From: Samantha Atkins (samantha@objectent.com)
Date: Mon Apr 30 2001 - 13:25:04 MDT
"Eliezer S. Yudkowsky" wrote:
>
> How do you resolve issues like these? Split your efforts between both
> alternatives to maximize output. How much money is spent on attempts to
> actually ship food directly to the poor? Lots. How much money is spent
> on direct efforts to implement the Singularity? We can both personally
> attest, Ben, that there is not much.
Perhaps there is a productive middle ground. Some of us could say more
about precisely how the Singularity, and the technologies along the way,
can be applied to solving many of the problems that beset real people
right now. We can produce and spread the memes of technology generally
and AI, NT and the Singularity in particular as answering the deepest
needs, hopes and dreams of human beings.
As part of this we also need more of a story about the steps up to
Singularity as involves the actual lives and living conditions of
people. That we will muddle along somehow while a few of the best and
the brightest create a miracle is not very satisfying. What kind of
world do we work toward in the meantime? What do we do about poverty,
about technology obsoleting skills faster than new ones can be acquired,
about creating workable visions including ethics and so on? What is our
attitude toward humanity?
The world we make along the way will shape the Singularity and may well
determine whether it occurs at all.
- samantha
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.5 : Sat Nov 02 2002 - 08:07:22 MST