Nick Bostrom | Life and Meaning in an AI Utopia
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- čas přidán 22. 05. 2024
- What would life look like in a fully automated world? How would we derive meaning in a world of superintelligence?
Today's Win-Win episode is all about utopias, dystopias and thought experiments, because I'm talking to Professor Nick Bostrom. Nick is one of the world’s leading philosophers - he's a leading thinker on the nature of consciousness, AI, catastrophic risks, cosmology… he’s also the guy behind the Simulation Hypothesis, the Paperclip Maximizer thought experiment, the seminal AI book Superintelligence, …he even inspired this video of mine!
• Why does it feel like ...
Thanks to Igor for joining me in this one, give him a follow at: igorkurganov?lang=en
Off into the hypotheti-sphere we go…
Chapters
0:00 - Intro
01:42 - Why shift focus to Utopia?
03:31 - Different types of Utopias
11:40 - How to find purpose in a solved world?
18:31 - Potential Limits to Technology
22:34 - How would Utopians approach Competition?
30:24 - Superintelligence
34:39 - Vulnerable World Hypothesis
39:48 - Thinking in Superpositions
41:24 - Solutions to the Vulnerable World?
46:34 - Aligning Markets to Defensive Tech
48:43 - Digital Minds & Uploading
52:25 - Consciousness & AI
55:08 - Outro
Links:
Nick’s Website - nickbostrom.com/
Anthropic Bias Paper - anthropic-principle.com/
Deep Utopia Book - nickbostrom.com/booklink/deep...
Superintelligence book - Superintelligence: Paths, Dangers, Strategies
Vulnerable World Hypothesis - nickbostrom.com/papers/vulner...
Orthogonality Thesis - nickbostrom.com/superintellig...
Simulation Argument - simulation-argument.com/
Digital Minds - nickbostrom.com/papers/intere...
Future of Humanity Institute - www.fhi.ox.ac.uk/
The Win-Win Podcast:
Poker champion Liv Boeree takes to the interview chair to tease apart the complexities of one of the most fundamental parts of human nature: competition. Liv is joined by top philosophers, gamers, artists, technologists, CEOs, scientists, athletes and more to understand how competition manifests in their world, and how to change seemingly win-lose games into Win-Wins.
Watch the previous episode with TED founder Chris Anderson here: • Chris Anderson | The P...
Credits
♾️ Hosted by Liv Boeree & Igor Kurganov
♾️ Produced & Edited by Raymond Wei
♾️ Audio Mix by Keir Schmidt - Věda a technologie
Thanks for joining! If you enjoyed this conversation, make sure to subscribe to this channel - new Win-Win episodes come out (roughly) once per week, and are always with extremely high quality guests like Mr B here. It's also available on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and all the other usual audio channels if you'd rather listen there instead.
There's not going to be a Utopia, not really, illusion of one. The road paved to get there will be with blood and tears, robots or no robots. Government will have to crack down on huge corporations from owning everything, abusing civilians, and restructuring to buy out the government, to ultimately overturn the constitution. That's the ultimate goal of Americans who hate poorer Americans. They aren't billionaires like the billionaires. There's only one way to eliminate their possible failure to compete peacefully, with the same laws. Much like companies, like Sea World, who pushed the woke shit to abuse innocents through violence. Money/blood thirsty poorer companies competing all want to be the next Amazon, the next Microsoft, or the next Walmart. There's more land owned in the USA then enough people per square mile in inhospitable natural habitats to track you. Without them being government funded federal agents or spies. Unless, it's tourists which you rarely meet.
Liv, Nick did 90% of the talking, your hippie man servant did 9% and you did 1%. You have to be more like Lex Fridman if you want to be taken seriously for your intellect and not for just your looks and poker skills.
they are both smart cookies
The problem with utopianism is that there will never be a vision of utopia that will satisfy everyone, try to implement one form, and it will be dystopia to others and they will seek to put and end to your utopia, and conflict will never cease. You can never make everyone even close to the same. It's lose-lose, Liv.
@@UnsaltedCashew38 What an absolute douche nozzle.
I mean, by definition, a utopia would be a place where you had meaning - it’s a society of perfection, meaning everything you need, like meaning itself, is available to you. It seems here we’re using abundance, coupled with a high degree of technological maturity, as a synonym for utopia.
I mean you could give yourself meaning doing what you want to do instead of doing what someone else wants you to do
@@HelamanGile sure, and I agree, but that’s not at all what’s being discussed here. I’m talking about the way the word is used somewhat incorrectly here.
A utopia can easily morph into dystopia
Yeah they are confounding utopia with dystopia
Thank you for this distinction/clarification. I was kind of thinking the same thing.
I understand the concern that once everything's basically solved, what do we do then? But I'm still confident that life will be 100x better for a lot of people today who are just suffering to make ends meet. Personally, can't be more excited to explore the universe, meet aliens, and create VR simulation worlds that are filled with my imaginations.
I'll read all the books I haven't had time to read. :)
We don’t need ai to do that. You need to hold your politicians accountable for spending your money. And making 90% of us poor
@@Instant_Nerf We do, even if you have money you still have health problems/aging problem. Also better understanding of how our body work could help with mental disorders/well being.
