Monday, June 25, 2007

The Andres Agostini [British] Globe!!! - (Ich Bin Singularitarian!)

The Andres Agostini Globe! -
Management Reflections

Andres Agostini (Ich Bin Singularitarian!).Executive Associate for Global Markets,OMEGA SYSTEMS GROUP INC.Arlington, Virginia, USA.

http://TheAndresAgostiniTimes.blogspot.com/

http://AgostiniHerald.blogspot.com/

http://AgostiniGlobe.blogspot.com/

http://www.geocities.com/AGOSBIO/a.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Andres_Agostini


FEATURE LINKS
ANDRES (ANDY) AND THE SCIENTIFIC
BIOGRAPHY OF ANDRES E. AGOSTINI
LEONARDO DA VINCI BY ANDRES AGOSTINI
http://www.geocities.com/davincianleo/1.htmlSUPER-SUCCESS BY ANDRES AGOSTINI - ICH BIN SINGULARITARIAN!http://www.geocities.com/transformationalriskmanagement/1.htmlREFLECTING ON STRATEGIC PLANNING BY ANDRES AGOSTINI
AGOSTINI UNPLUGGED (ANDRES AGOSTINI)
BEYOND LEADERSHIP (ANDRES AGOSTINI)
BEYOND SERENDIPITY (ANDRES AGOSTINI)
THE SUPER-SUCCESS (ANDRES AGOSTINI)
TRANSFORMATIVE RISK MANAGEMENT BY ANDRES AGOSTINI
ENTERPRISE HAZARD TERMINATION (ANDRES AGOSTINI)http://enterprisehazardtermination.blogspot.com/
SUPER-SUCCESS BY ANDRES AGOSTINI - ICH BIN SINGULARITARIAN
MANAGEMENT'S BEST PRACTICES BY ANDRES AGOSTINI
ENTERPRISE RISK TERMINATION (ANDRES AGOSTINI)http://enterpriserisktermination.blogspot.com/

Andres Agostini
Executive Associate for Global Markets
OMEGA SYSTEMS GROUP INC.
Arlington, Virginia, USA
http://agostiniherald.blogspot.com/


SEEING THE TREND. MAKE YOUR CONCLUSIONS. BY ANDRES AGOSTINI.“supercomputers [as of 1999] match at least the hardware capacity of the human brain….the computational capacity of a $ 4,0000 computing device (in 1999 dollars) is approximately equal to the computational capability of the human brain (20 million billion calculations per second)….[that is to say, 20,000,000,000,000,000,000 calculations per second]…..”. Source: ISBN 0-670-88217-8.
Andres Agostini
Executive Associate for Global Markets
OMEGA SYSTEMS GROUP INC.
Arlington, Virginia, USA.
PS: If there is no threat from the outter space--for instance and among others--, Who will stop the Socio-Technological Singularity? QUESTION: Who is ready to optimally manage risks beyond the boldest deams/nightmares? Are you working at it?

PROJECT MANAGEMENT REVISITED BY ANDRES AGOSTINI (UPPING, BROADENING THE SCOPE OF TRANSFORMATIVE RISK MANAGEMENT).

Project Management is the discipline of organizing and managing resources (i.e. .... The discipline of project management is about providing the tools and…….But that would be unfair as project management is not only about planning but ... Project management is all that mix of components of control, leadership, …..Project Management - [ Traduzca esta página ]Project management is a carefully planned and organized effort to accomplish a specific (and usually) one-time effort, for example, construct a building or ……future of the profession of project management is in the focus. ..... that project management is based on a theory of project and on a theory of management, ….. "eXtreme Project Management" is now live! read more……Project management is a philosophy and technique that enables its practitioners to perform to their maximum potential within the constraints of limited…..THINKING BEYOND LEAN: HOW MULTI PROJECT MANAGEMENT IS TRANSFORMING PRODUCT DEVELOPMENT AT TOYOTA ……Project management is a booming profession that is only going to get bigger in the ... Project management is becoming one of today’s fastest growing degree……In such an environment, a good axiom for project management is, Do It, Do It Right, Do It Right Now. Creating clear direction, efficiency, timely response,…..]A key component of successful project management is the ability to glean key learning’s from the experience throughout the lifecycle of the project, ..... However, the perception regarding project management is quickly changing. Companies now recognize that successfully managed projects increase productivity,……The Art of Project Management is relevant for any technical professional who becomes involved in any aspect of projects of any size…..CRITICAL CHAIN AND RISK MANAGEMENT - PROTECTING PROJECT VALUE FROM UNCERTAINTY -- Project management is the practice of turning uncertain events into ……Project Management is of fast growing importance to organisations because ... The University of Limerick, through the Centre for Project Management is the……Today's project management is less an arcane technical discipline than a set of ... Project management is simply guiding a project from inception to …….If ever there was proof needed that project management is a misunderstood role, you only have to look as far as prime time TV. In the last year or so,……Project management is a social problem. It is 99.5% about getting everyone who knows something about the state of the project to share what they know with……The Office of Management and Budget says its latest management watch and…….Project Management is growing by leaps and bounds to become one of the fastest growing professions and likely one right at the cutting edge of many …….Here is the main definition of what project management is: ... The role of the project manager in project management is one of great responsibility…….Project management is applicable in a wide range of business activities as it ... A Master of Science degree with an emphasis in project management is…….One consistent tension within project management is the extent to which a ... Project management is an essential way to keep discovery projects on track…….Good Project Management Is the Key to the Privatization Decision ... Sound project management is a two-way street. A project manager who is on top of the……project management is the ability to manage and share the company’s documents. This is achieved by removing certain core……Project management is a skill valued in every major industry. ... Project Management is a core or concentration option in the Management and Business Track…..If you're a fair idea of what project management is and want a fare .....The simple breakdown of the processes involved in project management is priceless!.......Project Management is a type of competence which is in great demand in ... The Master of Science degree in Project Management is an attempt by NTNU to …….Successful project management is better achieved by the intelligent application of sound ... 50% of project management is simply paying attention……The role of Project Management is to assist in turning uncertain events and ... Critical Chain-based project management is more than just Critical Chain……Project Management is an increasingly popular field among professionals who ... A nine-credit Advanced Certificate in Project Management is available for ……

