From MSNBC:

The band takes center stage, the fans surge forward and the sheer power of the crowd’s excitement amplifies the sound of their favorite songs — providing enough energy, in fact, to move a train.

It could happen in the Crowd Farm, a conceptual design by two graduate students at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology that seeks to milk the mechanical movement of hundreds or thousands of assembled people to produce electrical power.

In principal, a large-scale version of the setup could harness the collective energy of commuters   bustling toward subway stations, shoppers marching through mega malls or fans dancing at a rock concert. Already, the students have shown how the simple act of sitting on a stool can generate enough power to turn on four LED lights.

James Graham and Thaddeus Jusczyk, graduate students at MIT’s School of Architecture and Planning in Cambridge, Mass., said they envision their Crowd Farm more as a learning tool than an efficient energy source, at least in the near future. Even so, the idea builds upon the emerging consensus that power generation in the coming decades will need to rely on sustainable resources, whether water, wind, the sun or our own bodies.

“We engage with the city in a very physical and bodily way, every day, even though people don’t really think about it like that,” Graham said. “Our project tries to make that connection visible through this balance between capturing and using energy.”

Graham said moving to New York City on the day of the citywide blackout in 2003 and joining in the throng of pedestrians walking over the Williamsburg Bridge to Brooklyn inspired him to think about capturing the collective power of crowds.

Pacing in his apartment, he said, wouldn’t generate much power — each step would be just enough to light two 60 Watt light bulbs for a split second. But the aggregate power of 28,527 steps could power a moving passenger train for the same length of time. And a space shuttle launch? Graham and Jusczyk figured about 84 million strides should do the trick, leading one of their project reviewers to quip, “That’s one small step for man, eighty-four million, one-hundred sixty-two thousand, two hundred and three steps for mankind.”

The students’ proposal follows a long line of ideas in which human energy powers everything from bicycle lights to hand-crank radios. Researchers also have developed a variety of devices and surfaces, composed mainly of crystals or ceramics, that produce an electric charge when put under stress, a concept known as piezoelectricity.

The Crowd Farm concept relies on the related principle that mechanical movement can be converted into electricity, though on a larger scale in which the mechanics would be supplied by a spongy floor in which embedded blocks move under the weight of passing pedestrians. The conversion process itself could be handled by a generator that uses a rotating coil and electromagnets to produce an electric current from the mechanical movement.

Michael Sorkin, a New York City-based architect and president of Terreform Inc., a non-profit organization focused on urban and environmental research and intervention, said the Crowd Farm idea may not be entirely new but fits within the laudable goal of producing non-polluting energy.

“Even more fundamental,” Sorkin said, “is to think about the design of cities from the perspective of using the body as the primary means of circulation and energy in the first place.” For example, he said, it’s probably more efficient to design walk-up apartments than to power an elevator based on other people striding up the sidewalk.

Even so, with billions of people walking around the planet, Sorkin said, “if there’s a sensible, sustainable way of capturing that energy, it’s a win-win.”

For architects and urban designers, Graham said another challenge is to make people aware of their surroundings. Calling upon passersby to help light their way through a public building might be one way of redefining how people interact with urban spaces — and perhaps helping out with the electric bill.

Graham and Jusczyk generated a buzz last October at the Venice Biennale, a major contemporary art exhibition, and in January at an Italian architectural school, where they encouraged passersby to sit on a “power stool.” The added weight on the stool turned a flywheel that in turn powered a generator that lit up four LED lights.

“It was amazing to see how fascinated people were with it,” Graham said. “I’ve never before seen someone sit down again and again and again. People actually took pleasure in seeing that it was doing something.”

The students took their concept a few steps farther with a project that re-imagines a transportation hub and public space within the Italian city of Torino in the year 2050, where portions of an event area, athletic field and regional train and subway platforms are imbued with pressure-responsive units. High-volume sections of the flooring or stairs could be overlaid with special mats to capture the energy of a crowd, Graham said, or key areas could be embedded with variously sized electricity-generating boxes in the sub-flooring.

