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On March 5th the IEET’s Executive Director James Hughes discussed to address whether it was important to have a body to be human with Dr. Brent Waters of Garrett Theological Seminary and the students and faculty of the East Texas Baptist University. An edited version of Dr. Hughes’ prepared remarks are available here.
SoCal researchers recently made available videos of “SuperBot,” “identical modular units that plug into each other to create robots that can stand, crawl, wiggle and even roll.”
Follow the links below to view .wmv files of some of the videos:
Rope climbing between buildings:
http://www.isi.edu/robots/superbot/movies/Feb2007/ropeclimber.wmv
http://www.isi.edu/robots/superbot/movies/Feb2007/fastropeclimber.wmv
Caterpillar on beach and in room:
http://www.isi.edu/robots/superbot/movies/Feb2007/beach-caterpillar.wmv
http://www.isi.edu/robots/superbot/movies/Feb2007/rough-catapillar.wmv
http://www.isi.edu/robots/superbot/movies/Feb2007/caterpillar.wmv
http://www.isi.edu/robots/superbot/movies/Feb2007/ninja-caterpillar.wmv
http://www.isi.edu/robots/superbot/movies/Feb2007/hard-at-work.wmv
Climbing on sand dune, river bank, and in room:
http://www.isi.edu/robots/superbot/movies/Feb2007/sand-climber.wmv
http://www.isi.edu/robots/superbot/movies/Feb2007/climbcreek.wmv
http://www.isi.edu/robots/superbot/movies/Feb2007/carpet-climber.wmv
Climbing on a fishing net:
http://www.isi.edu/robots/superbot/movies/Feb2007/netclimb1.wmv
http://www.isi.edu/robots/superbot/movies/Feb2007/netclimb2.wmv
Carrying a camera:
http://www.isi.edu/robots/superbot/movies/Feb2007/climberCam.wmv
“If we’re looking at the highlights of human development, you have to look at the evolution of the organism and then at the development of its interaction with the environment. Evolution of the organism will begin with the evolution of life perceived through the hominid coming to the evolution of mankind. Neanderthal and Cro-Magnon man. Now, interestingly, what you’re looking at here are three strings: biological, anthropological — development of the cities — and cultural, which is human expression.
Now, what you’ve seen here is the evolution of populations, not so much the evolution of individuals. And in addition, if you look at the time scales that are involved here — two billion years for life, six million years for the hominid, 100,000 years for mankind as we know it — you’re beginning to see the telescoping nature of the evolutionary paradigm. And then when you get to agricultural, when you get to scientific revolution and industrial revolution, you’re looking at 10,000 years, 400 years, 150 years. Uou’re seeing a further telescoping of this evolutionary time. What that means is that as we go through the new evolution, it’s gonna telescope to the point we should be able to see it manifest itself within our lifetime, within this generation.
The new evolution stems from information, and it stems from two types of information: digital and analog. The digital is artificial intelligence. The analog results from molecular biology, the cloning of the organism. And you knit the two together with neurobiology. Before on the old evolutionary paradigm, one would die and the other would grow and dominate. But under the new paradigm, they would exist as a mutually supportive, noncompetitive grouping. Okay, independent from the external.
And what is interesting here is that evolution now becomes an individually centered process, emanating from the needs and desires of the individual, and not an external process, a passive process where the individual is just at the whim of the collective. So, you produce a neo-human, okay, with a new individuality and a new consciousness. But that’s only the beginning of the evolutionary cycle because as the next cycle proceeds, the input is now this new intelligence. As intelligence piles on intelligence, as ability piles on ability, the speed changes. Until what? Until we reach a crescendo in a way could be imagined as an enormous instantaneous fulfillment of human, human and neo-human potential. It could be something totally different. It could be the amplification of the individual, the multiplication of individual existences. Parallel existences now with the individual no longer restricted by time and space.
And the manifestations of this neo-human-type evolution, manifestations could be dramatically counter-intuitive. That’s the interesting part. The old evolution is cold. It’s sterile. It’s efficient, okay? And its manifestations of those social adaptations. We’re talking about parasitism, dominance, morality, okay? Uh, war, predation, these would be subject to de-emphasis. These will be subject to de-evolution. The new evolutionary paradigm will give us the human traits of truth, of loyalty, of justice, of freedom. These will be the manifestations of the new evolution. And that is what we would hope to see from this. That would be nice.”
Clip from CarliTV’s Megazin which shows an interview with the Slovenian artist Domen Lombergar on the opening night of his “Posthuman” exhibition at Hotel Mons on the 13th February 2007.
(From BoingBoing and Random-GoodStuff via YouTube) A monkey has a microchip in its brain which allows it to move a robotic arm as if it were its real arm.
To see videos of it working in real time, go here:
The universe appears to be so finely tuned to permit the existence of intelligent life that there may have been an Intelligent Designer. Or is it that since we can only exist in one of the infinite number of universes that permit intelligent life that is the only kind of universe we can observe? The latter is the “anthropic principle.” Nick Bostrom is one of the world’s experts on this question, and is interviewed for this excellent documentary about it.
Chris Carlsson participated in the SF Bay-area collective that produced the technoprogressive magazine Processed World. He has written a utopian novel, After The Deluge, and is working on documenting the history of Bay area activism.
From the best brain science program on radio, with the enchanting Natasha Mitchell: “Lead in paint. Methylmercury in fish. Arsenic in groundwater. Just some of the toxic insults on our vulnerable brains. But are they the thin end of the industrial chemical wedge? Could the world’s children be experiencing a silent pandemic in neurodevelopmental disorders? Harvard’s Professor Phillipe Grandjean thinks so, and joins Deborah Cory-Slechta at Rutgers University to unpick the latest compelling science. Don’t miss two of the world’s trailblazers in neurotoxicology.”
Aubrey speaking with Cameron Reilly, CEO of The Podcast Network and producer of G’Day World, an Australian podcast. Also listen to interview with Ray Kurzweil.
This is a very simple slideshow movie of events and pictures from uvvy island in second life, where there is an ongoing silent revolution into posthuman, transhuman and artistic innovations. Visit us at http://www.uvvy.com.
Richard Clarke talks about his thriller Breakpoint which addresses the growing threat from China, Christian fundamentalism and bioLuddite terrorism, and a not too distant transhuman future.
BBC: “Meet the scientific prophets who claim we are on the verge of creating a new type of human - a human v2.0. It’s predicted that by 2029 computer intelligence will equal the power of the human brain. Some believe this will revolutionize humanity - we will be able to download our minds to computers extending our lives indefinitely. Others fear this will lead to oblivion by giving rise to destructive ultra intelligent machines. One thing they all agree on is that the coming of this moment - and whatever it brings - is inevitable.” Link
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The IEET is a 501(c)3 non-profit, tax-exempt organization registered in the State of Connecticut in the United States.
Contact: Executive Director, Dr. James J. Hughes,
Williams 119, Trinity College, 300 Summit St., Hartford CT
06106 USA
Email: director @ ieet.org phone:
860-297-2376
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