[extropy-chat] Bluff and the Darwin award

[KAZ]

----- Original Message ---- 
From: Russell Wallace 
To: ExI chat list 
Sent: Tuesday, May 16, 2006 5:01:03 PM 
Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] Bluff and the Darwin award 

On 5/16/06, KAZ wrote: 
> On general principles, there is necessarily some deadline, simply 
> because nothing lasts forever; men are mortal, and so are nations, 
> civilizations, species and worlds. 
 
On the surface, this seems like extremely flawed inductive reasoning, though I may very well be misunderstanding you.
 
It reminds me of people who insist that human beings have souls because "energy can't be destroyed". I usually point out that the mental state of a computer does not persist if you turn it off, though energy cannot be destroyed, and there's even less reason to believe that a much more subtle human mind would persist /unchanged/ without a physical framework, rather than submitting to entropy.
 
In this case, I'd point out that "species" sometimes last millions of years, while we've only been around between 80 and 100 thousand. Imagine what we'd do with just another thousand.
 
And, of course, since we're sapient all bets are off...you might as well say "no species ever mastered fire" and therefore none ever will; we can't be offhandedly measured by the species-longevity of squid and parrots.
 
Same with all of your other "things don't last forever" examples. Everything has a first, and anyway we've been around at least 80,000 years, so it's not like another millenium would break the bank.
 
> As far as specifics go, if you look at history, the conditions supporting free 
> inquiry and rapid scientific and technological progress are a strange aberration, 
> occurring in only a very small minority of times and places; there is no reason 
> to expect them to persist for long, 
 
Yes, but it's not quite that simple and mystical...one can examine history and see precisely what causes those bursts of change. In each case, there is some kind of information revolution: The invention of writing, then the spread of literacy in the classical era, then the return of literacy in the renaissance, then the printing press for the Enlightenment, and of course the online revolution now.
 
If we're going to say "this is the pattern", we have to do so rationally, examining the whys and wherefores, not just say "it happened, therefore it will". Each one happened for a reason, and declined for a reason. This one could actually work out differently, because the reasons for decline are less readily available now. 
 
> and indeed we see today that with each passing year the web of laws 
> and regulations chokes a little tighter, the idea that an individual's life 
> is society's to control becomes a little more entrenched. 

This is true...but it's also nothing new. People were, correctly, pointing out exactly those factors thirty years ago, sixty years ago, ninety years ago, 150 years ago, and 185 years ago...just to mention a few I know of specifically. Things went to hell in a handbasket with the Civil War, with Woodrow Wilson, Andrew Jackson, et cetera.
 
But the downtime between the Enlightenment and the Information Revolution was both short and mild, in the US. Who knows, it might even be better this time.

> None of which, of course, establishes that the deadline must fall on any specific, 
> predicted date; we can't foretell the future, trends can change; the fall of the Soviet 
> Union, for example, was a very large reprieve. 
 
The fall of the Soviet Union was inevitable, because socialism is laughably incompetent. It was only the Cold War which had propped up their empire, giving them a common enemy, once Reagan wound things down their attention turned inward and everything fell apart. If only we'd leave Cuba alone, the same thing would happen there.
 
> But it does at the least suggest that we would be very unwise to 
> assume the deadline is so far in the future we needn't hurry. 

For almost all of recorded history, every big civilization fell because skin-wearing, hand-weapon wielding barbarian hordes invaded and wiped them out. Should we therefore worry that America is going to be invaded by the next wave of Indo-European tribesmen? This doesn't really suggest anything but that we should examine the actual reasons and see how they...and everything else we know about reality...apply to the current situation.
 
You can't just say "this kind of event happened a lot, therefore it could happen again any time". It happened for a reason then, and IF it happens next time, it'll be for a reason. In fact, you CAN "foretell the future" to that extent. 
 
--
Words of the Sentient:
Unlimited power is apt to corrupt the minds of those who possess it.
                -- Pitt the Elder
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