Posthuman Possibilities [betterhumans.com]
POSTHUMAN POSSIBILITIES:
- There will be multiple organism types that we will wear and fork into // maybe like fashion? Who will pick what, and why?
- Types include: silicon, steel, and microbes integrated with current body system; wave patterns inside computers; robots canvassing the frontiers of space (like Bender in Futurama)
- May test/break our capacity for change // so far it has been breaking many, possibly incarnation into the Prozac Nation
- Traditional biological evolution will end and directed technological evolution will begin (kurzweil)
By Pentti Malaska...
- Bio-orgs: 'protein-coded bio-organisms whose earthly infrastructure is their "natural" surrounding.'
- Cyborgs: 'cybernetic organisms' bio-mech hybrids
- Silorgs: 'silicon organisms--coding artificial DNA onto silicon compounds with ammonium as a solvent and intended basically for living in outer space.'
- Symborgs: 'symbolic organism' - avatars in the Internet
- Quantum Global Brain: Union of symborgs into giant Internet brain
By Wildman... (borg means bionic organism)
- Orgoborgs: us + hybrids
- GEborgs: genetically engineered
- Technoborgs: insect-like exo-skeletan
- 12% of population already cyborgs with "electronic pacemakers, artificial joints, drug implant systems, implanted corneal lenses and artificial skin."
INTERESTING LINKS:
Alvin Toffler - talks in article how there's a 4th wave on the way (with the 3rd being that from apes to man)
Karel Capek - "The word "robot" was created in 1921 by the Czech playwright Karel Capek in his book RUR (Rossum's Universal Robots). "
MY QUESTION:
- What how will our understanding of free will change in th 4th wave? If me and my dad decide to pick organism type A that thinks with parallel processors and moves back and forth between integration with other organisms of type A while as my mom and brother pick Type B which is an organism that does little else than spectate and enjoy life, and then once in those types, our decision-making mentality paradigm shifts, what will become of our normal conceptions of choice. i.e. right now, human choice is easy to understand... single node deliberates over mounds of evidence and comes up with a decision. The Type A organism's decisions will be based on democracy of others in Type A while also not returning with single decisions, but with a multiplicity of decisions. Type B organisms would make no decisions, but remain chained to constantly loving life, from which they could opt out, but by assuming Type B, they've chosen to reduce their desire for change. And then, the question is, was there something inherent about our family that made us choose to pick these certain Types that then changed our notion of choice. And if choosing change were a process that occured frequently, would there be certain local maximum equilibriums where one could get stuck? And which ones would you want to get stuck into? And by want does that mean want now, or want for later, or will want later?
... read the article, it has good quotes, summary of good one-liners points:
- biology not equal to destiny, more a tendancy
- ever more important than to create is to not destroy
- Will robots inherit the earth? Yes, Minsky says, but they'll be our children
// more of my comments
... and there's the classic attempts to come up with robot laws, like Assimov's laws, that will keep robots supposedly at bay... heh, yeah right... look @ the AI drones floating over bagdhad, they've already broken the robot rules....
... instead we should come up with robotic or AI or transhumanist principles that will we can all worship so that we can collectively insure that the singularity isn't the point where we destroy ourselves but rather the point where we enter the Heaven that we were all sold on when we were kids and believed in Santa Claus....
... see, I ultimately believe in the Law of Accelerating Returns ... so as time increases, intelligence must increase exponentially, and eventually approach an infinite-like level of intelligence... however, that doesn't necessarily mean it will happen to earth... Earth could very well be another Darwinian experiment in survivable planets and we're one of many trials being conducted across space... which planet survives will continue, reproduce, and propogate and will inherit the universe... please, I want it to be us, not them... whoever they are.
... and finally I conclude this long post with a page from Futurama Comics Issue #13.
Monday, Aug 4, 2003
