World War IV

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Wilshire

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« Reply #165 on: August 25, 2017, 12:19:42 pm »
Wilshire, yes, our democracy, if not for Trump was basically turning into an oligarchy(I believe that's the term in looking for), between the Bush's and Clinton's.

My post got to long, so I deleted out some paragraphs regarding this. We've got political dynasties in the US, and I think the Bush/Clinton families have had their turn, get them out. I think the election was really supposed to have been between Sanders/Trump but democrats sabotaged to some degree Sanders. After all, the differences between those campaigns (Trump/Sanders) were minimal. As much as I dislike giving any credence to trump, at least it wasn't a race between Bush/Clinton - I would have disliked that much more, I think.

And, if a new type of government restricted voters and it was done well and considered the welfare of everyone, id be happy with that.

I think we all would.

That said, I don't agree with your sentiment that even you shouldn't have a vote.

Sure maybe, but being articulate doesn't mean I know any more than the next guy about politics. I'm just as biased as the rest and I only care about a couple of issues (which I spend some nominal amount of time looking into) but outside of those few things, I probably know about the average amount of politics as everyone else. But really, calling for other's to not be allowed to vote and also saying that I should be one of the chosen is not what I'm trying to project. *shudders*.


You want a better world, be a better person … the rest will take care of itself. If you’re one of the few who can dynamically effect people, then feel free to promote a better world beyond your friends/family sphere.

Great post TaoHorror. You've captured much of the conversation in one place. And don't feel like you need to read 5 pages of posts before participating.
Anyway, that axiom is approximately how I interact with life. People typically do as the people around them. There are always outliers in either direction.
« Last Edit: August 25, 2017, 12:24:53 pm by Wilshire »
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TLEILAXU

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« Reply #166 on: August 25, 2017, 08:40:37 pm »
That is not enough for me. There is an ABSOLUTE to be attained, fellows. Democracy has stagnated for too long and secular humanism can be as much of a hindrance to progress as religion. We need radical change!

Wilshire

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« Reply #167 on: August 25, 2017, 10:58:45 pm »
That is not enough for me. There is an ABSOLUTE to be attained, fellows. Democracy has stagnated for too long and secular humanism can be as much of a hindrance to progress as religion. We need radical change!

Post-humanism approaches, as does the AI/technological singularity. Radical changes will be upon us in a dozen decades or so, +/- a century depending on who you ask.
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solipsisticurge

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« Reply #168 on: August 25, 2017, 11:28:09 pm »
There's an old saying is U.S. politics: "Democrats fall in love; Republicans fall in line." I firmly believe Sanders would have won the general election, as the Trump win basically came from working class voters straying from the Democratic flock (due to tepid opinions of Clinton in many cases), and low turnout by young/unaligned/idealistic voters who would typically lean Democratic, again, due to a lack of excitement for Clinton. It also allowed Trump to gain most of the "I just want a CHANGE!" votes that didn't go third party, where Sanders was far enough removed from Democratic middle ground to gain some of those votes.

You alienate a small margin in the swing states, you lose the election.

TaoHorror, the basic problem with any proposed or actual system is human weakness and the corrupting nature of power (or tendency of power to attract the already corrupt). Totalitarian communism would be great if people were capable of objectively and skillfully managing all the minutiae involved. They just aren't. Democracy/representative republics would be great if people actually made informed decisions and had the time or mental capacity to analyze all relevant data and make a truly informed decision divorced from emotion or bias. They just don't.

I don't have an answer for what would be superior. Humans will fuck up whatever sounds nice on paper. Even if we hand it over to the computer overlords, some human shortcut in the programming of the AI they evolved from will have them fucking up the show just as badly as we have so far.
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Woden

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« Reply #169 on: August 26, 2017, 07:25:22 am »

Wilshire, yes, our democracy, if not for Trump was basically turning into an oligarchy(I believe that's the term in looking for), between the Bush's and Clinton's.

The presidents are only the known faces of the oligarchy, but they are like pawns of the Dark Power who rules the world from behind moving the strings.
Know what your slaves believe, and you will always be their master.

TLEILAXU

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« Reply #170 on: August 26, 2017, 01:26:14 pm »
That is not enough for me. There is an ABSOLUTE to be attained, fellows. Democracy has stagnated for too long and secular humanism can be as much of a hindrance to progress as religion. We need radical change!

