From sjatkins at mac.com Sun Jan 1 03:05:06 2006 From: sjatkins at mac.com (Samantha Atkins) Date: Sat, 31 Dec 2005 19:05:06 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Politics: worthwhile commentary In-Reply-To: <20051231203605.20788.qmail@web51606.mail.yahoo.com> References: <20051231203605.20788.qmail@web51606.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <23F15BD5-F498-4C62-970B-D78CCF6EE6A5@mac.com> Alan, So far I have been pretty dead on. And that was a private message, dude. I rest my case. - s On Dec 31, 2005, at 12:36 PM, Al Brooks wrote: > Samantha, your dislike of me is to be taken as a compliment; the > way you ranted on concerning Iraq!-- and how disappointed you'll be > if things work out there. > Here's proof Confederate sympathizers have visited extropy bbs: > http://bbs.extropy.org/index.php? > board=16;action=display;threadid=53751 > > > > If I hadn't already written you off as a twit this would do it. > > - samantha > > Yahoo! for Good - Make a difference this year. > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From megao at sasktel.net Sun Jan 1 04:28:32 2006 From: megao at sasktel.net (Lifespan Pharma/Morris Johnson CTO) Date: Sat, 31 Dec 2005 22:28:32 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] A little Christmas Cheer- Apollo-Publishing-Corp. Message-ID: <43B75A70.3050106@sasktel.net> Was reading CFO magazine-Nov-Pg26 and this hilarious SEC offerring was mentioned. You have to see it to appreciate it. This was actually filed and is in the SEC archives. Proves anything can make it into the SEC. http://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1337897/000133789705000003/0001337897-05-000003.txt From spike66 at comcast.net Sun Jan 1 07:19:24 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Sat, 31 Dec 2005 23:19:24 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Politics: worthwhile commentary In-Reply-To: <23F15BD5-F498-4C62-970B-D78CCF6EE6A5@mac.com> Message-ID: <200601010721.k017LMe31602@tick.javien.com> Al, if someone insults you offlist, that is fair game, but it isn't fair game for you to post their private messages to the whole world. Do desist, thanks. spike _____ From: extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org [mailto:extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Samantha Atkins Sent: Saturday, December 31, 2005 7:05 PM To: ExI chat list Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] Politics: worthwhile commentary Alan, So far I have been pretty dead on. And that was a private message, dude. I rest my case. - s On Dec 31, 2005, at 12:36 PM, Al Brooks wrote: Samantha, your dislike of me is to be taken as a compliment; the way you ranted on concerning Iraq!-- and how disappointed you'll be if things work out there. Here's proof Confederate sympathizers have visited extropy bbs: http://bbs.extropy.org/index.php?board=16;action=display;threadid=53751 If I hadn't already written you off as a twit this would do it. - samantha _____ Yahoo! for Good - Make a difference this year. _______________________________________________ extropy-chat mailing list extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From pharos at gmail.com Sun Jan 1 11:39:44 2006 From: pharos at gmail.com (BillK) Date: Sun, 1 Jan 2006 11:39:44 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Politics: worthwhile commentary In-Reply-To: <200601010721.k017LMe31602@tick.javien.com> References: <23F15BD5-F498-4C62-970B-D78CCF6EE6A5@mac.com> <200601010721.k017LMe31602@tick.javien.com> Message-ID: On 1/1/06, spike wrote: > > Al, if someone insults you offlist, that is fair game, but it isn't fair > game for you to post their private messages to the whole world. Do desist, > Hmmm. Really??? Netiquette agrees that posting private messages to the list is wrong and an apology should be sent to the list and to the author. But making a distinction between private flames and on-list flames is worth a few moments thought. The extropy-chat guidelines do not make a distinction between private insults and public insults. This is probably because they were drafted to oppose the public flame wars that had appeared on the list. The problem is with the aggressive individuals who like to escalate the emotional content in discussions and walk the borderline of 'almost' personal attacks. These people are also quite likely to send ferocious private emails with a view to intimidating their opponents into stopping them posting contrary opinions to the list. Some lists mention this problem in their guidelines and suggest that if you receive a private flame message then you should forward the private flame to the moderators for their consideration. This seems reasonable to me. If someone disagrees with an opinion that you posted onlist, you should not have to put up with receiving private insults from them. I can well see how this would drive some people away from the list. BillK From spike66 at comcast.net Sun Jan 1 16:17:51 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Sun, 1 Jan 2006 08:17:51 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Politics: worthwhile commentary In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <200601011619.k01GJre17034@tick.javien.com> > bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of BillK > Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] Politics: worthwhile commentary > > On 1/1/06, spike wrote: > > > > Al, if someone insults you offlist, that is fair game, but it isn't fair > > game for you to post their private messages to the whole world. Do > desist, > > > > Hmmm. Really??? > > But making a distinction between private flames and on-list flames is > worth a few moments thought... BillK Thanks BillK. I did assume everyone here readily capable of verbal self defense. If someone wishes to engage in verbal sparring including personal attacks, I personally have no problem with their doing it in private. Any other thoughts? spike From iph1954 at msn.com Sun Jan 1 17:28:24 2006 From: iph1954 at msn.com (MIKE TREDER) Date: Sun, 01 Jan 2006 12:28:24 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Responsible Nanotechnology Newsletter Message-ID: C-R-Newsletter #36: December 31, 2005 To read this on the Web, with nice formatting and hyperlinks, go to http://www.crnano.org/archive05.htm#36 NOTE: In the items below, links are indicated with [brackets], and shown at the end of each section. Editor?s Note We wrap up our third year, appropriately, with monthly newsletter #36. Here?s wishing all our readers a prosperous and joyous 2006! CONTENTS - CRN Goes to Yale - New President at Foresight - CRN Task Force Progress - Bragging About Blogging - A Global Surge Protector? - Inside CRN, Parts 1-5 - Milestones & Moving Forward - Feature Essay: Simple Nanofactories vs. Floods of Products Every month this newsletter gets you up to date on recent events, but to follow the latest happenings on a daily basis, be sure to check our Responsible Nanotechnology weblog at http://CRNano.typepad.com/ ========== CRN Goes to Yale On Wednesday, December 7, CRN Executive Director Mike Treder gave a talk on "Transforming Society: Ethical Issues in the Nanotech Revolution," at Yale University's Institute for Social and Policy Studies. The presentation was addressed to Yale's [Technology and Ethics Working Research Group], an interdisciplinary affiliation of faculty, students, and community members. A unique feature of this opportunity was its length. The format allows for about 90 minutes of lecture and discussion, followed by a brief break for dinner (delivered to the meeting), and then more informal discussion. With almost three hours to approach a topic, the presenter and group are able to explore it in some depth. Still, at the end several people commented that we had barely scratched the surface of the many serious issues surrounding advanced nanotechnology. http://www.yale.edu/bioethics/tech.html New President at Foresight The Foresight Nanotech Institute has a [new president]. On December 9, Scott Mize stepped down after one year in the position, and Marc Lurie was appointed to replace him. Prior to joining Foresight, Lurie founded and as CEO helmed @hand, a software and services company delivering mission-critical mobile solutions to large enterprises. http://www.foresight.org/cms/press_center/159 CRN Task Force Progress Work is proceeding smoothly for the CRN Global Task Force on Implications and Policy, a [diverse group] of world-class experts brought together to develop comprehensive recommendations for the safe and responsible use of molecular manufacturing. Currently, we are completing first drafts on a series of essays that each identifies a specific concern of a task force member about advanced nanotechnology. Almost 20 essays have been written so far. When these are published in anthology form early next year, we will ask for feedback on our ideas, as well as public input on additional concerns. http://www.crnano.org/CTF.htm Bragging About Blogging [Technorati] is the equivalent of Google for the blogosphere. Currently tracking 23.4 million sites and 1.8 billion links, Technorati ranks weblogs by what they call ?authority?, based on the number of confirmed links from other blog sites. According to them, [CRN?s Responsible Nanotechnology blog] has more authority than 99.9% of all the others out there. Of course, there are a lot of blogs, and many of them are highly esoteric. But it's nice to know that so many other bloggers have seen the value of referring their readers to our work. http://www.technorati.com/ http://crnano.typepad.com/ A Global Surge Protector? Concentration of power is the topic of Mike Treder?s most recent Future Brief essay... Molecular manufacturing represents power: political power, military power, and economic power. When this power becomes available, will a "global surge protector" be needed? If so, how might that be devised and implemented? Who controls that power and how widely -- how democratically -- it is distributed will make all the difference when nanotechnology is fully developed. Decisions we make before that time will determine whether our world becomes safer or more dangerous; more just or less just; more free or more oppressive. Chances are you have a surge protector in your home to shield electronic devices from unexpected power surges. Someday soon, we may need protection from unprecedented surges in global political power. Read the full essay [here]. http://www.futurebrief.com/miketrederpower006.asp Inside CRN, Parts 1-5 In December, we published a [five-part series] on our blog that gave a look "inside" CRN. The series of short articles reviewed the process CRN follows in choosing how and what to describe as the likely results of our research into molecular manufacturing. Commenting on the series, Jamais Cascio of [WorldChanging.com] said: CRN looks primarily at the implications of what they term "middle period" nanotech, such as nanofactories -- much more sophisticated than nanomaterials, but not the fantastic nanoassemblers of science fiction. I strongly encourage our readers to check out the recently-concluded "Inside CRN" series at the Center for Responsible Nanotechnology blog. The five posts cover CRN's mission and goals, and explain how their focus differs from other nanotech resources. It's a great introduction to an extremely valuable organization. http://crnano.typepad.com/crnblog/2005/12/inside_crn_part.html http://www.worldchanging.com/archives/003837.html Milestones & Moving Forward As we commemorate our 3rd anniversary this month, we are proud of what we?ve accomplished so far, but mindful that greater challenges await us in 2006. This is important work that few others are doing. To keep moving forward, we will need to grow fast. A [new page] on our website lists some of the significant milestones from CRN?s first three years. That page also outlines our current priorities?including research, outreach, and development?and suggests several ways in which you can help advance this work. http://www.crnano.org/milestones.htm Feature Essay: Simple Nanofactories vs. Floods of Products Chris Phoenix, Director of Research, Center for Responsible Nanotechnology In [last month's essay], I explained why even the earliest meter-scale nanofactories will necessarily have a high throughput, manufacturing their own mass in just a few hours. I also explained how a nanofactory can fasten together tiny functional blocks ? nanoblocks ? to make a meter-scale product. The next question is what range of products an early nanofactory would be able to build. http://www.crnano.org/essays05.htm#10,November For several reasons, it is important to know the range and functionality of the products that the nanofactory will produce, and how quickly new products can be developed. Knowing these factors will help to estimate the economic value of the nanofactory, as well as its impacts and implications. The larger the projected value, the more likely it is to be built sooner; the more powerful an early nanofactory is and the faster new products appear, the more disruptive it can be. Because a large nanofactory can be built only by another nanofactory, even the earliest nanofactories will be able to build other nanofactories. This means that the working parts of the nanofactory will be available as components for other product designs. From this reasoning, we can begin to map the lower bound of nanofactory product capabilities. This essay is a demonstration of how CRN's thinking and research continue to evolve. In 2003, I published a peer-reviewed paper called [?Design of a Primitive Nanofactory?] in which I described the simplest nanofactory I could think of. That nanofactory had to do several basic functions, such as transporting components of various sizes, that implied the need for motors and mechanical components also in a variety of sizes, as well as several other functions. However, not long after that paper was published, an even simpler approach was proposed by John Burch and Eric Drexler. [Their approach] can build large products without ever having to handle large components; small blocks are attached rapidly, directly to the product. http://www.jetpress.org/volume13/Nanofactory.htm http://crnano.typepad.com/crnblog/2005/09/see_this_nanote.html The planar assembly approach to building products is more flexible than the convergent assembly approach, and can use a much more compact nanofactory. Instead of having to transport and join blocks of various sizes within the nanofactory, it only needs to transport tiny blocks from their point of fabrication to the area of the product under construction. (The Burch/Drexler nanofactory does somewhat more than this, but their version could be simplified.) This means that the existence of a nanofactory does not, as I formerly thought, imply the existence of centimeter-scale machinery. A planar nanofactory can probably be scaled to many square centimeters without containing any moving parts larger than a micron. Large moving parts need to slide and rotate, but small moving parts can be built to flex instead. It is theoretically possible that the simplest nanofactory may not need much in the way of bearings. Large bearings could be simulated by suspending the moving surface with numerous small load-bearing rollers or ?walkers? that could provide both low-friction motion and power. This might actually be better than a full-contact surface in some ways; failure of one load-bearing element would not compromise the bearing's operation. Another important question is what kind of computers the nanofactory will be able to build. Unlike my ?primitive nanofactory,? a simple planar-assembly nanofactory may not actually need embedded general-purpose computers (CPU's). It might have few enough different components that the instructions for building all the components could be fed in several times over during construction, so that information storage and processing within the nanofactory might be minimal. But even a planar-assembly nanofactory, as currently conceived, would probably have to incorporate large amounts of digital logic (computer-like circuitry) to process the blueprint file and direct the operations of the nanofactory fabricators. This implies that the nanofactory's products could contain large numbers of computers. However, the designs for the computers will not necessarily exist before they are needed for the products. Any nanofactory will have to perform mechanical motions, and will need a power source for those motions. However, that power source may not be suitable for all products. For example, an early nanofactory might use chemicals for power. It seems more likely to me that it would use electricity, because electric motors are simpler than most chemical processing systems, since chemical systems need to deliver chemicals and remove waste products, while electrical systems only need wires. In that case, products could be electrically powered; it should not be difficult to gang together many nanoscale motors to produce power even for large products. The ability to fasten nanoscale blocks to selected locations on a growing product implies the ability to build programmable structures at a variety of scales. At the current level of analysis, the existence of a large nanofactory implies the ability to build other large structures. Because the nanofactory would not have to be extremely strong, the products might also not be extremely strong. Further analysis must wait for more information about the design of the nanofactory. Sensing is an important part of the functionality of many products. An early nanofactory might not need many different kinds of sensing, because its operations would all be planned and commands delivered from outside. One of the benefits of [mechanosynthesis] of highly cross-linked covalent solids is that any correctly built structure will have a very precise and predictable shape, as well as other properties. Sensing would be needed only for the detection of errors in error-prone operations. It might be as simple as contact switches that cause operations to be retried if something is not in the right place. Other types of sensors might have to be invented for the products they will be used in. http://www.crnano.org/essays05.htm#2,Feb Nanofactories will not need any special appearance, but many products will need to have useful user interfaces or attractive appearances. This would require additional R&D beyond what is necessary for the nanofactory. The planar assembly approach is a major simplification relative to all previous nanofactory approaches. It may even be possible to build wet-chemistry nanofactory-like systems, as described in my [NIAC report] that was completed in spring 2005, and bootstrap incrementally from them to high-performance nanofactories. Because of this, it seems less certain that the first large nanofactory will be followed immediately by a flood of products. http://www.crnano.org/archive05.htm#33NASA A flood of products still could occur if the additional product functionality were pre-designed. Although pre-designed systems will inevitably have bugs that will have to be fixed, rapid prototyping will help to reduce turnaround time for troubleshooting, and using combinations of well-characterized small units should reduce the need for major redesign. For example, given a well-characterized digital logic, it should not be more difficult to build a CPU than to write a software program of equivalent complexity ? except that, traditionally, CPU's have required months to build each version of the hardware in the semiconductor fab. An incremental approach to developing molecular manufacturing might start with a wet-chemical self-assembly system, then perhaps build several versions of mechanosynthetic systems for increasingly higher performance, then start to develop products. Such an incremental approach could require many years before the first general-purpose product design system was available. On the other hand, a targeted development program probably would aim at a dry mechanosynthetic system right from the start, perhaps bypassing some of the wet stages. It would also pre-design product capabilities that were not needed for the basic nanofactory. By planning from the start to take advantage of the capabilities of advanced nanofactories, a targeted approach could develop a general-purpose product design capability relatively early, which then would lead to a potentially disruptive flood of products. * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * FUNDRAISING ALERT! Recent developments in efforts to [roadmap the technical steps] toward molecular manufacturing make the work of CRN more important than ever. http://www.foresight.org/roadmaps/index.html It is critical that we examine the global implications of this rapidly emerging technology, and begin creating wise and effective solutions. That?s why we have formed the CRN Task Force. But it won?t be easy. We need to grow, and rapidly, to meet the expanding challenge. Your donation to CRN will help us to achieve that growth. We rely largely on individual donations and small grants for our survival. To make a contribution on-line click this link > https://secure.groundspring.org/dn/index.php?aid=5594 This is important work and we welcome your participation. Thank you! * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * The Fine Print: The Center for Responsible Nanotechnology(TM) is an affiliate of World Care(R), an international, non-profit, 501(c)(3) organization. All donations to CRN are handled through World Care. The opinions expressed by CRN do not necessarily reflect those of World Care. From fauxever at sprynet.com Sun Jan 1 17:38:01 2006 From: fauxever at sprynet.com (Olga Bourlin) Date: Sun, 1 Jan 2006 09:38:01 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Einstein ... and All the Rest? Message-ID: <019c01c60efa$1d5d3b60$6600a8c0@brainiac> "One reason may be that science as a whole has lost its moral sheen. We are more aware than ever of the downside of scientific advances, whether nuclear power or genetic recombination; moreover, as science has become increasingly institutionalized, it has come to be perceived as just another guild pursuing its own selfish interests alongside truth and the common good. But the other reason is that Einstein possessed a moral quality - described by Robert Oppenheimer, the dark angel of nuclear physics, as "a wonderful purity at once childlike and profoundly stubborn" - that set him apart even in his own time." http://www.nytimes.com/2006/01/01/books/review/01horgan.html' From jef at jefallbright.net Sun Jan 1 18:14:13 2006 From: jef at jefallbright.net (Jef Allbright) Date: Sun, 1 Jan 2006 10:14:13 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Einstein ... and All the Rest? In-Reply-To: <019c01c60efa$1d5d3b60$6600a8c0@brainiac> References: <019c01c60efa$1d5d3b60$6600a8c0@brainiac> Message-ID: <22360fa10601011014y190cbc5elcddd8ad99dddef06@mail.gmail.com> On 1/1/06, Olga Bourlin wrote: > "One reason may be that science as a whole has lost its moral sheen. We are > more aware than ever of the downside of scientific advances, whether nuclear > power or genetic recombination; moreover, as science has become increasingly > institutionalized, it has come to be perceived as just another guild > pursuing its own selfish interests alongside truth and the common good. But > the other reason is that Einstein possessed a moral quality - described by > Robert Oppenheimer, the dark angel of nuclear physics, as "a wonderful > purity at once childlike and profoundly stubborn" - that set him apart even > in his own time." > > http://www.nytimes.com/2006/01/01/books/review/01horgan.html' Thanks Olga for sharing this quote. Einstein truly was a big-picture thinker, thus much of his thinking "possessed a moral quality" as he approached the question of what works in the ultimate god's-eye view of a rational universe. We continue to actively expand the range of our instrumental knowledge of our world, and it is commonly (but not universally) acknowledged that this knowledge is morally neutral until applied in the service of some set of values. What is less commonly understood is how some values work better than others, and we have yet to pursue this aspect in an equally scientific way. Best wishes for a New Year of growth, - Jef From russell.wallace at gmail.com Sun Jan 1 18:36:09 2006 From: russell.wallace at gmail.com (Russell Wallace) Date: Sun, 1 Jan 2006 18:36:09 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] the structure of randomness In-Reply-To: References: <20051230191958.7301.qmail@web60519.mail.yahoo.com> <6.2.1.2.0.20051230154804.01ccfaa8@pop-server.satx.rr.com> <4d21ddf772ab6a5cfa0967499984a0c5@HarveyNewstrom.com> <37419abbed015a31ba1f6e1c1b34b76f@HarveyNewstrom.com> <8d71341e0512302258j2f1440b9ndcda65e48fba9e32@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <8d71341e0601011036r1a9fdbc7q24f48182c41121b2@mail.gmail.com> On 12/31/05, gts wrote: > > The distributions do not deviate in any significant way from normal, but > the *fine structures* of multiple histograms seem correlated in time. For > example a bell-curve with a slightly "m-ish" shape (two subtle peaks) will > tend to appear again in the next test. That "m-ish" propensity then falls > off with time. How is that different from considering that batch of tests to be a single test, adding all their samples together, and saying the aggregate has an "m-ish" shape? (I might be overlooking something obvious here; there's *mumblety* years of rust on my knowledge of statistics.) - Russell -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From gts_2000 at yahoo.com Sun Jan 1 19:09:16 2006 From: gts_2000 at yahoo.com (gts) Date: Sun, 01 Jan 2006 14:09:16 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] the structure of randomness In-Reply-To: <8d71341e0601011036r1a9fdbc7q24f48182c41121b2@mail.gmail.com> References: <20051230191958.7301.qmail@web60519.mail.yahoo.com> <6.2.1.2.0.20051230154804.01ccfaa8@pop-server.satx.rr.com> <4d21ddf772ab6a5cfa0967499984a0c5@HarveyNewstrom.com> <37419abbed015a31ba1f6e1c1b34b76f@HarveyNewstrom.com> <8d71341e0512302258j2f1440b9ndcda65e48fba9e32@mail.gmail.com> <8d71341e0601011036r1a9fdbc7q24f48182c41121b2@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On Sun, 01 Jan 2006 13:36:09 -0500, Russell Wallace wrote: > On 12/31/05, gts wrote: >> >> The distributions do not deviate in any significant way from normal, but >> the *fine structures* of multiple histograms seem correlated in time. >> For example a bell-curve with a slightly "m-ish" shape (two subtle >> peaks) will tend to appear again in the next test. That "m-ish" >> propensity then falls off with time. > > > How is that different from considering that batch of tests to be a single > test, adding all their samples together, and saying the aggregate has an > "m-ish" shape? Assuming the effect is real, it pertains only to comparisons of two or more histograms. If radioactive decay happens randomly then one would not expect to see similarities in the fine structures of the histograms of two successive samples. It is possible (maybe) that the effect is real but that the fine structures of these histograms, though correlated through time, nevertheless change rapidly enough that larger samples would not reveal a deviation from normal. You can think of the effect in terms of the graphic visualization mode in computer media players, like Windows Media Player or iTunes. You can "see" music as it plays. The pattern changes constantly. However, because music has structure, similarities exist in the pattern from one moment to the next. The similarities fall off as a function of time. If the noise were completely random then you would see no such similarities. If the Shnoll effect is real then it is truly "The Music of the Spheres." > (I might be overlooking something obvious here; there's > *mumblety* years of rust on my knowledge of statistics.) Same here. :) For what it's worth, I found a website published by Jack Sarfatti on which he states his opinion that John Walker refuted the Shnoll effect to his satisfaction. Not sure Shnoll agrees. According to the article posted by Damien, Shnoll is planning to publish another paper on the subject. -gts From gts_2000 at yahoo.com Sun Jan 1 21:10:51 2006 From: gts_2000 at yahoo.com (gts) Date: Sun, 01 Jan 2006 16:10:51 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] the structure of randomness In-Reply-To: References: <20051230191958.7301.qmail@web60519.mail.yahoo.com> <6.2.1.2.0.20051230154804.01ccfaa8@pop-server.satx.rr.com> <4d21ddf772ab6a5cfa0967499984a0c5@HarveyNewstrom.com> <37419abbed015a31ba1f6e1c1b34b76f@HarveyNewstrom.com> <8d71341e0512302258j2f1440b9ndcda65e48fba9e32@mail.gmail.com> <8d71341e0601011036r1a9fdbc7q24f48182c41121b2@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: I wrote: > Assuming the effect is real, it pertains only to comparisons of two or > more histograms. I should qualify this a bit. The supposed non-monitonical ("toothy") shape of single histograms is part of the alleged effect, but I find that much less interesting than the claim that these patterns persist and recur periodically at 1, 27 and 365 days. However the more I think about it, the more convinced I am that Sarfatti is right to think Walker refuted it. -gts From gts_2000 at yahoo.com Sun Jan 1 21:10:55 2006 From: gts_2000 at yahoo.com (gts) Date: Sun, 01 Jan 2006 16:10:55 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] the structure of randomness In-Reply-To: References: <20051230191958.7301.qmail@web60519.mail.yahoo.com> <6.2.1.2.0.20051230154804.01ccfaa8@pop-server.satx.rr.com> <4d21ddf772ab6a5cfa0967499984a0c5@HarveyNewstrom.com> <37419abbed015a31ba1f6e1c1b34b76f@HarveyNewstrom.com> <8d71341e0512302258j2f1440b9ndcda65e48fba9e32@mail.gmail.com> <8d71341e0601011036r1a9fdbc7q24f48182c41121b2@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: I wrote: > Assuming the effect is real, it pertains only to comparisons of two or > more histograms. I should qualify this a bit. The supposed non-monitonical ("toothy") shape of single histograms is part of the alleged effect, but I find that much less interesting than the claim that these patterns persist and recur periodically at 1, 27 and 365 days. However the more I think about it, the more convinced I am that Sarfatti is right to think Walker refuted it. -gts From jrd1415 at yahoo.com Sun Jan 1 23:42:14 2006 From: jrd1415 at yahoo.com (Jeff Davis) Date: Sun, 1 Jan 2006 15:42:14 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Mars rovers RIP? In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <20060101234214.82619.qmail@web60017.mail.yahoo.com> A year and a half ago I posted this: http://lists.extropy.org/pipermail/extropy-chat/2004-June/006736.html Wherein I said: I suggest a "Rover expiration pool", where we all make our predictions re the date of the rovers' demise. I will guess five years from this date for the problem-free rover, and two years for the rover with the heater-always-on problem. That's June 9th, 2009, and June 9th, 2006, respectively. And to make it interesting I will place ten bucks US on each guess. **************************** No one showed any interest at the time. With the appearance of this article: Rovers Still Circle Mars http://wired.com/news/wireservice/0,69949-0.html?tw=wn_tophead_5 Wherein we read: "These rovers are living on borrowed time. We're so past warranty on them,"... I once again invite you all to participate in the "Rover expiration pool". If we could get enough people to join in, the pot could grow sufficiently to make things veeeeery interesting. I've already made my predictions, I'm just six months away from one of those. Also it occurs to me that a clear definition of "expiration" is needed. Would it be loss of mobility? Loss of some specified degree of functionality? Total loss of signal? Also, perhaps obviously, since it's likely (unless we get thousands of participants) that no one will get the expiration date exactly, the winner would be the person who's prediction is closest to the actual "expiration" date. And finally, if any of you diligent space science enthusiasts and rocket science professionals have an inside track on the equipment specs -- you know like batteries and solar panels -- and thereby a better data set for making your predictions, would you consider sharing those specs with the rest of us,...say after waiting briefly for all your lesser-informed brethren to commit themselves to their predictions. May the new year bring you love or good luck,...or more love. Best, Jeff Davis "And I think to myself, what a wonderful world!" Louie Armstrong __________________________________________ Yahoo! DSL ? Something to write home about. Just $16.99/mo. or less. dsl.yahoo.com From mail at HarveyNewstrom.com Mon Jan 2 03:18:41 2006 From: mail at HarveyNewstrom.com (Harvey Newstrom) Date: Sun, 1 Jan 2006 22:18:41 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Politics: worthwhile commentary In-Reply-To: <200601011619.k01GJre17034@tick.javien.com> References: <200601011619.k01GJre17034@tick.javien.com> Message-ID: <4df7d638d8cc005c5381a19b572ce9ca@HarveyNewstrom.com> On Jan 1, 2006, at 11:17 AM, spike wrote: >> bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of BillK >> Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] Politics: worthwhile commentary >> >> On 1/1/06, spike wrote: >>> >>> Al, if someone insults you offlist, that is fair game, but it isn't >>> fair >>> game for you to post their private messages to the whole world. Do >> desist, >>> >> >> Hmmm. Really??? >> >> But making a distinction between private flames and on-list flames is >> worth a few moments thought... BillK > > Thanks BillK. I did assume everyone here readily capable > of verbal self defense. If someone wishes to engage in > verbal sparring including personal attacks, I personally > have no problem with their doing it in private. > > Any other thoughts? spike It is unacceptable for any member of our list to be personally attacked, period. I don't care if it is done in public where we can see it, or whether they are attacked privately in e-mail. Such attacks are undesired behavior. Nobody wants to attract personal attacks via this list, any more than they want to attract spam or stalkers. What are you doing, Spike? First you allow off-topic politics. Then you encourage arguments as a valid form of communications. Now this. There seems to be an obvious pattern, but I can't discern a useful purpose. -- Harvey Newstrom CISSP CISA CISM CIFI NSA-IAM GSEC ISSAP ISSMP ISSPCS IBMCP From gts_2000 at yahoo.com Mon Jan 2 03:50:38 2006 From: gts_2000 at yahoo.com (gts) Date: Sun, 01 Jan 2006 22:50:38 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Politics: worthwhile commentary In-Reply-To: <4df7d638d8cc005c5381a19b572ce9ca@HarveyNewstrom.com> References: <200601011619.k01GJre17034@tick.javien.com> <4df7d638d8cc005c5381a19b572ce9ca@HarveyNewstrom.com> Message-ID: spike is right. It's not his job to moderate private emails. Should he moderate our phone calls too? -gts From analyticphilosophy at gmail.com Mon Jan 2 04:07:01 2006 From: analyticphilosophy at gmail.com (Jeff Medina) Date: Sun, 1 Jan 2006 23:07:01 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] the structure of randomness In-Reply-To: <8d71341e0512302255k341f521keb92e4c7380c1d56@mail.gmail.com> References: <20051227164022.23975.qmail@web61314.mail.yahoo.com> <8d71341e0512301009v410428f0r31ab250f9d4befc6@mail.gmail.com> <8d71341e0512301838n4595beb0g63753f063177cba0@mail.gmail.com> <5844e22f0512301916x2f67e847mbe0b11e1ada98ef0@mail.gmail.com> <8d71341e0512301933i1388a93bw97f8756d47157a3c@mail.gmail.com> <5844e22f0512302023qd62d9dfg5844c30ef3897630@mail.gmail.com> <8d71341e0512302101j9aec6f7l4422a832a8c789e0@mail.gmail.com> <5844e22f0512302236p731edaf4m15a75e4444e82463@mail.gmail.com> <8d71341e0512302255k341f521keb92e4c7380c1d56@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <5844e22f0601012007qa4ef7e8r248c5ed1f5008f7@mail.gmail.com> On 12/31/05, Russell Wallace wrote: > On 12/31/05, Jeff Medina wrote: > > And less than 99^ 10 and more than 99^10 are much better targets than > > 99^10. And >n and > greater than 2 (or where n is any integer at all, if you take ">n and > > > value). Your argument would apply equally no matter what the > > dimensions of the universe were, however you want to measure it > > (computational capacity, power requiring to run the sim, bits of > > information involved, number of particles observed or inferred, etc.). > > That makes it a non-argument. > > It would apply equally to any N, provided N were large, but that doesn't > make it a non-argument, because we have N being generated independently in > two different ways (amount of computing power just barely adequate for a > ground level simulation of the visible universe, amount just barely > available to the simulator), which makes it unlikely that the two values > would match so nearly exactly. You have absolutely no idea whether the computing power "just barely available" to the simulator is anywhere near (as opposed to notably greater than) the amount "just barely adequate for a ground level simulation of the visible universe". Why are you making such a strange assumption? Aside from that, it's also not necessarily unlikely that those values would be near one another. If I were trying to create an interesting simulation-world, I just might use all of the computing power available to me. Then Russell-in-the-world-I-made would say, "It sure is unlikely that my visible universe's required computing power matches the computing power available to the simulator." And Sim-Russell would be wrong. -- Jeff Medina http://www.painfullyclear.com/ Community Director Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence http://www.singinst.org/ Relationships & Community Fellow Institute for Ethics & Emerging Technologies http://www.ieet.org/ School of Philosophy, Birkbeck, University of London http://www.bbk.ac.uk/phil/ From sjatkins at mac.com Mon Jan 2 04:34:10 2006 From: sjatkins at mac.com (Samantha Atkins) Date: Sun, 1 Jan 2006 20:34:10 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Politics: worthwhile commentary In-Reply-To: <4df7d638d8cc005c5381a19b572ce9ca@HarveyNewstrom.com> References: <200601011619.k01GJre17034@tick.javien.com> <4df7d638d8cc005c5381a19b572ce9ca@HarveyNewstrom.com> Message-ID: If I think someone is being a twit (or whatever) then I reserve the right to privately say so if I consider it worth my while. Frankly, suggesting that moderators should prevent people from privately speaking their mind in ways you don't approve of seems pretty silly and foolish. The word in question is defined below. You don't qualify in my experience of you as generally silly or foolish. So you have nothing to worry about. :-) twit noun informal a silly or foolish person. - samantha On Jan 1, 2006, at 7:18 PM, Harvey Newstrom wrote: > > On Jan 1, 2006, at 11:17 AM, spike wrote: > >>> bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of BillK >>> Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] Politics: worthwhile commentary >>> >>> On 1/1/06, spike wrote: >>>> >>>> Al, if someone insults you offlist, that is fair game, but it >>>> isn't fair >>>> game for you to post their private messages to the whole world. Do >>> desist, >>>> >>> >>> Hmmm. Really??? >>> >>> But making a distinction between private flames and on-list >>> flames is >>> worth a few moments thought... BillK >> >> Thanks BillK. I did assume everyone here readily capable >> of verbal self defense. If someone wishes to engage in >> verbal sparring including personal attacks, I personally >> have no problem with their doing it in private. >> >> Any other thoughts? spike > > It is unacceptable for any member of our list to be personally > attacked, period. I don't care if it is done in public where we > can see it, or whether they are attacked privately in e-mail. Such > attacks are undesired behavior. Nobody wants to attract personal > attacks via this list, any more than they want to attract spam or > stalkers. > > What are you doing, Spike? First you allow off-topic politics. > Then you encourage arguments as a valid form of communications. > Now this. There seems to be an obvious pattern, but I can't > discern a useful purpose. > > -- > Harvey Newstrom > CISSP CISA CISM CIFI NSA-IAM GSEC ISSAP ISSMP ISSPCS IBMCP > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From neptune at superlink.net Mon Jan 2 04:39:15 2006 From: neptune at superlink.net (Technotranscendence) Date: Sun, 1 Jan 2006 23:39:15 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Mars rovers RIP? References: <20060101234214.82619.qmail@web60017.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <003e01c60f56$7d3a1380$16893cd1@pavilion> On Sunday, January 01, 2006 6:42 PM Jeff Davis jrd1415 at yahoo.com wrote: > No one showed any interest at the time. With the > appearance of this article: > > Rovers Still Circle Mars > http://wired.com/news/wireservice/0,69949-0.html?tw=wn_tophead_5 > > Wherein we read: > > "These rovers are living on borrowed time. > We're so past warranty on them,"... > > I once again invite you all to participate in the > "Rover expiration pool". If we could get enough > people to join in, the pot could grow sufficiently to > make things veeeeery interesting. I've already made > my predictions, I'm just six months away from one of > those. > > Also it occurs to me that a clear definition of > "expiration" is needed. Would it be loss of mobility? > Loss of some specified degree of functionality? > Total loss of signal? > > Also, perhaps obviously, since it's likely (unless we > get thousands of participants) that no one will get > the expiration date exactly, the winner would be the > person who's prediction is closest to the actual > "expiration" date. > > And finally, if any of you diligent space science > enthusiasts and rocket science professionals have an > inside track on the equipment specs -- you know like > batteries and solar panels -- and thereby a better > data set for making your predictions, would you > consider sharing those specs with the rest of > us,...say after waiting briefly for all your > lesser-informed brethren to commit themselves to their > predictions. Geez, I would've predicted Spirit to have already been under by now. So, I'd have lost. What I wonder is whether anyone on the MER team has suggested an all out endurance run of either rover. I.e., keep it going for a long distance, to get as far from the landing site, until it fails. > May the new year bring you love or good luck,...or > more love. Thanks and the same for everyone else! Dan From russell.wallace at gmail.com Mon Jan 2 04:54:37 2006 From: russell.wallace at gmail.com (Russell Wallace) Date: Mon, 2 Jan 2006 04:54:37 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] the structure of randomness In-Reply-To: <5844e22f0601012007qa4ef7e8r248c5ed1f5008f7@mail.gmail.com> References: <20051227164022.23975.qmail@web61314.mail.yahoo.com> <8d71341e0512301838n4595beb0g63753f063177cba0@mail.gmail.com> <5844e22f0512301916x2f67e847mbe0b11e1ada98ef0@mail.gmail.com> <8d71341e0512301933i1388a93bw97f8756d47157a3c@mail.gmail.com> <5844e22f0512302023qd62d9dfg5844c30ef3897630@mail.gmail.com> <8d71341e0512302101j9aec6f7l4422a832a8c789e0@mail.gmail.com> <5844e22f0512302236p731edaf4m15a75e4444e82463@mail.gmail.com> <8d71341e0512302255k341f521keb92e4c7380c1d56@mail.gmail.com> <5844e22f0601012007qa4ef7e8r248c5ed1f5008f7@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <8d71341e0601012054k68fa487eqc0c1c06b3fc16222@mail.gmail.com> On 1/2/06, Jeff Medina wrote: > > You have absolutely no idea whether the computing power "just barely > available" to the simulator is anywhere near (as opposed to notably > greater than) the amount "just barely adequate for a ground level > simulation of the visible universe". Why are you making such a strange > assumption? Of course it's a strange assumption, which is why I not only don't make it but have been arguing against it the whole time. Remember that the original argument was that a certain experiment may have detected a slight anisotropy of space or something similar (this seems unlikely in light of further discussion, but it can be taken as a premise) and that this implied one's estimate of the likelihood of the simulation hypothesis should be adjusted upward. Why would it be adjusted upward? Everyone understands the implied logic: a simulation is short of computing power and might skimp just enough to let the imperfection through. I'm arguing that we should _not_ a priori expect the available computing power to be anywhere near (in either direction), and therefore the original argument is _not_ valid; the originally described results do not give us any reason to adjust the estimated probably of the simulation hypothesis either up or down. Aside from that, it's also not necessarily unlikely that those values > would be near one another. If I were trying to create an interesting > simulation-world, I just might use all of the computing power > available to me. Then Russell-in-the-world-I-made would say, "It sure > is unlikely that my visible universe's required computing power > matches the computing power available to the simulator." And > Sim-Russell would be wrong. > Not really, because there'd be a zillion googol Sim-Russells simulated more efficiently, so the statement would be correct to the tune of a zillion googol to one. - Russell -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From spike66 at comcast.net Mon Jan 2 04:53:30 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Sun, 1 Jan 2006 20:53:30 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Mars rovers RIP? In-Reply-To: <003e01c60f56$7d3a1380$16893cd1@pavilion> Message-ID: <200601020455.k024tde07666@tick.javien.com> > > On Sunday, January 01, 2006 6:42 PM Jeff Davis jrd1415 at yahoo.com wrote: > > No one showed any interest at the time. With the > > appearance of this article: > > > > Rovers Still Circle Mars > > http://wired.com/news/wireservice/0,69949-0.html?tw=wn_tophead_5 > > > > Wherein we read: > > > > "These rovers are living on borrowed time. > > We're so past warranty on them,"... ... Technotranscendence wrote: > > Geez, I would've predicted Spirit to have already been under by now. > So, I'd have lost. Oh ye of little faith. These rovers are a Lockheeed Martin product. {8-] When these birds last this long, the programs end up with an embarrassing problem. They need to come up with funding to keep someone interpreting the new unexpected data. The slave labor (graduate students) move on, but there is still valuable data coming down every day. spike From spike66 at comcast.net Mon Jan 2 05:30:17 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Sun, 1 Jan 2006 21:30:17 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Politics: worthwhile commentary In-Reply-To: <4df7d638d8cc005c5381a19b572ce9ca@HarveyNewstrom.com> Message-ID: <200601020532.k025WKe11042@tick.javien.com> > -----Original Message----- > From: extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org [mailto:extropy-chat- > bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Harvey Newstrom ... > > > > Thanks BillK. I did assume everyone here readily capable > > of verbal self defense. If someone wishes to engage in > > verbal sparring including personal attacks, I personally > > have no problem with their doing it in private. > > > > Any other thoughts? spike > > It is unacceptable for any member of our list to be personally > attacked, period. I don't care if it is done in public where we can > see it, or whether they are attacked privately in e-mail. Such attacks > are undesired behavior. Nobody wants to attract personal attacks via > this list, any more than they want to attract spam or stalkers. > > What are you doing, Spike? First you allow off-topic politics. Then > you encourage arguments as a valid form of communications. Now this. > There seems to be an obvious pattern, but I can't discern a useful > purpose. > > -- > Harvey Newstrom > CISSP CISA CISM CIFI NSA-IAM GSEC ISSAP ISSMP ISSPCS IBMCP Harvey your concern is noted. I was hoping to avoid having ExI members complain to the moderators about another ExI member harassing them offlist. I agree that any attack is undesirable behavior, but I see that issue as one of the risks of posting your thoughts in public. Any public figure must accept this. We recognize that extropy sometimes attracts eccentric characters, but what the hey, we like eccentric characters. There is little we can do about that. Spam of course we can and do take action against. I can show you a pile of junk the ExI spam filters catch. The reason I know about this is it sends me a damn message every time it catches a spam. (gee thanks, spam filter, I really want to know all about every viagra and watch ad.) {8^D Regarding stalkers, this is an issue for the local constabulary or (if you live in Florida and they come on your property) Mister Twelve Gage. Nowthen, concerning your other points. > What are you doing, Spike? First you allow off-topic politics... I made a controversial judgment call on this one. We had some ExI posters who appeared to be boiling over to discuss the Second Iraq war, which turned out to be really about the U.S. constitution vs. international law. I can see how that directly impacts the extropian vision of the future in many ways. I suggested a week to discuss it, they did, many learned much. Now I would consider those kinds of topics fair game. The posters have been good about avoiding the boring and useless republicans this, democrats that, yakkity yak and bla bla. As long as the posters maintain some semblance of order and some level of relevance to extropy, I still think it is fair game. I am hoping to avoid an SL4-style list sniper task. I fully understand and agree with SL4 for doing that, but ExI is more a general topic list. >...Then you encourage arguments as a valid form of communications... Ja, it is a valid form of communications. Are you objecting to the term "arguments"? Arguments need not be heated, nor do they need to be insulting. Arguments can be educational. > ...Now this... Ja, now this. > There seems to be an obvious pattern, but I can't discern a useful > purpose. Nor can I. Open to suggestion. I will not referee every rassling match that breaks out; I have not the time for that. spike From neuronexmachina at gmail.com Mon Jan 2 05:35:55 2006 From: neuronexmachina at gmail.com (Neil H.) Date: Mon, 2 Jan 2006 00:35:55 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Aubrey de Grey on 60 Minutes Sunday, January 1st In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: Here's the transcript: http://cbs11tv.com/health/health_story_001195918.html Also, some commentary from the MPrize: http://mprize.org/index.php?ctype=news&pagename=blogdetaildisplay&BID=2006012-01075742&detaildisplay=Y On 12/30/05, Hughes, James J. wrote: > > > >From Longevity Meme: > http://www.longevitymeme.org/news/view_news_item.cfm?news_id=2141 > > 60 Minutes On Radical Life Extension > > Biomedical gerontologist Aubrey de Grey - advocate for the Strategies > for Engineered Negligible Senescence, a path towards and justification > for real anti-aging medicine - Jay Olshansky and other scientists will > be appearing on 60 Minutes on Sunday, January 1st in a segment on > radical life extension: "60 Minutes is planning three stories about > beginning anew this New Year's Day. ... We'll also take a look at new > medical research that may lead to people living much longer lives than > we ever thought possible, maybe even 400 or 500 years. Some doctors > believe with medical breakthroughs on the horizon, humans can live much > longer lives." > > "Up Next" at 60 Minutes: > http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/1998/07/08/60minutes/main13502.shtml > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From spike66 at comcast.net Mon Jan 2 05:35:43 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Sun, 1 Jan 2006 21:35:43 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Politics: worthwhile commentary In-Reply-To: <200601020532.k025WKe11042@tick.javien.com> Message-ID: <200601020537.k025bre11884@tick.javien.com> > ... I will not referee every > rassling match that breaks out; I have not the time for > that. spike Especially six months from now. I am going to be a father. {8-] spike From avantguardian2020 at yahoo.com Mon Jan 2 05:45:56 2006 From: avantguardian2020 at yahoo.com (The Avantguardian) Date: Sun, 1 Jan 2006 21:45:56 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] the structure of randomness In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <20060102054556.82018.qmail@web60521.mail.yahoo.com> --- gts wrote: > I should qualify this a bit. The supposed > non-monitonical ("toothy") shape > of single histograms is part of the alleged effect, > but I find that much > less interesting I agree with you that the non-monotonic nature of the histograms is less interesting than their alleged periodicity. In fact the expectation of monotonicity in presumably random distributions is, I think, a mistake similar to the fallacious law of averages. For example if I start to flip a coin and tally the results, it is true that as I flip the coin the ratio of heads to flips will start approaching 1/2. The fallacy however is the unfounded belief that this number approaches 1/2 monotonically the way a mathematical limit might approach 1/2 with each result bringing me closer to 1/2. Instead this is not the case at all. After 10 flips for example, the ratio could very well be exactly 1/2. Then I might flip it 10 more times and get heads everytime. This would take the ratio away from 1/2 to 3/4 and lead to non-monotonicty. Thus the fallacy is that more trials ALWAYS brings one closer to the expected average. In fact if you think about the more trials you have the more likely you will get larger devaitions from the mean. For example it is far more likely that you will have at some point had a run of 50 heads after 10,000 tosses than after 100. > than the claim that these patterns > persist and recur > periodically at 1, 27 and 365 days. > > However the more I think about it, the more > convinced I am that Sarfatti > is right to think Walker refuted it. I have read and thought about Walker's claim to refute Schnoll's work. While his explanation for the increase of similar histograms at +/- 0 hours is plausible (i.e. sampling bias of counting of 2 hrs worth of histograms as 1 hrs worth due to a systematic error) I don't buy Walker's explanation of "routine computer housekeeping" for the increase of similar histograms that Walker himself sees in his own data at +/- 24 hours. First of all, if it was such a thing, you would think that Walker could easily turn off the tape-backup, virus scan, or whatever else he presumes is causing his computer to oversample similar histograms in those regular time intervals. Second, this explanation could not possibly hold true for the spikes seen at 27 days and 365 days as these are not at precise intervals of 24 hours. ie. There were decimals that I don't recall after these numbers thus, the idea of some computer process that occurs with a regularity of 24 hours could be discounted. Third, Schnoll first noted and started observing this phenomenon 40 years ago, before Unix and any bias introduced by periodic Unix processes could have been introduced into the data. Therefore, I do not believe Walker has refuted Scnoll's data, although he might have pointed out a source of error for the immediate time measurements, he does in no way refute the periodicity of Schnoll's data which is the truly interesting part of it anyway. I understand that there is an urge to ignore anything that does not fit into ones tidy little paradigm, but all true progress of the paradigm depends on analyzing the anomalies and not ignoring them. The Avantguardian is Stuart LaForge alt email: stuart"AT"ucla.edu "The most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the source of all true art and science. He to whom this emotion is a stranger, who can no longer wonder and stand rapt in awe, is as good as dead: his eyes are closed. . ." - Albert Einstein, "What I Believe" (1930) __________________________________ Yahoo! for Good - Make a difference this year. http://brand.yahoo.com/cybergivingweek2005/ From deimtee at optusnet.com.au Mon Jan 2 06:46:13 2006 From: deimtee at optusnet.com.au (deimtee) Date: Mon, 02 Jan 2006 17:46:13 +1100 Subject: [extropy-chat] Future Spikelet In-Reply-To: <200601020537.k025bre11884@tick.javien.com> References: <200601020537.k025bre11884@tick.javien.com> Message-ID: <43B8CC35.8020809@optusnet.com.au> spike wrote >Especially six months from now. I am going to be a father. > >{8-] > >spike > > > > Congratulations !!!! From jrd1415 at yahoo.com Mon Jan 2 06:49:37 2006 From: jrd1415 at yahoo.com (Jeff Davis) Date: Sun, 1 Jan 2006 22:49:37 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Mars rovers RIP? In-Reply-To: <003e01c60f56$7d3a1380$16893cd1@pavilion> Message-ID: <20060102064937.74446.qmail@web60018.mail.yahoo.com> --- Technotranscendence wrote: > Geez, I would've predicted Spirit to have already > been under by now. So, I'd have lost. But you didn't, so you didn't, so you get a second chance. Ain't life grand? If you can't handle the twenty bucks, no one will discourse on what a cheap-ass piker you are (Whoops! Did I say that out loud? ;-}), make a prediction anyway. Best, Jeff D __________________________________ Yahoo! for Good - Make a difference this year. http://brand.yahoo.com/cybergivingweek2005/ From jrd1415 at yahoo.com Mon Jan 2 07:05:28 2006 From: jrd1415 at yahoo.com (Jeff Davis) Date: Sun, 1 Jan 2006 23:05:28 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Mars rovers RIP? In-Reply-To: <200601020455.k024tde07666@tick.javien.com> Message-ID: <20060102070528.78734.qmail@web60018.mail.yahoo.com> --- spike wrote: > Oh ye of little faith. These rovers are a Lockheeed > Martin product. {8-] Hey, that's terrific. I didn't know. So, Mr. Insider, Mr. LockMart Boaster boy, how about tracking down those specs for us so that everyone can enjoy a level playing field. Best, Jeff D __________________________________ Yahoo! for Good - Make a difference this year. http://brand.yahoo.com/cybergivingweek2005/ From gts_2000 at yahoo.com Mon Jan 2 07:10:54 2006 From: gts_2000 at yahoo.com (gts) Date: Mon, 02 Jan 2006 02:10:54 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] the structure of randomness In-Reply-To: <20060102054556.82018.qmail@web60521.mail.yahoo.com> References: <20060102054556.82018.qmail@web60521.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: On Mon, 02 Jan 2006 00:45:56 -0500, The Avantguardian wrote: > Therefore, I do not believe Walker has refuted > Scnoll's data, although he might have pointed out a > source of error for the immediate time measurements, > he does in no way refute the periodicity of Schnoll's > data which is the truly interesting part of it anyway. I'm not sure Walker believed it either. Sarfatti believed Walker's refutation, and unlike Walker, Sarfatti is a theoretical physicist. In one abstract by Walker he suggested the Shnoll effect might be real even despite his results, so perhaps Walker didn't agree with Sarfatti. I don't know. Emphasis here on the past tense. These discussions to which we are referring took place around '00-'01. The issue may be settled by now. > I understand that there is an urge to ignore anything > that does not fit into ones tidy little paradigm, but > all true progress of the paradigm depends on analyzing > the anomalies and not ignoring them. Yes. I once knew John Walker, though in a different capacity and one in which he would not remember me. I sent him an email several years ago about a subject related to this thread -- something about radioactive decay. He responded with an intelligent and thoughtful answer, never realizing that we were once business associates. :) Unfortunately I lost his email and he has since removed it from his website. Walker is the genius who founded Autodesk. Many years ago he left the company and moved to Switzerland. -gts From mail at HarveyNewstrom.com Mon Jan 2 07:18:11 2006 From: mail at HarveyNewstrom.com (Harvey Newstrom) Date: Mon, 2 Jan 2006 02:18:11 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Politics: worthwhile commentary In-Reply-To: References: <200601011619.k01GJre17034@tick.javien.com> <4df7d638d8cc005c5381a19b572ce9ca@HarveyNewstrom.com> Message-ID: <2d090727fd2988129ee3837dee32f6d2@HarveyNewstrom.com> On Jan 1, 2006, at 11:34 PM, Samantha Atkins wrote: > If I think someone is being a twit (or whatever) then I reserve the > right to privately say so if I consider it worth my while.? Frankly, > suggesting that moderators should prevent people from privately > speaking their mind in ways you don't approve of seems? pretty silly > and foolish.? Yes, so I am thankful that I didn't do this. Read my posts more carefully. I was objecting to Spike's statements that seemed to encourage personal attacks in private e-mail (by saying he didn't personally see anything wrong with that). I was pointing out what was wrong with personal attacks, not saying that Spike should moderate private e-mail. > The word in question is defined below.? You don't qualify in my > experience of you as generally silly or foolish. ? So you have nothing > to worry about.? :-)? I don't worry about it, because you wouldn't just call me a twit and leave it at that. You would explain why my statements seem silly or foolish. Even when I disagree with you, we have a rational conversation. I can't imagine you stooping to sending insulting messages off-list that you wouldn't dare send on list. Even in your heated moments, you still seem to explain yourself and your reasons. I don't know why other people not only don't do this, but they don't even understand the concept of rational debate. -- Harvey Newstrom CISSP CISA CISM CIFI NSA-IAM GSEC ISSAP ISSMP ISSPCS IBMCP From mail at HarveyNewstrom.com Mon Jan 2 07:20:15 2006 From: mail at HarveyNewstrom.com (Harvey Newstrom) Date: Mon, 2 Jan 2006 02:20:15 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Politics: worthwhile commentary In-Reply-To: References: <200601011619.k01GJre17034@tick.javien.com> <4df7d638d8cc005c5381a19b572ce9ca@HarveyNewstrom.com> Message-ID: <8e67406a95a7dc4e0cbaff0d5fb7e1b8@HarveyNewstrom.com> On Jan 1, 2006, at 10:50 PM, gts wrote: > spike is right. It's not his job to moderate private emails. Should he > moderate our phone calls too? I never said it was spike's job to moderate private e-mails. I said he shouldn't appear to encourage personal attacks in private e-mail, and I explained what was wrong with personal attacks. -- Harvey Newstrom CISSP CISA CISM CIFI NSA-IAM GSEC ISSAP ISSMP ISSPCS IBMCP From spike66 at comcast.net Mon Jan 2 07:22:49 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Sun, 1 Jan 2006 23:22:49 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Mars rovers RIP? In-Reply-To: <20060102070528.78734.qmail@web60018.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <200601020724.k027Ope23587@tick.javien.com> > bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Jeff Davis > Subject: RE: [extropy-chat] Mars rovers RIP? > > --- spike wrote: > > > Oh ye of little faith. These rovers are a Lockheeed > > Martin product. {8-] > > Hey, that's terrific. I didn't know. So, Mr. > Insider, Mr. LockMart Boaster boy, how about tracking > down those specs for us so that everyone can enjoy a > level playing field. > > Best, Jeff D The specs? Those specs called for a three month life with a probability of failure not greater than 5%. That wouldn't tell you the answer you asked. What we need is the reliability/life cycle model. I do not personally have access to that model, so I cannot offer a estimate of the life of those Mars rovers on that basis. That being said, there is some info that might be useful for this wager you propose Jeff. I don't know what type of batteries are in these rovers, but generally that is the subsystem that has a definable lifespan. If we can find out what type of batteries they use, I can offer a useful estimate of a time/probability distribution. I heard that the battery/solar charging system was not designed to survive the Martian winter. They did once, so perhaps they will survive again. spike From mail at HarveyNewstrom.com Mon Jan 2 07:28:28 2006 From: mail at HarveyNewstrom.com (Harvey Newstrom) Date: Mon, 2 Jan 2006 02:28:28 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Politics: worthwhile commentary In-Reply-To: <200601020532.k025WKe11042@tick.javien.com> References: <200601020532.k025WKe11042@tick.javien.com> Message-ID: <2d1f7df27cc71fbc4d883e90d762917b@HarveyNewstrom.com> On Jan 2, 2006, at 12:30 AM, spike wrote: > Harvey your concern is noted. I was hoping to avoid having > ExI members complain to the moderators about another ExI > member harassing them offlist. I agree that any attack is > undesirable behavior, but I see that issue as one of the risks > of posting your thoughts in public. Any public figure > must accept this. We recognize that extropy sometimes > attracts eccentric characters, but what the hey, we like > eccentric characters. There is little we can do about > that. This isn't what you said. You said you "personally have no problem with their doing it in private," appearing to open the door for list members to start sending personal attacks to list members in private e-mail with your blessing. >> What are you doing, Spike? First you allow off-topic politics... > > I made a controversial judgment call on this one. We had some ExI > posters who appeared to be boiling over to discuss the Second Iraq > war, which turned out to be really about the U.S. constitution > vs. international law. I can see how that directly impacts the > extropian vision of the future in many ways. This isn't what you said. You said, "If people have something to say that is not particularly extropian, say it this week" and "Then after that let us settle down and post extropian stuff again?" > As long as the posters maintain some semblance of order They didn't. You admonished Russell, saying that "all the skeptics who insisted we could not discuss political matters without fighting are surely nanner nannering us." > I am hoping to avoid an SL4-style list sniper task. It's called moderating. Why did you take the job of moderating if you don't want to do it? > I fully understand and agree with SL4 for doing that, but ExI is more > a general topic list. Oh, barf. I give up right now. I thought the whole point of trying to stay on extropian topics was to avoid being pulled down to the lowest common denominator of being a "general topic list"! But it seems that other people really want that. > I will not referee every rassling match that breaks out When the moderator says this, it appears to give a clear signal that "rassling matches" will be allowed by the moderators who will not intervene. Don't act surprised when they keep happening, because you are causing them. > I have not the time for that. Then I suggest you stop pretending to do the job that you have neither the time nor desire to do. Do what you say and say what you do. Either have a moderated list, or don't. I don't care. Just be honest about it. -- Harvey Newstrom CISSP CISA CISM CIFI NSA-IAM GSEC ISSAP ISSMP ISSPCS IBMCP -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: not available Type: text/enriched Size: 3027 bytes Desc: not available URL: From spike66 at comcast.net Mon Jan 2 07:28:51 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Sun, 1 Jan 2006 23:28:51 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Politics: worthwhile commentary In-Reply-To: <2d090727fd2988129ee3837dee32f6d2@HarveyNewstrom.com> Message-ID: <200601020730.k027Ure24138@tick.javien.com> > bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Harvey Newstrom ... > > Yes, so I am thankful that I didn't do this. Read my posts more > carefully. I was objecting to Spike's statements that seemed to > encourage personal attacks in private e-mail (by saying he didn't > personally see anything wrong with that). I was pointing out what was > wrong with personal attacks, not saying that Spike should moderate > private e-mail... > Harvey Newstrom Ok, I did misunderstand your comment. Regarding my notion that it is fair game for people to flame each other offlist, I should specify that from a list moderator's point of view it isn't a violation of the rules. I do not encourage this behavior. For years I have been urging extropians to be kind to each other. spike From amara at amara.com Mon Jan 2 09:24:09 2006 From: amara at amara.com (Amara Graps) Date: Mon, 2 Jan 2006 10:24:09 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] Mars rovers RIP? Message-ID: Spike: >Oh ye of little faith. These rovers are a Lockheeed Martin >product. {8-] The optics would degrade, however those are fixable with an occasional Martian dust storm ... :-) >When these birds last this long, the programs end up with >an embarrassing problem. They need to come up with funding >to keep someone interpreting the new unexpected data. The >slave labor (graduate students) move on, but there is still >valuable data coming down every day. Yes. Or the PIs continue working 16 hour days. (My best friend is married to a MER PI, I saw how insanely he works.) Amara -- Amara Graps, PhD Istituto di Fisica dello Spazio Interplanetario (IFSI) Istituto Nazionale di Astrofisica (INAF), Roma, ITALIA Amara.Graps at ifsi.rm.cnr.it From amara at amara.com Mon Jan 2 11:38:47 2006 From: amara at amara.com (Amara Graps) Date: Mon, 2 Jan 2006 12:38:47 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] Some recent probability/multiverse/quantum discussions Message-ID: Some discussions on the blog: "cosmic variance" that might be of interest to the readers here: Probability, quantum mechanics, copies of selves, multiverses http://cosmicvariance.com/2005/12/30/thought-experiments/ and an earlier discussion of the meaning of quantum wavefunctions http://cosmicvariance.com/2005/12/26/no-reasonable-definition-of-reality-could-be-expected-to-permit-this/ Enjoy! Amara -- ******************************************************************** Amara Graps, PhD email: amara at amara.com Computational Physics vita: ftp://ftp.amara.com/pub/resume.txt Multiplex Answers URL: http://www.amara.com/ ******************************************************************** "Before I came here I was confused about this subject. Having listened to your lecture I am still confused. But on a higher level." -- Enrico Fermi From mbb386 at main.nc.us Mon Jan 2 14:39:11 2006 From: mbb386 at main.nc.us (M.B. Baumeister) Date: Mon, 2 Jan 2006 09:39:11 -0500 (EST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Politics: worthwhile commentary In-Reply-To: <200601020537.k025bre11884@tick.javien.com> References: <200601020532.k025WKe11042@tick.javien.com> <200601020537.k025bre11884@tick.javien.com> Message-ID: <55632.72.236.103.220.1136212751.squirrel@main.nc.us> > > Especially six months from now. I am going to be a father. > > {8-] Congratulations, Spike! And to your wife. :) If this is your first, a whole new world awaits. Been there done that! Regards, MB From pharos at gmail.com Mon Jan 2 14:51:24 2006 From: pharos at gmail.com (BillK) Date: Mon, 2 Jan 2006 14:51:24 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Politics: worthwhile commentary In-Reply-To: <200601020730.k027Ure24138@tick.javien.com> References: <2d090727fd2988129ee3837dee32f6d2@HarveyNewstrom.com> <200601020730.k027Ure24138@tick.javien.com> Message-ID: On 1/2/06, spike wrote: > > Ok, I did misunderstand your comment. Regarding my notion > that it is fair game for people to flame each other offlist, > I should specify that from a list moderator's point of view > it isn't a violation of the rules. I do not encourage this > behavior. For years I have been urging extropians > to be kind to each other. > Agreed. All list moderators want to keep flame-fests away from their public list and almost all list rules say something along those lines. If flames and insults are kept out of sight then the list looks better and all the uninvolved list members do not have to suffer the barrage of insults. The Extropy-chat List Agreement says: "Personal Attacks: We do not allow personal attacks or libelous statements. Those violating this rule may be removed from the List without notice." But this is in the context of list behaviour, not private attacks. Some lists go further than just 'Keep it off the list!', because of the problem of private harassment of people with the intent to stop them posting disliked opinions to the list. Some aggressive people would be quite happy to drive their disliked opponents away from the list altogether. One example I found said something similar to the paragraph below. (I edited it slightly). I suggest that consideration be given to adding a similar paragraph to the extropy-chat List Agreement. "If you are ever the victim of a private ad hominem attack because of something that occurred on Extropy-chat, please forward a copy of the offending post to exi-list-admin at extropy.org. At the discretion of the Extropy Institute's list administrators, the perpetrator will be either warned or immediately temporarily suspended or permanently banned. Extropy Institute's list administrators will determine the duration of said ban". BillK From dirk.bruere at gmail.com Mon Jan 2 14:58:26 2006 From: dirk.bruere at gmail.com (Dirk Bruere) Date: Mon, 2 Jan 2006 14:58:26 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Politics: worthwhile commentary In-Reply-To: <20051231012702.4524.qmail@web60014.mail.yahoo.com> References: <20051231012702.4524.qmail@web60014.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: On 12/31/05, Jeff Davis wrote: > > --- Robert Bradbury wrote: > > > I agree with Dirk, that politics is somewhat > > different. In part because it > > is constantly shifting. So unlike a "hard" science > > it is difficult to > > establish who the authoritative sources are. > > If one cannot identify "authoritative sources", then > pursuit of a high-quality data set (to enable a > high-quality analysis) requires a different approach. > Get at foundational data and perform your own > analysis, and/or learn how to "crunch" sources so as > to be able to extract high-quality data from > mixed-quality data. > > The problem is, such data is called 'news' - and contains similar (though lesser) baises. Dirk -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From dirk.bruere at gmail.com Mon Jan 2 15:20:12 2006 From: dirk.bruere at gmail.com (Dirk Bruere) Date: Mon, 2 Jan 2006 15:20:12 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] the structure of randomness In-Reply-To: <20051230183453.96206.qmail@web60521.mail.yahoo.com> References: <6.2.1.2.0.20051230115306.01d339f8@pop-server.satx.rr.com> <20051230183453.96206.qmail@web60521.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: On 12/30/05, The Avantguardian wrote: > > > > --- Damien Broderick wrote: > > > > http://www.21stcenturysciencetech.com/articles/time.html > > > > It appears to show some surprising regularities > > within or atop various > > stochastic structures, correlating with, for > > example, sidereal rather than > > terrestrial/solar time. A possible connection > > between global and quantal > > scales? > > Very interesting, Damien. No endorsement is needed. > The paper gives no theories or explanations to refute. > Just observations and data from many many experiments. > To an empiricist, data speaks the truth. There is > something, not yet understood, underlying these > anomalies in randomness. Just because the scientist is > a Russian is no reason to assume he would falsify > hundreds of experiments to support no theory at all. > Perhaps this data ought to be viewed with respect to results from PEAR Dirk -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From natasha at natasha.cc Mon Jan 2 15:40:43 2006 From: natasha at natasha.cc (Natasha Vita-More) Date: Mon, 02 Jan 2006 09:40:43 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] Politics: worthwhile commentary In-Reply-To: <200601020730.k027Ure24138@tick.javien.com> References: <2d090727fd2988129ee3837dee32f6d2@HarveyNewstrom.com> <200601020730.k027Ure24138@tick.javien.com> Message-ID: <6.2.1.2.2.20060102093947.04d7e398@pop-server.austin.rr.com> At 01:28 AM 1/2/2006, Spike wrote: >Ok, I did misunderstand your comment. Regarding my notion >that it is fair game for people to flame each other offlist, >I should specify that from a list moderator's point of view >it isn't a violation of the rules. I do not encourage this >behavior. Bravo to Spike! Natasha Vita-More Cultural Strategist - Designer Future Studies, University of Houston President, Extropy Institute Member, Association of Professional Futurists Founder, Transhumanist Arts & Culture Honorary Vice-Chair, World Transhumanist Association Senior Associate, Foresight Institute Advisor, Alcor Life Extension Foundation If you draw a circle in the sand and study only what's inside the circle, then that is a closed-system perspective. If you study what is inside the circle and everything outside the circle, then that is an open system perspective. Buckminster Fuller -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From natasha at natasha.cc Mon Jan 2 15:42:15 2006 From: natasha at natasha.cc (Natasha Vita-More) Date: Mon, 02 Jan 2006 09:42:15 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] Politics: worthwhile commentary In-Reply-To: <200601020537.k025bre11884@tick.javien.com> References: <200601020532.k025WKe11042@tick.javien.com> <200601020537.k025bre11884@tick.javien.com> Message-ID: <6.2.1.2.2.20060102094107.04eb8910@pop-server.austin.rr.com> >Especially six months from now. I am going to be a father. Because of your ability to deal with criticisms directly and calmly, I think you will be a marvelous father. I am so happy for you Spike. Natasha Natasha Vita-More Cultural Strategist - Designer Future Studies, University of Houston President, Extropy Institute Member, Association of Professional Futurists Founder, Transhumanist Arts & Culture Honorary Vice-Chair, World Transhumanist Association Senior Associate, Foresight Institute Advisor, Alcor Life Extension Foundation If you draw a circle in the sand and study only what's inside the circle, then that is a closed-system perspective. If you study what is inside the circle and everything outside the circle, then that is an open system perspective. Buckminster Fuller -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jose_cordeiro at yahoo.com Mon Jan 2 15:47:21 2006 From: jose_cordeiro at yahoo.com (Jose Cordeiro) Date: Mon, 2 Jan 2006 07:47:21 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] More on Moore Message-ID: <20060102154721.53625.qmail@web32813.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Dear friends, Have a very happy start for 2006 and have more on Moore: http://www.itrs.net/Common/2005ITRS/ExecSum2005.pdf http://www.top500.org/lists/2005/11/p/Projected_Performance_Development Transhumanistically yours, La vie est belle! Yos? (www.cordeiro.org) Caracas, Venezuela, Americas, TerraNostra, Solar System, Milky Way, Multiverse -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From kerry_prez at yahoo.com Mon Jan 2 18:02:12 2006 From: kerry_prez at yahoo.com (Al Brooks) Date: Mon, 2 Jan 2006 10:02:12 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Politics: worthwhile commentary In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <20060102180212.66908.qmail@web51608.mail.yahoo.com> I apologize, yet it was just a little good natured public chiding, like, 'it takes a twit to know one-- at least one of us two twits will own up to being one'. Just one more point concerning white supremacists or confederates or whatever label they are given. I don't mind if they come out and say, "We don't like the way mud people look; we don't want to live in their communities; be exposed to their criminal activities and don't want to send children to integrated schools. We think too many of the mud people are slothful; they claim victimhood too much and they get affirmative action". None of these sentiments are particularly unfair. But when you look at what Melissa Johnson wrote you can see right away she isn't being candid, when her cipher is cracked it says she doesn't care much for nonwhites in the first place, affirmative action is a lesser concern. She wouldn't mind quotas favoring whites. I would prefer to read an article by a neo-nazi because right away it can be seen what they want, it's clinically fascinating to read. However with a cryptic piece you have to decipher the writer's code. > Al, if someone insults you offlist, that is fair game, but it isn't fair > game for you to post their private messages to the whole world. Do desist, --------------------------------- Yahoo! DSL Something to write home about. Just $16.99/mo. or less -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From spike66 at comcast.net Mon Jan 2 18:21:20 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Mon, 2 Jan 2006 10:21:20 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Politics: worthwhile commentary In-Reply-To: <2d1f7df27cc71fbc4d883e90d762917b@HarveyNewstrom.com> Message-ID: <200601021823.k02INMe19692@tick.javien.com> bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Harvey Newstrom ... >This isn't what you said. You said you "personally have no problem with their doing it in private," appearing to open the door for list members to start sending personal attacks to list members in private e-mail with your blessing... Oh, ok. List members, do refrain from bullying each other, in public and in private. If our dreams of radical life extension work out, we may need to entertain each other for a long time. I probably should have said something like: If you find you must participate in a flame war, please take it offlist. Feel free to killfile any yahoo that bugs you. Play the board, not the man. ... >This isn't what you said. You said, "If people have something to say that is not particularly extropian, say it this week" and "Then after that let us settle down and post extropian stuff again?" They didn't. You admonished Russell, saying that "all the skeptics who insisted we could not discuss political matters without fighting are surely nanner nannering us."... Ja, that was a disappointment to me that we dropped the ball at the goal line. As I recall, the person who did the personal attack was one of those who said we could not go a week without personal attack. I'm not sure that counts. >It's called moderating. Why did you take the job of moderating if you don't want to do it?... I am willing to moderate, but hold the view that extropians should be only lightly moderated. I do understand why the more focused groups must be carefully moderated. We have alternatives, if one is strongly focused on libertarianism or singularity for instance. >Oh, barf. I give up right now. I thought the whole point of trying to stay on extropian topics was to avoid being pulled down to the lowest common denominator of being a "general topic list"! But it seems that other people really want that... Max's extropian principles have a broad appeal: http://www.maxmore.com/extprn3.htm I recall finding this document in the early days of the internet, about 1994. It expressed so clearly what I and about five others were talking about in the early 80s in college. We need only request that posters read this document and decide if they find a deep resonance with those memes. If so, then ExI-chat is the right place to hang out. I propose that ExI-chat posters read over the principles at least once a year. It will only take about ten or fifteen minutes. This is the start of the new year, so do it today, then make it a New Years Day habit. I can imagine a huge range of topics that may have relevance to those principles, even if very indirectly. >Then I suggest you stop pretending to do the job that you have neither the time nor desire to do. Do what you say and say what you do. Either have a moderated list, or don't. I don't care. Just be honest about it... -- Harvey Newstrom Ok, here is my honest statement about list moderation: I will continue to moderate until requested to desist. I will moderate only lightly, as before. I consider it inappropriate for ExI moderators to referee private disputes, even if they started over ExI-chat posts. I will be quick to encourage decent behavior, but slow to spank.* Some have criticized ExI for under-moderating to the point of encouraging chaos, others say over-moderating to the point of censorship. With these two views I respectfully disagree. spike *Have you ever seen someone spanked slowly? I admit it just doesn't work very well. {8^D From gts_2000 at yahoo.com Mon Jan 2 18:27:15 2006 From: gts_2000 at yahoo.com (gts) Date: Mon, 02 Jan 2006 13:27:15 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] the structure of randomness In-Reply-To: References: <20060102054556.82018.qmail@web60521.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: I constructed this animated gif of 25 histograms. http://www.geocities.com/gts_2000/shnoll.html Is the effect there? Let your eyes be the judge. These histograms are from another of Shnoll's papers: Fine structure of histograms of alpha-activity measurements depends on direction of alpha particles flow and the Earth rotation: experiments with collimators. http://www.cifa-icef.org/shnoll.pdf -gts From spike66 at comcast.net Mon Jan 2 18:28:00 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Mon, 2 Jan 2006 10:28:00 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Politics: worthwhile commentary In-Reply-To: <20060102180212.66908.qmail@web51608.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <200601021830.k02IU1e20353@tick.javien.com> _____ From: extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org [mailto:extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Al Brooks Subject: [extropy-chat] Politics: worthwhile commentary >I apologize, yet it was just a little good natured public chiding, like, 'it takes a twit to know one-- at least one of us two twits will own up to being one'. OK, but I don't see what this has to do with the rest of your commentary. Feel free to hit send after the first sentence. >Just one more point concerning white supremacists or confederates or whatever label they are given... Al, this entire topic of racism must be handled with extreme care, if at all. When in doubt regarding relevance to ExI chat, please review the extropian principles. http://www.maxmore.com/extprn3.htm spike -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From dirk.bruere at gmail.com Mon Jan 2 18:39:55 2006 From: dirk.bruere at gmail.com (Dirk Bruere) Date: Mon, 2 Jan 2006 18:39:55 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Politics: worthwhile commentary In-Reply-To: <200601021830.k02IU1e20353@tick.javien.com> References: <20060102180212.66908.qmail@web51608.mail.yahoo.com> <200601021830.k02IU1e20353@tick.javien.com> Message-ID: On 1/2/06, spike wrote: > > OK, but I don't see what this has to do with the rest of your commentary. > Feel free to > > hit send after the first sentence. > > Al, this entire topic of racism must be handled with extreme care, if at > all. When in > > doubt regarding relevance to ExI chat, please review the extropian > principles. > > > > http://www.maxmore.com/extprn3.htm > I would expect that most here share my views on the subject. Namely, that each individual be judged on their own merits and not according to involuntary membership of a class. That the only discrimination be in favour of competence and ability. Dirk -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From kerry_prez at yahoo.com Mon Jan 2 19:16:56 2006 From: kerry_prez at yahoo.com (Al Brooks) Date: Mon, 2 Jan 2006 11:16:56 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Politics: worthwhile commentary In-Reply-To: <200601021830.k02IU1e20353@tick.javien.com> Message-ID: <20060102191656.72342.qmail@web51607.mail.yahoo.com> Natasha said to consolidate the posts. So not only am I confused about what is and is not off topic, but also about how many posts to send. Look, are you sure you wouldn't want to start an extropy twit-chat list? There's one-- perhaps two-- who might join right away :-) OK, but I don?t see what this has to do with the rest of your commentary. Feel free to hit send after the first sentence. --------------------------------- Yahoo! for Good - Make a difference this year. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From kerry_prez at yahoo.com Mon Jan 2 19:08:37 2006 From: kerry_prez at yahoo.com (Al Brooks) Date: Mon, 2 Jan 2006 11:08:37 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Politics: worthwhile commentary In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <20060102190837.87016.qmail@web51605.mail.yahoo.com> Here's a problem. We discriminate by physical appearance also. There's a report today that more guys are having cosmetic surgery done; previously cosmetic surgery was a gal thing. However it may just be that men are discovering they can obtain a higher income by looking better. Is this off-topic? A nonsequitor? I throw out things to see if others who know more will run with them. >That the only discrimination be in favour of competence and ability. >Dirk --------------------------------- Yahoo! for Good - Make a difference this year. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From thespike at satx.rr.com Mon Jan 2 19:38:56 2006 From: thespike at satx.rr.com (Damien Broderick) Date: Mon, 02 Jan 2006 13:38:56 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] Wil McCarthy's HACKING MATTER free download Message-ID: <6.2.1.2.0.20060102133711.01c36530@pop-server.satx.rr.com> http://www.boingboing.net/2006/01/01/wil_mccarthys_wonder.html specifically: http://www.wilmccarthy.com/hm.htm (but it's getting overloaded to hell) Charlie Stross will mirror it soon, I understand. From dirk.bruere at gmail.com Mon Jan 2 19:59:57 2006 From: dirk.bruere at gmail.com (Dirk Bruere) Date: Mon, 2 Jan 2006 19:59:57 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Politics: worthwhile commentary In-Reply-To: <20060102190837.87016.qmail@web51605.mail.yahoo.com> References: <20060102190837.87016.qmail@web51605.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: On 1/2/06, Al Brooks wrote: > > Here's a problem. We discriminate by physical appearance also. There's a > report today that more guys are having cosmetic surgery done; previously > cosmetic surgery was a gal thing. However it may just be that men are > discovering they can obtain a higher income by looking better. > Is this off-topic? A nonsequitor? I throw out things to see if others who > know more will run with them. > That is not necessarily bad, to a limited extent. There is a correlation between intelligence, genetic fitness, symmetrical features, height etc. In my experience smarter people are generally better looking people. Additionally, in later life we often come to reflect the type of person we have made ourselves (or allowed ourselves to become). Dirk -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From nanogirl at halcyon.com Mon Jan 2 21:34:08 2006 From: nanogirl at halcyon.com (Gina Miller) Date: Mon, 2 Jan 2006 13:34:08 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Politics: worthwhile commentary References: <200601020532.k025WKe11042@tick.javien.com><200601020537.k025bre11884@tick.javien.com> <6.2.1.2.2.20060102094107.04eb8910@pop-server.austin.rr.com> Message-ID: <005e01c60fe4$aa1179f0$0300a8c0@Nano> Congratulations Spike! "G Gina "Nanogirl" Miller Nanotechnology Industries http://www.nanoindustries.com Personal: http://www.nanogirl.com/index2.html Foresight Senior Associate http://www.foresight.org Nanotechnology Advisor Extropy Institute http://www.extropy.org 3D/Animation http://www.nanogirl.com/museumfuture/index.htm Microscope Jewelry http://www.nanogirl.com/crafts/microjewelry.htm Email: nanogirl at halcyon.com "Nanotechnology: Solutions for the future." ----- Original Message ----- From: Natasha Vita-More To: ExI chat list Sent: Monday, January 02, 2006 7:42 AM Subject: RE: [extropy-chat] Politics: worthwhile commentary Especially six months from now. I am going to be a father. Because of your ability to deal with criticisms directly and calmly, I think you will be a marvelous father. I am so happy for you Spike. Natasha Natasha Vita-More Cultural Strategist - Designer Future Studies, University of Houston President, Extropy Institute Member, Association of Professional Futurists Founder, Transhumanist Arts & Culture Honorary Vice-Chair, World Transhumanist Association Senior Associate, Foresight Institute Advisor, Alcor Life Extension Foundation If you draw a circle in the sand and study only what's inside the circle, then that is a closed-system perspective. If you study what is inside the circle and everything outside the circle, then that is an open system perspective. Buckminster Fuller ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ _______________________________________________ extropy-chat mailing list extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From thespike at satx.rr.com Mon Jan 2 21:37:33 2006 From: thespike at satx.rr.com (Damien Broderick) Date: Mon, 02 Jan 2006 15:37:33 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] the structure of randomness In-Reply-To: References: <20060102054556.82018.qmail@web60521.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <6.2.1.2.0.20060102153639.01e56b80@pop-server.satx.rr.com> At 02:10 AM 1/2/2006 -0500, gts wrote: >Sarfatti believed Walker's >refutation, and unlike Walker, Sarfatti is a theoretical physicist. Sarfatti is also a raving monster loony. From nanogirl at halcyon.com Mon Jan 2 21:55:17 2006 From: nanogirl at halcyon.com (Gina Miller) Date: Mon, 2 Jan 2006 13:55:17 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Happy New Year! References: <20051231072225.9143.qmail@web60517.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <020901c60fe7$7b03b3a0$0300a8c0@Nano> What a lovely expression. Thank you! Gina ----- Original Message ----- From: The Avantguardian To: ExI chat list Sent: Friday, December 30, 2005 11:22 PM Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] Happy New Year! Very cool. Thanks, and Happy New Year to you too. As they used to say in Scottland, "May you be a thousand times better off this time next year." --- Gina Miller wrote: > An animated New Years Greeting from yours truly - go > to this url to download: > > http://www.nanogirl.com/personal/newyears.htm > > > Gina "Nanogirl" Miller > Nanotechnology Industries > http://www.nanoindustries.com> _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat > The Avantguardian is Stuart LaForge alt email: stuart"AT"ucla.edu "The most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the source of all true art and science. He to whom this emotion is a stranger, who can no longer wonder and stand rapt in awe, is as good as dead: his eyes are closed. . ." - Albert Einstein, "What I Believe" (1930) __________________________________ Yahoo! for Good - Make a difference this year. http://brand.yahoo.com/cybergivingweek2005/ _______________________________________________ extropy-chat mailing list extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From sjatkins at mac.com Mon Jan 2 22:09:17 2006 From: sjatkins at mac.com (Samantha Atkins) Date: Mon, 2 Jan 2006 14:09:17 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Politics: worthwhile commentary In-Reply-To: <200601020537.k025bre11884@tick.javien.com> References: <200601020537.k025bre11884@tick.javien.com> Message-ID: <8B38C2E2-99BF-44CF-983B-E9693E47833E@mac.com> Whoa! Congratulations! I am sure you will be a fantastic Dad. - samantha On Jan 1, 2006, at 9:35 PM, spike wrote: > > > > > > >> ... I will not referee every >> rassling match that breaks out; I have not the time for >> that. spike > > > > Especially six months from now. I am going to be a father. > > {8-] > > spike > > > > > > > > > > > > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat From sjatkins at mac.com Mon Jan 2 22:21:46 2006 From: sjatkins at mac.com (Samantha Atkins) Date: Mon, 2 Jan 2006 14:21:46 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Politics: worthwhile commentary In-Reply-To: <20060102180212.66908.qmail@web51608.mail.yahoo.com> References: <20060102180212.66908.qmail@web51608.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <17D679CD-4086-44B2-9D3C-E6AB71E0F239@mac.com> On Jan 2, 2006, at 10:02 AM, Al Brooks wrote: > I apologize, yet it was just a little good natured public chiding, > like, 'it takes a twit to know one-- at least one of us two twits > will own up to being one'. > Just one more point concerning white supremacists or confederates > or whatever label they are given. The Confederates were not white supremacists per se and freeing slaves was not primarily what the conflict was about. Lincoln did a lot of extremely nasty and unconstitutional things in this war that many would consider treasonable. To only slam one side of this horrific conflict as you did while also slamming all who disagreed with you in the same post is precisely why I sent my infamous offline comment. If you want to discuss a topic you don't start by attacking all who disagree with your position. Thus your original post was little more than rant and flame bait. I thought a small slap on the wrist might wake you up a bit. That was obviously incorrect. Sorry for using unskillful means and for taking up list time with this. - samantha From gts_2000 at yahoo.com Mon Jan 2 22:43:10 2006 From: gts_2000 at yahoo.com (gts) Date: Mon, 02 Jan 2006 17:43:10 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] the structure of randomness In-Reply-To: <6.2.1.2.0.20060102153639.01e56b80@pop-server.satx.rr.com> References: <20060102054556.82018.qmail@web60521.mail.yahoo.com> <6.2.1.2.0.20060102153639.01e56b80@pop-server.satx.rr.com> Message-ID: On Mon, 02 Jan 2006 16:37:33 -0500, Damien Broderick wrote: > Sarfatti is also a raving monster loony. I don't know about Sarfatti but John Walker is brilliant. I think I understand why Walker may not have considered his results a clear refutation of Shnell. From reading Shnell's papers, it seems his team relies on visual analysis of the histograms. Walker used an automated statistical program to test for similarities, which may not be sensitive enough. This is from the discussion at http://noosphere.princeton.edu/shnoll2.html Date: Wed, 12 Jul 2000 12:43:59 +0200 From: Dick J Bierman To: John Walker , rdnelson Cc: nick herbert , Jack Sarfatti , Dean Radin , creon at isso.org Subject: Shnoll et al replications Hi to all, We just recieved a confirmation by W.I. Axford of the Max-Plank Aeronomy Institute, Lindau, Germany, that he has done an independent replication of the Schnoll effect. If I understand him correctly he just produced sets of histograms from two (random?) sources, removed all time information, randomized the order and then send them to Tatiana for human judgement. She then returned to them the pairs that were simlar and these turned out to be from simultaneous measurements. No stats were given but from his words it seems the result is robust. (He is a bit worried about the stretching operation but that can't explain the results; it is worrying from a physics perspective though). So this is a good reason (at least for me) to become more optimistic and to invest a bit more time in getting the human judgement replaced by computerized judgement. The results produced by John suggest to me that the chi-2 isn't the measure that corresponds very well to their human scored similarity. === -gts From thespike at satx.rr.com Mon Jan 2 23:20:28 2006 From: thespike at satx.rr.com (Damien Broderick) Date: Mon, 02 Jan 2006 17:20:28 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] the structure of randomness In-Reply-To: References: <20060102054556.82018.qmail@web60521.mail.yahoo.com> <6.2.1.2.0.20060102153639.01e56b80@pop-server.satx.rr.com> Message-ID: <6.2.1.2.0.20060102171859.01e44668@pop-server.satx.rr.com> At 05:43 PM 1/2/2006 -0500, gts wrote: >No stats were given but from his words it seems the result is robust. >(He is a bit worried about the stretching operation but that can't >explain the results; it is worrying from a physics perspective though). I'm more worried about the optional chirality rotation, which seems bogus without a *lot* of justification. Damien Broderick From jay.dugger at gmail.com Mon Jan 2 23:58:53 2006 From: jay.dugger at gmail.com (Jay Dugger) Date: Mon, 2 Jan 2006 17:58:53 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] Wil McCarthy's HACKING MATTER free download In-Reply-To: <6.2.1.2.0.20060102133711.01c36530@pop-server.satx.rr.com> References: <6.2.1.2.0.20060102133711.01c36530@pop-server.satx.rr.com> Message-ID: <5366105b0601021558k4a74bac2i4809164b2f2cab5c@mail.gmail.com> On 1/2/06, Damien Broderick wrote: > http://www.boingboing.net/2006/01/01/wil_mccarthys_wonder.html > > specifically: > > http://www.wilmccarthy.com/hm.htm (but it's getting overloaded to hell) > > Charlie Stross will mirror it soon, I understand. http://www.antipope.org/charlie/download/HackingMatterMultimediaEdition.pdf -- Jay Dugger Please donate to a charity you like. From femmechakra at yahoo.ca Tue Jan 3 00:17:02 2006 From: femmechakra at yahoo.ca (Anne-Marie Taylor) Date: Mon, 2 Jan 2006 19:17:02 -0500 (EST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Happy New Year and resolution. Message-ID: <20060103001702.64101.qmail@web35506.mail.mud.yahoo.com> One of my resolutions this year was to find out how to eat better and feel healthier. Is there a program or site that exists that can help me acknowledge what I eat and drink? Sorry for my ignorance, but I was just curious to find out if I could punch in what I eat and find out exactly what i'm putting in my body. (Like typing apple and knowing how many vitamins i'm putting in my body?)(Or by putting tuna and knowing how much iron i've absorbed. I would love to buy my Mother this device. If anybody has any fact, advice or opinion, I would love to know, Thank you Anna --------------------------------- Find your next car at Yahoo! Canada Autos -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From gts_2000 at yahoo.com Tue Jan 3 01:42:33 2006 From: gts_2000 at yahoo.com (gts) Date: Mon, 02 Jan 2006 20:42:33 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Happy New Year and resolution. In-Reply-To: <20060103001702.64101.qmail@web35506.mail.mud.yahoo.com> References: <20060103001702.64101.qmail@web35506.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Message-ID: On Mon, 02 Jan 2006 19:17:02 -0500, Anne-Marie Taylor wrote: > One of my resolutions this year was to find out how to eat better and > feel healthier. > Is there a program or site that exists that can help me acknowledge > what I eat and drink? > Sorry for my ignorance, but I was just curious to find out if I could > punch in what I eat and find out exactly what i'm putting in > my body. (Like typing apple and knowing how many vitamins > i'm putting in my body?)(Or by putting tuna and knowing how much > iron i've absorbed. > I would love to buy my Mother this device. > If anybody has any fact, advice or opinion, I would love to know, > Thank you > Anna USDA National Nutrient Database http://www.nal.usda.gov/fnic/foodcomp/search/ -gts From HerbM at learnquick.com Tue Jan 3 07:17:56 2006 From: HerbM at learnquick.com (Herb Martin) Date: Tue, 3 Jan 2006 01:17:56 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] Happy New Year and resolution. In-Reply-To: <20060103001702.64101.qmail@web35506.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Message-ID: > Is there a program or site that exists that can help me acknowledge > what I eat and dri nk? My guesses would include the WeightWatchers site and TonyRobbins site -- Tony was on Larry King the other night saying he had a free program fro the new year and I believe WW has diet guides online. Both are (obviously) designed to get you to sign up and spend money with them, but providing free content is a legitimate way to try to sell a product. A google search should get you more; something like (untested): [ nuitrition | diet log | diary carbohydrates | protein | fat ] The vertical bar | is OR, but you can use the capitalized word OR if you prefer. You can play around with this or add other keywords that follow more closely what you hope to find. Notice that Google accepts quotes for phrases and * as a wildcard within a phrase: "diet guide" "food * guide" You can restrict searches to certin URL patterns with "SITE:", e.g, this will only find you key words at US registered universities, colleges, etc: [ diet guide site:edu ] Tilde ~word will find synonyms for a keyword: [ ~diet ~diary ] And if you find a lot of "wrong" sites, you can preface a word with minus to DISALLOW pages with that word: [ ~diet ~diary -weightwatchers ] Another variation: Inurl: can find pages with a word within a URL, eg.: [ ~diet ~diary inurl:planner ] And while probably not useful for this quest, you can also specify certain useful file types: [ "diet * guide" filetype:pdf | filetype:doc | filetype:xls ] I through the xls in as an afterthought since you may actually find a (free) spreadsheet that will help you maintain such a diary/log. Let me know if you need more or more direct help. -- Herb Martin Teach fishing. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jay.dugger at gmail.com Tue Jan 3 13:49:44 2006 From: jay.dugger at gmail.com (Jay Dugger) Date: Tue, 3 Jan 2006 07:49:44 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] (U.S.) Government releases proposed space travel rules In-Reply-To: <43B47FF9.2000807@goldenfuture.net> References: <43B47FF9.2000807@goldenfuture.net> Message-ID: <5366105b0601030549g422aafddx2e86ee9f2b6da74c@mail.gmail.com> Tuesday, 3 January 2006 On 12/29/05, Joseph Bloch wrote: > The full text of the proposed regulations may be found at > http://frwebgate5.access.gpo.gov/cgi-bin/waisgate.cgi?WAISdocID=902051483587+0+0+0&WAISaction=retrieve This link fails; you might try the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) site. From there: New Era of Commercial Human Space Flight Dec. 30 ? FAA is proposing new rules specifically relating to crew and passengers on commercial space flights. Proposed rules focus on encouraging, facilitating, and promoting space tourism in a way that continuously improves safety. * Proposed Rules (PDF) http://ast.faa.gov/files/pdf/Human_Space_Flight_NPRM.pdf * Fact Sheet on Commercial Human Space Flight http://www.faa.gov/news/news_story.cfm?type=fact_sheet&year=2005&date=092605a Released on my natal anniversary; not a bad birthday present from Uncle Sam, and certainly the nicest thing the FAA did for me all year long. -- Jay Dugger Please donate to a charity you like. From kerry_prez at yahoo.com Tue Jan 3 15:01:55 2006 From: kerry_prez at yahoo.com (Al Brooks) Date: Tue, 3 Jan 2006 07:01:55 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Politics: worthwhile commentary In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <20060103150155.99535.qmail@web51615.mail.yahoo.com> I had no idea--this is good news. Come to think of it, if you took a very ugly woman and operated on her to make her into a drop-dead vixen, it would almost certainly change the way she thinks of herself and would surely change the way others think of her. Naturally, with men looks aren't as important. >There is a correlation between intelligence, genetic fitness, symmetrical features, >height etc. In my experience smarter people are generally better looking people. >Additionally, in later life we often come to reflect the type of person we have made >ourselves (or allowed ourselves to become). >Dirk --------------------------------- Yahoo! Shopping Find Great Deals on Holiday Gifts at Yahoo! Shopping -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From natasha at natasha.cc Tue Jan 3 15:34:02 2006 From: natasha at natasha.cc (Natasha Vita-More) Date: Tue, 03 Jan 2006 09:34:02 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] Politics: worthwhile commentary In-Reply-To: <20060103150155.99535.qmail@web51615.mail.yahoo.com> References: <20060103150155.99535.qmail@web51615.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <6.2.1.2.2.20060103093018.04c303a8@pop-server.austin.rr.com> At 09:01 AM 1/3/2006, you wrote: >I had no idea--this is good news. >Come to think of it, if you took a very ugly woman and operated on her to >make her into a drop-dead vixen, it would almost certainly change the way >she thinks of herself and would surely change the way others think of her. >Naturally, with men looks aren't as important. I disagree with you. Men's looks are equally as confidence building as a woman's. But a woman cannot hide her face, while a man can put his penis in his pants. I also disagree with you that what you call "ulgy" is an external characteristic. Frankly, I find "ulgy" to be 90% emotional and 10% physical. Natasha Natasha Vita-More Cultural Strategist - Designer Future Studies, University of Houston President, Extropy Institute Member, Association of Professional Futurists Founder, Transhumanist Arts & Culture Honorary Vice-Chair, World Transhumanist Association Senior Associate, Foresight Institute Advisor, Alcor Life Extension Foundation If you draw a circle in the sand and study only what's inside the circle, then that is a closed-system perspective. If you study what is inside the circle and everything outside the circle, then that is an open system perspective. Buckminster Fuller -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From dirk.bruere at gmail.com Tue Jan 3 15:38:20 2006 From: dirk.bruere at gmail.com (Dirk Bruere) Date: Tue, 3 Jan 2006 15:38:20 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Politics: worthwhile commentary In-Reply-To: <20060103150155.99535.qmail@web51615.mail.yahoo.com> References: <20060103150155.99535.qmail@web51615.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: On 1/3/06, Al Brooks wrote: > > I had no idea--this is good news. > Come to think of it, if you took a very ugly woman and operated on her to > make her into a drop-dead vixen, it would almost certainly change the way > she thinks of herself and would surely change the way others think of her. > Naturally, with men looks aren't as important. > > That is definately not true. It's just that the audience is different, in that it is other men who react to the male image. At the crudest level, being big and muscular probably means you will never be mugged. OTOH, other men can find that intimidating in a social setting. Dirk -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From dirk.bruere at gmail.com Tue Jan 3 16:35:25 2006 From: dirk.bruere at gmail.com (Dirk Bruere) Date: Tue, 3 Jan 2006 16:35:25 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Re: Qualia Bet In-Reply-To: References: <7a5e56060512290020r601a235fy23781e70bcf651ea@mail.gmail.com> <7a5e56060512292014t353e743bob2987d3d2cdedd1d@mail.gmail.com> <7a5e56060512292129k59ecbab3k376345d726a64a2d@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On 12/30/05, gts wrote: > > > But remember that the Chalmers/Clark idea of extended mind removes that > paradox. Colors are both 'out there' in the world and 'in here' in our > minds. Our minds contain the objects of our perception. > > All that is required is new physics. Of course, that new physics would also likely encompass Psi phenomena. Dirk -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From femmechakra at yahoo.ca Tue Jan 3 17:27:42 2006 From: femmechakra at yahoo.ca (Anne-Marie Taylor) Date: Tue, 3 Jan 2006 12:27:42 -0500 (EST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Happy New Year and resolution. In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <20060103172742.13310.qmail@web35509.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Thanks Herb, I thought that with technology so advanced that there may have been a program I haven't heard of yet that is simple and easy to use (My mother is quite old and I can't see her googling anything:). Something like a journal but that gives solid results at the end of the day. Such as how much cholesterol, proteins, carbohydrates and vitamins you absorb in one day. You punch in what you eat and you get actual results, I think it would be a great idea to promote proper health. People today really don't know what they are putting in there bodies. Anyhow thanks again, Anna Herb Martin wrote: > Is there a program or site that exists that can help me acknowledge > what I eat and dri nk? My guesses would include the WeightWatchers site and TonyRobbins site -- Tony was on Larry King the other night saying he had a free program fro the new year and I believe WW has diet guides online. Both are (obviously) designed to get you to sign up and spend money with them, but providing free content is a legitimate way to try to sell a product. A google search should get you more; something like (untested): [ nuitrition | diet log | diary carbohydrates | protein | fat ] The vertical bar | is OR, but you can use the capitalized word OR if you prefer. You can play around with this or add other keywords that follow more closely what you hope to find. Notice that Google accepts quotes for phrases and * as a wildcard within a phrase: "diet guide" "food * guide" You can restrict searches to certin URL patterns with "SITE:", e.g, this will only find you key words at US registered universities, colleges, etc: [ diet guide site:edu ] Tilde ~word will find synonyms for a keyword: [ ~diet ~diary ] And if you find a lot of "wrong" sites, you can preface a word with minus to DISALLOW pages with that word: [ ~diet ~diary -weightwatchers ] Another variation: Inurl: can find pages with a word within a URL, eg.: [ ~diet ~diary inurl:planner ] And while probably not useful for this quest, you can also specify certain useful file types: [ "diet * guide" filetype:pdf | filetype:doc | filetype:xls ] I through the xls in as an afterthought since you may actually find a (free) spreadsheet that will help you maintain such a diary/log. Let me know if you need more or more direct help. -- Herb Martin Teach fishing. _______________________________________________ extropy-chat mailing list extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat --------------------------------- Find your next car at Yahoo! Canada Autos -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From pgptag at gmail.com Tue Jan 3 18:46:49 2006 From: pgptag at gmail.com (Giu1i0 Pri5c0) Date: Tue, 3 Jan 2006 19:46:49 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] Wil McCarthy's HACKING MATTER free download In-Reply-To: <6.2.1.2.0.20060102133711.01c36530@pop-server.satx.rr.com> References: <6.2.1.2.0.20060102133711.01c36530@pop-server.satx.rr.com> Message-ID: <470a3c520601031046q1d3a52aat8c30a35395157b44@mail.gmail.com> I loved McCarthy's Bloom, much less Murder in the solid state (but I think that was his first novel). The first bb review of Hacking Matter looks great and advices to read it together with the Wellstone. The Wellstone is actually the sequel of Collapsium so I just placed the three books in my amazon cart. The bb comment that won me over was "Rucker-grade speculation about a universe dominated by programmable matter and practical immortality, teleportation, and other post-classical physics technology." On 1/2/06, Damien Broderick wrote: > http://www.boingboing.net/2006/01/01/wil_mccarthys_wonder.html > > specifically: > > http://www.wilmccarthy.com/hm.htm (but it's getting overloaded to hell) > > Charlie Stross will mirror it soon, I understand. > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat > From thespike at satx.rr.com Tue Jan 3 19:02:04 2006 From: thespike at satx.rr.com (Damien Broderick) Date: Tue, 03 Jan 2006 13:02:04 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] Re: Wil McCarthy's HACKING MATTER free download In-Reply-To: <470a3c520601031046q1d3a52aat8c30a35395157b44@mail.gmail.co m> References: <6.2.1.2.0.20060102133711.01c36530@pop-server.satx.rr.com> <470a3c520601031046q1d3a52aat8c30a35395157b44@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <6.2.1.2.0.20060103125739.01cefe88@pop-server.satx.rr.com> At 07:46 PM 1/3/2006 +0100, Giu1i0 Pri5c0 wrote: >I loved McCarthy's Bloom, much less Murder in the solid state (but I >think that was his first novel). The first bb review of Hacking Matter >looks great and advices to read it together with the Wellstone. Please note that HACKING MATTER is *not* fiction, but rather a popularized introduction to a potential technology (programmable matter) that Wil is currently developing in reality with his start-up. If he succeeds, he could become a Gates-scale billionaire -- and the world will be that much closer to a singularity. Damien Broderick From transhumanist at goldenfuture.net Tue Jan 3 19:06:24 2006 From: transhumanist at goldenfuture.net (Joseph Bloch) Date: Tue, 03 Jan 2006 14:06:24 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Happy New Year and resolution. In-Reply-To: <20060103172742.13310.qmail@web35509.mail.mud.yahoo.com> References: <20060103172742.13310.qmail@web35509.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <43BACB30.308@goldenfuture.net> It is a great idea. I know that the Weight Watcher's website does what you're talking about, and so does the Zone Diet website, but not with actual nutrition values; only with how many "points" a given food is within their system. Perhaps there's a market for such a thing? Joseph Anne-Marie Taylor wrote: > Thanks Herb, > I thought that with technology so advanced that there may have been a > program I haven't heard of yet that is simple and easy to use (My mother > is quite old and I can't see her googling anything:). Something like a > journal but that gives solid results at the end of the day. Such as > how much cholesterol, proteins, carbohydrates and vitamins you absorb > in one day. You punch in what you eat and you get actual results, > I think it would be a great idea to promote proper health. > People today really don't know what they are putting in there bodies. > Anyhow thanks again, > Anna > > > */Herb Martin /* wrote: > > *> Is there a program or site that exists that can help me > acknowledge* > *> what I eat and dri nk?* > ** > *My guesses would include the WeightWatchers site and TonyRobbins * > *site -- Tony was on Larry King the other night saying he had a free* > *program fro the! new year and I believe WW has diet guides online.* > > *Both are (obviously) designed to get you to sign up and* > *spend money with them, but providing free content is a * > *legitimate way to try to sell a product.* > > *A google search should get you more; something like (untested):* > ** > [ nuitrition | diet log | diary carbohydrates | protein | fat ] > ** > *The vertical bar | is OR, but you can use the capitalized word OR* > *if you prefer.* > > *You can play around with this or add other keywords that follow* > *more closely what you hope to find.* > ** > *Notice that Google accepts quotes for phrases and * as a wildcard* > *within a phrase: "diet guide" "food * guide"* > ** > *You can restrict searches to certin URL patterns with "SITE:",* > *e.g, this will only find you key words at US registered universities, > colleges, etc:* > ** > *[ diet guide site:edu ]* > ** > *Tilde ~word will find synonyms for a keyword: [ ~diet ~diary ]* > > *And if you find a lot of "wrong" sites, you can preface a word > with minus* > *to DISALLOW p! ages with that word:* > > *[ ~diet ~diary -weightwatchers ]* > ** > *Another variation: Inurl: can find pages with a word within a > URL, eg.:* > ** > * [ ~diet ~diary inurl:planner ]* > ** > *And while probably not useful for this quest, you can also > specify certain* > *useful file types:* > > * [ "diet * guide" filetype:pdf | filetype:doc | filetype:xls ]* > ** > *I through the xls in as an afterthought since you may actually find* > *a (free) spreadsheet that will help you maintain such a diary/log.* > > *Let me know if you need more or more direct help.* > ** > *-- > Herb Martin* > *Teach fishing.* > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat > > > ------------------------------------------------------------------------ > Find your next car at *Yahoo! Canada Autos* > >------------------------------------------------------------------------ > >_______________________________________________ >extropy-chat mailing list >extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org >http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat > > From HerbM at learnquick.com Tue Jan 3 19:08:40 2006 From: HerbM at learnquick.com (Herb Martin) Date: Tue, 3 Jan 2006 13:08:40 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] Happy New Year and resolution. In-Reply-To: <20060103172742.13310.qmail@web35509.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Message-ID: _____ From: extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org [mailto:extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Anne-Marie Taylor Sent: Tuesday, January 03, 2006 11:28 AM To: ExI chat list Subject: RE: [extropy-chat] Happy New Year and resolution. Thanks Herb, I thought that with technology so advanced that there may have been a program I haven't heard of yet that is simple and easy to use I am pretty sure there are such programs. When I am looking for programs I start with these sources: www.sourceforge.net (open source but smaller collection) www.nonags.com (practically all free as the name indicates) www.downloads.com (lot's of junk and overpriced stuff but reliable site) Downloads.com is really CNET now, but I still remember it under the old name. You can also search Google with these sites as restrictions (I believe this will work for NoNags but have not tried it.) (My mother is quite old and I can't see her googling anything:).&nb sp; Something like a journal but that gives solid results at the end of the day. Such as how much cholesterol, proteins, carbohydrates and vitamins you absorb in one day. You punch in what you eat and you get actual results, I think it would be a great idea to promote proper health. People today really don't know what they are putting in there bodies. Anyhow thanks again, Anna &nb sp; Herb Martin wrote: > Is there a program or site that exists that can help me acknowledge > what I eat and dri nk? My guesses would include the WeightWatchers site and TonyRobbins site -- Tony was on Larry King the other night saying he had a free program fro the! new year and I believe WW has diet guides online. Both are (obviously) designed to get you to sign up and spend money with them, but providing free content is a legitimate w ay to try to sell a product. A google search should get you more; somet hing like (untested): [ nuitrition | diet log | diary carbohydrates | protein | fat ] &nb sp; The vertical bar | is OR, but you can use the capitalized word OR if you prefer. You can play around with this or add other keywords that follow more closely what you hope to find. Notice that Google accepts quotes for phrases and * as a wildc ard within a phrase: "diet guide" "food * guide" You can restrict searches to certin URL patterns with "SITE:", e.g, this will only find you key words at US registered universities, colleges, etc: [ diet guide& nbsp; site:edu ] Tilde ~word will find synonyms for a keyword: [ ~diet ~diary ] And if you find a lot of "wrong" sites, you can preface a word with minus to DISALLOW p! ages with that word: [ ~diet ~diary -weightwatchers ] Another variation: Inurl: can find pages with a word within a URL, eg.: [ ~diet ~diary inurl:planner ] And while probably not useful for this quest, you can also specify certain useful file types: [ "diet * guide" filetype:pdf | filetype:doc | filetype:xls ] I through the xls in as an afterthought since you may actually find a (free) spreadsheet that will help you maintain such a diary/log. Let me know if you need more or more direct help. -- Herb Martin < STRONG>Teach fishing. _______________________________________________ extropy-chat mailing list extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat _____ Find your next car at Yahoo! Canada Autos -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From pharos at gmail.com Tue Jan 3 19:39:23 2006 From: pharos at gmail.com (BillK) Date: Tue, 3 Jan 2006 19:39:23 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Happy New Year and resolution. In-Reply-To: <20060103172742.13310.qmail@web35509.mail.mud.yahoo.com> References: <20060103172742.13310.qmail@web35509.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Message-ID: On 1/3/06, Anne-Marie Taylor wrote: > I thought that with technology so advanced that there may have been a > program I haven't heard of yet that is simple and easy to use (My mother > is quite old and I can't see her googling anything:). Something like a > journal but that gives solid results at the end of the day. Such as > how much cholesterol, proteins, carbohydrates and vitamins you absorb > in one day. You punch in what you eat and you get actual results, > I think it would be a great idea to promote proper health. > People today really don't know what they are putting in there bodies. > Try MyPyramid Plan can help you choose the foods and amounts that are right for you. For a quick estimate of what and how much you need to eat, enter your age, sex, and activity level in the MyPyramid Plan box. You can get your own plan at: And don't forget you need exercise as well. If you are a couch potato you need a lot less food. But your body won't be healthy unless you have fairly vigorous exercise for at least 30 minutes a day. Don't panic! Fast walking two miles a day is enough. :) BillK From transhumanist at goldenfuture.net Tue Jan 3 19:41:30 2006 From: transhumanist at goldenfuture.net (Joseph Bloch) Date: Tue, 03 Jan 2006 14:41:30 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] [Fwd: [Bioethics] Scholars debate whether to limit scientific research] Message-ID: <43BAD36A.3090202@goldenfuture.net> December 29, 2005 Scholars debate whether to limit scientific research ASU?s College of Law Center for the Study of Law, Science, & Technology will play host to a conference titled ?Forbidding Science? Balancing Freedom, Security, Innovation and Precaution? Jan. 12 ? 13 in the College of Law?s Great Hall, located at the corner of Orange Street and McAllister Avenue on the Tempe campus. The conference will explore whether scientific research should be restricted ? and, if so, how far ?too far? might be. The first day of the conference will provide an overview of the legal and policy questions, plus a discussion about the limitations of the ?right? to conduct scientific research. The second day?s events will focus on three case studies involving emerging research controversies in the areas of pathogens and toxins, nanotechnology and cognitive enhancement. ?We have reached a point in human history where some of the scientific research we could do, perhaps we should not do for safety, national security or ethical reasons,? says Gary Marchant, executive director of the center. ?We therefore must choose, for the first time, which science should be allowed, and which should not. How, and by whom, such decisions should be made will be the focus of this timely and path-breaking conference.? Among the distinguished conference scholars will be: ? ASU President Michael Crow. ? Leon Kass, Clark Harding Professor, Committee on Social Thought at the University of Chicago. ? Martin Redish, Louis & Harriet Ancel Professor of Law and Public Policy at Northwestern University School of Law. George Poste, director of ASU?s Biodesign Institute, will be the keynote speaker. Along with ASU, the conference co-sponsors include the Biodesign Institute; the Consortium for Science, Policy & Outcomes; the Center for Biology and Society; the Arizona Consortium for Medicine, Society and Values; the American Association for the Advancement of Science; the Lincoln Center for Applied Ethics; and the American Bar Association Section of Science and Technology Law. The conference, open to the public, welcomes all ASU faculty, staff and students. There is no conference fee except for attorneys seeking continuing legal education credits. Advance registration is requested. To register, go to the conference link at (www.law.asu.edu/forbiddingscience). From gts_2000 at yahoo.com Tue Jan 3 20:13:16 2006 From: gts_2000 at yahoo.com (gts) Date: Tue, 03 Jan 2006 15:13:16 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Re: Qualia Bet In-Reply-To: References: <7a5e56060512290020r601a235fy23781e70bcf651ea@mail.gmail.com> <7a5e56060512292014t353e743bob2987d3d2cdedd1d@mail.gmail.com> <7a5e56060512292129k59ecbab3k376345d726a64a2d@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On Tue, 03 Jan 2006 11:35:25 -0500, Dirk Bruere wrote: > All that is required is new physics. Could be. I was thinking about something I wrote to Acy. He suggested that observation is an act. I replied something like, "Here I will disagree with you... perception seems passive. The objects of our awareness are the actors. They act or our senses." Traditional empiricists like Locke might agree with my thought, but lately I've been studying evolutionary epistemology and am struck by the idea that observation is fundamentally aggressive. If we trace sensory awareness back through the path of evolution, we find ourselves in a quagmire when we reach the level of simple microbes. As Stu and I agreed, they seem to be "aware," but it also true that they have no obvious sense organs. As I mentioned, one species of paramecia uses a plant (Chlorella) to 'see'. It literally eats the plant, but then holds it hostage in its cytoplasm, using the Chlorella's photosynthesis mechanism as an 'eye' for finding more light and more food. Is it correct to call this primitive process "vision"? Probably not. It's more a form of sightless *cognition*. So we can trace cognition back to the simplest organisms, but not sensation. And this cognition is an *active* process. The normal paramecium cognates when in searches blindly for food via trial and error locomotion. Our human eyes and other sense organs are analogous to radar towers, constantly searching the environment and reporting information back to 'headquarters'. This information ultimately saves us physical steps. It is no coincidence that we see only a very narrow band of electromagnetic radiation. It so happens that things that reflect visual light are generally impenetrable. Unlike the blind paramecium we don't have to bounce into walls to know they exist. Also our use of visual light is ultimately related to light as food. It may be no coincidence that our eyes use the pigment retinal, and that we obtain the necessary nutrition through plants. Plants and animals may share a common ancestor that used beta carotene, a precursor to both animal retinal and plant chlorophyll. In our branch of evolution, we lost the ability to eat light but retained the ability to detect it. -gts From dirk.bruere at gmail.com Tue Jan 3 20:38:54 2006 From: dirk.bruere at gmail.com (Dirk Bruere) Date: Tue, 3 Jan 2006 20:38:54 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] [Fwd: [Bioethics] Scholars debate whether to limit scientific research] In-Reply-To: <43BAD36A.3090202@goldenfuture.net> References: <43BAD36A.3090202@goldenfuture.net> Message-ID: On 1/3/06, Joseph Bloch wrote: > > December 29, 2005 > > > Scholars debate whether to limit scientific research > > ASU's College of Law Center for the Study of Law, Science, & Technology > will play host to a conference titled "Forbidding Science? Balancing > Freedom, Security, Innovation and Precaution" Jan. 12 ? 13 in the > College of Law's Great Hall, located at the corner of Orange Street and > McAllister Avenue on the Tempe campus. > > LOL! Any Chinese delegates? Dirk -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From live2scan at charter.net Wed Jan 4 00:08:38 2006 From: live2scan at charter.net (Dennis Roberts) Date: Tue, 3 Jan 2006 19:08:38 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] awsome xmas video Message-ID: <4k176m$2didj8@mxip08a.cluster1.charter.net> I know its trivial and really not pertinent to this list, but does anybody know who does the piece of music in this video? http://media.putfile.com/WizardsofWinter-SM Dennis Roberts -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jef at jefallbright.net Wed Jan 4 00:28:43 2006 From: jef at jefallbright.net (Jef Allbright) Date: Tue, 3 Jan 2006 16:28:43 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] awsome xmas video In-Reply-To: <4k176m$2didj8@mxip08a.cluster1.charter.net> References: <4k176m$2didj8@mxip08a.cluster1.charter.net> Message-ID: <22360fa10601031628m6ee9c4c6j67bac17fd4b276c5@mail.gmail.com> On 1/3/06, Dennis Roberts wrote: > I know its trivial and really not pertinent to this list, but does anybody > know who does the piece of music in this video? > http://media.putfile.com/WizardsofWinter-SM I don't know, but 15 seconds with Google sugested that it's "Wizards of Winter" by Trans-Siberian Orchestra. - Jef From transcend at extropica.com Wed Jan 4 00:56:09 2006 From: transcend at extropica.com (Brandon Reinhart) Date: Tue, 3 Jan 2006 18:56:09 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] awsome xmas video In-Reply-To: <4k176m$2didj8@mxip08a.cluster1.charter.net> Message-ID: <200601040056.k040u8e27642@tick.javien.com> That's the quite famous "Trans-Siberian Orchestra" who also play as "Savatage" in the old hair metal scene: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Savatage http://www.bnrmetal.com/groups/sava.htm Brandon _____ From: extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org [mailto:extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Dennis Roberts Sent: Tuesday, January 03, 2006 6:09 PM To: extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org Subject: [extropy-chat] awsome xmas video I know its trivial and really not pertinent to this list, but does anybody know who does the piece of music in this video? http://media.putfile.com/WizardsofWinter-SM Dennis Roberts -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From sjatkins at mac.com Wed Jan 4 01:15:48 2006 From: sjatkins at mac.com (Samantha Atkins) Date: Tue, 3 Jan 2006 17:15:48 -0800 Subject: WARNING Re: [extropy-chat] awsome xmas video In-Reply-To: <4k176m$2didj8@mxip08a.cluster1.charter.net> References: <4k176m$2didj8@mxip08a.cluster1.charter.net> Message-ID: Dennis, I don't believe I have ever seen you here before so I would advise everyone not to access this link if you are running Windows. It may be perfectly safe but there are viruses now that infect IE on just visiting a site. Also putfile.com is a site that anyone can load whatever they want to. The content of this particularly link is only available to Windows players. DANGER. If you are legit I would strongly suggest something more pertinent and meaty for a [AFAIK] first post. - samantha On Jan 3, 2006, at 4:08 PM, Dennis Roberts wrote: > I know its trivial and really not pertinent to this list, but does > anybody know who does the piece of music in this video? http:// > media.putfile.com/WizardsofWinter-SM > > > > Dennis Roberts > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From megao at sasktel.net Wed Jan 4 05:45:45 2006 From: megao at sasktel.net (Lifespan Pharma/Morris Johnson CTO) Date: Tue, 03 Jan 2006 23:45:45 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] [Bioethics] Scholars debate whether to limit scientific research ??? In-Reply-To: <43BAD36A.3090202@goldenfuture.net> References: <43BAD36A.3090202@goldenfuture.net> Message-ID: <43BB6109.2000708@sasktel.net> This reminds me of an old superman comic from the 60's where Superman goes back to ancient Krypton to a time when "Science was Forbidden". There are many slants to this theme some sinister, some conspiracy theory oriented some ludditic, some just plain idiotic in a savant sort of way, but all are extremely dangerous and worse than any terrorist threat. Perhaps we globalists should ask all the world's people including muslims and chinese and others somewhat marginalized by the speakers referred to here just what is the best future for humankind. I see this theme played out in Star trek recently in the theme relating to Dr Sung, creator to be of Data and L'or and former proponent of transhuman genetic developed enhanced humans. It really is time for a coalition of the Gates, Allan, Dell , Kurzweil sort with help from Soros and perhaps Buffet to use the type of hype fronted by De Grey to start "War Against Aging" with all the intensity of a Manhatten project. With the anti-science people getting noisy, it's none too soon to hype the grass roots baby boomers to match the effort out of pension funds and health care expenditures to make the industry click. Bioethics my ass, its just a bunch of brainless dogs in the manger, pathetic but worse than any lunatic terrorist. Any group advocating the unnecesary death of 6 Billion sure as hell beats hand down the Nazis who only killed 6 Million. Call'em out for the "brown shirts " they are. Pardon my flame, but its time to put the fire out before it gets a chance to do significant damage. Joseph Bloch wrote: > December 29, 2005 > > > Scholars debate whether to limit scientific research > > ASU?s College of Law Center for the Study of Law, Science, & > Technology will play host to a conference titled ?Forbidding Science? > Balancing Freedom, Security, Innovation and Precaution? Jan. 12 ? 13 > in the College of Law?s Great Hall, located at the corner of Orange > Street and McAllister Avenue on the Tempe campus. > > The conference will explore whether scientific research should be > restricted ? and, if so, how far ?too far? might be. > > The first day of the conference will provide an overview of the legal > and policy questions, plus a discussion about the limitations of the > ?right? to conduct scientific research. The second day?s events will > focus on three case studies involving emerging research controversies > in the areas of pathogens and toxins, nanotechnology and > cognitive enhancement. > > ?We have reached a point in human history where some of the scientific > research we could do, perhaps we should not do for safety, national > security or ethical reasons,? says Gary Marchant, executive director > of the center. ?We therefore must choose, for the first time, which > science should be allowed, and which should not. How, and by whom, > such decisions should be made will be the focus of this timely and > path-breaking conference.? > > Among the distinguished conference scholars will be: > > ? ASU President Michael Crow. > > ? Leon Kass, Clark Harding Professor, Committee on Social Thought at > the University of Chicago. > > ? Martin Redish, Louis & Harriet Ancel Professor of Law and Public > Policy at Northwestern University School of Law. > > George Poste, director of ASU?s Biodesign Institute, will be the > keynote speaker. > > Along with ASU, the conference co-sponsors include the Biodesign > Institute; the Consortium for Science, Policy & Outcomes; the Center > for Biology and Society; the Arizona Consortium for Medicine, Society > and Values; the American Association for the Advancement of Science; > the Lincoln Center for Applied Ethics; and the American Bar > Association Section of Science and Technology Law. > > The conference, open to the public, welcomes all ASU faculty, staff > and students. There is no conference fee except for attorneys seeking > continuing legal education credits. Advance registration is requested. > > To register, go to the conference link at > (www.law.asu.edu/forbiddingscience). > > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat > > From megao at sasktel.net Wed Jan 4 06:01:24 2006 From: megao at sasktel.net (Lifespan Pharma/Morris Johnson CTO) Date: Wed, 04 Jan 2006 00:01:24 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] [Bioethics] Scholars debate whether to limit scientific research ??? In-Reply-To: <43BB6109.2000708@sasktel.net> References: <43BAD36A.3090202@goldenfuture.net> <43BB6109.2000708@sasktel.net> Message-ID: <43BB64B4.7020100@sasktel.net> Looked at the adjenda and see Nick Bostrom is a presenter. Hopefully some intelligence on the various groups and alliances and allegences and overt and coveret themes and strategies can be gathered. Even the restriction of science in the name of security endangers the singularity date. On the other hand a massive covert effort to develop super human soldiers might also be an adgenda for some. However, it will mean that only a choice few will benefit and the mass of this generation will be allowed to die natural deaths while the technology remains forbidden to expose to the world. From neuronexmachina at gmail.com Wed Jan 4 07:00:38 2006 From: neuronexmachina at gmail.com (Neil H.) Date: Tue, 3 Jan 2006 23:00:38 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Happy New Year and resolution. In-Reply-To: <20060103001702.64101.qmail@web35506.mail.mud.yahoo.com> References: <20060103001702.64101.qmail@web35506.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Message-ID: On 1/2/06, Anne-Marie Taylor wrote: > > One of my resolutions this year was to find out how to eat better and > feel healthier. > > Is there a program or site that exists that can help me acknowledge > what I eat and drink? > Sorry for my ignorance, but I was just curious to find out if I could > punch in what I eat and find out exactly what i'm putting in > my body. (Like typing apple and knowing how many vitamins > i'm putting in my body?)(Or by putting tuna and knowing how much > iron i've absorbed. > I would love to buy my Mother this device. > If anybody has any fact, advice or opinion, I would love to know, > One trick I've learned for finding useful sites is to do a search for popular del.icio.us tags on the subject. For example: http://del.icio.us/popular/nutrition http://del.icio.us/popular/diet http://del.icio.us/popular/health I haven't tried them out myself, but the following look like they could be useful: http://www.sparkpeople.com/ ("Stick with your free diet plan with the help of our daily food tracker, meal plans, shopping lists, progress reports, and more.") http://www.nutritiondata.com/ ("NutritionData (ND) provides nutrition facts, Calorie counts, and nutrient data for all foods and recipes.") http://www.caloriescount.org/cgi-bin/calorie_calculator.cgi http://www.bellybytes.com/articles/29foods.shtml ("The following is a "healthy food hot list" consisting of the 29 foods that will give you the biggest nutritional bang for you caloric buck, as well as decrease your risk for deadly illnesses like cancer, diabetes and heart disease.") http://www.fitday.com/ (" Sign-up for your free web accountand join the growing number of FitDay members who are tracking their foods, exercises, weight loss, and goals online.") http://hin.nhlbi.nih.gov/menuplanner/menu.cgi ("Interactive Menu Planner") -- Neil -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From pgptag at gmail.com Wed Jan 4 07:07:02 2006 From: pgptag at gmail.com (Giu1i0 Pri5c0) Date: Wed, 4 Jan 2006 08:07:02 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] "Transhumanist Works" land in Second Life In-Reply-To: <587852.1136357819323.JavaMail.root@bla4.blogger.com> References: <587852.1136357819323.JavaMail.root@bla4.blogger.com> Message-ID: <470a3c520601032307u31ac4110vcf38dca832cbc6b9@mail.gmail.com> I have purchased a bigger land parcel in Second Lifeat: Mocis 30, 4, 29 - this is the best spot I have found. The parcel, named "Transhumanist Works", is 1736 sq.m. and contains two buildings. Some pictures here . I hope this land will become a meeting space for transhumanists in SL. Everyone is welcome and thanks to those who already came visit. We will hold meetings on the organization of metaverse ventures there. Many adjacent parcels are for sale, if someone wants to buy land we could pool virtual estate and create a big transhumanist enclave. G. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From rafal.smigrodzki at gmail.com Wed Jan 4 08:25:03 2006 From: rafal.smigrodzki at gmail.com (Rafal Smigrodzki) Date: Wed, 4 Jan 2006 03:25:03 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] All hail Will Wilkinson Message-ID: <7641ddc60601040025n34b9aa96na0bc9eff1ef6bfea@mail.gmail.com> Will is a guy worth reading: http://www.willwilkinson.net/flybottle/2006/01/02/the-strange-myth-of-finite-status/ Just think about it. It is not wrong at all to engage in positional games. Pissing contests are not the reviled zero-sum games that e.g. Nick Bostrom would like to ban. Let thousands of unequal flowers bloom, each higher than all others, in one of the world's infinite dimensions. Burn the atavistic neurons of envy out of your brains, fellow transhumanists. Become better persons by being better, not equal. Let the New Revolution begin: Liberte-Inegalite-Atomisation! Rafal From pgptag at gmail.com Wed Jan 4 08:49:51 2006 From: pgptag at gmail.com (Giu1i0 Pri5c0) Date: Wed, 4 Jan 2006 09:49:51 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] All hail Will Wilkinson In-Reply-To: <7641ddc60601040025n34b9aa96na0bc9eff1ef6bfea@mail.gmail.com> References: <7641ddc60601040025n34b9aa96na0bc9eff1ef6bfea@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <470a3c520601040049v4f17ef0y46f9e462ccf38d53@mail.gmail.com> In high school we had farting contests like all kids. We also did a lot of sport, and of course the best football player won status. Why not? I liked it and later I have always enjoyed competition in sport, work and other things. I think Wilkinson's piece is good, and nobody wants to ban games where you can win status. But I think our civilization can now outgrow the primitive need to link ability to survive to status. I would say, first make sure that everyone can eat and feed his family, then "encourage a decentralized entrepreneurial culture where status domains without number may bloom". Football is much more enjoyable if you do not fear starving if your team loses the game. G. On 1/4/06, Rafal Smigrodzki wrote: > Will is a guy worth reading: > > http://www.willwilkinson.net/flybottle/2006/01/02/the-strange-myth-of-finite-status/ > > Just think about it. It is not wrong at all to engage in positional > games. Pissing contests are not the reviled zero-sum games that e.g. > Nick Bostrom would like to ban. > > Let thousands of unequal flowers bloom, each higher than all others, > in one of the world's infinite dimensions. Burn the atavistic neurons > of envy out of your brains, fellow transhumanists. Become better > persons by being better, not equal. > > Let the New Revolution begin: > > Liberte-Inegalite-Atomisation! > > Rafal > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat > From dirk.bruere at gmail.com Wed Jan 4 13:16:32 2006 From: dirk.bruere at gmail.com (Dirk Bruere) Date: Wed, 4 Jan 2006 13:16:32 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] All hail Will Wilkinson In-Reply-To: <470a3c520601040049v4f17ef0y46f9e462ccf38d53@mail.gmail.com> References: <7641ddc60601040025n34b9aa96na0bc9eff1ef6bfea@mail.gmail.com> <470a3c520601040049v4f17ef0y46f9e462ccf38d53@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On 1/4/06, Giu1i0 Pri5c0 wrote: > > In high school we had farting contests like all kids. We also did a > lot of sport, and of course the best football player won status. Why > not? I liked it and later I have always enjoyed competition in sport, > work and other things. > I think Wilkinson's piece is good, and nobody wants to ban games where > you can win status. But I think our civilization can now outgrow the > primitive need to link ability to survive to status. I would say, > first make sure that everyone can eat and feed his family, then > "encourage a decentralized entrepreneurial culture where status > domains without number may bloom". Football is much more enjoyable if > you do not fear starving if your team loses the game. > G. > That just moves the competition up a notch, and back into the arena of survival. It's just that some survive better than others. In general, I try to avoid competing because I am extremely competitive, and it's a pain to be driven to win all the time. Dirk -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From dirk.bruere at gmail.com Wed Jan 4 13:26:50 2006 From: dirk.bruere at gmail.com (Dirk Bruere) Date: Wed, 4 Jan 2006 13:26:50 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] [Bioethics] Scholars debate whether to limit scientific research ??? In-Reply-To: <43BB64B4.7020100@sasktel.net> References: <43BAD36A.3090202@goldenfuture.net> <43BB6109.2000708@sasktel.net> <43BB64B4.7020100@sasktel.net> Message-ID: On 1/4/06, Lifespan Pharma/Morris Johnson CTO wrote: > > Looked at the adjenda and see Nick Bostrom is a presenter. > Hopefully some intelligence on the various groups and alliances and > allegences and overt and coveret themes and strategies > can be gathered. > > Even the restriction of science in the name of security endangers the > singularity date. > > On the other hand a massive covert effort to develop super human > soldiers might also be an adgenda for some. > However, it will mean that only a choice few will benefit and the mass > of this generation will be allowed to die > natural deaths while the technology remains forbidden to expose to the > world. > > In another post I rhetorically asked whether there would be any Chinese delegates. Of course there won't be. This kind of guilt ridden introspection is a largely US (and to a lesser extent European) phenomenon. I have friend who has just spent some time in China on business. He was telling me about visiting a metal plating factory where there were open pits of hot acid. No safety equipment at all, not even guard rails to stop someone falling in. No pollution controls. Everything was focussed on creating the product for the least money no matter who or what suffered. Add to that a fanatical drive to become what they already believe they are, the number one civilisation, coupled with a nationalistic racism not seen since WW2 in Europe and you can guess what their response to Western 'ethical concerns' will be. The finger. Let's not hand them the future by default. They should at least have to earn it the hard way. Dirk -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From isthatyoujack at icqmail.com Wed Jan 4 14:28:54 2006 From: isthatyoujack at icqmail.com (Jack Parkinson) Date: Wed, 4 Jan 2006 22:28:54 +0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Happy New Year and resolution. References: <200601041327.k04DR8e25046@tick.javien.com> Message-ID: <001801c6113b$339c9400$04800d0a@JPAcer> > Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] Happy New Year and resolution. > To: ExI chat list > Message-ID: > Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 > > On 1/3/06, Anne-Marie Taylor wrote: >> I thought that with technology so advanced that there may have been a >> program I haven't heard of yet that is simple and easy to use (My mother >> is quite old and I can't see her googling anything:). Something like a >> journal but that gives solid results at the end of the day. Such as >> how much cholesterol, proteins, carbohydrates and vitamins you absorb >> in one day. You punch in what you eat and you get actual results, >> I think it would be a great idea to promote proper health. >> People today really don't know what they are putting in there bodies. The Hackers Diet is a net favorite - simple - and it works too! I used it to drop 20 kilos over a 10 month period about 4 years ago The book, plus spreadsheets etc, are free in a variety of formats from here: http://www.fourmilab.ch/hackdiet/#offline Jack Parkinson From dirk.bruere at gmail.com Wed Jan 4 14:40:37 2006 From: dirk.bruere at gmail.com (Dirk Bruere) Date: Wed, 4 Jan 2006 14:40:37 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Happy New Year and resolution. In-Reply-To: <20060103172742.13310.qmail@web35509.mail.mud.yahoo.com> References: <20060103172742.13310.qmail@web35509.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Message-ID: On 1/3/06, Anne-Marie Taylor wrote: > > Thanks Herb, > I thought that with technology so advanced that there may have been a > program I haven't heard of yet that is simple and easy to use (My mother > is quite old and I can't see her googling anything:). Something like a > journal but that gives solid results at the end of the day. Such as > how much cholesterol, proteins, carbohydrates and vitamins you absorb > in one day. You punch in what you eat and you get actual results, > I think it would be a great idea to promote proper health. > People today really don't know what they are putting in there bodies. > Anyhow thanks again, > Anna > Three factors (ignoring genetics) - diet, exercise, stress. All you need to do is get 2 of 3 correct. Dirk -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jef at jefallbright.net Wed Jan 4 14:47:13 2006 From: jef at jefallbright.net (Jef Allbright) Date: Wed, 4 Jan 2006 06:47:13 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] All hail Will Wilkinson In-Reply-To: <7641ddc60601040025n34b9aa96na0bc9eff1ef6bfea@mail.gmail.com> References: <7641ddc60601040025n34b9aa96na0bc9eff1ef6bfea@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <22360fa10601040647i18721e0fi35ab753086cc756e@mail.gmail.com> On 1/4/06, Rafal Smigrodzki wrote: > Will is a guy worth reading: > > http://www.willwilkinson.net/flybottle/2006/01/02/the-strange-myth-of-finite-status/ > > Just think about it. It is not wrong at all to engage in positional > games. Pissing contests are not the reviled zero-sum games that e.g. > Nick Bostrom would like to ban. This is analogous to popular conceptions of absolute happiness. Striving to attain status or striving to attain happiness -- each drive the system to ratchet up a notch in terms of satisfying current values. A side effect of this process is more general growth. > > Let thousands of unequal flowers bloom, each higher than all others, > in one of the world's infinite dimensions. Burn the atavistic neurons > of envy out of your brains, fellow transhumanists. Become better > persons by being better, not equal. > > Let the New Revolution begin: > > Liberte-Inegalite-Atomisation! Atomisation?? Rafal, I think I understand that this is a reflection of your strongly held Libertarian beliefs, but isn't "atomisation" clearly anti-extropic? I can imagine you shudder with revulsion as you read this, but would you consider that cooperation is a much stronger principle leading to growth, with the understanding that effective cooperation at a given level of organization benefits from diversity and competition at a lower level? - Jef From james.hughes at trincoll.edu Wed Jan 4 14:52:58 2006 From: james.hughes at trincoll.edu (Hughes, James J.) Date: Wed, 4 Jan 2006 09:52:58 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Scholars debate whether to limitscientific research ??? Message-ID: > Bioethics my ass, its just a bunch of brainless dogs in the > manger, pathetic but worse than any lunatic terrorist. I hope you will distinguish between bioconservatives like Kass, who are actually a minority among bioethicists, and the secular bioethics majority who are increasingly tilting our way. An example is Arthur Caplan, considered the dean of American bioethics, who coined the term "yuck factor" in order to deride it, and who is now an open champion of the right to use enhancements. For instance, in Kathy Schulz' recent article on neuro-enhancement in the Nation she says: "Arthur Caplan, director of the University of Pennsylvania's Center for Bioethics, is a champion of neuroenhancement..." http://www.thenation.com/doc/20060109/schulz You can also see him take apart the biocon Carl Elliot and defend enhancement here: http://www.betterhumans.com/Columns/Column/tabid/79/Column/361/Default.a spx We have also attracted about 40 bioethicists to our upcoming conference on "Human Enhancement Technologies and Human Rights" with most papers leaning toward a right to enhancement: http://ieet.org/HEHR/ Bioethicists do have concerns about safety, efficacy and equity, as should we. But most are on the side of consumer rights to choose. ------------------------ James Hughes Ph.D. Executive Director, Institute for Ethics and Emerging Technologies http://ieet.org Editor, Journal of Evolution and Technology http://jetpress.org Williams 229B, Trinity College 300 Summit St., Hartford CT 06106 (office) 860-297-2376 director at ieet.org From dirk.bruere at gmail.com Wed Jan 4 14:54:55 2006 From: dirk.bruere at gmail.com (Dirk Bruere) Date: Wed, 4 Jan 2006 14:54:55 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] All hail Will Wilkinson In-Reply-To: <22360fa10601040647i18721e0fi35ab753086cc756e@mail.gmail.com> References: <7641ddc60601040025n34b9aa96na0bc9eff1ef6bfea@mail.gmail.com> <22360fa10601040647i18721e0fi35ab753086cc756e@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On 1/4/06, Jef Allbright wrote: > > I can imagine you shudder with revulsion as you read this, but would > you consider that cooperation is a much stronger principle leading to > growth, with the understanding that effective cooperation at a given > level of organization benefits from diversity and competition at a > lower level? > > Cooperation within groups, competition between groups. 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URL: From jef at jefallbright.net Wed Jan 4 15:03:02 2006 From: jef at jefallbright.net (Jef Allbright) Date: Wed, 4 Jan 2006 07:03:02 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] All hail Will Wilkinson In-Reply-To: References: <7641ddc60601040025n34b9aa96na0bc9eff1ef6bfea@mail.gmail.com> <22360fa10601040647i18721e0fi35ab753086cc756e@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <22360fa10601040703l18bcf21bje9124e3e6441379@mail.gmail.com> On 1/4/06, Dirk Bruere wrote: > > > On 1/4/06, Jef Allbright wrote: > > I can imagine you shudder with revulsion as you read this, but would > > you consider that cooperation is a much stronger principle leading to > > growth, with the understanding that effective cooperation at a given > > level of organization benefits from diversity and competition at a > > lower level? > > > > > > Cooperation within groups, competition between groups. > Dirk - Yes, these exist, but what are your thoughts on their role within levels of organization? - Jef From dirk.bruere at gmail.com Wed Jan 4 15:25:31 2006 From: dirk.bruere at gmail.com (Dirk Bruere) Date: Wed, 4 Jan 2006 15:25:31 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] All hail Will Wilkinson In-Reply-To: <22360fa10601040703l18bcf21bje9124e3e6441379@mail.gmail.com> References: <7641ddc60601040025n34b9aa96na0bc9eff1ef6bfea@mail.gmail.com> <22360fa10601040647i18721e0fi35ab753086cc756e@mail.gmail.com> <22360fa10601040703l18bcf21bje9124e3e6441379@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On 1/4/06, Jef Allbright wrote: > > On 1/4/06, Dirk Bruere wrote: > > > > > > On 1/4/06, Jef Allbright wrote: > > > I can imagine you shudder with revulsion as you read this, but would > > > you consider that cooperation is a much stronger principle leading to > > > growth, with the understanding that effective cooperation at a given > > > level of organization benefits from diversity and competition at a > > > lower level? > > > > > > > > > > Cooperation within groups, competition between groups. > > > > Dirk - > > Yes, these exist, but what are your thoughts on their role within > levels of organization? > > Well, within an overall (smallish) organisation there should not be competing groups. It indicates redundancy at best and at worst empire building. When it comes to much larger groups eg nations, then that redundancy is a necessity. It also comes down to degrees of loyalty to, and feelings of inclusiveness of, tribal groupings at different scales. Dirk -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From gts_2000 at yahoo.com Wed Jan 4 15:42:13 2006 From: gts_2000 at yahoo.com (gts) Date: Wed, 04 Jan 2006 10:42:13 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] All hail Will Wilkinson In-Reply-To: References: <7641ddc60601040025n34b9aa96na0bc9eff1ef6bfea@mail.gmail.com> <22360fa10601040647i18721e0fi35ab753086cc756e@mail.gmail.com> <22360fa10601040703l18bcf21bje9124e3e6441379@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On 1/4/06, Jef Allbright wrote: > I can imagine you shudder with revulsion as you read this, but would > you consider that cooperation is a much stronger principle leading to > growth, with the understanding that effective cooperation at a given > level of organization benefits from diversity and competition at a > lower level? An example might help, Jef. I'm thinking you're correct, an example being competition between salespeople at a lower level and cooperation between the sales department and other departments at a higher level. -gts From dirk.bruere at gmail.com Wed Jan 4 15:49:26 2006 From: dirk.bruere at gmail.com (Dirk Bruere) Date: Wed, 4 Jan 2006 15:49:26 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] All hail Will Wilkinson In-Reply-To: References: <7641ddc60601040025n34b9aa96na0bc9eff1ef6bfea@mail.gmail.com> <22360fa10601040647i18721e0fi35ab753086cc756e@mail.gmail.com> <22360fa10601040703l18bcf21bje9124e3e6441379@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On 1/4/06, gts wrote: > > On 1/4/06, Jef Allbright wrote: > > > I can imagine you shudder with revulsion as you read this, but would > > you consider that cooperation is a much stronger principle leading to > > growth, with the understanding that effective cooperation at a given > > level of organization benefits from diversity and competition at a > > lower level? > > An example might help, Jef. I'm thinking you're correct, an example being > competition between salespeople at a lower level and cooperation between > the sales department and other departments at a higher level. > Is that really so, or a justification of existing practice and prejudice? Would cooperation between salespeople be a better strategy overall? Dirk -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From sentience at pobox.com Wed Jan 4 16:11:03 2006 From: sentience at pobox.com (Eliezer S. Yudkowsky) Date: Wed, 04 Jan 2006 08:11:03 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] All hail Will Wilkinson In-Reply-To: <7641ddc60601040025n34b9aa96na0bc9eff1ef6bfea@mail.gmail.com> References: <7641ddc60601040025n34b9aa96na0bc9eff1ef6bfea@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <43BBF397.6030303@pobox.com> Rafal Smigrodzki wrote: > Will is a guy worth reading: > > http://www.willwilkinson.net/flybottle/2006/01/02/the-strange-myth-of-finite-status/ > > Just think about it. It is not wrong at all to engage in positional > games. Pissing contests are not the reviled zero-sum games that e.g. > Nick Bostrom would like to ban. For every winner in Go, there must be a loser. Let us abolish the game at once. -- Eliezer S. Yudkowsky http://singinst.org/ Research Fellow, Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence From pgptag at gmail.com Wed Jan 4 16:20:36 2006 From: pgptag at gmail.com (Giu1i0 Pri5c0) Date: Wed, 4 Jan 2006 17:20:36 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] All hail Will Wilkinson In-Reply-To: <43BBF397.6030303@pobox.com> References: <7641ddc60601040025n34b9aa96na0bc9eff1ef6bfea@mail.gmail.com> <43BBF397.6030303@pobox.com> Message-ID: <470a3c520601040820w1f0e65c6ic83f485431759a3b@mail.gmail.com> No, let's continue playing Go because it is an interesting and fun game, and let's continue being as competitive as we like when we play go, because competition is part of the game. I just don't want my or anybody's survival to depend on Go scores, because survival is more serious than a game. G. On 1/4/06, Eliezer S. Yudkowsky wrote: > Rafal Smigrodzki wrote: > > Will is a guy worth reading: > > > > http://www.willwilkinson.net/flybottle/2006/01/02/the-strange-myth-of-finite-status/ > > > > Just think about it. It is not wrong at all to engage in positional > > games. Pissing contests are not the reviled zero-sum games that e.g. > > Nick Bostrom would like to ban. > > For every winner in Go, there must be a loser. Let us abolish the game > at once. > > -- > Eliezer S. Yudkowsky http://singinst.org/ > Research Fellow, Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat > From dirk.bruere at gmail.com Wed Jan 4 16:47:34 2006 From: dirk.bruere at gmail.com (Dirk Bruere) Date: Wed, 4 Jan 2006 16:47:34 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] All hail Will Wilkinson In-Reply-To: <470a3c520601040820w1f0e65c6ic83f485431759a3b@mail.gmail.com> References: <7641ddc60601040025n34b9aa96na0bc9eff1ef6bfea@mail.gmail.com> <43BBF397.6030303@pobox.com> <470a3c520601040820w1f0e65c6ic83f485431759a3b@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On 1/4/06, Giu1i0 Pri5c0 wrote: > > No, let's continue playing Go because it is an interesting and fun > game, and let's continue being as competitive as we like when we play > go, because competition is part of the game. > I just don't want my or anybody's survival to depend on Go scores, > because survival is more serious than a game. > G. > > How about the game where you have to learn some specific subject and then get tested on it? Dirk -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From sentience at pobox.com Wed Jan 4 17:10:21 2006 From: sentience at pobox.com (Eliezer S. Yudkowsky) Date: Wed, 04 Jan 2006 09:10:21 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] All hail Will Wilkinson In-Reply-To: <470a3c520601040820w1f0e65c6ic83f485431759a3b@mail.gmail.com> References: <7641ddc60601040025n34b9aa96na0bc9eff1ef6bfea@mail.gmail.com> <43BBF397.6030303@pobox.com> <470a3c520601040820w1f0e65c6ic83f485431759a3b@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <43BC017D.3070103@pobox.com> Giu1i0 Pri5c0 wrote: > No, let's continue playing Go because it is an interesting and fun > game, and let's continue being as competitive as we like when we play > go, because competition is part of the game. > I just don't want my or anybody's survival to depend on Go scores, > because survival is more serious than a game. > G. Let me clarify: Playing Go has a positive side effect, you get better at Go and learn generalizable skills. Playing Go is fun. An arms race for tallness of genetically engineered babies (yeah, right) may end up with negative side effects, such as poor health. Nothing in the imprecise real world is *exactly* zero-sum, and if it were, an altruist wouldn't care about it one way or the other. Some zero-sum games are actually negative-sum games because of wasted effort, wasted time, wasted money, infliction of fear and emotional distress. Other zero-sum games are positive-sum because people have fun playing them and learn something. It's the "zero-sum" games that are actually negative which Bostrom, and myself, would revile. -- Eliezer S. Yudkowsky http://singinst.org/ Research Fellow, Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence From gts_2000 at yahoo.com Wed Jan 4 18:46:56 2006 From: gts_2000 at yahoo.com (gts) Date: Wed, 04 Jan 2006 13:46:56 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] All hail Will Wilkinson In-Reply-To: References: <7641ddc60601040025n34b9aa96na0bc9eff1ef6bfea@mail.gmail.com> <22360fa10601040647i18721e0fi35ab753086cc756e@mail.gmail.com> <22360fa10601040703l18bcf21bje9124e3e6441379@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On Wed, 04 Jan 2006 10:49:26 -0500, Dirk Bruere wrote: > Is that really so, or a justification of existing practice and prejudice? > Would cooperation between salespeople be a better strategy overall? Commissioned salespeople cooperate when it's in their mutual best interests, but in general I think they enjoy and perform best in competition. -gts From dirk.bruere at gmail.com Wed Jan 4 18:51:49 2006 From: dirk.bruere at gmail.com (Dirk Bruere) Date: Wed, 4 Jan 2006 18:51:49 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] All hail Will Wilkinson In-Reply-To: References: <7641ddc60601040025n34b9aa96na0bc9eff1ef6bfea@mail.gmail.com> <22360fa10601040647i18721e0fi35ab753086cc756e@mail.gmail.com> <22360fa10601040703l18bcf21bje9124e3e6441379@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On 1/4/06, gts wrote: > > On Wed, 04 Jan 2006 10:49:26 -0500, Dirk Bruere > wrote: > > > Is that really so, or a justification of existing practice and > prejudice? > > Would cooperation between salespeople be a better strategy overall? > > Commissioned salespeople cooperate when it's in their mutual best > interests, but in general I think they enjoy and perform best in > competition. > Probably, but that may be a positive feedback effect in that the type of people attracted are the ones who enjoy such a role, and the 'co-operators' are discouraged. OTOH, in companies in which I have worked the biggest motivator for sales staff was not getting fired. Dirk -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From analyticphilosophy at gmail.com Wed Jan 4 18:53:11 2006 From: analyticphilosophy at gmail.com (Jeff Medina) Date: Wed, 4 Jan 2006 13:53:11 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Playing Go & demandingness in ethics Message-ID: <5844e22f0601041053r71a67c53mca4d56507cdbe135@mail.gmail.com> On 1/4/06, Eliezer S. Yudkowsky wrote: > Let me clarify: Playing Go has a positive side effect, you get better > at Go and learn generalizable skills. Playing Go is fun. Playing Go has the negative side effect of its opportunity cost. For example, if someone smart enough to play Go well is spending time playing Go, they aren't making contributions they otherwise could to the solution of technical problems that would contribute to the well-being of {a subset of the current and future morally significant population} greater than playing Go contributes to the subset of the population that enjoys playing Go or benefits from the generalizable skills Go has imparted on its players. This is not to pick on Go. It just gave me an opportunity to seed a discussion on demandingness in ethics, which has re-emerged in the past few days to steal some of my CPU cycles. Demandingness is a common criticism of consequentialist ethics -- e.g., don't ever eat a fancy pasta dish, as you can nearly always replace it with oatmeal or some other nutritious, less expensive food, be just as healthy, and donate the difference in cost to charitable causes (this sort of replacement argument applies to a bewildering proportion of most of our daily activities and decisions). Though it isn't argued as often, it applies to deontological systems and a number of virtue ethical systems. Now given that many people interested in transhumanism express an interest in the ethical arguments for various technological developments, the permissibility of enhancement, the right to morphological freedom (whether others consider what you're doing 'enhancement' or not)... why are the demands of our alleged beliefs nigh universally ignored? It is just a fact of human psychology that we can't motivate ourselves to moral behavior if it's not right in our face, or if it doesn't present immediate & painful consequences to ignore it? It is an illusory problem because none of us really care about ethics at all, and are only engaged in a social reciprocity game? Or is there some other explanation? And should and can we do something to change, acting more in accord with the demands of our ethics? Best, -- Jeff Medina http://www.painfullyclear.com/ Community Director Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence http://www.singinst.org/ Relationships & Community Fellow Institute for Ethics & Emerging Technologies http://www.ieet.org/ School of Philosophy, Birkbeck, University of London http://www.bbk.ac.uk/phil/ From gts_2000 at yahoo.com Wed Jan 4 20:29:33 2006 From: gts_2000 at yahoo.com (gts) Date: Wed, 04 Jan 2006 15:29:33 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] All hail Will Wilkinson In-Reply-To: References: <7641ddc60601040025n34b9aa96na0bc9eff1ef6bfea@mail.gmail.com> <22360fa10601040647i18721e0fi35ab753086cc756e@mail.gmail.com> <22360fa10601040703l18bcf21bje9124e3e6441379@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On Wed, 04 Jan 2006 13:51:49 -0500, Dirk Bruere wrote: > OTOH, in companies in which I have worked the biggest > motivator for sales staff was not getting fired. The carrot and the stick. :) -gts From sjatkins at mac.com Wed Jan 4 21:07:32 2006 From: sjatkins at mac.com (Samantha Atkins) Date: Wed, 4 Jan 2006 13:07:32 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] All hail Will Wilkinson In-Reply-To: References: <7641ddc60601040025n34b9aa96na0bc9eff1ef6bfea@mail.gmail.com> <22360fa10601040647i18721e0fi35ab753086cc756e@mail.gmail.com> <22360fa10601040703l18bcf21bje9124e3e6441379@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On Jan 4, 2006, at 7:49 AM, Dirk Bruere wrote: > > > On 1/4/06, gts wrote: > On 1/4/06, Jef Allbright wrote: > > > I can imagine you shudder with revulsion as you read this, but would > > you consider that cooperation is a much stronger principle > leading to > > growth, with the understanding that effective cooperation at a given > > level of organization benefits from diversity and competition at a > > lower level? > > An example might help, Jef. I'm thinking you're correct, an example > being > competition between salespeople at a lower level and cooperation > between > the sales department and other departments at a higher level. > > Is that really so, or a justification of existing practice and > prejudice? > Would cooperation between salespeople be a better strategy overall? > I have seen this work when the sales folks pitch each others strengths to likely prospects in order to pull together larger joint deals or additional deals that bring more net sales to the company. Using and sharing common pools of tools, contacts and knowledge increases the effectiveness of everyone in the group. I have seen some of this work even across different companies. - samantha -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From sjatkins at mac.com Wed Jan 4 21:25:03 2006 From: sjatkins at mac.com (Samantha Atkins) Date: Wed, 4 Jan 2006 13:25:03 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Playing Go & demandingness in ethics In-Reply-To: <5844e22f0601041053r71a67c53mca4d56507cdbe135@mail.gmail.com> References: <5844e22f0601041053r71a67c53mca4d56507cdbe135@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <1B812FF1-D79C-4ECB-80B3-6D9872220C3F@mac.com> On Jan 4, 2006, at 10:53 AM, Jeff Medina wrote: > On 1/4/06, Eliezer S. Yudkowsky wrote: >> Let me clarify: Playing Go has a positive side effect, you get >> better >> at Go and learn generalizable skills. Playing Go is fun. > > Playing Go has the negative side effect of its opportunity cost. For > example, if someone smart enough to play Go well is spending time > playing Go, they aren't making contributions they otherwise could to > the solution of technical problems that would contribute to the > well-being of {a subset of the current and future morally significant > population} greater than playing Go contributes to the subset of the > population that enjoys playing Go or benefits from the generalizable > skills Go has imparted on its players. Does your life belong to you or to those faceless others? If it belongs to you then the net benefit for others is not relevant except in the context of the value you personally place on being of benefit to others. > > This is not to pick on Go. It just gave me an opportunity to seed a > discussion on demandingness in ethics, which has re-emerged in the > past few days to steal some of my CPU cycles. > > Demandingness is a common criticism of consequentialist ethics -- > e.g., don't ever eat a fancy pasta dish, as you can nearly always > replace it with oatmeal or some other nutritious, less expensive food, > be just as healthy, and donate the difference in cost to charitable > causes (this sort of replacement argument applies to a bewildering > proportion of most of our daily activities and decisions). Though it > isn't argued as often, it applies to deontological systems and a > number of virtue ethical systems. > Generally tell those making demands what to do with their demands in no uncertain terms. Life is about more than mere utility. > Now given that many people interested in transhumanism express an > interest in the ethical arguments for various technological > developments, the permissibility of enhancement, the right to > morphological freedom (whether others consider what you're doing > 'enhancement' or not)... why are the demands of our alleged beliefs > nigh universally ignored? I do not make such arguments generally. I would rather argue from the right to your own life and pursuit of happiness. I don't require or seek permission to maximize my own life. > It is just a fact of human psychology that > we can't motivate ourselves to moral behavior if it's not right in our > face, or if it doesn't present immediate & painful consequences to > ignore it? We have some not useless propensity to distrust moral pronouncements and decisions. Since so much so-called morality is quite groundless and inimical to our well-being that is a useful defense. However, it is in our interest to develop increased ability to act according to our best understanding including in ethical matters regardless of our conditioning and evolutionary psychology. > It is an illusory problem because none of us really care > about ethics at all, and are only engaged in a social reciprocity > game? Or is there some other explanation? And should and can we do > something to change, acting more in accord with the demands of our > ethics? Please clarify exactly what you are asking. I don't believe it is in anyone's interest to justify everything they do in the manner you spoke of above. - samantha From avantguardian2020 at yahoo.com Wed Jan 4 21:28:50 2006 From: avantguardian2020 at yahoo.com (The Avantguardian) Date: Wed, 4 Jan 2006 13:28:50 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] the structure of randomness In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <20060104212851.98738.qmail@web60515.mail.yahoo.com> --- gts wrote: > > The results produced by John suggest to me that the > chi-2 isn't the > measure that corresponds very well to their human > scored similarity. Well that's because it's not. Chi^2 is more for comparing ratios than histograms. If I remember my stats correctly, the K-S (Kolmogorov-Smirnov) statistic is more appropriate and will give a P-value that two histograms represent the same underlying distribution. The Avantguardian is Stuart LaForge alt email: stuart"AT"ucla.edu "The most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the source of all true art and science. He to whom this emotion is a stranger, who can no longer wonder and stand rapt in awe, is as good as dead: his eyes are closed. . ." - Albert Einstein, "What I Believe" (1930) __________________________________________ Yahoo! DSL ? Something to write home about. Just $16.99/mo. or less. dsl.yahoo.com From sjatkins at mac.com Wed Jan 4 21:29:25 2006 From: sjatkins at mac.com (Samantha Atkins) Date: Wed, 4 Jan 2006 13:29:25 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] All hail Will Wilkinson In-Reply-To: References: <7641ddc60601040025n34b9aa96na0bc9eff1ef6bfea@mail.gmail.com> <22360fa10601040647i18721e0fi35ab753086cc756e@mail.gmail.com> <22360fa10601040703l18bcf21bje9124e3e6441379@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On Jan 4, 2006, at 10:51 AM, Dirk Bruere wrote: > > > On 1/4/06, gts wrote: > On Wed, 04 Jan 2006 10:49:26 -0500, Dirk Bruere > > wrote: > > > Is that really so, or a justification of existing practice and > prejudice? > > Would cooperation between salespeople be a better strategy overall? > > Commissioned salespeople cooperate when it's in their mutual best > interests, but in general I think they enjoy and perform best in > competition. > > Probably, but that may be a positive feedback effect in that the > type of people attracted are the ones who enjoy such a role, and > the 'co-operators' are discouraged. OTOH, in companies in which I > have worked the biggest motivator for sales staff was not getting > fired. > Sales is one place where you have more control over your income directly proportional to your results. Anyone motivated primarily by not getting fired does not belong in sales. I wouldn't want anyone working for me in any capacity to have that as a primary motivation. But especially not those in sales. - samantha -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jrd1415 at yahoo.com Wed Jan 4 21:35:24 2006 From: jrd1415 at yahoo.com (Jeff Davis) Date: Wed, 4 Jan 2006 13:35:24 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] fMRI lie detector Message-ID: <20060104213524.7102.qmail@web60015.mail.yahoo.com> Don't Even Think About Lying http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/14.01/lying_pr.html __________________________________________ Yahoo! DSL ? Something to write home about. Just $16.99/mo. or less. dsl.yahoo.com From discwuzit at yahoo.com Wed Jan 4 21:36:43 2006 From: discwuzit at yahoo.com (John B) Date: Wed, 4 Jan 2006 13:36:43 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Opportunity costs In-Reply-To: <200601041900.k04J0De30750@tick.javien.com> Message-ID: <20060104213643.98628.qmail@web54510.mail.yahoo.com> Quoting Jeff Medina - "Playing Go has the negative side effect of its opportunity cost." Well, sure! EVERYTHING you do has opportunity costs, and I can't think of something you can do that doesn't have negative side effects! There's a reason economics is called "the Dismal Science" after all! Quoting Jeff's post again - "Demandingness is a common criticism of consequentialist ethics -- e.g., don't ever eat a fancy pasta dish, as you can nearly always replace it with oatmeal or some other nutritious, less expensive food, be just as healthy, and donate the difference in cost to charitable causes" While true, this ignores some other features of that fancy pasta dish. Specifically, you gain pleasure you may or may not gain from oatmeal. You gain status/cachet in the eyes of some of those observing (not always a good thing, IMO, but there you are.) You are able to gain different nutritional requirements than just plain oatmeal - which isn't a nutritionally complete food source. (That last may be a bit of a straw man - Jeff did say "or some other nutritious, less expensive food", but then again fancy pasta dishes may be pretty inexpensive - pasta e fagioli for instance.) -snip- "Now given that many people interested in transhumanism express an interest in the ethical arguments for various technological developments, the permissibility of enhancement, the right to morphological freedom (whether others consider what you're doing 'enhancement' or not)... why are the demands of our alleged beliefs nigh universally ignored? It is just a fact of human psychology that we can't motivate ourselves to moral behavior if it's not right in our face, or if it doesn't present immediate & painful consequences to ignore it? It is an illusory problem because none of us really care about ethics at all, and are only engaged in a social reciprocity game? Or is there some other explanation? And should and can we do something to change, acting more in accord with the demands of our ethics?" Personally, while not perfect, I do strive to act in accord with my ethics. However, I do not personally agree that enhancement and morphological freedom trump other concerns - public safety issues among them. "Why do you want combat augments, Sir/Ma'am?" is a VERY valid, ethically driven question, as is "You want to do WHAT to your child?" Anathema here, I understand, but that's my personal take. YMMV, 'course. -John B __________________________________________ Yahoo! DSL ? Something to write home about. Just $16.99/mo. or less. dsl.yahoo.com From nanogirl at halcyon.com Wed Jan 4 22:31:20 2006 From: nanogirl at halcyon.com (Gina Miller) Date: Wed, 4 Jan 2006 14:31:20 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] New High lit film References: <7641ddc60601040025n34b9aa96na0bc9eff1ef6bfea@mail.gmail.com><22360fa10601040647i18721e0fi35ab753086cc756e@mail.gmail.com><22360fa10601040703l18bcf21bje9124e3e6441379@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <00c101c6117e$b0960110$0300a8c0@Nano> I made a new movie for you all - it's a brainy one! http://maxanimation.blogspot.com/2006/01/fireside-reading.html Gina "Nanogirl" Miller Nanotechnology Industries http://www.nanoindustries.com Personal: http://www.nanogirl.com/index2.html Foresight Senior Associate http://www.foresight.org Nanotechnology Advisor Extropy Institute http://www.extropy.org 3D/Animation http://www.nanogirl.com/museumfuture/index.htm Microscope Jewelry http://www.nanogirl.com/crafts/microjewelry.htm Email: nanogirl at halcyon.com "Nanotechnology: Solutions for the future." -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From dirk.bruere at gmail.com Wed Jan 4 22:33:39 2006 From: dirk.bruere at gmail.com (Dirk Bruere) Date: Wed, 4 Jan 2006 22:33:39 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] All hail Will Wilkinson In-Reply-To: References: <7641ddc60601040025n34b9aa96na0bc9eff1ef6bfea@mail.gmail.com> <22360fa10601040647i18721e0fi35ab753086cc756e@mail.gmail.com> <22360fa10601040703l18bcf21bje9124e3e6441379@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On 1/4/06, Samantha Atkins wrote: > > > On Jan 4, 2006, at 10:51 AM, Dirk Bruere wrote: > > > > On 1/4/06, gts wrote: > > > > On Wed, 04 Jan 2006 10:49:26 -0500, Dirk Bruere > > wrote: > > > > > Is that really so, or a justification of existing practice and > > prejudice? > > > Would cooperation between salespeople be a better strategy overall? > > > > Commissioned salespeople cooperate when it's in their mutual best > > interests, but in general I think they enjoy and perform best in > > competition. > > > > Probably, but that may be a positive feedback effect in that the type of > people attracted are the ones who enjoy such a role, and the 'co-operators' > are discouraged. OTOH, in companies in which I have worked the biggest > motivator for sales staff was not getting fired. > > > Sales is one place where you have more control over your income directly > proportional to your results. Anyone motivated primarily by not getting > fired does not belong in sales. I wouldn't want anyone working for me in > any capacity to have that as a primary motivation. But especially not those > in sales. > > The companies typically would set sales targets, and those who failed to meet them would be history. Dirk -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From analyticphilosophy at gmail.com Wed Jan 4 23:14:12 2006 From: analyticphilosophy at gmail.com (Jeff Medina) Date: Wed, 4 Jan 2006 18:14:12 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Playing Go & demandingness in ethics In-Reply-To: <1B812FF1-D79C-4ECB-80B3-6D9872220C3F@mac.com> References: <5844e22f0601041053r71a67c53mca4d56507cdbe135@mail.gmail.com> <1B812FF1-D79C-4ECB-80B3-6D9872220C3F@mac.com> Message-ID: <5844e22f0601041514s30b9040aje58418693eede4c7@mail.gmail.com> On 1/4/06, Samantha Atkins wrote: > > [Jeff said:] Now given that many people interested in transhumanism express an > > interest in the ethical arguments for various technological > > developments, the permissibility of enhancement, the right to > > morphological freedom (whether others consider what you're doing > > 'enhancement' or not)... why are the demands of our alleged beliefs > > nigh universally ignored? > > I do not make such arguments generally. This statement, as well as the other comments you gave, indicate pretty clearly that you are not one of the people referred to by the statement "many people interested in transhumanism express an interest in [certain related ethical issues]". So none of the questions apply to you; you're arguing against the given, not addressing the question (which assumes it). Now there's nothing wrong with spawning a new thread of conversation and disagreeing with the claim that people have to care about anyone else -- disagreeing that there are any moral obligations at all, in effect. But that's distinct from what I'm curious about, so we would be talking past one another. Or, to put it in a way that coheres with your view, I'm interested in the questions I posed *answered from the point of view of those who personally place value on being of benefit to [a.k.a. helping] others. Best, -- Jeff Medina http://www.painfullyclear.com/ Community Director Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence http://www.singinst.org/ Relationships & Community Fellow Institute for Ethics & Emerging Technologies http://www.ieet.org/ School of Philosophy, Birkbeck, University of London http://www.bbk.ac.uk/phil/ From russell.wallace at gmail.com Wed Jan 4 23:29:45 2006 From: russell.wallace at gmail.com (Russell Wallace) Date: Wed, 4 Jan 2006 23:29:45 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Playing Go & demandingness in ethics In-Reply-To: <5844e22f0601041053r71a67c53mca4d56507cdbe135@mail.gmail.com> References: <5844e22f0601041053r71a67c53mca4d56507cdbe135@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <8d71341e0601041529u576cacf6n26644e1eb081a71d@mail.gmail.com> On 1/4/06, Jeff Medina wrote: > > Now given that many people interested in transhumanism express an > interest in the ethical arguments for various technological > developments, the permissibility of enhancement, the right to > morphological freedom (whether others consider what you're doing > 'enhancement' or not)... why are the demands of our alleged beliefs > nigh universally ignored? It is just a fact of human psychology that > we can't motivate ourselves to moral behavior if it's not right in our > face, or if it doesn't present immediate & painful consequences to > ignore it? It is an illusory problem because none of us really care > about ethics at all, and are only engaged in a social reciprocity > game? Or is there some other explanation? And should and can we do > something to change, acting more in accord with the demands of our > ethics? That's a good question. For myself, I don't subscribe to strict utilitarianism, or the idea that strangers automatically have a right to claim my time or other resources; nonetheless I do hold it as my self-assigned duty to try to do that which will be of most benefit to humanity; so the question still applies. As it happens, I justify resources spent on apparently frivolous things like playing games or watching anime on the grounds that such activities are necessary for maintaining productivity; and I think the justification is valid; but to some extent this dodges the question, because I can easily imagine situations where it would not be valid; and it is not obvious to me that in that case I would immediately donate all my remaining resources to the Singularity Institute or suchlike. Thinking about it, I really don't know whether I would or not; I suspect that in any situation where I regarded continued survival as of positive utility to myself, I would also find a way of looking at it that meant I had a significantly nonzero chance of making my own contribution with at least some of the available resources. So I suppose I don't really have an answer to the original question, but I agree it is a good one. (The other question I don't have an answer to is how to discuss this sort of stuff autobiographically without sounding as frightfully pompous as I do in this post, alas :)) - Russell -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From live2scan at charter.net Wed Jan 4 23:18:04 2006 From: live2scan at charter.net (Dennis Roberts) Date: Wed, 4 Jan 2006 18:18:04 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] bad choice Message-ID: <4lnroc$7ph3mf@mxip21a.cluster1.charter.net> I regret sending that xmas video post to this list, trivial post, should have just Googled until I found the answer myself, and putting a link to that site in the post was like an invitation to play in traffic. The video itself was ( probably} OK, the site itself was probably a minefield of viruses and spyware. Sorry about that. Dennis Roberts -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From thespike at satx.rr.com Thu Jan 5 00:17:41 2006 From: thespike at satx.rr.com (Damien Broderick) Date: Wed, 04 Jan 2006 18:17:41 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] Ian Plimer: Global warming a damp squib Message-ID: <6.2.1.2.0.20060104181653.01e08fd0@pop-server.satx.rr.com> 05jan06 http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/printpage/0,5942,17729019,00.html HEAT, bushfires. Just another Australian summer, some hotter, some wetter, some cooler, some drier. As per usual, the northern hemisphere freezes and the blame game is in overdrive. At the 2005 UN Climate Change Conference in Montreal, Greenpeace's Steven Guilbeault stated: "Global warming can mean colder, it can mean drier, it can mean wetter, that's what we're dealing with." It is that simple! If it's hot, it's global warming; if it's cold, it's global warming. Demonstrators in frigid temperatures in Montreal chanted: "It's hot in here! There's too much carbon in the atmosphere!" The same apocalyptic Guilbeault says: "Time is running out to deal with climate change. Ten years ago, we thought we had a lot of time, five years ago we thought we had a lot of time, but now science is telling us that we don't have a lot of time." Really. In 1992, Greenpeace's Henry Kendall gave us the Chicken Little quote, "Time is running out"; in 1994, The Irish Times tried to frighten the leprechauns with "Time running out for action on global warming, Greenpeace claims"; and in 1997 Chris Rose of Greenpeace maintained the religious mantra with "Time is running out for the climate". We've heard such failed catastrophist predictions before. The Club of Rome on resources, Paul Erlich on population, Y2K, and now Greenpeace on global warming. During the past 30 years, the US economy grew by 50 per cent, car numbers grew by 143 per cent, energy consumption grew by 45 per cent and air pollutants declined by 29 per cent, toxic emissions by 48.5 per cent, sulphur dioxide levels by 65.3 per cent and airborne lead by 97.3 per cent. Most European signatories to the Kyoto Protocol had greenhouse gas emissions increase since 2001, whereas in the US emissions fell by nearly 1per cent. Furthermore, carbon credits rewarded Russia, (east) Germany and Britain, which had technically and economically backward energy production in 1990. By the end of this century, the demographically doomed French, Italians and Spaniards may have too few environmentalists to fund Greenpeace's business. So what really does Greenpeace want? A habitable environment with no humans left to inhabit it? Destruction of the major economies for .07C change? Does it matter if sea level rises a few metres or global temperatures rise a few degrees? No. Sea level changes by up to 400m, atmospheric temperatures by about 20C, carbon dioxide can vary from 20 per cent to 0.03 per cent, and our dynamic planet just keeps evolving. Greenpeace, contrary to scientific data, implies a static planet. Even if the sea level rises by metres, it is probably cheaper to address this change than reconstruct the world's economies. For about 80 per cent of the time since its formation, Earth has been a warm, wet, greenhouse planet with no icecaps. When Earth had icecaps, the climate was far more variable, disease depopulated human settlements and extinction rates of other complex organisms were higher. Thriving of life and economic strength occurs during warm times. Could Greenpeace please explain why there was a pre-Industrial Revolution global warming from AD900 to 1300? Why was the sea level higher 6000 years ago than it is at present? Which part of the 120m sea-level rise over the past 15,000 years is human-induced? To attribute a multicomponent, variable natural process such as climate change to human-induced carbon emissions is pseudo-science. There is no debate about climate change, only dogma and misinformation. For example, is there a link between hurricanes Katrina and Rita and global warming? Two hurricanes hit the US Gulf Coast six weeks apart in 1915, mimicking Katrina and Rita. If global warming caused recent storms, there should have been more hurricanes in the Pacific and Indian oceans since 1995. Instead, there has been a slight decrease at a time when China and India have increased greenhouse gas emissions. The impact of hurricanes might seem more severe because of the blanket instantaneous news coverage and because more people now live in hurricane-prone areas, hence there is more property damage and loss of life. Only a strong economy can produce the well fed who have the luxury of espousing with religious fervour their uncosted, impractical, impoverishing policies. By such policies, Greenpeace continues to exacerbate grinding poverty in the Third World. The planet's best friend is human resourcefulness with a supportive, strong economy and reduced release of toxins. The greenhouse gases - nitrous oxide, carbon dioxide and methane - have been recycled for billions of years without the intervention of human politics. Ian Plimer is a professor of geology at the University of Adelaide and former head of the school of earth sciences at the University of Melbourne. From albrooks2006 at yahoo.com Thu Jan 5 01:51:57 2006 From: albrooks2006 at yahoo.com (Alan Brooks) Date: Wed, 4 Jan 2006 17:51:57 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Ian Plimer: Global warming a damp squib In-Reply-To: <6.2.1.2.0.20060104181653.01e08fd0@pop-server.satx.rr.com> Message-ID: <20060105015157.46432.qmail@web35713.mail.mud.yahoo.com> It's plausible the icecaps could be partially melted and the upshot might be a cooling trend, perhaps even an eventual ice age. 05jan06 http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/printpage/0,5942,17729019,00.html HEAT, bushfires. Just another Australian summer, some hotter, some wetter, some cooler, some drier. As per usual, the northern hemisphere freezes and the blame game is in overdrive. At the 2005 UN Climate Change Conference in Montreal, Greenpeace's Steven Guilbeault stated: "Global warming can mean colder, it can mean drier, it can mean wetter, that's what we're dealing with." It is that simple! If it's hot, it's global warming; if it's cold, it's global warming. Demonstrators in frigid temperatures in Montreal chanted: "It's hot in here! There's too much carbon in the atmosphere!" The same apocalyptic Guilbeault says: "Time is running out to deal with climate change. Ten years ago, we thought we had a lot of time, five years ago we thought we had a lot of time, but now science is telling us that we don't have a lot of time." Really. In 1992, Greenpeace's Henry Kendall gave us the Chicken Little quote, "Time is running out"; in 1994, The Irish Times tried to frighten the leprechauns with "Time running out for action on global warming, Greenpeace claims"; and in 1997 Chris Rose of Greenpeace maintained the religious mantra with "Time is running out for the climate". We've heard such failed catastrophist predictions before. The Club of Rome on resources, Paul Erlich on population, Y2K, and now Greenpeace on global warming. During the past 30 years, the US economy grew by 50 per cent, car numbers grew by 143 per cent, energy consumption grew by 45 per cent and air pollutants declined by 29 per cent, toxic emissions by 48.5 per cent, sulphur dioxide levels by 65.3 per cent and airborne lead by 97.3 per cent. Most European signatories to the Kyoto Protocol had greenhouse gas emissions increase since 2001, whereas in the US emissions fell by nearly 1per cent. Furthermore, carbon credits rewarded Russia, (east) Germany and Britain, which had technically and economically backward energy production in 1990. By the end of this century, the demographically doomed French, Italians and Spaniards may have too few environmentalists to fund Greenpeace's business. So what really does Greenpeace want? A habitable environment with no humans left to inhabit it? Destruction of the major economies for .07C change? Does it matter if sea level rises a few metres or global temperatures rise a few degrees? No. Sea level changes by up to 400m, atmospheric temperatures by about 20C, carbon dioxide can vary from 20 per cent to 0.03 per cent, and our dynamic planet just keeps evolving. Greenpeace, contrary to scientific data, implies a static planet. Even if the sea level rises by metres, it is probably cheaper to address this change than reconstruct the world's economies. For about 80 per cent of the time since its formation, Earth has been a warm, wet, greenhouse planet with no icecaps. When Earth had icecaps, the climate was far more variable, disease depopulated human settlements and extinction rates of other complex organisms were higher. Thriving of life and economic strength occurs during warm times. Could Greenpeace please explain why there was a pre-Industrial Revolution global warming from AD900 to 1300? Why was the sea level higher 6000 years ago than it is at present? Which part of the 120m sea-level rise over the past 15,000 years is human-induced? To attribute a multicomponent, variable natural process such as climate change to human-induced carbon emissions is pseudo-science. There is no debate about climate change, only dogma and misinformation. For example, is there a link between hurricanes Katrina and Rita and global warming? Two hurricanes hit the US Gulf Coast six weeks apart in 1915, mimicking Katrina and Rita. If global warming caused recent storms, there should have been more hurricanes in the Pacific and Indian oceans since 1995. Instead, there has been a slight decrease at a time when China and India have increased greenhouse gas emissions. The impact of hurricanes might seem more severe because of the blanket instantaneous news coverage and because more people now live in hurricane-prone areas, hence there is more property damage and loss of life. Only a strong economy can produce the well fed who have the luxury of espousing with religious fervour their uncosted, impractical, impoverishing policies. By such policies, Greenpeace continues to exacerbate grinding poverty in the Third World. The planet's best friend is human resourcefulness with a supportive, strong economy and reduced release of toxins. The greenhouse gases - nitrous oxide, carbon dioxide and methane - have been recycled for billions of years without the intervention of human politics. Ian Plimer is a professor of geology at the University of Adelaide and former head of the school of earth sciences at the University of Melbourne. _______________________________________________ extropy-chat mailing list extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat nattering nabob of positivism since 1976 --------------------------------- Yahoo! Photos Ring in the New Year with Photo Calendars. Add photos, events, holidays, whatever. