Will AGI bring the 'death of death?' Or of poverty and aging? AGI and artificial superintelligence will clearly change almost everything ...
Artificial general intelligence is now an explicit aim for some of the largest corporations on the planet. Mark Zuckerberg’s new goal at Meta is to create smarter-than-humans AGI , the Vergeis “planning for AGI and beyond.
” If they or others achieve that goal, it could mean the death of death, the end of scarcity, and a whole new world of romance, according to author, scientist, and futurist Gregory Stock. But that’s just the beginning of the changes AI could be bringing, he argued at the recent Beneficial AGI conference in Istanbul, Turkey. AI is already significantly changing our culture and economy. AGI is a much bigger deal, however. It’s the point at which AI gets smarter than us, perhaps vastly smarter, and starts to learn at exponential rates. That’s potentially a major problem, which is why Geoffrey Hinton, one of the key figures in the development of AI, and Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak recently signed an)? Or, will AGI systems result in “human economic obsolescence and disempowerment, losses of freedom, civil liberties, dignity, and control,” as the open letter states? Stock, on the other hand, is not an AGI doomer, and he suggests that the most profound transformations caused by AGI may be within us: how humanity changes in response to AGI, and not just what machines become.Stock says the shift ahead isn’t just technological, it’s existential. Humans and machines are fusing into a super-organism, and when AI becomes an integral part of cognition, communication and creation, our individuality will blur. We’ll be less like tool users and more like biological nodes in a vast, hybrid intelligence, he says.ChatGPT is making all of us instant experts, perhaps. But when any motivated person can gain AI-assisted mastery in hours, the “expert class,” Stock says, is finished. One example: medicine, where AI already in some cases outperforms human doctors at diagnosis. The next generation won’t defer to credentialed experts, Stock says, they’ll consult an AI that theoretically knows everything and forgets nothing.we’re seeing right now. Communication, translation, design, photography, even education, all services that once required human labor, will become nearly free.Future generations won’t simply use AI; they’ll grow up with it. Stock envisions children developing in immersive AI environments: talking with avatars, learning through interactive models, and organizing their lives alongside digital assistants. That means our thinking will evolve with constant augmentation and that AI won’t just amplify us, it could rewire what being human means.French philosopher Teilhard de Chardin called it the “noosphere:” a collective consciousness across the entire planet. Stock argues we’re starting to enter that era now as instant translation and frictionless access to all information will make humanity function like a connected neural network.We will love our AIs, Stock predicts, and he’s not talking metaphorically. They’ll be our teachers, therapists, coaches and partners, sure, but even lovers, he says.loaded up with data on who you are, how you think and speak, and more. Stock envisions cheap, persistent avatars built from thousands of hours of recorded conversations, video and text that will be much better. They may think they are you, and family members will talk with them--and perhaps prefer them--after we pass away. In other words, if you die tomorrow, your digital self might not.Stock argues that AGI is not a threat to humans: we’re its parents, and we’re intertwined in the same ecosystem. But AGI and superintelligent AI systems will likely escape our control, and that’s a good thing, he says. The greater danger, he feels, is if humans remain in control. In his view, history shows what happens when we dominate technology: we weaponize it. Stock’s hope is that superintelligent AI will restrain us, acting as a planetary guardian that prevents us from destroying ourselves.The singularity isn’t extinction; it’s transformation, in Stock’s view. He believes the real risk is societal collapse during the handoff from human to hybrid civilization. Our economies, religions, and governments all assume scarcity, mortality, and human superiority, and it’s possible that none of that will survive contact with AGI. It’s hard to piece out what’s realistic and what’s fanciful when we talk about near-magical technologies like artificial superintelligence. AI doomers are worried about possible human extinction, as the Statement on Superintelligence signed by nearly 70,000 people references. AI optimists or accelerationists think superintelligence will vastly improve human existence, solving disease, hunger, poverty and more.Given that, perhaps we should prepare for the worst while also hoping for the best. How best to do that is hard to determine, but one way to try is international accords on how we develop AGI and how AGI systems should be used. Chinese President Xi Jinping recentlycreating a global body to govern artificial intelligence, but global rivals in the U.S. and Europe are unlikely to join that kind of initiative. Which means we may very well be at the mercy of organizations like Meta and OpenAI to develop AGI in pro-social ways, and not just ways to cement their own power and wealth.
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