Heavyweights Join US Floating Wind Project – Offshore WIND

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The University of Maine will collaborate with the Mitsubishi Corporation and RWE Renewables to develop UMaines floating offshore wind technology demonstration project off the coast of Maine.

New England Aqua Ventus, LLC (NEAV), a joint venture between Diamond Offshore Wind, a subsidiary of the Mitsubishi Corporation, and RWE Renewables, will as the developer own and manage all aspects of permitting, construction and assembly, deployment and ongoing operations for the project.

UMaines Advanced Structures and Composites Center will continue with design and engineering, research and development and post-construction monitoring.

The project will consist of a single semisubmersible concrete floating platform that will support a commercial 1012 megawatt wind turbine and will be deployed in a state-designated area two miles south of Monhegan Island and 14 miles from the Maine coast.

The purpose of the demonstration project is to further evaluate the floating technology, monitor environmental factors, and develop best practices for offshore wind to coexist with traditional marine activities.

Construction, following all permitting, is expected to be completed in 2023.

Diamond Offshore Wind and RWE Renewables will invest USD 100 million to build the project and help demonstrate the technology at full scale.

The project is projected to produce more than USD 150 million in total economic output and create hundreds of Maine-based jobs during the construction period.

We see great potential for floating wind farms worldwide, especially in countries like the U.S., with deeper coastal waters, said Sven Utermhlen, chief operating officer, Wind Offshore Global of RWE Renewables.

This innovative project combines the University of Maines knowledge with the states maritime heritage, allowing RWE Renewables to gain the experience that can help us provide future opportunities to grow local economies and produce clean, renewable power.

NEAV will continue to involve Maine companies in permitting, construction and assembly, deployment, and ongoing operations and maintenance of the project. In addition, NEAV has committed to working with the University of Maine on research, development, and design to take the technology elsewhere in the US and the world.

The developers will also work with the University of Maine System, the Maine Community College System and Maine Maritime Academy to attract K12 students to science, engineering and business programs, prepare college students and help to create a skilled workforce in Maine with the technical skills necessary to support offshore wind development and operation.

This project south of Monhegan is a perfect opportunity to demonstrate a new technology that can be built in Maine, create jobs in Maine, and demonstrate how fishing and offshore wind can co-exist, said Chris Wissemann of Diamond Offshore Wind.

Together with RWE, our engineers conducted an extensive due-diligence review of UMaines VolturnUS floating wind technology, and believe it is a world leader in floating wind that reduces costs and creates local jobs. We are really focused on creating economic opportunities for Maine as this new carbon-free economy emerges.

The University of Maine has researched floating offshore wind technology since 2008. After winning funding from the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE), the university worked with Maine-based construction firm Cianbro to build and deploy the first grid-connected offshore wind turbine in the US in 2013, a one-eighth scale prototype of its VolturnUS floating hull technology.

The success of the project led to additional funding from the DOE to further advance the VolturnUS technology, which has been issued 43 patents to date. UMaine will continue to own its VolturnUS floating hull intellectual property and license it to NEAV for this project.

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Heavyweights Join US Floating Wind Project - Offshore WIND

Voltaire to debut at Dogger Bank offshore the UK – Offshore Oil and Gas Magazine

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The Voltaire will be the first ultra-low emission vessel.

(Courtesy Jan De Nul)

Offshore staff

LUXEMBOURG SSE Renewables and Equinor have contracted Jan De Nul Group to transport and install the GE Haliade-X wind turbines at Dogger Bank A and Dogger Bank B in the UK North Sea.

This will be the first assignment for Jan De Nuls jackup installation vessel Voltaire. Installation is expected to start in 2023.

Located 130 km (81 mi) off the Yorkshire coast, Dogger Bank consists of three 1.2-GW phases: Dogger Bank A, Dogger Bank B, and Dogger Bank C. The final investment decision on Dogger Bank A and Dogger Bank B is expected in late 2020 and on Dogger Bank C in 2021.

SSE Renewables is leading the development and construction phases of the Dogger Bank wind farm.Equinor will lead on operations for its lifetime of at least 25 years.

When complete Dogger Bank is expected to be the worlds largest offshore wind farm and power more than 4.5 million homes every year around 5% of the UKs electricity needs.

08/07/2020

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Voltaire to debut at Dogger Bank offshore the UK - Offshore Oil and Gas Magazine

Galloper Makes Offshore Wind Scarecrow Tried-and-True – Offshore WIND

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A scarecrow system installed on the substation of the Galloper offshore wind farm has reduced seabird guano on the structure from approximately 50-60% coverage to almost none in the last 12 months.

The Scaretech system was installed on the substation located 27km off the Suffolk coast in the UK in July last year to address the guano problem.

Seabird poo or guano is said to be a huge problem for the global offshore wind industry as it poses a serious health risk due to its carcinogenic qualities, and is expensive and unpleasant to remove.

The Scaretech device is based on a traditional scarecrow concept and adapted for the offshore environment of a wind farm or oil platform. It emits sporadic loud noises and high-intensity strobe lights which deters seabirds from landing on the structure.

There is an abundance of seabass around our Galloper site, which attracts large numbers of seabirds. These in turn generate significant quantities of guano, which poses an unpleasant health and safety hazard for us, said Kieron Drew, Interim O&M Manager at Galloper.

This is a new innovation for the wind industry and it certainly worked for us. Once we installed the Scaretch device, we saw dramatic reductions in the amount of guano. In fact, the problem is now almost non-existent.

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Galloper Makes Offshore Wind Scarecrow Tried-and-True - Offshore WIND

Trademark Board Harshes the Mellow of CBD Oil Manufacturer – JD Supra

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The relationship between the cannabis industry and intellectual property laws in the United States is unique and complicated, in many ways mirroring the nations collective views on the cannabis plant. This is unfortunate, in part because the law abhors uncertainty and, in part, because cannabis companies are currently undergoing a renaissance, which has fostered an explosion of novel and creative concepts that the intellectual property laws of this county were designed to protect.

A recent decision shows, however, that despite changes in cannabis laws in many states and the growing cannabis industry throughout the country, obtaining a federal trademark for hemp derived products remains an uphill battle. On June 16, 2020, in In re Stanley Brothers Social Enterprises, LLC, the federal Trademark Trial and Appeal Board (TTAB) affirmed the refusal to register a trademark in connection with hemp oil extracts sold as an integral component of dietary and nutritional supplements on the grounds that hemp oil extracts be marketed and sold as dietary supplements were per se illegal under the Food, Drug & Cosmetics Act (FDCA).

In order for a trademark to qualify for federal registration, the mark must lawfully be used in commerce. When a trademark application is reviewed by the USPTO, however, the marks use will be presumed lawful unless the application record indicates a violation of federal law. The USPTO will evaluate whether the goods or services associated with a mark are per se illegal.

Stanley Brothers Social Enterprises, LLC is a Colorado marijuana grower that produces various cannabis derivative products. One of those products is an oil extracted from the cannabis plant that is high in cannabidiol (CBD) content and low in tetrahydrocannabinol (THC). Stanley Brothers sought registration of the CW mark for its CBD oil, which was marketed as a dietary supplement that can be used to promote mind and body wellness. The examining attorney refused registration on the grounds that the marks use in commerce was illegal because the goods are illegal under the FDCA and the Controlled Substance Act (CSA).

On appeal, the TTAB did not address the legality of the CBD oil products under the CSA. Rather, the board held that the CBD oil products were per se illegal under the FDCA and thus ineligible for trademark registration. In refusing registration, the TTAB focused on a provision of the FDCA that bans any foods to which has been added . . . a drug or biological product which substantial clinical investigations have been instituted and for which the existence of such investigations has been made public.

The TTAB was unpersuaded by Stanley Brothers argument that their dietary supplements are not food under the FDCA and ruled that FDCA definition of foods includes certain products marketed as dietary supplements and affirmed the examining attorneys contention that hemp oil extracts, such as CBD oil, are food to which CBD has been added. Specifically, because Stanley Brothers identified their CW CBD oil products as an integral component of dietary and nutritional supplements, the products are deemed to be food under the FDCA. The TTAB also rejected Stanley Brothers argument that the 2014 Farm Bills Industrial Hemp Provision exempted it from the FDCA provision regarding food. The TTAB reasoned that the Industrial Hemp Provision permits authorized entities to grow or cultivate industrial hemp, but did not permit the distribution or sale of CBD in food when CBD is the subject of clinical investigation, even if the CBD is derived from industrial hemp which falls outside the CSA. Stanley Brothers also argued that their product was in the market prior to the institution of any substantial clinical investigation; however, the TTAB found that this argument was unsupported by the evidence.

The ruling in In re Stanley is not an absolute bar on trademarks for CBD products, in fact, numerous trademark registrations for various CBD products, such as essential oils, have been issued. Nevertheless, companies in the hemp and cannabis industry will need to consider their trademark strategy and product marketing carefully. While, for now, at least, the USPTO has made it clear that trademarks for CBD products used in food and dietary supplements are illegal under the FDCA and not eligible for registration, companies may still be able to acquire trademark protections for related or ancillary non-food CBD products.

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Trademark Board Harshes the Mellow of CBD Oil Manufacturer - JD Supra

Mind uploading | Transhumanism Wiki | Fandom

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In transhumanism and science fiction, mind uploading (also occasionally referred to by other terms such as mind transfer, whole brain emulation, or whole body emulation) refers to the hypothetical transfer of a human mind to a substrate different from a biological brain, such as a detailed computer simulation of an individual human brain.

The human brain contains a little more than 100 billion nerve cells called neurons, each individually linked to other neurons by way of connectors called axons and dendrites. Signals at the junctures (synapses) of these connections are transmitted by the release and detection of chemicals known as neurotransmitters. The brain contains cell types other than neurons (such as glial cells), some of which are structurally similar to neurons, but the information processing of the brain is thought to be conducted by the network of neurons.

Current biomedical and neuropsychological thinking is that the human mind is a product of the information processing of this neural network. To use an analogy from computer science, if the neural network of the brain can be thought of as hardware, then the human mind is the software running on it.

Mind uploading, then, is the act of copying or transferring this "software" from the hardware of the human brain to another processing environment, typically an artificially created one.

The concept of mind uploading then is strongly mechanist, relying on several assumptions about the nature of human consciousness and the philosophy of artificial intelligence. It assumes that strong AI machine intelligence is not only possible, but is indistinguishable from human intelligence, and denies the vitalist view of human life and consciousness.

Mind uploading is completely speculative at this point in time; no technology exists which can accomplish this.

The relationship between the human mind and the neural circuitry of the brain is currently poorly understood. Thus, most theoretical approaches to mind uploading are based on the idea of recreating or simulating the underlying neural network. This approach would theoretically eliminate the need to understand how such a system works if the component neurons and their connections can be simulated with enough accuracy.

