Thank God I Wasn't Born Here (?)

Well, are you? Or is there some side to sl that would have made your childhood and life just that little bit better?

Just to clear up any confusion on this question, it's a game a friend and I "play" when we are travelling. I travel a lot so I get to see many places that make me shudder to think about what would have happened to me if I had been born there.

It happens when you are in a train or a car or at an airport, on holiday or on business or touring, and as you drive around just looking at the place. You see a dead-end street, or scruffy kids or a "defeated" woman or man and you think, "I had chances they never had". Midnight railway stations are best for this. I have never greyhounded in my life but that might do the trick.

It works also when you see real families and look at the mum or dad (airports are prime places) and you can say: "Yeah, they look okay" if I was given a choice of parents in the spirit world, or "Please, NO! He's stabbing his food rather than cutting it! I wouldnt want him for a dad" or "Is she seriously wearing those shorts in public?"

Does SL have a side to it that would have made you a happier kid? And have you met avis who you think may have made great parents - their "real" personalities and pics or their sl ones? Before anyone jumps down my throat, I don't have real kids. But I reckon I would make a great parent if I ever wanted to be one (which I dont).

So that's my Friday thread.

- Sulumor Romulus
- Fey Brightwillow
- Fiona Pegregrine

I would have loved to have either of those 3 as my mom. Wonderful people, extremely thoughtful.

And Fiona actually literally saved my life!

Desmond and Kaimi would make a great parental couple.

Who wants to start the matchmaking on that one?

Naw. I'm one of the few people I know who had a great childhood, no drama, no trauma, dad worked, mom home. We were poor, but I didn't know it. I had everything I needed so there was no way for me to gauge that. My mom made my clothes, that was the only thing, other kids had store bought clothes and I had mommy-made. But SL as birthplace? In my opinion, with SL being as restrictive as it is toward adults choosing to play child avs, I don't think it's a particularly good environment to grow up in, although Mari certainly makes it work. For me, it wouldn't be fun, as I"d want to be doing all kinds of things SL wouldn't allow me to do, as a kid. As for being a parent in SL, I've had my SL twin grandbabies in my inventory for a year now and have taken them out only twice. That can't be good, I think I'd be a crummy SL parent, not enough respect for da prim....

Oh yes. But we would have to have uncle Raymond in the family too.

You mean... would I want to be born into a transcendent society where all the requirements of life are provided by the fundamental laws of physics, changing one's shape, gender, species, or order of life was a matter of just wanting it to happen, no disease, no privation, ...

Imagine there's no Heaven
It's easy if you try
No hell below us
Above us only sky
Imagine all the people
Living for today [...]

I believe it was Aristotle who argued that "wisdom comes alone through suffering".

That is a family I would enjoy being part of.

I definitely wouldn't be showing up at the family gathering if a certain uncle was around - but then again, he would ignore me.

Hey, here's Auntie Brenda!

Aristotle also believed that flies were created by cow dung, the heart was the seat of thought and reason, and that experimentation was a waste of time. Galileo was held as guilty of contradicting Aristotle as the Bible. Argumentum ad verecundiam works better with a more credible authority.

Why does something about that make me feel dirty?

Hmmmm i had a pretty normal and happy childhood until i was 15 then my Dad left us but i'm lucky i guess because he always makes the effort to come see us atleast once a year. I know alot of people don't have that. Plus he lives in Japan so it can get very expensive for him lol.

In SL i don't really know many couples to be honest, i've seen them around of course on my travels

He may have had some insight there. They are now exploring the possibility the heart does more than pump blood. Personally, I think there is a lot about the body science has not discovered and/or understands poorly. The state of medicine today will someday be seen as a Dark Ages.

If you wonder what I refer to about the heart - sometimes people who have had a heart transplant begin craving things the donor craved, find talents the donor had, which the recipient never before possessed, and also have memories of the donor's life. Inexplicably. Unless the heart for instance contains memory cells or some other such thing.

Why would a fantastic machine such as the human body not be more efficient than we could ever dream.

Oh and they believed the appendix had no function, too. Vestigal my tail.

Ya think?

I dont belive this is a question that can reasonably be answered- think of it as realtime karma. You are who you are because of who you have been. Every day and every person makes me who i am. Every experience - there is no way I could say this wd be better this way- because i wd then not be me. No, thank you- I will keep me as I am- with all my faults and screw ups.

I try not to make snap judgments about strangers I pass by.

I've had friends play a game like this before.... my friends don't play those game anymore, at least not around me (I lived in a lot of places growing up). there are very few places i've been through that would make me say that.


yes, and yes.... I won't name my reasons or choices though, way too long and complicated to explain.

back to the point, Jig, you didn't ask whether being born into a post-singularity civilization would make you wiser, merely happier.

Yann lay on the floor, watching him. "I think I'm getting all the signals you talked about," he mused. "But they're so crude, even now. And before, it was just a single message, repeating itself endlessly: 'Be happy, be happy, be happy!' Do you think there's something wrong with this body?"

"I doubt it." Tchicaya sat cross-legged on the floor beside him. "You expected more?"

"I was already happy, so it was a bit redundant."

"How happy?"

"As happy as it's possible to be, for no particular reason."

Also, http://www.gregegan.net/DIASPORA/01/Orphanogenesis.html

Personally I think "happiness" is wisdom. Being content (and not necessarily with simple things - because I try to exst - and desire - the comfortable and luxurious) brings about a certian knowledge and integrity. Unhappiness is smoke that clouds the flame.

Then I don't believe wisdom requires physical suffering or privation. Few people in the first world today have to deal with the potential for suffering that was the birthright of every person in Aristotle's day, and Aristotle's peers were better off than pre-civilized humans. By their standards we are already on the far side of a Singularity, we have a society that a stone-age sage couldn't possibly imagine.

Intelligent beings are able to create more than enough mental stress and heartache without having to muddy the waters by setting them afloat on a sea of troubles.

Wooo. Deep. I was kinda meaning "Happy" with a bag from Gucci. You'd think I was true materialgirl.
When bags come with their OWN bags, you know youre on to something goooood.

But it's fun to do that. I can't stop doing it. It's so important to receive that "first signal" - will I like her/him? Can I work wih her/him. And especially - since many of us do this: what type/make of shoes is the man or woman wearing? Open-toed sandals won't cut it with me. Huge cloppitty hoppity Nikes wont get you past the elevator. Great hairstyle. Decent clothes. They show me if the man/woman has any respect for how they present their inner-self to the outer world.

Then I find out what they can speak about and can they speak intelligently.