GENIUS FORUMS

Dan wrote:

it's just that no-one sees it like hardly anyone sees the extent of the environmental issue facing us. I have a funny feeling over the next decade or two we're in for some changes that many people will find "outrageous and appalling" and contrary to "humaneness".

David Quinn wrote:

It will be interesting and confronting times for sure. I agree we are going to be in for some shocks.

What sorts of shocks do you predict? And what do you relate these shocks to? environmental change? exhaustion of resources? failure of agricultural systems?

Do you predict a global famine, and therefore global panic by the unconscious?

I wonder what the wisest course of action is for the wise as a means to prepare for such a global calamity if it is indeed coming. I wonder if some sort of cooperation is needed by the elite as a means to increase the chances of the survival of wisdom? any takes on this?

because suppose environmental change is coming, I wouldnt want to be stuck in the middle of an overpopulated city, dependent on unstable food networks.

Just look at the chaos caused by Hurricane Katrina, people were shooting each other in the streets because they were crippled by fear, and no one trusted the other.

Imagine something like that on a global scale, and it seems highly probable if one examines the causal circumstances closely.

David,

I don't remember ever advocating strangling female infants at birth.

I do remember what you said long ago at KIR. But you never said they should be strangled; only that their brains should be "rewired" into male brains. I can't give you the exact words, but that was the spirit of what was said.

Shahrazad wrote:David,

I don't remember ever advocating strangling female infants at birth.

I do remember what you said long ago at KIR. But you never said they should be strangled; only that their brains should be "rewired" into male brains. I can't give you the exact words, but that was the spirit of what was said.

There is a huge difference between "have their brains rewired at birth" and "all female infants should be strangled at birth." I don't remember all of who said he said that, but when i was first given that quote back in October, at least 3 different "eye witnesses" confirmed that exact statement "all female infants should be strangled at birth" as coming from Quinn. I asked him about it in a pm back then, but never got a response, so I didn't quite know what to make of it (and the thought did color my perception of him for quite awhile). I'm glad the rumor has finally been dispelled.

Ryan Rudolph wrote:Dan wrote:

it's just that no-one sees it like hardly anyone sees the extent of the environmental issue facing us. I have a funny feeling over the next decade or two we're in for some changes that many people will find "outrageous and appalling" and contrary to "humaneness".

David Quinn wrote:

It will be interesting and confronting times for sure. I agree we are going to be in for some shocks.

What sorts of shocks do you predict? And what do you relate these shocks to? environmental change? exhaustion of resources? failure of agricultural systems?

I think they will amount to certain severe restrictions on the way we live, the availability and cost of resources we have come to take for granted as almost a natural "right". I think the most striking effect will be an even greater gap between the wealthy and the poor. I suspect there will cease to be a middle class as we know it.

Do you predict a global famine, and therefore global panic by the unconscious?

Widespread famine is possible, but I wouldn't predict a panic of any kind. The process will be too gradual for that. I'm not a man-made Global Warming believer by the way. It's a causal assumption for which there is almost no proof. However, there are a multitude of environmental catastrophes that we are creating that add up to a very serious state of affairs.

Regarding famine, when you look at the world, human beings have a fascinating and even uncanny ability to quietly accept starvation, probably because there's not a whole lot they can do about it. Anything is acceptable if it becomes the norm and a mental habit. We have a bad tendency to act like the proverbial frog in water who gets boiled to death.

I wonder what the wisest course of action is for the wise as a means to prepare for such a global calamity if it is indeed coming.

I'd say running around in circles screaming hysterically is as good a response as any. So long as one did it in a non-attached fashion.... :)

I wonder if some sort of cooperation is needed by the elite as a means to increase the chances of the survival of wisdom? any takes on this?

The real elite are not interested is either wisdom or co-operation. The wise will just have to suck it up like everyone else.

because suppose environmental change is coming, I wouldnt want to be stuck in the middle of an overpopulated city, dependent on unstable food networks.

I think such a scenario is a fair way off for those in the industrialised West. But competition for resources will certainly become more acute if certain trends continue.

