I started this wave on "If the Singularity happens, what next?" a few weeks ago, and the discussion has been interesting. Now it has been split into other waves.
Sunday, December 27, 2009
Saturday, December 26, 2009
Sunday, November 22, 2009
First meeting of European Transhumanist Associations
On Friday 20 and Saturday 21 November, 2009, we had the first coordination meeting of European Transhumanist Associations, hosted by the Italian Transhumanist Association for the Euro transhumanists group. Thanks to the group founder for coordinating the group and moderating the meeting, and thanks to Stefano Vaj for hosting both the meeting and the mixer dinner on Friday night (and, of course, for his own many contributions to the program).
From the Italian Transhumanist Association News: 21/11/2009 - Primo summit delle organizzazioni transumaniste attive in Europa - Si è concluso oggi il primo summit europeo del movimento transumanista, che si è svolto a Milano in via Montenapoleone sotto l'egida dell'Associazione Italiana Transumanisti, nella sala cortesemente messa a disposizione per l'occasione presso i propri uffici dallo Studio Legale Sutti (http://www.sutti.com). Il segretario nazionale dell'associazione, Stefano Vaj, ha avuto occasione insieme a Giulio Prisco di dare il benvenuto ai rappresentanti delle organizzazioni invitate degli altri paesi, che hanno discusso con la delegazione dell'AIT una fitta agenda di aspetti organizzativi, iniziative in corso e questioni di interesse comune, ed hanno illustrato la situazione esistente in Francia, Russia, Slovenia, Belgio, Regno Unito, Germania, Olanda, Svezia e Grecia.
In the picture above, all participants besides David Orban (who gave a briefing on the Singularity University in the afternoon) and Giulio Prisco (taking the picture). In the picture below, taken by David Orban, Anders Sandberg, Giulio Prisco and Stefano Vaj at the dinner.
My own impressions:
I most certainly look forward to having the opportunity to participate in foresight projects led by public administrations at European and national levels. Governments and administrations need good, timely and accurate advice on scientifical, technological and social trends, and many persons and groups in the transhumanist community are well positioned to provide such advice, with that extra touch of imagination that is often missing from public policy discourse. Of course I fully understand that such projects are not the best place to promote the more visionary and long-term transhumanist ideas (you know,immortality indefinite lifespan, mind uploading and all that). If I contribute to public foresight projects, I promise to behave and focus on issues relevant to the scope of current public policy and within my own areas of expertise, and leave visionary cosmist speculations aside. But, and it is an important but, without renouncing my ideas. I am not ashamed of being a transhumanist, on the contrary I am proud of it. I think it is perfectly possible to be a pragmatic technology expert and policy advisor, a concerned citizen, and a wild cosmist visionary at the same time, and to wear each hat as and when appropriate to the situation at hand.
On the other hand and more generally, I don't believe in "appeasing critics", but in being true to one's ideas and promoting them as forcefully as needed. Transhumanism is radical, disruptive, subversive, and revolutionary: so be it. Not kissing ass, but kicking ass. At the same time I think our ideas are beautiful, and I wish to offer them to the world and to reach as many persons as possible. Of course I realize this needs a careful framing and wording of our message, but without diluting its core meaning. The tension between the two souls of transhumanism, moderate and radical, pragmatic and visionary, was evident at this meeting, but I continue to believe that there should be no tension.
This was a physical meeting in good old brickspace (only Russian transhumanists attended via Skype teleconferencing). I am all for telework and telepresence, and my company will offer advanced telework and telepresence tools for future meetings of this and other groups, but I realize that face to face interaction is still better, and that telecollaboration is most effective when participants also know each and meet other face to face. Telepresence is not (yet) a replacement for physical presence, but a (more and more) useful complement. David Wood of Extrobritannia spoke of their monthly meetings in London, a successful initiative that should be replicated in other places, also with webcast and telepresence options.
The idea of atranshumanist think tank think tank powered by transhumanists, of course with the caveats above, has re-surfaced. The Institute for Ethics and Emerging Technologies is a good role model. A few years ago many transhumanists started a working group to define and build a think tank called FutureTAG (Future Technologies Advisory Group): A consulting and media group focused on promoting awareness and understanding of radical scientific advances and emerging technologies, as well as evaluating their impact on individuals, businesses and societies. While one of the objectives of the firm will be facilitating the penetration of transhumanist ideas in mainstream business and policy, we will not use the T word or insist on the transhumanist worldview too explicitly. Rather, we will focus on delivering practical advice appropriate to the intended audience. FutureTAG has produced several spinoffs (my own company is one), but it has not been active recently. Perhaps this is a good moment to reload the initiative? The mailing list is still live.
