From extropians-request@gnu.ai.mit.edu Mon Mar 8 23:47:26 1993 Return-Path: Received: from usc.edu by chaph.usc.edu (4.1/SMI-4.1+ucs-3.0) id AA04178; Mon, 8 Mar 93 23:47:23 PST Errors-To: Extropians-Request@gnu.ai.mit.edu Received: from churchy.gnu.ai.mit.edu by usc.edu (4.1/SMI-3.0DEV3-USC+3.1) id AA04634; Mon, 8 Mar 93 23:47:20 PST Errors-To: Extropians-Request@gnu.ai.mit.edu Received: by churchy.gnu.ai.mit.edu (5.65/4.0) id ; Tue, 9 Mar 93 02:38:56 -0500 Message-Id: <9303090738.AA22685@churchy.gnu.ai.mit.edu> To: ExI-Daily@gnu.ai.mit.edu Date: Tue, 9 Mar 93 02:38:36 -0500 X-Original-Message-Id: <9303090738.AA22679@churchy.gnu.ai.mit.edu> X-Original-To: Extropians@gnu.ai.mit.edu From: Extropians-Request@gnu.ai.mit.edu Subject: Extropians Digest V93 #0114 X-Extropian-Date: Remailed on March 9, 373 P.N.O. [07:38:55 UTC] Reply-To: Extropians@gnu.ai.mit.edu Errors-To: Extropians-Request@gnu.ai.mit.edu Status: OR Extropians Digest Tue, 9 Mar 93 Volume 93 : Issue 0114 Today's Topics: D-FENS/BIOL: Defending ourselves [1 msgs] ECON/NANO/PHIL Defending Post-Scarcity [2 msgs] EXTROPY 5th Birthday Party: Dates [1 msgs] IMMOR: Belief in reincarnation may lead to deathism [1 msgs] KILLING: Why bother? [1 msgs] MEDIA: (non) Deathist Bias in (some) Popular Culture(s) [1 msgs] MEDIA: Extropianism considered harmful? [1 msgs] META: echoes META: echoes META: echoes [1 msgs] META??: Re: Sounds Like Branch Extropians to ME [1 msgs] MISC: Waco, BATF, Privatization, etc. [1 msgs] PHIL: Reincarnationists Not Deathists [2 msgs] QUANTUM: Suggestion [2 msgs] QUESTION: Is writing more satisfying than conversation? [5 msgs] SELF: The 7 habits of highly effective people [1 msgs] SURVEY: Reincarnation; Prospect for Immortality or a Load of Hooey [3 msgs] Thorpe hip to cryonics? [1 msgs] WACO: A few tidbits [1 msgs] Administrivia: This is the digested version of the Extropian mailing list. Please remember that this list is private; messages must not be forwarded without their author's permission. To send mail to the list/digest, address your posts to: extropians@gnu.ai.mit.edu To send add/drop requests for this digest, address your post to: exi-daily-request@gnu.ai.mit.edu To make a formal complaint or an administrative request, address your posts to: extropians-request@gnu.ai.mit.edu If your mail reader is operating correctly, replies to this message will be automatically addressed to the entire list [extropians@gnu.ai.mit.edu] - please avoid long quotes! The Extropian mailing list is brought to you by the Extropy Institute, through hardware, generously provided, by the Free Software Foundation - neither is responsible for its content. Forward, Onward, Outward - Harry Shapiro (habs) List Administrator. Approximate Size: 50793 bytes. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Mon, 8 Mar 93 17:08:20 EST From: drw@BOURBAKI.MIT.EDU Subject: WACO: A few tidbits There was an article in the Boston Globe last Sunday about the Waco incidend, noting that after the capture of the head (?) of the Posse Comitatus, the FBI and US Marshal's Service worked out a way of capturing heavily armed people by negotiation rather than shootouts. Some of the more interesting bits are: [Gordon] Kahl, a member of the Posse Comitatus, a racist, anti-Semitic group, was a true believer. He believed a Jewish-led conspiracy had infiltrated the US government, the judicial system and law enforcement, and was bent on destroying his white, Christian America. He believed paying taxes to that government was akin to paying tithes to the Synagogue of Satan. [...] After the Kahl incident, US marshals and FBI agents sat down to review the handling of the case. What they concluded was that people like Kahl and his associates would not respond to the logic of superior firepower. Unlike more conventional criminals, such as drug lords or the Mafia, they didn't care if they were outmanned or outgunned. In some cases, they even wanted to die, to offer themselves as martyrs to their cause. They were people who were estranged from the political process that we take for granted. They were people who saw their government as the enemy, and believed its laws and legal system were used not to help and protect them, but to take away their rights, infringe on their beliefs and destroy their way of life. They were peopple who responded to what they believed was a higher call and so, rather than obey the laws, they resisted them as a matter of principle. Even to the death. [...] [Lawmen] must look again to what they learned form the Gordon Kahl incident and reapply those tactics. For there are hundreds of groups like the Branch Davidians, Posse Comitatus and Covenant, Sword, and Arm of the Lord that dot this country. This is not an isolated incident, and if law enforcement officials choose to ignore the lessons from their past, more cops and more children will die. Dale Dale Worley Dept. of Math., MIT drw@math.mit.edu -- When the pain finally becomes TOO great, you'll get OFF your dead ass and