From: Spudboy100@aol.com
Date: Sat Jun 07 2003 - 23:18:04 MDT
Brett, what is disturbing to me is my sense of how few bench researchers
have interest in Transhumanism or cryo, or uploading. Maybe its too new a
concept for them. Or maybe we are all deluded and everything is hopeless, or
maybe there are other answers. (No I am NOT making a stealth attempt to pimp
religion here!).
When I first climbed aboard the Extropian list, I was hoping to see some
scientists promoting Transhumanism, some cosmologists or astronomers writing about
new, wondrous, essays; such as Moravec or Tipler. Basically, it ain't
happening and I am not sure why this is? But we seem to have a dearth of interested
theorists. Harvey Newstrom had a similar question about this last week. I
dunno. :-(
Brett stated:
<<I wonder then if Einstein would regard those who seek to avoid
total personal annihilation not through religion or superstition but
through the scientific pursuit of life extension, uploading, cryonics
etc as feeble souls and ridiculous egoists?
I don't think most transhumanists would think of themselves as
"feeble souls" and "ridiculous egoists".
I'm an atheist, but the psychology of believing is easier for me to
explain than the psychology of disbelieving. I can see how believing
and hoping for some sort of personal survival and continuance
however irrationally, could be an evolutionary advantage enabling
one to pass on one's genes, yet disbelieving in all forms of personal
continuation seems to be self defeating mechanism more likely to
instil depression and hopelessness.>>
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