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Origin >
The Singularity >
The technology of universal intelligence
Permanent link to this article: http://www.kurzweilai.net/meme/frame.html?main=/articles/art0598.html
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The technology of universal intelligence
Levels of intelligence far greater than our own are going to evolve within this century. We will ultimately saturate all of the matter and energy in our area of the universe with our intelligence.
Originally published in What
Is Enlightenment? Magazine Spring/Summer 2003. Excerpts published
on KurzweilAI.net October 16, 2003.
WIE: You mentioned earlier that as human beings we naturally
seek to expand our horizons, and that in the future we will do so
largely through the expansion of our intelligence. Do you see the
expansion of human intelligence as an evolutionary end in itself?
RK: Well, it's a good question. It's like asking, "What
is the purpose of life?" In my mind, we will ultimately saturate
all of the matter and energy in our area of the universe with our
intelligence, and I suppose you could say that's an end in itself.
All of this dumb matter and energy around us will wake up and become
sublimely intelligent. Then it will spread out to the whole universe
at the fastest speed information can flow. And one could make an
argument that it's not going to take an infinitely long time because
there may be other ways to get to other parts of the universe through
shortcuts like wormholes, which physics has postulated. Eventually
the whole universe will, essentially, wake up.
 futurespread_72dpi.jpg copy.jpg)
But isn't it interesting that you never see cosmologists give any
role to intelligence in the future destiny of the universe? Rather,
they talk a lot about whether or not the universe will contract
back to a big crunch or expand indefinitely, as if these sorts of
mindless forces of physics are just going to endlessly grind on
like a big dumb machine.
Nowhere do they consider, "Now, wait a second, intelligence could
spread through the universe and actually make an intelligent decision
about what the destiny of the universe is, and even though the gravitational
force and other forces might cause the universe to spin apart, the
intelligent civilization infusing the whole universe will decide,
'No, we're not going to do that. We're going to do something different.'"
WIE: Some scientists and cosmologists argue that the
universe is already intelligent. But what you're saying is that
we will use technology to inject our own intelligence into the nonintelligent
matter of the universe, that it's a purely physical accomplishment.
RK: Exactly. And that's a form of enlightenment. Because
I would say that the whole universe is not intelligent at
this point. But I think it will become intelligent through the process
that I described.
WIE: How do you see that happening on a practical level?
Can you envision it?
RK: Well, yes. We can state the fact that levels of intelligence
far greater than our own are going to evolve within this century.
We can't entirely describe what that will be like because it will
be, by definition, more intelligent than we are. As we move through
three-dimensional molecular computing, we're ultimately going to
be organizing matter and energy in a very efficient way, down to
the atomic level. In about twelve years, we'll be able to compute
very efficiently with these three-dimensional molecular structures,
which actually are based on carbon, much like life is, but organized
millions of times more powerfully.
%20Kurzweil_72dpi.jpg)
A one-inch tube of nanotube circuitry built out of carbon atoms
would be a million times more powerful than the human brain. Using
these incredibly small information-processing systems, which have
the ability to reorganize matter, we'll ultimately be able to convert
most of the matter and energy in our area of the universe into very
efficiently organized processes for running intelligence.
And then, this intelligence will expand outward, almost like information,
but it will actually be able to essentially convert and absorb into
itself all the matter and energy that it encounters as it continues
to spread outward into the universe.
© 2003 What
Is Enlightenment? Magazine. Reprinted with permission.
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Mind·X Discussion About This Article:
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Re: Running out of oil to power AI?
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So - we've got some infrastructure problems, and certainly oil getting more expensive would add somewhat (via transport costs) to the cost of coal and gas - but we're nowhere near running out of the latter, even if we might be close to a Hubbert peak for oil.
North America's natural gas situation is becoming critical, despite all the sophistical arguments from free-market ideologues to the contrary. Refer to:
Demand outpaces gas production
http://famulus.msnbc.com/famuluscom/bizjournal01-1 7-010317.asp?bizj=HOU
which states,
The natural gas industry faces a year of conflicting extremes in 2004.
