Are you afraid of the future?

[Innula Zenovka]

46 minutes ago, StarlanderGoods said:

Im really torn on the subject. On one side, there are a lot of people who need inmediate aid and that one can help, like you said, starting or joining soup kitches and such.

On the other side, charity is like trying to block the sun with your hands, there are deep, systemic changes needed (globally) to support the dispossessed, and our efforts are maybe better spent trying to change our societies so they care for the ones in need, instead of trying the fill the gaps of absent governments.

It's hardly a question of either/or, though, is it?   There's nothing to stop people from helping those in need here and now, when they can, and also campaigning to support political parties they hope will, at some point in the future, remove the need for such assistance.

 

Edited January 19, 2022 by Innula Zenovka

[Bagnu]

16 minutes ago, Silent Mistwalker said:

Holy hell. Did I start this dumpster fire? I am so sorry! 

LOL, this is a discussion, with everyone respecting each other's opinions. I don't see anything wrong with it. No name calling. Nothing destructive. Perhaps a bit of a debate, but debates are about learning, and they can lead to truth.

Edited January 18, 2022 by Bagnu

[Rolig Loon]

4 minutes ago, Bagnu said:

But there is the concept of why anyone does those things. Is it to make themselves feel good about doing those things, or actual altruism? I can't answer that question. That is another philosophical concept. Or is altruism such as that meant to ensure our survival as a species? Again I can't answer that question.

I can't either, but it's one of the few philosophical questions that can capture my attention and make me wonder about both the human condition and my own place in the world. I refuse to take the cynical position that we are somehow doomed to think of our own security and comforts first while there are unmet needs in the world. Why should I do the right thing?  What is the right thing? And, being practical about it, isn't it enough to at least do what I can even if it's partly because it makes me feel good and maybe get a tax break at the end of the year? I guess I don't see altruism as a goal as much as a path. And maybe it's an answer to why I do not fear the future. (See?  I haven't forgotten what this thread is all about.)  I believe that humanity will prefer to do the right thing and will end up better for it, if we can just keep our eye on the ball.

[Bagnu]

3 minutes ago, Rolig Loon said:

I can't either, but it's one of the few philosophical questions that can capture my attention and make me wonder about both the human condition and my own place in the world. I refuse to take the cynical position that we are somehow doomed to think of our own security and comforts first while there are unmet needs in the world. Why should I do the right thing?  What is the right thing? And, being practical about it, isn't it enough to at least do what I can even if it's partly because it makes me feel good and maybe get a tax break at the end of the year? I guess I don't see altruism as a goal as much as a path. And maybe it's an answer to why I do not fear the future. (See?  I haven't forgotten what this thread is all about.)  I believe that humanity will prefer to do the right thing and will end up better for it, if we can just keep our eye on the ball.

My position is that we have to help ourselves first, before we can help others. We can't help if we aren't in a position to do so. I know one ex drug addict who has become a teacher and drug addict counselor. They couldn't help anyone while they were addicted. I do charity work  for some in my profession. I get no tax break. Do I do that to make myself feel good? I don't know. I just do it.

[Fluffy Sharkfin]

4 minutes ago, Rolig Loon said:

Why should I do the right thing?  What is the right thing?

Honestly I'd be happy if we could just persuade people to stop doing the wrong thing so often, that would be a really good first step!

I'm not talking about the various moral quandaries that we sometimes face where it's hard to tell right from wrong, but the cases where clearly the person making those decisions knows it's wrong (as evidenced by them attempting to hide what they're doing) but goes ahead and does it anyway for whatever stupid, selfish reasons people do wrong things.

11 minutes ago, Rolig Loon said:

I guess I don't see altruism as a goal as much as a path.

I think there's a lot of wisdom in the quote "Be the change you wish to see in the world".  It may not change the hearts and minds of nations or governments or corporations but it can have a real effect on those you come into immediate contact with, and as the saying goes "A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step".

[Katherine Heartsong]

The right thing has for millions of years been driven by the overall drive to reproduce one's species. It's what we're here for in the simplest sense, to make more of ourselves. All life is, form a portent biological point of view.

That continues into the relatively common era of "modern humans" and forms many of the implied behaviours that are required to form small hamlets and tribes and communities to survive. Altruism is ingrained in our DNA. By helping a neighbour we tend to survive better. A common morality is shared as well, except by those individual we term "psychopathic", regardless of where you come from, your ethnicity, even your religion. 95% of the world's population when tested in large population surveys respond the same way to moral quandaries. We've seen this time and time again in studies.

Where we often differ is in our ethics (as opposed to our morality). Ethics, a professor once suggested, is best defined as "Knowing the difference between what is right to do, and what we have a right to do."

