From: Jeff Davis (jrd1415@yahoo.com)
Date: Sat Jul 26 2003 - 21:44:50 MDT
--- "Robert J. Bradbury" <bradbury@aeiveos.com> wrote:
> I believe that I subscribe to an "extropic" moral
> code ...
Robert, I consider you a person of good faith, so I'm
ready to accept that this exi-code is probably a good
thing. I just don't understand the details, and, at
first glance, the sacrifice of 10^8 real in-the-flesh
folks now, for a gazillion could-be folks later,
doesn't move me towards a favorable view.
> I was looking at the distinction between a one time
> cost of 10^8 human lives vs. 10^14 human lives *per
> second*.
> Few, if any, individuals seem to have picked up on
> the magnitude of the problem I was raising.
I get the size thing, Robert--a one time cost of 100
million vs. 100 trillion every second for the rest of
the age of the universe. Mucho big difference
numerically, absolutely. I'm willing to give you
that.
My problem is that 10^8 x 1 = 10^8, but 10^14 x (the
number of seconds remaining in the life of the
universe) x ***ZERO*** = ZERO. To me, a potential
life, a never-would-have-been-born-otherwise life gets
a coefficient of actuality--and corresponding
coefficient of value--of zero. Once you're born and
living, you *count*. Woulda-coulda-shoulda been alive
is nothing, zero, a fantasy. This in turn means that
you're proposing killing ten million for (what seems
to others to be) nothing.
Consequently, it's up to you to show that it isn't
nothing, and that it rises to a level justifying the
shocking violence you ask us to consider. I'm ready
to give you a fair hearing. Everything you've written
before tells me you're not some homicidal wacko.
Nevertheless, I think you have your work cut out for
you.
Best, Jeff Davis
"Believe nothing, no matter where you read it, or who
said it--no matter if I have said it--unless it agrees
with your own reason and your common sense."
Buddha
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