (BillK) Date: Tue, 28 Nov 2006 19:41:53 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Rational thinking was Movie review- (2) In-Reply-To: <5.1.0.14.0.20061128140220.036351f8@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> References: <5.1.0.14.0.20061128140220.036351f8@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> Message-ID: On 11/28/06, Keith Henson wrote: > Like everyone on this list, I value rational thoughts. But it is obvious > this is a minority viewpoint for the population in general. > > Why? > > Can anyone answer this from an evolutionary psychology point of view? > It is explained quite nicely in the Time Magazine article on risk assessment recently posted by p j manney. Quotes: Part of the problem we have with evaluating risk, scientists say, is that we're moving through the modern world with what is, in many respects, a prehistoric brain. We may think we've grown accustomed to living in a predator-free environment in which most of the dangers of the wild have been driven away or fenced off, but our central nervous system--evolving at a glacial pace--hasn't got the message. "There are two systems for analyzing risk: an automatic, intuitive system and a more thoughtful analysis," says Paul Slovic, professor of psychology at the University of Oregon. "Our perception of risk lives largely in our feelings, so most of the time we're operating on system No. 1." -------------- The article goes into much more detail about how rational thinking is rarely allowed to apply to the dangers of modern life. BillK From pharos at gmail.com Tue Nov 28 19:55:41 2006 From: pharos at gmail.com (BillK) Date: Tue, 28 Nov 2006 19:55:41 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] MISSING: Full Coverage of Max and ExI in Wikipedia's Transhumanism In-Reply-To: <470a3c520611280926i98e7defi43dd58449168c9d8@mail.gmail.com> References: <380-2200611228121643520@M2W007.mail2web.com> <470a3c520611280700i7ef43deanf88f2a65272fc06a@mail.gmail.com> <470a3c520611280926i98e7defi43dd58449168c9d8@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On 11/28/06, Giu1i0 Pri5c0 wrote: > Interested in the reference to Dante, that I was not aware of, I did a > quick research: > > Trasumanar significar per verba > non si poria; per? l'essemplo basti > a cui esperienza grazia serba. > > To represent transhumanise in words > Impossible were; the example, then, suffice > Him for whom Grace the experience reserves. > > (Paradise, I) > http://dante.ilt.columbia.edu/comedy/ > Dante is referenced in the Extropy FAQ: Of course Dante was not referring to what we mean by modern transhumanism. He was talking about a transcendental experience of God. A better translation of that verse is: The passing beyond humanity may not be set forth in words: therefore, let the example suffice any for whom grace reserves that experience. For a detailed analysis, see: BillK From msd001 at gmail.com Tue Nov 28 19:38:01 2006 From: msd001 at gmail.com (Mike Dougherty) Date: Tue, 28 Nov 2006 14:38:01 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Rational thinking was Movie review- (2) In-Reply-To: <5.1.0.14.0.20061128140220.036351f8@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> References: <5.1.0.14.0.20061128140220.036351f8@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> Message-ID: <62c14240611281138q143a0eb1u4339676bb6b724e9@mail.gmail.com> On 11/28/06, Keith Henson wrote: > > At 05:46 AM 11/28/2006 -0500, Robert wrote: > Heh. What would the rational thought that explained irrational thinking > be > worth? > hmm... Extropian Koan... -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jay.dugger at gmail.com Tue Nov 28 18:13:47 2006 From: jay.dugger at gmail.com (Jay Dugger) Date: Tue, 28 Nov 2006 13:13:47 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Group mind exploration In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <5366105b0611281013v26760a20l61af758961e93729@mail.gmail.com> Tuesday, 28 November 2006 R.B.: This sounds like a good deal to me, Robert. Would you mind ranking your books with priority, please? That gives potential patrons a good idea where your interests lie and where they might overlap with a patron's own. As of today every entry has "medium" priority. -- Jay Dugger http://jaydugger.suprglu.com Sometimes the delete key serves best. From thespike at satx.rr.com Tue Nov 28 20:17:13 2006 From: thespike at satx.rr.com (Damien Broderick) Date: Tue, 28 Nov 2006 14:17:13 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] MISSING: Full Coverage of Max and ExI in Wikipedia's Transhumanism In-Reply-To: References: <380-2200611228121643520@M2W007.mail2web.com> <470a3c520611280700i7ef43deanf88f2a65272fc06a@mail.gmail.com> <470a3c520611280926i98e7defi43dd58449168c9d8@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <7.0.1.0.2.20061128141044.02515628@satx.rr.com> At 07:55 PM 11/28/2006 +0000, BillK wisely wrote: >Of course Dante was not referring to what we mean by modern transhumanism. >He was talking about a transcendental experience of God. Yes indeed. It's badly misleading to try to conscript Dante's theological usage to >H-ism. (It'd make about as much sense as trying to drag in "transhumance", which at least might elicit a dry academic chuckle.) Julian Huxley was much closer to what we intend. As I recall across the decades, Huxley also favored the useful "teleonomy" as a term denoting a kind of self-imposed directionality to evolution, rather than any "teleology" imposed by an imaginary Higher Being. Damien Broderick From nvitamore at austin.rr.com Tue Nov 28 20:30:56 2006 From: nvitamore at austin.rr.com (nvitamore at austin.rr.com) Date: Tue, 28 Nov 2006 15:30:56 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] MISSING: Full Coverage of Max and ExI inWikipedia's Transhumanism Message-ID: <380-2200611228203056840@M2W002.mail2web.com> At 07:55 PM 11/28/2006 +0000, Bill wrote: (It'd make about as much sense as trying to drag in "transhumance", which at least might elicit a dry academic chuckle.) haha! Grazing for Digital narratives of thought can be well stated in a new historical approach of digital scholarship. Natasha -------------------------------------------------------------------- mail2web - Check your email from the web at http://mail2web.com/ . From nvitamore at austin.rr.com Tue Nov 28 19:24:47 2006 From: nvitamore at austin.rr.com (nvitamore at austin.rr.com) Date: Tue, 28 Nov 2006 14:24:47 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] MISSING: Full Coverage of Max and ExI inWikipedia's Transhumanism Message-ID: <380-2200611228192447773@M2W024.mail2web.com> From: Giu1i0 >Interested in the reference to Dante, that I was not aware of, I did a >quick research: It is in the Transhumanist FAQ at ExI's website and Transhumanist history at TAC. But is a worthwihile inquiry into relationships of words and how they are used over time in conveying an ideal of man: "Dante's Paradiso is a successful journey into the mind, even if at the outset the experience looms ineffably ahead. The "transhumanized" mind (Par. I, 70) passes beyond human logic and its limits of time and space, ultimately conceiving paradisal landscapes by the blending and interpenetration of sights and sounds." and as suggested by Rossi in "The Numinosum and the Brain:The Weaving Thread of Consciousness": "'the transfiguration of the subject' There is a change in the physical appearance, akin to Dante?s 'transhumanized' into a god a kind of beauty." and also by Arthos in "Dante, Michelangelo and Milton", London, Routledge and Kegan Paul. [1963] "In the light of the Longinian view that through the sublime, achieved by the artist from his own noble nature, the reader can be 'transhumanized,' the author examines the works of the three artists in their relation to divine principles. In a pithy chapter on Dante (pp. 18-49), ..." ciao- Natasha -------------------------------------------------------------------- mail2web - Check your email from the web at http://mail2web.com/ . From pharos at gmail.com Tue Nov 28 21:04:56 2006 From: pharos at gmail.com (BillK) Date: Tue, 28 Nov 2006 21:04:56 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] MISSING: Full Coverage of Max and ExI inWikipedia's Transhumanism In-Reply-To: <380-2200611228203056840@M2W002.mail2web.com> References: <380-2200611228203056840@M2W002.mail2web.com> Message-ID: On 11/28/06, nvitamore wrote: > At 07:55 PM 11/28/2006 +0000, Bill wrote: > > (It'd make about as much sense as trying > to drag in "transhumance", which at least might elicit a dry academic > chuckle.) > > haha! Grazing for Digital narratives of thought can be well stated in a new > historical approach of digital scholarship. > Well I would have said it if I'd heard the term before. :) But it was Damien that said it. I knew about the Alpine custom of moving livestock to higher pastures in summer and to the lower valleys in winter. But I hadn't heard that it was called transhumance. (There's a word for everything in English). Must be Damien's Aussie sheep herder experiences coming out. BillK From hkhenson at rogers.com Tue Nov 28 18:17:22 2006 From: hkhenson at rogers.com (Keith Henson) Date: Tue, 28 Nov 2006 13:17:22 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Movie review- Renaissance: Paris 2054 In-Reply-To: <20061128060422.37294.qmail@web60519.mail.yahoo.com> References: Message-ID: <5.1.0.14.0.20061128125816.038394d0@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> At 10:04 PM 11/27/2006 -0800, Stuart wrote: snip >Yes, I am aware of that, so much so that I am doing >something about it beyond mere debate. I and others >are forming a memetic antivirus marketed as a >religion. It's primary directive is to outcompete all >others by selling cleverly packaged reality instead of >so-called "truth". snip If you are serious, I highly advise reading _Religion Explained_ by Pascal Boyer. Boyer does not have a complete model, but his field work and observations have to be incorporated in any model. I would use extreme caution in marketing any meme set that is intended to compete with religions. I have recently come to the extremely paranoid view of religions as xenophobic meme reservoirs. I suspect that the evolved trait of humans hosting religions at all is connected to the irrational state humans enter when they unconsciously perceive the need to kill neighbors because of a pending resource crisis. (Think Rwanda.) I believe functional MRI could determine the actual brain areas involved, just as it showed what gets activated when partisans defending their leaders. Keith Henson PS. If history is any guide, your meme set is likely to mutate in ways that make it more fit to human needs to justify wars in a time of pending resource crunch. From alex at ramonsky.com Tue Nov 28 16:30:40 2006 From: alex at ramonsky.com (Alex Ramonsky) Date: Tue, 28 Nov 2006 16:30:40 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Group mind exploration References: Message-ID: <456C6430.2030709@ramonsky.com> Fun idea...but do they not have libraries where you live? The advantages are many -you can order and read any book you choose at absolutely no cost, you get exercise going to and from the library, you home doesn't fill up with books you wish you had never bought, you can photocopy and keep only those sections you want for research, and so on...? AR ********* Robert Bradbury wrote: > Ok, Christmas is coming and I've decided that I want people to send me > some presents. One normally doesn't send presents to someone one does > not know unless there is some perceived benefit. > From kerry_prez at yahoo.com Tue Nov 28 21:49:14 2006 From: kerry_prez at yahoo.com (Al Brooks) Date: Tue, 28 Nov 2006 13:49:14 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Rational thinking was Movie review- (2) In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <210498.33525.qm@web51606.mail.yahoo.com> You read the McGinnis article? Self deception is pandemic; the self is divided, the rational acquisitive calculating self is not in line with the spontaneous adventurous celebratory self. Given this and more how could less intelligent people possibly be rational? And then pump a few drinks into them and they are in a reality of their own creation. They take drink & drugs to, it goes without saying, deliberately escape from rationality altogether-- that on top of the irrationality the unwashed possess without the aid of chemical escapism. Rationalism? Who? when? where? All day long I meet those in a parallel universe of religiosity (often bad religion); conspiracy theorization; "love" relationships (contempt is not infrequently disguised as love)... Rationalism? There's a car in the backyard you can have for $50. No engine, it's rusty, but the price can't be beat. BillK wrote: On 11/28/06, Keith Henson wrote: > Like everyone on this list, I value rational thoughts. But it is obvious > this is a minority viewpoint for the population in general. > > Why? > > Can anyone answer this from an evolutionary psychology point of view? > It is explained quite nicely in the Time Magazine article on risk assessment recently posted by p j manney. Quotes: Part of the problem we have with evaluating risk, scientists say, is that we're moving through the modern world with what is, in many respects, a prehistoric brain. We may think we've grown accustomed to living in a predator-free environment in which most of the dangers of the wild have been driven away or fenced off, but our central nervous system--evolving at a glacial pace--hasn't got the message. "There are two systems for analyzing risk: an automatic, intuitive system and a more thoughtful analysis," says Paul Slovic, professor of psychology at the University of Oregon. "Our perception of risk lives largely in our feelings, so most of the time we're operating on system No. 1." -------------- The article goes into much more detail about how rational thinking is rarely allowed to apply to the dangers of modern life. BillK _______________________________________________ extropy-chat mailing list extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat --------------------------------- Cheap Talk? Check out Yahoo! Messenger's low PC-to-Phone call rates. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Wed Nov 29 00:39:21 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Tue, 28 Nov 2006 19:39:21 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Group mind exploration In-Reply-To: <456C6430.2030709@ramonsky.com> References: <456C6430.2030709@ramonsky.com> Message-ID: Alex, I've got one of the largest libraries in the world (at Harvard) at my disposal and I'm relatively sure I can get things out of MIT [1,2]. If you can find the book in their catalogs I'm willing to attempt to check them out I have *not* attempted to cross reference my wish list with the Harvard and MIT catalogs. I strongly suspect that since most of the books on my wish list are recent publications there is only a passing (50:50?) chance that they would be in the catalog and available. However, I do my best work when I can highlight the books and scribble in the margins [3]. Libraries tend to frown on that. Jay, I don't know how to rate them from a priority standpoint (I don't think Amazon allows you to do that -- if this is not true please tell me how [or send a note to Amazon about adding such a capability]). From a practical viewpoint I would probably order them from short term to long term, engineering to theoretical. So this would allow some flexibility in choosing those topics which you know I may be interested in and where your perceptions of short vs. long, easy vs. hard may be different from mine. (Treat me as a grad student -- I will not be offended.) This is where the experiment in group mind comes into play -- I do not expect my interests to match those of others and I do not expect that my extraction of information would be the same that other individuals would do. But people on the list presumably know my mindset and presumably know if there is something of interest I will identify it. So this is an experiment in distributed application of a transhumanist mind framework. "Can one send Robert off to do something useful from ones own perspective at relatively low cost?" [4] I will commit that if information explored is outside of ones realm of expertise and I view it as important but the supplier may not have an awareness of that an attempt will be made to educate one to the level that one can appreciate the value. I do not like creating a situation where people are unhappy with the results and a satisfied customer is the best way to get people to buy me more books :-; I stress that this is an experiment. To the best of my knowledge this has never been attempted using current era tools in quite this way. So it remains to be seen whether it can be viewed as a fruitful approach. I am in effect attempting to determine whether a random (presumably thoughtful) population can vote and vote effectively. Robert 1. http://hollis.harvard.edu/ 2. Barton: http://library.mit.edu/F?func=find-b-0 3. My copy of TSIN which is autographed by Ray and highlighted and margin scribbled in by me will presumably someday be a valuable antique. 4. I'm not working for "free", I've already selected the vectors I am interested in exploring. What one is doing is biasing those vectors in line with ones personal interests and priorities. You are in effect "spinning" potential future realities (under the gross assumption that if you influence what Robert knows you influence what he may influence). You don't have to make an argument or justify a perspective, you simply have to send me a book. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From nvitamore at austin.rr.com Wed Nov 29 01:18:40 2006 From: nvitamore at austin.rr.com (nvitamore at austin.rr.com) Date: Tue, 28 Nov 2006 20:18:40 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] MISSING: Full Coverage of Max and ExI inWikipedia'sTranshumanism Message-ID: <380-220061132911840226@M2W039.mail2web.com> "Dante's Paradiso is a successful journey into the mind, even if at the outset the experience looms ineffably ahead. The "transhumanized" mind (Par. I, 70) passes beyond human logic and its limits of time and space, ultimately conceiving paradisal landscapes by the blending and interpenetration of sights and sounds." and as suggested by Rossi in "The Numinosum and the Brain:The Weaving Thread of Consciousness": "'the transfiguration of the subject' There is a change in the physical appearance, akin to Dante?s 'transhumanized' into a god a kind of beauty." and also by Arthos in "Dante, Michelangelo and Milton", London, Routledge and Kegan Paul. [1963] "In the light of the Longinian view that through the sublime, achieved by the artist from his own noble nature, the reader can be 'transhumanized,' the author examines the works of the three artists in their relation to divine principles. In a pithy chapter on Dante (pp. 18-49), ..." ciao- Natasha -------------------------------------------------------------------- mail2web - Check your email from the web at http://mail2web.com/ . _______________________________________________ extropy-chat mailing list extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat -------------------------------------------------------------------- mail2web - Check your email from the web at http://mail2web.com/ . From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Wed Nov 29 02:23:05 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Tue, 28 Nov 2006 21:23:05 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] MISSING: Full Coverage of Max and ExI inWikipedia'sTranshumanism In-Reply-To: <380-220061132911840226@M2W039.mail2web.com> References: <380-220061132911840226@M2W039.mail2web.com> Message-ID: On 11/28/06, nvitamore at austin.rr.com wrote: > > "Dante's Paradiso is a successful journey into the mind, even if at the > outset the experience looms ineffably ahead. The "transhumanized" mind > (Par. I, 70) passes beyond human logic and its limits of time and space, > ultimately conceiving paradisal landscapes by the blending and > interpenetration of sights and sounds." I would point out the flaw in this statement -- that there is "transhumanist logic". As a computer scientist I reflect back to logic is logic is logic. If one invokes extranormal logic then "normal" logic (and indeed all rational thought) is worthless. Ands and Ors are Ands and Ors. You cannot merely assert that there is "logic" which exceeds the grasp of humans -- you have to make the case that it really exists. Otherwise this is merely an exercise of asserting and inserting fantacy into reality. One should draw a critical distinction in what the external reality actually is and what one at any moment perceives it to be. Communication sensors may provide a semi-up-to-date view of reality but that is not "reality". Robert -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From msd001 at gmail.com Wed Nov 29 02:43:18 2006 From: msd001 at gmail.com (Mike Dougherty) Date: Tue, 28 Nov 2006 21:43:18 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Group mind exploration In-Reply-To: References: <456C6430.2030709@ramonsky.com> Message-ID: <62c14240611281843v19a49f22vb477edaed3127ddb@mail.gmail.com> On 11/28/06, Robert Bradbury wrote: > > I stress that this is an experiment. To the best of my knowledge this has > never been attempted using current era tools in quite this way. So it > remains to be seen whether it can be viewed as a fruitful approach. I am in > effect attempting to determine whether a random (presumably thoughtful) > population can vote and vote effectively. > > 4. I'm not working for "free", I've already selected the vectors I am > interested in exploring. What one is doing is biasing those vectors in line > with ones personal interests and priorities. You are in effect "spinning" > potential future realities (under the gross assumption that if you influence > what Robert knows you influence what he may influence). You don't have to > make an argument or justify a perspective, you simply have to send me a > book. > In the vein of not working for free, what is your reaction to a similar proposal (a "rider" if you will) to your group-mind experiment that those of us with little "investment capital" venture 'works in kind' - such that there be an exchange of information of the type you are effectively "selling." One may not have the reputation of Robert Bradbury, but surely any sufficiently rational mind can distill the relevant bits of useful information from the vast data streams available. Would this be a worthwhile evolution of the premise of the experiment, or does it dilute your purpose such that it would be better suited to a different experiment altogether? -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jef at jefallbright.net Wed Nov 29 04:44:25 2006 From: jef at jefallbright.net (Jef Allbright) Date: Tue, 28 Nov 2006 20:44:25 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Rational thinking was Movie review- (2) In-Reply-To: <62c14240611281138q143a0eb1u4339676bb6b724e9@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: Mike Dougherty wrote: > On 11/28/06, Keith Henson wrote: >> At 05:46 AM 11/28/2006 -0500, Robert wrote: >> Heh. What would the rational thought that explained irrational thinking be >> worth? > > hmm... Extropian Koan... Well, as currently stated it's mundane because we often provide rational explanations of irrational thinking. But if we're talking about rational thought *justifying the use of* "irrational" thinking, then we quickly encounter the powerful concept of rationality fundamentally bounded by limited knowledge and computational capacity. The novice asked the master "I have learned that all knowledge is contingent, that the best I can do is to allocate probability mass wisely. But is there no certainty in the universe?" At that moment a spider fell from the ceiling onto the master's arm. The master swatted it deftly. At the moment, the novice was enlightened. From avantguardian2020 at yahoo.com Wed Nov 29 05:26:23 2006 From: avantguardian2020 at yahoo.com (The Avantguardian) Date: Tue, 28 Nov 2006 21:26:23 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Movie review- Renaissance: Paris 2054 In-Reply-To: <5.1.0.14.0.20061128125816.038394d0@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> Message-ID: <507281.22705.qm@web60512.mail.yahoo.com> Thanks, Keith. I will look for Boyer's book and keep the rest in mind too. --- Keith Henson wrote: > At 10:04 PM 11/27/2006 -0800, Stuart wrote: > > snip > > >Yes, I am aware of that, so much so that I am doing > >something about it beyond mere debate. I and others > >are forming a memetic antivirus marketed as a > >religion. It's primary directive is to outcompete > all > >others by selling cleverly packaged reality instead > of > >so-called "truth". > > snip > > If you are serious, I highly advise reading > _Religion Explained_ by Pascal > Boyer. > > Boyer does not have a complete model, but his field > work and observations > have to be incorporated in any model. > > I would use extreme caution in marketing any meme > set that is intended to > compete with religions. I have recently come to the > extremely paranoid > view of religions as xenophobic meme reservoirs. > > I suspect that the evolved trait of humans hosting > religions at all is > connected to the irrational state humans enter when > they unconsciously > perceive the need to kill neighbors because of a > pending resource > crisis. (Think Rwanda.) > > I believe functional MRI could determine the actual > brain areas involved, > just as it showed what gets activated when partisans > defending their leaders. > > Keith Henson > > PS. If history is any guide, your meme set is > likely to mutate in ways > that make it more fit to human needs to justify wars > in a time of pending > resource crunch. > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > Stuart LaForge alt email: stuart"AT"ucla.edu "Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, doesn't go away." - Phillip K. Dick ____________________________________________________________________________________ Cheap talk? Check out Yahoo! Messenger's low PC-to-Phone call rates. http://voice.yahoo.com From spike66 at comcast.net Wed Nov 29 05:47:12 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Tue, 28 Nov 2006 21:47:12 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] MISSING: Full Coverage of Max and ExI in Wikipedia'sTranshumanism In-Reply-To: <380-2200611228121643520@M2W007.mail2web.com> Message-ID: <200611290605.kAT65BIU022416@andromeda.ziaspace.com> > bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of nvitamore at austin.rr.com ... > > ... several asked me why Wikipedia's entry on "transhumanism" > places > emphasis on a historical account of transhumanism that appears to > intentionally leave out Max More and Extropy Institute, and much else... > Natasha Wikipedia and the mainstream media share a common characteristic. Only when they report on a topic which we already know or an event at which we were present do we recognize how biased and incomplete are their versions of reality. spike From jrd1415 at gmail.com Wed Nov 29 07:24:50 2006 From: jrd1415 at gmail.com (Jeff Davis) Date: Tue, 28 Nov 2006 23:24:50 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] 'a process of non-thinking called faith' 2 (2) In-Reply-To: <456A5688.7020208@goldenfuture.net> References: <20061125171315.91968.qmail@web51601.mail.yahoo.com> <456A5688.7020208@goldenfuture.net> Message-ID: On 11/26/06, Joseph Bloch wrote: > With all due respect, Sam, I don't believe you understand the situation regarding the threat posed to the West from the Jihadists. With all due respect Joseph I believe you have drunk deep of the hysterically-exaggerated-threat Kool-Aid. It's the oldest political tool: find a bogeyman, hype him (or it) to apocalyptic/existential threat, exploit the fear, and rake in the war profits both fiscal and political. With the Commies gone, Islam has been nominated as the next bogeyman. > While it is true that not all Muslims subscribe to the Jihadist ideology, the plain fact is that the expansionist Jihadist ideology is the norm within the broad Islamic community. Just because you assert this, presumably because you believe it, doesn't make it true. Show us some links to some facts or something purporting to be factually substantive. Also, many(most?) religions proselytize, seeking new adherents. But that needs to be distinguished from an ongoing program of active military aggression in the service of theocratic imperialism. > The vast majority of religious schools (which are just about the only schools in many Muslim nations) and mosques espouse that philosophy. It is not a fringe, or even a minority. Islam has been on the defense, legitimately so, against western aggression, domination and expansion for a long time. The most recent spasm of western aggression beginning in Nov of 1917 and continuing with substantial ferocity to this day. Self-defense is universally viewed as legitimate across cultures. It is disingenuous to mischaracterise defense as offense and to then couple this untruth to the common religious practice of evangelizing and declare Islam to be on a global jihad to kill or convert all unbelievers. Google up war deaths of the twentieth century and determine for that period how many westerners have been killed on western soil by invading armies of the east and vice versa. That should fairly well establish the degree to which jihad has been, and remains, defensive in nature. > The violent expansionist jihadist philosophy is mainstream Islam. I disagree. You'll have to provide facts in support of this (otherwise unsubstantiated) assertion. > We have our "friends" in Saudi Arabia, who have spent the last few decades spending their oil wealth building the infrastructure to propagate that interpretation of Islam, to thank. As I understand it the wahabi sect has been a challenge for the House of Saud. They feed it to keep from being eaten, so they can keep raking in the oil wealth, not because they support the wahabi religious authoritarianism, asceticism, and militancy. Thus oil wealth and Saudi vulnerability combine to amplify wahabi extremism. One could even make a case that it is the west through its addiction to oil that creates Islamic militancy, just as its appetite for drugs creates the drug trade. The west doesn't NEED to drive and get high, but the underprivileged folks in Islamic countries NEED to eat. > > Comparisons to Christians (as others have made) are unsupportable. The Muslim world never underwent a Reformation as did