More on Singularity University; is the curriculum appropriate?

I blogged earlier this week about the launch announcement for Singularity University (and their web site promptly failed due to intense interest – it has since been fixed). Jamais Cascio (a futurist) posits that the curriculum of Singularity University isn’t much to his liking.

I find the name and slogan annoying, but let’s set those aside. I’m mostly astounded — and not in a good way — by the academic tracks. For those of you who haven’t yet ventured into SU’s ivy-covered marble halls, they are:

1. Future Studies & Forecasting
2. Networks & Computing Systems
3. Biotechnology & Bioinformatics
4. Nanotechnology
5. Medicine, Neuroscience & Human Enhancement
6. AI, Robotics, & Cognitive Computing
7. Energy & Ecological Systems
8. Space & Physical Sciences
9. Policy, Law & Ethics
10. Finance & Entrepreneurship

The message here? People don’t matter.

The first track is just Singularitarianism 101. The next seven cover technology-based industries — the mix of “here’s what you can invest in now!” with “here’s something that we can imagine” still to be determined. The last one, on “Finance & Entrepreneurship,” gives away the game with its introduction: “…how can we monetize this new knowledge of future technologies?”

Mr. Cascio goes on to suggest an alternative curriculum after noting that Singularity U is still a work in progress.

[Intro:] Future Studies & Forecasting:
With Ray K as the chancellor, you’re not going to get away without a Singularity 101 session — but this doesn’t need to be a full track.
1. Remaking Our Bodies:
   Understanding biotech, radical longevity, and enhancement.
2. Remaking Our World:
   Understanding energy, ecological systems, and nanotechnologies.
3. Remaking Our Minds:
   Understanding neurotech, cognitive systems, and AI.
4. Power and Conflict:
   Emphasizing the role that political choices have in shaping technology.
5. Scarcity, Trade, and Economics:
   How does scarcity manifest in an accelerating tech world? How do you deal with mass unemployment, technology diffusion, leapfrogging?
6. Demography, Aging, and Human Mobility:
   Shifts in population and cultural identity; understanding impact of extending life.
7. Human Identity and Communication:
   Understanding the changing nature of identity in a densely-linked world, looking at how different forms of identity clash.
8. Governance and Law:
   How does governance emerge? How are laws about technology shaped?
9. Ethics, Morality, and Unintended Consequences:
   How ethics emerges in a swiftly-changing environment; morality and technology; precautionary/proactionary principles.
10. Openness, Resilience, and Models for Dealing with Rapid Transformation:
    Open source, open access, open governance; understanding resilience.

I have to be honest – I like the suggested curriculum better than the stated curriculum. Transhumanism is not a mainstream idea. It isn’t a part of most people’s lexicon. The global socioeconomic ramifications of the inevitably of the singularity are massive and could kill billions of human beings. We are talking about socioeconomic shifts that will rock the foundations of our world. Think for a moment of a cyborg Osama bin Laden who can make backup copies of himself. Or imagine how career government positions will change when a career spans 950 years instead of 30. What could a bureaucrat do with all that time? How do we avoid creating societies that restrict longevity technology availability to the elite? Is high penetration and widespread availability of such technology even desirable? How do we ensure that no one clones Brittany Spears or Paris Hilton?

I hope that Singularity University is a massive success and I think the curriculum will have plenty of time to evolve and mature. I’m more excited by the possibilities and the interest than I am disappointed by the initial offering.

Singularity University has a grand vision of the future

This is a school I’d like to attend.

Singularity University, which will be housed on the NASA Ames base near Mountain View and begin classes in June, is the brainchild of Ray Kurzweil and Peter Diamandis. The two world-renowned scientists were expected to unveil their plans at the TED (Technology, Entertainment, Design) conference beginning in Long Beach today.

The school hopes to attract students from a cross section of emerging disciplines – including nanotechnology, biotechnology and information technology – to tackle huge issues facing humanity. Pandemics and global health care concerns would be typical in scope and import.

“We are reaching out across the globe to gather the smartest and most passionate future leaders and arm them with the tools and network they need to wrestle with the grand challenges of our day,” said Diamandis, who is perhaps best known for his current work as chairman and CEO of the X Prize Foundation, a group that gives $10 million awards to teams working on breakthroughs in fields such as space travel and genomics. “There is no existing program that will offer the breadth and intensity that SU will offer.”

What’s not to like? I believe the in the concept of a singularity. Here is an explanation of what some people call the Singularity.

At the core of the university’s mission is Kurzweil’s theory of “Technological Singularity,” which theorizes that a number of exponentially growing technologies – such as nanotechnology and biotechnology – will massively increase human intelligence over the next two decades and fundamentally reshape the future of humanity. In his 2005 book, “The Singularity is Near,” Kurzweil famously predicted that artificial intelligence would soon allow machines to improve themselves with unforeseeable consequences.

From my perspective the more energy humanity can devote to this optimist’s outlook on the future, the better of most of us become just around the corner. The catch – you’ll have to be chosen and tuition is steep.

