<div dir="ltr"><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;font-size:small;color:rgb(0,0,0)"><br></div><div class="gmail_extra"><br><div class="gmail_quote">On Sat, Feb 4, 2017 at 4:04 PM, spike <span dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:spike66@att.net" target="_blank">spike66@att.net</a>></span> wrote:<br><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0px 0px 0px 0.8ex;border-left:1px solid rgb(204,204,204);padding-left:1ex"><div lang="EN-US"><div class="gmail-m_3560168748451016454WordSection1"><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:11pt;font-family:"calibri",sans-serif"><u></u> <u></u></span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:11pt;font-family:"calibri",sans-serif"><u></u> <u></u></span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><b><span style="font-size:11pt;font-family:"calibri",sans-serif">From:</span></b><span style="font-size:11pt;font-family:"calibri",sans-serif"> extropy-chat [mailto:<a href="mailto:extropy-chat-bounces@lists.extropy.org" target="_blank">extropy-chat-bounces@<wbr>lists.extropy.org</a>] <b>On Behalf Of </b>William Flynn Wallace<br><b>Sent:</b> Saturday, February 04, 2017 1:15 PM<br><b>To:</b> ExI chat list <<a href="mailto:extropy-chat@lists.extropy.org" target="_blank">extropy-chat@lists.extropy.<wbr>org</a>><br><b>Subject:</b> [ExI] Huxley or Orwell - who got it right?<u></u><u></u></span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><u></u> <u></u></p><div><div><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:12pt"><span style="font-family:"arial",sans-serif;color:black"><a href="https://www.theguardian.com/media/2017/feb/02/amusing-ourselves-to-death-neil-postman-trump-orwell-huxley?utm_source=pocket&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=pockethits" target="_blank">https://www.theguardian.com/<wbr>media/2017/feb/02/amusing-<wbr>ourselves-to-death-neil-<wbr>postman-trump-orwell-huxley?<wbr>utm_source=pocket&utm_medium=<wbr>email&utm_campaign=pockethits</a><u></u><u></u></span></p></div><div><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family:"arial",sans-serif;color:black"></span></p><div style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;font-size:small;color:rgb(0,0,0);display:inline" class="gmail_default">Spike wrote: <div style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;font-size:small;color:rgb(0,0,0);display:inline" class="gmail_default"></div>The article seems to think we are in danger of amusing ourselves to death.</div></div></div></div></div></blockquote><div><br>--------- <br></div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0px 0px 0px 0.8ex;border-left:1px solid rgb(204,204,204);padding-left:1ex"><div lang="EN-US"><div class="gmail-m_3560168748451016454WordSection1"><div><div><div style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;font-size:small;color:rgb(0,0,0);display:inline" class="gmail_default">Now I may not be the one to talk about people in public places sitting and staring at their cell phones - physicians' offices, for one - as I am the one with a book or Kindle reading fiction</div><div style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;font-size:small;color:rgb(0,0,0);display:inline" class="gmail_default">. But it does seem that people don't want to use their brains to create anything - they want it created for them by the entertainment industry, which now might just include politics and the coverage of it. It may not be about attention span at all. I did not watch any political thing on either side last fall, but I'll bet Trump scored high in entertainment over the dull as a stone age axe others in the Repub primaries.</div></div></div></div></div></blockquote><div> </div><div><br><div style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;font-size:small;color:rgb(0,0,0);display:inline" class="gmail_default">Surely we lead the world many times over in producing entertainment, if not the consumption of it, though I'll bet we are pretty high in that too. </div> <div style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;font-size:small;color:rgb(0,0,0);display:inline" class="gmail_default">IQ hasn't diminished - it may even has risen. But what are most people doing with it? Not using it to understand more fully what is going on. TV, FAcebook and all the rest are sound bits and short videos, which not so much shorten attention span as not provide enough information to form a proper opinion of the content and the underlying issues.