Category Archives: Transhuman News

Bubbles bubbles as far as the eye can see.

The vibe of the first day of F8, with an introduction by Mark Zuckerberg, was like a bunch of super-friendly RAs who ordered everyone pizza and just wanted to have some fun, talk about community, and deliver one core message: Now I am become Death, the destroyer of Snapchat.

The vibe of the second day of F8 was more like grad students who decided to get really stoned and think about the future for a while, with the main topic being, Wouldnt it be cool if like we were the computers?

The keynote, by CTO Mike Schroepfer, focused on three main themes: connectivity, AI, and virtual reality and augmented reality (with a little bit of freaky, direct brain-computer-interface stuff thrown in at the end).

Yael Maguire, part of Facebooks Connectivity Lab, said their strategy is using the atmosphere and the stratosphere to get people connected to the internet specifically by using millimeter-wave (MMW) radio technology to blanket an urban area in high-speed internet, or by using cellular networks to provide data connections in parts of the world that fiber-optic cable simply hasnt reached yet.

But the star of the show was Aquila, Facebooks solar-powered drone that the company hopes will one day beam down internet connectivity to parts of the world where none currently exists. A full-scale model of Aquila flew (and crashed) last year, and testing seems to be moving forward. While Facebook has yet to attempt to use MMW tech on it, it has attached an MMW transmitter to a Cessna, and was able to deliver 16-Gbps internet over a 13-kilometer radius enough to easily blanket all of Manhattan, most of Brooklyn, and parts of Queens and the Bronx with a signal. While all of Manhattan sharing that little bandwidth would make Netflix bingeing impossible, it would be more than enough for parts of the world without any connectivity to send text and pictures. Our goal is simple, said Schroepfer. We want to connect the 4.1 billion people who arent already connected to the internet.

Next up was Joaquin Quionero Candela talking about AI, or as its increasingly called deep learning or machine learning. The focus, given Facebooks newfound love of the camera, was mainly on using AI to examine and understand images, including understanding human posture and determining how close or far away objects are, even when using a single-lens camera. The most important part of this, however, seems to be that all of this AI processing isnt happening on a server farm somewhere its happening in real time on your phone, and its what made all those gee-whiz augmented-reality-camera moments from day one of F8 possible. (No word on what an active AI does to your battery life.)

Following that, Michael Abrash of Oculus took the stage and gave a long presentation on the future of augmented-reality glasses. AR glasses, of course, have had a certain odor of failure on them ever since Google Glass, and Abrash was quick to say that everything he was talking about was far in the future 20 or 30 years from now. His talk was more of a look at how Facebook is thinking about whats necessary for AR glasses to be successful the lens and optics, the AI needed, how to handle interaction than a concrete presentation. Abrashs main argument for AR glasses can be boiled down to: This is a technology that makes sense and people will want; technology is always advancing (usually faster than we think); and therefore, someday someone will invent AR glasses that are both usable, comfortable, and socially acceptable. But the biggest takeaway was that by dedicating this much time to essentially a wouldnt it be cool if presentation shows how Facebook is serious about AR.

Finally, Regina Dugan, previously the head of Googles Advanced Technology and Projects and before that head of research at DARPA, talked about direct brain-computer interfaces. Dugans speech touched on two main initiatives. One, that using passive brain monitoring (i.e., nothing gets drilled into your skull), her team believes they can produce something that will allow a user to type 100 words per minute using only their brain. Whats more, she expects that theyll be able to deliver a prototype of this in the next couple of years. The second was even more impressive, mainly because part of it has already been done: giving people the ability to decode language through touch. Of course, people have been doing this for nearly 200 years through Braille, but this was a bit different. An experiment showed a woman wearing a series of 16 actuators on her left arm, tuned to different frequencies. The woman (who was not deaf or blind) learned nine simple words purely by the tactile sensations coming from those sensors. She was then able to translate those words for example, grasp blue sphere as they related to a series of objects put in front of her. Essentially, the technology could create a universal tactile language something that would allow a person to, as Dugan put it, think in Mandarin, but feel in Spanish.

