intelligence enhancement /Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation (TMS)

I'll be concise: until all your posts sound like they could come from http://skeptic.com/ I'll refrain from arguing with you because to me detecting the signal in all your noise is a bit of a waste of time.(insert uneasy-smile emoticon)

Anyhoo.. if anyone is interested, a nice (short) discussion was held on the extropian board on the subject of this thread
http://www.extropy.org/bbs/index.php?board=67;action=display;threadid=56325

I skim read it + the original article again to get back in my creative mood but it worked so-so, for now I'll just post the highlight that I found the most inspirational:
"Bruce L. Miller, the A.W. and Mary Margaret Claussen distinguished professor in neurology at the University of California at San Francisco, is intrigued by Snyder's experiments and his attempts to understand the physiological basis of cognition. But he points out that certain profound questions about artificially altered intelligence have not yet been answered. ''Do we really want these abilities?'' he asks. ''Wouldn't it change my idea of myself if I could suddenly paint amazing pictures?''

It probably would change people's ideas of themselves, to say nothing of their ideas of artistic talent. And though that prospect might discomfort Miller, there are no doubt others whom it would thrill. But could anyone really guess, in advance, how their lives might be affected by instant creativity, instant intelligence, instant happiness? Or by their disappearance, just as instantly, once the TMS is switched off? ".

You know, as grounded as I'd like people's ideas of what TMS can do to remain, I don't see any reason why it couldn't be capable of the more out-there stuff that Snyder's trying to demonstrate.

Could you tell me why you think that? Is it somehting you heard or it's something you found by yourself?

I reckon the word "extropian" sound cultish but that said even if a lot of them are sci-fi fanboys, true blue extropians are capable of discernment and if you don't know them, then it's disingenious to pretend the contrary. (lot of them hold jobs in neuroscience, have phd in computer science or philo etc. The most impressive frequent posters are real intellectual big shots :-)

A constructive comment on the said thread:
"(...) the article seemed to suggest that the putative
effect comes from affecting specific regions of the
brain. A more detailed description of how the device
functions should show a correlation (well duh!)
between the known areas of brain activity during
certain tasks (as predetermined by MRI, PET or some
such brain activity scanning/mapping technique) and
the brain areas "focused on"/affected by the device."

doesn't sounds like a pro-pseudoscience comment to me :-)
..but yeah, in a way their ghettoization is somehting I don't want to associate myself with too much...

The whole lot of transhumanism/extropian values can be covered by hedonism and materialism, why deliberately go so much out of the way from their "Father" "da Law"? Was it genuine ignorance or vanity?
I think could make a case of it one way or the other but I deleted it for now: It's been a while since I want to address this issue with them as a group but my thoughts on the subject are not solid enough to "throw this whole enterprise down to the ground" and redirect their energy into actions that would have more "real wrold" traction.
Do you have some thoughts on this that might help me out?

No, I wasn't trying to make anything "look good". I was just stating the obvious.

There was a double-blind study done recently, which I saw on the evening news about two months ago, with specially-made magnetic foot pads which were found to help some of the many kinds of foot pain associated with diabetes. It worked. Not completely, but it got rid of the most excruciating sort of pain and all the test subjects were thrilled. Right after that, I started placing those dumb Alex Chiu banners to test Mr. Chiu's honesty (remember that?) Incidentally, I got enough clicks for 2 sets of his most powerful rings and he, of course, never sent me anything (big surprise).

I just find it ver funny since the AMA said magnetic therapy was totally useless and dangerous, when it first made its appearance in the US.

Maybe buy a good book on it (it's not just about sticking a magnet on your ass), order some super-magnets online and do a few experiments before you condemn it.

I posted to the extropian:
"I used the word "extropians" in a serious discussion recently and once again was reminded that extropians sound like goofy cultists.
Not being able to find out why they were thinking that, or have them forward me a link where one serious extropian sound like they say, I had to imagine the problem they might have that makes their opinion. So here it is, formulated as a question accordingly to the 7th extropian principle wich invites constructive criticism :

What would be the best answer to someone who would say that the primo body and mind uploading are allegoric figures that transhumanists and extropians are offering that permits to fantasm a body removed from it's attaches with the present, the here and now, impossible bodies, wich makes them promoter of an ascetic ideal, who hates the body and the flesh (and are possibly even worse than christians at it, with their angels without nose or phallus) and consequently alienation (alienation is to be understood here as "being estranged to oneself")."

I had 3 answers.

Damien Broderick :
"This is a good question and one often raised by intelligent opponents of the transhumanist project. Good responses are required.

A glib answer might be to ask why it does not apply with equal force to anyone who has work done on their decayed teeth, takes vitamin and other nutritional supplements, antibiotics and perhaps mood-altering prescription pharmaceutics, or (if old and ill) is fitted with an artificial hip or heart pace maker?

All these modifications of the natural body are endured or embraced for the *life-enhancing benefits* they provide us as human beings (evolved conscious animals) in a world where the ordinary experiences of life tend over time to wear down and diminish our physical and mental health.

It is especially ironic that transhumanists are often accused of being
`flesh-hating' body deniers on the one hand, and attacked as narcissistic and self-obsessed with fitness and healthy longevity on the other. (True, some extropians fit more readily into one category or the other.) "

Anders Sandberg:
"There are certainly transhumanists who partially share these beliefs (I would call them cybergnostics); like any good criticism it has some truth.

But I think the key mistake made in the criticism is that it cannot
imagine the other side: that we want better bodies to more fully enjoy
life. The ascetic ideal is well represented in our culture, but the idea of hedonic engineering or sensual technology is not. With T1000-style liquid bodies we could make Freud blush about "polymorphous perversity", and the descriptions of limited omniscience from a few threads back really have a deep sensual in-the-world quality. But relatively few authors describe this, and of course most of us transhumanists do not really start out our spiels by pointing it out (we usually start by complaining about death and taxes, and showing how they will be swept away). Maybe the best start of any transhumanist presentation is "Life is wonderful! I want more of it for everyone!"
(Mark Walker preciced "I would rather give strong prima facie consideration to the autonomy of individuals; thus the best start of any transhumanist presentation might be, "Life is wonderful! I want more of it for everyone who wants more!"")
(ps Anders is aware of my interest in a hedonist materialism, his answer hints to that)

James:
"> I used the word "extropians" in a serious discussion recently and once again > was reminded that extropians sound like goofy cultists.
> Not being able to find out why they were thinking that...

That's because extropians do sound like goofy cultists. That doesn't
mean extropians *are* goofy cultists. Most vaguely extropian discussion will operate several future shock levels above what 'normal' 'outsiders' are used to.

Every human pursuit has a scale of shock levels, jargon from some level of which will invoke responses from the general public such as "Yeah, whatever...", "Uh, right... ", "You're crazy", "What the hell are you talking about?", and so on. A discussion between experts in any field has the potential to look like ridiculous word soup to laymen, but unfortunately it's hard to tell the difference between complex discourse and genuine cultist insanity."

So far so good.
Next, I'll critique their use of an "institute"/"school of philosophy", their pretention to newness vs their lack of historical culture and their use of dialectic. All of this because I think they have great dreams but they don't go at it the right way.

4. This is simply amazing!

This may not be quite the right thread for this, but TMS has become pretty mainstream as a treatment for depression. Has anyone here tried it? It has been recommended to me by several mental health professionals and if it weren't for the time commitment (daily sessions for like 6 weeks) I'd try it without hesitation.