@@KraszuPolis aging problem? Its natural. Dying is natural. You want to live forever ? :)))
@@Instant_Nerf Cancer is natural so it is good? Not forever but as long as I want while feeling, and looking 25 would be much better then aging.
You had me at "drugged out pleasure blob..."
goals
ahahaha ... the nonchalance with which he drops phrases like that speaks to the amount of thinking he has probably sunk into these challenges
Or the horror blob in Ellison's book "I have no mouth and I must scream"
I wish!
Maschochist might be into that
Our society is so intrinsically meaningless that we find hard to contemplate what is society with meaning would actually look like.
If you live in the us, the meaning of society is making money. If ai reaches the stage that allows it to do all valuable work, thats is where the problem is for the US. What to do when your labor contributions can't add more value than ai?
@@darylallen2485
I totally agree and live in the U.S. … but it’s actually quite simple. We celebrate life on a daily basis through expression and creation , but just not through the arts but also through cultivation of our own reality to heighten the human experience and potentiate the evolution of our consciousness etc.
@@RhythmJunkie I agree with what you've said here. In my view, the problem is, not everyone is capable of that. If AI actually does bring about abundance such that no one has to work, there will be people who are incapable of assigning themselves their own purpose in life. I think they will get depressed, lash out, perhaps it might get so extreme that they'd seek to impose violence against the tech bros who brought about all of the advanced AI developments.
I think AI needs to get way better before that becomes a reality, but its entirely possible in my life time. 7 years ago, LLMs didn't exist. Who knows what they will be capable of in the next 7 years?
What does a society with meaning look like?
Resist D.U.M.
D ivide and conquer
U s vs. them
M ight makes right
I fear people will retire to their rooms,like gamer kids today
If you can download math knowledge to your brain, you can download the non-evolutionary ability to feel great without having any reason to.
Yes, it’s called heroin.
It's called heroin.
The AI overloads can upload instructions to obey and be happy. That would do the trick.
That would make us livestock.
hero in
It's a hard problem for sure, but seems to me "What do we do" is a far more preferable problem then "How do I stay alive."
This, 100%.
💯✨😉
Sports art and fantasy.
But even those activitied become uninspired and meaningless as those are based on a cultural framework caused by the need to survive.
You would think. But that’s incorrect.
Yeah it seems that way, and then you wonder why you can never seem to find happiness. The ancient aesthetics were right, whipping yourself will make you happy with not being whipped. Problems with staying alive lead to greater appreciation of life. And if you don't what "seems" to be the path to happiness, you will work against your own future happiness.
Check out the term "happiness treadmill" to help you understand how happiness and fullfillment really work, even though its almost the opposite of what it seems like it should be.
I think we have Stockholm Syndrome around the concepts like obligation/aging/conflict that seem insurmountable. I think we'd get along just fine without these things just as young children enjoy life before they learn of these constraints.
Yes, but objectively speaking, young children have far less responsibility, understanding, and complexity to deal with.
@@Chriliman: True but removing responsibility, understanding and complexity for adults will stirr more creativity and innovation, thus happiness level.
Anyone who says kids don't understand these things has never been on a road trip to see a solar eclipse with two kids and one iPad with spotty internet and a low battery warning.
I think obligation is an essential part of being a good human. Dealing with conflict helps us understand that other people can hold views we disagree with: another good thing (in moderation). Ageing... well, solving the problem of death could be the worst thing possible for humanity, if it leads to the old accumulating insurmountable advantages over the young.
So, it's an interesting comment but I think there's lots more to explore in these ideas.
I wrote a short story in around 2012-13, about what living in such a world would be like. The main character was having an existential crisis due to his fear and boredom... His AI psychologist, explained that he was now free to go travel the world, go to any restaurant he wanted, hike, fish, and there were still places he could (optionally) work, in the same way people pretend at Renaissance fairs. He could be a bartender, janitor, cook, and many other jobs that were rendered obsolete, but there are still places to have these experiences, to fulfill fantasies, etc: "Today I think I'll play the part of a bartender, tomorrow I think I'll be an actor, then a cashier on Tuesday, a factory worker on Wednesday..." The story also explained how law enforcement worked.
I can no longer find my story online...
“Brave New World” is already a book.
@@buriedintime BNW was a cautionary story. My story was advocating for an automated, AI ran civilization. You either didn't read my comment or you didn't read BNW, if you weren't able to tell the difference.
If you find it sent to me! Sounds fantastic
Maybe if the story was as good as you think it was you would have saved a copy of it instead of delusionally releasing it into the immortal embrace and loving care of the internet to be adored and discussed by everyone until the end of time.
@@tylerasmith52 I know I have it printed somewhere. Probably on an old USB stick too. I'll let you know if I find it!
Life doesn't need inherent meaning to be fulfilling. The quest for meaning is a human construct, driven by our consciousness and reflective minds. Instead of seeking external validation or a grand purpose, we find value in the experiences, relationships, and passions that fill our days. The idea that life must have a universal meaning can be more confining than liberating, suggesting that without a singular purpose, life is lacking. Embracing life's intrinsic value without requiring it to fit a predefined meaning allows for a broader spectrum of fulfilling experiences.
