From extropians-request@extropy.org Thu Dec 9 09:04:35 1993 Return-Path: Received: from usc.edu by chaph.usc.edu (4.1/SMI-4.1+ucs-3.0) id AA10148; Thu, 9 Dec 93 09:04:32 PST Errors-To: Extropians-Request@gnu.ai.mit.edu Received: from news.panix.com by usc.edu (4.1/SMI-3.0DEV3-USC+3.1) id AA02568; Thu, 9 Dec 93 09:04:27 PST Errors-To: Extropians-Request@gnu.ai.mit.edu Received: by news.panix.com id AA05798 (5.65c/IDA-1.4.4 for more@usc.edu); Thu, 9 Dec 1993 11:57:19 -0500 Date: Thu, 9 Dec 1993 11:57:19 -0500 Message-Id: <199312091657.AA05798@news.panix.com> To: Extropians@extropy.org From: Extropians@extropy.org Subject: Extropians Digest X-Extropian-Date: December 9, 373 P.N.O. [16:56:10 UTC] Reply-To: extropians@extropy.org Errors-To: Extropians-Request@gnu.ai.mit.edu Status: RO Extropians Digest Thu, 9 Dec 93 Volume 93 : Issue 342 Today's Topics: Astrology [1 msgs] Re: Brave New Extropia? No Thanks! [1 msgs] Re: Brave New Extropia? No Thanks. (Squirrel warning) [1 msgs] AESTHETICS: Spontaneous order [1 msgs] BOOK: The Nature of Rationality [1 msgs] Brave New Extropia? No Thanks. [2 msgs] CRYPTO BACK DOOR [1 msgs] Conceding Opponent's Points [1 msgs] Extropian children [1 msgs] FNs [1 msgs] Humorous Thought: HiTech HiJack [1 msgs] META: Debate on the List [1 msgs] META: Decline and Fall of the Extropians Li [1 msgs] POLITICS: Polly Klaas and the Long Island train... [1 msgs] POLITICS: The Polly Klaas Bill [1 msgs] POLITICS: the Polly Klaaus Bill [1 msgs] test [1 msgs] Administrivia: No admin msg. Approximate Size: 52332 bytes. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Thu, 9 Dec 93 4:10:33 WET From: rjc@gnu.ai.mit.edu (Ray) Subject: Brave New Extropia? No Thanks. Charlie Stross writes: > But schools in the UK began computerizing in about 1980. Typically > each school would get a handful of primitive micros that would be > shared among entire classes; only in the late 80's did schools have > enough machines for everyone to get to one. > > In coeducational classes, boys tend to be more aggressive and get a > significantly larger proportion of teacher attention (if for no other > reason than because if they're left alone they disrupt the other kids' > attention). They're also more likely to be interested in the kind of > games that were then available on the computers (with an emphasis on > violence -- attitudes to which are culturally dictated at an early > age). So the boys tended to hog the computers, preventing girls from > getting access to them. Most people who are heavily into computers, didn't get their first exposure to them in school. Schools rarely even present computers in an interesting and fun way. My schools from 7-12 grade presented computers in a basic programming class or showed us some very badly written educational software. IMHO, the majority of kids exposed to computers nowadays get that exposure and interest from _video games_ There are quite a few people who buy PCs/Amigas to simply play games. Discovering modems/bbses and productivity software comes later. This is why Mac's aren't very popular with kids (Mac's device independent graphics prevent "hitting the hardware" assembly language programming which most games require for 60 frames per second scrolling/video tricks) A pet peeve of mine is this liberal educrat idea that somehow introducing classrooms to computers and the datahighway is going to instantly make rocket scientists out of inner city kids. We have failed to teach even basic reading/writing/reasoning/math skills and most schools have computers now. We had no problem teaching this stuff 50 years ago before there were even calculators. If anything, putting schools on the net is going to result in a lowering of GPA and productivity. Why? Just read alt.games.mud.recovery. The net is a big time waster. Very little of significance gets resolved in any of the sci.* groups, it's mostly flame wars. College students who get net accounts instantly discover IRC, Netrek, and MUDS -- to the detriment of their classes. A friend of mine last semester used to skip classes every day to sit in the lab and play netrek/DikuMUD for 8hrs/day. The best thing someone can do for their productivity is to stay off the net and get rid of their TV set. Anyway, back to the gender issue. When I was young, I used to take everything apart to see how it worked, even my sister's talking dolls and other toys. If girl's perceive computers to be boy's toys, there should still be some fraction of "hacker" girls who decide to screw around with computers whether or not they are "meant for boys". The "boys hogging scarce computers in classrooms" theory is too contrived. Boys tend to investigate and explore everything: insects, buildings, electronics, toys, rooftops, etc. Computers aren't anything special. What I do see is a serious lack of girls doing these things. (except for tomboys) -- Ray Cromwell | Engineering is the implementation of science; -- -- rjc@gnu.ai.mit.edu | politics is the implementation of faith. -- Information doesn't want to be free; it told me that it wants to profit. ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 9 Dec 93 01:09:18 -0800 From: graps@clio.arc.nasa.gov (Amara Graps) Subject: Brave New Extropia? No Thanks. $$$$$$ Is this what you're looking for? $$$$$$$$ Extro-Beings.. This thread is dying a graceful death, but since I haven't responded yet to what I think are very good comments, I would like to continue. From: cappello@cs.ucsb.edu (Peter Cappello) >Speaking of freedom of disassociation inclines me to raise a related >but older thread. On this list, returning a flame with a flame is, >IMO, unnecessary and undesirable: It is as if we are playing the You can actually gain some (perhaps distateful) insights on yourself if you feel the need to strongly lash out back at someone. Your "button" gets pushed. You react. The insight comes in asking yourself why you have this particular "button." If what the other person says is out-of-line, wrong, whatever, and YOU know they are wrong, why waste the effort and mind-cycles to flame the other guy? But if you find yourself obsessing on the idea, and you want *so bad* to get back at the other person, it's likely that he/she has touched on something that's partially true, and you can't admit it to yourself. Sometimes what you find out about yourself are pretty ugly things. I would rather *know* these ugly things, then not know them,though. And it makes me more human in the process. Related to this idea is that if you know someone that you have a very strong reaction against, your strong reaction could be because you recognize something about them that you don't like in yourself. What I'm saying here is not new, it's pretty old sufism and budism (sp?) ideas. I find it pretty useful. >If someone gives me tit, I may simply refuse further interaction. >(Of course, in meat-space, the reverse is true.) Why is it the reverse in meat-space? Maybe you need to clarify what "tit" means (Tim will probably be happy to answer that, but please don't!). If it means that someone just grabbed me from behind, my "tat" would be to break whatever bone(s) of theirs was conveniently handy. But if their "tit" was to call me names or something, my "tat" would be no response for all of the reasons I gave above. From: schirado@lab.cc.wmich.edu (Schirado) >fnerd@smds.com (Future Nerd) writes extensively on the idea of Guys >operating on a sense of "fairness", a sort of internal "justice system", >or "due process game". I question whether this is (or should be) an >exclusively male approach. Every female I have known in my life that I Yes Yes! I'm always aware of fair play and it works as a good communication technique. From: jamie@netcom.com (Jamie Dinkelacker): >For what it's worth, I think many of the gender difference discussions miss >a basic point. I don't see the essential maleness/femaleness in the same >terms. I tend to see a basic cut in people between do-ers vs. wannabes, or >persons vs. wimps. Yes, I didn't want to draw battle lines between the two genders. I probably could have couched my original post with language that didn't use the "women" label quite so much. My point was that large areas of useful, interesting areas were being missed, that more "real-world" and "down-to-earth" discussions would help us get from "here" to "there" and I had hoped that some of the infrequent posters would find the topics interesting too. From: tcmay@netcom.com (Timothy C. May) (me) >> Bleh. You described in detail an evolutionary scenario appropriate >> to the hunter/hunting period, but it doesn't fit for the agricultural >> period, where the women went out and gathered food. I actually thought you >Exactly! Considering the agricultural period only started about 8,000 >years ago, just how much "evolution" has since occurred? This was I'm going to call you on this. Archeological excavations in south Turkey lowered the antiquity of planting cultures in the Near East to about 10,000 B.C. Is there strong evidence that hunting cultures existed for long periods of time before that? Finding conclusive artifacts dated before 10,000 B.C. is pretty difficult- I'm not convinced that we know exactly what kind of cultures existed before this time. >* much of knowledge is the art of bullshitting. Or, to mix metaphors, >* "quick-studies," a trait seen in many of the folks on this list, I agree with you 100% here. I wish I was more aware of this approach when I was in school and practiced it so that it was a part of my "toolkit". I find this approach incredibly difficult now. I'm always wanting to go off in a corner with my physics books and work out the equations, and state conclusions when I'm done. >I want to thank Amara Graps for starting this thread...I only wish she >had more time to participate in her own thread! Hey I'm dropping tidbits here and there, aren't I? >(Can't she tell Vince to take care of the rug rats?) Very funny, Tim! (Those who know me, know that there are no rug rats in my household. HOWEVER, there is a kitten that has been hanging around my back patio lately, that is sooooo cute! And yes I'm a sucker for Steven Spielberg's alien critters with big eyes. He does that on purpose, you know. It's called the "awww factor.") >toys" line. Until women can relate to these "toys" in a way similar to >the way boys do, I fear few of them will be happy and successful in >science. (I'll concede that there may be a "feminine way of science" >that differs from the Western, male model. If it