From austriaaugust at yahoo.com Thu Feb 1 00:16:45 2007 From: austriaaugust at yahoo.com (A B) Date: Wed, 31 Jan 2007 16:16:45 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Pleasing Oneself In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <687228.71803.qm@web37409.mail.mud.yahoo.com> I apologize for disturbing the peace by resurrecting a long-buried post, but I thought it was worth a comment, and I've been away from the Internet for a while. Some time ago Jef Albright wrote: "Seeking pleasure is ammoral , but tends to correlate with activity that we would assess as "good"." I would go so far as to say that achieving pleasure for oneself is, per se, beyond just being ammoral. I would argue that achieving pleasure for oneself is positively moral. It is only incidental that the entity that appears to sense and enjoy the pleasure is the one who is commonly considered to be "oneself". IOW, pleasing oneself is a special case of a more general condition (what Jef might consider "greater scope") of the whole of sentient beings experiencing pleasure. That's not to say that all sentients have a desire to please any sentient apart from themselves - as many examples will testify. However, I think that most humans would want other sentients to experience pleasure, all else being equal. IMHO, pleasing oneself only becomes arguably immoral (or ammoral) when the cost of the self-pleasure is a loss of pleasure in other sentients or a gain in suffering of other sentients. Best Wishes, Jeffrey Herrlich --------------------------------- Everyone is raving about the all-new Yahoo! Mail beta. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://lists.extropy.org/pipermail/extropy-chat/attachments/20070131/3ef1a096/attachment.html From sentience at pobox.com Thu Feb 1 00:25:31 2007 From: sentience at pobox.com (Eliezer S. Yudkowsky) Date: Wed, 31 Jan 2007 16:25:31 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] transhumanism=doomsday cult b.s? In-Reply-To: <8d71341e0701311418j75fbda8ctf85bcf7ff68e08a3@mail.gmail.com> References: <3642969c0701302345he9d716i56696ea78cb980da@mail.gmail.com> <8d71341e0701311418j75fbda8ctf85bcf7ff68e08a3@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <45C1337B.8030409@pobox.com> Russell Wallace wrote: > It's difficult to reliably distinguish in advance between visionary > ideas and wishful thinking, but I will suggest as a general guideline > looking at the following categories of claims: > > X is *possible* vs X is *easy*. > X *could* happen vs X *will* happen. > X can be achieved *someday* vs X can be achieved *within a specific time*. > > In each case claims of the former type have very often proved true, > whereas claims of the latter type usually have not, so we should be > receptive to the former but much more skeptical of the latter. "Me too." -- Eliezer S. Yudkowsky http://singinst.org/ Research Fellow, Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence From jef at jefallbright.net Thu Feb 1 00:40:59 2007 From: jef at jefallbright.net (Jef Allbright) Date: Wed, 31 Jan 2007 16:40:59 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Pleasing Oneself In-Reply-To: <687228.71803.qm@web37409.mail.mud.yahoo.com> References: <687228.71803.qm@web37409.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Message-ID: Interesting subject line for this thread. I hope it isn't self-referential? AB wrote: > Some time ago Jef Albright wrote: >> "Seeking pleasure is ammoral , but tends to correlate with activity that we would assess as "good"." >? > I would go so far as to say that achieving pleasure > for oneself is, per se,?beyond just being ammoral. > I would argue that achieving pleasure for oneself > is positively moral. It is only incidental that the > entity that appears to sense and enjoy?the pleasure > is the one who is commonly considered to be "oneself". > IOW, pleasing?oneself is a special case of a more general >?condition (what Jef might consider?"greater scope")?of > the whole of sentient beings experiencing pleasure. > That's not to say that all sentients have a desire > to please any sentient apart from themselves - as > many examples will testify. However, I think that > most humans would?want other sentients to experience > pleasure, all else being equal.?IMHO, pleasing oneself > only becomes arguably immoral (or ammoral) when the > cost of the self-pleasure is a loss of pleasure in > other sentients or a gain in suffering of other sentients. So I understand that you believe pleasure is the ultimate measure of morality. I understand you are claiming that morality is measured with respect to pleasure integrated over all sentient beings, right? Do you also integrate over all time? So that which provides the greatest pleasure for the greatest number for the greatest time is the most moral? I assume you acknowledge the necessity of some short term sacrifice of pleasure in order to achieve the greater pleasure. How do you see that working in principle? Based on your reasoning, if 50 percent of the population are feeling less than average pleasure, would it be a moral good to eliminate them from the population in order to raise the overall level of pleasure? - Jef From kevin.osborne at gmail.com Thu Feb 1 00:43:22 2007 From: kevin.osborne at gmail.com (kevin.osborne) Date: Thu, 1 Feb 2007 10:43:22 +1000 Subject: [extropy-chat] transhumanism=doomsday cult b.s? In-Reply-To: <3642969c0701302345he9d716i56696ea78cb980da@mail.gmail.com> References: <3642969c0701302345he9d716i56696ea78cb980da@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <3642969c0701311643t6246ec9eq56951950da769dad@mail.gmail.com> healthy, lucid, self-examinatory answers all; well done and congratulations, I think as a collective you guys have definitely passed the cult test with flying colours. what I was looking for wasn't necessarily direct responses to any of my egregious excoriations; what I was looking for was whether criticism could be parsed without rancor and whether unfettered self-examination came naturally; in both cases the responses were wonderful, served with a clarity, insight and self-effacement not often seen in our mighty tubular interwebs. *applauds* From neptune at superlink.net Thu Feb 1 00:56:02 2007 From: neptune at superlink.net (Technotranscendence) Date: Wed, 31 Jan 2007 19:56:02 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Sea boom References: <65464.86.130.30.87.1170253431.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> Message-ID: <003c01c7459b$bf3334c0$b5893cd1@pavilion> On Wednesday, January 31, 2007 9:23 AM Anders Sandberg asa at nada.kth.se wrote: > "The Sea Launch Zenit-3SL vehicle, carrying the NSS-8 satellite, > experienced an anomaly today during launch operations." as stated on > http://www.boeing.com/special/sea-launch/ > > The anomaly was of the explosive kind, unfortunately: > http://www.youtube.com/p.swf?video_id=eMG2SBwIcrM&eurl=http%3A//www.e24.se/dynamiskt/klacksparkar/did_14533588.asp&iurl=http%3A//sjl-static3.sjl.youtube.com/vi/eMG2SBwIcrM/2.jpg&t=OEgsToPDskLcQYWlDCcNpLn1Q6HKkWpu > > Perhaps not a major setback, but sad. However, the explosion is neat. Yes, sad and neat to see. In a way, it's good it happened now and not, say, several years ago. They've already got quite a few successful launches under their belt, so it's a proven model. However, whether they'll continue is another matter. I'm not sure how damaged the launch platform is and that might be the deciding factor. (Of course, it all depends on how much profit they can make off launches. This might drive up their [self?] insurance costs considerably.) Regards, Dan From nvitamore at austin.rr.com Thu Feb 1 01:39:18 2007 From: nvitamore at austin.rr.com (nvitamore at austin.rr.com) Date: Wed, 31 Jan 2007 20:39:18 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Pleasing Oneself Message-ID: <380-220072411391841@M2W020.mail2web.com> Hummm... -------------------------------------------------------------------- mail2web - Check your email from the web at http://link.mail2web.com/mail2web From neptune at superlink.net Thu Feb 1 02:26:44 2007 From: neptune at superlink.net (Technotranscendence) Date: Wed, 31 Jan 2007 21:26:44 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Pleasing Oneself References: <380-220072411391841@M2W020.mail2web.com> Message-ID: <000d01c745a8$6b166300$f4893cd1@pavilion> Not offering this as my opinion on the subject, but here it is to provoke comment: "A 60's-era interview with Paul Krassner in _The Realist_ comes to mind. Now, I love Paul Krassner and _The Realist_, and I understand that Mailer was trying to live up to his reputation as a professional asshole in this interview. The subject turned to masturbation, and Mailer declared that masturbation was misunderstood to be healthy when it is in fact traumatic and damaging to men, because it is an essentially isolating act. He then counseled men to do anything necessary, even if they had to commit rape, in order to avoid having to masturbate." >From http://www.litkicks.com/BeatPages/msg.jsp?what=MailerLeak Regards, Dan From asa at nada.kth.se Thu Feb 1 02:49:16 2007 From: asa at nada.kth.se (Anders Sandberg) Date: Thu, 1 Feb 2007 03:49:16 +0100 (MET) Subject: [extropy-chat] transhumanism=doomsday cult b.s? In-Reply-To: <3642969c0701311643t6246ec9eq56951950da769dad@mail.gmail.com> References: <3642969c0701302345he9d716i56696ea78cb980da@mail.gmail.com> <3642969c0701311643t6246ec9eq56951950da769dad@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <57737.86.130.30.87.1170298156.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> kevin.osborne wrote: > healthy, lucid, self-examinatory answers all; well done and > congratulations, I think as a collective you guys have definitely > passed the cult test with flying colours. "I passed the cult test but all I got was this T-shirt!" :-) I think transhumanism is a bit unusual in its tendency towards self-examination. But of course, that can be negatively formulated as self-absorption and narcissism too. Sometimes I think we started thinking we were going into the history books a few decades too early. -- Anders Sandberg, Oxford Uehiro Centre for Practical Ethics Philosophy Faculty of Oxford University From amara at amara.com Thu Feb 1 07:30:23 2007 From: amara at amara.com (Amara Graps) Date: Thu, 1 Feb 2007 08:30:23 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] Sabine's inspiration(s) Message-ID: Hi folks, this story by Sabine of what inspires her, and her perspective of theoretical physics and building our future is really nice. She's a very clear writer with a wonderful enthusiasm. Highly recommended! http://asymptotia.com/2007/01/31/sabine-hossenfelder-my-inspiration/ Amara -- Amara Graps, PhD www.amara.com INAF Istituto di Fisica dello Spazio Interplanetario (IFSI), Roma, ITALIA Associate Research Scientist, Planetary Science Institute (PSI), Tucson From ben at goertzel.org Thu Feb 1 07:43:18 2007 From: ben at goertzel.org (Ben Goertzel) Date: Thu, 1 Feb 2007 02:43:18 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Ben's 119'th dream In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <0BA18198-85BA-4277-8579-DC4BF9C674FE@goertzel.org> In a totally different vein, I took a couple hours and wrote down a recurring dream I've had for years, which is a sort of metaphor for transhumanism and the quest to create AGI... http://goertzel.org/Colors.pdf [warning: no scientific content, just some peculiar literature with a metaphoric transhumanist theme...] Not as funny as my post-apocalyptic scenario from a few years back, The McBuddha Awakens: http://www.goertzel.org/fiction/McBuddhaAwakens.htm -- Ben G On Feb 1, 2007, at 2:30 AM, Amara Graps wrote: > > Hi folks, this story by Sabine of what inspires her, and her > perspective > of theoretical physics and building our future is really nice. She's > a very clear writer with a wonderful enthusiasm. Highly recommended! > > http://asymptotia.com/2007/01/31/sabine-hossenfelder-my-inspiration/ > > Amara > > -- > > Amara Graps, PhD www.amara.com > INAF Istituto di Fisica dello Spazio Interplanetario (IFSI), Roma, > ITALIA > Associate Research Scientist, Planetary Science Institute (PSI), > Tucson > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat From eugen at leitl.org Thu Feb 1 09:29:45 2007 From: eugen at leitl.org (Eugen Leitl) Date: Thu, 1 Feb 2007 10:29:45 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] transhumanism=doomsday cult b.s? In-Reply-To: <57737.86.130.30.87.1170298156.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> References: <3642969c0701302345he9d716i56696ea78cb980da@mail.gmail.com> <3642969c0701311643t6246ec9eq56951950da769dad@mail.gmail.com> <57737.86.130.30.87.1170298156.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> Message-ID: <20070201092945.GO21677@leitl.org> On Thu, Feb 01, 2007 at 03:49:16AM +0100, Anders Sandberg wrote: > self-absorption and narcissism too. Sometimes I think we started thinking > we were going into the history books a few decades too early. I don't expect most people here are that hubristic/foolish. -- 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: not available Type: application/pgp-signature Size: 191 bytes Desc: Digital signature Url : http://lists.extropy.org/pipermail/extropy-chat/attachments/20070201/8ce36afc/attachment.bin From jonkc at att.net Thu Feb 1 17:07:59 2007 From: jonkc at att.net (John K Clark) Date: Thu, 1 Feb 2007 12:07:59 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Elvis Sightings References: <7.0.1.0.2.20070123163620.02269730@satx.rr.com><7.0.1.0.2.20070126162355.022cd960@satx.rr.com><5.1.0.14.0.20070128234250.03a64c70@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com><003601c743ed$d9f32810$da064e0c@MyComputer><0D622747-2CE8-449E-B50C-B32610822AB7@goertzel.org><005701c743f3$dfc82be0$da064e0c@MyComputer><008501c743f8$58045da0$6801a8c0@ZANDRA2><7.0.1.0.2.20070129171355.023cade0@satx.rr.com><003601c7444c$61ee02e0$5c0a4e0c@MyComputer><002701c74492$05be4ca0$df064e0c@MyComputer><9B6F2939-30AC-48C6-96FF-B48C7C234BAA@goertzel.org><45BF997F.2000109@pobox.com><001c01c744b6$b482dc00$6e074e0c@MyComputer><7.0.1.0.2.20070130180555.0261aa88@satx.rr.com><001e01c74500$ff13c230$de064e0c@MyComputer><001d01c74560$2abee900$dd084e0c@MyComputer> Message-ID: <002d01c74623$8d616b00$a2054e0c@MyComputer> "Ben Goertzel" > Replications have occurred in many university That's why their results have appeared in well respected scientific journals; oh wait, that hasn't happened. > and industry labs And that's why billions of dollars from venture capitalist have flooded in into this potential gold mine to fund cold fusion start up companies; oh wait, that hasn't happened either. > Read the literature I would love to, but a website is not "the literature", UFO Abduction Quarterly is not "the literature". Show me an article in Nature or Science reporting positive cold fusion results and you have won the argument. Just one article, that's all you have to do. John K Clark From ben at goertzel.org Thu Feb 1 17:18:00 