Post-humanism approaches, as does the AI/technological singularity. Radical changes will be upon us in a dozen decades or so, +/- a century depending on who you ask.
A dozen decades? That'd make me 144 years old by then. Doubt I'll be in greatest shape. I'm kind of triggered by the term post-humanism and its associations of neckbeards pretending CRISPR-Cas will make them immortal or that implanting a chip to open a security door is somehow is a huge step toward uploading your brain to the cloud and living forever in the digital Utopia (which is pure fantasy if you ask me), but if you really want to get there you have to do some things which are unethical by today's standards, such as experimenting with gene-editing human embryos.
The point is that it's not just going to come if we just sit here and wait, we have to get out there advocating for it, and that becomes a problem when the majority of the population starts thinking anything related to gene-editing is unnatural and IMMORAL.
« Last Edit: August 26, 2017, 04:39:53 pm by tleilaxu »

MSJ

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« Reply #171 on: August 26, 2017, 05:30:11 pm »
Yea, but it's going to happen. As someone said before on the forum, China will probably say Fuck your morals and start manipulating DNA and the such. And, I don't think we're to far off. Probably have already been done, imho.
“No. I am your end. Before your eyes I will put your seed to the knife. I will quarter your carcass and feed it to the dogs. Your bones I will grind to dust and cast to the winds. I will strike down those who speak your name or the name of your fathers, until ‘Yursalka’ becomes as meaningless as infant babble. I will blot you out, hunt down your every trace! The track of your life has come to me,

TLEILAXU

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« Reply #172 on: August 26, 2017, 06:07:00 pm »
Yea, but it's going to happen. As someone said before on the forum, China will probably say Fuck your morals and start manipulating DNA and the such. And, I don't think we're to far off. Probably have already been done, imho.
I'm the one who said that, but it still doesn't change much for we who live in the West. Keep in mind that nations and scientists doing unethical things can also be pressured economically. Your paper might not get published if it trespasses too much on what is considered ethical behavior.
I would consider the US one of the more liberal nations of the West in this regard, and look at the current situation http://www.sciencemag.org/news/2017/02/us-panel-gives-yellow-light-human-embryo-editing
Also, take a look at this statement from 2015 http://www.nature.com/news/don-t-edit-the-human-germ-line-1.17111
More specifically the quote
Quote
We are concerned that a public outcry about such an ethical breach could hinder a promising area of therapeutic development, namely making genetic changes that cannot be inherited.
These guys are AFRAID that negative PUBLIC opinion will hinder their own research. They're afraid that the fickle acceptance of the masses can turn into a massive hetz if a popular narrative so demands. This is what you work against. Look at how things are going on in the current zeitgeist. Organic movements are becoming more popular, the notion that natural = good, synthetic = evil is more popular than ever.
Unless your idea of the singularity is an AI that's really good at recommending porn, things aren't this straight-forward, there needs to be active involvement.

MSJ

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« Reply #173 on: August 26, 2017, 06:37:00 pm »
Fair enough. And, yea I get that public backlash is going to be quite harsh. What are you looking for tleilaxu? Are you concerned with extending your own life? Is it your wish to be immortal?

These things will have to happen organically, or they simply won't be accepted. In some cases, many people will never accept the cloning of people or even the manipulation of our DNA. Some people don't like the idea of playing God.
“No. I am your end. Before your eyes I will put your seed to the knife. I will quarter your carcass and feed it to the dogs. Your bones I will grind to dust and cast to the winds. I will strike down those who speak your name or the name of your fathers, until ‘Yursalka’ becomes as meaningless as infant babble. I will blot you out, hunt down your every trace! The track of your life has come to me,

TLEILAXU

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« Reply #174 on: August 26, 2017, 07:11:11 pm »
Fair enough. And, yea I get that public backlash is going to be quite harsh. What are you looking for tleilaxu? Are you concerned with extending your own life? Is it your wish to be immortal?
I do wish to be immortal, or something like it, but I guess it's also just a drive. Mankind, or at least parts of it, has always had a curiosity and a lust for transcendence.

These things will have to happen organically, or they simply won't be accepted. In some cases, many people will never accept the cloning of people or even the manipulation of our DNA. Some people don't like the idea of playing God.
What is organically? Nuclear power is strongly opposed in many countries ideological reasons, whereas others see it as a cheap and relatively clean source of energy. The US has been making GMO crops for decades while in the EU it's still outlawed, although IIRC one or two are imported.
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In some cases, many people will never accept the cloning of people or even the manipulation of our DNA.
Which is why them having power is problematic.
Quote
Some people don't like the idea of playing God.
Notice the socio-cultural load of this sentence. If gene-editing is playing God that indicates a STATIC nature, unchanging, perhaps divinely created as in Christianity or containing some spiritual essence as in new-age cults. In the end it's matter interacting with matter, not fundamentally that different from laying two blocks atop one another, although a more complex task for sure.

