Is everything a religion?

[Aeson]

In an augmented state where human analytical power is and memory capacity/stability are both vastly increased, I hold the belief that we will drop warfare and damaging forms of competition. They are archaic evolutionary artifacts that are already overcome by most humans most of the time.

The alternative is we eliminate ourselves.

[Aeson]

I think a lot of talk about what constitutes "real" AI conflates sentience, intelligence, and free will. While those concepts are clearly linked in terms of what we observe--humans--we have enough science fiction out there to imagine something different--that is, to see them as distinct concepts that don't necessarily imply each other. It might turn out that the concepts are inextricably, fundamentally linked, but I don't think we're at all knowledgeable enough yet to say that they are.

My use of the term here is an algorithm which is self improving and can generate its own goals within some higher level framework.

Sentience (as in experiencing consciousness of the kind I experience) is probably a state we can never prove to another being.

The problems and benefits with AI manifest themselves whether the lights are on or not.

[Lorizael]

The alternative is we eliminate ourselves.

http://www.vhemt.org/

[Elok]

In an augmented state where human analytical power is and memory capacity/stability are both vastly increased, I hold the belief that we will drop warfare and damaging forms of competition. They are archaic evolutionary artifacts that are already overcome by most humans most of the time.

The alternative is we eliminate ourselves.

War has been pushed to the periphery of the "civilized" world by nuclear weapons. Right up to the invention of the A-bomb, we were going at it hammer and tongs, sometimes killing tens of thousands in a single battle. Since then we have settled into an uneasy truce amongst ourselves while flailing the hell out of anybody too puny to have nukes or be under the committed protection of somebody with nukes. This is not the result of our moral growth as a species, only of technological change, and the status quo is obviously not stable because it depends on nobody being stupid, crazy, or vicious enough to actually use them. Which depends on the technology being contained to a self-selected few. North Korea is the obvious canary in this coal mine, but the technology can't be contained forever even if they went sane or lost all their nukes overnight. And it's not like all those miserable proxy wars are signs of enlightenment anyway.

As to augmented memory and whatever, leaving aside any technical issues which I know nothing of, that would only increase inequality between humans in addition to consuming extra finite resources. War is only irrational if one takes a cosmopolitan view, assuming the good of the whole human race as an end goal. In practical terms, societies look out for their own interests, and even when they don't, or claim they don't, the results are still war more often than not, and no less horrible for the ostensible good intentions. As the past fifteen years have taught us. The existence of supermen would raise various urgent questions, depending on perspective, to wit: "How can I become super too, and get what they have?" "How can we destroy the supermen, who threaten to dominate us?" and "How can I maintain my superiority by preventing others from becoming supermen?" All three questions are most readily answered by violence.

[Elok]

Unless, of course, you modify human nature so thoroughly as to make a being without basic human desires, in which case the rest of humanity will correctly view said being as a potential usurper of the Earth, and do their best to annihilate it.

[Proteus_MST]

Unless, of course, you modify human nature so thoroughly as to make a being without basic human desires, in which case the rest of humanity will correctly view said being as a potential usurper of the Earth, and do their best to annihilate it.

Or declare it a god/higher being and venerate it

[Elok]

Do you have any ideas about religions, or religious people, that are not variations on Sister Miriam?

[Elok]

I mean, seriously. We don't all bounce between going ooga-booga to cargo-cult idols and chasing after witches with pitchforks.

EDIT: For context, I personally have only killed one witch in my life, and it was his fault. He tried to steal my soul with a demonic picture-making box.

[Proteus_MST]

I mean, seriously. We don't all bounce between going ooga-booga to cargo-cult idols and chasing after witches with pitchforks.

Not all of you, of course.
Here in germany we have lots of religous moderates (my mother is one of them) and I myself was raised in the lutheran evangelial faith and I defiiniely wouldn' include such moderatesin the statement I made.
But there is always a certain percentage oof religious people who are more extreme.
(and, there also is a certain percentage of people who will jump into the bandwagon of a new guru/god as soon as it is presented to them ... else newer cults like Scientology, Aum Shinrikyo or Baghwan wouldn't have gained the followership they have ...soit isn't too farfetched to assume that the Nietzschean Ãœbermensch you described wuld also gain a certain (probably large) amount of followers)

[Elok]

I really can't envision a scenario where people would worship a modified human, outside of dystopian stuff where most of the population regresses into utter savagery while a small core retains wealth and knowledge. And that scenario itself is improbable. In all feasible scenarios, the normal humans would be at least somewhat aware of how the enhanced variety got enhanced, and either covet the power for themselves or seek to destroy those who have it. I could see religion getting worked into it, but in a dopey worship-the-hive-mind sort of way among the enhanced set.

[BlackCat]

Maybe it's so that religion has served it's purpose and now is outdated.

