At 11:11 PM 00/03/06, Zero Powers wrote:
>>From: "john grigg" <starman125@hotmail.com>
>>
>>I really enjoy being on this list. I have learned alot and made some
>>friends in the bargain. I am surprised there are not more people on it. I
>>still feel a little like a "pioneer" by being here.
>
>I believe you *are* a pioneer. I am sure that in 20-30 years when the viability of strong AI and nanotech start to become evident to the world at large, folks will look back to the archived writings and web pages of some of the people on this list and say "hey, those freaks were right all along!"
I had that experience in Russia, where the dissidents were right all
along, and for years were not just disbelieved, but in the best cased
dismissed and shun, and more often than not, persecuted, and living
in fear and poverty. Now everybody knows they were right all along,
but nobody even concentrates on this. People - the healthy, unscared
persecutors and the rest of the crowd who were busy making money and
contacts and having fun while the "pioneers" were bleeding for common
future - now these people own all the results, and they never pay to,
write about, or think of the dissidents.
How many of the Internet billionaires are talking, writing, or
supporting pioneers of the Web and cryptography?
How many times in your life do you hear: "You were right all along.
We were dumb. Now, please have our money"?
I know some aging Russian dissidents in Boston who are still discussing
who was right when, over tea with cheap cakes bought on foodstamps.
Nobody else ever listens.
I am for practicism now. There is little point lamenting that the
world is ungrateful. Not as the main method of self-gratification
anyway. If you are a pioneer, make sure you can benefit from it too.
Or if you are an unselfish pioneer, be prepared to be forgotten.
-----------------------------------------------------------
Sasha Chislenko <http://www.lucifer.com/~sasha/home.html>
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Thu Jul 27 2000 - 14:04:40 MDT