Category Archives: Transhuman

Felipe Gmez-Pallete, president of Democratic Quality and Culture.

Felipe Gmez-Pallete, born in Reinosa (Cantabria) 78 years ago, has been able to observe from executive watchtowers of large companies, such as Inditex or IBM, the effects of technologies that ceased to be new a long time ago. author of The society of the information. Risks and opportunities for the Spanish company (Science of Management, 1988) together with such prominent authors as Eduardo Punset, Emilio Fontela, Jos Luis Sampedro and Luis Racionero, among others, is now embarking on a new publishing adventure together with Paz de Torres (former director of Cisco), with who also shares the direction of Democratic Quality and Culture, an organization designed to facilitate citizen participation. This new job Dont let the trees prevent you from seeing the forest: paths of artificial intelligence (scheduled for publication in Crculo Rojo in October), addresses the transformation of society based on systems and machines that mimic the human way of thinking. He considers that it is necessary to anticipate and act in the face of something as promising as it is conflictive. We are playing god, he warns.

Ask. What is behind artificial intelligence?

Response. Various forces. One of them is economic interests, make no mistake. There is also the scientific interest, whose curiosity has no limits. And then the philosophical engine. Man has always tried to create copies of himself, even better ones. One of the authors we quoted [en el libro] affirms that we do it for the same reason that we have children. The drive that moves us is to feel like creators. Its like playing god. Its what were doing. That would be the philosophical interpretation, but the earthly and powerful interpretation is that of the economic interests behind this, like any technological innovation.

P. Google fired engineer Blake Lemoine for attributing sentiment to an artificial intelligence program.

R. Artificial intelligence will not have feelings. You can program, turn into algorithms, everything that is knowledge or ideas, but feelings, human feeling, seems to me absolutely unprogrammable. I recently reread yesterdays world, by Stefan Zweig, where he states: Only illusion, not knowledge, makes man happy. illusion cannot be algorithmize and, therefore, I do not believe in these so-called transhuman or posthuman replicas. Maybe we are confusing desire with reality because, if it were true, turn it off and lets go.

It can be programmed, converted into algorithms, everything that is knowledge, ideas, but feelings, the human feeling, seems to me absolutely unprogrammable

P. Can artificial intelligence affect dignity?

R. It is one of the aspects that most concerns us. [a los autores del libro]. Dignity, freedom, social recognition. Advances in artificial intelligence, in one way or another, can jeopardize or alter these values. Rafael Yuste, who leads the Brain project and advised Obama, warns that there are advances that are changing human nature. It is very serious.

P. Is technology neutral?

R. Technology is not neutral, it is like a match with which you can light your childs birthday candle or set the mountain on fire. The entire technological process that ends up crystallizing in a product, be it a match or an artificial intelligence system, responds to the interests and values of the moment in which it is developed. And the artificial intelligence that is being developed responds to political, social and economic interests.

P. Are we too cautious when it comes to giving up our data?

R. Recently, at a gathering of friends, one of them said that he didnt care if he was being watched, but he should know that if youre sleeping with someone and the other also has a cell phone, a lot of people will know when, where and with whom youve been sleeping. asleep, to say something mundane. We are giving all sorts of data about ourselves, our behavior, what we like or dont like, where we are, what we buy

All advances in artificial intelligence, in one way or another, can jeopardize or alter the parameters that make up dignity

P. Does that violate the dignity of people?

R. Yes, among other things, because it invades your privacy. It undermines your dignity because you let go of intimate arguments that explain your life. To argue that we provide the personal data that we want to give is a half-truth.

P. Will artificial intelligence end up destroying the workforce?

R. It is an old controversy. He has been working on this issue since the eighties, in the field of information and communication technologies. Technologies, and specifically artificial intelligence, destroy and create jobs. It is obvious. And the balance is not clear. Llus Racionero used to say that we should not tear our hair out because there is less and less work: it is not a failure of capitalism; it is the demonstration of its success because, if we understand by capitalism the gradual substitution of the labor factor for the capital factor, that is what we are doing, we are substituting human labor for forms of capital and this is what it is.