Politics (of course): there are new and emergent political forces whose core values and goals are definitely compatible with transhumanism, and which in turn share (or may be persuaded to share) transhumanist core value and ideas. There are interesting initiatives in this direction, and in general it is interesting to open a dialogue with new emergent political forces, very carefully as they might fear attempts to hijack them. I prefer not to go into details here, but there are interesting initiatives ongoing.
The strong, militant language used in the European Transhumanist Front website of Riccardo Campa leaves some participants uneasy, and I can perfectly understand why: the bold, provocative, radically Futurist stance of many Italian transhumanists, and the recent debates about its political roots, can trigger some fears. Yet, what is transhumanism but a permanent war against all limits? I endorse most of the Front's website content, especially: we do not cater to the idea that transhumanism's first concern should be that of appeasing the fears of neoluddites, comply with western political correctness, or struggle for a "respectability" that would only be the mark of irrelevance. "Compromises", "tradeoffs" and "doublespeak" are the tools-in-trade of governments, politicians, bureaucrats, diplomats, entrepreneurs. Not of lobbies, visionaries, think tanks or grass-roots movements... We see transhumanism as a metapolitical, social and cultural struggle, aimed at a revolutionary change of our way of life on the scale of the neolithic revolution, and in the shorter term fighting for self-determination and access to technology, against prohibitionist policies at a national as well as at an international level. Bravo!
German cryonicists gave a very interesting presentation, but most participants do not see cryonics as a core transhumanist issue at this moment. Yet, cryonics is all about self-ownership and self-determination, central transhumanist values which everyone supports, or should support.
In summary, a very interesting and productive summit meeting which we intend to repeat in 2010. At least three other important transhumanist events will be held in Europe in 2010: a one day event in the UK, Miriam's conference, and our own Transvision 2010.
From the Italian Transhumanist Association News: 21/11/2009 - Primo summit delle organizzazioni transumaniste attive in Europa - Si è concluso oggi il primo summit europeo del movimento transumanista, che si è svolto a Milano in via Montenapoleone sotto l'egida dell'Associazione Italiana Transumanisti, nella sala cortesemente messa a disposizione per l'occasione presso i propri uffici dallo Studio Legale Sutti (http://www.sutti.com). Il segretario nazionale dell'associazione, Stefano Vaj, ha avuto occasione insieme a Giulio Prisco di dare il benvenuto ai rappresentanti delle organizzazioni invitate degli altri paesi, che hanno discusso con la delegazione dell'AIT una fitta agenda di aspetti organizzativi, iniziative in corso e questioni di interesse comune, ed hanno illustrato la situazione esistente in Francia, Russia, Slovenia, Belgio, Regno Unito, Germania, Olanda, Svezia e Grecia.
In the picture above, all participants besides David Orban (who gave a briefing on the Singularity University in the afternoon) and Giulio Prisco (taking the picture). In the picture below, taken by David Orban, Anders Sandberg, Giulio Prisco and Stefano Vaj at the dinner.
My own impressions:
I most certainly look forward to having the opportunity to participate in foresight projects led by public administrations at European and national levels. Governments and administrations need good, timely and accurate advice on scientifical, technological and social trends, and many persons and groups in the transhumanist community are well positioned to provide such advice, with that extra touch of imagination that is often missing from public policy discourse. Of course I fully understand that such projects are not the best place to promote the more visionary and long-term transhumanist ideas (you know,
On the other hand and more generally, I don't believe in "appeasing critics", but in being true to one's ideas and promoting them as forcefully as needed. Transhumanism is radical, disruptive, subversive, and revolutionary: so be it. Not kissing ass, but kicking ass. At the same time I think our ideas are beautiful, and I wish to offer them to the world and to reach as many persons as possible. Of course I realize this needs a careful framing and wording of our message, but without diluting its core meaning. The tension between the two souls of transhumanism, moderate and radical, pragmatic and visionary, was evident at this meeting, but I continue to believe that there should be no tension.
This was a physical meeting in good old brickspace (only Russian transhumanists attended via Skype teleconferencing). I am all for telework and telepresence, and my company will offer advanced telework and telepresence tools for future meetings of this and other groups, but I realize that face to face interaction is still better, and that telecollaboration is most effective when participants also know each and meet other face to face. Telepresence is not (yet) a replacement for physical presence, but a (more and more) useful complement. David Wood of Extrobritannia spoke of their monthly meetings in London, a successful initiative that should be replicated in other places, also with webcast and telepresence options.