Houston-based and multinational energy companies will pursue a number of extremely huge exploration and production projects in the Gulf of Mexico.
But the amount of natural gas they supply, although substantial, will be woefully inadequate to offset a U.S. production rate that continues to dwindle at an extremely rapid pace.
And events like the freezing cold snap that hit much of the country in December and caused gas prices to spike 50 percent only represent the tip of the iceberg.
This bleak assessment of the disparity between expanding production and shrinking supply comes from Houston energy guru Matthew Simmons.
The president of Simmons & Co. International, an energy investment bank, believes the United States faces a serious natural gas crisis that could have a devastating impact on the national economy.
And Simmons is not alone.
In October, the National Petroleum Council (NPC) revised its official natural gas outlook with a 180-degree turn.
Four years ago, the council was projecting a bright future for the fuel, with ample supplies and prices averaging under $3 through 2015.
Now the NPC is saying that, "there has been a fundamental shift in natural gas supply/demand balance that has resulted in higher prices and volatility."
As a result, the NPC has lowered gas production estimates for North America by 22 percent, or 7.5 trillion cubic feet per year -- more than 16 billion cubic feet a day.
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Re: The Singularity versus the Dieoff
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The only long-term solution to Earth's Energy Problem in my opinion is PLASMA FUSION: the most powerful energy in the known Universe. Not coal. Not solar. Not natural gas. Not wind or hydro. And not nuclear FISSION: the SPLITTING of atoms. Nuclear fission, usually called -- nuclear energy -- has serious waste disposal problems connected with its technology. It also has other problems like having the potential to render a 100-square mile area of civilization radioactive for 25,000 years. Sure there have not been any Chernobyl's or Three Mile Islands lately, but the next one becomes more probable to the degree we set any more of this risky technology loose on the public. That said, Pebble-Bed reactors show safe promise and should possibly be investigated by the U.S. as China is now doing.(2)
Plasma FUSION: the JOINING of atoms -- is the only viable long-term answer on the horizon for heavy electrical requirements because it's robust and its only by-products are heat and water. More importantly, it's the only energy source we know of that will be able to meet goals of the ENTIRE human race, as extrapolated, since pre-industrial revolution demands. Until and unless long-term requirements are confronted, it is impossible to rationally select energy solutions. If you don't know WHAT your energy requirements will be in the next 50, 100, 200 years, how are you going to be able to select a viable DIRECTION to even START moving in? At the rate global civilization is increasing its demand, some 2.5% per year, even exploiting (destroying) the entire Alaska wilderness for oil will only yield an additional 5 years. Some studies say 1 year. So is it worth it? I say no. It's a misallocation of attention and intention. Right now the human race is WANDERING around in a fog just trying to cope. It has NO IDEA which DIRECTION it needs to go to survive and advance in the long-term. The answer to this dilemma is tied up in energy -- for WITHOUT SUFFICIENT ENERGY ALL LIFE SUPPORTING INDUSTRIES WILL EVENTUALLY CEASE TO EXIST.
The planet, meaning all countries and all of these countries' industries, will need 200 terawatts of power each and every year by the year 2100. That's less than 100 years from now. Again, your kids will probably STILL be alive. YOU may still be a live too, if therapeutic cloning becomes a widespread reality in time. (See http://www.advancedcell.com and The Immortal Cell by Michael D. West) Plasma fusion is the only technology that will be able to give us the necessary energy in 100 years and on.
