A Rant You've Heard Before

Over on Accelerating Future, Michael Anissimov (whose surname I once again "insist" is almost conspiratorially close to Asimov) gave us all the pleasure of pointing out the 'joys' of one Annalee Newitz's comments about Extropianism.

Now, let me start off by saying that she got her terminology wrong; extropians are a group as a whole focused on augmenting intelligence; on creating or finding greater intelligence either in humans or in machines. Her comments were with regards to Immortalists and transhumanists in general; but poorly aimed at extropians. Honestly, even a cursory examination of the title would reveal this: extropy is defined as the 'force' that causes organization within a group of things. This is inverse to entropy, which is the increasing disorder of things over time.

It's really an extremely subtle point, but one worth making. Now, as to the nuts and bolts of Annalee's comments; near the end of the article Michael references, she makes the following "end statement" by way of justifying her entire opinion:

And let there be no doubt about it: the extropian agenda is creepy. Who wants to live forever in a world where only the richest people in developed countries will become immortal? It's not as if there's going to be a special cryogenics fund for everybody in Kenya and Chile. In order for people to live forever in the transhumanist future, some people will still have to live like trash. Sounds sort of like entropy to me.

There it is: the continued, pervasive belief that only the richest people will enjoy these technologies, so they ought not be developed or possessed at all, by anyone, ever.

And frankly, this is a lot like saying, "Ebola will kill everyone in the city. We could develop a cure, but only the richest people in the city could afford it. So we're just going to let everyone die, because that would be unfair to the poor." Nevermind the fact that once the once the cure exists -- much like every other cure that has been developed -- if given long enough the cost could be brought down to the point where everyone could enjoy it. At the end of the day, that's a simple truth; over a long enough timeline, the cost for any new technology will be reduced to the point where a sufficiently great number of people can enjoy it. It may take five hundred years, or five thousand, but that is simply not an excuse to forbid it to anyone. Should I live to be a thousand, I will never understand the objection that "only the rich and powerful will enjoy this!"

It doesn't matter what you want to look at: Originally, good food and the luxury of a warm bed every night was something only the richest of the rich could be guaranteed. Today, it takes only a moderate income -- the American poverty level -- to ensure that. And as to Kenya and the rest of Africa? The problems there are less economic than they are political. You can hardly call something the failure of the capitalist system when the capitalist system has never been applied there. But I digress.

I'll use a more modern example to once again disprove the "fixed pie" myth: rapid prototyping technology, also referred to "home manufacturing" equipment, has always been exorbitantly expensive. But thanks to the folks at RepRap and Fab@Home, that will not remain true in the very near future. All that will remain exclusive is the knowledge to use them. An exclusivity which, much like the Linux operating systems for computers, or the Wikipedia 'free' encyclopedia, is fastly vanishing: both RepRap and Fab@Home are "open source" projects: their hardware & software designs are free to the public for any purpose, licensed under multi-national GNU. More and more colleges are offering free to the public college courses on a variety of topics -- online courses, of course. But if your goal is simple self-erudition, you can achieve it for between 5 and 40 bucks a month, depending on how much your internet connection costs. (Hell, go to a public library in the US and you don't even have to pay that.)

While Corporatist-style commercialism continues to run roughshod over the promotion of human decency and liberty, there is little to no question that advances in technology will very realistically play a major part in the solution to that problem. Youtube and the Peer-to-Peer networks have already cut a chink in the armor of the "Entertainment industry"; (the adult industry faces similar 'peril' from such glamourous sites as YouPorn, and XTube) and as to reaching these outer communities, the poorest portions of the world...

India and China have both presented to the world the Will to Industry. This despite the difficulty in achieving that state. With projects like RepRap and Fab@Home being developed by a very dedicated, if minor, community there is simply no question: while the disparity between haves and have nots may not close for decades or even centuries to come, any advancement in one area will have ancillary benefits that will affect everyone.

In the end, it seems utterly selfish to complain that only the "rich" or the "powerful" will acquire access to technologies providing extended life or increased genius; for all such complaints detract from how soon they will come around at all. And if any historical analysis of technological advancement is to be our guide at all, there is one simple truth:

Once something is invented, sooner or later anybody who wants it can have it.

