
Why the future doesn't need us (2000) - dreeves
http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/8.04/joy_pr.html
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ChuckMcM
Ah yes, Bill's essay on the dangers of the future. The first time I read it I
was struck not by the message but by the tone. Similar to the tone someone
uses when they buy their first (and perhaps only) gun in the USA and,
realizing how straight forward it was, they realize that anyone could just
walk up to them and shoot them because well they could easily get their own
gun.

The world is a big and generally ambivalent place. It has been in our (by
which I mean humans) power to render it uninhabitable for over 50 years now,
and yet still we haven't. We may at some point, but so far so good.

But as adults, you have to choose. You can choose not to drive on the
freeways, knowing that at any time you could be mowed down by a drunk driver
or someone texting, or you can go into it with your eyes open and your
precautions in place. It is important to know that you can be killed while
driving in order to respect what needs to be done (and not done) when you are
behind the wheel of a car. If you don't respect that, you die.

So it is with the world at large. And the great "information hiding"[1]
campaign not withstanding, its important to know how technology can kill you
so as to know when it is likely to.

I do believe at some point we'll be able to talk to machines directly with
your brain. We do that today with sound and visual images, eliminating the
ears and eyes in the path is a matter of understanding the API. A friend of
mine, points out that the first person to become part of a computer will be
able to out perform everyone else, if they are not a nice person they will
prevent others from getting the same advantage.

But what is their advantage? They can make more money than you and me? Lots of
people already have that. They can write code faster? better? Sure there are
meglomaniacs, we need to watch out for those folks and shut them down, but
there are bad drivers too.

We can run away, but it doesn't change what is. The older you get it seems the
more you recognize the futility of that.

[1] Somewhere in the mid-90's it occurred to people you could just learn all
this stuff that was _dangerous_ and they have been on a mission ever since to
carefully remove information from the system. The trick is to do it slowly and
carefully to avoid the Striesand effect, but it continues to this day.
Chemistry sets are a good exemplar.

~~~
vy8vWJlco
I get the impression that if issues of Phrack and old viruses weren't part of
the historical record, possessing them today would be illegal too.

------
damon_c
I sometimes think that if Theodore Kaczynski was a fictional character in a
Hollywood movie, he would be the hero, like a Neo...

Of course it would help if he looked like Keanu Reeves... and David Gelernter
would have to be evil and played by James Woods or something. The shack in the
woods in Montana didn't help either...

------
lectrick
With my only credentials being that I once had a single email exchange with
Bill Joy, I'd have to disagree and say that the future needs us more than
ever.

Machines are not taking over humans. They are taking over boring tasks,
leaving the ever more interesting ones to us. Nanotech and the like are
completely devoid of meaning without human input. And where is nanotech these
days, anyway?

~~~
michaelochurch
Bingo! This is what inspired me to develop the Convexity theory (
[http://michaelochurch.wordpress.com/2013/04/03/gervais-
macle...](http://michaelochurch.wordpress.com/2013/04/03/gervais-
macleod-21-why-does-work-suck/) ). It's a middle-ground between head-in-the-
sand "nothing's changing" and the almost theological "Singularity".

These machines are powerful levers, but they still need movers, and there's no
evidence that they'll become sentient or develop ulterior agendas. We'll just
develop more convincing abstraction layers and delegating a greater share of
the unpleasant, repetitive work.

~~~
clicks
Can you just write a book already michaaelochurch? Or rather, just compile
your blog writings into one [1]. I've been meaning to read everything you've
written in your blog... but I think I think I keep pushing it because I
generally don't like reading long things on a computer screen.

[1]: patio11 had good things about to say about the publisher he worked with,
perhaps they could also work with you too.

------
dreeves
Two previous discussions:

* <https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2478532> * <https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1378232>

(My take on this kind of thing is foremost to acknowledge that it's not enough
to make an argument that an existential risk scenario is implausible. Given
the stakes, it's not even enough to make a seemingly airtight argument that
it's impossible. We should be funding very serious thought on existential
risks, including crazy-seeming ones. Y'know, just in case.)