<br><br></div><div style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;font-size:small;color:rgb(0,0,0);display:inline" class="gmail_default">So in the present age we have petabytes of entertainment thrown at us but where is there to go to find constructive, mostly objective discussion of the big issues? If these exist, they are not apparent to me and it they do I'll bet they are duller than that axe. <br><br></div><div style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;font-size:small;color:rgb(0,0,0);display:inline" class="gmail_default">It doesn't have to be that way. Once upon a time I adopted a psych 101 book written by a wormrunner - James McConnell. Easiest book to read I've ever used, and it was so good that my class average jumped from around middle C level (about 75%) to 83%. So popularizing serious content can be done by the right people. Now let's get that sort of thing on TV. As it is, we are drowning in the trivia of sports. reality shows, adult cartoons and all the rest.<br></div></div><div><br><div style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;font-size:small;color:rgb(0,0,0)" class="gmail_default">A colleague of mine in the English dept. and I agreed - going to class and giving a presentation is Showtime! You have to interest them and put on a show. Sounds degrading, doesn't it? Nah. Just doing what is necessary.<br></div><br></div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0px 0px 0px 0.8ex;border-left:1px solid rgb(204,204,204);padding-left:1ex"><div lang="EN-US"><div class="gmail-m_3560168748451016454WordSection1"><div><div><p class="MsoNormal">bill </p><div style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;font-size:small;color:rgb(0,0,0);display:inline" class="gmail_default">w</div><br><p></p><p></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:11pt;font-family:"calibri",sans-serif"><u></u> <u></u></span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:11pt;font-family:"calibri",sans-serif"><u></u> <u></u></span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:11pt;font-family:"calibri",sans-serif"><u></u> <u></u></span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:11pt;font-family:"calibri",sans-serif">Good article BillW, reminiscent of so many debates I had with my father-in-law who is much more a Huxley fan than I am, while I am more an Orwell fan than he.<u></u><u></u></span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:11pt;font-family:"calibri",sans-serif"><u></u> <u></u></span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:11pt;font-family:"calibri",sans-serif">Brave New World is a book I found interesting, but not horrifying at all. It wasn’t clear to me that it was dystopian, certainly not all of it. He commented about how things changed over the years as he drove college students to sports events. He recalled how raucus those were and how they began to get quieter starting around 1985, to the point where twenty years later it would be nearly silent as the students sat back there gazing at computer screens, seldom saying a word to each other.<u></u><u></u></span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:11pt;font-family:"calibri",sans-serif"><u></u> <u></u></span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:11pt;font-family:"calibri",sans-serif">I offered that this would make a driver’s job much easier. But the history teacher side of him found it far too creepy. I suggested the students were watching the lectures they missed for the event to which he was taking them.<u></u><u></u></span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:11pt;font-family:"calibri",sans-serif"><u></u> <u></u></span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:11pt;font-family:"calibri",sans-serif">Soon the subject changed to another Huxleyan nightmare: designer babies. Oh the horror! Why? What would be so bad? We fertilize twenty embryos, let them divide about 5 times, select a cell from each, read the DNA, determine which one is most free of known genetic pathologies, implant. Obvious question: what do you do with the rest of them? My answer: leave them frozen. Who would ever use them? Why do we need to know that? But only the wealthy would have healthier babies! Ja.<u></u><u></u></span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:11pt;font-family:"calibri",sans-serif"><u></u> <u></u></span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:11pt;font-family:"calibri",sans-serif"></span></p><div style="font-family:arial,helvetica,sans-serif;font-size:small;color:rgb(0,0,0);display:inline" class="gmail_default"></div>The article seems to think we are in danger of amusing ourselves to death, but I would argue that if one dies laughing, one does not literally perish in most cases, and even if so, that would be a good way to go.<span class="gmail-HOEnZb"><font color="#888888"><u></u><u></u></font></span><p></p><span class="gmail-HOEnZb"><font color="#888888"><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:11pt;font-family:"calibri",sans-serif"><u></u> <u></u></span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:11pt;font-family:"calibri",sans-serif">spike<u></u><u></u></span></p></font></span></div></div></div></div><br>______________________________<wbr>_________________<br>
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