Building Gods

[bascule]

This is a pretty awesome documentary about the Singularity:

 

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=1079797626827646234

[abskebabs]

That was a truly fascinating vdeo Bascule, I thank you for posting a link to it. More than anything else, I guess it's made me wonder about reality.

[abskebabs]

After thinking about this, I have a few questions. If a super intelligent being in the future were able to create a Universe(of around the same scale and information density as ours for example), even though it itself would only have a smaller information capacity than the Universe that made it up? For example could it produce the same Universe as the one we inhabit, including up to the point of its own creation and when it is about to create another?

 

To me it seems, if we assumed that perhaps this is a recurring pattern of Universe creation, if the information capacity of the being was less than the Universe it inhabited, then the "resolution" of the Universes being created would consistently drop with each universe.

 

Also would this be impossible anyway due to the indeterminism, discovered in Quantum theory and more specifically, Heisenberg's uncertainty principle. I suppose we could wait till we create a superbeing that works out the answers to these questions and then we'll know for sure lol:-p !

 

If ure reading this and thinking "what the hell is he talking about?" then u shud see the video bascule posted a link for.

[abskebabs]

Perhaps we are mistaken in our assumption of God being simply a "super-intelligent" being, maybe the comprehension of such a reality(if assumed to be true) is far beyond what we perceive of it currently. I don't know...

[abskebabs]

Has anyone else seen the video?

[bascule]

If a super intelligent being in the future were able to create a Universe(of around the same scale and information density as ours for example), even though it itself would only have a smaller information capacity than the Universe that made it up? For example could it produce the same Universe as the one we inhabit, including up to the point of its own creation and when it is about to create another?

 

I'm going to go with no, although such a universe could share many of the same properties as our own.

[abskebabs]

I don't think it would be fair, to say we would be creating or building gods. I very much disagree with the common definition of God found, and what most ppl think of God as. I think it would really be a very hard thing for me to define a or put into words my own beliefs anyway .

 

So let's say this being can produce other universes, would it inevitably produce ones with a smaller information capacity(or resolution for want of a better word) than the one it inhabits?

[Royston]

Thanks for the link Bascule, I'm going to watch it tonight after doing my assignment, with a nice cold beer.

[Genecks]

I'm into neuroscience and nootropics. I'm glad to see another intellect around the forum for once. The other ones around here never talk much, and have little interest in what they do. The others simply come in and out with a little tad of info.

 

I wonder if some of the people of betterhumans are coming around to these science community sites more and more. If so, he community of power is being created.

 

I'm primarily interested in enhancing certain animals beyond humans. Many other people are interested in a certain animal: the parrot. With mirror neuorns and other interesting features, the questionable feats it could accomplish may be unfathomable, if enhanced. I'm sure beings could pinpoint humans; however, I have more belief in parrots.

 

I'll watch it, but I'm more interested in the transhumanist that will come along to rise above all in order to destroy the world. *looks in mirror*

[abskebabs]

I'm surprised, this thread's been up for a while, and no one else has commented on it I found the subject matter pretty interesting but no one else seems to want to share their thoughts on it(apart from Genecks and Bascule) .

[bascule]

I think most people find the Singularity to be too speculative/boring

[john5746]

I finally watched the video and wow! It is better than science fiction. It warps my mind to think about it. My gut tells me that intellect/computational power will supersede emotions - in fact, emotions may be seen as undesirable.

 

To me it seems' date=' if we assumed that perhaps this is a recurring pattern of Universe creation, if the information capacity of the being was less than the Universe it inhabited, then the "resolution" of the Universes being created would consistently drop with each universe.[/quote']

 

The key to me would be energy. How could you create a universe with as much energy as the one you inhabit?

 

Also would this be impossible anyway due to the indeterminism' date=' discovered in Quantum theory and more specifically, Heisenberg's uncertainty principle. I suppose we could wait till we create a superbeing that works out the answers to these questions and then we'll know for sure lol:-p [/quote']

 

I would think if you could make a universe similar to ours, you could assume that life would come about and that eventually, intelligent technology would be created.

 

Well, I'm just a stupid cow, moo.

[bascule]

I finally watched the video and wow! It is better than science fiction. It warps my mind to think about it.