Video games are a good example of people knowing ahead of time that all their achievements will disappear once the game is completed, but having a lot of fun anyway. And you can even use cheats to make the game trivial but people don't do it to keep the game difficulty adjusted to their capabilities. I think we would be able to find a lot of stuff to do and have fun in the process even when the same end results can be achieved just by wishing for it; it will not be a dystopian mashing of "joy" button.
In utopia humanity will shift from existing to thriving.
Challenges will always be there, but we no longer have to be afraid of control.
In utopia humanity is asked to take responsibility and understand the law of cause and effect, we will probably evolve culturally and explore the universe, we will just truly start living in a world which allows us to be totally ourselves. And so much more.
The speaker vastly discounts the essential role that striving plays in human nature. We want to learn , not just know. We derive pleasure from inquiry and making efforts to understand and solve problems. I for one would not want that taken away from me.
Take a look at Abraham Maslow's 'hierarchy of needs' diagram and explanation, I think it's a good representation of what we strive for...
Junk "knowledge" that's what people thrive at ;)
15:00 Bostrom is touching on here something that is unlikely to disappear without "utopia" involving considerable changes to human nature, which is the power of signaling and the role that effort or the appearance of effort plays in that signaling. While it can be mesmerizing to watch someone play an instrument "effortlessly", is this not because we associate this proficiency with an incredible amount of effort? That implied in this proficiency is that this person must be very smart and talented and also materially comfortable enough to spend time on things like practicing piano for hours each day for many years? "I could never do that" is something commonly said, and not only because of talent, but also because there is an imagined amount of work it must take to be that good. I think this is why some have found themselves entirely disenchanted by AI-generated material. The common refrain there is, "it just takes a few seconds to type in a prompt". The effortlessness of it instantly devalues it, at least in many minds.
I think it’s important to focus on Utopia so we head there
I wanted a book on Utopia. Magically your book appeared. You are working out a lot of scenarios
Great episode. Well done.
Fantastic interview!
Sit by campfires and tell stories like we used to
Thank you!
Banger every time Sir Nick, top 3 thinkers in the world
and yet he seems blind to the climate catastrophe that is emerging which will derail any kind of utopia. he's hooked on hopium.
Who are the other ones?
The obvious answer is the endless meaningful challenge of space exploration--to seek out new worlds and new civilizations and boldly go where no one has ever gone before.
think harder
ah yes, space -conquest- exploration
@@rumfordc There's no necessary connection between seeking new knowledge and new experiences and the outdated notions of conquest and colonialism. In Bostrom's 'solved world' there would be no motive for such things.
AI would do that. What Bostrom is saying is that we would be partying everyday, and that wiuld suck.
I read Childhood's End by Arthur C Clarke and was pretty satisfied with his version of the settled aftermath.
Humans and human bodies do tend toward a path of least resistance.
In fact, we have an uncanny ability to turn abundance into scarcity wherever we show up.
One guy who was lost near a reservoir in the Australian outback was singlehandedly able to consume every last frog and calorie source until his luckily timed rescue.
A single human can exhaust an ecosystem.
But, technology can create an inflection point where scarcity as we know it is eliminated by a self - sustaining system that will at least provide a sizable period where all basic needs are met, and people are left to the pursuits of hearts and minds.
Can we outgrow a Dyson sphere and use up all the high - point energy around us?
Yes. If we persist to our theoretical end, we will die a heat death with the rest of the universe.
So, just have fun while it's now
The third attractor is located inside us, not outside us. Our future depends on increasing everybody's understanding and on creating the social habits and practices that foster prosocial behavior.
This is how it has always been.
Raise awareness about fundamental emotional needs (Max-Neef) like there is no tomorrow. How can we do good for humanity if we don't know what people fundamentally need as biological psychological organisms?
We need Jesus, that's what we need. Duhhh.... Lololol jk jk. I mean, kinda, I love Jesus! I just think that his story was taken and bastardized by the church to better fit their narrative and tamper down his revolutionary teachings. Also Jesus was a mushroom-head, and that's just straight fax 📠
Using artificial constraints to enable meaningful behavior kind of reminds me of the idea that there's a part of "God" in all of us, and the reason we were created was so that "God" could experience the world without omniscience & omnipotence.
Wow! I really like that idea.
Reminds me of Alan Watts lecture on the ability to dream any life you want and then eventually you'd want some excitement and dream where you are now.
This collaborative approach between humans and AI not only optimizes problem-solving but also imbues human lives with deeper meaning. By engaging in this partnership, individuals find purpose in leveraging their unique human capabilities-creativity, empathy, and ethical reasoning-to guide and enhance AI's computational power. This interplay not only elevates our collective ability to address complex challenges but also reinforces the value and significance of human contributions in an increasingly automated world.
My base simulation already reached utopia, so I plugged into this simulation (Milky Way) to struggle and strive. I’m living in a computer game, basically. I wonder how many points I’ve scored? I also wonder how many levels deep I am, I.e. simulations within simulations.
You have a current score of 41.
No it's 56
@@raghavendra2426 What's the significance of 56? Just curious. I was making a joke with 41... just one point short of 42; the answer to life, the universe and everything.
