Category Archives: Post Human

Tactical war will outlive mankind. Sanity wont.

Post Human W.A.R is a turn-based tactical and psychological strategy game. At the dawn of our third millennium, mankind went extinct, leaving behind a deeply affected planet Earth. Ferocious mutated animals, household robots converted to warfare and inventive monkeys in tracksuits battle it out to decide the fate of the human heritage.

TEASER: https://youtu.be/ILupl_PopO8

Now on Steam: http://store.steampowered.com/app/462240/Post_Human_WAR/

Through online PvP or local campaigns, pick your faction and strategize your victory. Be wary, your enemy will be equally armed.

On May 3rd, Post Human W.A.R enters into a 2-month early access period with the goal to:

About PLAYDIUS:

Under the wing of Plug In Digital, its parent company, PLAYDIUS Ent. has a proven experience in the distribution and publishing of indie games. We provide our talented developers with production and marketing support to let them do what they do best: create amazing titles. More information here: http://www.playdius-ent.com or here: http://www.playdius-ent.com/PHW/press/

About StudioChahut:

The unique world of Post Human W.A.R was created and developed over several years by the small team of Studio Chahut,based in Grenoble, France.

It stems from our long-lasting love for unforgiving turn-based games, and our strong conviction that the genre deserved a fun, brand new universe.

More information about the game here: http://www.posthumanwar.com/?lang=en

Join the community on discord here: https://discordapp.com/invite/9BHzKzv

GLOBAL MEDIA CONTACT

Thibaud Rouquet

Thibaud@rpconseils.com

Games Press is the leading online resource for games journalists. Used daily by magazines, newspapers, TV, radio, online media and retailers worldwide, it offers a vast, constantly updated archive of press releases and assets, and is the simplest and most cost-effective way for PR professionals to reach the widest possible audience. Registration for the site and the Games Press email digest is available, to the trade only, at http://www.gamespress.com

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The absurd turn-based tactic game Post Human W.A.R enters in early access on May 3rd - Develop

JERUSALEM A day after militant Islamist group Hamas updated, and some say softened, its founding charter, an internationalhuman rights watchdogslammed the group as cruel and torturous over its continued incarceration of two Israelis withserious mental health conditions.

[Palestinians think Trump can make a deal]

In a report published Tuesday, Human Rights Watch shed light onthe disappearance of Avera Mangistu, an Israeli Jew of Ethiopian descent, and Hisham al-Sayed, a Bedouin Israeli. Both men were seenon Israeli security cameras entering Gaza, Mangistu in September 2014 and Sayed in April 2015.

Neither hasbeen heard from since.

Hamashas not confirmed that the men are in Gaza, but it has not denied it either. Over the past two years, officials from the Strip have made coy references to them and to the bodies of two Israeli soldiers killed in the 2014 summer war between Israel and Hamas.

[Palestinians and Israelis are now fighting over corpses]

Two weeks ago, Hamas leader, Khaled Meshaldeclared that any information about Israeli captives would carry a price indicating the two men are to be used as bargaining chips in exchange for Hamas combatants serving time in Israeli jails.

Hamas officials interviewed for the Human Rights Watch report suggested the two Israelis were legitimate prisoners of war because every Israeli male serves in the army. In one instance, the groups military wing,Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades,published computer-altered photographs of the men dressed Israeli army uniforms.

AHuman Rights Watch investigation revealed that both Mangistu and al-Sayed were rejected from Israeli military service on the grounds of their mental health.

Hamass refusal to confirm its apparent prolonged detention of men with mental health conditions and no connection to the hostilities is cruel and indefensible, saidSarah Leah Whitson, Middle East director at Human Rights Watch. No grievance or objective can justify holding people incommunicado and bartering over their fates.

The scolding from the Human Rights Watch comes as Hamas tries to rehabilitate its standing in the world. The Islamist militant groupis viewed as a terrorist organizationby Israel and the United States. But on Monday, it released a new manifestorebranding itself as an Islamic national liberation movement. While it no longer explicitly calls for the destruction of Israel, it does retain the goal of liberating historic Palestine.

The report also came out on the eve of Wednesday's meeting between Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbasand President Trump at the White House. Though Abbas is the elected leader of the Palestinian Authority, which controls the West Bank, he has no sway with Hamas.

Research for the report was carried out in September 2016, the first time since 2008 that Israel had allowed representatives of the nongovernmental organization to enter Gaza, an area that has been under an Israeli and Egyptian land and sea blockade since Hamas took controlin 2007.

Israel has not been sympathetic to the work of Human Rights Watch, often claiming that the organization singles Israel out on its human rights violations, while overlooking some of the worlds worst violators. In February, an American investigator from Human Rights Watch was deniedentry to Israel on the grounds that the NGO is systematically anti-Israel and works as a tool for pro-Palestinian propaganda.

