Lifeboat Foundation

FUTURISM UPDATE (November 30, 2014) — Mr. Andres Agostini, Amazon, LinkedIn

Toronto Star: Computer glitch sends $20M in overpayments to social assistance recipients http://lnkd.in/eQJMkvu

Washington Post: Russian warships pass through English Channel, anchor off the coast of France http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/russian-warships-pass-th…story.html

Foreign Affairs: Back to Europe’s Future http://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/142342/david-schoenba…pes-future

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Wired.com

The message arrives on my “clean machine,” a MacBook Air loaded only with a sophisticated encryption package. “Change in plans,” my contact says. “Be in the lobby of the Hotel ______ by 1 pm. Bring a book and wait for ES to find you.”

ES is Edward Snowden, the most wanted man in the world. For almost nine months, I have been trying to set up an interview with him—traveling to Berlin, Rio de Janeiro twice, and New York multiple times to talk with the handful of his confidants who can arrange a meeting. Among other things, I want to answer a burning question: What drove Snowden to leak hundreds of thousands of top-secret documents, revelations that have laid bare the vast scope of the government’s domestic surveillance programs? In May I received an email from his lawyer, ACLU attorney Ben Wizner, confirming that Snowden would meet me in Moscow and let me hang out and chat with him for what turned out to be three solid days over several weeks. It is the most time that any journalist has been allowed to spend with him since he arrived in Russia in June 2013. But the finer details of the rendezvous remain shrouded in mystery. I landed in Moscow without knowing precisely where or when Snowden and I would actually meet. Now, at last, the details are set.

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FUTURISM UPDATE (November 29, 2014) — Mr. Andres Agostini, Amazon, LinkedIn

BBC News: Royal Navy launches first ‘drone’ unit http://lnkd.in/ezyfkNj

FINANCIAL TIMES: China has ‘wasted’ $6.8tn in investment, warn Beijing researchers http://lnkd.in/eEAePxA

REUTERS: Saudi Arabia declares price war on U.S. shale http://lnkd.in/ex83vU4

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Kurzweil AI

Purdue University researchers are developing a robotic fabric that moves and contracts and is embedded with sensors, an approach that could bring “active clothing” and a new class of soft robots.

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FUTURISM UPDATE (November 28, 2014) — Mr. Andres Agostini, Amazon, LinkedIn

TechCrunch: GoPro Could Go Robo With Consumer Drones Launching Next Year http://lnkd.in/e_Zc-K4

Financial Times: Cheap energy is the new cheap labour. For companies wondering where to locate, the world has turned upside down http://lnkd.in/eyWJ3AN

Business Insider: A Single Number Explains Why Radical Politics In Spain Are Here To Stay http://www.businessinsider.com/spanish-youth-unemployment-an…z3KJxEhaHX

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This archive file was compiled from an interview conducted on the campus of Singularity University, February 2013. The interview took place at a time where new artificial intelligence systems, such as IBM’s Jeopardy winning “Watson,” were re-awakening the popular imagination in terms of artificial intelligence becoming a visible part of day to day life. The privacy issues regarding the ‘big-data’ that allowed many AI systems to function was also becoming a significant source of controversy. In this piece, Marty Kohn, MD, chief medical scientist on the IBM Watson Medical Team, gives insight into his personal thoughts and feelings regarding how society might both accept and reject the artificial intelligence advances of the coming years.

About the Speaker:
IBM:
researcher.ibm.com/researcher/view.php?person=us-marty.kohn

FutureMed:
futuremed2020.com/marty-kohn/

FUTURISM UPDATE (November 27, 2014) — Mr. Andres Agostini, Amazon, LinkedIn

Forbes: Automation Is On The Rise: Will Robots Soon Be Commonplace? http://lnkd.in/dYGpdAD

THE ECONOMIST: The ZEV’s invisible tailpipe. Are zero-emission vehicles cleaner than petrol cars? It all depends… http://lnkd.in/er_9ihg

CIO Magazine: 60 things European legislators don’t want Canada to learn about air passengers http://lnkd.in/eh88ND9

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By Zak Cheney-Rice — News.Mic

The news: Russian cosmonauts have discovered something remarkable clinging to the outside of the International Space Station: living organisms.

The microscopic creatures appeared during a space walk intended to clean the vessel’s surface, and were allegedly identified — incredibly — as a type of sea plankton. This is big: According to Sploid, Russian scientists are both “shocked by [the] discovery and can’t really explain how [it] is possible.”

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Technologies based on stem cells, genetic engineering or tissue engineering may eventually have considerable impact in alleviating certain diseases such as arthritis, heart disease, or dementia. But these rejuvenation biotechnologies cannot be used by the general public at large in order to negate the ageing process itself.

1. Problems with Stem Cell Therapies

One methodology for delivering biotechnology rejuvenation therapies (such as stem cell therapy) is bone marrow transplant. This is a complex, clinically risky, and administratively complicated procedure. It is well beyond the technical issue of artificially manipulating and repairing cells in the laboratory. Cells need to be harvested from a patient, manipulated in the laboratory, and then re-transplanted in the patient.

Consider what happens during an autologous cell harvest. The patient has to attend a clinic and this may involve a pre-procedure physical assessment, followed by administration of a Colony-Stimulating Factor which is given as an injection every day for up to 14 days, (the patient must be instructed on how to do this at home). A course of chemotherapy may be needed in order to regulate the production of stem cells. The patient returns for another visit for the harvest. The harvesting process takes three to four hours and it may have to be repeated every day for up to five days in order to collect enough cells for the transplant. It involves an epidural or a general anaesthetic (with all the associated risks), punctures over the pelvic bone and withdrawal of marrow material. Alternatively, intravenous access and blood withdrawal need to be arranged. The amount to be withdrawn must be assessed from person to person. The patient needs to recover from the anaesthetic.

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