2007 From: ben at goertzel.org (Benjamin Goertzel) Date: Thu, 1 Feb 2007 12:18:00 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Elvis Sightings In-Reply-To: <002d01c74623$8d616b00$a2054e0c@MyComputer> References: <9B6F2939-30AC-48C6-96FF-B48C7C234BAA@goertzel.org> <45BF997F.2000109@pobox.com> <001c01c744b6$b482dc00$6e074e0c@MyComputer> <7.0.1.0.2.20070130180555.0261aa88@satx.rr.com> <001e01c74500$ff13c230$de064e0c@MyComputer> <001d01c74560$2abee900$dd084e0c@MyComputer> <002d01c74623$8d616b00$a2054e0c@MyComputer> Message-ID: <3cf171fe0702010918g44819bb2mccb012150b21ed5e@mail.gmail.com> > I would love to, but a website is not "the literature", UFO Abduction > Quarterly is not "the literature". Show me an article in Nature or Science > reporting positive cold fusion results and you have won the argument. Just > one article, that's all you have to do. I am suggesting you to read a particular book, EXCESS HEAT, which surveys a lot of the scientific journal literature on CF, and also explains the political and social dynamics which led to Nature and Science not wishing to publish papers on CF. -- Ben G From hkhenson at rogers.com Thu Feb 1 17:25:48 2007 From: hkhenson at rogers.com (Keith Henson) Date: Thu, 01 Feb 2007 12:25:48 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] pointer to another EP/fMRI article In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <5.1.0.14.0.20070201122443.03afeea0@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> http://thetartan.org/2007/1/29/pillbox/shopping From jef at jefallbright.net Thu Feb 1 17:37:54 2007 From: jef at jefallbright.net (Jef Allbright) Date: Thu, 1 Feb 2007 09:37:54 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Ben's 119'th dream In-Reply-To: <0BA18198-85BA-4277-8579-DC4BF9C674FE@goertzel.org> References: <0BA18198-85BA-4277-8579-DC4BF9C674FE@goertzel.org> Message-ID: Ben wrote: > In a totally different vein, I took a couple hours and wrote down a > recurring dream I've had for years, which is a sort of metaphor for > transhumanism and the quest to create AGI... > > http://goertzel.org/Colors.pdf > > [warning: no scientific content, just some peculiar literature with > a > metaphoric transhumanist theme...] > Thanks Ben for sharing this. It's nice to know you see them/us too. - Jef From jef at jefallbright.net Thu Feb 1 17:59:33 2007 From: jef at jefallbright.net (Jef Allbright) Date: Thu, 1 Feb 2007 09:59:33 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Performance Limitations on Engineered Biological Systems Message-ID: An interesting, apparently recent, essay by John Smart. http://www.accelerationwatch.com/biotech.html - Jef From jonkc at att.net Thu Feb 1 18:29:31 2007 From: jonkc at att.net (John K Clark) Date: Thu, 1 Feb 2007 13:29:31 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Elvis Sightings References: <9B6F2939-30AC-48C6-96FF-B48C7C234BAA@goertzel.org><45BF997F.2000109@pobox.com><001c01c744b6$b482dc00$6e074e0c@MyComputer><7.0.1.0.2.20070130180555.0261aa88@satx.rr.com><001e01c74500$ff13c230$de064e0c@MyComputer><001d01c74560$2abee900$dd084e0c@MyComputer><002d01c74623$8d616b00$a2054e0c@MyComputer> <3cf171fe0702010918g44819bb2mccb012150b21ed5e@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <006101c7462e$f5291a20$a2054e0c@MyComputer> "Benjamin Goertzel" > I am suggesting you to read a particular book, EXCESS HEAT, which > surveys a lot of the scientific journal literature on CF, and also > explains the political and social dynamics which led to Nature and > Science not wishing to publish papers on CF. So let's review, some bozo I've never heard of called Charles G Beaudette wrote a book called "Excess Heat", which I've also never heard of. You say the book makes the claim that the editors of Nature and Science and ALL the top physics journals have been full of shit for the last 17 years; and then you recommend that I read this book. Benjamin, you really don't make a very compelling case that I should run out right now and buy that book. It seems a tad more likely to me that Mr. Beaudette is full of shit rather than all the most respected scientific journals on the planet are. John K Clark From ben at goertzel.org Thu Feb 1 19:26:26 2007 From: ben at goertzel.org (Ben Goertzel) Date: Thu, 1 Feb 2007 14:26:26 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Elvis Sightings In-Reply-To: <006101c7462e$f5291a20$a2054e0c@MyComputer> References: <9B6F2939-30AC-48C6-96FF-B48C7C234BAA@goertzel.org><45BF997F.2000109@pobox.com><001c01c744b6$b482dc00$6e074e0c@MyComputer><7.0.1.0.2.20070130180555.0261aa88@satx.rr.com><001e01c74500$ff13c230$de064e0c@MyComputer><001d01c74560$2abee900$dd084e0c@MyComputer><002d01c74623$8d616b00$a2054e0c@MyComputer> <3cf171fe0702010918g44819bb2mccb012150b21ed5e@mail.gmail.com> <006101c7462e$f5291a20$a2054e0c@MyComputer> Message-ID: Beaudette's book gives an excellent guide to the scientific literature on the topic. For one thing, it can be read as an annotated bibliography of the published literature on the topic, which is spread across a bunch of different scientific journals. Starting by reading the papers recommended in his book is better than reading random papers on cold fusion found via Googling, for example. Anyway, if you won't even take the time to read the available information on the topic, there's not much point in arguing with you on the topic. You are ignorant on this topic. I am less so. You are arguing that I have not convinced you to become informed on the topic. Apparently not. Fortunately, I have more interesting things to do with my time than try to convince you to become less ignorant on this topic '-) I welcome arguments on the reality of cold fusion with anyone who is familiar with the relevant scientific literature. ben g On Feb 1, 2007, at 1:29 PM, John K Clark wrote: > "Benjamin Goertzel" > >> I am suggesting you to read a particular book, EXCESS HEAT, which >> surveys a lot of the scientific journal literature on CF, and also >> explains the political and social dynamics which led to Nature and >> Science not wishing to publish papers on CF. > > So let's review, some bozo I've never heard of called Charles G > Beaudette > wrote a book called "Excess Heat", which I've also never heard of. > You say > the book makes the claim that the editors of Nature and Science and > ALL the > top physics journals have been full of shit for the last 17 years; > and then > you recommend that I read this book. Benjamin, you really don't > make a very > compelling case that I should run out right now and buy that book. > It seems > a tad more likely to me that Mr. Beaudette is full of shit rather > than all > the most respected scientific journals on the planet are. > > John K Clark > > > > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat From eugen at leitl.org Thu Feb 1 19:40:06 2007 From: eugen at leitl.org (Eugen Leitl) Date: Thu, 1 Feb 2007 20:40:06 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] Elvis Sightings In-Reply-To: References: <3cf171fe0702010918g44819bb2mccb012150b21ed5e@mail.gmail.com> <006101c7462e$f5291a20$a2054e0c@MyComputer> Message-ID: <20070201194006.GE21677@leitl.org> On Thu, Feb 01, 2007 at 02:26:26PM -0500, Ben Goertzel wrote: > I welcome arguments on the reality of cold fusion with anyone who is > familiar with the relevant scientific literature. You got me sufficiently interested to try the book (unfortunately, it's ridiculously expensive on amazon.de). I don't expect to learn anything about the reality of the phenomenon (I concur with John that it's >99% likely it's sloppy experimentation), but I expect to be entertained by the social aspect of it, aka the cold fusion craze (hey, I was a brief believer, myself). -- 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: not available Type: application/pgp-signature Size: 191 bytes Desc: Digital signature Url : http://lists.extropy.org/pipermail/extropy-chat/attachments/20070201/efd7f57d/attachment.bin From ben at goertzel.org Thu Feb 1 19:52:09 2007 From: ben at goertzel.org (Ben Goertzel) Date: Thu, 1 Feb 2007 14:52:09 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Elvis Sightings In-Reply-To: <20070201194006.GE21677@leitl.org> References: <3cf171fe0702010918g44819bb2mccb012150b21ed5e@mail.gmail.com> <006101c7462e$f5291a20$a2054e0c@MyComputer> <20070201194006.GE21677@leitl.org> Message-ID: <6267E8CD-C635-42A4-9F9A-AE283EC8B95A@goertzel.org> On Feb 1, 2007, at 2:40 PM, Eugen Leitl wrote: > On Thu, Feb 01, 2007 at 02:26:26PM -0500, Ben Goertzel wrote: > >> I welcome arguments on the reality of cold fusion with anyone who is >> familiar with the relevant scientific literature. > > You got me sufficiently interested to try the book (unfortunately, > it's ridiculously expensive on amazon.de). I don't expect to learn > anything about the reality of the phenomenon (I concur with John > that it's >99% likely it's sloppy experimentation), My prediction is that if you read the book and follow up a little bit by poking into the literature, your certainty in this regard will decrease to significantly below 99%... Please let us know, anyway ;-) ben > but I expect > to be entertained by the social aspect of it, aka the cold fusion > craze (hey, I was a brief believer, myself). > > -- > 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 > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat From gts_2000 at yahoo.com Thu Feb 1 19:33:55 2007 From: gts_2000 at yahoo.com (gts) Date: Thu, 01 Feb 2007 14:33:55 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Pleasing Oneself In-Reply-To: <380-220072411391841@M2W020.mail2web.com> References: <380-220072411391841@M2W020.mail2web.com> Message-ID: I have in the past discussed and debated hedonism as a philosophy. I learned that the word means different things to different people. Some people do not make the distinction I make between the experience of 'sensual pleasure' and the more ephemeral experience of 'happiness', considering them more or less different manifestations of the same category of experience. To me there is a clear distinction. Coincidently I was thinking about this distinction just a few nights ago, before this thread started. Like most people I love and seek pleasure but I was asking myself why happiness nevertheless seems better than pleasure. It occurred to me that the answer has something to do with *memory*. I find it relatively easy to re-experience some sense of past happiness via recall, but have difficulty conjuring up similar re-experiences of past sensual pleasures. So, in this sense, happiness keeps on giving but sensual pleasure does not. These kinds of considerations have become more important to me as I've grown older. In my youth I didn't care much about the distinction between pleasure and happiness, but as I grow older I become steadily more cognizant of my mortality. What things of value will I still have in my possession in those final moments before I die? I will have some memories of happiness, and not much else. -gts From austriaaugust at yahoo.com Thu Feb 1 20:28:35 2007 From: austriaaugust at yahoo.com (A B) Date: Thu, 1 Feb 2007 12:28:35 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Pleasing Oneself In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <979346.71747.qm@web37405.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Hi Jef, To clear up any possible confusion, I did not intend this post or thread name to exclusively imply sexual self-satisfaction, but rather any activity that provides oneself with pleasure; from watching TV to decoding the Universe. Although in principle, I don't see anything morally wrong with sexual self-satisfaction. Perhaps I should have been more careful in choosing a subject title. Oh well, maybe it will generate more thread attention ;-) Anyway, moving on ... Jef writes: "So I understand that you believe pleasure is the ultimate measure of morality." *Subjective* pleasure {as well as capacity for subjective pleasure} (in it's myriad forms to include those which some people would consider distasteful) over the "largest scope" -meaning the highest number of sentient beings regardless of their station of existence, yes. Jef writes: "I understand you are claiming that morality is measured with respect to pleasure integrated over all sentient beings, right? Do you also integrate over all time? So that which provides the greatest pleasure for the greatest number for the greatest time is the most moral?" Fundamentally, yes. However, this does not necessarily imply that one must inexorably commit immoral acts against other sentients in order to achieve this goal. Jef writes: "I assume you acknowledge the necessity of some short term sacrifice of pleasure in order to achieve the greater pleasure. How do you see that working in principle?" Well, we are dealing in abstract ideals and not in the grit of reality. However, achieving the "greater pleasure" does not inevitably require imposing suffering, or a loss of pleasure, or a loss of capacity for pleasure on any *other* sentient beings. For example, if 99% of hard working Americans chose to donate $30.00 to the advancement of altruistic AGI, well... good things would probably happen. Now donating that $30.00 may necessitate that a donor remain at his crappy job that he hates, but he always retains the choice not to donate and not to work, if he so chooses. It's a willful sacrifice. Jef writes: "Based on your reasoning, if 50 percent of the population are feeling less than average pleasure, would it be a moral good to eliminate them from the population in order to raise the overall level of pleasure?" No, definitely not. A more moral action would be to lift the lower 50% out of their unhappiness. Perhaps I could make my original statement more applicable by saying: Pleasing oneself only becomes arguably immoral or ammoral when the cost of the self-pleasure is a loss of pleasure in other sentients, a gain in suffering of other sentients, or a loss of capacity for pleasure in other sentients. In this case, if you were to kill the lower 50% you'd be bringing their capacity for subjective pleasure down to zero, in addition to eliminating whatever low level of pleasure that they did manage to experience to begin with. Best Wishes, Jeffrey Herrlich Jef Allbright wrote: Interesting subject line for this thread. I hope it isn't self-referential? AB wrote: > Some time ago Jef Albright wrote: >> "Seeking pleasure is ammoral , but tends to correlate with activity that we would assess as "good"." > > I would go so far as to say that achieving pleasure > for oneself is, per se, beyond just being ammoral. > I would argue that achieving pleasure for oneself > is positively moral. It is only incidental that the > entity that appears to sense and enjoy the pleasure > is the one who is commonly considered to be "oneself". > IOW, pleasing oneself is a special case of a more general > condition (what Jef might consider "greater scope") of > the whole of sentient beings experiencing pleasure. > That's not to say that all sentients have a desire > to please any sentient apart from themselves - as > many examples will testify. However, I think that > most humans would want other sentients to experience > pleasure, all else being equal. IMHO, pleasing oneself > only becomes arguably immoral (or ammoral) when the > cost of the self-pleasure is a loss of pleasure in > other sentients or a gain in suffering of other sentients. So I understand that you believe pleasure is the ultimate measure of morality. I understand you are claiming that morality is measured with respect to pleasure integrated over all sentient beings, right? Do you also integrate over all time? So that which provides the greatest pleasure for the greatest number for the greatest time is the most moral? I assume you acknowledge the necessity of some short term sacrifice of pleasure in order to achieve the greater pleasure. How do you see that working in principle? Based on your reasoning, if 50 percent of the population are feeling less than average pleasure, would it be a moral good to eliminate them from the population in order to raise the overall level of pleasure? - Jef _______________________________________________ extropy-chat mailing list extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat --------------------------------- Need Mail bonding? Go to the Yahoo! Mail Q&A for great tips from Yahoo! Answers users. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://lists.extropy.org/pipermail/extropy-chat/attachments/20070201/5e130832/attachment.html From asa at nada.kth.se Thu Feb 1 22:44:10 2007 From: asa at nada.kth.se (Anders Sandberg) Date: Thu, 1 Feb 2007 23:44:10 +0100 (MET) Subject: [extropy-chat] Pleasing Oneself In-Reply-To: References: <380-220072411391841@M2W020.mail2web.com> Message-ID: <56782.86.130.30.87.1170369850.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> Happiness also involves more parts of our being than just sensual pleasure. I think that the more aspects of ourselves we add to the positive experience, the more valuable it becomes. At the lowest level we have simple sensual pleasures, little more than stimuli that activate our experience of pleasures. As they become more complex more and more of our brains get involved in the enjoyment - a delicious meal involves both smell, taste and touch sensations but also the knowledge and emotions tied to the food (ah, the peas of the Po valley, they remind me of that trip to Milano...) and the likely complex setting of the meal. Even greater enjoyment can be created by participating in the experience as an actor and not just an observer: the dinner company talk over the meal, maybe I cook it. The highest forms of happiness occur when we are participating totally in something and using all our being to bring it about, be it cooking, climbing a mountain or solving a problem. At this level the pleasure sensation becomes less important than the happiness: it is actually not very pleasant to sit up all night hacking away at some great piece of code, but the happiness it brings is indeed supreme and lasting. Happiness tend to accompany doing things that makes us extend ourselves as beings. >From this perspective striving for happiness might be both a goal and a means. It is the transhuman thing to do. -- Anders Sandberg, Oxford Uehiro Centre for Practical Ethics Philosophy Faculty of Oxford University From spike66 at comcast.net Thu Feb 1 23:17:22 2007 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Thu, 1 Feb 2007 15:17:22 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] random links In-Reply-To: <003f01c74565$18558620$d7971f97@archimede> Message-ID: <200702012322.l11NMWOg012779@andromeda.ziaspace.com> Thanks for the links scerir! > bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of scerir > Subject: [extropy-chat] random links > > The air we (italians) breath > http://dorigo.wordpress.com/2007/01/23/the-air-we-breathe/ Ewww. Much of that might be Diesel particulates. I agree they should be illegal in cities. > The worst possible move > http://dorigo.wordpress.com/2007/01/28/the-worst-possible-move/ Cool, thanks, I will see if I can find one that breaks 50. It is unusual to have a chess position that is so open that there are 50 possible moves. Together with the stated constraints, this is a difficult puzzle indeed. > Prime numbers peep in. ... > http://www.arxiv.org/abs/quant-ph/0212084 But this link isn't about prime numbers, its Brukner paper: Information and fundamental elements of the structure of quantum theory Do post the one about primes if you can find it please. {8-] spike From jef at jefallbright.net Thu Feb 1 23:46:32 2007 From: jef at jefallbright.net (Jef Allbright) Date: Thu, 1 Feb 2007 15:46:32 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Pleasure as ultimate measure of morality [Was: Pleasing Oneself] In-Reply-To: <979346.71747.qm@web37405.mail.mud.yahoo.com> References: <979346.71747.qm@web37405.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Message-ID: Jeffrey - Would you please send to this list in plain-text format? Otherwise, it takes some time to reformat and properly quote your text. - Jef A B wrote: > Some time ago Jef Albright wrote: >> "Seeking pleasure is ammoral , but tends to correlate with activity that we would assess as "good"." > > I would go so far as to say that achieving pleasure > for oneself is, per se, beyond just being ammoral. > I would argue that achieving pleasure for oneself > is positively moral. It is only incidental that the > entity that appears to sense and enjoy the pleasure > is the one who is commonly considered to be "oneself". > IOW, pleasing oneself is a special case of a more general > condition (what Jef might consider "greater scope") of > the whole of sentient beings experiencing pleasure. > That's not to say that all sentients have a desire > to please any sentient apart from themselves - as > many examples will testify. However, I think that > most humans would want other sentients to experience > pleasure, all else being equal. IMHO, pleasing oneself > only becomes arguably immoral (or ammoral) when the > cost of the self-pleasure is a loss of pleasure in > other sentients or a gain in suffering of other sentients. --------------------------------------------------------------- > To clear up any possible confusion, I did > not intend this post or thread name to >?exclusively imply?sexual self-satisfaction, > but rather any activity that?provides oneself > with pleasure; from?watching TV?to decoding > the Universe. Although in principle, I don't > see anything?morally wrong with sexual > self-satisfaction. Perhaps I should have been > more careful in choosing a subject title. Oh > well,?maybe it will?generate more?thread > attention ;-) ?Anyway, moving on ... ? > Jef writes: >> So I understand that you believe pleasure is the ultimate measure of morality. ? > *Subjective* pleasure {as well as capacity for > subjective pleasure} (in it's myriad forms to > include those which some people would consider > distasteful) over the "largest scope" -meaning? > the highest number of sentient beings regardless > of their station of existence, yes. What do you mean by "subjective" pleasure? Is there some kind of pleasure that is not subjective? I think pleasure/happiness/eudaimonia has many variations. Of course you realize that I think these sensations and assessments are only indirect indicators and not fundamental measures of "good". But I wonder if you think you understand that statement of mine that you felt strongly enough about to disagree with? So if I'm to understand why you think pleasure is the ultimate measure of morality, I need to understand what you think pleasure is. Of course, if in your thinking there are many kinds of pleasure, then we'll need to understand what they all have in common before we can say that there is something that is worthy of calling fundamental or ultimate. I don't need to do this because I consider "pleasure" in all its manifestations to be only indications from a subjective system reporting that things are going well (whether those outside the system would agree or not.) To me, pleasure is only the vector of the feedback loop, but says nothing directly about the goodness of the output of the system. Do you see pleasure as being measured on a unipolar, or bipolar axis? As you probably know, many people consider pleasure and pain to be polar opposites on the same scale; do you agree with this? Or do you see pleasure as ranging from about zero (little or no pleasure) to some high value corresponding with extreme ecstacy? And just to add another calibration point, you would consider ecstacy to a higher moral good than, for example, the calm satisfaction of completing a hard day's work, or the joy of mother seeing her newborn after hours of painful labor, or...you get the idea. This leads me to ask you where you moral theory leads you in the case of someone in extreme pain from a terminal disease. Would it be morally better for them to die in order to increase net pleasure in the world, or do you see them as contributing some small absolute amount of pleasure (despite their pain) which would be lost if they died? I'm glad to see we seem to be using "scope" in the same way. ? > Jef writes: >> I understand you are claiming that morality is >> measured with respect to pleasure integrated over >> all sentient beings, right? Do you also integrate >> over all time? So that which provides the greatest >> pleasure for the greatest number for the greatest >> time is the most moral? ? > Fundamentally, yes. However, this does not necessarily > imply that one must inexorably commit immoral acts > against other sentients in order to achieve this goal. I understand that you claim that pleasure is the ultimate measure of morality, but your statement above seems to say that you think that there may be other measures of morality (possibly higher) that might come into conflict with increasing pleasure. Doesn't your statement above seem to contradict your thesis? ? > Jef writes: >> I assume you acknowledge the necessity of some short >> term sacrifice of pleasure in order to achieve the >> greater pleasure. How do you see that working in >> principle? ? > Well, we are dealing in abstract ideals and not in the > grit of reality. However, achieving the "greater pleasure" > does not inevitably require imposing suffering, or a loss > of pleasure, or a?loss of capacity for pleasure?on any > *other* sentient beings. For example, if 99% of hard > working Americans chose to donate $30.00 to the advancement > of altruistic AGI, well... good things would probably happen.? ? > Now donating that $30.00 may necessitate that a donor remain > at his crappy job that he hates, but he always retains the > choice not to donate and not to work, if he so chooses. It's > a willful sacrifice. It almost seems as if you saying that the freedom to choose is a greater moral good than actual pleasure (which of course I would agree with). So if you believe that the level of the world's pleasure over extended time is the ultimate measure of morality, would you therefore consider it a moral improvement if all currently living humans would sacrifice their current standard of living and invest their time and resources soley to increase the pleasure of future generations? This form of leverage should certainly result in greater pleasure for greater numbers over greater time, but it would violate many of my moral values. If you feel somehow that extrapolating to the future in such a way is not valid, then how about this scenario: Would your belief in pleasure as the ultimate measure of morality compel us to to adopt a form of willing slavery, where some people (say selected by lottery) would enjoy the labors of people who would otherwise be unemployed and unproductive members of society, as long as the "slaves" are given a constant supply of pleasure-inducing drugs? It seems all parties could have more pleasure in such a system, although at loss of what I consider greater moral values. Yes, these examples are extreme, but it's at the edges where we find out it a concept really holds up to its promise. ? > Jef writes: >> Based on your reasoning, if 50 percent of the population >> are feeling less than average pleasure, would it be a moral >> good to eliminate them from the population in order to raise >> the overall level of pleasure? ? > No, definitely not. A more moral action would be to lift the > lower 50% out of their unhappiness. Perhaps I could make my > original statement more applicable by saying: > Pleasing oneself only becomes arguably immoral or ammoral?when > the cost of the self-pleasure is a loss of pleasure in other > sentients, a gain in suffering of other sentients, or a loss > of capacity for pleasure in other sentients. So, based on your statement above, would you reason that it would be a moral good to increase the population of sentients as much as possible, despite the unavoidable economic difficulties so that these poor people could exist like many other poor people in the world, each of them adding an additional increment of pleasure? If, as I'm guessing, you're not comfortable with decreasing *or* increasing the number of sentients purely in order to increase the level of pleasure, then wouldn't this seem to tell us that increasing pleasure is not truly your fundamental and ultimate measure of morality? ? > In this case, if you were to kill the lower 50% you'd be > bringing their capacity for subjective pleasure down to zero, > in addition to eliminating whatever low level of pleasure that > they did manage to experience to begin with. ? Jeffrey, I've tried to show you some of the obvious inconsistencies in a system of morality based on pleasure. You're in good company as many philosophers have held to the same idea. You can find many arguments pro and con if you search "utilitarian ethics", and it's ultimately incoherent in my opinion. I could give you a more coherent view of morality, but you haven't asked why I made the statement that statement that you find disagreeable. - Jef From jef at jefallbright.net Fri Feb 2 00:09:29 2007 From: jef at jefallbright.net (Jef Allbright) Date: Thu, 1 Feb 2007 16:09:29 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Pleasing Oneself In-Reply-To: <56782.86.130.30.87.1170369850.