In April, the conceptual design won top honors in a student competition sponsored by the Switzerland-based Holcim Foundation for Sustainable Construction. Graham agrees with Sorkin that transforming the concept into a cost-effective system on a large scale would require a dramatic ramping up of current technology.

“We joke that we’re at the level of computers in the ‘60s when they were giants and clunky and took up entire rooms,” Graham said.

Nevertheless, the team takes inspiration from an old anecdote about Thomas Edison and a simple but effective turnstile. When visitors toured Edison’s summer property, the inventor allegedly asked them to pass through a peculiar turnstile. In response to their bemused queries, Edison would tell them good-naturedly that they had just helped him pump several gallons of water from his well into his storage tank.

 

A useful idea worth exploring.

 

 

 

Technological singularity and related talks from June 1^st to June 8^th, 2007, from 7:00 PM to 9:00 PM eastern (4 PM to 6 PM Pacific/Linden time)

Technological singularity - June 1st - What is the technological singularity?

We will discuss the technological singularity and the proposed possible impact of the singularity over the next seven nights and with a generalized summary of the entire program on the final night.

The Technological Singularity is the hypothesized creation that we will rapidly accelerate technological progress. Futurists have varying opinions regarding the time, consequences, and plausibility of a singularity.

Afn Bade will lead the discussions. Your input is welcomed. Join us from 7:00 PM to 9:00 PM Eastern, 6:00 PM to 8:00 PM Central, 4:00 PM to 7:00 PM Pacific/Linden time).

Meet us on June 1^st and enjoy the show!

We will be meeting at http://slurl.com/secondlife/Norfolk/75/204/23

From 7:00 PM to 9:00 PM eastern (4 PM to 6 PM Pacific/Linden time)

Technological singularity - June 2nd - key technologies needed for a singularity

The Technological Singularity is the hypothesized creation that we will rapidly accelerate technological progress. Futurists have varying opinions regarding the time, consequences, and plausibility of a singularity.

Tonight we focus on the key technologies that we need to develop to lay the groundwork for the technological singularity. Many of the in demand jobs in 2007 did not exist ten years ago. Key technologies needed for a singularity in the short term will create jobs. Long term the effects of the singularity will ultimately eliminate many of the jobs that our society creates.

Afn Bade will lead the discussions. Your input is welcomed. Join us from 7:00 PM to 9:00 PM Eastern, 6:00 PM to 8:00 PM Central, 4:00 PM to 7:00 PM Pacific/Linden time).

Meet us on June ^2nd and enjoy the show!

We will be meeting at http://slurl.com/secondlife/Norfolk/75/204/23

From 7:00 PM to 9:00 PM eastern (4 PM to 6 PM Pacific/Linden time)

Technological singularity - June 3rd – critical skills needed as we enter the singularity

The Technological Singularity is the hypothesized creation that we will rapidly accelerate technological progress. Futurists have varying opinions regarding the time, consequences, and plausibility of a singularity.

Tonight we focus on critical skills needed as we enter the singularity. 100 years ago many men did not know how to read, yet were able to make a living in our complex society. As we approach the technological singularity, what you need to know to survive on a personal level will change as our technological progress exponentially increases. We discuss the skills you will need in this new technological age. A new set of skills will be needed as we approach the singularity.

Afn Bade will lead the discussions. Your input is welcomed. Join us from 7:00 PM to 9:00 PM Eastern, 6:00 PM to 8:00 PM Central, 4:00 PM to 7:00 PM Pacific/Linden time).

Meet us on June ^3rd and enjoy the show!

