TransVision 2010, October 22-24, 2010

TransVision 2010 is over! I wish to thank all speakers and participants, those who came to Milan and those who participated remotely via Teleplace. Special thanks to Kim for her work at the main Teleplace workstation and for handling many technical problems, and to Cosimo and Jacopo for their work at the HD video camera. I wish to thank the volunteer Italian to English translator (I am not mentioning your name here because I guess you prefer it this way, but you know who you are and thank you so much), who gave also a great unscheduled presentation of the Polytopia Project. And of course I also want to thank Riccardo and Stefano for their support in organizing and running the conference. In particular Stefano should really have stayed at home to recover from recent surgery, but he made a special effort to be with us.

In the first two pictures, Dan Massey and Max More giving their talks. In the foreground, the Terasem 1 O'Neill Island One Space Habitat, a Bernal sphere model built by Simon Deering for the Terasem Movement of Martine Rothblatt and presented at TV10 by Khannea Suntzu. The model is now on its way to Florida to be delivered to the Terasem Movement. We had many great talks, not only about visionary technologies but also about literature, politics, philosophy and art. The second half of the first day has been dedicated to Italian neo-Futurist literary and artistic movement, but strike neo- because Futurism is always Neo by definition. I have been disappointed by not seeing as many people as I hoped: I counted about 65 participants in Milan over 3 days including a dog. The problem is that participating in conferences costs money and time, and in my own presentation (which I shortened to less than ten minutes to make time for other speakers) I proposed online conferences 2.0 as a solution.

We had about 30 remote participants in the in the TVirtual online extension of TransVision 2010, hosted by the teleXLR8 project based on the Teleplace online telepresence platform. Remote participants have been able to watch all talks in realtime, and interact with speakers and other participants. In the picture above, Max More's talk is shown to remote participants in Teleplace, and the virtual Teleplace conference hall is shown to the participants in Milan. We used two Teleplace workstations, one to stream the video and voice of the speaker and to interact with remote participants, and one to stream the speaker's slides. Lesson learned: if the text on the slides is small it is better to upload also the original .ppt or .pdf to Teleplace. We did this in realtime during the conference, but we should have done it in advance. For those speakers without presentations in .ppt or .pdf, we used the second Teleplace workstation to show the audience in Milan to the audience in Teleplace.

In the afternoon of the second day we have reversed the procedure outlined above and shown remote talks from speakers in Teleplace to the audience in Milan. After great talks by Eugen Leitl and Robert Geraci, Natasha Vita-More started her talk (picture above)... but 20 minutes into Natasha's talk all the Internet connections in the conference hall in Milan died, perhaps due to overload caused by too many WiFi connections in parallel (about 10 participants were using the hotel's WiFi connection). The Internet service provider's technicians could not fix the problem. The remote participants in Teleplace continued without us, and we have video recordings of the talks by remote speakers. However, all remote speakers have been invited to repeat their talks to the teleXLR8 community.

In the morning of the third day, not only the Internet connections in the conference hall were still dead, but also the screen projection system was dead! I had a (very) heavy-handed "exchange of views" with the hotel's personnel (wife says I can be quite unpleasant on occasions), and the technical problems were fixed.

This was a very interesting event, with great talks by great speakers. I am happy to have seen again many old friends and made many new ones. In the picture above, some speakers and participants at a dinner after the end of the conference. I was not really able to pay attention to any of the talks including my own, and I look forward to watching the video coverage. We recorded everything on video, both in HD with the cameras on site, and from Teleplace. The videos will be available online and on the conference's DVD proceedings. The videos recorded in Teleplace will be available online in a few days, and those recorded on site in a few weeks.

I have started two blog posts as containers and index pages for material to be posted later. Both posts have the same title as this one. The post on the TransVision 2010 blog will have links to the HD videos recorded in Milan, and the post on the teleXLR8 blog has links to the videos recorded in Teleplace. The Twitter feed created by participants at #TV2010 has the twitting history of the conference.

UPDATE - (almost) full video coverage recorded in Teleplace.
UPDATE - Transhumanist Science, Futurist Art, Telepresence and Cosmic Visions of the Future at TransVision 2010 @ KurzweilAI

My presentation at TransVision 2010: Online conferences 2.0

My presentation at TransVision 2010: Online conferences 2.0

One problem with conferences is that participating costs money and time. Today many conferences offer live video streams of all talks and discussion, which is very important for those who cannot attend physically. Some recent conferences like the ASIM 2010 Conference in San Francisco (satellite to the Singularity Summit 2010) have offered fully interactive remote participation with multi-user video, audio, text and document sharing (“mixed-reality”).

