From: Steve (steve@multisell.com)
Date: Mon May 27 2002 - 08:21:38 MDT
>Date: Sun, 26 May 2002 14:05:14 EDT
>From: Spudboy100@aol.com
>Subject: Re: life and time is too precious
>That fantasy past (Atlantis) won't last too long. Because if the Crudd-ites
>win, I am guessing that the human species will be goneski, within a few
>generations. Low tech can't sustain more then a few million people. Not if
>climate change has happend! And eventually, sooner then later, sayanara
(sp)
This posting lacks balance & perspective. No doubt extropians and
fundamentalist
transhumans will call me a neo-luddite for drawing attention to futurologist
Ian Pearson
(BT exact technologies) article in this week's Sunday Times warning of
dangers in
nanotechnology, AI, and biotechs that are capable of making life on earth
extinct.
I think we have to put safety ahead of mindless sci-fantasy optimism, and
want to point
out that I object to emotive and irrelevent terms like "luddite" that are
used incorrectly in
this debate. Pearson and even Greenpeace & ecology movement are using
empirical data
and arguments and are not "anti-science" anti-rational or even
anti-progress.
>Note: In my new anti-euro phase, I note with some glee that the heart of
the
>cruddite movement is eurpoean in nature. In the UK animal rights and
anti-GM
>smeggers, lead the way. In the USA, I believe such thinking faces a more
>hostile environment; especially in our heightend awareness against
terrorism
>(however long this lasts), mitigates against support for crudd-ites.
What we need is a middle way in advance. We should jettison tried & tested
techniques
in favour of untested, speculative and potentially lethal latest innovations
simply to
keep up with fashion. And what is wrong with concentrating on eco-friendly
science
such as wind-power & renewables ... green science can be just as
technologically
advanced, challenging and innovative as the 'blue sky' fads such as genetics
& nano-tech.
Steve Nichols
Posthuman.Org(anisation)
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