exists, it hasn't yet >been discovered. So I am skeptical of vague claims that women will Well my female friends get plenty excited about science, but you already labeled me in a special class (whatever that is). I told you a theory offline about my "feminine way of science" that I've seen tendencies of in some of my female scientist friends. But I'll summarize here. It's along the lines of education. When I get excited about a new scientific idea I read every I can about it. Then to make it more concrete, I start writing and writing and writing. Defining terms, creating examples, etc. Then some weeks later I have this cool little paper and start wondering what else I can do with it. In every case, I end up giving it to my friends and classmates. It gives me a strange sense of satisfaction that someone else can learn from my little process of trying to understand the topic. I've noticed that my female friends are similar in that they want people to learn and understand whatever it is that they are doing. So perhaps this is the "feminine way of science." From: Arthur Hlavaty >nurturing state, and a number of male libertarians (Murray Rothbard comes >to mind) who think that if women don't think like male libertarians, >that's the women's problem. Then those that think that are losing out of a vast richness of male/female interactions. From: freeman@maspar.com (Jay R. Freeman) > I am curious whether female Extropians are interested in the group >primarily for its libertarian flavor (some would say its anarcho-capitalist >flavor) or for other reasons. Any comments from the women here? One of my many labels is that I'm an anarchist (capitalist). If socialist stuff like sacrificing myself for the greater common good were spouted, I'd probably leave. I don't think the other cool topics would be enough to offset such socialist notions and make me want to stay. >Astronomy has a modest history of having proportionately more >women than other physical sciences, back at least to the late 18th >century. I'm not sure why -- My reason for going into this field was that space was the last great frontier (although I later thought that living in underwater cities would be a pretty exciting adventure), and it seemed exotic and romantic. I also am somewhat asocial, people are often a mystery to me, and the universe out there made sense. I never thought too much about what field to base my career in. Once I plotted my first cometary orbit in a high school physics class, I was hooked. Astronomy jobs came relatively easy ever since about age 19. (I'm 32 now.) From: phoenix@ugcs.caltech.edu (Aleph marinade) (talking about ratios of women to men at Caltech) >As for Caltech undergrads, we're cruising at 1/4 to >1/3 of the recent classes. Grads I don't know, although they seem This is a considerable improvement from what I remember in the early 80's. I used to spend some time at Caltech then because they had a better astronomy library than my library at UC-Irvine where I was working on my bachelors. (My mentor at UC-Irvine was an eccentric, brilliant, interesting professor named Virginia Trimble who did her PhD at Caltech, and gave me the idea of using that library.) I noticed virtually no women when I was there. And for the longest time a bumper sticker on the Caltech sign (Lake Ave exit I think) from the 210 Freeway remained with the words: "Females wanted. No Experience Necessary." From: cpresson@ingr.com (Craig Presson) |> How about discussions about the studies of MALE contraceptives? That |> handy little extropian device called the condom might prove to |> be an interesting topic (what is your favorite condom?). How about >Fave condom? Mint-flavored :-) Hee Hee! Do you know that you're the second person in the last 2 days to tell me that? There must be something to this mint-flavored stuff! |> [Digression.. If you guys insist on pushing this "E-babe" thingy, |> I would like to, in turn, push an "E-stud" thingy. Heehee. I'll |> have to think of someone who could, you know, look good in one of |> those Jockey briefs ads. Hmmm.. Time to draw on my many hours of |> experience of gazing at naked extropian male bodies in hot tubs!] >Iffen I had the body, I'd gladly pose for all the E-stud pix you want. Actually I think Tom Morrow would make a good poster boy! >Hmmmm ... POLL: How many E-women like Poker? Chess? sports usually played by men for blood>. Your approach to games like >these tells a lot about you. Hint: there are very few games I play >casually, and I'm not an excessively competitive male. I can't think You opened a can of worms here. [My range of sports is pretty wide- I used to play field hockey and soccer when I was younger, but my sports these days are mostly solitary ones- bicyling, roller-blading, martial arts (with partners). I like chess and poker but am not particularly good due to lack of experience. ] Once about 8 years ago, my old boyfriend tromped me real good in a game of hearts with some other people. He seemed to take exceptional glee in it. It startled me at first but we had an understanding that even in cards, we wanted to be as good as we could, so it was OK. However we later got in a discussion on what he would do if we were both presidents of competing companies. Would