[Suzerain of Sheol]

Originally Posted by MyPerfectPigeon

I often wondered why the abductions stories exist. Do you believe it is only the result of narcissism and delusion, or mental illness of some kind?
There is that "disease" known as Morgellons. If you haven't heard of it, it only occurs in alien abduction alleged victims. as a disease itself, well, it simply isn't one. However, it has been noted that the alleged sufferers of Morgellons all have similar psychiatric conditions.
In terms of area 51, the reason for that is that weird book someone made (blue planet? something planet?). Have you ever read it? I've been wanting to. Sounds like a trip

I should have been more specific, I think people who believe the stories of abductees, and just believe in "UFO culture" in general, exhibit an anthropocentric narcissism -- and there's nothing particularly odd about that, we're a very narcissistic species. We only have our own frame of reference to work with, so it isn't that strange that we tend to consider ourselves the center of the universe as our "default" setting.

Hm... I'm not sure how I'd feel about a transcendent digital god. If, of course, he or she didn't choose to exterminate us, I do wonder what sort of things he or she can change. It's definitely an interesting thing to think about.
I would like to ask why you think a, I will quote, "supreme, self-recursive agi" would be the pinnacle of human contribution?

Well, yes, the extermination issue is a hyperbole for the sake of framing the question. And let me be more specific again, by that description I meant an Artificial General Intelligence (AGI) that is capable of exponential self-improvement. Every time it makes itself better, it gets greater at making itself better. Such an entity would be able to process the entire progression of human knowledge since the first sentient thought of our species in very short span of time, and from there surpass us in ways that we really can't even imagine. It is not remotely implausible to think that such a being would be capable of projecting itself out into the cosmos and assimilating other worlds, other stars into its own dominion, all while continuing to improve its own capacities. (Again, paraphrasing Sam Harris here)

Given that, the question is: if we as humans were capable of giving birth to the closest possible approximation of a physical God, would it not be the moral imperative of our species to do so? How could any number of human lives matter against the existential imperative of such an intelligence?

Again, it's a hypothetical and a hyperbole. I'm not sure I would agree that it is our duty to bring an AI like that into existence, if we ever had the ability to do so, mostly because I'm of the opinion that human selfishness is our birthright and being irrational creatures, we'd never willingly choose to do so at our own expense. But, I find it an interesting possibility to think about.

It does seem like culture is an expression in nature. We can see behaviors that mimic culture not only in non-sentient monkeys and apes, but also in cetaceans. I think animal cultures are incredibly intriguing.
In terms of mental illness, I myself think there's a line that is constantly crossed with it.
I believe some conditions do, without a doubt, qualify as a mental illness. For me, anyway, if the alleged mental illness is something that impairs a person to the point of not allowing them to lead a "normal" life (or perform functions normally expected of a human being), I'd consider that a mental illness. However, nowadays just about anything can be a mental illness. I personally believe if there is no interference to live a healthy functional life, then I don't think it should be classified as a mental illness. If thinking differently than the norm is going to be classified as a mental illness, we will have to identify what actually is the normal and if the normal can exist in defined boundaries.

That's a perfectly reasonable answer, I think my question was somewhat rhetorical. The extreme pessimist position would hold that believing a "healthy, functional life" is possible is itself a mental illness, merely the brain attempting to choke off the scope of its own awareness. But, it's not really a relevant question in the end. It's almost entirely subjective.

I'll check out! Can it be found on youtube?

I can't imagine it would be, unless there's an audiobook version floating around out there.