Fight Aging!

Thoughts on large systems, communications, scientific progress, and evolutionary theory from h+ Magazine: "What do the Global Brain (GB) and human biological immortality have in common? At first, this appears to be a strange question. However, I believe that the realisation of the Global Brain will, perhaps inevitably, result in humans achieving extreme life extension, and eventually abolishing death due to aging. The GB is an emergent worldwide entity of distributed intelligence, one facilitated by communication and the meaningful interconnections between billions of humans, via technology such as the internet. ... When fully operational, the GB must rely on its individual constituents - individual human brains interconnected through technology. Without human input, the GB cannot exist. Furthermore, it cannot exist without technology. This is similar to the human brain - a neuron contributes to the whole, but without suitable connections, the individual neuron does not survive. This is not a magical or fictional process. The sequence of events will happen according to natural laws. Human brains, as individual units of the GB, will be subjected to increased pressures that facilitate longer survival. This is not a teleological argument. The GB does not have any intent or purpose. It is just an instrument of nature, forming part of the general direction of evolution from simple to complex. Within our specific niche, dependent on technology, society and communication, we must adapt and evolve quickly in order to be successful. A hierarchical progress from simple to higher intelligence is a natural consequence (or requirement) of this. It follows that nature will favor mechanisms that lead to higher intelligence quickly, abandoning slow, non-specific mechanisms, such as traditional natural selection. Resources will be shifted from primarily maintaining the germline at the expense of the body (the slow process of natural selection), to maintaining the brain (a fast process for achieving higher intellectual complexity)."

Link: http://hplusmagazine.com/2011/03/04/indefinite-lifespans-a-natural-consequence-of-the-global-brain/