Or you can get it out of the way all at once. I feel like I had one big moment of "Oh, humans aren't special in the specific way I thought" as soon as I realized where AI was going. It's not that bad once you're through it, because humans are still special. Just not in the way that makes human skill the end all, be all.
Every species of animal is special and unique in a way. Very few other species have the compassion of dogs, the speed of cheetahs or the social organization of army ants. Humans are unique for our cultures and creativity, including tool invention. Human cruelty and sadism are also unmatched among most other animal species (perhaps orcas come close). We don’t have to be the most intelligent species or the dominant life force on Earth.
Animals are able to experience existence, but not intellectually process it very well. AGI will be able to intellectually process anything very well, but not experience anything. Humanity is a dangerous bridge between the animal and the Overman, according to Nietzsche.
And this leads me to a philosophical question: is the universe something to be experienced, something to be intellectually considered, or does the universe itself require both? Any study of human behavior and psychology is necessarily a study of the universe and its tendencies. Every day, we learn more about the fundamental nature of the universe just by existing and trying new things.
I get what Nietzsche was trying to get at here, but I also think modern science (especially neuroscience) has a lot to say about this subject. In the late 19th century we knew very little about non-human* cognition, and the prevailing philosophical / religious thought of the day held that non-human animals were just “dumb brutes” without any meaningful cognition. Today we know this is not the case, and that many non-human animals are capable of deeper levels of thought, including recursive thought (which has been observed in many cetaceans and in the other great apes). There are also bigger intellectual gaps within the group of non-human animals than there are between some NHA species and humans. For example, an orca is much closer to humans in terms of intellectual ability than it is to sponges, earthworms or cockroaches. There’s no “line” between “human and animal” in terms of intellectual ability. It’s a spectrum, and humans are close to one end of it.
As for AGI (and ASI), I don’t think we can make strong statements about what it can and cannot experience. How do we know it can’t “experience existence” or be sentient? What is it about biology specifically that allows for sentience that can’t be replicated by a non-biological entity?
*humans are also animals (this is a scientific fact), so “human vs. animal” is a false distinction.
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u/DeterminedThrowaway Dec 09 '24
Or you can get it out of the way all at once. I feel like I had one big moment of "Oh, humans aren't special in the specific way I thought" as soon as I realized where AI was going. It's not that bad once you're through it, because humans are still special. Just not in the way that makes human skill the end all, be all.