[extropy-chat] Sustainability philosopy as a justification for existence

[Samantha Atkins]

On Sep 4, 2006, at 10:44 AM, Robert Bradbury wrote:

> I've been wrestling lately with the question about how one justifies  
> ones existence [1].  From an extropic perspective it would appear to  
> me that one has to be acting on the stage in such a way as to  
> contribute to sustainability, survival, evolution and presumably  
> increasing complexity of humanity.  I could argue that many people  
> who are currently "retired" do not meet this criteria.[2]  Many  
> people living in the third world do not meet this criteria.  Many  
> people with strong religious beliefs do not meet this criteria.   
> There are some "green" folks who would.  There are some research  
> scientists, technology developers, investment managers who do.
>

Is this a problem?  Does a butterfly need to justify its existence?   
How wonderful a creature we are that we have spare cycles to ruminate  
as to whether we are justified in simply being!

Don't you have more productive things to do with your massive brain  
than question whether most people, perhaps even yourself, are  
justified in being here?

> The allocation of resources in large part determines the rate of  
> progress along the singularity curve and how many people will end up  
> dying.

Who exactly are you to allocate the world's resources?  How will you  
choose among human brains without missing some critical spark of  
genius that has not yet flowered and may be in the wrong circumstances  
to ever do so?  Why claim that progress toward Singularity, which  
could easily kill everyone in some exotic fashion, is the primary  
value against which all are to be judged?


> Ultimately even a Matrioshka Brain has limits on energy and  
> information storage resources.  The energy resources are probably  
> much more limited than the information storage resources.  So one  
> gets into a question, not of whether to kill people (erase copies),  
> but how much "run time" to give them and when they should get to  
> have it [4].

This centralized control of the very moments of existence doesn't seem  
very appealing.

> This relates to the rich vs. poor discussions one gets into now-a- 
> days of who has the resources and who doesn't (relating of course to  
> taxation, relative needs, social safety net discussions, etc.).  But  
> I do not see in any current political system, religion or philosophy  
> a "raison d'etre" which seems to justify ones "right" to a share of  
> the resources (and in particular justifies a greater or lesser share  
> of said resources).

I don't believe in positive rights generally.  However, thinking in  
terms of scarcity seems to be a primary thread in your ponderings.   I  
don't see that as terribly extropian.

- samantha