It's an interesting question as to whether the end result of human civilization is AI.

But personally, it's not my goal to create AI, and even if I had the means to do so, I would only do it to benefit myself and other humans, not as an end in itself. If it's my life or AI, I choose my life, and I choose humanity. I don't care about machines beyond their utility or interest to humans. When not consuming scifi, I prefer the augmented intelligence route over artificial, where it's always humans that are being made smarter, instead of being replaced.

Why? Because machines don't care about anything, don't feel, aren't conscious. They're just tools.

As for life in general, I don't see why intelligence is preferable to other strategies. Ants or bacteria may long outlive bigger brained mammals and their technological creations. Despite all our success, bacteria still have us way outnumbered. It's a bit egotistical to think we're the central focus of life.

Horseshoe crabs have been around for 400+ million years in a similar form. Why would that be if super optimization is the goal? There could be planets where the most sophisticated form of life is something like a horseshoe crab or jellyfish. Maybe Earth is an outlier.

Kurzweil is an interesting thinker, but he always comes across as someone who thinks because they're an expert in one domain, that makes them an expert in all the others.

As for life in general, I don't see why intelligence is preferable to other strategies. Ants or bacteria may long outlive bigger brained mammals and their technological creations. Despite all our success, bacteria still have us way outnumbered. It's a bit egotistical to think we're the central focus of life. — Marchesk

1. The OP underlined that AGI/ASI is reasonably human-cognitive exceeding in nature, and thus the OP underlines humans are reasonably not the central focus of life.
   
2. Pertinently, AGI/ASI can theoretically solve any task, given sufficient compute resources, including tasks performed by bacteria!

How do you know the purpose of life isn't to create automobiles or flat screen tv's?

How do you know the purpose of life isn't to create automobiles or flat screen tv's? — fishfry

I don't detect the relevance of your question.

I) Solve many problems, including aging, death, etc.
Reference A: For eg, ai can already do this: "Self-taught artificial intelligence beats doctors at predicting heart attacks"
http://www.sciencemag.org/news/2017/04/self-taught-artificial-intelligence-beats-doctors-predicting-heart-attacks — ProgrammingGodJordan

Please, don't solve the aging and death cycle with AGI, not for me, maybe for you but definitely not for humanity.

Please, don't solve the aging and death cycle with AGI, not for me, maybe for you but definitely not for humanity. — ArguingWAristotleTiff

Why don't you wish for aging to be solved?

Pertinently, AGI/ASI can theoretically solve any task, given sufficient compute resources, including tasks performed by bacteria! — ProgrammingGodJordan

It's not whether AI can solve tasks performed by bacteria, it's the likelihood that bacteria will still be around long after the last machines rust away. All of human civilization is but a tiny blip in the history of life.

Why don't you wish for aging to be solved? — ProgrammingGodJordan

Because at the age of 47 I am pretty sure one normal lifetime will be enough for me.

I don't detect the relevance of your question. — ProgrammingGodJordan

Weak AI systems are an artifact of modern technology, like cars and flatscreen tv's. On what basis would one ask if AI is our purpose? Perhaps God put us on earth to invent flat screen tv's so God could watch the NFL playoffs, which are starting this very day. You actually didn't understand my point? That's astonishing.

Because at the age of 47 I am pretty sure one normal lifetime will be enough for me. — ArguingWAristotleTiff

Wow, really? I would be down with a few centuries, at least. Humans live such short lives as it is, compared to other time scales.

Wow, really? — Marchesk

Situational answer?

It's not whether AI can solve tasks performed by bacteria, it's the likelihood that bacteria will still be around long after the last machines rust away. All of human civilization is but a tiny blip in the history of life. — Marchesk

Why is the purpose of human life to create artificial general intelligence?



1.a) Evolution is optimising ways of contributing to the increase of entropy, as systems very slowly approach equilibrium. (The universe’s predicted end)

1.b) Within that process, work or activities done through several ranges of intelligent behaviour are reasonably ways of contributing to the increase of entropy. (See source)

1.c) As species got more and more intelligent, nature was finding better ways to contribute to increases of entropy. (Intelligent systems can be observed as being biased towards entropy maximization)

1.d) Humans are slowly getting smarter, but even if we augment our intellect by CRISPR-like routines or implants, we will reasonably be limited by how many computational units or neurons etc fit in our skulls.

1.e) AGI/ASI won’t be subject to the size of the human skull/human cognitive hardware. (Laws of physics/thermodynamics permits human exceeding intelligence in non biological form)

1.f) As AGI/ASI won’t face the limits that humans do, they are a subsequent step (though non biological) particularly in the regime of contributing to better ways of increasing entropy, compared to humans.

2) The above is why the purpose of the human species, is reasonably to create AGI/ASI.

1.a) Evolution is optimising ways of contributing to the increase of entropy, as systems very slowly approach equilibrium. (The universe’s predicted end) — ProgrammingGodJordan

How is "optimising ways of contributing to the increase of entropy" selected for by evolution?

As species got more and more intelligent, nature was finding better ways to contribute to increases of entropy. (Intelligent systems can be observed as being biased towards entropy maximization) — ProgrammingGodJordan

As some species get more intelligent. The keyword there is some. Intelligence is a favorable adaptation for some species. But those species aren't even the majority of life on this planet. Bacteria, plants, fungi, viruses and insects vastly outnumber mammals, birds and cephalopods. And they've been around for far longer.

So it's hard to see how intelligence is the end result of evolution. It's not even clear that it's a good long term adaptation for humans. We might go extinct because of our intelligence.

How is "optimising ways of contributing to the increase of entropy" selected for by evolution? — tom

See the source in (1.a).

