From: KPJ (kpj@sics.se)
Date: Mon Feb 14 2000 - 08:51:59 MST
It appears as if Robert J. Bradbury <bradbury@aeiveos.wa.com> wrote:
|
|As Ken pointed out, we now have cases where our email
|agents are "hiding" things from our attention because
|they look like things we think are irrelevant (gosh
|isn't that what the brain does much of the time???)
Those who use suboptimal information trimmers will lose data, naturally.
If one decides to use brain prostheses to sort out irrelevant inputs,
then one will want to assume the position of ultimate decision maker
of this cyborganic system, not slave of some suboptimal software.
Avoid simple ``spam filters'' or you may lose data. You have been warned.
|Then as Sasha pointed out, we should have some strength
|vis-a-vis our convictions.
|
|But as Eliezer/Neal/Ziana observe, it isn't our convictions
|that are so much the problem but the convictions of the
|non-extropian overlords of list subscribers who may not be
|especially happy with the topics we so freely throw around.
If one adopts the transhumanist/extropian world view,
then one would want to either
(a) assume the rôle of a free humanoid,
or (b) become an information guerilla unit.
Personally, I prefer the (a) solutionm, as it requires less energy.
In a territory controlled by some fascistoid or pure fascist government or
group, one would need to use the (b) solution, to survive.
Somewhat disappointing to note that the U.S. marches on, in the name of
political correctness, towards a fascistic future where true freedom
of information exchange has been suppressed. !-[
|One sees in the [distant?] horizon a lawsuit from parents
|against members of the Extropian list for contributing to
|the suicide of a list subscriber who became excessively
|depressed upon encountering discussions of Damien's "Spike" and
|Hanson's "There Shall Be Only One" uploading economics and
|Bradbury's proposed deactivation of obsolete sub-SIs (e.g. humans).
Yes. Unchecked, stupidity becomes the dictator.
Either you control stupidity or it controls you.
[Or: ``Thoughs Good! Slogans Bad!'' !-]
|As recent discussions regading DeCSS (see Slashdot.org and
|pointers from it to Linux World) indicate, though their
|may be no merit to these legal actions, the net effect
|would be stifle free speech (and force conformance)
|among the list subscribers. We only have to consider
|the can-of-worms that Keith Henson is in for evidence
|of this situation.
According to my data, U.S. law prohibits one to receive and decrypt data
that others sends into your site/house/person/etc (e.g. satellite TV)
unless specifically allowed by the sender of the data in question.
With a law prohibiting that, the DeCSS software illegalization seems
mainly a continuation of the same trend.
IMO, the struggle was lost when the govt allowed the megacorps to send
encrypted data into your site and prohibited you from decrypting the data
except under the circumstances expressly allowed for by those megacorps.
On the other hand, who expects U.S. law to exhibit consistency? !-]
|Should we start an Extropian Legal Defense Fund now?
As long as the Extropian organization continues to have its economical base
camp located in the Land of the Lawyers: ``Yes, definitely.''.
|Related to this, most humans are easily fooled by
|relatively primitive encryption... Should we develop
|simple programs that would allow the list-server to
|transmit "temperature adjective of physical act between
|two individuals" for subsequent translation on the
|reader's machine only when the magic key sequence
|is entered?
You might also use the old KGB method of dividing the organization into an
inner and outer layer. The outer layer would then simply attract all those
technology-happy humanoids out there with harmless future-positive gospels,
while the inner layer would find relevant outer layer members and initiate
them into the Real Agenda.
Then again, the nominally free might feel uncomfortable with this.
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.5 : Fri Nov 01 2002 - 15:26:48 MST