[Israel calls Human Rights Watch a propaganda tool, says it is not welcome]

This time, however, it is Hamas that is failing to comply with international humanitarian law by breaking commitments made in April 2014under the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities. Under the treaty, states must provide protections for people with psychosocial, or mental health, disabilities, wrote Human Rights Watch in its report.

According to the report, Mangistu, 30, entered Gaza through a barbed wire fence near a beach on Sept. 7, 2014. Sayed, 29, simply walked across the border into Gaza on April 20, 2015.

The family of a third Israeli citizen, Jumaa Abu Ghanima, also said their son had disappeared into Gaza, sometime in July 2016. Human Rights Watch, however, wrote it could not independently corroborate that account.

Mangistu and al-Sayed, an Ethiopian Jew and Palestinian Bedouin with mental health conditions, come from among the most marginalized communities in Israeli society, Whitson said. There is nothing patriotic or heroic in forcibly disappearing them.

The groups calls on Hamas to unconditionally disclose the mens whereabouts and release them unless they can provide a credible legal basis for continuing to hold them. It also said Hamas should allow the men to immediately make contact with their families.

Israeli has also called on Hamas to return Mangistu and Sayed, as well as the bodies of Hadar Goldin and Oron Shaul, the two Israeli soldiers killed in the 2014 summer war between Israel and Hamas.

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'Cruel and indefensible': Human Rights Watch slams Hamas for holding two mentally ill Israelis - Washington Post

TORONTO A landlord who repeatedly ignored his tenants requests to respect their prayer times and remove his shoes in their prayer space violated their religious rights, Ontarios human rights tribunal has ruled.

John Alabi is facing a $12,000 fine after the decision, which found he discriminated against his tenants on the grounds of their Muslim faith.

The decision handed down from tribunal adjudicator Jo-Anne Pickel outlines a turbulent tenancy for Walid Madkour and Heba Ismail, who rented a unit from Alabi for less than three months after moving to Toronto from Montreal.

The issues that came before the tribunal all took place in January and February 2015 the time between when both parties mutually agreed to terminate the lease and the day the couple moved out.

Conflicts centred around requests the couple had made while Alabi was trying to show their unit to prospective tenants.

Alabi told the tribunal he felt Madkour and Ismail were imposing their way of life on him, a claim flatly rejected in Pickels decision.

Unfortunately, attempts by Muslims to practice their faith have increasingly been interpreted as an attempt to impose their way of life on others, Pickel wrote.

There was absolutely no evidence that the applicants requests for additional notice and for the removal of shoes in this case were an attempt by them to impose their way of life on the respondent or anyone else. Far from seeking to impose their way of life on anyone, the applicants were merely making simple requests for the accommodation of their religious practices.

Between late January and late February 2015, Alabi had agreed to give the couple 24-hours notice if someone was planning to view the apartment, in accordance with Ontarios Residential Tenancies Act.

Madkour and Ismail, however, asked for additional notice up to an hour before Alabi planned to enter the apartment.

While they did not disclose the religious grounds for their request at first, they eventually explained that they wanted to be certain the visits did not coincide with prayer times designated by the Quran, the tribunal heard. As practising Muslims, both Madkour and Ismail pray five times a day during designated time periods.

Unfortunately, attempts by Muslims to practice their faith have increasingly been interpreted as an attempt to impose their way of life on others

Ismail also wanted to have enough time to ensure she was wearing her hijab and other modest attire in order to comply with another tenet of her faith, the tribunal heard.

Alabi frequently denied these requests or provided only momentary notice via text message before entering the apartment, the tribunal heard.

Once inside, another bone of contention often arose when Madkour or Ismail would request that people remove their shoes before walking through the unit.

The Quran states that the area in which prayers are conducted must be clean, the tribunal said, adding that potential contamination would result in extra work to cleanse the area.

In video evidence shown to the tribunal, Pickel said the couple is heard asking Alabi and a prospective tenant to remove their shoes before entering the bedroom, which they used as their prayer space.

Pickels decision said the video shows the prospective tenant wearing only socks, but clearly shows Alabi walking through the bedroom in shoes despite protests from Ismail, who is heard telling him that wearing footwear in the area is disrespectful.

Alabi told the tribunal that he ignored her request in order to avoid making a scene in front of the tenant and because he felt her stance was propaganda designed to make him look bad.

Pickel took a different view.

I fail to see how such a request would make the respondent look bad if he complied with it, she wrote. If anything, it was the respondents non-compliance with the request that made him look bad in front of prospective tenants.

She also pointed to some text messages sent to Madkour in response to his request for additional notice before an apartment viewing. One of those messages read Welcome to Ontario, Canada, prompting Pickel to find that Alabi was not respectful of the couples religious rights under the Human Rights Code.

She ordered Alabi to pay Madkour and Ismail $6,000 each, as well as to take an online course on human rights and rental housing.

Neither Alabi nor his legal representative immediately responded to request for comment.

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Landlord violated Muslim tenants' rights for not respecting prayer time: Human rights tribunal - National Post

What if you could make President Trump say whatever you wanted?Like this.

