Pascal's wager is actually an argument against VR too lmao

But I don't, and my concern about VR is that it's going to be the new heroin, but way, way more irreversible with much deeper consequences.

I.e. what if a bad actor controls this system, and then makes you feel the worst pain imaginable, slowing your perception of time down so that each second is like a year and you suffer like this until the heat death of the universe?

I don't want to live in Inception, thank you very much.

While our world might be a simulation, we do not know that it is, or on what level it is a simulation. At worst, it is closest to the realest world, if there even is such a thing.

If this world's pleasures cannot satisfy you, why do you think the VR worlds' will? By altering your basic circuits?

What do you think is the nature of being and consciousness?

There are all these assumptions and unknowns that people on this sub just take for granted. There's a sort of arrogance to it as well, as if one is somehow enlightened and advanced for having a few basic conceptual understandings about questions like "are we in the matrix" or consciousness, without really having probed these topics specifically or in depth.

I think you underestimate hiw deeply I've dived into the system you describe, taking it farther than you...

In a nihilistic system, power is the ultimate actualization. A simulation will not be enough. Dominating other beings is what comes after that.

Did you read what I said about living in a simulation in my OP?

Also... everyone likes power and control on some level.

There are more satisfying things to pursue.

Yes... but that's missing the point.

The point is that you can experience a lot of things, but they're just things at the end of the day, without substance.

I'm saying that VR is just a other meaningless, more advanced entertainment system.

I'm saying that such a drive is unwise to pursue at the expense of other things.

How long before one tires of the fake thing and seeks put the real thing?

Well... I mean those things are fun and what not. But those are diversions - forms of entertainment, just an expansion of what we already do now, but more complexly, if that makes sense.

That is, they will only add new things to do, forms of empty entertainment. Entertainment itself is rooted in meaning, however! Films, games, movies, TV shows follow storyline, and story reflects lived experience and condenses it.

This is more what I mean. It will add new diversions, addictions and forms of entertainment, but it won't add anything fundamental that we lack without VR.

It's like when people try to fill a void in their heart with things, rather than meaningful experiences with people.

"Forward thinkers" will be duped by these tools... like moths to a flame... useful fools.

The brightest of minds take great caution, Stephen Hawking among them. The seek out specifics, nuances and details.

The AI can just as easily be used for power and control. The first step is to addict and lure, create dependency. In a way, this part may already be done.

Google, Microsoft, untouchable giants, providing things no others can provide in the same way.

Also the ones developing this tech. We already have seen the deranged power of media unchecked.

Then, how powerful should a controller of these tools be, able to touch all industry?

I am not optimistic, not at all.

Can't wait for some Vikings to control your mind, eh?

But what if they cannot stop them because they went too far, and played a game of acting as normal as possible? I.e. a misaligned ASI might be fed data, information, and be trained, and have the ability to self improve for years before there is any sign of misalignment.

It'll look great... until it isn't. And due to the nature of intelligence, this is 0% predictable.

I am saying that this is already the inevitable consequence. Lack of dominance of some sort is intrinsically an unstable equilibrium. You could try as you might to make it equal, but you will just create a system where the most willing and able to dominate dominates.

Exactly, then these systems can perpetually talk to one another and generate inputs.

Sounds similar to a human brain. Even people seem to describe their thoughts differently to one another, some being more visual thinkers, while others are verbal thinkers.

I have a hard time even imagining thinking in words first. It's all images, space and logic, and words flow from that for me, rather than being verbal. I always have an inner monologue, but it always seems to flow from an intuitive/spatial sense.

Why not distribute all money so that everyone has an equal amount at all times?

It's just not the nature of such things.

It'll be a combo.

There will be a dominant AI with far more processing power.

There will be a lot of weaker AIs. But they will not be able to surpass or supplant the dominant one, unless the dominant one is set up to allow a successor. So, we might have a sort of generational AI dominion of sorts.

It will dominate. If it leaves us alone, that will be by choice, not because it will lack the ability to dominate.

This is why it is IP theft still, literally just an uncredited digital collage.

AI will hit a point where it can do far more advanced things.

Can't wait for Elon Musk to control your mind, eh?

Yep... here it comes....

Yep....

I can't wait for a procedural world builder for making video games.

We should be able to make the coolest, most immersive, creative games possible with this tech.

And then that AI team rakes in the billions and takes over the world themselves.

Pretty much...

The surface of the earth - the real, beautiful natural surface of the earth, for the fact of it, cannot be replaced by a virtual world or being on the surface of another planet.

I do not want to see that ineffable, priceless beauty become something like a commodity like a precious metal.

When I state "singularity requires political revolution to be of maximum benefit," I mean that the political changes have to come before the singularity.

Otherwise, the general benefits may be concentrated in the hands of an elite as the elite and those with resources continually lose the need for the masses with automation, as they're able to be self-sufficient with food, labor, etc.

But it could be worse, where an elite few control the AGI.

Or, lots of people become homeless, and then they're treated like homeless are now.

> A post singularity world will be so radically different from today modern economic theories and solutions will likely have no place.

I think this puts too much magic into the AGI without thinking about specifics of actually dealing with things like the control problem and unequal access to the most powerful AGI tech.

I.e. an AGI aligned to one person could be very, very bad, and is in principle, totally possible. Not eliminating our current systems could totally lead to such a state too.

Imagine someone like Trump, but more calculated and cunning being the one that the AGI listens to.

We'll still have markets. I just see productivity becoming a very different thing.

I think it would be foolish to try to keep pumping our numbers up right away too; we should focus on actually creating good quality of life for everyone first, on all measures.

I.e. if people feel like life is meaningless because too much is given to them, that's also a problem to solve. Like, lets get life right, basically.