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From:   E X T R O P Y   I N S T I T U T E

Greetings!  Your name has come to my attention as someone who is
interested in knowing more about Extropian perspectives, and the
activities of Extropy Institute (ExI). You may have recently joined the
Extropians e-mail list, or contacted me directly, or inquired after reading
a story in WIRED, the Observer, the Village Voice, Free Inquiry, California
Liberty, or some other publication.

If you send me your physical address and live in the USA or Canada I will
mail you information on ExI's activities, on EXTROPY: The Journal of
Transhumanist Thought -- the premier, intelligent futurist publication,
EXPONENT -- our members' newsletter, on the EXTRO conferences, and on
other activities, such as local discussions and events.

If you're already sure you're interested, see the end of this message for
a subscription/membership form. (You can sample EXTROPY for just $5.)

Extropians seek to use technology intelligently to overcome traditional,
genetic, biological, and neurological limits to the pursuit of life, liberty,
and boundless achievement.

Following is some information on our activities, beginning with online
forums.

                        Upward and Outward!

Max More                more@extropy.org                more@usc.edu
President               Extropy Institute (ExI)
                        13428 Maxella Avenue, #273
                        Marina Del Rey, CA 90292
                        310-398-0375


E X T R O P I A N S  O N L I N E

Extropy Institute sponsors a number of forums for sharing libertarian,
life-extensionist, pro-technology and other extropian ideas with bright,
like-minded individuals around the globe.
        The most popular service is the Extropians e-mail list, which boils
over with lively discussion and debate on numerous topics.To join,
send a request to:

        extropians-request@extropy.org

When sending your add request, indicate whether you want real time or
digest mode. (If unsure, try the digest mode first!) The Extropians list is
using the most advanced information-filtering software, allowing you to

select which messages (topic, author, etc.) you receive and how you
receive them. You can try the List free for a couple of months; after that,
staying on the list will require an fee of between $8 and $14.
        Another service is the ExI Essay list, for posting longer, more carefull
y
prepared electronic manuscripts.To get on this list, send a message to:

        exi-essay-request@gnu.ai.mit.edu

There are several local lists for announcements and discussions
around the San Francisco Bay Area, Los Angeles, New York, and Boston & UK.
To join these lists, send messages to:

        exi-bay-request@gnu.ai.mit.edu
        exi-la-request@gnu.ai.mit.edu
        exi-nyc-request@gnu.ai.mit.edu
        exi-bos-request@gnu.ai.mit.edu
        exi-uk-request@gnu.ai.mit.edu

You can also access the Frequently Asked Questions file, and other
Extropian writings, on the World Wide Web. Some Extropian home pages:

http://www.acm.usl.edu/~dca6381/c2_mirror/extropy.html
http://www.c2.org/~arkuat/extropy.html

Our FTP site: ftp://ftp.merak.com/pub/ExI-Essay
FTP site maintained by David McFadzean:  dbm@merak.com


E X T R O P Y  I N S T I T U T E  &  E X T R O P Y  M A G A Z I N E
I N F O R M A T I O N

Do you want to make the future better than the past?

Do you want to live a radically extended life span?

Are you attracted to innovative, market-oriented solutions to social
problems?

Do you want to upgrade your intellectual power?

Do you want to dispel the clouded thinking of the eco-doomsayers and
pessimists?

Do you want to throw off ingrained barriers to effective thinking and
action?

Do you want to continuously improve yourself -- physically,
intellectually, morally?

Do you think that technology can and should help us overcome
biological, genetic, and neurological limits to our abilities and goals?

    THEN EXTROPY INSTITUTE SHARES YOUR GOALS!

Technological and social change continue to accelerate, thrusting us into
a future of unprecedented possibility and choice.Increasingly,
gerontologists agree that aging will be partly or wholly controlled in the
next few decades.Drastic extension of the human lifespan will be
accompanied by the ability to radically increase human intelligence
using advanced nootropics (smart drugs) and neurological augmentation
with implanted miniaturized computers. Advances in genetic engineering,
biochemistry, and nanotechnology (molecular machines) will enable us to
heighten our senses, boost our strength, bolster our immune systems, and
increase our resistance to injury and death.

