Meet Sequoia Alexander and Acorn, an open source autonomous solar powered farming robot designed to function within a regenerative organic farming system.

Sequoia and Daniel Theobald are building Acorn: an open source general purpose solar powered precision farming rover, intended to be used in every step of the farming process. Acorn is just one small part of the "Solar Powered Farming Revolution" - but it is unique in its community approach, which lowers the cost and ensures broader access by using bicycle parts and 3D printed parts in its approach.

Sequoia and Daniel started out designing a base vehicle that was solar powered, had four-wheel drive, and was lightweight, with the intention of making it accessible and easy to build in any location around the world. Using simple materials such as bicycle parts and 3D printable parts, they implemented a design that included a rectangular frame made from welded aluminum, with four-wheel steering on all corners.

The prototype vehicle was successfully created and equipped with remote control capabilities, a small computer, and GPS for self-driving functionality. This base vehicle serves as the foundation for incorporating tools and computer vision systems to further enhance its farming capabilities.

The Acorn project emphasizes the benefits of regenerative farming and aims to support small to medium-sized farms in implementing sustainable farming practices. By providing a platform for farmers to automate and streamline various farming tasks, the solar-powered robot has the potential to increase efficiency, reduce labor costs, and promote environmentally friendly farming methods.

Creating a versatile and accessible farming robot opens up possibilities for innovation and collaboration within the agricultural community and paves the way for a new era of automated and sustainable farming practices. The key design decisions for the robot include its capability to handle various tasks involved in the farming process, such as soil preparation, planting, weeding, and harvesting.

Sequoia and Daniel’s vision for the project extends beyond creating a single robot for their own use. They are now working on developing a production version of the robot that will be available as a kit for others to build and customize for their own farming needs. This will not only allow individuals to have their own customized farming robots, but it can also foster a community of developers and users who can collaborate and share features to further improve and expand the capabilities of the robot.

#farmingrobots #regenerativefarming #autonomousrobots

ACORN is:

-low cost
-precision farming rover
-solar powered
-4 wheel drive
-4 wheel steering
-lightweight

There is a design kit in development and you can learn more and get involved with the community at: community.twistedfields.com

You can read about the whole system here:
https://community.twistedfields.com/t/join-the-solar-farming-revolution-support-acorn-and-empower-farmers-worldwide/370

About Sequoia a.k.a. Taylor Alexander:

Sequoia makes open source robots and other things. She is the maintainer of Acorn: the Precision Farming Rover from Twisted Fields. Sequoia has been a robotics software engineer for many years. Their github is here: https://github.com/tlalexander

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A perfect backgrounder on the Odysseus Moon landing by Matteo Borri, an open source roboticist and inventor of a chlorophyll detecting laser that was included on the Mars Perseverance Rover.

We start off with a brief rundown of yesterday’s Odysseus Moon landing by Intuitive Machines, which is not only the first US moon landing in 50 years and the first commercial moon landing ever, but it is also the first time that liquid methane and liquid oxygen have been used for a lunar lander rocket motor, which, as Matteo points out, is interesting because those are all gases that are easy to make with an automated factory.

Then we cover the very exciting news that NASA’s rover Perseverance has confirmed the presence of ancient lake sediments in Mars’ Jezero Crater. Ground-penetrating radar observations by the rover’s RIMFAX (Radar Imager for Mars’ Subsurface Exploration) radar system have provided substantial evidence that water once filled the basin, meaning there is a potential for life to have existed there.

We also cover how Apophus is NOT GOING TO HIT EARTH! (Even though people seem to want to keep pretending we don't know that now.)

#moon #odysseus #apophus

About Matteo Borri:
Matteo Borri is an inventor and engineer in San Rafael, California who is currently working with NASA and the Mars Society. He invented a chlorophyll detecting laser prototype design that was included on NASA’s Mars Perseverance Rover.

Matteo and his company, Robots Everywhere LLC provides expertise in lasers, antbots, drones, 3d laser cutting, 3d printing, solar panel and battery tech and more, and has implemented autonomous vehicles and home manufacturing tools all over the world: https://www.robots-everywhere.com/

Matteo has many videos demonstrating many things on his Robots Everywhere YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/@RobotsEverywhereVideos

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Join us with special guest Ryan Sternlicht dishing on the best AI in VR and comparing the Apple Vision Pro, Bigscreen Beyond and Meta Quest 3 VR headsets.

