Artificial Intelligence Within our Lifetime? Sunday, Mar 25 2007
AI 9:29 am
Kaj Sotala is a great guy who has done a lot for transhumanism. He sets an excellent example by donating $10 a month to CRN, Lifeboat, and SIAI, something you all should be doing. Now he steps up to the plate by writing an actual paper about AI, entitled, “Artificial intelligence within our lifetime? No idle speculation”. Here is the intro:
In recent years, some thinkers have raised the issue of a so-called “superintelligence” being developed within our lifetimes and radically revolutionizing society. A case has been made that once we have a human-equivalent artificial intelligence, it will soon develop to become much more intelligent than humans - with unpredictable results.
Often, people seem to have less trouble with the idea of machine superiority than with the idea of us actually developing an artificial intelligence within our lifetimes - to most people, true machine intelligence currently seems very remote. This text will attempt to argue that there are several different ways by which artificial intelligence may be developed in the near future, and that the probability of this happening is high enough that the possibility needs to be considered when making plans for the future.
Continue it here. This is an excellent effort for a critical cause. I wish more people would do things like it!
Another choice piece by Kaj is Why I Worry About the Future.
March 25th, 2007 at 10:36 am
Hi Michael. What happened to the site? I see you had to use a backup since 5 comments are missing here.
My comment went something like this:
I think that the CRN would get more donations if it had a slightly better looking website. I know that kind of stuff isn’t supposed to matter, but it does.
A few weeks ago I wrote to the Lifeboat Foundation webmaster to suggest re-doing the blue buttons on the left; they had pixelated fonts that made it look like 1996. I think the new ones give a better “feel” to the site in general, and that can help newcomers make that “blink” decision about “are these guys serious?”.
March 25th, 2007 at 10:41 am
Apparently someone accessed my site and deleted the most recent posts and the attending conversations. This is because I left the install.php file online and was apparently supposed to delete it.
The Lifeboat Foundation site needs a huge upgrade. CRN could use one too, you’re right.
If anyone has records of the blog posts which got deleted, or even remembers which are missing, please let me know!
March 26th, 2007 at 9:40 am
You can always count on the decency and goodness of everyone. I’m sure the person was simply pointing out a weakness in your system in the only way they knew how…
Where is that Lifeboat anyway?
Michael, sorry about this. I don’t know if you’ve suffered this before, but I don’t see any difference between this and basic vandalism (or worse) in the real world. Hope you get everything back up and patched up.
March 26th, 2007 at 9:55 am
“Where is that Lifeboat anyway?”
Lifeboat is in the links on the left of the page:
http://lifeboat.com/ex/main
Or were you making a joke about an actual boat?
March 26th, 2007 at 10:00 am
The term “Lifeboat” refers to our philosophy - that we want a lifeboat to keep some people safe in case of global disaster. It also refers to a general advocacy for better safeguards against existential risk.
March 26th, 2007 at 11:27 am
No, I was simply making a comment on how the attack on Michael’s blog site could just as easily have been someone hacking into something more significant. If it can be hacked someone will try do so… human nature, well, some people’s nature I guess.
I meant the “Lifeboat” that saves us all from all of those existential risks, including human nature. I think it is much more likely that we’ll doom ourselves than the planet getting hit by an asteroid, the sun going super nova or other external threats happening.
Hacking today is relatively benign and may wreak some minor havoc, but in the molecular nanotech/factory world or advanced bio-nano or AI world the consequences are going to become progressively greater. (I know, I know. Preaching to the choir…)
March 26th, 2007 at 1:33 pm
You right that hacking of this kind today is often fairly benign, but it will become more of an issue. For example, suppose everyone’s official “identity” is on some central government database, then a cracker gets in and alters or deletes your information. Overnight you become a non-person, unable to access basic services possibly including medical and financial systems. Suppose the entire database was taken down, then imagine the possible effects upon the economy.
March 26th, 2007 at 3:04 pm
You can easily retrieve all your old blog posts if you act quickly. Find a computer that was used to visit your blog before the deletions, and hasn’t reloaded those pages since then. It’s all in the offline browsing cache.
March 26th, 2007 at 3:17 pm
Can’t find one. There are only six or so missing posts anyway, none of which had a huge amount of original content. Most people I know who read my blog use an RSS reader to do so: they don’t actually visit the site itself. I reposted a few of the posts I remember. Considering that this hacker apparently had full access to the site and could have deleted everything, I think I got off easy. (There is a global backup, but I made it a couple months ago.)
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