This is cross-posted from my blog. We need more people on board for life extension in order to hit longevity escape velocity in our lifetimes. But most people have never heard of life extension, and even those who have often follow the same predictable arguments. “What if it doesn't work?”...
This is cross-posted from my blog and I interviewed him for a general audience rather than LessWrong people. I was lucky enough to interview Bill O’Rourke. Imagine you’re on a plane to Russia to become the new president of an aluminum factory. Conditions are abysmal. People are dying every year...
I’m a big life extension supporter but being unable to choose to die ever is a literal hell. As dark as it is, if these scenarios are likely, it seems the rational thing to do is die before AGI comes. Killing all of humanity is bad enough, but how concerned...
This is cross-posted from my blog. “Eight villages in our district have had significant to total structural damage from mudslides. Furthermore, the weather conditions conducive to mudslides have only been increasing in the past decade.” Professor Cristian Avendaño clicked the button and a list of temperatures, wind conditions, and annual...
This is cross-posted from my blog and is written more for a general audience rather than LessWrong people who will be more familiar with some of the relevant concepts. Robert McIntrye is an all-around smart and interesting dude, and he’s the CEO of Nectome, a startup devoted to preserving the...
I think a lot about the importance of incentives. There are numerous historical examples of perverse incentives but what are some examples of times where people got the incentives right?
This is cross-posted from my blog and is written more for a general audience rather than LessWrong people who will be more familiar with some of the relevant concepts. Robert McIntrye is an all-around smart and interesting dude, and he’s the CEO of Nectome, a startup devoted to preserving the human brain. Last year, I wrote a summary of Robert’s brain preservation talk at the Long Now Foundation: https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/N7j4xHkyjKbimmF6A/notes-on-robert-mcintyre-s-brain-preservation-talk-at-the-1 He later read it and reached out to me about discussing our thoughts. I asked if I could record it as an interview and here we are! We dive into topics such as brain preservation, personal identity, life extension, AGI, Rick and Morty, and why he’s worried about the current state of cryonics. Our interview went for over three hours and we weren’t anywhere close to exhausting our conversation (but we did exhaust my bladder capacity). A lot of time was spent on personal identity and the teletransportation paradox. We talked a lot about things we don’t actually disagree on, but I’m glad we did because it will help clear up confusion for listeners who aren’t on the same page. The crux of our actual disagreement is as follows: I wouldn’t destructively copy myself, as in the case of the teletransportation paradox, and he would. If you’ve read the Three Buckets, you know that I care about my own utility and the utility of my loved ones. Imagine someone made a perfect copy of me. If my copy’s hand was pricked, he would feel the pain but I wouldn’t. If that copy was eating a double-double animal style from In-N-Out, he would be enjoying the taste of that goodness but I wouldn’t be. While I’d prefer for my copy to be feeling pleasure rather than pain, if I had to choose, I’d prefer to be the one eating In-N-Out and not getting his hand pricked. It’s not that I don’t care if my copy is enjoying life. It’s that I don’t care as much because I’m not experiencing it.