From: Greg S. BartelsTo: technology@lists.village.virginia.edu Subject: Re: Technological advance and its consequences Date: Wednesday, December 09, 1998 7:13 PM back from vacation, a couple of interesting posts... here's a snippet from "Brad McCormick, Ed.D." >Wouldn't it make sense, therefore, to try to channel >research (etc.) into areas where the payoffs at least seem >relatively more likely to be constructive and less likely >to lead to waking nightmares? More public health-oriented "more constructive" and "waking nightmares" are meanings we invented. (i.e. they're subjective) there is no empirical test you can invent to put something on the "waking nightmare" scale, (although the skovill units is a pretty good scale for hell) ;) so what you're left with is for people to decide what's constructive and what's waking nightmare material, and then have them allocate money on it. that, theoretically, is what already happens in government sanctioned research. the money is funneled down the constructive holes and away from the nightmare holes. the problem comes from the simple fact that you will never have unaninimity on any possible topic. then what do you do? at that point it becomes a political process of voters, lobbyists, and Phd's taking congressmen out for wild nights on the town in hopes of getting a grant. its not a technological issue, its an issue with the political process. is there a political philosophy list somewhere? here's my soapbox... Socrate wanted 'philosopher kings' because he believed that the democratic government currently running things was in the process of collapsing. I believe it eventually did get overrun some time later. philosopher kings would figure out what is 'right' and what is 'justice' and implement that in the system. Plato believed these concepts existed first and that reality came after it. he was an idealist. (my version of Socrates in 50 words or less) anyway, we dont have philosopher kings, and people have been struggling with a political system that is fair, just, and good, but the problem is that it takes people to define fair just and good, and people just aint fair just and good if left to their own devices. that's why they want a government anyway, because there's a lot of unfair, unjust, and bad people running around. so, in short, people are their own problem.
Here's a snippet from "Ken Chen">( BW)(ISSO) Stunning Top Secret Military Documents Published On Internet >Revealing Recovery of Extraterrestrial Vehicles and Bodies During Truman >Administration Hell yes, little green men (and green, long legged, sultry, blue haired women) have been vacationing on earth for thousands of years. the sphynx, pyramids, the statues on Easter Islands, and the Aztec and Incan pyramids are all remnants of a once great and glorious amusment park built here on Earth. developed by the Ko'lth Oqur-in from the Wli-Ro system, around 3700 BC, Earth was one of the most commerciallized alien tourist traps in this sector of the galaxy. It enjoyed amazing commercial success for some time and expanded to Venus for a period until the wide-spread capitalism had deforested that planet and its entire eco-sphere collapsed. Earth remained however and flourished for thousands of years as the most popular tourist trap, gambling site, and brothel (though only unofficially on that last item). As the local lifeforms began to evolve and advance, it was relatively easy for the owners to keep them away from the sites through an occasional 'act of god' which consisted of explosions, fire, and laser light shows used by one of the local music acts. for many thousands of years this continued until bankruptcy befell the Ko'lth Oqur-in when they made some bad investments in some crooked deals that went sour. the tourist trap of Earth was shut down and most of it was sold for scrap, except for the objects to large to transport off the planet. but advertising broadcast thousands of years ago are still traveling through space and occassionally get picked up by inhabitants of the other galaxies, who then make a trip to Earth, only to find everything is shut down. Those coming from backwater galaxies usually come for the amusement park, and occasionally are niaeve enough to ask a government official for directions, only to be led into an airforce hanger and sliced up. those coming because of teh brothel advertisements are usually the one causing all the livestock mutilations. This usually stems from a mismatch in the anatomy of alian and livestock, which usually kills both the alien and the bovine in question. (for those unaware of the fact, most intelligent lifeforms evolve into quadrapeds with four stomachs resembling what we call a Guernsey cow. Humans are considered quite ugly on almost every other civilization. Earth's evolution seems to have been upset several thousand years ago by a Ko'lth Oqur-in research scientist who was using humans as guinee pigs to develop a serum for a primitive, but intelligent, gernsey, who was infected with a nasty virus. The virus killed off the intelligent strain of cows,. and cross experiments accidentally passed intelligence onto humans. a genetic vaccine had gone bad.) which all fits in with the subject of this email: Re: Technological advance and its consequences Greg --- from list technology@lists.village.virginia.edu --- **