Re: Confronting The Singularity Conference

From: Robin Hanson (rhanson@gmu.edu)
Date: Tue May 30 2000 - 07:39:36 MDT


phil osborn wrote:
>Minsky was on PBS recently - a panel on the future of the internet, as I
>recall. He now puts the Singularity - as far as real AI - at about 2073,
>to my surprise.

That is a pretty specific date; did he mention how he calculated it?

On the conference, I enjoyed my time there, but there were so many
parallel tracks that I can't claim my experience was representative.
I did two economics sessions, one on singularity economics and another
on nano-economics, and spend the rest of my formal time at an
idea futures section. As usual, I most enjoyed just talking to people
informally outside the formal sessions.

I wonder what would happen if you organized a "party/poster" conference
by just having a very large room with dozens of whiteboards, and with
snacks and chairs distributed throughout. There would be no official
schedule or map, and you'd spend the whole weekend wandering about joining
whatever discussions or presentations formed "spontaneously." Any dispute
about what a group talked about in a location would be handled as at a
party, with the option of one group walking away to do what they want
somewhere else.

Robin Hanson rhanson@gmu.edu http://hanson.gmu.edu
Asst. Prof. Economics, George Mason University
MSN 1D3, Carow Hall, Fairfax VA 22030
703-993-2326 FAX: 703-993-2323



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