From: J. R. Molloy (jr@shasta.com)
Date: Wed Aug 30 2000 - 13:41:03 MDT
> The dream world that some have painted for life after the mythical
> singularity bears an amazing resemblance to the religious doctrine of some
> faiths.
>
> Al
>
Yes indeed, extropy does involve some of the cache of faith. It includes a
concept that E. O. Wilson has called "exemptionalism."
"In this conception, our species exists apart from the natural world and holds
dominion over it. We are exempt from the iron laws of ecology that bind other
species. Few limits on human expansion exist that our special status and
ingenuity cannot overcome. we have been set free to modify Earth's surface to
create a world better than the one our ancestors knew.
"For the committed exemptionalist, Homo sapiens has in effect become a new
species... "
--E. O. Wilson, _Consilience_, p.278
Perhaps this happens because of the Western civ heritage of extropians. Anyway,
extropy and life itself have parallel trajectories. I look forward to a
Singularity which answers human questions and solves human problems.
Keep smiling,
--J. R.
"Something beckons within the reach of each of us
to save heroic genius. Find it, and do it.
For as goes heroic genius, so goes humankind."
--Alligator Grundy, _Analects of Atman_
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