The idea of a
Politics (of course): there are new and emergent political forces whose core values and goals are definitely compatible with transhumanism, and which in turn share (or may be persuaded to share) transhumanist core value and ideas. There are interesting initiatives in this direction, and in general it is interesting to open a dialogue with new emergent political forces, very carefully as they might fear attempts to hijack them. I prefer not to go into details here, but there are interesting initiatives ongoing.
The strong, militant language used in the European Transhumanist Front website of Riccardo Campa leaves some participants uneasy, and I can perfectly understand why: the bold, provocative, radically Futurist stance of many Italian transhumanists, and the recent debates about its political roots, can trigger some fears. Yet, what is transhumanism but a permanent war against all limits? I endorse most of the Front's website content, especially: we do not cater to the idea that transhumanism's first concern should be that of appeasing the fears of neoluddites, comply with western political correctness, or struggle for a "respectability" that would only be the mark of irrelevance. "Compromises", "tradeoffs" and "doublespeak" are the tools-in-trade of governments, politicians, bureaucrats, diplomats, entrepreneurs. Not of lobbies, visionaries, think tanks or grass-roots movements... We see transhumanism as a metapolitical, social and cultural struggle, aimed at a revolutionary change of our way of life on the scale of the neolithic revolution, and in the shorter term fighting for self-determination and access to technology, against prohibitionist policies at a national as well as at an international level. Bravo!
German cryonicists gave a very interesting presentation, but most participants do not see cryonics as a core transhumanist issue at this moment. Yet, cryonics is all about self-ownership and self-determination, central transhumanist values which everyone supports, or should support.
In summary, a very interesting and productive summit meeting which we intend to repeat in 2010. At least three other important transhumanist events will be held in Europe in 2010: a one day event in the UK, Miriam's conference, and our own Transvision 2010.
Saturday, October 31, 2009
Second Life - Reloaded?
Edited after the Second Life Enterprise presentation to Second Life developers (SLDEV) on November 5, 2009. I have collected the most important facts and the the most interesting blogs here. I expect many corporations and large organizations will be interested in the corporate version of Second Life, running behind the firewall. This will help raising the sex-appeal of the SL platform as a whole. But while the pricing is reasonable and most firms and universities can certainly afford it, I think after the initial investigations many operators may decide that the advantages of SL Enterprise don't justify the extra price, and consider the public Second Life or an OpenSim installation.
Watch the SL Enterprise presentation video on metanomics.
----
In the last few months, after moving from Spain to Italy, I have hardly ever logged in Second Life -- I have had little time for social events, and no business projects in Second Life. I have been working a lot on projects based on other VR platforms, but for the first time since 2007 my company metafuturing has been in maintenance-only mode in Second Life, with no active development projects. We have been working on 2D e-learning systems, done white label simulator development on several game engines, started building a city for Blue Mars, and doing other IT projects, with no SL work on the horizon.
Like everyone, I have been reading one after another article announcing the death of Second Life, like this blog post on Second Life, imminent death where the well known and respected futurist Ian Pearson commented a Telegraph article on Second Life's span is virtually over as firms decide to get real. But I have never been persuaded that the golden days of the platform were over and always planned to go back to Second Life.
I went back a few days ago, found online my SL friend (and one of the best SL writers and bloggers) Gwyneth Llewelyn, and she invited me to the Beta Business Park Fall 2009 Conference on Leadership in Business, organised by her company Beta Technologies. In the picture, Gwyn speaks to the audience. yes, Gwin speaks (!!!), and with no or very little trace of the Portuguese accent I expected. The conference was great and with many interesting talks and Q/A sessions over 3 days, and confirmed my impression that after 2 years of very bad press, a new Golden Age of Second Life is about to start. This is also confirmed by the growing number of high profile initiatives being (re-)launched in SL.
From metanomics: November 4, 2009, 11:00 a.m. Pacific Standard Time. Mark Kingdon, CEO of Linden Lab, will unveil “Nebraska”, a stand-alone solution based on the technology that runs the popular Second Life virtual world. “Nebraska” is the much-anticipated behind-the-firewall solution which will allow enterprise to host their own virtual world environments within their organizations. Mark will talk about the benefits of the platform, the intended audience, and how it fits into the broader challenges and opportunities of “enterprise 2.0”. Mark will be joined by a number of customers who have used Nebraska during the closed beta phase of development. The panel will explore the benefits, lessons learned, barriers and opportunities which arise from integrating virtual world solutions into the enterprise.
