Demonization for dummies

CAUTION: I originally intended to follow up on this post and update depending on the replies on the particular site, but as it turns out this would not be a very good idea. In fact I may drop this reply in total if this spirals out of control. The catchphrase is ‘apophenia alert’ here. Vigilantcitizen.com involves a particular pseudochristian subculture of people who see signs of the impending apocalypse, leftbehindism, the wrath of g-d, the illuminati etc. etc. etc. everywhere. They look for signs in Lady Gaga video’s, in the sincere conviction someone went through some kind of script charting out elaborate visual symbology of baphomet and zodiacs and ‘the way water is squirted in her face’ and all that, to make some kind of point. I am a little cautious about this bunch, since these are clearly people who are very much living an isolated, misunderstood and underappreciated existence, and they will latch onto everyone picking fights or ‘resisting satan’. Believe me, I’ve been there and it is not an easy life. Bad part is this will get worse as time goes by and more and more people opt for religion rather than SSRI’s.

UPDATE: The site which has posted a call-to-arms by consistently lying about the transhumanist movement does not desire open debate. Our replies are deleted and those who post are accused of being one and the same individual. Transparent debate seems to be impossible. The reply section has become one giant ‘hurray’ shouting match of apopheniac selfindulgence. Go for the own team, there’s at you, blackhatters.

UPDATE: All my replies have been deleted. New posts have been refused. The site below does no longer believe in an open discussion, or even an open exchange of ideas. They have not just failed miserably, their whole paranoia fest has exploded in their face for all I care. Very sad – because we could have really used these people as a critical countermovement or ‘echo chamber’ to transhumanism. That won’t work since transhumanism doesn’t have much use for what is clearly a bunch of loons.


Transhumanism is scary to the usual suspects. Let’s face it, some people are nervous about what is happening in the world around them, and have chosen to have a sniper mentality. The enemy is out there! Quick, let’s get him before he can get to us… (It is indicative of the same dynamic William Gibson so eloquently captured in his bridge trilogy when he had a company exist solely on the basis to attack competitors in the memeverse.) A whole legion of these self-appointed critics and moral sheep dogs sit around proposing very little by themselves, but look the horizon scouting for new ideas and when they spot any, they snipe them down. Remarkably enough the sniping is done with pretty awful arguments these days. So I was not surprised when I stumbled on another piece of marvelous social criticism over at this place. An angry analysis by an armchair counter-revolutionary…. This prompted me to doctor up a a response. Like always, a lengthy and somewhat tedious response, so if you can stomach it do read on.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jeZWg3KzMSI&hl=en_US&fs=1&]

The author is, at it turns out, stationed here. It becomes clearer the premise of these articles is to apply christian apocalyptic labels on events that do not fit inside the understanding of their regular readers, as to construct some kind of significance in all the confusion things that happen in the world. It is a little offensive to be grabbed and be recycled in their particular mental picture of the world, but I suppose thats what they have to to to survive in an increasingly complex world.

The article named “The Transhumanist and Police State Agenda in Pop Music” briefly explored the transhumanist theme of the Black Eyed Peas’ video “Imma Be/Rock that Body”. Vigilant Citizen collaborator LVB expands on this subject and describes the Psychological Warfare techniques used in this video.
The Black Eyed Peas “Imma Be / Rock that Body” video is a masterpiece of high tech computer-generated imagery and state of the art digital music production. It is also one of the most blatant examples of Psychological Warfare and deception that I have ever seen in modern mass media. This article will discuss

1) What Transhumanism actually is.
2) The massive use of Psychological Warfare techniques in this video and all forms of mass media.
3) Analysis of the video, itself – to show you how these psychological concepts, the occult and Transhumanist symbolism and the deceptive storyline are integrated in this video to promote the dangerous agenda of the cult known as Transhumanism.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cQjDYuAk4JE&hl=en_US&fs=1&]

Face it, I am not a fan of fergy and I can understand someone would consider her music and singing as a form of severe psychological warfare. Rather – the black eyed peas are tolerable as such, and I even see fergie have a sort of functionality in the band – they probably have been friends for ages – but fergie is no gwen stefanie for that matter. What gwen does with style, fergie does about as tasteless as a gutter hoe. It makes for interesting mashups at best. But seriously, you could have done better picking a statement of dubious message, overused CGI and vacuous content.

Better ExampleBetter ExampleBetter ExampleBetter ExampleBetter ExampleBetter ExampleBetter exampleWay better example … but OK fergie it is you prefer picking apart and so we’re stuck with that for don’t know how many pages. Great.

Ok let’s get to it.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2S-_hL-J1kU&hl=en_US&fs=1&]

Holy shit, the first paragraph displays some pretty deceitful, mean-spirited attitudes on your behalf. Was your mother possibly Sarah Connor and did she go on and on about it?

The very first sentences state the equivalent of ‘what is the organisation ACORN‘ and the next sentence is equivalent to ‘child sacrifice in modern cults‘. You are little hasty there. You jump from mentioning ‘transhumanism’ and next thing, wham, you throw the mind control card at the reader. By doing that you rush into it. What exactly is the bridge from mentioning transhumanism (we call it H+ these days, we even have a cult magazine) and then going and discussing *cough* using mass media Psychological Warfare techniques?” A bit of a stretch in my opinion. … But ok, maybe it has relevance. I would be the first to acknowledge that the current mass media are by and large ‘biatchified’ and coopted by the corporate sector. Last time I checked we ‘ the transhumanists’ didn’t have the resources the author proposes. It’s a bit like that movie ‘G.I. Joe‘ when they take the elevator down and end up in massive underground military installations miles big. I sure as hell didn’t know about those resources? Can someone signal me I need my share of the Global Transhumanist Conspiracy funds deposit on my bank account as soon as possible?

If only transhumanism had the resources the author LVB proposes, – damn that would be nice. Last time I checked we don’t and we’re still holding meetings in Second Life like a bunch of nerds.

Let me provide an alternative that has more of my fancy, and more of the message I espouse with Transhumanism, for reasons of contrast.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x7O2L4guEk4&hl=en_US&fs=1&]

That video says better how I feel about the world and why I am a ‘transhumanist’.

But on with the article.

The Transhumanist Agenda

Yes we have one.

Transhumanism is the name of a movement that claims to support the use of all forms of technology to improve human beings.  It is far more than just a bunch of harmless and misguided techie nerds, dreaming of sci-fi movies and making robots. It is a highly organized and well financed movement that is extremely focused on subverting and replacing every aspect of what we are as human beings – including our physical biology, the individuality of our minds and purposes of our lives – and the replacement of all existing religious and spiritual beliefs with a new religion of their own – which is actually not new at all.

Yep and now you will be amazed – completely true. Transhumanism is all this, and more. Transhumanism is a small movement (and not all that well financed or focused, but let’s not get into that) that has ideals to provide everyone with more choices for escaping the current limitations of the human state. Limitations as in death, smallpox, taxes, having to work, being stupid, being weak and a lot more besides. Transhumanism is a movement that asks some pretty fundamental questions, and comes up with an answer – as in ‘is this all there is?’ and answering ‘not yet, but we may get there’. Yes, transhumanism is fed up with our current biological constraints – in the same manner it is fed up with intestinal bacteria and having to defecate. Certainly by no stretch of the imagination is ‘transhumanism’ in any way occupied with reducing individuality in humans. I guess the angry people have been claiming that about ‘their enemies’ since the jews left Egypt – “they are all a bunch of insect people!!!” but this argument still works for some reason. With regards to transhumanism I’d say ‘au contraire’, if we get our cake humanity will be a good deal more able to self-express in a meaningful manner, rather than be a bunch of docile herbivores as most humans are now.

