coffee house conferences of the future

So there was this post on Futurismic a while ago. Largely talking about how new cognitive drugs might usher in a Second Enlightenment. They made this parallel: Coffee debuted in the late 17th century in Oxford, England — leading to rowdy coffee houses, jittery arguments and even an attempt by King Charles II to ban […]

Francis Fukuyama doesn’t think we’re headed for a Singularity

In his recent Long Now lecture Francis Fukuyama was asked about The Singularity during the Q’n’A. I found his response very interesting. In short, he said the rate of change from 1850 to 1900 was far higher than 1950 to 2000 and because of that he didn’t think we were heading towards any such event. […]

..Augmented Fluid Intelligence..

from Open the Future Augmented Fluid Intelligence Can we survive the multitasking era? Okay, multitasking is hardly up there with global warming, pandemic disease and asteroid strikes as a civilization threat, but it’s becoming increasingly clear that multitasking reduces overall effectiveness and accuracy. Yet we’re forced to juggle more and more simultaneous activities in our […]

Intelligence Augmentation

In my rant on The Imaginative Death of the Future I said I’d think about ideas I’d rather see being explored today. This is the first post in this series. The subject: BRAINS! Supplements like gingko and brahmi can help slow the degradation of the brain, but what technologies are available to actually provide human […]

..Intelligence drugs could be ‘common as coffee’..

from Telegraph Intelligence drugs could be ‘common as coffee’ It sounds like the stuff of science fiction: a new generation of drugs that make people more intelligent. But they are precisely the kind of mind-altering substances that students and businessman could be taking in the future to pass exams and boost work performance. Foresight, a […]

The Committee to Nuke Elysium

we're gonna blow up your space thing later