Projects

This list of current projects will be updated on an ongoing basis, to reflect the status of the projects, and to act as a focal point for the people involved in them.

If you see anything here which interests you, and think you can contribute, please contact the project leader and offer to help. See the links on the left for more details of the projects summarised on this page.

Extrobritannia

ExtroBritannia is a group formed in 2002, to enable like-minded people to meet and talk about various transhumanist topics, and attend more organised presentations, with invited guest speakers.

The meetings occur monthly, and are usually, but not always, held in London.

Visit the mailing list , or the Extrobritannia Blog , or use the link on the left to see more details, and information on how to get involved.

Media Campaigns

If we want our message to reach the mainstream of public consciousness, we need to develop a relationship with the mass- media. We are in the process of setting up a structure that will allow us to place our own sound-bite in the right media, at the right time, i.e. when and where news on subjects such as nanotechnology, stem-cell research, etc, are reported.

Arts and Culture

The arts have an important part to play in the spread of ideas. The rise in popularity of Japanese Manga comics and Anime films is one example of this. As a new generation grows up, they absorb the concepts presented in such entertainments, and when new possibilities are opened up by technology, they are more prepared to make sense of them. The Ironman 'Hypervelocity' story is an excellent example of this. Concepts such as mind uploading, accelerated cognition and intelligences roaming free on the global network are seeping into the cultural zeitgeist as a result of such entertainments, and inevitably colour the ambitions of the next generation of researchers, and help to shape the expectations of the public for what the future may hold.

The UKTA does not currently have a formal project in this area, but we would like to encourage you to think about how you might be able to contribute to spreading transhumanist memes by means of popular arts and culture.

Proactionary Principle

The Precautionary Principle is holding us back!

New developments carry an element of risk, nobody can deny this. Over-reacting to such risks, however, carries another risk: the risk of stagnation. The precautionary principle is leading us down a path that gets narrower and narrower, restricting research and denying many of the benefits of technological advances to those most in need of them. We are letting people die because of our approach to assessing risk.

The alternative is not a reckless abandon, as some seem to think, but a more considered and even-handed approach to assessing the risks of new technologies, which includes a consideration of the risks of not pursuing them.

Max More, of the Extropy Institute, has proposed and formulated an alternative guiding principle, that avoids the serious shortcomings of the precautionary principle while preserving the concept that we should assess the risks of new and developing technologies. This is the Proactionary Principle.

This project aims to promote the proactionary principle as a viable and sensible alternative to the precautionary principle, and educate people about the serious shortcomings of our current way of assessing risks.