Second keynote by Dr. Randal Koene at the 2012 Australian Singularity Summit. Dr. Koene presents the motivation for human technological augmentation and reasons to go beyond biological life extension.

1. Biological Life-Extension is Not Enough
Randal A. Koene
Carboncopies.org

2. PERSONAL

3. No one wants to live longer just to live longer.
Motivation informs Method.

4. Having an Objective, a Goal, requires that you
have some notion of success.

5. Creating (intelligent) machines that have the
capabilities we do not – is not as good as being
able to experience them ourselves...
Imagine... creating/playing music.
Imagine... being the kayak.
Imagine... perceiving the background radiation of
the universe.

6. Is being out of the loop really your goal?

7. Near-term goals: Extended lives without
expanded minds are in conflict with creative
development.

8. SOCIAL

9. Gene survival is extremely dependent on an
environment – it is unlikely to survive many
changes.
Worse... gene replication does not sustain that
which we care most about!

10. Is CTGGAGTAC better than GTTGACTGAC?
We are vessels for that game – but for the last
10,000 years something has been happening!

11. Certain future experiences are desirable, others
are not – these are your perspectives, the memes
you champion...
Death keeps stealing our champions, our experts.

12. Too early to do uploading? - No! The big
perspective is relevant now.
We don't like myopic thinking in our
politicians, let's not be myopic about world
issues ourselves.

13. SPECIES

14. Life-extension in biology may increase the fragility
of our species & civilization...
More people? - Resources.
Less births? - Fewer novel perspectives.
Expansion? - Environmental limitation.

15. Biological life-extension within the same
evolutionary niche = further specialization to the
same performance
“over-training” in conflict with generalization

16. Aubrey de Grey: Ultimately, desires “uploading”

17. TECHNICAL

18. Significant biological life-extension in
incredibly difficult and beset by threats.
Reality vs. popular perception.

19. Life-extension and Substrate-Independence are
two different objectives

20. Developing out of a “catchment area”
(S.Gildert) may demand iterations of
exploration – and exploration involves risk.
Hard-wired delusions and drives. What would
an AGI do? Which types of AGI would exist in
the long run?

21. “Uploading” is just one step of many – but a
necessary step – for a truly advanced species

22. Thank You
carboncopies.org
randal.a.koene@carboncopies.org
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