Mixed-reality via modern telepresence technology permits opening conferences to remote participants by merging on-site and remote participants in one virtual group. The 2-way video and audio link enables each participant, on-site or remote, to be seen and heard by all other participants, on-site or remote. Remote speakers and attendees are able to actively participate, follow the talks via interactive video streaming, ask questions to the speakers, contribute to the discussion, and give talks themselves. Of course, modern telepresence technology permits also online-only “conferences 2.0″, and I think this is an important trend. Going back to “one problem with conferences is that participating costs money and time“, it is evident that online conferences 2.0 permit saving a lot of money and time, thus enabling more people to participate in cultural acceleration.

I will present our teleXLR8 project based on Teleplace, recently covered by Hypergrid Business, one of the best online magazines focused on professional applications of virtual reality, “as an online open TED, using modern telepresence technology for ideas worth spreading, and as a next generation, fully interactive TV network with a participative audience.” See also “teleXLR8 Project News – a telepresence community for cultural acceleration“, our mini-manifesto Telepresence Education for a Smarter World on the IEET site and the interview MIND and MAN: Getting Mental with Giulio Prisco, by Natasha Vita-More, on H+ Magazine.

Si terra’ a Milano, nel penultimo weekend di ottobre, il congresso mondiale dei transumanisti: TransVision 2010

Si terra’ a Milano, nel penultimo weekend di ottobre, il congresso mondiale dei transumanisti: TransVision 2010.

Sarà un intenso, rapido e appassionante percorso nel pensiero transumanista contemporaneo, le tecnologie in via di sviluppo, e quelle più visionarie basate su conquiste scientifiche ancora lontane. La conferenza, che avrà luogo da venerdì 22 a domenica 24 di Ottobre alla Sala Carmagnola dell’ Hotel dei Cavalieri a Milano, esplorerà le tendenze scientifiche, tecnologiche, culturali, artistiche e sociali che promettono di cambiare il nostro mondo al di là di ogni aspettativa e potrebbero risultare in una “Singolarità” in solo poche decine di anni.

La precedente edizione si è tenuta negli Stati Uniti d’America, con la partecipazione del futurologo milionario Ray Kurzweil e di William Shatner, il celebre capitano Kirk della serie Star Trek. Si annunciano nomi importanti anche per questa edizione italiana della kermesse.

Uno dei principali relatori sarà Aubrey de Grey, il profeta del prolungamento radicale della vita, noto per aver affermato che “la prima persona che vivrà più di mille anni è già nata”. Sembrerebbe una provocazione difficile da prendere sul serio se de Grey, direttore del progetto SENS a Cambridge, non avesse un’ impressionante serie di sviluppi teorici e risultati sperimentali su animali da laboratorio da esibire a sostegno delle sue idee rivoluzionarie.

Non si tratterà di un raduno di soli scienziati e ricercatori, ma anche di filosofi come gli italiani Riccardo Campa e Roberto Marchesini, autori di numerosi saggi sul transumanesimo e il postumano, nonche’ l’inglese trapiantato negli Stati Uniti Max More, Direttore dell’ associazione transumanista globale Humanity+ e riconosciuto come uno dei padri fondatori del transumanismo contemporaneo. Prevista anche la partecipazione di artisti: Graziano Cecchini, noto per aver dipinto di rosso futurista la fontana di Trevi, sarà affiancato da una coppia di artisti olandesi con una scultura dinamica intesa a celebrare il nostro futuro nello spazio. Quest’ opera è stata voluta dalla geniale Martine Rothblatt, transessuale, miliardaria grazie alle sue scoperte scientifiche nei settori dello spazio e della medicina di frontiera e proprietaria di un’importante casa farmaceutica.

Rothblatt sarà fra i numerosi relatori che parleranno di una delle prospettive più affascinanti: l’ immortalità. Non solo grazie al prolungamento della vita biologica sviluppato dal progetto SENS di Aubrey de Grey, ma anche grazie al lavoro d’avanguardia della “nouvelle vague” di ricercatori che si occupano di immortalità cibernetica: il trasferimento del contenuto della mente umana a computer avanzatissimi, il cosidetto “Mind Uploading” che potrebbe offrire una vera e propria imortalità post-biologica alla generazione dei nostri nipoti. E ci sono quelli che si spingono ancora più oltre e ipotizzano la realizzazione, attraverso la scienza e la tecnologia, di tutte le promesse delle religioni. Nell’ultima giornata della conferenza, si parlerà anche di nuove religioni transumaniste basate sulla scienza.

