From: Michael Lorrey (mike@datamann.com)
Date: Mon Jan 22 2001 - 09:25:58 MST
Emlyn wrote:
>
> Eugene wrote:
> > denis bider wrote:
> > >
> > > To fantasize a little bit... A personal armor, one that could be used on
> a
> > > regular basis, would be wonderful. Imagine something that would protect
> the
> > > wearer against anything from bullets to biohazards.
> >
> > Best solution: 1) telepresence 2) cryptography + traffic mixers. Plus
> remote
> > redundant copies, which get woken up by watchdog/periodically.
> >
> > You can't nuke something if you don't know where it is.
> >
>
> I think Eugene is right on the ball here.
>
> I think telepresense is a bit of a sleeper concept which will gain a
> stronger hold in the next few years. Particularly in countries such as the
> US where fear of the outside world seems pretty extreme, I would expect that
> the option of having a telepresence to deal with bricks & mortar (& bullets)
> will hold a strong appeal.
Frankly, Emlyn, all we really fear is how eager so many foreign people
seem to be to enslave themselves and surrender their rights as much as
possible, and how much you all want us to do the same. Outside of that,
we tend to travel much. However, because our own nation is so large and
diverse (and inexpensive) we tend to travel within our country, or just
to either Canada or Mexico. For me, traveling to New York is the same as
Dennis traveling to Paris, me going to DC is like him going to Belgium
(actually, I'm traveling further).
Europeans will take to telepresence for economic reasons: its cheaper
because transportation in europe is expensive compared to the US. I can
fly from Boston to Seattle (over 3000 miles) for $350 US in 5-7 hours. I
can fly to Las Vegas for under $150 on occasion. I can drive to Seattle
for the same amount of money (in my Jeep) or less than half of that with
an economy car. The numbers are almost there, here, for employee
telepresence, to outsource to areas with lower cost of living (i.e.
Boston companies hiring me to work via telepresence in NH for half the
money of a Massachusetts resident employee), but only if they are
willing to loosen up on the control department. Here again, the issues
of trust of the individual come into play. Its more profitable to trust
people if those people are trust worthy.
>
> Basically, the place that holds your intelligence substrate is a liability;
> if it breaks, you die. So, options to remove this vulnerability will hold
> appeal. In the short term, hiding the body away (at home) is likely to do
> well. In the longer term, we upload and perhaps copy ourselves for
> redundancy (if we can just solve those pesky consciousness problems), or
> else we all get eaten by grey goo or are replaced by AI SIs... but there's
> another story.
>
> By the way, I'd never wear that armour, or carry a gun for that matter,
> unless circumstances were entirely different. It'd impinge on my personal
> sense of coolness. Can't have that.
>
> Emlyn
> (uh, except for nerf)
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.5 : Sat Nov 02 2002 - 08:05:11 MST