We will be meeting at http://slurl.com/secondlife/Norfolk/75/204/23

From 7:00 PM to 9:00 PM eastern (4 PM to 6 PM Pacific/Linden time)

Technological singularity - June 4th - the future of business as we approach the singularity

The Technological Singularity is the hypothesized creation that we will rapidly accelerate technological progress. Futurists have varying opinions regarding the time, consequences, and plausibility of a singularity.

 

Tonight we focus on business as we approach the singularity. A new set of business skills will be needed as we approach the singularity. Mass marketing does not work anymore.

Intellectual capital will change as we approach the singularity. We will also talk about why digital land is an important concept, even if digital land itself becomes valueless as we approach the technological singularity. The rules of business will exponentially change as we get closer to the singularity.

Afn Bade will lead the discussions. Your input is welcomed. Join us from 7:00 PM to 9:00 PM Eastern, 6:00 PM to 8:00 PM Central, 4:00 PM to 7:00 PM Pacific/Linden time).

We will be meeting at http://slurl.com/secondlife/Norfolk/75/204/23

Meet us on June ^4th and enjoy the show!

From 7:00 PM to 9:00 PM eastern (4 PM to 6 PM Pacific/Linden time)

Technological singularity - June 5th - politics as we approach the technological singularity

The Technological Singularity is the hypothesized creation that we will rapidly accelerate technological progress. Futurists have varying opinions regarding the time, consequences, and plausibility of a singularity.

Tonight we focus on politics as we approach the technological singularity. A new set of political skills will be needed as we approach the singularity. Democracy does not work anymore. How potential immortality will impact political debate as technology breaks barriers that have existed since the beginning of humanity.

 

Politics will exponentially change as we get closer to the singularity. Join us as we explore the impact of accelerating change on our political systems.

Afn Bade will lead the discussions. Your input is welcomed. Join us from 7:00 PM to 9:00 PM Eastern, 6:00 PM to 8:00 PM Central, 4:00 PM to 7:00 PM Pacific/Linden time).

We will be meeting at http://slurl.com/secondlife/Norfolk/75/204/23

Meet us on June ^5th and enjoy the show!

From 7:00 PM to 9:00 PM eastern (4 PM to 6 PM Pacific/Linden time)

Technological singularity - June 6th - disaster scenarios, including if the technological singularity never occurs.

The Technological Singularity is the hypothesized creation that we will rapidly accelerate technological progress. Futurists have varying opinions regarding the time, consequences, and plausibility of a singularity.

Tonight we focus on disaster scenarios, including if the technological singularity never occurs. We discuss “access” issues, the Peak oil problem, overpopulation, no jobs, end of the world, unfriendly AI, technology that eliminates democracy, and “what if” scenarios. We will end with solutions to most of the problems that are presented during the program.

 

We will be meeting at http://slurl.com/secondlife/Norfolk/75/204/23

Afn Bade will lead the discussions. Your input is welcomed. Join us from 7:00 PM to 9:00 PM Eastern, 6:00 PM to 8:00 PM Central, 4:00 PM to 7:00 PM Pacific/Linden time).

Meet us on June 6^th and enjoy the show!

Technological singularity - June 7th - Is the singularity a new age theory?

The Technological Singularity is the hypothesized creation that we will rapidly accelerate technological progress. Futurists have varying opinions regarding the time, consequences, and plausibility of a singularity.

Tonight we focus on “is the singularity a new age theory?” We discuss the history of the new age movement from the perspective of one new age society considered to be the birthplace of modern new age thought, and talk about Jiddu Krishnamurti: Who was he, What happened while he was growing up and what we can we learn from his life.

Afn Bade will lead the discussions. Your input is welcomed. Join us from 7:00 PM to 9:00 PM Eastern, 6:00 PM to 8:00 PM Central, 4:00 PM to 7:00 PM Pacific/Linden time).

Meet us on June 7^th and enjoy the show!

We will be meeting at http://slurl.com/secondlife/Norfolk/75/204/23

Technological singularity - June 8th - What is the technological singularity? Recap and final chat in this series.

