Paul Virillio is a French left-wing intellectual who has been warning for years of the impact of global communications. This is from "Speed and Information: Cyberspace Alarm", an essay written in 1995. Yes, 1995. from www.ctheory.com. I REALLY hope some of the ultra-sophisticate, neo-liberal, greedy yuppies who think nothings going to change their world and that this paranoia is a phenomena of right-wing survivalist nuts read this, because he's right on...anyway, maybe y2k is a good thing...for real!

"Together with the build-up of information superhighways we are facing a new phenomenae:loss of orientation. A fundamnetal loss of orientation complementing and concluding the societal liberalization and the deregualation of financial markets whose nefarious effects are well known. A total loss of the bearings of the individual looms large....WHAT LIES AHEAD IS A DISTURBANCE IN THE PERCEPTION OF WHAT REALITY IS: IT IS A SHOCK, A MENTAL CONCUSSION. And this outcome ought to interest us. Why? Because never has any progress in a technique been achieved without addressing it's specific negative aspects...The very world globalization is a fake...there is no such thing as globalization, only VIRTUALIZATION.

This is the kicker...truly, startlingly prophetic, I believe

"For the first time, history is going to unfold within a one-time system: global time. Up to now, history has taken place within local times, local frames, regions and nations. Int he very near future, our history will happen in universal time, itslef the outcome of instantaneity...Nothing is ever obtained without a loss of something else...("he draws a parallel between the catastrophes caused by trains before the advent of the block system)..."SO FAR, TRAFFIC CONTROL ENGINEERING ON THE INFORMATION (SUPER)HIGHWAYS IS CONSPICUOUS BY ITS ABSENCE" (you know you're reading a French Marxist when he starts talking like that!). " NO INFORMATION EXISTS WITHOUT DISINFORMATION."

He then talks about how Einstein warned about an "electronic bomb"!!!!!!!...that would be even worse than the atomic bomb, where "real-time interaction would be to information what radioactivity is to energy.The disintegration then will not merely affect the particles of matter, but also the very people of which our societies consist."

"After the globalization of telecommunications, one should expect a generalized kind of accident, a never-before-seen accident. It will be just as astonishing a global time...the accident of accidents, the mother of all accidents, as Sadaam Hussein would say...Nobody has seen this generalized accident yet. But then watch out as talk about the "financial bubble" in the economy: a very signigant metaphor is used here, and it conjures up visions of some kind of cloud, reminding us of other clouds, just as frightening as those of Chernobyl." He then talks about the Pentagon and info-war, etc., saying "when one speaks of accidents on the info superhighway, the point is not about the information itself, the point is the absolute velocity of electronic data." Chew on that one as you contemplate the Russian-US thing...i think the hair-trigger response and speed of communication, combined with disinformation from computer bombs, could definitely cause a nuclear conflict OF SOME KIND, just as the russian defense minister announced the other day hisself. Does anyone know where I can get some iodine and a plastic sarcophagus like the one they used to cover up Chernobly?

-- Nate Bodensteiner (rhizome@uwwc.com), March 05, 1999

Answers

All of us will be dead within 80 years, some sooner some later so it makes no difference to me. Some will die an ugly death, some a slow death, and some in their sleep, it makes no difference who you are, how powerful you are, how loving or good you are, death will bite us all.

-- makesnodifferencetome (makesnodifference@sowhat.com), March 05, 1999.

Being from the medical community, I can tell you that you probably have nothing to fear with death. However......its the DYING that can be a real bitch!!

Got morphine??

-- Taz (tassie@aol.com), March 05, 1999.

Right on, Taz. The dying process can take a llooonnnggg time, and long stretches are particularly horrifying. The death itself, though, is usually supernaturally beautiful.

Ashton & Leska in Cascadia, hospice caregivers

xxxxxxx xxxxxxx xxxxxxx xxxxxxx

-- Leska (allaha@earthlink.net), March 05, 1999.

The idiot left out an equation!

"Only the wise will understand!"

-- Mark Hillyard (foster@inreach.com), March 05, 1999.

you've got to be kidding...nothing wrong with the use of many words...if he was so smart, he'd keep it simple...he can't, and in that way he sounds intelligent and prophetic...but he isn't. Its a bunch of broo-haha...no doubt inspired by a desire to be "informed and enlightened above everyone else" We need to deal in facts...FACT, no one knows, and it does no good to worry others about unproven and packed phrases that carry the reader (sorry for him and I) NOWHERE... get real, when Y2K hits, it hits, and no amount of broo ha ha will prepare us..people need facts, and obvious logic based on fact..everything else is a waste of time, and frankly, ought to be avoided.

-- rick shade (Rickoshade@aol.com), March 05, 1999.

Isn't "worlds most brilliant left-wing philosopher," an oxymoron?

-- d (d@usedtobedgi.old), March 05, 1999.

NO NO GANG..... It has been my experience, (been there and almost did that) that the dying is fairly easy and doesn't hurt all that much. Ashton and Leska, Chris etc can you say ABG PO2<40?? Doesn't hurt at all, just weird thoughts runnin around in your head. Fortunately the pneunonia responded and I have a small vow that I won't go there again real soon.

CHuck

-- Chuck, night driver (rienzoo@en.com), March 06, 1999.

NO NO GANG..... It has been my experience, (been there and almost did that) that the dying is fairly easy and doesn't hurt all that much. Ashton and Leska, Chris etc can you say ABG PO2 less than 40??

Doesn't hurt at all, just weird thoughts runnin around in your head.
Fortunately the pneumonia responded and I have a small vow that I won't go there again real soon.

Chuck
-----

You were crumping, dear -- did they intubate?
Meditation is good for learning to control those weird thoughts. The will power developed comes in handy even when oxygen is being depleted. But if caught by surprise, ppl do have very strange thought experiences.
At death, though, suddenly the spirit is released and experiences a vivid clarity as it is no longer teethered and dependent upon oxygen or physical processes.

Some highly developed great souls are able to consciously die at will, and stay 'dead' as long as they desire, and come and go at will. Now that sounds like freedom!

Ashton & Leska in Cascadia

xxxxxxx xxxxxxx xxxxxxx xxxxxxx xxxxxxx x

-- Ashton & Leska in Cascadia (allaha@earthlink.net), March 06, 1999.

chuck, been there done that, along with blood poisoning that refused to respond for three weeks (spiritual warfare involved here - repeatedly freaked the nurses out praying in tongues)in DEC 97/JAN 98. NDE, whole 9 yards...very peaceful, as you say, just not time for me to go Home yet, you know?

Arlin

-- Arlin H. Adams (ahadams@ix.netcom.com), March 07, 1999.

Wow Chuck, you came close.

It's been my observation with some people who became deprived of oxygen enough, and thereby their mental faculty/conciousness much altered, seemed not to be in great pain (from body language cues observations only, as they can't tell us.)

But concider the slow and excrutiating dying process of metastasized cancer. Or severe burns. I've seen patients under heavy doses of morphine still praying for death to come, the pain was so great. That kind of death to me is scary.

I think that most people who've seen the dying process understand that it's not the "passing over" itself that's scary, but the process of getting there. Whether long and painful, or unexpected and sudden. Like for example, having a gun pointed at your head, or the first split second of seeing an uncoming head-on collision.

hmm...why are we discussing this? I lost the connection along the way here it seems, from the first post...

-- Chris (catsy@pond.com), March 07, 1999.