[Narz]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('golem', 'E')ver notice how the archetypal seeker of the truth is ALWAYS one step ahead of the LEFT BRAINED wankers?

[Dezakin]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('EnergyUnlimited', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Carlhole', 'U')sually, in science, you posit a theory and then use it to make a prediction.

To say that technological progress MUST stop is mere gibberish until you make some concrete prediction about it.

[Carlhole]

One can only hope that IBM's Blue Brain Project DOES NOT reproduce the brain architectures in silicon of any of the technology naysayers we've seen in this thread so far. That truly would be a Global Catastrophic Risk.

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', '[')b]The Blue Brain project is the first comprehensive attempt to reverse-engineer the mammalian brain, in order to understand brain function and dysfunction through detailed simulations.

In July 2005, EPFL and IBM announced an exciting new research initiative - a project to create a biologically accurate, functional model of the brain using IBM's Blue Gene supercomputer. Analogous in scope to the Genome Project, the Blue Brain will provide a huge leap in our understanding of brain function and dysfunction and help us explore solutions to intractable problems in mental health and neurological disease.

At the end of 2006, the Blue Brain project had created a model of the basic functional unit of the brain, the neocortical column. At the push of a button, the model could reconstruct biologically accurate neurons based on detailed experimental data, and automatically connect them in a biological manner, a task that involves positioning around 30 million synapses in precise 3D locations.

In November, 2007, the Blue Brain project reached an important milestone and the conclusion of its first Phase, with the announcement of an entirely new data-driven process for creating, validating, and researching the neocortical column.

More detailed information and a glimpse into the future of the Blue Brain Project.

[pedalling_faster]

it's always good to hear about conferences, like TED, or even Burning Man. i think Burning Man is sort of a conference. where else can you sit in a group and watch a woman stick 6" long needles into her breasts ?

it's certainly true that the Stanford AI center and other places where it is developed, like Microsoft and various DARPA-funded organizations, will continue developing AI and some human beings will be more and more integrated with the technologies in their lives.

but that form of technological progress does not equate to progress for our society.

for people for whom technology is a religion, technological progress is seen as a good thing, and it certainly is presented that way in the US media.

but to think that AI will help us solve our Peak Oil & Climate Change & economic collapse situations, is a little bit of cornucopian hopefulness.

the development of AI - for which this group seems to use the term Singularity - will continue. we see die-off occurring, too. we got a seat on the 50 yard line.

people have always died from lack of water & hunger. awareness of Peak Oil makes us realize that without major re-structuring of the way we do things, energy shortages will correlate with food and water shortages - more and more and more. until an aura of panic sets in.

by "major re-structuring of the way we do things", i mean, for example, how our cities treat sewage (we're throwing away fertilizer). also, how we deal with grim situations like death & dead bodies - cremation uses up natural gas, which is used to make fertilizer.

incidentally, the same SF sewage plant that is being re-named after Bush43 recently contributed some material to one of the central SF garden organizations, which has a medium-size composting operation. there were not a lot of takers, and the garbage collection that it's a part of is still fossil-fuel intensive, but it's a start.

[Carlhole]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Narz', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('golem', 'E')ver notice how the archetypal seeker of the truth is ALWAYS one step ahead of the LEFT BRAINED wankers?

[Carlhole]

I'm sure James Howard Kunstler won't mind if I reproduce here an email I just sent off to him:

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Carlhole', 'H')i James,

Here's a subject which I would love to read about in Clusterf*uck Nation or perhaps separately.

http://www.singularitysummit.com/summit_2008

The high-brow wonks from The Global Catastrophic Risks Conference will be presenting at the SS08 in numbers. Some of the topics discussed by the 8 or 10 GCRC presenters are abstracted here:

http://www.global-catastrophic-risks.co ... ubject.pdf

The GCRC website:

http://www.global-catastrophic-risks.com/

However, NONE of the global catastrophic risk topics that are being discussed pertain to our impending energy crunch. Maybe you could find out why not?

I actually love to read about cutting edge technology and follow efforts such as IBM's Blue Brain Project with high interest:

http://bluebrain.epfl.ch/

Personally, I welcome efforts that attempt to achieve machine intelligence just as much as I would have welcomed the late 19th century attempts at flight. In my mind, the brains of all animals demonstrate irrefutably that the quest to achieve machine intelligence is possible. The research could take different routes: (1) Continued research on AI using conventional microelectronics and advanced software, (2) A combination of wetware and hardware (as seen here http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1-0eZytv6Qk), or (3) a completely artificial neuron matrix reproducing the design of parts of the brain.

Of course there is the old joke: "If the human brain were simple enough for us to understand, we wouldn't be smart enough to understand it!".

