Casey Rae-Hunter is guest blogging this month.

I've certainly been having a wonderful time guest blogging here at SD. In fact, it's hard to believe the month is almost up. Since I started late, maybe the boss will give me an extension?

Having talked about heavy stuff like cognitive liberty, neurodiversity and my personal stake in such matters, I figured we might want to tackle a lighter subject. Like doomsday devices.

It's probably old news by now, but I was really taken by an article in last month's issue of WIRED, called "Inside the Apocalyptic Soviet Doomsday Machine." As a child of the 1970s and '80s, I remember fondly the thrill of itemizing Soviet and American nuclear arsenals and learning cool new terms like "Mutually Assured Destruction." My parents and grandparents were not as wowed by my obsession with atomic game theory, but they put up. From forensics to German expressionist films to how many megatons are in an MX missile. . . such is life with a precocious and somewhat morbid kid.

Not to make this post purely personal, but there was another reason for my obsession. I grew up in Maine — a rural US state that one wouldn't think as having anything to do with the nuclear arms race. To the contrary: America's easternmost, northernmost province was positively riddled with backscatter radar stations, whose purpose was to detect a Soviet first strike. This made Maine more likely to be dusted in an initial attack than, say, Washington, DC. . . where I currently live.

Yet as much information as my apocalypse-obsessed mind could consume, I never encountered any tales of Perimeter — a Soviet doomsday system that came online in the mid-'80s, and is apparently still at the ready. Perimeter, also known by the more chilling moniker, "Dead Hand," is among the most secret and mystifying artifacts of the Cold War. Most perplexing is the fact that even the highest-level US officials, past and present, have no knowledge of its existence.

Yet it exists. Very much so.

The author of the WIRED piece, Nicholas Thomson, tells the tale of Perimeter with the panache of a noir novelist. He reveals, through painstaking first-person research and some rather uncomfortable interviews with Soviet and American principals, how the Ruskies devised a doomsday device that could still obliterate the US even after a devastating American first strike.

Perimeter ensures the ability to strike back, but it's no hair-trigger device. It was designed to lie semi-dormant until switched on by a high official in a crisis. Then it would begin monitoring a network of seismic, radiation, and air pressure sensors for signs of nuclear explosions. Before launching any retaliatory strike, the system had to check off four if/then propositions: If it was turned on, then it would try to determine that a nuclear weapon had hit Soviet soil. If it seemed that one had, the system would check to see if any communication links to the war room of the Soviet General Staff remained. If they did, and if some amount of time—likely ranging from 15 minutes to an hour—passed without further indications of attack, the machine would assume officials were still living who could order the counterattack and shut down. But if the line to the General Staff went dead, then Perimeter would infer that apocalypse had arrived. It would immediately transfer launch authority to whoever was manning the system at that moment deep inside a protected bunker—bypassing layers and layers of normal command authority. At that point, the ability to destroy the world would fall to whoever was on duty: maybe a high minister sent in during the crisis, maybe a 25-year-old junior officer fresh out of military academy. And if that person decided to press the button ... If/then. If/then. If/then. If/then.

Most interesting to me is the author's dead-on analysis of Ronald Reagan's "Star Wars" missile defense system, which the Soviets viewed as less of a "shield" than act of sheer provocation:

Reagan announced that the US was going to develop a shield of lasers and nuclear weapons in space to defend against Soviet warheads. He called it missile defense; critics mocked it as "Star Wars."

To Moscow it was the Death Star—and it confirmed that the US was planning an attack. It would be impossible for the system to stop thousands of incoming Soviet missiles at once, so missile defense made sense only as a way of mopping up after an initial US strike. The US would first fire its thousands of weapons at Soviet cities and missile silos. Some Soviet weapons would survive for a retaliatory launch, but Reagan's shield could block many of those. Thus, Star Wars would nullify the long-standing doctrine of mutually assured destruction, the principle that neither side would ever start a nuclear war since neither could survive a counterattack.

As we know now, Reagan was not planning a first strike. According to his private diaries and personal letters, he genuinely believed he was bringing about lasting peace. (He once told Gorbachev he might be a reincarnation of the human who invented the first shield.) The system, Reagan insisted, was purely defensive. But as the Soviets knew, if the Americans were mobilizing for attack, that's exactly what you'd expect them to say. And according to Cold War logic, if you think the other side is about to launch, you should do one of two things: Either launch first or convince the enemy that you can strike back even if you're dead.