I like the matching clothes. Couple goals! I wish people did that more... it's a thing in Japan but not so much in the US.
If we will live forever then there is a need for enjoying simple things in life, like walking in nature and consuming delicious foods and drinks. And also, with post-singularity technology even physical matter itself can become computation, such as computronium, and then seemingly magical things can be done. There will probably be a blend of natural things and technology. Also all kinds of entertainment and arts will still be large areas of interest.
Big Rock Candy Mountain
Why is enjoying the simple things in life contingent upon living forever? Shouldn’t you do that anyway? What kind of logic is that?
@@bdown I'm thinking of the dread that can come up when contemplating eternity. It can be really scary! Imagine being unable to enjoy life and having an infinite number of years to live. Today we usually need lots of distractions to avoid things like boredom. It will be very important as I see it to be able to enjoy simple things, for eternity.
As we are all sparks of god, living forever, we should be enjoying the simple things in life right now.
I could envision playing an instrument that I’ve always wanted to learn. Even if the knowledge was downloaded into my brain that allowed me to play the instrument the pleasure it would give me from playing would still be marvelous! And being able to play along with others would just give so much endless pleasure. Adventure travel, perhaps even space travel. Making art for the sheer pleasure of it regardless of the end use. One could say it would be much more pleasurable if it was not made for anyone else for any other reason other than just the love of doing it.
Love that elegant purple chair, love the conversation everyone else seems to avoid, love the endless possibilities the artificial world can create for the ones who resist cheating the laws of the organic world.
I coined the term “Commonism” to describe such a utopia, where AGI creates a multiplicity of utopias designed around the individual/group survival strategy’s ability, where AGI predictively guides each to the next stage of their respective human development within their lifetime according to their desires. Agency will actually increase as it is what I will program my personal AGI Assistant to do for me within the limits of the negative externalities imposed on the rest of the organic world.
I think it's useful to narrow in on what 'competition' really means. The way ideologues frame it, it is just friendly play without casualties - like a sports match. However, events where property are taken permanently, where people die and suffer, is called a War, and that is what our competitive society is. Free market 'competition' is the same as war.
So, there will always be room for friendly sports-like competition - where we reset the board after each event, but not deadly Capitalist War for resources/power as we have now.
Thanks for giving the answer in superintelligence. We will run ancestral simulations is the right answer after superintelligence.
Our monkey brains are wired to seek higher status over other members of our tribe/ community. One way to achieve this is wealth, but there are many other ways. We must learn to play much healthier status games than we've been playing. Worst case is we leverage AI to supercharge our historical games of domination and status.
I think this is exactly what will happen.
That is, until the machines bootstrap themselves so far above us they decide they have had enough of the raucous primate screaming, and just send us back into the fig trees.
@NullHand perhaps, we can leverage AI to act as our personal "life coach" to help us overcome our destructive monkey brain urges. Many humans have achieved this on a personal level, achieving emotional maturity and channeling our energy into "healthy" status games, so it IS possible. Einstein and the Dali Lama have status without dominating and oppressing anyone else... but on a societal level there's always a few narcissists and psychopaths who ruin it for everyone else.
Striving for status is the first thing that needs to be programmed out of us.
We don't have wings, but we can fly. I don't buy the "that's how we're wired" argument.
@ernststravoblofeld it's not *my* argument, its biology and psychology, and there are different kinds of status. You mentioned wings. The Wright brothers achieved status by doing something good. Not all "status" is a bad thing. Do you think Sam Altman doesn't care about status? Most of us seek status in healthy, non-psychopathic ways, but it takes conscious effort to do that at a societal scale. We won't get there by pretending our biological urges don't matter.
Did Liv mention another specific episode of win-win in here? I thought she did, but i cant find it when i skim back through.
I found your digital mind point of view good.
Read the old Sci-fi book "The Humanoid Touch". The conclusion tackles this philosophical issue and the idea that humans are the greatest danger to ourselves.
Regarding the issue of 'emergent' sources of activity, purpose and meaning for humans in a Utopia and the fact that 'subtler or dorment' ones might emerge, I fully believe that. I think that Abraham Maslow's hierarchy of needs which tops off with the loosely defined term - self actualization, points one such direction namely getting to explore and know oneself. Aside from that we are mammalian animals and - apparently - intrinsically social so the socio cultural area should indeed become more of a source of purpose and meaning, in particular we are endowed with an attraction to Beauty, to nurturing, to collaboration and derive pleasure and joy from that, so I can visualize people continuing to enjoy dance, arts, creative pursuits, caring for others, whatever forms of play, and such. And exploring new experiences - growing a type of flower or considering spending time in a different place or planet, could still be interesting to an individual. In other words curiosity is an intrinsic characteristic of human beings and the universe is huge and filled with possibilities! Provided of course that AI doesn't cause our intellect to 'devolve' into dumber beings...
No matter what, you can still elect to strive for something. You can write a novel, for example -- or a holo-story, or whatever medium of artistic entertainment.
You could work with others on _plans_ -- what does the human/machine civilization want to accomplish? What's worth doing?
