Technology and Us

First of all
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....ah yes, Technology




I feel it has and is continuing to surpass us.

I've built PCs for people throughout high school and college. I had an MP3 player 6 years before the first iPod. People still ask me to fix things for them. I have been a PC gamer since people knew how to spell PC. I am not a tech muggle.

Even still, I think we are being surpassed. It's in front of us and some of us are watching it clearly. Being against tech is not reserved to some weird dark corners of society. The Terminator series has been well received for decades not just for its action value.



We have two options: Work the technology into your own skill set, like people being able to have implanted hard drives or processors which allow them to think faster and wider, or watch as the tech which is >doing precisely that which we consider preposterous< zooms past us. There is zero deterrent to changing everything and anything about technology. Therefore, tech only continues to be bigger and faster. Humans only do via evolution and that takes millennia. Tech can do this in half a decade.

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Joe Rogan and Sam Harris seem to get there. If you are familiar with the train of thought at all, you realize that others have shared this view as well.






So if anyone has some solid data to show that we are not heading towards a robot dominated future, please enlighten me. There is nothing in the past century that suggests that human labor is valued over machinery, so unless we develop and determine a new interpretation of human value in the world, everyone except the very select few skilled will be well of. Eventually even they won't matter. None of us are remotely equipped to take on the hard drive of even the machines that currently exist right now. That thing you're staring at can already store more data than you will ever encounter in your life.


It is also very apparent that most people lack vision to a puzzling degree. They seem incapable of displaying any sort of understanding of what a technology can become over time. No one is saying a computer is going to take your job today or tomorrow. However, anyone paying attention to >how quickly< technological trends come about and change what we know about tech, should realize that no human being can possibly keep up with it over an extended period of time. Many of you mocking older people for their lack of tech savvy are about to get steamrolled by the wave of technology that follows your own. The difference between you and the old guys is that you'll get steamrolled in your 30's whereas they got steamrolled in their 50's. Tech is increasing more and faster. Check your smart phone. Some Apps are "updating" every 2nd day just about. How long do you honestly think you can keep up with its updates? Another 30 years?

So unless we are having a conversation where we address how humanity will get enhanced along with all the technology that is coming out, what are we talking about? If it continues further and further and we remain the same, is it not just a matter of very near future until we are passed in terms of input value. Perhaps the only reason this has not entered common topics yet is because most jobs are still lost to outsourcing to foreigners instead of automated counterparts.


In general. What do we have to offer in 10 to 20 years? We will still have the same data storage capacity (hard drive) and the same data comprehension module (processor) that we have today. Meanwhile, where will tech be in 1-2 decades?

So, I'm wrong because? We are doing what to keep humanity on top?

 

Yeah, I was ultra high when I wrote all that, but it is a theme I keep coming back to, since I obviously don't want it to be true. The math simply doesn't add up for me as to what we possibly think we have to offer, based on how things have been going.



Why mimic the human brain at all? The number of neural connections in the human brain is irrelevant in the rise of technology and eventually A.I. The former is studied by modestly funded (or not funded) relatively smaller sections of science. The latter is funded by everyone and everything, all across the globe. There is far more investment and development going on in regards to technology and machinery than in unlocking whatever the human brain may or may not hold. Compare the budgets, minds, and sheer volume of R&D conducted by MIcrosoft, Google, and Apple, to whatever R&D may be going on with unlocking dubious human potential. I have np recognizing the complexity and beauty contained within the human brain, but it just doesn't seem like the front runner in what is currently going on.


Even if we can hold 25,000,000 gigs of data, we certainly can't recall anywhere near that at will, nor can we purposely store exactly what we want. Most of the data stored is just memories, and we didn't even choose which ones stuck in there.
Without an actual repeated >utility< of 25 mil gigs of data, that obscure questionable storage capacity becomes nothing but a neat factoid. This is why I said one of the options we would have to have is to work technology into our own biology so that we can in fact recall that data. The potato laptop I'm using here during my Europe trip holds 670GB, but that potato can call up each kilobyte of that upon mouse click. We are nowhere near that. Meanwhile, laptops and computers are doubling and tripling in process speeds and storage capacity within half a decade these days. The human brain is standing relatively still and in many cases is regressing due to prolonged exposure to mindless "entertainment", and the one factor that affects us all - aging.

