Re: Meet the 'transhumanists' behind the Pentagon terror casino

From: Mike Lorrey (mlorrey@yahoo.com)
Date: Tue Aug 05 2003 - 13:42:16 MDT

  • Next message: Anders Sandberg: "Re: Power from human blood"

    My local newspaper printed an editorial disparaging to the PAM, though
    it blamed Poindexter as the architect of it, innacurate as that is.
    Here is a letter to the editor I just sent off to them:

    To the Editor,
    I happen to know Robin Hanson personally. He is the fellow, an
    assistant prof at George Mason University, who came up with the whole
    idea behind the Pentagon's Policy Analysis Market, which you so snidely
    call the "Terror Futures Market". I also happen to have read quite a
    few of his scholarly papers, so I believe I am far more informed than
    you are to render judgement on the PAM as a means of predicting future
    terrorist events.
    It turns out that markets are far better at predicting future events
    than intelligence services that governments run. Why? Because a market
    turns every participant in it into an informer to the rest of the
    market on what they know that may impact the market. This is a far
    better intelligence gathering network than any government could ever
    afford on its own.
    Many liberal politicians that you editors admire think that the PAM is
    "morbid", "sick", even "evil", simply because it tries to reward people
    for correctly predicting future events. Like some modern day Cassandra
    (and I'll note that she wasn't popular in her day either), the PAM
    would accurately predict events far better because it essentially
    bribes terrorists, their associates, family members, and neighbors into
    becoming informants to the rest of the world on their activities.
    What I would like to know is, are investors in the PAM any LESS morbid
    than you buying life insurance on your spouse's life? At least with the
    PAM, only an attempt need be made for investors to win. Nobody HAS to
    die. The PAM is intended to help prevent terrorist attacks.
    For you to collect on your wive's insurance, she has to die. In this
    respect, I'd say that you are far more morbid to buy life insurance on
    a family member than to invest in the PAM. I think you owe an apology somewhere...

    =====
    Mike Lorrey
    "Live Free or Die, Death is not the Worst of Evils."
                                                        - Gen. John Stark
    Blog: Sado-Mikeyism: http://mikeysoft.zblogger.com
    Flight sims: http://www.x-plane.org/users/greendragon/
    Pro-tech freedom discussion:
    http://groups.yahoo.com/group/exi-freedom

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