The Double Ethical Bottleneck of A.I.
This is a small excerpt from my book The Journey Towards Compassionate A.I. The whole book describes the why’s, what’s and how’s concerning this.
Getting through the A.I. bi-bottleneck
On the road towards genuine super-A.I. – encompassing all domains of intelligence and in each being much more effective than humans – I see not one but two bottlenecks. This is no guarantee that after the bottlenecks, there will be heaven on earth, but let us suppose now that, from the day after, all will be well indeed.
That enables us to focus on the bottlenecks.
- The first one is human-made. Either rogue or naïve developers may take very wrong decisions. There is a sheer infinite amount of scenarios that one can think about. In the next section, I give a few examples. One may be enough not to need to fear any other anymore. It is the end, my friend.
- The second bottleneck is A.I.-made. On its way towards super-A.I. and beyond, there may be many stages and many changes. Even if the final stage is benevolent, and even if most stages are benevolent, it’s enough for only one stage to be less human-friendly, and we’re gone.
The bi-bottleneck may be quite long with many different stages.
Will humanity be able to control to a sufficient degree everything that can happen?
I think, and repeat, that reliance on control alone will not save us. I also don’t think we should relinquish all control and hope with crossed fingers that A.I. will eventually be Compassionate just like that, after the bottleneck as well as at any stage along. So, we should very well think about control, AND we should think about Compassion. BOTH are indispensable.
I hope that this book will be a wake-up call in this direction.
Related Posts
Distributed ‘Mental’ Patterns in A.I.
The idea that A.I. systems can mimic human cognition through distributed mental patterns opens exciting avenues for how we can design more nuanced and human-like A.I. By using distributed, non-linear processing akin to broader MNPs (see The Broadness of Subconceptual Patterns), A.I. could move toward a deeper form of ‘thinking’ that incorporates both cognitive flexibility Read the full article…
Let Us Go for Science with a Heart
Human-related science has, until now, not always taken the view from the heart. A.I.-based science may profoundly change this picture. If you are an avid reader of my blogs, this one has little new. Yet by putting things together from a different perspective, a new picture may emerge. Reproducibility Science is about many people being Read the full article…
Coarse Comparison of Brain and Silicon
In an age where artificial intelligence and silicon-based processors are advancing at lightning speed, it’s tempting to compare their capabilities to the human brain. Can silicon ever replicate human cognition? What are the strengths and limitations of each system? This exploration dives into the heart of these questions, revealing fascinating parallels and stark (!) differences Read the full article…