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> References: <380-220072411391841@M2W020.mail2web.com> <56782.86.130.30.87.1170369850.squirrel@webmail.csc.kth.se> Message-ID: Anders wrote: > The highest forms of happiness occur when we are participating > totally in > something and using all our being to bring it about, be it cooking, > climbing a mountain or solving a problem. At this level the > pleasure > sensation becomes less important than the happiness: it is actually > not > very pleasant to sit up all night hacking away at some great piece > of > code, but the happiness it brings is indeed supreme and lasting. > Happiness > tend to accompany doing things that makes us extend ourselves as > beings. > > >From this perspective striving for happiness might be both a goal > and a > means. It is the transhuman thing to do. Anders, I agree with your point, similar to that expressed so well by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi and called flow. I would, however, encourage people to avoid the traditional default concepts of goals and means, which, despite their comforting familiarity, carry an implicit assumption of a dualistic self. It's more coherent and conducive to longer-range thinking to view this flow experience as the natural and expected condition of a reflexive system that is fully expressing its values. Rather than the paradoxical collapsing of goals and means that you mentioned, dictated by classical thinking in this area (never mind what priveledged party is supposedly able to observe and assess these goals and means) we, and all other agents act in order to minimize the perceived difference between our values and the environment. Goals are only an epiphenomenon. - Jef From jef at jefallbright.net Fri Feb 2 00:28:58 2007 From: jef at jefallbright.net (Jef Allbright) Date: Thu, 1 Feb 2007 16:28:58 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Outlook spell checking! Message-ID: Does anyone here know why Outlook 2007 would go through all the motions of checking and correcting spelling errors and then just go ahead and send the original uncorrected text? It's been happening to me for a while and it's embarrassing. Yeah, I know "Don't use Outlook." I'm working on that... - Jef From hkhenson at rogers.com Fri Feb 2 02:01:43 2007 From: hkhenson at rogers.com (Keith Henson) Date: Thu, 01 Feb 2007 21:01:43 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Elvis Sightings Message-ID: <5.1.0.14.0.20070201210037.03b72878@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> At 08:40 PM 2/1/2007 +0100, you wrote: >On Thu, Feb 01, 2007 at 02:26:26PM -0500, Ben Goertzel wrote: > > > I welcome arguments on the reality of cold fusion with anyone who is > > familiar with the relevant scientific literature. > >You got me sufficiently interested to try the book (unfortunately, >it's ridiculously expensive on amazon.de). Try interlibrary loan if the local library does not have a copy. Keith Henson From avantguardian2020 at yahoo.com Fri Feb 2 02:22:57 2007 From: avantguardian2020 at yahoo.com (The Avantguardian) Date: Thu, 1 Feb 2007 18:22:57 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Indifference (was Coin Flip Paradox) In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <9980.25050.qm@web60524.mail.yahoo.com> --- gts wrote: > Think about it (and you too, Jef)... > > On what logical grounds can proposition A imply or > entail proposition B? > > A: "No information is available about the true > probabilities of the two > possible outcomes X and Y." > > B: "Outcomes X and Y are therefore equiprobable." > > Does A imply B, logically? I think not! If you or > Jef can show me > otherwise then please do. Because an empty scale will balance too, Gordon. Let me try to explain it to you from a frequentist point of view. I will assume that you are a very detailed oriented person because if you weren't, I don't think we would be having this conversation. So let me get a few key assumptions out of the way: 1. P(X) is the unknown *true probability* of X. (The Bayesian in me shudders at this, but I will try to argue this one from a frequentist stand point.) 2. X and Y are mutually exclusive. i.e. P(X|Y)=P(Y|X)=0 3. If X doesn't happen, then Y will happen or put another way, Y is the "non-occurance" of X or Y = X'. i.e. P(Y)=P(X')=1-P(X) 4. There exists a set S of all possible events and their "non-occurances" that may or may not happen i.e. {E1, E2, E3 ... En} & {E1',E2',E3' ... En'}. This gigantic, possibly infinite, set would include very rare events like you winning the lotto or getting hit by lightning and very likely events like the sun rising tomorrow or you taking a breath in the next hour as well as everything in between like whether a traffic light will turn red before you get to an intersection or not. 5. Every element Ei of S has a characteristic *true probability* P(Ei) that governs how likely it is to occur as well as a converse probability P(Ei')=1-P(Ei) which governs how likely it is to NOT occur. 6. Event X and its converse Y are elements of the set S. Now that we have all our assumptions explicitly stated, let's get to the logic. Now let us say that we want to try to estimate the *true probability* of X but we have no data regarding what that probability might be. So let us assign the probability of X a random variable P(X). Now we have no idea what the shape of the distribution of P(X) might be but we do know that it is a real number that lies somewhere on the interval [0,1]. So now what a frequentist would do is start drawing pairs of elements as samples from the set S and measure their *true probabilities*. Lets say on the first draw you get E1 and E2 with P1 and P2 of .0001 and .75 respectively. Then on the next draw you get E3 and E1' with P3 and P1' of .985 and .9999. Then on the next you draw you get E2' and E3' with probability .25 and .015 repectively. Next you calculate the average of the probabilities that you get in each draw: Average of draw 1: (.0001+.75)/2=.37505 Average of draw 2: (.985+.9999)/2=.99245 Average of draw 3: (.25+.015)/2=.1325 Now you calculate the mean average you get with your draws: (.37505+.99245+.1325)/3= .5 Now admittedly I rigged this particular example to come out at exactly .5 but do you not see that if the set of everything that can happen or not includes every event and its converse then for every probability P(E) there exists P'(E')=1-P(E). So if you take enough samples of specific events and measure their average probability (relative frequency at infinity) you cannot help but get .5 as the average probability of SOMETHING happening at all. This is guaranteed by the Law of Large Numbers and the Central Limit Theorem just like Von Mises' results were. So if you don't have any information regarding what the *true probability* of a specific event is, then it only makes sense that you assign it the average probability of *all possible events* or .5 because you will be within one standard deviation of the *true probability* 2/3rds of the time. That concludes my sloppy logical proof of the Principle of Indifference using frequentist rationale. I like Jef, am tired of discussing the Priciple of Indifference with you. If this doesn't convince you, you will just have to go through life not believeing in the Principle of Indifference. :) Other topics in the category of probability/randomness however are fine. Stuart LaForge alt email: stuart"AT"ucla.edu "If we all did the things we are capable of doing, we would literally astound ourselves." - Thomas Edison ____________________________________________________________________________________ Looking for earth-friendly autos? Browse Top Cars by "Green Rating" at Yahoo! Autos' Green Center. http://autos.yahoo.com/green_center/ From nvitamore at austin.rr.com Fri Feb 2 01:28:10 2007 From: nvitamore at austin.rr.com (nvitamore at austin.rr.com) Date: Thu, 1 Feb 2007 20:28:10 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Immortal - unmortal, amortal, emortal Message-ID: <380-2200725212810225@M2W007.mail2web.com> I was looking over a couple of posts from times past (2002) and came accross this cut and paste at the Immortality website: ">>gts wrote: >>>Robert Bradbury has suggested in light of this thread that we should >>>coin a new term to replace "immortality." I think it's a grand idea. >>On Wed, 4 Sep 2002, Eliezer S. Yudkowsky wrote: >>I think the word you may be looking for is 'amortal'. [snip] >Robert Bradbury writes: >I'll note that Damien has suggested in other messages 'emortal'. >In thinking about the evolution of possible vectors further it >seems to me one might also use 'unmortal' (in more the English >sense than the derived greek sense)." What was the outcome? I like emortal. Thoughts? Natasha -------------------------------------------------------------------- mail2web.com ? Enhanced email for the mobile individual based on Microsoft? Exchange - http://link.mail2web.com/Personal/EnhancedEmail From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Fri Feb 2 04:16:46 2007 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Thu, 1 Feb 2007 23:16:46 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Immortal - unmortal, amortal, emortal In-Reply-To: <380-2200725212810225@M2W007.mail2web.com> References: <380-2200725212810225@M2W007.mail2web.com> Message-ID: On 2/1/07, nvitamore at austin.rr.com wrote: > > > What was the outcome? I like emortal. Thoughts? I think its a question of taste. There was a similar discussion on the GRG list sometime in the last few months and there were many points of view raised (immortal, indefinite longevity, unlimited lifespan, ...). I don't think it will be resolved until someone with the "throw weight" to implant a term in many minds uses it in a number of public forums. (And uses the "term" in a sense that all can agree on.) You could probably compare this topic with the discussion that astronomers have about what to classify Pluto as (planet, minor planet, failed planet, KBO, ...). At least the astronomers know precisely *what* they are talking about. In the transhumanist ... human collective mindset range there is much less precision over exactly what we mean [1]. Robert 1. Taking as a simple examples the divisions over whether one wants ones body+mind, mind alone, contents of ones mind, ones DNA, ones DNA+ones mind, ones enhanced DNA+ones enhanced mind, ones recreated DNA, ones recreated mind, ... to survive for period X where X may range from hundreds to trillions of years. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://lists.extropy.org/pipermail/extropy-chat/attachments/20070201/038ca1a1/attachment.html From sentience at pobox.com Fri Feb 2 04:31:42 2007 From: sentience at pobox.com (Eliezer S. Yudkowsky) Date: Thu, 01 Feb 2007 20:31:42 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Immortal - unmortal, amortal, emortal In-Reply-To: References: <380-2200725212810225@M2W007.mail2web.com> Message-ID: <45C2BEAE.2000908@pobox.com> We could just call ourselves the Q. -- Eliezer S. Yudkowsky http://singinst.org/ Research Fellow, Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence From avantguardian2020 at yahoo.com Fri Feb 2 04:39:40 2007 From: avantguardian2020 at yahoo.com (The Avantguardian) Date: Thu, 1 Feb 2007 20:39:40 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Immortal - unmortal, amortal, emortal In-Reply-To: <380-2200725212810225@M2W007.mail2web.com> Message-ID: <83316.76280.qm@web60519.mail.yahoo.com> --- "nvitamore at austin.rr.com" wrote: > >Robert Bradbury writes: > >I'll note that Damien has suggested in other > messages 'emortal'. > > >In thinking about the evolution of possible vectors > further it > >seems to me one might also use 'unmortal' (in more > the English > >sense than the derived greek sense)." > > What was the outcome? I like emortal. Thoughts? Hey Natasha, I have a late entry: 'optimortal'. As in you die when you opt to. ;) Stuart LaForge alt email: stuart"AT"ucla.edu "If we all did the things we are capable of doing, we would literally astound ourselves." - Thomas Edison ____________________________________________________________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? Everyone is raving about the all-new Yahoo! Mail beta. http://new.mail.yahoo.com From jonkc at att.net Fri Feb 2 05:08:52 2007 From: jonkc at att.net (John K Clark) Date: Fri, 2 Feb 2007 00:08:52 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Elvis Sightings References: <9B6F2939-30AC-48C6-96FF-B48C7C234BAA@goertzel.org><45BF997F.2000109@pobox.com><001c01c744b6$b482dc00$6e074e0c@MyComputer><7.0.1.0.2.20070130180555.0261aa88@satx.rr.com><001e01c74500$ff13c230$de064e0c@MyComputer><001d01c74560$2abee900$dd084e0c@MyComputer><002d01c74623$8d616b00$a2054e0c@MyComputer><3cf171fe0702010918g44819bb2mccb012150b21ed5e@mail.gmail.com><006101c7462e$f5291a20$a2054e0c@MyComputer> Message-ID: <001801c74688$3f21e130$ed044e0c@MyComputer> Ben Goertzel" > Beaudette's book gives an excellent guide Excellent? How did you determine the book was excellent ? What reason do you have for thinking even any of the facts it touts actually happened as advertised? I have no reason to think any of the experiments he describes were even were performed, much less done competently and honestly. The only thing I know about this Beaudette person is that he knows how to type. > to the scientific literature on the topic. There is no literature on this topic, there is only pulp fiction. > You are ignorant on this topic. I am less so. Having encyclopedic knowledge of Bullshit is no virtue. And I have my faults but I'll tell you one thing, I'm not astronomically gullible. > I have more interesting things to do with my time No you do not; not if you have the time to read junk science. John K Clark From jonkc at att.net Fri Feb 2 05:21:20 2007 From: jonkc at att.net (John K Clark) Date: Fri, 2 Feb 2007 00:21:20 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Elvis Sightings References: <3cf171fe0702010918g44819bb2mccb012150b21ed5e@mail.gmail.com><006101c7462e$f5291a20$a2054e0c@MyComputer> <20070201194006.GE21677@leitl.org> Message-ID: <011001c74689$fd32d7a0$ed044e0c@MyComputer> Eugen* Leitl Wrote: > I concur with John that it's >99% likely it's sloppy experimentation I think you are being far too optimistic, or perhaps you were just being kind. Either Science and Nature are full of shit and have been for 17 years, and all the most cited Physics Journals are full of shit, and all the Nobel Prize Physicists (except Brian Josephson) are full of shit, OR, its Mr. Beaudette who has an excess of fecal material. I wouldn't give you a billion to one odds. Save your money Eugen. John K Clark From thespike at satx.rr.com Fri Feb 2 06:07:58 2007 From: thespike at satx.rr.com (Damien Broderick) Date: Fri, 02 Feb 2007 00:07:58 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] Elvis Sightings In-Reply-To: <011001c74689$fd32d7a0$ed044e0c@MyComputer> References: <3cf171fe0702010918g44819bb2mccb012150b21ed5e@mail.gmail.com> <006101c7462e$f5291a20$a2054e0c@MyComputer> <20070201194006.GE21677@leitl.org> <011001c74689$fd32d7a0$ed044e0c@MyComputer> Message-ID: <7.0.1.0.2.20070202000010.025fc550@satx.rr.com> At 12:21 AM 2/2/2007 -0500, John K Clark wrote: >Either Science and Nature are full of shit and have been for 17 years, >and all the most cited Physics Journals are full of shit, and all the Nobel >Prize Physicists (except Brian Josephson) are full of shit John, how do you square this absolute and apoplectic certainty concerning the wisdom of these gatekeepers with their attitude toward, say, potential drexlerian molecular manufacture (something you've defended with equal spirited vehemence for more than a decade even as Nobelists like Smalley jeered and denounced it), or the value of cryonics (has this topic been received enthusiastically by the arbiters of all true knowledge?), or the prospect of a technological Singularity? How full of shit do these journals and editors have to be to spurn ideas you apparently embrace as well-founded? Damien Broderick From avantguardian2020 at yahoo.com Fri Feb 2 06:52:55 2007 From: avantguardian2020 at yahoo.com (The Avantguardian) Date: Thu, 1 Feb 2007 22:52:55 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Pleasing Oneself In-Reply-To: <979346.71747.qm@web37405.