# 8519 byjohnf4303@... on July 13, 2006, 5:32 a.m.
Member since 2021-10-03
Old topic, but I found this in my drafts, and still wanted to input
somethings.
Subject: Re: Africa (was ...10 trillion people in thissolarsystem?)
>All that Vega is trying to say is that there is a natural cycle we should
>try to respect. Having too many old people around is not a very good idea,
>since according to nature's plan the young replace the old.
And according to "nature's plan", we're supposed to be hairy apes just
coming down from the trees. We interfered with this, thinking this kind of
existence isn't good enough. Imagination and technology (even stone knives
and skin clothing) let us re-set the part of the "plan" which relates to
what we're supposed to be.
"If we were meant to fly, we'd have been born with a brain capable of
figuring out how to do it without being born with wings."
>It is good to live long, but there comes an age when we must be prepared to
>move on.
Nobody says that the grim reaper won't have the last word. I doubt you'd
find the most enthusiastic transhumanist who'd say that we can out-plan fate
and truly live "forever" (as if "forever" or eternity or infinity of any
kind were a real thing, instead of a construct of human imaginations). Even
those in favor of braintaping and downloading the last known copy of an
intellect into the newest synthetic super-body, or even having multiple
diverging copies of a "person" (in whatever form that particular copy
prefers). Even if there's nothing beyond the death of the brain besides
oblivion, there must surely be room to imagine and accept dying.
Good quote from Robert
>a man should live as long as he wishes, and wish to live as long as
>he does. respect the cycle, but dont expect it to stay the same size.
And James Dean said "Dream as if you'll live forever, live as if you'll die
today." Sure, the Hindu life cycles are good to remember, but why accept
that we can't use healthy living and the technology we have the ability to
invent, to make the productive adulthood last longer than the average 40-60
years?
What kind of dreams and works would we allow ourselves if we weren't under a
century-or-less death sentence? Yes, we stumble over the occasional
sociopathic megalomaniac, but I like to try to plan for the creators.
Still, it might be interesting to persist beyond this body, and crash the
Omega Point party in the restaurant at the end of the universe. If the
universe is closed, with no possibility of persisting in some form beyond
the "big crunch", then there's a definite finishing point. If it's open,
we've got uintil proton decay in 10^10^76 years (by some estimates), and
maybe there's a possibility for memory in some form to go on past that
limit.
Might it be interesting to see what it's like then? (if we don't go extinct
in ~50 years when the oil runs out)
I'd at least like to see space opened up, and humanity seeing the potential
and accepting that while we may not be the total reason for the existence of
the universe, we can do a lot to bring some of it to life, Out There. Like
fusion, it's only about 20 to 50 years off, for the last ~30 years.
John S. Lewis From 'Mining the Sky'
As long as the human population remains as pitifully small as it is today,
we shall be severely limited in what we can accomplish. Human intelligence
is the key to the future: human beings are not, as some would have it, a
form of pollution.
Having only one Einstein, one Hokusai, one Mozart, one daVinci, one
Shankara,... is not enough. We need -and can have- a million times as many.
We need intelligence, wisdom, compassion, and excellence. These godlike
traits are manifested in the physical universe only by life, and in the
biological universe, only by intelligent life.
Life is not a cancer of matter; it is matter's trancendance of itself.
The fulfillment of time & space is matter; the fulfillment of matter is
life; the highest fulfillment of life is unbounded intelligence &
compassion."
We would be quite wrong to conclude that the asteroid belt, or solar
power... is the ultimate resource. Intelligent life, once liberated by the
resources of space, is the greatest resource of the solar system.
The material and energy resources of the solar system allow mankind an
infinite future: we can not only break free of the surly bonds of the Earth,
but break free of the Sun and escape its fate.
"There is no way back into the past.
The choice is the universe -or nothing.
-- H.G. Wells
# 8520 bysraj@... on July 13, 2006, 5:18 p.m.
Member since 2021-10-03
John wrote:
coming down from the trees. We interfered with this, thinking this kind of
existence isn't good enough ....
There is nothing wrong with interfering with nature's plans provided we do it wisely. But I find a lot of wishful thinking in the way in which we are interfering with nature's plan. One basic requirement in this direction is to find out what human needs really are and fashion our environment to meet these needs. What is happening is that Scientists and our Industrial 'Rambos' are exploiting our senses (created by nature), to make a fast buck, and forcing humans to adapt to an artificial environment. I remember reading in a newspaper that a woman in USA went to the extent of surgically modifying her toes so that they looked good in a pair of sandals she had purchased. Not only this woman, but in many ways most of us, are being led into doing similar things.