My train of thought is mostly driven by the very, very obvious fact that tech is increasing on every corner, at all times. The world of smart phones is only 8 years old in terms of existing in the mainstream, and look at the advancements and additions made. Within those same 8 years, the human brain accomplished nothing in terms of sophistication and evolution, which is why I say again: Unless we integrate tech into our own bodies, (something many if not most wouldn't even want), there is nothing currently going on that suggests we will have the upper hand or be desirable in terms of sheer labor force. Those who point how technology has created new jobs in the past are not dealing with the fact that modern tech is not creating mass-employment work. At best, tech creates highly specialized jobs occupied by fewer and fewer humans, and I see even that going out of the window since our brightest minds simply don't have the hardware to set themselves apart from whatever a supercomputer of the next decade or two will be. Meanwhile, I don't think anyone alive is confused about whether major companies are generally looking to employ as many people as they can, or as few.

There is a theme present in almost all movies where tech in general, or a piece of tech like a cyborg, surpasses humanity. They always say "They knew not what they were doing and when they realized, it was too late." Elon Musk himself suggests that there needs to be a supervising body in place that monitors how tech is advancing, to make sure it does not endanger humanity's best interest.

 

I agree that tech obviously has absolutely amazing properties. We are able to have this conversation because of tech from two different parts of the globe. I've been into tech my whole life.



Where we disagree is on whether or not we can create A.I. without having unlocked the depths of our own mind first. I don't see the two at all linked in a mandatory sense. A.I. does not have to be a successful copy of humanity and then a plus whatever. It can be a completely alone standing version of Intelligence. It does not have to be molded or carbon copied based on a human design. I think it is important to understanding potential A.I. to understand that there isn't just one form of intelligence (us), and all artificial versions of intelligence will have be exactly from the same mold. Don't get me wrong, I can easily see it going that way, and it would be logical, but I am saying it doesn't have to.

I also don't think that throughout history we have in fact created many things that seriously had the potential to harm the species as a whole. Nukes perhaps or maybe other serious weapons like weaponized viruses. Of course there are many things that are detrimental to us, but not many that toy with the annihilation or surpassing of the human species. One thing we have always had was mass employment. The nature of labor on Earth in every functioning country's economy always required large numbers of humans working. Considering the androids I linked in the original post are already 5 years old, I honestly don't see what prevents them from eventually going into mass production and start replacing more and more blue collar labor. Companies would fall over themselves to get them since it would mean having to pay zero wages, zero benefits, and a total elimination of human error or drama. All this while being able to work 24/7 without a single word of complaint.

To be clear, I don't see us getting eclipsed within the next few years, but based on how tech has been going in the past 10 years alone, and based on the fact that it increases exponentially, meaning the next 10 years will bring more tech than the last 10 have, and so on and so on, I honestly don't see what we have to offer unless we merge with the tech. Perhaps this is exactly what will happen, as your robot eye example is a good indicator of just how beneficial such an endeavor would be.

So yeah, I'm all for tech that benefits humanity, but like Elon Musk, I'd like to see more talk and perhaps laws and organizations that focus on making sure it is always humans first, tech 2nd.

 

I say unless we get bionically enhanced and/or major leaps are made in furthering what the human brain can do, then it seems clear to me that we will be apart from it. If tech continues the way it's going and humanity continues the way it's going, I genuinely don't see what humans have to offer in 10-20 years that tech can't do better.

We should point out, the way things are on Earth right now in 2015, is that the majority of humanity IS already apart from it. They use technology, but they have no clue how it works or how to fix/rebuild it. As someone remarked a while back: If I send you to the forest empty handed, how long until you can send me an e-mail? The answer is obviously never since even if we had the materials, almost all of us have no clue how to build a computer or connect to the internet from scratch.


If the majority doesn't understand how tech works, and tech continues to exponentially increase and grow more complex, then unless there is some sort of human augmentation, there is nothing that indicates we will be any smarter and more in control in the more complex future than we are today.

 

The great Terence McKenna on A.I. He nails it as usual.

 

Yeah, Rogan is on point. A very well working link between the intellectual and the meat head. He is intelligent enough to know when he's just speculating and mostly puts it as such. For higher expertise, as you mention, he gets a lot of good guests on the show. Harris, DeGrasse Tyson, Sheldrake, and Duncan Trussell, who may just be a pothead genius, to name a few. Most of the standard appearing comedy buddies of his are all great in their own way.

Being a double black belt who's won tournaments, rolls as a multi millionaire, and is one of the most vocal and proudest pro-pot celebrities on the planet........yeah. Rogan's a bad dude. Just happens to hang out with the baddest men on the planet, and when he does, he teaches them a thing or two.

 

Very cool. I've been following Ray peripherally for a while now. He's onto some great stuff himself.

 

It could be argued we are already unofficially doing this. Think about any and all provincial behavior that exists in the vast majority of the world. Cultural norm or gtfo. The more sheepish citizens already don't think but just download what the MSM of the region tells them to think.