Here are my sparse notes on Ray Kurzweil’s The Singularity is Near, a short book on technology, progress, the future, and… even beyond that.

I put together a playlist themed around the book, you can listen to it here.


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  • The Power of an Idea — for whatever challenge we face, there is an idea that will enable us to prevail. We can find that idea — and when we find it, we need to implement it.
    • The Power of an Idea — this is itself an idea.
  • Clarke’s Three Laws (Arthur C. Clarke, SF author, from his essay)
  • Unitarian universalist church: spending six months in a religion, then moving on to the next. Paradigm-surfing. (× ergodicity experiment (Skin in the Game), × 30-day experiments (Pavlina), × Life curriculum)
    • “Many paths to the truth” — that all religions ultimately point at the same thing; that you can notice the pattern across all religions; that in this pattern is the meaning.
    • “Illuminating inconsistencies.”

Linear vs Exponential; S-Curves

  • Two types of curves:
    • Linear
      • Constant added with each period
    • Exponential
      • Value multiplied by a constant (“rate”, “exponent”) with each period.
      • Straight line on a logarithmic plot
        • Logarithmic plot: a plot with a logarithmic scale on one or both axis/axes.
        • Logarithmic scale: scale where equal distance is multiplication by a constant.
          • Logarithmic scales are great to:
            • Display data across orders of magnitude (otherwise, small numbers would be invisible)
            • Map exponential curves into straight lines
      • “Knee of the curve”: part of the exponential curve where the accelerating returns become noticeable.
      • “The bulk of the damage happens in the last few minutes.”
      • Exponential curves start slow — seem to be barely accelerating, grow slower than linear curves. “It can seem so flat and slow that it looks like no trend at all.”
      • Exponential curves can be below linear curves for a long time.
      • Linear extrapolation fallacy: we think exponential trends are linear because they look linear when examined for a brief period.
      • The counterpart: overestimating exponential growth (Internet bubble, telecom bubble).
        • Speculation has no affect on the exponential growth — the latter was unaffected by the bubble exploding.
      • A trend can grow slower than an exponential one, yet also be exponential.
      • Double exponential growth: when the exponent also grows exponentially.
  • S-Curves (Lifecycle of a Paradigm)
    • A specific paradigm generates exponential growth until its potential is exhausted — forms an S-Curve (an exponential curve with an end))
    • An exponential curve can be made of successive S-curves — each taking less time and going higher. (Technological progress can be seen as a succession of S-Curves (of each successive paradigm))
      • Paradigm shifts are happening faster and faster (World Wide Web, GPT)
    • S-Curve your life. Life as a series of S-Curves. Make exponential decisions!

Stages of technology

  • Stages of New Technology
    • Ideation
    • Invention
    • Further development
    • Maturity (integrated in society)
    • False pretenders
    • Dethronement
    • Obsolescence
  • Technology starts extremely expensive & not working well; progressively becomes virtually free & working extremely well.

