Lindens Pimp the Singularity

Immersiva by Bryn Oh

The Lindens promoting green servers and propagating various global warming theories -- well, that's within the norm of their techno-libertarianism, surely, and no surprise. But pimping the Singularity? Mother of God...save us...

A self-serving advertorial by FJ Linden on the Lindens' new green server policies, which could have just been left ignored or put as boilerplate on their corporate blog, on the blog, turned into a debate about a) who is responsible for global warming and b) whether global warming is a true theory. Of course,  Blue moved to suppress speech here to keep the focus on the Linden glory. He does it with the best of motives -- keeping the conversation on topic --but I beg to differ.

First of all, I'm no global warming denier. You don't have to be a scientist to know something is wrong with the weather, which blows hot and cold in ways it never used to, the birds showing up at the wrong time, the bees dying, ice caps melting, countries getting submerged, and all the rest. Something's up, and maybe our time slice on the planet is too small to see it, but it surely wouldn't hurt to reduce consumption, pollution, etc. and recycle and keep a small carbon footprint and all the rest. Even if it turns out to be a false alarm, why wouldn't reduction of consumption not be a good thing if done in moderation? We do our part by playing Second Life and not going outside and getting hairspray on the environment or using up gas driving to the mall : )

Except, I think hair spray can automatically travel up to the ozone layer and puncture holes in it. I help the planet by never using hair spray. But hmm...if hairspray can do that, do spray cleaners or deodorant or spray paint do the same thing to the ozone layer? Please advise.

I've often wondered whether all that recycling we carefully and keep separate is really worth it, especially when I see it being carted off all mixed up lol. Or hear about it really being put in landfills. And of course, I'm worried about that big ocean of plastic sludge out there made up of garbage bags, with those little six-pack holder plastic thingies which can get wrapped around dolphins'  noses and starving them. I'm happy to recycle, come to the store with canvas bags to shop, and if you have an idea about the little plastic thingies (should we routinely cut them up first? I always do, thinking of the dolphins) let me know. Of course, we still need to put garbage in those plastic bags from the super market, so what's the plan there? In my apartment building, you have to have the bags a certain size to go down the chute to the incinerator room or crusher room or whatever it is, so we still need to use them. Were you suggesting paper? See, most things people cook up for *other* people to do always end up in questions for somebody, and that leads to lack of compliance.

Still, even being "green" myself, recycling, walking, not having a car, willing to believe a certain amount of global warming stuff, I still think of myself as an agnostic. I don't mind at all that the president of Czech Republic goes around questioning the science of global warming, as do quite a few scientists. That's what science is about. You have to question any scientific theory, and this is just a theory. It's a theory that some people become absolutely rabidly religious about, and then they stop accepting facts that contradict their theory.

On this Linden thread, we all appreciate that the Lindens are greening their servers (IBM had green servers and even a green display in SL which was fun to ride around in.) And of course several of us congratulated them and said, now disprove this silly blogging meme amped by Tony Walsh at Clickable Culture about the SL avatar using up "more than a Brazilian". Especially now that we have Brazilians *in* SL so we can now compare Brazilians using avatars to other Brazilians not using avatars...or something. I found that a lot of third-worldist claptrap. If a Northerner reduces his consumption by using a virtual world, great! If he still uses up  more than a Brazilian, well, that's life in the big city. The task is not to keep banging on the Northerner, the task is to bang equally on the Brazilian, who wants nothing more than to aspire to consume like a North American. Do you tell the Third World not to develop and not consume like Northerners? Well, why do you get to do that? In order to stay politically correct? But then, when they do, especially as they have populations growing faster than Europe, some, like China, huge percentages of the planet's overall population, what's your plan for staying green then and avoiding more global warming consequences?

That's why when somebody pompous and hortatory gets on the soap box in this thread to tell us that we in America are to blame first, we have caused most of the problems in the last 100 years (with only Europe with its shrinking birth rate and Japan on its tiny island added to the blame list), I say, um, well, wait a minute. You know, Brazil, Nigeria, Russia, China -- these are all really big countries!  they pollute a lot, and some of the have repressed independent environmental movements! Russia takes up one-fifth of the earth's surface. The former Soviet Union took up one-sixth of the earth's surface. Have you looked at the Aral Sea lately? It's shrunk way down from what it was.

