Yesterday I spoke to Nikola Danaylov at the Singularity Weblog. The title of the podcast comes from a quote I made during the interview, when Nikola asked me whether or not he thought we would need to sacrifice aspects of our humanity to go through a Technological Singularity. My response was that if we do the Singularity right, we need not compromise in any fashion: human beings from techno-enthusiasts to the Amish will be enthusiastic with the results.
During the podcast, Nikola asked me what I thought humanity’s chance of surviving the Singularity would be, and I said that my current estimate was around 25%, but that could change depending on what happens, and how much effort is put towards a positive Singularity.
some people are only happy when others aren’t happy. you see glimpses of this in the economics of positional goods.
“During the podcast, Nikola asked me what I thought humanity’s chance of surviving the Singularity would be, and I said that my current estimate was around 25%”
I wonder what makes people pull out magic probability numbers out of their heads like that. As if you could somehow predict the probability of human survival in a runaway event like the Singularity. You could maybe outline potential causality factors and plausibility arguments for certain scenarios, but a number like that? You might just as well ask a magic 8-ball.
> I wonder what makes people pull out magic probability numbers out of their heads like that
It is a bayesian probability. By Cox’s theorem, you have a probability for any event that lies between your actions and your goals, no matter how little you know about it.
Well, maybe people should also communiate the probability that they don’t actually have a clue about what’s going to happen. You don’t communicate probability numbers “no matter how little you know” about the validity and reliability of their underlying assumptions.
Yea, I think it’s called “degree of confidence” I give humanity a 75% chance of surviving the Singularity. And my degree of confidence in my opinion is 30%.
Like Roko says, I have an implicit probability estimate, whether I explicitly acknowledge it or not, so I might as well say it. It should be obvious that I am just making a guess based on my knowledge, and don’t have access to any kind of oracle.
Actually, Michael, it would be good to hear something about where this estimate came from – why you would specifically say the chances of survival are 1/4, rather than 2/3, 1/2, 1/3, 1/20, etc. It sort of implies that you see four classes of equally probable outcome, only one of which includes human survival. So what are the four types of outcome?
Only one in a quarter, huh? I guess we’d better roll high.
The problem is not that he openly states his estimate (which is what all of us do whether we use numbers or not) but that some readers, when they see numbers, feel used to trusting that they have been rigorously adduced. Nonetheless, as Twain said, there are lies, damned lies, and statistics. Or as my friend used to say, “77% of statistics are made up on the spot”. I don’t give particularly high reliability scores to Michael’s estimates, particularly when he doesn’t explain how he arrived at them, whether he offers them in number or “this is likely” form, but I give them higher trust than I do just anyone’s. So I was glad to hear an estimate.
TPSE = technological phase shift event , or technological plateau shock event.
Better defined, the chances on baseline humanity remaining in a somewhat recognizable cultural context, either self-determinacy or in reservations, is less than 5%.
The chances on a derivative human stare emerging, based on a lot of people becoming a lot more powerful and smart leading up to the slope if the TPSE emerges more gradually – about 10%. In any case society will be extremely disrupted, the first rules to be broken between 2020 and 2035 will be wealth disparities (either a lot more or a lot less), economic hegemony, military control, average lifespan, health, average intelligence, labor divisions and relationships. A personal favorite theme would be a sexual revolution of such vicious frenzy it would be terrifying to know details in advance.
Chances on most of the third world (and about half in the rich nations) dying between 2020 and 2040 (say a few billion people) (overlap with the above) – about 50%. This can be a very gentle transition (global euthanasia scenario) but don’t bet on it. By then people will have a clear understand what is at stake and many more than today will *really* have something to live for (games being one).
The other 70%?
Humans transitioning, such as forcible uploads or spectacular enforced interface-driven virtual realities. Also a possibility is an epidemic of cybergization – cheap cybernetic replacement treatments far better than natural limbs becoming available and being used by everyone on an epidemic scale. Or : largescale robotization, or largescale personality simulations (5000 copies of khannea suntzu roaming the internets blogging about everything politically incorrect, writing militant articles, creating offensive art, all cybering like lemmings, etc., i.e. HyperIdoru plague.) ….
Worst case scenario transpiring even before the actual singularity would be a nanoid storm – humans forcibly moving into controlled environments because outside the world,, biosphere and atmosphere turns into a corrosive nanoid soup.
These would be the ‘understandable’ scenario’s. If we do not have a pre-TPSE hill, but rather a sudden spiking emergence, or if the political caste does basicly nothing to anticipate events, then we are probably dead.
What would increase survival
- debate starting now, nearly everyone being aware of the idea ten years from now, and understanding we can’t stop (billjoy relinquishment) it without killing half the population and hurtling us all in a mad max world.
- Our societies institutionalize and internalize values of nonexclusion. Why? Because all reading on this site are far more to be themselves excluded rather than included. And so far, exclusion of any kind has resulted in intense misery. We all go on this boat and we decide we all go on this boat, and pay the high price of full inclusion, or we shouldn’t be surprised that our penchant for locking out people will carry on into the TPSE.
- make politicians aware and take it serious. It is good to know that Obama knows of the concept of the TPSE, and has appointed advisors to look into planning for it. And the Pentagon has already started its own study groups.
- If we actively stimulate diversity in TPSE actors (i.e. at least a dozen TPSE awaken roughly around the same time) then that *may* better our chances to survive inbetween the balance of artillect powers. (reign of steel scenarios).
Finally – nobody should ever ever have the hope that a TPSE will be a ‘subtle’, ‘black monolith’ event. No it wont curl up into itself and stand in the landscape all sinister and silent. The TPSE will be strongly disposed to filling EVERY space and niche and freedom, many of which we don’t have a clue about. A Hard TPSE is like a lahar. The worst singularity possible is the ‘Lahar’ singularity. It will expand outward like a sphere of artillect hegemony at an appreciable percentage of the speed of light. A mere day after it starts on earth you will start seeing the surface of mars change. It’ll start rebuilding alpha centauri in mere decades.
Humans will be an inconsequential afterthought.
Doesn’t a construct like the “TPSE” require a timeline? I didn’t see one in your post. On a long enough timeline, the probability of species survival always drops to zero. So, on what timeline are basing those probability estimates? Thirty years? Forty? Fifty?
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