Thinking Big Thoughts

Here is a talk at a TED Conference by Nick Bostrom, a leading transhumanist. On the surface, his talk seems absurd.

1. Death is a BIG problem


2. Existential risk (i.e., humanity commits suicide) is a BIG problem
3. 
   
4. That life isn't usually as wonderful as it could be is a BIG problem

These seem silly, but if you take the time and listen, Bostom has some very interesting points to make:



While the above is interesting, don't get swept away. It is always important to analyze and criticize. For example, here is a bit from Nick Bostrom's posting on the Edge site to answer the question "What Will Change Everything?":

Intelligence is a big deal. Humanity owes its dominant position on Earth not to any special strength of our muscles, nor any unusual sharpness of our teeth, but to the unique ingenuity of our brains. It is our brains that are responsible for the complex social organization and the accumulation of technical, economic, and scientific advances that, for better and worse, undergird modern civilization.

But wait... is this literally true? If you raise a feral child with that spectacular human brain, the poor kid is little better than an animal. The hardware is all there, but the software is missing: socialization. Humans need to be reared in a social environment to become fully human. This is a key weakness in the transhumanist argument. They are pure techies in love with hardware. But we have evolved in a complex interaction in which nature through nurture with feedbacks to nature makes us what we are.

I always chuckle at the old anthropologists who would establish homind hierarchies based on brain volume. But Neaderthals have bigger brains that us. Hardware is not destiny. The transhumanist desire to add jet boosters to the human frame won't, single-handedly, be enough allow us to zoom over to the promised land.