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Summary of current Lifeboat Foundation activities
1) Lifeboat Foundation is now a Partner of Arch Mission Foundation whose mission is to preserve and disseminate humanity’s most important information across time and space, for the benefit of future generations. Other partners include the Internet Archive, The Long Now Foundation, and Microsoft.
Learn more!
2) We would like to congratulate our Alan Stern for his accomplishment of New Horizons traveling 4 billion miles from Earth in the farthest flyby ever. Alan is Principal Investigator of NASA’s New Horizons probe which rang in the new year by swinging by Ultima Thule — “beyond the known world” — an object in the Kuiper asteroid belt.
The spacecraft passed within 2,200 miles of the large asteroid at 12:33 a.m. EST Tuesday, not long after the ball dropped in New York Times Square. The close encounter marks the farthest spacecraft flyby in history.
“We set a record! Never before has a spacecraft explored something so far away,” Alan said. “I mean, think of it. We’re a billion miles further than Pluto, and now we’re going to keep going into the Kuiper Belt.”
Learn more!
3) We now have a mobile version of our site. Check out https://lifeboat.com with your phone and let us know if anything needs fixing. Send your input to [email protected] with the subject “Lifeboat Foundation Mobile”.
4) Our Amara D. Angelica, Frank J. Boehm, Robert A. Freitas Jr., Steven A. Garan, Tad Hogg, Nuno R. B. Martins, Jeffrey V. Rosenfeld, Yuriy Svidinenko, and Melanie Swan coauthored Human Brain/Cloud Interface.
This paper describes how neuralnanorobotics may enable a B/CI with controlled connectivity between neural activity and external data storage and processing, via the direct monitoring of the brain’s ~86 × 109 neurons and ~2 × 1014 synapses.
5) Here’s an update on a little girl with brain cancer who we advised on…
Tara Huckle got brain cancer when she was two. You can read about this at https://www.shorehamherald.co.uk/news/book-bid-to-tell-the-story-of-daughter-s-battle-with-cancer-1-5522306 and https://web.archive.org/web/20131003031619/https://www.tarastale.org.
She had been operated on twice before her father contacted Lifeboat Foundation in 2012 when she was five. After consulting with multiple people on our Scientific Advisory Board, it was decided to try to avoid chemotherapy and she was operated on a third time in the seated position in another attempt to get all of the tumor which kept regrowing.
Unfortunately this didn’t stop the tumor and she had a fourth operation a year later. This also didn’t stop the tumor as it came back in two spots so she had a year of weekly doses of Vinblastine, which she seemed to tolerate well. She has been stable since for the last three years. (Her father says she is happy and healthy.)
So Tara first had brain cancer at age two and is now 12. We’ll post any updates that occur. Note that the tumor is considered benign although it has proven to be very persistent.
6) Lifeboat Foundation supported the production of the scifi short film When Fire Flies through Indiegogo at the Associate Producer level. This film is about a quiet, fugitive scientist who takes measures into his own hands to save the world from extinction. Lifeboat Foundation and its directors have granted $7,500 to this movie.
Learn more!
7) Our Baron Martin Rees has written the report Apollo 11 50th Anniversary.
This report discusses the importance of Apollo 11 and how it can lead to us colonizing first Mars and then later, the galaxy.
Baron Martin Rees is Astronomer Royal and is a leading astrophysicist. He has conducted influential theoretical work on subjects as diverse as black hole formation and extragalactic radio sources, and provided key evidence to contradict the Steady State theory of the evolution of the Universe.
Learn more!
8) Our José Cordeiro authored the special report Big Chronology of Life on Earth.
To put into perspective a complete chronology and evolution of life on our tiny planet Earth, José summarizes the most relevant information from the very distant past to our immediate future. His objective is to reach a better understanding about the long-term evolution of life, including the power of exponential changes.
Big History is a new discipline that allows us to analyze with a multidisciplinary focus the way events follow each other throughout time. Starting with a huge time scale from the faraway past to the present, we can see that there is an acceleration of the speed of changes, that should continue now thanks to exponential technologies.