Fusion is also the only energy that will give us rocket engines powerful enough to explore the Solar System in any meaningful way, when we're ready for it. And we WILL be ready for it starting in the coming decade. Thus, unless there is a major breakthrough in some other energy source, plasma fusion is the ticket, and we should stop wasting money and resources trying to develop other alternatives that will just place us into an endless "cope" cycle. This includes even placing too much hope in nanotechnology unless it leads aggressively to solar power and/or other useful, safe technologies. As much as I am romanced by the nanotech meme, no evidence of inorganic nanotechnology has been observed in the Universe. Thus it is highly doubtful if full Drexlerian INorganic nanotechnology is in fact possible. ORGANIC nanotechnology, such as bacteria and the ribosome, may well be the only forms of nanotechnology possible. Thus for us to sit around waiting for nanotechnology to present us with a technical deus ex machina (such as even in the case with nano-assissted solar technology) may be a big waste of time and energy. Also, zero-point energy (a.k.a. vacuum energy, dark energy, cosmological constant energy) and the Patterson Cell may be possible -- but tapping these are much more pie-in-the-sky. We need to focus about 75% of our resources on plasma fusion -- now! Not 100%, but 75%.
Future Energy Demands:
Count on it, Earth will need, want and demand a cumulative 10,000 terawatt-years of power over the next century and 200 TWs per year, and up, by the year 2100. Economizing will NOT work and those that think this is the way to go are being foolhardy. Civilizations DON'T economize, unless they're radically succumbing (a possibility that some of the more irresponsible powers-that-be act as if they want). So, we must push the fusion button to its sustainable point and get the job done. We are doing this now and should have sustainable reactions soon IF there is enough private and governmental money and thought allocated in this direction. Unfortunately we may not be able to count on governments to do this because they seem to be part of the problem. The reaction we ultimately need to gain mastery over is the deuterium-helium 3 reaction (D-He3 reaction) because this reaction is much cleaner than the deuterium-deuterium reaction (a reaction which eats away the walls of the outer chamber). In fact the D-He3 reaction is so clean and powerful, it produces the highest energy-to-mass ratio of any reaction found in nature. Why do you think stars us it? The Universe isn't dumb. Are we?
But here's the killer: there's no Helium-3 on Earth, thus we will have to eventually set up mining colonies on the Moon. The Moon is the closest place in the Solar System we can get Helium-3, so we'll we need to start mining He3 off the Moon by at least the year 2010 and be totally routine with such operations by the year 2025. Why? Because the supply of He3 will probably only give us only about 10,000 terawatt-years of energy. And MUCH of this energy may be needed for large nuclear/electric propulsion engines (and eventually fusion engines) that will be necessary to mine the Gas Giants, starting with Jupiter. Why will we have to go to the Gas Giants? For more Helium-3 obviously. The Gas Giants are the Persian Gulf of the Solar System when it comes to Helium-3. Jupiter alone has 5,600,000,000 terawatt-years of Helium-3, enough fuel to not only handle Earth's energy problems for millennia, but enough energy to explore and settle the entire Solar System. More importantly, how do you think we are ever going to get OUT of this Solar System and become a Type III, starfaring civilization? We'll need to mine the OTHER gas giants for their 8.3 billion terawatt-years of Helium-3 because we'll need a lot of this to power the super nuclear powered rocket engines that will be capable of getting us up to at least 5% of the speed of light.
So it's obvious to me, the Universe has laid out all the resources we need to take each baby step in our civilization's evolution. All we have to do is keep the ignorant and destructive morons off our backs long enough to get things done and meet targets. And foremost on the way to meeting conditional, operating and production targets, we MUST keep the oil cartels in the world energy Establishment from totally screwing up the biosphere (environment) and suppressing entrepreneurs who will cause the world to segue into a clean energy system based on plasma fusion (and nano-asisted solar). It will be a challenge, but the entire future of Earth, as well as the Solar System and possibly even our Galaxy depends on how we handle our resources, here and now, and as the Universe presents them at each new level of our technological and biological evolution.(3)
Funding Plasma Fusion and Solar:
If ample sums were allocated each year to the development of plasma fusion (even 11% of what we spend on the annual military budget of $440 billion in the U.S.), plasma fusion could be a reality within 10 - 20 years. Steps in fusion are already being taken, but not enough. (See ITER at http://www.iter.org and http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM .20061121.wnuclearfusion1121/EmailBNStory/Business /home) The projection of 50 to 100 years would be seen to be pessimistic in light of ample funding for research AND because it doesn't take into consideration the law of accelerating returns. (See Ray Kurzweil's book, The Singularity is Near available at Amazon). Plasma fusion would give Earth the needed 200 terawatts per year by 2100 and do it without further damage to the biosphere. Large plasma fusion plants could be located safely around the world and in Earth orbit to generate enormous amounts of clean electrical power, power that could be transmitted anywhere. Such plants generate sufficient electricity to crack hydrogen out of water, a virtually unlimited resource on Earth and hydrogen, by far, the most abundant element in the Universe. The hydrogen could then be used, not only to feed the fusion process, but as a "storage medium" for use in fuel cells and/or fuel for internal combustion engines that were adapted for hydrogen. Thus, the transportation industry and electricity-intensive industries could be supplied with limitless amounts of electricity originated from clean, renewable plasma fusion plants.