You might be able to do something with that chestnut in any discourse on CFN (Heh, heh). Many jokes have been made about The Singularity idea; some wag has labeled it, 'The Rapture for Nerds'.

I find all of this Blue Brain/Singularity stuff fascinating and sort of scientifically holy, in a way. However, I'm now a such a hopeless addict to your biting, sardonic wit that I'm willing to offer up Blue Brain as a sacrificial lamb to my hungry need.

But, mostly, I was hoping you might contact the folks at GCR to inquire about their complete ignorance of the whole Peak Oil argument. They may respond in detail to the author of 'The Long Emergency' if he were to inquire.

Thanks!

[comerbund]

Anyone who does not admit to peak oil is part of the control system.

Blue brain is a cover for mind control techniques and excuses to try and mess with human minds, no intelligence can exist there.

Since you aren't lietening, go be wrong then, who cares, they will never accompl;ish real intelligence, its the end of the world, get it?

[outcast]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'C')an't lay my hands on it atm Carlhole, but I remember seeing an essay some time ago about this concept of accelerating 'technological progress', and one of the things I remember from it was a graph that showed that the rate of innovation, i.e. the frequency of the development of truly new technologies, is actually deccelerating. What we've been experiencing over the last century or so is not really an increasing rate of technological progress, but merely ongoing refinement of what we already have.

[EnergyUnlimited]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Dezakin', '
')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'I') already pointed you out that constraints dictated by material science (limited number of available building blocks) are implying finite number of possible applications.

[EnergyUnlimited]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Carlhole', '
')Gosh, maybe IBM's Blue Brain Project needs your invaluable expertise, EU, perhaps you should give them a call and offer to oversee their research project to make sure they aren't heading down any blind alleys.

[TheDude]

Hi Carl,

The "wag" who coined the "Rapture for Nerds" slag was SF writer Iain M Banks, FYI. You are barking up the wrong skyscraper writing Kunstler emails about AI, if you ask me.

Why isn't energy on the table of your Catastrophic Conference? When asked about PO by (I think) George Noory Kurzweil handwaved the whole issue away, promising unlimited kw/h from nanotech solar. Soon.

I see Ray's teraflopping future is predicated on unproven tech as well:

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'T')hus, Kurzweil conjectures that it is likely that some new type of technology will replace current integrated-circuit technology, and that Moore's Law will hold true long after 2020. He believes that the exponential growth of Moore's law will continue beyond the use of integrated circuits into technologies that will lead to the technological singularity.

[Carlhole]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('TheDude', 'Y')ou'll enjoy I'm sure a Critical Discussion of Vinge's Singularity Concept, which has a whole host of very brainy people ruminating on the notion.

[TWilliam]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('outcast', 'T')he technology behind microchips is so radically different from vacuum tubes that they are a different kind of technology, even though they perform similair functions. Aside from their functions, they don't have much, if anything in common with each other.

[outcast]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'I')n my mind it is precisely the function that defines a technology. Finding different (even more efficient) ways to perform the same function is not 'new technology' IMO; it is merely re-decorating the house, so to speak.

[Dezakin]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('EnergyUnlimited', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Dezakin', '
')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'I') already pointed you out that constraints dictated by material science (limited number of available building blocks) are implying finite number of possible applications.

[Dezakin]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('TheDude', 'W')hy isn't energy on the table of your Catastrophic Conference? When asked about PO by (I think) George Noory Kurzweil handwaved the whole issue away, promising unlimited kw/h from nanotech solar. Soon.

[Narz]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('golem', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Narz', 'N')o, I haven't.

Studies show that when monks (who've been training for decades) are in deep meditation their left brains are highly active while their right brain activity is minimal. In mentally disturbed people it is the opposite.

[TheDude]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Dezakin', 'S')imply because Kurzweil and other 'singularitions' or whatever they call themselves are technophile utopians looking for yet another sort of rapture; Hope sells books better, as does fear. The color of the future will be far more banal over then next 50 years than Kurzweil is painting it. Or many of the doomers here come to mention it.

[Carlhole]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('TheDude', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Carlhole', 'I')t's all been pretty unbelievable except that now the IEEE (Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, Inc.) and the top managmeent at Intel have heartily endorsed the whole notion of this progression towards the Singularity and these people are sponsoring and speaking at The Singularity Summit 2008.

So that's news!

[Carlhole]

Well, I heard back from James Howard Kunstler:

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Kunstler', '[')i]On Sep 1, 2008, at 2:32 PM, [Carlhole] wrote:

> I sure would like to see someone take them on (or force the
>Global Catastrophic Risks people> to respond to the peak oil theory) in advance of their Oct 25 >Summit.

I've been planning to write a chapter about their f*cking nonsense for a book about the diminishing returns and unanticipated consequences of technology. In the meantime, somebody else can grapple with them. They're too f*cking annoying.

Jim