Or here he is again with his simulated frenemies, Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton:

How about listening to thevaguely robot-like voice of yourself, programmed into an app based on a sample of your speech? The technology will be readysoon,according to ateam of researchers from the University of Montreals institute for computer-based learning algorithms.

Now theyre seeking investors for theirproduct,Lyrebird,and hopetojoinGoogle in the fast-expandingbusiness ofmimicking human voices.

Virtual assistants such as Alexa and Siri have driven the voice technology into the mainstream, where we can controlourphones, cars and even refrigerators through verbal commands. And now we face a future where the perfect vocal replication of the president of the United States or you, or anyone could be just a few years away, some experts say. How does thatfuturesound?

Whoever wins the development race, experts in technology and ethical fields are gearing up for products that will do to voice what Photoshop did to photos make reality verydifficultto tell from a simulation.

Lyrebirdis aware of the downsides. Thetechnology isexciting with potentially dangerous consequences such as misleading diplomats, fraud and stealing the identity of someone else, according to an ethical disclaimer on Lyrebirds website. The developersdid not immediately respond to an interview request.

Nevertheless,the inventorsplan to begin selling what they call the first technology to allow copying voices in a matter of minutes with fine tuning for emotional control.

Scientific American notes that Lyrebird and a competing Alphabet-ownedproject called WaveNetuse neural network technology code patterned after neurons in thehuman brain to simulate human speech on the fly.

In contrast, existingvoice assistants such as Siri and Alexa work by cobbling together words and phrases from prerecorded files of one particular voice.

Lyrebird saysitstechnology, once released, will be able to mimic any voice based on as little as aminute of audio recording though one of the developers told TechCrunch that longer samples would reduce the distinctly metallic rasp that the outlet noted in clipsreleased so far.

[Burger King thought it had a great idea. Instead, it ended up with a Whopper of a problem.]

While Lyrebirds developers have not announced a release date for their product, they claimit will simulate audio much faster than Googles WaveNet.

When the tech giants artificial intelligence unit demonstrated WaveNetlast year, listeners rated it as the closest simulationyet of human speech, according to the Verge.

However, the outlet noted, Googles team had to manually tweakthe audiooutputor it sounded like AIbaby babble.

Timo Baumann, a speech processing researcher atCarnegie Mellon University, told Scientific American that Lyrebirds audio sounded a tad robotic but that convincing human simulations voice assistants that people might treat like friends were a few years away.

Five major tech giants: Apple, Google, Microsoft, Facebook and Amazon.com arepursingwhat The Washington Posts Elizabeth Dwoskincalled an arms race to create the next generation of virtual assistants to make our personal devices converselike humans, if not also sound like them.

Its about taking the way that humans have naturally interacted with each other for thousands of years and applying that to the way they interact with services, Dag Kittlaus, a co-f0under of the Siri app now in every iPhone, told Dwoskin. Hewas working on a conversational artificial intelligence technology he hoped would replace it.

Theprospect of computer-simulated voice concerned a security technologist from Harvard University, who told Scientific Americanthat a new reality of fake audio clips was on the horizon.

A refined version of this system could replicate a persons voice with incredible accuracy, making it virtually impossible for a human listener to discern the original from the emulation, Gizmodo warned. The day is coming when vocal speech, like an image processed in Photoshop, can be manipulated without our knowing.

When Adobe demonstrated yet another form of voice-faking software last year one that rearranges words in pre-recorded audio clips a technology researcher at the University of Stirling expressed horror to the BBC.

It seems that Adobes programmers were swept along with the excitement of creating something as innovative as a voice manipulator, Eddy Borges Rey told the outlet, and ignored the ethical dilemmas brought up by its potential misuse.

[The next hot job in Silicon Valley is for poets]

The creators of Lyrebird said they want their technology to be used for good:Giving back the voice to people who lost it to sickness, being able to record yourself at different stages in your life and hearing your voice later on, one of Lyrbirds developers told Gizmodo.

The teamtold TechCruch it plansto makeits voice simulator available to anyone with an Internet connection with free samples for fake audio in a voice of ones choosing, and a fee-per-sentence thereafter.

We hope that everyone will soon be aware that such technology exists and that copying the voice of someone else is possible, the developers wrote.

More reading:

Think your dog talks like people? Scientists say you might just be right.

Terrorists are building drones. France is destroying them with eagles.

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This audio clip of a robot as Trump may prelude a future of fake ... - Washington Post

Nearly a third of business leaders and technology analysts express no confidence that education and job training in the United States will evolve rapidly enough to match the next decades labor market demands, a new report from the Pew Research Center finds.

About 30 percent of the executives, hiring managers, college professors and automation researchers who responded to the Pew survey felt future prospects looked bleak, anticipatingthat firms would encounter more trouble finding workers with their desired skill sets over the next decade.

