A Tale of Two Cities

Hurricane Rita slammed into the Texas and Louisiana coasts Saturday, bringing strong winds and a significant storm surge. New Orleans was flooded once again, but this time the city was depopulated, and there was no repeat of the primitive lawlessness that occurred after Hurricane Katrina.

Houston, Texas, received a strong lashing from hurricane winds. Some looters tried to take advantage of the largely evacuated city, and the adverse weather. Houston was better prepared than New Orleans. Many looters were arrested, and many more were discouraged by the presence of either police officers, or citizen armed patrols. Certainly Houston contained a large number of criminals, just as New Orleans did. The state and local authorities in Houston were competent and aware, unlike their counterparts in Louisiana and New Orleans. There were none of the rapes, murders, carjackings, and other lawlessness that made New Orleans famous for all the wrong reasons.

Houston functioned as a modern, western city. New Orleans functioned as a city in Haiti, or better yet, Hades. Why the difference? Not very many miles separate the two cities. Houston was not flooded like New Orleans, but the hurricane's passage provided an excellent opportunity for the stay-behind criminal, just as it did in New Orleans.

Incompetence of local government officials, due to corrupted democratic institutions, is probably responsible for the Louisiana disaster. New Orleans had simply developed into an incredibly foul nest. It required a catastrophic event of nature to demonstrate just how foul.

The example of Houston's behaviour under duress should provide some encouragement that Louisiana is not representative of the United States, North America, or the increasingly multicultural developed world in general. That is most fortunate, since it is this multicultural aspect of the developed world which is growing the most rapidly. These new arrivals must pull their fair share of the load, rather than becoming freeloaders as many fear they will be. The technological progress required to push humans over the hump depends upon developed nations maintaining a high productivity.

Next level humans are waiting to be born.

Right Ascension

I have a confession to make. I do not really believe in "the singularity." Certainly I have links on the sidebar leading to several long discussions about the implications of the singularity, or "the omega point," as it is sometimes called. The concept is an important one, and approximates roughly what is likely to happen, unless the hyper-luddites of the left and right bring scientific progress to a screeching halt.

To actually reach the singularity is more difficult than to talk about it. It may be impossible. Like Zeno's paradoxes, you can approach the target but you can never strike it. Consider the state of affairs that would constitute a "singularity" to a modern between-levels human. Then consider the state of affairs that would constitute a "singularity" to a next-level human. They are not the same.

Humans have not reached their ultimate potential, even with the currently evolved genome. Changes in environmental parameters, particularly pre-natal environment, but also early childhood environment, have significant potential to improve mean human intelligence, by lifting some of the lower tail values. Significant statistically, but not nearly enough for our purposes.

The genome has to be modified, very carefully. Mind and brain need time to co-evolve into new realities. How long? It takes human girl infants about two years to become little chatterboxes. Human boys may take three years. Any adult humans who try to make the transformation will have to go through years of intense adjustment, similar to the early childhood years. The person who emerges may not resemble the original person very closely. No one knows.

Parallel to research in increasing human intelligence, is research into machine intelligence. Machines have no "rights organisations," so researchers can do what they like with machines, then discard them. The combination of research into machine intelligence, cognitive science, nanotechnology, and information technology, is leading inexorably toward new forms of intelligence. Humans had best do what they can to keep up.

Descent into the Inferno

Last week in the US city of New Orleans, a large number of people descended into hell on earth. Following the breach of a flood levee, the partially evacuated city lapsed into total lawlessness, as the city police joined the looters, or simply deserted their posts and left the city. As the city government collapsed into uselessness, the Louisiana state government apparently failed to fill the gap, even lacking an individual to place in charge of the logistics of relief efforts. This failure of local government to attempt to meet the needs of a devastating emergency boggles the mind.

The entire world was treated to stories of massive lootings, arson, rape, pillage, and murder. A small group of mostly European and Australian tourists, racially white, were threatened with death repeatedly by the black co-refugees inside the major evacuation centers inside New Orleans. These tourists were very afraid that the police could not protect them, and the police admitted as much. In the midst of an incredible human disaster, they were threatened because they were white. Not in Haiti, not in Cote d'Ivoire. In the United States of America, the richest nation in the world.

Thank goodness for the US military and its ability to get to disasters quickly. Despite the failure of local and state government, the US Navy, Coast Guard, and other elements of the US military were able to ultimately bring relief and order back into the chaos and impromptu human violence -- and make the place safe again for civilian forces. But what if there was no US military -- or if the US military were as incompetent and corrupt as most other militaries of the world? Things would have turned out much differently.

In order for the progress toward the singularity, toward the next level, to take place, civilisation has to maintain its hold on at least the developed world. The rule of law must be maintained, law and order must provide the stability for progress.

Various subcultures naturally develop in the freedom of the western world, where multiculturalism is celebrated, and some of these subcultures will inevitably become dysfunctional at some point. This dysfunctionality must be pointed out, and corrected both by the leaders of society at large, by the media in the society, and by respected people within the subculture itself. If the subculture has devolved too far to produce respected people from within, who will oppose its dysfunctionality, then other means of protecting society will have to be worked out, preferably while still respecting everyone's freedoms and rights.

This problem is something that will have to be dealt with eventually. I suspect that it will be contained well enough to allow the transitions I have been describing to occur among much of the population. At that point, better ideas for turning the negative devolution into a positive evolution will be produced.

It would be nice if a developed society of modern between-levels humans could come up with solutions for this problem that they themselves are responsible for, but between-levels humans are not far evolved above primitive level humans themselves. The dominance of the shit-throwing monkeys (post-modernist dogmatists and the political correctness police) in academia, government, and much of the corporate world is testimony to that.

No, it seems clear to me that the appearance of a significant number of next level humans will be necessary, before any meaningful solution to this "devolution in the middle of evolution" can be found.

More Remarks on IQ by Race and Gender

In a recent Commentary Magazine article, Charles Murray updates his findings on IQ as it relates to race. Back in 1994, before I was aware of such issues, Murray and Hernnstein published The Bell Curve, a sociological look at how small differences in IQ, evolved over tens of thousands of years in separated populations, might influence modern social dynamics. His recent article linked above refers to a significant body of research that has been done since the publication of his book.

