Interesting sites

"a man is rich in proportion to the number of things which he can afford to let alone."

Walden, Thoreau

Darwin continuity:

Evolution and Entropy:

    • Comment on: “Natural selection for least action.” Proceedings of The Royal Society A. doi:10.1098/rspa.2008.0178.

Futurism:

    • Chalmers on the Singularity, good references and clarity.

      • "biggest bottleneck on the path to AI is software, not hardware"

      • "Perhaps the most important remaining form of resistance is the claim that the brain is not a mechanical system at all, or at least that nonmechanical processes play a role in its functioning that cannot be emulated. If these processes cannot be emulated or artificially created, then it may be that human-level AI is impossible." This might be valid regarding the "self" / "I", but not regarding the cognitive capabilities of the self, which are already improved with technological resources (both memory (pcs), senses (glasses and hearing aids) and reasoning (calculators))

      • "It must be acknowledged that every path to AI has proved surprisingly di.cult to date. The history of AI involves a long series of optimistic predictions by those who pioneer a method, followed by a periods of disappointment and reassessment. This is true for a variety of methods involving direct programming, machine learning, and artificial evolution, for example."

      • Alan Perlis has suggested “A year spent in artificial intelligence is enough to make one believe in God”.

      • It is worth noting that in principle the recursive path to AI++ need not start at the human

      • level. [...] So in principle the path to AI++ requires only that we create a certain sort of self-improving system, and does not require that we directly create AI or AI+. In practice, the clearest case of a system with the capacity to amplify intelligence in this way is the human case [language is clearly this ability to self-improvement, in this perspective, the "path to AI" has started directly with the invention of language - a system that can self-improve in the sense that, in the long run, it is always augmenting it's intelligence.]

      • Many or most of these [cognitive] capacities are not themselves self-amplifying

      • [Artificial intelligence: we are it! We are artificial intelligent creations living on the bodies of primates, primitive humans. From primitive humans to doctors, nurses and football players. There is no break to further AI but continuity, from oral traditions (the Odyssey), to science, to the written press, small steps in the creation of an artificial man, which we already are and have been for centuries!]

      • [capacities that worked: memory, language (the ability to imprint in others specif states of mind), mathematics, logical thinking, clarity!,

      • Structural obstacles: Limits in intelligence space - Failure of takeoff - Diminishing returns.

    • Bill Joy: Why the future doesn't need us, wired

      • Eric Drexler: Engines of Creation, Unbounding the Future: The Nanotechnology Revolution

      • Many other quotes, they guy helped to invent linux, worried about, grey goo - reproducible nanotechnology - and other stuff, says scientists must be ethical and knowledge controlled. Interesting but too long.

    • Hans Beth cease and desist appeal to scientists

  • Google's man behind the curtain

        • "When do you think that kind of artificially intelligent search will happen? ... In terms of timing, I typically say about 200 to 300 years. I think it is probably closer to the 300th year end of it."

      • Wiki: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Embodied_agent

http://www.cassiopeiaproject.com/

high def videos for science

http://spacescraper.blogspot.com/

futurism

http://www.encyclopediaancienthistory.com/pdfs/Brother-Sister_Marriage.pdf

incest in ancient Egypt and religious considerations:

How Microbes Defend and Define Us - NYTimes.com

Terminal illness prevented by feces transplant.

http://www.synaptic.bc.ca/ejournal/luminidx.htm

Short assortment of "critical" thinkers

Combining Sex and Religion ^_^ - http://www.sexinchrist.com/ - For many years people have wondered how they could combine the high spirituality that they find in places of worship and in high level conversations with friends and mentors, with the seemingly obscene sexuality that can only happen at closed doors. Like if you wanted to stay absolutely clean while eating the biggest banquet of your life at the same time. Many of mankind's efforts were directed at these two desires, but, it seems, whosoever pursues one seems to loose the other out of sight. Now a solution has been found: instead of the mystic's despise of sex, or the orgasmic demise of religion as a whole, a combination of the two was now made possible. Through many generations a solution was finally contrived, through which we can enjoy sex but also respect the limits imposed on us by Religion. It is not easy, but it is possible, and whosoever is interested in achieving the plenitude of both the sensual and the spiritual world, should read each word of the site bellow as if it was a precious water pearl of wisdom in the middle of a vast desert of guilt & nonsense.