42 replies to this topic

[Imminst = pro murder (omega)]

Hmmm, so you think there will be a time when it is known that a person lives for all time? If that comes before all time has passed, it is not a result of deductive or inductive logic which require finite time. Proclaiming something is not sufficient to make it true no matter how loud or often, IMHO.

[jdgauchat]

Hmmm, so you think there will be a time when it is known that a person lives for all time? If that comes before all time has passed, it is not a result of deductive or inductive logic which require finite time. Proclaiming something is not sufficient to make it true no matter how loud or often, IMHO.

All I'm saying is that is not wrong to talk about immortality. Just that.

Edit: ...and yes, I know that some day we will be able to known that a person can live for ever, the same way I know right now that a glass of water will never kill me.

Edited by macrojd, 01 May 2009 - 04:15 PM.

[Cyberbrain]

the same way I know right now that a glass of water will never kill me.

If it's distilled water, it could kill you in the long run due to mineral deficiencies.

It could also be poisoned. Or the water could be contaminated.

If the glass is big enough, you could drown in it.

Somebody could hit you with that glass of water and that you kill you.

haha! ... just kidding

[jdgauchat]

the same way I know right now that a glass of water will never kill me.

If it's distilled water, it could kill you in the long run due to mineral deficiencies.

It could also be poisoned. Or the water could be contaminated.

If the glass is big enough, you could drown in it.

Somebody could hit you with that glass of water and that you kill you.

haha! ... just kidding

haha very funny!

We can find innumerable things that can't kill us right now because in fact that is why we are alive. An structure has parameters, margins, and between those margins the structure won't be affected. If the structure change or the environment change (poisoning water or boiled water for example) then the margins change. Its not a good explanation but I think I made my point

Edited by macrojd, 01 May 2009 - 09:02 PM.

[Shahzad]

< 50 years for biological immortality. I think strong AI seems likely to be a reality within as little as 10 years given the progress of the Blue Brain project and similar projects. After that milestone the Singularity can't be far off.

[Dmitri]

I voted over 100 years. There's no doubt that life extension technologies will become available within the next few decades; true immortality though has a long way to go.

[ben951]

I voted under 50, i also think that our best chance to get the knowledge necessary to overcome biological aging is the threw the development of AGI.

Not because i think that AGI is the only way, but because unlike SENS and other specific anti aging project, it's will be very difficult to stop the development and investment in that area, the world economy is more and more dependent on computers, they really are everywhere now.

To me the exponential grow of computer power will be very hard to stop, Moore law will come to an end, but in fact it might be very beneficial for the development of other technology whether it's 3d chips, nano computer, quantum computer or other.

It seems that Kurweil is not very popular in this forum, but i agree with him when he say that when Moore law will end it will create a huge research pressure in this area.

I don't think that Intel or AMD will say "well that's it, chips cannot be more powerfully will just have to go bankrupt" because why anybody will want to buy new computer if they are not more powerful ?

My Amstrad cpc 6128 is still working it doesn't need any repair yet.

You might say that computer power doesn't link directly with AGI and that the software is the most difficult part, but now we are entering an era where super computer power is pretty close to the estimated computation power of the brain, as you probably know if the doubling continue we will have computer 1000 more powerfully than the brain in 10 or 15 year, one million time more powerfully in 25 or 30 years etc.

It's possible that while AI become less and less narrow they will become almost naturally AGI even without reverse engineering the brain.

Most programmer working in the AI field agree that the more computation power you have the less difficult it is to build an AGI.

Some like Ben Goertzel think that if we had a lot more computation power we would only need general principles and a few lines of code to build it.

(Its only my second post here and English is not my first language so please be indulgent.)

[kismet]

I voted under 50, i also think that our best chance to get the knowledge necessary to overcome biological aging is the threw the development of AGI.

Not because i think that AGI is the only way, but because unlike SENS and other specific anti aging project, it's will be very difficult to stop the development and investment in that area, the world economy is more and more dependent on computers, they really are everywhere now.

Personally I believe any major investments in AGI on our side are a dangerous waste of resources.

To me the exponential grow of computer power will be very hard to stop, Moore law will come to an end, but in fact it might be very beneficial for the development of other technology whether it's 3d chips, nano computer, quantum computer or other.

3d computing is a near term solution, which will surface more than 20 years before the singularity is predicted to start (as per Kurzweil). The last I've read is that we don't know whether quantum computing will ever be feasible on a large scale and, contrary to popular belief, quantum computing is not faster than classical computing for most problems.  Computers are "nano" already...

It seems that Kurweil is not very popular in this forum, but i agree with him when he say that when Moore law will end it will create a huge research pressure in this area.

We thought that ~50million casualties per year would create more of research pressure for biogerontologists, but apparently we were wrong. No one should be sure of anything based on such simplified models and assumptions.

I don't think that Intel or AMD will say "well that's it, chips cannot be more powerfully will just have to go bankrupt" because why anybody will want to buy new computer if they are not more powerful ?

Because, well, all chips eventually die? E.g. through electromigration. Intel et al. know exactly what they're doing. They don't need exponential growth and neither do their customers.

My Amstrad cpc 6128 is still working it doesn't need any repair yet.

AFAIK the problem is exponentially exacerbated at smaller nodes.

Edited by kismet, 22 May 2009 - 06:05 PM.

[ShadowX]

It will most likely take way over 100 years. If only our research was better funded and more professionalize that we could perform and get results quicker. Also would kinda help to have a few already immortal things to analyze. Then again it may take forever assuming the one thing we need to become immortal is not even in this planet. Though from what I expect even if immortality become something that was actually possible to create or induce into a human subject, it would most likely be highly restricted to only people considered important.