I can, for example, choose smoke out of doors even if I know the smoke will drift into someone else's face on the wind (I don't smoke by the way, I just eat too many cookies) from time to time. It's legal for me to do that (i.e., I have the right to do that). But is it right knowing I am interfering with the right of another person to not be hurt (however slightly) or upset by my second hand smoke? I'd say no, others say it's the smokers right. That's the difference between ethics and morality.

Humans try their best to balance individual greed and altruism. Love watching that struggle play out in people, myself included. 

Is it right for me to use a computer (electricity, the rare earth elements mined in horrible conditions by people doing labour none of us could even imagine, using finite resources up for mere entertainment, etc) to merely post opinions on a form?

PS. I do believe the answer to the question "What is the meaning of life?" is best answered by "To reproduce." I know what most people mean though my the word "meaning" and my answer then is usually "To give life meaning." You get to define what that meaning is, but don't waste it, you have usually less than 80 years to show us what you are worth (less in most of the world).

Edited January 19, 2022 by Katherine Heartsong

[Tama Suki]

I took some time to read what you wrote and there are very interesting things that I would like to mention but the thread has become huge and my attention and memorization threshold is quite limited.
So I remain purely on the discourse of eliminating money in a future hypothetical society.
In fact, I gave the example of Star Trek because it seems to me that at the moment this goal is a total utopia.
They tried to do it with communism and it didn't work. But it didn't work not because, as @Fluffy Sharkfin said, there were the wrong people making this revolution.
It didn't work because it was an illusion. The only way you can build such a society is to impose it on the people, so it's a dictatorship. And with all the defects that our society has, I will always prefer it to a dictatorship.
Money is useful because there is a scarcity of resources and it is precisely on that concept that the whole economy that all human society has built is based. I hope I didn't say nonsense.
So the only way to get rid of money I think would be to get rid of the scarcity of resources. Perhaps it will be possible to do this in 1000 years when we have learned to extract matter from the nothing and to manipulate it, transforming it into what we need.
(there are some charlatans who say more or less it can be done with the NFT today but those are charlatans and do not count in this speech).
Then I have no idea how this future hypothetical society can actually work because I am a person who lives in the present and it would be a great inconvenience for me to do without money, I can't even imagine how one can live without owning anything or sharing everything. .
@Bagnu's speech on human nature is not wrong in my opinion, quite the opposite! It is true that human nature changes and adapts but our instincts will always remain more or less the same. We can tame them and educate them as we actually do by evolving, but we will always remain animals because in the end that is what we are. We are not gods. We tend to good and progress but we cannot think of transforming ourselves into something completely different within a few decades.
But anyway I think that it is not long before we discover the last mystery that remains to us about the objective nature of existence and we will probably soon discover how to manipulate matter and realize the old dream of the alchemists.
Having said that, I have great faith in humanity and in the future.
Above all because I think that we are the last most sophisticated evolution of life on this planet and that self-awareness is the winning feature that will allow us to overcome the limits that the very nature of the planet on which we were born imposes on us.

Edited January 19, 2022 by Tama Suki

[Madelaine McMasters]

On 1/17/2022 at 10:22 AM, Arielle Popstar said:

Sure, the rich and powerful financed the design and building of the ocean going ships to travel to the new world like the rich and powerful are also now doing the same for eventual interplanatary travel but what I was contesting/questioning was:

Quote

but they will migrate long after the powerful have established profitable passage and infrastructure at the destinations

I believe you're suggesting that interplanetary "New Worlds" will be as easily inhabitable as those "found" by Columbus, Cabot, da Gama, Vespucci, Magellan and countless others. Nothing could be further from the truth. Getting to new planets is the easy part. Staying there, not so much. In 1492, staying in the Bahamas was a hell of a lot easier than getting there from Spain.

[Arielle Popstar]

36 minutes ago, Madelaine McMasters said:

I believe you're suggesting that interplanetary "New Worlds" will be as easily inhabitable as those "found" by Columbus, Cabot, da Gama, Vespucci, Magellan and countless others. Nothing could be further from the truth. Getting to new planets is the easy part. Staying there, not so much. In 1492, staying in the Bahamas was a hell of a lot easier than getting there from Spain.

In 1492 there were no 5 star hotels yet so surely Colombus had to rough it too. Always going to be man vs beast, man vs man, man vs environment challenges in new worlds. At this point it is pure conjecture the degree of challenge it would be on a new world.

