From: Natasha Vita-More (natasha@natasha.cc)
Date: Thu Jul 10 2003 - 16:07:17 MDT
At 08:12 PM 7/10/03 +0200, Gui wrote:
>Now, this is an interesting discussion. I often wonder how a movement so
small in absolute numbers >can afford fragmentation, and whether
consolidating (joining forces) would make more sense. It is >difficult to
characterize differences between ExI and WTA without using politically
overcharged words >(which can upset some people).
I cannot speak for Foresight or any other organization, however from ExI's
stance, there is not a tendency to use politically overcharged words when
referring to any other organization within the transhumanist
community. ExI has never accused an organization of being politically
incorrect. There has been no need to due to a level of confidence ExI has
exuded over the years.
>Try this: A large part of the most vocal members of ExI tend to favor
spontaneous order over planning in social issues - A large >part of the
most vocal members of WTA tend to favor planning over spontaneous order in
social issues.
>Here, I have said it without using politically overcharged words [right,
left, libertarian, socialist, fascist, communist, anarchist, ...] >but I am
sure that some will still disagree with my (admittedly oversimplified)
statement.
Good.
>I, like many, am a member of both organizations and try, time allowing,
to contribute to both. I appreciate the value of both views, >and respect
both, but the point I wish to make is: my experience first as a person,
then as an engineer, then as a manager, tells >me that the right thing is
ALWAYS some kind of reasoned mix of spontaneous order and planning. Getting
it right is an >engineering, quantitative problem.
>I also think that "pure" positions at one or the other extreme are naive
in the best case, very dangerous in the worst case.
>I wonder how many agree with this point of view. If many do, as I hope,
then I do not see any fundamental problem if we wish to >have more
collaboration and less competition between ExI and WTA.
Yes. Since I'm for democracy, I think that our community needs to refrain
from issuing labels onto people. Please remember, ExI is not a competitive
organization. We have been here a long time and just keep doing what we
do. ExI has been supportive of new organizations and will continue to be,
regardless of religious sentiment or political extremism, but this does not
mean that we will advocate an organizations religious or political
views. Anyone competing with ExI is doing it on their own behalf and ExI
does not have to participate. All ExI has to do is continue striving for
excellent and keep doing what it does best.
Natasha
>###Natasha: Work directly with other organizations for a team-effort and
>one in which each organization decides what their contribution will be to
>the goal rather than duplicating the same thing (we see this with
>Foresight Institute's gatherings which is pretty much the same as the ExI
>community; and also with WTA's membership and goals which tends to be a
>duplication of ExI. If Foresight focused on nanotechnology and encouraged
>its members to be members of ExI, we would have more money and better
>advantage. Further, if WTA had joined forces with ExI rather than try to
>compete, we would have had a much larger community that would have been
>more diverse and copacetic to transhumanist goals.###
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