At the same time plasma fusion is being developed and distributed, solar technology could be developed for use in homes and small business. Since a home uses a relatively small amount of energy compared to an automobile, solar energy will soon reach a point where it will be able to supply the needed wattage to run all of the appliances and heating/cooling systems in a house or small business. This technology, with ample funding, will arrive easily by 2006, especially if the public intensifies political pressure to make it happen.(4)
Summary of Factors to Consider:
1. We will reach peak oil by 2020 but PROBABLY HAVE ALREADY REACHED IT.
2. CO2 build-up and global warming are serious, but potentially reversible given that advanced nano- or bio-engineering will be available later in this century.
3. Continued use of fossil fuels will contribute to CO2 build-up and, as a result, global warming, thus fossil fuels (i.e., oil, coal, natural gas, etc.) are no longer an option.
4. Solar, wind and hydro cannot provide enough energy to meet needs now, let alone when we need 50 terawatts of power per year by mid-century and close to 200 terawatts per year by 2100. The new solar cells being developed in South Africa are promising for houses, as the original edition of this article predicted.(4)
5. Nuclear FISSION is too dangerous and waste is a serious problem; plus uranium is a limited and non-renewable resource.
6. Some falsely believe plasma fusion is between 50 and 100 years away from deployment, thus insufficient attention is paid to it.
7. The current Energy Establishment may or may not be part of the Next Energy Establishment, but, in fact, all, or most of them, are clearly inhibiting the transition in order to amortize their $10 trillion infrastructure. This infrastructure is probably already amortized (i.e., bank loans paid off), but they would never admit this because to admit it would cause a decrease in profits, so they imagine.
8. The amount of money allocated towards energy research from the annual national budget is pitiful and the amount allocated to plasma fusion development is bordering on criminal. The U.S. spends less than $1 billion a year on domestic alternative energy development whereas it freely spends $440 billion a year on the death and destruction through the military. Again, government may not be the solution and thus private capital will have to intervene.
Given 1 - 8 above, as well as the data in numerous books and testimony by investment bankers (such as Matt Simmons), my conclusion is this: PLASMA FUSION supplemented by SOLAR are the only viable, long-term solutions to Earth's energy problem.
Conclusion:
Homes/small business could be operated on SOLAR energy and heavy industry/transportation could be operated on PLASMA FUSION. Earth's Energy Problem would thus be completely solved for the foreseeable future and well into the next 500 years by using a coordinated combination of:
A. CENTRALIZED FUSION POWER
B. DISTRIBUTED SOLAR POWER
The combination of FUSION and SOLAR would give the world a virtually infinite amount of clean, inexhaustible energy -- plus the added dividend of enough power to develop high-impulse fusion rocket engines that will be necessary to open the door to the manned exploration of the Solar System and its colonization over the next 500 years.
Given the short- and long-term benefits of a Fusion/Solar Energy Establishment, humanity should immediately begin allocating the necessary financial and intellectual resources to their focused development and deployment.
All else is a waste of time and money.
All fossil fuel technologies are counter-productive.
No energy technology other than plasma fusion will be sufficient.
Economizing is NOT an option for a growing, young planetary civilization.
