From extropians-request@extropy.org Thu Dec 23 05:11:37 1993 Return-Path: Received: from usc.edu by chaph.usc.edu (4.1/SMI-4.1+ucs-3.0) id AA23445; Thu, 23 Dec 93 05:11:36 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 AA22163; Thu, 23 Dec 93 05:11:28 PST Errors-To: Extropians-Request@gnu.ai.mit.edu Received: by news.panix.com id AA17079 (5.65c/IDA-1.4.4 for more@usc.edu); Thu, 23 Dec 1993 08:03:34 -0500 Date: Thu, 23 Dec 1993 08:03:34 -0500 Message-Id: <199312231303.AA17079@news.panix.com> To: Extropians@extropy.org From: Extropians@extropy.org Subject: Extropians Digest X-Extropian-Date: December 23, 373 P.N.O. [13:03:16 UTC] Reply-To: extropians@extropy.org Errors-To: Extropians-Request@gnu.ai.mit.edu Status: RO Extropians Digest Thu, 23 Dec 93 Volume 93 : Issue 356 Today's Topics: May's Social Darwinism [1 msgs] SA's War on Capitalism [1 msgs] Adversity Simulations [1 msgs] Another terminally clueless posting is rebutted! [1 msgs] Brave New Extropia? No Thanks. [2 msgs] Freezing Eggs [1 msgs] Getting Temp Jobs [1 msgs] Libertarian public relations [1 msgs] Political Rapture: Detweiling the Poor & other Entertainments [1 msgs] Tim May's Social Darwinism [1 msgs] UPLOADING MINDS: Next Step [1 msgs] redundancy [1 msgs] Administrivia: No admin msg. Approximate Size: 51365 bytes. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Wed, 22 Dec 1993 20:58:17 -0800 From: moulton@netcom.com (Fred C. Moulton) Subject: Tim May's Social Darwinism I hope the following is not too tangential and perhaps sheds some light and stimulates some thought on the issue. >From: nancy@genie.slhs.udel.edu > ..., I find it >inconsistant and perhaps even unfair that you make an ideology of >treating other people's emotions and desires as irrelevant. I think that it is important to consider the issue of the relevance of other people emotions and desires. Who are these "other people? Are we considering "other people" as the set of all persons excluding oneself? Are we to consider "other people" as some undifferentiated mass? In the context of this discussion, I (and I suspect most list readers) do make differentiations. First the problem of knowledge, I am not capable of knowing other people's emotions and desires as a totality. I struggle daily to understand my own emotions and desires, and to understand the emotions and desires of family, friends, coworkers, etc. These are relevant to me because they both affect me and they are in a context in which I can have some understanding. Those things of which I can know are things of which I can make a judgment about their relevancy to me. Second the problem of action. To the extent that I have some understanding about the emotions and desires of another person, what am I to do? Am I to do all or some of the actions that others would desire? I say no. I recognize that I am a social animal living in a social context and that my actions have an impact on the social context in which I live. I (and I suspect most list readers) act in a way which maximizes our own well being and yet in our individual actions, because we take into consideration our social context, we achieve a workable social environment. This has been pointed out I am sure by many people before me, this is Adam Smith's invisible hand applied to the arena of social interactions. Do I claim the I can prove that the above is the best or that someone has a duty to behave in this way? No, this is the best I have found. Of course it is open to criticism and testing, as I would advocate that we critically examine our theories. To avoid possible confusion, nothing in what I have said precludes any individual from deciding to spend the rest of their life working in a shelter for the "homeless" or giving all of their wealth to the poor and taking a vow of poverty. I may or may not agree with that person's course of action. I assume that many other people on this list are like me and give to various charitable and non-profit organizations, just as I assume there are many who do not. I do it because I think it makes my world better, others do not because I assume they are happier not making those contributions. We can exchange views and arguments, and sometimes minds are changed, often not. That is the way of the market. In closing, I would ask the consideration of the reductio ad absurdum of literally holding "other people's desires and emotions as relevant". If I was to do this literally, I would expend my energy in a flurry of manic data gathering and then collapse into a quivering heap because I could not reconcile the conflicting desires of the "other people". Of course, I can imagine the fingers poised over the keyboards now ready to reply "but that was not what was meant". Yes and I am not claiming that the reductio ad absurdum is the intended meaning; what I am suggesting is that when statements about the relevancy of other peoples desires and emotions are made, the individual making the statement needs to be clear on what is meant both in terms of their individual actions and the actions they would advocate for others. It is left as an exercise for the reader to consider the idea of "liking people" in the context of discussion. Fred (who likes some people and finds the emotions and desires of some people very relevant) ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 22 Dec 1993 21:21:48 -0800 (PST) From: tcmay@netcom.com (Timothy C. May) Subject: Another terminally clueless posting is rebutted! Martin