I haven’t voted on this comment yet, but I was very tempted to. While I do disagree with it, I’m more irritated that it makes several unsupported generalizations. You admit that there’s a bias involved in the arguments against life extension and then say that it’s to stop hubris, then you handwave away any evidence that you could provide to back up your argument. Sure you might not be able to prove that it’s hubris, surely something led you to believe that that could also persuade others right?
The rest of my complaints run in a similar vein; average life expectancy has been increasing for at least 50 years now, surely there’s evidence showing how people have damaged the common good in the name of life extension (Ballooning healthcare costs comes to mind). You generalize that all LWer’s have a fear of death… how? Who have you seen talking about being afraid of death? Why would rationality be insufficient? How do you know your views are getting downvoted on the sole basis of expressing an unpopular opinion?
If your other comments were of similar quality to this one, I wouldn’t have a hard time imagining why they were downvoted. They come off more as rants than as carefully measured attempts at argument.
I will say though, that if you do try and provide arguments that I’d be happy to upvote it.
Hey, thanks for the reply. I appreciate it. I’m not upset if people want to downvote the rant—rants by their nature are not carefully argued. The best spin might be ‘brainstorming’. I’ll edit it to label it up-front. But I don’t see how the original post is poorly argued; that’s what matters for visibility. The one thing I’ll note is:
average life expectancy has been increasing for at least 50 years now, surely there’s evidence showing how people have damaged the common good in the name of life extension
I agree and think that supports the point. The trend has already caused some damage, though we can handle it fairly gracefully. If it accelerates dramatically, then I fear we will be unable to handle it. Maybe I misunderstood you.
Maybe I’ll get the energy to make a post on hubris, but not right now.
I haven’t voted on this comment yet, but I was very tempted to. While I do disagree with it, I’m more irritated that it makes several unsupported generalizations. You admit that there’s a bias involved in the arguments against life extension and then say that it’s to stop hubris, then you handwave away any evidence that you could provide to back up your argument. Sure you might not be able to prove that it’s hubris, surely something led you to believe that that could also persuade others right?
The rest of my complaints run in a similar vein; average life expectancy has been increasing for at least 50 years now, surely there’s evidence showing how people have damaged the common good in the name of life extension (Ballooning healthcare costs comes to mind). You generalize that all LWer’s have a fear of death… how? Who have you seen talking about being afraid of death? Why would rationality be insufficient? How do you know your views are getting downvoted on the sole basis of expressing an unpopular opinion?
If your other comments were of similar quality to this one, I wouldn’t have a hard time imagining why they were downvoted. They come off more as rants than as carefully measured attempts at argument.
I will say though, that if you do try and provide arguments that I’d be happy to upvote it.
Hey, thanks for the reply. I appreciate it. I’m not upset if people want to downvote the rant—rants by their nature are not carefully argued. The best spin might be ‘brainstorming’. I’ll edit it to label it up-front. But I don’t see how the original post is poorly argued; that’s what matters for visibility. The one thing I’ll note is:
I agree and think that supports the point. The trend has already caused some damage, though we can handle it fairly gracefully. If it accelerates dramatically, then I fear we will be unable to handle it. Maybe I misunderstood you.
Maybe I’ll get the energy to make a post on hubris, but not right now.