From: Samantha Atkins (samantha@objectent.com)
Date: Sat Jun 08 2002 - 02:14:57 MDT
Lee Corbin wrote:
> Samantha writes
>
>
>>>Now, of course, afterwards, when you saw that this achieved
>>>nothing, it would be necessary for some proper moral body
>>>to seize control and censor the companies' activities that
>>>violated this ethic. Shades of 1917.
>>>
>>You are talking about something totally of your own imagining
>>that has nothing at all to do with what I would suggest.
>>
>
> Here, I think, you retreat to saying in effect, "Oh, I'm not
> proposing that we replace capitalism *now*!". Just as when you
> continue:
>
Do you think if I was intent on replacing it, that I would try
something as hare-brained as the above? Give some credit at least.
>
>>There is nothing so sacred about capitalism (although that is
>>not a proper name for what is really practiced) that it cannot
>>in whole or part be questined or that it can be just assumed to
>>be with us forever and beyond question.
>>
>
> I agree, we never cling to a *system* just out of loyalty.
> Moreover, I hope that you weren't accusing me of wanting
> any present way we do things "forever and beyond question".
> Indeed you go on:
>
>
>>>one might admit that capitalism can be pretty evil, but it
>>>happens to be less evil than anything people can think of
>>>to put in its place. (How else do you explain that every
>>>
>>So far only. It is built on assumptions of scarcity that
>>increasingly need not hold.
>>
>
> Quite right. But you see, in earlier posts you make it
> clear that we cannot *wait* for the singularity, that
> indeed we might not make it if we don't revise things
> now!
>
This is quite true imo. What is now being practiced
economically, especially in some of the more draconian IP laws
and in the legalized restraint of freedom, is not compatible
with reaching singularity, or at least not very peaceably or in
a way likely to preserve as many lives as possible.
> It seems to me that you want it both ways: you are
> so extremely impatient with capitalism, free markets,
> and our present institutions (never mind the unprecedented
> wellbeing of humankind), that you often sound like it
> has to go tomorrow. Yet if I mention the last great
> thinkers, e.g. 1917, to try, you think that I'm coming
> up with total inventions out of whole cloth. Could you
> explain?
>
There is no "unprecedented wellbeing of mankind"! Much of the
third world is in worse shape than it was two decades ago! The
US is 7 trillion dollars in debt! Most of the US citizenry is
massively in debt. Our economy sucks so bad that it is
difficult to fund any truly innovative companies any more. The
people of the world quite fairly don't know if technology is
their savior or the means to forge more efficient chains to keep
them from freedom and happiness. It is really realy not time to
claim we have done so good that there is not very ample room for
improvement.
I never said you were coming up with inventions. But we are
bleeding on this planet right now in a way I believe is not only
unsustainable (doesn't have to be sustainable if we truly do
reach singularity) but is in the way and endangering some of the
innovation necessary to get us there in as much of "one piece"
as possible.
>
>>I beg your pardon! I think there are people on this list every
>>bit as brilliant as these three stooges [Marx, Lenin, Mao]. :-)
>>
>
> Well, I see your emoticon, but I don't think that you are
> really joking. I do suppose that you have the hubris to
> believe that you (and people like you) could succeed *at
> the present time* in radically reforming society.
>
> And no, those guys were no dummies.
I don't think they were dummies. I also don't think that we,
many of us at 3 or more sigma out on the intelligence curve, can
afford not to try to come up with something better for the
radically different environment we are quickly moving into.
There are people here brighter than I. But frankly when I found
I was as bright, statistically speaking, as I am I found it very
humbling and a more than a little depressing. I had hoped there
were a lot more people very significantly brighter than I to
tackle the mess and its manifold potentials I saw even back
then. Well, there aren't a lot of people besides us to do the
work. So I suggest we roll up our sleeves.
- samantha
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