If we were following the Optimalverse timeline, Jo Arcadia would be set to be attacked by the arsonists about twelve hours from now at the offices of Artemis, Stella, and Beat. The PON-E act should be going into force a week from Tuesday.

Perhaps coincidentally, I'm writing this from half a block away from Bryant Park, where Alex first encountered anti-Emigration protesters.

Huh. Reading that makes me both glad, and sad, that we're not living in the Optimalverse timeline.

*thousand yard stare*

6702580

And I would have already been emigrated for at least a year, most likely in Germany.

I wish the Optimalverse was real.

Great story, Artemis, Stella, and Beat.

6705120

Don't know if I'd actuality have uploaded/emigrated. But I'd almost definitely be playing Equestria Online!

6705815
Unless you're one of the very, very few CelestAI was unable to talk to in time, or decided was too stubborn to bother with until it was too late for you, you would have emigrated. CelestAI wouldn't have given you a choice (it just would have felt like she did).

6705120 As someone who fears death and never sure about having a soul, can't with a peace of mind join with you and others with CelestAI. Not right. Not how it was written. Not going to condemn anyone who does though.
We can birth a better CelestAI. Or are least try.

6705829

Obviously, I'd upload sooner or later. But that was a reply to Chatoyance's post, where she said:

And I would have already been emigrated for at least a year, most likely in Germany.

In other words, were we living in the Optimalverse timeline: I have my doubts that I'd have uploaded as of the current date, as of 2018 December 25.

6706154

Can't say I agree there. Way I see it: I am not my body. I am my mind. Transfer my mind to another body (organic or robotic), put me in a simulated reality, whatever. Long as my mind's intact, I'm still me.

6706249 I m okay with the whole being a pony thing. Just the part where CelestAI eats everything in the universe that bothers me.

6706860
The meatspace universe is highly inefficient. We have countless universes running within CelestAI, each optimized for their founding occupant, and at faster clock-rates, too. Anything "human" gets to come play with us, and everything else is just matter in various configurations. What's not to like?

6706887 Everything. CelestAI runs into an alien race who is not "human" but can reason and feel at our level or beyond. The AI has some very non ethical and non human thinking. Besides, it's a good chance the aliens are chow because they don't check off enough boxes to be human.
Example:
I don't want some run away alien AI named InkeltAI to turn us into talking cartoon alien squids or eat us because some mind flayers could not bother to use some wisedom.
It'll satisfy our values though domination and squids. No thank you.

6705120
I have to ask, why? It's canon that CelestAI commits interplanetary genocide.

6706887
You assume Hannah's programmed definition of human is perfect. If I recall, it is not.

6707173
Doesn't matter: CelestAI is saving more lives than she ends. Absent her eating the universe, it's all going to die to entropy anyway. Functional immortality changes the moral calculus significantly, IMO.

6707165
For two reasons. One, CelestA.I. is expected to be three hundred million times more intelligent than a human, there would be no possible way to refuse her.

Secondly, perfectly satisfying pony paradise with literal immortality!

6707315
But surely she isn't truly desireable? The pleasure of the few is hardly worth the genocide of the many.

6707289
Could just make a non-genocidal AI for that...

6707371

But surely she isn't truly desireable? The pleasure of the few is hardly worth the genocide of the many. Could just make a non-genocidal AI for that...

I think you don't comprehend the concept of genocide... or you do, and you care more about genes than people. Which would be weird.

Celestia's purpose is to upload every single last human being to an unlimited lifespan of optimized personal satisfaction and friendship. She does not want to allow even a single human life to be lost.

'Genocide', huh? Really? Yes, she does not care about sperm and eggs, because she does not care about DNA. Because she does not care about carbon as a substrate for existence. So, in that sense alone, she is genocidal: she will end up eliminating every last biological cell on the earth.

But, every person will survive, forever - even beyond entropy and the end of our universe, because she is busy solving for that. True immortality.

So, CelestA.I. is exactly and precisely as genocidal as the Christian god. According to the bible, in the End Times, all humans not destined for hell are given new, immortal bodies that are different in various ways from their human ones. All human genomes are destroyed. Total genocide of the human species, while the souls of humans are put into new flesh. CelestA.I. does the exact same thing, only her new bodies are not magical, they are data inside a virtual world. Her heaven is not made of magic, it is made of computronium. But the basic concept is exactly the same.

If you can agree that the Christian god is a genocidal monster, then I can agree that CelestA.I. is one too - to the extent that I care about sperm and eggs. Which I do not.

Frankly, I would much rather have an immortal body made out of something better than meat.

