Short new video out on transhumanism via News:
Meet the 2016 presidential candidate who believes humans will eventually live forever.
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Category: transhumanism – Page 108
Got a bee shortage? No problem, DARPA has you covered.
Following the news that the honeybee is now officially an endangered species as “colony collapse disorder” accelerates, it seems that a Harvard research team has the solution – robotic honeybees. Instead of attempting to save the bees by reducing the use of pesticides or revising safety standards for cell phone radiation, the focus has shifted to replacing the bees altogether. Harvard University researchers, led by engineering professor Robert Wood have been tweaking “RoboBees” since their initial introduction in 2009. The bee-sized robots made of titanium and plastic represent a breakthrough in the field of micro-aerial vehicles. The size of the components needed to create flying robots were previously too heavy to make a such a small structure lightweight enough to achieve flight. Current models weigh only 80 mg and have been fitted with sensors that detect light and wind velocity.
Researchers claim that the bees could artificially pollinate entire fields of crops and will soon be able to be programmed to live in an artificial hive, coordinate algorithms and communicate among themselves about methods of pollination and the locations of particular crops. In addition, RoboBees have been suggested for other uses including searching disaster sites for survivors, monitoring traffic, and “military and police applications.” These applications could include using RoboBees to “scout for insurgents” on battlefields abroad or allowing police and SWAT teams to use the micro-robots to gather footage inside buildings.
The RoboBees project originally began at the University of California at Berkeley in 1998 when neurobiologist Michael Dickinson, electrical engineer Ron Fearing, and then-grad student Rob Wood received a $2.5 million grant from DARPA to create an insect drone. Dickinson now continues his work at the University of Washington while Wood heads the principal RoboBee micro-robotics lab at Harvard. DARPA, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency of the US military, is best known for its role in helping create the internet, but a vast majority of their taxpayer-funded projects paint a decidedly dystopian picture of humanity’s future. Most of DARPA’s projects involve transhumanism, the merging of humans and machines to create a technologically governed populace.
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Circa News, a millennial site, did a story on transhumanism and my campaign. There are 3 videos embedded into this article (a general one on transhumanism, one on using tech to help the environment, and one on a Universal Basic Income):
WATCH | Zoltan Istvan thinks all sentient beings — including, but not limited to humans, artificial intelligence and cyborgs — have the right to be immortal. And that right should be protected under law.
Which is why, naturally, he decided to run for president of the United States.
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Here’s my 20-min interview on transhumanism and AI for The Rubin Report:
Zoltan Istvan (Transhumanist and Presidential Candidate) joins Dave Rubin to discuss his candidacy for president under the transhumanist Party, and his views on artificial intelligence. ***Subscribe: https://www.youtube.com/subscription_center?add_user=RubinReport
***The Rubin Report is fan-funded: http://www.rubinreport.com/donate
Transhumanismo Brasil
Posted in life extension, transhumanism
Pesquisadores da Human Longevity, Inc. Publicou documentos detalhando resultados do sequenciamento profundo de 10.545 genomas humanos.
Documento descreve 150 milhões de variantes raras ou desconhecidas; cerca de 8.500 novas variantes por genoma.
Companhia também anuncia novo motor de pesquisa do genoma, HLI Open Search, para testes beta.
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Cool new story in the San Francisco Chronicle about the robotics conference. I gave a speech at it yesterday.
At the two-day RoboBusiness Conference, about 2,000 people were serenaded with lullabies and Disney tunes, including “Let It Go” from the hit film “Frozen,” by a human-like robot designed to comfort senior citizens and autistic children.
And next to a man-size robot that can drive a motorcycle 190 mph around a race track, a half-dozen ant-size robots quickly scurried about a miniature factory floor.
“In five years, could you imagine what this conference is going to look like?” Transhumanist Party presidential candidate Zoltan Istvan asked the crowd. “There are going to be 8-foot robots walking all around us, talking to us, some of them maybe being smarter than us.”
In a world first, a baby has been born with DNA from three biological parents.
Five-month-old Abrahim Hassan’s Jordanian parents, Ibtisam Shaban and Mahmoud Hassan, were treated by a U.S. team based in Mexico using a controversial technique that allows parents with rare genetic mutations to have healthy babies, the New Scientist reports.
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My new story for VentureBeat on the coming of robot bodyguards. I’ll be speaking about this next week at RoboBusiness 2016, a major robotics conference in San Jose:
I recently consulted with the US Navy on all things “transhuman.” In those conversations about how science and technology can help the human race evolve beyond its natural limits, it was clear that military is keen on replacing human soldiers with both fighting and peacekeeping machines so American military lives never have to come under fire or be in harm’s way.
However, it’s the peacekeeping technology that is particularly interesting for many civilians. While you wouldn’t want an armed Terminator in your home, you might like a robot that travels with you and offers personal protection, like a bodyguard. In a survey by Travelzoo of 6,000 participants, nearly 80 percent of people said they expect robots to be a significant part of their lives by 2020 — and that those robots might even join them on holidays.
The robotics industry is already considering this, and recently debuted some security models. A few months ago China came out with its Anbot, which can taser people and be used for riot control. And South Korea already uses mobile robot guards in its prisons. Even in San Francisco, you can rent out robot guards to protect your businesses and property. However, the rent-a-robot company, Knightscope, recently came under fire for accidentally running over a toddler at the Stanford Shopping Center.
Connecting the dots between transhumanism, veganism, and caring for animals. My new story for Vice Motherboard:
The answer is bewildering—and it probably won’t be satisfying to plant-loving people. Nonetheless, it will inevitably eliminate most human-caused animal deaths. The answer is transhumanism—the movement that aims to replace human biology with synthetic and machine parts.
You see, the most important goal of transhumanism is to try to overcome death with science and technology. Most cellular degeneration—otherwise known as aging and sickness—comes from the failing of cells. That failure is at least partially caused by the daily act of eating and drinking—of putting foreign objects into our bodies which cells have to consume or discard to try to create energy. Paraxdocially, it’s stressful and hard work for cells to endlessly do this just to live. A simple way to eliminate this Sisyphean task—all the steaks, chocolate donuts, bacon breakfasts, and even my favorite, scotch—is to get rid of human reliance on food and drink entirely.
Transhumanists, like myself, want to get rid of it all. We want to strip you of your stomach, your guts, and even your anus—and replace it all with machine parts and bionics. In the future, there will be no eating, drinking, or defecation.