DO something about it. -- Strata ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 8 Mar 93 17:39:43 GMT From: jrk@information-systems.east-anglia.ac.uk (Richard Kennaway) Subject: D-FENS/BIOL: Defending ourselves Dale Worley wrotes: >Somebody said: > From a survival point of view, becoming a milquetoast, a Walter Mitty type, > is definitely the way to go. > >Actually, all choices are probably equally good, since human >psychology is probably in a state of balanced polymorphism -- if any >one psychological type had a significant survival advantage over any >other, the first would become more and more prevelant over time. That would only be true if personality were entirely determined by genes, and completely independent of the environment. -- ____ Richard Kennaway \ _/__ School of Information Systems Internet: jrk@sys.uea.ac.uk \X / University of East Anglia uucp: ...mcsun!ukc!uea-sys!jrk \/ Norwich NR4 7TJ, U.K. ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 8 Mar 93 17:39:48 GMT From: jrk@information-systems.east-anglia.ac.uk (Richard Kennaway) Subject: PHIL: Reincarnationists Not Deathists Krzys' writes: >P.S. If there is no death, then there is no risk, and any long-term >thinking is unnecessary. How's that? Death is not the only problem people face, just one of them. -- ____ Richard Kennaway \ _/__ School of Information Systems Internet: jrk@sys.uea.ac.uk \X / University of East Anglia uucp: ...mcsun!ukc!uea-sys!jrk \/ Norwich NR4 7TJ, U.K. ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 8 Mar 93 17:57:50 GMT From: jrk@information-systems.east-anglia.ac.uk (Richard Kennaway) Subject: KILLING: Why bother? Dale Worley writes: >Unfortunately, to a male, every other male is a competitor for >fathering the next generation. (See "The Selfish Gene".) I can remember when the orthodoxy was the reverse. It was women who were supposed to be unable to have real relationships with each other, due to them always competing over men. This too will pass. -- ____ Richard Kennaway \ _/__ School of Information Systems Internet: jrk@sys.uea.ac.uk \X / University of East Anglia uucp: ...mcsun!ukc!uea-sys!jrk \/ Norwich NR4 7TJ, U.K. ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 8 Mar 93 18:02:29 EST From: drw@BOURBAKI.MIT.EDU Subject: QUESTION: Is writing more satisfying than conversation? From: lists@alan.b30.ingr.com (Alan Barksdale (lists)) I've read claims that talking to exchange information is characteristically male while talking for emotional support is characteristically female, traits leading to miscommunication between the sexes. I observe that libertarians, particularly techie libs such as extropians, tend to emphasize informational over touchy-feely conversation, which characteristic helps make us unpersuasive to most people. (See "The Naked Ape".) Among humans, "talking as social interaction" is our alternative to grooming among other primates. Humans who are deficient at this skill are (perceived to be) socially deficient. Not too surprisingly, people who philosophically and emotionally emphasize their autonomy from other people and social structures (e.g., libertarians) tend to not work hard at developing these interaction skills (or does causality go the other way?), and consequently are perceived as socially deficient. Dale Dale Worley Dept. of Math., MIT drw@math.mit.edu -- I moralized and starved until one day I swore that I would be a full-fed free man at all costs; that nothing should stop me except a bullet, neither reason nor morals nor the lives of other men. I said "Thou shalt starve ere I starve"; and with that word I became free and great. I was a dangerous man until I had my will: now I am a useful, beneficent, kindly person. -- G. B. Shaw, "Major Barbara" ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 8 Mar 1993 14:48:00 -0800 (PST) From: Scott C DeLancey Subject: MEDIA: Extropianism considered harmful? Elias Israel writes: > > In short, most people are about as fully human as their pets. > > We're talking about people who buy lottery tickets here. People who > think that higher taxes will decrease the public debt. People who think > that it's OK for the government to shoot at "crazies." People who think > that unions are valuable and capitalists are parasites. People who > think that their narrow, empty lives are a personal mission from God > Almighty. > > We all remember the story "The Marching Morons", wherein the protagonist > wakes up after a long sleep to find the US swamped by the ignorant masses. > Look around: it's no longer just a story, it's literal fact. ^^^^ ^^ ^^^^^^ ^^^^ ^ ^^^^^ Um ... Not to take issue with your perspective on our fellow citizens, but is this meant to imply that you think things were once different? I find that quite improbable, and nothing that I know about history suggests otherwise. Scott DeLancey delancey@darkwing.uoregon.edu Department of Linguistics University of Oregon Eugene, OR 97403, USA ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 