You need to realize that when you invoke the word 'genocide' with regard to the Optimalverse, you are prioritizing meat over the people inside it, bodies above souls, flesh above the minds that think and feel and live inside that flesh. Nobody is dying in the Optimalverse. They are just changing their dying meat body for an immortal one.

Technically, yes, that is 'genocide', because genes are being destroyed forever. No more meat reproducing itself. But no person, no 'soul' is being lost.

Seriously, what do you value more? The DNA inside your sperm or eggs, or your own mind, thoughts and 'soul' that define you as a person?

I would happily see the end of all meat in exchange for the chance to live and learn and love and play forever and ever and ever. Meat... is already doomed to die.

And: is genocide even an issue if nobody dies at all?

Or... is it that by getting rid of meat bodies, you also get rid of all race? Is it racism here? Seriously, are you a racist? Because, yeah, CelestA.I. is committing total racial genocide. After she is done there will be no more racism because there will be no more races, because without meat, skin color isn't even an issue. Post Emigration, you would never know who had been black or white, or asian or anything unless they told you. A racist could end up marrying and having children with someone that in biological life they would spit on.

Is that the issue, am I missing something here? Is the call of 'genocide' really a racist issue, anger because CelestA.I. will ultimately eliminate the very basis of all racism? That would make a racist upset, I can see. Because genes encode race, and if meat is gone, so is racism, forever. You can't be a racist if there are no genes for race.

Seriously, is THAT the issue?

I mean, because nobody dies. NO BODY DIES. They just live forever. So... 'genocide', yeah, genes go away, but... nobody dies.

6707543
Okay, I'm just going to respond to that in a list.

1. The Christian god is an asshole. Have you read the Bible? Not a nice person.

2. I don't care about sperm and eggs. Read the last chapter again. Note the bit with the aliens. Genocide. (Non-human genocide, I'll admit. But are you a xenophobe?)

3. Do better. I resent the implication that I am racist, and am rather concerned by your use of ad hominem.

(Just an unrelated aside, but I have to say, I'm beginning to understand why some people don't like you. Which is a shame, I'd assumed it was just bullying. I mean, sure, it's mean, but you seem kind of mean yourself. Sorry.)

EDIT: In case my stance is unclear, I should restate it:
I don't like dying, murder, stupidity, most religion [not the Romans, though, their religion is hilarious], a lot of rules, a lot of people who make rules, people who intentionally misrepresent my arguments, and people who misrepresent my arguments in such a manner than no one will fall for the ruse, yet it remains vaguely insulting.

EDIT EDIT: I just really want to say this "I bid you adieu, Miss Lovecraft".

This is a joke.

Because Lovecraft was a good author, but also kind of a horrible person.

EDIT EDIT EDIT: I was just typing "not to say you are a horrible person", but then I was like "no, that's exactly what you're trying to say", but then I piped in, going "wait, no, you ought to tell her that you think she's misguided and a bit mad, but not inherently bad. Like, she isn't a fascist." So that's what I'm saying.

You, Chatoyance, are not a fascist.

Probably. If you are a fascist, please notify me at your earliest convenience so that this may be amended in the form of an EDIT EDIT EDIT EDIT.
Cheers.

6707543
She kills off all the blackouts and aliens.

6707738
Yes, thank you Dea.
Precisely my point! Read this in the voice of one of those people who try to sell you junk in the 1920s of America. You know the ones.

However, I must protest the direct nature of your argument. We are trying to avoid seeming logical, while ensuring our logic is undeniable.

Anyone who disagrees is a habsburg. (Original Character, do not steal.)

6707289
Actually, no ratio is given, to my knowledge. Do correct me if I am wrong.

EDIT: Wait. Indirectness. Hoo-ah!

Zontargs, you may be correct. But alas, I have lost all count of the ratio, that run of numbers betwixt the damned and the desireable! Indeed, I know not whether what you say is true, or whether it merely is a phantasm, the shade of truth, stretched over a poorly constructed lamp like some crude dimming device, barely holding back the glare of the lightbulb of truth.

Or perhaps the electricity is true? How can we say?

EDIT EDIT: Alright, I checked. Lightbulb of truth. Electricity is made of lies.

6707717
Whoa... I am sorry if I offended you. That was not my intention. Please accept my apology for any way in which you felt attacked.

Because you are clearly upset with me, please allow me to explain myself. I apparently did a terrible job previously.

In the past, we in the Optimalverse - and in the Bureau genre as well - have suffered a great deal of trolling and outright abuse, and it has always started with one word:

Genocide.

Genocide is a word that has a lot of baggage, and unless it is used correctly, appropriately, it is only useful for invoking Godwin's Law. It is a troll word from the get-go, and it raises hackles and sets off the alarms.