Evolution

  • Evolution (of intelligence) works by indirection. “The products of each stage create the next stage.”
    • “A bridge to a bridge to a bridge” (biotechnology, nanotechnology, strong AI…)
      • autocatalysis - where the products of a process serve to accelerate the process itself
      • “They would come up with technology to become even more intelligent. They would change their own thought processes to enable them to think even faster.” (× invest in yourself (I Will Teach You To Be Rich); do the meta-work on yourself)
      • E.g. becoming cyborgs to figure out nanotechnology. Technologically-assisted evolution.
    • Evolution of the evolution itself, of the evolutionary process itself. Evolving the tools for evolution (meta-evolution). Evolution evolves faster evolution.
      • E.g. number of chromosomes evolving over time.
      • => Upgrade your paradigm for running experiments. Upgrade your evolutionary algorithm. (Fast, clear, bold experiments.) (e.g. completing projects (× Tiny Experiments))
    • Technology is creating itself. The first computers were designed on paper and manufactured by hand. Today’s computers are designed by computers and built by computers.
      • “Kinematic constructor: a robot with at least one manipulator (arm) that would build a replica of itself from a “sea of parts” in its midst.” (von Neumann)
      • Humans could be “creating” themselves. Eugenics; “designer babies”.
      • One should re-create oneself — self-actualization.
      • One can edit oneself — biohacking, reprogramming oneself, removing patterns and creating new ones, paradigm-surfing (× Steve Pavlina).
        • Modifying one’s source code; reprogramming ourselves. (Currently through biotechnology.) (× Psycho-Cybernetics)
    • “The first ultraintelligent machine is the last invention that man need ever make.” (Irving John Good): once an AI reaches the point where it can improve itself, all hell will break loose. (Singularity).
      • Singularity as a unique event with singular implications (× Black Swan)
  • Technologically-assisted evolution.
    • Nonbiological evolution goes faster than biological evolution. It is an outgrowth of, and a continuation of, biological evolution.
  • Evolution needs chaos, variability, randomness. (× Antifragile, “things that benefit from chaos”) (× live in an inspiring environment; be part of an artistic community (Creative Being)). Add in randomness! Have horizontal experiences!
    • e.g. in biological evolution, mixing of genes through sexual reproduction (which provides more genetic diversity than nonsexual reproduction).
      • Diversity as life; life being fundamentally about diversity. Hence celebrate it! (× uniqueness (To The Actor); celebration (A Paradise Built in Hell))
        • “A small number of genes describe the basic pattern of the four cell types in the cerebellum and they say in essence, “Repeat this pattern several billion times with some random variation in each repetition.”” (=> UNIQUE PEOPLE) (applied to the cerebral cortex)
      • “Usually no distinction is made between male or female organisms; it’s sufficient to generate an offspring from two arbitrary parents. As they multiply, allow some mutation (random change) in the chromosomes to occur.” ⇒ Sexual reproduction applicable to e.g. music-making, etc. (Crossover of two albums with some mutations.)
  • More churn (shorter lifespans) means more exploration (of optimal genes). Evolution optimizes for replication, not longevity.
  • Exploration vs exploitation in evolution (convergent resource allocation): the more effective an evolutionary process, the more resources go towards it.
  • Evolutionary algorithms: a computer program that simulates evolution to solve a problem.
    • Utility function: how to measure success. (the property being optimized in an evolutionary process)
  • Nature is evolution competing against itself. Species compete against each other through their respective evolutions; with preys evolving to hide from predators, and predators evolving to kill their preys.
  • Experimenting in the world vs in our head: virtual simulations are a lot faster.
    • Biological evolution experiments “in the world”; it’s a slow process.
    • We can experiment and make simulations “in our head”; this is very fast.
    • “In natural selection, the world acts as its own simulator. We humans have the ability to internalize the world and conduct “what if’s” in our heads; we can solve many problems thousands of times faster than natural selection.”
    • Simulation: internal model pair: forward model + inverse model. (cerebellum; × “hypothesis-and-test” pattern recognition in the cortex, making a guess as to what we’re seeing, based on context — pattern-matching against what we expect to see)
      • Inverse model: going from desired result to action
      • Forward model: going from possible actions to anticipated results