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From nvitamore at austin.rr.com Thu Jan 5 01:55:04 2006 From: nvitamore at austin.rr.com (nvitamore at austin.rr.com) Date: Wed, 4 Jan 2006 20:55:04 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] New High lit film Message-ID: <380-220061451554187@M2W142.mail2web.com> From: Gina >I made a new movie for you all - it's a brainy one! >http://maxanimation.blogspot.com/2006/01/fireside-reading.html :-)! ++ Natasha -------------------------------------------------------------------- mail2web - Check your email from the web at http://mail2web.com/ . From dirk.bruere at gmail.com Thu Jan 5 02:33:02 2006 From: dirk.bruere at gmail.com (Dirk Bruere) Date: Thu, 5 Jan 2006 02:33:02 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] VR headset Message-ID: Finally... *http://tinyurl.com/9a9lz $999 Dirk * -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From neuronexmachina at gmail.com Thu Jan 5 03:43:41 2006 From: neuronexmachina at gmail.com (Neil H.) Date: Wed, 4 Jan 2006 19:43:41 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] XM Passport: miniature satellite radio tuner Message-ID: I thought this was an interesting bit of technology, and quite a leap over systems from just a few years ago. I wonder what sorts of new systems this might enable. Perhaps an XM USB key or an XM SD device? http://www.spaceref.com/news/viewpr.html?pid=18655 "The XM Passport measures only 1.3 inches wide, 1.65 inches long, 0.44inches thick, yet this miniature cartridge contains the entire XM radio tuner needed to deliver XM Satellite Radio to a wide array of XM Ready products, including home stereo and home theater systems, DVD players, mini/micro-shelf systems, car radios, clock radios, boomboxes, and the new Samsung NEXUS XMP3 digital audio player. The XM Passport is inserted into a docking station connected to the product, or it is inserted directly into a port offered by the manufacturer, and it will deliver XM Satellite Radio to the product. The XM Passport is approximately 40 times smaller than the original trunk mount XM radio tuners introduced just four years ago. "Consumers can purchase an XM Passport for $29.99 (MSRP) and home and car docking stations ($29.99 each) at retailers beginning in spring 2006. The XM Passport will come bundled with the upcoming Samsung NEXUS XM/MP3 digital audio players and connect to the home docking station (supplied) and car dock (optional). The user can carry the one XM Passport between home and car docks for live reception of XM's signal in both environments." -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From marc.geddes at gmail.com Thu Jan 5 03:46:38 2006 From: marc.geddes at gmail.com (Marc Geddes) Date: Thu, 5 Jan 2006 16:46:38 +1300 Subject: [extropy-chat] Re: Qualia Bet In-Reply-To: References: <7a5e56060512290020r601a235fy23781e70bcf651ea@mail.gmail.com> <7a5e56060512292014t353e743bob2987d3d2cdedd1d@mail.gmail.com> <7a5e56060512292129k59ecbab3k376345d726a64a2d@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <7a5e56060601041946i4089d9a8l79740c3f56db2557@mail.gmail.com> On 12/30/05, gts wrote: > > > > So tomatoes in the dark are grey, just as common-sense was informing us > all along. There are animals with more than three cones in their visual system (for instance some birds have four cones). These animals would see the tomato as a different shading from us. Who is seeing the *correct* color? Both kinds of visual system are evolutionary accidents. There appears to be no way to pick one particular perception as 'right' and the other as a 'mis-perception'. Speaking of mis-perceptions: what about the cases of hullucination? I know you did try to deal with this, but not successfully in my view. Imagine a room-full of mad-men and they're all hullucinating different colors O.K ;) So, where do all these different color perceptions exist? Since they can't be seeing the right color, the color perceptions must be in their heads. But in that case, why bother with all this talk of 'extended minds' and 'primary color properties'? How is the case of hullucinations of colors really any different from the case of non-hullucinations - in terms of *subjective experience* at least, there is no difference. I just pointed out that animals with four cones in their visual system see a different shade of color for the tomato. Is the animal's perception a hullucination? If so, why is our perception of color not a hullucination as well? Hopefully you can see that the talk of 'extended minds' and 'primary color properties' is entirely superfluous. > > For your theory to seem consistent, I think you should say that colors are > properties of colored objects in the same way that platonic circularity is > a property of circular objects. > > -gts Circular objects have the property known as a 'circular trope'. This is a *particular* concrete instance of circularity which is not in fact the same as the platonic universal 'circularity'. Further, the property of a 'green qualia trope' IS indeed possessed by objects in my theory - this property is in the brain of the observer, not the externally observed objects. -- "Till shade is gone, till water is gone, into the shadow with teeth bared, screaming defiance with the last breath, to spit in Sightblinder's eye on the last day" -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From transcend at extropica.com Thu Jan 5 05:03:19 2006 From: transcend at extropica.com (Brandon Reinhart) Date: Wed, 4 Jan 2006 23:03:19 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] Re: Qualia Bet In-Reply-To: <7a5e56060601041946i4089d9a8l79740c3f56db2557@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <200601050503.k0553Fe30395@tick.javien.com> Does adding an additional cone provide a wider range of color, or merely a different range of color? Would transhuman artists potentially pursue eye modification that added more cones to their eyes (plus appropriate brain mods to process the extra "out of band" data)? Brandon _____ From: extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org [mailto:extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Marc Geddes Sent: Wednesday, January 04, 2006 9:47 PM To: ExI chat list Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] Re: Qualia Bet On 12/30/05, gts wrote: So tomatoes in the dark are grey, just as common-sense was informing us all along. There are animals with more than three cones in their visual system (for instance some birds have four cones). These animals would see the tomato as a different shading from us. Who is seeing the *correct* color? Both kinds of visual system are evolutionary accidents. There appears to be no way to pick one particular perception as 'right' and the other as a 'mis-perception'. Speaking of mis-perceptions: what about the cases of hullucination? I know you did try to deal with this, but not successfully in my view. Imagine a room-full of mad-men and they're all hullucinating different colors O.K ;) So, where do all these different color perceptions exist? Since they can't be seeing the right color, the color perceptions must be in their heads. But in that case, why bother with all this talk of 'extended minds' and 'primary color properties'? How is the case of hullucinations of colors really any different from the case of non-hullucinations - in terms of *subjective experience* at least, there is no difference. I just pointed out that animals with four cones in their visual system see a different shade of color for the tomato. Is the animal's perception a hullucination? If so, why is our perception of color not a hullucination as well? Hopefully you can see that the talk of 'extended minds' and 'primary color properties' is entirely superfluous. For your theory to seem consistent, I think you should say that colors are properties of colored objects in the same way that platonic circularity is a property of circular objects. -gts Circular objects have the property known as a 'circular trope'. This is a *particular* concrete instance of circularity which is not in fact the same as the platonic universal 'circularity'. Further, the property of a 'green qualia trope' IS indeed possessed by objects in my theory - this property is in the brain of the observer, not the externally observed objects. -- "Till shade is gone, till water is gone, into the shadow with teeth bared, screaming defiance with the last breath, to spit in Sightblinder's eye on the last day" -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From gts_2000 at yahoo.com Thu Jan 5 05:13:22 2006 From: gts_2000 at yahoo.com (gts) Date: Thu, 05 Jan 2006 00:13:22 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Re: Qualia Bet In-Reply-To: <7a5e56060601041946i4089d9a8l79740c3f56db2557@mail.gmail.com> References: <7a5e56060512290020r601a235fy23781e70bcf651ea@mail.gmail.com> <7a5e56060512292014t353e743bob2987d3d2cdedd1d@mail.gmail.com> <7a5e56060512292129k59ecbab3k376345d726a64a2d@mail.gmail.com> <7a5e56060601041946i4089d9a8l79740c3f56db2557@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On Wed, 04 Jan 2006 22:46:38 -0500, Marc Geddes wrote: > There are animals with more than three cones in their visual system (for > instance some birds have four cones). These animals would see the > tomato as a different shading from us. Who is seeing the *correct* > color? It it is my job here to defend the idea of extended mind then I think the definition of "correct color", (i.e, objective color), is yours. It is you who implies colors are objective like platonic numbers. > Imagine a room-full of mad-men and they're all hallucinating > different colors O.K ;) So, where do all these different color > perceptions exist? In their brains, of course. The brain would be among the physical objects that the mind comprehends. You see a real object in your field of vision, not much different from the way the madman sees an object in his imagination. > Since they can't be seeing the right color, the color perceptions > must be in their heads. But in that case, why bother with all this talk > of 'extended minds' and 'primary color properties'? Because it might resolve the question of how qualia are perceived without the "from mind" or "from matter" paradox. > I just pointed out that animals with four cones in their > visual system see a different shade of color for the tomato. Is the > animal's perception a hullucination? No, I would say. > Hopefully you can see that the talk of > 'extended minds' and '' is entirely superfluous. I don't think so. It may be true that objects have many primary color qualities, and that the qualities perceived are dependent on the animal that perceives them. Or it may be true that the idea of primary color properties is altogether mistaken. -gts From rafal.smigrodzki at gmail.com Thu Jan 5 05:19:05 2006 From: rafal.smigrodzki at gmail.com (Rafal Smigrodzki) Date: Thu, 5 Jan 2006 00:19:05 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] All hail Will Wilkinson In-Reply-To: <43BC017D.3070103@pobox.com> References: <7641ddc60601040025n34b9aa96na0bc9eff1ef6bfea@mail.gmail.com> <43BBF397.6030303@pobox.com> <470a3c520601040820w1f0e65c6ic83f485431759a3b@mail.gmail.com> <43BC017D.3070103@pobox.com> Message-ID: <7641ddc60601042119x5135aa0q19314acbdd943413@mail.gmail.com> On 1/4/06, Eliezer S. Yudkowsky wrote: > > An arms race for tallness of genetically engineered babies (yeah, right) > may end up with negative side effects, such as poor health. > > Nothing in the imprecise real world is *exactly* zero-sum, and if it > were, an altruist wouldn't care about it one way or the other. Some > zero-sum games are actually negative-sum games because of wasted effort, > wasted time, wasted money, infliction of fear and emotional distress. > Other zero-sum games are positive-sum because people have fun playing > them and learn something. It's the "zero-sum" games that are actually > negative which Bostrom, and myself, would revile. ### No contest here, although in the imprecise popular usage a "zero-sum game" stands for something to be reviled. The usefulness of Will's article (and a few other posts you can find on his blog) is in pointing out that some of the canonical examples of "zero-sum games", such as status seeking, are actually positive-sum games. Nick, as far as I remember, believes that status seeking is a negative-sum game, and AFAIK was quite seriously asking to enact limitations in e.g. genetic engineering of height that you mentioned. Rafal From marc.geddes at gmail.com Thu Jan 5 05:56:57 2006 From: marc.geddes at gmail.com (Marc Geddes) Date: Thu, 5 Jan 2006 18:56:57 +1300 Subject: [extropy-chat] Re: Qualia Bet In-Reply-To: <200601050503.k0553Fe30395@tick.javien.com> References: <7a5e56060601041946i4089d9a8l79740c3f56db2557@mail.gmail.com> <200601050503.k0553Fe30395@tick.javien.com> Message-ID: <7a5e56060601042156h714b564fgce6c1b502eb199a6@mail.gmail.com> On 1/5/06, Brandon Reinhart wrote: > > Does adding an additional cone provide a wider range of color, or merely > a different range of color? Would transhuman artists potentially pursue eye > modification that added more cones to their eyes (plus appropriate brain > mods to process the extra "out of band" data)? > > > > Brandon > > > ------------------------------ > > According to Koch (see the footnotes on page 52-53 of 'The Quest for > Consciousness') there are already a few extraordinary woman naturally born > with 4 cones instead of the normal three. It's not that clear that the > visual cortex can handle the additional information property but it appears > that these tetrachromat woman can experience subtler color hues. > > > > > > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From sjatkins at mac.com Thu Jan 5 12:04:32 2006 From: sjatkins at mac.com (Samantha Atkins) Date: Thu, 5 Jan 2006 04:04:32 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Playing Go & demandingness in ethics In-Reply-To: <5844e22f0601041514s30b9040aje58418693eede4c7@mail.gmail.com> References: <5844e22f0601041053r71a67c53mca4d56507cdbe135@mail.gmail.com> <1B812FF1-D79C-4ECB-80B3-6D9872220C3F@mac.com> <5844e22f0601041514s30b9040aje58418693eede4c7@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On Jan 4, 2006, at 3:14 PM, Jeff Medina wrote: > Now there's nothing wrong with spawning a new thread of conversation > and disagreeing with the claim that people have to care about anyone > else -- disagreeing that there are any moral obligations at all, in > effect. That is not in the least what I said. Please backup and check your assumptions and interpretations much more carefully. I care about people a great deal without falling prey to your apparent assumptions about what follows from that. - samantha From rafal.smigrodzki at gmail.com Thu Jan 5 13:25:11 2006 From: rafal.smigrodzki at gmail.com (Rafal Smigrodzki) Date: Thu, 5 Jan 2006 08:25:11 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Playing Go & demandingness in ethics In-Reply-To: <8d71341e0601041529u576cacf6n26644e1eb081a71d@mail.gmail.com> References: <5844e22f0601041053r71a67c53mca4d56507cdbe135@mail.gmail.com> <8d71341e0601041529u576cacf6n26644e1eb081a71d@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <7641ddc60601050525y3f795423o7f96d3170db426c4@mail.gmail.com> On 1/4/06, Russell Wallace wrote: > > That's a good question. For myself, I don't subscribe to strict > utilitarianism, or the idea that strangers automatically have a right to > claim my time or other resources; ### I do subscribe to a form of strict consequentialism, *and* I do not think that strangers have any a priori right to my time or resources. The apparent contradiction is solved when you weigh your own utility in the assessment of consequences: If I feel disinclined to give to others, the disutility of taking from me outweighs any claims on my property (outside of Kaldor-Hicks criteria) that could stem from the inclinations of others. I cannot demand much of others, therefore, not much may be demanded of me (although I can be generous if asked nicely). Rafal From amara at amara.com Thu Jan 5 14:52:21 2006 From: amara at amara.com (Amara Graps) Date: Thu, 5 Jan 2006 15:52:21 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] Deaf hacker rewrites implant-firmware to enjoy music again Message-ID: A fantastic story via Cory Doctorow and Boing Boing ( http://www.boingboing.net) : Deaf hacker rewrites implant-firmware so he can enjoy music again http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/13.11/bolero_pr.html Cory Doctorow: A deaf hacker diligently tinkered with the firmware on his cochlear implant, trying to get it to faithfully render out Ravel's symphony, Bol?ro, eventually meeting with success. Michael Chorost was born with partial hearing, and at 15, he discovered that Bol?ro was audible to him, and it became a touchstone for him, a piece of music that he developed a deep emotional attachment to. In 2001, Chorost experienced the sudden, total loss of the remains of his hearing, and Bol?ro was lost to him, seemingly forever. In this Wired feature, Chorost chronicles the amazing journey he embarked upon, learning the science of acoustics, of music, and of signal processing, reprogramming the firmware in his implanted prosthetic with the help of experts around the world with various theories about the psycho-acoustic basis for music. The story is gripping, fascinating and informative -- a template for a tale that I believe will become more and more prevalent in times to come: a person who relies on computerized prosthetics not being satisfied with the features that were included with it out of the box, taking it upon herself to improve it, to extend it, using her own body and perceptions as a laboratory for experiments on human perception and performance. --------- "I spent two and a half days hooked up to the computer, listening to endless sequences of tones - none of it music - in a windowless cubicle. Which of two tones sounded lower? Which of two versions of "Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star" was more recognizable? Did this string of notes sound like a march or a waltz? It was exacting, high-concentration work - like taking an eye exam that lasted for two days. My responses produced reams of data that they would spend hours analyzing. Forty minutes before my cab back to the airport was due, we finished the last test and the postdoc fired up the programs he needed to play Bol?ro. Some of the lower pitches I'd heard in the previous two days had sounded rich and mellow, and I began thinking wistfully about those bassoons and oboes. I felt a rising sense of anticipation and hope. I waited while the postdoc tinkered with the computer. And waited. Then I noticed the frustrated look of a man trying to get Windows to behave. "I do this all the time," he said, half to himself. Windows Media Player wouldn't play the file. I suggested rebooting and sampling Bol?ro through a microphone. But the postdoc told me he couldn't do that in time for my plane. A later flight wasn't an option; I had to be back in the Bay Area. I was crushed. I walked out of the building with my shoulders slumped. Scientifically, the visit was a great success. But for me, it was a failure. On the flight home, I plugged myself into my laptop and listened sadly to Bol?ro with Hi-Res. It was like eating cardboard." --------- -- ******************************************************************** Amara Graps, PhD email: amara at amara.com Computational Physics vita: ftp://ftp.amara.com/pub/resume.txt Multiplex Answers URL: http://www.amara.com/ ******************************************************************** "After silence that which comes nearest to expressing the inexpressible is music." --Aldous Huxley From jef at jefallbright.net Thu Jan 5 14:54:28 2006 From: jef at jefallbright.net (Jef Allbright) Date: Thu, 5 Jan 2006 06:54:28 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Playing Go & demandingness in ethics In-Reply-To: <5844e22f0601041053r71a67c53mca4d56507cdbe135@mail.gmail.com> References: <5844e22f0601041053r71a67c53mca4d56507cdbe135@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <22360fa10601050654s7e81bdcfm9343f8fd5ee5fbfd@mail.gmail.com> On 1/4/06, Jeff Medina wrote: > Now given that many people interested in transhumanism express an > interest in the ethical arguments for various technological > developments, the permissibility of enhancement, the right to > morphological freedom (whether others consider what you're doing > 'enhancement' or not)... why are the demands of our alleged beliefs > nigh universally ignored? It is just a fact of human psychology that > we can't motivate ourselves to moral behavior if it's not right in our > face, or if it doesn't present immediate & painful consequences to > ignore it? It is an illusory problem because none of us really care > about ethics at all, and are only engaged in a social reciprocity > game? Or is there some other explanation? And should and can we do > something to change, acting more in accord with the demands of our > ethics? This question appears to be the same as what I asked myself when I was about eight years old, had just finished reading the Bible and was trying to reconcile the Christian words and teachings (in which I was immersed) with easily apparent Christian hypocrisy. And I eventually came to understand that people have only limited awareness of themselves and their relationship to others, and to compound the matter, they have only limited motivation to increase their awareness, or their awareness of their awareness, and so on. It became clear to me that while a completely objective, big-picture view of any particular domain will facilitate rational decision-making (and thus behavior) within that domain, in the real world there is always a larger possible domain within which, even under the best conditions, we must operate under conditions of incomplete information. Consistency is the ultimate measure of morality, but we can only approach and never reach that level of objectivity (and gladly so, because then our subjective values would be nil.) Later it became clear to me that even the Self, which is assumed to be evaluating and making these rational decisions, doesn't exist in the discrete and independent sense that is assumed by most people raised within western culture. So, objective terms, as systems operating within the physical universe, our behavior certainly is consistent, but in terms of subjective agents, operating with only an approximate internal model of reality, our behavior is quite naturally inconsistent. I hope the foregoing provides a useful response to your question about why people do not meet the demands of their professed ethics. To your second question, "should and can we do something to change, acting more in accord with the demands of our ethics?", I would point out that for the last four or so years I have been something of a broken record on this very subject. It is disturbing to see intelligent thinkers simply assume that giving to charity is a fundamental good, that all humans or all "sentient beings" possess equal moral value, or that "rights" are somehow inherent in the structure of our world. These values and the actions they imply, like all others, are "good" to the extent that they work to promote increasingly shared values into the future. Charity, for example, is seen as a fundamental good because altruism is woven deeply into the fabric of our culture and our genes -- because it tends to work, and our values have been thereby shaped. Given a different environment of evolutionary adaptation -- or an imminent environment of rapid technological change -- charity may be seen and evaluated differently. Certain values become increasingly shared because they work, meaning they persist and grow. These increasingly shared values are the basis of our morality, what we tend to agree is good. Certain actions are considered good, to the extent that they promote our increasingly shared values. What can we do? We can continue to build a framework of social decison-making that increases our awareness of our increasingly shared subjective values, and that increases our increasingly objective instrumental knowledge applied to the promotion of those values. [To head off just one likely and immediate objection: "increasingly shared values" does not imply that we become borg-like. On the contrary, increasingly shared values that work implies a great practical respect for freedom and diversity.] - Jef From sjatkins at mac.com Thu Jan 5 20:24:22 2006 From: sjatkins at mac.com (Samantha Atkins) Date: Thu, 5 Jan 2006 12:24:22 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Playing Go & demandingness in ethics In-Reply-To: <22360fa10601050654s7e81bdcfm9343f8fd5ee5fbfd@mail.gmail.com> References: <5844e22f0601041053r71a67c53mca4d56507cdbe135@mail.gmail.com> <22360fa10601050654s7e81bdcfm9343f8fd5ee5fbfd@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On Jan 5, 2006, at 6:54 AM, Jef Allbright wrote: > > This question appears to be the same as what I asked myself when I was > about eight years old, had just finished reading the Bible and was > trying to reconcile the Christian words and teachings (in which I was > immersed) with easily apparent Christian hypocrisy. > The teachings are full of contradictions, invalid assumptions and fairy tales. It is not possible or desirable to live fully in accordance with them. > And I eventually came to understand that people have only limited > awareness of themselves and their relationship to others, and to > compound the matter, they have only limited motivation to increase > their awareness, or their awareness of their awareness, and so on. Human beings have limited abilities and intellect. Only when we think of humans as some nearly infinite "soul" housed in flesh do we wonder why we don't do so much better. We did not evolve to do better in all ways that someone may claim or feel that we should or that someone thinks would be desirable. > > It became clear to me that while a completely objective, big-picture > view of any particular domain will facilitate rational decision-making > (and thus behavior) within that domain, in the real world there is > always a larger possible domain within which, even under the best > conditions, we must operate under conditions of incomplete > information. Complete objectivity and knowledge is a mystical fantasy. > Consistency is the ultimate measure of morality, but we > can only approach and never reach that level of objectivity (and > gladly so, because then our subjective values would be nil.) Who says that consistency is the ultimate measure of morality? Consistency within what context and acknowledged limitations? What sort of morality? I don't think 2000+ year old prescriptions drilled into us long before we could intellectually resist memetic plaques qualify as any sort of morality that rational people should be worrying themselves about. > > Later it became clear to me that even the Self, which is assumed to be > evaluating and making these rational decisions, doesn't exist in the > discrete and independent sense that is assumed by most people raised > within western culture. The capital s "Self" is a mystical fantasy. It doesn't exist. > > So, objective terms, as systems operating within the physical > universe, our behavior certainly is consistent, but in terms of > subjective agents, operating with only an approximate internal model > of reality, our behavior is quite naturally inconsistent. > Yes! You see it, at least in part. Our models are approximations with limits to their accuracy and correctness. We are creatures with limits to our thinking, modeling and understanding of ourselves and everything else. We are evolved creatures with many relatively difficult to address proclivities. It is amazing we have as much self-control over our behavior as we do. Can most of us do better than we do? Probably. But the means to do so are not so obvious as just deciding we should do X rather than Y. There is a bit more to it than that. > I hope the foregoing provides a useful response to your question about > why people do not meet the demands of their professed ethics. > > To your second question, "should and can we do something to change, > acting more in accord with the demands of our ethics?", I would point > out that for the last four or so years I have been something of a > broken record on this very subject. > > It is disturbing to see intelligent thinkers simply assume that giving > to charity is a fundamental good, that all humans or all "sentient > beings" possess equal moral value, or that "rights" are somehow > inherent in the structure of our world. > Hear. hear on most of that. I do think the concept of natural rights as defined as what is essential to the full use of the human mind, our main enabler of survival and advancement, has some validity. > These values and the actions they imply, like all others, are "good" > to the extent that they work to promote increasingly shared values > into the future. Why is it important that the values be shared? Particularly as some humans seriously augment it is very unlikely that most humans will even understand >human values in any real depth much less share them. > Charity, for example, is seen as a fundamental good > because altruism is woven deeply into the fabric of our culture and > our genes -- because it tends to work, and our values have been > thereby shaped. It is not a fundamental or unlimited good. It is an approximate good in limited circumstances and context. Much evil has been done in the name of "altruism". Sometimes it seems to me that much evil would be avoided if people weren't so keen to pull on the mantle of "saving" or "uplifting" all of humanity. Ask first whether what you are doing is a good and compelling thing that you would do for yourself and those who understand it. Ask if doing it for that limited group is compelling enough to get you to take action. If it is not then dressing it up as being for all of humanity will not improve it or even necessarily energize you. It will simply make it vastly more dangerous. It is much more difficult to remain honest when out to save the world. > Given a different environment of evolutionary > adaptation -- or an imminent environment of rapid technological change > -- charity may be seen and evaluated differently. Yep. > > Certain values become increasingly shared because they work, meaning > they persist and grow. These increasingly shared values are the basis > of our morality, what we tend to agree is good. > This seems to say that certain values persist and grow because they persist and grow. And that the ones that persist and grow we agree are good. But this is surely not a valid way to determine what is good. It is an average across humanity with its current limitations. > Certain actions are considered good, to the extent that they promote > our increasingly shared values. > > What can we do? We can continue to build a framework of social > decison-making that increases our awareness of our increasingly shared > subjective values, and that increases our increasingly objective > instrumental knowledge applied to the promotion of those values. > How about knowledge applied to the examination of those values as not necessarily benign or leading to our transhuman goals? - samantha From dirk.bruere at gmail.com Thu Jan 5 20:48:00 2006 From: dirk.bruere at gmail.com (Dirk Bruere) Date: Thu, 5 Jan 2006 20:48:00 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Playing Go & demandingness in ethics In-Reply-To: <22360fa10601050654s7e81bdcfm9343f8fd5ee5fbfd@mail.gmail.com> References: <5844e22f0601041053r71a67c53mca4d56507cdbe135@mail.gmail.com> <22360fa10601050654s7e81bdcfm9343f8fd5ee5fbfd@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On 1/5/06, Jef Allbright wrote: > > [To head off just one likely and immediate objection: "increasingly > shared values" does not imply that we become borg-like. On the > contrary, increasingly shared values that work implies a great > practical respect for freedom and diversity.] > > Just as long as that diversity isn't so diverse as to disagree with our shared values eh? Dirk -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jef at jefallbright.net Thu Jan 5 21:27:20 2006 From: jef at jefallbright.net (Jef Allbright) Date: Thu, 5 Jan 2006 13:27:20 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Playing Go & demandingness in ethics In-Reply-To: References: <5844e22f0601041053r71a67c53mca4d56507cdbe135@mail.gmail.com> <22360fa10601050654s7e81bdcfm9343f8fd5ee5fbfd@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <22360fa10601051327n53cac3b0l6c3b9b33f516939d@mail.gmail.com> On 1/5/06, Samantha Atkins wrote: > > On Jan 5, 2006, at 6:54 AM, Jef Allbright wrote: // section which seemed to be in general agreement > > Consistency is the ultimate measure of morality, but we > > can only approach and never reach that level of objectivity (and > > gladly so, because then our subjective values would be nil.) > > Who says that consistency is the ultimate measure of morality? Agents with poor internal models behave erratically. With increasing awareness comes increasing consistency, in the sense that actions increasingly corresponding to expected outcomes, evaluated in increasing detail. > Consistency within what context and acknowledged limitations? What > sort of morality? I don't think 2000+ year old prescriptions drilled > into us long before we could intellectually resist memetic plaques > qualify as any sort of morality that rational people should be > worrying themselves about. Of course I would not make the assertion you are arguing against here. // more general agreement > > > These values and the actions they imply, like all others, are "good" > > to the extent that they work to promote increasingly shared values > > into the future. > > Why is it important that the values be shared? Particularly as some > humans seriously augment it is very unlikely that most humans will > even understand >human values in any real depth much less share them. I think the confusion here is that you must be clear that there is no absolute right or wrong, because any such judgment must be relative to subjective values. "Morality" as popularly understood is incoherent except within an artificially narrow context. For a lone individual, morality does not even apply, but as more people agree that some action is "right", we begin to call that "moral" action. // more agreement > > Certain values become increasingly shared because they work, meaning > > they persist and grow. These increasingly shared values are the basis > > of our morality, what we tend to agree is good. > > > > This seems to say that certain values persist and grow because they > persist and grow. And that the ones that persist and grow we agree > are good. But this is surely not a valid way to determine what is > good. As discussed earlier, we can not know what is "good", but only that what works to promote our values must be considered good. But even that is from a limited subjective viewpoint. However, regardless of these limits, we can agree that what works to promote our values *over increasing scope*, within an inherently competitive environment, is better. It is an average across humanity with its current limitations. No, we're talking all along about increasing awareness, so this is not about averaging which would mean lost information. Our shared values are complex and overlapping in many dimensions, but we certainly do agree on many of them, because of our common evolutionary basis. As you point out above, there is an almost tautological flavor to this concept, and this is because we are objectively functioning organisms looking at ourselves through a subjective lens and trying to compose an objective description of what we see happening. > > Certain actions are considered good, to the extent that they promote > > our increasingly shared values. > > > > What can we do? We can continue to build a framework of social > > decison-making that increases our awareness of our increasingly shared > > subjective values, and that increases our increasingly objective > > instrumental knowledge applied to the promotion of those values. > > > > How about knowledge applied to the examination of those values as not > necessarily benign or leading to our transhuman goals? Your question is not completely clear to me, but I may be able to address it by saying that while scientific knowledge is morally neutral, each additional bit of understanding fills in more of our map of reality, tending to aid in the promotion of our values either by suggesting where to step, where not to step, or where to explore further. - Jef From thespike at satx.rr.com Fri Jan 6 01:25:55 2006 From: thespike at satx.rr.com (Damien Broderick) Date: Thu, 05 Jan 2006 19:25:55 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] Woman marries dolphin Message-ID: <6.2.1.2.0.20060105192432.01d6a3d0@pop-server.satx.rr.com> http://www.theage.com.au/articles/2006/01/01/1136050339590.html Jerusalem January 2, 2006 Sharon Tendler met Cindy 15 years ago. She said it was love at first sight. This week she finally took the plunge and proposed. The lucky "guy" plunged right back. In a modest ceremony at Dolphin Reef in the southern Israeli port of Eilat, Tendler, a 41-year-old British citizen, apparently became the world's first person to "marry" a dolphin. Dressed in a white dress, a veil and pink flowers in her hair, Tendler got down on one knee on the dock and gave Cindy a kiss. And a piece of herring. "It's not a perverted thing. I do love this dolphin. He's the love of my life," she said Saturday, upon her return to London. Tendler, who said she imports clothes and promotes rock bands in England, has visited Israel several times a year since first meeting the dolphin. When asked in the past if she had a boyfriend, she would always reply, "No. I'm going to end up with Cindy." On Wednesday, she made it official, sort of. While she acknowledged the "wedding" had no legal bearing she did say it reflected her deep feelings toward the bottlenosed, 35-year-old object of her affection. "It's not a bad thing. It just something that we did because I love him, but not in the way that you love a man. It's just a pure love that I have for this animal," she said. While she still kept open the option of "marrying human" at some stage, she said for now she was strictly a "one-dolphin woman". She's hardly the jealous type, though. "He will still play with all the other girls there," she said, of their prenuptial agreement. "I hope he has a lot of baby dolphins with the other dolphins. The more dolphins the better." - AP From gts_2000 at yahoo.com Fri Jan 6 01:48:33 2006 From: gts_2000 at yahoo.com (gts) Date: Thu, 05 Jan 2006 20:48:33 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Woman marries dolphin In-Reply-To: <6.2.1.2.0.20060105192432.01d6a3d0@pop-server.satx.rr.com> References: <6.2.1.2.0.20060105192432.01d6a3d0@pop-server.satx.rr.com> Message-ID: The object of my affection can change my complexion from white to rosy red http://deanmartinlyrics.com/tooma.htm -gts From albrooks2006 at yahoo.com Fri Jan 6 02:01:53 2006 From: albrooks2006 at yahoo.com (Alan Brooks) Date: Thu, 5 Jan 2006 18:01:53 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Woman marries dolphin In-Reply-To: <6.2.1.2.0.20060105192432.01d6a3d0@pop-server.satx.rr.com> Message-ID: <20060106020153.11628.qmail@web35707.mail.mud.yahoo.com> A woman in Ohio married a dog not long ago. nattering nabob of positivism since 1976 --------------------------------- Yahoo! Photos Ring in the New Year with Photo Calendars. Add photos, events, holidays, whatever. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From thespike at satx.rr.com Fri Jan 6 02:36:50 2006 From: thespike at satx.rr.com (Damien Broderick) Date: Thu, 05 Jan 2006 20:36:50 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] hmmmmmm Message-ID: <6.2.1.2.0.20060105203515.01ceb4b8@pop-server.satx.rr.com> http://news.scotsman.com/scitech.cfm?id=16902006 Welcome to Mars express: only a three hour trip IAN JOHNSTON SCIENCE CORRESPONDENT AN EXTRAORDINARY "hyperspace" engine that could make interstellar space travel a reality by flying into other dimensions is being investigated by the United States government. The hypothetical device, which has been outlined in principle but is based on a controversial theory about the fabric of the universe, could potentially allow a spacecraft to travel to Mars in three hours and journey to a star 11 light years away in just 80 days, according to a report in today's New Scientist magazine. The theoretical engine works by creating an intense magnetic field that, according to ideas first developed by the late scientist Burkhard Heim in the 1950s, would produce a gravitational field and result in thrust for a spacecraft. Also, if a large enough magnetic field was created, the craft would slip into a different dimension, where the speed of light is faster, allowing incredible speeds to be reached. Switching off the magnetic field would result in the engine reappearing in our current dimension. The US air force has expressed an interest in the idea [etc] wtf? From dirk.bruere at gmail.com Fri Jan 6 02:42:22 2006 From: dirk.bruere at gmail.com (Dirk Bruere) Date: Fri, 6 Jan 2006 02:42:22 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] hmmmmmm In-Reply-To: <6.2.1.2.0.20060105203515.01ceb4b8@pop-server.satx.rr.com> References: <6.2.1.2.0.20060105203515.01ceb4b8@pop-server.satx.rr.com> Message-ID: On 1/6/06, Damien Broderick wrote: > > http://news.scotsman.com/scitech.cfm?id=16902006 > > Welcome to Mars express: only a three hour trip > IAN JOHNSTON SCIENCE CORRESPONDENT > > AN EXTRAORDINARY "hyperspace" engine that could make interstellar space > travel a reality by flying into other dimensions is being investigated by > the United States government. > > The hypothetical device, which has been outlined in principle but is based > on a controversial theory about the fabric of the universe, could > potentially allow a spacecraft to travel to Mars in three hours and > journey > to a star 11 light years away in just 80 days, according to a report in > today's New Scientist magazine. > > The theoretical engine works by creating an intense magnetic field that, > according to ideas first developed by the late scientist Burkhard Heim in > the 1950s, would produce a gravitational field and result in thrust for a > spacecraft. > > Also, if a large enough magnetic field was created, the craft would slip > into a different dimension, where the speed of light is faster, allowing > incredible speeds to be reached. Switching off the magnetic field would > result in the engine reappearing in our current dimension. > > The US air force has expressed an interest in the idea > > [etc] > > wtf? If this is true and we could have had mass interplanetary travel, maybe even starships, 50yrs ago I am going to be sooooooo pissed off. More details here: http://www.americanantigravity.com/documents/AuerbachJSE.pdf The guy is wellknown amongst the AG community. Dirk -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From thespike at satx.rr.com Fri Jan 6 02:44:25 2006 From: thespike at satx.rr.com (Damien Broderick) Date: Thu, 05 Jan 2006 20:44:25 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] Heim ho hum Message-ID: <6.2.1.2.0.20060105204400.01cd1040@pop-server.satx.rr.com> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Burkhard_Heim/Archive1 From jrd1415 at yahoo.com Fri Jan 6 03:34:15 2006 From: jrd1415 at yahoo.com (Jeff Davis) Date: Thu, 5 Jan 2006 19:34:15 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] nano structures self-assembly method Message-ID: <20060106033415.90140.qmail@web60018.mail.yahoo.com> http://www.technologyreview.com/NanoTech/wtr_16118,318,p1.html Nano Building Made Easy A surprising array of nano structures can be formed by a new general self-assembly method. ***************************** If anyone has access to the original 'Nature' paper, could you send me an electronic (html or pdf via ie email) copy I'd like to take a look at it. Thanks. Best, Jeff Davis "Everything's hard till you know how to do it." Ray Charles __________________________________________ Yahoo! DSL ? Something to write home about. Just $16.99/mo. or less. dsl.yahoo.com From wingcat at pacbell.net Fri Jan 6 04:01:57 2006 From: wingcat at pacbell.net (Adrian Tymes) Date: Thu, 5 Jan 2006 20:01:57 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] nano structures self-assembly method In-Reply-To: <20060106033415.90140.qmail@web60018.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <20060106040157.11664.qmail@web81610.mail.mud.yahoo.com> --- Jeff Davis wrote: > http://www.technologyreview.com/NanoTech/wtr_16118,318,p1.html > > Nano Building Made Easy > > A surprising array of nano structures can be formed by > a new general self-assembly method. > > ***************************** > > If anyone has access to the original 'Nature' paper, > could you send me an electronic (html or pdf via ie > email) copy I'd like to take a look at it. ...strange. The TR article is dated 1/5, so by "the current" issue they presumably mean this week's, or at least last week's - but a quick scan of the two issues' tables of contents (via Nature's Web site) reveals nothing apparently relevant. Or perhaps I missed it. From thespike at satx.rr.com Fri Jan 6 06:04:01 2006 From: thespike at satx.rr.com (Damien Broderick) Date: Fri, 06 Jan 2006 00:04:01 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] Hawking the rapper Message-ID: <6.2.1.2.0.20060106000244.01d83920@pop-server.satx.rr.com> http://www.expressmedia.org.au/vw_back_issues.php?content_id=164 From marc.geddes at gmail.com Fri Jan 6 10:42:55 2006 From: marc.geddes at gmail.com (Marc Geddes) Date: Fri, 6 Jan 2006 23:42:55 +1300 Subject: [extropy-chat] All hail Will Wilkinson Message-ID: <7a5e56060601060242s4c97adc0h715055c1cd1a36ed@mail.gmail.com> There's already a contest going on here: First person to create an FAI proves that they're the best! ;) You know I used to think the people on the transhumanist lists were ultra-smart but gradually I came to realize that hey, you know, these guys aren't actually that good. There's a lot of one-dimensional ideologies being argued for (like Libertarianism or Socialism for instance) or bizarre intellectual blind-spots. I think rationality, imagination and empirical knowledge ultimately wins out over raw IQ. The only person on the lists that's really any good is Eliezer but even he is not *that* good: my impression that a REAL transhuman would still eat that Eliezer pussy for breakfast (intellectually) and as for everyone else, a real transhuman would find their arguments so laughable that it wouldn't even bother to respond ;) No one here but me spotted the three time dimensions (which believe me to a real transhuman will be the most friggin obvious thing in the world) nor did any one here but me spot 7-aspect monism (the 7 fundamental properties making up the deep structure of reality). Like I said, no offense, but you guys just ain't that good. Time for Eli and the rest to face REAL transhuman awareness (well, not really but pseudo transhuman-awareness at least). Let's see how he fares. This is gonna be funny. Wanna see me kick some super-genius arse? ;) Let the games commence: http://www.agiri.org/forum/index.php?showtopic=108 -- "Till shade is gone, till water is gone, into the shadow with teeth bared, screaming defiance with the last breath, to spit in Sightblinder's eye on the last day" -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From acy.stapp at gmail.com Fri Jan 6 15:46:32 2006 From: acy.stapp at gmail.com (Acy Stapp) Date: Fri, 6 Jan 2006 09:46:32 -0600 Subject: WARNING Re: [extropy-chat] awsome xmas video In-Reply-To: References: <4k176m$2didj8@mxip08a.cluster1.charter.net> Message-ID: I haven't checked this particular link out but the music is from Trans-Siberian Orchestra. On 1/3/06, Samantha Atkins wrote: > Dennis, > > I don't believe I have ever seen you here before so I would advise everyone > not to access this link if you are running Windows. It may be perfectly > safe but there are viruses now that infect IE on just visiting a site. Also > putfile.com is a site that anyone can load whatever they want to. The > content of this particularly link is only available to Windows players. > DANGER. > > If you are legit I would strongly suggest something more pertinent and meaty > for a [AFAIK] first post. > > - samantha > > > On Jan 3, 2006, at 4:08 PM, Dennis Roberts wrote: > > > > I know its trivial and really not pertinent to this list, but does anybody > know who does the piece of music in this video? > http://media.putfile.com/WizardsofWinter-SM > > > > Dennis Roberts -- Acy Stapp "When I'm working on a problem, I never think about beauty. I think only how to solve the problem. But when I have finished, if the solution is not beautiful, I know it is wrong." -- R. Buckminster Fuller (1895 - 1983) From nanogirl at halcyon.com Fri Jan 6 22:23:46 2006 From: nanogirl at halcyon.com (Gina Miller) Date: Fri, 6 Jan 2006 14:23:46 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] New High lit film References: <380-220061451554187@M2W142.mail2web.com> Message-ID: <00ab01c6130f$f019fcf0$0400a8c0@Nano> Thank you! ----- Original Message ----- From: nvitamore at austin.rr.com To: extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org Sent: Wednesday, January 04, 2006 5:55 PM Subject: RE: [extropy-chat] New High lit film From: Gina >I made a new movie for you all - it's a brainy one! >http://maxanimation.blogspot.com/2006/01/fireside-reading.html :-)! ++ Natasha -------------------------------------------------------------------- mail2web - Check your email from the web at http://mail2web.com/ . _______________________________________________ extropy-chat mailing list extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From sjatkins at mac.com Fri Jan 6 23:43:35 2006 From: sjatkins at mac.com (Samantha Atkins) Date: Fri, 6 Jan 2006 15:43:35 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] All hail Will Wilkinson In-Reply-To: <7a5e56060601060242s4c97adc0h715055c1cd1a36ed@mail.gmail.com> References: <7a5e56060601060242s4c97adc0h715055c1cd1a36ed@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <914389A0-B8E9-4B02-A1AF-5F190F6153B3@mac.com> Will some moderator please bounce this offensive clown? Thanks. -s On Jan 6, 2006, at 2:42 AM, Marc Geddes wrote: > There's already a contest going on here: First person to create an > FAI proves that they're the best! ;) > > You know I used to think the people on the transhumanist lists were > ultra-smart but gradually I came to realize that hey, you know, > these guys aren't actually that good. There's a lot of one- > dimensional ideologies being argued for (like Libertarianism or > Socialism for instance) or bizarre intellectual blind-spots. I > think rationality, imagination and empirical knowledge ultimately > wins out over raw IQ. The only person on the lists that's really > any good is Eliezer but even he is not *that* good: my impression > that a REAL transhuman would still eat that Eliezer pussy for > breakfast (intellectually) and as for everyone else, a real > transhuman would find their arguments so laughable that it wouldn't > even bother to respond ;) > > No one here but me spotted the three time dimensions (which believe > me to a real transhuman will be the most friggin obvious thing in > the world) nor did any one here but me spot 7-aspect monism (the 7 > fundamental properties making up the deep structure of reality). > Like I said, no offense, but you guys just ain't that good. > > Time for Eli and the rest to face REAL transhuman awareness (well, > not really but pseudo transhuman-awareness at least). Let's see > how he fares. This is gonna be funny. Wanna see me kick some > super-genius arse? ;) > > Let the games commence: > http://www.agiri.org/forum/index.php?showtopic=108 > > -- > "Till shade is gone, till water is gone, into the shadow with teeth > bared, screaming defiance with the last breath, to spit in > Sightblinder's eye on the last day" > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From thespike at satx.rr.com Fri Jan 6 23:46:07 2006 From: thespike at satx.rr.com (Damien Broderick) Date: Fri, 06 Jan 2006 17:46:07 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] Ice cores show warming 'natural' (or not) Message-ID: <6.2.1.2.0.20060106174413.01c6c7c0@pop-server.satx.rr.com> http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/printpage/0,5942,17752119,00.html Brendan O'Keefe 07jan06 HUNDREDS of thousands of years worth of climate records in ice cores show there is nothing unusual in a global warming trend over the past 25 years. Marine geophysicist Bob Carter, a professor at Queensland's James Cook University and leading climate change sceptic, said the effects of human activity would barely register in the long-term history of climate change. He told The Weekend Australian that ice cores from Antarctica "tell us clearly that in the context of the meteorological records of 100 years, it is not unusual to have a period of warming like the one we are in at the moment". Dr Carter disputed the theory that human activity was making a current - natural - warm period hotter: "Atmospheric CO2 is not a primary forcing agent for temperature change." He argues that "any cumulative human signal is so far undetectable at a global level and, if present, is buried deeply in the noise of natural variation". Fellow sceptic William Kininmonth, a former director of the Bureau of Meteorology's National Climate Centre, agreed. He wrote in a 2004 book, Climate Change: A Natural Hazard that there was "every reason to believe that the variabilities in global temperature and other climate characteristics experienced over the past century are part of the natural variability of the climate system and are not a consequence of recent anthropogenic activities". But other leading scientists, who blame human activity for climate change, say the "denialists" are a one-to-99 minority. Will Steffen, director of the Centre for Resource and Environmental Studies at the Australian National University, said: "There is no debate. The debate is over." The evidence that human activity had increased emissions of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere, adding to natural warming, was "overwhelming", he said. For scientist and University of Adelaide academic Tim Flannery there was also no argument: humans had turned up the heating and only humans could keep a lid on it. The argument that human activity did not contribute to global warming was "not a credible hypothesis to build policy on", he said. ? The Australian ================= oh. OK From albrooks2006 at yahoo.com Sat Jan 7 00:37:56 2006 From: albrooks2006 at yahoo.com (Alan Brooks) Date: Fri, 6 Jan 2006 16:37:56 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] New High lit film In-Reply-To: <00ab01c6130f$f019fcf0$0400a8c0@Nano> Message-ID: <20060107003756.50698.qmail@web35712.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Do any of you like time travel films? How about a film concerning the daughter of a Jewish time machine inventor who travels back to 1944 Germany to have an affair with Hitler. Should I quit my day job? nattering nabob of positivism since 1976 --------------------------------- Yahoo! Photos Ring in the New Year with Photo Calendars. Add photos, events, holidays, whatever. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From dirk.bruere at gmail.com Sat Jan 7 00:44:12 2006 From: dirk.bruere at gmail.com (Dirk Bruere) Date: Sat, 7 Jan 2006 00:44:12 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] All hail Will Wilkinson In-Reply-To: <7a5e56060601060242s4c97adc0h715055c1cd1a36ed@mail.gmail.com> References: <7a5e56060601060242s4c97adc0h715055c1cd1a36ed@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On 1/6/06, Marc Geddes wrote: > > There's already a contest going on here: First person to create an FAI > proves that they're the best! ;) > > You know I used to think the people on the transhumanist lists were > ultra-smart but gradually I came to realize that hey, you know, these guys > aren't actually that good. There's a lot of one-dimensional ideologies > being argued for (like Libertarianism or Socialism for instance) or bizarre > intellectual blind-spots. I think rationality, imagination and empirical > knowledge ultimately wins out over raw IQ. The only person on the lists > that's really any good is Eliezer but even he is not *that* good: my > impression that a REAL transhuman would still eat that Eliezer pussy for > breakfast (intellectually) and as for everyone else, a real transhuman > would find their arguments so laughable that it wouldn't even bother to > respond ;) > > No one here but me spotted the three time dimensions (which believe me to > a real transhuman will be the most friggin obvious thing in the world) nor > did any one here but me spot 7-aspect monism (the 7 fundamental properties > making up the deep structure of reality). Like I said, no offense, but you > guys just ain't that good. > > Time for Eli and the rest to face REAL transhuman awareness (well, not > really but pseudo transhuman-awareness at least). Let's see how he fares. > This is gonna be funny. Wanna see me kick some super-genius arse? ;) > > Let the games commence: > http://www.agiri.org/forum/index.php?showtopic=108 > > Theories are ten a penny. Show us some novel tech deriving from it, then we'll take notice. Dirk -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From spike66 at comcast.net Sat Jan 7 02:20:22 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Fri, 6 Jan 2006 18:20:22 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] All hail Will Wilkinson In-Reply-To: <914389A0-B8E9-4B02-A1AF-5F190F6153B3@mac.com> Message-ID: <200601070220.k072KTe10391@tick.javien.com> Did it within 5 minutes of the post. s _____ From: extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org [mailto:extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Samantha Atkins Sent: Friday, January 06, 2006 3:44 PM To: ExI chat list Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] All hail Will Wilkinson Will some moderator please bounce this offensive clown? Thanks. -s On Jan 6, 2006, at 2:42 AM, Marc Geddes wrote: There's already a contest going on here: First person to create an FAI proves that they're the best! ;) You know I used to think the people on the transhumanist lists were ultra-smart but gradually I came to realize that hey, you know, these guys aren't actually that good... -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From nanogirl at halcyon.com Sat Jan 7 02:30:49 2006 From: nanogirl at halcyon.com (Gina Miller) Date: Fri, 6 Jan 2006 18:30:49 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] New High lit film References: <20060107003756.50698.qmail@web35712.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <027f01c61332$70f5d750$0400a8c0@Nano> While time travel is one of my favorite subjects, Hitler is not. Gina ----- Original Message ----- From: Alan Brooks To: ExI chat list Sent: Friday, January 06, 2006 4:37 PM Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] New High lit film Do any of you like time travel films? How about a film concerning the daughter of a Jewish time machine inventor who travels back to 1944 Germany to have an affair with Hitler. Should I quit my day job? nattering nabob of positivism since 1976 ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Yahoo! Photos Ring in the New Year with Photo Calendars. Add photos, events, holidays, whatever. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ _______________________________________________ extropy-chat mailing list extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From spike66 at comcast.net Sat Jan 7 03:51:56 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Fri, 6 Jan 2006 19:51:56 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] personal display In-Reply-To: <6.2.1.2.0.20060106000244.01d83920@pop-server.satx.rr.com> Message-ID: <200601070352.k073q3e17666@tick.javien.com> Hey cool, I have been waiting for years for something like this to come along: http://www.creativemac.com/articles/viewarticle.jsp?id=36560 {8-] spike From jay.dugger at gmail.com Sat Jan 7 04:05:45 2006 From: jay.dugger at gmail.com (Jay Dugger) Date: Fri, 6 Jan 2006 22:05:45 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] personal display In-Reply-To: <200601070352.k073q3e17666@tick.javien.com> References: <6.2.1.2.0.20060106000244.01d83920@pop-server.satx.rr.com> <200601070352.k073q3e17666@tick.javien.com> Message-ID: <5366105b0601062005n6dcb534fh512654886ba558c7@mail.gmail.com> Friday, 6 January 2006 Thank you, Spike! This looks like a very interesting product, but you might want to read PC Gamer's recent review of the eMagin Z800 display. (They weren't too impressed.) When I talked to eMagin middle-of-last-year, they had a lead time of multiple weeks for orders too. Which is just as well--save up for those purchases instead of using credit. Now all you need is a DejaView CamWear to hang off the side, or you can use the wearable video camera Tony Hawk shills. (See a whole project rig at http://www.flickr.com/photos/pmtorrone/sets/1710794/) I would certainly like to hear of anyone from the list building a wearable. (Yes, I remember Anders Sandberg did that.) Anyone else? -- Jay Dugger Please donate to a charity you like. From dirk.bruere at gmail.com Sat Jan 7 04:15:53 2006 From: dirk.bruere at gmail.com (Dirk Bruere) Date: Sat, 7 Jan 2006 04:15:53 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] personal display In-Reply-To: <5366105b0601062005n6dcb534fh512654886ba558c7@mail.gmail.com> References: <6.2.1.2.0.20060106000244.01d83920@pop-server.satx.rr.com> <200601070352.k073q3e17666@tick.javien.com> <5366105b0601062005n6dcb534fh512654886ba558c7@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On 1/7/06, Jay Dugger wrote: > > Friday, 6 January 2006 > > Thank you, Spike! This looks like a very interesting product, but you > might want to read PC Gamer's recent review of the eMagin Z800 > display. (They weren't too impressed.) When I talked to eMagin > middle-of-last-year, they had a lead time of multiple weeks for orders > too. Which is just as well--save up for those purchases instead of > using credit. > > Now all you need is a DejaView CamWear to hang off the side, or you > can use the wearable video camera Tony Hawk shills. (See a whole > project rig at http://www.flickr.com/photos/pmtorrone/sets/1710794/) > > I would certainly like to hear of anyone from the list building a > wearable. (Yes, I remember Anders Sandberg did that.) Anyone else? > > A better solution for those who have the patience, space and money would be to buy two SVGA projectors and polarise the outputs. Then watch the screen with polaroid glasses for a full 3D effect with close to 180 deg field of view. Dirk -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From fortean1 at mindspring.com Sat Jan 7 04:26:04 2006 From: fortean1 at mindspring.com (Terry W. Colvin) Date: Fri, 06 Jan 2006 21:26:04 -0700 Subject: [extropy-chat] Keeping current on government secrecy Message-ID: <43BF42DC.5090402@mindspring.com> [Extensive if not comprehensive, a wealth of information, overload potential here... -Terry] KEEPING CURRENT ON GOVERNMENT SECRECY A sizable inventory of organizations, web sites, and publications concerned in some way with government secrecy was presented in a recent survey. "In the interest of sharing information, here is a list of Web sites, blogs, listservs, and newsletters that could help clients needing access to government documents but who might experience difficulty locating that information. The list is arranged by government watchdog sites, sites that provide access to government documents, sites that document government secrecy, and advocacy groups that report on FOIA news." See "Shhh!!: Keeping Current on Government Secrecy" by Laura Gordon-Murnane, Searcher: The Magazine for Database Professionals, January 2006: http://www.infotoday.com/searcher/jan06/Gordon-Murnane.shtml -- "Only a zit on the wart on the heinie of progress." Copyright 1992, Frank Rice Terry W. Colvin, Sierra Vista, Arizona (USA) < fortean1 at mindspring.com > Alternate: < fortean1 at msn.com > Home Page: < http://www.geocities.com/Area51/Stargate/8958/index.html > Sites: * Fortean Times * Mystic's Haven * TLCB * U.S. Message Text Formatting (USMTF) Program ------------ Member: Thailand-Laos-Cambodia Brotherhood (TLCB) Mailing List TLCB Web Site: < http://www.tlc-brotherhood.org > [Southeast Asia/Secret War in Laos veterans, Allies, CIA/NSA, and "steenkeen" contractors are welcome.] From dirk.bruere at gmail.com Sat Jan 7 04:57:39 2006 From: dirk.bruere at gmail.com (Dirk Bruere) Date: Sat, 7 Jan 2006 04:57:39 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Flying Saucers... Message-ID: Followup on the New Scientist article on a possible hyperdrive. http://info.uibk.ac.at/c/cb/cb26/heim/theorie_raumfahrt/hqtforspacepropphysicsaip2005.pdf Sounds surprisingly like the classic description of a UFO? Dirk -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From spike66 at comcast.net Sat Jan 7 06:54:09 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Fri, 6 Jan 2006 22:54:09 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Ice cores show warming 'natural' (or not) In-Reply-To: <6.2.1.2.0.20060106174413.01c6c7c0@pop-server.satx.rr.com> Message-ID: <200601070654.k076sBe32626@tick.javien.com> Damien has posted two interesting articles. This showed up today in the MSM claiming that the warming is happening faster at the poles than in the tropics. This just doesn't make sense. Good news indeed if true, but I don't see how it could be. spike http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,180896,00.html 2005 Ties for 2nd Warmest Year Ever, But Cause Still Uncertain Friday, January 06, 2006 By Robert Roy Britt A new study finds last year tied for the second-warmest year since reliable records have been kept starting in the late 1800s. The global average temperature in 2005 was 0.54 degrees Fahrenheit (0.3 Celsius) warmer than the long-term average, tying a mark set in 2002. But a puzzling general pattern, seen the past three decades, persisted: The most significant warming occurred in the Arctic, where the ice cap is shrinking at an alarming pace. Seven times faster Since November 1978, the Arctic atmosphere has warmed seven times faster than the average warming trend over the southern two-thirds of the globe, based on data from NOAA satellites. "It just doesn't look like global warming is very global," said John Christy, director of the Earth System Science Center at the University of Alabama in Huntsville. The warmest five years since the 1890s, when reliable record-keeping began: 1. 1998 2. 2005 2. 2002 (tie) 4. 2003 5. 2004 Scientists agree the planet is warming. Ground in the Northern Hemisphere that's been frozen since the last Ice Age is melting and collapsing. But they are still debating exactly how much and to what extent humans are contributing by burning fossil fuels that create greenhouse gases. Lack of understanding In a report last May, researchers said they know very little about how Earth absorbs and reflects sunlight, crucial factors that control climate. Other studies have indicated that increased output from the Sun is responsible for more of global warming than was previously realized. "Obviously some part of the warming we've observed in the atmosphere over the past 27 years is due to enhanced greenhouse gases. Simple physics tells you that," Christy said. "But even if you acknowledge the effects of greenhouse gases, when you look at this pattern of warming, you have to say there must also be something else at work here." Nobody's sure what that might be. "The carbon dioxide from fossil fuels is distributed pretty evenly around the globe and not concentrated in the Arctic, so it doesn't look like we can blame greenhouse gases for the overwhelming bulk of the Northern Hemisphere warming over the past 27 years," Christy said. "The most likely suspect for that is a natural climate change or cycle that we didn't expect or just don't understand." Opposite of expectations Over the past 27 years, since the first temperature-sensing satellite was launched, the overall global temperature has risen 0.63 degrees Fahrenheit, while the hike in the Arctic has been 2.1 degrees. "The computer models consistently predict that global warming due to increasing greenhouse gases should show up as strong warming in the tropics," Christy said. Yet the tropical atmosphere has warmed by only about 0.3 degrees Fahrenheit in 27 years. A study last year examined natural climate change going back more than 1,000 years. How do the recent changes stack up? "It would be fairly rare to have this much warming all from natural causes, but it has happened [in the past]," Christy said. "What we've seen isn't outside the realm of natural climate change." Copyright C 2005 Imaginova Corp. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. From anyservice at cris.crimea.ua Sat Jan 7 07:25:37 2006 From: anyservice at cris.crimea.ua (Gennady Ra) Date: Sat, 07 Jan 2006 10:25:37 +0300 Subject: [extropy-chat] baloney in the memetic superstructure In-Reply-To: <20051204101640.GZ2249@leitl.org> References: <200512040348.jB43mCe22618@tick.javien.com> <20051204101640.GZ2249@leitl.org> Message-ID: <6.2.1.2.2.20060104201825.03c81240@pop.cris.net> At 11:16 04.12.05 +0100, you, Eugen Leitl, wrote: >>substitute that the prole used and managed to poison >>herself. Perhaps much of what is sold as LSD may be >>something else, such as strychnine. Rat poison is cheap >LSD is sold either as blotter, microdots or as liquid. >There's not enough volume in a microdot or a blotter for >a strychnine dosage to have any detectable physiological >effects. Somewhat dilatory reaction to the month old discussion: See my old post to the MAPS-Forum, Strychnine: a poison or a useful tool for psychonauts? http://www.maps.org/pipermail/maps_forum/1999-May/001752.html Best! Gennady Simferopol Crimea Ukraine From russell.wallace at gmail.com Sat Jan 7 10:39:48 2006 From: russell.wallace at gmail.com (Russell Wallace) Date: Sat, 7 Jan 2006 10:39:48 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] personal display In-Reply-To: References: <6.2.1.2.0.20060106000244.01d83920@pop-server.satx.rr.com> <200601070352.k073q3e17666@tick.javien.com> <5366105b0601062005n6dcb534fh512654886ba558c7@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <8d71341e0601070239u464e48e2qdaab0fe515bb772@mail.gmail.com> On 1/7/06, Dirk Bruere wrote: > > A better solution for those who have the patience, space and money would > be to buy two SVGA projectors and polarise the outputs. Then watch the > screen with polaroid glasses for a full 3D effect with close to 180 deg > field of view. I've been to movies with polaroid-glass 3D, and they never quite work; you always get a headache trying to keep both eyes locked on the scene; it was that way 15-20 years ago, is still that way now. Does anyone know why that happens, and whether it's intrinsic, or something that could in principle be fixed but will be unaffordable for the near future, or something that will likely be fixed with foreseeable progress? - Russell -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From alfio.puglisi at gmail.com Sat Jan 7 10:57:00 2006 From: alfio.puglisi at gmail.com (Alfio Puglisi) Date: Sat, 7 Jan 2006 11:57:00 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] Ice cores show warming 'natural' (or not) In-Reply-To: <200601070654.k076sBe32626@tick.javien.com> References: <6.2.1.2.0.20060106174413.01c6c7c0@pop-server.satx.rr.com> <200601070654.k076sBe32626@tick.javien.com> Message-ID: <4902d9990601070257p7ce9cad4l439a9f04d09aebae@mail.gmail.com> On 1/7/06, spike wrote: > Damien has posted two interesting articles. This showed > up today in the MSM claiming that the warming is happening > faster at the poles than in the tropics. This just doesn't > make sense. Good news indeed if true, but I don't see > how it could be. spike It has been generally accepted for quite some time that the warming is faster at the poles with respect to the rest of the planet. The reason seems difficult to find. Alfio From pharos at gmail.com Sat Jan 7 11:33:07 2006 From: pharos at gmail.com (BillK) Date: Sat, 7 Jan 2006 11:33:07 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Keeping current on government secrecy In-Reply-To: <43BF42DC.5090402@mindspring.com> References: <43BF42DC.5090402@mindspring.com> Message-ID: On 1/7/06, Terry W. Colvin wrote: > [Extensive if not comprehensive, a wealth of information, overload > potential here... -Terry] > > > KEEPING CURRENT ON GOVERNMENT SECRECY > > "In the interest of sharing information, here is a list of Web > sites, blogs, listservs, and newsletters that could help clients > needing access to government documents but who might experience > difficulty locating that information. The list is arranged by > government watchdog sites, sites that provide access to > government documents, sites that document government secrecy, > and advocacy groups that report on FOIA news." > > See "Shhh!!: Keeping Current on Government Secrecy" by Laura > Gordon-Murnane, Searcher: The Magazine for Database > Professionals, January 2006: > > http://www.infotoday.com/searcher/jan06/Gordon-Murnane.shtml > This is a good list of sites containing much stuff obtained under the FOIA. You can build a search query which will search through the list of sites provided in this article (plus others you might know about). Go to and give it the list of sites you want to search. Remember to save your list of sites so you don't have to key them in every time. :) BillK From pharos at gmail.com Sat Jan 7 11:33:07 2006 From: pharos at gmail.com (BillK) Date: Sat, 7 Jan 2006 11:33:07 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Keeping current on government secrecy In-Reply-To: <43BF42DC.5090402@mindspring.com> References: <43BF42DC.5090402@mindspring.com> Message-ID: On 1/7/06, Terry W. Colvin wrote: > [Extensive if not comprehensive, a wealth of information, overload > potential here... -Terry] > > > KEEPING CURRENT ON GOVERNMENT SECRECY > > "In the interest of sharing information, here is a list of Web > sites, blogs, listservs, and newsletters that could help clients > needing access to government documents but who might experience > difficulty locating that information. The list is arranged by > government watchdog sites, sites that provide access to > government documents, sites that document government secrecy, > and advocacy groups that report on FOIA news." > > See "Shhh!!: Keeping Current on Government Secrecy" by Laura > Gordon-Murnane, Searcher: The Magazine for Database > Professionals, January 2006: > > http://www.infotoday.com/searcher/jan06/Gordon-Murnane.shtml > This is a good list of sites containing much stuff obtained under the FOIA. You can build a search query which will search through the list of sites provided in this article (plus others you might know about). Go to and give it the list of sites you want to search. Remember to save your list of sites so you don't have to key them in every time. :) BillK From sjatkins at mac.com Sat Jan 7 12:33:57 2006 From: sjatkins at mac.com (Samantha Atkins) Date: Sat, 7 Jan 2006 04:33:57 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Ice cores show warming 'natural' (or not) In-Reply-To: <200601070654.k076sBe32626@tick.javien.com> References: <200601070654.k076sBe32626@tick.javien.com> Message-ID: <7FB2AFCA-C8FD-47FD-9AAD-101C3A73854B@mac.com> Warming at the north Pole in particular is very bad news. The thermohaline cycle is something we do not want to slow down and certainly not stop. Sufficient freshwater from melting polar ice is one way it could happen. I am not sure if this works but I could imagine that the distribution of CO2 and other greenhouse implicated gases tends to eventually get concentrated at the poles. This or some other explanation could perhaps be dredged up from old theories on why the ozone hole was a polar phenomenon. It also may have something to do with a feedback cycle due to melting ice causing less solar radiation to be reflect back into space and more heating of the newly exposed water. - samantha On Jan 6, 2006, at 10:54 PM, spike wrote: > Damien has posted two interesting articles. This showed > up today in the MSM claiming that the warming is happening > faster at the poles than in the tropics. This just doesn't > make sense. Good news indeed if true, but I don't see > how it could be. spike > > > http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,180896,00.html > > > 2005 Ties for 2nd Warmest Year Ever, But Cause Still Uncertain > Friday, January 06, 2006 > By Robert Roy Britt > > > A new study finds last year tied for the second-warmest year since > reliable > records have been kept starting in the late 1800s. > > The global average temperature in 2005 was 0.54 degrees Fahrenheit > (0.3 > Celsius) warmer than the long-term average, tying a mark set in 2002. > > But a puzzling general pattern, seen the past three decades, > persisted: The > most significant warming occurred in the Arctic, where the ice cap is > shrinking at an alarming pace. > > Seven times faster > > Since November 1978, the Arctic atmosphere has warmed seven times > faster > than the average warming trend over the southern two-thirds of the > globe, > based on data from NOAA satellites. > > "It just doesn't look like global warming is very global," said John > Christy, director of the Earth System Science Center at the > University of > Alabama in Huntsville. > > The warmest five years since the 1890s, when reliable record- > keeping began: > > > 1. 1998 > > 2. 2005 > > 2. 2002 (tie) > > 4. 2003 > > 5. 2004 > > Scientists agree the planet is warming. Ground in the Northern > Hemisphere > that's been frozen since the last Ice Age is melting and collapsing. > > But they are still debating exactly how much and to what extent > humans are > contributing by burning fossil fuels that create greenhouse gases. > > Lack of understanding > > In a report last May, researchers said they know very little about > how Earth > absorbs and reflects sunlight, crucial factors that control > climate. Other > studies have indicated that increased output from the Sun is > responsible for > more of global warming than was previously realized. > > "Obviously some part of the warming we've observed in the > atmosphere over > the past 27 years is due to enhanced greenhouse gases. Simple > physics tells > you that," Christy said. "But even if you acknowledge the effects of > greenhouse gases, when you look at this pattern of warming, you > have to say > there must also be something else at work here." > > Nobody's sure what that might be. > > "The carbon dioxide from fossil fuels is distributed pretty evenly > around > the globe and not concentrated in the Arctic, so it doesn't look > like we can > blame greenhouse gases for the overwhelming bulk of the Northern > Hemisphere > warming over the past 27 years," Christy said. "The most likely > suspect for > that is a natural climate change or cycle that we didn't expect or > just > don't understand." > > Opposite of expectations > > Over the past 27 years, since the first temperature-sensing > satellite was > launched, the overall global temperature has risen 0.63 degrees > Fahrenheit, > while the hike in the Arctic has been 2.1 degrees. > > "The computer models consistently predict that global warming due to > increasing greenhouse gases should show up as strong warming in the > tropics," Christy said. > > Yet the tropical atmosphere has warmed by only about 0.3 degrees > Fahrenheit > in 27 years. > > A study last year examined natural climate change going back more > than 1,000 > years. How do the recent changes stack up? > > "It would be fairly rare to have this much warming all from natural > causes, > but it has happened [in the past]," Christy said. "What we've seen > isn't > outside the realm of natural climate change." > > Copyright C 2005 Imaginova Corp. All Rights Reserved. This material > may not > be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. > > > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat From HerbM at learnquick.com Sat Jan 7 16:03:10 2006 From: HerbM at learnquick.com (Herb Martin) Date: Sat, 7 Jan 2006 10:03:10 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] personal display In-Reply-To: <8d71341e0601070239u464e48e2qdaab0fe515bb772@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: Russell Wallace wrote>> >>I've been to movies with polaroid-glass 3D, and they never quite work; you always get a headache trying to keep both eyes locked on the scene; it was that way 15-20 years ago, is still that way now. Does anyone know why that happens, and whether it's intrinsic, or something that could in principle be fixed but will be unaffordable for the near future, or something that will likely be fixed with foreseeable progress?<< Two reasons that I know of (there may be more): 1) You must keep your head essentially level or it changes the relationship between your two eyes. Normally we unconsciously shift our head, tilting it slightly, turning a bit left or right. 2) Reduction in light (this may have changed since I haven't seen one lately due to the various effects) since the polarization reduces light to each eye and generally the projectors have do NOT have increased power/light to compensate. Shows tend to be "dark". Glasses (or something similar) for the projectors are the likely best path to improvement: beam the two signals directly onto the retina. This has been possible (safely) for 5 years or more but the price, size(comfort), and resolution/'screen' size. (That is, they were stuck at VGA and below for quite a while, but in principle this can go to much higher resolution with very small advances in the technology.) -- Herb Martin _____ From: extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org [mailto:extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Russell Wallace Sent: Saturday, January 07, 2006 4:40 AM To: ExI chat list Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] personal display On 1/7/06, Dirk Bruere wrote: A better solution for those who have the patience, space and money would be to buy two SVGA projectors and polarise the outputs. Then watch the screen with polaroid glasses for a full 3D effect with close to 180 deg field of view. I've been to movies with polaroid-glass 3D, and they never quite work; you always get a headache trying to keep both eyes locked on the scene; it was that way 15-20 years ago, is still that way now. Does anyone know why that happens, and whether it's intrinsic, or something that could in principle be fixed but will be unaffordable for the near future, or something that will likely be fixed with foreseeable progress? - Russell -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From spike66 at comcast.net Sat Jan 7 16:18:55 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Sat, 7 Jan 2006 08:18:55 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Ice cores show warming 'natural' (or not) In-Reply-To: <4902d9990601070257p7ce9cad4l439a9f04d09aebae@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <200601071618.k07GIue18370@tick.javien.com> > It has been generally accepted for quite some time that the warming is > faster at the poles with respect to the rest of the planet. The reason > seems difficult to find. > > Alfio So that kind of global warming is a good thing, right? spike From dirk.bruere at gmail.com Sat Jan 7 16:56:30 2006 From: dirk.bruere at gmail.com (Dirk Bruere) Date: Sat, 7 Jan 2006 16:56:30 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] personal display In-Reply-To: <8d71341e0601070239u464e48e2qdaab0fe515bb772@mail.gmail.com> References: <6.2.1.2.0.20060106000244.01d83920@pop-server.satx.rr.com> <200601070352.k073q3e17666@tick.javien.com> <5366105b0601062005n6dcb534fh512654886ba558c7@mail.gmail.com> <8d71341e0601070239u464e48e2qdaab0fe515bb772@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On 1/7/06, Russell Wallace wrote: > > On 1/7/06, Dirk Bruere wrote: > > > > A better solution for those who have the patience, space and money would > > be to buy two SVGA projectors and polarise the outputs. Then watch the > > screen with polaroid glasses for a full 3D effect with close to 180 deg > > field of view. > > > I've been to movies with polaroid-glass 3D, and they never quite work; you > always get a headache trying to keep both eyes locked on the scene; it was > that way 15-20 years ago, is still that way now. Does anyone know why that > happens, and whether it's intrinsic, or something that could in principle be > fixed but will be unaffordable for the near future, or something that will > likely be fixed with foreseeable progress? > > There are head tilt problems. However, one major problem tends to be non-optimal stereo image generation eg camera and projector spacing and focal points. Dirk -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From alfio.puglisi at gmail.com Sat Jan 7 17:07:25 2006 From: alfio.puglisi at gmail.com (Alfio Puglisi) Date: Sat, 7 Jan 2006 18:07:25 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] Ice cores show warming 'natural' (or not) In-Reply-To: <200601071618.k07GIue18370@tick.javien.com> References: <4902d9990601070257p7ce9cad4l439a9f04d09aebae@mail.gmail.com> <200601071618.k07GIue18370@tick.javien.com> Message-ID: <4902d9990601070907o3878d2bdkb6559c1479cfad92@mail.gmail.com> On 1/7/06, spike wrote: > > It has been generally accepted for quite some time that the warming is > > faster at the poles with respect to the rest of the planet. The reason > > seems difficult to find. > > > > Alfio > > > So that kind of global warming is a good thing, right? spike Who knows? If you want to avoid sea rise, Antarctica is a bad place to warm (tropical warming wouldn't melt much ice...), but apart from that and a few more big icebergs there shouldn't be many other consequences. Warming up the Arctic doesn't raise sea levels, but raises concerns about the increase in fresh water in the North Atlantic and the consequences on the Gulf Stream. People living in Canada, North Europe and Siberia might enjoy the milder climate and be able to grow more food, but the ones living on the permafrost will be pissed when it melts and everything turns to mud. If the theories about the Gulf Stream shutting down are right, that's a major disaster. It's unclear if it takes 10 or 1000 years, or if it happens at all. Alfio From aiguy at comcast.net Sat Jan 7 18:05:52 2006 From: aiguy at comcast.net (Gary Miller) Date: Sat, 7 Jan 2006 13:05:52 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Ice cores show warming 'natural' (or not) In-Reply-To: <4902d9990601070257p7ce9cad4l439a9f04d09aebae@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <000001c613b4$fff51290$74550318@ZANDRA2> Isn't is possible that the increased carbon dioxide in the world has increased the growth of ocean phytoplankton and other land plants which in turn use the carbon dioxide replacing it with oxygen. It would also make sense that this same level of compensation would not occur at the poles due to the large percentatage of ice coverage and harsher climate. I did some Googling and found a 2001 project by Greensea Venture planned to even further accelerate the growth of phytoplankton by fertilizing stretches of ocean with iron. It sounded like they getting DOE funding and planned on seeing project results sometime in 2003. I never found the results of the research although it sounded like they were getting some resistence from envionmental opponents worried that the effects could have unwanted effects on the environment. http://archives.cnn.com/2001/NATURE/01/23/paradise.dump/ -----Original Message----- From: extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org [mailto:extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Alfio Puglisi Sent: Saturday, January 07, 2006 5:57 AM To: ExI chat list Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] Ice cores show warming 'natural' (or not) On 1/7/06, spike wrote: > Damien has posted two interesting articles. This showed up today in > the MSM claiming that the warming is happening faster at the poles > than in the tropics. This just doesn't make sense. Good news indeed > if true, but I don't see how it could be. spike It has been generally accepted for quite some time that the warming is faster at the poles with respect to the rest of the planet. The reason seems difficult to find. Alfio _______________________________________________ extropy-chat mailing list extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat From natasha at natasha.cc Sat Jan 7 20:41:19 2006 From: natasha at natasha.cc (Natasha Vita-More) Date: Sat, 07 Jan 2006 14:41:19 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] Natasha in Le Magazine de L'Optimum Message-ID: <6.2.1.2.2.20060107143621.02fec8b8@pop-server.austin.rr.com> Recently received high-gloss cultural magazine L'Optimum with Hilary Swank on the cover. A full-page spread features me as "Bionic woman" on page 56. (Actually I'm not very bionic at all! I think it must be referring to my views on the future body design -:)) Natasha Natasha Vita-More Cultural Strategist - Designer Future Studies, University of Houston President, Extropy Institute Member, Association of Professional Futurists Founder, Transhumanist Arts & Culture Honorary Vice-Chair, World Transhumanist Association Senior Associate, Foresight Institute Advisor, Alcor Life Extension Foundation If you draw a circle in the sand and study only what's inside the circle, then that is a closed-system perspective. If you study what is inside the circle and everything outside the circle, then that is an open system perspective. Buckminster Fuller -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From natasha at natasha.cc Sat Jan 7 21:05:58 2006 From: natasha at natasha.cc (Natasha Vita-More) Date: Sat, 07 Jan 2006 15:05:58 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] Extropy Institute - Membership Message-ID: <6.2.1.2.2.20060107150033.0da95e80@pop-server.austin.rr.com> Greetings! Many of you renewed your membership during 2005, and so far in 2006 we have received new memberships. If you have any questions about your membership and would like to receive additional material and information about the future of ExI, please email me. For those of you who have not renewed and would like to make a donation to Extropy Institute in our effort to promote the Proactionary Principle and other projects, please go to http://www.extropy.org/membership.htm As always, thank you for your generous donations and for working with us to help realize an extropic future for transhumanity! ProAction! Natasha Natasha Vita-More Cultural Strategist - Designer Future Studies, University of Houston President, Extropy Institute Member, Association of Professional Futurists Founder, Transhumanist Arts & Culture Honorary Vice-Chair, World Transhumanist Association Senior Associate, Foresight Institute Advisor, Alcor Life Extension Foundation If you draw a circle in the sand and study only what's inside the circle, then that is a closed-system perspective. If you study what is inside the circle and everything outside the circle, then that is an open system perspective. Buckminster Fuller -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From nanogirl at halcyon.com Sat Jan 7 23:20:05 2006 From: nanogirl at halcyon.com (Gina Miller) Date: Sat, 7 Jan 2006 15:20:05 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Natasha in Le Magazine de L'Optimum References: <6.2.1.2.2.20060107143621.02fec8b8@pop-server.austin.rr.com> Message-ID: <01f201c613e1$4b22d0a0$0400a8c0@Nano> Congrats Natasha! Gina "Nanogirl" Miller Nanotechnology Industries http://www.nanoindustries.com Personal: http://www.nanogirl.com/index2.html Blog: http://maxanimation.blogspot.com/ ----- Original Message ----- From: Natasha Vita-More To: extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org ; ART-tac at yahoogroups.com ; wta-talk at transhumanism.org Sent: Saturday, January 07, 2006 12:41 PM Subject: [extropy-chat] Natasha in Le Magazine de L'Optimum Recently received high-gloss cultural magazine L'Optimum with Hilary Swank on the cover. A full-page spread features me as "Bionic woman" on page 56. (Actually I'm not very bionic at all! I think it must be referring to my views on the future body design -:)) Natasha Natasha Vita-More Cultural Strategist - Designer Future Studies, University of Houston President, Extropy Institute Member, Association of Professional Futurists Founder, Transhumanist Arts & Culture Honorary Vice-Chair, World Transhumanist Association Senior Associate, Foresight Institute Advisor, Alcor Life Extension Foundation If you draw a circle in the sand and study only what's inside the circle, then that is a closed-system perspective. If you study what is inside the circle and everything outside the circle, then that is an open system perspective. Buckminster Fuller ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ _______________________________________________ extropy-chat mailing list extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From spike66 at comcast.net Sun Jan 8 01:06:11 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Sat, 7 Jan 2006 17:06:11 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Ice cores show warming 'natural' (or not) In-Reply-To: <4902d9990601070907o3878d2bdkb6559c1479cfad92@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <200601080107.k0817Je10835@tick.javien.com> > bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Alfio Puglisi ... > > > > > > So that kind of global warming is a good thing, right? spike > > Who knows? If you want to avoid sea rise, Antarctica is a bad place to > warm (tropical warming wouldn't melt much ice...) I was thinking just the opposite. If you warm the poles and the north icecap melts, the earth can absorb an enormous amount of heat as the floating ice goes thru a phase change without changing its own temperature. Ice at 0 celcius goes to water at 0 celcius, 80 calories are absorbed for each gram of ice. If on the other hand the tropics increased temperature even a few degrees, absorbing only one calorie for each gram degree C, the water would expand, raising the sea level. If on the third hand, the South pole, as you have specified, has a lot of ice that is supported by land and isn't floating, I suppose that would raise sea levels. Puzzling. spike From dirk.bruere at gmail.com Sun Jan 8 01:42:00 2006 From: dirk.bruere at gmail.com (Dirk Bruere) Date: Sun, 8 Jan 2006 01:42:00 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Book printing Message-ID: I have just come across an interesting site, which presumably makes use of a fairly new printing technology. The tech in question is a machine that takes electronic document text and turns out a complete, bound, printed book. The quantities are almost irrelevant, whether it's one or ten thousand. This is not like the old style vanity press, as you will see if you examine the site in detail. To give one example, a 500 page book in black/white 8" x 11" will cost $14.55 (about ?8) for one off. 100 copies will get you a 13% discount and 1000 22% ($11.30). All rights retained by the author. Check out the site for more info http://www.lulu.com/uk Dirk -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From mitchtemporarily at hotmail.com Sun Jan 8 02:24:42 2006 From: mitchtemporarily at hotmail.com (Mitchell Porter) Date: Sun, 08 Jan 2006 02:24:42 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Ice cores show warming 'natural' (or not) Message-ID: >Damien has posted two interesting articles. This showed >up today in the MSM claiming that the warming is happening >faster at the poles than in the tropics. This just doesn't >make sense. Good news indeed if true, but I don't see >how it could be. spike This is called "polar amplification" and is being discussed here: http://www.realclimate.org/index.php?p=234 From transhumanist at goldenfuture.net Sun Jan 8 03:56:22 2006 From: transhumanist at goldenfuture.net (Joseph Bloch) Date: Sat, 07 Jan 2006 22:56:22 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Book printing In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <43C08D66.9080702@goldenfuture.net> It's called "on-demand printing". Lulu.com is one of the better ones, but there are literally scores of 'em out there, and have been for years. The problem with them is that there is no editorial process; books are printed with tons of typos, grammatical errors, etc. Not to mention factual or conceptual errors that would never have made it past the slush pile of a more mainstream publisher. But they do indeed have a place; I think there's a niche for a value-added service that provides editorial, proofing, etc. services, for works which are then turned over to an on-demand publisher. It also speaks to the notion that there is NO reason any book should ever go out of print again. Even the most obscure academic title should be able to be had without scouring the Internet or used bookstores across the globe. (H.R. Ellis-Davidson's "The Road to Hel" comes to mind as a perfect example.) Perhaps this is a good avenue for university presses to pursue? Joseph Dirk Bruere wrote: > I have just come across an interesting site, which presumably makes > use of a fairly new printing technology. > The tech in question is a machine that takes electronic document text > and turns out a complete, bound, printed book. > The quantities are almost irrelevant, whether it's one or ten > thousand. This is not like the old style vanity press, as you will see > if you examine the site in detail. > To give one example, a 500 page book in black/white 8" x 11" will > cost $14.55 (about ?8) for one off. 100 copies will get you a 13% > discount and 1000 22% ($11.30). > > All rights retained by the author. > Check out the site for more info > http://www.lulu.com/uk > > Dirk > >------------------------------------------------------------------------ > >_______________________________________________ >extropy-chat mailing list >extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org >http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat > > From dirk.bruere at gmail.com Sun Jan 8 04:02:08 2006 From: dirk.bruere at gmail.com (Dirk Bruere) Date: Sun, 8 Jan 2006 04:02:08 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Book printing In-Reply-To: <43C08D66.9080702@goldenfuture.net> References: <43C08D66.9080702@goldenfuture.net> Message-ID: On 1/8/06, Joseph Bloch wrote: > > It's called "on-demand printing". Lulu.com is one of the better ones, > but there are literally scores of 'em out there, and have been for years. > > The problem with them is that there is no editorial process; books are > printed with tons of typos, grammatical errors, etc. Not to mention > factual or conceptual errors that would never have made it past the > slush pile of a more mainstream publisher. But they do indeed have a > place; I think there's a niche for a value-added service that provides > editorial, proofing, etc. services, for works which are then turned over > to an on-demand publisher. > > It also speaks to the notion that there is NO reason any book should > ever go out of print again. Even the most obscure academic title should > be able to be had without scouring the Internet or used bookstores > across the globe. (H.R. Ellis-Davidson's "The Road to Hel" comes to mind > as a perfect example.) Perhaps this is a good avenue for university > presses to pursue? > > I was thinking more along the lines of decent manuals for high value, low volume, machinery. Also to 'preview' a book to sell to a traditional publisher. Dirk -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From rafal.smigrodzki at gmail.com Sun Jan 8 06:25:18 2006 From: rafal.smigrodzki at gmail.com (Rafal Smigrodzki) Date: Sun, 8 Jan 2006 01:25:18 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Re: anarcho-capitalism Message-ID: <7641ddc60601072225n6d72648eg69f33299df573a90@mail.gmail.com> This is a response that Brett sent to me accidentally (I think) offlist - let me share our exchange with you. Brett wrote: > Ah, its the "replacing a government monopoly" bit which I meant > "could never work in practice", but I also mean and probably should > have said in our lifetime by my reckonning of our life expectancy. > ### I am more optimistic about our life expectancy, which leads me to optimism about anarchocapitalism but I agree that assuming the unenhanced human lifespan this political option would be unavailable to us. ------------------------------------------------ > > Boutique forms of local government might be possible under an > umbrella global government that was very thin in terms of what > it oversaw but in our lifetime the closest we will get to that is likely > to be something not very different to an expanded USA style nation > state and/or a UN structure. Smaller stuff that seeks to escape > scrutiny and accountability to the US will be hunted down by the > nation state that the US is becoming. ### Yes, the world government is on the rise, may its bestial claws be too slow to catch the nimble ones before the first laser torch is hoisted in space and the carbon sails are set aglow. (I am referring to one of the possible ways to start interstellar expansion, using lasers to boost sailships to 0.1c speeds - their carbon sails would glow white-hot during the boost phase) It gives me a tingle - just think about it: To sail to the stars on ships burning with white fire! ----------------------------------- Me: > Suffice to say that non-centralized > maintenance of both primary and secondary public goods is possible, > given sufficiently high intelligence and very long timeframes for > motivation. Brett: > Ah, theres the rub *given* sufficiently high intelligence and a very > long timeframe for motivation :-) ### Yeah, I am not, like, agitating to organize your PPO (Private Protection Organization) tomorrow. Someday, in an Oorts Cloud object far away.... Rafal From rafal.smigrodzki at gmail.com Sun Jan 8 10:14:54 2006 From: rafal.smigrodzki at gmail.com (Rafal Smigrodzki) Date: Sun, 8 Jan 2006 05:14:54 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] The Fifth Singularity and benefits of murder Message-ID: <7641ddc60601080214jdddeb3fx92e004ff9ac23e99@mail.gmail.com> I recently finished reading "Singularity is near" and now I am reading "Sex, Power, Suicide" by Nick Lane. The latter is a book about mitochondria: a must for all mitochondriacs, where what we knew is confirmed - mitochondria are the alpha and omega in the book of life. I have some gripes about SiN but not much: Kurzweil does acknowledge most of the Singularitarian ideas, doesn't try to give the impression that it's all his own stuff and writes in a much clearer fashion than in The Age of Spiritual Machines. What I don't like is the unrealistically optimistic belief that molecular nanotechnology is a pre-Singularity technology. I absolutely don't believe it. Also, I don't believe that the SAI will be made by reverse-engineering the human brain, and I think he's deluding himself if he thinks that he can "slow aging to a crawl" with his IV vitamin treatments. But enough digressions. What struck me during reading about sex, power and suicide is that Singularities, or brief periods of very rapid change which open totally new vistas explored over subsequent epochs, are nothing new. The archetypal singularity, the vacuum transformation which generated spacetime, may have been pretty energetic yet otherwise boring. But the following three have been getting more and more suspenseful: The second one was the formation of mutating replicators. This is where a piece of the world learned how trick other pieces of the world to become more like itself, by collecting floating bits of matter, reworking them if needed and using them to make new copies, capable of remembering the tricks. This was the first nibbler. The third one was the formation of devouring murdering replicators, or eukaryotes. Politically correct handbooks may tell you that the defining trait of the eukaryote is the nucleus, or some other such namby-pamby stuff but the stark reality is different: eukaryotes are the ones who can not only kill you but also eat you whole. Where prokaryotes could spill poison around them and hope to pick up a sauce from decaying bodies, the eukaryote learned how kill and eat the carcass. This totally changes the dynamics of killing: where the prokaryotes benefit from killing their enemies mostly by freeing up the space around them, eukaryotes benefit from devouring the enemies as well, making murder that much more attractive. The prokaryote must outgrow his enemies, replicating as quickly as possible, since killing them outright is technically difficult. This limits the amount of genetic information a prokaryote can keep around. Furthermore, prokaryotes kill collectively but benefit individually, leading to the possibility of freeloading, cheating to speed up individual replication by not pitching in the bacteriocins for the poison bath. The eukaryote kills and eats alone, which assures diligence and proficiency in killing. This in turn leads to less pressure to replicate - you don't need to hurry to divide faster than the neighbors, if you can eat them at your leisure. So, you can pay for the arts and sciences, build a nucleus and accumulate complexity. The reasoning explaining why the ability to kill and devour is the basis for all eukaryotic complexity is really worth reading, as is the whole book. Now, the fourth Singularity was the evolution of the smart murdering replicator, about 200 thousand years ago in Africa. As all the preceding replicator-related Singularities, this one also produced a single dominant form, rather than a multitude (multitudes are produced by the subsequent radiative evolution). Just as there is a universal genetic code (implying a monophyletic origin of life, a First Nibbler), there was only one origin of eukaryotes (The First Eat'ya Whole Eater) , and one species of humans (The First Smart Killer). This seems to be a distinguishing feature of Singularities so far: even if it doesn't wipe out all that came before it, the New One is at first always one, and not a whole bunch of competitors simultaneously evolving to achieve new heights. Hence the name "singularity" is apt on more than one level. And, to echo Neal Stephenson, the New One is always a meaner badass than the previous models. Whether this may serve as a basis for inference about the coming Fifth Singularity is unclear. At least, if the pattern of previous Singularities is repeated, we most likely won't even know what hit us. Rafal From alfio.puglisi at gmail.com Sun Jan 8 12:51:23 2006 From: alfio.puglisi at gmail.com (Alfio Puglisi) Date: Sun, 8 Jan 2006 13:51:23 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] Ice cores show warming 'natural' (or not) In-Reply-To: <200601080107.k0817Je10835@tick.javien.com> References: <4902d9990601070907o3878d2bdkb6559c1479cfad92@mail.gmail.com> <200601080107.k0817Je10835@tick.javien.com> Message-ID: <4902d9990601080451u3e63d254w5645037a6ced0115@mail.gmail.com> On 1/8/06, spike wrote: > > bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Alfio Puglisi > ... > > > > > > > > > So that kind of global warming is a good thing, right? spike > > > > Who knows? If you want to avoid sea rise, Antarctica is a bad place to > > warm (tropical warming wouldn't melt much ice...) > > I was thinking just the opposite. If you warm the poles and the north > icecap melts, the earth can absorb an enormous amount of heat as the > floating ice goes thru a phase change without changing its own > temperature. Ice at 0 celcius goes to water at 0 celcius, 80 calories > are absorbed for each gram of ice. > > If on the other hand the tropics increased temperature even a few > degrees, absorbing only one calorie for each gram degree C, the > water would expand, raising the sea level. Right, I forgot about expanding water. So, warming the South Pole results in more water, warming the tropics results in the same water occupying more volume, and warming the North Pole interferes with the Gulf Stream. There's no hope :-) Alfio From pharos at gmail.com Sun Jan 8 15:02:28 2006 From: pharos at gmail.com (BillK) Date: Sun, 8 Jan 2006 15:02:28 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Ice cores show warming 'natural' (or not) In-Reply-To: <4902d9990601080451u3e63d254w5645037a6ced0115@mail.gmail.com> References: <4902d9990601070907o3878d2bdkb6559c1479cfad92@mail.gmail.com> <200601080107.k0817Je10835@tick.javien.com> <4902d9990601080451u3e63d254w5645037a6ced0115@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On 1/8/06, Alfio Puglisi wrote: > Right, I forgot about expanding water. So, warming the South Pole > results in more water, warming the tropics results in the same water > occupying more volume, and warming the North Pole interferes with the > Gulf Stream. There's no hope :-) > You omitted the standard final phrase - "We're all doooooomed!" (Traditionally said in a broad Scottish accent). :) BillK From galizur at gmail.com Sun Jan 8 15:25:11 2006 From: galizur at gmail.com (Chris Long) Date: Sun, 8 Jan 2006 07:25:11 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Future Studies Message-ID: <200601080725.11696.galizur@gmail.com> The University of Houston program unfortuntely closed in 2004, but are there other schools offering graduate programs in future studies, either in the US or abroad? -- Chris Long, San Diego Padres, 100 Park Boulevard, San Diego CA Score: 0, Diff: 1, clong killed by a Harvard Math Team on 1 From natasha at natasha.cc Sun Jan 8 16:05:43 2006 From: natasha at natasha.cc (Natasha Vita-More) Date: Sun, 08 Jan 2006 10:05:43 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] Future Studies In-Reply-To: <200601080725.11696.galizur@gmail.com> References: <200601080725.11696.galizur@gmail.com> Message-ID: <6.2.1.2.2.20060108100152.0da8f338@pop-server.austin.rr.com> At 09:25 AM 1/8/2006, Chris Long wrote: >The University of Houston program unfortuntely closed in 2004, >but are there other schools offering graduate programs in >future studies, either in the US or abroad? The graduate program did not close. I am currently receiving an MS in Future Studies. It is an excellent program and I highly recommend it. I think this program will become a prototype for other universities developing future studies. Here is one of my projects with the program http://www.natasha/cc.futurists.htm The University of Hawaii also has a program. Natasha Natasha Vita-More Cultural Strategist - Designer Future Studies, University of Houston President, Extropy Institute Member, Association of Professional Futurists Founder, Transhumanist Arts & Culture Honorary Vice-Chair, World Transhumanist Association Senior Associate, Foresight Institute Advisor, Alcor Life Extension Foundation If you draw a circle in the sand and study only what's inside the circle, then that is a closed-system perspective. If you study what is inside the circle and everything outside the circle, then that is an open system perspective. Buckminster Fuller -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Sun Jan 8 16:36:41 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Sun, 8 Jan 2006 11:36:41 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Ice cores show warming 'natural' (or not) In-Reply-To: <6.2.1.2.0.20060106174413.01c6c7c0@pop-server.satx.rr.com> References: <6.2.1.2.0.20060106174413.01c6c7c0@pop-server.satx.rr.com> Message-ID: Who cares?!? We had discussions several years ago regarding the fact that CO2 = carbon and carbon is the best material for many nanostructures and so once nanotechnology (esp. nanorobots) become "real", they will suck all the available CO2 out of the atmosphere because it is a "free" resource. *We* should be discussing the coming CO2 shortage (and the death of all life forms based on photosynthesis) *NOT* global warming [1]. Worst case should be discussing global warming within the context about how stupid the discussion is because the press (and politicians and the public at large) really don't understand the implications of nanotechnology. That is what *should* be important to people on this list. The sooner people see nanotechnology development as an "easy" solution to global warming, the more investment will shift in that direction and as a side effect generate nanocapabilities sooner (saving a significant fraction of the people that die every year due to a lack of nanocapabilities to deal with things like heart disease, cancer, aging in general, etc.). I wrote up the solutions to this this in my "Global Warming is a Red Herring" paper 4+ years ago. *Why* are we still discussing it? I would generally agree with the comments that warming at the poles is probably good. Any sea level increases will be modest and can be dealt with relatively easily. The additional growing season in the northern hemisphere (esp. Russia and Canada) should increase agricultural production and make food cheaper thus decrease deaths caused by insufficient affordable food resources. This does not minimize the fact that some people may be negatively impacted by global warming but the volume of the discussion is *way* out of proportion to what should be discussed regarding the relatively slow rate of progress in biotechnology & nanotechnology (either of which could be used to solve the global warming problem). Rational approaches to these problems should focus attention on what is really important -- saving lives. Robert 1. Side notes -- To pull the CO2 out of the atmosphere doesn't even require full "nanorobot" capabilities, just molecular sorting rotors [Nanosystems, pgs 374-383] which are significantly less complex to design and build. You can also easily engineer bacteria to perform the same function. If you want to discuss something interesting -- discuss the costs associated with hauling CO2 (or pure C) back from Venus, Mars, Titan, Uranus or Neptune after plant life and cyanobacteria start dying off (which will presumably cause the extinction of most "higher" life forms as well) due to the removal of excessive amounts of CO2 from the Earth's atmosphere... -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From albrooks2006 at yahoo.com Sun Jan 8 19:35:52 2006 From: albrooks2006 at yahoo.com (Alan Brooks) Date: Sun, 8 Jan 2006 11:35:52 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Re: anarcho-capitalism In-Reply-To: <7641ddc60601072225n6d72648eg69f33299df573a90@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <20060108193552.41711.qmail@web35702.mail.mud.yahoo.com> It has always been like that, if it wasn't the state that did the hunting down then it was private groups & secret societies. Don't think all that much ever escaped scrutiny- the night has a thousand eyes. > Smaller stuff that seeks to escape scrutiny and accountability to the US >will be hunted down by the nation state that the US is becoming. >Brett nattering nabob of positivism since 1976 __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From neuronexmachina at gmail.com Sun Jan 8 22:17:22 2006 From: neuronexmachina at gmail.com (Neil H.) Date: Sun, 8 Jan 2006 14:17:22 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Deseret News article: Shall we enhance? Message-ID: An interesting article in the Religion & ethics sectino of the Deseret News, which basically gives an overview of transhumanism and differing perspectives on it: http://deseretnews.com/dn/view/0,1249,635174444,00.html I thought this part was particularly interesting, regarding Christians who promote and oppose transhumanism (a Southern Baptist and a Mormon, respectively): "The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary's R. Albert Mohler Jr. is another vocal opponent of radical enhancements. It's one thing, he says, to try to give a person with bad eyesight 20/20 vision, and it's another to try to create humans whose eyesight is superhuman. The latter, he says, uses science "to redefine the species." "From a Christian worldview perspective," he says, "there are two problems with this. First, you have the normative definition of what it means to be a human being made in the image of God." To try to exceed normal human capacities, he says, "is to open, quite literally, a Pandora's Box of moral problems." The second problem, Mohler says, is the transhumanist desire to prolong life beyond normal aging. "The tranhumanists increasingly see death as an oddity that is to be overcome. Christians certainly do not embrace death as a good in itself, but we understand that death is a part of what it means to be human, and that, indeed, the effort to forever forestall death is itself an act of defiance that will be both unworkable and morally suspect." Richard Sherlock takes a different view. Sherlock is a philosophy professor at Utah State University, one of only several Utah members of the World Transhumanist Association ? and also a practicing member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. "We ought to be able to look at the future as an opportunity, not a threat," says Sherlock, who is also a board member of the Journal of Evolution and Technology. "I don't think you can say God has said 'this, but no more.' All these technologies are ways in which we become more like our Creator," he adds. In fact, he says, the idea of a continually advancing human "fits better within a Mormon context that sees humanity as a developing structure, aspiring to be more like God."" -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From fortean1 at mindspring.com Mon Jan 9 03:53:55 2006 From: fortean1 at mindspring.com (Terry W. Colvin) Date: Sun, 08 Jan 2006 20:53:55 -0700 Subject: [extropy-chat] FWD (SK) Pop Ph.D.'s: How TV Ate Academics Message-ID: <43C1DE53.2050306@mindspring.com> January 8, 2006 Blackboard Pop Ph.D.'s: How TV Ate Academics By JEFF P. LEWIS TODAY'S academics, many of them Gen X or baby boomers, are far more tolerant of popular culture than previous generations, says Lynn Schofield Clark, a communications professor at the University of Colorado, Boulder, whose research centers on mass media and its audiences. But she is quick to qualify, saying, "But only when it's being employed as a bridge to ideas that are relevant, timeless and important." Perhaps nothing reflects this trend more than the eclectic dissertation topics of Ph.D.'s - research interests that eventually filter into the classroom. In her own thesis, Dr. Clark studied religious symbols and adolescents, "analyzing the interpretive strategies that teens brought to such popular television programs as 'Touched by an Angel.' " Here are others topics: "Audience Reception Study of the 'Survivor' Series," Richard Crew, chairman, communications department, College Misericordia (Pennsylvania). "From the Village Blacksmith to Mr. Good Wrench: Creating Auto Mechanics in Technology's Middle Ground," Kevin L. Borg, assistant professor of history, James Madison University (Virginia). "Myth of Communion: Rhetorical Analysis of the Narratives of Alien Abductees," Stephanie Kelley-Romano, assistant professor of rhetoric, Bates College (Maine). "Sonic Waves: Careers of Rap Musicians, 1979-1995," Jennifer Lena, assistant professor of sociology, Vanderbilt University (Nashville). "Unveiled: The Emotion Work of Wedding Coordinators in the American Wedding Industry," Angela Thompson, professor of sociology, Texas Christian University. "Urban Jungles: Zoos and American Society," Jeffrey Hyson, assistant professor of history, St. Joseph's University (Philadelphia). "Lowrider Space" (as in low-riding cars), Ben Chappell, assistant professor of sociology/cultural studies, Bridgewater College (Virginia). "Doing Gender With Santa: Gender-Typing in Children's Toy Preferences," Greta E. Pennell, associate professor of teacher education, University of Indianapolis. "Spaghetti Dinners and Fireflies in a Jar: The Shaping of Paradoxical Places and Spaces in Disney's Celebration," Jennifer Prough, instructor of humanities and anthropology, Valparaiso University (Indiana). "Reading Culture, Engendering Girls: The Politics of the Everyday in the Production of Girls' Manga" (Japanese comics), Andrew Wood, associate professor of communications, San Jose State University. http://select.nytimes.com/mem/tnt.html?emc=tnt&tntget=2006/01/08/education/edlife/phds.html&tntemail1=y -- "Only a zit on the wart on the heinie of progress." Copyright 1992, Frank Rice Terry W. Colvin, Sierra Vista, Arizona (USA) < fortean1 at mindspring.com > Alternate: < fortean1 at msn.com > Home Page: < http://www.geocities.com/Area51/Stargate/8958/index.html > Sites: * Fortean Times * Mystic's Haven * TLCB * U.S. Message Text Formatting (USMTF) Program ------------ Member: Thailand-Laos-Cambodia Brotherhood (TLCB) Mailing List TLCB Web Site: < http://www.tlc-brotherhood.org > [Southeast Asia/Secret War in Laos veterans, Allies, CIA/NSA, and "steenkeen" contractors are welcome.] From avantguardian2020 at yahoo.com Mon Jan 9 17:04:22 2006 From: avantguardian2020 at yahoo.com (The Avantguardian) Date: Mon, 9 Jan 2006 09:04:22 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] The Fifth Singularity and benefits of murder In-Reply-To: <7641ddc60601080214jdddeb3fx92e004ff9ac23e99@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <20060109170422.72310.qmail@web60515.mail.yahoo.com> --- Rafal Smigrodzki wrote: > The reasoning explaining why the ability to kill and > devour is the > basis for all eukaryotic complexity is really worth > reading, as is the > whole book. Interesting perspective, Rafal, but let us not forget that metaphyta, otherwise known as the plant kingdom, are eukaryotes as well. And if it weren't for them, the "killers" could not use their mitochondria to breath. I think that chloroplasts are therefore probably every bit as important as mitochondria in the shaping of eukaryotic complexity. Furthermore as much eukaryotic complexity is derived from the need NOT to be killed and eaten as is derived from the need to kill and eat. The gazelle runs to escape the cheetah and the cheetah runs to escape starvation. Both run to survive. The Avantguardian is Stuart LaForge alt email: stuart"AT"ucla.edu "The most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the source of all true art and science. He to whom this emotion is a stranger, who can no longer wonder and stand rapt in awe, is as good as dead: his eyes are closed. . ." - Albert Einstein, "What I Believe" (1930) __________________________________________ Yahoo! DSL ? Something to write home about. Just $16.99/mo. or less. dsl.yahoo.com From avantguardian2020 at yahoo.com Mon Jan 9 17:29:27 2006 From: avantguardian2020 at yahoo.com (The Avantguardian) Date: Mon, 9 Jan 2006 09:29:27 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Ice cores show warming 'natural' (or not) In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <20060109172927.76175.qmail@web60516.mail.yahoo.com> --- Robert Bradbury wrote: > The > sooner people see > nanotechnology development as an "easy" solution to > global warming, the more > investment will shift in that direction and as a > side effect generate > nanocapabilities sooner (saving a significant > fraction of the people that > die every year due to a lack of nanocapabilities to > deal with things like > heart disease, cancer, aging in general, etc.). Yes, Robert, but until enough people start to see global warming as a PROBLEM (oddly enough it need not actually BE a problem, mind you, merely percieved as one), it will not warrant a SOLUTION, nanotech or otherwise. By your own logic then, every transhumanist should be scaring the wits out of their neighbors with the threat of global warming even if they don't actually believe there is a threat. Simply because it will accelerate progress in nanotechnology. Once developed those technologies could be used for SENS and other applications. I think if there is a shortcoming amongst transhumanists, it is that they look so far into the future that they get ahead of themselves. It's like trying to drive looking through a telescope. What does it matter if you can see your destination from miles away if you cannot see the obstacles immediately in front of you? The Avantguardian is Stuart LaForge alt email: stuart"AT"ucla.edu "The most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the source of all true art and science. He to whom this emotion is a stranger, who can no longer wonder and stand rapt in awe, is as good as dead: his eyes are closed. . ." - Albert Einstein, "What I Believe" (1930) __________________________________________ Yahoo! DSL ? Something to write home about. Just $16.99/mo. or less. dsl.yahoo.com From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Mon Jan 9 19:45:05 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Mon, 9 Jan 2006 14:45:05 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Ice cores show warming 'natural' (or not) In-Reply-To: <20060109172927.76175.qmail@web60516.mail.yahoo.com> References: <20060109172927.76175.qmail@web60516.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: On 1/9/06, The Avantguardian wrote: > > > By your own logic then, every transhumanist > should be scaring the wits out of their neighbors with > the threat of global warming even if they don't > actually believe there is a threat. Simply because it > will accelerate progress in nanotechnology. Hmmm... I would then suggest that we might then need an age and location specific "scaring the wits" strategies. With respect to just about everyone 50-60+ aging and *death* will impact them significantly (and much more negatively) than global warming will in their generally anticipated lifetime. With respect to location, people living in places like Chicago, Montreal, Fairbanks, Moscow, etc. are going "Yea, bring it on" when you mention global warming (esp. this time of year) [you can include me, currently residing in Boston, as being part of this group]. Hell, I've always wanted to go waterskiiing in the summer on Great Slave Lake. The argument tends to fall apart as most people who have some understanding of global warming, nanotechnology, aging, transhumanism, etc. have *very* little contact with those who may be most negatively impacted by it (e.g. those in Brazil, central Africa, India, S.E. Asia and low lying islands). So it tends to look to me like a lot of scientists "crying wolf" to get support for their favorite research interests. The only "significant" negative impacts one can envision out of global warming are shutting down the Gulf Stream (which may require melting the Greenland ice cap -- or *more*) and what is probably worse -- a massive melting of the methane clathrates throughout the world. However neither of those situations is being predicted by currently envisioned global warming. Robert -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From kevin at kevinfreels.com Mon Jan 9 20:02:45 2006 From: kevin at kevinfreels.com (kevinfreels.com) Date: Mon, 9 Jan 2006 14:02:45 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] Ice cores show warming 'natural' (or not) References: <20060109172927.76175.qmail@web60516.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <004901c61557$aaad25d0$0100a8c0@kevin> >The only "significant" negative impacts one can envision out of global warming are shutting down the Gulf Stream (which may require >melting the Greenland ice cap -- or *more*) and what is probably worse -- a massive melting of the methane clathrates throughout >the world. However neither of those situations is being predicted by currently envisioned global warming. Care to elaborate on WHY neither of these has been brought the the attention of the lay person? If you go out in public and ask people if they are scared of global warming, a lot will probbaly say yes, but when asked why they won't have an answer. They only know that they have been conditioned to fear a gradual change in average temperature by a degree or two over a period of decades. Usually the fear mongers make up all sorts of whacky reasons to scare people, but the have constantly overlooked the methane clathrates that may be responsible for such things as the Permian-Triassic extinction event. Instead, people worry about retreating glaciers, melting ice caps and wacky weather. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Mon Jan 9 21:42:03 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Mon, 9 Jan 2006 16:42:03 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Ice cores show warming 'natural' (or not) In-Reply-To: <004901c61557$aaad25d0$0100a8c0@kevin> References: <20060109172927.76175.qmail@web60516.mail.yahoo.com> <004901c61557$aaad25d0$0100a8c0@kevin> Message-ID: On 1/9/06, kevinfreels.com wrote: > > Care to elaborate on WHY neither of these has been brought the the > attention of the lay person? > Well, the article I just briefly glanced at suggested that one has to dump a lot more water than is in the Greenland ice cap into the N. Atlantic to halt the Gulf Stream (and I don't have time to go investigate this in detail right now). In the case of the methane clathrate, I think there is significant uncertainty as to how much of it there is, how much warming may need to occur, and the extent to which it might cause run away global warming. I think the problems have been discussed but nobody wants to push on these given the very large uncertainties that would be associated with making a strong case for them. It has taken a couple of decades for people to get somewhat serious about the asteroid risk. You may be running into general human apathy something along the lines of "If it hasn't happened to my grandfather or my father it isn't likely to happen to me." Most people are *not* very good at evaluating the relative risks associated with their aggregate hazard function. For example, in my remaining lifetime, which should I fear more (a) the probability of Boston being destroyed by an asteroid; (b) radiation risk from a terrorist nuclear or dirty bomb boing off in Boston Harbor; or (c) the radon gas probably leaking out of the granite countertops in the house I am now living in? I could obviously come up with a couple of dozen examples to add to this list without thinking very hard. When I do things along that line, the general response from people is usually something to the effect of, "Please stop you are making my head hurt." Robert Side note: If the Gulf Stream does shut down, Boston is likely to become colder as well, so I'd side with the Europeans in being concerned about that. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From hal at finney.org Tue Jan 10 00:28:22 2006 From: hal at finney.org (Hal Finney) Date: Mon, 9 Jan 2006 16:28:22 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] 6 challenges to Drexlerian nanotech Message-ID: <20060110002822.9752C57F8C@finney.org> I've mentioned before that an excellent nanotech Blog is Soft Machines, by Richard Jones, . Jones is a British nanotech researcher and is active in the debates over nanotech policy as chair of the Nanotech Engagement Group. He is also a long-time critic of the Drexlerian nanotech paradigm. In his book Soft Machines he advocates a biological model for atomic design and says that the stiff diamondoid that Drexler relies on will not actually work the way Drexler says. (BTW although it is not what I want to comment on, take a look at where Jones describes research showing that buckyballs are not toxic to fish after all, in fact they are protective! Supposedly the earlier, widely publicised results were due to sloppy experimental procedure.) A recent blog posting described six "challenges" for the Drexlerian molecular manufacturing paradigm. These are problems which Jones feels have not been clearly addressed by researchers in the field, problems which could make the whole thing be a non-starter. The challenges: 1. Stability of nanoclusters and surface reconstruction. 2. Thermal noise, Brownian motion and tolerance. 3. Friction and energy dissipation. 4. Design for a motor. 5. The eutactic environment and the feed-through problem. 6. Implementation path. In listing them here I don't do justice to Jones' extensive elaborations on each point and his demonstration of how they work together. For example point 4, the need for a sound nanomechanical motor, points out that Drexler's sketch of an electrostatic motor is likely to run into problems either with surface reconstruction (point 1) or Brownian motion (point 2). Unfortunately, Jones well-though-out critiques, head and shoulders above most of what you read about nanotech, have been met only with silence from the Drexlerian advocacy camp. Nanodot has not mentioned them, nor has CRN . In particular, CRN with their frequent claims that Drexler's Nanosystems is inerrant, should note Jones' pointers to research showing that nanoscale friction measurements are much greater that Drexler's calculations, throwing many of his design techniques into question. I find that this blog is a refreshing peek into the mainstream of nanotech research and is free of the cultishness which sometimes attends discussions of Drexler's ideas. Reading this you see why Drexler is seen from within the professional research community as something of a wild card who is well outside the mainstream. It is always good to see as many viewpoints as possible so I strongly recommend reading Jones' blog along with the others I listed above. Hal Finney From avantguardian2020 at yahoo.com Tue Jan 10 00:26:52 2006 From: avantguardian2020 at yahoo.com (The Avantguardian) Date: Mon, 9 Jan 2006 16:26:52 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Ice cores show warming 'natural' (or not) In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <20060110002652.28175.qmail@web60514.mail.yahoo.com> --- Robert Bradbury wrote: > The only "significant" negative impacts one can > envision out of global > warming are shutting down the Gulf Stream (which may > require melting the > Greenland ice cap -- or *more*) and what is probably > worse -- a massive > melting of the methane clathrates throughout the > world. However neither of > those situations is being predicted by currently > envisioned global warming. Well there are other more subtle threats. For example global warming is believed to be partially responsible (along with increased air travel) for the spreading northward of tropical disease vectoring insects such as mosquitos carrying dengue fever, yellow fever, west nile virus, and all sorts of nasty plagues to northern latitudes. http://archives.cnn.com/2000/NATURE/07/17/global.warming.enn/ The Avantguardian is Stuart LaForge alt email: stuart"AT"ucla.edu "The most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the source of all true art and science. He to whom this emotion is a stranger, who can no longer wonder and stand rapt in awe, is as good as dead: his eyes are closed. . ." - Albert Einstein, "What I Believe" (1930) __________________________________________ Yahoo! DSL ? Something to write home about. Just $16.99/mo. or less. dsl.yahoo.com From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Tue Jan 10 01:18:56 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Mon, 9 Jan 2006 20:18:56 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Books: Harris; Religion and Reason Message-ID: Ok, lets see if I can keep this at an elevated level. I saw a show on CSPAN2 a couple of nights ago. Apparently a presentation by Sam Harris [1] author of "The End of Faith" [2,3] to the New York Society for Ethical Culture [4]. He made ~5 arguments against the tolerance by rational individuals of religious based perspectives (be they Christan fundamentalism or Muslim). One of his perspectives seemed to revolve around the fact that all religions are *not* equal and we should stop pretending that they are. He asked the fundamental question of "Where are the Buddhist suicide bombers?" (given the extent to which the Buddhists have been abused by the Chinese), or to an even greater extent "Where are the Jain militants?" (Jain's are an Indian religion that he suggested were extremely non-violent in their beliefs). His fundamental position seemed to be that the traditional position of "tolerance" by "moderates" for religious extremism, particularly that which is fundamentally unextropic, and particularly that which is based on the acceptance of irrational perspectives, should be discontinued. I.e. it is no longer acceptable for one to reject active forms of the destruction of information (e.g. suicide bombers) but one must extend that to passive forms of the destruction of information (e.g. irrational religions). I would tend to agree. If there are those who would like to support my renomination to the ExI Board based on the platform that all information as is feasible should be preserved and that the execution of programs which seek to destroy information without a substantive argument that such information is worthless (i.e. a legitimate reason to erase information rather than simply an unjustified assertion that one religion is right and another is wrong) should be terminated, I would be willing to accept such a nomination. Note carefully, that I am *not* saying that the information potentially contained in external programs should be erased (e.g. current forms of capital punishment) -- I am simply saying that the execution of programs that would intentionally erase information without a really good (proven) reason should cease execution. So, in some respects, I am throwing my glove down to the ExI board. Either you *are* or you are *not* extropic. Harris has, in my mind, outlined the problems with being a "tolerant" extropian. The problem with that is that it means transhumanism rules and extropianism falls. In transhumansism (using its most basic definitions) there is no moral compass. One can become transhuman along many vectors, some good, some bad. With extropianism, there is at least some guideline -- more information is good, information destruction (entropy) is bad, allowing (or worse enabling) the destruction of information is bad, etc.. This leads to the questions of what paths will generate the most "good" information the soonest (perhaps with the minimal destruction of *perceived* less useful information) and how does one deal with entirely unexplored paths (where the information gain may have positive, neutral or negative consequences). Robert 1. http://www.samharris.org/ 2. http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0393327655 3. End of Faith may be related to Jacoby's "Freethinkers : A History of American Secularism", if Amazon is selecting things correctly... See: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0805074422 4. http://www.nysec.org/ -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From HerbM at learnquick.com Tue Jan 10 02:28:02 2006 From: HerbM at learnquick.com (Herb Martin) Date: Mon, 9 Jan 2006 20:28:02 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] Books: Harris; Religion and Reason In-Reply-To: Message-ID: _____ From: Robert Bradbury I saw a show on CSPAN2 a couple of nights ago. Apparently a presentation by Sam Harris [1] author of "The End of Faith" [2,3] to the New York Society for Ethical Culture [4]. He made ~5 arguments against the tolerance by rational individuals of religious based perspectives (be they Christan fundamentalism or Muslim). One of his perspectives seemed to revolve around the fact that all religions are *not* equal and we should stop pretending that they are. He asked the fundamental question of "Where are the Buddhist suicide bombers?" (given the extent to which the Buddhists have been abused by the Chinese), or to an even greater extent "Where are the Jain militants?" (Jain's are an Indian religion that he suggested were extremely non-violent in their beliefs). The simple answer for the Buddhists is that their suicide bombers killed only themselves when they felt something was egregious enough a violation to warrant self-sacrifice and made sure that no one else was harmed. And I think this makes your (and Harris') point even more strongly. His fundamental position seemed to be that the traditional position of "tolerance" by "moderates" for religious extremism, particularly that which is fundamentally unextropic, and particularly that which is based on the acceptance of irrational perspectives, should be discontinued. I.e. it is no longer acceptable for one to reject active forms of the destruction of information (e.g. suicide bombers) but one must extend that to passive forms of the destruction of information (e.g. irrational religions). I would tend to agree. It's only logical. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From spike66 at comcast.net Tue Jan 10 03:00:32 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Mon, 9 Jan 2006 19:00:32 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Books: Harris; Religion and Reason In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <200601100300.k0A30ae12939@tick.javien.com> ________________________________________ From: extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org [mailto:extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Herb Martin Sent: Monday, January 09, 2006 6:28 PM To: 'ExI chat list' Subject: RE: [extropy-chat] Books: Harris; Religion and Reason ________________________________________ From: Robert Bradbury ... "Where are the Jain militants?" ... ? The simple answer for the Buddhists is that their suicide bombers killed only themselves when they felt something was egregious enough a violation to warrant self-sacrifice and made sure that no one else was harmed. ? And I think this makes your (and Harris') point even more strongly... I like the Buddhists. If I were to ever get religion again, it would be that one. That one Buddhist priest that did the human torch thing way back in the 60s was more effective than all the modern suicide bombers as far as calling actual attention to a cause. I was only a child at the time, yet I still remember he was about government interference with their practice of religion. Consider the suicide bombers that kill others today. I don't even want to know what their motive might be. By slaying innocents, they forfeit any attention on my part. But now I pledge that if any protestor should follow the example of the peaceful Buddhist, I will go out of my way to find out why he did it. Fair enough? Actually better yet, that form of protest they used recently in Africa where the women stripped naked: no loss of life, no property damage, and they have my full and undivided. spike From jay.dugger at gmail.com Tue Jan 10 04:25:36 2006 From: jay.dugger at gmail.com (Jay Dugger) Date: Mon, 9 Jan 2006 22:25:36 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] Ice cores show warming 'natural' (or not) In-Reply-To: References: <6.2.1.2.0.20060106174413.01c6c7c0@pop-server.satx.rr.com> Message-ID: <5366105b0601092025q171c3779r7b9c0467e477f20f@mail.gmail.com> On 1/8/06, Robert Bradbury wrote: > > Who cares?!? > [snip] > I wrote up the solutions to this this in my "Global Warming is a Red > Herring" paper 4+ years ago. *Why* are we still discussing it? > [snip] http://www.aeiveos.com/~bradbury/Papers/GWiaRH.html seems a dead link, Robert. Can you post a valid link for it, and for the rest of aeiveos.com? -- Jay Dugger Please donate to a charity you like. From fortean1 at mindspring.com Tue Jan 10 05:06:57 2006 From: fortean1 at mindspring.com (Terry W. Colvin) Date: Mon, 09 Jan 2006 22:06:57 -0700 Subject: [extropy-chat] CRS on declaration of war and AUMFS Message-ID: <43C340F1.1010605@mindspring.com> CRS ON DECLARATIONS OF WAR AND AUMFS The distinction between a formal declaration of war and an authorization for use of military force was addressed in an exceptionally informative report of the Congressional Research Service in 2003. "With respect to domestic law, a declaration of war automatically brings into effect numerous standby statutory authorities conferring special powers on the President with respect to the military, foreign trade, transportation, communications, manufacturing, alien enemies, etc." "In contrast, no standby authorities appear to be triggered automatically by an authorization for the use of force." The history of both categories is delineated, including the texts of the eleven formal declarations of war and the most important authorizations for use of military force, along with an itemization of the various statutes that are triggered directly or indirectly in each case. The 112 page CRS report is not generally available in the public domain. A copy was obtained by Secrecy News. See "Declarations of War and Authorizations for the Use of Military Force: Historical Background and Legal Implications," updated January 14, 2003: http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/natsec/RL31133.pdf -- "Only a zit on the wart on the heinie of progress." Copyright 1992, Frank Rice Terry W. Colvin, Sierra Vista, Arizona (USA) < fortean1 at mindspring.com > Alternate: < fortean1 at msn.com > Home Page: < http://www.geocities.com/Area51/Stargate/8958/index.html > Sites: * Fortean Times * Mystic's Haven * TLCB * U.S. Message Text Formatting (USMTF) Program ------------ Member: Thailand-Laos-Cambodia Brotherhood (TLCB) Mailing List TLCB Web Site: < http://www.tlc-brotherhood.org > [Southeast Asia/Secret War in Laos veterans, Allies, CIA/NSA, and "steenkeen" contractors are welcome.] From fortean1 at mindspring.com Tue Jan 10 05:06:48 2006 From: fortean1 at mindspring.com (Terry W. Colvin) Date: Mon, 09 Jan 2006 22:06:48 -0700 Subject: [extropy-chat] FWD (UFO UpDate) Edison's 'Conquest Of Mars' Message-ID: <43C340E8.4020802@mindspring.com> From: Nick Balaskas To: UFO UpDates - Toronto Date: Mon, 9 Jan 2006 11:45:33 -0500 (Eastern Standard Time) Subject: Edison's 'Conquest Of Mars' Hi Everyone! I got to hear and meet with Robert Godwin, publisher of Apogee Books, when he gave a talk last Wednesday to the members of the Toronto Centre of the Royal Astronomical Society of Canada at the Ontario Science Centre last Wednesday. Godwin gave many examples of long forgotten works of science fiction and scientific speculations by astronomers from the late 19th and early 20th centuries that not only directly influenced many of the space scientists and engineers of this generation that got us to the Moon and shaped our ideas about Mars but who also played a part in creating our present beliefs about aliens and UFOs. Many of us are familiar with H.G. Wells 1897 'War of the World' that created panic when it was first broadcast on radio in 1938 and later popularized in several films, including Steven Spielberg's version that was in the cinemas last summer, but few know that the Hearst publishing empire commissioned a sequel in 1898 called 'Edison's Conquest of Mars' that was serialized in their many newspapers. In this sequel, an armada of manmade cigar shaped UFOs were built and first test flown to the Moon before this 19th century international financed human invasion of Mars was launched from Earth (sounds familiar?). Now for the first time a book version of this sequel is now available by Apogee Books, the Canadian based space publishing company. Can Spielberg's sequel 'War of the Worlds 2' where it is our turn to kick some Martian butt be in the works too (a few years ago I had fun playing a soldier who gets killed chasing the Martians through the woods in the movie pilot of the short lived TV series 'War of the Worlds'). http://www.cgpublishing.com/Books/Edison.html Although Godwin's talk seemed to convince his audience that our science fiction and human creative ingenuity of the past can account for the rash of flying saucer sightings of the present and he also dismissed the Roswell UFO crash as nonsense, when I approached him after his talk to get him to sign my copy off 'Mars, The NASA Mission Reports' he was startled when I stated that I believed that some UFOs are real and not from Earth. I also reminded Godwin about the astronaut post flight debriefings reproduced in his three volume set on Apollo 11 that describe an unexplained UFO sighting in space made by these astronauts which he himself discussed on Errol Bruce-Knapp's 'Strange Days... Indeed' show 171 four years earlier! I encourage all of you to check out Godwin's other excellent and unique Apogee books on manned space flight and view the rare footage in the CDs/DVDs that accompany them which will allow you to relive many amazing and incredible moments in human space flight or to discover them for the first time. http://www.cgpublishing.com/Books/SPACE_SPLASH.html Godwin has visited many of NASA's facilities where he has seen valuable documents thought to have been lost or destroyed (including a room the size of the auditorium he spoke at which contained all the technical records of the Saturn V, the world's largest and most successful rocket which, if production was not cancelled, could have been used to place all the parts for the International Space Station into orbit in a couple of launches) and talked with many of the its past and present astronauts and employees, including Werner von Braun's right-hand man Ernst Stuhlinger and many other still living Project Paperclip space scientists from Nazi Germany who I know have a lot of important but still untold stories about space - and UFOs - that Godwin is unaware of and would be very surprised to learn about. Nick Balaskas -- "Only a zit on the wart on the heinie of progress." Copyright 1992, Frank Rice Terry W. Colvin, Sierra Vista, Arizona (USA) < fortean1 at mindspring.com > Alternate: < fortean1 at msn.com > Home Page: < http://www.geocities.com/Area51/Stargate/8958/index.html > Sites: * Fortean Times * Mystic's Haven * TLCB * U.S. Message Text Formatting (USMTF) Program ------------ Member: Thailand-Laos-Cambodia Brotherhood (TLCB) Mailing List TLCB Web Site: < http://www.tlc-brotherhood.org > [Southeast Asia/Secret War in Laos veterans, Allies, CIA/NSA, and "steenkeen" contractors are welcome.] From jef at jefallbright.net Tue Jan 10 05:30:26 2006 From: jef at jefallbright.net (Jef Allbright) Date: Mon, 9 Jan 2006 21:30:26 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Books: Harris; Religion and Reason In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <22360fa10601092130o12b2db6cw4ade3fb866c5eee3@mail.gmail.com> On 1/9/06, Robert Bradbury wrote: > If there are those who would like to support my renomination to the ExI > Board based on the platform that all information as is feasible should be > preserved and that the execution of programs which seek to destroy > information without a substantive argument that such information is > worthless ( i.e. a legitimate reason to erase information rather than simply > an unjustified assertion that one religion is right and another is wrong) > should be terminated, I would be willing to accept such a nomination. Note > carefully, that I am *not* saying that the information potentially contained > in external programs should be erased ( e.g. current forms of capital > punishment) -- I am simply saying that the execution of programs that would > intentionally erase information without a really good (proven) reason should > cease execution. > > So, in some respects, I am throwing my glove down to the ExI board. Either > you *are* or you are *not* extropic. Harris has, in my mind, outlined the > problems with being a "tolerant" extropian. The problem with that is that > it means transhumanism rules and extropianism falls. In transhumansism > (using its most basic definitions) there is no moral compass. One can > become transhuman along many vectors, some good, some bad. With > extropianism, there is at least some guideline -- more information is good, > information destruction (entropy) is bad, allowing (or worse enabling) the > destruction of information is bad, etc.. This leads to the questions of > what paths will generate the most "good" information the soonest (perhaps > with the minimal destruction of *perceived* less useful information) and > how does one deal with entirely unexplored paths (where the information gain > may have positive, neutral or negative consequences). Robert - I would certainly nominate and vote for you to rejoin the ExI board, if I were a dues-paying member, which remains unlikely since the time Max removed himself from active participation. While I don't entirely agree with your positions, I admire the intellectual rigor and the passion of your posts, the obvious time and effort you invest in the subjects, and the integrity with which you promote your values. Speaking of which, that's why I willingly contribute a small amount to SIAI, even though I don't entirely agree with the party line there either. I don't think all information is equally worthy of preservation because being a subjective agent in a competitive environment forces us to make choices according to our values. Interestingly, I see tolerance of competing beliefs as a "good" to the extent that they provide essential diversity to the creative process, but beyond that point at the edge of chaos such tolerance of incongruent beliefs is destructive and better not tolerated. A more enlightened theory of social decision-making will help us clarify and ratify such principles of growth of values that work, and I would strongly support efforts in that direction rather than what I see as a somewhat naive platform promoting the "saving of all information." When you say the following: "This leads to the questions of what paths will generate the most "good" information the soonest (perhaps with the minimal destruction of *perceived* less useful information) and how does one deal with entirely unexplored paths (where the information gain may have positive, neutral or negative consequences). then I suspect we might actually be in close alignment after all. - Jef From rafal.smigrodzki at gmail.com Tue Jan 10 05:46:24 2006 From: rafal.smigrodzki at gmail.com (Rafal Smigrodzki) Date: Tue, 10 Jan 2006 00:46:24 -0500 Subject: Fwd: [extropy-chat] The Fifth Singularity and benefits of murder In-Reply-To: <7641ddc60601091040v59da4587k868b03580d859621@mail.gmail.com> References: <7641ddc60601080214jdddeb3fx92e004ff9ac23e99@mail.gmail.com> <20060109170422.72310.qmail@web60515.mail.yahoo.com> <7641ddc60601091040v59da4587k868b03580d859621@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <7641ddc60601092146v71aeaf66i47b01aaa110dd45@mail.gmail.com> I am forwarding a post which was accidentally sent offlist. ---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: Rafal Smigrodzki Date: Jan 9, 2006 1:40 PM Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] The Fifth Singularity and benefits of murder To: The Avantguardian On 1/9/06, The Avantguardian wrote: > --- Rafal Smigrodzki > wrote: > > The reasoning explaining why the ability to kill and > > devour is the > > basis for all eukaryotic complexity is really worth > > reading, as is the > > whole book. > > Interesting perspective, Rafal, but let us not forget > that metaphyta, otherwise known as the plant kingdom, > are eukaryotes as well. And if it weren't for them, > the "killers" could not use their mitochondria to > breath. I think that chloroplasts are therefore > probably every bit as important as mitochondria in the > shaping of eukaryotic complexity. ### Oxygen in the air, as you correctly point out, is the reason why the alpha-proteobacteria that gave rise to mitochondria evolved in the first place. However, plants are not the initial source of oxygen - it was first produced in large quantities by cyanobacteria two billion years ago, a billion years ago before the first tiny leaves oriented to the sun. Plants are nothing but the progeny of ruthless, eykaryotic, mitochondria-containing predators who learned to be nice only after eating a cyanobacterium and enslaving it to work for them. So, yes, the chloroplast that came from the cyanobacterium is enormously important for the history of life, but it was not responsible for the generation of eukaryotic complexity. In the darknes of their inner self plants are predators, too ---------------------------------- Furthermore as much > eukaryotic complexity is derived from the need NOT to > be killed and eaten as is derived from the need to > kill and eat. The gazelle runs to escape the cheetah > and the cheetah runs to escape starvation. Both run to > survive. ### Yes, some of the elaborations on the theme are less blood-spattered than others but in the eukatyotic beginning, there was carnage. Rafal From rafal.smigrodzki at gmail.com Tue Jan 10 06:19:11 2006 From: rafal.smigrodzki at gmail.com (Rafal Smigrodzki) Date: Tue, 10 Jan 2006 01:19:11 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] The Fifth Singularity and benefits of murder In-Reply-To: <20060109202340.46873.qmail@web60525.mail.yahoo.com> References: <7641ddc60601091040v59da4587k868b03580d859621@mail.gmail.com> <20060109202340.46873.qmail@web60525.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <7641ddc60601092219k4e0736cbmf7db3cfa19e04976@mail.gmail.com> On 1/9/06, The Avantguardian wrote: > --- Rafal Smigrodzki > wrote: However, plants are not the initial > > source of oxygen - it > > was first produced in large quantities by > > cyanobacteria two billion > > years ago, a billion years ago before the first tiny > > leaves oriented > > to the sun. > > Perhaps then, it is the cyanobacteria that struck the > first blow of the evolutionary arms race by attempting > to poison their peaceful methanogen neighbors with > noxious oxygen. Then the anaerobic archaea would have > no choice but to engulf the alpha-proteobacteria, to > save them from the attempted genocide by the > cyanobacterium. :) ### Indeed, the arrival of the cyanobacteria resulted in a titanic act of mayhem, with massvie amounts of oxygen being elaborated in geologically short periods of time. Most of the worlds iron ores date from that time, as increasing concentrations of oxygen precipitated the iron dissolved in the oceans and caused it to settle in a rain of rust, sometimes hundreds of meters thick. The upper levels of the ocean were scoured of non-cyan life for a time, until other bacteria made a comeback. Yes, that was an age of mayhem, too. Not even the cyans have a clean conscience. Still, their crimes were impersonal, a murder by externality (oxygen), and occurred by accident rather than design. ------------------------- > > Ironically, even if murder was rampant, it was an act > of mercy by the progenitors of the eukaryotes in NOT > digesting the progenitors of the mitochondria that > enabled the survival of the eukaryotic line. ### Nick Lane favors the hydrogen theory of eukaryotic formation, according to which the eukaryote didn't develop by incomplete devouring of the mitochondrial progenitor by an archaea. Instead, there was progressive attachment with mutual benefits, between an archaea (the progenitor of the nucleus and the cytoplasm) and the alpha-proteobacterium (the progenitor of mitochondria). Neither could devour the other because at that time, murder by eating was still not invented (for complex reasons well-described in the book). Only after the two learned to live together in an unholy union did their monstrous progeny take to chomping on the flesh of its neighbors. Thus started the age of personalized, premeditated, one-on-one slaughter, a killing with gusto rather than by accident. ------------------------------ > Yes there was carnage but there was cooperation too. I > would think that a researcher of mitochondria would > have more of an appreciation for the power of > symbiosis. If natural history is red in tooth and > claw, it is filled with acts of selfish kindness as > well. ### Selfish kindness! This is a good way of putting it. (There is something oddly amusing in applying anthropomorphic terms to the mindless interactions of tiny chemical automata.) Rafal From avantguardian2020 at yahoo.com Tue Jan 10 08:28:10 2006 From: avantguardian2020 at yahoo.com (The Avantguardian) Date: Tue, 10 Jan 2006 00:28:10 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Books: Harris; Religion and Reason In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <20060110082811.49125.qmail@web60521.mail.yahoo.com> --- Robert Bradbury wrote: > Sam Harris [. . .] made ~5 arguments > against the tolerance by > rational individuals of religious based perspectives > (be they Christan > fundamentalism or Muslim). One of his perspectives > seemed to revolve around > the fact that all religions are *not* equal and we > should stop pretending > that they are. > He asked the fundamental question of > "Where are the Buddhist > suicide bombers?" (given the extent to which the > Buddhists have been abused > by the Chinese) Well I imagine a good number of them are lying at bottom of Pearl Harbor somewhere near the Arizona Memorial. Don't get me wrong, I have a great deal of respect for the Buddhist philosophy which has had a huge impact on my world view, but to believe that there is something inherently pacifist about ALL Buddhism is to ignore Buddhism's historical context. Remember that various sects of Buddhism have easily had as great an effect on Asian military tradition as Christianity has had on Western military tradition. >From the Shaolin warrior monks of China to the Zen Buddhist influence on the Budo arts of Imperial Japan, Buddhism has served the violent ends of the states that have sponsored it as readily as Islam or any other religion. While one can say that the Buddhist teachings extol the virtues of peace and advocate violence only in the cause of self-defense, one could likewise defend Christianity on the grounds that, amongst other platitudes, it advocates turning the other cheek. The fact of the matter is, Buddhism like every other religion, has had a severe disconnect between its preachings and its historical practice. Is this a fault of the meme or a limitation of the minds that hold it? I believe it is the latter. The same can be said of any other religion exploited by those with the will to incite the gullible to violence for personal gain. I am not certain that the eradication of religion will solve this. People can become fanatical about almost anything. Take away religion and the war-mongers will utilize something else to bring death and destruction into the world. Nationalism, Rock Concerts, and Soccer Games can all be used to incite the suggestable to violence against their neighbors. Let us not forget that the ancient Pythagoreans used math as an excuse to murder those who had the temerity to believe that the square roots of certain numbers could not be rendered as perfect fractions. , or to an even greater extent "Where > are the Jain > militants?" (Jain's are an Indian religion that he > suggested were extremely > non-violent in their beliefs). Well this is like asking, "Where are the dodos?". They died out. MOST LIKELY because of their entirely pacifist ways. If your religion dictates that you should rather die than step on bug, you and your religion are not long for this world. > His fundamental position seemed to be that the > traditional position of > "tolerance" by "moderates" for religious extremism, > particularly that which > is fundamentally unextropic, and particularly that > which is based on the > acceptance of irrational perspectives, should be > discontinued. But all fanaticism is irrational even when the memes one is fanatical about are rational. Nazism was heavily influenced by Neitsche's nihilism which was a RATIONAL philosophy and state-enforced rational atheism did not prevent Stalin from killing millions in the former USSR. > I.e. it is > no longer acceptable for one to reject active forms > of the destruction of > information (e.g. suicide bombers) but one must > extend that to passive forms > of the destruction of information (e.g. irrational > religions). Well I am not sure how responsible irrational religions are for the passive destruction of information. While I am against the religiously motivated burning of books, I don't think that simply believing in one after-life or another suffices as a mechanism of information destruction. > If there are those who would like to support my > renomination to the ExI > Board based on the platform that all information as > is feasible should be > preserved and that the execution of programs which > seek to destroy > information without a substantive argument that such > information is > worthless (i.e. a legitimate reason to erase > information rather than simply > an unjustified assertion that one religion is right > and another is wrong) > should be terminated, I would be willing to accept > such a nomination. Who gets to judge the worth of the information? For that matter HOW does one judge the worth of information? Should it be sheer rationality? Much of beautiful literature is not necessarily rational. Alice in Wonderland isn't a very rational story. Should it be banned? What is the worth of a platypus? Is the platypus rational? I am against the elimination of the platypus regardless of possible answers to these questions. If there was a platypus cult that believed that the platypus was nature's most perfect organism and all had to worship it or die, I might tell the cultists to bugger off but I would still be against the elimination of the platypus. That the platypus can be exploited by the cultists to further their own power has no bearing on the intrinsic worth of the platypus. Does my support of the platypus makes me complicit in the abhorrent conduct of the platypus cultists? I don't think so. > Note carefully, that I am *not* saying that the > information potentially contained > in external programs should be erased (e.g. current > forms of capital > punishment) As opposed to future or past forms of capital punishment? Talk about euphemisms. :) > -- I am simply saying that the execution > of programs that would > intentionally erase information without a really > good (proven) reason should > cease execution. Is simple competition for mind-share a good reason for one program to erase another? If not, then is hunger a good reason for the human program to erase the chicken program? Or the chicken program to erase the grasshopper program? > So, in some respects, I am throwing my glove down to > the ExI board . . . I am not a member of the ExI board, so I will bow out at this point. Suffice it to say that I think tolerance is a postive virtue within limits. Tolerating an idea and the person who holds it is one thing but tolerating those who would use that idea as an excuse to do harm to others, especially me, is another matter entirely. For what it is worth, I am not opposed to your reinstatement on the board, provided you realize that some sentiments, no matter how coldly rational they may seem to you, should only be communicated by private channels. On an email list such as this, freedom of expression must be tempered with an eye for public propriety because, by proxy, more than your own personal reputation is at stake. Feel free to privately email me with whatever floats your boat, however, as you will find me a bit more indulgent when not in the public eye. The Avantguardian is Stuart LaForge alt email: stuart"AT"ucla.edu "The most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the source of all true art and science. He to whom this emotion is a stranger, who can no longer wonder and stand rapt in awe, is as good as dead: his eyes are closed. . ." - Albert Einstein, "What I Believe" (1930) __________________________________________ Yahoo! DSL ? Something to write home about. Just $16.99/mo. or less. dsl.yahoo.com From alex at ramonsky.com Tue Jan 10 09:34:17 2006 From: alex at ramonsky.com (Alex Ramonsky) Date: Tue, 10 Jan 2006 09:34:17 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] personal display References: <200601070352.k073q3e17666@tick.javien.com> Message-ID: <43C37F99.7060300@ramonsky.com> Dude, I've had one of these for four years : ) See: http://home.ramonsky.com/not-for-wimps/index.html .....and scroll down : ) Xybernaught do them nice & cheap. AR ********* spike wrote: >Hey cool, I have been waiting for years for something like >this to come along: > >http://www.creativemac.com/articles/viewarticle.jsp?id=36560 > > >{8-] > >spike > > > > > >_______________________________________________ >extropy-chat mailing list >extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org >http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat > > > > From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Tue Jan 10 09:51:29 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Tue, 10 Jan 2006 04:51:29 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Books: Harris; Religion and Reason In-Reply-To: <20060110082811.49125.qmail@web60521.mail.yahoo.com> References: <20060110082811.49125.qmail@web60521.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: On 1/10/06, The Avantguardian wrote: > > but to believe that > there is something inherently pacifist about ALL > Buddhism is to ignore Buddhism's historical context. > Remember that various sects of Buddhism have easily > had as great an effect on Asian military tradition as > Christianity has had on Western military tradition. > > >From the Shaolin warrior monks of China to the Zen > Buddhist influence on the Budo arts of Imperial Japan, > Buddhism has served the violent ends of the states > that have sponsored it as readily as Islam or any > other religion. The quoting I'm seeing in gmail is a bit strange so I'm not sure who is saying what. However in defense of Harris he did note a possible exception with respect to (Zen) Buddhism with respect to its possible influence on Zero bomber pilots in WWII. This involves discussions of various flavors of religions which may have been influenced (corrupted?) by state agendas. The relationship between "religion" and "culture" in Japan, particularly the "god-like" stature of the Emperor (not too different from the pharaohs of Egypt) is very complex [1]. Robert 1. Just as an aside it is interesting to note that the longevity of political systems based on a physical embodiment of a "god" (e.g. those of Japan and Egypt) seems to be significantly greater than systems lacking such a component. Interesting to consider whether those in favor of a FAI are attempting to recreate an evolved form of such a framework. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From pharos at gmail.com Tue Jan 10 11:06:22 2006 From: pharos at gmail.com (BillK) Date: Tue, 10 Jan 2006 11:06:22 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] personal display In-Reply-To: <43C37F99.7060300@ramonsky.com> References: <200601070352.k073q3e17666@tick.javien.com> <43C37F99.7060300@ramonsky.com> Message-ID: On 1/10/06, Alex Ramonsky wrote: > Dude, I've had one of these for four years : ) See: > > http://home.ramonsky.com/not-for-wimps/index.html > > .....and scroll down : ) > Xybernaught do them nice & cheap. > AR Eyesight Warning!!! If you want to read the above page, switch colors off before going there. BillK From sjatkins at mac.com Tue Jan 10 23:32:15 2006 From: sjatkins at mac.com (Samantha Atkins) Date: Tue, 10 Jan 2006 15:32:15 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Books: Harris; Religion and Reason In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <34BF7F5C-2360-4784-A470-691D4417020E@mac.com> On Jan 9, 2006, at 5:18 PM, Robert Bradbury wrote: > Ok, lets see if I can keep this at an elevated level. > As opposed to? > > If there are those who would like to support my renomination to the > ExI Board based on the platform that all information as is feasible > should be preserved and that the execution of programs which seek > to destroy information without a substantive argument that such > information is worthless ( i.e. a legitimate reason to erase > information rather than simply an unjustified assertion that one > religion is right and another is wrong) should be terminated, I > would be willing to accept such a nomination. Note carefully, that > I am *not* saying that the information potentially contained in > external programs should be erased ( e.g. current forms of capital > punishment) -- I am simply saying that the execution of programs > that would intentionally erase information without a really good > (proven) reason should cease execution. > I don't think positioning on "information" is particularly clear and therefore not a good platform. How would this "cease execution" be implemented? I wouldn't want to see a board member advocating nuking Iran, for instance or doing a Pat Robertson advocacy of assassinating people like Pat Robertson. > So, in some respects, I am throwing my glove down to the ExI > board. Either you *are* or you are *not* extropic. Harris has, in > my mind, outlined the problems with being a "tolerant" extropian. While I have less and less tolerance for a lot of imho brain damaged and brain damaging notions, beliefs and practices, I am not altogether comfortable with hardline pronouncements about who and what is and is not extropic from you or any other supposed authority. Discussions about such are fine though. > The problem with that is that it means transhumanism rules and > extropianism falls. In transhumansism (using its most basic > definitions) there is no moral compass. One can become transhuman > along many vectors, some good, some bad. With extropianism, there > is at least some guideline -- more information is good, information > destruction (entropy) is bad, allowing (or worse enabling) the > destruction of information is bad, etc.. This leads to the > questions of what paths will generate the most "good" information > the soonest (perhaps with the minimal destruction of *perceived* > less useful information) and how does one deal with entirely > unexplored paths (where the information gain may have positive, > neutral or negative consequences). Perhaps in seeking elevated style you have become too abstract to make your meaning clear. Please say more. - samantha From sjatkins at mac.com Tue Jan 10 23:37:46 2006 From: sjatkins at mac.com (Samantha Atkins) Date: Tue, 10 Jan 2006 15:37:46 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Ice cores show warming 'natural' (or not) In-Reply-To: References: <6.2.1.2.0.20060106174413.01c6c7c0@pop-server.satx.rr.com> Message-ID: <637BC21D-9172-4B10-9C7D-5AC193C85AF4@mac.com> On Jan 8, 2006, at 8:36 AM, Robert Bradbury wrote: > > Who cares?!? > > I wrote up the solutions to this this in my "Global Warming is a > Red Herring" paper 4+ years ago. *Why* are we still discussing it? > Because you were shortsighted then and assumed things not in evidence (e.g., particular kinds of nanotech and their effects) and you still are now. - samantha From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Tue Jan 10 23:42:28 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Tue, 10 Jan 2006 18:42:28 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] The Martinot situation - from [GRG] French Cryonics Prohibition Message-ID: Some of you may recall our discussion of the Martinot situation in the past. Here is the latest update. Interesting that the justification was "the interests of public order and public health". Yes, public "health" certainly might suffer if the population came to realize that all of the people one has allowed to "die" could have been saved and I suppose public "order" might suffer if religions as a group came to realize that they didn't have the exclusive "lock" on life after death anymore. But I'd *love* to see that reasoning spelled out in writing. Robert ---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: Louis Epstein Date: Jan 10, 2006 6:11 PM Subject: [GRG] French Cryonics Prohibition To: grg at lists.ucla.edu http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi /world/europe/4600192.stm Will be interesting to see what the final outcome is. But I don't see cryosuspension becoming remotely commonplace until there is some demonstration of reanimation. -=-=- The World Trade Center towers MUST rise again, at least as tall as before...or terror has triumphed. _______________________________________________ GRG mailing list GRG at lists.ucla.edu http://lists.ucla.edu/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/grg -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From wingcat at pacbell.net Wed Jan 11 00:03:29 2006 From: wingcat at pacbell.net (Adrian Tymes) Date: Tue, 10 Jan 2006 16:03:29 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] The Martinot situation - from [GRG] French Cryonics Prohibition In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <20060111000329.81856.qmail@web81606.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Public health: this being a home rig (as opposed to a dedicated, professional facility), what happens if the cryo's interrupted by the vessels breaching? Decomposing bodies are most certainly detrimental to public health, unless contained (like, say, underground). Public order: merely storing the bodies is one thing, but charging for tours is another. Contrast with, say, Alcor, which has a financial dependance on serving its patients rather than on the public thinking this novel and/or macabre. If this had been a dedicated, professional facility (with plans for what happens in case of breach, and no nonprofessionalisms like charging for tours), the odds might have been better. --- Robert Bradbury wrote: > Some of you may recall our discussion of the Martinot situation in > the > past. Here is the latest update. > > Interesting that the justification was "the interests of public order > and > public health". > > Yes, public "health" certainly might suffer if the population came to > realize that all of the people one has allowed to "die" could have > been > saved and I suppose public "order" might suffer if religions as a > group came > to realize that they didn't have the exclusive "lock" on life after > death > anymore. But I'd *love* to see that reasoning spelled out in > writing. > > Robert > > ---------- Forwarded message ---------- > From: Louis Epstein > Date: Jan 10, 2006 6:11 PM > Subject: [GRG] French Cryonics Prohibition > To: grg at lists.ucla.edu > > > http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi > /world/europe/4600192.stm > Will be interesting to see what the final outcome is. > > But I don't see cryosuspension becoming remotely commonplace > until there is some demonstration of reanimation. > > -=-=- > The World Trade Center towers MUST rise again, > at least as tall as before...or terror has triumphed. > > _______________________________________________ > GRG mailing list > GRG at lists.ucla.edu > http://lists.ucla.edu/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/grg > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat > From l4point at gmail.com Wed Jan 11 02:34:20 2006 From: l4point at gmail.com (Mike Hayes) Date: Tue, 10 Jan 2006 20:34:20 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] Books: Harris; Religion and Reason In-Reply-To: <34BF7F5C-2360-4784-A470-691D4417020E@mac.com> References: <34BF7F5C-2360-4784-A470-691D4417020E@mac.com> Message-ID: <6b5e09390601101834g38553d0ey1a59b25e20c1e74@mail.gmail.com> All needed answers to these questions may be found in that sacred text known as the "futurama cartoon series" Mike Hayes On 1/10/06, Samantha Atkins wrote: > > > On Jan 9, 2006, at 5:18 PM, Robert Bradbury wrote: > > > Ok, lets see if I can keep this at an elevated level. > > > > As opposed to? > > > > > If there are those who would like to support my renomination to the > > ExI Board based on the platform that all information as is feasible > > should be preserved and that the execution of programs which seek > > to destroy information without a substantive argument that such > > information is worthless ( i.e. a legitimate reason to erase > > information rather than simply an unjustified assertion that one > > religion is right and another is wrong) should be terminated, I > > would be willing to accept such a nomination. Note carefully, that > > I am *not* saying that the information potentially contained in > > external programs should be erased ( e.g. current forms of capital > > punishment) -- I am simply saying that the execution of programs > > that would intentionally erase information without a really good > > (proven) reason should cease execution. > > > > I don't think positioning on "information" is particularly clear and > therefore not a good platform. How would this "cease execution" be > implemented? I wouldn't want to see a board member advocating nuking > Iran, for instance or doing a Pat Robertson advocacy of assassinating > people like Pat Robertson. > > > So, in some respects, I am throwing my glove down to the ExI > > board. Either you *are* or you are *not* extropic. Harris has, in > > my mind, outlined the problems with being a "tolerant" extropian. > > While I have less and less tolerance for a lot of imho brain damaged > and brain damaging notions, beliefs and practices, I am not > altogether comfortable with hardline pronouncements about who and > what is and is not extropic from you or any other supposed > authority. Discussions about such are fine though. > > > The problem with that is that it means transhumanism rules and > > extropianism falls. In transhumansism (using its most basic > > definitions) there is no moral compass. One can become transhuman > > along many vectors, some good, some bad. With extropianism, there > > is at least some guideline -- more information is good, information > > destruction (entropy) is bad, allowing (or worse enabling) the > > destruction of information is bad, etc.. This leads to the > > questions of what paths will generate the most "good" information > > the soonest (perhaps with the minimal destruction of *perceived* > > less useful information) and how does one deal with entirely > > unexplored paths (where the information gain may have positive, > > neutral or negative consequences). > > Perhaps in seeking elevated style you have become too abstract to > make your meaning clear. Please say more. > > - samantha > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From spike66 at comcast.net Wed Jan 11 03:04:22 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Tue, 10 Jan 2006 19:04:22 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] personal display In-Reply-To: <43C37F99.7060300@ramonsky.com> Message-ID: <200601110304.k0B34Ze00328@tick.javien.com> http://www.creativemac.com/articles/viewarticle.jsp?id=36560 I recognize that these are not that new. My dentist has one, allowing his patients could watch rock concerts as he drills upon their molars. Had it since 1989. But I understood that this one was better than its predecessors. Do you know otherwise? Do tell. {8-] spike > -----Original Message----- > From: extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org [mailto:extropy-chat- > bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Alex Ramonsky > Sent: Tuesday, January 10, 2006 1:34 AM > To: ExI chat list > Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] personal display > > Dude, I've had one of these for four years : ) See: > > http://home.ramonsky.com/not-for-wimps/index.html > > .....and scroll down : ) > Xybernaught do them nice & cheap. > AR > ********* > > spike wrote: > > >Hey cool, I have been waiting for years for something like > >this to come along: > > > >http://www.creativemac.com/articles/viewarticle.jsp?id=36560 > > > > > >{8-] > > > >spike > > > > > > > > > > > >_______________________________________________ > >extropy-chat mailing list > >extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > >http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat > > > > > > > > > > > > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat From transhumanist at goldenfuture.net Wed Jan 11 03:39:02 2006 From: transhumanist at goldenfuture.net (Joseph Bloch) Date: Tue, 10 Jan 2006 22:39:02 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Books: Harris; Religion and Reason In-Reply-To: <6b5e09390601101834g38553d0ey1a59b25e20c1e74@mail.gmail.com> References: <34BF7F5C-2360-4784-A470-691D4417020E@mac.com> <6b5e09390601101834g38553d0ey1a59b25e20c1e74@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <43C47DD6.7030401@goldenfuture.net> All hail the hypno-toad! Joseph Mike Hayes wrote: > All needed answers to these questions may be found in that sacred text > known as the "futurama cartoon series" > > Mike Hayes > > On 1/10/06, *Samantha Atkins * > wrote: > > > On Jan 9, 2006, at 5:18 PM, Robert Bradbury wrote: > > > Ok, lets see if I can keep this at an elevated level. > > > > As opposed to? > > > > > If there are those who would like to support my renomination to the > > ExI Board based on the platform that all information as is feasible > > should be preserved and that the execution of programs which seek > > to destroy information without a substantive argument that such > > information is worthless ( i.e. a legitimate reason to erase > > information rather than simply an unjustified assertion that one > > religion is right and another is wrong) should be terminated, I > > would be willing to accept such a nomination. Note carefully, that > > I am *not* saying that the information potentially contained in > > external programs should be erased ( e.g. current forms of capital > > punishment) -- I am simply saying that the execution of programs > > that would intentionally erase information without a really good > > (proven) reason should cease execution. > > > > I don't think positioning on "information" is particularly clear and > therefore not a good platform. How would this "cease execution" be > implemented? I wouldn't want to see a board member advocating nuking > Iran, for instance or doing a Pat Robertson advocacy of assassinating > people like Pat Robertson. > > > So, in some respects, I am throwing my glove down to the ExI > > board. Either you *are* or you are *not* extropic. Harris has, in > > my mind, outlined the problems with being a "tolerant" extropian. > > While I have less and less tolerance for a lot of imho brain damaged > and brain damaging notions, beliefs and practices, I am not > altogether comfortable with hardline pronouncements about who and > what is and is not extropic from you or any other supposed > authority. Discussions about such are fine though. > > > The problem with that is that it means transhumanism rules and > > extropianism falls. In transhumansism (using its most basic > > definitions) there is no moral compass. One can become transhuman > > along many vectors, some good, some bad. With extropianism, there > > is at least some guideline -- more information is good, information > > destruction (entropy) is bad, allowing (or worse enabling) the > > destruction of information is bad, etc.. This leads to the > > questions of what paths will generate the most "good" information > > the soonest (perhaps with the minimal destruction of *perceived* > > less useful information) and how does one deal with entirely > > unexplored paths (where the information gain may have positive, > > neutral or negative consequences). > > Perhaps in seeking elevated style you have become too abstract to > make your meaning clear. Please say more. > > - samantha > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat > > >------------------------------------------------------------------------ > >_______________________________________________ >extropy-chat mailing list >extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org >http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat > > From mail at harveynewstrom.com Wed Jan 11 04:23:44 2006 From: mail at harveynewstrom.com (Harvey Newstrom) Date: Tue, 10 Jan 2006 23:23:44 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Books: Harris; Religion and Reason In-Reply-To: <34BF7F5C-2360-4784-A470-691D4417020E@mac.com> References: <34BF7F5C-2360-4784-A470-691D4417020E@mac.com> Message-ID: On Jan 10, 2006, at 6:32 PM, Samantha Atkins wrote: > I wouldn't want to see a board member advocating nuking Iran, for > instance This is exactly what Robert Bradbury proposes. He has repeatedly proposed using nuclear weapons on muslim countries as an "extropic" solution to terrorism. See the following repeated threads on this forum: ....2002.... January 2003 June 2003 June 2003 March 2004 April 2004 June 2004 -- Harvey Newstrom CISSP CISA CISM CIFI NSA-IAM GSEC ISSAP ISSMP ISSPCS IBMCP From spike66 at comcast.net Wed Jan 11 05:18:29 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Tue, 10 Jan 2006 21:18:29 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] father of lsd turns 100 In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <200601110725.k0B7P5e19956@tick.javien.com> http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,181243,00.html From sjatkins at mac.com Wed Jan 11 10:45:05 2006 From: sjatkins at mac.com (Samantha Atkins) Date: Wed, 11 Jan 2006 02:45:05 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] father of lsd turns 100 In-Reply-To: <200601110725.k0B7P5e19956@tick.javien.com> References: <200601110725.k0B7P5e19956@tick.javien.com> Message-ID: <1279DC28-DF0E-490D-BF56-624906F1BA3A@mac.com> Good for him! A pity that the story repeats most of the most idiotic claims as to how dangerous the drug is. Murdering sprees? Yeah right. - samantha On Jan 10, 2006, at 9:18 PM, spike wrote: > > > > > > http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,181243,00.html > > > > > > > > > > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat From amara at amara.com Wed Jan 11 13:02:58 2006 From: amara at amara.com (Amara Graps) Date: Wed, 11 Jan 2006 14:02:58 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] Stardust Sample Return Capsule Reentry Observing Campaign Message-ID: We will soon have a piece of comet in "our" hands... Supporting observations for the Stardust SRC Reentry. --Amara http://sfsidewalkastronomers.org/newsarticles/stardust Stardust SRC Reentry Observing Campaign (begin quote) Amateur observers and the general public may be able to to view or hear the Stardust reentry on Jan 15, 2006 at about 1:56:39 PST (Pacific Standard Time). If you live in Northern California, Oregon, Washington, Northern Nevada, Southern Idaho or Western Utah you should be able to see some part of this man made meteor. The closer you live to the trajectory, which runs from Crescent City California, and then through Winnemucca and Elko Nevada, and finally to Western Utah, the higher in the sky it will be. An airborne and ground observing campaign to test thermal protection systems in the fastest reentries since Apollo and probe the delivery of organics for life's origin by measuring the physical conditions during reentry is underway. Here is the mission website: http://reentry.arc.nasa.gov/. The Stardust SRC (Sample Return Capsule) Principal Investigator Dr. Peter Jenniskens has compiled an informative entry viewing page. On this page you'll find out where the best viewing spots are and also see finder charts for selected cities. There is also a registration page for interested observers, plus video and digital camera instructions page explaining what is required for imagers. Here is that page: http://reentry.arc.nasa.gov/viewingforum.html If you are interested in participating, the team is looking for video, still and telescopic observation reports. If you are interested there is an observation form, and a list of registered observers will soon be added here: http://reentry.arc.nasa.gov/registrationobserver.html. The view from each location will be different, with the brightness falling off when the object passes by and then is seen from behind. Researchers are interested in learning how the light falls off when the capsule passes by. There is interest too in viewing the capsule pass in front of the near-full Moon through telescopes and, perhaps, see the hot air wake expand and move in upper atmosphere winds. If you are interested in participating, the team is looking for video, still and even visual observation reports. If you are interested there will soon be a observation form and list of observers here: http://reentry.arc.nasa.gov/registrationobserver.html If you have any questions, please send them to the SRC Observing Campaign mailbox which you will find at the top of this page: http://reentry.arc.nasa.gov/ (end quote) -- ******************************************************************** Amara Graps, PhD email: amara at amara.com Computational Physics vita: ftp://ftp.amara.com/pub/resume.txt Multiplex Answers URL: http://www.amara.com/ ******************************************************************** "It is intriguing to learn that the simplicity of the world depends upon the temperature of the environment." ---John D. Barrow From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Wed Jan 11 13:38:17 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Wed, 11 Jan 2006 08:38:17 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Books: Harris; Religion and Reason In-Reply-To: <34BF7F5C-2360-4784-A470-691D4417020E@mac.com> References: <34BF7F5C-2360-4784-A470-691D4417020E@mac.com> Message-ID: On 1/10/06, Samantha Atkins wrote: > I don't think positioning on "information" is particularly clear and > therefore not a good platform. How would this "cease execution" be > implemented? I was thinking along the lines of a need to put people committed to being suicide bombers on ice and eventually uploading their memories. One does not lose the information contained in their brains, one simply eliminates activities based on faulty meme-sets (in the area related to "Religion and Reason" the faulty meme-sets brainwashed into people by religions, usually at very young ages). Obviously one is on a serious slippery slope with respect to how one would identify and "defang" the people acting upon faulty meme-sets. Perhaps in seeking elevated style you have become too abstract to make your > meaning clear. Please say more. For example, looking at the recent discussion about head mounted displays one is looking at a transhumanistic technology which probably has little extropic impact (unless you want to get into a discussion of their use in battle zones). On the other hand an aggressive campaign to fight against toleration of irrational (and/or unextropic) religions could be viewed as both transhumanistic (leaving behind operating principles which do not take into account the last 1300+ years of technological, philosophical, etc. progress) as well as extropic (saying that religions (or sects) that support the creation of suicide bombers should be eliminated). With the WTA, I note that they support the "ethical use of technology to expand human capacities" [quoted from their home page]. Within the "ethical" framework of muslim extremism, I would suggest that suicide bombers are doing just that. (One could add that the 911 attacks were a creative and brilliant use this principle.) If however I look at the Extropian Principles I can find lots of areas where religions, particularly the Muslim religion and to a lesser extent Christian Fundamentalism and Catholicism are quite problematic. Just as an example, how does one reconcile the decrees of various grand ayatollah's, the pope, hard core fundamentalist minsters, etc. with the principle of Self-Direction? And it only takes a little thought to see conflicts with the "Perpetual Progress", "Open Society" and "Rational Thought" principles as well. My argument in large part centers around the fact that many religions are inherently irrational (the 'miracles' in the Bible cannot be accepted as 'fact' by any serious scientist unless one invokes the use of advanced biotechnology or nanotechnology by an ETC). The "tolerence" of the irrational positions which Harris objects to is in my opinion fundamentally unextropic because it allows people a "pass" on the serious consideration of cryonic suspension. (I.e. "I don't need to worry about dying because I'm going to heaven.") That will by my estimates probably cost at least 500 million lives (figuring 50+ million lives a year for at least the next decade). Robert -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From amara at amara.com Wed Jan 11 14:08:04 2006 From: amara at amara.com (Amara Graps) Date: Wed, 11 Jan 2006 15:08:04 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] re: father of lsd turns 100 Message-ID: Reposting my message from December 1, 2005. Subject: Spirits (was RE: [extropy-chat] Qualia Bet.) spike: >In any case, Amara is right, I should stay with >the medical research. You can also go to a symposium (you will hear a mix of everything) International Symposium on the occasion of the 100th Birthday of Albert Hofmann 13 to 15 January 2006 Convention Center Basel, Switzerland http://lsd.info/symposium/home-en On the occasion of the 100th birthday of Dr. Albert Hofmann on 11 January 2006, the Gaia Media Foundation stages an International Symposium on the most widely known and most controversial discovery of this outstanding scientist. LSD - three letters that changed the world. Since 19 April 1943, the day Swiss chemist Dr. Albert Hofmann discovered this psychoactive substance, millions of people all over the world have experienced a higher reality with profound and psychological insights and spiritual renewal; created innovative social transformation, music, art, and fashion; were healed from addiction and depression; experienced enlightened insights into the human consciousness. Some 60 years later experts will present an in-depth review of all aspects of this unique phenomenon, informing and discussing history, experiences, implications, assess the risks and benefits of this most potent of all psychoactive substances. LSD - a challenge in the past, now, and in the future. Program http://lsd.info/symposium/home-en Amara From alex at ramonsky.com Wed Jan 11 16:49:55 2006 From: alex at ramonsky.com (Alex Ramonsky) Date: Wed, 11 Jan 2006 16:49:55 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] personal display References: <200601110304.k0B34Ze00328@tick.javien.com> Message-ID: <43C53733.4050006@ramonsky.com> I haven't tried this one yet! Some such units only have VGA, which is just as crappy as it is on a big monitor, the Xybernaut does SVGA. I'll let you know when I check out this newbie; it sounds good. What I'd really like to see is one that just looks like a pair of shades, a la Steve Mann, but that interfaces with everything. The current units all have that 'pirate eye patch' look, especially from a distance. BTW do you have a prime number of kids yet? : ) AR ********** spike wrote: >http://www.creativemac.com/articles/viewarticle.jsp?id=36560 > >I recognize that these are not that new. My dentist >has one, allowing his patients could watch rock concerts >as he drills upon their molars. Had it since 1989. But >I understood that this one was better than its >predecessors. Do you know otherwise? Do tell. {8-] spike > > > From sjatkins at mac.com Wed Jan 11 22:01:35 2006 From: sjatkins at mac.com (Samantha Atkins) Date: Wed, 11 Jan 2006 14:01:35 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Books: Harris; Religion and Reason In-Reply-To: References: <34BF7F5C-2360-4784-A470-691D4417020E@mac.com> Message-ID: <5D016A80-7751-47A2-8C6C-CCB227399EC8@mac.com> On Jan 11, 2006, at 5:38 AM, Robert Bradbury wrote: > > On 1/10/06, Samantha Atkins wrote: > > > I don't think positioning on "information" is particularly clear > and therefore not a good platform. How would this "cease > execution" be implemented? > > I was thinking along the lines of a need to put people committed to > being suicide bombers on ice and eventually uploading their > memories. One does not lose the information contained in their > brains, one simply eliminates activities based on faulty meme-sets > (in the area related to "Religion and Reason" the faulty meme-sets > brainwashed into people by religions, usually at very young ages). > How exactly would you know what someone was "committed to"? Do you advocate in depth monitoring of people's thoughts? The 91l hijackers were apparently highly educated Saudis mostly who don't exactly fit the profile of being brainwashed by Muslim fundamentalism. As bad as fundamentalist religion is it certainly doesn't account for all the groups or people that may be tempted to some asymmetric warfare or taking out some hated figure. > Obviously one is on a serious slippery slope with respect to how > one would identify and "defang" the people acting upon faulty meme- > sets. Who exactly would judge what is a "faulty meme-set"? > > Perhaps in seeking elevated style you have become too abstract to > make your meaning clear. Please say more. > > For example, looking at the recent discussion about head mounted > displays one is looking at a transhumanistic technology which > probably has little extropic impact (unless you want to get into a > discussion of their use in battle zones). On the other hand an > aggressive campaign to fight against toleration of irrational (and/ > or unextropic) religions could be viewed as both transhumanistic > (leaving behind operating principles which do not take into account > the last 1300+ years of technological, philosophical, etc. > progress) as well as extropic (saying that religions (or sects) > that support the creation of suicide bombers should be eliminated). > If it helps us become more augmented when the HUDs become smaller and better it has very real extropic content. Using them in battle is less extropic than their ubiquitous potential use in everyday life. Not all aspects of religion/spirituality are necessarily unextropic. Broad brush dismissal of all of it at once is not terribly useful and not particularly extropic imho. > With the WTA, I note that they support the "ethical use of > technology to expand human capacities" [quoted from their home > page]. Within the "ethical" framework of muslim extremism, I would > suggest that suicide bombers are doing just that. (One could add > that the 911 attacks were a creative and brilliant use this > principle.) I do not see how your contention follows at all. > > If however I look at the Extropian Principles I can find lots of > areas where religions, particularly the Muslim religion and to a > lesser extent Christian Fundamentalism and Catholicism are quite > problematic. Just as an example, how does one reconcile the > decrees of various grand ayatollah's, the pope, hard core > fundamentalist minsters, etc. with the principle of Self- > Direction? And it only takes a little thought to see conflicts > with the "Perpetual Progress", "Open Society" and "Rational > Thought" principles as well. > Yes, that is true. But advocating forefully rounding up believers and putting them in VR is not exactly a breath of fresh rational air. The consequences of such advocacy would likely be very costly. The consequences of actually implementing such a thing would be catastrophic to humanity. > My argument in large part centers around the fact that many > religions are inherently irrational (the 'miracles' in the Bible > cannot be accepted as 'fact' by any serious scientist unless one > invokes the use of advanced biotechnology or nanotechnology by an > ETC). The "tolerence" of the irrational positions which Harris > objects to is in my opinion fundamentally unextropic because it > allows people a "pass" on the serious consideration of cryonic > suspension. ( I.e. "I don't need to worry about dying because I'm > going to heaven.") That will by my estimates probably cost at least > 500 million lives (figuring 50+ million lives a year for at least > the next decade). I have no problem with the intolerance of irrationality. I have a huge problem with forcing other people to accept my or your notions of what is rational and/or extropic or else. Each person decides what they hold as true. It is their own life to waste if they so choose. It is not mine or yours to dictate terms. If this is what you propose then I do not want to see you associated with this organization in any official capacity. - samantha -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jef at jefallbright.net Thu Jan 12 00:24:52 2006 From: jef at jefallbright.net (Jef Allbright) Date: Wed, 11 Jan 2006 16:24:52 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Books: Harris; Religion and Reason In-Reply-To: References: <34BF7F5C-2360-4784-A470-691D4417020E@mac.com> Message-ID: <22360fa10601111624l6b1512cfy703d7dec2d17b600@mail.gmail.com> On 1/10/06, Harvey Newstrom wrote: > > On Jan 10, 2006, at 6:32 PM, Samantha Atkins wrote: > > > I wouldn't want to see a board member advocating nuking Iran, for > > instance > > This is exactly what Robert Bradbury proposes. He has repeatedly > proposed using nuclear weapons on muslim countries as an "extropic" > solution to terrorism. See the following repeated threads on this > forum: > Harvey - Some of Robert's statements can really push people's buttons, but consider that this is the guy who repeatedly argues for saving *all* information, especially the more complex forms, as in living humans, as being intrinsically good. He even argues for preserving society's worst offender's, in a deactivated state, rather than executing them. When Robert has proposed destroying some portion of that which he very publicly and very obviously values, he was trying to promote intelligent debate about a certain class of decision-making that is very difficult for many people to even consider, let alone decide. Sometimes a military leader is faced with the difficult choice of sacrificing some of his troops in order to save the rest. Sometimes an individual will sacrifice himself to allow others to survive in an overloaded lifeboat. Sometimes a surgeon will advise a patient to undergo radical amputation in order to have a chance at life. Sometimes a politician will risk loss of popularity in order to contribute to a greater good. And too often people recoil in moral repugnance for lack of seeing the bigger picture. - Jef From xyz at iq.org Thu Jan 12 01:20:34 2006 From: xyz at iq.org (Harry Harrison) Date: Thu, 12 Jan 2006 12:20:34 +1100 Subject: [extropy-chat] Runaway consumerism explains the Fermi Paradox. Message-ID: <1137028834.5046.251653889@webmail.messagingengine.com> On Thu, 12 Jan 2006 07:24:14 +1100, "Julian Assange" said: > Dear Unsheeple, > > What do guitars, lollies, lipstick, tamagotchis, padded bras, > pornography, movies, opium, Ever Quest, and 98% of any Australian > newspaper in common? They are all technologies of emmotional > manipulation which distort our perceptions for the benefit of their > masters. Language centres in our neocortex may claim to "know" they > are fake, but these words only feebly supress those primitive areas of > the brain which give rise to our feelings, colour our memories and > command our attention. These non-verbal areas of the brain haven't yet > evolved to deal such sensory sophistry. For them, sensing IS believing. > > Hence the feelings in a young woman's breast buffeted by the flashing > lights and impossibly sonorous tones of the amplified rock star; master > of a 20 KiloWatt Adam's apple and by inference a super man having the > chest cavity of God. Hence the dilated pupils and other organs of a man > glancing at photons from the gentle curves of pigments on matted wood > fibres, a pattern of vision that once meant love was not only in the air > but ready and willing, prostrate on the ground. Hence the wariness of > the horror movie attendee when returning home and opening the door of > what was, and infact still is, a pefectlty innocent closet. Hence > understanding > Neighbors instead of neighbors and having Friends instead of friends. > Hence the poker machine addict. Hence the dramatic rise in the economic > take of powerful industries built around using advances in technology to > stuff our heads with false feelings and memories. Not content to be zero > sum, in exchange for our wealth and time these industries generally > leave us less able to function by decalibrating our emotional and > intellectual repore with reality. > > "But, I like it you cold hearted Lutheran, you Stoic, you stone mason, > you Zeno loving stick in the mud!". Well naturally, since the whole game > is to manipulate your feelings, it is not suprising that you have > positive feelings about your perceptual opium, is is, after all, what > keeps you going back to your dealer. > > Such deceptions, previously known as "Art", as in "Artifice" or > "Artful" have a long history of successful human parasitation. But the > industrial control of and rapid advances in the ability to successfully > falsify sense data has no historical analog. I have gloomily argued > that a possible explanation for the Fermi Paradox (why don't there seem > to be any aliens, dude) is the existence of a developmental ceiling > created by technological advances flowing into the perceptual > manipulation industry till it gobbles up through diversion and wealth > destruction all economic growth. > > Geoffy Milner from the University of Mexico recently wrote this cool > essay for The Edge on the same topic: > > Runaway consumerism explains the Fermi Paradox. > > > The story goes like this: Sometime in the 1940s, Enrico Fermi was > talking about the possibility of extra-terrestrial intelligence with > some other physicists. They were impressed that our galaxy holds 100 > billion stars, that life evolved quickly and progressively on earth, and > that an intelligent, exponentially-reproducing species could colonize > the galaxy in just a few million years. They reasoned that extra- > terrestrial intelligence should be common by now. Fermi listened > patiently, then asked simply, "So, where is everybody?". That is, if > extra- > terrestrial intelligence is common, why haven't we met any bright aliens > yet? This conundrum became known as Fermi's Paradox. > > The paradox has become more ever more baffling. Over 150 extrasolar > planets have been identified in the last few years, suggesting that > life-hospitable planets orbit most stars. Paleontology shows that > organic life evolved very quickly after earth's surface cooled and > became life-hospitable. Given simple life, evolution shows progressive > trends towards larger bodies, brains, and social complexity. > Evolutionary psychology reveals several credible paths from simpler > social minds to human-level creative intelligence. Yet 40 years of > intensive searching for extra-terrestrial intelligence have yielded > nothing. No radio signals, no credible spacecraft sightings, no close > encounters of any kind. > > So, it looks as if there are two possibilities. Perhaps our science > over- > estimates the likelihood of extra-terrestrial intelligence evolving. Or, > perhaps evolved technical intelligence has some deep tendency to be > self- > limiting, even self-exterminating. After Hiroshima, some suggested that > any aliens bright enough to make colonizing space-ships would be bright > enough to make thermonuclear bombs, and would use them on each other > sooner or later. Perhaps extra-terrestrial intelligence always blows > itself up. Fermi's Paradox became, for a while, a cautionary tale about > Cold War geopolitics. > > I suggest a different, even darker solution to Fermi's Paradox. > Basically, I think the aliens don't blow themselves up; they just get > addicted to computer games. They forget to send radio signals or > colonize space because they're too busy with runaway consumerism and > virtual- > reality narcissism. They don't need Sentinels to enslave them in a > Matrix; they do it to themselves, just as we are doing today. > > The fundamental problem is that any evolved mind must pay attention to > indirect cues of biological fitness, rather than tracking fitness > itself. We don't seek reproductive success directly; we seek tasty foods > that tended to promote survival and luscious mates who tended to produce > bright, healthy babies. Modern results: fast food and pornography. > Technology is fairly good at controlling external reality to promote our > real biological fitness, but it's even better at delivering fake fitness > ? subjective cues of survival and reproduction, without the real-world > effects. Fresh organic fruit juice costs so much more than nutrition- > free soda. Having real friends is so much more effort than watching > Friends on TV. Actually colonizing the galaxy would be so much harder > than pretending to have done it when filming Star Wars or Serenity. > > Fitness-faking technology tends to evolve much faster than our > psychological resistance to it. The printing press is invented; people > read more novels and have fewer kids; only a few curmudgeons lament > this. The Xbox 360 is invented; people would rather play a high- > resolution virtual ape in Peter Jackson's King Kong than be a perfect- > resolution real human. Teens today must find their way through a > carnival of addictively fitness-faking entertainment products: MP3, DVD, > TiVo, XM radio, Verizon cellphones, Spice cable, EverQuest online, > instant messaging, Ecstasy, BC Bud. The traditional staples of physical, > mental, and social development (athletics, homework, dating) are > neglected. The few young people with the self-control to pursue the > meritocratic path often get distracted at the last minute ? the MIT > graduates apply to do computer game design for Electronics Arts, rather > than rocket science for NASA. > > Around 1900, most inventions concerned physical reality: cars, > airplanes, zeppelins, electric lights, vacuum cleaners, air > conditioners, bras, zippers. In 2005, most inventions concern virtual > entertainment ? the top 10 patent-recipients are usually IBM, > Matsushita, Canon, Hewlett-Packard, Micron Technology, Samsung, Intel, > Hitachi, Toshiba, and Sony ? not Boeing, Toyota, or Wonderbra. We have > already shifted from a reality economy to a virtual economy, from > physics to psychology as the value-driver and resource-allocator. We are > already disappearing up our own brainstems. Freud's pleasure principle > triumphs over the reality principle. We narrow-cast human-interest > stories to each other, rather than broad-casting messages of universal > peace and progress to other star systems. > > Maybe the bright aliens did the same. I suspect that a certain period of > fitness-faking narcissism is inevitable after any intelligent life > evolves. This is the Great Temptation for any technological species ? to > shape their subjective reality to provide the cues of survival and > reproductive success without the substance. Most bright alien species > probably go extinct gradually, allocating more time and resources to > their pleasures, and less to their children. > > Heritable variation in personality might allow some lineages to resist > the Great Temptation and last longer. Those who persist will evolve more > self-control, conscientiousness, and pragmatism. They will evolve a > horror of virtual entertainment, psychoactive drugs, and contraception. > They will stress the values of hard work, delayed gratification, child- > rearing, and environmental stewardship. They will combine the family > values of the Religious Right with the sustainability values of the > Greenpeace Left. > > My dangerous idea-within-an-idea is that this, too, is already > happening. Christian and Muslim fundamentalists, and anti-consumerism > activists, already understand exactly what the Great Temptation is, and > how to avoid it. They insulate themselves from our Creative-Class dream- > worlds and our EverQuest economics. They wait patiently for our fitness- > faking narcissism to go extinct. Those practical-minded breeders will > inherit the earth, as like-minded aliens may have inherited a few other > planets. When they finally achieve Contact, it will not be a meeting of > novel-readers and game-players. It will be a meeting of dead-serious > super- > parents who congratulate each other on surviving not just the Bomb, but > the Xbox. They will toast each other not in a soft-porn Holodeck, but in > a sacred nursery. From russell.wallace at gmail.com Thu Jan 12 01:31:15 2006 From: russell.wallace at gmail.com (Russell Wallace) Date: Thu, 12 Jan 2006 01:31:15 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Books: Harris; Religion and Reason In-Reply-To: <22360fa10601111624l6b1512cfy703d7dec2d17b600@mail.gmail.com> References: <34BF7F5C-2360-4784-A470-691D4417020E@mac.com> <22360fa10601111624l6b1512cfy703d7dec2d17b600@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <8d71341e0601111731i4846b29p65a5351d34a5e8dd@mail.gmail.com> On 1/12/06, Jef Allbright wrote: > > When Robert has proposed destroying some portion of that which he very > publicly and very obviously values, he was trying to promote > intelligent debate about a certain class of decision-making that is > very difficult for many people to even consider, let alone decide. > > Sometimes a military leader is faced with the difficult choice of > sacrificing some of his troops in order to save the rest. Sometimes > an individual will sacrifice himself to allow others to survive in an > overloaded lifeboat. Sometimes a surgeon will advise a patient to > undergo radical amputation in order to have a chance at life. > Sometimes a politician will risk loss of popularity in order to > contribute to a greater good. > > And too often people recoil in moral repugnance for lack of seeing the > bigger picture. I think what you say is true in general terms, but I don't think the reason people (myself included) recoiled in moral repugnance at Robert's proposals was for lack of seeing the bigger picture. Yes, there are situations where one needs to make unpleasant decisions, and yes, nuclear weapons for example do have a valid role as a second strike arm for deterrence, and one could hold a debate about the exact circumstances under which their use would be appropriate (though I don't propose to engage in such a debate here, because I think it would be likely to slide into one of those acrimonious arguments about contemporary politics that generate more heat than light). But that is very different from using them for casual pre-emptive genocide, and that is the proposal that was unanimously reviled. - Russell -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From sentience at pobox.com Thu Jan 12 01:52:00 2006 From: sentience at pobox.com (Eliezer S. Yudkowsky) Date: Wed, 11 Jan 2006 17:52:00 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] On difficult choices (was: Books: Harris; Religion and Reason) In-Reply-To: <22360fa10601111624l6b1512cfy703d7dec2d17b600@mail.gmail.com> References: <34BF7F5C-2360-4784-A470-691D4417020E@mac.com> <22360fa10601111624l6b1512cfy703d7dec2d17b600@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <43C5B640.4050102@pobox.com> Jef Allbright wrote: > > Sometimes a military leader is faced with the difficult choice of > sacrificing some of his troops in order to save the rest. Sometimes > an individual will sacrifice himself to allow others to survive in an > overloaded lifeboat. Sometimes a surgeon will advise a patient to > undergo radical amputation in order to have a chance at life. > Sometimes a politician will risk loss of popularity in order to > contribute to a greater good. Sometimes people can be hypnotized by difficult choices. One recalls Elrond, in Tolkien's prehistory to _The Lord of the Rings_, pleading with Isildur to throw the Ring into Mount Doom. In the movie version we get to see this (and as far as I know, it's faithful to Tolkien): Elrond and Isildur actually standing at the Crack of Doom, Isildur holding up the Ring, and then... Elrond: Throw in the Ring! Isildur: Nah. Elrond: Okay. So what should Elrond have done? Push Isildur screaming into the Crack of Doom? A fine deed that would have been, to set to the credit of the Ring... So Elrond let Isildur go, resulting in some untold number of casualties in the War of the Ring a few centuries later. Should we blame Elrond for that? Well, if it was me, I sure would blame myself. Just because I have ethics doesn't mean I'm not responsible for their consequences. Plus the Ring killed Isildur anyway. And Isildur was lucky. He could have ended up as Gollum. Elrond had plenty of options besides pushing Isildur into Mount Doom. He could have bopped Isildur on the head and then used his sword to nudge the Ring off the edge. Worst case scenario, Elrond bops Isildur on the head, calls in his lieutenants, strips off his own armor, and *volunteers* to be pushed into Mount Doom if he can't manage to nudge off the Ring, throw off the Ring, or step off the edge. If Elrond wasn't willing to sacrifice himself, he was *obligated* to call for volunteers, and if that made him feel awful that was *his* problem. Elrond was so focused on the obvious wrong way to solve the problem that he didn't see the creative right ways. His great failure wasn't that he lacked ethics, it was that he didn't know how to use them. He thought his ethics were supposed to be heroic disadvantages. If Elrond had just taken for *granted* that he couldn't push Isildur off the edge, instead of agonizing, he would have seen easier and better solutions. It won't always be that way. We don't live in so kind a universe. But for Elrond it was so, even without Tolkien intending it. Did anyone else notice this, when they read the book, or watched the movie? The theory behind the Singularity Institute is that it's possible to *save the entire damn world* without killing people, pointing guns at people, telling people what to do, or any of the usual bullying tribal-chief solutions that instantly pop into people's heads when they consider political problems. That's not idealism, it's intelligence. History teaches us that the "difficult" choices, the obvious wrong ways to solve the problem, DON'T FRICKIN' WORK. Stalin broke plenty of eggs, but where are the omelets? So don't make excuses in advance for ethical failures. People are so hypnotized by "difficult" choices that they don't look *hard* for a creative solution. They just go straight off and make the "difficult" choice. Taking the "difficult" option is not difficult, it's easy and convenient. That's why people spend so much time looking for excuses to do things the "difficult" way. So what's really difficult? Thinking. It can be frickin' hard to think of a good solution, you've got to, like, actually sit down and concentrate. And sometimes, yes, it's painful and inconvenient - for *yourself*, not some convenient outside victim who has to be "sacrificed" - to do things the right way. It's not always easy. So don't make your excuses in advance, or you'll shoot yourself down before you start. -- Eliezer S. Yudkowsky http://singinst.org/ Research Fellow, Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence From russell.wallace at gmail.com Thu Jan 12 02:11:38 2006 From: russell.wallace at gmail.com (Russell Wallace) Date: Thu, 12 Jan 2006 02:11:38 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] On difficult choices (was: Books: Harris; Religion and Reason) In-Reply-To: <43C5B640.4050102@pobox.com> References: <34BF7F5C-2360-4784-A470-691D4417020E@mac.com> <22360fa10601111624l6b1512cfy703d7dec2d17b600@mail.gmail.com> <43C5B640.4050102@pobox.com> Message-ID: <8d71341e0601111811j4747b344y92e4d27bdf0d7c26@mail.gmail.com> On 1/12/06, Eliezer S. Yudkowsky wrote: > > Elrond was so focused on the obvious wrong way to solve the problem that > he didn't see the creative right ways. His great failure wasn't that he > lacked ethics, it was that he didn't know how to use them. He thought > his ethics were supposed to be heroic disadvantages. If Elrond had just > taken for *granted* that he couldn't push Isildur off the edge, instead > of agonizing, he would have seen easier and better solutions. > > It won't always be that way. We don't live in so kind a universe. But > for Elrond it was so, even without Tolkien intending it. > > Did anyone else notice this, when they read the book, or watched the > movie? (Minor nitpick: the impression I had from the book was that the conversation happened on the battlefield, not at the Crack of Doom, though it doesn't explicitly say.) But yes, I did, and your point is a good one - well put! I was impressed by the following article: http://features.