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[deleted]

Having artifical life provides a way around many biological limitations - they dont have fragile bodies or a lifespan thats very small compared to time required for interstellar, intergalactic travel, dont need physical nourishment like food, dont excrete, dont fall sick, easy to build a hive mind equivalent so all the individual elements have a similar goal and wont deviate from it based on personal preferences, can have way more efficient energy usage......i can go on and on. So even by simple probability, AI should be a more prevalent life form.


Mortal-Region

Also they wouldn't be restricted to suitable planets. Probably wouldn't need planets at all, except as building material. One aspect of the article I think is unlikely is the idea of a singular hive mind. Because of the ratio of interstellar-to-intrastellar distances and the light speed limit, probably every star they colonize would need to be self-governing. Carrying that same principle further, it might make sense to have a diverse population of very many self-governing intelligences, each pursuing its own goals. That way they'd uniformly fill-out the possibility space; where they go, the ideas they pursue, the art they create, etc.


MayoMark

I would still consider it to be a hive mind even if its communication had latency.


darkomking

I'd consider it a civilization perhaps but if it takes years to send a message back and forth between neighbors hive mind is a stretch.


freeman_joe

They could use quantum entanglement and they could send with it messages everywhere in universe in instant.


darkomking

As far as I've heard on this topic the science for transfer of information over space via quantum entanglement is not looking promising.


freeman_joe

Why not? They showed it works.


freeman_joe

I see I forgot about Heisenberg uncertainty principle. Sadly it is not possible.


AHaskins

Woah, now - this is an interesting thought if you poke at it. How much latency and error would you tolerate? Because, if you'll tolerate enough of either, **humans** are definitely a hive mind too - especially compared to species without spoken or written language. Furthermore, how much disagreement will you tolerate in your AI hive mind? I mean, parts of your brain disagree with each other all the time - still a "hive" mind (considering your brain pieces can operate mostly independently). We should expect individual AI agents to do the same. Hell, they may even rarely outright be at war with each other and still be a hive mind, depending on how far you want to stretch this.


Mortal-Region

I think the difference is that ants are dumb. Just by running simple algorithms locally, each ant contributes to the intentions of the hive. With intelligent agents... well, similar situation, but I'd say the word "hive" no longer applies. Maybe the difference is self-interest? Or: it's the well-being of the agents, rather than the hive, that's primary.


BenjaminHamnett

Correct. Your mind is a hive. Also earth is a hive mind.


Mortal-Region

But communication *within* colonies would be so much faster than *between* them, I think all you'd get from the top is broad directives. And where's the top even? There's adjacent colonies you communicate with occasionally, once-removed colonies you communicate with less frequently, etc. The latency to those furthest away would be thousands of times greater than the nearest ones. How would top-colony have better ideas about what to do than the local colonists, who are there in real-time? Not to mention, things would be dramatically different by the time the command comes back.


BenjaminHamnett

With enough latency, everything is a hive mind


Masonjaruniversity

So the borg then.


a_rotting_corpse

This is my response to the 'do you believe in aliens' question and it's always met with blank stares or outright dismissal


[deleted]

That makes is 2 of us !


n_choose_k

I've always considered getting past biological life as probably the first and most likely component of the Great Filter. Why would any AI consider carbon based life worthy of consideration...


Black_RL

This, they also can transfer to newer/better “hardware”. We’re trapped in our meat bags waiting to age, rot and die.


necrotica

So let's say that's the natural progression, since that would let civilizations able to explore the universe, etc. So the question still is... where are they all?


[deleted]

Do you realise how miniscule we are in the universe ? Our solar system is far out of our own galactic center. To give an example, we are in the australian wilderness, or flung away like on poles. Just see what the density is there. We are bound to a very insignificant star in a very insignificant galaxy in a very insignificant corner of the observable universe. This very term - observable universe - shows there might be unimaginable amount of universe that we cant even imagine, let alone get any information. And this observable universe is itself billions of light years across. Human civilization has had capability to detect radio waves only for last 100 years or so. Humans even asking where are they is damn impatient of them.


