Thank you, all of you.
We should remember that agreement isn't necessarily a sign of conformity
or political correctness. We all agree that the Earth goes around the
Sun, that molecules are made of atoms, and that humans can breathe oxygen
but not sulfuric acid; and the vast majority of us similarly agree that
transhumanism is a philosophy which encourages people to look to their
common identity as citizens of the Solar System and not one region or
ethnicity. My purpose in asking people to voice their usually unspoken
assent was not to enforce conformity or to run the opposing viewpoint off
the list, but simply to show the world that the prolifically expressed
opinions of a few posters do not represent the opinions of Extropians as a
whole. If we are going to run an open list and tolerate all ideas, even
really awful ideas on the part of people who are willing to go on arguing
indefinitely, then we need to make sure that everyone else speaks up now
and then, or people will get the impression that the most prolific posters
represent transhumanism. The flood of positive responses shows what most
of us believe. The frequently included quibbles, rephrasings, and "I
disagree with the part where you say..." have amply shown up the remarks
about "lemmings" and "political correctness" as flamebait.
Thank you,
Jef Allbright,
Samantha Atkins,
Alex Blainey,
Damien Broderick,
Philip Chaston,
Hal Finney,
Amara Graps,
John Grigg,
Spike Jones,
Barbara Lamar,
Mike Linksvayer,
Lucylou98,
Max More,
G. P.,
Jacques Du Pasquier,
Mikko Rauhala,
Anders Sandberg,
Scerir,
Steve365,
Darin Sunley,
Loree Thomas,
Natasha Vita-More,
and Beat Weber,
for speaking up.
(Sorry if I missed anyone there.)
Gratefully yours,
Eliezer Yudkowsky.
-- -- -- -- --
Eliezer S. Yudkowsky http://singinst.org/
Research Fellow, Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b30 : Sat May 11 2002 - 17:44:31 MDT