Christianity, and is still mired in the mind-set of the Crusades which Christianity thankfully shook off several centuries ago. I will point out that Episcopalians and Baptists, while they do indeed share the vision of converting the world, stop short of exterminating those who, when presented with the choice, fail to choose to convert. > > Last time I looked, there weren't any Methodists flying planeloads of innocent people into buildings. No, they prefer to drop planeloads of bombs etc on innocent people. And don't tell me that they drop the bombs on the bad guys, and that the innocent people -- collateral damage -- are killed by accident, because it's pure political expediency and cowardice. They don''t want pay the price required to spare the innocent, to put soldiers on the ground to root out the bad guys and only the bad guys. > > They are not just "a few Muslim leaders", although I will admit they are indeed "madmen." They are the mainstream of the leadership and educational institutions of the worldwide Muslim community, and they have turned the jihadist philosophy into the mainstream of Muslim jurisprudence. Substitute "Judeo-Christian fundamentalist" for "Muslim" in the above paragraph and you will have a perfect description of the Bush/neocon crusade/jihad. > > I will be the first to admit that Christianity is not, as a rule, a friend of Transhumanist ideology. However, given a choice between Christianity and Islam, I will take the former any day of the week. At least they don't chop off the heads of people with whom they disagree. Here we see the result of "thinking" under the influence of the Kool-Aid. It leads you to the inherently contradictory notion that sawing someone's head off with a knife is somehow fundamentally different from blasting the same head off with a machine gun. The real difference, the meaningful difference, is to be found in two numbers: 2882 as of today, and ~655,000. By this metric western crusader "evil" outpaces Islamic jihadist "evil" by a factor of 227:1. You can quibble about the numbers, but my point is clear: on the one hand we have is the reality based community and on the other the Kool-Aid based community. -- Best, Jeff Davis "Everything's hard till you know how to do it." Ray Charles From emlynoregan at gmail.com Wed Nov 29 07:27:32 2006 From: emlynoregan at gmail.com (Emlyn) Date: Wed, 29 Nov 2006 17:57:32 +1030 Subject: [extropy-chat] Rational thinking was Movie review- (2) In-Reply-To: <5.1.0.14.0.20061128140220.036351f8@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> References: <5.1.0.14.0.20061128140220.036351f8@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> Message-ID: <710b78fc0611282327p5b3c86dai21bc990e67cb4a26@mail.gmail.com> On 29/11/06, Keith Henson wrote: > Like everyone on this list, I value rational thoughts. But it is obvious > this is a minority viewpoint for the population in general. > > Why? - Rational thinking is hard (later evolutionarily than instinct, more complex). It takes longer. So more cost. - The difference between rational thinking and "gut feel" is only apparent when they diverge (non-zero difference). - Unless you train yourself not to, you will feel bad when you choose a rational approach over an intuitive one when there is a non-trivial difference, by definition. - So rational thought is for most people difficult and acting on it makes them feel bad. I think many people's intuitive morality is based on how they feel about things, so in fact they may also come to view going with a rational choice over gut instinct as morally wrong (because it "feels wrong"). This makes me think of the Kiersey typology T(hinking)/F(eeling) dimension. The former value rational thought, the latter value feelings/instincts. I also think many people in the Thinking camp are actually ruled by gut instinct, and use their natural propensity for reasoned thought and argument to defend and rationalize instinctive behaviour, often unaware of this motive. But that's pure conjecture, and the rationality of Kiersey types is suspect, so maybe ignore this ;-) Emlyn From pgptag at gmail.com Wed Nov 29 08:04:39 2006 From: pgptag at gmail.com (Giu1i0 Pri5c0) Date: Wed, 29 Nov 2006 09:04:39 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] MISSING: Full Coverage of Max and ExI inWikipedia's Transhumanism In-Reply-To: <380-2200611228192447773@M2W024.mail2web.com> References: <380-2200611228192447773@M2W024.mail2web.com> Message-ID: <470a3c520611290004j2f47470bg605e4c1df5e8e681@mail.gmail.com> Actually the verb used in Dante's original is "trasumanar" (without n). It makes sense since the n in "trans" is usually dropped in Italian, e.g. trascendere, trasferire, trasformare etc. Of course Dante did not mean technology-enabled transcendence, but something of a more spitirual nature. At the same time, the concept of "passing beyond humanity" is there, and Dante could not have imagined the possibility of using technology to pass beyond humanity. So I think we can welcome Dante as one of the founding fathers of transhumanism. G. On 11/28/06, nvitamore at austin.rr.com wrote: > From: Giu1i0 > > >Interested in the reference to Dante, that I was not aware of, I did a > >quick research: > > It is in the Transhumanist FAQ at ExI's website and Transhumanist history > at TAC. > > But is a worthwihile inquiry into relationships of words and how they are > used over time in conveying an ideal of man: > > "Dante's Paradiso is a successful journey into the mind, even if at the > outset the experience looms ineffably ahead. The "transhumanized" mind > (Par. I, 70) passes beyond human logic and its limits of time and space, > ultimately conceiving paradisal landscapes by the blending and > interpenetration of sights and sounds." > > and as suggested by Rossi in "The Numinosum and the Brain:The Weaving > Thread of Consciousness": > > "'the transfiguration of the subject' There is a change in the physical > appearance, akin to Dante's 'transhumanized' into a god a kind of beauty." > > and also by Arthos in "Dante, Michelangelo and Milton", London, Routledge > and Kegan Paul. [1963] > > "In the light of the Longinian view that through the sublime, achieved by > the artist from his own noble nature, the reader can be 'transhumanized,' > the author examines the works of the three artists in their relation to > divine principles. In a pithy chapter on Dante (pp. 18-49), ..." > > ciao- > Natasha > > > > -------------------------------------------------------------------- > mail2web - Check your email from the web at > http://mail2web.com/ . > > > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > From pgptag at gmail.com Wed Nov 29 08:22:30 2006 From: pgptag at gmail.com (Giu1i0 Pri5c0) Date: Wed, 29 Nov 2006 09:22:30 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] Dante and transhumanism Message-ID: <470a3c520611290022h5c1f1f60u1a04c26db0d65f08@mail.gmail.com> Compilation of interesting bits appeared on the Extropy list in a thread dedicated to the Wikipedia article onTranshumanism. Dante, Paradiso I: "Trasumanar significar per verba non si poria; per? l'essemplo basti a cui esperienza grazia serba." English: "The passing beyond humanity may not be set forth in words: therefore, let the example suffice any for whom grace reserves that experience." >From a blog on "Dante's Singularity" (!): "I believe this is the first use of the word "transhuman", in any variation, recorded. Recently, the term "transhuman" has been picked up by some of the more outr? futurists." http://www.bookcase.com/~claudia/mt/archives/000702.html Natasha: "The core idea of trans- humanism stems from many visionaries and writers and it can be traced back to Alighieri Dante. The Italian verb "transumanare" or "transumanar" was used for the first time by Dante (1265-1321) in the Divine Comedy. It means "go outside the human condition and perception" and in English could be "to Transhumanate" or "to Transhumanize"." http://www.americanantigravity.com/documents/Natasha-Vita-More-Interview.pdf Actually the verb used in Dante's original is "trasumanar" (without n). It makes sense since the n in "trans" is usually dropped in Italian, e.g. trascendere, trasferire, trasformare etc. But many modern authors, especially those who wish to establish a link between Dante and modern transhumanism, quote also the Italian original with "transumanar". Of course Dante did not mean technology-enabled transcendence, but something of a more spitirual nature. At the same time, the concept of "passing beyond humanity" is there, and Dante could not have imagined the possibility of using technology to pass beyond humanity. So: Should we say Trasumanar or Transumanar (the first is Dante's original, the second is also used and definitely sounds better)? Should we welcome Dante as one of the founding fathers of transhumanism, in the sense of "aspiration to pass beyond humanity"? From hkhenson at rogers.com Wed Nov 29 06:14:58 2006 From: hkhenson at rogers.com (Keith Henson) Date: Wed, 29 Nov 2006 01:14:58 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Rational thinking was Movie review- (2) In-Reply-To: References: <62c14240611281138q143a0eb1u4339676bb6b724e9@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <5.1.0.14.0.20061129011049.03613b70@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> At 08:44 PM 11/28/2006 -0800, you wrote: >Mike Dougherty wrote: > > On 11/28/06, Keith Henson wrote: > >> At 05:46 AM 11/28/2006 -0500, Robert wrote: > >> Heh. What would the rational thought that explained irrational >thinking be > >> worth? > > > > hmm... Extropian Koan... > >Well, as currently stated it's mundane because we often provide rational >explanations of irrational thinking. I claim that humans have mental mechanisms *for* irrational thinking. These get turned on when the "interest" of the person and his genes diverge (or he has been convinced they do). Or do you have a better explanation for suicide bombers? >But if we're talking about rational thought *justifying the use of* >"irrational" thinking, then we quickly encounter the powerful concept of >rationality fundamentally bounded by limited knowledge and computational >capacity. This was not what I had in mind. From amara at amara.com Wed Nov 29 09:56:36 2006 From: amara at amara.com (Amara Graps) Date: Wed, 29 Nov 2006 10:56:36 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] Dante and transhumanism Message-ID: Giu1i0 Pri5c0 pgptag at gmail.com : >So: Should we say Trasumanar or Transumanar (the first is Dante's >original, the second is also used and definitely sounds better)? Should >we welcome Dante as one of the founding fathers of transhumanism, in the >sense of "aspiration to pass beyond humanity"? Hmm. Dante is pretty new for tranhumanism thinking. The transhumanist trail goes back much further, at least two thousand years prior to Dante, to two papyri composed in Egypt around the 4th century C.E. called the "Leiden and Stockholm papri" (for the modern libraries, where they are stored). The papri state that "artificial is at least as good as the natural for the purpose of humans, perhaps better." Perhaps you mean specifically the term "transhumanism". I think it is more useful, however, to follow back in time the _ideas_. Amara -- Amara Graps, PhD www.amara.com Istituto di Fisica dello Spazio Interplanetario (IFSI), Roma, ITALIA Associate Research Scientist, Planetary Science Institute (PSI), Tucson From pharos at gmail.com Wed Nov 29 11:37:31 2006 From: pharos at gmail.com (BillK) Date: Wed, 29 Nov 2006 11:37:31 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Dante and transhumanism In-Reply-To: <470a3c520611290022h5c1f1f60u1a04c26db0d65f08@mail.gmail.com> References: <470a3c520611290022h5c1f1f60u1a04c26db0d65f08@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On 11/29/06, Giu1i0 Pri5c0 wrote: > Compilation of interesting bits appeared on the Extropy list in a > thread dedicated to the Wikipedia article onTranshumanism. > > Dante, Paradiso I: > > "Trasumanar significar per verba > non si poria; per? l'essemplo basti > a cui esperienza grazia serba." > > English: "The passing beyond humanity may not be set forth in words: therefore, > let the example suffice any for whom grace reserves that experience." > > So: > Should we say Trasumanar or Transumanar (the first is Dante's > original, the second is also used and definitely sounds better)? > Should we welcome Dante as one of the founding fathers of > transhumanism, in the sense of "aspiration to pass beyond humanity"? > Dante was writing in the Christian mystic tradition. He is looked upon by Rosicrucians as a follower of its doctrines and teachings and there is much to indicate that he had been either privately or partially initiated into some of its mysteries and was very familiar with its mystical ideals. Paradiso After an initial ascension (Canto I), Beatrice guides Dante through the nine spheres of Heaven. Beatrice leaves Dante with Saint Bernard who prays to Mary on behalf of Dante and Dante is allowed to see both Jesus and Mary. From here, Dante ascends to a substance beyond physical existence, called the Empyrean Heaven (Cantos XXX through XXXIII). Here he comes face-to-face with God Himself, and is granted understanding of the Divine and of human nature. His vision is improved beyond that of human comprehension. God appears as three equally large rings spinning within each other representing the Holy Spirit with the essence of each part of God, who according to Dante can equally be called a plural and a singular. After this vision, the book ends with Dante's vision growing ever stronger, and the vision of God becomes equally inimitable and inexplicable that no word can come close to explaining what he saw, offering him a vision how Divine Love is the power behind existence. Essentially, Dante described as much as one can in words the experience of the beatific vision. ---------------- In Paradiso Dante was trying to describe the mystical experience of casting off human flesh and becoming one with God. This is directly in the tradition of Christian mystics everywhere. The human mystical experience occurs in all religions throughout history. Even atheists have mystical experiences, but they don't link the experience so much to traditional religions. Some atheists are converted, after an overwhelming mystical experience, to a formal religion they have some previous knowledge of. If you want to link Dante to modern transhumanism, then you should also want to link all the famous mystics throughout history. Dante wasn't the first or the last. BillK From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Wed Nov 29 11:38:00 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Wed, 29 Nov 2006 06:38:00 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Group mind exploration In-Reply-To: <62c14240611281843v19a49f22vb477edaed3127ddb@mail.gmail.com> References: <456C6430.2030709@ramonsky.com> <62c14240611281843v19a49f22vb477edaed3127ddb@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On 11/28/06, Mike Dougherty wrote: > > In the vein of not working for free, what is your reaction to a similar > proposal (a "rider" if you will) to your group-mind experiment that those of > us with little "investment capital" venture 'works in kind' - such that > there be an exchange of information of the type you