[ExI] "an aboriginal human from 70,000 B.C."

[Stathis Papaioannou]

On 24/03/2008, BillK <pharos at gmail.com> wrote:

> Isn't there a great risk that a posthuman society will think about us
>  ordinary humans in much the same fashion?
>
>  If you were a posthuman scientist, wouldn't you want to try to uplift
>  the children at least, to give them the opportunity to join posthuman
>  society?
>
>  I expect the people in this list will be clamouring at the door 'Me
>  first!  Me first!', but less knowledgeable people might be very
>  reluctant to leave their old ways behind. We can say now that they
>  have their right to choose and should be left alone, and other PC
>  platitudes, but think about it.
>
>  A posthuman will know and experience wonders that at present we can
>  only dimly guess at.
>  Should uplift be denied, because the oldies don't understand, are
>  fearful of change, etc. etc.?
>
>  It is not an easy question to answer.

It wouldn't be so bad if, from the start, the indigenous people were
treated as equals. To an extent, this explains the better position,
then and now, of the Maori in New Zealand compared to the Australian
Aboriginals. The Maori were warriors, relatively more numerous and
better organised, and the Pakeha colonisers took them seriously enough
to agree to a treaty in 1840 with the Maori chiefs
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Treaty_of_waitangi). Still, many Maori
today consider the colonisers murderers and land thieves, which
undoubtedly some were.

Better not to be colonised.





-- 
Stathis Papaioannou