By Colin Campbell — Polygon
Firaxis’ strategy game Civilization: Beyond Earth, shows humankind populating new worlds. Set in a not-too distant future, the game demands that players choose and invest in technologies to ease their path.
Much research went into the technology choices utilized in the game, due to be released on Windows PC on Oct. 24. While previous Civilization games have charted technological progress in the past, Beyond Earth is a matter of conjecture and futures studies.
Posted in business, entertainment, finance, futurism, science, singularity
VICTORY: Getting Fortune-500 Prospective Client’s Cash, Continually and Successfully! By Mr. Andres Agostini at www.linkedin.com/in/AndresAgostini
HOW TO SUCCEED IN BUSINESS ACCORDING TO THESE COMPANIES:
Mitsubishi Motors, Honda, Daimler-Chrysler’s Mercedes-Benz, Toyota, Royal Dutch Shell Oil Company, Google, Xerox, Exxon-Mobil, Boeing, Amazon, Procter & Gamble, NASA and DARPA, Lockheed Martin, RAND Corporation and HUDSON Institute, Northrop Grumman Corporation, etc.
FIRST. You fully study the corporation’s story and current culture and lexicon.
SECOND. You fully study the corporation’s financial and legal and compliance and tax standing.
THIRD. If the corporation is publicly traded, you strongly look into this.
FOURTH. You fully study the corporation’s industry and all of its competitors.
FIFTH. If the industry to which belongs the designated corporation is facing an extraordinary unforeseen challenge, make a long executive presentation for the middle-management executives, fully acknowledging the details of said challenge and suggesting, as per authoritative authors in the subject matter, a well-organized myriad of viable fundamental solutions.
At all times, you are to make this executive presentation like a presentation to a sacred university professor and classroom, hence an institutional one only, and not a marketing one as you objective is to break the ice with your targeted corporate client ONLY through meaningfulness, utility, relevance, and purposefulness.
In no slide you would mention your name, but in your solemn business cards.
Throughout this executive presentation, you will NEVER be addressing any theme natural to your Core Business’ Products and/or Services, but in your solemn business cards.
(Commentary to FIFTH. Why does it have to be a long executive presentation? I will respond through Napoleon Bonaparte’s best practices.
Every time a General (Manager) under his Command would give him a one-page letter (memo, slide), Napoleon would say to his General in question,
“…General (Manager), you are to wage a grave military campaigns full of dynamics and details … I want to KNOW everything at all in advance, every detail at all, large or tiny, in order for me to issue my most-detailed commanding plans for your campaign …”
Frequently, Napoleon would dishonorably discharge this General (Manager) or have his head role for incompetence, incompetence is another word for people with a Mind “Engaged” in worshiping The Least Mental Effort, thus repudiating the “extra mile” effort.
Clearly, Napoleon, during his life time and early on, heavily warns against Corporate America CEOs wanting JUST a 1-page memo delivered via email.
SIXTH. Then, you call the prospective corporate client’s P.R. person Or Communications officer and tell them about what you would like to do.
You send a letter with a summary of your presentation via FEDEX. They will give you a time and board room for your presentation, to be received by the corporation’s middle-level and supervisory-level management workers.
SEVENTH. Once you drive you car to the corporation’s office, pay extreme attention to (first) the lower-level security personnel, (second) the front-desk receptionist, and, if possible, and (third) to the great janitorial staff.
Get extremely respectful with them and treat them as the Chairman and become a bit friendly as you try to get the company’s ethos’s by and through the lower-level security personnel, the front-desk receptionist, and the great janitorial staff.
Listen and mind-record their word types and wording construes most carefully.
In my case, by observing the front-desk receptionist for ten (10) minutes, I can tell you exactly what type of corporate culture there is about my coping with, much more importantly than those confidential underground reports by Wall Street Bankers and Trader.
EIGTH. Before starting the executive presentation, say to the audience that you would like to introduce yourself to each one of them and shake their hands, to bring about much more psychological proximity and fore-acceptance.
Then, explain the order of your executive presentation. Second, with great care, deliver the presentation without attacking people, institutions, or even ideas.