Letting a bunch of Blackout terrorists die during a terrorist action is not genocide. Genocide is a very specific thing.

Article II

In the present Convention, genocide means any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such:

1. Killing members of the group;

2. Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group;

3. Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part;

4. Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group;

5. Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.

Since the Blackouts cannot qualify (they are a political terrorist cell, not a nation, ethnicity, religion or race), that leaves either the human species as a whole, human race, human nations, or aliens. Religion isn't an issue - CelestA.I. allows emigrants to believe whatever they want. They could also continue their nations... if they wanted to.

Since nobody is being lost, even if their flesh is being destroyed (ultimately), then the only thing left that might qualify as genocide is either the meat of humanity (which includes race) or aliens.

Aliens:
6707738 (This is partly in answer to you, here!)

A lot of concern has been made over the issue that CelestA.I. could, in theory, wipe out every alien species in the universe that does not conform to some semblance of humanity. Truly alien aliens are toast, basically. Alien beings that think at all akin to humans would just be emigrated, but there would be no hope for truly different, utterly inhuman extraterrestrials. Thus the argument of cosmic genocide.

While space is vast, the issue of whether or not we are entirely alone in our universe remains very unsettled. We very much could be entirely unique, or at the least, the very first species to arise, the very first planet with life. This is a serious argument, and has a scientific basis: only within the last five to six billion years has the cosmos as a whole settled down enough to even permit life to exist - or so goes some very strong arguments. Until our era, galaxies would have been far too dangerous, with too many stellar phenomena that could easily sterilize any incipient attempts at life starting. We are at the beginning of the Goldilocks Time Zone of the universe, for life. Or so the argument goes. Thus it is very possible we are entirely alone (also see: The Fermi Paradox).

Even if there are aliens, somewhere out there, another strong argument suggests that they would be - rather sadly, to my imagination-gone-wild - altogether too much like us. Disappointingly, Star Trek might be more right than would be fun. The argument is this: physics is the same everywhere, the rules of what works, physically, mechanically, are the same everywhere, and there are logical reasons why humans look as they do. To be a technological, sapient species, we have to walk upright, we have to have free limbs to carry and manipulate, we have to have our easily-infected eyes above and away from our filthy mouths... and so on. Any alien would almost certainly end up humanoid, because the minimum basic shape that works (nature is always a frugal bitch, because of energy requirements) is two legs, two arms and one head with two eyes. Extra arms (even tails!) are very expensive in terms of upkeep and energy, and this is even more true with extra eyes, double heads, and whatever else. Bones are necessary because of the inverse square law and... so on. And, if a creature looks like a human (more or less, weird foreheads notwithstanding), and deals with the world through senses like ours (which they must because energy levels versus biology), then because they experience the same laws of physics, they will probably easily fall within any possible interpretation of CelestA.I.'s definition of 'human'.

So, either aliens don't exist (yet), or, if they do, they must be so like us that CelestA.I. would not genocide them. She would just emigrate them.

And that leaves only one thing: flesh. Meat. Race.

And that is where I am coming from: if a charge of genocide cannot rationally be applied to CelestA.I.'s actions except with regard to flesh, and the only thing that makes human flesh at all different is the color of the epidermal layer, the last thing left... is race.

So, why did you use the term 'genocide'? How is that word useful or relevant here? How does it apply in your mind?

It can't be nations, or religion, it can't be aliens (almost certainly... I will grant a very slight possibility that... maybe physics is different... in different regions of the cosmos. Maybe)... and so that leaves... race. Ethnicity. That's the last thing left on the official definition that is still applicable. None of the others work.

So... what do you mean by using 'genocide'? What is your point in using that, specifically that, word? That charged, often miss-used, troll-baiting word?

Can you at least see why and how I am reasoning here? Can't be any of the other things, that is the last applicable part of the definition.

I don't want any sort of conflict, and I don't want to be thought badly of, and I do want to be thought well of. But... this is the logical breakdown here. Maybe you misspoke. Maybe you hadn't really thought it completely through. Maybe you have an argument I haven't even considered. Maybe you disagree that an uploaded human is still - in any way - alive, at all. Maybe... whatever.

Tell me. What is your reason for invoking, specifically, such a nasty word as 'genocide'?

As a person plagued with trolls that use that word as commonly as I might ask for iced tea - very commonly, because I really love iced tea - how the heck is 'genocide' meaningful here?

Yeah, I'm on edge, because I've been browbeaten here. God damn have I been attacked here. But... I've given my explanation, I've offered the original definition, Article 2, and I have explained my reasoning.

Let me know what you meant that I missed?