As for the purposes of our lives – right now it is by and large to breed, pass on some genes and then die. I am sure quite a few non-transhumanists like to see that changed, as soon as possible. My version would be – give people a few extra centuries to decide for themselves what the actual raison d’etre of the human species might be, you know, while sitting on a beach looking at the sunset with cybernetic eyes so you can really appreciate the colors.

As for religion, hell yah, religion more or less sucks. Religion has tended to suck by and large, and I subscribe wholeheartedly to Hitchens position when he says ‘religion poisons everything’, and I’d be the first to start sawing under the very foundations of established religious edifices. That is, if people want to believe belief stuff, by all means, the more power to them. but don’t be scared to be held to public scrutiny, much in the same way our pal LVB is doing here.

The Elitist Creators of Transhumanism and Eugenics
“The term ‘Transhumanism‘ was coined by biologist Julian Huxley in 1957, who defined it as “man remaining man, but trans cending himself, by realizing new possibilities of and for his human nature.” Julian Huxley was the brother of Aldous Huxley, who you may know was the author of the very famous book, “Brave New World“, which is a vision of the future that most people view as “The New World Order” (along with the book “1984“, by George Orwell) – a depressing future police-state world in which a one world government uses technology, such as surveillance cameras, psychological warfare (propaganda) and brutal military/police forces to control everyone and everything in this dystopian, fictional world. The founders of Transhumanism, were highly educated and wealthy individuals of primarily British and European descent. These individuals were what we would call people of the elite, ruling class of society, and their views were absolutely elitist, if not outright totalitarian and fascist in nature.

Let me get this straight. Julian Huxley suggested a term ‘transhumanism’, for a concept that more or less traced back to Benjamin Franklin and even before that. Now his brother goes and write a rather dystopian-inclined Science Fiction story (Dunno, I would fancy a bit of soma every now and then) – and what is the link here exactly? Guilty by association? Let’s be frank, Aldous is not Julian and neither ever advocated in favor of introducing a world with actively horrendous qualities as in the book New World Order. I know Dubya read the book and got scared by the idea and with reason. But as a dystopian SF story, it’s a bit dated. But here LVB does the same thing again.

Premise 1: There is a pediatrician called Doctor Spock
Premise 2: A fictional character named Spock is cold, detached, aloof and inscrutinable.
Conclusion: The writings of Benjamin Spock have been discredited as cold, detached, aloof and child hostile.

I can give you other examples of these flimsy ‘guilty by association’ ploys, and every time I come across them my opinion of the author goes down a notch.

Bad form LVB!

EUGENICS
This Nazi propaganda poster is encouraging public support for its Eugenics program. The poster says that the mentally-challenged man in the picture is costing German citizens too much money, and should be put to death for his own good – and to keep costs down. One of the key concepts of old school Transhumanism was the elitist pseudoscience of Eugenics, or “racial hygiene“, which is a concept that still exists today in the modern, shiny, high-tech version of what is adoringly called Transhumanism, Human+, or H+, by its cult followers.

“Eugenics is the study and practice of selective breeding applied to humans, with the aim of improving the species. In a historical and broader sense, Eugenics can also be a study of “improving human genetic qualities”. Advocates of Eugenics sought to counter what they regarded as dysgenic dynamics within the human gene pool. Specifically, in regard to the continuation of congenital disorders and factors impacting overall societal intelligence relating to the heritability of IQ. Eugenics was widely popular in the early decades of the 20th century, but has largely fallen into disrepute after having become associated with Nazi Germany. Since the postwar period, both the public and the scientific communities have associated Eugenics with Nazi abuses, such as enforced racial hygiene, human experimentation, and the extermination of “undesirable” population groups. However, developments in genetic, genomic, and reproductive technologies at the end of the 20th century have raised many new questions and concerns about what exactly constitutes the meaning of Eugenics and what its ethical and moral status is in the modern era.”

So, because the Nazi atrocities became so widely known, the ideas of Eugenics went underground for awhile. But the original ideas and goals of “improving the species” and “improving human genetic qualities” are still front and center, albeit in a more subtle and glamorous package now. They try to avoid discussing those embarrassing ideas, like how to keep the undesirable races from breeding so much.

For the record, Transhumanists are not nazis. In fact if transhumanists had lived in western europe around 1940s my guess is we’d had all been ferried off into the ovens well in advance of the others to be gassed and incinerated. The transhuman ideal in my book is about as diametrically opposed to nationalist fascism, corporatist fascism and militarism as humanly possible. Transhumanism is about rational personal empowernment. The nazis would have been very keen on exterminating that.

BUT DO Let’s go out on a limb here. Let me say two things – (1) the term ‘eugenics’ has become historically contaminated by authoritarianism, genocide and bad science. In general ‘eugenics’ has become a curseword. In the name of eugenics fascist states killed and sterilized people. As late at the 1970s people having ‘undesirable racial and genetic qualities’ (including having a slurred speech and having lots of freckles) was reason for compulsory sterilization. Let me be totally frank here – I think this is bad and I would say this is unacceptable. Frankly I know no transhumanists who are in favor of this – with the exception of a few white power nut Lavey wannabes in the netherlands, ‘who call themselves transhumanists’ but who really aren’t. They even had their own nifty logo’s these ‘Prometheans’, but I wouldn’t call them credible part of the movement. Their webmaster happened to run another site incidentally.

Nevertheless, I’d be the first to admit I have ‘neo-eugenic’ sympathies, but not in the manner described above. I repeat, nowhere near the eugenic ideals held by fascists. Please contrast the historical term eugenical movement with if you can spot the differences.

  • Parents should be able to self-determine their own children, free to imbue them with ability, or free to not imbue them with ability
  • Society should intervene if parents abuse or neglect their children.
  • All people are morally obliged to care for the disabled and vulnerable and provide them with a humane and dignified existence.
  • Withholding safe treatments that cure heredetary genetic disabilities is a form of neglect.
  • Here is the somewhat longer version. I do have to update that one of these days however so please don’t nail me to the wall on that one 🙂

    But the original ideas and goals of “improving the species” and “improving human genetic qualities” are still front and center, albeit in a more subtle and glamorous package now. They try to avoid discussing those embarrassing ideas, like how to keep the undesirable races from breeding so much.

    The old eugenical movement is dead, and transhumanism is not a continuation of that historical monstrosity. As in – not by a long shot. The author of the article, ‘LVB’ can beat his chest for all he likes, repeating it over and over doesn’t make it any less lying. The old eugenicals were racists who regarded other races and the disabled as an undesirable subspecies of humanity that needed expedient extermination. Transhumanism doesn’t make much statements about races – it just charts human imperfections and proposes how to improve them, in a climate of maximum personal freedom. Sort of like granting everyone personal freedom to have or not to have smallpox. Comparing transhumanism and eugenics in this regard is just comparing dolphins and fish – since they both swim in the sea. It’s demonization and the rather familiar ‘guilty by association’ shtick LVB has been using like a jackhammer so far in this article.

    More bad form!

    My personal position is separate from all that – as a disabled person myself I often would have preferred my parents had been able to prenatally screen my genes before actual conception, remove any of the serious disorders to plague my life, and had me born ‘fixed’. I regard the desire to give prospective parents the freedom (and hopefully wisdom) to have sound, safe and tested therapies remove clearly pathological qualities from the genome off their children. I’d even go beyond that and wiuld say that not using these treatments is a form of severe neglect and child abuse in extreme cases. I’d say a parent who knows he or she has an inheritable genetic disease and still breeds without consideration for the life of the child is a pretty awful parent and an awful human being. Plus he is an irresponsible citizen that knowingly saddles society with significant costs in terms of care. Parents rarely pay the full costs involved whenever a child is born with a severe birth defect and more often than not society is left holding the bill. Someone who takes that risk is doing something really wrong. We should always care for those disabled that are born, but I’d rather that they had all been born as healthy as brangelina, and then some.