The thrust of this blog is entirely devoted to helping all humans transition to the next level, regardless of race or gender. It is my emphatic assertion that such a transition as I envision will render any remaining differences in intelligence between groups both random and insignificant. I make a further, more emphatic assertion. The people who oppose research into group differences in intelligence and cognitive abilities, are the very people who are obstructing the transition to a higher level of intelligence for the groups they purport to help. In other words, they are only another version of shit-throwing monkey, criticising honest researchers out of an innate instinct rather than from a rational, principled counter-hypothesis.

These monkeys could learn a lot from a group that they look down upon and secretly despise. I am referring to the class of blue collar worker known as maintenance workers. A maintenance worker is tasked to keep machines and systems of varying complexity operating. If the machines or systems break down, the maintenace person is called upon to repair the system. There is no fudging to be done here. Either the system will be fixed by the maintenance person or it will not. If not, another maintenance person is called who can fix the system. The maintenance person has to understand how the system works, and what has gone wrong. If he cannot do that much, he certainly cannot repair the system, in most cases. Any maintenance person who persists in denying that a system is broken, despite the obvious fact that it does not work, will be relegated to the unemployment line rather quickly.

Shit-throwing monkeys, on the other hand, are paid handsomely to deny that the broken system is broken. The louder their denials, the more they are paid. Millions may suffer because the broken system is neglected, not properly repaired, due to the denials of the monkeys. Nevertheless, the monkeys grow old, fat, comfortably well off, and retire as legends in their own minds.

When two different populations of initially similar individuals are allowed to evolve in isolation from each other for many hundreds of generations, significant differences between the populations are bound to arise. Even when two populations are coexistant geographically, but mostly separate in terms of mating and procreation, differences will show up. Finally, even when two groups coexist geographically, and mate freely with each other, significant differences can persist if the two groups were significantly different to begin with. As in human males and human females.

Yes, the differences in IQ by race and gender do exist, at least statistically and reproducibly. Perhaps they are not significant when it comes to real life performance, or more likely, the differences are only significant in a few specific areas. All the more reason to understand what is happening, and to utilise the very best of the best in the pursuit of the keys to the next level.

The Limits to Biology

Human beings are made of mostly soft tissue that is easily cut, bruised, crushed, burned, penetrated, torn, and liquified. This "too, too, solid flesh" is actually too, too, insubstantial flesh. Worse, this flesh is programmed to fall apart when its capacity to repair itself runs down.

Humans are too heavy to fly like birds, and also lacking in gills and proper streamlining/muscularization to swim like fish, limited to a narrow reach of the biosphere where oxygen concentrations are high enough, temperatures are mild enough, for frail humans to survive. To survive for a short time, long enough to breed and pass on enough knowledge to progeny so that they can live and breed.

The human brain is massively parallel, and composed of marvelous mechanisms of responsiveness and creation. Alas, it is also slow. Even were the human brain much faster in its responses and assessments, the human body would be unable to react with speed, for fear of tearing something loose, or breaking something. Real world mechanics places strict limits on what the human can do, and how quickly.

Ever since the dawn of computing machines, humans have dreamed of truly intelligent machines, machines that might even surpass man in ability to learn and reason. Artificial intelligence. The twists and turns taken by that field are fascinating and instructive, but not for today's posting. Something else that is artificial, synthetic biology is worth considering.

Most of you are familiar with the development of artificial replacement organs and tissues. Artificial appendages have become a big business for plastic surgeons and urologists. This business will only grow. [Chuckle]

Synthetic biology dives deeply into the mysteries of cellular workings, and aims to develop living materials that never existed. From the lowliest organelle to the cells, to tissues, to anything else that can be engineered. Using mathematical and numerical methods, borrowing from genomics and bioinformatics, doing in practice what nanoengineers only dream of doing--synthetic biologists are building a new biology almost from scratch.

What will this new biology accomplish? Yes, would you not like to know that? Perhaps you would also like to know the names of some biotech stocks that are likely to increase in value by ten or a hundred in the next five years? Yes, so would I. But that is largely informed guesswork. That is just money, something that next levels will be rolling in, if they wish.

Seriously, the new synthetic biology promises to accomplish many of the intermediate steps that de Grey and his SENS technologies are attempting to accomplish. The new biology is actually assembler nanotechnology in its most basic, imitative form. All of us knew that assembler nanotechnology would have to bootstrap itself up from the proof of concept, the biological mechanisms of life. Now that is being done.

This level of manipulation of life is a thing of science fiction, a tremendous jump ahead of what most science fiction authors would have predicted. You will not hear a lot of solid details for a while. Too much is riding on the early discoveries and patents. Information will be held close to the vest. Still, information has to be used in order to convert it to more tangible benefits.

When will you read about major advances from this technology in your local paper, or see a startling breakthrough on your local television news? Long, long, after you know all about it from other sources, if you keep watching and reading.

The Exponential Growth of Knowledge

If time is the horizontal axis and knowledge is the vertical axis, the resulting curve takes on an exponential shape with a vertical asymptote placed along the time axis somewhere before the end of the present century, perhaps before mid-century. A lot of assumptions are involved, but the underlying idea is sound.

Some people call the vertical asymptote on the graph "the singularity." The singularity being the point of no return, the point in time when humans accumulate so much knowledge that the knowledge feeds upon itself in a positive feedback loop that takes the curve truly vertical.

A lot of things can stop human progress between now and then. Nuclear war, a large asteroid strike, inter-civilisational wars of a global nature, massive releases of chemical and biological contaminants, toxicants, and pathogens . . . In many countries electricity generation is so centralised as to be vulnerable to multiple large-scale attacks. The same is true for fuel supply for transportation. Without electricity and transportation, the western world would crash. Food could not get to the consumer, water could not be pumped and purified, hospitals could not store blood or medicines safely, all the high tech equipment the western world depends on would turn into expensive landfill garbage.