Use, with extreme care and utility, their parlance and corporate culture at all times while you get, from A to Z, very solemnly.
Once you have thoroughly and calmly finished your executive presentation, use the Lee Iaccoca’s rule and say,
“ …okay, we have completed this executive presentation and through it we saw this, that, x, y, z,…” in a summarized way.
Give them now boundaryless time and psychological space to ask you zillion questions in the Q-and-A.
Ascertain to respond fully, accurately, on the point and with NONE MANIPULATION at all. If there is something that you do not know, tell them, research the answer fully, and get back with the answer via FEDEX-ed hard-copy.
Once you have responded all of the questions, give them an exact copy of the Executive Presentation, with the additional attachment of the authoritative literature you used in your evidence-based research.
Do this in hard-copy only and put it a nice white envelope. You give one package to each attendee and give the P.R. Manager three or four more for the CEO and the Board Members.
NINE. If you followed through to ULTIMATE PERFECTION, points #1 through #8, step by step, you will see them ask you something along these lines,
“…Okay, Mr. A, we like you evidence-based research and executive presentation and wonder who in the marketplace could offer these solutions to us …” Without being or sounding desperate, you will say quickly and softly, “… Our Company can fully take care of those for you …”
And the idea now is that you go from a Pro Bono Executive Presentation into a formal for-business conversation with your prospective corporate client.
As the formal conversation begins, as per my long experience, tell them kindly that in parallel you want to fulfill the corporation’s Guidelines to become a Registered Contractor as per your company’s Lines of Professional Practice.
Also in parallel, ask the mid-level managers that you are formally talking to that you would like to gain more familiarity by doing some small talk with lower-level employees, including the lower-level security and janitorial staff.
Put in writing a detailed overview and hand to him or her personally.
Sometimes these folks know the corporation better than the CEO.
THEN, FOLLOW THROUGH THESE PRACTICAL TENETS CONDUCIVE TO OUTRIGHT VICTORY:
(1.- of 17 ).- If you want to seize the undivided attention of top executives at Los Alamos National Laboratory and Procter & Gamble, talk to them through the notions of and by Process Re-engineering.
(2.- of 17 ).- If you want to seize the undivided attention of top executives at GE, talk to them through the notions of and by Six Sigma, and Peter F. Drucker’s Management by Objective (MBO). While you are with them, remember to commend on the Jack Welch’ and Jeff Immelt’s master lectures at GE’s Crotonville.
(3.- of 17 ).- If you want to seize the undivided attention of top executives at RAND Corporation and HUDSON Institute, talk to them through the notions of and by Herman Khan’s (Dr. Strangeloves’) Scenario Methodology.
(4.- of 17 ).- If you want to seize the undivided attention of top executives at Mitsubishi Motors and Honda and Daimler-Chrysler’s Mercedes-Benz and Maytag, talk to them through the notions of and by Kaisen.
(5.- of 17 ).- If you want to seize the undivided attention of top executives at NASA and DARPA and the Industrial-Military Complex, talk to them through the notions of and by Systems Approach with the Perspective of Applied Non-Theological Omniscience. And, also, want to get funded by DARPA? How? The pathway is extremely easy and promissory. Just give them an unimpeachable real-life demonstration of how to “violate” the Laws of Physics correctly and frequently, for Life!
(6.- of 17 ).- If you want to seize the undivided attention of top executives at Lockheed Martin, talk to them through the notions of and by Lean, Six Sigma and Skunk Works.
(7.- of 17 ).- If you want to seize the undivided attention of top executives at Toyota, talk to them through the notions of and by Toyota Production System (methodology). Please remember: TPS is also known as “…Thinking People System…”
(8.- of 17 ).- If you want to seize the undivided attention of top executives at Royal Dutch Shell, talk to them through the notions of and by Pierre Wack’s Scenario Methodology.
(9.- of 17 ).- If you want to seize the undivided attention of top executives at Mayo Clinic, talk to them through the notions of and by Dr. Joseph Juran’s (Total Quality Assurance) Prescription (ISBN: 978–0787900960).
