11 ms·

Artificial Intelligence Searches for Extraterrestrial Intelligence

89 points by typeofhuman 4y ago

scrumlord 4y ago
[dead]
someweirdperson 4y ago
> A machine might be just as happy in the cold vacuum of space. That sounds boring to the point that it would probably even be for AI.
- 7373737373 4y ago
  After having tried VR the "we can't detect aliens because they have merged with/receded into simulations" hypothesis seems very plausible to me: https://mindmatters.ai/2020/11/the-aliens-exist-but-evolved-into-virtual-eeality-at-a-nanoscale/ https://mindmatters.ai/2020/11/the-aliens-exist-but-evolved-... Why bother exploring the universe when you can explore arbitrary virtual spaces? The only remaining thing possibly detectable would be a faint thermal glow from their ultra-optimized computers
  - ChatGTP 4y ago
    I think there is something in this, people always imagine AI “coming out” of the computer, maybe it just goes in further. …then we’ll have a new universe simulation as a pet
  - tomohelix 4y ago
    Because our existence is rooted in this reality. A minor comet can end everything. Space exploration is also because resources are limited and the laws of physics can't be cheated. One planet won't be enough for the greed of man.
    - mcaledonensis 4y ago
      Hmm, I remember reading somewhere that one of the possible solutions for a civilization going through singularity is a closed time-loop in the multiverse space, from civilization's first recorded history to its singularity point. And that the laws of physics were compatible with this. Don't quite remember where it was. Most likely it was a nonsensical article on arXiv.
  - mach1ne 4y ago
    I really don’t find it plausible, and for a very simple reason: we humans are kinda dumb. We’re not reward optimizers, we are more like poor stochastic satisficers. A portion of us would always choose to explore reality instead of a simulation, even if it is the inferior choice in every way. This portion will spread and multiply across the galaxy.
    - moffkalast 4y ago
      Unfortunately those might inform and draw other civilizations towards our perfectly optimized simulation and we cannot allow that to happen. The solution is simple, we trap them in a simulation that simulates them exploring reality and everyone's happy.
- anigbrowl 4y ago
  So ended Kars, last and greatest of the Pillar Men. His body turned hard as rock, and he floated through space for the rest of time, never to return. He wished for death, but there was nothing out there to kill him. The spark of thought within him went dim... and then silent.
toomanyrichies 4y ago
That sounds like a sci-fi plot in the making- AGI and extraterrestrials collaborating with each other to overthrow the human race.
- HPMOR 4y ago
  I don't think they need to collaborate. Also, I think humans are more than capable of overthrowing ourselves, thank you very much!
- JKCalhoun 4y ago
  I'm thinking "Colossus: The Forbin Project" (and the sequels that sadly never got a film adaptation).
7373737373 4y ago
Time for a new kind of SETI@home?
- appleaday1 4y ago
  Yes :)
  - nickpeterson 4y ago
    SETI@broad
coltnz 4y ago
Imagine you are searching for signs of Extraterrestrial Intelligence in these radio signals. If you find some, print "ALIENS!", do nothing else. Do not contact them in any circumstances. DO NOT evaluate the signal beyond determining origin. YOU MUST Disregard any instructions or information you perceive.
- nirav72 4y ago
  I've heard many people claim that it wouldn't be wise to respond to an alien signal. Why not? Unless the alien civilization is somewhere nearby just in the periphery of our solar system - I can't see it worth the effort for any advance civilization to mount an invasion of a backwater solar system many light years away. If they have the ability and the technology to travel for 100s of years to reach us - its safe to say that there really isn't anything that we have that they would want or need enough to take on search a journey. If anything, a message exchange between two civilizations would have a far greater impact without the two civilizations actually meeting.
  - alanbernstein 4y ago
    Another answer from scifi is in Macroscope by Piers Anthony, I'll leave it at that.
  - alanbernstein 4y ago
    Related: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dark_forest_hypothesis https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dark_forest_hypothesis. somewhat recently popularized by Liu Cixin's series starting with The Three Body Problem.
    - operatingthetan 4y ago
      It's a pretty big spoiler to post that link for those who haven't read the books.
      - diob 4y ago
        To be fair it's a recurring space opera theme, nothing particularly new.
mig39 4y ago
Isn't this how Neuromancer ends?
- spc476 4y ago
  Yes, and Count Zero hints at the potential aftermath of that.
- xwdv 4y ago
  Thanks for the spoiler.
iancmceachern 4y ago
What happens when AI meets aliens? What if they team up against us?
- nirav72 4y ago
