SETI, Limbo, Walmart and Will

I know many of you wish I'd stick to venture capital stuff, but sometimes the superstition just piles up, and I can't help but vent. Here's what came in today's news feeds...

1) George Will opposes Roe v. Wade and other judicial defenses of our Constitutional right to privacy, citing U.S. Judge Raymond Randolph...

Since 1973, the privacy right has, as Randolph says, "morphed." Now it means personal autonomy - everyone's right to do whatever he or she pleases so long as others are not harmed.

And what is wrong with that? If we're not hurting anyone, why on Earth should government--or for that matter any institution--restrict us from doing what we want? George, please take 10 minutes to read Smullyan's dialogue between God and a mortal (from Hofstadter's Mind's I), and tell your friends about it.

By the way, I'm not trying to provoke the very complex debate on whether a fetus counts as an individual who shouldn't be harmed. George isn't even making that argument. Instead he is evoking the moralistic position, with an air of self-evidence no less, that actions can be evil and worthy of punishment even if they don't harm anybody. Of course, you have to think like George if you believe that blasphemy, idolatry, homosexuality and pre-marital sex are all evil.

2) Store Manager turns Walmart opening into a revival.

3) Vatican holds summit on Limbo. Where do the unbaptized babies go? What about all the other good people who never had a fair chance to embrace the New Kingdom? Someone needs to decide!

3) Intelligent Design proponents seek credibility by asserting the scientific equivalence of ID and SETI. After all, IDers see a Creator behind earthy complexity, just as SETI presumes that any complex signal in space implies intelligent life behind it. Wha? SETI is listening for clearly artificial sounds, not just the sonic, astronomical equivalent of eBay's Virgin Mary grilled cheese. Here, SETI researcher Seth Shostak has to defend his scientific credibility and spend valuable time debunking the ID camp's ridiculous excuse for logic.

Unfortunately, this morning's news feeds suggest that SETI needs to take a back seat to SeTI: the Search for Terrestrial Intelligence.