Did you know that your phone, pad, and laptop are all “computers” wherein all relevant info is stored in “bits”? And did you further know that you can get tools to let you very easily change almost any
Istvan seems to think that religion is just a random affliction that happens to weaker minds (I remember thinking this way when I was 12). However, the ubiquity of religion despite the existence of some atheists favors the notion that under the social evolutionary conditions prevalent over the last 30,000 years or so it had a fitness-enhancing effect - otherwise there would be many more atheists around. It may be that during evolution in the computational substrate populated by designed minds it may no longer be a fitness-enhancer - but this is a complex and hard-to-model issue, not something to be dealt with by silly talking about "a real-life god - our near perfect moral selves".
If stupidity and social evil have a fitness payoff, they *will* have a brilliant future.
I presume that the parent is talking about the standard individual interest vs collective interest dichotomy a la prisoner's dilemma, etc. If we can rewrite our code, we will do so in order to optimize for our individual objectives, and the result may well end up being a hugely negative-sum competitive game.
It's not the same thing. With mind re-programming you could announce you're going to put a man on the moon and then make everyone believe that Neil Armstrong's backyard IS the moon, or you could make them all believe that you realy said you were going to put a man in a backyard and that this is a monumental achievement.
What assumptions are implied by the claim that the mind can be imaged by reducing the relevant brain to information? Is there any way the brain could be that would preclude downloading? I don't know, and I hope Robin discusses this in his book.
But here's a stab: mind downloading assumes that mental states are "in the head." If the information we use is created only by interaction between causal processes in the brain and the (expected) external world, then any attempt to map the information in the brain might involve far greater complexity than anticipated.
The assumption, in other words, is that it is possible to image the material substratum of concepts in the same manner as percepts, which has been (as IMBASA puts it) essentially successful. Concepts are often thought contextual in a way qualitatively different from percepts.
In what "way" is Hanson assuming the mind works? His assumption, whatever exactly it is, seems minimal. He does admit that it might be hard to read a person's "code" (which, by the way, changes over time); I suspect that for the foreseeable future it will be *too* hard. And I have not seem him explain where he is drawing the line between *the mind* and *(the rest of) the body*.
it does mean that trying to create our current vision of utopia through the reprogramming of minds is a pipe dream and self-contradictory.But this is true of any important attempt to achieve perfection in any broad endeavor: your view of the goal will change as you progress. This doesn't make the effort unavailing--nor the (provisional) goal dispensable.
Yes, but in a black box manner (except for the connections to the peripheral nervous system and the senses, but we've sort of already mapped those sufficiently).
It would be sort of like working with software that you do not have the source code of: you can copy it easily but you need to disassemble it to learn how the code works internally (modern neuroscience is basically attempting that disassembly). Robin believes the human mapping of the human mind with sufficient resolution and understanding of the time-evolution of its patterns will be completed before the disassembly or from-the-ground-up creation of an equivalent system will be completed.
Sidenote, but quite relevant: I'll have the opportunity to see Mr. Istvan speak in person two weeks from now. I'm willing to field questions from anyone here, directed to Mr. Istvan, based on material either covered in his most recent Motherboard article, or his other works regarding transhumanism. I'll respond with his answers to whatever questions (as I recall them) not in the comments here, but in the next available open thread. Submit questions to me as a reply to this comment. Thanks!
The mind doesn't work that way is the title of a book by philosopher Jerry Fodor criticizing the modular view of mind.
I don't know that brain downloading depends on modularity, but it does seem to depend on a philosophical doctrine that's been subject to considerable challenge in the internalism versus externalism debate.
It seems to me the best arguments for a tech-utopia is Coasian in nature. When you view the problem of externality as being caused by transaction costs, the road to utopia seems within our grasp.
1. Hillary 2080!2. It is essential that governments be dismantled by that time. France asked google to disclose their search engine algo and Any government could conceivably steal your intellectual property at will or pull the plug on you
They seem to go along with immortality, the real prize.
Consider that Robin Hanson and Luke Muehlhauser were both raised as devout Christians. Presumably, they believed in immortality.
We hear of their intellectual struggles but not about how they managed to relinquish eternal life. I would imagine its very hard. Personally, I doubt I would be able to give up an illusion as satisfying as that.