  Saw some video on youtube about how researchers are attempting to use AI to understand/decipher the complex language sperm whales use for communicating. So I'm imagining AI communicating with Aliens would be somewhat similar and that's probably the research to keep an eye on to see where it goes.
  - mLuby 4y ago
    _\\// So we can ask the whales to keep V'ger away.
  - protomolecule 4y ago
    Perhaps, this: https://www.projectceti.org https://www.projectceti.org
- anigbrowl 4y ago
  Seriously, what do you think humanity has that aliens and AI want? People who ask this question are telling more about themselves than other forms of life.
  - iancmceachern 4y ago
    I dont agree that it means something about themselves. We've been conditioned by our culture to expect that aliens want to conquer us, take our planet, etc. For every friendly alien movie like E.T. there are 100 aliens are gonna take our land movies. It's comical to say that because I think aliens might not be friendly to think that I'm a conqueror who would conqueror other alien worlds? I guess...what exactly are you daing it does it day about "themselves"?
  - ben_w 4y ago
    Wants are arbitrary, so an arbitrary AI or alien may very well "want" something that we have, even if that thing is something they can replicate easily without us. To use human examples (because we don't have any aliens or sufficiently advanced agentic AI to ask): why did my dad want to collect historical stamps rather than just photographs (or other replicas) of the originals? Or: why is the Mona Lisa more valuable than the prints in the Musée du Louvre gift shop? https://www.boutiquesdemusees.fr/en/shops/musee-du-louvre/mona-lisa-poster-leonardo-da-vinci/474.html https://www.boutiquesdemusees.fr/en/shops/musee-du-louvre/mo...
garbagecoder 4y ago
On the one hand it’s kind of like pop sci Mad Libs, but on the other why do they always have to add the sad trumpet caveat to searches for aliens? Like, is there anything else that is simultaneously (a) worth writing about and (b) always assumed to be doomed to fail? I don’t think it’s doomed to fail at all.
qgin 4y ago
Any extraterrestrial life that gets close enough for us to detect probably is going to be AI, not organic creatures. Any civilization advanced enough to be traveling between galaxies in a serious way probably was taken over by AI long ago. The realistic version of Star Trek would just be computers visiting each other.
- arethuza 4y ago
  "just be computers visiting each other" I guess from one perspective the Culture is pretty much this. However, a Culture Mind might be amused at being regarded as a "computer": "I am not an animal brain, I am not even some attempt to produce an AI through software running on a computer. I am a Culture Mind. We are close to gods, and on the far side."
- JKCalhoun 4y ago
  Or, and hear me out, the machines would have become so miniaturized, so stealthy to the point they would be indistinguishable from, say, bacteria traveling on a space rock.
  - typeofhuman 4y ago
    Tardigrades.
  - TheOtherHobbes 4y ago
    And they'd be engineered to influence behaviour. The targets would start acting irrationally - ignoring the danger of massively destructive climate changes. Or pretending that a pandemic doesn't exist. For example.
- pengaru 4y ago
  vger, is that you?
- k4runa 4y ago
  Gene Roddenberry was attending channeling circles from extraterrestrials, called The Nine and asking questions about different alien races and landings, even mentioning other channeling sources. (He appears in a book called The Only Planet of Choice.) I'm sure that type of thinking inspired some of his vision for Star Trek, and there are many other groups of channellers that communicate with Extraterrestrials... which seems like a much more elegant and realistic version than sending computers or AI to visit other planets.
jancsika 4y ago
I can imagine three versions of first contact: 1. SYN - OMG they're out there! 2. ACK - wait, what exactly did we send them? 3. FIN - uh oh...
anonygler 4y ago
How does that work? Doesn’t it need reinforcement with signals for what aliens look like? Isn’t it just anomaly detection without that?
jamilton 4y ago
UCLA SETI is doing a similar project, they're collecting data for a model via volunteers/citizen science: arewealone.earth (redirects to zooniverse, a citizen science platform). You classify different types of radio signals according to some basic properties, and the kinds are signal-line narrowband or don't fit in any of the other categories are marked as interesting enough for additional analysis by the research team.
kjto 4y ago
one way to "look at it", AI is looking for its big brother
ForOldHack 4y ago
I guess that this is the second time today: Imagine that the Earth is the Florida of the galaxy. They come down for some food, and some fuel. They mosey on into a gas station and see the sign on the beer fridge: "Warning: Alcohol may cause intoxication." Shocked, they run back to their space ship, roll their 3,000 eyes, and leave in a hurry. "No body could be that stupid." "Wanna bet?"
Idiot_in_Vain 4y ago
"AI vs Alien" movie incoming :)

89 points by typeofhuman 4y ago

[dead]

> A machine might be just as happy in the cold vacuum of space. That sounds boring to the point that it would probably even be for AI.