And did you read the latest National Geographic about the dustbowl ranches in Australia? I mean, why is this always about "blame America first"?

This is a global problem, the standards set need to be global, and all countries need to adhere to them.

But what happens in a thread like this is that the pious politically correct dude gets to sound off, and while he is off-topic from the get-go, with his intonations about the U.S. being the most guilty blah blah (but we have recycling policies, environmental pressure groups, etc. that many countries don't have even a fledgling version of), he gets to stand, and then anyone disagreeing with him doesn't.

So a post like this gets deleted by Blue in the interests of off-topic policing by an avatar named JohnD Fitzgerald:

"Let us all remember Y2K. A hoax, a fraud, a failure, a Scientific Ponzi scheme. "Green" and "Global Warming" are Y2K all over again. Let us all remember "Global Warming" caused the Great Lakes, The Black Sea, the Sahara Desert and put 3/4 of Florida underwater, all before Columbus got to the US and the native Americans were natives. The amount of CO2 released by humans into the atmosphere since the industrial revolution is less than 1% of the entire atmosphere. The earth warms and cools based on heat from the sun, which is mostly stored in the ocean , not the atmosphere. The sun does not release heat at a constant rate. That solar heat impacts the ocean temperature as long term fluctuating energy, which in turn circulates stored energy in long term cycles around the earth. And, amazingly, there are long term cyclical weather patterns over hundreds of years all caused by natural forces affecting the oceans, not the atmosphere. Dont see any humans in that calculation. Stopping wasting time on being green."

While this attitude may seem extreme, and the idea that we shouldn't waste time on being green not really sustainable (why not waste time? It can't hurt), it is as least legitimate in the effort to question stuff that passes for "science". The Y2K bug wasn't something we consumers dreamed up; tekkies dreamed it up and inflicted it on the meme-o-sphere -- and then other tekkies blamed us for being retards and making Y2K closets (I was glad I did when 9/11 came and then the NYC blackout -- Y2K closets can't hurt).

Maybe this JohnD is right about the sun and fluctuations and all the rest -- and if he isn't, well, why can't we all debate this? Why do we have to accept religious doctrine about it?

Ok, all this is within the norm, so to speak, but...the Singularity? The Singularity?! Are you nuts?!

Here, the Lindens have gone off their rockers. Dusty Linden, apparently a youthful and over-enthusiastic Linden, is here flogging Ray Kurziweil and the Singularity.

Sigh.

Ray Kurziweil is not only a kook; he's a criminally-minded kook who advocates godless neo-totalitarianism of the worst kind. He affects that know-it-all assuredness that tekkies often do -- which is why they need civilian restraint. His confidence that machines will become more intelligent and overtaken humans and usher in an era of trans-humanism is as cocky as it is because he's absolutely sure, under this scenario, that he, as a programmer, will retain some sort of position of power. Disruptive technology will never disrupt *him*, in his mind, so he can enthusiastically usher it in. But really, he is chilling to watch -- and nobody ever argues with him. Ever.

I wasn't aware until I started googling this to see that Sun Microsystems' Bill Joy has cautioned about it, but his article is so long and obscure that it's hard to understand that he's really mounting any effective arguments against Kurziweil; the take-home is more of a visceral feeling that he is chilling.

You can debate *that* the Singularity will take place or that if it does, it will NOT be some unalloyed good, but perhaps even be evil -- but likely you will NOT be able to do this on the Lindens' forums, because Blue or some other Linden will be safeguarding Dusty Linden's god-given right to expound positively on this theory, and not brook any real dissent. In fact, this blog was driven to a "join the discussion" thread that is less visible, and when I got there, I couldn't see that comments were open (they are for me elsewhere on the blogs; I'm only barred from JIRA contribution for 14 days).

The Singularity nowadays also connotes singularity of connectedness. That is, most people envision it as taking place online, in real time, with connectivism, all knowledge residing on the network, information wanting to be free and all that, plus these super intelligencies residing in a virtual world, which is their perfect place.

Of course, one could point out that *real* super intelligences won't have any need for virtual worlds, which are vestiges of humanity lol. If you're a super intelligence, do you *really* need to have a little pictorial rendition of some concept or movement or thing? Of course not! No self-respecting super intelligence will ever need such silly toys. They don't have five senses, remember? So don't be surprised, come the Singularity, that the first thing the superintelligences do is wipe out all virtual worlds prepared as their home as unnecessary and redundant lol. Like making a little cardboard box with a blanket in it that your new pet never comes and lies down in.