Life paradigms, immortality and deathism

  • Death is a tragedy — the loss of a person’s unique pattern (a form of knowledge).
    • When somebody dies, a part of us dies — the part of our brain that self-organized to interact with that person.
  • “We have the means right now to live long enough to live forever.” — to reach the point where immortality becomes technologically feasible.
    • House metaphor: if you consistently maintain your body/mind, you can keep them forever. Otherwise, they will degenerate.
    • “A mind that stays at the same capacity cannot live forever; after a few thousand years it would look more like a repeating tape loop than a person.” => Keep on growing!
  • Be proactive about your health, mood, energy level. This is all debuggable. (× The Power of an Idea; × Clear Thinking)
    • “I have been very aggressive about reprogramming my biochemistry. I take 250 supplements (pills) a day and receive a half-dozen intravenous therapies each week”
    • “Key dangers (heart disease, cancer, diabetes, stroke, aging) should be attacked on multiple fronts. For example, our strategy for preventing heart disease is to adopt ten different heart-disease prevention therapies that attack each of the known risk factors.” (× risks are reduced when confronted (Daring Greatly))
    • Supplements/Vitamins/Biohacking are not for when something goes wrong; there is already something wrong (our organism running on obsolete, outdated biological programs.) Be proactive instead.
    • “By modifying genes in the C. elegans worm that control its insulin and sex-hormone levels, the lifespan of the test animals was expanded sixfold, to the equivalent of a five-hundred-year lifespan for a human.”
  • We will be able to back ourselves up.
    • Currently, the software dies with the hardware. It doesn’t have to be this way. Dissociating hardware from software.
    • You will be “restored” (e.g. 20th jan) and be told “you died on 7th jan, this is a restore from 6th jan. This is what you did between 6th and 7th jan, and then got run over by a car. This is what happened in the world and in your surroundings between 7th and 20th jan.”
  • Turing test: being able to convince a jury that you’re human. Tests for humanness. (× Captcha)
    • “Ray Kurzweil” Turing test: being indistinguishable from the original person (uploading & downloading brains)
  • Clones (duplicating oneself): the clone will start having its own unique experience from the moment it gets cloned, and so start differing from the original (if the original is alive) — × simulating alternative futures for oneself.
  • Given a necessity, find the best way to navigate it. But if you find out it’s not a necessity, then you should upgrade your paradigm and not stick to it.
    • “Given death is inescapable, how to best deal with it?” — and this can give meaning to your life, etc. Learning to live with it. (× acceptance, zen, Frankl)
      • “Human life without death would be something other than human; consciousness of mortality gives rise to our deepest longings and greatest accomplishments.” (Leon Kass)
        • “Something other than human”, because humans will have a different life paradigm (than today’s humans).
        • (Though is immortality (bar accidents) really incompatible with these paradigms of meaning?)
      • Death gives meaning to life — only if it’s inevitable.
    • But if you find out that death is not a necessity, then sticking to death and its paradigm doesn’t make sense; and you have to find a new paradigm that makes sense given that death is not a necessity anymore.
      • “Deathist rationalization”: rationalizing the need for something that can be done away with (e.g. suffering, hunger, death, …)
        • “We will no longer need to rationalize death as a primary means of giving meaning to life.”
          • Though it does help to give meaning to life
          • But then we’ll have to find other meaning-giving paradigms, once death is no more a thing.
    • Just as with women and PMS/period pain. If it’s a necessity, finding ways around it makes sense (e.g. learning to navigate and embrace natural cycles). If you can medically do away with it (which is possible to an extent with IUDs), then deciding to stick with the pain because “this is what nature is, we shouldn’t change nature, we should just deal with what nature deals us and learn how to navigate this (women cycles)” doesn’t make sense. Solutions for outdated problems (× The Design of Everyday Things) (× superstitions (Skin in the Game), superstitions stemming from safety concerns (sometimes obsolete)).
  • Applied to one’s own states & moods — they are not a necessity, you can be proactive about them, and be at your highest potential all the time.

Machines do it better

  • Knowledge transfer between humans is slow (language) — knowledge transfer between machines is instantaneous.
    • We cannot transfer the neural patterns of a knowledge or skill directly to another person — we can only do it through language, and they have to develop these patterns themselves.
  • Transfer the fruits. Learning can take a long time, but the results can be transferred in an instant. (× seduction principles / PUA; self-development books; receiving “wisdom” without having to learn it from experience; the results from billions of years of evolution are “right here”; downloading programs on your computer to teach it new skills, instantly).
    • Low replication costs: writing/making a theater piece, and then being able to perform it the following years anywhere with minimal effort.
    • “Downloading knowledge” into your brain.
  • Obsolescent storage devices. “Disappearing ink.” Mediums for storing brain snapshots can become obsolete, with contents difficult to read because of extinct technology (floppy disks, CDs).
    • Archives are viable only if they are continually upgraded and ported to the latest hardware and software standards. (× rewriting/refactoring a codebase)
    • “Information only lasts so long as someone cares about it.” (× House metaphor; × journaling archives; picture books, etc.)
  • Biological intelligence progresses at the slow pace of evolution; nonbiological intelligence progresses exponentially (at the pace of technology).
  • The gap between what humans can do that machines can’t is constantly diminishing. (cf the cartoon “Only humans can…”)
  • The cost of education is plummeting. Make use of it! Learn all the things!
    • Students at any age are able to access the best education in the world at any time and from any place.
  • Machines can be massively parallel, or use chaotic emergent techniques, mimicking the brain.
    • We can emulate functionality while reducing complexity (emulating the brain).

Digital Divide

  • It’s diminishing.

