Scientist say: Humans And Machines Will Merge In Near Future

[FourthBase]

Yep. Misused, abused. Saddest fucking thing that one of the world's greatest anti-anti-semites is so often labelled by the ignorant as a proto-Nazi.

Anyway, this thread reminds me of The Elementary Particles, the ghastly epilogue especially. It's notable that in the depicted "utopian" dystopia, the philosophy of Nietzsche is one of the things that became irrelevant.

[compared2what?]

Hey! We had tomorrow's news yesterday. By which I mean today's news,. If you can call USA Today news. Either way:

Inventors Are Sure Cars Can Fly



I think they're copying us. I say to USA Today: Stop copying us, USA Today!

'Cause, see, this way, if tomorrow, USA Today says: "Stop copying us, USA Today!" we'll know if I was right.

[brekin]

I ran into this photoshop contest a long time ago. It really affected me in a strange way. I've always enjoyed science fiction but the images really disturbed me and I feel are overall alienating.

Here's the link to the site.
[url]http://www.worth1000.com/contest.asp?contest_id=3543&display
=photoshop&page=5000#entries[/url]
(If you click on the right under similar contests you can see most of the
collection.)

Most of the images are crude robo-Mona Lisa's, but the "better" ones can be profound. Makes you wonder how people can spend hours perverting great works of art, kind of like scientists I guess.

[FourthBase]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transhumanism

OMFG, there really are people who see the epilogue of The Elementary Particles as a scenario to aspire to, and it turns out that the novel is just a imagined rehash of a world in which the transhumanists who do actually exist today have won. This might sound a tiny bit drastic but...I have the feeling that transhumanists could become more evil than even the fucking Nazis ever could have been. Fukuyama is right (despite his narrow reasoning): Transhumanism is the single most dangerous idea imaginable.

EDIT: I've said before (and I mean it with every fiber of my being) that if there is ever a military campaign required to save bonobos from extinction, that I would be the first to volunteer, I would risk death to help keep that species alive. That's not the only cause I would risk dying for, naturally, if I pondered it more. Case in point: I'm adding this to the list. If there is ever a chance of transhumanist goals actually being achieved, I would risk my life to do everything I could legally and non-terroristically do to prevent that.

[FourthBase]

Okay, it's been great catching up on all things rigorous and intuitive, but I have to get back to focusing on my individual life for a while. Before I take off again though, I need to state how absolutely terrifying the prospect of transhumanism is to me. I'm not joking or hyperbolizing when I say I'd rather the world endure a hundred Holocausts than allow the dreams of transhumanists to become reality in the next hundred years. I'm not joking or hyperbolizing when I say I'd rather roll the dice with a global near-annihilation that leaves just a couple hundred Rockefeller and Cheney types as the lone representives of humanity bunkered underground, than have no representives of humanity at all. I understand that eventually, thousands upon thousands upon thousands of centuries from now, humanity will have probably physically evolved into a dramatically different species anyhow. That's fine. Hopefully by then our species will have progressed intellectually and emotionally to be mature enough to play with the technology we've created in a responsible way. But if the transhumanists have their way remotely close to as soon as they want it, at a stage when humanity as a whole is barely as mature as a toddler but more powerful than God, our essence will be irreparably murdered. About the only things worse than successful transhumanism (no matter what form it takes, from robot hybrids to Houellebecq's insidious vision of "utopian" female clones) would be a successful invasion of Posleen type aliens or a climate/asteroid-related 100% extinction of all earthly life.

[FourthBase]

I find Kurzweil's predictions very exciting and inspiring, and a big reason to go on living when I'm very depressed.

I apologize, but you should probably just take anti-depressants, or whistle.

