Accelerating Future

Thanks to Phil Bowermaster of The Speculist for filming this.

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Technology can be used to slice through certain social and humanitarian problems like a hot knife through butter. Read about oral rehydration salts. This cheap solution eliminates the life-threatening dehydrating effects of diarrhea when water alone isn’t enough. You can talk about corruption in African governments all day long, but when humanitarian agencies actually deliver this physical substance to people suffering from diarrhea, it is life-saving.

Oral rehydration salts are being deployed now. What about the near future? Everyone in Africa needs a self-replication capable fabber based something like the RepRap project. This could be done in five years, if humanitarian organizations like the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation put a tiny portion of their budget towards realizing it. But I’m not seeing it. Self-replicating factories are the path to dirt cheap products for everyone, not just the developing countries but the developed countries as well. Leaders are lacking the vision to push towards solutions that automagnify even when we stop writing the checks.

In the longer-term future, we need to think about reprogramming human motivations themselves. Imagine a drug or brain implant that, when administered, causes people to enjoy cooperation more and work harder to resolve conflict, without any negative side effects whatsoever. (Or imagine some other cognitive modification agent, if cooperation and resolving conflict bothers you.) MDMA is already part of the way there, albeit with unwanted side effects. These side effects don’t fundamentally reflect any “hubris mechanism” on the part of the universe, but merely our insufficiently advanced science and technology. If politicians would realize that technology actually has the potential to improve human nature for the better, they would invest billions in psychopharmacology and cybernetics. This is not happening today, but it’s only a matter of time. I want to see it happen sooner rather than later.

Our efforts to hypnotize ourselves into being better people can only go so far. Every time a new baby is born, he or she reflects our 100,000 year old genome. It’s like starting from scratch all over again, with every generation. Why can’t we take permanent steps forward, by tweaking the genetics of babies before they are even born? It’s not eugenics, because it’s not based on arranged marriage, and no one has to be oppressed to make it happen. It can be entirely voluntary. Even if germline genetic engineering is ruled unethical, gene therapy will allow deep modifications to adults who are legally able to make their own decisions. If gene therapy doesn’t work, there will be implants… and I could keep going, listing numerous alternative paths.

That’s the problem with naysayers to the transhumanist vision: if one particular path is too “radical” or culturally objectionable for the mainstream to accept, then it will be pursued in niche environments, and if the results are beneficial, the mainstream opinion will change quickly. We have no reason to assume that evolution placed humanity at a global optima. Experimentation and intervention will allow us to seek out morphological configurations that even the greatest skeptic will see as obviously beneficial. For every skeptic Y, there is a biological modification to the body or brain X that they would clamor for. This will help get the wheels greased and turning for large-scale self-directed modification of the human species as a whole.

This is just a matter of time. The question is “when”, not “if”. Some transhumanists would like to think that biological self-modification could be delayed indefinitely or outlawed globally, but I don’t think this is very realistic. Maybe they are just looking for an excuse to acquire supporters.

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Lots of transhumanism coverage in the news lately.

Immediately on my mind is the New Scientist piece, “Death special: the plan for eternal life” and its accompanying video.

Reading the article made me feel a little squirmy. I don’t think the author had negative intentions at all: she just reported what she saw in the limited space she had. But I think that articles like this getting written show that transhumanism is doing something wrong.

The report was included as part of a special series on the topic of death. (Hence the indicator “Death special”.) Of course, this is because transhumanists are encouraging an engineering approach to combating human aging. But I often worry that this side of transhumanism is somewhat overemphasized. Again, no fault of the author here, I’m just looking at transhumanism in the mirror and commenting on what I see.

Although life extension is a big part of the transhumanist vision, there are other very important technologies, futuristic as well as contemporary, that I think deserve similar if not greater timeshare. Technologies mentioned in the article included: uploading, AI, genetic engineering, nanotechnology, and cybernetics. Egan wrote, “More immediate issues facing humanity, such as poverty, pollution and the devastation of war, tend to get ignored.” This is disappointing. I see transhumanist efforts as parallel to many conventional humanitarian initiatives.

For instance, the recent CRN conference that I attended last month had a number of transhumanist-oriented discussions, as well as many on basic research in nanotechnology, patent law, etc. The first talk was given by Lisa Hopper, founder of humanitarian giant WorldCare. As you can read in my coverage of the conference, Lisa talked at length about the connection between everyday humanitarian goals and future technologies that will enable them to be carried out more effectively, especially molecular nanotechnology. I talked to a WorldCare employee who had recently come back from aid work in sub-Saharan Africa about how nanotechnology is enabling passive nanoscale filtering of brackish water, circumventing the need for foul-tasting chemical purification techniques. Look at the potential for molecular manufacturing to make it faster and easier to construct housing and basic goods, and I see a very powerful connection between organizations like the Center for Responsible Nanotechnology, who advocates the humanitarian use of technology, and WorldCare, its parent organization, which uses technology to pursue humanitarian goals. The World Transhumanist Association should be highlighting these connections in their literature.