[cyborgdreamer]

If I or you did attain a virtual all knowledge state of being, we would probably choose to start it all over again with a blank slate so that there would be surprise, challenge, things to learn and no more boredom. You, I and everyone else may already be immortal in this sense but it includes dying as a part of life.

You might choose to lead that life if you had that kind of knowledge and power. However, if you think every person in the world would make that choice than you severely underestimate how much I and others hate death. No amount of knowledge could distort my identity to the point that I would voluntarily subject myself to the anguish of a life where everyone I love and everthing I am is doomed to oblivion. If bordom was a problem, I'd simply re-engineer my brain to enjoy things I already understood as much as I currently enjoy learning new things.

[ben951]

Personally I believe any major investments in AGI on our side are a dangerous waste of resources.

Can you elaborate why ?

3d computing is a near term solution, which will surface more than 20 years before the singularity is predicted to start (as per Kurzweil).

Yes I know Kurzweil predict the singularity for 2045 but predict drastic increase in life expending long before that.


He does not think that we need AGI to increase life expectancy in the first place, he's even more optimistic, to him as biology become an information technologies like it has started with the decoding of the genome,it will progress at an exponential rate like other information's technologies.

The last I've read is that we don't know whether quantum computing will ever be feasible on a large scale and, contrary to popular belief, quantum computing is not faster than classical computing for most problems.

This does not mean I won't be a great technological break threw if it's developed.

Computers are "nano" already...

When I was referring to nano computer I was referring to chips build by molecular assembler not just structures smaller than 100 manometer like in today's chips.

One concept of nano computer is shown here:

We thought that ~50million casualties per year would create more of research pressure for biogerontologists, but apparently we were wrong. No one should be sure of anything based on such simplified models and assumptions.

But here the research pressure will be fuelled by profit expectation and increasing demand of computer power and application in our everyday life, like for instance gaming.

Unfortunately profit and recreation is a lot more powerful drive in our society than to improve or save life of old people, further more because most of the society thinks there's no way to prevent old people from dying soon or later and restore them to an healthy and productive state, so it might be seen has a waste of resources, and religions is also a barrier.

By the way I'm not sure of anything, I'm just expressing my ideas, but I don't feel my assumption are more simplified than yours.

Because, well, all chips eventually die? E.g. through electromigration. Intel et al. know exactly what they're doing. They don't need exponential growth and neither do their customers.

Do you really think that replacement malfunctioning chips will bring the same amount of profit than replacement of outdated one ?

Did you replaced your last computer because the chip was malfunctioning ?

I was talking about my cpc 6128 but in fact all my old's chips are still working fine, I had some trouble with a mother board ones but that's all,

Ami ga 600, pentium 150, celeron 3300 etc.. all those chips are working fine, I might be wrong but I don't think any study shows that recent chips have shorter functioning expectancy than old one.

In fact I would rather think that new computer are cheaper better build and last longer than previous one even though they are more complex at each generation.

My previous cell phones are working fine too.

Except my that my old's ones were bigger, had less power autonomy and I could only make phone calls with them.

Now I can listen to radio, mp3, take pictures, make films, play games, access internet, and I almost forgot make phone calls, but beside all those new functions they are not less reliable than before, it's rather the contrary.

I might change to a new one in order to have the GPS functionality in the same device.

[kismet]

Personally I believe any major investments in AGI on our side are a dangerous waste of resources.

Can you elaborate why ?

I don't believe in the near term singularity. I don't think it's remotely as useful or even as feasible as short term gerontology or SENS style research. We will be all dead before the singularity does *something*, we're not even sure what it would do. Don't like that thought at all. Furthermore, we can't do a whole lot to accelerate it.

Because, well, all chips eventually die? E.g. through electromigration. Intel et al. know exactly what they're doing. They don't need exponential growth and neither do their customers.

Do you really think that replacement malfunctioning chips will bring the same amount of profit than replacement of outdated one ?

Possibly. Maybe even more profit as you won't need to pay billions to innovate (updating fabs costs "only" several hundred millions of dollars per node [per fab AFAIK], yay!)

Did you replaced your last computer because the chip was malfunctioning ?

Yeah, it was malfunctioning and I wanted a faster computer.

Ami ga 600, pentium 150, celeron 3300 etc.. all those chips are working fine, I might be wrong but I don't think any study shows that recent chips have shorter functioning expectancy than old one.

In fact I would rather think that new computer are cheaper better build and last longer than previous one even though they are more complex at each generation.

No, as far as I've been told it's the opposite. That's one of the reasons why NASA does not use newer chips. Smaller circuit -> easier damaged by radiation, electromigration, etc.

Edited by kismet, 04 June 2009 - 09:06 PM.

[Mr. Jingles]

The people in charge of society are taking steps to prevent Moore's Law from applying to personal computing. What that means is that distributed computing projects like Foldiong@home will not benefit from it.

What is being attempted is to change personal computers into consumer electronic gadgets. Rather than having PCs that keep relative pace with the computing available to institutions, they shall become:

• a multimedia entertainment center
• an audio/video/text communicator
• a game machine
• an network portal
• a consumer application platform
• a personal security/surveillance device
• all in a lightweight form factor; something one can type on, and a screen size based on the keyboard

Think along the lines of One Laptop Per Child. Actually, those machines will probably be better. The computing power of the consumer machines will be graphics-oriented in such a way that it will be very difficult to hack it to do non-graphics processing.

A massive delay to the transformative and democratizing enevitability of exponentially exponential computing power becoming ubiquitous seems to be becoming a reality.

Edited by Mr. Jingles, 08 June 2009 - 04:27 PM.