Barring a neuroscience advance that enables us to embed knowledge and skills directly into brain tissue and muscle formation, there will be no quantum leap in our ability to up-skill people, wrote Andrew Walls, managing vice president at Gartner, an IT consulting firm.

Seriously? Youre asking about the workforce of the future? added another respondent, a science editor who asked to stay anonymous. As if theres going to be one?

Lee Rainie, Pews director of Internet, science and technology research, the studys co-author, helped canvass, reaching out to 8,000 decision makers in Pew's database. About 1,400 responded, and many of those told the researchers they were bracing for machines to transform the ways humans work -- sometimes in unpredictable ways.

People are wrestling with this basic metaphysical question: What are humans good for? he said. Its important to figure that out because this blended world of machines and humans is already upon us and its going to accelerate.

Most of the business and technology professionals expected new training programs to emerge, both at schools and on the private market, to better prepare the future labor force. But 30 percent of the 1,408 respondents doubted such a quick transformation could take place. They felt, according to the report, that adaptation in teaching environments will not be sufficient to prepare workers for future jobs.

Jerry Michalski, the founder at REX, a technology think tank in Portland, Ore., feared public schools and universities arent keeping up with changes in the economy.

They take too long to teach impractical skills, he wrote, and knowledge not connected to the real world.

Im skeptical that educational and training programs can keep pace with technology, added Thomas Claburn, editor-at-large at Information Week, a news site.

Jason Hong, a Carnegie Mellon University professor, argued the country can train small numbers of individuals for more computerized roles at community colleges and in the university system. And while coding classes, for example, are cropping up on campuses, learning how to work in the computer realm just isnt part of the broader American curriculum.

There are two major components needed for a new kind of training program at this scale: political will and a proven technology platform, Hong wrote. Even assuming that the political will (and budget) existed, theres no platform today that can successfully train large numbers of people.

The next generation of workers should learn how to code, the Pew report asserts, or brush up on data science both skills that would serve them well in increasingly automated workplaces. But they shouldnt underestimate the importance of so-called emotional intelligence, or the ability to gracefully manage employees, co-workers and clients.

The skills necessary at the higher echelons will include especially the ability to efficiently network, manage public relations, display intercultural sensitivity and just enough creativity to think outside the box, wrote Simon Gottschalk, a sociology professor at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas.

Frank Elavsky, a data and policy analyst at Acumen LLC, an analytic tool developer, said people can hone those skills in this digital age by remembering to interact with other people.

The most important skills to have in life are gained through interpersonal experiences, he wrote. Human bodies in close proximity to other human bodies stimulate real compassion, empathy, vulnerability and social-emotional intelligence.

B. Remy Cross, an assistant professor of sociology at Webster University in Missouri, expressed doubt that future workers could easily bolster their social skills in an increasingly online world.

It is too hard to adequately instruct large numbers of people in the kinds of soft skills that are anticipated as being in most demand, Cross wrote. As manufacturing jobs move overseas or are fully mechanized, we will see a bulge in service jobs. These require good people skills, something that is often hard to train online.

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Bosses believe your work skills will soon be useless - The ... - Washington Post

Its no longer just Vladimir Putin.

As he settles into office, President Trumps affection for totalitarian leaders has grown beyond Russias president to include strongmen around the globe.

Egyptian President Abdel Fatah al-Sissi has had his opponents gunned down, but Trump praised him for doing a fantastic job. Thailands prime minister, Prayuth Chan-ocha, is a junta chief whose military jailed dissidents after taking power in a coup, yet Trump offered to meet with him at the White House. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has eroded basic freedoms, but after a recent political victory, he got a congratulatory call from Trump.

Then theres the case of Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte. He is accused of presiding over the extrajudicial killing of thousands of drug dealers and users. And in response to U.S. criticism of his human rights record last year, he said President Barack Obama can go to hell.

Yet on Sunday, in what the White House characterized as a very friendly conversation, Trump invited Duterte to Washington for an official visit.

(Sarah Parnass/The Washington Post)

In an undeniable shift in American foreign policy, Trump is cultivating authoritarian leaders, one after another, in an effort to reset relations following an era of ostracism and public shaming by Obama and his predecessors.

For instance, it has become an almost daily occurrence for Trump to gush about Chinese President Xi Jinping since their Mar-a-Lago summit last month. Trump has called Xi a very good man, highly respected and a gentleman, as he tries to persuade Xi to convince North Korea that it should scale back or give up its pursuit of nuclear weapons.

Trumps praise is not limited to potential U.S. allies. Even as North Korean leader Kim Jong Un ratchets up his provocations, Trump called Kim a smart cookie in a CBS News interview over the weekend. On Monday, Trump told Bloomberg News he would be honored to personally meet with Kim under the right circumstances.

[Trump takes a selective approach to the promotion of human rights]

Every American president since at least the 1970s has used his office at least occasionally to champion human rights and democratic values around the world. Yet, so far at least, Trump has willingly turned a blind eye to dictators records of brutality and oppression in hopes that those leaders might become his partners in isolating North Korea or fighting terrorism.