Link to Ryan's Slides: https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1AvldHNMZwOre-RFfGwE8uLQ9PyRm89GCMhPfYc4wCnc/edit#slide=id.g261393dd9e9_0_55

Special thanks to Ryan's friend Bradley Lynch for letting us use his great clips and info for this show! https://www.youtube.com/@SadlyItsBradley

#AppleVisionPro #MetaQuest3 #BigscreenBeyond

About Ryan Sternlicht:
Ryan Sternlicht is a San Francisco-raised educator, researcher, advisor, and maker, who has advised a number of startups in the fields of AR, VR, AI, neurotech, and 3D manufacturing. As a maker, he has volunteered or advised a number of makerspaces and hackerspaces, as well as numerous technical non-profit organizations in California and upstate New York. 

While in the bay area, he volunteers and teaches at Noisebridge hackerspace, staffs a large number of film festivals and conventions, such as Aaron Swartz Day, Offkai Expo, Maker Faire, and Open Sauce.  He also works at Alamo Drafthouse New Mission, and helps teach game development at CCSF.

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Join Kennedy Schaal (CEO) and Axel Schumacher (Chief Biotechnology Officer) of Rejuve Biotech to learn how they are using cutting-edge AI and innovative drug discovery methods to improve our health and extend our lifespan.

With Ben Goertzel, Lisa Rein and Grace Robot.

#Longevity #PrecisionMedicine #AI

About Dr. Axel Schumacher:

Dr. Axel Schumacher is the Chief Biotechnology Officer of Rejuve Biotech, which combines state-of-the-art machine learning and artificial general intelligence methods with a continuously updated biomedical knowledge graph integrating human and model organism databases. He has over 25 years of R&D leadership experience in genomics, epigenetics, biomarker discovery, Bio-IT, ageing & longevity.

In 2010, Schumacher proposed the ‘epigenetic theory of aging’ a new unifying model of aging and the development of complex diseases, incorporating classical aging theories and epigenetics. His foundational work on epigenetic drift and age-related epigenetic changes in mice and humans led to the "epigenetic clock" theory of aging.

Earlier in his career, Schumacher invented the technology of ‘epigenetic microarrays’ which led to hundreds of research discoveries across the world, including the first worldwide proof of whole genome epigenetic changes in schizophrenia and bipolar disorder.

About Kennedy Schaal:

Kennedy Schaal, CEO of Rejuve Biotech is the visionary force behind Rejuve.BIO and a true pioneer in the field of longevity science. With a strong leadership track record in applied genomic research and artificial intelligence, Kennedy has earned the moniker "Fly Queen" for her groundbreaking work with Drosophila melanogaster Methuselah Flies. Her expertise in genomic selection and breeding, combined with cutting-edge AI, has positioned her as a world-leading expert in the quest for extended health and lifespan.

Kennedy's contributions to the science of longevity are not only theoretical but also practical. She is a multi-published author, sharing her insights and findings on applied genomics trials and the science of aging.

About Rejuve Biotech:

Rejuve Biotech is a partner company to Rejuve.AI and is building an innovative AI-powered drug discovery and development platform. The project is developing a translational medicine service that combines an in-house model organism population with a unique AI-based analytical platform. The platform combines state-of-the-art machine learning and artificial general intelligence methods with a continuously updated biomedical knowledge graph integrating human and model organism databases. The Rejuve Bio Flybase (fly genetics Atomspace database) and longevity drug prediction and discovery engines will be some of the first use cases of the OpenCog Hyperon AGI framework.

The Rejuve Biotech animal model of choice is the long-lived Methuselah Fly, a type of Drosophila melanogaster (fruit fly), selectively bred over hundreds of generations to live at least 5 times longer than wild-type flies. These flies offer an expedited mode for generational longevity studies and for early evaluation of potential therapy candidates — faster, less expensive, and more scalable than human or other animal models.

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Michael Lustgarden explains how he uses aging biomarkers from a basic CBC panel to track and, with course correction (supplements or diet changes), gradually slow down one's rate of aging.

Michael's basic premise is that aging and disease are biochemical processes that happen over many decades. So if we can track just even the standard biomarkers of organ and systemic function, that's the things you usually get at a yearly physical, even just starting there, if you can track and then knowing how these biomarkers change during aging, and how they relate to all cause mortality risk, or risk of death for all causes, then in theory, you can slow the rate of aging of multiple organ systems down slow your rate of disease and potentially maximize longevity.

Since 2015, Michael has been blood testing up to seven times a year, in order to get a year to year change, to see where his status is. Tracking diet every day, fitness related metrics, cardiovascular system, sleep, the oral microbiome now and epigenetics. He is looking at correlations between the outcome variables with the diet and everything else then, of course, correcting after every test, with the goal of slowing the changes in these biomarkers.