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <197215.32923.qm@web60512.mail.yahoo.com> --- A B wrote: > To clear up any possible confusion, I did not > intend this post or thread name to exclusively imply > sexual self-satisfaction, but rather any activity > that provides oneself with pleasure; from watching > TV to decoding the Universe. Although in principle, > I don't see anything morally wrong with sexual > self-satisfaction. FWIW: http://jama.ama-assn.org/cgi/content/abstract/291/13/1578 Relevant quote: "However, high ejaculation frequency was related to decreased risk of total prostate cancer." In my opinion, it would be morally wrong not to. ;) Stuart LaForge alt email: stuart"AT"ucla.edu "If we all did the things we are capable of doing, we would literally astound ourselves." - Thomas Edison ____________________________________________________________________________________ Be a PS3 game guru. Get your game face on with the latest PS3 news and previews at Yahoo! Games. http://videogames.yahoo.com/platform?platform=120121 From scerir at libero.it Fri Feb 2 07:29:28 2007 From: scerir at libero.it (scerir) Date: Fri, 2 Feb 2007 08:29:28 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] random links References: <200702012322.l11NMWOg012779@andromeda.ziaspace.com> Message-ID: <002301c7469b$e017cd80$64bf1f97@archimede> "spike": > > Prime numbers peep in. > > http://www.arxiv.org/abs/quant-ph/0212084 > But this link isn't about prime numbers, [...] Yes, Zelinger's paper is about information, quantum, and related philosophies. But the quote below comes from that paper. "How to define the total information content of more complex systems? In a n-dimensional Hilbert space, one needs n^2 -1 real parameters to specify a general density matrix rho, which must be hermitean and have Trace(rho) = 1. Since measurements within a particular basis set can yield only n - 1 independent probabilities (the sum of all probabilities for all possible outcomes in an individual experiment is one), one needs n + 1 distinct basis sets to provide the required total number of n^2 - 1 independent probabilities. Ivanovic (1981) showed that the required number n + 1 of unbiased basis sets indeed exists if n is a prime number." The existence of unbiased basis sets is interesting both for fundamental reasons (is a quantum mechanics without probability amplitudes possible?) and for the construction of quantum-information protocols (key distributions based on a large number of unbiased basis sets may have advantages over key distributions based on qubits). So prime numbers peep in both for fundamental reasons and for 'technological' reasons. (But at least the latter is difficult stuff for me). s. From ben at goertzel.org Fri Feb 2 13:41:45 2007 From: ben at goertzel.org (Ben Goertzel) Date: Fri, 2 Feb 2007 08:41:45 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Elvis Sightings In-Reply-To: <001801c74688$3f21e130$ed044e0c@MyComputer> References: <9B6F2939-30AC-48C6-96FF-B48C7C234BAA@goertzel.org><45BF997F.2000109@pobox.com><001c01c744b6$b482dc00$6e074e0c@MyComputer><7.0.1.0.2.20070130180555.0261aa88@satx.rr.com><001e01c74500$ff13c230$de064e0c@MyComputer><001d01c74560$2abee900$dd084e0c@MyComputer><002d01c74623$8d616b00$a2054e0c@MyComputer><3cf171fe0702010918g44819bb2mccb012150b21ed5e@mail.gmail.com><006101c7462e$f5291a20$a2054e0c@MyComputer> <001801c74688$3f21e130$ed044e0c@MyComputer> Message-ID: On Feb 2, 2007, at 12:08 AM, John K Clark wrote: > Ben Goertzel" > >> Beaudette's book gives an excellent guide > > Excellent? How did you determine the book was excellent ? It presented complex information clearly, and served as a good guide to the more technical research literature (published journal papers, and conference papers), which I also dug into a bit. For links into the literature, a starting-point is: http://www.lenr-canr.org/ http://www.lenr-canr.org/LibFrame1.html > What reason do you > have for thinking even any of the facts it touts actually happened as > advertised? I agree, it could be the case that dozens of researchers at various university labs over the last 17 years have falsified their CF experiments and corresponding journal and conference publications, through dishonesty or mass insanity. It could also be the case that the Moon landing was falsified, and humans never really went to the moon. I never saw the Moon landing myself in person, nor personally talked to anyone who did -- I just watched it on TV, and read about it. I could be a brain floating in a vat filled with LSD, cayenne pepper and cream cheese, hallucinating I'm sitting at a desk typing on a computer... etc. etc. If CF is wrong, I don't think mass dishonesty or insanity is the best explanation, actually. The published CF experiments that appear to confirm the production of excess heat, have been done using a wide variety of experimental setups and calorimetric apparatus. It is certainly possible that there are strange, systematic errors in this wide variety of calorimetric apparatus, which are not understood by any current practitioners of calorimetry. However, based on my review of the literature, this seems less likely to me than the actual reality of the CF phenomenon. I am not sure why you find it so bizarre to imagine that some kind of non-binary nuclear fusion (multiple nuclei fusing, rather than pairwise fusion) could exist, when the right materials are sufficiently compressed together in the right conditions and enough charge is passed through them. There is certainly nothing in basic physics that prohibits this, as our current understanding of nuclear physics is based on a lot of crude approximations. Perturbation theory is not exact, and so far as I know no one has done any extremely detailed computer simulations of the conditions that exist inside the cell during CF experiments. -- Ben From spike66 at comcast.net Fri Feb 2 13:48:32 2007 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Fri, 2 Feb 2007 05:48:32 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] nanomachine In-Reply-To: <002301c7469b$e017cd80$64bf1f97@archimede> Message-ID: <200702021349.l12DnDfU013931@andromeda.ziaspace.com> It isn't clear what this guy is talking about, but sounds interesting: http://www.cnn.com/2007/TECH/02/01/nanomachine.reut/index.html spike From eugen at leitl.org Fri Feb 2 14:35:27 2007 From: eugen at leitl.org (Eugen Leitl) Date: Fri, 2 Feb 2007 15:35:27 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] Elvis Sightings In-Reply-To: References: <001801c74688$3f21e130$ed044e0c@MyComputer> Message-ID: <20070202143527.GV21677@leitl.org> On Fri, Feb 02, 2007 at 08:41:45AM -0500, Ben Goertzel wrote: > For links into the literature, a starting-point is: > > http://www.lenr-canr.org/ > http://www.lenr-canr.org/LibFrame1.html I'm reading through it (what's available as full text, that is), and it's appallingly bad science so far. Hopefully I'll find more time to explain why this rubs me the wrong way. Here's a 17 page excerpt from Beaudette, if one wants to see whether the book is worth buying: http://www.lenr-canr.org/acrobat/BeaudetteCexcessheat.pdf -- 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: not available Type: application/pgp-signature Size: 191 bytes Desc: Digital signature Url : http://lists.extropy.org/pipermail/extropy-chat/attachments/20070202/c3c99ab1/attachment.bin From scerir at libero.it Fri Feb 2 14:13:15 2007 From: scerir at libero.it (scerir) Date: Fri, 2 Feb 2007 15:13:15 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] nanomachine References: <200702021349.l12DnDfU013931@andromeda.ziaspace.com> Message-ID: <000e01c746d4$4b195170$d1b81f97@archimede> > It isn't clear what this guy is talking about, but sounds interesting: > http://www.cnn.com/2007/TECH/02/01/nanomachine.reut/index.html > spike See also http://physicsweb.org/articles/news/11/1/26 http://www.chem.ed.ac.uk/staff/leigh.html but, wait, there is another virtual paramachine here! http://www.arxiv.org/abs/cond-mat/0701641 (I do not remember the name of the extrope who was interested in those Casimir machine) From amara at amara.com Fri Feb 2 15:02:39 2007 From: amara at amara.com (Amara Graps) Date: Fri, 2 Feb 2007 16:02:39 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] Penn and Teller on the Moon Hoax Message-ID: Penn and Teller on the Moon Hoax http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=so2FmHB-R58&eurl= (hilarious!) Amara -- Amara Graps, PhD www.amara.com INAF Istituto di Fisica dello Spazio Interplanetario (IFSI), Roma, ITALIA Associate Research Scientist, Planetary Science Institute (PSI), Tucson From gts_2000 at yahoo.com Fri Feb 2 15:45:08 2007 From: gts_2000 at yahoo.com (gts) Date: Fri, 02 Feb 2007 10:45:08 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Indifference (was Coin Flip Paradox) In-Reply-To: <9980.25050.qm@web60524.mail.yahoo.com> References: <9980.25050.qm@web60524.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: A couple of things, Stu: 1) We're getting ahead of ourselves here; you posted at least two or three messages in the last two or three days to which I have not yet fully responded. As a result I think you are operating under the false assumption, among other things, that I am here trying to defend frequentism against Bayesianism. I am not. However I was defending frequentism against what I perceived as your false criticisms, e.g., your strange idea that contrary to theory, frequencies "orbit chaotically". The frequency theory deserves a fair hearing. So does the propensity theory, for that matter, which we've still barely touched on. 2) As I mentioned yesterday in private email, I worry that people here are getting annoyed with these debates about probability theory, mainly because Eugen has rung the warning bell not just once but twice now. I don't agree with that style of list management. As far as I can tell we are not flaming each other or doing anything else inappropriate and so we should be free to continue without questions and interruptions by the list managers. However I suspect nobody really cares what I think about list management. It might be time to drop the subject or take it elsewhere. I'm disappointed about this, but again this isn't about me. A similar thread exists on Ben's AGI list, on which this subject is welcome in so much as it relates to programming AI, so perhaps that would be the place to take it. Are you a subscriber there? In the meantime I've got you on the CC. That being said, I appreciate your contributions and your post deserves an answer... > That concludes my sloppy logical proof of the > Principle of Indifference using frequentist rationale. Because of 2) above I am reluctant to go into detail here as to the reason any such argument must fail, except to remind you that the frequency theory is an objectivist, non-epistemic account of probability in which the epistemic principle of indifference is irrelevant and nonsensical. That is, under frequentism the principle it is not even untrue, much less true. A proper proof would be by formal logic, (an epistemic endeavor), which I maintain is impossible. You simply cannot prove that total ignorance about the true state of nature gives one any real justification for assigning equal (or unequal) probabilities to each of the possible states of nature. This is so because ignorance does not imply knowledge. So when we invoke the principle of indifference, we do so without any formal justification. > If this doesn't convince you, you will just have to go through life not > believeing > in the Principle of Indifference. :) In that case I would go through life in good company, including the company of subjective Bayesians who know better than to imagine logical truth where none exists. -gts From jonkc at att.net Fri Feb 2 17:51:05 2007 From: jonkc at att.net (John K Clark) Date: Fri, 2 Feb 2007 12:51:05 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Elvis Sightings References: <9B6F2939-30AC-48C6-96FF-B48C7C234BAA@goertzel.org><45BF997F.2000109@pobox.com><001c01c744b6$b482dc00$6e074e0c@MyComputer><7.0.1.0.2.20070130180555.0261aa88@satx.rr.com><001e01c74500$ff13c230$de064e0c@MyComputer><001d01c74560$2abee900$dd084e0c@MyComputer><002d01c74623$8d616b00$a2054e0c@MyComputer><3cf171fe0702010918g44819bb2mccb012150b21ed5e@mail.gmail.com><006101c7462e$f5291a20$a2054e0c@MyComputer><001801c74688$3f21e130$ed044e0c@MyComputer> Message-ID: <00fe01c746f2$e8c62c40$10084e0c@MyComputer> "Ben Goertzel" > It could also be the case that the Moon landing was falsified, and > humans never really went to the moon. I believe people went to the moon for the same reason I believe most of what I read in Science and Nature, people I know and respect vouch for it. I've never heard of any of these cold fusion people, and none in the scientific community that I admire seems to have heard of them either, much less respect them. As I said before I have no reason to thing Mr. Beaudette isn't just a man with a typewriter. John K Clark From jonkc at att.net Fri Feb 2 17:52:16 2007 From: jonkc at att.net (John K Clark) Date: Fri, 2 Feb 2007 12:52:16 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Elvis Sightings References: <3cf171fe0702010918g44819bb2mccb012150b21ed5e@mail.gmail.com><006101c7462e$f5291a20$a2054e0c@MyComputer><20070201194006.GE21677@leitl.org><011001c74689$fd32d7a0$ed044e0c@MyComputer> <7.0.1.0.2.20070202000010.025fc550@satx.rr.com> Message-ID: <00ff01c746f2$e93b0e20$10084e0c@MyComputer> Damien Broderick" > John, how do you square this absolute and apoplectic certainty concerning > the wisdom of these gatekeepers with their attitude toward, say, potential > drexlerian molecular manufacture It's the difference between having a theory and claiming an experimental result. Drexler said, I do not believe my ideas contradict the known laws of Physics so I believe it will actually happen someday; if they had said the same about cold fusion I might not have agreed but I could at least have some respect for them. If Drexler had said "not only is Nanotechnology theoretically possible but I already invented it 17 years ago, and it's only because of an evil conspiracy among all the top sciences journal on the planet that prevents this Good News from being well known" then I would say Drexler is full of shit too. Fortunately Drexler said no such thing. > or the value of cryonics And if Cryonics advocates had said they have been freezing people and bringing them back to life for 17 years with no problem then they too would have fecal material up to their eyebrows. John K Clark From spike66 at comcast.net Fri Feb 2 17:39:13 2007 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Fri, 2 Feb 2007 09:39:13 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Elvis Sightings In-Reply-To: <20070202143527.GV21677@leitl.org> Message-ID: <200702021756.l12HuwqI029539@andromeda.ziaspace.com> > On Fri, Feb 02, 2007 at 08:41:45AM -0500, Ben Goertzel wrote: > > > For links into the literature, a starting-point is: > > > > http://www.lenr-canr.org/ > > http://www.lenr-canr.org/LibFrame1.html On the LENR-CANR site is the following comment: Appeal to readers: spread the word and help bring about a rebirth of interest in cold fusion. This includes responses from the present and previous editors of the Scientific American. Hmmmm. Another puzzler is a comment by A.C. Clarke: Free e-book Cold Fusion and The Future. The future might be better than you think. A. C. Clarke says this book calls for "a reliable Mind-Deboggler." What did he mean by that comment? It can be interpreted a number of ways. 1. Clarke read in the book: the cold fusion community needs "a reliable Mind-Deboggler." 