Just thought some people might be interested to see another techno-optimist futurist movement - Zero State.
THE NEW manifesto:
As new technologies emerge at an increasing pace, different groups of people are working to explore what that might mean for the future of society and the human condition. These groups have a wide range of backgrounds, priorities, opinions, skills, and resources. In the past, some of these organizations and their concerns have been grouped together under the headings of Transhumanism or Futurism, while others have been considered part of other social currents and movements.
Transhumanism is a big idea, in principle relevant to every human being alive today, but a problem has crept into it over time. The simple core of the Transhumanist idea is that the human condition can and should be improved through technology. This idea can easily be applied beyond the individual to apply to wider societal issues, too. The problem is that this idea has become confined by certain values and ideas – overly narrow interpretations and a subculture to go with them – which do not interest most tech-oriented observers and activists, let alone the wider public. The Transhumanist vision is stagnating within the limits of its brand, with no more than perhaps ten thousand explicit advocates worldwide, despite being one of the biggest ideas in human history and a potential force for good.
What we need is a looser, more open, more inclusive vision of the human future. One which recognises no “centre” or “head office” beyond the simple idea of improving lives through technology. A vision that replaces lists of rules, both explicit and implicit, with a general, open-ended enthusiasm. Transhumanism was always supposed to be about transcending limitations, and the time has come to transcend our own self-imposed cultural limitations… to encourage experimental social activism, economics, politics, art and religion as much as science and engineering. To reach out to more women, and a wider range of ethnic & cultural backgrounds. To jettison the idea that people must adhere to certain moral or philosophical points of view to be part of the movement. To remove the idea that being an official member of any organization is any kind of requirement for being a “true” advocate of our cause.
In that spirit, this letter has been sent to a number of groups not traditionally considered to be “Transhumanist”, or only sharing a vague sense of having similar interests or ideals rather than obvious, concrete commonalities. The common theme is a strong interest in technology and its (ideally positive) influence upon the future of humans and their societies.
I am the founder of one such group – the Zero State movement (http://zerostate.net). I strongly believe that our organizations should communicate and understand themselves to be part of a loose, informal, yet cohesive community of common intent. So that no single organization is or can be the “centre” of this community, I have set up a think tank called TETRAD (Transhuman Enhancement Technologies Research And Development: http://tetrad.org) to operate as a multi-organizational “hub”, having no rules, membership, or agenda of its own, acting only to keep the different parts of a growing community in touch with each other, communicating and collaborating as they see fit, treating our entire community as a shared resource, and source of inspiration. The only role of the TETRAD website within this community will be to keep a very wide range of organizations connected and informed about each other’s activities. We would like to consider you and your organization to be part of this new community, and for you to consider yourself part of it, too. It is there for your benefit, to draw upon as and when you see fit.