Bionic Knees?

So, here's the deal: there is more interest today than ever before in harnessing the natural rythms of the body for kinetic-electric conversion. What you're about to see (should you choose to click "play") is a video that shows a new avenue for electrical generation which could with capacitance and battery storage provide -- assuming, of course, the bulkiness is overcome -- all the whirring joys of extended battery life for all the wearables or gargoyling that may come to pass.

Dystopian: Pretend to Be a Time Traveler

The following is, apparently, a video that is meant to be an ad for Dennis Kucinich -- though you don't discover that until the end. I find it quite entertaining, however, whom the only politician actually mentioned was. You industrial fans out there -- be prepared to be amused.

Video: South Korea Clones "Glow In The Dark" Cats

I am struck by the recollection that only recently the news was made that you just can't clone a calico cat. That being said, it would seem that once again our poor benighted felines are doing their part in the advancement of cloning science. Check this video for more:

The reasoning behind this act was that it was meant as a proof-of-concept for the breeding of cats, which are supposedly genetically quite similar to humans, with specific genetic disorders unique to human beings. This would qualify, then, as quite the genetic-science breakthrough.

Yes, it's unfortunate that animals need to be used for such research, but there reaches a point where you can only study genetic functions in a functioning genetic machine -- that is, an animal. Here's to hoping that the Green-Peaces and Animal Liberation Fronts of the world don't stop this vital and fundamentally important work.

Nanosolar Press Release

Nanosolar Ships First Panels
December 18, 2007

After five years of product development – including aggressively pipelined science, research and development, manufacturing process development, product testing, manufacturing engineering and tool development, and factory construction – we now have shipped first product and received our first check of product revenue.

We are grateful to everyone who supported us through all these years and the many occasions where there appeared to be mile-high concrete walls in our path; the unusual intensity and creativity of our team deserves all the credit for achieving this major milestone today.

Our product is defining in more ways I can enumerate here but includes:

- the world's first printed thin-film solar cell in a commercial panel product;

- the world's first thin-film solar cell with a low-cost back-contact capability;

- the world's lowest-cost solar panel – which we believe will make us the first solar manufacturer capable of profitably selling solar panels at as little as $.99/Watt;

- the world's highest-current thin-film solar panel – delivering five times the current of any other thin-film panel on the market today and thus simplifying system deployment;

- an intensely systems-optimized product with the lowest balance-of-system cost of any thin-film panel – due to innovations in design we have included.

Today we are announcing that we have begun shipping panels for freefield deployment in Eastern Germany and that the first Megawatt of our panels will go into a power plant installation there.

As far as the first three of our commercial panels are concerned:

Panel #1 will remain at Nanosolar for exhibit.

Panel #2 can be purchased by you in an auction on eBay starting today.

Panel #3 has been donated to the Tech Museum in San Jose.

[These are obviously not the first three we ever produced – we have produced loads for testing – but these are the first three of what we consider our commercial panels.]

Take that, you vapor-ware claiming bastards!

Scientific Literacy: More Necessary Today Than Ever

It is all to easy to complain, these days, about any number of things. And it seems that where politics are concerned, all anyone is based on is what they complain about the most. Pessimism is chíc these days; optimism is considered naíve. So what, then, do we make of something that is both optimistic and pessimistic?

First; the pessimism. Much ado has been made about the fact that the Northwest Passage has been freed "for the first time ever". This video is proof of it:

Now, nobody is suggesting that this isn't going to have implications on global warming & global climate change in general. But this is used, once again, as evidence of man's fault: when NASA itself says this isn't so. Their culprit? Shifting wind patterns.

And this gets let go, by the public -- because the general comprehension of the media's representation is that "well, they did the research, so I don't have to." And that, more than anything, is the greatest threat facing society. Why? Because it means that whoever does do that research, controls society's opinions on everything under the sun. Are you comfortable with this? I certainly am not.

So where does this come from?

