From: Max More (maxmore@primenet.com)
Date: Mon Nov 04 1996 - 10:17:34 MST
At 04:02 PM 11/4/96 +0100, you wrote:
>
>To repeat it for the umpteenth time: there is nothing intrinsically holy
>or beautiful in the act of sex. It's in the eye of the observer, entirely.
>Sex is an artefact of evolution, tailored to fulfill its range of tasks
>(mostly, autoreplication) it was designed to do. Period.
>
>Once the entire background situation changes qualitatively, sex is obsolete.
In an evolutionary sense, probably. But already sex is used mostly for
pleasure and self-expression, not procreation. Making a universal statement
like "sex is obsolete" requires you to make more of an argument. Why should
everyone stop having sex (in whatever future form) just because *you* don't
see it as worthwhile in your future life? Would you do away with all other
pleasurable and expressive activities if they are not tied to survival or
material gain (if these are the values you see as central for uploads)?
Rather than saying "sex is obsolete" in the changed conditions of the
future, I think it more reasonable to say that sex will be optional. We will
be able to choose whether, when, how much, and with regard to who/what we
feel sexual urges. Becoming posthuman to me means not abolishing everything
about being human (though somethings may be good to abolish) but making them
a matter of choice, and being able to refine them.
Max
Max More, Ph.D.
President, Extropy Institute
more@extropy.org
http://www.extropy.org
Editor, Extropy magazine
extropy@extropy.org
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