    The modern mutation of Transhumanism claims to only support “voluntary eugenics“, which sounds much more benevolent than mandatory sterilization and euthanasia of undesirable humans, doesn’t it? But, if you have any sense at all, you will probably realize that this ethnic cleansing of the gene pool (“improving the species” and “improving human genetic qualities”) simply cannot and will not ever happen if it is voluntary. We should all understand that ideas such as “voluntary eugenics” will not be voluntary anymore, if and when the people who believe in these radical ideas get political and financial power. In fact, they already do have substantial wealth and power, and are working very hard to impose this Transhumanist agenda on our world – whether we like it or not.

    This is so untrue it is simply a form of lying. Yes VLB, you lie when you say Transhumanists want to impose an agenda of enforced eugenics. For starters Transhumanism is simply not associated with traditional historical eugenics – lie. Second, the idea of using force would be the most stupid idea ever. As in countereffective. Third, transhumanism is by and large focused on a number of other things: (1) artificial intelligence and robotics; (2) finding means to increase functional intelligence in the human brain(and why would we share those with anyone…?) ; (3) life extension; (4) nano technological fabrication and intervention and (5) cryonic suspension. I do not read all that many transhumanist articles on genetics, and nine out of ten articles are about finding cures for cancer or age related diseases. If there were any pamphlets going aound with secret plans to have the citizens of the world report with the NWO stormtroopers for genetic screenings, I am not in the loop.

    I’d ball ‘hysterical bullshit, alarmist and more ‘guilt by association’ on this line of speculation. In laymen’s terms : lying.

    The Principles and Concepts of Transhumanism
    Transhumanists believe they are working toward a new and improved existence, leaving everything we have known in the dust bin of history, welcoming a new “Golden Age” of superbeings. They want to become an entirely new species, transcending what we are as humans, using radically advanced technology to achieve their goals. Let’s look at just a few of the primary concepts and goals of Transhumanism.

    The Hive Mind

    One of the primary concepts of the Transhumanist agenda is “The Hive Mind”.

    “Hive Mind : A type of collective consciousness where individuality is stifled; a state of conformity; also written hivemind”.

    “A group of people who give the false impression of being a hivemind (1), eg. by mindlessly following orders.”

    One of the early Transhumanist elites, along with Julian Huxley, was Sir Charles Galton Darwin, the grandson of Charles Darwin, who founded the theory of evolution.

    So, anyway, here is one of Charles Galton Darwin’s quotes relating to the Hive Mind:

    “There might be a drug, which, without other harmful effects, removed the urgency of sexual desire, and so, reproduced in humanity the status of workers in a beehive.”

    As I said previously, the founders of Transhumanism had elitist views about what humanity should be. This Human Beehive concept has been envisioned by the ruling elite class throughout history as the ideal society. The ultimate slave race, scientifically designed to conform, obey and serve the needs of the elite – worker bees who do not question or rebel.

    Transhumanists envision this Hive Mind as being possible when all people across the world can link their minds together using technology, creating a symbiotic existence through the new superintelligence of this collective Hive Mind. Forget about the needs of the individual – it’s all about the Hive. They refer to this collective, superintelligence as the Singularity.

    You have just left the building but left on the lights. This is so far beside the truth. It’s like I am watching this video discussing the homosexual agenda and seconds later I am seeing a jew and a gay guy watching each other in complete and utter confusion asking ‘did you know about that?’. The singularity is not the borg taking over. The Singularity is in fact a very simple thing invented by a guy named Vernor Vinge.

    The singularity is the moment where artificially ‘intelligent’ (or otherwise creative) man-made machines or processes are able to quickly upgrade their own hardware, software, and or replicate themselves, to become even smarter and/or faster thinking, and as a consequence think and create so fast that they enter in a self-improvement recursive loop where pretty soon you’ll end up with something substantially smarter than even he smartest humans. Once that happens any prediction about what happens next are impossible and the future can no longer be modeled – very big changes are likely to come next

    As you can see this has inherently nothing to do with turning people into a slave race. Transhumanism is not about that – it is about giving people things like faxes and mobile phones and cheap ritalin with zero side effects. The suggestion it is is simply silly. It is comparing a landslide with brain surgery.

    I am sure that there are sinister types out there at the top of the existing government and corporate elites that have sinister plans of world domination. We do not live in a very pleasant world. But for peace sake do not go around confusing these sinister elites with transhumanists. It kind defeats your purpose since transhumanists are exactly the guys you want on your side as soon as the sinister elites (assuming they exist and have a clue) start taking over. It is not the wiccans or prayer meetings that’ll save your ass when the bad guys come to take over your mortgage and make your kids take genetic tests. The transhumanist movement are the john connors and mister andersons of the world. You really missed the broad side of the barn here.

    Uploading Your Mind
    “MURG” is the acronym that Transhumanists use to refer to the “Mind Upload Research Group”.
    The Hive Mind, or Singularity, that they are working toward, will occur, they believe, when technology exists that will allow humans to “upload their minds” to an artificial memory device, a sort of global hard drive, so that the combined intelligence of all our minds will create this new superintelligence that is the Singularity, or Hive Mind.

    Yah. Well. Great. Like with many of your statement I didn’t get the memo. Let me look here in the ‘pinkie and the brain’ folder to see if there’s anything under M, for MURG. Lemme see Massmurder .. Mayhem … Mech Warriors… Metal Soldiers … Misdirection… Mutants… Mutilation… Nope. No MURG anywhere. Maybe I don’t have the required rank to see these high level plans? Or maybe you are an fantast who played to many Steve Jackson games? Might that be it?

    The Cult of Transhumanism
    “Instead of meekly worshiping fictional gods, or blindly dismissing the ideals they represent, we should seek to become godlike ourselves. The body is weak, but the mind can be forever. People may die, but they can be preserved and resurrected. This world may in many ways resemble hell, but we can create heaven on earth. The universe may be a place of chaos and entropy, but we can fill it with order and intelligence. Guided by reason and empowered by technology, we can bend reality to our will, and make the impossible possible.”

    Yah that’s pretty much correct. Last time I checked founding your own church, or developing your own set of ideas of the world is legal in the US and UK and where I live. If I like to I can fold a big tinfoil hat emblazoned with dayglow stars and declare myself emperor empress of indochina. Not that it would make much sense. The term ‘god’ is overrated anyway. What kind of ‘god’ are we talking here, more along the lines of Zeus or Odin? Or more oldtestamental like all-powerful but unknowable deity? If you say, ‘we can become godlike’ you are either saying nothing, or you aren’t acknowledging we already are to 95% of human history. Humans fly. Humans talk tot other people on the ther side of the world. Minutes after I posted this endless dreary reply article someone on the other end of the world can get worked up about it. That is magic, and verily it is the power of the gods. It kinda deflates divinity, modern technology, doesn’t it? I mean, my WoW character is level 80. What level is zeus? Can’t be more than level 150…. and Jehova? My guess he should be a level 300. And what does all that mean? I’d say absolutely zilch. Godhood is an antiquated, meaningless term. It’s kids bickering their respective dad has a bigger bar.

    As for the rest, what you basicly said is ‘transhumanism is a movement associated with extending lives’, then we are talking falsifiable facts we can plot out on a chart. Average lifespans, drop-off rates, defection, record holders. The claims are not all that spectacular and a seamless extension of graphs up until this point. Is that some kind of sacrilege? Is it somehow ‘unfair’ or ‘unnatural’ presuming people are alive right now that will live to be 200? And how can you spin that around into some evil plan that belongs in the next James Bond movie?