Wilshire

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« Reply #175 on: August 30, 2017, 07:12:02 pm »
Get some humans off earth onto Mars, and the post-humans will come back and look at earth like the "earthicans" (futurama term, lol) are a bunch of braindead monkeys.

Remove economics a bit and raise up survival needs and the change will happen far more rapidly then trying to subvert millennium old dogmas. My opinion, at least.

That's pretty much why GMO's are even 'allowed' to exist - remove them and there simply isn't enough food production to feed everyone. Europe would lift that ban tomorrow if the US decided to ban production and millions of people around the world started dying of starvation - call it altruistic to hide the fact that the economic vacuum left behind would make billions for those that fill it...

Anyway, eugenics will need that to really take off, but strong AI not so much. Machine Leaning AI's are economically some of the most well funded research projects today, which are precursors to strong AI. Its still a big step up from there, but we're getting there.
Btw, a dozen decades (12 * 10 years = 120 years), +/- a century (120+100, or 120-100) would be between 20 and 220 years. People get all mystic/doomsday/optimistic with their predictions regarding these things, and that range captures most every prediction.


I think MSJ meant 'organically' as in it will naturally happen over time and trying to push it 'before people are ready' will have the opposite effect. I'm with you though, little we do as humans is 'natural', and thinking that eugenics crosses some kind of line that hasn't already been crossed to me is a sort of a fundamental misunderstanding of reality.


"Natural" makes me chuckle. Either nothing has been "natural" since we started farming and metal working, or everything that humans do is "natural" because we aren't magical beings that exist outside of nature.
"Playing God" is equally nebulous as far as I'm concerned, and then we're back to rehashing "whose god, who gets to decide, why them, shouldn't there be some kind of vote, why is voting better than..." etc. etc.
Even ignoring that, Humanity started playing god when we started cultivating farmland, domesticating animals, and genetically modifying our enslaved animals/plants via animal husbandry and cultivation. Eugenics has been around for nearly as far back as human history goes, applying it directly at the genetic level is more of the same if you ask me.
"GMO" is a meaningless term used by some groups to stay in control. Nearly everything in an industrialized country is genetically modified. From the grass we walk on to the food we eat. :)
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MSJ

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« Reply #176 on: August 30, 2017, 08:02:35 pm »
Quote from:  Wilshire
I think MSJ meant 'organically' as in it will naturally happen over time and trying to push it 'before people are ready' will have the opposite effect. I'm with you though, little we do as humans is 'natural', and thinking that eugenics crosses some kind of line that hasn't already been crossed to me is a sort of a fundamental misunderstanding of reality.

I agree with you and your correct in my assessment of natural. I agree we've probably already crossed these boundaries. But, take for example abortion. We can't even begin to decide that what is the right way to handle this situation. The left, it doesn't matter it's the woman's body, the right any and all abortions is murder. It probably lies somewhere in the middle and there are ways to prevent having abortion. So, when I say naturally, I mean, something will be done in regards to gene manipulation that undoubtedly is better for mankind and no one can dispute it. But, some always will, we can ignore them. I will admit though, it scares the shit out of me. I'm not saying it won't be a great leap in humanity, but it has equal chance to be the ruin of human civilization. I hear scientists and such say it just adjusting matter and this and that. Because, they're scientists, they wanna push the limit and explore. But, maybe that shit was meant to be manipulated and what if we manipulate it in the wrong way and boom, disaster!
“No. I am your end. Before your eyes I will put your seed to the knife. I will quarter your carcass and feed it to the dogs. Your bones I will grind to dust and cast to the winds. I will strike down those who speak your name or the name of your fathers, until ‘Yursalka’ becomes as meaningless as infant babble. I will blot you out, hunt down your every trace! The track of your life has come to me,

TaoHorror

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« Reply #177 on: August 30, 2017, 09:48:43 pm »
Solip - Not sure what your point is - no government is "great". Some are more effective than others in promoting "successful" society given human reality. If we were this or that is simply day-dreaming. Don't see a "better" alternative to Democractic Republics ( voting people in to do the work of government with constitutional protections ). We've grown in population and technological proliferation yielding a complexity too daunting for a single individual to manage. You're accurate on the weakness of democracy, the solution is to proliferate education to as many as possible. And even that, won't "solve" problems with corruption, pettiness, stupidity ... unfortuneately, those qualities are here to stay, my friend. Constitutional balance of power mechanisms have yeilded the "best" results thus far. What else could there be?