From the National Education Association:

A historic turnover is taking place in the teaching profession. While student enrollments are rising rapidly, more than a million veteran teachers are nearing retirement. Experts predict that overall we will need more than 2 million new teachers in the next decade.

This teacher recruitment problem, which has reached crisis proportions in some areas, is most acute in urban and rural schools; for high-need subject areas such as special education, math and science, and for teachers of color.

[...]

The statistics for turnover among new teachers are startling. Some 20 percent of all new hires leave the classroom within three years. In urban districts, the numbers are worse—close to 50 percent of newcomers flee the profession during their first five years of teaching.

Why do new teachers leave? They say they feel overwhelmed by the expectations and scope of the job. Many say they feel isolated and unsupported in their classrooms, or that expectations are unclear.

Nothing is particularly new about this. In fact, it is used as the most powerful argument for increasing teacher pay, for increasing funding to the Department of Education, and in general all sorts of interesting/curious events. But let us take a somewhat deeper examination of this plight -- one that won't exactly raise us up from this pessimism, but perhaps allow us to understand it a step or two further:

It is not in the best interests of the education lobby for education to actually improve.

It's a statement that we don't often think about, but bear with me and I will explain my logic -- or at least what passes for it. It's actually fairly simple. We'll use Washington, DC as the example for this. From the Cato@Liberty blog:

Is the problem insufficient funding? As it happens, DCPS’s total gross budget for the last school year was upwards of one billion dollars according to its own website, and its enrollment was about 52,000 students. That means DCPS had total per pupil spending of nearly $20,000 last year, or half a million dollars per class of 25 students. You’d think that would cover books.

In a previous article on this blog, "It's For The Children! ... And Other Lies My Government Told Me", I documented the fact that the national average annual cost per student for public schools was $8,701; whereas the cost per student for private schools was $3,116/yr. Almost a third the cost. So, going back to Washington, DC. How could this be so bloated over both the national average for both public and private schools? Well, the answer to that question can also be found in the public record: From The Examiner, circa August 24, 2007: "D.C. Public Schools will pay nearly $5.4 million in full-time salaries to 68 teachers and staff who won’t work full-time jobs this year, schools Chancellor Michelle Rhee told The Examiner on Thursday."

From all of the above, we have learned thus far three things:

Scholastic Acheivement is sliding continuously

This isn't much of a shocker, really: search anywhere and you'll see that there are, annually, fewer and fewer American engineering & physics graduates every year. There really isn't anybody whom is impressed with NCLB -- and that's not even if you include the people who actually study the topic.

Public schools cost more per student than private

There's not much equivocating there: $8.7k for public as compared to $3.1k for private? And let us not forget here that private schools -- even the 'average' ones -- have their impression of prestige for a reason: traditionally, private schools achieve greater scholastic results than public schools.

Washington DC schools spend millions of dollars on faculty that, literally, does nothing.

That incident reported was by no means a singular incident. It has happened before, and in larger numbers. Even so, these were actual teachers being discussed: lets not forget that schools also have administrative staffing; there have been entire studies to compare the number of non-teaching faculty members to the numbers of pupils... which says that this is a problem as well; less, one can only assume, for private schools than for public ones.

Even so; is simply privatizing all the schools the solution to this problem? (If our military security is any lesson, the answer to that question is an emphatic "NO!") Still, creating competition between schools simply couldn't hurt. Perhaps, if schools themselves were held accountable for the allocation of their resources on their students, we might see some streamlining of costs and some improvement of scholastic acheivement. And time and time again, the records have shown: the only effective mechanism for accountability is to put the fiscal survival of an institution on the line. That's called "market competition." However, there's no sign that given today's political and social climates, that honest markets can be restored to so ubiquitous and socialized -- which is what our educational system is. Should things actually turn around, however, it is effectively already too late. The day of the Renaissance man has been dead and buried for centuries.

