Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

The Most Terrifying Thought Experiment of All Time

slate.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

31–40 of 84 posts

Re: The Most Terrifying Thought Experiment of All Time

#31

Post by michaelfeathers »

spingsprong wrote: post #3

Nobody is going to make a malevolent universe controlling AI on purpose. If a massively powerful and knowledgeable AI was created by accident, it would have nothing to gain by being malevolent. And both those points don't matter anyway, since the technological singularity is impossible.

> If a massively powerful and knowledgeable AI was created by accident, it would have nothing to gain by being malevolent.

Indifference can be worse than malevolence. Think of every ant you've ever stepped on.

Re: The Most Terrifying Thought Experiment of All Time

#32

Post by onion2k »

teekert wrote: post #11

"it is preferable to torture a single person for 50 years than for a sufficient number of people (to be fair, a lot of people) to get dust specks in their eyes." This makes him Yudkowsky the perfect lab animal! Think of the things we can learn, the lives we can save by performing experiments (that most think are unethical) on him! As for the box choice? Just start chopping through the alien's head, the unknown that l…

This makes him Yudkowsky the perfect lab animal! Think of the things we can learn, the lives we can save by performing experiments (that most think are unethical) on him!

Only if you have a way to stop the other people getting dust in their eyes. Otherwise you're merely increasing the amount of suffering rather than mitigating it by transferring it all to one person.

Re: The Most Terrifying Thought Experiment of All Time

#33

Post by crdoconnor »

iSnow wrote: post #20

How is this more than a souped-up version of Pascal's wager? You better believe in God now because if you don't and he exists, you'll rot in hell.

* Because Pascal's wager could apply to any possible variation of supreme being - including non-sensical ones and ones that will punish you if you DO believe in them.

* Roko's Basilisk isn't really a deity, it's a powerful AI with the capability of simulating you and everybody else (or possibly just you).

* Pascal's wager does concern itself with the possibility that you are currently in a simulation.

Re: The Most Terrifying Thought Experiment of All Time

#34

Post by Shivetya »

dm2 wrote: post #22
resdirector wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

OT but IMO it's such a huge cost to the economy (and humanity) that marijuana is still taboo. The thought experiments that you describe, for me at least, are not only fun, but more often than not lead to practical, wealth-generating breakthroughs. I assume I'm not the only one. I hope one day historians and economists will study the lost opportunity costs of the prohibition / taboo nature of marijuana.

Richard Feynman, Carl Sagan, Bill Gates, Bill Clinton, Richard Branson and thousands of other top minds would agree with what you said. I don't think anyone would actually disagree and be able to provide a valid reason. Politics, money, religion, and several other irrelevant factors keep it highly illegal. It even has come to the point where states are ignoring federal law, so progress is happening thankfully. Changi…

Uh, SWAT teams are already making drug raids. That is what happened recently in Atlanta where they did a no knock warrant and flash banged an infant in his crib.

If anything we need to remove SWAT teams from existence as well as no knock warrants for any charge short of murder.

Re: The Most Terrifying Thought Experiment of All Time

#35

Post by teekert »

onion2k wrote: post #32
teekert wrote: post #11

"it is preferable to torture a single person for 50 years than for a sufficient number of people (to be fair, a lot of people) to get dust specks in their eyes." This makes him Yudkowsky the perfect lab animal! Think of the things we can learn, the lives we can save by performing experiments (that most think are unethical) on him! As for the box choice? Just start chopping through the alien's head, the unknown that l…

This makes him Yudkowsky the perfect lab animal! Think of the things we can learn, the lives we can save by performing experiments (that most think are unethical) on him! Only if you have a way to stop the other people getting dust in their eyes. Otherwise you're merely increasing the amount of suffering rather than mitigating it by transferring it all to one person.

Of course, we'd have to be sure first. But, perhaps we can start right away with splitting his organs among people who are on the waiting lists, surely, just with his kidneys we can already increase the life of two persons more than the kidneys can increase his life alone. Imagine if we harvest all of his organs!

What a guy and what a theory this moral utilitarianism! It's great! Think of the possibilities, they're endless.

I always thought that the only one who could put a value on my life was me. But this moral utilitarianism makes things so much simpler.

Re: The Most Terrifying Thought Experiment of All Time

#36

Post by teekert »

lxmorj wrote: post #18

So stupid. Roko's Basilisk and Roko's Infinite Blowjob Machine are equally probable. When I was a kid I watched a movie about a monster that came up from the basement when the kids in the house accidentally said an ancient Indian incantation. "BlahBlahBluey" or something I got scared that perhaps, the last thing I said "Good Night, Batman" or whatever, was in fact coincidentally an ancient curse incantation and I had…

"So stupid. Roko's Basilisk and Roko's Infinite Blowjob Machine are equally probable."

I think the latter is a lot more likely and I predict we'll see it before the singularity.

Re: The Most Terrifying Thought Experiment of All Time

#37

Post by a_bonobo »

crdoconnor wrote: post #33
iSnow wrote: post #20

How is this more than a souped-up version of Pascal's wager? You better believe in God now because if you don't and he exists, you'll rot in hell.

* Because Pascal's wager could apply to any possible variation of supreme being - including non-sensical ones and ones that will punish you if you DO believe in them. * Roko's Basilisk isn't really a deity, it's a powerful AI with the capability of simulating you and everybody else (or possibly just you). * Pascal's wager does concern itself with the possibility that you are currently in a simulation.

>Roko's Basilisk isn't really a deity, it's a powerful AI with the capability of simulating you and everybody else (or possibly just you).

At the risk of sounding flippant: What's the difference? If the AI is so powerful that it can simulate my thoughts (which would imply that thoughts and all of life is 100% deterministic), it has to be so powerful that it's practically omnipotent, and therefore, a God.

Re: The Most Terrifying Thought Experiment of All Time

#38

Post by probably_wrong »

teekert wrote: post #36
lxmorj wrote: post #18

So stupid. Roko's Basilisk and Roko's Infinite Blowjob Machine are equally probable. When I was a kid I watched a movie about a monster that came up from the basement when the kids in the house accidentally said an ancient Indian incantation. "BlahBlahBluey" or something I got scared that perhaps, the last thing I said "Good Night, Batman" or whatever, was in fact coincidentally an ancient curse incantation and I had…

"So stupid. Roko's Basilisk and Roko's Infinite Blowjob Machine are equally probable." I think the latter is a lot more likely and I predict we'll see it before the singularity.

Does this machine count? http://betabeat.com/2014/06/crowdfunded-electronic-blowjob-m...

(warning: language mildly NSFW, plus of course a video of a blowjob machine. No naked ladies, though)

Post reply on HN