Raja Clavata Posted January 25, 2021 Author Report Share Posted January 25, 2021 36 minutes ago, 12gauge82 said: Interesting post. It sounds like what your refering to is the kardashev scale, which has always interested me. I think by logical reasoning your pretty much spot on with your assumptions, although I'm not sure about the earthly objects, there's not much that can't be built, no mater how big, when you have hordes of expendable slaves at your disposal. IIRC that’s to do with the ability to harness and utilise energy. We’re not even at the first step and the great Carl Sagan proposed some intermediate classification system. I get your reasoning wrt to expendable slaves but if a species had the intelligence and resources to get here in the first place then they’ve probably already got the means to deploy intelligent machines at scale to do the same work without all the hassle of us pesky humans. One of the other concepts that I find intriguing is the notion that a species evolves to the point that it decides the physical world and their corporeal bodies are limiting factors and convert to a virtual world by transferring their mind into a machine. Not sure it’s all been thought through in detail but the “mind boggles” at the concept. I’m rubbish at remembering the names of all the theories and concepts but there’s something about a model where the age of the average civilisation life span is 6,500 years before it either annihilates itself or is wiped out by a cataclysmic natural event (I guess that’s applied across the universe and not specifically the case with Earth). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RockySpears Posted January 26, 2021 Report Share Posted January 26, 2021 16 hours ago, Raja Clavata said: I’m rubbish at remembering the names of all the theories and concepts but there’s something about a model where the age of the average civilisation life span is 6,500 years More like 336 years: https://kottke.org/19/05/the-lifespans-of-ancient-civilizations "The average lifespan of those surveyed was 336 years, but some of the longest-lived civilizations were the Vedics, Olmecs, Ku****es, and the Aksumites…they each lasted about 1000 years or more." So at that life span, no civilisation ever lasts long enough to get out in the universe! RS Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
discobob Posted January 26, 2021 Report Share Posted January 26, 2021 Is this going to end with the Prometheus thread!!! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Raja Clavata Posted January 26, 2021 Author Report Share Posted January 26, 2021 1 hour ago, RockySpears said: More like 336 years: https://kottke.org/19/05/the-lifespans-of-ancient-civilizations "The average lifespan of those surveyed was 336 years, but some of the longest-lived civilizations were the Vedics, Olmecs, Ku****es, and the Aksumites…they each lasted about 1000 years or more." So at that life span, no civilisation ever lasts long enough to get out in the universe! RS Yep, like I said, not anthropological civilisations - "Sebastian von Hoerner estimated the average duration of civilization at 6,500 years" - this relates to a species as a whole across the universe (and I don't know what the fancy word for that is 🙂) and I suspect it's the time the civilisation emits detectable signals out into the universe. Either way, not enough time to develop super intelligence, not to mention differing timescales and huge distances between such civilisations even if they were evolving around the same time. 20 minutes ago, discobob said: Is this going to end with the Prometheus thread!!! To be fair, there are worse endings, no? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
oowee Posted January 26, 2021 Report Share Posted January 26, 2021 (edited) 19 hours ago, Raja Clavata said: One of the other concepts that I find intriguing is the notion that a species evolves to the point that it decides the physical world and their corporeal bodies are limiting factors and convert to a virtual world by transferring their mind into a machine. Not sure it’s all been thought through in detail but the “mind boggles” at the concept. This is where the future must lie if there is to be one for us and part of the reason there is no obvious evidence of earth having been visited by extraterrestrials in the past. The convergent of man and machine is an inevitable consequence of living ever faster. We just need to survive long enough for the transfer to occur. Edited January 26, 2021 by oowee Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
discobob Posted January 27, 2021 Report Share Posted January 27, 2021 17 hours ago, oowee said: We just need to survive long enough for the transfer to occur. They would have to modify the poem..."I wandered lonely in the cloud" To do what though?? There would be no reproduction going on, no children, no Life, nothing to achieve and no ticking clock that is the spark for life! I do admit though that I come down on the Thanos viewpoint of population but perhaps not as extreme as the click! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
oowee Posted January 27, 2021 Report Share Posted January 27, 2021 11 hours ago, discobob said: They would have to modify the poem..."I wandered lonely in the cloud" To do what though?? There would be no reproduction going on, no children, no Life, nothing to achieve and no ticking clock that is the spark for life! I do admit though that I come down on the Thanos viewpoint of population but perhaps not as extreme as the click! Ultimately we are only individual data gatherers now. All the same experiences would happen and more for longer with no limits and we would be one. 😶 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Raja Clavata Posted January 28, 2021 Author Report Share Posted January 28, 2021 But it's just a concept, lots of details to be thrashed out and various scenarios could play out. Providing there would be a means of keeping the infrastructure in space, it's a form of immortality, could be something that the extremely rich take up whilst biological human evolution continues - most likely on another planet. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nuke Posted January 28, 2021 Report Share Posted January 28, 2021 On 27/01/2021 at 09:04, discobob said: To do what though?? Explore the universe. /Markus Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
oowee Posted January 28, 2021 Report Share Posted January 28, 2021 On 23/01/2021 at 18:58, RockySpears said: But then what? To be omnipotent, to become god. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Raja Clavata Posted January 28, 2021 Author Report Share Posted January 28, 2021 Effectively it's a race to become the super God and ruler of planet Earth in a concrete sense - some would argue it's a natural progression of a species that doesn't annihilate itself in the process. It could be a power for good - if the machine is truly able to think for itself without human bias then it's logical that it would consider all humans equal, the danger is it considers us all to be equally worthless. The first application of general / broad AI would likely be in the accumulation of unimaginable amounts of wealth through exploiting the financial markets and it's not inconceivable that an individual, rather than a government, could be the first to achieve it. Traditionally if you wanted to control / influence people you became a politician, today you instead aspire to be a technology mogul. The foundations have already been laid by the likes of Besos, Musk & Co. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
discobob Posted January 28, 2021 Report Share Posted January 28, 2021 Microsoft have announced that they plan to do facsimiles of departed people based on their online footprint so you can talk and interact with them!!! 25 minutes ago, Raja Clavata said: Traditionally if you wanted to control / influence people you became a politician, today you instead aspire to be a technology mogul. The foundations have already been laid by the likes of Besos, Musk & Co. This in part is the problem with the modern world. The power that these people have over everyone's lives is quite astounding. I know that this has been historically so but has usually been within a small sphere but over the years this has expanded from Town (factory owner) and is now global as a technology mogul Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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