Just look at the chaos caused by Hurricane Katrina, people were shooting each other in the streets because they were crippled by fear, and no one trusted the other.

Well, yeah, but I think that says more about American culture than anything else. In other parts of the world people rally together in such circumstances. Americans just have a thing about raping and pillaging and killing each other at the first opportunity. Plus, the politics involved were pretty taudry. I'm not sure we can derive any useful analogies from the Katrina debacle.

Imagine something like that on a global scale, and it seems highly probable if one examines the causal circumstances closely.

I don't see that happening, at least not for a long time. There may be certain upheavals such as the need to expatriate the residents of low lying Pacific countries and suchlike. But, we'll handle that. Environmental change is extremely hard to model because we just don't know enough to pinpont certain causes, so it'll be hard for us to predict what might need to happen in terms of social restructuring. It'll be ad hoc, as usual.

I don't remember all of who said he said that, but when i was first given that quote back in October, at least 3 different "eye witnesses" confirmed that exact statement "all female infants should be strangled at birth" as coming from Quinn.

In their defense, I'll say that it did happen years ago, and with all the comments the claim got through the years, it was distorted in a natural, non-malicious way.

Well, Chinese Whispers granted, certain people have exploited it in a very malicious way.

Dan wrote:

I'm not a man-made Global Warming believer by the way. It's a causal assumption for which there is almost no proof.

Why do you believe there is is no proof? There seems to be a consensus in the scientific community that man-made global warming is an actuality, what do you know that the scientists do not?

Dan wrote:

However, there are a multitude of environmental catastrophes that we are creating that add up to a very serious state of affairs.

What other environmental catastrophes are you referring to?

Shahrazad wrote:

DQ: I don't remember ever advocating strangling female infants at birth.

S: I do remember what you said long ago at KIR. But you never said they should be strangled; only that their brains should be "rewired" into male brains. I can't give you the exact words, but that was the spirit of what was said.

Oh yes, that's right. I think I said that with our emerging genetic technology we will have the means to reprogram women (and men) to have more masculine traits. Without this reprogramming, women (and feminine men) will continue to have little or no potential for wisdom. They might as well be strangled at birth for all the good it will do.

It's funny how people pick up on this sort of comment and make such a big deal of it that they can never let it go again. I had almost forgotten making this comment and yet Nat, for example, continues to carry it with him to this very day.

I'm reminded of the Zen story in which a Zen Master helps a beautiful woman by carrying her across a creek before continuing on with his journey. The student monk beside him was appalled and kept festering over his Master's sin until he could take it no more and let the Zen Master know just what he thought of such a contemptible act. The Zen Master replied, "Are you still carrying that woman?"

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David Quinn wrote:Shahrazad wrote:

DQ: I don't remember ever advocating strangling female infants at birth.

S: I do remember what you said long ago at KIR. But you never said they should be strangled; only that their brains should be "rewired" into male brains. I can't give you the exact words, but that was the spirit of what was said.

Oh yes, that's right. I think I said that with our emerging genetic technology we will have the means to reprogram women (and men) to have more masculine traits. Without this reprogramming, women (and feminine men) will continue to have little or no potential for wisdom. They might as well be strangled at birth for all the good it will do.

It's funny how people pick up on this sort of comment and make such a big deal of it that they can never let it go again. I had almost forgotten making this comment and yet Nat, for example, continues to carry it with him to this very day.

I'm reminded of the Zen story in which a Zen Master helps a beautiful woman by carrying her across a creek before continuing on with his journey. The student monk beside him was appalled and kept festering over his Master's sin until he could take it no more and let the Zen Master know just what he thought of such a contemptible act. The Zen Master replied, "Are you still carrying that woman?"

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I can't see how anyone can interpret your comments Quinn as anything but anti-empathetic. You are basically saying that women and most men have no potential for wisdom. Given that they take you seriously, your message is one that can only bring hopelessness and depression to women and feminine men. You don't give them any sense of dignity or usefulness.

And I'm not even saying that you are wrong for being the way you are.