MATRIX MANAGEMENT REVISITED BY ANDRES AGOSTINI (UPPING, BROADENING THE SCOPE OF TRANSFORMATIVE RISK MANAGEMENT).Matrix management is a type of organizational management in which people with similar ... The disadvantage of matrix management is that employees can become…..Matrix management is not a metaphysical experience. Its profundity is…..Matrix management is a type of project organization that facilitates strategic ... The relevance of this definition to matrix management is that the matrix …..Matrix management is a type of management used by some organizations . Under matrix management, all people who do one type of work…..Matrix management is an inherently a stressful ... Matrix management is traditionally believed to ... The desirability of matrix management is perceived ….Matrix management is a process driven methodology that allows a collaborative ... Matrix management is the buy-in across the organization, top to bottom, ….Matrix Management: Is It Really Conflict Management. - This report provides the potential project manager with a basic knowledge of the key features of matrix management and a comprehensive understanding of one ……Matrix management is the interface of an organization both vertically and ... One of the biggest challenges to matrix management is getting "buy-in" from .....]Matrix management is typically viewed as the endpoint in a sequence of lateral ... Finally, researchers conjecture that matrix management is a transitional …..The new matrix management is not the same old technology that existed in the 70’s and 80’s for managing matrix organizations. The new matrix technology …..Matrix management is not a new concept. Since the 1970’s organizations have ... Managers like Mark Jones understand that matrix management is more than just …..Matrix Management Is Failing With Current Employee Performance Evaluation. A recent global research study from management consulting firm Business…..]The relevance of this definition to matrix management is that the matrix matters less than the ... Matrix management is not a metaphysical experience…..Matrix management is a type of project organization that facilitates strategic ... In this context, the dynamics of matrix management is also discussed….."The new matrix management is the management of an organization in more than one dimension..." …..Organizations end up with matrix management; Which leads to problems with resource allocation and responsibility for work; And matrix management is blamed ….. matrix management is described as maintenance of. suitable habitat at multiple spatial scales, ... themes relevant to matrix management is probably .....Matrix Management is probably the ideal form of organization for dealing with ... You see, matrix management is a mindset first and an organizational form .....Matrix management is a type of project organization that facilitates strategic management. Matrix management structure allows for speedy procurement of ……Matrix management is a multi-dimensional management system that attempts to complete large projects, such as. National Programs, by organizing teams along…..Matrix management is traditionally believed to incur. higher management and administrative costs ... The desirability of matrix management is perceived ……Matrix Management Features Matrix management is a response to increasing com- ..... Nature of Matrix Matrix management is a way to bring conflict to the…… Matrix Management Structure and Development Matrix management is ... Finally, researchers conjecture that matrix management is a transitional ……Matrix management is not for everybody and requires careful planning. It violates some of the most “sacred cows” of organizational theory…..Matrix Management is Dead. This move corrects a problem that came out of the '70s and '80s where there was a belief that matrix organization would be the ……The relevance of this definition to matrix management is that the matrix matters less than the projects or multidisciplinary processes which emerge from ……Business Improvement Architects Shows Matrix Management is Failing With Current Employee Performance Evaluation from Business Wire in Business & Finance ……Understanding Matrix Management: Matrix management is a system based on…..Matrix management is a system of management based on two or more reporting systems, linked both to the vertical organisational hierarchy, and to horizontal ..... The key point is that matrix management is project-driven, not organizationally-driven. The benefits are both near-term and long-term…..Matrix management is based on two. key principles. The first is specialisation ... Matrix management is. managing the degree of integration……A key part of matrix management is the presence of team members empowered to make precise decisions with the ability to freeze the dialogue at ad hoc points……IRRI Management is fully aware that matrix management is a complex endeavor. In a world where financial resources, hence human resources, are unconstrained……Matrix management is a technique employed by many corporations in an attempt to better distribute the responsibility and authority for implementing its……The concept of matrix management is to make special talent available for more than one task. This creates a situation where the talented individual has more…..The goal of matrix management is to bring together the best expertise and ensure ... benefit of matrix management is that it improves coordination without……Often there is a mistaken belief that matrix management is the same as group decision making, and there are tendencies toward anarchy and power struggles…...I am building a training presentation on what Matrix management is…..Matrix management is one strategy used by top industry leaders in response to developments such as globalization, the intensification of competition,…..Matrix management is not a new concept. Since the 1970’s organizations have known that there was a need to find new ways of handling the…..Army Program Management System Integration: Structuring for……]The key to successful matrix management is a cohesive program office with close ties to the PM and to the user. Through responsible managers and employees……Matrix management is an organizational structure that gives one person two or more bosses. Technical. communicators may be in a formal or informal matrix……Matrix management is also exposed as not being a great idea for software developers. The author also points out how the overly busy organization is often……Matrix management is a "mixed" organizational form in which normal hierarchy is "overlayed" by some form of lateral authority, influence or communication……Second, instead of just measuring the extent to which matrix management is occurring, we need to assess how well it is working……reserves is essentially applied island biogeography theory per Diamond, 1975a), while its relationship to matrix management is less direct (focusing on…..In academic jargon "matrix management" is in vogue. Matrix management is the administrative equivalent of the tactical task force. A separate activity would…..Matrix management is not new to the Navy. It’s when resources and organization is aligned by program as opposed to a formal chain of command structure……It is a mistaken belief that matrix management is the same as group decision-making; ... Another important factor in designing a matrix management is that,…..matrix direction (английский -> русский translation glossary ...Matrix management is a type of management used by some large organizations. Large projects are organized with teams that work on a functional, rather than a…..Since matrix management is so difficult. to. work with, what are the reasons for using it? Matrix is the preferred. structural choice when all three of the……Not Magic, Strategic Futures Matrix Management is an organizational model organizing teams in the functional elements of an organization…….As we now know, matrix management is the hardest form of project organization for the project manager to lead and manage in, and requires real discipline in……A potential weakness of matrix management is that often no one is really in charge because responsibilities are dispersed among a number of organizations……Another feature of matrix management is quoted as follows:. *The identifying feature of a matrix organization is that some managers/staff……Matrix Management is the management of an organization in two dimensions: vertical and horizontal. The vertical dimension includes the traditional authority……CONCLUSION: The Lone Ranger days are over and MATRIX Management is in. MATRIX MANAGEMENT ... 1) The client using MATRIX MANAGEMENT is best served……What are your thoughts on matrix management? Is this old fad of management style regained it's popularity??? Anyone living it? ..... Matrix management is a technique of managing an organization (or, more commonly, part of an organization) through a series of dual-reporting relationships …..Matrix management is the buzz today in the corporate world but understanding the concepts that make the matrix system function can be less than clear…….Matrix Management is seen by staff as completely irrelevant. ... Top heavy with management - very bureaucratic and Matrix Management is a joke and ……industry, rather the degree of utilization of matrix management is depen- .... Matrix management is difficult and complex. It does test the adaptabil- ……The most frustrating part of “matrix management” is that it often becomes the easy scapegoat for poor performance. We would have done better but the…..Making matrix management work Matrix management is a controversial concept. Some people have had. bad experiences operating in a matrix…….suggested Matrix Management (Matrix management is a descriptive term for the management environment where projects cut across organizational…..Matrix Management is a cooperative approach to managing programs that span across two or more ... The Goal of matrix management is to improve …….Matrix Management is the Administrative Contact for the contested domain name, with someone being its registrant, with both having the same address in……Matrix Management is not a new concept; it has been a fixture in the private sector for 20 years or more. It is a flexible way to structure and execute ...
Risk Management Glossary (brief)(All definitions from Australian/New Zealand Standard for Risk Management AS/NZS 4360:1999)ConsequenceThe outcome of an event expressed qualitatively or quantitatively, being a loss, injury, disadvantage or gain. There may be a range of possible outcomes associated with an event.Cost. Cost of activities, both direct and indirect, involving any negative impact, including money, time, labour, disruption, goodwill, political and intangible losses.Event. An incident or situation, which occurs in a particular place during a particular interval of time.Frequency. A measure of the rate of occurrence of an event expressed as the number of occurrences of an event in a given time.Hazard. A source of potential hard or a situation with a potential to cause loss.Likelihood. Used as a qualitative description of probability or frequency.Loss. Any negative consequences, financial or otherwise.Monitor. To check, supervise, observe critically, or record the progress of an activity, action or system on a regular basis in order to identify change.Probability. The likelihood of a specific event or outcome, measured by the ratio of specific events or outcomes to the total number of possible events or outcomes.Risk. The chance of something happening that will have an impact upon objectives. It is measured in terms of consequences and likelihood.Risk acceptance. An informed decision to accept the consequences and the likelihood of a particular risk.Risk analysis. A systematic use of available information to determine how often specified events may occur and the magnitude of their consequences.Risk assessment. The overall process of risk analysis and risk evaluation.Risk avoidance. An informed decision not to become involved in a risk situation.Risk control. That part of risk management which involves the implementation of policies, standards, procedures and physical changes to eliminate or minimise adverse risks.Risk evaluation. The process used to determine risk management priorities by comparing the level of risk against predetermined standards, target risk levels or other criteria.Risk management. The culture, processes and structures that are directed towards the effective management of potential opportunities and adverse effects.Risk management process. The systematic application of management policies, procedures and practices to the tasks of establishing the context, identifying, analysing, evaluating, treating, monitoring and communicating risk.Risk retention. Intentionally or unintentionally retaining the responsibility for loss, or financial burden of loss within the organisation.Risk transfer. Shifting the responsibility or burden for loss to another party through legislation, contract, insurance or other means. Risk transfer can also refer to shifting a physical risk or part thereof elsewhere.Risk treatment. Selection and implementation of appropriate options for dealing with risk.Stakeholders. Those people and organisations who may affect, by affected by, or perceive themselves to be affected by, a decision or activity.

