Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!rutgers!aramis.rutgers.edu!klaatu.rutgers.edu!josh
From: josh@klaatu.rutgers.edu (J Storrs Hall)
Newsgroups: comp.society.futures
Subject: Re: Future Work (was Re: prognostications about expert systems)
Message-ID: <Apr.10.20.50.51.1990.1655@klaatu.rutgers.edu>
Date: 11 Apr 90 00:50:55 GMT
References: <2889@rodan.acs.syr.edu> <22190@cs.yale.edu>
Organization: Rutgers Univ., New Brunswick, N.J.
Lines: 47

Rob Jellinghaus writes:

    And JoSH unfortunately didn't state that he's basing his argument on a
    little book called _Engines_of_Creation_, by a chap named K. Eric Drexler.
    I personally believe the book should be required reading for anyone who
    reads this newsgroup, and that applies ESPECIALLY to people who are par-
    ticipating in this discussion.

Actually I have mentioned EoC on this newsgroup before, but I forgot to
give references:
  Engines of Creation: The Coming Era of Nanotechnology, 
  by K. Eric Drexler (foreword by Marvin Minsky)
  Anchor Library of Science, Anchor/Doubleday, NY, 1987
  ISBN 0-385-19973-2

However, EOC/nanotech is not the only source that one can base a
radical post-human futures outlook on.  Another book I've mentioned
here is:
  Mind Children: The Future of Robot and Human Intelligence
  By Hans Moravec;  Harvard Univ Press, 1988
  ISBN 0-674-57616-0

I reccomend these two books as an antidote to ALL the political 
idiocy, on ALL sides, of which we have been seeing here too much of
late.  Compared to the real potentialities (and the real tough
problems these possibilities raise!) most current-day concerns
begin to resemble the War of Jenkins' Ear.

What is of greatest importance is that we should go into this 
future with a sound and consistent moral philosophy in hand.
When Mr. Duddy trots out his ends-justifies-the-means and
don't-look-past-the-symptoms ideas, it is mandatory to point
out where they will lead in the end.  

The major question is simply, what will the superhuman intelligences
of 2100 be?  I think there are two possible answers:  

  (1) The descendants, children if you will, extensions, and 
augmentations of human intellects

  (2) The mechanizations of the bureaucratic processes of 
corporations and the State

Guess which one will happen if we just sit around and let 
nature take its course?

--JoSH