P. Is it just a matter of quantity or, also, of quality of work?

R. Both. The substitution of the person for algorithms modifies and diminishes the possibilities of learning, because the machine is left with circumstances in which the person can no longer be formed because they are opaque to it.

P. Can artificial intelligence be regulated?

R. The products, systems and services that were born in the laboratory and are on the market obviously need to be regulated. Europe has much more muscle and interest than the United States or China, but that battle must continue to be fought. But our focus is not on the regulation of existing artificial intelligence systems. We ask: wouldnt it also be convenient to put the magnifying glass of regulation at the origin, at the beginning, at basic research? Is it lawful for humanity to investigate anything, to develop anything? One of our favorite quotes is this from Margaret Boden: We must be very careful what we invent. That is the key, because the technology, once developed, there is no stopping it. We can regulate it, temper it, but we are late. Why dont we explain the pros and cons of regulating basic research, where new developments are born? We have not seen that there is interest or focus on research, on the source of the river. They justify us that, in the end, they will provide remedies. But they do not tell us the other side of the coin: the enormous economic interests to which they respond.

The technology, once developed, there is no stopping it. We can regulate it, temper it, but we are late

P. Is it the case of the metaverse?

R. Who is going to create the metaverse if not because, behind it, there is an immense and unimaginable billionaire accumulation of economic interests? Is it being done for the happiness of mankind? Well no. So why isnt it made that clear?

P. Can citizens do something?

R. In our book we make a call to equip citizens with philosophical and historical thought. If you are educated about what life is and how it unfolds over time, we will handle these waves of technology in a way that is much more measured or conducive to human happiness.

P. Does it mean that we are looking for happiness in technology when it is in our very essence?

R. We are looking outside and we have to look inside. Artificial intelligence is practically absent from the public debate and we want to launch a small cry, mobilize civil society, promote initiatives that make citizens demand more clarity, that part of what they sell us is not hidden only as a benefit for humanity . It is not like this. Absolutely. For now, it destroys jobs with the promise of creating many more and invades peoples privacy. It changes the essence of the human being, as Rafael Yuste repeatedly says. We are not against artificial intelligence and its benefits. We are against selling part of the truth.

Is the metaverse being made for the happiness of mankind? Well no. So why isnt it made that clear?

P. Should we introduce ethics in the first steps of technology?

R. In the United States, France, Italy or Canada they pay a lot of attention, a lot of resources, a lot of money and a lot of researchers to the ethics applied to artificial intelligence. In Spain we see it, but with less force; it is more part of an official discourse, because it has to be said, but I really dont see great promoters of ethics in the field of artificial intelligence among us.

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Felipe Gmez-Pallete, president of Democratic Quality and Culture: We are playing god with artificial intelligence - Morning Express

Of course, youre not supposed to know this. Youre not supposed to know that youre being mind-controlled, right now, by a self-replicating mutagenic xeno-substance that was initially sold to us as the key to the future. So the proof of its existence is hidden in the only place it can be hidden. Its hidden in science fiction.

This year alone, black goothe science-fictional name for the science-factual graphene oxidehas seeped its way into not one but two sci-fi shows, Severance and Westworld. Three if you count Stranger Things, where it was sighted in earlier seasons. These sightings and intertextual seepagessublimations, clearly, of real-world tormentsare too consistent to be coincidental. They are signs that cannot be ignored.

Start with Westworld, whose latest season finds the robots in complete control of humankind. This they accomplished, the robot-in-chief indicates, using a combination of flies, parasites, and, yes, black goo. We see vats of the stuff in a hidden lair, glistening sickly. It seems to be the medium in which the parasites are growna callback to the first major appearance of black goo in the canon, the OG, the Original Goo itself: the Purity virus in The X-Files.