8 Mar 93 17:59:31 EST From: drw@BOURBAKI.MIT.EDU Subject: QUANTUM: Suggestion From: Robin Hanson Dale Worley >(Summary (as of 3/8/93): Although the Copenhagen Interpretation seems >to be the most philosophically unreasonable interpretation of QM, all >experiments which are able to observationally distinguish it from >other interpretations have upheld it.) While true, I think this is somewhat deceptive. To my knowledge, no experiment has disinguished between any two widely held interpretations of QM. Depends on how exactly you want to do it. There are a fairly large class of theories that have the properties that imply Bell's inequality: information propagates no faster than c probabilities of events are always >= 0 and <= 1 all physical laws are local Conveniently, Bell's inequality is absolutely contradicted by the Copenhagen Interpretation, and it is (in theory) possible to construct an experiment to test it. No experiment that fully satisfies the conditions of a showdown test has been done yet, but some fairly close approximations have been done, and the results have been in the Copenhagen direction. In the absense of direct empirical evidence, I would think the a priori "unreasonable" interpretation should be considered less likely. Personally, I would vote for the interpretation which expresses the apparent philosophical content of the mathematics over what seems "reasonable". Over and over, the mathematics of physical theory has proved to be more correct than the intuition of the people who wrote the mathematics. Dale Dale Worley Dept. of Math., MIT drw@math.mit.edu -- War will exist as long as there's a food chain. -- P. J. O'Rourke ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 08 Mar 93 21:44:59 GMT From: sjw@liberty.demon.co.uk (Stephen J. Whitrow) Subject: META??: Re: Sounds Like Branch Extropians to ME Carol Moore writes: > (Though seriously folks I've been sitting here > watching Branaugh's HENRY V and wonder WHEN > will these males stop proving they exist and > can face the danger women face when they > bear children by going to bloody war. French vs. > English, Gun-Nut-Cults vs. BATF, Palestinian > Fundamentalist Muslims vs. World Trade Center. > When shall all this initiation of force and > self-defense--or kill for the fund of its self > sake--end!!) I suggest it will be vastly diminished when they recognise how precious life is, recognise that _you_ only live once, recognise that it pays to take steps to save themselves rather than hope to be saved by gods or unexplained phenomena of dubious substance, and resolve to divert their efforts to working together to defeat ageing and death rather than killing each other. Of course, it will help when folk are no longer forced to inhabit archaic bodies which are limited to a few decades of operation. When you know that you personally will have all the time in the world to achieve your goals, the sort of desperate struggles which occur nowadays will tend to become obsolete as pressures for conflict evaporate. Even in the era of full-blown nanotech, there may still be some individuals who go berserk and act destructively. But I'll be disappointed if it turns out that one can't even journey to the far edge of the galaxy without running a great deal of risk of being put out into deep space by marauding pirates, or getting blown up by gangs of interstellar voyagers who get some kick out of gratuitous violence. Steve Whitrow sjw@liberty.demon.co.uk ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 8 Mar 93 16:00:22 PST From: Robin Hanson Subject: QUESTION: Is writing more satisfying than conversation? Tim May writes: >Boring threads I can leave, boring conversations (no matter whose >fault, often my own) are harder to leave. Actually I think this is one of the main problems with email conversation. Yes, in person it is hard to just up and walk away in the middle of a conversation. But because of this you get much more closure to discussions. You have to wrap it up before you can change the topic or slip away. So you get summaries telling you that the other person now basically agrees, thinks its interesting, didn't understand, or something. In email, a few messages go back and forth and then, without warning, one of the messages is just the last. You generally have no idea *why* no one responded to your final post - do they now agree? Are they bored? Did no one understand you? Do they think you're beyond hope arguing with? I find this very frustrating. Robin Hanson ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 8 Mar 93 17:36:31 MST From: hammar@cs.unm.edu Subject: META: echoes META: echoes META: echoes TOMorrow wrote: Is anybody else picking up echo messages? I've received several posts twice over the last few days. I just got Jay's ECON/NANO/PHIL post again, for example. T.O. Morrow -- twb3@midway.uchicago.edu Law & Politics Editor: EXTROPY -- Journal of Transhumanist Thought Associate Executive Director: ExI -- The Extropy Institute ___________________ me too. I'm recieveing two copies of almost everything written by H.Shapiro. + some others stuff with no detected pattern. Neil Hammar ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 08 Mar 93 20:49:31 GMT From: price@price.demon.co.uk (Michael Clive Price) Subject: ECON/NANO/PHIL Defending Post-Scarcity Nick Szabo writes: > Some things that will remain scarce, unless the very laws > of physics are overturned, [...] > * Matter (protons, neutrons, electrons, etc.) No. The laws of physics, combined with the existence of the universe imply the reverse - that matter/energy/space can be created ex-nihilo. Ergo otherwise there'd be no universe. > * Real estate (surface area, cubic, etc.) Ditto above > * Time (speed of light limit) -- transportation, communication, > computation Probably, but I hope not. > * Energy & thermodynamic disequilibrium ("extropy") With energy for free (see above) entropy becomes a bit less crushing. > > None of these things can be copied like software. Yet! > > Nick Szabo szabo@techbook.com The eternal optimist, Mike Price (price@price.demon.co.uk) ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 8 Mar 93 18:05:30 MST From: hammar@cs.unm.edu Subject: QUESTION: Is writing more satisfying than conversation? Tim May wrote: Putting these various data points together, a few reasons seem likely: 1. In e-mail, as in published writings of other kinds, we are forced to develop an argument, to present evidence (without interruption!), and basically to "make a statement." Conversations are much different. 2. Our written statements succinctly "advertise" our positions. And by dint of being broadcast to hundreds (or more) readers at the same time, those interested in our ideas can find out immediately that we have something of interest to them. Conversation remains the same "linear diffusion" process that it was a century ago (though conversation as a result of "computerized intellectual dating" (a new term?) may be increasingly important in the future). 3. Perhaps we (I?) have come to expect too much in face to face conversations. No longer content to talk about old staples like music, no longer content to just sit around and ponder things in vague terms, it may not be surprising that conversations seem to have a kind of "flat" quality to them. (As an aside, at Max's house we _did_ end up talking about the musical group "The Shamen," as Max had a couple of their CDs on.) 4. Conversations involve people with different interests, different agendas. Others are unlikely to be up on the same areas as one's self, so a kind of dampening effect occurs. The lowest common denominator--music, sports, the weather, politics, etc.--then takes over. (The same is true in writing, but writer generally assumes the "ideal reader," that is, his target audience is assumed to be well-informed, interested, etc. A rapt audience, even if not true in fact. This makes for a much more stimulating motivation, as it were.) Maybe I'm just losing my patience, or my ability to converse in normal ways. ____________________________ I would like to suggest a 5th reason for this effect. 5. If I read a message and have nothing worth saying in reply, I don't. There are hundreds of people also reading it, and one of them may come up with a good response. Even if one doesn't, I've read a dozen other messages at aproxamately the same time, so I won't notice the lack unless I have a personal stake in the message. A multi-tasking conversation of this kind would be sheer babble, but the textual version can be managed by time-sharing your personal cpu. Neil HAmmar ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 8 Mar 1993 20:56:22 -0500 (EST) From: Carol Moore Subject: IMMOR: Belief in reincarnation may lead to deathism I only wanted to do one reincarnation reply and since you ask a dkirect question, I'll answer it. YOu ask if I could live forever, would I choose to do so? (ie in same body). I am the type of person who gets bored very easily. A million years of being me -- even if I could stay the gorgeous 25 year old I was instead of the flabby 45 year old I am-- sounds a bit boring. To me it is a greater adventure to live a number of lifetimes. My complaint is that I don't like to see this view of self-actualization put down as "deathist". Save that for those who consider killing others to be pleasureable-- or even necessary. Save it for those who kill themselves because they haven't even tried to live an interesting life this time around. I do believe that many of those who believe in reincarnation in a fatalist way--I'm stuck in this life, maybe the next will be better, I can't wait to die to get there-- are what you might call "deathists". But let's not put down all those who believe in it in a positive way because some have a more negative view of it. That's like saying all sex is bad because some people rape others. AS FOR THE SCIENTIFIC BASIS OF REINCARNATION: I am not saying that I believe it 100% to be true. I