Known and Unknown Possibilities

 

A brief summary on why intelligent women should reproduce:
http://infoproc.blogspot.com/2010/07/assortative-mating-regression-and-all.html
Note that the .5-.7 estimate is based on how much assortative mating has occurred among each parent's ancestors (more past assortative reproduction raises the estimate).

In the distance, thunderings and flashings of the overman:
http://infoproc.blogspot.com/2012/06/plenty-of-room-at-top.html

Average person=1000 deleterious mutations affecting IQ. Top hundredth of a percent IQ=900 such deleterious mutations.

And if we did a few dozen rounds of in vitro eugenic breeding (iterated embryo selection, IES), how much might this number be reduced? Of course, other genetic goals would receive some priority as well (eg, girls should be blessed with Marilyn Monroe's physical attributes). The principle limit on this technology may well be lack of knowledge of the phenotypic effects of various genes and gene-gene interactions. Some mathematical problems cannot be solved--experiments become necessary. Extrapolating the recent rate of progress, I suspect IES will be feasible within 10 years, though it will be suboptimal at least with respect to the gaps in our knowledge of which genes do what. And on the non-linearity problem, Hsu said, "Most of the genetic variation in intelligence is additive...fortunately for us linear effects still dominate the population variation* of quantitative traits. As any engineer or physicist can attest, linearity is our best friend :-)" Inescapable non-linearity, tragically, renders climate predictions invalid.

One problem with Hsu's analogy of this process with plant breeding: the ethical environment is completely different. Blind alleys in plant breeding are merely a waste of resources; in humans, they may entail great suffering.
But, the potential effects, as derived from such analogies, are spectacular: 32 SD increase in corn oil production per plant (an effort still making progress), an increase in flying speed of certain flies from 2.2 to 170 cm/sec in 100 generations of directed breeding without significant downsides on other characteristics.

There is a prevalent sense among neurologists that human intelligence has already undergone intense evolutionary selection and that it is subject to certain physical limits. These points are relevant to neuro-eugenic prospects. Hsu in the comments responds to this: "the results imply lots of extant variation to work with. Just imagine flipping all the (-)'s to (+) in a particular person. You get a lot more than +5 SDs." Hsu in the comments: "One important aspect of the toy model I discuss in the talk is that if it is correct, then any couple has the potential of producing a nearly max IQ child, because there will be little overlap between the locations of their (-) alleles." Aha! The path around reproductively negligent female geniuses.


A finely compacted interview of Hsu on his genetics work:
http://intelligence.org/2013/08/31/stephen-hsu-on-cognitive-genomics/
Note that China is financing a major attempt to take the lead in practical human eugenics.

His recent intelligence and heritability presentation (less compacted):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FgCSkGeBUNg&t=5m2s

In sum, this strikes me most forcefully--I had been unaware of the nearness of eugenic capacities--also unaware of their probable potential in the neurological realm. To paraphrase Boswell, my thoughts upon this awful change are in general full of wild apprehensions. This presages a Turn in human affairs, like to surpass all that came before. The implications are all-encompassing.

Biomedical Innovation

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vb15kf7W1wk

 

If they can make this happen, a technological pursuit I've been tracking for 15 years, it would shift the paradigm for valve repairs. The younger the patient, the more important and advantageous this would be. Lacking this innovation, as is currently the case, patients who are not full-grown face multiple surgeries to ensure that the size of the valve keeps pace with the growth of their hearts. The benefits even for adults are considerable: the 2% yearly mortality/morbidity resultant from the artificial valve is eliminated--repeat surgery is unnecessary--and the need to take harmful medications ad infinitum is avoided. In theory, this would place the patient, post-surgery, in the position of a person with a healthy, natural heart. Researchers in this field, therefore, deem tissue engineered valves the holy grail. Given that this remains at least a year out, even in Europe, and that younger patients would presumably (and justly) receive priority over adults. The relatively high frequency of valve issues in the population means this would impact hundreds of thousands a year just in Europe and America--it would constitute the most important triumph for tissue engineering so far.

A Decentralization Mechanism

http://www.thatsmags.com/shanghai/article/752/radical-manufacturing

They can already print guns with these tools--the Syrian insurgents could use a few. The legal obstacles are significant, though probably hard to enforce, as with other forms of digital piracy. Also, the right materials to produce goods remain necessary and can be a major part of the cost. Environmentally, over-enthusiastic home manufacturers could be a problem.

The last bit about the "replicating rapid prototyper" has particular potential.

The nanotech promoters have been speculating for decades (starting with Feynman back in 59') about nanomachines that can create new molecules and chemicals and replicate themselves as well. This concept is much further off from realization, however, and progress has been extremely slow except for systems using biological molecules like DNA.

100% Hybrid by 2020

This is a study by IBM in consultation with all the major car makers that concluded all new cars sold in 2020 will be, at least to some degree, hybridized. Also, they predict that 88% of the average vehicle will by then be recycled because automakers are taking the recycling priority into account when designing new vehicles so that they are cheaper to recycle. http://www.greencarcongress.com/2008/08/study-all-new-v.html