Lifeboat Foundation

“As academics we can sign petitions, but it is not enough.”

As academics we can sign petitions, but it is not enough. Scott Aaronson wrote very eloquently about this issue after the initial ban was announced (see also Terry Tao). My department has seen a dramatic decrease in the number of applicants in general and not just from Iran. We were just informed that we can no longer make Teaching Assistant offers for students who are unlikely to get a visa to come here.

The Department of Homeland Security has demonstrated its blatant disregard for moral norms. Why should we trust its scientific norms? What confidence do we have that funding will not be used in some coercive way? What does it say to our students when we ask them to work for DHS? Yes, the government is big, but at some point the argument that it’s mostly the guy at the top who is bad but the rest of the agency is still committed to good science becomes just too hard to swallow. I decided that I can’t square that circle. Each one of us should think hard about whether we want to.

Continue reading “Why I Will No Longer Do Research Sponsored By The Department Of Homeland Security” »

While the recent cases of Ebola and Zika contributed to an emphasis on research, response, and policy related to EIDs, the meeting also had presentations on emerging biotechnologies. Of particular note was the Synthetic Biology panel, which focused on the current state of synthetic biology, its use in the health security defense enterprise, and the policy conundrums that need to be addressed.

Synthetic Biology – Complexity through Simplification

The first presenter, Dr. Christopher Voigt of the Synthetic Biology Center at MIT, noted that synthetic biology was the application of engineering principles to biological systems. The end goal of this bioengineering framework is to leverage ever-increasing computer capabilities to simplify both the designing and writing of genomic sequences. Further simplification would then allow for the creation of more complex systems.

Continue reading “The Biotechnological Wild West: The Good, the Bad, and the Underknown of Synthetic Biology” »

Wish he & a couple of others would join this ranks that others are on which makes way more sense plus benefits the masses tremendously. Musk needs to join others in their work to enhance humans via Quantum Biosystems as this work is already showing signs of success across multiple areas such as anti-aging, disease elimination, intelligence & communications, security, reduction in costs of healthcare & social programs, advancements in new creative innovations in technology & medicine, new industry new growth/ economic expansion, elimination of starvation, etc.

How can humans stay relevant in an age of artificial intelligence? Elon Musk thinks cyborgs are the answer.

The Tesla and SpaceX CEO discussed the need for a “merger of biological intelligence and digital intelligence” during a talk on Monday at the World Government Summit in Dubai, CNBC reported.

Continue reading “Elon Musk sees critical role for cyborgs” »

This article does try to highlight what and where we are going with the merge of bio and technology. However, what has been shown to date is all very invasive as Quantum Biology has remained a gap in this development work until recently. Thanks to DARPA and others in the private sector who are working on technologies that leverages Quantum Biology principles to develop new integrated Biosystem technologies; we will see amazing work in cell circuitry and connectivity in areas of bio-security, BMI, prosthetics, immunology, anti-disease, reverse aging, etc.

These might sound like outlandish predictions, but DARPA’s Sanchez said it’s not as crazy as it might have sounded several years ago.

“Advancement of A.I. is making machines more powerful in the way they can understand everything from scientific papers to interpreting them and helping us solve big problems,” said Sanchez. “Another aspect to consider is our society [is] embracing things like wearables that… allow algorithms to analyze our physiology. Great examples of that are being able to monitor your sleep patterns and provide feedback on if you should change the time you go to bed or wake up in the morning.”

Continue reading “DARPA: We’re on cusp of merging human and machine” »

SAN FRANCISCO – In a policy speech that puts Microsoft front-and-center in the shifting ground of both politics and nationalism, company president Brad Smith said tech companies must declare themselves neutral when nations go up against nations in cyberspace.

“Let’s face it, cyberspace is the new battlefield,” he told an overflow audience in the opening keynote at the RSA computer security conference.

Tech must be committed to “100% defense and zero percent offense,” Smith said.

Continue reading “Microsoft calls for ‘digital Geneva Convention’” »

Posthumanists and perhaps especially transhumanists tend to downplay the value conflicts that are likely to emerge in the wake of a rapidly changing technoscientific landscape. What follows are six questions and scenarios that are designed to focus thinking by drawing together several tendencies that are not normally related to each other but which nevertheless provide the basis for future value conflicts.

