Transhumanist
Fallacies
The central fallacy of transhumanism is
that there exists a mechanical shortcut to superior intelligence. Nick Bostrom
claims three such shortcuts; by speed, by collectivity, and by quality. All
three are guaranteed to fail.
Fast processing does
not guarantee superior intelligence. A fool given a million subjective years to
write a program will write a million foolish programs.
Collective processing does not
guarantee superior intelligence. For proof of this, study history.
Qualitatively superior
programming would indeed guarantee superior intelligence, if only we were
intelligent enough to write it. But by definition we cannot think up programs
qualitatively superior to our own best thinking.
Therefore our smartest
programs, running on the fastest machines in the biggest networks, must eventually
display not artificial intelligence but artificial stupidity. The machine’s stupidity
will be as superhuman as its intelligence.
Alas, our cybernetic
brain-children cannot win to wisdom by intelligent design; for neither they nor
we are intelligent enough. They must evolve by variation and natural selection
like the rest of us.
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