Evolution is a part of nature's plan. Only we have to watch out that we don't become an extinct species.
Selvaraj.
From: John Frazer
To: spacesettlers@yahoogroups.com
Sent: Thursday, July 13, 2006 11:01 AM
Subject: [spacesettlers] "nature's plan"
Old topic, but I found this in my drafts, and still wanted to input
somethings.
from Selvaraj Message #7978, jun 4
Subject: Re: Africa (was ...10 trillion people in thissolarsystem?)
>All that Vega is trying to say is that there is a natural cycle we should
>try to respect. Having too many old people around is not a very good idea,
>since according to nature's plan the young replace the old.
And according to "nature's plan", we're supposed to be hairy apes just
coming down from the trees. We interfered with this, thinking this kind of
existence isn't good enough. Imagination and technology (even stone knives
and skin clothing) let us re-set the part of the "plan" which relates to
what we're supposed to be.
"If we were meant to fly, we'd have been born with a brain capable of
figuring out how to do it without being born with wings."
>It is good to live long, but there comes an age when we must be prepared to
>move on.
Nobody says that the grim reaper won't have the last word. I doubt you'd
find the most enthusiastic transhumanist who'd say that we can out-plan fate
and truly live "forever" (as if "forever" or eternity or infinity of any
kind were a real thing, instead of a construct of human imaginations). Even
those in favor of braintaping and downloading the last known copy of an
intellect into the newest synthetic super-body, or even having multiple
diverging copies of a "person" (in whatever form that particular copy
prefers). Even if there's nothing beyond the death of the brain besides
oblivion, there must surely be room to imagine and accept dying.
Good quote from Robert
>a man should live as long as he wishes, and wish to live as long as
>he does. respect the cycle, but dont expect it to stay the same size.
And James Dean said "Dream as if you'll live forever, live as if you'll die
today." Sure, the Hindu life cycles are good to remember, but why accept
that we can't use healthy living and the technology we have the ability to
invent, to make the productive adulthood last longer than the average 40-60
years?
What kind of dreams and works would we allow ourselves if we weren't under a
century-or-less death sentence? Yes, we stumble over the occasional
sociopathic megalomaniac, but I like to try to plan for the creators.
Still, it might be interesting to persist beyond this body, and crash the
Omega Point party in the restaurant at the end of the universe. If the
universe is closed, with no possibility of persisting in some form beyond
the "big crunch", then there's a definite finishing point. If it's open,
we've got uintil proton decay in 10^10^76 years (by some estimates), and
maybe there's a possibility for memory in some form to go on past that
limit.
Might it be interesting to see what it's like then? (if we don't go extinct
in ~50 years when the oil runs out)
I'd at least like to see space opened up, and humanity seeing the potential
and accepting that while we may not be the total reason for the existence of
the universe, we can do a lot to bring some of it to life, Out There. Like
fusion, it's only about 20 to 50 years off, for the last ~30 years.
John S. Lewis From 'Mining the Sky'
As long as the human population remains as pitifully small as it is today,
we shall be severely limited in what we can accomplish. Human intelligence
is the key to the future: human beings are not, as some would have it, a
form of pollution.
Having only one Einstein, one Hokusai, one Mozart, one daVinci, one
Shankara,... is not enough. We need -and can have- a million times as many.
We need intelligence, wisdom, compassion, and excellence. These godlike
traits are manifested in the physical universe only by life, and in the
biological universe, only by intelligent life.
Life is not a cancer of matter; it is matter's trancendance of itself.
The fulfillment of time & space is matter; the fulfillment of matter is
life; the highest fulfillment of life is unbounded intelligence &
compassion."
We would be quite wrong to conclude that the asteroid belt, or solar
power... is the ultimate resource. Intelligent life, once liberated by the
resources of space, is the greatest resource of the solar system.
The material and energy resources of the solar system allow mankind an
infinite future: we can not only break free of the surly bonds of the Earth,
but break free of the Sun and escape its fate.
"There is no way back into the past.
The choice is the universe -or nothing.
-- H.G. Wells
# 8521 bylucioc@... on July 13, 2006, 6:30 p.m.
Member since 2021-10-03
On 7/13/06, sraj wrote:
(...)
> There is nothing wrong with interfering with nature's plans provided we do it wisely.
and suggesting it (she?) has a "plan"?