Come è naturale per una conferenza dedicata a tecnologie tanto avanzate, TransVision 2010 sarà aperta anche a coloro che non possono essere presenti fisicamente grazie all’uso delle più avanzate tecnologie di realtà virtuale.

Sito web: http://transvision.cc/

TransVision 2010 Update: program, abstracts, TVirtual online extension

TransVision 2010 Update: program, abstracts, TVirtual online extension

After the change of conference venue announced last week, the preparation of TransVision 2010 is in full swing.

We have updated the conference program with new speakers and the abstracts of Miriam Ji Sun, Francesco Monico, Roberto Guerra, Marta Rossi and Jacopo Tagliabue, Antonio Saccoccio, Randal A. Koene, Danila Medvedev, Valerija Pride, David Styles, Mike Treder, David Pearce, Anders Sandberg, Remi Sussan, Alex Lightman, Khannea Suntzu and Simon Deering, Fiorella Terenzi. Other speakers and abstracts will be added soon.

Those who wish to attend the TransVision 2010 conference and community convention (October 22, 23 and 24 in Milan, Italy) but cannot come to Milan will have the option to participate remotely in the TVirtual online extension, watch all talks in realtime, and interact with speakers and other participants. TVirtual, hosted by the teleXLR8 project based on the Teleplace online telepresence platform, will be a mixed-reality event similar to the recent ASIM 2010 Conference. TVirtual tickets are available at a very reduced price.

TransVision 2010 is a global transhumanist conference and community convention, organized by several transhumanist activists, groups and organizations, under the executive leadership of the Italian Transhumanist Association (AIT) and with the collaboration of an Advisory Board. The event will take place on October 22, 23 and 24, 2010 in Milan, Italy with many options for remote online access.

Register now

post links to Twitter, your blogs and websites, and add your name to the TransVision 2010 Facebook page.

TransVision 2010 Conference to be streamed live interactively in Teleplace

Those who wish to attend the TransVision 2010 conference and community convention (October 22, 23 and 24 in Milan, Italy) but cannot come to Milan will have the option to participate remotely in the TVirtual online extension, watch all talks in realtime, and interact with speakers and other participants. TVirtual, hosted by the teleXLR8 project based on the Teleplace online telepresence platform, will be a mixed-reality event similar to the recent ASIM 2010 Conference.

TVirtual tickets are available at a very reduced price. Those who register for the full 3-days TVirtual before or on Sunday, October 10, including of course those who have registered already, will receive a free yearly membership in teleXLR8. Those who register for the full 3-days TVirtual after this date will be offered a 50% discount for yearly membership in teleXLR8. Current teleXLR8 beta account holders will be welcome to participate in TVirtual.

If you choose to attend TVirtual, you will be able to watch all talks, see and talk to speakers and other participants, and attend special telepresence sessions during, before and after the conference. In the pictures above, a TV10 planning session and several TransVision 2010 speakers giving talks in Teleplace at recent events. Please see the teleXLR8 website for full video coverage of recent transhumanist talks.

For a more detailed description of the objectives of our online events program, see our mini-manifesto Telepresence Education for a Smarter World on the IEET site and the interview MIND and MAN: Getting Mental with Giulio Prisco, by Natasha Vita-More, on H+ Magazine. See also teleXLR8 Project News – a telepresence community for cultural acceleration.

TRANSVISION 2010 Toward Scientific Futurism

Some translated excerpts of Roberto Guerra’s TRANSVISION 2010 Verso il Futurismo Scientifico (original in Italian), with comments. Roberto is one of the leading Italian Futurist (not Neo-Futurist: Futurism is always Neo) artists and, like all Futurist writers, he uses language in a mercurial and unconventional way which makes his writings a pleasure to read, but difficult to translate. My translation is understandable, but does not have the futurist sparks of the original, and I encourage those who read Italian to read the original.

“Soon (October 2010, Milano) starts Transvision 2010, the periodic event of the Transhumanist Movement, the futurology of the age of Internet, globally disseminated. A Great Event once promoted by the Humanity + (ex W.T.A) mother-ship. This edition is organized by the Italian Transhumanist Association (AIT).”

