31–40 of 188 posts
This is just another made up problem to wring our hands about. Remember The Singularity, is that not cool anymore? How about we focus on actual problems that actually exist, e.g. climate change, government corruption, and income inequality.
We are much more likely to be wiped out by natural disaster, asteroid impact, a dying sun, etc...
Unless we come up with some amazing new physics, I don't know how humans will ever make it very far from earth.
--edit Oh.. I just now saw part 2 which addresses this.
I'm more concerned about AI law enforcement. NSA eavesdropping plus an intelligent agent assigned to you is a powerful combination.
Wrong. Humans are the greatest threat to humanity. We almost annihilated everything we know during WWII - long before machine were intelligent.
It won't be machines that destroy us, it will be us.
I'm seriously so sick of hearing about how machine intelligence is going to spell the end of humanity. The amount of gears that would have to fall into place is never mentioned. We aren't close to SMI. Its much more likely that we humans are excelling at dreaming up apocalyptic scenarios, much like we have always done..... The "sloppy, dangerous thinking" is the aversion these types of articles create within the gene…
It's like people freaking out that "superhuman strength machines" would spell the end of the world since why, if an electric motor is so powerful, would you need manual labor for anything?
SMI is another tool and the interplay between "machine intelligence" and "human intelligence" will be complicated and nuanced.
For example, biotech is filled with ferociously complicated problems that may take machine intelligence to solve. Once solved, these could lead to genetically engineered humans that are intrinsically smarter or better able to deal with the machines.
This doesn't even touch on the fact that the distinction between machine intelligence and human intelligence might become quite blurred.
Already I've noticed that people are "stupider" without their phones, they've offloaded a lot of cognitive functions on a device that's pretty much omni-present. A person with a smart phone today could be considered of superhuman intelligence since they're able to draw on significant resources a person without one doesn't have. A seven year old kid can tell you the capital of Tajikistan and the last ten presidents of Micronesia without breaking a sweat.
I'm seriously so sick of hearing about how machine intelligence is going to spell the end of humanity. The amount of gears that would have to fall into place is never mentioned. We aren't close to SMI. Its much more likely that we humans are excelling at dreaming up apocalyptic scenarios, much like we have always done..... The "sloppy, dangerous thinking" is the aversion these types of articles create within the gene…
Give the AI's a chance to contribute, especially if the solutions to problems we can't crack are because of human cognitive limits. This situation reminds me of how the Apollo landings couldn't be done without computers. There's just no way a person can do those calculations on paper. AI as a contributor of economic, technological, or social policy seems to be a similar step.
It's hard to understand the danger machine intelligence poses to humanity for the same reason it's hard to understand the danger tiny startups can pose to big industries. Current implementations look like toys, humans have bad intuitions about exponential growth, and most will disagree on how _probable_ the threat is (something that might not be known except retroactively) while systematically underestimating how _large_ the threat is if it does come to pass (because it's so far off the scale of what's come before it)
Maybe Sam (and Elon Musk, and lots of other silicon valley types) are talking about this problem because they read too many sci-fi novels or are too privileged to worry about Real Problem X which affects Y group in the here and now.
But what if instead, they're talking about this problem because they've spent a lot of time seeing this sort of black swan pattern play out before, and they know the way to assess the impact of something truly _new_ is to see envision what it could be instead of looking at what it is now?
I'm seriously so sick of hearing about how machine intelligence is going to spell the end of humanity. The amount of gears that would have to fall into place is never mentioned. We aren't close to SMI. Its much more likely that we humans are excelling at dreaming up apocalyptic scenarios, much like we have always done..... The "sloppy, dangerous thinking" is the aversion these types of articles create within the gene…
What happens when most people have no salable skills due to the combination of robotics and AI? We're essentially going to have to live w/ income supports for the 90+% of Americans, and worse for the countries to which we've exported eg electronic device construction and clothing manufacture. I think there's a nonzero chance society essentially tears itself apart during the transition period. It is now the Republican party position that not all people deserve healthcare, housing, or enough food to eat. What happens when their hated segment of the populace gets much bigger in a job market that doesn't need cashiers, janitors, gardeners, cooks, taxi drivers, car washers, many farmers, or most menial labor?
Also, I would note that creating AI that requires less control makes it more useful. So in some sense the development of AI itself fights against controls.