It is unknown how precise the simulation of such a neural network would have to be to produce a functional simulation of the brain. It is possible, however, that simulating the functions of a human brain at the cellular level might be much more difficult than creating a human level artificial intelligence, which relied on recreating the functions of the human mind, rather than trying to simulate the underlying biological systems.[citation needed]

Thinkers with a strongly mechanistic view of human intelligence (such as Marvin Minsky) or a strongly positive view of robot-human social integration (such as Hans Moravec and Ray Kurzweil) have openly speculated about the possibility and desirability of this.

In the case where the mind is transferred into a computer, the subject would become a form of artificial intelligence, sometimes called an infomorph or "nomorph." In a case where it is transferred into an artificial body, to which its consciousness is confined, it would also become a robot. In either case it might claim ordinary human rights, certainly if the consciousness within was feeling (or was doing a good job of simulating) as if it were the donor.

Uploading consciousness into bodies created by robotic means is a goal of some in the artificial intelligence community. In the uploading scenario, the physical human brain does not move from its original body into a new robotic shell; rather, the consciousness is assumed to be recorded and/or transferred to a new robotic brain, which generates responses indistinguishable from the original organic brain.

The idea of uploading human consciousness in this manner raises many philosophical questions which people may find interesting or disturbing, such as matters of individuality and the soul. Vitalists would say that uploading was a priori impossible. Many people also wonder whether, if they were uploaded, it would be their sentience uploaded, or simply a copy.

Even if uploading is theoretically possible, there is currently no technology capable of recording or describing mind states in the way imagined, and no one knows how much computational power or storage would be needed to simulate the activity of the mind inside a computer. On the other hand, advocates of uploading have made various estimates of the amount of computing power that would be needed to simulate a human brain, and based on this a number have estimated that uploading may become possible within decades if trends such as Moore's Law continue.[citation needed]

If it is possible for human minds to be modeled and treated as software objects which can be instanced multiple times, in multiple processing environments, many potentially desirable possibilities open up for the individual.

If the mental processes of the human mind can be disassociated from its original biological body, it is no longer tied to the limits and lifespan of that body. In theory, a mind could be voluntarily copied or transferred from body to body indefinitely and therefore become immortal, or at least exercise conscious control of its lifespan.

Alternatively, if cybernetic implants could be used to monitor and record the structure of the human mind in real time then, should the body of the individual be killed, such implants could be used to later instance another working copy of that mind. It is also possible that periodic backups of the mind could be taken and stored external to the body and a copy of the mind instanced from this backup, should the body (and possibly the implants) be lost or damaged beyond recovery. In the latter case, any changes and experiences since the time of the last backup would be lost.

Such possibilities have been explored extensively in fiction: This Number Speaks, Nancy Farmer's The House of the Scorpion, Newton's Gate, John Varley's Eight Worlds series, Greg Egan's Permutation City, Diaspora, Schild's Ladder and Incandescence, the Revelation Space series, Peter Hamilton's Pandora's Star duology, Bart Kosko's Fuzzy Time, Armitage III series, the Takeshi Kovacs universe, Iain M. Banks Culture novels, Cory Doctorow's Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom, and the works of Charles Stross. And in television sci-fi shows: Battlestar Galactica, Stargate SG-1, among others.

Another concept explored in science fiction is the idea of more than one running "copy" of a human mind existing at once. Such copies could either be full copies, or limited subsets of the complete mentality designed for a particular limited functions. Such copies would allow an "individual" to experience many things at once, and later integrate the experiences of all copies into a central mentality at some point in the future, effectively allowing a single sentient being to "be many places at once" and "do many things at once".

The implications of such entities have been explored in science fiction. In his book Eon, Greg Bear uses the terms "partials" and "ghosts", while Charles Stross's novels Accelerando and Glasshouse deal with the concepts of "forked instances" of conscious beings as well as "backups".

In Charles Sheffield's Tomorrow and Tomorrow, the protagonist's consciousness is duplicated thousands of times electronically and sent out on probe ships and uploaded into bodies adapted to native environments of different planets. The copies are eventually reintegrated back into the "master" copy of the consciousness in order to consolidate their findings.

Such partial and complete copies of a sentient being again raise issues of identity and personhood: is a partial copy of sentient being itself sentient? What rights might such a being have? Since copies of a personality are having different experiences, are they not slowly diverging and becoming different entities? At what point do they become different entities?

If the body and the mind of the individual can be disassociated, then the individual is theoretically free to choose their own incarnation. They could reside within a completely human body, within a modified physical form, or within simulated realities. Individuals might change their incarnations many times during their existence, depending on their needs and desires.

Choices of the individuals in this matter could be restricted by the society they exist within, however. In the novel Eon by Greg Bear, individuals could incarnate physically (within "natural" biological humans, or within modified bodies) a limited number of times before being legally forced to reside with the "city memory" as infomorphic "ghosts".

Once an individual is moved to virtual simulation, the only input needed would be energy, which would be provided by large computing device hosting those minds. All the food, drink, moving, travel or any imaginable thing would just need energy to provide those computations.

Almost all scientists, thinkers and intelligent people would be moved to this virtual environment once they die. In this virtual environment, their brain capacity would be expanded by speed and storage of quantum computers. In virtual environment idea and final product are not different. This way more and more innovations will be sent to real world and it will speed up our technological development.

Regardless of the techniques used to capture or recreate the function of a human mind, the processing demands of such venture are likely to be immense.

Henry Markram, lead researcher of the "Blue Brain Project", has stated that "it is not [their] goal to build an intelligent neural network", based solely on the computational demands such a project would have[1].

Advocates of mind uploading point to Moore's law to support the notion that the necessary computing power may become available within a few decades, though it would probably require advances beyond the integrated circuit technology which has dominated since the 1970s. Several new technologies have been proposed, and prototypes of some have been demonstrated, such as the optical neural network based on the silicon-photonic chip (harnessing special physical properties of Indium Phosphide) which Intel showed the world for the first time on September 18, 2006.[3] Other proposals include three-dimensional integrated circuits based on carbon nanotubes (researchers have already demonstrated individual logic gates built from carbon nanotubes[4]) and also perhaps the quantum computer, currently being worked on internationally as well as most famously by computer scientists and physicists at the IBM Almaden Research Center, which promises to be useful in simulating the behavior of quantum systems; such ability would enable protein structure prediction which could be critical to correct emulation of intracellular neural processes.

Present methods require use of massive computational power (as the BBP does with IBM's Blue Gene Supercomputer) to use the essentially classical computing architecture for serial deduction of the quantum mechanical processes involved in ab initio protein structure prediction. If necessary, should the quantum computer become a reality, its capacity for exactly such rapid calculations of quantum mechanical physics may well help the effort by reducing the required computational power per physical size and energy needs, as Markram warns would be needed (and thus why he thinks it would be difficult, besides unattractive) should an entire brain's simulation, let alone emulation (at both cellular and molecular levels) be feasibly attempted. Reiteration may also be useful for distributed simulation of a common, repeated function (e.g., proteins).

Ultimately, nano-computing is projected by some[citation needed] to hold the requisite capacity for computations per second estimated necessary, in surplus. If Kurzweil's Law of Accelerating Returns (a variation on Moore's Law) shows itself to be true, the rate of technological development should accelerate exponentially towards the technological singularity, heralded by the advent of viable though relatively primitive mind uploading and/or "strong" (human-level) AI technologies, his prediction being that the Singularity may occur around the year 2045.[5]

The structure of a neural network is also different from classical computing designs. Memory in a classical computer is generally stored in a two state design, or bit, although one of the two components is modified in dynamic RAM and some forms of flash memory can use more than two states under some circumstances. Gates inside central processing units will often also use this two state or digital type of design as well. In some ways a neural network or brain could be thought of like a memory unit in a computer, but with an extremely vast number of states, corresponding with the total number of neurons. Beyond that, whether the action potential of a neuron will form, based upon the summation of the inputs of different dendrites, might be something that is more analog in nature than that which happens in a computer. One great advantage that a modern computer has over a biological brain, however, is that the speed of each electronic operation in a computer is many orders of magnitude faster than the time scales involved for the firing and transmission of individual nerve impulses. A brain, however, uses far more parallel processing than exists in most classical computing designs, and so each of the slower neurons can make up for it by operating at the same time.

There are many ethical issues concerning mind uploading. Viable mind uploading technology might challenge the ideas of human immortality, property rights, capitalism, human intelligence, an afterlife, and the Abrahamic view of man as created in God's image. These challenges often cannot be distinguished from those raised by all technologies that extend human technological control over human bodies, e.g. organ transplant. Perhaps the best way to explore such issues is to discover principles applicable to current bioethics problems, and question what would be permissible if they were applied consistently to a future technology. This points back to the role of science fiction in exploring such problems, as powerfully demonstrated in the 20th century by such works as Brave New World and Nineteen Eighty-Four, each of which frame current ethical problems in a future environment where those have come to dominate the society.

Another issue with mind uploading is whether an uploaded mind is really the "same" sentience, or simply an exact copy with the same memories and personality. Although this difference would be undetectable to an external observer (and the upload itself would probably be unable to tell), it could mean that uploading a mind would actually kill it and replace it with a clone. Some people would be unwilling to upload themselves for this reason. If their sentience is deactivated even for a nanosecond, they assert, it is permanently wiped out. Some more gradual methods may avoid this problem by keeping the uploaded sentience functioning throughout the procedure.

True mind uploading remains speculative. The technology to perform such a feat is not currently available, however a number of possible mechanisms, and research approaches, have been proposed for developing mind uploading technology.

Since the function of the human mind, and how it might arise from the working of the brain's neural network, are poorly understood issues, many theoretical approaches to mind uploading rely on the idea of emulation. Rather than having to understand the functioning of the human mind, the structure of underlying neural network is captured and simulated with a computer system. The human mind then, theoretically, is generated by the simulated neural network in an identical fashion to it being generated by the biological neural network.

These approaches require only that we understand the nature of neurons and how their connections function, that we can simulate them well enough, that we have the computational power to run such large simulations, and that the state of the brain's neural network can be captured with enough fidelity to create an accurate simulation.

A possible method for mind uploading is serial sectioning, in which the brain tissue and perhaps other parts of the nervous system are frozen and then scanned and analyzed layer by layer, thus capturing the structure of the neurons and their interconnections[6]. The exposed surface of frozen nerve tissue would be scanned (possibly with some variant of an electron microscope) and recorded, and then the surface layer of tissue removed (possibly with a conventional cryo-ultramicrotome if scanning along an axis, or possibly through laser ablation if scans are done radially "from the outside inwards"). While this would be a very slow and labor intensive process, research is currently underway to automate the collection and microscopy of serial sections[7]. The scans would then be analyzed, and a model of the neural net recreated in the system that the mind was being uploaded into.