Wow, right? I mean, I don't want to spoil it for you if you haven't yet read it, which you should.

It's interesting to note that Dead Hand is still active. Still out there, its once finely-tuned sensors decaying alongside the other relics of the ex-Soviet military/tech apparatus, waiting for seismic and communications evidence of a major strike by a fiercely cultivated enemy.

Does anyone in their right mind feel safer?

Casey Rae-Hunter is a writer, editor, musician, producer and self-proclaimed "lover of fine food and drink." He is the Communications Director of the Future of Music Coalition — a Washington, DC think tank that identifies, examines, interprets and translates issues at the intersection of music, law, technology and policy. He is also the founder and CEO of The Contrarian Media Group, which publishes The Contrarian and Autistic in the District — the latter a blog about Asperger's Syndrome.

This is another remarkable TED talk -- fascinating, incredibly informative and not without controversy. I'm overjoyed to hear an expert from IBM put forth a theory of mind that tries to address the problem of how the brain projects a representation of the universe to a subjective observer. I'm fairly convinced that his framing of the issue will yield some positive results.

Henry Markram says the mysteries of the mind can be solved in fairly short order. He argues that mental illness, memory and perception are all made of neurons and electric signals -- and he plans to find them with a supercomputer that models all the brain's 100,000,000,000,000 synapses.

We've been having a great discussion here at Sentient Developments on cognitive liberty and neurodiversity thanks to our guest blogger, Casey Rae-Hunter. Be sure to check out his recent posts, "Neuroplasticity and Coordinated Cognition: the Means of Self-Mastery?", "Neurodiversity vs. Cognitive Liberty", "Neurodiversity vs. Cognitive Liberty, Round II."

I'd now like to take a moment and address some issues as they pertain to cognitive liberty, a topic that I believe will start to carry some heavy implications in the near future.

Cognitive liberty is not just about the right to modify one's mind, emotional balance and psychological framework (for example, through anti-depressants, cognitive enhancers, psychotropic substances, etc.), it's also very much about the right to not have one's mind altered against their will. In this sense, cognitive liberty is very closely tied to freedom of speech. A strong argument can be made that we have an equal right to freedom of thought and the sustained integrity of our subjective experiences.

Our society has a rather poor track record when it comes to respecting the validity of certain 'mind-types'. We once tried to "cure" homosexuality with conversion therapy. Today there's an effort to cure autism and Asperger's syndrome -- a development the autistic rights people have railed against. And in the future we may consider curing criminals of their anti-social or deviant behaviour -- a potentially thorny issue to be sure.

There are many shades of gray when it comes to this important issue. It's going to requiring considerable awareness and debate if we hope to get it right. Your very mind may be at stake.

Neuroethical conundrums

Forced cognitive modification is an issue that's affecting real people today.

Aspies for Freedom claims that the most common therapies for autism are exactly this; they argue that applied behaviour analysis (ABA) therapy and the forced suppression of stimming are unethical, dangerous and cruel, as well as aversion therapy, the use of restraints and alternative treatments like chelation. Jane Meyerding, an autistic person herself, has criticized any therapy which attempts to remove autistic behaviors which she contends are behaviors that help autistics to communicate.

As this example shows, the process of altering a certain mind-type, whether it be homosexuality or autism, can be suppressive and harsh. But does the end justify the means? If we could "cure" autistics in a safe and ethical way and introduce them to the world of neurotypicality should we do it? Many individuals in the autistic/Asperger's camp would say no, but there's clearly a large segment of the population who feel that these conditions are quite debilitating. Not an easy question to answer.

This is an issue of extreme complexity and sensitivity, particularly when considering other implications of neurological modification. Looking to the future, there will be opportunities to alter the minds of pedophiles and other criminals guilty of anti-social and harmful behaviors. Chemical castration may eventually make way to a nootropic or genetic procedure that removes tendencies deemed inappropriate or harmful by the state.

Is this an infringement of a person's cognitive liberty?

