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Archive for the ‘transhumanism’ category: Page 118

Nov 13, 2015

Legalization of Drugs Should Be Part of a Transhumanist Agenda

Posted by in categories: biotech/medical, law, life extension, transhumanism

New article for Vice Motherboard on why society should support legalization of all drugs–and a short video of the Immortality Bus in Arkansas talking to marijuana supporters (a state where it’s totally illegal):


The “Mount Rushmore of the Drug War” featuring founding prohibitionists Harry Anslinger, Billie Holiday, and Arnold Rothstein. Image: Donkey Hotey/Flickr

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Nov 9, 2015

Meet The ‘Trans-Humanist’ Presidential Candidate

Posted by in categories: geopolitics, robotics/AI, transhumanism

A new story out in Breitbart that’s about AI, transhumanism, and politics: http://www.breitbart.com/tech/2015/11/08/trans-humanist-pres…overlords/


Zoltan Istvan is running for President in 2016, and hoping he might be one of the last humans to hold the job.

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Oct 31, 2015

p2p: Patient Zero And Anti-Aging Gene Therapy w/ special guest Liz Parrish, CEO BioViva

Posted by in categories: biotech/medical, transhumanism

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Oct 28, 2015

Humanity on a Budget, or the Value-Added of Being ‘Human’

Posted by in categories: automation, economics, futurism, governance, human trajectories, law, philosophy, policy, posthumanism, theory, transhumanism

This piece is dedicated to Stefan Stern, who picked up on – and ran with – a remark I made at this year’s Brain Bar Budapest, concerning the need for a ‘value-added’ account of being ‘human’ in a world in which there are many drivers towards replacing human labour with ever smarter technologies.

In what follows, I assume that ‘human’ can no longer be taken for granted as something that adds value to being-in-the-world. The value needs to be earned, it can’t be just inherited. For example, according to animal rights activists, ‘value-added’ claims to brand ‘humanity’ amount to an unjustified privileging of the human life-form, whereas artificial intelligence enthusiasts argue that computers will soon exceed humans at the (‘rational’) tasks that we have historically invoked to create distance from animals. I shall be more concerned with the latter threat, as it comes from a more recognizable form of ‘economistic’ logic.

Economics makes an interesting but subtle distinction between ‘price’ and ‘cost’. Price is what you pay upfront through mutual agreement to the person selling you something. In contrast, cost consists in the resources that you forfeit by virtue of possessing the thing. Of course, the cost of something includes its price, but typically much more – and much of it experienced only once you’ve come into possession. Thus, we say ‘hidden cost’ but not ‘hidden price’. The difference between price and cost is perhaps most vivid when considering large life-defining purchases, such as a house or a car. In these cases, any hidden costs are presumably offset by ‘benefits’, the things that you originally wanted — or at least approve after the fact — that follow from possession.

Now, think about the difference between saying, ‘Humanity comes at a price’ and ‘Humanity comes at a cost’. The first phrase suggests what you need to pay your master to acquire freedom, while the second suggests what you need to suffer as you exercise your freedom. The first position has you standing outside the category of ‘human’ but wishing to get in – say, as a prospective resident of a gated community. The second position already identifies you as ‘human’ but perhaps without having fully realized what you had bargained for. The philosophical movement of Existentialism was launched in the mid-20th century by playing with the irony implied in the idea of ‘human emancipation’ – the ease with which the Hell we wish to leave (and hence pay the price) morphs into the Hell we agree to enter (and hence suffer the cost). Thus, our humanity reduces to the leap out of the frying pan of slavery and into the fire of freedom.

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Oct 27, 2015

Chewbacca arrested, Emperor Palpatine wins in bizarre Ukrainian elections

Posted by in categories: internet, transhumanism

A funny article ending with transhumanism:


Ukraine’s Internet Party, which has been adding levity and subtle satire to the country’s tense politics for a few years now, is making a statement with sci-fi again. Yes, this is all true.

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Oct 25, 2015

Two-party politics has killed independent’s day

Posted by in categories: geopolitics, life extension, transhumanism

Transhumanism featured in The Times of London, a major UK paper. Sorry, you do need a subscription, I think:


Zoltan Istvan is campaigning for the White House by promising voters everlasting life. He is the Transhumanist party’s presidential nominee and he is touring the US in a vehicle shaped like a coffin that he calls the immortality bus.

He believes that technology will eventually allow humans to live for ever. His message, he says, is connecting with the millennial generation who were born from the early 80s onwards. But he has little money and his bus, which is very old, keeps breaking down. “I know what the chances are,” he told me of his attempt to capture the Oval…

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Oct 20, 2015

A tale of two buses: On Ben Carson, Zoltan Istvan, millennialism and eternal life

Posted by in categories: bioengineering, life extension, transhumanism

Austin’s (Texas) leading paper features features transhumanism, biohacking, and longevity near the bottom:


Yesterday began with a 7:30 a.m. call from Dr. Ben Carson for what I thought was a pretty good half hour interview about his new book, A More Perfect Union, his primer on the Constitution, which I read over the weekend.

I was pleased.

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Oct 13, 2015

Meet the Transhumanist presidential candidate who won’t be onstage tonight

Posted by in categories: geopolitics, transhumanism

Transhumanism in a major publication in Las Vegas today, just in time for the debates:


Zoltan Istvan is running for president on some very far-out ideas.

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Oct 10, 2015

A Stand-Up Comedian Tries to Cope with a World Where People Are Becoming Transhuman

Posted by in categories: entertainment, health, transhumanism

In the near future of the short film Enhanced, people can undergo a procedure that blends their bodies with technology, becoming smarter, healthier, and less anxious. But one stand-up comic finds he’s uneasy with the promise of perfection.

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Oct 10, 2015

h+ Magazine: Synthetic Biology — The True Savior of Mankind

Posted by in categories: biological, biotech/medical, disruptive technology, DNA, environmental, ethics, futurism, genetics, health, innovation, science, sustainability, transhumanism

Encapsulation Pictures

Fear of scientists “playing god” is at the centre of many a plot line in science fiction stories. Perhaps the latest popular iteration of the story we all love is Jurassic World (2015), a film I find interesting only for the tribute it paid to the original Michael Crichton novel and movie Jurassic Park.

Full op-ed from h+ Magazine on 7 October 2015 http://hplusmagazine.com/2015/10/07/opinion-synthetic-biolog…f-mankind/

john hammond jurrasic parkIn Jurassic Park, a novel devoted to the scare of genetic engineering when biotech was new in the 1990s, the character of John Hammond says:

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