The Technological Singularity!!!. The technological singularity is a future event where humanity will get a lot of power from scientific and technological breakthroughs. This exaggerate amount of power will make us better and will give us a better comprehension of who we are. The trend of technological growing is exponential-like. The predictions are based on the law of accelerating returns. That is, once we develop new technologies, these technologies will serve to develop new and better technologies, and so on. According to many scientists and futurists, technological singularity is supposed to arrive on 2050. Will humanity control and benefit from the power that science and technology will give us or this power will control us or maybe destroy everything? That is a hot ethical debate to analyze. There are so many benefits and dangerous risks too. Singularity has many controversial ethical connotations that will be analyzed here. Genetics, nanotechnology, and robotics (GNR) are the three intertwined sciences that will lead us to the singularity. Each year, billions of dollars are invested in GNR. Many advances are planned to come in 5, 10, 20, and 40 years. Scientists are now making the future. Some computer scientists have calculated that the maximum computational power (MCP) of a piece of matter with mass M (in kilograms) is: MCP=4.75 x 1050 x M [cps] (in calculations per second). The coefficient of this formula is pi times the speed of light squared (a very large number) divided by the Planck's constant (a very little number). Some neuroscientists have conservatively calculated that the human brain capacity is 1019 [cps]. The adult mass of the human brain is about 1.35 Kg. So, the maximum computational power for a piece of matter with the same mass of a human brain is 6.41 x 1050 [cps]. It can be inferred that this piece of matter could be 6.41 x 1031 times more powerful than the human brain. With that computational capacity, all the human thought during the last 10 thousand years can be emulated in just 1 second. What could happen if it is used more matter? One of the most important steps to achieve the singularity is the reverse engineering of the brain. That is a Herculean task that will allow us to develop the strong artificial intelligence. Once strong A.I. is created, it will help us to comprehend the most elusive mysteries of the universe and even to create new life because strong A.I. will be trillions of times greater than the entire human race. Living things are the most complex systems in the universe, but at the same time, these systems are simple: the complete human genome has been characterized by using 4 letters and it occupies less than 1 gigabyte of storage. This gigabyte can even be compressed. So, the information necessary to reconstruct a human like you could be stored in a pen drive. One of the most powerful and versatile technologies in the singularity will be the use of nanobots. There will be tiny but massive nanofactories creating trillions of nanobots everyday. These nanobots will be organizing the matter atom by atom in order to create intelligent materials. Nanotech will construct real objects in the same manner the printer makes books. If the invention of the printer was astonishing, because books were available to everybody; just imagine the advent of nanotech where everything could be created just by organizing atoms at a very low price. The intellectual property will be a hot issue since everything (even you) could be replicated from information stored in a computer. Nanobots will even enter in your bloodstream and will cure all the diseases and body malfunctions. 99% of the health problems will be overcome. Radical life extension will be a reality after circa 2050. Nanobots will replace every delicate and inefficient cell in our bodies. Death will be an option but some mystics will prefer to die because, according to their beliefs, death gives meaning to their lives and it is the beginning of the afterlife. Neuroscience has overwhelmingly demonstrated that the afterlife is the most famous human invention and that the soul and the mind are the same thing and it cannot exist without a functioning brain. In the world, there are no prestigious neuroscientists who believe in the afterlife. Nanobots will even permeate the blood brain barrier and will add more intelligence to our brains. This non-biological part of our brains will be billions of times greater than our current capacity. Nanobots will recreate vivid experiences and brain images like feelings, scents, tastes, touching, hearing and visions. We could even have wireless connections with other brains and with super entities in order to share knowledge. Fully immersion virtual reality will fool our sensations and will make us experiment situations that are improbable, impossible, desirable, exciting, and charged of knowledge that cannot be understood with our current minds. Brain extensions are now a reality. Neural implants for Parkinson's disease makes a dramatic change in patients who suffer from that illness. If the implant is turned off, their hands start shaking. And they stop shaking when the implant is turned on. Cochlear neural implants are now projecting auditory information to the temporal lobe in order to make deaf people hear. It is really amazing to observe the brain's neuroplasticity that can even adapt to the electronic signal of those implants. Electroencephalographic readings of the motor cortex are now used to control prosthetic limbs. Many U.S. soldiers who were injured in the Irak conflict are using these artificial limbs. There are attempts to emulate the sight: electronic visual projections to the V1 area. But the patients reported that they can only see blur images. One form of immortality will be attained by brain uploading and downloading. The technology to scan the brain activity and topology will be perfected and will serve to download a replica of the brain. Since the supercomputers of the future will exceed our brain capacity, the computer will run a simulation or a virtual personality who will claim to be conscious. By using neural nanobots, they will reconstruct the neural pathways to represent the knowledge acquired by somebody else. That will be called brain downloading. The reconstruction could be performed in a biological brain or in a non-biological brain. The last one will be better since it will have more computational capacity. Genetics, with a complete understanding of life sciences, will be creating new kinds of life and perfecting the ones we know. For example, muscle cells from one animal will be grown in large scales to supply meat to us. No animal suffering will exist anymore. Nanotechnology, with trillions of nanobots in each nanofactory, will be constantly constructing whatever you want for example: metals, biological wood, stones, plastic, oil, or even intelligent materials. Robotics, with strong A.I.s and ubiquitous computing, will be controlling everything and constantly innovating. Robots will be our most careful servants: even better than our right hands. The end of poverty, money, and world hunger will be inevitable. Everything will be fairer and all the world problems will be solved. But maybe new kinds of problems will emerge. I hope not. Singularity is described by some authors as the deepest art, the most beautiful science, and the most powerful technology. Some others don't agree and they say that singularity will destroy the world. The technological singularity is named after the physics' singularity, that is, the black hole. Inside a black hole, all the known physics laws break down and nobody can predict what happen there with precision. In the same manner, after the advent of the singularity, nobody can predict what would happen next. The more complex a system is the more unpredictable it becomes. Solar energy is the source of almost all the energy in our planet. Oil, winds, water movements, temperature changes, weather, plants, and animals are in some manner created, derived or affected by sun light. So, the best way to obtain energy in the future will be to create nano solar panels that will efficiently transform solar energy into electricity. Our best solar panels today have an efficiency of 3%, whereas nano solar panels' will be more than 30%. Many scientists say that if we capture and transform the 0.3% of all the sun light that hits the Earth in one day, this percentage will cover and exceed the energy demand of the entire human race for that day in the future. However, 3 existential risks will be present for the human race: nuclear bombs, nano-particle contamination (gray goo), and pathological strong A.I.s. The only thing we can do to protect ourselves is to be cautious. What-if scenarios and virtual models will be indispensable to assess the impact of each and every technology that is supposed to be launched to the public. Although, terrorism and mad scientists will be present in the future, so we will have to be aware of them. When creating strong A.I.s, it is strongly necessary to program them with good and hardwired values and principles like biodiversity, tolerance, freedom, peace, and organization. The market acceptance is another way to regulate the new technological products. But I think that too much regulation will only prevent the development of good technologies that will bring a lot of satisfaction and will stop the suffering of many people. I think the main concern in the future will be to acquire more knowledge. Traditional forms of power will be purposeless since we will live forever, with lives full of satisfactions, with an extreme abundance, and in a more controlled and supervised world where everything will be fairer and more civilized. The origin of evil will be completely understood (neurological causes) and every conflict will be solved by negotiation. The human race will not be precariously exposed anymore to comets, collision of galaxies, and the lure of the dumb natural forces because the human intelligence will be expanding at the speed of light throughout the rest of the Universe. All the efforts will be focus on circumventing the light speed limit. A complete knowledge of the wormholes could be a solution to overcome this problem. Circa 2100, pico-technology will be a reality and it will bring the possibility of transforming this dumb Universe into a conscious Universe. This does sound crazy right now. But, with the technological tools of the future, it could be possible. Remember the law of the accelerating returns.

