Re: Powerful Extropian Memes

Eliezer S. Yudkowsky (sentience@pobox.com)
Thu, 11 Mar 1999 02:58:43 -0600

Max More wrote:
>
> Eliezer: I wasn't objecting to any use of emotions, or to slogans in
> general. Note that my comments was focused specifically on the "crush the
> rainforests" line.

That wasn't to you, it was to the fellow who complained about my using "the worst memes of the limbic system".

I don't feel that I did so, at least in the sense of deliberately invoking them. I make every effort to keep my mind clean. However. There is no way I can write effective slogans without triggering those emotions to some degree in the part of the audience in which they are already present. In that case, the most you can hope for is that somebody taking elitist pride in being a scientist will eventually stumble on evolutionary psychology and feel obliged to believe it.

-- 
        sentience@pobox.com          Eliezer S. Yudkowsky
         http://pobox.com/~sentience/AI_design.temp.html
          http://pobox.com/~sentience/singul_arity.html
Disclaimer:  Unless otherwise specified, I'm not telling you
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