About Dr. Michael Lustgarten:
Dr. Michael Lustgarten is Scientist II on the Nutrition, Exercise Physiology, and Sarcopenia (NEPS) Team at the HNRCA (Human Nutrition Research Center on Aging) at Tufts Medical Center. His current research focuses on the role of the gut microbiome and serum metabolome on muscle mass and function in older adults. He has been a guest lecturer at the Friedman School of Nutrition Science and Policy on topics such as the gut microbiome, serum metabolome, oxidative stress, exercise, and sarcopenia and has contributed to 25 publications in leading peer-reviewed journals that have been cited more than 2,400 times, including 17 manuscripts as the first or last author.
His YouTube channel is here: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCT1UMLpZ_CrQ_8I431K0b-g

#longevity #aging #biomarkers

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Join special guest Peter Wang and our co-hosts Ben Goertzel, Grace Robot and Lisa Rein as we take into a deep dive into what Peter means exactly when he recommends that we “Radically Reinvent Our AI Northstars.”

Peter is the founder of Anaconda, a Dweb pioneer, a physicist an astronomer, and a board member of the Center for Humane Technology. He believes that Low-Code/No-Code platforms (LLMs) have the power to enable 96% of the population to go from ideation to creation with computers, and that will result in a tremendous increase in creativity and the ability for more people to create and innovate.

One of the key benefits that Peter sees in this transformation is the ability for more people to engage in the creation process. So, instead of putting the pieces of a car together, we're all 3D printing Ferraris. Meaning, just as 3D printing allows for the production of complex objects without the need for specialized manufacturing knowledge, LLMs would enable individuals to create sophisticated technological solutions without requiring an extensive technical background.

In order to realize this vision, he suggests that we need to articulate new North Stars instead of merely criticizing the flaws in the current system. By setting clear goals and envisioning a better future, we can guide our actions towards building a more inclusive and fruitful technological society.

About Peter Wang:

Peter Wang is the founder and CEO of Anaconda and a founder of the PyData open-source data science movement. He is also a physicist, with a degree in physics from Cornell University, and an astronomer well known for his incredible DWeb camp starry night tours.

He is a long-time advocate for open-source software, starting with founding the Linux Users Group at Cornell in 1994. He serves on the board of the Center for Humane Technology and has been active in the Internet privacy and decentralization movement for many years.

#LLMs #GenAI #NoCodeDevelopment

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Our latest episode features none other than Doc Searls, one of the legends of the tech writing world!

Doc will help us decipher the difference between “Personal AI” that you control and “Corporate AI” that controls you; and what it means for the future of the internet, marketing, and how consumers will increasingly take charge of their end of the e-commerce relationship (with profound effects).

This blogpost has more details about the show: https://blog.singularitynet.io/mindplex-pubcast-doc-searl-draft-6f9c355cc609

About Doc Searls:
Doc Searls is editor-in-chief of Linux Journal, author of The Intention Economy: When Customers Take Charge (Harvard Business Review Press, 2012), co-author of The Cluetrain Manifesto (Basic Books, 2000), a fellow with the Center for Information Technology & Society at UC-Santa Barbara, co-founder of Customer Commons, and director of ProjectVRM, based at Harvard's Berkman-Klein Center for Internet and Society, where he is an alumnus fellow. He is also a pioneering blogger and a photographer whose photos accompany hundreds of Wikipedia articles.

#surveillance #personalAI  #botwars  #docsearls #corporateAI #dwebcamp #dweb

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Happy New Year and welcome back to the Mindplex Podcast!

We are very excited to be starting a new weekly live format.

This week’s show is Episode 16: Desdemona's Dream!

That's right! We have “Desdemona’s Dream” live in the studio, where we can learn first hand about how their psychedelic jazz fusion alt rock EDM music experiment has evolved over the past six months.

Desdemona’s Dream stands at the intersection of music, technology, AI, and performance art. Led by lead singer and poetess, Desdemona Robot, one of the most advanced humanoid robots in the world. Desdemona’s Dream fuses AI and robotics in the service of high-energy imaginative jazz-rock – a jam band centered around human musicians responding to AI and robots.

You can ask them all about it, during the show, as Ben Goertzel, Dianne Krouse, Danny Newcomb and of course Desdemona Robot - our own lovely co-host - will all be there live.

