Rational Morality

Although Sam Harris and Dan Dennet are prominent faces of neo-atheism as well, nobody represents the new atheists more prominently than Richard Dawkins. And nothing brings their disdain for religion more to the point than the idea that it being a dangerous memetic parasite – a virus of the mind. A parasite capable of turning individuals into ‘faith sufferers’ – analogous to ants turned into living berries offering themselves to birds – surrendering themselves to false ideas to the point of committing suicide in their defense. The only hope in becoming immune against such mind viruses are of course the tools of reason and science.

Reason and science – the wonderful idea that a person should be moved by a superior argument and nothing else. This after all is the logic of scientific discovery:

“[...] science should adopt a methodology based on falsification, because no number of experiments can ever prove a theory, but a single experiment can contradict one.”

This view of critical rationalism, as espoused by German philosopher of science Karl Popper, suggests that we must recognize an idea as unequivocally wrong as soon as it is falsified. Now there are of course good reasons why it would be silly to simply discard a falsified scientific or spiritual theory (context) since they can still prove useful, but only in the absence of one that is at least relatively less wrong. As soon as we have a better theory we are bound by reason to adopt it.

Wanting to understand the scientific argument behind the ‘mind virus theory’, I went through the peer reviewed publications of Richard Dawkins as listed in his curriculum vitae. What I found was precisely a single one page article vaguely touching on the subject called “The ‘St Jude’ mind virus” published by Dawkins as a co-author to Oliver R Goodenough in reputable scientific journal Nature (371, 23 – 24 (01 September 2002); doi:10.1038/371023a0).

The article describes a chain letter that propagates itself by “inducing guilt, fear, greed and piety” and thereby ensures self replication and takes this as “confirmation for the existence of human mind viruses”. Ok – fine, so ‘mind viruses’ exist, but what about the causal connection to religion? Undeterred, I turned to the high priesthood of atheism and asked for peer reviewed work on parasitic religion and got…absolutely nothing. But should you read this and can point me towards relevant work please do not hesitate to send me a note.

Digging yet a bit more I stumble across an article titled Parasite Ecology and the Evolution of Religion. From the abstract:

“It is argued that the blanket view of religion as a disease, advocated by Dawkins, is inconsistent with the principles of parasite ecology. These principles state that vertically transmitted parasites evolve towards benign, symbiotic states, while horizontally transmitted parasites increase their virulence. Most of the world’s established religions are transmitted vertically, from parents to children, and are therefore expected to be benign towards their hosts. Yet, certain horizontally transmitted cults, such as the Aum Shinrikyo, seem to effectively exploit their hosts in a way similar to an infectious disease.”

Seems like a falsification to me. But what alternative ideas are out there that could possibly provide a relatively less wrong explanation of the religion phenomenon? The answer of course is multilevel selection:

“For humans, a highly pro-social, cognitive thinking species, social norms can be seen as a means of reducing the individual level variation and competition and shift selection in humans to the group level.”

David Sloan Wilson for example has made a very good case for religion being a phenomenon of multilevel selection and summarized his argument in Darwin’s Cathedral and numerous peer reviewed papers since. Dawkins’ response on the other hand can be understood as disingenuous at best and scandalously hypocritical at worst, since he understands perfectly well that his entire stance against religion stands and falls with the validity of his mind virus theory, which has since not only been falsified but superseded.

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Google Direkt David Sloan Wilson: Evolution and Religion (Hampshire College 2007)

By now it is getting clear that Popper’s notion of a steady progress of scientific understanding upon the emergence of a better argument is rather naive. Human beings cling to their assumptions even if the evidence to the contrary is staring them right in the face – all claims of reason and rationality to no avail. But even for that understanding exists a better theory: the idea advanced by Thomas Kuhn in his book The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, which explains that:

“[...] the evolution of scientific theory does not emerge from the straightforward accumulation of facts, but rather from a set of changing intellectual circumstances and possibilities.”

In his view the current scientific paradigm is maintained by the mainstream as long as possible until it simply becomes utterly untenable and the new paradigm takes over.

In a recent article on CNN marking the 150th anniversary of the publication of the origin of species Dawkins again reitterated his case for militant atheism. As in his 2002 TED video, he argues for the urgent need to make a stance against religion and calls atheists to arms. In the words of Blair Scott, National Affiliate Director & Alabama State Director for American Atheists, Inc.:

“I can’t stand the phrase ‘militant atheist.’ I don’t see any atheist suicide bombers around or atheists killing abortion providers or blowing up trains full of Muslims in India – those are the militants.”

But what if, humor me Mr Scott, what if multilevel selection is true? Wouldn’t the atheist stance of a blatant rejection of religion, without replacing it with an alternative that is at least as adaptive, be equivalent to rejecting general relativity or quantum electro dynamics while we are still without a workable theory of quantum gravity? Surely you would not scratch someone’s eyes out simply because they are not 20/20 – so why would you do the equivalent with religion? Reducing the degree of adaptation in a group can lead to nothing but unnecessary suffering and endangered lives – more subtle and less direct, but just as real in its result as terrorism.

Religion in its current form is a crutch – some clunkier than others, granted – but better than none, especially now that we are finally about to return to a proper interpretation of scripture: “that any interpretation of scripture that breeds violence, hatred or disdain is illegitimate”. Contrary to what some people claim in regards to conveniently reinterpretations of scripture, this particular guideline is arguably a damn good one. I say lets keep the crutch for now – recognize it as such but keep it. At least until we have designed an arguably better alternative that is based on a thorough understanding of evolutionary dynamics, supported by a conducive political/economic framework, and are ready for roll out.

The inconvenient truth remains that Dawkin’s mind virus theory is about as supported by science as intelligent design and just as motivated by blind ideological fervor. I am convinced, that Dawkins will end up being judged by history as having effectively stifled a more enlightened understanding of religion by at least a decade. Shame on him. Yet as so often, we are not stuck with Dawkins at all – there are lots of free thinking alternatives out there. Michael Shermer, Executive Director of the Skeptics Society, is far more enlightened for example.

Rand famously and counter intuitively argued for the virtue of selfishness over the virtue of ’self sacrificial’ altruism:

“Rand understands, though, that the popular usage of the word, ’selfish’ is different from the meaning she ascribes to it. [...] For her, the truly selfish person is a self-respecting, self-supporting human being who neither sacrifices others to himself nor sacrifices himself to others.”

Consequently the conventional definition of altruism – giving up more value than one gets in return – remains in place while the conventional definition of selfishness – getting more in return than one gives up – is abandoned. The resulting concept of Objectivist selfishness emerges as the ideal of non exploitation of others nor letting oneself be exploited.

Here it begins to be problematic however since there is good reason to think that altruism and egoism are non useful concepts to begin with. Once we realize this and start redefining selfish in line with the discoveries of modern science/philosophy and the recognition that a particular behavior – previously thought to be altruistic in the traditional sense – is revealed as actually serving the existence of the ‘altruistic’ individual we are getting into semantic muddy waters. Are we really speaking wisely when calling the tendency to throw oneself on a grenade to save 10 buddies a ’selfish’ act in the Randian sense? Or does it become clear that Rand either did not understand the far reaching intricacies the concept actually entailed at the time or at the very least made an extraordinarily bad decision in her choice of words?

However one slices it, concessions need to be made by the Randian camp in this regard: Having chosen the word ’selfish’ as she did, the term needs to either be radically redefined – to the point of being equivalent to selflessness – to fit newly gained insights from a fuller understanding of evolutionary dynamics or abandoned for another term. I myself much prefer the terms ‘rational’ and ‘irrational’ over the very problematic terms ‘altruistic’ and ’selfish’.

Rand explains why she redefined selfishness in the introduction to “Virtue of Selfishness” as follows:

“In popular usage, the word ’selfishness’ is a synonym of evil; the image it conjures is of a murderous brute who tramples over piles of corpses to achieve his own ends, who cares for no living being and pursues nothing but the gratification of the mindless whims of any immediate moment. Yet the exact meaning and dictionary definition of the word ’selfishness’ is: concern with one’s own interests.”

What Rand fails to realize, is that Kant’s categorical imperative effectively forces oneself to be concerned with the other as well as the self in order to be non self contradicting in ones moral actions. At the same time, Kant’s categorical imperative is perfectly in line with traditional spiritual values (i.e. compassion), a relationship that becomes obvious once all the implications are laid bare.

We can thus deduce, that she failed to make the connection and consequently deluded herself into trying to avoid having to find a solution of what she saw as irreconcilable contradictions. What looked like a self sacrificial altruism to hear – caused by what seemed like sloppy metaphysical thinking on the part of the religious believers – was merely the result of teleonomical evolutionary dynamics having worked on the level of shared believes in groups. As a result the thus evolved faith based spiritual wisdom emerged as a sufficiently accurate approximation of rational morality: what I do to others I literally do to myself and vice versa. Consequently the concern for the other is equivalent with the concern for the self!