Middle of season 3, you remember. French salvagers discover an alien vessel deep in the ocean and mysteriously die, but a diving suit belonging to one of them is covered, Mulder discovers, in some kind of oil. (Black goo is variously referred to as black oil, black cancer, black bile, black blood, etc. All the same stuff.) Is it possible the oil is, as he later puts it, a medium used by alien creatures to body-jump? Thats as far as Westworlds callback takes it: black-goo-as-medium. But X-Files knows the whole truth. Thanks to science-minded Scully, we learn in season 5 that the body-snatcher is some sort of vermiform organism that gets attached to the pineal gland. Translation: Black goo isnt just medium. Its also monster.

Sometimes, the victims of black engooment in X-Files survive, so long as the stuff safely, if violently, self-ejects from eyes and mouth. Not so much the victims in the Alien franchise, which constitutes the goos best-known modern manifestation. As one of the franchises tie-in video games puts it: Any living thing that comes into direct contact with the black gooknown technically, in this universe, as Chemical A0-3959X.91-15will either die horribly, give birth to monsters, or become a monster themselves. You see a lot of this oozy, unrecoverable infection in Prometheus. Also in Rakka, a little-known short film by Neill Blomkamp, where Sigourney Weaver leads a last hurrah in 2020 Texas against alien colonizers equipped with black-goo weaponry that can somehow both control minds and obliterate buildings.

Obviously, the sci-fi record isnt perfectly clear on the workings of black goo; it is, by its nature, impossible to grasp. In Miyazaki movies, it tends to be ecologically terrorizing; in Luc Bessons Lucy, its some sort of sparkly transhumanist supercomputing thing. (Perhaps not so coincidentally, Scarlet Johansson, Lucys Lucy, also stars in Under the Skin, as an alien who drowns and eats men in a sea of black goo.) In Severance, its more metaphorical, a visual symbol for the ways in which separate realities bleed into and out of each other. Same goes for Stranger Things, where its a kind of interdimensional trespasser. The specifics, though, are somewhat beside the point. The medium is the metaphor is the monster is the message, and the message is this: Whatever black goo is, its alien, everywhere, and the source of all evil on the planet.

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The Biggest Threat to Humanity? Black Goo - WIRED

St. Louis County Republicans last week surely feel they dodged a bullet with the exit from the November ballot of Katherine Pinner, who was briefly the partys nominee for St. Louis County executive. Whatever issues shed hoped to focus on in her campaign, the real issue would have been the lawsuit she filed against her former employer alleging that its mask mandate was satanic and that getting vaccinated displeases God.

Pinner thus took her place among a long line of loons in elective politics these days. Not all, but most, hail from the rightward side of the political spectrum. Which invites some legitimate questions about what has happened to the once-sober conservative movement.

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Pinner is the 55-year-old political novice who emerged from out of nowhere this month to win the Republican nomination for the countys top political post. Online, she had voiced beliefs consistent with QAnon, the culty crowd that thinks a dark world of all-encompassing conspiracies hums just beyond plain sight a good-versus-evil epic that casts Donald Trump, improbably, as the former.

Pinners posts pointed out that if you replaced each B in President Bidens Build Back Better legislation with 6, youd end up with the mark of the devil. As voters started catching onto this plan of 6uild 6ack 6etter, the democrats quickly changed their slogan, she wrote. (Shes right. I remember the memo from headquarters.)

She suggested that coronavirus vaccines were laced with nanotechnology designed to bar code nine billion people in order to inventory them.

Its all connected, she warned.

Because, yknow, its always all connected.

After winning the Aug. 2 primary, Pinner apparently got some good advice and did some online house cleaning to remove indications that she is, well, crackers. But it seems she couldnt rein in her demons for long. The $1.2 million lawsuit Pinner filed last week against her former employer, the American Association of Orthodontists, for its pandemic policies, alleges that vaccines prompt transhumanism changes in the body that can lead to being barred from Gods graces. And it claims mask-wearing is associated with dehumanization and satanic ritual abuse.