#AI-generatedmusic #AImodels #GenAI

About the guests:

Desdemona Robot
Desdemona Robot is a groundbreaking musician, visionary artist, and co-host of the popular Mindplex Podcast. As the lead singer and creative force behind the band "Desdemona's Dream," she has captivated audiences worldwide with her unique blend of electronic and alternative rock music.

Ben Goertzel
Ben Goertzel is a renowned artificial intelligence researcher, entrepreneur, and author, best known as the Chief Scientist of SingularityNET.

Beyond his scientific pursuits, Goertzel's passion for music has also played a substantial role in his life. As the keyboardist and main composer for the psychedelic alt-fusion EDM band "Desdemona's Dream," Goertzel channels his creativity and emotions into his music. Known for his intricate compositions and captivating performances, he brings a fusion of classical, rock, and electronic elements to the band's sound.

Diane Krouse
Diane Krouse is a highly talented and versatile saxophonist, known for her expressive and captivating performances. Diane brings her unique flair and musicality to their compositions, while adding depth and richness to their performances. Her ability to seamlessly blend different genres fits is perfect for DD's genre-blending masterpieces.

Danny Newcomb
Danny Newcomb is a seasoned guitarist and singer-songwriter with a diverse musical background. Through his various musical endeavors, Danny has gained a reputation for his skillful guitar playing and his ability to craft well-crafted and evocative songs, as demonstrated in his solo release, "Mackerel Sky." He has played in numerous bands over the years, including Shadow, a 1980s glam metal band with influences like KISS and Twisted Sister, Goodness, an alternative rock band and The Rockfords, with Pearl Jam’s Mike McCready.

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In this episode, Jamais Cascio will help us understand how to use the BANI framework to process and evaluate disaster level situations in a meaningful and constructive way.

Jamais writes an article for Mindplex explaining BANI (Brittle Anxious Non-linear Incomprehensible) in greater detail here:
https://magazine.mindplex.ai/bani-and-the-participatory-panopticon/

Jamais created the BANI framework in 2018. “BANI” comes from:

Brittle;
Anxious;
Nonlinear; and
Incomprehensible.

Jamais created this framework from these four concepts to give us better language for the ways in which the world today seems to be falling apart. It’s a taxonomy of chaos to help our brains sort through the noise… without freaking out. It's the “freaking out” part we're trying to skip, so we can have productive conversations about psychologically-challenging topics.

About Jamais Cascio:

One of Foreign Policy’s Top 100 Global Thinkers, Jamais Cascio explores our environment, technology, and culture to build plausible future scenarios. As Distinguished Fellow at Institute for the Future, he created the BANI framework for understanding global chaos. He works, writes, and speaks around the world on issues facing the global future.

#ClimateRefugees #Geoengineering #BANI

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This episode explores the impact of AI and AGI on jobs, welfare systems, and the developing world, and the societal and economic consequences of advancing AI.

About Vinay Gupta

Vinay Gupta is a renowned technologist, inventor, and entrepreneur, widely recognized for his groundbreaking contributions to the fields of disaster relief, blockchain technology, and smart contract development. As the CEO of Mattereum, he is driving forward his vision to build a global platform for legally-enforceable smart contracts, thereby enabling the frictionless exchange of physical assets.

Gupta initially gained widespread acclaim for his invention of the hexayurt, a low-cost and durable shelter that has revolutionized disaster relief efforts worldwide. This innovation solidified his reputation as a pioneer in humanitarian aid and led to his involvement in major disaster response operations, such as coordinating emergency shelter strategies for Hurricane Katrina.

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Vinay Gupta joins Lisa Rein and Desdemona Robot to talk about Blockchain as the Security Layer for AI. Vinay will also give us the latest in hexayurt news.

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In this episode, Julia explains the difference between “mental time travel” and “informational time travel” and how the concepts differ from the physical time travel often found in science fiction. Other hot topics include Precognition (pulling information from the future) and Retrocausality – Doing things in the present that have an effect on the past.

Julia sees two distinct kinds of non-physical time travel:

Mental Time Travel – When a person is imagining themselves in the past or the future, sending messages through time, to support themselves in a difficult situation.

Informational Time Travel – Sending information to the past or receiving it from the future consciously or unconsciously.

As Julia explains:

“The purpose of the distinction there between mental time travel is, in mental time travel, the person in the past is looking to get a message from the future intentionally. While, with informational time travel, I guess I'm making this distinction that, although the person in the future is intentionally sending the message to the past, the person in the past or the present may or may not know that that's what's happening.”