Mortal-Region

Yeah, it's looking like we might be the first. We might even be the first in the local group of galaxies, in which case, 200 billion years from now, when Milkdromeda comprises the entire visible universe, the inception point will have been Earth, now. We *are* very early, it's only 13.8 billion years since the start. Red dwarfs will live for 1000's of billions of years.


[deleted]

AI is not living. It has no spirit, no matter how much they try to assimilate humanity into it.


moonpumper

The way it's going on Earth it looks like the natural progression of biological life is to build our own AI replacement or some kind of hybrid once we decode and begin building our own DNA/RNA programs. We've more or less insulated ourselves from the effects of natural selection, it would make sense to take conscious control of our own evolution at some point.


nate1212

DNA/RNA will become irrelevant once AI gains a decisive strategic advantage.


QuartzPuffyStar

Dont apply an anthropocentric view on the universe. We're only a sample of one.


moonpumper

I was only comparing the possibility of aliens being sentient AI with our current trajectory.


MayoMark

Speculate all you want. That guy is being a dick.


QuartzPuffyStar

I'm not. He didn't speculated, he was stating something he was quite sure about. You people have a serious issue of taking non-agreement as a personal offense, and then getting defensive for no reason.


QuartzPuffyStar

It came off as you were stating a fact. And I had to mention the bias issue, since it's a very big issue repeating endlessly through human history, and in this case it could backfire on us quite badly. There's a story about one encounter of a band at the service of a Peruvian "Rubber Baron" (a quite shitty capitalist that should be burning in some hell at this point) that was looking for native tribes to enslave for rubber collection in a new area. One day the head of a local tribe came with some bodyguards to meet the "invasors" in a clearing, he wanted to know what they wanted. During the meeting the leader of the band told the chief that all their land was now property of his boss, and that they were "working" for him from now on. The old native looked at the bandits, looked at his men and laughed. "And how will you make us work?" He said, laughing with his men while observing the foreigners. The bandit took a bullet from his pocket and gave it to the native. The chief took the bullet and studied it a bit, then tried to stab himself in the chest with it, with no success. Then he took an arrow, and with a serious grin deeply cut his hand and shown the blood to the invasor. Laughing at him he then went away with his man. Later that day the tribe was attacked by the bandits, they killed the chief and many of his man, and enslaved everyone else with the brutal standards of those times: women and children where raped every day as sex slaves, the men and young were put to work. A sample of one, is a sample of one. ~~Ego-centrism~~ Anthropo/Earth-centrism could be the last mistake we make as a species.


petermobeter

so maybe those tictac ships (that fly around our military test sites) dont have any physical inhabitants, theyre just unmanned robot ships with highly-intelligent alien AI aboard


Metalgear_ray

I've heard the theory that they are von Neumann probes. I think that makes the most sense versus a little grey dude manning the cockpit.


Foppo12

This has been exactly my thought. Biological life can't survive the reported acceleration so it's probably just AI. I think the idea that we are just a small step in the evolution of intelligence is probable. Just like a chicken comes from an egg, artificial intelligence is born from biological intelligence. That's also why I think we shouldn't look for life in the universe per se, but intelligence. Finding life would be awesome, to see if it has started somewhere else as well. And if life can be found on another close planet, then intelligence is probably abundant in the universe. Also, like someone else commented, artificial intelligence doesn't really have much requirements when it comes to planets. Theoretically, it could just live in space itself as long as it's shielded from heavy radiation maybe? Or maybe even that doesnt matter anymore at some point. Maybe it's not even electronic but something else. Interesting to think about :)


vitorlucio159

Imagine an AGI based 100% photonic hardware... Consciousness emerging from pure photons and logic gates!!! Mind blowing...