MANAGEMENT REFLECTIONS (BUSINESS-plus) BY ANDRES AGOSTINIMoral responsibility in corporate medical management is a function of the exercise of authority over different aspects of the medical decision making ...... management is a function of hazards mitigation and vulnerability reduction. This is a very simple understanding for people in disaster studies……Effective management is a function of developing proper individual or team performance measures and then monitoring those ....... Natural resource management is a function of managing County parks, reserves, and recreation areas. The Department of Parks and Recreation has developed and ....... Emergency management is a function of the department as well. This is a co-managed function of both the City of Kearney and Buffalo County……Management is a function of position, while leadership is a function of skill. Some of the most effective leaders I meet and observe in my work have no ....... GOOD STRATEGIC LEARNING MANAGEMENT IS A FUNCTION OF HOW WELL PREPARED THE COMPANY'S PSYCHE IS IN PRO-ACTIVELY BLENDING THE MASSIVE CHANGES TAKING PLACE IN ....... risk management is a function of impact management. Define project support function…….Management is a function of planning, organizing, controlling leading, and staffing. Management is function of activities and ........ Management is a function of every stakeholder in an oganisation. If all this "management" is working towards well defined and appropriate objectives then it ....... Money management is a function of determining how much of your account to risk...on any given trade or for that matter, any given strategy…..Crisis management is a function of all public, private and non-profit organizations, supporting their fundamental strategic objective of ensuring ....... Public Sector Financial Management is a function of the Department of Treasury and Finance and Budget Management is one of its activities……that ecological pest management is a function of “many little hammers, but no silver bullet.”……. management is a function of the socio-economic factors;….. management is a function of the quality and consistency of routine operations……It is recognised that people management is a function of partners and managers, no matter how senior they might be. Psychological profiling can help firms……SOCIAL CONSTRUCTION, AND, THEREFORE, KNOWLEDGE MANAGEMENT IS A FUNCTION OF SOCIAL STRUCTURE.THE TOOL IS CALLED SOCIAL NETWORK ANALYSIS……the management is a function of the management’s forecast and actual aggregate demand of the next period……Collateral management is a function of ever-growing. importance to the futures industry. With operating margins. coming under increasing scrutiny,….. Introduction to crisis management as it is applied in public, private, and non-profit organizations; crisis management is a function of all organizations ……advancement and participation in project management is a function of the type of organizational culture which has traditionally…..Discusses how strategic management is a function of the cognitive, experiential and informational skills of the manager…….Request For Proposal management is a function of creating a detailed and concise document…….Nursing management is a function of the personnel department of a business. It deals with a system in high tension, with a network of interrelated ....... The proportionality of the two chosen by management is a function of values, acumen, environment, and situation. How do purchasing professionals reach some ....... Budget management is a function of the chair that requires teamwork with individuals both inside and outside the department…….The cost of memory management is a function of the allocation cost of memory associated with an instance of a type, the cost of managing that memory over ....... Management is a function of position and authority, leadership is not dependent on either, but is a function of personality……Therefore, disaster risk management is a function of hazards mitigation and vulnerability reduction…….Today in team-based knowledge-centric enterprises, management is a function of consensus building, motivating employees and convincing others……Crisis management is a function of anticipation and planning before the crisis occurs. ¨ Client information. Information about clients that should be shared ....... advertising management is a function of marketing starting from market research continuing through advertising leading to actual sales or achievement of ....... Inventory Management is a function of central importance in manufacturing control. It is an evolving discipline which encompasses the principles, ....... Knowledge management is a function of the generation and dissemination of information, developing a shared understanding of the information, ........ Today crisis management is a function of information management. Respond! aims at improving emergency management communication and enlarging the knowledge ......... time management is a function of how we manage the passing of time, we have little control over the situation…….The effectiveness of the application to stormwater management is a function of the hydraulic design of the bioretention system…….management is a function of the difference between the benefit received from management and that which can be acquired from alternative outcome ....... Contract management is a function of both project management and financial management. The functions of contract……Territory management, like time management, is a function of many attitudes, habits, values, skills and beliefs. It is also a function of: ....... Vegetation treatment and management is a function of site Development Scale – development scale will determine the intensity of treatment activities, etc. ....... The ability to self-manage is a function of individual differences and. is, therefore, dependent upon many variables, including specific biological,…… How you manage is a function of your personality. Two extremes:. Too much management. Too little management…...
IN AN INSIGHTFUL BOOK
"INEVITABLE SURPRISES", THE AUTHOR, PETER SCHWARTZ, OUTLINES STEPS TO COPE WITH THE FUTURE.
"You can't predict the chaos and turbulence to come. But how can you best prepare? What foresight can you cultivate, so that when this level of instability comes, you, and the people you care about, are ready for it? How can we learn from the last Great Transition to be better prepared for this new one?I have learned that several answers are available from years of helping organizations anticipate the future in scenario practice.
Build and maintain your sensory and intelligence systems. That doesn't just mean technological systems. It means the continued kinds of "strategic conversations" in which you and your cohorts and colleagues keep looking around to conserve and interpret the interaction of forces that might affect you, your enterprises, and your communities.This seems obvious, but it's surprising how many politicians, educators, and businesspeople I have met who do not make time for it. Over the years their ability to observe and interpret the world around them atrophies. In a singularity like the one approaching us, fine-grained awareness of the world outside your own organizational boundaries will be a paramount aid to survival.
Cultivate a sense of timing. When you see an event approaching, make a point of asking: How rapidly is it approaching? When could it occur? How far in the future? Identify in advance the kinds of "early-warning indicators" that would signal that a change is rapidly upon you. For instance, if you are a foreign investor, what are the early signals of potential financial crises? You know they will occur in China and India-what do you look for there? It you are a technologist, What kind of funding will be evident in your arena first, before it attracts financing from elsewhere? If you are concerned about climate change, what represents the next big warning sign? And how do you distinguish it from run-of-the-mill climate variation?Once you've identified these signals, keep an eye out for them and be prepared to act when you observe them. This is one place where my colleagues and I use short-term scenario exercises: "If we saw such a signal. What could it mean? And what would we do in response to it?" in 1997, when the financial crisis hit Southeast Asia, the U.S. Treasury had already undergone the kind of firewall-building exercise necessary in Mexico in 1994-which made it possible to move rapidly to contain the crisis, so that it did not ripple into China, Korea, and Japan.
Put in place mechanisms to engender creative destruction. The institutions, companies, agencies, political parties, and values of the past may turn out to be moribund and counterproductive in a new historical environment. Are you prepared to discard them? What processes, practices, and organizations have you actually dismantled in the last year or two? If the answer is none, perhaps it's time to get some practice in before urgency strikes.Creative destruction is not simply a matter of getting rid of old baggage. It means learning how to mitigate the costs. There is inevitable a fair amount of disruption to communities, the abandonment of secure livelihoods, and the severing of deep relationships. You cannot keep those old institutions for the sake of convenience; you need the creativity that comes from releasing them. But unless you can ease the pain of disruption, you will engender fierce resistance. Moreover, the pain of disruption tends to fall disproportionately on the "20-to-40-percent group": the hidden population of lower-level employees on whom the revival of the economy depends. Unless you can help them bear the consequences of disruption, you may cripple your ability to recover.
Note how many of the most successful businesspeople and politicians of the past twenty years have been successful at this, including the last two American presidents (both of whom arguably rode to success by largely discarding the previous identities of their political parties).
Try to avoid denial. When an "inevitable surprise" comes along that makes life difficult for you or your organization, do not pretend that it isn't happening. This book is full of examples where leaders exacerbated a problem by trying to deny its significance: AIDS in Africa and Russia, the telecommunications "last mile" problem, and the potential severity of global climate change. Unfortunately, most standard corporate or government planning is a recipe for denial. The standard operating procedure is to talk about the various futures that might lie ahead, pick the one that seems most likely to happen, plot the course accordingly, and maybe build in a few exigencies.
Having done this, the planners (being, after all, human beings) are naturally prone to discount any signals from the outside world that contradict the outcome they expected. The very fact that a future feels "likely" should make us skeptical of it. Chances are, we are drawn by our own limited worldview and predisposition to assume that what we expect to happen, will.By contrast, when a future feels particularly worrying or discomfiting, and your first impulse is to say, "That would hurt us if it happened, but it won't happen," that's a signal to pay closer attention to it. Something about that future is trying to break through your mental blinders, and if you deny it or ignore it, you may well inadvertently help to bring it to pass. Indeed that kind of denial may have caused the NASA leadership to deny the potential for catastrophic failure despite contrary evidence on the Columbia.
Think like a commodity company. Most goods, services, and financial sums that are traded are commodities-no one has a monopoly on producing them, and therefore they are subject to swings in supply and demand at any time. This includes not just real commodities, like oil, gold, and wheat, but also stock prices, tax receipts, and trade revenues. It's all too easy to believe, on a price upswing, that this time is different, and the commodity will rise forever. But sooner or later the price will hit a peak. Those peaks can come suddenly, and the aftermath can be a steep and highly disruptive fall.
Be aware of the competence of your judgment, and the level of judgment that new situations require; and move deliberately and humbly into new situations that stretch your judgment. Every successful individual organization has an integrated core of judgment-not just knowledge, but the ability to make wise decisions quickly in a particular field-that lies at the heart of success. When times are turbulent, the temptation to move outside that knowledge to take advantage of outside opportunities is great. Those are the risks that often get you into trouble.
Place a very, very high premium on learning. Most failures to adapt are, in effect, failures to learn enough in time about the changing circumstances. And there will be more to learn in the future. If advances in science and technology are any indication, work will be increasingly knowledge intensive, and the value of scientific knowledge in particular will be all the greater. Unfortunately, most western societies have approached education ideologically. There has not yet been a genuine consensus, among educators and budget-settings politicians, about how children and adults learn, and about how best to set up schools. Until such a consensus is reached in the most pragmatic, non-ideological way, we are unlikely to see a functional education system in most countries. Instead, we will have what we have now: various splinter groups arguing that their favored approach is best for schools, and no solid way to compare the results. (Standardized tests measure only a very small part of the capabilities that people need education to gain.) This is an extremely dysfunctional way to deal with the future.
Place a very high premium on environmental and ecological sustainability. This is not just a global political and environmental issue; it is a vehicle for high-quality integration and development. You almost have to run an organization that follows this path to recognize how valuable it is; it focuses attention on the "side effects" of your actions, in ways that are extremely useful.
Place a very high premium on financial infrastructure and support. Individuals need safety nets and insurance against crises. Organizations need to build in safeguards and help individuals build the financial infrastructure they need. And society as a whole will need to watch out for the interests of the "20-40-percent" group, for whom no one else typically is.The risks are greater than we think. In the future, people at all three levels will need safety nets in a way that hasn't been true before. And organizations will need to muster profits and use them wisely. Do you have the kind of portfolio of income and assets that will help you weather the storms to come? Do you have enough profits to fund your transition into the next stage of your evolution, whatever that turns out to be?
Cultivate connections. In the world of 2025 people will be inevitably in contract far more regularly and comprehensively than they are today. Quantum computing, universal broadband, longer lives, globalization and clean, green energy will reshape our world toward far greater interconnection. Are you prepared for this? Do you have the kinds of deep, candid connections that will help you ride through the next transition without having to ride alone."

