[ExI] extropy-chat Digest, Vol 63, Issue 11

[spike]

> ...On Behalf Of ben
...
>  >simply enjoy my time off.  No pressure - no deadlines.  
> Ahhhhhhhhhh ...
> 
> 
> Exactly.  I watch people getting in a tizzy as Xmas 
> approaches, and try to persuade them that they don't have to even have
Xmas, if it causes so much stress...

Of course stress can be a great motivator.  It causes people to spend money,
which increases debt, which actually in a sense increases the money supply,
which increases the metrics we have to measuring the health of the economy,
and causes people to have the perception of being in good times vs a
recession.  Capitalism is based on the notion that the health of an economy
is measured by the speed with which currency changes hands, rather than on
the proles actual wellbeing which is more difficult to measure.  Marketing
people depend for their living on causing holiday stress, on making people
feel entitled to gifts not just at Newtonmas but at Valentines Day,
birthdays, anniversaries, and an ever increasing list of occasions.

A pile of debt gets our asses out of our warm beds and into the office
nearly every day, does it not?  

> 
> Spike fnargled:
> 
>>... fnargling elided...
> 
> Hey, maybe we should be doing that!
> 
> Depending on whose calendar you use, we are anywhere between, 
> 50 BS and
> 5 BS (Before Singularity, or, for the more dubious, BBS, 
> because they think the Singularity is BS)...
> Pick your calendar, and let the confusion begin!

Thats the spirit Ben!  Fnargled, I like that word, thanks.  What is up with
you grinches?  Its the soltice season.  Let the fnargling begin!  I command
you to be happy, and to cut up and carry on.  Serious discussion welcome as
well, but fnargling is good now that many of us have time off from our
dreary wage-slave existence.


> 
> Spike again:
> 
>  > It fills me with hope for the future of humanity to see 
> the almighty  > dollar overpower the almighty imaginary creator.
> 
> Awww!
> And here was me eagerly anticipating the advent of the 
> Abundance Economy.  Now I have to dread it because it means a 
> return to God-Squad domination.
> Bugger.
> 
> Ben Zed

Ben keep in mind that the abundance economy will be gradually ushered in by
the scarcity economy and all the usual marketing tools.  The god squad isn't
going to just die and go away peacefully, but rather stage an impressive
fighting retreat.

I have been toying with an idea, that maybe this too is a good thing.
Consider those under the influence of certain drugs, such as marijuana.  I
know not from personal experience, but rather from being told by those who
do know:  stoners are generally peaceful types.  One with a good grass buzz
is unlikely to go seeking a fight, so those people are relatively harmless.
PCP on the other hand mixed with the grass gives a different kind of buzz
that actually creates a more dangerous ape.  Damien, et.al, is this
characterization approximately correct?

If so, let me go on to the notion: that those under the influence of most
religious ideologies are actually more harmless than they would be
otherwise, in terms of being less likely to commit violence.  In that sense,
most religions can be analogous to marijuana, which I have long argued
should be legal.  Of course there may be a major world religion that is more
analogous to PCP, which would make its practitioners more dangerous than
otherwise, so I suppose it is a mixed blessing.  

Is not Christianity is a marijuana of religions?

spike