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The Gentle Seduction (1989)

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Re: The Gentle Seduction (1989)

#41

Post by dinkleberg »

solenoid0937 wrote: post #31
a022311 wrote: post #28

I read the whole thing and I think it's useful to view this topic under a different lens. The most astonishing part for me is that it was written over 30 years ago! I'm a bit grateful that science today isn't nearly that advanced. It would be cool to be able to explore the world like the main character, but then again it seemed so sad and miserable. I share her sentiment from the beginning of the story: I don't want…

Having near-death experiences has made me much more scared of death. I realized I do not want eternal nothingness and nonexistence. I like existing, loving, etc. I do not think death adds any value. It certainly does not motivate me in any way. I don't do things because I will die, I do things because I want to. Most of the time I am not thinking about death at all. When I do, it is only with a sense of sadness/dread…

When people talk of life extension and us eventually achieving immortality, it is always "relative immortality" though. Maybe we develop the technology to regenerate our bodies and we could live for thousands of years. Maybe we can transfer our consciousness and minds into computers and maybe live for quite a bit longer than that.

But the time scale of the universe is unfathomable. Even if we lived for millions of years, it would be a drop in the bucket. And that time would still come to an end and we'd reach that same state of eternal nothingness and nonexistence.

Re: The Gentle Seduction (1989)

#42

Post by GolDDranks »

gcanyon wrote: post #40

I really enjoyed the story (pretty sure I've read it before, but many years ago, so it's fuzzy) and I know it's not key to the plot, but I really want to know how Jack failed to survive.

It is implied in the beginning: he expects to die before the singularity because of a tendency of heart problems in their family.

Re: The Gentle Seduction (1989)

#43

Post by GolDDranks »

hosh wrote: post #14
solenoid0937 wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Reading the beginning and end is like eating just the buns off a burger and declaring it bland and tasteless. Part of the magic of this story is that it can change what you agree with (as it did for me.) Not saying it will do the same for you, but it is a compelling vision; I can't think of other ways to get there without getting unscientific.

I am familiar with NLP and persuasion techniques, and when I started feeling it creep in as I read this story, I started skimming. I have learned that a compelling vision alone does not mean it is correct or even wise. The analogy is not correct. I know that burger is rich in taste and marvelous. It is also my opinion that it is an illusion, and lacks substance. There is so much more to the cosmos than science, thoug…

Where in the story does NLP (I guess you mean "Neurolinguistic programming" and not "Natural Language Processing") factor in?

Re: The Gentle Seduction (1989)

#45

Post by Isamu »

That’s interesting, they use the Singularity to refer to technological explosion in general rather than specifically AI becoming super intelligent. This seems to predate the AI usage.

>"Singularity is a time in the future. It'll occur when the rate of change of technology is very great--so great that the effort to keep up with the change will overwhelm us. People will face a whole new set of problems that we can't even imagine." A look of great tranquility smoothed the ridges around his eyes. "On the other hand, all our normal, day to day problems fade away. For example, you'll be immortal."

Re: The Gentle Seduction (1989)

#47

Post by tekne »

moffkalast wrote: post #34
WithinReason wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Efficient for what? What reason has AI to exist?

Well our purpose is to turn low entropy into high entropy, that's what drove the existence of life. If machines can do it faster then they'll win out eventually.

It's interesting: on balance life increases entropy.

Yet it also produces pockets of ultra-low entropy; states which would be staggeringly, astronomically unlikely to be witnessed in nature.

So perhaps what life does is increase entropy-entropy -- the diversity of entropy, versus a consistent entropic smear -- even as it increases entropy...

Re: The Gentle Seduction (1989)

#49

Post by tenuousemphasis »

amenhotep wrote: post #17
solenoid0937 wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Reading the beginning and end is like eating just the buns off a burger and declaring it bland and tasteless. Part of the magic of this story is that it can change what you agree with (as it did for me.) Not saying it will do the same for you, but it is a compelling vision; I can't think of other ways to get there without getting unscientific.

It's pretty obvious what it's doing, honestly. I did skim the entire thing but I don't think you need much more than the beginning and end once you see the point. Which is more or less lampposted by the title.

Ok, what is it doing?

Re: The Gentle Seduction (1989)

#50

Post by immibis »

WithinReason wrote: post #44
pixl97 wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What reason do you?

to propagate my genes

AI will be better at propagating copies of itself than you at yourself. In that sense, it will be more efficient and you will be obsolete.

When thinking about evolution we should be careful not to confuse description with prescription. Evolution theory says that we have lots of copies of things that replicated in the past, and since they are copies, they themselves are likely to be replicators. But it does not say that things should replicate, or that things which don't replicate are defective. It is merely explaining observations of the world.

If we create an AI that replicates more than humans, and do nothing to prevent that, we can end up in an AI-dominated world, or even one where multicellular carbon life is extinct, but that's absolutely not inevitable, just one possibility. We don't have to create a paperclip-maximized world. We totally have the possibility to declare the goal is human happiness or something, not maximum number of replicators.

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