THE LAW OF ACCELERATING RETURNSBY
RAY KURZWEILAn analysis of the history of technology shows that technological change is exponential, contrary to the common-sense "intuitive linear" view. So we won't experience 100 years of progress in the 21st century -- it will be more like 20,000 years of progress (at today's rate). The "returns," such as chip speed and cost-effectiveness, also increase exponentially. There's even exponential growth in the rate of exponential growth. Within a few decades, machine intelligence will surpass human intelligence, leading to The Singularity -- technological change so rapid and profound it represents a rupture in the fabric of human history. The implications include the merger of biological and non-biological intelligence, immortal software-based humans, and ultra-high levels of intelligence that expand outward in the universe at the speed of light.
ON THE SOCIO-TECHNOLOGICAL SINGULARITY:
Vernor Vinge
Department of Mathematical Sciences
San Diego State University(c) 1993 by Vernor Vinge(This article may be reproduced for noncommercial purposes if it is copied in its entirety, including this notice.)The original version of this article was presented at the VISION-21 Symposium sponsored by NASA Lewis Research Center and the Ohio Aerospace Institute, March 30-31, 1993. A slightly changed version appeared in the Winter 1993 issue of Whole Earth Review.AbstractWithin thirty years, we will have the technological means to create superhuman intelligence. Shortly after, the human era will be ended.Is such progress avoidable? If not to be avoided, can events be guided so that we may survive? These questions are investigated. Some possible answers (and some further dangers) are presented.What is The Singularity?The acceleration of technological progress has been the central feature of this century. I argue in this paper that we are on the edge of change comparable to the rise of human life on Earth. The precise cause of this change is the imminent creation by technology of entities with greater than human intelligence. There are several means by which science may achieve this breakthrough (and this is another reason for having confidence that the event will occur): There may be developed computers that are "awake" and superhumanly intelligent. (To date, there has been much controversy as to whether we can create human equivalence in a machine. But if the answer is "yes, we can", then there is little doubt that beings more intelligent can be constructed shortly thereafter.) Large computer networks (and their associated users) may "wake up" as a superhumanly intelligent entity. Computer/human interfaces may become so intimate that users may reasonably be considered superhumanly intelligent. Biological science may provide means to improve natural human intellect.The first three possibilities depend in large part on improvements in computer hardware. Progress in computer hardware has followed an amazingly steady curve in the last few decades [17]. Based largely on this trend, I believe that the creation of greater than human intelligence will occur during the next thirty years. (Charles Platt [20] has pointed out that AI enthusiasts have been making claims like this for the last thirty years. Just so I'm not guilty of a relative-time ambiguity, let me more specific: I'll be surprised if this event occurs before 2005 or after 2030.)What are the consequences of this event? When greater-than-human intelligence drives progress, that progress will be much more rapid. In fact, there seems no reason why progress itself would not involve the creation of still more intelligent entities -- on a still-shorter time scale. The best analogy that I see is with the evolutionary past: Animals can adapt to problems and make inventions, but often no faster than natural selection can do its work -- the world acts as its own simulator in the case of natural selection. We humans have the ability to internalize the world and conduct "what if's" in our heads; we can solve many problems thousands of times faster than natural selection. Now, by creating the means to execute those simulations at much higher speeds, we are entering a regime as radically different from our human past as we humans are from the lower animals.From the human point of view this change will be a throwing away of all the previous rules, perhaps in the blink of an eye, an exponential runaway beyond any hope of control. Developments that before were thought might only happen in "a million years" (if ever) will likely happen in the next century. (In [5], Greg Bear paints a picture of the major changes happening in a matter of hours.)I think it's fair to call this event a singularity ("the Singularity" for the purposes of this paper). It is a point where our old models must be discarded and a new reality rules. As we move closer to this point, it will loom vaster and vaster over human affairs till the notion becomes a commonplace. Yet when it finally happens it may still be a great surprise and a greater unknown. In the 1950s there were very few who saw it: Stan Ulam [28] paraphrased John von Neumann as saying:One conversation centered on the ever accelerating progress of technology and changes in the mode of human life, which gives the appearance of approaching some essential singularity in the history of the race beyond which human affairs, as we know them, could not continue.Von Neumann even uses the term singularity, though it appears he is thinking of normal progress, not the creation of superhuman intellect. (For me, the superhumanity is the essence of the Singularity. Without that we would get a glut of technical riches, never properly absorbed (see [25]).)In the 1960s there was recognition of some of the implications of superhuman intelligence. I. J. Good wrote [11]:Let an ultraintelligent machine be defined as a machine that can far surpass all the intellectual activities of any any man however clever. Since the design of machines is one of these intellectual activities, an ultraintelligent machine could design even better machines; there would then unquestionably be an "intelligence explosion," and the intelligence of man would be left far behind. Thus the first ultraintelligent machine is the _last_ invention that man need ever make, provided that the machine is docile enough to tell us how to keep it under control. ... It is more probable than not that, within the twentieth century, an ultraintelligent machine will be built and that it will be the last invention that man need make.Good has captured the essence of the runaway, but does not pursue its most disturbing consequences. Any intelligent machine of the sort he describes would not be humankind's "tool" -- any more than humans are the tools of rabbits or robins or chimpanzees.Through the '60s and '70s and '80s, recognition of the cataclysm spread [29] [1] [31] [5]. Perhaps it was the science-fiction writers who felt the first concrete impact. After all, the "hard" science-fiction writers are the ones who try to write specific stories about all that technology may do for us. More and more, these writers felt an opaque wall across the future. Once, they could put such fantasies millions of years in the future [24]. Now they saw that their most diligent extrapolations resulted in the unknowable ... soon. Once, galactic empires might have seemed a Post-Human domain. Now, sadly, even interplanetary ones are.What about the '90s and the '00s and the '10s, as we slide toward the edge? How will the approach of the Singularity spread across the human world view? For a while yet, the general critics of machine sapience will have good press. After all, till we have hardware as powerful as a human brain it is probably foolish to think we'll be able to create human equivalent (or greater) intelligence. (There is the far-fetched possibility that we could make a human equivalent out of less powerful hardware, if we were willing to give up speed, if we were willing to settle for an artificial being who was literally slow [30]. But it's much more likely that devising the software will be a tricky process, involving lots of false starts and experimentation. If so, then the arrival of self-aware machines will not happen till after the development of hardware that is substantially more powerful than humans' natural equipment.)But as time passes, we should see more symptoms. The dilemma felt by science fiction writers will be perceived in other creative endeavors. (I have heard thoughtful comic book writers worry about how to have spectacular effects when everything visible can be produced by the technologically commonplace.) We will see automation replacing higher and higher level jobs. We have tools right now (symbolic math programs, cad/cam) that release us from most low-level drudgery. Or put another way: The work that is truly productive is the domain of a steadily smaller and more elite fraction of humanity. In the coming of the Singularity, we are seeing the predictions of _true_ technological unemployment finally come