People talk about large scale economic disruption, but as long as there is electricity and transportation, with provision of edible food and clean water, the economy can bounce back. Without the basics, the economy is done. With a long-term economic crash, human research and progress will slow to a crawl. There would be no increase in intelligence, longevity, or miracle cures for spinal cord injuries, cancer, heart , lung and liver disease, etc.

The western world is the heart of secular liberal democracy, the rule of law, orderly government, and the scientific approach to knowledge acquisition. The Anglosphere of English speaking nations is the "Sanctum Sanctorum" of the western world, the heart of hearts. As long as the Anglosphere is kept safe and free from excessive interference from outside ideological interests, the knowledge singularity will arrive eventually.

What we need to do, as preparers of the ground, is to develop better methods of modeling knowledge, in more dynamic and interactive ways. It is important to decentralise this better modeled knowledge. It is also important to decentralise the production of electric power, at least significant backup power, and to develop alternative fuels for transportation that can be easily produced in emergency, albeit at higher costs than we are currently accustomed to.

The more difficult it is to crash western civilisation, the more likely the singularity appears on the horizon. We have to plan as if it is coming, at the same time we are planning to ensure that it does come.

Walking the Walk

I am over-educated and over-qualified for most occupations. Too many degrees, too much higher education. As a consultant and writer, I let those credentials work for me. As anything else, I would have a lot of explaining to do. Especially explaining why I continue to train in new fields. To break new ground, a person must understand the ground that has already been broken.

One problem is, it is much too easy for someone to bullshit about longevity and intelligence. Durk Pearson and Sandy Shaw have made a good living bull-shitting ever since the 1980s. I met them once and spoke with them briefly. It did not take long for my bullshit detector to go off. They attempted to come across as bio-medical experts, but I was the one who was in medical and graduate schools at the time. They failed the test, they simply did not know what they were talking about. Good enough on a surface level to snow-job the uninformed. Not good enough to back it up.

Preparation for next level humans is too important, too complex, to be left to pretenders and bullshitters. Those types of people may well dominate the interaction with popular media, and that is fine. Consider it a smokescreen of sorts to help conceal the actual work behind the scenes.

Next level humans will be incredibly intelligent, intelligent enough to know how to augment their own intelligence. Time will be a constraint, even for someone with a lifespan of 500 years. Priorities will be set, critical paths laid out, redundancy and rapid adaptability built into the system. No one can really anticipate what it will mean to have an IQ three times normal combined with a several century lifespan.

When next levels are ready to begin walking the walk, they will need guidance, in the same sense that a space ship needs guidance. The dangers are great and numerous and need to be mapped out. Someone has to prepare the way. This is part of the work that needs to be done, along with the nuts and bolts of combining longevity advances with intelligence improvements and emotional balancing/wisdom generation. Long life and intelligence would be a curse without emotional balance and wisdom. All of the above together would be less than fulfilling without tangible guidance and direction.

We cannot any of us know everything. Some of us compulsively try to do so. The best we can accomplish will be very little beside the accomplishments of a next level. All the more reason for the compulsives to do everything in their power to bring the possibilities to reality while there is time for them.

Another Look at Islamic Terrorism

Muslim terrorists generally have one thing in common: they want to install a global Caliphate to administer Sharia Islamic Law over every human being in the entire world. Anyone who violates Sharia would pay whatever penalty the religious judge chose to administer. Beatings, imprisonment, amputation, beheading, death by stoning.

The great return to the Stone Age? Not exactly. Not immediately. There are plenty of modern and semi-modern weapons and munitions to be used by non Salafists against the muslim terrorists. Nuclear, biological, chemical, conventional weapons--all would be used nearly to exhaustion of all supplies. The entire earth would become a wasteland, except those lucky regions where the inhabitants had managed to exclude the Salafists and the effects of their weapons. Even there, the impact of war would intrude, as refugees tried to swarm in to get away from radiation, plague, famine, persecution, and war, bringing much of what they are trying to escape along with them.

Many people scoff at the threat from islamist terrorists. A lot of these scoffers are frightened to death of globalization, global warming, the US "pax americana", eurocentrism, the fruits of modern scientific research, even rational thought itself. These are persons totally unprepared for the violent storm waiting to break. Unconsciously they assume the authorities of the western world, who they hate, will protect them, should the violence they deny so loudly actually come to pass. They are, in short, total fools who deserve nothing from anyone. Unable to protect themselves, unwilling to protect their neighbors, capable only of throwing shit on the very organisations that stand between them and bloody total mayhem. Like monkeys throwing shit.

What can stop this coming deluge of blood and murder? Only rational thought. Only the triumph of western rational thought over the irrationality of the postmodernist shit-throwing monkeys and the religious extremists.

A carpenter, plumber, electrician, and janitor is far more rational than the most "intelligent" postmodern university instructor. Every member of those occupations has to understand what he is doing, and perform appropriately within his task environment in order to do a job well. There is a clear difference between a good job and a bad job in those occupations. Not so for the monkeys employed as postmodern university instructors. Their bad jobs are so obscured, so politically protected, that they cannot be corrected or repaired. There is no discipline for a postmodernist monkey. They are encouraged to throw as much shit as they wish, the more the better.

When looking for rational solutions, do not look to the universities. You expect irrationality from the Sociology, Ethnic Studies, Language Departments, all the Humanities. Even the Psychology, Biology, Paleontology, Genetics, Anthropology, and Cognitive Science departments have been heavily infiltrated by the monkey scat-tossers. Rationality flees the universities as nepotism and political appointments fill the ranks of professors, even in the Science Departments.

Do not look to the corporations. As true-believing nepotists infiltrate the Human Resources departments, further hiring is dominated by nepotistic hires.

Do not look to governments: provincial or central government. The shit tossers took over the bureaucracies over twenty years ago. Rationality is out the window.

Do not look to the media. Only the least intelligent students go into journalism, and they typically halve their intelligence over the course of their training. The best way to lobotomise oneself is to follow the media too closely.

