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| Subtitle | Paths, Dangers, Strategies |
| First Written | 2014 |
| Genre | Fiction |
| Origin | UK |
| Publisher | Oxford University Press |
| ISBN-10 | 0199678111 |
| ISBN-13 | 978-0199678112 |
| My Copy | library copy |
| First Read | September 28, 2014 |
Superintelligence
That said, reading a really detailed book about a speculative future is completely engrossing. It's a dense book, but a really fascinating one. See the quotes for examples.
Noted on October 13, 2014
An academic, fairly dense look at artificial intelligence. It makes the case pretty convincingly that an AI - at least one that can teach itself to be more intelligent - is a really scary thing. But my experience with web software, and owning automobiles, is a good palliative here. Because really: shit is breaking all the time. We literally cannot keep a website running for years at a time without highly skilled programmers and LOTS of smoke and mirrors; it's hard to imagine creating any piece of technology that wouldn't be subject to the same problems.
Noted on October 13, 2014
“Far from being the smartest possible biological species, we are probably better thought of as the stupidest possible biological species capable of starting a technological civilization - a niche we filled because we got there first, not because we are in any sense optimally adapted to it.”
Quoted on October 13, 2014
One can speculate that the tardiness and wobbliness of humanity's progress on many of the "eternal problems" of philosophy are due to the unsuitability of the human cortex for philosophical work. On this view, our most celebrated philosophers are like dogs walking on their hind legs - just barely attaining the threshold level of performance required for engaging in the activity at all.
Quoted on October 13, 2014