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</o:shapelayout></xml><![endif]--></head><body lang=EN-US link=blue vlink=purple><div class=WordSection1><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><b><span style='font-size:10.0pt;font-family:"Tahoma","sans-serif"'>From:</span></b><span style='font-size:10.0pt;font-family:"Tahoma","sans-serif"'> extropy-chat-bounces@lists.extropy.org [mailto:extropy-chat-bounces@lists.extropy.org] <b>On Behalf Of </b>Mike Dougherty<br><b>Sent:</b> Tuesday, February 07, 2012 6:00 PM<br><b>To:</b> ExI chat list<br><b>Subject:</b> [ExI] Then and still Now (was Re: bees again)<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><o:p> </o:p></p><div><p class=MsoNormal>2012/2/7 spike <<a href="mailto:spike66@att.net">spike66@att.net</a>><o:p></o:p></p><div><div><p><span style='color:#1F497D'>>>…</span>As with most of us. We achieved a fraction of our potential, because so much of our time growing up was spent being babysat by the television. The content had approximately zero socially redeeming qualities back in those days.<o:p></o:p></p></div></div><div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='color:#1F497D'>>…</span>And it has more now?!? Honestly, I don't feel that for all of our exponential increase in the rate of change that things are all that much different<span style='color:#1F497D'>…</span>The details may be 30+ years different, but people's "trending" feels the same. <span style='color:#1F497D'> …</span>Sorry Spike, this rant really is out of nowhere (at least I changed the subject line). I considered discarding rather than sending, but I wondered if anyone else shares this nagging sense...<span style='color:#1F497D'><o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'>Mike, go with me on this flight of fancy, a thought experiment please.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'>Picture some area in life which you really care about, such as your favorite hobby or pastime, your foremost interest, your passion. If you are a foodie for instance, play this game. Imagine the worst possible world for a foodie (ignoring starvation for the purposes of this exercise) and assign that as 1 on a scale of 1 to 10. The beans and cold greasy tater tots they threw at you at summer camp is 1, that revolting tripe that you ate because that’s what was there and you were starving, or perhaps those desiccated hotdogs that have been revolving for the past four days on the freeway gas station ZippyMart. That’s 1. Now imagine the very best you can do if you have a ton of money: a standing army of the best chefs from all over the world, ready to fix you anything you want on demand, as often as you want, anytime day or night, a team of world class chefs working for you alone. Assign that as 9. That’s the best you can do with today’s tech with arbitrarily large amounts of money. Reserve 10 as whatever is better than that: you can have better food than we know how to make today, but you don’t get fat.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'>You like motorcycles? 1 is a rattly old moped that doesn’t run right. 9 is a warehouse full of every bike ever made, all of them yours, exotics, monster-bikes, a collection that would put Jay Leno’s to shame, a collection that would give you a major boner, that’s 9. 10 is better than that, somewhere beyond current technology, but if you heard it described, you would get it and you would want it. The bikes go faster than anything today, but handle so well you never crash, and you ride like the wind.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'>Other examples, suppose you are a connoisseur of feminine beauty. 1 is, well, use your imagination, and 9 is Hugh Hefner’s life: willing an nubile beauties everywhere, as many as money can buy. 10 is better than that. An example of 10: you can have Ingrid Bergman in 1943 trim, or be on the receiving end of those loving gazes Julie Andrews gave Captain Von Trapp in 1964, or Kina Grannis in her current form, and neither your mate or their mates are bothered, for it’s your thought experiment, and they don’t care what you do in your own mind.<o:p></o:p></span></p></div></div><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'>So that’s the game, pick your favorite thing in this life, or something you really care about, set 1 equal to terrible, 9 is as good as it gets today, and 10 is better.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'>Nowthen, take your entire life and imagine going from 1 to 10 in that time span in that area which you really care about and is your passion. That would be defined as a damn good life, ja? That would be a life in which you have it made and you know it clap your hands.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'>My passion in life has been learning stuff, access to information. Since I am one whose life passion and interest is information gathering, I am one of the fortunate few who has seen a 1 to 9 transition, but I can do one better. From the point of view of just 20 years ago, my current world is a 10, because what I have right in front of me now is beyond anything I could have done in 1990, regardless of how much money I had, because we didn’t have the web in those days. Earlier this evening when I started wondering about alternate pollinators, all I had to do is go into Google, type in alternate pollinators bees, and BOOM, everything I wanted to know is right there. I compare with my bee book, for which I traded a day’s wage at that time, a very thick book filled with information it is, a fine book. But it is nothing compared to what I can find in seconds on the internet.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'>Twenty years ago is fresh enough in my memory. I used to haunt libraries, just being an information pacman, browsing on random stuff. But now is so much better. So we don’t have flying cars and high speed rail. No problem, I don’t need to go anywhere anyways. What I want to do is right here.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'>Mine has been a 1 to 10 life, and life is good.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-size:11.0pt;font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif";color:#1F497D'>spike<o:p></o:p></span></p></div></body></html>