I was just saying to someone that the internet has made us Matrix-like superheroes with the ability to have ESP and real time upload of information.
I appreciate Kurzweil’s optimism (Singularity is Near, Transcendent Man), tho a wee bit too much for me. However, when you look at collectives like Anonymous, they’re literally a de-centralized superconsciousness, a flock of birds that will randomly go any direction, some peeling off from the group, then joining again, etc. It’s amazing.
The internet is changing humanity, and people think it’s about facebook. Most of the internet happens on forums, and it truly democratizes information. One I am on ended up getting a bunch of guys non-recalled flawed clutches fixed. Woot!
If you like Kurzweil, read his book “The Singularity is near”. It’s basically a highly complex conversation about what the movie “Her” was based off…. basically we’re going to transcend humanity, and AI might transcend us before we transcend it. This brings back something I LOVED talking about…. what’s cyborg? What’s human? Kurzweil is quite the optimist tho, IMHO. I assume the movie is just turning that book into a cool Ted Talk type thing?
Pacemakers make us bionic. Prosthetics make us bionic, or transcend humanity partially. We’re already there with medical sciences.
Crispr, frankly, is the largest leap in a long, long time. They’re halting MS (if you haven’t read about this, it is mind blowing), etc. Huntington’s. Cancer. Re-editing genes. Whatever goes now. It’s insane.
http://www.wired.com/2015/07/crispr-dna-editing-2/
related:
This is one of my favorite articles ever…
http://gizmodo.com/5403322/racing-on-carbon-fiber-legs-how-abled-should-we-be
How able bodied should we be, by Aimee Mullins. Racing on carbon fibre legs was “charming” and a great human interest story, until she started winning. Then it was cheating.
To think people thought she was an inspiration *UNTIL* she started beating other athletes and everyone went “holy *&$! what do we do”. haha…. what a lousy double standard.
BUT THIS tidit:
The concept of putting chips into her leg to simulate the limits of human capacity… that’s mind blowingly interesting.
We’re at the point of dialing back our tech to keep us more human. That’s wild. We are literally **Programming ourselves to be human?***
Think of that…. I also think it would make women jealous that she got to pick her own height. That ted interview is awesome.
https://www.ted.com/talks/aimee_mullins_on_running
But the idea of unnecessary lasik surgery for Tiger… that’s incredibly interesting. Taking HGH or having a laser make your vision better… what’s the difference?
We’re all about to get upgrades, whether due to car forums or medical science editing our genes. The superconsciousness aspect of it is just the start.
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This list of things Crispr can do is astonishing:
http://www.popularmechanics.com/science/a19067/11-crazy-things-we-can-do-with-crispr-cas9/
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