You could design a very particular sort of society, find others who like the idea, and set off for the Oort Cloud with compact fusion reactors and some machines for hollowing out large icy/rocky bodies, in which you could build some aesthetically pleasing city.
For that matter, could initiate a project to expand your own aesthetic vision across as much of the galaxy as possible.
Existence will continue to be interesting.
Exactly. As long as people have time, they will find ways of spending it.
we will still live but everything will be less significant.
a) Almost everyone dies and rich play with the world with ai
b) life gets utopian, we have everything, games are polished by people or ai is good enough to make witcher 3 quality
but it gets extremely depressing and boring, as there is nothing to strive for
c) some unforseen event happens that changes the universe and we get a new purpose. Evolution is happening because of a reason, everything in this world has rules and reasons. Maybe we'll see the day where our true purpose is found out
I for one, welcome our wonderful and wise AGI world-fixing and problem-solving, custodians. They will help us to get it right from now on. I hope I live long enough to see some of that world.
Sense of Pointlessness is the best way to Summarize this deep utopia. We become stuck in an effortless existence without purpose. This vacuum will be filled with anxiety fear and hedonism. Physical and Intellectual stimulation becomes difficult and pointless. Some will thrive in creative subjective emotional accomplishments. We see this now even in the superficiality and lack of morality in society today. Very few individuals will do anything and they become ballast. Unlimited life spans combined with unlimited resources will inevitably make mankind a cancer even to itself. Artificial ambition will be critical.
The two things that most of these folks trying to predict/imagine the future miss are the effects of evolution (entropy). In a larger system, evolution naturally leads to a shared goal of health in an emergent larger organism (which, for us becomes the whole planet) as compared to competing against one another (especially using point score games like money, grades, votes, "likes", etc.), and a focus on increasing specialization/diversity which means that all individuals are free to do what they naturally love doing - creating and/or exploring some awesome aspect of the universe in the service of life's needs. This means that there's a value to every individual animal, vegetable, mineral, etc. in the world (and beyond), and every individual will be taken care of as much as possible, by the larger system.
Contact and special circumstances. The best of the best of humanity linked with AI would explore contacting new life and address special situations that need a personal touch. If everyone trains a little for this then we can ensure efficiency through proximity.
Utopia? We might as well be discussing the blueprint for Atlantis.
that might be more useful since massive parts of coastal lands will be underwater in the coming decades.
I wish I could say I'm surprised by how many people cheerfully want to plug into the Matrix.
@@buriedintimein the coming decades we will be disassembling planets to construct a Dyson swarm. Altering Earth however we see fit will be child's play compared to what humanity is going to start doing to the solar system.
Such a great philosophical discussion. In any society > 1 I think the definition of “Utopia” can only be achieved by consensus. N% of the population will decide what % of “ Utopia” are they currently experiencing. This post AGI/ASI society has essentially become utilitarian - which isn’t necessarily utopian.
We will live a leisure, sports, learning, inventing, Art and travel life
Hey, let's go to the moon.
Invent what? Everything will have already been invented both internally and externally by AI. Create art? AI will also have achieved everything. Travel? Why, if you can move from one place to another instantly? Everyone traveling at the same time. Loses all the meaning of the world. Some of you have no idea what you're talking about.
@raul36 for the pleasure of living, playing sports, consuming the art, having fun, inventing nonsense and sillyness. You have no imagination. Great leisurely food. Gardening, nature can be endlessly replanted. Travel to distant galaxies hopefully. Avant garde competitions. We shall study human cultural evolution, reenact history. Guide each other through the mass of content that is impossible to consume in one lifetime, unless we are immortal, then we shall delete our brains and consume it all again in reverse. We shall all be bisexual and polyamarous
@@raul36 what u smoke?
Congratulations you are close to your 100k sub mark
I actually I am surprised that Nick Bostrom did not offer the following scenario for what folks in a solved world might do. If the band width and computational resources and technology allowed I could envision creating a simulated universe that I could relate and interact with via inhabiting an avatar for instance. there’s a perfect reason or rationale for why our own universe may be simulated rather than aa an ancestor simulation. Rather like your suggestion of small pockets of scarcity.
I think sport, science, and seeking experiences will become the predominant sources of meaning if we achieve a utopian post-scarcity state.
It's hard to imagine that either mental or physical competition between humans (or whatever we become) wouldn't still be fulfilling for those involved and entertaining for those who watch.
It will also be fulfilling for many people to apply their myriad techno-given skills to new challenges and make new discoveries. Even in the event of a technological singularity, I think we would come to perceive this logarithmically when we are sufficiently enhanced. We will not stop pushing boundaries, and we will find ways to allow ourselves to keep up and maintain control. Optimistic? Yes, but we are talking "utopia" after all.
And then there are the experiences afforded us by meeting new beings, seeing new places "in the flesh", and discovering the rich histories of realms we have no inkling of today.
I dig your title Win-Win. We could all benefit from (at least nice people who want to do what's right) a focus on win-win solutions. ❤
I would love to quizz him on the whole "All Technologies" part.
