X-Message-Number: 31274
Date: Tue, 16 Dec 2008 19:52:12 -0500
From:
Subject: Re: CI Merchandise suggestion
This is a belated reply to some of Paul Wakfer's
comments in reply to me in CryoMsg 31202 (posted 28 Nov 08):
http://www.cryonet.org/cgi-bin/dsp.cgi?msg=31202
Ben Best wrote:
> > Your short suggestion raises many issues, Doug.
> >
> > Your use of the word "solipsistic" is telling. Literally
> > the word is inappropriate because it refers to epistemological
> > isolation from the world. In an ethical context it has the
> > connotation of being even more isolated from concern about
> > others than the more appropriate terms "egoistic" or "egotistic".
> >
> > Your basic point seems to be that it is more socially
> > acceptable to present radical life extension ("reaching for
> > physical immortality")
Paul Wakfer wrote:
> Please try to refrain from use of the word "immortality" even in the
> sense of "reaching" for it. What life extensionists seek (are
> reaching for) is a lifespan which is both unbounded and constantly
> increasing in total lifetime happiness.
OK, I accept the chastisement.
Ben Best wrote:
> > from a humanitarian than from a selfish
> > point of view. That may be true, but it seems inappropriate
> > to me.
Paul Wakfer wrote:
> Anyone who thinks long range, views widely and evaluates hir choices
> and actions by integrating them with hir entire current and probably
> future environment will not only be constantly trying to optimally
> increase hir lifetime happiness (the ultimate purpose of life
> whether or not s/he knows it), but will also realize that hir
> lifetime happiness can be optimally promoted if and only if all
> others in society are also enabled to each optimally increase hir
> total lifetime happiness and all are actually doing so. In short,
> there is no necessary conflict between egoism and humanitarianism.
The conflict is generally perceived, and this is what Doug Skrecky
was reacting to. In discussing marketing issues, public perceptions cannot
be dismissed as being irrational. They must be acknowledged and
dealt-with. Wrong-headedness is a fact of reality.
Ben Best wrote:
> > Aubrey de Grey has succumbed to the humanitarian
> > approach -- by his own admission as the result of his marketing
> > efforts and his speaking to journalists -- in his references
> > to how many people die every year when describing the
> > potential benefits of SENS.
Paul Wakfer wrote:
> At the beginning it was far worse than that. Aubrey was accusing
> everyone who opposed research, the goal of which was the termination
> of human death from aging dysfunction, of actions morally equivalent
> to promoting, aiding and abetting a holocaust every 2 months. (The
> number of people dying on Earth every 3 months is about equal to the
> number estimated to have been killed by the Nazi perpetrated
> holocaust.)
>
> "Once it is seen that opposing curing
> aging equates to advocating that humanity perpetrate an entire *holocaust*
> every two months, quite a few arguments against life extension seem to
> fall bby[sic] the wayside."
> http://groups.google.com/group/sci.life-extension/msg/77ec90823df432e5
>
> However to his credit, I have not seen any sign of this sort of
> language for the last few years after I strongly rebuked Aubrey for
> such illogical and morally outrageous hype (even though he appeared
> to not understand or agree with me at the time).
Although he does not refer to a holocaust, in Chapter 2 of
ENDING AGING (http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0312367074/)
Aubrey paints a picture of human decimation, with the implication
that indifference has horrific results:
"Around 150,000 people die each day worldwide -- that's nearly two per
second -- and of those, about two-thirds die of aging. That's right,
100,000 people. That's about thirty World Trade Centers, sixty Katrinas,
every single day. In the industrialized world, the proportion of deaths
that are attributed to aging is around 90 percent -- yes that means that
for every person who dies of all causes other than aging added together,
be it homicide, road accidents, AIDS, whatever, somewhere around *ten*
people die of aging."
Ben Best wrote:
> > One reason I think the "humanitarian" approach is
> > inappropriate is because only a tiny fraction of humanity
> > shows any interest in radical life extension.
Paul Wakfer wrote:
> Actually, they can generally be quite easily turned away from this
> immediate culturally indoctrinated response, by a few simple pointed
> questions starting with:
> Do you want to die tomorrow?
> Do you want to die next month, next year, etc?
> If not, then just when do you wish to die and why?
> Then one convinces them that aging dysfunction and suffering is no
> longer necessary.
Not many people will opt to die tomorrow or even next year,
but for most people the concern about future decades quickly
diminishes. Call it highly discounted future value. And when
they have concern, it is mainly concern that they might suffer
in old age, not about death.
Ben Best wrote:
> > The vast majority
> > think that radical life extension is unnecessary for religious
> > reasons. Many of those people believe that it is an evil
> > attempt to thwart God -- or an expression of atheism. (The
> > "medical model" of cryonics is hard to sell.) And the vast
> > majority of atheists have no interest, either.
Paul Wakfer wrote:
> Since neither you nor I have interacted with "the vast majority of
> atheists", I suggest that the above statement is at best a
> hypothesis based on your limited experience.
Induction from a sample to a population is always a hypothesis,
but it many cases the hypothesis is well founded. I believe that
I have had many representative samples that allow for a good induction
allowing generalizations about the population. You believe that my
sampling methods are lousy (despite the fact that you only have
a small sampling of my experience) and have formed a hypothesis
about my sampling. Your induction about my sampling is a poor
hypothesis, I say, but I am not going to argue this point.
Ben Best wrote:
> > I have had
> > extensive experience trying to promote cryonics to humanists
> > and atheists with virtually no success. The main problem is
> > not that they don't think that it will work -- they simply
> > don't have an interest in it, and often think that it is
> > socially undesirable.
Paul Wakfer wrote:
> To counter this, one needs an ethical philosophical basis that
> totally integrates self-interest and humanitarianism. See my essay
> "Social Meta-Needs
> <http://selfsip.org/fundamentals/socialmetaneeds.html#Maslow>: A New
> Basis for Optimal Interaction" at:
> http://selfsip.org/fundamentals/socialmetaneeds.html for a basis of
> the only such consistent and complete philosophy of which I am aware.
You need to test your theory of how well this works
with a large sample of humanists and atheists. My own sampling
experiences leads me to believe that you will not have much
success. Thought experiments are no substitute for real experience.
Ben Best wrote:
> > To me, "Live Forever or Die Trying" actually sounds less
> > "nice" than "I will live forever or die trying". The
> > former sounds like a command telling people to do something
> > which they may not want. I do like the fact that it is
> > shorter and will fit on a bumper sticker. I am not allowing
> > my personal opinions to restrict what CI is offering as
> > bumper stickers, shirts, etc. Although I don't like references
> > to "freezing" (rather than vitrification), death or immortality
> > -- as well as implied guarantees of success -- I have been
> > giving CI Members the slogans on products that they have
> > requested.
Paul Wakfer wrote:
> Good for you, to all of the last sentence.
Thanks. And this brings me to my most important point.
There is still plenty of time to buy shirts, hats,
mugs, bumper stickers and other items with a cryonics/life
extensionist theme to give a Christmas gifts. There is
lots to choose from among the CI merchandise now available:
http://www.cafepress.com/ShopCI
and I am very responsive to suggestions by those who
are wanting to place a large order, but cannot find
exactly the product that they want. CafePress allows
for expedited shipping, if you want to pay extra.
-- Ben Best
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