From: Damien Broderick (d.broderick@english.unimelb.edu.au)
Date: Wed Apr 24 2002 - 20:06:00 MDT
At 03:33 PM 4/24/02 -0400, Dan wrote:
>[Think how frustrating it would be to know that you've spent all that
>time working on CATAI and now GISAI/CFAI, only to learn that in 2003
>human civilization and all your work would be destroyed in nuclear
>war.]
There'd be chagrin (not to mention heart-breaking grief), but this account
misses the point: you derive satisfaction *in the moment* by working on
what you regard *then and there* as meaningful.
Working for 20 years as a junk bond salesman or phone sex worker might not
have much intrinsic satisfaction, but working on a project you believe has
great import gives you pleasure and ontological security *as you do it*.
Writing a novel or a theoretical tome is both painful and pleasurable, and
the pleasure is increased if you can sell the damned thing at the end and
make a modest crust out of the sale, and increased again if a few people
enjoy reading it (and decreased somewhat if it's disparaged), but the core
reason you do it is for the daily buzz. That's why Salinger could sit there
writing every day and then lock his books away in a bank vault.
What would be a more enthralling and satisfying way for Eliezer to spend
his time than thinking out and notating CATAI et al? Teaching math in a
university? Working on nuclear missile systems? At least with the latter he
wouldn't feel retrospectively redundant when the nuclear war occurs in
2003. :)
Damien Broderick
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