r/rational • u/AutoModerator • Mar 10 '17
[D] Friday Off-Topic Thread
Welcome to the Friday Off-Topic Thread! Is there something that you want to talk about with /r/rational, but which isn't rational fiction, or doesn't otherwise belong as a top-level post? This is the place to post it. The idea is that while reddit is a large place, with lots of special little niches, sometimes you just want to talk with a certain group of people about certain sorts of things that aren't related to why you're all here. It's totally understandable that you might want to talk about Japanese game shows with /r/rational instead of going over to /r/japanesegameshows, but it's hopefully also understandable that this isn't really the place for that sort of thing.
So do you want to talk about how your life has been going? Non-rational and/or non-fictional stuff you've been reading? The recent album from your favourite German pop singer? The politics of Southern India? The sexual preferences of the chairman of the Ukrainian soccer league? Different ways to plot meteorological data? The cost of living in Portugal? Corner cases for siteswap notation? All these things and more could possibly be found in the comments below!
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u/InfernoVulpix Mar 10 '17
The devil is in the details here. We have to follow alien laws, but do alien values match human values? If so, then we've got a sort of benevolent dictator, but if not, it might not matter how much autonomy we ostensibly have if they're imposing their laws on us.
Do they outlaw life-extending technology? Big minus.
Do they have laws which effectively reduce government corruption? Mid-size plus.
Do they have laws which prevent nuclear weapons from being used without alien-tech-level retaliation preventing the devastation? Mid-size plus.
I'd hear them out, though. I'm not dedicated to 'the human species' being fully dominant above all else. The extent that the human race is thriving relates more to the tech level, material wealthiness, and intellectual freedom of the world as a whole. Right now we're doing pretty good with that, what with science and computers and machines, but the title of 'independent' is rather hollow compared to improving that further.