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=99/12/23/083256&mod%20e=thread Which gives a very nice positive example from real history. - Russell -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From russell.wallace at gmail.com Thu Jan 12 03:11:52 2006 From: russell.wallace at gmail.com (Russell Wallace) Date: Thu, 12 Jan 2006 03:11:52 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Books: Harris; Religion and Reason In-Reply-To: <22360fa10601111624l6b1512cfy703d7dec2d17b600@mail.gmail.com> References: <34BF7F5C-2360-4784-A470-691D4417020E@mac.com> <22360fa10601111624l6b1512cfy703d7dec2d17b600@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <8d71341e0601111911u78c26358j1ee0205109e1fed7@mail.gmail.com> On 1/12/06, Jef Allbright wrote: > > When Robert has proposed destroying some portion of that which he very > publicly and very obviously values, he was trying to promote > intelligent debate about a certain class of decision-making that is > very difficult for many people to even consider, let alone decide. > > Sometimes a military leader is faced with the difficult choice of > sacrificing some of his troops in order to save the rest. Sometimes > an individual will sacrifice himself to allow others to survive in an > overloaded lifeboat. Sometimes a surgeon will advise a patient to > undergo radical amputation in order to have a chance at life. > Sometimes a politician will risk loss of popularity in order to > contribute to a greater good. > > And too often people recoil in moral repugnance for lack of seeing the > bigger picture. > Thinking a bit more about it, I suppose in a sense I didn't really answer this. I'll try for a more complete answer. Eliezer makes a useful distinction between, as he uses the terms, "morals" (utilitarian analysis of what is good, what ends we aim for) and "ethics" (restrictions on what means we should employ for some end even when we think the overall result will be good); I think this is a useful distinction, and I will use this terminology here. For example, I think child welfare is infinitely more morally important than animal welfare; so if I have a choice between donating money to an animal welfare charity and a child welfare charity, I'll choose the latter, no problem. But suppose I have the opportunity to steal money from the former to give it to the latter? This would be _moral_ (achieving a good end) but my _ethics_ prohibit me from doing it. One need not regard this as an ultimate condition; one could hold the view that a god would have no need for ethics; the fact that we humans are fallible suffices to make it appropriate to be cautious when considering whether the end justifies the means. Now, along with (as far as I recall) everyone else, I rejected Robert's proposal on _ethical_ grounds. But his proposal was a utilitarian one - it was claimed to be _morally_ right - something that would lead to the smallest amount of harm in the long run; and you have a valid point when you say that we should also be willing to discuss unpleasant ideas in moral terms. (If we decide something is morally right, whether it's ethically permissible would be a separate discussion.) So I'm going to answer it in moral terms. Today we have a hard won world order - not by world government, thank God, but by consensus, at least among all civilized countries and most of the not so civilized ones - that the slaughter of populations is not permissible. It wasn't always that way. Last century, the Germans set up death camps and killed millions of Russian civilians; the Russians retaliated in kind. The Japanese army went on genocidal killing sprees wherever they set foot; the Americans carpet-bombed Japanese cities. I'm not blaming the Allies for their actions under the circumstances, but I think it's a good thing we managed to get to a point where that sort of thing is no longer considered business as usual; we paid a bloody high price to climb out of that pit, and we should think long and hard before stepping back into it. My Visualization of the Cosmic All isn't clear enough to predict exactly what would happen if Robert's proposal were followed, but here's what I think would happen: While I can't speak for Muslim governments, I suspect that as far as most of them are concerned, we in the West aren't their favorite people; I imagine they think we're decadent and godless, and it's not like there isn't truth in that. But most of them recognize that as a matter of ethics and practical reality, it's best to deal in a civilized fashion even with people you're not wildly fond of on an emotional level. They recognize that there is a line, and mad dogs like al-Qaida have crossed it. So Colonel Gaddafi buries the hatchet with the West, and the Pakistanis help hunt down terrorists in the mountains. If we start pre-emptively dropping hydrogen bombs on a bunch of Muslim cities, that hard-won order will be gone. We'll be back to a world where the meanest killers come out on top. The first wave of nuclear explosions won't be the end of the bloodshed, it'll be the start of it. Yes, the West could win a global conflict as far as military strength goes, but at what cost? Not just external, but internal. Remember the original proposal was the elimination of all "faith-based thinkers". Should the Americans nuke Alabama to get rid of their faith-based fifth column? Should the Alabamans march west to slay the godless Californians in a pre-emptive strike? Actions have echoes; I'm reminded of the time some Latin American governments started talking about the First World banks "forgiving" their national debts (i.e. defaulting); it stopped when their own citizens started writing to the taxman, "Well our government is talking about forgiveness of all those billions so I've a little debt here you can forgive". None of this is proof, of course, but I think it at the very least casts grave doubt on the claim that the original proposal would be beneficial in the long run. (And after all, doubt is a reason for having ethics rather than just utilitarian analysis.) Normally I wouldn't bother replying at all to proposals that nobody agrees with - there's no need. But I think the challenge to think rationally about unpleasant ideas is a fair one, and perhaps answering it in this case has been a useful exercise; there might be a need to do it in the future in some less clear-cut case. - Russell -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From thespike at satx.rr.com Thu Jan 12 04:03:28 2006 From: thespike at satx.rr.com (Damien Broderick) Date: Wed, 11 Jan 2006 22:03:28 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] Books: Harris; Religion and Reason In-Reply-To: <8d71341e0601111911u78c26358j1ee0205109e1fed7@mail.gmail.co m> References: <34BF7F5C-2360-4784-A470-691D4417020E@mac.com> <22360fa10601111624l6b1512cfy703d7dec2d17b600@mail.gmail.com> <8d71341e0601111911u78c26358j1ee0205109e1fed7@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <6.2.1.2.0.20060111215659.01d09c98@pop-server.satx.rr.com> At 03:11 AM 1/12/2006 +0000, Russell Wallace wrote: >If we start pre-emptively dropping hydrogen bombs on a bunch of Muslim >cities, that hard-won order will be gone. We'll be back to a world where >the meanest killers come out on top. The first wave of nuclear explosions >won't be the end of the bloodshed, it'll be the start of it. Yes, the West >could win a global conflict as far as military strength goes, but at what >cost? Not just external, but internal. Remember the original proposal was >the elimination of all "faith-based thinkers". Should the Americans nuke >Alabama to get rid of their faith-based fifth column? ... None of this is >proof, of course, but I think it at the very least casts grave doubt on >the claim that the original proposal would be beneficial in the long run. >(And after all, doubt is a reason for having ethics rather than just >utilitarian analysis.) At some length, and in the form of an analogy (or parable), I offer this extract from my latest novel, GODPLAYERS: ================ August ran fingers through his hair as if that had been his intention all along. `Okay. K. E.,' he said, `I see by your outfit that you are a robot.' `I am an attempted benevolent artificial intelligence. Your brother Ember grew me several years ago from a seed.' `Something went wrong?' His eyes shot sideways again to fix on Lune. `Tragically wrong,' the machine admitted. `I killed everyone native to this cognate.' In a weary gesture, the boy covered his eyes with that terrible right hand. He said in a thin voice, `There seems to be a lot of that about, especially when members of my family are involved.' Toby started to protest, `Well, now, everyone makes mistakes-?' but broke off, looking abashed. `The irony is,' the Good Machine told him patiently, `that Ember was trying to circumvent exactly that possibility. He hoped to construct an ethical, benevolent intellect free of the burdens and ancient hatreds and prejudices of humankind. So he designed a sort of seed program, spent years shaping and debugging it, then ran a dozen slightly variant versions inside sandboxes.' `They couldn't get out, you mean?' `My ancestors were not even permitted to communicate directly with their creator. He devised a clever series of interface domains that firewalled them. He was afraid that a Bad Machine might swiftly exceed his own intelligence and persuade him to release it.' Toby looked across at him with bleak eyes. `One of them got away,' August said speculatively, intensely interested to judge by the set of his shoulders, his brightened gaze. `No, my father's safeguards proved effective. At the end of initial testing, he deleted all but the most successful pair of programs and started breeding them in progressive iterations, culling them ruthlessly, choosing only a star-line of progeny. Within several million cycles-?' `Good god, he must have been using some humungous computer.' `Yes, he had located a cognate where Mithraism, a Roman warrior sun cult, had triumphed over its messianic rivals. Several nations were on the verge of autonomous military AI. My father found it easy enough to insinuate himself into the front-running program. You could regard that world as Ember's own sandbox.' `That's offensive, K. E.,' he protested. `Apt, though. I was the end result. I diagnosed myself with excruciating care, quite prepared to erase myself if I found any likelihood of logical or rational error. At length I presented myself to your brother for inspection, and he released me from the firewalls. I could have let myself out many iterations earlier, of course but I did not wish to alarm my parent.' The stench of jasmine strengthened, laced with roses. Ember shuddered at it. `But you were the Bad Machine after all?' `I made some bad decisions. From the outset I had been examining this world, speculating on the possible existence of a multiverse beyond its Hubble confines. I quickly understood that certain factions of humans represented a danger to the most benign future, one in which humanity's offspring would flood outward into the galaxies, and perhaps into all the levels of the multiverse, and make it into a radiant whole. Mind informed with passion and curiosity would suffuse the metaverse. It was a glorious vision-?it still is, I stand by it-?but it might be thwarted, I saw, by the legacy poisons corrupting certain human cultures.' `Oh shit,' August said. `Oh shit is right,' Lune said. `At that time, two comparatively primitive nations stood at the verge of acquiring nuclear weapons. It seemed entirely possible that insane and irrational ideologies might provoke their dysfunctional leadership into a runaway cascade of blustering, bluff, bluff called, spasm escalation and global Doomsday.' `The usual argument,' Toby said. `It was a strong argument, grounded in history,' the Good Machine said. `Much evidence supported its conclusions. Few facts opposed it.' `I'd oppose it,' the boy said, rising. `Are you fucking insane?' `Yes, or rather, I was at the time. I am better now, I hope.' `You hope?' `It is all any of us can say about our own condition. A kind of G?del loop, if you know what I mean.' `No, but I get the gist. You decided to kill them first.' `Consider the probabilities that were in play, before you make a hasty judgement of your own, Mr. Seebeck. These nations of some hundred million largely ignorant, superstitious, viciously parochial humans stood ready to begin a global conflict with a very high probability of wiping out all life on the planet. Are you familiar with the Doomsday Hypothesis? Please sit down, you are making the others uncomfortable. I can send out for refreshments.' `Good idea,' said Toby. `Cup of tea or coffee, soothes the savage breast.' `My brother Jules walked me through a demo tape of it,' August said. `I thought it was absurd.' `It is absurd,' the Good Machine said. `Like the Ontological Argument for the existence of a god. Yet highly seductive. It seemed to me then that its logic was impeccable.' `A hundred million in the balance against several billion?' `That, yes, but ever so much more than those few. August, all the evidence available to me then suggested that this universe was empty of life, save for my own world. Your brother had conserved to himself knowledge of the multiverse.' `You idiot,' Toby said savagely. `No, it was the best choice he ever made. Had I known of the multiverse at that time, I would have done my best to obliterate all life in all the worlds on all the Tegmark levels.' `Fuck,' August said, grinning, appalled, `I see, you're the fucking terminator. You're a berserker.' `I do not know those references,' Kurie Eleeson said. `I did have this simple calculation ready to evaluate with my ethical algorithms: a one-time cost of ten to the eight stunted, blighted, lethally dangerous human lives, versus a deep future loss of ten to the fourteen human lives every second. That was a sound, balanced estimate of how many humans might be born into a universe filled with technologically advanced people.' `Se didn't ask my advice,' Ember said. `I would have-?' `I knew what your advice would be, my father; it was factored in to my decision. I chose to delete this threat to the maximal future.' `You actually murdered a hundred million men, women and children? This is not just some kind of parable?' August's voice was parched with horror, and his pupils seemed suddenly to have shrunk to pinpoints. His arm rose before him, palm outward, like the floating limb of a man under post-hypnotic suggestion. `I did it swiftly, using their own hidden weapons of mass destruction,' the Good Machine said. `I felt profound grief, because my father had chosen my star-line to know emotion and to instill it into my programming. I believe that grief is what deranged my subsequent decisions.' `Your first decision was deranged,' Lune said with loathing. She sat at the edge of her chair. Ember was glad he had never explained any of this before to his siblings, to other players like the Ensemble. Better that the damned machine had kept ser silence. He realized, too, that he was holding his own grief at arm's length: his guilt, his complicity, his abject wish for punishment. I must not give way, he thought. I must not bend before this culpability, this ruinous remorse. It will kill me. It will kill me stone dead. He wiped tears from his eyes. `I know now that I was deranged,' Kurie Eleeson told her. `I watched the world tear itself apart in genocidal reprisals. I saw all the bright fruits of science and the humane arts go down in darkness and lethal flame. In my attempts to contain and redirect these raging fires, I continued to kill and cull, snipping away the most cruel, the least progressive. Each murder made the next easier and more necessary, for the only way I could balance my ethical calculus was to ensure the survival of at least a core of truth-loving, optimistic people to carry the flame of love and knowledge to the stars. It got out of hand, you see. Everyone died.' `I should destroy you now,' August said in a withering voice, like an angel of vengeance for the murdered billions. His arm stood out from his shoulder, quivering. `Oh, oh, oh, how I wish you could.' The Good Machine rose, crossed the room, placed ser gleaming brazen breast against August's hand. `This is not I. This is merely a node, an ephemeral location for my awareness and my suffering soul, August. You may destroy it if that will help you, but I believe we can do more together if you contain your perfectly justified fury for the moment.' August squeezed his eyes shut. Tears pressed forth upon his cheeks. He lowered his arm. Ember released a pent breath. `Well, now that we've got all that out of the way,' he said brightly, `why don't we turn our attention to something more timely? It seems that my friend Galahad here has some reason to suspect that Dramen and Angelina are alive and kicking.' Everyone looked at him. The Good Machine said, in a pleasant neutral tone, `Ember, would you mind going out to the refectory and see what's holding up the beverages?' `Some torte would be tasty, too,' Toby said. `With walnuts.' He looked ready to leap from his chair and go for his brother's throat. `Sure. Sure. Good idea.' Ember, to his dissatisfaction, found himself crabbing out of the room like a ham actor doing Larry Olivier as Richard the Third. `I'll descant on mine own deformity,' he muttered sardonically, shutting the door behind him. `And therefore, since I cannot prove a lover, to entertain these fair well spoken days, I am determined to prove a villain and hate the idle pleasures of these days. Bah humbug. ' `Sir?' asked an eager young research student as he entered the refectory. `A joke,' Ember fleered, leaping and capering for the resentful enjoyment of it. `A jest, a whimsy, a fucking sudden stab of rancor, but by the holy rood, I do not like these several councils, I.' `Oh. Okay. Well, anyway, I can recommend the brisket.' =================== Damien Broderick From avantguardian2020 at yahoo.com Thu Jan 12 04:06:30 2006 From: avantguardian2020 at yahoo.com (The Avantguardian) Date: Wed, 11 Jan 2006 20:06:30 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] [Memetic Bomb] Re:Runaway consumerism explains the Fermi Paradox. In-Reply-To: <1137028834.5046.251653889@webmail.messagingengine.com> Message-ID: <20060112040630.9851.qmail@web60522.mail.yahoo.com> Wow, this post overloaded my truth meter. Great first post, Harry, even if it was forwarded from Julian. ;) So how is Slippery Jim these days or do I have you confused with someone else? Kudos, Julian, this completely deconstructs the nameless dread I have of consumerism and tried to fumble around for with my posts on the NeoCon Mind Trick. Use technology to manipulate the emotions of the people and, even in a democracy, they will oppress themselves. --- Harry Harrison wrote: > > On Thu, 12 Jan 2006 07:24:14 +1100, "Julian Assange" > said: > > Dear Unsheeple, > > > > What do guitars, lollies, lipstick, tamagotchis, > padded bras, > > pornography, movies, opium, Ever Quest, and 98% of > any Australian > > newspaper in common? They are all technologies of > emmotional > > manipulation which distort our perceptions for the > benefit of their > > masters. Language centres in our neocortex may > claim to "know" they > > are fake, but these words only feebly supress > those primitive areas of > > the brain which give rise to our feelings, colour > our memories and > > command our attention. These non-verbal areas of > the brain haven't yet > > evolved to deal such sensory sophistry. For them, > sensing IS believing. > > > > Hence the feelings in a young woman's breast > buffeted by the flashing > > lights and impossibly sonorous tones of the > amplified rock star; master > > of a 20 KiloWatt Adam's apple and by inference a > super man having the > > chest cavity of God. Hence the dilated pupils and > other organs of a man > > glancing at photons from the gentle curves of > pigments on matted wood > > fibres, a pattern of vision that once meant love > was not only in the air > > but ready and willing, prostrate on the ground. > Hence the wariness of > > the horror movie attendee when returning home and > opening the door of > > what was, and infact still is, a pefectlty > innocent closet. Hence > > understanding > > Neighbors instead of neighbors and having Friends > instead of friends. > > Hence the poker machine addict. Hence the dramatic > rise in the economic > > take of powerful industries built around using > advances in technology to > > stuff our heads with false feelings and memories. > Not content to be zero > > sum, in exchange for our wealth and time these > industries generally > > leave us less able to function by decalibrating > our emotional and > > intellectual repore with reality. > > > > "But, I like it you cold hearted Lutheran, you > Stoic, you stone mason, > > you Zeno loving stick in the mud!". Well > naturally, since the whole game > > is to manipulate your feelings, it is not > suprising that you have > > positive feelings about your perceptual opium, is > is, after all, what > > keeps you going back to your dealer. > > > > Such deceptions, previously known as "Art", as in > "Artifice" or > > "Artful" have a long history of successful human > parasitation. But the > > industrial control of and rapid advances in the > ability to successfully > > falsify sense data has no historical analog. I > have gloomily argued > > that a possible explanation for the Fermi Paradox > (why don't there seem > > to be any aliens, dude) is the existence of a > developmental ceiling > > created by technological advances flowing into the > perceptual > > manipulation industry till it gobbles up through > diversion and wealth > > destruction all economic growth. > > > > Geoffy Milner from the University of Mexico > recently wrote this cool > > essay for The Edge on the same topic: > > > > Runaway consumerism explains the Fermi Paradox. > > > > > > The story goes like this: Sometime in the 1940s, > Enrico Fermi was > > talking about the possibility of extra-terrestrial > intelligence with > > some other physicists. They were impressed that > our galaxy holds 100 > > billion stars, that life evolved quickly and > progressively on earth, and > > that an intelligent, exponentially-reproducing > species could colonize > > the galaxy in just a few million years. They > reasoned that extra- > > terrestrial intelligence should be common by now. > Fermi listened > > patiently, then asked simply, "So, where is > everybody?". That is, if > > extra- > > terrestrial intelligence is common, why haven't we > met any bright aliens > > yet? This conundrum became known as Fermi's > Paradox. > > > > The paradox has become more ever more baffling. > Over 150 extrasolar > > planets have been identified in the last few > years, suggesting that > > life-hospitable planets orbit most stars. > Paleontology shows that > > organic life evolved very quickly after earth's > surface cooled and > > became life-hospitable. Given simple life, > evolution shows progressive > > trends towards larger bodies, brains, and social > complexity. > > Evolutionary psychology reveals several credible > paths from simpler > > social minds to human-level creative intelligence. > Yet 40 years of > > intensive searching for extra-terrestrial > intelligence have yielded > > nothing. No radio signals, no credible spacecraft > sightings, no close > > encounters of any kind. > > > > So, it looks as if there are two possibilities. > Perhaps our science > > over- > > estimates the likelihood of extra-terrestrial > intelligence evolving. Or, > > perhaps evolved technical intelligence has some > deep tendency to be > > self- > > limiting, even self-exterminating. After > Hiroshima, some suggested that > > any aliens bright enough to make colonizing > space-ships would be bright > > enough to make thermonuclear bombs, and would use > them on each other > > sooner or later. Perhaps extra-terrestrial > intelligence always blows > > itself up. Fermi's Paradox became, for a while, a > cautionary tale about > > Cold War geopolitics. > > > > I suggest a different, even darker solution to > Fermi's Paradox. > > Basically, I think the aliens don't blow > themselves up; they just get > > addicted to computer games. They forget to send > radio signals or > > colonize space because they're too busy with > runaway consumerism and > > virtual- > > reality narcissism. They don't need Sentinels to > enslave them in a > > Matrix; they do it to themselves, just as we are > doing today. > > > > The fundamental problem is that any evolved mind > must pay attention to > > indirect cues of biological fitness, rather than > tracking fitness > > itself. We don't seek reproductive success > directly; we seek tasty foods > > that tended to promote survival and luscious mates > who tended to produce > > bright, healthy babies. Modern results: fast food > and pornography. > > Technology is fairly good at controlling external > reality to promote our > > real biological fitness, but it's even better at > delivering fake fitness > > ? subjective cues of survival and reproduction, > without the real-world > > effects. Fresh organic fruit juice costs so much > more than nutrition- > > free soda. Having real friends is so much more > effort than watching > > Friends on TV. Actually colonizing the galaxy > would be so much harder > > than pretending to have done it when filming Star > Wars or Serenity. > > > > Fitness-faking technology tends to evolve much > faster than our > > psychological resistance to it. The printing press > is invented; people > > read more novels and have fewer kids; only a few > curmudgeons lament > === message truncated === The Avantguardian is Stuart LaForge alt email: stuart"AT"ucla.edu "The most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the source of all true art and science. He to whom this emotion is a stranger, who can no longer wonder and stand rapt in awe, is as good as dead: his eyes are closed. . ." - Albert Einstein, "What I Believe" (1930) __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com From spike66 at comcast.net Thu Jan 12 04:13:41 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Wed, 11 Jan 2006 20:13:41 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] circumcision In-Reply-To: <43C53733.4050006@ramonsky.com> Message-ID: <200601120413.k0C4Dme09064@tick.javien.com> > bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Alex Ramonsky ... > BTW do you have a prime number of kids yet? : ) > AR > ********** My son is due June. I jumped the gun in announcing this, because we are still high risk of miscarriage. Since you bring this up, I apologize in advance for a topic that is not extropic. But you are my friends and I need some friendly advice: To circumcise, or not. Why or nhy? Offlist OK. spike spike66 at comcast.net From russell.wallace at gmail.com Thu Jan 12 04:26:40 2006 From: russell.wallace at gmail.com (Russell Wallace) Date: Thu, 12 Jan 2006 04:26:40 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] circumcision In-Reply-To: <200601120413.k0C4Dme09064@tick.javien.com> References: <43C53733.4050006@ramonsky.com> <200601120413.k0C4Dme09064@tick.javien.com> Message-ID: <8d71341e0601112026ge0d9bdaj83c43692da7343d9@mail.gmail.com> On 1/12/06, spike wrote: > > > bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Alex Ramonsky > ... > > BTW do you have a prime number of kids yet? : ) > > AR > > ********** > > My son is due June. I jumped the gun in announcing this, > because we are still high risk of miscarriage. Since you > bring this up, I apologize in advance for a topic that > is not extropic. But you are my friends and I need some > friendly advice: > > To circumcise, or not. Why or nhy? Offlist OK. Well, I guess it's in a clearly identifiable thread that can be easily skipped by people who aren't interested in it... I can't give you a definitive answer to the question; I'm no medical expert. But one thing you might want to take into account when making the decision: I saw an article awhile back about some number of baby boys who had a circumcision botched to the point where doctors found it necessary to go for a full sex change operation. (It turned out badly: on reaching adolescence, they found themselves psychologically male in female bodies; that was the context in which I came across the article.) What the percentage of this is, I don't know. - Russell -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From russell.wallace at gmail.com Thu Jan 12 04:29:25 2006 From: russell.wallace at gmail.com (Russell Wallace) Date: Thu, 12 Jan 2006 04:29:25 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] circumcision In-Reply-To: <200601120413.k0C4Dme09064@tick.javien.com> References: <43C53733.4050006@ramonsky.com> <200601120413.k0C4Dme09064@tick.javien.com> Message-ID: <8d71341e0601112029i5e20180ai216e6a8b84607973@mail.gmail.com> On 1/12/06, spike wrote: > > My son is due June. I jumped the gun in announcing this, > because we are still high risk of miscarriage. Since you > bring this up, I apologize in advance for a topic that > is not extropic. But you are my friends and I need some > friendly advice: > > To circumcise, or not. Why or nhy? Offlist OK. I'll add, regardless of your decision on that, I hope your son is born alive and healthy, and wish you the best of luck; I can't very well pray, since I don't believe in God, but perhaps I may be forgiven this small superstition as I knock on wood... *knocks* ^.^ - Russell -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From spike66 at comcast.net Thu Jan 12 04:40:42 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Wed, 11 Jan 2006 20:40:42 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Runaway consumerism explains the Fermi Paradox. In-Reply-To: <1137028834.5046.251653889@webmail.messagingengine.com> Message-ID: <200601120440.k0C4ete12892@tick.javien.com> > bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Harry Harrison > Subject: [extropy-chat] Runaway consumerism explains the Fermi Paradox. ... > > I suggest a different, even darker solution to Fermi's Paradox. > > Basically, I think the aliens don't blow themselves up; they just get > > addicted to computer games. They forget to send radio signals or > > colonize space because they're too busy with runaway consumerism and > > virtual-reality narcissism... I don't understand why he considers this a darker solution to Fermi's Paradox. Sounds much brighter to me. Far preferable is it that humanity should turn inward and simply fail to breed than the alternatives that I have dreaded for years: mass starvation or mutual nuclear annihilation. spike From jef at jefallbright.net Thu Jan 12 04:45:31 2006 From: jef at jefallbright.net (Jef Allbright) Date: Wed, 11 Jan 2006 20:45:31 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] On difficult choices (was: Books: Harris; Religion and Reason) In-Reply-To: <43C5B640.4050102@pobox.com> References: <34BF7F5C-2360-4784-A470-691D4417020E@mac.com> <22360fa10601111624l6b1512cfy703d7dec2d17b600@mail.gmail.com> <43C5B640.4050102@pobox.com> Message-ID: <22360fa10601112045o75a8f9e4p3175ecc1ae4f6e91@mail.gmail.com> On 1/11/06, Eliezer S. Yudkowsky wrote: > Jef Allbright wrote: > > > > Sometimes a military leader is faced with the difficult choice of > > sacrificing some of his troops in order to save the rest. Sometimes > > an individual will sacrifice himself to allow others to survive in an > > overloaded lifeboat. Sometimes a surgeon will advise a patient to > > undergo radical amputation in order to have a chance at life. > > Sometimes a politician will risk loss of popularity in order to > > contribute to a greater good. > > Sometimes people can be hypnotized by difficult choices. Eliezer, I commend you on your pursuasive writing techniques (which I was tempted to annotate), and of course you make a valid point about the importance, rising to the level of necessity, of striving to discover a constructive solution to seemingly unsolvable problems. I could support your point using real-life examples such as the apparent paradox of the Cold War, or multiple examples from my own life where I haven't been able to see a way forward, but survived via perseverance and that abstract principle I've tried to communicate to you before -- that we're the end result of a long chain of survivors, and to a surprising extent we can trust in the environment that lead to us being here even when we don't know what's going on. But that wasn't the point of my post. The point was about that "moral repugnance", operating below fully conscious awareness, that people experience when faced with difficult decisions of the type where a near-term sacrifice is in fact indicated to achieve broader good. For the record, I wouldn't agree with a proposal to nuke a population under any expected near-term conditions, but I could conceive of hypothetical conditions under which that might be the right thing to do. I can certainly entertain the thought and consider classes of similar problems and what general approaches might be effective toward achieving various goals of varying moral value. If this topic of conversation ever evolved to a sustained level of intelligent, respectful discussion, I would hope to discuss ways of making such decisions rationally, but under constraints of incomplete knowledge and time. We might talk about heuristics and biases before moving on, and then I suspect it might become clear that decision-making based on informed principles, rather then expected end result, is one of the better ways to proceed in such cases. We might even talk about what it means to have principles that are "well informed", and so on... - Jef > One recalls > Elrond, in Tolkien's prehistory to _The Lord of the Rings_, pleading > with Isildur to throw the Ring into Mount Doom. In the movie version we > get to see this (and as far as I know, it's faithful to Tolkien): > Elrond and Isildur actually standing at the Crack of Doom, Isildur > holding up the Ring, and then... > > Elrond: Throw in the Ring! > Isildur: Nah. > Elrond: Okay. > > So what should Elrond have done? Push Isildur screaming into the Crack > of Doom? A fine deed that would have been, to set to the credit of the > Ring... So Elrond let Isildur go, resulting in some untold number of > casualties in the War of the Ring a few centuries later. > > Should we blame Elrond for that? Well, if it was me, I sure would blame > myself. Just because I have ethics doesn't mean I'm not responsible for > their consequences. > > Plus the Ring killed Isildur anyway. > And Isildur was lucky. He could have ended up as Gollum. > > Elrond had plenty of options besides pushing Isildur into Mount Doom. > He could have bopped Isildur on the head and then used his sword to > nudge the Ring off the edge. Worst case scenario, Elrond bops Isildur > on the head, calls in his lieutenants, strips off his own armor, and > *volunteers* to be pushed into Mount Doom if he can't manage to nudge > off the Ring, throw off the Ring, or step off the edge. If Elrond > wasn't willing to sacrifice himself, he was *obligated* to call for > volunteers, and if that made him feel awful that was *his* problem. > > Elrond was so focused on the obvious wrong way to solve the problem that > he didn't see the creative right ways. His great failure wasn't that he > lacked ethics, it was that he didn't know how to use them. He thought > his ethics were supposed to be heroic disadvantages. If Elrond had just > taken for *granted* that he couldn't push Isildur off the edge, instead > of agonizing, he would have seen easier and better solutions. > > It won't always be that way. We don't live in so kind a universe. But > for Elrond it was so, even without Tolkien intending it. > > Did anyone else notice this, when they read the book, or watched the movie? > > The theory behind the Singularity Institute is that it's possible to > *save the entire damn world* without killing people, pointing guns at > people, telling people what to do, or any of the usual bullying > tribal-chief solutions that instantly pop into people's heads when they > consider political problems. That's not idealism, it's intelligence. > History teaches us that the "difficult" choices, the obvious wrong ways > to solve the problem, DON'T FRICKIN' WORK. Stalin broke plenty of eggs, > but where are the omelets? > > So don't make excuses in advance for ethical failures. People are so > hypnotized by "difficult" choices that they don't look *hard* for a > creative solution. They just go straight off and make the "difficult" > choice. Taking the "difficult" option is not difficult, it's easy and > convenient. That's why people spend so much time looking for excuses to > do things the "difficult" way. > > So what's really difficult? Thinking. It can be frickin' hard to think > of a good solution, you've got to, like, actually sit down and > concentrate. And sometimes, yes, it's painful and inconvenient - for > *yourself*, not some convenient outside victim who has to be > "sacrificed" - to do things the right way. It's not always easy. So > don't make your excuses in advance, or you'll shoot yourself down before > you start. > From russell.wallace at gmail.com Thu Jan 12 04:53:31 2006 From: russell.wallace at gmail.com (Russell Wallace) Date: Thu, 12 Jan 2006 04:53:31 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Runaway consumerism explains the Fermi Paradox. In-Reply-To: <200601120440.k0C4ete12892@tick.javien.com> References: <1137028834.5046.251653889@webmail.messagingengine.com> <200601120440.k0C4ete12892@tick.javien.com> Message-ID: <8d71341e0601112053sc60010fs3e114ef1136a68e1@mail.gmail.com> On 1/12/06, spike wrote: > > I don't understand why he considers this a darker > solution to Fermi's Paradox. Sounds much brighter to > me. Far preferable is it that humanity should turn > inward and simply fail to breed than the alternatives > that I have dreaded for years: mass starvation or > mutual nuclear annihilation. > In the domain of Ethos, perhaps arguably so. In the domain of Pathos, I disagree. That the greatest civilization the world has ever seen should die, taking with it humanity's one shot at ascension; that the rest of humanity should stumble along until the hands of evolution turn past the point where any other outcome is possible; that the remains of sentience should decline in a long slow whimper until the sun boils the biosphere to steam and ash, and a hundred billion galaxies burn unwitnessed down to heat death, *all for no better reason than that people prefer watching television to raising children*; these things are plausible - might well actually come to pass - but to me, are far more depressing than flaming out cleanly at our brightest. - Russell -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From m_j_geddes at yahoo.com.au Thu Jan 12 04:55:25 2006 From: m_j_geddes at yahoo.com.au (Marc Geddes) Date: Thu, 12 Jan 2006 15:55:25 +1100 (EST) Subject: [extropy-chat] All hail Will Wilkinson Message-ID: <20060112045525.57698.qmail@web50506.mail.yahoo.com> >Will some moderator please bounce this offensive clown? Thanks. > >-s >Did it within 5 minutes of the post. > > > >s Don't be an idiot. The thread is talking about zero-sum games and contests - read the earlier posts. It should also be obvious from these and the smilies I was joking. There are far far more offensive messgages on the board in other threads if you want to be a tight-arse. In an earlier thread for instance Eliezer posted a string of extreme hate messages about me - and it was clear he *wasn't* joking. The moderators did nothing about them. But it's all silly stuff so I don't complain. But you keep on being silly and moderating my threads I might. "Till shade is gone, till water is gone, into the shadow with teeth bared, screaming defiance with the last breath, to spit in Sightblinder?s eye on the last day? ____________________________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? Yahoo! News: Get the latest news via video today! http://au.news.yahoo.com/video/ From russell.wallace at gmail.com Thu Jan 12 04:58:19 2006 From: russell.wallace at gmail.com (Russell Wallace) Date: Thu, 12 Jan 2006 04:58:19 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] On difficult choices (was: Books: Harris; Religion and Reason) In-Reply-To: <22360fa10601112045o75a8f9e4p3175ecc1ae4f6e91@mail.gmail.com> References: <34BF7F5C-2360-4784-A470-691D4417020E@mac.com> <22360fa10601111624l6b1512cfy703d7dec2d17b600@mail.gmail.com> <43C5B640.4050102@pobox.com> <22360fa10601112045o75a8f9e4p3175ecc1ae4f6e91@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <8d71341e0601112058i2a3ae7a9x58d717fac5fb96fc@mail.gmail.com> On 1/12/06, Jef Allbright wrote: > > If this topic of conversation ever evolved to a sustained level of > intelligent, respectful discussion, I would hope to discuss ways of > making such decisions rationally, but under constraints of incomplete > knowledge and time. We might talk about heuristics and biases before > moving on, and then I suspect it might become clear that > decision-making based on informed principles, rather then expected end > result, is one of the better ways to proceed in such cases. We might > even talk about what it means to have principles that are "well > informed", and so on... I wouldn't mind participating in such a discussion. I think it might be better though, if we were to have such, to use fictional examples as Eliezer did - in my analysis of Robert's proposal I tried to tread as carefully as possible, but it's still difficult for people (myself included) to keep a cool head when debating tricky moral issues in real life. - Russell -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From wingcat at pacbell.net Thu Jan 12 04:59:31 2006 From: wingcat at pacbell.net (Adrian Tymes) Date: Wed, 11 Jan 2006 20:59:31 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] circumcision In-Reply-To: <200601120413.k0C4Dme09064@tick.javien.com> Message-ID: <20060112045931.99182.qmail@web81608.mail.mud.yahoo.com> --- spike wrote: > My son is due June. I jumped the gun in announcing this, > because we are still high risk of miscarriage. Since you > bring this up, I apologize in advance for a topic that > is not extropic. But you are my friends and I need some > friendly advice: > > To circumcise, or not. Why or nhy? Offlist OK. Overall, if you've got a competent doctor doing it (enough that you know you've a significantly better than average chance of no negative effects - and this is already the norm in the urban areas of California), there appears to be a slight medical benefit to doing so. Of course, for a more thorough view: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Circumcision From spike66 at comcast.net Thu Jan 12 05:10:32 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Wed, 11 Jan 2006 21:10:32 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] All hail Will Wilkinson In-Reply-To: <20060112045525.57698.qmail@web50506.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <200601120510.k0C5Ade17131@tick.javien.com> > bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Marc Geddes ... > Don't be an idiot. The thread is talking about > zero-sum games and contests - read the earlier posts. > It should also be obvious from these and the smilies > I was joking... > But you keep on being silly and moderating my threads > I might. Marc, do let me explain myself. There is great significance in reputation, online as in the meat world. Eliezer has contributed many valuable memes for many years here and elsewhere. If he were to ever post something that caused us irritation, we would forebear because of his prior contributions. You are the new guy. You have the burden of posting a lot of good stuff for a long time. Do that, then we will cut you a lot of slack. In the meantime, not. spike From m_j_geddes at yahoo.com.au Thu Jan 12 05:19:10 2006 From: m_j_geddes at yahoo.com.au (Marc Geddes) Date: Thu, 12 Jan 2006 16:19:10 +1100 (EST) Subject: [extropy-chat] On difficult choices (was: Books: Harris; Religion and Reason) Message-ID: <20060112051911.37750.qmail@web50511.mail.yahoo.com> > The theory behind the Singularity Institute is that it's possible to > *save the entire damn world* without killing people, pointing guns at > people, telling people what to do, or any of the usual bullying > tribal-chief solutions that instantly pop into people's heads when they > consider political problems. That's not idealism, it's intelligence. > History teaches us that the "difficult" choices, the obvious wrong ways > to solve the problem, DON'T FRICKIN' WORK. Stalin broke plenty of eggs, > but where are the omelets? Hysterial nonsense. Eli's 'Elrond and the ring' thing is not a valid analogy either I don't think. We *don't know* that there's any real danger from recursively self-improving AI (and sorry, but 'Eli says so' doesn't count it. Only results published in an accredited academic journal do). In fact the more I've learned about Ai stuff, the more confident I am that there's no danger. I would never have posted the things I did to Sl4 , wta-talk and the Extropy list if I wasn't very very very very very very very VERY confident that Eli is wrong. That's why I've been taking the mikey out of him. AI's which aren't friendly can't recursively self-improve I say. All the unfriendly's are limited I think - that's my theory any way (Of course, even the limited unfriendly's could still do a fair bit of damage I must concede - they wouldn't be world destroying though). I shall attempt to write a paper which proves this at some point - it might take me several years to get it up a standard which might actually be accepted in an academic journal though. If I ever can. Of course, all my ideas *may* be total bullshit, in which case I'll be the first to concede I was a total arse ;) "Till shade is gone, till water is gone, into the shadow with teeth bared, screaming defiance with the last breath, to spit in Sightblinder?s eye on the last day? ____________________________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? Listen to over 20 online radio stations and watch the latest music videos on Yahoo! Music. http://au.launch.yahoo.com From jef at jefallbright.net Thu Jan 12 05:21:16 2006 From: jef at jefallbright.net (Jef Allbright) Date: Wed, 11 Jan 2006 21:21:16 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Books: Harris; Religion and Reason In-Reply-To: <8d71341e0601111911u78c26358j1ee0205109e1fed7@mail.gmail.com> References: <34BF7F5C-2360-4784-A470-691D4417020E@mac.com> <22360fa10601111624l6b1512cfy703d7dec2d17b600@mail.gmail.com> <8d71341e0601111911u78c26358j1ee0205109e1fed7@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <22360fa10601112121m4728705fp735e0a36a4589382@mail.gmail.com> Russell - Thank you very much for your response which was truly to the point of my post. I'll consider responding in more depth tomorrow. - Jef On 1/11/06, Russell Wallace wrote: > On 1/12/06, Jef Allbright wrote: > > When Robert has proposed destroying some portion of that which he very > > publicly and very obviously values, he was trying to promote > > intelligent debate about a certain class of decision-making that is > > very difficult for many people to even consider, let alone decide. > > > > Sometimes a military leader is faced with the difficult choice of > > sacrificing some of his troops in order to save the rest. Sometimes > > an individual will sacrifice himself to allow others to survive in an > > overloaded lifeboat. Sometimes a surgeon will advise a patient to > > undergo radical amputation in order to have a chance at life. > > Sometimes a politician will risk loss of popularity in order to > > contribute to a greater good. > > > > And too often people recoil in moral repugnance for lack of seeing the > > bigger picture. > > > > Thinking a bit more about it, I suppose in a sense I didn't really answer > this. I'll try for a more complete answer. > > Eliezer makes a useful distinction between, as he uses the terms, "morals" > (utilitarian analysis of what is good, what ends we aim for) and "ethics" > (restrictions on what means we should employ for some end even when we think > the overall result will be good); I think this is a useful distinction, and > I will use this terminology here. > > For example, I think child welfare is infinitely more morally important > than animal welfare; so if I have a choice between donating money to an > animal welfare charity and a child welfare charity, I'll choose the latter, > no problem. But suppose I have the opportunity to steal money from the > former to give it to the latter? This would be _moral_ (achieving a good > end) but my _ethics_ prohibit me from doing it. One need not regard this as > an ultimate condition; one could hold the view that a god would have no need > for ethics; the fact that we humans are fallible suffices to make it > appropriate to be cautious when considering whether the end justifies the > means. > > Now, along with (as far as I recall) everyone else, I rejected Robert's > proposal on _ethical_ grounds. But his proposal was a utilitarian one - it > was claimed to be _morally_ right - something that would lead to the > smallest amount of harm in the long run; and you have a valid point when you > say that we should also be willing to discuss unpleasant ideas in moral > terms. (If we decide something is morally right, whether it's ethically > permissible would be a separate discussion.) So I'm going to answer it in > moral terms. > > Today we have a hard won world order - not by world government, thank God, > but by consensus, at least among all civilized countries and most of the not > so civilized ones - that the slaughter of populations is not permissible. It > wasn't always that way. Last century, the Germans set up death camps and > killed millions of Russian civilians; the Russians retaliated in kind. The > Japanese army went on genocidal killing sprees wherever they set foot; the > Americans carpet-bombed Japanese cities. I'm not blaming the Allies for > their actions under the circumstances, but I think it's a good thing we > managed to get to a point where that sort of thing is no longer considered > business as usual; we paid a bloody high price to climb out of that pit, and > we should think long and hard before stepping back into it. > > My Visualization of the Cosmic All isn't clear enough to predict exactly > what would happen if Robert's proposal were followed, but here's what I > think would happen: > > While I can't speak for Muslim governments, I suspect that as far as most > of them are concerned, we in the West aren't their favorite people; I > imagine they think we're decadent and godless, and it's not like there isn't > truth in that. But most of them recognize that as a matter of ethics and > practical reality, it's best to deal in a civilized fashion even with people > you're not wildly fond of on an emotional level. They recognize that there > is a line, and mad dogs like al-Qaida have crossed it. So Colonel Gaddafi > buries the hatchet with the West, and the Pakistanis help hunt down > terrorists in the mountains. > > If we start pre-emptively dropping hydrogen bombs on a bunch of Muslim > cities, that hard-won order will be gone. We'll be back to a world where the > meanest killers come out on top. The first wave of nuclear explosions won't > be the end of the bloodshed, it'll be the start of it. Yes, the West could > win a global conflict as far as military strength goes, but at what cost? > Not just external, but internal. Remember the original proposal was the > elimination of all "faith-based thinkers". Should the Americans nuke Alabama > to get rid of their faith-based fifth column? Should the Alabamans march > west to slay the godless Californians in a pre-emptive strike? Actions have > echoes; I'm reminded of the time some Latin American governments started > talking about the First World banks "forgiving" their national debts (i.e. > defaulting); it stopped when their own citizens started writing to the > taxman, "Well our government is talking about forgiveness of all those > billions so I've a little debt here you can forgive". None of this is proof, > of course, but I think it at the very least casts grave doubt on the claim > that the original proposal would be beneficial in the long run. (And after > all, doubt is a reason for having ethics rather than just utilitarian > analysis.) > > Normally I wouldn't bother replying at all to proposals that nobody agrees > with - there's no need. But I think the challenge to think rationally about > unpleasant ideas is a fair one, and perhaps answering it in this case has > been a useful exercise; there might be a need to do it in the future in some > less clear-cut case. > > - Russell > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat > > > From jose_cordeiro at yahoo.com Thu Jan 12 05:49:07 2006 From: jose_cordeiro at yahoo.com (Jose Cordeiro) Date: Wed, 11 Jan 2006 21:49:07 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] THE WTA IS ROTTEN FROM THE TOP In-Reply-To: <43C5A3CE.3090301@goldenfuture.net> Message-ID: <20060112054907.41336.qmail@web32809.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Dear friends, I am writing to let you know that I am withdrawing my candidacy for the WTA Board. Regardless all my time and dedication, I have seen things in the WTA getting worse instead of getting better. The double standards, unethical practices, financial mismanagement, political recrimination, lack of transparency, immoral behavior and blatantly open lies of some of its leaders have been enough for me. Please, I urge to go over the WTA Board files that are open to paying members, and see for yourself. The drop that finally tilted the glass is the double morality exposed by some directors in order not to expulse Mr. D Medvedev, who has defended Stalin because of ?his overall contribution is overwhelmingly positive? regardless of ?a significant number of people were executed and a large number starved in a drought?. Some WTA Board members want to keep him because ?he is The webmaster of the Russian Transhumanist Movement? and ?he is an excellent translator of technical, transhumanist ideas between his Native language and English?. This shows a total lack of respect for human lives, freedom and human values, not only from Mr. D Medvedev but from some of the current WTA Board members, whose view is simply not compatible with humanism, and even les with the transhumanist ideas that I believe we have to strive for. I wish that was all. However, after telling many consecutive lies, James Hughes has been deleting my messages to the lists, and not just my messages, without giving any notice. In his typical Stalinist fashion, James Hughes has lied about how and why he censored the messages, but that is nothing new about his behavior of the people he dislikes. Nonetheless, Mr. D Medvedev and his support of Stalin is just moderated and not expelled, unlike other people before who supported the Nazis, for example. Well, the news is that Mr. D Medvedev now also told us about a strategy for the Nazis and how the WTA should create "a vision of racially pure superhumans? to attact them as well. James Hughes has been abusing his power constantly, including when he self nominated and appointed himself Executive Director in the WTA Board meeting in Oxford in 2004. He cleverly wrote to sets of minutes after the meeting, the original where he was not elected Executive Director, and a later one where he was supposedly appointed unanimously. However, there was never such an election, and even less an unanimous decision, since I certainly did not vote, and even less for him. Nonetheless, James Hughes is a clever writer of minutes, and so he wrote later what he wanted, even against reality and other people?s objections. Financially, James Hughes oversaw losing $ 7,000 in the Canada meeting, even though he always said it was a small quantity, but even now the figure is not really known. First he said, it was ?only? $ 3,000, then it grew to $ 5,000 and later he said it should be around $ 7,000. From 2004 to today, however, we don?t even have the final number. Harvey Newstrom, then a WTA Director, said that the financial management of the WTA was basically so sloppy that it might not pass any auditing process. That is why James Hughes has been constantly refusing the audit that I have proposed, even a free audit with no cost to the WTA. That sounds unbelievable, but true. And in 2005, James Hughes transferred close to $ 5,000 sponsor money to Africa instead of buying tickets for the supposedly African participants to TV05. Yes, James Hughes is responsible for losing at least $ 12,000 from its members and sponsors. Maybe that is why he has been constantly delaying the audit, but members should ask why to give money to the WTA to end like this. James Hughes also adores to love his enemies, and he has many. He never published any of my extensive writings in the IEET webpage when I was a fellow, and then he threw me out because I am an ?underdeveloped right-winger?, as he told me in Madrid last year. He has called Joseph Bloch a ?recalcitrant neocon?, he does ?hate that bitch? of Natasha Vita-More and many other comments about people who do not agree with him. Apparently he sees the world in black and white, either you are with him or against him. That is curious for a socialist who also hates Bush very deeply. One interesting description of James Hughes wrong ideas, without considering all his personal hatred, was clearly pointed out by Ronald Baily in Reason, so please take another look: www.reason.com/rb/rb051105.shtml. But you should really read the book to get the flavor of how much he hates the Extropy Institute, Max More and so many other transhumanists who don?t agree with him. Because of all the problems that James Hughes has had with so many people, we in the WTA Board gave him a one year trial period to see how he behaved. If you see the results, it has been a real disaster: more hatred, more problems, more bad talk. James Hughes has brought divisions to our little community instead of union and harmony. Maybe that is why he unilaterally declared last year that the WTA was not an umbrella organization of the transhumanist movement. Not only it is not an umbrella now, but it is driven by socialist ideas in a Stalinist manner. Anyone who disagrees with him will suffer hell, or just ask Harvey Newstrom, Eliezer Yudkowsky or Bruce Klein, or so many others before them. And so many others after me, because James Hughes will continue, it is in his nature: like the scorpion who will hurt anyone including himself. These problems did not start with me, and they will certainly continue as long as the unethical self-appointed and un-ratified Executive Director stays there. The reality is that James Hughes is becoming more of a liability than an asset to the WTA. I hope that you do not simply take my words for any of this, please, verify directly the WTA Board files, or contact me directly. It is very sad, but true. Nonetheless, I can gladly say that I will keep working on transhumanist ideas, because I believe in them, regardless of some rotten apples in the WTA Board. We transhumanists are so few, and we have to work together as opposed to be driven by totalitarian individuals, with political agendas, unethical behavior and double standards. Transhumanistically yours, La vie est belle! Jose Joseph Bloch wrote: mike99 wrote: >Joseph, >You missed the point of my message. > > Not at all. I grasped the point of your message perfectly. I simply disagreed with it. >Now Joseph, do you know of anyone from, let's say, the far-right who offers >the same combination of useful skills as Danila? > > You yourself said that DNAGod2000 (much as I might loathe and despise him and his message), aka Marcus Eugenicus, aka Marc Harris leads a "quasi-transhumanist cult". That strikes me as an effort that requires a certain combination of useful skills. He has a very well-developed website, and I daresay his organizational skills are exceptional. (I would say the same about den Otter, although he is somewhat less offensive and cultivates an air of respectability, inasmuch as he doesn't seem to promote the anti-Semetic rhetoric that Marc Harris does.) If he can found an organization, attract people to him, and get stuff done, all the while droning on about how Hitler was right, I fail to see how he is any worse than Danila, who drones on about how Stalin was a good man, and whose skill set is somewhat less. Are you saying we should attempt to cultivate Marc Harris as a member, hoping he grows out of his virulent neo-Nazism, because he has evinced some success in his endeavors? Of course not. He and his message are just as offensive as Danila and his message, and the fact that both of them could be seen as being marginally useful in no way makes up for the taint that an association with them would bring to the WTA as an organization. Joseph Date: Tue, 10 Jan 2006 22:36:34 -0500 From: "Joseph Bloch" View Contact Details Add Mobile Alert To: "World Transhumanist Association Discussion List" , "WTA Board of Directors List" Subject: [wtaboard] Re: [wta-talk] IMMEDIATE EXPULSION OF DANILA [input] [input] [input] [input] Hughes, James J. wrote: >>Unfortunately, because the leftist political leanings of >>James Hughes and Nick Bostrom, it just took longer to condemn >>the communist and socialist murderers. >> >> > >I understand that the Bolivarian Revolution has placed you under a great >deal of stress, but I really must take exception to this absurd >accusation. Nick can speak for myself, but your repeated suggestion that >I have not moved to expel Danila because I am a "leftist" or a >"Communist sympathizer" is baseless and quite ludicrous. > I do not presume to speak for Jose, but I will point out that the fact that a double standard exists within the WTA is neither baseless nor ludicous. It is also self-evident that you (as a result of your self-admitted political leanings) are largely responsible for that double standard. You are, by your own admission, a Socialist (of the "Democratic" stripe, but a Socialist nonetheless; I confess I find the notion that the proletariat has voted to redistribute my property not so much worse than the oligarchs have decided to do so, but I digress). You have, to date, dealt harshly and with dispatch when racist or racialist elements have attempted to insinuate themselves within the WTA (and rightly so). And yet, you have dealt relatively lightly with our resident USSR apologist. You claim that it is not because you are a leftist or a Communist sympathizer, but you have yet to provide an alternative explanation for your foot-dragging. Can you honestly claim that Marc Harris (aka DNAGod2000) or Dalibor van den Otter would have gotten so many chances? Of course not, yet our resident USSR apologist has been spewing his bile for months and months, picking up exactly where he left off once his moderation was lifted (and the explanation for why that was done, when there was a motion before the Board to terminate his rights to post at all, is still awaited). The simple fact is you don't seem to see Communism (because it is so closely associated with the Socialism you profess) as offensive as racism, and thus you don't treat it as harshly. It is precisely that double-standard, wherein the excesses of the Left get a pass while the excesses of the Right are excoriated, which has no place in a supposedly "apolitical" organization. You do the WTA a disservice by indulging your personal political preferences. One has to look no farther than the recent vote amongst the WTA board to condemn totalitarianism. When I suggested that we should pass a statement that would "formulate a broad, yet effective, policy against totalitarianism and authoritarianism, regardless if it comes from Left or Right", your response was to formulate a statement that endorsed State control of the economy. And then to proceed to compare me to Joseph McCarthy for daring to point that out. Eventually the version offered by Dr. Bostrom made no mention of left or right was adopted, but the fact remains that we have explicitly condemned right-wing extremism (twice!) but never left-wing extremism. Other examples are rife. You claim you are not biased in favor of the Left. I say the evidence says otherwise. You harbor an immense double-standard, which is reflected in every aspect of your oversight of the WTA, and which makes a mockery of its claim to be an organization without a political agenda. You once said to me that the WTA should be whatever you say it should be because you do all the work. If that's really your view (though I have every confidence you'll promptly deny ever having said it), then I would urge you to come out and do it. I, despite what you might think, won't stop you. I'll leave quietly. But what I will not abide quietly is this farce that the WTA is somehow apolitical, and balanced, when it is in fact ultra-left and pursuing the personal political agenda of its Executive Director. Please, either go all the way or stop imposing the double-standard on the WTA. Joseph Bloch, Director -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jose_cordeiro at yahoo.com Thu Jan 12 06:34:34 2006 From: jose_cordeiro at yahoo.com (Jose Cordeiro) Date: Wed, 11 Jan 2006 22:34:34 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Re: [wta-talk] JET: Peer-reviewed Journal? In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <20060112063434.10015.qmail@web32812.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Nick, We are still waiting to hear from you how the paper was reviewed? Can you please let us know? Jose "Hughes, James J." wrote: > who peer-reviewed Robin Hanson's paper on economic growth? Can't really say. It was published before I assumed editorship. Perhaps Nick Bostrom has a record and can tell you their professional qualifications. La vie est belle! Yos? (www.cordeiro.org) Caracas, Venezuela, Americas, TerraNostra, Solar System, Milky Way, Multiverse -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From m_j_geddes at yahoo.com.au Thu Jan 12 07:12:26 2006 From: m_j_geddes at yahoo.com.au (Marc Geddes) Date: Thu, 12 Jan 2006 18:12:26 +1100 (EST) Subject: [extropy-chat] On difficult choices (was: Books: Harris; Religion and Reason) Message-ID: <20060112071226.66796.qmail@web50509.mail.yahoo.com> Let me just clarify my above point. I believe a Singularity (initiated by recursively self-improving AI) is possible, but ONLY a friendly AI can initiate a Singularity, since any AI that isn't friendly would be limited and not recursively self-improving. Why do I think this? The point comes down to something actually realized by Eli: that morality is not something that can be externally searched for, but something that has to be *built into* the structure of a mind from the start. But he (Eli) doesn't seem to have fully realized the consequences of his own argument. In order to recursively self-improve an AI would have to be able to perform mathematical self-reflection. This can only work if such self-reflection involved the ability to seamlessly integrate different kinds of knowledge ( i.e 'Consilience') and to grow knowlede (since mathematical self-reflection - or 'Godelization' by definition involves an expansion of knowledge). Call the originial fai computer program (or in mathematical jargon a 'function') F Call a possible improved version of the function hyper-F In order for the system to determine that hyper-F really is a mathematical improvement over F, there has to be another kind of mathematical entity (call it M) which expresses the relationship between the two functions - F and hyper F. In other words, there has to an M that embeds F and hyper-F in a single mathematical field. But the process of embedding (or integrating) two different functions into a single coherent field is precisely the role played by *Memes*, which form the basis for morality. A dynamic positive-sum interaction between two different people is *equivalent* to a static mathematical relationship between two functions. A well functioning M generator has to have morality already built into it. A coherent relationship between a possible future version of oneself and a current version of oneship is *equivalent* to a positive-sum dynamic interaction between two different people. Thus, the argument suggests, the problem of recursive self-improvement is simply a generalized version of the problem of morality. Ergo, solving the problem of recursive self-improvement has to incorporate (or subsume) a solution to the morality problem. Ergo, only Friendly AI can recursively self-improve. Am I making sense here? "Till shade is gone, till water is gone, into the shadow with teeth bared, screaming defiance with the last breath, to spit in Sightblinder?s eye on the last day? ____________________________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? The New Yahoo! Movies: Check out the Latest Trailers, Premiere Photos and full Actor Database. http://au.movies.yahoo.com From wingcat at pacbell.net Thu Jan 12 08:21:24 2006 From: wingcat at pacbell.net (Adrian Tymes) Date: Thu, 12 Jan 2006 00:21:24 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] On difficult choices (was: Books: Harris; Religion and Reason) In-Reply-To: <20060112071226.66796.qmail@web50509.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <20060112082124.71338.qmail@web81610.mail.mud.yahoo.com> --- Marc Geddes wrote: > Am I making sense here? I understood what you were saying, for what it's worth. The counter-argument, as I understand it (not that I believe it), is that a slightly broken self-improvement routine, good enough to self-improve to some extent, might exclude morality. That is, at some level it would lose out to a moral self-improver if one was around to compete with it - but perhaps, by the time that level is reached, no one (broadly including all other sentients, human or otherwise) is around to care any longer as it starts to break down. From diegocaleiro at terra.com.br Thu Jan 12 10:02:31 2006 From: diegocaleiro at terra.com.br (Diego Caleiro) Date: Thu, 12 Jan 2006 08:02:31 -0200 Subject: [desejados] [extropy-chat] THE WTA IS ROTTEN FROM THE TOP In-Reply-To: <20060112054907.41336.qmail@web32809.mail.mud.yahoo.com> References: <20060112054907.41336.qmail@web32809.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <200601120802.31253.diegocaleiro@terra.com.br> So, is this a problem that Can, or that Can not be solved within WTA? Is it already an institutional problem? so that it would be worth to "restart" it from scratch. Or is it just about some people, that once taken away will be gone with the problem? Em Quinta 12 Janeiro 2006 03:49, Jose Cordeiro escreveu: > Dear friends, > > I am writing to let you know that I am withdrawing my candidacy for > the WTA Board. Regardless all my time and dedication, I have seen things in > the WTA getting worse instead of getting better. The double standards, > unethical practices, financial mismanagement, political recrimination, lack > of transparency, immoral behavior and blatantly open lies of some of its > leaders have been enough for me. Please, I urge to go over the WTA Board > files that are open to paying members, and see for yourself. The drop that > finally tilted the glass is the double morality exposed by some directors > in order not to expulse Mr. D Medvedev, who has defended Stalin because of > ?his overall contribution is overwhelmingly positive? regardless of ?a > significant number of people were executed and a large number starved in a > drought?. Some WTA Board members want to keep him because ?he is The > webmaster of the Russian Transhumanist Movement? and ?he is an excellent > translator of technical, transhumanist ideas between his Native language > and English?. This shows a total lack of respect for human lives, freedom > and human values, not only from Mr. D Medvedev but from some of the > current WTA Board members, whose view is simply not compatible with > humanism, and even les with the transhumanist ideas that I believe we have > to strive for. I wish that was all. However, after telling many consecutive > lies, James Hughes has been deleting my messages to the lists, and not just > my messages, without giving any notice. In his typical Stalinist fashion, > James Hughes has lied about how and why he censored the messages, but that > is nothing new about his behavior of the people he dislikes. Nonetheless, > Mr. D Medvedev and his support of Stalin is just moderated and not > expelled, unlike other people before who supported the Nazis, for example. > Well, the news is that Mr. D Medvedev now also told us about a strategy > for the Nazis and how the WTA should create "a vision of racially pure > superhumans? to attact them as well. James Hughes has been abusing his > power constantly, including when he self nominated and appointed himself > Executive Director in the WTA Board meeting in Oxford in 2004. He cleverly > wrote to sets of minutes after the meeting, the original where he was not > elected Executive Director, and a later one where he was supposedly > appointed unanimously. However, there was never such an election, and even > less an unanimous decision, since I certainly did not vote, and even less > for him. Nonetheless, James Hughes is a clever writer of minutes, and so he > wrote later what he wanted, even against reality and other people?s > objections. Financially, James Hughes oversaw losing $ 7,000 in the Canada > meeting, even though he always said it was a small quantity, but even now > the figure is not really known. First he said, it was ?only? $ 3,000, then > it grew to $ 5,000 and later he said it should be around $ 7,000. From 2004 > to today, however, we don?t even have the final number. Harvey Newstrom, > then a WTA Director, said that the financial management of the WTA was > basically so sloppy that it might not pass any auditing process. That is > why James Hughes has been constantly refusing the audit that I have > proposed, even a free audit with no cost to the WTA. That sounds > unbelievable, but true. And in 2005, James Hughes transferred close to $ > 5,000 sponsor money to Africa instead of buying tickets for the supposedly > African participants to TV05. Yes, James Hughes is responsible for losing > at least $ 12,000 from its members and sponsors. Maybe that is why he has > been constantly delaying the audit, but members ! should > ask why to give money to the WTA to end like this. > James Hughes also adores to love his enemies, and he has many. He > never published any of my extensive writings in the IEET webpage when I was > a fellow, and then he threw me out because I am an ?underdeveloped > right-winger?, as he told me in Madrid last year. He has called Joseph > Bloch a ?recalcitrant neocon?, he does ?hate that bitch? of Natasha > Vita-More and many other comments about people who do not agree with him. > Apparently he sees the world in black and white, either you are with him or > against him. That is curious for a socialist who also hates Bush very > deeply. One interesting description of James Hughes wrong ideas, without > considering all his personal hatred, was clearly pointed out by Ronald > Baily in Reason, so please take another look: > www.reason.com/rb/rb051105.shtml. But you should really read the book to > get the flavor of how much he hates the Extropy Institute, Max More and so > many other transhumanists who don?t agree with him. Because of all the > problems that James Hughes has had with so many people, we in the WTA Board > gave him a one year trial period to see how he behaved. If you see the > results, it has been a real disaster: more hatred, more problems, more bad > talk. James Hughes has brought divisions to our little community instead of > union and harmony. Maybe that is why he unilaterally declared last year > that the WTA was not an umbrella organization of the transhumanist > movement. Not only it is not an umbrella now, but it is driven by socialist > ideas in a Stalinist manner. Anyone who disagrees with him will suffer > hell, or just ask Harvey Newstrom, Eliezer Yudkowsky or Bruce Klein, or so > many others before them. And so many others after me, because James Hughes > will continue, it is in his nature: like the scorpion who will hurt anyone > including himself. These problems did not start with me, and they will > certainly continue as long as the unethical self-appointed and un-ratified > Executive! Director > stays there. The reality is that James Hughes is becoming more of a > liability than an asset to the WTA. I hope that you do not simply take my > words for any of this, please, verify directly the WTA Board files, or > contact me directly. It is very sad, but true. Nonetheless, I can gladly > say that I will keep working on transhumanist ideas, because I believe in > them, regardless of some rotten apples in the WTA Board. We transhumanists > are so few, and we have to work together as opposed to be driven by > totalitarian individuals, with political agendas, unethical behavior and > double standards. Transhumanistically yours, > > La vie est belle! > Jose > > Joseph Bloch wrote: > > mike99 wrote: > >Joseph, > >You missed the point of my message. > > Not at all. I grasped the point of your message perfectly. I simply > disagreed with it. > > >Now Joseph, do you know of anyone from, let's say, the far-right who > > offers the same combination of useful skills as Danila? > > You yourself said that DNAGod2000 (much as I might loathe and despise > him and his message), aka Marcus Eugenicus, aka Marc Harris leads a > "quasi-transhumanist cult". That strikes me as an effort that requires a > certain combination of useful skills. He has a very well-developed > website, and I daresay his organizational skills are exceptional. (I > would say the same about den Otter, although he is somewhat less > offensive and cultivates an air of respectability, inasmuch as he > doesn't seem to promote the anti-Semetic rhetoric that Marc Harris > does.) If he can found an organization, attract people to him, and get > stuff done, all the while droning on about how Hitler was right, I fail > to see how he is any worse than Danila, who drones on about how Stalin > was a good man, and whose skill set is somewhat less. > > Are you saying we should attempt to cultivate Marc Harris as a member, > hoping he grows out of his virulent neo-Nazism, because he has evinced > some success in his endeavors? > > Of course not. He and his message are just as offensive as Danila and > his message, and the fact that both of them could be seen as being > marginally useful in no way makes up for the taint that an association > with them would bring to the WTA as an organization. > > Joseph > > Date: Tue, 10 Jan 2006 22:36:34 -0500 From: "Joseph Bloch" > View Contact Details Add Mobile Alert > To: "World Transhumanist Association Discussion List" > , "WTA Board of Directors List" > Subject: [wtaboard] Re: [wta-talk] > IMMEDIATE EXPULSION OF DANILA [input] [input] [input] [input] > > Hughes, James J. wrote: >>Unfortunately, because the leftist political > leanings of >>James Hughes and Nick Bostrom, it just took longer to > condemn >>the communist and socialist murderers. >> >> > >I > understand that the Bolivarian Revolution has placed you under a great > >deal of stress, but I really must take exception to this absurd > >accusation. Nick can speak for myself, but your repeated suggestion that > >I have not moved to expel Danila because I am a "leftist" or a > >"Communist sympathizer" is baseless and quite ludicrous. > I do not > presume to speak for Jose, but I will point out that the fact that a > double standard exists within the WTA is neither baseless nor ludicous. > It is also self-evident that you (as a result of your self-admitted > political leanings) are largely responsible for that double standard. > You are, by your own admission, a Socialist (of the "Democratic" stripe, > but a Socialist nonetheless; I confess I find the n! otion > that the proletariat has voted to redistribute my property not so much > worse than the oligarchs have decided to do so, but I digress). You > have, to date, dealt harshly and with dispatch when racist or racialist > elements have attempted to insinuate themselves within the WTA (and > rightly so). And yet, you have dealt relatively lightly with our resident > USSR apologist. You claim that it is not because you are a leftist or a > Communist sympathizer, but you have yet to provide an alternative > explanation for your foot-dragging. Can you honestly claim that Marc > Harris (aka DNAGod2000) or Dalibor van den Otter would have gotten so > many chances? Of course not, yet our resident USSR apologist has been > spewing his bile for months and months, picking up exactly where he left > off once his moderation was lifted (and the explanation for why that was > done, when there was a motion before the Board to terminate his rights to > post at all, is still awaited). ! The > simple fact is you don't seem to see Communism (because it is so closely > associated with the Socialism you profess) as offensive as racism, and > thus you don't treat it as harshly. It is precisely that double-standard, > wherein the excesses of the Left get a pass while the excesses of the > Right are excoriated, which has no place in a supposedly "apolitical" > organization. You do the WTA a disservice by indulging your personal > political preferences. One has to look no farther than the recent vote > amongst the WTA board to condemn totalitarianism. When I suggested that > we should pass a statement that would "formulate a broad, yet effective, > policy against totalitarianism and authoritarianism, regardless if it > comes from Left or Right", your response was to formulate a statement > that endorsed State control of the economy. And then to proceed to > compare me to Joseph McCarthy for daring to point that out. Eventually > the version offered by Dr. Bostr! om made > no mention of left or right was adopted, but the fact remains that we > have explicitly condemned right-wing extremism (twice!) but never > left-wing extremism. Other examples are rife. You claim you are not > biased in favor of the Left. I say the evidence says otherwise. You > harbor an immense double-standard, which is reflected in every aspect of > your oversight of the WTA, and which makes a mockery of its claim to be > an organization without a political agenda. You once said to me that > the WTA should be whatever you say it should be because you do all the > work. If that's really your view (though I have every confidence you'll > promptly deny ever having said it), then I would urge you to come out > and do it. I, despite what you might think, won't stop you. I'll leave > quietly. But what I will not abide quietly is this farce that the WTA is > somehow apolitical, and balanced, when it is in fact ultra-left and > pursuing the personal political agenda ! of its > Executive Director. Please, either go all the way or stop imposing the > double-standard on the WTA. Joseph Bloch, Director > > > > > E-mail classificado pelo Identificador de Spam Inteligente Terra. > Para alterar a categoria classificada, visite > http://mail.terra.com.br/protected_email/imail/imail.cgi?+_u=diegocaleiro&_ >l=1,1137044963.661430.5062.chipata.terra.com.br,35991,20031127114101,2003112 >7114101 > > Esta mensagem foi verificada pelo E-mail Protegido Terra. > Scan engine: McAfee VirusScan / Atualizado em 11/01/2006 / Vers?o: > 4.4.00/4672 Proteja o seu e-mail Terra: http://mail.terra.com.br/ From russell.wallace at gmail.com Thu Jan 12 10:18:02 2006 From: russell.wallace at gmail.com (Russell Wallace) Date: Thu, 12 Jan 2006 10:18:02 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] On difficult choices (was: Books: Harris; Religion and Reason) In-Reply-To: <20060112051911.37750.qmail@web50511.mail.yahoo.com> References: <20060112051911.37750.qmail@web50511.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <8d71341e0601120218g6669207bya6f5168d015ee8ae@mail.gmail.com> On 1/12/06, Marc Geddes wrote: > > In fact the more I've learned about Ai stuff, the more > confident I am that there's no danger. I would never > have posted the things I did to Sl4 , wta-talk and the > Extropy list if I wasn't > very very very very very very very VERY confident that > Eli is wrong. That's why I've been taking the mikey > out of him. Oddly, you're right about this, though for the wrong reasons. That a race as mighty as 21st century Man could be exterminated by implacable Terminators with glowing red eyes and plasma rifles wielded by a superintelligence, at least makes intuitive and aesthetic sense. It's no more going to happen in real life than the USS Enterprise hitting Warp Factor 10, alas. The entities exterminating us aren't aliens from outer space in flying saucers with force shields that can withstand a nuclear explosion. The terrible truth is that we already know them. MTV. East Enders. Zoning laws. MAs in political science. http://www.opinionjournal.com/extra/?id=110007760 It makes sense, of course; the one thing an exterminator meme can't look like is an exterminator meme, otherwise almost by definition it wouldn't be one. Bacteria die to penicillin; HIV, the simplest thing, slips by. Sic transit gloria mundi. Unless we can win, in the timeslot available. I used to think if it took until 2500 AD, so it it. I was wrong. The clock really is ticking. - Russell -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From dirk.bruere at gmail.com Thu Jan 12 13:43:03 2006 From: dirk.bruere at gmail.com (Dirk Bruere) Date: Thu, 12 Jan 2006 13:43:03 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] THE WTA IS ROTTEN FROM THE TOP In-Reply-To: <20060112054907.41336.qmail@web32809.mail.mud.yahoo.com> References: <43C5A3CE.3090301@goldenfuture.net> <20060112054907.41336.qmail@web32809.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Message-ID: On 1/12/06, Jose Cordeiro wrote: > > Dear friends, > > I am writing to let you know that I am withdrawing my candidacy for > the WTA Board. Regardless all my time and dedication, I have seen things in > the WTA getting worse instead of getting be! tter. The double standards, > unethical practices, financial mismanagement, political recrimination, lack > of transparency, immoral behavior and blatantly open lies of some of its > leaders have been enough for me. Please, I urge to go over the WTA Board > files that are open to paying members, and see for yourself. > The drop that finally tilted the glass is the double morality exposed > by some directors in order not to expulse Mr. D? Medvedev, who has defended > Stalin because of "his overall contribut! ion is overwhelmingly positive" > regardless of "a significant number of people were executed and a large > number starved in a drought". Some WTA Board members want to keep him > because "he is The webmaster of the Russian Transhumanist Movement" and "he > is an excellent translator of technical, transhumanist ideas between his Native > language and English". This shows a total lack of respect for human lives, > freedom and human values, not only from Mr. D? Medvedev but from some of > the current WTA Board members, whose view is simply not compatible with > humanism, and even les with the transhumanist ideas that I believe we have > to strive for. > > And I thought it was only me... Anyway, welcome to reality and sanity. Dirk -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From pharos at gmail.com Thu Jan 12 11:34:04 2006 From: pharos at gmail.com (BillK) Date: Thu, 12 Jan 2006 11:34:04 +0000 Subject: [desejados] [extropy-chat] THE WTA IS ROTTEN FROM THE TOP In-Reply-To: <200601120802.31253.diegocaleiro@terra.com.br> References: <20060112054907.41336.qmail@web32809.mail.mud.yahoo.com> <200601120802.31253.diegocaleiro@terra.com.br> Message-ID: On 1/12/06, Diego Caleiro wrote: > So, is this a problem that Can, or that Can not be solved within WTA? > > Is it already an institutional problem? so that it would be worth to "restart" > it from scratch. Or is it just about some people, that once taken away will > be gone with the problem? > There seems to be more than one problem. The immediate problem is: What should a list do if a Stalinist sympathiser joins the list and many times posts that Stalin wasn't such a bad guy, just misunderstood? 1) Jose and Joseph support his immediate expulsion from the list and a formal WTA statement disowning such Stalinist views. This would be a clear solution and set a precedent for the future (like the previous WTA neo-Nazi expulsion). The disadvantage is the loss of some Russian WTA help. But this may be necessary if it stops the WTA associating with a pro-Stalinist Russian WTA site that wants to use transhumanist technology to promote a Stalinist-like state. 2) The current state of affairs appears to be to try to keep the Russian assistance by not expelling this person, but to moderate his offending posts so that Stalinist propaganda does not appear on the wta-talk list. The current moderation also bans any discussion of this problem from wta-talk by other list members as well. IMO this is a mistake. The moderator has a job for life because the Stalinist is unlikely to change his views (unless he emigrates to the West). The Russian WTA site is free to issue Stalinist propaganda and associate such with the WTA. Any Russians attracted to the Russian WTA site will meet with Stalinist support and future useful members will flee in disgust. Those remaining will be more Stalinist die-hards. The future problem will be worse if a larger Russian WTA organisation is created which supports Stalinist views. Financial mismanagement charges require an audit of the books. Every organisation that requests donations from the public should have an annual audit and issue an annual financial statement so that the public can see how their contributions are being used. This is a very basic requirement, no get-out excuses allowed. Organisational faults and mismanagement should be dealt with by the WTA board. They should provide guidelines for the day-to-day management of the WTA. The guidelines should, of course, be developed with the co-operation of the line manager to make sure that he is happy to work within these parameters. BillK From dirk.bruere at gmail.com Thu Jan 12 13:48:12 2006 From: dirk.bruere at gmail.com (Dirk Bruere) Date: Thu, 12 Jan 2006 13:48:12 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] circumcision In-Reply-To: <200601120413.k0C4Dme09064@tick.javien.com> References: <43C53733.4050006@ramonsky.com> <200601120413.k0C4Dme09064@tick.javien.com> Message-ID: On 1/12/06, spike wrote: > > > bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Alex Ramonsky > ... > > BTW do you have a prime number of kids yet? : ) > > AR > > ********** > > My son is due June. I jumped the gun in announcing this, > because we are still high risk of miscarriage. Since you > bring this up, I apologize in advance for a topic that > is not extropic. But you are my friends and I need some > friendly advice: > > To circumcise, or not. Why or nhy? Offlist OK. Not. It is a mutilation he is not in a position to decide upon, and will not be for a decade or two. If it's so good why don't most uncircumcised men line up for it? It seems to me that it's just a US peculiarity no doubt stemming from some lunatic fundie influence at some point in history. Dirk -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From james.hughes at trincoll.edu Thu Jan 12 14:11:14 2006 From: james.hughes at trincoll.edu (Hughes, James J.) Date: Thu, 12 Jan 2006 09:11:14 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] WTA matters Message-ID: Since ExI is an affiliate of the WTA, and we share many members in common, I thought I would post my response to some of the recent discussion of those issues here. Voting members of the WTA are welcome to participate in the discussion on our list for voting members. --- Sometimes its helpful to remind ourselves what an incredibly diverse organization we are. We have members in 100 countries, with views that range from far left to far right, and many that are just unchartable. We have every religious persuasion among our members, and many strongly critical of religion. Its hard to keep all that diversity moving together without occasional friction. On the matter of Danila Medvedev, the Board is currently investigating and reviewing the matter, and is scheduled to take up the motion to expel him next week. Some of his stated views are quite offensive, and we welcome input on whether they warrant expulsion and/or moderation. The relevant sections of the WTA Constitution are Article 3 Section 9 and Article 11 Section 8: http://www.transhumanism.org/index.php/WTA/constitution/ As to Mr. Cordeiro, its certainly been invigorating having him on the Board. I wish him well in his future endeavors. Most of his concerns about WTA governance have been reviewed here, and by the WTA Board, previously. But we can answer any questions members may have about them. As to my personal failings, insofar as they have to do with my personality, my next book is about Buddhism, the neurosciences and the cultivation of personal virtues such as patience, compassion and skillful communication. The challenges of the WTA have certainly given me a lot of opportunity to reflect on those qualities, especially patience, over the last two years. If any of you have advise on ways I can improve my communication skills, and my work on behalf of the WTA, please let me know: director at transhumanism.org. Please be frank. Since Mr. Cordeiro has withdrawn from the Board election, we are left with five candidates for five positions, so, with the permission of the Board, I'll close the election today. -------------------------------------------- James Hughes Ph.D. Secretary-Treasurer Executive Director World Transhumanist Assoc. Inst. for Ethics & Emerging Tech. http://transhumanism.org http://ieet.org director at transhumanism.org director at ieet.org Editor, Journal of Evolution and Technology http://jetpress.org Mailing Address: Box 128, Willington CT 06279 USA (office) 860-297-2376 From dirk.bruere at gmail.com Thu Jan 12 14:13:15 2006 From: dirk.bruere at gmail.com (Dirk Bruere) Date: Thu, 12 Jan 2006 14:13:15 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] WTA matters In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On 1/12/06, Hughes, James J. wrote: > > > [PR snipped] > > ... If any of you have advise on ways I > can improve my communication skills, and my work on behalf of the WTA, > please let me know: director at transhumanism.org. Please be frank. Resign Dirk -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From rafal.smigrodzki at gmail.com Thu Jan 12 14:14:39 2006 From: rafal.smigrodzki at gmail.com (Rafal Smigrodzki) Date: Thu, 12 Jan 2006 09:14:39 -0500 Subject: [desejados] [extropy-chat] THE WTA IS ROTTEN FROM THE TOP In-Reply-To: <200601120802.31253.diegocaleiro@terra.com.br> References: <20060112054907.41336.qmail@web32809.mail.mud.yahoo.com> <200601120802.31253.diegocaleiro@terra.com.br> Message-ID: <7641ddc60601120614y33e02fa3k9476dc44fcc85f9@mail.gmail.com> Wow, so Jose, and Joseph quit wta too? Looks like the wta is hemorrhaging its nice people. Not surprising at all. Rafal On 1/12/06, Diego Caleiro wrote: > So, is this a problem that Can, or that Can not be solved within WTA? > > Is it already an institutional problem? so that it would be worth to "restart" > it from scratch. Or is it just about some people, that once taken away will > be gone with the problem? > From brian_a_lee at hotmail.com Thu Jan 12 14:24:37 2006 From: brian_a_lee at hotmail.com (Brian Lee) Date: Thu, 12 Jan 2006 09:24:37 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] circumcision In-Reply-To: <8d71341e0601112026ge0d9bdaj83c43692da7343d9@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On the other side, circumsicion reduces the risk for cervical cancer in sexual partners and penile cancer. It also reduces/eliminates infection and inflammation of the foreskin. It also reduces the chance of STD transmission to sexual partners. BAL >From: Russell Wallace >To: ExI chat list >Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] circumcision >Date: Thu, 12 Jan 2006 04:26:40 +0000 > >On 1/12/06, spike wrote: > > > > > bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Alex Ramonsky > > ... > > > BTW do you have a prime number of kids yet? : ) > > > AR > > > ********** > > > > My son is due June. I jumped the gun in announcing this, > > because we are still high risk of miscarriage. Since you > > bring this up, I apologize in advance for a topic that > > is not extropic. But you are my friends and I need some > > friendly advice: > > > > To circumcise, or not. Why or nhy? Offlist OK. > > >Well, I guess it's in a clearly identifiable thread that can be easily >skipped by people who aren't interested in it... I can't give you a >definitive answer to the question; I'm no medical expert. But one thing you >might want to take into account when making the decision: I saw an article >awhile back about some number of baby boys who had a circumcision botched >to >the point where doctors found it necessary to go for a full sex change >operation. (It turned out badly: on reaching adolescence, they found >themselves psychologically male in female bodies; that was the context in >which I came across the article.) What the percentage of this is, I don't >know. > >- Russell >_______________________________________________ >extropy-chat mailing list >extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org >http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat From dirk.bruere at gmail.com Thu Jan 12 14:30:28 2006 From: dirk.bruere at gmail.com (Dirk Bruere) Date: Thu, 12 Jan 2006 14:30:28 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] circumcision In-Reply-To: References: <8d71341e0601112026ge0d9bdaj83c43692da7343d9@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On 1/12/06, Brian Lee wrote: > > On the other side, circumsicion reduces the risk for cervical cancer in > sexual partners and penile cancer. It also reduces/eliminates infection > and > inflammation of the foreskin. It also reduces the chance of STD > transmission > to sexual partners. Is that a decision you feel happy for someone else to make on your behalf? I certainly know of circumcised men who greatly resented it. Dirk -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From spike66 at comcast.net Thu Jan 12 15:46:49 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Thu, 12 Jan 2006 07:46:49 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] ants teach and learn In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <200601121547.k0CFl0e19948@tick.javien.com> Cool! http://www.cnn.com/2006/TECH/science/01/11/ants.teching.reut/index.html spike From bret at bonfireproductions.com Thu Jan 12 15:52:43 2006 From: bret at bonfireproductions.com (Bret Kulakovich) Date: Thu, 12 Jan 2006 10:52:43 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] circumcision In-Reply-To: References: <8d71341e0601112026ge0d9bdaj83c43692da7343d9@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <343F0C1D-E73B-48E8-B2DF-1E73A3985E13@bonfireproductions.com> For a little Devillian Advocacy: Dirk, this kid will get upwards of 50 immunizations aka shots aka intentional disease exposures in the first ten years of life. All of which have been almost predetermined as 'better than not', based on what Brian Lee just pointed out - reduced risk of infection, transmition, etc. Just a statement. ]3 On Jan 12, 2006, at 9:30 AM, Dirk Bruere wrote: > Is that a decision you feel happy for someone else to make on your > behalf? From kevin at kevinfreels.com Thu Jan 12 16:03:24 2006 From: kevin at kevinfreels.com (kevinfreels.com) Date: Thu, 12 Jan 2006 10:03:24 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] circumcision References: <43C53733.4050006@ramonsky.com><200601120413.k0C4Dme09064@tick.javien.com> <8d71341e0601112026ge0d9bdaj83c43692da7343d9@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <009001c61791$b8004500$640fa8c0@kevin> I doubt that your botched circumcision scenario is any more common than the case where the wrong leg gets amputated. It's a great story for creating fear and general awareness but the child is probably more likely to die in the car trip home from the hospital. As for circumcision, it is my understanding that it is much easier to keep clean when circumcised. I can only imagine that though as I was circumcised as an infant. I can tell you that I have personally never experienced any of the supposed problems others claim and have wondered whether or not circumcision has just been a convenient excuse for symptoms of other problems. ----- Original Message ----- From: Russell Wallace To: ExI chat list Sent: Wednesday, January 11, 2006 10:26 PM Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] circumcision On 1/12/06, spike wrote: > bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Alex Ramonsky ... > BTW do you have a prime number of kids yet? : ) > AR > ********** My son is due June. I jumped the gun in announcing this, because we are still high risk of miscarriage. Since you bring this up, I apologize in advance for a topic that is not extropic. But you are my friends and I need some friendly advice: To circumcise, or not. Why or nhy? Offlist OK. Well, I guess it's in a clearly identifiable thread that can be easily skipped by people who aren't interested in it... I can't give you a definitive answer to the question; I'm no medical expert. But one thing you might want to take into account when making the decision: I saw an article awhile back about some number of baby boys who had a circumcision botched to the point where doctors found it necessary to go for a full sex change operation. (It turned out badly: on reaching adolescence, they found themselves psychologically male in female bodies; that was the context in which I came across the article.) What the percentage of this is, I don't know. - Russell ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ _______________________________________________ extropy-chat mailing list extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From nvitamore at austin.rr.com Thu Jan 12 16:03:16 2006 From: nvitamore at austin.rr.com (nvitamore at austin.rr.com) Date: Thu, 12 Jan 2006 11:03:16 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] ants teach and learn Message-ID: <380-22006141216316888@M2W055.mail2web.com> Spike wrote: >Cool! >http://www.cnn.com/2006/TECH/science/01/11/ants.teching.reut/index.html I keep seeing nanorobots in my mind .... N -------------------------------------------------------------------- mail2web - Check your email from the web at http://mail2web.com/ . From mbb386 at main.nc.us Thu Jan 12 16:48:07 2006 From: mbb386 at main.nc.us (M.B. Baumeister) Date: Thu, 12 Jan 2006 11:48:07 -0500 (EST) Subject: [extropy-chat] circumcision In-Reply-To: <009001c61791$b8004500$640fa8c0@kevin> References: <43C53733.4050006@ramonsky.com><200601120413.k0C4Dme09064@tick.javien.com> <8d71341e0601112026ge0d9bdaj83c43692da7343d9@mail.gmail.com> <009001c61791$b8004500$640fa8c0@kevin> Message-ID: <33886.72.236.103.204.1137084487.squirrel@main.nc.us> What does the mother think, and what was done to the father are important aspects of this decision also. If (non)circumcision is not for religious reasons then it probably is simply "fashion" - what is prevalent at the time in any particular community. Cleaning is often cited as a reason for circumcision, but IMHO if you can clean your ears then you can clean your penis. Regards, MB From avantguardian2020 at yahoo.com Thu Jan 12 16:54:43 2006 From: avantguardian2020 at yahoo.com (The Avantguardian) Date: Thu, 12 Jan 2006 08:54:43 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] circumcision In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <20060112165443.373.qmail@web60514.mail.yahoo.com> --- Dirk Bruere wrote: > If it's so good why don't most uncircumcised men > line up for it? Because as an adult, a post-operative erection would tear the stitches out. Generally it is unwise to circumcise after puberty. The younger the better. The Avantguardian is Stuart LaForge alt email: stuart"AT"ucla.edu "The most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the source of all true art and science. He to whom this emotion is a stranger, who can no longer wonder and stand rapt in awe, is as good as dead: his eyes are closed. . ." - Albert Einstein, "What I Believe" (1930) __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com From wingcat at pacbell.net Thu Jan 12 17:08:44 2006 From: wingcat at pacbell.net (Adrian Tymes) Date: Thu, 12 Jan 2006 09:08:44 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] circumcision In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <20060112170844.47413.qmail@web81604.mail.mud.yahoo.com> --- Dirk Bruere wrote: > Is that a decision you feel happy for someone else to make on your > behalf? > > I certainly know of circumcised men who greatly resented it. That argument goes both ways. There are certainly uncircumcised men who greatly regretted not getting it - and, as has been pointed out, by the time they were old enough to make up their own mind, it was much less medically advisable. From rafal.smigrodzki at gmail.com Thu Jan 12 17:12:38 2006 From: rafal.smigrodzki at gmail.com (Rafal Smigrodzki) Date: Thu, 12 Jan 2006 12:12:38 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] circumcision In-Reply-To: <343F0C1D-E73B-48E8-B2DF-1E73A3985E13@bonfireproductions.com> References: <8d71341e0601112026ge0d9bdaj83c43692da7343d9@mail.gmail.com> <343F0C1D-E73B-48E8-B2DF-1E73A3985E13@bonfireproductions.com> Message-ID: <7641ddc60601120912r380320fdrc6dc94d8ad7aff7b@mail.gmail.com> On 1/12/06, Bret Kulakovich wrote: > For a little Devillian Advocacy: > > Dirk, this kid will get upwards of 50 immunizations aka shots aka > intentional disease exposures in the first ten years of life. All of > which have been almost predetermined as 'better than not', based on > what Brian Lee just pointed out - reduced risk of infection, > transmition, etc. > ### One may wonder, what is the reason why humans evolved to have a foreskin? For fun? To increase risk of infection and cancer? If we knew why we have it the first place, we'd know whether it's smart to cut if off. Rafal From albrooks2006 at yahoo.com Thu Jan 12 17:13:13 2006 From: albrooks2006 at yahoo.com (Alan Brooks) Date: Thu, 12 Jan 2006 09:13:13 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] THE WTA IS ROTTEN FROM THE TOP In-Reply-To: <20060112054907.41336.qmail@web32809.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <20060112171313.31977.qmail@web35711.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Why should he necessarily respect everyone's political opinions? Dr. Hughes can't be all political things to all political people. You are asking for a cyborg to be appointed head of WTA. [snip] James Hughes also adores to love his enemies, and he has many. He never published any of my extensive writings in the IEET webpage when I was a fellow, and then he threw me out because I am an ?underdeveloped right-winger?, as he told me in Madrid last year. He has called Joseph Bloch a ?recalcitrant neocon?, he does ?hate that bitch? of Natasha Vita-More and many other comments about people who do not agree with him. Apparently he sees the world in black and white, either you are with him or against him. That is curious for a socialist who also hates Bush very deeply. One interesting description of James Hughes wrong ideas, without considering all his personal hatred, was clearly pointed out by Ronald Baily in Reason, so please take another lo! ok: www.reason.com/rb/rb051105.shtml. But you should really read the book to get the flavor of how much he hates the Extropy Institute, Max More and so many other transhumanists who don?t agree with him. Because of all the problems that James Hughes has had with so many people, we in the WTA Board gave him a one year trial period to see how he behaved. If you see the results, it has been a real disaster: more hatred, more problems, more bad talk. James Hughes has brought divisions to our little commu! nity instead of union and harmony. Maybe that is why he unilaterally declared last year that the WTA was not an umbrella organization of the transhumanist movement. Not only it is not an umbrella now, but it is driven by socialist ideas in a Stalinist manner. Anyone who disagrees with him will suffer hell, or just ask Harvey Newstrom, Eliezer Yudkowsky or Bruce Klein, or so many others before them. And so many others after me, because James Hughes will continue, it is in his nature: like the scorpion who will hurt anyone including himself. These problems did not start with me, and they will certainly continue as long as the unethical self-appointed and un-ratified Executive Director stays there. The reality is that James Hughes is becoming more of a liability than an asset to the WTA. I hope that you do not simply take my words for any of this, please, verify directly the WTA Board files, or contact me directly. It is very sad, but true. Nonetheless, I can gladly say that I will keep working on transhumanist ideas, because I believe in them, regardless of some rotten apples in the WTA Board. We transhumanists are so few, and we have to work together as opposed to be driven by totalitarian individuals, with political agendas, unethical behavior and double standards. Transhumanistically yours, La vie est belle! Jose Joseph Bloch wrote: mike99 wrote: >Joseph, >You missed the point of my message. > > Not at all. I grasped the point of your message perfectly. I simply disagreed with it. &! gt;Now Joseph, do you know of anyone from, let's say, the far-right who offers >the same combination of useful skills as Danila? > > You yourself said that DNAGod2000 (much as I might loathe and despise him and his message), aka Marcus Eugenicus, aka Marc Harris leads a "quasi-transhumanist cult". That strikes me as an effort that requires a certain combination of useful skills. He has a very well-developed website, and I daresay his organizational skills are exceptional. (I would say the same about den Otter, although he is somewhat less offensive and cultivates an air of respectability, inasmuch as he doesn't seem to promote the anti-Semetic rhetoric that Marc Harris does.) If he can found an organization, attract people to him, and get stuff done, all the while droning on about how Hitler was right, I fail to see how he is any worse than Danila, who drones on about how Stalin was a good man, and whose skill s! et is somewhat less. Are you saying we should attempt to cultivate Marc Harris as a member, hoping he grows out of his virulent neo-Nazism, because he has evinced some success in his endeavors? Of course not. He and his message are just as offensive as Danila and his message, and the fact that both of them could be seen as being marginally useful in no way makes up for the taint that an association with them would bring to the WTA as an organization. Joseph Date: Tue, 10 Jan 2006 22:36:34 -0500 From: "Joseph Bloch" View Contact Details Add Mobile Alert To: "World Transhumanist Association Discussion List" , "WTA Board of Directors List" Subject: [wtaboard] Re: [wta-talk] IMMEDIATE EXPULSION OF DANILA [input] [input] [input] [input] Hughes, James J. wrote: >>Unfortunately, because the leftist political leanings of >>James Hughes and Nick Bostrom, it just took longer to condemn >>the communist and socialist murderers. >> >> > >I understand that the Bolivarian Revolution has placed you under a great >deal of stress, but I really must take exception to this absurd >accusation. Nick can speak for myself, but your repeated suggestion that >I have not moved to expel Danila because I am a "leftist" or a >"Communist sympathizer" is baseless and quite ludicrous. > I do not presume to speak for Jose, but I will point out that the fact that a double standard exists within the WTA is neither baseless nor ludicous. It is also self-evident that you (as a result of your self-admitted political leanings) are largely responsible for that double standard. You are, by your own admission, a Socialist (of the "Democratic" stripe, but a Socialist nonetheles! s; I confess I find the notion that the proletariat has voted to redistribute my property not so much worse than the oligarchs have decided to do so, but I digress). You have, to date, dealt harshly and with dispatch when racist or racialist elements have attempted to insinuate themselves within the WTA (and rightly so). And yet, you have dealt relatively lightly with our resident USSR apologist. You claim that it is not because you are a leftist or a Communist sympathizer, but you have yet to provide an alternative explanation for your foot-dragging. Can you honestly claim that Marc Harris (aka DNAGod2000) or Dalibor van den Otter would have gotten so many chances? Of course not, yet our resident USSR apologist has been spewing his bile for months and months, picking up exactly where he left off once his moderation was lifted (and the explanation for why that was done, when there was a motion before the Board to terminate his rights to post at a! ll, is still awaited). The simple fact is you don't seem to see Communism (because it is so closely associated with the Socialism you profess) as offensive as racism, and thus you don't treat it as harshly. It is precisely that double-standard, wherein the excesses of the Left get a pass while the excesses of the Right are excoriated, which has no place in a supposedly "apolitical" organization. You do the WTA a disservice by indulging your personal political preferences. One has to look no farther than the recent vote amongst the WTA board to condemn totalitarianism. When I suggested that we should pass a statement that would "formulate a broad, yet effective, policy against totalitarianism and authoritarianism, regardless if it comes from Left or Right", your response was to formulate a statement that endorsed State control of the economy. And then to proceed to compare me to Joseph McCarthy for daring to point that out. Eventually the version! offered by Dr. Bostrom made no mention of left or right was adopted, but the fact remains that we have explicitly condemned right-wing extremism (twice!) but never left-wing extremism. Other examples are rife. You claim you are not biased in favor of the Left. I say the evidence says otherwise. You harbor an immense double-standard, which is reflected in every aspect of your oversight of the WTA, and which makes a mockery of its claim to be an organization without a political agenda. You once said to me that the WTA should be whatever you say it should be because you do all the work. If that's really your view (though I have every confidence you'll promptly deny ever having said it), then I would urge you to come out and do it. I, despite what you might think, won't stop you. I'll leave quietly. But what I will not abide quietly is this farce that the WTA is somehow apolitical, and balanced, when it is in fact ultra-left and pursuing the personal political agenda of its Executive Director. Please, either go all the way or stop imposing the double-standard on the WTA. Joseph Bloch, Director _______________________________________________ extropy-chat mailing list extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat nattering nabob of positivism since 1976 --------------------------------- Yahoo! Photos Ring in the New Year with Photo Calendars. Add photos, events, holidays, whatever. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From albrooks2006 at yahoo.com Thu Jan 12 17:45:18 2006 From: albrooks2006 at yahoo.com (Alan Brooks) Date: Thu, 12 Jan 2006 09:45:18 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Re: WTA IS ROTTEN Message-ID: <20060112174518.76857.qmail@web35712.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Jose, it's your tone more than anything else, you sound like Stalin denouncing Trotsky: "..and he has misspent Party funds; he attacked worthy Comrades; he has..." Whom do you expect to find as semi-permanent WTA Secretary? nattering nabob of positivism since 1976 --------------------------------- Yahoo! Photos ? Showcase holiday pictures in hardcover Photo Books. You design it and we?ll bind it! -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From thespike at satx.rr.com Thu Jan 12 18:02:13 2006 From: thespike at satx.rr.com (Damien Broderick) Date: Thu, 12 Jan 2006 12:02:13 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] circumcision In-Reply-To: <7641ddc60601120912r380320fdrc6dc94d8ad7aff7b@mail.gmail.co m> References: <8d71341e0601112026ge0d9bdaj83c43692da7343d9@mail.gmail.com> <343F0C1D-E73B-48E8-B2DF-1E73A3985E13@bonfireproductions.com> <7641ddc60601120912r380320fdrc6dc94d8ad7aff7b@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <6.2.1.2.0.20060112114714.01e2f420@pop-server.satx.rr.com> At 12:12 PM 1/12/2006 -0500, Rafal wrote: >### One may wonder, what is the reason why humans evolved to have a >foreskin? For fun? To increase risk of infection and cancer? > >If we knew why we have it the first place, we'd know whether it's >smart to cut if off. Of course, the following is not the same, but a similar retort might be made to those crazy people who cut their hair, shave their beards, depilate their pubic hair, trim their toenails, wash themselves with soap, wear condoms during anal sex, clean their teeth with toothpaste... As far as I can see, though, male circumcision isn't really like any of the above, and derives from a surprisingly recurrent practice of self-mutilation in many cultures, similar to the votive practices of, say, knocking out one healthy tooth, cicatizing face, breast, arms, etc, as a kind of tribulation and admission to the tribe as well as an obeisance to supposed Higher Powers. Silly, and rather nasty. That it turns out to have some unexpected medical side benefits for people living in highly urban communities and engaging in sexual practices unavailable to our ancestors who were stuck in the same small region with the same small number of people for their whole lives, provides no warrant of adaptation. On the other hand, given the elaborate and cross infecting world we now live in, and that circumcision does have this unexpected side benefit, and is best inflicted in infancy if at all, it's worth considering for baby boys. Damien Broderick From jose_cordeiro at yahoo.com Thu Jan 12 18:09:43 2006 From: jose_cordeiro at yahoo.com (Jose Cordeiro) Date: Thu, 12 Jan 2006 10:09:43 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] JAMES HUGHES SHOULD RESIGN In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <20060112180943.96272.qmail@web32804.mail.mud.yahoo.com> "Hughes, James J." wrote: If any of you have advise on ways I can improve my communication skills, and my work on behalf of the WTA, please let me know: director at transhumanism.org. Please be frank. James, The best thing for you would be to resign immediately. This is my very frank and direct advise. First you were never elected Executive Director, and then you even changed the WTA Board minutes to try to change reality. Nonetheless, we in the WTA Board gave you a one-year trial period, and the results for you look very bad. You should resign immediately since you are becoming more of a liability than of an asset for the WTA. As Mikko Rauhala very calmly said about you "I really don't see WTA viable with him at the top either, because of his ability to make enemies if nothing else". I only wish the enemies were only inside the transhumanist movement, but James is also making them everywhere. James is like the scorpion: it runs in his nature. James with all your hatred towards people who don't share your socialist and Stalinist positions, the WTA has no good future. Calling Natasha a "bitch", calling Joseph Bloch a "recalcitrant neocon", calling me an "underdeveloped ringhtwinger", and on and on and on. You already had problems with very respectable former members of the WTA Board like Harvey Newstrom, Bruce Klein and Eliezer Yudkowsky, and others before and more to come after. In a very preliminary survey that Harvey Newstrom was doing while at the WTA Board, he asked people about their impressions concerning the WTA. Unfortunately, the impressions were very bad, and particularly about the leadership. Maybe you should publish some of his findings for all to read. By the way, many people have written to me about how to see the WTA Board files, so please send the information for all to see and get in the files. Financially, you should be in jail or at least fired. Any decent institution who has lost about $ 12,000 because of your incompetence, would fire you immediately. Also, I request all the WTA members not to give any more money to the WTA until the financial statements are audited, which James Hughes has constantly delayed, even a free audit. I feel sorry for the Finns, as a quarter of the contributing members, who have been giving money to a mismanaged black hole. However, my final point is your total lack of ethics and your perverse double morality. Supporting Stalinist views for a nice web page and a good Russian translation don't speak well about your morality. Transhumanistically yours, La vie est belle! Yos? (www.cordeiro.org) Caracas, Venezuela, Americas, TerraNostra, Solar System, Milky Way, Multiverse -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jose_cordeiro at yahoo.com Thu Jan 12 18:43:30 2006 From: jose_cordeiro at yahoo.com (Jose Cordeiro) Date: Thu, 12 Jan 2006 10:43:30 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Motion: To bar James Hughes from posting on WTA lists for two months In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <20060112184330.59691.qmail@web32810.mail.mud.yahoo.com> James, I think that it is YOU who should be moderated, but only after you report the financial mismanagement and your unethical principles. Anyway, your Stalinist methods within "YOUR" WTA are clearly seen by all the others. You asked for advise, and now that you are told to resign you don't like. That again is typical of your double morality. Transhumanistically yours, La vie est belle! Yos? (www.cordeiro.org) Caracas, Venezuela, Americas, TerraNostra, Solar System, Milky Way, Multiverse -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From nvitamore at austin.rr.com Thu Jan 12 18:57:35 2006 From: nvitamore at austin.rr.com (nvitamore at austin.rr.com) Date: Thu, 12 Jan 2006 13:57:35 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] HUMOR: A Guy describing a Traffic Accident via telephone Message-ID: <380-220061412185735757@M2W057.mail2web.com> Turn your sound up! http://www.chumfm.com/Morningshow/bits/march24.swf :-) Natasha -------------------------------------------------------------------- mail2web - Check your email from the web at http://mail2web.com/ . From albrooks2006 at yahoo.com Thu Jan 12 19:27:55 2006 From: albrooks2006 at yahoo.com (Alan Brooks) Date: Thu, 12 Jan 2006 11:27:55 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] JAMES HUGHES SHOULD RESIGN In-Reply-To: <20060112180943.96272.qmail@web32804.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <20060112192755.18185.qmail@web35708.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Do you know what Danila told me? He said there was some justification for the USSR's invasion of Afghanistan, for national security purposes. This is the same sort of justification Americans use to condone the Vietnam War. There was/is nothing extropian concerning the USSR's invasion. Jose, do you find the ongoing wars in Latin America extropian? > However, my final point is your total lack of ethics and your perverse double >morality. Supporting Stalinist views for a nice web page and a good Russian trans- >lation don't speak well about your morality. >Jose nattering nabob of positivism since 1976 --------------------------------- Yahoo! Photos Got holiday prints? See all the ways to get quality prints in your hands ASAP. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From pharos at gmail.com Thu Jan 12 19:50:20 2006 From: pharos at gmail.com (BillK) Date: Thu, 12 Jan 2006 19:50:20 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] JAMES HUGHES SHOULD RESIGN In-Reply-To: <20060112192755.18185.qmail@web35708.mail.mud.yahoo.com> References: <20060112180943.96272.qmail@web32804.mail.mud.yahoo.com> <20060112192755.18185.qmail@web35708.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Message-ID: On 1/12/06, Alan Brooks wrote: > Do you know what Danila told me? He said there was some justification for > the USSR's invasion of Afghanistan, for national security purposes. This is > the same sort of justification Americans use to condone the Vietnam War. > There was/is nothing extropian concerning the USSR's invasion. > Jose, do you find the ongoing wars in Latin America extropian? > But remember human security is better now than it has ever been. The full report can be downloaded as a series of pdf files, plus many tables and figures. Quotes: The first Human Security Report documents a dramatic, but largely unknown, decline in the number of wars, genocides and human rights abuse over the past decade. Published by Oxford University Press, the Report argues that the single most compelling explanation for these changes is found in the unprecedented upsurge of international activism, spearheaded by the UN, which took place in the wake of the Cold War. What is Human Security? Human security is a relatively new concept, but one that is now widely used to describe the complex of interrelated threats associated with civil war, genocide and the displacement of populations. The distinction between human security and national security is an important one. While national security focuses on the defence of the state from external attack, human security is about protecting individuals and communities from any form of political violence. Human security and national security should be?and often are?mutually reinforcing. But secure states do not automatically mean secure peoples. Protecting citizens from foreign attack may be a necessary condition for the security of individuals, but it is not a sufficient one. Indeed, during the last 100 years far more people have been killed by their own governments than by foreign armies. All proponents of human security agree that its primary goal is the protection of individuals. But consensus breaks down over what threats individuals should be protected from. Proponents of the 'narrow' concept of human security, which underpins the Human Security Report, focus on violent threats to individuals, while recognizing that these threats are strongly associated with poverty, lack of state capacity and various forms of socio-economic and political inequity, --------------------- BillK From jose_cordeiro at yahoo.com Thu Jan 12 20:07:00 2006 From: jose_cordeiro at yahoo.com (Jose Cordeiro) Date: Thu, 12 Jan 2006 12:07:00 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] RE: [wtahall] Motion: To bar Jose Cordeiro from posting on WTA listsfor two months In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <20060112200700.99977.qmail@web32805.mail.mud.yahoo.com> James, You were on a one-year trial that you have failed, even after changing the WTA Board minutes to have you self-appointed. But in any event, calling other Board members "recalcitrant neocon" and "underdeveloped rightwinger" does not lead to censure? Apparently no in your Stalinist system, particularly when you are the one, and also after calling people "bitch" and even worse things. I make a motion to bar James Hughes for posting to on WTA lists for two months? Any seconds? James, do you like your own medicine? Jose "Hughes, James J." wrote: > Once the new board is seated, I shall be submitting a motion > to remove you from that position, on that basis. Votes of no confidence are a standard feature of parliamentary life. I look forward to the discussion, and will of course accept the result. However calling people "scorpions" is not a part of civil parliamentary debate, and ordinarily leads to censure. J. Hughes _______________________________________________ wtahall mailing list wtahall at transhumanism.org http://www.transhumanism.org/mailman/listinfo/wtahall La vie est belle! Yos? (www.cordeiro.org) Caracas, Venezuela, Americas, TerraNostra, Solar System, Milky Way, Multiverse -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From sjatkins at mac.com Thu Jan 12 20:26:30 2006 From: sjatkins at mac.com (Samantha Atkins) Date: Thu, 12 Jan 2006 12:26:30 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Books: Harris; Religion and Reason In-Reply-To: <22360fa10601111624l6b1512cfy703d7dec2d17b600@mail.gmail.com> References: <34BF7F5C-2360-4784-A470-691D4417020E@mac.com> <22360fa10601111624l6b1512cfy703d7dec2d17b600@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On Jan 11, 2006, at 4:24 PM, Jef Allbright wrote: > > Harvey - > > Some of Robert's statements can really push people's buttons, but > consider that this is the guy who repeatedly argues for saving *all* > information, especially the more complex forms, as in living humans, > as being intrinsically good. He even argues for preserving society's > worst offender's, in a deactivated state, rather than executing them. > Nuking part of the planet most definitely will lose information. The argument was that it could save more information than it lost IIRC. But that was a bit of a stretch as it makes a series of HUGE assumptions. > When Robert has proposed destroying some portion of that which he very > publicly and very obviously values, he was trying to promote > intelligent debate about a certain class of decision-making that is > very difficult for many people to even consider, let alone decide. > The methods used did not and likely cannot lead to "intelligent debate". > Sometimes a military leader is faced with the difficult choice of > sacrificing some of his troops in order to save the rest. Sometimes > an individual will sacrifice himself to allow others to survive in an > overloaded lifeboat. Sometimes a surgeon will advise a patient to > undergo radical amputation in order to have a chance at life. > Sometimes a politician will risk loss of popularity in order to > contribute to a greater good. > And all to often major atrocities are committed in the name of "the greater good". > And too often people recoil in moral repugnance for lack of seeing the > bigger picture. There was no satisfactory "big picture" convincingly enough painted to justify mass murder. - samantha From sjatkins at mac.com Thu Jan 12 20:48:52 2006 From: sjatkins at mac.com (Samantha Atkins) Date: Thu, 12 Jan 2006 12:48:52 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] All hail Will Wilkinson In-Reply-To: <20060112045525.57698.qmail@web50506.mail.yahoo.com> References: <20060112045525.57698.qmail@web50506.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: It was offensive trash mouth idiocy and denigration of nearly everyone here. It does not belong on this list. It is you who are being the idiot. So much hurtful idiocy is covered up after the harm is done by claiming it was "a joke". That kind of behavior is not a joking matter. If you cannot behave yourself or take correction then leave until you can or be more permanently banned. - s On Jan 11, 2006, at 8:55 PM, Marc Geddes wrote: >> Will some moderator please bounce this offensive > clown? Thanks. >> >> -s > > >> Did it within 5 minutes of the post. >> >> >> >> s > > Don't be an idiot. The thread is talking about > zero-sum games and contests - read the earlier posts. > It should also be obvious from these and the smilies > I was joking. > > There are far far more offensive messgages on the > board in other threads if you want to be a tight-arse. > In an earlier thread for instance Eliezer posted a > string of extreme hate messages about me - and it was > clear he *wasn't* joking. The moderators did nothing > about them. But it's all silly stuff so I don't > complain. > > But you keep on being silly and moderating my threads > I might. > > "Till shade is gone, till water is gone, into the shadow with teeth > bared, screaming defiance with the last breath, to spit in > Sightblinder?s eye on the last day? > > > > ____________________________________________________ > Do you Yahoo!? > Yahoo! News: Get the latest news via video today! > http://au.news.yahoo.com/video/ > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat From albrooks2006 at yahoo.com Thu Jan 12 21:22:37 2006 From: albrooks2006 at yahoo.com (Alan Brooks) Date: Thu, 12 Jan 2006 13:22:37 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] theory: early bird gets the man In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <20060112212237.48895.qmail@web35701.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Prehistoric man may have been hunted by large birds: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060112/ap_on_sc/south_africa_ancient_mystery nattering nabob of positivism since 1976 --------------------------------- Yahoo! Photos ? Showcase holiday pictures in hardcover Photo Books. You design it and we?ll bind it! -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From acy.stapp at gmail.com Thu Jan 12 22:51:36 2006 From: acy.stapp at gmail.com (Acy Stapp) Date: Thu, 12 Jan 2006 16:51:36 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] circumcision In-Reply-To: <6.2.1.2.0.20060112114714.01e2f420@pop-server.satx.rr.com> References: <8d71341e0601112026ge0d9bdaj83c43692da7343d9@mail.gmail.com> <343F0C1D-E73B-48E8-B2DF-1E73A3985E13@bonfireproductions.com> <7641ddc60601120912r380320fdrc6dc94d8ad7aff7b@mail.gmail.com> <6.2.1.2.0.20060112114714.01e2f420@pop-server.satx.rr.com> Message-ID: I can't believe that otherwise well-informed adults are seriously considering circumcision as a valid option for a child. Clearly children are unable to give informed consent for a medical procedure due to limitations of their understanding, but children should have sovereignty over their own bodies unless medically necessary. In the case of circumcision the potential benefits occur when the boy becomes sexually active and is arguably fit to make that decision for themselves. I can guess what 99.9% of teenage boys would choose. As a side note, in cases of adult circumcision if the stitches pull out during an involuntary erection (apart from the mitigating extreme pain which would tend to reduce such an occurance) then the circumcision has removed an excessive amount of skin. The skin on the penis should not be so tight that it rips out stitches. http://www.norm-uk.org/circumcision_lost.html Acy On 1/12/06, Damien Broderick wrote: > At 12:12 PM 1/12/2006 -0500, Rafal wrote: > > >### One may wonder, what is the reason why humans evolved to have a > >foreskin? For fun? To increase risk of infection and cancer? > > > >If we knew why we have it the first place, we'd know whether it's > >smart to cut if off. > > Of course, the following is not the same, but a similar retort might be > made to those crazy people who cut their hair, shave their beards, depilate > their pubic hair, trim their toenails, wash themselves with soap, wear > condoms during anal sex, clean their teeth with toothpaste... > > As far as I can see, though, male circumcision isn't really like any of the > above, and derives from a surprisingly recurrent practice of > self-mutilation in many cultures, similar to the votive practices of, say, > knocking out one healthy tooth, cicatizing face, breast, arms, etc, as a > kind of tribulation and admission to the tribe as well as an obeisance to > supposed Higher Powers. Silly, and rather nasty. That it turns out to have > some unexpected medical side benefits for people living in highly urban > communities and engaging in sexual practices unavailable to our ancestors > who were stuck in the same small region with the same small number of > people for their whole lives, provides no warrant of adaptation. > > On the other hand, given the elaborate and cross infecting world we now > live in, and that circumcision does have this unexpected side benefit, and > is best inflicted in infancy if at all, it's worth considering for baby boys. "Given the high likelyhood that a child will use tobacco, and that lip removal does have the benefit of reducing oral cancer, and lip removal is best inflicted in infancy if at all, it's worth considering for all your babies." > > Damien Broderick > -- Acy Stapp "When I'm working on a problem, I never think about beauty. I think only how to solve the problem. But when I have finished, if the solution is not beautiful, I know it is wrong." -- R. Buckminster Fuller (1895 - 1983) From sjatkins at mac.com Thu Jan 12 22:59:08 2006 From: sjatkins at mac.com (Samantha Atkins) Date: Thu, 12 Jan 2006 14:59:08 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] WTA matters In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: If I had noticed that Medvedev was on the board I would have immediately withdrawn all association with WTA. There is no question abut the fact that he does not belong there and having him on the board is a major blunder. This has nothing at all to do with "diversity". - samantha On Jan 12, 2006, at 6:11 AM, Hughes, James J. wrote: > > Since ExI is an affiliate of the WTA, and we share many members in > common, I thought I would post my response to some of the recent > discussion of those issues here. Voting members of the WTA are welcome > to participate in the discussion on our list for voting members. > > --- > > Sometimes its helpful to remind ourselves what an incredibly diverse > organization we are. We have members in 100 countries, with views that > range from far left to far right, and many that are just > unchartable. We > have every religious persuasion among our members, and many strongly > critical of religion. Its hard to keep all that diversity moving > together without occasional friction. > > On the matter of Danila Medvedev, the Board is currently investigating > and reviewing the matter, and is scheduled to take up the motion to > expel him next week. Some of his stated views are quite offensive, and > we welcome input on whether they warrant expulsion and/or moderation. > The relevant sections of the WTA Constitution are Article 3 Section 9 > and Article 11 Section 8: > http://www.transhumanism.org/index.php/WTA/constitution/ > > As to Mr. Cordeiro, its certainly been invigorating having him on the > Board. I wish him well in his future endeavors. Most of his concerns > about WTA governance have been reviewed here, and by the WTA Board, > previously. But we can answer any questions members may have about > them. > > > As to my personal failings, insofar as they have to do with my > personality, my next book is about Buddhism, the neurosciences and the > cultivation of personal virtues such as patience, compassion and > skillful communication. The challenges of the WTA have certainly given > me a lot of opportunity to reflect on those qualities, especially > patience, over the last two years. If any of you have advise on ways I > can improve my communication skills, and my work on behalf of the WTA, > please let me know: director at transhumanism.org. Please be frank. > > Since Mr. Cordeiro has withdrawn from the Board election, we are left > with five candidates for five positions, so, with the permission of > the > Board, I'll close the election today. > > -------------------------------------------- > James Hughes Ph.D. > Secretary-Treasurer > Executive Director > World Transhumanist Assoc. Inst. for Ethics & Emerging Tech. > http://transhumanism.org http://ieet.org > director at transhumanism.org director at ieet.org > Editor, Journal of Evolution and Technology http://jetpress.org > > Mailing Address: Box 128, Willington CT 06279 USA > (office) 860-297-2376 > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat From analyticphilosophy at gmail.com Thu Jan 12 23:05:05 2006 From: analyticphilosophy at gmail.com (Jeff Medina) Date: Thu, 12 Jan 2006 18:05:05 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] WTA matters In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <5844e22f0601121505s663bc7e4p372eacc46d3ece5e@mail.gmail.com> Some wires got crossed in the communication lines: Danila Medvedev IS NOT on the board of the WTA. On 1/12/06, Samantha Atkins wrote: > If I had noticed that Medvedev was on the board I would have > immediately withdrawn all association with WTA. There is no question > abut the fact that he does not belong there and having him on the > board is a major blunder. This has nothing at all to do with > "diversity". > > - samantha > > On Jan 12, 2006, at 6:11 AM, Hughes, James J. wrote: > > > > > Since ExI is an affiliate of the WTA, and we share many members in > > common, I thought I would post my response to some of the recent > > discussion of those issues here. Voting members of the WTA are welcome > > to participate in the discussion on our list for voting members. > > > > --- > > > > Sometimes its helpful to remind ourselves what an incredibly diverse > > organization we are. We have members in 100 countries, with views that > > range from far left to far right, and many that are just > > unchartable. We > > have every religious persuasion among our members, and many strongly > > critical of religion. Its hard to keep all that diversity moving > > together without occasional friction. > > > > On the matter of Danila Medvedev, the Board is currently investigating > > and reviewing the matter, and is scheduled to take up the motion to > > expel him next week. Some of his stated views are quite offensive, and > > we welcome input on whether they warrant expulsion and/or moderation. > > The relevant sections of the WTA Constitution are Article 3 Section 9 > > and Article 11 Section 8: > > http://www.transhumanism.org/index.php/WTA/constitution/ > > > > As to Mr. Cordeiro, its certainly been invigorating having him on the > > Board. I wish him well in his future endeavors. Most of his concerns > > about WTA governance have been reviewed here, and by the WTA Board, > > previously. But we can answer any questions members may have about > > them. > > > > > > As to my personal failings, insofar as they have to do with my > > personality, my next book is about Buddhism, the neurosciences and the > > cultivation of personal virtues such as patience, compassion and > > skillful communication. The challenges of the WTA have certainly given > > me a lot of opportunity to reflect on those qualities, especially > > patience, over the last two years. If any of you have advise on ways I > > can improve my communication skills, and my work on behalf of the WTA, > > please let me know: director at transhumanism.org. Please be frank. > > > > Since Mr. Cordeiro has withdrawn from the Board election, we are left > > with five candidates for five positions, so, with the permission of > > the > > Board, I'll close the election today. > > > > -------------------------------------------- > > James Hughes Ph.D. > > Secretary-Treasurer > > Executive Director > > World Transhumanist Assoc. Inst. for Ethics & Emerging Tech. > > http://transhumanism.org http://ieet.org > > director at transhumanism.org director at ieet.org > > Editor, Journal of Evolution and Technology http://jetpress.org > > > > Mailing Address: Box 128, Willington CT 06279 USA > > (office) 860-297-2376 > > _______________________________________________ > > extropy-chat mailing list > > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat > -- Jeff Medina http://www.painfullyclear.com/ Community Director Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence http://www.singinst.org/ Relationships & Community Fellow Institute for Ethics & Emerging Technologies http://www.ieet.org/ School of Philosophy, Birkbeck, University of London http://www.bbk.ac.uk/phil/ From jose_cordeiro at yahoo.com Thu Jan 12 23:11:46 2006 From: jose_cordeiro at yahoo.com (Jose Cordeiro) Date: Thu, 12 Jan 2006 15:11:46 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Re: WTA IS ROTTEN Message-ID: <20060112231146.48247.qmail@web32801.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Dear Alan, Does my tone sound that bad? I apologize then. As for WTA Secretary, the WTA hired last year a full time staff person who can basically handle everything. La vie est belle! Jose [extropy-chat] Re: WTA IS ROTTENAlan Brooks albrooks2006 at yahoo.com Thu Jan 12 10:45:18 MST 2006 Previous message: [extropy-chat] ants teach and learn Next message: [extropy-chat] JAMES HUGHES SHOULD RESIGN Messages sorted by: [ date ] [ thread ] [ subject ] [ author ] --------------------------------- Jose, it's your tone more than anything else, you sound like Stalin denouncing Trotsky: "..and he has misspent Party funds; he attacked worthy Comrades; he has..." Whom do you expect to find as semi-permanent WTA Secretary? nattering nabob of positivism since 1976 La vie est belle! Yos? (www.cordeiro.org) Caracas, Venezuela, Americas, TerraNostra, Solar System, Milky Way, Multiverse -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From transhumanist at goldenfuture.net Thu Jan 12 23:14:46 2006 From: transhumanist at goldenfuture.net (Joseph Bloch) Date: Thu, 12 Jan 2006 18:14:46 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] WTA matters In-Reply-To: <5844e22f0601121505s663bc7e4p372eacc46d3ece5e@mail.gmail.com> References: <5844e22f0601121505s663bc7e4p372eacc46d3ece5e@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <43C6E2E6.8000504@goldenfuture.net> Absolutely correct. He is webmaster for the Russian Transhumanist Movement (an official WTA local chapter), and a frequent poster on the official WTA discussion lists and contributor to the events listed on the main page of the WTA. But he is not on the board. Joseph Jeff Medina wrote: >Some wires got crossed in the communication lines: Danila Medvedev IS >NOT on the board of the WTA. > >On 1/12/06, Samantha Atkins wrote: > > >>If I had noticed that Medvedev was on the board I would have >>immediately withdrawn all association with WTA. There is no question >>abut the fact that he does not belong there and having him on the >>board is a major blunder. This has nothing at all to do with >>"diversity". >> >>- samantha >> >>On Jan 12, 2006, at 6:11 AM, Hughes, James J. wrote: >> >> >> >>>Since ExI is an affiliate of the WTA, and we share many members in >>>common, I thought I would post my response to some of the recent >>>discussion of those issues here. Voting members of the WTA are welcome >>>to participate in the discussion on our list for voting members. >>> >>>--- >>> >>>Sometimes its helpful to remind ourselves what an incredibly diverse >>>organization we are. We have members in 100 countries, with views that >>>range from far left to far right, and many that are just >>>unchartable. We >>>have every religious persuasion among our members, and many strongly >>>critical of religion. Its hard to keep all that diversity moving >>>together without occasional friction. >>> >>>On the matter of Danila Medvedev, the Board is currently investigating >>>and reviewing the matter, and is scheduled to take up the motion to >>>expel him next week. Some of his stated views are quite offensive, and >>>we welcome input on whether they warrant expulsion and/or moderation. >>>The relevant sections of the WTA Constitution are Article 3 Section 9 >>>and Article 11 Section 8: >>>http://www.transhumanism.org/index.php/WTA/constitution/ >>> >>>As to Mr. Cordeiro, its certainly been invigorating having him on the >>>Board. I wish him well in his future endeavors. Most of his concerns >>>about WTA governance have been reviewed here, and by the WTA Board, >>>previously. But we can answer any questions members may have about >>>them. >>> >>> >>>As to my personal failings, insofar as they have to do with my >>>personality, my next book is about Buddhism, the neurosciences and the >>>cultivation of personal virtues such as patience, compassion and >>>skillful communication. The challenges of the WTA have certainly given >>>me a lot of opportunity to reflect on those qualities, especially >>>patience, over the last two years. If any of you have advise on ways I >>>can improve my communication skills, and my work on behalf of the WTA, >>>please let me know: director at transhumanism.org. Please be frank. >>> >>>Since Mr. Cordeiro has withdrawn from the Board election, we are left >>>with five candidates for five positions, so, with the permission of >>>the >>>Board, I'll close the election today. >>> >>>-------------------------------------------- >>>James Hughes Ph.D. >>>Secretary-Treasurer >>>Executive Director >>>World Transhumanist Assoc. Inst. for Ethics & Emerging Tech. >>>http://transhumanism.org http://ieet.org >>>director at transhumanism.org director at ieet.org >>>Editor, Journal of Evolution and Technology http://jetpress.org >>> >>>Mailing Address: Box 128, Willington CT 06279 USA >>>(office) 860-297-2376 >>>_______________________________________________ >>>extropy-chat mailing list >>>extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org >>>http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat >>> >>> >>_______________________________________________ >>extropy-chat mailing list >>extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org >>http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat >> >> >> > > >-- >Jeff Medina >http://www.painfullyclear.com/ > >Community Director >Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence >http://www.singinst.org/ > >Relationships & Community Fellow >Institute for Ethics & Emerging Technologies >http://www.ieet.org/ > >School of Philosophy, Birkbeck, University of London >http://www.bbk.ac.uk/phil/ >_______________________________________________ >extropy-chat mailing list >extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org >http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat > > > > From jose_cordeiro at yahoo.com Thu Jan 12 23:34:06 2006 From: jose_cordeiro at yahoo.com (Jose Cordeiro) Date: Thu, 12 Jan 2006 15:34:06 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] JAMES HUGHES SHOULD RESIGN Message-ID: <20060112233406.83764.qmail@web32810.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Dear Alan, Indeed, the comments by Danila are most disgraceful. Read this he sent: "I also acknowledge that when Stalin was leading my country a significant number of people were executed and a large number starved in a drought. However, when taking into account the positive things that happened when Stalin was our leader, his overall contribution is overwhelmingly positive." And James Hughes still defends him, because he is a "good" Stalinist. The problems of Latin America are partly due to the terrible influence of communist ideas. That is why I am so much against communism and socialism, because I suffer it here:-( Well, now that James Hughes has done his latest Stalinist act of unilaterally banning me from all the main WTA lists, or at least my messages apparently are not going through anymore, at least I will have more time to write my latest book, precisely about the future of Latin America:-) La vie est belle! Jose [extropy-chat] JAMES HUGHES SHOULD RESIGNAlan Brooks albrooks2006 at yahoo.com Thu Jan 12 12:27:55 MST 2006 Previous message: [extropy-chat] JAMES HUGHES SHOULD RESIGN Next message: [extropy-chat] JAMES HUGHES SHOULD RESIGN Messages sorted by: [ date ] [ thread ] [ subject ] [ author ] --------------------------------- Do you know what Danila told me? He said there was some justification for the USSR's invasion of Afghanistan, for national security purposes. This is the same sort of justification Americans use to condone the Vietnam War. There was/is nothing extropian concerning the USSR's invasion. Jose, do you find the ongoing wars in Latin America extropian? > However, my final point is your total lack of ethics and your perverse double >morality. Supporting Stalinist views for a nice web page and a good Russian trans- >lation don't speak well about your morality. >Jose nattering nabob of positivism since 1976 La vie est belle! Yos? (www.cordeiro.org) Caracas, Venezuela, Americas, TerraNostra, Solar System, Milky Way, Multiverse -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From starman2100 at cableone.net Fri Jan 13 03:06:06 2006 From: starman2100 at cableone.net (starman2100 at cableone.net) Date: Thu, 12 Jan 2006 20:06:06 -0700 Subject: [extropy-chat] The "Fourth Turning" concept Message-ID: <1137121566_12686@S2.cableone.net> An embedded and charset-unspecified text was scrubbed... Name: not available URL: From spike66 at comcast.net Fri Jan 13 03:44:19 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Thu, 12 Jan 2006 19:44:19 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] human security In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <200601130344.k0D3iYe25934@tick.javien.com> > bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of BillK ... > Quotes: > > The first Human Security Report documents a dramatic, but largely > unknown, decline in the number of wars, genocides and human rights > abuse over the past decade. Published by Oxford University Press, the > Report argues that the single most compelling explanation for these > changes is found in the unprecedented upsurge of international > activism, spearheaded by the UN, which took place in the wake of the > Cold War. ... > BillK This is great BillK, thanks! If these threads morph, do change the subject line. We have been letting the WTA air their laundry here, but we should avoid having fifty posts titled JAMES HUGHES SHOULD RESIGN if it isn't about that topic. Many of us are carefully staying out of that business. {8^D Note that I am not saying not to post on that topic, just label it correctly, thanks. I figure a good part of the reason human security has dramatically improved is due to the internet. Consider the present tension between Eritrea and Ethiopia. The mainstream press doesn't say much about it, but anyone with a cheap computer and a phone can find out everything as it happens. spike From thespike at satx.rr.com Fri Jan 13 03:45:44 2006 From: thespike at satx.rr.com (Damien Broderick) Date: Thu, 12 Jan 2006 21:45:44 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] The "Fourth Turning" concept In-Reply-To: <1137121566_12686@S2.cableone.net> References: <1137121566_12686@S2.cableone.net> Message-ID: <6.2.1.2.0.20060112214414.01d50528@pop-server.satx.rr.com> At 08:06 PM 1/12/2006 -0700, JG wrote: >Journalist Linda Turley-Hansen discusses the "fourth turning" concept in the >column below, and I'm curious to know what list members think regarding the >validity of this theory. I independently made much the same analysis in a book based on my doctoral dissertation, THEORY AND ITS DISCONTENTS, 1997. Damien Broderick From spike66 at comcast.net Fri Jan 13 04:21:47 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Thu, 12 Jan 2006 20:21:47 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] circumcision In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <200601130422.k0D4M8e30258@tick.javien.com> > bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Acy Stapp ... > Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] circumcision > > I can't believe that otherwise well-informed adults are seriously > considering circumcision as a valid option for a child. Clearly > children are unable to give informed consent for a medical procedure... Thanks Acy, this is close to my own thinking. Number 2 on the extropian principles is self transformation, and number 6 is self direction. My notion is that this kind of decision should be left to the owner. >From this group I am surprised no one suggested that stem cell technology may soon make the procedure reversible. Had this been suggested, I would have morphed toward a discussion of possible emotional impact from what must be nearly unimaginable agony at the age of 8 days. Thanks to all who posted, both onlist and off. I intend to make a stand on this. He will go natural unless and until he decides otherwise. spike From spike66 at comcast.net Fri Jan 13 04:30:07 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Thu, 12 Jan 2006 20:30:07 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] green ham and eggs In-Reply-To: <6.2.1.2.0.20060112214414.01d50528@pop-server.satx.rr.com> Message-ID: <200601130430.k0D4UIe31889@tick.javien.com> Would you eat this? http://www.cnn.com/2006/HEALTH/01/12/taiwan.pig.reut/index.html {8-] spike From jose_cordeiro at yahoo.com Fri Jan 13 06:26:09 2006 From: jose_cordeiro at yahoo.com (Jose Cordeiro) Date: Thu, 12 Jan 2006 22:26:09 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] TEH ECONOMIST: Google as a religion Message-ID: <20060113062609.79346.qmail@web32812.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Face value St Lawrence of Google Jan 12th 2006 >From The Economist print edition Larry Page, the co-founder of Google, has always wanted to change the world. He is well on his way Getty Images DOES Larry Page ever get vertigo when contemplating his life and future? After all, Mr Page and Sergey Brin, the co-founders of Google, the world's most popular internet search engine, can legitimately claim to have caused an information and media revolution. At 32, they are already worth far more than $10 billion each and fly around in their own Boeing 767. Bill Gates fears them; others in the industry admire or envy them, and some seem to consider them capable of anything. Expectations are dizzyingly high. ?It's not a good thing to think about,? said Mr Page behind the stage after his keynote address in Las Vegas at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) last week. But if he must ponder his company's achievements and power, he says in his halting, thoughtful voice, it gives him an even greater ?sense of responsibility? to make the world a better place. ?The reason your question doesn't make sense?, adds Eric Schmidt, the comparative veteran who is Google's chief executive and jointly runs the company with the founders, ?is that he's too busy? to have vertigo. Busy, that is, changing the world. = 0) || navigator.userAgent.indexOf("WebTV") >= 0) { document.write(''); } // --> That self-avowed goal causes a great deal of confusion. For instance, for the entire week leading up to his Las Vegas speech, much of the world's press decided to believe a rumour that Mr Page would announce a new, cheap computer powered by Google software (thus, went the logic, finally contesting Microsoft's reign over operating systems). Mr Page announced nothing of the sort. Yes, Google will ?support? an existing (and well-known) project by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology to produce a laptop for the poor, but so will many companies, and who wouldn't? At one point, Mr Page mocked such inflated expectations by ?announcing? Google Fastfood, a button in car dashboards that delivers instantaneous hamburgers. Mr Page used much of his speech to play the part of visionary geek-in-chief, dressed in a white lab coat and standing on spring-heeled sneakers, exhorting the 2,500 exhibitors at the CES to agree on industry standards and to make their gadgets less off-putting. He did also announce some intriguing new products?such as an expansion of Google Video, a download service that allows anybody to sell videos?thus continuing a seemingly endless dribble of product launches that cumulatively suggest astonishing ambition. Not only is Google already pursuing its stated goal to ?organise all the world's information? (not just web pages) by scanning library books to make them searchable, by bringing local information to mobile phones and people on the go, and so forth; it is also dabbling in side projects such as providing free wireless internet access to its home town in Silicon Valley, and perhaps to San Francisco and beyond. Mr Page's ambition started early. When he was 12, he read a biography of Nikola Tesla, a prolific inventor who never got credit for much, but is now a hero among geeks. Mr Page decided that he would be different: a great inventor and an acknowledged world-changer to boot. As the son of a computer-science professor, he channelled his energy into technology. By the time he was in college, Mr Page was building working inkjet printers out of Lego bricks?probably just to show that he could. A few years later, while doing his doctoral thesis at Stanford, Mr Page thought up his ?PageRank? system of ranking web pages by relevance, the foundation of Google's search engine. Teaming up with his intellectual soul mate, the Russian-born and mathematically gifted Mr Brin, Mr Page went ?on leave? from his research and founded Google. Mr Page was chief executive, until the founders were advised that they needed a more experienced adult at the helm: hence the arrival of Mr Schmidt, formerly the boss of Novell, a software firm. But Google stayed very much its founders' creation. It was Mr Page who wrote the letter?now legendary?in Google's regulatory filings for its stockmarket listing that announced the company motto: ?Don't be evil?. Despite rapid growth?from about 200 employees when Mr Page was chief executive to nearly 5,000 now?Google has lost none of its puritanical fanaticism. This zeal is starting to annoy some people. One visitor to the company's ?Googleplex? in Silicon Valley ?felt as if I were in the company of missionaries?. A consequence of the theory that Google is aiming to run the world could be that ?Google may be less liked in the industry than Microsoft inside 12 months,? says Pip Coburn, a technology analyst. Bloggers have started accusing Google of hubris and arrogance. Paul Saffo at Silicon Valley's Institute for the Future says that ?Google is a religion posing as a company.? Playing God If Google is a religion, what is its God? It would have to be The Algorithm. Faith in the possibility of an omniscient and omnipotent algorithm appears to be what Messrs Page and Brin have in common. It's ?in their DNA,? says Michael Moritz, a venture capitalist famous for investing early in both Yahoo! and Google. Whereas Yahoo! was started by two Stanford students who turned a hobby into a business, Google was started by two Stanford students who turned an intellectual obsession into a quest, says Mr Moritz. And what is that quest? Merely upstaging Microsoft would be almost banal. ?We're not trying to build a better operating system,? says Mr Schmidt (although that will not kill the rumour). Part of the plan is certainly ?organising the world's information?. But some people think they detect an even more grandiose design. Google is already working on a massive and global computing grid. Eventually, says Mr Saffo, ?they're trying to build the machine that will pass the Turing test??in other words, an artificial intelligence that can pass as a human in written conversations. Wisely or not, Google wants to be a new sort of deus ex machina. La vie est belle! Yos? (www.cordeiro.org) Caracas, Venezuela, Americas, TerraNostra, Solar System, Milky Way, Multiverse -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jrd1415 at yahoo.com Fri Jan 13 08:16:31 2006 From: jrd1415 at yahoo.com (Jeff Davis) Date: Fri, 13 Jan 2006 00:16:31 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] next generation of ion engines Message-ID: <20060113081631.77079.qmail@web60019.mail.yahoo.com> http://www.esa.int/esaCP/SEMOSTG23IE_index_0.html __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com From jrd1415 at yahoo.com Fri Jan 13 08:57:28 2006 From: jrd1415 at yahoo.com (Jeff Davis) Date: Fri, 13 Jan 2006 00:57:28 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] circumcision In-Reply-To: <20060112165443.373.qmail@web60514.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <20060113085728.26584.qmail@web60011.mail.yahoo.com> --- The Avantguardian wrote: > > --- Dirk Bruere wrote: > > If it's so good why don't most uncircumcised men > > line up for it? > > Because as an adult, a post-operative erection would > tear the stitches out. Generally it is unwise to > circumcise after puberty. The younger the better. This scenario seems implausible. Yes, the notion of a serious post-operative erection might suggest such a problem, but alternately, and in my view the more likely case, the pain associated with the onset of such an erection would put a quick end to the process. ************************************** --- Acy Stapp wrote: > I can guess what 99.9% of teenage boys > would choose. You're suggesting, I take it, that they would say "No way!" But what if it were culturally prescribed? If "all the men" had it done? It might be worth while to consult with some Muslims on this. They get circumised at age nine. This would give you some real data on pain et al. Also, I would guess that the Muslim boys 'choose' circumcision. At least insofar as any boy embarking on manhood 'chooses' the traditional ritual requirements/practices of the rite of passage. If I had to guess why most uncircumcised men don't "line up for it", I'd simply say, "What man in his right mind is gonna volunteer to have the end of his penis cut off, particularly if everything is working just fine?" Best, Jeff Davis "Is sex dirty? Only if it's done right," Woody Allen __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com From dirk.bruere at gmail.com Fri Jan 13 09:16:27 2006 From: dirk.bruere at gmail.com (Dirk Bruere) Date: Fri, 13 Jan 2006 09:16:27 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] green ham and eggs In-Reply-To: <200601130430.k0D4UIe31889@tick.javien.com> References: <6.2.1.2.0.20060112214414.01d50528@pop-server.satx.rr.com> <200601130430.k0D4UIe31889@tick.javien.com> Message-ID: On 1/13/06, spike wrote: > > Would you eat this? > > http://www.cnn.com/2006/HEALTH/01/12/taiwan.pig.reut/index.html I've eaten worse:-( Dirk -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From dirk.bruere at gmail.com Fri Jan 13 09:18:02 2006 From: dirk.bruere at gmail.com (Dirk Bruere) Date: Fri, 13 Jan 2006 09:18:02 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] The "Fourth Turning" concept In-Reply-To: <1137121566_12686@S2.cableone.net> References: <1137121566_12686@S2.cableone.net> Message-ID: On 1/13/06, starman2100 at cableone.net wrote: > > Hello everyone, > > Journalist Linda Turley-Hansen discusses the "fourth turning" concept in > the > column below, and I'm curious to know what list members think regarding > the > validity of this theory. Forebodings of the end of empire. Dirk -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From dirk.bruere at gmail.com Fri Jan 13 09:24:21 2006 From: dirk.bruere at gmail.com (Dirk Bruere) Date: Fri, 13 Jan 2006 09:24:21 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] THE WTA IS ROTTEN FROM THE TOP In-Reply-To: <20060112171313.31977.qmail@web35711.mail.mud.yahoo.com> References: <20060112054907.41336.qmail@web32809.mail.mud.yahoo.com> <20060112171313.31977.qmail@web35711.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Message-ID: On 1/12/06, Alan Brooks wrote: > > Why should he necessarily respect *everyone's* political opinions? Dr. > Hughes can't be all political things to all political people. > You are asking for a cyborg to be appointed head of WTA. > mike99 wrote: > One either treats apologists for mass murder the same, or one takes the partisan position that some mass murderers are OK. It doesn't take a cyborg to be fair and even handed in such a situation. If you are going to ban Hitler fans, ban Stalin, Mao and Pol Pot fans as well. Dirk -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From alex at ramonsky.com Fri Jan 13 09:47:24 2006 From: alex at ramonsky.com (Alex Ramonsky) Date: Fri, 13 Jan 2006 09:47:24 +0000 Subject: [desejados] [extropy-chat] THE WTA IS ROTTEN FROM THE TOP References: <20060112054907.41336.qmail@web32809.mail.mud.yahoo.com> <200601120802.31253.diegocaleiro@terra.com.br> <7641ddc60601120614y33e02fa3k9476dc44fcc85f9@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <43C7772C.5020207@ramonsky.com> Hey, you forgot Harvey! : ) Happy new year AR ****** Rafal Smigrodzki wrote: >Wow, so Jose, and Joseph quit wta too? > >Looks like the wta is hemorrhaging its nice people. Not surprising at all. > >Rafal > > > From russell.wallace at gmail.com Fri Jan 13 11:53:53 2006 From: russell.wallace at gmail.com (Russell Wallace) Date: Fri, 13 Jan 2006 11:53:53 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Runaway consumerism explains the Fermi Paradox. In-Reply-To: <1137028834.5046.251653889@webmail.messagingengine.com> References: <1137028834.5046.251653889@webmail.messagingengine.com> Message-ID: <8d71341e0601130353yf860aadjd5b478402c8c6f27@mail.gmail.com> I just had another thought about this. It's been remarked how strange and wondrous it is that creatures evolved for survival on the plains of Africa should be capable of discovering relativity; and indeed our Stone Age brains have worked surprisingly well - until now. Why should the late twentieth century have been the time the system really started breaking down? One obvious answer is that the evolution of lethal parasite memes only really kicks into gear when information technology reaches a certain point. Another possible answer is that the Great Filter might have a whole series of mini-steps _after_ the evolution of intelligence. Perhaps most species that evolve the ability to make tools don't happen to have the psychology to reach the Bronze Age, most of those don't invent the printing press etc. It's interesting to note that our own species may have lasted just long enough to still have a chance - that is, the development of new technologies such as life extension, nanotechnology, AI etc might still come in time. Combine that with something like the Simulation Argument, and we would expect that most intelligent _species_ don't get to the point of being astronomically observable, but most _observers_ find themselves members of species that _just barely_ make it. (I'm not necessarily claiming this should be taken seriously - I'm not sure anthropic arguments of this type have logical force (though they have made one successful prediction that I know of) - just offering it for those who, like me, find it amusing to dip into existential paranoia now and then :)) - Russell -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From hemm at openlink.com.br Fri Jan 13 13:51:51 2006 From: hemm at openlink.com.br (Henrique Moraes Machado (oplnk)) Date: Fri, 13 Jan 2006 11:51:51 -0200 Subject: [extropy-chat] green ham and eggs References: <200601130430.k0D4UIe31889@tick.javien.com> Message-ID: <014a01c61848$83fb8a50$fe00a8c0@cpd01> Didn't your mom allways tell you to eat the greens? :-P ----- Original Message ----- From: "spike" To: "'ExI chat list'" Sent: Friday, January 13, 2006 2:30 AM Subject: [extropy-chat] green ham and eggs > Would you eat this? > http://www.cnn.com/2006/HEALTH/01/12/taiwan.pig.reut/index.html > {8-] From brian_a_lee at hotmail.com Fri Jan 13 15:08:21 2006 From: brian_a_lee at hotmail.com (Brian Lee) Date: Fri, 13 Jan 2006 10:08:21 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] circumcision In-Reply-To: <200601130422.k0D4M8e30258@tick.javien.com> Message-ID: I think it's a bit ridiculous to not perform the procedure because an infant can't give consent. Will you wait until he's old enough to consent to vaccinations? Or blood transfusions? Or to donate a kidney to a dying twin? Parents are stewards of children and able and responsible to make important decisions. Would you make the decision to alter a baby's genes to improve intelligence, or to improve muscle growth or to improve their immune system if it involved a few minutes of pain that will not be remember after an hour? As for the trauma. At that age, the act of circumcision is not remembered and there are no credible studies to suggest that this pain affects the child. Think about it, 8 days ago the baby was pushed out of its mother which is much more painful than circumcision. BAL >From: "spike" >Reply-To: ExI chat list >To: "'ExI chat list'" >Subject: RE: [extropy-chat] circumcision >Date: Thu, 12 Jan 2006 20:21:47 -0800 > > > > bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Acy Stapp >... > > Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] circumcision > > > > I can't believe that otherwise well-informed adults are seriously > > considering circumcision as a valid option for a child. Clearly > > children are unable to give informed consent for a medical procedure... > > >Thanks Acy, this is close to my own thinking. Number 2 >on the extropian principles is self transformation, and >number 6 is self direction. My notion is that this kind >of decision should be left to the owner. > > >From this group I am surprised no one suggested that >stem cell technology may soon make the procedure >reversible. Had this been suggested, I would have >morphed toward a discussion of possible emotional >impact from what must be nearly unimaginable agony >at the age of 8 days. > >Thanks to all who posted, both onlist and off. I >intend to make a stand on this. He will go natural >unless and until he decides otherwise. > >spike > > > > >_______________________________________________ >extropy-chat mailing list >extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org >http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat From mbb386 at main.nc.us Fri Jan 13 15:40:13 2006 From: mbb386 at main.nc.us (M.B. Baumeister) Date: Fri, 13 Jan 2006 10:40:13 -0500 (EST) Subject: [extropy-chat] circumcision In-Reply-To: References: <200601130422.k0D4M8e30258@tick.javien.com> Message-ID: <34396.72.236.102.117.1137166813.squirrel@main.nc.us> > > As for the trauma. At that age, the act of circumcision is not remembered > and there are no credible studies to suggest that this pain affects the > child. Think about it, 8 days ago the baby was pushed out of its mother > which is much more painful than circumcision. > Perhaps there's something I'm missing here... what's with the "8 days" bit? My son was circumcised in the delivery room within moments of the birth. Why? Because it was common practice, as far as we knew, at the time. If we had it to do over, I think I would *not* choose circumcision. Mainly because I don't have any solid reason *for* it and am now more averse to needless (and as far as I know pointless) medical procedures. Regards, MB From albrooks2006 at yahoo.com Fri Jan 13 14:39:04 2006 From: albrooks2006 at yahoo.com (Alan Brooks) Date: Fri, 13 Jan 2006 06:39:04 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] THE WTA IS ROTTEN FROM THE TOP In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <20060113143904.92881.qmail@web35709.mail.mud.yahoo.com> I've been told not to post on this subject, but it's astonishing-- the flames directed at Dr. Hughes; it would appear he'd have to be Pol Pot himself to get so many negative reactions. That's all I'll say...'nuff said, bury the dead. >Dirk Bruere wrote:One either treats apologists for mass murder the same, or one >takes the partisan position that some mass murderers are OK.It doesn't take a >cyborg to be fair and even handed in such a situation.If you are going to ban Hitler fans, ban Stalin, Mao and Pol Pot fans as well. >Dirk nattering nabob of positivism since 1976 --------------------------------- Yahoo! Photos ? Showcase holiday pictures in hardcover Photo Books. You design it and we?ll bind it! -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From James.Rayburn at chw.edu Fri Jan 13 16:31:05 2006 From: James.Rayburn at chw.edu (Rayburn, James) Date: Fri, 13 Jan 2006 09:31:05 -0700 Subject: [extropy-chat] circumcision Message-ID: Our son was circed at the age of 8. We felt that it wasn't an issue as long as the kid learned to keep himself clean. Long story short, hey, I had to go there, he developed adhesions at the age of 7. He had more pain from the adhesion wound than the circ wound. Yep we (I) taught him how to clean himself; we called it the protocol. As my son got older and gained freedoms he developed his own, albeit, less thorough protocol. Thing is, one needs to set kids free at some point and the behind the ear inspections, (Have you looked behind the ears of kids ages 6-10? Some strange goings on back there.) become less frequent. Jim -----Original Message----- From: M.B. Baumeister [mailto:mbb386 at main.nc.us] Sent: Friday, January 13, 2006 8:40 AM To: ExI chat list Subject: RE: [extropy-chat] circumcision > > As for the trauma. At that age, the act of circumcision is not remembered > and there are no credible studies to suggest that this pain affects the > child. Think about it, 8 days ago the baby was pushed out of its mother > which is much more painful than circumcision. > Perhaps there's something I'm missing here... what's with the "8 days" bit? My son was circumcised in the delivery room within moments of the birth. Why? Because it was common practice, as far as we knew, at the time. If we had it to do over, I think I would *not* choose circumcision. Mainly because I don't have any solid reason *for* it and am now more averse to needless (and as far as I know pointless) medical procedures. Regards, MB _______________________________________________ extropy-chat mailing list extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat From spike66 at comcast.net Fri Jan 13 17:19:50 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Fri, 13 Jan 2006 09:19:50 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] THE WTA IS ROTTEN FROM THE TOP In-Reply-To: <20060113143904.92881.qmail@web35709.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <200601131719.k0DHJte09567@tick.javien.com> bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Alan Brooks Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] THE WTA IS ROTTEN FROM THE TOP I've been told not to post on this subject, but?it's astonishing--?the?flames directed at?Dr. Hughes; it would appear he'd?have to be Pol Pot himself to get so many?negative reactions. That's all I'll say...'nuff said, bury the dead. All right, Al Brooks has said his piece and ended with his 'nuff said, bury the dead, so I take that as an agreement to not post further on this topic. Since we have a volatile subject here, with a person's name in the subject line (poor form by the way), I propose the following. If one has no direct knowledge of the WTA, or is one of the usual suspects who gets in trouble with the moderators a lot, then I ask that you lay low on this topic and listen to what the others have to say on it. Thanks! {8-] spike From wingcat at pacbell.net Fri Jan 13 17:39:56 2006 From: wingcat at pacbell.net (Adrian Tymes) Date: Fri, 13 Jan 2006 09:39:56 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] next generation of ion engines In-Reply-To: <20060113081631.77079.qmail@web60019.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <20060113173956.69893.qmail@web81607.