2. Clarke read the book and now needs "a reliable Mind-Deboggler" because he is so amazed. 3. The writers have boggled minds to produce such a book. etc. The site doesn't do much to convince real scientists to study this field methinks. spike From scerir at libero.it Fri Feb 2 18:00:51 2007 From: scerir at libero.it (scerir) Date: Fri, 2 Feb 2007 19:00:51 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] random links References: <200702012322.l11NMWOg012779@andromeda.ziaspace.com> <002301c7469b$e017cd80$64bf1f97@archimede> Message-ID: <000401c746f4$13eca970$66bf1f97@archimede> > So prime numbers peep in both for fundamental reasons > and for 'technological' reasons. (But at least the latter > is difficult stuff for me). > s. There is another connection between QT and prime numbers, that seems even more interesting. http://www.maths.bris.ac.uk/research/highlights/random-m/ s. " My approach to understanding the full implications of G?del's work is mathematically analogous to the ideas of thermodynamics and Boltzmann and statistical mechanics. You might say, not completely seriously, that what I'm proposing is 'thermodynamical epistemology' !" - G. Chaitin From thespike at satx.rr.com Fri Feb 2 18:46:48 2007 From: thespike at satx.rr.com (Damien Broderick) Date: Fri, 02 Feb 2007 12:46:48 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] random links In-Reply-To: <000401c746f4$13eca970$66bf1f97@archimede> References: <200702012322.l11NMWOg012779@andromeda.ziaspace.com> <002301c7469b$e017cd80$64bf1f97@archimede> <000401c746f4$13eca970$66bf1f97@archimede> Message-ID: <7.0.1.0.2.20070202124531.02297ad8@satx.rr.com> At 07:00 PM 2/2/2007 +0100, Serafino wrote: >There is another connection between QT and prime >numbers, that seems even more interesting. >http://www.maths.bris.ac.uk/research/highlights/random-m/ That's really amazing. Of course mathematics starts by abstracting from observed physics, so maybe it's not *so* surprising... Damien Broderick From gts_2000 at yahoo.com Fri Feb 2 20:28:00 2007 From: gts_2000 at yahoo.com (gts) Date: Fri, 02 Feb 2007 15:28:00 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Indifference (was Coin Flip Paradox) In-Reply-To: References: <9980.25050.qm@web60524.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: This little blurb is so cogent that it must be mentioned here: "Evidently we require [in order to correctly invoke the supposed principle of indifference] not mere absence of knowledge of reasons favoring one alternative over another, but knowledge of the absence of such reasons." Some people confuse 'absence of knowledge of reasons' with 'knowledge of absence of reasons'. http://www.philosophyprofessor.com/philosophies/indifference-principle.php -gts From thespike at satx.rr.com Fri Feb 2 23:54:57 2007 From: thespike at satx.rr.com (Damien Broderick) Date: Fri, 02 Feb 2007 17:54:57 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] Elvis Sightings In-Reply-To: <20070202143527.GV21677@leitl.org> References: <001801c74688$3f21e130$ed044e0c@MyComputer> <20070202143527.GV21677@leitl.org> Message-ID: <7.0.1.0.2.20070202175236.023a3008@satx.rr.com> At 03:35 PM 2/2/2007 +0100, Eugen wrote: > > http://www.lenr-canr.org/LibFrame1.html > >I'm reading through it (what's available as full >text, that is), and it's appallingly bad science so far. Have you looked at papers by Peter Hagelstein yet? Damien Broderick From ben at goertzel.org Sat Feb 3 00:56:11 2007 From: ben at goertzel.org (Ben Goertzel) Date: Fri, 2 Feb 2007 19:56:11 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Elvis Sightings In-Reply-To: <7.0.1.0.2.20070202175236.023a3008@satx.rr.com> References: <001801c74688$3f21e130$ed044e0c@MyComputer> <20070202143527.GV21677@leitl.org> <7.0.1.0.2.20070202175236.023a3008@satx.rr.com> Message-ID: Eugen, Could you elaborate on what you feel is bad about some particular papers? The replications that Beaudette focuses on are the ones by the following researchers: * McKubre * Oriani * Miles * Arata so critiques of their work would be of the most interest to me. I appreciate very much critical comments about the actual science... -- Ben On Feb 2, 2007, at 6:54 PM, Damien Broderick wrote: > At 03:35 PM 2/2/2007 +0100, Eugen wrote: > >>> http://www.lenr-canr.org/LibFrame1.html >> >> I'm reading through it (what's available as full >> text, that is), and it's appallingly bad science so far. > > Have you looked at papers by Peter Hagelstein yet? > > Damien Broderick > > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat From gts_2000 at yahoo.com Sat Feb 3 02:58:03 2007 From: gts_2000 at yahoo.com (gts) Date: Fri, 02 Feb 2007 21:58:03 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Indifference (was Coin Flip Paradox) In-Reply-To: <62c14240702021843i29522bccsa0e0980fc1c389d1@mail.gmail.com> References: <9980.25050.qm@web60524.mail.yahoo.com> <62c14240702021843i29522bccsa0e0980fc1c389d1@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On Fri, 02 Feb 2007 21:43:51 -0500, Mike Dougherty wrote: > Your sentence construction requires parsing of very long strings to > establish idea chunks. These chunks are not easily disambiguated from > the adjacent chunks, so the whole paragraph tends to blur into a less > comprehensible moire of ideas. Ugh! Sorry if my writing is so unclear, Mike. I'll try to work on that! > I'm curious, do you know of a less ambiguous language? Do you think > there would be less language-inherent confusion if you were to explain > these ideas using Lojban++ I don't know Lojban++ but I am certified in C++. I don't think I could discuss philosophy in C++ though. :) >> "Evidently we require [in order to correctly invoke the supposed >> principle of indifference] not mere absence of knowledge of reasons >> favoring one >> alternative over another, but knowledge of the absence of such reasons." >> >> Some people confuse 'absence of knowledge of reasons' with 'knowledge of >> absence of reasons'. The point that author was making is that the principle of indifference might be logically valid in circumstances in which there are *truly* no reasons to prefer or expect one outcome over another, but not in circumstances in which we only *think* there are no such reasons (as is almost always if not absolutely always the case in which people try to invoke it). Does that make sense? > Because of 2) above I am reluctant to go into detail here as to the > reason any such argument must fail, except to remind you that the > frequency > theory is an objectivist, non-epistemic account of probability in which > the epistemic principle of indifference is irrelevant and nonsensical. Simply stated, if the principle of indifference could be proved valid using frequentist arguments as Stu suggested, then frequentists would be objective bayesians instead of frequentists. :) Epistemic concepts such as the principle of indifference have no traction under frequentism, because frequentists eschew epistemic interpretations of probability in favor of their brand of objectivism. Frequentists believe probabilities exist 'out there' in objective reality as opposed to 'in here' in our subjective assessments. -gts From pj at pj-manney.com Sat Feb 3 06:50:23 2007 From: pj at pj-manney.com (pjmanney) Date: Sat, 03 Feb 2007 01:50:23 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] "Wikilobbying" Message-ID: <14773075.870081170485421155.JavaMail.servlet@perfora> >From the font of funny, Mr. Stephen Colbert's take on what happens when democracy comes to information technology: http://www.comedycentral.com/motherload/index.jhtml?ml_video=81454 PJ From scerir at libero.it Sat Feb 3 08:07:58 2007 From: scerir at libero.it (scerir) Date: Sat, 3 Feb 2007 09:07:58 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] random links References: <200702012322.l11NMWOg012779@andromeda.ziaspace.com><002301c7469b$e017cd80$64bf1f97@archimede><000401c746f4$13eca970$66bf1f97@archimede> <7.0.1.0.2.20070202124531.02297ad8@satx.rr.com> Message-ID: <003a01c7476a$6b23c400$06931f97@archimede> > >http://www.maths.bris.ac.uk/research/highlights/random-m/ > > That's really amazing. Of course mathematics starts by abstracting > from observed physics, so maybe it's not *so* surprising... > > Damien Broderick In quantum chaology, I suppose, the usual quantal principles of stability (via quantization; via bounded operators; via fractal behaviours of wavefunctions in space and in time; via revivals; etc.) and evolution (via essential randomness; via finiteness of available information; via contextuality; via nonlocality; etc.) must hold. I would not be surprised if, sometimes, principles of stability and evolution are at work in the kingdom of mathematics. Maybe the question is not only about the 'unreasonable' effectiveness of mathematics in natural sciences http://www.dartmouth.edu/~matc/MathDrama/reading/Wigner.html but also the 'unreasonable' effectiveness of natural sciences in mathematics [1]. s. [1] "Nature is earlier than man, but man is earlier than natural science". -Von Weizsaecker From eugen at leitl.org Sat Feb 3 10:48:59 2007 From: eugen at leitl.org (Eugen Leitl) Date: Sat, 3 Feb 2007 11:48:59 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] Elvis Sightings In-Reply-To: <7.0.1.0.2.20070202175236.023a3008@satx.rr.com> References: <001801c74688$3f21e130$ed044e0c@MyComputer> <20070202143527.GV21677@leitl.org> <7.0.1.0.2.20070202175236.023a3008@satx.rr.com> Message-ID: <20070203104859.GJ21677@leitl.org> On Fri, Feb 02, 2007 at 05:54:57PM -0600, Damien Broderick wrote: > Have you looked at papers by Peter Hagelstein yet? Yes, but my beef is with the experiments. I'm not sure there's an anomaly to explain. What's needed is experimental proof of excess heat. http://www.lenr-canr.org/acrobat/Hagelsteinsummaryofi.pdf contains plenty of claims which are trivial to reproduce. Each one of these claims would be enough for a Nobel prize. This is pretty old stuff, why did they stop? You don't need a large budget, and you could do it in your cellar. So why did they stop? -- 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: not available Type: application/pgp-signature Size: 191 bytes Desc: Digital signature Url : http://lists.extropy.org/pipermail/extropy-chat/attachments/20070203/1a978b03/attachment.bin From ben at goertzel.org Sat Feb 3 11:44:02 2007 From: ben at goertzel.org (Ben Goertzel) Date: Sat, 3 Feb 2007 06:44:02 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Elvis Sightings In-Reply-To: <20070203104859.GJ21677@leitl.org> References: <001801c74688$3f21e130$ed044e0c@MyComputer> <20070202143527.GV21677@leitl.org> <7.0.1.0.2.20070202175236.023a3008@satx.rr.com> <20070203104859.GJ21677@leitl.org> Message-ID: <35950269-582C-4D64-B579-644D9B2250E8@goertzel.org> Eugen, The story that the researchers tell is as follows: 1) The experiments are simple but hard to get right, because when you run the cell for weeks on end, gunk tends to build up inside them so a lot of care needs to be taken 2) In most variants of the experiment, the phenomenon only occurs a certain % of the time. Arata's set-up seems to be an exception, but his set-up is not so easy to run in your garage. The variation appears to be related to the batch of palladium used, which suggests it has to do with impurities in the palladium. So, you have a phenomenon that requires extremely careful set-up, takes a long time to run, and succeeds only a certain percentage of the time. And then, once you've done it and gotten positive results, everyone laughs at you and calls you a MEGA-BULLSHITter anyway... Let's say that you, Eugen Leitl, took the time to replicate the results yourself. Let's say you put in a year of part-time effort on this project, learning the boring little ways of getting the deuterium to load really densely into the palladium, keeping your cell running cleanly and so forth. Then, at the end of the year, what would your result be? Well, it would be just another paper to add to the existing list of replications. How would one more replication, by you, change the situation any? The re-counting of McKubre's experiments in Beaudette's book are instructive, for example. -- Ben On Feb 3, 2007, at 5:48 AM, Eugen Leitl wrote: > On Fri, Feb 02, 2007 at 05:54:57PM -0600, Damien Broderick wrote: > >> Have you looked at papers by Peter Hagelstein yet? > > Yes, but my beef is with the experiments. I'm not sure there's > an anomaly to explain. What's needed is experimental proof > of excess heat. > > http://www.lenr-canr.org/acrobat/Hagelsteinsummaryofi.pdf > contains plenty of claims which are trivial to reproduce. > Each one of these claims would be enough for a Nobel prize. > This is pretty old stuff, why did they stop? You don't > need a large budget, and you could do it in your cellar. > > So why did they stop? > > -- > 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 > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat From george at betterhumans.com Sat Feb 3 13:17:23 2007 From: george at betterhumans.com (George Dvorsky) Date: Sat, 3 Feb 2007 08:17:23 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Fwd: Keith [Henson] Taken into Custody Message-ID: I just got this very disturbing email from Arel. Please do what you can to help. ---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: Arel Lucas Date: Feb 3, 2007 1:47 AM Subject: Keith Taken into Custody To: arellu at gmail.com Writing to myself and bc'ing you all so as not to compromise anybody's address. Don't think I've written any of you yet. Amost too tired to type. Running as fast as I can since around 3 or 3:30 this afternoon when Keith was arrested in Prescott, AZ, supposedly on the bench warrant issued by the judge in 2001 in Riverside County. I can barely think. I gave a nurse his blood pressure meds but haven't heard anything except that