Unlike a traditional university, Singularity will consist of a single, nine-week course of study every summer, during which 120 students from a cross-section of disciplines will mix together to tackle weighty issues. Tuition will be $25,000. Candidates will be chosen mostly from graduate and post-graduate programs around the world.

I’ll be keeping an eye on this program as I’ve spent years daydreaming about what paths I should be following. I want to be involved in efforts like this one. Hell, if all I could qualify for was a janitor job with this outfit I’d be happy. These are my people – the dreamers, the visionaries, the futurists, the explorers, the technologists and the calculated risk takers. Those who embrace change and then work to shape it make me happy.

Five dangerous ideas about cryonics

I suspect that the average person I see on the street is not even aware that there are active cryonics companies in the United States which will preserve your corpse upon expiration in the hopes that future technology will allow you to be revived so that you can continue existing. Assuming you know about cryonics and have an interest in the idea, you may want to spend some time thinking about the particulars and processes involved.  Cyronics is a scientific discipline – an unproven and often maligned and belittled field. Let’s be honest though – if you aren’t putting your hope in a perfect afterlife why not take a shot that you might be able to live again here in this world?

Aschwin de Wolf explores “5 dangerous ideas about cryonics.”

5. I will sign up for cryonics when I need it.

It should be obvious without much reflection why this is a dangerous idea. At the time a person really need cryonics, he may no longer be able to communicate those desires, lack funding to make arrangements, or encounter hostile relatives. A more subtle variant concerns the person who expects that aging will be solved before cryonics will be necessary. This person may or may not be right, but such optimism may not make him more immune to accidents than other people. This mindset is often observed among young “transhumanists” and practicing life extensionists. A related, but rarer, variant is to postpone making cryonics arrangements until the cryonics organization makes a number of changes including, but not limited to, hiring medical professionals, stop wasting money, becoming more transparent, giving members the right to vote, etc. Such issues are important, and need to be addressed, but a safer response would be to join the organization and influence its policies, or, if this will be necessary, combine with others to start a competing cryonics organization without such flaws.

There are not many people who think that it is sensible to make cryonics arrangements, but there are even fewer people who have actually made such arrangements.

As we have seen, some of these dangerous ideas share the same or related assumptions and produce identical effects (a decreased chance of personal survival). An important common theme is that cryonics cannot be treated as one single monolithic technology and that the fate of our survival depends as much on the state of the art in human cryopreservation technologies as on the competence of cryonics providers. Caveat emptor!

Some people are content with the idea that a few decades is enough. I am not. Ad vitam aeternum. Transcend humanity.

We live in interesting times; 21st century predictions

Humanity + is the most organized transhumanist group that I am aware of at this time, with a worldwide membership of 5,000+.

The group is currently nominating people to join its board of directors. I was reading Humanity + board of directors candidate statements when I came across an interesting summary that sums up my own thoughts fairly succinctly.

We live in interesting times – facing an upcoming century of radical uncertainty, where any number of new technologies may dramatically alter the world.  Probably for the better, but possibly for the worst.

It will be exciting time for humanity, and one in which we will see transhumanism make the same transition as personal computers and networks have in the past few decades.  Transhumanism will go from a fringe area appealing to a small group of open-minded geeks to an integral part of our society, discussed daily in newspapers and television.

Here’s why the 21st century will be the most interesting one so far:

• People will live longer than ever – but only some people in some societies.
• Social disparity will continue to grow causing tension, conflict and strife around the world.
• Nanotechnology and biotechnology will change aging paradigms forever.
• The number of “limited” conflicts being fought simultaneously around the world will reach the highest levels in history.
• Expectations about privacy will continue to erode in the more technology oriented cultures and societies. People in these areas who value privacy will turn to disinformation seeding campaigns (I’ll be writing a lot more about this idea.)
• The UN will be replaced/morph into world government.
• Non-human sentience will occur.
• A human mind will be replicated in the lab.

I’ll share more predictions as they occur to me.

In the mean time, expect part of the social disparity of the current century to involve conflicts between emerging memes and groups like Humanity + versus well established but inevitably dying memes like Christianity and Islam. Also expect many mutations when people find ways to make mashups between transhumanism and religion as will inevitably happen. I’m interested in the mutations and permutations we can expect to see in world religions when the average human lifespan jumps drastically higher, let alone the changes and conflicts that will result from the transition to post humanity. Will we survive?

Japanese create artificial DNA

From Next Big Future:

A new class of DNA-like oligomers made exclusively of nonnatural, stable C-nucleosides. The nucleosides comprise four types of nonnatural bases attached to a deoxyribose through an acetylene bond with the ?-configuration. The artificial DNA forms right-handed duplexes and triplexes with the complementary artificial DNA. The hybridization occurs spontaneously and sequence-selectively, and the resulting duplexes have thermal stabilities very close to those of natural duplexes. The artificial DNA might be applied to a future extracellular genetic system with information storage and amplifiable abilities.

While I’m a neophyte when it comes to manipulating DNA, my understanding after reading the article is that this is the first time DNA has been created from nonnatural nucleosides. I wonder what the potential applications are, if any.