How strong are your genes? How smart are you? People have
traditionally estimated answers to these questions based on
genetic
surveys and IQ Tests, which can provide
valuable answers, but stop well short of factoring in the system(s)
surrounding us. This failure to account for environmental effects
and group dynamics ultimately caps their utility when it come to
the fundamental future-related questions we all seek to answer,
like “How probable is it that I/we will survive?” or “How likely is
it that I/we will thrive?”
But don’t worry, we’re getting better at quantifying our system
all the time. Right now, we may be on the verge of a perspective
shift that will help us to fill in a few more gaps and better our
systems definitions. Both human intelligence and evolutionary
studies appear poised for a due emphasis shift from reductionism (the
focus on individual human agents and single brains) to a more
holistic (the focus on
large groups and the surrounding bio/info/tech structures)
approach.
Cognitive theorist Jim Flynn, founder of the Flynn Effect,
argues that it
is impossible to properly measure intelligence without considering
a combination of genetic and environmental effects. He and William
Dickens of the Brookings Institution have developed a new
model, which demonstrates that environmental factors play a
much larger role in the evolution of cognition than previously
thought. They theorize about how “industrialization’s rising
cognitive demands, at work and leisure, could in fact be the kind
of widespread (but not necessarily large), steadily changing
environmental factor that could account for the higher IQ scores
across so many nations.” (cont.)
When Charles Darwin first proposed writing his landmark book on
evolution, The Origins of Species, his editor suggested
writing a book on pigeons because, in his words, “Everyone is
interested in pigeons.” Fortunately, Darwin chose to ignore the
advice. I am reminded of the story because even though Darwin’s
theory was proposing only that species make modest, incremental
changes over long periods of time, it was – and in many circles
still is – a revolutionary idea.
What then happens if evolution is not just incremental in nature
but rather exponential? That, too, is a revolutionary idea –
especially since it could impact us within our lifetimes.
Well, we are now approaching a time when this exponential theory
of evolution will be put to the test.
If you accept the notion of evolution, you will agree that the
earliest life appeared on earth approximately 4 billion years ago.
Complex cellular organisms showed up 2 billion years ago, and the
first multicellular organism about 1 billion years ago. The first
reptiles and dinosaurs made their appearance 300 million years ago;
the first primates 40 million years ago; homo sapiens appeared
160,000 years ago; Cro-Magnon man 40,000 years ago; and modern
civilization as we know it began about 10,000 years ago.
Thinking about this much progress over such an extended period
of time is difficult. Years ago, Carl Sagan, the famed astronomer,
offered up a “cosmic calendar” to make such progress more
comprehensible to the layperson. He asked that they imagine the
entire history of the universe as being compressed into a single
year. (cont.)
Author
William McGaughey interprets world history as five
civilizations appearing in succession over the last 5,000 years,
each introduced by a new communication technology. In the first
civilization, humans only wrote in graphic form, then about 3,000
BC alphabet writing was devised, and this began the second
civilization.
This eventually led to the invention of the printing press in
China in 593 AD and the world’s first printed newspaper in Beijing
in 700 AD. These events were the beginning of the third
civilization. The fourth civilization started in the 20th century
with electronic recording and broadcasting, which is now merging
into the fifth civilization which utilizes computer communications
and the Internet, and is still in its infancy today.
Leaving the communications world, futurists ponder where we go
from here. In 1964, Russian astronomer Nikolai
Kardashev introduced a method for categorizing civilization
advances based on energy consumption which he divided into three
stages, Type I, II, and III
civilizations. Type I harnesses all the energy from its planet,
Type II, its sun, and Type III, its
galaxy. Others have since added Type IV, which controls
extra-galactic energy including dark matter that makes up 73% of
the universe.
Today, physicists rate Earth at Type 0.7. Astronomer
Don Goldsmith. reminds us that Earth receives only one
billionth of the suns energy, and that we utilize just one
millionth of that; however with the help of advanced nanotech and
greater-than-human intelligence, many predict we could reach Type I
status by 2100 or before. (cont.)
Since the dawn of humanity and the advent of civilized life,
humans have depended on technology to carry them into the future.
Now, from genetics to artificial intelligence to nanotechnology,
science is on the brink of extraordinary mega-revolutions that will
soon change how we view human life.
In the pre-industrial age, raw materials were locally grown,
chopped, or quarried, then produced by local craftsmen, and
consumed by local villagers. The Industrial Revolution and the
creation of the assembly line changed all that. Consumer goods
could now be mass produced and distributed worldwide. Today, a
global civilization tied together by trade is rising, which
economists believe will one day turn Earth into a “global
village.”
Today’s information technologies enable businesses to produce
goods and services more efficiently. With the Internet, ideas are
shared instantly worldwide allowing employees to work away from the
office. This is producing a series of development stages that
futurists believe will revolutionize our commerce world.
The first stage of this revolution was the formation of
international corporations that outsource production to where it is
cheapest, such as clothes designed in the U.S. and stitched
together in Mexico. The second stage was the creation of
multinational firms that distribute design teams across the globe
to wherever the talent lies.