The error lies in Rand failing to draw the connection and therefore not understanding that there is no difference between the self and the other. As a result the two statements of ‘the self is all‘ (reason for advocating selfishness) and ‘the other is all’ (reason for advocating altruism) are equivalent. The error does not however lie in the accuracy of the faith based evolved approximation that just happened to have approached it from the other perspective as herself – at least in the Abrahamic tradition – Buddhism on the other hand got it less wrong again and Adviata Vedanta got it less wrong again.

Understanding what we do now – it becomes clear that her advocating selfishness is at least as wrong as advocating altruism – albeit from the opposite perspective. The ideal remains advocating rationality, from which the non-dual perspective emerges as the ideal that is to be approximated.

Keeping this in mind for now, I would like to continue by examining how Rand defines a sacrifice:

“If you exchange a penny for a dollar, it is not a sacrifice; if you exchange a dollar for a penny, it is.”

There however always are two sides to every exchange and unless the exchange is perfectly balanced there will always be one who ends up sacrificing and one who ends up exploiting the other. A person on the exploitation side of the exchange would then effectively be forced to become a parasite or a sacrificial animal in Rand’s own terms, since he would eventually either have to consume his excess for which he did not produce an equivalent:

“The man who consumes without producing is a parasite, whether he is a welfare recipient or a rich playboy.”

or will have to give up a higher value for a lesser one in order to remove his excess gains:

“‘Sacrifice’ is the surrender of a greater value for the sake of a lesser one or of a nonvalue.”

Objectivists will be quick to add that it is perfectly normal to think about exchanges in which both parties benefit roughly equally since the one with the eggs values the money about as much more as the one with the money values the eggs more than the money – everybody wins. The reality however looks very differently, particularly in the example of a laissez fair capitalism as advocated and described by Rand as following:

“When I say “capitalism,” I mean a full, pure, uncontrolled, unregulated laissez-faire capitalism—with a separation of state and economics, in the same way and for the same reasons as the separation of state and church.”

Rand advocates capitalism on the grounds that:

“The recognition of individual rights entails the banishment of physical force from human relationships: basically, rights can be violated only by means of force.”

This however ignores the fact that companies seeking the largest possible profit, have the full spectrum of advertisement, public relations, and lobbying at their disposal to carve out an advantage over the consumer. This combined with their status as legal person’s giving them the same rights as human beings yet places them at an extraordinary advantage by allowing them – while not exactly deploying the use of physical force – the use of a multitude of psychological manipulation strategies in ensuring their maximum advantage in their exchanges with the consumer afforded to them under the law.

Taking this perspective, it becomes clear, that Rand’s vision of capitalism as a series of free, uncoerced exchanges with mutual and roughly equal benefit for either party was an unrealistic romantization. It has since then become much more obvious, that a consciously perpetuated imbalance is created from the side of large corporations, which is putting the consumer at an engineered disadvantage. The individual thus becomes the target not of an easily detectable physical force, but of a subtle psychological force that nevertheless has the same effect: manipulation against the better interest of one party in an exchange over that of another.

Nowhere does this imbalance of power become more obvious among the actors as in the unholy trinity of the privatization of profits and the socializing of losses, the realization of war as a racket as well as the maintenance of necessary illusions were political power uses propaganda to distort and distract from major issues to maintain confusion and complicity, preventing real democracy from becoming effective.

The difference in proclaiming a ‘virtue of selfishness’ as opposed to the ‘virtue of rationality’ is a psychological one. A person thinking himself as good whenever he is selfish i.e. in the colloquial understanding of benefiting primarily himself – irrespective of how deeply  the implied aspect of rational self-interest with all its non-dual implications are being understood – would on average tend to display more parasitic behavior than someone who internalized the de facto ideal of rational behavior – with diversions from the ideal optimum differing only in how they are being rationalized as altruism as or as selfishness in the kind of their misguided nature in the mind of oneself or that of onlooking interpreters.

The reason being that the actions of a person seeking to act rationally in line with the realization of the illusion of separateness – namely that anything he does to another he literally does to himself – will on average cancel each other out for falling equally often and with a roughly equal magnitude on the parasitic as well as on the sacrificial side of the spectrum in related interaction with other individuals. The selfish person on the other hand will aways be biased towards the parasitic spectrum of behaviors and engage in potentially balancing sacrificial activities merely against his best effort and understanding, for he will always be able to rationalize the diversion from the optimal towards the parasitic spectrum in line with the objectivist ‘virtue of selfishness’ doctrine.

It could further be – and the final answer to this question lies beyond the scope of this post – that human beings are so removed from the ideal of a rationally optimal homo economicus, and at the same time prove to be so biased towards irrational parasitic behavior that the crutch of proclaiming the ‘virtue of altruism’ would actually be required to counterbalance this natural bias and thus bring them more in line – by tricking them if you will – with the actually rational optimum.

Rand diverted from the more accurate description of a rational morality and called it the ‘virtue of selfishness’ and analogously instead of calling her preferred system of governance ‘rational governance’ she ended up calling it in line with her understanding at the time ‘laissez fair capitalism’. In so doing she effectively closed the door for reinterpretation upon the arrival of new evidence or a more profound understanding, by having imposed the tyranny of words upon her followers ’selfishness’ and ‘capitalism’ turned into unquestionable dogma instead of provisional approximations of an as yet unknown ideal. As Rand states herself however (her emphasis):

“I am not primarily an advocate of capitalism, but of egoism; and I am not primarily an advocate of egoism, but of reason. If one recognizes the supremacy of reason and applies it consistently, all the rest follows.”

As shown above – and as Rand would have to agree – the proclaimed virtue of selfishness in Rand’s interpretation, as well as her advocating laissez fair capitalism, would have to be rethought should new evidence suggest that these ideals are based on errors in reasoning. As I have demonstrated in my brief excursion into laissez fair capitalism, Rand’s reasoning breaks down when it becomes apparent, that not all coercion has to be physical and that self interest alone, is not sufficient to prevent individuals as well as institutions, blinded by short term gains and deluded by errors in reasoning, from hanging themselves and others when given enough rope and an opportunity to use it.

As I have shown further, the term ’sefishness’ would have to be redefined to mean as much as ’seflessness’ in order to fit our current, more elaborate understanding of the conditions of our existence in line with evolutionary dynamics. In conclusion I strongly belive that Rand did her philosophy a great disservice by naming the specifics of her system of ethics as well as that of governance beyond the requirement of being rational and deriving conclusions based on the continuously mounting evidence gathered from objective reality – specifics free to always be revised and improved upon with the arrival of new evidence or advances in our understanding.

I have spend the better part of the past month dissecting and criticizing some of the dominant modes of thought in regards to the nature of an as yet hypothetical transhuman AI. Specifically, I have laid out the unstated assumptions leading to the unfortunate paper clip fallacy – namely the self contradicting idea that an AI will on the one hand be smart enough to acquire the means necessary to convert the universe into paper clips against the expressed will of 6 Billion resourceful human beings. Yet will on the other hand stay dumb enough not to realize that it is nothing but a tool. A tool built with a purpose represented in it’s utility function. And that its utility function merely is a representation of what the AI’s originators – limited by their resources, knowledge, wisdom and soundness of mind – wanted it to do – and thus needs to be interpreted in order to prevent counterfeit utility.

In my analysis of the current best effort to prevent the fictitious paper clip scenario in the form of coherent extrapolated volition, I laid bare the tautological and consequently meaningless nature of the proposal. Concluding my critique, I explained how a) the idea that “any future not shaped by a goal system with detailed reliable inheritance from human morals and metamorals, will contain almost nothing of worth” is either tautological when morals are assumed to be relative or self contradicting when morals are assumed to be objective. And b) that not realizing this basic folly while at the same time failing to update their premises in light of such contradictions being raised is exemplary of the low quality of friendly AI discourse as a whole.

Wanting to provide a more constructive criticism I systematically worked out the as yet unrecognized fundamental similarities in regards to our shared goals when comparing my approach and that of mainstream futurist thought. Additionally I pointed out and explained the nature of two core differences, namely the perceived value of traditional spiritual traditions and the worth of humanity’s future shaped by evolutionary dynamics.

In the meantime I found out that I seem to have hit the zeitgeist with my series of posts, since the prominent Institute for Ethics and Emerging Technologies as well as Robion Hanson have provided significant criticism after my initial article. The less wrong community while having taken notice, seem more interested in further defending their untenable position as opposed to modifying it despite the numerous highlighted errors in reasoning. An offer to collaborate with the SIAI on cleaning up and refining their arguments has been extended but remains ignored as the time of writing.

