måndagen den 30 april 2001 18:14 Brent Allsop wrote:
>
> > In fact, just adding a friendly SI to the current world is not
> > obviously going to help. How is it really supposed to make religious
> > fanatics nicer?
...
> The only reason the religious fundamentalists fight and war
> with each other is because they all believe in a different God and
> they think their particular God is God, that he is undeniably so, the
> implication being that all others that do not think the same are the
> enemy and must be destroyed. But when people really come in contact
> with a Real Undeniable God that can do real good miracles, they will
> finally all say: "Boy, that God IS God" and "My God was nothing even
> close to this!"... Finally there will be no more reason to fight and
> kill each other!
Do you really think so? When the SI parts the Red Sea, feeds the worlds
hungry, demonstrates that it can give total bliss and explain everything,
they will just say: "So what? You are note a real god, since you were created
by humans. *God* is beyond the universe and far, far beyond what you are. In
fact, He even predicted you - read Revelations about the Antichrist!"
You make the mistake to apply our way of thinking (highly empirical,
rationalist) to people who do not think that way (religious fanatics). Sure,
plenty of them will fall to the lure of the SI, but given what we know of
human nature the SI would likely have to resort to direct brain surgery to
convince some of them. Which is of course the problem: exactly how far do we
allow a "friendly" entity to go in its quest to help us? I would definitely
not support such an entity if it ignored the right to one's life, body,
thoughts and property.
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