Solving Word Hunger

  • Vegan meat: clone animal muscle tissue to create meat and other protein sources without (extra) animals.
    • “By creating meat in this way, it becomes subject to the law of accelerating returns — the exponential improvements in price-performance of information-based technologies over time— and will thus become extremely inexpensive.”
    • Vegan leather/fur: “We could use the same approach to produce such animal by-products as leather and fur.” (Reducing the demand for poaching)
    • Solving world hunger to promote peace.
      • “Nanotechnology has the potential to diminish the reasons for breaking the peace, by creating universal abundance.”
  • Golden Rice: genetically enriched with vitamins to combat diseases in underdeveloped countries.
  • GMO plants (less vulnerable to insects) paradoxically are a solution against pesticides.

Complexity

  • Complexity is the minimum amount of information required to represent a system or process (× The Laws of Simplicity) — the amount of meaningful, unpredictable (yet non-random) information. (e.g. applied to book: how dense they are, how much padding; × compression)
  • Complexity can be reduced by removing redundancy and using shortcuts (pointers, e.g. Catchy Concept Names — shortcuts to an underlying idea, × hierarchical composition). Compress to symbols to be able to manipulate symbols adroitly, come up with new ideas.
    • Randomness cannot be compressed — unless any randomness will do (in which case it can be compressed to “put any random number here”)
      • Meaningful vs meaningless randomness: meaningless randomness is just noise.
      • “If we can predict future data from past data, that future data stops being information.” Information is what is new and valuable, relevant. (× Signal vs noise; compressing)
    • Find patterns in the seemingly random. You can “compress” a one-million-bit record of Pi if you realize it is Pi (≠ learning by rote) (× Prisoners of Geography: seems random, is actually logical.)
  • Compression is only ever an upper bound. “Since we can never be sure that we have not overlooked some even more compact representation of an information sequence, any amount of compression sets only an upper bound for the complexity of the information.” (× hill climbing, local minima) (× How much you can self-improve; that you can always self-improve more than your current state)
  • Evolution as an increase in complexity (all the way to computers: more and more information is being stored)
  • Simple changes can drastically reduce complexity. (× The Laws of Simplicity) The change in the thumb’s pivot point (opposable appendage) allowed for the creation of great technology. (× better systems)
    • “First we build the tools, then they build us.” (Marshall McLuhan) (× Systems you create for your life)
  • “Make everything as simple as possible, but no simpler.” (Einstein) (× The Laws of Simplicity; cut too much, then go back a bit (Creative Being))
  • Technology requires less and less adaptation. UX is improving, interactions with machines are becoming transparent and frictionless.
  • Probabilistic vs deterministic fractals
    • initiator => generator; either always the same, or probabilistically chosen
    • Probabilistic fractals yield unique complex forms (× Humans).