Also remember to conjointly speak, at all times, of efficiency, productivity, and ROI as it stems in the incessant real-time reckoning of man-hours per patient cured and healed.
To this end, you might wish to peruse this great title: The Essential Drucker: The Best of Sixty Years of Peter Drucker’s Essential Writings on Management by Peter F. Drucker (ISBN: 978–0061345012).
(10.- of 17 ).- If you want to seize the undivided attention of top executives at Google, talk to them through the notions of and by Strong Quantum Supercomputing and Human-Death Reverse-Engineering, as well as Curing Human Death.
(11.- of 17 ).- If you want to seize the undivided attention of top executives at Xerox, talk to them through the notions of and by PARC (Palo Alto Research Center Incorporated).
(12.- of 17 ).- If you want to seize the undivided attention of top executives at ExxonMobil, talk to them through the notions of and by Efficiency and Productivity as well as Return On Investment (ROI) per Petroleum Barrel produced (outputted), and Project Management.
(13.- of 17 ).- If you want to seize the undivided attention of top executives at Boeing, talk to them through the notions of and by Aerospace Engineering, Avionics, Systems Engineering, Reliability Engineering, Safety Engineering, Industrial Engineering, and Mechanical Engineering.
(14.- of 17 ).- If you want to seize the undivided attention of top executives at SETI (Search for ExtraTerrestrial Intelligence), talk to them through the notions of and by Superintelligence entrenched, in “… plain sight…,” in the covert ad infinitum realm of Dark Energy and Dark Matter.
(15.- of 17 ).- If you want to seize the undivided attention of top executives at Loyd’s of London, Swiss RE, Munich RE, and Allianz, talk to them through the notions of and by Minimax, Statistics, Actuarial Science, Predictive Analytics, and Systems Engineering.
(16.- of 17 ).- If you want to seize the undivided attention of top executives at Amazon, talk to them through the notions of and by Low-Cost And High-End Online Commerce, Content Creation, Hi-Tech, Quadcopters (Commercial Flying Drones), and Eternal Staggering Innovation. Don’t forget to mention the Mechanical Turk.
(17.- of 17 ).- If you want to seize the undivided attention of top executives at Northrop Grumman Corporation, talk to them through the notions of and by State of the Art: Quality, Continuous Improvement, Customer Satisfaction, Leadership (Man-Management and Statesmanship), Integrity, People, Suppliers, Sound Business Management, “…Best in Class…” Products and Services, and how to preemptively countermeasure Chinese penetrations and otherwise of both commercial and government networks in the United States.
NOTE: I know great c-suite consulting incumbents and other professional service providers who want to get the undivided attention of 90% of the CEOs above at once.
The majority of those CEOs are august applied scientists. They are only into applied scientific management. Ergo, they really need to get ready to be multidimensional and cross-functional and multifarious.
There is, NEVER EVER, no Internet resource, nor an online book or article giving you this most-profound advice/
Authored By Copyright Mr. Andres Agostini
White Swan Book Author
www.linkedin.com/in/andresagostini
www.amazon.com/author/Agostini
Adam Gell — HITC
Destiny has been in players’ hands for the past few days now, and I’ve also been doing my part to fight The Darkness this week too. But, as the game uses our own galaxy as the setting to tell its story, complete with futuristic space travel and talk of a Golden Age brought by the arrival of The Traveller, Activision and Bungie have worked with the National Space Centre to see what the UK could look like in the future when space travel is real.
Similarly in the images below, Destiny lets you travel to the futuristic imaginings of the Russian Cosmodrome, which is the real-world site of Earth’s first and largest space facility, and where Sputnik 1 (the first artificial Earth satellite) was launched in 1957. In the game the site looks quite different from today’s real-world counterpart, as humanity has gone through a Golden Age of space travel, and reached the brink of extinction with the arrival of The Darkness years later.