[Coffee Pancake]

9 minutes ago, Arielle Popstar said:

In 1492 there were no 5 star hotels yet so surely Colombus had to rough it too. Always going to be man vs beast, man vs man, man vs environment challenges in new worlds. At this point it is pure conjecture the degree of challenge it would be on a new world.

There has been considerable study, probes, manned missions to the moon, simulated missions on earth .. 

New worlds all have one thing in common .. Nothing that's any good for humans unless we take it with us, and nothing we take with us can survive without more stuff we take with us, and if we don't take exactly the right stuff .. everybody dies.

Simple things like a complete lack of liquid water bring considerable challenges, the least of which being the aforementioned lack of water. Rocks don't weather the same without some fluid to soften them up  .. oh look, a razor blade storm.

Or gravity .. a little less and we atrophy, a little more and we live short painful lives as our joints and heart give up. It will take many generations of Darwinian selection to even start to adapt. On worlds we can't survive on without constant systematic intervention.

It wont be some glamourous testament to man kind the great explorer, it will be an expertly prepared, over trained, over provisioned death trap and everybody will die. And we will try again hoping to learn lessons, and everybody will die, and we must keep trying until we get it right .. but by that point, don't expect us to look much like us anymore.

There is quite literally no place like home.

[Madelaine McMasters]

4 hours ago, Arielle Popstar said:

In 1492 there were no 5 star hotels yet so surely Colombus had to rough it too. Always going to be man vs beast, man vs man, man vs environment challenges in new worlds. At this point it is pure conjecture the degree of challenge it would be on a new world.

What a peculiar understanding you have of "roughing it".

Here's a snippet from Columbus' report to King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella upon his return in 1493...

"In the island, which I have said before was called Hispana, there are very lofty and beautiful mountains, great farms, groves and fields, most fertile both for cultivation and for pasturage, and well adapted for constructing buildings. The convenience of the harbors in this island, and the excellence of the rivers, in volume and salubrity, surpass human belief, unless one should see them. In it the trees, pasture-lands and fruits different much from those of Juana. Besides, this Hispana abounds in various kinds of species, gold and metals. The inhabitants . . . are all, as I said before, unprovided with any sort of iron, and they are destitute of arms, which are entirely unknown to them, and for which they are not adapted; not on account of any bodily deformity, for they are well made, but because they are timid and full of terror. . . . But when they see that they are safe, and all fear is banished, they are very guileless and honest, and very liberal of all they have. No one refuses the asker anything that he possesses; on the contrary they themselves invite us to ask for it. They manifest the greatest affection towards all of us, exchanging valuable things for trifles, content with the very least thing or nothing at all. . . . I gave them many beautiful and pleasing things, which I had brought with me, for no return whatever, in order to win their affection, and that they might become Christians and inclined to love our King and Queen and Princes and all the people of Spain; and that they might be eager to search for and gather and give to us what they abound in and we greatly need."

That's a five star review if ever I read one.

Edited January 20, 2022 by Madelaine McMasters

[Eggy UwU]

Gonna leave this here for this topic:

"What you are basically, deep deep down, far far in, is simply the fabric and structure of existence itself. Reality itself is gorgeous, it is the plenum, the fullness of total joy. ... It is a fireworks show to celebrate that existence is. Wowee." - Alan Watts

[Kalegthepsionicist]

This..

 

 

[Tama Suki]

17 minutes ago, Kalegthepsionicist said:

This..

 

 

This seems very interesting to me.
I'll watch it later.

[Innula Zenovka]

9 hours ago, Arielle Popstar said:

In 1492 there were no 5 star hotels yet so surely Colombus had to rough it too. Always going to be man vs beast, man vs man, man vs environment challenges in new worlds. At this point it is pure conjecture the degree of challenge it would be on a new world.

Yes, but 5 star hotels apart, I think the Bahamas have a few amenities that are not to be found on many other planets, such as a breathable atmosphere, potable water and ambient temperatures and an environment that's not actually hostile to human life.

Edited January 20, 2022 by Innula Zenovka

[Sid Nagy]

It is not for nothing that aliens don't visit us (Well except for the series Ancient Aliens maybe).
For us other environments are hostile, for them most likely ours.
And then there are the astronomical distances.
 

[Pamela Galli]

Earth is not only abundantly compatible with life, it is where the unfathomable occurred: out of dead matter, life arose. 

If that’s not a miracle, it’s pretty close to it.

And we think when we have destroyed it we can just find another.

[Tama Suki]

8 minutes ago, Pamela Galli said:

And we think when we have destroyed it we can just find another.

I don't think any kind of government or head of state would think that after destroying this planet another one could be found.