Of course, the “mother-ship” Humanity+ will be represented by many participants and speakers, including the Chair David Orban, the Vice Chair Ben Goertzel and the Executive Director Alex Lightman. From this article is evident that TransVision 2010 will not be focused only on contemporary and future scientific advances, but also on the synergies between Science and Art, of which contemporary Italian Futurism represents one of the best examples.

“The AIT, in a recent and very significant turn of the movement toward activism in the media, collaborates with the promoters of contemporary Futurism: Graziano Cecchini (well known for the Red Fountain performance and other futurist actions, the only italian artist in the Taschen Usa 2010 catalog), Antonio Saccoccio (the net-futurist digital natives of the web), Giovanni Tuzet (teacher at the Bocconi in Milano, theorist of logic futurism) and the author [Roberto] (writer and electronic poet). A futurology-transhumanism-neofuturism synergy, officially defined in the year of the futurist centenary, with the live centenary in Ferrara-emphasized by Rai Due [Italian television] in The Future of Futurism… and the book published by the AIT Divenire 3 Futurismo: the re-invention of futurism in its essence, dynamic and techno-scientific ante litteram….”

Transhumanists of the world, unite and come to Milan to meet Italian Futurists! Many of the Futurist artists, writers and theorists above will participate in TransVision 2010. Issue 3 of the AIT’s print magazine Divenire, dedicated to Futurism, is available online.

“[Riccardo] Campa [in his recent book Mutare o Perire (Change or Perish - The Challenge of Transhumanism)] emphasizes also the need for the collaboration of the artists more attuned to the new cyber-cultures (for example the writers- in Italy, the young connectivists like Verso, Battisti and others- science-fiction film makers, even the still leading futurist aesthetics) to facilitate overcoming a certain future shock, whose neo-obscurantist symptoms are often clearly evident in old media (like the printed press), in Italy, in certain cultural circles historically entrenched in obsolete epistemologies, para-religious or para-secular and ideological (right/left together… not surprisingly!), the well known gap between the national humanistic tradition and… the Earth rapidly spinning in the universe. The urgency of new paradigms, also social and cultural, and especially institutional and economic, insists Campa, appears even more urgent in view of the most advanced frontiers of contemporary science, which is now close, beginning in the second half of this century, to make reality of apparently science fictional ideas like human hibernation, cloning, Artificial Intelligence, Mind-Up Loading (that is, the transfer of human consciousness in cloned, robotic or even virtual bodies, practically a form of semi-immortality), the so-called technological Singularity, not to speak of very current and “vulgar” developments like cognitive science, education after Internet, online information, eBooks, domotics, cybersex, almost total autimation, space travel, GMO and nanotechnology for medical and other applications (and similar things behind the corner…).”

Mind-Up Loading is Roberto’s Futurist version of the more frequent Mind Uploading, which will be extensively discussed at the conference in all its scientific, technical and philosophical aspects.

“Another plane of the human condition is already surfacing with the post- and trans- human, perhaps a new phase of evolution, which requires entirely new mental paradigms, even more complex and revolutionary, almost multitasking brains to answer with speed… beauty and truth (and well-being) to such new challenges of modernity…”

Speed is a quintessential Futurist meme. From the current version of the Wikipedia article on Futurism: “the ideals of futurism remain as significant components of modern Western culture; the emphasis on youth, speed, power and technology finding expression in much of modern commercial cinema and culture.” The article defines and characterizes Futurism as “Futurism was an artistic and social movement that originated in Italy in the early 20th century… The founder of Futurism and its most influential personality was the Italian writer Filippo Tommaso Marinetti. Marinetti launched the movement in his Futurist Manifesto, which he published for the first time on 5 February 1909 in La gazzetta dell’Emilia, an article then reproduced in the French daily newspaper Le Figaro on 20 February 1909. He was soon joined by the painters Umberto Boccioni, Carlo Carrà, Giacomo Balla, Gino Severini and the composer Luigi Russolo. Marinetti expressed a passionate loathing of everything old, especially political and artistic tradition. “We want no part of it, the past”, he wrote, “we the young and strong Futurists!” The Futurists admired speed, technology, youth and violence, the car, the airplane and the industrial city, all that represented the technological triumph of humanity over nature, and they were passionate nationalists. They repudiated the cult of the past and all imitation, praised originality, “however daring, however violent”, bore proudly “the smear of madness”, dismissed art critics as useless, rebelled against harmony and good taste, swept away all the themes and subjects of all previous art, and gloried in science… Marinetti’s legacy is also obvious in philosophical ingredients of transhumanism, especially in Europe.” Modern transhumanists who may find something objectionable in this description should bear in mind that the strongly unPC language of Marinetti was typical of the artistic circles of his times, and that some historically inaccurate allegations written by the winners (like most of history) are not correct. Come to Milan to learn about Futurism – at TransVision 2010 many different interpretations of Transhumanism will be represented, including its most radical and hardcore interpretations.