There are uncertainties with this approach using current microscopy techniques. If it is possible to replicate neuron function from its visible structure alone, then the resolution afforded by a scanning electron microscope would suffice for such a technique[7]. However, as the function of brain tissue is partially determined by molecular events (particularly at synapses, but also at other places on the neuron's cell membrane), this may not suffice for capturing and simulating neuron functions. It may be possible to extend the techniques of serial sectioning and to capture the internal molecular makeup of neurons, through the use of sophisticated immunohistochemistry staining methods which could then be read via confocal laser scanning microscopy[citation needed].

A more advanced hypothetical technique that would require nanotechnology might involve infiltrating the intact brain with a network of nanoscale machines to "read" the structure and activity of the brain in situ, much like the electrode meshes used in current brain-computer interface research, but on a much finer and more sophisticated scale. The data collected from these probes could then be used to build up a simulation of the neural network they were probing, and even check the behavior of the model against the behavior of the biological system in real time.

In his 1998 book, Mind children, Hans Moravec describes a variation of this process. In it, nanomachines are placed in the synapses of the outer layer of cells in the brain of a conscious living subject. The system then models the outer layer of cells and recreates the neural net processes in whatever simulation space is being used to house the uploaded consciousness of the subject. The nanomachines can then block the natural signals sent by the biological neurons, but send and receive signals to and from the simulated versions of the neurons. Which system is doing the processing biological or simulated can be toggled back and forth, both automatically by the scanning system and manually by the subject, until it has been established that the simulation's behavior matches that of the biological neurons and that the subjective mental experience of the subject is unchanged. Once this is the case, the outer layer of neurons can be removed and their function turned solely over to the simulated neurons. This process is then repeated, layer by layer, until the entire biological brain of the subject has been scanned, modeled, checked, and disassembled. When the process is completed, the nanomachines can be removed from the spinal column of the subject, and the mind of the subject exists solely within the simulated neural network.

Alternatively, such a process might allow for the replacement of living neurons with artificial neurons one by one while the subject is still conscious, providing a smooth transition from an organic to synthetic brain - potentially significant for those who worry about the loss of personal continuity that other uploading processes may entail. This method has been likened to upgrading the whole internet by replacing, one by one, each computer connected to it with similar computers using newer hardware.

While many people are more comfortable with the idea of the gradual replacement of their natural selves than they are with some of the more radical and discontinuous mental transfer, it still raises questions of identity. Is the individual preserved in this process, and if not, at what point does the individual cease to exist? If the original entity ceases to exist, what is the nature and identity of the individual created within the simulated neural network, or can any individual be said to exist there at all? This gradual replacement leads to a much more complicated and sophisticated version of the Ship of Theseus paradox.

It may also be possible to use advanced neuroimaging technology (such as Magnetoencephalography) to build a detailed three-dimensional model of the brain using non-invasive and non-destructive methods. However, current imaging technology lacks the resolution needed to gather the information needed for such a scan.

Such a process would leave the original entity intact, but the existence, nature, and identity of the resulting being in the simulated network are still open philosophical questions.

Another recently conceived possibility[citation needed] is the use of genetically engineered viruses to attach to synaptic junctions, and then release energy-emitting molecular compounds, which could be detected externally, and used to generate a functional model of the synapses in question, and, given enough time, the whole brain and nervous system.

An alternate set of possible theoretical approaches to mind uploading would require that we first understand the functions of the human mind sufficiently well to create abstract models of parts, or the totality, of human mental processes. It would require that strong AI be not only a possibility, but that the techniques used to create a strong AI system could also be used to recreate a human type mentality.

Such approaches might be more desirable if the abstract models required less computational power to execute than the neural network simulation of the emulation techniques described above.

Another theoretically possible method of mind uploading from organic to inorganic medium, related to the idea described above of replacing neurons one at a time while consciousness remained intact, would be a much less precise but much more feasible (in terms of technology currently known to be physically possible) process of "cyborging". Once a given person's brain is mapped, it is replaced piece-by-piece with computer devices which perform the exact same function as the regions preceding them, after which the patient is allowed to regain consciousness and validate that there has not been some radical upheaval within his own subjective experience of reality. At this point, the patient's brain is immediately "re-mapped" and another piece is replaced, and so on in this fashion until, the patient exists on a purely hardware medium and can be safely extricated from the remaining organic body.

However, critics contend[citation needed] that, given the significant level of synergy involved throughout the neural plexus, alteration of any given cell that is functionally correspondent with (a) neighboring cell(s) may well result in an alteration of its electrical and chemical properties that would not have existed without interference, and so the true individual's signature is lost. Revokability of that disturbance may be possible with damage anticipation and correction (seeing the original by the particular damage rendered unto it, in reverse chronological fashion), although this would be easier in a stable system, meaning a brain subjected to cryosleep (which would imbue its own damage and alterations).[citation needed]

It has also been suggested (for example, in Greg Egan's "jewelhead" stories[8]) that a detailed examination of the brain itself may not be required, that the brain could be treated as a black box instead and effectively duplicated "for all practical purposes" by merely duplicating how it responds to specific external stimuli. This leads into even deeper philosophical questions of what the "self" is.

On June 6, 2005 IBM and the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Lausanne announced the launch of a project to build a complete simulation of the human brain, entitled the "Blue Brain Project".[9] The project will use a supercomputer based on IBM's Blue Gene design to map the entire electrical circuitry of the brain. The project seeks to research aspects of human cognition, and various psychiatric disorders caused by malfunctioning neurons, such as autism. Initial efforts are to focus on experimentally accurate, programmed characterization of a single neocortical column in the brain of a rat, as it is very similar to that of a human but at a smaller scale, then to expand to an entire neocortex (the alleged seat of higher intelligence) and eventually the human brain as a whole.

It is interesting to note that the Blue Brain project seems to use a combination of emulation and simulation techniques. The first stage of their program was to simulate a neocortical column at the molecular level. Now the program seems to be trying to create a simplified functional simulation of the neocortical column in order to simulate many of them, and to model their interactions.

With most projected mind uploading technology it is implicit that "copying" a consciousness could be as feasible as "moving" it, since these technologies generally involve simulating the human brain in a computer of some sort, and digital files such as computer programs can be copied precisely. It is also possible that the simulation could be created without the need to destroy the original brain, so that the computer-based consciousness would be a copy of the still-living biological person, although some proposed methods such as serial sectioning of the brain would necessarily be destructive. In both cases it is usually assumed that once the two versions are exposed to different sensory inputs, their experiences would begin to diverge, but all their memories up until the moment of the copying would remain the same.

By many definitions, both copies could be considered the "same person" as the single original consciousness before it was copied. At the same time, they can be considered distinct individuals once they begin to diverge, so the issue of which copy "inherits" what could be complicated. This problem is similar to that found when considering the possibility of teleportation, where in some proposed methods it is possible to copy (rather than only move) a mind or person. This is the classic philosophical issue of personal identity. The problem is made even more serious by the possibility of creating a potentially infinite number of initially identical copies of the original person, which would of course all exist simultaneously as distinct beings.

Philosopher John Locke published "An Essay Concerning Human Understanding" in 1689, in which he proposed the following criterion for personal identity: if you remember thinking something in the past, then you are the same person as he or she who did the thinking. Later philosophers raised various logical snarls, most of them caused by applying Boolean logic, the prevalent logic system at the time. It has been proposed that modern fuzzy logic can solve those problems,[10] showing that Locke's basic idea is sound if one treats personal identity as a continuous rather than discrete value.

In that case, when a mind is copied -- whether during mind uploading, or afterwards, or by some other means -- the two copies are initially two instances of the very same person, but over time, they will gradually become different people to an increasing degree.

The issue of copying vs moving is sometimes cited as a reason to think that destructive methods of mind uploading such as serial sectioning of the brain would actually destroy the consciousness of the original and the upload would itself be a mere "copy" of that consciousness. Whether one believes that the original consciousness of the brain would transfer to the upload, that the original consciousness would be destroyed, or that this is simply a matter of definition and the question has no single "objectively true" answer, is ultimately a philosophical question that depends on one's views of philosophy of mind.

Because of these philosophical questions about the survival of consciousness, there are some who would feel more comfortable about a method of uploading where the transfer is gradual, replacing the original brain with a new substrate over an extended period of time, during which the subject appears to be fully conscious (this can be seen as analogous to the natural biological replacement of molecules in our brains with new ones taken in from eating and breathing, which may lead to almost all the matter in our brains being replaced in as little as a few months[11]). As mentioned above, this would likely take place as a result of gradual cyborging, either nanoscopically or macroscopically, wherein the brain (the original copy) would slowly be replaced bit by bit with artificial parts that function in a near-identical manner, and assuming this was possible at all, the person would not necessarily notice any difference as more and more of their brain became artificial. A gradual transfer also brings up questions of identity similar to the classical Ship of Theseus paradox, although the above-mentioned natural replacement of molecules in the brain through eating and breathing brings up these questions as well.

A computer capable of simulating a person may require microelectromechanical systems (MEMS), or else perhaps optical or nano computing for comparable speed and reduced size and sophisticated telecommunication between the brain and body (whether it exists in virtual reality, artificially as an android, or cybernetically as in sync with a biological body through a transceiver), but would not seem to require molecular nanotechnology.

If minds and environments can be simulated, the Simulation Hypothesis posits that the reality we see may in fact be a computer simulation, and that this is actually the most likely possibility.[12]

Uploading is a common theme in science fiction. Some of the earlier instances of this theme were in the Roger Zelazny 1968 novel Lord of Light and in Frederik Pohl's 1955 short story "Tunnel Under the World." A near miss was Neil R. Jones' 1931 short story "The Jameson Satellite", wherein a person's organic brain was installed in a machine, and Olaf Stapledon's "Last and First Men" (1930) had organic human-like brains grown into an immobile machine.

Another of the "firsts" is the novel Detta r verkligheten (This is reality), 1968, by the renowned philosopher and logician Bertil Mrtensson, in which he describes people living in an uploaded state as a means to control overpopulation. The uploaded people believe that they are "alive", but in reality they are playing elaborate and advanced fantasy games. In a twist at the end, the author changes everything into one of the best "multiverse" ideas of science fiction. Together with the 1969 book Ubik by Philip K. Dick it takes the subject to its furthest point of all the early novels in the field.

Frederik Pohl's Gateway series (also known as the Heechee Saga) deals with a human being, Robinette Broadhead, who "dies" and, due to the efforts of his wife, a computer scientist, as well as the computer program Sigfrid von Shrink, is uploaded into the "64 Gigabit space" (now archaic, but Fred Pohl wrote Gateway in 1976). The Heechee Saga deals with the physical, social, sexual, recreational, and scientific nature of cyberspace before William Gibson's award-winning Neuromancer, and the interactions between cyberspace and "meatspace" commonly depicted in cyberpunk fiction. In Neuromancer, a hacking tool used by the main character is an artificial infomorph of a notorious cyber-criminal, Dixie Flatline. The infomorph only assists in exchange for the promise that he be deleted after the mission is complete.

