Q#1: Choose one of the following options for your Post:? Option #1 – Transhumanism After reading this week’s Required Learning Materials, review Bostrom’s ‘Transhumanist FAQs’ and Torrese

23 The Transhumanist FAQ

Nick Bostrom

GENERAL QUESTIONS ABOUT TRANSHUMANISM

What is transhumanism?

Transhumanism is a way of thinking about the future that is based on the premise that the human species in its current form does not represent the end of our development but rather a comparatively early phase. We formally define it as follows:

1) The intellectual and cultural movement that affirms the possibility and desirability of fun- damentally improving the human condition through applied reason, especially by devel- oping and making widely available technologies to eliminate aging and to greatly enhance human intellectual, physical, and psychological capacities.

2) The study of the ramifications, promises, and potential dangers of technologies that will enable us to overcome fundamental human limitations, and the related study of the ethical matters involved in developing and using such technologies.

Transhumanism can be viewed as an extension of humanism, from which it is partially derived. Humanists believe that humans matter, that individuals matter. We might not be perfect, but we can make things better by promoting rational thinking, freedom, tolerance, democracy, and concern for our fellow human beings. Transhumanists agree with this but also emphasize what we have the potential to become. Just as we use rational means to improve the human condition and the external world, we can also use such means to improve ourselves, the human organism. In doing so, we are not limited to traditional humanistic methods, such as education and cultural develop- ment. We can also use technological means that will eventually enable us to move beyond what some would think of as ‘‘human.’’

It is not our human shape or the details of our current human biology that define what is valuable about us, but rather our aspirations and ideals, our experiences, and the kinds of lives we lead. To a transhumanist, progress occurs when more people become more able to shape them- selves, their lives, and the ways they relate to others, in accordance with their own deepest values. Transhumanists place a high value on autonomy: the ability and right of individuals to plan and

From Nick Bostrom et al., The Transhumanist FAQ: A General Introduction, version 2.1 (2003). Copyright � 2003 by The World Transhumanist Association. Reprinted by permission of the author.

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C o p y r i g h t 2 0 0 9 . R o w m a n & L i t t l e f i e l d P u b l i s h e r s .

A l l r i g h t s r e s e r v e d . M a y n o t b e r e p r o d u c e d i n a n y f o r m w i t h o u t p e r m i s s i o n f r o m t h e p u b l i s h e r , e x c e p t f a i r u s e s p e r m i t t e d u n d e r U . S . o r a p p l i c a b l e c o p y r i g h t l a w .

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choose their own lives. Some people may of course, for any number of reasons, choose to forgo the opportunity to use technology to improve themselves. Transhumanists seek to create a world in which autonomous individuals may choose to remain unenhanced or choose to be enhanced and in which these choices will be respected.

Through the accelerating pace of technological development and scientific understanding, we are entering a whole new stage in the history of the human species. In the relatively near future, we may face the prospect of real artificial intelligence. New kinds of cognitive tools will be built that combine artificial intelligence with interface technology. Molecular nanotechnology has the potential to manufacture abundant resources for everybody and to give us control over the biochem- ical processes in our bodies, enabling us to eliminate disease and unwanted aging. Technologies such as brain-computer interfaces and neuropharmacology could amplify human intelligence, increase emotional well-being, improve our capacity for steady commitment to life projects or a loved one, and even multiply the range and richness of possible emotions. On the dark side of the spectrum, transhumanists recognize that some of these coming technologies could potentially cause great harm to human life; even the survival of our species could be at risk. Seeking to understand the dangers and working to prevent disasters is an essential part of the transhumanist agenda.

What is a posthuman?

It is sometimes useful to talk about possible future beings whose basic capacities so radically exceed those of present humans as to be no longer unambiguously human by our current standards. The standard word for such beings is ‘‘posthuman.’’ (Care must be taken to avoid misinterpretation. ‘‘Posthuman’’ does not denote just anything that happens to come after the human era, nor does it have anything to do with the ‘‘posthumous.’’ In particular, it does not imply that there are no humans anymore.)