Indeed, in his first 102 days in office, Trump has neither delivered substantive remarks nor taken action supporting democracy movements or condemning human rights abuses, other than the missile strike he authorized on Syria after President Bashar al-Assad allegedly used chemical weapons against his own people.

He doesnt even pretend to utter the words, said Michael McFaul, a U.S. ambassador to Russia under Obama. Small-d democrats all over the world are incredibly despondent right now about Donald Trump and thats true in China, in Iran, in Egypt, in Russia. They feel like the leader of the free world is absent.

A tipping point for many Trump critics was his invitation to Duterte to visit the White House. Sen. Benjamin L. Cardin (Md.), the ranking Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said he was deeply disturbed by Trumps cavalier invitation and called on him to rescind it.

This is a man who has boasted publicly about killing his own citizens, Cardin said of Duterte in a statement. The United States is unique in the world because our values respect for human rights, respect for the rule of law are our interests. Ignoring human rights will not advance U.S. interests in the Philippines or any place else. Just the opposite.

Yet Trumps advisers said the presidents silence on human rights matters is purposeful, part of a grand strategy to rebuild alliances or create new ones. Trumps outreach is designed to isolate North Korea in the Asia-Pacific region and to build coalitions to defeat the Islamic State in the Middle East and North Africa, senior administration officials said.

Inside the Trump White House, the thinking goes that if mending bridges with a country such as the Philippines historically a treaty ally whose relationship with the United States deteriorated as Duterte gravitated toward China means covering up or even ignoring concerns like human rights, then so be it.

The United States has a limited ability to direct things, said Michael Anton, the National Security Councils director of strategic communications. We cant force these countries to behave certain ways. We can apply pressure, but if the alternative is not talking, how effective would it be if we had no relationships? If you walk away from relationships, you cant make any progress.

Anton explained that Trump is trying to balance interests. He said the decision to invite Duterte to the White House a symbolic gesture that gives credibility to the autocrats rule was agreed to by most of Trumps advisers.

Its not binary, he said. Its not that you care about human rights so you cant have a relationship with the Philippines, or if you have a relationship with the Philippines you dont care about human rights.

Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Bob Corker (R-Tenn.) described the Trump strategy as establishing commonality with offending nations before publicly chastising them for offenses.

Their approach is to obviously continue to hold up the values that we have here in America, Corker said in a recent interview. But their approach is to build some commonality never let go of that as an American cause, but to work on it in ways where they achieve a result, and to not go in on the front end.

White House officials cite the release last month of Aya Hijazi an Egyptian American charity worker who had been imprisoned in Cairo for three years amid Sissis brutal crackdown on civil society as evidence that their strategy is paying dividends.

Trump and his aides worked for several weeks with Sissi and his government to secure Hijazis freedom. The Obama administration had pressed unsuccessfully for her release, but once Trump moved to reset U.S. relations with Egypt by embracing Sissi at the White House, Egypts posture changed.

[Freed Egyptian American prisoner returns home following Trumps intervention]

Tom Malinowski, assistant secretary of state for human rights and democracy under Obama, said Trump appears to be living up to his campaign promise.

The whole idea of America First is that were not trying to make the world better, Malinowski said. Were trying to protect the homeland and the domestic economy, and the rest is all cutting deals with whoever is willing to cut deals with us. Theres not much room in that equation for standing up for the rights, freedoms and well-being of other people.

Human rights activists are concerned that Trump is condoning the actions of dictators when he is warm to them or extends invitations to visit.

Inviting these men to the White House in effect places the United States seal of approval on their heinous actions, said Rob Berschinski, senior vice president at Human Rights First. He went on to say, Nothing excuses President Trumps clear inclination to reward mass murderers and torturers with undeserved honors.

Asked at the daily White House press briefing whether Trump had a thing for totalitarian leaders, press secretary Sean Spicer suggested he was cultivating such leaders with the explicit aim of weakening North Korea.

The president clearly, as I said, understands the threat that North Korea poses, Spicer said. Having someone with the potential nuclear capability to strike another country and potentially our country at some point in the future is something that the president takes very seriously.

But McFaul posited that the Trump administration may be naive in calculating that personal outreach and warm praise will persuade authoritarian leaders to support U.S. interests.

The converse of that is that these leaders are taking him for a ride, McFaul said. He tends to over-personalize relationships between states. He says Chinas raping us, then he meets President Xi and suddenly hes this wise man with whom he has a good chemistry. I hope this will produce outcomes that are good for us, but right now its producing outcomes that are good for China.

Karen DeYoung contributed to this report.