the desk clerk told me he had been booked and was in a single cell this evening. So I hope he's safe. The death threats continued unabated, and his last safe house had been visited by police, so we were seeking lawyers and talking about where to go when. They stopped the car of the 2 I own that he usually drives (he's still bankrupt and owns nothing). I'm running on rage. I have nothing else to give me energy. With grief or fear I'd break down. So I choose rage. Damned thing they call a democracy here in this damned country, where he was arrested, convicted and sentenced for picketing. Damned law enforcement that lies, has no brains, will do $cientology's bidding. I may have made some connections that will help him refuse extradition and have his case in California reviewed here in Arizona. The police told me that he can't have a lawyer at the hearing Monday morning, and I can't be there. I was told by a couple of people that it's no good fighting extradition, but when it's a matter of going into a $cientology-controlled jail so they can fulfill their death threats, I'll fight what I can. The damned $cientologists have carried out *every other threat they've made* against him *and* me. So I believe the death threats. Why wouldn't I? I did an oral history with someone in Canada in which she tells me of their murder of a friend of hers. I've seen the look on their smug faces. I've been snarled at by Elliot Abelson, the garbage Mafia lawyer who ran the trial in Hemet. I can use all the advice and help I can get. I will follow him to Riverside as soon as I have any clue he's on his way there. I will make as big a stink as I can. I'm trying to reach press, have given out my phone numbers to anyone who wants details. Please get press involved. If my employers can't take the heat, they'll either fire me or make me resign. The hell with them. I'll have reached the 2nd tier of social security sometime in July. If I can hold out till then I'll get a little more of a pittance. So if you talk to me and I'm mad, well, yes I am. I hate this country that arrests people for picketing and lets the terrorist $cientologists run wild. If I can get him out of jail we'll leave it--for good, if possible. I've lost faith in pretty much everyone and everything--certainly democracy, justice, law enforcement--but that was a long time ago. I'm used to it now. But I'm still mad. Arel (928) 445-4412 (323) 712-5492 From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Sat Feb 3 15:24:37 2007 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Sat, 3 Feb 2007 10:24:37 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Fwd: Keith [Henson] Taken into Custody In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: I have made a call to the Prescott jail (928) 771-3286 and yes it appears that Keith is in custody. The case number appears to be 389486 and he is slated to appear before a judge on Monday Feb 5 regarding the Riverside (Scientology related) warrant. Robert -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://lists.extropy.org/pipermail/extropy-chat/attachments/20070203/42ab11b1/attachment.html From amara at amara.com Sat Feb 3 15:45:28 2007 From: amara at amara.com (Amara Graps) Date: Sat, 3 Feb 2007 16:45:28 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] Fwd: Keith [Henson] Taken into Custody Message-ID: I just wrote Boing Boing, giving them Arel's letter, with a link to his Wikipedia entry, in case they don't know who he is. I suggest that you Robert, also give Boing Boing he Prescott jail information. The more press, and the more information the better chances he has. I'm very worried about Keith's safety. Second thing to do: On another list, Perry suggested to make a blog, like a "Keith Blog" for people to post information. Maybe those of you bloggers can consider (quickly) being a clearinghouse for Keith information, and setting up a blog for him. I don't have experience with such a thing, and I'm pressed for time, getting ready for a trip. Any takers? Amara -- Amara Graps, PhD www.amara.com INAF Istituto di Fisica dello Spazio Interplanetario (IFSI), Roma, ITALIA Associate Research Scientist, Planetary Science Institute (PSI), Tucson From bkdelong at pobox.com Sat Feb 3 16:05:18 2007 From: bkdelong at pobox.com (B.K. DeLong) Date: Sat, 3 Feb 2007 11:05:18 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Fwd: Keith [Henson] Taken into Custody In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: Yeah, Boing Boing would be the best place to get the word out. Someone needs to update his Wikipedia entry: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keith_Henson#Current_status On 2/3/07, Amara Graps wrote: > I just wrote Boing Boing, giving them Arel's letter, with a link > to his Wikipedia entry, in case they don't know who he is. I suggest > that you Robert, also give Boing Boing he Prescott jail information. > The more press, and the more information the better chances he has. > I'm very worried about Keith's safety. > > Second thing to do: On another list, Perry suggested to make a blog, > like a "Keith Blog" for people to post information. Maybe those of you > bloggers can consider (quickly) being a clearinghouse for Keith > information, and setting up a blog for him. I don't have experience > with such a thing, and I'm pressed for time, getting ready for a > trip. Any takers? > > Amara > > -- > > Amara Graps, PhD www.amara.com > INAF Istituto di Fisica dello Spazio Interplanetario (IFSI), Roma, ITALIA > Associate Research Scientist, Planetary Science Institute (PSI), Tucson > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > -- B.K. DeLong (K3GRN) bkdelong at pobox.com +1.617.797.8471 http://www.wkdelong.org Son. http://www.ianetsec.com Work. http://www.bostonredcross.org Volunteer. http://www.carolingia.eastkingdom.org Service. http://bkdelong.livejournal.com Play. PGP Fingerprint: 38D4 D4D4 5819 8667 DFD5 A62D AF61 15FF 297D 67FE FOAF: http://foaf.brain-stream.org From jay.dugger at gmail.com Sat Feb 3 16:11:07 2007 From: jay.dugger at gmail.com (Jay Dugger) Date: Sat, 3 Feb 2007 10:11:07 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] Fwd: Keith [Henson] Taken into Custody In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <5366105b0702030811v1cc895f1s8b3a22871fb62a0d@mail.gmail.com> 09:50 Saturday, 3 February 2007 On 2/3/07, Amara Graps wrote: > I just wrote Boing Boing, giving them Arel's letter, with a link > to his Wikipedia entry, in case they don't know who he is. I suggest > that you Robert, also give Boing Boing he Prescott jail information. > The more press, and the more information the better chances he has. > I'm very worried about Keith's safety. > > Second thing to do: On another list, Perry suggested to make a blog, > like a "Keith Blog" for people to post information. Maybe those of you > bloggers can consider (quickly) being a clearinghouse for Keith > information, and setting up a blog for him. I don't have experience > with such a thing, and I'm pressed for time, getting ready for a > trip. Any takers? > http://www.operatingthetan.com/ hasn't had an update since 23 Sep 2005, and http://www.keithhenson.org/ hasn't had an update since 29 May 2001. Technorati doesn't show much change on "keith henson" yet. As of 09:54, nothing on boingboing either. There now exists a "Free Keith Henson" blog at http://freekeithhenson.blogspot.com/. I created this, but I'd like a volunteer to assume responsibility for it. My employer often has me on the road at short notice and sometimes away from network access. I will keep the blog until someone else volunteers. If anyone wants to join as a group author, please speak up. On the subject of wikipedia updates and blog posts, may I have permission to quote the previous emails of this thread? > Amara > > -- > > Amara Graps, PhD www.amara.com > INAF Istituto di Fisica dello Spazio Interplanetario (IFSI), Roma, ITALIA > Associate Research Scientist, Planetary Science Institute (PSI), Tucson > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > -- Jay Dugger http://jaydugger.suprglu.com Sometimes the delete key serves best. From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Sat Feb 3 16:39:25 2007 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Sat, 3 Feb 2007 16:39:25 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Fwd: Keith [Henson] Taken into Custody In-Reply-To: <5366105b0702030811v1cc895f1s8b3a22871fb62a0d@mail.gmail.com> References: <5366105b0702030811v1cc895f1s8b3a22871fb62a0d@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: Permission granted on my part. I'm not particularly "blog-literate" so feel free to cross-post where you feel it is useful. Robert -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://lists.extropy.org/pipermail/extropy-chat/attachments/20070203/2676ea19/attachment.html From amaraa at gmail.com Sat Feb 3 16:51:55 2007 From: amaraa at gmail.com (Amara D. Angelica) Date: Sat, 3 Feb 2007 11:51:55 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Keith [Henson] Taken into Custody Message-ID: <013801c747b3$9d31e780$640fa8c0@HPMEDIACENTER> > > -----Original Message----- > > From: Arel Lucas [mailto:arellu at gmail.com] > > Sent: Saturday, February 03, 2007 11:35 AM > > To: amaraa at gmail.com > > Subject: Re: FW: [extropy-chat] Fwd: Keith [Henson] Taken into Custody > > > > There is no bail. he was convicted in California and sentenced there. > > he fled California hoping for asylum in Canada in the face of death > > threats that he would die in prison (his initial sentencing hearing > > had to be postponed when it was found that his probation report, which > > was politically influenced in the words of the probation officer, was > > in the hands of the Mafia lawyer who had directed the deputy district > > attorneiy who prosecuted his case. He is a convicted misdemeanant. > > He will be extradited unless we can find a way to refuse or fight > > extradition successfully. When he was about to deported from Canada > > he fled to a series of safe houses. Since police had shown up at the > > last one, we were trying to get representation by attorneys and find > > out his options--if he has any, but no lawyer had even called him > > back, must less agreed to represent him. Unfortunately our story > > sounds crazy. Former $ciclos will, however, back us up. > > > > We need publicity more than anything. Light needs to be shed on his > > situation before he disappears into a jail situaiton in which he has > > been told he would be killed. We need to make sure he gets his meds, > > gets proper care and exercise. I need to be able to get him materials > > for his contact lenses and get him zinc, without which he gets > > bronchitis. (His bronchitis went untreated for most of the 5 days he > > was in custody in Canada while the $ciclos were trying to find some > > way to keep him in jail or have him deported there.) I cannot see > > him. i was told I can't go to his hearing monday morning, and neither > > can he be represented by a lawyer. > > > > This arrest was engineered for a weekend so that representation > > couldn't be had even if we could find someone to believe us, and while > > the only lawyer who might help him (who has himself been ruined and > > rendered homeless by $cientology) is with his family in New Zealand > > and not available by phone or any other way except email, which he > > might not be able to get, since he is using public libraries to pick > > it up. > > > > I repeat what was said once in Chicago a long time ago by a Yippie: > > "Where is this!? Is this Amerika!?" > > > > Arel > > 928-445-4412 > > cell (323) 712-5492 From amara at amara.com Sat Feb 3 16:54:15 2007 From: amara at amara.com (Amara Graps) Date: Sat, 3 Feb 2007 17:54:15 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] Keith [Henson] Taken into Custody Message-ID: Nothing yet on Boing Boing. Maybe they think I'm a kook. Or maybe my crappy FastWeb ISP caused my message to be tagged as SPAM. Or maybe the topic is too dangerous for them. Others here, feel free to write Boing Boing too. http://boingboing.net/suggest.html Perhaps use the Wikipedia entry, as a suggested link. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keith_Henson I think that it is the clearest for an introduction to him. Anyone here on Cryonet? They should know too. Amara -- Amara Graps, PhD www.amara.com INAF Istituto di Fisica dello Spazio Interplanetario (IFSI), Roma, ITALIA Associate Research Scientist, Planetary Science Institute (PSI), Tucson From jef at jefallbright.net Sat Feb 3 17:10:31 2007 From: jef at jefallbright.net (Jef Allbright) Date: Sat, 3 Feb 2007 09:10:31 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Post of the month [Was: random links] In-Reply-To: <003a01c7476a$6b23c400$06931f97@archimede> References: <200702012322.l11NMWOg012779@andromeda.ziaspace.com><002301c7469b$e017cd80$64bf1f97@archimede><000401c746f4$13eca970$66bf1f97@archimede><7.0.1.0.2.20070202124531.02297ad8@satx.rr.com> <003a01c7476a$6b23c400$06931f97@archimede> Message-ID: I would nominate scerir as poster of the month for his paragraph below, so full of import and such high geek. - Jef scerir wrote: > > >http://www.maths.bris.ac.uk/research/highlights/random-m/ > > > > That's really amazing. Of course mathematics starts by > abstracting > > from observed physics, so maybe it's not *so* surprising... > > > > Damien Broderick > > In quantum chaology, I suppose, the usual quantal > principles of stability (via quantization; > via bounded operators; via fractal behaviours > of wavefunctions in space and in time; via > revivals; etc.) and evolution (via essential randomness; > via finiteness of available information; via > contextuality; via nonlocality; etc.) must hold. > I would not be surprised if, sometimes, > principles of stability and evolution > are at work in the kingdom of mathematics. > Maybe the question is not only about the 'unreasonable' > effectiveness of mathematics in natural sciences > http://www.dartmouth.edu/~matc/MathDrama/reading/Wigner.html > but also the 'unreasonable' effectiveness of > natural sciences in mathematics [1]. > s. > > [1] > "Nature is earlier than man, > but man is earlier > than natural science". > -Von Weizsaecker > > > > > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat From bkdelong at pobox.com Sat Feb 3 17:17:57 2007 From: bkdelong at pobox.com (B.K. DeLong) Date: Sat, 3 Feb 2007 12:17:57 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Keith [Henson] Taken into Custody In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: It's 9am on a Sat morning in CA, where most of the staff live. And they're not exactally early-to-bed-ers ;) Give it a few. The word will spread. Send it to Declan Mc., Dan Farber's Interesting People list, Usenet and other places where Keith's plight has usually been discussed. Get the word out to enough of those people and others will begin picking up on it - that includes reporters, television, radio and podcasters who have ever talked about his fight against Scientology. We have to think like a viral marketer ;) The Net is your telephone tree. On 2/3/07, Amara Graps wrote: > Nothing yet on Boing Boing. Maybe they think I'm a kook. Or maybe my > crappy FastWeb ISP caused my message to be tagged as SPAM. Or maybe > the topic is too dangerous for them. > > Others here, feel free to write Boing Boing too. > http://boingboing.net/suggest.html Perhaps use the Wikipedia entry, > as a suggested link. