From: Robert J. Bradbury (bradbury@aeiveos.com)
Date: Sun May 25 2003 - 13:36:15 MDT
On Sun, 25 May 2003, Spike wrote:
> No rabbits or hats. Use ordinary physics as we know it with
> some imaginative engineering, starting with your own concept
> of an Mbrain made up of nodes with reflective surfaces. [snip]
Reasonable -- I'd particularly like a reflective surface that
reflects the UV and not the IR or visible photons (one uses
the energy low energy photons for power while using the
higher energy photons [that normally damage your nanotech]
to heat up the sun. Balancing orbital positioning requirements
with solar heating requirements might get a tad tricky but one
does have lots of computronium to deal with it.
Did not use a makeup mirror to heat things up as a child.
I believe I was a bit more scientific and used a magnifying
glass... :-) Don't think my mother wore much makeup...
> Humans are apparently the first emergent sentience here in
> this galaxy.
I think you are in Eliezer's camp with this comment spike,
but I still remain less convinced.
See my reasoning, esp. points 1-5 at the end of this msg.
http://forum.javien.com/XMLmessage.php?id=id::XScpV30s-aRg1-DzBC-XCo9-OS9yOBcPd3lO
To make a strong assertion that our galaxy is "dead" you
have to make a number of other strong assertions.
E.g.
a) that stars are the best sources for resources (energy & matter);
b) that advanced civilizations see any point into "expanding/colonization"
(when anybody with half a computer science education [such as myself] knows
that the speed-of-light limitations dictate that one wants to grow smaller
*not* larger and so even a really primitive AI would recognize that
interstellar colonization is a stupid idea);
c) that there aren't ways out of this universe into better universes in the
multiverse;
etc., etc.
And I'm going to state fairly strongly that I don't think
either you or Eliezer have come close to making these cases
as far as I'm concerned. As such -- you cannot assert that
we are the "first emergent sentience here in this galaxy" (IMO).
> If there were other intelligences in this galaxy, I am at a loss
> to explain why they aren't here by now, as well as everywhere else.
Thats an extremely anthropocentric perspective. If I were an
advanced civilization I might go to where I could grow the most
or I might go to where I could think most productively or
I might go to where I could survive the longest.
Just because humans tend to colonize doesn't mean more advanced
rational species find this an interesting activity. The argument
is always made: "well if even one species does it they would
be all over the galaxy". DUH... if a species is capable of
interstellar travel it is capable of constructing a *LOT*
of very big telescopes and so it is going to know precisely
what is "out there" within the limits of speed-of-light
limitations. I suspect humans would think several times
about whether to go colonize a star system 50 light years
if they discovered even a primitive species 500 light years
away. How do you know how they might develop or where
they may be technologically or how they might have expanded
into their physical environment in the 500 years (assuming
0.1c travel speed) it is going to take you to get to the
system you want to colonize.
An interstellar colonization mission presumably isn't
something one undertakes lightly and one is going to
want to believe fairly strongly that it *will* be successful.
Do your associates at Lockheed simply throw up a satellite
with an attitude of "Lets go for it -- maybe it will work
out..."
> Perhaps we do not yet recognize ETI because we do not know what it
> looks like.
This I agree with.
> Do let us mercifully spare the next emergent ETI this puzzle by
> getting to its star and being there waiting for it to emerge.
You are assuming that stars are the destinations of choice
and I think that is open to significant discussion.
Robert
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