From: GBurch1@aol.com
Date: Sat Apr 10 1999 - 14:57:28 MDT
I've just finished a week of diving in Cozumel, my second extended dive trip
since I got a basic SCUBA certification in May of 1998. Diving is
technologically-oriented play and it exemplifies the use of intelligent
technology to break through traditional human limits. As I've become more
and more adept at the basic knowledge and sensory-motor skills involved in
diving, I've been struck by how much SCUBA diving exemplifies extropian
values: To do it well, you have to overcome primitive fears, learn and use
the biological science and physics of compressed nitrogen metabolism, air
consumption and buoyancy control, understand and use the technology of
regulators, buoyancy compensators and pressure and depth instrumentation,
learn the important social conventions of a dive group's mutual safety
responsibilities and master the new three-dimensional kinetic environment of
the aquanaut. On top of all that, you get to play with cool toys that are
currently undergoing an influx of new high technology: Heads-up in-mask
instrument displays, intelligent dive computers, and mixed-gas and rebreather
technologies moving into the range of consumer use that extend depth and dive
times. And the reward for all this? As close as you'll come to zero-g short
of free fall and access to a completely new and beautiful biosphere!!!!
Greg Burch <GBurch1@aol.com>----<gburch@lockeliddell.com>
Attorney ::: Vice President, Extropy Institute ::: Wilderness Guide
http://users.aol.com/gburch1 -or- http://members.aol.com/gburch1
"Civilization is protest against nature;
progress requires us to take control of evolution."
-- Thomas Huxley
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.5 : Fri Nov 01 2002 - 15:03:31 MST