Minow writes: > > But who decides what is ``sufficiently severe or pervasive''? > > Preferably a responsible individual within the company, such as a > senior H.R. (personnel) person. Large companies have an office staffed > to handle these complaints, and written policies regarding them. Not applicable. No company will decide that someone's actions are sufficiently severe, blah blah, to cause prosecution by the state, which was the situatin Han was describing. > If the company proves unresponsive, the matter may end up in a state > commission or, ultimately, before a jury. It is, in fact, the intent > of our legal system that a small number of responsible and disinterested > individuals decide the facts in dispute. Nonsense. Yes, this is indeed how it works in our corrupt system, but what we are arguing (some of us) is that things have gone far too far. Not surprisingly, I argue for no involvement whatsover by the State in such matters, unless gross violations of law (murder, rape, etc.) are involved. Thus, if I own a "Hooter's" restaurant and have my girls running around in skimpy outfits, and thin t-shirts, and encourage patrons to hoot at their hooters, this is just the way it is. Customers are free to take their business elsewhere, the hooter girls are free to choose employment elsewhere. This is about as basic a precept of this List as one finds, and the fact that so many people recently are whining about the need for laws, the need for a nurturing environment, and how yours truly needs to "tone down" his radical views in order not to scare off potential recruits tells us that outreach has gone too far, that many folks on this List do not subscribe to the core values implicit in the Extropian Principles, the various articles in "Extropy," and the tenor of this List. > It is my understanding that civil trials (which would be generally > appropriate for harassment cases) do not result in jail sentences. > Furthermore, civil trials are decided "on a preponderance of the evidence" > while criminal trials require the higher standard of "beyond a reasonable > doubt." Nonsense. If a _contract_ for something one might call "nonharassment" existed, then perhaps that contract could be the subject of a civil lawsuit. But not when a contract is lacking, as is the case today in most such situations. (Yes, to complete the point above, a Hooter girl is suing "Hooters" on the basis that having to have large breasts--a definite Hooters plus--constitutes discrimination and is also harassment. Ironically, a male who saw work as a Hooter girl, and was turned down in 17 microseconds, is also suing. The effect will ultimately be that Hooters changes its name to something innocuous and that 50-year-old waitresses, as one finds in any tired diner in Middle America, take over. The same thing happened when the Black Lobby decided that "Sambo's" was a slur by the honkeys and mofos on the Black Brothers....never mind that the "Little Black Sambo" of the (no longer read to children, and probably completely unknown to all of under 25) tale was an _India_ (from India, of course). No, the illiterates decided it was a slur on the homeboys, lawsuits were threatened, and "Sambo's" was forced by a civil court deal to change it's name to "Golden West," and has been downhill ever since.) So much for a tolerant society. Ve vill make you tolerant, even if it takes 3 years in the reeducation kamps! ... > This was established, as I recall, in a case in New Hampshire where an > individual was harassed and complained to management who chose to ignore > the problem. The fact that management was aware of the problem and > explicitly let the harassment continue was key: it was more than just > "doing nothing." So if the Extropians list "explicitly lets" the harassment of fat chicks go on, they are liable for damages? The offended employee in the case above had no contractual rights not to be harassed. Period. > A company would be expected to have policies in place that clarify their > expectations for a work environment that meets state and federal laws. > This is not a difficult task. Fuck this. And please read the Extropian Principles. > Discussing "morbid obesity," Han continues: > > > So it seems that the disabilities act can cover even voluntary or > mutable conditions that can somehow still be deemed as ``chronic'' or > ``lifelong.'' (Confused? You should be.) Alcoholism, for example, > is protected under disability law. What next? > > Losing weight, and keeping it off is harder than you might think. > Furthermore, the issue before the court was extreme obesity, which > is generally not a mutable or voluntary condition. There are a few > jobs that cannot safely be carried out by an extremely obese individual; > excepting those, an obese individual should have the same right and > opportunity to earn a living and, in doing so, to work in an environment > free from harassment, as someone of normal weight. A quotation from > Leviticus might be in order here: "Thou shalt not put a stumbling > block before the blind." As an employer, my employees agree to work for me for as long as we both find it mutually beneficial and advantageous. (Absent a specific employment contract, which complicates things a bit.) Should I decide a fatso no longer fits it with my employment plans, for any reason whatsover, I can dismiss that fatso, no matter how the problem originated. Likewise, that person is free to leave at any time (modulo contracts), which establishes a fundamental symmetry in the relationship. If we tolerate employers not being able to hire and fire "at will," should we then pass laws which forbid employees from quitting their jobs? > Since Han is posting from MIT, I would recommend that he obtain a book, > published a year or so ago (sorry, I forgot its name), that details > the Boston bank practice of "red-lining." What this book describes is > a situation in the late 1960's as the black ghettos were expanding. > Instead of making loans available to blacks througout the city, they > became available in only one neighborhood (Dorchester/Roxbury). This > prevented city-wide integration for many years. The fact that the bank > executives were Christian and the neighborhoods that became accessable > to blacks were Jewish may well have been relevant. What's wrong with red-lining when blacks are demonstrably terrible credit risks? Seriously, simple _greed_ pretty much ensures that at, if Boston blacks in ghettoes were in fact good customers, that at least some banks would "defect" and would make these lucrative loans. Fortunately, the technology of crypto-anarchy, of offshore data banks and offshore credit havens, of anonymous communication systems, will ensure that today's laws that force banks to make loans to customers they have no desire to (under various penalites, agreements, court stipulations, etc.) will be eventually replaced by digital free markets. This is what the Cypherpunks are working toward. > Finally, Han writes: > > >Everything that lies wrong with socialism is that unproductive > behaviors -- such as hypersensitivity to offense and the blaming of > everything on discriminatory oppression -- get rewarded. And by > robbing from the productive, no less. > > Pardon me, but I believe that we were discussing the USA here: there > is very little socialism in this country. If these guidelines are ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ > causing problems, it may well be because of an overabundance, and > consequent under-employment, of lawyers. The devil finding mischief > for idle hands, and all that. American lawyers are hardly socialists. > > Martin Minow Sorry, here I wrote all this and I only just realized the whole thing was a put-on, a satire of the mainstream socialist positions. "There is very little socialism in this country." That's hilarious, Martin. Here I was about to add you to my list of terminally clueless List members, then you come up with this one. Good one! --Tim May -- .......................................................................... Timothy C. May | Crypto Anarchy: encryption, digital money, tcmay@netcom.com | anonymous networks, digital pseudonyms, zero 408-688-5409 | knowledge, reputations, information markets, W.A.S.T.E.: Aptos, CA | black markets, collapse of governments. Higher Power: 2^756839 | Public Key: PGP and MailSafe available. Note: I put time and money into writing this posting. I hope you enjoy it. ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 22 Dec 1993 21:28:15 -0800 From: kwatson@netcom.com (Kennita Watson) Subject: Libertarian public relations Nancy Lebovitz writes: ... It isn't just you, but I'm probably going to make myself a button that says "Non-asshole libertarian--willing to talk politics", and see what happens. I think I coined the phrase "kinder, gentler Libertarian"; I used it to refer to myself during my Secretary of State campaign in 1990. It went over well -- feel free to use it. Kennita Watson | Do I want to live forever? Maybe not, but give kwatson@netcom.com | me one or two hundred thousand years to think HEx: KNNTA | it over. - KLW, 1993 ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 22 Dec 1993 22:08:54 -0800 (PST) From: tcmay@netcom.com (Timothy C. May) Subject: Political Rapture: Detweiling the Poor & other Entertainments I haven't been seeing Nancy's recent postings, so I guess I should thank Nick for quoting this piece of crap: > Nancy: > > I am not arguing that Tim is likely to go on a physical rampage against > > the poor. On the other hand, I do think that a sense of empathy or a > > feeling that other people are of the same "kind" as oneself is part > > of what prevents mass murder, So, I am now being compared to mass murderers, or is this a continuation of the flames of Price and Starr? > Indeed -- it helps prevent them from murdering us. Who has more firepower, > the inner city or Tim May? Who is more motivated to initiate deadly force, > a welfare addict or a libertarian? Of course, in this "inner sanctum" not My answer: a well-armed Libertarian is much more likely to defend himself against these predators. They almost never go target shooting, are ofen armed with inadequate "Saturday Night Specials," and are often mentally impaired when they strike. True, a gang of them is quite dangerous...hence the need for a cautious approach when travelling near their ghettoes. > What is the point of lobbying against gun control, crypto restrictions, > and the like if we make no effort bring a politically viable number > of those virtual bullets into our camp? It doesn't make sense to > politically agitate on the one hand, and be against memetic expansion > on the other hand. The objections of a little fringe group makes zippo Nick appears to be aiming these barbs at me, citing the points I often make and then apparently saying I am "against memetic expansion." (At least this is my interpretaton, as