See, I can apply a bit of superior intelligence ot this problem, too, ROFL.

But let's say they don't, let's say these superintelligences stay because they need to humour the humans awhile longer in their Extropian playground. Somebody will want to be in charge of running the superior intelligences or taking credit for them or will allign with them against others or all the other sort of Lord-of-the-Flies kinds of things that happen whenever there is a power, a FIC, and the rest of us ROFL. And it's not going to be pretty.

Lots of things could defeat the Singularity. Like weather, say, or electricity blackouts (if they hook it all up online). Warring tribes. A nuclear attack. A 5-year-old accidently hitting on something. Who the hell knows. I think those first years of the Singularity could be very rough. Those superintelligences will know, at some level, that they depend on, oh, mining in the DRC. And they will prove no better at unsnarling all the many social and political problems of the Congo than, say, the UN. In fact, the first thing the Singularity Superintelligences might do is go to places like the Congo, kill all the human beings, picking up tips on how to kill them better from the humans who have been doing that already for decades, and then take over. Of course, let's hope they have plenty of long-life battery packs for that expedition!

In fact, try to think about the ingredients that will go into the substrate needed for the superior intelligences to thrive, and capitalize on those items now and make sure they remain under human control. See, you *can* think one step ahead of the Singularity, although, perhaps it is too late in some  places.

One thing that the Singularity people often promote is the idea that you need "less" humanity. Not content with just reducing the birth rate with birth control, these types are perfectly content to just have excess humanity culled -- by, whatever. If not bad weather and climate disasters, then a little help from man-made "complex emergencies".

That's why when this nutter on the forums whose posts were left standing because he praised the Linden and "blamed America first," he specified that we must all move humanity to virtual worlds. Oh? Should we? Why? He thinks everything will be done there...is being done there.

If you doubt it, go to Legacy Locker and think up all the things you'd need to put in there to leave for your loved ones to be able to open after you die!

I'm not big on the Singularity. In fact, I oppose it quite vigorously. In fact, I head up the New England Chapter for the Society for the Pluralarity, which we hope will keep the Singularity on the run. Pluralism always works against singularisms.

Why wouldn't I be for progress? Well, I guess, given everything, and given that at root it will be made by humans, the super intelligences are not likely to operate any higher than the level of this 11-year-old.  I mean, this 11-year-old represents millenia of evolution in human intelligence perfecting itself, arriving at long last in West Virginia where it can really thrive. All it needs is the presence of a 7-year-old sister who understands the business end of a .38, a grandma who is stupid enough to a) maintain a gun and b)  maintain it where said 11 year old can get it -- and a society that says we need guns to protect us against criminals (and 7 year old sisters who don't want to play, and boring old grannies who won't let us have fun!) and walla!

There's no reason to assume that the Singularity will be any different than this touching family scene, simply because the ingredients of force, expediency, leniency, etc. will all be present. Code is not law; code is war. It is one human putting their will over another's without restraint.

Dusty Linden -- what a true exemplar of technolibertarianism! -- fulfills the description of said ideology as basically anti-Western communism fueling the love of the Singularity with this remark, "Here's my personal biggest question about Virtual Worlds... when you can have anything you want in a virtual world, will Western Civilization's desire for Real World Stuff decline? What will be the perceived value of... huge blingy handbags?"

Obviously, we can see from his "personal biggest question" that Dusty is a) a denizen of Western civilization and one of its chief beneficiaries and therefore has *choice* whether to consume or not to consume b) thinks there's something evil about Western civilization and its consumption c) has never visited deepest Africa or Eurasia to see that in fact, people, there, far from Western Civilization, want blingy handbags, too, and aspire to get them, or knock them off...

I wonder if Dusty Linden has a passport. Has he ever been to a Third World country? Does he think that because people in the rest of the world outside San Francisco are poor, that they don't wish the exact same things that people in  his much-hated Western civilization want? The Buddhist ideal of non-possession is the LAST thing you will find in the heartland of real Buddhism lol. Honestly, where do people pick up stupid-ass ideologies like this? Oh, I know! The Internet!