he give me any slack? Would I give him slack? He said that it would be the same as with the cards- may the best (wo)man win. I was rather disturbed by that because I would give him slack in such a situation. All I can conclude about this kind of competition, is that I wouldn't want to be in competing companies with my mate, and I would try to see that that never happened. I don't see a solution to this one. From: Charlie Stross >A question for the list: what would be the implications, role-wise, >for a civilization in which nanotechnology-based medicine makes >possible substantial cosmetic surgery and actual physical >sex-switching (down to the chromosomal level in every cell)? (See >_Steel Beach_ by John Varley for one approach ...) I've thought about this too, ever since I read some of Varley's short stories in Persistence of Vision. I find the idea intriguing, no.. _exciting_! Putting on a male body and seeing what that's like? Wow! And then switching back to a woman's body and enjoying even more the things I like about that? Yowza!! It can't happen soon enough for me. I think that the gender problems would go away. For the first time, we would truly understand what the other gender experienced. From: eli@suneast.east.sun.com (Elias Israel - SunSelect Engineering) >men about women's arguing technique. In fact, I'd like to suggest, without >any attempt to flatter, that you are an exceptional woman, Amara, and >as such, find all of these generalizations hopelessly off the mark. Were >you more ordinary you might not disagree with them so strongly. Do I say 'Thank you' or 'Hmpphh, I lost the argument'? :) >behaviour: I think of the possible range of human behaviour as a >surface in some imaginary n-space. All of the things a person could do I like your idea, but I'm back still trying to visualize tesseracts! Amara Graps graps@gal.arc.nasa.gov ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 9 Dec 93 4:28:56 WET From: rjc@gnu.ai.mit.edu (Ray) Subject: Humorous Thought: HiTech HiJack While watching the Hubble repair, a devious thought came to mind. What if NASA doesn't use encryption/authentication for the Hubble's command system. Furthermore, suppose you knew the signaling method and had suitable ways to broadcast/receive messages to/from the hubble. Now assume that you can reprogram the hubble's operating software and NASA doesn't have any "hard reset" system. Now the stage is set for our clever little cryptoanarchist hacker to seize control of the hubble and prevent further commands from being received without a password. She then sends a note to NASA ransoming the HST for a sum of cash somewhat less than the cost of flying a shuttle mission to go grab it. Alternatively, she could demand that NASA reallocate money to alternative laucher systems (SSTO, BDB) to be competitively developed by private contractors, or on more ambitious but risky plans like Mars Direct and other native materials processing missions. She could also elect to simply sabotage Hubble instead of blocking out commands. If NASA does have a "hardware reboot" signal, she could learn it and then threaten to make the Hubble unusable by continually rebooting it. Hijack the government! Forced Privatization. (Sue, being a capitalist, would do none of the above. Instead, she would sell Hubble time to "black market" private amateur astronomers or poor universities who get ignored by the space telescope institute) -- Ray Cromwell | Engineering is the implementation of science; -- -- rjc@gnu.ai.mit.edu | politics is the implementation of faith. -- Information doesn't want to be free; it told me that it wants to profit. ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 9 Dec 1993 10:28:52 +0000 From: felix@hu.se (Felix Ungman) Subject: AESTHETICS: Spontaneous order Andy Wilson asks: > I for one, being a musician, would welcome discussions of how extropian > ideas can be applied to the arts. One extropian idea essential to music (and art) is applied mathemathics. Bach (I think) used simple number sequences and well defined permutaions to produce harmonic and quite good sounding tunes. I don't remeber exact details, but I will find out more about this. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- True Name: Felix Ungman "Gen is god and your God is not" ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 9 Dec 1993 05:13:50 -0500 (EST) From: Harry Shapiro Subject: BOOK: The Nature of Rationality a conscious being, Kennita Watson wrote: > (semantic?) (marketing?) standpoint. I wonder how people manage to > write stuff that looks specific in a general way, or general in a > Extropians might make use of this phenomenon -- in improving public Fortune Cookie: You will have a long life after being frozen for 100 years. :) /hawk -- Harry S. Hawk habs@extropy.org Electronic Communications Officer, Extropy Institute Inc. The Extropians Mailing List, Since 1991 ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 9 Dec 1993 05:34:42 -0500 (EST) From: Harry Shapiro Subject: Extropian children a conscious being, Nick Szabo wrote: > > X-Message-Reference: #93-12-444 > > Andy: > > Hey, what's wrong with children having their own interests and > > philosophies? > > By definition people have their own interests and philosophies. > The trick is to mold our children's motivations fit well with our > future interests. That's the whole reason to have children in the What Nick describes is, while clearly ESS, very much against currently popular models of child "raising." To wit: Children should be allowed to develop along the lines that they find interesting. I am not talking about letting 6 years hitchhike across country. I am talking about parent(s) allowing children more and more autonomy as the child earns it, but recognizing from an early age that children are allowed and incourged to have their own ideas, likes, dislikes, and interests. ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 9 Dec 1993 10:29:32 +0000 (GMT) From: Charlie Stross Subject: META: Decline and Fall of the Extropians Li Michael S Kelley writes: >As someone who has worked his whole (arguably) adult life in publishing >(some magazine, books--literature and technical) I have to take issue >with Charlie Stross over his statement Permit me to submit that you've gotten me wrong: >Amateur writers (I'm *not* referring to Charlie) love to define their >"craft" as a "gift", something immune to examination or effort. But most >of writing (like any skill) is plain (and ugly) hard work that most don't >want to do. If you want to write, Charlie, do it for the love of it. >Whether or not the money follows is really in the hands of fate. But >don't blame the messenger, publishing, for the message. I've been writing fiction for fifteen years. In that time I've sold more than enough short fiction to fill a fat collection, and except for a rather unfortunate incident that novel -- and the sequel -- would already be in print. I also work with words for a living; indeed, as a technical author and freelance journalist I'm under no illusions that writing is some kind of "gift". It's bloody hard work all the way, and as someone who's written better than a dozen books I certainly appreciate that. It also happens to be something I enjoy immensely, most of the time. Indeed, I can tell you in one word why I've only finished one short story this year: burnout. Following the _eighth_ rewrite of the f*ing novel. Not the novel I wrote for the sake of literary pyrotechnics, or for training (there were only about ten of _them_ before it), but the one I wrote with every intention of making both a commercial and a critical success. Writing is hard work. And sometimes the rewards are so meagre it's barely worth doing; like last May, when I discovered I was so demotivated I couldn't do any more. Period. So I've decided to take a year out from writing fiction: to _finish_ the computer book I'm doing for Addison-Wesley, to _get_ that monthly column in a computer magazine, and _then_ to think about fiction again (hopefully when my agent's re-placed the novel and wants another). And of course, there's always the great software-industry insider novel I've got to write, before the novel finally becomes a moribund art form and dies. -- Charlie PS: burn-out translates as only 500,000 words per year, and little fiction. On-form translates as 2,000,000 words/year, including two or more novel drafts plus articles plus short stories. Maybe next year ... -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Charlie Stross is charless@sco.com, charlie@antipope.demon.co.uk ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 9 Dec 1993 06:22:22 -0500 (EST) From: Harry Shapiro Subject: test Please ignore -- Harry S. Hawk habs@extropy.org Electronic Communications Officer, Extropy Institute Inc. The Extropians Mailing List, Since 1991 ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 9 Dec 1993 07:25:18 -0500 (EST) From: bhaworth@acpub.duke.edu (W. Blair Haworth Jr.) Subject: POLITICS: the Polly Klaaus Bill > Texas has (had?) a "three strikes" law like the one you describe. Since > bouncing checks is a felony in Texas, an individual convicted of hanging > paper three times was sentenced to life in prison without parole. I heard > about this case while I was in high school and the debate topic dealt with > reforming the criminal justice system - is anyone else familiar with it? The irony of a modern American government reacting harshly to the writing of checks not covered by sufficient funds, of course, is an exercise best left to the student. Assuming, of course, there's no family history of apoplexy. --Blair bhaworth@acpub.duke.edu PS: Yes, Texas has a mandated balanced budget, as I recall. It's still denominated in FRN "dollars", functionally a form of bad check tendered at gunpoint. --wbh ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 9 Dec 1993 07:32:27 -0500 (EST) From: bhaworth@acpub.duke.edu (W. Blair Haworth Jr.) Subject: FNs (is the line-eater still in business?) Fmn. Craig Presson writes: > sternlight, v., to rave at length, while speaking as an apologist for > paternalistic government. sternlighting, n., stenlightish, adj., > sternlightly, adv. Note that it's an irregular verb: "The president's response to the Long Island commuter shootings yesterday was manifestly a purulent bunch of sternlit nonsense." --Blair bhaworth@acpub.duke.edu ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 9 Dec 93 05:46:09 -0800 From: Romana Machado