The Technological Singularity is the hypothesized creation that we will rapidly accelerate technological progress. Futurists have varying opinions regarding the time, consequences, and plausibility of a singularity.

Tonight we provide a general recap of the last seven talks, and continue on topics that you would like to continue discussing about the singularity in this final talk. We will also take comments and suggestions on a new set of lectures to be held in the future.

Afn Bade will lead the discussions. Your input is welcomed. Join us from 7:00 PM to 9:00 PM Eastern, 6:00 PM to 8:00 PM Central, 4:00 PM to 7:00 PM Pacific/Linden time).

Meet us on June 8^th and enjoy the show!

We will be meeting at http://slurl.com/secondlife/Norfolk/75/204/23

 

Technological singularity and related talks from June 1^st to June 8^th, 2007. Eight nights from 7:00 PM to 9:00 PM eastern (4 PM to 6 PM Pacific/Linden time)

June 1st - What is the technological singularity?

June 2nd - key technologies needed for a singularity

June 3rd – critical skills needed as we enter the singularity

June 4th - the future of business as we approach the singularity

June 5th - politics as we approach the technological singularity

June 6th - disaster scenarios, including if the technological singularity never occurs.

June 7th - Is the singularity a new age theory?

June 8th - What is the technological singularity? Recap and final chat in this series.

 

We will be meeting at http://slurl.com/secondlife/Norfolk/75/204/23

 From Wikipedia:

“The Technological Singularity is the hypothesized creation, usually via AI or brain-computer interfaces, of smarter-than-human entities that rapidly accelerate technological progress. Futurists have varying opinions regarding the time, consequences, and plausibility of such an event.

We will discuss the technological singularity and the proposed possible impact of the singularity over the next seven nights and a generalized summary of the entire program on the eighth night.

Afn Bade will lead the discussions. Your input is welcomed. Join us from 7:00 PM to 9:00 PM Eastern, 6:00 PM to 8:00 PM central, 4:00 PM to 7:00 PM Pacific/Linden time.

If successful we will repeat this series in the future and also add additional series.

 

 

Second Life is a free chat and virtual reality program, for more information and to download the client, visit www.secondlife.com

If you are new to Second Life, allow one to two hours before the event to familiarize yourself with the program If you have never used second life before. When your done with installing the program and orientation, you can teleport to the discussion.  http://slurl.com/secondlife/Norfolk/75/204/23

 

It is estimated that the IBM blue Gene project will use 80,000 chips and produce 80 to 256 teraflops of computing power. What we need is 80,000 processors on a single chip. If we can scale the postage stamp size intel 80 core chip by 1,000 percent, then we could have a serious workhorse that could give us the raw computational power needed for strong ai.

In the 1970's and early 1980s, large chips were common place. Even the first 486 chips in the early 1990's were larger in servers than in the later 1990s when they were in consumer machines. So what if the processor is the size of a dollar bill, or double the size of a dollar bill?

80,000 processors per chip is what we need to start the strong ai revolution. 80,000 processors per chip is an interesting number, a good number, because it is estimated to be similar to the same amount of neurons in a single cortical column. I think we will need 80,000 cores per chip to solve the strong ai and autonomous computing platform and make it work as a technology.

We need to rethink why we buy a computer. We buy a computer to process information, we buy new machines so we can process more information, and access more features that the additional computation allows us to do. Better speech recognition, video editing, money management, education, schedules, write papers and do more work than the previous machine.

Since computation is the reason we buy machines, shouldn't we put raw processing power on a chip? Let the machine optimize the code. Let the machine code the solution once we program the seed ai and nueural networks? Why stop at one processor per motheboard. For the problems of strong ai, we need 10 processors per motherboard. This would be more logical than single chip computer designs, and save many older computers from the landfills.

The intel 80 core chip, is a start. If it was not for the patent law and large corporations, if we could use the best of the intel 80 core chip design, and supersize the chip. We need to make the chip big by a factor of 1,000. We need an 80,000 core processor on a chip with 32 GB of memory on or under each core.