Computing power and communication bandwidth continue to grow explosively,
enabling the development of virtual reality, making accessible oceans of
information, allowing the creation of electronic markets and distributed
virtual communities. We can expect to see the evolution of truly intelligent
artificial persons, and to overcome biological and neurological limits
through human-machine symbiosis. These and other technology-driven
revolutions, such as space habitation and nanofabrication, offer the
potential both for progress and peril. Extropy Institute endeavors to
prepare our human culture for the dawning of the posthuman era, in which
today's beliefs, technological achievements, and culture will seem as
primitive as those of the Middle Ages seem today.


E X T R O P Y  I N S T I T U T E

Extropy Institute (ExI) encourages the development and use of emerging
and future technologies to overcome historically unchallenged limits to
full human flourishing. ExI focuses the most creative, forward-thinking
intellects from numerous fields of endeavor in working to overcome
traditional, genetic, biological, and neurological limits to the pursuit of
life, liberty, and boundless achievement. Our network of dynamic
optimists seeks to guide and accelerate humanity, through education
and example, into an unbounded "posthuman" future.

Since 1988, when Extropy first appeared, extropian ideas have attracted
those wanting to continually improve their capabilities, those who are
bold enough to challenge entrenched dogmas concerning the inevitability
of death, of centralized, coercive government, and of fixed limits to
human achievement and ability. Our evolving synthesis of ideas
ontinues to welcome fresh input.

Extropy Institute is building a culture favoring physical and intellectual
augmentation, radical life extension, and a free and responsible society
(here, in cyberspace, or off-Earth). We are a network of thinkers and
doers who seek to question today's dogmas, shape an open-ended future,
and create "transhuman" lifestyles, technologies, and institutions.
We develop, debate, and disseminate our ideas by means of publications,
meetings, and special projects including:

E X T R O P Y
Our unique and thriving major publication provides intelligent, thorough
analysis and advocacy of advanced and future technologies and their use in
creating a future worthy of human potential (see below).

E X P O N E N T
Our members' newsletter, published 6 times per year, carries current
Extropian movement news, media coverage, local events information, timely
reviews of books and software, and short articles.

E L E C T R O N I C  F O R A
Electronic activities include a highly active e-mail list
(extropians-request@extropy.org), founded in 1991, frequented by the
brightest, most iconoclastic minds, and an essay list for longer papers.
The Extropians e-mail list has branched out into local e-mail lists, for
Silicon Valley, Southern California, New York, Boston, and other areas.
These virtual meeting places carry announcements of local meetings, events,
and celebrations.

S O C I A L  &  I N T E L L E C T U A L  N E T W O R K
ExI hosts special events and social celebrations, and is forming local and
university discussion groups around the country and abroad. We also offer
books, tapes, and other items of interest to members.

E X T R O  C O N F E R E N C E S
Our successful second conference, EXTRO-2, took place in Santa Monica,
California in June 1995, with Prof. Marvin Minsky of MIT as keynote speaker.


T H E  E X T R O P I A N  P R I N C I P L E S  v. 2.5
(Full v. 2.5 appears in Extropy #11, 2nd Half 1993)

BOUNDLESS EXPANSION:  Seeking more intelligence, wisdom, and
effectiveness, an unlimited lifespan, and the removal of political,
cultural, biological, and psychological limits to self-actualization and
self-realization. Perpetually overcoming constraints on our progress and
possibilities. Expanding into the universe and advancing without end.

SELF-TRANSFORMATION:  Affirming continual psychological,
intellectual, and physical self-improvement, through reason and critical
thinking, personal responsibility, and experimentation. Biological and
neurological augmentation.

DYNAMIC OPTIMISM:  Positive expectations fueling dynamic action.
Adopting a rational, action-based optimism, shunning both blind faith
and stagnant pessimism.

