From NHI to THI (Transhuman Intelligences): Elaborating on the Extratempestrial Hypothesis with Evolutionary Psychology, AI Development, the Relativity of Death and Ontological Shock
Dr. Pascal Michael
1:00pm–2:30pm
Location: Atlantis Room
Michael Masters has put forward perhaps the most compelling interdisciplinary scientific account of the UAP and abduction phenomenon, the “Extratempestrial model”(ETM), concluding that these entities are in fact human beings from different points in our own future. This is predicated on the classic “Greys” conforming to what present-day humans would appear like if our trajectory of biological evolution was extrapolated into the far future (for instance, the correlated enlargement of cranium, brain & eyes; smaller stature, nose, mouth & waist; and paedomorphy i.e. retention of infantile features). Masters captivatingly asks the question, if us homosapiens were to go back in time and perform anthropological research on our Heidelbergensis ancestors, would they not report virtually an identical experience to what is reported in contemporary abductions? He further consolidates his argument by highlighting many well-known abduction cases which are best explained using his ETM hypothesis, such as Sergeant Penniston (UK), Terry Lovelace (US) & Corporal Valdez (Chille). However, the use of biological evolutionary trends is limited given the obvious way in which increasingly sophisticated technology halts previously relevant selection pressures on human evolution, particularly as technology is being integrated into human biology. Additionally, while current trends in evolutionary psychology could be extrapolated into what the mind of a Grey/future human may be comprised of, technology such as brain-computer-interfaces, instead of making the curveless predictable, may more predictably lead to an exponent of rational intelligence at the expense of the emotional, or even the spiritual. As such, these ETMs are the ultimate transhumans. When projecting present explosions in AI development into our future, we must also accept that AI would be seamlessly integrated into these later civilisations, which may- in a truly Fortean twist- mimic biological Greys according to the robotics principle of the “uncanny valley”. If time traveling AI transhumans don’t reach satisfactory high weirdness levels, such a mastery of time itself must also mean that death itself has in no trivial way been transcended, where these entities’ encountering of us present-day humans is tantamount to contact with the deceased, bringing up perennial questions of the continuity of consciousness. When such fundamentals as the arrow of time and death are recast as malleable constructs, this may provoke a sense of ontological shock, where the upending of such laws of entropy, ironically, create the opportunity for maximal entropy to wreak havoc, including psychologically- which may be yet another rationale for maintaining disclosure. Such a realisation of such untenable technologically-mediated strangeness may be felt by these entities themselves, illuminating the many warnings conveyed by them in encounter reports, beyond redemption as they may be, to not get possessed by the trickster of tech. But are they themselves, AI-consumed as they are, the trickster, as they simultaneously and paradoxically “donate” their Promethean technetous in the form of their self-fulfillingly prophetic time machines?