I my vision of the future, I call this computer the “Dave 80”.

The real reason we want 80,000 cores on a single chip is so we can build a 10 processor computer that has 800,000 cores from 10 processors. This would allow us the freedom to model complex datasets, and crack the problem of strong ai, nautural language processing. A 10 processor system could have different configurations given your goals, and keep the machine out of the landfills for a few additional years longer than a single processor system.

You might want to have all 800,000 cores in a seed ai configuration. If you were building a gaming machine, you might divide the 10 cores one for game input, several for game AI, several for object recognition and object understanding, and two processors for real time graphics output. Think pov-ray distributed on 1 or two 80,000 core processors. Imagine 160,000 processors generating photo-realistic 3-D. I call the this machine the “Dave 800”.

Network ten 800,000 processor systems into a simple network and you have a very powerful system for strong ai applications. I call this the “Dave 10M” or “Dave Pro” system. With a blazing 8 million cores, I think it would have the raw power to understand language, create self improving software based on scientific benchmarks and at some point exhibit strong ai.

I think that 8 million cores should be enough to model a strong self-learning ai. However, a “Dave Pro” system could be as large as 100 to 1,000 computers. I do not think we would want or need a 100,000 machine system, but the rate that progress makes machines obsolete, once the first “Dave 80,000 processor core machine is in mass production, there will be a need to increase the amount of cores by a factor of 10, 100, and 1000.

The end result of an 80,000 core machine, and 80,000 core machines in networked configurations is that we can hopefully create computers that can help us think faster and validate results faster than it would be possible by human thought and cognition alone.

 

Now if I could just get the venture capital. We could have 80,000 core machines in 15 years if we worked to make it happen. Why go for 80, when you can scale by 1,000 percent. We will need to scale by 1,000 percent to solve the computer problems that our current generation of machines are incapable of performing. The only way to get out of the problem box is to scale processing power by 1,000 percent from existing multi core designs.

10 processors per machine, at 80k cores each, times 10 machines give you 8 million processors total. I think that would be enough power to brute force create functional multipurpose ai.

http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/2007/04/30/the_arrival_of_teraflop_computing/1

http://domino.watson.ibm.com/comm/wwwr_thinkresearch.nsf/pages/20010611_cellular.html

I saw the movie "The Fountain" over the weekend, and  another immortality movie with the immortality theme as a negative.

From Netflix:

"A medical researcher's wife is dying and he possibly discovers a drug that will prevent aging while searching for a cure. The drug is from a South American tree. The wife is writing a book about 16th century Spanish soldiers searching for a tree of life that will prevent aging. All the 16th century scenes are imaginary scenes based on this book. The wife dies and her husband plants a tree (the same one that yields the anti-aging drug) on her grave. She had told him a story about a South American man who had done the same feeling that his wife would be reborn into life through the tree growing over her grave. She also discussed the birth of stars from the remains of supernovas (which create all the heavier elements) with her husband. 600 years in the future if the husband is still alive and wealthy from his anti-aging discovery and if he still hasn't gotten over his wife's death then he might transport his wife's grave and the now 600 hundred year old tree to a region of space where new stars will be formed with the idea that they both will be part of the formation of new stars and planets and new life. Apparantly 600 years in the future they still haven't found an anti depressant that would prevent the husband from committing suicide. I might add that the movie was originally a studio film in 2002 but the studio pulled the plug. The producers started over 2 years later with half the budget and a new script. My guess is most of the budget cuts were on the scenes set in the future."

 The ending failed because once the compound was identified in the present day, the medical researcher did not inject the drug into his dying wife's body to save her life. The movie showed that the compound had success in the test chimp before his wife died. If an injection of the drug into his wife was added to the movie, it would have created two possible endings based on the reality of the movie. The movie would make sense, since we go to movies for sense making. 