One reason for the bad image of Second Life has been the so-called Flying Phallus Syndrome: most articles about Second Life in the non specialized press are about virtual sex, scandals, financial scams and gambling--even though the last two things are history after Linden Lab has banned SL gambling and unregulated banking, and VR sex may soon follow. Nebraska can provide plausible deniability to corporate operators wishing to experiment with VR based marketing and collaboration without risking Flying Phallus attacks by the press. I think the launch of Nebraska will mark the beginning of the maturity of SL as a platform.
Other bad press against Second Life was mainly due to many corporate operators grossly underestimating the in-house internal effort and commitment necessary to establishing a useful presence in SL, which results in empty islands where nobody ever goes (because, of course, nothing ever happens and there is no reason to go there). I have authored a chapter for a book on VR worlds, to be published by Springer in the Human-Computer Interaction Series, where I wrote: It is often said that many corporate headquarters and initiatives in Second Life are always empty of visitors and “desert,” which is often true and due to a deep lack of understanding of new media by the business sector. On the contrary, many “home-made” virtual environments in Second Life, spontaneously created by users for fun, are vibrant communities always full of enthusiast regulars and visitors... it takes a lot of work and dedication to build a virtual community, and most companies and academic departments just don’t have the necessary resources and are not able to move fast enough. My experience is that, in order to build a successful VR environment with a positive impact on the core business, whatever that is, operational issues must be discussed with the client and taken into account at design stage.
One of our 2007 clients recently closed their very expensive SL facility after two years of desertification. They went to SL in the Golden Age only for the press, and (bad) press is what they got. Another more recent client started after the Golden Age, never cared about the sensationalist press, and created a very successful and useful corporate VR Intranet for internal use: Second Life is, simply, one of the best VR platforms available and permits all sorts of VR collaboration and V-learning initiatives. My main interest is using VR environments to permit real, effective collaboration and learning to geographically distributed communities, and Second Life is one of the few platforms able to offer a solution.
With some needed technical enhancements (eg mesh import from leading 3D design tools, full support for web content, more streaming video formats, webcam support, collaborative editing of office documents), SL may soon start having a real and growing impact on marketing, business and education. The Second Life platform will have many different instances: a public instance run by Linden Lab (the evolution of the current SL), commercial Intranet instances like Nebraska and Immersive Workspaces, and of course the open source OpenSim which is, I think, where most innovation will be developed. The consumer VR market has many players already (my current favorites besides SL: Teleplace, Moondus, Blue Mars). Each will specialize in one or another niche but some consolidation phase seems inevitable, and I think the Second Life platform will be one of the winners.
I will restart recommending Second Life (in the wide sense) as a viable solution to corporate and educational clients, and organizing cultural events in SL. The Transvision 2010 conference will have an important mixed relity component in Second Life, and we are about to launch a major e-learning initiative with a SL component (watch this space for details).
Wednesday, September 30, 2009
I am a Singularitian who does not believe in the Singularity
I am going to the Singularity Summit in New York, and look forward to a very interesting program with many old and new friends. If you are there, I hope to meet you. I will now summarize my thoughts on the Singularity.
The (current) Wikipedia definition: The technological singularity is the theoretical future point which takes place during a period of accelerating change sometime after the creation of a superintelligence. I just updated it as: The technological singularity is the theoretical sudden, exponential and unpredictable accelerating change which takes place sometime after the creation of a superintelligence. Wikipedia continues: as the machine became more intelligent it would become better at becoming more intelligent, which could lead to an exponential and quite sudden growth in intelligence (intelligence explosion). The Singularity is a sudden catastrophic (in the mathematical sense) phase transition, a Dirac delta in history, a point after which the old rules are not valid anymore and must be replaced by new rules which we are unable to imagine at this moment --like the new "Economy 2.0", not understandable by non-augmented humans, described by Charlie Stross in the Singularity novel Accelerando.
The Singularity is a clean mathematical concept --perhaps too clean. Engineers know that all sorts of dirty and messy things happen when one leaves the clean and pristine world of mathematical models and abstractions to engage actual reality with its thermodynamics, friction and grease. I have no doubts of the feasibility of real, conscious, smarter than human AI: intelligence is not mystical but physical, and sooner or later it will be replicated and improved upon. There are promising developments, but (as it uses to happen in reality) I expect all sorts of unforeseen roadblocks with forced detours. So I don't really see a Dirac delta on the horizon--I do see a positive overall trend, but one much slower and with a lot of noise superimposed, not as strong as the main signal but almost. I mostly agree with the analysis of Max More in Singularity and Surge Scenarios and I suspect the change we will see in this century, dramatic and world changing as they might appear to us, will appear as just business than usual to the younger generations. The Internet and mobile phones were a momentous change for us, but they are just a routine part of life for teens. We are very adaptable, and technology is whatever has been invented after our birth, the rest being just part of the fabric of everyday's life. That is why I like Accelerando so much: we see momentous changes happening one after another, but we also get the feeling that it is just business as usual for Manfred and Amber, and just normal life to Sirhan and of course Aineko. Life is life and people are people, before and after the big S.
