From: Michael Lorrey (retroman@together.net)
Date: Thu Nov 27 1997 - 04:51:27 MST
Anders Sandberg wrote:
>
> I have a small confession to make: as you might guess, my childhood
> peers were not particularly fond of people who wanted to read or think
> about "weird" things. As a result, I decided in a classical cartoon
> mad scientist style to get my revenge upon them in the future, in some
> creative way (preferably involving large amounts of thermonuclear
> power or something similar). But a while later I realized that any
> normal kind of revenge would be rather pointless; what would I really
> accomplish with it? Instead I came up with a truly devious plan: I
> wanted to remake the world so that the likes of me would be on top,
> and all the idiots would know that in order to become successful they
> would have to become like me. That would be a most fitting revenge,
> and quite constructive too.
>
> Unfortunately Bill Gates seems to have beaten me to my revenge, but it
> still seems to work. :-)
Such a strategy is the most successful one, of course, however, not all
geniuses always make decisions based on their own rational long term
interest. They ar of course, more likely to than the average cluck, but
there is also the observed attendant higher odds of mental illness among
the genius level population than the common 'danes. Constructing
safeguards to test new uploads for mental stability are of course, in
order, but who decides, and who watches the watchers???
>
> Seriously, I think it is more rational and efficient to find ways to
> circumvent or ignore the anti-tech/anti-intellectuals. Direct
> confrontations are so silly.
>
> > Reactionaries will of course be on the opposite side, forming
> > terrorist insurgencies to oppose the transition. Anyone who thinks the
> > transcendant period will not be violently dynamic is living in a fools
> > paradise.
>
> We discussed this at the Aleph dinner yesterday. One idea we came up
> with in order to avoid strong reactionary forces is to make sure we
> listen to dissidents, and make them an acknowledged part of our way of
> planning. Despite their views, they sometimes have true things to say,
> and letting them argue their case makes some of the steam blow off,
> which otherwise would have increased the pressure.
>
You guys are so lucky to live in such a homogenous country. Your ideas
about political/cultural polarization are so quaint. SOrry to sound
demeaning, but I recommend you read _Culture_Wars_. When there is
political polarization, those who lead the sides tend to be radicals
that push out voices of moderation. The longer it takes to come to
political solution, the greater the polarization, the more shrill and
uncompromizing the parties. Solutions usually take the form of reactions
to atrocities enacted by an extremist. Usually opposite of what the
extremist intended. The way to neutralize anti-techers is to frame
extremist members of their groups in a plot to bomb some symbolic center
of high tech, say, the first AI, or the Patent Office. I know it sounds
darkly Machiavellian, but history shows that it works... Tell me, what
do you think of Luddites when you think of Theodore Kazinski??? He's an
excellent example of what we need to see more of. Marginalization by
making them seem like they are all wackos. Its worked for anti-gun
activists to to the same in PR against gun owners.
-- TANSTAAFL!!! Michael Lorrey ------------------------------------------------------------ mailto:retroman@together.net Inventor of the Lorrey Drive MikeySoft: Graphic Design/Animation/Publishing/Engineering ------------------------------------------------------------ How many fnords did you see before breakfast today?
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