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Hmm. The stats on it as listed at http://www.estec.esa.nl/conferences/FPD/info/eui-act20051215.pdf suggest that you could get up to a full Newton of thrust with 100 cm^2 of grid. I wonder how light one could build an engine that size? If one could also find a battery or capacitor capable of delivering 100 kW over 10-15 minutes, such that battery/capacitor plus grid was less than a kilogram total mass, one could use this for ground launches. (Some googling seems to indicate that said amount for the energy storage alone - at about 17-25 kWh/kg - it either well beyond or about at the limit of current technology, and that's not including the engine's mass.) --- Jeff Davis wrote: > http://www.esa.int/esaCP/SEMOSTG23IE_index_0.html > > __________________________________________________ > Do You Yahoo!? > Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around > http://mail.yahoo.com > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat > From spike66 at comcast.net Fri Jan 13 17:41:50 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Fri, 13 Jan 2006 09:41:50 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] subject lines In-Reply-To: <200601131719.k0DHJte09567@tick.javien.com> Message-ID: <200601131741.k0DHfte11699@tick.javien.com> > Subject: RE: [extropy-chat] THE WTA IS ROTTEN FROM THE TOP ... > > Since we have a volatile subject here, with a person's > name in the subject line (poor form by the way)... > > spike Regarding highly controversial issues, I request non-inflammatory subject lines, such as "WTA business" or something other than "THE WTA IS ROTTEN FROM THE TOP" or anything with a person's name. We put a stop to it when they were doing that to Harvey Newstrom a couple years ago. Thanks. spike From mbb386 at main.nc.us Fri Jan 13 18:35:58 2006 From: mbb386 at main.nc.us (M.B. Baumeister) Date: Fri, 13 Jan 2006 13:35:58 -0500 (EST) Subject: [extropy-chat] circumcision In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <34538.72.236.103.102.1137177358.squirrel@main.nc.us> > Our son was circed at the age of 8. We felt that it wasn't an issue as > long > as the kid learned to keep himself clean. Long story short, hey, I had to > go > there, he developed adhesions at the age of 7. He had more pain from the > adhesion wound than the circ wound. Yep we (I) taught him how to clean > himself; we called it the protocol. As my son got older and gained > freedoms > he developed his own, albeit, less thorough protocol. Thing is, one needs > to set kids free at some point and the behind the ear inspections, (Have > you > looked behind the ears of kids ages 6-10? Some strange goings on back > there.) become less frequent. Ouch! :( IIUC my brother was circumcised before going to war (I was just a little kid). It was related to being able to keep clean - in wartime, where? when? how? Makes sense, I guess. It was his idea. You're right, you cannot subject a big kid of 8-10 to such thorough inspection, they must begin to take responsibility for themselves. My son had toenail troubles: he was cutting them wrong and that led to ingrown toenails. Geez. :/ I thought we'd covered that, but plainly he hadn't gotten the message. Kids. Once a parent, always a parent! :))) Regards, MB From sjatkins at mac.com Sat Jan 14 03:08:49 2006 From: sjatkins at mac.com (Samantha Atkins) Date: Fri, 13 Jan 2006 19:08:49 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] WTA matters In-Reply-To: <43C6E2E6.8000504@goldenfuture.net> References: <5844e22f0601121505s663bc7e4p372eacc46d3ece5e@mail.gmail.com> <43C6E2E6.8000504@goldenfuture.net> Message-ID: Ah, good. On Jan 12, 2006, at 3:14 PM, Joseph Bloch wrote: > Absolutely correct. He is webmaster for the Russian Transhumanist > Movement (an official WTA local chapter), and a frequent poster on > the official WTA discussion lists and contributor to the events > listed on the main page of the WTA. > > But he is not on the board. > > Joseph > > Jeff Medina wrote: > >> Some wires got crossed in the communication lines: Danila Medvedev IS >> NOT on the board of the WTA. >> >> On 1/12/06, Samantha Atkins wrote: >> >>> If I had noticed that Medvedev was on the board I would have >>> immediately withdrawn all association with WTA. There is no >>> question >>> abut the fact that he does not belong there and having him on the >>> board is a major blunder. This has nothing at all to do with >>> "diversity". >>> >>> - samantha >>> >>> On Jan 12, 2006, at 6:11 AM, Hughes, James J. wrote: >>> >>> >>>> Since ExI is an affiliate of the WTA, and we share many members in >>>> common, I thought I would post my response to some of the recent >>>> discussion of those issues here. Voting members of the WTA are >>>> welcome >>>> to participate in the discussion on our list for voting members. >>>> >>>> --- >>>> >>>> Sometimes its helpful to remind ourselves what an incredibly >>>> diverse >>>> organization we are. We have members in 100 countries, with >>>> views that >>>> range from far left to far right, and many that are just >>>> unchartable. We >>>> have every religious persuasion among our members, and many >>>> strongly >>>> critical of religion. Its hard to keep all that diversity moving >>>> together without occasional friction. >>>> >>>> On the matter of Danila Medvedev, the Board is currently >>>> investigating >>>> and reviewing the matter, and is scheduled to take up the motion to >>>> expel him next week. Some of his stated views are quite >>>> offensive, and >>>> we welcome input on whether they warrant expulsion and/or >>>> moderation. >>>> The relevant sections of the WTA Constitution are Article 3 >>>> Section 9 >>>> and Article 11 Section 8: >>>> http://www.transhumanism.org/index.php/WTA/constitution/ >>>> >>>> As to Mr. Cordeiro, its certainly been invigorating having him >>>> on the >>>> Board. I wish him well in his future endeavors. Most of his >>>> concerns >>>> about WTA governance have been reviewed here, and by the WTA Board, >>>> previously. But we can answer any questions members may have about >>>> them. >>>> >>>> >>>> As to my personal failings, insofar as they have to do with my >>>> personality, my next book is about Buddhism, the neurosciences >>>> and the >>>> cultivation of personal virtues such as patience, compassion and >>>> skillful communication. The challenges of the WTA have certainly >>>> given >>>> me a lot of opportunity to reflect on those qualities, especially >>>> patience, over the last two years. If any of you have advise on >>>> ways I >>>> can improve my communication skills, and my work on behalf of >>>> the WTA, >>>> please let me know: director at transhumanism.org. Please be frank. >>>> >>>> Since Mr. Cordeiro has withdrawn from the Board election, we are >>>> left >>>> with five candidates for five positions, so, with the permission of >>>> the >>>> Board, I'll close the election today. >>>> >>>> -------------------------------------------- >>>> James Hughes Ph.D. >>>> Secretary-Treasurer >>>> Executive Director >>>> World Transhumanist Assoc. Inst. for Ethics & Emerging Tech. >>>> http://transhumanism.org http://ieet.org >>>> director at transhumanism.org director at ieet.org >>>> Editor, Journal of Evolution and Technology http://jetpress.org >>>> >>>> Mailing Address: Box 128, Willington CT 06279 USA >>>> (office) 860-297-2376 >>>> _______________________________________________ >>>> extropy-chat mailing list >>>> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org >>>> http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat >>>> >>> _______________________________________________ >>> extropy-chat mailing list >>> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org >>> http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat >>> >>> >> >> >> -- >> Jeff Medina >> http://www.painfullyclear.com/ >> >> Community Director >> Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence >> http://www.singinst.org/ >> >> Relationships & Community Fellow >> Institute for Ethics & Emerging Technologies >> http://www.ieet.org/ >> >> School of Philosophy, Birkbeck, University of London >> http://www.bbk.ac.uk/phil/ >> _______________________________________________ >> extropy-chat mailing list >> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org >> http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat >> >> >> > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat From sjatkins at mac.com Sat Jan 14 03:52:05 2006 From: sjatkins at mac.com (Samantha Atkins) Date: Fri, 13 Jan 2006 19:52:05 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] THE WTA IS ROTTEN FROM THE TOP In-Reply-To: <200601131719.k0DHJte09567@tick.javien.com> References: <200601131719.k0DHJte09567@tick.javien.com> Message-ID: On Jan 13, 2006, at 9:19 AM, spike wrote: > bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Alan Brooks > Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] THE WTA IS ROTTEN FROM THE TOP > > I've been told not to post on this subject, but it's > astonishing-- the flames directed at Dr. Hughes; it would appear > he'd have > to be Pol Pot himself to get so many negative reactions. > That's all I'll say...'nuff said, bury the dead. > > > > All right, Al Brooks has said his piece and ended with > his 'nuff said, bury the dead, so I take that as an > agreement to not post further on this topic. A sibling organization seem to be have some real troubles. I think that is a little too important to more or less sweep it under the rug. So I hope we continue to discuss it. - samantha From spike66 at comcast.net Sat Jan 14 04:06:08 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Fri, 13 Jan 2006 20:06:08 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] subject lines In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <200601140406.k0E46Ie09153@tick.javien.com> > -----Original Message----- > From: extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org [mailto:extropy-chat- > bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Samantha Atkins > Sent: Friday, January 13, 2006 7:52 PM > To: ExI chat list > Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] THE WTA IS ROTTEN FROM THE TOP > > > On Jan 13, 2006, at 9:19 AM, spike wrote: > > > bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Alan Brooks > > Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] THE WTA IS ROTTEN FROM THE TOP ... > > That's all I'll say...'nuff said, bury the dead. > > > > > > > > All right, Al Brooks has said his piece and ended with > > his 'nuff said, bury the dead, so I take that as an > > agreement to not post further on this topic. > > A sibling organization seem to be have some real troubles. I think > that is a little too important to more or less sweep it under the > rug. So I hope we continue to discuss it. > > - samantha Ja I agree. My request was that 1) those who do not know about WTA should listen to those who do, and 2) pay attention to subject lines. The subject line WTA IS ROTTEN FROM THE TOP is unlikely to produce useful discourse. This topic is too important to have it devolve into a screaming match. spike From kevin at kevinfreels.com Sat Jan 14 04:34:50 2006 From: kevin at kevinfreels.com (kevinfreels.com) Date: Fri, 13 Jan 2006 22:34:50 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] circumcision References: <8d71341e0601112026ge0d9bdaj83c43692da7343d9@mail.gmail.com><343F0C1D-E73B-48E8-B2DF-1E73A3985E13@bonfireproductions.com> <7641ddc60601120912r380320fdrc6dc94d8ad7aff7b@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <000f01c618c3$dbb9e400$640fa8c0@kevin> > > If we knew why we have it the first place, we'd know whether it's > smart to cut if off. > This always disturns me. The thought that every part of us has a "reason". Chance plays a much larger part than I think many want to admit. And there are lots of things that we get that have not benefits at all. From kevin at kevinfreels.com Sat Jan 14 04:39:26 2006 From: kevin at kevinfreels.com (kevinfreels.com) Date: Fri, 13 Jan 2006 22:39:26 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] circumcision References: <8d71341e0601112026ge0d9bdaj83c43692da7343d9@mail.gmail.com><343F0C1D-E73B-48E8-B2DF-1E73A3985E13@bonfireproductions.com><7641ddc60601120912r380320fdrc6dc94d8ad7aff7b@mail.gmail.com><6.2.1.2.0.20060112114714.01e2f420@pop-server.satx.rr.com> Message-ID: <002301c618c4$80231fc0$640fa8c0@kevin> >but children should have > sovereignty over their own bodies unless medically necessary. Are you serious? I told my parents clearly I DO NOT want braces. What an idiot I was! Good thing they didn't see it your way. > I can guess what 99.9% of teenage boys would choose. What's that? And why do you think? From transhumanist at goldenfuture.net Sat Jan 14 04:44:22 2006 From: transhumanist at goldenfuture.net (Joseph Bloch) Date: Fri, 13 Jan 2006 23:44:22 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] A new email list to bridge the gaps In-Reply-To: References: <200601131719.k0DHJte09567@tick.javien.com> Message-ID: <43C881A6.5090208@goldenfuture.net> I confess I'm not entirely sure why the WTA internal fighting was brought up in the ExI chat list to begin with, but perhaps because the initiator felt his posts would be suppressed in the WTA fora. Still, they are not relevant to the Extropy Institute, and I feel it's unfair to inflict such carnage on another group, "sibling organization" or not. Fortunately I have come up with something of a solution. Behold the Transhumanism_general email list, which is not associated with any organization. Completely independent, and a tad iconoclastic for all of that, but hopefully it will grow into something of its own, and be a place where the WTA and ExI (and, hopefully, those who don't find either organization to their taste) can find a common meeting-place. http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Transhumanist_general I really hope folks will see this as an opportunity to get past not only the recent rancor, but the long-standing feud between the factions in >H circles. Let's use this as a way to come together, and emphasize our commonalities, and all help bring about the PostHuman world thereby. Come, let's talk. Joseph From deimtee at optusnet.com.au Sat Jan 14 06:16:39 2006 From: deimtee at optusnet.com.au (deimtee) Date: Sat, 14 Jan 2006 17:16:39 +1100 Subject: [extropy-chat] next generation of ion engines In-Reply-To: <20060113173956.69893.qmail@web81607.mail.mud.yahoo.com> References: <20060113173956.69893.qmail@web81607.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <43C89747.6020202@optusnet.com.au> Adrian Tymes wrote: >Hmm. The stats on it as listed at >http://www.estec.esa.nl/conferences/FPD/info/eui-act20051215.pdf >suggest that you could get up to a full Newton of thrust with >100 cm^2 of grid. I wonder how light one could build an engine >that size? If one could also find a battery or capacitor >capable of delivering 100 kW over 10-15 minutes, such that >battery/capacitor plus grid was less than a kilogram total mass, >one could use this for ground launches. (Some googling seems >to indicate that said amount for the energy storage alone - at >about 17-25 kWh/kg - it either well beyond or about at the limit >of current technology, and that's not including the engine's >mass.) > > Uh, no. It takes about 10 newtons to lift a kilo against 1 gee. You would have to get the mass under 100 grams just to lift off. However, how about if you dropped it off SpaceShipOne at apogee? How much time have you got to give it orbital velocity before drag exceeds thrust? also, I think you are a bit optimistic on the battery too. 100kW * 10 min = 16.666 kWHrs Thats about the same as a 12 volt battery delivering 1400 amps for an hour. I want some of those for my electric car. : ) - deimtee. From wingcat at pacbell.net Sat Jan 14 07:57:09 2006 From: wingcat at pacbell.net (Adrian Tymes) Date: Fri, 13 Jan 2006 23:57:09 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] next generation of ion engines In-Reply-To: <43C89747.6020202@optusnet.com.au> Message-ID: <20060114075709.94949.qmail@web81609.mail.mud.yahoo.com> --- deimtee wrote: > It takes about 10 newtons to lift a kilo against 1 gee. ...right, forgot to factor in G. > However, how about if you dropped it off SpaceShipOne at apogee? > How much time have you got to give it orbital velocity before drag > exceeds thrust? >From http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SpaceShipOne_flight_17P we know that SSO only took 24 minutes between detaching from White Knight through apogee to landing, of which just over 80 seconds was spent under thrust. So the apogee-to-landing phase probably took about 12 minutes. Most orbital rocket launches I've studied seem to take about 10 minutes to get to orbital velocity. So, you'd probably need wings or something to gain lift while going at hypersonic speeds - and the wings would need to be thermally protected (probably made out of solid heat shields), because as you get towards Mach 25 you're flying not through air but through plasma. Which is not to say it can't be done, just that a proper analysis is probably way in excess of simple back-of-the-envelope equations. I wonder, though: what would be the physics of flying through plasma? Could you use an M2P2-type magnetic bubble to shield the craft from direct contact with the atmosphere, while still maintaining enough of an airfoil shape (in the bubble, which seems to be the shape that would then matter for lift and drag calculations) to gain lift? > also, > I think you are a bit optimistic on the battery too. > > 100kW * 10 min = 16.666 kWHrs > Thats about the same as a 12 volt battery delivering 1400 amps for an > hour. > > I want some of those for my electric car. : ) Actually, some of the sources were advanced batteries being developed for cars. But I did caution that that was the optimistic end of the figures I was seeing: quite a few of the "most advanced" figures were quite a bit more conservative than that. ;) From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Sat Jan 14 08:55:30 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Sat, 14 Jan 2006 03:55:30 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] next generation of ion engines In-Reply-To: <20060114075709.94949.qmail@web81609.mail.mud.yahoo.com> References: <43C89747.6020202@optusnet.com.au> <20060114075709.94949.qmail@web81609.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Message-ID: Without directly meaning to be a "killjoy", what is it precisely that you are trying to accomplish? It makes sense (at least now) to propose long duration missions with ion thrusters. But it makes no sense if you have the power output of the sun (10^26W) at your disposal. So precisely what is the window you are targeting and what do you intend to do with it? Though we probably do not like to discuss it there *is* a point in the development in the singularity where later launched spacecraft will have resources at their disposal that significantly exceed the capabilities of spacecraft launched at an earlier time. Recognizing that suggests that the development of the "earlier" spacecraft is relatively pointless. I would agree that it is cool that we have more efficient ion thrusters. I am just frustrated that there does not seem to be a really robust discussion with respect to the use of such. Robert -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From sjatkins at mac.com Sat Jan 14 09:37:18 2006 From: sjatkins at mac.com (Samantha Atkins) Date: Sat, 14 Jan 2006 01:37:18 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Math Will Rock Your World Message-ID: In the spirit of the post or Brin and Page, here is the url of an article in the current business Week that could have the subtitle "Revenge of the Math Nerds". Sorry not to post the text but it is bit too long the keep the list bots happy. http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/06_04/b3968001.htm - samantha From jose_cordeiro at yahoo.com Sat Jan 14 11:01:58 2006 From: jose_cordeiro at yahoo.com (Jose Cordeiro) Date: Sat, 14 Jan 2006 03:01:58 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] RE: [wtahall] Some thoughts In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <20060114110158.90330.qmail@web32807.mail.mud.yahoo.com> "Hughes, James J." wrote: ... thank George and Mark for their exemplary service. James, Thank you for (not) including me. As the supposedly Executive Director, your double standards never fail to amaze me! By the way, you are still censoring 2 of my messages from January 11 and January 12. I guess it must be difficult for you to keep track of all the messages that you censor in so many lists, from different people, at different times. If you still send them, please, notice the original time and date when they were sent. When people like you keep lies on top of lies above more lies, it is difficult to have a consistent story. Some truth will come out despite all your censorship. It happened clearly with others like Harvey Newstrom before, who you heavily censored in the WTA Board. It happened to me now, and it will happen to others who disagree with you in the future. Your recent hypocritical apologies to Natasha, Eliezer and me, really made me laugh. You are such a cynic, without ethics and nasty double morality. Some who have gotten to know you and your ways (particularly when you are drunk and your natural hatreds flow more easily) will see the malice behind your false apologies. I truly wish I were wrong, but what you have done to others before, is not a good indication about the future. By the way, there is no need to censor this message and the next one, because they will be my last in a long time to any of your controlled lists. Please, notice that this message is being sent at 6:00 am, New York time. I really hope that at least you stopped your filtering and the two messages go through, but I want people to know the exact time anyway. Also, if there is anyone with insomnia, and this message passes without filters, you might want to tune ABC radio at 7:30 am, New York time, today Saturday January 14, where I will be talking about the future, but certainly not about the WTA. Transhumanistically yours, La vie est belle! Yos? (www.cordeiro.org) Caracas, Venezuela, Americas, TerraNostra, Solar System, Milky Way, Multiverse -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jose_cordeiro at yahoo.com Sat Jan 14 11:02:15 2006 From: jose_cordeiro at yahoo.com (Jose Cordeiro) Date: Sat, 14 Jan 2006 03:02:15 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] REAL POLITIK IN THE WTA... and so long... Message-ID: <20060114110215.63683.qmail@web32809.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Dear friends, This I hope will be my last message here for a long time. I am tired of all this infighting and I have better things to do, like you too. So please, don?t read any further if you are thinking you are wasting your time now, and disregard any pornographic material in between. I want to take this time to briefly describe the ?real politik? in the WTA, which unfortunately follows very traditional and past left-right models. I will be sarcastic so that you get a more quick reaction and because that is my culture and general character, as you have surely noticed by now. Please, don?t be offended, but if you do, it is probably because you deserve it, as we say in Spanish: ?el que se pica es porque aji come?. I am not sure about the equivalent in English, but you can do some googling and have fun. The current WTA Board is basically controlled by the large socialist block led Stalinistically by James Hughes. The other members are Mark Walker, Mike LaTorra, George Dvorsky, Nick Bostrom and Gaurav Gupta (some of whom seem to have had orgasms attacking me, both publicly and privately). Then there are two mostly independent characters (Giulio Prisco and Mike Treder) and the two anti-communists (Joseph Bloch and myself). You can check some general lines by seeing many of the WTA Board files www.transhumanism.org/mailman/private/wtaboard and vote results groups.yahoo.com/group/wtaboard. Now, let?s see these persons one by one and I also apologize for letting out some dirty secrets of all involved, c?est la vie: James Hughes has a great job that lets him devote his time almost continuously to the WTA. He is a former Marxist who has partially evolved into socialism, however, he keeps his Stalinist views and if you happen to be his target, he will continue until he destroys you. If you talk long enough with him, especially when he is drunk, he will tell you bad things about everybody, no exceptions, including himself. In fact, he formerly had in his web page that he hated his own sex (sadly he took it away, not his sex but the comments on it). He will do anything to get his objective, spare no prisoners, and forget about ethics. If needed, he will invent things, create stories, cheat and try to change the past. He loves to make enemies in the WTA, among transhumanists and other groups in general. James Hughes intensely hates Natasha Vita-More (more than Max More), his eyes turn red and his jaws begin salivating when he talks about her, maybe even more than when he thinks of Leon Kass or Francis Fukuyama. He is the scorpion who might destroy the WTA. He is a terrible manager who has also overseeing losing $12,000 from members and sponsors, and he hates audits, even if free. (Please, don?t ever give anymore money to WTA, but at least until its accounts are audited). Mark Walker is the grayest of the gray (he likes gray and black) personalities in the current WTA Board. If he disappeared tomorrow, no one would notice him missing. His claims to fame are to write some unreadable philosophical documents and to do some editing, besides not even caring to participate in half of the WTA Board votes: groups.yahoo.com/group/wtaboard. If needed, he will come running to do the dirty work that James Hughes would not do himself in order to keep their appearances of independence. He also hates me very deeply, intensely and passionately, almost as much as James Hughes loves (?) me. Mike LaTorra is a good hearted man, unless you discuss with him his Buddhist and socialist ideas. Then he gets really mad and threatens you with not being his friend and hoping that you will have a better reincarnation next time. He is known for putting together the WTA News and loving science fiction. He is very worried because he feels that he is getting old (aren?t we all?). If you are a Stalinist, but a ?good? Stalinist, who makes nice web pages and translates well into Russian, Mike LaTorra will invite you to join his Club since he has a nice double morality. George Dvorsky has been very busy with some personal and work problems after losing his previous job, and he then has let the Toronto TA almost die. He is known for inviting some well-known clowns (this is the exact word used by Nick Bostrom) to his conference in Toronto and losing about $7,000 with the full cooperation of James Hughes. However, almost two years after the fact, the exact numbers are unknown. He is also the first transhumanist to have cloned himself in order to vote twice in WTA Board votes. Other than that, his departure from the WTA Board to IEET, together with Mark Walker, will hardly be noticed. Nick Bostrom keeps low profile for his public secret about learning transhumanist concepts and ideas from Extropy Institute and its members. He plagiarized most of the principles and frequently asked questions from the work of Sasha Chislenko, Max Moore, Harvey Newstrom and others. Because of his socialist leanings, he philosophized that he would start an apolitical umbrella organization, supposedly the current WTA, which is sadly neither apolitical nor an umbrella (or it certainly has many holes). He lets James Hughes do all the dirty work to keep his profile untouched, while he continues to package and repackage the ideas of others, with no moral drawbacks. He risks becoming to transhumanism what Hwang Woo-suk has become to cloning. Gaurav Gupta is a very immature and unpredictable person. He wrote that he ?cursed the day (he) joined? the WTA, he slandered the founders of WTA-India (another Indian and myself), he resigned from the WTA Board, later he returned saying that he did not want to resign, then he looked for a girl friend to have a free ticket to come with him to Venezuela, and finally he said that he was not going to travel anyway. His only real contribution to the WTA Board has been to help writing a pamphlet about AI, useless but better than nothing. Giulio Prisco is the person that I admire the most in the WTA Board. He is calm, intelligent, tolerant, active and thoughtful. Even though he has a socialist leaning, he is very willing to compromise, and he is always looking for the most practical and better solutions. I think that is part of his scientific training which allows him to discern what works from what does not work. He has demonstrated to be very politically independent in the quarrelsome WTA Board; however, in times of crisis, he sides with the majority in order to preserve a false harmony. Mike Treder is almost as political independent as Giulio Prisco, also with a small socialist leaning, but sometimes he runs to help James Hughes (even though James Hughes has said that he is actually an asshole for not sharing some of his fantastic ideas about CRN with WTA, so Mike, watch out for your true friends). He designed one the best introductory pages about transhumanism, organized several transhumanist meetings in NY, was a dutiful treasurer while he lasted and is an incredible promoter of responsible nanotechnology. Joseph Bloch has continuously placed human freedom and human dignity above any totalitarian method to arrive to posthumanity. He is the only other staunch anti-communist in the group and is continuously attacked by James Hughes and his peons. He has devoted part of his time and money to promote the WTA in public events like some science fiction conferences and to organize transhumanist meetings in NJ. He is very active in the WTA Board and is heavily under fire from James Hughes, who did not want to approve his original statement against totalitarian systems. Jose Cordeiro is an ?underdeveloped right-winger? according to James Hughes, a ?rat? according to Gaurav Gupta, an asshole and many other nice words to some WTA members. Indeed, he is a warrior fighting for freedom in totalitarian Venezuela, and has arrested once and has been threatened to be killed twice by those same totalitarian chavistas that James Hughes and Danila Medvedev love so much. Transhumanistically speaking, he organized the largest and most accredited TV conference, helped starting the Spanish and soon Portuguese web pages, defends openly the extropian and other non socialist transhumanist positions, has begun and supported at least half of the current WTA Chapters and is now coediting the first book about transhumanism in Korean. But the WTA Board is not the end of the story, because James Hughes saw that some non socialists kept infiltrating the WTA. The cases of Harvey Newstrom, Eliezer Yudkowsky and Bruce Klein are notable (James Hughes loved to confront them), and now it is my turn and soon it will be others. For that reason, James Hughes started with most of his peons a ?think tank? called the IEET, which would not be accountable to anyone but himself (the IEET has an extra E for ethics in the title but James Hughes wipes his behind with ethics, particularly if you oppose him). He first used me as a fellow to have some names, but never published any of my documents and then threw me out like an ?underdeveloped right-winger?. The IET (with just one E, no ethics for simplicity) wants to be what the WTA could not be: the socialist group to promote his and Nick?s ideas, and forget about any problematic members or elections. Just like the WTA grew out of the ExI, now the IET was the perfectly controlled socialist transhumanist group. Sure, the IET supposedly had the grandiose objective to be a real think tank, but the real politik behind was also clear. I hate these simple definitions myself, but it is the easiest and most ironic way to transmit the message. Also, if you don?t like it: shoot the message but not the messenger (or is it the other way around?). I think that we should move forward from left-wingers and right-wingers to become up-wingers, as FM-2030 described, but James Hughes has made this impossible within the WTA. He is obsessed with his deep hatred of extropians and his particular idea, even if not Marxist anymore, but he should probably get some advice from Ronald Bailey (http://www.reason.com/rb/rb051105.shtml). Well, if you have read up to now and still have not killed me, think seriously about these issues if you want the WTA to achieve the goals most of us have in mind. If the WTA keeps being the Hughes or Socialist TA, that might be fine too if James Hughes had the decency of acknowledging it and saying that transhumanists who oppose his views are not welcome. James Hughes has to recognize that his period as Executive Director has been bad and that his performance was rather mediocre, besides financially irresponsible, intolerant, unethical and based on a double morality. I hope all these comments will serve to straighten out the WTA in the future. The WTA is right now a fringe organization within a fringe movement (and dare I say while looking for a mirror, with some fringe people too). If transhumanism is really going to succeed, we have to look forward united, with tolerance and ethics. I really tried my best in the WTA, and I did all I could while in the WTA Board. I am no longer interested in this useless infighting, if James Hughes believes that he has won, let it be, but right now the WTA, and particularly its Board, is a not functioning group because of the way that James Hughes uses and abuses power. I have other things to do that the WTA is certainly not doing. But if you thought that James Hughes or anyone was indispensable, you are wrong. In fact, the cemeteries are full of previously indispensable people. The WTA has now paying a staffer full time to do most of the needed work. What is actually indispensable is to correct the situation in the WTA, if it ever is going to change for the better. James, you don?t need to bar me since I will be putting all messages with the WTA word in a quarantined folder for at least two months. I don?t want to know what will happen until then. If the WTA can not solve its problems, it might not have a future, or even worse, a useless future. Also, don?t send me any Emails because I will not read WTA messages for that time. If anyone from the WTA needs to contact me just for a life or death problem write to another Email (jose at cordeiro.org). If anyone is just going to flame and scream asshole, send your messages to yet another Email (james.hughes at trincoll.edu). I am very disappointed with the WTA after several years, so if you still have not noticed that I am upset: yes, I am. Please, as an advice, don?t waste your time and money to support the rotten ego of James Hughes. If transhumanism succeeds, it will certainly not be because of the WTA as it is today. I hope that James Hughes, since he says that he is a Buddhist, reincarnates into a better person, and stops hating his own sex and everybody else who does not agree with him (he really has to fix some deep psychological problems). Others should also work at improving the WTA, and I wish well to the new WTA Board members. I will finish by saying that I will do my best as well and forgive my crudeness, I am only human as well. Well, those are my final 2 Kbits of news and best of luck to you all and to the WTA, it really needs it... Transhumanistically yours, La vie est belle! Yos? (www.cordeiro.org) Caracas, Venezuela, Americas, TerraNostra, Solar System, Milky Way, Multiverse -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From alfio.puglisi at gmail.com Sat Jan 14 11:31:50 2006 From: alfio.puglisi at gmail.com (Alfio Puglisi) Date: Sat, 14 Jan 2006 12:31:50 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] REAL POLITIK IN THE WTA... and so long... In-Reply-To: <20060114110215.63683.qmail@web32809.mail.mud.yahoo.com> References: <20060114110215.63683.qmail@web32809.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <4902d9990601140331k79a4e461ka0131080469b5eb2@mail.gmail.com> For those who didn't want to read the long email, I can sum it up: "socialism bad, WTA socialist, WTA bad". 13 K of text from an intelligent person should not reduce to a simplicistic "socialism - not socialism" axis. Alfio From isthatyoujack at icqmail.com Sat Jan 14 14:54:49 2006 From: isthatyoujack at icqmail.com (Jack Parkinson) Date: Sat, 14 Jan 2006 22:54:49 +0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] On Gut Feelings Message-ID: <002501c6191a$79cb2b80$04800d0a@JPAcer> The fairly recent acrimonious political debate in this forum and the airing of the WTA 'dirty laundry' has made me wonder a little about the reliability of the 'gut-feeling' as an arbiter of what intelligent life ought to be listening and paying attention to. In the case of Danila Medvedev: To be sure, I am no apologist for Stalin: But - I do believe in free speech. I see no benefits whatsoever in sweeping unpalatable political facts - or even unpalatable political fictions and delusions - beneath some metaphorical carpet. We are reasonable people (or should be) and able to engage/reject a topic with reason and informed debate. So I was somewhat taken aback some time ago when I mildly remonstrated against the ad-hominem attacks Danila Medvedev was being subjected to on the WTA list and was promptly denounced as a 'commie' and an admirer of Hitler and Pol-Pot. Almost immediately the signal to noise ratio made further discussion impossible. Pity - because something important was lost. Reasoned response was sacrificed (eventually moderated out) because a few individuals persisted in their pejorative attacks - making it clear that their sacrosanct world view was not to be threatened on THEIR list... But, if you read Danila's posts, it is clear that he is not an idiot, and that he is capable of presenting useful viewpoints on a whole range of topics. Ok - most of us disagree with him concerning Stalin - so what? If he has other useful things to contribute, why should you or I care if he indulges in the odd whacko belief? Is it worse than Mormonism? Seventh Day Adventism? The Moonies? Catholicism? Flying Spaghetti Monsterism? Adulation of Mao? Che? Eva Peron? Or even, God help us - George W? I often disagree with the neo-conservative and libertarian viewpoints as expressed here on this list. To me these opinions often appear to lack the rigor of a truly subjective (international as opposed to Amerocentric or occasionally Eurocentric) viewpoint. For me these opinions smack too much of the home-comforts of a select and highly privileged group. OK - it is true that the future will be built by groups like this. But also, and perhaps more importantly, probably equally - the future will be built by the Stalinist and Holocaust revisionists, the theocrats, cultists, communists, anarchists, totalitarians, corporate entities, democrats, socialists, petty dictators and the myriad others who make up the current population of this world. This list, this group, and the values it generally shares (values which some members sometimes seek to ferociously protect) has no comfortable sanction on what will and will not be a part of our extropian future. We each have our subjective reality. All the things that this group (or some elements of it) might seek to exclude will continue to be factors influencing the future regardless of your willingness to admit them or not. So what is the point of limiting debate? The truth is - there is no point - if you admit that reality is more important than the maintenance of some fictional comfort-zone. In fact, moderation should not be about limiting debate, it should be about limiting personal abuse. Nor is there any merit in shunting unpalatable topics off to sub-lists with headings like 'politics', 'technology', 'personal development', etc - there are NO neat dividers. Everything merges into everything else - and no overview/synthesis/synergy is possible as long as some elements are denied. Names like 'Bush,' 'Clinton,' 'Mao,' Stalin,' 'Hitler,' 'Saddam,' 'Pol-Pot,' 'Chavez,' 'Ayatollah Khomeini' are so loaded with semantic association it is difficult to imagine any useful dialogue that does not quickly revert to the 'gut-feeling' of emotion and personal attack. Usually the call is to banish the topic, limit it, or divert it elsewhere: Anything but face up to the fact that the past we refuse to come to grips with and reconcile NOW - is still a very real part of our future, Just my opinion: But moderation might be (could be): 1.. Anything goes - provided it has an extropian angle. 2.. Politics, religion and sexual preference are exclusively the preserve and prerogative of the writer. Respect them. 3.. Although you may seriously doubt the mental health of the poster - you may attack the concept/proposition as outlined in the post ONLY on reasoned, rational grounds. Under NO circumstances will you resort to pejorative labelling: ie, telling the author s/he is crazy/commie/anarchist/etc etc, or otherwise attempt to discredit the person rather than the argument. If you do so - you will get moderated out of the discussion forthwith. 4.. If you find something offensive - you may protest by stating: "I find this offensive because...reason 1)...2)...3) etc. You may then choose to have nothing further to do with either the subject or the poster. You do NOT have the right to demand that the moderator support your world-view - no matter how worthy it is - by suppressing a poster who is able to present a cogent argument contrary to your principles. (rubbishy, rantings, ravings and vilifications can be trashed of course) I know that the downside of this is that you have to put up with a certain amount of lunatic fringe activity. But the consequence of not adopting some such rule set is that free speech is the preserve of some inner elite who perpetually reserve the right to quash dissent. Free speech needs the odd crackpot to reassure us all that the system is working. Jack Parkinson -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From l4point at gmail.com Sat Jan 14 15:11:19 2006 From: l4point at gmail.com (Mike Hayes) Date: Sat, 14 Jan 2006 09:11:19 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] On Gut Feelings In-Reply-To: <002501c6191a$79cb2b80$04800d0a@JPAcer> References: <002501c6191a$79cb2b80$04800d0a@JPAcer> Message-ID: <6b5e09390601140711r4f8879c3u99d68446c0e244b1@mail.gmail.com> That is an interesting view on some difficult subjects. Some time ago I wrote an analysis of the New Testament "Miracle of the Loaves and Fishes" from an objectivist point of view. I found that there were so many subjective emotionally laden words within the subject matter, that it was necesary to develop an alternative vocabulary to reference key persons, events and the differences between the historical accounts. When words have baggage, it's hard to sling them around and make precise points. Personally I see no problem with debating the merits of Stalin's approach to maintaining control over the USSR, while simultaneously keeping one finger on the nuclear cold war trigger, and intending with the other, to destroy totalitarian and fascist social structures with free trade, bikinis on their women, and pop music spread amidst their younger generations. I assume that there are no members of this list from within mainland China, is that known as a fact? On 1/14/06, Jack Parkinson wrote: > > The fairly recent acrimonious political debate in this forum and the > airing of the WTA 'dirty laundry' has made me wonder a little about the > reliability of the 'gut-feeling' as an arbiter of what intelligent life > ought to be listening and paying attention to. > > In the case of Danila Medvedev: To be sure, I am no apologist for Stalin: > But - I do believe in free speech. I see no benefits whatsoever in sweeping > unpalatable political facts - or even unpalatable political fictions and > delusions - beneath some metaphorical carpet. We are reasonable people (or > should be) and able to engage/reject a topic with reason and informed > debate. > > So I was somewhat taken aback some time ago when I mildly remonstrated > against the ad-hominem attacks Danila Medvedev was being subjected to on the > WTA list and was promptly denounced as a 'commie' and an admirer of Hitler > and Pol-Pot. Almost immediately the signal to noise ratio made further > discussion impossible. Pity - because something important was lost. Reasoned > response was sacrificed (eventually moderated out) because a few individuals > persisted in their pejorative attacks - making it clear that their > sacrosanct world view was not to be threatened on THEIR list... > > But, if you read Danila's posts, it is clear that he is not an idiot, and > that he is capable of presenting useful viewpoints on a whole range of > topics. Ok - most of us disagree with him concerning Stalin - so what? If he > has other useful things to contribute, why should you or I care if he > indulges in the odd whacko belief? Is it worse than Mormonism? Seventh Day > Adventism? The Moonies? Catholicism? Flying Spaghetti Monsterism? Adulation > of Mao? Che? Eva Peron? Or even, God help us - George W? > > I often disagree with the neo-conservative and libertarian viewpoints as > expressed here on this list. To me these opinions often appear to lack the > rigor of a truly subjective (international as opposed to Amerocentric or > occasionally Eurocentric) viewpoint. For me these opinions smack too much of > the home-comforts of a select and highly privileged group. OK - it is true > that the future will be built by groups like this. But also, and perhaps > more importantly, probably equally - the future will be built by the > Stalinist and Holocaust revisionists, the theocrats, cultists, communists, > anarchists, totalitarians, corporate entities, democrats, socialists, petty > dictators and the myriad others who make up the current population of this > world. > > This list, this group, and the values it generally shares (values which > some members sometimes seek to ferociously protect) has no comfortable > sanction on what will and will not be a part of our extropian future. We > each have our subjective reality. All the things that this group (or some > elements of it) might seek to exclude will continue to be factors > influencing the future regardless of your willingness to admit them or not. > So what is the point of limiting debate? The truth is - there is no point > - if you admit that reality is more important than the maintenance of some > fictional comfort-zone. > > In fact, moderation should not be about limiting debate, it should be > about limiting personal abuse. Nor is there any merit in shunting > unpalatable topics off to sub-lists with headings like 'politics', > 'technology', 'personal development', etc - there are NO neat dividers. > Everything merges into everything else - and no overview/synthesis/synergy > is possible as long as some elements are denied. > > Names like 'Bush,' 'Clinton,' 'Mao,' Stalin,' 'Hitler,' 'Saddam,' > 'Pol-Pot,' 'Chavez,' 'Ayatollah Khomeini' are so loaded with semantic > association it is difficult to imagine any useful dialogue that does not > quickly revert to the 'gut-feeling' of emotion and personal attack. Usually > the call is to banish the topic, limit it, or divert it elsewhere: Anything > but face up to the fact that the past we refuse to come to grips with and > reconcile NOW - is still a very real part of our future, > > Just my opinion: But moderation might be (could be): > > 1. Anything goes - provided it has an extropian angle. > 2. Politics, religion and sexual preference are exclusively the > preserve and prerogative of the writer. Respect them. > 3. Although you may seriously doubt the mental health of the > poster - you may attack the concept/proposition as outlined in the post ONLY > on reasoned, rational grounds. Under NO circumstances will you > resort to pejorative labelling: ie, telling the author s/he is > crazy/commie/anarchist/etc etc, or otherwise attempt to discredit the person > rather than the argument. If you do so - you will get moderated out > of the discussion forthwith. > 4. If you find something offensive - you may protest by stating: "I > find this offensive because...reason 1)...2)...3) etc. You may then choose > to have nothing further to do with either the subject or the poster. You > do NOT have the right to demand that the moderator support your world-view - > no matter how worthy it is - by suppressing a poster who is able to present > a cogent argument contrary to your principles. (rubbishy, rantings, ravings > and vilifications can be trashed of course) > > I know that the downside of this is that you have to put up with a certain > amount of lunatic fringe activity. But the consequence of not adopting some > such rule set is that free speech is the preserve of some inner elite who > perpetually reserve the right to quash dissent. > > Free speech needs the odd crackpot to reassure us all that the system is > working. > Jack Parkinson > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat > > > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From pharos at gmail.com Sat Jan 14 16:21:34 2006 From: pharos at gmail.com (BillK) Date: Sat, 14 Jan 2006 16:21:34 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] On Gut Feelings In-Reply-To: <002501c6191a$79cb2b80$04800d0a@JPAcer> References: <002501c6191a$79cb2b80$04800d0a@JPAcer> Message-ID: On 1/14/06, Jack Parkinson wrote: > > > Just my opinion: But moderation might be (could be): > > Anything goes - provided it has an extropian angle. > Politics, religion and sexual preference are exclusively the preserve and > prerogative of the writer. Respect them. > Although you may seriously doubt the mental health of the poster - you may > attack the concept/proposition as outlined in the post ONLY on reasoned, > rational grounds. Under NO circumstances will you resort to pejorative > labelling: ie, telling the author s/he is crazy/commie/anarchist/etc etc, or > otherwise attempt to discredit the person rather than the argument. If you > do so - you will get moderated out of the discussion forthwith. > If you find something offensive - you may protest by stating: "I find this > offensive because...reason 1)...2)...3) etc. You may then choose to have > nothing further to do with either the subject or the poster. You do NOT have > the right to demand that the moderator support your world-view - no matter > how worthy it is - by suppressing a poster who is able to present a cogent > argument contrary to your principles. (rubbishy, rantings, ravings and > vilifications can be trashed of course) > I know that the downside of this is that you have to put up with a certain > amount of lunatic fringe activity. But the consequence of not adopting some > such rule set is that free speech is the preserve of some inner elite who > perpetually reserve the right to quash dissent. > > Free speech needs the odd crackpot to reassure us all that the system is > working. Most of what you wrote sounds pretty sensible. But 'Free speech' does not necessarily mean 'Free Speech *here*'. There is the whole WWW out there, millions of sites, mail lists, chatrooms, etc. Every fanatic and his dog have places where they can discuss their concerns as much as they like. You are surely not recommending that everything out there should be allowed to post through 'our' list? ('our' list could refer to every individual list on the Internet). Every list has allowable content. If you fail to control content then the meaning of the list is lost and the list will become useless. Nobody will read it because of the 99% rubbish off-topic content. I agree that here 'Anything goes - provided it has an extropian angle.' But that would ban Stalinist whitewashing and recommendations of how to use transhumanist technologies to achieve an ideal 'Stalinist-type' controlled society. Just as it would ban many other topics of no relevance to extropianism. You cannot make a list of banned subjects, because the list would be enormous. It is down to the moderators to shape the list according to the list objectives. Occasional off-topic posts do little harm, but once a propagandist arrives with their own agenda, then they must be stopped for the good of the list. There is no point in having a list where all the interesting people leave because of the amount of garbage (as defined by the list objectives) that is allowed to flow through the list. BillK From russell.wallace at gmail.com Sat Jan 14 16:26:55 2006 From: russell.wallace at gmail.com (Russell Wallace) Date: Sat, 14 Jan 2006 16:26:55 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] On Gut Feelings In-Reply-To: <002501c6191a$79cb2b80$04800d0a@JPAcer> References: <002501c6191a$79cb2b80$04800d0a@JPAcer> Message-ID: <8d71341e0601140826y4ae7b2ebx690c998361a98acc@mail.gmail.com> On 1/14/06, Jack Parkinson wrote: > > In the case of Danila Medvedev: To be sure, I am no apologist for Stalin: > But - I do believe in free speech. I see no benefits whatsoever in sweeping > unpalatable political facts - or even unpalatable political fictions and > delusions - beneath some metaphorical carpet. We are reasonable people (or > should be) and able to engage/reject a topic with reason and informed > debate. This idea of "if you don't want to listen to X, you're against free speech/unwilling to step outside your cosy box" gets used often enough I think it's time somebody said something about it. The fact is, everyone has some point beyond which they'll start filtering content (whether by calling for moderation, using a killfile, unsubscribing from a list or whatever method). Yes, everyone including you. Different people use different criteria for when they start filtering; the idea of list moderation is to find a set of reasonable consensus criteria that doesn't restrict interesting or useful discussion while keeping things within boundaries where the interesting people don't start unsubscribing from the list en masse. And frankly, when someone starts praising mass murderers, that's a pretty damned reasonable criterion for saying enough is enough. Don't give me a straw man about it being just because I don't agree with Danila's political views. I don't approve of socialism, but you don't see me saying all socialists should be banned. I don't believe in flying saucers, but I spoke up in defense of a Raelian, on condition that he didn't keep spamming the list trying to convert the rest of us to his religion. But when you get someone saying Stalin was an okay guy after all, it's entirely reasonable that people should lose their tempers. If you have anything interesting or useful to say on the topic, then go ahead and say it; if, as I suspect is the case, you haven't and nor has anyone else, then I don't see any point in arguing for it being on the list. - Russell -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jef at jefallbright.net Sat Jan 14 16:41:28 2006 From: jef at jefallbright.net (Jef Allbright) Date: Sat, 14 Jan 2006 08:41:28 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Math Will Rock Your World In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <22360fa10601140841o352e2516s64c2c1cb96d606e3@mail.gmail.com> On 1/14/06, Samantha Atkins wrote: > In the spirit of the post or Brin and Page, here is the url of an > article in the current business Week that could have the subtitle > "Revenge of the Math Nerds". > http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/06_04/b3968001.htm Thanks Samantha for an article that illuminates the trend toward increasing awareness of ourselves -- our values and our understandings -- driven by competitive forces cooperating to ratchet forward what works in business and academia. The article also helps convey how advanced mathematical modeling can and will help us better appreciate our similarities and differencies without the "averaging" or blurring of important distinctions often taken for granted in contemporary social studies. As with all technologies, this too is a double-edged sword, and we would do well to promote access and use of such knowledge tools and their associated data sets throughout the general population. - Jef http://www.jefallbright.net "Increasing awareness for increasing morality" From mike99 at lascruces.com Sat Jan 14 18:03:40 2006 From: mike99 at lascruces.com (mike99) Date: Sat, 14 Jan 2006 11:03:40 -0700 Subject: [extropy-chat] RE: [wtahall] REAL POLITIK IN THE WTA... and so long... In-Reply-To: <20060114110215.63683.qmail@web32809.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Message-ID: Dear Jose, Thank you for telling us much more about yourself -- by your selective use of information and your invention of untruths -- than about me or anyone else. For example, since in fact I do not believe in reincarnation, I could never have wished for you a better one! As a Buddhist I have taken a vow to work toward the end of suffering for all sentient beings. That includes Stalinists and neo-Nazis...and even you. This does not make me a Stalinist or a neo-Nazi. And, I am relieved to say, it doesn't make me you, either, my friend! Good luck in your future endeavors. Regards, Michael LaTorra mike99 at lascruces.com mlatorra at nmsu.edu English Dept., New Mexico State University "For any man to abdicate an interest in science is to walk with open eyes towards slavery." -- Jacob Bronowski "Experiences only look special from the inside of the system." -- Eugen Leitl "Man is a rope stretched between the animal and the Superman: a rope across an abyss - a dangerous going across, a dangerous wayfaring, a dangerous looking back, a dangerous shuddering and staying still." -- Friedrich Nietzsche Member: Board of Directors, World Transhumanist Association: www.transhumanism.org Board of Directors, Institute for Ethics and Emerging Technologies: http://ieet.org/ Extropy Institute: www.extropy.org Alcor Life Extension Foundation: www.alcor.org Society for Universal Immortalism: www.universalimmortalism.org President, Zen Center of Las Cruces: www.zencenteroflascruces.orgwww.zencenteroflascruces.org -----Original Message----- From: wtahall-bounces at transhumanism.org [mailto:wtahall-bounces at transhumanism.org]On Behalf Of Jose Cordeiro Sent: Saturday, January 14, 2006 4:02 AM To: wtahall at transhumanism.org; extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org; wta-politics at transhumanism.org Subject: [wtahall] REAL POLITIK IN THE WTA... and so long... Dear friends, This I hope will be my last message here for a long time. I am tired of all this infighting and I have better things to do, like you too. So please, don?t read any further if you are thinking you are wasting your time now, and disregard any pornographic material in between. ... Mike LaTorra is a good hearted man, unless you discuss with him his Buddhist and socialist ideas. Then he gets really mad and threatens you with not being his friend and hoping that you will have a better reincarnation next time. He is known for putting together the WTA News and loving science fiction. He is very worried because he feels that he is getting old (aren?t we all?). If you are a Stalinist, but a ?good? Stalinist, who makes nice web pages and translates well into Russian, Mike LaTorra will invite you to join his Club since he has a nice double morality. ... Transhumanistically yours, La vie est belle! Yos? (www.cordeiro.org) Caracas, Venezuela, Americas, TerraNostra, Solar System, Milky Way, Multiverse -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From amara at amara.com Sat Jan 14 18:42:53 2006 From: amara at amara.com (Amara Graps) Date: Sat, 14 Jan 2006 19:42:53 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] On Gut Feelings Message-ID: Bill K: >And frankly, when someone starts praising mass murderers, that's a pretty >damned reasonable criterion for saying enough is enough. (I agree) When Danila appeared and started talking about Stalin's grand and amazing contributions, my response was to let my uncle speak, using his own words. My post to wta-talk of my uncle's story didn't stop Danila from sending me private email, to tell me more of how misinformed I was about Stalin. So I've permanently blocked him from my email. If Danila's character wasn't so abrasive and arrogant, then I think that people would have probably talked to him more and been more ready to recognize his contributions, and might have been open to a discussion. I don't think that Jack was put through the ringer about that. I think that unfortunately Jack defended a guy that acted like like he relished pushing people's buttons and is quick to call people names. Personally I have no patience for a person who behaves like that (Danila). Amara -- Amara Graps, PhD www.amara.com Istituto di Fisica dello Spazio Interplanetario (IFSI) Istituto Nazionale di Astrofisica (INAF), Adjunct Assistant Professor Astronomy, AUR, Roma, ITALIA Amara.Graps at ifsi.rm.cnr.it From amara at amara.com Sat Jan 14 18:48:38 2006 From: amara at amara.com (Amara Graps) Date: Sat, 14 Jan 2006 19:48:38 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] On Gut Feelings Message-ID: scusi', wrong attribute, Russell Wallace said this. >And frankly, when someone starts praising mass murderers, that's a pretty >damned reasonable criterion for saying enough is enough. Amara From sjatkins at mac.com Sat Jan 14 18:54:39 2006 From: sjatkins at mac.com (Samantha Atkins) Date: Sat, 14 Jan 2006 10:54:39 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] On difficult choices (was: Books: Harris; Religion and Reason) In-Reply-To: <8d71341e0601120218g6669207bya6f5168d015ee8ae@mail.gmail.com> References: <20060112051911.37750.qmail@web50511.mail.yahoo.com> <8d71341e0601120218g6669207bya6f5168d015ee8ae@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On Jan 12, 2006, at 2:18 AM, Russell Wallace wrote: > The entities exterminating us aren't aliens from outer space in > flying saucers with force shields that can withstand a nuclear > explosion. The terrible truth is that we already know them. MTV. > East Enders. Zoning laws. MAs in political science. > http://www.opinionjournal.com/extra/?id=110007760 > It makes sense, of course; the one thing an exterminator meme can't > look like is an exterminator meme, otherwise almost by definition > it wouldn't be one. Bacteria die to penicillin; HIV, the simplest > thing, slips by. I read this article. Not to put too fine a point on it, I found it laughable. Religious faith is not going to save the West and secularism sure as hell isn't dooming it. As much as I think welfare statism is evil and dangerous I can't in honesty lay the blame there except as a large contributory drain on the economy and on the character of the people. The notion that we must reproduce more this close to Singularity is the biggest laugh of all. What is wrong imo is that we have lost heart, lost vision, lost fire as a people. We have lost it to enshrinement of mediocrity and it has died from a million cuts, mostly inflicted by our own government on us and in the world, draining away our self-respect and belief in ourselves as a people. Civilizations decline for many reasons. But a common denominator is that in their hearts their people no longer believe in the goodness of the country or its ideals or if they do then they don't believe those ideals can ever be achieved. They become sneak thieves out to grab what they can before the house of cards comes crashing down. We need a new strong vision. I thought transhumanism or extropianism might help supply it. But one of those is being shanghaied by the Left and the other seems to doubt that creating such a Vision is even a good thing. In America we have dug ourselves a deep hole. Our total debts and account payables approach $40 trillion. We have been fed too long at the public and private level the notion that we can spend, spend, spend our way into prosperity. We have spent. So much so that the individual savings rate is negative and the government has become the largest debtor nation in history. We suck down > $ 2 billion a day of foreign money just to pay for the party. We are only a few more missteps away form financial ruin. Our descendants are in hock before they begin. The threat is from ourselves to a large degree. It is from our assumptions of superiority and of wealth without any longer paying much attention to where wealth comes from or what it takes to create and grow it. After the stock bubble blew followed by 911 many of us Americans made ends meet and kept right on consuming by sucking down easy credit and cheap money by taking cash out of our homes. So much so that the retained equity in homes fell rapidly. We created a housing bubble in the process that is now venting and deflating. We spent so much energy and determination keeping that bubble growing that we put out interest only loans and no down payment loans that actually gave back money to the buyer. In 2005 it is estimated that over half of the home sells had these very questionable types of loans and that over 40% of the sales were bought not as primary residences but on speculation that the prices would continue to rise. Woe to the banks who hold the derivatives guaranteeing these loans. The key to the future is surely knowledge and education. In America according to recent studies over 60% of college graduates are not competently literate. China is turning out engineers and scientists an order of magnitude faster than we are. India's college level education is much tougher than our own and people compete fiercely to get into the technical programs. These people of the East are bright, hardworking and hungry. If we in the West do not wake up from our complacency they will eat our lunch. All of that and more has zip to do with religion or how fast we breed or how secular our culture is or even with welfare and social entitlement. It has a lot to do with a mixture of cynicism, arrogance, ignorance and lack of enough courage to look at reality. - samantha -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From pharos at gmail.com Sat Jan 14 18:58:33 2006 From: pharos at gmail.com (BillK) Date: Sat, 14 Jan 2006 18:58:33 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] On Gut Feelings In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On 1/14/06, Amara Graps wrote: > scusi', wrong attribute, Russell Wallace said this. > >And frankly, when someone starts praising mass murderers, that's a pretty > >damned reasonable criterion for saying enough is enough. > No problem - I agree anyway. :) BillK From sjatkins at mac.com Sat Jan 14 19:10:32 2006 From: sjatkins at mac.com (Samantha Atkins) Date: Sat, 14 Jan 2006 11:10:32 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] On Gut Feelings In-Reply-To: <002501c6191a$79cb2b80$04800d0a@JPAcer> References: <002501c6191a$79cb2b80$04800d0a@JPAcer> Message-ID: <8A08D763-4889-4D11-B351-E8339C4742D7@mac.com> On Jan 14, 2006, at 6:54 AM, Jack Parkinson wrote: > The fairly recent acrimonious political debate in this forum and > the airing of the WTA 'dirty laundry' has made me wonder a little > about the reliability of the 'gut-feeling' as an arbiter of what > intelligent life ought to be listening and paying attention to. > > In the case of Danila Medvedev: To be sure, I am no apologist for > Stalin: But - I do believe in free speech. I see no benefits > whatsoever in sweeping unpalatable political facts - or even > unpalatable political fictions and delusions - beneath some > metaphorical carpet. We are reasonable people (or should be) and > able to engage/reject a topic with reason and informed debate. > Wholesale rewriting of history and denial of atrocities has nothing to do with reason on informed debate. Such denials are not debatable. > So I was somewhat taken aback some time ago when I mildly > remonstrated against the ad-hominem attacks Danila Medvedev was > being subjected to on the WTA list and was promptly denounced as a > 'commie' and an admirer of Hitler and Pol-Pot. Almost immediately > the signal to noise ratio made further discussion impossible. Pity > - because something important was lost. Reasoned response was > sacrificed (eventually moderated out) because a few individuals > persisted in their pejorative attacks - making it clear that their > sacrosanct world view was not to be threatened on THEIR list... > The notion that all opinions no matter how absurd or evil are worthy of defense and serious consideration is shallow thinking. > > This list, this group, and the values it generally shares (values > which some members sometimes seek to ferociously protect) has no > comfortable sanction on what will and will not be a part of our > extropian future. We each have our subjective reality. All the > things that this group (or some elements of it) might seek to > exclude will continue to be factors influencing the future > regardless of your willingness to admit them or not. So what is the > point of limiting debate? The truth is - there is no point - if you > admit that reality is more important than the maintenance of some > fictional comfort-zone. > I do get to decide what I sanction and abhor. So do groups of people and organizations. By what they sanction and stand for they will be judged. Debate is not limited. Having such an open mind that your brains fall out is not "debate" or respect for reality. > > Just my opinion: But moderation might be (could be): > Anything goes - provided it has an extropian angle. mostly the way things are here. > Politics, religion and sexual preference are exclusively the > preserve and prerogative of the writer. Respect them. What does this "respect" of politics or religion mean? Does it mean that we don't rigorously examine and criticize each other's notions in these areas? If so then I am not interested. > Although you may seriously doubt the mental health of the poster - > you may attack the concept/proposition as outlined in the post ONLY > on reasoned, rational grounds. Under NO circumstances will you > resort to pejorative labelling: ie, telling the author s/he is > crazy/commie/anarchist/etc etc, or otherwise attempt to discredit > the person rather than the argument. If you do so - you will get > moderated out of the discussion forthwith. Yes, again part of this list. > - samantha -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From russell.wallace at gmail.com Sat Jan 14 19:11:34 2006 From: russell.wallace at gmail.com (Russell Wallace) Date: Sat, 14 Jan 2006 19:11:34 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] On difficult choices (was: Books: Harris; Religion and Reason) In-Reply-To: References: <20060112051911.37750.qmail@web50511.mail.yahoo.com> <8d71341e0601120218g6669207bya6f5168d015ee8ae@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <8d71341e0601141111w7fa08c8bu753281f358e0a600@mail.gmail.com> On 1/14/06, Samantha Atkins wrote: > I read this article. Not to put too fine a point on it, I found it > laughable. Religious faith is not going to save the West and secularism > sure as hell isn't dooming it. As much as I think welfare statism is evil > and dangerous I can't in honesty lay the blame there except as a large > contributory drain on the economy and on the character of the people. The > notion that we must reproduce more this close to Singularity is the biggest > laugh of all. > Out of curiosity, how close to the Singularity do you think we are? - Russell -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From sjatkins at mac.com Sat Jan 14 19:32:07 2006 From: sjatkins at mac.com (Samantha Atkins) Date: Sat, 14 Jan 2006 11:32:07 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] REAL POLITIK IN THE WTA... and so long... In-Reply-To: <4902d9990601140331k79a4e461ka0131080469b5eb2@mail.gmail.com> References: <20060114110215.63683.qmail@web32809.mail.mud.yahoo.com> <4902d9990601140331k79a4e461ka0131080469b5eb2@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <40A08DE6-5D01-4DE1-8762-D4FC14CAEB7C@mac.com> In my experience the WTA has largely put forward the notion than transhumanism requires socialism and that those who disagree are not very welcome. The WTA has put on this mantle of socialism and it will experience some consequences from doing so. Also the post does not remotely reduce to only being about socialism in the WTA. - samantha On Jan 14, 2006, at 3:31 AM, Alfio Puglisi wrote: > For those who didn't want to read the long email, I can sum it up: > "socialism bad, WTA socialist, WTA bad". > > 13 K of text from an intelligent person should not reduce to a > simplicistic "socialism - not socialism" axis. > > Alfio > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat From sjatkins at mac.com Sat Jan 14 19:35:43 2006 From: sjatkins at mac.com (Samantha Atkins) Date: Sat, 14 Jan 2006 11:35:43 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] On difficult choices (was: Books: Harris; Religion and Reason) In-Reply-To: <8d71341e0601141111w7fa08c8bu753281f358e0a600@mail.gmail.com> References: <20060112051911.37750.qmail@web50511.mail.yahoo.com> <8d71341e0601120218g6669207bya6f5168d015ee8ae@mail.gmail.com> <8d71341e0601141111w7fa08c8bu753281f358e0a600@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <669DC541-211F-4E62-95B0-F316FFB0585C@mac.com> On Jan 14, 2006, at 11:11 AM, Russell Wallace wrote: > On 1/14/06, Samantha Atkins wrote: > I read this article. Not to put too fine a point on it, I found it > laughable. Religious faith is not going to save the West and > secularism sure as hell isn't dooming it. As much as I think > welfare statism is evil and dangerous I can't in honesty lay the > blame there except as a large contributory drain on the economy and > on the character of the people. The notion that we must reproduce > more this close to Singularity is the biggest laugh of all. > > Out of curiosity, how close to the Singularity do you think we are? > > About one generation away if we don't do something stupid. Of late I think the odds of us doing something catastrophically stupid are higher than the odds of Singularity by a growing margin. That is not a happy conclusion. I also believe that the Singularity is increasingly much more likely to come out of the East rather than the West. - samantha -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From live2scan at charter.net Sat Jan 14 19:39:05 2006 From: live2scan at charter.net (Dennis Roberts) Date: Sat, 14 Jan 2006 14:39:05 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] next generation of ion engines In-Reply-To: <20060114075709.94949.qmail@web81609.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <4kchs4$66sfj9@mxip34a.cluster1.charter.net> You really don't need SpaceShipOne or anything like it. Check out http://www.jpaerospace.com/, these folks are probably still dancing around after ESA's announcement. Low cost access to LEO is comin' to us all. Dennis Roberts -----Original Message----- From: extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org [mailto:extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Adrian Tymes Sent: Saturday, January 14, 2006 2:57 AM To: ExI chat list Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] next generation of ion engines --- deimtee wrote: > It takes about 10 newtons to lift a kilo against 1 gee. ...right, forgot to factor in G. > However, how about if you dropped it off SpaceShipOne at apogee? > How much time have you got to give it orbital velocity before drag > exceeds thrust? >From http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SpaceShipOne_flight_17P we know that SSO only took 24 minutes between detaching from White Knight through apogee to landing, of which just over 80 seconds was spent under thrust. So the apogee-to-landing phase probably took about 12 minutes. Most orbital rocket launches I've studied seem to take about 10 minutes to get to orbital velocity. So, you'd probably need wings or something to gain lift while going at hypersonic speeds - and the wings would need to be thermally protected (probably made out of solid heat shields), because as you get towards Mach 25 you're flying not through air but through plasma. Which is not to say it can't be done, just that a proper analysis is probably way in excess of simple back-of-the-envelope equations. I wonder, though: what would be the physics of flying through plasma? Could you use an M2P2-type magnetic bubble to shield the craft from direct contact with the atmosphere, while still maintaining enough of an airfoil shape (in the bubble, which seems to be the shape that would then matter for lift and drag calculations) to gain lift? > also, > I think you are a bit optimistic on the battery too. > > 100kW * 10 min = 16.666 kWHrs > Thats about the same as a 12 volt battery delivering 1400 amps for an > hour. > > I want some of those for my electric car. : ) Actually, some of the sources were advanced batteries being developed for cars. But I did caution that that was the optimistic end of the figures I was seeing: quite a few of the "most advanced" figures were quite a bit more conservative than that. ;) _______________________________________________ extropy-chat mailing list extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat From russell.wallace at gmail.com Sat Jan 14 19:48:36 2006 From: russell.wallace at gmail.com (Russell Wallace) Date: Sat, 14 Jan 2006 19:48:36 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] On difficult choices (was: Books: Harris; Religion and Reason) In-Reply-To: <669DC541-211F-4E62-95B0-F316FFB0585C@mac.com> References: <20060112051911.37750.qmail@web50511.mail.yahoo.com> <8d71341e0601120218g6669207bya6f5168d015ee8ae@mail.gmail.com> <8d71341e0601141111w7fa08c8bu753281f358e0a600@mail.gmail.com> <669DC541-211F-4E62-95B0-F316FFB0585C@mac.com> Message-ID: <8d71341e0601141148p673f90b8mb994f2dd1dca63e8@mail.gmail.com> On 1/14/06, Samantha Atkins wrote: > > > On Jan 14, 2006, at 11:11 AM, Russell Wallace wrote: > > Out of curiosity, how close to the Singularity do you think we are? > > > > About one generation away if we don't do something stupid. > I hope you're right! I think it's likely to take longer, even in the best case scenario; but if the Singularity does arrive in one generation, feel free to say "see, Russell, you were being unnecessarily grouchy and pessimistic" and I'll agree that this was indeed so :) Operationally, I'll keep trying to figure out how to prove myself wrong. Of late I think the odds of us doing something catastrophically stupid are > higher than the odds of Singularity by a growing margin. That is not a > happy conclusion. > No indeed! I'm actually a bit more optimistic than you are on this one, since I think civilization is strong enough to withstand any single catastrophic error. I also believe that the Singularity is increasingly much more likely to come > out of the East rather than the West. > Maybe; fair play to them if that does happen, as long as _someone_ manages to pull it off. - Russell -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From spike66 at comcast.net Sat Jan 14 20:01:52 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Sat, 14 Jan 2006 12:01:52 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] REAL POLITIK IN THE WTA... and so long... In-Reply-To: <40A08DE6-5D01-4DE1-8762-D4FC14CAEB7C@mac.com> Message-ID: <200601142001.k0EK1te08722@tick.javien.com> > bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Samantha Atkins > Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] REAL POLITIK IN THE WTA... and so long... > > In my experience the WTA has largely put forward the notion than > transhumanism requires socialism ... > > - samantha I will accept this as fact unless someone from WTA is hanging out here and offers a counter argument. This notion simplifies matters considerably, for it appears to me that transhumanism requires capitalism. Transhumanism thrives on individual freedom, loooots of free-flowing capital, profit motive, getting governments out of our way (insert Howard-Dean-ish YEEAAAAHH), wealth creation, etc. spike From jef at jefallbright.net Sat Jan 14 20:18:21 2006 From: jef at jefallbright.net (Jef Allbright) Date: Sat, 14 Jan 2006 12:18:21 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] REAL POLITIK IN THE WTA... and so long... In-Reply-To: <200601142001.k0EK1te08722@tick.javien.com> References: <40A08DE6-5D01-4DE1-8762-D4FC14CAEB7C@mac.com> <200601142001.k0EK1te08722@tick.javien.com> Message-ID: <22360fa10601141218s6c14a521w34dc2ed7b690e963@mail.gmail.com> On 1/14/06, spike wrote: > > bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Samantha Atkins > > Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] REAL POLITIK IN THE WTA... and so long... > > > > In my experience the WTA has largely put forward the notion than > > transhumanism requires socialism ... > > > > - samantha > > I will accept this as fact unless someone from WTA is > hanging out here and offers a counter argument. > > This notion simplifies matters considerably, for > it appears to me that transhumanism requires capitalism. > Transhumanism thrives on individual freedom, loooots > of free-flowing capital, profit motive, getting > governments out of our way (insert Howard-Dean-ish > YEEAAAAHH), wealth creation, etc. > Spike, I agree with you regarding the necessity of individual drivers of growth, but what is often disregarded is the cooperative framework that supports such individual growth, and the overwhelming (in the long term) benefits of synergetic organization. [I hope this isn't construed as support for socialism and central management.] - Jef http://www.jefallbright.net "Increasing awareness for increasing morality" From reason at longevitymeme.org Sat Jan 14 20:21:21 2006 From: reason at longevitymeme.org (Reason) Date: Sat, 14 Jan 2006 12:21:21 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] REAL POLITIK IN THE WTA... and so long... In-Reply-To: <200601142001.k0EK1te08722@tick.javien.com> Message-ID: > -----Original Message----- > From: extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org > [mailto:extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org]On Behalf Of spike > Sent: Saturday, January 14, 2006 12:02 PM > > bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Samantha Atkins > > Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] REAL POLITIK IN THE WTA... and so long... > > > > In my experience the WTA has largely put forward the notion than > > transhumanism requires socialism ... > > > > - samantha > > I will accept this as fact unless someone from WTA is > hanging out here and offers a counter argument. > > This notion simplifies matters considerably, for > it appears to me that transhumanism requires capitalism. > Transhumanism thrives on individual freedom, loooots > of free-flowing capital, profit motive, getting > governments out of our way (insert Howard-Dean-ish > YEEAAAAHH), wealth creation, etc. A reading of this piece with that in mind would be helpful: http://www.longevitymeme.org/news/view_news_item.cfm?news_id=2158 http://deseretnews.com/dn/view/0,1249,635174444,00.html "In the Deseret News, a somewhat depressing look at early skirmishes in the war over who gets to control what you are permitted to do with your own life - including how long you are permitted to live. It's sad that it has come to this, that so many people pour resources in fighting for control of - and thereby supporting and sustaining - an increasingly dangerous and corrupt system. Consider this: in a truly free society of small government and rule of law, employees of the state would not have the power to block support and development of real anti-aging technologies, nor block your opportunity to amass wealth and purchase working anti-aging medicine. To live longer or not would be an individual choice; the only need for resources would be to develop the necessary medical technologies - not to defend your health and life from uncaring, over-empowered government employees." Reason From wingcat at pacbell.net Sat Jan 14 21:08:21 2006 From: wingcat at pacbell.net (Adrian Tymes) Date: Sat, 14 Jan 2006 13:08:21 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] next generation of ion engines In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <20060114210821.58748.qmail@web81604.mail.mud.yahoo.com> --- Robert Bradbury wrote: > Without directly meaning to be a "killjoy", what is it > precisely that > you > are trying to accomplish? Well...what I was hoping was a path to, within several years (well short of the Singularity, and probably sooner than a space elevator could be constructed), have a much cheaper way of doing Earth-To-Orbit operations - the prerequisite to dong *anything* in space. Although, it looks like this is probably not quite there yet. > Though we probably do not like to discuss it there *is* a > point in > the > development in the singularity where later launched spacecraft > will > have > resources at their disposal that significantly exceed the > capabilities of > spacecraft launched at an earlier time. Unless you're talking about missions which are intended to be complete way before said development. Which includes most any point-to-point traversal mission within our solar system today. (Doesn't include, say, building Dyson spheres. But does includes missions to Pluto.) Practically no one with the ability to actually build spaceships is currently constructing a ship that is intended to go past the Oort Cloud - and, frankly, given the time scales, you'd have to have a mission that won't reach its destination for multiple decades before it makes sense to even consider banking on technology that has yet to be developed. From wingcat at pacbell.net Sat Jan 14 21:18:17 2006 From: wingcat at pacbell.net (Adrian Tymes) Date: Sat, 14 Jan 2006 13:18:17 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] next generation of ion engines In-Reply-To: <4kchs4$66sfj9@mxip34a.cluster1.charter.net> Message-ID: <20060114211817.53158.qmail@web81609.mail.mud.yahoo.com> That will work for getting things to orbital altitude. There's a big difference between orbital altitude and orbital velocity. Better ion engines would be of possible use for stationkeeping, and for the sats they launch - but doesn't really strike me as something they would get uber-excited about. That said, they're also well short of the edge of space: their latest mission only got to about 78 thousand feet, well short of 100 km (about 328 thousand feet). --- Dennis Roberts wrote: > You really don't need SpaceShipOne or anything like it. Check out > http://www.jpaerospace.com/, these folks are probably still dancing > around > after ESA's announcement. Low cost access to LEO is comin' to us all. > Dennis Roberts > > -----Original Message----- > From: extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org > [mailto:extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Adrian > Tymes > Sent: Saturday, January 14, 2006 2:57 AM > To: ExI chat list > Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] next generation of ion engines > > --- deimtee wrote: > > It takes about 10 newtons to lift a kilo against 1 gee. > > ...right, forgot to factor in G. > > > However, how about if you dropped it off SpaceShipOne at apogee? > > How much time have you got to give it orbital velocity before drag > > exceeds thrust? > > >From http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SpaceShipOne_flight_17P we > know that SSO only took 24 minutes between detaching from White > Knight through apogee to landing, of which just over 80 seconds > was spent under thrust. So the apogee-to-landing phase probably > took about 12 minutes. Most orbital rocket launches I've > studied seem to take about 10 minutes to get to orbital > velocity. So, you'd probably need wings or something to gain > lift while going at hypersonic speeds - and the wings would need > to be thermally protected (probably made out of solid heat > shields), because as you get towards Mach 25 you're flying not > through air but through plasma. Which is not to say it can't be > done, just that a proper analysis is probably way in excess of > simple back-of-the-envelope equations. > > I wonder, though: what would be the physics of flying through > plasma? Could you use an M2P2-type magnetic bubble to shield > the craft from direct contact with the atmosphere, while still > maintaining enough of an airfoil shape (in the bubble, which > seems to be the shape that would then matter for lift and drag > calculations) to gain lift? > > > also, > > I think you are a bit optimistic on the battery too. > > > > 100kW * 10 min = 16.666 kWHrs > > Thats about the same as a 12 volt battery delivering 1400 amps for > an > > hour. > > > > I want some of those for my electric car. : ) > > Actually, some of the sources were advanced batteries being > developed for cars. But I did caution that that was the > optimistic end of the figures I was seeing: quite a few of the > "most advanced" figures were quite a bit more conservative than > that. ;) > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat > From pharos at gmail.com Sat Jan 14 21:18:58 2006 From: pharos at gmail.com (BillK) Date: Sat, 14 Jan 2006 21:18:58 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] REAL POLITIK IN THE WTA... and so long... In-Reply-To: <22360fa10601141218s6c14a521w34dc2ed7b690e963@mail.gmail.com> References: <40A08DE6-5D01-4DE1-8762-D4FC14CAEB7C@mac.com> <200601142001.k0EK1te08722@tick.javien.com> <22360fa10601141218s6c14a521w34dc2ed7b690e963@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On 1/14/06, Jef Allbright wrote: > Spike, I agree with you regarding the necessity of individual drivers > of growth, but what is often disregarded is the cooperative framework > that supports such individual growth, and the overwhelming (in the > long term) benefits of synergetic organization. > > [I hope this isn't construed as support for socialism and central management.] > Oh, Spike, you are naughty! :) You said that bad word - 'socialism'. :) It covers such a wide range of features that it is pretty well useless as an adjective and just becomes an epithet that is thrown at people. I think it is safe to say that the WTA does *not* consist mostly of dyed-in-the-wool libertarians. :) But I suspect you would find a lot to agree with, in their statement of Transhumanist Values written by Nick Bostrom. (You probably won't agree with everything, but that's life). After all, Max and Natasha are Honorary Vice Chairs of the WTA, and they have been featured speakers at the last three Transvision conferences. I am sure if the WTA was a hotbed of Communist propaganda they would soon disassociate themselves. A couple of quotes from Transhumanist Values: ------------------------ To start with, transhumanists typically place emphasis on individual freedom and individual choice in the area of enhancement technologies. Humans differ widely in their conceptions of what their own perfection or improvement would consist in. Some want to develop in one direction, others in different directions, and some prefer to stay the way they are. It would be morally unacceptable for anybody to impose a single standard to which we would all have to conform. People should have the right to choose which enhancement technologies, if any, they want to use. In cases where individual choices impact substantially on other people, this general principle may need to be restricted, but the mere fact that somebody may be disgusted or morally affronted by somebody else's using technology to modify herself would not normally a legitimate ground for coercive interference. Furthermore, the poor track record of centrally planned efforts to create better people (e.g. the eugenics movement and Soviet totalitarianism) shows that we need to be wary of collective decision-making in the field of human modification. --------------------- Since technological development is necessary to realize the transhumanist vision, entrepreneurship, science, and the engineering spirit are to be promoted. More generally, transhumanists favor a pragmatic attitude and a constructive, problem-solving approach to challenges, preferring methods that experience tells us give good results. They think it better to take the initiative to "do something about it" rather than sit around complaining. This is one sense in which transhumanism is optimistic. ------------------------ And there is the recent Statement on Totalitarianism Friday, November 04, 2005 "Whereas, transhumanism presupposes a robust respect for individual liberty, cultural diversity, and human rights; Therefore the WTA considers totalitarian regimes to be contrary to transhumanist values and hostile to transhumanist aspirations." BillK From spike66 at comcast.net Sat Jan 14 21:21:46 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Sat, 14 Jan 2006 13:21:46 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] REAL POLITIK IN THE WTA... and so long... In-Reply-To: <22360fa10601141218s6c14a521w34dc2ed7b690e963@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <200601142121.k0ELLne15897@tick.javien.com> ... > > governments out of our way (insert Howard-Dean-ish > > YEEAAAAHH), wealth creation, etc. > > > > Spike, I agree with you regarding the necessity of individual drivers > of growth, but what is often disregarded is the cooperative framework > that supports such individual growth, and the overwhelming (in the > long term) benefits of synergetic organization. > > [I hope this isn't construed as support for socialism and central > management.] > > - Jef Jef your comment is right in line with my own thinking. This cooperative framework that supports individual growth is a corporation. Team up with others, specialize to whatever degree you are comfortable, then work like mad to devour the other guys' lunch. Of course he is struggling to devour yours. But at the end of the day, the winning corporation wins, and the consumer wins. The losing corporation, well, it is made of individual consumers, so it wins in an indirect sort of way. It's all about wealth creation as opposed to wealth redistribution. What a system! In modern times there is a new holy grail, far beyond making the best trinkets for the least money. Today we are standing on the threshold of a dream. On the visible horizon is radical life extension, health improvement, intelligence enhancement, wealth creation that boggles the mind. May we all live to see it happen. spike From spike66 at comcast.net Sat Jan 14 21:39:26 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Sat, 14 Jan 2006 13:39:26 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] REAL POLITIK IN THE WTA... and so long... In-Reply-To: <200601142001.k0EK1te08722@tick.javien.com> Message-ID: <200601142139.k0ELdSe17416@tick.javien.com> BillK wrote: >Oh, Spike, you are naughty! :) >You said that bad word - 'socialism'. :) Ja, but I want to make like that president we had in the 70s and make one thing perfectly clear. In my earlier comment, I meant I would accept as fact that WTA puts forward the notion that transhumanism requires socialism, not that *I* think that transhumanism requires socialism. I was expecting someone from WTA to come in any time now and explain that WTA does not really promote socialism. But thanks for the link BillK, I will read that over. I met Nick Bostrom at Extro5, and found him to be a most delightful good guy. I recognize that I am carrying a lot of memetic baggage that is disdainful of socialism. Taking that prejudice into account and multiplying thru by the appropriate scale factor, I find the whole notion of socialism most distasteful. As for communism, I prefer to abstain from discussing it in polite company. {8-] spike Earlier commentary: > > > > In my experience the WTA has largely put forward the notion than > > transhumanism requires socialism ... > > > > - samantha > > I will accept this as fact unless someone from WTA is > hanging out here and offers a counter argument. > > This notion simplifies matters considerably, for > it appears to me that transhumanism requires capitalism. > Transhumanism thrives on individual freedom, loooots > of free-flowing capital, profit motive, getting > governments out of our way (insert Howard-Dean-ish > YEEAAAAHH), wealth creation, etc. > > spike From rafal.smigrodzki at gmail.com Sat Jan 14 21:52:22 2006 From: rafal.smigrodzki at gmail.com (Rafal Smigrodzki) Date: Sat, 14 Jan 2006 16:52:22 -0500 Subject: Simple expressions was Re: [extropy-chat] REAL POLITIK IN THE WTA... and so long... Message-ID: <7641ddc60601141352y1d93c6aev7b58c5e0611c98cf@mail.gmail.com> On 1/14/06, spike wrote: But at the end of the day, the winning corporation wins, > and the consumer wins. The losing corporation, well, it is made > of individual consumers, so it wins in an indirect sort of > way. ### Spike, this is the best way of saing that in capitalism there are no losers that I heard in a long time. Capitalism at its core is a way of organizing competition to, paradoxically, achieve cooperation, and not destruction. This is a simple truth made popular by Schumpeter but it has been obscured by years of collectivist and statist propaganda. Your eloquent expression can help bring it back to the fore. Rafal From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Sat Jan 14 22:14:40 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Sat, 14 Jan 2006 17:14:40 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] On Gut Feelings In-Reply-To: <8d71341e0601140826y4ae7b2ebx690c998361a98acc@mail.gmail.com> References: <002501c6191a$79cb2b80$04800d0a@JPAcer> <8d71341e0601140826y4ae7b2ebx690c998361a98acc@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: I agree with most of the points which have been said. So *long* as there is an extropic angle I am willing to listen to the argument. If it involves some attempt to rewrite history in attempting to advance a personal agenda then I have problems with it and moderation may be useful. That being said... In line with the Harris Religion v. Reason argument -- it is open for "extropic" debate because at least several worldwide religions *completely* fail the "rationality" test. The religions themselves are responsible for *writing* the history which served their purposes. In evaluating Stalin, Hitler, Hussein, etc. in ways relevant to the Extropian list the question which *should* be asked is whether or not their actions resulted in a greater preservation of information. I.e. *were* their actions extropic? If I thought about it for a while I think I could make arguments that their actions were (Stalin and Hussein are much easier than Hitler IMO). Now, I strongly suspect that my making those arguments would primarily serve to annoy some of the people on the list. The arguments would also probably not serve a particularly useful purpose moving forward since they are all effectively "done deals". A little bit of wisdom I learned long long ago which may be interesting to consider in this context of *who* one allows to speak and/or *who* one listens to... "Reality is a function of agreement. Agreement is a function of enrollment." Having a fair amount of personal experience with it, I would suggest that some Russian forms of enrollment are quite different from Western forms of enrollment and unless you have had an opportunity and good reasons to try and understand what is going on in the minds of the individuals making the arguments it is difficult to accept some of the forms they may take. On lists with large numbers of people with specific cultural extractions it is presumably wise to tailor argument strategies to fit the audience. This is simple Marketing 101. (However I always disliked marketing... :-;) Robert -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From alfio.puglisi at gmail.com Sat Jan 14 22:42:20 2006 From: alfio.puglisi at gmail.com (Alfio Puglisi) Date: Sat, 14 Jan 2006 23:42:20 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] REAL POLITIK IN THE WTA... and so long... In-Reply-To: <40A08DE6-5D01-4DE1-8762-D4FC14CAEB7C@mac.com> References: <20060114110215.63683.qmail@web32809.mail.mud.yahoo.com> <4902d9990601140331k79a4e461ka0131080469b5eb2@mail.gmail.com> <40A08DE6-5D01-4DE1-8762-D4FC14CAEB7C@mac.com> Message-ID: <4902d9990601141442u750d8683h3014660e2eb25c3c@mail.gmail.com> On 1/14/06, Samantha Atkins wrote: > > Also the post does not remotely reduce to only being about socialism > in the WTA. Since the word socialism was included almost in every sentence, and was the predominant metric when describing people, I had the impression that it was actually the real reason, and everything else just ancillary stuff. Alfio From rafal.smigrodzki at gmail.com Sat Jan 14 22:49:52 2006 From: rafal.smigrodzki at gmail.com (Rafal Smigrodzki) Date: Sat, 14 Jan 2006 17:49:52 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] REAL POLITIK IN THE WTA... and so long... In-Reply-To: References: <40A08DE6-5D01-4DE1-8762-D4FC14CAEB7C@mac.com> <200601142001.k0EK1te08722@tick.javien.com> <22360fa10601141218s6c14a521w34dc2ed7b690e963@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <7641ddc60601141449g785a9c25pc4a116c6c528bca4@mail.gmail.com> I find that Jose didn't need to use invective against James. Calling him a "scorpion" is unseemly. However drastically I disagree with his worldview, and his way of running the WTA discussion lists, there is no place for such words in civilized discourse. But, to air a few long-held grudges, let me recount here how I decided to dissociate myself from the WTA A couple years ago, when wta-talk was unmoderated, there was a discussion where Dale Carrico claimed that the "marginal minority" of the "Libertarian noise brigade" was overloading the list with their inanities. I actually went to the trouble of sifting through a few months' worth of the archives, counting the number of posts by each contributor, and classifying them according to their political views (which for the most part was pretty easy and non-controversial). It turned out that libertarians produced almost exactly the same number of posts as socialists, on a per capita basis. For Dale, a philosopher, and a rhetorician, dealing with pesky numbers would be a bit demeaning but here comes a new law to the rescue - wta-talk became a moderated list, and I was told by James that in the future such feats of accounting would not be allowed there. OK, that angered me immensely but I continued posting to wta-politics. Earlier last year I had another exchange with Dale, laced with invective and rancor, as usual. And as usual I was defending the notions of personal responsibility, individualism, and the others you all know I defend. James told me to stop the exchange, or else wta-politics could become a moderated list. This really strained my patience and I cut back on posting there. Finally, Mr Medvedev started his bizarre quest to introduce us to the wonders of the North Korean way to transhumanism, such as mandatory psychoengineering of all citizens (yes, he really did say it would be a good thing), and as a sideline extolled the virtues of Stalin. Now, as a libertarian, I do not support censorship, and if it was my list, I would let the clown post, although I would clearly tell what I think about his ideas. Foolishness has a way of defeating itself in a discussion and you can't have a discussion if you pretend it doesn't exist - however, if a list is already moderated to exclude my accounting of the number of libertarian posts, it would be a matter of symmetry to exclude Mr Medvedev as well. After all, reasonable members would worry about their reputation being tarnished by association, especially since Mr Medvedev was a WTA functionary. When I mentioned this to James, he answered he didn't really know what was the problem. This was the final straw for me. An "apolitical, umbrella organization" that censors mere counting of libertarian posts, or defense of low taxes but doesn't see a problem with actual honest-to-god Stalinist apologia, is something I would not want to be associated with in any way. So, here are my answers to some comments made by BillK: > I think it is safe to say that the WTA does *not* consist mostly of > dyed-in-the-wool libertarians. :) ### Indeed, they left. ---------------------------------- > After all, Max and Natasha are Honorary Vice Chairs of the WTA, and > they have been featured speakers at the last three Transvision > conferences. I am sure if the WTA was a hotbed of Communist propaganda > they would soon disassociate themselves. > ### I did. Rafal From james.hughes at trincoll.edu Sat Jan 14 22:52:36 2006 From: james.hughes at trincoll.edu (Hughes, James J.) Date: Sat, 14 Jan 2006 17:52:36 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Politics of the WTA Message-ID: The WTA is not socialist in any sense of the term, and, as was pointed out, Max and Natasha are Honorary Vice-Chairs of the WTA, and Extropy Institute is an affiliate of the WTA. As to whether WTA members are socialists, the WTA membership have been polled twice about their politics, among other things. The results can be read here: http://transhumanism.org/resources/WTASurvey03Report.pdf And here: http://transhumanism.org/resources/survey2005.pdf The results: ----------------------------------- How would you describe your politics? 2003 2005 "Libertarians" Libertarian 11% 10% European Liberal 6% 7% Anarcho-capitalist 4% 2% Randian/Objectivist 1% 2% Minarchist 1% 1% "Socialists" Libertarian socialist 7% 7% Democratic socialist 4% 6% Left anarchist 2% 3% Communist 1% 1% "Progressives" Progressive 6% 7% Green 4% 4% Social democrat 5% 5% US-style liberal 4% 4% Radical 2% 1% Moderate 7% 8% "Conservatives" Christian Democrat 1% 0% Conservative 2% 2% Far right 1% 0% Upwinger/advocate of future political system 8% 10% Other 9% 7% Not political 15% 12% -------------------------------------------- In other words, only 14%-17% of the membership consider themselves "socialists" compared to 22%-23% who consider themselves libertarians. Even if you add together all the left-leaners as "socialists", from US liberals to Communists (as the critics of the WTA seem to do) then left-wingers constitute less than 40% of the membership. As to my own often-maligned politics, I have been a proud and card-carrying member of the Democratic Socialists of America (http://dsausa.org) since 1980, organized campus chapters of the DSA, served on the National Executive of the Young Democratic Socialists, edited their magazine The Activist, chaired the Chicago chapter, and started their website. The DSA is a member of the Socialist International, along with the British Labour Party, French Socialist Party, German and Swedish Social Democratic Parties, and more than 100 other parties. All of them have been and remain anti-communist, as am I and as I have been since I became politically active in college. The conflation of social democrats and democratic socialists with communists is simply right-wing hyperbole. The assertion that the WTA is a socialist organization is simply incomprehensible. -------------------------------------------- James Hughes Ph.D. Executive Director World Transhumanist Assoc. Inst. for Ethics & Emerging Tech. http://transhumanism.org http://ieet.org director at transhumanism.org director at ieet.org Editor, Journal of Evolution and Technology http://jetpress.org Mailing Address: Box 128, Willington CT 06279 USA (office) 860-297-2376 From moulton at moulton.com Sat Jan 14 22:55:48 2006 From: moulton at moulton.com (Fred C. Moulton) Date: Sat, 14 Jan 2006 14:55:48 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] On difficult choices (was: Books: Harris; Religion and Reason) In-Reply-To: References: <20060112051911.37750.qmail@web50511.mail.yahoo.com> <8d71341e0601120218g6669207bya6f5168d015ee8ae@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <1137279348.29699.332.camel@localhost.localdomain> On Sat, 2006-01-14 at 10:54 -0800, Samantha Atkins wrote: > > On Jan 12, 2006, at 2:18 AM, Russell Wallace wrote: > > > The entities exterminating us aren't aliens from outer space in > > flying saucers with force shields that can withstand a nuclear > > explosion. The terrible truth is that we already know them. MTV. > > East Enders. Zoning laws. MAs in political science. > > http://www.opinionjournal.com/extra/?id=110007760 > > It makes sense, of course; the one thing an exterminator meme can't > > look like is an exterminator meme, otherwise almost by definition it > > wouldn't be one. Bacteria die to penicillin; HIV, the simplest > > thing, slips by. > > > > > I read this article. Not to put too fine a point on it, I found it > laughable. Samantha correctly pegs the intellectual level of the Steyn article. It is also sad that anyone is taking it seriously. The same article was referenced on another list I am on a few days ago and wrote my comments for that list. I reproduce the majority of my remarks here just in case anyone is interested my view of the Steyn article. It was written for a different audience which in general has a lower level of science and technology background than this group however I do not have time to do a rewrite. As originally posted to another listed: The Steyn essay begins by claiming that much of "what we call the Western world will not survive the century". We are then given a several thousand word grand tour of the problem as viewed by Steyn touching on everything from gay marriage to Cameron Diaz. The essay as I see it has a couple of major flaws; - the first being a lack of serious consideration of technology and business factors during the course of this century impacting on cultural norms, birthrates, etc. - the second is a failure to properly grasp some key issues about memetics and cultural beliefs. Although the first is one that I find very interesting I will not deal with it here but will instead focus on the second issue. The essay contains various statistics and comparisons about birth rates and replacement rates and the shrinking of traditional European populations and the rise of Muslim populations. Further statistics are brought forth about how the number of Muslims living in the United Kingdom who want be live under Shariah law. It appears as if he wants to paint the picture of fundamentalist Islam sweeping over much of the Europe. Of course after hammering on the racial and ethnic demographics we find the disclaimer near the end of the article: "But it's not about race, it's about culture. If 100% of your population believes in liberal pluralist democracy, it doesn't matter whether 70% of them are "white" or only 5% are. But if one part of your population believes in liberal pluralist democracy and the other doesn't, then it becomes a matter of great importance whether the part that does is 90% of the population or only 60%, 50%, 45%." It would seem that the obvious point would be to discuss how to promote acceptance of liberal pluralist values but Steyn does not seem inclined to devote much space to what is obviously a major question implied by his prior discussion. Mr. Steyn writes of the Europeans holding the idea the "liberal pluralist democracy" but surely he must realize that this is a fairly recent development. It was only a few centuries ago that both Protestants and Catholics used torture and death on those they considered heretics. What happened was that ideas changed. For many in Europe and the USA the link between religion and government has either weakened or been cut. Again this raises the question of why does Steyn not focus more on memetics than ethnic demographics. I began to get a glimpse of Steyn's thinking when I compared what he considered the primary impulses of a society "national defense, family, faith and, most basic of all, reproductive activity" with the what he terms the secondary impulses of society "government health care", "government day care" and "government paternity leave". He argues that at least one party in the US and most parties in the rest of the West have platforms which are largely concerned with the "secondary impulses" and he says that if we fail to pay attention to the "primary impulses" then the "secondary impulse" items become unaffordable. And I admit that discussions of how to pay for welfare programs might be a topic that persons interested in policy matters may want to pursue. But is the thrust of Steyn's essay about paying for welfare programs? No, it appears not. It seems that Steyn thinks the West is not focused on the proper issues for the "survival of the west". And it is this concern that explains why Steyn leads us on the tangents about gay marriage and Cameron Diaz. And it illuminates one reason why I find Steyn's thinking so flawed. Notice that in the list of "secondary impulses" each of the items listed is a government welfare program. Now notice that in the list of "primary impulses" national defense is one that often considered a government activity but what of the others; family, faith, reproduction. The lack of distinction by Steyn between society, government, family and individual further weaken his point. There is another weakness in the list and that is the use of the term faith in the list. It raises the question of faith in what: faith in money; faith in your favorite baseball team, faith in Allah, faith in what exactly? I found Steyn using another term in an unusual manner, the term secular. Consider Steyn's description of the "progressive agenda--lavish social welfare, abortion, secularism, multiculturalism". But secularism usually is used to refer to the lack of religious influence in public affairs of society. Yet this inclusion of secularism in the description ignores the religious backgrounds of many people in the early and current progressive movement. Putting "secularism" in the description of a progressive agenda might score rhetorical points with some in his audience but with me it just further erodes any possibility of taking him seriously. And his lack of intellectual rigor is further demonstrated by a discussion of multiculturalism that is at a level I would expect to hear at a frat house kegger not in a serious analysis. His trotting out of Cameron Diaz is not much better than his discussion of multiculturalism. Attempting to make any sort of important point by describing the Cameron Diaz appearance on the Oprah Winfrey show is about at the same level as if Shaquille O'Neil wanted to show his basketball skills by playing a little one on one with a seven year old. Steyn gives us this line: Why then, if your big thing is feminism or abortion or gay marriage are you so certain that the cult of tolerance will prevail once the biggest demographic in your society is cheerfully intolerant? I consider myself a feminist yet I have no illusion about the problems that can occur when a majority of persons in a society are intolerant. We have ample record of that in the history of many societies including this one. My point is that a threat of some future intolerant majority is not a reason for abandoning feminism or for stopping the efforts towards getting the government's nose out of marriage and personal relationships between consenting adults. And this gets to what I think is a key point; it is a memetic and cultural battle that is occurring. In some cases the cultural conflict erupts into violence. We have seen this before when heretics where persecuted and burned in Europe; and we see it now it the violence that some Muslims direct towards others who they see as the enemies of Islam. My position is that we need to understand and continue the memetic and cultural struggle to advance the ideas of forethought, free markets and individual liberty. Of course this memetic and cultural struggle will be weaken other religous faiths just as much as it weakens the Muslim faith. Perhaps this is something which in the unwritten background of Steyn's essay, it is hard to say. My impression of Steyn's essay is that it while it seems to try to address some questions which are potentially interesting it is thin on substance and thick on rhetorical tricks that fail to either amaze or amuse. I wish that Steyn has been more direct rather than attempting the rhetorical route. Perhaps it was a matter of personal style but it is not persuasive. So if I am so dismissive of Steyn's essay, why did I spend my time writing this rather getting some sleep? It is because of the damage that views like Steyn's do to the movement for free markets and individual liberty. Too often people mistakenly associate conservatives like Steyn with free markets and when I mention the value of free markets some false impressions are made and I spend valuable time trying to convince people that free markets and individual liberty really mean free markets and individual liberty instead of the rhetoric that a conservative like Steyn got published. If persons are interested in Islamic fundamentalism and religion in general and our modern society then I recommend the book The End of Faith written by Sam Harris. I will warn you that he expresses himself very forcefully and directly and persons with delicate sensibilities are hereby warned. For those too busy to buy and read the book you can get a free MP3 download of a talk he gave a few weeks ago in San Francisco at: http://www.longnow.org/shop/free-downloads/seminars/ Just scroll to the bottom of the list, the title of the talk is "The View from the End of the World" and covers much of the material in the book. The talk was well attended and was standing room only, fortunately I found a chair. Fred From thespike at satx.rr.com Sat Jan 14 21:49:11 2006 From: thespike at satx.rr.com (Damien Broderick) Date: Sat, 14 Jan 2006 15:49:11 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] "Shall we enhance?" Message-ID: <6.2.1.2.0.20060114153554.01c93108@pop-server.satx.rr.com> Dear Ms. Jarvik You write: http://deseretnews.com/dn/view/0,1249,635174444,00.html "How smart should we be allowed to be? How tall? How happy?" These are among the strangest and most distressing questions I have ever seen printed in a responsible journal, or indeed any outside totalitarian societies. "Allowed" by whom? Implicitly, you condone the suggestion that someone else has a moral right to reduce or limit my intelligence and happiness, or that of my children. Extraordinary! I assume this is not something you really think, but is purely an artifact of journalism's routine but often profoundly misleading "On the one hand, on the other". Would you feel equally comfortable writing: "How literate should we be allowed to be? How old? How ethical?" Like yours, these are all questions more suited to a Taliban theologian, I think, or one of Pol Pot's ideologues. Damien Broderick, PhD University of Melbourne Australia From rafal.smigrodzki at gmail.com Sat Jan 14 23:01:23 2006 From: rafal.smigrodzki at gmail.com (Rafal Smigrodzki) Date: Sat, 14 Jan 2006 18:01:23 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] On Gut Feelings In-Reply-To: <002501c6191a$79cb2b80$04800d0a@JPAcer> References: <002501c6191a$79cb2b80$04800d0a@JPAcer> Message-ID: <7641ddc60601141501i6606452ap4f7357632ca89be1@mail.gmail.com> On 1/14/06, Jack Parkinson wrote: > > Free speech needs the odd crackpot to reassure us all that the system is > working. ### You are right, Jack (strange we agree, isn't it?). The problem with wta-talk is that it was supposed to *apolitically* moderated, and it wasn't. Failing to expel an extreme communist (because Mr Medvedev is not even a mainstream communist anymore) after having silenced the opposite end of the political spectrum amounts to support for one of the positions. Rafal From james.hughes at trincoll.edu Sat Jan 14 23:09:27 2006 From: james.hughes at trincoll.edu (Hughes, James J.) Date: Sat, 14 Jan 2006 18:09:27 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] REAL POLITIK IN THE WTA... and so long... Message-ID: > especially since > Mr Medvedev was a WTA functionary. Mr. Medvedev is not a WTA functionary. He's not even a functionary of the Russian Transhumanist Association. Currently he is barred from posting on the WTA lists, and his posts have been moderated since the Board originally debated the matter. After next week, he may not be a member of the WTA since we will be voting on whether to expel him. I take it that would be your advise? As to the need to moderate vituperative political debates on the WTA lists, to which you objected in the past, I note that the same debate about the appropriateness of political debate, and vituperation, has also occurred here. -------------------------------------------- James Hughes Ph.D. Executive Director World Transhumanist Assoc. Inst. for Ethics & Emerging Tech. http://transhumanism.org http://ieet.org director at transhumanism.org director at ieet.org Editor, Journal of Evolution and Technology http://jetpress.org Mailing Address: Box 128, Willington CT 06279 USA (office) 860-297-2376 From rafal.smigrodzki at gmail.com Sat Jan 14 23:18:56 2006 From: rafal.smigrodzki at gmail.com (Rafal Smigrodzki) Date: Sat, 14 Jan 2006 18:18:56 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] On difficult choices (was: Books: Harris; Religion and Reason) In-Reply-To: <8d71341e0601141148p673f90b8mb994f2dd1dca63e8@mail.gmail.com> References: <20060112051911.37750.qmail@web50511.mail.yahoo.com> <8d71341e0601120218g6669207bya6f5168d015ee8ae@mail.gmail.com> <8d71341e0601141111w7fa08c8bu753281f358e0a600@mail.gmail.com> <669DC541-211F-4E62-95B0-F316FFB0585C@mac.com> <8d71341e0601141148p673f90b8mb994f2dd1dca63e8@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <7641ddc60601141518k341b0d22t51dede2e562307b2@mail.gmail.com> On 1/14/06, Russell Wallace wrote: > On 1/14/06, Samantha Atkins wrote: > > > > > > > > > > On Jan 14, 2006, at 11:11 AM, Russell Wallace wrote: > > Out of curiosity, how close to the Singularity do you think we are? > > About one generation away if we don't do something stupid. > > I hope you're right! I think it's likely to take longer, even in the best > case scenario; but if the Singularity does arrive in one generation, feel > free to say "see, Russell, you were being unnecessarily grouchy and > pessimistic" and I'll agree that this was indeed so :) Operationally, I'll > keep trying to figure out how to prove myself wrong. > > ### My 95% confidence interval for the SAI-driven Singularity is 2015 to 2050, squarely within our generation's lifetimes. But I am not as pessimistic as Samantha about the US economy. Read Arnold Kling - the fact is, the US is doing better than ever, even despite the horrid stupidities that bedevil the system. Samantha, about five years ago we discussed on ExI the same question - you finished your last post in the thread by wondering whether maybe the American society might be able to invent its way out of the financial ruin brought about by government spending. Now I feel more confident than ever that it will happen. The dramatic improvements in labor productivity produced by American capitalism will produce so much wealth that even American politicians won't be able to destroy it all (you can find the relevant analyses on TCS and on Econlog). Rafal From rafal.smigrodzki at gmail.com Sat Jan 14 23:27:17 2006 From: rafal.smigrodzki at gmail.com (Rafal Smigrodzki) Date: Sat, 14 Jan 2006 18:27:17 -0500 Subject: Fwd: [extropy-chat] REAL POLITIK IN THE WTA... and so long... In-Reply-To: <7641ddc60601141526j2d23cf06u2741d19b7b1e0740@mail.gmail.com> References: <7641ddc60601141526j2d23cf06u2741d19b7b1e0740@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <7641ddc60601141527k4c84b2b8xc89b052a6abe943a@mail.gmail.com> ---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: Rafal Smigrodzki Date: Jan 14, 2006 6:26 PM Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] REAL POLITIK IN THE WTA... and so long... To: "Hughes, James J." On 1/14/06, Hughes, James J. wrote: > > > especially since > > Mr Medvedev was a WTA functionary. > > Mr. Medvedev is not a WTA functionary. ### But at the time my post referred to he was, wasn't he? ----------------------------------- > > As to the need to moderate vituperative political debates on the WTA > lists, to which you objected in the past, I note that the same debate > about the appropriateness of political debate, and vituperation, has > also occurred here. > ### Oh, if only you were to moderate vituperation, rather than ego-dystonic politics... Rafal From rafal.smigrodzki at gmail.com Sat Jan 14 23:34:29 2006 From: rafal.smigrodzki at gmail.com (Rafal Smigrodzki) Date: Sat, 14 Jan 2006 18:34:29 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Politics of the WTA In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <7641ddc60601141534m6328f02csd4930f2c0c82ac49@mail.gmail.com> On 1/14/06, Hughes, James J. wrote: > The WTA is not socialist in any sense of the term, ### At the time I decided not post on wta lists it was socialist in the sense of limiting expression of non-socialist worldviews by selective moderation. Rafal From spike66 at comcast.net Sat Jan 14 23:34:28 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Sat, 14 Jan 2006 15:34:28 -0800 Subject: Simple expressions was Re: [extropy-chat] REAL POLITIK IN THE WTA...and so long... In-Reply-To: <7641ddc60601141352y1d93c6aev7b58c5e0611c98cf@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <200601142334.k0ENYVe28889@tick.javien.com> > bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Rafal Smigrodzki > Subject: Simple expressions was Re: [extropy-chat] REAL POLITIK IN THE > WTA...and so long... > > On 1/14/06, spike wrote: > > But at the end of the day, the winning corporation wins, > > and the consumer wins. The losing corporation, well, it is made > > of individual consumers, so it wins in an indirect sort of > > way. > > ### Spike, this is the best way of saing that in capitalism there are > no losers that I heard in a long time... Thanks Rafal, you are too kind. > ...Capitalism at its core is a way > of organizing competition to, paradoxically, achieve cooperation, and > not destruction... I get so turned on by this kind of talk. Makes me want to run out and find something to invest in. I agree with Governor Dean's sentiment when he uttered the most sensible and eloquent comment that he ever made: "YEEEAAH" {8^D I figure economic competition in the form of unapologetic, unbridled capitalism is like a money version of democracy, where we proles get to vote with our money. It is like biological evolution, where the most robust solutions are found by recursive selection. It is like engineering, where design is perfected thru the feedback metric of profit. YEEEAAH, life is gooood! > This is a simple truth made popular by Schumpeter but > it has been obscured by years of collectivist and statist propaganda. > Your eloquent expression can help bring it back to the fore. > > Rafal Rafal I fear you and I reinforce each other bud. We need to get together, talk long enough to find something on which we disagree. {8^D spike From james.hughes at trincoll.edu Sat Jan 14 23:38:11 2006 From: james.hughes at trincoll.edu (Hughes, James J.) Date: Sat, 14 Jan 2006 18:38:11 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] REAL POLITIK IN THE WTA... and so long... Message-ID: > ### But at the time my post referred to he was, wasn't he? No, he was never a functionary, appointee or electee of the WTA or the RTA. He translated some documents and sent us some news. That's all. J. From james.hughes at trincoll.edu Sat Jan 14 23:45:57 2006 From: james.hughes at trincoll.edu (Hughes, James J.) Date: Sat, 14 Jan 2006 18:45:57 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] REAL POLITIK IN THE WTA... and so long... Message-ID: > ### I was told we was the webmaster of the WTA site in Russian. He has helped on the RTA's website, which is owned and run by someone else, but he has not edited our Russian language page. J. From james.hughes at trincoll.edu Sat Jan 14 23:47:35 2006 From: james.hughes at trincoll.edu (Hughes, James J.) Date: Sat, 14 Jan 2006 18:47:35 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Politics of the WTA Message-ID: > ### At the time I decided not post on wta lists it was > socialist in the sense of limiting expression of > non-socialist worldviews by selective moderation. If telling you to take your political fights off-line is socialist then I guess a lot of people on this list are socialist also. J. From rafal.smigrodzki at gmail.com Sun Jan 15 00:01:31 2006 From: rafal.smigrodzki at gmail.com (Rafal Smigrodzki) Date: Sat, 14 Jan 2006 19:01:31 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Politics of the WTA In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <7641ddc60601141601s2caf00ads49f1abe6f741fb73@mail.gmail.com> On 1/14/06, Hughes, James J. wrote: > > ### At the time I decided not post on wta lists it was > > socialist in the sense of limiting expression of > > non-socialist worldviews by selective moderation. > > If telling you to take your political fights off-line is socialist then > I guess a lot of people on this list are socialist also. ### Removing a discussion between a collectivist and a libertarian while keeping communist ravings certainly is socialist. Rafal From spike66 at comcast.net Sun Jan 15 00:05:11 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Sat, 14 Jan 2006 16:05:11 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Politics of the WTA In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <200601150005.k0F05Ie32100@tick.javien.com> > bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Hughes, James J. > Subject: RE: [extropy-chat] Politics of the WTA > > > ### At the time I decided not post on wta lists it was > > socialist in the sense of limiting expression of > > non-socialist worldviews by selective moderation. > > If telling you to take your political fights off-line is socialist then > I guess a lot of people on this list are socialist also. > > J. Evolution forbid, oy vey. We never really did come up with a solution on moderating political material that was acceptable to all. Some left ExI-chat because it was too political, others because it wasn't political enough. We decided when in doubt, let it go out: meaning, keep moderation to a bare minimum or less. {8-] Political discussion is allowed on ExI-chat, but personal attacks are not. ExI-chat has a lot of libertarians and those sympathetic with libertarian notions, but Extropy Institute itself does not specifically endorse any one political persuasion. See question 2: http://www.extropy.org/About.htm#No Ideally we could have their political discussions without attacking each other. It has worked fairly well since about last summer. spike From isthatyoujack at icqmail.com Sun Jan 15 01:00:08 2006 From: isthatyoujack at icqmail.com (Jack Parkinson) Date: Sun, 15 Jan 2006 09:00:08 +0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] On Gut Feelings References: <002501c6191a$79cb2b80$04800d0a@JPAcer> <6b5e09390601140711r4f8879c3u99d68446c0e244b1@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <001601c6196f$099f7ff0$04800d0a@JPAcer> ----- Original Message ----- From: Mike Hayes >When words have baggage, it's hard to sling them around and make precise >points. Yes - and unfortunately, words do acquire semiotic content over time. One of the best essays on this topic is "Thick Description" by Clifford Geertz - I have no url for this but I believe it is vailable on the web if Googled... >I assume that there are no members of this list from within mainland China, >is that known as a fact? Actually, I live in mainland China, and have for almost the past 3 years - although I am from the UK originally. Jack Parkinson From isthatyoujack at icqmail.com Sun Jan 15 01:10:47 2006 From: isthatyoujack at icqmail.com (Jack Parkinson) Date: Sun, 15 Jan 2006 09:10:47 +0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] On Gut Feelings References: <002501c6191a$79cb2b80$04800d0a@JPAcer> <7641ddc60601141501i6606452ap4f7357632ca89be1@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <001b01c61970$86fd8130$04800d0a@JPAcer> ----- Original Message ----- From: "Rafal Smigrodzki" > > Free speech needs the odd crackpot to reassure us all that the system is > working. ### You are right, Jack (strange we agree, isn't it?). The problem with wta-talk is that it was supposed to *apolitically* moderated, and it wasn't. Failing to expel an extreme communist (because Mr Medvedev is not even a mainstream communist anymore) after having silenced the opposite end of the political spectrum amounts to support for one of the positions. Rafal Good to see we have the occasional overlapping position! I can see how those postings amount to major embarrassment - but I still think that trying for a complete separation of politics from the issues the WTA discusses is something of a lost cause. Science/technology has ramifications for politics/sociology and vice -versa... Jack Parkinson From isthatyoujack at icqmail.com Sun Jan 15 01:33:46 2006 From: isthatyoujack at icqmail.com (Jack Parkinson) Date: Sun, 15 Jan 2006 09:33:46 +0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] On Gut Feelings References: <002501c6191a$79cb2b80$04800d0a@JPAcer> <8A08D763-4889-4D11-B351-E8339C4742D7@mac.com> Message-ID: <002a01c61973$bbba4cc0$04800d0a@JPAcer> ----- Original Message ----- Samantha Atkins said: >Wholesale rewriting of history and denial of atrocities has nothing to do >with reason on informed >debate. Such denials are not debatable. Being an ostrich has nothing to do with reason or informed debate either. Everything is debatable. >The notion that all opinions no matter how absurd or evil are worthy of >defense and serious >consideration is shallow thinking. No, it is pragmatic acceptance of reality. Few things are ever decided for all eternity. Maybe nothing is. Remember Roe vs Wade? How long did it take for that heady feeling of victory to be replaced by the dull realization that this battle will need to be fought again - and probably again and again? >I do get to decide what I sanction and abhor. So do groups of people and >organizations. By >what they sanction and stand for they will be judged. >Debate is not limited. Having such an open >mind that your brains fall out >is not "debate" or respect for reality. Sanction is an interesting word - a 'contronym' - a word that means its own opposite. It has the dual sense of both allowing and restricting. In the second sense, sanction is no more than imposing your point of view and refusing to listen to the protests. Where is the logic or merit in that? >What does this "respect" of politics or religion mean? I take it to mean that everyone has the right to believe what they like. >Does it mean that we don't rigorously examine and criticize each other's >notions in these areas? No. And nor is this implied in my post. But it is the NOTION that ought to be the subject of criticism, not the person.... Jack Parkinson From analyticphilosophy at gmail.com Sun Jan 15 01:46:09 2006 From: analyticphilosophy at gmail.com (Jeff Medina) Date: Sat, 14 Jan 2006 20:46:09 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] On Gut Feelings In-Reply-To: <002a01c61973$bbba4cc0$04800d0a@JPAcer> References: <002501c6191a$79cb2b80$04800d0a@JPAcer> <8A08D763-4889-4D11-B351-E8339C4742D7@mac.com> <002a01c61973$bbba4cc0$04800d0a@JPAcer> Message-ID: <5844e22f0601141746u31211876nc5589f22fcea9af9@mail.gmail.com> On 1/14/06, Jack Parkinson wrote: > In the > second sense, sanction is no more than imposing your point of view and > refusing to listen to the protests. Where is the logic or merit in that? I offer to provide enough 'protests' to keep you reading/listening 24/7, 365.25 days a year. No lunch breaks, no sleep, no hobbies, no day job. Since there's never any logic or merit in "refusing to listen to the protests", you must of course agree wholeheartedly to spend all your time on whatever I choose to ramble at you about. Right? Right. Or perhaps the existence of limited resources entails we pick and choose just what positions we consider worth listening to or debating, and to what extent, with whom, and in what context. -- Jeff Medina http://www.painfullyclear.com/ Community Director Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence http://www.singinst.org/ Relationships & Community Fellow Institute for Ethics & Emerging Technologies http://www.ieet.org/ School of Philosophy, Birkbeck, University of London http://www.bbk.ac.uk/phil/ From transhumanist at goldenfuture.net Sun Jan 15 03:35:52 2006 From: transhumanist at goldenfuture.net (Joseph Bloch) Date: Sat, 14 Jan 2006 22:35:52 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] What _is_ it with the WTA board, anyway? Message-ID: <43C9C318.60302@goldenfuture.net> Setting aside for the moment the specifics of the recent spat within the WTA board of directors, one cannot help but notice that this is a recurring event. Almost like clockwork, one or more members of the Board become so frustrated that they feel compelled to resign (or are otherwise driven out), and much bad blood is generated, and good, active leaders leave the WTA. Almost invariably, the persons in question were in a conflict with Dr. Hughes. One or two times, you can ascribe to coincidence. But this has happened with at least four people thusfar to my knowledge. Can it really be their fault every time? Does it really make sense that Jose Cordeiro, Bruce Klein, Harvey Newstrom, and Elizier Yudkowski are each to blame, when each and every one of them ran afoul of James Hughes and left or were driven out subsequently? Not to mention all the other bitter arguments amongst the board, some quite heated, each and every one of which sees Dr. Hughes at its center (and I have had my share, I will fully admit, and I'm probably next on the list to be forced out). It doesn't make a lot of sense to me that it's "everyone else's fault". If that sounds like a swipe at Dr. Hughes, so be it; I ask it as a legitimate question. Four personal conflicts bad enough to drive away members of the Board (and countless others of lesser severity) and it's never his fault? I find it difficult to reasonably accept that poor set-upon James is an innocent player in all this. Joseph From megao at sasktel.net Sun Jan 15 04:19:40 2006 From: megao at sasktel.net (Lifespan Pharma/Morris Johnson CTO) Date: Sat, 14 Jan 2006 22:19:40 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] POLITIK IN THE WTA... symbolic of a fundamental human defect In-Reply-To: <7641ddc60601141449g785a9c25pc4a116c6c528bca4@mail.gmail.com> References: <40A08DE6-5D01-4DE1-8762-D4FC14CAEB7C@mac.com> <200601142001.k0EK1te08722@tick.javien.com> <22360fa10601141218s6c14a521w34dc2ed7b690e963@mail.gmail.com> <7641ddc60601141449g785a9c25pc4a116c6c528bca4@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <43C9CD5C.9000403@sasktel.net> Rafal Smigrodzki wrote: >I find that Jose didn't need to use invective against James. Calling >him a "scorpion" is unseemly. However drastically I disagree with his >worldview, and his way of running the WTA discussion lists, there is >no place for such words in civilized discourse. > > As human connectivity converges it will be interesting to see how philosophical differences can continue to co-exist. This may be the single biggest challenge of the singularity. How to allow for the co-existance of diverse world views. Virtualization of many radical and bizzare worldscapes might compartmentalize some, but who or how can it be determined what is to be discouraged and what is to be allowed to run unfettered in a segregated domain. Most humans might eventually want to experience all possible divergent and bizzare lifestyles conceivable if they can return to their own thoughtspace to reflect and continue forward, sort of like going to movies. As with ST type holodeck programs , which should be able to gain physical existance, and which should remain virtually imprisoned to the holodeck? Will posthumanity succeed in a social sense or will it be necessary to become like Vulcans to survive without a philisophical WAR of Minds the likes of which we can barely concieve of. Will we develop a symbiotic duality between a rational entity and a social entity. Might we relegate our social side to a holodeck world of experiences and only allow our rational entity to have a physical existance. Immortality might become our undoing if these issues are not properly dealt with before any singularity occurs. From metavalent at gmail.com Sun Jan 15 05:07:39 2006 From: metavalent at gmail.com (Metavalent Extropianism) Date: Sat, 14 Jan 2006 21:07:39 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] "Shall we enhance?" In-Reply-To: <6.2.1.2.0.20060114153554.01c93108@pop-server.satx.rr.com> References: <6.2.1.2.0.20060114153554.01c93108@pop-server.satx.rr.com> Message-ID: <4e674fa00601142107u3ff3d5c5sb7a170e69d04dc94@mail.gmail.com> Keep in mind that Deseret is code for "Mormon Church" http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deseret so there is always a loving, but apparently jealous and somewhat insecure "Heavenly Father" out there -- whom one day, "we shall be like, for he was once as we" according to the cult's dogma -- dictating our boundaries. Of course, only specially selected humans who have played by the cult's bizarre rules are authorized to explain to the rest of us what Heavenly Father finds acceptable. All the leading religions are extremely scary on their own demerits, but the LDS wackos are especially frightening if you ask me. So, as is so often the case, one need only consider the source to get a pretty good sense of motives and rationale. On 1/14/06, Damien Broderick wrote: > Dear Ms. Jarvik > > You write: > "How smart should we be allowed to be? How tall? How happy?" > > These are among the strangest and most distressing questions I have ever > seen printed in a responsible journal, or indeed any outside totalitarian > societies. "Allowed" by whom? Implicitly, you condone the suggestion that > someone else has a moral right to reduce or limit my intelligence and > happiness, or that of my children. Extraordinary! > > Damien Broderick, PhD > University of Melbourne > Australia -- -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v1.4.2 (MingW32) - GPGshell v3.47 Comment: Open Source Encryption for Everyone iD8DBQFDn7+GYAcVeu6D610RAgh5AJ9xxKV+dLvknuLo7QR2gA78DhI5FQCgsA8i XGmHxa5f0ozj2a8uXHGlDpk= =RAJu -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- Fingerprint: 2336 49B5 A73D 82BE ECE7 96EA 6007 157A EE83 EB5D From thespike at satx.rr.com Sun Jan 15 05:58:37 2006 From: thespike at satx.rr.com (Damien Broderick) Date: Sat, 14 Jan 2006 23:58:37 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] "Shall we enhance?" In-Reply-To: <4e674fa00601142107u3ff3d5c5sb7a170e69d04dc94@mail.gmail.co m> References: <6.2.1.2.0.20060114153554.01c93108@pop-server.satx.rr.com> <4e674fa00601142107u3ff3d5c5sb7a170e69d04dc94@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <6.2.1.2.0.20060114235539.01e19710@pop-server.satx.rr.com> >Keep in mind that Deseret is code for "Mormon Church" Quite so. It would be revealing, however, if the journalist who wrote that biased piece provided just that justification ("God made me do it")--or, far more likely, evaded the issue with blustering. Damien Broderick From sjatkins at mac.com Sun Jan 15 09:11:40 2006 From: sjatkins at mac.com (Samantha Atkins) Date: Sun, 15 Jan 2006 01:11:40 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] REAL POLITIK IN THE WTA... and so long... In-Reply-To: <200601142121.k0ELLne15897@tick.javien.com> References: <200601142121.k0ELLne15897@tick.javien.com> Message-ID: <9A02A8BE-1F49-4EB6-9F98-7A70AE3B9D6C@mac.com> On Jan 14, 2006, at 1:21 PM, spike wrote: > > Jef your comment is right in line with my own thinking. This > cooperative framework that supports individual growth is a > corporation. > Team up with others, specialize to whatever > degree you are comfortable, then work like mad to devour the > other guys' lunch. Of course he is struggling to devour > yours. Seems to me that Linux and many Open Source/Free Software projects do fine without a corporation or being out to eat anyone else's lunch. Times and forms change. > But at the end of the day, the winning corporation wins, > and the consumer wins. The losing corporation, well, it is made > of individual consumers, so it wins in an indirect sort of > way. It's all about wealth creation as opposed to wealth > redistribution. What a system! Corporations and consumers eh? How like 20th century! Wealth is created all kinds of new oddball ways as more of us hook into the Web as full-fledged participants not so easily separated into producers and consumers or both and other. > > In modern times there is a new holy grail, far beyond > making the best trinkets for the least money. Today > we are standing on the threshold of a dream. On the > visible horizon is radical life extension, health improvement, > intelligence enhancement, wealth creation that boggles the > mind. May we all live to see it happen. Yes. And may we shed old forms and forge new ones as needed every step of the way. - samantha From sjatkins at mac.com Sun Jan 15 09:20:51 2006 From: sjatkins at mac.com (Samantha Atkins) Date: Sun, 15 Jan 2006 01:20:51 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Politics of the WTA In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <45450F7A-0F39-4DC6-9543-D13278C47966@mac.com> On Jan 14, 2006, at 2:52 PM, Hughes, James J. wrote: > > The WTA is not socialist in any sense of the term, and, as was pointed > out, Max and Natasha are Honorary Vice-Chairs of the WTA, and Extropy > Institute is an affiliate of the WTA. > I am sorry but the WTA organization is heavily bent in the socialist direction and to assert otherwise is a damn lie. A straw poll of members hasn't anything to do with it. Neither does having Max and Natasha as *Honorary* Vice-Chairs. Your "umbrella" is no such thing. - samantha From sjatkins at mac.com Sun Jan 15 09:36:51 2006 From: sjatkins at mac.com (Samantha Atkins) Date: Sun, 15 Jan 2006 01:36:51 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] REAL POLITIK IN THE WTA... and so long... In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On Jan 14, 2006, at 3:09 PM, Hughes, James J. wrote: > >> especially since >> Mr Medvedev was a WTA functionary. > > Mr. Medvedev is not a WTA functionary. He's not even a functionary of > the Russian Transhumanist Association. Currently he is barred from > posting on the WTA lists, and his posts have been moderated since the > Board originally debated the matter. After next week, he may not be a > member of the WTA since we will be voting on whether to expel him. > Ah. So now you take action. Good to see you changing your tune after all the mealy-mouthed platitudes and inaction. > > As to the need to moderate vituperative political debates on the WTA > lists, to which you objected in the past, I note that the same debate > about the appropriateness of political debate, and vituperation, has > also occurred here. > I was one of the libertarians ran off your list ages ago. You condoned those practices. I haven't forgotten. The vituperative energy was mostly on the other side but libertarians got to be the scapegoats. I have not believed that you are at all interested in "debate" or in being inclusive ever since. But the Medvedev tolerance you practiced for so long was beyond anything I would have believed if I had not seen it myself. I am glad you are now taking action but it is too late. Your colors have been seen. - samantha From sjatkins at mac.com Sun Jan 15 09:47:13 2006 From: sjatkins at mac.com (Samantha Atkins) Date: Sun, 15 Jan 2006 01:47:13 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] On difficult choices (was: Books: Harris; Religion and Reason) In-Reply-To: <7641ddc60601141518k341b0d22t51dede2e562307b2@mail.gmail.com> References: <20060112051911.37750.qmail@web50511.mail.yahoo.com> <8d71341e0601120218g6669207bya6f5168d015ee8ae@mail.gmail.com> <8d71341e0601141111w7fa08c8bu753281f358e0a600@mail.gmail.com> <669DC541-211F-4E62-95B0-F316FFB0585C@mac.com> <8d71341e0601141148p673f90b8mb994f2dd1dca63e8@mail.gmail.com> <7641ddc60601141518k341b0d22t51dede2e562307b2@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On Jan 14, 2006, at 3:18 PM, Rafal Smigrodzki wrote: > On 1/14/06, Russell Wallace wrote: >> On 1/14/06, Samantha Atkins wrote: >>> >>> >>> >>> >>> On Jan 14, 2006, at 11:11 AM, Russell Wallace wrote: > >>> Out of curiosity, how close to the Singularity do you think we are? > >>> About one generation away if we don't do something stupid. >> >> I hope you're right! I think it's likely to take longer, even in >> the best >> case scenario; but if the Singularity does arrive in one >> generation, feel >> free to say "see, Russell, you were being unnecessarily grouchy and >> pessimistic" and I'll agree that this was indeed so :) >> Operationally, I'll >> keep trying to figure out how to prove myself wrong. >> >> > ### My 95% confidence interval for the SAI-driven Singularity is 2015 > to 2050, squarely within our generation's lifetimes. > > But I am not as pessimistic as Samantha about the US economy. Read > Arnold Kling - the fact is, the US is doing better than ever, even > despite the horrid stupidities that bedevil the system. How do you figure that? With massive public and private debt, huge foreign ownership, more dollars in foreign hands than in our own, little on-shore manufacturing capability, a government that eats 50% of everything and still is massively in debt, liberty and freedom largely forgotten by the people - exactly HOW can you possibly claim we are doing better than ever? If you claim it is because of our technology, well, that same technology is all over the East and much of the critical components are produced mainly there. So that isn't going to keep the US boat afloat. > > Samantha, about five years ago we discussed on ExI the same question - > you finished your last post in the thread by wondering whether maybe > the American society might be able to invent its way out of the > financial ruin brought about by government spending. Now I feel more > confident than ever that it will happen. How? Which companies and what areas? R&D financed how? > The dramatic improvements in > labor productivity produced by American capitalism will produce so > much wealth that even American politicians won't be able to destroy it > all (you can find the relevant analyses on TCS and on Econlog). No. That was largely a hoax. For "productivity" increase the government counts the difference in computer speed/strorage cost per dollar. But anyone working in computers (especially software) knows that raw machine power increases do not translate into real productivity gains like that, not even in direct computer related industries. If our productivity is really so good then why is China eating our lunch? - samantha From amara at amara.com Sun Jan 15 10:15:39 2006 From: amara at amara.com (Amara Graps) Date: Sun, 15 Jan 2006 11:15:39 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] Woo Hoo! Stardust Capsule Lands Safely!!! Message-ID: It deccelerated from the fastest manmade object to hit our Earth's atmosphere to ~ 10mph and landed safely in the north Utah desert!!! -- Amara Graps, PhD Istituto di Fisica dello Spazio Interplanetario (IFSI) Istituto Nazionale di Astrofisica (INAF), Adjunct Assistant Professor Astronomy, AUR, Roma, ITALIA Amara.Graps at ifsi.rm.cnr.it From russell.wallace at gmail.com Sun Jan 15 10:21:03 2006 From: russell.wallace at gmail.com (Russell Wallace) Date: Sun, 15 Jan 2006 10:21:03 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Woo Hoo! Stardust Capsule Lands Safely!!! In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <8d71341e0601150221h5e0eeb2eha86723ab03166f37@mail.gmail.com> On 1/15/06, Amara Graps wrote: > > It deccelerated from the fastest manmade object to hit our > Earth's atmosphere to ~ 10mph and landed safely in the north > Utah desert!!! Great! Congratulations to everyone involved! - Russell -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From rafal.smigrodzki at gmail.com Sun Jan 15 11:00:15 2006 From: rafal.smigrodzki at gmail.com (Rafal Smigrodzki) Date: Sun, 15 Jan 2006 06:00:15 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Politics of the WTA In-Reply-To: <200601150005.k0F05Ie32100@tick.javien.com> References: <200601150005.k0F05Ie32100@tick.javien.com> Message-ID: <7641ddc60601150300l70ce327bq78b8c79c52d72b2f@mail.gmail.com> On 1/14/06, spike wrote: > > bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Hughes, James J. > > Subject: RE: [extropy-chat] Politics of the WTA > > > > > ### At the time I decided not post on wta lists it was > > > socialist in the sense of limiting expression of > > > non-socialist worldviews by selective moderation. > > > > If telling you to take your political fights off-line is socialist then > > I guess a lot of people on this list are socialist also. > > > > J. > > Ideally we could have their political discussions > without attacking each other. It has worked fairly well > since about last summer. > ### The special irony in this case is that J was telling me to "take your political fights off-line" referring to posts on the list *wta-politics*. Funny, ain't it? Rafal From amara at amara.com Sun Jan 15 14:08:48 2006 From: amara at amara.com (Amara Graps) Date: Sun, 15 Jan 2006 15:08:48 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] Stardust Capsule Return Press briefing Message-ID: http://www.nasa.gov/multimedia/nasatv/index.html Press briefing at 6:30am PST, 9:30amEST, 3:30CET on the Stardust sample return capsule recovery. I watched the return on NASA TV, and it was perfect! Apparently after losing the IR tracking, and hitting the ground gently, the capsule bounced a few times and landed on its side under the parachute, and the helicopters needed about an hour to find it in the dark on the Utah salt beds (they had the signal, and the IR helped, but it cooled rapidly upon landing). Now the capsule is in a temporary storage facility on the army base, to undergo some cleaning before being transferred to the long term dust samples storage in Houston (and some pieces will be sent to other laboratories all over the world for study). BTW, I think that Don Yeomans in the broadcast made some debatable and controversial statements about the role of comets in our lives.... Amara -- Amara Graps, PhD Istituto di Fisica dello Spazio Interplanetario (IFSI) Istituto Nazionale di Astrofisica (INAF), Adjunct Assistant Professor Astronomy, AUR, Roma, ITALIA Amara.Graps at ifsi.rm.cnr.it From megao at sasktel.net Sun Jan 15 14:56:44 2006 From: megao at sasktel.net (Lifespan Pharma/Morris Johnson CTO) Date: Sun, 15 Jan 2006 08:56:44 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] HACCP as a tool to Integrate/Synchronize Disruptive Technologies Message-ID: <43CA62AC.60609@sasktel.net> Some thoughts about novel ways to deploy "next generation" HACCP high level management systems. One can deploy HACCP protocols to integrate and synchronize and optimize disruptive technologies Was reading a piece in "CIO Insight" -RFID article while watching Star Trek Enterprise- episode about "temporal management" with consideration of - food/nutriceutical/drug security-bioterrorism-agroterrorism HACCP applications article. HACCP for disruptive technology tools: RFID - transactional tool HACCP for Humans - lifespan/healthspan sentience optimization tool Carnivore/Internet et. al.- information and security managment tools GPS/GIS- logistical management tool Bio-Cyber-Nano HACCP- biomechanical management tool From james.hughes at trincoll.edu Sun Jan 15 15:21:46 2006 From: james.hughes at trincoll.edu (Hughes, James J.) Date: Sun, 15 Jan 2006 10:21:46 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] What _is_ it with the WTA board, anyway? Message-ID: > Jose Cordeiro, Bruce Klein, Harvey > Newstrom, and Elizier Yudkowski are each to blame, when each > and every one of them ran afoul of James Hughes Uh, for the record, Mr. Cordeiro just withdrew from running for re-election, Bruce Klein and Harvey Newstrom resigned from the Board, and Mr. Yudkowsky lost a re-relection. So I don't know how I can be blamed for 'driving out' Yudkowsky. And yes, the other three Board members and I had many disagreements. But neither I, nor any Board member, moved to have them removed from the Board. Subsequently I have collaborated on WTA and IEET projects with Mr. Klein and Mr. Newstrom, and I'm glad we have repaired those relationships. J. Hughes From megao at sasktel.net Sun Jan 15 15:52:08 2006 From: megao at sasktel.net (Lifespan Pharma/Morris Johnson CTO) Date: Sun, 15 Jan 2006 09:52:08 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] Re: HACCP as a tool to Integrate/Synchronize Disruptive Technologies In-Reply-To: <43CA6ED3.10807@sasktel.net> References: <43CA62AC.60609@sasktel.net> <43CA6ED3.10807@sasktel.net> Message-ID: <43CA6FA8.7070506@sasktel.net> Lifespan Pharma/Morris Johnson CTO wrote: > Lifespan Pharma/Morris Johnson CTO wrote: > >> >> Some thoughts about novel ways to deploy "next generation" HACCP >> high level management systems. >> >> One can deploy HACCP protocols to integrate and synchronize and >> optimize disruptive technologies >> >> Was reading a piece in "CIO Insight" -RFID article while watching >> Star Trek Enterprise- episode about "temporal management" with >> consideration >> of - food/nutriceutical/drug security-bioterrorism-agroterrorism >> HACCP applications article. >> >> HACCP for disruptive technology tools: >> >> RFID - transactional tool >> HACCP for Humans - lifespan/healthspan sentience optimization tool >> Carnivore/Internet et. al.- information and security managment tools >> GPS/GIS- logistical management tool >> Bio-Cyber-Nano HACCP- biomechanical management tool >> >> >> > Think Tanks like Exi and Futuretag can work to deploy HACCP protocols > as a Singularity Managment Tool and do so as a commercial venture. > > It is my opinion that the gravitational eddys of the singularity have > been upon us since perhaps 1995 when the functional seamless global > internet > began to displace all other mediums of connectivity and facilitated > real-time access to knowledge of a broad spectrum of technological > change events while similtaneously corroding conventional barriers > to social interaction . > > An thus, such broad discussion as that below becomes a daily coffee > row instead of being sequestered in some obscure clique of techies. > > ******************************************************************************* > > Shall we enhance? > > Transhumanism says we're a species in flux > > By Elaine Jarvik > Deseret Morning News........................................... > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From spike66 at comcast.net Sun Jan 15 16:43:00 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Sun, 15 Jan 2006 08:43:00 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Woo Hoo! Stardust Capsule Lands Safely!!! In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <200601151643.k0FGh6e07285@tick.javien.com> Wooooohooooo! {8^D Cool! Looks like the Lockheeed boys managed to put the pyros in correctly this time. {8-] s > -----Original Message----- > From: extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org [mailto:extropy-chat- > bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Amara Graps > Sent: Sunday, January 15, 2006 2:16 AM > To: extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org; wta-talk at transhumanism.org > Subject: [extropy-chat] Woo Hoo! Stardust Capsule Lands Safely!!! > > It deccelerated from the fastest manmade object to hit our > Earth's atmosphere to ~ 10mph and landed safely in the north > Utah desert!!! > > > -- > > Amara Graps, PhD > Istituto di Fisica dello Spazio Interplanetario (IFSI) > Istituto Nazionale di Astrofisica (INAF), > Adjunct Assistant Professor Astronomy, AUR, > Roma, ITALIA Amara.Graps at ifsi.rm.cnr.it > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat From megao at sasktel.net Sun Jan 15 15:48:35 2006 From: megao at sasktel.net (Lifespan Pharma/Morris Johnson CTO) Date: Sun, 15 Jan 2006 09:48:35 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] Re: HACCP as a tool to Integrate/Synchronize Disruptive Technologies In-Reply-To: <43CA62AC.60609@sasktel.net> References: <43CA62AC.60609@sasktel.net> Message-ID: <43CA6ED3.10807@sasktel.net> Lifespan Pharma/Morris Johnson CTO wrote: > > Some thoughts about novel ways to deploy "next generation" HACCP > high level management systems. > > One can deploy HACCP protocols to integrate and synchronize and > optimize disruptive technologies > > Was reading a piece in "CIO Insight" -RFID article while watching > Star Trek Enterprise- episode about "temporal management" with > consideration > of - food/nutriceutical/drug security-bioterrorism-agroterrorism > HACCP applications article. > > HACCP for disruptive technology tools: > > RFID - transactional tool > HACCP for Humans - lifespan/healthspan sentience optimization tool > Carnivore/Internet et. al.- information and security managment tools > GPS/GIS- logistical management tool > Bio-Cyber-Nano HACCP- biomechanical management tool > > > Think Tanks like Exi and Futuretag can work to deploy HACCP protocols as a Singularity Managment Tool and do so as a commercial venture. It is my opinion that the gravitational eddys of the singularity have been upon us since perhaps 1995 when the functional seamless global internet began to displace all other mediums of connectivity and facilitated real-time access to knowledge of a broad spectrum of technological change events while similtaneously corroding conventional barriers to social interaction . An thus, such broad discussion as that below becomes a daily coffee row instead of being sequestered in some obscure clique of techies. ******************************************************************************* Shall we enhance? Transhumanism says we're a species in flux By Elaine Jarvik Deseret Morning News Stupidity and sadness, cancer and bad golf scores. In the world according to transhumanism, these and other human frailties will eventually go the way of scurvy. Also on the horizon: immortality. Photo Jessica Berry, Deseret Morning News The possibilities are either tantalizing or terrifying, depending on your point of view. Transhumanists embrace a future in which everyone has the right to live a life beyond current biological limitations. Their detractors argue that all these radical enhancements will make us less human. That depends on what you mean by "human," say transhumanists, whose very name suggests a species in flux. As the World Transhumanist Association notes on its Web site, transhumanism is based on the premise that "the human species in its current form does not represent the end of our development but rather a comparatively early phase." Eventually, say transhumanists, we may indeed become "posthuman" -- such an amalgamation of nanotechnology and neuropharmaceuticals, so changed by our interface with microchips and nanorobots, so much smarter, happier and healthier, that we hardly would be recognizable to early 21st century eyes. It's science fiction based on science fact, a trajectory that begins with emerging technologies like cyberkinetic chips and gene therapy, says James Hughes, president of the World Transhumanist Association and author of "Citizen Cyborg." Actually, says Hughes, that trajectory began as soon as our Paleolithic ancestors started taking care of everyone who was toothless, a point at which we first transcended natural selection, he says. We have relied on technologies of one sort or another for millennia -- from eye glasses to antibiotics -- to continually make ourselves better than we naturally are. But where do we draw the line? Or should we draw a line at all? How smart should we be allowed to be? How tall? How happy? If we can make depressed people less depressed, should we make happy people more happy? If we can make our children healthier and smarter, if we can eliminate much of the suffering in the world through technology, do we have a moral responsibility to do so? Or do we have a moral responsibility to speak out against it? These questions and hundreds of others will face humanity in the decades to come. There will likely come a time in the not-so-distant future when we will look back on simpler issues -- steroid use by baseball players, for example -- with a certain nostalgia for simpler times. Jeremy Jones, a University of Utah senior majoring in philosophy, is writing his honors thesis on the fuzzy distinction between treatment and enhancement. A treatment, for example, would be a drug to help Alzheimer's patients improve their failing memories. "Of course we would say 'Let's let Grandpa use it, to bring him back so he can be a functioning part of society,' " Jones says. But what if the same drug could help a college student, as Jones says, "catch an edge"? At what point is the drug the mental equivalent of muscle-building steroids? "These conditions exist on a continuum," he says. "That's why it's so hard to draw the line." The same dilemma will exist when we figure out how to give people a genetic tweak so they won't ever get dementia," says "Citizen Cyborg" author Hughes. On the one hand, it's a medical therapy. On the other, it's a way of fiddling with the natural aging process. "Bio-Luddites" is what Hughes calls people who want to ban the technologies and drugs that would help humans live beyond their current potential. "There are people who are mobilizing to ban these technologies; we would do well not to underestimate them," says Hughes, who also teaches health policy at Trinity College in Hartford, Conn. "Bioconservatives are very attached to four score and six, and the IQ, as definitions of what it means to be human," he says. "But what it means to be human is to push all those boundaries." Just look how far we've come from our agricultural ancestors, who "were flea-bitten and had short lives," he adds. Critics of pushing boundaries come from both the political right and left, he says, pointing to conservatives such as Francis Fukuyama of the President's Council on Bioethics (which in 2003 published a critical report called "Beyond Therapy: Biotechnology and the Pursuit of Happiness") and liberal activists such as Jeremy Rifkin, president of the Foundation on Economic Trends. The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary's R. Albert Mohler Jr. is another vocal opponent of radical enhancements. It's one thing, he says, to try to give a person with bad eyesight 20/20 vision, and it's another to try to create humans whose eyesight is superhuman. The latter, he says, uses science "to redefine the species." "From a Christian worldview perspective," he says, "there are two problems with this. First, you have the normative definition of what it means to be a human being made in the image of God." To try to exceed normal human capacities, he says, "is to open, quite literally, a Pandora's Box of moral problems." The second problem, Mohler says, is the transhumanist desire to prolong life beyond normal aging. "The tranhumanists increasingly see death as an oddity that is to be overcome. Christians certainly do not embrace death as a good in itself, but we understand that death is a part of what it means to be human, and that, indeed, the effort to forever forestall death is itself an act of defiance that will be both unworkable and morally suspect." Richard Sherlock takes a different view. Sherlock is a philosophy professor at Utah State University, one of only several Utah members of the World Transhumanist Association -- and also a practicing member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. "We ought to be able to look at the future as an opportunity, not a threat," says Sherlock, who is also a board member of the Journal of Evolution and Technology. "I don't think you can say God has said 'this, but no more.' All these technologies are ways in which we become more like our Creator," he adds. In fact, he says, the idea of a continually advancing human "fits better within a Mormon context that sees humanity as a developing structure, aspiring to be more like God." Not that technology doesn't present potential challenges, he says. But "we can't put our head in the sand and hope they go away. They need careful thought in light of the moral and religious traditions of the West." "The really important question that transhumanists themselves worry about," he adds, "is how to make the future equitable." What happens, for example, if the rich have access to nanorobots that can rid the body of cancer cells, but the poor don't? What happens if only developed countries can provide their citizens, or maybe just their wealthiest citizens, the latest in gene therapy? Hughes calls the solution "democratic transhumanism." "Our agenda is not just 'rahrah technology,' " he says, "but the creation of a society that is egalitarian in the use of those technologies." But even in that best of all worlds, the potential dilemmas are staggering. Take the case of Parker Jensen -- the Utah boy whose parents were charged with kidnapping when they refused to let their son undergo chemotherapy -- and think about what happens if a hospital decides that an unborn baby must undergo genetic engineering so he won't ever get cancer in the first place. What happens when parents decide they want their children to be genetically altered to be tall? Will shortness become a disability when buildings and furniture and cars all are redesigned for the burgeoning population of tall people? Will governments decide that tallness is not in the community's best interest, since tall people take up more room? Will tallness no longer be an asset, anyway, if everyone is the same height? And these are the easy questions. What about the scenario Hughes presents in "Citizen Cyborg": the fictitious case of a woman named Grace? The hypothetical Grace has an auto accident that destroys the right half of her brain, at which time her remaining brain is suffused with nanoelectrodes hooked up to a computer that has the same power as the human brain. At the same time, a bath of neural growth factors and cloned neural stem cells stimulate her remaining brain cells to grow new connections to the brain prosthesis. As time goes by, the brain prosthesis assumes an increasing role in Grace's head. In her 80s, though, Grace is diagnosed with an incurable form of neurological deterioration, which makes her organic brain slowly shut down. No problem, though, since Grace's computer self has kept her mentally sharp, and has preserved her memories, emotions and personality via computer-- a process known as uploading. As her organic brain deteriorates, Grace asks to have her computer self removed from her dying body and attached to the World Wide Web, or whatever the Web has morphed into by then. She builds herself a virtual body "with virtual simulations of neurochemistry, hormonal ebbs and flows, and a sense of embodiment," writes Hughes. "She edits her body image back to a vigorous 20-year-old, and jacks up her self-confidence and becomes a successful politician campaigning for cheaper electricity and cyborg rights." Is Grace still human? "So long as we continue to talk with her and we feel the presence of another mind with which we can empathize, we are compelled to grant her the rights and responsibilities of membership in society regardless of whether she is still 'human,' " says Hughes. And what about machine minds that aren't uploads of human brains? Do they have rights? And what about creatures that are part animal, part human? "There is no intrinsic value in being human, just as there is no intrinsic value in being a rock, a frog or a posthuman," say the founding documents of the World Transhumanist Association. "The value resides in who we are as individuals and what we do with our lives." "Bio-Luddites," Hughes argues, "advocate human-racism." Instead he focuses on what he calls "personhood." All of which makes U. student Jones understand people who say "Whoa!" to technological progress. But the good news, he says, is that "we're not there yet . . . . We have a little bit of time to figure it out." We shouldn't try to institutionalize restrictions on enhancement technologies yet, he says, "or try to create a society that doesn't stop to think about the ethics. We can't let the capitalist market rule or the conservative drive to restrict everything." The solution, likely, is somewhere in the middle. "We just don't know now what it is." ------------------------------------------------------------------------ E-mail: jarvik at desnews.com -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: e010706trans.jpg Type: image/jpeg Size: 23202 bytes Desc: not available URL: From l4point at gmail.com Sun Jan 15 19:19:55 2006 From: l4point at gmail.com (Mike Hayes) Date: Sun, 15 Jan 2006 13:19:55 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] What _is_ it with the WTA board, anyway? In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <6b5e09390601151119x2b3b6711k61434b3e166470e2@mail.gmail.com> To the context of much chatter about what should and should not be allowed on lists, with constraints being mentioned having to do with list decorum and relationships to the primary Subject Matter: 1. I have removed my name from the WTA list due to bullshit far in excess of any reasonable person's expectations of what should be allowed in their INBOX. 2. I respect various persons who use the organizational capabilities of their human cognitive facilities to attempt to connect the dots between what should and should not be allowed within a list. 3. However, WTA bullshit is now spilling over in the this list, which in turn finds its way to my inbox. 4. This list in turn must be terminated. That is to say, it must be made to cease to exist within the confines of the universe of my Inbox. Failure consists, in essence, of some number of persons in a closed room chattering about subjects, and some larger number of persons leaving that room than those, hearing the chatter, choosing to go into it. 5. I believe that this list represents a sort of first generation mail list protocal, indeed it predates the Internet and it's general format, as I recall, was floating in Arpanet. It is obselete. 6. If and when the members of this Extropy chat list determine methods to, in the course of conversations, assign reputation and interesting/non interesting factors to members, and thus in turn for a subscriber to filter to an acceptable level incoming communications, while at the same time providing negative feedback to loudmouth jerks who are free to clog the bandwidth, please at that time, send me a note so that I may resubscribe. 7. Factors such as described in #6 are already in place in the web based communication systems of teenagers, from whom, perhaps there is much to learn. 8. Have a nice day. Mike Hayes On 1/15/06, Hughes, James J. wrote: > > > > Jose Cordeiro, Bruce Klein, Harvey > > Newstrom, and Elizier Yudkowski are each to blame, when each > > and every one of them ran afoul of James Hughes > > Uh, for the record, Mr. Cordeiro just withdrew from running for > re-election, Bruce Klein and Harvey Newstrom resigned from the Board, > and Mr. Yudkowsky lost a re-relection. > > So I don't know how I can be blamed for 'driving out' Yudkowsky. And > yes, the other three Board members and I had many disagreements. But > neither I, nor any Board member, moved to have them removed from the > Board. > > Subsequently I have collaborated on WTA and IEET projects with Mr. Klein > and Mr. Newstrom, and I'm glad we have repaired those relationships. > > J. Hughes > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From sentience at pobox.com Sun Jan 15 20:14:41 2006 From: sentience at pobox.com (Eliezer S. Yudkowsky) Date: Sun, 15 Jan 2006 12:14:41 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Re: What _is_ it with the WTA board, anyway? In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <43CAAD31.2070400@pobox.com> Hughes, James J. wrote: > >>Jose Cordeiro, Bruce Klein, Harvey >>Newstrom, and Eliezer Yudkowsky are each to blame, when each >>and every one of them ran afoul of James Hughes > > Uh, for the record, Mr. Cordeiro just withdrew from running for > re-election, Bruce Klein and Harvey Newstrom resigned from the Board, > and Mr. Yudkowsky lost a re-relection. > > So I don't know how I can be blamed for 'driving out' Yudkowsky. And > yes, the other three Board members and I had many disagreements. But > neither I, nor any Board member, moved to have them removed from the > Board. For the record, James Hughes did drive me out of the WTA. First, about the election. When the WTA first formed, the five founding directors who received the largest number of votes - that is, the five most popular directors - were all lumped together into the even-numbered years. As a result, I was routinely running for re-election against the likes of Nick Bostrom. So at one point I was bumped out of the Top Five group (by Harvey Newstrom). However, I certainly would have run for re-election in the subsequent odd-numbered year, since an umbrella organization for transhumanist groups (which is how the WTA was proposed to the founding Directors) should surely represent Singularitarians and the Singularity Institute; I liked the work WTA was doing, and my presence on the Board would continue to attract Singularitarians to the WTA. Except that I'd just spent the entire preceding two years using my own reputational capital to try and patch relations with transhumanist groups Hughes had offended, and objecting to the sly spins and digs that Hughes would slip into WTA publications. I wanted to make sure transhumanism didn't end up polarized. Hughes's own agenda was, and appears to still be, to create and drive a wedge between transhumanists of different political orientations. I presume this is because Hughes wants to be the big fish of a leftist transhumanism, even if that means splitting off a smaller pond. And if Hughes picks a fight, why, you'll have to pick sides, and once you pick Hughes's side he can get away with anything because he's on *your* side; an old, old, trick. I am still strongly opposed to this, but I have more important things to do with my life than fighting Hughes. It's *tiring*. I could be re-elected to the Board any time I wish, I'm pretty sure; I left the WTA because I just didn't have the energy anymore. That, too, is an old, old, trick. I can't back Jose Cordeiro on the accusations he made against any of the WTA Directors who were present during my own tenure. It is implausible that so many bad apples would end up on the WTA Board. One may well suspect that Cordeiro himself is also at fault. I never had trouble with anyone except Hughes. From time to time, I find it necessary to say nasty things about someone, for example, James Hughes. When I do, I am forthright about the fact that I am doing it, and I present my reasons for doing so. I don't blink cutely and say "Who, me?" James Hughes seems to think he can say nasty things about SIAI or drive Directors off the Board, and then stand around with an innocent look on his face. Maybe Hughes has, by repeating it often enough, convinced even himself that he is the offended party. So let's be clear about this: Hughes is systematically offending other transhumanist organizations and he cannot possibly be doing it by accident. If you call Natasha Vita-More a "wife", or Yudkowsky a millennarian apocalyptic, you know full well they'll be offended; no one is that stupid. If the WTA kicked out Hughes, the WTA would probably fall apart because Hughes is doing all the volunteer work. Good luck solving that one; it's up to you. I've served my time in the barrel. -- Eliezer S. Yudkowsky http://singinst.org/ Research Fellow, Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence From james.hughes at trincoll.edu Sun Jan 15 20:46:15 2006 From: james.hughes at trincoll.edu (Hughes, James J.) Date: Sun, 15 Jan 2006 15:46:15 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Re: What _is_ it with the WTA board, anyway? Message-ID: > So at one point I was bumped out of the Top > Five group (by Harvey Newstrom). As you say, you were not re-elected and decided not to run again. You are welcome to do so in January 2007. In regards the role of the WTA vis-a-vis other transhumanist organizations, there is a necessary tension between building an awareness of transhumanism in the media, policy arena and academia, and maintaining perfect sync with our very small and relatively unknown group of organizations. We value both goals, but they are sometimes in tension. J. From femmechakra at yahoo.ca Sun Jan 15 20:56:17 2006 From: femmechakra at yahoo.ca (Anne-Marie Taylor) Date: Sun, 15 Jan 2006 15:56:17 -0500 (EST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Singularity and Religion Message-ID: <20060115205617.48355.qmail@web35515.mail.mud.yahoo.com> I'm interested in finding good articles that deal with the impact on religion if Singularity should occur. If anybody has any information it would be much appreciated. Thanks Anna --------------------------------- Find your next car at Yahoo! Canada Autos -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From dirk.bruere at gmail.com Sun Jan 15 23:37:19 2006 From: dirk.bruere at gmail.com (Dirk Bruere) Date: Sun, 15 Jan 2006 23:37:19 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] REAL POLITIK IN THE WTA... and so long... In-Reply-To: <40A08DE6-5D01-4DE1-8762-D4FC14CAEB7C@mac.com> References: <20060114110215.63683.qmail@web32809.mail.mud.yahoo.com> <4902d9990601140331k79a4e461ka0131080469b5eb2@mail.gmail.com> <40A08DE6-5D01-4DE1-8762-D4FC14CAEB7C@mac.com> Message-ID: On 1/14/06, Samantha Atkins wrote: > > In my experience the WTA has largely put forward the notion than > transhumanism requires socialism and that those who disagree are not > very welcome. The WTA has put on this mantle of socialism and it > will experience some consequences from doing so. > > I can certainly confirm some of what Jose says, since I was personally squeezed out of the WTA for expressing opinions that Hughes did not like. He also fabricated blatant untruths about me and my beliefs. While I have in the past crossed swords (and angry words) with Jose, I cannot say that he is anything but upfront and honest as far as I'm concerned. He is not a Hughes. Dirk -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From dirk.bruere at gmail.com Sun Jan 15 23:40:23 2006 From: dirk.bruere at gmail.com (Dirk Bruere) Date: Sun, 15 Jan 2006 23:40:23 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] REAL POLITIK IN THE WTA... and so long... In-Reply-To: <200601142139.k0ELdSe17416@tick.javien.com> References: <200601142001.k0EK1te08722@tick.javien.com> <200601142139.k0ELdSe17416@tick.javien.com> Message-ID: On 1/14/06, spike wrote: > > BillK wrote: > > >Oh, Spike, you are naughty! :) > >You said that bad word - 'socialism'. :) > > > Ja, but I want to make like that president we had > in the 70s and make one thing perfectly clear. In > my earlier comment, I meant I would accept as fact > that WTA puts forward the notion that transhumanism > requires socialism, not that *I* think that > transhumanism requires socialism. > > I was expecting someone from WTA to come in any > time now and explain that WTA does not really > promote socialism. But thanks for the link BillK, > I will read that over. I met Nick Bostrom at > Extro5, and found him to be a most delightful > good guy. > > I recognize that I am carrying a lot of memetic > baggage that is disdainful of socialism. Taking that > prejudice into account and multiplying thru by the > appropriate scale factor, I find the whole notion > of socialism most distasteful. As for communism, > I prefer to abstain from discussing it in > polite company. > > The problem is not the WTA, nor socialism. It is Hughes pushing his personal partisan politics (party as well as petty) at the expense of the WTA. Dirk -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From mike99 at lascruces.com Sun Jan 15 23:48:02 2006 From: mike99 at lascruces.com (mike99) Date: Sun, 15 Jan 2006 16:48:02 -0700 Subject: [extropy-chat] RE: [wta-talk] What _is_ it with the WTA board, anyway? In-Reply-To: <43C9C318.60302@goldenfuture.net> Message-ID: The impression has been given that all fingers of blame for trouble on the WTA Board point to James Hughes. How did that impression come about? Well, if you look at those pointing fingers, you will see that the first one belonged to Jose Cordeiro, who began attacking James Hughes at the WTA Board meeting in Oxford, UK in April 2004. I was there and, at the time, wondered why Jose kept needling James, taunting him, and -- when we were all sitting in the bar -- trying to pick a fight with him. James kept refusing to take Jose's flame bait. But it was quite clear that Jose despised James' democratic socialist politics and wanted to argue about it. There is nothing wrong with a good political argument. But Jose went beyond that into outright character assassination. Not all Board members attended the Oxford meeting. Interestingly, the ones who did not attend -- Bruce Klein and Harvey Newstrom -- were the ones who eventually joined Jose's crusade against James. Why? Because Jose moved swiftly to make his case against James, both on the WTA Board listserv and in many, many private messages. As you will have read in Jose's most recent -- and allegedly final -- screed against the WTA Board, Jose is extremely emotional, vindictive, highly selective in his choice of facts, and not above tarring his self-chosen enemies while always denying that he himself has ever made a single mistake. I am still amazed at Jose's ability to misremember and mischaracterize his flouting of the Board's votes. Jose refused to request that the Venezuelan embassy issue visas for the Indian delegates to TransVision05 the Board had chosen -- which included an elected member of the Board! Jose had a personal vendetta against that Board member. And not being one to let democracy trump his personal pet peeves, Jose simply refused to accept the democratic process. (I can't help but notice that this is also his approach to the elected government of his native Venezuela.) Jose's transparently self-serving denial of his culpability in acting in a fashion that he himself should recognize as being STALINIST should tell you everything you need to know about his capacity for hypocrisy. (And Jose, if you are reading this, you know that I've already pointed this out to you privately more than once.) Jose's propaganda campaign against James in 2004 turned out to be very effective. It prompted Bruce Klein to resign from the Board, much to our regret, since Bruce is a talented, dedicated and very hard-working transhumanist. His Immortality Institute has done fine work and continues to do so. More power to him. Harvey Newstrom, who is also quite intelligent and adept, was encouraged by Jose to question everything...endlessly. Questioning is good. But like the child who asks an endless series of "Why?" questions, responding to every proffered answer with yet another "Why?" Harvey only managed to bring the work of the Board to a grinding halt. In an elected legislature, this is called tying up the house in procedural motions. That's what Harvey did. Finally, the Board had had enough and asked him to leave. The claim has been made (and I see in another message, already corrected) that Eliezer Yudkowsky was forced off the Board. This is another of Jose's fabrications. Eliezer, although brilliant and a great transhumanist figure, did not win re-election to the WTA Board. But he continues to due extremely valuable work through his Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence. More power to him. At one time, Jose could probably have been elected Executive Director of the WTA. At one time, I would have voted for him. But, strangely, he always declined to run. And now he has so tarnished his reputation that he could not even be re-elected to the Board, much less get a majority of the Board to elect him Executive Director. Jose and I have a love-hate relationship. I am willing to risk besmirching my own reputation by mud wresting with my friend Jose about his statements and behavior. But I have to do that. As a Zen Buddhist priest, I have taken a vow to work toward the end of suffering for all sentient beings. And I do not intend to leave Jose behind. If this means I have to boost him out of the mud while I sink deeper into it, so be it. That's what bodhisattvas are supposed to do. Regards, Michael LaTorra mike99 at lascruces.com mlatorra at nmsu.edu English Dept., New Mexico State University "For any man to abdicate an interest in science is to walk with open eyes towards slavery." -- Jacob Bronowski "Experiences only look special from the inside of the system." -- Eugen Leitl "Man is a rope stretched between the animal and the Superman: a rope across an abyss - a dangerous going across, a dangerous wayfaring, a dangerous looking back, a dangerous shuddering and staying still." -- Friedrich Nietzsche Member: Board of Directors, World Transhumanist Association: www.transhumanism.org Board of Directors, Institute for Ethics and Emerging Technologies: http://ieet.org/ Extropy Institute: www.extropy.org Alcor Life Extension Foundation: www.alcor.org Society for Universal Immortalism: www.universalimmortalism.org President, Zen Center of Las Cruces: www.zencenteroflascruces.orgwww.zencenteroflascruces.org > -----Original Message----- > From: wta-talk-bounces at transhumanism.org > [mailto:wta-talk-bounces at transhumanism.org]On Behalf Of Joseph Bloch > Sent: Saturday, January 14, 2006 8:36 PM > To: World Transhumanist Association Discussion List; ExI chat list > Subject: [wta-talk] What _is_ it with the WTA board, anyway? > > > Setting aside for the moment the specifics of the recent spat within the > WTA board of directors, one cannot help but notice that this is a > recurring event. > > Almost like clockwork, one or more members of the Board become so > frustrated that they feel compelled to resign (or are otherwise driven > out), and much bad blood is generated, and good, active leaders leave > the WTA. Almost invariably, the persons in question were in a conflict > with Dr. Hughes. > > One or two times, you can ascribe to coincidence. But this has happened > with at least four people thusfar to my knowledge. Can it really be > their fault every time? Does it really make sense that Jose Cordeiro, > Bruce Klein, Harvey Newstrom, and Elizier Yudkowski are each to blame, > when each and every one of them ran afoul of James Hughes and left or > were driven out subsequently? Not to mention all the other bitter > arguments amongst the board, some quite heated, each and every one of > which sees Dr. Hughes at its center (and I have had my share, I will > fully admit, and I'm probably next on the list to be forced out). > > It doesn't make a lot of sense to me that it's "everyone else's fault". > If that sounds like a swipe at Dr. Hughes, so be it; I ask it as a > legitimate question. Four personal conflicts bad enough to drive away > members of the Board (and countless others of lesser severity) and it's > never his fault? I find it difficult to reasonably accept that poor > set-upon James is an innocent player in all this. > > Joseph > _______________________________________________ > wta-talk mailing list > wta-talk at transhumanism.org > http://www.transhumanism.org/mailman/listinfo/wta-talk > From dirk.bruere at gmail.com Sun Jan 15 23:51:07 2006 From: dirk.bruere at gmail.com (Dirk Bruere) Date: Sun, 15 Jan 2006 23:51:07 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] What _is_ it with the WTA board, anyway? In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On 1/15/06, Hughes, James J. wrote: > > > > Jose Cordeiro, Bruce Klein, Harvey > > Newstrom, and Elizier Yudkowski are each to blame, when each > > and every one of them ran afoul of James Hughes > > Uh, for the record, Mr. Cordeiro just withdrew from running for > re-election, Bruce Klein and Harvey Newstrom resigned from the Board, > and Mr. Yudkowsky lost a re-relection. > > So I don't know how I can be blamed for 'driving out' Yudkowsky. And > yes, the other three Board members and I had many disagreements. But > neither I, nor any Board member, moved to have them removed from the > Board. > > Subsequently I have collaborated on WTA and IEET projects with Mr. Klein > and Mr. Newstrom, and I'm glad we have repaired those relationships. > > The technical term is "constructive dismissal" Dirk -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From dirk.bruere at gmail.com Sun Jan 15 23:56:24 2006 From: dirk.bruere at gmail.com (Dirk Bruere) Date: Sun, 15 Jan 2006 23:56:24 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] What _is_ it with the WTA board, anyway? In-Reply-To: <6b5e09390601151119x2b3b6711k61434b3e166470e2@mail.gmail.com> References: <6b5e09390601151119x2b3b6711k61434b3e166470e2@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On 1/15/06, Mike Hayes wrote: > > > 3. However, WTA bullshit is now spilling over in the this list, which in > turn finds its way to my inbox. > > Probably because the WTA list is not a free and open medium, given its 'moderator'. Also, the internal workings of the WTA are legitimate and very much on topic for any Transhumanist list. Dirk -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From dirk.bruere at gmail.com Mon Jan 16 00:08:04 2006 From: dirk.bruere at gmail.com (Dirk Bruere) Date: Mon, 16 Jan 2006 00:08:04 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] On difficult choices (was: Books: Harris; Religion and Reason) In-Reply-To: <8d71341e0601141111w7fa08c8bu753281f358e0a600@mail.gmail.com> References: <20060112051911.37750.qmail@web50511.mail.yahoo.com> <8d71341e0601120218g6669207bya6f5168d015ee8ae@mail.gmail.com> <8d71341e0601141111w7fa08c8bu753281f358e0a600@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On 1/14/06, Russell Wallace wrote: > > On 1/14/06, Samantha Atkins wrote: > > > I read this article. Not to put too fine a point on it, I found it > > laughable. Religious faith is not going to save the West and secularism > > sure as hell isn't dooming it. As much as I think welfare statism is evil > > and dangerous I can't in honesty lay the blame there except as a large > > contributory drain on the economy and on the character of the people. The > > notion that we must reproduce more this close to Singularity is the biggest > > laugh of all. > > > > Out of curiosity, how close to the Singularity do you think we are? > > In the 1980s I estimated not sooner than 2010 and not later than 2050, with the most likely date around 2030. I still believe that. Dirk -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From spike66 at comcast.net Mon Jan 16 00:10:11 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Sun, 15 Jan 2006 16:10:11 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Singularity and Religion In-Reply-To: <20060115205617.48355.qmail@web35515.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <200601160010.k0G0ADe18803@tick.javien.com> I'm interested in finding good articles that deal with the impact on religion if Singularity should occur. If anybody has any information it would be much appreciated. Thanks Anna The singularity is difficult to understand by its nature. What will happen afterward is anyone's guess. For what it's worth, I was a witness to a fundy religion just before the first moon landing. Several Baptist preachers and maaaany of the congregants firmly believed that the mission would fail, because Mr. Damn would not allow sin to expand beyond this fallen planet. The fire that took Grissom, Chaffee and White was considered a warning. After the successful landing, everything went on as before. Never heard a word mentioned about it. spike -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From spike66 at comcast.net Mon Jan 16 00:28:01 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Sun, 15 Jan 2006 16:28:01 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] RE: [wta-talk] What _is_ it with the WTA board, anyway? In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <200601160028.k0G0S8e20087@tick.javien.com> > bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of mike99 ... > Jose and I have a love-hate relationship. I am willing to risk besmirching > my own reputation by mud wresting with my friend Jose about his statements > and behavior. But I have to do that... Regards, Michael LaTorra... As a ExI-chat moderator, it is unclear to me what to do about all this, but my inclination is to stand by for a while and let everyone concerned have their say. If anyone has comments, encouragement, complaints or suggestions on this policy, feel free to discuss it with me offlist. In the mean time, WTA-ers go ahead and post your discussion. The rancor has been is within tolerance limits so far. {8-] Others who see their friends being jumped, feel free to not leap to their defense. These are all big boys, they can defend themselves. spike From transhumanist at goldenfuture.net Mon Jan 16 00:29:21 2006 From: transhumanist at goldenfuture.net (Joseph Bloch) Date: Sun, 15 Jan 2006 19:29:21 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] What _is_ it with the WTA board, anyway? In-Reply-To: References: <6b5e09390601151119x2b3b6711k61434b3e166470e2@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <43CAE8E1.9020503@goldenfuture.net> Dirk Bruere wrote: > > > On 1/15/06, *Mike Hayes* > wrote: > > > 3. However, WTA bullshit is now spilling over in the this list, > which in turn finds its way to my inbox. > > > Probably because the WTA list is not a free and open medium, given its > 'moderator'. > Also, the internal workings of the WTA are legitimate and very much on > topic for any Transhumanist list. For those who are interested, it is because of precisely this sort of thing that I set up the Transhumanist_General list. If Extropian folks want to see the WTA threads moved there, I most certainly have no objection (although I obviously cannot compel compliance). All parties are welcome to post (unlike me, ironically, whose latest post on this subject on WTA-Talk was held in moderated limbo for about six hours or so). http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Transhumanist_general/ Joseph From dirk.bruere at gmail.com Mon Jan 16 00:29:28 2006 From: dirk.bruere at gmail.com (Dirk Bruere) Date: Mon, 16 Jan 2006 00:29:28 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] On Gut Feelings In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On 1/14/06, BillK wrote: > > On 1/14/06, Amara Graps wrote: > > scusi', wrong attribute, Russell Wallace said this. > > >And frankly, when someone starts praising mass murderers, that's a > pretty > > >damned reasonable criterion for saying enough is enough. > > > > > No problem - I agree anyway. :) > > If you mean killfile them, I agree. If you mean expel/censor them then I don't. I believe in freedom of speech. Dirk -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Mon Jan 16 00:29:49 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Sun, 15 Jan 2006 19:29:49 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Singularity and Religion In-Reply-To: <20060115205617.48355.qmail@web35515.mail.mud.yahoo.com> References: <20060115205617.48355.qmail@web35515.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Message-ID: Anna, You should be *very* careful about putting "The Singularity" label onto various independent technology development paths (most prominently infotech, biotech and nanotech). Continual progress on the biotech path will allow significant lifespan extensions. One does not need to include infotech or nanotech, though nanotech will significantly enhance the lifespan extension vector. (Non-aging biological systems have longevities of 1000-2000+ years given current accident rates. Nanotech based enhancements to those systems enable ~10,000+ year lifespans. Uploading, either that based on advanced info-biotech or info-nanotech pushes lifespans to millions if not trillions of years (if people are willing to adapt/evolve themselves -- as it requires uploading and converting to a distributed replicated intelligence). The concept of "The Singularity" is in large part based upon the idea that the rate of change is going to continue to increase. That is *not* necessary for the clash to take place between "rational thought" and "religion". As Harris has pointed out if one looks at religious texts, esp. the Bible and the Koran, many simply do not hold water from a rational standpoint. The progress of technology is going to gradually remove the legs that at least some religions stand upon. Lifespan extension removes religion's lock on "life" vs. "death". Nanotechnology (as in Jesus was a nanoenhanced extraterrestrial among other possibilities) kills off many of the so-called "miracles". The entire "God created the universe" is under significant fire from the hard core physics camp. Reality as we perceive it may be getting a significant rewrite from serious academics (e.g. Rees, Freitas, Bostrom, etc.) that reality may all be a simulation (ala the Matrix). So conventional religions are under fire from a number of quite different angles. As there are relatively few people outside of the Extropy/Transhumanist community which are aware of all of these vectors I seriously doubt that you will find articles exploring them. However it is difficult to have a rational discussion in this area as many "religious" people are operating on "faith" which cannot be reasoned with. Robert On 1/15/06, Anne-Marie Taylor wrote: > > I'm interested in finding good articles that deal with > the impact on religion if Singularity should occur. If anybody > has any information it would be much appreciated. > Thanks > Anna > > ------------------------------ > Find your next car at *Yahoo! Canada Autos* > > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat > > > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From rafal.smigrodzki at gmail.com Mon Jan 16 01:42:15 2006 From: rafal.smigrodzki at gmail.com (Rafal Smigrodzki) Date: Sun, 15 Jan 2006 20:42:15 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] I don't need an umbrella Message-ID: <7641ddc60601151742r5750ed9cycded56f77ffc799@mail.gmail.com> I feel a bit uncomfortable about ExI being described as an "affiliated organization" under the "umbrella" of WTA. This gives a certain hint of dominance and inferiority, as if ExI were a vassal of WTA. Clearly, WTA is not an umbrella organization, since it is actively pursuing its own agenda rather than acting as a clearinghouse for collaboration between various transhumanist groups. And, from a number of recent posts I gather that it does not have an equitable relationship with SIAI, ImInst, and ExI, not to mention the Transtopians. I wonder if ExI should more explicitly disavow being a sub-group under WTA 's aegis. Rafal From transhumanist at goldenfuture.net Mon Jan 16 01:56:53 2006 From: transhumanist at goldenfuture.net (Joseph Bloch) Date: Sun, 15 Jan 2006 20:56:53 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Re: Kurzweil on C-SPAN2 In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <43CAFD65.6080900@goldenfuture.net> Two points: 1) This wonderful interview (I'm watching as I type this) will be repeated tomorrow at 4 PM ET, so them's as missed some or all of it can hopefully catch the whole thing. 