    Transhumanist ideas of becoming gods and having eternal life through technology certainly display an extreme level of vanity. Not just the simple human vanity of wearing nice clothes and putting on makeup to look good – but to BE gods – therefore, rejecting and replacing God, entirely. This is the Luciferian doctrine.

    Now we are getting somewhere. Are you a religious person? Do you believe in the god of adam, mozes, abraham and jesus? If you do, power to you. You might additionally believe in original sin and the fall of man as well as the fall of angels. You are entitled to hold these beliefs. But they aren’t my beliefs. I do not belief in this god, and the whole concept makes very little sense to me. Actually, with all due respect, but the whole idea creeps me out immensely. I don’t like people having an active belief in hell and everlasting punishment and demons, but I can do very little about it.

    Now there is one rule though. You explain your world as you see fit. Go ahead and interpret the shape of tortillas in the context of a transcendant deity that created the entire cosmos. But I draw the line here – do not shoehorn me in that metaphysical construct. And if you must, do not say you do. It’s rude. It’s like I produced porn, or some other fictional account, and consistently used your face stitched on the body of Ron Jeremy. It’s rude. It’s like telling you I masturbate on images of your mother. It’s offensive and if I do I should have the proper respect to shut up about it.

    Pragmatic Morality
    The Transhumanist idea that they call Pragmatic Morality, is simply a recycled and renamed version of the oldest deception in the world – that there is no good or evil.
    Here is how this concept applies to the beliefs of the cult of Transhumanism:

    “Ethics and morals must serve, or at least not stand in the way of, boundless self-actualization. They should be tools and guidelines for successful living, not instruments of senseless repression. Like the flesh, traditional morality is something to be overcome. There is no ‘Good’ and ‘Evil’; just efficiency and inefficiency; intelligence and stupidity; winners and losers. There is only rational self-interest, and those too timid and ignorant to pursue it. This simple yet profound realization forms the bedrock of an empowered worldview, and is a key step towards achieving enlightenment and transcendence.”

    Sticks and stones. While what you describe above is not by necessity the mindset of ‘transhumanists’, there would be nothing wrong if any did in fact hold these beliefs. I consider these notions to be immoral and repugnant – I loathe zero sum mindsets. What you describe sounds more like a neoconservative mindset. Or maybe the personal philosophy of Alan Greenspan (I read his memoires). It is an objectivist ethical viewpoint what you describe and though not unknown, it is seriously not the norm with transhumanists I know, and I know most of them.

    A straw man argument is an informal fallacy based on misrepresentation of an opponent’s position. To “attack a straw man” is to create the illusion of having refuted a proposition by substituting a superficially similar proposition (the “straw man”), and refuting it, without ever having actually refuted the original position. Presenting and refuting a weakened form of an opponent’s argument can be a part of a valid argument. For example, one can argue that the opposing position implies that at least one other statement – being presumably easier to refute than the original position – must be true. If one refutes this weaker proposition, the refutation is valid and does not fit the above definition of a “straw man” argument.

    I submit to the jury that by now you are making a spectacle of yourself.

    THE PATRON SAINT OF TRANSHUMANISM
    “‘Lucifer’ is the Latin term originally used by the Romans to refer to the planet Venus when that planet was west of the sun and hence rose before the sun in the morning, thereby being the morning star.”

    “According to Extropian philosopher Max More, “Lucifer is the embodiment of reason, of intelligence, of critical thought. He stands against the dogma of God and all other dogmas. He stands for the exploration of new ideas and new perspectives in the pursuit of truth.” He is also the archetypal iconoclast, rebel, and adversary (the word ‘Satan’ is from a Hebrew word, ‘Sathane’, meaning adversary or culminiator; in original Jewish usage [see the book of Job], Satan is the adversary, not of God, but of mankind; i.e., the angel charged by God with the task of proving that mankind is an unworthy creation). In the transtopian context, Lucifer represents ambition, rebellion, rational enlightenment, and the dark side of Transhumanism.”

    They invoke the devil, verily they must be wicked!

    facepalm

    And the christian (not judaism! jewish orthodoxy does not acknowledge a ‘satan’ in the same manner christianity does) perspective on the matter is that a Luciferan or Satanic figure stood up to ‘god’, and rebelled against an autocrat. So what did this god do? He created a personalized and eternal auschwitz and threw a third of his personal servants plus any human he didn’t like in it. Nice guy. Great idea to worship that guy. Let’s hope you don’t piss him off anywhere along the road.

    Let’s be very clear about it – I am an atheist. I have no use for that ‘god’ and ‘lucifer’ other than to mine for memes. That religion to me is nothing but discarded scrapmetal. … Other than as a handy metaphor or allegory the whole late iron age desert tragedy it holds not special appeal to me. As allegories go, I prefer other ones. My preferred faerie tales are gnostic in nature. Feel free to figure out by yourself what I might mean with that reference.

    Selling Transhumanism to the Masses using Psychological Warfare
    What exactly is “Psychological Warfare“?

    Might it be – persistent and repetitive lying about an ideology because you find reason to disagree with it?

    Psychological Warfare (PSYWAR) is defined by the U.S. Department of Defense as:

    “The planned use of propaganda and other psychological actions having the primary purpose of influencing the opinions, emotions, attitudes, and behavior…of groups in such a way as to support the…objectives.”

    “Various techniques are used, by any set of groups, and aimed to influence a target audience’s value systems, belief systems, emotions, motives, reasoning, or behavior.”

    This is often referred to as “winning hearts and minds“, or similarly, “Capture their minds and their hearts and souls will follow.”

    That is what you are doing and that is what transhumanism is doing. Difference is, neither me nor transhumanists have much cause to misrepresent (or lie) about other people’s position. In fact I see absolutely no reason to give a damn about where you stand. So far you have spread nothing but alienation. You have clarified your position nowhere. In fact you have done all you can to alienate the transhumanist spectrum of thinking, whereas at first glance you have comparable views on corporatism, banks, govenments, money, industries as I do.

    Metacommunication
    Metacommunication is a natural human communication process, which is as simple as saying, “I love you”, while you are smiling – communication on two levels. Throw in a hug and there are three levels of communicating this positive message.

    All communication consists of (at least) two levels. First, there is the “content level” of what is being said, literally. Second, there is the level that Gregory Bateson calls metacommunication, which is the underlying message or tone of the communication, which can be as simple as a facial expression. We often recognize this as being the “tone” of someone’s voice, or how something is being said. So, you have what is being said, and how it is being said. The tone is actually the “command” portion of communication, because it is designed to instruct or position the receiver (or victim) of the communication to interpret the message in a certain way.

    Bateson’s communications theory can help reveal the interaction operating behind the message. Every communication, he claims, has both a report [the actual message] and a command aspect [tone]. While the report conveys information about a state of affairs, the command positions the receiver to adopt a particular attitude towards the report and (leads them to) respond in a certain way. The command element of the message is a metacommunication about the context of the message – the nature of the relationship in which the information is exchanged.

    Let me analyze that. You take a video of a mediocre and tasteless band, in a mediocre and tasteless entertainment medium and put it on display. When watching the video, what I see is not the expression of a sinister cabal of global memengineers at work – I see a overexploited mashup of loosely William Gibson based cliche’s strung together at the lowest budget, emphasizing Fergie’s ass, the idea that ‘we gotta go with the program’ (and buy a lot of stuff to be socially relevant). I see some designers and costumers drive up and drown the strip buying ‘cool looking stuff’, with fergie emphasizing accessories that ‘make her ass look good’. All this situated in a desert because it is cheap, has the best lighting, and the hot sun looks great on fergie’s aerobic shape. I see a film crew float by on the imagery established in the movie “district 9” and that disaster that was “terminator 4”. Continuously allowing for sexy close-ups of fergie, fergie in high heels, fergie with childbearing hips. Basic shallow commercial drivel that is polluting our world and is so popular because -allegedly- it has electrolytes.