INTELLIGENT TECHNOLOGY:  Applying science and technology
creatively to transcend "natural" limits imposed by our biological
heritage, culture, and environment.

SPONTANEOUS ORDER:  Supporting decentralized, voluntaristic
social coordination processes. Fostering tolerance, diversity, foresight,
personal responsibility, and individual liberty.

Extropians affirm a transhumanist philosophy:  Like humanism, we value
reason and humanity and see no grounds for belief in unknowable,
supernatural forces externally controlling our destiny. Transhumanism
goes further in urging us to push beyond the merely human stage of
evolution. As physicist Freeman Dyson has said: "Humanity looks to
me like a magnificent beginning but not the final word."


E X T R O P Y: The Journal of Transhumanist Thought

*       Life extension, immortalism, and biostasis
*       Privacy technologies, electronic markets, digital money
*       Transhumanism, futurist philosophy
*       Smart drugs and other intelligence-intensifying technologies
*       Machine intelligence, personality uploading, and artificial life
*       Nanocomputers and molecular nanotechnology
*       Spontaneous order (free markets, neural networks, evolutionary
        processes, genetic algorithms, etc.)
*       Memetics (ideas as replicating agents)
*       Experimental free communities in space, on the oceans, & in cyberspace
*       Effective thinking, information-filtering, life management
*       Self-transformative psychology
*       Probing the ultimate limits of physics

Since 1988, Extropy has provided a unique forum for intriguing and
inspiring explorations of advanced and future technologies, focusing on
their potential for overcoming present human limits, enabling us to
create a posthuman future. If you're tired of shallow, trendy, or
uncritical thinking on the technological frontier, Extropy will satisfy,
startle, and stimulate you.

"I love it. Extropy excites the hell out of my mind." ZL, 1/93

"It's an absolutely great issue, and in general I would call it the best
periodical I have ever seen in my life..." AC, 8/92

"#9 is excellent! Truly outstanding! The best yet! Keep up the good
work." MS, 8/92

"I just wanted to let you know that Extropy keeps getting better & better!
(as, of course, it must in order to be so named). What a uniformly
excellent, eclectic, thoughtful, well-written selection of articles. By far
the most thought-provoking, ground-breaking stuff in any magazine I
read." PG 7/94

Jerod Pore, Factsheet Five #47: "The zine of the ultimate reality hackers
(and far beyond the pretentious incarnation of Mondo 2000).... An
awesome glimpse of a better future."

_____________________________________________________________
TO SUBSCRIBE OR BECOME AN ExI MEMBER:
I would like to join Extropy Institute in shaping the future, receiving
Extropy, Exponent, other publications, information on events, and
discounts on books, tapes, and conferences. Annual rates:

USA:                    $45             Sustaining Member:      $100
Canada/Mexico:          $50             Corporate Sustaining
Overseas (sf/air):      $55/$67         Member:                 $250

You may subtract $5 if you are a full-time student (with ID).
For a two-year membership, double the amount then subtract $5.

I would like to make a tax-deductible donation to sustain and expand
Extropy Institute's activities:

 $10    $25        $50        $100       $500       $1000          Other: $

I don't want to join Extropy Institute at this time, but I do want to read
Extropy: The Journal of Transhumanist Thought. Enclosed is $17 (14% off the
cover price), or $32 for 8 issues (19% off) ($21 Canada/Mexico;
$30/$22 overseas air/surface) for a four-issue subscription.

Back issues available:  1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10,11,12,13,14, 15 -- $5 each

E-MAIL LIST:  After 45 days free, a fee is required to stay on the
Extropians List. For one year: Member rate; $8. Extropy subscriber
rate: $10  Other: $14

Make checks payable to "Extropy Institute," and mail to:
Extropy Institute, 13428 Maxella Avenue #273, Marina Del Rey, CA
90292. Tel: 310-398-0375
E-mail: exi-info@extropy.org

Foreign orders: We can accept payment in either US dollars, or by
means of a check in your own currency.
Sorry, we cannot process credit card orders.

Your name:
Address:


_____________________________________________________________
[Version: August 11 1995]