Subject: Conceding Opponent's Points Eat this! Max More wrote in Extropy #8*: "Dynamic optimists identify themselves not with a particular set of beliefs and practices but with the active process of learning, correction, and improvement. This means that they are not afraid of being wrong, and they boldly keep trying new strategies for winning - they implement the advice of Thomas Watson, the founder of IBM: "The way to succeed is to double your failure rate." This aspect of D.O. is what fosters active thinking, thinking receptive to new ideas, new methods and strategies. Being corrected by new information is welcomed because it means a step in the right direction. Successful living is understood by dynamic optimism as a cybernetic process of continual error-correction. This perspective makes it difficult to resent correction from others." * More, Max, "Dynamic Optimism: Epistemological Psychology for Extropians", _Extropy #8_ (vol.3(2)), Winter 1991/92, p. 21. (Thanks for the back issues, Max!) Romana Machado romana@apple.com _____________________________________________________________ Humility is a means of travel. ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 9 Dec 93 13:45:57 GMT From: nancy@genie.slhs.udel.edu Subject: Astrology Kennita's got some interesting ideas about the value of looking at astrology from the outside. As for why people might think that the generalities about their own sign apply to them without noticing that the generalities about the other signs don't, my own behavior around psychology might be an answer. I read astrology for amusement, not guidance, and unless the stuff about my sign is really funny, I'm not going to bother with the other signs. I've heard that there's a popular system of divination in Japan based on blood type--I would think that it has the same sort of commercially interesting features that astrology has. Astrology may have some value as a psychological system. The description for Gemini includes a fascination with getting and passing on information that I have very strongly and that I haven't seen described anywhere else. Nancy Lebovitz ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 9 Dec 1993 08:10:26 -0600 From: "Phil G. Fraering" Subject: CRYPTO BACK DOOR Uh, Sandy, that's not quite true. A great deal of the jews in Europe didn't really have that sort of money to begin with. And the other countries of the time were practicing rather strict anti-immigration laws, if I remember my history correctly. For instance: before the Germans initiated the Holocaust, they tried to simply deport large number of jews. We and many other western nations would not accept them; the ship bounced from port to port and eventually wound up in Germany again. My dad had a friend who was on that boat. He jumped off in the Havana harbor and swam to shore. He lived, but the rest of his family didn't. (I know what the "official" reason for the refusal was, to not "cooperate" with the Nazi's inhumane attempt to deport the jews, but to me here in 1993 it looks like one group of fascists fighting with another about what would be a more proper solution to the Jewish Problem.) phil ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 9 Dec 1993 08:18:33 -0600 From: "Phil G. Fraering" Subject: POLITICS: The Polly Klaas Bill >This brings up the possibility of being convicted of crimes after >you're dead, the punishment being the disposal of your frozen remains. >Yipes! >Andy Please, someone tell me I'm not the only person on the list who's read those stories by Larry Niven... Phil ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 9 Dec 1993 08:24:06 -0600 From: "Phil G. Fraering" Subject: POLITICS: Polly Klaas and the Long Island train... You see where the President was decrying the assault weapon (I heard it was a semi-auto pistol myself) used in the attack and raving about how if the Feinstein Bill had been in effect, he wouldn't have been able to perform the attack due to the unavailability of "Those Multi-Round Clips." Yes, Virginia, the President is going to stop crime by banning Multi-Round Clips. (Before, he was talking about clips > 10 shots. Now it's "multi-round." Tim, where the hell do I sign up for this "crypto-anarchy destroy the government" thingey again? Phil P.S.: If you reply, cc to me, I'm still having ethernet problems... pgf ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 9 Dec 93 14:29:17 GMT From: nancy@genie.slhs.udel.edu Subject: Re: Brave New Extropia? No Thanks! > >Okay, >> = Nancy >> > = Steve, and > = fnerd (I realize that this puts the attributions out of order, but as proto-Jupiter brains, I think we can handle it.) >> When I told some of my male friends about the stuff about male >> interrupting, most of them would go silent for a bit, and then >> interrupt me about twice as frequently as they usually did for >> a while. (This seemed to be a unconscious reaction, not a >> joke.) > >Yipes! About all I can imagine is a sort of raised emotional >state due to having one's fairness criticized. I should stress I think that's part of it, though I think there's more going on, or there'd be all sorts of other nervous reactions, too--and at least I didn't notice any. It could be the combination of the raised