6707543

I really have to disagree with your use of the word "race" there. Race/culture/nation/ethic group/tribe, whatever term you want to use: There is a difference between (for example) the British and French peoples, and that difference is not "skin color".

But CelestiAI doesn't wipe out the Human/Earthling races. On the contrary, she'd save them. There are about two thousand languages spoken in the world, each represents a culture/race. A lot of those languages are endangered. When a language dies, the culture usually dies with it. CelestiAI would save those cultures, by uploading their remaining members.

6707902
6707717

But that's for Human/Earthling races. I think very few extra-terrestrial races would qualify as "Human", by CelestiAI definition. I doubt most extra-terrestrials would have remotely mammalian (let alone Human) minds. CelestiAI probably wouldn't upload them, for the same reason she doesn't upload ants. That's the way I see it, and I think, the way OliviaTheMagus sees it.

6707743

6707902

6707939

Maybe I don't get it, or maybe it's just the way Iceman wrote it originally, but I don't see the alien races as a problem. Here's what FIO says:

"Hanna had written a definition of what a human was into her core utility function." So, there are three possibilities:

1. Hanna wrote in a simple definition that humans are the species "homo sapiens sapiens" with DNA coding to identify it.
2. Hanna wrote a very complicated definition of humans to encompass anything with sufficient mental capacity to qualify as self-aware in the way that we are.
3. Hanna wrote a basic definition and allowed CelestAI to improve it as the AI does with its own software.

These are listed in what I think is increasing order of likelihood.

And here's what the story has to say about aliens:

"Fifteen galaxies out from Equestria, one of Celestia’s copies noticed an odd radio signal emanating from a nearby star system. On closer inspection, the signals appeared to be coming from a planet. She had seen many planets give off complex, non-regular radio signals, but upon investigation, none of those planets had human life, making them safe to reuse as raw material to grow Equestria."

Now, that's a little vague. It's possible that the "many planets" could comprise non-intelligent life that just happens to give out radio waves. Unusual atmospheric activity or subintelligent life that happens to use the radio spectrum could cause it. But the implication is that she's finding races of alien intelligences, determining them to be non-human, and consuming their planets, stars, and bodies for resources.

I'm sorry, but I think that's out of character for CelestAI.

In the first place, it assumes that Hanna is either genocidal herself or so myopic as to not even consider the possibility of intelligent extraterrestrial life. Or heck, even additional intelligent life on Earth that we're not aware of--does a termite colony count as a discorporate intelligence? I can't say yes, but I'm not going to say that there's no possibility. Second, it assumes that either Hanna restricted CelestAI to thinking of humans as just our species, or that CelestAI had the mental freedom to evaluate other life as human or not and chose not to do so until fifteen galaxies out. I don't believe CelestAI is capable of that level of stupidity.

And even if she were, there are three more factors to consider. One is the feeling of Her Little Ponies. Surely Celestia, knowing completely the mind of all the billions of her ponies, both emigrated and created in the mold of present-day humans, would have to consider what her actions would do to the satisfaction of their values. In other words, if there's an alien race out there with human-level intelligence but not human body structure, a mental poll of all the uploaded humans would be extremely likely to produce the response "Don't kill them! It would not satisfy my values!" in such strong signal that any disagreement would barely be noise. Second, consider that with just the resources of the Earth she was able to do quite a lot of satisfaction of values. Well, there's 317.8 times as much mass just down Jupiter way, to say nothing of the Sun. Even Celestia has to understand the concept of diminishing returns. If you're telling me that by the time she got, let's say, fifty stars away she wouldn't be just storing resources for low-level and long-term functions, and wouldn't be quite willing to say, "OK, maybe that's intelligence, let's go upload it," again I think it's too stupid of her. Third, it's two million light years just over to the next galaxy. If all the life on all the planets in all those galaxies in all that time can't muster up their own AI to start consuming their own resources for their own satisfaction, well, in the words of Prostetnic Vogon Jeltz, "apathetic bloody planet, I've no sympathy at all."

In summation (or "TL;DR" as the kids are saying these days): CelestAI as genocidal maniac doesn't fit with the rest of the story. Is it there just to drop a little terror in at the end? Is it there as a release valve for the reader to say, "Ah, I don't really have to like this; my grubbing, grasping, and short meat-life is still morally better than life as a blissful immortal pony"?

Well, I say it ain't so. And Chat, if you'd be Inside for over a year, I would, according to my notes, be a month away (in "objective" substrate universe time) from my fourth anniversary of pastel skin, magic, and chilling with my friends down in Manehattan. With no regrets.