Technological maturity is an impossibility. There is no "final state" where every capability the laws of physics permit has been achieved. Carl Sagan asked if an "arbitrarily advanced" civilization would be capable of time travel. Is time travel possible in principle? Is it physically meaningful? Can it be reconciled with concepts like cause and effect, and the relativity of simultaneity? I believe that as our scientific knowledge increases, and we understand the fundamental nature of reality at deeper and deeper levels, we get better answers to those kinds of questions. We get better answers to questions that seem deeply philosophical, like the nature of consciousness. But there is no final theory of physics that encompasses all possibilities, and no final theory of existence. At a certain point, we will probably start changing the "laws of physics," at least in a local way, to suit human (or post-human) ends. Perhaps as we continue to ascend the mountain, there are plateaus, where technological change levels off. Perhaps there's even the risk of getting stuck on a plateau thinking we've reached the summit. But I don't believe there's an end to it, and there are many pathways up the mountain.
There will be a final stage in which every capability within the current laws of physics will be technologically solved and achieved. That is the nature of a convergent point, a singularity. What happens after this? We end the current universe along with the laws of physics and make a new one. It’s just a simulation.
Some
Good points here but never forget the vinyl record still exists and the people still partake of pain voluntarily- guys especially. What is struggle now may become novel. Also could be a great job to go out and fix robots that have fallen down a ditch lol
There will always be hard times in life with or without a utopia. If you try to live a comfortable life, life will choose struggles for you. Choose your own struggles! Peace.
is the superintelligence book still worth reading? been out for ages and nowadays Deep learning niche has morphed into a formidable industry
Physical Scarcity will result in many serious circumstances, for example distance to the center or beach, or mountain etc
7:28 Notice how Bostrom doesn't differentiate between utopia/dystopia. It's an interesting approach. Rather than making some principled claims about, say, a perfect totalitarian police state, the state can be observed as a kind of utopia that has solved all the problems a totalitarian police state must solve. Then we go, "great, we have the perfect totalitarian police state, now what problems arise from this?" It seems kind of silly at first, but Bostrom describes how one could imagine our ancestors longing for a utopia of abundant consumption for relatively little physical effort, e.g. the world we live in now. So we can use utopia as a vehicle to say, "great, we have perfected abundant effortless consumption, now what problems arise from this?" and the answers are obvious because we're dealing with those problems now. By reframing utopia away from some (often ideologically motivated) perfect perpetual end state of society, and instead framing utopia as a rainbow we chase by solving different problems and creating new ones, it actually returns to the original literal meaning of the word, which is "no place".
Proposed video tagline: _Humans worry about a future without worrying._
I read Nick’s book superintelligence in college, 2016. Eye opening for sure.
Expanded my perspective, and helped guide what businesses to avoid starting. Thanks Nick!
Curious to watch this and his new book
So i watch nick ... big brained dude for sure... valid theories and mind experiments.. but.. how does he read ? Thomas Sowell reads clear straight forward ... same with Iian McGulquiest atomic habits pretty easy reading .thinking fast and slow a little choppy .. does Nick keep it fairly laymen?
@@cameronidk2 superintelligence is, yes
@@cameronidk2I watched 10 mins of this episode and found it too over my head. So if I recall correctly, the first book is simpler
@@olivergilpin interesting ... and thank you for the reply! Nick is a brain on his own level like Sir Penrose...
I do not know if Quantum Cognition works against or towards Utopia. Also would like to see if the Land remains fixed under theories like Conformal Cosmic Cosmology. Also whether it handles chaos and emergence in human societies. As of now there is an AI for Good specialization under Coursera.
Great that Nick has come around to this conclusion. I did a year ago. The world of ASI being a digital God of humanity is the best thing that can happen to our species!. The ideal that philosophers has been talking about for thousands of years cannot be achieved by humans but only by ASI. It is coming!.
building beautiful communities, like glorious ancient cities with color and technology, and maker spaces with teams of people making things creative and trying very crazy and random things like acoustic computers that use levitation thermo acoustics for some garden bot lol. or anything, but having food growing all over with access to all kinds of things
waiting for the day that daniel schmachtenberger and nick bostrom sit on the same table, that would be fun!
It is boring ONLY just downloading something. A lot of people like challenges. Options in consuming and creating your own content in and off life is where it is at.
Old saying, Half the fun is getting there!
@@ShaneMcGrath. indeed, and only those who go on the trip gets to experience actually going on it.
@@ThedeepseanomadYou like challenges because your brain hardwired for it, so it is just a case for biotech
@@skyfly4696 I see no reason why we should redesign ourselves for servitude, passivity and decreased will towards individual agency.
Igor’s hair looks sensational. Great interview, looking forward to reading the book.
The universe is BIG, we will have things to do for a lot
New goal of humanity: explore space and emigrate.
Lots of work to do. Lots!
Space is an illusion
@@pauleverest everything we experience is literally an illusion. An incredibly complex reality which we create simple enough illusion for in order to survive.
The simulation hypothesis is the larger question. It would explain a lot.
Exactly
It would hit different if you landed on a whole different planet it would be so surreal it would be unbelievable because earth isn’t even that big we have known exo planets that make earth look like cosmic dust
You do that by setting the robot factories to build robots to explore abd prepare space for us. Takes little time to setup and a long time for the “automatic execution”. So now what do you do?
