Renaissance Blog

This NASA project rubbed me the wrong way: 

< http://spectrum.ieee.org/automaton/robotics/military-robots/nasa-jsc-unveils-valkyrie-drc-robot  >

Why on earth, figuratively, would anyone build a humanoid robot for extraterrestrial activities? 

We make robots humanoid to appease humans or make the robot more capable of navigating human-centric environments. I think we can all agree that space, or other planets, are not human-centric. If you are going to argue with me on this one, then just stop reading right now and go back to fantasizing about sending your own meat bag to mars. 

The other reason would to make people identify more with the robots so that they are willing to throw billions of tax dollars at space exploration. These people do not understand that the same functions and features would be available in a robot for 1/100 the price and probability for failure than these humanoid robots. 

Don’t get me wrong. I want my household robotic maid to look like Megan Fox, but when I am funding a robotic space exploration robot, I want it to be the most efficient engineering marvel for navigating the target environment. I could not give two shits if it looks humanoid. 

Let’s see some research focused in the right areas, and not blatantly following their own agendas for “cool projects” on the back of specialized funding 

Please, don’t ever diet again, it Is not going to work. 

I tend to be a very positive person, and I hate it when people say you can’t do something. 

This is one of the cases where it is true.  

You can’t “diet” and maintain a healthy lifestyle. 

As usual, I am not going to do your research for you. It has been proven again and again. 

Change your lifestyle. 

Change how you look at food. 

Change your attitude. 

Challenge your assumptions. 

Challenge your upbringing. 

But don’t diet.  

Diets are temporary.  

Diets are Band-Aids on broken bones. 

Diets distract you from the real problem. 

If you have read any of my previous posts and are still reading then you are open minded and self-analytical. 

Think about your own food hang-ups.  

Why do you want to change? 

It is not until you answer that question, and the answer is important enough to you, that you will really change in the long term. 

Don’t diet, change to be better. 

Why did I sign up for the Crossfit Open? 

Because I am a Crossfitter. 

I struggled more with this question than I thought I would. Every answer I wrote turned into a “Why do I CrossFit?” answer instead of relating to the Open itself. 

When I was 15 years old I came home from a 10k road race and my dad asked me if I won. I told him no, and he looked disappointed and asked me why I even bother racing then. I was enraged. In that moment I stood up to my father for the first time.  I told him that I do it to improve. To test myself. To be better than the person I was last week. He did not say a word. Just grinned, nodded, and went back to reading his newspaper. 

The Open will show you how you rank compared to everyone else in the world who signed up. Thousands upon thousands of them. You will look and compare, and then you will realize that is not why you are doing it. 

We started CrossFit three years ago, shortly before the 2011 Open. Everyone encouraged us to sign up for the Open, but we didn’t think we were ready yet after one month of CrossFit.  

We watched from the sidelines while everyone at our gym competed, and we learned what CrossFit was about.  

We witnessed the community getting closer together. We witnessed people doing things they thought impossible. We saw the look in their eyes and the energy radiating from their soul when they finished.  

We saw athletes revitalized.  

We saw new passion born. 

We saw every single person get at least one rep on every WOD.  

Each one of those people got one more rep than we did. 

We were ready, we knew the movements, we probably could have even beaten a few people. We just did not understand what the Open was. Don’t let ignorance limit you too.  

The Open will test you.  

And it will teach you about yourself. 

The Open will bring you closer to your gym family.  

Closer to your coaches and your friends. 

The Open is your chance to measure yourself. 

Against others, and against the version of you who did the Open last year. 

Are you Fitter, Faster, and Stronger than last year? 

If you don’t sign up this year, next year how will you look back? 

The Open is a perfect recurring reference point.  

What are you afraid of? 

Why are you standing on the sidelines watching? 

Don’t just stand there watching life pass you by. 

The Open is more than another workout. It is a celebration of every person’s achievements. What have you achieved? What are you going to achieve in the coming year before the next Open?  

Jump in. 

Do the WODs. 

Then get in someone’s face and cheer them on. 

They did not let you put down the bar, and you are not going to let them. 

The Open is everything that makes CrossFit great, all rolled into a series of weekly WODs that feel more like a party. No way in hell I am missing that. 

Do two things for me: 

1. Sign up, so I can cheer you on. 
2. If I get far enough into a WOD with muscle-ups, make sure all the pretty girls are watching – I always get more muscle-ups that way. 

Does surveillance really impose on our privacy? What is it that I lose by having data gathered about me? Do the benefits outweigh the downsides in the long term? 

I have asked this question of many people and have yet to find anyone who can articulate their fears in a way that is rational and reasonable when challenged with the positive effects that outweighs the negative. 

