From: Robert J. Bradbury (bradbury@aeiveos.com)
Date: Wed Dec 18 2002 - 20:26:24 MST
On Wed, 18 Dec 2002, Max M wrote:
[snip]
>
> I don't recognise any of the authors as being of >H interrest myself,
> but maybe someone on the list does. If so, feel free to point them out.
[bigger snip]
> Larry Niven
You don't recognise "Larry Niven"? Have you heard of the Ringworld novels?
Lord, if you haven't heard of the "Ringworld novels" then you don't
know about megascale superstructures. That would imply that you haven't
read Dyson's original paper on Dyson "shells", Anders' paper on Jupiter
Brains, my paper on Matrioshka Brains, and subsequent theoretical work
by Frank or Lloyd. You probably don't even know who Bremmerman, Bekenstien
and Landauer are.
I am hereby proposing this as the 3rd greatest "crime" in the history
of extropic & transhumanist development. These are:
1) Sasha's unfortunate premature demise.
2) A large number of extropians being sold a bill of goods by a
responsible and qualified academic "expert") at Extropy 4 (which
prompted my rather infamous outburst from the audience).
3) Max M. (from Denmark), not to be confused with Max More, doesn't
recognize the name of "Larry Niven".
Lord, we need to invent a whole new body of law -- "Crimes against Extropy".
And Max is probably going to be the first person we prosecute under them.
Are we now allowing people with a complete lack of knowledge about megascale
superstructures onto the list? That is just a completely unacceptable situation!
It seems clear that if we are going to maintain the quality of the Extropian
list that we are going to need to require "entrance exams". Only those
people who have read all of the necessary background literature should
be allowed to particpate. (Of course since I'm a little behind on
my extropic reading, I realize this might eliminate me -- but hey, that
might make some people on the list very happy.)
Rant, stamp of several feet, slamming of doors, razzim, frazzim, moaning
and complaining, Robert stomps off the stage.
(Side note to Max -- please take this minor rant with a large dose of humor
and send me an offlist note if you want me to provide pointers to any of
the things I have cited.)
Robert
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