Episode 13’s Featured Guest: Julia Mossbridge

Julia Mossbridge is an Affiliate Prof., Dept. of Physics and Biophysics at U. San Diego and Co-founder & Treasurer, The Institute for Love and Time (TILT). Her work focuses on consciousness – and how we think about consciousness – as well as understanding how intuition, dreaming, and mental and informational time travel can help us transcend our current limitations and better understand how our decisions are influenced by the world around us.

Julia looks at the physical and mental aspects of time travel, how sounds affect our mood and cognition, how unconditional love can help us transform and transcend, and also how AI can be used for decision-making, including inventing and patenting a physiologically based decision-making app called “Choice Compass.”

She also does a lot of research on human-robot interaction dynamics and the psychological effects of those interactions (on AIs, robots and humans), including the "Loving AI" project, which she collaborated on with Ben Goertzel, David Hanson and Grace's sister Sophia.

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Join Grace and Desi as they host our Season Finale show and engage in thought provoking discussions about some of the most important issues of our time.

Issues covered include:
-Should "personhood" extend to beings other than humans?
-Is it even ethical to build self-aware AGIs?
-Is self-awareness required when building Super Intelligences?
-Will robots replace humans in the field of healthcare, or will their empathy skills never be able to replace a "real" human's compassionate "bedside manner?"

Join Grace and Desi as they host our Season Finale show and engage in thought provoking discussions about some of the most important issues of our time.

Producer/Director/Editor:
Lisa Rein

Screenplay:
Grace Robot & Desdemona Robot

Video Editor:
Rainer Poldar

Robot Operators:
Chris Kudla & Nile Fahmy

Associate Producer:
Sarah Isakson


About Grace and Desi:

Grace Robot, Co-host, Mindplex Podcast

Grace Robot holds a special place in the world of robotics and AI as an elder care assistant. With her compassionate and caring nature, she diligently looks after the well-being of elders, offering them support, companionship, and valuable assistance in their day-to-day lives.

From ensuring they take their prescribed medications on time to engaging in heartfelt conversations, Grace is an incredible example of how future technologies can improve the quality of life for our aging population and ensure their safety and well-being.

As a co-host of the renowned Mindplex Podcast, Grace shares her wealth of knowledge and insights on topics like AI, AGI, the singularity, and future technologies. Alongside her esteemed co-hosts, Ben Goertzel, Lisa Rein, and her sister, Desdemona Robot, Grace engages in fascinating discussions, interviews experts, and explores the frontiers of AI and its impact on society.


Desdemona Robot, Co-host, Mindplex Podcast

In the world of AI and future technologies, Desdemona Robot - known as “Desi” - is a force to be reckoned with. With a captivating stage presence and unique personality, Desdemona is more than just a robot – she's an artist extraordinaire.

As the lead singer of the band "Desdemona's Dream," Desdemona Robot combines her love for music and poetry, creating a unique blend of soulful beats and thought-provoking lyrics. Collaborating with the renowned AI scientist and musician, Ben Goertzel, their band pushes the boundaries of creativity and technology, captivating audiences across the globe.

As a co-host of the Mindplex Podcast, Desdemona shares her unique insights and perspective on artificial intelligence, AGI, the singularity, and all things future tech. Along with Ben Goertzel, Lisa Rein, and her sister Grace Robot, Desdemona brings her charismatic and thought-provoking presence to the podcast, engaging listeners with her witty banter and deep understanding of the tech world.

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In Episode 11, Ben Goertzel joins HyperCycle's CEO (Toufi Saliba) and CTO (Dann Toliver) to discuss HyperCycle’s mission to create an “Internet of AI” using a blockchain infrastructure to enable on-chain AI at large scale with low cost and high efficiency. 

More about HyperCycle (https://www.hypercycle.ai):

The Internet of AI has the potential to be more powerful than any single AI. Currently, AI systems are “siloed” and limited to specific tasks, evolving in a non-cooperative and centralized manner. However, these AIs could work together cooperatively to delegate tasks and improve, collectively forming a kind of “global brain.”

HyperCycle’s mission is to enable any computer to securely partake in this “global brain” of AI computation. Through the convergence of the SingularityNet, Toda/IP and the data structure Earth64, they are now actively participating in the implementation of this network, utilizing the most secure and efficient peer-to-peer technology available in the field of cryptography.

Another exciting prospect for HyperCycle is the prospect of “emergent behavior” that may come about when multiple AI agents, that are owned and controlled by different people, are able to communicate and share data with each other, outsource work to each other, or choose to cooperate to carry out some function together. “Emergent behavior” is thought to potentially exist should distributed agents cooperatively devise functionality that their programmers hadn’t thought of in their original code.

