SIAI Interview Series: Steve Omohundro Wednesday, Apr 23 2008
AI and singularity 7:37 pm

Watch SIAI’s new interview with AI researcher Steve Omohundro, president of Self-Aware Systems. His CV is here. A transcript of the interview is here.
AI and singularity 7:37 pm

Watch SIAI’s new interview with AI researcher Steve Omohundro, president of Self-Aware Systems. His CV is here. A transcript of the interview is here.
They’re working on AGI, but sadly, they can’t seem to find the input volume setting on the microphone ;)
Nice interview. However, I don’t believe that advanced AI or nanotech will eliminate disease. New environments bring new opportunities, and viruses/microorganisms constantly evolve, exploiting any available weakness. In some ways the modern world makes life very pathogen friendly. Worldwide air travel and increased centralization in food production/distribution break down barriers which would previously have allowed disease spread to be contained or hindered. For example the foot and mouth outbreak in the UK a few years ago showed how centralization of cattle markets allowed the disease to spread more rapidly than similar events in previous decades.
Bob, blue goo can evolve a lot faster than pathogens. That is because the former can be directed by intelligent systems, or indeed any suitable system, whereas the latter is restricted to Darwinian evolution, which makes a million mistakes before it has one success.