From: Anders Sandberg (asa@nada.kth.se)
Date: Mon Feb 03 2003 - 09:20:58 MST
On Mon, Feb 03, 2003 at 07:28:33AM -0800, Rüdiger Koch wrote:
> --- Anders Sandberg <asa@nada.kth.se> wrote:
> > Overall, it may have a
> > chilling effect on the debate, and represents a dangerous step
> > that should be opposed firmly and loudly.
>
> The problem seems to be that it gets fashionable in the US and Europe
> to transform democratic structures into bureaucratic and eventually
> totalitarian structures. Maybe it doesn't make that much sense any more
> to oppose each single law and instead try to remind the law making
> bodies that they must take the respective constitution more serious
> than the lobbyists. This seems most urgent in the US which is already
> sliding down a slippery road to totalitarism.
It is popular to blame lobbyists, but one has to remember that it is
the citizens that largely endorse the system and keep incumbents in
power by not speaking out. There is nothing inevitable in democratic
declines, it is just that it is both a public good problem and that
many feel it hard to struggle against "the way things are". But in the
end it is a cultural matter.
Perhaps the thing to aim for is to create institutions that prevent
such bureaucratic-totalitarian slides (division of power,
accountability, freedom of information rules, budget limitations) and
to create institutions intended to bootstrap the next reasonable
government after the current one has calcified.
> Personally, I find the current copyright craze even more scary. And
> when I read how eagerly McCarthy's heirs (Homeland foobar) grab power
> in the US I am glad to live on the east side of the Atlantic ocean.
> Hope the Americans don't wait 'till witch hunting starts.
A lot hinges on the civil society and its values. That is why I'm not
that worried about the US becoming McCarthyland (or Europe, for that
matter), there is too much diversity and acceptance of diversity these
days. Which doesn't mean things can't become very nasty, but it seems
likely that the "forces of evil" do not have the cultural advantage
even if they gain the organisational advantage. But the political
developments over the last years have been frightening, mainly because
the new threats against freedom have arrived from very different
directions - anti-terrorism, intellectual property,
internationalisation of law etc. Many of these threats are completely
incidental, the decline of freedom is not a goal at all of the groups
pursuing them. Unintended consequences are everywhere.
I guess one thing we as transhumanists can do is to exploit our
somewhat different perspective. We see technology and humanity
co-evolving, the present merely as a phase in a far greater process
and have great liberty in what issues and concepts to problematize.
That means we can bring fresh perspectives completely outside the
mainstream discourse into it, which is efficient at meeting the often
conventional-thinking based threats.
-- ----------------------------------------------------------------------- Anders Sandberg Towards Ascension! asa@nada.kth.se http://www.nada.kth.se/~asa/ GCS/M/S/O d++ -p+ c++++ !l u+ e++ m++ s+/+ n--- h+/* f+ g+ w++ t+ r+ !y
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