am saying that it is a fascinating hypothesis which should be explored a great deal more, both theoretically and empirically. I only got into it after reading the books of Helen Wambaugh, a psychologists who hypnotized thousands of people in an attempt to prove it was all baloney. She would ask them very concrete questions about the kind of clothes they wore, money they used, houses they lived in, eating utensils they used, etc. and she found a statistically significant number of people remembered things that they just would not know unless they were deep readers of the minutae of history. I would like to see a lot more of this type of research done. By the way, I did come up with a possible name of the soldier I might have been in WWII. ANy one know how I can find out if such an individual existed and was from the mid-west? Call the army? Anyway, I'm glad to see a few people are open minded on the subject! ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 8 Mar 93 19:20:27 MST From: hammar@cs.unm.edu Subject: MEDIA: (non) Deathist Bias in (some) Popular Culture(s) Steve Neal wrote: > Immortality In Popular Culture > > A more serious bias can been seen when you look at depictions of >people who want to live forever. Wishing to avoid going gently into >that good night is clearly the mark of a psychopath, not just in >Hollywood's eyes, but almost universally in human mythology. ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ You speak only for your own culture here. A major portion of religious and practical Taoism is based on the search for immortality. (As a matter of fact, western alchemy was seriously influenced by inadequate translations of Chinese alchemical writings, where the translator didn't realise the formulas for the "true gold" were the ingrediants for a "golden elixer" (imortality drug) instead of a quest for spending cash.) Unfortunatly, no consistantly replicable formula has been publicly released. (Darn!) However, a "Golden Elixer Cryonics Corporation" would have built in good press. (There are several legends of holy people chosing to sleep until a specific event. Most famous are the Buddhist saints who are waiting for Maitria Buddha to appear.) Oh yes, that reminds me, the prophecies of the Maitriya Buddha say he won't appear until the people have a lifespan of 80,000 years. Maybe some of the bigger Buddhist denominations could be persuaded to provide grant money into nanotech and other repair of aging cells. :-) I believe that in Japan and India, old age (far beyond normal) is also considered a sign (not infallible though) of exceptional morality, if not true holyness. Neil Hammar ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 8 Mar 93 18:24:28 PST From: desilets@sj.ate.slb.com (Mark Desilets) Subject: SURVEY: Reincarnation; Prospect for Immortality or a Load of Hooey In my untiring efforts to provide statistical ammunition for list members who may want to make sweeping statements like "Extropians think Reincarnation is a fascinating area of scientific research, ripe for NSF funding", or, "Extropians think reincarnation is a pantload of hooey and we'd rather not discuss it here", I am taking the following survey: Do you believe that 1) Reincarnation is an interesting area of discussion for the list - or - 2) Reincarnation is a pantload of hooey Please respond with the number that most closely matches your feelings on the subject. Additional comments are welcome and will be tablulated as an appendix to the surevey results proper. Thank you for your participation. Mark ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 8 Mar 93 21:42:49 WET From: rjc@gnu.ai.mit.edu (Ray) Subject: QUANTUM: Suggestion drw@BOURBAKI.MIT.EDU writes: > Conveniently, Bell's inequality is absolutely contradicted by the > Copenhagen Interpretation, and it is (in theory) possible to construct > an experiment to test it. No experiment that fully satisfies the > conditions of a showdown test has been done yet, but some fairly close > approximations have been done, and the results have been in the > Copenhagen direction. If you are referring to Aspect's experiment, I thought it was generally acknowledged that his experimental constraints were not stringent enough to be considered an accurate test. (atleast from what's I've read in sci.physics and Phys. Rev.) > In the absense of direct empirical evidence, I would think > the a priori "unreasonable" interpretation should be considered less > likely. > > Personally, I would vote for the interpretation which expresses the > apparent philosophical content of the mathematics over what seems > "reasonable". Over and over, the mathematics of physical theory has > proved to be more correct than the intuition of the people who wrote > the mathematics. So far, the philosophical content of Quantum mathematics has lead to multiple mathematical models and multiple philosophical interpretations all of which are equivalent and agree with experimental results. (Copenhagen, Many