"In the healthy crisis of ideologies, beyond future shock in Italy, evident in the historic and cultural stagnation (even political…) facing the evolution of contemporary science, Transvision 2010, in summary, announces the arrival in the field of the new italian futuribiles- marching with the global movement- hoping in new synergies with possible scientific and cultural movements as a fundamental means to re-futurize XXI century’s Italy and cast it into new, strong, humanist and post-humanist, net-modern scenarios."

Eppur si vola

Roberto Guerra: writer and video poet. His published works include, among other writings, “Marinetti e il Duemila” (in AA.VV. “Divenire 3 Futurismo” edited by AIT, 2009, Sestante Edizioni) and “Moana Lisa Cyberpunk” (Edizioni Diversa Sintonia, 2010). He participated in “The Scientist International Videoart Festival” organized by Ferrara Video&Arte. In 2009 he organized, with Graziano Cecchini “Futurismo 100 live”, dedicated to 100 years of Futurism. Since 2010 he is the coordinator of the Laboratory of Futurist Literature of AIT (Italian Transhumanist Association).

TransVision 2010: New confirmed speakers

The following speakers will give talks at TransVision 2010, which brings the number of confirmed speakers to 24. Other speakers will be announced in a few days.

Roberto Guerra: writer and video poet. His published works include, among other writings, “Marinetti e il Duemila” (in AA.VV. “Divenire 3 Futurismo” edited by AIT, 2009, Sestante Edizioni) and “Moana Lisa Cyberpunk” (Edizioni Diversa Sintonia, 2010). He participated in “The Scientist International Videoart Festival” organized by Ferrara Video&Arte. In 2009 he organized, with Graziano Cecchini “Futurismo 100 live”, dedicated to 100 years of Futurism. Since 2010 he is the coordinator of the Laboratory of Futurist Literature of AIT (Italian Transhumanist Association).

Alex Lightman is the Executive Director of Humanity+ (formerly the World Transhumanist Association), author of over 800,000 words mainly about science, technology, science fiction, and the future including Brave New Unwired World: The Digital Big Bang and the Infinite Internet. He is a graduate of MIT and attended graduate school at MIT and Harvard. He completed Army Airborne paratrooper training, Navy Cold Weather Survival School, and over 25 road races including six marathons in the last 18 months. He got support from 40 countries for his government policy recommendations for IPv6.

Marta Rossi graduated (B.A.) in Philosophy of Mind and Languages from San Raffaele University (Milan) with a dissertation on self-reference. She received her M.A. from the same institution with a final dissertation on the ontology of functionalism and its consequences in ethics and social theory. Her research are focused on mind-body relations, philosophical and scientific accounts of consciousness and the link between Singularity and social changes. Currently a Ph.D. Candidate in Philosophy and Cognitive Sciences, she has been working @ iLabs since 2006, where she is Strategic Partnership Manager, leading the management of projects in ethics, social and political theory.

Jacopo Tagliabue graduated (B.A.) in Philosophy of Mind and Languages from San Raffaele University (Milan) with a dissertation on formal ontology. He received his M.A. from the same institution with a final dissertation on scientific explanations in complex systems. He studied microeconomics, statistics and complexity theory in renowned international institutions (London School of Economics, New York University, Santa Fe Institute) and he is currently a Ph.D. Candidate in Philosophy and Cognitive Sciences. He has been working @ iLabs since 2006, where he is now Chief Scientist for Qualitative Modelling.

Francesco Verso is an Italian SF writer (tough he defines his genre as “future fiction” from a definition of Anthony Burgess for A Clockwork Orange). He follows transhumanism since many years because its themes are strictly connected to the ones of his novels. Books: Antidoti umani – (Human Antidotes) – short-listed for the Urania Mondadori 2004 Award, deals with human augmentation & sensorial prosthetis. e-Doll – winner of the Urania Mondadori 2008 Award – is about the relationship between Maya, a moscow teenager, and Angel, an highly sofisticated replicant who is employed in the business of sex. The novel talks about the birth of consciousness and analyses aspects of human sexuality.