Is it wise to put uploading on display at the forefront of transhumanism’s interface with the public? I don’t think so. There are enough near-term issues that deeply inspire transhumanist sentiments that I think we should focus on those for the most part, scaling back more speculative discussions of mind uploading. What about: stem cells, NNI-style nanotechnology, synthetic biology, bioethics, patent law, rapid prototyping, and even software security? I don’t think discussions of molecular manufacturing, cybernetics, and superintelligence should be excluded, but we require a more continuous spectrum of dialogues connecting together present-day technologies with more futuristic iterations of these technologies. This will make it clearer in the eyes of the public (and to ourselves) that there is no real fanciful leap of faith involved in talking about technologies of the second category as opposed to only those of the first.

This was made clear at the other big event last month, the Singularity Institute’s Singularity Summit 2007. Many of the speakers are working on projects relevant right now, as well as offering their predictions and recommendations for how to move forward in light of more futuristic possibilities. This combination of near-term and long-term thinking is critical for connecting transhumanist foresight to the pragmatic realities of the real world. All great futurist thinkers should be capable of doing this. That way there’s no conceptual disconnect that leaves people saying, “huh?” If a futurist prediction sounds highly discontinuous, there should be a good underlying reason for that property: for instance, switching to a world where human productivity is rapidly accelerated due to the availability of brain implants. We should be able to say, “If Y occurs then X is also likely”, instead of saying “X will certainly happen!”

So September was the ninth annual meeting of the World Transhumanist Association. I look forward to the next one, the big 10th anniversary Transvision. But I hope that we wise up in our interactions with the press and the public. People want to know: “why is transhumanism relevant to me?” They don’t care about many of our intensely focused philosophical tangents.

Will transhumanism, as a movement, ever go mainstream? Should it? Maybe people will widely adopt transhumanist technologies without ever explicitly acknowledging themselves as “transhumanists” per se. People who use computers rarely call themselves “computerists”, even if that’s what they are.

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I often enjoy the news items from PhysOrg, a top-notch science news site. Here are some from just today:

Scientists found a clam that lived for 400 years. A non-sentient clam gets to live 400 years and we humans typically drop dead at around 80? Doesn’t seem very fair.

A Japanese Institute is taking robotics to the next level, creating a system that learns through gestures rather than just executing pre-programmed routines.

UC San Diego scientists found that the T4 virus contains a molecular motor with twice the power density of an automobile engine. My thought is, “that’s it?” Scaling laws should enable molecular motors with thousands or even millions of times the power density of an auto engine.

Lots of people are keen to modify their appearance surgically. 48% of women were interested, 23% of men. As the procedures lower in cost and increase in elegance and utility, more people will sign up for cosmetic surgery. Of course, I take this to mean that many people will embrace enhancement-oriented surgeries and implants when they become available 10-20 years from now. (We already have artery-cleaning, bio-powered micro-robots, after all.)

A UK scientist has brought a 53 million year-old spider “back to life” by scanning tiny fossil details with x-rays and reconstructing a 3-D digital image. This is made possible by recent advances in scanning resolution.

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For the last couple weeks, I have been debating Berkeley professor of rhetoric Dale Carrico more or less non-stop. This morning, responding to his criticisms of the Singularity Institute (SIAI), I wrote a summary of reasons to support the organization:

~~~

Dale,

SIAI works towards Friendly (through whatever means works, something other than mathematical-deductive if necessary) seed AGI because the people in the organization see it as a high moral priority. This is humanity’s first experience of stepping beyond the Gaussian curve of ordinary human intelligence distributions. If it is not facilitated by AGI, it will be by enhancing humans: whether through psychopharmacology, neuroengineering, brain-computer interfaces, gene therapy, etc.

The question is not “if” intelligence enhancement technologies will be available, but “when”. When they are, it will become possible to “construct intelligence” actively rather than be limited to human generational cycles, birth-rates, and education. Now there’s nothing at all wrong with these conventional human patterns, but we have to note that the introduction of enhancement technology is bound to throw the existing order out of whack.

It shouldn’t be hard to imagine that enhanced humans or AGIs will get to the point of being substantially smarter than the smartest given humans. After all, the hardware differences, in terms of basic components, between a human and a chimp isn’t actually all that large. But a machine could process thoughts at greater speeds and with more flexibility than any member of our species.

If intelligence enhancement tech really does produce a superintelligence, then we have a moral duty to maximize the probability that said superintelligence cares about humanity as a whole, not itself or any narrow group of humans. Otherwise the outcome could be grim. A few thousand Europeans enslaved native populations of millions with “only” somewhat more advanced technology — here we are talking about fundamental differences in substrate and cognitive architecture. To assume that we could keep intelligence-enhanced people or AGIs under our control is foolish.

So, the idea is to “get them while they’re young”: create superintelligences with altruistic goal systems. SIAI is the only organization pursuing this goal in a structured manner.

Michael