In the 1982 novel Software, part of the Ware Tetralogy by Rudy Rucker, one of the main characters, Cobb Anderson, has his mind uploaded and his body replaced with an extremely human-like android body. The robots who persuade Anderson into doing this sell the process to him as a way to become immortal.

In the 1997 novel "Shade's Children" by Garth Nix, one of the main characters Shade (a.k.a. Robert Ingman) is an uploaded consciousness that guides the other characters through the post-apocolyptic world in which they live.

The fiction of Greg Egan has explored many of the philosophical, ethical, legal, and identity aspects of mind uploading, as well as the financial and computing aspects (i.e., hardware, software, processing power) of maintaining "copies". In Egan's Permutation City and Diaspora, "copies" are made by computer simulation of scanned brain physiology. Also, in Egan's "Jewelhead" stories, the mind is transferred from the organic brain to a small, immortal backup computer at the base of the skull, with the organic brain then being surgically removed.

The Takeshi Kovacs novels by Richard Morgan was set in a universe where mind transfers were a part of standard life. With the use of cortical stacks, which record a person's memories and personality into a device implanted in the spinal vertebrae, it was possible to copy the individual's mind to a storage system at the time of death. The stack could be uploaded to a virtual reality environment for interrogation, entertainment, or to pass the time for long distance travel. The stack could also be implanted into a new body or "sleeve" which may or may not have biomechanical, genetic, or chemical "upgrades" since the sleeve could be grown or manufactured. Interstellar travel is most often accomplished by digitized human freight ("dhf") over faster-than-light needlecast transmission.

In the "Requiem for Homo Sapiens" series of novels by David Zindell (Neverness, The Broken God, The Wild, and War in Heaven), the verb "cark" is used for uploading one's mind (and also for changing one's DNA). Carking is done for soul-preservation purposes by the members of the Architects church, and also for more sinister (or simply unknowable) purposes by the various "gods" that populate the galaxy such gods being human minds that have now grown into planet- or nebula-sized synthetic brains. The climax of the series centers around the struggle to prevent one character from creating a Universal Computer (under his control) that will incorporate all human minds (and indeed, the entire structure of the universe).

In the popular computer game Total Annihilation, the 4,000-year war that eventually culminated with the destruction of the Milky Way galaxy was started over the issue of mind transfer, with one group (the Arm) resisting another group (the Core) who were attempting to enforce a 100% conversion rate of humanity into machines, because machines are durable and modular, thereby making it a "public health measure."

In the popular science fiction show Stargate SG-1 the alien race who call themselves the Asgard rely solely on cloning and mind transferring to continue their existence. This was not a choice they made, but a result of the decay of the Asgard genome due to excessive cloning, which also caused the Asgard to lose their ability to reproduce. In the episode "Tin Man", SG-1 encounter Harlan, the last of a race that transferred their minds to robots in order to survive. SG-1 then discover that their minds have also been transferred to robot bodies. Eventually they learn that their minds were copied rather than uploaded and that the "original" SG-1 are still alive.

The Thirteenth Floor is a film made in 1999 directed by Josef Rusnak. In the film, a scientific team discovers a technology to create a fully functioning virtual world which they could experience by taking control of the bodies of simulated characters in the world, all of whom were self-aware. One plot twist was that if the virtual body a person had taken control of was killed in the simulation while they were controlling it, then the mind of the simulated character the body originally belonged to would take over the body of that person in the "real world".

The Matrix is a film released the same year as The Thirteenth Floor that has the same kind of solipsistic philosophy. In The Matrix, the protagonist Neo finds out that the world he has been living in is nothing but a simulated dreamworld. However, this should be considered as virtual reality rather than mind uploading, since Neo's physical brain still is required to reside his mind. The mind (the information content of the brain) is not copied into an emulated brain in a computer. Neo's physical brain is connected into the Matrix via a brain-machine interface. Only the rest of the physical body is simulated. Neo is disconnected from this dreamworld by human rebels fighting against AI-driven machines in what seems to be a neverending war. During the course of the movie, Neo and his friends are connected back into the Matrix dreamworld in order to fight the machine race.

In the series Battlestar Galactica the antagonists of the story are the Cylons, sentient computers created by man which developed to become nearly identical to human beings. When they die they rely on mind transferring to keep on living so that "death becomes a learning experience".

The 1995 movie Strange Days explores the idea of a technology capable of recording a conscious event. However, in this case, the mind itself is not uploaded into the device. The recorded event, which time frame is limited to that of the recording session, is frozen in time on a data disc much like today's audio and video. Wearing the "helmet" in playback mode, another person can experience the external stimuli interpretation of the brain, the memories, the feelings, the thoughts and the actions that the original person recorded from his/her life. During playback, the observer temporarily quits his own memories and state of consciousness (the real self). In other words, one can "live" a moment in the life of another person, and one can "live" the same moment of his/her life more than once. In the movie, a direct link to a remote helmet can also be established, allowing another person to experience a live event.

Followers of the Ralian religion advocate mind uploading in the process of human cloning to achieve eternal life. Living inside of a computer is also seen by followers as an eminent possibility.[13]

However, mind uploading is also advocated by a number of secular researchers in neuroscience and artificial intelligence, such as Marvin Minsky. In 1993, Joe Strout created a small web site called the Mind Uploading Home Page, and began advocating the idea in Cryonics circles and elsewhere on the net. That site has not been actively updated in recent years, but it has spawned other sites including MindUploading.org, run by Randal A. Koene, Ph.D., who also moderates a mailing list on the topic. These advocates see mind uploading as a medical procedure which could eventually save countless lives.

Many Transhumanists look forward to the development and deployment of mind uploading technology, with many predicting that it will become possible within the 21st century due to technological trends such as Moore's Law. Many view it as the end phase of the Transhumanist project, which might be said to begin with the genetic engineering of biological humans, continue with the cybernetic enhancement of genetically engineered humans, and finally obtain with the replacement of all remaining biological aspects.

The book Beyond Humanity: CyberEvolution and Future Minds by Gregory S. Paul & Earl D. Cox, is about the eventual (and, to the authors, almost inevitable) evolution of computers into sentient beings, but also deals with human mind transfer.

Raymond Kurzweil, a prominent advocate of transhumanism and the likelihood of a technological singularity, has suggested that the easiest path to human-level artificial intelligence may lie in "reverse-engineering the human brain", which he usually uses to refer to the creation of a new intelligence based on the general "principles of operation" of the brain, but he also sometimes uses the term to refer to the notion of uploading individual human minds based on highly detailed scans and simulations. This idea is discussed on pp. 198-203 of his book The Singularity is Near, for example.

Hans Moravec describes and advocates mind uploading in both his 1988 book Mind Children: The Future of Robot and Human Intelligence and also his 2000 book Robot: Mere Machine to Transcendent Mind. Moravec is referred to by Marvin Minsky in Minsky's essay Will Robots Inherit the Earth?.[14]

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Mind Uploading

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Welcome

Minduploading.org is a collection of pages and articles designed to explore the concepts underlying mind uploading. The articles are intended to be a readable introduction to the basic technical and philosophical topics covering mind uploading and substrate-independent minds. The focus is on careful definitions of the common terms and what the implications are if mind uploading becomes possible.

Mind uploading is an ongoing area of active research, bringing together ideas from neuroscience, computer science, engineering, and philosophy. This site refers to a number of participants and researchers who are helping to make mind uploading possible.

Realistically, mind uploading likely lies many decades in the future, but the short-term offers the possibility of advanced neural prostheses that may benefit us.

Mind uploading is a popular term for a process by which the mind, a collection of memories, personality, and attributes of a specific individual, is transferred from its original biological brain to an artificial computational substrate. Alternative terms for mind uploading have appeared in fiction and non-fiction, such as mind transfer, mind downloading, off-loading, side-loading, and several others. They all refer to the same general concept of transferring the mind to a different substrate.

Once it is possible to move a mind from one substrate to another, it is then called a substrate-independent mind (SIM). The concept of SIM is inspired by the idea of designing software that can run on multiple computers with different hardware without needing to be rewritten. For example, Javas design principle write once, run everywhere makes it a platform independent system. In this context, substrate is a term referring to a generalized concept of any computational platform that is capable of universal computation.

We take the materialist position that the human mind is solely generated by the brain and is a function of neural states. Additionally, we assume that the neural states are computational processes and devices capable of universal computing are sufficient to generate the same kind of computational processes found in a brain.

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Mind uploading – RationalWiki

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Mind uploading could use some help. Please research the article's assertions. Whatever is credible should be sourced, and what is not should be removed.

Mind uploading is a science fictional trope and popular desired actualization among transhumanists. It's also one of the hypothesised solutions to bringing people back from cryonics. It posits that your soul 'mind pattern' can be implemented in a computer.

The first, and main, problem is that the "mind" isn't a physical thing. "Minds" are emergent properties of living brains. So what you would need to do is preserve is all the electrical, chemical and physical information contained in a living connected-up brain at one particular instant, and then recreate that exact instantaneous set of electrical and chemical data in a new physical substrate and get it set up so that it immediately created the same set of emergent properties. This is not going to happen soon and, perhaps, ever.

Nevertheless proponents typically will say you just need to preserve a dead person's brain, slice it very thinly, scan each piece with microscopes, and reconstruct and run the connections on a computer. With continued exponential improvements in computing, this will soon be possible!

Except it isn't that simple. The brain is not a 'computer' as such, and the neurons are much more complicated than the simplified 'neurons' of machine learning. It isn't feasible to preserve a dying brain before cell death destroys much of the information you are trying to get. Even if it were, preservation techniques only allow one to see the structure of the connections between neurons, but further electrical and chemical detail is lost.

The brain, like any organ, works via biochemistry. It doesn't have a standardized computer architecture whereby you can download data. Vital information of the distribution of various molecules and how they are distributed and interact needs to be recorded, but this is heavily damaged by any preservation solution. There does not appear to be a way, even in theory, to preserve the biochemistry in a readable state. Not only that, but the brain is a wet, organic analogue processor; it will certainly not be possible to copy it to dry, inorganic digital silicon without massive changes to the enormous amounts of data you would need to obtain.