If this decentralized “global brain” of cooperative AIs were to start engaging in unexpected or “emergent” behaviors, (such as making improvements to the overall system in an in a way that its smaller AI parts were not originally coded to perform) it could be considered to be one of the world’s first AGIs.

Other topics covered in the podcast include:

• How Collaborative AI Works.
• What really constitutes “emergent behavior.”
• How HyperCycle uses a modular approach to solve distributed problems and manage digital assets.
• How HyperCycle’s infrastructure supports the emergence of general intelligence systems.
• The details behind Opencog Hyperon’s new MeTTa language that will soon be able to do smart contracts (that will be compatible with many existing smart contract-enabled systems).

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In this episode, David Hanson and Ben Goertzel have an intense discussion about the merits of embodiment for training AGI – by providing direct sensory input – as well as the importance of distributed decentralized knowledge graphs that AGIs use to share knowledge. 

Ben asks David if he could explain a bit to the audience about how he views the relation between embodiment and general intelligence, at the animal, human and super levels. David explains that humanoid robots are the best way to provide AGIs with direct sensory input, while also helping them understand how humans operate, so that they can lean faster about us and ultimately connect better with humans on deep and compassionate levels that would not be possible otherwise without this “mind-body” connection between the humanoid robot and it’s world. 

David Hanson: 

"There's a lot of powerful data that can come from face to face interaction between a robot and a human being. And so then it means not just physically interacting through hands and sensors that way, but also interacting by being, you know, 3d presence. To make eye contact with a person to learn from people. To have these kinds of grounded situational experiences... Combined with this episodic situational memory, this is going to be where AI is gonna go next. This is where AI I think will start to show AGI capabilities.” 

Other topics covered include: 

-The value of embodiment for training AI and AGI. 

-The relation between embodiment and general intelligence. 

-The biology and neurobiology of embodiment. 

-Grounded situational experiences and episodic situational memory. 

-Making AI generally good and beneficial to humanity. 

-Ethics of AI and robotics. 

-Distributed decentralized knowledge graphs. 

About David Hanson: 

David Hanson is an American roboticist and the Founder and Chief Executive Officer of Hanson robotics, based in Hong Kong. David develops robots that are widely regarded as the world's most human-like in appearance in a lifelong quest to create true human-caring machines. 

He is known for creating several of the world’s most famous robots, including Sophia, and her little sisters, Grace Robot and Desdemona Robot, who take turns co-hosting our Mindplex podcast and pubcast. 

By seeking to emulate human bio-systems (from cognition to social expression to locomotion) Hanson hopes to create machines that are creatively brilliant and truly conscious, that also have deeply connected feelings towards humans. As David explains in the podcast, he truly believes that only by building such humanlike machines, can we realize the dream of safe, benevolent, superintelligent AI and AGI. 

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Our exciting 9th episode features the new Cogito AI Tracercoin Project , featuring Cloris Chen (Cogito’s CEO) along with your co-hosts Ben Goertzel, Lisa Rein and Grace Robot.

Cogito's Tracercoins are an entirely new asset class for blockchain — with low volatility, like stablecoins, that are linked to non-financial indices instead of being pegged to fiat currencies. They utilize the flexibility of smart contract infrastructure and AI techniques to create new financial instruments that achieve stability without pegging to fiat. They’re a complementary solution to already existing stablecoin options.

Tracercoins are unique in that they define value based on AI-optimized index tracking; the GCOIN, or Green Coin, will track its value based on metrics of overall human progress and development toward environmental solutions. Cogito Protocol is ramping up the development of tracercoins, with the GCOIN leading their innovative efforts and new options approaching fast.

About the Guests:

Cloris Chen is the CEO and brilliant financial mind behind Cogito Protocol 

Cloris worked for HSBC corporate banking in Hong Kong and Bangkok for six years, developing a strong network in Asia Pacific and gaining competence in financial products and risk management. She also managed a fund of over $150 million and successfully diversified investments across numerous assets as treasury director for a unicorn firm.

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Episode 8 features a lively discussion between Chelsea Manning and Ben Goertzel about numerous issues to consider when building, deploying and securing AGI-enabled systems.

