Human Enhancement Project - Natasha Vita-More - H+ Summit @ Harvard
18
P R O J E C T HUMAN ENHANCEMENT H d s Rise of the Citizen Scientist e Natasha Vita-More PhD Res, Univ. Plymouth Board of Directors, Humanity+ [email protected]
description
This talk addresses the historical perspective of human enhancement as stemming from second-order cybernetics, Gregory Bateson, Heinz Von Forester and the Biological Computer Lab. The continued use of computer-based augmentation of human physiology has lead toward human-NBIC enhancement media, but is not limited to this quartet. The media also includes information technologies such as automation, robotics, AI, and simulation processes. Included in this perspective is that the first area of concern for enhancement is that of logic: "We must restrict our focus on the zone where desire and feasibility intersect." (Stock 1992, 97) I frame this sensibility as a second-order enhancement cybernetics, which includes social engineering and individual plasticity. Each person is an enhancement project as well as the observer of the project. Second-order cybernetics suggests that the observer is a necessary aspect of what is being observed; however, it does not assign a behavioral trait to the observer. Like cybernetics, there is a circular system in which feedback provides information which helps us adjust and adapt to change. Unlike cybernetics, the circular loop is spiraling rather than a closed system. This feedback helps us focus on the zone where desire and feasibility intersect and, further, toward develop long-range plans for a posthuman evolution. The relationship between the project, the observer, feedback, and adaptation is further influenced by a fourth attribute—what I introduce as an automorphic behavior within a social ecology. Natasha Vita-More, media artist and theorist, is a frequent guest speaker on topics concerning the future in the international arena. She is best known as designer of "Primo Posthuman". Her writings have been published in numerous books, she has appeared in more than twenty-four televised documentaries, and featured in magazines including The New York Times, Wired, Village Voice, Marie Claire, Harper’s Bazaar, U.S. News & World Report, Net Business, and Teleopolis. Natasha is a Fellow of the Institute for Ethics and Emerging Technologies, Visiting Scholar at 21st Century Medicine, Scientific Board of Lifeboat Foundation, and advises non-profit organizations including Alcor Life Extension Foundation. She was formerly president of Extropy Institute from 2002-2005. As a bit of history, Natasha authored the "Transhuman Statement", Create/Recreate: the 3rd Millennial Culture (cybernetic culture and the future of humanism and the arts and sciences). In the early 1990s, she hosted the TV show "Transcentury UPdate" and was elected to the Green Party as a Los Angeles Councilperson.
Transcript of Human Enhancement Project - Natasha Vita-More - H+ Summit @ Harvard
P R O J E C THUMAN ENHANCEMENT
Hds
Rise of the Citizen Scientist
e
Natasha Vita-MorePhD Res, Univ. PlymouthBoard of Directors, [email protected]
P R O J E C THUMAN ENHANCEMENT
Design Science
eHds
P R O J E C THUMAN ENHANCEMENT
The project began in the late 1990s with designs for a posthuman prototype. From 2004 to 2008, the project developed a theory of human enhancement linking available information on a scientific, technological and philosophical approach to human futures. From 2008 to the 2010, the project has been dealing with a central issue for the near-term—staying alive.
P R O J E C THUMAN ENHANCEMENT
1.8 deaths per second worldwide, meaning that there are over 100 deaths per minute. There are over 150,000 deaths per day and over 55 million deaths per year.
21.6 deaths every 12 seconds
PREDICAMENT
The predicament human enhancement faces is mostly behavioral–what we desire and what is feasible. Much of this has to do with what we want to control and why we need to control it.
For human enhancement, the control factor is to stay alive. One way we can do this is by changing what is considered as the normal human condition. For those opposed to enhancement, the control factor is to die. One way they can do this is to restrain our condition by keeping disease alive.
DESIGN
Science & Technology
Marketing/Consumers
Society & Beliefs
Ethics &Biopolitics
FearActivism
HopeAnxiety
Design/Arts & Sciences
NBIC+AI/AGIRobotics
NarrativesPhilosophy
SpiritualityReligion
Visuals
Symbols
Culture Culture
VirtualitySimulationBio-Synthetics
Whole brain emulationDisembodied cognitionconnective intelligence
PRACTICESCIENCE
Cognition Quotient
BRAIN
BEHAVIOR
BODY
Plasticity, Protection, Preservation
Flexibility, Strength, Disease Control
Perception, Reflexivity, Connectivity
The interrelationship of brain, body and behavior
IDEA
METHOD
MEANS
Stay alive
Increase Cognition Quotient
Second-order enhancement cybernetics.
The user-agent-observer guides the enhanced attributes of its own system.
• Feedback loop• Adaptation • Decision assist• Error correction• Multiple viewpoints• Prosthetic neo-cortex
plasticity
softwareWearable or in-system• experience memory• persona recordation• relay between avatars
Brain system
auto
mor
phic
ds
Designer,Frog Design
Designer,Pouvan Mokhtarani
Designer,Mikhail St-Denis
Designer, QIS Design
Info
link
s
Need to know
Self-tracking systems / well-being behavior health risks
What to know
How to know
Designers, Sajid Sadi and Marcelo CoelhoMEMTABLE
Designers, Seth Hunter with Jenny Chan, Katie Harrington, Emily Zhao, Alexander Milouchev, and Michael Kuo
MEMTABLE
Technology
Design Praxis
human-technologyintegration
Evolution
Evolution
HUMAN ENHANCEMENTCybernetics Self-directed
Computer Media NBIC Media
human-futuresconceptualization
HUMANENHANCEMENT
design process practicality of enhancement In
fo li
nks
cyborg transhuman posthumanHu[man]-machine
Philosophy
Identity
FuturesScenarios
Evolution
Existence
Metaphysics
Biopolitics
Functionalism
Future StudiesCybernetics
Transhumanism
Ethics
Info
link
s
HumanEnhancement
Historical
DesignPractices
Philosophyand Theory
FutureScenarios
Technologies
Cybernetics: Establishing a Framework of Human Enhancement
Historical Praxis of Emerging field of Heds Regeneration of Personal Existence as a foundation Existence over space and time Sciences: Hard and Soft
Human Enhancement as a Field
Locating Evidence of HE in arts Assessment of HCI, Body Art, Robotics,
Conceptual Art, Wearables, Performance Art, Prosthetics, Biological Art
Comparisons between artistic fields which engage transdisciplinary media to produce full concept
Defining human enhancement Relationship to cybernetics Free Will, Survival and Evolution Regeneration of personal existence Existence over space and time
Human Enhancement within Practices
Media of human enhancement – NBIC+ Links between Science, Technology and Art
Human Enhancement Media
Philosophies and Theories of Human Futures
Stemming out of Cybernetics Stemming from Transhumanism Stemming from Posthumanism Analyzing the Cyborg, Transhuman, Posthuman
Designing a Field
Investigating Experts within fields of NBIC+ Links to artistic practice and theory Future Scenarios of Human Enhancement Media
P R O J E C THUMAN ENHANCEMENT
Hds
Rise of the Citizen Scientist
eHds
Rise of the Citizen Scientist
e
P R O J E C THUMAN ENHANCEMENT
Hds
Natasha Vita-MorePhD Res, Univ. PlymouthBoard of Directors, [email protected]
Rise of the Citizen Scientist
e
