The Road to Superintelligence
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Cadell Last
(Image credit: mindcontrol.se)
In the 21st century, we are walking an important road. Our species is alone on this road and it has one destination: super-intelligence.
The most forward-thinking visionaries of our species were able to get a vague glimpse of this destination in the early 20th century. Paleontologist Pierre Teilhard de Chardin called this destination Omega Point. Mathematician Stanislaw Ulam called it "singularity":
One conversation on the ever accelerating progress of technology and changes in the mode of human life, which gives the appearance some essential singularity in the history of the race beyond which human affairs, as we know them, could not continue.For thinkers like Chardin, this vision was spiritual and religious; God using evolution to pull our species closer to our destiny. For others, this vision was a fiercely secular and naturalistic technological utopia designed on scientific principles alone. The rapture for the nerds.
Today the philosophical debates of this vision have become more varied, but also more focused on model building and scientific prediction. The closer we get to our destination, the clearer we can see this world. In the early 20th century Chardin could only generalize about its features. In The Phenomenon of Man he described the Omega Point as "super-personalized" and "infinitely enriched".
It's hard to make real sense of what this means.
In contrast, today we can define the specific mechanisms that could realize a new world. We can actually see the singularity. We can actually touch it in laboratories around the world. Sometimes, we actually experience it in the real world of 2014. Modern theorists can describe it so well that it becomes real to the mind, making our present world seem hopelessly barbaric and painfully primitive. Even embarrassing.
One of the best descriptors of our potential future world was explored in a recent paper by cyberneticist Francis Heylighen titled: Return to Eden? Promises and Perils on the Road to Superintelligence.
Here I summarize the main technological mechanisms as described by Heylighen. I hope you will quickly realize the point of this exercise. In 2014, we live in a world with global brain technology. We live in a world where the consequences of our technological actions demonstrate that the possibilities of utopia come dangerously close to the possibilities of destruction. For example, drones can give us an automated distributed network with the ability to give anyone, anything they want, in a negligible amount of time and for negligible cost. Or... drones could be used to kill children in the developing world.
So far we've chosen the peril first, and planned for the promises second. With the technology yet to come, we must do better. We must prudently walk this road towards the promises, while avoiding the perils in their entirety.
Promise #1: Omniscience
Important Mechanisms:
- Semantic web
- Artificial intelligence (AI)
- Massively Online Open Courses (MOOCs)
Promise #2: Omnipresence
Important mechanisms:
- Internet of things (IoT)
- Wearable/Internal computing
- Cloud computing
Promise 3: Omnipotence
Important mechanisms:
- Robotics
- Nano-assemblers (3D/4D printing)
- Internet of things (IoT)
Promise 4: Omnibenevolence
Important mechanisms:
- Higher education
- Abundance
- Increased connectivity
This Road has Perils
This is not an easy road to walk. Super-intelligence is within our grasp. Temporally speaking, we're closer than most realize. The last few metaphorical kilometers may be the most difficult, or they may be surprisingly easy. No one really knows. But we do know that emergent technology can theoretically be used for global horrors, just as they can be used for global paradise. From my perspective the road can't be avoided, as evolution can't be stopped. But there is no way of knowing with 100% certainty whether we will successfully make the journey. It will take intelligent decision-making from our most powerful institutions. That takes evidence-based distributed decision-making, as opposed to ideology-driven centralized decision-making. They must be willing to make this change now. And yet I fear they won't. Maybe technology will re-structure them for us, or maybe we must actively change them ourselves. Maybe a combination of both approaches is the key. We do see signs of hope.
Whatever happens, the global brain is coming. The technology to build a global brain will come whether our institutions change or not. The problem then morphs into something a little more interesting: technology can build the global brain, but its up to us to build the global village.
For more read: Return to Eden? Promises and Perils on the Road to Superintelligence
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