I posted this morning my comment that I am not personally interested in manning card tables out in front of supermarkets, as I did many times for the LP. This does not mean I am "against" memetic inspection, just that I think Extropianism is not likely to be of great popularity....and there are better ways to change the world anyway.) > majority remain quite limited. When society can shoot back with > _force majeure_, good manners towards society are required, even if > that means being excrutiatingly politically correct. Don't dis > the taxman. Don't get the taxman's stooges all in a lather. Fuck that, Nick, with all due respect to your many fine comments over the time I have known you. We don't have to be polite, show good manners, or be politically correct. You are of course free to do so. > On a private list I hope we can be looser, and in that sense I welcome > the frank comments of Tim May and his critics. These comments > are indeed valuable for helping us "find our own kind" on the net. Exactly. Again, I will repeat what I said recently: no one else was writing essays to Betsy (or to Nancy, etc.) that explained in polite, caring , nurturing, nonconfrontational terms, the arguments against more welfare, against programs to "help" drug addicts and terminal losers. So I spoke up. If folks want longer, less blunt, and more "conciliatory" postings to folks who quite clearly have not read the basic readings, then they should _write_ those postings. > But frankly, I think far too much bandwidth is being wasted on politics. Then don't read these posts. Simple. Frankly, I don't think we debate the basic issues enough, as witnessed by the "backslidings" into comments about the need for welfare, the need for "anti-discrimination" laws, and the whole point about political correctness (made by Ray, of all people!). > "Rapture of the Future" has is now being rivalled by "Rapture of the > Political". Both can be very debilitating in that they focus our attention > on what we dream might be, losing our grip on improving our lot in the > world as it is: the social democratic world we are all wrapped up in -- > paying taxes, using the roads, depending on police protection, > college financial aid, some of us even work for the government, If this is directed at me, I think it is misguided. I am not arguing for _more_ politics, I am arguing--as Duncan Frissell and others have argued--that politics is a peripheral issue, that political parties are useless, that the compelling changes will be technological. I comment on vacuous remarks about "how do we help the poor?" because these issues come up on the List. > ad nauseum. Tim May has called us "elite", but most of us much more I hope I instead said "elitist," which has a different sense. Though of course I do think we are largely an elite group, no matter our ages or past accomplishments. > skilled in dreaming about the world as it might be than in > working with the world as it is. Detweiling the poor, dreaming of > PPLs and the next century's tech gadgets(1), etc. can be quite > entertaining and interesting, but are mostly useless for building for > our future in the world as we find it today. > > Nick Szabo szabo@netcom.com > > (1) Two exceptions are cryonics reanimation and uploading, far-future > tech that has major implications on how we can best live our lives > today, as we've discussed elsewhere. I suspect both cryonics reanimation and (especially) uploading are so far off in the future that we need not even think about them today. Thus, I see a different set of priorities, a much shorter-term focus than Nick seems to see. --Tim May -- .......................................................................... Timothy C. May | Crypto Anarchy: encryption, digital money, tcmay@netcom.com | anonymous networks, digital pseudonyms, zero 408-688-5409 | knowledge, reputations, information markets, W.A.S.T.E.: Aptos, CA | black markets, collapse of governments. Higher Power: 2^756839 | Public Key: PGP and MailSafe available. Note: I put time and money into writing this posting. I hope you enjoy it. ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 22 Dec 1993 22:44:50 -0800 From: kwatson@netcom.com (Kennita Watson) Subject: Brave New Extropia? No Thanks. >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!). I don't know if this ever got clarified. I think that "the reverse" refers to "In meat-space, if someone (presumably female for the male speaker) gives me tit, I may _encourage_ future interaction." I found it a funny pun, not being all that sensitive about sexual innuendo; your mileage may vary. Figuring I've probably flagellated the decaying equine long enough now, I remain Kennita Watson | Do I want to live forever? Maybe not, but give kwatson@netcom.com | me one or two hundred thousand years to think HEx: KNNTA | it over. - KLW, 1993 ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 23 Dec 1993 02:00:50 -0500 (EST) From: usr1593a@tso.uc.EDU (Bruce Zimov) Subject: UPLOADING MINDS: Next Step On: 12/20/93 21:39 Nick Szabo (szabo@netcom.com) said: >There isn't thing one we can or should do about uploading right >now, beyond (a) determining how probable it is, (b) roughly how >much of an improvement it could bring about (and potential >downsides) and (c) what we can do for ourselves to make sure we >get that far (and indeed if it's worthwhile sacrificing for now to >get a probable enormous payoff later). >Those who spend