~~~

Dale responded here, in the post “Debating Singularitarians”. (I suggest you go read it before reading what’s below.) Being a bit frustrated by his disrespectful tone, I gave the following response:

~~~

Dale,

I have to say right off that the somewhat disrespectful way you engage in discussion makes me less motivated to spend time on it. For instance, “Cue the music”, “Gosh, that’s big of you”, “True Believers always feel about their Pet Raptures”, etc etc etc., shows you aren’t really taking my opinion or statements very seriously at all. In your responses, your tone doesn’t even address me directly, it sounds more like an attempt to mock me in front of some sympathetic third party audience. Such a disrespectful way of interacting would be frowned upon at a round table meeting or in a classroom context. At a cocktail party, it would cause someone to simply walk away.

I am interested in your criticisms of Singularitarianism because I believe they reflect the concerns of a wider group of people who are silent. But, I find it difficult to engage with your venomous and sarcastic tone. I wish we could talk at least under the pretense of mutual respect. (I have respect for your ideas but the inverse clearly does not apply.)

I don’t have a clear idea of what goes down when we create human-equivalent AI or enhanced human thinkers. I wish you wouldn’t put words in my mouth and claim that I do have an idea, because I don’t. There are a range of possible outcomes, but it’s useless to delve into them if one doesn’t even believe the underlying premise: that significant intelligence enhancement is technologically possible.

I’m barely even into SF. I don’t watch any television or many movies. I watch anime that is mostly fantasy, not sci-fi. I got into transhumanism by reading non-fiction books. Most fiction deals with AI in a really anthropomorphic way, so it doesn’t factor into my thinking about the future of AI in the real world. I dislike much sci-fi and often give it negative reviews, like the negative review of Accelerando I wrote about a year ago.

I don’t think you have a lack of vision or imagination. I disagree with Roko’s critique of you in his recent post.

I don’t think that the risk of rogue AI is only 5% , but substantially greater than that. Like James Hughes and many other transhumanist philosophers, I believe human-level AI is likely to be developed in the first half of the coming century.

Problems are not “reductively solvable through the implementation of instrumental rationality”, but using a variety of techniques such as communication, charisma, creativity, research, brainstorming, and experiments. Any AI of any use would need to possess all these characteristics, or it wouldn’t truly be human-equivalent. If it does possess these characteristics, then it could certainly help with human problems.

I am sympathetic for many of the causes you list, but think that implementing many of them would be nearly impossible. For instance, the USA is never going to put itself in a position where its politicians or generals are subject to punishment by international courts, no matter how much we try to institute such a structure. Making war unprofitable is incredibly difficult, and I’d advocate a technological solution — clean, abundant energy through solar power. The US military is never going to reveal its precise budget, that is a fantasy. And military funding is not going to be appreciably decreased, because since 9-11 people are on edge. Russia is threatening us, Iran is threatening us, China is highly militarized, etc. I have opinions on all the causes you mention but I think that politics as usual is not the way to go about it.

Technological solutions, such as increasing transparency, will help circumvent impasses that have held since the beginning of civilization. Humans have had basically the same motivations since ancient times, but technology changes. Technology such as air travel has fundamentally changed the way people worldwide interact. I think that transparency (facilitated by technology) coupled with demands for government accountability (facilitated by activism) will reduce militarization, but the technological component is critical. If it were so easy to get the militaries of the world to put down their arms, it would have been accomplished a long time ago. There is too much international tension. An eventual world government or strengthening of the UN could help in this regard.

To realize many of your political goals would require that the Republicans in this country magically disappear, which isn’t going to happen. I advocate many centrist political positions because I see them as a possible equilibrium to demands from opposing sides of the political spectrum. Many of your socialist ideas could never be successful, they merely aggravate the conservative crowd and cause the pendulum to swing in the other direction. I am a liberal but I am also practical.

Michael

~~~

And that’s it for now. Dale’s extremely disrespectful and negative attitude totally stresses me out, but I keep arguing for some reason.