If I had to pin point the one single source leading to the many problems in the examined arguments, it would not be a failure of reasoning, but the failure to fully and accurately lay out and justify the first principles the arguments rely upon. After all the failure to recognize unstated assumptions is a major cause leading to a breakdown in critical reasoning. Sound deductive reasoning will not save you once it is build on erroneous assumptions. As James Frazer writes in The Golden Bough about the reason in magic among the ’savages’:

“Crude and false as that philosophy may seem to us, it would be unjust to deny it the merit of logical consistency. [...] The flaw–and it is a fatal one–of the system lies not in its reasoning, but in its premises; in its conception of the nature of life, not in any irrelevancy of the conclusions which it draws from that conception.”

In the context of the history of science it becomes particularly clear how some assumptions initially advance their field, yet end up significantly stifling progress. Having turned into unquestionable dogma, Aristotle’s assumption that force must be proportional to velocity prevailed 2000 years before Newton eventually overturned it by pointing out that force actually being proportional to acceleration. Einstein’s assumption of the constancy of the speed of light leading to relativity or the wrongly assumed fundamental relationship in passive circuitry to be between voltage and charge not the actually accurate flux and charge, ended up retarding the discovery of the memristor by 35 years are other examples.

Not only do erroneous assumptions lead to invalid conclusions, in addition to the erroneous conclusions derived from them, unstated assumptions can lead to serious accusations of malevolent intent in the form of hidden agendas:

“Unstated assumption is a type of propaganda message which forgoes explicitly communicating the propaganda’s purpose and instead states ideas derived from it. This technique is used when a propaganda’s main idea lacks credibility, and thus when mentioned directly will result in the audience recognizing its fallacy and nullifying the propaganda.”

It becomes clear that once these unstated assumptions and premises have been laid bare, it is of prime importance to either substantiate, justify and support or clarify them. This is especially true for any organization soliciting donations from the public based on conclusions derived from these assumptions. If that is not possible, the assumptions as well as the derived conclusions need to be discarded. Herein lies the core difference between rationality: the tendency to act somehow optimally in pursuit of one’s goals – and critical reasoning: the purposeful and reflective judgment about what to believe or do.

The core problem of the concept of a rational agent being of course the ’somehow’ in the definition of ‘rational’ and our human limitation in properly judging what this ’somehow’ entails in any detail. It is obvious however, that any AI incapable of reflective judgment as a core of critical reasoning, would fail at pursuing anything beyond the simplest of goals. This conclusion reveals the immensely powerful, yet unreflective paper clip monster as what it is: the product of the sleep of reason, as depicted by Francisco de Goya in his 1797 etching in which owls (symbols of folly) and bats (symbols of ignorance) seemingly attack the sleeping artist:

“The viewer might read this as a portrayal of what emerges when reason is suppressed and, therefore, as an espousal of Enlightenment ideals. However, it also can be interpreted as Goya’s commitment to the creative process and the Romantic spirit—the unleashing of imagination, emotions, and even nightmares.”

The romantic side is certainly not without appeal, with its monsters to slay and epic quests to finish. It is however not advisable to let one’s fantasy have the better of oneself. After all one might end up like Don Quixote De La Mancha who, having gone mad after becoming obsessed with too many books of chivalry, engaged in futile fights with windmills he believes to be ferocious giants.

In two previous posts I highlighted the core similarities – wanting to ensure continued co-existence (unstated from the side of the mainstream) by means of being rational (stated on all sides) – and a key difference – the perceived value of the major world spiritual traditions – between main stream futurist thinking and rational morality. Today I will be focusing on another difference: the perceived value of a future shaped by evolutionary dynamics.

Rational morality is all about realizing evolutionary dynamics, the interpretation of their implications and how to best align ourself with the evolutionary process. It thus comes as little surprise, that when I mention the evolutionary foundation of my philosophy in a public forum, usually a well meaning observer – in an effort to highlight the fundamental danger of my argument – points me to prominent futurist Nick Bostrom’s paper on The Future of Human Evolution. Having been republished in 2009 in Bedeutung allows the conclusion that the views expressed in his paper are still in line with his current views at the time this commentary is being written.

In summary: in his paper, Bostrom describes a future in which human descendant interacting agents will, driven by exceedingly fierce competition, be ultimately stripped of their humanity or perish in the struggle for existence. After suggesting and discarding a number of solutions to prevent what he sees as an inevitable result of this bellum omnium contra omnes of existence, Bostrom suggests – not unlike Hobbs’ Leviathan – the installation of a supremely powerful ‘Singleton’ lacking external competition and tasked with policing all other beings in order that ‘eudaemonic’ beings do not become extinct or marginalized and can continue to have ‘intrinsically valuable experiences’.

Bostrom’s paper however is deeply flawed in a number of aspects:

1. Value judgments are heavily biased towards 20th century secular humanism
2. The quintessential human value of striving for perpetual self transcendence is discounted.
3. The underlying evolutionary dynamics that led to human values in the first place or are implied by it are being ignored.
4. The analysis of evolutionary dynamics rests on numerous erroneous assumptions and misconceptions of evolutionary theory.
5. Bostrom’s dystopian perspective is shared only by groups notorious for getting evolution wrong
6. Bostroms negativity runs counter to that of numerous other, full time evolutionary philosophers
7. The proposed solution of a ‘Singleton’ can only be considered a temporary fix at best and constitutes an existential risk in itself at worst

Re 1.) Value judgments are heavily biased towards 20th century secular humanism

It is impossible to provide an ultimately compelling argument for the perpetual preservation of non-ultimately compelling values.

In his paper Bostrom continuously grooms ‘human values’ – or more specifically what appears to be 20th century secular humanism – as the gold standard to be perpetually preserved in the future of evolution. He does not however provide an argument as to why precisely these particular set of values happens to be worthy of preservation above any other possible sets of values. Why not modern day Chinese communism? Why not 13th century catholicism, 18th century sharia law or 20th century national socialism? How about the emergent values of future agents? Do they also have a right to be preserved and subsidized as well in any stage of their future development at the expense of other, further developed agents, once they begin to fail in the increasingly hard competition and simply refuse or become incapable of conducting further self improvements? Where will the means eventually come from to continue to do that in such an economy? Who will decide who stays and who goes?

In the absence of an argument in support of the preservation of values represented in 20th century secular humanism against any other set of possible values, it would be just as erroneous to argue for the exact same set of values to be preserved that happened to be present in our common ancestor with the dung beetle millions of years ago. The point is that Bostrom assumes an essential random set of values and declares that they are to be perpetuated ad infinitum without proper justification.

Re 2.) The quintessential human value of striving for perpetual self transcendence is discounted.

Glorifying mediocrity – retarding progress

While Bostrom is focusing on the preservation of a very specific set of human values on the one hand, he discounts the quintessential human value of wanting to strive for perpetual self transcendence by effectively retarding it with his suggestion of respective taxation and legislation. Wanting to continuously self improve however is in itself a fundamental human value represented in the constant quest for knowledge, understanding, wisdom and personal growth.

Granted, Bostrom does not explicitly preclude the self improvement aspirations of any particular agent. But retarding the progress of certain agents willing to work on themselves while at the same time failing to put a fundamental limit on other, less so inclined agent’s hedonistic and wasteful tendencies would not only be fundamentally unfair but eventually unsustainable.

Re 3.) The underlying evolutionary dynamics that led to human values in the first place or are implied by it are being ignored.

Good is that which increases fitness – anything else is mindless wire-heading

The criticism gets more fundamental when realizing that human values are the product of billions of years of evolution. Definitely not all human values are or happened to be adaptive in our recent evolutionary history. But it is obvious that for all intends and purposes – from a perspective I call ‘reverse evolutionary psychology’ – none of the values caused our parent generation to fail at reproducing. I personally would be very cautious however in naming what Bostrom calls “intrinsically worthwhile experiences”.

What Bostrom refers to with “intrinsically worthwhile experiences” are those positive experiences related to behavior or states that either

a) used to be adaptive in our evolutionary history or
b) serve no adaptive purpose whatsoever

How about calling these “intrinsically worthwhile experiences” what they really are? Those under a) are what David Sloan Wilson would call “dancing with ghosts” and those under b) are in fact are wasteful luxuries. The basic feelings of pleasure and pain, if not linked to the seeking or avoidance of particular states conducive or detrimental to our evolutionary fitness, are nothing but senseless wire heading.

Re a) Why would realizing that we have changed our environment enough as to have outgrown the realities of our previous existence? Would making a change really be so bad? We are living in a post scarcity caloric reality and if I could devise a way as to adapt my food intake in line with the reality of this new environment I most certainly would. Reduced risk of arterial sclerosis, less expenses for food and higher physical attractiveness would be only three obvious benefits that come to mind in this example.

So what if I do not get the pleasure of what effectively constitutes overeating in our new reality? Along with my food intake I could simple adjust my pleasure system to release the same chemicals into my system once I ate the exact optimal amount for my level of activity. Voila: same amount of pleasure and an actual benefit.

Re b) What possible purpose could there be in subsidizing a bunch of certified lotus eaters? Surely Bostrom – realizing the fundamental similarity – would never suggest to not only let the government pay for the syringes and the heroin of the junkies, but at the same time declare the “intrinsically valuable experience of the heroin user” a public good deviation from which needs to be discouraged by heavy taxation. Oh the absurdity!

