Lifeboat Foundation

Major military powers are racing to embrace weapons that select and fire on targets without meaningful human control. This is raising the specter of immoral, unaccountable, largely uncontrollable weapon systems – killer robots. It is also driving fears of widespread proliferation and arms races leading to global and regional instability.

There is increasing recognition that it’s time to ring the alarm on these weapons systems. This month in Paris, United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres called for a new international treaty to ban killer robots, stating that “machines that have the power and discretion to kill without human intervention are politically unacceptable and morally despicable.”

Yet at last week’s meeting of the Convention on Conventional Weapons (CCW) at the UN in Geneva, states made no progress towards launching negotiations on a treaty to ban or restrict such fully autonomous weapons. Instead, they agreed to spend the next two years developing a “normative and operational framework” to address concerns raised by such weapons systems.

Last week, the transhumanist activist Zoltan Istvan announced his candidacy for President of the United States in next year’s elections. The writer, humanitarian and outspoken advocate of radical science is no stranger to the issues surrounding Longevity, and has spoken widely on subjects including AI, genetic editing, technology policy, and futurism.

In 2016, Istvan ran as an independent presidential candidate and travelled across the United States, spreading his message from a coffin-shaped bus, known as the “Immortality Bus.” This time he’s on the ballot, running against Donald Trump as a candidate for the Republican party in next year’s primaries. Things are a bit more serious this time.

Among his key policies, Istvan includes transhumanism, universal basic income and the need to beat China in the global innovation race – an issue we addressed in our Jamie Metzl interview. We spoke to him to find out more about his views on the Longevity sector.

Democratic presidential candidate Andrew Yang says individuals should have ownership rights over their own data and large companies should have to pay to use it. He’s not alone.

Is there room for one more in the 2020 presidential race? Transhumanist Zoltan Istvan has declared he’s running for the White House as a Republican, complete with the campaign motto “Upgrading America” — a task he believes can be accomplished through futuristic technology and science.

One new press report describes him as “the cyborg who is running against Donald Trump.” Mr. Istvan appears ready.

“My team and I are ready to really push hard, get on primary ballots, and see if we can get conservatives to be more open-minded about the future. We’re excited that they will open up so that the far-left doesn’t totally own radical science and tech in the future. We think we can be instrumental in getting to GOP and libertarian conservatives to broaden their perspectives about these things,” Mr. Istvan told The Washington Times.

Some important news out today, and we hope to have an official announcement in the next 24 hours or so as my team makes final preparations. Thank you for your support!

Zoltan Istvan, a leader of the transhumanist movement to merge humans with technology, is challenging Trump with a plan for America that’s beyond radical.

My mission is to drastically improve your life by helping you break bad habits, build and keep new healthy habits to make you the best version of yourself. I read the books and do all the research and share my findings with you!

This video is me (Brent Nally) interviewing Transhumanist Party US Presidential Candidate Ben Zion on October 3, 2019 at RAADFest at the Westgate Hotel & Casino.

Continue reading “Brent Nally interviews Transhumanist Party US Presidential Candidate Ben Zion on October 3, 2019” »

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BqNZPUfau0U&feature=share

At RAAD Fest in Las Vegas on October 6, 2019, Gennady Stolyarov II, Chairman of the U.S. Transhumanist Party / Transhuman Party (USTP), announces the results of the 2019 USTP Electronic Primary for President of the United States, and introduces the winner of the Electronic Primary and the USTP-endorsed candidate for President of the United States in 2020, Johannon Ben Zion.

See the detailed results here: https://transhumanist-party.org/2019/10/02/ustp-2019-electronic-primary-results/

Continue reading “U.S. Transhumanist Party 2019 Primary Election Results and Johannon Ben Zion Acceptance Speech” »

How do weapons inspectors verify that a nuclear bomb has been dismantled? An unsettling answer is: They don’t, for the most part. When countries sign arms reduction pacts, they do not typically grant inspectors complete access to their nuclear technologies, for fear of giving away military secrets.

Instead, past U.S.-Russia arms reduction treaties have called for the destruction of the delivery systems for nuclear warheads, such as missiles and planes, but not the warheads themselves. To comply with the START treaty, for example, the U.S. cut the wings off B-52 bombers and left them in the Arizona desert, where Russia could visually confirm the airplanes’ dismemberment.

It’s a logical approach but not a perfect one. Stored nuclear warheads might not be deliverable in a war, but they could still be stolen, sold, or accidentally detonated, with disastrous consequences for human society.