9) Books
Read 3 Essays on Virtual Reality: Overlords, Civilization, and Escape by our Eliott Edge. Read Artificial You: AI and the Future of Your Mind by our Susan Schneider. Read Assembling Life: How Can Life Begin on Earth and Other Habitable Planets? by our David W. Deamer. Read Cybofree: Posthuman Bioethics for a Sustainable Humanity. by our V.R. Manoj. Read Exponential Ethics by our Nicoletta Iacobacci. Read On the Future: Prospects for Humanity by our Martin Rees. Read Principles of Space Anthropology: Establishing a Science of Human Space Settlement by our Cameron Smith.
9) Lifeboat Tours are now available in Reno, Nevada where our President also lives. We welcome Lifeboat Foundation visitors to visit us in Reno. Contact [email protected] with the subject “Lifeboat Foundation Reno” to make arrangements. We have a guest room (and bathroom).
10) Lifeboat Foundation Conference support
The Lifeboat Foundation supported countless conferences this year. They included:
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Longevity Therapeutics 2019 was held January 29–31
in San Francisco. This conference focused on enhancing & accelerating
aging research & the development of therapies targeting age-related diseases.
Our Judith Campisi, Aubrey de Grey, João Pedro de Magalhães, Peter Fedichev, Kristen Fortney, Lorna Harries, Morgan E. Levine, and Alex Zhavoronkov spoke. Learn more!
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The
Southern Hemisphere Space Studies Program was held January
14–February 15 at the Mawson Lakes Campus, University of South Australia
Adelaide, Australia. Our
Alan Hale taught “Small Bodies in the
Solar System” on January 31 and Stockport Observatory on February 9.
Learn more!
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Mitochondria: From Basic Biology to Mechanisms of Disease Conference
was held February 27–March 2 in Nassau, Bahamas.
Our Matt Kaeberlein and Yousin Suh spoke at this event.
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We supported the annual March
Storm Washington DC Blitz on March 10–14, 2019. Sunday March 10 which was an
all-day training event, followed by up to four days of Congressional
visits.
Learn more.
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BICT 2019 — 11th EAI International Conference on Bio-inspired
Information and Communications Technologies was held March 13–14 in
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, United States. This conference provided a
unique venue for researchers and practitioners in diverse disciplines to
seek the understanding of key principles, processes, and mechanisms in
biological systems and leverage those understandings in design,
engineering, and technological applications.
Our
Bud Mishra was the General Chair of this event.
Learn more!
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Undoing Aging 2019 was held March 28–30 in Berlin, Germany.
Our
Julie K. Andersen,
Dmitry V. Bulavin,
Dongsheng Cai,
Judith Campisi,
Aubrey de Grey,
Michael Greve,
Andrei Gudkov,
Ruth Itzhaki,
Alvaro Mata,
Graham Pawelec,
Mikhail S. Shchepinov, and
Evan Snyder
spoke/participated.
Learn more!
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The
4th Conference on Artificial Intelligence and Theorem Proving AITP
2019 was held April 7–12 in Obergurgl, Austria.
Our Ben Goertzel, Sean Holden, and Ramana Kumar spoke.
Learn more!
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The
3rd Annual Congress on
Emerging Materials and Nanotechnology was held in Barcelona, Spain
on April 11–12.
Our Jonathan Lyons gave
a talk at this conference on current and future uses of
nanotechnology.
Learn more!
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The
1st Mediterranean Congress of Anti-aging Medicine was held
in Larnaca, Cyprus on April 13–14.
Our Marios Kyriazis is Conference Chair. Our José Cordeiro, Brian M. Delaney, João Pedro de Magalhães, Stala Kioupi, Ilia Stambler, and Nektarios Tavernarakis spoke. Learn more!
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The
10th IAASS International Space Safety Conference was held in
El Segundo, California on May 15–17.
Our Dallas Bienhoff, Aline Decadi, MSc, Giulio Di Gravio, Michael Kezirian, Eugene Levin, Chris Mattenberger, Riccardo Patriarca, Joseph Pelton, Tommaso Sgobba, and Swapnil Surdi spoke/participated. Learn more!
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The
AAPG (American Association of Petroleum Geologists) 2019 Annual
Convention & Exhibition (ACE) was held in San Antonio, Texas on
May 19–22.