As a bonus, an insightful commenter, “Utilitarian”, had this to say in response to another commenter:

~~~

James,

My argument is that if AI is plausible then there will be some appropriate strategies to pursue, most of them very different from SIAI’s donor-funded secretive algorithmic research approach.

If AI is first constructed through imitating brain processes, then beneficial outcomes would hinge more on processes of education and understanding messy emotions rather than formally represented goal systems. Then the SIAI approach would be irrelevant (except as something to be taken up by the humanlike AI) but the personality and motives of resulting AI would remain extremely important.

This is so even without a ‘hard takeoff’: if it takes time to develop and then educate an AI the first ones created can occupy whole labor markets by rapid self-replication. This would create massive populations with extremely similar motivations, a powerful constituency that would shape the future and provide the base for modification for superior intelligence (even if that process takes several years). Creating the initial AI and allowing it some freedom to communicate and replicate would be practically and politically irrevocable (as AI could quickly spread across borders and make itself economically and militarily indispensable) without extraordinarily rapid recursive self-improvement.

The shared motivations of those AIs would matter enormously: shared tendencies towards sociopathy and contempt for humans (harmless in positions of political weakness) could be disastrous even to the point of human genocide, while benevolence at or beyond the upper limits of the human range could make for a tremendously better democratic society. And in either case the susceptibility of digital minds to copying, intelligence enhancement without many of the complications of using biotech on brains, and running on faster hardware would mean tremendous increases in economic and technological growth.

If hostile or unfriendly AI is not a danger at all, then billions of dollars should be put into public funding for basic research in AI, allocated through normal processes of peer review (plus potentially better ones like tiered prizes). The ratio of cost to expected benefit would be very favorable relative to funding for nuclear fusion research (with its or much of our biomedical research funding (most of which will fail to produce anything of value). [Incidentally, I think both fusion power and cancer research are very worth funding, despite their track records of hype and failure.]

If hostile AI is a danger, and we have unfriendly humans and the fact that power is a convergent goal for lots of different nonhuman motivations to support the idea that it is, then other general measures could be appropriate. Theoretical examination of those dangers that can be conceived of now, conditions on government funding or regulation to ensure that precautions are taken, and possibly an increase in research funding to increase the likelihood that AI is developed under the safety framework rather than outside it come to mind.

Regardless, there are many things to try to do to produce beneficial AI other than secretive research aimed at a provably safe algorithmic AI, funded by private donations at an organization like SIAI with staff you dislike for various reasons (some of them very important ones). There are many possibilities under which AI research and AI safety are of critical importance other than the SIAI hard takeoff scenario, and alternative paths to solutions. I would like to see a supplement to Dale’s critique of Superlative discussion of AI with positive alternatives, rather than throwing out the baby with the bathwater. [And I don’t take the advice to join the ACLU as really serious engagement on positive alternatives, given the extent of resources already dedicated to its causes and diminishing marginal returns. Discussion of activism to disclose secret weapons research by DARPA would better suggest engagement rather than just a convenient club for dismissal. I also haven’t seen a response to the argument that if AI safety is nothing to worry about then we should just try to increase public funding for basic research into AI by quite a lot.]

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Here’s a shot of me with Aubrey from last Friday.

Aubrey always looks so tired nowadays. I hope we achieve indefinite life extension soon, so he can finally relax!

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Accelerating Future compañero Jeriaska has recently transcribed Eliezer Yudkowsky’s talk from the Singularity Summit 2007. Yudkowsky is a highly respected figure in the transhumanist community whose intense dissection and analysis of futurist issues is second to none. Thank you Jeriaska for transcribing this!

Judging by the way some people casually use the word “Singularity” in the comments section of this blog, I think you could really use this. Read this talk and you’ll see the “Singularity” for what it really is — three entirely separate but terribly conflated ideas. Cory Doctorow, for one, is guilty of conflating these ideas to the point where they were nothing more than a tepid paste by the time he was through with them.

Lots of other fantastic transcripts are up at the People Database Blog, and many more will be going up in coming weeks. Subscribe for the latest info, mofo!

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(Source: Wikipedia)

Full name: Convention on the Prohibition of the Development, Production, Stockpiling and Use of Chemical Weapons and on their Destruction.

Short name: Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC)
Open for signature: January 13, 1993
Entered into force: April 29, 1997
Member states: 182
Map of member states:

(States in light blue are full participants but still have stockpiles in various stages of disposal.)

Notable non-signatories include Angola, North Korea, Egypt, Iraq, Lebanon, Somalia, and Syria.

Summary:

Article I. General Obligations
Article II. Definitions and Criteria
Article III. Declarations
Article IV. Chemical Weapons
Article V. Chemical Weapons Production Facilities
Article VI. Activities Not Prohibited under this Convention
Article VII. National Implementation Measures
Article VIII. The Organization
Article IX. Consultations, Cooperation and Fact-Finding
Article X. Assistance and Protection against Chemical Weapons
Article XI. Economic and Technological Development
Article XII. Measures to Redress a Situation and to Ensure Compliance
Article XIII. Relation to Other International Agreements
Article XIV. Settlement of Disputes
Article XV. Amendments
Article XVI. Duration and Withdrawal
Article XVII. Status of the Annexes
Article XVIII. Signature
Article XIX. Ratification
Article XX. Accession
Article XXI. Entry into Force
Article XXII. Reservations
Article XXIII. Depositary
Article XXIV. Authentic Texts

Full text available here.

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Richard Jones, a professor of physics and the Senior Strategic Advisor for Nanotechnology for the UK’s Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council — a role informally known as “UK Nano-Champion” — has adopted Berkeley rhetoric professor Dale Carrico’s criticism of so-called superlative technology discourse. In a recent blog post, he responded to an article following on the heels of a TV series hosted by Michio Kaku, titled “We will have the power of gods”. Here is an extract with choice pieces, selected by Carrico:

~~~~

“Superlative technology discourse… starts with an emerging technology with interesting and potentially important consequences, like nanotechnology, or artificial intelligence, or the medical advances that are making (slow) progress combating the diseases of aging. The discussion leaps ahead of the issues that such technologies might give rise to at the present and in the near future, and goes straight on to a discussion of the most radical projections of these technologies. The fact that the plausibility of these radical projections may be highly contested is by-passed by a curious foreshortening….

[T]his renders irrelevant any thought that the future trajectory of technologies should be the subject of any democratic discussion or influence, and it distorts and corrupts discussions of the consequences of technologies in the here and now. It’s also unhealthy that these “superlative” technology outcomes are championed by self-identified groups — such as transhumanists and singularitarians — with a strong, pre-existing attachment to a particular desired outcome - an attachment which defines these groups’ very identity. It’s difficult to see how the judgements of members of these groups can fail to be influenced by the biases of group-think and wishful thinking….

The difficulty that this situation leaves us in is made clear in [an] article by Alfred Nordmann — “We are asked to believe incredible things, we are offered intellectually engaging and aesthetically appealing stories of technical progress, the boundaries between science and science fiction are blurred, and even as we look to the scientists themselves, we see cautious and daring claims, reluctant and self- declared experts, and the scientific community itself at a loss to assert standards of credibility.” This seems to summarise nicely what we should expect from Michio Kaku’s forthcoming series, “Visions of the future”. That the program should take this form is perhaps inevitable; the more extreme the vision, the easier it is to sell to a TV commissioning editor…