are effectively > "selling." One may not have the reputation of Robert Bradbury, but surely > any sufficiently rational mind can distill the relevant bits of useful > information from the vast data streams available. Would this be a > worthwhile evolution of the premise of the experiment, or does it dilute > your purpose such that it would be better suited to a different experiment > altogether? I've got no problem with it but I'm unclear of the form you are proposing. Just throwing things out off the top of my head (a) creating Wikipedia pages related to the book(s) under discussion; (b) creating an ExICh thread discussing each book; (c) sharing the book (I send it marked up to someone who sends it to someone else who sends it...) [sounds like a chain letter... :-?] Some of the books on my list are rather pricey and probably of interest to a very small subset of the ExiCh list. If we get lots of people interested in reading them it would be possible to distribute the costs over a larger group of people. Since many of them fall into the category of college level textbooks I doubt many would have the time or interest in reading them. It raises interesting questions with respect to ones time and/or $ investment vs. perceived benefit. I'm sure there are a lot of people on the list who would love to explore various areas but either time or $ are limiting factors. The experiment is in part related to asking oneself questions regarding what are the topics where one wants to know the "bottom line" without having to invest the time to get there oneself [1]. For example, we get a lot of feedback from time to time about what various people are reading or have read but we don't get an opportunity to say "Hey Damien, go read this and give me a one page summary." Robert 1. This relates to long running threads about irrational thought and belief systems where one is handed conclusions but doesn't have any confidence in how those conclusions were reached. Hopefully my summaries would be based on a rational thought process as well as the integration of a wide range of relevant contextual information. Now of course there may be some who doubt my capacity for rational thought but thats a different thread... -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From nvitamore at austin.rr.com Wed Nov 29 10:41:13 2006 From: nvitamore at austin.rr.com (nvitamore at austin.rr.com) Date: Wed, 29 Nov 2006 05:41:13 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Dante and transhumanism Message-ID: <380-2200611329104113719@M2W035.mail2web.com> From: Amara Graps Giu1i0 Pri5c0 pgptag at gmail.com : >So: Should we say Trasumanar or Transumanar (the first is Dante's >original, the second is also used and definitely sounds better)? Should >we welcome Dante as one of the founding fathers of transhumanism, in the >sense of "aspiration to pass beyond humanity"? "Hmm. Dante is pretty new for tranhumanism thinking. The transhumanist trail goes back much further, at least two thousand years prior to Dante, to two papyri composed in Egypt around the 4th century C.E. called the "Leiden and Stockholm papri" (for the modern libraries, where they are stored). The papri state that "artificial is at least as good as the natural for the purpose of humans, perhaps better."" "Perhaps you mean specifically the term "transhumanism". I think it is more useful, however, to follow back in time the _ideas_." Two points here. How words are put together and used and reused over time. The point being in the original post was the term transhumanism and how coincidental it was that FM was not aware of transhuman being used by Broderick or Huxley or anyone else who use did. Same for Max - who used transhumanism without prior knowledge of it in the literary sphere. First, are FM and Max honest? I believe so. In fact, utterly so. Then the issue re wikipedia was the claim that Huxley is the real father of the philosophy of transhumanism, which I do not agree with and which was the topic of a conversation here in Sao Paulo. Did Huxley set out to write a philosophy? No. Did Max, yes. Then where did this word come from which has been used as a ploy to separate out transhumanism and make claims that transhumanism really came from Huxley rather than Max. In order to be clear, it is optimal to trace the word. What did Huxley really mean? Where did he see the term? Did he see it before or not. No one knows and it may not make any difference at all, but as far as modern history methodology is concerned, it is interesting. Did he read Dante and see "transhumanized" or did he see "Transumanar"? Did he read TS Elliot who also used "transhumanized" in _The Cocktail Party_? I don't know and one might say, who give a big ___. Maybe Max does. Maybe FM did (which, frankly he did). Maybe Damien does not. That is his choice. I am not an historian by any great leap in imagination, but anyone can realize that words do carry ideas. Ideas are more difficult to trace without the words. Perhaps a linguist can explain this better. But tracing ideas is very difficult because "new" ideas are the offshoot of other ideas. Which brings in originality and what is original? I agree with you that it is the idea which carries weight, and maybe more than the word. Pictures are influential carriers of ideas as well and cave paintings give a pretty clear indication of what the cave dwellers were thinking and doing. Natasha -------------------------------------------------------------------- mail2web - Check your email from the web at http://mail2web.com/ . From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Wed Nov 29 13:01:28 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Wed, 29 Nov 2006 08:01:28 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Extinctions past and future Message-ID: The NY Times has an interesting commentary [1] on a recent Science paper [2]. The net of it is that the Permian-Triassic Extinction event [3] 251 million years ago eliminated a significant majority of species and forced most of those that remained into a "mobile" framework to find food. This ultimately lead to much of the animal diversity you see on the planet today. I.e. were it not for this event animals (and you and I) might not exist. The species that remained as "plants" (immobile) adapted to this by evolving increasingly complex genomes. Most people don't realize it but complex plant genomes are *larger* than animal genomes. The lack of mobility drove a diversification at the genome level -- you have to evolve genes to deal with whatever nature (weather, fungi, insects, birds, etc.) throws at you where you stand. One can argue that mobility enables genomic simplicity. Now, species at the time were incapable of forward thought. Astrophysical processes handed them a wakeup call and they adapted as best they could. *We* on the other hand see the future coming. *We* have very good ideas as to how it will evolve towards the limits allowed by physics. But "we" are 1000 people out of 6 billion [4]. One must ask whether another "great dying" (to quote the NYT) is coming [5] and whether mobility is the path to survival or whether like the plants we can evolve ourselves to a point where "U can't touch this." [6]? Robert 1. Revkin, AC, "Marine Life Leaped From Simple to Complex After Greatest Mass Extinction", NY Times (26 Nov 2006) http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/28/science/28mari.html?pagewanted=print 2. Wagner, PJ et al, "Abundance distributions imply elevated complexity of post-Paleozoic marine ecosystems", Science 314:1289-92 (24 Nov 2006) http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?db=pubmed&cmd=Retrieve&dopt=AbstractPlus&list_uids=17124319&itool=pubmed_docsum 3. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Permian_extinction 4. I'm making this number up. It would be *nice* if the "powers that be" would post the number of subscribers to the ExICh list in the monthly summary! 5. Those over 60 not signed up for cryonics are dead. Those under 40 are probably guaranteed a seat unless something really bad happens (an AGI overlord perhaps?). For those of us in between its luck-of-the-draw. 6. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/U_Can't_Touch_This -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From kerry_prez at yahoo.com Wed Nov 29 15:08:27 2006 From: kerry_prez at yahoo.com (Al Brooks) Date: Wed, 29 Nov 2006 07:08:27 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] 'a process of non-thinking called faith' 2 (2) In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <20061129150827.584.qmail@web51606.mail.yahoo.com> Fine, but remember the administration knew when the coalition invaded Iraq in '03 the allied military could defeat the regulars, yet they had no way of knowing for sure they would lose the peace. Dont think the Bush administration possesses more foresight than it actually does; the administration lied, they screwed up-- however they couldn't have known what would happen years later. You can't accuse this administration of prescience can you? No, they prefer to drop planeloads of bombs etc on innocent people. And don't tell me that they drop the bombs on the bad guys, and that the innocent people -- collateral damage -- are killed by accident, because it's pure political expediency and cowardice. They don''t want pay the price required to spare the innocent, to put soldiers on the ground to root out the bad guys and only the bad guys. Jeff Davis --------------------------------- Everyone is raving about the all-new Yahoo! Mail beta. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jef at jefallbright.net Wed Nov 29 15:57:23 2006 From: jef at jefallbright.net (Jef Allbright) Date: Wed, 29 Nov 2006 07:57:23 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Rational thinking was Movie review- (2) In-Reply-To: <5.1.0.14.0.20061129011049.03613b70@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> Message-ID: >>>> Heh. What would the rational thought that explained irrational >>>> thinking be worth? >> Well, as currently stated it's mundane because we often provide >> rational explanations of irrational thinking. Keith Henson wrote: > I claim that humans have mental mechanisms *for* irrational > thinking. These get turned on when the "interest" of the > person and his genes diverge (or he has been convinced they do). > > Or do you have a better explanation for suicide bombers? Keith, you remind me of another guy on this list. Whenever someone touches on [self|free-will|morality|social decision-making] he goes off about how these related concepts are real but not what they appear and can be better understood in terms of expanding context of the self-model. In your case, mention of [evolution|warfare|society] triggers posting about how certain "irrational" social behaviors such as warfare can be better understood as genetically driven responses to perceived threat of scarcity that worked in the environment of evolutionary adaptation. In each case, I suspect many people read and say something like, "Yeah, so what?" My earlier comment was to the point that we *often* provide rational explanations of irrational thinking. We are accustomed to explaining irrational thinking due to causes such as emotional predisposition, actual mental illness, learned biases, temporary emotional upset, and as you point out, evolved traits causing us to react strongly and sometimes inappropriately in ways that tended to convey a fitness advantage in the EEA. I agree with you that the behavior of suicide bombers is largely determined by such evolved genetic drivers. I would add, however, that a more complete understanding must include social factors, technological asymmetry, game theory and more. However, my comment was in response to Mike Dougherty's "Koan" statement. By the way, thanks Mike for your contributions to the list since your recent joining. Koans are intended to present a paradox in simple terms such that a more encompassing understanding may be intuited. On that theme, I offered the paradoxical idea that any behavior is "rational" only within a given limited context. [I have a lot in common with that "expanding context" guy mentioned earlier.] - Jef From nvitamore at austin.rr.com Wed Nov 29 15:40:30 2006 From: nvitamore at austin.rr.com (nvitamore at austin.rr.com) Date: Wed, 29 Nov 2006 10:40:30 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] MISSING: Full Coverage of Max and ExIinWikipedia'sTranshumanism Message-ID: <380-2200611329154030984@M2W030.mail2web.com> Thought - Instead of there being an article on "Extropy Institute" which covers the philosophy of extropy and transhumanism, there is an article on "Extropianism" at Wikipedia. It is poorly written. I ought to have been more aware of this, but was not because I have no idea who the people are that entered it (other than Price). Perhaps someone here can fix this. Also, there are a few authors who appear on several articles about transhumanism which are written for a particular emphasis. (I am not saying this is good or bad, just an observation.) Extropy Institute is closing down, this is true, but ExI is not dead, nor is the philosophy of Extropy, nor is Max. ciao- Natasha -------------------------------------------------------------------- mail2web - Check your email from the web at http://mail2web.com/ . From thespike at satx.rr.com Wed Nov 29 18:00:45 2006 From: thespike at satx.rr.com (Damien Broderick) Date: Wed, 29 Nov 2006 12:00:45 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] Dante and transhumanism In-Reply-To: References: <470a3c520611290022h5c1f1f60u1a04c26db0d65f08@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <7.0.1.0.2.20061129115523.024d7aa8@satx.rr.com> At 11:37 AM 11/29/2006 +0000, BillK wrote: >Even atheists >have mystical experiences, but they don't link the experience so much >to traditional religions. Some atheists are converted, after an >overwhelming mystical experience, to a formal religion they have some >previous knowledge of. This seems to be precisely what happened to >H sf writer John C. Wright (an occasional poster to this list), who converted to Christian Science, a rather zany mutation of Xianity. He's probably lucky there wasn't a Scientologist in the room at the time. Damien Broderick From jef at jefallbright.net Wed Nov 29 17:48:28 2006 From: jef at jefallbright.net (Jef Allbright) Date: Wed, 29 Nov 2006 09:48:28 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Extinctions past and future In-Reply-To: Message-ID: Robert Bradbury wrote: > The NY Times has an interesting commentary [1] on > a recent Science paper [2]. The net of it is that > the Permian-Triassic Extinction event [3] 251 million > years ago eliminated a significant majority of > species and forced most of those that remained into > a "mobile" framework to find food. This ultimately > lead to much of the animal diversity you see on the > planet today. I.e. were it not for this event animals > (and you and I) might not exist. Robert, I've long appreciated your factual as well as speculative contributions to our list. I find your factual statements to be well-founded, and your speculative statements to be of a practical orientation. But there's an aspect of your statements that is mentally jarring (to me) and might offer some meta insights upon inspection. There's a