If She dies, or she lives, that would create drama. The scene was not added, so the movie had no dramatic tension and resolution -- just futuristic eye candy.

The movie was written without a coherent script, ie, no resolution. No wonder it was dumped for funding! 

The acorn the medical researcher places over his dead wife's body reminded me of a picture of a proposed Mechanical Artificial Red Blood Cell that had a tree like structure. Foresight has a picture of a Mechanical Artificial Red Blood Cell, but not the one I remember.

  (http://www.foresight.org/Nanomedicine/Respirocytes.html)

Science as of 2007 has not cured cancer, and the movie mirrors current reality. As of 2007 we are Close to the cure to end cancer, and theoreticaly end aging, but we are not there yet. We are closer to the fountain of youth in 2007 than 1510, but still not there. When we do figure out the technology it will cause several singularities.  

Immortality is seen as a lonely journey through space in the movie. When  immortality is achieved on earth through stem cell implantation,  Mechanical Artificial cells and advanced genomics technology, the result will be very different than any movie ever created.

I guess the biologically inspired spaceship is worth a mention for a concept, unique and visual eye candy. When we do end cancer and understand how to end aging, or stop and reverse aging for increased longevity and creative problem solving, we may advance to a world where everything is biological and natural, and technology no longer exists. (In this world view, poison ivy does not exist, or any "toxic" because we genetically and technically engineer the world to support human life and make biology subservient to humanity. At this level of technology, what ever is killing you is eliminated, and your dna at this level would never die a pre-singularity disease or toxic.  )

The end result would be Adam and eve become one, and the tree of technology recreates the world as a biological paradise to serve man. I guess the the complete cycle would be a biological spore, that would also be a spaceship. the spore would  travel through space to some end point in the universe.

One issue the movie does raise, is why be immortal, if you have no one to share your immortality with.

If we do attain immortality on earth, stars still implode and black holes exist. In this context, we still have a death, but depending on our actions and environment , our actual path before we die could be a few thousand, to millions, to billions of years depending on how cautious, advanced or lucky we become.

 

 

 We need some key advances in computing power, hardware and software to have a winning chance to see a technological singularity within lifespans estimated as of 2007.

 I find it hard to actually play a role in helping bring about the technological singularity. 

If we are to take the singularly seriously, we need to reinvent the concept of computing and replace it with a different methodology. We need a state of the art data center (2007 version) in a single desktop machine. We need the “cloud” to become one.

What is is unattainable today is possible tomorrow. If we start working on the hardware we need to create the singularity, we can build it and achieve it sooner than we think it is  currently possible.

We need to skip existing machine architectures and build from the bottom up. We need to rethink technology. Do we need more programming languages? No. Human speech the only language we need.

We need to eliminate software programming. Creating a "better" self coding machine is an engineering problem. We need to replace software with something better. We need to design memory structures that address billions and trillions of discrete individual pieces of information in parallel. We need a total rethink around processor memory, we need system memory to be big as a data center, and fit it in a single machine. The cloud needs to become one.

We do not need a desktop anymore. Let's eliminate it. The self programming computer needs to generate it's own code from written information and give us useful reports. We have millions of books on how to write code. We have a web. Why is this not automated so the coder is free from the task of coding? Machines with the right software in memory do not need to be coded from a human operator.

Is it not an impossible feat to automate code so we do not have to write any more code, or read and analyze other coder's actions. We do not want code, we want useful machines. Why can't we make code automatic? Why should we waste a lifetime reading books and magazines on how to code, or any other subject when we are close to creating the tools to end information overload. We need to give the machine the code to code itself.

Let's use machines to make us smarter. Let's use the web to make us happier, better, live longer. Around the world we are coding esoteric data structures in c++, basic and thousands of scripting and programming languages. Let's eliminate the need to write code. Let the machine do it. Over time, the code the machine writes will become better than any human could write.

