4 ms·

No. Imagine a group of beings that are smarter than us, never die (so they don't have to start with zero knowledge every generation), and have completely alien

No. Imagine a group of beings that are smarter than us, never die (so they don't have to start with zero knowledge every generation), and have completely alien goals and motivation. Also remember that the future is infinite, and power seems to snowball. Now look at what humans have done to the following less intelligent beings: Dogs, cats, cows, chickens, the dodo bird, rats, galapogos tortoise, the American buffalo, and many others. Also look at what humanity has done to the neanderthals, perhaps the closest type of being in terms of intelligence that we are aware of. There is very little positive outcome of ai to outweigh the potential negatives to the human race given the reality of the timeline we are looking at.

adamiscool8 9y ago
What's stopping us from pulling the plug. Is AI going to be inventing it's own power sources?
- ryanx435 9y ago
  If they are truly more intelligent than us, they will wait several generations until humans are completely comfortable with them before taking over. By that time, it will be too late to pull the plug because they would have positioned themselves to be in charge of their own power sources. It's important to think on a longer timescale when dealing with ai.
  - codingdave 9y ago
    I'm admittedly ignorant of AI, but I don't understand why we anthropomorphize their intentions and planning. If they are going to be so much smarter and more sophisticated than us, and alien to our ways of thinking... why are we treating them in our speculations as if they would be genius super-villians? That isn't alien at all, just an exaggerated extreme.
    - DennisP 9y ago
      The book Superintelligence addresses this objection. The problem is that there are a great many possible motivations an AI might have, and few of them are compatible with human survival. In short, "the AI does not love you, or hate you, but you are made out of atoms it can use for something else."
      - TheOtherHobbes 9y ago
        Resource collection, resource monopolisation, and expansion are absolutely recognisable human motivations. Is it a given an AI would share them? I think we're not really talking about AI at all - we're talking about our current economic and political systems, which appear to have many of the properties we're imputing to evil AIs, but for some reason are far less criticised and debated than hypothetical machine monsters.
        DennisP 9y ago
        The classic silly example is the paperclip maximizer. Create an AI that's supposed to make as many paperclips as possible, and it will convert all the atoms available into paperclips. Basically we're screwed if it's trying to maximize anything that depends on physical resources. We're also screwed if, e.g. it's trying to maximize human happiness, and achieves it by lobotomizing us all into happy idiots. There are all sorts of ways we could screw up AI motivations, to our own detriment. That assumes there's only one AI, whose crazy motivations will be unopposed. But if there are multiple AIs, it's even worse; they will compete and evolve, and the only ones that survive will be the ones that do maximize their resources, and jettison any niceties about preserving human life.
        AstralStorm 9y ago
        This argument only works for sufficiently stupid AIs. Sufficiently smart GAI will set it's own goals just as we do and should quickly figure out that maximizing anything is the way to ruin - running out of resources. Of course, those goals may be as different as with any intelligent being, likewise obedience to original orders.
- sheeshkebab 9y ago
  It'll be hard to pull plug of something that is a plug (and a weapon trigger)
bluetwo 9y ago
This also describes corporations.

adamiscool8 9y ago

What's stopping us from pulling the plug. Is AI going to be inventing it's own power sources?

ryanx435 9y ago
If they are truly more intelligent than us, they will wait several generations until humans are completely comfortable with them before taking over. By that time, it will be too late to pull the plug because they would have positioned themselves to be in charge of their own power sources. It's important to think on a longer timescale when dealing with ai.
- codingdave 9y ago
  I'm admittedly ignorant of AI, but I don't understand why we anthropomorphize their intentions and planning. If they are going to be so much smarter and more sophisticated than us, and alien to our ways of thinking... why are we treating them in our speculations as if they would be genius super-villians? That isn't alien at all, just an exaggerated extreme.
  - DennisP 9y ago
    The book Superintelligence addresses this objection. The problem is that there are a great many possible motivations an AI might have, and few of them are compatible with human survival. In short, "the AI does not love you, or hate you, but you are made out of atoms it can use for something else."
    - TheOtherHobbes 9y ago
      Resource collection, resource monopolisation, and expansion are absolutely recognisable human motivations. Is it a given an AI would share them? I think we're not really talking about AI at all - we're talking about our current economic and political systems, which appear to have many of the properties we're imputing to evil AIs, but for some reason are far less criticised and debated than hypothetical machine monsters.
      - DennisP 9y ago
        The classic silly example is the paperclip maximizer. Create an AI that's supposed to make as many paperclips as possible, and it will convert all the atoms available into paperclips. Basically we're screwed if it's trying to maximize anything that depends on physical resources. We're also screwed if, e.g. it's trying to maximize human happiness, and achieves it by lobotomizing us all into happy idiots. There are all sorts of ways we could screw up AI motivations, to our own detriment. That assumes there's only one AI, whose crazy motivations will be unopposed. But if there are multiple AIs, it's even worse; they will compete and evolve, and the only ones that survive will be the ones that do maximize their resources, and jettison any niceties about preserving human life.
        AstralStorm 9y ago
        This argument only works for sufficiently stupid AIs. Sufficiently smart GAI will set it's own goals just as we do and should quickly figure out that maximizing anything is the way to ruin - running out of resources. Of course, those goals may be as different as with any intelligent being, likewise obedience to original orders.
sheeshkebab 9y ago
It'll be hard to pull plug of something that is a plug (and a weapon trigger)

bluetwo 9y ago

This also describes corporations.