X-Message-Number: 4689
From: 
Date: Sun, 30 Jul 1995 14:59:04 -0400
Subject: history

Even though the work level is several fathoms over my head, I can't resist a
few more words about the sweep of history.

While some rough categories of events often recur--or have done so in certain
time frames--the cyclical view of history is basically naive, primitive, and
superficial. Taken to extremes, it produces such market-theory absurdities as
"Elliott waves" or even"Kondratieff waves." (I won't add now to my past
comments on these, R.I.P.)

There are many examples of essentially irreversible watersheds in history, or
ratchets, since the emergence of homo sap. Once we had metals, stone tools
and weapons were essentially done, period. Once we had agriculture and
domesticated animals, hunting for a living was essentially done, period. And
now that we have modern research and organizational methods, they (or
improvements) will continue to be applied--simply because they produce
results and overwhelm the competition, period.

Obviously, none of this means that calamities can't occur. In particular, we
know that modern technology and organization can coexist with brutal polities
and psychopathic societies. But at least we can be very sure that, barring
the collapse of civilization, technology will continue to advance, and its
fruits will include just about everything we have imagined, as well as a
great many things we have not imagined. Again, this leaves open many hazards
to particular individuals and organizations in local spacetime, but the sweep
is undeniable.

Even some of the truly pessimistic aspects of recent history may be overdone.
A notable example is the unrestrained breeding of the lower classes and the
backward countries. These women will not submit indefinitely to being used as
baby machines and household drudges; they are learning to want & demand a
better life, and the numbers are beginning to tell the story.

Human stupidity is formidable but not invincible. People and institutions--if
they survive long enough--do eventually learn. Masochists and ideologues to
the contrary notwithstanding, the general rule is that people want pleasure &
security, defined in simple and natural ways--and this implies a long,
healthy life in a stable and reasonably free society. 

I am not a short term optimist, as I have often repeated. I remember all too
well the failed predictions of the past--including suspended animation being
"just around the corner" every ten years or so. Keep your guard up, circle
the wagons, save your money, support your organization and its research--do
as much as you can to shift the odds in our favor, until you reach the point
where you think you are sacrificing too much for an uncertain future at the
expense of life in the present. But if you have to choose between the
cyclical view of history and the millennial, the former choice is both wrong
and counterproductive.

Robert Ettinger
Cryonics Institute
Immortalist Society 


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