Its easy to roll your eyes at a lot of this stuff laser drones and AR glasses and typing 100 words per minute with just your brain. But none of the presenters are lightweights in their fields, and Facebook has quietly been amassing a murderers row of talent in long-distance communication and AI and AR. With Google seemingly abandoning many of its own moonshot projects, and Apple quietly working on something related to AR but staying mum, Facebooks futurism suddenly makes it seem very different from the rest of the Silicon Valley crowd. Whether any of this actually helps a company that still draws most of its income from delivering direct-sales ads to your eyeballs remains an open question.

The Snapchat 101: The Best, Coolest, Smartest, Weirdest Accounts on the Hottest Social Network on Your Phone

Google Is Considering Building Ad-Blocking Directly Into Chrome, Which Is a Terrible Idea

You can return your expensive juice press if you want.

Your Google Home speaker will now support multiple users and can recognize you just by the sound of your voice.

The pictures from the night are something else.

A steal at $85 bucks a night.

All big companies do it.

The online advertising giant seeks to directly control its competitors.

Stringing together song titles into semi-coherent sentences is this weeks best meme.

Day two of F8 felt a lot more like a sci-fi novel than a tech conference.

A Twitter thread contains fabled secrets that all New Yorkers crave to know.

Silicon Valley innovation has done it again.

Nintendo could be bringing the greatest console it ever made back to life for the holiday season.

The News Feeds enormous audience wont solve its waning relevance.

If Snapchat wants to be the Apple of augmented reality, Facebook is more than happy to be its Microsoft.

We give it three months before Facebook rips off the idea.

Move fast and break things doesnt work when those things are research procedures, laws of science, and human bodies.

A day in the life of YouTubes reigning teen queen.

Cabana lets you watch videos with your friends in real time.

You may be able to give a five-star review, and tip a dollar or two, at the end of an Uber ride in the near future.

Cant keep a good content farm down.

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Facebook Gets Far Out With Futurism at F8 - New York Magazine

Musks History of AI Concerns

Elon Musk has made itclear that he is concerned about the extreme advancements being made in artificial intelligence (AI) research.Ultimately, he fears that AI will, one day, overtake humanity.Over the years, this fear has pushed Musk to make moves that will help ensure that our artificial intelligences dont turn humans into second class citizens.

One of the first instances of such action was back in 2015, whenMusk donated $10 millionto the Future of LifeInstitue, an organizationthat gives money to researchers who are working to mitigate the existential risks facing humanity, particularly, existential risks from advanced artificial intelligence.

Around the same time, Musk, Stephen Hawking, and more than 20,000 other expertssigned an open letter calling for an autonomous weapons ban. The letter explains, If any major military power pushes ahead with AI weapon development, a global arms race is virtually inevitable. And this was just the beginning of Musks work.

In December 2015, Musk took his first majoraction, and announced the formation of OpenAI, a non-profit AI research company that hopesto advance digital intelligence in a way that will benefit humanity as a whole. Less than a year later, Musk spoke out against AI on Twitter. In this instance, he noted the ways in which super-advanced AI could be used to targetthe internet through DDoS (distributed denial of service) attacks. calling ita great threat to the internet. He claimed that its only a matter of time until we see a massive AI attack on internet infrastructure.

At the time, Musk spoke out and called artificial intelligence ita major threat to the internet itself. He also claimed that its only a matter of time until we see a massive AI attack on internet infrastructure.

So whats Musks plan for saving us from killer robots? Ironically, its becoming one with the AI.

Just a few weeks ago, details leakedasserting that Muskis backing a brain-computer interface venture that was founded in order to allow humans to keep up with the advancements made in machine intelligence. At the time of the leak, the company called Neuralink was still in the earliest stages of development. To that end, it had no public presence at all.

