[FRIAM] Faber, Sapiens, or Ludens?

[Steve Smith]

Victoria writes:   “IN the long run it is more profitable, and much less arrogant.”   If I were sick with one of these conditions, I’d be extra special mad if it approval of these treatments were hung up on the politics of fear…   http://www.technologyreview.com/news/519071/when-will-gene-therapy-come-to-the-us/   http://www.uphs.upenn.edu/news/News_Releases/2014/03/june/   Marcus This also could be considered another salvo *in* the politics of fear.   "If you *don't* approve on my schedule, the unregulated use of any given promising technology to relieve my specific life-threatening condition, you are harming me".  I'm pretty much LIbertarian in my views on such things, so tend to prefer erring on the "permissive" side...   but that doesn't mean I think progress is all it is cracked up to be, or that we are not repeatedly victims of our own wishful thinking and the Con Men of all stripes (e.g. business suits, lab coats, church frocks) that prey on it.. What is the middle way if there is one?   Homo Faber creates, Homo Sapiens is wise.   We are clearly the former and aspire to the latter. My point is that being very clever at the former does not equate to being mature in the latter.   Many who are clever at the former tend to ignore this. It has certainly become fashionable to embrace retro/primitive as "better".  I think my words here show my sympathies with that position pretty clearly.   But my challenge is not simply to throw our wooden shoes into the machinery because we fear it is changing our lives in horrific but unspecified ways, it is to encourage seeking deeper understanding than is often "convenient" for those promoting a given technology or policy about technology...   Oddly I believe most Libertarians are also rabid Technophiles...   I am simultaneously Technophilic and Technophobic, I *really do* want to have it both ways. Marcus' point earlier in this thread that anytime we are not operating out of (partial?) ignorance, we are dealing with an oversimplified system is well taken.   Life, and ultimately intelligence, is at least partly, though I contend not exclusively, about developing predictive abilities regarding the future state of our environment.  It is also about developing manipulative capabilities to manipulate that future state as much as possible.   Thus Sapiens, thus Faber.  I contend that to be human, we must do both, remember, think, predict, enlighten ourselves *and* extend our phenotype through direct augmentation (e.g. lithics, ceramics, levers, clothing, glasses, hearing aids and bussard ramjets) and through collective identity/organization/action (e.g. tribe/pack/herd/hive, religion/politics/society). For what it is worth, we also have Homo Ludens, the "playing" human.  Perhaps this is what is required to keep a sufficiently complex mind engaged in "enlightened problem solving" rather than in various pathological applications of one's intellect and brawn.   Art engages Sapiens, Faber *and* Ludens.   In light of other disparaging implications that Technophiles are "just playing", I would claim that Technologists (formerly known as Craftsmen?)  are seeking the same:  to engage Faber, Sapiens *and* Ludens but I understand why it would seem that oftentimes we are simply "playing". What represents a responsible, enlightened balance between Faber, Sapiens and Ludens ?   As both Glen and Marcus have pointed out (I hope I'm not taking too many liberties in interpreting them) the only way to find out answers to questions like this is to proceed, and I have to agree... I just don't want to see any of the three thrown out/ignored/marginalized at the expense of the others.   I believe that would be, using Tory's terms "arrogant and ultimately unprofitable" - Steve    (who clearly doesn't have something better to do on a lovely Sunday afternoon, WTF?)

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