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Trump keeps praising international strongmen, alarming human rights advocates - Washington Post

Wavebreakmedia/DreamstimeAs part of its special issue on the so-called alt-right, New York Magazine has published an especially dim-witted article attacking transhumanism entitled, "Techno-Libertarians Praying for Dystopia." The author Mark O'Connell begins by going after Silicon Valley venture capitalist and wrong-headed Trump-supporter Peter Thiel who also happens to have some interest in how the technological Singularity may unfold. Thiel has made no secret about the fact that he has long had "this really strong sense that death was a terrible, terrible thing." Thus he finances researchers who hope to develop anti-aging technologies and think tanks that try to foresee the consequences of succeeding at that goal. Fine.

To illustrate Thiel's evil intentions, O'Connell points to his 2009 assertion, "I no longer believe that freedom and democracy are compatible." As further evidence of political depravity, he cites Thiel's 2011 observation, "Probably the most extreme form of inequality is between people who are alive and people who are dead." Based on these statements, O'Connell accuses Thiel of "ethical simple-mindedness." Really? Is it not more ethically simple-minded to believe that democratic authoritarianism cannot run roughshod over minority rights or that ensuring that everybody is equally diseased, disabled, and dead is somehow the height of moral probity.

O'Connell then notes that other Silicon Valley "libertarians" share Thiel's interest in human enhancement (and not only those who reside in purlieus of Palo Alto do too). Apparently, for O'Connell, the desire for ageless bodies and enhanced minds necessarily amounts to a rightwing conspiracy. As evidence for his claim that transhumanism is a manifestation of the alt-right, O'Connell digs up a couple of oddballs who've hung around the fringes of transhumanism who now call themselves neo-reactionaries. Of course, anybody can apply the labels libertarian and transhumanist to themselves with malice aforethought. Remember how progressives stole the term "liberal" back in the day. Once O'Connell has made the old guilt-by-association rhetorical move, he does admit that one of his two exemplars of supposedly alt-right transhumanism is "these days something of a pariah from the transhumanist movement." Indeed.

Transhumanism is a big tent. For example, my sometime intellectual sparring partner James Hughes, who is former executive director of the World Transhumanist Association, is a fierce social democrat and author of Citizen Cyborg: Why Democratic Societies Must Respond to the Redesigned Human of the Future (2005). In his Transhumanist Values manifesto, Oxford philosopher Nick Bostrom argues for wide access to enhancement technologies:

The full realization of the core transhumanist value requires that, ideally, everybody should have the opportunity to become posthuman. It would be sub-optimal if the opportunity to become posthuman were restricted to a tiny elite.

There are many reasons for supporting wide access: to reduce inequality; because it would be a fairer arrangement; to express solidarity and respect for fellow humans; to help gain support for the transhumanist project; to increase the chances that you will get the opportunity to become posthuman; to increase the chances that those you care about can become posthuman; because it might increase the range of the posthuman realm that gets explored; and to alleviate human suffering on as wide a scale as possible.

The wide access requirement underlies the moral urgency of the transhumanist vision. Wide access does not argue for holding back. On the contrary, other things being equal, it is an argument for moving forward as quickly as possible. 150,000 human beings on our planet die every day, without having had any access to the anticipated enhancement technologies that will make it possible to become posthuman. The sooner this technology develops, the fewer people will have died without access.

Is transhumanism some kind of ultimate threat to humanity? Not all. Last year I explained in the Washington Post:

One crowning achievement of Enlightenment humanism is the principle of tolerance, of putting up with people who look different, talk differently, worship differently and live differently than we do. In the future, our descendants may not all be unenhanced Homo sapiens, but they will still be moral beings who can be held accountable for their actions. There is no a priori reason to think that the same liberal political and moral principles that apply to diverse human beings today would not apply to relations among future humans and transhumans.

The highest expression of human nature and dignity is to strive to overcome the limitations imposed on us by our genes, our evolution and our environment. Future generations will look back at the beginning of the 21st century and be astonished that some well-meaning and intelligent people actually wanted to stop bio-nano-infotech research and deployment just to protect their cramped and limited vision of human nature. If transhumanism is allowed to progress, I predict that our descendants will look back and thank us for making their world of longer, healthier and abler lives possible.

Does that sound like anyone is praying for a dystopia?

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Transhumanism Is Not an Alt-Right Conspiracy! - Reason (blog)

James Scully did not intend to become the public scold of a global fashion industry one that views models as interchangeable widgets, that strong-arms them into unhealthy weight-loss regimens and insists on referring to them as girls. Nonetheless the veteran casting director has emerged as one of the most vocal agitators for change. He wants the fashion industry to treat models like human beings rather than commodities.

In February, several models came to him complaining about their treatment at an audition for the fall 2017 Balenciaga runway show the kind of prestigious booking that could pave a young models way in the business. Not only had some 150 hopefuls waited hours for the chance to be one of 47 chosen to walk in the show, they also had been left languishing for hours in an unlit stairwell while the casting directors went out for lunch.

Incensed, Scully took to Instagram to call out the Balenciaga team. But he wasnt done yet. In that same post, Scully claimed that representatives of the French fashion house Lanvin told model agencies not to send black women to its auditions. Finally, he voiced his suspicions that underage models were being booked in Paris, where 16 is the standard minimum.