The third stage focuses on design and manufacture; for example,
electronic firms now buy all the parts from different companies and
just add packaging to the finished product. The fourth stage,
expected to advance rapidly in the next decade, allows
three-dimensional objects to be emailed and printed on any
inkjet-based printer. This enables consumers to build products
themselves, without labor costs. (cont.)
Stress resistance at the cellular level is correlated with
longevity at the organismal level, to such an extent that one can
screen for longevity mutants by first identifying
stress-resistant animals. Conversely, the cells of prematurely
aging mutants tend to be
hypersensitive to stress. The idea here is that longevity is
controlled in part by basal and inducible molecular defenses like
antioxidants and chaperones, and that high levels of such factors
confer both stress resistance and enhanced longevity.
What’s interesting about this pattern is that it seems to apply
to a wide range of multiple stresses, with very different physical
bases: oxidation, irradiation, starvation, heavy metal toxicity,
and temperature, to name a few. Without a great deal of
experimental proof to support it, one can imagine some central
homeostatic integrator of cellular well-being, upon which all
manner of perturbations might impinge and which might in turn
control both the appropriate defensive responses and factors that
determine longevity.
It would therefore come as a surprise if a long-lived organism
turned out to be unusually sensitive to stress — and in particular,
sensitive to particular stresses. In one fell swoop, this
would falsify both the general, well-accepted correlative pattern
(stress resistance = longevity) and the somewhat more fanciful
model of a central homeostatic integrator.
align=”right” width=”100”>Lo, the naked mole rat,
Heterocephalus glaber. A eusocial rodent roughly
intermediate in size between a mouse and a rat (depending on where
you shop), and slightly less aesthetically pleasing than an
overcooked boudin blanc with teeth, the naked mole rat has
recently drawn the attention of model-hungry biogerontologists
worldwide: Perhaps because of the
quirky selection pressures on eusocial animals, H.
glaber is unusually long-lived compared to animals of similar
size and body plan (like mice and rats). Like, ten times
longer-lived. So, compared to mice and rats, mole rats should be
much more resistant to all stresses, right? (cont.)
In one of those wonderful historical anomalies, February 12, 2009 was the 200th anniversary of the birth of both Abraham Lincoln and Charles Darwin.
Lincoln is recognized as one of the greatest American presidents for helping end slavery. Darwin, of course, is the father of evolutionary biology.
It might appear these two historical giants have little else in common except the same birthday, but Darwin’s theory of evolution will soon call forth a new political debate which could, if not peacefully resolved, rip this country apart as surely as slavery did.
If you enjoy futuristic gadgets and evolution then this Saturn-commissioned steampunk commercial should be right up your alley (hi-def version here):
Though I'm sure it's primarily intended to wow, I enjoy the robotic take on evolution because of how it removes the emotional animal component and places the emphasis on basic form. It's very transhuman in spirit. Unfortunately the sky does not open wide to a transcendent singularity at the conclusion of the video, which would have made it super-viral among the growing singularitarian community, but I'm sure that we'll see newer, more philosophically advanced car commercials in the near-future. ;)
In the article, Rose critically evaluates several of the
assumptions underlying
SENS (Strategies for Engineered Negligible Senescence)
as formulated by anti-aging activist Aubrey de Grey,
placing them in the context of demographic and
population-biological observations. Ultimately, Rose concludes that
life-extension therapeutics must address the issue of age-specific
adaptation in order to be effective (link;
emphasis below is mine):
Making SENSE: Strategies for
Engineering Negligible Senescence Evolutionarily
Thirty years ago, in 1977, few biologists thought that it would
be possible to increase the maximum life span characteristic of
each species over the variety of environmental conditions in which
they live, whether in nature or in the laboratory. But the
evolutionary theory of aging suggested otherwise. Accordingly,
experiments were performed with fruit flies, Drosophila
melanogaster, which showed that manipulation of the forces of
natural selection over a number of generations could substantially
slow the rate of aging, both demographically and physiologically.
After this first transgression of the supposedly absolute limits to
life extension, it was suggested that mammals too could be
experimentally evolved to have greater life spans and slower aging.
And further, it was argued that such postponed-aging mammals could
be used to reverse-engineer a slowing of human aging. The
subsequent discovery and theoretical explanation of mortality-rate
plateaus revealed that aging was not due to the progressive
physiological accumulation of damage. Instead, aging is now
understood by evolutionary biologists to arise from a transient
fall in age-specific adaptation, a fall that does not necessarily
proceed toward ineluctable death. This implies that SENS must be based on re-tuning adaptation, not
repairing damage. As evolutionary manipulation of model
organisms shows us how adaptation can be focused on engineering
negligible senescence, there are thus both scientific and practical
reasons for making SENS evolutionary;
that is making SENSE.
It seems that once a technology is created and shown to work, it's not too long before someone creates a similar product in their basement for a fraction of the price. Here's TradeMark Gunderson of the Evolution Control Comittee showcasing his rear-projection touchscreen he threw together using some LEDs and two WiiMotes. Hope it inspires you to build your own since the Microsoft Surface costs about $12,500.