By gathering health information on everyone, people fear that their health insurance rates will go up. Health insurance costs are driven by the costs of health care. The cost of health care is driven by excessive testing; misdiagnosis; failure to seek treatment before problems become critical and costly; and legal fees. These all come from lack of information about the patient and disease.  

Once we are gathering copious amounts of data on people, we will be able to properly research and diagnose these diseases. Imagine a world where every human being feeds into statistical analysis for medical research. This kind of data mining will open the medical research field up in ways that can’t be achieved by todays methods. 

How many health problems could be prevented if people would see their doctor earlier, or monitor their heath for early warning signs. People like to live in denial, they are afraid to face the truth about their lifestyle and how it is affecting their health. They make subconscious decisions that shorten their lives because they fear their mortality. We need monitoring so that we can have a “check engine” light serving our bodies. This will allow our biological mechanic to fix a problem before it becomes a catastrophic failure.  

Be honest with yourself, are you trying to hide your health information from the government, insurance companies, and your employer, or are you trying to hide it from yourself? 

Envy and Jealousy are useless in our world so they must be controlled. 

Envy is fear of missing out. 

Jealousy is fear of losing what you have. 

These two concepts are often confused because they are complex reactions to the real emotion of fear. They are not emotions in and of themselves. They are an interpretation of our fear and often used to generalize because we are afraid of facing those fears head on. 

If we consider ourselves an enlightened society, we need to rid ourselves of the self-defeating behaviors caused by these two pseudo-emotions. They will both tear you down, waste your energy, and destroy your chances at thriving in your life. 

Let’s start with the easier of the two: Envy. When we want something that someone else has, we are envious of them. We need to ask ourselves why we really care what another person has. They most likely did not steal that “thing” from you. Them having it rarely means that you can not also have it too. There are very few truly unique items and experiences in the world. We envy someone primarily because they have something that we fear we can not have. We are afraid that we will miss out on some experience that they have attained, or will attain. Our society is becoming less and less a scarcity based economy. Do not envy someone for something they have. If it is truly a priority for you, then you can attain the same objectives. 

Next, the more complex: Jealousy. When we fear that we will lose something that is important to us, we feel jealous. The most common type of jealousy is related to a loved one. When we feel a threat that we will lose a loved one to someone else, then we feel jealous. That fear of loss comes from a more deep seated insecurity that we are not good enough to maintain the relationship in the presence of competition. This is what makes jealousy a complex situation and not an emotion on it’s own. Don’t try to address the jealousy face on. Even worse, don’t just avoid the situation that causes the jealousy. To do so is just another way of hiding your head in the sand. Why do you fear losing this person? Is there an underlying problem in your relationship that needs to get fixed? Are you insecure that you are not good enough to be in the relationship in the first place? These are all real problems and they need to be addressed to maintain a healthy relationship. Fix the source of the problem and you will be amazed at how liberating and stress free your life is when you feel truly secure and comfortable in your relationships.  

My snatch is terrible. My snatch is getting better. 

My snatch problem: I am slow getting under the bar, and I have terrible shoulder mobility.  

These are fixable, and I am working on them, but I have not made very much progress. It’s time to stop talking about what is wrong, and time to start talking about what I am doing to fix it. 

I am making a mental shift.  

When people ask why I am doing a certain drill. My response is not that it is “Because I am slow” it will be “This is making me faster under the bar.” 

When you ask me why I am inflicting pain on myself with a lacrosse ball; my response will not be “Because I have terrible shoulder mobility,” it will be “This is how I get my arms straight overhead.” 

I have long since removed these kind of negative statements everywhere else in my life. Why would I be using them at the gym? This is a place that is such a large part of my life, and a place where I have a huge support group helping me get better. 

My request to my gym family: If you catch me making those two negative statements – punch me straight in the gut – that’ll teach me. 

Memento mori. “Remember that you will die.”  Does death scare you, does death motivate you? 

This assignment gave me a little laugh. I understand how this one phase could give people direction and drive to live a better life, but it clearly would not work for me. As you all know, I have no intention of ever dying. There are a couple points this brings up though that I feel I should address.  

Many people also believe that those of us who fight the notion that death is inevitable are doing so based on a fear of death. 

Many people claim that it is the fear of death that keeps us human, that it is the basis for our ethical standard and gives meaning to our lives. 

I’d like to dispel these two widely held beliefs. I will grant that the two statements above do in fact apply to some people. My intent is to point out that they are gross generalizations that do not cover as many people as the proponents would have you believe. The two arguments above are fallacies meant to distract attention away from the core principle. When we question something that people hold so sacred and certain in their lives, they get very uneasy. 