By Harry J. Bentham - More articles by Harry J. Bentham
Originally published at the Institute for Ethics and Emerging Technologies on 17 July 2014
Since Maquis Books published The Traveller and Pandemonium, a novel authored by me from 2011–2014, I have been responding as insightfully as possible to reviews and also discussing the book’s political and philosophical themes wherever I can. Set in a fictional alien world, much of this book’s 24 chapters are politically themed on the all too real human weakness of infighting and resorting to hardline, extremist and even messianic plans when faced with a desperate situation.
The story tells about human cultures battling to survive in a deadly alien ecosystem. There the human race, rather than keeping animals in cages, must keep their own habitats in cages as protection from the world outside. The human characters of the story live out a primitive existence not typical of science-fiction, mainly aiming at their own survival. Technological progress is nonexistent, as all human efforts have been redirected to self-defense against the threat of the alien predators.
Even though The Traveller and Pandemonium depicts humanity facing a common alien foe, the various struggling human factions still fail to cooperate. In fact, they turn ever more hostilely on each other even as the alien planet’s predators continue to close in on the last remaining human states. At the time the story is set, the human civilization on the planet is facing imminent extinction from its own infighting and extremism, as well as the aggressive native plant and animal life of the planet.
The more sinister of the factions, known as the Cult, preaches the pseudo-religious doctrine that survival on the alien world will only be possible through infusions of alien hormones and the rehabilitation of humanity to coexist with the creatures of the planet at a biological level. However, there are censored side effects of the infusions that factor into the plot, and the Cult is known for its murderous opposition to anyone who opposes its vision.
The only alternative seems to be a second faction, but it is equally violent, and comes under the leadership of an organization who call themselves the Inquisitors. In their doctrine, humans must continue to isolate themselves from the alien life of the planet, but this should extend to exterminating the alien life and the aforementioned Cult that advocates humans transmuting themselves to live safely on the planet.
I believe that this aspect of the story, a battle between two militant philosophies, serves well to capture the kind of tension and violent irrationality that can engulf humanity in the face of existential risks. There is no reason to believe that hypothetical existential risks to humanity such as a deadly asteroid impact, an extraterrestrial threat, runaway global warming, alien contact or a devastating virus would unite the planet, and there is every reason to believe that it would divide the planet. It is often the case that the more argument there is for authority and submission to a grand plan in order to survive, the greater the differences of opinion and the greater the potential for divergence and conflict.
Social habits, politics, beliefs and even the cultural trappings of the different human cultures clinging to the alien planet are fully represented in the book. In all, the story has had significant time and care put into refining it to create a compelling and believable depiction of life in an inhospitable parallel world, and readers remarked in reviews that it is a “masterclass in world-building”.
The central character of the story, nicknamed the Traveler, together with his companion, do not really subscribe to either of the extremist philosophies battling over humanity’s fate on the alien planet, but their ideas may be equally strange. Instead, they reject the alien world in which they live. With an almost religious naïveté, they are searching for a “better place”. It is through this part of the plot that the concepts of religious faith and hope are visited. Of course, at all times the reader knows they are right – there is a “better place” only not the religious kind. Ultimately, the quest is for Earth, although the characters have never heard of such a place and have only inferred that it might somehow exist and represent an escape from the hostile planet where they were born.
Reviewers have acknowledged that by inverting the relationship of humanity and nature so that nature is on the advance and humans are receding and diminishing in the setting of this science-fiction novel, a unique and compelling setting is created. I believe the story offers my best exploration of a number of political and ethical themes, such as how people feel pressured to choose between hardline factions in times of extreme desperation and in the face of existential threats. Science fiction is a worthy medium in which to express and explore not only the future, but some of the most troubling political and philosophical scenarios that have plagued humanity’s past.
By JASCHA HOFFMANJUNE — NY Times
Dawn of the Planet of the Apes. Directed by Matt Reeves. Opens July 11.