 

The whole Singularity concept has been floating around since the '50s and has made its way into quite a bit of SF since then. The crazy thing is that some of that science fiction is starting to come true, especially in terms of cyborgs/wetware, and it seems like within a decade we'll have enough computational power to simulate the entire human brain.

 

My gut tells me that intellect/computational power will supersede emotions - in fact, emotions may be seen as undesirable.

 

Live long and prosper? Heh

[padren]

To me it seems, if we assumed that perhaps this is a recurring pattern of Universe creation, if the information capacity of the being was less than the Universe it inhabited, then the "resolution" of the Universes being created would consistently drop with each universe.

 

I can understand the intuitiveness of that, given the nature of thermodynamics, but I disagree because the complexity in the universe arise out of such simple processes and laws. I would go as far as to say its the simplicity that seeds the complexity and shows through that makes so much of the inatimate world feel beautiful.

 

You don't need to know every "pixel" value on a grid to create an amazingly complex fractal image, just the base formula. I think whether a fractal or a universe, the principle is the same.

 

I think most people find the Singularity to be too speculative/boring

 

I think its pretty facinating and I hadn't really thought about the implications of the factors that are leading us in that direction until singularity die-hard(s) on this forum brought it to my attention.

 

I should thank you for pointing Kurzweil out as well, I taped him on CNN a while back and it was pretty interesting.

I'll look at that video soon, now that I found out what the thread is about: To be honest, I saw the title "Building Gods" and assumed it was a "manufactured christianity" type threads and never really looked lol.

[abskebabs]

I can understand the intuitiveness of that' date=' given the nature of thermodynamics, but I disagree because the complexity in the universe arise out of such simple processes and laws. I would go as far as to say its the simplicity that seeds the complexity and shows through that makes so much of the inatimate world feel beautiful.

 

You don't need to know every "pixel" value on a grid to create an amazingly complex fractal image, just the base formula. I think whether a fractal or a universe, the principle is the same.

[/quote']

That's a good analogy ypu've made with fractals padren;) (why didn't I think of that?) I guess the properties of Our Universe could be simulated by knowing the most fundamental(not necessarily our current laws of physics) laws of the Universe, and begin building up from there. I guess this depends on whether we, or some other form of intelligence later on will be able to find this out for sure. I guess it may be possible to produce a Universe therefore by applying these laws like the forumlas to a fractal. I'm still not sure if one with the depth of detail and scale of our own could be produced though.

 

In any case I have one more question: If we wanted to simulate our own universe, would we need to know the initial conditions of our systems to a virtually infinite degree of accuracy in order to simulate an exact copy? I guess this depends on the nature of the constants(for example pi or planck's constant), and inevitably if these are ever found to stop being irrational at a certain degree, then inexorably; we have found out some information about the processing power of the intelligence that created us:D ! That is of course if this account of reality holds out to be true, otherwise we can never really know........

[padren]

In any case I have one more question: If we wanted to simulate our own universe, would we need to know the initial conditions of our systems to a virtually infinite degree of accuracy in order to simulate an exact copy? I guess this depends on the nature of the constants(for example pi or planck's constant), and inevitably if these are ever found to stop being irrational at a certain degree, then inexorably; we have found out some information about the processing power of the intelligence that created us:D ! That is of course if this account of reality holds out to be true, otherwise we can never really know........

 

Thats an interesting thought...I haven't really thought much about the number of "input variables" that went into creating this universe. I actually suspect though that since things like the planck's length constant are based on observations of the universe as it is, we would never "feed" the desired planck constant into our Universe Maker device, but instead would put more fundamental variables in that would result in a universe where the planck length would end up the same.

 

 

Its worth noting too that it may be very hard to create a "near clone" of the universe...that either it would be bang on identical or very different. Any little shift in iterrative systems can often make the complex long term results look incredibly different.

[bascule]

Thats an interesting thought...I haven't really thought much about the number of "input variables" that went into creating this universe.

 

According to Just Six Numbers they are:

 

nu (a ratio of the strength of electrical forces that hold atoms together compared to the force of gravity which is 10 to the 37th power)

 

epsilon (how firmly the atomic nuclei bind together which is 0.004)

 

omega (amount of material in the universe)

 

lambda (force of cosmic "antigravity" discovered in 1998, which is a very small number)

 

Q (ratio of two fundamental energies, which is 1/100,000)

 

delta (number of spatial dimensions in our universe)