Memia 2022.36: Beginning of the end?🇺🇦// merging⛙// future’s so bright…😎// getting serious about climate tech🔋// RunwayML🤯// big purple tomato🟣🍅// reprogramming the genome🧬// a quiet week🤫
Probey McProbeface
Kia ora,
Welcome to this week’s Memia newsletter, your regular scan across emerging tech and the future as it’s unfolding, viewed from Aotearoa New Zealand.
1 day late this week - thanks for bearing with me as I made my way back to the whenua from the UK. Mood right now:
“She knows, now, absolutely …that Damien’s theory of jet lag is correct: that her mortal soul is leagues behind her, being reeled in on some ghostly umbilical down the vanished wake of the plane that brought her here, hundreds of thousands of feet above the [ocean]. Souls can't move that quickly, and are left behind, and must be awaited, upon arrival, like lost luggage.”
(PSA: these weekly emails are *way* too long for most email clients…click on the link above to read online or view in the Substack app on iOS.)
Weekly roundup
The most clicked link in last week’s newsletter (3% of openers) was the Curt Skelton DIY deepfake (again).
Aotearoa digital strategy and action plan
The government finally released its Digital Strategy for Aotearoa and Action Plan yesterday (Only just skimmed it, will cover in more detail next week. Here’s an overview — they really need to work on presentation, eh…)
Forthcoming events
A few dates for your diary that you may be interested in (all in my Ōtautahi ‘hood — let me know if you’ve got an event happening around the motu to share with Memia readers):
It Starts Here and Now – Because we are smarter than bacteria - speaker Susan Krumdieck (MNZM), one of the co-founders of the Global Association for Transition Engineering and Professor of Energy Transition Engineering at Heriot-Watt University, Edinburgh. (EPECentre Christchurch, Wed 28th Sep 2022, 6:00 pm - 7:00pm)
TUANZ Smart Christchurch discussing the new Aotearoa Digital Strategy above (Thu 22 September 2022 5:00 pm – 7:00 pm)
Also reminder I’m speaking at next Wednesday’s Te Ao Earth week event on Digital Earth (Wed 21st Sep 2022, 4:00 pm - 6:00 pm)
Also in the last week…
🇺🇦Beginning of the end?
The 200-day Russia-Ukraine war took a sudden turn as Ukraine recaptured up to 6,000 sq. km in and around the North-Eastern city of Kharkhiv in less than a week:
(For more detailed play-by-play maps, @JominiW produces the goods as usual). Russia retaliated with more indiscriminate shelling of Kharkiv city from behind the border.
The pace of the counteroffensive seemed to surprise commentators on all sides after weeks of focus on Kherson in the South: this video mashup captures the mood perfectly:
At the time of writing, some Western media reports indicate that Russian military commanders have ordered an evacuation from Crimea as Ukraine seeks to extend even further the territorial gains it has made in recent days.
Whether or not this week’s events signal a turning point in Putin’s formidable grip on power, Ukraine’s defence minister this week made it clear what would (pyrrhically, at least) constitute “victory” for Ukraine (and by extension its Western allies):
Russia departs all of Ukraine permanently
Russia pays reparations (can you imagine the bill after the total destruction of so many cities?)
International trials for war crimes
🔌Energy and climate change
Tracking 2nd-order effects of climate change on energy supply:
California’s electricity grid made it through last week’s record breaking heatwave with fewer blackouts than had been predicted, again helped by new on-grid battery storage which smoothed out daily peaks in air conditioning demand.
However, in last month’s European heatwave French nuclear power stations had to cut production since rivers were drying up and what water was left was “too warm”. (This at a time when half of EDF’s 56 nuclear reactors are offline due to planned maintenance and repair work). Electricity futures surged to 900 euros per megawatt-hour -- over 10 times the price at this time last year.
🌳Slowing deforestation
Indonesia, home to a third of the world's rainforests and Norway, one of the world’s most wealthy countries as a result of its oil reserves, are reviving a stalled bilateral agreement to curb deforestation: the updated forest and climate partnership involves Norway providing financial contributions towards stopping deforestation while Indonesia sets the strategy and manages the funds, slowing (if not stopping) conversion to palm oil plantations.
(Last year Indonesia severed the previous agreement with Norway citing non-payment: however, now the first payment amounting to US$56 million for emission reductions in the August 2016 to July 2017 period is still back on the table, with more detailed measurement and verification framework to be put in place going forward.
(At last year’s COP26 Climate Summit, world leaders pledged to end deforestation by 2030 at the latest).