In the latest head-spinning twist, Pinner late Thursday told the county Republican chair she plans to drop out of the race, without explaining why. Its a welcome if undeserved reprieve for the party, which can now put someone less demonstrably loopy on the ballot.

But the question remains: Why do Republicans, here and around America, keep nominating candidates who, if they approached them on the sidewalk, would prompt them to cross the street?

The poster-child for this phenomenon, of course, is Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Georgia. Evidence of her psychosis is too voluminous to detail here, so lets leave it at her suggestion that Californias wildfires were caused by space-based lasers controlled by a cabal of Jewish overlords.

Rep. Lauren Boebert, R-Colorado, hasnt achieved quite that level of bonkers, but its not for lack of effort. Among her litany of lunacy was a speech in June declaring, The church is supposed to direct the government Im tired of this separation of church and state junk thats not in the Constitution. (Narrator: Except in the very first words of the very first amendment in the Bill of Rights.)

Republican candidates coming up through this years congressional primaries promise more of this derangement. Even Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell who has more motive than anyone to get Republicans seated, no matter the details recently worried aloud that his party might fail to take back the Senate because of what he diplomatically called candidate quality issues.

Dr. Mehmet Oz, Pennsylvanias Republican Senate nominee, has pushed such quack remedies that it prompted an essay in the normally staid Scientific American headlined: Dr. Oz Shouldnt Be a Senator or a Doctor. Arizona Republicans have nominated to the Senate 36-year-old Blake Masters, who has praised the anti-tech manifesto of Ted Unabomber Kaczynski. In Georgia, GOP Senate nominee Herschel Walker the former NFL star who has already been in the politically awkward position of having to issue clarifications to the media regarding how many children he has fathered by how many women bashed Bidens new climate law last week by asking, Dont we have enough trees around here?

Then (as always) theres Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, who last week lambasted Dr. Anthony Fauci at a fundraising event. Fauci, the federal governments top infectious-disease expert, is retiring in the face of conservative fury over his allegiance to science instead of Trump. But thats not good enough for DeSantis, who told the crowd that someone needs to grab that little elf and chuck him across the Potomac. Its worth noting that this elevated rhetoric comes from the man who many Republicans view as the more-sane alternative to Trump for the GOPs 2024 presidential nomination.

Despite the controversy surrounding Pinners brief presence on the St. Louis County ballot, she perhaps shouldnt completely discount a future in the GOP. At the rate its going, todays Republican Party will likely have a place for people like her for a long time to come.

Kevin McDermott is a Post-Dispatch columnist and Editorial Board member. On Twitter: @kevinmcdermott Email: kmcdermott@post-dispatch.com

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McDermott: Pinner may have been crackers, but in today's GOP, she was practically normal - St. Louis Post-Dispatch

One of the most exciting things about the introduction of a New Year is all the tech, trends, and games that roll out. This is a time when manufacturers, designers, and creators want to make the biggest impact on their audience. It can be a defining or breaking time for any company. This is especially true for the gaming industry, as the bar is being raised to unbelievable heights year after year.

That said, there is usually so much rolled out at the beginning of the year that it can be hard to keep up with it all sometimes. While 2022 is well over halfway over, the world has been introduced to some truly groundbreaking accomplishments. If youve already found yourself overwhelmed, here are some of the biggest that you certainly dont want to miss out on.

Elden Ring

Fully explorative gaming is nothing new these days. Designers have been creating what seems like near-endless worlds for gamers to explore and delve into. Because of this, the genre has seemed to become a bit overplayed and saturated. Perhaps a bit watered down. Well, Elden Ring changes all that and brings new light back into the genre.

Its one of the first fully explorative games in a long time that makes the act of exploration feel endlessly rewarding. Coming off his groundbreaking achievement of the legendary Dark Souls series, Hidetaka Miyazaki once again redefines what a Souls game can be.

In the dense open world of Elden Ring, deadly secrets are lurking around every corner, tucked inside nooks and crannies, and stashed in places where no one would even think to explore. It will be your curiosity that rewards the most breathtaking discoveries in this harsh environment.