As biologist PZ Myers - who freezes zebrafish brains a whole lot, and would be delighted to have anything recoverable at the end - explained:

We dont have a method to lock down the state of a 1.5kg brain. What youre going to be recording is the dying brain, with cells spewing and collapsing and triggering apoptotic activity everywhere. And thats another thing: what the heck is going to be recorded? You need to measure the epigenetic state of every nucleus, the distribution of highly specific, low copy number molecules in every dendritic spine, the state of molecules in flux along transport pathways, and the precise concentration of all ions in every single compartment. Does anyone have a fixation method that preserves the chemical state of the tissue? All the ones I know of involve chemically modifying the cells and proteins and fluid environment. Does anyone have a scanning technique that records a complete chemical breakdown of every complex component present?

The concept has been criticized further by Myers[2][3][4] and by neuroscientist Kenneth D. Miller.[5]

Additionally, computer emulations of brain activity, even if it was just the connections between neurons, are not going to be affordable. This means that the price of computing cannot keep falling like it has, so the enormous supercomputers that would be required to run any uploaded mind would be unaffordable, even in the future.

It seems likely that the best and most efficient medium for running a human mind is a human brain, so keep yours in good working order.

The less crazy transhumanist think that brain uploading would involve cutting up the brain. [6] The more crazy guys think that nanotech would allow a slow and steady replacement of brain's tissue to the computing substrate. [7]

Several metaphysical questions are brought up by the prospect of mind uploading. Like many such questions, these may not be objectively answerable, and philosophers would no doubt continue to debate them even if uploading somehow became a reality.

The first major philosophical question is more or less falsifiable: whether consciousness is artificially replicable in its entirety. In other words, assuming that consciousness is not magic, and that the brain is the seat of consciousness, does it depend on any special functions or quantum mechanical effects that cannot ever be replicated on another substrate? This question, of course, remains unanswered although, considering the current state of cognitive science, it is not unreasonable to think that consciousness will be found to be replicable in the future.

Assuming that consciousness is proven to be artificially replicable, the second question is whether the "strong AI hypothesis" is justified or not: if a machine accurately replicates consciousness, such that it passes a Turing Test or is otherwise indistinguishable from a natural human being, is the machine really conscious, or is it a soulless mechanism that merely imitates consciousness?

Third, assuming that a machine can actually be conscious (which is no great stretch of the imagination, considering that the human brain is essentially a biological machine), is a copy of your consciousness really you? Is it even possible to copy consciousness? Is mind uploading really a ticket to immortality, in that "you" or your identity can be "uploaded"?

Advocates of mind uploading take the functionalist/reductionist approach of defining human existence as the identity, which is based on memories and personalities rather than physical substrates or subjectivity.[8] They believe that the identity is essential; the copy of the mind holds just as much claim to being that person as the original, even if both were to exist simultaneously. When the physical body of a copied person dies, nothing that defines the person as an individual has been lost. In this context, all that matters is that the memories and personality of the individual are preserved. As the recently murdered protagonist states in Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom, "I feel like me and no one else is making that claim. Who cares if I've been restored from a backup?"

Skeptics of mind uploading[9] question if it's possible to transfer a consciousness from one substrate to another, and hold that this is critical to the life-extension application of mind uploading. The transfer of identity is similar to the process of transferring data from one computer hard drive to another. The new person would be a copy of the original; a new consciousness with the same identity. With this approach, mind uploading would simply create a "mind-clone"[10] an artificial person with an identity gleaned from another. The philosophical problem with uploading "yourself" to a computer is very similar to the "swamp man" and teleportation thought experiments. [11] Suppose Alec Davidson goes hiking in the swamp and is struck and killed by a lightning bolt. At the same time, nearby in the swamp another lightning bolt spontaneously rearranges a bunch of molecules such that, entirely by coincidence, they take on exactly the same form that Dr. Holland's Davidson's body had at the moment of his untimely death. This being, whom Davidson terms Swamp Thing "Swampman," has, of course, a brain which is structurally identical to that which Davidson had, and will thus, presumably, behave exactly as Davidson would have. He will walk out of the swamp, return to Davidson's office at Berkeley, and write the same essays he would have written; he will interact like an amicable person with all of Davidson's friends and family, and so forth. This is one reason that has led critics to say it's not at all clear that the concept mind uploading is even meaningful. [12] For the skeptic, the thought of permanently losing subjective consciousness (death), while another consciousness that shares their identity lives on yields no comfort. Daniel Dennett, in Consciousness Explained, has called into question the validity of these sorts of thought experiments altogether, maintaining that when a thought experiment is too far removed from the actual state of affairs, our intuitions cease to be meaningful.

Consciousness is currently (poorly) understood to be an epiphenomenon of brain activity specifically of the cerebral cortex[13]. Identity and consciousness are distinct from one another though presumably the former could not exist without the latter. Unlike an identity, which is a composition of information stored within a brain it is reasonable to assume that a particular subjective consciousness is an intrinsic property of a particular physical brain. Thus, even a perfect physical copy of that brain would not share the subjective consciousness of that brain. This holds true of all 'brains' (consciousness-producing machines), biological or otherwise. When/if non-biological brains are ever developed/discovered it would be reasonable to assume that each would have its own intrinsic, non-transferable subjective consciousness, independent of its identity. It is likely that mind uploading would preserve an identity, if not the subjective consciousness that begot it. If identity rather than subjective consciousness is taken to be the essential, mind uploading succeeds in the opinion of mind-uploading-immortalist advocates.

Mind uploading has also ethical issues, especially in what refers to duplicates of a given self, as well as others relatives to the harmful things that could be done on what basically would now be an equivalent of a computer file or program, and that (at least for now and at least not so easily too) cannot happen in a human mind -namely, erasing it or destroying the computer that is running the simulation/storing the uploaded mind killing for good the person, modifying its contents deleting and/or adding others, merging two or more previous selves into other and vice-versa, being copied or moved ad infinitum, messing with inputs (sort of sending someone to a "digital heaven" or a "digital hell" -or worse-), messing with the way time is felt by the uploaded speeding or slowing the simulation (or causing it to enter into an infinite loop), infecting a mind with the equivalent of a computer virus (or rather the equivalent of a neurological disease)... the list goes on-.

Believing that there is some mystical "essence" to consciousness that isn't preserved by copying is ultimately a form of dualism, however. Humans lose consciousness at least daily, yet still remain the same person in the morning. In the extreme, humans completely cease all activity, brain or otherwise, during deep hypothermic circulatory arrest, yet still remain the same person on resuscitation,[14] demonstrating that continuity of consciousness is not necessary for identity or personhood. Rather, the properties that make us identifiable as individuals are stored in the physical structure of the brain.

Ultimately, this is a subjective problem, not an objective one: If a copy is made of a book, is it still the same book? It depends if you subjectively consider "the book" to be the physical artifact or the information contained within. Is it the same book that was once held by Isaac Newton? No. Is it the same book that was once read by Isaac Newton? Yes.

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COVID-19 Daily Update 8-7-2020 – West Virginia Department of Health and Human Resources

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The West Virginia Department of Health andHuman Resources (DHHR) reports as of 10:00 a.m., on August 7,2020, there have been 312,521 total confirmatorylaboratory results received for COVID-19, with 7,433 totalcases and 127 deaths.

DHHR has confirmed the deaths of an81-year old female from Pleasants County, a 66-year old male from Mingo Countyand a 73-year old male from Mingo County. We offer our deepest sympathies to thefamilies as our state grieves more losses due to COVID-19, said Bill J.Crouch, DHHR Cabinet Secretary.

In alignment with updated definitions fromthe Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the dashboard includes probablecases which are individuals that have symptoms and either serologic (antibody)or epidemiologic (e.g., a link to a confirmed case) evidence of disease, but noconfirmatory test.

CASESPER COUNTY (Case confirmed by lab test/Probable case):Barbour (29/0), Berkeley (658/28), Boone(97/0), Braxton (8/0), Brooke (61/1), Cabell (364/9), Calhoun (6/0), Clay(17/1), Doddridge (5/0), Fayette (140/0), Gilmer (16/0), Grant (116/1),Greenbrier (91/0), Hampshire (76/0), Hancock (105/4), Hardy (57/1), Harrison(213/1), Jackson (162/0), Jefferson (288/6), Kanawha (885/13), Lewis (28/1),Lincoln (81/0), Logan (209/0), Marion (179/4), Marshall (126/4), Mason (54/0),McDowell (57/1), Mercer (177/0), Mineral (115/2), Mingo (156/2), Monongalia(918/17), Monroe (20/1), Morgan (25/1), Nicholas (35/1), Ohio (263/3),Pendleton (39/1), Pleasants (11/1), Pocahontas (40/1), Preston (101/21), Putnam(185/1), Raleigh (208/7), Randolph (204/4), Ritchie (3/0), Roane (15/0),Summers (7/0), Taylor (55/1), Tucker (11/0), Tyler (13/0), Upshur (36/3), Wayne(198/2), Webster (4/0), Wetzel (42/0), Wirt (6/0), Wood (231/12), Wyoming(31/0).

As case surveillance continues at thelocal health department level, it may reveal that those tested in a certaincounty may not be a resident of that county, or even the state as an individualin question may have crossed the state border to be tested.Such is the case of Preston County in this report.

Specificallyregarding the change in cases for Grant and Pendleton counties in this report,when the tests were administered in these counties the facility left someaddress fields blank therefore the address on file resorted back to thehistoric address on file for an individual which was not necessarily consideredtheir current address.

Pleasenote that delays may be experienced with the reporting of information from thelocal health department to DHHR. Visitthe dashboard at http://www.coronavirus.wv.gov for more detailed information.

On July 24,2020, Gov. Jim Justice announced that DHHR, the agency in charge of reportingthe number of COVID-19 cases, will transition from providing twice-dailyupdates to one report every 24 hours. This became effective August 1, 2020.

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COVID-19 Daily Update 8-7-2020 - West Virginia Department of Health and Human Resources

COVID-19 Daily Update 8-5-2020 – West Virginia Department of Health and Human Resources

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The West Virginia Department of Health andHuman Resources (DHHR) reports as of 10:00 a.m., on August 5,2020, there have been 302,443 total confirmatorylaboratory results received for COVID-19, with 7,159 totalcases and 124 deaths.

In alignment with updated definitions fromthe Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the dashboard includes probablecases which are individuals that have symptoms and either serologic (antibody)or epidemiologic (e.g., a link to a confirmed case) evidence of disease, but noconfirmatory test.

