<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN">
<HTML><HEAD>
<META http-equiv=Content-Type content="text/html; charset=iso-8859-1">
<META content="MSHTML 6.00.2900.2963" name=GENERATOR>
<STYLE></STYLE>
</HEAD>
<BODY bgColor=#ffffff>
<DIV>>It is simply a transfer of natural selection into the virtual
realm.</DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>Indeed. The only slight difference being that some
form of intellignece is being allowed to judge, or even prejudge, when an entity
or pathway has become none desirable. People don't like that, probably because
they're so used to other humans trying to screw them over if possible for their
resources.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>By leaving it to chance in the natural method of
selection, it seems fairer to the majority I suspect. </FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>You could question, is it also fair that you're
born predisposed to dying of cancer?</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>And I think the majority would also answer no, that
we should wipe out these predispositions and you would then die based solely on
your interactions with the world, not on a predisposition.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>The religious might argue against that, until they
get cancer.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>Unfortunately, the universe is not homogenous, so
what about those people born in environment more threatening to them? They're
also predisposed to an early death regardless of their genetics.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>How about randomness in general predisposing people
to random deaths through no fault of their own? The utter chaos people like to
think exists, doesn't. Everything you interact with on a macro scale today is
probably (since I can't rule out god) happening because of something that's
happened to it in the past. Gas molecules bouncing against your skin because
they've spent the last few billion years bouncing against others, causing vector
changes that have brought them to Earth and up close to your body. Maybe
your boss will be angry with you today and so depress you, making you more
likely to die earlier. Random? No.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT><FONT
face=Arial size=2></FONT><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>So, keeping all this predisposition in mind,
the idea of an intelligence evaluating entities for resources doesn't quite seem
so terrible after all. At least an intelligence is able to evaluate the
randomness as well and make and effort to balance things out. Natural
selection doesn't care one bit, you're predisposed, you die. It's like that
great arguement "A drugs company killed people 10 people developing this drug,
so there's been no gain". Leave it to natural selection and you'll have a few
million times that number of deaths before some problems are solved, potentially
billions or trillions more for other problems.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>Neither do we know for sure that the intelligence
doing the selecting (humans) are entirely free entities themselves. A great deal
of what we do is predetermined before we even think of doing it (see the boss
example above - you being depressed has been partially set in motion by your
boss before they even came into work).</FONT></DIV><FONT face=Arial
size=2></FONT>
<DIV><BR>>This is particularly true if the net result is to give the "gift of
extended life" </DIV>
<DIV>>to a bunch of people whose lives can be considered quite unextropic
[4]. </DIV>
<DIV>>Years ago I used to think that lifespan extension was a great
idea. People </DIV>
<DIV>>would have more time, they would learn more, they would be more
generous, etc. </DIV>
<DIV>>But if reality is that the "Type A" personalities are going to grab all
of the marbles </DIV>
<DIV>>and leave most of the rest of humanity with little or nothing then I
have no interest </DIV>
<DIV>>in that reality. </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>I also agree.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>As I've already said, I'm going to do electronics
with nanotech soon. I can already anticipate that, without doubt, I will come up
against the idea of developing something that will in some way be exploited by
someone else for malevolent manipulation and exploitation of others. That's
a hard one to justify for me because I'm not a flag waver. </FONT><FONT
face=Arial size=2>Although, I am open to the ontological question, why does
killing someone for their wallet always have to be wrong?</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>I made a post on hypocrisy to a web blog with a
similar vibe just recently.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>If you know something is wrong, you can either
uphold your own opinion to the letter and hope to 'inform and transform' or you
can play along with that failing system as a normal member and attempt to crash
it from there. The first is very romantically correct, the second can
be far more efficient.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>You may develop a cure for death, and
simultaneously doctor it to allow you to selectively wipe out those individuals
stealing all the marbles so's that the remainder can share (although, I suspect
you'll find a lot of new marble stealers offer to take up the position). Or
maybe you'll become a marble stealer yourself. Or a marble stealer in a select
group of entities 'worthy' of existence. With a little bit of consideration,
marble stealing can become a perfectly valid job title that even agrees in some
ways with your idea of trimming. I suppose what you really mean, however, is
marble stealing for the sake of marble stealing. Like, being a billionaire and
buying ten cars that you never actually remember you have.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>At least by doing the degree I am going to do, I
will be a good position to partially influence the direct the results
take.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV>>Nor do I have any interest in a reality where it is all worked out by
an </DIV>
<DIV>>AI caretaker (God by any other name). </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>Not so sure know about that myself, depends on how
much the AI was doing. If it was just looking after everything, it might give me
more spare time to do the things I was interested in.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>Even if it appeared to rule my experience of
existence, I'd have to question whether or not it and I were truely separate
entities - perhaps it might just be some separate area of my own conscious
experience, as the subconcious (the thalamus for instance) in my brain
that preprocesses all the data coming in from my sensory nervous system is
presently my "AI caretaker". No one seems to mind that though. In fact, without
it, like being without a linear, logical method of interconnecting neurons,
we'd just turn out highly random, intelligence
lacking junk.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>And after all, the propogation of intelligence is
basically what transhumanism / extropy is all about - we don't really care about
the continued propogation of space dust. It's not about humans themselves, with
their flesh and bones, it's about the intelligence they contain.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>I think intelligence and caretaking (which is just
intelligence on level that we can't directly, consciously experience for
ourselves) can certainly live together, being simply different forms of a
similar thing that can interact almost synergetically.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV>>But perhaps the worst of the three would be the reality that looks
</DIV>
<DIV>>like the one we have today (only with many more people with much longer
lives) </DIV>
<DIV>>-- where it is clear, at least to some, that we could have much </DIV>
<DIV>>much more and have failed to develop the philosophical, economic and
political systems >which are necessary to enable that. <BR></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>Maybe we should get married.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>John</FONT></DIV></BODY></HTML>