All I'm saying is that I have a hard time believing that your mirror neurons are functioning like most people, despite you say they do. Despite you say you have empathy, I have a hard time believing that.

For instance, I was reading on that balance thread about your reactions to your mother when she cried for years about your decision to follow in the footsteps of Jesus, Buddha, etc. How did you feel when you hurt your mother? Did it bother you at all?

Simon,

I can't see how anyone can interpret your comments Quinn as anything but anti-empathetic. You are basically saying that women and most men have no potential for wisdom. Your message is one that can only bring hopelessness and depression to women and feminine men. You don't give them any sense of dignity or usefulness.

I'm not really sure that my empathy, or lack of it, is the issue here.

First and foremost, if we really want to help women develop to become conscious and wise, we have to be realistic about what's involved. There is not much point in giving women false hope, or lying to them, or pretending that they are something they are not. It might comfort them in the short-term to tell a few lies for their sake, but the basic situation of their lives will only remain unchanged.

I realize that it is a harsh truth for women (and men) to face. But unless we face up to it, nothing will ever be done about it.

And I'm not even saying that you are wrong for being the way you are.

All I'm saying is that I have a hard time believing that your mirror neurons are functioning like most people, despite you say they do. Despite you say you have empathy, I have a hard time believing that.

Does a doctor who has to perform a painful operation on a patient for the good of his long-term health lack empathy? I'm sure the top doctors have empathy in spades.

For instance, I was reading on that balance thread about your reactions to your mother when she cried for years about your decision to follow in the footsteps of Jesus, Buddha, etc. How did you feel when you hurt your mother? Did it bother you at all?

Not really. Not then. I was too concentrated on my own sense of destiny to have much empathy for her. I knew that that she would take it quite hard, as it was evident that the last thing my parents had groomed me for was rejecting the world and leading a spiritual life. But I knew that I had to break it to them and cop whatever response they offered on the chin.

Young people have to break from their parents at some stage. They have to leave the nest, as it were, and fly off to follow their own path, and this is often upsetting and traumatizing for the parents. But really, it is the parent's own fault if they get upset, because they are the ones who have projected their own egotism and values upon the child, regardless of whether the child wants these values or not. If the child turns around and rejects them, then that's too bad for the parents.

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It's funny how people pick up on this sort of comment and make such a big deal of it that they can never let it go again.

Well, it's not exactly an easy thing to forget.

Ryan,

DQ: It will be interesting and confronting times for sure. I agree we are going to be in for some shocks.

R: What sorts of shocks do you predict? And what do you relate these shocks to? environmental change? exhaustion of resources? failure of agricultural systems?

Do you predict a global famine, and therefore global panic by the unconscious?

I don't think anyone really knows what's going to happen. The only thing I am reasonably certain of is that we are placing increasing pressure on all levels of the environment and sooner or later they are going to break.

Some likely scenarios would include: killer viruses sweeping through large sections of the world's population, large-scale famines caused by sudden changes in climate patterns, increasing water shortages, and the breakdown of Western democracies. Any of these events could decimate the global economy and plunge it into a depression. They could also cause many of the political flashpoints in the world, currently on tender hooks, to erupt. Can you imagine what will happen in the Middle East, for example, when countries there start running out of water? It will be a nightmare.

So that is my basic prediction - namely, that the global climate, the global economy, and the various political truces will become increasingly unstable, resulting in God knows what.

I wonder what the wisest course of action is for the wise as a means to prepare for such a global calamity if it is indeed coming.

Escape into nirvana as soon as possible, I should think.

I wonder if some sort of cooperation is needed by the elite as a means to increase the chances of the survival of wisdom? any takes on this?

There's not enough of us to do anything about it. Maybe we should all move down to Queenstown (Tasmania) where Kevin lives. It is as far from the rest of the world as you can reasonable get and there is plenty of water there. Although once the trouble starts, the locals might not let anyone in!

Do you have any ideas?

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Maybe we should all move down to Queenstown (Tasmania) where Kevin lives.

May I ask what is the altitude of that city? Because cities in islands will mostly go under water, except for the ones on mountains. I'm pretty sure my city will.