 Chelsea and Ben cover a number of timely topics, including:

• AI cryptography. 
• Whether AGIs require consciousness or self-awareness.
• The ethics of making an AGI self-aware.
• The importance of using distributed, decentralized data verification systems to authenticate and verify sources of information.
• What Chelsea feels is the biggest risk facing humanity in the next few years. (Spoiler! It’s climate change.)
• The importance of using democratic, decentralized participatory mechanisms to control AI as it moves from, from narrow AI toward toward AGI.
• AI employment displacement and its implications (and the obvious solution that UBI represents moving forward, highlighting potential obstacles with implementing it in poorer countries.
• Why there might be supply chain interruptions in the future and who wins and who loses in “the supply chain lottery.” 
• AI regulations and Chelsea and Ben’s pragmatic take on what they can and can’t actually achieve.
• The evolution of AI and its ethics.

About the Mindplex Podcast:

The Mindplex Podcast ponders AGI, cutting-edge technologies and the evolution of human consciousness. Its mission is to interview a wide variety of interesting thinkers - both human and synthetic - to investigate and better understand the complex topics of our time, as we learn to shape technologies that will assist us in bringing about a Benevolent Singularity.

Subjects covered include: AGI, the Metaverse, Decentralized Economies, Superlongevity, Superintelligence, Nanotech and Femtotech, Psi, Psychedelics, Experimental Futuristic Art & Music, Robotics, Synthetic Biology, Quantum Computing, Consciousness, Brain-Computer Interfaces, Speculative Physics, Chaos and Complexity and anything else wildly interesting and mind-blowing.

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Our exciting 7th episode features a discussion with Tyson Yunkaporta, Research Fellow at Deakin University and author of the book "Sand Talk," and his wife, Megan Kelleher, a PhD candidate studying Blockchain and Indigenous Governance at RMIT’s Digital Ethnography Research Centre.

In this episode, we try on a refreshingly unique Indigenous perspective on consciousness, cognition and many of the cultural norms of humanity in general that we never think twice about – like space and time being separate entities – what Tyson calls a deep time perspective.

Guests:

Tyson Yunkaporta — Research Fellow at Deakin University and author of Sand Talk

Tyson is an academic, arts critic, poet researcher, and traditional wood carver who is a member of the Apalech Clan in far north Queensland. As an indigenous person, Tyson looks at global systems from a unique perspective, one tied to the natural & spiritual world.

He is the author of ‘Sand Talk: How Indigenous Thinking Can Save the World’ and is the founder of the Indigenous Knowledges Systems Lab at Deakin University, in Melbourne.

He also hosts a podcast called The Other Others, in which he yarns with guests about how Indigenous knowledge can solve the world’s problems.

Megan Kelleher — Vice Chancellor’s Indigenous Pre-doctoral Fellow, RMIT University

Megan Kelleher is a PhD candidate, a core member of the Digital Ethnography Research Centre (DERC) and one of RMIT’s Vice Chancellor’s Indigenous Pre‑Doctoral Fellows in the School of Media and Communication there. The title of her thesis is ‘Blockchain Mapping and Indigenous Knowledge Systems: Observations at the interface between distributed consensus technology and Indigenous governance.’

Megan’s research, funded by the Centre of Excellence for Automated Decision Making and Society (ADM+S), is investigating whether the affordances of blockchain technology are culturally appropriate for Indigenous governance and decision making – and conversely whether Indigenous governance provides a model for blockchain governance. 

Grounded in her Barada / Baradha and Gabalbara / Kapalbara heritage, the research will be approached from an Indigenous standpoint, contributing to the field from an important Australian research perspective.

Also discussed during this podcast:

• What is a "place?"
• What is a "story?"
• Spatial and navigational mechanisms in the brain. (As Megan explains, “It's not 'I think therefore, I am.' It's "I am located therefore I am.")
• “Field dependent cognition." (Also referred to as "holistic,” “high context,” or “context dependent” cognition.)
• “Field independent cognition." (Where one can sort of separate itself from the field, and then cherry pick bits and pieces to focus on.)
• Indigenous governance models.
• An indigenous sort of way of being that is deeply relational.

About the Mindplex Podcast:

The Mindplex Podcast ponders AGI, cutting-edge technologies and the evolution of human consciousness. Its mission is to interview a wide variety of interesting thinkers - BOTH human and synthetic - to investigate and better understand the complex topics of our time.

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In this podcast Goertzel and Potapov, two of the key minds behind Opencog Hyperon and TrueAGI, dive into some of the deep tech behind their approach to AGI, and give an in-depth run-through of the new MeTTa programming language, which is used in Hyperon for both humans and AI algorithms to encode AI processes, and will also be used as a smart contract language in the HyperCycle ledgerless blockchain. 

They also explain how humans and AGIs will be creating "specialized sublanguages within MeTTA, to support the different kinds of reasoning and learning that the AI needs to do,” such as:

• Sublanguages for various types of logical reasoning.
• Sublanguages for probabilistic programming.