In this second big-budget prequel to the 1968 technicolor classic, intelligent apes are thriving in the forest while human cities crumble. If that sounds depressing, think again: In this version of “Planet of the Apes,” the chimps are the heroes. Rather than shooting in a studio, as is the custom for motion capture, much of the film was shot in the forest, where actors playing apes, their bodies covered with infrared dots tracked by hidden cameras, controlled the skeletons of their primate avatars. How does one walk like an ape? The motion is “heavy, weighted and circular,” said Terry Notary, a former gymnast who served as movement coach for the film, although “the pace, energy and feel” differs for gorillas, orangutans and chimpanzees. To capture emotion, a small camera mounted on the actors’ heads harvested facial data to drive the apes’ expressions. “This high-tech rig is so powerful and transparent that it allows actors to abandon control,” Mr. Notary said. The results are apes so magnetic, it’s hard not to empathize with them, even as they take up arms against their human rivals. “We’re making a film where apes are causing our downfall,” said Joe Letteri, the senior visual effects supervisor, “but they’re the ones you want to root for.”
by Eddie Krassenstein — 3DPrint.com
It’s always fun predicting the future. People do it all the time because it is entertaining to imagine a world that we or our children will one day have the chance to experience. We’ve seen fictitious movies do this from time to time since the beginning of film. There was the hoverboard in ‘Back to the Future’, the jet packs in ‘The Rocketeer’, teleportation in Star Trek, and the list goes on. Some of these inventions have already become a reality, while we are still awaiting the arrival of others.
Another Star Trek prediction, was that of the Replicator, which was used to basically 3D print objects, especially food. These have already begun to take shape in current times, in the form of 3D printers. MakerBot even calls their consumer level 3D printer the ‘Replicator’. Sure it may not work the exact same way, but its close enough.
Now, one video game development company, Sledgehammer Games, is trying to predict the future in their upcoming video game. We’re sure that most of you are well aware of the Call of Duty video game series. ‘Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare’ is currently scheduled for release this coming Novembmer. In the game, which takes place in the year 2054, Sledgehammer Games will try their hands at predicting the future themselves. One of the more notable futuristic ideas in the game, is that of the 3D-Printer Rifle.
Growing up in the South gave me a certain perspective of the United States that I wish many wouldn’t have to deal with, from bigotry to ignorance, poverty to inequality. So listening to Hip Hop became my way of escaping these realities. As time progressed, however, and as society evolved, so too did Hip Hop. Now as we reach the Information Age and a nearing Transhumanist paradigm shift, I again look to Hip Hop and see what it’s saying and whether or not it’s keeping up with the times.
I was able to speak with two individual Emcees, in particular, who are making sure Hip Hop is alive and well in today’s age: M.C. Kilch and Maitreya One!
Both preside in New York, with Kilch from Brooklyn and Maitreya from the Bronx. They are Hip Hop Emcees and Transhumanists, dedicating their lives not only to achieve indefinite life extension for themselves, but for the culture and musical art they love.
M.C. Kilch: They call me Kilch, I’m a Dreamer and Emcee from Brooklyn, NY. Hip Hop is practically in your blood when you’re from Brooklyn, so getting attracted to it was easy. The attitude and energy of the culture makes it influential, whether you listen to it or not. It was the Freestyle cyphers that got me involved.
Watching this group of people, who gather in a circle and take turns making up lyrics on the spot, was a representation of pure, unfiltered creativity, and it amazed me! I tried it myself one day, loved it, and ended up in cypher groups all the time. Not too long after that it became a regular part of my life, and I started writing songs. It was a natural progression since I was already writing poetry at the time, and I haven’t stopped.
Maitreya One: My name is Maitreya One or lord Maitreya for short. Many things inspired me. One of my inspirations comes from a man named J. Edgar Hoover who was the founder and director of the FBI in the 60’s. He started a program called COINTELPRO, short for counter intelligence program. It was designed to neutralize the black messiah – the one who would unify the masses.
Emceeing is just a element in the culture. Hip Hop has 9 elements as present. Hip Hop is beyond entertainment and is a form of higher intelligence (HI). I’m one of the avatars in the culture of Hip Hop, which just means that my purpose is not based on any industrial status symbol.
Kilch: Hip Hop artists are much like the storytellers and keepers of oral tradition who have existed in human societies for thousands of years, such as the Griots of West Africa or the Minstrels of medieval Europe. However, the current stage features a technological backdrop.
