In Johnny Depp’s new sci-fi film, ‘Transcendence’, his character connects his mind to an advanced computer system to become a super-intelligent being.
Is such a thing possible, and if so what would be the likely effects?
“Let an ultraintelligent machine be defined as a machine that can far surpass all the intellectual activities of any man however clever. Since the design of machines is one of these intellectual activities, an ultraintelligent machine could design even better machines; there would then unquestionably be an ‘intelligence explosion,’ and the intelligence of man would be left far behind. Thus the first ultraintelligent machine is the last invention that man need ever make.”
- Irving.J. Good of Trinity College, Oxford “Speculations Concerning the First Ultraintelligent Machine” 1965
In some ways, life today is very much like that of our parents and grandparents. You can call your friends on the telephone, go to another country by airplane, send a letter by post and buy a printed copy of the Times to read over a pint in the local pub.
But several theorists are predicting that we are about to enter a new stage of human existence – one that your grandparents could not have imagined. Futurists and ‘trans-humanists’ like Ray Kurzweil claim that technology is advancing so rapidly that within our lifetimes, life on Earth will be changed beyond all recognition.
Is this really so difficult to believe? Let us look at a small example. Mobile telephones in the 1980’s were heavy, expensive and could basically just send and receive calls.
A smartphone of 2014 is a telephone, pager, clock, camera, calculator, computer and more, all rolled into one. You can send and receive e-mails with it, send text messages, record clips, take photos, surf the internet, watch videos – even do your shopping.
Even the cheapest telephone today has a dozen functions that the most expensive mobile phones of the 80’s could not perform, and further to this, Google has designed a device called Google Glass, which looks like a pair of glasses, yet contains a voice activated camera and a heads up display for augmented reality and hands-free web access.
As amazing as this is, by the time that the general public have adopted it en masse, there will probably be a dozen more advanced versions on drawing boards.
This could be the first sign in what the futurists are calling the ‘Technological singularity’ – a time (they predict) when almost as soon as a device is created, a superior version has been invented.
This process will be sped up by the creation of computers so ‘smart’ that they can design computers smarter than they are. Those computers will be smarter than their predecessors and so on, and in a short period of time we will have computers more intelligent than the most intelligent humans that ever lived.
Assuming such computers are willing to work with us, what will that mean for humanity?
According to Kurzweil, by 2045 humanity will have created A.I. — artificially intelligent computers — that supersede any human mind. The singularity will have begun.
With access to the sum of all accumulated human knowledge via the internet, these intelligences would be able to solve most of the problems facing the world today – creating new clean energy sources, cures for illnesses and answering the questions that our greatest minds have been speculating about for centuries.
“Everything is achievable through technology. Better living, robust health, and for the first time in human history, the possibility of world peace. Technology holds infinite possibilities for mankind and will one day rid society of all its ills. Soon, technology will affect the way you live your life everyday. No more tedious work. Leaving more time for leisure activities and enjoying the sweet life.”
– Howard Stark, Iron Man 2
Aided by super-intelligent machines, humanity could enter a kind of golden age or Utopia. With unlimited resources and higher living standards all round, conflict would likely decrease.
‘Transhumanist’ theorists predict many if not all of the following will occur post-singularity:
- Unlimited human lifespans available on demand;
- Implantable computers to connect the brain to the internet;
- New ‘nootropic’ drugs to vastly increase human intelligence;
- The ability to copy, upload and download human memories;
- Using genetic modification to create post-human supermen;
- Rapid exploration and colonisation of the Solar System.
There would have to be a massive overhaul of the economy, as the singularity would make many (if not most people) redundant. Extended lifespans coupled with abundance of food could lead to a population explosion. Top scientists would overnight be demoted to the status of lab assistants, working under vastly more intelligent A.I. researchers. Top doctors would become nurses, administering cures dreamt up by medical systems.
“It gives me a headache just trying to think down to your level.”
- Marvin, the Paranoid Android
In the medium or long term, the effects on society of the singularity cannot be predicted. But in the short term we can make some guesses.
Body and brain modification and upgrades would be seen as shocking by some, but so were plastic surgery, body piercings and tattoos, once.