Muslim terrorism has few real enemies willing to stand up and oppose it. It is a grassroots movement supported by activities at tens of thousands of mosques around the world in most countries, even Canada. It will not stop until you are dead or dhimmi.

Think about it.

What of Love?

The road to the next level is also the road to financial success. Time, intelligence, wisdom, financial savvy, a profound understanding of. Life. will be busy, prosperous, and full. But what of love?

Love is like an ice cream flavor. Like everyone's favorite ice cream flavor. It is so much a favorite, it is also a daily quasi-required nutrient.

A person can live without love, but not very well. Living for centuries without love is a terrifying prospect.

Most people think of humans as a rational animal, above the other animals because of reasoning. If humans are able to reason better than other animals, it is only a matter of degree. Humans use emotional "fuzzy logic" for reasoning. It is a quicker form of reasoning than the formal logic of mathematics or computers, but less precise. Humans depend on their emotions for everyday thought. It is emotions and feelings that connect our minds to our bodies. Emotions are the basis of our reality.

Love is an emotion that stimulates the endocrine and immune systems of the human body to perform especially well. Love is essential for optimum health. Love suppresses other emotions that will stimulate the sometimes vital but for moderns physiologically damaging, fight or flight reflex. Without love the blood pressure easily rises, the heart gets stiff, the blood vessels lose their flexibility, tissues suffer.

Love is not a symphony. Love is an essential part of the symphony, the part that the audience waits for in anticipation. The reason people came to hear the performance.

Manfred Clyne, a neuroscientist and musician, learned something about the symphony of emotions. Clyne discovered a sequence of emotions which could be consciously triggered, resulting in the person feeling like he had just walked out of a very satisfying 2 hour movie, after only a few minutes of "sentic cycling." You know the feeling I mean--when a movie has really worked you over, but left you with a clean, positive feeling?

During the studies, Dr. Clynes was able to resolve at least 20 different emotional states, or Essentic Forms Patterns including: anger, hate, grief, love, sex, joy, reverence, and no-emotion. Others essentic forms studied included hope, courage, guilt, and shame. There are probably a lot more, but sometimes they are combinations of emotions, like envy.

This allowed Dr. Clynes to precisely map different physiological and behavior patterns based on the particular evoked emotion. __Source

Our emotions have to be exercised, must be acknowledged. Love is at the focal point. All emotions relate to love somehow. But all emotions are not love. They still must be exercised and experienced. Next levels will learn to treat their emotions with the respect and regard that they deserve. Love will earn the center position of the next level human's existence.

Only the Few

We are living in the age of technology. Technology for the masses. That is the story of modern capitalism, the way that technological innovations work their way down from the upper classes to the lower classes. Technology is ubiquitous.

Solid state technologies such as we find in cellphones, gameboys, mp3 players, pda's, notebook computers, large screen televisions, etc. are the most ubiquitous. There are many other technologies that are starting to enjoy the economy of scale deriving from ubiquitous silicon technologies seen in information, communications, and entertainment devices. Medical devices, research devices, security devices, energy related devices. The improved productivity and efficiencies from the diffusion of this technology has only just begun.

Technology is expensive to develop. Wealthy people tend to utilise technology initially, helping to finance the transition to better designs and mass production methods. Then the middle classes start to buy into the new technology, lending the support that allows even less expensive design and production methods, and pulling in more competition, further lowering prices.

Price is not the only bottleneck restricting acceptance of new technology. In more regulated and litigious areas of commerce, the threat of lawsuits or heavy fines may cause a company to avoid entire areas of research and development. This is good for the families of the trial lawyers and high level bureaucrats, but the millions whose lives are lost or harmed from being deprived of new technologies are invisible ghosts among us, unmourned.

Technologies of higher intelligence and longevity will eventually make their way down from the wealthy to the middle class. Trial lawyers, government bureaucrats, political activists--all will do their best to stop it, while attempting behind the scenes to acquire the benefits for themselves or their loved ones. The technology will nevertheless become widely available, due to human nature and the everpresent desire for a better life. This will not automatically lead to a more mature human, or one more wise.

At that point, what will be the bottleneck preventing the transition to the next level? Almost the entire intellectual thrust of the modern western world is oriented toward the idea that all world cultures are essentially of equal value, except western culture which is inherently racist, oppressive, and controlled by evil white males. This is the basis for the curriculums of western schools from the lowest level to the highest. This is the basis for every news broadcast, almost every motion picture, much popular music. It is the editorial stance of most western newspapers and printed journals. It is the invisible substrate of reflexive ideation that guides most politicians, labor activists, university professors, journalists, and civil rights activists.

The rejection of rationalism, the insistence that the creed of postmodern multiculturalism is sacrosanct and not to be analysed by modern scientific methods, is at the foundation of this pseudo-intellectual movement that has come to control the schools, the media, the entertainment industry, most government bureaucracy, labor unions, the legal sector, and much of the commercial sector of the western world.

This idiocy will prevent most people from transitioning to the next level. Many will come to live longer and be more intelligent. Few will become wise enough to make the transition through to what is possible.

How many rational and wise next level humans would it take to guarantee the survival of next levels? The answer may surprise you.

Across the Gulf of Species

Can you talk to a whale? Can you communicate with a gorilla? Can you describe your deepest hopes and fears to your cat, and expect it to understand and feel sympathy? There is a gulf, a chasm, that separates us from other species. Part of the gulf comes from the different evolutionary paths our respective brains have followed. Another part of the separation comes from the different experiences in the womb and after. Different upbringings don't you know, what?

Communicating with a next level human will not be as difficult. Neither will it be as easy as communicating with your identical twin, or other sibling. Part of the problem will be that we will not be communicating as equals.

Imagine a family where one of the siblings is bright, happy, and successful. Everything he does shines and prospers. Now imagine another sibling in the family whose mood is always dark, who stumbles in his thoughts when trying to solve most problems, who is never able to finish a task, who reaches for chemical solutions to his problems. Think of the two siblings sitting down and trying to relate to each other.