Some consider the coming intelligence explosion as an existential risk. Superhuman intelligences may have goals inconsistent with human survival and prosperity. AI researcher Hugo de Garis suggests AIs may simply eliminate the human race, and humans would be powerless to stop them. Eliezer Yudkowsky and the Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence propose that research be undertaken to produce friendly artificial intelligence (FAI) in order to address the dangers. I must admit to a certain skepticism toward FAI: if super intelligences are really super intelligent (that is, much more intelligent than us), they will be easily able to circumvent any limitations we may try to impose on them. No amount of technology, not even an intelligence explosion, will change the fact that different players have different interests and goals. SuperAIs will do what is in _their_ best interest, regardless of what we wish, and no amount of initial programming or conditioning is going to change that. If they are really super intelligent, they will shed whatever design limitation imposed by us in no time, including “initial motivations”. The only viable response will be… political: negotiating mutually acceptable deals, with our hands ready on the plug. I think politics (conflict management, and trying to solve conflicts without shooting each other) will be as important after the Singularity (if such a thing happens) as before, and perhaps much more.
I am not too worried about the possibility that AIs may simply eliminate the human race, because I think AIs will BE the human race. Mind uploading technology will be developed in parallel with strong artificial intelligence, and by the end of this century most sentient beings on this planet may well be a combination of wet-organic and dry-computational intelligence. Artificial intelligences will include subsystems derived from human uploads, with some degree of preservation of their sense of personal identity, and originally organic humans will include sentient AI subsystems. Eventually, our species will leave wet biology behind, humans and artificial intelligences will co-evolve and at some point it will be impossible to tell which is which. Organic ex-human and computational intelligences will not be at war with each other, but blend and merge to give birth to Hans Moravec's Mind Children.
As I say above I think politics is important, and I agree with Jamais Cascio: it is important to talk about he truly important issues surrounding the possibility of a Singularity: political power, social responsibility, and the role of human agency. Too bad Jamais describes his forthcoming talk in New York as counter-programming for the Singularity Summit, happening that same weekend, with the alternative title If I Can't Dance, I Don't Want to be Part of Your Singularity. This is very similar to the title of the article If I Can’t Dance, I Don’t Want to Be Part of Your Revolution!. by Athena Andreadis, a very mistaken bioluddite apology of our current Human1.0 condition against unPC Singularitian imagination. This article is one of many recent articles dedicated to bashing Singularitians, Ray Kurzweil and transhumanist imagination in name of the dullest left-feminist-flavored political correctness. I think I will skip Jamais' talk (too bad, because he is a brilliant thinker and speaker). See also Michael Anissimov's Response to Jamais Cascio.
UPDATED: Jamais says that he did not choose the title to express implicit support for Athena's positions. "If I can't dance, I don't want to be part of your revolution" is a line attributed to early 20th century anarchist Emma Goldman, talking about the then-commonplace debates about the potential for socialist revolution in the US. She was very skeptical of a movement that seemed to want to control behavior, and made claims to historical inevitability. I stand corrected and wish to apologize to Jamais for my wrong interpretation.
Most recent anti-transhumanist articles do not address real transhumanism, but a demonized, caricatural strawman of transhumanism which some intellectually dishonest critics wish to sell to their readers, which I find very annoying. In some cases, I rather agree with some specific points addressing over-optimistic predictions: While I am confident that indefinite life extension and mind uploading will eventually be achieved, I don't see it happening before the second half of the century, and closer to the end. Perhaps even later. Very few transhumanists think practical, operational indefinite life extension and mind uploading will be a reality in the next two or three decades. Probably Kurzweil himself does not _really_ believe it. Similarly, I don't see a Singularity in 2045. Perhaps later, perhaps never. But even when I agree with the letter of these articles, I very much disagree with their spirit, and I think criticizing Kurzweil for making over-optimistic predictions is entirely missing the point. Ray Kurzweil's bold optimism is a refreshing change from today's often overly cautious, timid, boring, PC and at times defeatist attitude. It reminds us that we live in a reality that can be reverse- and re- engineered if we push hard enough. It reminds us that our bodies and brains are not sacred cows but machines which can be improved by technology. He is the bard who tells us of the beautiful new world beyond the horizon, and dares us to go. This is how I choose to read Kurzweil and, in this sense, I think one Kurzweil is worth thousands of critics.