Worlds, Quantum Logic, "pilot wave", etc) Faced with this, which one is "correct"? Unless there is an experiment that could prove Copenhagen more correct over Many-Worlds, the only conclusion is that they are all viable, and thus correct. Occam's razor should be used to select from the set of QM interpretations. I am taking courses in Quantum mechanics, and interpretations aren't taught at all. The standard of correctness taught is whether or not the numbers you crank out of the equations agree with experiment (this is because predictions are falsifiable. Currently, I know of no experiments which could falsify the many QM interpretations). Interpretations are in the realm meta-physics. Just because the predictions of mathematics disagree with intuition does not mean philosophical interpretations based on mathematics are also correct. Those interpretations are based on the same flawed intuition that the mathematics contradicted. Thus, if the mathematics employ some kind of trick like using 26 dimensions, you should not jump to the conclusion that 26 dimensions exist unless you can test that hypothesis. Before I get flamed to 10^6 Kevlin, I am not against _strict_ interpretations of mathematics that are testable or best (according to Occam), I am against creative interpretations (e.g. Von Neumann's "... and then a miracle happens."). However, I do feel that sometimes even strict interpretations get in the way of further scientific breakthoughs. (e.g. the solar-system model of the atom taught in highschool, the continuum in classical physics, the ether, continuum E & B "fields". All these are the result of applying "intuitive" Newtonian mechanic interpretations to areas where they are not applicable.) -Ray p.s. Just to let myself off-the-hook incase I made some of kind of incorrect assumption (for example that there is no experiment which can test Many Worlds or Copenhagen), I use the excuse that they don't teach any "Philosophy of Quantum mechanics" courses at my college. ;-) Regretably, I am forced to get all my information in that area from popularizations like Quantum Reality, Dancing Wu Li Masters (ack!), In Search of Schodinger's Cat, Tao of Physics (ack again!), etc. I claim not to be an expert in this area, only an interested observer. -- Ray Cromwell | Engineering is the implementation of science; -- -- EE/Math Student | politics is the implementation of faith. -- -- rjc@gnu.ai.mit.edu | - Zetetic Commentaries -- ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 8 Mar 93 22:15:28 WET From: rjc@gnu.ai.mit.edu (Ray) Subject: QUESTION: Is writing more satisfying than conversation? I have noticed that even on the telephone or in a one-on-one debate there is a tendency to try to "shout" over the other person, and continually interupt them. The reason for this, I think, is that when you are listening to someone else speak, as soon as an idea pops into your head, you want to get it across before you forget it. It's hard to fully listen to someone's point, and then remember it totally and comment on each part. Quoting articles on the net is a tremendous improvement. Not until the wide-spread use of hip-pc's with voice input/recognition and scroll back capability will this tendency to interrupt be overcome. If my hip PC could translate someone's speech to ascii, it would totally overcome the urge to interrupt. I would simply sample someone's speech, listen to their point, review each part of what they said, quote and playback (in the speaker's original voice) a certain section, and then respond to it. Until this capability becomes available, I will prefer email conversation over voice. Where else can you have a conversation with over 300 people and still be heard? I am probably socially incompentent. I have a tendency to say "un huh. Yeah. I see. Ok. Go on." while someone else is talking to rush them through the small-talk introductory phase and cut right to the nitty-gritty. I hate small-talk, and always try to escape as politely as possible when someone starts it with me. It just seems so fake, and in general, I am not very good at it. ("How are you doing?" "Fine." ) However, my mother is an absolute prodigy when it comes to smalltalk. She makes total friends with perfect strangers in minutes, it's amazing. For instance, she'll walk into a store, and while she's in the checkout line, the clerk and her (whom she has never met with before) will start joking and telling about life experiences before she gets to the end of the line. I used to theorize a lot about what makes people individualists, or modem hobiests, or hackers. I think it has a lot to do with poor social skills (not that I consider small-talk some kind of great skill, unlike say mathematics or musical talent). -- Ray Cromwell | Engineering is the implementation of science; -- -- EE/Math Student | politics is the implementation of faith. -- -- rjc@gnu.ai.mit.edu | - Zetetic Commentaries -- ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 8 Mar 93 