Profiles

When Vernor Vinge Coined the Technological Singularity

by Socrates
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When Vernor Vinge coined the term technological singularity few foresaw it becoming the conceptual watershed that it is now. Today, regardless of whether you are writing about sci fi, futurism, artificial intelligence, technology or the future of humanity, the moment you embrace the longer-term big picture framework of reference is the moment you are writing about the singularity. And if that is not the case, then, you must justify why not. So, in a way, you are still writing about the singularity. Thanks to Josh Calder, who made the effort to dig out and scan the original article, I can now show you a copy of the actual page where the term was used for the very first time in its contemporary technological context: the January 1983 issue of Omni magazine. Hope you enjoy this little digital piece of history as much as I do! Related articles 17 [...]

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HackLab.TO: Toronto’s Hacker Collective

by Socrates
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When Eric Boyd invited me to visit HackLab.TO I got very exited. I have always had a fascination with hackers and love visiting their creative space because these guys are always pushing the envelope and often point the way for things to come. In the past, I have lacked the proper equipment to do an on-site audio or video recording without having to borrow it from my friends or my very generous brother-in-law. Fortunately, though, last week I got the biggest anonymous donation ever received at Singularity Weblog. The money allowed me to purchase a brand new Canon VIXIA HF G10 (aff) camcorder as well as a Fujifilm X10 (aff) photo camera, and thus equipped I headed to HackLab.TO. About HackLab.TO HackLab.TO is a community space with a diverse membership, including artists, computer programmers, web designers, and hardware hackers. It is inspired by the [...]

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Steven Kotler on Singularity 1 on 1: Get Off the Couch and Change the World

by Socrates
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Yesterday I interviewed Steven Kotler on Singularity 1 on 1. Together with Peter Diamandis, Steven is the co-author of Abundance: The Future is Better than You Think. Abundance is a book that provides both hope and inspiration in an ocean of doom and gloom. Its main message being that the future can and, most likely, will be better than we think. Impossible?! Check out the interview to see why you are probably wrong. During our conversation with Steven Kotler we discuss issues such as: running a dog shelter for special needs dogs; the story of how Steven got his first writing job and eventually published articles in Maxim, Wired, GQ, Popular Science and other periodicals; his first novel; environmental degradation, global warming and biodiversity; the neuroscience behind out cognitive biases such as why we are local optimists but global pessimists; environmentalism [...]

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Ramez Naam on Singularity 1 on 1: The World Needs Innovation. Don’t Be a Spectator, Participate!

by Socrates
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Yesterday I interviewed Ramez Naam for my singularity podcast. Ramez is the author of an award-winning, timely and easy to digest book on the ethical, political, economic and other implications of transhumanism titled More Than Human. Since I enjoyed reading the book very much I simply had to interview Naam and ask him to talk more about his ideas. During our conversation we discuss a variety of topics such as: Ramez’ early interest philosophy, physics and computer science; the motivation behind his work at Microsoft on projects such as MS Word, Outlook and the Bing search engine; the inspiration behind his book on transhumanism; human evolution and the way technology has become a crucial part of who we are; playing God in general and altering the human DNA in particular; life extension and the probability of overcoming death; artificial intelligence, the technological singularity and why he [...]

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Mobile Innovators: BestBuy Features Ray Kurzweil on Super Bowl Ad

by Socrates
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“I’m Ray Kurzweil. I gave your words a voice.” This was Ray’s punchline during yesterday’s feature BestBuy Super Bowl ad also acknowledging a number of other mobile innovators. The commercial focused the spotlight on ten technology innovators who have changed the way we use our phones: Philippe Kahn: created the camera phone and MotionX Neil Papworth: sent the first SMS message Paul & David Bettner: created Words With Friends Kevin Systrom: creator of the Instagram free photo sharing application Jim McKelvey: created Square Mobile Pay Chris Barton and Avery Wang: helped create Shazam Daniel Henderson: video sharing Kurzweil’s text-to-speech invention is utilized on mobile devices by enabling the reading of information for a visually challenged person, or it may be used to augment the reading of a text message or email. It is often used with voice recognition to answer [...]

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Daniel Kraft on Singularity 1 on 1: You Don’t Have To Be a Doctor to Improve Health Care

by Socrates
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This morning I interviewed Daniel Kraft for Singularity 1 on 1. I met Dr. Kraft at Singularity University where he is the Medicine and Neuroscience Chair and executive director of the FutureMed Program. Daniel is one of those people with an incredibly diverse spectrum of talents and interests for he is not only a medical doctor and oncologist but also an inventor, a technology and space enthusiast, an entrepreneur and an F-16 flight surgeon. During our conversation we discuss a variety of topics such as: Daniel’s early interest and talent in technology and science; his original fascination with the Apollo Space program and eventual participation in International Space University; his passion for flying and being a pilot; his medical education and personal journey to becoming a faculty member at Singularity University; his desire to be an instigator, connector and motivator of innovation; [...]

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Paul Baraka’s Original Video and Music Intro to Singularity Weblog

by Socrates
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I was quite happy when a fan got in touch with me volunteering to produce an entirely original video and music intro for Singularity Weblog and Singularity 1 on 1. Little did I know that a couple of weeks later my happiness would turn into sheer ecstasy. Paul Baraka of Vision Mantra made an incredibly dynamic, totally original, very creative and captivating video and music intro while accurately capturing the best of what this blog is and aspires to be. I simply cannot stop watching the attached 22 second clip. For me, it works not only visually but also musically. Even if I close my eyes I still feel profoundly moved by the power of the soundtrack. How can you put so much energy and emotion in mere 22 seconds!? When I gave Paul keywords such as: singularity, artificial intelligence, exhilaration, [...]

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Rachel Haywire on Singularity 1 on 1: Art is Intellectual and the Intellect is Artistic

by Socrates
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A couple of months ago I interviewed Rachel Haywire for Singularity 1 on 1. I had some dificulties in posting this interivew but, since those were eventually resolved, better late than never… Rachel Haywire is a multi-media artist and writer currently residing in Los Angeles, California. She is the founder of The Human 2.0 Council which is a Transhumanist network of artists and students on the edge of society and media. Known for bridging the gap between the counterculture and academia she founded the Extreme Futurist Festival which is a 2 day entertainment and tech convention focusing on radical performers and voices of the new evolution. Rachel is known as an “antisocial media coach” and considered a leading voice in digital media. She is credited for bringing DIY Transhumanism into the mainstream. I have to admit that I worked for 10 hours before my interview with [...]

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