certain "inside-outness" of point of view that I notice, which reflects the popular point of view but seems to impair descriptive coherence. I'll try to comment below in a way that may highlight this. I note also that my phrase "meta insights", in its self-contradictory direction of attention, may be an indicator of how deeply rooted is this bias in our language and our thinking. > The species that > remained as "plants" (immobile) adapted to this by > evolving increasingly complex genomes. The statement above, while expressing the popular view of evolutionary development, imputes intention and purpose where there is none. It implies a kind of "survival strategy", where there is none. I'm sure this was not intended, but it is conveyed. It may be worthwhile here to emphasize that evolution proceeds through destruction. That novel growth follows pruning, rather than the reverse. Of course, that was a key point of the NYT article, but it is easily lost in the subsequent commentary. The popular and common point of view is the intentional stance, where one prunes to shape and reduce the preceding growth, but such is not the way of evolution. > Most people > don't realize it but complex plant genomes are > *larger* than animal genomes. The lack of mobility > drove a diversification at the genome level -- you > have to evolve genes to deal with whatever nature > (weather, fungi, insects, birds, etc.) throws at you > where you stand. Again, attributing intentionality to an evolutionary process. I understand that the point of this commentary is a question of survival strategy, but clarity and coherence, and thus effective extrapolation, are sacrificed in this manner. > One can argue that mobility enables > genomic simplicity. More fundamentally, we might say that mobility and genomic complexity express fitness functions exploiting alternate dimensions of the same environment and that it's economic to express one rather than both. My intention here is not to be pedantic or to pick nits, but to point out that mobility is not nearly as fundamental as is exploiting a novel dimension of freedom leading to growth. > > Now, species at the time were incapable of forward > thought. Yes, this is crucial--from our point of view. > Astrophysical processes handed them a > wakeup call and they adapted as best they could. Again imputing intentionality and anthropomorphizing, but this has already been beaten to death (to use a metaphor in a similar sense.) > *We* on the other hand see the future coming. *We* > have very good ideas as to how it will evolve > towards the limits allowed by physics. Yes, we can intentionally affect our environment and the course of our development--to a much greater extent than plants or animals lacking our knowledge and our self-awareness--but we are still bound by the extremely limited context of our awareness (relative to indications of how much more there is to understand) and we are still subject to fundamental pressures to either grow or perish within a coevolutionary environment. > But "we" are > 1000 people out of 6 billion [4]. One must ask whether > another "great dying" (to quote the NYT) is coming [5] > and whether mobility is the path to survival or whether > like the plants we can evolve ourselves to a point > where "U can't touch this." [6]? All that I have said above is meant to highlight the point that "survival" in a static sense is unrealistic. But we can act to promote our values (knowing that they too will evolve over time) into the future. To suggest that we can "evolve ourselves" in order to preserve ourselves is to assume some immutable core of self that, despite the illusions of our sensory experience, reinforced by our language and culture, simply doesn't exist. - Jef From jef at jefallbright.net Wed Nov 29 19:40:06 2006 From: jef at jefallbright.net (Jef Allbright) Date: Wed, 29 Nov 2006 11:40:06 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Rational thinking was Movie review- (2) In-Reply-To: <710b78fc0611282327p5b3c86dai21bc990e67cb4a26@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: Emlyn wrote: > On 29/11/06, Keith Henson wrote: > > Like everyone on this list, I value rational thoughts. But it is > > obvious this is a minority viewpoint for the population in general. > > > > Why? > > - Rational thinking is hard (later evolutionarily than > instinct, more complex). It takes longer. So more cost. > - The difference between rational thinking and "gut feel" is > only apparent when they diverge (non-zero difference). **************** > - Unless you train yourself not to, you will feel bad when > you choose a rational approach over an intuitive one when > there is a non-trivial difference, by definition. **************** [The above statement is so important and little recognized, it bears highlighting] > - So rational thought is for most people difficult and acting > on it makes them feel bad. I think many people's intuitive > morality is based on how they feel about things, so in fact > they may also come to view going with a rational choice over > gut instinct as morally wrong (because it "feels wrong"). I think this is a HUGE part of the impasse in mutual understanding between Thinkers and Feelers. I've lived in California much of my life, where there's a strong popular sentiment to "go with your feelings", "trust the truth of your feelings", and so on. It's actually considered a hallmark of higher wisdom by many. What is not nearly so popularly recognized is that while our feelings are very real, they are very simple in their relection of the perceived well-being of the organism...er, person. Emotions tend to be simple black and white in their responses and while very quick to activate, they are generally slow to subside, these traits providing increased fitness for our ancestors. So to the extent that the present situation is more complex or otherwise differs from the environment of evolutionary adaption or of childhood development, the emotional indicators are likely to be inaccurate. Worse yet, in many cases emotions are self-perpetuating. "I wouldn't be anxious if I felt safe." Thanks again, Emlyn, for pointing out that it is normal and expected that *good rational decisions will not feel good* when they differ from the simple untrained signals of the emotional system. - Jef From lcorbin at rawbw.com Thu Nov 30 02:37:20 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Wed, 29 Nov 2006 18:37:20 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Rational thinking Message-ID: <00f801c71428$a1413100$6601a8c0@homeef7b612677> I have another, simple question. Were the legendary founders of the United States who famously pledged "our lives, our Fortunes, and our sacred honor" being irrational? I want to hear some good answers to that; I expect, alas, rationalizations, which is what the mind churns out in order to satisfy judgments reached by non-rational means. What is the structural difference---biases aside---between their sacrifices and those of Kamikaze pilots or those of suicide bombers? Merely the *likelihood* of loss? Lee From lcorbin at rawbw.com Thu Nov 30 02:29:15 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Wed, 29 Nov 2006 18:29:15 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Rational thinking References: <62c14240611281138q143a0eb1u4339676bb6b724e9@mail.gmail.com> <5.1.0.14.0.20061129011049.03613b70@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> Message-ID: <00f401c71427$5a03ff80$6601a8c0@homeef7b612677> Keith wrote > I claim that humans have mental mechanisms *for* irrational > thinking. These get turned on when the "interest" of the person > and his genes diverge (or he has been convinced they do). There is an absolutely great book, "The Robot's Rebellion", that goes into these issues in great detail, and it becomes clear that these deep issues resist the simple evaluations I'm reading on this list. > Or do you have a better explanation for suicide bombers? Suicide bombers are *not* irrational, not in the slightest. It can be entirely rational for an individual organism (read human being) to calculate an extremely careful behavior according to all that individual's values and memes, and to execute that behavior. We must resist the simple equating of "rationality" = "what is good for the individual vehicle", which several people seem to embrace. The entire "Neurathian project" --- which Stanovich in his book makes so clear --- argues that in the manner so familiar to those who follow PCR, that each meme, each value, each and every instinct must be individually evalutated in the light of the others! (Yes, the bulk of the book focuses on the need to be able to hold up instincts and genetic impulses one at a time and criticize them in the light of everything we know, and to somehow resist their domination, which, as hardly needs be said here, characterizes the behavior of most people.) Just how irrational would it be for you to sacrifice many hundreds of thousands of dollars for a cause to which you were dedicated, even though that sacrifice entailed a somewhat diminished expectation of the eventual survival of your own skin? What I see over and over again on this list is that causes which repel us we evaluate as "irrational" whereas causes that we support---e.g. the reduction of the world's great terrorist state (the U.S.) --- merit great effort and even sacrifice. Lee P.S. I hope that no one is offended by my changing the subject line, since the current topic really has nothing to do with a movie review. From msd001 at gmail.com Thu Nov 30 03:01:02 2006 From: msd001 at gmail.com (Mike Dougherty) Date: Wed, 29 Nov 2006 22:01:02 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Rational thinking was Movie review- (2) In-Reply-To: References: <5.1.0.14.0.20061129011049.03613b70@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> Message-ID: <62c14240611291901i14a9fc93p62cdd437d008b8c6@mail.gmail.com> On 11/29/06, Jef Allbright wrote: > > However, my comment was in response to Mike Dougherty's "Koan" > statement. By the way, thanks Mike for your contributions to the list > since your recent joining. Koans are intended to present a paradox in Hey, thanks for the 'props' simple terms such that a more encompassing understanding may be > intuited. On that theme, I offered the paradoxical idea that any > behavior is "rational" only within a given limited context. [I have a > lot in common with that "expanding context" guy mentioned earlier.] > "given limited context" - That makes me think of topology. Perhaps what is rational is a local maxima decision-making process, but those who see a higher peak discard the less-informed conclusions in light of a bigger picture. Of course there is always a bigger picture. It's unfortunate that it takes so many so long to reach their local peak before they can see/realize that though. Also unfortunate that people rarely listen to new ideas while they're focussed on reaching their own achievements. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From sentience at pobox.com Thu Nov 30 04:23:09 2006 From: sentience at pobox.com (Eliezer S. Yudkowsky) Date: Wed, 29 Nov 2006 20:23:09 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Rational thinking In-Reply-To: <00f801c71428$a1413100$6601a8c0@homeef7b612677> References: <00f801c71428$a1413100$6601a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: <456E5CAD.9000207@pobox.com> Lee Corbin wrote: > I have another, simple question. > > Were the legendary founders of the United States who famously > pledged "our lives, our Fortunes, and our sacred honor" being > irrational? That depends on what they were trying to do, of course. Going on their stated motives of essentially "the public utility", I'd say they did pretty damn well for the eighteenth century. > What is the structural difference---biases aside---between their > sacrifices and those of Kamikaze pilots or those of suicide bombers? > Merely the *likelihood* of loss? The Founders were more educated and more philosophically sophisticated, going by historical records of the debates that went on at the Constitutional Convention, and by their existence as literate, politically active aristocrats of that day and age. -- Eliezer S. Yudkowsky http://singinst.org/ Research Fellow, Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence From femmechakra at gmail.com Thu Nov 30 05:19:34 2006 From: femmechakra at gmail.com (Anna Taylor) Date: Wed, 29 Nov 2006 21:19:34 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Question: A Poetic response to an Irrational question? Message-ID: <11cc03d50611292119w7f3e2924i5e7f5b1b7ce19f77@mail.gmail.com> Based on curiosity, I have some questions about rationality (1). Although I fullly understand the need for rational behavior, I was curious to know what rationalists think about behavior that seems irrational. ------------------------------------------------ A rational point of view of the irrational. How can you know your being rational? How do you describe rational? What makes a person rational? Just Curious Anna (1) If you don't know, chances are, you've never heard of rationality? "consistent with or based on or using reason" "intellectual: of or associated with or requiring the use of the mind" "processes are" "Choosing that which is preferred. Acting to achieve what is most preferred" "Using reason or logic in thinking out a problem." From thespike at satx.rr.com Thu Nov 30 05:33:38 2006 From: thespike at satx.rr.com (Damien Broderick) Date: Wed, 29 Nov 2006 23:33:38 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] citation analyses using Google Scholar Message-ID: <7.0.1.0.2.20061129233026.024fc218@satx.rr.com> My Vice-Chancellor at the University of Melbourne writes (and this might be generally useful): ===================== Dr Anne-Wil Harzing's most impressive personal page includes a software program to perform citation analyses using Google Scholar. Called 'Publish or Perish', it provides statistics such as total number of papers, total number of citations, citations per paper, citations per author, h-index and g-index (the latter are two new measures of research impact recently developed in Physics). By typing in an author's name (first initial and family name works best) information is available in only a few seconds. 