These two are not equal in their ability to earn a living, to have satisfying relationships with other people, to solve daily problems and plan exciting and enjoyable leisure time. They will live in different environments, drive different cars, dwell on problems of entirely different levels. Their range of travel will be different, their scope of thought will be different, their ultimate ambitions will be different. Yet they will both end in the same place. Is it really true that "all is vanity?"

What if the happy sibling lives 500 years, while the dark, brooding, addicted sibling lives only 80 years, and produces nothing much more than his own unhappiness, spread among a few friends? What if, on the other hand, the happy one sires dozens of children, happy like himself and intelligent? What if "happy" invents solutions to shortages of energy, solutions to hazardous environmental pollutants, cures for degenerative diseases, means to travel to outer space more economically and more safely? What if "happy" is survived by dozens of children, hundreds of grandchildren, and thousands of great-grandchildren--all of whom he had a chance to meet, know, and love? Would the lives of "happy" and "unhappy" be equally vain and pointless?

At the time "unhappy" is lying down on his deathbed, with great relief, "happy" is just getting started. Happy may attend his brother's funeral, if he is on Earth at the time. Or he may send flowers if he is too far away. Regardless, "happy" will quickly move on to his plans and goals, momentarily saddened at the wasted life of brother "unhappy," but soon busy with his life. Will "happy" ponder at the vast waste of millions, or billions of "unhappies?" Probably, from time to time. Not for long. There will be too many things to be done.

Is "happy" good or bad, for humanity as it is? A few "happies" could solve many of humankind's most difficult and intransigent proglems. Between level humans might tolerate a few, like they tolerate a few mega-billionaires among them. If "happy" started producing hundreds, or thousands of progeny "happies," a clash of cultures would be inevitable. Between-levels would feel threatened, for their own sake and for the sake of their children. "Happy" must realize this.

To be a "happy," will be to cross the gulf of species. To cross the gulf, but to never stop looking back and beckoning your cousins to cross with you.

Thanks to Sam Cardon.

When will they ever learn?

What would an effective educational system look like? What sort of curriculum would it teach, and what sort of person would be in demand as a teacher?

As far as curriculum, I was pleased to come across the works of John David Garcia, formerly of the Eugene, Oregon area. Here is a link to his curriculum for young children. I think you will be impressed at the possibilities. I was visiting friends in the US Pacific Northwest when I first discovered Garcia's writings, and was fortunate to visit with him before he died. He was a powerful personality and a wonderful teacher in spite of himself. For the truly curious, here is a link to John David Garcia's books that are online.

If you take the time to look over Garcia's curriculum, you will be struck by the same thing that struck me--very few instructors, even at the college level, are qualified to teach this curriculum for young children. Thinking back on my intellectual curiosity from my earliest memories, I am convinced that the curriculum would not have been too advanced, given a suitable instructor. That is the rub. A suitable instructor.

Factual knowledge is important for providing a grounding and point of reference for further discovery. Procedural knowledge, or learning to do things, is just as important if not more so. Knowing useful facts and being able to recognize patterns is crucial for a young mind. A sense of competence, though, comes more from being able to perform skill tasks well. Especially tasks that older folks might not expect the young one to be able to perform.

Children have an infinite capacity to surprise adults, but are too rarely allowed to exercise that capacity due to the stifling dumbing down of the typical upbringing of children. Moronic incompetency is the norm among teachers and professors. What do these fools know about real life, on average? What do these tenured clowns know about the real world? Almost nothing.

Children want to learn, they crave knowledge and skills. The adult world disappoints them with its banality, its lack of real challenge or excitement.

Who are the villains here? For the culture of security-craving and risk-averseness we can blame the trial attorneys and the lawsuit cabal. For the dumbing down of what should be an amazing intellectual journey, we can blame the "multicultural" and political correctness cliques, that try to force a "sameness" on all cultures and philosophies, while demonizing western culture--the most seminal and inclusive culture of them all. By trying to eliminate western culture from modern education these morons have made education impotent. Of course, the masculine metaphors describing the potency and power of western culture only make the badly sagging feminists all the more furious and determined to obliterate the traces of western culture from schools.

Today's posting has dwelled on more of the aspects of "living among morons" that I touched on last week. Next time I will try to be more positive.

Living Among Morons

Most of us have had the experience of attempting to explain a simple concept to someone who simply cannot comprehend. We may try several different approaches to the concept, using every metaphor that we think the person should reasonably be capable of following. Sometimes we succeed and sometimes we fail.

Most everyday functions of modern life require an IQ of around 90. Driving a car, mailing a letter, paying bills, making a bank deposit. The more specialized the function, the more intricate, the higher the level of intelligence necessary. In general, persons self-select their occupation according to intelligence level. If the selection criteria for the job focus on ability to do the job competently, intelligence levels will stratify according to the job difficulty. If the selection criteria is biased away from the ability to perform the job well, intelligence levels will not correspond as closely to job difficulty.

Nepotism is the downfall of governments and societies. We see that nepotism has become the official policy of western governments and societies. Should we expect western civilisation to go the way of third world "nations" such as Zimbabwe or Cuba? Perhaps we should. Perhaps we would, if not for the tremendous momentum of western civilisation. It may be that the rare intelligent civil servant, journalist, or university professor is truly "living among morons" in the form of his co-workers, because of nepotistic hiring practices. Yes, probably. Somehow the necessary work gets done.

Students at university are holding professors more in disdain, although not in as high disdain as might be deserved. Likewise most citizens shape their lives so as to come under the stamp of a civil servant as rarely as possible. Do it over the web, the phone, or through the mail. The legal system is avoided at all costs by most ordinary citizens.

Most of us know what it is like to be at the mercy of someone who was promoted beyond her competence level. Such Peter Principle Promotion has become the law of the land. Living not only among morons, but at the mercy of morons. With the coming of muslim terrorism, dying at the mercy of morons.

Enter the next level human. How will next level humans deal with these people? First of all, compared to a next level human, even the brightest among us are quite dim. For next levels to get anything done, they will have to work with the materials at hand. That means you and me. Next levels will live among "morons" and work alongside "morons" to accomplish their goals.

