Reading this essay by Peter Thiel, I was struck by an amusing (though almost certainly coincidental) parallel. Thiel mentions three areas in which people interested in freedom may manage to get out from under the thumb of excessive government: cyberspace, seasteading, and outer space. The parallel is to three fronts on which people are pursuing… Continue reading Mindsteading
There’s been much note in the blogosphere in recent days about Aberystwyth University’s Robot Scientist project and its Adam robot: Since the project has been going on for quite a few years, the reason it’s suddenly in the news is presumably the publication of a report, The Automation of Science, in Science.
In my Early Retirement post, I wrote If you have a human-level AI based on computer technology, the cost to do what it can do will begin to decline at Moore’s Law rates. Even if an AI costs a million dollars in, say, 2020, it’ll be a thousand in 2030 and one dollar in 2040… Continue reading Early retirement — how soon?
Jeriaska has made available videos of presentations from Convergence08, held on November 15-16, 2008 in Mountain View, California, to examine the convergence of NBIC (Nano-Bio-Info-Cogno) technologies. Among those of special interest to Nanodot readers: Mapping a Cone of Uncertainty, Paul Saffo Convergence: Artificial Intelligence Panel, Peter Norvig, Steve Omohundro, Ben Goertzel, Barney Pell Convergence: Synthetic… Continue reading Videos from Convergence08 Unconference available
What forces are going to shape the world throughout the 21st century? A recent NYT bestseller, The Next 100 Years, by George Friedman, proposes a number of very interesting theories. Friedman is considered to be something of an intellectual maverick, contradicting the conventional wisdom at many points, and very insightful, since in many cases his… Continue reading Required Reading
Last week at AGI-09, I chaired a one-day workshop on the future of AGI. (“AGI” means Artificial General Intelligence, which is essentially what the term “AI” meant before 1980: the attempt to build a system that would be the equivalent of a human in its thinking abilities, displaying a robust ability to think, converse, exhibit… Continue reading Early Retirement
This the sixth essay in a series exploring if, when, and how the Singularity will happen, why (or why not) we should care, and what, if anything, we should do about it. Part VI: The heavily-loaded takeoff The fastest software I ever used ran on some of the slowest computers I ever had. Circa 1980,… Continue reading Singularity, part 6
Charlie Stross, the British science fiction writer, recently posted a “21st Century FAQ” on his blog that has aroused some reaction in futurist circles. Let it be noted that I’ve had a few drinks with Charlie, and he is a pleasant, engaging, and very intelligent guy, and writes really excellent science fiction. But I have… Continue reading Forward to the past
This the fifth essay in a series exploring if, when, and how the Singularity will happen, why (or why not) we should care, and what, if anything, we should do about it. Part V: AIs: smarter or just faster? One of the primary phenomena invoked in the notion that the Singularity will come with an… Continue reading Singularity, part 5
This the fourth essay in a series exploring if, when, and how the Singularity will happen, why (or why not) we should care, and what, if anything, we should do about it. Part IV: When So when is all this going to happen? To quote Mark Twain, I’m gratified to be able to answer that… Continue reading Singularity, part 4