[Tama Suki]

1 hour ago, Innula Zenovka said:

Yes, but 5 star hotels apart, I think the Bahamas have a few amenities that are not to be found on many other planets, such as a breathable atmosphere, potable water and ambient temperatures and an environment that's not actually hostile to human life.

But humans adapt, that's their asset.
We know that we will soon colonize the moon and this is not science fiction but something that is really happening and in which enormous resources have already been invested.
We just need to find some stone from which to extract energy and essential chemical elements. Then the rest is not difficult.

[Fluffy Sharkfin]

41 minutes ago, Sid Nagy said:

And then there are the astronomical distances.

Then there's the fact that, according to current estimates, our species has only been around for approximately 200,000 years whereas the earth is estimated to be around 4.5 billion years old (with the universe supposedly being 3 times that).  If these estimates are to be believed it means the human race has been around for roughly 0.0015% of the lifespan of the universe.

That other 99.9985% would be more than enough time for numerous sentient species and advanced civilizations to rise and fall and be swept away by the sands of time, engulfed in supernovas, sucked into black holes, etc. and we would never be aware of their existence.  It's possible that it could have happened right here in our own solar system or even on this very planet.

[Tama Suki]

12 minutes ago, Fluffy Sharkfin said:

Then there's the fact that, according to current estimates, our species has only been around for approximately 200,000 years whereas the earth is estimated to be around 4.5 billion years old (with the universe supposedly being 3 times that).  If these estimates are to be believed it means the human race has been around for roughly 0.0015% of the lifespan of the universe.

That other 99.9985% would be more than enough time for numerous sentient species and advanced civilizations to rise and fall and be swept away by the sands of time, engulfed in supernovas, sucked into black holes, etc. and we would never be aware of their existence.  It's possible that it could have happened right here in our own solar system or even on this very planet.

I have read some books by Lawrence Krauss and other physicists such as the great Italian astrophysicist Margherita Hack (peace to her soul, great woman!) That deal with this topic.
The most logical idea that I have made is that surely there are many other super evolved alien species that are already observing us and that do not manifest themselves because perhaps there is a last wall of awareness that we must overcome. If we cannot overcome that wall there is no possibility that we will be able to communicate with them or that they will be able to do it with us.

[Fluffy Sharkfin]

6 minutes ago, Tama Suki said:

I have read some books by Lawrence Krauss and other physicists such as the great Italian astrophysicist Margherita Hack (peace to her soul, great woman!) That deal with this topic.
The most logical idea that I have made is that surely there are many other super evolved alien species that are already observing us and that do not manifest themselves because perhaps there is a last wall of awareness that we must overcome. If we cannot overcome that wall there is no possibility that we will be able to communicate with them or that they will be able to do it with us.

Perhaps, or maybe we're just so different and primitive by comparison that they simply have no interest in us.  It really depends on whatever the nature of their species/ideology of their society is I guess.  If it's anything at all like ours I expect our first contact with alien life will be when the mining ships show up in orbit to start carving up our planet for resources. 

Perhaps we'll be interesting enough to keep as laboratory specimens, or if we're really lucky, pets (although let's face it, given the choice between a pet human and a pet cat no advanced civilization in their right mind is gonna choose us).  Either way I don't think the encounter will end well for us.

Possibly the most optimistic outcome to that scenario would be that in some ironic twist of fate the aliens will do some preliminary scans and announce that since we've already exhausted every resource of any value they're just going to leave us alone to face natural extinction on the depleted husk of a planet we've made for ourselves?!

[Arielle Popstar]

11 hours ago, Coffee Pancake said:

There has been considerable study, probes, manned missions to the moon, simulated missions on earth .. 

New worlds all have one thing in common .. Nothing that's any good for humans unless we take it with us, and nothing we take with us can survive without more stuff we take with us, and if we don't take exactly the right stuff .. everybody dies.

Simple things like a complete lack of liquid water bring considerable challenges, the least of which being the aforementioned lack of water. Rocks don't weather the same without some fluid to soften them up  .. oh look, a razor blade storm.

Or gravity .. a little less and we atrophy, a little more and we live short painful lives as our joints and heart give up. It will take many generations of Darwinian selection to even start to adapt. On worlds we can't survive on without constant systematic intervention.

It wont be some glamourous testament to man kind the great explorer, it will be an expertly prepared, over trained, over provisioned death trap and everybody will die. And we will try again hoping to learn lessons, and everybody will die, and we must keep trying until we get it right .. but by that point, don't expect us to look much like us anymore.

There is quite literally no place like home.

There are 2 trillion galaxies in observable universe. For all 2 trillion galaxies, each one has 100 billion stars. Next, one in five stars has an Earth-like planet. That means there are as many as 40 billion Earth-sized planets.

