Political compass for the21st century

[Eric the Green]

(03-14-2021, 11:35 AM)Captain Genet Wrote:

(03-02-2021, 04:09 PM)Eric the Green Wrote: AH, so you are Bill the Piper. I see the connections. Down with hedonism! Tech forever! Welcome back.

Here again you oversimplify my positions. It took me some time to think how I should respond to it.

"Down with hedonism" - I do disagree with hedonism as a philosophical position that pleasure is the supreme good. It's great to enjoy wine, women and song, but a civilized person puts other, more complex goals first. But societies and movements opposed to all pleasure often end up stagnant and opposed to most innovation, like the Amish or Orthodox Jews. This is certainly not my ideal.

"Tech forever" - I hope that modern tech never gets lost. But today overuse of digital technologies, cutting people away from own bodies and emotions and from other people, is a bigger threat than technological regress. I have criticized Millennials for that, but you choose to overlook this part of my message. Extropianism, as defined by Max More in 1988, values above all "intelligence, functional order, vitality, energy, life, experience, and capacity and drive for improvement and growth". Yes, this includes tech and in my previous incarnation I have advocated perhaps too much for biotechnological solutions. But living things have more extropy than computers. Social organization is certainly extropy. Art is extropy too.

Ah, so the new incarnation of you has more moderated positions. Very good.

Now, maybe you can begin to see that "sex, drugs and rock'n'roll", as the modern-day version of wine, women and song, has its place too, and I agree that "a civilized person puts other, more complex goals first". I also contend that the 2nd-turning version was better than the 3T version, because it had its high-art "extropy" aspects. These may not be so apparent in the portion that is readily available on mainstream media. That's why I recommend you peruse my list! 
http://philosopherswheel.com/ericrock.html (and brower too; he still prefers the previous 4T version)

And I recommend Joseph Campbell's statement that art at its best is the handmaiden of religious experience.

I see how the word "extropy" relates to "entropy," the 2nd law of thermodynamics used to propose the ultimate run-down of the universe, and how extropy might be an alternative to this supposed destiny. If that's what it means, heartily agree. I believe some people used the word "negentropy" for this, probably based on the work of Pierre Teilhard de Chardin.

Again, welcome back.