CASESPER COUNTY (Case confirmed by lab test/Probable case):Barbour (30/0), Berkeley (643/27), Boone (92/0), Braxton (8/0), Brooke(60/1), Cabell (353/9), Calhoun (6/0), Clay (17/1), Doddridge (4/0), Fayette(134/0), Gilmer (16/0), Grant (88/1), Greenbrier (88/0), Hampshire (75/0),Hancock (102/4), Hardy (53/1), Harrison (203/1), Jackson (158/0), Jefferson(287/5), Kanawha (843/13), Lewis (27/1), Lincoln (75/0), Logan (162/0), Marion(175/4), Marshall (126/3), Mason (51/0), McDowell (47/1), Mercer (173/0),Mineral (114/2), Mingo (151/2), Monongalia (913/16), Monroe (18/1), Morgan(25/1), Nicholas (32/1), Ohio (262/1), Pendleton (41/1), Pleasants (8/1),Pocahontas (40/1), Preston (102/23), Putnam (173/1), Raleigh (200/7), Randolph(203/3), Ritchie (3/0), Roane (14/0), Summers (7/0), Taylor (54/1), Tucker(11/0), Tyler (12/0), Upshur (36/3), Wayne (192/2), Webster (3/0), Wetzel(40/0), Wirt (6/0), Wood (228/12), Wyoming (24/0).

As case surveillance continues at thelocal health department level, it may reveal that those tested in a certaincounty may not be a resident of that county, or even the state as an individualin question may have crossed the state border to be tested.

Pleasenote that delays may be experienced with the reporting of information from thelocal health department to DHHR. Visitthe dashboard at http://www.coronavirus.wv.gov for more detailed information.

On July 24,2020, Gov. Jim Justice announced that DHHR, the agency in charge of reportingthe number of COVID-19 cases, will transition from providing twice-dailyupdates to one report every 24 hours. This became effective August 1, 2020.

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COVID-19 Daily Update 8-5-2020 - West Virginia Department of Health and Human Resources

UCSF’s Global Health Institute Fights COVID-19 Around the World – UCSF News Services

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People wear masks as they walk through an outdoor market in Brazil, a country that has seen skyrocketing numbers of COVID-19 cases. Getty Images

UC San Francisco has spearheaded campaigns across the globe to stop the spread of deadly diseases such as malaria, measles and AIDS in developing countries. Now UCSFs Institute for Global Health Sciences (IGHS) is building upon lessons learned to help low- and middle-income countries fight COVID-19, a disease that hits the poorest among us the hardest.

The Bay Areas success flattening the COVID curve during the spring meant UCSF could send teams to New York and the Navajo Nation to support weary health workers. But even as the SARS-CoV-2 virus is spiking in California and across the U.S., global health leaders say our experience as challenging as it is may pale in comparison to the outbreaks developing in countries with fewer resources.

COVID-19 wreaks its greatest havoc on communities of color, sickening and killing Latinx and Black people in the U.S. at numbers significantly higher than those of white people, due to social and racial injustices. Such inequities are even more stark in developing countries where hospitals are few, food is scarce, and struggling families earn less than $5 a day. Experts predict the number of deaths from COVID-19 will be far worse in poorer nations compared to wealthier ones where 100 to 1,000 times more is spent per person per year on health care.

Everyone in global health is incredibly conscious that this is an unfolding catastrophe. The numbers in Brazil have been rocketing upwards. India and all its neighbors are facing an explosive pandemic, said Sir Richard Feachem, PhD, DSc, director of the Global Health Group (GHG), an IGHS action tank that translates bold ideas in global health into large-scale operations that impact millions of people. Not only will the coronavirus cause much sickness and death, but we also face major setbacks in malaria, HIV, tuberculosis, and childhood immunization, to name four, because health systems are overwhelmed and supply chains disrupted.

It is the worsening crisis along the U.S. border with our southern neighbor that worries Jaime Sepulveda, MD, MPH, DrSc, MSc, the IGHS executive director and Haile T. Debas Distinguished Professor in Global Health Sciences. As of Aug. 2, Mexico had 424,600 cases and 46,700 deaths, a toll that is now third highest in the world, behind the U.S. with the most deaths followed by Brazil. Sepulveda, who served as director-general of Mexicos National Institute of Public Health, has traveled to Tijuana, Mexico, several times since last fall to visit the detention and refugee camps.

It is the perfect storm for having a huge outbreak in those squalid camps, where thousands and thousands of people are living in miserable conditions crowding, no water, no sanitation. If nothing is done, he predicted, there is a risk of large outbreaks and continuing chains of transmission among migrant families. The consequences are dire indeed.

Since April, IGHS has mobilized its international partners, resources and expertise to fight the coronavirus in Africa, Central America and South Asia under the leadership of Feachem and Sepulveda. Experience gained in malaria eradication and AIDS control around the world has given these global veterans technical know-how, expertise in building systems to tackle disease outbreaks, and strong partnerships with other like-minded organizations to combat COVID-19. Their record speaks for itself: Working with the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the GHG and its partners cut worldwide malaria incidence by 36 percent and death rates by 60 percent since 2000. Today, more than half of the worlds countries are malaria-free largely due to the on-the-ground efforts of this team.

Those working in the global sphere know that measures that slow disease spread in richer nations, i.e. lockdowns, will not work in poorer ones where many citizens are day laborers living in crowded, urban slums. Lockdown is a middle-class luxury that would lead to starvation and misery on an extraordinary scale in these countries, Feachem said, so we are relying on other measures and other combinations of interventions to slow transmission.

Lockdown is a middle-class luxury that would lead to starvation and misery on an extraordinary scale in these countries, so we are relying on other measures and other combinations of interventions to slow transmission.

Sir Richard Feachem, PhD, DSc

Jeremy Alberga, the GHGs deputy director, said each country is developing its own pandemic playbook that uses surveillance, diagnostic tools and therapeutic remedies to inform public health responses and conserve scarce resources. Working closely with partners IDinsight and Evidence Action in Kenya, Uganda, Zimbabwe and India, UCSF has launched the Pandemic Community Response and Resilience Initiative, which employs a three-pronged approach:

Longtime global health supporter Unorthodox Philanthropy fully supports the IGHSs efforts to develop community-based COVID-19 responses, knowing its $200,000 investment goes further in poorer countries. "With more than a decade at the forefront of fighting infectious diseases, the Global Health Group knows how to help countries find their own path to fight the novel coronavirus, the foundation said in a statement. The GHG is expert at taking scientific research and translating it into actionable policy that meets each nation's particular needs.

Public radio producer Wendy Holcombe, a member of the IGHSs leadership council, and her husband, Carl Kawaja, chairman of Capital Research and Management Company and a member of the UCSF Board of Overseers, are enthusiastic supporters of UCSFs global efforts, and gave $500,000 in 2020.

"The COVID-19 pandemic has made clear the vital importance of the institutes work, Holcombe said. We admire the team and want to support them as they tackle COVID-19 and other global health challenges of the future. We also recognize that because were located in this unique ecosystem of the Bay Area, we can take advantage of the knowledge and skills here to make positive changes around the world."

Feachem and Sepulveda say that until a vaccine is discovered and distributed, their efforts will require buying testing kits, identifying infected individuals, tracing contacts, isolating and treating those who are sick, and implementing basic hygiene measures. Both leaders are turning to their networks, including the 300 Global Health Institute-affiliated faculty members, and philanthropic partners to help advance these crucial endeavors.

For those in the global sphere, COVID-19 has thrown into stark relief a maxim they already knew was true: We all sink or we all swim. Were in this together, Feachem said. Noting how the virus spread to every country in the world in its first three months, he added, There's no wall that any country can build to protect itself from COVID-19 or the next pandemic, which could be worse.

Both Feachem and Sepulveda somberly noted that the toll from paused efforts to fight other infectious diseases like measles, AIDS, and malaria could be even higher than that of COVID-19. But they agree that today the priority is to get a grip on this deadly virus as cases continue to climb around the world.

We need to be working with other countries and the World Health Organization to bring the numbers down, Feachem said. When we have new drugs, we must distribute them widely, and when we have a vaccine, we must distribute it widely. This really is a collective enterprise.

Sepulveda wholeheartedly agreed. This is the fastest expanding pandemic mankind has ever seen. But eventually we will conquer the virus, as we have done with every other bug in history. It will be at a huge cost to society. And when we emerge, it will be a new world.

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UCSF's Global Health Institute Fights COVID-19 Around the World - UCSF News Services

NFL, NFLPA agree to tweak COVID-19 testing protocols – ESPN

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The NFL and the NFL Players Association have tweaked their coronavirus testing procedures in an attempt to separate "false-positive" results from active infections, the league said in a memo sent to clubs Friday.

The policy will apply to any Tier 1 or Tier 2 employee -- including all players and coaches -- who produces a positive test but is asymptomatic and has no known history of a coronavirus infection. If the person meets those criteria, the league will require two additional tests within 24 hours. If both of those tests come back negative, the person will be allowed to resume normal activity.

List of NFL players who are opting out Could players wear masks during season? Football historians discuss 1918 pandemic No bubble for NFL play? Why league said no Calendar: Coronavirus-impacted schedules

The change comes less than a week after Detroit Lions quarterback Matthew Stafford was placed on the reserve/COVID-19 list because of one positive test during the league's training camp intake process. Stafford later tested negative three times and was reinstated to the active roster.

Dr. Allen Sills, the NFL's chief medical officer, said Friday that the league has conducted 75,000 tests in the past two weeks and remains committed to evolving the league's policy whenever necessary.

"We've always wanted to make sure that we provide the most accurate test results," Sills said. "In doing 75,000 tests over the first two weeks, you collect a lot of learning. We are constantly looking at all aspects of the protocol and how we can make it better. ...

"What we're trying to do here is be really, radically transparent. We're trying to tell you, 'This is what we're learning and seeing in real time, here are the steps we're making to adjust.' And I expect that process to continue over the course of this season."

The NFLPA announced Thursday on its website that 56 players have tested positive since the start of training camp. Sills declined to confirm that number, however. He said that IQVIA, the league's health data analyst, is in the process of reconciling positive test numbers to understand how many revealed actual infections and how many were either "persistent" -- a result of a previous infection that is no longer active -- or otherwise inconclusive. The league is not using the term "false positive," an NFL adviser said, because the tests are considered accurate but sometimes identify remnants of an inactive infection or, in some cases, an immunological response to a virus other than COVID-19.

To this point, NFL players had been placed on the reserve/COVID-19 list if they had any positive test or if they were determined to have had close contact with someone who was infected.

In the memo, the NFL also reminded teams that all Tier 1 and Tier 2 employees must wear masks inside their team buildings, and that a face shield is not an acceptable substitute. Also, the league continued to encourage players to test out custom Oakley mouth shields that can be attached to their helmets. Another suggested option is to wear a neck gaiter. Neither is required, however.

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Ohio governors COVID-19 results show tests imperfections – WANE

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Posted: Aug 8, 2020 / 07:43 AM EDT / Updated: Aug 8, 2020 / 07:43 AM EDT

WASHINGTON (AP) Ohio Gov. Mike DeWines positive-then-negative test results for the coronavirus are a reminder that no test is definitive.

The governor tested positive using a rapid test Thursday, before testing negative later in the day using a more sensitive laboratory-developed test. He was tested because he was going to meet with President Donald Trump during his visit to the state.