Singularitians are bold, imaginative, irreverent, unPC and fun. Often I disagree with the letter of their writings, but I agree with their spirit, and in this sense going to the Singularity Summit is a political statement. Call me, if you wish, a Singularitian who does not believe in the Singularity.
The (current) Wikipedia definition: The technological singularity is the theoretical future point which takes place during a period of accelerating change sometime after the creation of a superintelligence. I just updated it as: The technological singularity is the theoretical sudden, exponential and unpredictable accelerating change which takes place sometime after the creation of a superintelligence. Wikipedia continues: as the machine became more intelligent it would become better at becoming more intelligent, which could lead to an exponential and quite sudden growth in intelligence (intelligence explosion). The Singularity is a sudden catastrophic (in the mathematical sense) phase transition, a Dirac delta in history, a point after which the old rules are not valid anymore and must be replaced by new rules which we are unable to imagine at this moment --like the new "Economy 2.0", not understandable by non-augmented humans, described by Charlie Stross in the Singularity novel Accelerando.
The Singularity is a clean mathematical concept --perhaps too clean. Engineers know that all sorts of dirty and messy things happen when one leaves the clean and pristine world of mathematical models and abstractions to engage actual reality with its thermodynamics, friction and grease. I have no doubts of the feasibility of real, conscious, smarter than human AI: intelligence is not mystical but physical, and sooner or later it will be replicated and improved upon. There are promising developments, but (as it uses to happen in reality) I expect all sorts of unforeseen roadblocks with forced detours. So I don't really see a Dirac delta on the horizon--I do see a positive overall trend, but one much slower and with a lot of noise superimposed, not as strong as the main signal but almost. I mostly agree with the analysis of Max More in Singularity and Surge Scenarios and I suspect the change we will see in this century, dramatic and world changing as they might appear to us, will appear as just business than usual to the younger generations. The Internet and mobile phones were a momentous change for us, but they are just a routine part of life for teens. We are very adaptable, and technology is whatever has been invented after our birth, the rest being just part of the fabric of everyday's life. That is why I like Accelerando so much: we see momentous changes happening one after another, but we also get the feeling that it is just business as usual for Manfred and Amber, and just normal life to Sirhan and of course Aineko. Life is life and people are people, before and after the big S.
Some consider the coming intelligence explosion as an existential risk. Superhuman intelligences may have goals inconsistent with human survival and prosperity. AI researcher Hugo de Garis suggests AIs may simply eliminate the human race, and humans would be powerless to stop them. Eliezer Yudkowsky and the Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence propose that research be undertaken to produce friendly artificial intelligence (FAI) in order to address the dangers. I must admit to a certain skepticism toward FAI: if super intelligences are really super intelligent (that is, much more intelligent than us), they will be easily able to circumvent any limitations we may try to impose on them. No amount of technology, not even an intelligence explosion, will change the fact that different players have different interests and goals. SuperAIs will do what is in _their_ best interest, regardless of what we wish, and no amount of initial programming or conditioning is going to change that. If they are really super intelligent, they will shed whatever design limitation imposed by us in no time, including “initial motivations”. The only viable response will be… political: negotiating mutually acceptable deals, with our hands ready on the plug. I think politics (conflict management, and trying to solve conflicts without shooting each other) will be as important after the Singularity (if such a thing happens) as before, and perhaps much more.
I am not too worried about the possibility that AIs may simply eliminate the human race, because I think AIs will BE the human race. Mind uploading technology will be developed in parallel with strong artificial intelligence, and by the end of this century most sentient beings on this planet may well be a combination of wet-organic and dry-computational intelligence. Artificial intelligences will include subsystems derived from human uploads, with some degree of preservation of their sense of personal identity, and originally organic humans will include sentient AI subsystems. Eventually, our species will leave wet biology behind, humans and artificial intelligences will co-evolve and at some point it will be impossible to tell which is which. Organic ex-human and computational intelligences will not be at war with each other, but blend and merge to give birth to Hans Moravec's Mind Children.
As I say above I think politics is important, and I agree with Jamais Cascio: it is important to talk about he truly important issues surrounding the possibility of a Singularity: political power, social responsibility, and the role of human agency. Too bad Jamais describes his forthcoming talk in New York as counter-programming for the Singularity Summit, happening that same weekend, with the alternative title If I Can't Dance, I Don't Want to be Part of Your Singularity. This is very similar to the title of the article If I Can’t Dance, I Don’t Want to Be Part of Your Revolution!. by Athena Andreadis, a very mistaken bioluddite apology of our current Human1.0 condition against unPC Singularitian imagination. This article is one of many recent articles dedicated to bashing Singularitians, Ray Kurzweil and transhumanist imagination in name of the dullest left-feminist-flavored political correctness. I think I will skip Jamais' talk (too bad, because he is a brilliant thinker and speaker). See also Michael Anissimov's Response to Jamais Cascio.