their days whining at the world to make their long-term >dreams come true will be six feet under, "Preterites". I don't think that all activism is just "whining at the world". By 'lobbying', I really didn't mean anything more than 'outreach'. As I said: >> Most of our allies in medicine >> need to be found, nurtured, highlighted. >> The next latest and greatest >> computer alone is not going to cut it. You appear to agree that this type of activism is not "whining out the world", since you say: >This is a very important point, in a slightly different >context -- bringing Extropian ethics to the medical community >and creating biotech organizations pursuing enhancement goals (smart >drugs, life extension, cryonics, etc.) as well as cure-sickness >goals (the current dominant medical paradigm). Let me give you an example of finding UPLOAD-related technology today. I examined all the grants titles on the Internet, and ran across a direct neuron-electrode connective device. After phoning the medical research lab in CA that got the grant, I learned that the technology was licensed to Cyberonics, a start-up that trades OTC. I called 1-713-332-1375 and spoke to Susan Everett in investor relations who sent me a prospectus. On p. 20, is a graphical illustration of the device, which is a helical winding electrode that fits around the Vagus nerve. A pacemaker-like signal is transmitted to the nerve to treat epilepsy primarily, but has been used in depression. They have noticed that direct electrode/nerve membrane contact tends to damage the membrane at the point of contact. They also had one patient suffer permanent irreversible facial paralysis. Another UPLOAD-related technology I found some years ago was Dr.Yannos nerve regeneration matrix. Dr. Yannos is at MIT and pioneered artificial skin for burn patients. This worked so well that he modified the technology to help severed nerves grow back together. I suggested to him that it would be interesting to see if electrical current has any effect on the regeneration rate, to which he replied that its a good idea but there is no research money for it. Another UPLOAD-related technology is detailed in the book IF WE CAN KEEP A SEVERED HEAD ALIVE... by Chet Fleming. Chet is a patent lawyer who realized that we had the technology to keep severed heads alive, and had succesfully done it with monkeys. So, in order to protect humans from the encroaching technology, he applied and was granted U.S. Patent 4,666,425 for a device that would keep a human head alive. His activism was motivated by medical ethics. The main problem with his device was the different temperature gradients the blood had to go through, and infection at the base of the neck. So, you see, I have given 3 concrete examples of what CAN be done now, what CAN be found out about now, and what kind of "outreach" CAN be done now. What IS done now DOES bring the day closer when the UPLOAD-technology is available. What other UPLOAD-related technologies are going on today, especially those with follow-up/outreach potential? P.S. I hope I have convinced you that there is something we can do about uploading right now beyond assessing its probability and its implications. Bruce Zimov usr1593a@tso.uc.edu ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 22 Dec 1993 23:02:33 -0800 (PST) From: tcmay@netcom.com (Timothy C. May) Subject: Brave New Extropia? No Thanks. Kennita Watson writes: > >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!). I will anyway. Tit-for-tat is of course (surely everyone knows this?) a term of art in game theory. > I found it a funny pun, not being all that sensitive about sexual > innuendo; your mileage may vary. I suspect it was just a good pun, though this is the first I've seen this piece. Ironically, while Kennita is not sensitive to innunendo and wordplay like this, in many jurisdictions an employee or staff member (and perhaps someday a List subscriber?) could cite this as "harassment" and win a hefty settlement. Then we'll have our tits in the wringer. --Tim May .......................................................................... Timothy C. May | Crypto Anarchy: encryption, digital money, tcmay@netcom.com | anonymous networks, digital pseudonyms, zero 408-688-5409 | knowledge, reputations, information markets, W.A.S.T.E.: Aptos, CA | black markets, collapse of governments. Higher Power: 2^756839 | Public Key: PGP and MailSafe available. Note: I put time and money into writing this posting. I hope you enjoy it. ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 22 Dec 1993 23:20:04 -0800 From: dasher@netcom.com (D. Anton Sherwood) Subject: redundancy Mgix! escrit: > There's a common theory around that says only 10% (or so, don't > ask me about numbers) of your neurons are real useful. How about > we learn how to make use of the rest in the first place ? What if it's a natural limit? Sometimes it's a lot cheaper to build a bigger engine than to try to make the engine more efficient. Where did the 1/10 story come from? How in the Black Infinite could the number be arrived at? Is it just a gross underestimate of the amount of logical work the brain does? Anton Sherwood *\\* +1 415 267 0685 *\\* DASher@netcom.com ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 23 Dec 1993 00:04:49 -0800 From: kwatson@netcom.com (Kennita Watson) Subject: Getting Temp Jobs Mark Shewmaker writes: With one service who would actually interview me, even though I've taken and