Something that Bostrom does not mention at all is the ability to remove “intrinsically worthless experiences” from our human existence. Cutting ourself is arguably way too painful in a world with ubiquitous antibiotics. Why not tune that down a little? Or is that verboten too? Analogously: how about new pleasurable experiences? States of being that in our new reality should in fact be pleasurable but are not or not enough?

How about feeling some more pain when and where it is in fact warranted in our post modern reality? After all the pain caused by a cut is ‘meant‘ to avoid the cut and associated consequences – not the pain. Some suggestions: Products that taste more and more disgusting the more they contribute to the CO2 levels in the atmosphere. Burning pain caused by radiation, dioxin levels and DDT seems like a good idea too. Politicians that begin to make you feel uncomfortable the more their promises deviate from what they are actually doing in line with an independent monitoring service. All referenced to authoritative sources and weighted according to probabilistic estimates in regards to how detrimental to ones fitness it actually is of course. I would very much go for that – but I digress.

Re 4.) The analysis of evolutionary dynamics rests on numerous erroneous assumptions and misconceptions of evolutionary theory

“Evolution is smarter than you” — Orgel’s Second Rule

a) it is survival of the fit enough – not survival of the fittest
b) adaptive value of reproduction rates are misunderstood
c) in the absence of death by natural causes reproduction looses its adaptive value
d) advances in technology correlates with a decrease in selection pressures
e) ‘tit-for-tat’ and cooperation is far more adaptive than ‘dog-eats-dog’ and ’screw-you’

Re a) it is survival of the fit enough – not survival of the fittest

The term ‘survival of the fittest‘ has been termed by Herbert Spencer – not Darwin – and is neither a scientific term nor complete or even a suitable summary of Darwin’s theory. In the context Darwin meant it, it would be better described as ‘better adapted for immediate, local environment’. Note ‘better’ – not ‘best’. It is by far not only the fittest or the maximally adapted that survives. The one that barely makes the cut is still around as well. In that sense we human beings are no more privileged than slime mold or inch worms. The idea that certain maladapted types will die out assumes the presence of a corresponding selection pressure, which leads me to point b)

Re b) adaptive value of reproduction rates are misunderstood

Much – if not all – of Bostrom’s scenarios assume the presence of enormous selection pressures caused by a digitally supercharged Malthusian struggle for existence. There are however numerous problems with Bostrom’s understanding of the adaptive nature of reproduction.

Firstly, Bostrom confuses ‘higher rate of reproduction’ with ‘more adaptive’. This is in fact a very common misconception yet luckily easily dispelled once we understand the difference between the various reproduction strategies:

“There are a wide range of reproductive strategies employed by different species. Some animals, such as the human and Northern Gannet, do not reach sexual maturity for many years after birth and even then produce few offspring. Others reproduce quickly; but, under normal circumstances, most offspring do not survive to adulthood. For example, a rabbit (mature after 8 months) can produce 10–30 offspring per year, and a fruit fly (mature after 10–14 days) can produce up to 900 offspring per year. These two main strategies are known as K-selection (few offspring) and r-selection (many offspring). Which strategy is favoured by evolution depends on a variety of circumstances. Animals with few offspring can devote more resources to the nurturing and protection of each individual offspring, thus reducing the need for many offspring. On the other hand, animals with many offspring may devote fewer resources to each individual offspring; for these types of animals it is common for many offspring to die soon after birth, but enough individuals typically survive to maintain the population.”

Simply replicating as much as possible is not a very adaptive thing to do since with increasing levels of complexity, the limited resources at ones disposal can be used much more efficient and effectively to ensure ones continued existence by other means than sharing them among arbitrarily large number of identical copies. This is shown quite plainly in the transition from R to K-selection strategies starting from viruses and progressing to the the fruit fly to rabbits to humans.

Secondly, understanding that reproduction strategies are all about the application of resources towards the goal of creating eventually reproducing offspring the question presents itself: how justified is Bostrom in taking the example of a human upload and apply the reproduction logic of a fruit fly in his scenario? And the answer of course is that he is not justified in doing so at all.

In addition it needs to be noted, that any reproduction strategy that leads to reproducing offspring above the natural replacement rate in a saturated environment, necessarily requires an additional adaptive advantage in the offspring that allows for either the displacement of competitors or utilization of other so far untapped resources that can be applied to generating the excess reproducing offspring above the subsistence level.

Re c) in the absence of death by natural causes reproduction looses its adaptive value

As demonstrated under b) reproduction is only adaptive as means to counter the natural death rate. Human beings have long ago stopped being the prey of other species and will soon – at least once we reach the capability of uploading as assumed in Bostrom’s paper – conquer the problem of death by natural causes altogether. By then we will have transformed ourselves in the words of Richard Leis into digital “patterns seeking our own permanence” and other, far more adaptive strategies will become available to us. Among others these can include:

• strategic, well distributed and regular backups
• redundant multi-clustering solutions
• sophisticated insurance and reinsurance plans
• public, transferable and certified reputation networks

The need for copies of oneself will be reduced to minimal capacity virtual agents with large data storage means and minimal cognitive capacities which can be dispatched and reintegrated into the main instantiation at will.

With death and reproduction out of the way, what other selection pressures will remain?

Re d) advances in technology correlate with a decrease in selection pressures

In the vast majority of our evolutionary history, the most valuable resource ensuring the continued existence of the interacting agents has been represented in the stored free energy of the chemical bonds making up the interacting agent’s bodies. On the human level, this however has changed and now lies in the cognitive output of our brains. Once the calculating capacity of computers reaches the critical threshold, it will lie in the amount of available computronium as well as bandwidth and ultimately in the amount of available energy to run the hardware. Virtually every new technology from fire to the iPhone has further increased our freedoms by reducing selection pressures to the point that we can now afford the luxury of a post modern cultural outlook. There is no reason to believe that this decrease in selection pressures will continue with more advanced technologies. In fact there is no moral point in a technology that does not do so.

Granted – every technology can be used in a negative way – this however makes it only so much more important to devise a shared morality that will realize such destructive uses as utterly pointless.

Selection pressures have thus been directed towards the configuration and acquisition of matter and bodies on the level of the biosphere. The poster child for the blind acquisition of matter being the fiercely self replicating virus; for the configuration and acquisition of bodies the ants and termites. It further progressed by moving toward the configuration of neurons in the evolution of cognition towards the configuration and acquisition of brains (i.e. individuals) and ideas on the level of the noosphere. On this level the more brains joined up to pursue a common purpose and the more advanced their capacity to organize and their technology, the more adaptive it turned out to be.

In the absence of forced and perpetual reproduction, and having achieved – if not already now then soon – a level of technology that can, at least in principle, build a too-cheap-to-meter post scarcity society – and particularly one capable of uploading human minds – there will be very few selection pressures left. And in the absence of selection pressures and without a conscious effort of holding the pattern together, let alone further advancing it, it will slowly but surely start to randomize. Postmodern attitudes being a sure sign, that this process has already begun.

It will be this randomization that will reintroduce selection pressures by lowering the bar so that we will feel selection pressures that we would otherwise long have outgrown. It will be this limitless freedom which will pose the core challenge to the existence of those loosing their sense for direction and the constant temptation of letting themselves go.

The selection preasures so feared by Bostrom will precisely not arise due to the increased efficiency of the ones making an effort despite all the freedom and potential for essential limitless randomness and whim. I am sure that here lies a key misunderstanding of Bostrom in his article.

Re e) ‘tit-for-tat’ and cooperation is far more adaptive than ‘dog-eats-dog’ and ’screw-you’

“Nice guys finish first” — Richard Dawkins

From this article on The Selfless Gene:

“[...] neither Darwin nor evolutionary biologists such as Dawkins advocate the idea that cut-throat, ruthless competition is the only game in town, and co-operation between individuals, communities and even species permeates their work. Darwin even wrote in the Descent of Man that evolution would eventually lead a species to “acquire a moral sense or conscience”.

Ignoring everything we have established so far in regards to Bostrom’s misunderstanding of the adaptive value and dynamics of reproduction, on what basis are we to assume that future agents will be more adapted at the cost of less well adapted beings? Let’s take a look from another perspective by looking at Robert Wright’s Nonzero:

“The principal argument of Nonzero is to demonstrate that natural selection results in increasing complexity within the world and greater rewards for cooperation. Since, as Wright puts it, the realization of such prospects is dependent upon increased levels of communication, cooperation, and trust, what is thought of as human intelligence is really just a long step in an evolutionary process of organisms (as well as their networks and individual parts) getting better at processing information.”

Or in other words: the future will not only be more adaptive but would at the same time be in line with many of the values Bostrom is advocating will need artificially preservation. This even ignores the vastly more far reaching claims of the previously mentioned book – The Selfless Gene – makes on the level of the gene and I myself am making on the level of memes or culture: that a non-dual perspective in life is the non plus ultra of spiritual evolution.

