[ExI] Jaron Lanier's new book, You Are Not a Gadget: A Manifesto

[Max More]

Emlyn: Your long and angry response to the Lanier interview was 
stimulating. Sorry if my posting that distracted you from other tasks 
and drew you into a lengthy broadside... Although I disagreed with 
some of what you said in an earlier post on a related topic, I found 
that I agreed with almost everything you said in your current response.

The one obvious point on which I disagree is this:

>Why do they only read that? Because mostly we just need a good, 
>impartial summary and Wikipedia does that wonderfully.

I agree that Wikipedia is generally excellent for non-controversial 
topics. But for controversial topics, both my personal experience and 
reading about others' experiences says that it does *not* do a 
wonderful job of being impartial. Cliques of editors can and do exert 
great control over content, making it very difficult for anyone 
outside their clique to make changes. They enjoy the appearance of 
broad input without the reality. (Different editorial policies and 
incentives might change this, but that's the way it's been for years now.)

Apart from that, yes, Lanier seems both anti-transhumanist, pretty 
much anti-technological progress, and ultimately deeply conservative 
-- and not in any good sense.

Max


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Max More, Ph.D.
Strategic Philosopher
The Proactionary Project
Extropy Institute Founder
www.maxmore.com
max at maxmore.com
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