I'm willing to bet that even if Dusty Linden doesn't have a blingy real-life handbag, he has some form of other politically-correct conspicuous consumption -- say, an i-phone or a laptop whose components and electricity would keep a third-world village labouring and lit for a month...

One of the problems with these debates is that if you counter any technology's anticipated ill effects, you are labelled a "Luddite". Of course, that stems from not understanding that Luddites were not against machines; they were against not getting paid. They had a system of craftsmenship and set rates that enabled them to earn a living. Machinery that accelerated and automated crafts reduced minimum prices for their products for them, and endangered their livlihood. There was nothing wrong with the Luddites worrying about how they would buy groceries. Nothing at all.

Oppose the Singularity! While we still have grandma to tell her grandchild to put down the gun...

Comments

[Ace Albion]

I don't know if Dusty Linden has traveled the world, but if he's asking that question, it's clear to me that he's never traveled Second Life.

[Gareth Nelson]

Honestly prok, you need to read more on the subject, start here:
http://singinst.org/upload/CEV.html

[HatHead Rickenbacker]

Hi Prok,

"But really, [Ray Kurzweil] is chilling to watch -- and nobody ever argues with him. Ever."

-------

Perhaps not 'argues' - conjuring up an image of people just bleating at one another without listening - but there is debate, which endeavours to remove distracting personal characterizations from the discussion of the ideas themselves.

Bill Joy for one, as you note.

Douglas Hofstadter vs Kurzweil on stage:
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=8832143373632003914

John Horgan vs Kurzweil on stage:
http://singinst.org/media/singularitysummit2008/raykurzweiljohnhorgan

Marshall Brain at the Singularity Summit making a case for those be unemployed by technology (he was not well rec'd):
http://singinst.org/media/singularitysummit2008/marshallbrain

While the elbows here might not perhaps be sharp enough for your taste, there is some debate (but little argument).

Cheers!

[Gareth Nelson]

Ben Goertzel is one of the lead programmers resposnible for the Novamente Cognition Engine, here's an essay about "AI morality" from him:

http://www.goertzel.org/dynapsyc/2002/AIMorality.htm

[Gareth Nelson]

About VWs and AIs:

http://www.goertzel.org/dynapsyc/2003/NovamenteSimulations.htm

AGISim is a rather cool concept, basically a mini virtual world for training AIs inside of.

[Prokofy Neva]

I look forward to seeing those videos, Hat, thanks for the tip. I'm glad he's getting some pushback. A citizen's arrest might be more in order, however.

[cube inada]

y2k was a TECHNOLOGY SALES SCAM, not a SCIENCE scam.

the inability of the culture to differentiate science from technology is why we have silliness like the "singularity" and its "wired" religious followers.

[HatHead Rickenbacker]

Taking cube Inada's cue, there are many religious people who should face a citizen's arrest, regardless of what they are worshiping.

The Hofstadter video doesn't really get to Ray's "hand waving" until about 12 minutes in and Ray sits to the side (taking many notes).

The Horgan video is mono et mono: singularity 2040 vs never and more back & forth. Cheers!

[Prokofy Neva]

well, cube, I take your point that science and technology are separate, but these days, you need technology to do science, and you need science to do technology.

people who promote intelligent design or creationism haven't yet proven a threat to anyone's freedom or livlihood, that I've seen. They may have objectionable views, but they don't harm anyone with them. The Singularity is about a few people taking over, however.

[Darien Caldwell]

This is the first time I've heard of this singularity, and what strikes me as absurdly obvious right away is, that the concept of 'super intelligence' is ironically completely dumb.

Intelligence is a subjective measurement of the ability to apply knowledge to the working world, and it's completely human based. A machine doesn't care how intelligent it may or may not be. For that to happen, machines would have to become sentient, and that will never occur, because well, humans will never be intelligent enough to achieve it, if it's even possible. True irony.

Even so, It's impossible to be 'super intelligent', as that implies intelligence has an infinite range. Intelligence is very finite, once you are able to reason all things with 100% perfection, you have reached the peak of intelligence, and there is no way to go beyond it. And it doesn't take a lot of intelligence to know perfection is an impossibility as well.

The Singularity, like The Cake, is a lie.