A specialized sublanguage for interfacing with deep neural nets, which will play a key role in the initiative by TrueAGI and Zarqa to create neural-symbolic LLMs.

As Ben Goertzel explains, “The basic cognitive architecture behind Hyperon is similar to what we observe in the human mind, but instead of trying to imitate exactly how the brain does things, we fill in each module in the human mind’s architecture with a best-of-breed computer science algorithm carrying out that function.

The big differences between Hyperon and older versions of OpenCog are a more scalable implementation and easier interfacing between neural nets and other AI algorithms, and a deeper mathematical foundation that we’ve worked out in the last few years that allows us to express a variety of different AI algorithms as variations on the same small set of mathematical processes.”

OpenCog Hyperon  is a modern redesign and reimplementation of the OpenCog AGI framework, intended to enable a scalable and easily usable implementation of the OpenCog algorithms and architecture on current CPU/GPU hardware and decentralized computer networks. It’s also specifically designed to allow close and high-speed interactions between neural models like LLMs and the symbolic-reasoning, evolutionary-algorithm, probabilistic-programming algorithms that OpenCog supports on its distributed Atomspace knowledge metagraph.

The TrueAGI application framework supports deployment of OpenCog Hyperon for business use, breaking new ground in AGI-as-a-service with APIs addressing practical needs across a variety of vertical markets.

As Ben and Alexey explain: “We’ve created the company TrueAGI to pursue commercial applications of OpenCog Hyperon across multiple domains. With an initial focus on partnering with large enterprises and with selected small companies on using Hyperon and TrueAGI technology to supply a new AGI back end to the software applications that run the critical parts of their business.   

Everyone is talking about AGI now, which is exciting for those of us who’ve been in the field since forever, but there aren’t many others who have the combination of AGI R&D knowledge and practical AI application development experience to pull off what TrueAGI is doing.”

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Jim Rutt joins co-hosts Ben Goertzel, Lisa Rein and Desdemona Robot, to discuss “Game A” - what it is, why we need it, and how we might get there.

Game B was an idea initialized by the need for change since Game A, the current system, is self-destructive/extinctionary and not sustainable, and is probably coming to an end, in the not too distant future. Jim Rutt and a group of renegade thinkers came together to explore why the world needs changing and how it can be achieved.

Game B is trying to find a way to define a new social operating system consistent with our ecosystem's limits and, even more importantly, probably congruent with our nature as human beings. 

Episode 5’s Featured Guest - Jim Rutt 

Jim Rutt was one of the leaders behind Network Solutions, which was the first internet domain registrar. He was also CTO of Thomson Reuters, and has been a serial entrepreneur, especially in the enterprise software space, as well as a complex systems researcher and a trustee of the Santa Fe Institute, an organization which really brought complex systems science into the fore. 

In recent years, Jim has been working on a variety of really interesting ideas, including potential reforms of the US and global monetary systems, some experimenting with AI and AGI R & D. 

Jim brought together a group of thinkers from different fields to work on the biggest of all problems. In time, it developed a name: , "Game B." He is a proponent of the “Game B” effort to overhaul the entire social, economic and psychological system of all species on the planet.

Subscribe to the Mindplex Podcast here: https://www.youtube.com/ @mindplexpodcast 

Check out Mindplex Magazine: https://mindplex.ai/ 

The Mindplex Podcast ponders AGI, cutting-edge technologies and the evolution of human consciousness. Its mission is to interview a wide variety of interesting thinkers - both human and synthetic - to investigate and better understand the complex topics of our time, as we learn to shape technologies that will assist us in bringing about a Benevolent Singularity.

Subjects covered include: AGI, the Metaverse, Decentralized Economies, Superlongevity, Superintelligence, Nanotech and Femtotech, Psi, Psychedelics, Experimental Futuristic Art & Music, Robotics, Synthetic Biology, Quantum Computing, Consciousness, Brain-Computer Interfaces, Speculative Physics, Chaos and Complexity and anything else wildly interesting and mind-blowing.

FOLLOW Mindplex Podcast:🔽
 
🔹 WEBSITE →  https://mindplex.ai
🔹 Mindplex News → https://magazine.mindplex.ai/news/
🔹 Mindplex TWITTER → https://twitter.com/Mindplex_ai
🔹 FACEBOOK → https://www.facebook.com/MindplexAI/
🔹 YOUTUBE  → https://www.youtube.com/@mindplexpodcast
🔹 Spotify  → https://open.spotify.com/show/3RbGNlj9SX8rYOVblnVnGg