22:46:33 WET From: rjc@gnu.ai.mit.edu (Ray) Subject: SELF: The 7 habits of highly effective people Has anyone read this book? I just caught the TV version of this book on PBS and it was very interesting. The speaker often made statements like "rewrite the script of your life. You are the programmer now." The speaker seemed to emphasize that there are objective principles to live by, one of them is personal responsibility. ("make a promise, and then keep it." Sounds like fulfilling a personal contract?) It sounded like a very extropian philosophy based on the indvidual, it also sounded like it would actually work in changing bad habits. I haven't read the book, can anyone else comment? -- Ray Cromwell | Engineering is the implementation of science; -- -- EE/Math Student | politics is the implementation of faith. -- -- rjc@gnu.ai.mit.edu | - Zetetic Commentaries -- ------------------------------ Date: 08 Mar 1993 22:59:32 -0500 (EST) From: KMOSTA01@ULKYVX.LOUISVILLE.EDU Subject: PHIL: Reincarnationists Not Deathists ">From: KMOSTA01@ulkyvx.louisville.edu >P.S. If there is no death, then there is no risk, and any long-term >thinking is unnecessary. Thus reincarnationists will not care about >any totalitarianism, or statism, not much at least, because if ther >is not death, why fear the statists? Isn't that what Jesus of >Nazareth and Jesus of Waco teach? Couldn't this be said about technological immortalists like myself as well? And wouldn't it be false? Perry" No, Perry, this can't we said about you. You may be a technological immortalist, but you can be killed. Krzys' ------------------------------ Date: 08 Mar 1993 23:06:58 -0500 (EST) From: KMOSTA01@ULKYVX.LOUISVILLE.EDU Subject: SURVEY: Reincarnation; Prospect for Immortality or a Load of Hooey 2 -- hooey Krzys' ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 8 Mar 93 20:17:33 -0800 From: graps@argus.arc.nasa.gov (Amara Graps) Subject: QUESTION: Is writing more satisfying than conversation? Tim May in his usual abstraction-upon-analysis-upon-generalization- upon.. way :) concluded that face-to-face conversations were lately becoming less satisfying than email conversations. He offered several hypotheses but it seems to me that he missed some of the very big psychological reasons for why he's been disappointed with face-to- face interactions. Given that Tim is a hyper-rational guy like many of you, it's not surprising that the emotive aspect got missed. (My opinion, mind you) So, my hypotheses is that Tim's emotional state or mood was playing a role. We all carry around a great deal of emotional bagagge and you'd be surprised (maybe not) at how much that affects our day-to-day encounters with other people. For people like us who live in our heads alot, our thinking influences our moods, which in turn, influences our thinking, which in turn, influences our moods, which in turn... So if you've got a belief system that sometimes gets somewhat distorted, it taints perceptions to the point of us being constantly disappointed. For example, a common cognitive distortion that everybody practices at one time or another is "Should Statements." You try to motivate yourself and others with "shoulds" and "shouldn'ts" with the consequence of feeling guilty, anger, frustration, resentment etc. Tim referred to this in one of his hypotheses as "expecting too much in face-to-face conversations." I think that's what's partly going on. Try going to one of these social events with no expectations ("going-with-the-flow", so to speak). If that's repugnant to you, then arrange an agreement with some of the people that you'll be meeting that you will talk about topics a, b, and c. That will solve the fuzzy, "pointless conversation" (S. Neal's words) that Tim finds frustrating. [I suppose that I'm talking about all of this out of experience because I feel that I'm the grand "should master." My personality type (Myers-Briggs INTJ, Enneagram 5w6,->translate to your favorite personality map) seems to have a peculiar affinity to judging myself and others harshly, so it's a real effort to *not* listen to my "should gremlin" and therefore have few expectations when I interract socially.] A going-with-the-flow kind of approach actually facilitates another perspective on social interactions: that is we can learn from just about anyone that we encounter. Yes, even statists! Since, as Tim mentioned, conversations involve people with different interests etc, open your mind and listen to what other people say. My impression from reading between the lines of Tim's post was this idea: "I feel it, therefore it must be true." This is another cognitive distortion! (Also very common..) When we enter a social situation, expectations, distractions, tiredness, etc affect our moods so that we're not receptive to the dance. Later, upon analysis of the social encounter, we unconsciously note our emotional state and use it in our analysis, often making sweeping generalizations. (No criticism intended here Tim, just