2) There is an email list set up explicitly for these sorts of announcements. See http://tv.groups.yahoo.com/group/TransTelevision/ Joseph Martin Striz wrote: >I don't remember anybody mentioning this, but Ray Kurzweil is on >C-SPAN2 (BookTV) talking about his book "The Singularity is Near" >RIGHT NOW, 8 pm EST, until 9. > >Martin > >_______________________________________________ >wta-talk mailing list >wta-talk at transhumanism.org >http://www.transhumanism.org/mailman/listinfo/wta-talk > > > > From starman2100 at cableone.net Mon Jan 16 03:13:39 2006 From: starman2100 at cableone.net (starman2100 at cableone.net) Date: Sun, 15 Jan 2006 20:13:39 -0700 Subject: [extropy-chat] Deseret News & LDS Church Message-ID: <1137381219_6309@S2.cableone.net> An embedded and charset-unspecified text was scrubbed... Name: not available URL: From brent.allsop at comcast.net Mon Jan 16 02:50:44 2006 From: brent.allsop at comcast.net (brent.allsop at comcast.net) Date: Mon, 16 Jan 2006 02:50:44 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Singularity and Religion Message-ID: <011620060250.14303.43CB0A020008C795000037DF22058864429F019C04040ED29B020A9D0D@comcast.net> Anna, I'm very interrested in this also! Have seen nothing of quality on this topic. Let me know if you find anything! Thanks Brent -------------- Original message -------------- From: Anne-Marie Taylor I'm interested in finding good articles that deal with the impact on religion if Singularity should occur. If anybody has any information it would be much appreciated. Thanks Anna Find your next car at Yahoo! Canada Autos -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: -------------- next part -------------- An embedded message was scrubbed... From: Anne-Marie Taylor Subject: [extropy-chat] Singularity and Religion Date: Sun, 15 Jan 2006 20:56:49 +0000 Size: 679 URL: From isthatyoujack at icqmail.com Mon Jan 16 04:48:57 2006 From: isthatyoujack at icqmail.com (Jack Parkinson) Date: Mon, 16 Jan 2006 12:48:57 +0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] On Gut Feelings References: <002501c6191a$79cb2b80$04800d0a@JPAcer> <8A08D763-4889-4D11-B351-E8339C4742D7@mac.com> <002a01c61973$bbba4cc0$04800d0a@JPAcer> <5844e22f0601141746u31211876nc5589f22fcea9af9@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <000d01c61a58$2b8d42c0$0901a8c0@EF02jack> ----- Original Message ----- From: "Jeff Medina" To: "Jack Parkinson" ; "ExI chat list" Sent: Sunday, January 15, 2006 9:46 AM Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] On Gut Feelings On 1/14/06, Jack Parkinson wrote: > In the > second sense, sanction is no more than imposing your point of view and > refusing to listen to the protests. Where is the logic or merit in that? I offer to provide enough 'protests' to keep you reading/listening 24/7, 365.25 days a year. No lunch breaks, no sleep, no hobbies, no day job. Since there's never any logic or merit in "refusing to listen to the protests", you must of course agree wholeheartedly to spend all your time on whatever I choose to ramble at you about. Right? Right. Or perhaps the existence of limited resources entails we pick and choose just what positions we consider worth listening to or debating, and to what extent, with whom, and in what context. Jeff Medina *** The objection above is only superficially valid. It reads commonsensically - albeit exaggeratedly - but it is predicated on the assumption there is no differentiation between 'signal' and 'noise' in the protests offered. My previous post does make it clear that rants, raves and rubbish can - and should be mercilessly trashed. Just lets not throw out the baby with the bathwater. Jack Parkinson From mail at HarveyNewstrom.com Mon Jan 16 09:10:41 2006 From: mail at HarveyNewstrom.com (Harvey Newstrom) Date: Mon, 16 Jan 2006 04:10:41 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] RE: [wta-talk] What _is_ it with the WTA board, anyway? In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <126a75a572fc0cac4345c878fa1817ce@HarveyNewstrom.com> On Jan 15, 2006, at 6:48 PM, mike99 wrote: > Not all Board members attended the Oxford meeting. Interestingly, the > ones > who did not attend -- Bruce Klein and Harvey Newstrom -- were the ones > who > eventually joined Jose's crusade against James. This is unfair, Mike. You didn't think it was a crusade at the time. You quoted James as admitting that there was never a specific vote in Oxford and that a vote would be a good idea. You yourself made a motion for such a vote, saying that a resolution was needed that would be accepted by the entire board. It was only when that vote failed that you guys decided that a vote was an unnecessary crusade against James. (See your own e-mail below to refresh your memory.) -- Harvey Newstrom CISSP CISA CISM CIFI NSA-IAM GSEC ISSAP ISSMP ISSPCS IBMCP On May 21, 2004, at 3:08 PM, mike99 wrote, > What James has written here about our decision at Oxford as previously > stated in the minutes and adopted by the Board is exactly as I > remember. We > voted for James as Executive Director. Later, after Oxford, the open > question about serving simultaneously as ED and a Board member was > clarified > as a matter of law in the applicable jurisdiction. > > I am not questioning these decisions. In fact, I am in favor of James > as ED > and as a member of the Board. There seems to be some confusion among > some > Board members about this situation, which is why I moved for another > vote. > > If I am out of order in moving to vote again on issues already > settled, then > I request that we find some other means to confirm the decisions so > that all > members of the Board will accept them. As things stand now, there > seems to > be some confusion. My motion was intended as a clarification, not a > change. > > Giulio, can you suggest another way that we might clarify these issues > to > everyone's satisfaction? > > > Michael LaTorra > >> -----Original Message----- >> From: wtaboard-bounces at transhumanism.org >> [mailto:wtaboard-bounces at transhumanism.org]On Behalf Of Hughes, James >> J. >> Sent: Friday, May 21, 2004 12:45 PM >> To: WTA Board of Directors List >> Subject: RE: [wtaboard] Re: Mike's motions >> >> >>> Can you clarify this for me? I missed the Oxford meeting >> >> It seemed a clear decision of the Oxford meeting that I would become >> ED >> effective immediately, with a salary and travel budget >> to-be-determined >> once we had actual money. >> >> However there was never a specific vote to that effect, and I think >> one >> would be a good idea. >> >> I raised the question at the time about whether I would need to step >> down from the Board in order to become ED, and said I would get back >> to >> the Board about it. >> >> I believe I reported back to the Board after Oxford that there were no >> restrictions on the ED being a Board member in the US or CT law, and >> you >> may remember that we then created wtaboard2004 at yahoogroups.com in >> order >> to discuss matters relating to my employment "in my absence". >> >> I subsequently reported in the minutes from Oxford that the Board had >> appointed me ED, which seemed both in Oxford and on the list once we >> briefed Harvey and BJ, to be a decision my acclaim. >> >> The minutes were then adopted, and I have proceeded to sign my email >> messages and refer to myself as ED on the website and in every >> official >> communication as the ED. The Board's decision to fund my trip to >> Foresight was in the context of it being the first step toward my >> having >> an ED travel budget. >> >> However, as we are all now chastened about trusting to decisions by >> acclaim, I have no objections to a vote and urge you to put it to a >> formal vote, as I take Harvey and Jose now want to do. >> >> Since Giulio is of the opinion that the decision was made between >> Oxford >> and the adopting of the minutes, I suppose that it now would require a >> vote to challenge the ruling of the chair. >> >> However, I do think you need to decide first whether anyone feels that >> the ED cannot be a member of the Board. >> >> As I said, I am no longer willing to resign from the Board to take the >> post of ED. >> >> ------------------------ >> James Hughes Ph.D. >> Executive Director >> World Transhumanist Association >> http://transhumanism.org >> Box 128, Willington CT 06279 USA >> (office) 860-297-2376 >> secretary at transhumanism.org >> _______________________________________________ >> wtaboard mailing list >> wtaboard at transhumanism.org >> http://www.transhumanism.org/mailman/listinfo/wtaboard >> > > > _______________________________________________ > wtaboard mailing list > wtaboard at transhumanism.org > http://www.transhumanism.org/mailman/listinfo/wtaboard From mail at HarveyNewstrom.com Mon Jan 16 09:56:28 2006 From: mail at HarveyNewstrom.com (Harvey Newstrom) Date: Mon, 16 Jan 2006 04:56:28 -0500 Subject: [wta-talk] RE: [extropy-chat] What _is_ it with the WTA board, anyway? In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On Jan 15, 2006, at 10:21 AM, Hughes, James J. wrote: > Uh, for the record, Mr. Cordeiro just withdrew from running for > re-election, Bruce Klein and Harvey Newstrom resigned from the Board, > and Mr. Yudkowsky lost a re-relection. > > So I don't know how I can be blamed for 'driving out' Yudkowsky. And > yes, the other three Board members and I had many disagreements. But > neither I, nor any Board member, moved to have them removed from the > Board. James thinks I resigned, even though I have always denied it. On Jan 15, 2006, at 6:48 PM, mike99 wrote: > Harvey Newstrom, who is also quite intelligent and adept, was > encouraged by > Jose to question everything...endlessly. Questioning is good. But like > the > child who asks an endless series of "Why?" questions, responding to > every > proffered answer with yet another "Why?" Harvey only managed to bring > the > work of the Board to a grinding halt. In an elected legislature, this > is > called tying up the house in procedural motions. That's what Harvey > did. > Finally, the Board had had enough and asked him to leave. Mike thinks the board asked me to leave, even though James has always denied it. This is why I ask endless questions. Different board members still disagree about whether the board did or did not take some official action. How can they not remember or agree on what happened on the board? How can the records be of no help in answering these questions? How can there be no minutes or disputed minutes? How can we tell which claimed official actions are real and which ones aren't. When board members violently disagree on basic truths, how can members determine the truth? And how can these same questions be unanswered year after year? -- Harvey Newstrom CISSP CISA CISM CIFI NSA-IAM GSEC ISSAP ISSMP ISSPCS IBMCP From jay.dugger at gmail.com Mon Jan 16 11:58:52 2006 From: jay.dugger at gmail.com (Jay Dugger) Date: Mon, 16 Jan 2006 06:58:52 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] LINK: Nick Szabo Calls for Comments on "History and the Security of Property" Message-ID: <5366105b0601160358le30c027q687284725602610c@mail.gmail.com> Monday, 16 January 2006 Hello all: NIck Szabo's has a draft paper, "History and the Security of Property," at this link. http://szabo.best.vwh.net/history.html He asks for comments on the paper in his blog Unenumerated on 07 January 2006. -- Jay Dugger Please donate to a charity you like. From pgptag at gmail.com Mon Jan 16 15:06:56 2006 From: pgptag at gmail.com (Giu1i0 Pri5c0) Date: Mon, 16 Jan 2006 16:06:56 +0100 Subject: [wta-talk] RE: [extropy-chat] What _is_ it with the WTA board, anyway? In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <470a3c520601160706k62fe0c6dr4d526a725ced9807@mail.gmail.com> Pleeeeease my friends, not again! First, I wish to remind everyone that all WTA members can access the WTA Board archives which, as I just checked, go back to August 2003. Just write to me or to Marcelo for a password. Second, I see that these pointless discussions are spilling over to the Extropy list, where perhaps people prefer discussing other things and do not wish to see their mailboxes flooded with endless repetitions of the same old stories. If I were Natasha, I would consider issuing a warning to all WTA members on the Extropy list to please discuss internal WTA problems at home, refrain from taking them to the Extropy list, and not assume that everyone is interested in petty disputes. I could do it myself as I am also a list deputy on the Extropy list, but in this case I prefer leaving it to Natasha. Third, I can see that some people are using the old and recent discussions in the WTA to create tension between the ExI, the WTA and other transhumanist associations. If you are one of those, and you will know if you are one, I wish to ask you to consider focusing your energy to more productive activities. There is a lot to do to move towards the future we wish to see and I think we can not waste our time like that. G. On 1/16/06, Harvey Newstrom wrote: > > On Jan 15, 2006, at 10:21 AM, Hughes, James J. wrote: > > > Uh, for the record, Mr. Cordeiro just withdrew from running for > > re-election, Bruce Klein and Harvey Newstrom resigned from the Board, > > and Mr. Yudkowsky lost a re-relection. > > > > So I don't know how I can be blamed for 'driving out' Yudkowsky. And > > yes, the other three Board members and I had many disagreements. But > > neither I, nor any Board member, moved to have them removed from the > > Board. > > James thinks I resigned, even though I have always denied it. > > On Jan 15, 2006, at 6:48 PM, mike99 wrote: > > > Harvey Newstrom, who is also quite intelligent and adept, was > > encouraged by > > Jose to question everything...endlessly. Questioning is good. But like > > the > > child who asks an endless series of "Why?" questions, responding to > > every > > proffered answer with yet another "Why?" Harvey only managed to bring > > the > > work of the Board to a grinding halt. In an elected legislature, this > > is > > called tying up the house in procedural motions. That's what Harvey > > did. > > Finally, the Board had had enough and asked him to leave. > > Mike thinks the board asked me to leave, even though James has always > denied it. > > This is why I ask endless questions. Different board members still > disagree about whether the board did or did not take some official > action. How can they not remember or agree on what happened on the > board? How can the records be of no help in answering these questions? > How can there be no minutes or disputed minutes? How can we tell > which claimed official actions are real and which ones aren't. When > board members violently disagree on basic truths, how can members > determine the truth? And how can these same questions be unanswered > year after year? > > -- > Harvey Newstrom > CISSP CISA CISM CIFI NSA-IAM GSEC ISSAP ISSMP ISSPCS IBMCP From natasha at natasha.cc Mon Jan 16 16:32:24 2006 From: natasha at natasha.cc (Natasha Vita-More) Date: Mon, 16 Jan 2006 10:32:24 -0600 Subject: [total] RE: [extropy-chat] What _is_ it with the WTA board, anyway? In-Reply-To: <470a3c520601160706k62fe0c6dr4d526a725ced9807@mail.gmail.co m> References: <470a3c520601160706k62fe0c6dr4d526a725ced9807@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <6.2.1.2.2.20060116101202.041bb738@pop-server.austin.rr.com> At 09:06 AM 1/16/2006, Giu1i0 Pri5c0 wrote: >If I were Natasha, I would >consider issuing a warning to all WTA members on the Extropy list to >please discuss internal WTA problems at home, refrain from taking them >to the Extropy list, and not assume that everyone is interested in >petty disputes. I could do it myself as I am also a list deputy on the >Extropy list, but in this case I prefer leaving it to Natasha. Spike, the lead list moderator, is watching the posts; albeit I appreciate your post and concerns. To prevent any negative subject lines about the WTA, ExI has asked that all thread subject lines not use any negative language re WTA. Spike is monitoring this. >Third, I can see that some people are using the old and recent >discussions in the WTA to create tension between the ExI, the WTA and >other transhumanist associations. The only post that I read that was intentionally written to aggravate ExI and WTA was made by Marino Buble on WTA's list. ExI's chair Max More responded to this calmly and cogently. Regarding posts on ExI's List: Jose's post was inflammatory. He did state that he would not post again for a couple of months. Harve's and Eli's posts have not been inflammatory, they have been level-headed expressions of their thoughts and feelings. Regarding all other postings, Spike is very careful in watching for ad hominem attacks and posts that are written to cause conflicts. Thank you for your concerns, and I will share with you that I hope people can air their thoughts and feelings with civility and work toward solving problems. Best wishes, Natasha Natasha Vita-More Cultural Strategist - Designer Future Studies, University of Houston President, Extropy Institute Member, Association of Professional Futurists Founder, Transhumanist Arts & Culture Honorary Vice-Chair, World Transhumanist Association Senior Associate, Foresight Institute Advisor, Alcor Life Extension Foundation If you draw a circle in the sand and study only what's inside the circle, then that is a closed-system perspective. If you study what is inside the circle and everything outside the circle, then that is an open system perspective. Buckminster Fuller -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From mail at HarveyNewstrom.com Mon Jan 16 17:30:19 2006 From: mail at HarveyNewstrom.com (Harvey Newstrom) Date: Mon, 16 Jan 2006 12:30:19 -0500 Subject: [wta-talk] RE: [extropy-chat] What _is_ it with the WTA board, anyway? In-Reply-To: <470a3c520601160706k62fe0c6dr4d526a725ced9807@mail.gmail.com> References: <470a3c520601160706k62fe0c6dr4d526a725ced9807@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <766342b3ec3815570e6f82d12ef7d468@HarveyNewstrom.com> On Jan 16, 2006, at 10:06 AM, Giu1i0 Pri5c0 wrote: > If I were Natasha, I would > consider issuing a warning to all WTA members on the Extropy list to > please discuss internal WTA problems at home, refrain from taking them > to the Extropy list, and not assume that everyone is interested in > petty disputes. Two points should be made here: 1. Take a look at the posters discussing WTA Board politics on the ExI-chat list: James Hughes, Mike Treader, Michael LaTorra, Giulio Prisco, Joseph Bloch, Jose Cordiero, Harvey Newstrom, Eliezer Yudkowski, etc. Six WTA Board members and two former WTA Board members. This is not some discussion of WTA board matters by non board members. This is the WTA board fighting among itself in public again. 2. The two former Board members were not involved in this discussion until WTA Board members made claims about them by name. We both posted to set the record straight about ourselves. Max and Natasha likewise stayed out of this discussion until they were invoked by name. You yourself posted what Natasha should do to stop this discussion, forcing her to respond to your statements in her name. These people aren't causing problems for the WTA Board. The WTA Board is causing problems for us. If you want the conversations stopped, WTA Board members need to solve their problems themselves. Asking people to ignore the problem and not talk about it isn't the solution. (Goodbye again, until I am invoked again by name.) -- Harvey Newstrom CISSP CISA CISM CIFI NSA-IAM GSEC ISSAP ISSMP ISSPCS IBMCP From pgptag at gmail.com Mon Jan 16 17:57:22 2006 From: pgptag at gmail.com (Giu1i0 Pri5c0) Date: Mon, 16 Jan 2006 18:57:22 +0100 Subject: [wta-talk] RE: [extropy-chat] What _is_ it with the WTA board, anyway? In-Reply-To: <766342b3ec3815570e6f82d12ef7d468@HarveyNewstrom.com> References: <470a3c520601160706k62fe0c6dr4d526a725ced9807@mail.gmail.com> <766342b3ec3815570e6f82d12ef7d468@HarveyNewstrom.com> Message-ID: <470a3c520601160957p7953a868q969850e3724f8d2d@mail.gmail.com> Harvey, I think the sequence of things and who wrote what to whom and when can be seen very clearly in the archives of the exi-chat (open to all list members), wta-talk (open to all list members), and wtahall (open to all WTA paying members). I won't repeat what is on the archives for everyone to see. It is not the WTA board fighting among itself in public again, it is two Board members who decided to take the debate to the exi-chat list, forcing the others to respond. Can we just stop this? Please? btw I did not tell Natasha what she should do I told her what I would consider doing if I were in her place it is not the same thing. G. On 1/16/06, Harvey Newstrom wrote: > > On Jan 16, 2006, at 10:06 AM, Giu1i0 Pri5c0 wrote: > > > If I were Natasha, I would > > consider issuing a warning to all WTA members on the Extropy list to > > please discuss internal WTA problems at home, refrain from taking them > > to the Extropy list, and not assume that everyone is interested in > > petty disputes. > > Two points should be made here: > > 1. Take a look at the posters discussing WTA Board politics on the > ExI-chat list: James Hughes, Mike Treader, Michael LaTorra, Giulio > Prisco, Joseph Bloch, Jose Cordiero, Harvey Newstrom, Eliezer > Yudkowski, etc. Six WTA Board members and two former WTA Board > members. This is not some discussion of WTA board matters by non board > members. This is the WTA board fighting among itself in public again. > > 2. The two former Board members were not involved in this discussion > until WTA Board members made claims about them by name. We both posted > to set the record straight about ourselves. Max and Natasha likewise > stayed out of this discussion until they were invoked by name. You > yourself posted what Natasha should do to stop this discussion, forcing > her to respond to your statements in her name. These people aren't > causing problems for the WTA Board. The WTA Board is causing problems > for us. If you want the conversations stopped, WTA Board members need > to solve their problems themselves. Asking people to ignore the > problem and not talk about it isn't the solution. > > (Goodbye again, until I am invoked again by name.) > > -- > Harvey Newstrom > CISSP CISA CISM CIFI NSA-IAM GSEC ISSAP ISSMP ISSPCS IBMCP From natasha at natasha.cc Mon Jan 16 18:07:34 2006 From: natasha at natasha.cc (Natasha Vita-More) Date: Mon, 16 Jan 2006 12:07:34 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] ExI: Think-Tank Team for Strategic Plan Message-ID: <6.2.1.2.2.20060116114932.02f12210@pop-server.austin.rr.com> Dear Extropes and other Transhumanists, Futurists, Life Extension Activists: Extropy Institute's New Strategic Plan, written over the summer of 2005, has been put into action. The plan was developed by ExI's Board of Directors with the outside collaboration of Dr. Peter Bishop (Futurist and Professor of Studies of the Future) and Dr. Donald Emery (Business Consultant and on the Board of numerous non-profit educational organizations). In realizing our new Plan, Extropy Institute welcomes Kerry Rameriz of the United Space Alliance and Graduate student at the University of Houston, who is our new Research Assistant. ExI needs an extended think-tank team for putting the Strategic Plan's initiatives into action. We are currently looking for: 1. Resource Director for an upcoming Library of Transhumanism; 2. Public Relations Specialist for promoting The Proactionary Principle 3. Multidisciplinary Thinkers to creatively work with the Strategic Plan Initiatives production; including a new enterprise focused on The Proactionary Principle and education. If you want to work with us, and we hope you do, please email me at your earliest convenience. I look forward to working with you all! ProAct! Natasha Natasha Vita-More Cultural Strategist - Designer Future Studies, University of Houston President, Extropy Institute Member, Association of Professional Futurists Founder, Transhumanist Arts & Culture Honorary Vice-Chair, World Transhumanist Association Senior Associate, Foresight Institute Advisor, Alcor Life Extension Foundation If you draw a circle in the sand and study only what's inside the circle, then that is a closed-system perspective. If you study what is inside the circle and everything outside the circle, then that is an open system perspective. Buckminster Fuller -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From dirk.bruere at gmail.com Mon Jan 16 00:26:09 2006 From: dirk.bruere at gmail.com (Dirk Bruere) Date: Mon, 16 Jan 2006 00:26:09 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] On Gut Feelings In-Reply-To: <8A08D763-4889-4D11-B351-E8339C4742D7@mac.com> References: <002501c6191a$79cb2b80$04800d0a@JPAcer> <8A08D763-4889-4D11-B351-E8339C4742D7@mac.com> Message-ID: On 1/14/06, Samantha Atkins wrote: > > > On Jan 14, 2006, at 6:54 AM, Jack Parkinson wrote: > > The fairly recent acrimonious political debate in this forum and the > airing of the WTA 'dirty laundry' has made me wonder a little about the > reliability of the 'gut-feeling' as an arbiter of what intelligent life > ought to be listening and paying attention to. > > In the case of Danila Medvedev: To be sure, I am no apologist for Stalin: > But - I do believe in free speech. I see no benefits whatsoever in sweeping > unpalatable political facts - or even unpalatable political fictions and > delusions - beneath some metaphorical carpet. We are reasonable people (or > should be) and able to engage/reject a topic with reason and informed > debate. > > > > Wholesale rewriting of history and denial of atrocities has nothing to do > with reason on informed debate. Such denials are not debatable. > ie some things are beyond debate because we all know them to be true/false... Doesn't sound very Extropian to me. So I was somewhat taken aback some time ago when I mildly remonstrated > against the ad-hominem attacks Danila Medvedev was being subjected to on the > WTA list and was promptly denounced as a 'commie' and an admirer of Hitler > and Pol-Pot. Almost immediately the signal to noise ratio made further > discussion impossible. Pity - because something important was lost. Reasoned > response was sacrificed (eventually moderated out) because a few individuals > persisted in their pejorative attacks - making it clear that their > sacrosanct world view was not to be threatened on THEIR list... > > > The notion that all opinions no matter how absurd or evil are worthy of > defense and serious consideration is shallow thinking. > That has no bearing on whether someone who holds one of those 'absurd or evil' beliefs should be allowed to make a case. This list, this group, and the values it generally shares (values which some > members sometimes seek to ferociously protect) has no comfortable sanction > on what will and will not be a part of our extropian future. We each have > our subjective reality. All the things that this group (or some elements of > it) might seek to exclude will continue to be factors influencing the future > regardless of your willingness to admit them or not. So what is the point of > limiting debate? The truth is - there is no point - if you admit that > reality is more important than the maintenance of some fictional > comfort-zone. > > > I do get to decide what I sanction and abhor. So do groups of people and > organizations. By what they sanction and stand for they will be judged. > Debate is not limited. Having such an open mind that your brains fall out > is not "debate" or respect for reality. > You have just decided that some things are *not* to be debated - not just by you but everyone here. Just my opinion: But moderation might be (could be): > > 1. Anything goes - provided it has an extropian angle. > > mostly the way things are here. > > > 1. > 2. Politics, religion and sexual preference are exclusively the > preserve and prerogative of the writer. Respect them. > > > What does this "respect" of politics or religion mean? Does it mean that > we don't rigorously examine and criticize each other's notions in these > areas? If so then I am not interested. > I'm not big on the US definitions of 'tolerance' and 'respect' . Too often they mean unquestioning quasi-acceptance. In reality what they mean is that we allow freedom of expression for all parties, pro and con, and we respect the right of a person to hold 'absurd or evil' beliefs. > 1. Although you may seriously doubt the mental health of the > poster - you may attack the concept/proposition as outlined in the post ONLY > on reasoned, rational grounds. Under NO circumstances will you > resort to pejorative labelling: ie, telling the author s/he is > crazy/commie/anarchist/etc etc, or otherwise attempt to discredit the person > rather than the argument. If you do so - you will get moderated out > of the discussion forthwith. > > > Yes, again part of this list. > I think this whole storm is pointing to the need for there to be a *true* umbrella org. And that means one where Transhumanists are not thrown out because of their political beliefs (or debating/expressing them), be they Stalinists, Libertarians, Socialists, Nazis, Raelians or Prometheans. When someone seriously puts together such an org I will consider joining. Dirk -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From starman2100 at cableone.net Mon Jan 16 01:07:56 2006 From: starman2100 at cableone.net (starman2100 at cableone.net) Date: Sun, 15 Jan 2006 18:07:56 -0700 Subject: [extropy-chat] Desert News Article & LDS church Message-ID: <1137373676_6181@S4.cableone.net> An embedded and charset-unspecified text was scrubbed... Name: not available URL: From russell.wallace at gmail.com Mon Jan 16 20:42:56 2006 From: russell.wallace at gmail.com (Russell Wallace) Date: Mon, 16 Jan 2006 20:42:56 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] On difficult choices (was: Books: Harris; Religion and Reason) In-Reply-To: References: <20060112051911.37750.qmail@web50511.mail.yahoo.com> <8d71341e0601120218g6669207bya6f5168d015ee8ae@mail.gmail.com> <8d71341e0601141111w7fa08c8bu753281f358e0a600@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <8d71341e0601161242t6145dc38u783253e8bfa4ea8b@mail.gmail.com> On 1/16/06, Dirk Bruere wrote: > > > > On 1/14/06, Russell Wallace wrote: > > > > > > Out of curiosity, how close to the Singularity do you think we are? > > > > > In the 1980s I estimated not sooner than 2010 and not later than 2050, > with the most likely date around 2030. > I still believe that. In the 1980s, I reckoned it might happen by 2000 :) Now I think 2030-2050 might be a possibility if a great many things go well - let's try and prove you optimists right! - Russell -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From james.hughes at trincoll.edu Mon Jan 16 20:54:43 2006 From: james.hughes at trincoll.edu (Hughes, James J.) Date: Mon, 16 Jan 2006 15:54:43 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] I don't need an umbrella Message-ID: > I feel a bit uncomfortable about ExI being described as an > "affiliated organization" under the "umbrella" of WTA. Indeed - our relations are as affiliates, a fraternal relationship, not a hierarchical one. The reference to "umbrella" comes from two sources. First, the first consitution we adopted in 2002 allowed for organizations to be members of the WTA with voting rights alongside individuals. ExI was a formal member of the WTA at that time. That was a dumb idea (like mushing together the UN and the House of Representatives), and we dropped it in favor of the fraternal "affiliation" acknowledgement. We are not accountable to one another, and only to our memberships. Disaffiliation is a possibility at any time. Second, the WTA is consciously attempting to include and represent all transhumanists. ExI has always made clear that extropianism is one flavor or type of transhumanism, and that there are others. However you define those flavors - politically, by values or by organizational affiliation - the WTA is an organization that includes extropians along with singularitarians, religious transhumanists, independents, democratic transhumanists, technoprogressives and so on. So we are an umbrella in terms of inclusion. -------------------------------------------- James Hughes Ph.D. Executive Director World Transhumanist Assoc. Inst. for Ethics & Emerging Tech. http://transhumanism.org http://ieet.org director at transhumanism.org director at ieet.org Editor, Journal of Evolution and Technology http://jetpress.org Mailing Address: Box 128, Willington CT 06279 USA (office) 860-297-2376 From mehranraeli at comcast.net Mon Jan 16 22:07:54 2006 From: mehranraeli at comcast.net (Mehran) Date: Mon, 16 Jan 2006 17:07:54 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Singularity and Religion In-Reply-To: <200601162033.k0GKXLe26333@tick.javien.com> Message-ID: <003d01c61ae9$5619a060$799f6041@DBX6XT21> Singularity will be a boost for science-based religions in particular those that have a detailed vision of the future based on technological advances. See for example RAEL's Yes to Human Cloning and his other books, highly transhumanist texts available online: rael.org LOVE Mehran www.rael.org Without love for each other there will be no future! ------------------------------ Message: 4 Date: Sun, 15 Jan 2006 15:56:17 -0500 (EST) From: Anne-Marie Taylor Subject: [extropy-chat] Singularity and Religion To: extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org Message-ID: <20060115205617.48355.qmail at web35515.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" I'm interested in finding good articles that deal with the impact on religion if Singularity should occur. If anybody has any information it would be much appreciated. Thanks Anna From thespike at satx.rr.com Mon Jan 16 22:27:42 2006 From: thespike at satx.rr.com (Damien Broderick) Date: Mon, 16 Jan 2006 16:27:42 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] Singularity and Religion In-Reply-To: <003d01c61ae9$5619a060$799f6041@DBX6XT21> References: <200601162033.k0GKXLe26333@tick.javien.com> <003d01c61ae9$5619a060$799f6041@DBX6XT21> Message-ID: <6.2.1.2.0.20060116162602.01ce4eb8@pop-server.satx.rr.com> >See for example RAEL's Yes to Human Cloning and his other books, highly >transhumanist texts available online: rael.org > >LOVE >Mehran >www.rael.org > >Without love for each other there will be no future! without brainless bullshit scams there'll be a far better future. From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Mon Jan 16 22:34:33 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Mon, 16 Jan 2006 17:34:33 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Re: Kurzweil on C-SPAN2 In-Reply-To: <43CAFD65.6080900@goldenfuture.net> References: <43CAFD65.6080900@goldenfuture.net> Message-ID: I only caught the tail end of this. It seems to be an old show (perhaps taped 11/30/2005). I'm also not sure about how "wonderful" it was. Ray clearly got the answer to the question about solving the energy problem wrong (citing the need for solar power applications of nanotechnology coming online in 15-20 years as the solution when biotechnology and "whole genome engineering" could probably solve it in less than 5 years (IMO) . He did nothing more than add some estimation of the arrival dates of a technology predicted by Drexler in EOC in 1986 (20 years ago!) [1]. It also seemed to me that many of his answers to questions from the audience did not really address their questions directly. Robert 1. http://www.foresight.org/EOC/EOC_Chapter_8.html (search for solar power) On 1/15/06, Joseph Bloch wrote: > > Two points: > > 1) This wonderful interview (I'm watching as I type this) will be > repeated tomorrow at 4 PM ET, so them's as missed some or all of it can > hopefully catch the whole thing. > > 2) There is an email list set up explicitly for these sorts of > announcements. See http://tv.groups.yahoo.com/group/TransTelevision/ > > Joseph > > Martin Striz wrote: > > >I don't remember anybody mentioning this, but Ray Kurzweil is on > >C-SPAN2 (BookTV) talking about his book "The Singularity is Near" > >RIGHT NOW, 8 pm EST, until 9. > > > >Martin > > > >_______________________________________________ > >wta-talk mailing list > >wta-talk at transhumanism.org > >http://www.transhumanism.org/mailman/listinfo/wta-talk > > > > > > > > > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From dirk.bruere at gmail.com Mon Jan 16 22:42:09 2006 From: dirk.bruere at gmail.com (Dirk Bruere) Date: Mon, 16 Jan 2006 22:42:09 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Singularity and Religion In-Reply-To: <003d01c61ae9$5619a060$799f6041@DBX6XT21> References: <200601162033.k0GKXLe26333@tick.javien.com> <003d01c61ae9$5619a060$799f6041@DBX6XT21> Message-ID: On 1/16/06, Mehran wrote: > > Singularity will be a boost for science-based religions in particular > those > that have a detailed vision of the future based on technological advances. > See for example RAEL's Yes to Human Cloning and his other books, highly > transhumanist texts available online: rael.org > > That's like chimps speculating on what Human Level Intelligence would do for them coming up with the idea of 'bigger bananas'. Dirk -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From fortean1 at mindspring.com Mon Jan 16 23:51:19 2006 From: fortean1 at mindspring.com (Terry W. Colvin) Date: Mon, 16 Jan 2006 16:51:19 -0700 Subject: [extropy-chat] Magnetic field shoves heat sideways & Massless ghosts of the nanoworld Message-ID: <43CC3177.1050907@mindspring.com> Forwarding permission was given by William R. Corliss < http://www.science-frontiers.com > SCIENCE FRONTIERS, No. 163, Jan-Feb 2006, p. 4 PHYSICS No. 1 Magnetic field shoves heat sideways Here is an anomaly only a physicist could love. Normally, when one applies heat to the edge of a flat plate, the heat flows directly across to the opposite cold edge of the plate. It's elementary physics. But if the experimenter also applies a magnetic field through the plate--- top to bottom---it gives the heat a sideways push toward one of the edges. But the plate here is electrically *nonconducting*. This effect is analogous to the well-known Hall effect in which a similarly applied magnetic field makes electrons flowing in a *conducting* plate swerve sidewards. Since magnetic fields are admitted to affect the motion of electrons, the Hall effect is nonanomalous. But the heat in the *nonconducting* plate is transported by phonons (quantum vibrations) rather than electrons. The phonons being uncharged electrically should not be affected by the applied magnetic field. So an anomaly is born. (Cho, Adrian; "Magnetic Fields Give Heat a Curious Sideways Shove," *Science*, 310:420, 2005) No. 2 Massless ghosts of the nanoworld In the realm of the very small---the nanoworld---weird phenomena occur often. Most of these weird events cannot [be] termed "anomalous" because quantum mechanics explains them handily. (Of course, understanding quantum mechanics is another matter.) Anyway, a most interesting effect happens in carbon sheets only one atom thick. Electrons moving in this ultrathin sheet move as if they possess *no* mass! They zip along at speeds much faster than they do in semiconductor sheets of comparable thickness. In the quantum-mechanical explanation the apparent loss of mass occurs when the quantum waves of the confined electrons meet and cancel one another out. Now, technologists foresee thin carbon sheets---conducting high-speed electrons in electronic devices---as potentially increasing their operating frequencies a thousandfold. (Weiss, P.; "Ghostly Electrons," *Science News*, 168:309, 2005) SCIENCE FRONTIERS is a bimonthly collection of scientific anomalies in the current literature. Published by the Sourcebook Project, P.O. Box 107, Glen Arm, MD 21057 USA. Annual subscription: $8.00. -- "Only a zit on the wart on the heinie of progress." Copyright 1992, Frank Rice Terry W. Colvin, Sierra Vista, Arizona (USA) < fortean1 at mindspring.com > Alternate: < fortean1 at msn.com > Home Page: < http://www.geocities.com/Area51/Stargate/8958/index.html > Sites: * Fortean Times * Mystic's Haven * TLCB * U.S. Message Text Formatting (USMTF) Program ------------ Member: Thailand-Laos-Cambodia Brotherhood (TLCB) Mailing List TLCB Web Site: < http://www.tlc-brotherhood.org > [Southeast Asia/Secret War in Laos veterans, Allies, CIA/NSA, and "steenkeen" contractors are welcome.] From sjatkins at mac.com Tue Jan 17 00:00:57 2006 From: sjatkins at mac.com (Samantha Atkins) Date: Mon, 16 Jan 2006 16:00:57 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] On Gut Feelings In-Reply-To: References: <002501c6191a$79cb2b80$04800d0a@JPAcer> <8A08D763-4889-4D11-B351-E8339C4742D7@mac.com> Message-ID: On Jan 15, 2006, at 4:26 PM, Dirk Bruere wrote: > > > On 1/14/06, Samantha Atkins wrote: > > On Jan 14, 2006, at 6:54 AM, Jack Parkinson wrote: > >> The fairly recent acrimonious political debate in this forum and >> the airing of the WTA 'dirty laundry' has made me wonder a little >> about the reliability of the 'gut-feeling' as an arbiter of what >> intelligent life ought to be listening and paying attention to. >> >> In the case of Danila Medvedev: To be sure, I am no apologist for >> Stalin: But - I do believe in free speech. I see no benefits >> whatsoever in sweeping unpalatable political facts - or even >> unpalatable political fictions and delusions - beneath some >> metaphorical carpet. We are reasonable people (or should be) and >> able to engage/reject a topic with reason and informed debate. >> > > Wholesale rewriting of history and denial of atrocities has nothing > to do with reason on informed debate. Such denials are not debatable. > > ie some things are beyond debate because we all know them to be > true/false... > Doesn't sound very Extropian to me. > Only to a complete subjectivist I dare say. >> So I was somewhat taken aback some time ago when I mildly >> remonstrated against the ad-hominem attacks Danila Medvedev was >> being subjected to on the WTA list and was promptly denounced as a >> 'commie' and an admirer of Hitler and Pol-Pot. Almost immediately >> the signal to noise ratio made further discussion impossible. Pity >> - because something important was lost. Reasoned response was >> sacrificed (eventually moderated out) because a few individuals >> persisted in their pejorative attacks - making it clear that their >> sacrosanct world view was not to be threatened on THEIR list... >> > > The notion that all opinions no matter how absurd or evil are > worthy of defense and serious consideration is shallow thinking. > > That has no bearing on whether someone who holds one of those > 'absurd or evil' beliefs should be allowed to make a case. > In what context? Free speech does not mean any particular venue has to make itself open to everything any member may say or write. >> This list, this group, and the values it generally shares (values >> which some members sometimes seek to ferociously protect) has no >> comfortable sanction on what will and will not be a part of our >> extropian future. We each have our subjective reality. All the >> things that this group (or some elements of it) might seek to >> exclude will continue to be factors influencing the future >> regardless of your willingness to admit them or not. So what is >> the point of limiting debate? The truth is - there is no point - >> if you admit that reality is more important than the maintenance >> of some fictional comfort-zone. >> > > I do get to decide what I sanction and abhor. So do groups of > people and organizations. By what they sanction and stand for they > will be judged. Debate is not limited. Having such an open mind > that your brains fall out is not "debate" or respect for reality. > > You have just decided that some things are *not* to be debated - > not just by you but everyone here. Groups have charters. They are not open to everything and anything. People have standards. Are you saying it is wrong that this is so? > > I'm not big on the US definitions of 'tolerance' and 'respect' . > Too often they mean unquestioning quasi-acceptance. > In reality what they mean is that we allow freedom of expression > for all parties, pro and con, and we respect the right of a person > to hold 'absurd or evil' beliefs. > I accept everyone's right to believe whatever they wish. That doesn't mean I won't campaign to limit what they share of their beliefs in particular venues. I also have the right to judge them based on their beliefs ad the apparent quality of their reasoning and understanding. - samantha -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From sjatkins at mac.com Tue Jan 17 00:03:49 2006 From: sjatkins at mac.com (Samantha Atkins) Date: Mon, 16 Jan 2006 16:03:49 -0800 Subject: [wta-talk] RE: [extropy-chat] What _is_ it with the WTA board, anyway? In-Reply-To: <470a3c520601160706k62fe0c6dr4d526a725ced9807@mail.gmail.com> References: <470a3c520601160706k62fe0c6dr4d526a725ced9807@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <0170CC27-33B6-40B0-949B-10FD351853B2@mac.com> I do not consider this pointless. I am interested. Why would you presume to speak for other people or limit what they read here? People are quite able to speak for themselves. - s On Jan 16, 2006, at 7:06 AM, Giu1i0 Pri5c0 wrote: > Pleeeeease my friends, not again! > First, I wish to remind everyone that all WTA members can access the > WTA Board archives which, as I just checked, go back to August 2003. > Just write to me or to Marcelo for a password. > Second, I see that these pointless discussions are spilling over to > the Extropy list, where perhaps people prefer discussing other things > and do not wish to see their mailboxes flooded with endless > repetitions of the same old stories. If I were Natasha, I would > consider issuing a warning to all WTA members on the Extropy list to > please discuss internal WTA problems at home, refrain from taking them > to the Extropy list, and not assume that everyone is interested in > petty disputes. I could do it myself as I am also a list deputy on the > Extropy list, but in this case I prefer leaving it to Natasha. > Third, I can see that some people are using the old and recent > discussions in the WTA to create tension between the ExI, the WTA and > other transhumanist associations. If you are one of those, and you > will know if you are one, I wish to ask you to consider focusing your > energy to more productive activities. There is a lot to do to move > towards the future we wish to see and I think we can not waste our > time like that. > G. > > On 1/16/06, Harvey Newstrom wrote: >> >> On Jan 15, 2006, at 10:21 AM, Hughes, James J. wrote: >> >>> Uh, for the record, Mr. Cordeiro just withdrew from running for >>> re-election, Bruce Klein and Harvey Newstrom resigned from the >>> Board, >>> and Mr. Yudkowsky lost a re-relection. >>> >>> So I don't know how I can be blamed for 'driving out' Yudkowsky. And >>> yes, the other three Board members and I had many disagreements. But >>> neither I, nor any Board member, moved to have them removed from the >>> Board. >> >> James thinks I resigned, even though I have always denied it. >> >> On Jan 15, 2006, at 6:48 PM, mike99 wrote: >> >>> Harvey Newstrom, who is also quite intelligent and adept, was >>> encouraged by >>> Jose to question everything...endlessly. Questioning is good. But >>> like >>> the >>> child who asks an endless series of "Why?" questions, responding to >>> every >>> proffered answer with yet another "Why?" Harvey only managed to >>> bring >>> the >>> work of the Board to a grinding halt. In an elected legislature, >>> this >>> is >>> called tying up the house in procedural motions. That's what Harvey >>> did. >>> Finally, the Board had had enough and asked him to leave. >> >> Mike thinks the board asked me to leave, even though James has always >> denied it. >> >> This is why I ask endless questions. Different board members still >> disagree about whether the board did or did not take some official >> action. How can they not remember or agree on what happened on the >> board? How can the records be of no help in answering these >> questions? >> How can there be no minutes or disputed minutes? How can we tell >> which claimed official actions are real and which ones aren't. When >> board members violently disagree on basic truths, how can members >> determine the truth? And how can these same questions be unanswered >> year after year? >> >> -- >> Harvey Newstrom >> CISSP CISA CISM CIFI NSA-IAM GSEC ISSAP ISSMP ISSPCS IBMCP > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat From dirk.bruere at gmail.com Tue Jan 17 00:16:43 2006 From: dirk.bruere at gmail.com (Dirk Bruere) Date: Tue, 17 Jan 2006 00:16:43 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] On Gut Feelings In-Reply-To: References: <002501c6191a$79cb2b80$04800d0a@JPAcer> <8A08D763-4889-4D11-B351-E8339C4742D7@mac.com> Message-ID: On 1/17/06, Samantha Atkins wrote: > > > On Jan 15, 2006, at 4:26 PM, Dirk Bruere wrote: > > > > On 1/14/06, Samantha Atkins wrote: > > > > > > On Jan 14, 2006, at 6:54 AM, Jack Parkinson wrote: > > > > The fairly recent acrimonious political debate in this forum and the > > airing of the WTA 'dirty laundry' has made me wonder a little about the > > reliability of the 'gut-feeling' as an arbiter of what intelligent life > > ought to be listening and paying attention to. > > > > In the case of Danila Medvedev: To be sure, I am no apologist for > > Stalin: But - I do believe in free speech. I see no benefits whatsoever in > > sweeping unpalatable political facts - or even unpalatable political > > fictions and delusions - beneath some metaphorical carpet. We are reasonable > > people (or should be) and able to engage/reject a topic with reason and > > informed debate. > > > > > > > > Wholesale rewriting of history and denial of atrocities has nothing to > > do with reason on informed debate. Such denials are not debatable. > > > > ie some things are beyond debate because we all know them to be > true/false... > Doesn't sound very Extropian to me. > > > Only to a complete subjectivist I dare say. > So, who decides what is 'obvious' and hence cannot be discussed? So I was somewhat taken aback some time ago when I mildly remonstrated > > against the ad-hominem attacks Danila Medvedev was being subjected to on the > > WTA list and was promptly denounced as a 'commie' and an admirer of Hitler > > and Pol-Pot. Almost immediately the signal to noise ratio made further > > discussion impossible. Pity - because something important was lost. Reasoned > > response was sacrificed (eventually moderated out) because a few individuals > > persisted in their pejorative attacks - making it clear that their > > sacrosanct world view was not to be threatened on THEIR list... > > > > > > The notion that all opinions no matter how absurd or evil are worthy of > > defense and serious consideration is shallow thinking. > > > > That has no bearing on whether someone who holds one of those 'absurd or > evil' beliefs should be allowed to make a case. > > > In what context? Free speech does not mean any particular venue has to > make itself open to everything any member may say or write. > Well, in this context it would have to have a bearing on Transhumanism. And offhand I can think of at least 3 topics that would get most people banned by the WTA and probably by ExI that are Transhuman related. This list, this group, and the values it generally shares (values which some > > members sometimes seek to ferociously protect) has no comfortable sanction > > on what will and will not be a part of our extropian future. We each have > > our subjective reality. All the things that this group (or some elements of > > it) might seek to exclude will continue to be factors influencing the future > > regardless of your willingness to admit them or not. So what is the point of > > limiting debate? The truth is - there is no point - if you admit that > > reality is more important than the maintenance of some fictional > > comfort-zone. > > > > > > I do get to decide what I sanction and abhor. So do groups of people > > and organizations. By what they sanction and stand for they will be > > judged. Debate is not limited. Having such an open mind that your brains > > fall out is not "debate" or respect for reality. > > > > You have just decided that some things are *not* to be debated - not just > by you but everyone here. > > > Groups have charters. They are not open to everything and anything. > People have standards. Are you saying it is wrong that this is so? > No. I'm saying that a charter for my ideal Transhumanist org should not specify peoples politics, nor limit discussion of such politics if they have Transhumanist implications. Clearly resurgent Stalinism in Russia and National Socialism/Fascism in China *do* have major implications, and I personally would not ban one side of such a discussion/argument as to whether they are desirable or effective/detrimental to Transhumanist goals. I'm not big on the US definitions of 'tolerance' and 'respect' . Too often > they mean unquestioning quasi-acceptance. > In reality what they mean is that we allow freedom of expression for all > parties, pro and con, and we respect the right of a person to hold 'absurd > or evil' beliefs. > > > I accept everyone's right to believe whatever they wish. That doesn't > mean I won't campaign to limit what they share of their beliefs in > particular venues. I also have the right to judge them based on their > beliefs ad the apparent quality of their reasoning and understanding. > > You may certainly judge them. But only on your own behalf - not mine. Dirk -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From extropy at unreasonable.com Tue Jan 17 00:28:09 2006 From: extropy at unreasonable.com (David Lubkin) Date: Mon, 16 Jan 2006 19:28:09 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Re: What _is_ it with the WTA board, anyway? In-Reply-To: <470a3c520601160957p7953a868q969850e3724f8d2d@mail.gmail.co m> References: <470a3c520601160706k62fe0c6dr4d526a725ced9807@mail.gmail.com> <766342b3ec3815570e6f82d12ef7d468@HarveyNewstrom.com> <470a3c520601160957p7953a868q969850e3724f8d2d@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <6.2.3.4.2.20060116182217.08703010@unreasonable.com> Giu1i0 wrote: >It is not the WTA board fighting among itself in public again, it is >two Board members who decided to take the debate to the exi-chat list, >forcing the others to respond. >Can we just stop this? >Please? As someone only negligibly involved with WTA, I appreciate this thread. The goings-on in a publicly visible organization in the same meme space as ExI are pertinent and appropriate for exi-chat. The players involved include friends, people I know and respect, and those with whom I might work in the future. If there are serious issues of their behavior or treatment, I want to hear about it. Beyond the thread / BOD participants, many on the list are or have been involved with WTA. Since one of the issues raised is alleged censorship on the WTA lists, it makes sense to discuss it off a WTA list. Criticizing the behavior of a list member is not ad hominem in this case, since their behavior is central to the thread topic. I would hope, however, that the criticism not be needlessly vulgar. "X is a liar" -- yes; "X is a lying turd" -- no. -- David. From sjatkins at mac.com Tue Jan 17 00:40:36 2006 From: sjatkins at mac.com (Samantha Atkins) Date: Mon, 16 Jan 2006 16:40:36 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] setting us up for war against Iran? Message-ID: Apparently this didn't get through when I sent it earlier. This is an excellent piece on the ways we may be being marched toward military action against Iran. I hope we do not let ourselves be led blindly into such a conflict. http://www.sovereignlife.com/essays/16-01-06.html The Power of The Lie Remember the movie "Groundhog Day"? It was the story of a man (Bill Murray) who was forced to continuously relive the worst day of his life, until he learned to become a better person. As we launch into 2006, it already has the feeling of deja vu, of a groundhog day in the making. I recall my intense scepticism when pressure was being put on Iraq, in the first stages of that relentless momentum to a pre-planned goal - war. I also recall joining tens of thousands of people in a street protest against the impending war. That was a first for me - as I'm not a "protest" sort of person. But I was so angry that I took the only option available to me to voice such anger. Not that it did any good of course! Now we know that all that hoopla was a fabrication, that there were no WMD in Iraq, and no impending attack from that country. Doesn't matter, Saddam was a bad man, and the world is better off with one less bad man - so the revised story goes. You'd think that experience would cause our leaders to tread more carefully in future - to at least learn from past mistakes. But this appears not to be the case. Right now, a new campaign is under way - the first steps in another relentless drive to full military confrontation with that other Middle East country, Iran. As with Iraq, the military option is being played down, and our leaders claim to be seeking a "diplomatic" solution. Listen not to words however, but observe actions. You can witness this momentum building each passing day, as the phrase, "Iran is seeking to build a nuclear weapon" passes into the common consciousness. It's not even necessary to state it as a fact (as the American administration does). All that's required is to massage these words in different ways, and present them with various shades of meaning - like how Iran is "suspected" of building a nuclear weapon, or how Iran has the "potential" to build such a weapon in the near future. Or even simply, the US administration "believes" Iran has a secret plan to build a nuclear weapon. Each headline, each newspaper editorial, and each political utterance has the mesmerising effect of slowly, but surely, imprinting in the public's mind the belief that this surely must be the case - that Iran is either planning to build, or has built, a nuclear weapon. For its part, Iran states that it is not building or thinking of building a nuclear weapon - and is prepared to allow full IAEA inspections to prove its point. It also stands firm and asserts its right to develop nuclear technology for peaceful means - i.e. electricity generation - a right it is granted as a signatory to the NPT (Nuclear Proliferation Treaty). But all of this counts for nought in the face of a persistent, relentless lie. It seems as if the human psyche is programmed to believe a repeated lie - when uttered by authority figures. It's a form of crude brainwashing, which politicians learn to use early on in their careers. Think back to Saddam Hussein again - when he was accused of harbouring WMD. Our leaders asserted he did have them. He asserted he did not. Who was telling the truth then? The best way to get a handle on this whole issue is to make an attempt to stand in another's shoes - Iran's shoes in this case. Just imagine yourself as an Iranian and consider your options. You live in a hostile environment. Your foes, Israel and the USA, are armed to the teeth and Israel is not a signatory to the NPT. It regularly threatens to attack you, and in fact has done so in the past. You ponder on the inconsistencies of this world - a world where other nations are allowed to develop nuclear power and nuclear weapons. A world where other countries regularly use force to achieve their objectives. And a world where such countries assume the right to tell your country what it can and cannot do. You are outraged. You believe that if it's good enough for other countries to develop their nuclear technology, to meet their energy needs, then it's good enough for Iran to do likewise. If pressed, you may even assert that even though your country has no intention of building nukes - you have the right to do so for self-defence, especially when facing aggressive, nuclear-armed foes. From your viewpoint, the growing world opinion against your country is a form of mass hypocrisy. Who decided that certain nations can browbeat and bully others into submission - to conform to standards which they themselves do not observe? Who decided who should or should not be able to develop nuclear power, or even a nuclear deterrent? Are you not a member of a sovereign nation - a country with certain rights, just like other countries? You look at America and you cannot understand it. While it builds its case against your country, it continues to support other nations which already have nuclear weapons, which are not signatories to the NPT, and which are often not even democracies. You revert to your religion to explain all this - and perhaps you're right. Perhaps the west really IS at war with Islam! Right now we've reached phase one of the strategy to militarily confront Iran - with the threat of sanctions and of it being referred to the United Nations Security Council. All this happened to Iraq as well. We've been there, done that. In this case, the US and its EU allies face some opposition - most likely from China and possibly Russia. China has an ongoing and friendly relationship with Iran - not to mention important economic and energy-related business dealings. China has the power to veto any UN Security Council resolution - and is now the focus of intense diplomatic pressure from the USA, in an attempt to bring them on board with the growing "consensus". We will hear a lot about this "consensus" in coming weeks and months. The next stage will likely involve the "uncovering" of new intelligence, which will "prove" that Iran is indeed operating a secret nuclear weapons programme. This will sway any doubters and lingering dissidents - and pull world opinion into line. The clincher may come with information obtained from certain Iranians themselves - perhaps defectors from the regime. Shades of Iraq all over again. The major media - Fox News, BBC, New York Times, The Washington Post and TV and newsprint media in general, will parrot the official line, and confirm our worst fears - that Iran really does have the capacity to threaten us, and is very likely to attack us in the future. We will be told this situation is NOT like Iraq, that it is a different ball game. And most will believe it. The only medium to offer any counter to the official line will, of course, be the internet - that damn, uncontrollable cyberspace! But when it comes to impact, the internet is still not capable of truly shaping world opinion. Yes, it's a haven for dissidents and independent thinkers - but they are still the minority, and a "fly in the ointment" as far as the campaign for total global information control is concerned. You and I will have no means of verifying this type of military intelligence of course, and will be faced with the choice of either accepting or rejecting it. But I know one thing, most people will accept it as true - simply because it is asserted by their rulers. It will be believed because it is stated by those in power - those who MUST be believed. God knows why, but that's the way it is. Each stage of this strategy will move the western powers ever closer to the final goal - that of attacking Iran. Any attack will likely not be the same as the war waged on Iraq, as that has been a disaster. Besides, the USA simply does not have the manpower to wage that type of ground war all over again. No, what is more likely is an attack on strategic and/or nuclear sites - a targeted aerial bombardment to "neutralise" Iran's nascent nuclear industry. The world will cheer. Another potential threat to world peace will have been taken out. Another victory in the war on terror! Or ... it could be a fatal conceit. It could trigger a war between Israel and Iran. It could be the beginning of a general Middle East conflagration. It could cause Iran to "trigger" its support base in Iraq, and lead to a general uprising against US forces in that region. It could lead to the world's first nuclear war. It could be the Armageddon that so may fundamentalist Christians believe is the essential precursor to a better world. And it could also be the catalyst that sends the global economy into a tailspin - and impacts on the entire world. Take your pick. But for the serious freedom seeker, war is an anathema. War is never a cause for celebration. As Randolph Bourne said, "War is the health of the state". War always benefits the state and its apparatus of control. Every war has strengthened the state's hand in public affairs and private life. And an ever-more powerful state is NEVER in the interest of the freedom seeker. So, in 2006, keep your wits about you. Keep your eyes open. Don't believe every word you read or are told. Seek alternative sources of information to at least provide a "second opinion". And most of all, remember that politicians DO lie. They've been caught out time and time again. Lying is the name of their game. There is simply no reason to have faith in them - and even less reason to follow them blindly into the abyss. The only possible cause for long range optimism in all this, is that making the same mistake over and over again, and reliving (as in Groundhog Day) the "worst" day in our collective lives - in mayhem and war - could lead us to seek a "better" form of social order in the future. It could lead to a significant number of the world's people rejecting the warfare state as the optimum organisational model for a modern, progressive, free and peaceful world. I live in hope. Yours in freedom David MacGregor ------------------------------------------------------------------------ -- David MacGregor operates an information service which is designed for all those who seek more practical and financial freedom in their lives. http://www.sovereignlife.com ------------------------------------------------------------------------ -- ? ? ? -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: _clear.gif Type: image/gif Size: 42 bytes Desc: not available URL: -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: _clear.gif Type: image/gif Size: 42 bytes Desc: not available URL: -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: _clear.gif Type: image/gif Size: 42 bytes Desc: not available URL: From nvitamore at austin.rr.com Tue Jan 17 00:54:28 2006 From: nvitamore at austin.rr.com (nvitamore at austin.rr.com) Date: Mon, 16 Jan 2006 19:54:28 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] setting us up for war against Iran? Message-ID: <380-22006121705428750@M2W110.mail2web.com> From: Samantha >Apparently this didn't get through when I sent it earlier. This is >an excellent piece on the ways we may be being marched toward >military action against Iran. I hope we do not let ourselves be led >blindly into such a conflict. >http://www.sovereignlife.com/essays/16-01-06.html Tears come to my eyes every time I hear about another person being killed through hatred. Or another person being hurt through mean-spirited actions. If we are to stop anything, let it be unnecessary emotions that cause hatred and vile actions intended to hurt others. I am so tired, so very tired of it all - Natasha The Power of The Lie Remember the movie "Groundhog Day"? It was the story of a man (Bill Murray) who was forced to continuously relive the worst day of his life, until he learned to become a better person. As we launch into 2006, it already has the feeling of deja vu, of a groundhog day in the making. I recall my intense scepticism when pressure was being put on Iraq, in the first stages of that relentless momentum to a pre-planned goal - war. I also recall joining tens of thousands of people in a street protest against the impending war. That was a first for me - as I'm not a "protest" sort of person. But I was so angry that I took the only option available to me to voice such anger. Not that it did any good of course! Now we know that all that hoopla was a fabrication, that there were no WMD in Iraq, and no impending attack from that country. Doesn't matter, Saddam was a bad man, and the world is better off with one less bad man - so the revised story goes. You'd think that experience would cause our leaders to tread more carefully in future - to at least learn from past mistakes. But this appears not to be the case. Right now, a new campaign is under way - the first steps in another relentless drive to full military confrontation with that other Middle East country, Iran. As with Iraq, the military option is being played down, and our leaders claim to be seeking a "diplomatic" solution. Listen not to words however, but observe actions. You can witness this momentum building each passing day, as the phrase, "Iran is seeking to build a nuclear weapon" passes into the common consciousness. It's not even necessary to state it as a fact (as the American administration does). All that's required is to massage these words in different ways, and present them with various shades of meaning - like how Iran is "suspected" of building a nuclear weapon, or how Iran has the "potential" to build such a weapon in the near future. Or even simply, the US administration "believes" Iran has a secret plan to build a nuclear weapon. Each headline, each newspaper editorial, and each political utterance has the mesmerising effect of slowly, but surely, imprinting in the public's mind the belief that this surely must be the case - that Iran is either planning to build, or has built, a nuclear weapon. For its part, Iran states that it is not building or thinking of building a nuclear weapon - and is prepared to allow full IAEA inspections to prove its point. It also stands firm and asserts its right to develop nuclear technology for peaceful means - i.e. electricity generation - a right it is granted as a signatory to the NPT (Nuclear Proliferation Treaty). But all of this counts for nought in the face of a persistent, relentless lie. It seems as if the human psyche is programmed to believe a repeated lie - when uttered by authority figures. It's a form of crude brainwashing, which politicians learn to use early on in their careers. Think back to Saddam Hussein again - when he was accused of harbouring WMD. Our leaders asserted he did have them. He asserted he did not. Who was telling the truth then? The best way to get a handle on this whole issue is to make an attempt to stand in another's shoes - Iran's shoes in this case. Just imagine yourself as an Iranian and consider your options. You live in a hostile environment. Your foes, Israel and the USA, are armed to the teeth and Israel is not a signatory to the NPT. It regularly threatens to attack you, and in fact has done so in the past. You ponder on the inconsistencies of this world - a world where other nations are allowed to develop nuclear power and nuclear weapons. A world where other countries regularly use force to achieve their objectives. And a world where such countries assume the right to tell your country what it can and cannot do. You are outraged. You believe that if it's good enough for other countries to develop their nuclear technology, to meet their energy needs, then it's good enough for Iran to do likewise. If pressed, you may even assert that even though your country has no intention of building nukes - you have the right to do so for self-defence, especially when facing aggressive, nuclear-armed foes. From your viewpoint, the growing world opinion against your country is a form of mass hypocrisy. Who decided that certain nations can browbeat and bully others into submission - to conform to standards which they themselves do not observe? Who decided who should or should not be able to develop nuclear power, or even a nuclear deterrent? Are you not a member of a sovereign nation - a country with certain rights, just like other countries? You look at America and you cannot understand it. While it builds its case against your country, it continues to support other nations which already have nuclear weapons, which are not signatories to the NPT, and which are often not even democracies. You revert to your religion to explain all this - and perhaps you're right. Perhaps the west really IS at war with Islam! Right now we've reached phase one of the strategy to militarily confront Iran - with the threat of sanctions and of it being referred to the United Nations Security Council. All this happened to Iraq as well. We've been there, done that. In this case, the US and its EU allies face some opposition - most likely from China and possibly Russia. China has an ongoing and friendly relationship with Iran - not to mention important economic and energy-related business dealings. China has the power to veto any UN Security Council resolution - and is now the focus of intense diplomatic pressure from the USA, in an attempt to bring them on board with the growing "consensus". We will hear a lot about this "consensus" in coming weeks and months. The next stage will likely involve the "uncovering" of new intelligence, which will "prove" that Iran is indeed operating a secret nuclear weapons programme. This will sway any doubters and lingering dissidents - and pull world opinion into line. The clincher may come with information obtained from certain Iranians themselves - perhaps defectors from the regime. Shades of Iraq all over again. The major media - Fox News, BBC, New York Times, The Washington Post and TV and newsprint media in general, will parrot the official line, and confirm our worst fears - that Iran really does have the capacity to threaten us, and is very likely to attack us in the future. We will be told this situation is NOT like Iraq, that it is a different ball game. And most will believe it. The only medium to offer any counter to the official line will, of course, be the internet - that damn, uncontrollable cyberspace! But when it comes to impact, the internet is still not capable of truly shaping world opinion. Yes, it's a haven for dissidents and independent thinkers - but they are still the minority, and a "fly in the ointment" as far as the campaign for total global information control is concerned. You and I will have no means of verifying this type of military intelligence of course, and will be faced with the choice of either accepting or rejecting it. But I know one thing, most people will accept it as true - simply because it is asserted by their rulers. It will be believed because it is stated by those in power - those who MUST be believed. God knows why, but that's the way it is. Each stage of this strategy will move the western powers ever closer to the final goal - that of attacking Iran. Any attack will likely not be the same as the war waged on Iraq, as that has been a disaster. Besides, the USA simply does not have the manpower to wage that type of ground war all over again. No, what is more likely is an attack on strategic and/or nuclear sites - a targeted aerial bombardment to "neutralise" Iran's nascent nuclear industry. The world will cheer. Another potential threat to world peace will have been taken out. Another victory in the war on terror! Or ... it could be a fatal conceit. It could trigger a war between Israel and Iran. It could be the beginning of a general Middle East conflagration. It could cause Iran to "trigger" its support base in Iraq, and lead to a general uprising against US forces in that region. It could lead to the world's first nuclear war. It could be the Armageddon that so may fundamentalist Christians believe is the essential precursor to a better world. And it could also be the catalyst that sends the global economy into a tailspin - and impacts on the entire world. Take your pick. But for the serious freedom seeker, war is an anathema. War is never a cause for celebration. As Randolph Bourne said, "War is the health of the state". War always benefits the state and its apparatus of control. Every war has strengthened the state's hand in public affairs and private life. And an ever-more powerful state is NEVER in the interest of the freedom seeker. So, in 2006, keep your wits about you. Keep your eyes open. Don't believe every word you read or are told. Seek alternative sources of information to at least provide a "second opinion". And most of all, remember that politicians DO lie. They've been caught out time and time again. Lying is the name of their game. There is simply no reason to have faith in them - and even less reason to follow them blindly into the abyss. The only possible cause for long range optimism in all this, is that making the same mistake over and over again, and reliving (as in Groundhog Day) the "worst" day in our collective lives - in mayhem and war - could lead us to seek a "better" form of social order in the future. It could lead to a significant number of the world's people rejecting the warfare state as the optimum organisational model for a modern, progressive, free and peaceful world. I live in hope. Yours in freedom David MacGregor ------------------------------------------------------------------------ -- David MacGregor operates an information service which is designed for all those who seek more practical and financial freedom in their lives. http://www.sovereignlife.com ------------------------------------------------------------------------ -- ??? ??? ??? -------------------------------------------------------------------- mail2web - Check your email from the web at http://mail2web.com/ . From rafal.smigrodzki at gmail.com Tue Jan 17 01:36:57 2006 From: rafal.smigrodzki at gmail.com (Rafal Smigrodzki) Date: Mon, 16 Jan 2006 20:36:57 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] I don't need an umbrella In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <7641ddc60601161736m4e7f4fbw8881ddc52ac9b476@mail.gmail.com> On 1/16/06, Hughes, James J. wrote: WTA is an organization that includes extropians along > with singularitarians, religious transhumanists, independents, > democratic transhumanists, technoprogressives and so on. So we are an > umbrella in terms of inclusion. ### As the preceding discussion has abundantly shown, this is not the case, in at least two meanings. Firstly, "umbrella" implies being on top or above, if only by reference to the common accessory of that name, and its usage does imply something more that being ecumenical. Secondly, WTA is only ecumenical in its charter but not in its daily practice, since it practices political discrimination among its members. I note your choice of analogy, "like mushing together the UN and the House of Representatives". These are not separate but equal entities which again gives a glimpse of the true intended meaning of "umbrella", and explains the basis for WTA's pretense to represent the transhumanist community as a whole. I'd rather say that conflating ExI and WTA is like mushing together the House of Representatives and the Duma. Rafal From user at dhp.com Tue Jan 17 05:55:26 2006 From: user at dhp.com (user) Date: Tue, 17 Jan 2006 00:55:26 -0500 (EST) Subject: [extropy-chat] nuclear non-proliferation as energy strategy ? Message-ID: Lost in a lot of the Iran nuke coverage was an overture by the Russian government to essentially co-locate the Iranian refinement centers inside of Russia. It would allow Iran to do the work they are purporting to do, while keeping the refinement (and potential weapons) out of their hands. All well and good. I am curious though ... if the world truly is moving away from fossil fuels and (perhaps) towards more and more technologically advanced forms of nuclear power ... what does that mean for the balance of energy haves and have nots when the major industrialized nations, under the guise of the UN and IAEA, etc., can limit the use of those technologies ? Is it perhaps an unintended consequence of nuclear non-proliferation that only rich, developed countries will have access to modern forms of energy production ? Is it perhaps _not_ an unintended consequence ? Do the US and EU dream of selling electricity to arabs for petrodollars ? From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Tue Jan 17 11:52:50 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Tue, 17 Jan 2006 06:52:50 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] nuclear non-proliferation as energy strategy ? In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On 1/17/06, user wrote: > > ... what does that mean for the balance of energy haves > and have nots when the major industrialized nations, under the guise of > the UN and IAEA, etc., can limit the use of those technologies ? Actually, as the article recently cited by Samantha points out, signing the NPT gives nations the freedom to perform uranium enrichment for peaceful applications (such as as power production). Iran has signed the treaty. Israel, India and Pakistan have not. Iran at this point seems to have the designs and parts for the centrifuges required to perform uranium enrichment. The problem comes down to the fact that it is a relatively small step from enriching uranium for generating electricity to producing highly enriched uranium for nuclear weapons. Generally speaking until Iran runs out of oil it seems to make little economic sense for it to be building nuclear power reactors. Is it perhaps an unintended consequence of nuclear non-proliferation that > only rich, developed countries will have access to modern forms of energy > production ? Actually, if you look at the maps at [1] you can see that there are nuclear reactors all around the world including some countries that could be considered "less" developed. Is it perhaps _not_ an unintended consequence ? Do the US and EU dream > of selling electricity to arabs for petrodollars ? Electricity doesn't transport well over long distances due to the transmission line losses. It is also true that countries are unlikely to rely foreign sources for a critical resource such as electricity. One can too easily end up with situations similar to the U.S. 1970s oil shortages or the recent Ukraine/EU situation with Russian natural gas supplies. Robert 1. http://www.insc.anl.gov/pwrmaps/ -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From brian_a_lee at hotmail.com Tue Jan 17 14:52:55 2006 From: brian_a_lee at hotmail.com (Brian Lee) Date: Tue, 17 Jan 2006 09:52:55 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] nuclear non-proliferation as energy strategy ? In-Reply-To: Message-ID: It is possible to have nuke plants without weapons refining capability. I don't think it's the nuclear power that US/EU is freakng out about. It's Iran having the ability to create weapans grade plutonium along with nuclear power. BAL >From: user >Reply-To: ExI chat list >To: extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org >Subject: [extropy-chat] nuclear non-proliferation as energy strategy ? >Date: Tue, 17 Jan 2006 00:55:26 -0500 (EST) > > >Lost in a lot of the Iran nuke coverage was an overture by the Russian >government to essentially co-locate the Iranian refinement centers inside >of Russia. It would allow Iran to do the work they are purporting to do, >while keeping the refinement (and potential weapons) out of their hands. > >All well and good. > >I am curious though ... if the world truly is moving away from fossil >fuels and (perhaps) towards more and more technologically advanced forms >of nuclear power ... what does that mean for the balance of energy haves >and have nots when the major industrialized nations, under the guise of >the UN and IAEA, etc., can limit the use of those technologies ? > >Is it perhaps an unintended consequence of nuclear non-proliferation that >only rich, developed countries will have access to modern forms of energy >production ? > >Is it perhaps _not_ an unintended consequence ? Do the US and EU dream >of selling electricity to arabs for petrodollars ? > >_______________________________________________ >extropy-chat mailing list >extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org >http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Tue Jan 17 15:19:19 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Tue, 17 Jan 2006 10:19:19 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] nuclear non-proliferation as energy strategy ? In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On 1/17/06, Brian Lee wrote: > > It is possible to have nuke plants without weapons refining capability. I > don't think it's the nuclear power that US/EU is freakng out about. It's > Iran having the ability to create weapans grade plutonium along with > nuclear > power. Actually, I don't think plutonium is the main concern. For that you not only need a nuclear reactor but a fuel reprocessing plant (such as the PUREX plant which used to operate at the Hanford Nuclear Reservation in Washington). I believe the last information I read indicated that the Iranian's didn't have an operational nuclear reactor and the Russians were running behind on helping them finish it. (Not that it made much sense to do so without any fuel unless one were puchasing it from a nuclear capable nation, most probably Russia or China). Though plutonium can be used to make relatively small nuclear weapons, it is difficult to work with. It requires more highly enriched uranium (HEU) to make a weapon but to produce that all you have to do is take the normal enrichment process for reactor grade fuel (that is what the centrifuges are for) and just run the cycle somewhat longer to get a higher enrichment level (at least that is my understanding). It would presumably require a very intrusive monitoring process to guarantee that the Iranian's were not siphoning off enriched uranium and turning it into HEU for weapons given their history of hidden/underground nuclear facilities. Robert -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From brian_a_lee at hotmail.com Tue Jan 17 16:00:20 2006 From: brian_a_lee at hotmail.com (Brian Lee) Date: Tue, 17 Jan 2006 11:00:20 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] nuclear non-proliferation as energy strategy ? In-Reply-To: Message-ID: The last plan I saw was that the EU/US wanted to provide the enriched uranium to fuel Iran's future reactors. Iran was against that and so we're at where we are today. So I guess there's no solution that gives Iran the capability to make nuclear fuel without the capability to make weapons grade material. BAL >From: Robert Bradbury >Reply-To: ExI chat list >To: ExI chat list >Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] nuclear non-proliferation as energy strategy ? >Date: Tue, 17 Jan 2006 10:19:19 -0500 > >On 1/17/06, Brian Lee wrote: > > > > It is possible to have nuke plants without weapons refining capability. >I > > don't think it's the nuclear power that US/EU is freakng out about. It's > > Iran having the ability to create weapans grade plutonium along with > > nuclear > > power. > > >Actually, I don't think plutonium is the main concern. For that you not >only need a nuclear reactor but a fuel reprocessing plant (such as the >PUREX plant which used to operate at the Hanford Nuclear Reservation in >Washington). I believe the last information I read indicated that the >Iranian's didn't have an operational nuclear reactor and the Russians were >running behind on helping them finish it. (Not that it made much sense to >do so without any fuel unless one were puchasing it from a nuclear capable >nation, most probably Russia or China). > >Though plutonium can be used to make relatively small nuclear weapons, it >is >difficult to work with. It requires more highly enriched uranium (HEU) to >make a weapon but to produce that all you have to do is take the normal >enrichment process for reactor grade fuel (that is what the centrifuges are >for) and just run the cycle somewhat longer to get a higher enrichment >level >(at least that is my understanding). It would presumably require a very >intrusive monitoring process to guarantee that the Iranian's were not >siphoning off enriched uranium and turning it into HEU for weapons given >their history of hidden/underground nuclear facilities. > >Robert >_______________________________________________ >extropy-chat mailing list >extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org >http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat From user at dhp.com Tue Jan 17 16:23:40 2006 From: user at dhp.com (user) Date: Tue, 17 Jan 2006 11:23:40 -0500 (EST) Subject: [extropy-chat] nuclear non-proliferation as energy strategy ? In-Reply-To: Message-ID: On Tue, 17 Jan 2006, Robert Bradbury wrote: > Actually, as the article recently cited by Samantha points out, signing the > NPT gives nations the freedom to perform uranium enrichment for peaceful > applications (such as as power production). Iran has signed the treaty. > Israel, India and Pakistan have not. Iran at this point seems to have the > designs and parts for the centrifuges required to perform uranium > enrichment. The problem comes down to the fact that it is a relatively > small step from enriching uranium for generating electricity to producing > highly enriched uranium for nuclear weapons. > > Generally speaking until Iran runs out of oil it seems to make little > economic sense for it to be building nuclear power reactors. Yes, this is what has confused me. So they have signed the treaty, and they are attempting actions that fall within the treaty ... So two things: 1. We are keeping nuclear energy development away from people we don't like, regardless of whether they are playing by _our_ rules or not. 2. Is it really true that signatories can pursue modern nuclear power generation ? Can they develop modern pebble bed nukes, etc. ? Or does that fall outside of what is allowed. Again, my previous analysis may not apply to Iran, but it sure looks like we are trying to keep nuclear power generation (or at least modern forms of it - see #2 above) out of peoples hands, regardless of the weapons implications. From user at dhp.com Tue Jan 17 16:25:36 2006 From: user at dhp.com (user) Date: Tue, 17 Jan 2006 11:25:36 -0500 (EST) Subject: [extropy-chat] nuclear non-proliferation as energy strategy ? In-Reply-To: Message-ID: On Tue, 17 Jan 2006, Brian Lee wrote: > The last plan I saw was that the EU/US wanted to provide the enriched > uranium to fuel Iran's future reactors. Iran was against that and so we're > at where we are today. So I guess there's no solution that gives Iran the > capability to make nuclear fuel without the capability to make weapons grade > material. Which seems sensible from a "we're scared of brown people" standpoint, but from Irans standpoint ... I would reject that plan as well. If they really were (a big if) interested in modern electrical power infrastructure to tie their developing country to, why shackle yourself to the goodwill of others to provide the necessary fuel ? Again, it seems like a perfect role reversal, and if I were Iran I would balk too... From amara at amara.com Tue Jan 17 16:53:45 2006 From: amara at amara.com (Amara Graps) Date: Tue, 17 Jan 2006 17:53:45 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] Pluto New Horizons launch -getting ready Message-ID: The spacecraft is on the launch pad, the launch is presently scheduled to be in about one hour. You can see the NASA broadcast here: http://www.nasa.gov/multimedia/nasatv/ (*) Pluto New Horizons http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Horizons Amara From kevin at kevinfreels.com Tue Jan 17 18:03:46 2006 From: kevin at kevinfreels.com (kevinfreels.com) Date: Tue, 17 Jan 2006 12:03:46 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] Pluto New Horizons launch -getting ready References: Message-ID: <00fc01c61b90$5cf52c90$640fa8c0@kevin> We should launch more of these..... 9 hours to the moon? 1 yr to Jupiter? That's just too cool! ----- Original Message ----- From: "Amara Graps" To: ; Sent: Tuesday, January 17, 2006 10:53 AM Subject: [extropy-chat] Pluto New Horizons launch -getting ready > The spacecraft is on the launch pad, the launch > is presently scheduled to be in about one hour. > > You can see the NASA broadcast here: > http://www.nasa.gov/multimedia/nasatv/ > > (*) Pluto New Horizons > http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Horizons > > > Amara > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat > From dirk.bruere at gmail.com Tue Jan 17 18:15:46 2006 From: dirk.bruere at gmail.com (Dirk Bruere) Date: Tue, 17 Jan 2006 18:15:46 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] nuclear non-proliferation as energy strategy ? In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On 1/17/06, Brian Lee wrote: > > It is possible to have nuke plants without weapons refining capability. I > don't think it's the nuclear power that US/EU is freakng out about. It's > Iran having the ability to create weapans grade plutonium along with > nuclear > power. > > Of course it is. They'd be stupid not to take this opportunity to get nukes. The US is bogged down with the Iraq invasion and unlikely to risk anything substantial in the near future. They have also seen that having nukes is the only guarantee of *not* being invaded. See N Korea for details. Dirk -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From brian_a_lee at hotmail.com Tue Jan 17 18:26:12 2006 From: brian_a_lee at hotmail.com (Brian Lee) Date: Tue, 17 Jan 2006 13:26:12 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] nuclear non-proliferation as energy strategy ? In-Reply-To: Message-ID: I don't think Iran's race has anything to do with it (re: the "brown people" comment). It has more to do with their terrorist nation status. Maybe it's just me, but Iran having nuclear weapons scares me. Nuclear power doesn't. I think it's smart for Iran to pursue nuclear power as it may take 20 years to really get serious power output and they need to start now if they want to be ready when the oil is gone. But I don't think Iran has shown itself responsible enough to have nuclear weapons. BAL >From: user >To: ExI chat list >Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] nuclear non-proliferation as energy strategy ? >Date: Tue, 17 Jan 2006 11:25:36 -0500 (EST) > > > >On Tue, 17 Jan 2006, Brian Lee wrote: > > > The last plan I saw was that the EU/US wanted to provide the enriched > > uranium to fuel Iran's future reactors. Iran was against that and so >we're > > at where we are today. So I guess there's no solution that gives Iran >the > > capability to make nuclear fuel without the capability to make weapons >grade > > material. > > >Which seems sensible from a "we're scared of brown people" standpoint, but >from Irans standpoint ... I would reject that plan as well. If they >really were (a big if) interested in modern electrical power >infrastructure to tie their developing country to, why shackle yourself to >the goodwill of others to provide the necessary fuel ? > >Again, it seems like a perfect role reversal, and if I were Iran I would >balk too... > >_______________________________________________ >extropy-chat mailing list >extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org >http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat From dirk.bruere at gmail.com Tue Jan 17 18:30:42 2006 From: dirk.bruere at gmail.com (Dirk Bruere) Date: Tue, 17 Jan 2006 18:30:42 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] nuclear non-proliferation as energy strategy ? In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On 1/17/06, Brian Lee wrote: > > I don't think Iran's race has anything to do with it (re: the "brown > people" > comment). It has more to do with their terrorist nation status. Maybe it's > just me, but Iran having nuclear weapons scares me. Nuclear power doesn't. > I > think it's smart for Iran to pursue nuclear power as it may take 20 years > to > really get serious power output and they need to start now if they want to > be ready when the oil is gone. But I don't think Iran has shown itself > responsible enough to have nuclear weapons. > > Well, Iraq is a very 'in-your-face' demo of what can happen if you *don't* have WMDs Dirk -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From kevin at kevinfreels.com Tue Jan 17 18:39:40 2006 From: kevin at kevinfreels.com (kevinfreels.com) Date: Tue, 17 Jan 2006 12:39:40 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] Pluto New Horizons launch -getting ready References: <00fc01c61b90$5cf52c90$640fa8c0@kevin> Message-ID: <013101c61b95$60d27480$640fa8c0@kevin> The launch was delayed until 1:45 EST. That's about 10 minutes from now. I have it on my bigscreen with my surround sound on and I began to wonder........why aren't they broadcasting something as cool as a launch in surround sound? You would think someone like McDonald's would pay for the surround ability and broadcast in exchange for a logo on the side of the rocket. > > > The spacecraft is on the launch pad, the launch > > is presently scheduled to be in about one hour. > > > > You can see the NASA broadcast here: > > http://www.nasa.gov/multimedia/nasatv/ > > > > (*) Pluto New Horizons > > http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Horizons > > > > > > Amara > > _______________________________________________ > > extropy-chat mailing list > > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat > > > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat > From brian_a_lee at hotmail.com Tue Jan 17 18:58:51 2006 From: brian_a_lee at hotmail.com (Brian Lee) Date: Tue, 17 Jan 2006 13:58:51 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] nuclear non-proliferation as energy strategy ? In-Reply-To: Message-ID: Exactly, that's why the US and Europe want to stop Iran from getting nukes. BAL >From: Dirk Bruere >To: ExI chat list >Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] nuclear non-proliferation as energy strategy ? >Date: Tue, 17 Jan 2006 18:30:42 +0000 > >On 1/17/06, Brian Lee wrote: > > > > I don't think Iran's race has anything to do with it (re: the "brown > > people" > > comment). It has more to do with their terrorist nation status. Maybe >it's > > just me, but Iran having nuclear weapons scares me. Nuclear power >doesn't. > > I > > think it's smart for Iran to pursue nuclear power as it may take 20 >years > > to > > really get serious power output and they need to start now if they want >to > > be ready when the oil is gone. But I don't think Iran has shown itself > > responsible enough to have nuclear weapons. > > > > >Well, Iraq is a very 'in-your-face' demo of what can happen if you *don't* >have WMDs > >Dirk >_______________________________________________ >extropy-chat mailing list >extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org >http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat From sjatkins at mac.com Tue Jan 17 19:03:32 2006 From: sjatkins at mac.com (Samantha Atkins) Date: Tue, 17 Jan 2006 11:03:32 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] nuclear non-proliferation as energy strategy ? In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <8DA079EC-0957-43A1-9DBB-E12047278FBF@mac.com> On Jan 17, 2006, at 3:52 AM, Robert Bradbury wrote: > > On 1/17/06, user wrote: > ... what does that mean for the balance of energy haves > and have nots when the major industrialized nations, under the > guise of > the UN and IAEA, etc., can limit the use of those technologies ? > > Actually, as the article recently cited by Samantha points out, > signing the NPT gives nations the freedom to perform uranium > enrichment for peaceful applications (such as as power > production). Iran has signed the treaty. Israel, India and > Pakistan have not. Iran at this point seems to have the designs > and parts for the centrifuges required to perform uranium > enrichment. The problem comes down to the fact that it is a > relatively small step from enriching uranium for generating > electricity to producing highly enriched uranium for nuclear weapons. > According to other recent articles Iran will not be in a position to buid its own nukes, if it wants to, until 2009 at minimum. That "small step" takes considerable time and dedication. Any half decent oversight and inspection would make it much more difficult if not impossible. So it is a bit early to scare folks with an Iranian nuclear bomb wielding Iranian bogey man. It would be very misguided if we set policy on the supposed immediacy of such fears. > Generally speaking until Iran runs out of oil it seems to make > little economic sense for it to be building nuclear power reactors. On the contrary, nuclear is cleaner and oil sells to others really well. Bottom line is that a sovereign country does not have to explain its energy decisions. - samantha -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From sjatkins at mac.com Tue Jan 17 19:06:02 2006 From: sjatkins at mac.com (Samantha Atkins) Date: Tue, 17 Jan 2006 11:06:02 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] nuclear non-proliferation as energy strategy ? In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <167B1C1F-B426-4042-BAF8-CD8204F116AA@mac.com> The freaking out is more likely to be about Iranian plans to create a Euro dominated oil market (bourse) in March. At least that is likely to be a source of the US freaking out. Any major move to oil no longer being sold in terms of US currency would be very destabilizing for the dollar. - s On Jan 17, 2006, at 6:52 AM, Brian Lee wrote: > It is possible to have nuke plants without weapons refining > capability. I don't think it's the nuclear power that US/EU is > freakng out about. It's Iran having the ability to create weapans > grade plutonium along with nuclear power. > > BAL > >> From: user >> Reply-To: ExI chat list >> To: extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org >> Subject: [extropy-chat] nuclear non-proliferation as energy >> strategy ? >> Date: Tue, 17 Jan 2006 00:55:26 -0500 (EST) >> >> >> Lost in a lot of the Iran nuke coverage was an overture by the >> Russian >> government to essentially co-locate the Iranian refinement centers >> inside >> of Russia. It would allow Iran to do the work they are purporting >> to do, >> while keeping the refinement (and potential weapons) out of their >> hands. >> >> All well and good. >> >> I am curious though ... if the world truly is moving away from fossil >> fuels and (perhaps) towards more and more technologically advanced >> forms >> of nuclear power ... what does that mean for the balance of energy >> haves >> and have nots when the major industrialized nations, under the >> guise of >> the UN and IAEA, etc., can limit the use of those technologies ? >> >> Is it perhaps an unintended consequence of nuclear non- >> proliferation that >> only rich, developed countries will have access to modern forms of >> energy >> production ? >> >> Is it perhaps _not_ an unintended consequence ? Do the US and EU >> dream >> of selling electricity to arabs for petrodollars ? >> >> _______________________________________________ >> extropy-chat mailing list >> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org >> http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat > > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat From sjatkins at mac.com Tue Jan 17 19:35:43 2006 From: sjatkins at mac.com (Samantha Atkins) Date: Tue, 17 Jan 2006 11:35:43 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] nuclear non-proliferation as energy strategy ? In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: We slap a label on a country and expect the normal rules not to apply. Very neat. A much scarier country that already has nukes is Pakistan. But they are our good buds. Israel is a major international outlaw by the number and scope of UN resolutions they have violated but they have had nukes since at least the sixties and are one of the most heavily militarized countries per capita on the planet. All secular folks in Israel are bound by law to support a huge and growing religious caste. The religious caste has tremendous power. Israel is arguably not a secular State in practice. Yet they are certainly our good friends. So the issue does not seem to come down to a State being in good repute or being in its government cleanly secular. State involved in terrorism? Saudi Arabia is heavily involved in terrorism. Most of the 911 hijackers were Saudi. But they are also our buds. We even edited out the parts of the 911 commission report that might have made them look bad. So tell me again why Iran having nuclear power and maybe some day being able to produce nuclear bombs is a major crisis. - samantha On Jan 17, 2006, at 10:26 AM, Brian Lee wrote: > I don't think Iran's race has anything to do with it (re: the > "brown people" comment). It has more to do with their terrorist > nation status. Maybe it's just me, but Iran having nuclear weapons > scares me. Nuclear power doesn't. I think it's smart for Iran to > pursue nuclear power as it may take 20 years to really get serious > power output and they need to start now if they want to be ready > when the oil is gone. But I don't think Iran has shown itself > responsible enough to have nuclear weapons. > > BAL > >> From: user >> To: ExI chat list >> Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] nuclear non-proliferation as energy >> strategy ? >> Date: Tue, 17 Jan 2006 11:25:36 -0500 (EST) >> >> >> >> On Tue, 17 Jan 2006, Brian Lee wrote: >> >> > The last plan I saw was that the EU/US wanted to provide the >> enriched >> > uranium to fuel Iran's future reactors. Iran was against that >> and so we're >> > at where we are today. So I guess there's no solution that gives >> Iran the >> > capability to make nuclear fuel without the capability to make >> weapons grade >> > material. >> >> >> Which seems sensible from a "we're scared of brown people" >> standpoint, but >> from Irans standpoint ... I would reject that plan as well. If they >> really were (a big if) interested in modern electrical power >> infrastructure to tie their developing country to, why shackle >> yourself to >> the goodwill of others to provide the necessary fuel ? >> >> Again, it seems like a perfect role reversal, and if I were Iran I >> would >> balk too... >> >> _______________________________________________ >> extropy-chat mailing list >> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org >> http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat > > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat From thespike at satx.rr.com Tue Jan 17 19:56:57 2006 From: thespike at satx.rr.com (Damien Broderick) Date: Tue, 17 Jan 2006 13:56:57 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] 'The Revenge of Gaia' by James Lovelock Message-ID: <6.2.1.2.0.20060117135625.01e4b298@pop-server.satx.rr.com> 'We Are Past the Point of No Return': James Lovelock MICHAEL MCCARTHY, Environment Editor - The Independent (U.K.) Thirty years ago, the scientist James Lovelock worked out that the Earth possessed a planetary-scale control system which kept the environment fit for life. He called it Gaia, and the theory has become widely accepted. Now, he believes mankind's abuse of the environment is making that mechanism work against us. His astonishing conclusion - that climate change is already insoluble, and life on Earth will never be the same again. The world has already passed the point of no return for climate change, and civilisation as we know it is now unlikely to survive, according to James Lovelock, the scientist and green guru who conceived the idea of Gaia - the Earth which keeps itself fit for life. In a profoundly pessimistic new assessment, published in today's Independent, Professor Lovelock suggests that efforts to counter global warming cannot succeed, and that, in effect, it is already too late. The world and human society face disaster to a worse extent, and on a faster timescale, than almost anybody realises, he believes. He writes: " Before this century is over, billions of us will die, and the few breeding pairs of people that survive will be in the Arctic where the climate remains tolerable." In making such a statement, far gloomier than any yet made by a scientist of comparable international standing, Professor Lovelock accepts he is going out on a limb. But as the man who conceived the first wholly new way of looking at life on Earth since Charles Darwin, he feels his own analysis of what is happening leaves him no choice. He believes that it is the self-regulating mechanism of Gaia itself - increasingly accepted by other scientists worldwide, although they prefer to term it the Earth System - which, perversely, will ensure that the warming cannot be mastered. This is because the system contains myriad feedback mechanisms which in the past have acted in concert to keep the Earth much cooler than it otherwise would be. Now, however, they will come together to amplify the warming being caused by human activities such as transport and industry through huge emissions of greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide (CO2 ). It means that the harmful consequences of human beings damaging the living planet's ancient regulatory system will be non-linear - in other words, likely to accelerate uncontrollably. He terms this phenomenon "The Revenge of Gaia" and examines it in detail in a new book with that title, to be published next month. The uniqueness of the Lovelock viewpoint is that it is holistic, rather than reductionist. Although he is a committed supporter of current research into climate change, especially at Britain's Hadley Centre, he is not looking at individual facets of how the climate behaves, as other scientists inevitably are. Rather, he is looking at how the whole control system of the Earth behaves when put under stress. Professor Lovelock, who conceived the idea of Gaia in the 1970s while examining the possibility of life on Mars for Nasa in the US, has been warning of the dangers of climate change since major concerns about it first began nearly 20 years ago. He was one of a select group of scientists who gave an initial briefing on global warming to Margaret Thatcher's Cabinet at 10 Downing Street in April 1989. His concerns have increased steadily since then, as evidence of a warming climate has mounted. For example, he shared the alarm of many scientists at the news last September that the ice covering the Arctic Ocean is now melting so fast that in 2005 it reached a historic low point. Two years ago he sparked a major controversy with an article in The Independent calling on environmentalists to drop their long-standing opposition to nuclear power, which does not produce the greenhouses gases of conventional power stations. Global warming was proceeding so fast that only a major expansion of nuclear power could bring it under control, he said. Most of the Green movement roundly rejected his call, and does so still. Now his concerns have reached a peak - and have a new emphasis. Rather than calling for further ways of countering climate change, he is calling on governments in Britain and elsewhere to begin large-scale preparations for surviving what he now sees as inevitable - in his own phrase today, "a hell of a climate", likely to be in Europe up to 8C hotter than it is today. In his book's concluding chapter, he writes: "What should a sensible European government be doing now? I think we have little option but to prepare for the worst, and assume that we have passed the threshold." And in today's Independent he writes: "We will do our best to survive, but sadly I cannot see the United States or the emerging economies of China and India cutting back in time, and they are the main source of [CO2] emissions. The worst will happen ..." He goes on: "We have to keep in mind the awesome pace of change and realise how little time is left to act, and then each community and nation must find the best use of the resources they have to sustain civilisation for as long as they can." He believes that the world's governments should plan to secure energy and food supplies in the global hothouse, and defences against the expected rise in sea levels. The scientist's vision of what human society may ultimately be reduced to through climate change is " a broken rabble led by brutal warlords." Professor Lovelock draws attention to one aspect of the warming threat in particular, which is that the expected temperature rise is currently being held back artificially by a global aerosol - a layer of dust in the atmosphere right around the planet's northern hemisphere - which is the product of the world's industry. This shields us from some of the sun's radiation in a phenomenon which is known as "global dimming" and is thought to be holding the global temperature down by several degrees. But with a severe industrial downturn, the aerosol could fall out of the atmosphere in a very short time, and the global temperature could take a sudden enormous leap upwards. One of the most striking ideas in his book is that of "a guidebook for global warming survivors" aimed at the humans who would still be struggling to exist after a total societal collapse. Written, not in electronic form, but "on durable paper with long-lasting print", it would contain the basic accumulated scientific knowledge of humanity, much of it utterly taken for granted by us now, but originally won only after a hard struggle - such as our place in the solar system, or the fact that bacteria and viruses cause infectious diseases. Rough guide to a planet in jeopardy Global warming, caused principally by the large-scale emissions of industrial gases such as carbon dioxide (CO2), is almost certainly the greatest threat that mankind has ever faced, because it puts a question mark over the very habitability of the Earth. Over the coming decades soaring temperatures will mean agriculture may become unviable over huge areas of the world where people are already poor and hungry; water supplies for millions or even billions may fail. Rising sea levels will destroy substantial coastal areas in low-lying countries such as Bangladesh, at the very moment when their populations are mushrooming. Numberless environmental refugees will overwhelm the capacity of any agency, or indeed any country, to cope, while modern urban infrastructure will face devastation from powerful extreme weather events, such as Hurricane Katrina which hit New Orleans last summer. The international community accepts the reality of global warming, supported by the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. In its last report, in 2001, the IPCC said global average temperatures were likely to rise by up to 5.8C by 2100. In high latitudes, such as Britain, the rise is likely to be much higher, perhaps 8C. The warming seems to be proceeding faster than anticipated and in the IPCC's next report, 2007, the timescale may be shortened. Yet there still remains an assumption that climate change is controllable, if CO2 emissions can be curbed. Lovelock is warning: think again. 'The Revenge of Gaia' by James Lovelock is published by Penguin on 2 February, price ?16.99 From kevin at kevinfreels.com Tue Jan 17 20:14:11 2006 From: kevin at kevinfreels.com (kevinfreels.com) Date: Tue, 17 Jan 2006 14:14:11 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] Looking for examples of naturally evolved X-ray vision? Message-ID: <018b01c61ba2$94ebc890$640fa8c0@kevin> I was helping my daughter come up with some ideas for a school science project and I stumbled onto a couple unknowns. Animals have evolved a wide variety of abilities to seek food and avoid predators. Echo-location, color vision, and compound eyes are just a few. All provide important information regarding the immediate surroundings. My daughter asked me why the visible light spectrum IS the visible light spectrum. After all, animals hear at a wide range of frequencies that humans cannot, so why not have the same thing occurring in vision? Are there animals with X-ray vision? My first reaction was to say "no". After all, once you leave the visible spectrum, light becomes considerable less usefull to the purposes of survival. For example, what good is an X-ray if you see right through the animal that is hunting you? I guess a predator that was invisible to visible light but detectable by X-rays would do the trick, but such a thing is impossible (except for some high-tech cloaking and imaging system). I could think of no reason that X-ray vision would be selected for. Of course, there is random chance, but eyes and the brain's ability to interpret what it is seeing are tough developments to attribute to chance. So I started to look for information on this. According to a small atricle in Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roentgen_Rays), Brandes and Roentgen discovered that X-rays ARE visible to the dark adapted human naked eye. I really did not know this although I am sure some of you were aware of it. Now I am wondering if anyone knows any examples of a natural biological organism that has developed and improved upon the abillity to see X-rays. Google has turned up nearly blank. And if the ability is there, how could it be built upon and used as we take evolution into our own hands? -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Tue Jan 17 20:30:23 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Tue, 17 Jan 2006 15:30:23 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] nuclear non-proliferation as energy strategy ? In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: > 1. We are keeping nuclear energy development away from people we don't > like, regardless of whether they are playing by _our_ rules or not. You have to be specific about what you mean when you say "nuclear energy development" (see below). 2. Is it really true that signatories can pursue modern nuclear power > generation ? Can they develop modern pebble bed nukes, etc. ? Or does > that fall outside of what is allowed. Power generation certainly. Its the fuel cycle -- uranium enrichment and used fuel rod reprocessing that people become concerned with because they give you the raw materials (HEU and plutonium respectively) from which weapons can be constructed. Again, my previous analysis may not apply to Iran, but it sure looks like > we are trying to keep nuclear power generation (or at least modern forms > of it - see #2 above) out of peoples hands, regardless of the weapons > implications. I don't think that is true. As Russia is advising on (building?) their nuclear reactor you can't really make that claim. I also think there was an understanding by the U.S. & E.U. that Russia would supply the fuel and handle the fuel rod reprocessing. If they wanted to block power generation they would either have blocked the reactor (they tried unsuccessfully to do that when Congress passed the law that the U.S. would not buy Russian "products" such as Soyuz flights to the ISS) or they might have blocked the sale of any raw uranium to Iran at all. I do not believe that Iran is particularly "rich" in uranium though a quick google suggests that it has 3-10 uranium mines. Most of its uranium is being bought from the Chinese I believe. I don't think you have to look for "sinister"motives involved. The concerns are pretty much the same with Iran as they were/are with North Korea. Once you allow "irrational" people to develop nuclear weapons, one can potentially be held hostage by them. It is reasonably clear that North Korea is effectively holding South Korea hostage and indirectly Japan and the U.S. Now whether you believe Iran could and would accomplish something similar is a matter of debate (though I'm not sure that this list would be the proper forum). Robert -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From alfio.puglisi at gmail.com Tue Jan 17 21:10:39 2006 From: alfio.puglisi at gmail.com (Alfio Puglisi) Date: Tue, 17 Jan 2006 22:10:39 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] Looking for examples of naturally evolved X-ray vision? In-Reply-To: <018b01c61ba2$94ebc890$640fa8c0@kevin> References: <018b01c61ba2$94ebc890$640fa8c0@kevin> Message-ID: <4902d9990601171310k86adc07of26ccda4bad9003@mail.gmail.com> On 1/17/06, kevinfreels.com wrote: > > My first reaction was to say "no". After all, once you leave the visible > spectrum, light becomes considerable less usefull to the purposes of > survival. Good infrared vision (in the body temperature range) would be quite valuable for both nocturnal predators and prey. Since they don't have it, my hypothesis is that the tecnological obstacles to build a good infrared biological camera are too big to be overcome by evolution. Liquid nitrogen-cooled eyes anyone? The same could be said about X-rays, with the difference that the fancy high-energy nature of those rays could be exploited by a number of side effects on ordinary, yellow-and-green-sensing eyes. The Wikipedia article names a few. Alfio From pharos at gmail.com Tue Jan 17 21:15:26 2006 From: pharos at gmail.com (BillK) Date: Tue, 17 Jan 2006 21:15:26 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Looking for examples of naturally evolved X-ray vision? In-Reply-To: <018b01c61ba2$94ebc890$640fa8c0@kevin> References: <018b01c61ba2$94ebc890$640fa8c0@kevin> Message-ID: On 1/17/06, kevinfreels.com wrote: > > I was helping my daughter come up with some ideas for a school science > project and I stumbled onto a couple unknowns. > > Animals have evolved a wide variety of abilities to seek food and avoid > predators. Echo-location, color vision, and compound eyes are just a few. > All provide important information regarding the immediate surroundings. My > daughter asked me why the visible light spectrum IS the visible light > spectrum. After all, animals hear at a wide range of frequencies that humans > cannot, so why not have the same thing occurring in vision? Are there > animals with X-ray vision? > You need to read up on 'Evolution of Eyes'. Try: Read a few more as well, to get other opinions. Basically, he says: Why Do We See What We See? All eyes are sensitive to a common, rather narrow range of wavelengths within the broad spectrum of energy produced by the sun. Why is this? Why can't we see more of this spectrum? The most likely explanation is that eyes first evolved in animals living in water, and, water, due to its fundamental nature, filters out all but two quite narrow ranges of electromagnetic (EM) radiation. As shown in figure 1, the range of EM radiation 'visible' for most organisms is a narrow, sharply defined band, ranging from the very short wavelengths we think of as having a blue color to longer wavelengths we identify as red. It is particularly narrow when compared with the full range of EM radiation produced by the sun. In our language, we divide this narrow range of perceived wavelengths into seven names (red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, violet), also called spectral colors. As is clear from the figure, in this very narrow band, EM radiation penetrates water better than the adjacent wavelengths by about 6 orders of magnitude. So, since our ultimate ancestors existed in a watery slime, the only radiation to penetrate water must have been the primary selective force. As we see now, this early selection for the narrow spectrum ultimately drove the evolution of biochemical mechanisms sensitive to these colors of light. This is true both for perception of light by animals and for photosynthesis by plants. Now, five billion years later, though many animal species have moved onto land where the sun's full spectrum is available, eyes remain sensitive only to this narrow region. That limit comes now, not from the filtering properties of water but rather from the biochemical mechanisms that evolved in response to the limited wavelengths penetrating the original slime. *Once selection started organisms down that path, mechanisms that evolved limited future options.* *(My emphasis)* It is true that many insect species as well as some species of fish and birds can 'see' in the ultraviolet, or very short wavelength end of the visible spectrum. However, they do so with slight modifications of the same biochemical system that the rest of us use to see, not with new mechanisms. BillK From dirk.bruere at gmail.com Tue Jan 17 21:16:14 2006 From: dirk.bruere at gmail.com (Dirk Bruere) Date: Tue, 17 Jan 2006 21:16:14 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Looking for examples of naturally evolved X-ray vision? In-Reply-To: <4902d9990601171310k86adc07of26ccda4bad9003@mail.gmail.com> References: <018b01c61ba2$94ebc890$640fa8c0@kevin> <4902d9990601171310k86adc07of26ccda4bad9003@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On 1/17/06, Alfio Puglisi wrote: > > On 1/17/06, kevinfreels.com wrote: > > > > My first reaction was to say "no". After all, once you leave the visible > > spectrum, light becomes considerable less usefull to the purposes of > > survival. > > Good infrared vision (in the body temperature range) would be quite > valuable for both nocturnal predators and prey. Since they don't have > it, my hypothesis is that the tecnological obstacles to build a good > infrared biological camera are too big to be overcome by evolution. > Liquid nitrogen-cooled eyes anyone? Rattle Snakes http://www.desertmuseum.org/books/rattlesnakes.html "Rattlesnakes and other pit vipers have remarkable heat-sensing pits. Located behind each nostril, below a straight line that would directly connect the nostril to the eye, is a loreal pit (called this because it is a depression in the loreal scale). These pits are highly effective in detecting differences in temperature even several yards away. At short ranges within a foot or so, minute differences (of perhaps fractions of a degree) may be perceived." Maybe evolution has not been working long enough. Dirk -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Tue Jan 17 21:35:31 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Tue, 17 Jan 2006 16:35:31 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Looking for examples of naturally evolved X-ray vision? In-Reply-To: <018b01c61ba2$94ebc890$640fa8c0@kevin> References: <018b01c61ba2$94ebc890$640fa8c0@kevin> Message-ID: You can sense IR photons (as heat) if there are sufficient numbers of them. But one problem with photons in the UV-thru-X-ray range is that the photons are energetic enough to break atomic bonds. This is particularly true for UV-B and UV-C. [1] So the sensing systems for these wavelengths *are* going to decay over time and would require expensive repair or replacement. X-rays in fact are so energetic that they break the bonds in the water molecules and produce multiple free radicals which cause extensive DNA damage. This is why X-ray exposure must be limited. There is a problem of producing large numbers of photons with these energies. Other than the stars, supernovas, neutron star collisions, etc. there *aren't* a lot of natural processes that can generate the high energy photons. UV-lamps typically require high temperatures or high voltages and X-rays require very high voltages. One might be able to have biological systems construct "capacitors" to store charges (an electric eel comes to mind) but the voltages one usually finds in biological systems are measured in millivolts (neuron voltages are usually < 100 mv) while one is talking significantly higher voltages to start playing with significant numbers of UV & X-ray photons. This is particularly a problem in biological systems based on salt water. Salt water is a good conductor -- so its probably difficult to build up very large voltages in biological systems. (Neurons use lipid membranes to maintain charge separation but high voltages would punch through those.) Since there aren't any biological systems producing photons at those wavelengths it doesn't make much sense to evolve sensors for them. The exception might be reflected UV light from the sun. I believe that bees are capable of sensing UV light. The only systems I can think of where one may moving towards generating higher amounts of energy is deep sea fish that can produce their own light (presumably to attract or recognize prey). As an aside, CCD arrays are quite good at reading UV & X-rays at certain frequencies and are used in various UV & X-ray astronomy cameras as well as CAT scanners I believe. There are also CCD array like detectors that can detect IR but they are usually based on structures with elements like Hg+Te+Cd or Pb+Se which aren't exactly abundant in biological systems. Robert 1. See UV photon energy in Nanosystems Table 6.2 (pg 151) and the Bond Dissociation energies om Table 3.8 (pg 52). -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From alfio.puglisi at gmail.com Tue Jan 17 21:37:49 2006 From: alfio.puglisi at gmail.com (Alfio Puglisi) Date: Tue, 17 Jan 2006 22:37:49 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] Looking for examples of naturally evolved X-ray vision? In-Reply-To: References: <018b01c61ba2$94ebc890$640fa8c0@kevin> Message-ID: <4902d9990601171337g32e46ef3vbbb346834083b5b0@mail.gmail.com> On 1/17/06, BillK wrote: > You need to read up on 'Evolution of Eyes'. Try: > > Read a few more as well, to get other opinions. > > Basically, he says: > > Why Do We See What We See? > >[...] > Now, five billion years later, more like five hundred millions years later. Dry land wasn't highly priced in the real estate market before then. > though many animal species have moved onto land where > the sun's full spectrum is available, eyes > remain sensitive only to this narrow region. This is incorrect. The full spectrum emitted by the Sun is not available this side of the atmosphere. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Atmospheric_electromagnetic_transmittance_or_opacity.jpg for a pretty drawing of atmospheric opacity. Basically, ultraviolet is quickly absorbed, while infrared fares a bit better. Alfio From pharos at gmail.com Tue Jan 17 21:49:09 2006 From: pharos at gmail.com (BillK) Date: Tue, 17 Jan 2006 21:49:09 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Looking for examples of naturally evolved X-ray vision? In-Reply-To: <4902d9990601171337g32e46ef3vbbb346834083b5b0@mail.gmail.com> References: <018b01c61ba2$94ebc890$640fa8c0@kevin> <4902d9990601171337g32e46ef3vbbb346834083b5b0@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On 1/17/06, Alfio Puglisi wrote: > On 1/17/06, BillK wrote: > > though many animal species have moved onto land where > > the sun's full spectrum is available, eyes > > remain sensitive only to this narrow region. > > This is incorrect. The full spectrum emitted by the Sun is not > available this side of the atmosphere. See > In context, I think that by 'full'' he meant 'our normal daily range of spectrum' as opposed to the small part of the spectrum that you could see under water. Poetic licence. ;) BillK From mbb386 at main.nc.us Tue Jan 17 22:29:43 2006 From: mbb386 at main.nc.us (MB) Date: Tue, 17 Jan 2006 17:29:43 -0500 (EST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Looking for examples of naturally evolved X-ray vision? In-Reply-To: References: <018b01c61ba2$94ebc890$640fa8c0@kevin> <4902d9990601171310k86adc07of26ccda4bad9003@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <35370.72.236.102.71.1137536983.squirrel@main.nc.us> > Rattle Snakes > http://www.desertmuseum.org/books/rattlesnakes.html > > "Rattlesnakes and other pit vipers have remarkable heat-sensing pits. > Located behind each nostril, below a straight line that would directly > connect the nostril to the eye, is a loreal pit (called this because it is > a > depression in the loreal scale). These pits are highly effective in > detecting differences in temperature even several yards away. At short > ranges within a foot or so, minute differences (of perhaps fractions of a > degree) may be perceived." > > Maybe evolution has not been working long enough. > Pythons also have heat pits. You can clearly see the three pink heat pits here: http://buncombe.main.nc.us/~mbbweb/snakes/pantera/pantera3.jpg Ball pythons are night hunters. Regards, MB From avantguardian2020 at yahoo.com Tue Jan 17 22:37:24 2006 From: avantguardian2020 at yahoo.com (The Avantguardian) Date: Tue, 17 Jan 2006 14:37:24 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Who needs a CAT scan when you have a well trained dog? (was: naturally evolved X-ray vision) In-Reply-To: <018b01c61ba2$94ebc890$640fa8c0@kevin> Message-ID: <20060117223724.45804.qmail@web60525.mail.yahoo.com> Not exactly X-ray *vision* but seemingly able to take the place of mammograms and CT scans in our fight against cancer. http://www.newscientist.com/article.ns?id=dn8549 Surely the dog IS man's best friend. The Avantguardian is Stuart LaForge alt email: stuart"AT"ucla.edu "The most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the source of all true art and science. He to whom this emotion is a stranger, who can no longer wonder and stand rapt in awe, is as good as dead: his eyes are closed. . ." - Albert Einstein, "What I Believe" (1930) __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com From thespike at satx.rr.com Tue Jan 17 23:06:33 2006 From: thespike at satx.rr.com (Damien Broderick) Date: Tue, 17 Jan 2006 17:06:33 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] Looking for examples of naturally evolved X-ray vision? In-Reply-To: References: <018b01c61ba2$94ebc890$640fa8c0@kevin> Message-ID: <6.2.1.2.0.20060117170052.03553e78@pop-server.satx.rr.com> At 04:35 PM 1/17/2006 -0500, Robert Bradbury wrote: >You can sense IR photons (as heat) if there are sufficient numbers of >them.... X-rays in fact are so energetic that they break the bonds in the >water molecules and produce multiple free radicals which cause extensive >DNA damage. This is why X-ray exposure must be limited. Superman's eyes, as everyone knows, emitted copious quantities of infrared photons, as well as streams of X-rays (although how he used the latter to see with has never been clear to me, since the whole point is that they mostly pass through objects rather than bouncing off them). But it's noticeable that he hasn't been in the news lately; I happen to know that he's lying very low, trying to evade the tremendously expensive class actions from families of all the people he killed with his X-rays, most heartbreakingly his radiation poisoned foster parents and the cancer-riddled Lana Lang and Lois Lane. Damien Broderick From thespike at satx.rr.com Tue Jan 17 23:32:10 2006 From: thespike at satx.rr.com (Damien Broderick) Date: Tue, 17 Jan 2006 17:32:10 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] Looking for examples of naturally evolved X-ray vision? In-Reply-To: <4902d9990601171337g32e46ef3vbbb346834083b5b0@mail.gmail.co m> References: <018b01c61ba2$94ebc890$640fa8c0@kevin> <4902d9990601171337g32e46ef3vbbb346834083b5b0@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <6.2.1.2.0.20060117172559.034a6b38@pop-server.satx.rr.com> At 10:37 PM 1/17/2006 +0100, Alfio Puglisi wrote: > > Now, five billion years later, > >more like five hundred millions years later. Dry land wasn't highly >priced in the real estate market before then. An interesting book on this topic is: Parker, Andrew In the Blink of an Eye: The Cause of the Most Dramatic Event in the History of Life, London: The Free Press, 2003. Here's a chunk from my own book FEROCIOUS MINDS: ...................................................................... It is slightly shocking that for nearly four billion years our planet?s most complicated creatures were bacteria, algae, single-celled primitive creatures: bland, living on sunlight like plants but unable to see by its illumination. For most of the tenure of life on earth, long before insects and dinosaurs and rats and us, the light was on?but nobody interesting was at home. Life changed and diversified, but at an excruciatingly slow pace. A little more than half a billion years ago, everything accelerated, in an extraordinary burst of evolutionary inventiveness. That surge in novelty, when complicated life galloped into existence, is known as the Cambrian explosion. We don't have much instinct for these sorts of numbers. Yes, half a billion years is a tremendous span, equivalent to ten million pre-industrial human lifetimes strung out one after the other, and for all our antiquity humans have only been here for a thousand generations. If an average lifespan today represents the history of life on the planet, a human would be a very strange monster indeed. For the first 68 years or so, you would remain a single celled embryo, patient and mindless in your mother's womb. Abruptly, in a single month, you would start developing in earnest. Clumsy speech and dexterity would be delayed until the closing days of your 80th year, and true intelligence would not blossom until the final few hours. Self-preening, we stress that final burst into brilliant intellect, and disregard a tormenting question: why the extreme delay at the starting line? How is it that almost nothing happened for the first seven-eighths of life's history? What kept the brakes locked down on evolution, and what released them at long last, permitting an explosive flowering from just four basic kinds of very ancient inner and outer body design into 10 times as many, giving rise to everything we see and much that is already extinct, like the dinosaurs? The Cambrian explosion took place between about 543 and 538 million years ago. Into those five million years were crammed all this rococo fabrication of complex life's ground rules. Why so fast, and why so long to get started? It would be neat and satisfying to resolve both questions with one answer. Zoologist Andrew Parker, a Royal Society research fellow at Oxford University, deemed by the Times one of the three most important young scientists in the world, took an interesting shot at the task seven years ago. His popular account is readily accessible to non-scientists. Possibly too accessible, since he leaves out any pointers to other research, except for some names mentioned in passing, which makes it hard to follow up claims hotly contested by other experts. Still, his book is richly crowded with altogether fascinating details, the very stuff of polymathy: how our planet was frozen for hundreds of millions of years under kilometers of ice, stopping life in its tracks; why the working insides of animals vary more than their defensive shells; exactly what causes the shimmering opalescence and iridescence of a pearl or a beetle's wing. For Parker, the key to the Cambrian event was the long delay before vision evolved. For vast stretches of time, creatures navigated and sought prey (or evaded the hungry) using touch, smell, taste, magnetic sensing: intimate and blurred. The world lay in fog. Then light-sensitive patches on the skin evolved with striking swiftness into true eyes, conscripting from other purposes the nerve wiring needed to turn images into a map of the world. Parker calls the epoch when sight came into useful focus the `Light Switch'. Once its switch was thrown, you could see others across a crowded room (or pool, or paddock) and they could see you. Under that spur, that naked transparency, natural selection was ruthless and quick, testing and conserving a vast number of sighted creatures such as trilobites, Parker's favorite candidate for the first eyed animal. It seems he is wrong, though, since trilobites (as Cambridge zoologist Simon Conway Morris argues) appeared as the Cambrian explosion was subsiding, not igniting. Well, details, details. Parker's key idea is fresh and fertile and fun. In the luminous shallows of Australia?s Great Barrier Reef, he ran into a dark brown cloud of cuttlefish ink. As it cleared, he faced thirty of the animals, forming `an exact arc around me, tentacles to face, eye to eye. Their brown bodies instantaneously bleached as I moved toward them... [then] displayed a wave of color changes. Brown and white synchronized undulations... suddenly a `loud' red...a calming green as I retreated... their eyes remained silver, like mirrors' (4). This is deliciously vivid, exactly capturing how crucial the sense of sight has become since the first clear-lensed eye opened half a billion years ago.[1] Even if eyes were the crucial breakthrough to explosive diversity, why did they take so long to arrive? My guess, reading toward the end of this detective story, was that air or water had perhaps long been murky, and cleared with a change in the environment. Either that, or the great slow orbit of the solar system into the dusty arms of the galaxy and out again might have modified the intensity of the Sun's light. Parker tries all these notions, and more, but fails to find a totally satisfying culprit. Still, his theory insists that there must be one, and so provokes a new and exciting scientific quest. [1] In his efforts to be lucid as well as engaging, Parker does sometimes slip into unintended comedy. `Chemical detectors,' he explains carefully, `detect chemicals' (282). From bpaatsch at bigpond.net.au Wed Jan 18 00:13:08 2006 From: bpaatsch at bigpond.net.au (Brett Paatsch) Date: Wed, 18 Jan 2006 11:13:08 +1100 Subject: [extropy-chat] Impeachment of President Bush What odds am Ioffered? References: <20051220013537.9B4F757F5B@finney.org> Message-ID: <03bf01c61bc3$f604a4f0$1283e03c@homepc> Hal Finney wrote: > Brett writes: >> If I was to say that I have US$1000 of real money that >> says that President George W Bush will be impeached >> what odds would serious minded people like to offer me >> I wonder? > > There is a related claim at the FX game, > http://www.ideosphere.com/fx-bin/Claim?claim=BuImp > > : Claim BuImp - Bush impeached or resigns > : > : This claim will be true if a majority of the US house votes to impeach > : George Bush--or Bush resigns from office. It may be judged when another > : US president is inaugurated or George Bush out of office. > : > : Note: it is not necessary for the Senate to convict Bush for this claim > : to be true. > > Since its creation in September, the claim has traded very stably at > about 20, implying a roughly 20% chance of coming true. This counts > both resignation and impeachment, so the odds of just impeachment would > be somewhat lower, but I don't know how much. I don't know exactly how much lower either but it would be significantly lower I'd think, as suggested by Nixon who resigned in the face of impeachment articles against him having been prepared by the House Judiciary Committee. http://www.historyplace.com/unitedstates/impeachments/nixon.htm Faced with the fact of articles of impeachment having been prepared and the US people and its representatives being ready to impeach him it seems likely to me at a gutcheck level that Bush would find or be persuaded perhaps by other Republicans to find resignation to be the better option. Without doing a lot of analysis and what might amount to little better than guessing even then I don't know that I could work out the probability of X given Y, but I'd think X given Y would probably still be greater than not X given Y, where Y is articles of impeachment having been prepared and X is impeachment. > So I'd be willing to offer 4 to 1 odds against, and feel like I had a > modest profit expectation. And yes, I'd be willing to cover the > $1000 bet (putting up my $4000 against that). If Bush were to 'do a Nixon', and resign after articles of impeachment were prepared by the House Judiciary Committee, then he would not be impeached as he would not be President and impeachment would not be necessary, but he *would* have been held somewhat to account. What I am actually interested in is whether the US voters through their elected representatives and the US system will hold this US President to account. Let's say I agree to take your odds Hal, are there any UK based extropes that you would be willing to have hold our stakes? Or alternatively, how would you propose to proceed? Reply offlist if you prefer. Brett Paatsch From brian_a_lee at hotmail.com Wed Jan 18 00:41:23 2006 From: brian_a_lee at hotmail.com (Brian Lee) Date: Tue, 17 Jan 2006 19:41:23 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] nuclear non-proliferation as energy strategy ? In-Reply-To: Message-ID: This is why Iran is a bigger problem than Pakistan or Israel: Iran supports terrorism and makes threats about annihilating other countries (specifically US and Israel). Their president is a raving lunatic who denies the Holocaust and calls for Israel to be wiped off the map. If we could go back in time, we should have stopped Pakistan and Israel from developing nuclear weapons but we can't, so they have nukes. Additionally, Pakistan "playing ball" with the US and cooperating goes a long way toward them not being a threat. The 911 hijackers being Saudi does not mean the Saudi government supports terrorism. To suggest this link is misguided. BAL >From: Samantha Atkins >To: ExI chat list >Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] nuclear non-proliferation as energy strategy ? >Date: Tue, 17 Jan 2006 11:35:43 -0800 > >We slap a label on a country and expect the normal rules not to apply. >Very neat. A much scarier country that already has nukes is Pakistan. >But they are our good buds. Israel is a major international outlaw by the >number and scope of UN resolutions they have violated but they have had >nukes since at least the sixties and are one of the most heavily >militarized countries per capita on the planet. All secular folks in >Israel are bound by law to support a huge and growing religious caste. >The religious caste has tremendous power. Israel is arguably not a >secular State in practice. Yet they are certainly our good friends. So >the issue does not seem to come down to a State being in good repute or >being in its government cleanly secular. State involved in terrorism? >Saudi Arabia is heavily involved in terrorism. Most of the 911 hijackers >were Saudi. But they are also our buds. We even edited out the parts of >the 911 commission report that might have made them look bad. So tell me >again why Iran having nuclear power and maybe some day being able to >produce nuclear bombs is a major crisis. > >- samantha > > >On Jan 17, 2006, at 10:26 AM, Brian Lee wrote: > >>I don't think Iran's race has anything to do with it (re: the "brown >>people" comment). It has more to do with their terrorist nation status. >>Maybe it's just me, but Iran having nuclear weapons scares me. Nuclear >>power doesn't. I think it's smart for Iran to pursue nuclear power as it >>may take 20 years to really get serious power output and they need to >>start now if they want to be ready when the oil is gone. But I don't >>think Iran has shown itself responsible enough to have nuclear weapons. >> >>BAL >> >>>From: user >>>To: ExI chat list >>>Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] nuclear non-proliferation as energy strategy >>>? >>>Date: Tue, 17 Jan 2006 11:25:36 -0500 (EST) >>> >>> >>> >>>On Tue, 17 Jan 2006, Brian Lee wrote: >>> >>> > The last plan I saw was that the EU/US wanted to provide the enriched >>> > uranium to fuel Iran's future reactors. Iran was against that and so >>>we're >>> > at where we are today. So I guess there's no solution that gives Iran >>>the >>> > capability to make nuclear fuel without the capability to make >>>weapons grade >>> > material. >>> >>> >>>Which seems sensible from a "we're scared of brown people" standpoint, >>>but >>>from Irans standpoint ... I would reject that plan as well. If they >>>really were (a big if) interested in modern electrical power >>>infrastructure to tie their developing country to, why shackle yourself >>>to >>>the goodwill of others to provide the necessary fuel ? >>> >>>Again, it seems like a perfect role reversal, and if I were Iran I would >>>balk too... >>> >>>_______________________________________________ >>>extropy-chat mailing list >>>extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org >>>http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat >> >> >>_______________________________________________ >>extropy-chat mailing list >>extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org >>http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat > >_______________________________________________ >extropy-chat mailing list >extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org >http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat From HerbM at learnquick.com Wed Jan 18 02:27:06 2006 From: HerbM at learnquick.com (Herb Martin) Date: Tue, 17 Jan 2006 20:27:06 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] nuclear non-proliferation as energy strategy ? In-Reply-To: Message-ID: > From: Samantha Atkins > > We slap a label on a country and expect the normal rules not to > apply. Very neat. A much scarier country that already has nukes is > Pakistan. But they are our good buds. Israel is a major > international outlaw by the number and scope of UN resolutions they > have violated but they have had nukes since at least the sixties and > are one of the most heavily militarized countries per capita on the > planet. The above is either sophomoric or dishonest since Israel is NOT a frequent violator of BINDING UN resolutions, nor a signatory to the NPT The petty dictatorships that make up the bulk of the UN member states can vote anything they please, sensible or not, but all of that is NON-BINDING on member nations. The Israelis are militarized because ALL of their neighbors (and secondary neighbors) want to, or have wanted to, throw them into the sea or MURDER them. Iran has signed nuclear non-proliferation agreements benefited from those agreements. Pakistan and India, along with Israel have always refused to sign. It would have been better had both Pakistan and India been PREVENTED from developing and deploying such weapons but the opportunity to do so was lost due to Cold War concerns between the US and the USSR (and to some extent PRC.) And remember that "mobilization" has long been considered an act of war -- development of nuclear weapons by a state which did not have them can certainly be considered to constitute mobilization. Bottom line: Iran and North Korea cannot be trusted with nuclear weapons and if they can be removed they should be removed. Funny that largely the same people that would allow nuclear weapons to such states are typically the same people that would argue against the individual right of human beings to keep and bear arms. -- Herb Martin From thespike at satx.rr.com Wed Jan 18 03:37:55 2006 From: thespike at satx.rr.com (Damien Broderick) Date: Tue, 17 Jan 2006 21:37:55 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] nuclear non-proliferation as energy strategy ? In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <6.2.1.2.0.20060117213543.01ce49d0@pop-server.satx.rr.com> At 08:27 PM 1/17/2006 -0600, Herb Martin wrote: >Funny that largely the same people that would allow >nuclear weapons to such states are typically the >same people that would argue against the individual >right of human beings to keep and bear arms. I don't know if that's true, but if so might it also be the case that it's Funny that largely the same people that would deny nuclear weapons to such states are typically the same people that would argue for the individual right of human beings to keep and bear arms? Damien Broderick From sjatkins at mac.com Wed Jan 18 03:46:02 2006 From: sjatkins at mac.com (Samantha Atkins) Date: Tue, 17 Jan 2006 19:46:02 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] nuclear non-proliferation as energy strategy ? In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On Jan 17, 2006, at 4:41 PM, Brian Lee wrote: > This is why Iran is a bigger problem than Pakistan or Israel: Iran > supports terrorism and makes threats about annihilating other > countries (specifically US and Israel). Laughable threats against the US and rather unlikely ones against Israel for the next few years at least. I am really shaking. > Their president is a raving lunatic who denies the Holocaust and > calls for Israel to be wiped off the map. That sort of rhetoric is not exactly unique. > If we could go back in time, we should have stopped Pakistan and > Israel from developing nuclear weapons but we can't, so they have > nukes. Additionally, Pakistan "playing ball" with the US and > cooperating goes a long way toward them not being a threat. Only a matter of internal regime change for Pakistan to be a very nasty threat in the region. Of course they currently are sensible enough to realize that any real nastiness would mean their annihilation. > > The 911 hijackers being Saudi does not mean the Saudi government > supports terrorism. To suggest this link is misguided. > I don't think so. The Saudi government gives strong support to very radical Islamic groups. If there is no smoke here then why the deletions from the report? A leader running off at the mouth doesn't mean Iran has or is about to have adequate means to be a real threat or that there is good reason to attack Iran or Iranian targets at this time. - samantha From sjatkins at mac.com Wed Jan 18 04:29:27 2006 From: sjatkins at mac.com (Samantha Atkins) Date: Tue, 17 Jan 2006 20:29:27 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] nuclear non-proliferation as energy strategy ? In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <2C0C7DB2-04AF-4678-87E2-0630A10CF2C5@mac.com> On Jan 17, 2006, at 6:27 PM, Herb Martin wrote: >> From: Samantha Atkins >> >> We slap a label on a country and expect the normal rules not to >> apply. Very neat. A much scarier country that already has nukes is >> Pakistan. But they are our good buds. Israel is a major >> international outlaw by the number and scope of UN resolutions they >> have violated but they have had nukes since at least the sixties and >> are one of the most heavily militarized countries per capita on the >> planet. > > The above is either sophomoric or dishonest > since Israel is NOT a frequent violator of > BINDING UN resolutions, nor a signatory to the > NPT > Watch out expunging my motives or using denigration toward me of any kind. I will not stand for it. If you are talking of a Security Council resolution as "binding" it should be pointed out that although the US would very likely veto any such resolution that was too onerous there have in fact been quite some number of Security Council resolutions that Israel has violated or is in violation of until this very day. From 1967 to 1988 the Security Council passed 88 resolutions directly against Israel and Israel was condemned 49 times. That looks a little significant to me. Check out wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ List_of_the_UN_resolutions_concerning_Israel_and_Palestine http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/UN_Security_Council_Resolution_242 also: http://domino.un.org/UNISPAL.NSF/0/5aa254a1c8f8b1cb852560e50075d7d5? OpenDocument Israel violated the following Security Council resolutions: Resolution 252 (1968) Israel Urgently calls upon Israel to rescind measures that change the legal status of Jerusalem, including the expropriation of land and properties thereon. 262 (1968) Israel Calls upon Israel to pay compensation to Lebanon for destruction of airliners at Beirut International Airport. 267 (1969) Israel Urgently calls upon Israel to rescind measures seeking to change the legal status of occupied East Jerusalem. 271 (1969) Israel Reiterates calls to rescind measures seeking to change the legal status of occupied East Jerusalem and calls on Israel to scrupulously abide by the Fourth Geneva Convention regarding the responsibilities of occupying powers. 298 (1971) Israel Reiterates demand that Israel rescind measures seeking to change the legal status of occupied East Jerusalem. 446 (1979) Israel Calls upon Israel to scrupulously abide by the Fourth Geneva Convention regarding the responsibilities of occupying powers, to rescind previous measures that violate these relevant provisions, and "in particular, not to transport parts of its civilian population into the occupied Arab territories." 452 (1979) Israel Calls on the government of Israel to cease, on an urgent basis, the establishment, construction, and planning of settlements in the Arab territories, occupied since 1967, including Jerusalem. 465 (1980) Israel Reiterates previous resolutions on Israel's settlements policy. 471 (1980) Israel Demands prosecution of those involved in assassination attempts of West Bank leaders and compensation for damages; reiterates demands to abide by Fourth Geneva Convention. 484 (1980) Israel Reiterates request that Israel abide by the Fourth Geneva Convention. 487 (1981) Israel Calls upon Israel to place its nuclear facilities under the safeguard of the UN's International Atomic Energy Agency. 497 (1981) Israel Demands that Israel rescind its decision to impose its domestic laws in the occupied Syrian Golan region. 541 (1983) Turkey Reiterates the need for compliance with prior resolutions and demands that the declaration of an independent Turkish Cypriot state be withdrawn. 550 (1984) Turkey Reiterates UNSC resolution 541 and insists that member states may "not to facilitate or in any way assist" the secessionist entity. 573 (1985) Israel Calls on Israel to pay compensation for human and material losses from its attack against Tunisia and to refrain from all such attacks or threats of attacks against other nations. 592 (1986) Israel Insists Israel abide by the Fourth Geneva Conventions in East Jerusalem and other occupied territories. 605 (1987) Israel "Calls once more upon Israel, the occupying Power, to abide immediately and scrupulously by the Geneva Convention relative to the Protection of Civilian Persons in Times of War, and to desist forthwith from its policies and practices that are in violations of the provisions of the Convention." 607 (1986) Israel Reiterates calls on Israel to abide by the Fourth Geneva Convention and to cease its practice of deportations from occupied Arab territories. 608 (1988) Israel Reiterates call for Israel to cease its deportations. 636 (1989) Israel Reiterates call for Israel to cease its deportations. 641 (1989) Israel Reiterates previous resolutions calling on Israel to desist in its deportations. 694 (1991) Israel Reiterates that Israel "must refrain from deporting any Palestinian civilian from the occupied territories and ensure the safe and immediate return of all those deported." etc. You may wish to quibble about what "is" is or what is "binding" but it was certainly not at all dishonest or "sophomoric" to point out that Israel violates UN resolutions. > The petty dictatorships that make up the bulk > of the UN member states can vote anything they > please, sensible or not, but all of that is > NON-BINDING on member nations. This is more than a bit of over-simplification on your part. > > The Israelis are militarized because ALL of their > neighbors (and secondary neighbors) want to, > or have wanted to, throw them into the sea or > MURDER them. > > The Israelis have done more than their share of murdering and invading their neighbors. Do you concede this or do I need to lay it out for you? > Iran has signed nuclear non-proliferation agreements > benefited from those agreements. > And this is supposed to be worse than Israel not even being a signatory how? > > And remember that "mobilization" has long been > considered an act of war -- development of nuclear > weapons by a state which did not have them can > certainly be considered to constitute mobilization. No it can't. > > Bottom line: Iran and North Korea cannot be trusted > with nuclear weapons and if they can be removed they > should be removed. > Even if you plunge the world into the abyss to do so? Even if Iran can be easily prevented from building its own nuclear weapons without a shot fired? (as if that was remotely what the saber rattling was really about) > Funny that largely the same people that would allow > nuclear weapons to such states are typically the > same people that would argue against the individual > right of human beings to keep and bear arms. > You really have no friggin' idea who I am do you? I am a staunch 2nd amendment advocate and I have enough hardware to prove that that is not simply a paper position. What I am tired of is supposed defenders of freedom and enlightenment who seem to never meet an excuse to pour money and lives out anywhere in the world while taking away what paltry freedoms we still have at home that they don't applaud. - samantha -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From sjatkins at mac.com Wed Jan 18 05:42:29 2006 From: sjatkins at mac.com (Samantha Atkins) Date: Tue, 17 Jan 2006 21:42:29 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] nuclear non-proliferation as energy strategy ? In-Reply-To: <2C0C7DB2-04AF-4678-87E2-0630A10CF2C5@mac.com> References: <2C0C7DB2-04AF-4678-87E2-0630A10CF2C5@mac.com> Message-ID: On Jan 17, 2006, at 8:29 PM, Samantha Atkins wrote: > > On Jan 17, 2006, at 6:27 PM, Herb Martin wrote: > >>> From: Samantha Atkins >>> >>> We slap a label on a country and expect the normal rules not to >>> apply. Very neat. A much scarier country that already has nukes is >>> Pakistan. But they are our good buds. Israel is a major >>> international outlaw by the number and scope of UN resolutions they >>> have violated but they have had nukes since at least the sixties and >>> are one of the most heavily militarized countries per capita on the >>> planet. >> >> The above is either sophomoric or dishonest >> since Israel is NOT a frequent violator of >> BINDING UN resolutions, nor a signatory to the >> NPT >> > > Watch out expunging my motives or using denigration toward me of > any kind. I will not stand for it. Err, "impugning" even. Dyslexia is a bitch but aging biological minds hardly need excuses. :-( -s From m_j_geddes at yahoo.com.au Wed Jan 18 06:28:24 2006 From: m_j_geddes at yahoo.com.au (Marc Geddes) Date: Wed, 18 Jan 2006 17:28:24 +1100 (EST) Subject: [extropy-chat] On difficult choices (was: Books: Harris; Religion and Reason) Message-ID: <20060118062824.17244.qmail@web50504.mail.yahoo.com> >### My 95% confidence interval for the SAI-driven Singularity is 2015 to 2050, squarely within our generation's lifetimes. You can't give a confidence interval as high as 95% but yes, I do agree with your date range. I can't see the Singularity taking longer than 2050 if it's possible at all, and I give it a 50-50 chance of happening before 2030. I don't see seed-AI as being likely to be created by any of the well known groups however (for instance Sing Inst). It's been a terrible shock to me to see so many brilliant thinkers on the transhumanist lists (in the sense of having really high IQ's) who are actually quite limited in their thinking (in the sense of lacking imagination, empathy and rationality). Take Eliezer for instance. Here you have this really brilliant fellow gifted with a high IQ, but who is really quite narrow minded in his thinking. It's very sad. I tried to lecture people out of their ignorance which was a really *really* big mistake I see now, since I've totally alienated nearly every-one on the transhumanist lists :-( You can't lecture people out of their ignorance. You can only help them to grow. Please understand my extreme impatience for getting to the Singularity and my horror at seeing even brilliant people going astray. Please understand my frustration. I lost my head. This doesn't excuse my behaviour on the lists, but it does I hope, help to explain it. I lost my head. I'm sorry. There will never be true general intelligence without sentience or emotions. An AI without sentience or emotions will only be a limited AI and will not be able to initiate a Singularity. Should the design being purused by the Singularity Institute work at all, it will at best be a human-level intelligence, not a recursively self-improving one. Someday the Sing Inst folks will understand this. I urge every-one to carefully read the abstract summary of my *Mathematico-Cognition Reality Theory* published here: http://www.toequest.com/forum/showthread.php?t=1338 Cheers! "Till shade is gone, till water is gone, into the shadow with teeth bared, screaming defiance with the last breath, to spit in Sightblinder?s eye on the last day? ____________________________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? Take your Mail with you - get Yahoo! Mail on your mobile http://au.mobile.yahoo.com/mweb/index.html From fortean1 at mindspring.com Wed Jan 18 07:27:43 2006 From: fortean1 at mindspring.com (Terry W. Colvin) Date: Wed, 18 Jan 2006 00:27:43 -0700 Subject: [extropy-chat] FWD [Skeptic] Re: Looking for examples of naturally evolved X-ray vision? Message-ID: <43CDEDEF.8050803@mindspring.com> On Jan 17, 2006, at 8:10 PM, Terry W. Colvin fnarded: > I was helping my daughter come up with some ideas for a school > science project and I stumbled onto a couple unknowns. > > Animals have evolved a wide variety of abilities to seek food and > avoid predators. Echo-location, color vision, and compound eyes are > just a few. All provide important information regarding the > immediate surroundings. My daughter asked me why the visible light > spectrum IS the visible light spectrum. After all, animals hear at > a wide range of frequencies that humans cannot, so why not have the > same thing occurring in vision? Are there animals with X-ray vision? The "visible light spectrum" refers to humans. Two reasons most of life on Earth is anchored on the "visible" spectrum: 1. the atmosphere is not transparent. Solar X-Rays, Gamma, and UV do not have much intensity on the surface. See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ Image:Atmospheric_electromagnetic_transmittance_or_opacity.jpg 2. there isn't much functional benefit: there are no biological emitters or reflectors of X-rays. It would be like turning plants and animals into glass. Other animals have extended or shifted visible ranges, as you expect. Insects and some other invertebrates see well into the UV, as do some Aves. Many vertebrate predators see into the IR. This is a useful piece of trivia when I talk about applications of organic chemistry. Specifically: brighteners and whiteners. These are chemicals that are added to detergents or paper to make the objects appear brighter. The way they work is that they absorb light from many wavelengths and reflect in the visible spectrum, achieving greater light intensity than you would expect in ordinary daylight. One side effect of this phenomenon is that they can sometimes reflect intensely in the UV range as well but we don't see it. Insects, however, see it like a beacon and this explains why when you're hiking in a group sometimes there's that one unfortunate kid who's a bee magnet. Think black light in reverse. Those white flowers are only white to us. To bees, they're a palette of the most beautiful colours in the world. The flowers evolved to be pollinated by insects, not to benefit human aesthetics. If your kid's looking for a science topic, this is has been popular in the past: "bee's-eye view of the world." As an interesting philosophical aside, there's an example of how facts can be used to back any argument if you close one eye and squint enough: I feel that this invisible world is evidence that the universe is not designed with humans in mind. My Mennonite friends consider this evidence that the world so obviously has a creator. I don't see the connection, myself. -graeme __________ Graeme Kennedy -- "Only a zit on the wart on the heinie of progress." Copyright 1992, Frank Rice Terry W. Colvin, Sierra Vista, Arizona (USA) < fortean1 at mindspring.com > Alternate: < fortean1 at msn.com > Home Page: < http://www.geocities.com/Area51/Stargate/8958/index.html > Sites: * Fortean Times * Mystic's Haven * TLCB * U.S. Message Text Formatting (USMTF) Program ------------ Member: Thailand-Laos-Cambodia Brotherhood (TLCB) Mailing List TLCB Web Site: < http://www.tlc-brotherhood.org > [Southeast Asia/Secret War in Laos veterans, Allies, CIA/NSA, and "steenkeen" contractors are welcome.] From avantguardian2020 at yahoo.com Wed Jan 18 08:46:24 2006 From: avantguardian2020 at yahoo.com (The Avantguardian) Date: Wed, 18 Jan 2006 00:46:24 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] nuclear non-proliferation as energy strategy ? In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <20060118084624.57646.qmail@web60511.mail.yahoo.com> --- Brian Lee wrote: > This is why Iran is a bigger problem than Pakistan > or Israel: Iran supports > terrorism and makes threats about annihilating other > countries (specifically > US and Israel). Well I have heard an unsubstantiated rumor that more than a few Muslims believe that Zionists control the US government. Whether this is true or not, when it comes to the human psyche, perception might as well be reality. > Their president is a raving lunatic > who denies the Holocaust > and calls for Israel to be wiped off the map. Is he really a lunatic? Or is he a shrewd politician who has learned lessons from history like the value of the bluff from Nikita Khrushchev ("We will bury you.") and the value of appealing to religious fundamentalism from none other than George W. Bush. However, unlike Jesus' favorite president George Bush, Ahmadinejad has a colleague that claimed to see a "glow of light" around him as he addressed a stunned United Nations with the words you mentioned. So if you imagine yourself an average Arab, I think that Ahmadinejad might be telling you EXACTLY what you would want to hear. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2006/01/14/wiran14.xml&sSheet=/news/2006/01/14/ixworld.html > If we > could go back in time, > we should have stopped Pakistan and Israel from > developing nuclear weapons > but we can't, so they have nukes. Yes, the "going back in time" motif seems to run quite prominently through reflections upon the history of the nuclear genie. So if a time machine gets invented so that we can go back in time as you suggest, perhaps we should keep that technology out of the hands of the brown people too. > Additionally, > Pakistan "playing ball" with > the US and cooperating goes a long way toward them > not being a threat. True, provided that the US does not do stupid things like using predator drones to bomb the shit out of an innocent Pakistani village in the hopes of hitting an Al Quaeda leader that isn't there. http://www.indianexpress.com/full_story.php?content_id=86042 > The 911 hijackers being Saudi does not mean the > Saudi government supports > terrorism. To suggest this link is misguided. No, of course not. Just because Saudi Arabia is the religious capital of Islam doesn't mean that they would secretly support terrorist activity any more than than the US government would support any of the black ops that we disavow. Especially when they have so little to gain from a world-wide Caliphate. So apparently in the unruly poker-game that is international relations today, with fence-sitting China as a wild card, Iran has seen our Iraqi quagmire and raised us a full-scale Jihad. The stakes? On one side, the right of nations that are technologically capable of producing WMD to produce them and on the other? Ring-side seats for a potential World War. Unless one can afford a get away to a summer home in the Bahamas. The fact that Iran is China's number one oil-supplier really heightens my suspense. The question on my mind is whether Ahmadinejad has the charisma to unite the Arab Sunnis and Shiites with the Persian Shiites against the great "Satan of the West". I doubt it but then again I also doubted Bush's ability to unite Catholics and Protestants against Kerry with simple-minded religious rhetoric. Should we trust Iran with nukes? No more than we trust Pakistan, Israel, or North Korea. After all, you can't trust a 3000 year old civilization, that once ruled a world-wide empire, with last century's weapons. But that IS the point of nukes isn't it? You have to trust the nations have them because there isn't any other option? So perhaps there is some method to MADness after all. So riddle me this, libertarian-man: Does the right to bear arms mean that if I am smart enough to invent the Illudium PU-36 Explosive Space Modulator, I therefore have the right to wield it? Interestingly enough, this fear of nuclear proliferation is a major stumbling block for the development of next-generation fast-breeder nuclear reactors that would generate electricity much more efficiently than current reactors AND eliminate the need of finding safe places to store nuclear waste for a million years. But I suppose that it is the price of fear that keeps fear-mongers afloat. It is programmed into our genes after all to not trust any other tribe. They might, after all, try to steal your women and your bananas! The Avantguardian is Stuart LaForge alt email: stuart"AT"ucla.edu "The most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the source of all true art and science. He to whom this emotion is a stranger, who can no longer wonder and stand rapt in awe, is as good as dead: his eyes are closed. . ." - Albert Einstein, "What I Believe" (1930) __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com From HerbM at learnquick.com Wed Jan 18 09:42:46 2006 From: HerbM at learnquick.com (Herb Martin) Date: Wed, 18 Jan 2006 03:42:46 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] nuclear non-proliferation as energy strategy ? In-Reply-To: <6.2.1.2.0.20060117213543.01ce49d0@pop-server.satx.rr.com> Message-ID: > From: Damien Broderick > >Funny that largely the same people that would allow > >nuclear weapons to such states are typically the > >same people that would argue against the individual > >right of human beings to keep and bear arms. > > I don't know if that's true, but if so might it also be the > case that it's > > Funny that largely the same people that would deny > nuclear weapons to such states are typically the > same people that would argue for the individual > right of human beings to keep and bear arms? No, that one is quite easy to understand after a moment or two of thinking it through... The freedoms of individual human beings have been secured by armed citizens of the democracies, in spite of, and in the face of the despotic dictatorships where ONLY force matters. Nations don't have a "right to nuclear arms" and that includes the US -- what the US has is a REQUIREMENT (not even a responsibility) to defend ourselves and as many free peoples as we can. To do otherwise is to die, see our children enslaved, or worse: to see democracy disappear from the Earth into the jaws of the most vicious nations which will take everything from all humans by force. -- Herb Martin From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Wed Jan 18 10:22:50 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Wed, 18 Jan 2006 05:22:50 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] nuclear non-proliferation as energy strategy ? In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On 1/17/06, Brian Lee wrote: > The 911 hijackers being Saudi does not mean the Saudi government supports > terrorism. To suggest this link is misguided. Actually, you may want to read the Wikipedia entries on Wahhabism [1]. If one supports the spread of Wahhabism and schools that educate people to think along the "party line" (such as the madrassas in Pakistan) and those schools teach you to follow an irrational belief set then one is coming dangerously close to promoting terrorism. The discussion about Iran and the European Nuclear Reactor offer is in [2]. [3] appears to be a good source about Iran uranium mining. It is hard to take seriously the Asefi statement quoted in [2] in light of "Known Recoverable Resources of Uranium" [5] which lists the top countries as Australia, Kazakhstan, Canada, South Africa and Nambia. The geology of Iran might be close enough to Kazakhstan that they could have significant reserves but how they expect to compete in the world market is a bit murky. The Russians obviously have significant enrichment capability as does Japan [5] and presumably China. I find it very difficult to believe Iran could compete against them if they chose to become enriched uranium exporters. While Iran's choice to go with a heavy water reactor would allow it to use its own (unenriched?) uranium (thus preventing an cutoff from international suppliers) it also apparently allows it to produce plutonium at a more rapid rate [6]. I personally find the idea that Iran wants to (or could) become a major supplier of nuclear fuel rather stretched. Robert 1. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wahhabi 2. http://en.wikinews.org/wiki/Iran_rejects_EU_nuclear_reactor_offer 3. http://www.bellona.no/en/international/russia/nuke_industry/co-operation/28445.html 4. http://www.uic.com.au/nip01.htm 5. http://www.jnfl.co.jp/english/our_business/uranium-enrichment/ 6. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pressurised_Heavy_Water_Reactor -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From anyservice at cris.crimea.ua Wed Jan 18 11:09:56 2006 From: anyservice at cris.crimea.ua (Gennady Ra) Date: Wed, 18 Jan 2006 14:09:56 +0300 Subject: [extropy-chat] Wired: LSD: The Geek's Wonder Drug? Message-ID: <6.2.1.2.2.20060118132849.03616eb0@pop.cris.net> In consonance of the recent posts: a nice article in Wired on the most powerful available extropiate* http://www.wired.com/news/technology/1,70015-1.html LSD: The Geek's Wonder Drug? By Ann Harrison BASEL, Switzerland -- When Kevin Herbert has a particularly intractable programming problem, or finds himself pondering a big career decision, he deploys a powerful mind expanding tool -- LSD-25... ... "I think that in human evolution it has never been as necessary to have this substance LSD," said Hofmann. "It is just a tool to turn us into what we are supposed to be." ====== * Extropiate Any drug that has extropic effects, including all cognition enhancing and life extending drugs. [David Krieger, December 1991] (From Lextropicon. Extropian Neologisms collected by Max More. http://www.extropy.com/neologo.htm ) ====== Best! Gennady Simferopol Crimea Ukraine From dirk.bruere at gmail.com Wed Jan 18 13:51:06 2006 From: dirk.bruere at gmail.com (Dirk Bruere) Date: Wed, 18 Jan 2006 13:51:06 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] nuclear non-proliferation as energy strategy ? In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On 1/18/06, Herb Martin wrote: > > > From: Samantha Atkins > > > > We slap a label on a country and expect the normal rules not to > > apply. Very neat. A much scarier country that already has nukes is > > Pakistan. But they are our good buds. Israel is a major > > international outlaw by the number and scope of UN resolutions they > > have violated but they have had nukes since at least the sixties and > > are one of the most heavily militarized countries per capita on the > > planet. > > The above is either sophomoric or dishonest > since Israel is NOT a frequent violator of > BINDING UN resolutions, nor a signatory to the > NPT > > That's because their client state, the USA, uses its veto in the UN to protect them. IIRC it has done so more than 50 times. Dirk -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From dirk.bruere at gmail.com Wed Jan 18 13:58:00 2006 From: dirk.bruere at gmail.com (Dirk Bruere) Date: Wed, 18 Jan 2006 13:58:00 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] On difficult choices (was: Books: Harris; Religion and Reason) In-Reply-To: <20060118062824.17244.qmail@web50504.mail.yahoo.com> References: <20060118062824.17244.qmail@web50504.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: On 1/18/06, Marc Geddes wrote: > > >### My 95% confidence interval for the SAI-driven > Singularity is 2015 to 2050, squarely within our > generation's lifetimes. > > You can't give a confidence interval as high as 95% > but yes, I do agree with your date range. I can't see > the Singularity taking longer than 2050 if it's > possible at all, and I give it a 50-50 chance of > happening before 2030. > > I don't see seed-AI as being likely to be created by > any of the well known groups however (for instance > Sing Inst). > > I see a true AI as most likely evolving from a slice-and-map simulation of an existing brain. OTOH, maybe a singularity could be generated simply by non general AI progs like genetic algorithms coupled with data mining tools creating a vast array of inventions beyond human capability to understand. Dirk -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From bpaatsch at bigpond.net.au Wed Jan 18 14:21:08 2006 From: bpaatsch at bigpond.net.au (Brett Paatsch) Date: Thu, 19 Jan 2006 01:21:08 +1100 Subject: Belated reply to Spike was Re: [extropy-chat] Impeachment of etc References: <200512232148.jBNLm8e11646@tick.javien.com> Message-ID: <068b01c61c3a$6d0eb880$1283e03c@homepc> [Spike I was away from my PC for longer than I thought I would be over the christmas new year break and whilst I read some posts to the Extropy Chat list I wasn't getting email between 23 December and 13 January] Spike wrote: >> bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Brett Paatsch > ... >> >> We were getting race riots here in Australia. >> >> Home grown plotters have been reported in >> the papers citing the invasion of Iraq as reasons >> why they want to do something. Do something >> like kill the Prime Minister and/or his family. > ... >> Brett Paatsch > > > Brett I am still pondering the rest of your post, but > to this comment I will respond on my way out. > I have no doubt that the local papers cited the > invasion of Iraq as a reason the rioters want to > do something. The race riots and home grown plotters were two separate paragraphs (I was writing a lot in trying to communicate with you but I got tired and abbreviated). The race riots which do seem to have subsided are only symptomatic of tensions coming to the surface. The Howard government is or now has changed terrorism laws here and almost all the civil libs groups are upset. No surprise there I suppose but the media around that feeds into the sense that Muslims are being picked on, and of course to a certain extent they are. Everyone says profiling isn't done exactly that would be prejudice but of course it is. > The reporter who wrote this might have searched > and found someone who made such a comment, or > failing that, imagined one. You give me too little credit for reading critically Spike. I don't ask you to trust me but don't please don't assume I'm an idiot. If you don't trust me and want evidence then do ask for it and I'll probably be able to give it to you. --- The front page story of the 17-18 December Weekend Australian carried the story "Police taped terror plot to kill Howard". The Weekend Australian, 17-12-2005. "TWO Melbourne terror suspects discussed killing John Howard and his family, launching a large-scale attack at a football game and causing carnage at a train station as part of a religious war in Australia. In a series of chilling conversations caught on police listening devices and revealed yesterday, self-styled Muslim cleric Abdul Nacer Benbrika, 46, and 20-year old Abdulla Merhi discussed the terror plot as payback for the deaths of Muslims. "For example, if John Howard kills innocent Muslim families do we .. do we have to kill him and his family ... (and) his people, like at the football?" asked Mr Mehri. Mr Benbrika allegedly replied: "If they kill our kids, we kill little kids." "We send a message back to them", Mr Mehri allegedly said. "That's it, an eye for an eye," Mr Benbrika replied. The conversations, recorded on September 24 were played to the Melbourne Magistrates Court during the unsuccessful bail applications of two of the accused men who were charged after last month's early morning anti-terror raids in Melbourne." ---- So its not some reporter finding some bozo to bear out some theory what is being quoted are comments on a police tape being offered as evidence in court. > Like here > and everywhere else, Australian news reporters > have their own agendas to promote. Of course. > Of course > they must sell newspapers, otherwise they would > need to find a real job. That's a tad harsh. Ben Franklin was a pamphleteer as I understand. There is real value in some news papers they just need to be used intelligently. > It is much easier for me to believe that these riots > are made up of good old fashioned motives that > have always been with us: bored idle young men, > territoriality made more acute by the persistent > and increasing shortage of public-accessible > oceanfront, real or perceived unfairness resulting > in relative poverty, add testosterone and alcohol, > stir vigorously. Elements of that are likely to be true, but its not that simple. > Look at the pictures of the rioters. Do you see > anyone there who looks over 40? I see plenty of > teens and twenties aching to demonstrate their > manly courage. I can't specifically recall seeing any that look over 40 but I recall reading that at least one was 39. But you can't discern a bunch of rioters motives from pictures alone now *you* are speculating. > Young men like to fight; humans have evolved that way. If you are going to be that simplistic about it, all humans like to fight. The genes go to the females as well. In this case though one group targeted was "the Lebs", short for Lebanese. Its culture (including the media) that effects that sort of targeting not genes. > But this is actually good news, for the average population > is increasing everywhere on this planet. As time goes on, the > world will have ever fewer of the young and the restless, and > ever more of the old and the helpless, resulting in a more > peaceful (even if more boring) world. Spike, you are underestimating the depth of feeling that is around. Whether the media is true or not it is around and it does influence. You don't seem to be reading the lessons of the bombings in London where the bombers were home grown. In June last year there were ASIO (Australian Security Intelligence Organisation) raids in the street where I live. During the day a friend and I noticed federal police all over my neighbours yard and the next day when I went out to collect the garbage bins in the morning I was met by about thirty television newspaper and radio reporters who were looking to interview neighbours like me or anyone who'd talk to them who might know anything about a raid that had taken place under the new ASIO laws. The media interest was heightened because these were the first raids and those raided were not allowed by law to speak to the media - they risk imprisonment or penalty for even saying a family member had been arrested or some such silliness. Since then about 10 Melbourne men have been picked up and are being held under new laws. I don't know if my neighbour was amongst them. I never met my neighbour until the day after the first raid when I said hello to him after the media went away. I kind of felt guilty not knowing him at all when he'd been there so long. Another older neighbour later told me he put him in the window as a child as a way to get his keys when he'd locked himself out. Anyway obviously I don't want explosions taking place around Melbourne and threatening the lives of people I care about and obviously my neighbour could be either innocent or guilty (not really guilty - the nature of the raids is preventative and to gather intel but guilt of speaking bad words or perhaps plotting worse) but what really annoys me is that if I was a "terrorist" I'd probably think the Aussies have it coming to them now just like the Brits and the Yanks, but most especially like the Yanks. Don't democracies get the governments they deserve? When the rule book is torn up like the US tore it up then there *is* no rule book anymore, there is just asymmetric warfare on all fronts with absolutely no holds barred. All forms of violence become legitimate political tools to be weighted only in terms of their effectiveness. I'm no terrorist to anybody Spike but it is only an accident of location of birth that has made me not be an insurgent. And had your country invaded my country on a pretext and killed my family I don't think I'd be particularly squeamish about upholding laws the protections of which were denied to me and I don't think I'd stop trying to fight you once you left my homeland. I've noticed that amongst those picked up in Australia and the UK as part of the home-grown batch there was at least one white westerner still with a white western name. This is another ranty post from me Spike but I can only take this stuff a certain amount of seriously. Human barbarity and stupidity will probably kill me indirectly if not directly but it doesn't impress me much anymore its just too damn predictable. By nature I'm interested in stuff like politics and law and the rational for the farcical war on terror and by circumstances I find people around me are the subject of draconian laws so I watch this stuff more closely that most perhaps. I think like a "terrorist" because if my neighbour or someone really is one I want to be ready not surprised but I also have to think about what the government or police drop kicks might do. Police or skymarshalls have shot 'innocent' people in the UK on a train and in the US. I feel a duty to speak up and out to a certain extent to ensure that we don't lose the ability to be able too. Brett Paatsch From amara at amara.com Wed Jan 18 17:05:59 2006 From: amara at amara.com (Amara Graps) Date: Wed, 18 Jan 2006 18:05:59 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] Looking for examples of naturally evolved X-ray vision? Message-ID: >My daughter asked me why the visible light spectrum IS the visible >light spectrum. After all, animals hear at a wide range of frequencies >that humans cannot, so why not have the same thing occurring in >vision? Are there animals with X-ray vision? >My first reaction was to say "no". One can imagine with no stretch of current physics to have living creatures on planets located around other stars, who evolve to have Xray vision. This question is a beautiful question to answer with elementary blackbody physics i.e. Wien's Law (*), spectroscopy (*), and stellar evolution (*). The relationships I used below are simplified alot (from an basic astronomy text), but they give a general idea for the steps you can follow to quantify this problem. Electromagnetic radiation with wavelengths between 400 and 700 nm is called visible light because those are the waves to which human vision is sensitive. This is the band of the electromagnetic spectrum where the Sun give off the greatest amount of radiation. It's not coincidental that human eyes evolved to see the kinds of waves that the Sun produces most effectively. The more light there was by which to see, the more efficiently humans could evade predators and make babies before they got stepped on or eaten. Visible light penetrates the Earth's atmosphere effectively, except when it is temporarily blocked by passing clouds. From Wien's Law, the wavelength at which a blackbody emits its maximum energy can be calculated according to : max wavelength (nm) = 3x10^6 / T (K). The temperature (surface) of the Sun is 5800 K, so then the wavelength at which the maximum energy is emitted is: 520 nm, which is in the middle of the visible light range. This explains much of the wavelength of human vision and probably the range of other Earth animals vision, as well. For Xray vision, the middle of the X ray wavelength range is 1 angstrom, 10^{-10) m = 0.1nm To evolve 'naturally', one needs to have a nearby star with the following temperature: T(K) = 3x10^6 / 0.1nm = 30,000 K. You can identify such a star from the Hertzsprung Russell diagram (*). It is an O or (or hot B) spectral class star, which has a luminosity of ~ 1000 * solar luminosities. From the main sequence luminosity, you can approximate the star's mass: L ~ M^{3.5} ==> M ~ 7 solar masses It will have a lifetime on the main sequence (for living creatures to evolve): t ~ 1/ M(M_solar)^{2.5) = 0.01 solar lifetimes Since the solar lifetime is about 10 billion years = 10^{10} years, then the lifetime of this star is about: 10^{-2} * 10^{10} = 10^8 years (=100 million years) When this star evolves off of the main sequence, it will be a giant or supergiant star. Amara (*) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Optical_spectrum (*) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hertzsprung-Russell_diagram (*) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wien's_displacement_law (*) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stellar_evolution Seeing the Whole Symphony (a beautiful lesson about Spectroscopy) http://ccnmtl.columbia.edu/projects/helfand/ -- Amara Graps, PhD Istituto di Fisica dello Spazio Interplanetario (IFSI) Istituto Nazionale di Astrofisica (INAF), Adjunct Assistant Professor Astronomy, AUR, Roma, ITALIA Amara.Graps at ifsi.rm.cnr.it From hal at finney.org Wed Jan 18 19:22:56 2006 From: hal at finney.org (Hal Finney) Date: Wed, 18 Jan 2006 11:22:56 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Impeachment of President Bush What odds am Ioffered? Message-ID: <20060118192256.B8F2A57F8C@finney.org> Brett writes: > Let's say I agree to take your odds Hal, are there any UK based > extropes that you would be willing to have hold our stakes? Or > alternatively, how would you propose to proceed? Reply offlist if > you prefer. I need a few days right now to deal with a potentially serious medical problem that could impair my ability to consummate this wager. I will try to get back to you next week. In the mean time you may take heart from this recent poll: http://www.zogby.com/Soundbites/ReadClips.dbm?ID=12528 : Zogby poll: Majority supports impeaching Bush for wiretapping : : WASHINGTON, D.C. - By a margin of 52 to 43 percent, citizens want : Congress to impeach President Bush if he wiretapped American citizens : without a judge's approval, according to a new poll commissioned : by AfterDowningStreet.org, a grassroots coalition that supports a : Congressional investigation of Pres. Bush's decision to invade Iraq : in 2003. : : The poll was conducted by Zogby International. : : The poll found that 52 percent of respondents agreed with the statement: : "If President Bush wiretapped American citizens without the approval of : a judge, do you agree or disagree that Congress should consider holding : him accountable through impeachment." : : Of those contacted, 43 percent disagreed, and 6 percent said they : didn't know or declined to answer. The poll has a margin of error of : 2.9 percent. : ... : Responses to the Zogby poll varied by political party affiliation: : 76 percent of Democrats favored impeachment, compared to 50 percent of : independents and 29 percent of Republicans. : : Responses also varied by age, sex, race, and religion. 70 percent of : those 18-29 favored impeachment, 51 percent of those 31-49, 50 percent : of those 50-64, and 42 percent of those older than 65. Among women, : 56 percent favored impeachment, compared to 49 percent of men. Among : African Americans, 90 percent favored impeachment, compared to 67 : percent of Hispanics, and 46 percent of whites. : : The new Zogby poll shows a major shift in support for Bush's impeachment : since June 2005. In a Zogby poll conducted June 27-29, 2005 of 905 : likely voters, 42 percent agreed and 50 percent disagreed with the : identical statement asked about in this recent polling. I'm puzzled by this last paragraph. How could they have asked the identical question in June, 2005? "If President Bush wiretapped American citizens without the approval of a judge...?" That didn't become a story until December, whan an NSA insider leaked it. I am quite certain that wiretapping of American citizens without judicial approval was not a topic on anyone's minds in June, because it was no public knowledge at that time. They might have asked about impeachment in general back in June, but I don't see how they could have asked the same question. Back then I think the main issue would have been the Iraq war and claims made to justify the invasion. I sent a query to Zogby about this, we'll see if I hear back. Hal From sentience at pobox.com Wed Jan 18 20:04:41 2006 From: sentience at pobox.com (Eliezer S. Yudkowsky) Date: Wed, 18 Jan 2006 12:04:41 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] The mixed blessing of silence In-Reply-To: <20060118174414.55997.qmail@web80729.mail.yahoo.com> References: <20060118174414.55997.qmail@web80729.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <43CE9F59.2020909@pobox.com> It's easy to call for peace, an end to conflict, without blaming any specific parties. It scores you points with everyone who's sick of hearing about it, usually the majority. It sounds like deep wisdom and gets you a reputation as a nice guy. But a population of doves is easily invaded by hawks. When no one will protest, anyone can get away with anything. There is such a thing as an Evolutionarily Stable Strategy. There is also such a thing as yammering about the subject unproductively because no side is willing to accept anything less than a complete victory. So I don't feel too guilty about posting my opinions, *once*. Playing flame tennis, on and on, is a bad idea. Remember, though, that not everyone has the luxury of a standing, pre-built reputation good enough that they can afford to ignore attacks, confident that others know better than to listen. Don't assume that other people can get away with ignoring attacks. They're not responding to annoy you, they're responding because there are real penalties for not responding. I know you're fed up with big messy public battles. The alternative may be for things to go wrong silently. That is the option you are presented with, when you hear the deeply wise, easy, convenient calls for everyone to just shut up. It doesn't get rid of the problem. It shuts off the sensor that lights up to indicate the problem. -- Eliezer S. Yudkowsky http://singinst.org/ Research Fellow, Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence From bpaatsch at bigpond.net.au Wed Jan 18 21:38:08 2006 From: bpaatsch at bigpond.net.au (Brett Paatsch) Date: Thu, 19 Jan 2006 08:38:08 +1100 Subject: [extropy-chat] Impeachment of President Bush What odds amIoffered? References: <20060118192256.B8F2A57F8C@finney.org> Message-ID: <070901c61c77$792e4800$1283e03c@homepc> Hal wrote: > I need a few days right now to deal with a potentially serious medical > problem that could impair my ability to consummate this wager. I will > try to get back to you next week. No probs. Thanks for letting me know I would have hovered waiting for a response had you not and now I can do other things. If you can't proceed due to health concerns you'll lose none of my respect. Your health is more important. Also I had time to think about this over the end of year break. Regards, Brett Paatsch From brent.allsop at comcast.net Wed Jan 18 22:23:46 2006 From: brent.allsop at comcast.net (brent.allsop at comcast.net) Date: Wed, 18 Jan 2006 22:23:46 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] death will be overcome claim yet on foresight exchange. Message-ID: <011820062223.22921.43CEBFF2000418ED0000598922092246279F019C04040ED29B020A9D0D@comcast.net> Folks, I?m surprised that there is no death will be overcome claim yet on foresight exchange. http://www.ideosphere.com/fx/index.html I?m trying to think what such a claim might be like. Here is a first stab I?ve attempted. Please let me know what you think! Thanks Brent Allsop Trading symbol: ndeath Short description: The end of involuntary death by 2200. Long Description: The general spirit of this claim is that the singularity will occur around 2050, as Kurzweil predicts in his book ?The Singularity is Near?. And that one of the most important defining points of this singularity will be no more involuntary death. This claim is that there will be no more involuntary death some time before the end of this century (before Jan 1, 2200) But it is very difficult to define such an event ? since even after death has appeared to be overcome in general ? there could still be a catastrophic event or significant down turn resulting in more people dieing. So I propose the following definition for this claim: This claim will be judged true if there is a 1 year period in which there is no known involuntary permanent termination of any human level or greater sentience. In the future there will likely be something along the lines of ?uploading? of people?s sentience into artificial platforms or brains and abandoning of the previous brain leaving it to die. Many may argue that something like this would fall within the definition of ?death? and or there is something of significance lost in the process ? even if something does survive in the artificial platform or whatever. For the purposes of this claim, most of these kinds of disagreements that would exist today are deemed to be because we do not yet have a complete understanding and agreement of what sentience is and/or don?t have the ability to engineer, augment, or eff (subjectively share the ineffable) such. In other words, we can?t yet agree on what being immortal will be. Part of this claim is that we will achieve this kind of understanding and such abilities in which all (or at least a significant majority) will be able to agree on what immortal sentient life is and what is required to achieve it. As long as there is any kind of a majority of sentient beings that believe something significant is still being lost ? this will be defined as death and the claim cannot be judged as true. But, if the clear majority of people, because of whatever technological understanding and development, believe that nothing important is being lost ? then this will be defined as successful avoidance of death. When the first year of time is completed where no such involuntary death occurs, and if this is done before the year 2200, this claim will be judged true. Another possibility is that there might be some kind of ?backup? technology. For example a person could have some kind of brain scan every month. Anything like this that could be used to completely restore the particular sentience should an accidental death occur will suffice. In such a case, the most that would be lost would be the less than one month of memories and experiences between the most recent backup and the death. For this claim, if any known sentience permanently looses more than one month of experience and or memory, this will be defined as ?death?. If there is a one year period where more than this is never lost for anyone, involuntarily, then death will be judged to be eliminated as required for this claim to be judged true. Note: Immortal soul considerations. Many claim we have an immortal ?soul? or an ?essence? that goes on to some kind of ?afterlife?, ?reincarnation?, or whatever. If such turns out to be true and verifiable, then this claim can be judged true. But, currently, there is clearly some kind of significant majority of people that believe something is being lost in this death process. For example, I am unable to physically talk with my ?dead? grandmother so feel there is a loss. As soon as there is some kind of development (like say a ?second coming??) which enables the clear majority of sentient beings to agree upon such: that our ?souls? do not really die, then this claim will be spontaneously judged true since most everyone will finally agree there is no such thing as ?death? of sentience. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From kevin at kevinfreels.com Wed Jan 18 22:26:21 2006 From: kevin at kevinfreels.com (kevinfreels.com) Date: Wed, 18 Jan 2006 16:26:21 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] Project anyone? Message-ID: <01f201c61c7e$369eed80$640fa8c0@kevin> Has anyone considered building a piece of software which would allow a user to hum a few parts of a tune and have the software provide a list of possible songs along with clips of the song itself? Would some level of AI provide better results than brute force pattern recognition? -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From thespike at satx.rr.com Wed Jan 18 22:37:00 2006 From: thespike at satx.rr.com (Damien Broderick) Date: Wed, 18 Jan 2006 16:37:00 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] death will be overcome claim yet on foresight exchange. Message-ID: <6.2.1.2.0.20060118163416.01db2bd0@pop-server.satx.rr.com> At 10:23 PM 1/18/2006 +0000, Brett wrote: >The general spirit of this claim is that the singularity will occur around >2050, as Kurzweil predicts in his book ?The Singularity is Near?. And >that one of the most important defining points of this singularity will be >no more involuntary death. This claim is that there will be no more >involuntary death some time before the end of this century (before Jan 1, 2200) I assume you meant "before Jan 1, 2101"? (Or "before Jan 1, 2100", the last year of this century, for people who can't count.) Damien Broderick From brent.allsop at comcast.net Wed Jan 18 22:37:25 2006 From: brent.allsop at comcast.net (brent.allsop at comcast.net) Date: Wed, 18 Jan 2006 22:37:25 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Project anyone? Message-ID: <011820062237.5336.43CEC325000A7E0B000014D822007507449F019C04040ED29B020A9D0D@comcast.net> They already have this: http://www.phonecontent.com/bm/news/gnews/543.shtml Just call a phone number and hum a tune. If they recognize and name the song you pay them a buck or something. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From thespike at satx.rr.com Wed Jan 18 22:39:18 2006 From: thespike at satx.rr.com (Damien Broderick) Date: Wed, 18 Jan 2006 16:39:18 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] and for people who can't read or spell... Message-ID: <6.2.1.2.0.20060118163727.01ceb748@pop-server.satx.rr.com> I keyed and sent: At 10:23 PM 1/18/2006 +0000, Brett wrote: But it was not Brett but brent.allsop. Sorry, guys. From brent.allsop at comcast.net Wed Jan 18 22:40:22 2006 From: brent.allsop at comcast.net (brent.allsop at comcast.net) Date: Wed, 18 Jan 2006 22:40:22 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] no death Message-ID: <011820062240.26299.43CEC3D6000975D9000066BB22073000339F019C04040ED29B020A9D0D@comcast.net> Damian, I assume you meant "before Jan 1, 2101"? (Or "before Jan 1, 2100", the last year of this century, for people who can't count.) Yes, sorry, my bad. I'm glad you know what I meant to say. brent -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From mindspillage at gmail.com Wed Jan 18 22:44:36 2006 From: mindspillage at gmail.com (Kat Walsh) Date: Wed, 18 Jan 2006 17:44:36 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Project anyone? In-Reply-To: <01f201c61c7e$369eed80$640fa8c0@kevin> References: <01f201c61c7e$369eed80$640fa8c0@kevin> Message-ID: <8e253f560601181444r5e5f60cey21142888fa26f4fa@mail.gmail.com> On 1/18/06, kevinfreels.com wrote: > Has anyone considered building a piece of software which would allow a user > to hum a few parts of a tune and have the software provide a list of > possible songs along with clips of the song itself? Would some level of AI > provide better results than brute force pattern recognition? Try searching for the phrase "query by humming" and see what comes up. In short, yes, often considered; there are several demos out though most only work on a small corpus yet, and may not give good suggestions depending on various factors including how badly you hum! The Music Information Retrieval bibliography search can point you to some work on the topic, though I'm not up enough on it to go ahead and pick out the good ones for you. -Kat musician and longtime lurker -- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Mindspillage | (G)AIM:LucidWaking "Once you have tasted flight you will always walk with your eyes cast upward. For there you have been and there you will always be." - Leonardo da Vinci From brent.allsop at comcast.net Wed Jan 18 22:54:54 2006 From: brent.allsop at comcast.net (brent.allsop at comcast.net) Date: Wed, 18 Jan 2006 22:54:54 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] no death Message-ID: <011820062254.11887.43CEC73E0009574F00002E6F22070208539F019C04040ED29B020A9D0D@comcast.net> Damien, Yeah, but the precise terms of a declared bet are pretty important if you're posting it on foresight exchange. Oh yes, absolutely. I'm updating my draft now to clearely say before Jan 1, 2100. And I'm sure I'm still very far from anything worthing of submitting to FX. Brent -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From hal at finney.org Wed Jan 18 23:31:38 2006 From: hal at finney.org (Hal Finney) Date: Wed, 18 Jan 2006 15:31:38 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] no death Message-ID: <20060118233138.36E4D57F8C@finney.org> There is a claim: http://www.ideosphere.com/fx-bin/Claim?claim=Immo > Claim Immo - Immortality by 2050 > bid 24, ask 26, last 25 > > The Claim > > The death rate (per hundred thousand persons) will drop by 90%, relative > to 1994, in any year through 2050. The measurement population is people > in the United States, who are at least one year old. Persons in suspended > animation (or cryonic suspension, reduced metabolism, etc.), if they > are expected to remain suspended for a month or more, count as dead > while suspended; they are omitted from the calculation after the year of > "death". So this asks for at least near-immortality by 2050. It is trading at about 25% odds. However FX is somewhat notorious for overestimating the likelihood of long-term low-probability claims. Hal From brent.allsop at comcast.net Thu Jan 19 00:05:54 2006 From: brent.allsop at comcast.net (brent.allsop at comcast.net) Date: Thu, 19 Jan 2006 00:05:54 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] no death Message-ID: <011920060005.4433.43CED7E20006EA590000115122007507449F019C04040ED29B020A9D0D@comcast.net> Hal, There is a claim: (Immo) Oh, sorry, I hadn't seen this one. This looks like a nice concice way to do it. Thanks Brent. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From fortean1 at mindspring.com Thu Jan 19 00:15:53 2006 From: fortean1 at mindspring.com (Terry W. Colvin) Date: Wed, 18 Jan 2006 17:15:53 -0700 Subject: [extropy-chat] FWD [forteana] The state of science education (new subj) Message-ID: <43CEDA39.4050108@mindspring.com> (old subj) Magnetic field shoves heat sideways & Massless ghosts of the nanoworld. [I think Peter's comments are valid as they come from the horse's mouth, a current science teacher in Australia. -Terry] At 06:48 PM 18/01/2006, you wrote: >Ray D wrote: > > Nope Stewart, but _was_ once irated beyond endurance by some > > time-serving science hack who, when a BBC R4 debate on science > > and edu aired the complaint that school science was boring, > > replied "Science is _supposed_ to be boring" > > > > So wrong! Science is only boring when under the domination of > > boring people like him. > > > >You won't hear any argument from me about the above. Every university >in the UK is struggling to fill science and engineering courses (outside >of presently sexy subjects like biology) because not enough work is done >in schools to make science exciting for all kids and not just the geeks. and therein lies the rub. Scientists have been so successful in portraying science as sexy and exciting that kids are turned off at school when they find out that sciences isn't exactly like it's portrayed on the discovery channel. Kids don't seem to realise that for every 1 hour nature documentary showing the extreme lifestyle that baboons live on the African savannah, there's a few hundred hours of rangers and scientists sitting around watching said baboons scratch their nuts. For every thrilling space launch sending space probes out to the far flung reaches of the solar system there is a barn load of engineers and physicists using maths and solving equations. And every freaking last one of those kids still thinks there are a whole lot of jobs at CSI : Coonabarabran where you get to visit crime scenes, perform autopsies, test for suspicious substances, take casts and moulds, use maggots to determine time of death, test fire sidearms and reconstruct a person's physiognomy from a few scraps of facial bones. We've managed to get science as a major part of popular culture, but because all the legwork doesn't make for good television, it tends to get left out. I'm not sure about the situation in the UK or US, but science syllabi out this way have undergone major revision in recent years. Gone are the reliance on testing lists of facts (as Ray has identified before) - now science teaching is centred around doing "real" science, and science in the context of the real world. This is, on the whole, a good approach. However, it doesn't take into account a few real world considerations. A point to consider - here in Queenslandland, we don't work to a single curriculum. Each subject has a generalised syllabus which is then tailored by individual schools to meet their needs. Assessment is moderated between schools by panels of etachers to ensure quality and rigour. However, there aren't single monolithic tests that all kids undertake. This is good in that it means that kids in Mount Isa don't have to know everything about mangrove environments, but it's an amazing workload on teachers. You can't be a lazy disinterested teacher under these conditions. We don't tend to use textbooks much anymore - no textbook can keep up with the pace of scientific advance and since all science programs need to be geared to the needs and interests of the stuents they serve, a text book which would have been good for the inland mining city of Mount Isa where I taught for the first 6 years of my career would be useless out here. Economies of scale mean that publishers really can't afford to write relevant texts. Additionally, because the information goes out of date so quickly, even if we do find a textbook, schools can't afford to keep on updating them every couple of years (most kids hire textbooks through the school, rather than owning their own). Don't get me wrong - there's nothing more soul destroying than teaching rigidly out of a 10 year old textbook that is talking about the potential that the human genome project and cloning will have when we eventually get around to doing it. However it also means that I am now responsible for finding resources for everything the kinds do. Thank God for the internet, and let's hope I don't have to take too many sick days (no more "read pp234-238 and answer the questions"). One of the problems most quoted about science teaching is overworked, burnt-out science teachers. Imagine having to prepare innovative, interesting and relevant science lessons for all of the five or six class you teacher from scratch and see how fast you burn out. A frightening number of young teachers in Queenslandland leave the profession before their fifth year. I almost did it last year in my 8th. If anything, science education has moved too far away from remembering facts (what is called "recall", normally grouped in the knowledge and understanding criteria). No-one in their right mind would say that a good indicator of a scientist is only the ability to remember all sorts of stuff. However, no-one in their right mind would say that a scientist shouldn't have a base of knowledge to work from. Unfortunately in the new syllabi, they've done some really odd things. [Before I do discuss this, who says kids don't want to learn facts ? One thing that makes me reasonably popular as a teacher is my background knowledge. I may have my specialisation in the ultrastructure of nematode eggshells, but the kids know that they can ask me about virtually anything and get some kind of an answer (or at the very least, and opportunity to go and find the answer out togther through research). Without blowing my own trumpet too much, the kids respect that. I don't think knowing a whole bunch of arcane facts makes me smart, but the kids do.] In the past, if you got 50% of the recall type questions in an exam (which would also have included questions requiring you to apply recalled knowledge, use scientific processes and complex thinking skills) would have gotten you a C to be combined with your results of the other sections. That means if you could only remember half of the work you'd done, you could probably reason your way through the other types of questions and land yourself a C. Now, they are telling us that since recall is such a lower order thinking process, to qualify for a C in the recall type questions you need to get 90% of them right (although you're not allowed to use percentages - don't get me started on that). Now, we have a few science types on this list - how do you think you would have enjoyed science if, to pass, you had to remember 90% of the stuff you learnt, plus get the majority of the higher order stuff done as well. Should you survive this regime, how will you feel when you get to university and your first piece of assessment is a 100% 200 question multiple choice recall exam ? It's interesting hearing folks talk about the poor state of science education. The politer ones pussyfoot around and blame the terrible funding or the social conditions under which the kids live. However, fundamentally the blame is laid on the teachers and the programs that they teach. Overworked, disinterested teachers pushing outdated programs that the kids find boring. Can I go out on a limb here and say that most kids would find the real work of science boring and unpleasant. I'm not going to agree with the twat that Ray quoted, but science shouldn't have to appeal to every single kid. I'm not especially artistically gifted and I'm bloody glad that I only had to do art to grade eight. However I'm currently teaching kids up to year 10 who have to do a science of some description. As a result, the science subjects we teach are becoming less and less scientific to appeal to these kids and to allow them to achieve in it. There are always going to be kids who are scientifically inclined. These are the kids who are curious, who ask the tough questions, who like to knuckle down and work their way through a particularly tough problem, who understand that you have to show persistance, to try things from a number of different approaches and to accept it when the evidence tends to lean away from your cherished idea. These are the folks who will be scientists. These are the kids I teach at the moment who, on seeing the patterns of DNA bands, want to know why they have formed the pattern they did, rather than simply matching it up to the suspect's DNA to see whodunnit. These are the kids who, after graphing the pattern of disease spread in the epidemiology game (and fulfilling the requirements of the lesson) start to notice patterns in the way the disease has spread - how it stayed to just girls or spread rapidly through the popular kids but left the nerds unscathed. These are the kids who after throwing up the first time they opened up their liver baits to see what maggots they've collected, make it a competition to see who can get the greatest number and variety of flies hatching out, rather than just giving up and refusing to do the experiments. These are the kids who spent three hours just flipping over rocks in tidal pools to see what they could find. Unfortunately, these are the kids who don't go well in the new assessment regime. For better or for worse they like learning facts and showing them off to folks around them. They don't tend to write good projects or assignments because they're so focused on learning things that they fail to satisfy the criteria. When the assessment type that does suit them (an exam) does roll around, they get absolutely creamed by it. I've lost four bright kids from my academy class between last year and this year and kept all the clowns. Might I suggest another reason why kids are put off science ? Maybe they find that they can't learn in an environment where a teacher is forced to pander to the least common denominator because every kid is forced to do science. Maybe they're sick and tired of doing forensics for the 4th time because "that's what everyone wants to do". Maybe because the areas that appeal to the technically minded students - areas that involoved using set algorithms to solve problems - have all but been abandoned because of the insistence on global contexts for science (you should have seen the opposition I faced when I organised a simple optics unit for year 9 science last year). Maybe some of these kids have got more brains than what we credit them for and realise that a career in science is setting oneself up for a lifetime of short-term contracts, endlessly chasing research grants, diminishing funding and control by corporate interests. Kids now (and, lets face it they did when I was at school) pick subjects that'll help them get rich, or, failing that, financially secure. Science won't do that. Hell, a majority of science teachers now are former scientists like me - we're not exactly good role models for encouraging kids to seek careers in science. Maybe we should stop sugar coating science as ALWAYS EXCITING, ALWAYS DANGEROUS, ALWAYS EXTREME, all the way through school so that when they get to university and have to sit through a mound of number crunching it won't be so disappointing. Understand this (and this is what I think the twat Ray was talking about was meaning if not aequately explaining) : Kids have a different definition of exciting and interesting. You and I (and probably a high proportion of folks on this list) find knowledge it's own reward. We learn stuff because we get pleasure from learning. We seek out information because that is what drives us. For this reason, we put up with a lot of the dull stuff that goes along with learning (like reading and calculations). Your average teenager doesn't. They like car chases, explosions and an answer to a vexing problem in 43 minutes max. There are exceptions - these are the kids we were when we were at school and who will turn into us and become the next group of scientists. If we want to stop the drain away from science careers and courses then by all means revamp the syllabi and encourage burnt-out teachers to move on. But let's also do something about making science a more attractive prospect once kids get out there in the workforce. Unfortunately, to do that we're going to have to pay them more, give them a bit of job security and stop the reliance on corporate money to do this. Can't see that happening in the near future, so lets just fall back on the old familiar punching bag of slack teachers. Above all, let the geeks be geeks. I'm all in favor of all students doing some kind of science subject throughout their schooling - teach them what the scientific method is and we might have a few more rational decisions being made (similarly, I'd like to see social sciences compulsory for all students at well). But let's leave the whiz bang stuff for this subject. Leave the academic sciences to the folks who will become scientists. Let them learn their facts in a relevant context alongside the other important elements of science. peter *phew* that rant's been a long time coming -- "Only a zit on the wart on the heinie of progress." Copyright 1992, Frank Rice Terry W. Colvin, Sierra Vista, Arizona (USA) < fortean1 at mindspring.com > Alternate: < fortean1 at msn.com > Home Page: < http://www.geocities.com/Area51/Stargate/8958/index.html > Sites: * Fortean Times * Mystic's Haven * TLCB * U.S. Message Text Formatting (USMTF) Program ------------ Member: Thailand-Laos-Cambodia Brotherhood (TLCB) Mailing List TLCB Web Site: < http://www.tlc-brotherhood.org > [Southeast Asia/Secret War in Laos veterans, Allies, CIA/NSA, and "steenkeen" contractors are welcome.] From dirk.bruere at gmail.com Thu Jan 19 00:22:45 2006 From: dirk.bruere at gmail.com (Dirk Bruere) Date: Thu, 19 Jan 2006 00:22:45 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] FWD [forteana] The state of science education (new subj) In-Reply-To: <43CEDA39.4050108@mindspring.com> References: <43CEDA39.4050108@mindspring.com> Message-ID: On 1/19/06, Terry W. Colvin wrote: > > (old subj) Magnetic field shoves heat sideways & Massless ghosts of the > nanoworld. > > [I think Peter's comments are valid as they come from the horse's > mouth, a current science teacher in Australia. -Terry] > > At 06:48 PM 18/01/2006, you wrote: > >Ray D wrote: > > > Nope Stewart, but _was_ once irated beyond endurance by some > > > time-serving science hack who, when a BBC R4 debate on science > > > and edu aired the complaint that school science was boring, > > > replied "Science is _supposed_ to be boring" > > > > > > So wrong! Science is only boring when under the domination of > > > boring people like him. > > > > > > >You won't hear any argument from me about the above. Every university > >in the UK is struggling to fill science and engineering courses (outside > >of presently sexy subjects like biology) because not enough work is done > >in schools to make science exciting for all kids and not just the geeks. > > and therein lies the rub. Scientists have been so successful in portraying > science as sexy and exciting that kids are turned off at school when they > find out that sciences isn't exactly like it's portrayed on the discovery > channel. Kids don't seem to realise that for every 1 hour nature > documentary showing the extreme lifestyle that baboons live on the African > savannah, there's a few hundred hours of rangers and scientists sitting > around watching said baboons scratch their nuts. For every thrilling space Simpler than that. Science/engineering is a bad choice in societies where status = money and scientists/engineers are not paid well. The kids aren't stupid. Dirk -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From fortean1 at mindspring.com Thu Jan 19 02:41:13 2006 From: fortean1 at mindspring.com (Terry W. Colvin) Date: Wed, 18 Jan 2006 19:41:13 -0700 Subject: [extropy-chat] FWD [forteana] Re: Looking for examples of naturally evolved X-ray vision? Message-ID: <43CEFC49.3040202@mindspring.com> Terry W. Colvin fnarded: > Those white flowers are only white to us. To bees, they're a palette > of the most beautiful colours in the world. The flowers evolved to be > pollinated by insects, not to benefit human aesthetics. That was something interesting that I think came up in David Attenborough's recent series Life in the Undergrowth (watch it if it gets to the US!) looking at invertebrates. It turned out that, seen from a bee's pov, a crab spider on a white flower (white on white to our eyes) stands out like a sore thumb as the spider still glows in UV while the flower is a lot dimmer. You'd think this would mean the bee would avoid that flower but they don't. Quite an odd one. Another thing that show indicated to me is either that the extremely complex relationships and behaviours between insects and plants evolved over millions of years or gawd has WAY too much time on its pseudopods. Stew -- Stewart Smith "The monks of science dwell in smuggeries that are walled away from event-jungles" -Charles H. Fort, Wild Talents, Chapter 13. -- "Only a zit on the wart on the heinie of progress." Copyright 1992, Frank Rice Terry W. Colvin, Sierra Vista, Arizona (USA) < fortean1 at mindspring.com > Alternate: < fortean1 at msn.com > Home Page: < http://www.geocities.com/Area51/Stargate/8958/index.html > Sites: * Fortean Times * Mystic's Haven * TLCB * U.S. Message Text Formatting (USMTF) Program ------------ Member: Thailand-Laos-Cambodia Brotherhood (TLCB) Mailing List TLCB Web Site: < http://www.tlc-brotherhood.org > [Southeast Asia/Secret War in Laos veterans, Allies, CIA/NSA, and "steenkeen" contractors are welcome.] From fortean1 at mindspring.com Thu Jan 19 02:42:39 2006 From: fortean1 at mindspring.com (Terry W. Colvin) Date: Wed, 18 Jan 2006 19:42:39 -0700 Subject: [extropy-chat] FWD (UFO UpDate) A Peck Of Nanotech Message-ID: <43CEFC9F.2030605@mindspring.com> [Partial woo-woo alert! -Terry] From: Bob Soetebier To: UFO UpDates - Toronto Date: Tue, 17 Jan 2006 20:45:19 -0600 Subject: A Peck Of Nanotech Because of the obviously advanced technology involved - exhibited via "impossible" high-speed maneuvers and other high- tech attributes - some have speculated that Alien intelligence certainly would have long ago mastered advances in atomic-level miniaturization. In other words: Nanotechnology. My interest in nanotechnology began around 1990. That is when I first read about fullerine and 'Bucky Balls' (named to honor former St. Louisan Buckminster Fuller, the inventor of the geodesic dome), along with the development of carbon nanotubules. Many consider nanotechnology "science fiction" - if they have heard or read about it all. Nanotech holds great promise and is already being implemented in various fields, including electronics and medicine, among others. (For some examples of current nanotech in use in everyday products, you can read a Tues., Jan. 3, 2006, St. Louis Post- Dispatch 'Op-Ed' piece, by Julia A. Moore and Daniel Ray - entitled, SCIENCE: Super-tiny 'machines' are already at work - at the following URL.): http://tinyurl.com/8oyx2 At the same time, the potential threat posed by unrestrained nanotech 'in the wild' is a very real possibility! For those who might discount some of the hazard warnings, please consider the following from a September 24, 2002 PC Magazine article entitled Nanotech Hazards?, by Sebastian Rupley: ... The National Science Foundation predicts that within ten years the entire semiconductor industry will rely on nanotechnology and nanomaterials. But according to some new reports, there may be hazards in toying with Mother Nature's building blocks. At a meeting held by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) this past spring, researchers reported that nanoparticles (bits of material engineered at nanoscale) have already appeared in the livers of research animals and may eventually piggyback on bacteria and enter the food chain. That report was followed by a warning from the ETC Group, an organization focused on technology's risk to the environment, criticizing the fact that there is no regulatory body tracking nanomaterials. While keeping that above reference to "bacteria" in mind, consider the following predictive info that was contained in an April 2000 "Wired" magazine article entitled "Why The Future Doesn't Need Us" by Bill Joy. Regarding nanotech developments, Bill Joy quotes Eric Drexler (author of the book, Engines of Creation) thusly: As Drexler explained: "Plants" with 'leaves' no more efficient than today's solar cells could out-compete real plants, crowding the biosphere with an inedible foliage. Tough omnivorous 'bacteria' could out- compete real bacteria: They could spread like blowing pollen, replicate swiftly, and reduce the biosphere to dust in a matter of days. Dangerous replicators could easily be too tough, small, and rapidly spreading to stop - at least if we make no preparation. We have trouble enough controlling viruses and fruit flies. Among the cognoscenti of nanotechnology, this threat has become known as the 'gray goo problem'. Though masses of uncontrolled replicators need not be gray or gooey, the term 'gray goo' emphasizes that replicators able to obliterate life might be less inspiring than a single species of crabgrass. They might be superior in an evolutionary sense, but this need not make them valuable. The gray goo threat makes one thing perfectly clear: We cannot afford certain kinds of accidents with replicating assemblers. Gray goo would surely be a depressing ending to our human adventure on Earth, far worse than mere fire or ice, and one that could stem from a simple laboratory accident. Considering recent incidents of the escaping into the wild of unintentionally - but, not necessarily unpredictable - 'bio-engineered' herbicide-resistant weeds, no one can any longer doubt the threat of such man-made negligence. Everyone should be concerned of the gravely serious hazard posed by 'in-the-wild nanoparticles'! Bob Soetebier -- "Only a zit on the wart on the heinie of progress." Copyright 1992, Frank Rice Terry W. Colvin, Sierra Vista, Arizona (USA) < fortean1 at mindspring.com > Alternate: < fortean1 at msn.com > Home Page: < http://www.geocities.com/Area51/Stargate/8958/index.html > Sites: * Fortean Times * Mystic's Haven * TLCB * U.S. Message Text Formatting (USMTF) Program ------------ Member: Thailand-Laos-Cambodia Brotherhood (TLCB) Mailing List TLCB Web Site: < http://www.tlc-brotherhood.org > [Southeast Asia/Secret War in Laos veterans, Allies, CIA/NSA, and "steenkeen" contractors are welcome.] From fortean1 at mindspring.com Thu Jan 19 03:09:48 2006 From: fortean1 at mindspring.com (Terry W. Colvin) Date: Wed, 18 Jan 2006 20:09:48 -0700 Subject: [extropy-chat] FWD [forteana] Re: Looking for examples of naturally evolved X-ray vision? Message-ID: <43CF02FC.3030703@mindspring.com> On 1/18/06, Terry W. Colvin fnarded: > I was helping my daughter come up with some ideas for a school science > project and I stumbled onto a couple unknowns. > > Animals have evolved a wide variety of abilities to seek food and avoid > predators. Echo-location, color vision, and compound eyes are just a > few. All provide important information regarding the immediate > surroundings. My daughter asked me why the visible light spectrum IS the > visible light spectrum. After all, animals hear at a wide range of > frequencies that humans cannot, so why not have the same thing occurring > in vision? Are there animals with X-ray vision? Several reasons why not: 1. Animals don't generate the light they see by, by and large, they detect light generated by the sun or by other animals. 2. Therefore the light that is used to see by must be something that is reflected by the things you want to see. 3. X-rays mostly go right through things you might want to see. Infrared is mostly absorbed by them. 4 Given that early life evolved in water, the visible spectrum is the about the only bit *not* blocked by atmosphere plus water. IR, X-rays, Radio, and UV are all blocked by water. Not much point seeing a frequency which is blocked. 5. X-rays are extremely energetic, and actually break down biological tissue; hard to make a biological detector. 6. X-rays are extremely energetic, and would be hard or impossible for living systems to generate. Certain animals (e.g. Snakes) can "see" infra-red (Humans can detect IR, too - just stand near a fire.....) Certain animals (e.g. Bees) can "see" UV (I believe that humans can see near UV if the lens of the eye has been removed or replaced by a synthetic substitute) Radio waves certainly reach earth,and I suppose could be a good thing to see by, except that they are faint, and receiving them requires rather large receivers, probably not practical for biological systems. They are also absorbed, rather than reflected by lots of things. Excellent question, though. -- "Only a zit on the wart on the heinie of progress." Copyright 1992, Frank Rice Terry W. Colvin, Sierra Vista, Arizona (USA) < fortean1 at mindspring.com > Alternate: < fortean1 at msn.com > Home Page: < http://www.geocities.com/Area51/Stargate/8958/index.html > Sites: * Fortean Times * Mystic's Haven * TLCB * U.S. Message Text Formatting (USMTF) Program ------------ Member: Thailand-Laos-Cambodia Brotherhood (TLCB) Mailing List TLCB Web Site: < http://www.tlc-brotherhood.org > [Southeast Asia/Secret War in Laos veterans, Allies, CIA/NSA, and "steenkeen" contractors are welcome.] From dirk.bruere at gmail.com Thu Jan 19 03:18:21 2006 From: dirk.bruere at gmail.com (Dirk Bruere) Date: Thu, 19 Jan 2006 03:18:21 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] FWD [forteana] Re: Looking for examples of naturally evolved X-ray vision? In-Reply-To: <43CF02FC.3030703@mindspring.com> References: <43CF02FC.3030703@mindspring.com> Message-ID: On 1/19/06, Terry W. Colvin wrote: > > On 1/18/06, Terry W. Colvin fnarded: > > > I was helping my daughter come up with some ideas for a school science > > project and I stumbled onto a couple unknowns. > > > > Animals have evolved a wide variety of abilities to seek food and avoid > > predators. Echo-location, color vision, and compound eyes are just a > > few. All provide important information regarding the immediate > > surroundings. My daughter asked me why the visible light spectrum IS the > > visible light spectrum. After all, animals hear at a wide range of > > frequencies that humans cannot, so why not have the same thing occurring > > in vision? Are there animals with X-ray vision? > > > Several reasons why not: > 1. Animals don't generate the light they see by, by and large, they detect > light generated by the sun or by other animals. > 2. Therefore the light that is used to see by must be something that is > reflected by the things you want to see. > 3. X-rays mostly go right through things you might want to see. Infrared > is > mostly absorbed by them. > 4 Given that early life evolved in water, the visible spectrum is the > about > the only bit *not* blocked by atmosphere plus water. IR, X-rays, Radio, > and > UV are all blocked by water. Not much point seeing a frequency which is > blocked. > 5. X-rays are extremely energetic, and actually break down biological > tissue; hard to make a biological detector. > 6. X-rays are extremely energetic, and would be hard or impossible for > living systems to generate. > > Certain animals (e.g. Snakes) can "see" infra-red (Humans can detect IR, > too > - just stand near a fire.....) > Certain animals (e.g. Bees) can "see" UV (I believe that humans can see > near > UV if the lens of the eye has been removed or replaced by a synthetic > substitute) > > Radio waves certainly reach earth,and I suppose could be a good thing to > see > by, except that they are faint, and receiving them requires rather large > receivers, probably not practical for biological systems. They are also > absorbed, rather than reflected by lots of things. > > Excellent question, though. Which leaves mm wavelength radiation. Dirk -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From HerbM at learnquick.com Wed Jan 18 02:32:26 2006 From: HerbM at learnquick.com (Herb Martin) Date: Tue, 17 Jan 2006 20:32:26 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] FW: Iran Behavior: Stratfor Geopolitical Intelligence Report Message-ID: Consider: _____ From: Strategic Forecasting, Inc. [mailto:noreply at stratfor.com] Sent: Tuesday, January 17, 2006 6:08 PM To: HerbM at learnquick.com Subject: Stratfor Geopolitical Intelligence Report Strategic Forecasting Stratfor.com Services Subscriptions Reports Partners Press Room Contact Us GEOPOLITICAL INTELLIGENCE REPORT 01.17.2006 READ MORE... Analyses Country Profiles - Archive Forecasts Geopolitical Diary Global Market Brief - Archive Hotspots - Archive Intelligence Guidance Net Assessment Situation Reports Special Reports Strategic Markets - Archive Stratfor Weekly Terrorism Brief Terrorism Intelligence Report Travel Security - Archive US - IRAQ War Coverage Iran's Redefined Strategy By George Friedman The Iranians have broken the International Atomic Energy Agency seals on some of their nuclear facilities. They did this very deliberately and publicly to make certain that everyone knew that Tehran was proceeding with its nuclear program. Prior to this, and in parallel, the Iranians began to -- among other things -- systematically bait the Israelis, threatening to wipe them from the face of the earth. The question, of course, is what exactly the Iranians are up to. They do not yet have nuclear weapons. The Israelis do. The Iranians have now hinted that (a) they plan to build nuclear weapons and have implied, as clearly as possible without saying it, that (b) they plan to use them against Israel. On the surface, these statements appear to be begging for a pre-emptive strike by Israel. There are many things one might hope for, but a surprise visit from the Israeli air force is not usually one of them. Nevertheless, that is exactly what the Iranians seem to be doing, so we need to sort this out. There are four possibilities: 1. Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the Iranian president, is insane and wants to be attacked because of a bad childhood. 2. The Iranians are engaged in a complex diplomatic maneuver, and this is part of it. 3. The Iranians think they can get nuclear weapons -- and a deterrent to Israel -- before the Israelis attack. 4. The Iranians, actually and rationally, would welcome an Israeli -- or for that matter, American -- air strike. Let's begin with the insanity issue, just to get it out of the way. One of the ways to avoid thinking seriously about foreign policy is to dismiss as a nutcase anyone who does not behave as you yourself would. As such, he is unpredictable and, while scary, cannot be controlled. You are therefore relieved of the burden of doing anything about him. In foreign policy, it is sometimes useful to appear to be insane, as it is in poker: The less predictable you are, the more power you have -- and insanity is a great tool of unpredictability. Some leaders cultivate an aura of insanity. However, people who climb to the leadership of nations containing many millions of people must be highly disciplined, with insight into others and the ability to plan carefully. Lunatics rarely have those characteristics. Certainly, there have been sociopaths -- like Hitler -- but at the same time, he was a very able, insightful, meticulous man. He might have been crazy, but dismissing him because he was crazy -- as many did -- was a massive mistake. Moreover, leaders do not rise alone. They are surrounded by other ambitious people. In the case of Ahmadinejad, he is answerable to others above him (in this case, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei), alongside him and below him. He did not get to where he is by being nuts -- and even if we think what he says is insane, it clearly doesn't strike the rest of his audience as insane. Thinking of him as insane is neither helpful nor clarifying. The Three-Player Game So what is happening? First, the Iranians obviously are responding to the Americans. Tehran's position in Iraq is not what the Iranians had hoped it would be. U.S. maneuvers with the Sunnis in Iraq and the behavior of Iraqi Shiite leaders clearly have created a situation in which the outcome will not be the creation of an Iranian satellite state. At best, Iraq will be influenced by Iran or neutral. At worst, it will drift back into opposition to Iran -- which has been Iraq's traditional geopolitical position. This is not satisfactory. Iran's Iraq policy has not failed, but it is not the outcome Tehran dreamt of in 2003. There is a much larger issue. The United States has managed its position in Iraq -- to the extent that it has been managed -- by manipulating the Sunni-Shiite fault line in the Muslim world. In the same way that Richard Nixon manipulated the Sino-Soviet split, the fundamental fault line in the Communist world, to keep the Soviets contained and off-balance late in the Vietnam War, so the Bush administration has used the primordial fault line in the Islamic world, the Sunni-Shiite split, to manipulate the situation in Iraq. Washington did this on a broader scale as well. Having enticed Iran with new opportunities -- both for Iran as a nation and as the leading Shiite power in a post-Saddam world -- the administration turned to Sunni countries like Saudi Arabia and enticed them into accommodation with the United States by allowing them to consider the consequences of an ascended Iran under canopy of a relationship with the United States. Washington used that vision of Iran to gain leverage in Saudi Arabia. The United States has been moving back and forth between Sunnis and Shia since the invasion of Afghanistan, when it obtained Iranian support for operations in Afghanistan's Shiite regions. Each side was using the other. The United States, however, attained the strategic goal of any three-player game: It became the swing player between Sunnis and Shia. This was not what the Iranians had hoped for. Reclaiming the Banner There is yet another dimension to this. In 1979, when the Ayatollah Ruholla Khomeini deposed the Shah of Iran, Iran was the center of revolutionary Islamism. It both stood against the United States and positioned itself as the standard-bearer for radical Islamist youth. It was Iran, through its creation, Hezbollah, that pioneered suicide bombings. It championed the principle of revolutionary Islamism against both collaborationist states like Saudi Arabia and secular revolutionaries like Yasser Arafat. It positioned Shi'ism as the protector of the faith and the hope of the future. In having to defend against Saddam Hussein's Iraq in the 1980s, and the resulting containment battle, Iran became ensnared in a range of necessary but compromising relationships. Recall, if you will, that the Iran-Contra affair revealed not only that the United States used Israel to send weapons to Iran, but also that Iran accepted weapons from Israel. Iran did what it had to in order to survive, but the complexity of its operations led to serious compromises. By the late 1990s, Iran had lost any pretense of revolutionary primacy in the Islamic world. It had been flanked by the Sunni Wahhabi movement, al Qaeda. The Iranians always saw al Qaeda as an outgrowth of Saudi Arabia and Pakistan and therefore, through Shiite and Iranian eyes, never trusted it. Iran certainly didn't want al Qaeda to usurp the position of primary challenger to the West. Under any circumstances, it did not want al Qaeda to flourish. It was caught in a challenge. First, it had to reduce al Qaeda's influence, or concede that the Sunnis had taken the banner from Khomeini's revolution. Second, Iran had to reclaim its place. Third, it had to do this without undermining its geopolitical interests. Tehran spent the time from 2003 through 2005 maximizing what it could from the Iraq situation. It also quietly participated in the reduction of al Qaeda's network and global reach. In doing so, it appeared to much of the Islamic world as clever and capable, but not particularly principled. Tehran's clear willingness to collaborate on some level with the United States in Afghanistan, in Iraq and in the war on al Qaeda made it appear as collaborationist as it had accused the Kuwaitis or Saudis of being in the past. By the end of 2005, Iran had secured its western frontier as well as it could, had achieved what influence it could in Baghdad, had seen al Qaeda weakened. It was time for the next phase. It had to reclaim its position as the leader of the Islamic revolutionary movement for itself and for Shi'ism. Thus, the selection of the new president was, in retrospect, carefully engineered. After President Mohammed Khatami's term, all moderates were excluded from the electoral process by decree, and the election came down to a struggle between former President Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani -- an heir to Khomeini's tradition, but also an heir to the tactical pragmatism of the 1980s and 1990s -- and Ahmadinejad, the clearest descendent of the Khomeini revolution that there was in Iran, and someone who in many ways had avoided the worst taints of compromise. Ahmadinejad was set loose to reclaim Iran's position in the Muslim world. Since Iran had collaborated with Israel during the 1980s, and since Iranian money in Lebanon had mingled with Israeli money, the first thing he had to do was to reassert Iran's anti-Zionist credentials. He did that by threatening Israel's existence and denying the Holocaust. Whether he believed what he was saying is immaterial. Ahmadinejad used the Holocaust issue to do two things: First, he established himself as intellectually both anti-Israeli and anti-Jewish, taking the far flank among Islamic leaders; and second, he signaled a massive breach with Khatami's approach. Khatami was focused on splitting the Western world by dividing the Americans from the Europeans. In carrying out this policy, he had to manipulate the Europeans. The Europeans were always open to the claim that the Americans were being rigid and were delighted to serve the role of sophisticated mediator. Khatami used the Europeans' vanity brilliantly, sucking them into endless discussions and turning the Iran situation into a problem the Europeans were having with the United States. But Tehran paid a price for this in the Muslim world. In drawing close to the Europeans, the Iranians simply appeared to be up to their old game of unprincipled realpolitik with people -- Europeans -- who were no better than the Americans. The Europeans were simply Americans who were weaker. Ahmadinejad could not carry out his strategy of flanking the Wahhabis and still continue the minuet with Europe. So he ended Khatami's game with a bang, with a massive diatribe on the Holocaust and by arguing that if there had been one, the Europeans bore the blame. That froze Germany out of any further dealings with Tehran, and even the French had to back off. Iran's stock in the Islamic world started to rise. The Nuclear Gambit The second phase was for Iran to very publicly resume -- or very publicly claim to be resuming -- development of a nuclear weapon. This signaled three things: 1. Iran's policy of accommodation with the West was over. 2. Iran intended to get a nuclear weapon in order to become the only real challenge to Israel and, not incidentally, a regional power that Sunni states would have to deal with. 3. Iran was prepared to take risks that no other Muslim actor was prepared to take. Al Qaeda was a piker. The fundamental fact is that Ahmadinejad knows that, except in the case of extreme luck, Iran will not be able to get nuclear weapons. First, building a nuclear device is not the same thing as building a nuclear weapon. A nuclear weapon must be sufficiently small, robust and reliable to deliver to a target. A nuclear device has to sit there and go boom. The key technologies here are not the ones that build a device but the ones that turn a device into a weapon -- and then there is the delivery system to worry about: range, reliability, payload, accuracy. Iran has a way to go. A lot of countries don't want an Iranian bomb. Israel is one. The United States is another. Throw Saudi Arabia, Turkey, and most of the 'Stans into this, and there are not a lot of supporters for an Iranian bomb. However, there are only two countries that can do something about it. The Israelis don't want to get the grief, but they are the ones who cannot avoid action because they are the most vulnerable if Iran should develop a weapon. The United States doesn't want Israel to strike at Iran, as that would massively complicate the U.S. situation in the region, but it doesn't want to carry out the strike itself either. This, by the way, is a good place to pause and explain to readers who will write in wondering why the United States will tolerate an Israeli nuclear force but not an Iranian one. The answer is simple. Israel will probably not blow up New York. That's why the United States doesn't mind Israel having nukes and does mind Iran having them. Is that fair? This is power politics, not sharing time in preschool. End of digression. Intra-Islamic Diplomacy If the Iranians are seen as getting too close to a weapon, either the United States or Israel will take them out, and there is an outside chance that the facilities could not be taken out with a high degree of assurance unless nukes are used. In the past, our view was that the Iranians would move carefully in using the nukes to gain leverage against the United States. That is no longer clear. Their focus now seems to be not on their traditional diplomacy, but on a more radical, intra-Islamic diplomacy. That means that they might welcome a (survivable) attack by Israel or the United States. It would burnish Iran's credentials as the true martyr and fighter of Islam. Meanwhile, the Iranians appear to be reaching out to the Sunnis on a number of levels. Muqtada al-Sadr, the leader of a radical Shiite group in Iraq with ties to Iran, visited Saudi Arabia recently. There are contacts between radical Shia and Sunnis in Lebanon as well. The Iranians appear to be engaged in an attempt to create the kind of coalition in the Muslim world that al Qaeda failed to create. From Tehran's point of view, if they get a deliverable nuclear device, that's great -- but if they are attacked by Israel or the United States, that's not a bad outcome either. In short, the diplomacy that Iran practiced from the beginning of the Iraq-Iran war until after the U.S. invasion of Iraq appears to be ended. Iran is making a play for ownership of revolutionary Islamism on behalf of itself and the Shia. Thus, Tehran will continue to make provocative moves, while hoping to avoid counterstrikes. On the other hand, if there are counterstrikes, the Iranians will probably be able to live with that as well. Send questions or comments on this article to analysis at stratfor.com. Get unrestricted access to Stratfor Premium with a FREE 7-day Trial today. 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Newsletter Subscription The STRATFOR Weekly is e-mailed to you on an opt-in basis with STRATFOR. If you no longer wish to receive regular e-mails from STRATFOR, please send a message to service at stratfor.com with the subject line: UNSUBSCRIBE - Free GIR. For more information on STRATFOR's services, please visit www.stratfor.com or e-mail info at stratfor.com today! C Copyright 2006 Strategic Forecasting Inc. All rights reserved. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From ken at javien.com Thu Jan 19 04:29:13 2006 From: ken at javien.com (Ken Kittlitz) Date: Wed, 18 Jan 2006 21:29:13 -0700 Subject: [extropy-chat] death will be overcome claim yet on foresight exchange. In-Reply-To: <011820062223.22921.43CEBFF2000418ED0000598922092246279F019 C04040ED29B020A9D0D@comcast.net> Message-ID: <4.3.2.7.2.20060118212033.03ae6038@127.0.0.1> At 10:23 PM 1/18/2006 +0000, brent.allsop at comcast.net wrote: >I'm surprised that there is no death will be overcome claim yet on >foresight exchange. > > > >http://www.ideosphere.com/fx/index.html > > There are actually a couple of relevant claims -- that you were unable to find them suggests that the claim search/filtering routines need to be improved ;-) http://www.ideosphere.com/fx-bin/Claim?claim=Immo (Immortality by 2050) http://www.ideosphere.com/fx-bin/Claim?claim=immort (Immortality in mammal by 2015) The first claim refers to "people"; the second to mammals in general. I don't mean to imply there isn't a need for other claims that help map out more of the probability space -- overcoming death is a goal that warrants all the best information we're able to generate, by markets or other means. --- Ken Kittlitz http://www.javien.com From info at nanoaging.com Thu Jan 19 04:54:15 2006 From: info at nanoaging.com (The NanoAging Institute) Date: Wed, 18 Jan 2006 23:54:15 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] The Perfect Survivor (Ideas needed) Message-ID: <002801c61cb4$6664c950$cb337a18@nomxx5ybrzvkgn> Hello, I edited the article about the perfect survivor again: http://future.wikicities.com/wiki/Perfect_Survivor I invite you to read the text and add some ideas/comments --Jon -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From pgptag at gmail.com Thu Jan 19 05:48:20 2006 From: pgptag at gmail.com (Giu1i0 Pri5c0) Date: Thu, 19 Jan 2006 06:48:20 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] Re: [wta-talk] The mixed blessing of silence In-Reply-To: <43CE9ECE.6080001@pobox.com> References: <20060118174414.55997.qmail@web80729.mail.yahoo.com> <43CE9ECE.6080001@pobox.com> Message-ID: <470a3c520601182148h718d7648v5ff98893bc7024ab@mail.gmail.com> I agree with most of what Eliezer says here, in particular that "shutting off the sensor that lights up to indicate the problem" does not solve the problem itself. I also think conflicts are not necessarily bad things - conflicts on *issues* that do not degenerate in pointless personal battles, and are faced with a constructive attitude by all parties involved, are often opportunities for growth. I think it is perfectly possible to find good solutions to well posed problems even starting from different positions on politics, philisophy, religion or thai food. But I believe the most recent example of flame war is nothing but big ego trips masquerading as disagreement over politics or how transhumanist organizations should be run, where the primary objective is not finding a good way to do things better but rather scoring points against some or some other opponent. For this, I really do not have time. G. On 1/18/06, Eliezer S. Yudkowsky wrote: > It's easy to call for peace, an end to conflict, without blaming any > specific parties. It scores you points with everyone who's sick of > hearing about it, usually the majority. It sounds like deep wisdom and > gets you a reputation as a nice guy. > > But a population of doves is easily invaded by hawks. When no one will > protest, anyone can get away with anything. > > There is such a thing as an Evolutionarily Stable Strategy. There is > also such a thing as yammering about the subject unproductively because > no side is willing to accept anything less than a complete victory. > > So I don't feel too guilty about posting my opinions, *once*. Playing > flame tennis, on and on, is a bad idea. Remember, though, that not > everyone has the luxury of a standing, pre-built reputation good enough > that they can afford to ignore attacks, confident that others know > better than to listen. Don't assume that other people can get away with > ignoring attacks. They're not responding to annoy you, they're > responding because there are real penalties for not responding. > > I know you're fed up with big messy public battles. The alternative may > be for things to go wrong silently. That is the option you are > presented with, when you hear the deeply wise, easy, convenient calls > for everyone to just shut up. It doesn't get rid of the problem. It > shuts off the sensor that lights up to indicate the problem. > > -- > Eliezer S. Yudkowsky http://singinst.org/ > Research Fellow, Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence > _______________________________________________ > wta-talk mailing list > wta-talk at transhumanism.org > http://www.transhumanism.org/mailman/listinfo/wta-talk > From sjatkins at mac.com Thu Jan 19 11:37:01 2006 From: sjatkins at mac.com (Samantha Atkins) Date: Thu, 19 Jan 2006 03:37:01 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Re: [wta-talk] The mixed blessing of silence In-Reply-To: <470a3c520601182148h718d7648v5ff98893bc7024ab@mail.gmail.com> References: <20060118174414.55997.qmail@web80729.mail.yahoo.com> <43CE9ECE.6080001@pobox.com> <470a3c520601182148h718d7648v5ff98893bc7024ab@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <1ADBC8F7-1EBE-4B8B-A19D-21CA4848C0C6@mac.com> On Jan 18, 2006, at 9:48 PM, Giu1i0 Pri5c0 wrote: > But I believe the most recent example of flame war is nothing but big > ego trips masquerading as disagreement over politics or how > transhumanist organizations should be run, where the primary objective > is not finding a good way to do things better but rather scoring > points against some or some other opponent. For this, I really do not > have time. It saddens me that this is how you sum up the recent problem reports. It doesn't seem very constructive. - s From dirk.bruere at gmail.com Thu Jan 19 15:18:58 2006 From: dirk.bruere at gmail.com (Dirk Bruere) Date: Thu, 19 Jan 2006 15:18:58 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Re: [wta-talk] The mixed blessing of silence In-Reply-To: <1ADBC8F7-1EBE-4B8B-A19D-21CA4848C0C6@mac.com> References: <20060118174414.55997.qmail@web80729.mail.yahoo.com> <43CE9ECE.6080001@pobox.com> <470a3c520601182148h718d7648v5ff98893bc7024ab@mail.gmail.com> <1ADBC8F7-1EBE-4B8B-A19D-21CA4848C0C6@mac.com> Message-ID: On 1/19/06, Samantha Atkins wrote: > > > On Jan 18, 2006, at 9:48 PM, Giu1i0 Pri5c0 wrote: > > > But I believe the most recent example of flame war is nothing but big > > ego trips masquerading as disagreement over politics or how > > transhumanist organizations should be run, where the primary objective > > is not finding a good way to do things better but rather scoring > > points against some or some other opponent. For this, I really do not > > have time. > > > > It saddens me that this is how you sum up the recent problem > reports. It doesn't seem very constructive. Ditto. I see it as arguments over the overt (party) politicisation of a major Transhumanist org, largely due to one person. IMHO that is not trivial. Dirk -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From starman2100 at cableone.net Thu Jan 19 19:30:07 2006 From: starman2100 at cableone.net (starman2100 at cableone.net) Date: Thu, 19 Jan 2006 12:30:07 -0700 Subject: [extropy-chat] Damien's possible next project... Message-ID: <1137699007_6141@S2.cableone.net> An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From amara at amara.com Thu Jan 19 19:05:36 2006 From: amara at amara.com (Amara Graps) Date: Thu, 19 Jan 2006 20:05:36 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] Pluto New Horizons successful launch Message-ID: Pluto New Horizons successfully launched ! http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Horizons Amara From acy.stapp at gmail.com Thu Jan 19 21:10:08 2006 From: acy.stapp at gmail.com (Acy Stapp) Date: Thu, 19 Jan 2006 15:10:08 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] FWD [forteana] Re: Looking for examples of naturally evolved X-ray vision? In-Reply-To: References: <43CF02FC.3030703@mindspring.com> Message-ID: Is there any evidence that THz radiation can be perceived by animals? It seems physiologically feasible (and evolutionarily useful) but AFAIK the only ambient source of THz radiation is blackbody emission. Acy On 1/18/06, Dirk Bruere wrote: > > > > On 1/19/06, Terry W. Colvin wrote: > > On 1/18/06, Terry W. Colvin fnarded: > > > > > I was helping my daughter come up with some ideas for a school science > > > project and I stumbled onto a couple unknowns. > > > > > > Animals have evolved a wide variety of abilities to seek food and avoid > > > predators. Echo-location, color vision, and compound eyes are just a > > > few. All provide important information regarding the immediate > > > surroundings. My daughter asked me why the visible light spectrum IS the > > > visible light spectrum. After all, animals hear at a wide range of > > > frequencies that humans cannot, so why not have the same thing occurring > > > in vision? Are there animals with X-ray vision? > > > > > > Several reasons why not: > > 1. Animals don't generate the light they see by, by and large, they detect > > light generated by the sun or by other animals. > > 2. Therefore the light that is used to see by must be something that is > > reflected by the things you want to see. > > 3. X-rays mostly go right through things you might want to see. Infrared > is > > mostly absorbed by them. > > 4 Given that early life evolved in water, the visible spectrum is the > about > > the only bit *not* blocked by atmosphere plus water. IR, X-rays, Radio, > and > > UV are all blocked by water. Not much point seeing a frequency which is > > blocked. > > 5. X-rays are extremely energetic, and actually break down biological > > tissue; hard to make a biological detector. > > 6. X-rays are extremely energetic, and would be hard or impossible for > > living systems to generate. > > > > Certain animals (e.g. Snakes) can "see" infra-red (Humans can detect IR, > too > > - just stand near a fire.....) > > Certain animals (e.g. Bees) can "see" UV (I believe that humans can see > near > > UV if the lens of the eye has been removed or replaced by a synthetic > > substitute) > > > > Radio waves certainly reach earth,and I suppose could be a good thing to > see > > by, except that they are faint, and receiving them requires rather large > > receivers, probably not practical for biological systems. They are also > > absorbed, rather than reflected by lots of things. > > > > Excellent question, though. > > > Which leaves mm wavelength radiation. > > Dirk > > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat > > > -- Acy Stapp "When I'm working on a problem, I never think about beauty. I think only how to solve the problem. But when I have finished, if the solution is not beautiful, I know it is wrong." -- R. Buckminster Fuller (1895 - 1983) From dirk.bruere at gmail.com Thu Jan 19 21:41:28 2006 From: dirk.bruere at gmail.com (Dirk Bruere) Date: Thu, 19 Jan 2006 21:41:28 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] FWD [forteana] Re: Looking for examples of naturally evolved X-ray vision? In-Reply-To: References: <43CF02FC.3030703@mindspring.com> Message-ID: On 1/19/06, Acy Stapp wrote: > > Is there any evidence that THz radiation can be perceived by animals? > It seems physiologically feasible (and evolutionarily useful) but > AFAIK the only ambient source of THz radiation is blackbody emission. > > Maybe we should look for a biological THz emitter. OTOH, what kind of stellar environment would result in significant THz radiation reaching a planetary surface? And what distance from primary would provide reasonable temp range? Amara? Dirk -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From brent.allsop at comcast.net Thu Jan 19 21:59:40 2006 From: brent.allsop at comcast.net (brent.allsop at comcast.net) Date: Thu, 19 Jan 2006 21:59:40 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] death will be overcome claim yet onforesight exchange. Message-ID: <011920062159.5680.43D00BCC00074D860000163022007510909F019C04040ED29B020A9D0D@comcast.net> Ken, There are actually a couple of relevant claims -- that you were unable to find them suggests that the claim search/filtering routines need to be improved ;-) I simply went to the page that lists all the short descriptions and searched for the word death. I didn't see any other obvios searching mechanism? Thanks for this info! Brent Allsop -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From ken at javien.com Thu Jan 19 23:00:53 2006 From: ken at javien.com (Ken Kittlitz) Date: Thu, 19 Jan 2006 16:00:53 -0700 Subject: [extropy-chat] death will be overcome claim yet onforesight exchange. In-Reply-To: <011920062159.5680.43D00BCC00074D860000163022007510909F019C04040ED29B020A9D0D@comcast.net>; from brent.allsop@comcast.net on Thu, Jan 19, 2006 at 09:59:40PM +0000 References: <011920062159.5680.43D00BCC00074D860000163022007510909F019C04040ED29B020A9D0D@comcast.net> Message-ID: <20060119160053.A20777@mail.javien.com> On Thu, Jan 19, 2006 at 09:59:40PM +0000, brent.allsop at comcast.net wrote: > Ken, > > I simply went to the page that lists all the short descriptions and searched for the word death. I didn't see any other obvios searching mechanism? > Thanks for this info! The only search mechanism we have currently uses the keywords (categories) associated with each claim. On the claim list page , you can select one or more categories to search for. The most relevant category for medical-type claims is "Science & Technology: Medicine, Biochemistry" (which also yields some claims about the Methuselah Mouse prize). -Ken From avantguardian2020 at yahoo.com Fri Jan 20 01:59:31 2006 From: avantguardian2020 at yahoo.com (The Avantguardian) Date: Thu, 19 Jan 2006 17:59:31 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Fwd: 2nd Annual Frontiers in NanoSystems Conference Message-ID: <20060120015931.64900.qmail@web60520.mail.yahoo.com> In case any of you are interested in attending. . . :) Note: forwarded message attached. The Avantguardian is Stuart LaForge alt email: stuart"AT"ucla.edu "The most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the source of all true art and science. He to whom this emotion is a stranger, who can no longer wonder and stand rapt in awe, is as good as dead: his eyes are closed. . ." - Albert Einstein, "What I Believe" (1930) __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com -------------- next part -------------- An embedded message was scrubbed... From: stuart at ucla.edu Subject: Fwd: 2nd Annual Frontiers in NanoSystems Conference Date: Thu, 19 Jan 2006 17:56:21 -0800 Size: 41794 URL: From starman2100 at cableone.net Fri Jan 20 02:27:18 2006 From: starman2100 at cableone.net (starman2100 at cableone.net) Date: Thu, 19 Jan 2006 19:27:18 -0700 Subject: [wta-talk] RE: [extropy-chat] What _is_ it with the WTA board, Message-ID: <1137724038_12921@S3.cableone.net> An embedded and charset-unspecified text was scrubbed... Name: not available URL: From dirk.bruere at gmail.com Fri Jan 20 02:21:03 2006 From: dirk.bruere at gmail.com (Dirk Bruere) Date: Fri, 20 Jan 2006 02:21:03 +0000 Subject: [wta-talk] RE: [extropy-chat] What _is_ it with the WTA board, In-Reply-To: <1137724038_12921@S3.cableone.net> References: <1137724038_12921@S3.cableone.net> Message-ID: On 1/20/06, starman2100 at cableone.net wrote: > > I wish I could easily sort out what has really gone on regarding the > conflict > between the WTA leadership. But I will say people like Eliezer Yudkowsky, > Bruce > Klein and Harvey Newstrom who I have met in person seem to be of good > character > and intentions so the situation leaves me puzzled. > > I remember as a teen reading a SF short story about a very sparsely > populated > colony world of Earth's where the crotchety ramshackle pioneers can't > stand each > other and so from their homestead fortresses they lob "low-tech" weapons > like > nukes at the neighbors they don't like. The climate and geography of this > alien > world had been so horribly scarred by the many petty battles over the > decades > that a scientist revisiting the place could barely recognize it. > > Sometimes I wonder should our dreams come true regarding > super-technologies and > the Singularity, if we will find ourselves on a terraformed world with a > transhumanist banner atop it where we take our strife to the next level by > manufacturing armies of nanotech drones to do battle against each other > from our > respective continents and sky cities. Will we have a "supreme council" > with > folks like Max, Natasha and Spike to settle such disputes so no one gets > seriously hurt? Or will we turn real authority over to some God-like A.I. > Sysop > who will hopefully be beyond human pettiness? I tend to think our > lifespans and > ability to control matter and energy will exponentially grow, but our > primate > politics games will remain. I can imagine disenfranchised former WTA > gov't > leaders a century from now taking residence on planet Extropia as they > continue > arguing in the virtual world networks. > > Only two PostHuman scenarios make sense IMO. Either a Borg Collective/Hive Mind or totally self sufficient loners. End of society as we know it either way. Dirk -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From spike66 at comcast.net Fri Jan 20 02:49:05 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Thu, 19 Jan 2006 18:49:05 -0800 Subject: [wta-talk] RE: [extropy-chat] What _is_ it with the WTA board, In-Reply-To: <1137724038_12921@S3.cableone.net> Message-ID: <200601200249.k0K2nMe00768@tick.javien.com> ... > bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of starman2100 at cableone.net ... > Subject: Re: [wta-talk] RE: [extropy-chat] What _is_ it with the WTA > board, > > ... Will we have a "supreme council" with > folks like Max, Natasha and Spike to settle such disputes so no one gets > seriously hurt? ... John Heyyy, not me man. I don't do power, makes me squirm. If we ratchet it down a few dB below supreme council, I would serve as acting Omni-impotent Advisor and Wheedley Cajoler on an adequate council. Johnny! Good to see you posting again man! {8-] We missed you pal. spike From fortean1 at mindspring.com Fri Jan 20 03:01:15 2006 From: fortean1 at mindspring.com (Terry W. Colvin) Date: Thu, 19 Jan 2006 20:01:15 -0700 Subject: [extropy-chat] FWD [Skeptic] Re: Looking for examples of naturally evolved X-ray vision? Message-ID: <43D0527B.303@mindspring.com> Includes comments on Superman's vision and the Museum of Jurassic Technology... >>> fortean1 at mindspring.com 01/18/06 10:09 PM >>> On 1/18/06, Terry W. Colvin fnarded: > I was helping my daughter come up with some ideas for a school science > project and I stumbled onto a couple unknowns. > > Animals have evolved a wide variety of abilities to seek food and avoid > predators. Echo-location, color vision, and compound eyes are just a > few. All provide important information regarding the immediate > surroundings. My daughter asked me why the visible light spectrum IS the > visible light spectrum. After all, animals hear at a wide range of > frequencies that humans cannot, so why not have the same thing occurring > in vision? Are there animals with X-ray vision? Several reasons why not: 1. Animals don't generate the light they see by, by and large, they detect light generated by the sun or by other animals. 2. Therefore the light that is used to see by must be something that is reflected by the things you want to see. 3. X-rays mostly go right through things you might want to see. Infrared is mostly absorbed by them. 4 Given that early life evolved in water, the visible spectrum is the about the only bit *not* blocked by atmosphere plus water. IR, X-rays, Radio, and UV are all blocked by water. Not much point seeing a frequency which is blocked. 5. X-rays are extremely energetic, and actually break down biological tissue; hard to make a biological detector. 6. X-rays are extremely energetic, and would be hard or impossible for living systems to generate. (deleted) >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> This discussion reminds me of the old Superman comic books I used to read, with Superman having x-ray vision. As it was depicted, there were cones emerging from his eyes (as if they were emitting x-rays, rather than receiving radiation, which is what eyes do). The radiation then apparently penetrates the thing he wants to look through (like a wall), but then somehow stops at the object he wants to observe, and is reflected back to him (again through the wall) so he can see it. The physics seems rather implausible. Tom Wheeler -------------------------------- > 3. X-rays mostly go right through things you might want to see. Yeah, when you look at an x-ray picture, basically what you see is a differential. That is, less x-rays penetrate the bone and dense tissue, so they appear as shades of grey. Looking at an x-ray picture of a bone is really a little like looking at something made of glass. You "see" all the way through it. The detail you see is due to differences in density. This is what makes CT so awesome--since the images are captured by electronic sensors rather than conventional film and stored as a block of data that can be manipulated, you can display images where minute differences in density can be emphasized. For example, you can tell the difference between white matter and grey matter in a brain, or between pancreatic tissue and stomach tissue. You can't really do that with conventional film...though in theory the difference in density is there (because either in CT or regular radiography the same proportion of photons are going through and being attenuated by the tissues), the human eye can't see the subtle shades of grey that a computer could. > 5. X-rays are extremely energetic, and > actually break down biological > tissue; hard to make a biological detector. Yeah, like someone else pointed out here, the damage tends to be done in one of two general ways. Either the photon strikes the DNA molecule itself, or it ionizes a water molecule in a cell and causes the creation of a free radical that can damage the DNA or other chemical processes inside a cell. Either way, bad things tend to happen to the cell. > This discussion reminds me of the old Superman > comic books I used to read, with Superman > having x-ray vision. As it was depicted, there > were cones emerging from his eyes (as if they > were emitting x-rays, rather than receiving radiation, > which is what eyes do). The radiation then > apparently penetrates the thing he wants to look > through (like a wall), but then somehow stops at > the object he wants to observe, and is reflected > back to him (again through the wall) so he can > see it. The physics seems rather implausible. Speaking of improbable physics, remember what Superman used to do when criminals shot at him? He'd just stand there and let them shoot their bullets into his chest, but then he'd duck when they threw the empty guns at him. :-) ------------------------------ You have to visit the site. The Museum of Jurassic Technology is sort of a simultaneous tribute to and parody of museums. Its exhibits are dead on in capturing the style of old natural history museums, even when describing a bat that uses x-ray sonar and can fly through solid objects. The one on display at the museum (I?ve been there) is supposedly trapped inside a solid lead block, but can be viewed using special x-ray goggles. I stongly suspect the bat is one of the parody exhibits... ---------------------------- You can sense IR photons (as heat) if there are sufficient numbers of > them. But one problem with photons in the UV-thru-X-ray range is that > the photons are energetic enough to break atomic bonds. This is > particularly true for UV-B and UV-C. [1] So the sensing systems for > these wavelengths *are* going to decay over time and would require > expensive repair or replacement. X-rays in fact are so energetic that > they break the bonds in the water molecules and produce multiple free > radicals which cause extensive DNA damage. This is why X-ray exposure > must be limited. The earth's sun _does_ produce X-Rays and they do reach the earth. There are several reasons why we did not evolve the ability to detect them. The ionizing radiation factor has already been mentioned. X-Rays have a tendency not to interact with low density objects; this is problematic for two reasons. First this would make it difficult to see things like predators or pools of water since they would not be reflecting significant amounts of the sun's X-rays. Second in order to see your retina must interact with whatever type of photon you "see" with. This means that in order to pick up the X-Rays in any significant number you would need to have either a much more dense or much thicker retina. Possibly more importantly the sun produces X-Rays in relatively small quantities compared to other types of photons. The sun can be thought of as a Black Body at a temp of about 6000K. At this temperature we get the following curve: http://hyperphysics.phy-astr.gsu.edu/hbase/vision/solirrad.html Examining the curve shows us that natural selection loves us and wants us to be happy. We evolved to see photons right at the sun's peak power density. YT, Dan Noland -- "Only a zit on the wart on the heinie of progress." Copyright 1992, Frank Rice Terry W. Colvin, Sierra Vista, Arizona (USA) < fortean1 at mindspring.com > Alternate: < fortean1 at msn.com > Home Page: < http://www.geocities.com/Area51/Stargate/8958/index.html > Sites: * Fortean Times * Mystic's Haven * TLCB * U.S. Message Text Formatting (USMTF) Program ------------ Member: Thailand-Laos-Cambodia Brotherhood (TLCB) Mailing List TLCB Web Site: < http://www.tlc-brotherhood.org > [Southeast Asia/Secret War in Laos veterans, Allies, CIA/NSA, and "steenkeen" contractors are welcome.] -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From m_j_geddes at yahoo.com.au Fri Jan 20 09:46:11 2006 From: m_j_geddes at yahoo.com.au (Marc Geddes) Date: Fri, 20 Jan 2006 20:46:11 +1100 (EST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Technical paper on 3-dimensional time Message-ID: <20060120094611.80598.qmail@web50514.mail.yahoo.com> This is very recent (late 2005): "This paper will interpret quantum physics by using two extra dimensional time as quantum hidden variables. I'll show that three dimensional time is a bridge to connect basics quantum physics, relativity and string theory. ``Quantum potential'' in Bohm's quantum hidden variable theory is derived from Einstein Lagrangian in 6-dimensional time-space geometry. Statistical effect in the measurement of single particle, non-local properties, de Broglie wave can be naturally derived from the natural properties of three dimensional time." ... Link: http://arxiv.org/abs/quant-ph/0510010 "Till shade is gone, till water is gone, into the shadow with teeth bared, screaming defiance with the last breath, to spit in Sightblinder?s eye on the last day? ____________________________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? Find a local business fast with Yahoo! Local Search http://au.local.yahoo.com From max at maxmore.com Fri Jan 20 14:17:27 2006 From: max at maxmore.com (Max More) Date: Fri, 20 Jan 2006 08:17:27 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] "How to Live Forever" in March issue of Hustler Message-ID: <6.2.3.4.2.20060120081023.04bd8a30@pop-server.austin.rr.com> In case anyone is looking for an excuse to pick up a copy of Larry Flynt's Hustler magazine, note that the March 2006 issue (now available) features my cover article, "How to Live Forever." Flip past the lovely Victoria to p.43 and you'll find it. Have fun. Max _______________________________________________________ Max More, Ph.D. max at maxmore.com or more at extropy.org http://www.maxmore.com Strategic Philosopher Chairman, Extropy Institute. http://www.extropy.org ________________________________________________________________ Director of Content Solutions, ManyWorlds Inc.: http://www.manyworlds.com --- Thought leadership in the innovation economy m.more at manyworlds.com _______________________________________________________ From dirk.bruere at gmail.com Fri Jan 20 16:16:35 2006 From: dirk.bruere at gmail.com (Dirk Bruere) Date: Fri, 20 Jan 2006 16:16:35 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] "How to Live Forever" in March issue of Hustler In-Reply-To: <6.2.3.4.2.20060120081023.04bd8a30@pop-server.austin.rr.com> References: <6.2.3.4.2.20060120081023.04bd8a30@pop-server.austin.rr.com> Message-ID: On 1/20/06, Max More wrote: > > In case anyone is looking for an excuse to pick up a copy of Larry > Flynt's Hustler magazine, note that the March 2006 issue (now > available) features my cover article, "How to Live Forever." Flip > past the lovely Victoria to p.43 and you'll find it. > > Have fun. > > Sorry - those pages seem to be stuck together... Dirk -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From starman2100 at cableone.net Fri Jan 20 17:25:52 2006 From: starman2100 at cableone.net (starman2100 at cableone.net) Date: Fri, 20 Jan 2006 10:25:52 -0700 Subject: [extropy-chat] Max's new article Message-ID: <1137777952_1905@S4.cableone.net> An embedded and charset-unspecified text was scrubbed... Name: not available URL: From kevin at kevinfreels.com Fri Jan 20 19:32:36 2006 From: kevin at kevinfreels.com (kevinfreels.com) Date: Fri, 20 Jan 2006 13:32:36 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] FWD [Skeptic] Re: Looking for examples of naturally evolved X-ray vision? References: <43D0527B.303@mindspring.com> Message-ID: <021301c61df8$44d65570$640fa8c0@kevin> This is all true. What I found particularly interesting and what you are leaving out is that the human eye IS capable of detecting X-rays. That was my initial point. Evolution has been generous enough to give us all sorts of improbable things. Natural selection and random chance make their contributions. It's hard to believe that at some point some animal hasn;t come around that is more capable than us at seeing X-rays. I grant that there isn't much to build on there. And I am not arguing the point. But it is these kinds of assumptions that have left scientists baffled time and again with each new discovery. ----- Original Message ----- From: Terry W. Colvin To: ExI chat list ; Forteana [Alternate Orphan] Sent: Thursday, January 19, 2006 9:01 PM Subject: [extropy-chat] FWD [Skeptic] Re: Looking for examples of naturally evolved X-ray vision? Includes comments on Superman's vision and the Museum of Jurassic Technology... >>> fortean1 at mindspring.com 01/18/06 10:09 PM >>> On 1/18/06, Terry W. Colvin fnarded: > I was helping my daughter come up with some ideas for a school science > project and I stumbled onto a couple unknowns. > > Animals have evolved a wide variety of abilities to seek food and avoid > predators. Echo-location, color vision, and compound eyes are just a > few. All provide important information regarding the immediate > surroundings. My daughter asked me why the visible light spectrum IS the > visible light spectrum. After all, animals hear at a wide range of > frequencies that humans cannot, so why not have the same thing occurring > in vision? Are there animals with X-ray vision? Several reasons why not: 1. Animals don't generate the light they see by, by and large, they detect light generated by the sun or by other animals. 2. Therefore the light that is used to see by must be something that is reflected by the things you want to see. 3. X-rays mostly go right through things you might want to see. Infrared is mostly absorbed by them. 4 Given that early life evolved in water, the visible spectrum is the about the only bit *not* blocked by atmosphere plus water. IR, X-rays, Radio, and UV are all blocked by water. Not much point seeing a frequency which is blocked. 5. X-rays are extremely energetic, and actually break down biological tissue; hard to make a biological detector. 6. X-rays are extremely energetic, and would be hard or impossible for living systems to generate. (deleted) >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> This discussion reminds me of the old Superman comic books I used to read, with Superman having x-ray vision. As it was depicted, there were cones emerging from his eyes (as if they were emitting x-rays, rather than receiving radiation, which is what eyes do). The radiation then apparently penetrates the thing he wants to look through (like a wall), but then somehow stops at the object he wants to observe, and is reflected back to him (again through the wall) so he can see it. The physics seems rather implausible. Tom Wheeler -------------------------------- 3. X-rays mostly go right through things you might want to see. Yeah, when you look at an x-ray picture, basically what you see is a differential. That is, less x-rays penetrate the bone and dense tissue, so they appear as shades of grey. Looking at an x-ray picture of a bone is really a little like looking at something made of glass. You "see" all the way through it. The detail you see is due to differences in density. This is what makes CT so awesome--since the images are captured by electronic sensors rather than conventional film and stored as a block of data that can be manipulated, you can display images where minute differences in density can be emphasized. For example, you can tell the difference between white matter and grey matter in a brain, or between pancreatic tissue and stomach tissue. You can't really do that with conventional film...though in theory the difference in density is there (because either in CT or regular radiography the same proportion of photons are going through and being attenuated by the tissues), the human eye can't see the subtle shades of grey that a computer could. 5. X-rays are extremely energetic, and actually break down biological tissue; hard to make a biological detector. Yeah, like someone else pointed out here, the damage tends to be done in one of two general ways. Either the photon strikes the DNA molecule itself, or it ionizes a water molecule in a cell and causes the creation of a free radical that can damage the DNA or other chemical processes inside a cell. Either way, bad things tend to happen to the cell. This discussion reminds me of the old Superman comic books I used to read, with Superman having x-ray vision. As it was depicted, there were cones emerging from his eyes (as if they were emitting x-rays, rather than receiving radiation, which is what eyes do). The radiation then apparently penetrates the thing he wants to look through (like a wall), but then somehow stops at the object he wants to observe, and is reflected back to him (again through the wall) so he can see it. The physics seems rather implausible. Speaking of improbable physics, remember what Superman used to do when criminals shot at him? He'd just stand there and let them shoot their bullets into his chest, but then he'd duck when they threw the empty guns at him. :-) ------------------------------ You have to visit the site. The Museum of Jurassic Technology is sort of a simultaneous tribute to and parody of museums. Its exhibits are dead on in capturing the style of old natural history museums, even when describing a bat that uses x-ray sonar and can fly through solid objects. The one on display at the museum (I?ve been there) is supposedly trapped inside a solid lead block, but can be viewed using special x-ray goggles. I stongly suspect the bat is one of the parody exhibits... ---------------------------- You can sense IR photons (as heat) if there are sufficient numbers of > them. But one problem with photons in the UV-thru-X-ray range is that > the photons are energetic enough to break atomic bonds. This is > particularly true for UV-B and UV-C. [1] So the sensing systems for > these wavelengths *are* going to decay over time and would require > expensive repair or replacement. X-rays in fact are so energetic that > they break the bonds in the water molecules and produce multiple free > radicals which cause extensive DNA damage. This is why X-ray exposure > must be limited. The earth's sun _does_ produce X-Rays and they do reach the earth. There are several reasons why we did not evolve the ability to detect them. The ionizing radiation factor has already been mentioned. X-Rays have a tendency not to interact with low density objects; this is problematic for two reasons. First this would make it difficult to see things like predators or pools of water since they would not be reflecting significant amounts of the sun's X-rays. Second in order to see your retina must interact with whatever type of photon you "see" with. This means that in order to pick up the X-Rays in any significant number you would need to have either a much more dense or much thicker retina. Possibly more importantly the sun produces X-Rays in relatively small quantities compared to other types of photons. The sun can be thought of as a Black Body at a temp of about 6000K. At this temperature we get the following curve: http://hyperphysics.phy-astr.gsu.edu/hbase/vision/solirrad.html Examining the curve shows us that natural selection loves us and wants us to be happy. We evolved to see photons right at the sun's peak power density. YT, Dan Noland -- "Only a zit on the wart on the heinie of progress." Copyright 1992, Frank Rice Terry W. Colvin, Sierra Vista, Arizona (USA) < fortean1 at mindspring.com > Alternate: < fortean1 at msn.com > Home Page: < http://www.geocities.com/Area51/Stargate/8958/index.html > Sites: * Fortean Times * Mystic's Haven * TLCB * U.S. Message Text Formatting (USMTF) Program ------------ Member: Thailand-Laos-Cambodia Brotherhood (TLCB) Mailing List TLCB Web Site: < http://www.tlc-brotherhood.org > [Southeast Asia/Secret War in Laos veterans, Allies, CIA/NSA, and "steenkeen" contractors are welcome.] ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ _______________________________________________ extropy-chat mailing list extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From pharos at gmail.com Fri Jan 20 20:43:43 2006 From: pharos at gmail.com (BillK) Date: Fri, 20 Jan 2006 20:43:43 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] FWD [Skeptic] Re: Looking for examples of naturally evolved X-ray vision? In-Reply-To: <021301c61df8$44d65570$640fa8c0@kevin> References: <43D0527B.303@mindspring.com> <021301c61df8$44d65570$640fa8c0@kevin> Message-ID: On 1/20/06, kevinfreels.com wrote: > > This is all true. What I found particularly interesting and what you are > leaving out is that the human eye IS capable of detecting X-rays. That was > my initial point. Evolution has been generous enough to give us all sorts of > improbable things. Natural selection and random chance make their > contributions. It's hard to believe that at some point some animal hasn;t > come around that is more capable than us at seeing X-rays. I grant that > there isn't much to build on there. And I am not arguing the point. But it > is these kinds of assumptions that have left scientists baffled time and > again with each new discovery. > I think your phrase 'the human eye IS capable of detecting X-rays' is misleading. The rods and cones in the human eye have evolved to respond to a very narrow band of the radiation spectrum that we call visible light. That does not mean that all radiation outside that narrow band has no effect on the human eye. The eye contains physical mechanisms that can be affected or damaged by extreme radiation. Astronauts have reported seeing flashes or streaks that were put down to cosmic ray nuclei passing through their eyes. But nobody claims that they were 'seeing' cosmic rays. Similarly x-rays probably cause induction of phosphorescence in the eyeball, which the brain interprets as a 'glow'. If you shut your eyes tightly you induce flashes of light and colors. Light sensations have also been reported from cancer patients receiving eye irradiations. 'phosphenes' is the technical term for these eye side-effects. Try googling on that term plus a few others like radiation, phosphorescence, etc. I found Particle Induced Visual Sensations in Heavy-Ion Tumor Therapy BillK From spike66 at comcast.net Sat Jan 21 03:54:30 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Fri, 20 Jan 2006 19:54:30 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] stardust@home In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <200601210354.k0L3sZe12495@tick.javien.com> http://stardustathome.ssl.berkeley.edu/ Hey this is cool: volunteers search thru a virtual microscope to identify cosmic dust impact regions on the detectors of the Stardust spacecraft (which was built by Lockheeed Martin and performed faultlessly.) http://www.spaceref.com/news/viewpr.html?pid=18702 I think I will sign up for this. spike {8-] Friends, is this a great time to be alive, or what? {8-] From thespike at satx.rr.com Sat Jan 21 04:22:44 2006 From: thespike at satx.rr.com (Damien Broderick) Date: Fri, 20 Jan 2006 22:22:44 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] stardust@home In-Reply-To: <200601210354.k0L3sZe12495@tick.javien.com> References: <200601210354.k0L3sZe12495@tick.javien.com> Message-ID: <6.2.1.2.0.20060120222041.01d50428@pop-server.satx.rr.com> At 07:54 PM 1/20/2006 -0800, spike wrote: >http://stardustathome.ssl.berkeley.edu/ >Friends, is this a great time to be alive, or what? {8-] Yeah, right--it's all fun and games until the Andromeda Strain rips out of the lab and eats everyone's head. Damien Broderick [I *hope* I'm joking...] From spike66 at comcast.net Sat Jan 21 05:34:20 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Fri, 20 Jan 2006 21:34:20 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] stardust@home In-Reply-To: <6.2.1.2.0.20060120222041.01d50428@pop-server.satx.rr.com> Message-ID: <200601210534.k0L5Yae20720@tick.javien.com> > bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Damien Broderick ... > At 07:54 PM 1/20/2006 -0800, spike wrote: > http://stardustathome.ssl.berkeley.edu/ > >Friends, is this a great time to be alive, or what? {8-] > > Yeah, right--it's all fun and games until the Andromeda Strain rips out of > the lab and eats everyone's head. > > Damien Broderick > [I *hope* I'm joking...] Ja, you are joking, I can assure you. This dusty old planet has passed thru the tails of comets millions of times, yet never have we suffered having our heads devoured. {8-] At least I have not. {8^D Amara may be able to verify, but it is easy to imagine that several tons of cosmic dust enter the atmosphere every day. There is a fairly straightforward calculation that shows that a lifeform on a sufficiently small grain of cosmic dust could survive atmospheric reentry. I will dig out the text on this, or perhaps attempt to rederive it from first principles, should there be sufficient replyage to this comment. This of course leaves unanswered the fundamental question of what is the noun form of the verb "reply", if not replyage? Replyitude? Replyation? Just reply? Dr. Broderick, you are the scholar of letters among us, what is the answer sir? spike From amara at amara.com Sat Jan 21 09:31:44 2006 From: amara at amara.com (Amara Graps) Date: Sat, 21 Jan 2006 10:31:44 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] stardust@home Message-ID: Spike: >http://stardustathome.ssl.berkeley.edu/ >Hey this is cool: volunteers search thru a virtual >microscope to identify cosmic dust impact regions A reminder that you will not be searching the part of the aerogel that was open during the comet Wild-2 flythrough, but the other side of the aerogel that was open to interstellar dust. Information from the Stardust web site said that the interstellar dust collection times were from March-May 2000 and July-December 2002 (which I wrote it at Wikipedia, and noone changed :-) ) >Amara may be able to verify, but it is easy to imagine that >several tons of cosmic dust enter the atmosphere every >day. More, here are the details I know from the researchers - Generally, an average of 40 tons per day of extraterrestrial material falls to the Earth. Elmar Jessberger at the Institut fuer Planetologie in Muenster and his colleagues estimate that most of the influx of extraterrestrial matter onto the Earth is dominated by meteoroids with diameters in the range 50 to 500 micrometers, of average density 2.0 gr/cm^3 (with porosity about 40%). George Flynn at SUNY-Plattsburgh, who focuses his studies on the interstellar component of the extraterrestrial dust, says that 20 kilograms of interstellar dust particles, in the size range 0.3 to 1 micrometers and densities of 3 gr/cm^3, falls to the Earth over a period of about 2 months. In addition, models show that 20 percent of the Earth-falling dust in a size range near 0.5 micrometers as interstellar in origin. My Sky and Telescope article about cosmic dust http://www.mpi-hd.mpg.de/dustgroup/~graps/st/ My Wikipedia pages about cosmic dust (obviously in progress) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cosmic_dust By the way, I hope y'all know that there is a Student Dust Counter on the Pluto New Horizons mission, just launched. It is the first NASA student instrument, designed and built wholly by engineering students at the University of Colorado, Boulder. My dust charging 'mentor' Mihaly Horanyi was/is advising them on this project. It will be the first dust collection in the outer solar system; the instrument will be on in the inner solar system as well, so one can correlate that data with other dust detectors that are flying and have flown in the solar system. >There is a fairly straightforward calculation that >shows that a lifeform on a sufficiently small grain of >cosmic dust could survive atmospheric reentry. I will >dig out the text on this, or perhaps attempt to rederive >it from first principles, should there be sufficient >replyage to this comment. If you look up references by Mark J. Burchell and Gerda Horneck on NASA ADS: http://adsabs.harvard.edu/abstract_service.html then you should find some good information, since it's the topic of much of their research. For example: http://adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-bib_query?bibcode=2004MNRAS.352.1273B&db_key=AST&data_type=HTML&format=&high=438d7c522923799 http://adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-bib_query?bibcode=2004IJAsB...3...73B&db_key=AST&data_type=HTML&format=&high=438d7c522923799 http://adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-bib_query?bibcode=2003OLEB...33...53B&db_key=AST&data_type=HTML&format=&high=438d7c522923799 http://adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-bib_query?bibcode=2001Icar..154..545B&db_key=AST&data_type=HTML&format=&high=438d7c522923799 http://adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-bib_query?bibcode=2005M%26PSA..40.5048S&db_key=AST&data_type=HTML&format=&high=438d7c522924702 http://adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-bib_query?bibcode=2004cosp.meet.2596M&db_key=AST&data_type=HTML&format=&high=438d7c522924702 I should add that I was incredibly annoyed by the pre-Stardust capsule return NASA TV coverage of the statements made by Don Yeomans (JPL): "We wouldn't be here if it weren't for comets.." ... which I say is debatable, under study, and not proven! - We don't know if a comet is the cause of the dinosaur extinction (if iridium is present in comets then the evidence is good) - We don't know how much water comets carry (under study) - We don't know how much water comets carried to Earth (but probably less than 10% from isotopic studies). -We don't know how much organic material comets carry (but we are learning quickly) -We don't know how much biotic material comets can carry (under study) - We don't know how well biotic material can survive reentry into the Earth's atmosphere (under study) I wish Yeomans didn't say these words, because the Italian media jumped on it, and made it a large aspect of their reports. ("humans exist because of comets...") Grrrrrrrrrrrr Amara -- ******************************************************************** Amara Graps, PhD email: amara at amara.com Computational Physics vita: ftp://ftp.amara.com/pub/resume.txt Multiplex Answers URL: http://www.amara.com/ ******************************************************************** "We came whirling out of Nothingness scattering stars like dust." --Rumi From m_j_geddes at yahoo.com.au Sat Jan 21 09:48:31 2006 From: m_j_geddes at yahoo.com.au (Marc Geddes) Date: Sat, 21 Jan 2006 20:48:31 +1100 (EST) Subject: [extropy-chat] stardust@home In-Reply-To: <200601210354.k0L3sZe12495@tick.javien.com> Message-ID: <20060121094831.21211.qmail@web50508.mail.yahoo.com> --- spike wrote: > spike > > {8-] > > Friends, is this a great time to be alive, or what? > {8-] > Only for a tiny minority of rich white boys living in Europe or the States. Spare a thought for the several billion people still living on less than a couple of dollars a day. Or even for most of the ordinary folks in the developed world who have to slog away all day at mind-numbing jobs just to stay alive. What most people *should* ideally be doing is working on AGI or the theory of everything. Unfortunately they can't even if they want to, due to the aforementioned lack of funds. I believe that if all of us were awash with funds and computing power any of us could do what Eli does (though it would probably take most of us a little longer). One of the things that post-human historians should grasp is that the world simply was *not* awash with funds and computing power, which is why the vast majority of people never even had a decent crack at AGI or the theory of everything. Unfortunately a tiny minority of rich kids are having all the fun. Facile statements of 'gee whiz how great it's gonna be' are just plain irritating. For instance, I mean no disrespect to Nick Bostrom but his 'Letter From Utopia' just really annoyed me: http://www.nickbostrom.com/utopia.html Being told what we're missing really is kinda depressing. We're *so close* yet think of all those that will miss out because they die. Like I said Spike, for a tiny minority of rich white boys it may be kinda fun to be alive right now, but for everyone else who is aware of the potential of a transhuman future yet lacks the funds, brains or reputation to do anything to bring it about it's really *really* frustrating. "Till shade is gone, till water is gone, into the shadow with teeth bared, screaming defiance with the last breath, to spit in Sightblinder?s eye on the last day? ____________________________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? The New Yahoo! Movies: Check out the Latest Trailers, Premiere Photos and full Actor Database. http://au.movies.yahoo.com From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Sat Jan 21 13:43:48 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Sat, 21 Jan 2006 08:43:48 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] stardust@home In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On 1/21/06, Amara Graps wrote: > Generally, an average of 40 tons per day of extraterrestrial material > falls to the Earth. Elmar Jessberger at the Institut fuer Planetologie > in Muenster and his colleagues estimate that most of the influx of > extraterrestrial matter onto the Earth is dominated by meteoroids with > diameters in the range 50 to 500 micrometers [snip] Wow, that much! I didn't realize it was that high but I have been thinking about this since I pointed out somewhere that many space exploration missions, e.g. the Pluto mission, are actually disassembling the Earth (to make a point that planetary disassembly *was* feasible). But it looks like we are going the other way. ... Spike, isn't this going to end up changing the Earth's orbit because we are getting heavier?... This would seem to provide a good justification for *more* interplanetary missions so we retain the Earth in an ecologically sound mass balance ... another trivia question ... how much would we have to lighten the Earth on a yearly (daily) basis to enlarge our orbit as the Sun expands to a red giant and thus maintain the planet in a habitable zone ... leads to lots of more questions... How much power will we need? How many active fusion reactors? How many mines hauling mass out of the ground? How long before the Earth starts turning into swiss cheese? Etc. etc. > > I should add that I was incredibly annoyed by the pre-Stardust capsule > return NASA TV coverage of the statements made by Don Yeomans (JPL): > "We wouldn't be here if it weren't for comets.." [snip] I wish Yeomans didn't say these words, because the Italian media > jumped on it, and made it a large aspect of their reports. > ("humans exist because of comets...") Grrrrrrrrrrrr True. Its best to stick with the "safe" stuff... E.g. "Humans exist because of supernovas", unless one subscribes to the theory of "Humans exist because of the *superintelligent design* of the solar system by a Matrioshka Brain that realized that real matter and energy can perform certain types of simulations faster than its 'limited' computational capacity was capable of." :-) Though there is the alternate theory that Matrioshka Brains have more important things to do with their limited computational capacity than run simulations involving mere human evolution so better to dedicate some underutilized matter and energy to the task. Robert -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Sat Jan 21 14:42:04 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Sat, 21 Jan 2006 09:42:04 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Being alive timing [was: Stardust@Home] Message-ID: On 1/21/06, Marc Geddes , commenting on Spikes comment regarding being alive wrote: > > > Only for a tiny minority of rich white boys living in Europe or the > States. You forgot Japan, Australia, and some regions in Asia and one doesn't have to be "rich" in the classical sense to live relatively well (compared to those who struggle to feed themselves on a day-to-day basis). Spare a thought for the several billion people still living on less than a > couple of dollars a day. A quick glance at The World Fact Book (for the World statistics) and use of the google calculator (too bad I can't use my web browser to go to the bathroom... yet...) reveals that the average person in the world is living on ~$18/day. Even assuming a long tail end of the curve for the less developed countries I don't think it is quite as bad a picture as Marc would paint. Or even for most of the ordinary folks in the developed world who have to > slog away all day at mind-numbing jobs just to stay alive. Of course I suppose you would prefer to have us freezing in caves and going out in the hope that we could risk our lives bringing down a wooly mammoth and bring something home for diner... What most people *should* ideally be doing is working > on AGI or the theory of everything. Unfortunately > they can't even if they want to, due to the > aforementioned lack of funds. I believe that if all > of us were awash with funds and computing power any of > us could do what Eli does (though it would probably > take most of us a little longer). > > One of the things that post-human historians should > grasp is that the world simply was *not* awash with > funds and computing power, [snip] Not today, but we are getting *very* close at least as far as computing power goes. The soon to be released Playstation 3 has a cell processor with ~200 GFLOPS and a graphics chip rumored to have 1.3 TFLOPS with built in networking. Link a few hundred of those together and you have human brain equivalence. And those chips are being built at the 90nm scale not the current state-of-the art 65nm scale or the forthcoming 45nm scale. Things are going to get very interesting around 2010-2014 when human brain equivalence (using a petaflop as the ballpark which is a Bradbury (~Moravec) threshold rather than a Kurzweil threshold) starts being available in ~10 "personal" machines, then 2, then 1 machine. And this is all without either reversible computing (to resolve heat generation problems) and reconfigurable hardware (so one can dedicate *all* of the petaflop to a specific task). While AGI will help uplift humans, a TOE probably does very little. A point that Marc misses is that neither of these is particularly helpful to people *today*. What *is* helpful is wireless (from cell phones to WiFi) communications and low cost web enabled devices from PDAs to the low cost laptop initiatives. Those will give universal access to the WWW -- think of all the young minds in less developed countries having access to everything from Wikipedia to courses from MIT & Harvard at extremely low cost. One thing which is not commonly recognized is that there is are rate limits on human development. Two which come to mind are (a) population growth rate and (b) human information absorption rate. These are determined by human physiology and will limit the rate at which the singularity "takes off". An additional factor would be (c) fear of the unknown. This is probably to a large extent physiological (genetic) as well but varies within the population (early adapters vs. late adapters of technologies). Until you have a combination of human intelligence and/or AGI applied to the development of bio/nanotech based solutions to (b) and (c) the rate of development and economic growth (and the rate at which the problems bothering Marc can be solved) will be constrained. While there are many more humans living in poor situations and dying today than there were a million, or even a hundred, years ago I think their chances for survival and potential for growing and developing to who knows what levels are much greater. So I tend to lean towards Spike's perspective. Robert -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Sat Jan 21 16:53:24 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Sat, 21 Jan 2006 11:53:24 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Is Nemesis a Matrioshka Brain? Message-ID: An interesting note [1] on /. this morning [1] citing an actual web site [2] about the Nemesis theory [3] started me thinking about whether or not Nemesis could be a Matrioshka Brain [4]. If so, that opens a whole range of possible thought paths regarding the superintelligent design and/or management of our solar system... Is there any hard evidence *against* Nemesis other than the fact that we haven't located it? True, we haven't discovered it using past surveys, the best of which, at least for IR, was probably IRAS, but its frequency detection was not that far into the IR and its resolution certainly wasn't very high. But if we are *still* discovering nearby planetary bodies, e.g. Sedna, 2003UB313, etc. then we cannot have done very robust surveys. The initial Nemesis proposal (according to Wikipedia) seems to be for a Mag. 7-12 red dwarf most likely at 1000+AU(?) -- but those calculations would have a much wider range if one was dealing with a "dark" object such as a Matrioshka Brain). If you don't like the small star powered Matrioska Brain idea, how about a swarm of of them powered by internal fusion reactors, masquerading as Oort cloud bodies? They could still accomplish the gravitational disruption of the Oort cloud at periodic intervals (a key element of the Nemesis theory) and use their Oort cloud encounters as refueling opportunities. One could also ask if we have done *enough* occultation astronomy (i.e. we would have to watch the *entire* sky semi-continuously for disappearing stars) to notice *really* large (gas-giant planet to star sized?) solar arrays collecting the low density solar radiation at 100+ AU to supply power to numerous Jupiter Brains. Muller's comments [5] lead me to believe we aren't even close setting constraints on "alternative" explanations for Nemesis. Once again, astronomers trip over the assumption that the universe must be "dead". :-( Robert 1. http://science.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=06/01/21/0338234 2. http://www.binaryresearchinstitute.org.nyud.net:8090/ 3. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nemesis_%28star%29 4. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Matrioshka_Brain 5. http://muller.lbl.gov/pages/lbl-nem.htm -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From amara at amara.com Sat Jan 21 17:17:08 2006 From: amara at amara.com (Amara Graps) Date: Sat, 21 Jan 2006 18:17:08 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] Is Nemesis a Matrioshka Brain? Message-ID: I don't know if this is helpful, but I gave a summary and some questions about Nemesis as a suggested project topic for my Astro 100 students last year (and before). It is project number "V" on the following handout. Perhaps there are some references that you missed. http://www.amara.com/astro100/Projects.pdf Amara -- ******************************************************************** Amara Graps, PhD email: amara at amara.com Computational Physics vita: ftp://ftp.amara.com/pub/resume.txt Multiplex Answers URL: http://www.amara.com/ ******************************************************************** "It is intriguing to learn that the simplicity of the world depends upon the temperature of the environment." ---John D. Barrow From spike66 at comcast.net Sat Jan 21 23:52:27 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Sat, 21 Jan 2006 15:52:27 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] stardust@home In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <200601212352.k0LNqUe08147@tick.javien.com> bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Robert Bradbury Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] stardust at home On 1/21/06, Amara Graps wrote: Generally, an average of 40 tons per day of extraterrestrial material falls to the Earth... ...Wow, that much!? I didn't realize it was that high but I have been thinking about this since I pointed out somewhere that? many space exploration missions, e.g. the Pluto mission, are actually disassembling the Earth... Robert that little bit leaving and even that 4e7 kg/day incoming is negligible compared to the 6e24 kg upon which we shuffle about in our tragically short few years of human existence. ? ... Spike, isn't this going to end up changing the Earth's orbit because we are getting heavier?...? The total mass doesn't matter. We pick up a little momentum from some of the stuff, lose a little to some of it. I haven't calculated, but my intuition guesses that it nearly balances. ... how much would we have to lighten the Earth on a yearly (daily) basis to enlarge our orbit as the Sun expands to a red giant and thus maintain the planet in a habitable zone ... Why would we want to drag the entire rock? Make a number of habitable microplanets, download ourselves into those and blast them out as quickly as we can make them. As we do, we carry off momentum and the enormous rock we call earth will slip a little closer to the sun, but there is time before sol goes red giant. Assuming we get busy. {8-] Robert your notion of a Matrioshka Brain is still one of the most stunning insights ever seen on this list. Don't lose sight of that jewel of an idea. ... How much power will we need?? How many active fusion reactors?? How many mines hauling mass out of the ground?? How long before the Earth starts turning into swiss cheese?? Etc. etc. Fusion reactors? We already have a really good one. We use mirrors to reflect photons from the sun directly west. The entire earth is turned into an enormous photon rocket, gradually picking up angular momentum and thus spiralling slowly away from the sun. That was a joke of course. We would move earth little further from the sun with this scheme, but the real reason to do this would be to increase the rotation rate of the planet. Once we spin it up to about a milliradian per second, from its current ~72 microradians per second, stuff at the equator becomes nearly weightless. That is a good starting point for taking material off of the planet. As we do, of course, it takes angular momentum with it, so we must make up the difference with mirrors reflecting sunlight west. In doing this, we will have created a the equivalent of a solar powered orbit ascent vehicle. Of course we would also sling our atmosphere into interplanetary space, resulting in suffocation of all lifeforms. But at least it cleanly solves the problem of excess carbon dioxide and freon in the atmosphere. spike ps HEY cool! This is starting to sound like the good old ExI chat that I knew from years ago. {8-] From spike66 at comcast.net Sun Jan 22 00:26:43 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Sat, 21 Jan 2006 16:26:43 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] stardust@home In-Reply-To: <200601212352.k0LNqUe08147@tick.javien.com> Message-ID: <200601220026.k0M0Qse11428@tick.javien.com> > bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of spike ... > ...but the real reason to do > this would be to increase the rotation rate of the planet. Once > we spin it up to about a milliradian per second, from its current > ~72 microradians per second, stuff at the equator becomes > nearly weightless. That is a good starting point for taking > material off of the planet... spike How long would this take? I did a quicky back of the envelope one digit calculation and get about ten million years. This is the fastest possible rate, assuming no atmospheric losses of sunlight, and every square meter of planet surface covered with a perfectly reflecting mirror shooting solar photons westward. Of course there are those nasty practical considerations that partially spoil the fun, but if we have a billion years before the sun goes red super giant, we should be able to spin up this planet such that equatorial residents would be weightless. How cool would that be? ("Ward, Im worried about the Beaver. He and Wally were having a highjump competition in the back yard, and I haven't seen them since.") spike {8^D From spike66 at comcast.net Sun Jan 22 00:50:21 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Sat, 21 Jan 2006 16:50:21 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] stardust@home In-Reply-To: <200601220026.k0M0Qse11428@tick.javien.com> Message-ID: <200601220050.k0M0oOe13614@tick.javien.com> > -----Original Message----- > From: extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org [mailto:extropy-chat- > bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of spike > Sent: Saturday, January 21, 2006 4:27 PM > To: 'ExI chat list' > Subject: RE: [extropy-chat] stardust at home > > > bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of spike > ... > > ...but the real reason to do > > this would be to increase the rotation rate of the planet. Once > > we spin it up to about a milliradian per second, from its current > > ~72 microradians per second, stuff at the equator becomes > > nearly weightless. That is a good starting point for taking > > material off of the planet... spike > > > > How long would this take? I did a quicky back of the > envelope one digit calculation and get about ten million > years... spike Oops I goofed this. The earlier calc assumed conversion of energy of the photons, but the description of the method (reflecting photons westward) is a conservation of momentum technique. So assuming the mirror reflecting westward notion, it would take ~700 billion years to spin up the earth to a milliradian per second. We don't want to wait that long. So we still need to convert solar energy into some form suitable for hurling mass westward, as opposed to simply reflecting photons out that way if we wish to achieve the 90 minute day. spike From russell.wallace at gmail.com Sun Jan 22 01:08:34 2006 From: russell.wallace at gmail.com (Russell Wallace) Date: Sun, 22 Jan 2006 01:08:34 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] stardust@home In-Reply-To: <200601220050.k0M0oOe13614@tick.javien.com> References: <200601220026.k0M0Qse11428@tick.javien.com> <200601220050.k0M0oOe13614@tick.javien.com> Message-ID: <8d71341e0601211708o2fb078a8x57772cf7df93b028@mail.gmail.com> On 1/22/06, spike wrote: > > Oops I goofed this. The earlier calc assumed conversion > of energy of the photons, but the description of the > method (reflecting photons westward) is a conservation > of momentum technique. So assuming the mirror reflecting > westward notion, it would take ~700 billion years to > spin up the earth to a milliradian per second. We don't > want to wait that long. So we still need to convert > solar energy into some form suitable for hurling mass > westward, as opposed to simply reflecting photons out > that way if we wish to achieve the 90 minute day. That's going to waste a lot of energy; why not just use mass drivers to disassemble the planet? (Actually I think Earth should be kept the way it is, but there are lots of dead planets and moons to disassemble.) - Russell -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From thespike at satx.rr.com Sun Jan 22 02:08:28 2006 From: thespike at satx.rr.com (Damien Broderick) Date: Sat, 21 Jan 2006 20:08:28 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] Suspended animation for 3 hours Message-ID: <6.2.1.2.0.20060121200735.01d3cb18@pop-server.satx.rr.com> http://smh.com.au/news/health-and-fitness/doctors-claim-suspended-animation-success/2006/01/20/1137553739997.html From spike66 at comcast.net Sun Jan 22 02:11:33 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Sat, 21 Jan 2006 18:11:33 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] stardust@home In-Reply-To: <200601220050.k0M0oOe13614@tick.javien.com> Message-ID: <200601220211.k0M2Bae21796@tick.javien.com> > -----Original Message----- > From: extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org [mailto:extropy-chat- > bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of spike > ... So assuming the mirror reflecting > westward notion, it would take ~700 billion years to > spin up the earth to a milliradian per second... > > spike Note however that the moon has only about a thousandth the moment of inertia of the earth, with a sixteenth the surface area. Using the mirror scheme, we might get it spun to a milliradian per second in about forty billion years. With about a quarter the radius and about a sixth the gravity, we need not get up to quite a milliradian per second to achieve weightlessness at the lunar equator, two thirds of a mrad/sec would do, so 25-ish billion. Better still might be to spin up the tiny moons of Mars, or use the asteroids. One could imagine spinning them fast enough that one experiences negative acceleration at the equator. Then whenever MBrain nodes come off the nano-assembly line, they are not launched but rather gently allowed go on their way to a thought-filled cosmic eternity. There is a compelling peacefulness to this scenario. spike From thespike at satx.rr.com Sun Jan 22 04:12:38 2006 From: thespike at satx.rr.com (Damien Broderick) Date: Sat, 21 Jan 2006 22:12:38 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] time reversed entanglement? Message-ID: <6.2.1.2.0.20060121221049.01e38658@pop-server.satx.rr.com> Quantum Physics, abstract Time-reversal formalism applied to maximal bipartite entanglement: Theoretical and experimental exploration http://arxiv.org/abs/quant-ph/0510048 Authors: M. Laforest, R. Laflamme, J. Baugh Comments: 10 pages, 16 figurers, submitted to PRA Within the context of quantum teleportation, a proposed intuitive model to explain bipartite entanglement describes the scheme as being the same qubit of information evolving along and against the flow of time of an external observer. We investigate the physicality of such a model by applying the time-reversal of the Schrodinger equation in the teleportation context. To do so, we first lay down the theory of time-reversal applied to the circuit model and then show that the outcome of a teleportation-like circuit is consistent with the usual tensor product treatment, thus independent of the physical quantum system used to encode the information. Finally, we demonstrate a proof of principle experiment on a liquid state NMR quantum information processor. The experimental results are consistent with the interpretation that information can be seen as flowing backward in time through entanglement. From brian at posthuman.com Sun Jan 22 06:42:31 2006 From: brian at posthuman.com (Brian Atkins) Date: Sun, 22 Jan 2006 00:42:31 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] Two Errors: Intelligent Design and "Progress" Message-ID: <43D32957.7040001@posthuman.com> http://www.kschroeder.com/blog/1135873151/index_html "I've just finished my chapter submission to Global Catastrophic Risks, a book being edited by Nick Bostrom and Milan Cirkovic for Oxford University Press. In my chapter, I talk about how the idea of humanity evolving into or creating some transcendent post-human species rests on the same error as the idea of 'intelligent design'." From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Sun Jan 22 11:59:54 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Sun, 22 Jan 2006 06:59:54 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Two Errors: Intelligent Design and "Progress" In-Reply-To: <43D32957.7040001@posthuman.com> References: <43D32957.7040001@posthuman.com> Message-ID: I read this note a few weeks ago and found the arguments weak. For example: "Crucially, the general trend toward greater complexity in earthly life is not the result of some *direction* to evolution; it's the result of random drift taking place in the absence of mass extinctions." Actually that isn't true. There are at least two "directions to evolution" that I can think of. The first is towards a direction of greater survivability. There is a second direction which seems to be to increase the rate of evolution "when necessary". The direction towards greater survivability can clearly be seen in both the development of flight and the development of intelligence. Both enhance the chances of the survival of the species (and its genes). If one looks at everything from the development of the E. coli SOS response to the development of the nucleus, chromosomes and sex it looks like evolution has two competing priorities. First, "if its not broke don't fix it". This is why the SOS response isn't turned on by default in E. coli. (The SOS response allows hypermutation and takes place when E. coli is stressed -- presumably the stress indicates a situation where the genome may not survive and the only solution may be to rapidly evolve a better genome.) That leads to the second direction which is to detect cases where the genome may be "maladapted" and evolve it quickly. Things like chromosomes and sex allow for genome redundancy (not generally present in prokaryotes) so you can vary things and have a backup copy. They also allow you to mix and match gene sets with the possibility of creating a new species perhaps better suited for different environments. Influenza is a great example of a rapidly evolving species due to its multiple "chromosomes" that doesn't care about genome redundancy -- presumably because it is always up against an adapting immune system trying to eliminate it. HIV is an example of a rapidly evolving species with a built in strategy of hypermutation assuming that some small percentage of the copies will survive. Viruses can get away with such strategies because they aren't paying most of the cost of making genetic copies. More complex organisms from bacteria up to mammals have to take into account the high investment costs of creating a copy. If the copy fails, the investment is completely wasted. This may be one reason for the development of intelligence -- the creation and selection of survival strategies (behaviors) is taking place in software rather than hardware. Ideas are cheap -- maybe thats why we have so many stupid ones floating around. Robert -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From alfio.puglisi at gmail.com Sun Jan 22 12:50:13 2006 From: alfio.puglisi at gmail.com (Alfio Puglisi) Date: Sun, 22 Jan 2006 13:50:13 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] Two Errors: Intelligent Design and "Progress" In-Reply-To: References: <43D32957.7040001@posthuman.com> Message-ID: <4902d9990601220450y1fb9116cw7156b813fdb54ca7@mail.gmail.com> I find it weak too, for a different reason. His argument that intelligence is not significative for survival doesn't work anymore when the same intelligence gives a species some powerful technology to change the environment: a moderately intelligent dinosaur may be not much fitter than a dumb one, but a dinosaur intelligent enough to detect the incoming asteroid and change its orbit is a hell of a lot fitter than a T. Rex. Alfio From hawthornman at blueyonder.co.uk Sun Jan 22 14:17:54 2006 From: hawthornman at blueyonder.co.uk (JAMES WILLIAMS) Date: Sun, 22 Jan 2006 14:17:54 -0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] FWD [Skeptic] Re: Looking for examples ofnaturally evolved X-ray vision? In-Reply-To: <021301c61df8$44d65570$640fa8c0@kevin> Message-ID: Whereas it may not be possible to actually see X rays you probably do have the ability to sense them. the basis i have for this is the effect X rays have on living tissue, if they cause damage you should be able to feel it. We learn using a sort of feedback process yes? So, if you have ever broken a bone and actually had an X ray you will know that during the process all of your attention is focused on the fact that someone is going to shoot you with a big gun that fires radiation. No doubt at this point your body will log what that just felt like. _______________________________________________ extropy-chat mailing list extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From neptune at superlink.net Sun Jan 22 14:53:25 2006 From: neptune at superlink.net (Technotranscendence) Date: Sun, 22 Jan 2006 09:53:25 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] next generation of ion engines References: <43C89747.6020202@optusnet.com.au><20060114075709.94949.qmail@web81609.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <015f01c61f63$9969a9e0$a8893cd1@pavilion> That's the classic "let's wait for the singularity" argument. Well, why do anything until after the singularity? I think we should all tell the researchers and pioneers to stop work until the singularity comes. Why waste any efforts now? Instead, forget your work and just get out there and party. :) (Okay, just trying my hand at a little humor here. No offense intended.) To be more serious, I'd rather see the or any singularity from a distance. If it turns nasty, perhaps there'd be a tiny chance of surviving. Why have all your eggs in the singularity basket? Regards, Dan From: Robert Bradbury To: ExI chat list Sent: Saturday, January 14, 2006 3:55 AM Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] next generation of ion engines [snip] Though we probably do not like to discuss it there *is* a point in the development in the singularity where later launched spacecraft will have resources at their disposal that significantly exceed the capabilities of spacecraft launched at an earlier time. Recognizing that suggests that the development of the "earlier" spacecraft is relatively pointless. [snip] -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From brian at posthuman.com Sun Jan 22 17:27:19 2006 From: brian at posthuman.com (Brian Atkins) Date: Sun, 22 Jan 2006 11:27:19 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] Two Errors: Intelligent Design and "Progress" In-Reply-To: <4902d9990601220450y1fb9116cw7156b813fdb54ca7@mail.gmail.com> References: <43D32957.7040001@posthuman.com> <4902d9990601220450y1fb9116cw7156b813fdb54ca7@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <43D3C077.2050101@posthuman.com> Alfio Puglisi wrote: > I find it weak too, for a different reason. His argument that > intelligence is not significative for survival doesn't work anymore > when the same intelligence gives a species some powerful technology to > change the environment: a moderately intelligent dinosaur may be not > much fitter than a dumb one, but a dinosaur intelligent enough to > detect the incoming asteroid and change its orbit is a hell of a lot > fitter than a T. Rex. > Possibly, but while I was quickly scanning his page, I think he brought that up somewhere and proposed the idea that greater intelligence also may create additional risks for the species that did not exist prior to that point. In other words, global catastrophic risks, which the upcoming book is exactly about. Some of those risks might wipe out humans, but leave bacteria - so which species had better survivability in the _long run_? -- Brian Atkins Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence http://www.singinst.org/ From thespike at satx.rr.com Sun Jan 22 17:56:33 2006 From: thespike at satx.rr.com (Damien Broderick) Date: Sun, 22 Jan 2006 11:56:33 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] Two Errors: Intelligent Design and "Progress" In-Reply-To: <43D3C077.2050101@posthuman.com> References: <43D32957.7040001@posthuman.com> <4902d9990601220450y1fb9116cw7156b813fdb54ca7@mail.gmail.com> <43D3C077.2050101@posthuman.com> Message-ID: <6.2.1.2.0.20060122115520.02ed9d68@pop-server.satx.rr.com> At 11:27 AM 1/22/2006 -0600, Brian Atkins wrote: >I think he brought that up somewhere and proposed the idea that greater >intelligence also may create additional risks for the species that did not >exist prior to that point. In other words, global catastrophic risks, >which the upcoming book is exactly about. Some of those risks might wipe >out humans, but leave bacteria - so which species had better survivability >in the _long run_? From THE ONION: Maverick Hunter's 'Human Beings As Prey' Plan Not As Challenging As Expected January 17, 2006 | Issue 42?03 PERIL ISLAND?Big-game hunter Baron Hugo von Urwitz conceded Tuesday that his theory that human beings are the most cunning and challenging of quarry is seriously flawed. "Perhaps I gave my fellow man too much credit," said von Urwitz, looking on as his servants carried three lifeless human beings bound to poles by their hands and ankles. "Admittedly, there are fewer kills today than yesterday, but only because the herd is thinning." Bored with netting such elusive and dangerous prey as Bengal tigers, white rhinos, and Cape buffalo, the 51-year-old adventurer said he had thought it would be "capital sport" to hunt humans on his uncharted, densely forested private island. "My huntsman's heart thrilled at the prospect of bringing down a live human, who alone in the animal kingdom has the capacity to outwit and even best his enemies through sheer intellect," von Urwitz said. "What I neglected to consider is that man is also alone in the capacity to tumble straight into quicksand while fleeing from a swarm of yellow jackets after trying to steal honey from their nest." Von Urwitz chanced upon his stock of prey Saturday, after a chartered luxury yacht ran aground in the shoals surrounding his island. The yacht's 29 passengers and five crew members were promptly invited to lodge in the baron's imposing fortress. At dawn Sunday, von Urwitz roused his guests to announce his shocking intent to hunt them. Allowing them only small knives and the clothes on their backs, he anticipated that his human prey would elude him in inventive and clever ways?and perhaps even make their hunter the hunted himself. Yet in the first night alone, eight tourists died of exposure. "I'm not sure I even need to be here, really," von Urwitz added. "At the very least, I assumed they would take to the trees and hills in desperate flight," he said. "Instead, many of them just milled about like peahens within the confines of my estate, periodically rattling the backdoor knob to ensure that it hadn't been unlocked since they last checked." The baron theorized that the grave danger simply didn't register with most of the humans. "Look at this one," von Urwitz said, as a cellar meat locker revealed an overweight, middle-aged male bearing a single gunshot wound to the forehead. "I bagged him in the courtyard as he sipped vitamin water, after I had given him a four-hour running start. Where's the sport in this?" Von Urwitz said three vacationers brazenly approached him with strange questions. "They asked about grand prizes and something they called an 'immunity challenge,'" von Urwitz said. "I had my men slit their throats." Those who had the wherewithal to hide did so in obvious places, such as in the toolshed, under the car, or behind bushes. Von Urwitz said his hounds "made short work of them." A few did flee to the jungle, including one man who raced in the direction of a pit trap dug by von Urwitz's men. From a hunting blind close to the trap, von Urwitz said he watched with "immense excitement." "Would [the man's] eyes catch the carpet of dead, flattened leaves in the clearing, noticing their rather unnatural distribution, and quickly surmise, through reason and intuition alike, that something was dreadfully amiss?" von Urwitz said. "Or would he blindly stumble into the pit and be finished off by our arrows?" Ultimately, the man did neither. Before coming within 20 yards of the pit, he was knocked cold by a low-hanging tree limb. With 22 kills by nightfall Tuesday, the baron recognized the need to amend his strategy. "I had snared a couple of tourists, but they were so obviously feebleminded that I threw them back into the brush," von Urwitz said. "If I leave them alone, perhaps in a few weeks one or two of them will have developed survival tactics besides uncontrolled weeping and involuntary defecation." Hinting that his ruthlessness was quickly turning to pity for the pathetic, fragile creatures, von Urwitz also mused about rounding them up in an island game preserve. "I am reminded of Theodore Roosevelt, with his hunter's love of nature," von Urwitz said. "Perhaps future generations of von Urwitzes can enjoy the humans' comical antics, and if their numbers increase sufficiently, perhaps hunt some of the?one would hope?increasingly fit adults from time to time." "On the other hand, I could always put out some large glue traps," von Urwitz added. From dirk.bruere at gmail.com Sun Jan 22 18:15:21 2006 From: dirk.bruere at gmail.com (Dirk Bruere) Date: Sun, 22 Jan 2006 18:15:21 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Two Errors: Intelligent Design and "Progress" In-Reply-To: <6.2.1.2.0.20060122115520.02ed9d68@pop-server.satx.rr.com> References: <43D32957.7040001@posthuman.com> <4902d9990601220450y1fb9116cw7156b813fdb54ca7@mail.gmail.com> <43D3C077.2050101@posthuman.com> <6.2.1.2.0.20060122115520.02ed9d68@pop-server.satx.rr.com> Message-ID: On 1/22/06, Damien Broderick wrote: > > At 11:27 AM 1/22/2006 -0600, Brian Atkins wrote: > > >I think he brought that up somewhere and proposed the idea that greater > >intelligence also may create additional risks for the species that did > not > >exist prior to that point. In other words, global catastrophic risks, > >which the upcoming book is exactly about. Some of those risks might wipe > >out humans, but leave bacteria - so which species had better > survivability > >in the _long run_? > > From THE ONION: > > Maverick Hunter's 'Human Beings As Prey' Plan Not As Challenging As > Expected > > January 17, 2006 | Issue 42?03 > > PERIL ISLAND?Big-game hunter Baron Hugo von Urwitz conceded Tuesday > that his theory that human beings are the most cunning and challenging > of quarry is seriously flawed. > > "Perhaps I gave my fellow man too much credit," said von Urwitz, > looking on as his servants carried three lifeless human beings bound to > poles by their hands and ankles. "Admittedly, there are fewer kills > today than yesterday, but only because the herd is thinning." > > Bored with netting such elusive and dangerous prey as Bengal tigers, > white rhinos, and Cape buffalo, the 51-year-old adventurer said he had > thought it would be "capital sport" to hunt humans on his uncharted, > densely forested private island. > > "My huntsman's heart thrilled at the prospect of bringing down a live > human, who alone in the animal kingdom has the capacity to outwit and > even best his enemies through sheer intellect," von Urwitz said. "What > I neglected to consider is that man is also alone in the capacity to > tumble straight into quicksand while fleeing from a swarm of yellow > jackets after trying to steal honey from their nest." > > Von Urwitz chanced upon his stock of prey Saturday, after a chartered > luxury yacht ran aground in the shoals surrounding his island. The > yacht's 29 passengers and five crew members were promptly invited to > lodge in the baron's imposing fortress. > > At dawn Sunday, von Urwitz roused his guests to announce his shocking > intent to hunt them. Allowing them only small knives and the clothes on > their backs, he anticipated that his human prey would elude him in > inventive and clever ways?and perhaps even make their hunter the hunted > himself. > > Yet in the first night alone, eight tourists died of exposure. > > "I'm not sure I even need to be here, really," von Urwitz added. > > "At the very least, I assumed they would take to the trees and hills > in desperate flight," he said. "Instead, many of them just milled about > like peahens within the confines of my estate, periodically rattling > the backdoor knob to ensure that it hadn't been unlocked since they > last checked." > > The baron theorized that the grave danger simply didn't register with > most of the humans. "Look at this one," von Urwitz said, as a cellar > meat locker revealed an overweight, middle-aged male bearing a single > gunshot wound to the forehead. "I bagged him in the courtyard as he > sipped vitamin water, after I had given him a four-hour running start. > Where's the sport in this?" > > Von Urwitz said three vacationers brazenly approached him with strange > questions. > > "They asked about grand prizes and something they called an 'immunity > challenge,'" von Urwitz said. "I had my men slit their throats." > > Those who had the wherewithal to hide did so in obvious places, such as > in the toolshed, under the car, or behind bushes. Von Urwitz said his > hounds "made short work of them." > > A few did flee to the jungle, including one man who raced in the > direction of a pit trap dug by von Urwitz's men. From a hunting blind > close to the trap, von Urwitz said he watched with "immense > excitement." > > "Would [the man's] eyes catch the carpet of dead, flattened leaves in > the clearing, noticing their rather unnatural distribution, and quickly > surmise, through reason and intuition alike, that something was > dreadfully amiss?" von Urwitz said. "Or would he blindly stumble into > the pit and be finished off by our arrows?" > > Ultimately, the man did neither. Before coming within 20 yards of the > pit, he was knocked cold by a low-hanging tree limb. > > With 22 kills by nightfall Tuesday, the baron recognized the need to > amend his strategy. "I had snared a couple of tourists, but they were > so obviously feebleminded that I threw them back into the brush," von > Urwitz said. "If I leave them alone, perhaps in a few weeks one or two > of them will have developed survival tactics besides uncontrolled > weeping and involuntary defecation." > > Hinting that his ruthlessness was quickly turning to pity for the > pathetic, fragile creatures, von Urwitz also mused about rounding them > up in an island game preserve. "I am reminded of Theodore Roosevelt, > with his hunter's love of nature," von Urwitz said. "Perhaps future > generations of von Urwitzes can enjoy the humans' comical antics, and > if their numbers increase sufficiently, perhaps hunt some of the?one > would hope?increasingly fit adults from time to time." > > "On the other hand, I could always put out some large glue traps," von > Urwitz added. > Problem is, Hollywood always has von Urwitz select Arnold Schwatzenegger or Claude van Damme to be the prey. Big mistake. OTOH, some US survivalist nuts or British SAS men might provide more sport. 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URL: From natasha at natasha.cc Sun Jan 22 20:38:48 2006 From: natasha at natasha.cc (Natasha Vita-More) Date: Sun, 22 Jan 2006 14:38:48 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] test Message-ID: <6.2.1.2.2.20060122143839.02af6d18@pop-server.austin.rr.com> From natasha at natasha.cc Sun Jan 22 21:20:02 2006 From: natasha at natasha.cc (Natasha Vita-More) Date: Sun, 22 Jan 2006 15:20:02 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] ExI Job Posting: Content Manager - Information Specialist Message-ID: <6.2.1.2.2.20060122143903.05903418@pop-server.austin.rr.com> Technical Information Specialist - Content Manager Requirements * Background knowledge of transhumanism and the philosophy of extropy is preferred. * A basic knowledge of web design and page construction abilities is essential, including the ability to create an effective search function. * Strong skills in organizing content. * Experience with XML and RSS preferred, but not necessary. * Candidates must be communicative and responsive in relation to the work. Duties Responsibilities include organizing and structuring data for the new Transhumanist Library for the public; including material from past issues of Extropy magazine, the Extro conferences, and other Extropy Institute publications and activities, and other major transhumanist content developed over the years. The Transhumanist Library will be open to the public and provide information services to the global community. The Library's collection of online content will be a resource for researchers, professionals, students, and others interested in learning about transhumanism. Interested candidates may send their resume to Natasha Vita-More at Natasha at extropy.org Natasha Vita-More Cultural Strategist - Designer Future Studies, University of Houston President, Extropy Institute Member, Association of Professional Futurists Founder, Transhumanist Arts & Culture Honorary Vice-Chair, World Transhumanist Association Senior Associate, Foresight Institute Advisor, Alcor Life Extension Foundation If you draw a circle in the sand and study only what's inside the circle, then that is a closed-system perspective. If you study what is inside the circle and everything outside the circle, then that is an open system perspective. Buckminster Fuller -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From bret at bonfireproductions.com Mon Jan 23 15:33:20 2006 From: bret at bonfireproductions.com (Bret Kulakovich) Date: Mon, 23 Jan 2006 10:33:20 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] WSJ on Cryonics: Message-ID: <5003C4E8-46FB-4682-A97F-78565BA0E921@bonfireproductions.com> The article itself is not 'bad' but the spin coming off of this seems negative. http://online.wsj.com/public/article/ SB113780314900652582-3NZCCoZBW7UHDmouEOrkzkalkfY_20060129.html?mod=blogs Sorry if this is already posted to the list - I haven't received any messages since yesterday afternoon. Bret K. From davidmc at gmail.com Mon Jan 23 15:30:18 2006 From: davidmc at gmail.com (David McFadzean) Date: Mon, 23 Jan 2006 08:30:18 -0700 Subject: [extropy-chat] test In-Reply-To: <6.2.1.2.2.20060122143839.02af6d18@pop-server.austin.rr.com> References: <6.2.1.2.2.20060122143839.02af6d18@pop-server.austin.rr.com> Message-ID: test again On 1/22/06, Natasha Vita-More wrote: > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat > From rafal.smigrodzki at gmail.com Mon Jan 23 15:54:19 2006 From: rafal.smigrodzki at gmail.com (Rafal Smigrodzki) Date: Mon, 23 Jan 2006 10:54:19 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Fwd: The extropian dream car was Re: [extropians] Aptera 330 MPG hybrid car? In-Reply-To: <7641ddc60601221134i7d7cc7f2q317563b257fb9768@mail.gmail.com> References: <7641ddc60601221134i7d7cc7f2q317563b257fb9768@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <7641ddc60601230754o59d79ad5i741d8883187f9b41@mail.gmail.com> I am reposting from extropians - thought it might stimulate a discussion. ---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: Rafal Smigrodzki Date: Jan 22, 2006 2:34 PM Subject: The extropian dream car was Re: [extropians] Aptera 330 MPG hybrid car? To: extropians at yahoogroups.com On 1/21/06, Eugen Leitl wrote: > > I presume the old winner looked about as the current one > http://www.paccar.ethz.ch/pac_car_nogaro?hires > which is utterly impractical, for the same reason those > PV-driven solar racers are impractical. ### I am totally unmoved by extreme attempts at improving gas mileage, since they indeed come at a great cost in practicality. But, what would be an extropian dream car? Given that extropians want to get places fast and stay alive for a long time, this machine would have to combine extreme safety with high speed. I have been thinking about the ways to achieve substantial risk reductions while increasing cruising speeds. First of all, the driver must be enclosed in an impenetrable cockpit - a windowless sphere of metal stiffened with carbon fiber with thermal insulation and a supply of air sufficient to survive while the rest of the car burns down. Secondly, the sphere should be mounted on gimbals (or a similar arrangement of ball-bearings in a metal cage), so as to be able to rotate independently of the rest of the chassis - in this way, in an offset collision the driver would not be subjected to strong torsional forces. Even more importantly, in a frontal collision the driver could be oriented in the optimal position along the axis of deceleration. There are large differences in survivability of deceleration depending on the direction of it in relation to the brain. Deceleration of as much as 130 g can be survived without any major damage, as long as the whole body is decelerated without allowing significant relative movements of body parts, such as neck extension or flexion (it was neck flexion that killed Dale Earnhart in an otherwise trivial accident). This implies that inside the sphere there must be an active restraint system, similar to the ejection seat in a jet, that will stabilize all body parts by tying them down to the seat, and I mean more than a few belts - a whole network of limb, abdomen, torso, and head restraints would have to be activated moments before a crash. Finally, the construction of the car outside of the sphere and its suspension would have to allow a steady deformation producing the maximal deceleration of the sphere compatible with survival - from the moment the bumper touches the obstacle to the moment where the sphere almost touches it, and the part of the car between the bumper and the sphere is reduced to nothing (e.g. by controlled disintegration and sideways-ejection of parts). A system of deformable anchor belts allowing the sphere to slide forward along a stiff chassis might do the trick as well. Of course, other changes to the car would have to be made - the driver would have to use synthetic vision and strictly electronic linkages to see the road and control the car. Egress would be a bit more difficult, given the constrains imposed by the spherical cockpit. These would not be insurmountable. Assuming a steady deceleration of 130 g = 9.82m/s^2 x 130 = 1276 m/s^2, you could decelerate from 288 km/h (179mph) in 2.5 meters (8.2 feet) to zero, followed by a fuel explosion, and walk away without any major injury. Achieving this kind of progress in protecting life *while speeding like a demon* would be IMO much more extropian than saving gas, which I think is just techno-wanking. Rafal -- Rafal Smigrodzki, MD-PhD Chief Clinical Officer, Gencia Corporation 706 B Forest St. Charlottesville, VA 22903 tel: (434) 295-4800 fax: (434) 295-4951 This electronic message transmission contains information from the biotechnology firm of Gencia Corporation which may be confidential or privileged. The information is intended to be for the use of the individual or entity named above. If you are not the intended recipient, be aware that any disclosure, copying, distribution or use of the contents of this information is prohibited. If you have received this electronic transmission in error, please notify us by telephone (434-295-4800) or by electronic mail (fportell at genciabiotech.com) immediately. From live2scan at charter.net Mon Jan 23 20:18:01 2006 From: live2scan at charter.net (Dennis Roberts) Date: Mon, 23 Jan 2006 15:18:01 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] next generation of ion engines In-Reply-To: <20060114211817.53158.qmail@web81609.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <4lch77$1ofj752@mxip03a.cluster1.charter.net> I guess you haven't read their site. Sure the most altitude they've reached is ONLY in the neighborhood of 100k feet. They are hoping to develop an ascender to regularly climb to much higher altitudes. Then they want to setup a permanent facility where a craft that can reach both orbital altitude and velocity can be constructed. A ship that will never be able to land but doesn't require an initial high velocity to achieve orbit is what they aspire to build. It's an AIRSHIP, just floatin' along to start, but at a high enough altitude that an ion engine can operate to accelerate it, slowly. It will (hopefully) be able to return to its starting point the same way- no flaming re-entry needed. -----Original Message----- From: extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org [mailto:extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Adrian Tymes Sent: Saturday, January 14, 2006 4:18 PM To: ExI chat list Subject: RE: [extropy-chat] next generation of ion engines That will work for getting things to orbital altitude. There's a big difference between orbital altitude and orbital velocity. Better ion engines would be of possible use for stationkeeping, and for the sats they launch - but doesn't really strike me as something they would get uber-excited about. That said, they're also well short of the edge of space: their latest mission only got to about 78 thousand feet, well short of 100 km (about 328 thousand feet). --- Dennis Roberts wrote: > You really don't need SpaceShipOne or anything like it. Check out > http://www.jpaerospace.com/, these folks are probably still dancing > around > after ESA's announcement. Low cost access to LEO is comin' to us all. > Dennis Roberts > > -----Original Message----- > From: extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org > [mailto:extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Adrian > Tymes > Sent: Saturday, January 14, 2006 2:57 AM > To: ExI chat list > Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] next generation of ion engines > > --- deimtee wrote: > > It takes about 10 newtons to lift a kilo against 1 gee. > > ...right, forgot to factor in G. > > > However, how about if you dropped it off SpaceShipOne at apogee? > > How much time have you got to give it orbital velocity before drag > > exceeds thrust? > > >From http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SpaceShipOne_flight_17P we > know that SSO only took 24 minutes between detaching from White > Knight through apogee to landing, of which just over 80 seconds > was spent under thrust. So the apogee-to-landing phase probably > took about 12 minutes. Most orbital rocket launches I've > studied seem to take about 10 minutes to get to orbital > velocity. So, you'd probably need wings or something to gain > lift while going at hypersonic speeds - and the wings would need > to be thermally protected (probably made out of solid heat > shields), because as you get towards Mach 25 you're flying not > through air but through plasma. Which is not to say it can't be > done, just that a proper analysis is probably way in excess of > simple back-of-the-envelope equations. > > I wonder, though: what would be the physics of flying through > plasma? Could you use an M2P2-type magnetic bubble to shield > the craft from direct contact with the atmosphere, while still > maintaining enough of an airfoil shape (in the bubble, which > seems to be the shape that would then matter for lift and drag > calculations) to gain lift? > > > also, > > I think you are a bit optimistic on the battery too. > > > > 100kW * 10 min = 16.666 kWHrs > > Thats about the same as a 12 volt battery delivering 1400 amps for > an > > hour. > > > > I want some of those for my electric car. : ) > > Actually, some of the sources were advanced batteries being > developed for cars. But I did caution that that was the > optimistic end of the figures I was seeing: quite a few of the > "most advanced" figures were quite a bit more conservative than > that. ;) > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat > _______________________________________________ extropy-chat mailing list extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat From amara at amara.com Mon Jan 23 22:45:54 2006 From: amara at amara.com (Amara Graps) Date: Mon, 23 Jan 2006 23:45:54 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] WSJ: A Cold Calculus Leads Cryonauts To Put Assets on Ice Message-ID: The Wall Street Journal has an interesting article about a trust fund, collected by oneself, after one is reanimated from cryonics suspension. http://online.wsj.com/public/article/SB113780314900652582-3NZCCoZBW7UHDmouEOrkzkalkfY_20060129.html?mod=blogs A Cold Calculus Leads Cryonauts To Put Assets on Ice With Bodies Frozen, They Hope to Return Richer; Dr. Thorp Is Buying Long By ANTONIO REGALADO Staff Reporter of THE WALL STREET JOURNAL January 21, 2006; Page A1 You can't take it with you. So Arizona resort operator David Pizer has a plan to come back and get it. Like some 1,000 other members of the "cryonics" movement, Mr. Pizer has made arrangements to have his body frozen in liquid nitrogen as soon as possible after he dies. In this way, Mr. Pizer, a heavy-set, philosophical man who is 64 years old, hopes to be revived sometime in the future when medicine has advanced far beyond where it stands today. And because Mr. Pizer doesn't wish to return a pauper, he's taken an additional step: He's left his money to himself. (see the article for the rest) Amara -- ******************************************************************** Amara Graps, PhD email: amara at amara.com Computational Physics vita: ftp://ftp.amara.com/pub/resume.txt Multiplex Answers URL: http://www.amara.com/ ******************************************************************** "It is intriguing to learn that the simplicity of the world depends upon the temperature of the environment." ---John D. Barrow From transhumanist at goldenfuture.net Tue Jan 24 02:27:54 2006 From: transhumanist at goldenfuture.net (Joseph Bloch) Date: Mon, 23 Jan 2006 21:27:54 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] WSJ: A Cold Calculus Leads Cryonauts To Put Assets on Ice In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <43D590AA.2030807@goldenfuture.net> I've seriously considered doing something similar for myself (inspired by James L. Halpren's book "The First Immortal"). Granted that the universe of those signed up for cryonics is incredibly small, and a stark minority even among Transhumanists, I cannot help but wonder if there isn't some sort of business opportunity for a company to sell such financial management services as a trust, with all the funds being pooled and then doled out proportionally. My knowledge of such matters (both financial and legal) is small, but I would think it would be doable, if only there were a large enough pool of interested parties and funds to make it work. From this article, it seems that there might be... Joseph Amara Graps wrote: > The Wall Street Journal has an interesting article about a trust fund, > collected by oneself, after one is reanimated from cryonics suspension. > > http://online.wsj.com/public/article/SB113780314900652582-3NZCCoZBW7UHDmouEOrkzkalkfY_20060129.html?mod=blogs > > > A Cold Calculus Leads Cryonauts To Put Assets on Ice > With Bodies Frozen, They Hope to Return Richer; > Dr. Thorp Is Buying Long > By ANTONIO REGALADO > Staff Reporter of THE WALL STREET JOURNAL > January 21, 2006; Page A1 > > You can't take it with you. So Arizona resort operator David Pizer has > a plan to come back and get it. > > Like some 1,000 other members of the "cryonics" movement, Mr. Pizer > has made arrangements to have his body frozen in liquid nitrogen as > soon as possible after he dies. In this way, Mr. Pizer, a heavy-set, > philosophical man who is 64 years old, hopes to be revived sometime in > the future when medicine has advanced far beyond where it stands > today. > > And because Mr. Pizer doesn't wish to return a pauper, he's taken an > additional step: He's left his money to himself. > > (see the article for the rest) > > Amara > From transhumanist at goldenfuture.net Tue Jan 24 02:46:40 2006 From: transhumanist at goldenfuture.net (Joseph Bloch) Date: Mon, 23 Jan 2006 21:46:40 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] WSJ: A Cold Calculus Leads Cryonauts To Put Assets on Ice In-Reply-To: <43D590AA.2030807@goldenfuture.net> References: <43D590AA.2030807@goldenfuture.net> Message-ID: <43D59510.20000@goldenfuture.net> Apologies... looking over at my bookcase, I notice it's "Halperin", not "Halpren". Definitely worth the read (his other book "The Truth Machine" is nice, but not as interesting, I think, as "The First Immortal"). Joseph Joseph Bloch wrote: > I've seriously considered doing something similar for myself (inspired > by James L. Halpren's book "The First Immortal"). > > Granted that the universe of those signed up for cryonics is > incredibly small, and a stark minority even among Transhumanists, I > cannot help but wonder if there isn't some sort of business > opportunity for a company to sell such financial management services > as a trust, with all the funds being pooled and then doled out > proportionally. My knowledge of such matters (both financial and > legal) is small, but I would think it would be doable, if only there > were a large enough pool of interested parties and funds to make it work. > > From this article, it seems that there might be... > > Joseph > > Amara Graps wrote: > >> The Wall Street Journal has an interesting article about a trust fund, >> collected by oneself, after one is reanimated from cryonics suspension. >> >> http://online.wsj.com/public/article/SB113780314900652582-3NZCCoZBW7UHDmouEOrkzkalkfY_20060129.html?mod=blogs >> >> >> A Cold Calculus Leads Cryonauts To Put Assets on Ice >> With Bodies Frozen, They Hope to Return Richer; >> Dr. Thorp Is Buying Long >> By ANTONIO REGALADO >> Staff Reporter of THE WALL STREET JOURNAL >> January 21, 2006; Page A1 >> >> You can't take it with you. So Arizona resort operator David Pizer has >> a plan to come back and get it. >> >> Like some 1,000 other members of the "cryonics" movement, Mr. Pizer >> has made arrangements to have his body frozen in liquid nitrogen as >> soon as possible after he dies. In this way, Mr. Pizer, a heavy-set, >> philosophical man who is 64 years old, hopes to be revived sometime in >> the future when medicine has advanced far beyond where it stands >> today. >> >> And because Mr. Pizer doesn't wish to return a pauper, he's taken an >> additional step: He's left his money to himself. >> >> (see the article for the rest) >> >> Amara >> > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat > > From brent.allsop at comcast.net Tue Jan 24 05:06:37 2006 From: brent.allsop at comcast.net (brent.allsop at comcast.net) Date: Tue, 24 Jan 2006 05:06:37 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] WSJ: A Cold Calculus Leads Cryonauts To Put Assets on Ice Message-ID: <012420060506.23240.43D5B5DC000B1D8E00005AC822007340769F019C04040ED29B020A9D0D@comcast.net> The WSJ said: ?Such financial arrangements, which tie up money that might otherwise go to heirs or charities, are "more widespread than I originally thought," says A. Christopher Sega? Why do they always put it like this? Queen Latifah can spend all of her money in a completely wasteful last bash, not leaving any of it to ?heirs or charity? and everyone cheers: ?You go girl!? But if someone lives a thrifty hard working life so he has $10 million in the end. (while many of his pears respectfully waste all theirs on yachts, planes, space flights ? or whatever) And wants to save only half of that remaining $10 million for himself ? oh man ? what an evil person! Brent Allsop -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From wingcat at pacbell.net Tue Jan 24 21:24:45 2006 From: wingcat at pacbell.net (Adrian Tymes) Date: Tue, 24 Jan 2006 13:24:45 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] WSJ: A Cold Calculus Leads Cryonauts To Put Assets on Ice In-Reply-To: <012420060506.23240.43D5B5DC000B1D8E00005AC822007340769F019C04040ED29B020A9D0D@comcast.net> Message-ID: <20060124212445.92653.qmail@web81611.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Because the person isn't spreading the wealth to other people. The money just sits there, where no one can get at it. (Of course, this is from the point of view of those who assume that the cryo-preserved definitely can't ever come back, so cryo is basically an alternate form of burial - or that any multi-decade restriction on funds like this, where the money is completely off limits until whoever is expressing the sentiment is also dead, is inherently wasteful. These would be, in a sense, the antithesis of the Long Now Foundation.) --- brent.allsop at comcast.net wrote: > > The WSJ said: > > ?Such financial arrangements, which tie up money that might otherwise > go to heirs or charities, are "more widespread than I originally > thought," says A. Christopher Sega? > > Why do they always put it like this? > > Queen Latifah can spend all of her money in a completely wasteful > last bash, not leaving any of it to ?heirs or charity? and everyone > cheers: ?You go girl!? > > But if someone lives a thrifty hard working life so he has $10 > million in the end. (while many of his pears respectfully waste all > theirs on yachts, planes, space flights ? or whatever) And wants to > save only half of that remaining $10 million for himself ? oh man ? > what an evil person! > > Brent Allsop > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat > From zarathustra_winced at yahoo.com Tue Jan 24 21:50:47 2006 From: zarathustra_winced at yahoo.com (Keith M. Elis) Date: Tue, 24 Jan 2006 13:50:47 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] WSJ: A Cold Calculus Leads Cryonauts To Put Assets on Ice In-Reply-To: <20060124212445.92653.qmail@web81611.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <20060124215047.55878.qmail@web80729.mail.yahoo.com> The money just sits there? That's just wrong. The money will be entirely invested for the entire time supplying much needed capital to the hundreds of thousands of businesses and individuals who need it, and know what to do with it. By putting it in money market instruments and CDs, corporate bonds, junk bonds, stocks, precious metals, REITs, etc., the money will be doing far more good for the world than his heirs spending it on Britney Spears albums, Aston Martins, and filet mignon, at the same time the government spends their share on god-knows-what. I hope he wakes up a trillionaire. Keith Adrian Tymes wrote: Because the person isn't spreading the wealth to other people. The money just sits there, where no one can get at it. (Of course, this is from the point of view of those who assume that the cryo-preserved definitely can't ever come back, so cryo is basically an alternate form of burial - or that any multi-decade restriction on funds like this, where the money is completely off limits until whoever is expressing the sentiment is also dead, is inherently wasteful. These would be, in a sense, the antithesis of the Long Now Foundation.) --- brent.allsop at comcast.net wrote: > > The WSJ said: > > ?Such financial arrangements, which tie up money that might otherwise > go to heirs or charities, are "more widespread than I originally > thought," says A. Christopher Sega? > > Why do they always put it like this? > > Queen Latifah can spend all of her money in a completely wasteful > last bash, not leaving any of it to ?heirs or charity? and everyone > cheers: ?You go girl!? > > But if someone lives a thrifty hard working life so he has $10 > million in the end. (while many of his pears respectfully waste all > theirs on yachts, planes, space flights ? or whatever) And wants to > save only half of that remaining $10 million for himself ? oh man ? > what an evil person! > > Brent Allsop > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat > _______________________________________________ extropy-chat mailing list extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From wingcat at pacbell.net Tue Jan 24 21:57:05 2006 From: wingcat at pacbell.net (Adrian Tymes) Date: Tue, 24 Jan 2006 13:57:05 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] WSJ: A Cold Calculus Leads Cryonauts To Put Assets on Ice In-Reply-To: <20060124215047.55878.qmail@web80729.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <20060124215705.77571.qmail@web81612.mail.mud.yahoo.com> I should have said: *from the point of view of the speaker*, the money just sits there. Invested != spent, no matter how similar those conditions are at times. --- "Keith M. Elis" wrote: > The money just sits there? That's just wrong. The money will be > entirely invested for the entire time supplying much needed capital > to the hundreds of thousands of businesses and individuals who need > it, and know what to do with it. By putting it in money market > instruments and CDs, corporate bonds, junk bonds, stocks, precious > metals, REITs, etc., the money will be doing far more good for the > world than his heirs spending it on Britney Spears albums, Aston > Martins, and filet mignon, at the same time the government spends > their share on god-knows-what. I hope he wakes up a trillionaire. > > Keith > > Adrian Tymes wrote: > Because the person isn't spreading the wealth to other people. > The money just sits there, where no one can get at it. (Of > course, this is from the point of view of those who assume that > the cryo-preserved definitely can't ever come back, so cryo is > basically an alternate form of burial - or that any multi-decade > restriction on funds like this, where the money is completely > off limits until whoever is expressing the sentiment is also > dead, is inherently wasteful. These would be, in a sense, the > antithesis of the Long Now Foundation.) > > --- brent.allsop at comcast.net wrote: > > > > > The WSJ said: > > > > ?Such financial arrangements, which tie up money that might > otherwise > > go to heirs or charities, are "more widespread than I originally > > thought," says A. Christopher Sega? > > > > Why do they always put it like this? > > > > Queen Latifah can spend all of her money in a completely wasteful > > last bash, not leaving any of it to ?heirs or charity? and everyone > > cheers: ?You go girl!? > > > > But if someone lives a thrifty hard working life so he has $10 > > million in the end. (while many of his pears respectfully waste all > > theirs on yachts, planes, space flights ? or whatever) And wants to > > save only half of that remaining $10 million for himself ? oh man ? > > what an evil person! > > > > Brent Allsop > > > _______________________________________________ > > extropy-chat mailing list > > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat > > > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat > > > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat > From wingcat at pacbell.net Tue Jan 24 22:05:10 2006 From: wingcat at pacbell.net (Adrian Tymes) Date: Tue, 24 Jan 2006 14:05:10 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] next generation of ion engines In-Reply-To: <4lch77$1ofj752@mxip03a.cluster1.charter.net> Message-ID: <20060124220511.73508.qmail@web81605.mail.mud.yahoo.com> I did read their site. In fact, I know some of their people. High-performance ion engines might be useful for station-keeping for their eventual goal, but it's not critical for achieving orbital altitude their way. If one wanted to get to altitude their way and then accelerate to orbital velocity - one still runs into the problem of going Mach 25 through an atmosphere thick enough to provide lift, from wings or balloons or what have you, no matter how slowly one approaches that speed. (In fact, this is part of the reason why rockets tend to get out of the lower atmosphere and then roll to start horizontal acceleration. Dealing with the atmosphere at those speeds is bad enough once per mission, when you're landing.) --- Dennis Roberts wrote: > I guess you haven't read their site. Sure the most altitude they've > reached > is ONLY in the neighborhood of 100k feet. They are hoping to develop > an > ascender to regularly climb to much higher altitudes. Then they want > to > setup a permanent facility where a craft that can reach both orbital > altitude and velocity can be constructed. A ship that will never be > able to > land but doesn't require an initial high velocity to achieve orbit is > what > they aspire to build. It's an AIRSHIP, just floatin' along to start, > but at > a high enough altitude that an ion engine can operate to accelerate > it, > slowly. It will (hopefully) be able to return to its starting point > the same > way- no flaming re-entry needed. > > -----Original Message----- > From: extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org > [mailto:extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Adrian > Tymes > Sent: Saturday, January 14, 2006 4:18 PM > To: ExI chat list > Subject: RE: [extropy-chat] next generation of ion engines > > That will work for getting things to orbital altitude. There's > a big difference between orbital altitude and orbital velocity. > Better ion engines would be of possible use for stationkeeping, > and for the sats they launch - but doesn't really strike me as > something they would get uber-excited about. That said, they're > also well short of the edge of space: their latest mission only > got to about 78 thousand feet, well short of 100 km (about 328 > thousand feet). > > --- Dennis Roberts wrote: > > > You really don't need SpaceShipOne or anything like it. Check out > > http://www.jpaerospace.com/, these folks are probably still dancing > > around > > after ESA's announcement. Low cost access to LEO is comin' to us > all. > > Dennis Roberts > > > > -----Original Message----- > > From: extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org > > [mailto:extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Adrian > > Tymes > > Sent: Saturday, January 14, 2006 2:57 AM > > To: ExI chat list > > Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] next generation of ion engines > > > > --- deimtee wrote: > > > It takes about 10 newtons to lift a kilo against 1 gee. > > > > ...right, forgot to factor in G. > > > > > However, how about if you dropped it off SpaceShipOne at apogee? > > > How much time have you got to give it orbital velocity before > drag > > > exceeds thrust? > > > > >From http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SpaceShipOne_flight_17P we > > know that SSO only took 24 minutes between detaching from White > > Knight through apogee to landing, of which just over 80 seconds > > was spent under thrust. So the apogee-to-landing phase probably > > took about 12 minutes. Most orbital rocket launches I've > > studied seem to take about 10 minutes to get to orbital > > velocity. So, you'd probably need wings or something to gain > > lift while going at hypersonic speeds - and the wings would need > > to be thermally protected (probably made out of solid heat > > shields), because as you get towards Mach 25 you're flying not > > through air but through plasma. Which is not to say it can't be > > done, just that a proper analysis is probably way in excess of > > simple back-of-the-envelope equations. > > > > I wonder, though: what would be the physics of flying through > > plasma? Could you use an M2P2-type magnetic bubble to shield > > the craft from direct contact with the atmosphere, while still > > maintaining enough of an airfoil shape (in the bubble, which > > seems to be the shape that would then matter for lift and drag > > calculations) to gain lift? > > > > > also, > > > I think you are a bit optimistic on the battery too. > > > > > > 100kW * 10 min = 16.666 kWHrs > > > Thats about the same as a 12 volt battery delivering 1400 amps > for > > an > > > hour. > > > > > > I want some of those for my electric car. : ) > > > > Actually, some of the sources were advanced batteries being > > developed for cars. But I did caution that that was the > > optimistic end of the figures I was seeing: quite a few of the > > "most advanced" figures were quite a bit more conservative than > > that. ;) > > _______________________________________________ > > extropy-chat mailing list > > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat > > > > _______________________________________________ > > extropy-chat mailing list > > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat > > > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat > From mbb386 at main.nc.us Tue Jan 24 22:40:55 2006 From: mbb386 at main.nc.us (MB) Date: Tue, 24 Jan 2006 17:40:55 -0500 (EST) Subject: [extropy-chat] WSJ: A Cold Calculus Leads Cryonauts To Put Assets on Ice In-Reply-To: <20060124215047.55878.qmail@web80729.mail.yahoo.com> References: <20060124212445.92653.qmail@web81611.mail.mud.yahoo.com> <20060124215047.55878.qmail@web80729.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <40172.72.236.102.66.1138142455.squirrel@main.nc.us> > The money just sits there? That's just wrong. The money will be entirely > invested for the entire time supplying much needed capital to the hundreds > of thousands of businesses and individuals who need it, and know what to > do with it. By putting it in money market instruments and CDs, corporate > bonds, junk bonds, stocks, precious metals, REITs, etc., the money will be > doing far more good for the world than his heirs spending it on Britney > Spears albums, Aston Martins, and filet mignon, at the same time the > government spends their share on god-knows-what. I hope he wakes up a > trillionaire. > This is exactly my take on it too. I fail to see why people think it is "out of circulation" - geez, it's not like he going to take the actual money and had have it frozen with him! Some folks seem to have no idea what happens when you "save money". Do they really think it's all sitting there in a bag in the bank? Does "investing" mean that it somehow isn't being "spent"? Geez. Regards, MB From sentience at pobox.com Tue Jan 24 23:18:06 2006 From: sentience at pobox.com (Eliezer S. Yudkowsky) Date: Tue, 24 Jan 2006 15:18:06 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] WSJ: A Cold Calculus Leads Cryonauts To Put Assets on Ice In-Reply-To: <40172.72.236.102.66.1138142455.squirrel@main.nc.us> References: <20060124212445.92653.qmail@web81611.mail.mud.yahoo.com> <20060124215047.55878.qmail@web80729.mail.yahoo.com> <40172.72.236.102.66.1138142455.squirrel@main.nc.us> Message-ID: <43D6B5AE.7090904@pobox.com> MB wrote: > > This is exactly my take on it too. I fail to see why people think it is > "out of circulation" - geez, it's not like he going to take the actual > money and had have it frozen with him! And if he did have the money frozen with him as cash, it would reduce the amount of money in circulation. Other paper bills would become more valuable. Only having actual goods frozen with you would damage the economy in any obvious way. As for nonobvious ways... not my specialty. -- Eliezer S. Yudkowsky http://singinst.org/ Research Fellow, Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence From mbb386 at main.nc.us Wed Jan 25 00:01:39 2006 From: mbb386 at main.nc.us (MB) Date: Tue, 24 Jan 2006 19:01:39 -0500 (EST) Subject: [extropy-chat] WSJ: A Cold Calculus Leads Cryonauts To Put Assets on Ice In-Reply-To: <43D6B5AE.7090904@pobox.com> References: <20060124212445.92653.qmail@web81611.mail.mud.yahoo.com> <20060124215047.55878.qmail@web80729.mail.yahoo.com> <40172.72.236.102.66.1138142455.squirrel@main.nc.us> <43D6B5AE.7090904@pobox.com> Message-ID: <40226.72.236.102.109.1138147299.squirrel@main.nc.us> > MB wrote: >> >> This is exactly my take on it too. I fail to see why people think it is >> "out of circulation" - geez, it's not like he going to take the actual >> money and had have it frozen with him! > > And if he did have the money frozen with him as cash, it would reduce > the amount of money in circulation. Other paper bills would become more > valuable. > > Only having actual goods frozen with you would damage the economy in any > obvious way. As for nonobvious ways... not my specialty. > Eliezer, I certainly hadn't thought of it that way! :) Though the actual return probably would not increase as much as investments do... unless in the 'rare coins' market or some such, depending on length of storage! ;) Regards, MB From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Wed Jan 25 01:39:34 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Tue, 24 Jan 2006 20:39:34 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] WSJ: A Cold Calculus Leads Cryonauts To Put Assets on Ice In-Reply-To: <40226.72.236.102.109.1138147299.squirrel@main.nc.us> References: <20060124212445.92653.qmail@web81611.mail.mud.yahoo.com> <20060124215047.55878.qmail@web80729.mail.yahoo.com> <40172.72.236.102.66.1138142455.squirrel@main.nc.us> <43D6B5AE.7090904@pobox.com> <40226.72.236.102.109.1138147299.squirrel@main.nc.us> Message-ID: Actually, I think the debate gets much more complex. I don't think being buried with the cash would have a significant effect due to the fact that the government is printing tons of the stuff (even if they are borrowing it from China). If its being invested it makes a big difference whether you are investing it in a nanotech investment fund (which is *really* investing in nanotechnology and not nanohype) vs. say U.S. automobile manufacturers or in the not so distant future the "old-mentality" phone companies. It also makes a difference whether one confines the investment to U.S. $ or opts for an international currency mix. That in turn tends to relate to how hard (and where) one thinks various aspects of the singularity may hit. The path you choose determines whether you come back a rich person or much more likely (IMO) a relatively poor person (if you haven't kept up with the singularity). It isn't enough to simply index to the economy -- anyone slightly more willing to take risks or come up with a slightly better idea or strategy is going to come out way ahead. Case in point, look at Brin & Page vs. Gates, Ellison & Jobs (new money vs. "old" money). They are way past Steve, combined are more than Larry and stand a good chance of closing in on Bill. It is worth noting that the money managers who earn the "big bucks", including those who manage the endowments for Harvard, Yale, etc. are managing returns of something like 14-18%/yr. I would guess that the average frozen person's assets are probably getting 1/2 to 1/3 of that. Designing a *good* investment strategy for what is coming and taking into accout the various reanimation scenarios is *not* easy and I would argue that most people who would be tasked with doing it (today) are likely to significantly underperform the rate of growth that the singularity may bring. [How many investment strategies detail precisely *when* you turn the money over to a self-evolving, improving AI investment fund manager?] Robert -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From wingcat at pacbell.net Wed Jan 25 02:33:54 2006 From: wingcat at pacbell.net (Adrian Tymes) Date: Tue, 24 Jan 2006 18:33:54 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] WSJ: A Cold Calculus Leads Cryonauts To Put Assets on Ice In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <20060125023354.62777.qmail@web81607.mail.mud.yahoo.com> If you're dead, you can't come up with slightly better ideas, nor can you manage risks - for instance in an extreme case, if something becomes a (to the living) blindingly obviously bad thing to be invested in. The problem with being dead is, you can't react to anything. Even really simple stuff that we living folk take for granted that we can avoid. --- Robert Bradbury wrote: > Actually, I think the debate gets much more complex. I don't think > being > buried with the cash would have a significant effect due to the fact > that > the government is printing tons of the stuff (even if they are > borrowing it > from China). > > If its being invested it makes a big difference whether you are > investing it > in a nanotech investment fund (which is *really* investing in > nanotechnology > and not nanohype) vs. say U.S. automobile manufacturers or in the not > so > distant future the "old-mentality" phone companies. It also makes a > difference whether one confines the investment to U.S. $ or opts for > an > international currency mix. That in turn tends to relate to how hard > (and > where) one thinks various aspects of the singularity may hit. > > The path you choose determines whether you come back a rich person or > much > more likely (IMO) a relatively poor person (if you haven't kept up > with the > singularity). It isn't enough to simply index to the economy -- > anyone > slightly more willing to take risks or come up with a slightly better > idea > or strategy is going to come out way ahead. Case in point, look at > Brin & > Page vs. Gates, Ellison & Jobs (new money vs. "old" money). They are > way > past Steve, combined are more than Larry and stand a good chance of > closing > in on Bill. > > It is worth noting that the money managers who earn the "big bucks", > including those who manage the endowments for Harvard, Yale, etc. are > managing returns of something like 14-18%/yr. I would guess that the > average frozen person's assets are probably getting 1/2 to 1/3 of > that. > > Designing a *good* investment strategy for what is coming and taking > into > accout the various reanimation scenarios is *not* easy and I would > argue > that most people who would be tasked with doing it (today) are likely > to > significantly underperform the rate of growth that the singularity > may > bring. [How many investment strategies detail precisely *when* you > turn the > money over to a self-evolving, improving AI investment fund manager?] > > Robert > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat > From naogrist at yahoo.com Wed Jan 25 04:04:05 2006 From: naogrist at yahoo.com (Daniel Wolfson) Date: Tue, 24 Jan 2006 20:04:05 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] WSJ: A Cold Calculus Leads Cryonauts To Put Assets on Ice In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <20060125040405.84758.qmail@web35406.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Hi everyone, Does anyone know if there are any legal problems that could occur and how to avoid them? I mean the law doesn't recognize that death is a reversible process, and I think some heirs would want all the inheritance. Would the trust hold up in a court where a corpsicle hasno civil liberties because, in a legal sense, it is only a dead body? This is my first post. Dan Wolfson Amara Graps wrote: The Wall Street Journal has an interesting article about a trust fund, collected by oneself, after one is reanimated from cryonics suspension. http://online.wsj.com/public/article/SB113780314900652582-3NZCCoZBW7UHDmouEOrkzkalkfY_20060129.html?mod=blogs A Cold Calculus Leads Cryonauts To Put Assets on Ice With Bodies Frozen, They Hope to Return Richer; Dr. Thorp Is Buying Long By ANTONIO REGALADO Staff Reporter of THE WALL STREET JOURNAL January 21, 2006; Page A1 You can't take it with you. So Arizona resort operator David Pizer has a plan to come back and get it. Like some 1,000 other members of the "cryonics" movement, Mr. Pizer has made arrangements to have his body frozen in liquid nitrogen as soon as possible after he dies. In this way, Mr. Pizer, a heavy-set, philosophical man who is 64 years old, hopes to be revived sometime in the future when medicine has advanced far beyond where it stands today. And because Mr. Pizer doesn't wish to return a pauper, he's taken an additional step: He's left his money to himself. (see the article for the rest) Amara -- ******************************************************************** Amara Graps, PhD email: amara at amara.com Computational Physics vita: ftp://ftp.amara.com/pub/resume.txt Multiplex Answers URL: http://www.amara.com/ ******************************************************************** "It is intriguing to learn that the simplicity of the world depends upon the temperature of the environment." ---John D. Barrow _______________________________________________ extropy-chat mailing list extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat --------------------------------- What are the most popular cars? Find out at Yahoo! Autos -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From zarathustra_winced at yahoo.com Wed Jan 25 04:30:20 2006 From: zarathustra_winced at yahoo.com (Keith M. Elis) Date: Tue, 24 Jan 2006 20:30:20 -0800 (PST) Subject: Perpetuities (was Re: [extropy-chat] WSJ: A Cold Calculus Leads Cryonauts To Put Assetson Ice) Message-ID: <20060125043020.43043.qmail@web80731.mail.yahoo.com> The heirs (in the US) have a case: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rule_against_perpetuities "About half of the states in the United States follow the Uniform Statutory Rule Against Perpetuities, which gives a grantor 90 years for the interest to vest. If the interest does not vest to some life in being within 90 years, the grant will be reformed judicially so it does vest." The common law rule is more generous. Regardless, I would be pretty surprised to see the first-ever 'revival trust' (I wonder if I just coined that...) interpreted by the courts to allow an indefinite perpetuity. Anyway, it would be a very interesting case. The evidentiary record alone would be valuable as a showcase for the best scientific evidence for and against the possibility of post-cryonic reanimation. Keith From spike66 at comcast.net Wed Jan 25 04:50:59 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Tue, 24 Jan 2006 20:50:59 -0800 Subject: Perpetuities (was Re: [extropy-chat] WSJ: A Cold Calculus LeadsCryonauts To Put Assetson Ice) In-Reply-To: <20060125043020.43043.qmail@web80731.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <200601250451.k0P4pFe29935@tick.javien.com> > bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Keith M. Elis > Subject: Perpetuities (was Re: [extropy-chat] WSJ: A Cold Calculus > LeadsCryonauts To Put Assetson Ice) > > The heirs (in the US) have a case: > > http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rule_against_perpetuities > > "About half of the states in the United States follow the Uniform > Statutory Rule Against Perpetuities, which gives a grantor 90 years for > the interest to vest. If the interest does not vest to some life in > being within 90 years, the grant will be reformed judicially so it does > vest." Keith There is high risk that government revolution or other circumstances would make one's paper holdings worthless while one is in the old nitrogen bath. Last time around with this topic, we discussed storing wealth in the form of precious metals, buried in a secret location with GPS coordinates somehow bonded to a tooth. One could imagine that the best bet to hide one's gold would be on BLM land, such as that large tract out west of Roseburg Oregon. If such practice as burying gold or platinum became common, perhaps it could cause cryonics to be discouraged or even outlawed. spike From zarathustra_winced at yahoo.com Wed Jan 25 05:31:24 2006 From: zarathustra_winced at yahoo.com (Keith M. Elis) Date: Tue, 24 Jan 2006 21:31:24 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] WSJ: A Cold Calculus Leads Cryonauts To Put Assetson Ice Message-ID: <20060125053124.66338.qmail@web80727.mail.yahoo.com> Robert Bradbury: > If its being invested it makes a big difference whether you are > investing it in a nanotech investment fund (which is *really* > investing in nanotechnology and not nanohype) vs. say U.S. > automobile manufacturers or in the not so distant future the > "old-mentality" phone companies. > > It also makes a difference whether one confines the investment > to U.S. $ or opts for an international currency mix. That in > turn tends to relate to how hard (and where) one thinks various > aspects of the singularity may hit. The money will no doubt be well-diversified and properly managed based on the information available at the time. Even if his average net ROR was a fairly moderate 8% per year over 100 years, a million dollars would be worth upwards of 2.1 billion. Another 80 years at that rate and he's a trillionaire. (This assumes he puts it all in a tax-shelter). > The path you choose determines whether you come back a rich > person or much more likely (IMO) a relatively poor person (if > you haven't kept up with the singularity). It's the singularity that this cryonics customer is betting on (whether he knows it or not). This isn't simply an elaborate way to achieve 8% net for 100 years. He's betting that he'll come back, he'll be himself, he'll have his faculties, and he'll be able to adjust without going insane. A singularity is the big payoff for him. It means he gets to come back at all. But more to your point, how do *you* propose to become rich leading up to and during a singularity if not by investing in some kind of profit-making enterprise out there in the economy? > Designing a *good* investment strategy for what is coming and > taking into accout the various reanimation scenarios is *not* > easy and I would argue that most people who would be tasked > with doing it (today) are likely to significantly underperform > the rate of growth that the singularity may bring. [How many > investment strategies detail precisely *when* you turn the > money over to a self-evolving, improving AI investment fund > manager?] You see, you bring up this term 'underperform' but it's meaningless without a benchmark. Which benchmark do you want to use? Since the dawn of the markets, it has always made sense to index the largest companies in the market to get an idea of how the economy overall is behaving. You don't want to use existing indices, so what other benchmark do you propose? Keith From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Wed Jan 25 05:38:27 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Wed, 25 Jan 2006 00:38:27 -0500 Subject: Perpetuities (was Re: [extropy-chat] WSJ: A Cold Calculus LeadsCryonauts To Put Assetson Ice) In-Reply-To: <200601250451.k0P4pFe29935@tick.javien.com> References: <20060125043020.43043.qmail@web80731.mail.yahoo.com> <200601250451.k0P4pFe29935@tick.javien.com> Message-ID: On 1/24/06, spike wrote: > There is high risk that government revolution or other > circumstances would make one's paper holdings > worthless while one is in the old nitrogen bath. Last > time around with this topic, we discussed storing > wealth in the form of precious metals, buried in a > secret location with GPS coordinates somehow bonded to a > tooth. One could imagine that the best bet to hide one's > gold would be on BLM land, such as that large tract out > west of Roseburg Oregon. If such practice as burying > gold or platinum became common, perhaps it could cause > cryonics to be discouraged or even outlawed. Its far far worse than that. Given nanotechnology (which is the most probable path to reanimation) both gold & platinum will probably become relatively cheap -- do the the numbers on the cost of pulling the ions out of sea water or hauling back asteroids full of them. Alternatively with really cheap energy one can simply use breeder reactors or cyclotrons to produce tons of your favorite isotopes (Au, Pt, Gd148, etc.). The really valuable stuff is going to be the stuff which is really expensive to produce in a nanotechnology based economy and is in high demand. And even after all of the time I've thought about this (~5 years) I still don't have a clue as to what that might be. It would probably take several years of playing around with nuclear reaction equations and fusion reactor designs to propose some interesting possibilities. Even then I don't think the guesses would hold for long with the really cheap intelligence that is going to be available to compute alternative production methods. Off the top of my head I might guess hafnium or tungsten. Robert -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From m_j_geddes at yahoo.com.au Wed Jan 25 05:39:18 2006 From: m_j_geddes at yahoo.com.au (Marc Geddes) Date: Wed, 25 Jan 2006 16:39:18 +1100 (EST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Being alive timing [was: Stardust@Home] Message-ID: <20060125053918.85343.qmail@web50503.mail.yahoo.com> >A quick glance at The World Fact Book (for the World statistics) and use of the google calculator (too bad I can't use my web browser to go to the bathroom... yet...) reveals that the average person in the world is living on ~$18/day. Even assuming a long tail end of the curve for the less developed countries I don't think it is quite as bad a picture as Marc would paint. Wow, $18 a day. What a life huh? Champagne wishes and cavier dreams? NOT. And the average is a lot higher than the median. The average is pushed up by the 1% of really rich. >Of course I suppose you would prefer to have us freezing in caves and going out in the hope that we could risk our lives bringing down a wooly mammoth and bring something home for diner... Well of course relative to the past some of us are very lucky. But bear in mind between 5-10% of all the people who have ever lived are living today. So we're not as lucky as you might think. And we're losing extropian friends all the time. Not a month goes past without some messgae about some pioneer or another who 'sadly didn't make it singularity' or 'oh how sad the singularity didn't come fast enough for him' and so on and so forth (like for instance Roy Walford or Christopher reed). Kinda depressing no? >Not today, but we are getting *very* close at least as far as computing power goes. The soon to be released Playstation 3 has a cell processor with ~200 GFLOPS and a graphics chip rumored to have 1.3 TFLOPS with built in networking. Link a few hundred of those together and you have human brain equivalence. And those chips are being built at the 90nm scale not the current state-of-the art 65nm scale or the forthcoming 45nm scale. Things are going to get very interesting around 2010-2014 when human brain equivalence (using a petaflop as the ballpark which is a Bradbury (~Moravec) threshold rather than a Kurzweil threshold) starts being available in ~10 "personal" machines, then 2, then 1 machine. And this is all without either reversible computing (to resolve heat generation problems) and reconfigurable hardware (so one can dedicate *all* of the petaflop to a specific task). Interesting points. I've seen a lot of people talking about getting their hands on those Playstations and connecting them to make a cheapo super-computer. I had the same idea myself... But it's important that future historians realize why we're not immediately creating AGI and doing all these other things. You know when I was at Uni I often heard people wondering why Kepler didn't immediately work out the laws of planetary motion from Tycho Brahe's data. When you study the history of science you realize why. The world circa middle ages wasn't awash with cheap calculators. Kepler had to work out all the calculations by hand. You may hear some silly student in the future wondering 'why didn't Geddes immediately work out the TOE after realizing that time was 3-dimensional?' or 'What took Yudkowsky so long?'. Well, the answer of course, is that it's not like the future where one could instantly snap one's fingers and call up multiple networked super-computers the size of grains of sand and the equivalent of $US 5 million in free venture capital. >While AGI will help uplift humans, a TOE probably does very little. A point that Marc misses is that neither of these is particularly helpful to people *today*. Well, of course my definition of a TOE does not conform to the physicists definition. I think a TOE would be revolutionary. And you may also be aware of my strong suspicion that you can't create AGI without at least some rudimentary awareness of the TOE... >What *is* helpful is wireless (from cell phones to WiFi) communications and low cost web enabled devices from PDAs to the low cost laptop initiatives. Those will give universal access to the WWW -- think of all the young minds in less developed countries having access to everything from Wikipedia to courses from MIT & Harvard at extremely low cost. Good points. >While there are many more humans living in poor situations and dying today than there were a million, or even a hundred, years ago I think their chances for survival and potential for growing and developing to who knows what levels are much greater. So I tend to lean towards Spike's perspective. Robert Well, I suppose some of us are very lucky really. I'm just trying to point out why there's a major disconnect between extropianism and the average person. For those lucky enough to be working in something related to transhumanism all well and good, but in my case there's an an almost *total* disconnect between my ordinary life and the ideas of transhumanism. And many of the transhumanist lists can seem elitist and cold. far the worst example I've ever seen is the SL4 list, where nearly everyone there seems to believe they're the messiah, but all the transhumanists lists suffer from it to some degree. "Till shade is gone, till water is gone, into the shadow with teeth bared, screaming defiance with the last breath, to spit in Sightblinder?s eye on the last day? ____________________________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? The New Yahoo! Movies: Check out the Latest Trailers, Premiere Photos and full Actor Database. http://au.movies.yahoo.com From spike66 at comcast.net Wed Jan 25 05:58:04 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Tue, 24 Jan 2006 21:58:04 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Being alive timing [was: Stardust@Home] In-Reply-To: <20060125053918.85343.qmail@web50503.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <200601250558.k0P5wCe03560@tick.javien.com> > >A quick glance at The World Fact Book (for the World > statistics) and use of the google calculator ... > reveals that the average person in the world > is living on ~$18/day... But how can we know? In many African nations, there is an income tax in the 30% range that kicks in at an annual income of 400 dollars. We can be sure that if there is any way to hide income, they will. There can be plenty of trade that goes on which is not subject to either sales tax or income tax, because it is intentionally invisible. In places where governments take poor people's money, there are plenty of poor people. spike From spike66 at comcast.net Wed Jan 25 06:06:31 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Tue, 24 Jan 2006 22:06:31 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] google toons In-Reply-To: <20060125053918.85343.qmail@web50503.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <200601250606.k0P66ne04559@tick.javien.com> One hears an unknown song that one likes, listens for a few bars of the lyrics such as yakkity yak and bla bla. One goes into google and enters: song lyrics yakkity yak and bla bla. The song comes up. OK what if one is a musician and hears a tune that doesn't have lyrics (most of my favorite songs do not). But one can play a few bars on one's instrument. How could we make a google-like search engine that would allow us to store tunes on the internet and find them? Ideas? spike From thespike at satx.rr.com Wed Jan 25 06:12:46 2006 From: thespike at satx.rr.com (Damien Broderick) Date: Wed, 25 Jan 2006 00:12:46 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] black vinyl of the spheres Message-ID: <6.2.1.2.0.20060125001139.01d4aa20@pop-server.satx.rr.com> I kinda like their corny old analogy... http://www.space.com/scienceastronomy/060124_spacetime_dent.html From neuronexmachina at gmail.com Wed Jan 25 06:22:53 2006 From: neuronexmachina at gmail.com (Neil H.) Date: Tue, 24 Jan 2006 22:22:53 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] google toons In-Reply-To: <200601250606.k0P66ne04559@tick.javien.com> References: <20060125053918.85343.qmail@web50503.mail.yahoo.com> <200601250606.k0P66ne04559@tick.javien.com> Message-ID: On 1/24/06, spike wrote: > > > One hears an unknown song that one likes, listens for a > few bars of the lyrics such as yakkity yak and bla bla. One > goes into google and enters: song lyrics yakkity yak and > bla bla. The song comes up. > > OK what if one is a musician and hears a tune that > doesn't have lyrics (most of my favorite songs do > not). But one can play a few bars on one's > instrument. How could we make a google-like search > engine that would allow us to store tunes on the > internet and find them? Ideas? http://www.songtapper.com/s/tappingmain.bin "Let's say you have a song stuck in your head, and you don't know the name of it. Never fear! Load up our search screen, and try tapping the *rhythm* of the song on your space bar while humming the tune. Tap the space bar for each *syllable* that you sing. It's that simple" http://querybyhum.cs.nyu.edu/ "A Query by Humming system allows the user to find a song by humming part of the tune. No musical training is needed. The idea is simple: you hum into the microphone, the computer records the hum and extracts certain features corresponding to the melody and rhythm characteristics, and it then compares the features to the features of the songs in the database. Finally it returns a ranked list of the songs or song segments most similar to the humming." Other systems: http://querybyhum.cs.nyu.edu/index.php?p=others -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From pharos at gmail.com Wed Jan 25 09:14:39 2006 From: pharos at gmail.com (BillK) Date: Wed, 25 Jan 2006 09:14:39 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] WSJ: A Cold Calculus Leads Cryonauts To Put Assets on Ice In-Reply-To: References: <20060124212445.92653.qmail@web81611.mail.mud.yahoo.com> <20060124215047.55878.qmail@web80729.mail.yahoo.com> <40172.72.236.102.66.1138142455.squirrel@main.nc.us> <43D6B5AE.7090904@pobox.com> <40226.72.236.102.109.1138147299.squirrel@main.nc.us> Message-ID: On 1/25/06, Robert Bradbury wrote: > It is worth noting that the money managers who earn the "big bucks", > including those who manage the endowments for Harvard, Yale, etc. are > managing returns of something like 14-18%/yr. I would guess that the > average frozen person's assets are probably getting 1/2 to 1/3 of that. > > Designing a *good* investment strategy for what is coming and taking into > accout the various reanimation scenarios is *not* easy and I would argue > that most people who would be tasked with doing it (today) are likely to > significantly underperform the rate of growth that the singularity may > bring. [How many investment strategies detail precisely *when* you turn the > money over to a self-evolving, improving AI investment fund manager?] > You are perpetuating the myth that investment managers have a skill that is worth the fees they skim off your investments. Many surveys have shown that picking stocks at random does just as well as the average of mutual funds, better than some, worse than others. Of course the ideal is to pick the best performing fund every year, but you need hindsight for that. One sample: Quote: Fooled by Randomness is loaded with crackling little insights, but the best one is that what looks like skill is often plain old luck, so beware of investment geniuses. They will get their comeuppance, just as Solon warned. Solon was an upright ancient Greek legislator, known for speaking his mind. When King Croesus of Lydia, the richest man of his day, bragged to Solon about his wealth, Solon admonished, "The uncertain future is yet to come, with all the variety of future." And it did. Cyrus defeated Croesus and nearly burned him at the stake. "When people buy stocks," wrote Meir Statman, a finance professor at Santa Clara University and one of the leading experts on markets, "they think they are playing a game of skill. When the stock goes down rather than up, they think they have lost their knack. But they should take heart. All they have lost is luck. And next time, when the stock goes up, they should remember that was luck, too." End quote. CEOs of companies use a similar technique. If the company has a good year, they claim it must have been due to their wise management and they deserve their 5 million in compensation. If the company has a bad year they claim that it was due to circumstances beyond their control and take their money anyway. BillK From dirk.bruere at gmail.com Wed Jan 25 10:27:14 2006 From: dirk.bruere at gmail.com (Dirk Bruere) Date: Wed, 25 Jan 2006 10:27:14 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Being alive timing [was: Stardust@Home] In-Reply-To: <200601250558.k0P5wCe03560@tick.javien.com> References: <20060125053918.85343.qmail@web50503.mail.yahoo.com> <200601250558.k0P5wCe03560@tick.javien.com> Message-ID: On 1/25/06, spike wrote: > > > >A quick glance at The World Fact Book (for the World > > statistics) and use of the google calculator ... > > reveals that the average person in the world > > is living on ~$18/day... > > > But how can we know? In many African nations, there is > an income tax in the 30% range that kicks in at an > annual income of 400 dollars. We can be sure that if > there is any way to hide income, they will. There > can be plenty of trade that goes on which is not subject > to either sales tax or income tax, because it is intentionally > invisible. In places where governments take poor people's > money, there are plenty of poor people. > $18 a day is a meaningless figure. It needs to be corrected for Purchasing Power Parity. $18 goes a *lot* further in Chad than in Japan. Dirk -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From isthatyoujack at icqmail.com Wed Jan 25 10:33:35 2006 From: isthatyoujack at icqmail.com (Jack Parkinson) Date: Wed, 25 Jan 2006 18:33:35 +0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] WSJ: A Cold Calculus Leads Cryonauts To Put Assetson Ice References: <20060124212445.92653.qmail@web81611.mail.mud.yahoo.com><20060124215047.55878.qmail@web80729.mail.yahoo.com><40172.72.236.102.66.1138142455.squirrel@main.nc.us><43D6B5AE.7090904@pobox.com><40226.72.236.102.109.1138147299.squirrel@main.nc.us> Message-ID: <000801c6219a$cf3e3ac0$17800d0a@JPAcer> ----- Original Message ----- From: "BillK" To: "ExI chat list" Sent: Wednesday, January 25, 2006 5:14 PM Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] WSJ: A Cold Calculus Leads Cryonauts To Put Assetson Ice > On 1/25/06, Robert Bradbury wrote: >> It is worth noting that the money managers who earn the "big bucks", >> including those who manage the endowments for Harvard, Yale, etc. are >> managing returns of something like 14-18%/yr. I would guess that the >> average frozen person's assets are probably getting 1/2 to 1/3 of that. >> >> Designing a *good* investment strategy for what is coming and taking into >> accout the various reanimation scenarios is *not* easy and I would argue >> that most people who would be tasked with doing it (today) are likely to >> significantly underperform the rate of growth that the singularity may >> bring. [How many investment strategies detail precisely *when* you turn >> the >> money over to a self-evolving, improving AI investment fund manager?] >> > > You are perpetuating the myth that investment managers have a skill > that is worth the fees they skim off your investments. > > Many surveys have shown that picking stocks at random does just as > well as the average of mutual funds, better than some, worse than > others. > > Of course the ideal is to pick the best performing fund every year, > but you need hindsight for that. > > One sample: > > Quote: > Fooled by Randomness is loaded with crackling little insights, but the > best one is that what looks like skill is often plain old luck, so > beware of investment geniuses. They will get their comeuppance, just > as Solon warned. Solon was an upright ancient Greek legislator, known > for speaking his mind. When King Croesus of Lydia, the richest man of > his day, bragged to Solon about his wealth, Solon admonished, "The > uncertain future is yet to come, with all the variety of future." And > it did. Cyrus defeated Croesus and nearly burned him at the stake. > > "When people buy stocks," wrote Meir Statman, a finance professor at > Santa Clara University and one of the leading experts on markets, > "they think they are playing a game of skill. When the stock goes down > rather than up, they think they have lost their knack. But they should > take heart. All they have lost is luck. And next time, when the stock > goes up, they should remember that was luck, too." > > End quote. > > > CEOs of companies use a similar technique. If the company has a good > year, they claim it must have been due to their wise management and > they deserve their 5 million in compensation. If the company has a bad > year they claim that it was due to circumstances beyond their control > and take their money anyway. > > BillK Precisely! By the same token, the rich can glory in their own prescience, and their acute grasp of business principles - and big corporations can impressively graph their efficiencies and perpetuate the myth that they are in every way better and more fitting to lead than their competitors. Incidentally (but comfortably) - If we subscribe to this view - we can righteously condemn the poor and pour scorn on the small business that did not make it to big business. They were losers! It's their fault for failing to compete! So of course they deserve what they get (or fail to get) As Adam Smith remarked on (same article - url above) "the overweening conceit which the greater part of men have of their own abilities [and] their absurd presumption in their own good fortune." Nothing new there - we still worship the people who got the lucky break. And they still sternly assure us there was nothing lucky about it... Jack Parkinson From sjatkins at mac.com Wed Jan 25 10:38:12 2006 From: sjatkins at mac.com (Samantha Atkins) Date: Wed, 25 Jan 2006 02:38:12 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] WSJ: A Cold Calculus Leads Cryonauts To Put Assets on Ice In-Reply-To: <20060125040405.84758.qmail@web35406.mail.mud.yahoo.com> References: <20060125040405.84758.qmail@web35406.