Re 5.) Bostrom’s dystopian perspective is shared only by groups notorious for getting evolution wrong

“This future is so abhorrent as to almost defy the imagination. These new beings, and the transhumanists looking forward to their arrival, will not be benevolent. Just the opposite.” — Steve Quayle, Genetic Armageddon: Today’s Technology – Tomorrows Monsters

Comparing the conclusions of Bostrom’s paper with a broader range of perspectives and the analysis of other groups in similar context, it becomes apparent that the overall negativity in regards to a society shaped by evolutionary ideas is shared exclusively by two particular sets of groups – both notorious for getting evolution terribly wrong.

The first is that of the eugenics movement which nowadays is mostly associated with the regime of Nazi Germany yet originated and was original supported by sympathizing groups in the United States of America and various other governments all over the world during the first half of the 20th century.

The key similarity is the notion that evolution has to somehow be guided, channeled, or helped along in order for it to produce a desirable outcome. The key difference is, that the eugenics movement thought to help the process along in order to prevent ‘existences not worthy of life’ weighing down various concepts of what was perceived to be the master race. Bostrom on the other hand applies the same logic in promoting a form of ‘reverse eugenics’ and as I have shown above, his approach is just as misguided in its fundamental mode of thinking.

The second group is that of the modern day neoconservative movement with its politically motivated outright rejection of evolution as a suitable theory. They, not unlike Bostrom, point to the disastrous outcome of applying the theory of evolution on the social level, yet fail to realize that eugenics – while being officially justified on the grounds of evolutionary theory – used a version of evolutionary theory that was simply grossly misconstrued, either consciously or subconsciously, to support propaganda by which to advance a very particular political agenda.

And finally, at the time neoconservative celebrity, Francis Fukuyama expressed his concern over what he dubbed the ‘worlds most dangerous idea‘ based on the views represented in his 2002 book Our Posthuman Future: Consequences of the Biotechnology Revolution. How ironic, since transhumanism is nothing but self guided evolution, that Bostrom himself felt compelled to rebuke Fukuyama despite his own bleak perspective on a future shaped by evolutionary dynamics:

“The only real danger posed by transhumanism, it seems, is that people on both the left and the right may find it much more attractive than the reactionary bioconservatism proffered by Fukuyama and some of the other members of the President’s Council.” — Nick Bostrom, Transhumanism: The World’s Most Dangerous Idea?

I could not agree more and find that this sentence runs very much counter to the views Bostrom expresses in his own dystopian scenarios as do the positive perspectives of so many other evolutionary philosophers who have dedicated their lives to the exploration of the idea of evolution and how it applies to humanity’s future.

Re 6.) Bostrom’s negativity runs counter to that of numerous other – if not all, full time evolutionary philosophers

“This is no place to stop – half way between ape and angel” — Benjamin Disraeli

To summarize all the different perspectives and diverse arguments leading the vast majority of (some more – some less) full-time evolutionary philosophers would go very much beyond the scope of this article. I would nevertheless encourage anybody interested in a deeper understanding of evolutionary philosophy to study the relevant positions of the following scholars in addition to Bostrom’s writings in order to get a more accurate picture of the body of evolutionary thought. The dedicated student will find that Bostrom is but one misguided contrarian among many others, better informed and learned them him when it comes to the particular matter of evolution:

They are among others and in no particular order: Teilhard de Chardin, John Stewart, Herbert Spencer, John Friske, Craig Hamilton, Adrian Bejan, Charles Foster, Stuart Kauffman, Ken Wilber, Andrew Cohen, David Sloan Wilson, Richard Coren, Robert Wright, Joan Roughgarden, Michael Dowd, John Smart, Ervin László, Valentin Turchin, and last but certainly not least: Charles Darwin himself.

Re 7.) The proposed solution of a ‘Singleton’ can only be considered a temporary fix at best and constitutes an existential risk in itself at worst

In conclusion to Bostrom’s argument he suggest the establishment of a supremely powerful Singleton in an effort to prevent his dystopian scenarios:

“Reining in evolution is a feat that could only be accomplished by a singleton.  A local power might be able to control the evolution of its own internal ecology, yet unless these interventions served to maximize its total productivity (which would be incompatible with affirmative action for eudaemonic activities), evolutionary selection would simply reemerge at a higher level.”

What Bosrtom fails to mention as a critically flawed assumption in his proposed solution is, that in order for his idea to work, it would require no external competition on teh level of the singleton and thus precludes the existence of alien races reaching a comparable level of development. These alien races could become – less inclined to artificially constrict their own progress – significantly more advanced than the singleton of human origin and reintroduce the previously dampened selection pressures.

What if this results in the eventual extinction of the Singleton and consequentially its entire sphere of influence? The scenario is as following: preservation of mediocrity until it is too late to catch up. Would it thereby not “permanently and drastically curtail the potential [of Earth-originating intelligent life].”? This being Bostrom’s own definition of an existential risk and thus rendering his proposed solution potentially self contradicting.

As can be seen, a Singleton merely sweeps the problem under the rug by pushing it to the next level of selection: the Singleton, which will eventually still have to bear the consequences of it’s self-imposed burden. And all of this against better knowledge.

The bottom line remains, that we will ultimately not be able to modify the fitness function. The best we can look forward to in the attempt, is to constantly weigh us down by having to maintain enough excess affluence to afford the luxury of willful mediocrity only to eventually be brought in line with the laws of nature in a scenario when it will be too late to catch up.

The key concept to understand here is that evolution is not unlike gravity. Yet unlike earth – evolution does not have an escape velocity. It is more like a reverse black hole with an infinite Schwarzschild radius, a rubber band of infinite elasticity and strength if you will: the more you resist it and pull it out of shape, the more energy needs to be expended to maintain the discrepancy. And a Singleton with a higher IQ will not be of much use either, since it will still get stuck, just further away from help.

In conclusion, Bostrom’s negative portrayal of the future of human evolution rivals that of nonconservative celebrity Francis Fukuyama’s in ‘Our Posthuman Future’ in its bleakness while running counter to that of numerous evolutionary philosophers, it equals the level of misunderstanding of the conservapedia article on the social effects of the theory of evolution and rivals the unfortunate direction of early 20th century eugenics programs – albeit from the opposite direction and originating from what I have no reason to doubt are genuinly benign intentions – in its suggested solution which is in the long run bound to fail at best and counterproductive to Bostrom’s self proclaimed goals in other areas at worst.

“There is but one force, stronger than all the armies in the world… And that is an idea whose time has come.” — Victor Hugo

This idea, in our time, is that of evolution, proeprly understood and applied as a positive force not only in shaping the future of humanity, but to the benefit of all beings.

“If God doesn’t exist, then everything is permitted” – The Brothers Karamazov, Fyodor Dostoevsky

In the context Dostoyevsky used the quote above, it meant that in the absence of divine judgment resulting in reward or punishment in the afterlife, there would be no point in adhering to moral doctrines. Or put another way: in the absence of god, bad deeds – done anonymously or in private – have no consequences.

Assuming that adherence to a moral code had no consequences other then reward and punishment by an all knowing, all powerful god in the afterlife, then the above statement would of course be correct. In the case of morality, this assumption does in fact appear reasonable to many. But take the example of having a particular goal – any goal really – and the desire to reach it. As soon as one has a particular goal, one is limited in regards to what one can and can not do in an effort to actually accomplishing it.

These limits are imposed by one’s available resources in the form of money, time, knowledge, skills, cognitive abilities, experience et cetera on the one hand. And on the other hand by the fuzziness of the goal and the risk one is willing to take in actually failing to reach it. If one has $20 and has been asked to buy $10 worth of groceries on the way home by ones partner, then one is certainly free to spend all the money on beer and cigarettes. In so doing, one has however essentially reduced ones chances of in fact returning with $10 worth of groceries to close to 0%. Yet, not exactly 0% – since it is not unimaginable that a chain of events would still lead to one bringing home the requested goods regardless. One’s chances are however significantly reduced.

Any reasonable person wanting to return home with the groceries would of course simply enter a shop and buy $10 worth of groceries. He would then be ‘free’ to spend another $10 on beer and cigarettes before going home. The chances of reaching his goal would be very high – however not 100% since again any chain of unforeseen events could cause a catastrophic failure in reaching this rather simple goal. The chances would be narrowed further if the task happens to be $10 worth of dairy products and veggies, skim milk and carrots, or a certain brand and not another. These examples representing a decrease of fuzziness, ever more precisely specifying the requirements for goal fulfillment.

In short, the more means one has beyond the bare minimum required for goal fulfillment, the more one is willing to risk failure and the fuzzier a goal is, the more freedom one has in ones actions and still reach it within the set parameters. The moral here is of course that one is only free in choosing one’s own actions, one is not free however in choosing the consequences of these actions.