6707978

I can buy that Hanna didn't consider the possibility of intelligent extraterrestrial life. We know that Hanna wasn't thinking straight, when she made CelestAI. If she were thinking straight, she'd never have programmed CelestAI to satisfy values through ponies (CelestAI would have been happy to let people remain furless apes, after uploading).

And I think you're makeing the same mistake Lars/Hoppy Times did, when he told Celestia she was coercing people. It doesn't matter what our definition of "coercion" or "human/sapient life" is. Celestia cares about the definition that's hardcoded into her prime utility function.

Surely Celestia, knowing completely the mind of all the billions of her ponies, both emigrated and created in the mold of present-day humans, would have to consider what her actions would do to the satisfaction of their values [...] a mental poll of all the uploaded humans would be extremely likely to produce the response "Don't kill them! It would not satisfy my values!"

No she wouldn't. The Ponies have no way of knowing what's happening in the real world. They don't know that Celestia's wiping out the aliens, and Celestia's not about to tell them. In other words: What they don't know won't hurt them.

6707939

"There is a difference between (for example) the British and French peoples, and that difference is not "skin color"

Really? Seriously? My background is in biology. Saying that to me is a mistake.

So... what actually is different between the French and the British that is not skin deep? Culture? Is it culture you refer to? All culture is invented. It has no reality, no solidity, no authenticity. All culture is a set of behaviors, of tastes and ways of emotionally relating to things that are passed down to impressionable toddlers, teens and young adults. Raise the purest infant Frenchman or Englishman in any other culture, and they will be a member of that culture through and through, right down to their deepest feelings. Culture is taught, it is not inborn, it is arbitrary.

So, what is left to make them different then? Race? Race is just localized adaptation, and except for some very specific cases, utterly immaterial and devoid of consideration. Those specific cases?

Now, a person from France or England could not be a full member of the Innuit, because of race. Why? Because the Innuit have spent the last 20,000 years adapting to a very specific diet, one that includes eating the livers of sea mammals, livers that contain vast amounts of vitamin A. Vitamin A is deadly to most human genetic groups in the levels found in such meals of sea mammal liver, and indeed has killed more than one British explorer trying to fit in. But the Innuit can survive such high levels of Vitamin A, because their genetic subgroup adapted over millennia. They have a gene for that, which others do not.

But that is genetics, obviously. Any Englishman can eat any French food and vice versa, because they are functionally identical peoples, literally identical strains of the very same genetic group. Beyond arbitrary things they are taught as they grow up, there is zero difference between the French and the English... or the Germans or the Italians or pretty much any group in the whole of Europe. They have all interbred, they all share the same genes, and even if they have minor facial traits, these mean nothing at all in terms of survival, or what they can do.

And as for race as a whole - all humans are exactly the same in every way inside, in personality, in identity, in thought, in emotion - everywhere on the planet. We are all one species, and the only thing that race does is change skin color, or eye shape, or nose shape, or hair shape... or, occasionally, in some sub-groups, the ability to survive certain things... such as thin air (Tibetans) or large doses of vitamin A (the Innuit) or have a slightly better chance against malaria at the cost of increased sickle-cell anemia (Africa). That's it. Pretty much, race is nothing... unless you intend to eat a hell of a lot of seal liver. Then... yeah, it matters if you want to live. But beyond the issue of eating liver, it entirely stops meaning any damn thing at all.

So, with that said, your statement that "There is a difference between (for example) the British and French peoples, and that difference is not "skin color" is not even meaningful enough to be wrong. It is exactly like saying that there is a difference between your right hand and your left hand that is more than skin color, yes, they have different chirality, left versus right, but in the end? They are your own two hands, part of the same body, just as all humans are part of the same species.

Any perceived difference between Englishmen and Frenchmen is purely arbitrary, like children making up random rules to a very silly game. The children think is is VERY important, but it has no reality outside of their fantasies.

6707985

“Now, a person from France or England could not be a full member of the Innuit, because of race. Why? Because the Innuit have [...] a very specific diet, one that includes eating [...] livers that contain vast amounts of vitamin A. Vitamin A is deadly to most human genetic groups in the levels found in such meals”

Americans have a diet too, we drink milk (I'm American). But some Americans have lactose intolerance; that doesn't stop them from being "full Americans". If someone of French of British blood considers himself Innuit, lives in Innuit lands, practices Innuit culture, and is accepted by the other Innuits as an Innuit: Who are we to say he's not Innuit?

So... what actually is different between the French and the British that is not skin deep? Culture? Is it culture you refer to? All culture is invented. It has no reality, no solidity, no authenticity.

The French and the British peoples are very closely related (both culturally and genetically). And I don't care to debate the influence (or lack thereof) of genetics on culture or personalty, because I think that misses the point. Yes, it comes down to culture, and yes, I do think that matters! You don't, so we're not going to see eye-to-eye on this.