What we did know is that the companys ultimate goalis to develop a device (a brain-computer interface, to be exact) that could be implanted into the brain in order to augment (see: improve) human intelligence. Itsa controversial idea Musk initially put forward back in 2016. At the time, he called it a neural lace; an idea he revisited earlier this year at the World Government Summit in Dubai. Since the computing powers of AI are expected to surpass that of humans in rather quick order, the neural lace is meant to push our cognitive performance to a level that is comparable to that of AI.

Shortly after details leaked regardingthe new venture, Musk took to Twitter to acknowledge that the reports were true.Musk confirmed his plan via a tweet in which he also promised more details details which would be coming the week of April 10th thanks to Tim Urban at the the websiteWait But Why.

Today, those details finally came to light(This summary highlights key points directly from Urbans post):

As previously mentioned, Musk isnt the only one concerned about the impact that AI will have on the future of humanity.Many experts and tech giants have spoken extensively about their fears regarding the development of synthetic intelligence.

In a video posted byBig Think, Michael Vassar thechief science officer of MetaMed Research stated that, unless we are careful, any truly sentient AI that we develop will likely kill us all (literally): If greater-than-human artificial general intelligence is invented without due caution, it is all but certain that the human species will be extinct in very short order.Similarly, Stephen Hawking famously stated that AI is one of the biggest threats to humanity:

The development of AIcould spell the end of the human race. It would take off on its own and redesign itself at an ever-increasing rate. Humans, who are limited by slow biological evolution, couldnt compete, and would be superseded.

And this is just the start of the experts who are concerned with AI. Like Musk,Braintree founder Bryan Johnsons company Kernal is currently working on a neuroprosthesis that can mimic, repair, and improve human cognition. If it comes to fruition, that tech could be a solid defense against the worst case AI scenarios. After all, if we are able to upgrade our brains to a level that is equal to that of AI, we may be able to at least stay on par with the machines.

Being able to systematically and intelligently work with our neural code is the most consequential and pressing opportunity in the world today. All that we are, all that we do, all that we become will be a result of our progress, explains Johnson.

Notably, while advancements like those that Johnson and Musk are working on could allow us to merge with machines, they could also allow us to literally program (or reprogram) our neural code, which would allow us to transform ourselves in ways that we cant even imagine. In short, we couldprogram ourselves into the people that we want to be. The experts are ready. The question is, are humans prepared to adopt the technology?

Disclosure: Bryan Johnson is an investor in Futurism; he does not hold a seat on our editorial board or have any editorial review privileges.

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Elon Musk Just Outlined How He'll Merge The Human Brain and AI - Futurism

In Brief Scientists have located an exoplanet that's the best candidate for life as we know it. They believe it may prove to be an even more important target for the future characterization of planets in the habitable zone than Proxima b or TRAPPIST-1. Super-Earth LHS 1140b

Only a few decades ago, the thought of any alien planets existing in the reaches of space were just hypothetical ideas. Now, we know of thousands of such planets and today, scientists may have discovered the best candidate yet for alien life.

That candidate is an exoplanet orbiting a red dwarf star 40 light-years from Earthwhat the international team of astronomers who discovered it have deemed a super-Earth. Using ESOs HARPS instrument and a range of telescopes around the world, the astronomers located the exoplanet orbiting the dim star LHS 1140 within its habitable zone. This world passes in front of its parent stars as it orbits, has likely retained most of its atmosphere, and is a little larger and much more massive than the Earth. In short, super-Earth LHS 1140b is among the most exciting known subjects for atmospheric studies.

Although the faint red dwarf star LHS 1140b is ten times closer to its star than the Earth is to the Sun, because red dwarfs are much smaller and cooler than the Sun is, the super-Earth lies in the middle of the habitable zone and receives around half as much sunlight from its star as the Earth does.

