[ExI] Not Immoral to Want to Be Immortal

[Jef Allbright]

On Fri, Apr 25, 2008 at 9:27 PM, spike <spike66 at att.net> wrote:

>  Which makes one wonder, what if The Price is Right is still around as we
>  approach the singularity.  Does the prevailing singularity theory predict a
>  runaway inflation right before a singularity?  Does currency become
>  meaningless?  Does it remain stable just before, since few anticipate or
>  even understand what is happening at the time?  Is there such a thing as
>  prevailing singularity theory?
>
>  Interesting that I have been reading ExI-chat for well over a decade and SL4
>  for a long time but still can't give convincing answers to these questions.

It may help to consider that the fundamental economics of supply and
demand are as unlikely to change as are the fundamental laws of
physics, but the position of an individual agent within the system is
continuing to change in the direction of decreasing scarcity.
"Pricing" has meaning only in relation to perceived scarcity, and we
can expect that while the overall system will continue to heat up,
humans will perceive a flip from economics of conflict over scarcity
to an economics of cooperation for growth.

What answers do you feel are lacking?  As with the perennial
"problems" of probability, causality, free will, consciousness,
personal identity and morality that so perplex so many "rationalists"
on these lists, righteously conflating rationality with objectivity,
an effective understanding depends on context.   The system will
continue to heat up, but individual awareness won't keep up the pace.

How much would the richest person person of 20 or 50 years ago have
been willing to pay for the health care, entertainment and information
resources we commonly take for granted today?

- Jef