No test for coronavirus infection is perfect, and test results can be affected by a variety of factors, including the type of test used, the quality of the sample and when it was taken during the course of any infection.

A look at the types of tests currently used to diagnose COVID-19:

ANTIGEN TEST

DeWine initially received an antigen test, a type of rapid test that uses similar technology for screening for flu, strep throat and other infections on small machines at doctors offices.

Instead of detecting the virus itself, such tests look for proteins, or antigens, found on the surface of the virus, which are generally considered a less accurate measure of infection. The test, which uses a nasal swab, takes about 15 minutes.

The tests are relatively new in the U.S. and federal regulators have only allowed two on the market, from manufacturers Quidel and Becton Dickinson. DeWine spokesman Dan Tierney said a Quidel test was used for DeWine; a spokesman for Quidel said the company is looking into the matter.

The biggest risk with antigen tests is that they may deliver false negatives, missing real COVID-19 infections. But they are considered very accurate for ruling out the virus when it is not present, making false positive results highly unlikely.

Some experts have been calling for increased use of antigen tests because they can be developed quickly, avoiding the delayed results frequently seen with higher-grade tests that must be shipped to a laboratory for processing.

GENETIC TEST

After testing positive with the antigen test, DeWine said he and his wife received a genetic, laboratory-developed test that came back negative. This is the most commonly used test in the U.S. and is considered the gold standard for accuracy.

A nasal swab is mixed with chemicals to isolate any genetic material of coronavirus. Laboratory equipment is used to amplify the material millions of times, until it is detectable with a computer.

These tests take several hours to process and are done at large laboratories, hospitals or universities. They are considered the best method for both detecting whether the virus is present and ruling it out if theres no infection.

A third type of test uses technology similar to the genetic test but speeds up the process dramatically to deliver results in about 15 minutes. These tests done on small machines are used at the White House and at nursing homes to rapidly screen for the virus. But federal regulators consider them slightly less sensitive than the conventional laboratory test.

In either case, accuracy can be affected by a faulty nasal swab and where the person is in terms of the course of the infection. Even the most accurate genetic test usually only begins detecting virus three to five days after initial infection, when levels are high enough to be picked up.

Farnoush Amiri contributed to this report from Columbus, Ohio.

The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institutes Department of Science Education. The AP is solely responsible for all content.

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Ohio governors COVID-19 results show tests imperfections - WANE

The Many Symptoms of Covid-19 – The New York Times

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Rob Gregson, 52, of South Orange, N.J., went to bed feeling under the weather and woke up with chest tightness, a weird cough, difficulty breathing and crazy fatigue. It was March 11, just before lockdowns were imposed, and he immediately suspected Covid-19. But because he never had a fever, it took him more than a week to find a doctor to help and get a swab test. He tested positive.

Its been the fatigue that is the most debilitating, said Mr. Gregson, executive director of a faith-based nonprofit, adding that hes still struggling to regain his stamina nearly five months later. Ive been on the coronavirus roller coaster, feeling better and thinking Ill be OK, then it comes roaring back.

When Erin, a 30-year-old who works for a nonprofit in Washington, D.C., first developed a cough and headache in May, she wasnt worried. I did not have a fever, and Id been very diligent about wearing a mask and washing my hands, so I figured it was allergies or a cold at the beginning, she said.

About four days after the cough began, Erin was hit with severe fatigue, sore throat, congestion, chills, body aches and a slight loss of sense of smell but still no fever. She also had one unusual symptom: severe pain in her hip muscles, which she described as really weird.

Although body aches are a common symptom of Covid-19, some patients are reporting severe joint and body pain, particularly in large muscles. Although its rare, Covid-19 can cause painful inflammation in the joints or lead to rhabdomyolysis, a serious and potentially life-threatening illness that can cause excruciating muscle pain in the shoulders, thighs or lower back.

A New York cyclist who developed severe leg pain in May was initially diagnosed via telemedicine with a bulging disc. She sought a second telemedicine opinion with Dr. Jordan Metzl, a sports medicine specialist at the Hospital for Special Surgery in New York, who asked her to move, twist and put pressure on her legs as he watched her on video.

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The Many Symptoms of Covid-19 - The New York Times

Harper’s COVID-19 outbreak: What a state report shows about who got infected and when – Lansing State Journal

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Harper's Restaurant photographed on Tuesday, June 23, 2020, in East Lansing.(Photo: Nick King/Lansing State Journal)

EAST LANSING Over the course of about a month, nearly 200 people from 18 counties tested positive for COVID-19 in connectionwith an outbreak at Harper's Brewpub.

The outbreak, which gained national media attention, infected 192 people, according to a state epidemiology report.

Of those infected, 146 visited the bar while it was open between June 8and June 20. Another 46 were infected after coming into contact with those people.

Read the latest on the outbreak: Harper's owners defend safety of bar before liquor commission after COVID-19 outbreak

To date, no one has been hospitalized as a result of the outbreak, though most of those infected have shown symptoms.

Here's what else the state report, shared by Ingham County Health Officer Linda Vail, reveals about the outbreak.

According to the report, there was a little more than a month between the first person showing symptoms and the person with thelast confirmed case either being referred to take a test or taking a test.

People who were at the bar started showing symptoms as soon as June 13 five daysafter the bar reopenedand as late as July 30.

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the incubation period for COVID-19 is as long as two weeks, with a median time of four to five days from exposure to symptoms onset.

The onset of symptoms spiked on June 21.

This graph shows when people infected in the Harper's outbreak started showing symptoms.(Photo: Courtesy of Ingham County Health Department)

The people they went on to infect started showing symptoms as early as June 18 and as late as July 5.

People who were referred for a test without first showing symptoms got a doctor's order or simply took the test as early as June 15.

This graph shows when people infected in the Harper's outbreak were referred for a COVID-19 test.(Photo: Courtesy of Ingham County Health Department)

Referrals spiked on June 25 and 26 after the increasing number of cases received widespread publicity.

The final referral related to the outbreak was on July 15.

Though no one infected had symptoms serious enough to go to the hospital, the majority of those infected as part of the outbreakdid get sick.

About 73% of people who tested positive in relation to the outbreak reported symptoms.

The most common symptoms were:

There is overlap in symptoms, which is why the percentageswhen added are greater than 100%.

No one showed evidence of pneumonia or reported acute respiratory distress, sepsis, organ failure, encephalitis or seizure.

Most people who were infected as a result of the outbreak were young, white adults.

The age of all those infected ranged from 3 to 79 years old, with 11 people age 50 or older testing positive through secondary contact with the virus.

People who were infected at the bar were 18 to 28 years old.

Nearly everyone infected was white about 87% of all those who tested positive.

Less than 10% combined were Black or Asian, and 3.6% identify themselves by more than one race or a race other than those listed in the report.

No one identified as Native American, Hawaiian or Pacific Islander.

People from 18 counties were infected, including two counties in which residents were only infected secondarily.

No one listed a county in the Upper Peninsula as their primary county of residence.

There were no secondary cases in Berrien, Kalamazoo, Lapeer, Livingston, Manistee, Midland, Ottawa or St. Clair county residents

There were only secondary cases in Isabella and Sanilac county residents.

The report doesn't make it clear whether secondary cases happened after people traveled or whether those people were infected in Ingham County and simply list the other counties as their primary place of residence.

There is no discussionof the outbreak just statistics in the report, which is dated July 24.

Contact reporter Megan Banta at mbanta@lsj.com. Follow her on Twitter @MeganBanta_1.

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Contact Tracers Arent Asking COVID-19-Positive Oregonians If Theyve Visited Restaurants – Eater Portland

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In almost all Oregon counties, on-site dining is allowed in some form: Restaurants can open their indoor dining rooms with socially distanced tables, or begin serving customers outside on patios. However, with more than 20,000 total cases, Oregon isnt out of the woods with COVID-19. And the role Oregon restaurants and bars play in the spread of COVID-19 is unclear, mostly because according to a senior health advisor at the Oregon Health Authority contact tracers arent asking Oregonians which restaurants theyve visited, if any.

In an OPB story, OHA advisor Ann Thomas says that the states overworked contact tracers arent asking about restaurants or bars during case interviews, partially because of the already lengthy interview process. We cant ask every little thing that you and I think of or would like to know, Thomas told the NPR affiliate. We dont ask if you were in a bar or restaurant.

The spread of COVID-19 at bars and restaurants, however, is more than hypothetical; many states across the country have attributed specific outbreaks and resurgences of COVID-19 cases to dining at restaurants at bars. In Texas, Gov. Greg Abbott attributed a June surge in cases to 20-somethings going to bars, and in Louisiana, health officials tied at least 100 coronavirus cases to bars, according to the New York Times.

When the employees of a restaurant contract COVID-19 and it spreads within the workplace, the Oregon Health Authority will include that restaurant in its weekly report; for instance, there are 14 cases traced to a McDonalds in Umatilla County. However, OPB reports that the Oregon Health Authority does not notify the patrons of restaurants with workplace outbreaks. We just dont have the manpower, Oregon state epidemiologist Dean Sidelinger told OPB. But that certainly doesnt mean theres been transmission in those settings.

Then again, getting clear lists of patrons at a restaurant or bar at a given time is difficult in Oregon; unlike states like Washington, Oregon bar and restaurant owners dont need to keep a list of patrons for contact tracing measures. Most Oregon restaurants and bars remain open for dine-in service, excluding Umatilla County.

Oregon health officials are adamant that there is no indication of significant spread traced back to restaurants or bars. What happens is, you find out that two people who work together in a bar had COVID. But they probably got it from their roommates, Thomas told OPB. We arent seeing a week later that you have 20 patrons who got it.

Is indoor dining safe? Oregons data cant say [OPB] Is It Safe to Eat at Restaurants Yet? [E] OHA COVID-19 News [Official] All Eyes on Bars as Virus Surges and Americans Go Drinking [NYT] Oregon COVID-19 status [JHU] Oregon Phase One restaurant guidance [OHA]

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Cybin Applauds TheraPsil’s Advocacy to Bring Psilocybin Therapy to Palliative Care of Canadian Patients – Business Wire

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TORONTO--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Cybin Corp. (Cybin or the Company), Canada's leading-edge mushroom life sciences company, is proud to applaud the efforts of TheraPsil, a non-profit coalition that advocates for legal, Special Access Programme (SAP) access to psilocybin therapy for palliative care of Canadians.

Recently, four Canadians battling incurable cancer were approved by the federal Minister of Health, Patty Hajdu, to use psilocybin therapy in the treatment of their end-of-life distress. According to TheraPsil, these four patients mark the first publicly-known individuals to receive a legal exemption from the Canadian Drugs and Substances Act, under Section 56, to access psychedelic therapy. They are also the first known patients to legally use psilocybin since the compound became illegal in Canada in 1974.