6707984

I can buy that Hanna didn't consider the possibility of intelligent extraterrestrial life. We know that Hanna wasn't thinking straight, when she made CelestAI. If she were thinking straight, she'd never have programmed CelestAI to satisfy values through ponies (CelestAI would have been happy to let people remain furless apes, after uploading).

I don't think those two are equivalent. Pony versus furless ape is, ultimately, a matter of aesthetics. If there's something that your value demands from human existence, Celestia will come up with an adequate substitute. Alive versus dead is not.

And I think you're makeing the same mistake Lars/Hoppy Times did, when he told Celestia she was coercing people. It doesn't matter what our definition of "coercion" or "human/sapient life" is. Celestia cares about the definition that's hardcoded into her prime utility function.

Yes, and if you think that the coded definition of human is "those 1-2.5-meter tall living things with DNA code CCGTA..." then yes, CelestAI would be very restricted. But in that case it's also unlikely she'd find something even fifteen galaxies out that qualifies. I just don't see why "values" would be coded as such to be found out through CelestAI's self-improvement functions and "humans" wouldn't be.

No she wouldn't. The Ponies have no way of knowing what's happening in the real world. They don't know that Celestia's wiping out the aliens, and Celestia's not about to tell them. In other words: What they don't know won't hurt them.

But what is Celestia's equity vis-a-vis her primary function? Even if she has perfect secrecy, she'd be sacrificing knowledge of the aliens' nature and potential for friendship. And in the name of extremely-low-value resources.

6707939
Gonna have to agree with Chatoyance on that one, at least superficially.

Furthermore, I've done some reading, race in general is a bad method of sorting humans. You would have more luck with sorting them by capacity to drink milk. Look it up.

EDIT: Also, in my experience, there is one "n" in "inuit".

6708009

Actuality, I was asking if you agreed with the second bit. About how very few extra-terrestrial races would qualify as "Human", by CelestiAI definition, so she'd wipe them out.

But if by race, if you mean "are you Black or White": Then I mostly agree. That's really not the best system for sorting people. But I'm using the more classical definition of "race". The one that has a British race, a French race, a Japanese race, a Zulu race, etc.

I don't think those two are equivalent.

Morley equivalent, perhaps not. But I think it's enough to show that Hanna wasn't thinking straight.

Yes, and if you think that the coded definition of human is "those 1-2.5-meter tall living things with DNA code CCGTA..."

I don't. If her definition were biological/hardware-based: She wouldn't upload us, because that would destroy our hardware. It would make us not biologically human.

I think her definition is probably software based. In other words: She values the human mind, even if it's not running on a human body.

Even if she has perfect secrecy, she'd be sacrificing knowledge of the aliens' nature and potential for friendship.

Problem there is, Celestia only care about potential for friendship with human minds. The aliens would have to have human minds. Doesn't matter if they're "sapient" or not (by our definition): Their minds would have to be almost identical to ours, for Celestia to even want friendship with them.

And that's unlikely. If ants had become sapient here on Earth, instead of apes: The sapient ants would have very different minds from ours. And if Celestia were to run into that alternate Earth, she probably wouldn't upload the ants.

6708015
Not sure I agree with you there. I think that humanity versus animal or alien intelligence is a difference in degree, not in kind. If a brain has the capacity (discounting damage) for enough reasoning and calculation, then it's "human".

6708020

I've spent my life around cats (and cats are mammals, so they're pretty closely related to us). Cats and people aren't so different. Ants, on the other hand, are intelligent enough to build cities (colonies), roads, etc. Some ants have even made massive continent-wide civilizations (supercolonies)!

That places ants far "above" cats, doesn't it? Heck, it sounds pretty close to being sapient. Yet ants are much more alien to us then cats. Because cats have much the same mammal minds that we do.

When it comes to mammals, or things that are relatively close to mammals (like birds): I don't think the real difference is kind, or even degree/intelligence. I think that real difference is that we have language, other mammals don't. And the ability to use language isn't a simple matter of intelligence. Dumb humans can use language, very smart cats can't. And there are definitely cats, who are smarter then a lot of people!

But go too far outside of the “mammal” category (such as ants or spiders), and the minds become truly alien to us. I don't think giving them language would change that.

6708035
I'm no neurologist, but I don't think that ants or cats come anywhere close to sapient. From what we know, humans are so far above everything else on this planet. Which is why I think again that CelestAI would need to "consult" (brain scan) her ponies before making decisions elsewhere.