Unless you don't believe in global warming, in which case, ignore what I said.

That's a point to consider. Queenstown is nestled in a valley, surrounded by fairly high mountains, and situated across hilly/mountainous country 40km from the sea. I could be wrong, but I think the sea levels would have to rise quite steeply before Queenstown became affected. Kevin would know better.

City is the wrong word for it. It's a small mining town - current population: 2200.

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David Quinn wrote:

There's not enough of us to do anything about it. Maybe we should all move down to Queenstown (Tasmania) where Kevin lives. It is as far from the rest of the world as you can reasonable get and there is plenty of water there. Although once the trouble starts, the locals might not let anyone in!

Do you have any ideas?

I was thinking something around those lines. But one needs to have a subtle understanding of causality. For instance: Many parts of the Canadian prairies that are currently incredibly fertile would dry up in the event of a global increase of 4 or 5 degrees Celsius, and I assume that many other fertile parts of the world are equally as fragile.

The possible error that could be made is that if a wise group of individuals decided to unite and cooperate to secure the basic necessities, and then that chosen destination could be drastically affected by the causal changes, which could ultimately result in an inability to secure basic food crops.

There would need to be a back up plan in the choice itself, for instance if there was in area that was incredibly fertile, like a river valley that could be farmed, but there would also need to be tropical jungles near by that one could resort to if climate change affected the valley drastically.

That is just an idea, but any two types of environments would do, although Canada is quite barren in the winter, and I couldn’t imagine trying to survive the winter months here if civilization fell apart.

A tropical or semi-tropical environment is ideal.

Ideally I wouldn’t want to be isolated when these global changes take place because the chances of survival around a bunch of deluded people is much lower I would imagine. It only seems logical to unite as a means to improve both the changes of the other and oneself of surviving.

However, it is difficult to know how much time one has to prepare for the changes. The scientists say that humans have a decade to drastically change their consumption patterns, but it is difficult to know.

Sometimes I feel as though I have less than a decade to prepare, maybe 5-7 years, that is just what my intuition tells me, but I don’t know how I know this and if it is correct.

Not sure of the town's actual elevation, but it lies in a mountainous area.

Qeenstown

So we should all move to Australia, and form a little compound of thinking people in case the world goes batty(er) we can survive?

Oh well, sounds good without the end of the world bit...

Returning to the issue of David's passing thought about euthaniasing older people who have failed to attain any wisdom by 60 or 70 years, this is part of a rather "vigorous" (and somewhat illadvised and unskilled on my part) exchange I had at another board. I'm not sure it requires any commentary but I'm going to offer some anyway:

Poster: I say get the weeds like Q's ilk out and it will be just fine with me!

Me: There ya go!! Mrs Hitler!! I knew we'd reach this point eventually. You and Dave have a lot more in common than you think. Get rid of a certain segment of humanity and the world will be fine and dandy by your standards. I think after this you should really just shut the hell up.

Poster: No, get rid of a certain segment of humanity and Q's world will be fine and dandy. That's what started this whole discussion, remember? My idea of 'getting rid' of anyone (as in weeds from the garden) is my ability to pluck them out and cast them aside, not kill them. They can take root elsewhere, not my problem, just not in my garden. Killing is the
form of removal Q solicits. My speaking out against Q and his insane gobbledygook doesn't equate to a desire to see him dead. See the difference?

No, I don't really see the difference. It would be nice to be able to just invent a fantasy world called "cast aside" so as to retain the appearance of humanity and moral virtue, but it doens't mean anything. Where the hell is this fantasy land called "cast aside"? It isn't anywhere because it is merely a fiction, a convenient rhetorical device that avoids the occasionally harsh reality of real world scenarios. I'm sure David wishes he had the mystical realm of "cast aside" available to him where he could just dump his ignorant oldies, but he seems to have his head set too firmly in the real world. It's clever to simply create rhetorical devices for the sake of apperances, but it doesn't involve anything resembling intellectual integrity.