Have we, as Kaku claims, “unlocked the secrets of matter”? On the contrary, there are vast areas of science — areas directly relevant to the technologies under discussion — in which we have barely begun to understand the issues, let alone solve the problems. Claims like this exemplify the triumphalist, but facile, reductionism that is the major currency of so much science popularisation. And Kaku’s claim that soon “we will have the power of gods” may be intoxicating, but it doesn’t prepare us for the hard work we’ll need to do to solve the problems we face right now.

~~~~

I agree, from first exposure, that the Kaku piece is unnecessarily triumphalist, facile, and reductionist. Science popularization often sweeps away the manifold complexities involved in developing, deploying, and regulating major technologies for the sake of simplicity and shortening attention spans. Articles titled “we will have the power of gods” are incredibly unhelpful, even if they might be absolutely correct in the long term. Think about it: many of our powers today would be considered godlike from the perspective of the Middle Ages. When technology is applied to changing the human form, this effect will become much more pronounced.

But this sensationalistic talk prevents more cautious people from taking the arguments seriously.

I think Jones and Carrico are both wrong that transhumanists have a “strong, pre-existing attachment to a particular desired outcome”. A minority of transhumanists maybe, but not a majority. What transhumanists want is for humanity to enjoy healthier, longer lives and higher standards of living provided by safe, cheap, personalized products. The precise path pursued to achieve these outcomes is a secondary question, albeit an important one.

Many transhumanists are concerned that current fund dispersion schemes (the National Nanotechnology Initiative for example) fail to invest significantly in higher-payoff research avenues such as mechanosynthesis. The leading universities, and other entrenched incumbents have a monopoly on research dollars. They know they will get the funds anyway, so they are given great flexibility in how “nanotechnology” is defined, leading to more incremental research and less bold, cutting-edge research holding the possibility of major breakthroughs. This is counter-productive.

I first read Eric Drexler’s Engines of Creation when I was 13. Admittedly, I became very excited about Drexler’s vision of molecular manufacturing creating rocket engines made of pure diamond and the like. But as I got older, I had to discard my juvenile attachment to particular technological outcomes, and embrace fuzzy probability distributions and uncertain research initiatives skewing distributions as a matter of percentages. The mission is to make the world a better place to live: if mechanosynthesis or artificial intelligence turn out to be extremely difficult or unworkable, we’d have to put our focus towards other projects, like:

brain-computer interfacing
deployment of solar power satellites
studies in proteomics and epigenetics
psychopharmacology and nootropics
progressively better fabbers
“smart” materials and bio-inspired materials
wearable devices and cybernetic implants

…and dozens or hundreds more. And many of us already do. See, transhumanism is not a preoccupation with a narrow range of specific technological outcomes. It looks at the entire picture of emerging technologies, including those already embraced by the mainstream. If one path doesn’t work, we try another. The overall trend in support of enhancement technologies is already practically ubiquitous in research labs worldwide.

If any transhumanists do have specific attachments to particular desired outcome, I suggest they drop them — now. The transhumanist identity should not be defined by a yearning for such outcomes. It is defined by a desire to use technology to open up a much wider space of morphological diversity than experienced today. We want to create millions of Homo sapiens spinoffs which people can mix and match at will. This will make democracy stronger by introducing new agents immune to human-characteristic cognitive biases, among other things.

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(Source: Wikipedia)

Full name: Convention on the Prohibition of the Development, Production and Stockpiling of Bacteriological (Biological) and Toxin Weapons and on their Destruction

Short name: Biological Weapons Convention (BWC)
Open for signature: April 10, 1972
Entered into force: March 26, 1975
Member states: 158
Map of member states:

Summary:

Article I. Never under any circumstances to acquire or retain biological weapons.
Article II. To destroy or divert to peaceful purposes biological weapons and associated resources prior to joining.
Article III. Not to transfer, or in any way assist, encourage or induce anyone else to acquire or retain biological weapons.
Article IV. To take any national measures necessary to implement the provisions of the BWC domestically.
Article V. To consult bilaterally and multilaterally to solve any problems with the implementation of the BWC.
Article VI. To request the UN Security Council to investigate alleged breaches of the BWC and to comply with its subsequent decisions.
Article VII. To assist States which have been exposed to a danger as a result of a violation of the BWC.
Article X. To do all of the above in a way that encourages the peaceful uses of biological science and technology.

Full text available here.

One Response »

Some elitist-sounding comments by Marvin Minsky in a New Scientist article recently have caused some concern. Danielle Egan, the author of the article, posted the full transcript of her interview with Minsky in an effort to defend her choice of words and demonstrate that she wasn’t trying to misrepresent him. Some transhumanists disagreed with her. Here is Egan’s email in defense of herself, along with the full transcript, with the quoted parts bolded:

Danielle Egan here.

I’m here to stand behind the published quotes by Minsky. The transcript of our interview is copied below. You can judge for yourselves whether I took Minsky’s comments out of context or not.

(And also whether publishing any of his additional info would have softened or hardened Minsky’s published quotes.)

While I would have loved to write 5,000 words about the conference and included my interviews with all of the people I met there (and some I didn’t even get to meet), I had to deal with a 1,200 word assignment that was eventually reduced to just under 900 words by the editor. Even the published quotes from the few people included in the piece would have been much better understood if their entire interviews had been published, along with a whole lot of extra background notes. But that wasn’t possible based on the assignment and while I lament the death of long-form journalism, I think covering the basics, including the obvious polarities within the H+ movement and the not-so-warm-fuzzy comments of certain “visionary” H+ers, is much better than nothing. And in fact, I gave a lot more ink to the quotes and info around proposed democratic and ethical goals within the movement than anything else.

I agree with Sky that I didn’t capture the spirit of the conference. I think my first draft did that, but it was over 2,000 words long. And since the published draft is kicking up controversy, not to mention various attempts to discredit me, a longer more nuanced piece would probably just have pissed of MORE people. At any rate, few people enjoy seeing their whole life history, their philosophies, etc reduced to a handful of quotes, actions and a basic physical description. I’ve noticed that people are sometimes shocked by their own words, just as we can be shocked by our reflection in the mirror, thinking, ‘I don’t really look like that!’ One of our many human quirks.

But don’t transhumanists pride themselves in being shock-proof? Or do they reserve that for thinking long, hard and honestly about the future, not present day life?

