] Some Traditional Mechanisms of Governance Are Becoming
] Problematic
]
] New Governmental Mechanisms Are Being Enabled
]
] New Political Actors Are Being Empowered
]
] The Information Revolution Could Over Time Change the
] Role of the Nation-State:

Downstream impact could be vast.

The Global Course of the Information Revolution | RAND

] Eric Bonabeau, Ph.D, a keynote speaker at the upcoming
] Emerging Technology conference, is a leader in the field
] of swarm intelligence and has focused on applying these
] concepts to real world problems such as factory
] scheduling and telecommunications routing.

Perhaps there is a potential convergence between swarm intelligence and genetic programming. What if one could evolve the components of the swarm to improve the overall capabilities of the whole?

OpenP2P.com: Swarm Intelligence: An Interview with Eric Bonabeau [Feb. 21, 2003]

] "Computer sentience is possible," said John Holland,
] professor of electrical engineering and computer science
] and professor of psychology at the University of
] Michigan. "But for a number of reasons, I don't believe
] that we are anywhere near that stage right now."
] ...
] According to Holland, the problem with developing
] artificial intelligence through things like genetic
] algorithms is that researchers don't yet understand how
] to define what computer programs should be evolving
] toward. Human beings did not evolve to be
] intelligent--they evolved to survive. Intelligence was
] just one of many traits that human beings exploited to
] increase their odds of survival, and the test for
] survival was absolute. Defining an equivalent test of
] fitness for targeting intelligence as an evolutionary
] goal for machines, however, has been elusive. Thus, it is
] difficult to draw comparisons between how human
] intelligence developed and how artificial intelligence
] could evolve.

Newswise

] Science fiction often depicts robots of the future as
] machines that look like people and feel, or at least
] hanker after the ability to feel, human emotions.
]
]
] A team at Vanderbilt University is turning this notion on
] its head by developing a robotic assistant whose goal is
] not to develop emotions, but rather respond to the moods
] of its human master.
]
] By processing information sent from physiological sensors
] the human counterpart wears, the Vanderbilt robot can
] detect when its master is having a bad day and approach
] with the query: "I sense that you are anxious. Is there
] anything I can do to help?"

Wired News: Feeling Blue? This Robot Knows It

] R. Michael Young, an assistant professor of computer
] science at N.C. State University, is working on research
] that might one day make video games more enjoyable.
] Young, 41, is studying ways to build artificial
] intelligence -- the ability of computers to act like
] humans -- into games so that users get movielike stories.
] With such technology, for example, a game could adjust to
] a player's actions and provide a different experience
] every time it is played.

newsobserver.com - Games of infinite possibilities

] "They made the machines. That's what I'm trying to tell
] you. Meat made the machines."
]
] "That's ridiculous. How can meat make a machine? You're
] asking me to believe in sentient meat."
]
] "I'm not asking you, I'm telling you. These creatures are
] the only sentient race in that sector and they're made
] out of meat."
]
] "Maybe they're like the orfolei. You know, a carbon-based
] intelligence that goes through a meat stage."
]
] "Nope. They're born meat and they die meat. We studied
] them for several of their life spans, which didn't take
] long. Do you have any idea what's the life span of meat?"

Before The Matrix, There was Only Meat

Rumor has it that that this site was down for a while due to intellectual property issues. Good to see it back.

MathWorld

Wrong.

This article appears in the March 2003 issue of MIT Technology Review. A subscription is required for access to the full text. It's also available in print on newsstands everywhere.

Do you have a good idea that In-Q-Tel should know about?

Can Sensemaking Keep Us Safe?

] But the real success story is the Contras, or rather
] their modern successor: al Qaeda. Osama bin Laden's crew
] is a band of government-funded anticommunist
] counterrevolutionaries who grew up and cut the apron
] strings. These new-model Contras don't need state support
] from Washington, Moscow, or any Accessory of Evil. Like
] Project Democracy, they've got independent financing: oil
] money, charity money, arms money, and a collection plate
] wherever a junkie shoots up in an alley. Instead of
] merely ignoring and subverting governments for a higher
] cause, as Poindexter did, al Qaeda tries to destroy them
] outright. Suicide bombers blew the Chechnyan provisional
] puppet government sky high. Cars packed with explosives
] nearly leveled the Indian Parliament. We all know what
] happened to the Pentagon.
]
] The next Iran-Contra is waiting, because the
] contradictions that created the first have never been
] resolved. Iran-Contra wasn't about eager American
] intelligence networks spreading dirty money in distant
] lands; it was about the gap between old, legitimate,
] land-based governments ruled by voters and the new,
] stateless, globalized predation. The next scandal will
] erupt when someone as molten, self-righteous, and
] frustrated as John Poindexter uses stateless power for
] domestic advantage. That's the breaking point in American
] politics: not when you call in the plumbers, but when you
] turn them loose on the opposition party. Then the Empire
] roils in a lather of sudden, indignant fury and strikes
] back against its own.

Wired 11.04: The Secret War Machine (Bruce Sterling)

] Since the end of the cold war, the United States has been
] trying to come up with an operating theory of the
] world—and a military strategy to accompany it. Now
] there’s a leading contender. It involves identifying the
] problem parts of the world and aggressively shrinking
] them. Since September 11, 2001, the author, a professor
] of warfare analysis, has been advising the Office of the
] Secretary of Defense and giving this briefing continually
] at the Pentagon and in the intelligence community. Now
] he gives it to you.

The Pentagon's New Map