So where do we go from here? Well, our nation's resident mad military scientist organization -- DARPA -- has already begun to aid in this:

Famous for funding futuristic technology, DARPA is spending $24 million to launch the Brain-Machine Interface Program (BMI), with the five-year research monies divided among six laboratories. High on its development wish list are mind-controlled battle robots, as well as airplanes flown and weapons or equipment operated with nothing more than thought – even from a distance – all through wireless neural interfaces.

And mind you, DARPA is not alone on this. Should true data-in BMI be developed, the problem of education and scientific literacy in particular could be resolved absolutely. Howso? Because the possibility of having a microchip -- or ten -- implanted in your head, and thus allowing you a replete factual education -- with said procedure to cost in the same ballpark as a breast augmentation does today -- between $4,000 to $10,000, USD -- would allow for wholly 'humanities'-esque education; focusing on reasoning skills and the like.

Without such a development, we are likely to face a scenario where the amount of information necessary to make an informed opinion on any given subject continues to fall further and further from the grasp of even our communities of "experts" -- but thankfully, if DARPA, Cyberkinetics, and other such organizations/companies have anything to say, we won't have too much to worry about there: the money is being spent, the effort is being made. While a complicated task, so long as the funding doesn't dry up it's essentially inevitable. (I suppose that statement makes me a functionalist -- but gee, isn't that a shocker to anyone whom has read the title of this blog?)

(Yes, for you AGI enthusiasts; the same gains can be made by AGI as can be made by BMI -- if and only if we hand over control of society to our AGI's. Which, if they are "Seed" AGIs, is entirely likely. But that is too "post-singularity" a subject for this author to be fully comfortable attempting to discuss.)

Can A Transhuman Future Survive Without Libertarian Ideals?

As a transhumanist, I am all too keenly aware of the good and the ill that can come of technology. One technology, however, that seems to have only ills springing from it these days is that of surveillance technology. Consider, for example the perhaps not so infamous as it ought to be 'dragonfly spy':

The little robot you see on the fingertip is a prototype created by the Harvard Microrobotics Lab. While it does not carry any optical equipment -- there are optics of sufficiently small size to fit. More on this particular topic can be found at the Sydney Morning Herald's article, "Washington abuzz with talk of dragonfly spies". There are many obstacles to the development of such machines -- and, to be frank, they offer a multitude of uses beyond mere surveillance. For the moment, however, we'll discuss 'merely' surveillance.

There is another, perhaps more insidious, approach which has been suggested which entails literally growing insects around MEMS devices. What possible benefit to the would-be super-spy is there in this, you ask? Well, the answer to that question becomes more prevalent when one considers that researchers have already -- if crudely -- decoded the neural activity of a cat's brain into visual information.



So you see -- we may come to a point where it will literally be possible -- from a sensory point of view -- to be a "fly on a wall." This becomes all the more troublesome when we consider that -- regardless of Ray Kurzweils's 'law' of accelarating returns -- technological development is outstripping society's ability to regulate our machines. There's nothing really new about that idea -- but still; it is strongly worth paying attention to when we consider the advocates of regulation for new, 'existentially risky' technologies -- such as molecular manufacturing, or synthetic biology, or viral engineering, or... well, by now the point is clear. Surveillance, however, is the name of today's game. More and more, we are told that the new cameras being installed are for our own protection; that they are to prevent crime and the like. Now, numerous studies have shown that they really can't be said to do any such thing:

According to the information, London police solve only 21 percent of all crimes, and the rate of success does not appear to have any correlation to the number of CCTV cameras installed in each borough.

The numbers led a spokesperson for the group to say, "Some of this money might have been better spent on police officers. Although CCTV has its place, it is not the only solution in preventing or detecting crime and too often still, calls for CCTV cameras come as a knee-jerk reaction. It is time we engaged in an open debate about the role of CCTV cameras in London today."

So what, then would the impact -- let alone impetus -- of such advanced technologies as 'bug-cameras' be on society? Given the FBI's now infamous abuse of "national security letters" to bypass the 4^th Amendment (that'd be the one that protects "a bloke" from "unreasonable search and seizure"), is there any doubt that, left in the hands of government agencies, these devices would find their way into uses we could not now either imagine nor approve? But, of course -- as I already hinted at -- such devices almost never stay solely in the hands of our governments -- trustworthy or otherwise. And as technology itself becomes more and more readily manufactured by the private citizen, the question facing us is this:

How, exactly, will we adapt to the fact that legislation will be completely inadequate to the task of protecting us from our own ingenuity?