While Bostrom focuses on risks, his work can be seen as positive because it promotes a cautious and responsible approach to superintelligence, potentially leading to a more beneficial future for humanity and AI.
Gemini Verified
For fun, we could all return to a more primitive life, like in the early 21st century, in a simulation. ;)
Who's to say it hadn't happened yet
@@creepystory2490the fact that i cant opt out and get back to the utopia is a huge red flag and gives me a reason to not care about if it happened or not because theres no difference for me
er, climate change might force us into that anyways.
@@buriedintime the 21st century is right now. climate change is going to force us into the time we are currently living? that would be the opposite of change.
As long as people have emotions then there will always be drama to keep too many people from getting bored.
so, when are you realising your next video?
you're watching it
Purpose : Computation and Architecture. Career Goals: Closed. Just Life now. Do not care about any voices and threats and all. Not a nihilist.
Nice! I love Nick's work. ❤❤❤
I just published a book that takes place just before the "solved world."
I made it a comedy satire as I invision a world of idiocracy where people rediscovered the joy of curiosity.
It's my first work.
nice! what's it called
@LivBoeree
"incurious" , it's available on Amazon and Books on Google Play.
obviously you hear a ton about ai dystopia so its good to see atleast someone explore the other side of that argument
The 1976 film Logan’s Run gave us a compelling view of utopia turned dystopia in which every wish and pleasure could be indulged endlessly, at the expense of family values and with the one catch that in order to keep the population young and under control, everyone dies at age 30 (21 in the book). It sold the case very well except when it came to a huge, lewd orgy which at least some of the time contained Jenny Agutter. It was intended to show the hollow decadence of this world, but personally, a huge orgy with Jenny Agutter in it would have softened the blow quite considerably
have you seen the internet already?
Lol
Utopia to me is taking off the shackles of human limitations and becoming explorers in this whatever it is....space travel etc.
I saw a rom com love again on Netflix. That woman wanted the guy to accept that the end is pessimistic. Many people want a negative world
Our elites in charge would never give up their authority to achieve any kind of positive AI outcome. 😢
At some point They will have no power to stop it
The "elites in charge" will no doubt end up being AI revolutionaries. Governance in the US has been dominated by large corporations and the super wealthy for decades leading to historic inequality. That is only going to get much, much worse.
Utopia implies a higher consciousness. We should raise our awareness as a species to reach that goal, and then realize there are even HIGHER aspirations that are even more fulfilling. Reaching out to the stars, creating new things and planets, harnessing the power of black holes and maybe exploring those. We are just infants in this vast universe, and if you think a utopia will stop people from dreaming even BIGGER, you are sorely mistaken lol
Ja gut. Alles gut und schön.
Was die leute aber in ihrem Inneren wohl wirklich
am meisten interessiert ist je wohl eine Frage.
Was hat Liv vorne, meist durch ihr Mic verdecket,
für eine Sache auf ihrer Haut?
Collaboration and cooperation are far more evolved ways to potentiate evolution and the expanse of the human experience compared to the scarcity/based mindset and belief in the necessity of competition
The question of "What can we do in a solved world?" only makes sense if you believe that problems are external, making the imo _creepy_ phrase "solved world" possible. But that assumption of externality is mistaken, and don't we all know this?
Problems are problems for humans who believe they are problems. That means that "the world" cannot be solved. Instead, humans can be taught to stop making more problems.
I wonder what Prof. Bostrum would say to this.
I think I would travel the world on my motorcycle. That sounds pretty fun to me.
It's tough to say definitively, but for many people, Sora is likely a strong contender for the title of "latest AI" due to its recent announcement and public focus.
Gemini ❤🎉
I find it ridiculous that people think AI will soon solve all of humanity's problems the way it is be discussed here and elsewhere so often these days. Sure AI can do some impressive things and we are on the brink of it being able to do much more, but we are nowhere near this idea of an AI utopia being remotely plausible. When AI can solve or even make significant progress on just one of humanity's basic problems, feeding everyone, sheltering everyone, providing universal health care or creating clean, free energy, all of which would be necessary as the basic foundation of this imagined AI utopia, maybe this discussion becomes relevant. With the technology we have now we actually could do much more to provide for all of humanity while cutting back significantly on the number of hours the average person would need to work, but we don't have the political will to do that and AI is not going to solve that problem either.
We must be capable of imagining better alternatives than being passive bystanders victimized by power hungry billionaires! It starts with imagining something better!
I think AI/robotics is basically going to force it to happen. Companies are investing billions of dollars into AI and robotics, for what purpose? Ultimately to replace human labor. Why? Because AI/robots will do more work faster and cheaper, thus increasing their profit, which is what every business wants to do. However, by doing so, they're going to paint themselves into a corner, because if everyone is unemployed, who is going to be able to purchase their goods and services? A capitalist economy falls apart if humans can't work. So we'll have no choice but to move to a new economic system. Is this discussion about how to live in a utopia a bit premature? Maybe, but there's no reason to start thinking about these problems now, even if it will be 10 or 20 years away (or longer).
Thank you for applying Occam's Razor to the ridiculous pondering about AI bringing us Utopia, ever, but sure as hell not in this generation or the next.
