X-Message-Number: 15964
Date: Wed, 28 Mar 2001 16:27:10 -0500
From: Sabine Atkins <>
Subject: final words


With this message, I want to say that I regret participating at and involving 
the other 

directors of SIAI in the "Singularity... Bah Humbug!" thread started by James 
Swayze.


I'm interested in the cryonics movement since the beginning of 1999. And I'm 
thrilled by the 

hard work that has been and is done by all people in the movement. I think it is
wonderful 
that cryonic suspension exists.


I'm signed up myself - but I can't lay back and count only on cryonics that it 
will bring me back 

from the dead for sure. There is the possibility that cryonics might never work.
And so I want 
to educate myself about the other possibilities around.


One of these possibilities is the Friendly AI (aka Transition Guide) Eliezer 
Yudkowsky plans 
to build.


Now I thought that people who are so much interested in the future like the 
people in the 

cryonics movement, are also interested in learning about other possibilities or 
things that 
might affect them when they get revived.


I can't say for sure whether the Friendly AI might work or not, or whether or 
not it will be the 

only AI around forever. And I can't say that the Friendly AI will become a Sysop
or not. The 

Sysop scenario is only a possibility - not what Eliezer plans to build. He 
merely wants to build 

a Transition Guide that humanity can use for coping with the accelerating change
in 
technology and science.


IMHO, the imaginations some people in the Cryonet forum have about the Friendly 
AI plan 

are fueled by fear rather than knowledge. I'm reminded of the well-known 
sentence: "People 
fear what they don't understand."


I hoped that the people who are skeptical that the Singularity will ever happen 
and/or that an 

AI can/should be an important part of the Singularity would be interested in 
educating 
themselves about all the different possiblities.


James Swayze put "Singularity...Bah Humbug!" in the subject line of his message.
On the 

other hand, he likes to support his arguments with quotes from Ray Kurzweil. 
This makes me 

ask, whether James Swayze has read anything newer by Kurzweil than a 2 years old
article. 

Ray Kurzweil's new book is called "The Singularity Is Near" and he has a brand 
new website 
(which includes excerpts from the book) devoted to the Singularity and AI.

Here's the URL: 
http://www.kurzweilai.net/meme1/frame.html?main=/articles/art0134.html

--
Sabine Atkins  
http://www.posthuman.com/
--
Singularity Institute for 
Artificial Intelligence 
http://singinst.org/

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