of course passed their Wordperfect and Word for Windows tests, and have called them about once a week, in about three and half months they have yet to send me out on any simple word processing job. After I had dropped out of the job market for a little under a year, wondering if I wanted to be a programmer anymore and sleeping in my best friend's living room with my stuff in another friend's basement, I woke up one morning having decided that being a programmer was not morally reprehensible, so I could in good conscience go back to doing it rather than getting a degree in psychology and becoming a counselor, and I decided to get back into the job market in any way that would let me get my own place to sleep (great motivation: my friend had two kids in the house, one a baby). I signed up with Kelly Temps, and far from just taking tests, I asked to take every computer-aided course they offered, and ended up (with my computer background at my back) certified level 5 (their highest) in everything from Excel to WordPerfect to Wang word processing to typing (which took a typing speed above 50 wpm -- worth practicing for). I also told them I was willing to do light phones (I lived to almost regret this one), filing (which there was also a test for), and meeting setup. All of this together qualified me for decent administrative assistant work, for about $12/hr. to start (CA wages, remember), until I got my resume around and got a computer consulting job a few months later (your mileage may vary; with my work history, many places might not have looked at me twice had my resume not had some magic incantations on it: MIT, MSCS, Stanford -- I'm not above taking advantage of credentialism). The trick is to be aggressive about learning. Kelly Temps was the only place I saw that offered so much training; if there's no Kelly in GA, hopefully there's an equivalent. BTW -- it also helps to be willing to go out on short assignments on an hour's notice, to be willing to do things other than word processing (ask them what they most need people to do, and make a case for how you could do those things), and to be willing to wear business attire (painful as that may be). Once you have a reputation with a firm as a reliable, hard worker, no matter what at, they are more likely to call you. I think I'd also call more than once a week. Definitely call first thing Monday morning (like 10 minutes after the office opens). Whew! I do have one very good lead for a computer sales job to start sometime the first couple weeks in January, but I'll count myself lucky if I can get $6/hour out of it. Computer sales might not be so bad -- it's a start, anyhow. Would you get a commission? Kennita Watson | Do I want to live forever? Maybe not, but give kwatson@netcom.com | me one or two hundred thousand years to think HEx: KNNTA | it over. - KLW, 1993 ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 23 Dec 1993 00:07:37 -0800 From: kwatson@netcom.com (Kennita Watson) Subject: Adversity Simulations I originally put this at the end of the Temp Jobs posting, because that's what brought it to mind, but decided that it deserved its own posting, because people who don't give a shit about jobs in Atlanta might be interested in it. (As an aside, I have approximately the same attitude towards constructs like "sh*t" that Tim has towards smileys. If you're going to swear, do it right.) I occasionally run a mental simulation of what I would do if I woke up on a strange roadside with nothing but the clothes on my back. For fun, I throw in varying degrees of amnesia, varying climates (and appropriate/inappropriate clothing), rural/urban/wilderness settings, and miscellaneous resources (I managed to arrive with my briefcase minus wallet, or just with my Swiss Army knife, or whatever). I haven't tossed in wounds yet: grist for the mill. I feel more confident for having run such simulations; I recommend them for those daydreamy times. I certainly think if by some mischance you should ever find yourself in a dark, cold forest with a gash in your leg and not know how you got there, you'd be better off having thought of a possibility or two in advance. It helps justify the Dynamic Optimism, because Proper Prior Project Planning Prevents Piss-Poor Performance. Kennita Watson | Do I want to live forever? Maybe not, but give kwatson@netcom.com | me one or two hundred thousand years to think HEx: KNNTA | it over. - KLW, 1993 ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 23 Dec 1993 00:18:12 -0800 From: kwatson@netcom.com (Kennita Watson) Subject: Freezing Eggs Amara Graps wrote: > Is freezing one's eggs a possible option for a healthy woman aged > puberty-35 today if she doesn't want to have children now, but may > want to in 10-20 years? ... Mike Price replied: ... But if you _did_ have your head (or eggs or almost any tissue) frozen your full genome would be preserved. Tinkering with the gene control and expression mechanisms (realistically 10-30 years, IMO) would enable the culturing of fully viable ova or whatever. You'd be keeping your options open about having children in the future. If I'm not mistaken, an egg doesn't contain the mother's full genome; I thought that was part of the point of sexual reproduction. BTW -- I talked to my gynecologist this week, and he said that part of the reason that eggs aren't frozen more often is that they would need to be ripened first, then collected one by one; it doesn't work well to take