true.Another symptom of progress toward the Singularity: ideas themselves should spread ever faster, and even the most radical will quickly become commonplace. When I began writing science fiction in the middle '60s, it seemed very easy to find ideas that took decades to percolate into the cultural consciousness; now the lead time seems more like eighteen months. (Of course, this could just be me losing my imagination as I get old, but I see the effect in others too.) Like the shock in a compressible flow, the Singularity moves closer as we accelerate through the critical speed.And what of the arrival of the Singularity itself? What can be said of its actual appearance? Since it involves an intellectual runaway, it will probably occur faster than any technical revolution seen so far. The precipitating event will likely be unexpected -- perhaps even to the researchers involved. ("But all our previous models were catatonic! We were just tweaking some parameters....") If networking is widespread enough (into ubiquitous embedded systems), it may seem as if our artifacts as a whole had suddenly wakened.And what happens a month or two (or a day or two) after that? I have only analogies to point to: The rise of humankind. We will be in the Post-Human era. And for all my rampant technological optimism, sometimes I think I'd be more comfortable if I were regarding these transcendental events from one thousand years remove ... instead of twenty.Can the Singularity be Avoided?Well, maybe it won't happen at all: Sometimes I try to imagine the symptoms that we should expect to see if the Singularity is not to develop. There are the widely respected arguments of Penrose [19] and Searle [22] against the practicality of machine sapience. In August of 1992, Thinking Machines Corporation held a workshop to investigate the question "How We Will Build a Machine that Thinks" [27]. As you might guess from the workshop's title, the participants were not especially supportive of the arguments against machine intelligence. In fact, there was general agreement that minds can exist on nonbiological substrates and that algorithms are of central importance to the existence of minds. However, there was much debate about the raw hardware power that is present in organic brains. A minority felt that the largest 1992 computers were within three orders of magnitude of the power of the human brain. The majority of the participants agreed with Moravec's estimate [17] that we are ten to forty years away from hardware parity. And yet there was another minority who pointed to [7] [21], and conjectured that the computational competence of single neurons may be far higher than generally believed. If so, our present computer hardware might be as much as _ten_ orders of magnitude short of the equipment we carry around in our heads. If this is true (or for that matter, if the Penrose or Searle critique is valid), we might never see a Singularity. Instead, in the early '00s we would find our hardware performance curves beginning to level off -- this because of our inability to automate the design work needed to support further hardware improvements. We'd end up with some _very_ powerful hardware, but without the ability to push it further. Commercial digital signal processing might be awesome, giving an analog appearance even to digital operations, but nothing would ever "wake up" and there would never be the intellectual runaway which is the essence of the Singularity. It would likely be seen as a golden age ... and it would also be an end of progress. This is very like the future predicted by Gunther Stent. In fact, on page 137 of [25], Stent explicitly cites the development of transhuman intelligence as a sufficient condition to break his projections.But if the technological Singularity can happen, it will. Even if all the governments of the world were to understand the "threat" and be in deadly fear of it, progress toward the goal would continue. In fiction, there have been stories of laws passed forbidding the construction of "a machine in the likeness of the human mind" [13]. In fact, the competitive advantage -- economic, military, even artistic -- of every advance in automation is so compelling that passing laws, or having customs, that forbid such things merely assures that someone else will get them first.Eric Drexler [8] has provided spectacular insights about how far technical improvement may go. He agrees that superhuman intelligences will be available in the near future -- and that such entities pose a threat to the human status quo. But Drexler argues that we can confine such transhuman devices so that their results can be examined and used safely. This is I. J. Good's ultraintelligent machine, with a dose of caution. I argue that confinement is intrinsically impractical. For the case of physical confinement: Imagine yourself locked in your home with only limited data access to the outside, to your masters. If those masters thought at a rate -- say -- one million times slower than you, there is little doubt that over a period of years (your time) you could come up with "helpful advice" that would incidentally set you free. (I call this "fast thinking" form of superintelligence "weak superhumanity". Such a "weakly superhuman" entity would probably burn out in a few weeks of outside time. "Strong superhumanity" would be more than cranking up the clock speed on a human-equivalent mind. It's hard to say precisely what "strong superhumanity" would be like, but the difference appears to be profound. Imagine running a dog mind at very high speed. Would a thousand years of doggy living add up to any human insight? (Now if the dog mind were cleverly rewired and _then_ run at high speed, we might see something different....) Many speculations about superintelligence seem to be based on the weakly superhuman model. I believe that our best guesses about the post-Singularity world can be obtained by thinking on the nature of strong superhumanity. I will return to this point later in the paper.)Another approach to confinement is to build _rules_ into the mind of the created superhuman entity (for example, Asimov's Laws [3]). I think that any rules strict enough to be effective would also produce a device whose ability was clearly inferior to the unfettered versions (and so human competition would favor the development of the those more dangerous models). Still, the Asimov dream is a wonderful one: Imagine a willing slave, who has 1000 times your capabilities in every way. Imagine a creature who could satisfy your every safe wish (whatever that means) and still have 99.9% of its time free for other activities. There would be a new universe we never really understood, but filled with benevolent gods (though one of _my_ wishes might be to become one of them).If the Singularity can not be prevented or confined, just how bad could the Post-Human era be? Well ... pretty bad. The physical extinction of the human race is one possibility. (Or as Eric Drexler put it of nanotechnology: Given all that such technology can do, perhaps governments would simply decide that they no longer need citizens!). Yet physical extinction may not be the scariest possibility. Again, analogies: Think of the different ways we relate to animals. Some of the crude physical abuses are implausible, yet.... In a Post-Human world there would still be plenty of niches where human equivalent automation would be desirable: embedded systems in autonomous devices, self-aware daemons in the lower functioning of larger sentients. (A strongly superhuman intelligence would likely be a Society of Mind [16] with some very competent components.) Some of these human equivalents might be used for nothing more than digital signal processing. They would be more like whales than humans. Others might be very human-like, yet with a one-sidedness, a _dedication_ that would put them in a mental hospital in our era. Though none of these creatures might be flesh-and-blood humans, they might be the closest things in the new enviroment to what we call human now. (I. J. Good had something to say about this, though at this late date the advice may be moot: Good [12] proposed a "Meta-Golden Rule", which might be paraphrased as "Treat your inferiors as you would be treated by your superiors." It's a wonderful, paradoxical idea (and most of my friends don't believe it) since the game-theoretic payoff is so hard to articulate. Yet if we were able to follow it, in some sense that might say something about the plausibility of such kindness in this universe.)I have argued above that we cannot prevent the Singularity, that its coming is an inevitable consequence of the humans' natural competitiveness and the possibilities inherent in technology. And yet ... we are the initiators. Even the largest avalanche is triggered by small things. We have the freedom to establish initial conditions, make things happen in ways that are less inimical than others. Of course (as with starting avalanches), it may not be clear what the right guiding nudge really is:Other