[HatHead Rickenbacker]

people who promote intelligent design or creationism haven't yet proven a threat to anyone's freedom or livelihood, that I've seen.

----

Gary Goodyear, the Federal Minister of Science here in Canada, let it slide he does not believe in evolution due to his religious beliefs - his choice of course to believe in whatever he wants but not a good choice for minister of science, especially as evolution is the cornerstone of modern empirical biology. This while his ministry is making significant cuts to science research programs, sending workers in these fields scrambling.

A delegation went to meet with Minister Goodyear to discuss this reduction in funding however the meeting was reported very short with Goodyear apparently yelling at the scientists in anger, waving his finger at them. In fact, the tenure of the meeting was so bad that they left without their coats and were told to send someone else to retrieve them.

As you can imagine, this is a political firestorm in our country but it is also however an example at the highest level of a few Creationist aka Intelligent Design people taking over and directly threatening the livelihoods of others.

We should be watchful and wary of all belief systems as none are exempt from nutters and power mongers.

[Prokofy Neva]

I don't see why a scientist's religious belief would have to interfere in him doing good biology.

Evolution -- God's plan for the planet : )

Maybe he has to reduce funding because it's a recession. I dunno. Seems to me there could be different versions of this story.

I think it's a far cry from some minister saying he's cut somebody's bacon to saying he's destroyed their livlihood. Canadians live in a socialist state dependent on the state. I know, I lived there for some years and got the socialized medicine, too.

Meanwhile, the Singularity involves overriding human intelligence and putting a few coders in charge.

I think there's definitely a hierarchy of threats, and creationists are not at all the threat you imagine.

[Prokofy Neva]

Darien, yes, a computer isn't going to care about becoming smarter, and maybe has no motivation to appear smarter.

But for all we know, it's an automated thing at some point where systems want to just keep adding information. That somehow somewhere they will decide "more information is better". So they won't necessarily have intelligence, but information.

I'm not sure how this logical leap was accomplished, but you're right to point it out. Kurziweil may in fact have no way that he explains why these machines "have to" become more intelligent and may simply have that as a religious doctrine.

[Gareth Nelson]

The reason why an AI would want to become more intelligent is very simple: AI is software, written by humans.

The human programmers currently at work on strong AI intend for it to assist in the creation of more improved AI. Very, very simple - the initial goals are provided by humans, not the machine itself.

Nothing "religious" about this either, i'd say it's "religious" to believe that only the brain can manifest intelligence, especially considering how much progress is being made in reverse engineering human psychology and neurology, and the progress being made on narrow AI and artificial reasoning.

What is religious perhaps is to assume that the singularity will solve all problems (as some believe it will), it won't - it'll give us a vastly greater means of understanding and analysing problems.

[cube]

actually i believe ther have been firings and such by intelligent deign advocates upon those who think evolution is a fact....moneky trials and all- past and recent-), but that wasnt my point...

and yes. you can do science without technology today... as did einstein and his thought expereiments...while science is only "one" factor that creates a technology...

science asks how and why..... technology answers it with what and when.

not the same.....the fact that an atom exists..is not the same as the device that splits it.

anhyhow....

creationism is a weak a set of hypothesis as the singularity and both have been used as the "rally" cries for their believers to enact techologies that have been used for harm against the "other".

[cube]

the truly intelligent machine, like the truly intelligent human, might want to be dumb.....

anyhow.

singularities and extropolarian nonscence has been at the heart of sf and sv tech culture for 2 decades... damage is done....
repairs are up to us.

and prok. 'intellegent design" has been a scam on the science departments of us schools...
its done harm to rational thought, and does not follow the true idea of ones beliefs/faith beings important to them and or protected in a pluralistic society., Intelligent design has been a marketed agenda device for the religious right, its puesdo science created to appear as science to an audience that cannot reconscile a round earth and 15 billion years with a paragraph of text in an old book:)

only faith can do that.... intellegent design tries to use the flagellum.... its a dumb attempt... just like when humans try to convince other humans that they "know" what a machine would thunk about..:)

angels on heads of needles... either from technoids or biblenoids....

utlimate geek religion for both.

[Gareth Nelson]

" its a dumb attempt... just like when humans try to convince other humans that they "know" what a machine would thunk about"

You build it from scratch, you'll know what you set it up to do :)

[Melissa Yeuxdoux]

"Intelligence is a subjective measurement of the ability to apply knowledge to the working world..."

