X-Message-Number: 17128
From: "George Smith" <>
References: <>
Subject: Magic, Elitism, and the Triple Delusion
Date: Fri, 27 Jul 2001 12:41:23 -0700

First MAGIC:

Thomas R Mazanec writes in part:

 "Thousands of people, at most, have signed up for cryonics. Why do 99.9% of
the smart, educated, wealthy population have nothing to do with cryonics? "

Especially the "experts" in the fields of science, right?

Ladies and gentlemen!  Step a little closer please.  I have before me a
shiny, bright twenty dollar gold piece!  Please observe carefully what I do
with it.  If YOU can correctly guess WHICH hand the gold piece is in, I will
GIVE it to you no strings attached!

Now watch carefully as I place it into my left hand.  Now, folks, I am
holding BOTH of my closed fists in front of you.  Who would like to guess
first?

Ah, the little lady with the bonnet says it is in THIS hand.  Sorry, my
dear, but as you can plainly see my left hand is empty.

Ah, the famous, rich and brilliant expert in human psychology, Dr. Sigmund
Freud, is present and he says it is in my right hand.

Dr. Freud, I am willing to give you my $20 gold piece IF you are right, but
now you have the advantage over me.  The little lady has already guessed
wrong and you already know it is NOT in my left hand.

Dr. Freud would you be willing to compensate me with a small wager if YOU
are wrong?  Shall we say a mere $5?  A mere $5 pittance against the
possibility of winning a $20 solid gold coin?

Very well, I will shake your hand to seal the bargain.

Oh!

You see the coin is NOT in my RIGHT hand either!

And THANK YOU, Dr. Freud, for paying your wager as a gentleman!

(Curtain closes).

The "experts" in scientific fields have offered historical evidence for the
reality of the paranormal phenomena of precognition by continuously scoring
statistically BELOW chance in regard to predicting the future.  They "know"
when the coin is in the right hand.

But what you DON'T know can kill you.

The REALLY smart, "educated" people do not ASSUME that cryonics won't work.
They cover ALL bets.  Right hand.  Left hand.  Somewhere else.  Maybe
something we don't know about yet.

And now,

ELITISM:

Mike Perry writes in part (message  #17120: Infinite Self-Worth):

"In fact, I think people can be assigned an infinite *potential* self-worth,
based on ideas and hopes I have about immortality. If things go as they
should, their "worth" (however you reasonably define it), though always
finite, should go to infinity over infinite time, as they develop and
progress to ever higher levels. This should avoid the problem that somehow
a person could be rated or feel "worthless"."

Frankly, this DOES compel me to some agreement.

If I were to choose who should die, a mortalist or an immortalist (potential
immortalist, if you prefer), the mortal goes down the tube.  If you wish to
assign value to a human being BASED ON HIS ACTIONS then the immortalist is
worth many (infinite?) lives as he lives them as opposed to the single
mortal who is done in maybe 100 years or less.

To kill a true immortal would be equivalent over time to killing more than
all the people who have ever lived to date.   If duration is the value we
would assign to a person, one immortal is worth more than six billion
mortals.

A rather scarey thought.

Mike continues:

"Having a basic sense of self-worth I do not see as a detriment, properly
handled, but really a
benefit and something essential."

Of course, the question is essential for what?  If one can live effectively
(MORE effectively in my experience) without a "basic sense of self-worth",
then it is clearly not essential.  But Mike continues in his explanation:

"People who, like the devout Buddhists,
point to their physical housing and say, "there's no person in here," may
feel great bliss. But how many of them are signed up? As far as I can tell,
they simply are not interested."

I am not promoting Buddhism.  Some aspects of that religion are correct.
Some are not.  What I AM suggesting is that first assuming you must assign a
value (self-worth) to yourself, is unnecessary though popular, and can
commonly lead to depression and suicide.

Self esteem (self worth, etc.) is popular through out history in all
cultures.  So is the need for the individual to subsume his best personal
interests to the needs of the social groups around him.  In fact, I suspect
that this is the historical origin of self esteem, tribal peer pressure
which becomes internalized.

As we age we tend to not maintain our physical and mental skills.
Exceptions aside, until technology fixes this situation, individuals tend to
deteriorate with time.  IF they operate on assigning themselves a value
based on their capabilities, sooner or later MOST people have to lower their
self assigned value.

This leads to depression and suicide in all its various forms.  Not signing
up for cryonics as an informed decision is just another form of suicide in
my opinion.

TRIPLE DELUSION

James in Message #17121 wrote in part:

"Regarding self and identity I liked George's later post and got the feeling
from it that
identity could be independent from memory. I could be wrong. I have a
notion, a purely
subjective hunch, that if I were to suffer total amnesia (if that is
possible) I would
still consider my self as having worth. I would still have the desire to
survive and if
I had that I at least have some sense of worth or why bother the effort to
survive? Like
I said it's only a hunch and welcome comment from anyone with knowledge of
how amnesia
victims view themselves."

If I am correct on this (and I could be wrong) this "sense of worth" is
something only humans do through the use of language by accepting and
perpetuating a triple delusion.

The first part of the delusion is that the experiencer can be experienced
(sort of impossible if you think about it), that the essential "self" can be
known like I can know about a pencil.  To get the magician to open his other
hand we only need ask the question of any experience, "WHO is experiencing
this?"  (In one hand is experience.  In the other is the "self").

The second part of the delusion is deciding to IDENTIFY with things which in
experience CAN be known, such as skills, social roles, physical attributes,
etc.  In other words, after we decide there is a "self" which can be somehow
known, we begin to include a wide range of arbitrary things to call "me".

The third part of the delusion is allowing the VALUE we assign to the items
we have identified as "us" to be our value too.  This is the creation self
worth.  It starts as soon as we learn language.  The next time you are
around a parent with a small child just listen.

"That's right, Johnny.  You did what Mommy asked.  You are a GOOD boy".
Johnny begins to mentally repeat this in his own mind and thus is created
some "positive self esteem".  And, of course, the contrary is also true.
You are a BAD boy!" becomes some degree of "negative self esteem".

It is not necessarily easy to leave the self worth delusionary paradigm.  It
is cross cultural and ancient.  It infests virtually every aspect of human
life.

But the simple fact of the matter is that it is an unnecessary mental
(triple) step.  You do not have to feel a sense of worth to seek pleasure
and avoid pain, which is hard wired into our nervous system.  You do not
have to feel a sense of self worth to plan for achieving goals, struggle to
pay the bills nor seek success in romance, finance or discourse.

Reward is rewarding.  Pain is painful.

No price tags for participants are required.

Step right up, folks.  Guess which hand holds the $20 gold piece and you
WIN!

Just my opinion,

George Smith
CI member

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