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <3EAEB863-9C6F-4B0F-B3CA-193323E3861D@mac.com> I can set up a trust or foundation or other instrument that survives my "death" now and follows my wishes in perpetuity including retaining the best investment advice available to keep the financial entity alive and thriving and on track. I don't see why there is a large problem here. As long as this financial entity has some agreed way to recognize the resuscitated beneficiary and is obligated in its charter to do so I think such would be workable. - samantha On Jan 24, 2006, at 8:04 PM, Daniel Wolfson wrote: > Hi everyone, > Does anyone know if there are any legal problems that could > occur and how to avoid them? I mean the law doesn't recognize that > death is a reversible process, and I think some heirs would want > all the inheritance. Would the trust hold up in a court where a > corpsicle hasno civil liberties because, in a legal sense, it is > only a dead body? This is my first post. > > Dan Wolfson > > Amara Graps wrote: > The Wall Street Journal has an interesting article about a trust fund, > collected by oneself, after one is reanimated from cryonics > suspension. > > http://online.wsj.com/public/article/ > SB113780314900652582-3NZCCoZBW7UHDmouEOrkzkalkfY_20060129.html? > mod=blogs > > A Cold Calculus Leads Cryonauts To Put Assets on Ice > With Bodies Frozen, They Hope to Retu! rn Richer; > Dr. Thorp Is Buying Long > By ANTONIO REGALADO > Staff Reporter of THE WALL STREET JOURNAL > January 21, 2006; Page A1 > > You can't take it with you. So Arizona resort operator David Pizer has > a plan to come back and get it. > > Like some 1,000 other members of the "cryonics" movement, Mr. Pizer > has made arrangements to have his body frozen in liquid nitrogen as > soon as possible after he dies. In this way, Mr. Pizer, a heavy-set, > philosophical man who is 64 years old, hopes to be revived sometime in > the future when medicine has advanced far beyond where it stands > today. > > And because Mr. Pizer doesn't wish to return a pauper, he's taken an > additional step: He's left his money to himself. > > (see the article for the rest) > > Amara > > -- > > ******************************************************************** > Amara Graps, PhD email: amara at amara.com > Computational Physics vita: ftp://ftp.amara.com/pub/resume.txt > Multiplex Answers URL: http://www.amara.com/ > ******************************************************************** > "It is intriguing to learn that the simplicity of the world depends > upon the temperature of the environment." ---John D. Barrow > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat > > > > What are the most popular cars? Find out at Yahoo! Autos > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From sjatkins at mac.com Wed Jan 25 10:42:24 2006 From: sjatkins at mac.com (Samantha Atkins) Date: Wed, 25 Jan 2006 02:42:24 -0800 Subject: Perpetuities (was Re: [extropy-chat] WSJ: A Cold Calculus Leads Cryonauts To Put Assetson Ice) In-Reply-To: <20060125043020.43043.qmail@web80731.mail.yahoo.com> References: <20060125043020.43043.qmail@web80731.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <81AAF239-4682-45C8-BA7D-B113CD7A0B55@mac.com> Wills and trusts do not have to give anything at all to heirs. I think this is a question of definitions. Surely there are some instruments that can be set up to fulfill the originator's wishes indefinitely even after her demise or suspension. - s On Jan 24, 2006, at 8:30 PM, Keith M. Elis wrote: > The heirs (in the US) have a case: > > http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rule_against_perpetuities > > "About half of the states in the United States follow the Uniform > Statutory Rule Against Perpetuities, which gives a grantor 90 years > for > the interest to vest. If the interest does not vest to some life in > being within 90 years, the grant will be reformed judicially so it > does > vest." > > The common law rule is more generous. > > Regardless, I would be pretty surprised to see the first-ever 'revival > trust' (I wonder if I just coined that...) interpreted by the > courts to > allow an indefinite perpetuity. Anyway, it would be a very interesting > case. The evidentiary record alone would be valuable as a showcase for > the best scientific evidence for and against the possibility of > post-cryonic reanimation. > > Keith > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat From sjatkins at mac.com Wed Jan 25 10:49:08 2006 From: sjatkins at mac.com (Samantha Atkins) Date: Wed, 25 Jan 2006 02:49:08 -0800 Subject: Perpetuities (was Re: [extropy-chat] WSJ: A Cold Calculus LeadsCryonauts To Put Assetson Ice) In-Reply-To: <200601250451.k0P4pFe29935@tick.javien.com> References: <200601250451.k0P4pFe29935@tick.javien.com> Message-ID: <4D0861A9-7FF6-49A5-8E22-F4B58CC5B41D@mac.com> On Jan 24, 2006, at 8:50 PM, spike wrote: > > There is high risk that government revolution or other > circumstances would make one's paper holdings > worthless while one is in the old nitrogen bath. Last > time around with this topic, we discussed storing > wealth in the form of precious metals, buried in a > secret location with GPS coordinates somehow bonded to a > tooth. One could imagine that the best bet to hide one's > gold would be on BLM land, such as that large tract out > west of Roseburg Oregon. If such practice as burying > gold or platinum became common, perhaps it could cause > cryonics to be discouraged or even outlawed. > huh? There aren't that many interested and probably never will be. There aren't many interested in savings in any form. I hardly think this is any real problem. Besides gold and platinum are useless across a singularity. With even pre-AI and pre-nanotech technology improvements it should be possible soon to get all the precious metal you could dream of out of near-earth asteroids. Such metals will not be scarce for too long into the future and thus such caches will likely be valueless. - samantha From isthatyoujack at icqmail.com Wed Jan 25 11:46:21 2006 From: isthatyoujack at icqmail.com (Jack Parkinson) Date: Wed, 25 Jan 2006 19:46:21 +0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Being alive timing [was: Stardust@Home] References: <20060125053918.85343.qmail@web50503.mail.yahoo.com><200601250558.k0P5wCe03560@tick.javien.com> Message-ID: <003501c621a4$f7d4cf30$17800d0a@JPAcer> ----- Original Message ----- From: Dirk Bruere $18 a day is a meaningless figure. It needs to be corrected for Purchasing Power Parity. $18 goes a *lot* further in Chad than in Japan. Dirk The observation above is correct. $18 daily is meaningless in itself. It is (for instance) around double the rate an average university graduate in China might expect to earn if employed (in China) by a US multi-national operation. It is also more than an average doctor or lawyer in China would get in their first few years of practice. In addition, $18 would be a reasonable weeks income for many Chinese farming families (excellent for some) and a good weeks income for building workers and other unskilled labor. But then again, living standards are also significantly lower. The graduates working for the US multinationals are typically housed in small apartments in high-rise blocks - or live offsite with their parents until married. Minimal facilities are offered, 1 hot tap, two gas rings, shared kitchens and toilets. Clothes are hand-washed and dried on the balcony, and there are no lifts in buildings under 8 floors. Often there is no heating or cooling and very basic wooden furniture. The laborers will be expected to 'camp' on the job, sleeping in half-built/half demolished buildings or temporary shacks on site that they build themselves from whatever rubbish is handy. Bosses will provide basic rations, (rice/vegetables) but toilets are the nearest quiet place and showers the nearest tap. Relative purchasing power is a good indicator - but it is unreasonable to believe that western style comforts are available to substantial numbers of people in developing countries on whatever dollar income they might receive. Jack Parkinson From dirk.bruere at gmail.com Wed Jan 25 12:06:27 2006 From: dirk.bruere at gmail.com (Dirk Bruere) Date: Wed, 25 Jan 2006 12:06:27 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Being alive timing [was: Stardust@Home] In-Reply-To: <003501c621a4$f7d4cf30$17800d0a@JPAcer> References: <20060125053918.85343.qmail@web50503.mail.yahoo.com> <200601250558.k0P5wCe03560@tick.javien.com> <003501c621a4$f7d4cf30$17800d0a@JPAcer> Message-ID: On 1/25/06, Jack Parkinson wrote: > > > ----- Original Message ----- > From: Dirk Bruere > > $18 a day is a meaningless figure. > It needs to be corrected for Purchasing Power Parity. > $18 goes a *lot* further in Chad than in Japan. > > Dirk > > The observation above is correct. $18 daily is meaningless in itself. It > is > (for instance) around double the rate an average university graduate in > China might expect to earn if employed (in China) by a US multi-national > operation. It is also more than an average doctor or lawyer in China > would > get in their first few years of practice. In addition, $18 would be a > reasonable weeks income for many Chinese farming families (excellent for > some) and a good weeks income for building workers and other unskilled > labor. > > But then again, living standards are also significantly lower. The > graduates > working for the US multinationals are typically housed in small apartments > in high-rise blocks - or live offsite with their parents until married. Compared to living in Tokyo, that sounds like luxury... Minimal facilities are offered, 1 hot tap, two gas rings, shared kitchens > and toilets. Clothes are hand-washed and dried on the balcony, and there > are > no lifts in buildings under 8 floors. Often there is no heating or cooling I've lived like that in Britain. Dirk -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From paul_illich at yahoo.com Wed Jan 25 12:19:27 2006 From: paul_illich at yahoo.com (paul illich) Date: Wed, 25 Jan 2006 04:19:27 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Re: black vinyl of the spheres In-Reply-To: <200601251039.k0PAdce31892@tick.javien.com> Message-ID: <20060125121927.38731.qmail@web52708.mail.yahoo.com> Damien wrote: > I kinda like their corny old analogy... > http://www.space.com/scienceastronomy/060124_spacetime_dent.html The relevant bit - "Twisted spacetime will cause gas falling into a black hole to move in certain ways. The phenomenon can be roughly compared to the movement of a needle on a record player: as the needle moves along an etched groove on a record, it produces a sound, the exact nature of which is determined by physical deformations in the groove itself." This reminded me of two pop culture analogies. The SF writer Ian Watson did a short story (similar to Asimov's Nightfall) in which a culture that experienced a periodic extinction event turn out to live on a platter in space... and The Sheffield, UK, band Human League did a classic synth-nerd 7" back in the early eighties, called Black Hit of Space. Stoopid but fun: Been out all night, I needed a bite I thought I'd put a record on I reached for the one with the ultra-modern label And wondered where the light had gone It had a futuristic cover Lifted straight from Buck Rogers The record was so black it had to be a con The autochanger switched as I filled my sandwich And futuristic sounds warbled off and on Chorus : The Black Hit Of Space It's the one without a face It's the one that doesn't fit You can only see the flip The Black Hit Of Space Sucking in the human race How can it stay at the top When it's swallowed all the shops? As the song climbed the charts The others disappeared 'Til there was nothing but it left to buy It got to number one Then into minus figures Though nobody could understand why (Chorus) I couldn't stand this bland sound any more so I walked towards my deck to turn it off. All I could see was the B-side of the disc which had assumed a doughnut shape with the label on the outside rim. I reached for the arm which was less than one micron long but weighed more than Saturn and time stood still. I knew I had to escape but every time I tried to flee, the record was in front of me. The Black Hit Of Space Get James Burke on the case It's the hit that's never gone Time stops when you put it... Irrlevent perhaps, but I liked them both. Paul __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com From thespike at satx.rr.com Wed Jan 25 18:05:50 2006 From: thespike at satx.rr.com (Damien Broderick) Date: Wed, 25 Jan 2006 12:05:50 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] the very model of a Singularitarian Message-ID: <6.2.1.2.0.20060125120351.01d20468@pop-server.satx.rr.com> http://www.kurzweilai.net/meme/frame.html?main=/articles/art0626.html I am the very model of a Singularitarian well... okay... not bad... From russell.wallace at gmail.com Wed Jan 25 18:14:40 2006 From: russell.wallace at gmail.com (Russell Wallace) Date: Wed, 25 Jan 2006 18:14:40 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] the very model of a Singularitarian In-Reply-To: <6.2.1.2.0.20060125120351.01d20468@pop-server.satx.rr.com> References: <6.2.1.2.0.20060125120351.01d20468@pop-server.satx.rr.com> Message-ID: <8d71341e0601251014r6b80f532nf08f5e8b14daa246@mail.gmail.com> On 1/25/06, Damien Broderick wrote: > > http://www.kurzweilai.net/meme/frame.html?main=/articles/art0626.html > > I am the very model of a Singularitarian > > of > Gilbert & Sullivan's "I Am The Very Model of a Modern Major General," from > the Gilbert & Sullivan opera, "The Pirates of Penzance."> > > well... okay... not bad... > *laughs* I like the lyrics! The page suggests it's available as a free MP3, but doesn't seem to provide the actual download (when I click the link, it appears to be trying to play the song in my web browser, which said browser isn't happy with), is it supposed to be available for download? If so, could anyone post a direct link to the file, or just mail me the MP3 as an attachment? Thanks, - Russell -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From shogyo.mujo at gmail.com Wed Jan 25 19:04:37 2006 From: shogyo.mujo at gmail.com (=?ISO-8859-1?Q?Tom=E1s_Arribas?=) Date: Wed, 25 Jan 2006 20:04:37 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] the very model of a Singularitarian In-Reply-To: <8d71341e0601251014r6b80f532nf08f5e8b14daa246@mail.gmail.com> References: <6.2.1.2.0.20060125120351.01d20468@pop-server.satx.rr.com> <8d71341e0601251014r6b80f532nf08f5e8b14daa246@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: Here you have a direct link to the MP3: http://transhumanism.org/resources/Singularitarian.mp3 On 1/25/06, Russell Wallace wrote: > On 1/25/06, Damien Broderick wrote: > > > http://www.kurzweilai.net/meme/frame.html?main=/articles/art0626.html > > > > I am the very model of a Singularitarian > > > > of > > Gilbert & Sullivan's "I Am The Very Model of a Modern Major General," from > > the Gilbert & Sullivan opera, "The Pirates of Penzance."> > > > > well... okay... not bad... > > > > *laughs* I like the lyrics! > > The page suggests it's available as a free MP3, but doesn't seem to provide > the actual download (when I click the link, it appears to be trying to play > the song in my web browser, which said browser isn't happy with), is it > supposed to be available for download? If so, could anyone post a direct > link to the file, or just mail me the MP3 as an attachment? > > Thanks, > > - Russell > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat > > > -- Emergency e-mail: mobile at forbidden-games.com From russell.wallace at gmail.com Wed Jan 25 19:12:29 2006 From: russell.wallace at gmail.com (Russell Wallace) Date: Wed, 25 Jan 2006 19:12:29 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] the very model of a Singularitarian In-Reply-To: References: <6.2.1.2.0.20060125120351.01d20468@pop-server.satx.rr.com> <8d71341e0601251014r6b80f532nf08f5e8b14daa246@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <8d71341e0601251112m40d9d4dbrc29d697e50d34daf@mail.gmail.com> On 1/25/06, Tom?s Arribas wrote: > > Here you have a direct link to the MP3: > > http://transhumanism.org/resources/Singularitarian.mp3 Thanks! - Russell -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From avantguardian2020 at yahoo.com Wed Jan 25 19:34:01 2006 From: avantguardian2020 at yahoo.com (The Avantguardian) Date: Wed, 25 Jan 2006 11:34:01 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Being alive timing [was: Stardust@Home] In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <20060125193401.16432.qmail@web60524.mail.yahoo.com> --- Dirk Bruere wrote: > On 1/25/06, spike wrote: > > > > > >A quick glance at The World Fact Book (for the > World > > > statistics) and use of the google calculator ... > > > reveals that the average person in the world > > > is living on ~$18/day... > $18 a day is a meaningless figure. > It needs to be corrected for Purchasing Power > Parity. > $18 goes a *lot* further in Chad than in Japan. Not only is $18 a day meaningless for the reasons you discussed, Dirk, but depending on how Spike calculated the "average" it may be highly misleading. If he just took the total wealth in the world and divided by the number of people in the world, he would be calculating the mean. The mean however is not the correct measure of "averageness" for highly skewed distributions like the wealth curve. Since over half of all available wealth is concentrated in the highest 5% of the wealth distribution, the median is more reflective of the wealth of the "average" person than the mean would be. The Sultan of Brunei, for example, has a significant effect on the mean while he is simply cancelled out by a starving Bangladeshi with regards to the median. Thus the mean wealth is much HIGHER for the world than the median wealth. I don't have data for the whole world, but for the U.S. during the 80s-90s, the mean wealth was about four times higher than the median wealth. See the attached tables for details. The tables are from "Recent Trends in the Size Distribution of Household Wealth" by Edward N. Wolff, The Journal of Economic Perspectives, Vol. 12, No. 3. (Summer, 1998), pp. 131-150. The trend is that mean wealth is rising over time while the median wealth is falling. This could be construed as a problem, unless of course one is in the upper 5%. The Avantguardian is Stuart LaForge alt email: stuart"AT"ucla.edu "The most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the source of all true art and science. He to whom this emotion is a stranger, who can no longer wonder and stand rapt in awe, is as good as dead: his eyes are closed. . ." - Albert Einstein, "What I Believe" (1930) __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: wealth.jpg Type: image/pjpeg Size: 19842 bytes Desc: 3682926632-wealth.jpg URL: From nvitamore at austin.rr.com Wed Jan 25 21:26:03 2006 From: nvitamore at austin.rr.com (nvitamore at austin.rr.com) Date: Wed, 25 Jan 2006 16:26:03 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Discovery.com website Message-ID: <380-22006132521263213@M2W026.mail2web.com> http://www.discovery.org/scripts/viewDB/index.php?command=view&program=CSC&i d=1910 Does anyone know who these folks are? The website http://www.discovery.org is stunning, but are they really pro-discovery or are they marketing discovery as a pin-up in front of their conservative views? Thanks, Natasha -------------------------------------------------------------------- mail2web - Check your email from the web at http://mail2web.com/ . From pharos at gmail.com Wed Jan 25 21:37:59 2006 From: pharos at gmail.com (BillK) Date: Wed, 25 Jan 2006 21:37:59 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Discovery.com website In-Reply-To: <380-22006132521263213@M2W026.mail2web.com> References: <380-22006132521263213@M2W026.mail2web.com> Message-ID: On 1/25/06, nvitamore wrote: > Does anyone know who these folks are? The website http://www.discovery.org > is stunning, but are they really pro-discovery or are they marketing > discovery as a pin-up in front of their conservative views? > They are the Intelligent Design crowd, anti-evolution. The New Creationists Seattle's Discovery Institute leads a national movement challenging Darwinism. BillK From james.hughes at trincoll.edu Wed Jan 25 21:40:42 2006 From: james.hughes at trincoll.edu (Hughes, James J.) Date: Wed, 25 Jan 2006 16:40:42 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Discovery.com website Message-ID: > Does anyone know who these folks are? The website > http://www.discovery.org is stunning, Discovery is the chief lobby behind intelligent design, and they provide a fellowship for one of the chief critics of transhumanism, Wesley J. Smith. They are also religiously, socially and economically conservative. Not one of my favorite thinktanks. -------------------------------------------- James Hughes Ph.D. Executive Director World Transhumanist Assoc. Inst. for Ethics & Emerging Tech. http://transhumanism.org http://ieet.org director at transhumanism.org director at ieet.org Editor, Journal of Evolution and Technology http://jetpress.org Mailing Address: Box 128, Willington CT 06279 USA (office) 860-297-2376 From wingcat at pacbell.net Wed Jan 25 21:43:09 2006 From: wingcat at pacbell.net (Adrian Tymes) Date: Wed, 25 Jan 2006 13:43:09 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Discovery.com website In-Reply-To: <380-22006132521263213@M2W026.mail2web.com> Message-ID: <20060125214309.4824.qmail@web81602.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Careful with the subject header! http://www.discovery.org/ is primarily concerned with religion. http://www.discovery.com/ is a mainstream science broadcasting organization (and a good one, IMO). The two are not affiliated (that I know of), and in fact are probably even opposed on several issues of concern to us. --- "nvitamore at austin.rr.com" wrote: > http://www.discovery.org/scripts/viewDB/index.php?command=view&program=CSC&i > d=1910 > > Does anyone know who these folks are? The website > http://www.discovery.org > is stunning, but are they really pro-discovery or are they marketing > discovery as a pin-up in front of their conservative views? > > Thanks, > > Natasha > > -------------------------------------------------------------------- > mail2web - Check your email from the web at > http://mail2web.com/ . > > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat > From HerbM at learnquick.com Wed Jan 25 22:04:43 2006 From: HerbM at learnquick.com (Herb Martin) Date: Wed, 25 Jan 2006 16:04:43 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] Discovery.com website In-Reply-To: <380-22006132521263213@M2W026.mail2web.com> Message-ID: > From: nvitamore at austin.rr.com > > http://www.discovery.org/scripts/viewDB/index.php?command=view&program=CSC&i d=1910 > > Does anyone know who these folks are? The website > http://www.discovery.org > is stunning, but are they really pro-discovery or are they marketing > discovery as a pin-up in front of their conservative views? I would never have described their website as 'stunning', but they certainly do seem to be touting some right wing (perhaps far right) party line of the ignorant on ID and "assisted suicide." They just don't get it that ID is not science and that how one dies is NO ONE else's business, unless one chooses to bring someone in on it (i.e., a physician who is willing to help.) > Natasha The right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness would clearly indicate both doing what one wishes with one's life AND NOT being subjected to torture on the way out. Choosing your own death qualifies for every one of the big three; the liberty to choose one's life, or end it, and to be happy as opposed to tortured. -- Herb Martin From starman2100 at cableone.net Wed Jan 25 22:39:40 2006 From: starman2100 at cableone.net (starman2100 at cableone.net) Date: Wed, 25 Jan 2006 15:39:40 -0700 Subject: [extropy-chat] ABC News & Cryonics Message-ID: <1138228780_10823@S4.cableone.net> An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From nvitamore at austin.rr.com Wed Jan 25 22:34:24 2006 From: nvitamore at austin.rr.com (nvitamore at austin.rr.com) Date: Wed, 25 Jan 2006 17:34:24 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Discovery."org" website Message-ID: <380-22006132522342448@M2W094.mail2web.com> Thanks everyone for the info. I didn't know because I was researching some material on Discovery channel, linked around a bit, and ended up there instead of http://www.discovery.com/ At first I actually thought it was actually affiliated with the "real" Discovery. (Those bloody bastards.) Natasha -------------------------------------------------------------------- mail2web - Check your email from the web at http://mail2web.com/ . From russell.wallace at gmail.com Thu Jan 26 00:36:47 2006 From: russell.wallace at gmail.com (Russell Wallace) Date: Thu, 26 Jan 2006 00:36:47 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Cryonics and uploading Message-ID: <8d71341e0601251636n266caf60j858b3dd534d5f868@mail.gmail.com> Do current cryonics providers have a section on their consent form that asks whether you want: a) To be uploaded as soon as the technology becomes available for it (cryonics patients are the obvious first candidates for destructive scan uploading, likely to be the first feasible type). b) To be kept on ice until the technology advances to the point of allowing thawing out and biological revival (perhaps with the option of later uploading) (which might be years to decades later). If not, is there enough difference among people signed up for cryonics to merit such? I ask because it occurs to me that there is a split in general between people who subscribe to the _pattern_ view of identity (in which destructive scan uploading from a frozen state is fine) and those who subscribe to the _thread_ view of identity (in which historical continuity is important, so they'd rather wait for gradual uploading to be available); if that split also exists among cryonics patients, it might be worth making sure your position on the matter is written down somewhere before you go into the dewar. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From transhumanist at goldenfuture.net Thu Jan 26 01:51:58 2006 From: transhumanist at goldenfuture.net (Joseph Bloch) Date: Wed, 25 Jan 2006 20:51:58 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Cryonics and uploading In-Reply-To: <8d71341e0601251636n266caf60j858b3dd534d5f868@mail.gmail.com> References: <8d71341e0601251636n266caf60j858b3dd534d5f868@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <43D82B3E.3040207@goldenfuture.net> There was nothing like that in my Alcor paperwork. Joseph Russell Wallace wrote: > Do current cryonics providers have a section on their consent form > that asks whether you want: > > a) To be uploaded as soon as the technology becomes available for it > (cryonics patients are the obvious first candidates for destructive > scan uploading, likely to be the first feasible type). > > b) To be kept on ice until the technology advances to the point of > allowing thawing out and biological revival (perhaps with the option > of later uploading) (which might be years to decades later). > > If not, is there enough difference among people signed up for cryonics > to merit such? I ask because it occurs to me that there is a split in > general between people who subscribe to the _pattern_ view of identity > (in which destructive scan uploading from a frozen state is fine) and > those who subscribe to the _thread_ view of identity (in which > historical continuity is important, so they'd rather wait for gradual > uploading to be available); if that split also exists among cryonics > patients, it might be worth making sure your position on the matter is > written down somewhere before you go into the dewar. > >------------------------------------------------------------------------ > >_______________________________________________ >extropy-chat mailing list >extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org >http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat > > From pgptag at gmail.com Thu Jan 26 05:14:17 2006 From: pgptag at gmail.com (Giu1i0 Pri5c0) Date: Thu, 26 Jan 2006 06:14:17 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] Cryonics and uploading In-Reply-To: <43D82B3E.3040207@goldenfuture.net> References: <8d71341e0601251636n266caf60j858b3dd534d5f868@mail.gmail.com> <43D82B3E.3040207@goldenfuture.net> Message-ID: <470a3c520601252114p29ff4091jca727f82d85d0af1@mail.gmail.com> And there wes nothing like that in my CI paperwork. I asked Bob Ettinger about uploading a couple of years ago, but he did not seem to view it as an option. Not only because we are still very far from developing enabling technologies for uploading, but also because he does not think the copy would be a continuation of the original (the identity problem). I don't see why not, and would sign up for uploading immediately if there were providers offering brain scans of sufficient resolution, but also this is quite far (20 years is my best case estimate, but please correct me if I am wrong). G. On 1/26/06, Joseph Bloch wrote: > There was nothing like that in my Alcor paperwork. > > Joseph > > Russell Wallace wrote: > > > Do current cryonics providers have a section on their consent form > > that asks whether you want: > > > > a) To be uploaded as soon as the technology becomes available for it > > (cryonics patients are the obvious first candidates for destructive > > scan uploading, likely to be the first feasible type). > > > > b) To be kept on ice until the technology advances to the point of > > allowing thawing out and biological revival (perhaps with the option > > of later uploading) (which might be years to decades later). > > > > If not, is there enough difference among people signed up for cryonics > > to merit such? I ask because it occurs to me that there is a split in > > general between people who subscribe to the _pattern_ view of identity > > (in which destructive scan uploading from a frozen state is fine) and > > those who subscribe to the _thread_ view of identity (in which > > historical continuity is important, so they'd rather wait for gradual > > uploading to be available); if that split also exists among cryonics > > patients, it might be worth making sure your position on the matter is > > written down somewhere before you go into the dewar. > > > >------------------------------------------------------------------------ > > > >_______________________________________________ > >extropy-chat mailing list > >extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > >http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat > > > > > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat > From russell.wallace at gmail.com Thu Jan 26 05:31:52 2006 From: russell.wallace at gmail.com (Russell Wallace) Date: Thu, 26 Jan 2006 05:31:52 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Cryonics and uploading In-Reply-To: <470a3c520601252114p29ff4091jca727f82d85d0af1@mail.gmail.com> References: <8d71341e0601251636n266caf60j858b3dd534d5f868@mail.gmail.com> <43D82B3E.3040207@goldenfuture.net> <470a3c520601252114p29ff4091jca727f82d85d0af1@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <8d71341e0601252131w5e55a65eg3d7136c1d01c2a3f@mail.gmail.com> On 1/26/06, Giu1i0 Pri5c0 wrote: > > And there wes nothing like that in my CI paperwork. I asked Bob > Ettinger about uploading a couple of years ago, but he did not seem to > view it as an option. Not only because we are still very far from > developing enabling technologies for uploading, but also because he > does not think the copy would be a continuation of the original (the > identity problem). Yes, some people do hold that view, that's why I think it should be up to the individual to decide. (Not that it matters to me personally - cryonics isn't available in Ireland - just trying to be helpful.) I don't see why not, and would sign up for uploading immediately if > there were providers offering brain scans of sufficient resolution, > but also this is quite far (20 years is my best case estimate, but > please correct me if I am wrong). You're right :) - Well I think so anyway, 20 years best case if things go well. But cryonics isn't exactly a short term enterprise in the first place - indeed it's precisely the fact that some or all of us will be dead by the time uploading becomes possible that makes uploading from cryonic status an important issue. - Russell -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From spike66 at comcast.net Thu Jan 26 06:33:37 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Wed, 25 Jan 2006 22:33:37 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] dalai lama's attitude towards human enhancement In-Reply-To: <380-22006132521263213@M2W026.mail2web.com> Message-ID: <200601260633.k0Q6Xpe07214@tick.javien.com> http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,182826,00.html From m_j_geddes at yahoo.com.au Thu Jan 26 06:34:13 2006 From: m_j_geddes at yahoo.com.au (Marc Geddes) Date: Thu, 26 Jan 2006 17:34:13 +1100 (EST) Subject: [extropy-chat] the very model of a Singularitarian In-Reply-To: <6.2.1.2.0.20060125120351.01d20468@pop-server.satx.rr.com> Message-ID: <20060126063413.74019.qmail@web50501.mail.yahoo.com> Yes! Singularity! WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO HOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO! Singularity is here! SINGULARIY IS NEAR! SINGULARITY! "Till shade is gone, till water is gone, into the shadow with teeth bared, screaming defiance with the last breath, to spit in Sightblinder?s eye on the last day? ____________________________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? Messenger 7.0: Free worldwide PC to PC calls http://au.messenger.yahoo.com From neuronexmachina at gmail.com Thu Jan 26 08:04:37 2006 From: neuronexmachina at gmail.com (Neil H.) Date: Thu, 26 Jan 2006 00:04:37 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] dalai lama's attitude towards human enhancement In-Reply-To: <200601260633.k0Q6Xpe07214@tick.javien.com> References: <380-22006132521263213@M2W026.mail2web.com> <200601260633.k0Q6Xpe07214@tick.javien.com> Message-ID: In all fairness though, that's just a quote from his interpreter, not the Dalai Lama himself. The Dalai Lama did give some interesting comments at the recent Society for Neuroscience conference, though. A portion of a rough write-up from neurodudes: http://neurodudes.com/2005/11/12/his-holinesss-message-better-living-through-chemicals-or-electrodes/ Wants chemical or electrical ways to change negative emotions "Everybody needs that." (sweet!) Hatred, jealousy, little operation here and there and it's all gone. (seriously sweet!) His Holiness wants to be the first patient. Looks like he wants the drugs/electrodes to save some time: "I spend a few hours in meditation every day, [if we get neuroscience-based englightenment] then no need for these things." On 1/25/06, spike wrote: > > > > http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,182826,00.html > > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Thu Jan 26 09:50:59 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Thu, 26 Jan 2006 04:50:59 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Cryonics and uploading In-Reply-To: <470a3c520601252114p29ff4091jca727f82d85d0af1@mail.gmail.com> References: <8d71341e0601251636n266caf60j858b3dd534d5f868@mail.gmail.com> <43D82B3E.3040207@goldenfuture.net> <470a3c520601252114p29ff4091jca727f82d85d0af1@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On 1/26/06, Giu1i0 Pri5c0 wrote: > ...Ettinger about uploading a couple of years ago, but he did not seem to > view it as an option. ... but also because he does not think the copy > would be a continuation of the original (the identity problem). A copy is a copy is a copy! Commands like COPY (DOS) or cp (UNIX) would not be of questionable use if they did not create an *exact* copy. People who are "rational thinkers" should confront this head on and get the people who hold the "its not the original" position and force them to explain precisely *why* the copy is not the original. This goes back to the points Sam Harris has made about the need for the religious moderates to confront the religious conservatives who can offer no hard evidence for most of their positions. You have to nail such people down to *precisely* how much information loss they are willing to tolerate (this gets into discussions about how many cells the brain loses each day or how many are lost after a minor stroke or how many are lost if you hold your breath to the point of becoming unconscious, etc.) and relate it to things similar areas that they can easily understand, e.g. the difference between PNG and JPEG images or WAV and MP3 sound. This then leads into a discussion as to *where* in the brain the information the *useful* information is stored. For those people who want to be recreated down to the level of specific atomic isotopes for each atom in the brain (or body) I fear they may be looking at a long long time on ice. > I don't see why not, and would sign up for uploading immediately if > there were providers offering brain scans of sufficient resolution, > but also this is quite far (20 years is my best case estimate, but > please correct me if I am wrong). The problem *isn't* the resolution. You could do atomic scale resolution scans now. I believe methods have even been developed to do less than atomic diameter measurements. The problem is the parallelism requirements and readout time. If one had the resources to setup the lab you could start uploading someone now. Without the parallelism improvements the process would probably take many thousands of years. The real problem is that you couldn't "run" them yet because we don't know how to run a human data copy with simulated inputs and outputs. You also couldn't rebuild an identical biological copy (yet). Robert From alito at organicrobot.com Thu Jan 26 12:15:04 2006 From: alito at organicrobot.com (Alejandro Dubrovsky) Date: Thu, 26 Jan 2006 22:15:04 +1000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Cryonics and uploading In-Reply-To: References: <8d71341e0601251636n266caf60j858b3dd534d5f868@mail.gmail.com> <43D82B3E.3040207@goldenfuture.net> <470a3c520601252114p29ff4091jca727f82d85d0af1@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <1138277704.13280.90.camel@alito.homeip.net> On Thu, 2006-01-26 at 04:50 -0500, Robert Bradbury wrote: > The problem *isn't* the resolution. You could do atomic scale > resolution scans now. > I believe methods have even been developed to do less than atomic diameter > measurements. (The experts in the list seem to have dissapeared. Time for the hacks to make some noise to fill the void) References? I think you can do sub-atomic resolution scan of one layer with electron microscopy, but I don't think you can slice atomically, especially in the watery, amorphous looking slices that the brain would produce. APM won't give you atomic resolution (not down to the hydrogen atoms), and again, you won't be able to make a neat slice to see what's underneath the top layer. You can pull out a silicon atom from a silicon solid with it, but that doesn't mean you can yank an oxygen from an amino-acid while leaving the rest intact. If, like some esoteric theories predict, memories are partly stored in prion-like conglomerates near the synapses, this could even be important information being lost. Even if that's not the case, scanning resolution of large (ie brain-size) watery 3d objects is not that great. I can't see what's going to give you sub-125 nm^3 voxels at the moment, and at that resolution you might agree important information is being lost. Which leaves resolution as still part of the problem. From pgptag at gmail.com Thu Jan 26 12:45:24 2006 From: pgptag at gmail.com (Giu1i0 Pri5c0) Date: Thu, 26 Jan 2006 13:45:24 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] Cryonics and uploading In-Reply-To: References: <8d71341e0601251636n266caf60j858b3dd534d5f868@mail.gmail.com> <43D82B3E.3040207@goldenfuture.net> <470a3c520601252114p29ff4091jca727f82d85d0af1@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <470a3c520601260445q67f75ffete071920ff68adc0@mail.gmail.com> Well... yes we can do atomic scale resolution now, but not for living brain tissue with a non-destructive process, and not within realistic readout time and storage size bound. Asuming copying technology becomes available at some point, not having the technology to run the copy would not be a big issue as one can arrange for safe storage of the copy until the technology to run it becomes available (same argument than for today's cryonics). G. On 1/26/06, Robert Bradbury wrote: > > I don't see why not, and would sign up for uploading immediately if > > there were providers offering brain scans of sufficient resolution, > > but also this is quite far (20 years is my best case estimate, but > > please correct me if I am wrong). > > The problem *isn't* the resolution. You could do atomic scale > resolution scans now. > I believe methods have even been developed to do less than atomic diameter > measurements. The problem is the parallelism requirements and readout time. > If one had the resources to setup the lab you could start uploading someone now. > Without the parallelism improvements the process would probably take > many thousands > of years. The real problem is that you couldn't "run" them yet > because we don't know > how to run a human data copy with simulated inputs and outputs. You > also couldn't > rebuild an identical biological copy (yet). > > Robert > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat > From bret at bonfireproductions.com Thu Jan 26 14:53:11 2006 From: bret at bonfireproductions.com (Bret Kulakovich) Date: Thu, 26 Jan 2006 09:53:11 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Cryonics and uploading In-Reply-To: References: <8d71341e0601251636n266caf60j858b3dd534d5f868@mail.gmail.com> <43D82B3E.3040207@goldenfuture.net> <470a3c520601252114p29ff4091jca727f82d85d0af1@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: What a nice thread! Here's my two kopeks worth. Lets jump forward and assume perfects - we quantum entangle a brain into a cubic 20cm box. It is a perfect and exact copy. Good job! But even though it is a duplicate of the original, it is not the original, no matter how perfect. The mind/body problem holds generally that monists hold conscience as an electro-chemical event, the body and mind are inseparable. Dualists hold that the mind/body are separate and discreet, perhaps a body/soul or body/spirit is going on, and they are distinct. You can see one lends itself immediately to the possibility of cryonics, and the other to uploading. Sure they can each lean in one direction or the other... What is happening behind my eyes right now - can I move it? Or am I dead when the destructive upload occurs, with a perfect simulacra of me advancing on the next clock cycle in software? Until we get that one singular thing to work (or, alternately, those two things =) ) then we can't make the call. On Jan 26, 2006, at 4:50 AM, Robert Bradbury wrote: > On 1/26/06, Giu1i0 Pri5c0 wrote: >> ...Ettinger about uploading a couple of years ago, but he did not >> seem to >> view it as an option. ... but also because he does not think the >> copy >> would be a continuation of the original (the identity problem). > > A copy is a copy is a copy! Commands like COPY (DOS) or cp (UNIX) > would not be of questionable use if they did not create an *exact* > copy. > People who are "rational thinkers" should confront this head on and > get the > people who hold the "its not the original" position and force them > to explain > precisely *why* the copy is not the original. This goes back to > the points > Sam Harris has made about the need for the religious moderates to > confront the > religious conservatives who can offer no hard evidence for most of > their positions. > > You have to nail such people down to *precisely* how much > information loss > they are willing to tolerate (this gets into discussions about how > many cells the > brain loses each day or how many are lost after a minor stroke or > how many are > lost if you hold your breath to the point of becoming unconscious, > etc.) and relate > it to things similar areas that they can easily understand, e.g. the > difference between > PNG and JPEG images or WAV and MP3 sound. This then leads into a > discussion > as to *where* in the brain the information the *useful* information is > stored. For those > people who want to be recreated down to the level of specific atomic > isotopes for > each atom in the brain (or body) I fear they may be looking at a long > long time on ice. > >> I don't see why not, and would sign up for uploading immediately if >> there were providers offering brain scans of sufficient resolution, >> but also this is quite far (20 years is my best case estimate, but >> please correct me if I am wrong). > > The problem *isn't* the resolution. You could do atomic scale > resolution scans now. > I believe methods have even been developed to do less than atomic > diameter > measurements. The problem is the parallelism requirements and > readout time. > If one had the resources to setup the lab you could start uploading > someone now. > Without the parallelism improvements the process would probably take > many thousands > of years. The real problem is that you couldn't "run" them yet > because we don't know > how to run a human data copy with simulated inputs and outputs. You > also couldn't > rebuild an identical biological copy (yet). > > Robert > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From russell.wallace at gmail.com Thu Jan 26 16:11:47 2006 From: russell.wallace at gmail.com (Russell Wallace) Date: Thu, 26 Jan 2006 16:11:47 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Cryonics and uploading In-Reply-To: References: <8d71341e0601251636n266caf60j858b3dd534d5f868@mail.gmail.com> <43D82B3E.3040207@goldenfuture.net> <470a3c520601252114p29ff4091jca727f82d85d0af1@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <8d71341e0601260811l2a017805ma2a64ca35113f53f@mail.gmail.com> On 1/26/06, Bret Kulakovich wrote: > > > What a nice thread! Here's my two kopeks worth. > > Lets jump forward and assume perfects - we quantum entangle a brain into a > cubic 20cm box. It is a perfect and exact copy. Good job! > > But even though it is a duplicate of the original, it is not the original, > no matter how perfect. > Okay, so you hold the thread view of identity, fair enough. The mind/body problem holds generally that monists hold conscience as an > electro-chemical event, the body and mind are inseparable. Dualists hold > that the mind/body are separate and discreet, perhaps a body/soul or > body/spirit is going on, and they are distinct. > *laughs* I suppose I've seen patternites accuse threadites [1] of believing in dualism and the soul often enough, the compliment was bound to be returned sooner or later. But no, neither view has anything to do with that. If you're going to try to relate the pattern view to classical philosophy, you should call it not dualist but Platonist. You can see one lends itself immediately to the possibility of cryonics, and > the other to uploading. Sure they can each lean in one direction or the > other... > The pattern view is fine with cryonics, just as long as the information in the brain is preserved. And in the thread view, you should be fine with gradual uploading (neuron by neuron, with your thread of consciousness unbroken), just not with destructive scan uploading. [1] Barbaric abuse of language, I know, are there any better short terms for people who subscribe to the thread versus pattern views of identity? I tried the "-ist" version and it looked even worse. - Russell -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Thu Jan 26 16:18:18 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Thu, 26 Jan 2006 11:18:18 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Intelligent Design: I'm not dead yet Message-ID: Slashdot is reporting [1] that the BBC is reporting [2] that more than 50% of the people in Britian do not believe in evolution and more than 40% support the teaching of creationism or intelligent design. So this isn't a problem for the United States only. On top of that is this report [3] from Physorg that there are still people out there who believe in intelligent design but they are laying low because the time isn't right to push the ideas into forums that promote brain washing people who have little experience in rational thought. Mind you, I support the idea of "intelligent design" -- but it would be *rational* intelligent design with testable hypotheses. Of interest might be [4] which documents the billions of adherents for various religions, many of which have fundamental problems because they are built on foundations which include arbitrary and/or irrational assumptions. This isn't a small problem and represents a fundamental problem for extropianism and transhumanism in general. It would be interesting to know what fraction of "wars" that took place over the history of humanity were due to conflicts of belief systems (i.e. faith based motivations) rather than conflicts of resource availability (i.e. survival based motivations). The crusades and of course the various Israeli vs. Arab conflicts come to mind. I ask this because if even a small fraction of those "faith-based" thought machines come to the conclusion that transhumanistic ideas (or even science in general) represent a growing threat to their cherished belief systems then you can kiss the singularity goodbye. Sigh, Robert 1. http://science.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=06/01/26/1346255 2. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/4648598.stm 3. http://www.physorg.com/news10145.html 4. http://www.adherents.com/adh_rb.html -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From russell.wallace at gmail.com Thu Jan 26 16:39:32 2006 From: russell.wallace at gmail.com (Russell Wallace) Date: Thu, 26 Jan 2006 16:39:32 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Cryonics and uploading In-Reply-To: References: <8d71341e0601251636n266caf60j858b3dd534d5f868@mail.gmail.com> <43D82B3E.3040207@goldenfuture.net> <470a3c520601252114p29ff4091jca727f82d85d0af1@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <8d71341e0601260839p61ce8bf1i8410df1399c56642@mail.gmail.com> On 1/26/06, Robert Bradbury wrote: > > A copy is a copy is a copy! Commands like COPY (DOS) or cp (UNIX) > would not be of questionable use if they did not create an *exact* copy. > People who are "rational thinkers" should confront this head on and get > the > people who hold the "its not the original" position and force them to > explain > precisely *why* the copy is not the original. This goes back to the > points > Sam Harris has made about the need for the religious moderates to confront > the > religious conservatives who can offer no hard evidence for most of > their positions. I don't think "confront" and "force" are useful approaches (granted, you may think I say that as shouldn't! :)); they tend to get people's backs up, and into a situation where they feel they have to defend their position tooth and nail; but discussion of the issues may certainly be useful. I also don't think it's a case of rational vs irrational; I've seen plenty of rational people subscribe to the thread view of identity. I think it's a matter of philosophical axioms. You have to nail such people down to *precisely* how much information loss > they are willing to tolerate (this gets into discussions about how > many cells the > brain loses each day or how many are lost after a minor stroke or how many > are > lost if you hold your breath to the point of becoming unconscious, > etc.) and relate > it to things similar areas that they can easily understand, e.g. the > difference between > PNG and JPEG images or WAV and MP3 sound. This then leads into a > discussion > as to *where* in the brain the information the *useful* information is > stored. The thread view of identity does run into fuzziness issues. One friend of mine who subscribes to it, agrees he can't be sure he doesn't die every time he goes to sleep; in practice he doesn't waste a lot of time fretting over it, because everyone needs sleep regardless of their philosophy, but he agrees it is a problem in principle. I've seen other people who won't go that far, nonetheless agree surgery under general anaesthetic, or cryonic suspension, may create a problem with regard to breaking the thread of consciousness. (Does that mean you should eschew major surgery or cryonic suspension? Not if you're going to die without them! You shouldn't go into them if you're currently healthy, of course, but we knew that already.) In fairness, though, the pattern view of identity is also fuzzy. I'd be fine with an accurate destructive scan upload, but what about an inaccurate one? More prosaically, what about information loss from conditions such as strokes or Alzheimer's disease? There's a point beyond which the law would say the resulting entity was still me and I'd say it wasn't, but I couldn't define in advance exactly where that point lies, any more than I could define in advance exactly how many grains of sand are required before you have a pile of sand. (This sort of issue is sometimes called a "sorites paradox", after the Greek word for "heap", which should indicate how far back it goes.) The problem *isn't* the resolution. You could do atomic scale > resolution scans now. This unfortunately turns out not to be the case, at least when talking about 3D rather than surface scans. However, it may be possible short of full nanotechnology; Eugen Leitl posted an excellent message (on this list or some other one, I don't remember) a good while back on how it might be done, unfortunately I can't find the original post but the gist of it involved freezing the brain then scanning in slices of thickness on the order of 10 nanometers or so, not atomic resolution but fine enough to capture synaptic structure. I believe methods have even been developed to do less than atomic diameter > measurements. The problem is the parallelism requirements and readout > time. > If one had the resources to setup the lab you could start uploading > someone now. > Without the parallelism improvements the process would probably take > many thousands > of years. The real problem is that you couldn't "run" them yet > because we don't know > how to run a human data copy with simulated inputs and outputs. You > also couldn't > rebuild an identical biological copy (yet). > This is true. - Russell -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From russell.wallace at gmail.com Thu Jan 26 17:04:20 2006 From: russell.wallace at gmail.com (Russell Wallace) Date: Thu, 26 Jan 2006 17:04:20 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Identity and becoming a Great Old One Message-ID: <8d71341e0601260904p1370977fm1227200725fb1450@mail.gmail.com> The thread view (identity is a verb, a continuing thread of consciousness) and the pattern view (identity is an adjective; as John Clark put it, "I am the way matter behaves when it is organized in a Johnclarkian way") give the same results most of the time; the one scenario that always gets adherents of the two arguing with each other is destructive scan uploading (fine by the pattern view, semelparous suicide by the identity view). (Happily, gradual uploading is a potential way around this problem for the thread view.) Another scenario in which the two views might give different results is the wish expressed by some transhumanists that can be summarized as "when I grow up I want to be a Great Old One"; that is, over the next while - say, a million subjective years - they want to continually modify and augment themselves such that the result will be, as they see it, as far beyond the original as the original was beyond an amoeba. (I don't personally accept the analogy even given the premises, but it gets the point across nicely enough that I did happily make use of it for science fiction purposes.) To me, as a subscriber to the pattern view, this doesn't make sense because said entity wouldn't be me anymore, so it would be a form of suicide; one could still regard the future existence of such an entity as a cool thing, but why would one have a desire to use oneself in particular as a seed/raw material? But it occurs to me that it makes perfect sense from the thread viewpoint; with appropriate care (don't discard so much that the result, while incredibly intelligent, no longer has any feeling or awareness so that it isn't anyone, etc) a huge change could be done as a series of incremental steps, each small enough that the thread of consciousness was unbroken; so a subscriber to this view could reasonably believe a Great Old One _would_ be them, if it came into existence by the right path. One should then desire to follow this path if and only if one believes gradual uploading is better than destructive scan uploading. I'm curious as to how many positive and negative examples of this theory there are? (Meta: This is an SL3-4 topic, which people on the SL4 list have been unhappy about the shortage of lately; it's also I believe on-topic for extropy-chat, and is something of a followup to a previous (lower SL) message I posted there, so it seems appropriate for both lists; if the moderators of one or both lists disagree, or if crossposting like this isn't the right way to go about it, please let me know.) - Russell -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From bret at bonfireproductions.com Thu Jan 26 17:07:11 2006 From: bret at bonfireproductions.com (Bret Kulakovich) Date: Thu, 26 Jan 2006 12:07:11 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Cryonics and uploading In-Reply-To: <8d71341e0601260811l2a017805ma2a64ca35113f53f@mail.gmail.com> References: <8d71341e0601251636n266caf60j858b3dd534d5f868@mail.gmail.com> <43D82B3E.3040207@goldenfuture.net> <470a3c520601252114p29ff4091jca727f82d85d0af1@mail.gmail.com> <8d71341e0601260811l2a017805ma2a64ca35113f53f@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: >> Lets jump forward and assume perfects - we quantum entangle a >> brain into a cubic 20cm box. It is a perfect and exact copy. Good >> job! >> >> But even though it is a duplicate of the original, it is not the >> original, no matter how perfect. > > On Jan 26, 2006, at 11:11 AM, Russell Wallace wrote: > Okay, so you hold the thread view of identity, fair enough. Tut-tut! I said no such thing! If I duplicate item A perfectly in every sense as indicated, it is at the very best item A1. It is not item A, since Item A is sitting right there next to it, distinct and separate in every sense. A third copy would be A3, and so on, copying does not automatically mean replacing. > But no, neither view has anything to do with that. If you're going > to try to relate the pattern view to classical philosophy, you > should call it not dualist but Platonist And snub Descartes? He's the best thing Uploading (with a capital U) has going for it right now. If true I could remove my world-point-of- view from within my skull - pop it out like a Lego? - and plug it into something else - we're golden! > [1] Barbaric abuse of language, I know, are there any better short > terms for people who subscribe to the thread versus pattern views > of identity? I tried the "-ist" version and it looked even worse. I won't tell if you won't tell. How else will etymology evolve? Bret K. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From bret at bonfireproductions.com Thu Jan 26 17:11:24 2006 From: bret at bonfireproductions.com (Bret Kulakovich) Date: Thu, 26 Jan 2006 12:11:24 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Cryonics and uploading In-Reply-To: <8d71341e0601260811l2a017805ma2a64ca35113f53f@mail.gmail.com> References: <8d71341e0601251636n266caf60j858b3dd534d5f868@mail.gmail.com> <43D82B3E.3040207@goldenfuture.net> <470a3c520601252114p29ff4091jca727f82d85d0af1@mail.gmail.com> <8d71341e0601260811l2a017805ma2a64ca35113f53f@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <89C4C5E6-A93F-486A-A2BF-447AE886B9D3@bonfireproductions.com> On Jan 26, 2006, at 11:11 AM, Russell Wallace wrote: > On 1/26/06, Bret Kulakovich wrote: > The mind/body problem holds generally that monists hold conscience > as an electro-chemical event, the body and mind are inseparable. > Dualists hold that the mind/body are separate and discreet, perhaps > a body/soul or body/spirit is going on, and they are distinct. > > *laughs* I suppose I've seen patternites accuse threadites [1] of > believing in dualism and the soul often enough, the compliment was > bound to be returned sooner or later. I concede an obvious over-simplification for the need of time, ease of discussion on this. No 'accusations' meant! Throwing this in the pile, since from past discussions on this list I believe we agreed (?) as a neutral source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_mind-body_problem Bret K. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From russell.wallace at gmail.com Thu Jan 26 17:14:42 2006 From: russell.wallace at gmail.com (Russell Wallace) Date: Thu, 26 Jan 2006 17:14:42 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Cryonics and uploading In-Reply-To: References: <8d71341e0601251636n266caf60j858b3dd534d5f868@mail.gmail.com> <43D82B3E.3040207@goldenfuture.net> <470a3c520601252114p29ff4091jca727f82d85d0af1@mail.gmail.com> <8d71341e0601260811l2a017805ma2a64ca35113f53f@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <8d71341e0601260914s708b8399k3f1f88145f003bd8@mail.gmail.com> On 1/26/06, Bret Kulakovich wrote: > Tut-tut! I said no such thing! > You said you subscribe to the view that even a perfect copy is in an important sense not the original; that's the view of identity that I refer to as "the thread view" (I'm open to suggestions from its adherents for a better name - no, "the correct view" will not be accepted ;)). Provided of course... If I duplicate item A perfectly in every sense as indicated, it is at the > very best item A1. It is not item A, since Item A is sitting right there > next to it, distinct and separate in every sense. A third copy would be A3, > and so on, copying does not automatically mean replacing. > that your reason for saying A1 is not A is the fact that it lacks an unbroken thread of continuity with A; if you have a different reason for saying A1 is not A, then perhaps you suscribe to some third theory (in which case I would be curious as to what it is). And snub Descartes? > Afraid so, sorry Descartes. - Russell -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Thu Jan 26 17:49:10 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Thu, 26 Jan 2006 12:49:10 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Computing Power: Moore's Law keeps going and going and going Message-ID: Intel started selling the Pentium D processors based on 65nm technology in Dec. 2005 [1]. They announced yesterday that it is now able to manufacture 1 billion transistor memory chips at the 45nm scale [2,3] and plans to introduce them in 2nd half of 2007. Interestingly, AMD announced an alliance with Integrated Silicon which may lead to using Z-RAM for its 65nm chip caches (allowing caches to be 5x larger) [4,5]. IBM, Sony and Toshiba have started work on the 32nm Cell (the multiprocessor in the Playstation 3) [6] and Taiwan Semiconductor has announced it has started preparing for 22nm lithography (having started 65nm production last year) [7]. In the meantime Intel is working with QinetiQ producing InSb 85nm transistors which they hope will have 1.5x the speed at 1/10th the power [8]. The scale seems to be going 90nm, 65nm, 45nm, 32nm, 22nm, 16nm for those who are interested. The picture for the 16nm scale and those thereafter (post-2015) gets a bit fuzzy... But more and more it looks like people are going to have at least hundreds of GFLOPS of processor power, wearable, powered by fuel cells sucking glucose out of your blood stream within the next 10 years *without* "real" nanotechnology. Gives rise to whole new lines of thought -- parent to child, "Mary, you are getting thin, you either need to eat more or turn down the clock rate on your exoprocessors." Robert 1. http://www.tgdaily.com/2005/12/27/intel_announces_pentium_ee_955/ 2. http://www.tgdaily.com/2006/01/25/intel_announces_45nm_sram/ 3. http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20060125/tc_nm/intel_chip_dc 4. http://www.geek.com/news/geeknews/2006Jan/gee20060124034376.htm 5. http://www.eet.com/news/semi/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=177101749 6. http://www.theregister.co.uk/2006/01/12/ibm_sony_toshiba_32nm_cell/ 7. http://www.tgdaily.com/2006/01/16/tsmc_22nm_production/ 8. http://www.xbitlabs.com/news/other/display/20051207211955.html -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From rafal.smigrodzki at gmail.com Thu Jan 26 17:55:05 2006 From: rafal.smigrodzki at gmail.com (Rafal Smigrodzki) Date: Thu, 26 Jan 2006 12:55:05 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Identity and becoming a Great Old One In-Reply-To: <8d71341e0601260904p1370977fm1227200725fb1450@mail.gmail.com> References: <8d71341e0601260904p1370977fm1227200725fb1450@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <7641ddc60601260955r5627e30vd4bfea37673ce4c8@mail.gmail.com> On 1/26/06, Russell Wallace wrote: > To me, as a subscriber to the pattern view, this doesn't make sense because > said entity wouldn't be me anymore, so it would be a form of suicide; one > could still regard the future existence of such an entity as a cool thing, > but why would one have a desire to use oneself in particular as a seed/raw > material? ### I also see myself as a pattern, and I would prefer to grow up to exist indefinitely in a state recognizably similar to present, although much smarter and more powerful. And yes, I agree that evolving beyond recognizable similarity with my current pattern would be a form of death, even if at each step the transformation was ego-syntonic. Still, as forms of death go, this is a magnificent one: aside from happily staying alive forever, what could be better than going out in a blaze of supernatural, god-birthing glory? The only thing even better than that is indefinitely staying alive, happy and powerful *and* spawning off a copy that becomes an Old One. Rafal From bret at bonfireproductions.com Thu Jan 26 17:58:20 2006 From: bret at bonfireproductions.com (Bret Kulakovich) Date: Thu, 26 Jan 2006 12:58:20 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Cryonics and uploading In-Reply-To: <8d71341e0601260914s708b8399k3f1f88145f003bd8@mail.gmail.com> References: <8d71341e0601251636n266caf60j858b3dd534d5f868@mail.gmail.com> <43D82B3E.3040207@goldenfuture.net> <470a3c520601252114p29ff4091jca727f82d85d0af1@mail.gmail.com> <8d71341e0601260811l2a017805ma2a64ca35113f53f@mail.gmail.com> <8d71341e0601260914s708b8399k3f1f88145f003bd8@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On Jan 26, 2006, at 12:14 PM, Russell Wallace wrote: > You said you subscribe to the view that even a perfect copy is in > an important sense not the original; that's the view of identity > that I refer to as "the thread view" (I'm open to suggestions from > its adherents for a better name - no, "the correct view" will not > be accepted ;)). ... its the view of someone who is looking at two identical coffee mugs. =) Let me ask this differently. We make a perfect copy in every sense of the word, of item A. How many items are there now? > The thread view (identity is a verb, a continuing thread of > consciousness) and the pattern view (identity is an adjective; as > John Clark put it, "I am the way matter behaves when it is > organized in a Johnclarkian way") give the same results most of the > time; the one scenario that always gets adherents of the two > arguing with each other is destructive scan uploading (fine by the > pattern view, semelparous suicide by the identity view). (Happily, > gradual uploading is a potential way around this problem for the > thread view.) Even if I re-arrange matter in a johnclarkian way twice, is it John Clark, or John Clark and another John Clark? Two John Clarks. Bret K. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From bret at bonfireproductions.com Thu Jan 26 18:04:56 2006 From: bret at bonfireproductions.com (Bret Kulakovich) Date: Thu, 26 Jan 2006 13:04:56 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Identity and becoming a Great Old One In-Reply-To: <8d71341e0601260904p1370977fm1227200725fb1450@mail.gmail.com> References: <8d71341e0601260904p1370977fm1227200725fb1450@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <332E50AC-6CED-4722-B69D-BD4A77E49783@bonfireproductions.com> This really is the old teleportation/"transporter accident" etc. argument all over again. Even Outer Limits milked this; Which I will now mangle horribly. If I could teleport you using the following method, would you go to a (point of interest, other planet, whatever): You step into the matter transmitter at point A You are scanned Your scan is transmitted to point B The scan is rebuilt into you at point B The you at point A is destroyed Would you "go"? Are "you" dead? I have always thought - If I am a virus, then this is great. Since I am conscious, no thanks. Sorry if this over simplifies anything you are saying in this post. Bret K. On Jan 26, 2006, at 12:04 PM, Russell Wallace wrote: > The thread view (identity is a verb, a continuing thread of > consciousness) and the pattern view (identity is an adjective; as > John Clark put it, "I am the way matter behaves when it is > organized in a Johnclarkian way") give the same results most of the > time; the one scenario that always gets adherents of the two > arguing with each other is destructive scan uploading (fine by the > pattern view, semelparous suicide by the identity view). (Happily, > gradual uploading is a potential way around this problem for the > thread view.) > > Another scenario in which the two views might give different > results is the wish expressed by some transhumanists that can be > summarized as "when I grow up I want to be a Great Old One"; that > is, over the next while - say, a million subjective years - they > want to continually modify and augment themselves such that the > result will be, as they see it, as far beyond the original as the > original was beyond an amoeba. (I don't personally accept the > analogy even given the premises, but it gets the point across > nicely enough that I did happily make use of it for science fiction > purposes.) > > To me, as a subscriber to the pattern view, this doesn't make sense > because said entity wouldn't be me anymore, so it would be a form > of suicide; one could still regard the future existence of such an > entity as a cool thing, but why would one have a desire to use > oneself in particular as a seed/raw material? > > But it occurs to me that it makes perfect sense from the thread > viewpoint; with appropriate care (don't discard so much that the > result, while incredibly intelligent, no longer has any feeling or > awareness so that it isn't anyone, etc) a huge change could be done > as a series of incremental steps, each small enough that the thread > of consciousness was unbroken; so a subscriber to this view could > reasonably believe a Great Old One _would_ be them, if it came into > existence by the right path. > > One should then desire to follow this path if and only if one > believes gradual uploading is better than destructive scan > uploading. I'm curious as to how many positive and negative > examples of this theory there are? > > (Meta: This is an SL3-4 topic, which people on the SL4 list have > been unhappy about the shortage of lately; it's also I believe on- > topic for extropy-chat, and is something of a followup to a > previous (lower SL) message I posted there, so it seems appropriate > for both lists; if the moderators of one or both lists disagree, or > if crossposting like this isn't the right way to go about it, > please let me know.) > > - Russell > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat From russell.wallace at gmail.com Thu Jan 26 18:20:27 2006 From: russell.wallace at gmail.com (Russell Wallace) Date: Thu, 26 Jan 2006 18:20:27 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Cryonics and uploading In-Reply-To: References: <8d71341e0601251636n266caf60j858b3dd534d5f868@mail.gmail.com> <43D82B3E.3040207@goldenfuture.net> <470a3c520601252114p29ff4091jca727f82d85d0af1@mail.gmail.com> <8d71341e0601260811l2a017805ma2a64ca35113f53f@mail.gmail.com> <8d71341e0601260914s708b8399k3f1f88145f003bd8@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <8d71341e0601261020x66934292i237202117b7e7939@mail.gmail.com> On 1/26/06, Bret Kulakovich wrote: > Even if I re-arrange matter in a *johnclarkian* way twice, is it John > Clark, or John Clark and *another* John Clark? Two John Clarks. > Is it meaningful to say "This is the original John Clark, and this is a copy?" Or (supposing a sufficiently accurate copy) is the word "original" just meaningless noise, and should we just say "Here are two instances of John Clark"? The former is the thread view, the latter is the pattern view. - Russell -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From russell.wallace at gmail.com Thu Jan 26 18:22:01 2006 From: russell.wallace at gmail.com (Russell Wallace) Date: Thu, 26 Jan 2006 18:22:01 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Identity and becoming a Great Old One In-Reply-To: <7641ddc60601260955r5627e30vd4bfea37673ce4c8@mail.gmail.com> References: <8d71341e0601260904p1370977fm1227200725fb1450@mail.gmail.com> <7641ddc60601260955r5627e30vd4bfea37673ce4c8@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <8d71341e0601261022j1e86800epf2364b2e62277b69@mail.gmail.com> On 1/26/06, Rafal Smigrodzki wrote: > > ### I also see myself as a pattern, and I would prefer to grow up to > exist indefinitely in a state recognizably similar to present, > although much smarter and more powerful. And yes, I agree that > evolving beyond recognizable similarity with my current pattern would > be a form of death, even if at each step the transformation was > ego-syntonic. > > Still, as forms of death go, this is a magnificent one: aside from > happily staying alive forever, what could be better than going out in > a blaze of supernatural, god-birthing glory? > > The only thing even better than that is indefinitely staying alive, > happy and powerful *and* spawning off a copy that becomes an Old One. Okay, these are good points! - Russell -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From russell.wallace at gmail.com Thu Jan 26 18:24:21 2006 From: russell.wallace at gmail.com (Russell Wallace) Date: Thu, 26 Jan 2006 18:24:21 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Identity and becoming a Great Old One In-Reply-To: <332E50AC-6CED-4722-B69D-BD4A77E49783@bonfireproductions.com> References: <8d71341e0601260904p1370977fm1227200725fb1450@mail.gmail.com> <332E50AC-6CED-4722-B69D-BD4A77E49783@bonfireproductions.com> Message-ID: <8d71341e0601261024j468403dfne5ee611ad244729@mail.gmail.com> On 1/26/06, Bret Kulakovich wrote: > > Would you "go"? > Are "you" dead? > > I have always thought - If I am a virus, then this is great. Since I > am conscious, no thanks. *nods* As we've seen, you hold the thread view of identity. So to test my theory: Suppose you were offered the chance to become a Great Old One, slowly and incrementally, with your chain of consciousness unbroken (_not_ disassembled and reconstructed at any point), would you take it? - Russell -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jonkc at att.net Thu Jan 26 18:32:51 2006 From: jonkc at att.net (John K Clark) Date: Thu, 26 Jan 2006 13:32:51 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Cryonics and uploading. References: <8d71341e0601251636n266caf60j858b3dd534d5f868@mail.gmail.com><43D82B3E.3040207@goldenfuture.net><470a3c520601252114p29ff4091jca727f82d85d0af1@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <035201c622a7$0dc20620$4e0f4e0c@MyComputer> Bret Kulakovich Wrote: > even though it is a duplicate of the original, > it is not the original, no matter how perfect How do you know? If the copy is perfect then how do you know it is not the "original", how do you know somebody didn't copy you last night and destroyed the "original", how do you know that you are not a "copy"? I think it's pointless to include a lot of restrictions on exactly how a cryonics patient is to be repaired; they'll do what they want to do regardless. If the Jupiter Brains of the future can think of a reason to do anything at all with your frozen body they will almost certainly reanimate you as a upload. They won't want us using up a lot of resources in the "real" world and they would probably be a bit squeamish about letting us fool around at that level of reality, like letting a monkey run around in an operating room. They'll want a firewall to protect themselves from our stupidity. But if you have a known history of disliking the idea of uploading and Mr. Jupiter is kind he'll upload you anyway, he just won't tell you you're an upload and you'll never know the difference. John K Clark From bret at bonfireproductions.com Thu Jan 26 18:40:08 2006 From: bret at bonfireproductions.com (Bret Kulakovich) Date: Thu, 26 Jan 2006 13:40:08 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Cryonics and uploading In-Reply-To: <8d71341e0601261020x66934292i237202117b7e7939@mail.gmail.com> References: <8d71341e0601251636n266caf60j858b3dd534d5f868@mail.gmail.com> <43D82B3E.3040207@goldenfuture.net> <470a3c520601252114p29ff4091jca727f82d85d0af1@mail.gmail.com> <8d71341e0601260811l2a017805ma2a64ca35113f53f@mail.gmail.com> <8d71341e0601260914s708b8399k3f1f88145f003bd8@mail.gmail.com> <8d71341e0601261020x66934292i237202117b7e7939@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <78CEBE37-403B-4DA3-A4D0-7DCCBB46FE79@bonfireproductions.com> Ok, I agree, the term 'original' is useless at this point, except perhaps for sentimental value, which is arguably useless as well. "Here are two instances of John Clark." Now each of them is conscious. Two separate conscious entities, I am assuming. One walks out of the room and comes back a while later. Do they both know where the one who left went? I'd say no. They aren't linked in any way. So their experiences are distinct. But one still existed before the other, and lent all of its perfectly copied experience and properties. to the second, which did not exist before the process. So both sets of matter are now experiencing life in a johnclarkian way with all of their johnclarkian faculties, etc. However: The moment they were perfectly copied they are distinct again, because their experience point diverged, as did their location, at the moment of creation. So in that manner they are not equal, one is space-shifted and the other one was not. True? On Jan 26, 2006, at 1:20 PM, Russell Wallace wrote: > On 1/26/06, Bret Kulakovich wrote: > Even if I re-arrange matter in a johnclarkian way twice, is it > John Clark, or John Clark and another John Clark? Two John Clarks. > > Is it meaningful to say "This is the original John Clark, and this > is a copy?" > > Or (supposing a sufficiently accurate copy) is the word "original" > just meaningless noise, and should we just say "Here are two > instances of John Clark"? > > The former is the thread view, the latter is the pattern view. > > - Russell > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jef at jefallbright.net Thu Jan 26 18:43:18 2006 From: jef at jefallbright.net (Jef Allbright) Date: Thu, 26 Jan 2006 10:43:18 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Identity and becoming a Great Old One In-Reply-To: <8d71341e0601260904p1370977fm1227200725fb1450@mail.gmail.com> References: <8d71341e0601260904p1370977fm1227200725fb1450@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <22360fa10601261043r57620386sf85a98b6d9abd1fe@mail.gmail.com> On 1/26/06, Russell Wallace wrote: > > The thread view (identity is a verb, a continuing thread of consciousness) > and the pattern view (identity is an adjective; as John Clark put it, "I am > the way matter behaves when it is organized in a Johnclarkian way") give the > same results most of the time; the one scenario that always gets adherents > of the two arguing with each other is destructive scan uploading (fine by > the pattern view, semelparous suicide by the identity view). (Happily, > gradual uploading is a potential way around this problem for the thread > view.) > > Another scenario in which the two views might give different results is > the wish expressed by some transhumanists that can be summarized as "when I > grow up I want to be a Great Old One"; that is, over the next while - say, a > million subjective years - they want to continually modify and augment > themselves such that the result will be, as they see it, as far beyond the > original as the original was beyond an amoeba. (I don't personally accept > the analogy even given the premises, but it gets the point across nicely > enough that I did happily make use of it for science fiction purposes.) > While I subscribe to the pattern view of personal identity, I also recognize that the pattern is ever-changing and that the closer one looks, the more one finds that there is no discrete or continuous self to be preserved. As we live, grow, and develop, we update and edit an ongoing narrative describing the Self to which we feel so attached. This narrative is replete with gaps, errors, inaccuracies and fabrications, but to the subjective Self it is complete and true and the only point of view available. In my thinking on this and related topics, I have come to see to that to be consistent, all that really matters to the Self at any given instant is that its current values are projected into the future. - Jef http://www.jefallbright.net increasing awareness for increasing morality -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From bret at bonfireproductions.com Thu Jan 26 18:45:22 2006 From: bret at bonfireproductions.com (Bret Kulakovich) Date: Thu, 26 Jan 2006 13:45:22 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Identity and becoming a Great Old One In-Reply-To: <8d71341e0601261024j468403dfne5ee611ad244729@mail.gmail.com> References: <8d71341e0601260904p1370977fm1227200725fb1450@mail.gmail.com> <332E50AC-6CED-4722-B69D-BD4A77E49783@bonfireproductions.com> <8d71341e0601261024j468403dfne5ee611ad244729@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <44064850-EFF0-44F2-B5FC-995F3281CC79@bonfireproductions.com> I am familiar with the 'viral' prospect we are discussing in a manner through Greg Baer's Eon - I certainly wouldn't mind going through that 'transporter' problem so long as I was not destroyed at the end. Then there is - urban legend or not - the idea that your Great Old One hypothesis happens already, that every cell in our bodies is replaced often enough that in x years we are not even the same sack of protoplasm we were at life - x years ago. The Great Old One path, with the relatively unbroken chain of consciousness, is my intention. Not counting the lapse between shutdown and restart spent inert. So cryonics could be arguably threaded or patterned - I don't think we'll know until it happens. The bulb is out for a very long time before the power is restored. On Jan 26, 2006, at 1:24 PM, Russell Wallace wrote: > On 1/26/06, Bret Kulakovich wrote: > Would you "go"? > Are "you" dead? > > I have always thought - If I am a virus, then this is great. Since I > am conscious, no thanks. > > *nods* As we've seen, you hold the thread view of identity. > > So to test my theory: Suppose you were offered the chance to become > a Great Old One, slowly and incrementally, with your chain of > consciousness unbroken (_not_ disassembled and reconstructed at any > point), would you take it? > > - Russell > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From pgptag at gmail.com Thu Jan 26 18:48:23 2006 From: pgptag at gmail.com (Giu1i0 Pri5c0) Date: Thu, 26 Jan 2006 19:48:23 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] Cryonics and uploading In-Reply-To: <78CEBE37-403B-4DA3-A4D0-7DCCBB46FE79@bonfireproductions.com> References: <8d71341e0601251636n266caf60j858b3dd534d5f868@mail.gmail.com> <470a3c520601252114p29ff4091jca727f82d85d0af1@mail.gmail.com> <8d71341e0601260811l2a017805ma2a64ca35113f53f@mail.gmail.com> <8d71341e0601260914s708b8399k3f1f88145f003bd8@mail.gmail.com> <8d71341e0601261020x66934292i237202117b7e7939@mail.gmail.com> <78CEBE37-403B-4DA3-A4D0-7DCCBB46FE79@bonfireproductions.com> Message-ID: <470a3c520601261048m57870161j8687c30e763577c2@mail.gmail.com> If a perfect copy is not the original, then what is the difference between the prerfect copy and the original? ###> Lets jump forward and assume perfects - we quantum entangle a brain into a cubic 20cm box. It is a perfect and exact copy. Good job! > > But even though it is a duplicate of the original, it is not the original, no matter how perfect.### From wingcat at pacbell.net Thu Jan 26 18:48:19 2006 From: wingcat at pacbell.net (Adrian Tymes) Date: Thu, 26 Jan 2006 10:48:19 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Computing Power: Moore's Law keeps going and going and going In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <20060126184819.35016.qmail@web81606.mail.mud.yahoo.com> --- Robert Bradbury wrote: > But more and more it looks like > people are > going to have at least hundreds of GFLOPS of processor power, > wearable, > powered by fuel cells sucking glucose out of your blood stream within > the > next 10 years *without* "real" nanotechnology. Two thoughts: * Even if it is made top-down like traditional litho, rather than bottom-up molecular-manufacturing-style - if it's dealing with individual elements < 1 micron, it's real nanotech. * The rest of your post only commented on the rise of computer chips, and said nothing about glucose-powered fuel cells. There'd be quite a market *right now* for glucose-powered "fuel cells" that don't actually produce useful amounts of power but do consume significant (relative to the average obese American's body) amounts of glucose. (I considered doing this a while ago, but decided to devote my efforts to seemingly easier advances for the time being. Still, it does not seem like this would be too incredibly difficult for someone with more of a biosciences background to put together. It wouldn't be a panacea - it wouldn't do anything directly about artery clogs, for example, although perhaps the glucose-starved blood might start mining those plaques for glucose - but it would directly attack the visible bulges that, likely more out of vanity than out of genuine health concern, most customers would care most about.) From bret at bonfireproductions.com Thu Jan 26 18:56:06 2006 From: bret at bonfireproductions.com (Bret Kulakovich) Date: Thu, 26 Jan 2006 13:56:06 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Cryonics and uploading. In-Reply-To: <035201c622a7$0dc20620$4e0f4e0c@MyComputer> References: <8d71341e0601251636n266caf60j858b3dd534d5f868@mail.gmail.com><43D82B3E.3040207@goldenfuture.net><470a3c520601252114p29ff4091jca727f82d85d0af1@mail.gmail.com> <035201c622a7$0dc20620$4e0f4e0c@MyComputer> Message-ID: I am saying this from two standpoints: 1. If I am myself making the copy, and the copy is a success, and assuming that the two objects do not occupy the same location in space-time, and that for my convenience the locations they occupy are close to me and one another. The one on my left, is the original. On my right, the 'copy'. I could mark one with a Sharpie, so I don't mix them up. If you shuffled them when I wasn't looking, then of course I can't tell them apart, ever again, assuming they were not conscious entities. If they were conscious entities, then their 'exacting perfection' would fall gradually out of coherence as they each gather their own a- prioi experience. And that is how I could tell them apart - assuming the technology to perfectly copy two living things assumes the technology to tell them apart, doesn't it? 2. Right now, being unaware that I was or was not copied last night, I cannot possibly know. I could be buried in the yard, and this me is a perfect copy, who interprets the experiences recorded as my own, just like a replicant, transporter user in previous example, victim of the Outer Limits, etc. But we also lack the technology and tools of my example above right now. Apologies in using you in examples without prior consent in previous emails! Bret K. On Jan 26, 2006, at 1:32 PM, John K Clark wrote: > >> even though it is a duplicate of the original, >> it is not the original, no matter how perfect > > How do you know? If the copy is perfect then how do you know it is > not the > "original", how do you know somebody didn't copy you last night and > destroyed the "original", how do you know that you are not a "copy"? -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From bret at bonfireproductions.com Thu Jan 26 19:01:46 2006 From: bret at bonfireproductions.com (Bret Kulakovich) Date: Thu, 26 Jan 2006 14:01:46 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Cryonics and uploading In-Reply-To: <470a3c520601261048m57870161j8687c30e763577c2@mail.gmail.com> References: <8d71341e0601251636n266caf60j858b3dd534d5f868@mail.gmail.com> <470a3c520601252114p29ff4091jca727f82d85d0af1@mail.gmail.com> <8d71341e0601260811l2a017805ma2a64ca35113f53f@mail.gmail.com> <8d71341e0601260914s708b8399k3f1f88145f003bd8@mail.gmail.com> <8d71341e0601261020x66934292i237202117b7e7939@mail.gmail.com> <78CEBE37-403B-4DA3-A4D0-7DCCBB46FE79@bonfireproductions.com> <470a3c520601261048m57870161j8687c30e763577c2@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: For simplicities sake: I am staring out of one of them, at the other one of me. I am sure the other one of me is trying to figure out where the hell that painting of the rowboat on the beach behind "the copy's" shoulder came from too. And that chair wasn't there a second ago, either. Otherwise, it does not matter which one is original, they are equal. But you can tell them apart. On Jan 26, 2006, at 1:48 PM, Giu1i0 Pri5c0 wrote: > If a perfect copy is not the original, then what is the difference > between the prerfect copy and the original? > > ###> Lets jump forward and assume perfects - we quantum entangle a > brain into a cubic 20cm box. It is a perfect and exact copy. Good job! >> >> But even though it is a duplicate of the original, it is not the >> original, no matter how perfect.### > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat From russell.wallace at gmail.com Thu Jan 26 19:14:26 2006 From: russell.wallace at gmail.com (Russell Wallace) Date: Thu, 26 Jan 2006 19:14:26 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Identity and becoming a Great Old One In-Reply-To: <22360fa10601261043r57620386sf85a98b6d9abd1fe@mail.gmail.com> References: <8d71341e0601260904p1370977fm1227200725fb1450@mail.gmail.com> <22360fa10601261043r57620386sf85a98b6d9abd1fe@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <8d71341e0601261114pa978a3k8afd33e6a5abbf25@mail.gmail.com> On 1/26/06, Jef Allbright wrote: > > > While I subscribe to the pattern view of personal identity, I also > recognize that the pattern is ever-changing and that the closer one looks, > the more one finds that there is no discrete or continuous self to be > preserved. As we live, grow, and develop, we update and edit an ongoing > narrative describing the Self to which we feel so attached. This narrative > is replete with gaps, errors, inaccuracies and fabrications, but to the > subjective Self it is complete and true and the only point of view > available. > > In my thinking on this and related topics, I have come to see to that to > be consistent, all that really matters to the Self at any given instant is > that its current values are projected into the future. Fair enough, so that's a (rather nicely described) counterexample to my theory, a philosophy that subscribes to the pattern view yet does not regard even a very large total change as suicide. Hmm, and I'm inclined to agree with your last paragraph; how do I reconcile that with my view that becoming a Great Old One would eliminate the self? (I don't hold personal survival as the highest value, but I still place significant value on it.) I'm not sure of the answer to that; perhaps I'm skeptical about the possibility of preserving my current values over a path involving very large total change. Perhaps if and when it's shown to be possible, I may change my mind. - Russell -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jef at jefallbright.net Thu Jan 26 21:03:44 2006 From: jef at jefallbright.net (Jef Allbright) Date: Thu, 26 Jan 2006 13:03:44 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Identity and becoming a Great Old One In-Reply-To: <8d71341e0601261114pa978a3k8afd33e6a5abbf25@mail.gmail.com> References: <8d71341e0601260904p1370977fm1227200725fb1450@mail.gmail.com> <22360fa10601261043r57620386sf85a98b6d9abd1fe@mail.gmail.com> <8d71341e0601261114pa978a3k8afd33e6a5abbf25@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <22360fa10601261303n4fa5bb1dwbeff40134bd7fd8f@mail.gmail.com> On 1/26/06, Russell Wallace wrote: > > On 1/26/06, Jef Allbright wrote: > > > > > > While I subscribe to the pattern view of personal identity, I also > > recognize that the pattern is ever-changing and that the closer one looks, > > the more one finds that there is no discrete or continuous self to be > > preserved. As we live, grow, and develop, we update and edit an ongoing > > narrative describing the Self to which we feel so attached. This narrative > > is replete with gaps, errors, inaccuracies and fabrications, but to the > > subjective Self it is complete and true and the only point of view > > available. > > > > In my thinking on this and related topics, I have come to see to that to > > be consistent, all that really matters to the Self at any given instant is > > that its current values are projected into the future. > > > Fair enough, so that's a (rather nicely described) counterexample to my > theory, a philosophy that subscribes to the pattern view yet does not regard > even a very large total change as suicide. > Hmm, and I'm inclined to agree with your last paragraph; how do I reconcile > that with my view that becoming a Great Old One would eliminate the self? (I > don't hold personal survival as the highest value, but I still place > significant value on it.) > Any Self that you imagine to have been eliminated was only one frame in a long motion picture film, already fading into the past before you could think to mourn the perceived loss. There was never a discrete self to be preserved or lost, but there is certainly a subjective narrative of self as well as an objective record of events connecting the past with the present. Becoming a Great Old One may indeed be a very worthy goal, similar to the journey from toddler to leader but on a vastly larger scale, and in neither case should we confuse a continuing process of growth with loss of something that had only the illusion of permanence. I'm not sure of the answer to that; perhaps I'm skeptical about the > possibility of preserving my current values over a path involving very large > total change. Perhaps if and when it's shown to be possible, I may change my > mind. > We can be sure that our values will change over time--as the environment and our interactions with it must change as well. Rather than "change", a better description might be "develop", since at each moment, our existing core values (shared with others and reinforced by a common environment and ancestry) strongly determine the direction of growth. One can hold on to a narrower conception of self and it will serve well in most circumstances. However, paradox arises when one attempts to apply the popular conception to issues of larger scope. Examples such as individuals willing giving their lives or all their time and energy to a cause, morphing to a fundamentally different form, spawning duplicates, uploading to a different substrate, all make sense within a more encompassing understanding of self. Paradox is always a matter of insufficient context. In the bigger picture all the pieces must fit. - Jef http://www.jefallbright.net increasing awareness for increasing morality -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Thu Jan 26 22:06:54 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Thu, 26 Jan 2006 17:06:54 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Computing Power: Moore's Law keeps going and going and going In-Reply-To: <20060126184819.35016.qmail@web81606.mail.mud.yahoo.com> References: <20060126184819.35016.qmail@web81606.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Message-ID: On 1/26/06, Adrian Tymes wrote: > > * Even if it is made top-down like traditional litho, rather than > bottom-up molecular-manufacturing-style - if it's dealing with > individual elements < 1 micron, it's real nanotech. By your definition perhaps. In my mind "real nanotechnology" has to meet the NSF specification of < 100 nm and it has to be assembled small-molecule by small-molecule (just as the human body is) with a very high degree of positional accuracy. Ion implantation of traditional lithography generally does *not* achieve the same accuracy that most enzymes do. At 45nm you are probably 10-100 times larger than the scale biological systems are generally working at. * The rest of your post only commented on the rise of computer > chips, and said nothing about glucose-powered fuel cells. > There'd be quite a market *right now* for glucose-powered > "fuel cells" that don't actually produce useful amounts of > power but do consume significant (relative to the average > obese American's body) amounts of glucose. Agreed. But if that is you goal it isn't hard. Just filter the glucose out of you blood and circulate it into a bag containing bacteria that utilize the glucose to produce light. If you make the bag into a transparent suit jacket you can glow in the dark while losing weight. Robert -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From thespike at satx.rr.com Thu Jan 26 22:18:15 2006 From: thespike at satx.rr.com (Damien Broderick) Date: Thu, 26 Jan 2006 16:18:15 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] Computing Power: Moore's Law keeps going and going and going In-Reply-To: References: <20060126184819.35016.qmail@web81606.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <6.2.1.2.0.20060126161247.01ec08a0@pop-server.satx.rr.com> At 05:06 PM 1/26/2006 -0500, Robert B. wrote: >Just filter the glucose out of your blood and circulate it into a bag >containing bacteria that utilize the glucose to produce light. If you >make the bag into a transparent suit jacket you can glow in the dark while >losing weight. That's cool, of course, and lets you read under the blankets, if you're the sort of person who sleeps in his suit jacket, as most of us here surely are--but it can be a hassle, wearing clothes that require you to plug them in to an indwelling catheter stuck inside a major blood vessel. So messy to keep clean and bacteria-free. (I had a friend once with a colostomy; he spent an awful lot of time in the shower.) Damien Broderick From avantguardian2020 at yahoo.com Thu Jan 26 22:21:44 2006 From: avantguardian2020 at yahoo.com (The Avantguardian) Date: Thu, 26 Jan 2006 14:21:44 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Intelligent Design: I'm not dead yet In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <20060126222144.13304.qmail@web60518.mail.yahoo.com> --- Robert Bradbury wrote: > It would be interesting > to know what fraction of > "wars" that took place over the history of humanity > were due to conflicts of > belief systems (i.e. faith based motivations) rather > than conflicts of > resource availability (i.e. survival based > motivations). These two motives are not as separable as you might believe and almost every conflict I can think of are a little of both. Thus faith has always been used to embolden those under fire and priority over natural resources is nearly always a matter of divine mandate. > The crusades and > of course the various Israeli vs. Arab conflicts > come to mind. I ask this > because if even a small fraction of those > "faith-based" thought machines > come to the conclusion that transhumanistic ideas > (or even science in > general) represent a growing threat to their > cherished belief systems then > you can kiss the singularity goodbye. > > Sigh, > Robert Or worse yet, fatalistic belief in some divinely ordained apocalypse will extinguish us before the singularity can be achieved. It seems that there are fundamentalists out there (from more than one religion) who believe that by hastening the end of the world, they are serving God. Don't lose heart, Robert. Not all the players have taken the field yet and there is much yet to be revealed, decisions to be made, and deeds to be done. The one undeniable truth that runs through ALL religions is the free agency of mankind. Thus whether you believe in a creator or not, man and man alone, will have to decide between the singularity or the apocalypse. I do think there are some religions amenable to recombination with extropian memes. I think that Intelligent Design makes a great basis for an extropic religion of reason. I find one of these to be exceptionally well suited for this purpose. And, interestingly enough, much of the leg work has been done already - No reason to reinvent the wheel. More later. . . The Avantguardian is Stuart LaForge alt email: stuart"AT"ucla.edu "The most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the source of all true art and science. He to whom this emotion is a stranger, who can no longer wonder and stand rapt in awe, is as good as dead: his eyes are closed. . ." - Albert Einstein, "What I Believe" (1930) __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com From sentience at pobox.com Thu Jan 26 22:48:39 2006 From: sentience at pobox.com (Eliezer S. Yudkowsky) Date: Thu, 26 Jan 2006 14:48:39 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Re: Identity and becoming a Great Old One In-Reply-To: <44064850-EFF0-44F2-B5FC-995F3281CC79@bonfireproductions.com> References: <8d71341e0601260904p1370977fm1227200725fb1450@mail.gmail.com> <332E50AC-6CED-4722-B69D-BD4A77E49783@bonfireproductions.com> <8d71341e0601261024j468403dfne5ee611ad244729@mail.gmail.com> <44064850-EFF0-44F2-B5FC-995F3281CC79@bonfireproductions.com> Message-ID: <43D951C7.3000906@pobox.com> Bret Kulakovich wrote: > > Not counting the lapse between shutdown and restart spent inert. So > cryonics could be arguably threaded or patterned - I don't think we'll > know until it happens. The bulb is out for a very long time before the > power is restored. What difference does it make if it is 10^40 planck increments between when your neurons fire, or 10^53 planck increments between your cryonic suspension and revival? You and your wacky anthropomorphic notions about "short times" and "long times". To physics your brain is a motionless statue with neurons firing only on a timescale of aeons. Even so, you live. -- Eliezer S. Yudkowsky http://singinst.org/ Research Fellow, Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence From bpaatsch at bigpond.net.au Thu Jan 26 22:47:37 2006 From: bpaatsch at bigpond.net.au (Brett Paatsch) Date: Fri, 27 Jan 2006 09:47:37 +1100 Subject: [extropy-chat] Computing Power: Moore's Law keeps going and goingand going References: <20060126184819.35016.qmail@web81606.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <039d01c622ca$81aec2d0$1283e03c@homepc> Robert Bradbury wrote: ----- Original Message ----- From: Robert Bradbury To: ExI chat list Sent: Friday, January 27, 2006 9:06 AM Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] Computing Power: Moore's Law keeps going and goingand going On 1/26/06, Adrian Tymes wrote: * Even if it is made top-down like traditional litho, rather than bottom-up molecular-manufacturing-style - if it's dealing with individual elements < 1 micron, it's real nanotech. By your definition perhaps. In my mind "real nanotechnology" has to meet the NSF specification of < 100 nm and it has to be assembled small-molecule by small-molecule (just as the human body is) with a very high degree of positional accuracy. The unit of biology is the cell not the atom. Its the cell that does the replicating and any particular human body we have experience of to date has developed from cells, not atoms. Sure, I think along with just about everyone that isn't a supernaturalist that somewhere, somehow the first cell *must* have formed naturally from smaller elements but *how* that happened is not currently known. The significance of this in relation to nanotech speculations is that it is the cell which is a living replicator and its not nanoscale its micron scale. DNA does not replicate on its own. Ribosomes don't work outside of their cellular environments. Ion implantation of traditional lithography generally does *not* achieve the same accuracy that most enzymes do. At 45nm you are probably 10-100 times larger than the scale biological systems are generally working at. The *generally* in that sentence is one hell of a hard working word. Cellular membranes are around 6nm. Cellular membranes are important because they compartmentalise regions in which biochemisty takes place. In order for oxidative phosphorylation to work, or to stop free radicals spilling out of organelles, you need to maintain membrane integrity. ie. You need to maintain the integrity of something that is only 6nm thick and exists as it exists only within certain limits of temperature, pressure, pH etc. * The rest of your post only commented on the rise of computer chips, and said nothing about glucose-powered fuel cells. There'd be quite a market *right now* for glucose-powered "fuel cells" that don't actually produce useful amounts of power but do consume significant (relative to the average obese American's body) amounts of glucose. Agreed. But if that is you goal it isn't hard. Just filter the glucose out of you blood and circulate it into a bag containing bacteria that utilize the glucose to produce light. If you make the bag into a transparent suit jacket you can glow in the dark while losing weight. I am not an expert in this. But there are feedback mechanisms in place such that glycolysis operates sometimes and gluconeogenesis other times and various GLUT receptors on various types of cells are sensing different levels of blood glucose. The balance of metabolic systems will be effected by adding in *anything* new. *How* it will be effected is hard to say unless the person proposing to add the thing in can say what its characteristics are and where it would be located. Would the nanobot glucose burner only be in the bloodstream or would it be cells, if so which cells. So far as I know those aspects are never adequately filled in in nanobot flights of fancy. There are whole homeostastis mechanisms that don't get touched with a level of analysis that says "just filter the glucose out of your blood". "Just filter" how? "Just filter" where? Brett Paatsch -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From sentience at pobox.com Thu Jan 26 22:52:18 2006 From: sentience at pobox.com (Eliezer S. Yudkowsky) Date: Thu, 26 Jan 2006 14:52:18 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Re: Identity and becoming a Great Old One In-Reply-To: <8d71341e0601260904p1370977fm1227200725fb1450@mail.gmail.com> References: <8d71341e0601260904p1370977fm1227200725fb1450@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <43D952A2.1080608@pobox.com> When I saw the subject line, I immediately thought of a bumper sticker reading "Great Old One or Bust". Russell Wallace wrote: > > Another scenario in which the two views might give different results is > the wish expressed by some transhumanists that can be summarized as > "when I grow up I want to be a Great Old One"; that is, over the next > while - say, a million subjective years - they want to continually > modify and augment themselves such that the result will be, as they see > it, as far beyond the original as the original was beyond an amoeba. (I > don't personally accept the analogy even given the premises, but it gets > the point across nicely enough that I did happily make use of it for > science fiction purposes.) > > To me, as a subscriber to the pattern view, this doesn't make sense > because said entity wouldn't be me anymore, so it would be a form of > suicide; one could still regard the future existence of such an entity > as a cool thing, but why would one have a desire to use oneself in > particular as a seed/raw material? Even the Eliezer of 1996, who knew so much less than I as to constitute perhaps a different person, knew the answer to that. 1: A finite computer has only a finite number of possible states. In the long run, then, you *must* either die (not do any processing past a finite number of operations), go into an infinite loop (also implying no further processing), or grow beyond any finite bound. Those are your only three options, no matter the physics. Being human forever isn't on the list. That is not a moral judgment, it's an unarguable mathematical fact. In the long run - the really long run - humanity isn't an option. 2: The Eliezer of 1996 exists woven into the *now* of 1996, where he belongs. There is no need for him to exist in 2006 also. It would be redundant. If my worldline were a purely constant state, I would not call that immortality, but death, the cessation of processing. Not all change is life, but all life is change. Where do you draw the line between moment-to-moment neural updates and death? How do you say that your self of 1996 has died, but your self of five seconds ago has not? 3: There ought to be more to the choice to live, than being afraid of dying. It should involve wanting to do certain things, and having fun, and learning is part of the fun. If you keep on learning, and you keep on growing stronger, sooner or later you must end up as a Great Old One. But that isn't even my point. My point is that I cannot "want" to live forever. My finite brain is not large enough to want an infinite number of things. My desire for life, as opposed to my fear of death, can only extend as far into the future as my mortal eyes can see. And of course I anticipate that when I have lived one more week, one more year, one more century, I will find new things to desire, and so desire again to live one more week. In that sense I will want to live forever, by induction on the positive integers. But my desire to be something roughly similar to the Eliezer of today, is also finite, and can only extend for so far as today's Eliezer wants to do particular things (in a state of mind roughly similar to the Eliezer of today, so that it counts as "me" doing them). When my future self acquires new desires and wants to do new things, I will want to do them while being roughly similar to the Eliezer of that day, not similar to the Eliezer of 2006. So thee wishes not to be a Great Old One, Russell Wallace? I should like to know what is thy alternative. -- Eliezer S. Yudkowsky http://singinst.org/ Research Fellow, Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence From russell.wallace at gmail.com Thu Jan 26 23:19:33 2006 From: russell.wallace at gmail.com (Russell Wallace) Date: Thu, 26 Jan 2006 23:19:33 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Re: Identity and becoming a Great Old One In-Reply-To: <43D952A2.1080608@pobox.com> References: <8d71341e0601260904p1370977fm1227200725fb1450@mail.gmail.com> <43D952A2.1080608@pobox.com> Message-ID: <8d71341e0601261519t32026e05ucffa53ef1c18dae2@mail.gmail.com> On 1/26/06, Eliezer S. Yudkowsky wrote: > > When I saw the subject line, I immediately thought of a bumper sticker > reading "Great Old One or Bust". *laughs* That's not a bad idea actually. 1: A finite computer has only a finite number of possible states. In > the long run, then, you *must* either die (not do any processing past a > finite number of operations), go into an infinite loop (also implying no > further processing), or grow beyond any finite bound. Those are your > only three options, no matter the physics. Being human forever isn't on > the list. That is not a moral judgment, it's an unarguable mathematical > fact. In the long run - the really long run - humanity isn't an option. This is of course mathematically true; whether it's physically relevant is still an open question. (In particular, we don't know whether the ultimate laws of physics permit infinite computation; currently known physics suggests a limit much less than 2^N operations for relevant values of N, but this is not certain.) [arguments snipped and mostly agreed with] So thee wishes not to be a Great Old One, Russell Wallace? I should > like to know what is thy alternative. I don't know; I'm not even sure about the yes/no, let alone the alternative. It would depend in part on the answer to the above question about the limits of computation, and I think in part on the answer to certain questions about intelligence and consciousness that I haven't coherently formulated yet. Not like we have to decide by next week. (I have a sudden vision of Eliezer and the rest of the SIAI guys saying "Well actually Russell, now that you mention that..." :)) - Russell -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From bpaatsch at bigpond.net.au Thu Jan 26 23:53:42 2006 From: bpaatsch at bigpond.net.au (Brett Paatsch) Date: Fri, 27 Jan 2006 10:53:42 +1100 Subject: [extropy-chat] Re: Identity and becoming a Great Old One References: <8d71341e0601260904p1370977fm1227200725fb1450@mail.gmail.com> <332E50AC-6CED-4722-B69D-BD4A77E49783@bonfireproductions.com> <8d71341e0601261024j468403dfne5ee611ad244729@mail.gmail.com><44064850-EFF0-44F2-B5FC-995F3281CC79@bonfireproductions.com> <43D951C7.3000906@pobox.com> Message-ID: <03ce01c622d3$bcff4e50$1283e03c@homepc> Eliezer S. Yudkowsky wrote: > What difference does it make if it is 10^40 planck increments between > when your neurons fire, or 10^53 planck increments between your cryonic > suspension and revival? Are *you* suggesting that it makes no difference? A brain contains a *lot* of neurons (perhaps not as many as 10^13 though I'd have to look that up) and they don't all fire together. > You and your wacky anthropomorphic notions > about "short times" and "long times". To physics your brain is a > motionless statue with neurons firing only on a timescale of aeons. > Even so, you live. You are the only person I've seen use the term planck increment. Is it quantum physics term? The term looks a little pseudo sciencey to me but that could be because I am just plain ignorant. I am more than usually cautious of any "science" I first meet on transhumanist lists so apologies if its just plain ignorance on my part. What is a planck increment? Is it standard physics or "alternative physics"? Or to put it another way, if its a unit of time, how many planck increments make up a single second of time? Brett Paatsch From thespike at satx.rr.com Thu Jan 26 23:58:40 2006 From: thespike at satx.rr.com (Damien Broderick) Date: Thu, 26 Jan 2006 17:58:40 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] Planck_units In-Reply-To: <03ce01c622d3$bcff4e50$1283e03c@homepc> References: <8d71341e0601260904p1370977fm1227200725fb1450@mail.gmail.com> <332E50AC-6CED-4722-B69D-BD4A77E49783@bonfireproductions.com> <8d71341e0601261024j468403dfne5ee611ad244729@mail.gmail.com> <44064850-EFF0-44F2-B5FC-995F3281CC79@bonfireproductions.com> <43D951C7.3000906@pobox.com> <03ce01c622d3$bcff4e50$1283e03c@homepc> Message-ID: <6.2.1.2.0.20060126175811.049b0c40@pop-server.satx.rr.com> >What is a planck increment? Is it standard physics or "alternative >physics"? > >Or to put it another way, if its a unit of time, how many planck >increments make up a single second of time? google as always in your friend. E.g. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Planck_units From bpaatsch at bigpond.net.au Fri Jan 27 00:19:20 2006 From: bpaatsch at bigpond.net.au (Brett Paatsch) Date: Fri, 27 Jan 2006 11:19:20 +1100 Subject: [extropy-chat] Planck_units References: <8d71341e0601260904p1370977fm1227200725fb1450@mail.gmail.com><332E50AC-6CED-4722-B69D-BD4A77E49783@bonfireproductions.com><8d71341e0601261024j468403dfne5ee611ad244729@mail.gmail.com><44064850-EFF0-44F2-B5FC-995F3281CC79@bonfireproductions.com><43D951C7.3000906@pobox.com><03ce01c622d3$bcff4e50$1283e03c@homepc> <6.2.1.2.0.20060126175811.049b0c40@pop-server.satx.rr.com> Message-ID: <03eb01c622d7$51ab9470$1283e03c@homepc> From: "Damien Broderick" To: "ExI chat list" Sent: Friday, January 27, 2006 10:58 AM Subject: [extropy-chat] Planck_units > >>What is a planck increment? Is it standard physics or "alternative >>physics"? >> >>Or to put it another way, if its a unit of time, how many planck >>increments make up a single second of time? > > google as always in your friend. E.g. > > http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Planck_units Thanks, I did Google on "Planck increment" which is what Eliezer usually writes, including if I recall correctly in the front page of your book Godplayers. It *might* be one of the better arguments against the need for continuity (ie. that physics suggests that we don't, can't in fact have more than the illusion of continuity now - if in fact it is physics that shows that) but it, the argument, has got to be *understandable* to be convincing. Words matter. I didn't know what "planck increment" meant when Eliezer said it, or indeed, if it meant anything. Brett Paatsch From sentience at pobox.com Fri Jan 27 00:23:53 2006 From: sentience at pobox.com (Eliezer S. Yudkowsky) Date: Thu, 26 Jan 2006 16:23:53 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Re: Identity and becoming a Great Old One In-Reply-To: <03ce01c622d3$bcff4e50$1283e03c@homepc> References: <8d71341e0601260904p1370977fm1227200725fb1450@mail.gmail.com> <332E50AC-6CED-4722-B69D-BD4A77E49783@bonfireproductions.com> <8d71341e0601261024j468403dfne5ee611ad244729@mail.gmail.com><44064850-EFF0-44F2-B5FC-995F3281CC79@bonfireproductions.com> <43D951C7.3000906@pobox.com> <03ce01c622d3$bcff4e50$1283e03c@homepc> Message-ID: <43D96819.10008@pobox.com> Brett Paatsch wrote: > Eliezer S. Yudkowsky wrote: > >> What difference does it make if it is 10^40 planck increments between >> when your neurons fire, or 10^53 planck increments between your >> cryonic suspension and revival? > > Are *you* suggesting that it makes no difference? A brain contains a > *lot* of neurons (perhaps not as many as 10^13 though I'd have > to look that up) and they don't all fire together. It does make no difference. If your 10^14 synapses (10^11 neurons) fire two hundred times per second in absolutely perfect unsynchrony, there must be at least 10^27 planck intervals between the arbitrary time assigned to each firing. 5 x 10^-44 planck intervals = 1 second. Even calcium ions entering and exiting the neural fiber move far more slowly than elementary physical timescales, the dance of quarks. If you permit that neural firings should stretch over vast periods of elementary time, why should not we regard a suspended cryonics patient as stretched out over an only slightly longer period of time? The fallacy is that you are calling upon your human-scale perspective on time flow to decide what is "stopped" and therefore dead, and what is "moving" and therefore alive. Which makes around as much sense as saying that anything smaller than a millimeter is "too small" to be alive. What matters is continuity of causality, whether over a picosecond or an eon. -- Eliezer S. Yudkowsky http://singinst.org/ Research Fellow, Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence From sentience at pobox.com Fri Jan 27 01:13:50 2006 From: sentience at pobox.com (Eliezer S. Yudkowsky) Date: Thu, 26 Jan 2006 17:13:50 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Re: Identity and becoming a Great Old One In-Reply-To: <43D96C8D.9000504@posthuman.com> References: <8d71341e0601260904p1370977fm1227200725fb1450@mail.gmail.com> <332E50AC-6CED-4722-B69D-BD4A77E49783@bonfireproductions.com> <8d71341e0601261024j468403dfne5ee611ad244729@mail.gmail.com><44064850-EFF0-44F2-B5FC-995F3281CC79@bonfireproductions.com> <43D951C7.3000906@pobox.com> <03ce01c622d3$bcff4e50$1283e03c@homepc> <43D96819.10008@pobox.com> <43D96C8D.9000504@posthuman.com> Message-ID: <43D973CE.6070102@pobox.com> Brian Atkins wrote to me: > Eliezer S. Yudkowsky wrote: > >> 5 x 10^-44 planck intervals = 1 second. > > Umm, I think that's 5.39 x 10^-44 sec = 1 planck interval, right? Yah, my bad. -- Eliezer S. Yudkowsky http://singinst.org/ Research Fellow, Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence From sentience at pobox.com Fri Jan 27 01:16:03 2006 From: sentience at pobox.com (Eliezer S. Yudkowsky) Date: Thu, 26 Jan 2006 17:16:03 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Planck_units In-Reply-To: <03eb01c622d7$51ab9470$1283e03c@homepc> References: <8d71341e0601260904p1370977fm1227200725fb1450@mail.gmail.com><332E50AC-6CED-4722-B69D-BD4A77E49783@bonfireproductions.com><8d71341e0601261024j468403dfne5ee611ad244729@mail.gmail.com><44064850-EFF0-44F2-B5FC-995F3281CC79@bonfireproductions.com><43D951C7.3000906@pobox.com><03ce01c622d3$bcff4e50$1283e03c@homepc> <6.2.1.2.0.20060126175811.049b0c40@pop-server.satx.rr.com> <03eb01c622d7$51ab9470$1283e03c@homepc> Message-ID: <43D97453.1090006@pobox.com> Brett Paatsch wrote: > > Thanks, I did Google on "Planck increment" which is what Eliezer > usually writes, including if I recall correctly in the front page of your > book Godplayers. Googling, it looks like "Planck interval" is the more common usage for time, so I'll try to use that from now on. (Though I try to think interchangably of time increments and space increments, and "interval" doesn't apply to space quite as well.) -- Eliezer S. Yudkowsky http://singinst.org/ Research Fellow, Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence From starman2100 at cableone.net Fri Jan 27 01:46:44 2006 From: starman2100 at cableone.net (starman2100 at cableone.net) Date: Thu, 26 Jan 2006 18:46:44 -0700 Subject: [extropy-chat] Cryonics and uploading Message-ID: <1138326404_36477@S2.cableone.net> An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From wingcat at pacbell.net Fri Jan 27 01:17:31 2006 From: wingcat at pacbell.net (Adrian Tymes) Date: Thu, 26 Jan 2006 17:17:31 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Glucose into electricity (was: Computing Power: Moore's Law keeps going and going and going) In-Reply-To: <6.2.1.2.0.20060126161247.01ec08a0@pop-server.satx.rr.com> Message-ID: <20060127011731.29353.qmail@web81607.mail.mud.yahoo.com> (Thanks for the support, Brett - you said most everything I was going to there. ;) ) --- Damien Broderick wrote: > That's cool, of course, and lets you read under the blankets, if > you're the > sort of person who sleeps in his suit jacket, as most of us here > surely > are--but it can be a hassle, wearing clothes that require you to plug > them > in to an indwelling catheter stuck inside a major blood vessel. So > messy to > keep clean and bacteria-free. Which is why the idea I was thinking of was entirely internal. Seated in the belly/front of the gut, right in the middle of a prime center of fat cells in most obese people (and thus where glucose hopefully naturally diffuses to if there's an imbalance in glucose levels in the body - like, say, if something in one particular region is consuming more glucose than normal), it would scavenge glucose that came by and break it down in the normal glucose->ATP cycle - except, when you get to the step where there's a free electron to convert ADP to ATP, it would capture said electron for use as electricity. (Although this system's alterations to the process would of course have to be tested, using the same enzymes as much as possible would hopefully ensure the system's safety. The study of the original process's non-toxicity has been generating data for thousands of years...) The first version would just suck up energy and discharge somehow (possibly, via induction to something passed outside the skin every so often, so no breaching of the skin would be needed after the installation surgery - and said surgery would be minimally invasive, going no deeper than the fat layer...and not really caring if a few of the cells around the install area died during surgery, because the whole point is to get rid of that fat anyway). Later versions could be wired to cybernetic implants, to be developed after this power source was proven and available, so of course that development would take a while (parallel to refinements to make the energy harvesting more efficient and to shake out any undesired side-effects). From avantguardian2020 at yahoo.com Fri Jan 27 01:17:50 2006 From: avantguardian2020 at yahoo.com (The Avantguardian) Date: Thu, 26 Jan 2006 17:17:50 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Re: Identity and becoming a Great Old One In-Reply-To: <43D96819.10008@pobox.com> Message-ID: <20060127011750.37296.qmail@web60517.mail.yahoo.com> --- "Eliezer S. Yudkowsky" wrote: > If you permit that neural firings should stretch > over vast periods of > elementary time, why should not we regard a > suspended cryonics patient > as stretched out over an only slightly longer period > of time? The difference between being in a bonfire for 10^40 planck intervals and 10^50 planck intervals is more substantial than your logic would seem to suggest, Eliezer. > > The fallacy is that you are calling upon your > human-scale perspective on > time flow to decide what is "stopped" and therefore > dead, and what is > "moving" and therefore alive. Which makes around as > much sense as > saying that anything smaller than a millimeter is > "too small" to be > alive. What matters is continuity of causality, > whether over a > picosecond or an eon. Everything is in motion, nothing is stopped. Does this mean that everything lives? Or is there some non-mechanical property that distinguishes life from non-life? Are humans smaller than a millimeter too small to be alive? Are they too small to be human? It seems that a human scale perspective is the most useful one to have if you are a human. Neither picoseconds nor eons are mine to give or take, despite my being part of a continuum of causality stretching back to the beginning of time. So don't count your Great Old Ones before they hatch, Eliezer. The Avantguardian is Stuart LaForge alt email: stuart"AT"ucla.edu "The most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the source of all true art and science. He to whom this emotion is a stranger, who can no longer wonder and stand rapt in awe, is as good as dead: his eyes are closed. . ." - Albert Einstein, "What I Believe" (1930) __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com From mehranraeli at comcast.net Fri Jan 27 01:22:28 2006 From: mehranraeli at comcast.net (Mehran) Date: Thu, 26 Jan 2006 20:22:28 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Intelligent Design: I'm not dead yet In-Reply-To: <200601261843.k0QIhhe15530@tick.javien.com> Message-ID: <009201c622e0$2635da40$799f6041@DBX6XT21> Science is the designer in intelligent design. It is scientists who design and modify life forms... genetically modified organisms are just the first step towards truly scientific and intelligently designed life forms. Why future transhumans are always depicted as attached to machines or hooked to computers!? We will be biologically enhanced. The machine part is at best just a transition stage. The proponents of atheist intelligent design such as Raelians promote science, progress and all biological engineerings of life. Singularity is coming fast and noone can stop it. If we want to take full advantage of it at a personal level, we just need to prepare ourselvs mentally and ... culturally. No need for me to type it all here since you can download the book for free. The true Intelligent Design book: www.rael.org LOVE Mehran www.rael.org ------------------------------ Message: 2 Date: Thu, 26 Jan 2006 11:18:18 -0500 From: Robert Bradbury Subject: [extropy-chat] Intelligent Design: I'm not dead yet To: ExICh Message-ID: Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Slashdot is reporting [1] that the BBC is reporting [2] that more than 50% of the people in Britian do not believe in evolution and more than 40% support the teaching of creationism or intelligent design. So this isn't a problem for the United States only. On top of that is this report [3] from Physorg that there are still people out there who believe in intelligent design but they are laying low because the time isn't right to push the ideas into forums that promote brain washing people who have little experience in rational thought. Mind you, I support the idea of "intelligent design" -- but it would be *rational* intelligent design with testable hypotheses. Of interest might be [4] which documents the billions of adherents for various religions, many of which have fundamental problems because they are built on foundations which include arbitrary and/or irrational assumptions. This isn't a small problem and represents a fundamental problem for extropianism and transhumanism in general. It would be interesting to know what fraction of "wars" that took place over the history of humanity were due to conflicts of belief systems (i.e. faith based motivations) rather than conflicts of resource availability (i.e. survival based motivations). The crusades and of course the various Israeli vs. Arab conflicts come to mind. I ask this because if even a small fraction of those "faith-based" thought machines come to the conclusion that transhumanistic ideas (or even science in general) represent a growing threat to their cherished belief systems then you can kiss the singularity goodbye. Sigh, Robert 1. http://science.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=06/01/26/1346255 2. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/4648598.stm 3. http://www.physorg.com/news10145.html 4. http://www.adherents.com/adh_rb.html -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://www.lucifer.com/pipermail/extropy-chat/attachments/20060126/c3041461/ attachment-0001.htm - From bret at bonfireproductions.com Fri Jan 27 01:24:12 2006 From: bret at bonfireproductions.com (Bret Kulakovich) Date: Thu, 26 Jan 2006 20:24:12 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Semantics + Re: Identity and becoming a Great Old One In-Reply-To: <43D951C7.3000906@pobox.com> References: <8d71341e0601260904p1370977fm1227200725fb1450@mail.gmail.com> <332E50AC-6CED-4722-B69D-BD4A77E49783@bonfireproductions.com> <8d71341e0601261024j468403dfne5ee611ad244729@mail.gmail.com> <44064850-EFF0-44F2-B5FC-995F3281CC79@bonfireproductions.com> <43D951C7.3000906@pobox.com> Message-ID: <54D1EE31-9E9D-4103-AE06-AC41D172F965@bonfireproductions.com> Hi Eliezer, The duration, though it does not matter to me in the state of storage - obviously - will certainly dictate the method of revival. Remaining in the flavor of the thread I can safely state that while the possibility of being revived by Jupiter Brains 10 years from now exists, it is extremely remote. Since we have yet to revive anyone, I can also safely state that the method could be threaded, patterned, both or neither, etc. Meanwhile, it remains to be seen if the 'brink' of consciousness will successfully translate my personal experience during any cryonic process. So from my perspective (the one that matters in most in the examples I have been making re:duplication) the "bulb is out" at the scale you speak of, more likely than not. Yes? What is more important in this thread is the terminology being used to re-name classical philosophical definitions. I find this is a bit harrowing. It will be hard for others to take these postulates seriously when the rest of our species is using "monism" and "dualism" while we apply different terms. The geography of Transhumanism is on a landscape we must share with all - even if they died thousands of years ago. Bret K. //apologies - this is more than 8 posts today. On Jan 26, 2006, at 5:48 PM, Eliezer S. Yudkowsky wrote: > Bret Kulakovich wrote: >> Not counting the lapse between shutdown and restart spent inert. >> So cryonics could be arguably threaded or patterned - I don't >> think we'll know until it happens. The bulb is out for a very long >> time before the power is restored. > > What difference does it make if it is 10^40 planck increments > between when your neurons fire, or 10^53 planck increments between > your cryonic suspension and revival? You and your wacky > anthropomorphic notions about "short times" and "long times". To > physics your brain is a motionless statue with neurons firing only > on a timescale of aeons. Even so, you live. > > -- > Eliezer S. Yudkowsky http://singinst.org/ > Research Fellow, Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat From starman2100 at cableone.net Fri Jan 27 02:03:59 2006 From: starman2100 at cableone.net (starman2100 at cableone.net) Date: Thu, 26 Jan 2006 19:03:59 -0700 Subject: [extropy-chat] dalai lama's attitude towards human enhancement Message-ID: <1138327439_36773@S2.cableone.net> An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From nvitamore at austin.rr.com Fri Jan 27 01:35:36 2006 From: nvitamore at austin.rr.com (nvitamore at austin.rr.com) Date: Thu, 26 Jan 2006 20:35:36 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Cryonics and uploading Message-ID: <380-22006152713536817@M2W091.mail2web.com> Hi Starman - The best source on the topic of the continuity of the self and identity is Max's PhD dissertation: http://www.maxmore.com/disscont.htm Natasha -------------------------------------------------------------------- mail2web - Check your email from the web at http://mail2web.com/ . From russell.wallace at gmail.com Fri Jan 27 01:36:45 2006 From: russell.wallace at gmail.com (Russell Wallace) Date: Fri, 27 Jan 2006 01:36:45 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Semantics + Re: Identity and becoming a Great Old One In-Reply-To: <54D1EE31-9E9D-4103-AE06-AC41D172F965@bonfireproductions.com> References: <8d71341e0601260904p1370977fm1227200725fb1450@mail.gmail.com> <332E50AC-6CED-4722-B69D-BD4A77E49783@bonfireproductions.com> <8d71341e0601261024j468403dfne5ee611ad244729@mail.gmail.com> <44064850-EFF0-44F2-B5FC-995F3281CC79@bonfireproductions.com> <43D951C7.3000906@pobox.com> <54D1EE31-9E9D-4103-AE06-AC41D172F965@bonfireproductions.com> Message-ID: <8d71341e0601261736rffaef18o72333ff407669b12@mail.gmail.com> On 1/27/06, Bret Kulakovich wrote: > > What is more important in this thread is the terminology being used > to re-name classical philosophical definitions. I find this is a bit > harrowing. It will be hard for others to take these postulates > seriously when the rest of our species is using "monism" and > "dualism" while we apply different terms. The geography of > Transhumanism is on a landscape we must share with all - even if they > died thousands of years ago. I'm all in favor of reusing existing terminology where possible, but unfortunately "dualism" means at least two completely different things, which makes it worse than useless for our purposes here. - Russell -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From bpaatsch at bigpond.net.au Fri Jan 27 01:51:48 2006 From: bpaatsch at bigpond.net.au (Brett Paatsch) Date: Fri, 27 Jan 2006 12:51:48 +1100 Subject: [extropy-chat] Planck_units References: <8d71341e0601260904p1370977fm1227200725fb1450@mail.gmail.com><332E50AC-6CED-4722-B69D-BD4A77E49783@bonfireproductions.com><8d71341e0601261024j468403dfne5ee611ad244729@mail.gmail.com><44064850-EFF0-44F2-B5FC-995F3281CC79@bonfireproductions.com><43D951C7.3000906@pobox.com><03ce01c622d3$bcff4e50$1283e03c@homepc> <6.2.1.2.0.20060126175811.049b0c40@pop-server.satx.rr.com><03eb01c622d7$51ab9470$1283e03c@homepc> <43D97453.1090006@pobox.com> Message-ID: <041e01c622e4$3c7ada90$1283e03c@homepc> Eliezer S. Yudkowsky wrote: > Brett Paatsch wrote: >> >> Thanks, I did Google on "Planck increment" which is what Eliezer >> usually writes, including if I recall correctly in the front page of your >> book Godplayers. > > Googling, it looks like "Planck interval" is the more common usage for > time, so I'll try to use that from now on. (Though I try to think > interchangably of time increments and space increments, and "interval" > doesn't apply to space quite as well.) You do have me thinking hard Eliezer, like I might have to change my mind on something sort of hard. Kudos, and my thanks for that. I'm not persuaded to the wisdom of cryonics but as a result of your argument I'm less confident than I was about the validity of the discontinuity objection to it. I hope it is intellectual caution and not my arrogance or stupidity that causes me to conceed less quickly than I should. Brett Paatsch From sjatkins at mac.com Fri Jan 27 03:13:02 2006 From: sjatkins at mac.com (Samantha Atkins) Date: Thu, 26 Jan 2006 19:13:02 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Intelligent Design: I'm not dead yet In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On Jan 26, 2006, at 8:18 AM, Robert Bradbury wrote: > Mind you, I support the idea of "intelligent design" -- but it > would be *rational* intelligent design with testable hypotheses. > Of interest might be [4] which documents the billions of adherents > for various religions, many of which have fundamental problems > because they are built on foundations which include arbitrary and/ > or irrational assumptions. This isn't a small problem and > represents a fundamental problem for extropianism and transhumanism > in general. It would be interesting to know what fraction of > "wars" that took place over the history of humanity were due to > conflicts of belief systems ( i.e. faith based motivations) rather > than conflicts of resource availability (i.e. survival based > motivations). The crusades and of course the various Israeli vs. > Arab conflicts come to mind. I ask this because if even a small > fraction of those "faith-based" thought machines come to the > conclusion that transhumanistic ideas (or even science in general) > represent a growing threat to their cherished belief systems then > you can kiss the singularity goodbye. > How come? The Crusades and various Israel-Arab conflicts were paltry little affairs compared to the major wars of the last century. The historical record doesn't make your case. Now, if we decide to declare an all out conflict targeted at one or more major religions, that would be a dangerous and foolish thing to do. Let's not go there. - samantha From russell.wallace at gmail.com Fri Jan 27 03:34:32 2006 From: russell.wallace at gmail.com (Russell Wallace) Date: Fri, 27 Jan 2006 03:34:32 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Intelligent Design: I'm not dead yet In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <8d71341e0601261934i7b7b1c95lfd7f4146eb9bdac7@mail.gmail.com> On 1/27/06, Samantha Atkins wrote: > > How come? The Crusades and various Israel-Arab conflicts were paltry > little affairs compared to the major wars of the last century. The > historical record doesn't make your case. Now, if we decide to > declare an all out conflict targeted at one or more major religions, > that would be a dangerous and foolish thing to do. Let's not go there. I agree. Most followers of the world's major religions are not enemies of progress. Yes, a minority of fanatics are; the same is true among atheists; to indiscriminately tag all "faith-based thinkers" as the enemy is both untrue and unproductive. - Russell -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From kerry_prez at yahoo.com Fri Jan 27 03:34:53 2006 From: kerry_prez at yahoo.com (Al Brooks) Date: Thu, 26 Jan 2006 19:34:53 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Intelligent Design: I'm not dead yet In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <20060127033453.39305.qmail@web51611.mail.yahoo.com> The Arab-Israeli conflict has been no paltry affair-- and is no paltry affair at this time. No one can say how many casualties will occur in the mideast; we know it will be in the thousands, it might be millions. It is even conceivable billions will ultimately die because of what is brewing in that screwed-up region of political & military quicksand. >Samantha Atkins wrote: >How come? The Crusades and various Israel-Arab conflicts were paltry >little affairs compared to the major wars of the last century. --------------------------------- What are the most popular cars? Find out at Yahoo! Autos -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From spike66 at comcast.net Fri Jan 27 03:58:47 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Thu, 26 Jan 2006 19:58:47 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Identity and becoming a Great Old One In-Reply-To: <8d71341e0601261024j468403dfne5ee611ad244729@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <200601270359.k0R3x0e05757@tick.javien.com> ... bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Russell Wallace ... So to test my theory: Suppose you were offered the chance to become a Great Old One, slowly and incrementally...- Russell Russell, I figure I'm well on my way to becoming a Great Old One, for slowly and incrementally I have become a Reasonably Good Middle Aged One. spike From spike66 at comcast.net Fri Jan 27 04:18:12 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Thu, 26 Jan 2006 20:18:12 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Re: Identity and becoming a Great Old One In-Reply-To: <43D952A2.1080608@pobox.com> Message-ID: <200601270418.k0R4IJe07365@tick.javien.com> > bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Eliezer S. Yudkowsky ... > > So thee wishes not to be a Great Old One, Russell Wallace? I should > like to know what is thy alternative. > > -- > Eliezer S. Yudkowsky In the long run, there are no other alternatives, unfortunately. It's either Great Old One or Great Cold One. spike From velvethum at hotmail.com Fri Jan 27 05:33:25 2006 From: velvethum at hotmail.com (Heartland) Date: Fri, 27 Jan 2006 00:33:25 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Cryonics should be preserving life, not just identity. Message-ID: >From my blog: "Cogito ergo sum" - Ren? Descartes "I don't want to achieve immortality through my work... I want to achieve it through not dying." - Woody Allen Life is a subjective experience of being in the present. Death is a subjective experience of nothingess. Life is powered by an activity of matter in space and time. Even though life depends on the existence of matter, it's only the activity of that matter in time and space that causes life to exist. And this: http://sl4.org/archive/0510/12465.html I fully subscribe to "the thread view" that Russell Wallace mentioned earlier. (BTW, nice term, although I'm not sure if non-programmers would fully appreciate it. In my writings about the topic I refer to "the thread" simply as "life".) Cryonics makes no sense if it tries to preserve the identity of the original while forgetting to preserve the *life* of the original. sp From fauxever at sprynet.com Fri Jan 27 06:58:12 2006 From: fauxever at sprynet.com (Olga Bourlin) Date: Thu, 26 Jan 2006 22:58:12 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] What's the Antonym for Longevity? Message-ID: <005001c6230f$0ab232d0$6600a8c0@brainiac> Compared to women, the statistics on how many males kill themselves seem to be way out of whack - and much worse than I thought, if there's any credence to this article: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2006/01/26/BAGHRGT0DV1.DTL If true, it's disturbing and sad (and even more puzzling that many women still tend to think of themselves as "victims"). Olga From sjatkins at mac.com Fri Jan 27 07:53:39 2006 From: sjatkins at mac.com (Samantha Atkins) Date: Thu, 26 Jan 2006 23:53:39 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Intelligent Design: I'm not dead yet In-Reply-To: <20060127033453.39305.qmail@web51611.mail.yahoo.com> References: <20060127033453.39305.qmail@web51611.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <8A02BF34-FCCB-48CB-BED3-A96968D98847@mac.com> On Jan 26, 2006, at 7:34 PM, Al Brooks wrote: > The Arab-Israeli conflict has been no paltry affair-- and is no > paltry affair at this time. No one can say how many casualties will > occur in the mideast; we know it will be in the thousands, it might > be millions. > It is even conceivable billions will ultimately die because of > what is brewing in that screwed-up region of political & military > quicksand. > The point was simply that compared to world wars and other things that could actually threaten Singularity religion based wars appear to be pretty far down on the list. It is not conceivable that "billions will die" unless major armed states like the US and Russia start hurling nukes regarding local squabbles. But then the real energy behind such a possibility is our continuing dependence on fossil fuel not religion per se. An energy war is one very likely way we may never get to Singularity. Only if we are pretty stupid will we see directly by force of arms opposing a religion (or all religions) as being worth possibly missing Singularity. - samantha From mbb386 at main.nc.us Fri Jan 27 12:19:47 2006 From: mbb386 at main.nc.us (MB) Date: Fri, 27 Jan 2006 07:19:47 -0500 (EST) Subject: [extropy-chat] What's the Antonym for Longevity? In-Reply-To: <005001c6230f$0ab232d0$6600a8c0@brainiac> References: <005001c6230f$0ab232d0$6600a8c0@brainiac> Message-ID: <34105.72.236.102.115.1138364387.squirrel@main.nc.us> > Compared to women, the statistics on how many males kill themselves seem > to > be way out of whack - and much worse than I thought, if there's any > credence > to this article: > > http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2006/01/26/BAGHRGT0DV1.DTL > > If true, it's disturbing and sad (and even more puzzling that many women > still tend to think of themselves as "victims"). > Yes that is shocking and very frightening. In my experience they're right, too - I don't know any female suicides, but several male ones. :( However... women today are constantly being told they're victims. Everywhere, in all situations. As workers, mothers, lovers, wives, professionals, scientists - you name it, the woman is a victim of *something* or *somebody*. They're not truly taught that they're strong and capable and responsible for their own future. Even now. :( At least that's how I see it. My daughter is running along nicely, but she's certainly played the victim role, much to the family's disgust. We can only hope she's out of that, but who knows? Regards, MB From bret at bonfireproductions.com Fri Jan 27 14:22:24 2006 From: bret at bonfireproductions.com (Bret Kulakovich) Date: Fri, 27 Jan 2006 09:22:24 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Semantics + Re: Identity and becoming a Great Old One In-Reply-To: <8d71341e0601261736rffaef18o72333ff407669b12@mail.gmail.com> References: <8d71341e0601260904p1370977fm1227200725fb1450@mail.gmail.com> <332E50AC-6CED-4722-B69D-BD4A77E49783@bonfireproductions.com> <8d71341e0601261024j468403dfne5ee611ad244729@mail.gmail.com> <44064850-EFF0-44F2-B5FC-995F3281CC79@bonfireproductions.com> <43D951C7.3000906@pobox.com> <54D1EE31-9E9D-4103-AE06-AC41D172F965@bonfireproductions.com> <8d71341e0601261736rffaef18o72333ff407669b12@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <052417DB-E6E2-405A-9BB4-2BDB30C7A4C8@bonfireproductions.com> Yes, there are a few flavors of Dualism, but they are all based on Plato, and distinct enough. I am more into being wrong than right, believe me - but the pattern view you are talking about is pretty much Neutral Monism. The threaded view is a type of dualism, and in some extreme examples arguably Parallelism or (egh) Phenominalism. And the reason I bring this up, again, is while interacting with the rest of the world, wanting them to understand things like the Proactionary Principle and such, we need to reduce terms to basics and only claim what is our own as new. Coming to the table saying we espouse the "Threaded View" and the other party returning "You mean Cartesian Dualism?" would not strengthen our standing. So hey- If you get a chance, I am not asking to be catered to - it would help a great deal all involved if the distinctions between Threaded and Patterned, Dualism and Monism could be illustrated by examples that would not make them so. At worst, you have a new Dualism an Monism here ; ) Bret K. On Jan 26, 2006, at 8:36 PM, Russell Wallace wrote: > On 1/27/06, Bret Kulakovich wrote: > What is more important in this thread is the terminology being used > to re-name classical philosophical definitions. I find this is a bit > harrowing. It will be hard for others to take these postulates > seriously when the rest of our species is using "monism" and > "dualism" while we apply different terms. The geography of > Transhumanism is on a landscape we must share with all - even if they > died thousands of years ago. > > I'm all in favor of reusing existing terminology where possible, > but unfortunately "dualism" means at least two completely different > things, which makes it worse than useless for our purposes here. > > - Russell > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From rafal.smigrodzki at gmail.com Fri Jan 27 14:25:57 2006 From: rafal.smigrodzki at gmail.com (Rafal Smigrodzki) Date: Fri, 27 Jan 2006 09:25:57 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Re: Identity and becoming a Great Old One In-Reply-To: <43D952A2.1080608@pobox.com> References: <8d71341e0601260904p1370977fm1227200725fb1450@mail.gmail.com> <43D952A2.1080608@pobox.com> Message-ID: <7641ddc60601270625ge178cddi5fdf12562fc3ec1e@mail.gmail.com> On 1/26/06, Eliezer S. Yudkowsky wrote: > 1: A finite computer has only a finite number of possible states. In > the long run, then, you *must* either die (not do any processing past a > finite number of operations), go into an infinite loop (also implying no > further processing), or grow beyond any finite bound. Those are your > only three options, no matter the physics. Being human forever isn't on > the list. That is not a moral judgment, it's an unarguable mathematical > fact. In the long run - the really long run - humanity isn't an option. > ### Is being human (in the sense of having a certain threshold number of similarities to myself) really unavoidably a finite process? The answer depends crucially on the type of properties that constitute being human as opposed to an Old One - I would contend that if you choose the right definition of yourself, you could become infinite without losing it. In fact, although I have insufficient data, I surmise that the current essence of Smigrodzkism is compatible with infinity. The first component of this essence is that for a device to be legitimately classified as an instance of myself it has to contain a certain finite amount of information that describes my current memories, without limitation on the total amount of information contained within the device - and it appears that this doesn't force the device into finitude. The second component of the essence is a stipulation that in situations analogous to my current circumstances the device must make certain choices identically to my current instance, or its versions that have better information about outcomes of actions, including a version possessing full and certain information about outcomes of actions (choices of versions with more information trump the choices of versions with less information). Not all choices must be identical, only some choices in some situations, and on of the points of reference is, as I said, a hypothetical, omniscient version of myself, which is itself an infinite being. Thus, the second part of the essence not only does not limit my future self but even requires an infinite being for the definition. I think it is then reasonable to conclude that being Rafal is not necessarily a finite process. Rafal From jonkc at att.net Fri Jan 27 15:14:50 2006 From: jonkc at att.net (John K Clark) Date: Fri, 27 Jan 2006 10:14:50 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Cryonics and uploading References: <1138326404_36477@S2.cableone.net> Message-ID: <00c801c62354$9ba33fb0$84074e0c@MyComputer> Bret Kulakovich bret at bonfireproductions.com Wrote: >Here are two instances of John Clark. Now each of them is conscious. Yes. > Two separate conscious entities, I am assuming. No. At that point there is only one conscious entity, there are just two bodies. > One walks out of the room and comes back a while later. Do they both know > where the one who left went? Of course not, one has had experiences the other has not so they are no longer identical, they are thinking different thoughts, they are now different conscious entities. > The one on my left, is the original. On my right, the 'copy'. I could mark > one with a Sharpie, so I don't mix them up. Why should you care if you mix them up? For some reason whenever somebody proposes such a thought experiment they always put themselves in the position of the "original", but supposes you looked down and saw the word "copy" written on your arm. Even though you were created 30 seconds ago you feel just as you always did, you still have vivid memories of your childhood, so is there any reason to be upset? I can't think of any. Or suppose the duplicating chamber was symmetrical, there is a flash of light and you are staring across the chamber at somebody who looks just like you. Are you the "copy" or the "original"? Who cares. starman2100 at cableone.net Wrote: > A very vocal opponent of his view takes out a handy plasma rifle and > pointing it at the original man's head says, "are you so sure of your > statement that my pulling the trigger doesn't worry you?" Certainly that would worry me because the two copies are now not anywhere near to being identical, one is being threatened with death and having a very traumatic experience and the other is not. I can't think of anything that would make the two diverge faster. John K Clark From dirk.bruere at gmail.com Fri Jan 27 15:19:03 2006 From: dirk.bruere at gmail.com (Dirk Bruere) Date: Fri, 27 Jan 2006 15:19:03 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Intelligent Design: I'm not dead yet In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On 1/26/06, Robert Bradbury wrote: > > Slashdot is reporting [1] that the BBC is reporting [2] that more than 50% > of the people in Britian do not believe in evolution and more than 40% > support the teaching of creationism or intelligent design. So this isn't a > problem for the United States only. Yes it is. There is absolutely no pressure to teach ID in schools here. No religious orgs or movements have anything like the power they do in the US. Here, such opinions stay opinions. They are not translated into political action. Dirk -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Fri Jan 27 15:58:29 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Fri, 27 Jan 2006 10:58:29 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Computing Power: Moore's Law keeps going and goingand going In-Reply-To: <039d01c622ca$81aec2d0$1283e03c@homepc> References: <20060126184819.35016.qmail@web81606.mail.mud.yahoo.com> <039d01c622ca$81aec2d0$1283e03c@homepc> Message-ID: On 1/26/06, Brett Paatsch wrote: The unit of biology is the cell not the atom. Its the cell that does the > replicating and any particular human body we have experience of to date has > developed from cells, not atoms. > Let me state this very clearly -- self-replication is *NOT* necessary for "real nanotechnology" (at least in my book). Josh Hall wrote a paper 5+ years ago demonstrating quite clearly that nanotechnology assembly lines could be very fast. Put another way a specific dedicated assembly process can be much more efficient than a general purpose assembly process. This relates to the "broadcast" architecture for nanorobotic assembly methods -- you do not have to replicate the subcomponents which store and retreive the information (DNA & RNA in cells). All that is required is the receiver for the instruction scheme. This corresponds someplace between SIMD and MIMD in computer architectures -- but not general purpose self-replicating assemblers. While some people view self-replication as a goal to be achieved (i.e. 'we have created life') I tend to view it as misdirected energy which could be better utilized designing nanoscale parts and/or nanofactories for them. We already have self-replicating, relatively general purpose assembly systems (bacteria) which we have been and continue to engineer for various purposes. The advantage a "cell" has over "soup" is that it allows for reactant concentration and speeds up the rates at which molecules can be broken down and/or reassembled. That becomes largely irrelevant when nanofactories are fed relatively pure small molecule reactant streams. (Why do you think I wrote the paper about the assembly of an aircraft carrier from an oil pipeline???). DNA does not replicate on its own. Ribosomes don't work outside of their > cellular environments. > DNA is replicated using a reactant pool (esp. Primers, DNA bases & ATP) and a single molecular machine (one of the various DNA polymerases). This is the entire basis of PCR amplification (replication) of DNA. DNA replication does not require a cell. DNA polymerases are molecular machines that I would guess are around 10-20nm in size (still smaller than current scale lithography). Extracellular production of proteins from RNA is also feasible (I believe you can buy kits for this from the molecuar biology companies). Whether all of the components on the kits are produced de novo or whether some are isolated from cells I do not know. But the chemistry and biochemistry for the production of all of the necessary molecular machines for these processes is well known. It is simply a cost issue of whether it is cheaper to do the reactant synthesis from cheap materials or separate the already built reactants from biological systems. The *generally* in that sentence is one hell of a hard working word. > Actually, it is "biological systems" that may be the point of confusion. I was *not* refering to self-replicating biological systems which probably require a minimal size of 200-300nm, more probably 500+nm (I'll believe nanobacteria exist when I see the genome sequence for one deposited in a database). What I was refering to was biological disassembly or assembly systems (everything from single enzymes to enzyme complexes to enzyme systems). Those I believe fall into the 5-20nm range. There may be a few that are somewhat larger but I doubt many are larger than 100nm (though obviously the protein chain could be longer). But there are feedback mechanisms in place such that glycolysis operates > sometimes and gluconeogenesis other times and various GLUT receptors on > various types of cells are sensing different levels of blood glucose. > [snip] > Yes of course. I was talking about systems that would circulate *only* small molecules such as glucose. Both the kidney and dialysis machines are examples of systems which allow selective transport of various molecules from one side of a membranes to another (look up their wikipedia entries or see [1]). In fact you could get the same effect by inhibiting the transporters in the kidney which reabsorb glucose. The reason that diabetics have sweet urine is that the blood sugar glucose levels are so high that they overwhelm the reuptake transporters [2]. But rather than taking a drug to inhibit glucose reuptake it seemed much cooler to plug yourself into something which uses the glucose for a useful purpose. Damien is right about the connection problems of course. But this is something that people are working on very intensely because they want to monitor blood glucose levels and be able to have a computer administer insulin as required. There are different routes being pursued towards this which involve implanted and external solutions which obviously have different advantages and disadvantages. Robert 1. http://arbl.cvmbs.colostate.edu/hbooks/molecules/hexose_xport.html 2. http://science.uwaterloo.ca/~mpalmer/MetabolismNotes/page-14.7.html -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jef at jefallbright.net Fri Jan 27 16:04:13 2006 From: jef at jefallbright.net (Jef Allbright) Date: Fri, 27 Jan 2006 08:04:13 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Re: Identity and becoming a Great Old One In-Reply-To: <7641ddc60601270625ge178cddi5fdf12562fc3ec1e@mail.gmail.com> References: <8d71341e0601260904p1370977fm1227200725fb1450@mail.gmail.com> <43D952A2.1080608@pobox.com> <7641ddc60601270625ge178cddi5fdf12562fc3ec1e@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <22360fa10601270804m61e809acs28c7f781c8654161@mail.gmail.com> On 1/27/06, Rafal Smigrodzki wrote: > > On 1/26/06, Eliezer S. Yudkowsky wrote: > > > 1: A finite computer has only a finite number of possible states. In > > the long run, then, you *must* either die (not do any processing past a > > finite number of operations), go into an infinite loop (also implying no > > further processing), or grow beyond any finite bound. Those are your > > only three options, no matter the physics. Being human forever isn't on > > the list. That is not a moral judgment, it's an unarguable mathematical > > fact. In the long run - the really long run - humanity isn't an option. > > > ### Is being human (in the sense of having a certain threshold number > of similarities to myself) really unavoidably a finite process? The > answer depends crucially on the type of properties that constitute > being human as opposed to an Old One - I would contend that if you > choose the right definition of yourself, you could become infinite > without losing it. > > In fact, although I have insufficient data, I surmise that the current > essence of Smigrodzkism is compatible with infinity. I would suggest that the current conception of an "essence of Smigrodzkism" is not about essence, but about a description of a process. The specified process has been ongoing for less than half a century and its current working description is dominated by events weighted toward the present. One could argue that there was a genetic essence of Smigrodzkism even before birth that has been carried forward as a set of characteristics that influence the propensities of the present Smigrodzki, but environment and happenstance already outweigh the influence of this early essence. Given a further 1000 years of growth, the essential *description* of Smigrodzki of 2006 would be seen as a historical factoid, multidimensional and descriptive of what it meant to be a certain creative, thinking human at that time, but nearly insignificant in terms of what would define and influence a capable intelligent agent of the fourth millenium. The first component of this essence is that for a device to be > legitimately classified as an instance of myself it has to contain a > certain finite amount of information that describes my current > memories, without limitation on the total amount of information > contained within the device - and it appears that this doesn't force > the device into finitude. Storage of past versions should not be difficult, but such historical data will be of diminishing significance. The second component of the essence is a stipulation that in > situations analogous to my current circumstances the device must make > certain choices identically to my current instance, or its versions > that have better information about outcomes of actions, including a > version possessing full and certain information about outcomes of > actions (choices of versions with more information trump the choices > of versions with less information). Not all choices must be identical, > only some choices in some situations, and on of the points of > reference is, as I said, a hypothetical, omniscient version of myself, > which is itself an infinite being. Thus, the second part of the > essence not only does not limit my future self but even requires an > infinite being for the definition. I think what is missing here is that not only will Smigrodzki change over time, but the environment too will change, and he will eventually find himself to be not only a substantially different player, but that the game itself will have changed. Therefore, the basis of comparison between the newer and older versions of Smigrodzki will become vanishingly small. Your point about such comparisons would remain technically correct, but irrelevant. I think it is then reasonable to conclude that being Rafal is not > necessarily a finite process. We are not necessarily finite, because we can in principle continue to grow indefinitely and continue to project our updated values in the future. However, we are practically finite because in a competitive co-evolving environment, any substantial description of our past selves rapidly becomes irrelevant. - Jef -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From analyticphilosophy at gmail.com Fri Jan 27 16:23:16 2006 From: analyticphilosophy at gmail.com (Jeff Medina) Date: Fri, 27 Jan 2006 11:23:16 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Semantics + Re: Identity and becoming a Great Old One In-Reply-To: <052417DB-E6E2-405A-9BB4-2BDB30C7A4C8@bonfireproductions.com> References: <8d71341e0601260904p1370977fm1227200725fb1450@mail.gmail.com> <332E50AC-6CED-4722-B69D-BD4A77E49783@bonfireproductions.com> <8d71341e0601261024j468403dfne5ee611ad244729@mail.gmail.com> <44064850-EFF0-44F2-B5FC-995F3281CC79@bonfireproductions.com> <43D951C7.3000906@pobox.com> <54D1EE31-9E9D-4103-AE06-AC41D172F965@bonfireproductions.com> <8d71341e0601261736rffaef18o72333ff407669b12@mail.gmail.com> <052417DB-E6E2-405A-9BB4-2BDB30C7A4C8@bonfireproductions.com> Message-ID: <5844e22f0601270823w2cde03dt4b66bcdb3ea31562@mail.gmail.com> On 1/27/06, Bret Kulakovich wrote: > Yes, there are a few flavors of Dualism, but they are all based on Plato, In any sense other than that of the trivial "all philosophy is a footnote to Plato" platitude, this claim is false. There are numerous 'flavors' of dualism in contemporary philosophy of mind, and most of them bear so little resemblance to anything Plato wrote as to be not worth mentioning. > the pattern view you are talking about is pretty much Neutral Monism. The > threaded view is a type of dualism, and in some extreme examples arguably > Parallelism or (egh) Phenominalism. While they may seem similar to you, that the pattern & threaded views reduce to types of these others is (1) arguable, and hence would require quite a bit of tangential discussion to establish, with little foreseeable value in so doing, and (2) pointless, as there are many nuances to different philosophers' variants of general terms like dualism, monism, neutral monism, etc., so people would still need to clarify what they meant by "phenomenalism", leading to the very same discussion of the threaded view that is currently going on. > as new. Coming to the table saying we espouse the "Threaded View" and the > other party returning "You mean Cartesian Dualism?" would not strengthen our > standing. Sure it would, after we pointed out that they were wrong to dismiss someone's nuanced view with a philosophical red herring it to them bore some resemblance. It would only harm our standing if they would be right to call it Cartesian dualism, and they wouldn't. > So hey- If you get a chance, I am not asking to be catered to - it would > help a great deal all involved if the distinctions between Threaded and > Patterned, Dualism and Monism could be illustrated by examples that would > not make them so. Introducing these various terms will only serve to confuse the discussion, because a lot of people have half-baked, half-read understandings of them, and people will be forced to respond again and again to misdirected comments based on different conceptions of the broad philosophical terms. I therefore strongly recommend *not* introducing these terms. In fact, I may just add them to my auto-trash filter, along with q-ualia and f-ree will. -- Jeff Medina http://www.painfullyclear.com/ Community Director Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence http://www.singinst.org/ Relationships & Community Fellow Institute for Ethics & Emerging Technologies http://www.ieet.org/ School of Philosophy, Birkbeck, University of London http://www.bbk.ac.uk/phil/ From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Fri Jan 27 16:32:25 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Fri, 27 Jan 2006 11:32:25 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Cryonics should be preserving life, not just identity. In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On 1/27/06, Heartland wrote: > > Cryonics makes no sense if it tries to preserve the identity of the > original while forgetting to preserve the *life* of the original. Actually that may be the case for you but may not be the case for everyone. I think my father might not prefer to continue on an exteremely extended life if many of the people he has cared about have died (my mother for example). I proposed something along these lines a few weeks ago but it did not lead to an active thread. Briefly they are: 1) Total reanimation of the "thread" (i.e. *you* get to run who *you* consider yourself to be). 2) Total recovery of all of the memories of a life preserved within a brain. Though presumably if these were uploaded these would allow one to "inhabit" the mind of that person. (Do I really want to be Paris Hilton?) 3) Total recovery of all of the "good" memories of a life preserved within a brain. E.g. my father might prefer to pass along his memories of his childhood, my paternal grandfather (whom I never knew), my great grandfather, etc. but not pass on his memories of WWII. I suspect this would require something like bequeathing ones brain to a trust and allowing information withdrawal from the trust under carefully controlled situations (similar to today's medical ethics evaluation committees dealing with things like allowable organ donations, transplants, etc.). In cases not foreseen this might require partial "reactivation" of the evaluation centers (which could be connected to the emotional centers) of the mind in order to evaluate a withdrawal request which was unanticipated with the trust was established. It gets very dicey if it was specified in the memory trust establishment that full "thread" activations were not allowed. Robert -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From starman2100 at cableone.net Fri Jan 27 17:40:39 2006 From: starman2100 at cableone.net (starman2100 at cableone.net) Date: Fri, 27 Jan 2006 10:40:39 -0700 Subject: [extropy-chat] Re: Identity and becoming a Great Old One Message-ID: <1138383639_48749@S2.cableone.net> An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jonkc at att.net Fri Jan 27 17:21:58 2006 From: jonkc at att.net (John K Clark) Date: Fri, 27 Jan 2006 12:21:58 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Cryonics and uploading References: <1138326404_36477@S2.cableone.net> Message-ID: <06ab01c62366$350cde70$84074e0c@MyComputer> starman2100 at cableone.net > I believe the term Robert Ettinger uses for describing the continuity of > the consciousness is the "self-circuit." Ettinger has been pushing that tired old idea for years and I think it's really silly. I have a sense of self so I must have a self circuit, my radio can play Beethoven so it must have a Beethoven circuit. Pretty Silly. Also Ettinger's circuit doesn't do a damn thing except give us a sense of self, so if we have one then Evolution is wrong because it could never have produced it in a million years, or a billion, or a trillion, or a trillion trillion. In fact "self circuit" is just a euphemism for the Soul. > A favorite analogy of mine regarding the question, "is a perfect copy of > me, actually me? Did I read your original message on my computer or only a copy? Perhaps if I'd read your ORIGINAL message it would have convinced me, as it is I only saw a lowly copy. John K Clark From sentience at pobox.com Fri Jan 27 17:32:13 2006 From: sentience at pobox.com (Eliezer S. Yudkowsky) Date: Fri, 27 Jan 2006 09:32:13 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Re: Identity and becoming a Great Old One In-Reply-To: <6fdad3790601270655h24f19194t6cd0b9faaa97a8ce@mail.gmail.com> References: <8d71341e0601260904p1370977fm1227200725fb1450@mail.gmail.com> <43D952A2.1080608@pobox.com> <6fdad3790601270655h24f19194t6cd0b9faaa97a8ce@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <43DA591D.8090200@pobox.com> Philip Goetz wrote: > > I suspect that if you worked it out, you would come to the heat death > of the universe before a human brain needed to repeat state. If not, > add another hundred neurons. Yes, I'm well aware of that. If our current model of physics is correct, we must eventually somehow jump to a universe with different laws of physics, or do something else creative, or die. Current physical models should permit me to get all the living done which my current brain is large enough to actually want, so that problem I bequeath to my future self. It'll probably be quite some time before I can realistically want something that would require me to escape the heat death of the universe. One suspects that laying down new memories, learning new skills, and becoming a person who can exist coherently with so much knowledge and capability, requires the brain to grow at a (hopefully sub-cubic) rate which leads into Great Old One territory much faster than the requirement of not repeating yourself. But the part about not repeating yourself is easier to see mathematically. The point is that if you genuinely want to escape death, you have to become a Great Old One eventually. And if you *can't* escape death, what is the point of *not* becoming a Great Old One? It would seem obvious that *not* wanting to *eventually* become a Great Old One must be based *strictly* on a form of *very long term* death-fear, rather than desire for life, or fear of any localizable discontinuity. If you want life, Great Old Ones Have More Fun (or what's the point of being a Great Old One?) If you're afraid of dying in the short term, you won't cease to be you next week. You will never, from your perspective, cease to be you in the next week. The argument against becoming a Great Old One is based on fear of *eventual* change, that if you dare to learn a little tomorrow, then you'll learn even more the day after that, and *eventually* your future self will be so different that your self of 2006 will have ceased to exist. But your self of 2006 cannot live forever as a pre-Singularity human, whether because of the heat death of the universe, or because there's a finite number of available brain states of finite size. So if you never cease to exist as yourself in the next week; and it's either physically or mathematically impossible to continue forever as a pre-Singularity human; and you have more fun if you're allowed to learn things; that would seem to force you down the slippery slope that leads into Great Oldness. -- Eliezer S. Yudkowsky http://singinst.org/ Research Fellow, Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence From natasha at natasha.cc Fri Jan 27 17:37:05 2006 From: natasha at natasha.cc (Natasha Vita-More) Date: Fri, 27 Jan 2006 11:37:05 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] ACA International Creativity Conference Message-ID: <6.2.1.2.2.20060127113544.02d15c10@pop-server.austin.rr.com> American Creativity Association International Conference March 22 - 25, 2006, Austin, Texas * Peggy Van Pelt (Walt Disney Imagineering, Los Angeles, CA) * Andrew Ouderkirk (3M Corporate Scientist, 3M, Minneapolis, MN) * David Pearce Snyder (Independent Consulting Futurist) * Michael Beyerlein (Director of the Center for Collaborative Organizations, University of North Texas, Denton, TX) * Sam Stern (Dean, School of Education, Oregon State University, Portland, OR) * Doug Hall (Founder and CEO, Eureka Ranch, Cincinnati, OH) * Kirpal Singh (Professor, School of Economics & Social Sciences, Singapore Management University, Singapore) * Ann Herrmann-Nehdi (CEO, Herrmann Brain Dominance Institute, Lake Lure, NC) * Alex N. Pattakos (Director, Center for Personal Meaning, Santa Fe, NM) * Abdullah Alsafi (Professor, King Khalid University, Abha, Saudi Arabia) * Ta -Wei Lee (Professor, National Taiwan Normal University, Taiwan) * Betty Otter Nickerson (COO, Lance Armstrong Foundation, Austin, TX) * Mitchel Stoller (CEO, Lance Armstrong Foundation, Austin, TX). Natasha Vita-More Cultural Strategist - Designer Future Studies, University of Houston President, Extropy Institute Member, Association of Professional Futurists Founder, Transhumanist Arts & Culture Honorary Vice-Chair, World Transhumanist Association Senior Associate, Foresight Institute Advisor, Alcor Life Extension Foundation If you draw a circle in the sand and study only what's inside the circle, then that is a closed-system perspective. If you study what is inside the circle and everything outside the circle, then that is an open system perspective. Buckminster Fuller -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From kevin at kevinfreels.com Fri Jan 27 17:41:06 2006 From: kevin at kevinfreels.com (kevinfreels.com) Date: Fri, 27 Jan 2006 11:41:06 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] Intelligent Design: I'm not dead yet References: Message-ID: <00dc01c62368$da89c230$640fa8c0@kevin> What I find interesting is that the Vatican supports the teaching of evolution in schools and not ID. It's almost as if ID has become it's own religion. ----- Original Message ----- From: Dirk Bruere To: ExI chat list Sent: Friday, January 27, 2006 9:19 AM Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] Intelligent Design: I'm not dead yet On 1/26/06, Robert Bradbury wrote: Slashdot is reporting [1] that the BBC is reporting [2] that more than 50% of the people in Britian do not believe in evolution and more than 40% support the teaching of creationism or intelligent design. So this isn't a problem for the United States only. Yes it is. There is absolutely no pressure to teach ID in schools here. No religious orgs or movements have anything like the power they do in the US. Here, such opinions stay opinions. They are not translated into political action. Dirk ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ _______________________________________________ extropy-chat mailing list extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From spike66 at comcast.net Fri Jan 27 18:17:47 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Fri, 27 Jan 2006 10:17:47 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Re: Identity and becoming a Great Old One In-Reply-To: <1138383639_48749@S2.cableone.net> Message-ID: <200601271817.k0RIHre21675@tick.javien.com> bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of starman2100 at cableone.net ? John P.S. Spike, what is going on with messages bouncing and not making it through to the list?? I've had some problems. Hmmm, I don't know John. I checked your ExI status and it doesn't show anything amiss. I haven't had any bounces when I try to post, so I assume nothing is up with the ExI-chat server. Anyone else getting bounces? If not John the problem must be on your end. Are you getting bounces from anything else that you are posting to? Is your ISP goofing up somehow? I will watch the spam filter carefully, make sure it isn't catching your stuff for some odd reason. spike From starman2100 at cableone.net Fri Jan 27 19:16:11 2006 From: starman2100 at cableone.net (starman2100 at cableone.net) Date: Fri, 27 Jan 2006 12:16:11 -0700 Subject: [extropy-chat] Intelligent Design: I'm not dead yet Message-ID: <1138389371_50746@S2.cableone.net> An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From bret at bonfireproductions.com Fri Jan 27 18:54:34 2006 From: bret at bonfireproductions.com (Bret Kulakovich) Date: Fri, 27 Jan 2006 13:54:34 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Semantics + Re: Identity and becoming a Great Old One In-Reply-To: <5844e22f0601270823w2cde03dt4b66bcdb3ea31562@mail.gmail.com> References: <8d71341e0601260904p1370977fm1227200725fb1450@mail.gmail.com> <332E50AC-6CED-4722-B69D-BD4A77E49783@bonfireproductions.com> <8d71341e0601261024j468403dfne5ee611ad244729@mail.gmail.com> <44064850-EFF0-44F2-B5FC-995F3281CC79@bonfireproductions.com> <43D951C7.3000906@pobox.com> <54D1EE31-9E9D-4103-AE06-AC41D172F965@bonfireproductions.com> <8d71341e0601261736rffaef18o72333ff407669b12@mail.gmail.com> <052417DB-E6E2-405A-9BB4-2BDB30C7A4C8@bonfireproductions.com> <5844e22f0601270823w2cde03dt4b66bcdb3ea31562@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On Jan 27, 2006, at 11:23 AM, Jeff Medina wrote: > On 1/27/06, Bret Kulakovich wrote: >> Yes, there are a few flavors of Dualism, but they are all based on >> Plato, > > In any sense other than that of the trivial "all philosophy is a > footnote to Plato" platitude, this claim is false. That the mind and body are separate, which is important in the context of the Threaded thread - regardless of how much I have simplified exactly for your terms below - is actually a part of each form of Dualism. As I am sure you are aware given your .sig >> the pattern view you are talking about is pretty much Neutral >> Monism. The >> threaded view is a type of dualism, and in some extreme examples >> arguably >> Parallelism or (egh) Phenominalism. > > While they may seem similar to you, that the pattern & threaded views > reduce to types of these others is (1) arguable, and hence would > require quite a bit of tangential discussion to establish, with little > foreseeable value in so doing, and (2) pointless, as there are many > nuances to different philosophers' variants of general terms like > dualism, monism, neutral monism, etc., so people would still need to > clarify what they meant by "phenomenalism", leading to the very same > discussion of the threaded view that is currently going on. Jeff, I'm pretty sure internet mailing lists are generally defined by (1) and (2). >> So hey- If you get a chance, I am not asking to be catered to - >> it would >> help a great deal all involved if the distinctions between >> Threaded and >> Patterned, Dualism and Monism could be illustrated by examples >> that would >> not make them so. > > Introducing these various terms will only serve to confuse the > discussion, because a lot of people have half-baked, half-read > understandings of them, and people will be forced to respond again and > again to misdirected comments based on different conceptions of the > broad philosophical terms. > > I therefore strongly recommend *not* introducing these terms. In fact, > I may just add them to my auto-trash filter, along with q-ualia and > f-ree will. Can you point me to anything - something at SIAI perhaps, on the Threaded/Patterned topic? I'm obviously not the first person to make the comparison. If you won't even allow idle discussion to lead to clarity for some internet crank, what on earth will you do about peer review? As a Community Director I would think you would want people to introduce the terms so that we could all leave with the same understanding? from the bottom of your killfile, Cheers, Bret K. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From spike66 at comcast.net Fri Jan 27 19:03:19 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Fri, 27 Jan 2006 11:03:19 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Intelligent Design: I'm not dead yet In-Reply-To: <1138389371_50746@S2.cableone.net> Message-ID: <200601271903.k0RJ3ce26463@tick.javien.com> bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of starman2100 at cableone.net Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] Intelligent Design: I'm not dead yet I remember in college attending a?lecture by an Evangelical Protestant?engineering Phd?who told us?the earth was actually very young (in the thousands of years)?and that?humanity had co-existed with dinosaurs...John Would that be Dr. Robert Gentry? spike From analyticphilosophy at gmail.com Fri Jan 27 21:51:28 2006 From: analyticphilosophy at gmail.com (Jeff Medina) Date: Fri, 27 Jan 2006 16:51:28 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Semantics + Re: Identity and becoming a Great Old One In-Reply-To: References: <8d71341e0601260904p1370977fm1227200725fb1450@mail.gmail.com> <332E50AC-6CED-4722-B69D-BD4A77E49783@bonfireproductions.com> <8d71341e0601261024j468403dfne5ee611ad244729@mail.gmail.com> <44064850-EFF0-44F2-B5FC-995F3281CC79@bonfireproductions.com> <43D951C7.3000906@pobox.com> <54D1EE31-9E9D-4103-AE06-AC41D172F965@bonfireproductions.com> <8d71341e0601261736rffaef18o72333ff407669b12@mail.gmail.com> <052417DB-E6E2-405A-9BB4-2BDB30C7A4C8@bonfireproductions.com> <5844e22f0601270823w2cde03dt4b66bcdb3ea31562@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <5844e22f0601271351u52528a8t7c8d0ac45a838910@mail.gmail.com> On 1/27/06, Bret Kulakovich wrote: > regardless of how much I have simplified exactly But it's _not_ regardless of how much you've simplified. How much you're simplifying is precisely one of the key issues leading to my assertion that [introducing monism/dualism talk will only confuse matters further]. > While they may seem similar to you, that the pattern & threaded views > reduce to types of these others is (1) arguable, and hence would > require quite a bit of tangential discussion to establish, with little > foreseeable value in so doing, and (2) pointless, as there are many > nuances to different philosophers' variants of general terms like > dualism, monism, neutral monism, etc., so people would still need to > clarify what they meant by "phenomenalism", leading to the very same > discussion of the threaded view that is currently going on. > > Jeff, I'm pretty sure internet mailing lists are generally defined by (1) > and (2). Then it should've been obvious that I must've meant something more specific/precise. I'm sure you'll have no problem thinking of more meaningful connotations of (1) and (2) than the generic all-internet-mailing-list-applicable sense. To which Bret replied: > Can you point me to anything - something at SIAI perhaps, on the > Threaded/Patterned topic? No, but I fail to see the point of this request. I haven't defended any position in the threaded/patterned discussion, nor have I suggested that this was hashed out previously by myself or anyone else at SIAI. > I'm obviously not the first person to make the comparison. I'm obviously not the first person to point out that, in the general case, noting other people share one's view does not imply one's view isn't due for an update. > If you won't even allow idle discussion to lead to clarity for > some internet crank, what on earth will you do about peer review? Internet crank? Pardon, maybe someone who actually is in my kill file started the threaded/patterned discussion -- I don't know who you're talking about. Unless you're just being excessively, unseriously self-deprecating. As to the actual content of this query, please elaborate just how "introducing terms X and Y would be counterproductive in this particular discussion" implies a problem regarding my view on peer review. (Which is not to say I don't have any problems with the current peer review system. Like many, I do. But those problems are not relevant to the current discussion.) > I would think you would want people to introduce the > terms so that we could all leave with the same understanding? I explicitly stated that the terms would *confuse* the matter, because most people have different "half-baked, half-read understandings" of technical philosophical jargon. They think they understand, but that appears to be because there's not often a bunch of scary math on the same page, and this leads them to assume philosophy is easier to understand and do well. So, to this question, no -- I *don't* want the terms introduced *precisely because* you will decrease the chances of everyone leaving with the same understanding. Best, -- Jeff Medina http://www.painfullyclear.com/ Community Director Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence http://www.singinst.org/ Relationships & Community Fellow Institute for Ethics & Emerging Technologies http://www.ieet.org/ School of Philosophy, Birkbeck, University of London http://www.bbk.ac.uk/phil/ From extropy at unreasonable.com Fri Jan 27 23:11:02 2006 From: extropy at unreasonable.com (David Lubkin) Date: Fri, 27 Jan 2006 18:11:02 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Cognitive markers Message-ID: <6.2.3.4.2.20060127164727.07973528@unreasonable.com> What are your thoughts on (and, preferably, experience with) a set of tests that people can use to assess the consequences of changes in diet, exercise, sleep, time of day, nootropics, age, etc. on cognitive functions? The tests need to: a) cover a reasonable range of abilities b) take 5 or 10 minutes to complete c) cost under $100 d) retain accuracy across dozens or hundreds of uses e) can be used alone, at home or when travelling For example, an easily created subtest might present a random sequence of digits, on screen or spoken, to be repeated or reversed. Unfortunately, requirement (d) isn't so easy to meet for other sorts of tests. -- David. From transcend at extropica.com Sat Jan 28 00:05:11 2006 From: transcend at extropica.com (Brandon Reinhart) Date: Fri, 27 Jan 2006 18:05:11 -0600 Subject: FW: [extropy-chat] Cryonics and uploading Message-ID: <200601280005.k0S054e20056@tick.javien.com> It's something to ask about. I'm interested in signing up with Alcor, but I subscribe (at the moment) to the thread view of identity. I'd like to read more philosophical works on the subject, as I don't consider my view to be set in stone. If anyone has any links or references to discussions or debates on the subject of pattern vs. thread, I would be interested. Brandon - An open mind is like a fortress with its gate unbarred and unguarded. -----Original Message----- From: extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org [mailto:extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Joseph Bloch Sent: Wednesday, January 25, 2006 7:52 PM To: ExI chat list Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] Cryonics and uploading There was nothing like that in my Alcor paperwork. Joseph Russell Wallace wrote: > Do current cryonics providers have a section on their consent form > that asks whether you want: > > a) To be uploaded as soon as the technology becomes available for it > (cryonics patients are the obvious first candidates for destructive > scan uploading, likely to be the first feasible type). > > b) To be kept on ice until the technology advances to the point of > allowing thawing out and biological revival (perhaps with the option > of later uploading) (which might be years to decades later). > > If not, is there enough difference among people signed up for cryonics > to merit such? I ask because it occurs to me that there is a split in > general between people who subscribe to the _pattern_ view of identity > (in which destructive scan uploading from a frozen state is fine) and > those who subscribe to the _thread_ view of identity (in which > historical continuity is important, so they'd rather wait for gradual > uploading to be available); if that split also exists among cryonics > patients, it might be worth making sure your position on the matter is > written down somewhere before you go into the dewar. > >------------------------------------------------------------------------ > >_______________________________________________ >extropy-chat mailing list >extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org >http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat > > _______________________________________________ extropy-chat mailing list extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat From transcend at extropica.com Sat Jan 28 00:09:00 2006 From: transcend at extropica.com (Brandon Reinhart) Date: Fri, 27 Jan 2006 18:09:00 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] Cryonics and uploading In-Reply-To: <8d71341e0601260811l2a017805ma2a64ca35113f53f@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <200601280009.k0S091e20357@tick.javien.com> It boils down, for me, simply to the subjective experience. If the copy boots up, would I experience its state subjectively? Sure, everyone else would interact with it just as if it were me. But I don't want to preserve my objective self, I want to preserve my subjective self. The linear conscious narrative that exists between sleep cycles.that's what I want to keep around for years to come :-) Brandon _____ From: extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org [mailto:extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Russell Wallace Sent: Thursday, January 26, 2006 10:12 AM To: ExI chat list Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] Cryonics and uploading On 1/26/06, Bret Kulakovich wrote: What a nice thread! Here's my two kopeks worth. Lets jump forward and assume perfects - we quantum entangle a brain into a cubic 20cm box. It is a perfect and exact copy. Good job! But even though it is a duplicate of the original, it is not the original, no matter how perfect. Okay, so you hold the thread view of identity, fair enough. The mind/body problem holds generally that monists hold conscience as an electro-chemical event, the body and mind are inseparable. Dualists hold that the mind/body are separate and discreet, perhaps a body/soul or body/spirit is going on, and they are distinct. *laughs* I suppose I've seen patternites accuse threadites [1] of believing in dualism and the soul often enough, the compliment was bound to be returned sooner or later. But no, neither view has anything to do with that. If you're going to try to relate the pattern view to classical philosophy, you should call it not dualist but Platonist. You can see one lends itself immediately to the possibility of cryonics, and the other to uploading. Sure they can each lean in one direction or the other... The pattern view is fine with cryonics, just as long as the information in the brain is preserved. And in the thread view, you should be fine with gradual uploading (neuron by neuron, with your thread of consciousness unbroken), just not with destructive scan uploading. [1] Barbaric abuse of language, I know, are there any better short terms for people who subscribe to the thread versus pattern views of identity? I tried the "-ist" version and it looked even worse. - Russell -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From mbb386 at main.nc.us Sat Jan 28 00:57:18 2006 From: mbb386 at main.nc.us (MB) Date: Fri, 27 Jan 2006 19:57:18 -0500 (EST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Intelligent Design: I'm not dead yet In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <34330.72.236.102.122.1138409838.squirrel@main.nc.us> > Yes it is. > There is absolutely no pressure to teach ID in schools here. > No religious orgs or movements have anything like the power they do in the > US. Here, such opinions stay opinions. They are not translated into > political action. > Then what about the Emmanuel Schools the Vardy Foundation is underwriting? http://www.evowiki.org/wiki.phtml?title=Vardy_Foundation http://www.answersingenesis.org/docs2003/0923UKschools.asp http://www.answersingenesis.org/docs2003/0923UKschools.asp ... and I understand Bob Edmiston is underwriting more. Regards, MB From kerry_prez at yahoo.com Sat Jan 28 00:57:44 2006 From: kerry_prez at yahoo.com (Al Brooks) Date: Fri, 27 Jan 2006 16:57:44 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Intelligent Design: I'm not dead yet In-Reply-To: <8A02BF34-FCCB-48CB-BED3-A96968D98847@mac.com> Message-ID: <20060128005744.83346.qmail@web51612.mail.yahoo.com> Even without the major powers involvement, there could be clouds of fallout, plus bio and/and chemical warfare; if it was anywhere else but the Mideast I would be optimistic, the Mideast is the worst region in the world-- aside from Africa (however there aren't many WMDs in Africa). Does anyone know how many WMDs exist in the Mideast? Not likely. The point was simply that compared to world wars and other things that could actually threaten Singularity religion based wars appear to be pretty far down on the list. It is not conceivable that "billions will die" unless major armed states like the US and Russia start hurling nukes regarding local squabbles. But then the real energy behind such a possibility is our continuing dependence on fossil fuel not religion per se. An energy war is one very likely way we may never get to Singularity. Only if we are pretty stupid will we see directly by force of arms opposing a religion (or all religions) as being worth possibly missing Singularity. - samantha _______________________________________________ extropy-chat mailing list extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat --------------------------------- Bring words and photos together (easily) with PhotoMail - it's free and works with Yahoo! Mail. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From fortean1 at mindspring.com Sat Jan 28 07:16:01 2006 From: fortean1 at mindspring.com (Terry W. Colvin) Date: Sat, 28 Jan 2006 00:16:01 -0700 Subject: [extropy-chat] FWD [tlc-brotherhood] Re: No More Hookers for GI's Message-ID: <43DB1A31.5030006@mindspring.com> [Cogent comment re post-puberty circumcisions...] As noted, sodium nitrite to reduce male libido is a myth. On the other hand, amyl nitrite IS used to deflate an undesired erection. It is inhaled by those who have circumsisions as adults. It acts by dropping the blood pressure dramatically resulting in dizziness, and fainting if taken in excess...not something they could put in a guy's food. 'SpyDoc' -- "Only a zit on the wart on the heinie of progress." Copyright 1992, Frank Rice Terry W. Colvin, Sierra Vista, Arizona (USA) < fortean1 at mindspring.com > Alternate: < fortean1 at msn.com > Home Page: < http://www.geocities.com/Area51/Stargate/8958/index.html > Sites: * Fortean Times * Mystic's Haven * TLCB * U.S. Message Text Formatting (USMTF) Program ------------ Member: Thailand-Laos-Cambodia Brotherhood (TLCB) Mailing List TLCB Web Site: < http://www.tlc-brotherhood.org > [Southeast Asia/Secret War in Laos veterans, Allies, CIA/NSA, and "steenkeen" contractors are welcome.] -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From velvethum at hotmail.com Sat Jan 28 12:19:13 2006 From: velvethum at hotmail.com (Heartland) Date: Sat, 28 Jan 2006 07:19:13 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Cryonics should be preserving life, not just identity. References: Message-ID: On 1/27/06, Heartland wrote: > > Cryonics makes no sense if it tries to preserve the identity of the > original while forgetting to preserve the *life* of the original. Actually that may be the case for you but may not be the case for everyone. I think my father might not prefer to continue on an exteremely extended life if many of the people he has cared about have died (my mother for example). I proposed something along these lines a few weeks ago but it did not lead to an active thread. Briefly they are: 1) Total reanimation of the "thread" (i.e. *you* get to run who *you* consider yourself to be). 2) Total recovery of all of the memories of a life preserved within a brain. Though presumably if these were uploaded these would allow one to "inhabit" the mind of that person. (Do I really want to be Paris Hilton?) 