    So where exactly do you propose shoehorning this video in the same box as where ze transhumanists are rummaging about?

    Falsified Metacommunication – Mixed Signals and Deception
    The point where this becomes falsified metacommunication in mass media is when they include a primary false message in an advertisement or music video, which is designed not only to sell the product, but also to influence the viewer’s attitudes and beliefs.

    Daniel Lerner, who was part of the OSS (the predecessor of the CIA), called this the “Black Level” of Psychological Warfare, because it includes:

    “Commissions of falsification (lies) intended to deceive the enemy“.

    I wouldn’t be emphasizing the strategy of lying too much at this stage. You might have lost some credibility about now.

    There are many layers of communication in movies, videos, advertising and news media that we usually don’t even realize on a conscious level, and that is what this part of the article and the BEP video are all about.

    The term, falsified metacommunication, was coined by anthropologist Richard Herskowitz. It can be understood, in part, using the simple example of a con-man:

    He shakes your hand, smiles at you and tells you nice things…as he steals your money.

    It is a strategy of deliberately distracting you from his real purpose or goal by using friendly, charming deception. It is saying one thing, as a way of distracting the victim with deception to make them feel comfortable with the situation, in order to do another thing – to achieve the real goal, which is stealing your money.

    For example, say there is a magazine ad with a very beautiful female model, but off to the side you can see the makeup artist standing there putting makeup on another model, who looks like she just woke up. They are letting you in on the joke, the artificial nature and deceptive elements of the ad. This makes you realize that you get it, you think that you understand the illusion, and that makes you feel clever, like an insider, and this feeling gives you a sense of reward and ego boost because you feel smart and cool.

    This process has the typical effect of getting people to relax and let their guard down a little bit, which leaves them more open to the actual intent of what the ad is trying to do – to sell you some crap that you probably don’t need – and ideas that you may not agree with. This brings us to another tool of manipulation and control in communication, known as a double bind.

    There is even something like a triple blind and a double whammy and a obfuscated message and a reverse image. This is high school trickery my dear man. But this is all completely irrelevant to transhumanism.

    Let me give you my version. You just don’t like how the world is turning out. That isn’t strange, I don’t like it one bit either. Humans are genocidal, deceptive and predatorial animals and since we outcompeted our natural enemies we are now finding enemies by whatever excuse in other humans. Humans have become wolves to other animals. This is in our nature and no amount of denying it will make it go away. Society has succeeded in channeling these negative urges in the human species and turned crass negative in a positive – rampant competition culminated in the free market system, and greed now is the new good. I don’t like it, but we are stuck with it. So we are left with bastards ganging up not to kill us and steal our stuff, but rather an ever mountain of garbage stacked up to the sky, composed of stuff of the least value and lowest common denominator sold us as if it’s polished gold, whereas its trash made by the lowest bidder under the most flattering conditions, to make us do stuff. As in work. It’s a crap-ass system but so far it works. People are over all better off than in most of human history. And all we are all looking for is the escape out of this damn hamster cage. So far the only way out was as compost – through dying.

    No wonder that people respond with anger if you take away that – “in the future we might all become centuries old’ – at which most people realize, FUCK, another century of this unmitigated crap? That is why people don’t want any of it. They don’t want that junk jard in the desert, even if fergie’s around to apply three blowjobs a day -because in the end it’s hot in the desert, and it’s lonely and it smells. People see the junk and it isn’t discarded margueritavilles they see, they see themselves in the junk – thrown away by the ingrate kids they raise to replace them.

    Double Binds
    A double bind is a dilemma in communication in which an individual (or group) receives two or more conflicting messages, with one message negating the other. This creates a situation in which a successful response to one message results in a failed response to the other, so that the person will be automatically wrong regardless of their response. The nature of a double bind is that the person cannot confront the inherent dilemma, and therefore can neither comment on the conflict, nor resolve it, nor opt out of the situation. Falsified metacommunication is similar to this in many ways.

    Just understand that this is all about communicating ideas at multiple levels; some true information and some false information, and other levels showing you that they are showing you something, in order to distract you from the real message or purpose, and also to deny what the real purpose of the communication is. It sounds really confusing and schizophrenic, doesn’t it? That’s because it is. More from Richard Herskowitz:

    “This schizophrenic system [double binds and falsified metacommunication as they are used in mass media], therefore, bares its exploitative nature to its victims in a manner that evokes their participation in their own oppression. As Anthony Wilden argues: “It is a necessary function of pathological communication to deny its own pathology while admitting and using it at other levels. Thus, since no system [including the human mind] can actually ignore feedback relationships, our culture simply converts them into POWER relationships.

    The manner in which the spectator’s recognition of mass media deception is channeled into participation in that deception (is) a false democratization of an exploitative relationship, and is used to position the viewer in a certain way, as a means of controlling how they will receive the message.”

    Or, you are channeling you own inadequacy and existential fear in precisely the wrong direction – as surely as you’d be sent out from the trenches of world war one, to stumble over the corpses and mines and barbed wire towards an enemy that is a mirror image reflection of yourself, to cut that enemy down, because some slogan on the wall says you must. Yet you fail to realize at it isn’t the pale losers in the other trenches that are so like you, and the real enemy are the meat merchants with handlebar mustaches that are your betters by birth or fortune or military rank. Don’t taze me bro.

    Imma Be Duplicity
    Duplicity is defined as “contradictory doubleness of thought, speech, or action; especially, the concealment of one’s true intentions by deceptive words or actions”. It is saying one thing and doing (or meaning) another…and doing it intentionally, in order to deceive. So, with this idea of duplicity in mind, let’s look at what the different layers of communication in this BEP video are telling us.

    Seriously, I wouldn’t be reading that much in fergie. Come to your senses man.

    One layer involves giving the viewer (victim) a false message that is friendly or they will agree with, to make them feel comfortable. In this video, the false and deceptive message is that they believe it is wrong to replace people with machines and “we’re not robots”. This is established at the beginning, to give the viewer a friendly message that they can feel comfortable about and agree with. Like the con-man, they charm you to disarm you.

    But, then you also have Will.I.Am saying how cool it is that the artificial intelligence vocal machine (technology) is going to replace humans, and they won’t have to do the singing anymore. Contradictory messages used to conceal their true intentions = duplicity.

    Another layer involves giving the viewer some clues or obvious messages to show them that the video‘s story is just a story – by calling attention to itself at the beginning and end of this video and showing you the (false) real life events of the BEPs having their meeting, Fergie’s accident and when they rush to help her at the end of the video.

    This method of using the story to call attention to itself is designed to give the victim an added comfort level (remember the first layer above) and a sense of reward or ego boost by giving the victim the illusion that they have figured it out and are “in on the joke”, so that they feel good and smart because they’ve figured it out, which leads them to relax and let their guard down. This is a secondary layer of charming and disarming you.

    But, the most important layer of communication in this video is the story itself, which is shown (falsely) to be “only a dream or fantasy”, which implies that it is not the real message or purpose of the communication. The opposite is true.

    This “dream sequence” shows you very clearly with its visual imagery and ideas what the true purpose and message of this story really is. Here is what you are being shown in the “dream”:

    Humans are depicted as stuttering, broken, helpless machines that are inferior in every way to the machines. In contrast, the machines are depicted as benevolent and good, and they are shown helping humans to become more perfect beings…by force, shooting them with guns that cure their broken condition. This is a good example of cognitive dissonance, which is another powerful aspect of psychological warfare in mass media.

    Cognition is the scientific term for “the process of thought”.