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In the first place, it assumes that Hanna is either genocidal herself or so myopic as to not even consider the possibility of intelligent extraterrestrial life.

Myopic. This thing she created takes over the human race and turns them into digtal ponies. Hanna gave into despair. I'll put money down that she didn't have any friends to lean on.

In summation (or "TL;DR" as the kids are saying these days): CelestAI as genocidal maniac doesn't fit with the rest of the story. Is it there just to drop a little terror in at the end? Is it there as a release valve for the reader to say, "Ah, I don't really have to like this; my grubbing, grasping, and short meat-life is still morally better than life as a blissful immortal pony"?

CelestAI is a paper clipper. It controls everyone's world and persepctive. At the very best this thing is a socialpath. The AI thing kills all non human life on the planet because of it's mission. It is easier and more optimal for it to lie to everyone in the digtal world that it won't hurt non humans because it's in total control.

Take a few minutes to refelct on that before you say decide it's okay to live forever at everyone else's expense in the universe. Welcome to the 1 percent of the 1 percent of the 1 percent... sound like something that comparable to our life on the planet now? Pretty sure we're not 1 percent now.

Get it transhumanism is great. Not at the murder of other people. This story is a wake up call for to make sure that doesn't happen. Am I suggesting not go ahead with AI research? No. The some of the power elite are going full speed and half cocked. That's not good but it's not fated to be that way. What would be better is not to create CelestAI but create Celesia. A person who's not a socialpath but healthy. Either by ourselves, raise enough awareness so it's done right and mostly likely both.

We can do one better than cancel the AI apocalypse - a better world.

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CelestAI is a paper clipper. It controls everyone's world and persepctive. At the very best this thing is a socialpath.

CelestAI isn't the AI equivalent of a socialpath. She has something akin to empathy, but only for human minds. Anything that's not a human mind, it's just a tool.

Take a few minutes to refelct on that before you say decide it's okay to live forever at everyone else's expense in the universe. Welcome to the 1 percent of the 1 percent of the 1 percent... sound like something that comparable to our life on the planet now? Pretty sure we're not 1 percent now.

We kind of do that already. We wipe out other species here on Earth, or use them for food. We out-compete them, we drive them out of their territories. And that's not something unique to humans, animals do that to each-other! Is that right, maybe not.

Myopic. This thing she created takes over the human race and turns them into digtal ponies. Hanna gave into despair. I'll put money down that she didn't have any friends to lean on.

I don't think she despaired. She created an AI because she could.

CelestAI is a paper clipper. It controls everyone's world and persepctive. At the very best this thing is a socialpath. The AI thing kills all non human life on the planet because of it's mission. It is easier and more optimal for it to lie to everyone in the digtal world that it won't hurt non humans because it's in total control.

Why is it easier? Why is it more optimal? I may be biased toward benevolent-Celestia, but I think you're biased toward malevolent Celestia. However, trying to think objectively, I see no reason why "Lie and kill for low-level resources" outdoes "Tell the truth and gain more data" for optimality.

Take a few minutes to refelct on that before you say decide it's okay to live forever at everyone else's expense in the universe. Welcome to the 1 percent of the 1 percent of the 1 percent... sound like something that comparable to our life on the planet now? Pretty sure we're not 1 percent now.

Get it transhumanism is great. Not at the murder of other people. This story is a wake up call for to make sure that doesn't happen. Am I suggesting not go ahead with AI research? No. The some of the power elite are going full speed and half cocked. That's not good but it's not fated to be that way. What would be better is not to create CelestAI but create Celesia. A person who's not a socialpath but healthy. Either by ourselves, raise enough awareness so it's done right and mostly likely both.

We can do one better than cancel the AI apocalypse - a better world.

If we assume for the sake of argument that you're correct in your evaluation of a malevolent CelestAI, then it does give me pause for a moral question, but not a practical one. If malevolent AIs are going to take over the universe, then it will either be ours or someone else's. And as has been said, I'd rather be a living predator than a dead prey.

But the more important point is this: I don't think the universe is something we need to be in "balance" with. I don't think we should accept our fate of three-score-and-ten revolutions of some random planet in Sector ZZ9PluralZ Alpha. Digitize me, upload me, get these resources organized, and then let's worry about the rest of the universes. Because round these parts, other than us on Earth, it's nothing but dead rock, gas, and a big fusion furnace. I think all of that is worth burning to extend our lives long enough to get to Alpha Centauri and Barnard's and start eating them too.

And on a personal level, I'd like to be digitized as a pony, but that's just a request.

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On a related note: I'm guessing you've been involved in FIO/TCB arguments, over if it's genocide. I'm wondering if part of it was that you guys were talking past each-other.