I made the post out of personal outrage, Scully says a month later.

His alert led to apologies from Balenciaga, as well as denials and explanations from Lanvin and the casting directors accused of wrongdoing. But more than anything, Scullys words a rather modest call to arms, on the face of it managed to add fuel to an ongoing conversation about the often unprofessional, disorganized and offensive treatment of models by their own industry.

The frock trade has always been far grittier and seamier than its glossy trappings would suggest. There have been dramatic examples of drug abuse, deaths from eating disorders and sexual misconduct. But there are far more stories of mistreatment by omission or disregard. Models are expected to wait hours at an audition. They have fittings that last until the wee hours of the morning for which they receive no overtime pay. Sometimes they are paid for their services in clothes, not currency. They can wind up as nearly indentured servants working to pay off debts to their agencies.

And often designers and their staffs even fail to recognize that models need water as became clear during Kanye Wests presentation on Roosevelt Island last summer, when unpaid models collapsed in the September heat.

Im trying to make people realize the human cost of this behavior, Scully says. We have normalized it and become desensitized to it.

The Council of Fashion Designers of America offers some guidance all of it optional about providing food and water backstage and at long fittings, about not booking unhealthily thin models, about striving for diversity. The New York legislature passed a law in 2013 giving models younger than 18 protections similar to those that govern child actors, such as limits on work hours and regulations regarding pay.

But there are loopholes. And models 18 and older are essentially on their own, says Sara Ziff, who in 2012 founded the Model Alliance, an advocacy organization for models working in the United States.

I make sure parents understand that their child might be pressured to miss school, says Ziff, a former model. There are a lot of adult pressures that come with working in the industry at a young age.

In the past, models were typically in their 20s, with a sense of how the industry worked, by the time their careers gained traction. Now its all accelerated, Scully says. Todays models are being asked to do a womans job, and theyre kids.

The potential for abuse has grown with practices such as street casting, in which designers invite everyone from friends to their favorite bartender to participate in a show. The philosophy suggests that almost anyone can be a model at least for a few hours. The churn of fast fashion means that not just clothes are disposable; people are, too.

Girls are seeing this big dream world through social media. They think they can be a model and dont realize what theyre getting into. The turnaround now is so fast; its almost like trafficking, says Scully, who sits on the Model Alliance advisory board. Theyre pulled in and traumatized and then spit back out.

Scully, 52, is tall and slim with neatly trimmed salt-and-pepper hair, a jutting jaw, and a resting expression that is pleasantly somber supporting-actor handsome. His Manhattan apartment is filled with calming earth tones and nubby textures. He is the picture of earthy serenity by way of Architectural Digest.

But when he speaks, its at full gallop, his voice filled with the agita of someone whose childhood fantasy-come-true has gone bad.

One of 10 children in a working-class family, he spent his early childhood in South Amboy, N.J., a small city about an hour outside Manhattan that was almost all white and largely Catholic. It was the smallest town with the most bars, he says. Id never been around an Asian person. I didnt know what a Jewish person was.

He was transfixed by acting after an aunt took him to see Pippin on Broadway, but he loved fashion, too, thanks to an older sister with a stash of Cosmopolitan magazines. He enrolled at the Laboratory Institute of Merchandising (LIM), where he took a class taught by Audrey Smaltz, a former host of Ebony Fashion Fair and founder of the team of backstage dressers and assistants called the Ground Crew. Scully became her intern.

His freelance work with her helped pay his way through school until he was distracted by jobs in retail and nightlife. His grades fell, he lost his scholarship and dropped out. He got a job at the influential fashion boutique Charivari, later worked for the production company Kevin Krier & Associates, and then Harpers Bazaar. Scullys career helped him see the fashion industry from virtually every angle.

Hes been a part of fashion shows since the early 90s, and hes seen a lot in that time, Smaltz says. Hes seen all thats happened and how its changed. Its not nice.

Smaltz recalls when a runway show featured 10 to 15 professional models, and each would make three or four changes in a single show. Today, a show hires 50 women. Mostly, anonymous. No clothing changes.

How can you pay all those models? They try to pay the models in clothes. Smaltz says. You dont need anyone with experience. Theyre like robots. ... Some directors tell the girls: Do not smile. Do not clap. Its one model after another. Its a human conveyor belt.

Scullys foray into activism began in the mid-2000s, but the seeds had been planted earlier. As a teenager, his vision of fashion was shaped by images of the multicultural aesthetic of Saint Laurent and Halston in the 1970s an ideal he continued to carry into his career.

He went on to work on some of the most influential runway shows of the late 1990s, including those mounted by Tom Ford for Gucci and Yves Saint Laurent, whose casting was particularly diverse. Fords shows helped turn the Ethiopian-born model Liya Kebede into a star. In 2003, she became one of the faces of Estee Lauder the first black model to represent the beauty brand.