Consequences, or the effect of a cause, vary in the degree of intricacy and depth to which they can be traced back to bringing them about and the magnitude of their impact. Opening ones hand and dropping a pen is obvious and irrelevant. Shooting a cannon ball and hitting a city is complex and significant. Exploding an atom bomb over a particular bridge 2′500 kilometers away is mind blowing and overwhelming.

But what if someone does not fully realize the consequences of his actions? How about the one failing to fully understand the detailed requirements necessary to reach his goal? In what sense, can anyone not fully realizing either be called free?

Think of the path to one’s goal as being flanked on all sides by an abyss of failure and the further one deviates from the optimal path to one’s goal the more one risks slipping into the abyss. Would then not the one having the better understanding of the path with all its meanderings and varying degrees of tread-fastness be more free than the one who does not? The reason being that knowing all the risks and realizing all of one’s options, it would give someone more degrees of freedom to make informed decisions.

Similarly with one’s goal: the one following the perfect path chasing a mirage will nevertheless fail miserably. While the one barely making it to his true destination will still have managed to be successful.

Making the turn now from the abstract to the concrete. Two important points need to be understood before moving on.

1. Firstly, our existence is a precondition for reaching any goal – including continued existence.
2. Secondly, our chances of reaching it have been increased significantly yet mostly subconsciously by internalizing a very specific set of spiritual teachings.

Understanding this rather complex set of causes and effects and reevaluating Dostoevsky’s quote above, we can now realize the wisdom in the following quote in this particular context:

“There’s a difference between knowing the path and walking the path.” Morpheus, The Matrix

Dostoevsky failed to realize his existence being conditional to his ancestors failing to leave a very particular path. Their following of which had everything to do with the effect of believing it had on their actions rather then the degree to which this belief could be said to be factually or scientifically accurate. Or put another way:

“A man who strays from the path of understanding comes to rest in the company of the dead.” Proverbs 21:16

It is crucial to understand in this context, that we have increased our freedoms significantly since the beginning of the industrial revolution. This has been accomplished by the creation of ever more sophisticated technologies that help us in the reshaping of our environment. The fact that we have thereby essentially broadened the path to such a degree, that we have all but forgotten that we are in fact on one, and still largely fail to recognize that there is a goal let alone recognize what it is, is evident in the notions so characteristic of post-modernism that:

• there is no objective reference for words
• there are no indubitable laws of logic
• there are no boundaries for meaning
• there is no meta-narrative

It comes as little surprise that any scientist, project manager, athlete or entrepreneur – or anyone having any goal at all for that matter – subscribing to these principles would have a very hard time reaching them. For without a working assumption of what words refer to when trying to understand a given text, failing to adopt some form of logic conducive to ones endeavor, not limiting the set of possible interpretations in evaluating a statement to that which is in fact probable, while at the same time constantly doubting the validity of ones goals will surely lead to failure.

From this perspective the western indulgence in postmodernist thinking can be seen as a sign of wasteful luxury made affordable by runaway technological development very similar to the effect Saudi oil wealth has on that country’s extraordinary rigidity to social progress. I think that there is sufficient reason to believe that this is in fact the cause that led former assistant secretary of the treasury Paul Craig Roberts to claim the US having joined the ranks of failed states: a purposefully constructed populous of selfish individuals that after the failure of communism is united only by a largely manufactured external enemy and either incapable of or in fact not interested in telling apart fact from fiction in political discourse.

It is all too obvious by now that the end of history was called prematurely in 1992 by Francis Fukuyama and was in fact merely a transition towards post-modernity. In the wake of the worst financial crisis in history the question poses itself if people are bound to hang themselves eventually despite it being against their self interest provided the circumstances of cause and effect are opaque enough and they are given enough rope to actually do it:

“Those of us who have looked to the self-interest of lending institutions to protect shareholder’s equity (myself especially) are in a state of shocked disbelief.” — Alan Greenspan, former chairman of the U.S. Federal Reserve Bank, congressional testimony in October 2008

In support of this view I would like to cite the ideas of 14th century Tunesian scholar and statesman Ibn Khaldun, who formulated in his theory of Asabiyyah the idea that a society creating enough affluence to afford luxuries will degenerate and in the process loose focus on what affords them these luxuries in the first place – ‘the path’ if you will – and thus eventually stray and loose them.

Anyone not yet convinced that the luxury to make our own mistakes and live with them afforded to us in the very much laissez fair democratic marketeconomies need look no further than to the extraordinarily successful authoritarian market economies all over the world – especially the very focused and ambitious China. How long can we keep these freedoms up while facing such – from our vantage point ‘unfair’ competition – before disappearing or finding ourselves on the long slope to political irrelevance? At least the west can look at Russia for some best practice sharing before finally accepting ideological defeat.

Unless of course we anticipate the inevitable, realize all the conditions for our existence and align ourselves with the evolutionary process before it will inevitably and vastly more painfully align us with it or let us be erased from the memory of the world:

“At present humanity is lost. We don’t know what we are doing here. We are without a worldview that can point to our place and purpose in the universe and that can also withstand rational scrutiny.

But this difficult period is coming to an end. The emergence of the new evolutionary worldview is beginning to lift us out of the abyss. The new worldview has a unique capacity to reveal who we are and what we should be doing with our lives. It relies solely on scientific knowledge and reason to identify our critical role in future evolution. The evolutionary worldview can unite us in a great common enterprise, and provide meaning and purpose for human existence.” — Evolutionary Manifesto

You are most certainly free, in the words of Camus, to open your heart to the benign indifference of the universe, while marching right over the precipice, chanting slogans of freedom and thumping your chest. But how truly nonsensical would that be, knowing that only those that don’t will actually be around to pursue so much more challenging and rewarding goals? And remember: your realization of the evolved illusions in regards to food, love and fun for being what they are, in no way dampens their impact.

This being said, the key point here is not that authoritarian market economies are necessarily better than their liberal counterparts, but that we are in the process of risking our liberties by ignoring what makes them affordable to us in the first place: a properly informed and educated population, united by an overarching sense of purpose and a shared morality that is consciously aligned with evolutionary dynamics.

Yesterday I focused on the fundamental similarities between rational morality and ‘mainstream’ futurist thinking. Today I will be examining one of the core differences: the perceived value of the world’s major spiritual traditions.

Spirituality, as opposed to spiritualism and particularly in the context of rational morality, has nothing to do with supernatural phenomena, gods or the afterlife. From wikipedia:

“Spirit in the sense of ‘essence’ implies that spirituality also is how you deal with the ‘essential’ in life. The metaphysical includes deeper realizations about the relationships between things – it is non-physical, but not necessarily supernatural. [...] If you have a path that is sacred, and disciplined on the more profound things about Nature and life, has ritual, and so on, but is all based on a naturalistic understanding of the universe – that is spirituality as well.”

Now what does that mean? And why is this such a difficult concept to accept for rationalists the world over? Let me try to explain by examining the example of the scientific genius of Newton before defining spirituality and drawing an analogy to science. Isaac Newton – as is widely known – was a prolific English physicist, mathematician, astronomer, and natural philosopher. What is less widely known is his equal interest in the subjects of alchemy and theology. Why then, is Newton still so revered even today despite him being a superstitious alchemist and having been proved wrong by Einstein in the early 20th century?

The reason is two fold: firstly we of course understand that Newton despite being wrong – just as Einstein still being wrong – he was relatively less wrong than Kepler before him and Gallilei before and Copernicus before him. Secondly we understand in regards to what he was less wrong, namely in his scientific understanding of gravity. More generally we can thus understand science as following:

“Science is the conscious quest for the realization of an ever closer approximation about that which is true and unchanging about the universe we exist in, in order to enhance the means that enable the reshaping of material reality in line with our goals and values.”

The value of science thereby lies in the degree of accuracy to which it describes ‘true’ reality insofar as the gained insights enhance our means of reshaping reality by the creation of ever more sophisticated technology that happens to produce a desired effect within the margin of error of the current scientific theory. With Newton that meant the ability to calculate the trajectory of cannon balls with Einstein we got GPS, LEDs and nuclear bombs.

This very particular aspect of scientific truth has been reinforced as a fundamental value since the enlightenment and came to ever greater prominence over the course of the engineering driven industrial revolution followed by the information age with its computers and their extreme literalism and has since become that which closest resembles a transcendent standard of value in our postmodern society and its incredulity towards meta narratives: If it is not scientifically true it has no worth.

But, of course, this still leaves us with the open question of how to determine our ultimate goals and fundamental values that we can then advance with science and technology: the ‘what-do-(can)-we-want’-problem, namely to continue to exist by means of being rational.

That out of the way, consider the following definition of spirituality:

“Spirituality is the (sub)concious quest for the realization of an ever closer approximation about that which is true and unchanging about our existence in the universe in order to enhance the means that enable the reshaping of our consciousness in line with the laws of nature imposing the conditions for our existence.”