That does not mean that next levels will tolerate the nepotism that endangers the very existence of western civilisation, and its next level successor. This institutionalised nepotism will be dealt with as firmly as islamic terrorism will be dealt with. At least for the next level society, this nepotism will be eliminated.

Jobs in the civil sector, media, and university, must not be used as substitutes for welfare, for persons who are incapable of succeeding on their own. Of course if large numbers of persons choose longevity technologies along with cognitive boosting technologies, but choose to continue in the dysfunctional nepotism of between levels existence, they will be free to form their own societies. They will simply be prevented from influencing or limiting the next level society.

Unless western civilisation is destroyed by the coalition of the nepotistic with the islamic terrorists, the technologies of longevity and cognitive enhancement will be developed. It is unlikely that most of the persons able to take advantage of many of these technologies will have the sophistication of a next level human. Not at first. The few who are next levels by temperament will act as the yeast in the wort or dough, to ferment the finest beverage or the most delicious bread.

If you find yourself living among morons, consider that a challenge. It will take the best efforts of the best among us to evolve the first of the next levels. Once that is done, it will require the support of the best among us to allow enough next levels to evolve so as to create an unstoppable movement of evolutionary development. Think of the task ahead and what it demands. Throw yourself into the work.

The only cure for the moronic nepotism and imbecilic religious fanaticism that threaten us, is the intelligence and longevity along with the wisdom, of the next level human.

Making the Cut

Next level humans will be smarter and live longer than modern day humans. That will not be enough. They have to know what to do with their intelligence and their long lives. This higher degree of savvy will separate next levels from those who are merely intelligent and long-lived.

It is not those with the highest IQ's who hold the greatest wealth, the greatest power, or the most profound happiness and satisfaction in life. Eventually it probably will be. The reason for this is that until now humans have not reached the critical threshold of intelligence, where rationality and emotionality work cooperatively toward a total life success.

Greater longevity requires adjustments to the human genome, as well as ongoing modifications through nanotechnology, endocrine treatments, stem cell therapies, immune support, and improved nutritional support along with better methods of achieving peak fitness. We must not neglect the emotional component to longevity, which works through endocrine and immune pathways. Once our rational brain learns to cooperate with our emotional brain, the way is open for true happiness and satisfaction in life, true success.

Higher intelligence will also require adjustment to the human genome. Nanotechnology can aid intelligence in many ways. Maintaining good endocrine balance and good balance of neuromodulatory compounds will be vital. Stimulation of neural tissue with electrical and magnetic signals, along with other senses such as visual, auditory, touch, smell, proprioception, and balance, are other ways to achieve neural growth. Meditation, visualization, hypnosis, will all be utilized for improving mental reach.

Knowing what to do with intelligence and long life will separate the pretenders from the contenders. For most modern humans, simply achieving prosperity along with physical and emotional health, with long life and healthy relationships, are sufficient goals for a human lifetime. For next levels, those things are merely the starting point for lives of achievement.

We see how easy it is to bribe most between level humans. A sinecured university post, a secure civil service position, good job benefits and pensions. Security. Work out your time and live out your life with guaranteed income and perquisites.
Persons who prize security above everything else will never contribute to human progress, instead simply mark time until they die.

There are many examples of great human striving. In the modern world we see sports figures as the most graphic pictures of the human will to overcome. The Olympic Games are particularly full of stories of individual effort to surpass the best that humans have ever achieved. Sports figures provide excellent examples of human energy and drive.

The same type of effort goes on behind the scenes in cutting edge technologies such as genetic engineering, nanotechnology, microelectronics, information technology, neuroscience, tissue engineering, communications technology, energy research, and many other fields of science and technology. The payoffs for significant advances in these fields are tremendous, and motivate persons of higher drive and intelligence. The best of the best of these bright and driven people will extend the outer limits of human achievement.

Even in fields that are mature and even humdrum, finding better ways of doing the banal and everyday task can lead to riches and fame. Imaginative, intelligent, and driven individuals achieve prosperity through making the humdrum more efficient, every day, in opportunity societies. These persons may lack the brilliance of a top theoretical physicist, but they have the savvy and drive to do what they can with the situation in which they find themselves, and do well.

Next level humans will combine the energy of the world class athlete, with the brilliance of a top scientist or inventor, and the savvy and resourcefulness of a successful entrepreneur, to reshape the universe that humans inhabit. Brilliance, healthy long life, economic and social success, will not be enough. Next levels will always keep the big picture in mind, will always be thinking of ways to expand the sphere of human existence.

Growing Beyond the State

The Anglosphere is the set of English speaking Common Law nations. According to James C. Bennett, " To be part of the Anglosphere requires adherence to the fundamental customs and values that form the core of English-speaking cultures. These include individualism, rule of law, honoring contracts and covenants, and the elevation of freedom to the first rank of political and cultural values. " See Anglosphere Primer

The US and the UK, along with Canada, New Zealand, and Australia, form the greater part of the Anglosphere. Outliers might include South Africa, the English speaking population of India, and English speaking possessions and tributaries of the above nations.

These nations as a whole comprise the most desirable places to emigrate, for most of the world's population. They are acknowledged to have the best educational institutions, the most stable democracies, and the most advanced research centres in the world. Without the economies of the Anglosphere, the rest of the world would be in desperate deprivation. China is being pulled out of poverty by the Anglosphere, not by its own bootstraps.

Thus, naturally when we speak of the technological path toward humans gaining control of their own evolution, we expect this most advanced part of the advanced world, the Anglosphere, to display leadership in achieving this worthy goal. Yet, the Anglosphere is actively engaged in tying its own hands behind its own back, and placing blinders over its eyes, and sound mufflers over its ears. The Anglosphere is handicapping itself, making itself vulnerable to its enemies, just at the time when it is most needed to provide guidance, protection, and resources to the effort of humans to gain control of their evolution.

Does the Anglosphere have a suicide wish? Why does the Anglosphere wallow in self-defeating policies which can only hamper the effort to make humans more capable of providing long, healthy, and enjoyable lives for themselves?

