[ExI] video games take 2

[Keith Henson]

On Mon, Aug 7, 2017 at 8:41 AM,  Tara Maya <tara at taramayastales.com> wrote:

> I guess I don?t understand this concept of people not having work to do. They need to survive, win a mate, outbreed the competition and spread to new territory. Machines can help us do that better, and hopefully to other planets, but it doesn?t relieve us of the work of living.

It might be worth the trouble to figure out where this cultureal, and
very likely, genetic bias to work came from.

Gregory Clark makes the case that it happened as a result of strong
Darwinian selection in the stable agraian north west Europe between
about 1200 and 1800.

But northern winters and farmers may have biased selection to work for
much longer than the 400 years Clark looked at.  The ones with a drive
to stack more firewood (and food) than the minimum made it through the
occasonal extra hard winter.  Their children repopulated the farms of
the ones who froze.

> I already know of two guys whose wives divorced them because all the guys did was play video games. I?m pretty sure natural selection won?t take too long to course correct on this one?.

The whole biology business is not likely to extend long enough to get
much selection.

> Either that, or in the future, men may battle their avatars against one another in virtual worlds to win the maidens fair?.. in that case, winning the game is the same as winning THE game.

I really don't know.  We are no more than a generation from putting
our own genetics under control.  Selection in such a world will be by
design.  What are we going to design future humans to do?

Keith