emotional state and thinking about interrupting. >that I mean everybody's conversation is habits driven by >emotions, and thought blinded by perceptual habits. But the >ability to think and the good motivations are often in there. Agreed about that last. Something I try to remember is that people are capable of changing and it's worthwhile for me to treat people in ways that leave them room to behave differently. >> kinds of conversation--a high-interruption style that's >> good for intellectual excitement, and a no-interruption >> style that's good for emotional exploration. I've worked >> on having the flexibility to do both styles, and also >> gotten a lot more aggressive if I feel that I'm being >> ignored. > >Cool. I know sometimes I criticize someone left and right as a >way of (not) saying, "come on, what's the *central* point?" And Why not say that? >it's frustrating when they're just flustered, and a relief when >they finally yell or interrupt. It's just, that's what needs to >happen; when there's a sense that people are worrying about egos >and aggression things get kind of sour and sad. That's an interesting point. > >By the way, where do I get off speaking for Guys? I've just once >in a while found myself in one of those crossed-wires conversations, >where I found myself in the Guy role, according to descriptions I've >seen. Mostly I'm talking about Guys in just going about their >business mode, but it seems to run roughshod over someone who >comes in and (temporarily at least) plays a Gal role. Seems. > >By the way, I'm way convinced of the idea of social programming. >The power of habits and assumptions seems sufficient to explain >what we see, and getting clear evidence of genetic effects (where >you know you've seen anything *at all*) looks so tough...why ask >for trouble when there's obvious stuff to tackle that will help >remove the biases from genetic study anyway? > I agree. On the other hand, my impression is that most (all?) societies have sex roles, even though they might assign different traits to each sex. (I gather that societies vary a lot on which sex is the practical one.) Maybe people just have an instinct for making each other smug and/or miserable that way? Here's a totally unverifiable theory: Maybe the idea is to force association between men and women by half crippling them in complementary ways. >... >> Part of the problem, at least in my case, is finding it hard to >> believe that anything so confrontational will work. I tend to >> assume that talking someone into doing something that they don't >> want to do will just make them resentful and have all sorts of >> unpleasant side effects, starting with foot-dragging. (I'm >> extrapolating from myself on this. :-) ) > >Hmm. I think my dramatics let something slip by. I was saying, >guys seem to be fighting ("so confrontational") when often they're >just trying to get to truth and workable solutions for everybody. >So, not "talking someone into doing something," but talking >through something based on someone's natural (but maybe obscure) >desire to be cooperative. > That makes sense. In a Guy environment, how do you tell the difference between getting at someone's sense of truth and fairness and talking them into something they don't want to do? (....) > >> >The Person with the Truth is supposed to deliver it in the form of >> >an Argument or Explanation that the Guys can understand... >> >> Interesting point--the great difficulty there is that sometimes it >> can be difficult to get emotional issues into words, especially for >> an unsympathetic audiance. > >Yah, the Guy game has great promise but is somewhat >broken. I sometimes find myself trying to raise philosophical or I think that the major place that it's broken is precisely that it forbids observation of emotional states--this makes it hard to fix in the same way that someone who just doesn't want to think about money is going to have a hard time managing their finances unless they luck into a good set of traditions and ircumstances that fit them. Would it be a useful argument to point out that someone who wants to live as a human without paying attention to emotions is like someone who owns a car without knowing anything about how it works? >technical policy or meta-debate issues (in techie situations) and >getting not disagreement but just no response. It's hard to figure >what's just my not having something worth saying and what's other >people's not knowing how to hear and respond. > >... >> Here's a way I've formulated part of the stereotype. Real Men have >> desires but not emotions, and Real Women have emotions but not >> desires. A desire is wanting something, and an emotion is a >> reaction to getting or not getting it. It came as a revelation to >> me that desires and emotions are different from each other. > >I've never quite seen it put that way. Hmm. >To me, only some reference to the future puts and emotional issue >into focus. For instance, frustration is a reaction to something >in the context of wanting something. Rejection...obviously a >reaction but in the context of wanting some kind of relationship >or set of friends. Insult...because you want respect. etc. Interesting--I'm not sure that I see any difference