Wild Ideas

The author is obviously some kind of crazy anarchist. Private law system? You mean that all of a sudden people would become customers of multiple legal firms instead of subjects of one big system and will be able to choose laws they like while at the same time not interfering directly with others who chose different laws? You mean that all of a sudden majority would lose its power to dictate minorities how to live their lives and gay people all over the world can start marrying each other simply because they are customers of a different firm by their voluntary choice? I say impossible! We need government. Anyone who says we don't is an anarchist and we all know anarchists are bad for ya.

#2, about health insurance, overlooks a big part of the RAND HIE's findings: people who were sick and poor in the study did have worse health outcomes.

Yes, wild ideas except for the "2100" part. The scientific and engineering breakthroughs have been slowing down dramatically in past 50 years or so. Science fiction from 60s and 70s is embarrassingly filled with predictions such as we would have colonies in space, computers indistinguishable from humans, flying cars on street, humankind without poverty and end of cancer by 2020. How close are we? If we go back in time to meet all these writers from 60s & 70s, the major breakthroughs we would have to show for are likes of Instagram and Angry Birds. Yes, I'm downplaying all these increase in computing power and better algorithms in search etc but guess what? Moors law is dead as we know it and search is still keywords in a textbox. To me it looks like we probably had 10 fold increase in human productivity during past 50 years but major portion of it goes towards "enhancing shareholder value" or wars rather than advancing science and technology. So unless this changes somehow, all the magic that can happen is still pretty far in distant, probably much beyond 2100.

Soul Extraction - Assuming that there is a technological singularity at some point in the future, and assuming that time travel is possible[1], but that we've seen no evidence of it because it must be mostly observational in nature in order to prevent disruptions that would create time paradoxes, humanity adopts the practice of extracting the brain/nervous systems (and then replacing w/ equivalent matter) of every human in history at the moment of their death, to live in a post-singularity utopia.

[1]: Einstein, Hawking, and many others have speculated that time travel should be possible, but were ultimately skeptical of it because of the "Where are all of the time travelers?" argument. Fear of the creation of time paradoxes could be the reason why there's no evidence of time travel.

1. Many times each day, your mind permanently splits into different versions that live in different worlds. True.

2. If medicine were taxed so much that people only bought half as much, they would be just as healthy. False. The "extra" spending in medicine drives innovations so we have better drugs & procedures etc. than we would otherwise.

3. If we keep writing down common sense datums until 2100, we can make computers as smart as people. False.

4. If your head is cryogenically frozen today, you will be alive in 2100. Maybe.

5. By 2100, the vast majority of "people" will be immortal computers running brain simulations. True.

6. There's a five percent chance I live in a "future" computer simulation as I write this. False - to run simulate sentient beings with so much suffering would be cruel.

7. By 2100, world economic growth rates will have increased by over a factor of a hundred. Maybe - progress & growth keep happening faster and faster.

8. The growth of humanity and its descendants will stop forever within a thousand years or so. False - see _The Beginning of Infinity_ by David Deutsch.

9. Our descendants will colonize millions of star systems within ten thousand years or so. True, if we don't fuck up - again, see _The Beginning of Infinity_.

10. The nearest intelligent aliens are many millions of light-years away. True.

11. Billions of years ago, intelligent aliens had a colony near here, but left in a big hurry. False. It's a bad explanation.

12. If we allowed complete freedom of contract, law could be privatized, to our common benefit. Maybe - I don't know about "complete freedom of contract" (can you sell yourself into slavery?) but privatizing law might be a good idea, eventually.

13. If we switched to "futarchy" as a form of government, we would be richer and just as happy. Maybe - if we're going to deviate from tradition, better to do it in the direction of more freedom and less government control - which is known to make people richer.

14. If even a few of us honestly sought truth, we would not disagree with each other. True. For any issue, there is an objective truth of the matter, and if people care enough to find out the truth, they should eventually find a theory/explanation of the issue that no has an issue with, at least for a while. People will keep finding new problems with the latest theory, and they'll have to sort that out, but eventually truth-seeking should lead to plateaus of agreement.