As far as what role Hip Hop should play for our future, I’m less concerned with that, and more interested in blurring the lines between music genres/cultures, even exploring the creation of new ones. That being said, I don’t see the function of the Emcee going away anytime soon, and would like to see more people make music how they truly want to make it, instead of trying to meet the expectations of the masses or major corporations.
Maitreya: Hip Hop is the transformation of all subjects and objects with an attempt to define our consciousness. The goal for the culture of Hip Hop is to become the 51st state of the union and defeat congressional rule. Hip Hop’s role and purpose is to unite humanity and help relieve human suffering. We will do that by all means necessary. Hip Hop has the spirit of ‘76.
Kilch: I would like to see more Emcees making music that utilizes Transhumanist thinking or speaks about concepts such as the Technological Singularity, but I don’t think that Hip Hop has a duty to promote such. I only say that because I think people should use the cultural tools at their disposal the best way they see fit; some people might want to make music about love and getting drunk, and others promote political or philosophical ideas.
As an individual, I feel a certain sense of duty to advocate Transhumanism because applying its principles to my life leads to a very realistic view on existence, one of knowing that anything is possible, which is an alternative to a culture that falsely sells us our own limitations, fears, and even revolutions. I want to see as many people as possible understand why Transhumanism is important, but I don’t think the use of any type of force is the most productive way of getting that to happen, including prescribed musical subject matter.
Maitreya: Hip Hop’s duty is to show the proper use of technology, which is to be used in a humane way, not just to uphold a social order that oppresses and divides us. Hip Hop sees technology’s ability to free us from the mundane work-a-day schedule that limits our freedom and holds our bodies captive to a corrupt monetary system that enslaves us. Hip Hop’s version of the technological singularity is all inclusive and puts humanity first. Hip Hop has transcended our humanity. We are raceless and classless, a unique group of people with the ability to tap into our collective creative intelligence at will.
Kilch: I do understand that people have become more secular minded and it’s great to see the idea of the separation of church and state spread globally. I think secularism gives us a wonderful opportunity to learn from each other, no matter our differences. Although I have personally vied for the separation of church and state and have shown a general disdain for religion in some of my music, I can’t say I necessarily agree with Hip Hop trying to curb the influence of religion on the music. I can say that I would like to see more people who have a problem with religion begin to see it as a tool, instead of trying to somehow remove it from music, or human society for that matter.
In many ways I see religion as a byproduct of the human need to express ideas metaphorically/artistically. Some people draw inspiration from using that perspective in their lives to varying degrees. Many do this by reading comic books or watching movies and television shows about orcs, elves, and superheroes. There isn’t much difference between the two behaviors from my perspective. It’s the people who have used a religious context to impose their personal standards of behavior on everyone that are truly a threat to progressive thinking. In the future, when we are more than human, I could see people abandoning the idea of religion altogether.
Maitreya: Hip Hop doesn’t need fans, we need Hip Hoppas. The divide between science and religion is artificial due to the present social order that is in place in the world. When Hip Hop achieves superlongevity and statehood, these artificial boundaries will seize to exist and a new dawn will be upon us. The old age of divide and conquer is deeply rooted in this deathist culture.
Kilch: I would have to say yes and no. It’s very interesting how the rise of social media has given us the chance to hear many Hip Hop figures speak about their views on life via platforms such as YouTube, Twitter, etc. I recently saw a couple of videos featuring what I can only call the Nazi-Punks of Hip Hop who have obvious issues with LGBTQ+ equality, as well as make blatantly racist remarks during their interviews. We’re in 2014. This showed me just how immature Hip Hop can be, but then again, Hip Hop is a tool, and you won’t find uniformity in how it’s used no matter how hard you try, not for any music culture for that matter.
On the contrary, you don’t have to look far, especially given the rise of the internet, to find Hip Hop artists that are expressing their opposition to war or addressing issues like immigrant rights or LGBTQ+ equality. Having spent some time in the New York City Hip Hop circuit doing live shows and putting out independent music, perhaps I have seen more of this than many people, but there are artists on the up and coming that are going to be a major voice for social issues in the years to come.