1. Will ecological thinking eventuate in an instrumentalization of life? Generally speaking, biology – especially when a nervous system is involved — is more energy efficient when it comes to storing, accessing and processing information than even the best silicon-based computers. While we still don’t quite know why this is the case, we are nevertheless acquiring greater powers of ‘informing’ biological processes through strategic interventions, ranging from correcting ‘genetic errors’ to growing purpose-made organs, including neurons, from stem-cells. In that case, might we not ‘grow’ some organs to function in largely the same capacity as silicon-based computers – especially if it helps to reduce the overall burden that human activity places on the planet? (E.g. the brains in the vats in the film The Minority Report which engage in the precognition of crime.) In other words, this new ‘instrumentalization of life’ may be the most environmentally friendly way to prolong our own survival. But is this a good enough reason? Would these specially created organic thought-beings require legal protection or even rights? The environmental movement has been, generally speaking, against the multiplication of artificial life forms (e.g. the controversies surrounding genetically modified organisms), but in this scenario these life forms would potentially provide a means to achieve ecologically friendly goals.

2. Will concerns for social justice force us to enhance animals? We are becoming more capable of recognizing and decoding animal thoughts and feelings, a fact which has helped to bolster those concerned with animal welfare, not to mention ‘animal rights’. At the same time, we are also developing prosthetic devices (of the sort already worn by Steven Hawking) which can enhance the powers of disabled humans so their thoughts and feelings are can be communicated to a wider audience and hence enable them to participate in society more effectively. Might we not wish to apply similar prosthetics to animals – and perhaps even ourselves — in order to facilitate the transaction of thoughts and feelings between humans and animals? This proposal might aim ultimately to secure some mutually agreeable ‘social contract’, whereby animals are incorporated more explicitly in the human life-world — not as merely wards but as something closer to citizens. (See, e.g., Donaldson and Kymlicka’s Zoopolis.) However, would this set of policy initiatives constitute a violation of the animals’ species integrity and simply be a more insidious form of human domination?

Continue reading “Value Conflicts surrounding the Meaning of Life in the Trans/Post/Human Future” »

Great read and highlights what I have been showing folks around the convergence that is occurring between technology and biology via Quantum. We’re achieving (in the Epoch chart on Singularity Evolution) Epoch 5 via Quantum Bio and our work we’re seeing from DARPA, Microsoft, Amazon, Google, and others. Synbio has to mimic the properties we see with Quantum Biology/ Biosystems. And, things like DARPA’s own RadioBio will enable and expose many things on multiple fronts in Biosensors (including security), IoT, healthcare/ medical prevention management and treatments, AI, etc.

Singularity – the state of being singular; Oneness.

The biological system is a natural form of technology. A simple examination of the nanobiology of the macromolecular system of any cell will attest to this – enzymes and structural proteins are veritable nanomachines, linked to the information processing network of DNA and plasma membranes. Far from being a primordial or rudimentary organic technology – we are discovering more and more the level of complexity and paragon technological sophistication of living systems, which as is being discovered, even includes non-trivial quantum mechanical phenomena once thought to only be possible in the highly specialized and controlled environment of the laboratory.

Continue reading “The Kurzweilian Singularity and Evolution of the Technigenome” »

Over the past week, the White House appointed five new senior National Security Council staff officials. Two in particular signify the emerging and disruptive influence Billionaire tech investor Peter Thiel could have on U.S. national security and how he might bring his venture capital perspective — visionary but unconventional leaders, big bets on disrupting established industries — to national security.

Kevin Harrington, a Thiel acolyte, has been named Deputy Assistant to the President for strategic planning. Since early December, Harrington served on the Trump “landing team” at the Commerce Department, where his job was to help hire people for open positions and identify policy priorities. Before that, he worked at hedge funds started by Thiel. Michael Anton, a former executive at an investment management firm and speechwriter, was named Deputy Assistant to the President for Strategic Communications, virtually the same job that Obama advisor Ben Rhodes held. POLITICO reports that he received the position “thanks to an entree from Thiel.”

The Harrington appointment is unusual for a couple of reasons. First, the elevation of this position to “Deputy Assistant to the President,” the second highest rank within the White House, suggests that Harrington will have a larger role than his predecessors. Although the strategic planning office is one of the most important at the NSC, it is typically staffed by a lean team of forward thinkers and the head of the office is ranked accordingly.

Continue reading “Disrupting the White House: Peter Thiel’s Influence is Shaping the National Security Council” »

Quantum Tech and Bank security.

BT’s research arm showcased the future of banking technology, including quantum key distribution and biometrics.