Feb 14, 2017 02:06 AM
(This post was last modified: Feb 14, 2017 06:03 AM by C C.)
The Bridge, by D. Keith Mano
http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1547120.The_Bridge
Kirkus Reviews: Imagine that sometime in the near-distant future of anti-technology, the Ecological Movement (no cars, no electricity, no food, no excrement -- just a narcoticizing E-diet), finally carries its dicta against killing to its logical conclusion: the voluntary extinction of human beings...
Science Fiction Ruminations: [...] The dystopic world (of radical environmentalism) that emerges is characterized by the outlawing of a vast gamut of normal human activities -- competition between man, killing of any form of life including bacteria, consuming organic matter, etc. The goal is clear: such laws will force mankind to die out [...ending the top threat to other life forms...]
Because humans cannot kill ANY living creature, Mano’s prose veers into visceral and horror-esque realms: for example, insects writhing under the skin [...] Every page is filled to the brim with societal and environmental effects of [...extremist...] legislation. The entire landscape is overgrown with layers of vegetation, rotting organic matter, the human body festers with diseases and covered with layers of insect bites, police take random blood tests to test for “Organic Food Content, the body is beset with spasms due to the required drug-imbued E-diet. The E-diet consists of no organic matter and barely keeps the body alive. Untreated diseases ravish the population: “Under the rib cage a mass of alien flesh squatted, thriving. After common infections, cancer was the most frequent cause of death; E-diet eroded, altered cell walls of stomach and intestine. Tumors had been declared an autonomous life form, no less valid than the life form of their hosts...”
On Homo Deus
http://www.overcomingbias.com/2017/02/on-homo-deus.html
EXCERPT: Historian Yuval Harari’s best-selling book "Sapiens" mostly talked about history. His new book, "Homo Deus", won’t be released in the US until February 21, but I managed to find a copy at the Istanbul airport – it came out in Europe last fall. This post is about the book, and it is long and full of quotes; you are warned.
While Homo Deus also mostly talks about the past and present, people told me I should read it because it is about the future, just like my book. Amazon lists it as a bestseller in “humanist philosophy” which seems a reasonable category for it. This is “philosophy” in the popular not the academic sense of the word. The book doesn’t draw much on academic philosophy, but instead uses various science-fictiony and futuristic scenarios to anchor a discussion of possible broad attitudes toward life and the universe. These quotes give you a flavor...
I’ve complained that futurist (and political) talk jumps too quickly to value talk, and should instead take more time to first work out details of likely scenarios. By this standard, "Homo Deus" is not my kind of futurism. But in the process of setting up those value discussions "Homo Deus" does make some more factual claims about the future. And in this post I’ll give Yuval Harari the respect of criticizing some of his claims....
http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1547120.The_Bridge
Kirkus Reviews: Imagine that sometime in the near-distant future of anti-technology, the Ecological Movement (no cars, no electricity, no food, no excrement -- just a narcoticizing E-diet), finally carries its dicta against killing to its logical conclusion: the voluntary extinction of human beings...
Science Fiction Ruminations: [...] The dystopic world (of radical environmentalism) that emerges is characterized by the outlawing of a vast gamut of normal human activities -- competition between man, killing of any form of life including bacteria, consuming organic matter, etc. The goal is clear: such laws will force mankind to die out [...ending the top threat to other life forms...]
Because humans cannot kill ANY living creature, Mano’s prose veers into visceral and horror-esque realms: for example, insects writhing under the skin [...] Every page is filled to the brim with societal and environmental effects of [...extremist...] legislation. The entire landscape is overgrown with layers of vegetation, rotting organic matter, the human body festers with diseases and covered with layers of insect bites, police take random blood tests to test for “Organic Food Content, the body is beset with spasms due to the required drug-imbued E-diet. The E-diet consists of no organic matter and barely keeps the body alive. Untreated diseases ravish the population: “Under the rib cage a mass of alien flesh squatted, thriving. After common infections, cancer was the most frequent cause of death; E-diet eroded, altered cell walls of stomach and intestine. Tumors had been declared an autonomous life form, no less valid than the life form of their hosts...”
On Homo Deus
http://www.overcomingbias.com/2017/02/on-homo-deus.html
EXCERPT: Historian Yuval Harari’s best-selling book "Sapiens" mostly talked about history. His new book, "Homo Deus", won’t be released in the US until February 21, but I managed to find a copy at the Istanbul airport – it came out in Europe last fall. This post is about the book, and it is long and full of quotes; you are warned.
While Homo Deus also mostly talks about the past and present, people told me I should read it because it is about the future, just like my book. Amazon lists it as a bestseller in “humanist philosophy” which seems a reasonable category for it. This is “philosophy” in the popular not the academic sense of the word. The book doesn’t draw much on academic philosophy, but instead uses various science-fictiony and futuristic scenarios to anchor a discussion of possible broad attitudes toward life and the universe. These quotes give you a flavor...
Quote:The modern deal offers us power, on the condition that we renounce our believe in a great cosmic plan that gives meaning to life. .. According to humanism, humans must draw form within their inner experiences not only the meaning of their own lives, but also the meaning of the entire universe. .. Humanism has taught us that something can be bad only if it causes someone to feel bad. .. Humanism split into three branches. .. The orthodox branch [and] .. two very different offshoots: socialist humanism .. and evolutionary humanism.
Liberals .. believe that every humans is a uniquely valuable individual, whose free choices are the ultimate source of authority. In the twenty-first century, three practical developments might make this belief obsolete: 1. Humans will lose their economic and military usefulness. .. 2. The system will still find value in humans collectively, but not in unique humans. 3. The system will still find value in some unique humans, but these will be a new elite of upgraded superhuman rather than the mass of the population. ..
The contradiction between free will and contemporary science is the elephant in the laboratory, whom many prefer not to see as they peer into their microscopes and fMRI scanners. .. If organisms indeed lack free will, it implies we could manipulate and even control their desires using drugs, genetic engineering or direct brain stimulation. ..
New techno-religions can be divided into two main types: techno-humanists and data religion. Data religion argues that humans have completed their cosmic task, ad they should now pass the torch on to entirely new kinds of entities. .. Techno-humanism .. still sees humans as the apex of creation .. but concludes that we should therefore use technology to create Homo deus – a much superior human model.
I’ve complained that futurist (and political) talk jumps too quickly to value talk, and should instead take more time to first work out details of likely scenarios. By this standard, "Homo Deus" is not my kind of futurism. But in the process of setting up those value discussions "Homo Deus" does make some more factual claims about the future. And in this post I’ll give Yuval Harari the respect of criticizing some of his claims....