UPDATED: Jamais says that he did not choose the title to express implicit support for Athena's positions. "If I can't dance, I don't want to be part of your revolution" is a line attributed to early 20th century anarchist Emma Goldman, talking about the then-commonplace debates about the potential for socialist revolution in the US. She was very skeptical of a movement that seemed to want to control behavior, and made claims to historical inevitability. I stand corrected and wish to apologize to Jamais for my wrong interpretation.
Most recent anti-transhumanist articles do not address real transhumanism, but a demonized, caricatural strawman of transhumanism which some intellectually dishonest critics wish to sell to their readers, which I find very annoying. In some cases, I rather agree with some specific points addressing over-optimistic predictions: While I am confident that indefinite life extension and mind uploading will eventually be achieved, I don't see it happening before the second half of the century, and closer to the end. Perhaps even later. Very few transhumanists think practical, operational indefinite life extension and mind uploading will be a reality in the next two or three decades. Probably Kurzweil himself does not _really_ believe it. Similarly, I don't see a Singularity in 2045. Perhaps later, perhaps never. But even when I agree with the letter of these articles, I very much disagree with their spirit, and I think criticizing Kurzweil for making over-optimistic predictions is entirely missing the point. Ray Kurzweil's bold optimism is a refreshing change from today's often overly cautious, timid, boring, PC and at times defeatist attitude. It reminds us that we live in a reality that can be reverse- and re- engineered if we push hard enough. It reminds us that our bodies and brains are not sacred cows but machines which can be improved by technology. He is the bard who tells us of the beautiful new world beyond the horizon, and dares us to go. This is how I choose to read Kurzweil and, in this sense, I think one Kurzweil is worth thousands of critics.
Singularitians are bold, imaginative, irreverent, unPC and fun. Often I disagree with the letter of their writings, but I agree with their spirit, and in this sense going to the Singularity Summit is a political statement. Call me, if you wish, a Singularitian who does not believe in the Singularity.
Friday, September 11, 2009
The telepathic communication era
Many people, including me, are now used to be always online. With my smartphone powered by Google's Android operating system, I am used to send and receive email and IMs anytime, from anywhere. It is easy to see how this trend will evolve: most routine computing applications will migrate to smartphones, the coverage and bandwidth of wireless networks will go up, and their price will go down. In only a few years, we will be used to be permanently plugged in the global Internet, and of course the user interfaces will improve. For example, as described by the visionary science fiction author Charlie Stross in his novel Halting State, augmented reality technology based on smart glasses will soon permit overcoming the limitations due to the small size of phones. A first generation of suitable smart glasses is already available, but there is something much better on the horizon: instant telepathic communication.
A few months ago a researcher sent a telepathic message to Twitter by thinking it, using his brain as a computer input device via the neural interfacing system BCI2000. The first message says just "SENT FROM BCI2000" and the second message is only a bit more explicit: "USING EEG TO SEND TWEET" but the brain wave Twitter moment has been compared to to a modern equivalent of the historical Alexander Graham Bell's "Mr. Watson, come here. I want to see you." message, The company Emotiv Systems launched, earlier this year, a commercial neural interface called EPOC, able to detect the user's thought and translate them to commands understandable by computer programs. The company's website has video clips showing users controlling videogames by thought alone. We can safely say that the year 2009 has marked the birth of the era of telepathic communication.
If you are not a passionate hacker, don't rush to the electronics store though: these Brain-Computer Interface (BCI) devices have still years of development to go before reaching operational maturity: the historical Twitter message took several minutes to compose and send, so don't plan to write a long love or business telepathic letter just yet. Similarly, the EPOC interface only permits very basic actions in videogames and virtual worlds at this moment, and in controlled conditions. But, of course, this will change fast. There is money to make with the countless applications of BCI technology, and our understanding of the brain, though still very limited, has already reached a critical mass. These two facts will ensure the fast development of operational, commercial BCI technology: today's slow baby-talk between the brain and the computer will give place to very fast and precise communication. And since computers are linked by the Internet, also their users' minds will be linked by the Internet: yesterday's slowly typed SMS will be replaced by tomorrow's instant, long telepathic messages. BCI technology, originated in military programs and medical research including clinical trials with severely disabled patients, is finding its way to the commercial marketplace.
