__B_B__'s comments

Some people are just dazzled by the promise of being able to manipulate reality in whatever variety of ways they can imagine using comparatively little effort, and just don't think any deeper into it than how much they might personally enjoy that.

It's kind of like the rush a highway robber might get from realizing that people do what he wants when he points his weapon at them.

Ah yes, ye olde genetically engineered crop product TM. Don't worry boys. Just plug the genomes into the database and the computer will fix it. Guys, Victor Glushkov told me that if we just plug the economy numbers in, the computer will fix it and everything will be efficient again. We just need all the informations and you need to stop doing whatever it is you're doing so we can get back to what we know works, so stop being so self indulgent.

You're assuming "the world" and "society" to be harmonious concepts but in the worldview of the author they're not, and therefore, for him, there is no contradiction.

You will see it in the way he describes working together to meet basic needs at the end of point 6. He says society is a system for meeting needs. The world presents a set of problems and society presents a set of solutions through it's behavioral demands.

The rest of the article is just him rationalizing the demands and the repercussions of not meeting them but the underlying assertions he is making are these:

That humans are not a part of the world. They are just in it and afflicted by the requirements of being there. That society is a social technology which partitions us off and functions to preserve us therein. Therefore any demands it makes or repercussions it inflicts are legitimate and bound up with your survival and that the sooner you get on board, the sooner you will be "a better person".

Another dead give away is the fact that "better" is a completely subjective evaluation, but he kind of buries the lede on that one and goes on to talk about "society" in the singular, probably knowing full well that the reader will just project their own subjective definition.

If the only reason to do anything is because other people think you should, you better hope they have empathy for you.

Well let me put it to you this way. He whines about proof of work, as is popular to do. Proof of work means to expend resources to produce a true statement such that the cost of lying is prohibitive, because producing an accurate record is better than producing nothing, given the same expenditure.

Cost of refutation is a related rhetorical concept. If this worthless article is going to can a few common critical tropes, all previously addressed, even by other technologies in the same space it aimed at, why should I do anything other than respond with equivalently low effort?

Because you want me to expend the resources? I thought wasted resources were bad? That's the premise of the whining after all, isn't it? Disingenuous, worthless article, preying upon stupidity, fear and moral outrage, which just happened to be filed within days of most cryptos dropping 25% in price, roughly, in the middle of a bear market.

And?

It's the logical conclusion derived from the conceptualization of humans as programmable machines and education as their programming. After one accepts that belief, the issue merely becomes one of economy. Managing costs.

Well, you're seeing one of the problems with systems based on consensus expressed in grocery prices now. Refusal to adopt the faith for any reason increases harm exponentially.

The notion that, if everyone just went along with things, then they would be better off, is why some people argue that free will doesn't exist and more to the subject matter, it's also why agriculturally productive land has been more and more centralized and industrialized, over the last few decades especially, in the name of creating this giant system of global food distribution which so many are now reliant entirely upon and which has also now just shit the bed.

Whining about proof of work. Check. Whining about ransomware. Check. Ponzi scheme. Check. What an organic article and opinion.

The presumption that terraforming is merely the formulizing of chemistry and biology appropriately would be more convincing if it was actually achieved on Earth first. As far as I know, all "sustainability" so far is merely passing of the buck.

Still, even presuming "moon soil" can be made fertile with microbiological and chemical amendments from the Earth, who's to say whatever inert resource which may exist in it is capable of sustaining a self sufficient system once seeded? Perhaps all terraforming will ever be is the opportunity to neurotically dump a stream of the Earth's resources down a bottomless pit?