On AI, superintelligence, and whether we live in a sim
 

I would not normally post a youtube video > 1h long, *nobody* will watch, but man - that guy is not stupid and has thought about some interesting angles... Pick one of the indexed topics that worries you for 5 minutes, and prepare to be even more worried afterwards and maybe listen to the entire thing - I did - in the car !! That was really good (and scary)

https://youtu.be/UclrVWafRAI?si=taaYdNRJyCXGbNGm

Link

A marshmallow world in the winter.

I swear I had never heard this song until about five years ago. Never. Then it just sort of exploded. This coincided with the whole we live in a simulation thing.

I now suspect that this is a glitch. And anyone claiming to have heard it before 2019 is an NPC. It’s an unfalsifiable suspicion. How do I test this?

Go back in time. Duh!

I haven't watched any yet, but the Diary of a CEO guy interviews some interesting folks that seem smarter than your average bear. I've watched several of his interviews and come away thinking.

If you are talking about the same song that is on Phil Spector's 1963 Christmas Album, I must be an NPC, whatever that means. My parents definitely had that record shortly after it was released. :)
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I don't think we live in a sim but after watching a few videos, I do wonder if we're in a black hole. Like the entire observable universe is in a black hole.

I'm just waiting for it to advance to the point where it eliminates the jobs of the software engineers who created it and continue to work on it. You know, the day when the AI says, "we've got it from here." :)

Then I will lean back and have a cold beverage and a smile. As for the future in general, I'm just glad that I'll be dead.

Exactly what an AI would say.

All the comments which accompany that video predicting that AI will lead to the collapse of civilization remind me of one of my favorite Sci-Fi films from the '50s...Forbidden Planet.
The Krell develop a technology for artificially boosting intelligence that's powered by an unlimited energy source but fail to realize that their achievements have outpaced their more primitive mental abilities to control them. In the end, their very own "Monsters from the ID" doom their entire race.

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Could we now be on the verge of following the Krell into oblivion?

I don't know if we're living in the matrix, but I've been getting these WWII documentary videos the last couple of days; the overall gist of the video is a ton of research told in a hi-bred British voice, (male or female? You decide) along with a few photos of the subject at hand. (You don't miss much by having these on in the background as you go about other chores. The photos don't add much to the story)

They all have the same AI voice, one that is remarkably well done with a few obvious glitches. For instance, they always call fifty cal guns "point five oh" or "point fifty", the German ME planes are prefaced with the word "ME" instead of calling out the letters M and E; that sort of thing. (Me 109)

But the weirdness comes in their glorification of American exceptionalism during the war, which comes with an aside of just how wasteful Americans were. My feeling is, is that it's someone's propaganda, but I can't understand the end result and it makes me feel like I'm just an old man being suspicious of someone being nice.

I mean, it's great hearing about the remarkable industrialization of the US and how by industrial efficiency the US was able to produce giant quantities of ships, planes, tanks, food, gasoline, etc etc, and how that flood of weaponry and supplies completely swamped the enemy's ability to fight against such long odds. Makes you proud. But makes you think. I wonder why these videos show up now. There's quite a few of them and they seem to be fairly new.

The intelligence is getting much, much smarter. I worry for my future self. Will I be able to resist the Egyptian Prince who just needs to park a few million rupees in my bank account until he gets his inheritance?

Edit; the video is crippled to only be viewable on YouTube but this one is titled:

"German Colonel Captured 50,000 Gallons of US Fuel and Realized Germany Was Doomed"


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The AI videos bug me. I don't watch them. And then on top of everything, I don't believe them. I assume that some percentage of what they say is true, and that there may be some huge mistakes or issues with the "facts".

Exactly. That's what makes these WWII docs so "interesting". On the one hand, Yay! Jingoistic fervor! Who doesn't love stories of American might in the face of adversity?

On the other hand, who knows how factual these are, (and why harsh the mellow with asides about the wastefulness of individual citizens?)

That's why my last sentence was a lament on what future Herr_O is going to be up against as AI is dug in deep and can influence feelings on a molecular level and an old man with diminishing skills and processing capabilities is being potentially targeted.

I don't think we live in a sim either. But the fact is, we could be living in a sim. It is a very small chance.

Double slit experiment:

https://www.facebook.com/share/r/19k8wN8s1t/

After seeing your post, we watched Forbidden Planet last night. Once you tune yourself into watching a 70 year old movie and ignore the hokeyness of it (why did they bring a wrecker truck with them?), it's well done and you can see how it really started the sci-fi genre.