Since energy is a common need of ALL people and all industries, whether in developed or developing nations, the creation and deployment of A and B should really be a WORLD WIDE project lead by the United States. As a demonstration of good faith, the U.S. should allocate about 10% of its military budget ($50 billion per year) toward the development and deployment of plasma fusion. Other countries should contribute 2% of their annual military budgets as well and if they have no defense budget they should contribute by reducing their population by 2% per year.
The calculus of the above would eventually lead to less ability and need to wage wars as a "solution" to problems, especially problems caused by limited energy. Once war, and those who use and profit from it, are gradually removed from power, civilization will be able to allocate increasing amounts of its energy to increasing the standard of living on Earth, thus all the "reasons" for war as a "solution" to anything will systematically become obsolete. Again, one of the primary "reasons" governments and "leaders" embroil their citizens in war is to secure energy, such as oil, by force, if necessary. Such reasons for war become untenable when energy is abundant and thus able to bolster the production of abundant, quality products. In short, wars ALWAYS do more damage than they do good. Wars always destroy more resources than they create.
Again, if the above steps are taken, the energy dividend will pay off in all industries, making all products and services less expensive and higher in quality. If, while this productivity transformation is taking place, countries lead by the United States, could remove themselves from fiat money standards and re-adopt sound money standards, the excess productivity caused by the energy dividend would not be absorbed by government expansion, perpetual wars, empire building, socialist programs and waste. Thus, benefits would accrue to people and private industry.
The combination of a clean and infinite new Energy Establishment and a Sound Money Establishment would usher in an era of unprecedented prosperity and expansion. The human race would thus, for the first time in history, be in a position to attain full Class I status as a global civilization -- Class I meaning, having the ability to fully and economically utilize the resources of its host planet. Class I status would thus close the door on war as an option for the resolution of conflict and open the door to the remedy of the scarcity of material possessions thus leaving human beings in a position to spend considerably more time pursuing education, entertainment, new product development, spiritual enlightenment and exploration.
All problems, no matter how simple or complex, are related. They are solvable by addressing the problems that have the most common elements first, and then moving down the list of priorities to problems that have no common elements. ENERGY is common to all products, services and human activities. MONEY is common to all products, services and most human activities. Money is a form of energy, thus money and energy are, in many ways, flip sides of the same coin and collectively the most common elements of all of humanities' secular problems. Thus these two problems should be addressed and remedied first but probably simultaneously. If this could happen, a solution to WAR, CRIME, IGNORANCE, WASTE, INEFFICIENCY, MATERIAL SCARCITY, OVER-POPULATION, DISEASE, POLLUTION, GLOBAL WARMING, TRANSPORTATION, TRUNCATED-LONGEVITY and all other problems would manifest in sequence.
But it all starts by properly solving Earth's Energy Problem.
Listen to the scientists, not the politicians and not the MONEY-mentality (i.e., people only motivated by money, power and prestige). The later live only for today; the former will help you and your progeny live forever.
James Jaeger |
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Re: The technology of universal intelligence
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I happen to think that Kurzweil is way out of his
league here when he talks about intelligence
taking over all of the matter in the universe,
manipulating space and time, etc.
It is indeed quite possible, though not yet certain, that some form(s) of nanotechnology could be based on self replicating molecules such as DNA (perhaps modified forms of DNA, or
some other molecular structure) which could
have the viability of life in expanding throughout
this and other planetary systems, causing
transformations as they go, just as life has
here. But the laws of thermodynamics, gravity,
etc., must be accomodated in the process; they
can not be changed at will. In particular, the
first and second laws of thermodynamics: the
conservation of energy, and the nondecrease of
entropy; the speed limit on direct travel through space set by special relativity (the speed of
light); the law of gravitation and general
relativity etc. etc. set important limits on how
far any intelligence or technology can go in
manipulating nature.
Indeed, the second law of thermodynamics points to the possibility of something known as the "classical heat death" of the universe - temperatures tend to equalize when hot and cold come into contact and in a closed static universe everything must eventually come to the same temperature, at which point no further change is possible. Of course, we don't live in a closed,
static universe (or a classical one; nature is
quantum mechanical) so this scenario is more of a
thought experiment than reality.