TransVision 2010 is a global transhumanist conference and community convention, organized by several transhumanist activists, groups and organizations, under the executive leadership of the Italian Transhumanist Association (AIT) and with the collaboration of an Advisory Board. The event will take place on October 22, 23 and 24, 2010 in Milan, Italy with many options for remote online access.

Register now

to take advantage of our special early Bird rates, post links to Twitter, your blogs and websites, and add your name to the TransVision 2010 Facebook page.

David Pearce at TransVision 2010: Fostering Post-Darwinian Life

David Pearce will give a talk at TransVision 2010:

Fostering Post-Darwinian Life
The case for paradise-engineering
by David Pearce

In the state-space of all possible minds, presumably only a tiny percentage can ever be physically realized – since matter, energy and information in the accessible universe are all finite. So we need to consider not just whether intuitively it is ethically good or bad for a sentient being – or species of sentient beings – to exist, but also the cost of such existence in terms of opportunities forgone. Some minds are clearly much more beautiful than others. For example, when the technology matures, would it be better if all our matter and energy were converted into different species of posthuman “smart angel”?

Our response to this question may depend at least in part on how it is posed. Thus if asked whether you’d take a wonderpill that overnight made you several orders of magnitude smarter, happier and more ethically sophisticated than you are now, then one might say yes. On the other hand, if asked whether you’d consent to having your brain reformatted and its matter reprogrammed into a different sentient being who was unimaginably more wonderful, then one might say no. For such a supermind wouldn’t be “me”.

More generally, a problem with being a classical utilitarian is that one is (apparently) obliged to seek the extinction of all existing species, including humans. This is because our matter and energy could be used more efficiently to produce utilitronium – whether in the guise of orgasmium, hedonium, pleasure plasma or Jupiter brains is still unclear. Critics might see this conclusion as a reductio of classical utilitarian ethics. Yet in a world run on utilitarian principles, it’s hard to see how such an outcome could be avoided, in the long run, on pain of inconsistency. True, the physical capacity to manufacture utilitronium is decades away at best, and perhaps centuries or more. So this argument might seem idle philosophizing. But the classical utilitarian is supposed to recognize that time-discounting at a rate different from zero is morally unacceptable too.

In this talk, I shall argue that we should strive for an impartial, “God”s-eye-view” in ethics, just as we do in natural science. Thus we should aim computationally to maximise the cosmic abundance of subjectively hypervaluable states in our Hubble volume. This entails fostering the emergence and spread of post-Darwinian life. I predict our descendants – and maybe our mature selves – will be wiser and happier beyond the bounds of normal human experience.

TransVision 2010 is a global transhumanist conference and community convention, organized by several transhumanist activists, groups and organizations, under the executive leadership of the Italian Transhumanist Association (AIT) and with the collaboration of an Advisory Board. The event will take place on October 22, 23 and 24, 2010 in Milan, Italy with many options for remote online access.

Register now

to take advantage of our special early Bird rates, post links to Twitter, your blogs and websites, and add your name to the TransVision 2010 Facebook page.

TransVision 2010, October 22-24 in Milan

TransVision 2010 official website

Transvision 2010 is a global transhumanist conference and community convention, organized by several transhumanist activists, groups and organizations, under the executive leadership of the Italian Transhumanist Association (AIT) and with the collaboration of an Advisory Board. The event will take place on October 22, 23 and 24, 2010 in Milan, Italy with many options for remote online access.

While Transvision 2010 is not organized by or connected with Humanity+ (formerly WTA), the organizer of most previous Transvision conferences, we wish to thank the Humanity+ Board for allowing the use of the name.

TransVision 2010 will be a very intense, informative, scientific as well as entertaining tour de force in contemporary transhumanist thinking, activism, science, technology & innovation and grand visionary dreams, with over 40 talks distributed over three days. Join us to explore the scientific, technological, cultural, artistic and social trends which could change our world beyond recognition and may result in a singularity in only a few decades.

The first day will be mainly dedicated to the philosophical, cultural and social aspects of transhumanism. We will also explore new forms of artistic expressions and design inspired by transhumanist thinking.

