More about where society might be going, and maybe why guys like sci-fi or pursue the monastic life
Previously I speculated on where society might be going and now I do a little bit of a follow up to that. First up is the equally disturbing trend regarding sexuality as explemplified on an editorial on “the morning news”.org, which I first saw at NSLog’s post about it. This, together with some evolutionary reasoning (see my EvolutionaryReasoningDisclaimer), enables one to start putting some pieces together:
Back before we had the ability to transfer memes, as described in The Meme Machine, we were only guided by instinct and trial-and-error learning. Only instinct is something that is likely inherited and thus not necessarily a product of our environment. In Darwinian Natural Right, we see how some of our notions of “right” and “wrong” can be expressed in terms of both evolutionary reasoning as well as magnified natural consequences of our instincts. At any rate, we are thus able to posit the existence of “instincts”. Clearly, one of our instincts is to reproduce - or else the human race would not have done so. In The Meme Machine we learn of the power of genetic sexual selection, and we see that in many ways, females are learning how to be as selective as they want to be and getting paid for it too, whereas in terms of propagation of memes (ideas), males currently tend to have an upper hand - as exemplified by the astuteness of The Vatican’s Response to the New Age Movement.
The fact that males presently have the upper hand as regards meme propagation (despite efforts to alleviate that condition - efforts which are in spite of the biological tendencies inherent in being, or possibly being, a mother), combined with the possible network effects of ReedsLaw suggests that via tools such as MemeStreams and the network effect that blogging enables, it will become increasingly possible for males to utilize this network effect to reinforce their memetic dominence as they continue to lose their ability to shape their own genetic destiny. In contrast, their inability to shape their own genetic destiny is the advent of cloning, which can, at a certain level, be seen as a last-ditch effort to enable males to regain control over the genetic future of this species. More pronounced, at the social level, although less obviously yielding any fruit now, is the typical male preoccupation with science fiction which seems to be lacking in females. I suspect this is a subconcious endeavor to escape the reproductive process all together via the creation of a technology that can become the superior progeny of males, devoid of female influences. Indeed, in this context, celebate lifestyles in a variety of religions, as well as notions that regard sex as “bad” suggest that this is something that males have been yearning for for quite some time. Indeed, it would seem that some religious movements have, at there core, a means whereby males can choose to avoid the whole necessity of interacting with females and devalue the notion of genetic progeny - instead, the emphasis becomes on being “reborn on a higher level” or “ascending” or other such notions.
But why this possible “battle of the sexes” which all of the above discussion has presupposed? That will have to wait for another post.
http://www.andrewsw.com/news/index.php?p=259 is the followup about the basis for the “battle of the sexes”.