However, recent observations have provided strong evidence that the expansion of the universe is accelerating with distant regions accelerating
away from each other and losing casual (light cone) contact at an accelerating rate. This accelerating expansion makes a mockery of any claim that a single intelligent force could influence all matter in the universe, or that all matter could be connected together in a single networked intelligence.
On the other hand, an intriguing speculation was made in an earlier post. Current inflationary
cosmological models do strongly imply that this
universe is just one of a very large (perhaps
infinite) number of universes that are constantly
being born. Perhaps in some distant future, when
much, much more is understood about quantum gravity, string theory, inflationary cosmology etc., it could be possible for our (evolutionary) descendants to create other universes, perhaps even to design them (wholly or partially)according to predetermined specifications and/or
to leave this universe and go to one that has
been created. This sort of scenario could provide a neat explanation for why we see no evidence of other intelligences in our universe - they have packed up and left for more auspicious places. However, it should be emphasized that at the present time we don't have anywhere near the
understanding needed to evaluate such scenarios,
and that there is no real evidence for it - just
speculation.
In any case, none of this has any relevance to
our near future or the next major transformation
here on Earth: the singularity which Kurzweil has
so elegantly expounded upon. We would do better
to focus on that. |
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Re: The technology of universal intelligence
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Doomsday senario's always project past problems (which are already in the process of being solved) to a future that can't exist.
What a great way of looking at it. Lets take, for example, the doomsday scenario of using nanotechnology to produce spores that can a) reproduce and b) carry enough botulism to kill every human on earth:
“Molecular manufacturing raises the possibility of horrifically effective weapons. As an example, the smallest insect is about 200 microns; this creates a plausible size estimate for a nanotech-built antipersonnel weapon capable of seeking and injecting toxin into unprotected humans. The human lethal dose of botulism toxin is about 100 nanograms, or about 1/100 the volume of the weapon. As many as 50 billion toxin-carrying devices—theoretically enough to kill every human on earth—could be packed into a single suitcase.” (http://crnano.org/dangers.htm)
This is terrorism to the N’th degree, but as you stated, is a scenario which involves today’s biggest fear, especially here in America, of terrorism.
I would like to see some research to support this argument, but I believe your quote hits the mark, and I hope our civilization will be able to survive accelerating technology, especially nanotechnology which will impact every facet of our lives, good or bad. Not to mention, Molecular Nanotechnology and ‘nano-factories’ are on our doorstep.
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Re: The technology of universal intelligence
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I think a mistake Kurzweil and others are making here is to talk about this new intelligence as "ours", and to say "we" will extend our intelligence. The mind of this new intelligence will be very much outside of our own. We will not share in its experiences. The best we can hope for is to be one of the few people (if any) lucky enough to be in a privileged position that allows us to be given a few crumbs of whatever insights it may have. As someone who has not thought about this as much as Kurzweil has, I'm really curious to know if I'm wrong and he has thought this through and has a good rationale for using the words "we" and "our" when talking about this intelligence. Those words also imply some measure of control, as if we would have any control over such an intelligence, which seems to me like a pretty outrageous assumption to make.
If by "we" Kurzweil means humanity, I think this is a misleading and mistaken view. The intelligence will arise not from some unified effort of all humanity, but rather secretly inside some research lab of a large organization such as a company. IBM, Microsoft, and Google come to mind. It may be months or even years before the existence of the intelligence is revealed to the world. Also this scenario is entirely consistent with the idea that the first intelligence will emerge in the Internet, because large organizations like those can easily harness the power of the Internet, or large subsets of it, through initiatives such as grid computing (IBM), Google Compute (Google) or .NET (Microsoft). But that is not the only path to success: they could just use the Internet as a data source for learning; they should have enough money to buy plenty of units of computing power at whatever the price happens to be at the time. When intelligence is built or emerges within one of these organizations, that does not represent something "we" as humanity did, nor is it ours. It represents something that the organization that produced it did, and it is *theirs* (not ours) to do with what *they* (not we) want to. I make this point because of Kurzweil's specific and confusing use of the word "our" to describe this intelligence.
