From: J. R. Molloy (jr@shasta.com)
Date: Tue Jul 10 2001 - 00:03:54 MDT
From: "Miriam English" <miriam@werple.net.au>
> The first two are sadly true, but the third is only temporarily true. It
> will cease to be as soon as AIs become at all common. Then human xenophobia
> will ensure AIs rank below us in the human-centered scale of universal
> importance.
On the contrary, the thing described at
http://www.thebunker.net/net_230998.htm
leads me to think that AI will become even more valuable than immense wealth.
Possessiveness trumps xenophobia:
"Touch our AI and you die, orga," say the capitalist overlords (who are also
orgas, or perhaps cyborgs), because their AIs have made them rich beyond
imagination.
> In fact I have a feeling also that mega-wealth's high rank is weakening.
> There is this scent in the breeze of late... Do you hear it whispered from
> time to time?... what the world could be if money went back to being just
> trading tokens...
Yes, that's the sound of day traders and shysters seducing investors and VCs,
making it easier to separate them from their real currency. Much of the dotcom
bubble bursting derives from "irrational exuberance" relating to the
over-hyped "new economy" which predicted digi-cash and e-money.
The feeling that you have probably resembles the feeling Lenin had way back
when he dreamed of toiletizing capitalism. The "scent in the breeze"? I dunno.
Whatcha been smokin'? Just kidding.
But seriously, going backwards as you suggest, to happier times when people
supposedly didn't worship money, would also mean going back to an age when
people didn't have nearly as much time to trade tokens as we do today... since
they only lived two or three decades. For all its seeming callousness and
cruelty, capitalism has brought us to the world of opportunity that we have
now.
It's my contention that capitalism will continue to drive the search for (and
the attainment of) AI.
Stay hungry,
--J. R.
Useless hypotheses, etc.:
consciousness, phlogiston, philosophy, vitalism, mind, free will, qualia,
analog computing, cultural relativism, GAC, CYC, and ELIZA
Everything that can happen has already happened, not just once,
but an infinite number of times, and will continue to do so forever.
(Everything that can happen = more than anyone can imagine.)
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