Let's replace human generated code with something better, machine generated code. Let's eliminate the desktop. Let's automate the desktop gui with self-programming code and eliminate the user from the equation. When the computer generates it's own code, optimizes it's own code and can self-verify code and factual information, we will have a better world. We will have a better machine.

Let's make code that machines will love because the machine wrote the code. Self coding machines will not be an easy task. What is hard today will become simple in the future. Machines that can perform synthesis, verification and the ability to abstract useful information from digital information and create executable code will be needed.

We need machines that use natural language processing to create, organize, share, automate and prioritize knowledge. Once we have one machine, we can scale the process and use peer based networking, p2p, to create a self programming cloud of machines. Each machine, sharing and contributing information as well as code. Self programming machines build even stronger machines when networked.

The building blocks are in place, but no one has put all the blocks together and make it work. Code is simple. We need to write “hello world” and let the computer replace it with “Goodbye programming”.

In five to 10 years we will have 80 processors on a single chip. We need to think about eliminating our programming addiction, and let the machine do the work, and let the machine create the code. Goodbye scripting languages, Goodbye C++.

Who needs production quality code anymore when we can let the machine write the functions and it's methods?  Why spend hours designing? We need to design the computer to eliminate the design process from the machine. We do not want to design a machine when we buy one, we want the machine to do useful work for us.

We need a machine that will automatically change information from “facts” to executable “code” . We need to replace web sites with better systems of data-interchange. We need to rethink the box. In the future we will not need software or websites. The process of exchanging information into utillity will be in the machine.  

The web will still exist for historical curiosity and human entertainment. A small amount of new information will still be mined from the web, because some humans will prefer web based communication. When machines write, optimize and maintain information and code in a self programming maxtrix, we will only need verification that the machine is accurate.  Use of the machine will be simple when we want to start new or complete goals.

The simple automation of forms, controls, and computer based objects is not going to create high level intelligence on a general scale. Single processor machines do not have the power needed to process and understand natural language, or at best we have not cracked the code of meme based communication or accurate enough natural language processing to exploit the self programming concept and way of thinking into everyday reality.

We need to put a google data center on a single chip. We need to replace human coding with an automatic system with built in optimization, scientific experimentation and verification. If we can shrink a processor cloud to a single machine, and eliminate software code creation and replace it with contextual goal creation, we may able to witness self coding computers sooner than later.

 If we create self-programming code on existing machines and network the result, we might be able to sidestep the future and  create machines that give us one step closer to the singularity or a new golden age.  

I watched the video A Crude Awakening: The Oil Crash on DVD.

In light of all the advances we are making in the nano, bio and technology sectors, we have a very serious problem with our dependence on oil as an energy source.  

Our western standard of living is ONLY available to us if we have cheap sources of energy to perform tasks.

 We use oil because it is so cheap. Fed ex and UPS use oil to deliver packages from place to place, not human slave labor or teams of oxen.

There is no working solution that can replace oil as the core energy producer to drive our society at the level of production we get from using oil. This is the key problem.

There is no system in place that can generate the amount of energy we get from oil in the capacity that we need in modern western society to function.

Hydrogen and fusion are replacements for oil. Only when hydrogen and fusion technologies scale and are able to produce as much energy as we get from crude and refined oil will we have solved the oil problem. As of 2007 we are no way near solving our energy problem.

There is no real solution for the replacement of oil. One person in the program remarked that we will have a depression much greater than the great depression of the 1930's. This is because the 1930's stock market bubble was not a resource based depression.

Our computer networks are only as good is if we can keep the electricity on, and able to drive many miles a day as needed for work, play and utillity. Oil drives our western standard of living, and middle class lifestyles.

The replacement for oil can not come quick enough.

 

A short video I found on the web. "Shift Happens."

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GIqk4agzKPE

 

I think the music is from the 1992 movie:

The Last of the Mohicans   Enjoy.