And that's a very, very serious question -- however, it doesn't seem to be one that even my fellow transhumanists recognize, which I personally find troublesome. Consider this another political screed, then: it is abundantly clear that our technologies will never be sanitized, never be made safe by bureaucracies nor by legislation. The 'kiddy porn' epidemic is only another example of this -- things that are legal and perfectly fine, such as a fourteen year old engaging in sexual acts on film, in some former Soviet Bloc countries; these things are profoundly illegal (let alone immoral) here in the 'States. This, 'once upon a time', wouldn't have been an issue -- but communications technology has changed that, as it seems everyone is now aware. As it is, it remains abundantly clear that our government is either incapable or else simply lacks the desire to react to new technologies and techniques. Much like the constant white-hat/ black-hat divide -- or the ongoing 'hacking the iPhone' saga -- bureaucratic organizations; such as religious institutions and yes, the ubiquitously mentioned yet nebulously referenced, "Government", are simply incapable of doing anything more than react to the machinations of "Progress." It's the nature of the beast. This leaves us with a simple question:

What possible solution is there to even mitigate the risks to society that new technologies and techniques present?

Yes, yes -- I know: I'm being about as subtle as a lead ingot dropped on your head from the top of the Empire State Building (how's that for a visual?) And of course the answer -- or at least the one I propose -- is equally as 'subtle'... and equally as simple.

Entrust the protection of society to... social expectations. It is my proposition that the only societies which will survive the raw power that futuristic developments represent will be ones that, much as with the advent of nuclear weapons, are possessed of powerfully strong social mores against their improper use (power plants = okay, global thermonuclear warfare = bad). And here's the catch: So long as we expect our bureaucratic institutions -- and those institutions alone -- to provide for our security and provender, we are essentially doomed to the abuse of new devices -- such as our friendly dragonfly spy cams. And that, ladies and gentlemen of my audience, is exactly the reason behind the "libertarian" argument: socializing the idea of personal responsibility, of the idea that being irresponsible is perhaps the single most immoral, or reprehensible, behavior one can engage in. To get there, we libertarians realize, will require a great deal of change in our ways of doing business and in what we believe government is "good for." It's a simplistic screed -- but it's a vitally important one, if we expect to have the best of all possible outcomes.

A Hazard of Blind Technophilia

Many transhumanists are activists for what is called "mind uploading"; the idea that we can have our 'meat-brains' uploaded into computers, to live out our lives in electronic wonderlands a la today's videogames. And to be fair, with things like "Heavenly Sword" for the PS3, that's no surprise -- imagine where things will be in twenty years. It's pretty hard to imagine that, given the choice between an 'eternal' virtual playground where even the laws of physics are up for grabs, and this grubby ol' world of ours, that even the majority of people would choose the physical.

But there's just one tiny problem with this sort of thinking: electronics are vastly inferior, in terms of survivability, to biological neurons. No computer yet built has operated at full load for a year continuously; yet our bodies do this for decades. By way of example of what I mean, please consider the following video:

To be fair, this is really nothing more than a technological problem -- and technological problems tend to get solved over sufficient time -- but a bit of realism would go a long way towards assuaging the fears and doubts of those who question the realities we transhumanists propose.

Insanity At The Gates

So I admit it -- today is a bit of a slow news day. But those of us with a Transhumanist mindset also tend to keep our eyes on the future; while many also take on the label of "progressive", not all of us do. Either way, however, this eye on the prize, as it were, gives us a perspective that not everybody else can perceive. Today I will share the benefit of this perspective with you, my reader. Forgive me if you've already seen this particular item already.

