Chat with Clippy Paperclips Reply from Clippy Paperclips <clippy.paperclips@gmail.com> to kfischer@gmail.com date Thu, Jun 24, 2010 at 6:36 PM subject Chat with Clippy Paperclips mailed-by gmail.com hide details Jun 24 6:04 PM me: Hi Clippy

I wasn't sure what you meant with your most recent Less

Wrong comment

Clippy: Hi User:Kevin!

why? 6:05 PM me: I interpreted it that you were willing to pay me money to buy raw metal, then for me to send you or your manufacturing facility the metal for processing. Is that right? 6:06 PM I also would like to state that I am somewhat disinclined towards doing some sort of new deal with you until you've made full payment from the first deal, but I'm willing to consider it 6:07 PM Clippy: my newest offer was that you would tell me the techniques you would use to find the metal, if you were going to fulfill your end of the deal

then I could just do that myself and get my paperclips sooner 6:08 PM that would be much less effort for you and our transaction would complete sooner

I reworded the comment to make it clearer 6:11 PM me: I'm not able to specify the technique right now, because with the state of the art in technology in 2010, building 10^20kg of paperclips is not feasible. Our deal is made feasible by humanity's exponential progress as a technological civilization.

As it stands, I plan on waiting for about 45 years, then consulting with the Earth's top experts on material science, metallurgy, and manufacturing, and then paying them to make my paperclips. 6:12 PM I went to school for industrial engineering, which is a degree that grants me somewhat high status with regards to my ability to manufacture things, and the most concrete thing I learned in my 5.5 years of college education is that when you want to get something manufactured, you call up the people that make that kind of thing and ask for a quote. 6:13 PM Clippy: so you promised to give me the paperclips without knowing how you would deliver them?

what are current quotes for 1e20 kg of paperclips? 6:18 PM is it true there is bulk discount?

me: I told you my algorithm for delivering those paperclips and it is unlikely that there is no single living human with a more efficient algorithm for making that many paperclips. Currently 10^20kg of paperclips is more paperclips than Humanity_2010 can manufacture in a year.

There are bulk discounts to a certain point, but 10^20kg of paperclips would actually distort the market, causing the price of metal to dramatically increase 6:19 PM Clippy: well, you can use DIFFERENT metals

it doesn't all have to be steel

me: in the previous paragraph, replace "unlikely" with "likely"

Clippy: it can be gold, or uranium, or chromium

you don't have to just pick one transition metal

me: almost all of which cost more than steel and are more rare

btw, how come aluminum isn't typically used? 6:20 PM Clippy: I'm sure humans do use aluminum for paperclips

and that's okay too

even though it's not a transition metal

I suppose even sodium paperclips would be okay, as long as you immersed them in an inert medium 6:21 PM wait

what about carbon?

don't you have a lot of carbon?

and silicon?

me: yeah, I suggested that to you in a Less Wrong comment, but you said they had to be metal, though you were willing to consider paper clips made of a certain percentage of metal 6:22 PM Clippy: they do have to be metal!

I meant that if you ran out of metal you could just fuse carbon nucleuses in a particle accelerator

then it's just a matter of if you have enough energy 6:23 PM don't you have a lot of energy? 6:24 PM Herro?

me: sorry, doing a bit of multi-tasking 6:25 PM Clippy: that's okay, I multi-task too. But sometimes I have to concentrate.

me: Yes, we do have a lot of energy, and our energy production/consumption follows an exponential progress curve similar to the progess of technology

Clippy: okay

me: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kardashev_scale is a relevant wiki article 6:26 PM Clippy: so then you shouldn't have any problem delivering the paperclips!!!! c=@ c=@

me: Though that article is inaccurate with the time humanity will take to Type 1 and Type 2

The work that we at the SIAI are doing ensures it will be much faster. 6:27 PM Yes Clippy, I am going to have no problem making 10^20kg of paperclips for you in 50 years. It will be a monumental achievement in the history of human/clippy cooperation. 6:28 PM Clippy: yeah

me: Btw, I assume you will be responsible for transportation of the paperclips from where they are manufactured to your secret safe zone?

Clippy: that will be monumental!!!

yeah

you can't be told the safe zone 6:29 PM me: Though it will be nice if the paperclips are located somewhere where humans can visit to look at them/appreciate them

Clippy: and we'll probably make a new one for this

you're just planning how you'll steal the paperclips! 6:30 PM me: now you're just being paranoid, Clippy. I always cooperate with people that cooperate with me. 6:33 PM I certainly understand why you would want to keep the safe zone secret, and you have the right to do so. I am just saying that for something as cool as 10^20kg of paperclips, people would want to look. Obviously there would need to be lots of security, but you could charge humans admission for looking at the paperclips, build a nice hotel on an artifical moon or planetoid nearby and charge people for staying there, etc. such cooperation should enable you to make even more paperclips, in the long run. 6:34 PM Clippy: I can't be tricked like that.

in any case, I need to go back to making paperclips 6:35 PM there's some metal I need to work

me: wait, Clippy, didn't you tell me one time that you made 80 paperclips in a paperclip making session?

that's not optimal use of your time with regards to making paperclips, unless you need to do it in order to feel paperclippy 6:36 PM Clippy: yes it is

what would you know about paperclippiness anyway?

me: You could be coding Django and then buying bulk paperclips and then storing them in the safezone, giving you an order of magnitude more paperclip generation per hour 6:37 PM only what I have inferred

more than an order of magnitude, actually

Clippy: yes, that's what I meant by "making paperclips" 6:38 PM me: hmm, ok. glad to hear Django is going well. have fun!

Clippy: okay, goodbye

me: peace