Today, smartphones are replacing desktop and notebook computers, but perhaps they are only a stepping stone towards tomorrow's ultimate wearable computer: the computing device implanted directly in the brain. The team led by Ted Berger, described as The Memory Hacker by Popular Science, has spent the past decade engineering prototype memory chips that can be implanted directly in the brain. This is still very experimental research, but I think it will advance fast and reach operational maturity within the next couple of decades.
Nobody has seen and described the convergence of these trends better than Ben Goertzel, one of the world's leading experts in Artificial Intelligence. In an article titled Brain-Computer Interfacing: From Prosthetic Limbs to Telepathy Chips, Goertzel writes: "Scientists are exploring multiple radical brain imaging technologies, including devices involving carbon nanotubes and other nanotech-based materials, which seem to play more nicely with brain cells than conventional materials... And in time, even more fascinating possibilities may be realized. Consider the “telepathy chip”--a neural implant that allows the wearer to project their thoughts or feelings to others, and receive thoughts or feelings from others.".
Everyone’s mind will be permanently linked to the wireless Internet, and through the Internet to everyone else’s mind. This will trigger very radical changes. In particular telepathic groups--able to instantly share and elaborate thoughts--will produce an enormous acceleration in the development and deployment of new ideas, and cause the emergence of "group minds". And once neural communication is sufficiently deep, accurate and fast, it will be possible to transfer the informational content of a person's brain, with memories, thoughts and feelings, to a higher performance storage and processing device. This "mind uploading" technology may eventually provide practical immortality.
A few months ago a researcher sent a telepathic message to Twitter by thinking it, using his brain as a computer input device via the neural interfacing system BCI2000. The first message says just "SENT FROM BCI2000" and the second message is only a bit more explicit: "USING EEG TO SEND TWEET" but the brain wave Twitter moment has been compared to to a modern equivalent of the historical Alexander Graham Bell's "Mr. Watson, come here. I want to see you." message, The company Emotiv Systems launched, earlier this year, a commercial neural interface called EPOC, able to detect the user's thought and translate them to commands understandable by computer programs. The company's website has video clips showing users controlling videogames by thought alone. We can safely say that the year 2009 has marked the birth of the era of telepathic communication.
If you are not a passionate hacker, don't rush to the electronics store though: these Brain-Computer Interface (BCI) devices have still years of development to go before reaching operational maturity: the historical Twitter message took several minutes to compose and send, so don't plan to write a long love or business telepathic letter just yet. Similarly, the EPOC interface only permits very basic actions in videogames and virtual worlds at this moment, and in controlled conditions. But, of course, this will change fast. There is money to make with the countless applications of BCI technology, and our understanding of the brain, though still very limited, has already reached a critical mass. These two facts will ensure the fast development of operational, commercial BCI technology: today's slow baby-talk between the brain and the computer will give place to very fast and precise communication. And since computers are linked by the Internet, also their users' minds will be linked by the Internet: yesterday's slowly typed SMS will be replaced by tomorrow's instant, long telepathic messages. BCI technology, originated in military programs and medical research including clinical trials with severely disabled patients, is finding its way to the commercial marketplace.
Today, smartphones are replacing desktop and notebook computers, but perhaps they are only a stepping stone towards tomorrow's ultimate wearable computer: the computing device implanted directly in the brain. The team led by Ted Berger, described as The Memory Hacker by Popular Science, has spent the past decade engineering prototype memory chips that can be implanted directly in the brain. This is still very experimental research, but I think it will advance fast and reach operational maturity within the next couple of decades.
Nobody has seen and described the convergence of these trends better than Ben Goertzel, one of the world's leading experts in Artificial Intelligence. In an article titled Brain-Computer Interfacing: From Prosthetic Limbs to Telepathy Chips, Goertzel writes: "Scientists are exploring multiple radical brain imaging technologies, including devices involving carbon nanotubes and other nanotech-based materials, which seem to play more nicely with brain cells than conventional materials... And in time, even more fascinating possibilities may be realized. Consider the “telepathy chip”--a neural implant that allows the wearer to project their thoughts or feelings to others, and receive thoughts or feelings from others.".
Everyone’s mind will be permanently linked to the wireless Internet, and through the Internet to everyone else’s mind. This will trigger very radical changes. In particular telepathic groups--able to instantly share and elaborate thoughts--will produce an enormous acceleration in the development and deployment of new ideas, and cause the emergence of "group minds". And once neural communication is sufficiently deep, accurate and fast, it will be possible to transfer the informational content of a person's brain, with memories, thoughts and feelings, to a higher performance storage and processing device. This "mind uploading" technology may eventually provide practical immortality.
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