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Re: The technology of universal intelligence
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Would it not be wise to start with a definition of Universal Intelligence (with perhaps a subdef for the human variety?) And who says that all the described matter and energy is that dumb?
I think we abound in arrogance in ascribing this intelligence as our own - did it not, after all, evolve with us? The implication, in my view, is that it existed before we did.
The universe is calculated to be 13.7B or so years old. Are we so vain as to believe that its been waiting all this time just for us to reach this particular stage of our development so it may hand us the reins?
I rather like the posit that intelligence and survival are inexorably linked, but then, is death really non-survival? or does the soul simply take another step down (or up) on the stairwell of entropy? Christianity teaches us that animals have no souls; Just how fearfull of a being do you have to be to declare another living entity soulless? Do they fear dogs could crowd us out of heaven if we allowed them equity?
Arrogance and vanity are typically the characteristics of the fearfull, ignorant and insecure (my observation, that I have more than once seen in my own actions).
All this harkens back to that wonderfull story of Crocodile Dundee's: We are the fleas that argue about who owns that part of the dog that we inhabit, whereas we really belong to the dog . . .
Do we create reality by imagination, or do we discover it? And what is the true nature of language, after all? To obfuscate, seduce, confuse, enlighten, condemn, enrapture. Is language a friend or an enemy? Like all tools, it is both. Bear in mind, at our root, we are toolmakers and users (as are a surprising number of our animal brethren).
I suspect one day god will write on our species' tombstone: "They made workable tools" I suspect (or rather hope) he makes tools as well. The idea of Black Holes as galaxial conversion tools is rather fascinating.
Lets posit another (not so new) idea: The aim of life is the survival of a species (be it on a Universal, Solar, planetary, microbial or sub-atomic scale) Some species die and some survive. All members of a species die sometime, but if too many die, the species becomes extinct. Through evolution, the better their ability to adapt, the longer the species should survive. Can these rules be applied to the universe? It seems they may apply to galaxies, solar systems, right on down to the smallest lifeform imaginable. Fascinating idea that god might be fighting for his own survival, eh?
Anyway, in our experience as a species it has become apparent that toolmaking is a very usefull adjunct to survival. Toolmaking seems to be enhanced by imagination and, ultimately, intelligence. So, the age old question: what comes first, the tool or the intelligence? Lets define toolmaking for the moment as the ability to take something less usefull from the environment and turn it to a more usefull task.
Feel free to critise, I'm flying by the seat of my pants here.
No matter what faculties employed, the aim is still to make better tools. Is tool making possible without intelligence? Did the development of a slime-trail for slugs happen completely by chance? What factors pushed or favoured its occurrence? Was local or distributed intelligence involved? Could slugs have some infinitessimal intelligence? Do they not also want to survive just as we do? Its enough to say that they have survived, not so?
Is it fair to say that one galaxy devouring another does so because it can, or that it must to survive? Are galaxies really that dumb? and completely enslaved by their gravitional forces?
And are they just waiting for our magical touch to blow full force intellect and self awareness into their huge but mundane existences? |
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Re: The technology of universal intelligence
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Mr. Kurzweil’s insights are a welcome breath of fresh air! He has finally managed to bring Eastern thought in complete contact with Western science. Although others, notably Fritjof Capra, have written about parallels between quantum physics and Eastern philosophies, this is truly a significant development, in the acknowledgement in the understanding of the “organic” nature of the universe.
I have several concerns, dealing with the “Western” approach to the intelligence that Kurzweil describes. I agree that in the not-too-distant future our intelligence will far outstrip anything that we can conceive of. As a culture, and a planet, there appears to be very little discussion about the potentials involved. We barely have experience with individuals having an IQ of over 200 (The poet Goethe, with a considered IQ of 210, is considered the most “intelligent” man to have lived.) How will we deal with the “super intelligent” who will, at first, be as strangers in a strange land? How will our own definition of intelligence and who we are change?