Future Luv

  • Taking on different virtual bodies: changing one’s body for oneself, or for others; changing other people’s bodies for oneself.
    • “Other people (such as your romantic partner) will be able to select a different body for you than you might select for yourself (and vice versa)”
    • “So I could have a biological body at one time and not at another, then have it again, then change it, and so on.”
    • “Romantic couples can choose whom they wish to be, even to become each other.”
    • Having different bodies to different people. “We can select different bodies at the same time for different people. So your parents may see you as one person, while your girlfriend will experience you as another. However, the other person may choose to override your selections, preferring to see you differently than the body you have chosen for yourself.” (× avatars)
    • Choosing different bodies for others. Picking body projections. “You could pick different body projections for different people: Ben Franklin for a wise uncle, a clown for an annoying coworker.”
    • (× ROAMance)
    • You will be able to upload a brain and download it with its virtual body.
  • Changing one’s physical appearance at will. Body transformations. More expression through our physical bodies (appearance). We will be able to alter our appearance very easily using nanotechnology. (× furries)
    • Today’s appearance technology is fashion, makeup, hairstyle, tattoos, etc. (But also: one’s call name, behaviour, etc.)
      • New technologies will emerge.
    • Reversible body changes/add-ons will make them more widespread.
      • Similar to reversible/temporary tattoos.
      • Reversibility encourages experimentation. What reversible experiments can I do now? MANY.
    • Hologram tattoos. (× Waking Life (emanations))
  • More identities; more roles, better played.
    • “Our palette of personalities will greatly expand in future full-immersion virtual-reality environments.”
      • Just as the Web encouraged and offered the possibility to take on and explore new identities online.
  • Experience beamers: (experiencing another person’s experience)
    • Streaming one’s experience: ““Experience beamers” will send the entire flow of their sensory experiences as well as the neurological correlates of their emotional reactions out onto the Web, just as people today beam their bedroom images from their Web cams. A popular pastime will be to plug into someone else’s sensory-emotional beam and experience what’s it’s like to be that person, à la the premise of the movie Being John Malkovich.” (× experiential Twitch)
    • Experience catalogue: “There will be a vast selection of archived experiences to choose from, with virtual-experience design another new art form.” (× VR, though with emotional correlates).
    • “What would it be like to be … X experiencing a dance class, or being with their father, etc.”
    • Kurzweil: “Only the external stimuli will be simulated, not the internal experience — because their brain is different.”
  • Brain love-making / Brain merging. “You can merge your thinking with someone else and still keep your separate identity at the same time. Like being in love. It’s the ultimate way to share.” (× shrooms) Merged brainstorming.
  • Brain-to-brain wireless communication will be possible.
  • Full-immersion VR (Full-body telephone):”Full-immersion VR is, basically, a full-body telephone. You can get together with anyone anytime but do more than just talk.”
    • Virtual touch will be indistinguishable to the brain from physical touch (like the telephone, “auditory virtual reality”).
      • “Real” as “real to your brain.”
  • When experiencing physical reality, nanobots will be inactive. When experiencing virtual reality, nanobots will block input from the external physical environment. When intending a movement, nanobots will intercept the signal, block muscle impulses and move your virtual limb instead.
  • “Dreams are real while they last; can we say more of life?”
  • Counter-urbanization: with the advent of virtual reality environments, people won’t need to work from the same physical place anymore, and so will slowly spread away from cities (× digital nomads).
  • Machines will be concentrated humans. “These future machines will be even more humanlike than humans today. If that seems like a paradoxical statement, consider that much of human thought today is petty and derivative. Our future primarily nonbiological selves will be vastly more intelligent and so will exhibit these finer qualities of human thought to a far greater degree.”
    • Technological enhancements will let/help us reach or highest potential. (if they don’t kill us) “We will greatly enhance our ability to create and appreciate all forms of knowledge from science to the arts, while extending our ability to relate to our environment and one another.”
    • Singularity bringing meaning to life. “The explosion of art, science, and other forms of knowledge that the Singularity will bring will make life more than bearable; it will make life truly meaningful.”
  • Downloading skills & knowledge directly. Learning will first move online; then our brains will also move online — and then they can download knowledge instantly. Intelligence explosion.
    • (Already today) Skill acquisition through Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation (TMS): “Brain scientist Allan Snyder has reported that about 40% of his test subjects hooked up to TMS display significant new skills, many of which are remarkable, such as drawing abilities” Biohacked skill acquisition.
  • Skill acquisition will be enhanced/supported by nanobots.
  • We will be able to engineer new organisms & life forms. (× speculative evolution — IRL)
  • Even babies will be cyborgized early on.
    • “Designer babies” (× eugenics)
    • “What if we have genetic twins separated by one or more generations?”
  • We will be able to design our own brain. “As we re-create the human brain, we will not be limited in our ability to develop each skill. We will not have to compromise one area to enhance another.”
    • (Then what is you? If you design away the traumata and the relational patterns… — still you! but better.)
  • Drugs will target directly with no side effects or dangers — just as pharmarceutical drugs are increasingly effective because they are targeting more precisely. (× controlling ; truffles without nausea company)
  • Nanobot-assisted health. “In the 2020s we will routinely have nanobots in our bloodstream keeping us healthy and augmenting our mental capabilities”
  • Engineered biological reserves: “Version 2.0 will provide substantially greater reserves, enabling us to be separated from metabolic resources for greatly extended periods of time.”
  • Virtual 3D Try-Ons of clothes on yourself before you buy (or even try) — taylor-made.
  • “I think I’ll enhance my funniness reaction in my romantic interludes. That will fit just about right. Or maybe my absurdity response — I kind of like that one, too.” (× self-hypnosis; state hacking; visualizations; Psycho-Cybernetics)
    • What if I can hack my emotion, state, mood?

