Have you gone through the points I made on my List? My claim is : there is just no reason to believe (based on the evidence presented by Yudkowsky, Vinge and Kurzweil) that a singularity could happen. A singularity is still very hypothetical (more or less in the realm of science fiction). Anand
=+= http://groups.yahoo.com/group/indo-euro-americo-asian_list/messages --- In [email protected], Venky TV <venky.tv@...> wrote: > > On 7 February 2011 00:01, Anand Manikutty manikuttyanand@... wrote: > > > Technological systems, businesses and social systems work together. > > Technology is not developed in a vacuum - it needs to be deployed somehow - > > and it is at the point of deployment of technology that regulation by > > government kicks in. That sort of regulation seems to be all that is needed, > > the sort of the system that is already in place. > > I don't even to begin to understand this argument. The very definition of a > singularity is that once it happens, things are fundamentally beyond out > control. Once a singularity occurs, I don't see how holding businesses > accountable for it will help put that genie back in the bottle. > > And if your position is instead that technologies that lead _towards_ a > singularity are the ones that businesses would be held accountable for, it makes > even less sense. You brought up the concept of "bounded rationality" yourself, > which demolishes much of that one. To add to that, the consequences of > such technologies (until the point where they spiral out of control) will be, > almost invariably, positive. It would be very stupid of businesses to smother > or ignore those, because if they do, they will be left behind by businesses that > don't. > > I dislike bringing up the oft-used example of nuclear weapons, but I think it is > quite relevant in this case. The difference (and one that makes the case for > technological singularity every stronger) is that every country already knows > the consequences of nuclear weapons. It is just that they are mostly helpless. > If India ignores nuclear weapons technology, it will be at the mercy of Pakistan > -- and vice-versa, of course. (It is for the same reason I remain sceptical of > the possibility of complete nuclear disarmament -- at least until a more potent > weapon is invented.) > > For the record, I'm not saying that a singularity _will_ occur. I don't know > enough about AI or its possibilities to make that assessment. It is just that > your arguments against it make absolutely no sense to me. > > Also, I don't think innovation should be regulated either. Not because I'm > sceptical of the concept of a singularity, but because if a singularity is > possible, regulation will do absolutely nothing to prevent it. > > > The fact that I could tell them about Noam Chomsky's response to my email > > did impress the people at the Singularity meetup. Again, the fact that we > > are both skeptical about the concept having arrived at our conclusions > > independently should provide indirect evidence that there may not be much to > > this. > > Don't you think dropping the Chomsky name twice in the same context in the same > discussion is a bit much? :) > > Venky (the Second). >