🤫A quiet week
Otherwise, it’s been a strangely quiet week in my feed…
Reminder: Aotearoa, together with Australia, Canada and 12 other “Commonwealth Realms”, still endure constitutional monarchy from the other side of the world. Now feels like as good a time as ever to start collectively actioning constitutional reform — perhaps with the goal of a single shared “Commonwealth Independence Day” in a few years…
I previously wrote about Aotearoa constititional reform in Memia 2021.10 Constitution-as-code:
“There are a few places to look for resources on alternative constitutional arrangements after - or perhaps before - Ma’am departs, including:
The Constitute Project is an international website which compiles the world’s constitutions to search and compare. They have compiled a complete single version of New Zealand’s current (otherwise scattered) constitution here.
Geoffrey Palmer and Andrew Butler’s 2016 book A Constitution for New Zealand never really got traction (and disappointingly the website has been 404ing for while now) - but their proposed constitution is available in the Wayback Machine web archive.
New Zealand Republic is a campaign group for an independent, citizen of Aotearoa, head of state.”
(For reference, the Australian Republic Group published its model for an Australian republic in January this year).
My 2c: Time to get on with it.
…And, while this is certainly a process for Mana Whenua to decide when and how to initiate, my hope is that the eventual constitutional outcome delivers an equitable voice to all future Aotearoans, of all genetic inheritances/modifications, as much as those living today or in the past. (Indeed, one of the core arguments in my current book ⏩Fast Forward Aotearoa is exactly that: weight the future as much as we do the past).
(Incidentally I’ve been revisiting Kim Stanley Robinson’s epic Mars Trilogy on my travels… the chapter in Green Mars on the Dorsa Brevia conference for developing a new constitution for an independent Mars is an excellent translation of the considerations and processes involved to a future context.)
[Weak] signals
Another blast through technological developments this week which signal change in near and far futures…
⛙ Merging
The Ethereum Proof-of-stake Merge, is due *TODAY*. Huge congratulations to Vitalik and the team.
The Economist reports that The future of crypto is at stake in Ethereum’s switch
😎Future’s so bright…
Mark Zuckerberg teased the launch of Meta’s new Quest Pro headset on October 11th. Interestingly this photo shows that it’s effectively just a big set of glasses… no light-blocking “gasket” around the side. Less than 5 years and these devices will look and feel like a pair of Raybans.
(Along with the rest of the NASDAQ — except Twitter, LOL — Meta’s share price slumped even further in the last 2 days…)
Meanwhile, in other Metaverse news, introducing the Mutalk (not a joke, apparently…):
🔋Getting serious about climate tech
Five reads I came across this week which show how technology makes climate goals more achievable:
A breakthrough discovery in carbon capture conversion for ethylene (a key building block for plastic products) promises carbon-negative sequestration: the process which can run on renewable electricity can convert up to 6 metric tons of carbon dioxide into 1 metric ton of ethylene, recycling almost all carbon dioxide captured.
Researchers from 15 leading international universities published a topical review of 100% renewable energy systems research, concluding that 100% renewable energy can be achieved on global, regional, and national levels by or before 2050.
“The new system would be based largely on solar and wind energy, energy storage, sector coupling, and direct and indirect electrification of almost all energy demand.”
Bloomberg reports on how the huge increases in fossil fuel prices this year are hiding the fact that solar is winning the energy transition: The Supply Chain to Beat Climate Change Is Already Being Built:
🛫University of Bristol researchers published a paper outlining how the aviation industry could cut climate impact by 20% in only five years by modifying air traffic control procedures and aircraft operations:
“Flight route modifications in the form of climate optimal routing, to avoid climate-sensitive regions, and formation flight, in which two aircrafts fly one behind the other (separated by ~2km) could hold the key to drastically reducing aviation’s climate impact,”
Most radically, University of Oxford researchers published research demonstrating that a “fast” energy transition would save US$5-$15 Trillion in costs for the global economy:
“Compared to continuing with a fossil fuel-based system, a rapid green energy transition will likely result in overall net savings of many trillions of dollars—even without accounting for climate damages or co-benefits of climate policy.“
Get IN.
🤯RunwayML
Check out this demo from RunwayML and have your mind blown.
🟣🍅Big purple tomato
🧬Reprogramming the genome
Also, a significant development in synthetic biology: Chinese researchers claim to have successfully reprogrammed the genome of the common lab mouse — rearranging its genes and reducing its number of chromosomes from 20 to 19:
“For the first time in the world, we have achieved complete chromosomal rearrangement in mammals.”