The second day will be mainly dedicated to technology: we will cover life extension, biotechnology and genetic engineering, cryonics and brain preservation, whole brain emulation and mind uploading, synthetic biology, virtual and augmented reality, artificial intelligence, nanotechnology, converging technologies and the technological singularity, and other transhumanist technologies, either already emerging from the research labs and almost ready for operational deployment, or still in a conceptual development phase.

The third day will be dedicated to the big picture, the wonderful cosmic adventures in which the human race is about to embark, leaving our little blue planet and spreading to the stars and beyond together with our AI mind children. We will also cover the metaphysical, spiritual, and even religious impact of transhumanist cosmic visions.

The conference program is packed with very well known and less known, but also outstanding, speakers. The morning sessions are reserved for invited talks, and the afternoon sessions are also open to contributed talks by other participants. The official language of the conference is English. We will also have some talks in Italian, for which simultaneous translation will be provided. Besides the main talks, the conference will feature round tables, debates, satellite meetings and social events. Please contact us for any question that you might have, register now, post a link to your blog, Twitter, Facebook etc., and consider submitting your proposal for a talk.

TransVision 2010, 22-24 Ottobre a Milano

Sito ufficiale di TransVision 2010

TransVision 2010 è un evento transumanista globale, organizzato da varie organizzazioni e gruppi transumanisti coordinati dall’ Associazione Italiana Transumanisti (AIT) con la collaborazione di un gruppo di esperti. L’ evento avrà luogo il 22, 23 e 24 Ottobre 2010 a Milano, con varie possibilità di accesso remoto online.

Mentre Transvision 2010 non è organizzato da o collegato a Humanity+ (precedentemente nota come WTA), responsabile della maggior parte dei precedenti eventi Transvision, ringraziamo la direzione di Humanity+ per aver permesso l’ uso del nome.

TransVision 2010 sarà un’ intenso, rapido e appassionante percorso nel pensiero transumanista contemporaneo , attività in corso, tecnologia e grandi visioni cosmiche, con oltre 40 interventi distribuiti su tre giorni. Unisciti a noi per esplorare le tendenze scientifiche, tecnologiche, culturali, artistiche e sociali che promettono di cambiare il nostro mondo al di là di ogni aspettativa e potrebbero risultare in una singolarità in solo poche decine di anni.

Il primo giorno sarà principalmente dedicato agli aspetti filosofici, culturali e sociali del transumanismo. Esploreremo anche nuove forme di espressione artistica e design ispirate dal pensiero transumanista.

Il secondo giorno sarà principalmente dedicato alla tecnologia: ci occuperemo di estensione della vita, biotecnologia e ingegneria genetica, crionica e preservazione cerebrale, emulazione cerebrale completa e “mind uploading”, biologia sintetica, realtà virtuale e aumentata, intelligenza artificiale, nanotecnologia, tecnologie convergenti e la singolarità tecnologica, e altre tecnologie transumaniste, alcune che stanno già emergendo dai laboratori di ricerca e sono quasi pronte per le applicazioni pratiche, ed altre che si trovano ancora in una fase di sviluppo concettuale.

Il terzo giorno sarà dedicato agli aspetti più visionari del pensiero transumanista: le meravigliose avventure cosmiche verso le quali stiamo per imbarcarci, lasciandoci indietro il nostro piccolo pianeta azzurro per partire verso le stelle ed oltre, insieme ai nostri discendenti spirituali (“mind children”) AI. Approfondiremo inoltre le conseguenze metafisiche, spirituali, e perfino religiose, delle visioni cosmiche transumaniste.

Il programma della conferenza è pieno di intervenenti di grande notorietà globale, ed altri meno conosciuti ma ugualmente eccellenti. Le sessioni mattutine sono riservate agli interventi sollecitati dagli organizzatori, mentre le sessioni pomeridiane sono aperte anche ad interventi proposti da altri partecipanti. La lingua ufficiale della conferenza è l’ Inglese. Ci saranno anche alcuni interventi in Italiano, per i quali sarà offerta una traduzione simultanea. Oltre agli interventi principali, la conferenza includerà tavole rotonde, dibattiti, riunioni parallele ed eventi di carattere sociale. Ti preghiamo di contattarci per ogni dubbio o domanda, registrarti adesso, aggiungere un link al tuo blog, Twitter, Facebook ecc., e ti incoraggiamo a farci una proposta per un tuo intervento.