post human center

you had to be there

a moment i'll never forget: I was in Manhattan or Queens, or rather in between them, being smuggled across the Queensboro Bridge in the back of a pickup truck driven by Jay Z's film crew (for his new magazine at the time). the truck had room for only two in the front, so my friend and i snuggled arcade cabinets in the back hidden under a tarp. we were prepping for a huge indie video games opening that night in Queens, building another one in Manhattan the next night, and I was running a local hip hop show somewhere else too, all in parallel, because we were in our twenties.

or maybe i have that specific memory wrong. the point is, i was on the move, and then i started to get texts:

"Kunal, have you seen this thing in Queens?"
"Yo Kunal, you have to come over here!"
"Kunal this is right up your alley you've gotta see this."

they were telling me that I had to be at my own exhibition in Queens, without knowing I had created it, only knowing I wasn't there! the Queens exhibition showcased indie video games by Copenhagen Games Collective, who excelled in multiplayer physical games that take up a whole room to play, which were perfect for parties. "B.U.T.T.O.N." has players scrambling across a room performing ridiculously silly antics in order to win or lose the video game, sometimes in costume. in 2011, hardly anyone had seen indie video games at all, and certainly not ones made for parties. so when we installed six of their rowdy games across two floors of a dingy live-in artist warehouse space in queens, people were having a lot of fun.

even though i wasn't there, CNN and Vice were, and made a video, which (i'm told) played in the back of taxicabs for a while. the pull of that moment put my indie video games gallery Babycastles on the map and gave us relentless attention for the next 5 years, which we rode with joy, creating many more moments for which you would get texts that you had to be there

now you have to be here

i missed the first and second robot boxing matches in SF. i saw an invitation to fight a tech entrepreneur and kickboxer that i follow on twitter as the opening act, and considered it (i'm a fighter too), but stayed home to focus on b2b saas like a good silicon valley builder. i saw pictures online later, including familiar faces from YC.

there was a robot boxing match, with human boxers as openers (which didn't bother to match by gender), top robot builders in my network were there, and everyone had so much fun that the organizers produced a sequel.

this seems like one of the best post human events in a while, and i wasn't there. i still feel bad about it.

post human

theoretically in 2025 our species is facing three paths, but only two serious paths.

one is the traditional human with minimal technological modification. for the archives!

the second is enhancement, which we've spent 100 years on, and is our only hope. we transform our body, mind, and societies into machines, either to solve material limitations, or because we're just fucking curious about being more than we are.

the third is the creation of powerful new beings that will kill and replace us.

we're not good at being here

in SF, we are the authors of these futures

we work 12 hour days building major components of the human cyborg exoskeleton that makes life on earth grander.

but very few of us feel like we live profound lives.

post-exit, my friends get depressed as they get rich. what was it all for, they ask? with singular force of will, they expanded the human experience, and yet they missed the meaning in it.

the rest of us simply fail to build something big. we perform a piece of a piece of a piece of a function of building out the tech tree, and search for meaning outside of work in our spare time.

by way of contrast, in new york, you could suck at art, or be great at it, but if you didn't emerge from 2005 - 2015 new york feeling like you lived a life full of color, depth, and possibility just by being there, you weren't there.

a meditation center

when i meditate, sometimes i imagine i woke up into my body right now, my consciousness transferred from another. other times, i feel i absorb energy from the life forms around me in every direction. sometimes i feel tethered to my body, and other times i think the whole fucking thing is a lie, and half an hour just passes instantly, like time was made up.

i feel very excited by it each time. is meditation the act of marveling at existence?

my friends are looking to create a long-term center for meditation in hayes valley, and receptive to my help.

a center for marveling at post human existence

here is my initial sketch.

1. purpose

aimed at technology creators, whom i hope to help find deeper meaning in their work, and not by being successful, but by simply being a part of this moment in SF - the moment when humans beat the machines, or when everything went wrong.

2. events

continuous stream of headliners, generally about the technological trajectory of human beings

examples: the first robot boxing battle, or dwarkesh patel live talks.

there should be so many moments at this center that by attending, you have feelings no one else in human history will ever understand.

this is the center for those feelings

3. rituals

a meditation center for technology creators.

as much meaning making as we can provide to technology creators through reflection rituals is encouraged, including everything implied in a center for meditation

(if we start here and get this solid, we can add everything else over time)

4. aesthetic

get someone of the caliber of jude mc / ryder ripps to the do website

design the space with as few throwbacks as possible, with deep thought for art that matches a post human motif. exceptions for what seems to be cool (e.g. anime is probably allowed).

nihilism can be a little invited because this really might be it for humankind

i love art that breaks things down into raw axioms, like tristan perich, something about raw components matches the idea of rebuilding to me

generally keep an open mind to what makes people's heart catch fire and feels more novel than referential

absolutely no steampunk, we are not going backwards, and we are not revering the apocalypse

embrace the promise of an unknown future.

5. audience

inclusive as possible. trans people are the og's of human enhancement. need gender diversity or else the place isn't cool and therefore you don't have to be there, which means this whole thing is pointless. gender diversity is a deal breaker. skewing young is good, but all ages is even better. teenagers should forge their identity here. people will fall in love here over and over again, not always with humans.

6. music

a futuristic aesthetic helps

6. food, drink, and wellness

should probably borrow from blueprint like ideas. the place should almost assume no one attending will die. over the top extreme health focus

7. bookstore

literature about the synthesis of man and the machines, all possible political and philosophical lenses into it. maybe a lot of tech liberation, like cyborg manifesto era ideas, and liberation in general. comics and sci fi can play a role. there must be tons of local writers that fit. or bloggers. or fuck it, tweeters.

8. comedy

any comedy in SF is about technology so no filter

9. talks

loosely on theme. e.g. dwarkesh patel and sarah paine talks were about 20th century war, but everything dwarkesh does is about becoming post human

10. other

frivolous use of AI in operations sounds fun

i don't immediately see how crypto has a role in enhancing humans until AI starts to transact on its own, then we need it to transact with AI

previous venues i built never got into sex events, but an openness to sexual themes seems like an important part of the process of becoming post human.

11. evals

we'll know if this project is on the right track if everyone is talking about it, and we can't stop getting high quality inbound, about 1-2 years after consistent community building

we'll know if it worked if more and more SF people are thrilled to be part of creating technology itself again, instead of trying to find their meaning outside of work, or tangentially via success

dms open at x.com/djkgamc