It's interesting that no-one seems to have even noticed the qualifying statement in David's post on the issue, that being "if needs be". Clearly, if he had an option available, such as a mystical realm into which to insert people, he'd have used it. Pity we live in a real world where real stuff happens and real choices must be made - if needs be.

City is the wrong word for it. It's a small mining town - current population: 2200.

So, probably the only way to get a job in that village is to become a miner. Pretty tough.

Nick,

Have you considered the full implications of Hume's is/ought problem: whereas you can't derive an ought from an is? All values ultimately depend upon the passions, and as such, a value for reason does not come from reason, but ironically, from passion. Hence why Hume suggested that "reason is, and ought only to be, the slave of the passions". Even your distaste for emotion is born out of it. The simple "cold hard truth" of the matter is that human emotion is very real, and to dismiss it off hand as "evil" or whatnot is simply irrational.

Also, the latest developments in cognitive science seem to suggest that emotion and reason are tied together to a much greater degree then folks like Descartes figured. One can't simply say that emotion is the product of the limbic system and that reason is the product of the cerebral cortex anymore, as the truth of the matter seems much more complicated. This, perhaps, should have been apparent given that animals that seem capable of the complicated emotions that humans have tend to also be quite intelligent, whereas animals that don't have complex emotions seem to simply respond to stimuli in a manner quite predictable by their nature. It would seem to me that if we wanted to "glorify what it is to be animal" we would want to ignore our emotions and simply fulfill our base needs like hunger, lust, or thirst; with no thought given to human desire for love, friendship, or beauty.

Just some thoughts on this bastard of a topic - the future - sadly, with a lack of any solutions.

As far as I am concerned truth is only a small part of our world, with the rest being emotions. As the bulk of most lives is emotion, the truth of physical suffering will be what changes the world to seek greater truth, to be more rational. It is a complex, confusing world, and people will seek refuge in emotional satisfaction, until providing for such temporary satisfactions costs too much. Newly developing economies will be particularly fierce in their desire not to go back to past discomforts. Populations will continue to grow in virtually all countries. The increasingly aging and demanding Western countries, and countries who climatically benefit from climate change, will require increasing levels of immigration, and poorer countries suffering hardship will seek refuge in baby making.

We can save the world if we spend as much effort on problem solving, as we do now on temporary emotional satisfaction, but first we have to have the pain - economies are still growing so the pain hasn’t arrived as yet.

China and Sth Korea have intelligent populations. We have yet to see their real inventive potential, though Japan technological rise last century gives you an idea of what might be their imaginative potentiality. Fingers crossed.

I don’t think energy and resource problems will get really severe for another 15-20 years yet. By really severe I mean a "sufficient cause for war". America will have to accept a move into second place. They'll be kept busy by influx from the South.

I'm not too worried about the Islamists. They will mostly kill each other. Oil supplies may be made inconsistent, but this will have vital impact on alternative energy usage. The market for oil won’t be removed so it will be produced until there is no more.

Climatic change could possibly cause a collapse in the southern Asian belt. Australia does have to keep itself as relatively wealthy compared to this general area, though this point actually applies to every country. There could be a lot of internal turmoil for this area. I don't know, forests can be pretty resilient to heat, providing moisture levels remain high. Lots more forest fires there nowadays though.

Cities will stay where they are, even though the changing climate may make them not suitable for such populations. The cost of adapting cities to hotter climates will create a huge demand for energy and resources.

A big problem though is that we must have economic depressions to stifle rampant desire. It will basically be up to the multinationals, in 15-20 years the concentration of power will be immense, to firstly, allow them to occur (being greed obsessive they may not allow this) and secondly to control their depth. They have been completely irresponsible to date.

In the absence of a world war, most western countries should be relatively safe for say 30 years.
In this time changes should occur slowly enough to be adapted to, though we will always be fair way behind the eight ball, so a complete crisis will eventuate at some stage.

I don’t particularly care if global warming is man-made or not, because there is still the underlying pollution that has to be minimised. With pollution, I am most concerned with some failure of the overall food chain - we just don’t know what the combination of extra heat and significant air and water pollution. We are creating different chemical combinations that the lower section of the food chain will have to adapt to - will they?

