Transhumanism seems to hold people’s interests until around the time they turn 40, when the middle-aged reality principle (aging and mortality) starts to assert itself. It resembles going through a goth phase as a teenager.
BTW, I find it interesting that Peter Thiel’s name keeps coming up in connection with stories about the singularity, as in the New York Observer one, when he has gone out of his way lately to argue that technological progress has stagnated. Thiel has basically staked out an antisingularity position.
That position is “antisingularity” only in the Kurzweilian sense of the word. I wouldn’t be surprised if e.g. essentially everyone at the Singularity Institute were “antisingularity” in this sense.
Saying that we haven’t made much progress recently isn’t the same as not wanting a positive singularity event. These are orthogonal. Thiel has directly supported singularity related organizations and events, while also being pessimistic on our technology progress. These are most certainly related.
For a little historical perspective, here are some examples of journalistic coverage of Extropians in the 1990s: June 1993. October 1994. March 1995. April 1995. Also 1995.
Transhumanism seems to hold people’s interests until around the time they turn 40, when the middle-aged reality principle (aging and mortality) starts to assert itself. It resembles going through a goth phase as a teenager.
BTW, I find it interesting that Peter Thiel’s name keeps coming up in connection with stories about the singularity, as in the New York Observer one, when he has gone out of his way lately to argue that technological progress has stagnated. Thiel has basically staked out an antisingularity position.
That position is “antisingularity” only in the Kurzweilian sense of the word. I wouldn’t be surprised if e.g. essentially everyone at the Singularity Institute were “antisingularity” in this sense.
Yep.
Saying that we haven’t made much progress recently isn’t the same as not wanting a positive singularity event. These are orthogonal. Thiel has directly supported singularity related organizations and events, while also being pessimistic on our technology progress. These are most certainly related.