From extropians-request@extropy.org Mon Oct 10 15:16:15 1994 Return-Path: extropians-request@extropy.org Received: from usc.edu (usc.edu [128.125.253.136]) by chaph.usc.edu (8.6.8.1/8.6.4) with SMTP id PAA21539 for ; Mon, 10 Oct 1994 15:15:43 -0700 Received: from news.panix.com by usc.edu (4.1/SMI-3.0DEV3-USC+3.1) id AA00337; Mon, 10 Oct 94 15:14:44 PDT Received: by news.panix.com id AA01399 (5.67b/IDA-1.4.4); Mon, 10 Oct 1994 18:03:47 -0400 Date: Mon, 10 Oct 1994 18:03:47 -0400 Message-Id: <199410102203.AA01399@news.panix.com> To: Extropians@extropy.org From: Extropians@extropy.org Subject: Extropians Digest #94-10-124 - #94-10-136 X-Extropian-Date: October 10, 374 P.N.O. [18:01:44 UTC] Reply-To: extropians@extropy.org X-Mailer: MailWeir 1.0 Status: RO Extropians Digest Mon, 10 Oct 94 Volume 94 : Issue 282 Today's Topics: [1 msgs] Help! Missing cat problem... [3 msgs] M.S. in Studies of the Future from UHCL [3 msgs] Mental Changes [3 msgs] Recommended Book [1 msgs] SCI: Many-Worlds FAQ [1 msgs] What Happens First? [1 msgs] Administrivia: Note: I have increased the frequency of the digests to four times a day. The digests used to be processed at 5am and 5pm, but this was too infrequent for the current bandwidth. Now digests are sent every six hours: Midnight, 6am, 12pm, and 6pm. If you experience delays in getting digests, try setting your digest size smaller such as 20k. You can do this by addressing a message to extropians@extropy.org with the body of the message as ::digest size 20 -Ray Approximate Size: 25646 bytes. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- From: Kathryn Dillon 225-5878 Date: Fri, 07 Oct 1994 09:44:00 -0800 (PST) Subject: [#94-10-124] Recommended Book Have any of you read _Emergence_ by David R. Palmer? It's a Sci-Fi novel about "homo post hominem". Although this race advanced beyond humans by a genetic accident rather than by their own initiative, it offers some interesting possibilities. The book is also a great read, one of those you can't put down. Kat Dillon Dillon.Kathryn@gene.com ------------------------------ From: hanson@hss.caltech.edu (Robin Hanson) Date: Fri, 7 Oct 1994 14:03:48 -0700 Subject: [#94-10-125] What Happens First? Nick Szabo writes: >> How do comet eaters come so far before reproducing assemblers? > >I will probably be feasible to make self-reproducing vacuum >greenhouses with advanced biotech. ... Finally, advanced biotech is >on a direct tooling path from today's technology, while nanotechnology >(and even moreso, uploading) require a very different industrial >ecology. Even if nanotech and uploading were slightly more feasible >in theory, in practice we'd get the biotech stuff first because that's >where industry and academia is starting from today. Orders of >magnitude more students are being trained in biotech than in nanotech; >few if any are being trained to do anything sufficiently close to >uploading. Thanks for the explanation. A plausible perspective. I just tend to think intrinsic feability will have more effect on what comes first. What do the big nanotech pushers (Drexler, Merkle) think of your reasoning? Robin Hanson ------------------------------ From: hanson@hss.caltech.edu (Robin Hanson) Date: Fri, 7 Oct 1994 14:10:03 -0700 Subject: [#94-10-126] M.S. in Studies of the Future from UHCL DEREK@alcor.org writes: >An application for a Master of Science degree in "Studies of the >Future" from the Institute for Futures Research at the University of >Houston-Clear Lake. ... >1) Has anyone ever heard of a program like this before? (I.e., Is it >truly one of a kind?) Yes, they've been around a while. There was a similar program at U. Hawaii. "Futurists" are an academic group - see the journals "The Futurist", and a couple other with the string "futur" in them. >2) Do we think that informing the Institute for Futures Research >about ExI would be a good idea? I had high hopes to when I first heard of them a decade ago. But I was very disappointed - pretty sloppy thinking in my view. But of course since 95% of everything is crap, perhaps I don't know the 5% of good stuff that makes the rest worth it. Robin Hanson ------------------------------ From: hanson@hss.caltech.edu (Robin Hanson) Date: Fri, 7 Oct 1994 15:52:55 -0700 Subject: [#94-10-127] SCI: Many-Worlds FAQ Thanks to Mike Price for constructing his Many-Worlds FAQ. I have been a Many-Worlds advocate for a long time, though it was pretty much denounced in my physics and philosophy graduate work (I was clearly discouraged from studying it). I still think its the best approach around. But I do have a problem with it in that I don't understand how it can be exactly right. Imagine that the universe starts in some superposition of a finite set of cohering "worlds" (each decoherent from the rest). There would