getting back to an old subject...

[Tony Scharf]

On Sat, Apr 14, 2012 at 7:50 AM, Peter Korsten <peter at severity-one.com> wrote:
>
> Iain M.Banks describes Gert's vision of an ideal society in the Culture
> novels. It's a society based on abundance, and hyper-intelligent machines.
> It relies on several premises:
> * those hyper-intelligent machines are benign
> * people find nothing more important than to belong to society; ostracism is
> the worst possible punishment
> * there's an infinite amount of energy and materials
>


For hyper-intelligent machines substitute 'Humans', and for people,
substitute 'dogs'.

Pretty accurately describes a dogs view of the world...(at least in my
less than awake brain).

>
> Actually, I find Banks' socialist Utopia rather objectionable. The people
> are without exception hedonistic, narcissistic and egotistical. The natural
> world is there to be exploited.
>

Its very star trek like, and while I love trek..I have always felt it
was a bit too optimistic about the future.

I mean, seriously....a 15 year old boy with access to a holodeck, and
he wants to hang out on the bridge with the captain?  Nope.

> In contrast, my niece is currently taking a university course in sustainable
> development in South Africa. And whilst I get the impression that part of
> the ideas sustainable development is rather idealistic and political in
> nature, and would perhaps not stand up to scientific scrutiny, it is a very
> different way of looking at things.
>
> And in my opinion, it's also a much fairer one. Not just to the people
> around us, but also the entire world.
>

What we need is an evolutionary leap.  We need better people.
Eventually, nature will oblige us (or maybe not) but thats the
problem.  We have done a lot to change how we live, but our collective
behavior has a long way to go still.

Tony