X-Message-Number: 10621
Date: Wed, 21 Oct 1998 07:49:28 -0700
From: Peter Merel <>
Subject: Scarcity and Christianity

Thomas Donaldson writes,

>It is a fundamental tenet of economics, with which I agree, that there
>will ALWAYS be scarcity in some form or another. 

Oh, certainly, there's only so much resource accessible to us at any time;
even if nanotech increases that amount vastly, we're still dealing with a
kind of scarcity. But in another sense - that of human need - nanotech
apparently does end scarcity. When every human person on the planet can live
better than Bill Gates does today, without the exertion of any further
human labor, there's no scarcity in the sense that gnaws the guts. 
Scarcity moves from the realm of exigency to that of opportunity, 
and socioeconomics must follow along.

For Will Dye and Lea Wagner:

>> Jesus is not against saving lives by un-natural ways, he did it 
>> himself. Therefore no christians should be either.  
>
>Still, I like the argument.  I think we should focus less on "natural" 
>as an indicator of God's will, and more on compassion, courage, etc.  

I wonder whether Genesis 3:22 might be more problematic:

 And the LORD God said, "The man has now become like one of us, knowing good
 and evil. He must not be allowed to reach out his hand and take also from 
 the tree of life and eat, and live forever." 

If anything technological sounds like the tree of life, cryonics seems
to be it.

Peter Merel.

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