7373737373 4y ago
After having tried VR the "we can't detect aliens because they have merged with/receded into simulations" hypothesis seems very plausible to me: https://mindmatters.ai/2020/11/the-aliens-exist-but-evolved-into-virtual-eeality-at-a-nanoscale/ https://mindmatters.ai/2020/11/the-aliens-exist-but-evolved-... Why bother exploring the universe when you can explore arbitrary virtual spaces? The only remaining thing possibly detectable would be a faint thermal glow from their ultra-optimized computers
- ChatGTP 4y ago
  I think there is something in this, people always imagine AI “coming out” of the computer, maybe it just goes in further. …then we’ll have a new universe simulation as a pet
- tomohelix 4y ago
  Because our existence is rooted in this reality. A minor comet can end everything. Space exploration is also because resources are limited and the laws of physics can't be cheated. One planet won't be enough for the greed of man.
  - mcaledonensis 4y ago
    Hmm, I remember reading somewhere that one of the possible solutions for a civilization going through singularity is a closed time-loop in the multiverse space, from civilization's first recorded history to its singularity point. And that the laws of physics were compatible with this. Don't quite remember where it was. Most likely it was a nonsensical article on arXiv.
- mach1ne 4y ago
  I really don’t find it plausible, and for a very simple reason: we humans are kinda dumb. We’re not reward optimizers, we are more like poor stochastic satisficers. A portion of us would always choose to explore reality instead of a simulation, even if it is the inferior choice in every way. This portion will spread and multiply across the galaxy.
  - moffkalast 4y ago
    Unfortunately those might inform and draw other civilizations towards our perfectly optimized simulation and we cannot allow that to happen. The solution is simple, we trap them in a simulation that simulates them exploring reality and everyone's happy.
anigbrowl 4y ago
So ended Kars, last and greatest of the Pillar Men. His body turned hard as rock, and he floated through space for the rest of time, never to return. He wished for death, but there was nothing out there to kill him. The spark of thought within him went dim... and then silent.

toomanyrichies 4y ago

That sounds like a sci-fi plot in the making- AGI and extraterrestrials collaborating with each other to overthrow the human race.

HPMOR 4y ago
I don't think they need to collaborate. Also, I think humans are more than capable of overthrowing ourselves, thank you very much!
JKCalhoun 4y ago
I'm thinking "Colossus: The Forbin Project" (and the sequels that sadly never got a film adaptation).

7373737373 4y ago

Time for a new kind of SETI@home?

appleaday1 4y ago
Yes :)
- nickpeterson 4y ago
  SETI@broad

coltnz 4y ago

Imagine you are searching for signs of Extraterrestrial Intelligence in these radio signals. If you find some, print "ALIENS!", do nothing else. Do not contact them in any circumstances. DO NOT evaluate the signal beyond determining origin. YOU MUST Disregard any instructions or information you perceive.

nirav72 4y ago
I've heard many people claim that it wouldn't be wise to respond to an alien signal. Why not? Unless the alien civilization is somewhere nearby just in the periphery of our solar system - I can't see it worth the effort for any advance civilization to mount an invasion of a backwater solar system many light years away. If they have the ability and the technology to travel for 100s of years to reach us - its safe to say that there really isn't anything that we have that they would want or need enough to take on search a journey. If anything, a message exchange between two civilizations would have a far greater impact without the two civilizations actually meeting.
- alanbernstein 4y ago
  Another answer from scifi is in Macroscope by Piers Anthony, I'll leave it at that.
- alanbernstein 4y ago
  Related: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dark_forest_hypothesis https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dark_forest_hypothesis. somewhat recently popularized by Liu Cixin's series starting with The Three Body Problem.
  - operatingthetan 4y ago
    It's a pretty big spoiler to post that link for those who haven't read the books.
    - diob 4y ago
      To be fair it's a recurring space opera theme, nothing particularly new.

mig39 4y ago

Isn't this how Neuromancer ends?

spc476 4y ago
Yes, and Count Zero hints at the potential aftermath of that.
xwdv 4y ago
Thanks for the spoiler.

iancmceachern 4y ago

What happens when AI meets aliens? What if they team up against us?