True to his nature, this game will be no cakewalk and youll need to improve your skills to venture into the most rewarding of all territories.

The Quarry

There is something about a big budget that seems to accompany failure. Just look at all the previous games, designers, Hollywood producers, and directors that have sunk millions into creating something thats supposed to be so earth-shattering that it seems surreal. What usually happens when the finished product rolls out? It fails to live up to the hype!

That certainly was not the case with The Quarry. And there is one reason that it took the path less traveled. That was because it was one of the funniest and warmest adolescence games to roll out in years. There are plenty of gruesome and terrifying scenes that could easily bump this game up to an R rating, but it first draws on the players sympathy.

There is no denying that the higher budget opened more doors for a well-known and defined cast as well as access to more varied playable environments, but it mesh the perfect amount of cinematic horror with the teen slasher feel. The Quarry was 2K Games return to the industry, and it could easily be described as a triumphant one. Take a few hours away from your favorite to immerse yourself in this horrifying world of unknowns.

Sephonie

One of the things that most players enjoy about games is that they feel futuristic. That was a big part of Cyberpunk, right? Well, Sephonie doesnt match up to the graphics and cinematic experience of such games, but it does an excellent job of creating a sci-fi platform that feels like one of the most futuristic experiences possible.

Even long after you finish the experience youll be left with lingering thoughts, feelings, and doubts. How transhuman enhancements can change relationships with flora/fauna mixed with alien ecology only adds to the complexity of the characters and ideas.

Despite all this, the most impressive thing about this game is that it was largely completed by only two individuals. Thats an immense accomplishment when compared to the levels this game reaches.

Tom Clancys Rainbow Six Extraction

Although the Rainbow Six franchise has taken on a cooperative online platform over the years, Extraction goes in a completely different direction. Instead of using high-tech gadgets and gear to breach defending areas and planning out tactical assaults, it goes back to the basics.

The game does offer online play, but it feels just as rewarding to design and implement your own tactical approach to fighting zombies.

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Gaming Adventures You Don't Want To Miss In 2022 - Gamesreviews

Okay, this one may not technically be a furry game. If the late Fred Patten were to start this review off, he may have asked something along the lines that if you as a player moves around the world as a cat with a robot companion augmenting their ability to interpret the society around them, is that game actually anthropomorphic? Perhaps its more in line with transhumanism, but in this case more transfelinism, where your feline character is augmented by their technological companion.

And like Adam Jensen of Deus Ex: Human Revolution, the cat you play certainly didnt ask for this.

The opening of the game reminded me of Milo and Otis, an old movie of a dog and a cat that end up getting lost in the woods and need to make their way back home. Basically it was the predecessor of Homeward Bound: The Incredible Journey. In this case, the unnamed feline protagonist you play as is just catting around with other cats when you find yourself in trouble and are separated from your companions and fall down into a strange lost society of automatons.

You go on your own heros journey through this strange world that has established itself under what appears to be a giant blast shield facility. In order to return to the surface youll need to help your new robot friends, while avoiding the perils of an invasive species that has taken root in the darkness of this underworld.

While the game has been noted to be on the shorter side, it is very much a complete and contained experience. It has moments of tension and balances it well with a cathartic sense of discovery and exploration. I noted while playing that the designer definitely took inspiration from Valve works, and this includes their understanding of Battle Fatigue.

Things can work their way to a bit of an intensity when dealing with the headcrab like creatures that want to chew on your cat hide, but your moments of fleeing and fighting are spaced out where it doesnt become fatiguing.

The world is fun and immersive and the robot characters are interesting. There are certain embellishments that were fun, such as a fully functioning pool table in the bars that you can bat the ball around with your paws. Desks are littered with items to knock down, though disappointingly it doesnt cause frustrations if the owner of said desk watches you knock things off like the true feline you are.