Intelligence _tests_ are subjective, but the world itself is the ultimate test of whether one correctly applies knowledge to the world, and it's not subjective at all. Fail there, and you suffer real damage.

It may be that the Singularity won't happen. Some of the deepest results in math and computing are proofs of impossibility: you can't write a program that will determine whether an arbitrary program will halt; any deductive system sufficiently strong to derive the arithmetic of the natural numbers either is self-contradictory or incomplete; etc. It may be that someone will prove strong AI impossible--some think they have already.

OTOH, I'd say the following: first, look at people. Do you really think we're (at our best) as smart as it gets? Also, even if we don't get to strong AI, wouldn't it be nice if everyone could work at the level of an Einstein? That might be a result of work to hasten the Singularity, and I'd say that's worthwhile.

[Prokofy Neva]

Why Einstein? And why do we have to live with YOUR idea of what's smart?

[Prokofy Neva]

It's not about reconciling a round earth with a paragraph in a book. It's about seeing evidence of intelligent design everywhere, and just not being in denial about its patterns, that's all. Those who work so hard to deny it have to defy the logic they see in patterns just to make sure they won't wind up under some religion that might curb their sex life or something. That's all it's about. I don't see why I would have to be under their thumb, either.

[Ann Otoole]

SL must be "intelligent design". After all it works despite defying all conventional software engineering logic and methodologies.

[cube inada]

not with ya here...
patterns do not signify an intelligence only the application of an intelligence to there reading.

the intelligent design movement is not about faith, its about an anti scientific methodology being used to create evidence that has a preditermined outcome and agenda. The "proof" of a christian god in a culture that requires consential science proofs at this time..

the need for the intellegent design movement shows a failure of faith.

evolution, as a mechanism of nature/or even a "possible" god is consistant with science as a methodology and set of collbrative evidence proofs.

ID has been shown over and over not to hold up to even its own criteria.

BTW- blame another berkeley ite-- but this one is from the right:)

God may not need thumbs nor starships:)

faith IS delusion and agreement. that contradiction is "human" and needs nothing more.imo.:)

thats the trick that poor gareth will have to teach his computer android partner;)

but thats old school, unhip/uncool Star Trek ...not summer movie mass meme tech geek type.

[HatHead Rickenbacker]

I hear the sound of moving goal posts a bit. Originally it was 'threatening their livelihood" not "destroyed their livelihood' :) Shaking your fist at someone is different than punching them with it.

Our Canadian socialism has failed these workers for they are not eligible for unemployment insurance as a result of losing grant money. That is, their jobs are destroyed with no further funding - i.e no stem cell research jobs for stem cell researchers. Always free health care for those newly unemployed though - love that!

Although the majority of scientists in history have been religious, none used 'insert divine miracle here' in their experimental methods. Modern biology is founded upon evolutionary processes and it is hard to imagine anyone doing good science if they don't fundamentally believe in what they are doing.

Lastly, I can give you more examples but get the feeling that we would wade into a game of rationalization however I must add that your apologies for our good Minister of Science are unconvincing since he went on the record otherwise.

Both science and religion are ultimately founded upon belief systems, each of which can be used to marginalize other people. IMO, your challenging of technology is offset somewhat by your quiet defense of religion - it would be great to have the same critical eye applied to both equally.

I won't belabor these points any further though as we are probably both fairly settled in our world views anyway.

A pleasure as always - peace!

[Prokofy Neva]

I don't see why I'd need to go out of my way to criticize religion, when I believe in God. That is, I could criticize this or that aspect of man-made religious ritual like failure to approve birth control or lack of female priests or something like that. But I don't feel the need to debunk God. This doesn't make me unscientific. It just makes me not sign up for *your* religion by force. To me, failure to believe in a higher power and creation is really all about defying the facts as they are there to be perceived.

I think the humility that such a world view gives you might make you a better biologist, in fact, not a worse one.

[HatHead Rickenbacker]

'It's about seeing evidence of intelligent design everywhere, and just not being in denial about its patterns, that's all.'

----

The Creationists say: 'but the proof is all around you, can't you see it?'

The Naturalists say: 'but the proof is all around you, can't you see it?'

The patterns we perceive around us are inescapably shaped by our belief systems.