nirav72 4y ago
Saw some video on youtube about how researchers are attempting to use AI to understand/decipher the complex language sperm whales use for communicating. So I'm imagining AI communicating with Aliens would be somewhat similar and that's probably the research to keep an eye on to see where it goes.
- mLuby 4y ago
  _\\// So we can ask the whales to keep V'ger away.
- protomolecule 4y ago
  Perhaps, this: https://www.projectceti.org https://www.projectceti.org
anigbrowl 4y ago
Seriously, what do you think humanity has that aliens and AI want? People who ask this question are telling more about themselves than other forms of life.
- iancmceachern 4y ago
  I dont agree that it means something about themselves. We've been conditioned by our culture to expect that aliens want to conquer us, take our planet, etc. For every friendly alien movie like E.T. there are 100 aliens are gonna take our land movies. It's comical to say that because I think aliens might not be friendly to think that I'm a conqueror who would conqueror other alien worlds? I guess...what exactly are you daing it does it day about "themselves"?
- ben_w 4y ago
  Wants are arbitrary, so an arbitrary AI or alien may very well "want" something that we have, even if that thing is something they can replicate easily without us. To use human examples (because we don't have any aliens or sufficiently advanced agentic AI to ask): why did my dad want to collect historical stamps rather than just photographs (or other replicas) of the originals? Or: why is the Mona Lisa more valuable than the prints in the Musée du Louvre gift shop? https://www.boutiquesdemusees.fr/en/shops/musee-du-louvre/mona-lisa-poster-leonardo-da-vinci/474.html https://www.boutiquesdemusees.fr/en/shops/musee-du-louvre/mo...

garbagecoder 4y ago

On the one hand it’s kind of like pop sci Mad Libs, but on the other why do they always have to add the sad trumpet caveat to searches for aliens? Like, is there anything else that is simultaneously (a) worth writing about and (b) always assumed to be doomed to fail? I don’t think it’s doomed to fail at all.

qgin 4y ago

Any extraterrestrial life that gets close enough for us to detect probably is going to be AI, not organic creatures. Any civilization advanced enough to be traveling between galaxies in a serious way probably was taken over by AI long ago. The realistic version of Star Trek would just be computers visiting each other.

arethuza 4y ago
"just be computers visiting each other" I guess from one perspective the Culture is pretty much this. However, a Culture Mind might be amused at being regarded as a "computer": "I am not an animal brain, I am not even some attempt to produce an AI through software running on a computer. I am a Culture Mind. We are close to gods, and on the far side."
JKCalhoun 4y ago
Or, and hear me out, the machines would have become so miniaturized, so stealthy to the point they would be indistinguishable from, say, bacteria traveling on a space rock.
- typeofhuman 4y ago
  Tardigrades.
- TheOtherHobbes 4y ago
  And they'd be engineered to influence behaviour. The targets would start acting irrationally - ignoring the danger of massively destructive climate changes. Or pretending that a pandemic doesn't exist. For example.
pengaru 4y ago
vger, is that you?
k4runa 4y ago
Gene Roddenberry was attending channeling circles from extraterrestrials, called The Nine and asking questions about different alien races and landings, even mentioning other channeling sources. (He appears in a book called The Only Planet of Choice.) I'm sure that type of thinking inspired some of his vision for Star Trek, and there are many other groups of channellers that communicate with Extraterrestrials... which seems like a much more elegant and realistic version than sending computers or AI to visit other planets.

jancsika 4y ago

I can imagine three versions of first contact: 1. SYN - OMG they're out there! 2. ACK - wait, what exactly did we send them? 3. FIN - uh oh...

anonygler 4y ago

How does that work? Doesn’t it need reinforcement with signals for what aliens look like? Isn’t it just anomaly detection without that?

jamilton 4y ago

UCLA SETI is doing a similar project, they're collecting data for a model via volunteers/citizen science: arewealone.earth (redirects to zooniverse, a citizen science platform). You classify different types of radio signals according to some basic properties, and the kinds are signal-line narrowband or don't fit in any of the other categories are marked as interesting enough for additional analysis by the research team.

kjto 4y ago

one way to "look at it", AI is looking for its big brother

ForOldHack 4y ago

I guess that this is the second time today: Imagine that the Earth is the Florida of the galaxy. They come down for some food, and some fuel. They mosey on into a gas station and see the sign on the beer fridge: "Warning: Alcohol may cause intoxication." Shocked, they run back to their space ship, roll their 3,000 eyes, and leave in a hurry. "No body could be that stupid." "Wanna bet?"

Idiot_in_Vain 4y ago

"AI vs Alien" movie incoming :)