💿Global music Vault
Microsoft announced it was partnering with Elire Group on a long-term data storage solution which uses laser pulses to etch 3D nanoscale patterns into thin 7.5cm quartz glass wafers. Each wafer currently holds ~100 gigabytes of music (~2,000 songs), but the aim is to hold terabytes soon. The media is expected to survive 10,000 years.
As a demo, Microsoft will backup a library of songs and bury them alongside the Global Seed Vault (better known as the Doomsday Vault) in the Arctic, Svalbard, Norway, which houses the largest collection of agricultural seeds on the planet.
👃Mapping the world’s smells
Google researchers introduced the “Principal Odor Map” (POM), which “identifies the vector representation of each odorous molecule in the model’s embedding space as a single point in a high-dimensional space”: a map of smells.
Mind expanding
I’ve been dipping into some longer reads and bigger thinks while I’ve been away. A few links to share:
Something from nothing
As usual, I’m trying and failing to get my head around the truly mindbending implications of quantum physics. The latest: 70-year-old quantum prediction comes true, as something is created from nothing — for the first time, scientists managed to create particles without any collisions or precursor particles at all: through strong electromagnetic fields and something called the “Schwinger effect”.
🔲Quadriform Society
Harold Jarche: There is no public in the global market conceives of a “Quadriform Society”:
The three organizing forms for society, chronologically — Tribes, Institutions (Governments), Markets — are widely applicable across history.
Each form builds on the other and changes it.
The last form is the dominant form — today that would be the Market form (market volatility today is increasing inequality and turmoil)
A new form is emerging — Networks (Commons)‚ and hence the T+I+M+N model.
This form has also been called the noosphere.
I have found evidence that what initiated each new form was a change in human communication media — T+I (written word), T+I+M (print), T+I+M+N (electric/digital).
I believe we are currently in between a triform (T+I+M) and a quadriform (T+I+M+N) society, which accounts for much of the current political turmoil in our post-modern world.
This model can help inform us how to build better organizational forms for a coming age of entanglement.
He proposes a “networked commons” as the potential solution for future societal organisation:
Automating invention
What if “we” could?
Fast.ai
Finally, this site comes highly recommended for (free) self-directed online courses on Machine Learning and AI:
Rollcall
Some exciting transport and aerospace developments happening around the motu in the last week:
🚆Miro Rail
Returned Kiwi entrepreneur Rollo Wenlock’s new startup Miro Rail is raising capital to develop high-speed battery-electric railcars, potentially able to travel up to 300kmh and run on Aotearoa’s existing rail network.
Check out the story and concept drawings in Stuff: High-speed battery railcar could get you from Christchurch to Auckland in seven hours
First impressions, this feels like it could be an optimum cost-benefit solution for cities like Ōtautahi and Ōtepoti without viable commuter rail networks right now.
📦🚀Cargo by rocket
Don’t even *think* about the CO2 emissions…
🆙Stratospheric
Kea Aerospace unveiled the design of their new stratospheric aircraft:
0️⃣1️⃣More Zeroes and Ones
Also, previously covered, now out in print as well as digital:
Nuggets and gems
Finally four varied memes which caught in my net this week:
After Crungus, Loab
“Loab” is a ghoulish discovery inside several text-to-image generative AI models which is the result of experimenting with “negative prompt weights”: instead of creating an image of the text prompt, the AI is prompted to try to make the image look as different from the prompt as possible. (Click for a long and slightly nightmarish thread…)
(Crungus, covered in Memia 2022.25, is another seemingly unexplained phantom being hidden inside generative AI text-to-image models).
Probey McProbeface
Genius (unintended?) PR for NASA as the tweet below blew up this week - a competition to name the next Uranus Orbiter and Probe mission! Laughing out loud at the thousands of suggestions in the thread…
Hey Microsoft Teams user
I don’t know who in Microsoft(?!) came up with this video but it had me in stitches.
“I want to send you a meme or a gif in a message, all from one convenient location”
(The most apt description of Teams I’ve ever heard is having “a UX designed by someone wearing a welding mask. In the dark.”)
🤖Prepare for the robot uprising
Finally, speaking of *dark*, this XKCD. On so many levels. (🎩@sarahbickerton for sharing)
Thanks as always to everyone who gets in touch each week with ideas, thoughts, feedback, links - always appreciated!
See you again next week.
Ngā mihi
Ben
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