I need cyberware

This is a request to the researchers and engineers who are working in the fields of prosthetics and cybernetics, and to those who provide funding for such work.  Get on with it!  I'm aging here.  I'm not as old as the Boomers, but I'm a Gen-Xer who can only accurately say that I am 30-something for 3 1/2 more weeks.  I want cyberware options!  I'm going to need some wetware soon.  The vision is there, crack open some William Gibson or Bruce Sterling, dammit!  I'm not sure if I want to go full Lobster or not, but I certainly have Mechanist leanings.  Too, where are my Zeiss cyber eyes with full micro to macro capabilities, infrared, and a HUD?  I definitely need a HUD. Augmented reality is in its infancy.  We need to prod it along.  I don't want it to seem as if I don't think that there has been any progress.  There has been.  Reality is in some cases outpacing the fiction.  Remember, Johnny could only carry a few hundred MB in his head in Gibson's original story, updated to 80 GB in the film.  The Micro-SD XC specification calls for a capacity of 2 TB.  I wouldn't even have to dump my memories to get that stuffed into my head.

Daft Punk on image

If we have to create an image, it must be an artificial image. That combination hides our physicality and also shows our view of the star system. It is not a compromise. - Thomas Bangalter.

I just discovered this quote, and it very much appeals to me.  It strikes me as being analogous to the way that we craft our identities in virtual spaces.   If only were as flawless in the meat world as the avatars that we create for ourselves are.  Crafting an image internally seems much easier than instantiating it is.

People who use requests for help as power games

I really despise non-consensual power games.  One of the things that irks me in particular is when a person asks someone more experienced in a topic for help and guidance, and the more knowledgeable person turns the situation into a power game.  They use their experience to belittle and bewilder someone who asked for their help.  I gave some advice to a good friend the other night which will hopefully help them out, after another ostensible ally was giving them the run-around.  In areas in which I have expertise, I don't like seeing my friends considered as marks.

Occult clinic duty?

I feel a little like House when he pulls clinic duty.  I've spent the past few hours on /x/ on 4chan dispensing occult advice.

Bombastic promulgation #1: There is no enlightenment without risk

In order to expand one's personal awareness, presence, or power in any meaningful way, one must be willing to risk the ground that they are already standing upon.  For example, you obviously can't advance to the next stone in the stream, unless you are willing to step off of your current stone, if the new position is close, or jump for it if the next stone is farther away.  If your perceptions are accurate, and you plan your move with forethought, you are more likely to find your new footing solid as well.  If you are careless or unobservant, you are much more likely to find yourself in the water.

New Scientist article on random numbers from quantum noise

I read an interesting article from New Scientist today: Random numbers created out of nothing

Consciousness as Integrated Information

From a great New York Times article, Sizing Up Consciousness by Its Bits by Carl Zimmer, I was led to this paper: Consciousness as Integrated Information: a Provisional Manifesto by Dr. Giulio Tononi at the University of Wisconsin, Madison.  As anyone who has read my writing is aware, I'm fascinated by the emergent phenomenon of consciousness.  From the paper's abstract: The integrated information theory (IIT) starts from phenomenology and makes use of thought experiments to claim that consciousness is integrated information.