Lifeboat Foundation

It is critical that those responsible for running our nations have scientific knowledge in order to make the right decisions instead of making them based on misunderstandings of what the real science is.

My new policy article for the HuffPost on why more than ever we need to avoid war and armed conflict:

Some of the early years of my adult life were in conflict zones as a journalist—which included covering the Pakistan/Indian Kashmir conflict for the National Geographic Channel and The New York Times Syndicate. War zones are terrifying. One always is worried about bullying soldiers, speeding armed military vehicles, stray bullets, and whether there’s a roadside bomb on your path. Anyone that approaches you is suspect and could be carrying ready-to-detonate explosives.

One thing conflict zones teach you is that freedom is precious. The nearly 70-year Kashmir conflict has approximately a half million soldiers involved, so even if they’re supposedly on your side (depending on what country you’re in), you still feel under siege. My time in certain parts of Sudan, Israel, Palestine, Zimbabwe, Lebanon, Sri Lanka, Eritrea, Mali, and Yemen left me with the same feeling.

Continue reading “The Libertarian Futurist’s Case for Avoiding War and Military Entanglements” »

Today, U.S. Depart of Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao released the DoT and National Highway Traffic and Safety Administration’s new guidelines for automated driving systems. This is version 2.0 of a federal policy on self-driving cars, and Chao said it’s a “living document,” with plans already for version 3.0 to arrive in 2018.

These guidelines are called “A Vision for Safety 2.0,” which Chao says reflects their importance in terms of addressing the rising rate of traffic deaths in the U.S. Chao cited the most recent stats, which include the stat that 94 percent of serious motor vehicle accidents in the U.S. are due to human error, in presenting the new guidelines at an event today.

The new guidelines are designed to unify development of automation features, including full autonomy and advanced driver assistance systems (ADAS), and to help unify industry, local, state and federal government efforts to that end. It’s voluntary guidance, but it focuses on SAE Levels 3 through 5 automation, and it clarifies that companies don’t need to wait to begin testing and deploying their automated driving systems, and streamlines the self-assessment process for companies and organizations.

Continue reading “Department of Transportation releases new self-driving vehicle guidelines” »

Are these huge solar flares causing massive hurricanes or Man made Climate Change? Interview with Harvard-Smithsonian Solar Physicist Wei-Hock “Willie” Soon about how solar cycle accounts for climate change.

In this exclusive interview, Infowars reporters Millie Weaver and David Knight talk with Harvard-Smithsonian Solar Physicist Wei-Hock “Willie” Soon about how solar cycle account for climate change. Soon uses science to dispel the false notion that C02 emissions are to blame for ‘global warming’ and that it is nothing more than the politicization of pseudoscience for policy makers.

Continue reading “Solar Physicist Explains How The Sun Controls Climate, Not Man” »

The cabinet also approved a slew of measures to support the development of robotics and other targeted industries to keep up with the Thailand 4.0 policy.

Industry Minister Uttama Savanayana said the measures are aimed at encouraging the manufacturing and service sectors to increase productivity through the use of robotics and automation systems.

Futurist José Cordeiro talks longevity, AI, and the humanitarian crisis in Venezuela.

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Continue reading “Can Science Reverse Aging?” »

You can go to school for space mining.

GOLDEN, Colo. — The Colorado School of Mines plans to launch a new graduate program that could help people inhabit other planets some day.

The school is working to launch the space resources graduate program that will teach students how to explore, extract and use resources not only on Earth but also on the moon, Mars, asteroids and more.

Continue reading “Colorado School of Mines plans to launch space mining graduate program” »

Set on Sir Richard Branson’s Necker Island, the third annual Blockchain Summit, hosted by BitFury, a leading full service Blockchain company, and Bill Tai, a venture investor and technologist, has come to a close. This event was an intimate, if perfectly balanced, gathering of technology, policy, investment and business leaders from around the world and across sectors. Topics ranged from the public policy implications of what is being heralded as a foundational technology, to new emerging business models that can ride on the very rails that enabled the global bonanza of digital currencies like Bitcoin. A key question that underpinned the Summit is if Blockchain could not have existed without the Internet, what could not exist without Blockchain?

Blockchain technology can undoubtedly change industries, especially those that labor under often byzantine, opaque and friction-laden business models. While many of the early pioneers are focusing on finance and insurance, the opportunities for this radical technology may very well reorder society as we know it. The remarkable case of Estonia, for example, shows a country reinventing itself into a future-proof digital state, where citizen services are rendered nearly instantaneously and to people all over the world. Similarly, promising work inspired by the famed Peruvian economist, Hernando de Soto, on improving land registries is being carried out by BitFury in a host of countries. With land and property being the two largest assets people will own — and the principal vehicle of value creation and wealth transfer — an unalterable, secure and transparent registration process should give the world comfort and elected leaders longevity.

What drives this unique technology is the power of distributed singularity, from which Blockchain’s identity pioneers like Dr. Mariana Dahan, who launched the World Identity Network on Necker Island, and Vinny Lingham of Civic, draw their inspiration. Blockchain operates on the basis of a distributed ledger (or database) system, inexorably marching forward recording and time-stamping transactions or records. While some may herald Bitcoin as Blockchain’s “killer app,” it is easy to maintain that the killer app is not the digital currencies that ride on Blockchain’s rails, but rather the rail system altogether. Two trains can ride on rails. But a high-speed maglev train is a decidedly faster mode of transport than a steam engine. Just as the maglev makes little or no contact with the rails enabling low-friction transport, the Blockchain can greatly reduce the friction in how the world transfers and records value.

Continue reading “Blockchain and the Power of Singularity” »

My HuffPost article from yesterday on military, #transhumanism and science was on the frontpage of Reddit today with nearly 12,000 upvotes & This was a policy article of my libertarian CA governor campaign. I’m happy to see it do so well.