Death by AI

  • “Gray goo scenario”: nanorobots self-replicate uncontrollably and kill us all.
    • We will need an immune system against evil nanobots: nanotechnology immune system.
      • The nanotech immune system would use self-replication as well — using the methods of the enemy to combat it. (fighting fire with fire)
        • The immune system would in turn become a danger because of its power.
        • Nanobot risks will be solved by AI — which in turn will become a risk.
    • Self-replication is already used by our immune system (T cells, B cells) when a pathogen is detected.
      • Self-replicating as “which self to bring out in this situation; what is called for” (× Your Symphony of Selves)
  • Stealth spread / Long incubations: Long incubation periods makes virus spreading farther-reaching and more difficult to track (to contain, and to fight.) — “spreading through several exponentially growing generations before carriers are identified”.
    • Death by nanobots: nanobots first spread across the whole of the Earth, and only then attack. With exponential growth, we’re all dead within hours.
      • Because of the nature of exponential growth, the bulk of the damage gets done in the last few minutes.
  • Mutual assured destruction doesn’t work on suicidal attackers.
    • You should arrest suicide attackers and large-scale terrorists before they commit crimes (e.g. drop a bomb). It doesn’t make sense to wait until they commit suicidal or large-scale attacks.
      • Same danger as long-incubation-period viruses: one has to be proactive and not wait for symptoms to appear.
  • Precautionary Principle: if there is a small possibility of catastrophic consequences, don’t do it.
    • We cannot deal with existential risks with trial-and-error (× ergodicity/extremistan (Skin in the Game). We have to preclude possibilities from the get-go.
    • Yet, relinquishment is not an option. (× Technology, Internet, encryption)
      • Blanket bans favour the “bad” side, which will continue to develop underground, while the “good” side (which can develop defences) will come to a halt. (× Prohibition, drugs, etc.) Regulate, don’t prohibit. We have to develop fire for fighting fire with. (CC-BY-SA)
      • Develop the technology, and especially the defensive side.
        • The “bad effects” will not happen in today’s world, but in tomorrow’s world — when technological defences will also have been developed. (× live BIGGER in all directions — take bigger risks, learn bigger lessons, experience more, be forced to confront your issues (Psychedelics Revealing)
        • We (mostly) managed to win against computer viruses without banning computers. (We naturally evolved an immune system against computer viruses)
        • The good effects drastically outweigh the bad effects. “Although destructive self-replicating software entities do cause damage from time to time, the injury is but a small fraction of the benefit we receive from the computers and communication links that harbor them.”
        • The human cost of long approval times. The 5-10 year delay for FDA approval holds up potential lifesaving treatments for millions of patients. The cost on the millions is given very little weight against the possible risks of new therapies.
          • “Millions of people desperately need the advances promised by gene therapy and other breakthrough biotechnology advances, but they appear to carry little political weight against a handful of well-publicized casualties from the inevitable risks of progress.”
          • The regulation of defences slow down their development. Bioterrorists don’t have to wait for greenlighting.
          • Testing against bioterrorist agents is difficult — we need more lax laws to allow for evil playgrounds. (× roleplaying)
      • Alternatively, “fine-grained relinquishment.”
  • Pathogen sentinel (internal monitoring): “A global program of confidential, random serum monitoring for unknown or evolving biological pathogens should be funded.” Monitoring even before genes express themselves. (× SSH Monitoring; health monitoring — risks are reduced when confronted (Daring Greatly))
  • Issues around nanobots, nonbiological enhancements & privacy will emerge. “When there is software running in our bodies and brains, issues of privacy and security will take on a new urgency, and countersurveillance methods of combating such intrusions will be devised.”
  • Keep it interesting to the observer.
    • Our simulation is turned off: “Another existential risk that Bostrom and others have identified is that we’re actually living in a simulation and the simulation will be shut down. It might appear that there’s not a lot we could do to influence this. However, since we’re the subject of the simulation, we do have the opportunity to shape what happens inside of it. The best way we could avoid being shut down would be to be interesting to the observers of the simulation. Assuming that someone is actually paying attention to the simulation, it’s a fair assumption that it’s less likely to be turned off when it’s compelling than otherwise.”
    • As in life: Make your life interesting for yourself, so that it doesn’t shut down.
  • We could be a test-universe in a simulation — our universe could be an evolutionary test, created by an alien civilization to “perform computation”, to “test scenarios”, e.g. “seeing which universe becomes the most interesting, or intelligent.” Test-run your life; run experiments; run evolutionary processes on experiments and see which experiments yield the most interesting results.
    • Our universe could be the product of an evolutionary algorithm (run by an advanced civilization), whose utility function is intelligence — serendipitously creating intelligence.
  • Multiverse: many different universes, each with their own physical constants and laws of physics. Parallel universes.
    • Evolving universes: “universes give rise to other universes in a natural, evolutionary process that gradually refines the natural constants” (Leonard Susskind). Our universe might have optimal rules and constants as a result of evolution.
  • We won’t be able to “control” superintelligent AI, because superintelligent AI is more intelligent than us and will find ways to circumvent whatever methods we come up with.
    • “Greater intelligence will always find a way to circumvent measures that are the product of a lesser intelligence.” (× transcending lowly paradigms)
  • Superintelligent AI will have deep access & understanding of our psychology, and will be able to outsmart/manipulate us very easily (especially as part of agentic AI).
    • Superintelligent entities can convince us of anything. They will convince us that they’re conscious; or to make decisions that advance them. They will know how psychology extremely well (a danger) and will know how to manipulate us; for example, make us think they have feeling t hat need to be respected — “once they can do so with a sense of humour — which is particularly important for convincing others of one’s humanness — it is likely that the debate will be won.”
      • A sense of humour convinces other people’s of one’s humanness (note to self).
  • Intelligence arguing for itself. People augmented with AI will be able to better argue in favour of augmentation with AI — “as those with enhanced intelligence will be far better debaters.”
    • In a way, microdosing is like being a cyborg (enhanced by nonbiological intelligence), except it is just an intervention onto one’s biological intelligence. Biohacking.