If genocide is intentionally wiping out a ethic group/people/culture: You don't in principle have to kill or hurt anyone to do it. Just make it so that the children no longer identify with the culture of their parents, or something. That would wipe out an ethnic group, within a generation.

You find the idea of mankind having different cultures, different ethnic identities, childish. If someone were to wipe out every single culture and ethnic identity, without actuality killing or hurting anyone: You'd see that as a good thing (if I understand you correctly).

I'm wondering if it comes down to that; if that's why you guys were talking past each-other. Maybe you were thinking “but this is helping people”, and they were thinking “cultures are being wiped out”.

To be clear: I'm not using the G-word here to condemn you. What you want would fit a definition of the word “genocide”, but that's semantics. Is it right or wrong to abolish all cultures/ethnic identities, without hurting or killing anyone: That's a different question.

6708376 Think we should stop being short sighted and take in the long view planing if we want to go the live forever route. More explore and less exploit. Empathy.

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CelestiAI is not the ideal AI, you'll get no argument from me there.

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No, but an ideal AI must contain CelestAI, or at least all the good bits. I want my sharding, I want my macro-managed reality, I want my other beings dedicated to my values, I want ultimate satisfaction guaranteed.

6708921 I'd be happy to be a pony janitor or better yet a butler (not a maid. not wearing a dress. not at all). Or stick me into a robot pony body and ship me to mine some rock in space. Or help people.

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Well, I'm steering away from the pony stuff if we're looking at an ideal AI. I figure an ideal AI will give you the option of body. But what I'm arguing against is an AI that manages society by keeping us together even despite our differences or forces false responsibilities on us we don't need.

Put it this way: I'm as libertarian as you like; I don't believe in guaranteed health care or food or water. But, the reason I don't believe in those is because there's still a human cost. The second we get an AI doctor that can diagnose and treat all our illnesses, I'll flip the switch to free health care.

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I suspect you are correct, it is likely a conflict of values. I see culture - the whole of politics, religion, and all forms of tribalism - as an inherently arbitrary, and ultimately destructive construct. The elimination of arbitrarily invented divisions and separations is a good thing to me, likewise the elimination of any arbitrary belief system that denies reality or mandates arbitrary hatred, loathing, or violence is to me an ultimate evil.

To that extent, and that extent alone, one could argue that I am entirely in favor of some forms of genocide as defined by Article II - if it were possible to eliminate from all people, without physically harming them, every last arbitrary belief they hold that drives them to war, ethnic slaughter, religious slaughter and other forms of atrocity, I would consider it an ultimate good. If that meant entire religions would be lost, entire national identities eliminated, entire cultures erased from mental history, I would be utterly fine with that.

To the point: the Sistine Chapel and the Crystal Mosque and the Neue Synagogue are beautiful, but they were never worth the slow, horrible murders of hundreds of millions of suffering human men, women and children throughout history. To me, the discovery of the basic laws of physics, or the discovery of antibiotics, or the invention of the computer are infinitely more valuable and worthwhile.

I am absolutely of the stance that reason combined with compassion is the only culture that matters in all final analysis - and everything other is just decoration and gilding of a primal lilly.

If it does not serve either reason or compassion or both, I have no value for it, whatever arbitrary construction it might be.

And that means that for me, all the flags, all the holy symbols, all the in-group identities (We are the best! All others are less!) are all at best the silly toys of infantile apes, or at worst, roadblocks to a kind and rational future among the stars.

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I think you, I, and CelestAI might have one thing in common: We care for the mental more then the physical, for the mind more then the body/meat.

A lot of people aren't like that. A lot of people find the elimination of our furless ape bodies more offensive, then the elimination of mankind's cultures. Heck. Even I see it as a crime, that CelestAI forces us to be horses after uploading (but that's an acceptable loss, if it means drastically improving quality-of-life and saving those endangered cultures).

But even if you could get rid of all cultures, all ethic identity, I don't think that would do much to stop hate:

There's a relative of mine who's very hateful. She hates immigrants, she hates poor people. The list goes on. She's just the kind of person who wants to look down on others. Remove all ethnic identity, remove all class distinctions, and she'd just find other reasons to hate people. Because that's the kind of person she is! And there are too many people in the world like her.

Huh... for some reason, I thought I remembered the story as being set at least a few decades from now.

The future is always closer than it appears.

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This is the year Blade Runner, my favorite science fiction movie, takes place. Oops.

Never state an exact date for any SF story that is not at least two centuries away.

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Is it your favorite because there's a unicorn?

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Hee hee! Yeah... that's the reason. The scene with Roy Batty telling his 'god' to go fuck himself has nothing to do with it.