Neuroconformity vs. neurodiversity

Consider the deprogramming of individuals to help them escape the clutches of a cult. The term itself is quite revealing: notice that it's deprogramming, not reprogramming -- a suggestion that the person is being restored to a pre-existing condition.

But what about those cases like pedophilia or autism where there is no pre-existing psychological condition for those persons, save for whatever mind-state society deems to be appropriate? This is the (potential) danger of neuroconformism, the evil flipside to neurodiversity. Without a broad sense and appreciation for alternative mind-types we run the risk of re-engineering our minds into extreme homogeneity.

Now I'm not suggesting that we shouldn't treat sociopaths in this way. What I'm saying is that we need to tread this path very, very carefully. Manipulating minds in this way will have an irrevocable impact on a person's sense of self. In a very profound way, a person's previous self may actually be destroyed and replaced by a new version.

For us Buddhists this doesn't tend to be a problem as we deny the presence of a singular and immutable self; what we can agree on, however, is that our agency in the world is heavily impacted by our genetics and environment which leads to a fairly consistent psychology -- what we call personalities and tendencies. In most cases, we tend to become attached to our personality and tendencies -- it's what we like to call our 'self.' And it's perfectly appropriate to want to retain that consistent sense of self over time.

So, if one applies a strict interpretation of cognitive liberty, a case can be made that a sociopath deserves the right to refuse a treatment that would for all intents-and-purposes replace their old self with a new one. On the other hand, a case can also be made that a sociopathic criminal has forgone their right to cognitive liberty (in essence the same argument that allows us to imprison criminals and strip them of their rights) and cannot refuse a treatment which is intended to be rehabilitative.

I am admittedly on the fence with this one. My instinct tells me that we should never alter a person's mind against their will; my common sense tells me that removing sociopathic tendencies is a good thing and ultimately beneficial to that individual. I'm going to have to ruminate over this one a bit further...

As for autistism, however, I'm a bit more more comfortable suggesting that we shouldn't force autistics into neurotypicality. At the very least we should certainly refrain from behavior therapy and other draconian tactics, but I have nothing against educating autistics on how to better engage and interact with their larger community.

And to repeat a point I made earlier, we should err on the side of neurodiversity and a strong interpretation of cognitive liberty. The right to our own minds and thoughts is a very profound one. We need to be allowed to think and emote in the way that we want; the potential for institutions or governments to start mandating to us what they consider to be "normal thinking" is clearly problematic.

So fight for your right to your mind!

From the four corners of the web:

• Wolfram Alpha's Second Act
  Following a sharp drop in interest, the "computational knowledge engine" pins hopes on API--and homework.
• The Future of Supercomputers is Optical
  An IBM researcher gives a timeline for developing the next generation of supercomputers.
• Google Profits Up 27% in Q3
  Google's quarterly profits jumped 27 percent, year over year, to $1.65 billion, marking a very strong showing in the third quarter of a tough year and outstripping analyst's predictions of results for the search and advertising giant.
• Three Google Wave Searches Worth Saving - Searches - Lifehacker
  After only a few weeks of Wave usage, my inbox is full of waves from strangers and items I don't particularly care about. Rather than archiving everything in Wave, I'm going with the flow–with the help of saved searches.

Casey Rae-Hunter is guest blogging this month.

From the four corners of the web:

• Google Wave's Little Secret: It Already Works On The iPhone
• Ultimate List of Google Wave Tips and Tricks
• People who work after retiring enjoy better health
• Terry Grossman: Feeling Great Forever [ h+ Magazine]
  I just got back from a short trip to Mexico where I went for the express purpose of having a few grams of placental tissue transplanted beneath the skin of my lower abdomen. I am evaluating this procedure, which has been available in Mexico for nearly 20 years, as a possible rejuvenation treatment for patients who come to my wellness center.
• Testosterone drives men to buy fast cars
• Smart drugs for cognitive enhancement: ethical and pragmatic considerations in the era of cosmetic neurology -- JME
  Reports in the popular press suggest that smart drugs or "nootropics" such as methylphenidate, modafinil and piracetam are increasingly being used by the healthy to augment cognitive ability. Although current nootropics offer only modest improvements in cognitive performance, it appears likely that more effective compounds will be developed in the future and that their off-label use will increase.
• Op-Ed Columnist - The Young and the Neuro - NYTimes.com
  When you go to an academic conference you expect to see some geeks, gravitas and graying professors giving lectures. But the people who showed up at the Social and Affective Neuroscience Society's conference in Lower Manhattan last weekend were so damned young, hip and attractive. The leading figures at this conference were in their 30s, and most of the work was done by people in their 20s. When you spoke with them, you felt yourself near the beginning of something long and important.