[Aeson]

War has been pushed to the periphery of the "civilized" world by nuclear weapons. Right up to the invention of the A-bomb, we were going at it hammer and tongs, sometimes killing tens of thousands in a single battle. Since then we have settled into an uneasy truce amongst ourselves while flailing the hell out of anybody too puny to have nukes or be under the committed protection of somebody with nukes. This is not the result of our moral growth as a species, only of technological change, and the status quo is obviously not stable because it depends on nobody being stupid, crazy, or vicious enough to actually use them. Which depends on the technology being contained to a self-selected few. North Korea is the obvious canary in this coal mine, but the technology can't be contained forever even if they went sane or lost all their nukes overnight. And it's not like all those miserable proxy wars are signs of enlightenment anyway.

As to augmented memory and whatever, leaving aside any technical issues which I know nothing of, that would only increase inequality between humans in addition to consuming extra finite resources. War is only irrational if one takes a cosmopolitan view, assuming the good of the whole human race as an end goal. In practical terms, societies look out for their own interests, and even when they don't, or claim they don't, the results are still war more often than not, and no less horrible for the ostensible good intentions. As the past fifteen years have taught us. The existence of supermen would raise various urgent questions, depending on perspective, to wit: "How can I become super too, and get what they have?" "How can we destroy the supermen, who threaten to dominate us?" and "How can I maintain my superiority by preventing others from becoming supermen?" All three questions are most readily answered by violence.

As I noted the alternative is we destroy ourselves.

Nukes keep the relative peace (for those who have them) because they make the mutually harmful outcome of war obvious enough that virtually everyone can grasp that it is in their best interest for there to not be war (between nuclear powers). It could fall apart is the wrong combination of leaders/nations ignore it. It literally would be ignorance of the highest order. (Assuming the nation isn't mostly comprised of suicidal individuals.)

For those who are already able to quantify it properly, there is not a chasm between self interest and the greater good of humanity. They are in fact highly dependent on each other. We would all quickly be vastly better off if we worked together than by working against each other. This is even true of the richest people who have ever lived, who have and are living lives that are or will be considered "destitute" at a later date.

The problem is most people aren't very good at mapping out the vast number of causal interactions even on a high level of abstraction or predicting how changing factors would affect them. This is a problem both of lack of processing power and corruptible, unstable, and limited memory.

People also aren't very good at remembering what is in their long term interest, often losing sight of it for short term payouts, and regretting it soon after. Again, a problem of computation and memory.

So what happens when we remove those processing and memory constraints? My view is that it becomes undeniable to all who have removed those constraints that we are better off helping each other out and working towards a mutually beneficial future (not even long term, on the order of weeks or months) than competing with each other.

Those augmented will join with those already capable of such vision in solving problems (including mental health) and helping others. They will see that it is in their best interest to do so, and their capability will prove invaluable to those who either haven't been augmented yet, or choose not to be. Quickly all those open to augmentation will be given access to it. Increasing the amount of good being done and the percent of the populace capable of seeing and keeping in mind the vast benefit of cooperation and peace. All working together to prove that peace and cooperation is beneficial to those who can't yet process it themselves ...

... or we destroy ourselves.

Resource scarcity won't be an issue unless we are very wrong about population growth trends. Even if it were to raise its head, it would still be obvious to those with higher processing power/data storage that consuming a little less and continuing to exist is better than trying to consume more and being eliminated.

[Proteus_MST]

I really can't envision a scenario where people would worship a modified human, outside of dystopian stuff where most of the population regresses into utter savagery while a small core retains wealth and knowledge. And that scenario itself is improbable. In all feasible scenarios, the normal humans would be at least somewhat aware of how the enhanced variety got enhanced, and either covet the power for themselves or seek to destroy those who have it. I could see religion getting worked into it, but in a dopey worship-the-hive-mind sort of way among the enhanced set.

People worshipped Baghwan Shree Rayneesh and Swami Praphupada (to mention 2 of the gurus of the 20th century) ... both mortal beings ... in a way people also worship(ped) Siddharta Gautama (despite the fact that his religion defnitely isn't meant to be about worshipping him, but rather finding the core of yourself)

[Aeson]

Methods by which we destroy ourselves... augmentation is developed as a military tech, the first to be augmented are sociopaths, resistance to augmentation as "unnatural" or "against God" is widespread, etc.

They aren't that unlikely. But it's much better to believe in a good future, have the hope that working towards it is beneficial, and one day be disappointed, than believe in a horrific future and never experience hope or the interim benefits of the actions and experiences they lead to.

[Proteus_MST]

As I noted the alternative is we destroy ourselves.
Nukes keep the relative peace (for those who have them) because they make the mutually harmful outcome of war obvious enough that virtually everyone can grasp that it is in their best interest for there to not be war (between nuclear powers). It could fall apart is the wrong combination of leaders/nations ignore it. It literally would be ignorance of the highest order. (Assuming the nation isn't mostly comprised of suicidal individuals.)
...

I think the problem is that with rising nuclear proliferation the danger becomes much higher, that a nuke comes into possession of terrorist group.
The danger IMHO already now is not low in Pakistan (where parts of the population iss connected with the Taliban and other extremist groups)

And I have no doubt that if, for example, IS gets into possession of a Nuke, it would not hesitate to use it