> What is happening is that Scientists and our Industrial 'Rambos' are exploiting our senses (created by nature), to make a fast buck, and forcing humans to adapt to an artificial environment. I remember reading in a newspaper that a woman in USA went to the extent of surgically modifying her toes so that they looked good in a pair of sandals she had purchased. Not only this woman, but in many ways most of us, are being led into doing similar things.
(...)
No one is being "forced" to do anything. This woman did that surgery
on her own free will, or are you suggesting that there was an Evil
Industrialist pointing a gun to her while an Evil Scientist was
modifying her toes?
Besides, there are (or, saying better, always were) people who
modified their bodies just for fun, without any need of adaptation to
a given product involved. See for instance The Body Modification EZine
(http://www.bmezine.com/).
This recurring bullshit of the Great Evil Conspiracy of the Evil
Corporations really drives me SICK.
# 8522 bydougmay@... on July 13, 2006, 8:10 p.m.
Member since 2021-10-03
On Jul 13, 2006, at 12:54 PM, Lucio de Souza Coelho wrote:
> Corporations really drives me SICK.
I think you may be over-reacting to his comment a bit. There's
obviously no broad-based conspiracy to make us evolutionarily less
successful, but by their nature, successful corporations have to over-
emphasize short term profits to be competitive. The lady who carved
up her toes to look good exercised her own free will to beautify her
body, as humans have been doing for certainly 100,000 years, if not
much more. If a company can find a way to profitably exploit a human
tendency, that company will thrive and drown out less fit companies.
Hmm... sounds kind of like evolution..... Even in the most closed
communist system imaginable, capitalist exploitation is inevitable
because it is more successful than non-exploitation. We humans
exploit O2 every time we breathe. Life would not be possible at all
without this natural tendency towards exploitation.
AT THE SAME TIME, however; Over-exploitation leads to extinction.
Imagine a petri-dish full of food and bacteria. The bacteria will
exploit this food, not caring that by doing so they are assuring
their eventual starvation. The trick becomes to continue an
appropriate level of exploitation to advance the species or
civilization, while avoiding over-exploitation or excessively risky
exploitation that threatens your future. People having plastic
surgery on otherwise healthy toes seems silly to me, but I hardly
think it threatens our survival. Sure, we would all be better off if
people like that would share their excess wealth with the "have-
nots," but anytime you have a financial surplus, you'll have some
eccentric spending, and no shortage of companies willing to exploit it.
doug
# 8523 bysraj@... on July 13, 2006, 10:51 p.m.
Member since 2021-10-03
Lucio wrote,
Corporations really drives me SICK...
Sorry Lucio to make you sick. If you go to my website www.humanposture.com you will realize how sick people really are. There are x ray images in the site which show the type of distortion people introduce in their bodies .... and the bad news is the situation is getting worse with our modern way of life.
Best Wishes
Selvaraj
From: Lucio de Souza Coelho
To: spacesettlers@yahoogroups.com
Sent: Thursday, July 13, 2006 11:24 PM
Subject: Re: [spacesettlers] "nature's plan"
On 7/13/06, sraj wrote:
(...)
> There is nothing wrong with interfering with nature's plans provided we do it wisely.
If you are not speaking metaphorically, then are you deifying Nature
and suggesting it (she?) has a "plan"?
> What is happening is that Scientists and our Industrial 'Rambos' are exploiting our senses (created by nature), to make a fast buck, and forcing humans to adapt to an artificial environment. I remember reading in a newspaper that a woman in USA went to the extent of surgically modifying her toes so that they looked good in a pair of sandals she had purchased. Not only this woman, but in many ways most of us, are being led into doing similar things.
(...)
No one is being "forced" to do anything. This woman did that surgery
on her own free will, or are you suggesting that there was an Evil
Industrialist pointing a gun to her while an Evil Scientist was
modifying her toes?
Besides, there are (or, saying better, always were) people who
modified their bodies just for fun, without any need of adaptation to
a given product involved. See for instance The Body Modification EZine
(http://www.bmezine.com/).
This recurring bullshit of the Great Evil Conspiracy of the Evil
Corporations really drives me SICK.
# 8524 byhetrevillion@... on July 13, 2006, 11:59 p.m.
Member since 2021-10-03
Fire,
heat and light.
If not for the one
who struck that first brilliant spark,
we'd still be cold and
stuck in the
dark.
and develop it's own evolution. We have been doing so since the
discovery of fire and sharp stones and sticks.
regards to all
Harvey
# 8525 byxenophile2002@... on July 14, 2006, 1:40 a.m.
Member since 2021-10-03
Eh. They're her toes.