I've often said that transhumanism is supported and strengthened by three basic impulses, namely the upholding of our reproductive, morphological and cognitive liberties. Should any one of these be absent, the tripod cannot stand.

We transhumanists stand divided on any number of issues; put us in a room together and you're guaranteed to get an argument. But one aspect that unites virtually all of us is our steadfast commitment to biolibertarianism -- the suggestion that people, for the most part, deserve considerable autonomy over their minds, bodies and reproductive processes.

Granted, conceptions of what is meant by biolibertarianism varies considerably. I'm sure there are many transhumanists who feel that any state involvement in the development, regulation and implementation of transhumantech is completely unwarranted. But a number of transhumanists, including those of us who are affiliated with the Institute for Ethics and Emerging Technologies (IEET), believe there's more to it than that.

Safety checks

Indeed, these technologies are far too powerful to be left to unchecked market forces and the whims of individuals. Most companies and people can be trusted with such things, but there's considerable potential for abuse and misuse...things like the availability of dangerous and unproven pharmaceuticals, irresponsible fertility clinics, or parents who want to give their children horns and a devil's tail. Not cool. This is why the state will have to get involved.

Without safety and efficacy the biolibertarian agenda is facile. I strongly agree that we should allow market forces to drive the development of transhumantech, but state involvement will be necessary to ensure that these technologies are safe, effective and accessible. And in addition, governments will also need to ensure that individuals aren't harming themselves or others with these technologies.

All this said, I'll restate an earlier point: transhumanists tend to hold the biolibertarian conviction that informed and responsible adults have the right to modify their minds and bodies as they see fit and to reproduce in a way that best meets their needs. The state has no business telling people what they should look like, how they should reproduce or how their minds should work. Governments should only intervene in extreme cases, particularly when the application of these biotechnologies lead to abuse and severely diminished lives.

The need for tolerance

But even this is tricky. What do we mean by a 'dimished' life or self-inflicted harm? Who are we to decide which choices are permissable and which are not?

The key, in my opinion, will be to remain informed and open-minded. It will be important to understand why individuals choose to modify themselves in certain ways -- and accept it. We may not always agree, but we'll often need to tolerate.

And in so doing we'll be in a better position to uphold the rights of individuals to shape their lives and experiences as they best see fit.

From the four corners of the web:

• The Calorie-Restriction Experiment - NYTimes.com
  A curious aspect of the Calerie project, though, is that it is not meant to study weight loss or if one type of diet is better than another. Instead, Calerie is investigating how (and if) a spartan diet affects the aging process and its associated diseases.
• Italian Scientists Put Robot Spiders In Your Colon [Grinding]
• Tons of Twitter Stats
• Is a Virus the Cause of Fatigue Syndrome?
  In a new study, many patients with the debilitating disorder were infected with a recently discovered virus.
• Shared folders and more in Google Docs
• Practical Ethics: The ethics of mind-reading
  Recent developments in neuroimaging have created concerns about the ethics of 'mind-reading'. A technology called functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) has led to significant advances in the ability to determine what someone is thinking by monitoring their brain activity.
• Can Health-Care Workers Be Forced to Get Flu Shots? - TIME
  Workers in many hospitals have to get the 2009 H1N1 vaccine.
• The Transhumanists Arrive - Forbes.com
  Technology futurists love to talk about the Singularity as the point in time when technology progresses so rapidly that machine intelligence melds with and surpasses human intelligence. In early October, more than 800 technology- and future-focused attendees gathered at the historic 92nd Street YMCA in New York City for the fourth annual Singularity Summit.

Casey Rae-Hunter is guest blogging this month.

