Our Lives, Controlled From Some Guy’s Couch

Are we are living in a simulation akin to, 'The Matrix?' According to Oxford University Professor Nick Bostrom there is a 20% probability we are... Below is an extract from the article in the NY Times.

In fact, if you accept a pretty reasonable assumption of Dr. Bostrom’s, it is almost a mathematical certainty that we are living in someone else’s computer simulation.

This simulation would be similar to the one in “The Matrix,” in which most humans don’t realize that their lives and their world are just illusions created in their brains while their bodies are suspended in vats of liquid. But in Dr. Bostrom’s notion of reality, you wouldn’t even have a body made of flesh. Your brain would exist only as a network of computer circuits.

You couldn’t, as in “The Matrix,” unplug your brain and escape from your vat to see the physical world. You couldn’t see through the illusion except by using the sort of logic employed by Dr. Bostrom, the director of the Future of Humanity Institute at Oxford.

Dr. Bostrom assumes that technological advances could produce a computer with more processing power than all the brains in the world, and that advanced humans, or “posthumans,” could run “ancestor simulations” of their evolutionary history by creating virtual worlds inhabited by virtual people with fully developed virtual nervous systems.

The full paper from 2003 is available here. Thanks to one of our Beta testers Scott for this feed. Add him as a contact - he sure needs some! Just kidding Scottie!!!

Spellbinder

Social networking and Geo location. Introducing Spellbinder:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/6938244.stm

Link courtesy Dr. Dee.

They 'already' know where you are... [Part 1]

Reflecting on the past is time well spent in the day of anyone involved in corporate vision and direction. So when we asked Colum Joyce, our EVP of Strategic Disruption, to write an article for the blog, it really should have come as no surprise when he came back with this first part in a series on personal and professional visibility...

I kind of miss the days when I could actually disappear. Those wonderful times when no one knew where I was, could not contact me and I controlled who knew what about me.

Today? Well it is next to impossible. Now we have satellites with image resolution of a couple of inches, phones that leave a trail, PCs that communicate and record, software and feedback features that monitor and report, packages with RFID, CCTV that snap as we shop, TVs that tell what programmes we are watching, pattern recognition softwares that match faces, personal behaviours and habits are just some of the ways that we have lost the ability to disappear and be anonymous.

In effect we are tracked, traced and trailed every moment of our day. Does it matter? Probably not: we don't seem to be any more secure, don't seem to be less free, don't seem to realise, don't seem to care to very much..

If you do care and want to rebel just a little then:

1. Do nothing illegal (Being good really doesn't help big brother)
2. Change your name on a regular basis (alternate between John Smith and James Jones is a nice ploy if female, reverse if male, transsexuals can use Joyce Joyce)
3. All the family should wear the same wig and mouth inserts and reflective sun glasses (this disturbs face recognition software somewhat)
4. Move house and leave no forwarding address (really steams the clam of direct marketers)
5. Place a large sign on your lawn, roof or flat surface with "Osama for President" (they won't know whether you dislike Hillary or are a budding Jihadist)
6. Have lots of children (it will eventually overload the system)
7. Marry and divorce on a 9 month schedule (increases your productivity and more system overload)
8. Have your children in different countries (more system load, Axis of Evil country births are bonus points)
9. Buy unpackaged foods
10. Generate your own electricity
11. Install a Faraday cage in your house
12. Put reflexive coatings on your windows (The cool Jack Bauer domestic look)
13. Use only cash
14. Resign from all loyalty schemes
15. Cancel all subscriptions to magazines, news papers etc.
16. Opt out of all direct marketing schemes
17. Cancel your cable subscription
18. Switch of your mobile
19. Make calls only using other peoples phones, computers, cars and connections
20. Only use Internet cafes
21. Use trigger words (some examples here) in every conversation , e-mail and communication - remember ECHELON is listening to everything
22. Only write in an ancient script and change it regularly, (except the trigger words of course)
23. Use an anonymous or randomizer e-mail address generator
24. Keep your computer off line
25. Avoid WiFi and WiMAX etc.
26. Never send error reports
27. Hand write letters
28. Learn Navajo
29. Shred all your paper (best use a cross hatch shredder)
30. Compost the shredded paper
31. Destroy your old hard disks physically (Hammer is good, acid is best)
32. Wave to the sky as you walk down the street
33. Always smile at the cameras
34. At Xmas do a Big card and walk around. (It should say something like Happy Xmas Big Brother. This is also good at Chinese new year, St.Patrick's day, Easter or Hanuka. It is really effective for national holidays in the Axis of Evil countries)
35. Go on walking holidays and camp to avoid hotel registration
36. E-mail a travel agency asking if there are any cheap, random destination, CIA flights available on a last minute basis (you need to book lots of free days if you get one but accommodation is free I believe)
37. Tell someone you just booked it (Its one of those times its nice not to be invisible)
38. Start your own political party (good fun and you might just be a George W.)
39. Start a religion (someone will believe you and you get tax breaks)
40. Move to North Korea (solves obesity, visibility and longevity issues)
41. Plan to die in a place no one will find you (tax and statistics guys hate that)
42. Vote for someone you know nothing about (at least you won't be lied to)
43. Have fun at their expense: You're paying for it after all. (Think of it as testing or quality control for the good of national security)

If after all that effort they do actually track you then we can all feel so much more confident that the real baddies are soon to be just road kill on the highway to Security.

Behind the scenes

MyVector launched mid 2005 to address the ever increasingly complex needs of business travellers. Would you find it useful/comforting to know where your family, friends and colleagues are when they are travelling? We built many of the services MyVector offers based on this question as an overwhelming number of people surveyed responded: YES!

So who uses MyVector?

• People / groups who travel - such as businessmen/women, pilots, dj's, bands (artists), sports clubs (football, rugby etc.), students, faculty staff
• People who know people who travel - PA's, admins/secretaries, husbands/wifes, partners, siblings and offspring

What does MyVector offer?

• The ability to share where you are now or at any point in the future. [Share]
• Access to and updates on your friends, colleagues or families whereabouts. [Find]
• A record of your travel events. [Store]
• Plus much more...

What's next?

We're working to a 5 year plan along the lines of Develop, Deploy, Test, Revise and Exploit. When we heard Head of the US Senate Commerce Committee, Ted Stevens, state to congress, "The Internet is not something that you just dump something on, it's not a big truck, it's, it's a series of tubes!!!" we had an epiphany. We'll be entering our 3rd year in business with the launch of the new site at the end of September 07. As always we look forward to your feedback.

Congrats on finding our blog! Subscribe to us, link to us and comment on us... Keep tuned for more info, thought provoking rants from our EVP of Strategic Disruption, plus sneak previews of the new UI and upcoming additional features.