I think I’ll give up here, too depressing. I can’t think of sufficient positives. Mind you I'm 45 and if I see out another 30 years I’ll be most pleased. Must buy a good air conditioner, while I can still afford it :).

Ryan - wasn't it you that already dismissed my idea of pod life? At the very least, finding an old, abandoned mine inside a mountain far away from where the tectonic plates meet sounds good enough to me (the Carolinas or around there would be good). The ground temperature is a constant 72 degrees so we wouldn't have to worry about heating or air conditioning, and we would be safe from the storms, we could farm the land on top of the mountain while the weather still permitted, and use solar power to raise crops underground when it got too hot for plants outside.

I can't imagine people wanting to move to Tasmania. That's pretty close to the hole in the ozone layer, and I imagine that the reflections off the ocean's surface bounce down off the inside of the ozone layer and get that far up the planet. I would think the risk of cancer would be much higher where Kevin lives.

Kevin - why did you move there?

ExpectantlyIronic wrote:Have you considered the full implications of Hume's is/ought problem: whereas you can't derive an ought from an is? All values ultimately depend upon the passions, and as such, a value for reason does not come from reason, but ironically, from passion. Hence why Hume suggested that "reason is, and ought only to be, the slave of the passions". Even your distaste for emotion is born out of it. The simple "cold hard truth" of the matter is that human emotion is very real, and to dismiss it off hand as "evil" or whatnot is simply irrational.

Some people are naturally more inclined to think logically rather than emotionally. It all depends on the causal circumstances. A dog shits because it ate while another dog didn't shit because it didn't eat. Who cares?

When did I ever try to dismiss emotion as if they didn't exist? I was only pointing out how digusting it is to watch people masturbate in their emotions and glorify it as something spiritual.

ExpectantlyIronic wrote:Also, the latest developments in cognitive science seem to suggest that emotion and reason are tied together to a much greater degree then folks like Descartes figured. One can't simply say that emotion is the product of the limbic system and that reason is the product of the cerebral cortex anymore, as the truth of the matter seems much more complicated. This, perhaps, should have been apparent given that animals that seem capable of the complicated emotions that humans have tend to also be quite intelligent, whereas animals that don't have complex emotions seem to simply respond to stimuli in a manner quite predictable by their nature. It would seem to me that if we wanted to "glorify what it is to be animal" we would want to ignore our emotions and simply fulfill our base needs like hunger, lust, or thirst; with no thought given to human desire for love, friendship, or beauty.

So what if human emotions are more "complex" than that of other animals? They are still emotions. What makes us human is the ability to think logically, rationally, and reasonably. Without these abilities we would still be living in caves, or extinct by now.

Nick Treklis wrote:Without these abilities we would still be living in caves, or extinct by now.

Well, if the people who insist this global warming is just a natural cycle and we have been through it before are even close to right, perhaps the cave-dwellers were the only ones who survived the last global bake-off. Perhaps the caves of cave-dwellers were the abandoned mines of a lost civilization. Maybe thinking logically, rationally, and reasonably will lead us into the caves again, but if we go early enough this time to have time to bring manifestations of wisdom with us, we won't have to start from scratch this time.

Elizabeth wrote:

Ryan - wasn't it you that already dismissed my idea of pod life? At the very least, finding an old, abandoned mine inside a mountain far away from where the tectonic plates meet sounds good enough to me (the Carolinas or around there would be good). The ground temperature is a constant 72 degrees so we wouldn't have to worry about heating or air conditioning, and we would be safe from the storms, we could farm the land on top of the mountain while the weather still permitted, and use solar power to raise crops underground when it got too hot for plants outside.

Yes, perhaps I was a little hard on your pod idea, it just sounded quite odd to me at the time, they are all possibilities I suppose, although being an outsider and being dependent on technologies for crops creates many problems.

The main point is that it is so difficult to know for certain how much torture the planet can handle before significant changes occur. This is the biggest difficulty is trying to determine whether to take action.