{"id":2358,"date":"2004-12-25T02:54:08","date_gmt":"2004-12-25T02:54:08","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.soulhuntre.com\/items\/date\/2004\/12\/25\/fear-of-the-future\/"},"modified":"2004-12-25T02:54:08","modified_gmt":"2004-12-25T02:54:08","slug":"fear-of-the-future","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/legacyiamsenseiken.local\/2004\/12\/25\/fear-of-the-future\/","title":{"rendered":"Fear of the future…"},"content":{"rendered":"

Dynamist Blog<\/a> – a cool blog by the author of “The Future and Its Enemies<\/a>“. I am pretty clearly going to have to pickup the book as soon as I have a chance. The things the book seems to discuss (via excerpts) are very real… people are afraid of change, afraid of progress. Like all those in the past who feared the future they do not think of themselves as ignorant or regressive but they are just the same.<\/p>\n

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“Stasist social criticism—which is to say essentially all current social criticism—brings up the specifics of life only to sneer at or bash them. Critics assume that readers will share their attitudes and will see contemporary life as a problem demanding immediate action by the powerful and wise. This relentlessly hostile view of how we live, and how we may come to live, is distorted and dangerous. It overvalues the tastes of an articulate elite, compares the real world of trade-offs to fantasies of utopia, omits important details and connections, and confuses temporary growing pains with permanent catastrophes. It demoralizes and devalues the creative minds on whom our future depends. And it encourages the coercive use of political power to wipe out choice, forbid experimentation, shortcircuit feedback, and trammel progress.” – quote in context<\/a><\/i><\/p>\n

“The story of silicone-gel breast implants illustrates how technocracy can be captured to achieve reactionary ends. Breast implants offend every reactionary impulse. There is nothing traditional about enlarging one’s breasts; the very act defies fate, asserts individual will. Implants are highly artificial—overt attempts to overthrow nature, to use the mind to reshape the body, to alter genetic destiny without giving a good reason. They serve no social purpose or “vital need.” They would not exist without the pursuit of profit, the ambition of technology, and the instinct for self-improvement. And they portend an unknown future, filled with even stranger biological manipulations.<\/p>\n

But the scientific evidence that implants cause serious health problems is nonexistent. For policymakers devoted to pure science, that would end the discussion. Nonetheless, in 1992 the FDA imposed a moratorium on the sale of most silicone-gel breast implants, essentially limiting their use to postmastectomy reconstruction, and only then if patients agreed to participate in long-term clinical studies. The moratorium was driven partly by the bureaucratic ambition to exercise greater control over medical devices. But it also represented the culmination of a campaign by feminists and antitechnology activists, notably Sidney Wolfe of the Health Research Group, who did not approve of the devices and who promoted the notion that they posed serious dangers. The moratorium’s result was devastating. By feeding litigation against their manufacturers, it guaranteed that the implants would thenceforth be too risky to sell in the United States.” – quote in context<\/a><\/i><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Dynamist Blog – a cool blog by the author of “The Future and Its Enemies“. I am pretty clearly going to have to pickup the book as soon as I have a chance. The things the book seems to discuss (via excerpts) are very real… people are afraid of change, afraid of progress. Like all […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":56243,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"aside","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[278],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/legacyiamsenseiken.local\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2358"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/legacyiamsenseiken.local\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/legacyiamsenseiken.local\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/legacyiamsenseiken.local\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/legacyiamsenseiken.local\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2358"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/legacyiamsenseiken.local\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2358\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/legacyiamsenseiken.local\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/56243"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/legacyiamsenseiken.local\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2358"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/legacyiamsenseiken.local\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2358"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/legacyiamsenseiken.local\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2358"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}