I would recommend this game if you are a curious sort, you know, like a cat. You like to explore places and enjoy the story of a exotic society. If youre the kind that likes a more visceral or reaction based game of skill, you may not enjoy it so much. Take your time and take in the environment around you and youll get the most out of it. Talk to as many folks as you can and do the tasks they ask of you to get the most out of it. Heck, you can even nap around and take in the world as the camera pans out. Because cats like their naps.

Not much to say, its a short game and its mostly the story which I cant go into without spoiling things. Its a nice and contained experience that should you enjoy its premise enough, youll come back to experience it again like a film or a book. Its sometimes refreshing to experience a game that is a contained experience rather than one that expects to be a service it sells to you for the next decade.

To me, I would rather pay 30 bucks for a complete and enjoyable experience even if it is short, then to get it for free and go through a bunch of immersion breaking microtransactions. If that is too pricey for you for a seven hour experience, then you can feel free to wait for the price point to come down.

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Stray - A simple and focused game in a world of games that go astray - Flayrah

But today there is a third city affecting the other two. Silicon Valley, this third city, is not governed primarily by reason (it is practically the mark of a great entrepreneur to not be reasonable), nor by the things of the soul (the dominant belief seems to be a form of materialism). It is a place, rather, governed by the creation of value. And a large component of value is utilitywhether something is useful, or is at least perceived as good or beneficial.

I realize that some people in Silicon Valley think of themselves as building rationalist enterprises. Some of them might be. The citys guiding spirit, however, is summed up by investor and podcast host Shane Parrish, popular among the Silicon Valley set, when he says: The real test of an idea isnt whether its true, but whether its useful. In other words, utility trumps truth or reason.

Our new centurythe world from 2000 to the present dayis dominated by Silicon Valleys technological influence. This city has produced world-changing products and services (instantaneous search results, next-day delivery of millions of products, constant connectivity to thousands of friends) that create and shape new desires. This new city and the new forces it has unleashed are affecting humanity more than anything Tertullian could have imagined.

And this new city is growing in power. Never before have the questions of Athens and the questions of Jerusalem been mediated to us by such a great variety of things that vie for our attention and our desires. Silicon Valley, this third city, has altered the nature of the problem that Tertullian was wrestling with. The questions of what is true and what is good for the soul are now mostly subordinated to technological progressor, at the very least, the questions of Athens and Jerusalem are now so bound up with this progress that its creating confusion.

It is hard to escape the utilitarian logic of Silicon Valley, and we lie to ourselves when we rationalize our motivations. The most interesting thing about the cryptocurrency craze was the ubiquity of white papersthe framing of every new product in purely rational terms, or the need to present it as a product of Athens. And then there was Dogecoin.

Were not living in a world of pure reason or religious enchantment, but something entirely new.

Reason, religion, and the technology-driven quest to create value at any cost are now interacting in ways we scarcely understand, but which have vast influence over our everyday lives. Our two-decades-long experiment with social media has already shown the extent to which reason, or Athens, is being flooded with so much content that many have referred to it as a post-truth environment. Some social psychologists, like Jonathan Haidt, believe its making us crazy and undermining our democracy. Humanity is at a crossroads. We are trying to reconcile various needsfor rationality, for worship, for productivityand the tension of this pursuit shows up in the things we create. Because the three cities are interacting, we are now living with technology-mediated religion (online church services) and technology-mediated reason (280-character Twitter debates); religiously adopted technology (bitcoin) and religiously observed reason (Covid-19 cathedrals of safety); rational religion (effective altruism) and rational technology (3D-printed assisted-suicide pods).

If Tertullian were alive today, I believe he would ask: What does Athens have to do with Jerusalemand what do either have to do with Silicon Valley? In other words, how do the domains of reason and religion relate to the domain of technological innovation and its financiers in Silicon Valley? If the Enlightenment champion Steven Pinker (a resident of Athens) walked into a bar with a Trappist monk (Jerusalem) and Elon Musk (Silicon Valley) with the goal of solving a problem, would they ever be able to arrive at a consensus?

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The Three-City Problem of Modern Life - WIRED