But more importantly, it appears, from an Eastern philosophical point of view that Kurzweil’s view is based on an “upside-down” assumption of how the universe is “constructed”. Most Eastern philosophies hold consciousness to be the primary foundation of existence, and that our form of intelligence is a rather low-level, subsidiary phenomenon. In light of that view, perhaps, yes, our exponential expansion of intellect may have effects that we can vaguely perceive, as has Mr. Kurzweil. However, we may also see that our relations with higher aspects of “universal” (for lack of a better word) intelligence may have some interesting, and completely unforeseen consequences, as “out there” may not be as empty and “dumb” as the good author supposes. The universe may have some “ideas” of its own..
Perhaps it is time to explore some of those possible consequences and the range of responses that we personally, and as societies and cultures, may have to the new worlds before us.
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Re: The technology of universal intelligence
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i think intelligence is really poorly defined in this article. just what exactly is supposed to be permeating all matter and energy?
i don't even usually speak in terms of matter and energy because it implies there is a difference between the two; that matter is some dumb stuff and energy is what moves that stuff around. but reality, as it exists outside of our textbooks and conversations, is really just a patterning. we havent found "stuff" yet. and there is no reason, in fact, for there to be any stuff. so just what is it we are trying to control by bringing the singularity about?
it seems obvious to me that the whole of existence and the universe itself is innately conscious and intelligent already. surely, as a scientist this fellow realizes that we grew out of the earth along with every other form of "life" that we see on this planet. (unless you subscribe to a philosophy that advocates you were brought into existence by a god or divine force of some kind and then placed on a planet that it made for you to inhabit) therefore, by default, we know that the universe is already intelligent.
it's similar to the lilac tree in my back yard. it grows lilac flowers...that is simply what it does. the flower is the most complex feature of the whole bush in terms of physical structure, function, and visual appeal, but the flowers don't have anything to them that the bush didn't make for them. we are the most complex thing we have encountered in the universe so far but we don't have anything that the universe didn't have from the strat. and what's more, the lilac bush (our universe) will never randomly grow oranges (accidently create intelligence). you don't get oranges out of a lilac bush, and you don't get intelligent beings out of an unintelligent universe.
intelligence has already permeated the whole universe (and probably set it into motion). the whole talk of ending pain and undifferentiating each one of us into a collective singularity sounds more like it would stop existence altogether. how would you know pleasure without pain? without the extremes of pleasure and pain you couldn't even experience the neutral state, when you are neither in pleasure nor pain but simply well and fine. let's say we do achieve a singularity and control everything and know everything and become, for all purposes, divine existence itself. then what? i think it should be rather boring being a god in this sense. where's the fun in that? the first thing i would do to entertain myself if i achieved the singularity would probably be to split myself into an infinitude of different things like hydrogen, rocks, trees, birds, beetles, and people that have conversations on internet forums... |
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Re: The technology of universal intelligence
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Extrasense:
Yes I feel it still does mean something, in the manner that many people are content with watching sports (as I do at times) rather then cogitate about a possible trans-human condition as we all like to do on Mind-X.
Since Zizzi is a person of letters, an astrophysicist. I strongly suspect that his analysis of the cosmos is more educated and therefore, more profound then mine. For example, Zizzi has published papers in peer-reviewed science journals, and I never have. I can read what he writes, but cannot contribute to the knowledge-base itself.
Thus, I would term Zizzi or somebody like him, a thinker, rather than myself, or Joe Sixpack down the street, who can only draw inspiration from such thinkers.
-Spudboy100 |
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Re: The technology of universal intelligence
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Wow what a long thread,I started readin about enerjy and then it went into differnt ideas,even some phantisee,,but when I got slam-ed by not being a 'thinker",,just because I"m not smart,,hey I can think too.I think I can,,But most of my ideas come from learning from others-and isn't that the way most of us get our"ideas',?
i think I am there for im ego rapped in a flesh sut-Sorry but I want to be a thinker--someday.. |
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