Date: Fri, 23 Feb 2001 08:01:16 -0800
From: "Technotranscendence" <neptune@mars.superlink.net>
Subject: Re: Heston Speech
>> I tend to look down on political theory ... and prefer to judge issues on
>> a case-by-case, situationalist (posthuman aesthetic) way.
>I don't look down on political philosophy, though I look down on certain
>wrong political philosophies.
No political theory is completely correct ... and all are formed out
of past events so might not be relevant in the future. If a theory cannot
be continually modified ... then it is dead meat. And if it is continually
modified, then it cannot ever be formulated ...... so why bother?
>By what means does one "to judge issues on a case-by-case, situationalist
>(posthuman aesthetic) way?" That would seem to mean to me an implicit,
>tacit political philosophy as opposed to an explicit one.
Yes.
>The latter is easier to examine.
Fossils are easy to examine, this is true.
>(Also, I think such "case-by-case" thinking is just how
>the average person and politician approaches matters.
Of course it must be ..... politicians in practice find they cannot
stick to their cumbersome political theories.
>This is how we get
>people who say they are for freedom of expression, but against expression
>they or well established find offensive, such as people who against anyone
>making anti-Christian art.)
Not sure what you mean here, but certainly, a priori offence at
anti-Christian
art is a 'political' theory rather than a case-by-case aesthetic judgement.
>I think also there is a difference between having a rule in this area and
>having principles. The latter are contextual and open-ended, the former
are
>neither. Most people I know don't think of the latter as an alternative to
>the former. They are suspicious of any systematic thinking. I'm not.:)
Principles or guide-lines are "soft rules" as opposed to "hard rules", sure.
I have deliberately never tried to compile any "Posthuman Principles"
though because I *do* distrust (or rather, see little point in) UNIVERSAL
catch-all linguistic formulations that are independent of any empirical test
or evidence. I suppose it is inevitable that we make up Posthuman
*suggestions* from time to time, but maybe shouldn't try to pretend that
such suggestions are immune from change and somehow true for all
time or permanent .. that would be self-defeating for a radical futurist
agenda! And if the extropian principles are updated every year, then
they cannot be very principled principles anyway ... far too short term ..
Steve Nichols
http://www.multi.co.uk/identity.htm
Posthuman Movement
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b30 : Mon May 28 2001 - 09:56:47 MDT