then be a finite bound on the ratio of the norms of any pair of these. Imagine each decoherence event splits each world into a finite set of successors, each with a finite relative norm. And imagine there have been a finite set of such decoherence events between the start and now. These assumptions are pretty natural given thermodynamics and the usual initial conditions. Thus Many-Worlds would say we now have a very large, but finite, number of worlds, and each pair of these have a finite relative norm. A very small fraction of these worlds have most of the norm "weight", and in these worlds history has vindicated the usual laws of quantum statistics. But in the *vast* majority of these worlds, history has vindicated a different quantum statistics, one in which events happen with equal probability. Now since in our world now, quantum statistics has been vindicated, we can be pretty sure we're now in one of these few big worlds. Why are we so special? And in the vast majority of future worlds where someone reads these words, quantum statistics should seem to have changed suddenly just as I wrote this! Why do I care so little about these readers, and am only interested in writing to those who will inhabit the few big future worlds? The usual proofs, like those Mike refers to, talk about how with an infinite number of decoherence events, those small worlds will be infinitely smaller than the big ones, and so they would be zero norm, and so they wouldn't then exist. So we can ignore them -- as Mike says "Thus all worlds obey the usual Born predictions of quantum theory." But here we are now before infinity - where Many-Worlds would seem to predict all these itty bitty worlds do exist - where almost all worlds must violate these quantum statistics. There seems a problem here. The solution that occurs to me is that Many-Worlds isn't exactly right. When a world gets too itty-bitty relative to a big one, maybe it just goes away. Yes, maybe "Linearity (of the wavefunction) has been verified [to] hold true to better than 1 part in 10^27", but that's only 90 bits of information. Maybe for almost all the worlds that follow this moment (assuming I'm in a big world now), the next 100 bits of data from quantum measurements would violate standard quantum statistics, and then, poof, nonlinear interaction with other much bigger worlds will suddenly destroy all the familiar structures (like brains) in that world. Then it would be true that almost all worlds with functioning structures would obey the usual quantum statistics. So Many-Worlds looks plausible to me, assuming it isn't exactly right. This is similar to the way folks accepted non-renormalizeable quantum field theories, but were quite sure this showed that, at some short enough range, these theories would no longer apply. Reactions? Robin Hanson ------------------------------ From: Naval A Deshbandhu Date: Fri, 7 Oct 1994 15:45:07 -0400 (EDT) Subject: [#94-10-128] On Wed, 5 Oct 1994, Craig Presson wrote: > Speaking of that, does anyone know how the Romans did handle > stuff like fractions? I have one book on ancient math but it's > all on Babylon and Greece. > dunno if i can help you with the way romans did their math, but.... check out books on vedic mathematics, a system of doing calculations worked out by ancient indian sages. the development of a methos is clear, simple and emphasizes intuition rather than brute thinking..... naval ------------------------------ From: szabo@netcom.com (Nick Szabo) Date: Fri, 7 Oct 1994 17:32:32 -0700 (PDT) Subject: [#94-10-129] M.S. in Studies of the Future from UHCL "Futurists" are futurists in the tradition of H.G. Welles, Isaac Asimov, and Star Trek, ie Fabian socialists. Their primary emphasis is on extrapolating trends (eg one of their big buggaboos is "overpopulation"). They are close to the WorldWatch Institute's extrapolations at current levels of technology, although the do have a minority from the Kahn school that tries to work progress into the extraplations. Extropians are developing a quite different view of the future, by studying those specific theoretical technologies with the most important personal consequences, rather than trying to project the future of "society" in general via either current or near-future changes in technology. We do have a minority school of thought that makes projections which tend to be quite optimistic, eg Dani Eder's derivations of a Singularity in 2030, but they also posit radically new technologies. We also have a school that tries to apply theoretical science to present day business, but it is too far out on the "bleeding edge" of practical technology to gather a large following. All these Extropians views are inspired by the theoretical applied science view of things (Drexler, Moravec, Minsky, et. al)., which