From: Robert J. Bradbury (bradbury@aeiveos.com)
Date: Tue Sep 03 2002 - 11:33:55 MDT
On Tue, 3 Sep 2002, Hubert Mania wrote:
> >Could we please get our priorities straight people!
>
> but in the same mail talked at length about spam and HIV.
Because I consider these to be "real" problems that are costing money,
threatening to destroy the extropy promoting internet and kill millions
of people. They are all *very* real problems today that are getting worse,
not better, generally speaking. (Some limited progress has been made on
anti-HIV drug pricing for poorer countries but it isn't enough).
> Some 15 hours later he started
> this thread about terrorism. In the face of these facts, how do we have to interpret
> this? Is it a withdrawal of his objections in "Pragmatic Realism"?
To me the terrorism threat is *very* real. I have argued previously
why this problem will not go away (cultural clash, multiple wives,
lack of economic development due to prohibitions against interest).
I know the Aum Shinrinkyo cult is reported to have spent in excess
of $12 million dollars in Russia (enough to buy thousands of strains
of potential bioweapons if even one member of a large military-scientific
complex was corruptable). I also know we are only at the beginning
of dealing with the bioweapons problem given the march of technology.
Given my perspective that we should *do* as much as possible to
prevent the deaths of thousands to millions of individuals (from natural
or man-made causes), or the wasting of millions of hours/dollars
that could better be spent elsewhere, looking at possible solutions
to terrorist agendas seems consistent and extropic.
> Why suppress voices who feel at home here and wish to express more
> private thoughts?
If it wasn't clear -- you can express the "thought" to the list.
But if you plan to engage in a long drawn out debate on the list it
might be courteous to consider whether all the list members should be
subjected to wasting their time either (a) reading subject lines;
and/or (b) hitting the delete key if the topic isn't of general
extropic interest (I took my sprikler comments offline to Natasha,
Eugene took his health suggestions offline to me).
> If you don`t like this kind of talk, why not simply delete or ignore
> such a thread and don`t give a damn about such deviation anymore.
Because the needs of the many *do* outweigh the needs of the few (IMO).
Would you rather have me spending my time hitting the delete key
*or* figuring out the retrosynthesis of the Fine Motion Controller?
What about the several hundred other people who have to hit the
delete key -- wouldn't it be better of Gina was studying what
courses to take at the UW for example?
Maybe we need a "ExI-short-term" list and an "ExI-long-term" list.
I'd primarily want to be on the "short-term" list because what
we discuss and do there is going to determine whether we (or
many humans alive) ever get to any of the things on the
"long-term" list. Perhaps I'm simply tired of the endless
libertarian discussions -- the system *isn't* going to change
until a "disruptive event" occurs.
> "Go ahead and make a plan.
> Be just bright!
> Then, make a second plan.
> They both won`t turn out right."
Hmmmm, I've been saying ever since I encountered the entity
called the "Russian sociopolitical environment", "Always
have 'Plan B'".
I brought up the terrorism thread because it has killed people,
has the risk of doing so again, and seems to be a problem that
technology could help solve if applied carefully. I personally
thought it was a worthwhile discussion since it might require
people give up some "privacies" they currently have and could
potentially expand possibilities for state abuse of technologies.
So I was looking for privacies people didn't care much about
or ideas of how to avoid possible abuse.
Considering Spikes comment -- having a neighbor have a police
scanner is one thing -- allowing them to have access to my CC
numbers is another. Its a question perhaps of whether they
can be trusted to use the information in a responsible way
or are they simply using it for their entertainment (e.g.
kind of the difference between the TV shows "America's
Most Wanted" and "Cops"). The first tries to catch criminals
while the second merely has people riding around in the
back of police cars filming what goes on.
Robert
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.5 : Sat Nov 02 2002 - 09:16:40 MST