FollowBig title. Active thoughts for a Monday morning. A long blog. Think of all the energy a rocket needs at take off just to lift those first few feet. Before I go blogging officially: the dedication of blog entry. I’m holding a bottle of champagne with nowhere to break it. My favorite earth creature (for my 30’s decade) was the Ostrich. If there was a problem with life on the rural plain, the Ostrich buried head in sand (like under a pillow in a dark room). Miraculously, one of two things happened upon removal; problem was either still there or not. Perhaps an animal behavior psychologist should’ve Pavlovian taught the practicality of a coin toss; maybe eliminating sandy ears (was Road Runner the same species?) Having moved passed that mid-life decade (way past) another life form comes to mind for dealing with problems. Samantha Stevens always smiled, was basically cool, calm and collected; just the twitch of that perfectly formed nose handed down from father Robert Montgomery (nominated for an Oscar for ‘Here Comes Mr. Jordan.’ Claude Rains was in that movie too; best as Louis in ‘Casablanca’). Samantha’s nose twitches; Thomas Jefferson is having dinner with her and Darren. Kennedy once said as 49 Nobel Prize winners were dining with him at the White House; that this dinner constituted the greatest collection of talent and human knowledge except perhaps when Jefferson (a Deist) dined alone. How magical Samantha was. How many of us dream of twitching our noses like her? I am right now. Elizabeth was such a great talent. Her father, brother and her all died from cancer. A propitious segue to Transhumanism and the H+ Summit.
Through the magic of Facebook (soon a $50 billion IPO? Recent Russian anti-Semitism chased away a young man and his family. He came to America and co-founded Google. $150 Billion innovation chased away from Moscow. But at least a Russian owns the New Jersey Nets now) I found out about the H+ Summit at Harvard (Thanks to Alex L.) Two days of 60 amazing speakers talking about the Rise of the Citizen Scientist, Singularity, Transhumanism (live longer, be smarter. Maybe down a future road, they could’ve done something with Elizabeth’s pre-cancer genes). To this day, I still regret not having gone to the March on Washington in August, 1963. To add to a growing list of life’s regrets, was not being LIVE at this summit. But I watched the live stream (and continue to watch the un-live stream rebroadcast) and promised myself, next May at H+ Summit, I’ll be there. Singularity in case you wonder: Maybe in a few decades a superior intelligence will be in charge (like HAL in 2001?). Life won’t be the same. I know that now. There won’t be any Tuna left in the seas. Maybe the seas, thanks to BP are dead anyway. I had to get that in. Right now, no one can really predict down the road. But when it happens, Singularity says humans and machines will merge (become single) so bad health, old age and even dying is gone. Once again we could’ve helped Elizabeth. Maybe Singularity is this escape twitching to living to 150. Twitch rhymes with switch. I’ve been saying for a long time, one day we’ll find that switch that starts the aging process and you know what? Design a computer to design a computer that can find that switch. Are we at the 6th paradigm? Three dimensional molecular computing.
Everyone, I suppose had an old swimming hole growing up. In Newark, it was a pool in a Temple on Clinton Avenue (the same place where Dr. King spoke in early 1963. I should’ve been there too). A few laps, dry off and your head is still swimming, ears ringing with clogged water. My mind is swimming from Saturday and Sunday’s speakers. One showed a video of a creature in a maze-like situation. I’m in a verbal maze. I don’t know what to say first. On Saturday afternoon, I did have the best of all worlds imaginable; watching the stream of speakers, taking notes and pedaling on my exercise bike, full throttle, thereby enabling my cerebral telomeres to stay young, vibrant; making them and the rest of my cells forget their age. When the Saturday session was over, I journeyed through the Lincoln Tunnel to the Upper East Side of New York, met siblings, had dinner (with Pellegrino not Vichy Water on the table). Walking around the city on a summer Saturday night is nirvana until you realize, no one is over thirty anywhere. Even two old women, supported by a cane and a walker, talking to a doorman on Park Avenue somehow looked in their late twenties. I was so self conscious (of my age) and remembering the movie, “Logan’s Run” where anyone over thirty is vaporized(I’m never in the mood for that) I ran into a deserted alley, found the cat from “Breakfast at Tiffany’s” and rushed back to New Jersey where they accept every one(not like the Russians) When I got home, (still hungry, remembering that fancy Manhattan dining usually means plates garnished like an Andy Warhol painting, with just several strands of Pappardelle pasta. A voice said, “It’s all in the presentation”) I opened a box of Cheerios and sat in my high chair (high refers to mental state, still euphoric from all the biking endorphins) The cereal filled me up, senses too. Felt my cholesterol dropping 3 %. Love unrestrained high chairs at 2 AM.
What a world. Sunday night. After Day #2. So much to learn. Social networking to meet ‘likes.’ Moore’s Law. Computing performance per unit cost. More bang for bucks every 24 months. Swimming. Neuro-modulation. My hand is raised. I’ll volunteer. Improve my health. When I start all over, let me keep both my meniscus. Maybe grow a second heart when needed. Redundancy works for me. I remember a pix of an Albatross on Midway Island( body was filled with ingested garbage, thrown away, all the way out there) The first synthetic cell was created. More swimming. Someday an I-Pad becomes an oscilloscope. Imagine a future subway ride in New York City, now accepting people in their forties, looking at your oscilloscope and showing off your spikes to a complete stranger. Somebody said Italy’s birth rate is 1.2 % (not enough to sustain a country and their population is aging. I worry about that) Michael S. mentioned language barriers in our world holding us back. I wrote a blog about that a while back and called it “Tower of Babble.” I haven’t eaten red meat since 1975. One day, they’ll grow meat in a lab dish. So what happens to my objections then? Do I start looking for an ethicist now? Do we need a moral high ground in the future? What about the cell that takes up CO2, gets energy from the sun, and pees gasoline? I’ll bet plenty Exxon raises the price of our pump gas to fund that one. And finally listening to Ray Kurzweil talk. Indeed what a wonderful world and conference.
The race track reference in the title: I always lose when I go the track. Once made 27 bets and lost all 27. I don’t go anymore. There’s another race on. Really important. I’m not betting. Just sitting in my high chair as I write this. I wouldn’t think to go to the dock at the bay; just sit in a wooden chair. Nano-tech will give us (earthlings) the first true society of abundance. But will sustainability let us reap. It’s a race. Much appreciation to all the folks at H+ Summit for mind expansion. Read novel ‘Vichy Water’ for future think as well.