Istvan seems to think that religion is just a random affliction that happens to weaker minds (I remember thinking this way when I was 12). However, the ubiquity of religion despite the existence of some atheists favors the notion that under the social evolutionary conditions prevalent over the last 30,000 years or so it had a fitness-enhancing effect - otherwise there would be many more atheists around. It may be that during evolution in the computational substrate populated by designed minds it may no longer be a fitness-enhancer - but this is a complex and hard-to-model issue, not something to be dealt with by silly talking about "a real-life god - our near perfect moral selves".
If stupidity and social evil have a fitness payoff, they *will* have a brilliant future.
I presume that the parent is talking about the standard individual interest vs collective interest dichotomy a la prisoner's dilemma, etc. If we can rewrite our code, we will do so in order to optimize for our individual objectives, and the result may well end up being a hugely negative-sum competitive game.
... you could get people to stop caring about monumental achievements.
Hell, you could make a person believe he's a potato.
It's THE game changer: changing human nature itself.
It's not the same thing. With mind re-programming you could announce you're going to put a man on the moon and then make everyone believe that Neil Armstrong's backyard IS the moon, or you could make them all believe that you realy said you were going to put a man in a backyard and that this is a monumental achievement.
In what "way" is Hanson assuming the mind works?
What assumptions are implied by the claim that the mind can be imaged by reducing the relevant brain to information? Is there any way the brain could be that would preclude downloading? I don't know, and I hope Robin discusses this in his book.
But here's a stab: mind downloading assumes that mental states are "in the head." If the information we use is created only by interaction between causal processes in the brain and the (expected) external world, then any attempt to map the information in the brain might involve far greater complexity than anticipated.
The assumption, in other words, is that it is possible to image the material substratum of concepts in the same manner as percepts, which has been (as IMBASA puts it) essentially successful. Concepts are often thought contextual in a way qualitatively different from percepts.
In what "way" is Hanson assuming the mind works? His assumption, whatever exactly it is, seems minimal. He does admit that it might be hard to read a person's "code" (which, by the way, changes over time); I suspect that for the foreseeable future it will be *too* hard. And I have not seem him explain where he is drawing the line between *the mind* and *(the rest of) the body*.
it does mean that trying to create our current vision of utopia through the reprogramming of minds is a pipe dream and self-contradictory.But this is true of any important attempt to achieve perfection in any broad endeavor: your view of the goal will change as you progress. This doesn't make the effort unavailing--nor the (provisional) goal dispensable.
Yes, but in a black box manner (except for the connections to the peripheral nervous system and the senses, but we've sort of already mapped those sufficiently).
It would be sort of like working with software that you do not have the source code of: you can copy it easily but you need to disassemble it to learn how the code works internally (modern neuroscience is basically attempting that disassembly). Robin believes the human mapping of the human mind with sufficient resolution and understanding of the time-evolution of its patterns will be completed before the disassembly or from-the-ground-up creation of an equivalent system will be completed.
Sidenote, but quite relevant: I'll have the opportunity to see Mr. Istvan speak in person two weeks from now. I'm willing to field questions from anyone here, directed to Mr. Istvan, based on material either covered in his most recent Motherboard article, or his other works regarding transhumanism. I'll respond with his answers to whatever questions (as I recall them) not in the comments here, but in the next available open thread. Submit questions to me as a reply to this comment. Thanks!
The mind doesn't work that way is the title of a book by philosopher Jerry Fodor criticizing the modular view of mind.
I don't know that brain downloading depends on modularity, but it does seem to depend on a philosophical doctrine that's been subject to considerable challenge in the internalism versus externalism debate.
Isn't that translation the basic premise of brain downloading?
It seems to me the best arguments for a tech-utopia is Coasian in nature. When you view the problem of externality as being caused by transaction costs, the road to utopia seems within our grasp.
People who won't defend their ideas against criticism aren't worth listening to.
1. Hillary 2080!2. It is essential that governments be dismantled by that time. France asked google to disclose their search engine algo and Any government could conceivably steal your intellectual property at will or pull the plug on you
They seem to go along with immortality, the real prize.
Consider that Robin Hanson and Luke Muehlhauser were both raised as devout Christians. Presumably, they believed in immortality.
We hear of their intellectual struggles but not about how they managed to relinquish eternal life. I would imagine its very hard. Personally, I doubt I would be able to give up an illusion as satisfying as that.
"If God did not exist, it would be necessary for someone to invent Him."
--paraphrased from Voltaire