them directly out of the ovary while they're still "green", because we don't know what's involved in the maturing them inside the ovary. You might be able to get more by using fertility drugs to ripen and release more at once, but still, you'd maybe get ten, not millions (as for sperm). Another part is that the egg is the largest cell in the body, and subject to much more freezing damage than (say) a sperm, or other relatively simple cells. Kennita Watson | Do I want to live forever? Maybe not, but give kwatson@netcom.com | me one or two hundred thousand years to think HEx: KNNTA | it over. - KLW, 1993 ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 23 Dec 93 8:24:04 GMT From: starr@genie.slhs.udel.edu Subject: SA's War on Capitalism Tim May posted: >(In South Africa, at the end of the Second World War, >American and RSA companies wanted to hire blacks to help meet the >labor needs....that's when RSA instituted Apartheid.) According to 3-time Nobel Peace Prize Nominee Leon Llouw, leader of the South African libertarian movement, all the National Party did in 1948 was put the finishing touches on Apartheid in the social realm. The rest of it was already in place and had been put there by the British who were in power previously, including the economic restrictions, which were advocated on explicitly racist grounds by the white unions. First, white industry got anti-competitive legislation passed putting blacks out of manufacturing, so the blacks went into the professions. Then they got barred from the professions by licensing, so they went into transport. Got barred by licensing again, so they went into unskilled labor. Then the white unions got them barred from well- paying unskilled labor. Then the Nats came into power in 1948 and put such finishing touches on as banning interracial marriage. We carry a tape of Leon giving a talk on this. Tim Starr - Renaissance Now! Assistant Editor: Freedom Network News, the newsletter of ISIL, The International Society for Individual Liberty, 1800 Market St., San Francisco, CA 94102 (415) 864-0952; FAX: (415) 864-7506; 71034.2711@compuserve.com Think Universally, Act Selfishly - starr@genie.slhs.udel.edu ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 23 Dec 93 9:28:27 GMT From: starr@genie.slhs.udel.edu Subject: May's Social Darwinism >From: rjc@gnu.ai.mit.edu (Ray) >Subject: Tim May's Social Darwinism > > I think Tim's just taking things to extremes to push everyone's hot buttons. If so, then he has no right to bitch about getting compared to Nazis. He brings it on himself. He asks for it. And then he has the nerve to get offended when it happens. Typical pathological, passive-aggressive, manipulative behavior. It's tantamount to saying "C'mon, call me a Nazi, I dare you!" and then whining to the authorities when someone takes up the dare - "Mommy, she called me a Nazi!" It's not his style I find objectionable, it's the Social Darwinist content and his duplicity when called on it, plus the fact that he keeps trying to stake out the moral high ground on the list for himself and his views. He's free to continue to do so, but I want to make it clear that he's wrong about the moral standards of at least one list participant, if not more. >I agree that calling welfare mothers "ghetto trash who breed like rats >subsidized by my wallet, etc" (although this statement does bear some >resemblance to the truth) is unproductive to persuasion as it makes >people put up a wall/filter of emotion against what you are saying. Yes, but what I really objected to was his perpetuation of the myth that all the poor deserve their fate. This is the rationale the statists use to cover up their victimization of all of us: if they coerce us, we deserve it. > I must agree with Tim*. Cold Turkey d-day type government changes >aren't going to work because you aren't changing the viewpoints of the people >who make such a government possible. Actually, that isn't my position. It may be possible to get where we want to go without any persuasion whatsoever. But, I would argue that it will be easier to get there with a combination of persuasion and other kinds of action than with any single strategy. We can't know what strategy will do the trick, so it's in our interests to encourage diverse experiments so that we can find out ASAP. >From: tcmay@netcom.com (Timothy C. May) >Subject: Tim May's Social Darwinism > >Surprise, surprise, Tim Starr thinks I'm bad public relations for the >Libertarian Cause. I'll bet that a jury of reasonable people will agree with me, too. >> Yes, some people are poor and weak because of their own choosing and have >> no claim even upon our charity, but others are victims, others just plain >> unlucky, and others prefer leisure to working. > >And none of them have a claim on my time or resources, period. Strawman. I didn't even imply that they did, nor did Betsy or anyone else to my knowlege. >Whoever may have "victimized" them, it wasn't me. Morally, you did when you perpetuated the myth that it's all their fault. >> Then why not go for the Final Solution? What reason do you have not to? >> If they deserve to die, then they ought to be killed. If they're in your >> way, then the sooner you have them liquidated, the better. > >??? Those are the logical conclusions which follow from the premises you expressed in the post of yours which I replied to, as I would bet a jury composed of reasonable people would agree. > They weren't flames. I didn't