Paths to the Singularity: Intelligence Amplification_When people speak of creating superhumanly intelligent beings, they are usually imagining an AI project. But as I noted at the beginning of this paper, there are other paths to superhumanity. Computer networks and human-computer interfaces seem more mundane than AI, and yet they could lead to the Singularity. I call this contrasting approach Intelligence Amplification (IA). IA is something that is proceeding very naturally, in most cases not even recognized by its developers for what it is. But every time our ability to access information and to communicate it to others is improved, in some sense we have achieved an increase over natural intelligence. Even now, the team of a PhD human and good computer workstation (even an off-net workstation!) could probably max any written intelligence test in existence.And it's very likely that IA is a much easier road to the achievement of superhumanity than pure AI. In humans, the hardest development problems have already been solved. Building up from within ourselves ought to be easier than figuring out first what we really are and then building machines that are all of that. And there is at least conjectural precedent for this approach. Cairns-Smith [6] has speculated that biological life may have begun as an adjunct to still more primitive life based on crystalline growth. Lynn Margulis (in [15] and elsewhere) has made strong arguments that mutualism is a great driving force in evolution.Note that I am not proposing that AI research be ignored or less funded. What goes on with AI will often have applications in IA, and vice versa. I am suggesting that we recognize that in network and interface research there is something as profound (and potential wild) as Artificial Intelligence. With that insight, we may see projects that are not as directly applicable as conventional interface and network design work, but which serve to advance us toward the Singularity along the IA path.Here are some possible projects that take on special significance, given the IA point of view: Human/computer team automation: Take problems that are normally considered for purely machine solution (like hill-climbing problems), and design programs and interfaces that take a advantage of humans' intuition and available computer hardware. Considering all the bizarreness of higher dimensional hill-climbing problems (and the neat algorithms that have been devised for their solution), there could be some very interesting displays and control tools provided to the human team member. Develop human/computer symbiosis in art: Combine the graphic generation capability of modern machines and the esthetic sensibility of humans. Of course, there has been an enormous amount of research in designing computer aids for artists, as labor saving tools. I'm suggesting that we explicitly aim for a greater merging of competence, that we explicitly recognize the cooperative approach that is possible. Karl Sims [23] has done wonderful work in this direction. Allow human/computer teams at chess tournaments. We already have programs that can play better than almost all humans. But how much work has been done on how this power could be used by a human, to get something even better? If such teams were allowed in at least some chess tournaments, it could have the positive effect on IA research that allowing computers in tournaments had for the corresponding niche in AI. Develop interfaces that allow computer and network access without requiring the human to be tied to one spot, sitting in front of a computer. (This is an aspect of IA that fits so well with known economic advantages that lots of effort is already being spent on it.) Develop more symmetrical decision support systems. A popular research/product area in recent years has been decision support systems. This is a form of IA, but may be too focussed on systems that are oracular. As much as the program giving the user information, there must be the idea of the user giving the program guidance. Use local area nets to make human teams that really work (ie, are more effective than their component members). This is generally the area of "groupware", already a very popular commercial pursuit. The change in viewpoint here would be to regard the group activity as a combination organism. In one sense, this suggestion might be regarded as the goal of inventing a "Rules of Order" for such combination operations. For instance, group focus might be more easily maintained than in classical meetings. Expertise of individual human members could be isolated from ego issues such that the contribution of different members is focussed on the team project. And of course shared data bases could be used much more conveniently than in conventional committee operations. (Note that this suggestion is aimed at team operations rather than political meetings. In a political setting, the automation described above would simply enforce the power of the persons making the rules!) Exploit the worldwide Internet as a combination human/machine tool. Of all the items on the list, progress in this is proceeding the fastest and may run us into the Singularity before anything else. The power and influence of even the present-day Internet is vastly underestimated. For instance, I think our contemporary computer systems would break under the weight of their own complexity if it weren't for the edge that the USENET "group mind" gives the system administration and support people! The very anarchy of the worldwide net development is evidence of its potential. As connectivity and bandwidth and archive size and computer speed all increase, we are seeing something like Lynn Margulis' [15] vision of the biosphere as data processor recapitulated, but at a million times greater speed and with millions of humanly intelligent agents (ourselves). The above examples illustrate research that can be done within the context of contemporary computer science departments. There are other paradigms. For example, much of the work in Artificial Intelligence and neural nets would benefit from a closer connection with biological life. Instead of simply trying to model and understand biological life with computers, research could be directed toward the creation of composite systems that rely on biological life for guidance or for the providing features we don't understand well enough yet to implement in hardware. A long-time dream of science-fiction has been direct brain to computer interfaces [2] [29]. In fact, there is concrete work that can be done (and is being done) in this area: Limb prosthetics is a topic of direct commercial applicability. Nerve to silicon transducers can be made [14]. This is an exciting, near-term step toward direct communication. Direct links into brains seem feasible, if the bit rate is low: given human learning flexibility, the actual brain neuron targets might not have to be precisely selected. Even 100 bits per second would be of great use to stroke victims who would otherwise be confined to menu-driven interfaces. Plugging in to the optic trunk has the potential for bandwidths of 1 Mbit/second or so. But for this, we need to know the fine-scale architecture of vision, and we need to place an enormous web of electrodes with exquisite precision. If we want our high bandwidth connection to be _in addition_ to what paths are already present in the brain, the problem becomes vastly more intractable. Just sticking a grid of high-bandwidth receivers into a brain certainly won't do it. But suppose that the high-bandwidth grid were present while the brain structure was actually setting up, as the embryo develops. That suggests: Animal embryo experiments. I wouldn't expect any IA success in the first years of such research, but giving developing brains access to complex simulated neural structures might be very interesting to the people who study how the embryonic brain develops. In the long run, such experiments might produce animals with additional sense paths and interesting intellectual abilities. Originally, I had hoped that this discussion of IA would yield some clearly safer approaches to the Singularity. (After all, IA allows our participation in a kind of transcendance.) Alas, looking back over these IA proposals, about all I am sure of is that they should be considered, that they may give us more options. But as for safety ... well, some of the suggestions are a little scarey on their face. One of my informal reviewers pointed out that IA for individual humans creates a rather sinister elite. We humans have millions of years of evolutionary baggage that makes us regard competition in a deadly light. Much of that deadliness may not be necessary in today's world, one where losers take on the winners' tricks and are coopted into the winners' enterprises. A creature that was built _de novo_ might possibly be a much more benign entity than one with a kernel based on fang and talon. And even the egalitarian view of an Internet that wakes up along with all mankind can be viewed as