This is the most exciting exoplanet Ive seen in the past decade, lead author Jason Dittmann of the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics said in an ESO science release. We could hardly hope for a better target to perform one of the biggest quests in science searching for evidence of life beyond Earth.

To support life as we know it, a planet must retain an atmosphere and have liquid surface water. When red dwarf stars are young, they emit radiation that can damage the atmospheres of planets around them. This planets large size indicates that a magma ocean may have existed on its surface for eons, feeding steam into the atmosphere and replenishing the planet with water until well within the time the star had cooled to its current, steady glow. The astronomers estimate the planet is at least five billion years old, and deduce that it has a diameter of almost 18,000 kilometers (11,185 mi) 1.4 times larger than that of the Earth. Its greater mass and density implies that it is probably made of rock with a dense iron core.

Two of the European members of the team, Xavier Delfosse and Xavier Bonfils, stated in the release: The LHS 1140 system might prove to be an even more important target for the future characterization of planets in the habitable zone than Proxima b or TRAPPIST-1. This has been a remarkable year for exoplanet discoveries!

Scientists expect observations with the Hubble Space Telescope will soon allow them to assess how much high-energy radiation the exoplanet receives, and further into the future with the help of new telescopes like ESOs Extremely Large Telescope and the James Webb Telescope detailed observations of the atmospheres of exoplanets will be possible.

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Scientists Just Discovered an Alien Planet That's The Best Candidate for Life As We Know It - Futurism

In BriefResearchers discovered that plasma from cord blood containsproteins that improve learning and memory skills by enhancing theactivity of the hippocampus. The protein could also mitigate theeffects of Alzheimer's. Plasma of Youth

Researchers from Stanford University in California may have stumbled upon a potential elixir of youth. The team, led by Joseph Castellano, found that blood from babies blood contains anti-aging and memory-enhancing potential.While it might sound like the premise of a horror movie, theres no need to worry: no infantswere harmed in the research, as the blood was collected from their umbilical cords.

The rejuvenating effects of infantsblood is the subject of a study the researcherspublished in the journal Nature. Similar to a previous study linkingmemory and cognitive enhancing effects to teenagers blood, Castellano and his team believe that umbilical blood may have the ability to rejuvenate memory.Click to View Full Infographic

Here we show that human cord plasma treatment revitalizes the hippocampus and improves cognitive function in aged mice, the researchers wrote. They gave three groups of mice, each about 50 years old in human years, human blood injections. The mice were split into three groups, each receiving plasma from different sources. One group received the umbilical cord plasma, the second got plasma from young people roughly aged 22, while the third gotplasma from people about 66 years old.

The mice infused with plasma from cord bloodshowed the greatest improvements, demonstrating faster learning sense and better maze navigation. This indicated enhanced activity in the mices hippocampi, the memory and learning center of the brain.

Castellano and his colleagues believe that the effectscome from aprotein found in plasma. Umbilical cord blood is rich in a protein called TIMP2, which consequently declinesas people age. This explains why the plasma from young people also demonstrated some rejuvenating ability, butplasma from older adults did not.

TIMP2 has also been known to limit the growth of enzymes called matrix metalloproteinases, believed to be involved in the development of Alzheimers. How TIMP2 works is still not clear; that being said, researchers are very interested in studyingits potential for treating age-related cognitive disorders, particularly Alzheimers. Itll take time before any such treatment could be developed from this, however.

If and when TIMP2 looks promising as a possible therapy, Id imagine there would be a great deal of interest, Castellano said. As the aging population grows each year, I think well increasingly need to look for ways to limit the harmful effects of aging.

Indeed, thereis now a trend among scientists to consider aging a disease that needs to be and can be treated. Researchers are looking for potential ways to keep aging at bay, or at the very least, to keep its degenerative effects in check. These efforts are varied, from using stem cells to gene and cellular manipulation, and even using bacteria. All of whichare avenues made possible by improved technologies that allow for better medical research and treatment.