call you a Nazi or "detritus." Criticism of your posts doesn't constitute flaming. If you can't take the heat... >> You go ahead and commit public relations suicide, but don't >> take the rest of us with you. > >And what is this supposed to mean? That you don't speak for the list. That your opinions as to its character are false. That I, for one, try not to alienate as many people as possible. That I, for one, am not a mean, heartless bastard that blames people who truly are victims of the State for their misfortunes. That I, for one, care about helping them voluntarily in such a way as to be mutually beneficial. >When I describe Extropianism to >people, I describe it in the Nietzshean, Promethean terms I use >here....most are utterly turned off, but a select few are intrigued. I >described things in these terms to Julian Dibell, Keving Kelly, and >Steven Levy, amongst others. Dibell and Kelly have already reported on >the Extropians, and Levy is apparently writing an entire book on these >and related topics. What are you trying to say here, that you did your damndest to alienate them, but failed? >We don't need the masses. Maybe not, but I'm betting that we'll do better with them than without them. Frankly, I think that if you thought we could get them that you'd be all for it, and I think that your conclusion that we can't get them is premature. I, for one, am trying to get better at persuasion than I am now. However, even if you're right that we don't need the masses, it by no logical means follows from that that we ought to knowingly alienate them! If nothing else, we ought to refrain from making them scared of us, like you're so good at doing. Remember, anything you say can and will be used against you. >Time for a more radical and yet more selective system, based on using >technology to directly undermine the State and ensure liberty for >those capable of grasping it. I support the technological way of struggling against the State as best I can, but see no reason why this means we ought to abandon all other hopes. I think you must have had your other hopes dashed by other things in order for you to have such a pessimistic view of other, perhaps complementary ways of achieving our goals. Further, I'd argue that you're wrong to have concluded so prematurely. We don't go about sabotaging your efforts, now, do we, Tim? Why must you do so to us? >My understanding is that the List is somewhat of a "safe haven," as >Perry used to put it, for people for whom it is nearly axiomatic that >welfare mothers are bums who are in fact breeding like maggots. Your understanding is incorrect. They are not "bums." They are mostly victims of the State, at least to this list participant. >Thus, when somone uses liberal logic to talk about how free markets >will hurt the poor and the crippled, this illogic is best met with a >clear statement of beliefs, in my view. Yes, but what beliefs? That they deserve to be hurt, or that they're poor and crippled by the State, from which free markets are their only hope of temporal salvation? >And in fact I cited "Losing Ground" in one of my essays, I thinkt the >one being now called a Nazi screed by some. Nope. You only got around to coming close to ansering Betsy's question after Nancy subtlely suggested through a rhetorical question that perhaps some of those you blamed are actually victims instead. That's when you cited Murray, who doesn't act at all like you do when confronted with questions about how to help the poor and is very persuasive as a direct consequence. You still didn't answer Betsy's question, though, because she asked for positive alternatives to the welfare state, and all you did was attack the welfare state. Negation of the State is not formation of alternatives. >Betsy's case I don't know as much >about, except that the points made this time about "But what about the >poor?" echo the same points made _last_ year about the poor and the >"regular job-impaired," with little evidence that she's lookied at any >of the writings by Charles Murray or by others or, indeed, that she's >given the matter much thought at all. I don't recall anyone ever even suggesting reading material on this subject to her before, much less the wrong material. I'd suggest "The Tragedy of American Compassion" by Marvin Olasky and "Reclaiming the American Dream" by Richard Cornuelle, because they're actually about private charity alternatives in practice to the welfare state, not just negative critiques (excellent as they may be) of it. Also Murray's second book, "In Pursuit of Happiness and Good Government." >Why should I write a "convincing" essay when folks won't read what's >already out there? You shouldn't. I shudder to think what the result would be like. But you shouldn't make things worse for those of us who think we might have it in us to have some success with this method. Duncan Frissell: >Tim is actually trying to extend the hand of friendship to the oppressed. >He wants them to join him to the extent they are able. If so, he's got a funny way of showing it. Tim Starr - Renaissance Now! Assistant Editor: Freedom Network News, the newsletter of ISIL, The International Society for Individual Liberty, 1800 Market St., San Francisco, CA 94102 (415) 864-0952; FAX: (415) 864-7506; 71034.2711@compuserve.com Think Universally, Act Selfishly - starr@genie.slhs.udel.edu ------------------------------ End of Extropians Digest V93 #356 *********************************