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Are We Spiritual Machines? Ray Kurzweil vs. the Critics of Strong A.I.

June 8, 2001

Are We Spiritual Machines

Author:
Jay W. Richards, Ray Kurzweil, George Gilder
Publisher:
Discovery Institute (2001)

Computers are becoming more powerful at an ever-increasing rate, but will they ever become conscious? Artificial intelligence guru Ray Kurzweil thinks so and explains how we will “download” our software (our minds) and “upgrade” our hardware (our bodies) to become immortal — before the dawn of the 22nd century.

In this debate with his critics, including several Discovery Institute fellows, Kurzweil defends his views and sets the stage… read more

Topics: AI/Robotics | Cognitive Science/Neuroscience | Social/Ethical/Legal

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The Rational Optimist: How Prosperity Evolves

July 27, 2010

The Rational Optimist: How Prosperity Evolves

Author:
Matt Ridley
Publisher:
Harper (2010)

Amazon | Ideas have sex, in Ridley’s schema; they follow a process of natural selection of their own, and as long as they continue to do so, there is reason to retire apocalyptic pessimism about the future of our species. Erstwhile zoologist, conservationist, and journalist, Ridley (The Red Queen) posits that as long as civilization engages in exchange and specialization, we will be able to reinvent ourselves and responsibly… read more

Topics: Environment/Climate | Social/Ethical/Legal

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The Empathic Civilization: The Race to Global Consciousness in a World in Crisis

July 8, 2010

The Empathic Civilization cover

Author:
Jeremy Rifkin
Publisher:
Tarcher (2009)

Amazon | Never has the world seemed so completely united-in the form of communication, commerce, and culture-and so savagely torn apart-in the form of war, financial meltdown, global warming, and even the migration of diseases.

No matter how much we put our minds to the task of meeting the challenges of a rapidly globalizing world, the human race seems to continually come up short, unable to muster the… read more

Topics: Social/Ethical/Legal

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Wicked Problems – Social Messes: Decision Support Modelling with Morphological Analysis

September 1, 2011

wickedproblems

Author:
Tom Ritchey
Publisher:
Springer (2011)

Amazon | This is the first dedicated book to be published on computer-aided General Morphological Analysis (GMA) as a non-quantified modelling method. It presents the history and theory of GMA and describes how it is used to develop interactive, non-quantified inference models. Eleven case studies are presented out of more than 100 projects carried out since 1995, illustrating how GMA has been employed for structuring complex policy… read more

Topics: Social/Ethical/Legal | Survival/Defense

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New Model Army

July 18, 2012

New-Model-Army

Author:
Adam Roberts
Publisher:
Gollancz (2010)

A nightmarish vision of future war from a literary master of SF.

Adam Roberts’ new novel is a terrifying vision of a near future war—a civil war that tears the UK apart as new technologies allow the worlds first truly democratic army to take on the British army and wrest control from the powers that be.

Taking advances in modern communication and the new eagerness for power… read more

Topics: Singularity/Futures | Social/Ethical/Legal | Survival/Defense

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The Psychedelic Future of the Mind: How Entheogens Are Enhancing Cognition, Boosting Intelligence, and Raising Values

February 26, 2013

psychedelic-future-of-the-mind-how-entheogens-are-enhancing-cognition-boosting-intelligence-and-raising-values

Author:
Thomas B. Roberts
Publisher:
Park Street Press (2013)

Explores scientific and medical research on the emerging uses of psychedelics to enrich mind, morals, spirituality, and creativity

• Outlines a future that embraces psychedelics as tools for cognitive development, personal growth, business, and an experience-based religious reformation

• Presents research on the use of psychedelics to enhance problem-solving, increase motivation, boost the immune system, and deepen ethical values

• Includes chapters by Roger N. Walsh,… read more

Topics: Biomed/Longevity | Cognitive Science/Neuroscience | Human Enhancement

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Be Different: Adventures of a Free-Range Aspergian with Practical Advice for Aspergians, Misfits, Families & Teachers

April 4, 2011

Be Different book cover

Author:
John Elder Robison
Publisher:
Crown Archetype (2011)

Amazon | “I believe those of us with Asperger’s are here for a reason, and we have much to offer. This book will help you bring out those gifts.”

