From: Michael S. Lorrey (retroman@turbont.net)
Date: Thu Oct 12 2000 - 07:34:13 MDT
Elaine Walker wrote:
>
> Okay, folks. What has happened to the Extropian Principles? I am saddened.
>
> I opened up my ZIA multimedia from 1994 to read an older verion of the Extropian Principles, because I thought that the new ones looked much much different than I had remembered. All of these years I was chanting mostly number 1, 3, and 5 of the 2.5 version, that I had engraved in memory. Now I feel like a fool that they hardly exist anymore.
>
> I suppose I shouldn't complain too much, since I haven't been around for the "PERPETUAL PROGRESS" you have made here. But these principles sound much more practical and politically correct and less dynamic than they used to. Perhaps I should try to be more of a "PRACTICAL OPTIMIST" and not so much the "DYNAMIC OPTIMIST" I have chosen to be all these years.
>
> But I WON'T! By golly, I am a "DYNAMIC optimist"!!
>
> PRACTICAL optimism is not going to get us into space, and that is the focus of my life.
>
> I am sure these principles have been subtly morphing over the years, and I do not wish to haggle over them, personally. I just urge you all to re-read this older version which I have made a part of my life for several years now. I find them easy to remember and to chant, and straight and to the point, without sounding too politically correct or too touchy-feely. They are short and to the point, and have enough GRIT.
Elaine,
I know what you mean. I myself have been stuck, apparently and happily
hopelessly, in a v2.5 mode. I just can't accept the PC mamby pambyness of a few
of the changes in the 3.0 principles. 'Practical' is for politicians and porch
sitters, IMHO, NOT for pioneers. I don't mind the Open Society and Self
Direction parts much though, and they are most decidedly not PC in today's world
of community, animal, and other 'rights' that are merely spin agitprop used to
strip the individual of his or her rights. 'Perpetual Progress': Who decides
what this means? So called 'progressives' are almost uniformly of a communalist
nature, and claim the day of the individual is over (a claim that was obsolete
in 1945, and reiterated in 1990), that the concept of the courageous pioneer
breaking a path into the unknown and putting untapped resources to good
technological use is simply an illusion of the sexist imperialist capitalist
running dog patriarchal society justifying its crimes against nature. Perpetual
Progress, in today's world, is almost the direct opposite of Boundless
Expansion.
Mike
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