h+ Magazine

Currently a professor at Xiamen Universty, where he teaches theoretical physics and computer science, Hugo de Garis is legendary in AI and futurist circles.  He’s been working on neural networks and “artificial brains” since the 1990s.  de Garis is also an advocate of Femtotechnology — the notion that we could operate technologically at a level a million times smaller than nanotech.  In 2005, de Garis published a controversial book called Artilect Wars that predicted an upcoming “gigadeath” war between Terrans (those who want to remain human) and “Cosmists” (those who want to unite with AIs and become posthuman and post-terrestrial).  

A Dutch physicist, Eindhoven-based Peter Meijer, has developed a device called vOICe that allows blind people to see, using the aural information entering their ears. The device converts visual information received by a camera into soundscapes, which then gives an aural representation of what the camera sees.

Film Review

A Hole in the Head, Spectacle Films

I have to make a confession.  I have a soft posterior fontanelle.  When I press on that spot, my head indents noticeably — enough that you can actually see it.  Furthermore, I frequently feel a sort of need to do this.  And when I do it, it seems to help me feel less sleepyheaded and more focussed.  If I’m feeling a bit woozy, it helps me feel less so.  And, indeed, sometimes I feel as though I’d like to drill right into it — as though there is some sort of psychic G spot hungering to be stimulated and satisfied.  Naturally, I’ve been intrigued by trepanning — the practice of intentionally drilling small holes in the skull.  

"Information" is one of those words (in English and other romance languages) that are blessed/cursed with a deliciously filigreed constellation of meanings.  It’s not that it’s lacking a definition, but rather that there exist any number of definitions, each context-dependent, that are largely mutually exclusive.  Information theoreticians will, from a technical perspective, think of Shannon’s work — whilst mortal humans will recall aphorisms such as "information is power," and ponder on the relationship between information and wisdom. 

Irrespective of this, there’s broad consensus across a variety of au courant academic and applied fields of research that "information" is an increasingly fundamental concept of study.  This is surely no news to fields whose very nomenclature encapsulates the term (viz., "information theory," "bioinformatics," etc.) — but is also equally true for fields as diverse as computer science, systems theory, synthetic biology, and linguistics. 

Courts have a special power over us to compel testimony and force us to hand over evidence.  Through various methods, ranging from warrants and subpoenae to the "discovery" of civil cases, the court can demand evidence about you that is against your interests, and they can seize it by force if necessary.  In many cases, it would not be possible to convict or prevail without this power.

At the same time, we are wary of this power.  People have a presumption of innocence, and these actions are a major invasion if done against the innocent.  Most free nations don’t force people to testify against themselves or their immediate family, but all will allow your possessions to be used as evidence against you.

This interview was conducted with Lincoln Cannon, the co-founder, director and president of the Mormon Transhumanists.

H+:  How long has there been a ‘Mormon Transhumanist’ group, and how many members are there?

Lincoln Cannon: The 14 founding members of the Mormon Transhumanist Association adopted a constitution on 13 May 2006.  We incorporated in Utah of the United States on 4 August 2006, and received 501c3 nonprofit status, effective the same date. We affiliated with Humanity+ (formerly the World Transhumanist Association) on 6 July 2006, and remained affiliated until Humanity+ terminated all affiliations on 6 April 2010.  Today, the Mormon Transhumanist Association consists of 116 members, with approximately 41% living in Utah and 90% living in the United States.  The purpose of the Mormon Transhumanist Association is to promote the Transhumanist Declaration and the Mormon Transhumanist Affirmation (see reference below).

This interview was conducted with Dr. Miriam Ji Sun (a.k.a. MJSL2050), the current chair of the German Transhumanist Association (De:Trans).  Miriam has a PhD (MCL) in sociology with an interdisciplinary thesis on robotics and society.  Genetically Asian, she’s lived in 6 countries. She speaks German, English, Japanese, Dutch, French and Arabic and she can read basic Spanish and Italian. She considers herself a “world citizen with a German passport.” Currently she works as foresight researcher at a major Dutch Research Institute.

Historically, the medical approach for attempting to cure the incurable effects of tragic spinal cord injuries — such as in the case made famous by America’s classic super hero, Christopher Reeve  — has been to affect regeneration of damaged nerves through stem cell therapy or by introducing growth factor proteins, like BDNF. Success with these applications has yet to be realized, as apparently the adult body’s resistance to re-growing its nerve centers is stronger than expected.

Recently, however, a team at Children’s Hospital Boston, lead by Zhigang He, has been developing an alternate approach to the problem. Instead of trying to force existing nerve fibers to regrow, or trying to introduce new cells to take their place, the group manipulates the communication in the cells to "turn off" an apparent gene that tells the neuron to stop growing. With the gene shut down, the neuron is free to generate and flourish as it sees fit.

Arthur Schopenhauer once said, “The World is my Idea,” but for those of us lacking the ego to leap directly to solipsism, the natural question to ask is “where did this idea come from?” Regardless of one’s stance on the identity or non-identity of the mind with the brain, it is reasonable to suppose that this idea comes from a combination of the collected and crystallized experiences of our ancestors embodied as the species-specific architecture of our brains; and the ever-changing, dynamic, adaptive plasticity of our neural tissue as it learns, remembers, experiences, and takes its unique shape that identifies it as a particular person in response to the prods and pokes of the random vicissitudes that sum together to make a life.

It’s life, Jim, but not as we know it.

The premise of cryonics is simple: Do nothing, and when you die, you die forever; get cryopreserved, and when you die, maybe you get a second chance. But what does “when you die” mean, and why does it matter?

In the past, if your heart stopped beating and your lungs stopped breathing — end of story, you were legally dead. Then resuscitation technology got better and “dead” people starting rebooting. Ta-da!