But the prejudices Kebede faced along the way exasperated Scully. A few years later, after taking time away from the industry, he joined activist Bethann Hardison and models Naomi Campbell and Iman in industry town halls, panel discussions and a media blitz to highlight the lack of black and brown models on the runway. Hardison, a former model and agent, worked to mentor more women of color, and men. Scully pushed to cast more of them in shows.

[Once Again, White Is the New White]

He speaks his mind. Thats who he is, Smaltz says. I just thought, Good for you, Scully. Take care of these young girls.

In May, he will be honored by the Black Alumni of Pratt Institute for his efforts.

In the winter of 2016, Scully delivered an impassioned talk at a Business of Fashion conference in Europe about labor practices that include bullying young women and treating puberty like a career-killer.

His February Instagram post, with more than 9,700 likes, received overwhelmingly positive feedback. Change is on the way thanks to you, wrote model Karolina Wallace.

It gives me a lot of hope to know that there is someone like you fighting for better treatment of models, wrote Gwen Van Meir, a young model. I once [was] in Milan, waited at a casting for almost four hours in the hot sun, with no water available. ... It seemed like a lot of the models were afraid to say anything.

Over the years, the very nature of what it means to be a model has shifted, from one of performer and experienced professional to that of an anonymous, prepubescent-looking mannequin. Only a few savvy young women of this era Gigi Hadid, Karlie Kloss, Kendall Jenner have successfully positioned themselves as full-fledged personalities with the potential for professional longevity. Thats largely thanks to their diligent off-the-clock efforts on social media.

But models have few work protections. Theyre not unionized. Financial agreements with agencies can be opaque. Pressure to lose weight is not just a medical concern but also a labor issue, says Ziff of the Model Alliance.

I think that many of the problems James called out models waiting an inordinate amount of time, working through the night, not having breaks all of that is a symptom of a bigger problem, Ziff says. And thats a power imbalance.

Modeling has always been unregulated. And a models career was always relatively short and reliant on a certain amount of good timing and genetics. But there was a code of ethics and on some human level, you did care about models, Scully says.

I sit and I have to do massive castings with 600 girls a season, Scully says. Im bleary-eyed. I have no idea who I saw.

Now its really about being clothes hangers, he says. Theyre disposable and replaceable.

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James Scully's radical idea for the fashion industry: Treat models like human beings - Washington Post

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This doctor plans to perform a human head transplant this year - New York Post

BERLIN No bones? No problem!

Scientists say theyve figured out a way to extract tiny traces of ancient human DNA from dirt in caves that lack skeletal remains.

The technique could be valuable for reconstructing human evolutionary history, according to the study published Thursday in the journal Science.

Thats because fossilized bones, currently the main source of ancient DNA, are scarce even at sites where circumstantial evidence points to a prehistoric human presence.

There are many caves where stone tools are found but no bones, said Matthias Meyer, a geneticist at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig, Germany, who co-authored the study.

The researchers collected 85 sediment samples from seven caves in Europe and Russia that humans are known to have entered or even lived in between 14,000 and 550,000 years ago.

By refining a method previously used to find plant and animal DNA, they were able to search specifically for genetic material belonging to ancient humans and other mammals.

Scientists focused on mitochondrial DNA, which is passed down the maternal line, because it is particularly suited to telling apart closely related species. And by analyzing damaged molecules they were able to separate ancient genetic material from any contamination left behind by modern visitors

The researchers found evidence of 12 mammal families including extinct species such as woolly mammoth, woolly rhinoceros, cave bear and cave hyena.

By further enriching the samples for human-like DNA, however, the scientists were able to detect genetic traces of Denisovans a mysterious lineage of ancient humans first discovered in a cave in Siberia and Neanderthals from samples taken at four sites.

Crucially, one of the sites where they discovered Neanderthal DNA was a cave in Belgium, known as Trou AlWesse, where no human bones had ever been found, though stone artefacts and animal bones with cut marks strongly suggested people had visited it.

In principle, every cave where theres evidence of human activity now offers this possibility

Eske Willerslev, who helped pioneer the search for DNA in sediment but wasnt involved in the latest research, said the new study was an interesting step, but cautioned that its difficult to determine how old sediment samples found in caves are.

In general (it) is very disturbed and unless you can show thats not the case you have no idea of the date of the findings, said Willerslev, an evolutionary geneticist at the University of Copenhagen, Denmark.

Meyer said the new method greatly increases the number of sites where archaeologists will be able to find genetic evidence to help fill gaps in the history of human evolution and migration, such as how widespread Neanderthal populations were and which stone tools they were able to make.

Scientists may also be able to greatly expand their limited knowledge of the Denisovans, whose DNA can still be found in Melanesians and Aboriginal Australians today, by using the new procedure.

In principle, every cave where theres evidence of human activity now offers this possibility, Meyer told The Associated Press.

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No bones? No problem! DNA from dirt tracing ancient humans found in 'empty' caves - National Post