Our current population is 6.5 billion people. If life extension technologies create super extended life spans there will not be enough arable land to feed, cloth, house and give a lower middle class to working class lifestyle to all 6.5 billion of us.

I propose a radical solution to our problems. Mass extinctions. Remember the dinosaurs? As robots replace human labor, we will not need so many people on this planet. Wars are good. They kill people. My position is clear, we need a global scale war to kill as many people as we can so we can create the society that will be able to shepherd humanity into the post-singularity.

As radical as this idea may seem, wars are good for capitalism. Technology and and innovation advances faster in war than in peacetime. Soldiers killed on the battlefield, or in an office building like the 9-11 trade center bombings, create insurance payoffs, and can lead to massive job openings in a troubled economy.

If it is true that we are just as little as 50 years away from radically extended life spans. Most work that we consider worth human effort will be automated and the human element eliminated from the position. We can not have 5 billion people with nothing to do, no employment prospects or ability to create wealth. Hence, we will need an enviromentally friendly way to eliminate millions of people.

I propose we engineer a plague, or find some other way to reduce human population levels to about 1 million per continent. To create a world of only 6 million of us. Perhaps, such a plan is already in the works. There is an easy way to engineer a plague. Nuclear war is a possible solution, because governments around the world can blame the terrorists, and millions of lives lost will make way for new life.

the Robots with human level intelligence would eliminate millions of positions, Multi-core processors in a few years with the correct software could replace most white collar positions. Even if the new 100 core computers cost $25,000 or less, white collar work would be eliminated. The cost advantages of using a machine or robot to do intellectual or physical work will create a no-job society. Why pay a human when a robot or computer can do it better, cheaper, faster.  

Who do we selectively eliminate? Anyone without a post graduate degree? Anyone with a criminal conviction, perhaps? If we selectively eliminate at a 1 to 1000 ratio, there would be room to grow. Gas chambers are politically incorrect. The goal is not to exterminate entire species of people, just to eliminate the masses without the population elimination be considered to be politically incorrect.

I give you this post as a point to ponder. As technology advances and the mass production of robotics elminates human labor, at some future point mass exitinctions would give humanity the potential to reengineer the planet for super-longevity.

Selective elimination will allow for us to enter the singularity with enough land and resources for greatly extended life spans. My thoughts are radical. Wars exist. People are killed. If we have a global pandemic that was engineered, or nuclear war, or a bio-engineered grey goo. Mass extinctions would clear the land and the planet for a post-singularity future where everyone lives in a garden of eden.*

(*Biblical reference to the garden of eden not intended. )

 The 4th Georgia 3D Fest will be held from 9 AM to 8 PM on Saturday, February 17, at the Holiday Inn Conference Center in Decatur, Georgia.  The Atlanta Stereographic Association will again be hosting the event.  Activities will include exhibits, docent talks, workshops, a trade fair and both film and digital projection.  Admission is $5 and covers all events.  A partial schedule is at http://shughes.org/3dfest2007/  The information will be updated as events are confirmed.

I will be at the event, and the 3-D shows are great to watch. If you have never seen a 3-D show, you will want to make plans to be at the Holiday Inn Conference Center in Decatur, Georgia, on Feb. 17th. (Decatur is an Atlanta suburb.)  I will be giving demonstrations of the Euphoria Machine and displaying 3-D world Medium Format electronic coin operated stereo viewers, as well as taking orders.

I just got back from a regional venture capital conference, and will post some musings about venture capital in a future post. 3-D is a critical technology for augmented displays, and new media applications. I am working on a 3-D content delivery system, and would love to hear your comments about the technology. 3-D is critical to know.

If you want to have a great time, you will not want to miss the The 4th Georgia 3D Fest from 9 AM to 8 PM on Saturday, February 17. All of the proceeds go to ASA, a worthwhile non-profit charity. The best shows will be from 5 to 8 PM. See you there!