Our Bruce Cutright spoke about Energy and Minerals Drive Commercial Space Exploration on May 20th. Learn more!
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The
48th Age Conference was held May 30–June 2 at
San Francisco, California.
Our Judy Campisi, Pete Estep, Vera Gorbunova, Matt Kaeberlein, Brian Kennedy, Morgan Levine, Yousin Suh, and Alex Zhavoronkov spoke. Learn more!
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The
International Society for the
Study of Information Summit (IS4SI 2019) was held June 2–6 at
Berkeley, California.
Our Paul Saffo spoke. Our Mark Burgin ran a miniconference on Theoretical Information Studies (TIS) at this event. Our Gordana Dodig-Crnkovic ran a miniconference on Morphological & Unconventional Computing at this event. Our Raffaela Giovagnoli ran a miniconference on Habits and Rituals at this event as well.
This summit discussed the theoretical, practical, and ethical challenges posed by the growth of information technology. The theme of the 2019 Summit focused on what AI is, isn’t, could be, and shouldn’t be, as well as to consider how it is related to mental processes produced by brains and to the different concepts of information.
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Nor-shipping 2019 was held June 4–7 in Oslo, Norway.
Nor-Shipping is the platform for sustainable ocean development, helping leading maritime players plot profitable courses into the future. Nor-Shipping is committed to the UN Sustainable Development Goals and is an official partner for the Action Platform for Sustainable Ocean Business.
Our Silje Bareksten is Head of Sustainability and Technology at Nor-Shipping. Learn more!
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ISDC 2019 – International Space
Development Conference was held June 6–9 in Arlington, Virginia.
This conference brings together leading managers, engineers, scientists, educators, and business people from the civilian, military, commercial, entrepreneurial, and grassroots advocacy space sectors to work toward a common goal of developing a space-faring civilization.
Our Martine Rothblatt and John Strickland Jr. spoke. Previous featured speakers included our Buzz Aldrin and Alan Stern. Learn more!
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EUROPT 2019
was held June 28–29 in Glasgow, United Kingdom.
This workshop is the annual event of the EUROPT continuous optimization
working group of EURO (The Association of European Operational Research
Societies).
Our Edmondo Minisci and Massimiliano Vasile spoke. Learn more!
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Ending Age-Related Diseases: Investment Prospects & Advances in Research
was held in
New York City on July 12.
Our
Joe Betts-Lacroix,
María A. Blasco,
Bobby Brooke,
Judith Campisi,
Keith Comito,
Antonei Csoka,
Aubrey de Grey,
Greg Fahy,
Peter Fedichev,
Kristen Fortney,
Vadim Gladyshev,
Vera Gorbunova,
Michael Greve,
Andrei Gudkov,
Tam Hunt,
Morgan Levine,
João Pedro de Magalhães,
Paul A. Spiegel, and
Alex Zhavoronkov spoke.
Learn more!
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The Global Bioethics Initiative (GBI), in collaboration with the
Department of Bioethics & Engagement, Mahidol Oxford Tropical Medicine
Research Unit (MORU), University of Oxford, invites students and
professionals worldwide to attend the
International
Bioethics Summer School held at the Abloom Hotel.
This program was held in Bangkok, Thailand from August 5 to 9, 2019.
Our Ana Lita is Cofounder and Executive Director of the Global Bioethics Initiative.
Learn more!
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AGI 2019 was held August 6–9 in Shenzhen, China.
As the AI field becomes increasingly commercialized and well accepted,
maintaining and emphasizing a coherent focus on the AGI (Artificial
General Intelligence) goals at the
heart of the field remains more critical than ever.
Our Pulin Agrawal, Joscha Bach, Jordi Bieger, Antonio Chella, Arthur Franz, Suzanne Gildert, Ben Goertzel, Marcus Hutter, Matthew Iklé, Anton Kolonin, Alexey Potapov, Rafal Rzepka, Julian Togelius, Harri Valpola, Pei Wang, and Byoung-Tak Zhang participated.
Learn more!
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The
O’Reilly AI Conference was held in San Jose, California on
September 9–12, 2019.
Our Mazin Gilbert and Anand Rao spoke. Learn more!
