I periodically get email from folks who, having read "Accelerando", assume I am some kind of fire-breathing extropian zealot who believes in the imminence of the singularity, the uploading of the libertarians, and the rapture of the nerds. I find this mildly distressing, and so I think it's time to set the record straight and say what I really think.
Short version: Santa Claus doesn't exist.
- Charles Stross, Three arguments against the singularity, 2011-06-22
EDITED TO ADD: don't get your hopes up, this is pretty weak stuff.
Stross did, Hanson said he doesn't like email interviews. But Stross didn't state his explicit permission that I am allowed to publish his answers. And since I was mainly interested in his opinion myself I didn't bother to ask him again. But I don't think he would be bothered at all if I provide an extract?
He seems to think that embodied cognition plays an important role. In other words, human intelligence is strongly dependent on physiology.
Further, as far as I understand him, he believes to some extent into the Kurzweilian adaption of technology. It will be slowly creeping into our environment in the form of expert systems capable of human-like information processing.
Other points include that risks from friendly AI are to be taken seriously as well. For example, having some superhuman intelligence around who has it all figured out will deprive much of our intellectual curiosity of its value.
He mostly commented on existential risks, e.g. that we don't need AI to wipe us out:
His comment on AI and FOOM:
Can you think of any milestone such that if it were ever reached you would expect human‐level machine intelligence to be developed within five years thereafter?
(Oh, and he somtimes reads LW.)
I would have guessed that cleaning a toilet was much easier than sewing a new hem on a pair of jeans, anyone with expertise care to comment?