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New Research Shows That Babies' Blood Can Improve Memory - Futurism

Driving Too Fast?

Teslas vehicles have had their fair share of accidents and crashes. While most of those involved in these reported accidents have survived, perhaps no one has ever been more thankful than the driver and passenger of a Model S that went over the edge of a cliff in California last week.

According to a report by Electrek, the Tesla driver was speeding along Grizzly Peak Boulevard, driving home towards Oakland Hills, when his Model S tumbled 150 meters (500 feet) down the side of a cliff. The driver and his passenger managed to crawl out of the upside down Model S totally ok.

The Tesla driver, who wished to remain anonymous, posted this on an online forum for Tesla owners and enthusiasts last Sunday: Driving perhaps a tad too spirited, a deer appeared at a curve at the worst possible moment. I instinctively (mistakenly) swerved to avoid it and my car ended up over the edge. We tumbled perhaps 150-200 feet down a steep slope, ended up upside down. It was only when his car was towed back up that they discovered theyd fallen 150 meters (500 feet) down, and not just 60 meters (200 feet).

Amazingly, while the Model S was wrecked, the interior of the cabin was totally intact. We climbed out with only bruises and muscle soreness, the drivers post related.I dont know how to compare this with other cars but it felt rock solid to me and I feel lucky to be alive because of my [Tesla].

The report by Electrek noted that the large crumple zones in Teslas cars, which are due to not having an engine under its hood, was the lifesaving factor in this accident. While this is yet another testament to just how committed to safety Tesla is, CEOElon Musk has promisedto strengthenthe companys standards even more.

Aside from the physical build of Tesla vehicles, a bigger contributor to safety is the Autopilot system. According to a report by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) released earlier this year, improvements and updates to its autonomous driving software have cut down Teslas crash records by 40 percent. In one occasion, Autopilots life-saving abilities was even caught on camera. With the 8.1 update finally out, Autopilot is expected to have improved considerably.

As for the driver from last weeks crash, hes already looking forward to hopping back inside another Tesla. Once I get insurance worked out Im sure Ill be in another one, he said in his post. Hes certainly learned his lesson, though. Maybe Ill be driving those mountain roads at night a bit more cautiously, he added.

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Tesla Driver and Passenger Survive a 500-Foot Tumble, Thanks to Safety Features in the Model S - Futurism

In Brief A prominent analyst has demonstrated his belief that Tesla's electric semi truck will disrupt the auto industry by downgrading stocks of competitors. This comes on the heels of the highest share price forecast Tesla has ever received. Disruption Ahead

Last week, Elon Musk announced that the seriously next-level Tesla semi truck would be coming this September. In response, Piper Jaffray analyst Alex Potter published a note on April 18 indicating that he is downgrading truck makers Paccar and Cummins, partly because their valuations already reflect cyclical optimism, but also because we think TSLAs impending arrival could pressure valuations.

Potters vote of confidence in Teslas potential impact on transportation was met with incredulity from some in the auto making industry, as neither the Tesla Model 3 or its semi have launched yet.According to CNBC, Potter further clarified his position in a separate note strictly on Cummins:

Cummins makes diesel engines, but companies like Tesla (among others) are aiming to supplant CMIs products. These Silicon Valley disrupters are not confining their ambitions to sedans; instead, they have announced plans for electric semis, electric pickups, electric buses, and various other products that defy the preeminence of diesel engines. CMI enthusiasts will note that EVs wont replace diesel trucks in the coming 2 years (not in a material way, at least) and we agree. But when/if electric drivetrains are proven viable in the first commercial vehicle segments, we think incumbents valuations could fall rapidly thereafter.

