by cameron | Jul 31, 2007 | Podcast, singularity, transhumanism
Today I had the fortune to chat with another living legend – Vernor Vinge (pronounced “vin-jee” as in, he explained off air, “stingy”). While VV may not have the public profile of a William Gibson or Neal Stephenson, in geek circles no SF author carries more respect. Why is it so?
In 1981 Vernor wrote a novella called TRUE NAMES which was the one of the earliest stories to present a fully realized concept of cyberspace which he called the “Other Plane” and which people accessed by attaching electrodes to their scalp. Inside the Other Plane, people hid their “true names” from the Government by creating avatars with pseudonyms – sound familiar? This was several years before NEUROMANCER (William Gibson, 1984) or SNOW CRASH (Neal Stephenson, 1992) and is therefore a seminal work in cyberpunk fiction.
Vinge’s novels A FIRE UPON THE DEEP (1992) and A DEEPNESS IN THE SKY (1999) both won the Hugo Award for Best Novel. In 1993 he wrote an essay called “The Coming Technological Singularity” which popularized that term.
His latest novel, RAINBOWS END, is a masterpiece of near-future Sci-Fi which explores the world circa 2025. Marc Andreessen called it “the clearest and most plausible extrapolation of modern technology trends forward to the year 2025 that you can imagine.” It has been nominated for the 2007 Hugo Award for Best Novel.
You can learn more about the huge potential ramifications of the Singularity by attending the Singularity Summit 2007.
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The G’Day World Theme Song is “Save Me†by The Napoleon Blown Aparts.
by cameron | Jul 7, 2007 | Podcast, science, singularity, technology
Wendell Wallach is a lecturer and consultant at Yale University’s Interdisciplinary Center for Bioethics where he chairs the working research group on Technology and Ethics, leads a seminar for bioethics interns, and functions as a senior coordinator for other working groups and projects. He has lectured worldwide, published many articles, and is presently writing two books. Cybersoul explores the ways in which cognitive science and the Information Age are altering our understanding of human decision-making and ethics. Machine Morality: From Aristotle to Asimov and Beyond, which Wendell is co-authoring and which will be published by MIT Press, explores the prospects for designing computer systems capable of making moral decisions. Wendell is recognized as one of the leaders in the new field of Machine Ethics, and designed the first course anywhere on this subject, which he has taught twice at Yale.
Wendell is one of the speakers at the upcoming Singularity Summit.
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The G’Day World Theme Song is “Save Me†by The Napoleon Blown Aparts.
by cameron | Jul 5, 2007 | Podcast, singularity
J. Storrs Hall is an independent scientist and author. His most recent book is Beyond AI: Creating the Conscience of the Machine, and he was the founding Chief Scientist of Nanorex, Inc, which is developing a CAD system for nanomechanical engineering, is currently a member of Nanorex’ Scientific Advisory Board, and is a Research Fellow of the Institute for Molecular Manufacturing. He is also known as the originator of the Utility Fog concept.
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The G’Day World Theme Song is “Save Me†by The Napoleon Blown Aparts.
by cameron | Jun 26, 2007 | Podcast, singularity, technology, transhumanism
Jamais Cascio is a San Francisco Bay Area-based writer and ethical futurist. He chatted with me last week about the “Participatory panopticon“, Sousveillance, and why everyone should take “democratic transhumanism” very, very seriously. Read Jamais’ blog to find out more about his views on the preferred future. You can also catch Jamais at the Singularity Institute‘s conference in September 2007.
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The G’Day World Theme Song is “Save Me†by The Napoleon Blown Aparts.
by cameron | Jun 22, 2007 | Podcast, science, singularity, technology, transhumanism
Steve Omohundro is a computer scientist and President of Self-Aware Systems in Palo Alto, California. Since April 2007 he is a research advisor to the Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence. We chatted this morning about his timeline and vision for the possible ways that artificial intelligence will emerge and how he believes self-aware machines will benefit humanity.
Steve is going to be another of the speakers at SIAI’s conference in September 2007.
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The G’Day World Theme Song is “Save Me†by The Napoleon Blown Aparts.
by cameron | Jun 16, 2007 | Melbourne, singularity, Uncategorized
Been quiet for the last couple of days. Lots of travel and meetings.
Yesterday, Duncan Riley (aka Michael Arrington’s bitch), Jim Stewart and I spoke on a panel at the evolve conference in Melbourne. The panel was about content anarchy or something. We were the last session of the day and today Kimberley (the event organizer) told us that the audience voted our session the best of the day. I bet she says that to everyone though. Jim says his favourite moment was my dildo reference. Don’t ask. You had to be there.
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Caught a taxi to the airport with Ross Dawson and we had a great chat about the Singularity. Ross looks like an accountant but he’s really a major geek. He’s got a one minute video interview with my ungrateful protégé Rich Giles from his Web 2.0 event in Sydney last week. As usual, he didn’t invite me to speak. Hmph.
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For those of you who can’t get enough of me (which isn’t many of you), I’m on this week’s edition of The Father Bob Show. I’ll be taking over co-hosting the show again for a few weeks while Michaela takes a holiday. Someone want to start a book running on how long it will be before Bob and I get into a screaming argument over the evils of religion?
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What’s Cam reading at the moment, did I hear you ask?
Here’s a quick selection of the latest tomes added to the veritable mountain beside my bed:
