Comments on: Apocalyptic AI: Visions of Heaven in Robotics, Artificial Intelligence, and Virtual Reality http://www.kurzweilai.net/apocalyptic-ai-visions-of-heaven-in-robotics-artificial-intelligence-and-virtual-reality-2 Accelerating Intelligence Thu, 20 Jun 2013 00:00:09 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.4.1 By: segfaultvicta http://www.kurzweilai.net/apocalyptic-ai-visions-of-heaven-in-robotics-artificial-intelligence-and-virtual-reality-2/comment-page-1#comment-181 segfaultvicta Fri, 09 Jul 2010 15:37:21 +0000 http://www.kurzweilai.net/?p=94799#comment-181 There is a key difference between the apocalyptic tradition of Judeochristian religion and the concept Mr. Geraci is expounding here, which can be summed up as, "the idea of Heaven is backed up by fables and mythology, the transhumanist state is backed up by a few reasonable assumptions." Heaven supposedly exists, put in place by a god; we -build- whatever transhuman existence may or may not wind up existing with our bare hands. Heaven is an end-goal, a single point of convergence; the transhuman future is one of an expanded role for sentience in the cosmos and a nearly-infinite widening of the possibility space for human action and thought. I've not read the book yet; in fairness to Mr. Geraci, this review may not do his book justice. However, I think it's willfully misrepresentative to describe transhumanism as a 'belief system' with a clear isomorphism to Judeochristian belief implied. Worldview, perhaps. Weltanschauung, perhaps. To imply that someone who shares this worldview does so out of blind Faith - to imply that transhumanists believe in a dualistic universe and a seperation of body and soul - is to do a great disservice to transhumanist philosophy and ethics. The realisation that consciousness is an algorithmic process currently implemented on large, wet chunks of bone-enclosed meat is isomorphic to the realisation that we do -not- live in a dualistic universe, in the same sense as a person with Judeochristian beliefs might argue. There is a deep and important difference between theology and science, and while there is -much- undeniable speculation and banking on hope within the transhumanist community, the core ideas are those from materials science research, cognitive science, computer science, etc., and to misrepresent these as religious dogma seems questionable in the extreme. There is a key difference between the apocalyptic tradition of Judeochristian religion and the concept Mr. Geraci is expounding here, which can be summed up as, “the idea of Heaven is backed up by fables and mythology, the transhumanist state is backed up by a few reasonable assumptions.” Heaven supposedly exists, put in place by a god; we -build- whatever transhuman existence may or may not wind up existing with our bare hands. Heaven is an end-goal, a single point of convergence; the transhuman future is one of an expanded role for sentience in the cosmos and a nearly-infinite widening of the possibility space for human action and thought.

I’ve not read the book yet; in fairness to Mr. Geraci, this review may not do his book justice. However, I think it’s willfully misrepresentative to describe transhumanism as a ‘belief system’ with a clear isomorphism to Judeochristian belief implied. Worldview, perhaps. Weltanschauung, perhaps. To imply that someone who shares this worldview does so out of blind Faith – to imply that transhumanists believe in a dualistic universe and a seperation of body and soul – is to do a great disservice to transhumanist philosophy and ethics. The realisation that consciousness is an algorithmic process currently implemented on large, wet chunks of bone-enclosed meat is isomorphic to the realisation that we do -not- live in a dualistic universe, in the same sense as a person with Judeochristian beliefs might argue.

There is a deep and important difference between theology and science, and while there is -much- undeniable speculation and banking on hope within the transhumanist community, the core ideas are those from materials science research, cognitive science, computer science, etc., and to misrepresent these as religious dogma seems questionable in the extreme.

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