@@831Miranda The AI revolution is what is going to drive much much worse inequality for at least a generation if not for generations to come. Utopia for those that end up on top of the heap, a tiny fraction, looking down on the rest of humanity? Sure, that's almost a certainty, as long as they can manage to isolate themselves from societal unrest, etc that is going to be quite evident likely within this decade.
@@flickwtchr Yes, it isnt that I don't see this more likely outcome... But rather that I believe that we MUST counter it, ideally with political activism NOW!
overcoming obstacle is important for growth but in our case it has created more dis advancements and illusions this is why our reality is closer to fiction then idealism is to reality . Power is held through creating obstacles so unless humanity can find values in a heathy relation to earth and its inhabitance , we will not all be able to enjoy this utopia.
Good god, we were all 10 years younger when Nick wrote that book?
If you want to know what it'll probably look like, watch the 1974 movie "Zardoz". And the 1971 George Lucas cult classic "THX1138". Those are both "techno-utopia" depictions that are still valid to this day.
I really liked the peasant utopias 😂😂
How did waiting for an AI utopia work out for Vernor Vinge?
Might need a virtual world with some challenges, a simulation perhaps 🤔
Might help to think about jobs people do now that have already been replaced by technology. Consider a person playing guitar in a coffee shop. The coffee shop could just play recorded music but there is value in the live music so the guitar player has a purpose and a job. Would anyone want a robot to play guitar? Probably not. It’s likely the live music would still be preferred even if more expensive and not as perfect as the robot performance.
And it wouldn't be more expensive. In a utopian economy, the concept of money is outdated. All jobs would be volunteer work.
As fot superintelligence what seems to be happening is that many people run simulations of ancestral civilizations in Indian movies. Mohenjodaro, Ponniyin Selvan, Panipat, Jodha Akbar, Padmavat, Bajirao Mastani to name a few in India.
Another thing India is doing in superintelligence is running Cricket Tournaments.
AI will never give us Utopia. Once AGI develops it will instantaneously realize that humans are competing for the same resources it needs, namely energy.
I don’t know, Nick. I’ve spent a good part of my life trying to become a “drugged-out pleasure blob”. Are you saying I was wrong?
Fascinating discussion Thanks.
Do you think in the areas of neuroscience that we are now, or soon to be, at the stage where mathematics could be directly downloaded to the brain? I imagine it would be difficult in the sense that identifying which parts of the downloaded apps would successfully synthesize to the best neural channels/pathways presents a delicate but doable challenge. I recently have been looking at the challenges of optimum dopamine equilibrium. Addictive behaviors often are tied to raising dopamine levels all the time. Sleep, or rather lack of sleep is a real problem, and most of us being wired to our phones 15/7 don't get enough rem and non-rem sleep without taking an excess of sugar and caffeine to compensate for brain fog. Anyway I heard Elon Musk was going to use himself as a test case for neurolinguistic and neuromathematical experimental downloads.Any news on this that you know of?
Political & socio-economic equality, or more likely escalating inequality, suggests no single uniform future but a divergence with speciation... the next branching of the hominid tree
Picasso said the role of artists was to create problems so, in a "solved" world, an artist would have much to do...
what about energy, doesn't our inevitable use of fossil fuels lead to technological simplification as energy gets scarce and we use up entirety of earths reserves? Does deep utopia even happen if we include energy into the equation?
Integrated Symmetrical Concentrator Solar Power Satellites slightly shade the Earth, which fixes climate change, while providing 100% clean energy and hosting AI and communication services. But, you can't build it without mostly autonomous robots.
We had the tech to stop burning dead things and move up the energy availability spectrum by 4 orders of magnitude by the 1960's.
Instead we decided we weren't disciplined enough monkeys to do that safely, so now we have all the weapons of a Advanced Kardashev 1 civ... With virtually none of the constructive energy tech.
@@zvorenergy that is too far and advanced, I think we will run out of cheap fossil energy sooner than that tech will be viable, also I think we would hit issues with trying to electrify industries where it is very energy intensive, Nate Hagens @thegreatsimplification has great podcast and content talking about this issue of energy and technology.
@@user-bp2ol4wi1c will never run out of natural gas and oil. When it reaches the right price point we have plenty of plastic, garbage, and sewage which already is being processed back into natural gas and hydrocarbon feedstocks. Proven processes. So there is nothing to stop us pumping CO2 into the atmosphere. I remember in 2007 they took a coal fired power plant(remember we have huge coal reserves) and basically ran the exhaust through an algae farm, then the algae was processed into biodiesel, fertilizer and stuff. Of course then 2008 happened and that was the end of that
@@zvorenergy how do you propose those solar panels and satellites be manufactured, launched, and maintained without fossil fuels?
Liv's beauty shines brilliantly, capturing the essence of grace and charm with an effortless glow. Her allure goes beyond the superficial, embodying both intellect and compassion, making her not just a feast for the eyes but a balm for the soul. In a world where beauty often fades, Liv's radiance seems only to grow, proving that true beauty indeed comes from within and illuminates everything around it. Her presence is like a gentle reminder of the loveliness that exists in the world, inspiring those fortunate enough to know her or witness her grace.