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The
23rd World Futures Studies Federation Conference 2019 (WFSF) was
held September 10–13, 2019 in Mexico City, Mexico.
Our Rosa Alegria, Peter Bishop, Lucio Mauricio Henao Vélez, Tom Lombardo, and Alethia Montero spoke/participated.
Learn more!
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RAADfest 2019 was held October 3–6 in Las Vegas, Nevada.
This is the largest event in the world where practical and cutting-edge
methods to reverse aging are presented for all interest levels, from
beginner to expert.
Our Maria Entraigues-Abramson, Orn Adalsteinsson, Nichola Conlon, José Cordeiro, Aubrey de Grey, Brian Delaney, Valerio Di Nicola, Greg Fahy, Bill Faloon, Ben Goertzel, Rudi Hoffman, Steve Hruby, Sandra Kaufmann, David Kekich, Ray Kurzweil, Liz Parrish, Neal Van De Ree, and Natasha Vita-More spoke.
Learn more!
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The
International Conference of Techno-Scientific Awareness was held by TAFFDs on
October 7–11 at the University of Rwanda.
Our Christopher K. Haley, Ósìnàkáchì Ákùmà Kálù, Doris Ngozi Morah, Ira Pastor, Ilia Stambler, and Zoltan Istvan spoke/participated.
Learn more!
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Space Settlement Summit 2019 was held November 13–14 in Pasadena,
California.
Our
Dallas Bienhoff,
Mark Hopkins, and
Alan Ladwig spoke.
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The GSA 2019 Annual Scientific Meeting “Strength in Age: Harnessing the
Power of Networks” was held November 13–17 in Austin, Texas. This
meeting is devoted to the advancement of gerontological research,
learning, and practice.
Our Holly M. Brown-Borg and Matt Kaeberlein are on the program committee.
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New Worlds 2019 was held November 15–16 in
Austin, Texas.
This conference is committed to enabling human beings to live and thrive in space, to identifying and developing the technologies and approaches needed to harvest space resources and using those resources to build new industries, companies, and communities that will open the frontier, be it on the Moon, Mars, or the Free Space between worlds.
Our Buzz Aldrin, Barbara Belvisi, Jason Dunn, Haroon Oqab, Khaki Rodway, Gabriel Rothblatt, Rick Tumlinson, Bart Womack, and Robert Zubrin spoke.
Learn more!
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The
Healthy Masters International Conference 2019 was held
November 30–December 1 at the Sheraton Porto in Portugal.
Our Nichola Conlon, José Luis Cordeiro, Aubrey de Grey, Greg Fahy, William Faloon, Steven A. Garan, Naveen Jain, David Kekich, Maxim Kholin, Nuno Martins, Stuart Maudsley, Liz Parrish, Denisa Rensen, and Paul A. Spiegel spoke.
Learn more!
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The
Envision conference was held Nov 22–24 at Princeton University
with the theme “The Future of Us”.
Our Aubrey de Grey, Daniel Elton, Francesca Ferrando, Liz Parrish, Anders Sandberg, and Susan Schneider spoke.
Free food included:
Fresh strawberry yogurt & home-made granola
Breakfast tacos with pico de gallo salsa
Heart healthy muffins and fruit breads with apple butter
Assorted cereals with berries and fruit
Grilled garden vegetables and egg white frittata
A big bowl of berries and fruit
Drinks included: Gourmet brewed coffee, herbal tea assortment, and fresh juices.
Participants enjoyed stimulating conversations with Lifeboat members!
12) As our contribution to Twitter Philanthropy, Lifeboat Foundation is giving away $1,000 to one person who both retweets our tweet at https://twitter.com/LifeboatHQ/status/1199614115649425409 plus is following us. Deadline to retweet is Dec 31, 2019.
13) Our site has become a source of information for so many people that the Internet Archive has had multiple months this year where they archived us every day of the month.
Learn more at https://web.archive.org/web/*/https://lifeboat.com/!
14) Do you have a project that would benefit from the advice and input of our advisory board members? If so, send an email with the subject “Lifeboat Foundation Projects” to [email protected]
Our goal is $25,000. Help us make 2020 our best year yet.