In his bestselling memoir, Look Me in the Eye, John Elder Robison described growing up with Asperger’s syndrome at a time when the diagnosis didn’t exist. He was intelligent but socially isolated; his talents won him jobs with… read more

Topics: Cognitive Science/Neuroscience | Social/Ethical/Legal

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Your Brain at Work: Strategies for Overcoming Distraction, Regaining Focus, and Working Smarter All Day Long

June 23, 2011

Your Brain at Work book cover

Author:
David Rock
Publisher:
HarperBusiness (2009)

Amazon | Meet Emily and Paul: The parents of two young children. Emily is the newly promoted VP of marketing at a large corporation while Paul works from home or from clients’ offices as an independent IT consultant. Their lives, like all of ours, are filled with a bewildering blizzard of emails, phone calls, yet more emails, meetings, projects, proposals, and plans. Just staying ahead of the storm… read more

Topics: Cognitive Science/Neuroscience

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Insultingly Stupid Movie Physics: Hollywood’s Best Mistakes, Goofs and Flat-Out Destructions of the Basic Laws of the Universe

June 7, 2011

Insultingly Stupid Movie Physics book cover

Author:
Tom Rogers
Publisher:
Sourcebooks Hysteria (2007)

Amazon | Would the bus in Speed really have made that jump? Could a Star Wars ship actually explode in space? What really would have happened if you said “Honey, I shrunk the kids”?

The companion book to the hit website, which boasts more than 1 million visitors per year, Insultingly Stupid Movie Physics is a hilarious guide to the biggest mistakes, most outrageous assumptions,… read more

Topics: Entertainment/New Media | Physics/Cosmology

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The Long Tomorrow: How Advances in Evolutionary Biology Can Help Us Postpone Aging

July 16, 2010

The Long Tomorrow: How Advances in Evolutionary Biology Can Help Us Postpone Aging

Author:
Michael R. Rose
Publisher:
Oxford University Press, USA (2005)

Amazon | Rose, an authority on gerontology, uses evolutionary biology to frame the problem of aging, contrasting the drive to reproduce in youth with the ability to survive into old age. In short, according to his research, the Victorians were right: sex is death. The evolutionary pressure of reproducing at an early age seems to have the side effect of causing early aging. Rose’s explanation of his theory is… read more

Topics: Biomed/Longevity

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Postsingular

May 17, 2011

Postsingular

Author:
Rudy Rucker
Publisher:
Tor Books (2009)

Booklist | Always willing and able to embrace sf’s trendiest themes, Rucker here takes on the volatile field of nanotechnology and the presumed inevitable “Singularity” of human and computer unification.

In a series of interrelated vignettes, he describes the calamity that befalls nanotech inventor Ond Lutter and his would-be benefactors when Ond unleashes a variety of self-replicating nanobots. In one episode, trillions of microscopic bots, dubbed… read more

Topics: AI/Robotics | Nanotech/Materials Science | Singularity/Futures | VR/Augmented Reality/Computer Graphics

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Present Shock: When Everything Happens Now

March 15, 2013

Present Shock

Author:
Douglas Rushkoff
Publisher:
Current Hardcover (2013)

This is the moment we’ve been waiting for, explains award-winning media theorist Douglas Rushkoff, but we don’t seem to have any time in which to live it. Instead we remain poised and frozen, overwhelmed by an always-on, live-streamed re­ality that our human bodies and minds can never truly in­habit. And our failure to do so has had wide-ranging effects on every aspect of our lives.

People… read more

Topics: Human Enhancement | Internet/Telecom | Singularity/Futures | Social/Ethical/Legal

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Program or Be Programmed: Ten Commands for a Digital Age

December 16, 2010

program-programmed

Author:
Douglas Rushkoff
Publisher:
OR Books (2010)

Amazon | Today’s leading media theorist offers everyone a practical yet mind-blowing guide to our digital world. The debate over whether the Net is good or bad for us fills the airwaves and the blogosphere. But for all the heat of claim and counter-claim, the argument is essentially beside the point: it’s here; it’s everywhere. The real question is, do we direct technology, or do we let… read more

Topics: Internet/Telecom | Social Networking/Web/Education | Social/Ethical/Legal | Survival/Defense

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The Tomorrow Project: Bestselling Authors Describe Daily Life in the Future

August 24, 2011

INTEL-eBook_15-04-2011-E-1

Author:
Douglas Rushkoff, Ray Hammond, Scarlett Thomas
Publisher:
Intel (2011)

Intel | “The Tomorrow-Project” is a unique literary project which shows the important effects that contemporary research will have on our future and the relevance that this research has for each of us. Research currently being conducted by Intel in the fields of photonics, robotics, telematics, dynamic physical rendering and intelligent sensors served as the basis to inspire four bestselling authors. The results are four short stories… read more

Topics: AI/Robotics | Singularity/Futures

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Virolution

June 30, 2011

Virolution

Author:
Frank Ryan
Publisher:
HarperCollins UK (2009)

Amazon | From an acclaimed scientific thinker and writer comes the most exciting advance in evolution since Dawkins’ The Selfish Gene — how the extraordinary role of viruses in evolution is revolutionizing biology and medicine.

Combining Darwin, the double helix, the genome project, and viruses to explain the last great mystery of evolution, this book is the product of Frank Ryan’s decade of research at the frontiers of a… read more

Topics: Biomed/Longevity | Biotech

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