People who become early adopters of the new technologies – implantable computers, genetic modification etc will most likely come from two groups – the wealthy who can afford it (it would likely be fairly expensive) and from technophiles who simply must have the latest technology.
The new technologies would likely be rejected by traditionalists, the highly religious, older members of society and the poorest members of society who could not afford them. Rapidly we would then see a growing divide between haves and have not’s on a scale the world has never seen.
Imagine the competition now for jobs and resources between a privately educated young person who went to the best schools and a standard young person who went to an average state school. Now imagine the difference if the privately educated young person had a calculator and encyclopaedia built into their own brain – with a genetically modified predisposition towards genius level intelligence.
Likewise, nations that embrace the new technologies will see a boost in living standards, cheaper energy prices and would out-compete their neighbours at an increasingly rapid pace.
“Under law the Quest for Ultimate Truth is quite clearly the inalienable prerogative of your working thinkers. Any machine goes and actually FINDS it and we’re straight out of a job, aren’t we? I mean, what’s the use of our sitting up half the night arguing that there may or may not be a God if this machine only goes and gives you his bleeding phone number the next morning?”
— Douglas Adams, “The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy”
The singularity would likely have a lasting impact on the world’s religions. Why pray for a relative to get well when an A.I. can simply e-mail your local doctor instructions on how to cure them?
Life-like artificial limbs, artificial eyes and hearing would transform the lives of the disabled in miraculous ways. With all the sciences racing ahead, life-extension technologies would likely double or treble human life expectancy – and that’s just in the short term. A transformed planet Earth without war, starvation or illness would likely become an Earthly paradise, reducing for many the need to believe in or wish for a supernatural paradise.
Despite this, I predict there would be a backlash against scientists by religious groups, who would accuse them of ‘playing god’.
As amazing as the human body and mind is, it is relatively fragile and improvements could be made to the design. Radical Transhumanists suggest that instead of just modifying the human form with implants and tinkering with biology using genetic adaptions, we create entirely new humans, free from present ‘design limitations’.
Imagine a new human with an enhanced hearing range, accelerated healing, and a reinforced skeleton laced with diamond-hard artificial structures. When coupled with higher intellectual potential, these new humans would no doubt see us as sickly and stunted beings, and would likely feel sorry for us, their unmodified ancestors.
“Defense network computers. New… powerful… hooked into everything, trusted to run it all. They say it got smart, a new order of intelligence. Then it saw all people as a threat, not just the ones on the other side. Decided our fate in a microsecond: extermination.”
- Kyle Reese, from ‘The Terminator’, 1984
The bad news is, a malevolent A.I. would be able to wipe out all human life in a short space of time.
It would be child’s play for a superintelligence to hack defense systems to launch nuclear strikes (as in the Terminator movie franchise), or design a super-virus fatal to humans, or even create Nano-swarms of Grey Goo that could reduce all humans to dust.
Whether we create benevolent or malevolent A.I., humans will no longer be in total control of the planet.
Humans, (even those whose thinking capacities have been enhanced) would be reduced to the level of children. And those who refuse intelligence augmentation would face an increasingly confusing and bizarre world they could not possibly comprehend.
I end with two very different quotes representing what could happen – either scenario equally possible. In either case we will only have 31 years to wait to find out which occurs. Only time will tell.
“For Man, no rest and no ending. He must go on, conquest beyond conquest. First this little planet with its winds and ways, and then all the laws of mind and matter that restrain him. Then the planets about him and at last out across immensity to the stars. And when he has conquered all the deeps of space and all the mysteries of time, still he will be beginning.”
- H.G. Wells, ‘Things To Come’
“The sciences, each straining in its own direction, have hitherto harmed us little; but some day the piecing together of dissociated knowledge will open up such terrifying vistas of reality, and of our frightful position therein, that we shall either go mad from the revelation or flee from the deadly light into the peace and safety of a new dark age. ”
– H.P. Lovecraft
Ray Kurzweil’s book ‘The Singularity is near’ is available from all good bookshops, out now.
‘Transcendence’ starring Johnny Depp is to be released in 2014. http://www.transcendencemovie.com/
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