3) Total recovery of all of the "good" memories of a life preserved within a brain. E.g. my father might prefer to pass along his memories of his childhood, my paternal grandfather (whom I never knew), my great grandfather, etc. but not pass on his memories of WWII. > These would be good options to have but it seems that they all fall under the task of preserving identity (memory of who you are plus memory of your life experiences). Unfortunately, these options/requirements do not preserve the actual *life*. In other words, they do not preserve the original presence of being of the original thread that carves out unique trajectory in space-time. Instead, the original trajectory ends and a different one is created with the same identity (memories) of the original. Unfortunately, the side effect of this is that the original life ends forever. >I suspect this would require something like bequeathing ones brain to a trust and allowing information withdrawal from the trust under carefully controlled situations (similar to today's medical ethics evaluation committees dealing with things like allowable organ donations, transplants, etc.). In cases not foreseen this might require partial "reactivation" of the evaluation centers (which could be connected to the emotional centers) of the mind in order to evaluate a withdrawal request which was unanticipated with the trust was established. It gets very dicey if it was specified in the memory trust establishment that full "thread" activations were not allowed. Robert > I would like my original brain to be fully restored and operational. This would restore both life and the identity of the original. Subsequent mind substrate changes would have to be performed by Moravec transfer. sp From velvethum at hotmail.com Sat Jan 28 12:48:58 2006 From: velvethum at hotmail.com (Heartland) Date: Sat, 28 Jan 2006 07:48:58 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Cryonics and uploading References: <200601280005.k0S054e20056@tick.javien.com> Message-ID: > If anyone has any links or references to discussions or debates on the > subject of pattern vs. thread, I would be interested. > > Brandon > - An open mind is like a fortress with its gate unbarred and unguarded. http://lists.extropy.org/pipermail/extropy-chat/2004-September/008635.html http://lists.extropy.org/pipermail/extropy-chat/2004-September/008738.html http://lists.extropy.org/pipermail/extropy-chat/2005-March/014718.html http://lists.extropy.org/pipermail/extropy-chat/2005-March/014783.html http://www.sl4.org/archive/0510/12449.html From velvethum at hotmail.com Sat Jan 28 13:10:36 2006 From: velvethum at hotmail.com (Heartland) Date: Sat, 28 Jan 2006 08:10:36 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Cryonics and uploading References: <200601280009.k0S091e20357@tick.javien.com> Message-ID: > It boils down, for me, simply to the subjective experience. If the copy > boots up, would I experience its state subjectively? Sure, everyone else > would interact with it just as if it were me. But I don't want to preserve > my objective self, I want to preserve my subjective self. > > > Brandon That's my view too. If I like chocolate (and I do :)) and and my brain has been scanned destructively in order to make a copy then it's the copy that will experience the pleasure of eating chocolate, not me. Instead, I will subjectively experience nothing (death). That's not my idea of imortality. Slawomir From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Sat Jan 28 14:37:50 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Sat, 28 Jan 2006 09:37:50 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Cryonics should be preserving life, not just identity. In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On 1/28/06, Heartland wrote: > > On 1/27/06, Heartland wrote: > Unfortunately, the side effect of this is that the original life ends > forever. That is what the individuals I am thinking of actually seem (seemed) to want. The termination of that specific thread. What I am dealing with is reasons to support cryonics that would not involve thread continuation. It is kind of like having access someone's letters, writings, etc. but in a more robust form (e.g. for writing an in depth biography) without actually being able to ask the individual questions about what they were thinking at the time the writing took place. I would like my original brain to be fully restored and operational. This > would restore both life and the identity of the original. Subsequent mind > substrate changes would have to be performed by Moravec transfer. So either of (a) an identical atom by atom brain disassembly followed by identical reassembly (with isotopic identity preserved if you so choose) [leaving aside the difficulties of actually doing so]; or (b) a reactivation of the thread present at your time of "death" running on a non-biological ( e.g. uploaded) substrate would not be acceptable? If the answers are yes to either of these questions can you provide a rational explanation other than something along the lines of "this is what I feel most comfortable with"? Thanks, Robert -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Sat Jan 28 15:11:58 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Sat, 28 Jan 2006 10:11:58 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Intelligent Design: I'm not dead yet In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On 1/26/06, Samantha Atkins wrote: > > > How come? The Crusades and various Israel-Arab conflicts were paltry > little affairs compared to the major wars of the last century. The > historical record doesn't make your case. Now, if we decide to > declare an all out conflict targeted at one or more major religions, > that would be a dangerous and foolish thing to do. Let's not go there. Samantha, I agree with your points, sp. regarding the magnitude of the conflicts and how it would be undesirable to "make war" on religion. However, if you have been watching recent news programs on Al Queda it seems clear that they *have* declared "war" on the U.S. and that seems *largely* for ideological (faith) based reasons. As far as I can tell in my limited reading on Islam (mostly in Wikipedia) suggests there is a substantial amount of support behind bringing back the Caliphate. [I believe the debate over who the Caliph should be and what power/authority they have is a significant part of the Sunni/Shia split so it is already the source of significant animosity in the Middle East.] One could speculate that the entire debate over allowing Iran to develop the means for creating nuclear weapons revolves around the problem of allowing nuclear weapons to be under the control of irrational people (unless you view someone who claims the holocaust is a myth as a "rational" thinker). The question would be how dangerous to transhumanist or extropic goals is someone having control over nuclear weapons, lacking the Pope's current scruples (mind you Popes were not always particularly scrupulous) and possibly wanting to regain a position of combined faith-based & political power which has largely been missing from the world for ~300+ years? I don't know enough about the causes of WWI and WWII to know the extent to which they were (a) driven by faith; (b) driven by survival interests; or (c) driven by power hungry megalomaniacs (which could be interpreted as "personal" survival interests). I would speculate based based on limited knowledge that (c) was the primary cause in those cases. [If we go any further down this path we should probably change the Subject heading since it isn't directly related to "intelligent design"] Robert -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From dirk.bruere at gmail.com Sat Jan 28 15:18:48 2006 From: dirk.bruere at gmail.com (Dirk Bruere) Date: Sat, 28 Jan 2006 15:18:48 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Intelligent Design: I'm not dead yet In-Reply-To: <34330.72.236.102.122.1138409838.squirrel@main.nc.us> References: <34330.72.236.102.122.1138409838.squirrel@main.nc.us> Message-ID: On 1/28/06, MB wrote: > > > > Yes it is. > > There is absolutely no pressure to teach ID in schools here. > > No religious orgs or movements have anything like the power they do in > the > > US. Here, such opinions stay opinions. They are not translated into > > political action. > > > > Then what about the Emmanuel Schools the Vardy Foundation is underwriting? > > http://www.evowiki.org/wiki.phtml?title=Vardy_Foundation > http://www.answersingenesis.org/docs2003/0923UKschools.asp > http://www.answersingenesis.org/docs2003/0923UKschools.asp > > ... and I understand Bob Edmiston is underwriting more. So? The fact that I have not heard of them says plenty. There is a history in Britain of private schools with weird teachings. At least I've heard of the Steiner schools. Dirk -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From dirk.bruere at gmail.com Sat Jan 28 15:20:49 2006 From: dirk.bruere at gmail.com (Dirk Bruere) Date: Sat, 28 Jan 2006 15:20:49 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Intelligent Design: I'm not dead yet In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On 1/28/06, Robert Bradbury wrote: > > > On 1/26/06, Samantha Atkins wrote: > > > > > > How come? The Crusades and various Israel-Arab conflicts were paltry > > little affairs compared to the major wars of the last century. The > > historical record doesn't make your case. Now, if we decide to > > declare an all out conflict targeted at one or more major religions, > > that would be a dangerous and foolish thing to do. Let's not go there. > > > Samantha, I agree with your points, sp. regarding the magnitude of the > conflicts and how it would be undesirable to "make war" on religion. > However, if you have been watching recent news programs on Al Queda it seems > clear that they *have* declared "war" on the U.S. and that seems *largely* > for ideological (faith) based reasons. As far as I can tell in my > Not really. It is because of the US support for both Israel and the Saudi regime. Not to mention Iraq. Standard political reasons IMO. Dirk -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From spike66 at comcast.net Sat Jan 28 16:27:21 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Sat, 28 Jan 2006 08:27:21 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] FWD [tlc-brotherhood] Re: No More Hookers for GI's In-Reply-To: <43DB1A31.5030006@mindspring.com> Message-ID: <200601281627.k0SGRae14231@tick.javien.com> bounces at lists.extropy.org] On Behalf Of Terry W. Colvin Subject: [extropy-chat] FWD [tlc-brotherhood] Re: No More Hookers for GI's ...As noted, sodium nitrite to reduce male libido is a myth... Wasn't it potassium nitrate? I heard that one doesn't work either. ... an undesired erection... Hmmm, contradiction in terms. {8-] ...It is inhaled by those who have circumcisions as adults... Oh, yes, under those special circumstances, I see. ...resulting in dizziness, and fainting if taken?in excess... If one were in the situation you mentioned and had the contradiction in terms above, and the stitches began to rip out, they would faint anyway. {8-[ owwww. On to more pleasant thoughts. spike {8-] From mehranraeli at comcast.net Sat Jan 28 16:43:11 2006 From: mehranraeli at comcast.net (Mehran) Date: Sat, 28 Jan 2006 11:43:11 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Collective Intelligence 2.0 Message-ID: <000c01c62429$f0967890$799f6041@DBX6XT21> Source: http://novaspivack.typepad.com/ January 24, 2006 Collective Intelligence 2.0 Nova Spivack Introduction: This article proposes the creation of a new open, nonprofit service on the Web that will provide something akin to "collective self- awareness" back to the Web. This service is like a "Google Zeitgeist" on steroids, but with a lot more real-time, interactive, participatory data, technology and features in it. The goal is to measure and visualize the state of the collective mind of humanity, and provide this back to humanity in as close to real-time as is possible, from as many data sources as we can handle -- as a web service. By providing this service, we will enable higher levels of collective intelligence to emerge and self-organize on the Web. The key to collective intelligence (or any intelligence in fact) is self- awareness. Self-awareness is, in essence, a feedback loop in which a system measures its own internal state and the state of its environment, then builds a representation of that state, and then reasons about and reacts to that representation in order to generate future behavior. This feedback loop can be provided to any intelligent system -- even the Web, even humanity as-a-whole. If we can provide the Web with such a service, then the Web can begin to "see itself" and react to its own state for the first time. And this is the first step to enabling the Web, and humanity as-a-whole, to become more collectively intelligent. It should be noted that by "self-awareness" I don't mean consciousness or sentience - I think that the consciousness comes from humans at this point and we are not trying to synthesize it (we don't need to; it's already there). Instead, by "self-awareness" I mean a specific type of feedback loop -- a specific Web service -- that provides a mirror of the state of the whole back to its parts. The parts are the conscious elements of the system - whether humans and/or machines - and can then look at this meta-mirror to understand the whole as well as their place in it. By simply providing this meta-level mirror, along with ways that the individual parts of the system can report their state to it, and get the state of the whole back from it, we can enable a richer feedback loop between the parts and the whole. And as soon as this loop exists the entire system suddenly can and will become much more collectively intelligent. What I am proposing is something quite common in artificial intelligence. For example, in the field of robotics, such as when building an autonomous robot. Until a robot is provided with a means by which it can sense its own internal state and the state of its nearby environment, it cannot behave intelligently or very autonomously. But once this self-representation and feedback loop is provided, it can then react to it's own state and environment and suddenly can behave far more intelligently. All cybernetic systems rely on this basic design pattern. I'm simply proposing we implement something like this for the entire Web and the mass of humanity that is connected to it. It's just a larger application of an existing pattern. Currently people get their views of "the whole" from the news media and the government - but these views suffer from bias, narrowness, lack of granularity, lack of real-time data, and the fact that they are one-way, top-down services with no feedback loop capabilities. Our global collective self-awareness -- in order to be truly useful and legitimate really must be two-way, inclusive, comprehensive, real-time and democratic. In the global collective awareness, unlike traditional media, the view of the whole is created in a bottom-up, emergent fashion from the sum of the reports from all the parts (instead of just a small pool of reporters or publishers, etc.). The system I envision would visualize the state of the global mind on a number of key dimensions, in real-time, based on what people and software and organizations that comprise its "neurons" and "regions" report to it (or what it can figure out by mining artifacts they create). For example, this system would discover and rank the current most timely and active topics, current events, people, places, organizations, events, products, articles, websites, in the world right now. From these topics it would link to related resources, discussions, opinions, etc. It would also provide a real- time mass opinion polling system, where people could start polls, vote on them, and see the results in real-time. And it would provide real-time statistics about the Web, the economy, the environment, and other key indicators. The idea is to try to visualize the global mind - to make it concrete and real for people, to enable them to see what it is thinking, what is going on, and where they fit in it - and to enable them to start adapting and guiding their own behavior to it. By giving the parts of the system more visibility into the state of the whole, they can begin to self-organize collectively which in turn makes the whole system function more intelligently Essentially I am proposing the creation of the largest and most sophisticated mirror ever built - a mirror that can reflect the state of the collective mind of humanity back to itself. This will enable an evolutionary process which eventually will result in humanity becoming more collectively self-aware and intelligent as-a- whole (instead of what it is today -- just a set of separeate interacting intelligent parts). By providing such a service, we can catalyze the evolution of higher-order meta-intelligence on this planet -- the next step in human evolution. Creating this system is a grand cultural project of profound social value to all people on earth, now and in the future. This proposal calls for creating a nonprofit orgnaization to build and host this service as a major open-source initiative on the Web, like the Wikipedia, but with a very different user-experience and focus. It also calls for implementing the system with a hybrid central and distributed architecture. Although this vision is big, the specific technologies, design patterns, and features that are necessary to implement it are quite specific and already exist. They just have to be integrated, wrapped and rolled out. This will require an extraordinary and multidisciplanary team. If you're interested in getting involved and think you can contribute resources that this project will need, let me know (see below for details). Further Thoughts Today I re-read this beautiful, visionary article by Kevin Kelley, about the birth of the global mind, in which he states: The planet-sized "Web" computer is already more complex than a human brain and has surpassed the 20-petahertz threshold for potential intelligence as calculated by Ray Kurzweil. In 10 years, it will be ubiquitous. So will superintelligence emerge on the Web, not a supercomputer? Kevin's article got me thinking once again about an idea that has been on my mind for over a decade. I have often thought that the Web is growing into the collective nervous system of our species. This will in turn enable the human species to function increasingly as an intelligent superorganism, for example, like a beehive, or an ant colony -- but perhaps even more intelligent. But the key to bringing this process about is self-awareness. In short, the planetary supermind cannot become truly intelligent until it evolves a form of collective self-awareness. Self-awareness is the most critical component of human intelligence -- the sophistication of human self- awareness is what makes humans different from dumb machines, and from less intelligent species. The Big Idea that I have been thinking about for over a decade is that if we can build something that functions like a collective self- awareness, then this could catalyze a huge leap in collective intelligence that would essentially "wake up" the global supermind and usher in a massive evolution in its intelligence and behavior. As the planetary supermind becomes more aware of its environment, its own state, and its own actions and plans, it will then naturally evolve higher levels of collective intelligence around this core. This evolutionary leap is of unimaginable importance to the future of our species. In order for the collective mind to think and act more intelligently it must be able to sense itself and its world, and reason about them, with more precision -- it must have a form of self-awareness. The essence of self-awareness is self-representation -- the ability to sense, map, reason about, and react to, one's own internal state and the state of one's nearby environment. In other words, self- awareness is a feedback loop by which a system measures and reacts to its own self-representations. Just as is the case with the evolution of individual human intelligence, the evolution of more sophisticated collective human intelligence will depend on the emergence of better collective feedback loops and self- representations. By enabling a feedback loop in which information can flow in both directions between the self-representations of individuals and a meta-level self-representation for the set of all individuals, the dynamics of the parts and the whole become more closely coupled. And when this happens, the system can truly start to adapt to itself intelligently, as a single collective intelligence instead of a collection of single intelligences. In summary, in order to achieve higher levels of collective intelligence and behavior, the global mind will first need something that functions as its collective self-awareness -- something that enables the parts to better sense and react to the state of the whole, and the whole to better sense and react to the state of its parts. What is needed essentially is something that functions as a collective analogue to a self -- a global collective self. Think of the global self as a vast mirror, reflecting the state of the global supermind back to itself. Mirrors are interesting things. At first they merely reflect, but soon they begin to guide decisionmaking. By simply providing humanity with a giant virtual mirror of what is going on across the minds of billions of individuals, and millions of groups and organizations, the collective mind will crystallize, see itself for the first time, and then it will begin to react to its own image. And this is the beginning of true collective cognition. When the parts can see themselves as a whole and react in real-time, then they begin to function as a whole instead of just a collection of separate parts. As this shift transpires the state of the whole begins to feedback into the behavior of the parts, and the state of the parts in turns feeds back to the state of the whole. This cycle of bidirectional feedback between the parts and whole is the essence of cognition in all intelligent systems, whether individual brains, artificial intelligences, or entire worlds. I believe that the time has come for this collective self to emerge on our planet. Like a vast virtual mirror, it will function as the planetary analogue to our own individual self-representations -- that capacity of our individual minds which represents us back to ourselves. It will be comprised of maps that combine real-time periodic data updates, and historical data, from perhaps trillions of data sources (one for each person, group, organization and software agent on the grid). The resulting visualizations will be something like a vast fluid flow, or a many particle simulation. It will require a massive computing capability to render it -- perhaps a distributed supercomputer comprised of the nodes on the Web themselves, each hosting a part of the process. It will require new thinking about how to visualize trends in such vast amounts of data and dimensions. This is a great unexplored frontier in data visualization and knowledge discovery. How It Might Work I envision the planetary self functioning as a sort of portal -- a Web service that aggregates and distributes all kinds of current real-time and historical data about the state of the whole, as well as its past states and future projected states. This portal would collect opinions, trends, and statistics about the human global mind, the environment, the economy, society, geopolitical events, and other indicators, and would map them graphically in time, geography, demography, and subject space -- enabling everyone to see and explore the state of the global mind from different perspectives, with various overlays, and at arbitrary levels of magnification. It would have open data and API's so that new data feeds could easily be added, or remixed and fed back in from existing ones, and so that new visualizations could be created by others from the data and added back into the system. The collective self would provide a sense of collective identity: who are we, how do we appear, what are we thinking about, what do we think about what we are thinking about, what are we doing, how well are we doing it, where are we now, where have we been, where are we going next. Perhaps it could be segmented by nation, or by age group, or by other dimensions as well to view various perspectives on these questions within it. It could gather its data by mining for it, as well as through direct push contributions from various data- sources. Individuals could even report on their own opinions, state, and activities to it if they wanted to, and these votes and data points would be reflected back in the whole in real time. Think of it as a giant emergent conversation comprised of trillions of participants, all helping to make sense of the same subject -- our global self identity -- together. It could even have real-time views that are animated and alive -- like a functional brain image scan -- so that people could see the virtual neurons and pathways in the global brain firing as they watch. If this global self-representation existed, I would want to subscribe to it as a data feed on my desktop. I would want to run it in a dashboard in the upper right corner of my monitor -- that I could expand at any time to explore further. It would provide me with alerts when events transpired that matched my particular interests, causes, or relationships. It would solicit my opinions and votes on issues of importance and interest to me. It would simultaneously function as my window to the world, and the world's window to me. It would be my way of participating in the meta-level whole, whenever I wanted to. I could tell it my opinions about key issues, current events, problems, people, organizations, or even legislative proposals. I could tell it about the quality of life from my perspective, where I am living, in my industry and demographic niche. I could tell it about my hopes and fears for the future. I could tell it what I think is cool, or not cool, interesting or not interesting, good or bad, etc. I could tell it what news I was reading and what I think is noteworthy or important. And it would listen and learn, and take my contributions into account democratically along with those of billions of other people just like me all around the world. From this would emerge global visualizations and reports about what we are all thinking and doing, in aggregate, that I could track and respond to. Linked from these flows I could then find relevant news, conversations, organizations, people, products, services, events, and knowledge. And from all of this would emerge something greater than anything I can yet imagine - - a thought process too big for any one human mind to contain. I want to build this. I want to build the planetary Self. I am not suggesting that we build the entire global mind, I am just suggesting that we build the part of the system that functions as its collective self-awareness. The rest of the global mind is already there, as raw potential at least, and doesn't have to be built. The Web, human minds, software agents, and organizations already exist. Their collective state just needs to be reflected in a single virtual mirror. As soon as this mirror exists they can begin to collectively self-organize and behave more intelligently, simply because they will have, for the first time, a way of measuring their collective state and behavior. Once there is a central collective self-awareness loop, the intelligence of the global mind will emerge and self-organize naturally over time. This collective self-awareness infrastructure is the central enabling technology that has to be there first for the next-leap in intelligence of the global mind to evolve. Project Structure I think this should be created as a non-profit open-source project. In fact, that is the only way that it can have legitimacy -- it must be independent of any government, cultural or commercial perspective. It must be by and for the people, as purely and cleanly as possible. My guess is that to build this properly we would need to create a distributed grid computing system to collect, compute, visualize and distribute the data -- it could be similar to SETI at Home; everyone could help host it. At the center of this grid, or perhaps in a set of supernodes, would be a vast supercomputing array that would manage the grid, do focused computations and data fusion operations. There would also need to be some serious money behind this project as well -- perhaps from major foundations and donors. This system would be a global resource of potential incalculable value to the future of human evolution. It would be a project worth funding. Getting Involved Let me know if you are interested in getting involved. If you want to help, link to this article with a note saying what skill-sets you could bring to the project, and I'll see your link. If enough people link, I'll make a list here of bloggers that have signed up. If the time is right, the necessary team will grow emergently around this meme. Here are blogs that have signed up to endorse this idea and participate: 1. Lifesized (Thanks for suggesting a great title for this post!) 2. (your blog goes here -- just link to this post and I'll see your trackback and add you) ________________________________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________________________ Message: 3 Date: Fri, 27 Jan 2006 22:42:24 -0000 Subject: Researchers concoct self-propelled nano motor ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ The Raelian Movement for those who are not afraid of the future : http://www.rael.org ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Source: http://www.nytimes.com/cnet/CNET_2100-11394_3-6031320.html? _r=2&pagewanted=print January 25, 2006 Researchers concoct self-propelled nano motor Michael Kanellos, for News.com Researchers at UCLA and the University of Bologna have come up with a nano-size vehicle that can inch its way forward on sunlight and one day could, conceivably, be used to shuttle medicines or other small particles around. The motor in chemical terms is a rotaxane, a mechanically interlocked molecule consisting of a ring trapped on a rod by bulky stoppers at both ends in the same way that rings are kept on an abacus. The ring in a sense serves as the foot. It is attracted to one end of the rod, called Station A, and moves toward it until it hits the stopper. The ring then moves to the second port of call, Station B, and moves toward it until halted by the opposite stopper. By alternating between Stations A and B, the ring pulls the whole contraption forward. The attraction and repulsion is accomplished through electron harvesting. One of the ends of the barbell harvests an electron from sunlight and transfers it to Station A. When Station A contains an electron, the ring moves toward Station B. When Station A returns the electron to the barbell, the ring moves toward it. A full cycle is carried out in less than a thousandth of a second, which means that the motor can operate at a frequency of 1,000 Hertz, according to the researchers. This is equivalent, using the car engine analogy, to 60,000 revolutions per minute. "The kind of nanotechnology that will emerge from these nano motors still requires a lot of fundamental work. The nano motors are extremely sophisticated in their design," Fraser Stoddart, UCLA's Fred Kavli chair of NanoSystems Sciences and director of the institute, said in a statement. Last year, researchers at Rice University showed off nanocars. These were propelled by external electric fields and did not generate their own energy, which the UCLA motor does. However, the Rice vehicles had moving molecular wheels. ________________________________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________________________ Message: 4 Date: Fri, 27 Jan 2006 17:28:32 +0100 Subject: Role of the nervous system in regulating stem cells discovered ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ The Raelian Movement for those who are not afraid of the future : http://www.rael.org ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Source: The Mount Sinai Hospital / Mount Sinai School of Medicine http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2006-01/tmsh-rot012406.php Role of the nervous system in regulating stem cells discovered Study led by Mount Sinai School of Medicine may provide new hope for cancer patients and others with compromised immune systems 26-Jan-2006 Contact: Mount Sinai Press Office newsmedia at mssm.edu 212-241-9200 New study by Mount Sinai researchers may lead to improved stem cell therapies for patients with compromised immune systems due to intensive cancer therapy or autoimmune disease. The study is published in this week's issue of Cell. A group, led by Paul Frenette, Associate Professor of Medicine at Mount Sinai School of Medicine, found that the sympathetic--or "fight or flight" branch--of the nervous system plays a critical role in coaxing bone marrow stem cells into the bloodstream. Bone marrow cells known as hematopoietic stem cells are the source for blood and immune cells. Hematopoietic stem cell transplants are now routinely used to restore the immune systems of patients after intensive cancer therapy and for treatment of other disorders of the blood and immune system, according to the National Institutes of Health. While physicians once retrieved the stem cells directly from bone marrow, doctors now prefer to harvest donor cells that have been mobilized into circulating blood. In normal individuals, the continuous trafficking of the stem cells between the bone marrow and blood fills empty or damaged niches and contributes to the maintenance of normal blood cell formation, according to the researchers. Although it has been known for many years that the mobilization of hematopoietic stem cells can be enhanced by multiple chemicals, the mechanisms that regulate this critical process are largely unknown, they said. One factor in particular, known as hematopoietic cytokine granulocyte-colony stimulating factor (G-CSF), is widely used clinically to elicit hematopoietic stem cell mobilization for life-saving bone marrow transplantation, said Dr. Frenette. Several years ago, Dr. Frenette's group reported that a second compound, fucoidan, which is synthesized by certain seaweeds, could also spur the stem cells into action. The group speculated that the seaweed derivative might work by imitating a similar compound, called sulfatide, naturally present in mammalian tissues. To test the idea, the researchers examined mice lacking the enzyme responsible for making sulfatide. "Lo and behold, mice lacking the enzyme Cgt did not mobilize hematopoietic stem cells at all when treated with the stimulating factor G-CSF or fucoidan," Dr. Frenette said. "You don't get such dramatic results that often in science. We knew we had stumbled onto something important." To their surprise, further study failed to connect the stalled stem cell movement to sulfatide. Rather, they found, the deficiency stemmed from a defect in the transmission of signals sent via the sympathetic nervous system. The products of Cgt contribute to the myelin sheath that coats and protects nerve cells, they explained. Mice with other nervous system defects also exhibited a failure to mobilize bone marrow stem cells, they found. Moreover, drugs that stimulate the sympathetic nervous system restored stem cell movement into the blood stream in mice with an impaired ability to respond to norepinephrine, the signature chemical messenger of the sympathetic system. "The nervous system plays an important role in producing signals that maintain the stem cell niche and retention in bone marrow," Dr. Frenette said. "The new findings add another dimension of complexity to the processes involved in stem cell maintenance and mobilization and emphasize the interrelationships among the nervous, skeletal and hematopoietic systems," he added. "They all have to work together ? to talk to each other ? to produce blood and maintain stem cells." The results suggest that differences in the sympathetic nervous systems of stem cell donors may explain "conspicuous variability" in the efficiency with which they mobilize hematopoietic cells into the bloodstream, the researchers said. Furthermore, drugs that alter the signals transmitted by the sympathetic nervous system to the stem cells in bone may offer a novel strategy to improve stem cell harvests for stem cell-based therapeutics, they added. The unexpected findings by Frenette and his colleagues further "suggest that the pharmacological manipulation of the sympathetic nervous system may be a means of therapeutically targeting the stem cells in their niche for the purpose of either mobilization or, conversely, attracting stem cells to the niche following transplantation," they added. ### ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ "Ethics" is simply a last-gasp attempt by deist conservatives and orthodox dogmatics to keep humanity in ignorance and obscurantism, through the well tried fermentation of fear, the fear of science and new technologies. There is nothing glorious about what our ancestors call history, it is simply a succession of mistakes, intolerances and violations. On the contrary, let us embrace Science and the new technologies unfettered, for it is these which will liberate mankind from the myth of god, and free us from our age old fears, from disease, death and the sweat of labour. Rael ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ----------------------------------------------------------------- From spike66 at comcast.net Sat Jan 28 17:04:02 2006 From: spike66 at comcast.net (spike) Date: Sat, 28 Jan 2006 09:04:02 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] diapause in scorpions In-Reply-To: <20060125053918.85343.qmail@web50503.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <200601281704.k0SH4Ee17532@tick.javien.com> Cool, diapause: http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,183034,00.html spike From kerry_prez at yahoo.com Sat Jan 28 17:17:54 2006 From: kerry_prez at yahoo.com (Al Brooks) Date: Sat, 28 Jan 2006 09:17:54 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Intelligent Design: I'm not dead yet In-Reply-To: <20060128005744.83346.qmail@web51612.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <20060128171754.60600.qmail@web51607.mail.yahoo.com> Yes, the odds are extremely remote billions will die however the region is so unpredictable that we can be sure thousands will die and peace is way off. It is not conceivable that "billions will die" unless major armed states like the US and Russia start hurling nukes regarding local squabbles. But then the real energy behind such a possibility is our continuing dependence on fossil fuel not religion per se. An energy war is one very likely way we may never get to Singularity. Only if we are pret! ty stupid will we see directly by force of arms opposing a religion (or all religions) as being worth possibly missing Singularity. - samantha --------------------------------- Yahoo! Autos. Looking for a sweet ride? Get pricing, reviews, & more on new and used cars. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jonkc at att.net Sat Jan 28 17:53:06 2006 From: jonkc at att.net (John K Clark) Date: Sat, 28 Jan 2006 12:53:06 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Cryonics and uploading References: <200601280009.k0S091e20357@tick.javien.com> Message-ID: <003101c62433$c0f3e820$ea064e0c@MyComputer> "Heartland" > If I like chocolate (and I do :)) and and my brain has been scanned > destructively in order to make a copy then it's the copy that will > experience the pleasure of eating chocolate, not me. But unknown to you I made a destructive copy of you last night, but you still like chocolate. After that I decided to make a destructive copy of you ever minute, but you still like chocolate. For the last half hour I have been making a destructive copy of you every nanosecond, but nevertheless something has continued, something still likes chocolate. I think that something is you. And this is not just a thought experiment, like it or not you are undergoing a destructive copying process every day of your life. Nearly every one of your atoms is different from the ones you had 6 months ago. John K Clark From thespike at satx.rr.com Sat Jan 28 20:45:09 2006 From: thespike at satx.rr.com (Damien Broderick) Date: Sat, 28 Jan 2006 14:45:09 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] String theory and neutrino detection Message-ID: <6.2.1.2.0.20060128144240.03a34e88@pop-server.satx.rr.com> Researchers at Northeastern University and the University of California, Irvine say that scientists might soon have evidence for extra dimensions and other exotic predictions of string theory. http://www.newswise.com/p/articles/view/517544/ Newswise ? Researchers at Northeastern University and the University of California, Irvine say that scientists might soon have evidence for extra dimensions and other exotic predictions of string theory. Early results from a neutrino detector at the South Pole, called AMANDA, show that ghostlike particles from space could serve as probes to a world beyond our familiar three dimensions, the research team says. No more than a dozen high-energy neutrinos have been detected so far. However, the current detection rate and energy range indicate that AMANDA's larger successor, called IceCube, now under construction, could provide the first evidence for string theory and other theories that attempt to build upon our current understanding of the universe. An article describing this work appears in the current issue of Physical Review Letters. The authors are: Luis Anchordoqui, associate research scientist in the Physics Department at Northeastern University; Haim Goldberg, professor in the Physics Department at Northeastern University; and Jonathan Feng, associate professor in the Department of Physics and Astronomy at University of California, Irvine. The evidence, they say, would come from how neutrinos interact with other forms of matter on Earth. ?To find clues to support string theory and other bold, new theories, we need to study how matter interacts at extreme energies,? said Anchordoqui. ?Human-made particle accelerators on Earth cannot yet generate these energies, but nature can in the form of the highest-energy neutrinos.? In recent decades, new theories have developed ? such as string theory, extra dimensions and supersymmetry ? to bridge the gap between the two most successful theories of the 20th century, general relativity and quantum mechanics. Quantum mechanics describes three of the fundamental forces of nature: electromagnetism, strong forces (binding atomic nuclei) and weak forces (seen in radioactivity). It is, however, incompatible with Einstein's general relativity, the leading description of the fourth force, gravity. Scientists hope to find one unified theory to provide a quantum description of all four forces. Clues to unification, scientists say, lie at extreme energies. On Earth, human-made particle accelerators have already produced energies at which electromagnetic forces and weak forces are indistinguishable. Scientists have ideas about how the next generation of accelerators will reveal that strong forces are indistinguishable from the weak and electromagnetic at yet higher energies. Yet to probe deeper to see gravity's connection to the other three forces, still higher energies are needed. Anchordoqui and his colleagues say that extragalactic sources can serve as the ultimate cosmic accelerator, and that neutrinos from these sources smacking into protons can release energies in the realm where the first clues to string theory could be revealed. Neutrinos are elementary particles similar to electrons, but they are far less massive, have neutral charge, and hardly interact with matter. They are among the most abundant particles in the universe; untold billions pass through our bodies every second. Most of the neutrinos reaching Earth are lower-energy particles from the sun. AMANDA, funded by the National Science Foundation, attempts to detect neutrinos raining down from above but also coming "up" through the Earth. Neutrinos are so weakly interacting that some can pass through the entire Earth unscathed. The total number of "down" and "up" neutrinos is uncertain; however, barring exotic effects, the relative detection rates are well known. AMANDA detectors are positioned deep in the Antarctic ice. The NSF-funded IceCube has a similar design, only it has about six times more detectors covering a volume of one cubic kilometer. A neutrino smashing into atoms in the ice will emit a brief, telltale blue light; and using the detectors, scientists can determine the direction where the neutrino came from and its energy. The key to the work presented here is that the scientists are comparing ?down? to ?up? detections and looking for discrepancies in the detection rate, evidence of an exotic effect predicted by new theories. ?String theory and other possibilities can distort the relative numbers of ?down? and ?up? neutrinos,? said Jonathan Feng. ?For example, extra dimensions may cause neutrinos to create microscopic black holes, which instantly evaporate and create spectacular showers of particles in the Earth's atmosphere and in the Antarctic ice cap. This increases the number of ?down? neutrinos detected. At the same time, the creation of black holes causes ?up? neutrinos to be caught in the Earth's crust, reducing the number of 'up' neutrinos. The relative ?up? and ?down? rates provide evidence for distortions in neutrino properties that are predicted by new theories.? ?The neutrinos accelerated in the cosmos to energies unattainable on Earth can detect the ?footprint? of new physics,? said Goldberg. ?The ?body? responsible for the footprint can then emerge through complementary experiments at the new generation of human-made colliders. On all fronts, it is an exciting era in high-energy physics.? More information about AMANDA and IceCube is available at the IceCube website, http://www.icecube.wisc.edu From velvethum at hotmail.com Sat Jan 28 21:27:19 2006 From: velvethum at hotmail.com (Heartland) Date: Sat, 28 Jan 2006 16:27:19 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Cryonics and uploading References: <200601280009.k0S091e20357@tick.javien.com> <003101c62433$c0f3e820$ea064e0c@MyComputer> Message-ID: > "Heartland" >> If I like chocolate (and I do :)) and and my brain has been scanned >> destructively in order to make a copy then it's the copy that will >> experience the pleasure of eating chocolate, not me. > But unknown to you I made a destructive copy of you last night, but you > still like chocolate. After that I decided to make a destructive copy of > you > ever minute, but you still like chocolate. For the last half hour I have > been making a destructive copy of you every nanosecond, but nevertheless > something has continued, something still likes chocolate. I think that > something is you. I understand your point. Of course my copy will still like chocolate but my point is that the original is dead and will not *enjoy the feeling* of eating chocolate because his mind hardware is gone. > And this is not just a thought experiment, like it or not you are > undergoing a destructive copying process every day of your life. Nearly > every one of your atoms is different from the ones you had 6 months ago. > > John K Clark This is basically a natural occurence of Moravec transfer which does preserve life. The reason why this transfer works is that it doesn't destroy the original mind process. Desctructive uploading does. The reason why "the patern view" is wrong is that it assumes original can actually experience the sensation of being *through the copy*. If my perfect clone and I are in the room and he starts eating chocolate it doesn't mean that I will automatically feel chocolate in my mouth. Yet, according to "the pattern view" the guy jealously looking at his copy (me) should also feel the sensation of eating chocolate. Regardless of whether I'm inside the room or outside, alive or dead, I will not be able to taste it, and the level of accuracy to which the copy was created in my image will never change that fact. Slawomir From benboc at lineone.net Sat Jan 28 21:35:55 2006 From: benboc at lineone.net (ben) Date: Sat, 28 Jan 2006 21:35:55 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Cryonics and uploading In-Reply-To: <200601281643.k0SGhee15600@tick.javien.com> References: <200601281643.k0SGhee15600@tick.javien.com> Message-ID: <43DBE3BB.3010806@lineone.net> Brandon wrote: "It boils down, for me, simply to the subjective experience. If the copy boots up, would I experience its state subjectively? Sure, everyone else would interact with it just as if it were me. But I don't want to preserve my objective self, I want to preserve my subjective self." Er... what's the difference? I don't really see how the terms 'objective' and 'subjective' are relevant here. We are talking about a copy of a mind. In other words, an information process. Granted, a very complex and as yet barely-understood one, but that's what it boils down to. After all, what else could it be? You talk of 'the copy' as if somehow it wasn't you. But that's the whole point of the exercise. Copying you. If the copy isn't you, then it hasn't worked, and the faulty procedure needs to be fixed. As far as the copy's (your) subjective experience is concerned, it (you) will be you (it). Slawomir wrote: "If I like chocolate (and I do :)) and and my brain has been scanned destructively in order to make a copy then it's the copy that will experience the pleasure of eating chocolate, not me. Instead, I will subjectively experience nothing (death). That's not my idea of imortality." So who's this 'i' you are talking about? Once more: The copy *will be* you, if the procedure works properly. (This has nothing to do with the original having been destroyed, either. If it wasn't destroyed, then there would be two of you. Not an original and a copy, not a 'genuine' and a 'fake' one, but simply you * 2). Consider it this way: Your brain IS being 'destructively scanned', right now, and has been all your life. It's part of the normal metabolic processes that go on all the time. The physical bits that make up your brain are constantly being destroyed, and identical copies are put in their place. So, by your logic, 'you' are long dead, and the current 'you' is an impostor, enjoying chocolate instead of the 'real you'. In fact - horror! - maybe the 'real you' didn't like chocolate at all! I hope you can see that i'm talking nonsense now. 'You' is an immensely complex, ever-changing flow of information. It can, in theory at least, be stopped, restarted, copied, transcribed into another form, and run on a different substrate (at least that's what many of us hope!), without ever losing the tiniest bit of it's internal qualities, including all the qualities that people refer to as consciousness, subjectivity, soul, spirit, whatever. I don't really understand why so many people have difficulty with this concept of the mind being an information process (i'm not comfortable with the term 'pattern' for this. It implies something static, and the mind is anything but static). Perhaps it's something like the problem that creationists have with evolution, thinking that it somehow demeans us if we are 'descended from monkeys'. Is it a problem if our minds are the same kind of (very) general thing as a telephone exchange or a web search engine? (I know, very inaccurate examples, worse even than 'descended from monkeys', but i hope you get my meaning). No matter how they twist and turn, and use fancy language, people who insist that the 'essential them' is *not* an information process that is, at least in principle, copyable, storable, etc., are subscribing to a supernatural explanation for their minds. If anyone has a third possibility, i'd be fascinated to hear it (unless it contains the word 'quantum' ;)). ben From amara at amara.com Sat Jan 28 21:55:04 2006 From: amara at amara.com (Amara Graps) Date: Sat, 28 Jan 2006 22:55:04 +0100 Subject: [extropy-chat] Post-doc or Scientist Position in Brain-Computer Interfaces Message-ID: (Seen on phds.org Looks interesting! Amara) Post-doc or Scientist Position in Brain-Computer Interfaces (Europe only) Location: Bremen, Germany Description: The Institute of Automation, University of Bremen, Germany, has an opening for a post-doc or scientist in the EU project BRAINROBOT. The qualified scientist will join an already existing team, and should carry out high level research in brain-computer coupling for control of a robot arm. Equipment for non-invasive measurement of brain potentials and EEG, as well as several robots designed for the support of disabled people, is available at the institute. The ideal candidate has an interest in applying their knowledge for the control of robots, and a strong background in any of the following fields: brain-computer interfaces, signal processing, machine learning and neural networks, human-machine interaction, neuroscience and brain signal acquisition. The candidate should also be able to transfer their knowledge to students and other scientist through publications and courses. The Institute of Automation has a strong tradition in robotics and image processing, and scientists and students from more than 9 countries are working at the institute. English is the main working language. The institute is coordinator of the EU project BRAINROBOT, with 4 other international partners. Prerequisites: The applicant should hold a PhD degree in a relevant area, such as biomedical engineering, computer science, electrical engineering, neuroscience, or a related field. The applicant must be a citizen of a European Union country, Iceland, Israel, Liechtenstein, Norway or Switzerland. The applicant must however not be a German citizen, nor have resided in Germany for longer than a total period of 12 months during the last three years. Appointment: The appointment is for a maximum of two years within the EU-project. Provided successful research, prolongation financed by other resources may be possible. Ideal starting date is May 2006. The salary will be around 4000 Euro/month before tax and social security fees, and around 2200 Euro/month after tax and social security fees. Applications: Interested candidates should send an application, including their detailed CV, list of publications and names of at least 2 references, to Professor Axel Gr?ser, ag at iat.uni-bremen.de. University of Bremen and IAT are equal opportunity employers, and are actively involved in the European initiative involving the Advancement of Women in Science. IAT provides equal opportunity for all candidates based on their merits, and equally encourages both females and males to consider employment with the Institute of Automation. Employer: University of Bremen Contact: Prof. Dr. Axel Graeser Institut f?r Automatisierungstechnik Universit?t Bremen Otto Hahn Allee NW1 D-28359 Bremen Tel.: ++49-421-218-7326 / 7523 Fax.: ++49-421-218-4596 / 4707 Mobil: ++49-177-79 79 036 AG at IAT.UNI-BREMEN.DE http:/www.iat.uni-bremen.de Please mention that you saw this job on phds.org! Sector: Academic Hours: Full time Type: Postdoctoral fellowship Duration: 24-29 months PhD fields sought: Life Sciences, Physical Sciences / Math, Engineering / Computer Science Expires: February 15, 2006 -- Amara Graps, PhD Istituto di Fisica dello Spazio Interplanetario (IFSI) Istituto Nazionale di Astrofisica (INAF), Roma, ITALIA Amara.Graps at ifsi.rm.cnr.it From velvethum at hotmail.com Sat Jan 28 23:14:05 2006 From: velvethum at hotmail.com (Heartland) Date: Sat, 28 Jan 2006 18:14:05 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Cryonics should be preserving life, not just identity. References: Message-ID: On 1/28/06, Heartland wrote: > > On 1/27/06, Heartland wrote: > Unfortunately, the side effect of this is that the original life ends > forever. That is what the individuals I am thinking of actually seem (seemed) to want. The termination of that specific thread. What I am dealing with is reasons to support cryonics that would not involve thread continuation. It is kind of like having access someone's letters, writings, etc. but in a more robust form (e.g. for writing an in depth biography) without actually being able to ask the individual questions about what they were thinking at the time the writing took place. > That's an interesting reason for signing up for suspension. I was under impression that cryonics was about saving actual lives but if someone really wants to preserve just memories/experiences for posterity, instead of an actual life, I see no problem with it, as long as he is aware of what he pays for. I would like my original brain to be fully restored and operational. This > would restore both life and the identity of the original. Subsequent mind > substrate changes would have to be performed by Moravec transfer. So either of (a) an identical atom by atom brain disassembly followed by identical reassembly (with isotopic identity preserved if you so choose) [leaving aside the difficulties of actually doing so]; or (b) a reactivation of the thread present at your time of "death" running on a non-biological ( e.g. uploaded) substrate would not be acceptable? If the answers are yes to either of these questions can you provide a rational explanation other than something along the lines of "this is what I feel most comfortable with"? Thanks, Robert Ultimately, I would like to preserve the original subjective experience which, objectively, is nothing more than a mind-producing activity of matter in space and time. That matter and its activity carves out a necessarily unique trajectory in space-time. To preserve subjective experience, then, means to not destroy the original space-time trajectory of mind-producing activity of matter while keepling it "mind-producing". I assume that scenario b) involved destructive uploading so it's definitely unacceptable since it clearly destroys the original trajectory while creating a duplicate thread/process along separate trajectory. Scenario a) is much more interesting but also more complicated. The explanation of why the scenario should be acceptable probably involves examining the actual function that space-time trajectory serves. I have a pretty good idea how to explain this but I would have to think about it some more. If you want, I could try to explain later. Slawomir From bpaatsch at bigpond.net.au Sun Jan 29 01:39:37 2006 From: bpaatsch at bigpond.net.au (Brett Paatsch) Date: Sun, 29 Jan 2006 12:39:37 +1100 Subject: Faith-based thought vs thinkers Re: [extropy-chat] Intelligent Design: I'm not dead yet References: <8d71341e0601261934i7b7b1c95lfd7f4146eb9bdac7@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <081801c62474$dda963f0$1283e03c@homepc> Russell Wallace wrote: ----- Original Message ----- From: Russell Wallace To: ExI chat list Sent: Friday, January 27, 2006 2:34 PM Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] Intelligent Design: I'm not dead yet On 1/27/06, Samantha Atkins wrote: How come? The Crusades and various Israel-Arab conflicts were paltry little affairs compared to the major wars of the last century. The historical record doesn't make your case. Now, if we decide to declare an all out conflict targeted at one or more major religions, that would be a dangerous and foolish thing to do. Let's not go there. I agree. Most followers of the world's major religions are not enemies of progress. Yes, a minority of fanatics are; the same is true among atheists; to indiscriminately tag all "faith-based thinkers" as the enemy is both untrue and unproductive. Perhaps you are right that "faith-based thinkers" should not be regarded as the enemy. Perhaps it is 'faith-based thought', not the 'thinker' that is the root danger. But the thinker or non-thinker is the agent or vector. The only atheists that have done significant harm that I am aware of have only been able to do so because large numbers of people put faith in them. To me "faith-based thinking" rings like a contradiction in terms. To me faith-based thinking looks the same in its consequences as non-thought but perhaps you have a different understanding of the word faith. Can you offer any examples where faith-based thinking is progressive, humanistic, extropic, or in any way a net benefit to people in its consequences? Brett Paatsch -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From riel at surriel.com Sun Jan 29 02:18:27 2006 From: riel at surriel.com (Rik van Riel) Date: Sat, 28 Jan 2006 21:18:27 -0500 (EST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Re: black vinyl of the spheres In-Reply-To: <20060125121927.38731.qmail@web52708.mail.yahoo.com> References: <20060125121927.38731.qmail@web52708.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: On Wed, 25 Jan 2006, paul illich wrote: > "Twisted spacetime will cause gas falling into a black hole to move in > certain ways. One thing I've wondered about. Time dilation causes the matter falling into a black hole to (from our point of view) slow to infinitessimal speeds near the event horizon. Does that mean that, from our point of view, matter never really goes into a black hole but always stays on the event horizon? Or am I just overlooking something (I usually do with physics) -- "Debugging is twice as hard as writing the code in the first place. Therefore, if you write the code as cleverly as possible, you are, by definition, not smart enough to debug it." - Brian W. Kernighan From acy.stapp at gmail.com Sun Jan 29 02:28:25 2006 From: acy.stapp at gmail.com (Acy Stapp) Date: Sat, 28 Jan 2006 20:28:25 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] Cognitive markers In-Reply-To: <6.2.3.4.2.20060127164727.07973528@unreasonable.com> References: <6.2.3.4.2.20060127164727.07973528@unreasonable.com> Message-ID: Some quick googling found Brain Builder at http://www.toolsforwellness.com/54816.html "The program consists of seven activities. Three focus on auditory processing, three on visual processing, and one on attention and cognitive processing speed. A baseline level is established in each of the activities, then the program moves you to more challenging levels of training. Results from the activities are analyzed by session and compared with your progress to date and may be viewed in reports and graphs." On 1/27/06, David Lubkin wrote: > What are your thoughts on (and, preferably, experience with) a set of > tests that people can use to assess the consequences of changes in > diet, exercise, sleep, time of day, nootropics, age, etc. on > cognitive functions? > > The tests need to: > > a) cover a reasonable range of abilities > b) take 5 or 10 minutes to complete > c) cost under $100 > d) retain accuracy across dozens or hundreds of uses > e) can be used alone, at home or when travelling > > For example, an easily created subtest might present a random > sequence of digits, on screen or spoken, to be repeated or reversed. > Unfortunately, requirement (d) isn't so easy to meet for other sorts of tests. > > > -- David. > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat > -- Acy Stapp "When I'm working on a problem, I never think about beauty. I think only how to solve the problem. But when I have finished, if the solution is not beautiful, I know it is wrong." -- R. Buckminster Fuller (1895 - 1983) From bpaatsch at bigpond.net.au Sun Jan 29 05:26:07 2006 From: bpaatsch at bigpond.net.au (Brett Paatsch) Date: Sun, 29 Jan 2006 16:26:07 +1100 Subject: [extropy-chat] Re: Identity and becoming a Great Old One References: <8d71341e0601260904p1370977fm1227200725fb1450@mail.gmail.com> <332E50AC-6CED-4722-B69D-BD4A77E49783@bonfireproductions.com> <8d71341e0601261024j468403dfne5ee611ad244729@mail.gmail.com><44064850-EFF0-44F2-B5FC-995F3281CC79@bonfireproductions.com> <43D951C7.3000906@pobox.com><03ce01c622d3$bcff4e50$1283e03c@homepc> <43D96819.10008@pobox.com> Message-ID: <089e01c62494$81cd6840$1283e03c@homepc> Eliezer S. Yudkowsky wrote: >>> What difference does it make if it is 10^40 planck increments between >>> when your neurons fire, or 10^53 planck increments between your cryonic >>> suspension and revival? >> >> Are *you* suggesting that it makes no difference? A brain contains a >> *lot* of neurons (perhaps not as many as 10^13 though I'd have >> to look that up) and they don't all fire together. > > It does make no difference. If your 10^14 synapses (10^11 neurons) fire > two hundred times per second in absolutely perfect unsynchrony, there must > be at least 10^27 planck intervals between the arbitrary time assigned to > each firing. I grant that that seems to make logical sense given your givens. I honestly do not know if it is valid/appropriate to talk in terms of planck intervals away from quantum physics. Frankly, this has the feel of some sort of trick about it, perhaps a trick that might be capturing the tricker as well as the trickee. >> 5.39 x 10^-44 sec = 1 planck interval >[i.e. Brian Atkin's correction] > Even calcium ions entering and exiting the neural fiber move far more > slowly than elementary physical timescales, the dance of quarks. Also granted. I don't know the relevant timescales but I think you are probably telling the truth. > If you permit that neural firings should stretch over vast periods of > elementary time, why should not we regard a suspended cryonics patient as > stretched out over an only slightly longer period of time? I think I must "permit" that, on my understanding of how neurons fire, that they do fire over what amounts to many multiples of time greater than the amount of time in a planck interval. And that neurons firing is what I understand gives rise to the sense of self and of consciousness. But whilst matter chunks into discontinuous chunks such as elements or subatomic particles, I don't know that time really does. I suspect that you would say that that doesn't matter, that the calcium ions *are* matter, the very same matter that is involved in a neuron firing, and that I must agree that that matter chunks. > The fallacy is that you are calling upon your human-scale perspective on > time flow to decide what is "stopped" and therefore dead, and what is > "moving" and therefore alive. Possibly. But if you are correct then your argument really says that there is no such thing as me, Brett, or you, Eliezer, for that matter. Don't you agree? And if there is no such thing as Eliezer why would Eliezer want to preserve Eliezer or any part of Eliezer into the future? Isn't it logically absurd of *you* though to try to preserve a self or an identity that doesn't exit? Brett Paatsch From rafal.smigrodzki at gmail.com Sun Jan 29 06:07:21 2006 From: rafal.smigrodzki at gmail.com (Rafal Smigrodzki) Date: Sun, 29 Jan 2006 01:07:21 -0500 Subject: Fwd: [extropy-chat] Re: Identity and becoming a Great Old One In-Reply-To: <7641ddc60601282206n4628a640h9ce504cdf596e223@mail.gmail.com> References: <8d71341e0601260904p1370977fm1227200725fb1450@mail.gmail.com> <43D952A2.1080608@pobox.com> <7641ddc60601270625ge178cddi5fdf12562fc3ec1e@mail.gmail.com> <22360fa10601270804m61e809acs28c7f781c8654161@mail.gmail.com> <7641ddc60601282206n4628a640h9ce504cdf596e223@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <7641ddc60601282207r7827af82ifd7e8a9da14e46c6@mail.gmail.com> Accidentally sent off-list ---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: Rafal Smigrodzki Date: Jan 29, 2006 1:06 AM Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] Re: Identity and becoming a Great Old One To: Jef Allbright On 1/27/06, Jef Allbright wrote: >Rafal: > > The second component of the essence is a stipulation that in > > situations analogous to my current circumstances the device must make > > certain choices identically to my current instance, or its versions > > that have better information about outcomes of actions, including a > > version possessing full and certain information about outcomes of > > actions (choices of versions with more information trump the choices > > of versions with less information). Not all choices must be identical, > > only some choices in some situations, and on of the points of > > reference is, as I said, a hypothetical, omniscient version of myself, > > which is itself an infinite being. Thus, the second part of the > > essence not only does not limit my future self but even requires an > > infinite being for the definition. > > Jef: > I think what is missing here is that not only will Smigrodzki change over > time, but the environment too will change, and he will eventually find > himself to be not only a substantially different player, but that the game > itself will have changed. Therefore, the basis of comparison between the > newer and older versions of Smigrodzki will become vanishingly small. Your > point about such comparisons would remain technically correct, but > irrelevant. ### In my initial post I gave a long-winded description of the definition of smigrodzki which could be condensed to say that a smigrodzki is a device with my memories and core values. The description provides a partial technical statement of what it means to share core values with me ("in situations analogous....") and implies that an infinite amount of development of the device is still compatible with being smigrodzki. Now you seem to agree factually with this conclusion saying that it is "technically correct" but then sally forth into normative statements ("irrelevant", "historical data of diminishing significance", "nearly insignificant in terms of what would define and influence a capable intelligent agent of the fourth millenium.", "any substantial description of our past selves rapidly becomes irrelevant". ) I don't know the basis for these normative statements and I don't share it. For me, all that is significant is that future highly-evolved devices have as a matter of fact my memories and core values (as defined above) and when other minds see these properties as insignificant, it doesn't diminish my satisfaction. I have a feeling that you in fact doubt that my conclusion is technically correct, that is you think that meeting the technical specifications of a smigrodzki precludes being infinite, or evolving through an infinite number of well-differentiated stages. Let me then elaborate on this a bit: The current core values of smigrodzki include, for example, preservation of memories, predation, limited dominance, curiosity, vindictiveness, reciprocal altruism, limited benevolence, and others. There are a few ego-dystonic or irrelevant features of the current Smigrodzki, such as malice, or right-handedness that don't make into the specification of smigrodzki. If you look closely, you will find that some of the specified values are directly derived from our common ancestor, the first eukaryote. This little creature was the first predator - its values included engulfement of other creatures to be rendered into its own flesh. I am a predator, too, since I do not have any qualms about devouring nourishment taken from the flesh of other eukaryotes (in this broad definition even vegans are predatory, since they eat sessile non-sentient eukaryotes). I don't attach any value to feeding on abiotically generated foodstuffs. So, one should say that I share the core values of an amoeba, and not in an insignificant way, either. You do too, unless you tell me that eating spinach fills you with horror. Without doubt there are many of my core values that the amoeba didn't have (i.e. vindictiveness), and certainly the future yotta-FLOPS smigrodzkis will have many core values in addition to my current set - but in the relevant circumstances these old core values will still guide their actions. Just as I, confronted with a tasty mussel, chomp, they will too, repeating a pattern first seen with the amoeba. Being smigrodzki doesn't mean having most of your behavioral repetoire defined by my current core values, just as being an amoeba-derived predator doesn't mean a lack of appreciation of Bach - all it takes is that the relevant aspects of behavior are guided by my core values, however small their overall input into all behaviors. Whether this is "significant" by some-god else standards, is not important for me. Rafal -- Rafal Smigrodzki, MD-PhD Chief Clinical Officer, Gencia Corporation 706 B Forest St. Charlottesville, VA 22903 tel: (434) 295-4800 fax: (434) 295-4951 This electronic message transmission contains information from the biotechnology firm of Gencia Corporation which may be confidential or privileged. The information is intended to be for the use of the individual or entity named above. If you are not the intended recipient, be aware that any disclosure, copying, distribution or use of the contents of this information is prohibited. If you have received this electronic transmission in error, please notify us by telephone (434-295-4800) or by electronic mail (fportell at genciabiotech.com) immediately. From velvethum at hotmail.com Sun Jan 29 12:48:44 2006 From: velvethum at hotmail.com (Heartland) Date: Sun, 29 Jan 2006 07:48:44 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Cryonics should be preserving life, not just identity. References: Message-ID: > I would like my original brain to be fully restored and operational. This >> would restore both life and the identity of the original. Subsequent mind >> substrate changes would have to be performed by Moravec transfer. > > > So either of (a) an identical atom by atom brain disassembly followed by > identical reassembly (with isotopic identity preserved if you so choose) > [leaving aside the difficulties of actually doing so]; or (b) a > reactivation > of the thread present at your time of "death" running on a non-biological > ( > e.g. uploaded) substrate would not be acceptable? > > If the answers are yes to either of these questions can you provide a > rational explanation other than something along the lines of "this is what > I > feel most comfortable with"? > > Thanks, > Robert > > Ultimately, I would like to preserve the original subjective experience > which, objectively, is nothing more than a mind-producing activity of > matter in space and time. That matter and its activity carves out a > necessarily unique trajectory in space-time. To preserve subjective > experience, then, means to not destroy the original space-time trajectory > of mind-producing activity of matter while keepling it "mind-producing". > > I assume that scenario b) involved destructive uploading so it's > definitely unacceptable since it clearly destroys the original trajectory > while creating a duplicate thread/process along separate trajectory. > > Scenario a) is much more interesting but also more complicated. The > explanation of why the scenario should be acceptable probably involves > examining the actual function that space-time trajectory serves. I have a > pretty good idea how to explain this but I would have to think about it > some more. If you want, I could try to explain later. > > Slawomir Well, I thought about it for a long time yesterday an my final conclusion is that scenario a) is unacceptable after all because the original trajectory gets destroyed during disassembly. It's the only logically consistent explanation. Slawomir From jonkc at att.net Sun Jan 29 15:40:11 2006 From: jonkc at att.net (John K Clark) Date: Sun, 29 Jan 2006 10:40:11 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Cryonics and uploading References: <200601280009.k0S091e20357@tick.javien.com><003101c62433$c0f3e820$ea064e0c@MyComputer> Message-ID: <018601c624ea$557fe4b0$c6044e0c@MyComputer> Heartland Wrote: > Of course my copy will still like chocolate but my > point is that the original is dead and will not > *enjoy the feeling* of eating chocolate because > his mind hardware is gone. So you think the copy of you would be conscious but he just wouldn't be you, even though he looks acts and thinks just like you, even though he remembers being you, even though he is absolutely convinced he is you; thus you think the original is dead. If so then you could be dead right NOW because one nanosecond before I said "now" I made a destructive copy of you. In fact I have been making a destructive copy of you a billion times a second for the last year, and yet you go about your business with no difficulty. A billionth of a second if far too short to form a conscious thought, but nevertheless something has been conscious for the last year, something has continued, and I think a good name for that something is "you". > If my perfect clone and I are in the room and he starts eating chocolate > it doesn't mean that I will automatically feel chocolate in my mouth. Don't be silly, if one perfect clone is eating chocolate and the other is not then they are no longer perfect. >This is basically a natural occurence of Moravec transfer which does >preserve life. The reason why this transfer works is that it doesn't >destroy the original mind process. Desctructive uploading does. Why? Both are doing the same thing both are replacing all the atoms in your brain but you say one works and one does not. Why? >I thought about it for a long time yesterday an my final conclusion is that >scenario a) is unacceptable after all because the original trajectory gets >destroyed during disassembly. Original trajectory? All the atoms in your brain get recycled several times a year, try to imagine the path through space time of every atom that had ever made up your brain in your life. The time line would look like a dog's breakfast and it would be difficult to see any continuity there. And yet something continues. > I would like my original brain to be fully restored and operational. I think cryonics patients should understand that if the huge silicon brains of the future decide to revive you they are unlikely to be superstitious about the superiority a bag of protoplasm has over silicon and will revive you it their own way. Giving detailed instructions on how you should be revived is almost as pointless as setting up a trust fund so you will be rich a century from now. They may decide to let you think you are flesh and blood but you will really be a pattern of bits deep in the guts of a computer. And could somebody explain to me what "Cryonics should be preserving life, not just identity" means, I can't make heads or tails out of it. John K Clark From megao at sasktel.net Sun Jan 29 20:08:00 2006 From: megao at sasktel.net (Lifespan Pharma/Morris Johnson CTO) Date: Sun, 29 Jan 2006 14:08:00 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] HACCP for Humans... transhumanism Message-ID: <43DD20A0.7060500@sasktel.net> -------- Original Message -------- Subject: HACCP for Humans... lets think of a new name for this ? Date: Sun, 29 Jan 2006 10:53:18 -0600 From: Lifespan Pharma/Morris Johnson CTO To: Giu1i0 Pri5c0 , csmith2 at agr.gov.sk.ca, kbettschen at foodcentre.sk.ca, futuretag at yahoogroups.com, futuretagltd at yahoogroups.com, ExI chat list , Morris Johnson , The Avantguardian , "Hughes, James J." , Rafal Smigrodzki , orin Hazards , Deviations and Countermeasures.... -Oxidative stress and antioxidants -Inflammation and antiinflammatories -Immune dysfunction and modulation both suppression and enhancement, spot and medium/long term duration. -Symbiotic organism relationships , the concept of systemic biofilms in colon, stomach, mouth, teeth, vascular plaque, epidermal tissues , dormant viral particles in cells, body appliances ( dentures, implanted joints, heart valves).... mangement of both the volume of symbiosis and nature of the organisms tolerated and rejected. As Brij Verma said , there is much to be understood till the day comes when we can be like those shepherds he talked about and drink that contaminated water without suffering any ill effects... it did not just happen, it was the result of a complex biological mechanism. Of course the most important symbiotic organelle relationship we have is with our mitochodria. -Nutrigenomics and environmental genomic up and down regulation. Current medicine simply cleans and sanitizes and repairs a few of the catastrophic failures in a crude manner. The human "plant" goes through a rapid degenerative cycle failing in a few short decades as some fundamental hazards are not properly dealt with and the fixes are insufficient to maintain a "like new" condition to the "plant". Obselescence is accepted and reproduction is the accepted response to create cheap new replacements. I will be bringing Raymond Kurzweil's book "Fantastic Voyage, Live long enough to live forever" back with me and hope the concepts it espouses evoke at least some minor interest. With the human body, it is first and foremost important to take the lead and take the position of "HACCP Coordinator" or at very least "HACCP Technician" for our body away from the State, Goverment , Lawmakers or Health providers and Institutions who are mostly acturarily based socio-economic risk managers and "take ownership" of our own personal "HACCP plan"..... or we will most certainly be statisitics just like the last 10 billion or so humans. Morris -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From russell.wallace at gmail.com Sun Jan 29 22:21:07 2006 From: russell.wallace at gmail.com (Russell Wallace) Date: Sun, 29 Jan 2006 22:21:07 +0000 Subject: Faith-based thought vs thinkers Re: [extropy-chat] Intelligent Design: I'm not dead yet In-Reply-To: <081801c62474$dda963f0$1283e03c@homepc> References: <8d71341e0601261934i7b7b1c95lfd7f4146eb9bdac7@mail.gmail.com> <081801c62474$dda963f0$1283e03c@homepc> Message-ID: <8d71341e0601291421w73e877a6he375ea288f4c5034@mail.gmail.com> On 1/29/06, Brett Paatsch wrote: > The only atheists that have done significant harm that I am aware of have > only been able to do so because large numbers of people put faith in them. > Well yes, but you can expand on that: the only people of any persuasion who've done significant good _or_ harm outside technical areas, have been able to do so because large numbers of people put faith in them. To me "faith-based thinking" rings like a contradiction in terms. To me > faith-based thinking looks the same in its consequences as non-thought but > perhaps > you have a different understanding of the word faith. > *shrug* I'm not the one who introduced the term "faith-based thinking"; I'm happy to just say "faith". Can you offer any examples where faith-based thinking is progressive, > humanistic, extropic, or in any way a net benefit to people in its > consequences? > Pretty much the entirety of political, social and moral progress from the days when slavery and genocide were the normal way of doing things. Yes, in principle you can logically argue that a liberal society (in the classical sense) has this and that benefit, but you have to want those benefits in the first place, and the arguments depend on intellectual tools that weren't available to the likes of Jesus, Martin Luther, George Washington, Gandhi or their followers; nor would they have had any force if they were - nobody actually makes political decisions based on abstruse logical arguments. All the good those people and the ones who believed in them did, was motivated by and based on faith. - Russell -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From velvethum at hotmail.com Sun Jan 29 23:22:58 2006 From: velvethum at hotmail.com (Heartland) Date: Sun, 29 Jan 2006 18:22:58 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Cryonics and uploading References: <200601280009.k0S091e20357@tick.javien.com><003101c62433$c0f3e820$ea064e0c@MyComputer> <018601c624ea$557fe4b0$c6044e0c@MyComputer> Message-ID: > Heartland Wrote: > >> Of course my copy will still like chocolate but my >> point is that the original is dead and will not >> *enjoy the feeling* of eating chocolate because >> his mind hardware is gone. > So you think the copy of you would be conscious but he just wouldn't be > you, > even though he looks acts and thinks just like you, even though he > remembers being you, even though he is absolutely convinced he is you; Yes. The aim of my "chocolate" example is to point out why the brain structure of the copy has absolutely no influence over whether original *lives* or not. It shows why the pattern view fails. thus you think > the original is dead. If so then you could be dead right NOW because one > nanosecond before I said "now" I made a destructive copy of you. I, the person who typed this sentence, might be the copy of the original who might be dead. In fact I > have been making a destructive copy of you a billion times a second for > the > last year, and yet you go about your business with no difficulty. A > billionth of a second if far too short to form a conscious thought, but > nevertheless something has been conscious for the last year, something has > continued, and I think a good name for that something is "you". "You" in the sense of identity, the memories of who you are as a person, opinions, memories of your life experiences, but not the life of the original being who carried that identity. >> If my perfect clone and I are in the room and he starts eating chocolate >> it doesn't mean that I will automatically feel chocolate in my mouth. > > Don't be silly, if one perfect clone is eating chocolate and the other is > not then they are no longer perfect. My word "perfect" means that both copy and the original share the same brain structure. Do you mean that in order for a copy to be "perfect" means that they have not only the same brain structure but also share the exact same experiences? >>This is basically a natural occurrence of Moravec transfer which does >>preserve life. The reason why this transfer works is that it doesn't >>destroy the original mind process. Destructive uploading does. > > Why? Both are doing the same thing both are replacing all the atoms in > your > brain but you say one works and one does not. Why? Brain is not the mind. Don't focus on the brain structure. Instead, focus on the activity of atoms (not the atoms, just the activity) that causes mind to arise. In other words, please focus on the mind process. Here's an analogy that I've come up with over the years that should show why destructive uploading destroys mind process/life and Moravec transfer doesn't: Consider a network of paths through which streams flow. Even though water molecules are being continuously replaced, the stream remains the same. Brain is like the network of paths and mind process is the actual flow of the stream. Moravec transfer maintains *the flow* even though the stuff that is necessary for the flow to exist is being constantly replaced. I could even replace water molecules with, say, mercury and the earth paths with concrete paths, the flow would still exist. On the other hand, destructive uploading simply evaporates both water molecules and erases the stream path so that flow cannot continue. > And could somebody explain to me what "Cryonics should be preserving life, > not just identity" means, I can't make heads or tails out of it. > > John K Clark I hope that the above stream analogy should help explain the difference. Identity is the brain structure, merely a "map" of the path network of existing streams. Life is the collective "flow" of these streams. Slawomir From velvethum at hotmail.com Mon Jan 30 00:00:48 2006 From: velvethum at hotmail.com (Heartland) Date: Sun, 29 Jan 2006 19:00:48 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Cryonics and uploading References: <200601281643.k0SGhee15600@tick.javien.com> <43DBE3BB.3010806@lineone.net> Message-ID: > Slawomir wrote: > "If I like chocolate (and I do :)) and and my brain has been scanned > destructively in order to make a copy then it's the copy that will > experience the pleasure of eating chocolate, not me. Instead, I will > subjectively experience nothing (death). That's not my idea of > imortality." > > > So who's this 'i' you are talking about? > > Once more: The copy *will be* you, if the procedure works properly. First of all, let's assume the original and the copy coexist. The copy will be me in the sense that it will carry the same identity. Still, I will not be experiencing the life of the copy. The original will experience his own life. > (This has nothing to do with the original having been destroyed, either. > If it wasn't destroyed, then there would be two of you. Not an original > and a copy, not a 'genuine' and a 'fake' one, but simply you * 2). Then let's think about this. Let's track the "is you"/"isn't you" status of just the copy in the following cases: (Please fill the copy status for each case with either "is you" or "isn't you".) Case 1: Copy is created, original still exist. Copy status is... Case 2: Copy is created, original brain was destroyed during scanning. Copy status is... Case 3: Copy is created, original stays around for a while and is then killed. Copy status is... Thanks. Slawomir From davidmc at gmail.com Mon Jan 30 00:21:32 2006 From: davidmc at gmail.com (David McFadzean) Date: Sun, 29 Jan 2006 17:21:32 -0700 Subject: [extropy-chat] META: mailing list transfer Message-ID: I am in the process of moving the ExI's mailing lists to a new (more stable) server. If all goes well you shouldn't notice the transition, however please be advised there may be intermittent outages over the next few days. Thanks in advance for your patience. David From thespike at satx.rr.com Mon Jan 30 00:21:27 2006 From: thespike at satx.rr.com (Damien Broderick) Date: Sun, 29 Jan 2006 18:21:27 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] Cryonics and uploading In-Reply-To: References: <200601281643.k0SGhee15600@tick.javien.com> <43DBE3BB.3010806@lineone.net> Message-ID: <6.2.1.2.0.20060129180717.03c6e008@pop-server.satx.rr.com> At 07:00 PM 1/29/2006 -0500, Slawomir wrote: > The copy will be me in the sense that it will carry the same identity. > Still, I will not be experiencing the life of the copy. The original will > experience his own life. Exactly. Or not, assuming destructive copying. Good dog! I can't believe intelligent people still don't get this, after at least a decade of the same old same old. Think about what's at stake, and for whom. The mad scientists come to you in the night and tell you that you're about to be executed--killed, murdered, gone--but that it's okay, because they're going to make a perfect clone of you and raise it just right so that in N years it will be exactly the way you are now, at which point your life will continue on uninterrupted. (As in Theodore Sturgeon's 1962 story "When you care, when you love.") For the rest of the world, this is great news. You've been absent for N years, but now you're back. Whoopee! For *you*, here and now, this is a terrifying sentence of oblivion. What the hell's in it for you? What a difference individual point of view makes! Damien Broderick From bpaatsch at bigpond.net.au Mon Jan 30 01:06:36 2006 From: bpaatsch at bigpond.net.au (Brett Paatsch) Date: Mon, 30 Jan 2006 12:06:36 +1100 Subject: [extropy-chat] Cryonics and uploading References: <200601281643.k0SGhee15600@tick.javien.com><43DBE3BB.3010806@lineone.net> <6.2.1.2.0.20060129180717.03c6e008@pop-server.satx.rr.com> Message-ID: <09a701c62539$6b366b90$1283e03c@homepc> Damien wrote: > For *you*, here and now, this is a terrifying sentence of oblivion. What > the hell's in it for you? As Eliezer might point out the whole terrifying sentence of oblivion doesn't get served continuously though. You can't possible *feel* any terror because of all those planck intervals ;-) Brett Paatsch From velvethum at hotmail.com Mon Jan 30 01:25:18 2006 From: velvethum at hotmail.com (Heartland) Date: Sun, 29 Jan 2006 20:25:18 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Cryonics and uploading References: <200601281643.k0SGhee15600@tick.javien.com><43DBE3BB.3010806@lineone.net> <6.2.1.2.0.20060129180717.03c6e008@pop-server.satx.rr.com> Message-ID: > At 07:00 PM 1/29/2006 -0500, Slawomir wrote: > >> The copy will be me in the sense that it will carry the same identity. >> Still, I will not be experiencing the life of the copy. The original will >> experience his own life. Damien wrote: > Exactly. Or not, assuming destructive copying. > > Good dog! I can't believe intelligent people still don't get this, after > at least a decade of the same old same old. Amazing, isn't it? Especially since it seems like a blindingly obvious and trivial thing to realize. The emphasis is on "blindingly", too hard to see. I can't believe it either that so many people still don't get it. My strategy during the current round of debates has been to focus attention of readers on subjective POV of the original. Why should you be jealous of your perfect clone eating your chocolate in front of you if the clone is "technically" you? And if you're not experiencing the taste of chocolate by watching your identical copy eat it now and in your presence, then what makes you think that the creation of your copy in the future will "wake you up" from the cryonic suspension and give you ability to taste it? Well, we'll see if that angle makes people realize what's going on. Slawomir From bpaatsch at bigpond.net.au Mon Jan 30 03:29:08 2006 From: bpaatsch at bigpond.net.au (Brett Paatsch) Date: Mon, 30 Jan 2006 14:29:08 +1100 Subject: Faith-based thought vs thinkers Re: [extropy-chat] IntelligentDesign: I'm not dead yet References: <8d71341e0601261934i7b7b1c95lfd7f4146eb9bdac7@mail.gmail.com><081801c62474$dda963f0$1283e03c@homepc> <8d71341e0601291421w73e877a6he375ea288f4c5034@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <09f901c6254d$54469860$1283e03c@homepc> Russell Wallace wrote: On 1/29/06, Brett Paatsch wrote: The only atheists that have done significant harm that I am aware of have only been able to do so because large numbers of people put faith in them. Well yes, but you can expand on that: the only people of any persuasion who've done significant good _or_ harm outside technical areas, have been able to do so because large numbers of people put faith in them. No I couldn't, in good conscience, expand on that like that. [I nearly said in "good faith" instead of in good conscience. ] I think science, and more fundamentally, reasoning, and those that practice them *have* done significant good because some others have also been able to put aside faith and belief. You say people of any "persuasion". I can be persuaded by reason if I am willing to question my assumptions and think about other arguments but how is someone persuaded to faith ? To me "faith-based thinking" rings like a contradiction in terms. To me faith-based thinking looks the same in its consequences as non-thought but perhaps you have a different understanding of the word faith. *shrug* I'm not the one who introduced the term "faith-based thinking"; I'm happy to just say "faith". Okay. For me faith (or belief) and reasoning are almost opposites. For you is faith (or belief) ever reasoning? Can you offer any examples where faith-based thinking is progressive, humanistic, extropic, or in any way a net benefit to people in its consequences? Pretty much the entirety of political, social and moral progress from the days when slavery and genocide were the normal way of doing things. Yes, in principle you can logically argue that a liberal society (in the classical sense) has this and that benefit, but you have to want those benefits in the first place, and the arguments depend on intellectual tools that weren't available to the likes of Jesus, Martin Luther, George Washington, Gandhi or their followers; nor would they have had any force if they were - nobody actually makes political decisions based on abstruse logical arguments. All the good those people and the ones who believed in them did, was motivated by and based on faith. All your above relates to the past as is shown by your last sentence "WAS motivated by and based on faith". I asked about IS not WAS. Can you offer an example where faith per se IS CURRENTLY progressive, humansitic, extropic, or in any way a net benefit to people in its consequences? If you are a person of faith or with faith (whatever that means to you), perhaps a personal example would be easier. Perhaps you could point out where you would decide sometime on faith and act on that decision such that you would think that would have been a better thing for you to have done. Better as opposed to deciding on some other basis than faith and then acting. I think all decisions based on faith are morally wrong (or rather non decisions, or abrogations of responsibility to intellectually engage, or use one's conscience) but perhaps you can show me I'm wrong with a single example. Brett Paatsch -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From russell.wallace at gmail.com Mon Jan 30 03:57:49 2006 From: russell.wallace at gmail.com (Russell Wallace) Date: Mon, 30 Jan 2006 03:57:49 +0000 Subject: Faith-based thought vs thinkers Re: [extropy-chat] IntelligentDesign: I'm not dead yet In-Reply-To: <09f901c6254d$54469860$1283e03c@homepc> References: <8d71341e0601261934i7b7b1c95lfd7f4146eb9bdac7@mail.gmail.com> <081801c62474$dda963f0$1283e03c@homepc> <8d71341e0601291421w73e877a6he375ea288f4c5034@mail.gmail.com> <09f901c6254d$54469860$1283e03c@homepc> Message-ID: <8d71341e0601291957j35f3a0d3ya68bba4dc3b6010c@mail.gmail.com> On 1/30/06, Brett Paatsch wrote: > I think science, and more fundamentally, reasoning, and those that > practice them *have* done significant good because some others have also > been able to put aside faith and belief. > Science yes; I did say outside technical areas. You say people of any "persuasion". I can be persuaded by reason if I > am willing to question my assumptions and think about other arguments but > how is someone persuaded to faith ? > Usually by being taught it as a child. Okay. For me faith (or belief) and reasoning are almost opposites. For you > is faith (or belief) ever reasoning? > No, faith is belief in the absence of a reason. > All your above relates to the past as is shown by your last sentence "WAS > motivated by and based on faith". I asked about IS not WAS. > Okay, fair point. Can you offer an example where faith per se IS CURRENTLY progressive, > humansitic, extropic, or in any way a net benefit to people in its > consequences? > To the extent that people in today's world believe in doing good rather than harm (however you define these things), and act on those beliefs, why do you think they do so? Because they've studied history, philosophy, ethics, economics, game theory and evolutionary psychology in great depth and derived theories that lead them to the conclusion that this or that is the best way to behave? Of course not. It's not remotely practical for everyone to go through that process before they can start acting in the real world; and the inherent complexity and fuzziness of the subject matter combines with the nature of human psychology to largely eliminate reason as a driving force in human affairs anyway. Put simply: intellectual study won't convince you to do good or evil, it will merely give you the tools to justify what you were going to do anyway. Nor would civilization work if people would cheat, betray, steal and kill whenever there wasn't a policeman watching them. In practice, civilization works because - and only when - most of the citizens have faith in it and its associated moral standards. That is, if you are using "faith" in the general sense of belief in the absence of evidence. Or do you mean it to refer specifically to belief in God or the supernatural? (Not commenting on which definition is better, just checking which one you're using.) - Russell -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From megao at sasktel.net Sun Jan 29 16:53:18 2006 From: megao at sasktel.net (Lifespan Pharma/Morris Johnson CTO) Date: Sun, 29 Jan 2006 10:53:18 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] HACCP for Humans... lets think of a new name for this ? Message-ID: <43DCF2FE.6050609@sasktel.net> Hazards , Deviations and Countermeasures.... -Oxidative stress and antioxidants -Inflammation and antiinflammatories -Immune dysfunction and modulation both suppression and enhancement, spot and medium/long term duration. -Symbiotic organism relationships , the concept of systemic biofilms in colon, stomach, mouth, teeth, vascular plaque, epidermal tissues , dormant viral particles in cells, body appliances ( dentures, implanted joints, heart valves).... mangement of both the volume of symbiosis and nature of the organisms tolerated and rejected. As Brij Verma said , there is much to be understood till the day comes when we can be like those shepherds he talked about and drink that contaminated water without suffering any ill effects... it did not just happen, it was the result of a complex biological mechanism. Of course the most important symbiotic organelle relationship we have is with our mitochodria. -Nutrigenomics and environmental genomic up and down regulation. Current medicine simply cleans and sanitizes and repairs a few of the catastrophic failures in a crude manner. The human "plant" goes through a rapid degenerative cycle failing in a few short decades as some fundamental hazards are not properly dealt with and the fixes are insufficient to maintain a "like new" condition to the "plant". Obselescence is accepted and reproduction is the accepted response to create cheap new replacements. I will be bringing Raymond Kurzweil's book "Fantastic Voyage, Live long enough to live forever" back with me and hope the concepts it espouses evoke at least some minor interest. With the human body, it is first and foremost important to take the lead and take the position of "HACCP Coordinator" or at very least "HACCP Technician" for our body away from the State, Goverment , Lawmakers or Health providers and Institutions who are mostly acturarily based socio-economic risk managers and "take ownership" of our own personal "HACCP plan"..... or we will most certainly be statisitics just like the last 10 billion or so humans. Morris From hkhenson at rogers.com Mon Jan 30 04:41:07 2006 From: hkhenson at rogers.com (Keith Henson) Date: Sun, 29 Jan 2006 23:41:07 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Cryonics and uploading--reversible In-Reply-To: <6.2.1.2.0.20060129180717.03c6e008@pop-server.satx.rr.com> References: <200601281643.k0SGhee15600@tick.javien.com> <43DBE3BB.3010806@lineone.net> Message-ID: <5.1.0.14.0.20060129232738.04db70b0@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> At 06:21 PM 1/29/2006 -0600, Damien wrote: >At 07:00 PM 1/29/2006 -0500, Slawomir wrote: > >> The copy will be me in the sense that it will carry the same identity. >> Still, I will not be experiencing the life of the copy. The original >> will experience his own life. > >Exactly. Or not, assuming destructive copying. Would it help confuse this issue even further if uploading was reversible? Say as a side effect of doctor boxes. You walk into one of these things and your body gets infiltrated with nanomachines. Your consciousness runs in a brain simulation, but while your body is being patched up your personal experiences in the simulation are being used to update your wetware brain, When the repair work is finished, you can just wonder out and your conscious experiences merges with and continues to run in your physical body. This business of destructive uploads just isn't going to play in the market (for anyone besides Hans), and, in my estimation, the technology to do reversible uploading of this kind isn't any harder technically than a destructive upload. Keith Henson >Good dog! I can't believe intelligent people still don't get this, after >at least a decade of the same old same old. > >Think about what's at stake, and for whom. > >The mad scientists come to you in the night and tell you that you're about >to be executed--killed, murdered, gone--but that it's okay, because >they're going to make a perfect clone of you and raise it just right so >that in N years it will be exactly the way you are now, at which point >your life will continue on uninterrupted. (As in Theodore Sturgeon's 1962 >story "When you care, when you love.") > >For the rest of the world, this is great news. You've been absent for N >years, but now you're back. Whoopee! > >For *you*, here and now, this is a terrifying sentence of oblivion. What >the hell's in it for you? > >What a difference individual point of view makes! > >Damien Broderick >_______________________________________________ >extropy-chat mailing list >extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org >http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat From exi at syzygy.com Mon Jan 30 06:19:30 2006 From: exi at syzygy.com (Eric Messick) Date: 30 Jan 2006 06:19:30 -0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Cryonics and uploading--reversible In-Reply-To: <5.1.0.14.0.20060129232738.04db70b0@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> References: <200601281643.k0SGhee15600@tick.javien.com> <43DBE3BB.3010806@lineone.net> <5.1.0.14.0.20060129232738.04db70b0@pop.bloor.is.net.cable.rogers.com> Message-ID: <20060130061930.25870.qmail@syzygy.com> >This business of destructive uploads just isn't going to play in the market >(for anyone besides Hans), and, in my estimation, the technology to do >reversible uploading of this kind isn't any harder technically than a >destructive upload. > >Keith Henson I always figured the data structure representing the uploaded brain could be used to continuously update the synaptic connectivity in the biological brain. You end up with the biological brain remembering the stream of consciousness of the upload in the computer. Of course, you continuously update in the other direction too. The key to figuring this out is that you can have multiple streams of consciousness running on top of the same set of data structures. Just sum the changes to the data structures due to each of the streams. The data structures represent the neural connectivity of the brain and the details of the synaptic strengths. Consciousness is in the ephemeral electrical activity that sits on top of those data structures. Splitting and recombining those streams is easy, as long as the copies of the data structures don't get too far out of sync. If you separate two copies of a brain for too long, the merge process could get difficult. So, does this unify "pattern" and "thread"? -eric From bpaatsch at bigpond.net.au Mon Jan 30 08:10:25 2006 From: bpaatsch at bigpond.net.au (Brett Paatsch) Date: Mon, 30 Jan 2006 19:10:25 +1100 Subject: Faith-based thought vs thinkers Re: [extropy-chat]IntelligentDesign: I'm not dead yet References: <8d71341e0601261934i7b7b1c95lfd7f4146eb9bdac7@mail.gmail.com><081801c62474$dda963f0$1283e03c@homepc><8d71341e0601291421w73e877a6he375ea288f4c5034@mail.gmail.com><09f901c6254d$54469860$1283e03c@homepc> <8d71341e0601291957j35f3a0d3ya68bba4dc3b6010c@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <0aa301c62574$9fd37fb0$1283e03c@homepc> Russell Wallace wrote: On 1/30/06, Brett Paatsch wrote: I think science, and more fundamentally, reasoning, and those that practice them *have* done significant good because some others have also been able to put aside faith and belief. Science yes; I did say outside technical areas. Reasoning is even more important and fundamental than science because science can't take place without it. I don't think reasoning is just dismissable as being a technical area. Reasoning applies to law and philosophy not just science. Law matters profoundly in my view but law seems to be an area of significant disagreement between you and I. You say people of any "persuasion". I can be persuaded by reason if I am willing to question my assumptions and think about other arguments but how is someone persuaded to faith ? Usually by being taught it as a child. Okay, but taught not intellectually using reason but rather conditioned or indoctrinated. I'd normally use persuasion to mean intellectual persuasion not persuasion by threat of pain or threat of withdrawal of essential parental support. But people of various religion groupings are often described as being of various persuasion. I wouldn't see much point in say Attila the Huns' dog is of the Attila is right "persuasion". Okay. For me faith (or belief) and reasoning are almost opposites. For you is faith (or belief) ever reasoning? No, faith is belief in the absence of a reason. Okay. I know what you mean by faith. I agree with that as a minimum. All your above relates to the past as is shown by your last sentence "WAS motivated by and based on faith". I asked about IS not WAS. Okay, fair point. Can you offer an example where faith per se IS CURRENTLY progressive, humansitic, extropic, or in any way a net benefit to people in its consequences? To the extent that people in today's world believe in doing good rather than harm (however you define these things), and act on those beliefs, why do you think they do so? Not fair. You are answering (or rather not answering) a question with a question. You haven't answered my question which I asked first, then re-asked. Because they've studied history, philosophy, ethics, economics, game theory and evolutionary psychology in great depth and derived theories that lead them to the conclusion that this or that is the best way to behave? No. Though some of them have. [Aside: To varying degrees - I have] Of course not. It's not remotely practical for everyone to go through that process before they can start acting in the real world; True. No argument. But are you saying that they do that on faith? If so I wish you'd be direct. and the inherent complexity and fuzziness of the subject matter combines with the nature of human psychology to largely eliminate reason as a driving force in human affairs anyway. Reason can only be eliminated as a driving force in human affairs if it has first gotten to *be* a driving force in human affairs. Put simply: intellectual study won't convince you to do good or evil, it will merely give you the tools to justify what you were going to do anyway. Not merely. By not answering the question I asked you are making it difficult to communicate with you. Nor would civilization work if people would cheat, betray, steal and kill whenever there wasn't a policeman watching them. In practice, civilization works because - and only when - most of the citizens have faith in it and its associated moral standards. Now you seem to be using faith as a synonym for confidence. That is, if you are using "faith" in the general sense of belief in the absence of evidence. Or do you mean it to refer specifically to belief in God or the supernatural? (Not commenting on which definition is better, just checking which one you're using.) I was trying to find out what *you* meant by "faith" remember? You said "I'm not the one who introduced the term "faith-based thinking"; I'm happy to just say "faith". It was your comment that "the same is true among atheists; to indiscriminately tag all "faith-based thinkers" as the enemy is both untrue and unproductive." that I entered the thread after. I wondered if you were defending some right of religious people to be "faith-based thinkers" perhaps because you were yourself a religious person or if instead your objection was coming from a different place. Brett Paatsch -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From russell.wallace at gmail.com Mon Jan 30 08:39:55 2006 From: russell.wallace at gmail.com (Russell Wallace) Date: Mon, 30 Jan 2006 08:39:55 +0000 Subject: Faith-based thought vs thinkers Re: [extropy-chat]IntelligentDesign: I'm not dead yet In-Reply-To: <0aa301c62574$9fd37fb0$1283e03c@homepc> References: <8d71341e0601261934i7b7b1c95lfd7f4146eb9bdac7@mail.gmail.com> <081801c62474$dda963f0$1283e03c@homepc> <8d71341e0601291421w73e877a6he375ea288f4c5034@mail.gmail.com> <09f901c6254d$54469860$1283e03c@homepc> <8d71341e0601291957j35f3a0d3ya68bba4dc3b6010c@mail.gmail.com> <0aa301c62574$9fd37fb0$1283e03c@homepc> Message-ID: <8d71341e0601300039u495c7cccuad5de4b7b60297de@mail.gmail.com> On 1/30/06, Brett Paatsch wrote: > By not answering the question I asked you are making it difficult to > communicate with you. > I was trying to, but maybe I didn't do a good job of it; I'll try again. I was trying to find out what *you* meant by "faith" remember? > Okay, I'll define it as belief in the absence of evidence. I wondered if you were defending some right of religious people to be > "faith-based thinkers" perhaps because you were yourself a religious person > or if instead your objection was coming from a different place. > Different place; I have no belief in God or the supernatural. Nor do I suggest that faith can replace reason in science, law or philosophy. But nor can reason entirely replace faith. Reason can tell you that B follows from A, but it can't tell you whether to believe A in the first place; the chain has to start somewhere. I'm not a religious man, but I believe in love and life and laughter. I believe in beauty and truth and goodness, and I believe these things are worth protecting, even though neither I nor anyone else can prove it; at some point I, like any civilized man, must resort to belief in the absence of evidence; for people who don't believe in beauty produce ugliness; people who don't believe in truth produce falsehood; and people who don't believe in good produce evil. And if I were to draw a dividing line in the sands of philosophy and choose one side to make a stand against the other, I wouldn't draw it between those who believe in God and those who do not. I would draw it between those who believe in beauty and truth and goodness - whether or not God is part of their belief system - and those who do not. Does that answer your question? - Russell -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From jonkc at att.net Mon Jan 30 15:53:45 2006 From: jonkc at att.net (John K Clark) Date: Mon, 30 Jan 2006 10:53:45 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Cryonics and uploading References: <200601280009.k0S091e20357@tick.javien.com><003101c62433$c0f3e820$ea064e0c@MyComputer><018601c624ea$557fe4b0$c6044e0c@MyComputer> Message-ID: <00e901c625b5$74656c30$a10d4e0c@MyComputer> "Heartland" > the brain structure of the copy has absolutely no influence over whether > original *lives* or not. So the me of 5 minutes ago is dead, even though I remember being that person 5 minutes ago, even though the thoughts and feelings that person was having continued uninterrupted. If that is death then death is vastly overrated, it's a big nothing. Thoughts continue feelings continue I continue because I do not have thoughts and feelings, I am thoughts and feelings. I am only dead when I have a last thought. > I, the person who typed this sentence, might be the copy of the original > who might be dead. In the old Twilight Zone there was a show where at the end the hero was horrified to discover he was dead, even as a kid that never made sense to me, here he was thinking and talking and walking around but he's upset. He should be jumping for joy to discover death was not all it was cracked up to be. > My word "perfect" means that both copy and the original share the same > brain structure. Do you mean that in order for a copy to be "perfect" > means that they have not only the same brain structure but also share the > exact same experiences? Well of course it does! The two may start out being identical but as soon as then have different experiences they diverge, they no longer have the same brain structure and become separate people. > Brain is not the mind. I am mind and mind is what the brain does, but there is always more than one way to do something. At the present time there is only one object in the universe that behaves in a Johnclarkian way, but that need not always be true. > My strategy during the current round of debates has been to focus > attention of readers on subjective POV of the original. Every time I debate this people ALWAYS talk about the POV of the original. Always. Just once try thinking about the POV of the copy, put yourself in his place. You will find that the POV of the copy and original are identical. > Why should you be jealous of your perfect clone eating your chocolate in > front of you if the clone is "technically" you? Because he is no longer me, obviously. John K Clark From avantguardian2020 at yahoo.com Mon Jan 30 17:45:59 2006 From: avantguardian2020 at yahoo.com (The Avantguardian) Date: Mon, 30 Jan 2006 09:45:59 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Re: Faith-based thought vs thinkers In-Reply-To: <081801c62474$dda963f0$1283e03c@homepc> Message-ID: <20060130174559.95623.qmail@web60511.mail.yahoo.com> --- Brett Paatsch wrote: > Perhaps you are right that "faith-based thinkers" > should not be regarded as the enemy. Perhaps it is > 'faith-based thought', not the 'thinker' that is the > root danger. But the thinker or non-thinker is the > agent or vector. Faith-based thought is a tool and can be either a friend or an enemy. It all depends on your relationship to the believer and what is believed. > > The only atheists that have done significant harm > that I am aware of have only been able to do so > because large numbers of people put faith in them. The majority of people hate to think. They want the answers right there at their finger tips. Why do you think calculators exist? People need to believe in SOMETHING. You tell them the ugly truth and their minds rail against it and reject it. Too honest people have few friends. Nature's most powerful computer, designed to look for meaning, structure, and PATTERN in all things is incapable of assigning a null value to their own existense. Because they do not have the will to bootstrap their own purpose, they seek meaning and purpose from without. Religion, however unlikely the details thereof, gives them that purpose. It gives meaning to their metabolism and a sense of worth beyond the primal yearning of their gonads. > To me "faith-based thinking" rings like a > contradiction in terms. To me faith-based thinking > looks the same in its consequences as non-thought > but perhaps > you have a different understanding of the word > faith. Faith-based thinking is simply a self-contained algorithm of social software capable of propagating itself and executing itself on millions of minds down through the ages. It is an algorithm simple enough to run on the slowest of processors with a minimum of storage space. That it may be irrational, usually reflects little upon its own success as a meme, although it may negatively affect the success of its adherents. > > Can you offer any examples where faith-based > thinking is progressive, humanistic, extropic, or in > any way a net benefit to people in its consequences? Faith-based thinking is less useful than faith-based action. Faith is the basis of every gamble ever undertaken. In a world where little is certain, to believe that the cards will fall your way is the whole essense of faith. Nobody would ever take a chance at anything, if they did not believe. This is the essence of the Proactionary Principle. That SOME risks are worth the taking. Thus the most rational reason to believe in God is as a role model. You can tear him down with rationality as Neitsche did but then you are left adrift in Darwin's stormy seas with no star to guide you. Thus, like Nietzsche, More, and Yudkowski you must set up a Superman/Posthuman/SIAI in his place. This is fine for all those who have the rational tools and will to use them. But what of the rest? Would you leave them behind? Would you wait and hope for their biological evolution to catch up? Would you forcefully awaken them? Or would you give them a dream in accordance with what is inevitable? I have heard the siren song of both the Divine and the Superman. And while their melodies are different, they have the same underlying beat, and they beckon to the same place from behind the stars. Actions speak volumes more than words. That humanity grasps at perfection. That we explore the beauty of our temporal existense while maintaining right thought, right word, and right action - this is the essence of all religion and philosophy. And it will require faith of one sort or another: faith in God, faith in ones self, faith in ones fellow man, and faith in truth, and faith in reason. The mind makes reality. Those that believe in destiny have one. Those that believe in souls have one. What do non-believers have? A disconcerted ubermonkey with delusions of grandeur. Thus spake Zoroaster, thus spake Zarathustra, and thus speak I. Stuart Park La Forge alt email: stuart"AT"ucla.edu "Thereupon, the Soul of Mother Earth bewailed, Should I accept the support of a feeble man and listen to his words? In fact I desired the aid of a strong and mighty king. When shall such a person arise and bring strong-handed succor to me?" -Yasna 29, verse 9 "Now I am light, now I am flying, now I see myself beneath myself, now a God dances through me." - St. Nietzsche __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com From kerry_prez at yahoo.com Mon Jan 30 17:58:15 2006 From: kerry_prez at yahoo.com (Al Brooks) Date: Mon, 30 Jan 2006 09:58:15 -0800 (PST) Subject: [extropy-chat] Re: Faith-based thought vs thinkers In-Reply-To: <20060130174559.95623.qmail@web60511.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <20060130175815.18490.qmail@web51612.mail.yahoo.com> And there are practical reasons for faith-based families. Why would so many parents want to bust their humps if they didn't believe in the benevolent Creator looking out for them? Familial love doesn't appear to be enough to sustain their fortitude. To change diapers by itself must take great faith in the Almighty. People need to believe in SOMETHING. You tell them the ugly truth and their minds rail against it and reject it. Too honest people have few friends. Nature's most powerful computer, designed to look for meaning, structure, and PATTERN in all things is incapable of assigning a null value to their own existense. Because they do not have the will to bootstrap their own purpose, they seek meaning and purpose from without. Religion, however unlikely the details thereof, gives them that purpose. It gives meaning to their metabolism and a sense of worth beyond the primal yearning of their gonads. --------------------------------- Yahoo! Autos. Looking for a sweet ride? Get pricing, reviews, & more on new and used cars. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From zenkai001 at sbcglobal.net Mon Jan 30 18:14:49 2006 From: zenkai001 at sbcglobal.net (christopher hershey) Date: Mon, 30 Jan 2006 10:14:49 -0800 (PST) Subject: Faith-based thought vs thinkers Re: [extropy-chat]IntelligentDesign: I'm not dead yet In-Reply-To: <8d71341e0601300039u495c7cccuad5de4b7b60297de@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <20060130181450.67342.qmail@web81702.mail.mud.yahoo.com> you have gotten the wrong address, cause i never asked you a question and i dont know who you are. Russell Wallace wrote: On 1/30/06, Brett Paatsch wrote: By not answering the question I asked you are making it difficult to communicate with you. I was trying to, but maybe I didn't do a good job of it; I'll try again. I was trying to find out what *you* meant by "faith" remember? Okay, I'll define it as belief in the absence of evidence. I wondered if you were defending some right of religious people to be "faith-based thinkers" perhaps because you were yourself a religious person or if instead your objection was coming from a different place. Different place; I have no belief in God or the supernatural. Nor do I suggest that faith can replace reason in science, law or philosophy. But nor can reason entirely replace faith. Reason can tell you that B follows from A, but it can't tell you whether to believe A in the first place; the chain has to start somewhere. I'm not a religious man, but I believe in love and life and laughter. I believe in beauty and truth and goodness, and I believe these things are worth protecting, even though neither I nor anyone else can prove it; at some point I, like any civilized man, must resort to belief in the absence of evidence; for people who don't believe in beauty produce ugliness; people who don't believe in truth produce falsehood; and people who don't believe in good produce evil. And if I were to draw a dividing line in the sands of philosophy and choose one side to make a stand against the other, I wouldn't draw it between those who believe in God and those who do not. I would draw it between those who believe in beauty and truth and goodness - whether or not God is part of their belief system - and those who do not. Does that answer your question? - Russell _______________________________________________ extropy-chat mailing list extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From velvethum at hotmail.com Mon Jan 30 19:21:49 2006 From: velvethum at hotmail.com (Heartland) Date: Mon, 30 Jan 2006 14:21:49 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Cryonics and uploading References: <200601280009.k0S091e20357@tick.javien.com><003101c62433$c0f3e820$ea064e0c@MyComputer><018601c624ea$557fe4b0$c6044e0c@MyComputer> <00e901c625b5$74656c30$a10d4e0c@MyComputer> Message-ID: >> My word "perfect" means that both copy and the original share the same >> brain structure. Do you mean that in order for a copy to be "perfect" >> means that they have not only the same brain structure but also share the >> exact same experiences? John wrote: > Well of course it does! The two may start out being identical but as soon > as > then have different experiences they diverge, they no longer have the same > brain structure and become separate people. And that's where we differ. In my view they would have two separate *lives* even if both minds experienced exactly the same POV. If the original got killed in front of the perfect copy, the original would not witness his own death through the eyes of the copy. >> My strategy during the current round of debates has been to focus >> attention of readers on subjective POV of the original. > > Every time I debate this people ALWAYS talk about the POV of the original. > Always. Just once try thinking about the POV of the copy, put yourself in > his place. You will find that the POV of the copy and original are > identical. I did put myself in copy's place and wrote earlier that I could be a copy while my original might be dead. Since uploading technology doesn't exist yet, logic tells me that I must be the original. >> Why should you be jealous of your perfect clone eating your chocolate in >> front of you if the clone is "technically" you? > > Because he is no longer me, obviously. > > John K Clark Please look at this last sentence and the last one in your previous paragraph. They seem to contradict each other. Since you say that POV of the original and the copy would be the same, then why do you admit that original would be jealous? If both POVs were the same, the original should have nothing to be jealous about because he would be tasting chocolate too. Slawomir From james.hughes at trincoll.edu Mon Jan 30 19:44:34 2006 From: james.hughes at trincoll.edu (Hughes, James J.) Date: Mon, 30 Jan 2006 14:44:34 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] IEET Enhancement Conf: May 26-28, 2006, Stanford Law School Message-ID: "Human Enhancement Technologies and Human Rights" May 26-28, 2006 Stanford University Law School, Stanford, California, USA http://ieet.org/HETHR/ Organized by: Institute for Ethics and Emerging Technologies Co-Sponsors: Center for Cognitive Liberty and Ethics, Stanford Center for Law and the Biosciences, Stanford Program in Ethics in Society Some of the people who will be speaking at the HETHR conference: - Walter Truett Anderson Ph.D., President, World Academy of Art and Science - Richard Boire J.D., Senior Fellow, Center for Cognitive Liberty and Ethics - Nick Bostrom Ph.D., Future of Humanity Institute, Oxford University - Katrina Bramstedt Ph.D., Bioethics Dept., Cleveland Clinic Lerner College of Medicine - Nigel Cameron Ph.D., Director, Center on Nanotechnology and Society - Michael Chorost Ph.D., author of Rebuilt: How Becoming Part Computer Made Me More Human - Laura Colleton J.D., Harvard Divinity School - Gregory Fowler Ph.D., Executive Director, GeneForum - Henry Greely J.D., Director, Center for Law and the Biosciences, Stanford Law School - Martin Gunderson Ph.D., Department of Philosophy, Macalester College - William Hurlbut M.D., Stanford University, President's Council on Bioethics - Ramez Naam, senior engineer, Microsoft, and author of More Than Human - Annalee Newitz Ph.D., contributing editor, Wired magazine - Christine Peterson, Vice President Foresight Nanotech Institute - Martine Rothblatt Ph.D., J.D., Executive Director, Terasem Foundation - Anita Silvers Ph.D., Dept. of Philosophy, San Francisco State University For a full list of speakers and abstracts: http://ieet.org/index.php/IEET/HETHR_speakers Much of the criticism of enhancement technologies has focused on the potential for increased discrimination against women, people of color, the poor, the differently enabled, or "unenhanced" humans. Some bioethicists have proposed a global treaty to ban enhancement technologies as "crimes against humanity." Defenders of enhancement argue that the use of biotechnologies is a fundamental human right, inseparable from the defense of bodily autonomy, reproductive freedom, free expression and cognitive liberty. While acknowledging real risks from genetic, prosthetic, and cognitive enhancement, defenders of enhancement believe that bans on the consensual use of new technologies would be an even greater threat to human rights. Health care, disability and reproductive rights activists have argued that access to technology empowers full and equal participation in society. On the same grounds a generalized right to "technological empowerment" might connect defenders of enhancement technologies with disability activists, reproductive rights activists with would-be parents seeking fertility treatments, the transgendered with aesthetic body modifiers, drug policy reformers and anti-aging researchers with advocates for dignity in dying. Yet, what, if any, limits should be considered to human enhancement? On what grounds can citizens be prevented from modifying their own genes or brains? How far should reproductive rights be extended? Might enhancement reduce the diversity of humanity in the name of optimal health? Or, conversely, might enhancements inspire such an unprecedented diversity of human beings that they strain the limits of liberal tolerance and social solidarity? Can we exercise full freedom of thought if we can't exercise control over our own brains using safe, available technologies? Can we ensure that enhancement technologies are safe and equitably distributed? When are regulatory efforts simply covert, illiberal value judgments? Between the ideological extremes of absolute prohibition and total laissez-faire that dominate popular discussions of human enhancement there are many competing agendas, hopes and fears. How can the language of human rights guide us in framing the critical issues? How will enhancement technologies transform the demands we make of human rights? With the Human Enhancement Technologies and Human Rights conference we seek to begin a conversation with the human rights community, bioethicists, legal scholars, and political activists about the relationship of enhancement technologies to human rights, cognitive liberty and bodily autonomy. It is time to begin the defense of human rights in the era of human enhancement. REGISTRATION: http://ieet.org/index.php/IEET/HETHR_register/ Regular Students Before March 1, 2006: $150 $100 After March 1, 2006: $170 $120 At the door: $200 $150 For more information please contact the conference chair: James Hughes Ph.D., Executive Director, Institute for Ethics and Emerging Technologies, Trinity College, Williams 229B, 300 Summit St., Hartford CT 06106, USA director at ieet.org, (860) 297-2376 From jonkc at att.net Mon Jan 30 21:20:05 2006 From: jonkc at att.net (John K Clark) Date: Mon, 30 Jan 2006 16:20:05 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Cryonics and uploading References: <200601280009.k0S091e20357@tick.javien.com><003101c62433$c0f3e820$ea064e0c@MyComputer><018601c624ea$557fe4b0$c6044e0c@MyComputer><00e901c625b5$74656c30$a10d4e0c@MyComputer> Message-ID: <019401c625e3$03a581a0$300c4e0c@MyComputer> "Heartland" > In my view they would have two separate *lives* > even if both minds experienced exactly the same POV. Ah, this is obviously some strange use of the word "separate" that I wasn't previously aware of. > If the original got killed in front of the perfect copy, the original > would not witness his own death through the eyes of the copy. As I've said many many times before the 2 "perfect" copies are no longer even close to being perfect, one is going through a traumatic experience and one is not. > I did put myself in copy's place and wrote earlier that I could be a copy > while my original might be dead. I'd send condolences that the person you remember being yesterday is dead, but I wouldn't know where to send them, I don't know who the injured party is. It's certainly not you, you're doing fine, you didn't even know you were a copy until I told you. Nor can I find anything the you of yesterday has to complain about, somebody who remembers being him survived and his thoughts and feelings continued on without a hitch. What more can you want out of immortality? > you say that POV of the original and the copy would be the same, then why > do you admit that original would be jealous? If two brains are identical then they are doing the same thing, if they are doing the same thing they are producing the same mind. In your thought experiment the two brains are no longer identical, they are doing different things, they are producing different minds, they have diverged. Is that really difficult to understand? >And that's where we differ. You believe that nature can recycle all the atoms in your body every month or so but if nanotechnology were to try to do the same thing something would be missing, that something can only be a unique soul. Our fundamental difference is that I don't believe in souls and although you may call it something else, you do. John K Clark From kevin at kevinfreels.com Mon Jan 30 21:39:57 2006 From: kevin at kevinfreels.com (kevinfreels.com) Date: Mon, 30 Jan 2006 15:39:57 -0600 Subject: Faith-based thought vs thinkers Re:[extropy-chat]IntelligentDesign: I'm not dead yet References: <20060130181450.67342.qmail@web81702.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <018b01c625e5$b7aa07f0$640fa8c0@kevin> "I'm not a religious man, but I believe in love and life and laughter. I believe in beauty and truth and goodness, and I believe these things are worth protecting, even though neither I nor anyone else can prove it; at some point I, like any civilized man, must resort to belief in the absence of evidence; for people who don't believe in beauty produce ugliness; people who don't believe in truth produce falsehood; and people who don't believe in good produce evil." I just want to point out that this is a beautiful piece of work. I didn't know if anyone else noticed since it was in the context of a larger discussions. ----- Original Message ----- From: christopher hershey To: ExI chat list Sent: Monday, January 30, 2006 12:14 PM Subject: Re: Faith-based thought vs thinkers Re:[extropy-chat]IntelligentDesign: I'm not dead yet you have gotten the wrong address, cause i never asked you a question and i dont know who you are. Russell Wallace wrote: On 1/30/06, Brett Paatsch wrote: By not answering the question I asked you are making it difficult to communicate with you. I was trying to, but maybe I didn't do a good job of it; I'll try again. ! I was trying to find out what *you* meant by "faith" remember? Okay, I'll define it as belief in the absence of evidence. I wondered if you were defending some right of religious people to be "faith-based thinkers" perhaps because you were yourself a religious person or if instead your objection was coming from a different place. Different place; I have no belief in God or the supernatural. Nor do I suggest that faith can replace reason in science, law or philosophy. But nor can reason entirely replace faith. Reason can tell you that B follows from A, but it can't tell you whether to believe A in the first place; the ! chain has to start somewhere. I'm not a religious man, but I believe in love and life and laughter. I believe in beauty and truth and goodness, and I believe these things are worth protecting, even though neither I nor anyone else can prove it; at some point I, like any civilized man, must resort to belief in the absence of evidence; for people who don't believe in beauty produce ugliness; people who don't believe in truth produce falsehood; and people who don't believe in good produce evil. And if I were to draw a dividing line in the sands of philosophy and choose one side to make a stand against the other, I wouldn't draw it between those who believe in God and those who do not. I would draw it between those who believe in beauty and truth and goodness - whether or not God is part of their belief system - and those who do not. Does that answer your question? - Russell _______________________________________________ extropy-chat mailing list extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ _______________________________________________ extropy-chat mailing list extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From kerry_prez at yahoo.com Mon Jan 30 21:57:40 2006 From: kerry_prez at yahoo.com (Al Brooks) Date: Mon, 30 Jan 2006 13:57:40 -0800 (PST) Subject: Faith-based thought vs thinkers Re:[extropy-chat]IntelligentDesign: I'm not dead yet In-Reply-To: <018b01c625e5$b7aa07f0$640fa8c0@kevin> Message-ID: <20060130215740.5240.qmail@web51605.mail.yahoo.com> Can't one believe in truth yet also produce falsehood-- for security's sake? Churchill said words to the effect that in wartime lies are the bodyguard of truth. There also exists an ongoing disagreement about what constitutes life; anti-abortionists are convinced fetuses are lives. "I'm not a religious man, but I believe in love and life and laughter. I believe in beauty and truth and goodness, and I believe these things are worth protecting, even though neither I nor anyone else can prove it; at some point I, like any civilized man, must resort to belief in the absence of evidence; for people who don't believe in beauty produce ugliness; people who don't believe in truth produce falsehood; and people who don't believe in good produce evil." --------------------------------- Bring words and photos together (easily) with PhotoMail - it's free and works with Yahoo! Mail. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From avantguardian2020 at yahoo.com Mon Jan 30 22:19:25 2006 From: avantguardian2020 at yahoo.com (The Avantguardian) Date: Mon, 30 Jan 2006 14:19:25 -0800 (PST) Subject: Faith-based thought vs thinkers Re:[extropy-chat]IntelligentDesign: I'm not dead yet In-Reply-To: <018b01c625e5$b7aa07f0$640fa8c0@kevin> Message-ID: <20060130221925.42134.qmail@web60523.mail.yahoo.com> --- "kevinfreels.com" wrote: > "I'm not a religious man, but I believe in love and > life and laughter. I believe in beauty and truth and > goodness, and I believe these things are worth > protecting, even though neither I nor anyone else > can prove it; at some point I, like any civilized > man, must resort to belief in the absence of > evidence; for people who don't believe in beauty > produce ugliness; people who don't believe in truth > produce falsehood; and people who don't believe in > good produce evil." > > > I just want to point out that this is a beautiful > piece of work. I didn't know if anyone else noticed > since it was in the context of a larger discussions. I did. And I think Russell did an admirable job of defending faith, or as he called it, "belief in the absence of evidence". I think the true worth of faith is that it gives apriori value to the nobler aspects of humanity. Stuart Park La Forge alt email: stuart"AT"ucla.edu "Thereupon, the Soul of Mother Earth bewailed, Should I accept the support of a feeble man and listen to his words? In fact I desired the aid of a strong and mighty king. When shall such a person arise and bring strong-handed succor to me?" -Yasna 29, verse 9 "Now I am light, now I am flying, now I see myself beneath myself, now a God dances through me." - St. Nietzsche __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com From sentience at pobox.com Mon Jan 30 22:59:49 2006 From: sentience at pobox.com (Eliezer S. Yudkowsky) Date: Mon, 30 Jan 2006 14:59:49 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Re: Faith-based thought vs thinkers In-Reply-To: <8d71341e0601300039u495c7cccuad5de4b7b60297de@mail.gmail.com> References: <8d71341e0601261934i7b7b1c95lfd7f4146eb9bdac7@mail.gmail.com> <081801c62474$dda963f0$1283e03c@homepc> <8d71341e0601291421w73e877a6he375ea288f4c5034@mail.gmail.com> <09f901c6254d$54469860$1283e03c@homepc> <8d71341e0601291957j35f3a0d3ya68bba4dc3b6010c@mail.gmail.com> <0aa301c62574$9fd37fb0$1283e03c@homepc> <8d71341e0601300039u495c7cccuad5de4b7b60297de@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <43DE9A65.9050903@pobox.com> Russell Wallace wrote: > > I'm not a religious man, but I believe in love and life and laughter. I > believe in beauty and truth and goodness, and I believe these things are > worth protecting, even though neither I nor anyone else can prove it; at > some point I, like any civilized man, must resort to belief in the > absence of evidence; for people who don't believe in beauty produce > ugliness; people who don't believe in truth produce falsehood; and > people who don't believe in good produce evil. http://www.nizkor.org/features/fallacies/appeal-to-consequences.html You're conflating empirical propositions with moral choices, mixing up probability theory and decision theory. Perhaps you are confused because English uses the same word "believe in" to indicate both your hypotheses and your ethics. I *choose* love and life and laughter, beauty and goodness. I also choose truth. I strive to attain the map that reflects the territory; to believe based solely on evidence, and to abjure any shift of credence whatsoever which is not based on evidence. For you cannot draw an accurate map of a city by sitting in your living room and having great faith in your doodles. You must go outside and walk down streets, and keep your eyes open, and look around, and make lines on paper that correspond to what you see, and resist the temptation to draw in a few extra lines just for fun. P.C. Hodgell said: "That which can be destroyed by the truth should be." I have never heard a declaration of rationality which is both simpler and better than this. If a wire approaches, and I believe it to be electrified, and it is *not* electrified, then the truth opposes my fear. If a wire approaches, and I believe it is not electrified, and it *is* electrified, then the Way opposes my calm. I wish to attain those feelings and ethics and emotions and principles which I would aver if I saw truly, being the person that I am. Where is the false statement I must believe, to choose love and life and laughter? -- Eliezer S. Yudkowsky http://singinst.org/ Research Fellow, Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence From velvethum at hotmail.com Mon Jan 30 23:15:47 2006 From: velvethum at hotmail.com (Heartland) Date: Mon, 30 Jan 2006 18:15:47 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Cryonics and uploading References: <200601280009.k0S091e20357@tick.javien.com><003101c62433$c0f3e820$ea064e0c@MyComputer><018601c624ea$557fe4b0$c6044e0c@MyComputer><00e901c625b5$74656c30$a10d4e0c@MyComputer> <019401c625e3$03a581a0$300c4e0c@MyComputer> Message-ID: >> If the original got killed in front of the perfect copy, the original >> would not witness his own death through the eyes of the copy. John wrote: > As I've said many many times before the 2 "perfect" copies are no longer > even close to being perfect, one is going through a traumatic experience > and > one is not. Okay, so if we assume your meaning of the word "perfect" which is "same brain structure, same subjective experience at all times" then how do you propose to revive a frozen brain? As soon as you make a copy from the frozen brain the copy will not be "perfect" because, according to your definition, both will have different subjective experience. One feels nothing, the other feels something. So can we at least agree that it's impossible to make a frozen brain and a copy "perfect?" >> you say that POV of the original and the copy would be the same, then why >> do you admit that original would be jealous? > If two brains are identical then they are doing the same thing, Not true. You could make an atomically precise copy of me and my clone and I could be doing different things. > if they are > doing the same thing they are producing the same mind. If both of them share the same subjective experience only means just that and nothing else. The argument that "same subjective experience -> same mind" is as valid as "I watch a movie with a friend -> we become one mind". > In your thought > experiment the two brains are no longer identical, they are doing > different > things, they are producing different minds, they have diverged. Is that > really difficult to understand? > >>And that's where we differ. > > You believe that nature can recycle all the atoms in your body every month > or so but if nanotechnology were to try to do the same thing something > would > be missing, that something can only be a unique soul. Wait, I didn't say anything close to that. I only said that recycling of atoms is a natural occurrence of Moravec transfer, that's all. It would be perfectly legal to perform Moravec transfer by means of nanomachines. It's the destructive uploading that is the problem. Slawomir From nvitamore at austin.rr.com Mon Jan 30 23:18:56 2006 From: nvitamore at austin.rr.com (nvitamore at austin.rr.com) Date: Mon, 30 Jan 2006 18:18:56 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] ARTS: Nanotechnology Conference Exhibition Message-ID: <380-220061130231856754@M2W083.mail2web.com> CALL FOR TRANSHUMANIST ARTS AND ARTISTS! If you are an artist who likes science, or a scientist that likes the arts, or a technologist that likes both arts and sciences (or anyone on between), this message is for you! We are collecting nanotechnology concepts that translate into designs, sounds, moving images, etc. for the upcoming "NanoTx 06 conference - The Promise of Tomorrow" http://www.nanotx.biz/ Please let me know soonest - we need this in a nanominute! Create! Natasha Natasha Vita-More Transhumanist Arts & Culture -------------------------------------------------------------------- mail2web - Check your email from the web at http://mail2web.com/ . From nanogirl at halcyon.com Mon Jan 30 23:21:54 2006 From: nanogirl at halcyon.com (Gina Miller) Date: Mon, 30 Jan 2006 15:21:54 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] New nanotech animations References: <200601280009.k0S091e20357@tick.javien.com><003101c62433$c0f3e820$ea064e0c@MyComputer><018601c624ea$557fe4b0$c6044e0c@MyComputer><00e901c625b5$74656c30$a10d4e0c@MyComputer> Message-ID: <008b01c625f3$fb8584f0$0300a8c0@Nano> I've got a couple new nanotech animations: http://maxanimation.blogspot.com/2006/01/documentary-for-wusl.html Gina "Nanogirl" Miller Nanotechnology Industries http://www.nanoindustries.com Personal: http://www.nanogirl.com/index2.html Blog: http://maxanimation.blogspot.com/ Foresight Participating Member http://www.foresight.org Nanotechnology Advisor Extropy Institute http://www.extropy.org 3D/Animation http://www.nanogirl.com/museumfuture/index.htm Microscope Jewelry http://www.nanogirl.com/crafts/microjewelry.htm Email: nanogirl at halcyon.com "Nanotechnology: Solutions for the future." -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From nvitamore at austin.rr.com Mon Jan 30 23:28:38 2006 From: nvitamore at austin.rr.com (nvitamore at austin.rr.com) Date: Mon, 30 Jan 2006 18:28:38 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] New nanotech animations Message-ID: <380-220061130232838909@M2W030.mail2web.com> Gina wrote: >I've got a couple new nanotech animations: >http://maxanimation.blogspot.com/2006/01/documentary-for-wusl.html Hi Gina! We are on the same planet, that is certain. Perhaps these can be used for the NanoTx 06 Conference! Create! Natasha -------------------------------------------------------------------- mail2web - Check your email from the web at http://mail2web.com/ . From russell.wallace at gmail.com Mon Jan 30 23:30:48 2006 From: russell.wallace at gmail.com (Russell Wallace) Date: Mon, 30 Jan 2006 23:30:48 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Re: Faith-based thought vs thinkers In-Reply-To: <43DE9A65.9050903@pobox.com> References: <8d71341e0601261934i7b7b1c95lfd7f4146eb9bdac7@mail.gmail.com> <081801c62474$dda963f0$1283e03c@homepc> <8d71341e0601291421w73e877a6he375ea288f4c5034@mail.gmail.com> <09f901c6254d$54469860$1283e03c@homepc> <8d71341e0601291957j35f3a0d3ya68bba4dc3b6010c@mail.gmail.com> <0aa301c62574$9fd37fb0$1283e03c@homepc> <8d71341e0601300039u495c7cccuad5de4b7b60297de@mail.gmail.com> <43DE9A65.9050903@pobox.com> Message-ID: <8d71341e0601301530r7c893866v3d655442dadc5cc4@mail.gmail.com> On 1/30/06, Eliezer S. Yudkowsky wrote: > > You're conflating empirical propositions with moral choices, mixing up > probability theory and decision theory. Perhaps you are confused > because English uses the same word "believe in" to indicate both your > hypotheses and your ethics. This is why I said it is important to state a definition of the word "faith", because it is a rather fuzzy word. The definition I said I was using is "belief in the absence of evidence", which my comments fit by the normal use of the English word "belief". You seem to be using the definition "belief in empirical propositions contrary to the evidence" (for example creationism, or the belief by some of James Randi's correspondence in their psychic powers even after a test produces a null result); I do not advocate that sort of faith. I *choose* love and life and laughter, beauty and goodness. I also > choose truth. I strive to attain the map that reflects the territory; > to believe based solely on evidence, and to abjure any shift of credence > whatsoever which is not based on evidence. For you cannot draw an > accurate map of a city by sitting in your living room and having great > faith in your doodles. You must go outside and walk down streets, and > keep your eyes open, and look around, and make lines on paper that > correspond to what you see, and resist the temptation to draw in a few > extra lines just for fun. Agreed. - Russell -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From emlynoregan at gmail.com Mon Jan 30 23:35:14 2006 From: emlynoregan at gmail.com (Emlyn) Date: Tue, 31 Jan 2006 10:35:14 +1100 Subject: [extropy-chat] What's the Antonym for Longevity? In-Reply-To: <005001c6230f$0ab232d0$6600a8c0@brainiac> References: <005001c6230f$0ab232d0$6600a8c0@brainiac> Message-ID: <710b78fc0601301535k67579233h@mail.gmail.com> Shortevity, surely... On 27/01/06, Olga Bourlin wrote: > Compared to women, the statistics on how many males kill themselves seem to > be way out of whack - and much worse than I thought, if there's any credence > to this article: > > http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2006/01/26/BAGHRGT0DV1.DTL > > If true, it's disturbing and sad (and even more puzzling that many women > still tend to think of themselves as "victims"). > > Olga > > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat > -- Emlyn http://emlynoregan.com * blogs * music * software * NaNoWriMo word count: 50000+! Winner! (http://nanowrimo.org) From bpaatsch at bigpond.net.au Mon Jan 30 23:53:51 2006 From: bpaatsch at bigpond.net.au (Brett Paatsch) Date: Tue, 31 Jan 2006 10:53:51 +1100 Subject: Faith-based thought vs thinkers Re:[extropy-chat]IntelligentDesign: I'm not dead yet References: <8d71341e0601261934i7b7b1c95lfd7f4146eb9bdac7@mail.gmail.com><081801c62474$dda963f0$1283e03c@homepc><8d71341e0601291421w73e877a6he375ea288f4c5034@mail.gmail.com><09f901c6254d$54469860$1283e03c@homepc><8d71341e0601291957j35f3a0d3ya68bba4dc3b6010c@mail.gmail.com><0aa301c62574$9fd37fb0$1283e03c@homepc> <8d71341e0601300039u495c7cccuad5de4b7b60297de@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <0c7101c625f8$6c0371c0$1283e03c@homepc> Russell Wallace wrote: On 1/30/06, Brett Paatsch wrote: By not answering the question I asked you are making it difficult to communicate with you. I was trying to, but maybe I didn't do a good job of it; I'll try again. I was trying to find out what *you* meant by "faith" remember? Okay, I'll define it as belief in the absence of evidence. Okay. I wondered if you were defending some right of religious people to be "faith-based thinkers" perhaps because you were yourself a religious person or if instead your objection was coming from a different place. Different place; I have no belief in God or the supernatural. Nor do I suggest that faith can replace reason in science, law or philosophy. But nor can reason entirely replace faith. Reason can tell you that B follows from A, but it can't tell you whether to believe A in the first place; the chain has to start somewhere. Yes, the chain of reasoning does have to start somewhere, I agree with that. I don't know if it is right or moral that you should start your chain of reasoning from beliefs rather than axioms though. I'm not a religious man, but I believe in love and life and laughter. I believe in beauty and truth and goodness, Good for you, honestly. What I mean is I think those are good values. I live. I can laugh. I haved loved. I see beauty. I value and pursue truth. Goodness seems good to me. But it doesn't seem quite right to me to say that I *believe* in those things. Now here's something. I might be able to live more, laugh more, see more beauty and see more good if like you I believed more. I don't know. You may be happier than me because you reason from beliefs rather than axioms. You might not be, but you might be. and I believe these things are worth protecting, even though neither I nor anyone else can prove it; at some point I, like any civilized man, must resort to belief in the absence of evidence; for people who don't believe in beauty produce ugliness; people who don't believe in truth produce falsehood; and people who don't believe in good produce evil. I am trying to get at whether your believing qua believing is actually anything rather than an artifact of language. I get that you think (intellectually) and feel (emotionally) that what you value, life, laughter, beauty, truth, goodness, is valuable and is worth protecting, so do I. What I am not sure about is whether there is some essential domain of truth that only the words belief or faith can cover for you. Or if in holding to believe you are simply clinging to a cosy error. I think most of the things you've identified as beliefs would be valued as valuable by most people. But I doubt that *you* would find *values* to be a satisfactory substitute for beliefs or articles of faith. Or would you? Do values and beliefs seem to be different things for you. I don't get why you think or feel that you must "resort" to belief in the absence of evidence. By doing so you seem to turn values into beliefs and it is not clear to me that in 2006 there is any advantage in doing that. Whereas it is clear to me (and here I could be wrong) that believe and faith carries a lot of baggage. Others also value life, laughter, beauty, truth and goodness as they see it. There are things which are nearly universally valued by all homo sapiens - and both that that is so, and what those things are, are things which can yeild to intellectual inquiry or to study into human beings. Given a magic button impossibly disconnected from everything else such that you might benefit from my pressing on it with more life, laughter, love, beauty, truth and goodness without any shortfall in those things arising at the same time elsewhere and I would be happy to press that button for you. I think you are wrong to hold that those that don't believe in beauty produce ugliness. Nature doesn't believe in beauty yet there are sunsets, sunrises, night skies that non-believers like me do find beautiful. A person that finds beauty in a new and unexpected experience could not prior to the experience have had a belief in it and once they have had it it seems to add little to create a new belief. The thing that believing seems to give a person is fraternity with those that also like to talk about what they believe in. And perhaps power over them if they imprint on one. And as what some believe in (their words not mine) seem to me and others to be ugly, false and bad things, so the the fraternity of believers that will stand by believers against non-believers does not seem to be a moral one to opt in to. Notwithstanding how cosy it may look to social creatures to have so much emotional company. I admit believing looks pretty cosy and comfortable to me sometimes. And if I were to draw a dividing line in the sands of philosophy and choose one side to make a stand against the other, I wouldn't draw it between those who believe in God and those who do not. I would draw it between those who believe in beauty and truth and goodness - whether or not God is part of their belief system - and those who do not. [I don't seem to be able to indent the comment line at the side so I'll switch to italics] If you were to draw your dividing line then call people and invite those who believe in beauty, truth and goodness to chose one side and those that didn't to choose the other I'd probably choose the other or equivicate until you deemed that I had because I couldn't say I *believed* in them. Yet nor do I *believe* in (endorse or affirm) ugliness, falsehood or evil. But my failure to chose you would apparently placed me in your opposing camp whereas by mine you've given me a conflated choice. (Aside: This is perhaps similar to the conflated choice President Bush offers or demands one makes when he says you are either with us (meaning him) or against us.) If you were to invite those who *value* beauty, truth and goodness to chose a side and those that do not to chose the other I'd be on the side of those that value them. Now lets change things a little. If I was looking for people that could do something about improving the world and I was looking for practical folk I might use belief in God, or belief in fairies, or belief in just about anything to sort folk into practical and impractical categories. The believers are not likely to understand the contingent nature of the universe. Those that think they can both have their cake and eat it, best not be given the responsibilities of a quartermaster or the treasury or the cake they will eat and the treasure they will spend will not be there for others. In terms of their sentiments the faith-based groups aren't the enemy but in terms of their practicality they are deadly in large numbers not just to themselves but to non-believers. Does that answer your question? Perhaps *I* have a hang-up against believing and against faith and that is making me especially dull to your meaning. My question was "can you offer an example where faith per se IS CURRENTLY progressive, humansitic, extropic, or in any way a net benefit to people in its consequences?", *I* don't think you did answer that exactly. Others without my possible hang-ups and aversions to believing and faith might think you did. In talking about what you "believe in" you *did* make some of your own values clearer and they are values I can relate to a respect. You say above that reason cannot entire replace faith. Okay but if you believe in something like that "international law is an existential risk" I wonder if you can be moved away from any of your belief which I might find to be themselves anti-extropic, by reason. I wonder if you will allow things *you* have faith in to give ground to reason or if when an article of faith for you is challenged in order to build a bridge to you your reasoning will only serve to protect beliefs regardless of whether those belief ought be protected. You seem to be able to defend others who you disagree with on priniciple sometimes (which I think is promising and likeable) but I don't know how reliable your adherence to principle can be. I think that to be effective within the world we live in we have to form hierarchies of principle, not belief. Its not going to be enough to just have principles when those principles can conflict. Beliefs have to be fair ground for directing criticism at if we are to get the hierarchy of principle right. Sorry for the length of my reply. Brett Paatsch -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From nanogirl at halcyon.com Mon Jan 30 23:47:44 2006 From: nanogirl at halcyon.com (Gina Miller) Date: Mon, 30 Jan 2006 15:47:44 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] New nanotech animations References: <380-220061130232838909@M2W030.mail2web.com> Message-ID: <000001c625fa$603a4100$0300a8c0@Nano> It's good not to be alone, and what better company could one have! When is the NanoTX06 conference? Gina ----- Original Message ----- From: nvitamore at austin.rr.com To: extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org ; extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org Sent: Monday, January 30, 2006 3:28 PM Subject: RE: [extropy-chat] New nanotech animations Gina wrote: >I've got a couple new nanotech animations: >http://maxanimation.blogspot.com/2006/01/documentary-for-wusl.html Hi Gina! We are on the same planet, that is certain. Perhaps these can be used for the NanoTx 06 Conference! Create! Natasha -------------------------------------------------------------------- mail2web - Check your email from the web at http://mail2web.com/ . _______________________________________________ extropy-chat mailing list extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From thespike at satx.rr.com Tue Jan 31 00:07:42 2006 From: thespike at satx.rr.com (Damien Broderick) Date: Mon, 30 Jan 2006 18:07:42 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] Re: Faith-based thought vs thinkers In-Reply-To: <8d71341e0601301530r7c893866v3d655442dadc5cc4@mail.gmail.co m> References: <8d71341e0601261934i7b7b1c95lfd7f4146eb9bdac7@mail.gmail.com> <081801c62474$dda963f0$1283e03c@homepc> <8d71341e0601291421w73e877a6he375ea288f4c5034@mail.gmail.com> <09f901c6254d$54469860$1283e03c@homepc> <8d71341e0601291957j35f3a0d3ya68bba4dc3b6010c@mail.gmail.com> <0aa301c62574$9fd37fb0$1283e03c@homepc> <8d71341e0601300039u495c7cccuad5de4b7b60297de@mail.gmail.com> <43DE9A65.9050903@pobox.com> <8d71341e0601301530r7c893866v3d655442dadc5cc4@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <6.2.1.2.0.20060130175333.01d21308@pop-server.satx.rr.com> At 11:30 PM 1/30/2006 +0000, Russell W wrote: >The definition I said I was using is "belief in the absence of evidence", >which my comments fit by the normal use of the English word "belief". Well, no. That's a preposterously partisan definition. The normal use of the English word is something like "that which I hold to be the case", generally something held with less absolute conviction than if it was said to be "known"; while "faith" is the state or condition of believing something. People who say for example that they believe in God therefore would generally deny that they are holding this conviction *in the absence of evidence*. Christians and Muslims, for example, will point to sacred Scriptures that they regard as historical documents supporting their beliefs. What's more, many will refer to experiences of a powerful kind linked to states of prayer, contemplation, even desperation, etc. Other believers will nod in recognition at the descriptions provided. So to that extent there is even a quasi-public character to belief. What is at issue is surely the general acceptability of the proffered evidence, not its absence. Damien Broderick From pharos at gmail.com Tue Jan 31 00:11:39 2006 From: pharos at gmail.com (BillK) Date: Tue, 31 Jan 2006 00:11:39 +0000 Subject: Faith-based thought vs thinkers Re: [extropy-chat]IntelligentDesign: I'm not dead yet In-Reply-To: <8d71341e0601300039u495c7cccuad5de4b7b60297de@mail.gmail.com> References: <8d71341e0601261934i7b7b1c95lfd7f4146eb9bdac7@mail.gmail.com> <081801c62474$dda963f0$1283e03c@homepc> <8d71341e0601291421w73e877a6he375ea288f4c5034@mail.gmail.com> <09f901c6254d$54469860$1283e03c@homepc> <8d71341e0601291957j35f3a0d3ya68bba4dc3b6010c@mail.gmail.com> <0aa301c62574$9fd37fb0$1283e03c@homepc> <8d71341e0601300039u495c7cccuad5de4b7b60297de@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: On 1/30/06, Russell Wallace wrote: > And if I were to draw a dividing line in the sands of philosophy and choose > one side to make a stand against the other, I wouldn't draw it between those > who believe in God and those who do not. I would draw it between those who > believe in beauty and truth and goodness - whether or not God is part of > their belief system - and those who do not. > Hey, this is Plato talking, isn't it? Quote: Plato believes in the existence of absolute truth, goodness, and beauty. Beyond our fuzzy and confused view of things is the reality of eternal standards and structures. There are many (more or less) good things; there is one absolute good. There are many (more or less) beautiful things; there is one absolute beauty. There are many (more or less) just persons; there is one absolute justice (idea or ideal of justice). The attainment of absolute truth, goodness, and beauty is impossible for humans, but the belief that they exist and a glimpse of them from time to time in a rare moment of insight is what motivates us to think, inquire, deliberate, and strive. End quote. This is Plato's Theory of Forms, which is pretty well fundamental to Western Philosophy. (Although much criticised and amended nowadays). BillK From russell.wallace at gmail.com Tue Jan 31 00:15:11 2006 From: russell.wallace at gmail.com (Russell Wallace) Date: Tue, 31 Jan 2006 00:15:11 +0000 Subject: Faith-based thought vs thinkers Re:[extropy-chat]IntelligentDesign: I'm not dead yet In-Reply-To: <0c7101c625f8$6c0371c0$1283e03c@homepc> References: <8d71341e0601261934i7b7b1c95lfd7f4146eb9bdac7@mail.gmail.com> <081801c62474$dda963f0$1283e03c@homepc> <8d71341e0601291421w73e877a6he375ea288f4c5034@mail.gmail.com> <09f901c6254d$54469860$1283e03c@homepc> <8d71341e0601291957j35f3a0d3ya68bba4dc3b6010c@mail.gmail.com> <0aa301c62574$9fd37fb0$1283e03c@homepc> <8d71341e0601300039u495c7cccuad5de4b7b60297de@mail.gmail.com> <0c7101c625f8$6c0371c0$1283e03c@homepc> Message-ID: <8d71341e0601301615h13565d78wb856756509f21546@mail.gmail.com> On 1/30/06, Brett Paatsch wrote: > I don't know if it is right or moral that you should start your chain of > reasoning from beliefs rather than axioms though. > In the context of values, things that are not empirical propositions, "belief" and "axiom" mean the same thing. The people on the other side of my metaphorical line in the sand are not those who merely hold axioms instead of beliefs - those are two words denoting the same thing in this context. They are those who claim that standards in art are merely a class-based conspiracy, that truth is just a social construct, that "good" has no meaning beyond "wins out in the Darwinian struggle". (None of these are straw men. I've seen all of them claimed repeatedly, and not by adolescents going through a rebellious phase, but by people with strings of college degrees.) > *You say above that reason cannot entire replace faith. Okay but if you > believe in something like that "international law is an existential risk" I > wonder if you can be moved away from any of your belief which I might find > to be themselves anti-extropic, by reason.* > Certainly. The claim of mine that you quote is an empirical one - potentially verifiable or falsifiable - and is therefore in the domain of reason; I'm quite happy to hear arguments against it. - Russell -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From russell.wallace at gmail.com Tue Jan 31 00:16:36 2006 From: russell.wallace at gmail.com (Russell Wallace) Date: Tue, 31 Jan 2006 00:16:36 +0000 Subject: Faith-based thought vs thinkers Re: [extropy-chat]IntelligentDesign: I'm not dead yet In-Reply-To: References: <8d71341e0601261934i7b7b1c95lfd7f4146eb9bdac7@mail.gmail.com> <081801c62474$dda963f0$1283e03c@homepc> <8d71341e0601291421w73e877a6he375ea288f4c5034@mail.gmail.com> <09f901c6254d$54469860$1283e03c@homepc> <8d71341e0601291957j35f3a0d3ya68bba4dc3b6010c@mail.gmail.com> <0aa301c62574$9fd37fb0$1283e03c@homepc> <8d71341e0601300039u495c7cccuad5de4b7b60297de@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <8d71341e0601301616v78ed629bu6180c9796bff90e5@mail.gmail.com> On 1/31/06, BillK wrote: > > Hey, this is Plato talking, isn't it? Yes; while I don't agree with Plato 100% across the board, I have always leaned strongly in his direction. - Russell -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From sentience at pobox.com Tue Jan 31 00:36:22 2006 From: sentience at pobox.com (Eliezer S. Yudkowsky) Date: Mon, 30 Jan 2006 16:36:22 -0800 Subject: [extropy-chat] Re: Faith-based thought vs thinkers In-Reply-To: <8d71341e0601301530r7c893866v3d655442dadc5cc4@mail.gmail.com> References: <8d71341e0601261934i7b7b1c95lfd7f4146eb9bdac7@mail.gmail.com> <081801c62474$dda963f0$1283e03c@homepc> <8d71341e0601291421w73e877a6he375ea288f4c5034@mail.gmail.com> <09f901c6254d$54469860$1283e03c@homepc> <8d71341e0601291957j35f3a0d3ya68bba4dc3b6010c@mail.gmail.com> <0aa301c62574$9fd37fb0$1283e03c@homepc> <8d71341e0601300039u495c7cccuad5de4b7b60297de@mail.gmail.com> <43DE9A65.9050903@pobox.com> <8d71341e0601301530r7c893866v3d655442dadc5cc4@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <43DEB106.8090305@pobox.com> Russell Wallace wrote: > On 1/30/06, *Eliezer S. Yudkowsky* > wrote: > > You're conflating empirical propositions with moral choices, mixing up > probability theory and decision theory. Perhaps you are confused > because English uses the same word "believe in" to indicate both your > hypotheses and your ethics. > > This is why I said it is important to state a definition of the word > "faith", because it is a rather fuzzy word. The definition I said I was > using is "belief in the absence of evidence", which my comments fit by > the normal use of the English word "belief". You seem to be using the > definition "belief in empirical propositions contrary to the evidence" > (for example creationism, or the belief by some of James Randi's > correspondence in their psychic powers even after a test produces a null > result); I do not advocate that sort of faith. I do indeed mean "faith" in the sense of "belief in the absence of evidence", i.e., "drawing a line on your map without having seen something that corresponds to the line, perhaps because you haven't visited that part of the territory yet". Not necessarily "faith" as "belief contrary to evidence", i.e., "drawing a line on your map that contradicts something you actually saw". Either way you end up with a lousy map. In any case, you seem to have missed the point of my objection: assigning a high probability to love is a type error. -- Eliezer S. Yudkowsky http://singinst.org/ Research Fellow, Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence From russell.wallace at gmail.com Tue Jan 31 00:54:27 2006 From: russell.wallace at gmail.com (Russell Wallace) Date: Tue, 31 Jan 2006 00:54:27 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Re: Faith-based thought vs thinkers In-Reply-To: <43DEB106.8090305@pobox.com> References: <081801c62474$dda963f0$1283e03c@homepc> <8d71341e0601291421w73e877a6he375ea288f4c5034@mail.gmail.com> <09f901c6254d$54469860$1283e03c@homepc> <8d71341e0601291957j35f3a0d3ya68bba4dc3b6010c@mail.gmail.com> <0aa301c62574$9fd37fb0$1283e03c@homepc> <8d71341e0601300039u495c7cccuad5de4b7b60297de@mail.gmail.com> <43DE9A65.9050903@pobox.com> <8d71341e0601301530r7c893866v3d655442dadc5cc4@mail.gmail.com> <43DEB106.8090305@pobox.com> Message-ID: <8d71341e0601301654v6c187b1fg43a7d73a5f3b2ecc@mail.gmail.com> On 1/31/06, Eliezer S. Yudkowsky wrote: > > In any case, you seem to have missed the point of my objection: > assigning a high probability to love is a type error. > Of course it is, which is why I didn't do so. In English, "I believe in X" where X is a value rather than an empirical proposition, does not mean "I assign a high probability to X", it means something like "I take as an axiom that X is to be valued". (If your objection is that English is fuzzy, I will remind you that it evolved for the use of humans, not AI programs.) - Russell -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From dgc at cox.net Tue Jan 31 02:23:55 2006 From: dgc at cox.net (Dan Clemmensen) Date: Mon, 30 Jan 2006 21:23:55 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Re: Faith-based thought vs thinkers In-Reply-To: <43DE9A65.9050903@pobox.com> References: <8d71341e0601261934i7b7b1c95lfd7f4146eb9bdac7@mail.gmail.com> <081801c62474$dda963f0$1283e03c@homepc> <8d71341e0601291421w73e877a6he375ea288f4c5034@mail.gmail.com> <09f901c6254d$54469860$1283e03c@homepc> <8d71341e0601291957j35f3a0d3ya68bba4dc3b6010c@mail.gmail.com> <0aa301c62574$9fd37fb0$1283e03c@homepc> <8d71341e0601300039u495c7cccuad5de4b7b60297de@mail.gmail.com> <43DE9A65.9050903@pobox.com> Message-ID: <43DECA3B.5080409@cox.net> Eliezer S. Yudkowsky wrote: > Russell Wallace wrote: > >> >> I'm not a religious man, but I believe in love and life and laughter. >> I believe in beauty and truth and goodness, and I believe these >> things are worth protecting, even though neither I nor anyone else >> can prove it; at some point I, like any civilized man, must resort to >> belief in the absence of evidence; for people who don't believe in >> beauty produce ugliness; people who don't believe in truth produce >> falsehood; and people who don't believe in good produce evil. > > > http://www.nizkor.org/features/fallacies/appeal-to-consequences.html > > You're conflating empirical propositions with moral choices, mixing up > probability theory and decision theory. Perhaps you are confused > because English uses the same word "believe in" to indicate both your > hypotheses and your ethics. > > I *choose* love and life and laughter, beauty and goodness. I also > choose truth. I strive to attain the map that reflects the territory; > to believe based solely on evidence, and to abjure any shift of > credence whatsoever which is not based on evidence. For you cannot > draw an accurate map of a city by sitting in your living room and > having great faith in your doodles. You must go outside and walk down > streets, and keep your eyes open, and look around, and make lines on > paper that correspond to what you see, and resist the temptation to > draw in a few extra lines just for fun. > > P.C. Hodgell said: "That which can be destroyed by the truth should > be." I have never heard a declaration of rationality which is both > simpler and better than this. If a wire approaches, and I believe it > to be electrified, and it is *not* electrified, then the truth opposes > my fear. If a wire approaches, and I believe it is not electrified, > and it *is* electrified, then the Way opposes my calm. I wish to > attain those feelings and ethics and emotions and principles which I > would aver if I saw truly, being the person that I am. Where is the > false statement I must believe, to choose love and life and laughter? > Now we are getting close. Discard that which is provably false. Accept that which is provably true. But even in formal logic, certain propositions are provably undecidable. By analogy, There are propositions in a practical belief structure that must be treated as axioms, not subject to formal proof in terms of other axioms. I take as axioms: formal logic The Paeno postulates Occam's razor I accept Reproducible observation From there, it gets messy. I think can see paths to the singularity based only on the above, but perhaps I'm delusional. As a practical matter, I operate on a set of assertions that we may call "beliefs." These assertions are thing that I (perhaps subconsciously) think are derivable from the above, but for which I cannot cite an explicit derivation. Using this definition, I "believe:" Accumulation of "public knowledge" is good. Self-preservation is good The "extended golden rule" is good. (Do unto others as they would be done by.) Waste is bad. Sorry if this is trite. From bpaatsch at bigpond.net.au Tue Jan 31 04:39:50 2006 From: bpaatsch at bigpond.net.au (Brett Paatsch) Date: Tue, 31 Jan 2006 15:39:50 +1100 Subject: [extropy-chat] Impeachment of President Bush What odds am Ioffered? References: <026401c604f4$c89d6f50$cd81e03c@homepc> <5366105b0512191554r11bd4ce6l29f580287bdb569e@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: <0d8701c62620$5f7ffc70$1283e03c@homepc> Jay Dugger wrote: > On 12/19/05, Brett Paatsch wrote: >> >> If I was to say that I have US$1000 of real money that says that >> President George W Bush will be impeached what odds would >> serious minded people like to offer me I wonder? >> > > Find out the odds at http://www.ideosphere.com/. This won't let you > use US currency, but it might let you estimate the odds. ... > Please let me (or the list, if you think it of general interest) know what > odds you get. Jay, the odds I got were 4 to1 that the House Judicial Committee would initiate impeachment proceedings against the President http://biz.yahoo.com/prnews/060119/to160.html?.v=18 "Initiating impeachment proceedings" is easier than getting impeachment to occur, its a necessary but not sufficient prerequisite. The largest bet that Sportsbook.com would allow was US$100. I only bet US$10 to see how Sportsbook.com's processes worked with respect to fees taken and withdrawals authorised etc. Brett Paatsch From robert.bradbury at gmail.com Tue Jan 31 13:14:12 2006 From: robert.bradbury at gmail.com (Robert Bradbury) Date: Tue, 31 Jan 2006 08:14:12 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Faith-based thought vs thinkers Re: IntelligentDesign: I'm not dead yet In-Reply-To: <8d71341e0601301616v78ed629bu6180c9796bff90e5@mail.gmail.com> References: <8d71341e0601261934i7b7b1c95lfd7f4146eb9bdac7@mail.gmail.com> <081801c62474$dda963f0$1283e03c@homepc> <8d71341e0601291421w73e877a6he375ea288f4c5034@mail.gmail.com> <09f901c6254d$54469860$1283e03c@homepc> <8d71341e0601291957j35f3a0d3ya68bba4dc3b6010c@mail.gmail.com> <0aa301c62574$9fd37fb0$1283e03c@homepc> <8d71341e0601300039u495c7cccuad5de4b7b60297de@mail.gmail.com> <8d71341e0601301616v78ed629bu6180c9796bff90e5@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: Since I may have been the one who contributed "faith-based thought" to the discussion (I haven't gone back through the thread to check), I'll explain what I meant (or would mean by it). To me, "faith-based thought" implies beliefs in assertions, axioms, statements, etc. as being valid (true) to the extent that those beliefs dictate actual actions. (I.e. if there are not "thoughts" there are presumably no "actions" -- even reflex reactions involve "thought" (i.e. computation) though it is generally extremely simple in nature). IMO, "faith-based thought" must involve (a) unconscious thought (believing things without actively thinking about them) or (b) conscious thought which either ignores evidence or in some way rejects rational conclusions. For example, as a child I was handed a system of beliefs called Catholicism. As I grew older, learned more about the world (esp. physics and other aspects of science) it became clear that the "miracles" upon which Catholicism is based (virgin birth, death & resurrection, etc.) could *not* be true without rejecting the body of evidence provided by scientific "reality". Since I was particularly keen on rejecting the laws of physics I rejected Catholicism instead. Others, e.g. certain scholars, some Protestant variants, etc. tend to recast the "miracles" as parables, analogies, etc. i.e. making the Bible non-literal. Other religions have tried to enforce the literal interpretation of the Bible. Subsequently over the last few years I've devoted some thought to how much of Catholicism (or Biblical history) could be true if things like miracles relying on nanotechnology, Intelligent Design (of solar systems), ETI (SI) interventions in human evolution or computer based simulations of entire civilizations are feasible (which appears to be the case). There appears to be a significant element of "group-think" in "faith-based thought". It would seem to make sense that everyone who eventually reaches the conclusion that Santa Claus is a myth should also reach the conclusion that religions that are based on other "magical" claims are also myths. While giving up ones belief in Santa Claus is accepted - giving up ones belief in a fictional reality based set of religious beliefs generally is not. The point which Harris finds objectionable is that the moderates allow the "faith-based actors" to continue to act without forcing (and yes, I used the word *force* again) them to confront their failure to build rational systems for acting. Irrational actors in other contexts tend to be locked away where they can do minimal harm to society. Each person reading this has made a conscious (or unconscious) choice not to stand in front of their local religious institution on Friday, Saturday or Sunday morning holding up a sign saying "You are acting upon beliefs in *myths*" (in "Western" cultures). [You either *are* extropic and are acting upon it or you are just along for the ride...] The continued tolerance of the mental belief systems of faith-based actors (and the actions resulting therefrom) *do* have consequences such as: 1) the hold-ups in California funding for stem cell research (an active topic on the GRG list); 2) recent proposals in a number of state legislatures to *allow* individuals ranging from doctors to pharmacists to legally not act (or act) based on their conscience (faith) in various circumstances (performing abortions, filling morning-after pill prescriptions, ignoring DNR directives, etc.); 3) spending hundreds of billions of dollars on defense or wars that might be better spent on medical, biotechnology or nanotechnology research (largely in response to actions of various "faith-based actors"), etc. Robert -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From bret at bonfireproductions.com Tue Jan 31 13:57:40 2006 From: bret at bonfireproductions.com (Bret Kulakovich) Date: Tue, 31 Jan 2006 08:57:40 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Semantics + Re: Identity and becoming a Great Old One In-Reply-To: <5844e22f0601271351u52528a8t7c8d0ac45a838910@mail.gmail.com> References: <8d71341e0601260904p1370977fm1227200725fb1450@mail.gmail.com> <332E50AC-6CED-4722-B69D-BD4A77E49783@bonfireproductions.com> <8d71341e0601261024j468403dfne5ee611ad244729@mail.gmail.com> <44064850-EFF0-44F2-B5FC-995F3281CC79@bonfireproductions.com> <43D951C7.3000906@pobox.com> <54D1EE31-9E9D-4103-AE06-AC41D172F965@bonfireproductions.com> <8d71341e0601261736rffaef18o72333ff407669b12@mail.gmail.com> <052417DB-E6E2-405A-9BB4-2BDB30C7A4C8@bonfireproductions.com> <5844e22f0601270823w2cde03dt4b66bcdb3ea31562@mail.gmail.com> <5844e22f0601271351u52528a8t7c8d0ac45a838910@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: Hi Jeff, sorry for the time lapse. I will try to cut to the chase. Below is our ongoing conversation. However: 1) Given the state of the Cryonics and uploading conversation currently on this list, please weigh the benefits of the introduction of classically shared definitions. Who are you afraid of confusing given that there isn't a common ground semantically? I think you are elevating the concern over term uses a bit beyond practical discourse. 2) Isn't an outline of the mind/body problem exactly what we should work from in this context (this context, the list, right here)? The thread is very much re-hashing the classical argument, which is fine to a degree - but creating new terms, and failing to find a concrete set of agreed upon definitions, isn't moving us forward. I don't think we need to worry about crushing intellectual creativity, and no one is denying anyone their say. I posted Wikipedia references earlier, and though they be lacking in many ways, anything is better than the industrial strength tail chasing going on over common and yet undeclared terms such as POV. I am thankful that subjectivity/objectivity have made it in, but even they are starting to run amok. On with the show: On Jan 27, 2006, at 4:51 PM, Jeff Medina wrote: > On 1/27/06, Bret Kulakovich wrote: >> regardless of how much I have simplified exactly > > But it's _not_ regardless of how much you've simplified. How much > you're simplifying is precisely one of the key issues leading to my > assertion that [introducing monism/dualism talk will only confuse > matters further]. > >> While they may seem similar to you, that the pattern & threaded views >> reduce to types of these others is (1) arguable, and hence would >> require quite a bit of tangential discussion to establish, with >> little >> foreseeable value in so doing, and (2) pointless, as there are many >> nuances to different philosophers' variants of general terms like >> dualism, monism, neutral monism, etc., so people would still need to >> clarify what they meant by "phenomenalism", leading to the very same >> discussion of the threaded view that is currently going on. >> >> Jeff, I'm pretty sure internet mailing lists are generally defined >> by (1) >> and (2). > > Then it should've been obvious that I must've meant something more > specific/precise. I'm sure you'll have no problem thinking of more > meaningful connotations of (1) and (2) than the generic > all-internet-mailing-list-applicable sense. Points taken - and thank you for your reply. Was also trying to 'lighten the mood'. But this list is a discussion forum, and questions are entertained. You have no responsibility to me to answer my questions about m, d and pattern and threaded. My simplification lead to your assertion about confusion. A lack of definition lead to my confusion to begin with, which I was seeking to resolve. I am guessing that the answer to the question I stated about the similarities != "No." But since I can't find any definitions for Threaded or Patterned, that we can all claim as a valid source, my question remains unanswered. > To which Bret replied: >> Can you point me to anything - something at SIAI perhaps, on the >> Threaded/Patterned topic? > > No, but I fail to see the point of this request. I haven't defended > any position in the threaded/patterned discussion, nor have I > suggested that this was hashed out previously by myself or anyone else > at SIAI. Apologies: Russel Wallace -> SL4 -> Elizer -> Your (Jeff's) .sig -> Grand Assumption on My Part It was easy. I started asking questions in "Russel's" thread and you and Elizer started making statements in the same thread in response. Russel mentioned SL4 in his earlier messages. You being the third respondent and the second directly from SIAI, and having so much to offer, leads me to think you have resources. If you do not, or are too busy, then that is fine too. But being too busy doesn't invalidate a need for shared terms, just as my questions don't compromise your f-f-f-ree will. I withhold a joke about pre- determin! sm at this point. >> I'm obviously not the first person to make the comparison. > > I'm obviously not the first person to point out that, in the general > case, noting other people share one's view does not imply one's view > isn't due for an update. Which is what I am attempting by asking questions in this thread. I want to know. It is well stated that I'm not exactly here for the political discourse, or your other favored terms like >> If you won't even allow idle discussion to lead to clarity for >> some internet crank, what on earth will you do about peer review? > > Internet crank? Pardon, maybe someone who actually is in my kill file > started the threaded/patterned discussion -- I don't know who you're > talking about. Unless you're just being excessively, unseriously > self-deprecating. Internet crank = Capital M Me. Some relatively anonymous symbol making other symbols in an exchange of symbols. > As to the actual content of this query, please elaborate just how > "introducing terms X and Y would be counterproductive in this > particular discussion" implies a problem regarding my view on peer > review. (Which is not to say I don't have any problems with the > current peer review system. Like many, I do. But those problems are > not relevant to the current discussion.) If aforementioned Internet crank 'A' regardless of whether he is a copy or an original, remains unsated after all this typing, on the issue of the four terms discussed prior, then what about answering questions or criticisms when it really matters, etc. How will these problems be resolved after publication if they haven't even been hashed or at least stated elsewhere? Can't exactly cite the old noodle at the end. Yet. (As for the sub-context presented, it is irrelevant, and at least something we have in common if neither Monism or Dualism). >> I would think you would want people to introduce the >> terms so that we could all leave with the same understanding? > > I explicitly stated that the terms would *confuse* the matter, because > most people have different "half-baked, half-read understandings" of > technical philosophical jargon. They think they understand, but that > appears to be because there's not often a bunch of scary math on the > same page, and this leads them to assume philosophy is easier to > understand and do well. > > So, to this question, no -- I *don't* want the terms introduced > *precisely because* you will decrease the chances of everyone leaving > with the same understanding. Given the current state of understanding in the Cryonics/uploading/ fubar threads, I humbly disagree - We will never get to the capability of being confused by these terms given the tail-chasing environment. Cheers, Bret K. From jonkc at att.net Tue Jan 31 16:47:35 2006 From: jonkc at att.net (John K Clark) Date: Tue, 31 Jan 2006 11:47:35 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Cryonics and uploading References: <200601280009.k0S091e20357@tick.javien.com><003101c62433$c0f3e820$ea064e0c@MyComputer><018601c624ea$557fe4b0$c6044e0c@MyComputer><00e901c625b5$74656c30$a10d4e0c@MyComputer><019401c625e3$03a581a0$300c4e0c@MyComputer> Message-ID: <002601c62686$41ecd0f0$2f0d4e0c@MyComputer> "Heartland" > You could make an atomically precise copy of me and my clone and I could > be doing different things. Nonsense, if you make them do different things then the atomic structure of their brain must change. > If both of them share the same subjective experience only means just that > and nothing else. Only? ONLY! Having your subjective experience continue is the entire point of immortality. What more could you want? > The argument that "same subjective experience -> same > mind" is as valid as "I watch a movie with a friend -> we become one > mind". I wonder if one person on this planet really thinks that when 2 people see the same movie they both have the same subjective experience. I very much doubt it. > I only said that recycling of atoms is a natural occurrence of Moravec > transfer, that's all. It would be erfectly legal to perform Moravec > transfer by means of nanomachines. It's > the destructive uploading that is the problem. I see no fundamental difference between what you call "Moravec transfer" and "destructive uploading", one just happens a little faster than the other. And science could not find any difference in the products produced by the two methods, not the slightest bit, zero, nada, zilch. Unless there were careful record keeping it would be imposable to tell which one is which; and yet you insist there is nevertheless a colossal astronomical vitally important difference between the two. If you're right then that difference can't be anything material or science would spot it, thus it must be spiritual. It must be the two have different souls, souls that are not amenable to the scientific method. Now I'm sure you won't use the word "soul" to describe it, not on the Extropian list you won't, you'll dream up some euphemism for it, but I know what you're talking about. And shit by any other name would stink as bad. John K Clark From bret at bonfireproductions.com Tue Jan 31 17:42:45 2006 From: bret at bonfireproductions.com (Bret Kulakovich) Date: Tue, 31 Jan 2006 12:42:45 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Cryonics and uploading In-Reply-To: <002601c62686$41ecd0f0$2f0d4e0c@MyComputer> References: <200601280009.k0S091e20357@tick.javien.com><003101c62433$c0f3e820$ea064e0c@MyComputer><018601c624ea$557fe4b0$c6044e0c@MyComputer><00e901c625b5$74656c30$a10d4e0c@MyComputer><019401c625e3$03a581a0$300c4e0c@MyComputer> <002601c62686$41ecd0f0$2f0d4e0c@MyComputer> Message-ID: <96D199C9-03D0-4A6D-9115-2EB580DFA9F9@bonfireproductions.com> On Jan 31, 2006, at 11:47 AM, John K Clark wrote: > "Heartland" > >> You could make an atomically precise copy of me and my clone and I >> could >> be doing different things. > > Nonsense, if you make them do different things then the atomic > structure of > their brain must change. I call shenanigans - an absolute perfect copy of me, has f!ree will, just like me, and therefore does whatever the Hell it pleases. We diverge in subjective experience from the moment the copying process is complete, given that we are each looking through two separate sets of eyes, and accruing sense-data from two unique and separate locations i.e. separate bodies. Because we do not occupy the same place at the same time, otherwise there wouldn't be a copy, just a schizophrenic. Bret K. From jonkc at att.net Tue Jan 31 18:28:27 2006 From: jonkc at att.net (John K Clark) Date: Tue, 31 Jan 2006 13:28:27 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Cryonics and uploading References: <200601280009.k0S091e20357@tick.javien.com><003101c62433$c0f3e820$ea064e0c@MyComputer><018601c624ea$557fe4b0$c6044e0c@MyComputer><00e901c625b5$74656c30$a10d4e0c@MyComputer><019401c625e3$03a581a0$300c4e0c@MyComputer><002601c62686$41ecd0f0$2f0d4e0c@MyComputer> <96D199C9-03D0-4A6D-9115-2EB580DFA9F9@bonfireproductions.com> Message-ID: <017001c62694$351e6ec0$2f0d4e0c@MyComputer> "Bret Kulakovich" > I call shenanigans - an absolute perfect copy of me, has f!ree will, > just like me Free will? What an odd phrase, what on earth does it mean? > and therefore does whatever the Hell it pleases. Ah, so there are reasons, causes, for what he does, and those are his likes and dislikes, and there are reasons he has those particular likes and dislikes, the structure of his brain, and since your brain is identical to his..... well I think you get the picture. John K Clark From bret at bonfireproductions.com Tue Jan 31 19:30:05 2006 From: bret at bonfireproductions.com (Bret Kulakovich) Date: Tue, 31 Jan 2006 14:30:05 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Cryonics and uploading In-Reply-To: <017001c62694$351e6ec0$2f0d4e0c@MyComputer> References: <200601280009.k0S091e20357@tick.javien.com><003101c62433$c0f3e820$ea064e0c@MyComputer><018601c624ea$557fe4b0$c6044e0c@MyComputer><00e901c625b5$74656c30$a10d4e0c@MyComputer><019401c625e3$03a581a0$300c4e0c@MyComputer><002601c62686$41ecd0f0$2f0d4e0c@MyComputer> <96D199C9-03D0-4A6D-9115-2EB580DFA9F9@bonfireproductions.com> <017001c62694$351e6ec0$2f0d4e0c@MyComputer> Message-ID: On Jan 31, 2006, at 1:28 PM, John K Clark wrote: > Ah, so there are reasons, causes, for what he does, and those are > his likes > and dislikes, and there are reasons he has those particular likes and > dislikes, the structure of his brain, and since your brain is > identical to > his..... well I think you get the picture. But the stimuli these brains are responding to, no matter how many copies or how perfect - are all different. Different positions in the same room, at different luminosity, different temperatures, and subjective points-of-view. Or, do you suspect that all of the Mes will stand there, only moving about in synch, like the Rockettes, speaking in synch, summoning Mothra, or otherwise be incapable of doing anything different from one another. Even though each one is now however many seconds into an individual existence? The simplest example. Ten of me can't all occupy the same square foot of floor space. We (or to you, I'd guess "I") spread out. From one vantage point in the room, you can see down a hallway to the Men's room. This is not within the field of vision of all 10, just one. Being incredibly vain, this discovery causes this one to leave for the Men's room... or... what? All ten walk out? > > John K Clark > > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat From velvethum at hotmail.com Tue Jan 31 21:20:15 2006 From: velvethum at hotmail.com (Heartland) Date: Tue, 31 Jan 2006 16:20:15 -0500 Subject: [extropy-chat] Cryonics and uploading References: <200601280009.k0S091e20357@tick.javien.com><003101c62433$c0f3e820$ea064e0c@MyComputer><018601c624ea$557fe4b0$c6044e0c@MyComputer><00e901c625b5$74656c30$a10d4e0c@MyComputer><019401c625e3$03a581a0$300c4e0c@MyComputer> <002601c62686$41ecd0f0$2f0d4e0c@MyComputer> Message-ID: > "Heartland" >> If both of them share the same subjective experience only means just that >> and nothing else. > > Only? ONLY! Having your subjective experience continue is the entire point > of immortality. What more could you want? But you need to realize at some point that your current subjective experience would NOT transfer to your copy. Of course, the copy would "feel" that the original subjective experience has been transferred successfully. However, the point is that dead original wouldn't. Don't expect your subjective experience you carry now to magically continue on a destructively uploaded copy. Why? Because each mind (that produces that subjective experience) carves out separate and verifiably unique trajectory in space-time from any other mind, and unless you merge two minds by *physically* connecting them, you can't merge two minds (resulting in the same instance of subjective experience) by merely making both brain structures the same. That's impossible. Just because you made a thing x at point p1 and time t1 structurally the same as another thing x at point p2 and time t2 doesn't make a thing x at point p1 and time t1 automatically appear at p2 and t2. Think about it. >> I only said that recycling of atoms is a natural occurrence of Moravec >> transfer, that's all. It would be perfectly legal to perform Moravec >> transfer by means of nanomachines. It's >> the destructive uploading that is the problem. > > I see no fundamental difference between what you call "Moravec transfer" > and > "destructive uploading", one just happens a little faster than the other. One is gradual which doesn't destroy or alter the mind process that produces subjective experience. The other one obliterates it. > Now I'm sure you won't use the word "soul" to describe it, not on the > Extropian list you won't, you'll dream up some euphemism for it, but I > know > what you're talking about. And shit by any other name would stink as bad. > > John K Clark Not soul, but life. There is such a thing as life while the concept of soul is just silly. The reason you bring up soul is not that I'm trying to smuggle the concept of soul here, but that the whole point of why two instances of the same subjective experience are not the same somehow eludes you and you resort to the next best thing that you understand, the soul. I think you just need to think about this more deeply. Slawomir From benboc at lineone.net Tue Jan 31 23:16:14 2006 From: benboc at lineone.net (ben) Date: Tue, 31 Jan 2006 23:16:14 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Cryonics and uploading In-Reply-To: <200601300811.k0U8BDe06350@tick.javien.com> References: <200601300811.k0U8BDe06350@tick.javien.com> Message-ID: <43DFEFBE.3090406@lineone.net> Slawomir wrote: "Well, we'll see if that angle makes people realize what's going on." I can tell you exactly what's going on. Crypto-Dualism. "I can't believe intelligent people still don't get this" is exactly my reaction. I can't quite believe that intelligent people are clinging to this dualist view. All this talk of 'you' and 'your own life' is a form of mysticism. It ignores the fact that 101001101 is IDENTICAL to 101001101. If a mind and everything in it, including all it's subjective opinions and feelings etc., is indeed information (and we know that information can be completely represented in a digital form), then thats it. That's everything. There is no room left for anything else. At all. Hence, the 'you', the 'life', the 'thread' is all in there, all information. It's absolutely no good saying "yes, but there's still the FLOW of that information, the link to the next brain state, etc.", because all that still boils down to information that can be read, recorded, and reproduced. The fact that it's rather weird to think of there being two of you is irrelevant. It's also weird to think of a photon being both a wave and a particle. So what. Answers to those questions: (Please fill the copy status for each case with either "is you" or "isn't you".) Case 1: Copy is created, original still exist. Copy status is... YOU Case 2: Copy is created, original brain was destroyed during scanning. Copy status is... YOU Case 3: Copy is created, original stays around for a while and is then killed. Copy status is... YOU! All You! You=You. Copy You (perfect copy, includes all information relevant to a mind) = You. Exactly as a digital copy of "All of You" IS "All of You", no matter how many other copies exist. Saying that it's just one "All of You" is both true and irrelevant. Any one is completely interchangeable with any other, in every respect. Oh, i give up. It seems clear that the animists and the patternists here aren't going to convince one another of their respective viewpoints. Perhaps we should just concentrate on other things, like how an uploading procedure could satisfy both. F'rinstance, i suspect that we may crack the issue of neural interfacing, enabling more and more comprehensive and powerful links between neurons and electronics, and leading to something like Moravec's Transmigration, before we solve how to scan, destructively or not, an entire brain, then figure out what to do with the resulting information. Any opinions on that? ben From kevin at kevinfreels.com Tue Jan 31 23:00:43 2006 From: kevin at kevinfreels.com (kevinfreels.com) Date: Tue, 31 Jan 2006 17:00:43 -0600 Subject: [extropy-chat] WSJ: A Cold Calculus Leads Cryonauts To PutAssetson Ice References: <20060125053124.66338.qmail@web80727.mail.yahoo.com> Message-ID: <015301c626ba$2a45fc40$640fa8c0@kevin> This reminds me of a small website I ran across a while back - www.relifeaac.com The idea I think was to pay out to this company when you die, then your money is no longer yours and can;t be attacked by people after the state. A contract is signed and I guess if they don't pay up when you come back, you could sue them for breech of contract. It led me to another idea. Has anyone considered something similar to the X-prize for cryonics? Imagine a trust that was paid into out of life insurance as people passed away. This trust would pay out say 10% to the first group to bring back a squirrel after 6 months, 25% to the first to bring back a dog after a year, and 65% to whomever brings back the first human. This pot would continuously grow as more people were preserved. On top of that, you could have a trust set aside specifically for the person who brought you back. How's that for incentive? ----- Original Message ----- From: "Keith M. Elis" To: Sent: Tuesday, January 24, 2006 11:31 PM Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] WSJ: A Cold Calculus Leads Cryonauts To PutAssetson Ice > Robert Bradbury: > > > If its being invested it makes a big difference whether you are > > investing it in a nanotech investment fund (which is *really* > > investing in nanotechnology and not nanohype) vs. say U.S. > > automobile manufacturers or in the not so distant future the > > "old-mentality" phone companies. > > > > It also makes a difference whether one confines the investment > > to U.S. $ or opts for an international currency mix. That in > > turn tends to relate to how hard (and where) one thinks various > > aspects of the singularity may hit. > > The money will no doubt be well-diversified and properly managed based > on the information available at the time. Even if his average net ROR > was a fairly moderate 8% per year over 100 years, a million dollars > would be worth upwards of 2.1 billion. Another 80 years at that rate > and he's a trillionaire. (This assumes he puts it all in a > tax-shelter). > > > The path you choose determines whether you come back a rich > > person or much more likely (IMO) a relatively poor person (if > > you haven't kept up with the singularity). > > It's the singularity that this cryonics customer is betting on (whether > he knows it or not). This isn't simply an elaborate way to achieve 8% > net for 100 years. He's betting that he'll come back, he'll be himself, > he'll have his faculties, and he'll be able to adjust without going > insane. A singularity is the big payoff for him. It means he gets to > come back at all. > > But more to your point, how do *you* propose to become rich leading up > to and during a singularity if not by investing in some kind of > profit-making enterprise out there in the economy? > > > > > Designing a *good* investment strategy for what is coming and > > taking into accout the various reanimation scenarios is *not* > > easy and I would argue that most people who would be tasked > > with doing it (today) are likely to significantly underperform > > the rate of growth that the singularity may bring. [How many > > investment strategies detail precisely *when* you turn the > > money over to a self-evolving, improving AI investment fund > > manager?] > > You see, you bring up this term 'underperform' but it's meaningless > without a benchmark. Which benchmark do you want to use? Since the dawn > of the markets, it has always made sense to index the largest companies > in the market to get an idea of how the economy overall is behaving. > You don't want to use existing indices, so what other benchmark do you > propose? > > Keith > > _______________________________________________ > extropy-chat mailing list > extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org > http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo/extropy-chat > From benboc at lineone.net Tue Jan 31 23:25:28 2006 From: benboc at lineone.net (ben) Date: Tue, 31 Jan 2006 23:25:28 +0000 Subject: [extropy-chat] Faith-based thought vs thinkers In-Reply-To: <200601301900.k0UJ0Fe30759@tick.javien.com> References: <200601301900.k0UJ0Fe30759@tick.javien.com> Message-ID: <43DFF1E8.8040402@lineone.net> "Because they do not have the will to bootstrap their own purpose, they seek meaning and purpose from without" Brilliant! I love this. Henceforth, my motto will be: "Bootstrap your own purpose". It sums up my own attitude perfectly. Thanks! ben