'Publish or Perish', at is a great example of how new media makes possible many takes on existing information. ================ Damien Broderick From max at maxmore.com Thu Nov 30 05:33:30 2006 From: max at maxmore.com (Max More) Date: Wed, 29 Nov 2006 23:33:30 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] Resist perishing Message-ID: <200611300533.kAU5XZ3p029306@ms-smtp-04.texas.rr.com> A few recently-gathered quotes I liked: The existentially determined: ?Man is perishable. That may be; but let us perish resisting, and, if nothingness is what awaits us, let us not act in such a way that it would be a just fate.? -- ?tienne Pivert de Senancour The simply pithy: ?Luck is probability taken personally.? Penn Jillette. The perspective-shifting: ?She made me feel like a human being. That?s not the kind of thing you forgive.? Angel (in demon form), on Buffy: The Vampire Slayer, season two. The downright nasty: ?I just want to find a woman who I can stand once her mouth?s free of obstruction.? Christian Troy, Nip/Tuck, season 2. The practical: As one Chinese proverb reminds us: The person who says it cannot be done should not interrupt the person doing it. The long-term: When Konosuke Matsushita started the Matsushita Institute of Government and Management -- his graduate school for people who want to go into public service -- he explained that his vision was to help Japanese politics become less corrupt and more visionary. When a skeptical reporter asked how long that would take, he said, ?In my judgment, about 400 years -- which is why it?s so important that we start today.? And the heretical (so I'm told): If you talk to God, you are praying. If God talks to you, you have schizophrenia. Thomas Szasz Onward! Max From avantguardian2020 at yahoo.com Thu Nov 30 06:48:16 2006 From: avantguardian2020 at yahoo.com (The Avantguardian) Date: Wed, 29 Nov 2006 22:48:16 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Resist perishing In-Reply-To: <200611300533.kAU5XZ3p029306@ms-smtp-04.texas.rr.com> Message-ID: <62282.39053.qm@web60523.mail.yahoo.com> Very good advice. A very eclectic collection of quotes too. Thanks, Max. :) --- Max More wrote: > A few recently-gathered quotes I liked: > > The existentially determined: > > ?Man is perishable. That may be; but let us > perish resisting, and, if nothingness is what > awaits us, let us not act in such a way that it > would be a just fate.? > -- ?tienne Pivert de Senancour > > The simply pithy: > > ?Luck is probability taken personally.? > Penn Jillette. > > The perspective-shifting: > > ?She made me feel like a human being. That?s not > the kind of thing you forgive.? > Angel (in demon form), on Buffy: The Vampire Slayer, > season two. > > The downright nasty: > > ?I just want to find a woman who I can stand once > her mouth?s free of obstruction.? > Christian Troy, Nip/Tuck, season 2. > > The practical: > > As one Chinese proverb reminds us: The person who > says it cannot be done should not interrupt the > person doing it. > > The long-term: > > When Konosuke Matsushita started the Matsushita > Institute of Government and Management -- his > graduate school for people who want to go into > public service -- he explained that his vision > was to help Japanese politics become less corrupt > and more visionary. When a skeptical reporter > asked how long that would take, he said, ?In my > judgment, about 400 years -- which is why it?s so > important that we start today.? > > And the heretical (so I'm told): > > If you talk to God, you are praying. If God talks > to you, you have schizophrenia. > Thomas Szasz > > > Onward! > > Max > > > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > Stuart LaForge alt email: stuart"AT"ucla.edu "Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, doesn't go away." - Phillip K. Dick ____________________________________________________________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? Everyone is raving about the all-new Yahoo! Mail beta. http://new.mail.yahoo.com From pharos at gmail.com Thu Nov 30 08:23:39 2006 From: pharos at gmail.com (BillK) Date: Thu, 30 Nov 2006 08:23:39 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Rational thinking In-Reply-To: <00f401c71427$5a03ff80$6601a8c0@homeef7b612677> References: <62c14240611281138q143a0eb1u4339676bb6b724e9@mail.gmail.com> <5.1.0.14.0.20061129011049.03613b70@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> <00f401c71427$5a03ff80$6601a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: On 11/30/06, Lee Corbin wrote: > > Just how irrational would it be for you to sacrifice many hundreds > of thousands of dollars for a cause to which you were dedicated, > even though that sacrifice entailed a somewhat diminished > expectation of the eventual survival of your own skin? > > What I see over and over again on this list is that causes which > repel us we evaluate as "irrational" whereas causes that we > support---e.g. the reduction of the world's great terrorist > state (the U.S.) --- merit great effort and even sacrifice. > Exactly how rational is it to spend 140,000 to 280,000 USD (depending on family income) on raising a child to age 17? (1) And then there is college costs in addition. These costs mean the parents spend much less on their own lifestyle, pension fund, etc. Surely this cannot be rational? As the falling western birth rate shows, it is more rational for the human race to die out. (1) Expenditures on Children by Families BillK From jef at jefallbright.net Thu Nov 30 14:58:21 2006 From: jef at jefallbright.net (Jef Allbright) Date: Thu, 30 Nov 2006 06:58:21 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Quotes: Growth Message-ID: The only good quote I have on perishing is "Perishable. Keep refrigerated". But I do have some good quotes on growth and change. - Jef It takes a lot of courage to release the familiar and seemingly secure, to embrace the new. But there is no real security in what is no longer meaningful. There is more security in the adventurous and exciting, for in movement there is life, and in change there is power. -- Alan Cohen The art of progress is to preserve order amid change and to preserve change amid order. -- Alfred North Whitehead Life is a process of becoming, a combination of states we have to go through. Where people fail is that they wish to elect a state and remain in it. This is a kind of death. -- Anais Nin There came a time when the risk to remain tight in the bud was more painful than the risk it took to blossom. -- Anais Nin Change alone is eternal, perpetual, immortal. -- Arthur Schopenhauer The important thing is this: To be able at any moment to sacrifice what we are for what we could become. -- Charles Dubois All conservatism is based upon the idea that if you leave things alone you leave them as they are. But you do not. If you leave a thing alone you leave it to a torrent of change. -- G. K. Chesterton Change is the law of life. And those who look only to the past or present are certain to miss the future. -- John F. Kennedy To exist is to change, to change is to mature, to mature is to go on creating oneself endlessly. -- Henri Bergson From lcorbin at rawbw.com Thu Nov 30 13:24:17 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Thu, 30 Nov 2006 05:24:17 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Rational thinking References: <00f801c71428$a1413100$6601a8c0@homeef7b612677> <456E5CAD.9000207@pobox.com> Message-ID: <002101c71497$86209d10$6501a8c0@homeef7b612677> Eliezer writes (!) > Lee Corbin wrote: >> I have another, simple question. >> >> Were the legendary founders of the United States who famously >> pledged "our lives, our Fortunes, and our sacred honor" being >> irrational? > > That depends on what they were trying to do, of course. Going on their > stated motives of essentially "the public utility", I'd say they did > pretty damn well for the eighteenth century. Ladies and gentlemen, for the first time in recorded history, Eliezer Yudkowsky has declined to forcefully answer a question "yes" or "no". What sad (or happy) portent is this? >> What is the structural difference---biases aside---between their >> sacrifices and those of Kamikaze pilots or those of suicide bombers? >> Merely the *likelihood* of loss? > > The Founders were more educated and more philosophically sophisticated, Okay, I presently consider "rationality" (scare quotes fully intended) to be an instrument which, like fire or the wheel, can be used for human well-being or against human well-being. The Nazis, for example, were extremely rational in their decision making for a Final Solution to some nagging questions bothering them, given their values. However, *having* rationality or being able to deploy it gives us an opportunity to rise above the animal level and go on pure gut reaction alone. Those Founders deployed their rationality to good effect; the Nazis obviously did not. But that was not the question. > going by historical records of the debates that went on at the > Constitutional Convention, and by their existence as literate, > politically active aristocrats of that day and age. Yes. But the question still remains, When they put their own lives at great risk, were they being rational, and how exactly is that fundamentally different from the case of the kamikazes? (It's Obvious to Me / What the Answer should Be :-) Lee From lcorbin at rawbw.com Thu Nov 30 13:24:58 2006 From: lcorbin at rawbw.com (Lee Corbin) Date: Thu, 30 Nov 2006 05:24:58 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Rational thinking References: <62c14240611281138q143a0eb1u4339676bb6b724e9@mail.gmail.com><5.1.0.14.0.20061129011049.03613b70@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com><00f401c71427$5a03ff80$6601a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: <002201c71497$862c83f0$6501a8c0@homeef7b612677> BillK writes > On 11/30/06, Lee Corbin wrote: > >> Just how irrational would it be for you to sacrifice many hundreds >> of thousands of dollars for a cause to which you were dedicated, >> even though that sacrifice entailed a somewhat diminished >> expectation of the eventual survival of your own skin? >> >> What I see over and over again on this list is that causes which >> repel us we evaluate as "irrational" whereas causes that we >> support---e.g. the reduction of the world's great terrorist >> state (the U.S.) --- merit great effort and even sacrifice. > > Exactly how rational is it to spend 140,000 to 280,000 USD (depending > on family income) on raising a child to age 17? (1) And then there > are college costs in addition. Very good question! The answer is clear: it is entirely rational, if your carefully considered values place the benefits accruing to your child above the well-being of your own vehicle. (Anyone mystified by the use of "vehicle" need only consult the writings of Richard Dawkins.) > These costs mean the parents spend much less on their own lifestyle, > pension fund, etc. Surely this cannot be rational? Thanks for piling on! > As the falling western birth rate shows, it is more rational for the > human race to die out. LOL. Touche! But seriously, you didn't say rational for *whom*. For many determined individualists who don't give a fig about anything beyond themselves, it's entirely rational to make no effort whatsoever to save western civilization or even the entire human race, let alone raise a child. Lee > (1) > Expenditures on Children by Families From rafal.smigrodzki at gmail.com Thu Nov 30 16:28:23 2006 From: rafal.smigrodzki at gmail.com (Rafal Smigrodzki) Date: Thu, 30 Nov 2006 11:28:23 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] The Undying Message-ID: <7641ddc60611300828w11947c8aic7314f599d4f29ce@mail.gmail.com> There seem to be a few threads on the list that seemingly cannot die. One of them involves pointless (IMO) struggles over the meaning of "rationality". This word has a reasonably clear definition provided on wikipedia, although there is also a Gordian knot of circular definitions scattered over other sources. There is no need to invent a definition of this common term, and if new but related referents need a name, it's better to come up with a new word. I know that since "rational" has strong positive emotional and moral connotations (especially among us self-declared rationalists), there is the temptation to redefine the term so as to be able to claim the moral high ground but it only sows confusion (irrationality, one might say) and makes for horribly boring threads. Rafal From jef at jefallbright.net Thu Nov 30 17:05:53 2006 From: jef at jefallbright.net (Jef Allbright) Date: Thu, 30 Nov 2006 09:05:53 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Rational thinking In-Reply-To: <002101c71497$86209d10$6501a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: Lee Corbin wrote: >> Lee Corbin wrote: >>> I have another, simple question. >>> >>> Were the legendary founders of the United States who >>> famously pledged "our lives, our Fortunes, and our >>> sacred honor" being irrational? Eliezer wrote: >> That depends on what they were trying to do, of course. Going on >> their stated motives of essentially "the public utility", >> I'd say they did pretty damn well for the eighteenth century. > > Ladies and gentlemen, for the first time in recorded history, > Eliezer Yudkowsky has declined to forcefully answer a > question "yes" or "no". What sad (or happy) portent is this? Not speaking for Eliezer, but feeling motivated to respond once again to Lee's polemics: My children were often frustrated that I would not give them a simple yes/no answer, when my intention was to give them a useful answer, and to help them see that few if any real-world issues can be assessed separately from their context. Similarly, the rationality of any act can be assessed only according to its effectiveness toward achieving specified goals (creating the desired future) within context and has no direct correspondence with good or bad, right or wrong. However, actions that are seen to work over increasing scope are seen as increasingly good -- as they increasingly promote the values of the assessing agent. And actions that are seen to work over increasing scope are seen as increasingly moral -- as they increasingly promote the values of the assessing population. > > >> What is the structural difference---biases aside---between their > >> sacrifices and those of Kamikaze pilots or those of > suicide bombers? A key difference between the sacrifices of the founding fathers and those of the kamikaze pilots was that the founding fathers were taking action on behalf of a wide sphere of self-identity to promote their values into the significant future, while the kamikaze pilots were acting within the narrow sphere of individual identity in fear of societal pressure and dire consequences in the very near term. (Note that the question asked about the rationality of the pilots, and not of their commanders. Note also that we have not addressed factors of pride or patriotism which have little overlap with the domain of individual rational decision-making.) Both classes of action were rational within their associated context. The actors had no better choice given their values and their contextual environment. The founding father's action was more moral, intended to promote shared social values over wide scope. The kamikaze pilots' action was less moral, intended to promote an individual's values (minimize shame and suffering) over a severely limited scope. (Again, note that this says nothing about the rationality or morality of the Japanese leaders actions to protect their homeland and increase their empire.) - Jef From pgptag at gmail.com Thu Nov 30 18:10:10 2006 From: pgptag at gmail.com (Giu1i0 Pri5c0) Date: Thu, 30 Nov 2006 19:10:10 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] Anders Sandberg on "Keep on raging against aging" in Second Life, December 18, 2006 Message-ID: <470a3c520611301010v5f4fdad4x59e266b5835d4fe9@mail.gmail.com> Anders Sandberg on "Keep on raging against aging", December 18, 2006, 10 am PST (1 pm EST, 7pm CET), uvvy islandin Second Life . Extending lifespans is something many do not take seriously. It is in the realm of wishful thinking, science fiction and health gurus. But if one is concerned about the current demographic trends and the somewhat long-term future, then one ought to at least consider progress in extending lifespans as one possibility to take into account. In his report "Keep on raging against ageing" Anders Sandberg , research director of Eudoxa and transhumanistpar excellence, will make a moral and scientific case for life extension. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jef at jefallbright.net Thu Nov 30 18:22:11 2006 From: jef at jefallbright.net (Jef Allbright) Date: Thu, 30 Nov 2006 10:22:11 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] The Undying In-Reply-To: <7641ddc60611300828w11947c8aic7314f599d4f29ce@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: Rafal Smigrodzki wrote: > There seem to be a few threads on the list that seemingly cannot die. > One of them involves pointless (IMO) struggles over the > meaning of "rationality". This word has a reasonably clear > definition provided on wikipedia, although there is also a > Gordian knot of circular definitions scattered over other > sources. There is no need to invent a definition of this > common term, and if new but related referents need a name, > it's better to come up with a new word. > > I know that since "rational" has strong positive emotional > and moral connotations (especially among us self-declared > rationalists), there is the temptation to redefine the term > so as to be able to claim the moral high ground but it only > sows confusion (irrationality, one might > say) and makes for horribly boring threads. Rafal, I agree with you that it gets old rehashing what we mean by rationality. Same goes for personal identity, free-will, morality and X*. But it's interesting to me that this problem of understanding runs so deeply on a common thread tied to the meaning of self. And it's very interesting that we have yet to come to terms with this, or agree widely that it's a problem, even as we claim to anticipate and embrace radical technological change that clearly threatens to challenge our practical understanding of these concepts. There's a tendency for thinkers of above average intelligence to discover and climb the mountain of libertarian philosophy nearly to its peak and stand there in awe of the elegance of its structure and the sharpness of its fine point. But fewer then move back down the slope--not all the way down to the tepid waters of "ideal" democracy--but partway down to the fog at the edge of chaos where Self meets the adjacent possible, and novel structures branch anew. Sorry to go all poetic on your shit, but there's a self-reinforcing sterility to certain forms of rational thought, and it takes more than logic to break out of that kind of rut. - Jef *X in the sequence above stands for an as yet unimplemented form of collaborative social decision making based on a rational understanding of the preceding items in the sequence. See the thread? From pj at pj-manney.com Thu Nov 30 19:27:27 2006 From: pj at pj-manney.com (pjmanney) Date: Thu, 30 Nov 2006 14:27:27 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Music and Science Message-ID: <31074321.2412691164914847390.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> I have a research question for you all. Are you aware of any scientists who have had specific scientific inspiration from music? I am aware of Einstein finding the architecture and inner unity of Mozart and Bach while playing the violin an inspiration for the elegant equations he sought. I also have heard that Francis Collins found inspiration during the Human Genome project while playing his guitar, but I haven't been able to find out specifically what inspiration that was or what he was playing. It could have been "Onward Christian Soldier" for all I know... ;-) Are there any other scientists you know who have achieved intellectual breakthroughs or more general inspiration while either playing or listening to music? Thanks for your time. [And could either Jef or Russell please forward this to the WTA list? Seems I'm having problems with their server again... - Thanks!] Take care all, PJ From hibbert at mydruthers.com Thu Nov 30 19:15:45 2006 From: hibbert at mydruthers.com (Chris Hibbert) Date: Thu, 30 Nov 2006 11:15:45 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Rational thinking In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <456F2DE1.5070309@mydruthers.com> Jef Allbright wrote: > A key difference between the sacrifices of the founding fathers and > those of the kamikaze pilots was that the founding fathers were > taking action on behalf of a wide sphere of self-identity to promote > their values into the significant future, while the kamikaze pilots > were acting within the narrow sphere of individual identity in fear > of societal pressure and dire consequences in the very near term. > (Note that the question asked about the rationality of the pilots, > and not of their commanders. Note also that we have not addressed > factors of pride or patriotism which have little overlap with the > domain of individual rational decision-making.) This seems to be uncharitable to the motivations of the Japanese pilots, and I can't tell whether the intent is to include all uniformed soldiers, all those acting in the moment, or only conscripts. I won't try to argue that those pilots were acting rightly, or that they were fighting on behalf of a noble cause, but to say that they were irrational because their immediate motivations were due to training and group pressure doesn't give any credit to their feelings of patriotism and their desire to support a large cause. When phrased that way, all soldiers in combat act for those motivations, but surely some of them have decided to place themselves in that position. That was what the founders of the US were doing when they made the aforementioned pledge. Once having done so, they each often found themselves pressured by the force of later events and earlier commitments. But you give them credit for the noble motivations behind the earlier pledge, rather than the situations the pledge let them into. Would you like to draw a finer or a different distinction? How do you want to characterize the actions of an American in uniform, who voluntarily enlists, and later finds him or herself in a battlefield situation, falling on a grenade to save fellow soldiers? Or soldiers in earlier wars who made attacks against daunting odds in service of a cause they chose to defend? Chris -- Currently reading: Marc Bekoff, The Cognitive Animal; Hahn and Tetlock: Information Markets; Robert T. Kiyosaki, Rich Dad's Guide to Investing; David D. Friedman: Harald Chris Hibbert hibbert at mydruthers.com Blog: http://pancrit.org From ben at goertzel.org Thu Nov 30 19:52:13 2006 From: ben at goertzel.org (Ben Goertzel) Date: Thu, 30 Nov 2006 14:52:13 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Music and Science In-Reply-To: <31074321.2412691164914847390.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> References: <31074321.2412691164914847390.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> Message-ID: <638d4e150611301152y3049a242xc0bab8f475c38ae3@mail.gmail.com> Nietzsche was not exactly a scientist, but he considered his music improvisation necessary to his work as a philosopher. He kept promising himself to stop spending so much time on it, and once said "From now on, I will pursue music only insofar as it is domestically necessary to me as a philosopher." A sentiment I have expressed to myself many times (my music keyboard being a tempting 10 feet away from my work desk...) -- Ben G On 11/30/06, pjmanney wrote: > I have a research question for you all. > > Are you aware of any scientists who have had specific scientific inspiration from music? > > I am aware of Einstein finding the architecture and inner unity of Mozart and Bach while playing the violin an inspiration for the elegant equations he sought. > > I also have heard that Francis Collins found inspiration during the Human Genome project while playing his guitar, but I haven't been able to find out specifically what inspiration that was or what he was playing. It could have been "Onward Christian Soldier" for all I know... ;-) > > Are there any other scientists you know who have achieved intellectual breakthroughs or more general inspiration while either playing or listening to music? > > Thanks for your time. > > [And could either Jef or Russell please forward this to the WTA list? Seems I'm having problems with their server again... - Thanks!] > > Take care all, > PJ > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > From sentience at pobox.com Thu Nov 30 20:10:41 2006 From: sentience at pobox.com (Eliezer S. Yudkowsky) Date: Thu, 30 Nov 2006 12:10:41 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Rational thinking In-Reply-To: <002101c71497$86209d10$6501a8c0@homeef7b612677> References: <00f801c71428$a1413100$6601a8c0@homeef7b612677> <456E5CAD.9000207@pobox.com> <002101c71497$86209d10$6501a8c0@homeef7b612677> Message-ID: <456F3AC1.7020304@pobox.com> Lee Corbin wrote: > > Okay, I presently consider "rationality" (scare quotes fully intended) to > be an instrument which, like fire or the wheel, can be used for human > well-being or against human well-being. The Nazis, for example, were > extremely rational in their decision making for a Final Solution to some > nagging questions bothering them, given their values. However, *having* > rationality or being able to deploy it gives us an opportunity to rise > above the animal level and go on pure gut reaction alone. > > Those Founders deployed their rationality to good effect; the Nazis > obviously did not. But that was not the question. Um, no human being is "rational" which may be one reason why I declined to provide a definite answer to your question. There's varying degrees of rationality on many different levels. For example, the Final Solution originators (Godwin alert ding ding ding) seem to have been heavily into pagan mythology, if I recall correctly. They had a number of beliefs about biological superiority that were, as a matter of simple fact, false. Were there motives what they would have been if they had possessed an epistemologically veridical view of the word? Of course the same question can be leveled at the Founders, many of whom undoubtedly believed that their personal moralities were endorsed by a sky fairy. But I don't believe in a sky fairy, and I do believe in freedom of speech, so the question is still out on that one. >>going by historical records of the debates that went on at the >>Constitutional Convention, and by their existence as literate, >>politically active aristocrats of that day and age. > > Yes. But the question still remains, When they put their own lives > at great risk, were they being rational, and how exactly is that > fundamentally different from the case of the kamikazes? > > (It's Obvious to Me / What the Answer should Be :-) Maybe I'm reading too much into your question - assuming that you were looking for a nonobvious answer. I thought you acknowledged that human beings can have interests (components in their utility function) beyond their own self-preservation. So there's no particular reason, it seems to me, that we should assume the Founders had lower-than-usual rationality for their day and age (which is a pretty low bar by our standards) and equally it would be anachronistic to assume them as skilled Bayescrafters. So I really don't understand what you're getting at here, but maybe you're just fishing for the obvious answer, "They sacrificed themselves for different ends, and rationality is neutral about the question of self-sacrifice as such." -- Eliezer S. Yudkowsky http://singinst.org/ Research Fellow, Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence From avantguardian2020 at yahoo.com Thu Nov 30 20:16:14 2006 From: avantguardian2020 at yahoo.com (The Avantguardian) Date: Thu, 30 Nov 2006 12:16:14 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Music and Science In-Reply-To: <31074321.2412691164914847390.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> Message-ID: <20061130201614.75524.qmail@web60523.mail.yahoo.com> --- pjmanney wrote: > Are there any other scientists you know who have > achieved intellectual breakthroughs or more general > inspiration while either playing or listening to > music? Johannes Kepler was greatly inspired by what he though of as the "music of the spheres". A concept first proposed by Pythagoras the ancient Greek. Kepler's three laws of planetary motion still hold their own under General Relativity, faring much better than Newton's laws in this regard. Here is a site that discusses it: http://www.skyscript.co.uk/kepler.html Warning: the site is an astrology site but there was not a big difference between astrology and astronomy in Kepler's time. Stuart LaForge alt email: stuart"AT"ucla.edu "Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, doesn't go away." - Phillip K. Dick ____________________________________________________________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? Everyone is raving about the all-new Yahoo! Mail beta. http://new.mail.yahoo.com From jay.dugger at gmail.com Thu Nov 30 21:00:03 2006 From: jay.dugger at gmail.com (Jay Dugger) Date: Thu, 30 Nov 2006 16:00:03 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Anders Sandberg on "Keep on raging against aging" in Second Life, December 18, 2006 In-Reply-To: <470a3c520611301010v5f4fdad4x59e266b5835d4fe9@mail.gmail.com> References: <470a3c520611301010v5f4fdad4x59e266b5835d4fe9@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <5366105b0611301300t4a8b0150iad515f353c634783@mail.gmail.com> Thursday, 30 November 2006 G.P.: > Anders Sandberg on "Keep on raging against aging", December 18, 2006, 10 am > PST (1 pm EST, 7pm CET), uvvy island in Second Life. Please consider adding this event to Second Life's public calendar. That will advertise the event to a broad audience. You can use this link: http://secondlife.com/events/edit.php?date=1166428800 I'd do it myself, but that seems a little presumptuous to me. You could also add it to Eventful.com (http://eventful.com/events?l=Second%20Life) or Upcoming.org to reach non-subscribers who might like to attend. While on the subject, will transcripts, audio recordings, IRC logs, and images from the event appear afterwards? Work has me in rural Manitoba, Canada during the event, and I will most likely miss the lecture. -- Jay Dugger http://jaydugger.suprglu.com Sometimes the delete key serves best. From thespike at satx.rr.com Thu Nov 30 21:51:15 2006 From: thespike at satx.rr.com (Damien Broderick) Date: Thu, 30 Nov 2006 15:51:15 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] A Headline I'd Like To See Message-ID: <7.0.1.0.2.20061130154752.0225cef8@satx.rr.com> In the slightly belated spirit of Thanksgiving: "Pope pardons Turkey" and while we're on the topic, I read in the papers that "Pope Benedict XVI, right, is greeted by Istanbul's Mufti Mustafa Cagrici outside the Blue Mosque in Istanbul, Turkey... The pope, wearing white robes" Which, alas, entirely spoiled my hopes that he'd be in mufti. From jef at jefallbright.net Thu Nov 30 22:53:48 2006 From: jef at jefallbright.net (Jef Allbright) Date: Thu, 30 Nov 2006 14:53:48 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Rational thinking In-Reply-To: <456F2DE1.5070309@mydruthers.com> Message-ID: Chris Hibbert wrote: > Jef Allbright