From: p_chikara@hotmail.com
Date: Sun Aug 03 2003 - 18:20:55 MDT
> So in what way are we misreading predecessors? You do not give any
>examples, just suggestive quotes that they "had the same ideas" (or
> rather, have ideas similar to the ones we develop in the light of
> current knowledge and ideas).
That's it: since these ideas have been around I think it's not productive to
go through the motion of selling them again as "new" by grouping them under
a new brand; doing so sounds like a sleazy marketing move. Even if the only
contribution of extropianism to these ideas would have been an update in the
light of current knowledge, I'd say might as well also pick-up the old name
to do it and to improve on it. It is the honest thing to do and it is
usually the way philosophical views are thoroughly included into the
academic culture network, wich would be the best thing to do since they
would be diffused at least as much as other philosohers who addressed the
question of technology like Ellul, Heidegger, Latour, Marcuse, Dewey,
Ortega, Mumford etc and shine to their full potential.
> extropianism is just a materialism and
> realizing it by droping the usless brand name would be the mature thing to
> do for it would help in getting credibility and real life traction to our
> common dreams.
> Rejoice! You are not an extropian, you are a materialist ! :-)
>
>But what kind of materialist? Marxist materialist? Epicurean
>materialist? Reductive or eliminative materialist? That I am a
>materialist does not tell much about my ethics, my ideas of what
>constitutes the good life, my ideas of how knowledge can be acquired and
>applied. Saying extropianism is just materialism is like saying it is
>just optimism - it takes a part (which is not even essential, since
>there are Christian extropians who presumably are not materialists) and
>says it is all.
Making-up a word like "extropian" doesn't tell anything to anyone: it's much
worse! :-)
So our intellectual contribution should go to specifying what we mean by
materialism, I don't see the need to make it a "double-whammy" but for those
who do, I suggest immortalist materialist (would it be presumptuous of me to
suggest my own interest, hedonist materialist wich is also an immortalism?
Probably since this list is PG-13 isn'it? :-). I'll go further (out of my
league): one who understands matter is very likely to be an immortalist so
simply claiming to be a materialist is enough to tell about one's ethics etc
Anders, I'll get 'round the rest of your interesting answer later.
Sébastien Chikara
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