Evolution WAS Re: Optimum number of symbols

Raymond Brown sikyal:

> >Evolution goes both ways, but in the field of technology, the
> >accumulative effect (two steps forward, one step back) goes towards
> >progress.
>
> Like, er, the production of nuclear weapons. Yep, a great advance in
> evolution since the primitive spear.  You can kill only one guy at time
> with a spear; obviously we need progress...
Indeed.  If your goal is killing people, developing nuclear weapons is a
fabulous improvement, offering approximately a 100000% increase over the
most efficient ways to kill people before.  Do you have any idea how long
it would take to kill 60,000 Japanese people with a spear?

Technology does, in fact, do a fabulous job of improving whatever you're
hoping to improve.  If you want to place blame, don't put it on
"technology," but on those who decide that destruction is the thing that
needs to be worked on.

> >Technology builds on itself, and who knows where it will
> >end.
>
> Armageddon??
We can only hope.


Jesse S. Bangs jaspax@u.washington.edu

"If you look at a thing nine hundred and ninety-nine times, you are
perfectly safe; if you look at it the thousandth time, you are in
frightful danger of seeing it for the first time."
--G.K. Chesterton

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