From: Robert J. Bradbury (bradbury@aeiveos.com)
Date: Tue Apr 30 2002 - 12:12:46 MDT
On Sun, 28 Apr 2002, Lee Corbin wrote:
> Hal (at least if the attributions are correct) writes
>
> > I don't accept the first reason, in fact it is downright immoral
> > to justify inflicting pain and hardship on others just because some
> > people might play either the top or bottom role from time to time.
>
> I agree: it is completely unacceptable to inflict needless pain
> and hardship. Moreover, it's unrealistic. I made plenty of
> marginal annotations pointing out that even today animals are
> invariably better treated.
What about the "pain" of failing to evolve, failing to transcend
the hazard function of the galaxy or failing reach ones ultimate
potential?
I think the hairs that are split with respect to treating chimps
or dolphins much better than cattle or pigs are *pretty* small.
Bottom line -- "nature" doesn't care even a teeny, tiny, little,
miniscule Bekenstein-bound sized bit about whether or not pain
is inflicted in the process of evolution. In fact "nature"
developed pain as a feedback process to facilitate evolution.
(Its the supreme motivating force to get individuals to alter what
they are doing when that isn't working to avoid being preyed upon.)
Create a higher order pain function associated with the deaths
that may be caused because the knowledge to prevent those deaths
was unavailable because of the funds that had to be devoted to
providing mice or rate "old-age" homes. Or a higher order pain
function associated with the fact that we didn't evolve to a
higher level quite fast enough to be able to prevent a world
level sterilization event.
The current "pain" discussions, seem to be to be highly
anthropocentric.
As En Vogue would say -- "Free your mind -- the rest will follow".
> > Why would it be so impossible simply to treat everyone with respect?
>
> Quite right: not only would it be possible, but 21st century people
> would, for the most part, be very uncomfortable being so nastly to
> conscious and sensitive beings.
Ah-ha. The sympathy card gets played. (We need a deck of cards
whose properties correspond to interesting lower/higher memes
built into or developed by humans -- "Transhuman Tarot Cards".)
Would you argue that those people behaving in ill-informed
or self-destructive patterns deserve "extra-human" levels of
consideration? Are you really arguing that I (or everyone)
should be responsible for the quality of *their* lives?
There is a utilitarian perspective here -- how many mouse
lives must I sacrifice to save a human life? If thei
preservation of mouse lives becomes paramount, then
it seems likely that you will sacrifice the rate of progress
of humanity. That *does* have consequences.
Going back to the original question:
"Why would it be so impossible simply to treat everyone with respect?"
Answer:
Because if I "respect" individuals whose perspectives would retard
the development of humanity such that my own survival or the survival
of humanity is at stake, then such respect is utterly pointless.
It is essentially respecting positions which promote the dismantlement
of complex life fomrs so as to return them to dust in the universe.
*NOT* a very effective extropic position (IMO).
I'll take a neutral position WRT the novel because I haven't
read it and even if I had, I'm fairly poor at understanding
and debating literary styles.
Robert
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