Ramez Naam
Ramez Naam was born in Cairo, Egypt, and came to the US at the age of 3. He's a computer scientist who spent 13 years at Microsoft, leading teams working on email, web browsing, search, and artificial intelligence. He holds almost 20 patents in those areas. Ramez is the winner of the 2005 H.G. Wells Award for his non-fiction book More Than Human: Embracing the Promise of Biological Enhancement. He's worked as a life guard, has climbed mountains, survived dust storms in the desert, backpacked through remote corners of China, and ridden his bicycle down hundreds of miles of the Vietnam coast. He lives in Seattle, where he writes and speaks full time.
7 Books Written
Winner of the 2014 Prometheus AwardMankind gets an upgradeIn the near future, the experimental nano-drug Nexus can link humans together, mind to mind. There are some who want to improve it. There are some who want to eradicate it. And there are others who just want to exploit it.When a young scientist is caught improving Nexus, he’s thrust over his head into a world of danger and international espionage – for there is far more at stake than anyone realizes.From the halls of academe to the halls of power, from the headquarters of an elite US agency in Washington DC to a secret lab beneath a top university in Shanghai, from the underground parties of San Francisco to the illegal biotech markets of Bangkok, from an international neuroscience conference to a remote monastery in the mountains of Thailand – Nexus is a thrill ride through a future on the brink of explosion.File Science Fiction [Humanity 2.0 | Mind Matters | Hive | This Will Happen]
Finalist for the 2014 Prometheus Award.Six months have passed since the release of Nexus 5. The world is a different, more dangerous place. In the United States, the terrorists – or freedom fighters – of the Post-Human Liberation Front use Nexus to turn men and women into human time bombs aimed at the President and his allies. In Washington DC, a government scientist, secretly addicted to Nexus, uncovers more than he wants to know about the forces behind the assassinations, and finds himself in a maze with no way out.In Thailand, Samantha Cataranes has found peace and contentment with a group of children born with Nexus in their brains. But when forces threaten to tear her new family apart, Sam will stop at absolutely nothing to protect the ones she holds dear. In Vietnam, Kade and Feng are on the run from bounty hunters seeking the price on Kade’s head, from the CIA, and from forces that want to use the back door Kade has built into Nexus 5. Kade knows he must stop the terrorists misusing Nexus before they ignite a global war between human and posthuman. But to do so, he’ll need to stay alive and ahead of his pursuers. And in Shanghai, a posthuman child named Ling Shu will go to dangerous and explosive lengths to free her uploaded mother from the grip of Chinese authorities. The first blows in the war between human and posthuman have been struck. The world will never be the same.File Under : Science Fiction [ Stage 2 | Terrorist or Freedom Fighter? | Mind Games | Upgrading… ]
The Explosive Conclusion to Nexus and CruxWinner of the Philip K. Dick Award Global unrest spreads through the US, China, and beyond. Secrets and lies set off shockwaves of anger, rippling from mind to mind. Riot police battle neurally-linked protestors. Armies are mobilized. Political orders fall. Nexus-driven revolution is in here. Against this backdrop, a new breed of post-human children are growing into their powers. And a once-dead scientist, driven mad by her torture, is closing in on her plans to seize planet's electronic systems, and re-forge everything in her image. A new Apex species is here. The world will never be the same.File Science Fiction [ Humanity 2.0 | Mind Matters | Hive | This Will Happen ]
The most valuable resource on earth is not oil, gold, water, or land. Instead, our capacity for expanding human knowledge is our greatest resource, and the key to overcoming the very real and enormous environmental challenges we face. Throughout human history we have learned to overcome scarcity and adversity through the application of innovation - the only resource that is expanded, not depleted, the more we use it. The century ahead is a race between our damaging overconsumption and our growing understanding of ways to capture and utilize abundant natural resources with less impact on the planet. The Infinite Resource is a clear-eyed, visionary, and hopeful argument for progress.
WINNER OF THE 2005 H.G. WELLS AWARD"The Editors Recommend" - Scientific American What if you could be smarter, stronger, and have a better memory just by taking a pill? What if we could alter our genes to cure Alzheimer's and Parkinson's?What if we could halt or even reverse the human aging process?What if we could communicate with each other simply by thinking about it ?These questions were once the stuff of science fiction. Today, advances in biotechnology have shown that they're plausible, even likely to be accomplished in the near future. In labs around the world, researchers looking for ways to help the sick and injured have stumbled onto techniques that enhance healthy animals--making them stronger, faster, smarter, and longer-lived--in some cases, even connecting their minds to robots and computers across the Internet. Now science is on the verge of applying this knowledge to healthy men and women, allowing us to alter humanity in ways we'd previously only dreamed possible. The same research that could cure Alzheimer's is leading to drugs and genetic techniques that could boost human intelligence. The techniques being developed to stave off heart disease and cancer have the potential to slow or even reverse human aging. And brain implants that restore motion to the paralyzed and sight to the blind are already allowing a small set of patients to control robots and computers simply by thinking about it.Not everyone welcomes this scientific progress. Cries of "against nature" arise from skeptics even as scientists break new ground at an astounding pace. Across the political spectrum, the debate Should we embrace the power to alter our minds and bodies, or should we restrict it? Distilling the most radical accomplishments being made in labs worldwide, including gene therapy, genetic engineering, stem cell research, life extension, brain-computer interfaces, and cloning, More Than Human offers an exciting tour of the impact biotechnology will have on our lives. Throughout this remarkable trip, author Ramez Naam shares an impassioned vision for the future with revealing insight into the ethical dilemmas posed by twenty-first-century science."A terrific survey of current work and future possibilities in gene therapy, neurotechnology and other fields." - Los Angeles Times"Ramez Naam provides a reliable and informed cook's tour of the world we might choose if we decide that we should fast-forward evolution. I disagree with virtually all his enthusiasms, but I think he has made his case cogently and well." - Bill McKibben, author Staying Human in an Engineered Age " More Than Human is one of those rare books that is both a delightful read and an important statement. No one interested in the future intersections of science, technology, and medicine can afford to miss this book." - Steven Johnson, author of Mind Wide Open and Where Good Ideas Come From" More Than Human is excellent - passionate yet balanced, clearly written and rich with fascinating details. A wonderful overview of a topic that will dominate the twenty-first century." - Greg Bear, author of Dead Lines and Darwin's Children"The future accelerates and change is upon us. The only question - asked cogently in More Than Human - is whether we can learn to ride the waves, or else be swept away. This book is a how-to guide for future-wave riders." - David Brin, author of EXISTENCE and The Transparent Will Technology Make Us Choose Between Privacy and Freedom?
PREVIEW OF CHAPTERS 1 - 3 of NEXUSIn the near future, the illegal and experimental nano-drug Nexus can link humans together, mind to mind. There are some who want to improve it. There are some who want to eradicate it. And there are others who just want to exploit it.When a young scientist is caught improving Nexus, he’s thrust over his head into a world of danger and international espionage – for there is far more at stake than anyone realizes.From the halls of academe to the halls of power; from the headquarters of an elite US agency in Washington DC to a secret lab beneath a top university in Shanghai; from the underground parties of San Francisco to the illegal biotech markets of Bangkok; from an international neuroscience conference to a remote monastery in the mountains of Thailand – Nexus is a thrill ride through a future on the brink of explosion.