alas has gathered only an informal academic and entertainment following. It would be very interesting to set up a School of Theoretical Applied Science. Also, Extropians tend to be anarcho-capitalists and individualists, in sharp contrast to the Fabian socialist tradition that has dominated futurism. One of the Fabian tenets was that if they spent enough enough time predicting, planning, and politicking, they could then implement those Plans with ambitious government programs (NASA to colonize space, Great Society to cure poverty, ad nauseum). Just like the Soviet five=year plans, only these were fifty- and hundred-year plans. Hayekian Extropians like myself reject that, limiting our claims about the future to claims of theoretical applied science and economics. We concentrate on their impact on the people we understand and care about most, namely ourselves and our loved ones. We are less concenred about "society" which we, like everybody else, have few real clues about or empathy with. We weigh very different scenarios (eg "will uploads come before strong AI?"), rather than tying ourselves religiously to Plans. We still have a strong non-Haykian thread of thought that concentrates on impact on "society", but I consider that a mostly a throwback to Fabian futurism with their Plans. Hayekian Extropians think about specific knowable things, like market niches, technological ecologies, and ourselves, rather than the largely mythical beast "society". Nick Szabo szabo@netcom.com ------------------------------ From: pgf@srl02.cacs.usl.edu (Phil G. Fraering) Date: Fri, 7 Oct 1994 20:15:40 -0500 Subject: [#94-10-130] Help! Missing cat problem... A roughly (we don't know for sure) three month old male cat I adopted about a month ago (when he did not even appear to be six weeks old; he grew a lot) has been missing since Monday. I have turned the neighborhood upside-down looking, and put up flyers, all to no avail. Due to some behavior problems I suspect his hormones might have some relation to his behavior, if he is still alive. I need to know urgently if there's any way I can get him back if he's avoiding me or lost: if he is still alive, which I currently doubt, he needs to get home, and inside, *NOW*. So far my only idea is to find some urine from a female in estrus, or a suitable chemical simulant. Do any of you know where I can find such a material? About a third to a half of the people I have talked to in the neighborhood have had pets go missing, most of them cats, and some of them small dogs. There have been distant sightings of what might have been foxes or coyotes, and many suspect that the main cause of the missing pets is predation by the ubiquitous feral domestic dog/coyote/red wolf hybrids in the area. Do any of you have any ideas? I need some, badly. What I've been doing isn't working. Phil Fraering pgf@srl03.cacs.usl.edu 318/365-5418. P.S.: Jay, are you still here? I tried calling last night... I thought you would be a good person to ask about this sort of thing. I hope I had the right Jay Freeman's phone number... ------------------------------ From: freeman@netcom.com (Jay Reynolds Freeman) Date: Fri, 7 Oct 1994 19:19:23 -0700 Subject: [#94-10-131] Help! Missing cat problem... I'm still here, and have communicated with Phil by EMail and by "talk". I wish I had more to say -- losing pets is as bad for many people as losing family members, perhaps moreso. -- Jay Freeman ------------------------------ From: price@price.demon.co.uk (Michael Clive Price) Date: Fri, 07 Oct 1994 07:33:26 GMT Subject: [#94-10-132] Mental Changes Steve Witham writes: > My first depression, at age 17, had a metaphysical flavor, > although it sure felt bad, and I'm sure there were more > down-to-earth causes. I remember it was triggered by a > depressing science fiction story. I was seriously convinced > that there was no possible *reason* to live (nor to > die, by the way). Life and existence seemed seriously baseless. Wow. Which story was that! Michael Price price@price.demon.co.uk ------------------------------ From: fcp@nuance.com (Craig Presson) Date: Fri, 07 Oct 1994 10:00:51 -0500 Subject: [#94-10-133] Help! Missing cat problem... At 08:15 PM 10/7/94 -0500, pgf wrote: >A [...]male cat I adopted about a month ago [...] >has been missing since Monday. [coyotes/wild dogs/wolves suspected] These animals are definitely spreading -- there are many reports of coyotes in and near Redstone Arsenal, where there are no hunters. I am sorry about the pets. I and my Remington .22 Viper could be of some help (especially since I just bought 5,500 rounds of ammo) if you want to take up a collection ;-) I'll bring Greg along if you can get a big enough grant. \\ fcp@nuance.com (Craig Presson) CPresson@aol.com\ -- WWW: http://www.nuance.com/~fcp/ -----------------\ -- President & Principal, T4 Computer Security ------> -- P.O. Box 18271, Huntsville, AL 35804 -------------/ // (205) 880-7692 Voice, -7691 FAX -----------------/ ------------------------------ From: minsky@media.mit.edu (Marvin Minsky) Date: Sat, 8 Oct 94 00:16:43 -0400 Subject: [#94-10-134] Mental Changes >Steve Witham writes: >> My first depression, at age 17, had a metaphysical flavor, >> although it sure felt bad, and I'm sure there were more >> down-to-earth causes. I remember it was triggered by a >> depressing science fiction story. I was seriously convinced >> that there was no possible *reason* to live (nor to >> die, by the way). Life and existence seemed seriously baseless. > >Wow. Which story was that! > >Michael Price price@price.demon.co.uk I'd like to know, too. Just think what could be done with it if it were improved and further debugged! ___________________________________________ "Don't pay any attention to the critics. Don't even ignore them." --------- Sam Goldwyn ------------------------------ From: MckenzieO@aol.com Date: Fri, 07 Oct 94 23:05:18 EDT Subject: [#94-10-135] Mental Changes Nancy, I just read your post of Oct. 6 wherein you talk of > a complete shift in my view of myself and of > fiction as well as my view of other people. As well as I can remember > it, I simply didn't have a way of thinking about people (including > myself) as coherent psychological entities. . . . I'm reading "The Man Who Mistook His Wife For A Hat," by the same neurologist who wrote "Awakenings," and I wonder if this wasn't an event along the same lines as whatever occurred (in the opposite direction) in the patient called 'Dr. P.' whose perception began to consist almost entirely of the abstract without any of the personal perception and ability to see things and people in relation to each other that nearly all of us have. This sort of personal perception of people as more than a collection of assorted features and traits seems to come from the right hemisphere of the brain. (Forgive me for my lack of precision in this explanation; I've just begun reading the book -- the first case history is the one I'm referring to.) Just a thought. Perhaps there was some sort of transformation -- a sudden growth spurt, or a coming awake of the synapses in that area -- that occurred in the instance you remember. Does this sound right, or possible, to you? McKenzieO@aol.com PS - I'm not a neurologist or even in any way involved in medicine or biology. I'm simply fascinated with the way the brain & nervous system function, and motivated to learn more and more due to my own ADD, chronic depression, etc. (Wish I could figure out how to brew my own SSRI's, or discover a root that stimulates the brain's own production of serotonin. All this Prozac is getting darned expensive. :-] ) ************************************************ M c K E N Z I E O E R T I N G = = = = B o a t N a m e s & G r a p h i c s = = = = A Name Known To Mariners For Five Generations (High-performance hull graphics and ports-of-call for yachting enthusiasts everywhere) T o l l - f r e e : ( 8 0 0 ) 3 5 9 -1 4 2 3 F a x / v o i c e : ( 3 0 5 ) 8 9 2 - 0 7 7 8 "[S]he painted post-atomic mindflash" - Kathi Gibson, Whig Party singer/songwriter/guitarist ************************************************ ------------------------------ From: moulton@netcom.com (Fred C. Moulton) Date: Fri, 7 Oct 1994 23:11:25 -0700 Subject: [#94-10-136] M.S. in Studies of the Future from UHCL I think that Nick overstates the case somewhat about futurists. While it is correct that some futurists are similar to what he describes, it is also correct to observe that not all are Fabian socialists. I am not. Nor are all futurists blindly extrapolating current trends into the future. For example one of the developers of the Delphi polling method was Harold Linstone, professor emeritus at Portland State University. This and many other methods are used by futurists, some more successfully than others. One of the most well known of the misapplication of extrapolation is the Club of Rome study which has been recognized as flawed by the futurist community. And let us not forget that sometimes extrapolating a trend is a useful activity. Fred >From: szabo@netcom.com (Nick Szabo) >"Futurists" are futurists in the tradition of H.G. Welles, >Isaac Asimov, and Star Trek, ie Fabian socialists. Their >primary emphasis is on extrapolating trends (eg one of their big >buggaboos is "overpopulation"). They are close to the WorldWatch >Institute's extrapolations at current levels of technology, >although the do have a minority from the Kahn school that tries >to work progress into the extraplations. ------------------------------ End of Extropians Digest V94 #282 *********************************