X-Message-Number: 21716 From: "Mark Plus" <> Subject: The Blue Pill People have their own journal now. Date: Tue, 06 May 2003 12:53:10 -0700 Check out some of the articles, available on the Web, from the new print journal, "The New Atlantis": http://www.thenewatlantis.com/ Especially this choice piece by Leon Kass: http://www.thenewatlantis.com/archive/1/kass.htm "A flourishing human life is not a life lived with an ageless body or untroubled soul, but rather a life lived in rhythmed time, mindful of time s limits, appreciative of each season and filled first of all with those intimate human relations that are ours only because we are born, age, replace ourselves, decline, and die and know it. It is a life of aspiration, made possible by and born of experienced lack, of the disproportion between the transcendent longings of the soul and the limited capacities of our bodies and minds. It is a life that stretches towards some fulfillment to which our natural human soul has been oriented, and, unless we extirpate the source, will always be oriented. It is a life not of better genes and enhancing chemicals but of love and friendship, song and dance, speech and deed, working and learning, revering and worshipping. The pursuit of an ageless body is finally a distraction and a deformation. The pursuit of an untroubled and self-satisfied soul is deadly to desire. Finitude recognized spurs aspiration. Fine aspiration acted upon is itself the core of happiness. Not the agelessness of the body, nor the contentment of the soul, nor even the list of external achievement and accomplishments of life, but the engaged and energetic being-at-work of what nature uniquely gave to us is what we need to treasure and defend. All other perfection is at best a passing illusion, at worst a Faustian bargain that will cost us our full and flourishing humanity." Fortunately the Venturists are hard at work on a new print magazine to present our viewpoint in opposition to such fecklessness. Mark Plus _________________________________________________________________ The new MSN 8: advanced junk mail protection and 2 months FREE* http://join.msn.com/?page=features/junkmail Rate This Message: http://www.cryonet.org/cgi-bin/rate.cgi?msg=21716