The answers lie in the phenomena of labyrinths. Everything relating to modern human society can be related to the concept of a labyrinth, or maze. The best intentions might lead one to create a set of simple laws to govern a population. At first. But over time, special interests and special circumstances insert themselves into a body of law, again and again, until the convolutions and contradictions within that body of law require not one judge to interpret, but several levels of regional and provincial judicial committees, up to appeals committees and finally to the Supreme Committees of Law. Even the Supreme Committees are unable to fully comprehend the labyrinth of law, but they never admit that. Nothing must undermine the authority of the state and the state's representatives.

Consider tax law. Initially taxes might be locally based, and logically connected to some activity which is facilitated by the local government. But over time, more and more of human activity is taxed, until eventually a family's tax burden is its largest expense. More levels of government are created, all of which require operating expenses which are obtained from the population. Depending on the type of taxation involved, an individual or family must spend large amounts of time and money in order to insure that the state does not confiscate everything that makes life worthwhile, both during life and after death.

Most nations of the world are thoroughly strangled by labyrinthine bureaucracies and legal structures, often quite corrupt. Historically, the Anglosphere has largely avoided allowing its bureaucracies to choke as much human activity as almost all other developed and semi-developed nations. Recently, since the mid-20th century, that is becoming less the case.

How does this relate to the quest to become a next level human? Unfortunately, there is a direct connection between the choking out of the freedom of individual action by the state, even Anglospheric states, and the ability of humans to gain control of their own evolution. Reaching out to the next level of human existence will require all the resources at our command. Mentally, emotionally, physically, financially, socially, and politically, we will have to reach beyond ourselves to reach a place no one has reached till now.

It is increasingly clear that we will have to do this in spite of the states' exponential and labyrinthine growth, that threatens our freedom of action at every turn. Freedom is still greatest in the Anglosphere. I hope it will always be so, given the remarkable history of this tradition. But do not count on it. Aspiring next levels will need to learn to grow beyond the state.

Fortunately, just when the labyrinth of the state threatens to close all avenues of progress, new methods of organisation have been devised which will help provide us with alternative pathways of movement. The internet itself, based upon decentralised organisation of information transfer, provides a powerful metaphor for putting together a flexible system of accomplishing a goal, without a centralised overseeing entity.

While terrorists may use some of these ad hoc organising methods, it is likely that other groups with wholly productive goals will also organise along these lines. Individuals at many different research labs will carry out parallel research programs, off the books perhaps, while also doing their regular work. The results of this alternative research will be dispersed among researchers with special interest in these matters. Much of this work will be unpaid, just as computer experts often create open source software without being paid monetarily. Humans value many different types of rewards, besides money.

Regardless, just the activity of developing alternative means of organising human resources to reach goals, will be pro-evolutionary in itself. Sadly, however, a short lifespan of seventy years or so does not allow for very much evolution, and most evolution that does occur is not passed forward into the future, so it is often lost.

A longer lifespan will allow evolutionary advances to be recognised and passed on to newer generations. This longer lifespan must be presented to the state as a fait accompli. At that point, the state will have to decide if it wants to go along for the ride. Humans must grow beyond the state's power to choke off action and possibilities. That is the only way to move to the next level.

Wisdom

To be wise is not a state of mind but a state of action. Wisdom is acting in the best manner given all the information at hand. Some of the information may be unconscious, out of reach of verbal consciousness. Wisdom takes account of all information available.

Wisdom is contextual. In the current context, it may be wise for someone to accept the reality of death at age 75, or earlier. Even if all disease were conquered, death from trauma would occur. Accidents, warfare, terrorism, homicide. Many of these trauma deaths occur through lack of wisdom on the part of at least one of the persons involved.

Wisdom is not the same as knowing facts. A person may be the repository of a surfeit of factual information, but be a fool. Many of the most intelligent persons living between levels are complete fools. Masters of acquiring and manipulating information, they achieve high levels of monetary and social success. Still their children despise them, their spouses cheat on them, their lives are too often hollow and pointless.

The waste of natural resources is often decried, while the waste of information is generally ignored. To political partisans, information is meant to be wasted and suppressed if it does not automatically provide partisan advantage. This is clear from our news media, which after all are run by between level humans with many faults, including partisan dishonesty.

New tools of information manipulation and correlation have been developed to help with the problem of information overload in modern between level civilisation. Many of these tools are expensive, some are prototypes, with outputs only available to persons of high rank in government or commerce.

These complex software programs are not intelligent, nor are they wise. But they do fill an evolutionary gap in the human capacity to comprehend large amounts of information. They may yet facilitate wisdom in those who are so disposed.

Bill Joy warned against nanotechnology, artificial intelligence, and biotechnology. For that, some futurists have tagged him "Kill Joy." Aspiring next levels will merely smile and get on with the difficult work of optimising information acquisition and use. We will need everything that nanotechnology, information technology, and genetic and bio-engineering can give us, if we are to learn wisdom in the larger context of the next level.

500 Year Lifespan

Next level humans will live at least 500 years, which by itself would give them a different psychological approach to life. Being responsible will become second nature.

If you know you will live for 500 years or longer, you will take a different approach to your life. You will expect to see multiple careers, and probably multiple marriages. You will have time to accumulate significant wealth and will probably live under several different political systems over time. Politicians will not be able to bullshit a next level human.

Space travel will be commonplace within the next 500 years, perhaps travel to other star systems, but certainly travel to habitable settlements on other planets and planetoids in the solar system. You will expect travel to be quite safe, and trauma support in case of accident to be prompt and expert, perhaps provided by robodoc under some circumstances.

Why would people have children if they are living 500 years? There will be no real need to live through your children if you yourself are living so long. The danger of overpopulation will be significant unless new frontiers are opened beyond the surface of earth.

If people are living 500 years or more, they will have to be completely responsible for the children they create. It is unlikely that people who are irresponsible or incompetent will ever become next level humans.

Victim thinking will not exist among next levels. This must seem threatening to individuals who make their living exploiting victim thinking among large groups of people. TS.

