You are invited to attend two unusual conferences where I’ll speak in May:

1. INSTED: Agitate! Los Angeles, May 2, 10am-10pm. $25 if you act fast. I talk at time TBD:

The Age Of Em: Envisioning Brain Emulation Societies

Tired of all the wining and boasting on the latest tech & politics trends? See it all shrink to insignificance as we contemplate the next revolution on the scale of the farming and industrial revolutions. The Age of Em will start sometime in the next century; in it, brain emulations could change almost everything. (video)

2. Building The New World Conference, May 28-31, Radford University in Virginia,  $375 for 4 days includes food & room. I talk at 3:30pm May 30 on:

When Men Become Machines: Meaning, Identity, and Ethics at the Advent of a Trans-Human Era and Emulation-Based Singularity.

The three most disruptive transitions in history were the introduction of humans, farming, and industry. Another transition lies ahead: Artificial Intelligence in the form of whole brain emulations – “ems” – sometime in the next century. We will explore the upcoming Trans-Human Era, which will include ems, using a broad synthesis of standard academic consensus, and we will outline a baseline scenario for this “Singularity.” Lastly, we will consider not only the economics of this new world, but also the meaning and identity that human residents will experience during this unprecedented shift. (video)