[extropy-chat] Re: extropy-chat Digest, Vol 9, Issue 37

[Chris Phoenix]

From: devon fowler <dfowler282004 at yahoo.com> wrote:
> --- "J. Andrew Rogers" <andrew at ceruleansystems.com> wrote:
>> The cessation of all foreign aid would be an
>> excellent start.  
>> Seriously.
> 
> This is a much more rational solution that Roberts and
> I agree one hundred percent cut the foreign aid and
> these people with 'too much time on their hands' will
> be forced to deal with impovershiment as a justifiable
> and imo reasonable punishment for their bizzarre form
> of severe barabarism

If Keith Henson is right, there may well be a practical problem with 
this.  Henson theorizes that sometimes it's good evolutionary strategy 
to fight to lose.  When resources get tight and things look hopeless, 
you don't just go to war; you aim to get yourself killed off so the 
better-off enemy will adopt your women and children.  If this is right, 
the last thing we want to do is to create an economic pinch!

There's a very distinctive mindset in terrorists, rampage killers, and 
'amok' people.  "My life is less than worthless, so I'll kill as many of 
you as I can."  I now wonder whether this mindset is the implementation 
of the suicidal urge that Keith has predicted.  If so, that would 
reinforce the point that we really want to make their lives better all 
the time, not punish them economically.

That doesn't mean we should dump more money on them.  Human psychology 
is complex, and welfare can easily be corrosive, leading to 
dissatisfaction even when the recipient is in no danger of starving. 
But deliberately creating an economic crisis in a region already rife 
with terrorist memes seems like a very risky thing to do.

Chris

-- 
Chris Phoenix                                  cphoenix at CRNano.org
Director of Research
Center for Responsible Nanotechnology          http://CRNano.org