Dirk Bruere
Attended Nottingham University and later what is now Westminster University, and has a BSc in Physics. Subsequently pursued a career in electronics and computer research and is a research engineer at Surface Measurement Systems. A founder member of Zero State (ZS) and a member of the Futurists Board of the Lifeboat Foundation. Founder of The Consensus in 2002CE, a political party with a core philosophy of Transhumanism, which has been influential in Zero State and the Wave. Other interests include the interface between technology and theology explored in the books TechnoMage and The Praxis, and was co-presenter of a UK radio show, OneTribe. Head of The Praxis, a ZS spiritual organization. For several years held the position of Branch Master in the World Shorinji Kempo Organization, teaching Zen and martial arts, although is now retired from a teaching role.
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Elon Musk’s Neuralink — The Dark Side
Elon Musk has recently unveiled his company’s first Neuralink device implanted in an experimental animal — a pig. To briefly describe the device for those without much technical knowledge, it is an invasive technology based on the concept of a neural lace, which is a mesh of perhaps hundreds of wires laced throughout the brain albeit with concentration of connections in certain areas. These either sample neural patterns or modify them. Needless to say, even the minor technical challenges are massive. For example, it involves brain surgery. Then we have bio-compatibility problems as typically implanted electrodes tend to cause the tissues around them to die back. Finally, actually transferring massive amounts…
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Transhumanism – The Final Religion?
After several decades of relative obscurity Transhumanism as a philosophical and technological movement has finally begun to break out of its strange intellectual ghetto and make small inroads into the wider public consciousness. This is partly because some high profile people have either adopted it as their worldview or alternatively warned against its potential dangers. Indeed, the political scientist Francis Fukuyama named it “The world’s most dangerous idea” in a 2004 article in the US magazine Foreign Policy, and Transhumanism’s most outspoken publicist, Ray Kurzweil, was recently made director of engineering at Google, presumably to hasten Transhumanism’s goals. So, what are these goals and how does Transhumanism define itself? Well,…
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Gareth Williams – Conspiracy and Logic
Old news, but the Snowden revelations might have some bearing on the matter… I wrote this as a speculative piece in 2010. For background click here: For those who do not know, Gareth Williams was the GCHQ mathematician and cryptanalyst seconded to SIS who was found dead in a bag in a bath at his flat. The inquest has just concluded with the coroner saying that he was “probably unlawfully killed”. Naturally there has been a lot of speculation over who and why. However, looking at the case logically narrows the possibilities considerably. First, we can rule out wild notions of foreign hit men killing him in revenge for merely…
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Limits to Growth
The idea that economic growth cannot continue, and that it must not continue is deeply ingrained in the so-called “Green” political view of the future. The simplistic notion is that the Earth’s resources are finite and either we will exhaust them or fatally pollute the planet while attempting to do so. Superficially this makes sense. For example, if economic growth continues for the next century at around three percent per annum everyone will, on average, be twenty times as wealthy as they are now. In fact, almost everyone in Britain would be able to afford to live in a large fifteen bedroom house in several hectares of land with a…
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Fear and Loathing in Transhumanism
There is a sense of paranoia seething in some areas of “traditional” Transhumanism. There is the smell of change in the air and some people do not like it one little bit. So, what is the change and why is it causing problems? To illustrate, let’s go back almost exactly twenty years to the early days of the Net. Back then very few people outside of the technical elite even knew that the “Internet” existed, let alone what it was. That self selected elite had their own culture, their own in-jokes and their own sense of idealism and freedom in what they saw as uncorrupted cyberspace, along with a utopian…
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Our Vampire Future? – Wireheading and Hitech Psychopaths
Wireheading – a term from science fiction that was coined some decades back to describe people who use electrical stimulation of the “pleasure center” of the Human brain to achieve the absolute maximum happiness possible. As a result the Wirehead often dies of neglect since the impulse to eat and drink, or indeed do anything at all, becomes insignificant compared to the ecstasy of the next jolt. The concept itself was in turn based upon studies of rats that had been implanted with electrodes in an experimental setup where by pressing a lever a the animal could self administer a jolt of supreme pleasure. The result being that they continually…
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In Praise of the Borg – “Resistance is futile – you will want to be assimilated!”
All Star Trek fans have seen them, the relentless, powerful and collective mind known as the Borg. They roam about the galaxy press-ganging everyone they can find into becoming ugly mind controlled drones who work for the good of the hive whether they want to or not. While we might hope for better from Star Trek we should not expect it. Trek has almost a pathological antipathy to anything Transhumanist, and explicitly rejects any kind of enhancement of Humans whether it is genetic (Eugenics Wars), medical (anti aging) or technological (Borg). Even brain computer interfacing seems off-limits. So, given that Trek is a Luddite propaganda tool why don’t we take…
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The State of Zero State – 2014
This is a statement to clarify (to some extent) the degree to which ZS has evolved and its current state of existence. My qualification for writing this is as nominal head of ZS, in its incarnation as a Wave Group 2 organization. If you do not know what that means… well, you should find out. Originally ZS grew out of Transhumanism, to which it is still strongly tied via its Principles. However, the political and technological aspects now dominate in the form of ZS Projects. In “The Good Old Days” of 2012 it was envisaged that ZS would define its actions via semi-autonomous projects which fell under different headings and…
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Inventions and Discoveries Out of Time – What might still be missing?
Did you know that Magnesium Diboride (MgB2) was first synthesized in 1953 and that it was discovered that it superconducts at a temperature of 39K in 2001? So what you might think. It’s just an obscure compound of little interest. However, it could have been made, and this property discovered, over 100 years ago. The fact that up until the 1980s the temperature record holder for any superconducting material was about half that of MgB2 makes it rather interesting. Something rather important to science was missed for decades. What else has been overlooked? Well, in the superconductor arena the biggie was the discovery in the 1980s of the Yttrium Barium…
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The Transhumanist Declaration 2.0
This was the winner of the competition for a new declaration that was held by Transhumanity. As such it is currently the definition adopted by Zero State. It is shorter than those it was based upon with many of the negative caveats concerning its dangers condensed into a single point. Humanity stands to be profoundly affected by science and technology in the future. We assert the desire ability of transcending human limitations by overcoming aging, enhancing cognition, abolishing involuntary suffering, and expanding beyond Earth. We intend to become more than Human. The single defining factor of Transhumanism that separates it from all previous philosophies is the proposed use of…