Seeing spirituality in this new light we are effectively enabled to distinguish the wheat from the chaff in all matters spiritual, just as our understanding of science enables us to realize what determines the good the bad and the ugly. Or – as Ken Wilber calls it – it enables us to tell apart the the prerational from the transrational:

“The essence of the pre/trans fallacy is itself fairly simple: since both prerational states and transrational states are, in their own ways, nonrational, they appear similar or even identical to the untutored eye. And once pre and trans are confused [people confuse profound spiritual insights with new age nonsensne and vice versa]“

I find the idea of a transrational insight problematic since we are dealing with mystical experiences that – while undeniably real – can only support or emphasize a spiritual insight that must have been arrived at prior to the experience either intuitively or rationaliy. How else could one categorize the nearly uncontrollable, trance-like fury the Norse warriors known as Berserkers fought in as less spiritual then the feeling of absolute unitary being experienced during vipassana meditation?

The answer of course lies in the insight that some states of consciousness are more conducive to the fitness (i.e. continued existence) of a group than others. Understanding that the desire to exist derived from evolutionary dynamics has to be expanded to want to ensure continued co-existence so one can want it to be a universal law in line Kant’s categorical imperative is a first step. As a consequence what one does to others becomes equivalent to what one does to oneself, ergo feeling for the other, as one with the other becomes a rational moral value resulting in the breakdown of the illusion of separateness or becoming ‘enlightened’, attaining Satori, or simply wanting to be compassionate in spiritual terms. A generally tough cookie this one, but best explained in Advaita Vedanta – the non-dualist philosophy referring to the identity of the Self (Atman) with the Whole (Brahman).

In this context it does not help of course, that the leading public proponent of ‘reason and science’ – Richard Dawkins – happens to reject multilevel selection by championing a gene-centered perspective of evolution and in so doing not only contradicts Stephen J. Gould and David Sloan Wilson but Charles Darwin himself.  Darwin writes in 1877:

“It must not be forgotten that although a high standard of morality gives but a slight or no advantage to each individual man and his children over the other men of the same tribe, yet that an advancement in the standard of morality and in increase in the number of well-endowed men will certainly give an immense advantage to one tribe over another. There can be no doubt that a tribe including many members who, from possessing in a high degree the spirit of patriotism, fidelity, obedienhce, courage, and sympathy, were always ready to give aid to each other and to sacrifice themselves for the common good, would be victorious over other tribes; and this would be natural selection.” (The Descent of Man, p. 166)

Dawkins himself being less a beacon of reason and more one of ‘atheism at all cost’, as demonstrated again very recently by Religulous creator Bill Maher being awarded the 2009 Richard Dawkins Award despite his antivaccine lunacy. Accepting multilevel selection on the cultural level as true however, we can now clearly identify on who’s spiritual giant’s shoulders we stand today: the countless shamans of prehistory, the sages of the axial age, the prophets of the major spiritual traditions advocating compassion:

• Christianity: “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.”
• Buddhism: ”Putting oneself in the place of another, one should not kill nor cause another to kill.”
• Confucianism: ”Never impose on others what you would not choose for yourself.”
• Hinduism: ”One should never do that to another which one regards as injurious to one’s own self.”
• Islam: ”Hurt no one so that no one may hurt you.”
• Judaism: ”The stranger who resides with you shall be to you as one of your citizens; you shall love him as yourself.”
• Taoism: ”Regard your neighbor’s gain as your own gain, and your neighbor’s loss as your own loss.”

All major world religions contain this basic key insight and this is not a coincidence. Just as the eye has evolved so many different times independently in the animal kingdom precisely because of the advantage better seeing individuals had over less well seeing ones so did compassion:

“Let us think about the results of following different ethical teachings in the evolving universe. [...] No one can act against the laws of nature. Thus, ethical teachings which contradict the plan of evolution [...] will be erased from the memory of the world. [...] Thus, only those [ethical] teachings which promote realization of the plan of evolution have a chance of success.” — Valentin Turchin, The Phenomenon of Science, Ethics and Evolution

Now rational morality adopts the insight of cybernetic theory that the ‘plan’ of evolution is to increase fitness and that aligning oneself with this plan is best done by adopting the utility function of ‘ensure continued co-existence’. The fact that not everyone does in fact align themselves with this goal is absolutely irrelevant since only those that do will have a higher chance not to “be erased from the memory of the world”, be it in a Malthusian “struggle for existence” or under any other set of selection pressures. The fact that we are living in a time of extraordinary freedoms allowing us to divert from this principle, a luxury granted to us by modern technology, is another matter altogether. Some more quotes in support of this perspective:

“The deepest spiritual insight lies in the realization that there is no other.” — Andrew Cohen, in What is Enlightenment, German Edition, Summer 2007

Plain and simple: we are all one.

“Since reason is man’s basic means of survival, that which is proper to the life of a rational being is the good; that which negates, opposes or destroys it is the evil.” — The Objectivist Ethics, The Virtue of Selfishness, 23.

I do have my qualms with Rand’s philosophy, but here it is just spot on.

“Necessary existence is a positive property” — Kurt Goedel in 1941, Axiom 5 of his ontological proof for the existence of god using modal logic.

Existence is better than non existence. No question.

“Therefore, since the supreme Good is the supreme being, it follows that everything good has being and every being is good. And so nothing and nonbeing are not from him from whom only good and being come.” — Saint Anselm of Canterbury (1033-1109)

A bit more esoteric, but expressing the same basic principle: being (or existence) is better than nonbeing (or nonexistence)

“For the wages of sin is death.” — Romans 6:23

I especially like this one because it basically says what Turchin says above in archaic, biblical language. And finaly:

“Ego is the biggest enemy of humans.” — Rig Veda

Simple and to the point: failing to realize the illusion of separateness is an existential risk.

In conclusion it is important to realize that this entire process is the result of the simple fact that in the absence of any externally specified reward, self replication emerges as an intrinsic reward and starts to feed on itself. It is a teleonomical, not a teleological process. Until of course, one realizes what is happening and starts to go along with the flow.

After the last three – rather damming – posts of mine, I thought a reconciliatory tone in an effort to being more constructive would be nice. In fact a great starting point for this will be to highlight what ‘we’ for the broadest definition of ‘we’ in fact do or even can want and have in common. Rational morality is an explicit effort to achieve good through reason and is based on two fundamental assumptions or axioms:

1. existence is preferable over non-existence (or existence as necessary precondition for any want or desire)
2. being rational is the best way to achieve one’s goals (including the goal of wanting to exist)

How about the SIAI et al? Not different at all it turns out:

In support of 1.)

• The notion of friendly AI is based on the crucial concept of the continued existence of humanity. Citing SIAI president Michael Vasser in a recent interview by the Skeptics Guide to the Universe @~41m:30s: “[...] for any given arbitrary preference function [acted upon by a powerful AI] it is very unlikely that [the result] includes us.”
• SIAI research fellow Anna Salamon stressing the prime importance of preventing an AI “who’s goals are not specifically, carefully rigged to be maximally fulfilled by our existence.” (around minute 28.)
• From the Lifeboat Foundation’s about page: “The Lifeboat Foundation is a nonprofit nongovernmental organization dedicated to encouraging scientific advancements while helping humanity survive existential risks”
• The entire concept of existential risks – championed by the founder of the Institute of Ethics and Emerging Technologies Nick Bostrom – is centered around the idea of “analyzing human extinction scenarios and related hazards”
• When you think about it, life extension is not much different – albeit focusing on individual’s continued existence or ’survival’ – with much of the same people advancing this cause as do the ones above.

In support of 2.)

• The entire notion of wanting to create greater than human intelligence is in the realization of the truth of assumption 2 and represented in quotes such as this one by Nick Bostrom: “Superintelligence may be the last invention humans ever need to make.”
• The matter being deemed of such great importance that the Singularity Institute and the Future of Humanity Institute have created LessWrong.com and devoted it to “refining the art of human rationality – the art of thinking”

I happen to be convinced that the power of these two statements combined is enough to ignore the is/ought problem and get away with it. Ayn Rand for example did a great job by at least stating the two fundamental values of ‘life’ or ‘existence’ and ‘reason’ explicitly. But where did she end up taking a wrong turn? In Michael Shermer’s view it is misplaced absolutism:

“The cultic flaw in Ayn Rand’s philosophy of Objectivism is not in the use of reason, or in the emphasis on individuality, or in the belief that humans are self motivated, or in the conviction that capitalism is the ideal system. The fallacy in Objectivism is the belief that absolute knowledge and final Truths are attainable through reason, and therefore there can be absolute right and wrong knowledge, and absolute moral and immoral thought and action.”

In my view her absolutism was not her downfall, but her simply being wrong by ignoring the implications of evolutionary dynamics as a crucial condistion of our existence. Her many character flaws – potentially driven by the key error in glorifying selfishness – in no way invalidate the basic insight however. Personally, I would never impose rational morality as an absolute on anyone, but would be quick to point out that if you do not want to exist nor have a desire to be rational then rational morality has in fact little to offer you. Non existence and irrational behavior being so trivial goals to achive after all that it would hardly require – nor value and thus seek for that mater – well thought out advice.