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keith_Henson > I think that it is the clearest for an introduction to him. > > Anyone here on Cryonet? They should know too. > > Amara > > -- > > Amara Graps, PhD www.amara.com > INAF Istituto di Fisica dello Spazio Interplanetario (IFSI), Roma, ITALIA > Associate Research Scientist, Planetary Science Institute (PSI), Tucson > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > -- B.K. DeLong (K3GRN) bkdelong at pobox.com +1.617.797.8471 http://www.wkdelong.org Son. http://www.ianetsec.com Work. http://www.bostonredcross.org Volunteer. http://www.carolingia.eastkingdom.org Service. http://bkdelong.livejournal.com Play. PGP Fingerprint: 38D4 D4D4 5819 8667 DFD5 A62D AF61 15FF 297D 67FE FOAF: http://foaf.brain-stream.org From natasha at natasha.cc Sat Feb 3 16:46:38 2007 From: natasha at natasha.cc (Natasha Vita-More) Date: Sat, 03 Feb 2007 10:46:38 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] Fwd: Keith [Henson] Taken into Custody In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <6.2.1.2.2.20070203104450.02dd1e60@pop-server.austin.rr.com> At 07:17 AM 2/3/2007, George Dvorsky wrote: >I just got this very disturbing email from Arel. Please do what you can to >help. Keith is a long, long time friend of many and this community and we must do what we can to help him and Arel. Natasha Natasha Vita-More 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: http://lists.extropy.org/pipermail/extropy-chat/attachments/20070203/2432fb05/attachment.html From george at betterhumans.com Sat Feb 3 17:37:00 2007 From: george at betterhumans.com (George Dvorsky) Date: Sat, 3 Feb 2007 12:37:00 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] [wta-talk] Fwd: Keith [Henson] Taken into Custody In-Reply-To: <6.2.1.2.2.20070203104450.02dd1e60@pop-server.austin.rr.com> References: <6.2.1.2.2.20070203104450.02dd1e60@pop-server.austin.rr.com> Message-ID: I just sent a personal plea to Cory Doctorow. Hopefully he'll be sympathetic. George From rhanson at gmu.edu Sat Feb 3 16:48:09 2007 From: rhanson at gmu.edu (Robin Hanson) Date: Sat, 03 Feb 2007 11:48:09 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Fwd: Keith [Henson] Taken into Custody In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <0JCW00JDRC09VC80@caduceus1.gmu.edu> I just mentioned Keith's troubles in passing at OvercomingBias.com Robin Hanson rhanson at gmu.edu http://hanson.gmu.edu Research Associate, Future of Humanity Institute at Oxford University Associate Professor of Economics, George Mason University MSN 1D3, Carow Hall, Fairfax VA 22030-4444 703-993-2326 FAX: 703-993-2323 From bkdelong at pobox.com Sat Feb 3 17:51:05 2007 From: bkdelong at pobox.com (B.K. DeLong) Date: Sat, 3 Feb 2007 12:51:05 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] [wta-talk] Fwd: Keith [Henson] Taken into Custody In-Reply-To: <6.2.1.2.2.20070203104450.02dd1e60@pop-server.austin.rr.com> References: <6.2.1.2.2.20070203104450.02dd1e60@pop-server.austin.rr.com> Message-ID: Natasha - do we have a good, one-paragraph summary detailing Keith's contributions to the Transhumanisim movement? Might give a bit more relevance to a posting on all our respective blogs & sites. On 2/3/07, Natasha Vita-More wrote: > > At 07:17 AM 2/3/2007, George Dvorsky wrote: > > > I just got this very disturbing email from Arel. Please do what you can to > help. > Keith is a long, long time friend of many and this community and we must do > what we can to help him and Arel. > > Natasha > > Natasha Vita-More 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 > > > > > > _______________________________________________ > wta-talk mailing list > wta-talk at transhumanism.org > http://www.transhumanism.org/mailman/listinfo/wta-talk > > > -- B.K. DeLong (K3GRN) bkdelong at pobox.com +1.617.797.8471 http://www.wkdelong.org Son. http://www.ianetsec.com Work. http://www.bostonredcross.org Volunteer. http://www.carolingia.eastkingdom.org Service. http://bkdelong.livejournal.com Play. PGP Fingerprint: 38D4 D4D4 5819 8667 DFD5 A62D AF61 15FF 297D 67FE FOAF: http://foaf.brain-stream.org From natasha at natasha.cc Sat Feb 3 17:15:39 2007 From: natasha at natasha.cc (Natasha Vita-More) Date: Sat, 03 Feb 2007 11:15:39 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] Keith [Henson] Taken into Custody In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <6.2.1.2.2.20070203111521.0424c500@pop-server.austin.rr.com> > >Anyone here on Cryonet? They should know too. I'll foward the message now. Natasha >Amara > >-- > >Amara Graps, PhD www.amara.com >INAF Istituto di Fisica dello Spazio Interplanetario (IFSI), Roma, ITALIA >Associate Research Scientist, Planetary Science Institute (PSI), Tucson >_______________________________________________ >extropy-chat mailing list >extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org >http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat From jay.dugger at gmail.com Sat Feb 3 17:57:41 2007 From: jay.dugger at gmail.com (Jay Dugger) Date: Sat, 3 Feb 2007 11:57:41 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] [wta-talk] Fwd: Keith [Henson] Taken into Custody In-Reply-To: References: <6.2.1.2.2.20070203104450.02dd1e60@pop-server.austin.rr.com> Message-ID: <5366105b0702030957h2af6bef7y85484985954e9b42@mail.gmail.com> 11:38 Saturday, 3 February 2007 I called the Prescott Detention Center at the number in Robert's post. The lady who answered told me they had a "Howard Henson" in custody, and that he would appear in court on Monday. More information should be available at MST 1600 Monday, 05 February 2007 from the detention center (jail) or from the court. When you call the jail: 1) Remember you deal with the police. 2) Speak politely. 3) Refer to the case number (389486) and ask for Keith by his full name, Howard Keith Henson. Things to learn: 1) Superior Court's docket, and contact information. I think this information is accurate. anyone care to test? Yavapai County Government: Clerk of Superior Court 120 S Cortez St Prescott, AZ 86303 (928) 771-3312 http://ww2.co.yavapai.az.us/departments/Sct/SctHome.asp 2) Contact information for Keith. 3) Can he receive phone calls or packages? 4) Can he receive vistors? Has he gotten his blood pressure medication? Does he need zinc, or contact lens cleaner, or something to read? (Yes, that last is serious. Jail sucks, for those of you lucky enough to remain ignorant.) Still looking for co-authors and eventually a maintainer for the Free Keith Henson blog. Discussion of the wikipedia article update happens on its Talk page. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Keith_Henson Legal costs will mount soon. Shall we start a collection for it? Paypal account volunteers? Who else can we tell? Glenn Reynolds and Greg Burch come to mind, if they don't already know. -- Jay Dugger http://jaydugger.suprglu.com Sometimes the delete key serves best. From jef at jefallbright.net Sat Feb 3 17:57:56 2007 From: jef at jefallbright.net (Jef Allbright) Date: Sat, 3 Feb 2007 09:57:56 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Keith Henson Taken into Custody In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: Those who have blogs can help by posting their own concise personal statements and including links to http://freekeithhenson.blogspot.com/ as well as http://www.operatingthetan.com/, http://www.keithhenson.org/, and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keith_Henson. Don't rely on reposting text from other blogs, as duplicate text is increasingly ignored by search engine algorithms. Doing so will rapidly influence visibility on Google and other search engines. Please choose wording carefully as the search engine excerpts will be read widely when the entire post may not. This is about visibility, reputation and integrity. - Jef > -----Original Message----- > From: extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org [mailto:extropy-chat- > bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Amara Graps > Sent: Saturday, February 03, 2007 8:54 AM > To: extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > Subject: [extropy-chat] Keith [Henson] Taken into Custody > > Nothing yet on Boing Boing. Maybe they think I'm a kook. Or maybe > my > crappy FastWeb ISP caused my message to be tagged as SPAM. Or maybe > the topic is too dangerous for them. > > Others here, feel free to write Boing Boing too. > http://boingboing.net/suggest.html Perhaps use the Wikipedia > entry, > as a suggested link. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keith_Henson > I think that it is the clearest for an introduction to him. > > Anyone here on Cryonet? They should know too. > > Amara > > -- > > Amara Graps, PhD www.amara.com > INAF Istituto di Fisica dello Spazio Interplanetario (IFSI), Roma, > ITALIA > Associate Research Scientist, Planetary Science Institute (PSI), > Tucson > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat From bkdelong at pobox.com Sat Feb 3 18:05:37 2007 From: bkdelong at pobox.com (B.K. DeLong) Date: Sat, 3 Feb 2007 13:05:37 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] [wta-talk] Fwd: Keith [Henson] Taken into Custody In-Reply-To: <5366105b0702030957h2af6bef7y85484985954e9b42@mail.gmail.com> References: <6.2.1.2.2.20070203104450.02dd1e60@pop-server.austin.rr.com> <5366105b0702030957h2af6bef7y85484985954e9b42@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: Just keep posting this info to the blog so we all are kept abreast and not just those on the lists. On 2/3/07, Jay Dugger wrote: > 11:38 Saturday, 3 February 2007 > > I called the Prescott Detention Center at the number in Robert's post. > The lady who answered told me they had a "Howard Henson" in custody, > and that he would appear in court on Monday. More information should > be available at MST 1600 Monday, 05 February 2007 from the detention > center (jail) or from the court. > > When you call the jail: > > 1) Remember you deal with the police. > 2) Speak politely. > 3) Refer to the case number (389486) and ask for Keith by his full > name, Howard Keith Henson. > > Things to learn: > > 1) Superior Court's docket, and contact information. > > I think this information is accurate. anyone care to test? > > Yavapai County Government: Clerk of Superior Court > 120 S Cortez St > Prescott, AZ 86303 > (928) 771-3312 > > http://ww2.co.yavapai.az.us/departments/Sct/SctHome.asp > > 2) Contact information for Keith. > 3) Can he receive phone calls or packages? > 4) Can he receive vistors? > > Has he gotten his blood pressure medication? Does he need zinc, or > contact lens cleaner, or something to read? (Yes, that last is > serious. Jail sucks, for those of you lucky enough to remain > ignorant.) > > Still looking for co-authors and eventually a maintainer for the Free > Keith Henson blog. Discussion of the wikipedia article update happens > on its Talk page. > > http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Keith_Henson > > Legal costs will mount soon. Shall we start a collection for it? > Paypal account volunteers? > > Who else can we tell? Glenn Reynolds and Greg Burch come to mind, if > they don't already know. > > -- > Jay Dugger > http://jaydugger.suprglu.com > Sometimes the delete key serves best. > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat > -- B.K. DeLong (K3GRN) bkdelong at pobox.com +1.617.797.8471 http://www.wkdelong.org Son. http://www.ianetsec.com Work. http://www.bostonredcross.org Volunteer. http://www.carolingia.eastkingdom.org Service. http://bkdelong.livejournal.com Play. PGP Fingerprint: 38D4 D4D4 5819 8667 DFD5 A62D AF61 15FF 297D 67FE FOAF: http://foaf.brain-stream.org From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Sat Feb 3 18:07:17 2007 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Sat, 3 Feb 2007 18:07:17 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] [wta-talk] Fwd: Keith [Henson] Taken into Custody In-Reply-To: References: <6.2.1.2.2.20070203104450.02dd1e60@pop-server.austin.rr.com> Message-ID: I would propose a strategy. Since it was easy enough for me to get the number of the Prescott police dept. and the jail and the case number. Make this a *hot* topic in AZ before the hearing on Monday. I.e. Why is AZ executing a CA bench warrant? Who contacted police to let them know where Keith was? This should all be available under FOI requests (if people don't answer questions directly.) My interaction with the Jail indicated that did not have a clue as to whom they were holding. If the CoS fingers are in this and behind this, then it is clear that it should be brought into the light. Robert -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://lists.extropy.org/pipermail/extropy-chat/attachments/20070203/93b0b2e4/attachment.html From jonkc at att.net Sat Feb 3 18:02:49 2007 From: jonkc at att.net (John K Clark) Date: Sat, 3 Feb 2007 13:02:49 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Elvis Sightings References: <001801c74688$3f21e130$ed044e0c@MyComputer><20070202143527.GV21677@leitl.org><7.0.1.0.2.20070202175236.023a3008@satx.rr.com><20070203104859.GJ21677@leitl.org> <35950269-582C-4D64-B579-644D9B2250E8@goertzel.org> Message-ID: <003401c747bd$8f8a1210$d3064e0c@MyComputer> "Ben Goertzel" > The experiments are simple but hard to get right One of the greatest understatements of all time! A simple well publicized experiment that was true but imposable to confirm for 17 years would be unprecedented in Science, at least for the last few centuries; I think you'd have to go back to Hero of Alexandria's steam engine or the Baghdad battery, and even then they weren't really well publicized. Ben, let me ask you a purely theoretical question, suppose two fairly well respected scientists had performed a simple experiment and claimed a revolutionary result, and suppose, just for the sake of argument they were wrong. What do you imagine the results would be 17 years later? I would think crackpots would still be repeating it in science fair experiments and they would still be claiming revolutionary results, and I would imagine real scientists would have forgotten about the entire sorry fiasco and moved on to more productive things. Does any of this sound familiar? John K Clark From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Sat Feb 3 18:14:03 2007 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Sat, 3 Feb 2007 18:14:03 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] [wta-talk] Fwd: Keith [Henson] Taken into Custody In-Reply-To: References: <6.2.1.2.2.20070203104450.02dd1e60@pop-server.austin.rr.com> Message-ID: