Hi Krim, Nothing supernatural here (or anywhere real for that matter, by my definition), but yes it's the threat to the "sense of autonomy" - I referred to controlling the press, the media, the internet, the text-books, prevailing thought, basis of decision-making, etc. Yes ?
So not an insult to individual autonomy / intelligence, but a threat to socio-intellectual (and bio-physical) interests of humans as a species. Humanity is not going to give those up without a (Darwinian) fight. So no physical / technological limits, just limits to humanity's acceptance of an idea (meme). I do agree with you that it's only a matter of time. To use Quinn's Ishmael ideas, the time it takes for humans to "get out of the bloody way" and recognise that our position as the most advanced knowing-things in the universe is a temporary blip and a matter of (our) perspective. Of course like of lot of humans, I won't take second place lying down, I'll be "negotiating" the best deal for us humans, when the mice and the dolphins (and AI-bots) finally make their case for pole position. And being "intelligent", by definition, the new masters will listen to the merits of our case - our prime responsibility is to make those merits (our learnings) crystal clear. Like, acceptance that human "dominance" is not a fact is not the same as treating humans as "expendable" of with any kind of disrespect for that matter - a very important (not to be) excluded middle. The same way we humans have (eventually, and not a millennium too soon) learned that no other piece of the living cosmos is expendable, and requires treating with mutual respect. ie We humans will have something to say about when AI "overtakes" us, and that will affect the take-over process. I'm sure Kurzweil's dates are simply "provocative". (BTW to me the A in AI stands for "alternative" - nothing real is "artificial".) Ian On 6/11/07, Krimel <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > Ian, > > So far all of the predictions of the end of Moore's law have proven > premature. As Kurzweil points out sooner or later you run into the limit of > how individual atoms interact. But he adds other technologies seem to be on > deck to fill in the gap. Just as human technologies came on line to continue > the acceleration of the slow moving natural process of evolution. > > As for his predictions, what I read was written in the late 80s and in his > recent work Kurzweil is touting the success of his predictions to date. I > have only heard summaries of his current work but what I know about research > in the medical field suggests he may be on to something. DNA sequencing is > becoming routine and researchers are busy at translating and determining the > function of various combinations of genes. Kurzweil calls this, not > surprisingly, reverse engineering. There is no reason to think this won't > succeed. Some don't like the idea because it assaults their sense of > autonomy or their reliance on the supernatural but specific predictions and > dates aside, we both know it is only a matter of time. > > Krimel > > ---------------------------------- > > Hi Krim, > > I think I appreciate that, but I guess I'm saying seeing the > "geometric" acceleration is one thing, but predicting the sort of > dates Kurzweil does is another - probably overlooking additional > complexities like society's "skeptical correctness". My own pet theory > (after Kondratiev and more recently Dawkins memes) is that these > things always take three (human) generations, so long as humans > control the press and the internet, no matter how "fast" the > technology aspects. > > Moore's law has hit such limits - there are just so many mp3's and > HDDVD tracks humans can conceive of. > > Ian > > On 6/11/07, Krimel <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > [Ian] > > Timescales aside, I find Kurzweil's predictions hype. What it does > > show is that evolution is needed to explain life and intellgence, and > > that complex adaptive systems are needed to achieve it. Oh look, we > > are one. > > > > [Krimel] > > Kurzweil addresses this, claiming that the process of evolution itself has > > followed the path of accelerating returns. He claims that as complexity > > proceeds time speeds up and that the process of evolution has followed a > > geometric pattern of acceleration. Moore's law he claims is an extension > of > > this. > > > > moq_discuss mailing list > > Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. > > http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org > > Archives: > > http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ > > http://moq.org.uk/pipermail/moq_discuss_archive/ > > > moq_discuss mailing list > Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. > http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org > Archives: > http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ > http://moq.org.uk/pipermail/moq_discuss_archive/ > > moq_discuss mailing list > Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. > http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org > Archives: > http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ > http://moq.org.uk/pipermail/moq_discuss_archive/ > moq_discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org.uk/pipermail/moq_discuss_archive/