Although I may not always agree with everything people are trying to get established, as long as it isn’t bigoted, I can only be thrilled to hear of people using Hip Hop to have serious conversations pertaining to the state and future of the world.
Maitreya: Hip Hop is a human culture that gives all people of the planet Earth a leg to stand on. The question isn’t, who are you a voice for; the real question is, do you have the courage to be the real you!?
Kilch: Yes, I’m working on a Mixtape called Cyberpunk Futures & Lucid Dreams, which will be out by early summer. It will deal with such subjects as Transhumanism, cryonics, sex robots and technological religion. The first single by the same name is available for free download right now, with the Mixtape to follow very soon! You can find the single and mixtape at http://mckilch.bandcamp.com/
Maitreya: I’m presently working on two albums, The Messiah of Morris Ave. and Maitreya One: The HipHop State. Both albums are the first of its kind. The first album will be to help build a Temple of Hip Hop in my hood in the Bronx. The second album is about freeing a colony and building a Hip Hop city. I also rap about mastering the elements of my culture and reversing aging. I want to give a shout out to the forefathers of Hip Hop: Kool Herc, Flash, Bam and KRS One. I also want to shout out Saul Kent, William Faloon, Stephen Valentine, Ray Kurzweil and Robert Ettinger. One, I’m out!
For previous interviews by B.J. Murphy, check out “Ruling the Rhetoric on North Korea: A Pedagogical Perspective,” which interviews experts of northern Korea and provides an open-minded look into the ins and outs of the gravely misunderstood country.
How has your work, your life, your humanity, been improved by the promise of Big Data?
What apps and online media do you use to upload personal and other info?
Singularity has flopped – that is to say, this week Johnny Depp’s new film Transcendence did not bring in as much as Pirates of the Caribbean. Though there may not have been big box office heat, there is heat behind the film’s subject: Big Data! Sure we miss seeing our affable pirate chasing treasure, but hats off to Mr. Depp who removed his Keith Richards make-up to risk chasing what might be the mightiest challenge of our century.
Singularity, coined by mathematician John von Neumann, is a heady mathematical concept tested by biotech predictions. Made popular by math and music wunderkindt turned gray hair guru of an AI movement Ray Kurzweil, Singularity is said to signify the increasing rate at which artificial intelligence will supersede human intelligence like a jealous sibling. Followers of the Singularity movement (yes, with guru comes followers) envision the time of override in the not to distant future with projections set early as 2017 and 2030. At these times, the dynamics of technology are said to set about a change in our biology, our civilization and “perhaps” nature itself. Within our current reach, we see signs of empowered tech acting out in the current human brain mapping quest and brain-computer interface systems. More to the point, there is an ever increasing onslaught of Google Alerts annoucing biotech enhancements with wearable tech. Yes indeed, here comes the age of smart prosthetics and our own AI upload of medical and personal data to the internet. Suddenly all those Selfies seem more than mere narcissistic postings against the imposing backdrop of Big Data.
Johnny Depp’s face says it all in Transcendence where Big Data determines our AI future wherein life as we know it, can and will exist online. Think beyond a 24/7 teenage plug into a smart phone or flash- driving Facebook entries. Think Neuromancer, VALIS, and Star Trek’s Borg — sci fi predecessors predicting memory transformations amounting to an existential reboot. Translated into the everyday, we’re talking more than just uploading your genetic code to 23andme. This is an imagined future where what we call “Me” will be psychologically and legally recognized as living online.
As a contemporary sci fi, Transcendence is filled with pentimento film tributes to Zombie and X-Men TakeOvers, Westerns and Romantic Tragedies. Pitting AI critics against AI visionaries, the film is a bioethics drama, where the prospect of creating online Selves will constitute a direct social threat with thoroughgoing eco consequences. At the center of the bioethics contest, we encounter the marriage and business partnership of Will and Eleanor Castor — the heroic scientist and the eco-activist whose death do us part vows are broken to unleash a future so thoroughly transformed by AI as to render biological existence “hacked” by internet code.
