In a message dated 03/13/2000 3:28:32 PM Eastern Standard Time,
hal@finney.org writes:
> Most people would not say that we should fight tooth and nail against
> our children to prevent them from shoving us off the earth prematurely.
> Yet they will say exactly that with regard to our mind children.
> This sounds to me like mindless genetic programming talking, and needs
> to be better justified if we are going to seriously oppose AI because
> of its potentially superior survival abilities.
>
I just read the April 2000 WIRED issue tonight and found it somehow
dispiriting. Very much a glum forecast for genetic tech and nanotech. This
was even from some of my favs like George Dyson. Its like every section of
the article was a Silent Spring, or more like an On the Beach. I would go
further then Moravec and say that the Mind Children are not merely our
successors, but in fact are us, complete. I don't advocate embracing the
compu-future of the species till we actually materially see what that future
is. If it turns out disappointing, we should always have the option of
staying meat and bone, till the tech is perfected
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Thu Jul 27 2000 - 14:05:05 MDT