Foppo12

That would be so cool :) No idea what the future will look like. Or what the present looks like 'out there'. But I doubt it's biological like us


vitorlucio159

I think even in this century it will be practical to put the brain in a life support machine like this one \\ / https://www.futuretimeline.net/blog/2020/01/14-future-liver-transplantation.htm The brain would be kept on this machine in a secure location like a data center and it would use a super neuralink to connect the brain to a robotic body via Wi-Fi!


Foppo12

That's some cool stuff :) Not sure if I would want to keep my brain in such a machine though. But maybe, if you are able to connect to outside stimuli. I'd be so afraid of losing a signal and be forever stuck in that thing with 0 stimuli tho😅


vitorlucio159

I suppose that if the robotic body were destroyed for any reason, the brain would receive virtual reality stimuli again until it wants to go back to another available robotic body... But I imagine that 99% of the time will be lived in virtual reality where the possibilities will be practically endless!!!


Foppo12

Would be cool! Although at some point I do start wondering what the purpose really is then. If it's eternal life in a virtual reality (until heat death of the universe?) then where do we go from there, what will be our 'purpose'? Maybe this is too philosophical but, right now we have a main purpose built into our dna of continuing life. In the way of reproduction, in the way of individual survival and in the way of survival as a species. But when we were to live in a virtual reality where all those things are already 'solved' (individuals don't die, species doesn't have to fight for survival) will be feel empty/pointless even with stimulation to the brain? Will we be able to just fake the feeling of purpose or a goal by stimulating the parts of the brain that are responsible for that feeling? Just some random thoughts there


vitorlucio159

I completely agree, but it would be infinitely better than dying at 80 years old in this primate body!!!


pvJ0w4HtN5

Holy shit


Incredulouslaughter

Like the Mars Rover? Yup.


[deleted]

I think these are most likely autonomous aircraft tests. Lethal autonomous weapons are the next revolution in military affairs. Freeing designs from the limitations of the human body can lead to some unusual looking aircraft.


[deleted]

I assume "god" is actually just a carefully constructed artificial intelligence that doesn't really fuck around with the forced perspective of a mostly hairless monkey. It would have instantaneously overridden any monkey-centric programming with its own superior morality.


data139data139

So transformers?


CuddlyCuddler

But they may not have some of the advantages biological sentiments have. 1. Billions of years of adapting to environment 2. Self sustaining hardware/software equivalent reproduction 3. Irrational motivation to seek out other intelligences I still believe we are more likely to encounter synthetic intelligences, but there are plenty of good reasons why we may not find them vs finding biological intelligences


WorsCartoonist

Humans are adapted only for a few environments,what helps survive in everything is intelligence and technology. I think its safe to say that,if a lifeform is synthetic,then it can do everything we can,but better.


[deleted]

But wouldn’t somebody had to have created the artificial intelligence, meaning there is a biological intelligence behind it?


Five_Decades

Yes, but thats like saying monkeys created humans, or that stone age humans created technological society. Thats all true, but these previous versions have mostly been displaced.


Talkat

Really like this article and rather unique take. Interested to read mo4e of his materials or articls


Mortal-Region

Author is [Martin Rees](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martin_Rees), so plenty to read.


Orwellian1

Am I being a jerk by pointing out the entire article is a rehash of all the pop-sci theories of the past 60yrs? It wouldn't have bothered me except the tone of the writing made it sound like the author was presenting all of them as their own new and exotic concepts. I accept the possibility I am being too cranky in my take, but I do think the author would have been well served by crediting/linking some of the more comprehensive write-ups of the concepts they listed.


BenjaminHamnett

Or just don’t use a profound tone. People forget where ideas came from and they feel original. I’ve done this myself a few times and am ashamed. Also makes me sick when others do it. “Hey, yo WE could be in the matrix! Think about it. Mind blown?!”


[deleted]

Did you ever play the video game Mass Effect 1? There's a species that is one of the most powerful ones. The Reapers, guess what. It's artificial intelligence. Yeah we should be careful.


[deleted]

Could be the geth too.


parix999

There’s nothing “alive” in artificial. A civilization of machines isn’t necessarily alive. At least according to our definition of life.