From: Charles Hixson (charleshixsn@earthlink.net)
Date: Mon Mar 08 2004 - 00:59:29 MST
Philip Sutton wrote:
>Hi Charles,
>
>
>
>>I've said this in other contexts, but *I* think it bears repeating.
>>If it weren't for the actions taken by persons in power, I would feel
>>that all reasonable steps should be taken to slow the onset of the
>>singularity. As it is, I feel the singularity may represent our only
>>hope for survival, dangerous though it is.
>>
>>
>Given your preamble on the dynamic of instability in the face of rapid
>change, what makes you feel that a coercive oligarchy won't be the
>force that actually controls the launch into the singularity ie. that
>controls the critical bulk of computational power and other key
>technologies?
>
>Cheers, Philip
>
They may well initiate it's launch. If they do, I feel our chances of
survival are worse. But in any case, those who launch it will soon lose
control over it. Soon may mean in minutes. The course that we are
attempting to follow is to create an entity that will, of it's own
volition, make decisions that we would, if we understood the situation,
consider life affirming. I don't think anyone here has the illusion
that control would rest with any human or group of humans. At least,
humans as we would recognize them today. Multiple paths to
transcendence imply that in some of them the control would rest with a
group of entities that had once been human. Those aren't necessarily
the most hopeful paths, either.
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.5 : Wed Jul 17 2013 - 04:00:46 MDT