are almost certainly bullshit.
You can be certain if you wish. I am not. As I am not sure that there isn't a supervirus somewhere, I can't be certain that there isn't a decent self-improver somewhere. Probably not, but ...
Both ARE possible, according to my best knowledge, so it wouldn't be wise to be too sure in any direction.
As you are.
Both ARE possible, according to my best knowledge, so it wouldn't be wise to be too sure in any direction.
According to the technically correct, but completely useless, lesswrong style rationality you are right that it is not wise to say that it is "almost certainly bullshit". What I meant to say is that given what I know it is unlikely enough to be true to be ignored and that any attempt at calculating the expected utility of being wrong will be a waste of time, or even result in spectacular failure.
I currently feel that the whole business of ...
...has finally been published.
Contents:
The issue consists of responses to Chalmers (2010). Future volumes will contain additional articles from Shulman & Bostrom, Igor Aleksander, Richard Brown, Ray Kurzweil, Pamela McCorduck, Chris Nunn, Arkady Plotnitsky, Jesse Prinz, Susan Schneider, Murray Shanahan, Burt Voorhees, and a response from Chalmers.
McDermott's chapter should be supplemented with this, which he says he didn't have space for in his JCS article.