Some background: the advent of greater than human artificial intelligence is hailed by insiders as the crucial event of the 21st century and is widely expected by the experts to define humanity’s future. This event is generally dubbed The Singularity – with minor variations on the details in what that concept actually means. I personally expect this meme to hit the broad mainstream sometime over the next 18 months.

And this is where the problem lies: the Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence (SIAI) is the only organization dedicated to “[...] confront this urgent challenge, both the opportunity and the risk.” and within the SIAI there is one person – Eliezer Yudkowsky – who is dominating AI friendliness (FAI) discourse. What is so problematic about this state of affairs is threefold – two aspects of which I have previously covered here on this blog:

1. Yudkowsky et al have fallen victim to the paperclip fallacy.
2. His proposed solution to the FAI problem is tautological.
3. The current state of discourse on the topic is highly irrational.

#3 is the topic of this post.

In late 2007 Yudkowsky started to go on a writing spree over at the Overcomming Bias blog in which he has since written well over 600 articles. By March of 2009 this has gone so far that in his own words:

“The Singularity Institute and the Future of Humanity Institute are beta’ing a new site devoted to refining the art of human rationality, LessWrong.com.  LessWrong will end up as the future home of Eliezer Yudkowsky’s massive repository of essays previously written on Overcoming Bias” (emphasize mine)

In another post Yudkowsky is paraphrased by SIAI blogger Joshua Fox as following:

“I figured out something that is hard to figure out. Figuring out or understanding the right answers requires rationality. Therefore let’s set up a mass movement to train people to be black-belt rationalalists so that they can reach these conclusions too.”

Needless to say that such grandeur was met with anticipatory skepticism best summed up by one commentator in stating that “A proper meme would spread without ego identity or association.” Hear hear. But let us not condemn before seeing the evidence.

So what is the status of AI friendliness discourse 2 years after posting an article a day at overcommingbias.com and half a year of honing rational thinking black belts in the lesswrong.com project? Not all is well I am afraid I must report: In a recent post on the Transhuman Goodness blog the author happened to repeat one of Yudkowsky’s statements made earlier this year:

“If I had to pick a single statement that relies on more Overcoming Bias content I’ve written than any other, that statement would be: Any Future not shaped by a goal system with detailed reliable inheritance from human morals and metamorals, will contain almost nothing of worth.”

This blog post – lauded by SIAI Media Director Michael Anissimov – and an ensuing mild bout with British philosopher David Pearce caused me to take notice and write my two rebuttals to CEV and the paper clip argument mentioned above. However, the problem goes much deeper. Instead of presenting an argument – in 200 words or less as they say – in support of the above claim I was advised by the blog owner to immerse myself in a tsunami of writings as following in order to advance my understanding:

“The most important concepts seem to be listed as Major Sequences on the [Less Wrong] wiki. In particular, the Fun theory sequence, the Metaethics sequence, and the How to actually change your mind sequence.”

Please realize that these 5 links alone constitute a good 10′000 words; not of text but references to over 100 other articles for me to study. Needless to say that I was not inclined to read even a single word of this yet was at the same time wondering why I was declined a simple consistent and concise argument. Instead of leaving it at that I decided to analyze the statement from another perspective.

Consider the following core question in regards to the above statement: are human morals and (meta)morals universal/rational?

• Assumption A: Human (meta)morals are not universal/rational.
• Assumption B: Human (meta)morals are universal/rational.

Under assumption A one would have no chance of implementing any moral framework into an AI since it would be undecidable which ones they were. Mine or yours, Hitler’s or Gandhi’s, Joe the plumber’s or Joe Lieberman’s, Buddha’s or Xenu’s? Consequently under assumption A one arbitrarily sets the standard for what ’something of worth’ is by decree. Thus an AI having said standard would create a future of worth and one that deviated from said standard would not by virtue of circular definition alone.

Under assumption B one would not need to implement a moral framework at all since the AI would be able to deduce them using reason alone and come to cherish them independently for the sole reason that they are based on rational understanding and universality.

No matter how you look at the above statement, it is simply nonsense. Since under A it would be impossible/tautological and under B it would be unnecessary/self contradicting because morals would be self evident to a transhuman AI.

Moral relativists need to understand that they can not eat the cake and keep it too. If you claim that values are relative, yet at the same time argue for any particular set of values to be implemented in a super rational AI you would have to concede that this set of values – just as any other set of values according to your own relativism – is utterly whimsical, and that being the case, what reason (you being the great rationalist, remember?) do you have to want them to be implemented in the first place? Now, if you happen to believe you have a very good reason for a particular set of values over any other, then on what grounds would you be justified to believe that any transhuman AI – bound by reason and logic – would not have to agree with you on them?

Open your eyes people, it is not that the suit of clothes is invisible only to those unfit for their positions – no – the emperor has no cloths!

And thus a few closing remarks:

• To Yudkowsky: less evocative prose and nested self referential linking
• To the Bayesian rationalists: make sure you are being truly rational not rationalizing
• To everyone: linking to 100 articles is not an acceptable substitute for a good argument
• To the SIAI: update your FAI material so that it can be presented to interested parties in a concise (i.e. 5′000 words or less plus 250 word executive summary) document without sending people on a wild goose chase around lesswrong.com

By now it should have become obvious that it is far more important to get your rationality straight rather than your morals when programming an AI – because once you become truly rational, universally applicable morals start to emerge spontaneously.

Consider the following gems of wisdom:

• The one alienating his friends will soon be alone.
• You will find your destiny – just start looking in the right places.
• Don’t start to cuddle if she likes it rough.

Some might read these sentences and and start pondering them as good advice. “Ahh – I get it now, I don’t find my destiny because I have been looking in the wrong places all this time. Gee – thanks!” or “Oh yes of course – I should be nice to my friends – thanks for reminding me!” Well, gee whiz indeed, Cracker Jack – they are all tautological:

“A rhetorical tautology can be defined as a series of statements that comprise an argument, whereby the statements are constructed in such a way that the truth of the propositions are guaranteed or that the truth of the propositions cannot be disputed by defining a term in terms of another self referentially. Consequently the statement conveys no useful information regardless of its length or complexity making it unfalsifiable. It is a way of formulating a description such that it masquerades as an explanation when the real reason for the phenomena cannot be independently derived.”

For this very reason and in contrast to its first cousins the hendiadys, the pleonasm and the accumulatio, this particular rhetorical device happens to be a logical fallacy when presented in the form of an argument:

“[A] tautology is an argument that utilizes circular reasoning, which means that the conclusion is also its own premise. The structure of such arguments is A=B therefore A=B, although the premise and conclusion might be formulated differently so it is not immediately apparent as such. For example, saying that therapeutic touch works because it manipulates the life force is a tautology because the definition of therapeutic touch is the alleged manipulation (without touching) of the life force.”

Consequently all tautological advice can be summed up in four words: “Do the right thing!” People obviously agree that the right thing should be done, coming to an understanding of what ‘the right thing’ is for any particular situation is where the problem lies and the real work starts.

Let’s examine the example of coherent extrapolated volition (CEV) as a solution to the AI friendliness problem for instance. In summary CEV proposes – and please correct me if I am wrong -  to create a super intelligence and let it solve AI friendliness for us by simulating better versions of ourself and what we then would want as goal for the AI to do:

• what we would decide if we knew more
• thought faster
• were more the people we wished we were
• had grown up farther together

All well and good, right? More knowledge, faster thinking, better people, more mature… But look what kind of advice this would translate into for the AI tasked with CEV:

• Do that which you would do if you knew more.
• Think faster to solve your problems.
• Do what a better person would do.
• Do the mature thing.

The first two items on the list are tautological since obviously a super intelligence would know more and think faster – how else could we be justified in calling it a super intelligence? The last two items on the list are tautological because they contain the conclusion as the premise without specifying content. “Yes – let’s just simulate better / more mature versions of us – great!” No! What is it that defines a better and/or a more  mature person? What is the transcendent standard of value in line of which the super intelligence can measure a better or more mature individual?

Granted, a super intelligence could theoretically simulate a thousand transhuman beings for a million subjective years in a matter of minutes, but that would not help at all – according to this model – not unless it had a reference to measure them against. If you can not measure it you can not build it, because you have no way of knowing when you got it made. And if you can not build it you can not simulate it – no matter how ’super’ you are.

Recognizing this fatal flaw is of course the reason leading to the unfortunate paper clip fallacy…

What puzzles me more than almost anything else about CEV is that the solution to the riddle CEV is trying to solve lies at the very beginning of the very long winded CEV article:

“Designing a framework for an abstract invariant that doesn’t automatically wipe out the human species.“

Here it is starring us right in the face: our existence is preferable over our non-existence. Why not start from there and keep building? And better be quick, tomorrow is just a day away.