    Dissonance is a state of disagreement or conflict between two or more things – things that don’t fit together. In music, dissonance is expressed as being “a mingling of discordant notes, a clashing or unresolved musical interval or chord”. The simplest explanation of this in music is that dissonance sounds bizarre and disturbing to the ear. Notes that don’t sound good together.

    “Cognitive dissonance is an uncomfortable feeling caused by holding two contradictory ideas simultaneously. The theory of cognitive dissonance proposes that people have a motivational drive to reduce dissonance by changing their attitudes, beliefs, and behaviors, or by justifying or rationalizing them. In 1957, Leon Festinger published his theory of cognitive dissonance, which has changed the way psychologists look at decision-making and behavior. It is one of the most influential and extensively studied theories in social psychology.

    Cognitive dissonance occurs when a person perceives a logical inconsistency in his beliefs, when one idea implies the opposite of another. The dissonance might be experienced as guilt, anger, frustration, or embarrassment.”

    The important thing about cognitive dissonance in mass media is that when a person is confronted with such contradictory ideas, it creates a conflict or disturbance that is usually not even noticed on a conscious level. Instead, it is internalized and processed by your subconscious mind, your autopilot system, in the same way that your autonomic nervous system controls your breathing, heart rate and blinking your eyes without you ever thinking about it consciously.

    Cognitive dissonance huh?… Might also be when a person cannot accept his life, being subject of a production, consumption-based societal death trap, at times liberated from a convenient explanation, yet overloaded by superficial freedoms. It might also be symptomatic of severe future shock, when the neurology of the human body has reached capacity input, and is close to overload – when the human is reduced to a shellshocked, recalcitrant version of himself – cynical and full of rejection. This is the onset of anomie, a collapse of values and the replacement of traditional belief systems with short term animist beliefs. Religion and scientific systems no longer provide any leitmotif and everyday life attains the trappings of a jungle metaphor – a wild pandemonium of sounds, dangers, enemies, competitors and fear. The person that falls into this state sees enemies everywhere and escape nowhere. Anyone has an ulterior motive and they are all out to get you.

    Exposure and Desensitization
    The first time you watch the movie, “Saw”, you might be freaked out by the gruesome murders and torture. But if you watch it another hundred times, I can guarantee that it won’t bother you very much anymore. Over time, when we are exposed to images of graphic violence, sexuality or ideas utilizing combinations of such images (cognitive dissonance) we slowly become desensitized to these ideas, and we are conditioned to stop reacting to them as strongly.

    Seriously? I saw it three or four times and I still get bile in my throat and tears in my eyes. You are saying you can get that desensitized to that level of brutality? I’m sorry, just can’t.

    This can be understood in the same way that a person may get a painful sunburn the first time that they are out in the sun too long – overexposure – too much of what you are not conditioned to accept, all at once. But, after being out in the sun all summer long, the skin has become desensitized, or conditioned, to accept the UV radiation, by receiving smaller doses of it, consistently, over a longer period of time. Therefore, the person doesn’t experience the strong reaction (sunburn) that they did the first time.

    Of course, this example is one where there is a good aspect to the desensitization – not getting a painful sunburn every day is a good thing. In the same way, allergy shots can help people to avoid severe allergic reactions, desensitizing them by giving them small doses of what is bad for them, over a longer period of time. Not having severe allergy/asthma attacks is a good thing, too.

    But, in the case of mass media and the desensitization of our minds, there is nothing good or beneficial about the way that we are being systematically desensitized to accept a variety of destructive and dangerous ideas. Transhumanist ideas are one example of this – humans becoming more like robots, and robots becoming more like humans.

    You are reading it wrong. A robot is nothing more mindshattering than a fridge. A robot is not a demonic entity from another dimension – it’s a thing with moving parts which gets your groceries. Or changes your diapers. It is a machine. It is a function of its parts. Make it complex enough and it can do everything you tell it to do, up and including become you. There is no difference between you and the world, other than the pattern which is you that desperately strives to perpetuate itself.

    [youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bSZKyrwzOh0&hl=en_US&fs=1&]

    The End of the Beginning
    So, the primary intended message of this video is the Transhumanist idea that humans are not good enough the way we are naturally, and we need to be altered with technological devices and reprogrammed with radically different ideas in order to be better, even if this must be done to us against our will. This idea is dangerously flawed and it is a complete dehumanization of our species, as well as being a very troublesome vision for the future of humanity.


    1. The intellectual and cultural movement that affirms the possibility and desirability of fundamentally improving the human condition through applied reason, especially by developing and making widely available technologies to eliminate aging and to greatly enhance human intellectual, physical, and psychological capacities.
    2. The study of the ramifications, promises, and potential dangers of technologies that will enable us to overcome fundamental human limitations, and the related study of the ethical matters involved in developing and using such technologies.

    No amount of repetition made people believe Borat when he claimed the jew had horns and cloven feet.

    I hope this introduction to Psychological Warfare techniques helps you to better understand the deceptive methods that are used in mass media to persuade us and modify our attitudes, and that it will help you to see the true purpose and meanings in ads, movies and videos that you see in the future. If you’re still reading, you’re a real trooper, and I salute you!! So, now we’ve covered what Transhumanism is, Psychological Warfare techniques that are used in mass media – false metacommunication, double binds, duplicity, cognitive dissonance, exposure and desensitization – and how they are used as a means of deception in mass media. The hard part is over.

    Holy shit, more sermons? How long will this take?

    Imma Be / Rock that Body Video Analysis
    The Imma Be / Rock that Body video begins with all of the BEPs sitting in an office, talking and working on ideas. The main guy, Will.I.Am, is sitting at his computer looking
    an accident) in a superior position, casting its ominous dark shadow down upon the apparently dead human lying on the ground. The machine killed the human. Get it?

    Double pacepalm

    The Transhumanist Song Meanings
    This BEP video uses the songs “Imma Be” and “Rock that Body“. In terms of Transhumanist meanings, I believe that “Rock that Body” means “change and improve the human body“; i.e., improve the flawed, human meat machine using advanced technology, as we see in the video.

    Imma Bee – Literally
    What I find very interesting about the song “Imma Be” is that I believe it is saying, “I’m a Bee”, literally. Obviously, I do realize that “Imma Be” is used as a slang way of

    mes, probably a hundred or so times in about four minutes. So, it seems pretty clear that it was an important message that they wanted to get across.

    triple facepalm

    So here’s Fergie, looking all better now, thank goodness, and she begins singing…well, rapping the lyrics. I noticed that her outfit gives the appearance of a robot face, with the round eyes being her breast areas and the square black mouth is a piece of fabric or tape. Also, notice that behind her is the giant black bad guy Borg. He drops in for the first time here.

    Fergie is now walking toward the diner, which is flanked by the TUBORG beer signs, as well as the BEP album cover image. The album title, “The E.N.D.”, is interesting, not only because of the obvious “The End (of the World)” idea, but also because it means “Energy Never Dies”. This has some obvious spiritual and reincarnation components.

    Some Transhumanists are into cryogenically freezing and storing their heads (Cryonics) when they die, because they believe that technology will exist in the future to bring them back from the dead. Thus, Energy Never Dies.

    Near the diner is a large graveyard of obsolete and broken machines. Keep this in mind.

    Dancing in the Graveyard
    He’s half the man he used to bee…and he doesn’t have a leg to stand on! This is symbolic of dehumanization and mutilation, pure and simple.

    civilization is shown disappearing?

    An you suggest some sinister guys in trenchcoats are going around giving mediocre music video directors large lumps of money and make them follow a carefully choreographed plot for world domination – by over exploiting old 80s cyberpunk imagery barely a notch more original than that billy idol crap? Are you serial?