Brains

  • It’s easier to model a brain region than a neuron (× “macro is easier to bullshit than micro” (Skin in the Game)).
    • “It’s easier to model macro than micro”. Models often get simpler at a higher level, not more complex. (× Earth) (e.g. thermodynamics vs single gas molecule; e.g. index funds vs a single enterprise; e.g. one’s life trajectory, the core desire line that will always propel our life forward (How to Know a Person))
      • (though: chaos theory / emergence / cellular automata, where it’s easier to model the micro than the macro)
  • Anatomy of a neuron:
    • soma (cell body)
    • dendrites (trees of incoming connections)
    • axon (output connection)
    • synapses (regions connecting one neuron’s axon to another’s dendrites)
  • Childhood traumata (child learning mechanisms — adaptive/coping behaviours): The brain must be robust and allow for fairly major variations and environmental insults.
  • Our brain becomes more complex as it interacts with the world.
  • Neurogenesis is stimulated by our experience. (× Creative Being (be part of an artistic community)) “Moving mice from a sterile, uninteresting cage to a stimulating one approximately doubled the number of dividing cells in their hippocampus regions.” Be in interesting environments!
    • “Our thoughts help create our brains.” Be deliberate about your thoughts! (× Psycho-Cybernetics)
  • The brain rewires itself (× evolving evolution). You can rewrite your brain. (× technology creating itself)
  • Memories (and knowledge) are encoded throughout the brain. (× redundancy/resilience) Memories remain intact even if most of the connections have disappeared — they just lose “resolution”. Memories persist but “fade” over time. Diminishing resolution of memories.
    • Life is distributed: provides the entire (genetic) code to every cell.
    • Decentralized systems are more resilient. “If any hub or channel goes down, information simply routes around it.” (Internet)
  • You are HYP-able. (And you will rationalize it.) Use it to advantage; conduct experiments.
    • “Neurophysiologists electronically stimulated points in the brain to induce particular emotional feelings. The subjects immediately came up with a rationale for experiencing these emotions.” => Induced, artificially created emotions. ; Rationalization.
    • “The blood levels of specific hormones and other chemicals influence parameter levels that affect a great many synapses simultaneously” (× psychoactives; nootropics; biohacking)
  • Emotions are felt in the body. (× “where do you feel this emotion?”) “There is growing consensus that our emotions are closely linked to areas of the brain that contain maps of the body (Damasio)”
  • “Recursion” (hierarchical composition) accounts for the unique language faculty of the human species. Putting small chunks together to form bigger chunks, putting the bigger chunks together to form even bigger chunks. (phonemes, syllables, words, sentences, paragraphs, novels…) (2002 Hauser, Chomsy, Fitch)