How Do You Make a Next Level Human?

Realistically, changing present day humans to next level humans is going to require genetic manipulation. Some genetic sequences that are active will need to be turned off, some sequences that are dormant will have to be turned on, and other sequences will probably have to be cycled on and off over certain intervals of time. Living a long time will be a fine balancing act if we do not want to initiate malignant tumors on a frequent basis.

Nanotechnology may provide us with temporary measures, in terms of keeping blood vessels clear, delivering selective toxins to tumors, cleaning out metabolic waste products that interfere with normal cell metabolism, and other cellular housekeeping chores.

Neither genetic therapy nor nanotechnology are at a stage that will allow transitioning to the next level. There will be stopgaps, such as stem cell therapies, which may be available much sooner. These therapies should allow organ transplants and crude regenerative treatments for many body tissues. Scientists will also learn much more about tissue growth factors and various low level hormones that affect health on a cellular level. Standard pharmaceuticals will become safer and better targeted to the body systems that need treatment. Nutritional science will learn better means of tissue support.

If you are over the age of forty, particularly if you smoke and are sedentary and obese, you probably won't see many of the advances listed above in time to be of help. If you are thirty or under, and take very good care of your body, the chances of excellent that you will see most or all of those advances, and will probably benefit from at least tissue growth factors and some cell therapies.

Within the next fifty years, geneticists will probably be able to design an embryo's genetics using gene segments from several different humans, choosing among them for the very best combination. Embryos will likely be grown in artificial wombs. This may happen on a lab in international waters, or in an orbiting lab outside any national jurisdiction. Or it may become commonplace in your neighborhood genetics lab.

Humans have long wished for freedom from death and disease, for more strength, more intelligence. That wish is within our sight if not our grasp. For it to become real, we have to do our jobs.

Civilisation itself is under threat from stone aged religious and ideological reactionaries. These enemies of the future cannot be allowed to prevent humanity from making that transition to the next level. Perhaps we can make it that far, but if not, our children surely can. We have to hold off the enemy long enough to allow our scientists and engineers to create the pathway to the next level. We do not want to fail.

On racial and gender differences in IQ

There has been a lot written on differences in mean IQ scores between different ethnicities and nationalities. Murray and Hernstein's "Bell Curve", and Lynn and Vanhanen's "IQ and the Wealth of Nations", are two scholarly discussions of the topic. Gender differences in IQ and aptitude are also controversial, typified by the excellent debate at edge.org between a somewhat ditzy and reactionary psychologist from Berkeley and a progressive linguist from MIT(now Harvard).

When it comes to next level humans, these differences will not be significant. Compared to the difference between modern humans and next level humans, these small differences between gender and ethnicity will not matter.

More in the next post.

Evolution by Indirection

How would you get from here, between levels, to the next level? How do short-lived bipeds of mediocre intelligence, gossip-mongers, delusional mob thinkers and actors--how do we get there from here?

Virtually nothing in nature travels by straight line. The same is true for evolution. Evolution twists and turns like a lazy river. Watching a slow moving river on a quiet day you would never guess at all the floods, torrents, and deluges. Observe a branching evolutionary tree. Cover the top half with a sheet of paper and ask someone to predict which of the lower branches will survive to the top level. You are tempted to say that one cannot get there from here, going from the root to the uppermost branch. But you can indeed trace the maze-like connection, once you see to the top.

A man drives along a rainy street at night, trying to see through the thick falling drops to the street where he must turn. He sees that he is almost to the street and begins his turn-but something makes him pause. Suddenly a motorcycle with dim headlights surprises the man and bursts through the rain. The motorcycle passes through the space the man's car would have occupied if he had proceeded to turn. Why did the man pause his turn?

Another man puzzles over a scientific problem. He cannot make head nor tail of the problem no matter how he thinks about it. Then, while the man is sleeping before a fire, in a dream, the solution comes to him. What caused the answer to suddenly appear in a dream?

A third man struggles to climb a sheer cliff, hundreds of feet off the ground. He is tired and in a precarious position. He has to move and as he moves suddenly he feels himself start to fall. He tries to compensate but his imbalance gets worse. Suddenly he relaxes and his body moves, as if on its own, precisely to the position that allows him to recover and move on. Why did he relax when he was in danger of falling, and why did letting go of his rigid mental grip allow his "mindless body" to recover?

We can try to picture the path we need to follow in becoming next level humans. But we cannot see enough of the maze to see through to the end. Perhaps we are holding on too rigidly to our present concepts, preventing us from making the transition to concepts that would facilitate growth. Our evolution may not be smooth. Like a river, we may have to live through the floods and deluges. Ice dams may have to break to release enough hydraulic power to shape our future selves.

Some of the answers may come to us in our sleep. We will forget most of them in our "waking" to everyday life. Some of us may remember a few things. What we do with the things we remember will determine how smoothly we can make the change.

Imagine someone such as Stalin or Kim making the transition to long life and super intelligence. Imagine the suffering of most humans under such an unending regime of horror and death. Such a thing is not likely.

Next level humans will arrive via lateral thinking and indirection. Edward de Bono has written several books on the lateral thinking methods of problem solving. As we learn more about how the human brain actually works we will learn better ways of using it. Then, as we learn how the human genome shapes the human brain in concert with the larger environment, we will learn better ways of making smarter humans. That frightens a lot of people.

That is because most humans are easily frightened. Most humans will not be capable of stepping beyond themselves. The habit of thinking with the group, of seeking reassurance from the group, will hold them back. Next level humans will be fiercely independent. Next levels will be too independent to want to use their potency to control masses of primitives and between-levels. They have places to go, things to do, and much to learn.

Humans are not rational in the way computers are rational. Humans are much more. Human minds function in an indirect manner. Emotions are at the heart of the human mind. Deep within the human mind, apparently another mind resides, a mind capable of solving problems that the superficial mind has difficulty solving directly. The deeper, more indirect, mind has trouble communicating with the superficial mind. Bridging that communications gap is just one problem that independent and intelligent between-levels need to solve, to evolve.