“The Link Age” (Keynote by Tør Nørretranders)

Do we know what it means to be human?

Can human beings simulate human beings?

Emotions are more at the core of what it means to be human – artificial emotions vs artificial intelligence

“laptop” vs. “headtop”

laptops get hot because they’re burning power
your head is governed by meaning and value – this is why your head is cool: it’s very efficient.

emotions are more efficient than intelligence.

Contrary to economic theory, people are OK at losing money to ensure other people behave in a fair way.

Markets are anonymous. Gifts are personal

Gifting is important in private life and in the scientific community. (and, of course, open source).

The gift economy is about to dominate the market economy

But, of course, the gift economy is based on human relationships – it’s controlled by emotions.

Theodore Roszak: Person/Planet (1979):

The needs of a person are the same as the needs of a planet. If the planet is in crisis, the human will experience that as a personal crisis.

...and we should compare ourselves to the things we build. We are like flows of water and fire
1.5 tons of matter goes through each of us every year – there is flow through us. (98% of the atoms in us are replaced in a year – so does that make me “me”? In a sense, we’re teleporting all the time).
Permanent reincarnation, then, but we never lose our information.
We are like digital media – we continue to exist no matter which atoms we’re made of (wheras things stop existing as themselves when their atoms change)

Stone Agers in the Fast Lane

[cf the whole “since the eighties, technology just sped up rather than innovating.”]

Dare, care and share.

We do this to gain attention and thus rise in the attention economy.

Sex is the origin of all that is noble.

The killer app of the 2.0 age is the link

1964 – Paul Baran at RAND Corp – Distributed network diagram (as opposed to centralized and decentralized)