Before I leave you with Minsky’s transcript, thanks again to all of you for talking to me about H+. I am hoping to do larger articles on the topic and while I have my own personal biases - journalists are flawed just like scientists! - I will do my best not to let them creep in. Journalists are supposed to sit on the fence, so by that I partly mean that I will try my best not to fall hard for you people and your grand ideas, which is a difficult task since I find many H+ views and goals fascinating, challenging, seductive and pragmatic. I’m all for the “mainstream” getting into this discussion.

Truncated interview with Minsky, over lunch, day one of the conference. Prior to this point of the interview Minsky discussed narrow AI, religion, soccer, steroids, wrestling and warned me against recreational running, telling me I only have so many steps to take in my life and perhaps shouldn’t waste them on running. (Editorial: I’ve since given up running. See what I mean about Stockholm syndrome!)

Q: The majority of Americans believe in god so they think they’re going to live forever. And most of us use technology, so it’s strange to me that transhumanism seems so radical to them.

Minsky: I once did a sort of experiment. I was at a meeting at which the subject came up and I asked a big audience, ‘How many of you would like to live for 200 years?’ Most said no. This was a bunch of non-specialized citizens who’d come to a meeting with Philip Morris for some purpose I can’t remember. But very few of them. I asked them why and they said, ‘Well it would be boring.’ Some said, ‘Well if you were infirm and handicapped it would be unpleasant.’ I said, ‘Well suppose you were healthy to the last minute? In other words, you stay 30 years old for 200 years.’ They said, it would still be boring after a while. So then the next chance I got, I had a room full of scientists and I said the same thing. They all said, ‘Yes.’ I said, ‘Why?’ ‘Because I have some hard problems that will take that long to solve.’ So what I concluded is that ordinary citizens wouldn’t know what to do with eternal life. The masses don’t have any clear-cut goals or purpose. That’s why the world is so dangerous. People will go to war because the worst that could happen is they get killed and what difference does that make. It’s not as though it were important. They don’t like getting killed but they don’t have any reason not to get killed. As far as I can tell, only scientists have problems that are hard but that they see some hope of solving. Religious people want to obey god or something and I don’t think that’s a very strong motive – and they want to avoid being punished. But they don’t have positive goals, like that. There’s a quote from WH Auden: We’re all on earth to do good, but what I can’t figure out is what the others are here for. Maybe these are people who have ambitions and interests that distinguishes them from the rest.

Q: I meet scientists with all sorts of goals. Some of them don’t seem very scientific to me, or there are ulterior motives for the science. But some of the transhumanists I’ve met have very ethical goals and some seem quite conservative, cautious; used to be boy scouts.

Minsky: What does that mean, to be a boy scout?

Q: Learned survival methods as a child, and now are sort of boy scouts about things like nanotech.

Minsky: I know what a boy scout is. I have a merit badge for tying knots. I don’t know what you mean by boy scouts about nanotechnology.

Q: Caution and concern about the negative implications of these techs. They want nanotech, but want it used in a wise, ethical way.

Minsky: The problem is combining those qualities in the same person. The reason we have politicians is to prevent bad things from happening. It doesn’t make sense to ask a scientist to worry about the bad effects of their discoveries, because they’re no better at that than anyone else. Scientists are not particularly good at social policy.

Q: But shouldn’t they have an ethical responsibility for their inventions?

Minsky: No they shouldn’t have an ethical responsibility for their inventions. They should be able to do what they want. You shouldn’t have to ask them to have the same values as other people. Because then you won’t get them. They’ll make stupid decisions and not work on important things, because they see possible dangers. What you need is a separation of powers. It doesn’t make any sense to have the same person do both. Is this a new idea to you? Many people find it shocking.

Q: But this is also a problem in the scientific community.

Minsky: No, it is not. It is not a problem. Science is like a big animal that grows over thousands of years. It’s different than all other intellectual things because it has critical thinking and you win a prize if you show that an article of faith is right. It’s a very important thing and cultures without science are to me are like parasites that survive for their own good. Religion doesn’t do good for other people. It’s an organization that tries to convert people into its way of thinking. Science doesn’t do that. Every scientist will give his arm to show that the others are wrong. No priest would give his arm to show that the Pope is wrong. So science is different from other things because you have to check your beliefs. The general beliefs are probably crazy. Like birth control. Religious people say I want as many people as possible and I don’t care if it fucks up the environment.

Q: But you can make the same argument for some scientists. There are scientists with bias, like in the medical community, ties to drug companies, ego.

Minsky: You see them as being morally defective? That doesn’t matter because they get caught. Everyone who engages in scientific fraud gets caught. Maybe they get away with it for a while. I’m not saying that there aren’t lots of people who are corrupt and make money by selling something like homeopathic drugs. It’s a 40 billion dollar industry. It’s not science. It’s just another set of religious-like beliefs. A person is not a scientist or an atheist. A person is a very complicated thing. We’re talking about scientists as a set of humans who are rather fragile but important because it’s about taking a belief and testing it. That doesn’t mean you convince everyone that you’re right.

Q: But as you said, the primary goal of science is to tackle an issue the other way around. By attempting to prove a theory is wrong. But too much of the time, they try to prove that something is right.

Minsky: I think you’re confusing science with some idea that each scientist is a perfect thing, but they’re just people, they’re not particularly ethical and they’re not even particularly admirable. That’s the reason you shouldn’t ask scientists to be responsible for their discoveries. That’s the job of people that have other sets of values that are usually wrong anyway. For example we have a very high priority of reducing infant mortality. To focus on what you don’t like about particular scientists is missing – what’s causing wars and things? Not the scientists, it’s the true believers. Of course we need more wars because the true believers are making the population grow out of bounds and they’re making more money with war and they want their converts to kill the converts of other religions. Generally the ethics on the surface of most systems of belief or cultures are competitive and that’s a big mess. I feel that science is dying out in the US while we’re fighting these – well if you look at the Bush people, they’re trying to make this in to a religious country.

Q: But increasingly scientists are also beholden to their funders and their funders include the government and corporations.

Minsky: That’s the great thing about science. It doesn’t matter, if your theory is false, your reputation goes.

Q: But you can be marginalized if you don’t produce the results the person or people paying for your research want.

Minsky: Yes, like being paid to show that smoking is good for you. Wasn’t there a recent one that showed ex-smokers are delayed in their Alzheimer’s. It’s funny to look at our culture, because our heroes are actors and what’s an actor? A professional liar?