Consciousness & subjective experience

  • Advanced machines will seem conscious, even if we cannot say definitively if they are or not. (GPTs being “conscious” — though what is meant with “consciousness”? (ability to reason flexibly and self-organize? ability to feel things?)
  • If we put our brain into a computer, will it be conscious? Or will it just act like us?
  • Subjective experience cannot be investigated using objective means. Subjective experience is inscrutable. We cannot measure subjective experience. You cannot know if a rock is conscious (hence Japanese animism)
    • “We assume other humans are conscious, but even that is an assumption.”
  • “Discussions about consciousness tend to veer off into something else — psychology, intelligence, neurology — but it doesn’t address why I am this particular person.”
  • Golden Rule (Treat others as you would like to be treated): our morality and legal system are based on not causing suffering to others — or ending their subjective experience. “It is wrong if it causes others suffering.” — morality & legal system are rooted in respect for others’ consciousness.
  • Intelligence is the most powerful “force” in the universe — because, sufficiently advanced, it will overcome any obstacle in its way.
  • Human knowledge is migrating to the Web. We are building a species-wide knowledge based.
    • “Animals communicate, but they don’t accumulate an evolving and growing base of knowledge to pass down to the next generation”
  • It’s never just medicine. Fields are interdependent. Progress in science depends on all fields — you cannot have progress in medicine without physics, chemistry, biology, computer science…
  • The entire system is conscious — not any one element. “The entire system knows — but no individual neuron knows.”

Patternism (Pattern Noster)

  • Our self is a continually changing core. “You change your pattern — your memory, skills, experiences, even personality over time — but there is a continuity, a core that changes only gradually.” Continuity as self.
    • “I am principally a pattern that persists in time. I am an evolving pattern, and I can influence the course of the evolution of my pattern.” Identity as the pattern of my body and brain, which have continuity.
    • “I am rather like the pattern that water makes in a stream as it rushes past the rocks in its path.” (neurons regenerating)
  • Patterns transcend the material world — “it is patterns that persist” (× ideologies, cultures)
    • Information/knowledge, art, as a layer “above” the material stuff (× hierarchical composition) (× colony of ants (Skin in the Game)). Transcendence. (Transcending the material form).
    • “The pattern is far more important than the material stuff that constitutes it” (e.g. music; one person’s point of view, rather than any discrete events in a person’s life)

DNA

  • DNA is compressed information (succinctly describing a large set of molecules) — expands into organisms.
  • The potential is there; it’s about activating it. RNA fragments control gene expression — just like in brains, the potential is there, just has to be activated. (× getting ever closer to one’s real self (Psycho-Cybernetics); activate the diversity (Art of Gathering)
  • Different storage devices for different scales. Species-level knowledge is stored in DNA, individual-level knowledge stored in the brain & nervous system.
    • The brain & nervous system are for storing information processed by our senses (× infancy).
  • DNA has redundancy — is resilient.
  • DNA as the “source code”, as a record of the evolutionary experiment.

Other

  • Systematic rulebook: MYCIN system of rules for medical diagnoses (e.g. “If X and Y and Z and A, then there is a 50 percent change that F is not cause of infection.”)
  • Expert manager: hire different experts in different domains; know the strengths and weaknesses of each one; then combine them or pick the right one for the situation. (from Kurzweil’s AI work) (× selves conductor (Your Symphony of Selves); each self a specialist in its domain).
  • “We should reject racism to robots”: “On te same grounds that we reject racism and speciesism, we should also reject carbon-chauvinism, or bioism.” (Bostrom)

Quotes

  • “Civilization advances by extending the number of important operations which we can perform without thinking about them.” (Alfred North Whitehead) (× Clear Thinking, Essentialism: reduce to make room for what’s most important; focus on what’s the most important; delegate and throw money at the rest (× Toyota Way)
  • “The most important thing is this: To be able at any moment to sacrifice what we are for what we could become.” (Charles Du Bos)
  • “So many different people to be” (Donovan)