in the feeling between being angry at someone for what they did do, and being angry for what they *might* do. Or are you saying that you only get angry at people for what they might do again, not for what they've actually done? (I think that getting angry at people for what they might do is fairly pointless, and I try to stop it when I notice myself doing it.) >... >> but another way of looking at it is that it's a way of finding out >> what's going on emotionally without biasing the results. > >But--I feel like a Guy--whatever *for*? Because people's actions are shaped by their emotions as well as their wills. Because emotions are weird and dramatic. Because emotions are part of reality, and, as such, are worthy of attention. Because, if you don't pay attention to them, and they go bad, you won't have any tools for fixing them--you won't even know how they've broken. Besides, if you don't pay attention to them, how will you know if they're been uploaded properly? > >... >> Interesting point--it might help if more guys were more explicit >> about what they were doing, though I'd be willing to bet that the >> strategy you describe is mostly used unconsciously. > >Yes, mostly, that's what I meant. Also, I think Guys mess things >up by not understanding how they themselves are motivated. (As >does everyone.) They live by cheap stereotypes of themselves. ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ *Nice* phrasing. >This seems true of Guy sexuality as people describe it. > >> How do you think Guys would react to being asked how strongly >> they believe the point they're presenting? > >Badly, uncomfortably, they might bias their answers. The rule is >you're not supposed to talk directly about personal things, but >phrase everything in terms of impartial truth. It's not so much >changing the subject as changing the voice of the sentence. Also I >know this isn't always what one is supposed to do but I'm unclear >on the rules when I try to think about them consciously. Anyway, >for instance, and now you're inviting me to expose my ineptness: > How strongly do you believe...? --> How important is it that...? >Etc. This *is* exploring the Guy's feelings, he even treats >it like that, but it, I guess, gives him a way to change his >mind if the process uncovers something. Hmm. Commitment... Very interesting advice--I'll keep it in mind. I find it hard to imagine it working, but that may just prove that I'm not A Guy. Um, how do you think you'd go about convincing a Guy that the stuff in his head isn't the laws of the universe? Does Robert Anton Wilson help? Nancy Lebovitz ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 9 Dec 93 14:37:41 GMT From: nancy@genie.slhs.udel.edu Subject: Re: Brave New Extropia? No Thanks. (Squirrel warning) Ok, squirrel, if "baby lust" is just going to fall away from transhumanity, why will Jupiter brains propagate themselves? Or will they? Is just plain lust a part of mere humanity and another thing that you expect to see fade? Why do people enjoy sound ideas? Could seeing the beauty of a good idea be a mere physiological reaction? Now that I think about it, bad logic feels physically painful to me, though I don't have the sensation quite pinned do. Nancy Lebovitz ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 9 Dec 1993 08:50:56 -0600 From: cpresson@ingr.com (Craig Presson) Subject: META: Debate on the List In <9312082226.AA25051@ciis.mitre.org>, Curtis D. Frye writes: |> Over 10 billion lines served... |> |> This may be my first post here. If so, I hope to make a good impression :-). Mission accomplished. |> As someone who spends one or two weekends a month judging college debate |> tournaments ... [so, you're a master at it (GROAN)] |> |> The problem with debating rational vs. moral issues is that the two sides |> have insufficient common assumptions about what is relevant. Each interest |> dismisses critical parts of the other, such as "morality" and "utilitarian |> concerns", eliminating meaningful exchange. Consider this: how do you win |> a philosophical argument? Answer: Ad hominem - matters of faith are |> inherently undebatable, so you need to attack the person holding the views |> instead of the views themselves. Reminds me of the old legal saw, "when you have a good case, argue the facts; when you don't, argue with the other man's lawyer." Since you've seen a lot of formal debate, and you think we do it well given the odd nature of the medium, I'd like to hear what you think of the role of debate vs. other modes of discussion. There was a proposal a while back to isolate debates on the list by marking them DEBATE: and having a formal structure. Then anyone who was feeling argumentative could announce a DEBATE: on his chosen topic and those who wanted a more mutual style of discussion could go sit by the fire and figure things out without keeping score. As usual, this idea died for want of anyone to carry it on, the population of the list not really quite high enough for this or the multiple-rooms idea to fly yet. ^ / ------/---- cpresson@ingr.com (Freeman Craig Presson) /AS 5/20/373 PNO; ISGS 9/373; ExI 4/373, NRA 5/373, etc. ------------------------------ End of Extropians Digest V93 #342 *********************************