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http://hplusclub.com/tucson/presentation20071102

"Cryonics: Freak Freeze?"

Date and Time: Friday, November 02, 2007 from 4:00pm until 6:00pm MST

Location: Tubac Room, 4th Floor, Student Union Memorial Center, 1303 E. University Blvd., Tucson, AZ, USA 85721-0017 | Google Maps

Description: "Cryonics: Freak Freeze?" - No, it is not, but there remains poor mainstream understanding of cryonics and its potential and obstacles. We will cover the basics of cryogenics and cryonics, available services, and related topics, in preparation for next week's guest speakers.

Presentations

• [PowerPoint] Cryonics: Freak Freeze? by Richard Leis, Jr.
• [PowerPoint] Cryonics by eon fathom

Meeting Notes

Freezing - a liquid is frozen
Vitrification - conversion to glassy substance

Companies
- Alcor Life Extension
- American Cryonics Society
- Cryonics Institute

Revival of an animal "event of the millennium"
What happens concerning other bodily fluids?

Stabilize > Transport > Preserve > Store
- 77 people currently stored

Why hasn't it caught on?
- lacking demonstration
- gruesome
- needs medical backing by doctors
- needs better marketing

Cryonics
- reactions slow down significantly
- time basically stops, "time travel"
- key focus is to preserve people
- revival
- what will the economy be like in the future?
- What is the ethics of a super-intelligence?
- Might we become a third-world frozen society?
- Will the human race be a hive mind?
- What is value?
- Should we work on projects that wont happen for centuries?
- We need an entire mechanistic view of the brain

Lasers used to destroy blood-borne diseases

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Date and Time: 2007-09-21 (Friday) at 4:00 PM
Location: Tubac Room, 4th Floor, Student Union
Description: Richard Leis, Jr. will recap Singularity Summit 2007 and WIRED NextFest. Open discussion.

Please contact HAdmin (at) hplusclub (dot) com for more information and directions.

Meeting Notes

MIT human augmentation research lab

Wired NEXT
(http://www.wirednextfest.com)
- gel-like materials are used as skin on robots
- Zeno Robot
- soft, putty-like material hardens when impacted

Google Lunar X Prize announced
(http://www.googlelunarxprize.org)

Quotation from the book "Robot"
- advanced life may make themselves into strictly rational agents
- some quantum form may be adopted to become essentially invisible to the naked eye

HiRise superRes

Google Mars in development
(http://www.google.com/mars)

Stem-cell research
- too much money is being given to stem cells ($10 billion)
- possible that male testicles may be used for stem cells

Bionic Woman review
- a girl is saved by robotically augmenting her body
- she wakes up and believes her life is ruined
- philosophical perspective: "god among us" must either help us or die

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Location: Room 2919 at the Arizona Cancer Center, 1515 N. Campbell | map
Title: "1957, 2007, and the Discovery Channel's 2057"
Presenter: Richard Leis, HiRISE Operations Specialist, h+ Adviser
Presentation Description: On Sunday, January 28, 2007, the Discovery Channel presented 2057¹, a documentary/drama that asked "What would you see and experience if the clocks rolled forward 50 years?"² Their answer? A time that mirrors the issues of our own era, where problems are solved by deus ex machina, and convergence is superficial at best.

Are the quaint predictions of the future from the 1950's and the populist scenarios in 2057 the best we can do? Are transhumanist thinkers any better? I will examine past predictions and present reality, review 2057, and attempt to build a framework for prediction independent of contemporary biases.

Notes:

1. 2057; - http://dsc.discovery.com/convergence/2057/2057.html
2. 2057 - About the Show - http://dsc.discovery.com/convergence/2057/about/about.html

Presentations

• [PowerPoint] 1957, 2007, and the Discovery Channel’s 2057 by Richard Leis, Jr.

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Date and Time: Friday, January 19, 2007, 4 PM
Location: Presidio conference room (map) on the fourth floor of the Student Union
Title: Open Presentations and "Technology Trends From 2004 Through 2007"
Presenter: Everyone, Richard Leis
Presentation Description: The floor is open. Also, Richard will be discussion a few technology trends he tracked from 2004 through 2007. Did they follow linear, exponential, or hyper exponential growth? What do these trends tell us about progress in general and the Singularity specifically?

Presentations

• [PowerPoint] Technology Progress From 2004 Through 2007 by Richard Leis, Jr.

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Presentations

• [PowerPoint] Tag, You’re It! Privacy Versus Safety in the 21st Century by Richard Leis, Jr.

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Presentations

• [PowerPoint] HiRISE Transition Imaging and Augmenting Humans Instead of Terraforming Mars by Richard Leis, Jr.