[NTLK] OT: iPad vs. MS Courier: Sound Off

[Lord Groundhog]

~~~ On 2010/04/08 06:42, Jim Lee at jimlee at centurytel.net wrote ~~~

>    Thanks for the pointers, Ryan.  I'll check out those studies, but I
> still believe that "cognition" of the human brain is un-interfaceable...


Hi Jim 

On the whole I share your pessimism == I'm inclined to think we won't do it
easily, if at all. 

BUT -- and you heard that coming didn't you -- there is one powerful factor
at work here.  There are certain Big Players in the funding of R&D who
really, really want true augmented cognition, though not necessarily for
reasons you and I would like.  First of all, there are the defence depts of
the world who want to have it, just for the possibilities it presents.   And
once they have it, it will present even more possibilities to them.  That's
how this stuff works.

Second, and far less acceptible (to me at least), the "intelligence"
agencies will regard it as something to have almost at all costs.  Genuine
augmented cognition comes with the possibility of gaining access to
someone's thoughts at a level they only can dream of right now.  Combine
this kind of technology with drugs that diminish self-control, so the theory
might go, and all you hve to do is hook the individual up to a machine that
will transcribe all the thoughts he's trying to suppress.

Would it ever actually work?  I still am not convinced.  But I am ready to
believe that the kind of people who once upon a time financed the remote
psychic viewing experiments would also throw a lot of money at trying to
make augmented cognition work.  All for the best possible reasons, of
course.  

You don't have to be paranoid to think they're out to get you...  :-)


 
Shalom. 
Christian 

~~~ ~~~ ~~~

³Any sufficiently advanced magic is indistinguishable from a Newton.²
            -- what Arthur C. Clarke meant

http://youtube.com/watch?v=1ZzpdPJ7Zr4
(With thanks to Chod Lang)
http://tinyurl.com/29y2dl
http://www.diyplanner.com/node/3942



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