What is it, precisely, that I'm talking about? That would be nothing short of the apparent revivalism of the Soviet/American "Cold War". Now, this has been discussed by this blog before, when I asked: "Could Somebody Please Tell Me What Year It Is?" So some of this is apparently just recision, or iteration, for my 'regulars'. For those of you whom are not -- consider the following:

There's more to this, of course -- a good deal more. Today, I pull -- perhaps hedonistically would be too strong of a word? -- from the AP:

President Vladimir Putin announced in August that Russia was resuming long-range bomber flights over the Pacific, Atlantic and Arctic oceans for the first time since the breakup of the Soviet Union.

Russian Air Force officials in Moscow could not be reached for comment after hours. They have repeatedly said that the planes were not violating any nation's airspace or any international agreements.

But in mid-September, British and Norwegian jets intercepted Russian military aircraft after they breached NATO airspace close to the U.K. and Finland. And on a handful of occasions this year, NATO nations including Britain and Norway have sent fighters to escort Russian bombers nearing their territory.

Now, on it's surface this is no major fiasco; no huge problem, as it were. If a nation wants to saber-rattle, a little, that's just fine. But take this into context; with the opening up of Atlantic-ocean resources, it would seem that the term cold-war could take on more literal meanings than in days past. Further, take into context the fact that Russian law-makers are voting -- unanimously -- to censure former Soviet Union countries for siding with the US over Russia. Add into that the fact that the US and Russia remain the world's largest suppliers of arms to 'developing countries' such as China, India, Pakistan, and the Middle East. It is worth noting that in the last four years -- that is, since 2002, more than 70% of all US arms deals were with Middle Eastern countries.

(Hey, while we're at it, here's a thought: If we're so miffed about Iran supplying the insurgents weapons, why don't we stop supplying the insurgents with weapons first?)

In the meanwhile, however, if the US and Russia are to renew the cold-war era conflicts between one another, which it would seem Vladimir Putin is seeking to accomplish, we have to ask ourselves: who would be cast as the totalitarian police state this time around? I don't mean to be biased -- truly I don't. But between Russia and the US, it is my country that has domestic spying programs. It is my country that wants to use SPY SATELLITES ON ITS OWN POPULACE. It is my country that has an effective real taxation rate of roughly 40% on its entire populace. It is my country that is engaging in extraordinary rendition, and it is my country that is torturing innocent civilians. (See Section IV, second paragraph.) So Again: Which of us is the totalitarian/authoritarian state? Throw in the blatant corporatism of the medical, agro, and energy companies, and the picture gets even worse. Remember; the Soviet Union was defeated due to economic collapse. And if David Walker -- the Comptroller General of the United States -- is only half right, the US isn't that far away from one of its own.

We can't afford to replay history, folks. We "plain and simple", "straight and narrow", can't afford it. At a time when we should be curtailing government spending however possible -- even if by transferring our social security, welfare, and medicare over to private non-profits (as opposed to not-for-profits) so as to benefit from the massive increase in efficiency per dollar spent (This considering that the US has a higher welfare spending rate than any other OECD-listed country save Luxembourg, on a per Capita basis), and thus avoid the need to increase spending over time -- we are instead arguing with ourselves over whether or not to expand the SCHIP program -- meant to care for the nation's poor and needy children -- to cover families which make almost twice the national median income.

Whether it be the revival of the Cold War, the selling of arms and armaments to our sworn enemies, or the spending of money we don't -- and will never -- have, this insanity has got to stop.

Video: Over-the-Phone Lie Detectors

The technology is called Voice Stress Analysis. It is used extensively in insurance call-centers, and has been around for a few decades. Essentially, it detects what statements you make which you feel an unusual amount of stress about compared to your "baseline" -- and thus makes guesses or assumptions about your mendacity. Now here's a question: With the "Bush Wiretapping Scheme", what makes anyone think that this sort of technology isn't being used, to pick up the conversations that people feel "anxious" about? Observe:

Video: China Attempts To Go Green

It's a message some of us don't seem to want to hear; that there is a balance between the cost of 'alternative technology', and the cost of energy. Once that threshold is crossed, without incentives and without mandates, the crossover will happen on its own. And for China, water heating seems to have already reached that point.