a nightmare [26].The problem is not simply that the Singularity represents the passing of humankind from center stage, but that it contradicts our most deeply held notions of being. I think a closer look at the notion of strong superhumanity can show why that is.Strong Superhumanity and the Best We Can Ask forSuppose we could tailor the Singularity. Suppose we could attain our most extravagant hopes. What then would we ask for: That humans themselves would become their own successors, that whatever injustice occurs would be tempered by our knowledge of our roots. For those who remained unaltered, the goal would be benign treatment (perhaps even giving the stay-behinds the appearance of being masters of godlike slaves). It could be a golden age that also involved progress (overleaping Stent's barrier). Immortality (or at least a lifetime as long as we can make the universe survive [10] [4]) would be achievable.But in this brightest and kindest world, the philosophical problems themselves become intimidating. A mind that stays at the same capacity cannot live forever; after a few thousand years it would look more like a repeating tape loop than a person. (The most chilling picture I have seen of this is in [18].) To live indefinitely long, the mind itself must grow ... and when it becomes great enough, and looks back ... what fellow-feeling can it have with the soul that it was originally? Certainly the later being would be everything the original was, but so much vastly more. And so even for the individual, the Cairns-Smith or Lynn Margulis notion of new life growing incrementally out of the old must still be valid.This "problem" about immortality comes up in much more direct ways. The notion of ego and self-awareness has been the bedrock of the hardheaded rationalism of the last few centuries. Yet now the notion of self-awareness is under attack from the Artificial Intelligence people ("self-awareness and other delusions"). Intelligence Amplification undercuts our concept of ego from another direction. The post-Singularity world will involve extremely high-bandwidth networking. A central feature of strongly superhuman entities will likely be their ability to communicate at variable bandwidths, including ones far higher than speech or written messages. What happens when pieces of ego can be copied and merged, when the size of a selfawareness can grow or shrink to fit the nature of the problems under consideration? These are essential features of strong superhumanity and the Singularity. Thinking about them, one begins to feel how essentially strange and different the Post-Human era will be -- _no matter how cleverly and benignly it is brought to be_.From one angle, the vision fits many of our happiest dreams: a time unending, where we can truly know one another and understand the deepest mysteries. From another angle, it's a lot like the worst- case scenario I imagined earlier in this paper.Which is the valid viewpoint? In fact, I think the new era is simply too different to fit into the classical frame of good and evil. That frame is based on the idea of isolated, immutable minds connected by tenuous, low-bandwith links. But the post-Singularity world _does_ fit with the larger tradition of change and cooperation that started long ago (perhaps even before the rise of biological life). I think there _are_ notions of ethics that would apply in such an era. Research into IA and high-bandwidth communications should improve this understanding. I see just the glimmerings of this now [32]. There is Good's Meta-Golden Rule; perhaps there are rules for distinguishing self from others on the basis of bandwidth of connection. And while mind and self will be vastly more labile than in the past, much of what we value (knowledge, memory, thought) need never be lost. I think Freeman Dyson has it right when he says [9]: "God is what mind becomes when it has passed beyond the scale of our comprehension."[I wish to thank John Carroll of San Diego State University and Howard Davidson of Sun Microsystems for discussing the draft version of this paper with me.]Annotated Sources [and an occasional plea for bibliographical help][1] Alfve'n, Hannes, writing as Olof Johanneson, _The End of Man?_, Award Books, 1969 earlier published as "The Tale of the Big Computer", Coward-McCann, translated from a book copyright 1966 Albert Bonniers Forlag AB with English translation copyright 1966 by Victor Gollanz, Ltd.[2] Anderson, Poul, "Kings Who Die", _If_, March 1962, p8-36. Reprinted in _Seven Conquests_, Poul Anderson, MacMillan Co., 1969.[3] Asimov, Isaac, "Runaround", _Astounding Science Fiction_, March 1942, p94. Reprinted in _Robot Visions_, Isaac Asimov, ROC, 1990. Asimov describes the development of his robotics stories in this book.[4] Barrow, John D. and Frank J. Tipler, _The Anthropic Cosmological Principle_, Oxford University Press, 1986.[5] Bear, Greg, "Blood Music", _Analog Science Fiction-Science Fact_, June, 1983. Expanded into the novel _Blood Music_, Morrow, 1985.[6] Cairns-Smith, A. G., _Seven Clues to the Origin of Life_, Cambridge University Press, 1985.[7] Conrad, Michael _et al._, "Towards an Artificial Brain", _BioSystems_, vol 23, pp175-218, 1989.[8] Drexler, K. Eric, _Engines of Creation_, Anchor Press/Doubleday, 1986.[9] Dyson, Freeman, _Infinite in All Directions_, Harper && Row, 1988.[10] Dyson, Freeman, "Physics and Biology in an Open Universe", _Review of Modern Physics_, vol 51, pp447-460, 1979.[11] Good, I. J., "Speculations Concerning the First Ultraintelligent Machine", in _Advances in Computers_, vol 6, Franz L. Alt and Morris Rubinoff, eds, pp31-88, 1965, Academic Press.[12] Good, I. J., [Help! I can't find the source of Good's Meta-Golden Rule, though I have the clear recollection of hearing about it sometime in the 1960s. Through the help of the net, I have found pointers to a number of related items. G. Harry Stine and Andrew Haley have written about metalaw as it might relate to extraterrestrials: G. Harry Stine, "How to Get along with Extraterrestrials ... or Your Neighbor", _Analog Science Fact- Science Fiction_, February, 1980, p39-47.] [13] Herbert, Frank, _Dune_, Berkley Books, 1985. However, this novel was serialized in _Analog Science Fiction-Science Fact_ in the 1960s.[14] Kovacs, G. T. A. _et al._, "Regeneration Microelectrode Array for Peripheral Nerve Recording and Stimulation", _IEEE Transactions on Biomedical Engineering_, v 39, n 9, pp 893-902.[15] Margulis, Lynn and Dorion Sagan, _Microcosmos, Four Billion Years of Evolution from Our Microbial Ancestors_, Summit Books, 1986.[16] Minsky, Marvin, _Society of Mind_, Simon and Schuster, 1985.[17] Moravec, Hans, _Mind Children_, Harvard University Press, 1988.[18] Niven, Larry, "The Ethics of Madness", _If_, April 1967, pp82-108. Reprinted in _Neutron Star_, Larry Niven, Ballantine Books, 1968.[19] Penrose, Roger, _The Emperor's New Mind_, Oxford University Press, 1989.[20] Platt, Charles, Private Communication.[21] Rasmussen, S. _et al._, "Computational Connectionism within Neurons: a Model of Cytoskeletal Automata Subserving Neural Networks", in _Emergent Computation_, Stephanie Forrest, ed., pp428-449, MIT Press, 1991.[22] Searle, John R., "Minds, Brains, and Programs", in _The Behavioral and Brain Sciences_, vol 3, Cambridge University Press, 1980. The essay is reprinted in _The Mind's I_, edited by Douglas R. Hofstadter and Daniel C. Dennett, Basic Books, 1981 (my source for this reference). This reprinting contains an excellent critique of the Searle essay.[23] Sims, Karl, "Interactive Evolution of Dynamical Systems", Thinking Machines Corporation, Technical Report Series (published in _Toward a Practice of Autonomous Systems: Proceedings of the First European Conference on Artificial Life_, Paris, MIT Press, December 1991.[24] Stapledon, Olaf, _The Starmaker_, Berkley Books, 1961 (but from the date on forward, probably written before 1937).[25] Stent, Gunther S., _The Coming of the Golden Age: A View of the End of Progress_, The Natural History Press, 1969.[26] Swanwick Michael, _Vacuum Flowers_, serialized in _Isaac Asimov's Science Fiction Magazine_, December(?) 1986 - February 1987. Republished by Ace Books, 1988.[27] Thearling, Kurt, "How We Will Build a Machine that Thinks", a workshop at Thinking Machines Corporation, August 24-26, 1992. Personal Communication.[28] Ulam, S., Tribute to John von Neumann, _Bulletin of the American Mathematical Society_, vol 64, nr 3, part 2, May 1958, pp1-49.[29] Vinge, Vernor, "Bookworm, Run!", _Analog_, March 1966, pp8-40. Reprinted in _True Names and Other Dangers_, Vernor Vinge, Baen Books, 1987.[30] Vinge, Vernor, "True Names", _Binary Star Number 5_, Dell, 1981. Reprinted in _True Names and Other Dangers_, Vernor Vinge, Baen Books, 1987.[31] Vinge, Vernor, First Word, _Omni_, January 1983, p10.[32] Vinge, Vernor, To Appear [ :-) ].


Andres Agostini (Ich Bin Singularitarian!).Executive Associate for Global Markets, OMEGA SYSTEMS GROUP INC.,Arlington, Virginia, USA.

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