As some species get more intelligent. The keyword there is some. Intelligence is a favorable adaptation for some species. But those species aren't even the majority of life on this planet. Bacteria, plants, fungi, viruses and insects vastly outnumber mammals, birds and cephalopods. And they've been around for far longer.

So it's hard to see how intelligence is the end result of evolution. It's not even clear that it's a good long term adaptation for humans. We might go extinct because of our intelligence. — Marchesk

1. Why did you not bother to read the sources provided in my earlier response?
   
2. Anyway, see this same source from 1.b (from my earlier response), showing the non trivial connection between intelligence and evolution, contrary to your non evidenced opinions:

I don't think so, I mean i think it's a wrong road that we will happily speed down but I would say that its happened to us through our greed for technology. You can't ask this question without wondering if there is more intelligent life in the universe and is it their fate too to create some kind of artificial intelligence? I don't agree. I think you can take the human race as an example of how bad intelligence can be, we're completely blinded by money and the sad thing is, we aren't creating an artificial intelligence to better the human race, it's all for the profit, the money. If money had no value I don't think we would rushing to create these things like we are now.

I think that this thread is based on a false premise.

There is no telos in the evolution of life on Earth. At least not in Darwinian evolution by natural selection. There is no purpose or direction to biological evolution. Mutations--sometimes thought of as bad copies--happen; environments change; and those in an environment who possess certain traits reproduce successfully.

What is beneficial today--including cultural adaptations like technology--could be a detriment tomorrow.

I don't know if it gets any more ethnocentric or anthropocentric than to say that one invention of one human civilization is the purpose of life.

Yes, Life's purpose (the Mind) is to Create.

The AI piece is just self-serving and good marketing for academic fund raising.

See the source in (1.a). — ProgrammingGodJordan

I doesn't seem to indicate how entropy maximization either is selected for, nor could be selected for by evolution. Replication seems totally absent, as is variation.

Unless I have missed something of course?

Perhaps you could explain?

Life's purpose is to destroy itself, and the best way to do that is to create intelligence with no interest in preserving life. Since the most efficient use of machines is to limit their usage the end game of the machines would be that they switched themselves off; they can only do that when there is no one alive to keep switching them back on.

I don't know if it gets any more ethnocentric or anthropocentric than to say that one invention of one human civilization is the purpose of life. — WISDOMfromPO-MO

Yes, not just anthropocentric but either arrogant, naive or both.

1.a) Evolution is optimising ways of contributing to the increase of entropy, as systems very slowly approach equilibrium. (The universe’s predicted end) — ProgrammingGodJordan

this is gibberish.

I'm from Indonesia. I completely agree.

Human beings is very limited.
So it's time to evolve further (just like in some science-fictions).

A.I (Artificial Intelligence), AGI, V.R (Virtual Reality), Transhumanism, Post-humanism,
these are all the true/real "meaning of life"
To evolve (evolution)
To transcend (transcendence)

Life's purpose is to create Artificial General Intelligence. — OP

You mean like we're supposed to pass on the baton to a better version of ourselves?

:cool:

Don't expect to evolve to transhumanism or "Post-humanism" if we do not understand ourselves yet.
I think all of those tendencies are higher than we usually wonder about.

.

. — Yohan

Your point is well made and unarguable.

The thesis of the op is arbitrary and without merit. Might as well claim that the purpose of the sun is to shine. It's an abuse of language to even suggest that evolution has purpose or direction.

It's an abuse of language to even suggest that evolution has purpose or direction — unenlightened

Why though?

You have included quite a few references for reading in your description of your topic. I am going to read them, but let me first examine Artificial General Intelligence from a general viewpoint, as I know quite a few things on the subject of AI.

From Wikipedia:

1) "Intelligence has been defined in many ways: the capacity for abstraction, logic, understanding, self-awareness, learning, emotional knowledge, reasoning, planning, creativity, critical thinking, and problem-solving."

2) "Artificial general intelligence (AGI) is the ability of an intelligent agent to understand or learn any intellectual task that a human being can. It is a primary goal of some artificial intelligence research and a common topic in science fiction and futures studies. "
(Note: If taken literally, which is usually the case, one can undestand that it can do any intellectual task that a human being can. Which is preposterous, of course. If you have a doubt, just check with the definition of "intelligence" (1).)

3) "Artificial intelligence (AI) is intelligence demonstrated by machines, as opposed to the natural intelligence displayed by animals including humans."

4) "Intelligent agent is anything which perceives its environment, takes actions autonomously in order to achieve goals, and may improve its performance with learning or may use knowledge.
A thermostat is considered an example of an intelligent agent ..."

5) "A thermostat is a regulating device component which senses the temperature of a physical system and performs actions so that the system's temperature is maintained near a desired set point."

Can a mechanism as the above be considered "intelligent"? There are thousands of devices that do similar things. Should we considering them as "intelligent" or "smart"?

The word "intelligent", when applied to any kind of a device --from thermostats to supercomputers and robots-- is used as a figure of speech. (Is a "smartphone" really "smart"?)
And because these things (are programmed to) really do amazing things and also because of the ignorance of the general public regarding what a computer, programming and AI is, people believe they have or can have a soul and mind of themselves. Science fiction also helps a lot in that!

In fact, the only entity that can be called really intelligent is the human being. Animals can be called intelligent too, but to a very limited extent, comparing to human beings.

And it is the human beings who program devices to do things that themselves do mentally.
Devices execute instructions, which are contained in programs created by humans.
Devices cannot and do not think. Humans can.

At this point, it helps looking again at the definition of "intelligence" (1) in relation to devices.

(BTW, I am a professional programmer, and AI is one of the main fields I work in.)