~~~

There is no question that Minsky’s quotes in this article have set back transhumanism’s efforts to dispel its elitist associations for at least a year. The question is: who’s to blame, Minsky, Egan, or the editors of New Scientist?

By the way, I believe that everyone could enjoy a really long life (not just scientists), and I hope you do too.

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Should transhumanists be emotionally invested in particular technologies, such as molecular manufacturing, which could radically accelerate the transhumanist project?

My answer: for fun, sure. When serious, no. Transhumanists should always have a part of themselves serving as a detached futurist. Even though accurate prediction of the future is absolutely impossible, it makes sense to estimate probability distributions — we all have them, the difference is whether we explicitly acknowledge their presence and at least try to make them logically self-consistent.

For instance, right now I believe there is an over 85% chance that, barring catastrophic disaster, AI surpassing the human level will be developed by the end of this century.

Do I have an emotional investment in this prediction? No. What do I desire? Radical life extension, intelligence enhancement, permanent elimination of disease and war, and even the abolition of suffering in all sentient life. But this does not require artificial intelligence. I believe AI could accelerate these goals, but they are not dependent on it, so there is little personal emotional investment.

Most transhumanist goals are achievable through a variety of different technological paths. Still, even if none of these paths work, human life is not all that terrible — at least if you live in a developed country. Even if no transhumanist aims are accomplished this century, we could spend our time trying to bring the rest of the world up to the Western level of material prosperity, and that would be a worthy endeavor unto itself.

We have to make the best of what we have. No one person can map out the entire technological solution space using pure imagination, otherwise they could invent all the devices themselves. In lieu of perfect knowledge, we are stuck with probabilities.

But the probabilities are worth formulating. I see more extreme technological changes in the upcoming century than an average person, and these have policy implications in the here and now. I would like to see more attention being paid to what would be called “low probability, high impact” events. The politics we play in human society tends to make us focus on the immediate present, not the longer-term future.

In the end, futurism is a personal thing. In the media, a lot of futurism is about wearing the beliefs as clothes — signalling mechanisms to get across to a target market. Beliefs about the future can be biased through various social forces. You have to ask yourself, “what do I believe here personally, if no one else is looking?” Only then are you being honest about your predictions, and can compare them usefully to other models.

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