Part of the great debate that has come to characterize current assignments within the autism spectrum has centered on the concept of neurodiverity, which is, to my understanding, an umbrella term that connotes a desire to respect the neurological integrity of individuals. However, it has come to mean more to some with Asperger's Syndrome — particularly those adult "aspies" whose self-definition and place in the world may be hard won, to say the least.

It is somewhat difficult to have a cogent argument about neurodiversity at this stage in history, due to the relative newness of the Asperger's diagnosis. The sociological impact of having an entire generation of adults coming to grips with the existence of an autistic spectrum (and their place within it) can not be overstated. These are early days for aspie advocacy, so it's to be expected that some within this community, having suffered a broad array of indignities, would want to assert themselves through what they see as favorable self-categorization. To others, however, it may be interpreted as elitism.

Many adults with Asperger's (such as myself) did not have the benefit of social or scholastic acceptance of their differences. My own burdens were lightened considerably by my eventual AS diagnosis, but I'm sure for some this is not the case. Keep in mind that Asperger's is an autistic spectrum disorder — if you've met one aspie. . . you've met one aspie. I've heard some real horror stories of tragic childhoods, miserable school experiences and failed relationships, so I understand why some folks with AS may feel a certain degree of embitterment towards the neurotypical world. And it's definitely easy to retreat into a fantasy where you're the "superior" and everyone else just doesn't "get it."

Perhaps an analogy can be drawn to the feminist movement of the early 1960s. Having endured years of societal repression — if not outright abuse — at the hands of a patriarchal status quo, was it any wonder that some self-identifying feminists pushed the envelope of diplomatic conversation with larger society? My opinion is that some in the AS community are having their "I am Aspie, hear me roar" moment.

Well intentioned as such advocacy may be, it seems unfair to champion "neurodiversity" when there are people with, ahem, "lower functioning" autism who struggle greatly with their neurological lot. Families of autistic individuals may actually prefer a "cure" to this condition, as it's preferable to a lifetime of social stigma, behavioral outbursts and isolation. From that perspective, "fixing autism" looks pretty compassionate.

For those on the Asperger's side of the spectrum, the idea that aspies should be "cured" — likely through medical, societal or familial coercion — is as offensive as it gets. As we piece together the historic record of autism, it's clear that a shocking number of the most influential minds of the last several centuries may indeed have had Asperger's Syndrome: Nikola Tesla, Albert Einsten, Andy Warhol, Mozart. . . the speculative list goes on and on. If you'd suffered a lifetime of mistreatment by peers and ostracizing in romance or the workplace, wouldn't you want to self-identify with such titans of mentation? And who's to say that the increase in diagnosed Asperger's isn't just due to better clinical testing? Perhaps it's an evolutionary advantage — wouldn't our digital era favor adaptive traits that reward certain kinds of functioning? Ever wonder why there's so many aspie kids in Silicon Valley? Born to code, indeed.

On the other hand, this could all be a scientific canard.

It's probably better and more helpful to examine the meaning of cognitive liberty — which is to say, the right to psychological self-determination, based on robust informational resources and stratified by some level of societal tolerance. Before you say, "hey, that sounds like neurodiversity," consider my handy Principles of Cognitive Liberty:

1. Cognitive liberty is the basic right of an individual to pursue beneficial psychological trajectories. If the individual is unable to make these choices themselves, than it is the right of their closest family members to make them, provided they are not coerced by the medical establishment or prevailing social strata.

2. Cognitive liberty recognizes that information and education are key to making informed choices. In the absence of such information, cognitive libertarians will advocate for the fullest range of data in when considering treatment options or lifestyle planning.

3. Cognitive liberty recognizes the range of psychological profiles in both the neurotypical world and otherwise. Until and unless an individual's psychology can be determined as infringing on another individual's cognitive liberty, they are free to pursue or not pursue strategies for conventional adaptation or any other panacea — actual or postulatory.

What do you think about neurodiversity vs. cognitive liberty? How practical is either?

Casey Rae-Hunter is a writer, editor, musician, producer and self-proclaimed "lover of fine food and drink." He is the Communications Director of the Future of Music Coalition — a Washington, DC think tank that identifies, examines, interprets and translates issues at the intersection of music, law, technology and policy. He is also the founder and CEO of the Contrarian Media Group, which publishes The Contrarian and Autistic in the District — the latter a blog about Asperger's Syndrome.