12. "How would your views about war, politics and the role of the military change if all future conflicts were fought by armies of robots (that is to say, if all nations agreed to conduct wars exclusively with machines so that human casualties would be virtually non-existent)?"
I'd still feel the same way. Its all a economic/game of egos that solves nothing. Waste of geography and resources - ruins evironments, landscapes and architecture.
13. You are in a plane crash in the Andes Mountains, not unlike those people from the movie Alive. As such, you will be forced to consume the human flesh of the people who died on impact; this will be a terrible experience but it is the only way for you to survive. Fortunately, you did not know any of the victims personally.
Would you rather eat a dead baby, or would you rather eat a dead elderly person? Would you gender play a role in your selection process? And how much would it bother you if this meat turned out to be delicious?
14. Is there any widespread practice more futile than attempting to predict society's future relationship with technology?
15. While traveling on business, your spouse (whom you love) is involved in a plane crash over the Pacific Ocean. It is assumed that everyone on board has died. For the next seven months, you quietly mourn. But then the unbelievable happens: it turns out your spouse has survived. He/She managed to swim to a desert island, where he/she lived in relative comfort with one other survivor (they miraculously located most of the aircraft's supplies on the beach, and the island itself was filed with ample food sources). Against all odds, they have just been discovered by a Fijian fishing boat.
The two survivors return home vie helicopter, greeted by the public as media sensations. Immediately upon their arrival, there is an international press conference. And during this press conference, you cannot help but notice how sexy the other survivor is; physically, he/she perfectly embodies the type of person your mate is normally attracted to. Moreover, the intensity of the event has clearly galvanized a relationship between the two crash victims: they spend most of the interview explaining how they could not have survived without the other person's presence. They explain how they passed the time by telling anecdotes from their respective lives, and both admit to admit to having virtually given up on the possibility of r a tearful good-bye hug. It's extremely emotional.
After the press conference you are finally reunited with your spouse. He/She embraces you warmly and kisses you deeply.
How long do you wait before asking if he/she was ever unfaithful to you on this island? Do you never ask? And if your mate's answer is "yes," would that (under these specific circumstances) be acceptable?
16. Let us assume you have the ability to telekinetically change culture while you actively experience it. Your mind can now dictate what you see and hear. For example, if you were listening to Pear Jam's Yield and you wanted the music to be heavier, it would immediately sound as though Mike McCready's guitar had been tuned differently in the studio. If you were watching The Office on NBC and decided that Jim should marry Pam (or Karen, or both), you could make it happen--all you would need to do is think about that specific desire. You could stare at an oil painting and unconsciously change the color contrasts. If a PG13 romantic comedy grew dull, you could force it to evolve into an eroticized NC-17 thriller. You could (essentially) write books as you read them, eliminating certain characters and redirecting plot points as the occurred in the text. However, such changes would only apply to your experience; you could kill off Han Solo at the end of Return of the Jedi, but htat would not change the movie for anyone else. All other people would posses the same personal telekinetic powers as you.
Would you want this? And--if this became a reality--would art retain any meaning whatsoever?
17. You die from natural causes.
Upon death, you are absorbed skyward. You ascend toward a warm, white light. You immediately realize you have entered the afterlife...and (much to your surprise) it is exactly like the cliched conventional, kindergarten version of Christian heaven. You enter through gates made of pearl. The ground is covered by a white, cloud like fog. Angels fly around you and play the hard. You are wearing a comfortable white robe. Everyone there is aimlessly walking around, smiling broadly, perfectly content; this, it seems, is how you will spend eternity.
Upon your arrival, you are greeted by Jesus (and he looks exactly like the stereotypical depiction of Jesus). "Welcome to heaven," he says. "I think you will like it here, and I look forward to loving you unconditionally for the duration of time. But I also realize heaven isn't necessarily for everyone, so I always give newcomers a chance to go to the other place, if that's what they would prefer."
"Are you referring to hell?" you say in response.
"Oh, no," says Jesus. "Not hell. Certainly not hell. I would never send you to hell. But you can go to somewhere that isn't here. It's a viable post-life option. About 18% of our potential residents go in that direction."
"What is the other place like?" you ask.
"I can't tell you," says Jesus. "But if you do elect to go there, you can never come back here. And you only have 20 minutes to decide."
"Why only 20?" you ask.
"Because I am Jesus," says Jesus.
What do you do?
18. The world is ending. It's ending quickly, and it's ending dramatically. It will either end at noon on your fortieth birthday, or it will end two days after you die (from natural causes) at the age of seventy-five. Which apocalyptic scenario do you prefer?
19. You are given the chance to control what your legacy will be. You can't specifically dictate how you will be recalled by future generations, but you are given the chance to choose between two general idioms of legacies.
The first kind of legacy ("option A") would be that you lived your days as a good, honest person who worked hard and contributed to society. However, the limitation of this legacy will be that almost no one will know or remember this information (including future members of your own extended family). Most average people will never even know you lived.
The second kind of legacy ("option B") will be familiar to almost everyone in the world for centuries to come. However, this legacy will be extremely strange and neutral; it will be an obscure fact that has almost nothing to do with your tangible day-to-day life (the best comparison being the legacy of General Tso Tsungtang, an extremely gifted and successful military leader during the seventeenth-century Qing Dynasty who is now exclusively remembered as the namesake for the popular Chinese dish General Tso's chicken).
Which legacy do you want?
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