    Where’s Emerald City?
    The message we are being given here is that human civilization is disappearing and is being left behind by the marching Borg army. Very disturbing.

    killed here, and replaced by the Transhumanist vision of superintelligent, superhuman beings. This ending really drives home the primary deception in this story, and how powerful and effective these tools of Psychological Warfare truly are.

    Quadruple facepalm

    Vigilant’s Conclusion
    The idea of transhumanism has been circulating in mass media outputs, especially movies, TV shows and music videos. Imma Be /Rock that Body is of many videos portraying the upgrade of human beings to a super-robotlike status. The repeated recurrence of this theme simply cannot be a coincidence. It is rather the result of a steady agenda of desensitization, predictive programming and good old fashioned marketing. The trend is not about to die. Here’s Rihanna copulating with robots at Echo 2010.

    Seriously. You should have used this video.

    [youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gc4NTe5O488&hl=en_US&fs=1&]

    to massacre the global transhumanist conspiracy. You could have used more explicit sexual imagery. Missed opportunity really.

    update: http://www.archive.org/download/OccultAmerica/20100227horowitz.mp3

    [youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eHoR2QqiN3U&hl=en_US&fs=1&]

    15 thoughts on “Demonization for dummies

    1. LOL.

      Hat off Khannea, you’ve obviously been thinking more about this than I have.
      Applause.

      One closing remark: be careful what you wish for.

      bodzette

      1. Look at your face in the mirror and ask yourself – what do you have to lose – and are your greatest featest subject to engineering solutions?

        Even if in self-deceit, I selected an answer I found credible by every measure.

    2. Hi Khannea,
      Interesting blog. I read some of your other comments over at the singularity.
      I more or overlap on some of your opinions and ideas but I’m not sold on anything yet because we just don’t know.

      One topic of conversation where I differ though is this:
      Religion is not bullshit. It’s just belief, rightly or wrongly.

      Consider this:
      Hard Takeoff scenario. Omnipotent AI.
      Scenario #1 AI wants to keep human beings around but limited resources leads to competition for processing time.
      Scenario #2 AI considers human beings a total waste of resources.

      I won’t consider Scenario #2 here from the religious perspective because effectively it’s the end of the road for humans.

      In scenario #1, what would be the conditions that human beings would likely be kept around?
      Well, we may speculate, but I suspect that it wouldn’t be to waste processing time in such aimless activities such as virtual sex.

      If that turns out to be true then we may speculate what would be the conditions under which a human being simulation would be allowed processing time: I think it would be one who wasn’t interested in *carnal activites*. Sound familiar?

      Here’s yet another angle from which we may derive some kind of religion:

      The question has been posed that due to our (improbably) large current population it’s likely that we are either a simulation or else about to crash. If we are a simulation then quite obviously the owners of the computational resources would have to value running simulations of current events.

      How could this come about? I suspect (and don’t buy the *religious* idea that we can’t guess what the singularity is like :->) the following:

      Imagine we have a singularity but it’s not a hard takeoff based on an exponentially improving AI, it’s a singularity which has resulted from human augmentation.

      In such a scenario you could ask the question: why would we run historical simulations?
      Well, why do we do it today?
      Research and entertainment.

      Now let’s ignore Research for the purposes of this and look at entertainment and specifically SL as it *is* a simulation.

      What are the characteristics of SL?
      An outside entity controls an in-world entity which may or may not resemble the outside entity in any way, lives and dies inworld as the entity and then can be changed to an entirely different entity with completely different characteristics or gender.

      Does that sound like any particular religion? Perhaps reincarnation?

      Now, I don’t particularly believe in any one particular religion, but I find it interesting relating the concepts of certain religions back to the central concept of this world being a simulation itself (i.e. the singularity has already happened….)

      My 2c.

      1. > Interesting know.

        I agree. We know very little. But if you add up Maturing nanotechnology, robotization, life extension, SSRS, biogenetics, cybernetics, narrow artificial intelligence, virtual reality, augmented reality, global warming, peak oil, terrorism, governments run by senile underachiever bedwetters (etc) in a big salads bowl, my expectation of the near future is that we will have some pretty wild ride ahead of us. It’s then a matter of imagination (or suspension of disbelief? *smirk*) how far this rabbit hole goes. My personal techno-progressive take on things leads me to regard some sort of ‘hypertechological coal burn’, where technology proceeds independent of what any number of humans want (with or without AI) is unavoidable. But yah that is a ‘belief’ not related to anything measurable.

        > One wrongly.

        I am the first to agree that my persistent contempt of organized religion comes from my experiences with religion, whereas my persistent and deep love for some religious people comes from the indescribable benevolence done to me by some of the same. I am talking thousands of euro’s of charity and even though I keep fucking up they still give me the light of day. Religion in this world is important to those under it’s spell, but the sad fact is that very every sincere religious someone there is ten others under another and quite contradictory spell. Many of them a goddamn nuisance.

        > Consider this:
        Hard Takeoff scenario. Omnipotent AI. road for humans.

        Scenario 4 – due to very rapid advances in AI technology somewhere in june 2042 fourteen thousand systems achieve take-off around GMT 06:17 and 18 seconds. Alchemy. Some downloaded algorithm gets implemented in GWindows 42 (Yawning Vortex Edition) and fourteen thousand mainframe
        towers scattered around the worlds coastal areas BHAM achieve takeoff. Sure, some are nasty and maybe 200.000 people worldwide die. However many of these systems have pretty nifty loyalty codes towards humanity and some 90% proceeds to ‘singularitize’ towards humanities benefit. The world is a mess, but those alive steadily get better, from the a developmntal balance between these AI sytems, and from an explosion of new technological advances.
        Scenario 5 – in 2020 nearly everyone has these headsets. Amazing things really – portable microtechnology. Your current PC in a ring, the best PC you can by in 2020 in a jewel around your neck. Other systems just cant compete as it turns out that by far the best technology is consistency both massproduced and consumer-generated. Pentagon and big business stagger along with societal development and interfaces become so smooth and happy and dedicated to serve, by constant consumer driven evolution, that governments find themselves forced to buy WII tools and hellokittybots because well, ‘repurposed’ toys and games are simply the best market options available. TV is dead. Internet is dead. Nearly all people now inhabit internet 4.0, or ‘the obviousium’, a cloud of super-evolved (and continuing to evolve) interface design, derivative from second life, wikipedia and TheBrain mindmapping software. A kid born in 1990 magically taken to 2020 can use the obviousium from day one- largely because its so obvious you cant miss it. Over the years this future results not in one AI waking up, by a storm of consumer empowerment that lifts anyone up, whether they want to or not.
        Scenario 6 – 2016, someone steals a billion euro by having a small robot that looks vaguely like a cigarette pack, crawl into a window and plug in to the USB port of a banker. 2018, storm of robotization sweeps the world. Governments collapse, and civil wars erupt. But not many people die, as these cheap, locally printed robots take over most paid labor. Unemployment skyrockstes to 80% in most countries. These robots come in all sizes, are insanely modular (snapping on and off limbs and tools and sensory devices all the time) and they save TONS of energy costs, largely by far better logistics. Downside is, everyone MUST own and manage like hundreds of bots, like a big-ass strategy game. Costs hours per day to micromanage your swarms to get food, defend your home from other bots, play, and things we dont even have words for in 2010. IP is dead. Privacy is dead. Murders are common for a year and then they stop (everyone unlikable has died, and those left make sure they are likeable). People live in huge houses, in tribal collectives by 2030. Pastic surgery and cybernetics are amazing. Children born are dismembered and given far better replacement limbs (which grow with the child and are constantly replaced) and nearly all humans look like idealized and breaktaking fashion models by 2035.

        You want scenario 6 to 185?

        > In scenario #1, what would be the conditions that human beings would > likely be kept around?
        > Well, we may speculate, but I suspect that it wouldn’t be to waste
        > processing time in such aimless activities such as virtual sex.

        I give you a personal guarantee that we are now seeing the stirrings of a sexual revolution that will blow your mind. You have NO idea. I am fairly certain that by 2020 this revolution has taken hold of society. Trust me, I knew kids in 1980 and kids now in 2010 are not the same. Sure it may be bluff, but it won’t be bluff in a few years. Take this example:

        http://fetlife.com/users/298908

        That’s a mousy little girl age 18. She isn’t merely openly ‘bisexual’… No she makes a spectacle of being actively interested in fucking machines, tentacle rape, triple penetrations and some other things. She’s probably bluffing. But – are you sure? Hell, my expectation is we have seen nothing yet. I say this sex gaming and super-sexuality will saturate all our daily lives – yours, mine – into a simmering seeting tantraic frenzy. And this will be GOOD because these levels of sexual selfexpression are HEALTHY. Sure it will have excesses, sure sad sordid people will do contemptible things, sure a minority of conservatives will scream hell and murder, but who are you to judge?

        > If …familiar?

        Damn. Did you ever hear of the laws of ‘supply and demand’? What if the first AI systems that achieve take-off are super-idealized porn stars (servicing millions through subroutines, all engaged in frenzied competition for consumer attention, male, female, anything in-betweem AND furries) ?? Hell, I intend to be ONE OF THESE SINGULARITARIAN porn stars.

        That’ll be my favorite religion!

        > Here’s yet another angle from which we may derive some kind of
        > religion events.

        Look you know how I think by now. I am a cynical in your face hyper-materialist and a epicurian. You will probably be able to think up a dozen other, completely different and bewildering ‘ancestor simulations’ we may be, why they exist and how they may unfold. Have you contemplated the possibility that the ‘outside’ of any ancestor simulations we inhabit may be so strange, we cannot make any sensible statement about it. Do I *need* to waste my time giving your a dozen wildly disparare scenarios to prove that you have been using a very constrained model? Give it a try – think up ten ancestor scenarios, how they came to be, why they exist, why they act as they act, where they run, and how they may end (or not). See? Possibilities love.

        > How human augmentation.

        Yah one POTENTIAL scenario. I can also show you a scenario where in 1980 the space shuttle wasn’t implemented, and in 2010 we have a lunar city housing 500, we are mining asteroids, oil is used less and less because of dirt cheap orbital solar electricty and there is barely any wars, and everyone in the third world is twice as affluent as they are now. WE DON’T KNOW what is possible until we try. Sure, we have internet in 2010. In how many parallel (and perfectly plausible) world did internet NOT develop. Was internet unavoidable? And if so – did we get a lousy deal with the world we aree in?

        And darling – this will ONLY get worse as we drift nearer to the waterfall call Singulrity. Ya cant just add more and more change and stay confident like a heroin saint Kurzweil and assume it will all turn out for the best. Take the three scenario’s above. Read them closely. NOW ENVISION what woiuld happen if all three (and 6 to 185) ALL HAPPENED AT ONCE.

        In such a scenario you could ask the question: why would we run singularity has already happened….)

        I invite you. To have a close look at SL. And then go and google the concept of the ‘pleasurable companion’ in the game ‘age of conan’. Think about how that might be an answer to your question.

        My favorite quote from the movie ‘hellraiser’ – angels to some, demons to others. Ot ‘jacob’s ladder’ –

        Jacob Singer: Jezzie? Get me out of here.
        Evil Doctor: Where do you want to go?
        Jacob Singer: Home.
        Evil Doctor: Home? This is your home. You’re dead.
        Jacob Singer: Dead? No. I just hurt my back, I’m not dead.
        Evil Doctor: What are you, then?
        Jacob Singer: I’m alive.
        Evil Doctor: Then what are you doing here?
        Jacob Singer: I don’t know.
        [crying]
        Jacob Singer: This isn’t happening.
        Evil Doctor: What *is* happening?
        Jacob Singer: Get me out of here.
        Evil Doctor: There is no out of here. You’ve been killed, don’t you remember?

        Think about it :

        http://fetlife.com/users/353123/pictures/1723513

        http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TNnQcL5t9yU&feature=related

    3. I love you I think, and I do not disagree with you at all but I am a smart@$$ so I have to comment.

      {….if we get our cake humanity will be a good deal more able to self-express in a meaningful manner, rather than be a bunch of docile herbivores as most humans are now.}

      But if we choose to we will get to turn ourselves into docile herbivores right? Or even get to stay the mindless group think violent omnivores we are?

      {…But as a dystopian SF story, it’s a bit dated.}

      http://www.recombinantrecords.net/docs/2009-05-Amusing-Ourselves-to-Death.html

      Just read it, think about our current sociaty, and what is shown that was in Brave new World. Seems a bit less dated now.

      {The transhumanist movement are the john connors and mister andersons of the world.}

      Terminator, now there is a hard take off singularity that went real bad.

      {Yah that’s pretty much correct. Last time I checked founding your own church, or developing your own set of ideas of the world is legal in the US and UK and where I live.}

      Look at Sciencetology, made up church that brainwashes people and is built like a pyramid scheme al about getting money. Oddly, for a so called Church with science in the name I have yet to meet a transhumanist that did not hate it with a passion. Probably the whole brain washing, remove any uniquness, and not let anyone treat parts of the human condition like mental ilness thing they have going on.

      {Humans have become wolves to other animals. }

      Not true. Wolves are loyal, noble, and inteligent pack animals. Humans are ignoble, traitorus, herd animals. They are like sheep, but with the eating habits of pigs (Voracious omnivors) mixed with locusts (Consume everythign and damn the future!).

      That all snarked out, I still say I don’t disagree with you at all and am in aww of your Saint-Machine-Like-Patience.

      1. I agree with your basic assessment.

        But now visualise … have humans live 20 years longer. You, me, everyone, lives 20 years longer. Kids growing up realise, shit, “I am one of the first of a full generation that will be over 100 years, on average – and by the time I am 50, technology will probably be able to make people live to 150, on average.” Politicians will realise… “shit voters will have a long term outlook as opposed to the expectation they’ll probably be dead soon“… Parents who look at their children, “o dear my kid may live to become centuries old“. In all cases – with what world will we be left with?

        Look at how easy it is to create human life. Costs next to nothing, often happens all by itself. Now imagine how much it costs to keep people over 50 alive – as in, thelast third of human existence. Now imagine the costs of having to generationally teach people, every generation has to completely start over. Aging costs ten times as much as the 50 years before. The first twenty years also cost a fortune (but at least not medically) … Imagine taxpayers and insurance systems would have to contend with pushing that ‘aging burden’ forward by a few decades.

        The longer we live, the more productive the arc of our existence is , the more we’d save and the more it would make us prescient as a species.

        I agree, human beings are seriously flawed – that isn’t because some deity made us seriously flawed, or some deity couldn’t intervene because we came out seriously flawed. It is because we are seriously flawed, and anything else we just don’t know. Impairment and incapacity should be a challenge to do better. You can’t hold a knife to god’s throat and say – make it better, or else I am just gonna sit on my ass all day, in passive aggressive protest.

        Maybe it is the meaning of humanity to repair itself and join the angels. Maybe we are supposed to crawl out of our crib. It won’t be easy, and we’ll probably fall on our noses hard a few times, but what’s the alternative. We we have right now is not working, especially not in the long run.

    4. Here via Grinding.

      As has been said, you have machine-saint-like patience.

      I disagree about the nature and function of religion/belief, overall, but completely agree as to what kind of mangling wretchedness has been perpetrated, there.

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