Meeting notice: The 00.07.18 meeting will be held at 7:30 p.m. at the Royal East (782 Main St., Cambridge), a block down from the corner of Main St. and Mass Ave. If you're new and can't recognize us, ask the manager. He'll probably know where we are. <-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-> Suggested topic: While the biohacker/bioterrorist scenario is certainly one frightening outcome of the development of biotech (but see http://www.bullatomsci.org/issues/1999/ja99/ja99tucker.html) it is not the only one. Another is the possibility of significant extensions in physical life span without accompanying discoveries in the rejuvenation of functioning neural tissue, perhaps because neural tissue raises issues of connections or configuration that take longer to decode. One consequence might be a considerable increase in the size of the population suffering from the various disabling dementias, as victims survived the onset of their diseases decade after decade. Even supposing this bullet is dodged somehow (perhaps a cure will be found for the worst illnesses) we face the related problem that even people who are not dementious still lose capacity along any of several dimensions of mental function -- memory formation, creativity, self- editing, associative speed, and so on -- as they age. Living an extra century of so with the mental condition of a representative 90 year old, while perhaps better than the alternative, is still pretty unappealing. Even if we were to find ways of rejuvenating mental tissues physiologically, it seems entirely possible that young persons would be more able to profit from those discoveries -- to develop enhanced powers of memory, etc. -- than old people. Perhaps the structure responsible for integrating new neural tissue into the old brain would be itself prone to aging, so that the older the brain, the less successfully it could be functionally rejuvenated, regardless of the state of its underlying physiology. In short, the relative difference between rejuvenated old brains and enhanced young ones might be just as great as the difference between that of a 20 year old and a 90 year old today, no matter how the physiologies might have changed absolutely. If so, the degree of social peripheralization experienced by the old would be just as great. The one area of expertise on which even old brains are likely to remain competitive is the culture of their childhood. All of us have a very good grip on the cultural motifs and processes we witnessed and participated in between the ages of 15 and 30. Younger generations are unlikely to improve on that grip, because even if they are brighter than us, they just weren't there. They don't have the advantages of direct observation and will never have them. Thus each generation is safe from marginalization on the ground of its own chronological culture. The musicians, artists, and other culture workers of that generation live as were behind a permanent trade wall, their jobs relatively secure even if their incomes might decline over time. Bottom line: it seems possible that over the next century the culture of the species might reorganize itself from a structure based on geographical borders to generational ones. If we assume an average life span of about 200, there might be about six of these generational tribes, each with their own culture. If you look close enough, you might even see the shape of this world taking place now, in rock tours by the several Boomer musicians now closing in on or over 60. <-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-> Foresight has started a weblog based on the Slashdot model. (Jon Katz is calling this model 'open source journalism.) Contributors submit links and cites on nanotech-related news items to nanodot.org. Commentators comment. Worth checking out. <-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-> Foresight's Fall Senior Associate Gathering Sept 8 evening through Sept 10, 2000 http://www.foresight.org/SrAssoc/fall2000 register by August 1 to save $100 Speakers and participants at previous events in this series have included: Bruce Ames, David Brin, Eric Drexler, Esther Dyson, Doug Engelbart, David Friedman, John Gilmore, Robert Hambrecht, Bill Joy, Steve Jurvetson, Brewster Kahle, Ray Kurzweil, Marvin Minsky, Virginia Postrel, Eric Raymond, Paul Saffo, Eric Schmidt, Vernor Vinge & Roy Walford. <-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-> Announcement Archive: http://www.pobox.com/~fhapgood/nsgpage.html. <-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-><-> Legend: "NSG" expands to Nanotechnology Study Group. The Group meets on the first and third Tuesdays of each month at the above address, which refers to a restaurant located in Cambridge, Massachusetts. The NSG mailing list carries announcements of these meetings and little else. If you wish to subscribe to this list (perhaps having received a sample via a forward) send the string 'subscribe nsg' to majordomo@world.std.com. Unsubs follow the same model. Discussion should be sent to nsg- d@world.std.com, which must be subscribed to separately. You must be subscribed to nsg-d to post to it and must post from the address from which you subscribed (An anti- spam thing). Comments, petitions, and suggestions re list management to: nsg@pobox.com.