Do I want to lie forever because I fear death? Absolutely not. Anyone who has known me since I was a child would tell you quite the opposite. Long before I was a transhumanist, long before I knew with certainty that technology would free me from death, I was certain that I wanted to live a long and fruitful life. A life full of adventure and ambition. I was also looking forward to death. I have often told friends that I considered death “The last great adventure.” It was the one experience that I could not mentally model or play out a simulation in my head for what the experience might be like. It was a one-way ticket on a train to the unknown. That excited me, and I can honestly say that it still does. I have had people express concern that I was suicidal because of my obsession with what death might be like. The key is that I am also a very patient person. Just because I am curious about death, and would welcome it as a great experience, does not mean that I am eager to take that road. There are countless experiences left here to pursue. I do not fear death, I just have far too much ambition to let it ruin my plans. I have always been very good at delayed gratification, even though I am excited to see what is on the other side, I’ll gladly put it off indefinitely. 

Does the fear of death give meaning to our lives as humans? I can understand how some people would think that knowing their life will end causes them to live each day to the fullest and to value life. I argue that it is personality types that cause us to live our lives a certain way, not an expectation that death will end it all. 

We do not need to fear death to be able to open our eyes to the beauty of the world and the people around us. All we have to do is get over the numbness that we have built up over the years. Just watch a child. They have not built the patterns to instantly recognize and draw conclusions about the things they see. They observe and they analyze. They live a life full of wonder and amazement. If we let ourselves live our lives in this way then we will truly live to the fullest. Many people when faced with death finally become aware of how they are living their lives and all the incredible experiences and people around them. You have control over your own perception. The world is no different if you are going to die or not, you can choose your own catalyst, and it does not have to be a fear of death.  

To my wife and daughters: 

I just wanted to let you know that I believe in you. 

I have confidence in your abilities.  

If you ever think you can’t do any more, go any further, tolerate another setback, or endure any more pain.  

Know that I believe in you. 

When you are tired, and just want to stop. 

When you are discouraged, and ready to give up. 

When you are hurting, and don’t know where to turn. 

Know that I believe in you. 

You are woman. 

You have power within you that I can see, even if you do not. 

Ignore everyone else. 

Ignore the negative voice in your head. 

And listen to me. 

Listen to me! 

You have my spirit behind you, helping you find the way. 

I will always be with you. 

If you need a little extra strength. 

Know that I believe in you. 

And keep moving forward. 

 Take a look at the hero’s journey, and identify where you are in that journey. 

I have a minor problem with this assignment because I think we take these journeys many times in our lives, sometime repeatedly looping through the sequence. We take several of them at a time. I have several areas of my life running in parallel and I am at a different point in each. My career is one, my personal relationship with my wife, my being a father, my fitness, and my battle with age. 

In my career there are many cycles through this path with each one leading to another epic battle. Right now I am in “Meeting with the Mentor” – learning and growing. I am already planning my path through the end of this journey and planning how I can use it to embark on the next. 

In my fitness I am in the “Ordeal” – fighting to make gains, and doing battle with my body. 

With my children I am still in the “Ordeal” – working every day to protect and teach. 

With my wife I am “Seizing the Sword”, reaping the benefits from years of marriage and enjoying life with the woman of my dreams. 

In my battle with age I am in “Tests, Allies, and Enemies”. Clearly starting to seek allies and prepare for the road ahead. 

This is an interesting concept, in that the alignment of these phases across the different aspects of our lives is what really tests us. When too many areas line up, we struggle to give the proper attention to any of them. This is another area of balance, one of managing the phases or our different life  journeys. We must never sit in one phase too long, and we must start new journeys when the old ones have ended. Without those journeys, our life stagnates.  

Take that first step heroes – and remember that it is the journey that makes you grow, not getting to the destination. 

Rewilding is an interesting new word. The basic premise is that our world is out of balance and by bringing back some of things that we thought were negative – we can bring back balance and actually vastly improve many areas of our environment. From http://rewilding.org/: 

In short, the rewilding argument posits that large predators are often instrumental in maintaining the integrity of ecosystems. In turn, the large predators require extensive space and connectivity.  

This appeals to my primal mature because I also feel the drive and desire to rejoin a more wild environment, while enjoying access to the comforts and safety of our current world.  

I want to spend a week naked in the jungle fending for myself. 

This desire is not coherent to the life I currently live. As a transhumanist I cannot risk losing the one instance that I have of myself right now. Once I have a backup – will I find myself getting involved in more dangerous activities, or will I just run a simulation in VR to experience the same activity?  There will be purists who will feel that they have to participate in the meat world to obtain the “real” experience.   

The question remains, is this an experiment in rewilding ourselves? Will we need these experiences to stay in touch with our human sides?  

I need to hunt, and be hunted. This is a thrill that my primal nature desires, and I look forward to the opportunity.