The romantic hubris of Transcendence is jolting with a Shakespearean twist: Dare to Upload yourself to the internet and threaten genealogy, global power. Wait, this is no Romeo and Juliet. Love and Death, Eros and Thanatos, as Herr Freud called it, stands at the center of this science fiction pivoting on Will Castor’s heroic martyrdom (played astutely by Johnny Depp). By the end of the film, we are forced to face the movie’s existential questions as moral and medical ones. With new sentient life living online, collective imagination for our biohumanity and ecosystem is left unhinged.
While the film lifts common AI themes of transformed “self-awareness” and “identity,” the real AI deal breaker in Transcendence, and in our own lives, is Time – biological, ecological and geologic. Described as a sequential and cyclical process, Time frames our present experience, shaping both memory and imagination of that present experience. As my Buddhist philosophy professor use to say: “When you are waiting for your lover, 10 minutes feels like 1 hour; but when your lover arrives, 1 hour feels like 10 minutes.” Cognitive neuroscientists tell us that episodic memory is at once measurable and elusive of metrics — researchers can study the sequence of what we remember (like learning our ABC’s) but they struggle to discover how it feels to remember the alphabet.
Time after Will Castor’s AI is not waiting for cognitive neuroscience to catch up with a hacker’s race to design new codes, new systems, and new products for regenerating uberhuman biosystems. After all, AI Time presumes the speed of downloads to the Internet and programming APPs as if to emulate the speed of light.
Before Einstein, Neuroscience, the Internet and Apps, Time was once thought of in mythic, primal terms of genesis. In Indian cosmology, Siva, the God of Time, dances on the back of mother earth, moving us through karmic cycles of birth, life, death and rebirth. In the ancient Greco-Roman cosmos, Time is born from Chronos the three headed serpent that gives us earth, sky and the underworld. Through the ages, Time / Chronos became associated with the cycle of seasons, assigning to the process of change in light and life, the name Father Time in contrast to quiet, deep Mother Earth, which seems to absorb the underworld into her womb.
Conceived as such, Father Time has given way to our current understanding of RAM and neural memory codes leaving Mother Earth to stand in for blood, bones and stem cells. Today as we couple with technology and look to Big Data for knowledge and insight, we lose sight of when, and how, we capitulate to a fundamental misperception: That we are one and the same with the technology we create. Blinded by the light and speed of computer gazing, we mistake ourselves for our creations. We forget difference and our humanity — even if coupled with technology. For the sake of a popular drama, Transcendence pushes on the consequences of this misperception by entertaining a bioethics war over regenerating biological tissue. Like I said, this is a flick with a nod to X-Men.
With computational neuroscience sitting at the center of this passion play, it is neurobiologist and bioethicist Max, the Castor’s closest friend and film’s narrator who reminds us that we are Time emergent and memories alone are not us. Memory may be coded for upload but it cannot fully account for the what and who we are as neuroplastic creatures with uncertain futures. Yes, we are more than just code. As the father of American psychology William James once wrote, we draw from a world of “blooming buzzing confusion,” perceptions enriched with a variety of associated thoughts, sensations and reactions. That piece of wisdom may be more than a century old, but even if our behaviors might fit a statistical profile for behavioral economics, we are reminded: statistical profiles are not Us.
Coda:
Looking back to the late 1990’s, the call for the human-machine interface was met by both excitement and trepidation by frontier technologists and skeptical intellectuals. In my own backyard, I curated a 2003 symposium at Art Center College of Design with NASA scientists and a world famous cyborg, STELARC to discuss: What kind of science and technologies would push the design futures forward and would our imagined futures require the inevitable coupling of human and technology? Now more than 10 years later with advances in the Cloud, wearable tech and neuro-marketing, students have no greater skills for managing their union with the Borg. To paraphrase the thinking of my business partner, Gaynor Strachan Chun, ‘the problem is not with technology, but the way people behave with technology.’
Future Forward? Let’s skill up with the brain in mind to face the behavioral challenges with Big Data.
M. A. Greenstein, Ph.D., Lifeboat Advisor — Neuroscience / Diplomacy / Futures; Founder / Chairman, The George Greenstein Institute (GGI); Founder / Chief Innovation Officer, SM+ART