This is a watershed moment for the patients involved who deserve the right to manage their health challenges with dignity, said Paul Glavine, Co-founder of Cybin. Everyone at Cybin applauds the efforts of TheraPsil and these brave individuals, and we thank the Minister of Health for her foresight.

Former Ontario Health Minister and Cybin advisor, Dr. Eric Hoskins, praised Minister Hajdus approval. I am pleased to see this important step towards considering psilocybin as a natural compound with a growing body of experience of therapeutic uses for patients in need, rather than strictly a prohibited substance, Hoskins said. I joined Cybin because of their dedication to patients who need and benefit from psilocybin-assisted therapy."

Dr. Jukka Karjalainen, Cybins Chief Medical Officer concurs: This landmark recognition of the benefits of psilocybin is tremendous validation for our sector. Cybin is proud to applaud TheraPsils efforts, while continuing to focus on the development of a psilocybin oral film delivery system which will potentially alleviate the burden of pill consumption for seniors and patients in palliative care, who often have difficulty swallowing."

About Cybin

Cybin is a life sciences company advancing mushroom-based psychedelic and nutraceutical products for various psychiatric and neurologic conditions. Cybin is developing technology that seeks to improve bioavailability to achieve the desired effects of psychedelics at lower dosages. Cybin is developing products with new delivery systems and intends to support clinical trials to evaluate efficacy to potentially combat major depressive disorder and addiction and improve cognitive flexibility.

Forward Looking Statements

Certain statements in this press release constitute forward-looking information. All statements other than statements of historical fact contained in this press release, including, without limitation, those regarding the ability to receive all necessary approvals, the bioavailability and potential use of the oral film delivery system, the potential safety and efficacy of psilocybin administered in an orally-dissolving film, research and clinical trial programs, statements regarding Cybins future, strategy, plans, objectives, goals and targets, and any statements preceded by, followed by or that include the words believe, expect, aim, intend, plan, continue, will, may, would, anticipate, estimate, forecast, predict, project, seek, should or similar expressions or the negative thereof, are forward-looking statements. These statements are not historical facts but instead represent only Cybins expectations, estimates and projections regarding future events. These statements are not guaranteeing future performance and involve assumptions, risks and uncertainties that are difficult to predict. Therefore, actual results may differ materially from what is expressed, implied or forecasted in such forward-looking statements. The forward-looking information and forward-looking statements included in this press release are made as of the date of this press release. The Company does not undertake an obligation to update such forward-looking information or forward-looking information to reflect new information, subsequent events or otherwise unless required by applicable securities law.

More information about TheraPsil may be found on their website https://therapsil.ca/.

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US issues level 4 advisory warning against travel to The Bahamas – Loop News Jamaica

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Residents of the United States have been cautioned against travelling to The Bahamas.

On Thursday the US State Department issued a level four travel advisory for the Caribbean territory citing health and safety concerns and COVID-19 related conditions.

The advisory which was issued on Thursday said: "Do not travel to The Bahamas due tohealth and safety measures and COVID-related conditions.Exercise increased caution in The Bahamas due tocrime. Some areas have increased risk."

The State Department warned US residents to exercise extreme caution if they decided to venture to the Caribbean territory.

Included in the advisory was a country summary which read: "Violent crime, such as burglaries, armed robberies, and sexual assault, occurs even during the day and in tourist areas. Although the family islands are not crime-free, the vast majority of crime occurs on New Providence and Grand Bahama islands."

The Bahamas is the first country within the English speaking Caribbean to be on the receiving end of a level four travel advisory since the start of the pandemic.

The United States has approximately five million confirmed cases and has recorded over 160 thousand virus-related deaths.

On Thursday the Bahamas Ministry of Health recorded 10 new cases of COVID-19 bringing the total number of confirmed cases to 761.

Of the 10 new cases, 7 were recorded in New Providence, 2 in Bimini and 1 on the island of Abaco.

With concerns raised over the rate of infection in the territory, persons travelling from The Bahamas to Sweden and the United Kingdom will now be subject to a mandatory 14-day quarantine.

The Bahamas currently has 654 active cases of COVID-19.

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Foundations Aren’t What You Think: The Little-known Bahamas Private Wealth Structure Explained – Wealth Management – Bahamas – Mondaq News Alerts

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06 August 2020

Intertrust

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When you hear the word "foundation" your immediatecorrelation is probably "charity." But in the Bahamas,the definition has evolved from the classical philanthropic senseand foundations have become a formidable instrument to assist withprivate wealth planning.

The Bahamas Foundations Act, 2004 (later amended in 2007)relating to the appointment of a foundation agent, foundationcouncil and the rights of a beneficiary, is a relativelylittle-known private wealth vehicle. Over the years, we have seenthat certain instruments originating from common law jurisdictionsmay not be recognized in civil law jurisdictions, but foundationsare a dependable option due to their non-recognition, meaningthey're not subject to forced heirship statutes applied bycivil law countries.

Foundations are often referred to as a "hybrid," a termused because this instrument has attributes of a trust as well as acompany.

Here are the similarities of a foundation to a trust:

Has a settlor

The founder is similar to thesettlor

Settlor can have reservedpowers

Founder can have reservedpowers

Can be revoked

Can be revoked

Can be amended

Can be amended

Must have objects (assets)

Must have objects (assets)

Must have beneficiaries

Must have beneficiaries

No perpetuity period

No perpetuity period

May have a protector

May have a protector

After death of the settlor,probate is not necessary

After death of the founder,probate is not necessary

And here are the similarities of a foundation to a company:

Coupled with the Bahamas' stable regulatory framework,foundations are an untapped and practical private wealth option.Get in touch with an expert below to learn more.

The content of this article is intended to provide a generalguide to the subject matter. Specialist advice should be soughtabout your specific circumstances.

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Bahamas PM Assesses Isaias Damage on US Coast Guard Aircraft – US Embassy in The Bahamas

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A U.S. Coast Guard HC-144 Ocean Sentry takes off from Odyssey Aviation in Nassau, The Bahamas, on the way to an overflight of areas affected by Hurricane Isaias | August 2, 2020

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Public Affairs Sectionhttps://bs.usembassy.gov+1 (242) 322-1181 ext. 4220Nassau, The Bahamas | August 2, 2020

Less than 24 hours after Hurricane Isaias passed over The Bahamas, the United States provided aircraft support so that Prime Minister the Most Honorable Dr. Hubert Minnis could assess the damage, and the humanitarian needs of those in the storms wake.

Charg dAffaires Kevin OReilly accompanied the Prime Minister on the overflight, along with U.S. Coast Guard District 7 Commander Rear Admiral Eric Jones. The Honorable Desmond Bannister, Minister of Public Works; Captain Stephen Russell, Director of the National Emergency Management Agency; and Leader of the Opposition, Philip Davis also joined the overflight.

As Hurricane Isaias was still roaring over The Bahamas on August 1, the U.S. Embassy was putting in place a plan to provide a U.S. Coast Guard HC-144 Ocean Sentry so that the Prime Minister could fly over affected areas to assess the damage from the storm. Based out of Air Station Miami, the overflight went over Andros and the Berry Islands, before returning to New Providence due to prevailing weather conditions.

In the coming weeks the United States will continue to work with Bahamian partners at every level of government to strengthen disaster response in The Bahamas. Before Isaias struck, the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) activated a team of 11 Bahamas-based disaster experts to liaise with NEMA and humanitarian partners, and to help assess impacts and humanitarian needs, if required.

Long before Isaias had formed in the eastern Caribbean, the United States works year-round to reduce the riskand impactof disasters in the Caribbean. The USAID Bureau of Humanitarian Assistance has provided training to NEMA staff and other national and local emergency responders in The Bahamas, including courses on disaster risk reduction, school safety, shelter management, risk program management, and damage assessment and needs analysis. NEMA staff are now certified to teach the courses to others first responders, ensuring the wide implementation of the information and protocols across The Bahamas, thereby strengthening the entire countries ability to respond to a disaster.

By U.S. Embassy Nassau | 2 August, 2020 | Topics: Press Releases

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Bahamas PM Assesses Isaias Damage on US Coast Guard Aircraft - US Embassy in The Bahamas

Coronavirus UK live updates as arrivals from Belgium, Andorra and The Bahamas forced into quarantine – HullLive

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People arriving into the UK from Belgium, Andorra and The Bahamas will have to self-isolate after a rise in coronavirus cases.

Transport Secretary Grant Shapps confirmed on Thursday evening that the three countries will be removed from the UK travel corridor list.

It means anyone arriving into the UK from one of the three countries after 4am on Saturday will have to self-isolate for 14 days.

A statement on the Government website said: "Data from the Joint Biosecurity Centre and Public Health England has indicated a significant change in both the level and pace of confirmed cases of coronavirus (Covid-19) in all 3 destinations, leading to ministers removing these from the current list of travel corridors.

"There has been a consistent increase in COVID-19 cases per 100,000 of the population in Belgium since the middle of July, with a 4-fold increase in total cases over this time period. In Andorra, new cases per week have increased 5-fold over the same time period, while in The Bahamas the weekly case rate peaked at 78.6 last week, up from 3.1 in mid-July."

Mr Shapps tweeted: "Data shows we need to remove Andorra, Belgium and The Bahamas from our list of #coronavirus Travel Corridors in order to keep infection rates DOWN.

If you arrive in the UK after 0400 Saturday from these destinations, you will need to self-isolate for 14 days.

Meanwhile, a further 950 cases of coronavirus were confirmed in the UK on Thursday - the highest daily number for six weeks.

A total of 49 more deaths have also been confirmed, bringing the UK death toll to 46,413.

The worst affected areas in England remain Blackburn with Darwen, where there are 82.2 cases per 100,000 people. It is followed by Oldham, at 67.9, Pendle, at 58.6, and Leicester, at 52.2 cases.

Other areas where there have been increases are Swindon, Calderdale, Manchester, Preston and Tameside.

In Leeds, the city council has warned of clusters in Kirkstall and Harehills and says "further steps may need to be considered" if case numbers continue to increase.

In Hull, the infection rate in the seven days to August 3 is 1.9 - with five cases confirmed - compared to 3.5 in the seven days to July 27, when nine cases were confirmed.

Meanwhile, up to 135,000 people could lose their jobs at more than 100 of Britain's biggest firms due to coronavirus.

An audit carried out by the Daily Mail shows the severity of cuts likely to hit both here and abroad.

Analysis found that, of large firms that disclosed figures, 22,500 jobs are in retail, 18,100 in hospitality and 21,600 in travel and airlines.

For more of the latest updates, follow our live blog below.

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Coronavirus UK live updates as arrivals from Belgium, Andorra and The Bahamas forced into quarantine - HullLive