[barracuda]

This undated photo made available from the Bio-Medical Campus University of Rome on Wednesday, Dec. 2, 2009 shows Pierpaolo Petruzziello's amputated hand linked with electrodes to a robotic hand, seen at top left, as part of an experiment, called LifeHand, to control the prosthetic with his thoughts. A group of European scientists on Wednesday announced they successfully connected a robotic hand to a man, Petruzziello, who had lost an arm in a car accident, allowing him to control the prosthetic with his thoughts and feel sensations in the artificial limb. The experiment lasted a month. But scientists say it marks the first time an amputee has been able to make complex movements using his mind to control a biomechanic hand connected to his nervous system. (AP Photo/Courtesy of Bio-Medical Campus University)

[Blue]

Thanks for kicking this thread. As some have already mentioned all of these wonderful medical advancements using nanotech, etc. will only be available for the super wealthy or guinea pigs like soldiers. Remember the movie with Kurt Russell called Soldier?

I always thought Kurzweil was absurdly optimistic with regards to how soon these technologies will arrive and how they'll essential make us immortal. Although there is a lot of great information about staying healthy in his book Fantastic Voyage: Live Long Enough to Live Forever, his predictions are very classist.

http://www.fantastic-voyage.net/

[Belligerent Savant]

Although there is a lot of great information about staying healthy in his book Fantastic Voyage: Live Long Enough to Live Forever, his predictions are very classist.

http://www.fantastic-voyage.net/

Indeed.

The other factor that seems ignored by Kurzweil is that pesky population problem... if there are already methods in place to 'thin the herd' via manufactured viruses, additives in foods, and the seeming suppression of medical advancement, where is the incentive to make any of Kurzweil's predictions applicable to the majority?

As alluded above, whatever advancements that are or will be in place will likely only be available and/or accessible to the top-tier folk [or to military personnel as human lab rats, as Blue indicated], leaving the rest of us to our own devices...

That being said, I believe it was "Occult Means Hidden" that mentioned something on the first page of this thread regarding as of yet undiscovered aspects of our DNA and how 'downloading' our thoughts to machine may be at a cost... [it's debatable if it truly is 'consciousness' that can be downloaded -- our top scientists have yet to even unravel that grand mystery that is consciousness, let alone download to another medium]

[tazmic]

I'm pleased to see some hearty rejection of the transhumanist fantasy here.
And that people aren't being called future denialist yet...

Reminds me of the obama campaign 'change is gotta be good, right?' Right...

Anyone like to bring the Unabomber into this? I'm still only half way though his manifesto, it's
tedious but interesting. I'll drop a line:

"TECHNOLOGY IS A MORE POWERFUL SOCIAL FORCE THAN THE ASPIRATION FOR FREEDOM" (125)

And this

We'll make campfires, have children, hunt and fish, and die, like it was meant to be.

gave me a welcome smile.

[vigilant]

Nano particles are often coupled with "half gold/half something else" to make the nano particles functional. The "1/2 something else" is its function or reason for being". I am fascinated by the properties of gold. Even though I have studied it, there is something about the electrical properties and gravitational properties of gold that I am missing. There is something in my knowledge bank that I am missing, and that I need to make this picture complete.

For instance, 'in my opinion', this subject has something to do with Morgellon's disease.
Here is a photograph of "Goldenhead", one of the machines that make the Morgellon fibers: (according to this website) http://www.relfe.com/07/morgellon%27s_d ... _cure.html


I have not studied the veracity of the information of this website, but I do know that nano sized factories are often equipped with a 1/2 gold head, and then the other half its "functional/intent" part.


If anyone can shed light on the "why" that "gold" imparts life and direction to matter I would be grateful for your knowledge on this subject.

I am familiar with "ormus" and drinking colloidal gold. Matter of fact, I mixed a big batch myself, and I drank it. I could see through my eyelids when I did it. I swear...I could...It was ruby colored just like good gold water was supposed to be. It was strong, and I drank it...

I'm sure many of the readers of this forum are familiar with the ancient mysteries and the properties of ingesting gold. Anybody more experienced and knowledgeable that would be willing to contribute your experiences...I would appreciate it.

A sheet of gold can be beaten so flat that it is transparent and has wild optical properties. Somewhere in the optical, electrical, gravitational properties of gold there is a life giving, or intent giving magic in gold that I still have not totally nailed down for myself.

[tazmic]

Vigilant: revealing the metaphoric hue of Alchemy...

[vigilant]

Vigilant: revealing the metaphoric hue of Alchemy...

yes indeed...but there is a little something missing that i don't understand.