And in a separate note dealing solely with Paccar, Potter reportedly wrote,

Teslas presence looms large; laugh all you want, but this trend cannot be ignored. In the automotive segment, Tesla and others have wrought substantial disruption, forcing incumbents to change their hiring practices, increase R&D spending, and ultimately, suffer lower multiples. PCAR may be less at risk than others and its probably too early to start ringing alarm bells but with the stock trading near the high-end of its historical valuation range, we wouldnt be adding to positions.

Although Potter acknowledged both that Tesla is not the first to produce an electric truck and that details about the truck remain unknown, he made it clear that he believes investors should consider Teslas disruptive potential in the market now. Potter forecast Tesla shares at $368 on Monday, April 10 the highest price forecast it had ever received from an analyst at a major firm.

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Expert Asserts That Tesla's Electric Semi Will Totally Disrupt the Auto Industry - Futurism

In Brief AeroMobil, a flying car company, has unveiled the first edition of its new vehicle and is taking pre-orders for shipments in 2020. The vehicle will sell at around $1.3 to $1.7 million, depending on specifications. The Flying Car

With our childhood perceptions of the future formed by viewings of Back to the Future and the Jetsons, we have always held a special place in our hearts for the idea of a flying car. And while tech industry giants like Elon Musk say that there is no real future for flying cars, AeroMobil, a flying car company, seems to disagree.

Credit: Aeromobil

The company has released its new model and is currently taking pre-orders for the limited first edition of the flying car. All preorders on the AeroMobil will ship 2020, and the added time will give the company a chance to increase production to meet the demands of building500 vehicles.

The two-seated vehicle powered by hybrid propulsion can transform from car to plane in under 3 minutes. It also boasts a driving range of 700 km (434 miles) and a flight range thats a bit longer at 750 km (466 miles) at 75 percent of its top speed. On the ground, the hybrid vehicle boasts a top speed around 160 kph (100 mph), while in the air its 360 kph (224 mph).

Now, should the Flying Car run out of fuel midflight or bust an engine, there are safety features that help it glide down to Earth with the help of a parachute. Passengers would be provided with airbags for in-air and on-road accidents.

If you want to get your hands on one of these, youll need to fork over $1.3 to $1.7 million. While flying cars may seem like a fad for the rich, it might become something more than that, with ride-share companies like uber taking an interest in the technology. Aeromobil also isnt alone in their quest to conquerthe skies. In a few years, we may be able to have our pick of flying cars although none are likely to be DeLoreans.

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The World's First Flying Car Is Taking Pre-Orders for 2020 Delivery - Futurism

In Brief Regina Dugan, a former DARPA executive and current head of Facebook's mysterious Building 8, has released information about the work that the social media giant has been doing on brain-computer-interfaces meant to let you "communicate using only your mind."

Facebooks annual developers conference is in full swing this week. Ultimately, the event serves as an opportunity for the company to unveil their most innovative products and reveal key details about upcoming projects. And nothing is more promising or intriguing than whats coming out of Facebooks mysterious Building 8(B8).

Currently, we know very little about B8, as none of their projects have been officiallydetailed, but rumors are swirling, and its not like we dont know anything. We have some big, overarching information about the general work being done.It seems that B8 is working on four primary projects. These are said to include augmented reality, drones, cameras, and direct brain-computer interfaces (BCIs).

Yes, Facebook is working on computers that are meant to interface with our brains.

During the opening event yesterday, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced that, today, speakers at the conferencewoulddiscuss where they are in relation to their work on the BCI technology.

At the event, he stated that we would hear from Regina Dugan about some of the work that [they are] doing to build even further out beyond augmented reality, and that includes work around direct brain interfaces that are going to, eventually, one day, let you communicate using only your mind.

Dugan is aformer DARPA executive. She also worked for Googles advanced projects division. Now, Dugan has finally released information about the work B8 has been doing. The highlights and video of the event are below (this story is developing):

This article has been updated to clarify the nature of the brain interface and what information Facebook is hoping to capture and transmit to the outside world.

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Facebook Finally Released Details on Their Top Secret Brain-Computer Interface - Futurism