wrote: >> A key difference between the sacrifices of the founding fathers >> and those of the kamikaze pilots was that the founding fathers >> were taking action on behalf of a wide sphere of self-identity >> to promote their values into the significant future, while the >> kamikaze pilots were acting within the narrow sphere of >> individual identity in fear of societal pressure and dire >> consequences in the very near term. >> (Note that the question asked about the rationality of the >> pilots, and not of their commanders. Note also that we have not >> addressed factors of pride or patriotism which have little >> overlap with the domain of individual rational decision-making.) > > This seems to be uncharitable to the motivations of the > Japanese pilots, and I can't tell whether the intent is to > include all uniformed soldiers, all those acting in the > moment, or only conscripts. I referred to kamikaze pilots in toto, based on my reading and conversations while I lived in Japan, and my experience of the world in general and of social machines in particular. At the Battle of the Philippine Sea in June of 1944, Japan had lost essentially all of their carrier-borne aircraft (and associated trained pilots.) With skilled fighter pilots extremely scarce and low availability of parts and fuel, the Japanese military decided to try a desperate new strategy of kamikaze suicide bombers. These roughly 2000 new pilots were not well trained, but they didn't have to be to crash their planes. The roughly 2000 kamikaze pilots were all considered volunteers, and they signed papers to that effect. However, if you know Japanese culture you can easily understand that these young men in their late teens and early twenties, having just received the honor of entering flight school, could hardly decline when faced with the question of whether they would "earnestly and wholeheartedly" give their lives for the emperor. We should also be able to agree that these young men were not truly aware of the big picture, able to make a moral choice informed by any big-picture understanding of world events. So it would be most accurate to say that they were caught up in the war machine and rationally did what they could do within that context. > I won't try to argue that those pilots were acting rightly, > or that they were fighting on behalf of a noble cause, but to > say that they were irrational because their immediate > motivations were due to training and group pressure doesn't > give any credit to their feelings of patriotism and their > desire to support a large cause. Chris, I'm going to insert here two directly relevant lines from my post that somehow you neglected to include in your reply: (1) "Both classes of action were rational within their associated context. The actors had no better choice given their values and their contextual environment." (2) "Note also that we have not addressed factors of pride or patriotism which have little overlap with the domain of individual rational decision-making." > When phrased that way, all soldiers in combat act for those > motivations, but surely some of them have decided to place > themselves in that position. That was what the founders of > the US were doing when they made the aforementioned pledge. As explained above, the kamikaze pilots had no real choice in the matter and had no real understanding of world events. If they were to decline, the shame would be much worse than an honorable death. Their focus was on a timescale of weeks and they received intense emotional indoctrination each day to keep them from thinking too much about the bigger picture. They were acting honorably, but with virtually zero moral context. The founding fathers were acting with much greater awareness of the intended and expected consequences of their actions. Their actions were extensively considered and taken on behalf of a much broader self-identity than their individual persons. Their actions were intended to promote their rationally-considered and wide-scoped values significantly into the future. Their moral context was very broad. The situation with regard to career military personnel in the US military is nearly orthogonal and wasn't part of the earlier discussion. > Once having done so, they each often found themselves > pressured by the force of later events and earlier > commitments. But you give them credit for the noble > motivations behind the earlier pledge, rather than the > situations the pledge let them into. If you re-read my earlier post you may notice that my analysis was of a completely pragmatic nature, talking about rationality necessarily about what works within a specified context, and about morality being the assessment of rational action applied to rational goals over increasing scope. I specifically stated that pride and patriotism have little overlap with the rational domain at the level of the individual, and you can include "noble" motivations in that same category. I would give the founding fathers a great deal of moral credit for their rationally considered actions to create a better future for posterity. I wouldn't think of assigning credit for the "situations the pledge led them into." I'm not even sure any of us know what that might mean, although the pattern is a familiar idiom in popular thought, as in "that was wonderful how you avoided all those obstacles and got the car back on road after falling asleep at the wheel." My point is that it makes sense to give credit for intentional acts, not those which are accidental or contra-intentional [better word here?]. > Would you like to draw a finer or a different distinction? I thought had already made very precise fundamental distinctions at the beginning of my post. Since you neglected to include them here, allow me: (1) The rationality of any act can be assessed only according to its effectiveness toward achieving specified goals (creating the desired future) within context and has no direct correspondence with good or bad, right or wrong. (2) However, actions that are seen to work over increasing scope are seen as increasingly good -- as they increasingly promote the values of the assessing agent. (3) And actions that are seen to work over increasing scope are seen as increasingly moral -- as they increasingly promote the values of the assessing population. > How do you want to characterize the actions of an American in > uniform, who voluntarily enlists, and later finds him or > herself in a battlefield situation, falling on a grenade to > save fellow soldiers? Or soldiers in earlier wars who made > attacks against daunting odds in service of a cause they > chose to defend? I wish you had provided here examples of rational altruism so that I could acknowledge the noble motives that are the crux of your reason for posting. Since you didn't, I'll provide some, and then explain why your examples are not. Example: A mountain climber hangs at the end of a long rope, high above the dessert floor after falling from the rock face. Above him, also dangling from the rope are two other climbers: his daughter and his son in law, both of whom he cares for very much. [I saw this in a movie. Don't remember the name.] The rope is frayed near the top and the combined weight of three climbers is likely to cause it to break and send all three to their deaths. The climber on the bottom acts to release himself from the rope, causing him to fall to his death but saving the other two. Some will argue ad nausem that his was basically a selfish act, done to satisfy his own emotional needs. Alternatively, they could argue that he was simply acting out of biological fatherly instinct, or that it was a result of more general evolutionary pressures at the group level, and in any case he deserves no credit for rational altruism. It's the same business as the free-will problem, another matter of context, and it gets silly at the extremes. Gandhi, Mother Teresa and Jesus of Nazareth are well known examples of rational altruism. There are many more examples in daily life where people have considered and have decided to act to create a better world without the requirement that they be there to enjoy it. Regardless of any and all arguments as to ultimate causes, the altruistic distinction remains and is clear *within the context* of human individual decision-making. Now with your first example, of the enlisted soldier who throws himself on a grenade to save his fellow soldiers, his action certainly could be considered altruistic (again within the normal context) but it would be difficult to show that it was *rational* altruism. The fact that he enlisted voluntarily is irrelevant because at the time he made that decision, it would be reasonable to consider the probability of falling on a grenade to be nearly negligible, and by a large margin, most soldiers come home after their term of service. As for the act of falling on the grenade, I would consider that to be more a result of deeply ingrained training than considered rational action. Numerous examples abound of similar acts of courage, and the US military, especially the Marines, trains for exactly that kind of behavioral response. With your second example, of soldiers "in earlier wars" who made attacks against daunting odds in service of a cause they chose to defend, I see that they made a brave choice to join the fight, a few of them with a high degree of awareness of the risks and consequences, and many more because they were expected to, or they were driven by a primal urge to fight(defend?), or they were looking for adventure and had nothing else planned, and so on. Once caught up in the military machine, however, rational altruism would have very little say in future outcomes. This post has become much longer than envisioned. I hope it provides some clarification. I could continue with examples of noble and heroic acts, but again, that wasn't the point of the original post. - Jef From kerry_prez at yahoo.com Thu Nov 30 22:42:50 2006 From: kerry_prez at yahoo.com (Al Brooks) Date: Thu, 30 Nov 2006 14:42:50 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] A Headline I'd Like To See In-Reply-To: <7.0.1.0.2.20061130154752.0225cef8@satx.rr.com> Message-ID: <20061130224250.33923.qmail@web51601.mail.yahoo.com> The turkey wasn't pardoned, the Pope sold the owner of the turkey an indulgence that forgave the turkey's sins .`-) Damien Broderick wrote: In the slightly belated spirit of Thanksgiving: "Pope pardons Turkey" --------------------------------- Everyone is raving about the all-new Yahoo! Mail beta. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From amara at amara.com Thu Nov 30 23:40:15 2006 From: amara at amara.com (Amara Graps) Date: Fri, 1 Dec 2006 00:40:15 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] A Headline I'd Like To See Message-ID: Damien Broderick: >In the slightly belated spirit of Thanksgiving: >"Pope pardons Turkey" :-) >and while we're on the topic, I read in the papers that >"Pope Benedict XVI, right, is greeted by Istanbul's Mufti Mustafa >Cagrici outside the Blue Mosque in Istanbul, Turkey... The pope, >wearing white robes" >Which, alas, entirely spoiled my hopes that he'd be in mufti. :-) Notice that he didn't pray there..(visitors/nonMuslims are not permitted to enter the Blue Mosque during the times of Salat) The place where I stayed on March 30 in the old part of Istanbul gave me a perfect view of the Blue Mosque from one window and a perfect view of the Aya Sofia Mosque (*) from another window. At night, I made some experiments with my camera, taking long exposures while 1) shooting through the window glass, and then 2) opening the windows, which removed the reflective aspect. The results from that night are a little grainy, but I have some interesting reflection images from study-2) such as this one: http://www.amara.com/Reflections.jpg where the Blue Mosque is superimposed on the Aya Sofia Mosque. I like playing with metaphors. Enjoy... Amara (*) previously a Christian church that was burned down by rioters a few times before it was rebuilt, and then, many hundreds of years later, was converted into a mosque. From asa at nada.kth.se Thu Nov 30 23:47:00 2006 From: asa at nada.kth.se (Anders Sandberg) Date: Fri, 1 Dec 2006 00:47:00 +0100 (MET) Subject: [extropy-chat] Anders Sandberg on "Keep on raging against aging" in Second Life, December 18, 2006 In-Reply-To: <5366105b0611301300t4a8b0150iad515f353c634783@mail.gmail.com> References: <470a3c520611301010v5f4fdad4x59e266b5835d4fe9@mail.gmail.com> <5366105b0611301300t4a8b0150iad515f353c634783@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <3793.86.130.23.218.1164930420.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> Jay Dugger wrote: > While on the subject, will transcripts, audio recordings, IRC logs, > and images from the event appear afterwards? Work has me in rural > Manitoba, Canada during the event, and I will most likely miss the > lecture. I'll see what I can do. This is going to be my first lecture in second life, so I'm exploring the different options for presentation. As well as what to say that Aubrey haven't said a thousand times better :-) -- Anders Sandberg, Oxford Uehiro Centre for Practical Ethics Philosophy Faculty of Oxford University From ps.udoname at gmail.com Sat Nov 25 19:20:25 2006 From: ps.udoname at gmail.com (ps udoname) Date: Sat, 25 Nov 2006 19:20:25 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] mathimatical model for the singularity In-Reply-To: References: <28553f510611202314j4852b833m8df7eccf99bc8f22@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <28553f510611251120j567c3132wf17bdb36baa274c0@mail.gmail.com> Ray Kurzweil seems too simplistic to be again, and statements like ' the singularity will happen in 2029' are FAR too accurate. Better to be like Vinge and give intervals like 2005-2030. Anyway, what I was thinking is you could start with a S=e^kt (S=scientific progress), and then modify it so that k is a function of intelligence rather then a constant, and intelligence is a function of S. For simplicite's sake, dS/dt = kS becomes dS/dt=(cS+ N)S (c is a constant denoting how quickly science incereaces intelligence, N is the natural intelligence of a hunter gather) dS/dt=(cS+N)S Which solves as : S=N/((e^-Nt)-c) (these are new values of N and c which have been multiplied by another constant) Which looks like S=Ne^Nt at first, and then has an asyptope at t= -(ln(c))/N. And the entire reason why the singularity is called the singularity is that is has an asymtope, which is somthing s-curves lack. On 21/11/06, Robert Bradbury wrote: > > > On 11/21/06, ps udoname wrote: > > > > I was just thinking that I see a lot of people who say things like "the > > singularity WILL be exponential" and seem to think that the whole of human > > progress can be described as p=e^kt. > > This seems a little simplistic to say the least. I was going to say that > > I could come up with a better model, but I'm sure someone must have already > > done that somewhere.... > > > > Ray Kurzweil discusses it extensively in Chapter 2 of The Singularity is > Near titled "A Theory of Technological Evolution" which goes on for 75 > pages with lots of graphs (and a discussion of S-curves). > > > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > > > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: