X-Message-Number: 27076
References: <>
From: Peter Merel <>
Subject: A Thought Experiment
Date: Sun, 18 Sep 2005 19:18:21 +1000

Beth Bailey writes,

> I agree with you Peter, FDR was right. I wish the "Four Freedoms"  
> were still part of the political debate taking place throughout the  
> world.

Not many have argued against FDR on principle. The devilish difficult  
problem is how to make his freedoms real. As Thomas has written, the  
implementation of the peace was very far from perfect or  
perfectionist. Short term political intents intervened and that was  
that.

We cryonicists are uniquely motivated to consider the long term. If  
the 4 freedoms are essential to our future, we should talk about the  
effects of our actions, for good or ill, in this light. I'd like to  
propose this as a thought experiment for earnest cryonicists:

Imagine living 200 years ago, expecting to be reborn today; how could  
you have acted to ameliorate the troubles we've experienced? What  
could you have said or done, and to whom, to truly alter the way  
things are now?

> By nature or nurture, there are evil people in the world who would  
> kill you just as soon as look in your direction.

People kill for reasons. The obvious reason for the 9/11 attack is  
the US-led invasions and blockades that have murdered millions of  
innocents over the last two decades. It's not surprising the  
survivors of our victims fight back asymmetrically. How else could  
they fight back?

> I refuse to accept what you say, "If there are evil people, it's  
> us." No one in those airplanes (with the exeption of the Al Queda  
> scum) and no one in the WTC towers or Pentagon deserved to die, or  
> be maimed that day, for the crime of getting up in the morning and  
> going to work.

"All that is necessary for evil to triumph is that good men do  
nothing" -- Edmund Burke, a British sympathizer to the American  
revolution. A succession of Western governments have committed mass  
murder in the middle east. And the WTC victims, and you, I, and the  
rest of cryonet, have done nothing.

What policy would genuinely promote civilization in the middle east?  
These people are not savages - read http://www.talkorigins.org/ 
origins/postmonth/jun04.html#p2 . Could we set up, say, a series of  
UN-based missions to feed and educate a generation of secularized  
civilized people there? Something like http://www.c2.com/cgi/wiki? 
SchoolsForCivilization ?

Or if the US spent its budget on alternative petrochemical technology  
- algal biodiesel, say - instead of military adventures, could the  
terrorists become economically disempowered? Would they return to  
their old tribal conflicts with no motive for aggression against the  
USA? Is the best solution to terror simply to end oil dependence on  
the middle east?

For myself I believe to achieve any constructive solution to terror,  
we must start with ourselves. Establish a humane way of life in  
America and lead the rest of the world by example. If we want to  
remove their motes, we must start with our beams.

Peter Merel.

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