Even if none of them actually have life already, it is quite likely that at least some could be seeded and engineered to support it within a generation or two. Our first expeditions would likely be for mining of things that are scarce here.

2 hours ago, Innula Zenovka said:

Yes, but 5 star hotels apart, I think the Bahamas have a few amenities that are not to be found on many other planets, such as a breathable atmosphere, potable water and ambient temperatures and an environment that's not actually hostile to human life.

See above and also will point out that in spite of glowing reports, Columbus lost a ship, suffered death and disease and mutinies of his men, lost 39 of them, killed when they were left behind by the natives. There are going to be different challenges for sure but we simply do not know what they will be until we get there.

 

6 hours ago, Madelaine McMasters said:

What a peculiar understanding you have of "roughing it".

Here's a snippet from Columbus' report to King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella upon his return in 1493...

"In the island, which I have said before was called Hispana, there are very lofty and beautiful mountains, great farms, groves and fields, most fertile both for cultivation and for pasturage, and well adapted for constructing buildings. The convenience of the harbors in this island, and the excellence of the rivers, in volume and salubrity, surpass human belief, unless one should see them. In it the trees, pasture-lands and fruits different much from those of Juana. Besides, this Hispana abounds in various kinds of species, gold and metals. The inhabitants . . . are all, as I said before, unprovided with any sort of iron, and they are destitute of arms, which are entirely unknown to them, and for which they are not adapted; not on account of any bodily deformity, for they are well made, but because they are timid and full of terror. . . . But when they see that they are safe, and all fear is banished, they are very guileless and honest, and very liberal of all they have. No one refuses the asker anything that he possesses; on the contrary they themselves invite us to ask for it. They manifest the greatest affection towards all of us, exchanging valuable things for trifles, content with the very least thing or nothing at all. . . . I gave them many beautiful and pleasing things, which I had brought with me, for no return whatever, in order to win their affection, and that they might become Christians and inclined to love our King and Queen and Princes and all the people of Spain; and that they might be eager to search for and gather and give to us what they abound in and we greatly need."

That's a five star review if ever I read one.

Yes a report to his investors who had promised him lands and titles if his trip was successful as well as being in control of the purse strings to finance another trip. So in spite of the men and ship he lost as well as well as not really bringing back the gold and spices he had hoped to, he made the best of the situation and promised that the lands and natives were ripe for easy pickings. I think it is called creative writing

Quote

I believe you're suggesting that interplanetary "New Worlds" will be as easily inhabitable as those "found" by Columbus, Cabot, da Gama, Vespucci, Magellan and countless others. Nothing could be further from the truth. Getting to new planets is the easy part. Staying there, not so much. In 1492, staying in the Bahamas was a hell of a lot easier than getting there from Spain.

So yes and again, by ignoring the hardships they did endure, the men and ships he did lose and ignoring scores of other explorers who were lost on their voyages and explorations of new lands, you can cherry pick a few that were successful , especially by only looking at the positive benefits of the mission and ignoring the negative bits.

[Tama Suki]

3 minutes ago, Fluffy Sharkfin said:

Perhaps, or maybe we're just so different and primitive by comparison that they simply have no interest in us.  It really depends on whatever the nature of their species/ideology of their society is I guess.  If it's anything at all like ours I expect our first contact with alien life will be when the mining ships show up in orbit to start carving up our planet for resources. 

Perhaps we'll be interesting enough to keep as laboratory specimens, or if we're really lucky, pets (although let's face it, given the choice between a pet human and a pet cat no advanced civilization in their right mind is gonna choose us).  Either way I don't think the encounter will end well for us.

Possibly the most optimistic outcome to that scenario would be that in some ironic twist of fate the aliens will do some preliminary scans and announce that since we've already exhausted every resource of any value they're just going to leave us alone to face natural extinction on the depleted husk of a planet we've made for ourselves?!

What you write is very funny but I, by my personal nature, am more fascinated by science and by systematic methodologies of thought more similar to Theravada Buddhism than to Hollywood movies.
Life is precious in the immense desolation of space, even if it is a hideous species of cockroach that evolved by eating its own feces.

[Fluffy Sharkfin]

19 minutes ago, Tama Suki said:

What you write is very funny

Yeah I like to approach any discussion about the future with a sense of humour.  That way when the realization of just how royally screwed we all are starts to dawn on me at least I get to have a good chuckle about it before the mind numbing fear sets in! 😜

23 minutes ago, Tama Suki said:

Life is precious in the immense desolation of space, even if it is a hideous species of cockroach that evolved by eating its own feces.