Michael LaTorra wrote:
> Emlyn emlyn@one.net.au wrote:
>
> >What does that mean, though? If you are going to build a do-it-yourself
> >guardian (in the sense of Plato - it was Plato, wasn't it?) then I think
> >that's bad news; the best outcome we can hope for is failure. It's also
> >bloody arrogant.
>
> Yes, it was Plato; and no, I am not proposing a ruling elite of guardians,
> for as the saying goes "Who guards the guardians?"
>
Excellent
>
> >If you are going to become one....
>
> Yep. It's the logical extension of all Transhumanism.
>
Well, greater control over our own presents and futures is the goal of
Transhumanism (I think). Some people define this as Godhood. This is a bit
lazy intellectually, more below.
> >...you either envisage being such a guardian,
> >or maybe raising everyone up to equal status.
>
> The latter.
>
> >In the egalitarian case, where is godhood? It's
> >more powerful beings, sure, but a society of such. So the concept of God
is
> >not useful in that context.
>
> I disagree. It is Olympian. A society of Gods. Such Gods are defined as
such
> by the
> traditional attributes of divinity: immortality, omnipotence, omniscience,
> and so forth.
> I rather the fancy the idea of Zeus Eleutherios, "Zeus the Liberator."
>
Godhood implies perfection, and requires all these absolute abilities;
immortality, omnipotence, omniscience, are good examples.
Really, though, we can never be immortal, omnipotent, or omniscient. We can
live a long time (1000s of years?), we can have much more power over the
universe (moving stellar bodies around), we can know a lot of things (what's
going on at the atomic level in a star on the other side of the galaxy). But
we are fundamentally limited, and always will be.
These "godly" attributes are the limit; we can approach the limit, but never
achieve it. That's ok; we can always improve, and the journey should be
mighty wild! But godhood is not a sensible thing to talk about in this
context; it's just a big ego trip.
>
> >Basically, the concept of God is all about authority, control, dominance.
>
> That's your concept, not mine. Different definitions define our
differences.
>
What's your definition? Being able to do mighty stuff? Then we are gods
compared to our cave dwelling ancestors. Is it useful to sit around dwelling
on our comparative godhood in that context? I don't think so.
>
> >Gods will not help us where we are going. But they could seriously stuff
> >things up.
>
> Godhood is precisely where we are going, as I defined it above. Some of us
> might get there before others. If I get there before you, Emlyn, would you
> like a hand up and some friendly advice, or shall I let you take the long
> way 'round and arrive later after much unnecessary travail? I believe in
> free will and so will not compel you to join us on Olympus. But I would be
> delighted to help you if I can.
If I remember the stories about Olympus correctly, the inhabitants exhibited
decidedly mortal character flaws, although perhaps in godly proportion.
Certainly, there was a rather large helping of arrogance, and an uncommonly
large amount of smiting going on. Kind of like Melrose Place with nuclear
weapons. No thanks.
Anyway, the green movement will be uploading me shortly, so I should do ok.
"Anyone but" Emlyn
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Mon Oct 02 2000 - 17:38:36 MDT