Poetry of Brains Future Salon

I am thrilled to announce that in the spirit of this years Artificial Intelligence Accelerating Change conference, I've convinced my long time mentor, UC Berkeley Professor Walter J. Freeman to come and talk to us about his neurobiological study of the Mind (and A.I.)  Dr. Freeman embodies the highly interdisciplinary, fully micro & macroscopic study of the single most important (and difficult?) question that has and IMHO will ever faced humankind: How do neurons make brains, brains make minds, minds make consciousness, (and collective consciousness make societies, and if we can repeat the grand experiment in silicon!)

Dr. Freeman knows a little bit about the subject: he earned his first degree in Physics from MIT, took a break to study electronics in the Navy during WWII, worked on mathematics at Hamilton College in N.Y., went on to earn a PhD in English & Philosophy from U. of Chicago - and topped it all off with a cum laude M.D. from Yale med school. He eventually joined the Cal faculty, where he has worked in the departments of Molecular & Cell Biology, Biophysics, and Bioengineering.

He has earned too many academic honors to list, ranging from the Lifetime Achievement Award (and a term as president) of the International Neural Network Society to the Dactyl Foundation Prize for applying Science to Literature.  He is also the author of hundreds of peer reviewed academic papers, on a wide diversity of topics ranging from philosophy of mind to the neurophysiology of EEG to the chaotic mathematics of neural nets.  Titles range from: "Happiness doesn't come in bottles: Neuroscientists learn that joy comes through dancing, not drugs."  to "The neurobiology of semantics: How can machines be designed to have meanings?"  He has also published five neuroscience books, including "Societies of Brains : A Study in the Neuroscience of Love and Hate", and "How Brains Make Up Their Minds".

We have an interesting opportunity to try something slightly different for this Future Salon.  Since Dr. Freeman can speak on a wide range of topics, I personally thought it would be interesting to challenge him to tie together the biology and philosophy of Consciousness, Love (& Sex, Dancing, & Happiness), and silicon A.I. Both Mark Finnern and I are intrigued by the possibility of letting the audience help influence the theme.  We challenge you to ask questions and/or, or suggest themes or topics of interest - before the talk.  You can try out the special Poetry of Brains Future Salon Wiki Mark F. has created just for this purpose (or respond to me via email directly if you prefer).

Friday 19th of August, 6-7 networking with light refreshments proudly sponsored by SAP.  From 7-9+ pm presentation and discussion. SAP Labs North America, Building D, Room Southern Cross, 3410 Hillview Avenue, Palo Alto, CA 94304 [map] As always free and open to the public, bring your friends. Improve your commute and social networking by sharing it with a fellow Futurist. Check the Ride Board for carpooling opportunities. Please RSVP http://tinyurl.com/73g8w so that we have enough food and drinks. See you there.

Oh, and lest I forget the poetry part - when I emailed Dr. Freeman what he thought of Vinge's vision of the "Singularity", here was his email reply:

What is a model?
Walter J. Freeman
Berkeley, California
Perspectives in Biology & Medicine 18: 475-476, 1975.

Let us bring to time
You the feminine phases of the moon,
I the masculine footsteps of the years.
Time's arrow and the circle make a stream.
From every point the past and future fan
With infinite possibilities.
Like rocks we stand as time swirls by.
We do not know what happened or will happen
But tell a past and cast a future
By extrapolation of our motion.
Mathematicians say we have
Uncountable rates of change.
So much for math, and for prediction.

Turn and face a past
And see another future.
Try to recreate, and get nostalgia.
Climb a hill and time
Spreads all before, past and future,
Fusing on the line in both directions
Orthogonal to gaze. Our futures shrink
To vanish at a mile or a millennium,
Below the fixed horizon
Receding as time runs by.

Is time's rate constant? What shall be our clock?
Your touch accelerates my pulse.
Physicists assert their rate is fixed
To keep perspective on their world of matter.
Growing old, they sense time's quickening
And blame it on their chemistry.
Let us take time's measure not from world
But you and me, and then the rate of time
Increases exponentially. Our physics
Says our universe is not expanding
But time is shrinking. Theirs says the red shift
Is the contrail of a fleeing star,
Ours that it is fossil light
Emitted when our universe was young.

So much for physics. Shall we say the speed
Of time increases in proportion to
The number of our friends?
Will time's rate increase for everyone
As the world's population? Is it uniform
For wastelands and the cities?
Will crisis come when the rate exceeds the rate
Of speech between ourselves? Is this why
With time we drift apart?

Let us choose a unit of a day
And look back in exponential time.
Four days: you and I were born.
Seven days: man invented fire.
Ten days: dinosaurs
Two weeks: the universe exploded.
Look forward. In two days
You will take a day to brush your hair
And I to dress. Six days: we will need
A day to think a thought. Two weeks:
Our last heartbeat will last forever.

Long before, its time run out
Our brains dissolve, their parts
Returning to material time,
And only thus we circumvent
The deep freeze of time's tailing
Immortal loneliness.

Comments

[jeepee]

Poetry bid to reduce suicide rate (BBC News)

A poet is to be appointed in a drive to reduce the number of people taking their own lives in the Highlands.
The poetry will be read at workshops and schools in a bid to encourage young men to talk about their emotions.

The arts organisation for the Highlands and Islands, HI-Arts, which is running the £4,000 project, has been accused of "insensitivity" by one politician.

But suicidal behaviour expert Rory O'Connor said anything that encouraged people to talk should be applauded.

"It's progressive to try to get a poet to engage with young people and their emotional issues, that can only be a positive thing," he said.

In recent years the suicide level in the Highlands and Islands has been above the national average, with 39 people taking their lives in the Highland Council area last year.

'Macho attitude'

HI-Arts co-ordinator Peter Urpeth said suicide rates were among the biggest challenges facing the area's communities.

"I think writing and arts should be close to the heart of our understanding of these issues," he said.

"The poet who will work with us on this project will be an exceptional writer who can bring insight and, I hope, new understanding to this issue."

Have a nice day,

jeepee