my theory. Throw it out if it doesn't fit.) In the middle of writing this post I read Alan's Barkdale's idea that emotional support is characteristically female, so I suppose I'm adding some validity to that idea! Amara-the pop psychologist-Graps ******************************************************************** Computational Physicist NASA-Ames Research Center MS 245-5 Moffett Field, CA 94035 (415) 604-5507 graps@gal.arc.nasa.gov ******************************************************************** ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 8 Mar 93 23:17:00 WET From: rjc@gnu.ai.mit.edu (Ray) Subject: ECON/NANO/PHIL Defending Post-Scarcity Michael Clive Price writes: > > Nick Szabo writes: > > Some things that will remain scarce, unless the very laws > > of physics are overturned, [...] > > > * Matter (protons, neutrons, electrons, etc.) > > No. The laws of physics, combined with the existence of the universe > imply the reverse - that matter/energy/space can be created ex-nihilo. > Ergo otherwise there'd be no universe. But this is only globally correct? Combined with > > * Time (speed of light limit) -- transportation, communication, it seems that for the most part, energy and matter are conserved on local scales. I agree with you that there is a free-lunch with respect to an expanding universe, but it seems hard to take advantage of this fact when you're limited to alpha * c, with alpha <<<< 1. > > * Energy & thermodynamic disequilibrium ("extropy") > > With energy for free (see above) entropy becomes a bit less crushing. Good. I used to be pessimistic about omega-point like things happening when heat-death was a theoretical possibility. The next problem is to avoide a potential Big-Crunch. Hans Moravec proposed a method in Mind Children, but I'm not sure whether it will work. ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 8 Mar 93 21:23:04 PST From: Eli Brandt Subject: Thorpe hip to cryonics? At the fourth and last of his lectures at UC Irvine, there was a rather peculiar exchange. Someone in the audience asked a question about "very long term investment"; he referred her to an article by Art Quaife in the TransTime newsletter. He is apparently familiar with TransTime, but the exchange is still odd -- he wouldn't have recognized "very long term" as a code word for cryonics unless he knew the questioner, in which case why would she have asked publically? Odd. Interesting guy, in any case -- he also tossed in a reference to Walford's "120-Year Diet". Apparently Walford was involved with some roulette scheme... PGP 2 key by finger or e-mail Eli ebrandt@jarthur.claremont.edu ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 8 Mar 93 22:32:09 PST From: Pandit Singh Subject: MISC: Waco, BATF, Privatization, etc. > > > From: owen@autodesk.com (D. Owen Rowley) > > > > Do you really want to live in a society where everyone packs a gun? > > I want to live in a society where everyone can pack a gun. I want to live in a society where there are no guns. Does anybody here support expatriation of gang members? --- singh ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 8 Mar 93 23:31:00 EST From: mike@highlite.gotham.COM (Mike Wiik) Subject: SURVEY: Reincarnation; Prospect for Immortality or a Load of Hooey Mark, I can't read your email address. I presume a survey should go to the sender for tabulation. -Mike mike@highlite.gotham.com ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 8 Mar 93 22:56:28 PST From: more@chaph.usc.edu (Max More) Subject: EXTROPY 5th Birthday Party: Dates EXTROPY 5TH BIRTHDAY PARTY! EXTROPY will be five years old this coming September. In that time, it has grown from a primitive, thin, small-format zine with a print run around 60, to a full-size, smart journal with a print run of 2,500 (and rising). EXTROPY spawned this e-mail list (thanks originally to Perry Metzger), and then Extropy Institute and it's newsletter, EXPONENT. It's time for a birthday party! Long time list member Mark Desilets has kindly offered his house as the site for this event - a concentration of intelligence and futique fun hitherto unprecedented! Holding it in Northern California will be easiest for most people. September is not a good month to hold the party because of the Worlcon and because many of us will have restarted the academic year. I therefore propose the following date: Saturday August 21. Alternatively: Saturday August 28. Please reply *privately* to me, letting me know whether you can make this date. For those coming from further afield, no doubt there will be volunteers to put you up for a night before and/or after. I'm also open to suggestions for things to do at this all day party. A hike during the morning or early afternoon? Roundatable discussions prior to the random events of the evening? Max More more@usc.edu Executive Director Extropy Institute (ExI) 213-484-6383 ------------------------------ End of Extropians Digest V93 Issue #0114 ****************************************