[0mar]

Omega Point sounds like a benevolent SkyNet. Not my idea of Utopia.

[rsch20]

not necessarily my idea of a utopia either, it could easily be a bad scene for humans (there is no guarantee it would be a 'benevolent skynet', it could be an 'actual skynet'). given the alternatives it seems to be a risk we have to take though, additionally it is a risk we are going to take whether it's a good idea or not. if it can happen, and nothing more serious pre-empts it, then it will happen. whether we want it to or not.

I wanted to address permaculture one more time as well, Omega Point does give rise to thoughts like 'f*** the ecology, full steam ahead!' I agree, and that's a rough concept to accept for some people, especially ones with an 'eco-conscience'. however it's not actually that far off the mark.

Energy Star technology is a good example of this, I'm sure most of the people here have seen the Energy Star symbol in the corner of their monitors when turning it on before. this is a tech that we spent millions of dollars researching, and years of man-hours on. solely for the purpose of making monitors safer. LCD monitors completely obsolete this tech, and if we had spent the Energy Star time and money on real research, we would have had LCD monitors years earlier.

if permaculture is the answer, what are you doing here? lets generously assume you are generating your own electricity in an eco-friendly manner, how about your internet connection? how about everyone else that spends time and energy reading your (2000+) posts, how many man hours do you suppose have been spent reading your posts? how much electricity usage would that equate to? how much of that electricity was generated in renewable and eco-friendly methods? how many of those posts are useful and pertinent?

[Omnitir]

Omega Point sounds like a benevolent SkyNet.

I don’t think so. I think it’s an obscure concept that is difficult to imagine not least of all because we can’t really comprehend what it would be, anymore then an early hunter-gatherer could understand what the industrial revolution was going to be like. Theoretically, Omega Point is as far removed from us today as we today are removed from hunter-gatherer society.

benevolent SkyNet. Not my idea of Utopia.

Are you sure? A global power in charge of everything, running the world immeasurably better then humans ever could, making all the difficult discissions for us on a global scale with everybody’s best interest in mind and no personal motivations, and using it’s considerable cognitive abilities to strive for peace, justice and well-being for all human-kind. Sounds like the best formula for utopia to me. I can’t think of any political system that wouldn’t work better if it were run by intelligent self-aware benevolent computers instead of the current system we have of corrupt politicians feeding their elite rich friends at the expense of the majority.

[rsch20]

couldn't agree more.

[rsch20]

Happy 2011, thought I would resurrect my first post on this site (and my first visit in a year or so) and note that all the links in the original post are still valid.

Happy New Year!