Woden - disagree, you're giving humanity too much credit to sport the competence for true conspiracy ( conspiracy would be an impressive achievement and a relief if there was indeed one - but simply beyond our grasp ). There are human networks operating in the leadership superstructure, but they evolve/devolve, change directions and don't amount to "conspiracy". The "bad"/"corrupt"/"destructive" decisions of government stem from incompetence, not evil manipulation.
It's me, Dave, open up, I've got the stuff

TLEILAXU

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« Reply #178 on: August 31, 2017, 03:21:36 am »
That's pretty much why GMO's are even 'allowed' to exist - remove them and there simply isn't enough food production to feed everyone. Europe would lift that ban tomorrow if the US decided to ban production and millions of people around the world started dying of starvation - call it altruistic to hide the fact that the economic vacuum left behind would make billions for those that fill it...
I wouldn't be so sure of that. Asian and African nations for sure, yes, but the EU is ideologically deeply committed to this path.

Anyway, eugenics will need that to really take off, but strong AI not so much. Machine Leaning AI's are economically some of the most well funded research projects today, which are precursors to strong AI. Its still a big step up from there, but we're getting there.
I'm probably sounding like a broken record by now, but I firmly believe this will never happen.

I think MSJ meant 'organically' as in it will naturally happen over time and trying to push it 'before people are ready' will have the opposite effect. I'm with you though, little we do as humans is 'natural', and thinking that eugenics crosses some kind of line that hasn't already been crossed to me is a sort of a fundamental misunderstanding of reality.
But will it though? Look at the public perception of GMOs, they seem to be getting worse and worse. It's not going to come UNTIL the zeitgeist itself changes, and that won't happen without active participation. Also, we should use another term than eugenics  8). It's too associated with the disastrous pseudo science of the early 20th century

"Playing God" is equally nebulous as far as I'm concerned, and then we're back to rehashing "whose god, who gets to decide, why them, shouldn't there be some kind of vote, why is voting better than..." etc. etc.
Even ignoring that, Humanity started playing god when we started cultivating farmland, domesticating animals, and genetically modifying our enslaved animals/plants via animal husbandry and cultivation. Eugenics has been around for nearly as far back as human history goes, applying it directly at the genetic level is more of the same if you ask me.
"GMO" is a meaningless term used by some groups to stay in control. Nearly everything in an industrialized country is genetically modified. From the grass we walk on to the food we eat. :)
Humans have been playing God since their ancient microbial ancestors performed horizontal gene transfer in the oceans billions of years ago  8)

But, take for example abortion. We can't even begin to decide that what is the right way to handle this situation. The left, it doesn't matter it's the woman's body, the right any and all abortions is murder. It probably lies somewhere in the middle and there are ways to prevent having abortion.
More like it's completely fucking arbitrary, if you ask me  8) ABORTIONS FOR ALL! From my throne of aborted fetuses I shall command my baby-devouring legions to spread Monsanto's GMO maize across the stars.

But, maybe that shit was meant to be manipulated and what if we manipulate it in the wrong way and boom, disaster!
Nah bro. The only thing that could truly cause disaster is a cosmic event, a big climate change or nuclear war, which is why we should fear World War IV indeed.

MSJ

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« Reply #179 on: August 31, 2017, 03:00:44 pm »
Quote from:  tleilaxu
Nah bro. The only thing that could truly cause disaster is a cosmic event, a big climate change or nuclear war, which is why we should fear World War IV indeed.

What makes you so sure? What if by genetically altering the make up of humans, those new humans think the rest of us are just bugs? What them? What if we Fuck up and give them super -human powers, unlocking something that's in all of us and they use it to destroy mankind? I mean bro, you don't know what will happen til it does, simple and plain. I know, I'm thinking worst case scenario here. But, better that than owe we can Fuck around and make these babies super smart and everything will be just fine. We all live in peace and harmony. I think it's quote better to expect the worse and pray for the best. Just my 2 cents.
“No. I am your end. Before your eyes I will put your seed to the knife. I will quarter your carcass and feed it to the dogs. Your bones I will grind to dust and cast to the winds. I will strike down those who speak your name or the name of your fathers, until ‘Yursalka’ becomes as meaningless as infant babble. I will blot you out, hunt down your every trace! The track of your life has come to me,