Many transhumanists wish to follow life paths which would, sooner or later, require growing into posthuman persons: they yearn to reach intellectual heights as far above any current human genius as humans are above other primates; to be resistant to disease and impervious to aging; to have unlimited youth and vigor; to exercise control over their own desires, moods, and mental states; to be able to avoid feeling tired, hateful, or irritated about petty things; to have an increased capacity for pleasure, love, artistic appreciation, and serenity; to experience novel states of con- sciousness that current human brains cannot access. It seems likely that the simple fact of living an indefinitely long, healthy, active life would take anyone to posthumanity if they went on accumulat- ing memories, skills, and intelligence.

Posthumans could be completely synthetic artificial intelligences, or they could be enhanced uploads, or they could be the result of making many smaller but cumulatively profound augmen- tations to a biological human. The latter alternative would probably require either the redesign of the human organism using advanced nanotechnology or its radical enhancement using some combi- nation of technologies such as genetic engineering, psychopharmacology, anti-aging therapies, neu- ral interfaces, advanced information management tools, memory enhancing drugs, wearable computers, and cognitive techniques.

Some authors write as though simply by changing our self-conception, we have become or could become posthuman. This is a confusion or corruption of the original meaning of the term. The changes required to make us posthuman are too profound to be achievable by merely altering some aspect of psychological theory or the way we think about ourselves. Radical technological modifications to our brains and bodies are needed.

It is difficult for us to imagine what it would be like to be a posthuman person. Posthumans may have experiences and concerns that we cannot fathom, thoughts that cannot fit into the three-

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The Transhumanist FAQ 347

pound lumps of neural tissue that we use for thinking. Some posthumans may find it advantageous to jettison their bodies altogether and live as information patterns on vast super-fast computer net- works. Their minds may be not only more powerful than ours but may also employ different cogni- tive architectures or include new sensory modalities that enable greater participation in their virtual reality settings. Posthuman minds might be able to share memories and experiences directly, greatly increasing the efficiency, quality, and modes in which posthumans could communicate with each other. The boundaries between posthuman minds may not be as sharply defined as those between humans.

Posthumans might shape themselves and their environment in so many new and profound ways that speculations about the detailed features of posthumans and the posthuman world are likely to fail.

What is a transhuman?

In its contemporary usage, ‘‘transhuman’’ refers to an intermediary form between the human and the posthuman. One might ask, given that our current use of, for example, medicine and informa- tion technology enable us to routinely do many things that would have astonished humans living in ancient times, whether we are not already transhuman? The question is a provocative one, but ultimately not very meaningful; the concept of the transhuman is too vague for there to be a definite answer.

A transhumanist is simply someone who advocates transhumanism. It is a common error for reporters and other writers to say that transhumanists ‘‘claim to be transhuman’’ or ‘‘call themselves transhuman.’’ To adopt a philosophy which says that someday everyone ought to have the chance to grow beyond present human limits is clearly not to say that one is better or somehow currently ‘‘more advanced’’ than one’s fellow humans.

TECHNOLOGIES AND PROJECTIONS

Biotechnology, genetic engineering, stem cells, and cloning—what are they and what are they good for?

Biotechnology is the application of techniques and methods based on the biological sciences. It encompasses such diverse enterprises as brewing, manufacture of human insulin, interferon, and human growth hormone, medical diagnostics, cell cloning and reproductive cloning, the genetic modification of crops, bioconversion of organic waste and the use of genetically altered bacteria in the cleanup of oil spills, stem cell research, and much more. Genetic engineering is the area of biotechnology concerned with the directed alteration of genetic material.

Biotechnology already has countless applications in industry, agriculture, and medicine. It is a hotbed of research. The completion of the human genome project—a ‘‘rough draft’’ of the entire human genome was published in the year 2000—was a scientific milestone by anyone’s standards. Research is now shifting to decoding the functions and interactions of all these different genes and to developing applications based on this information.

The potential medical benefits are too many to list; researchers are working on every common disease, with varying degrees of success. Progress takes place not only in the development of drugs and diagnostics but also in the creation of better tools and research methodologies, which in turn accelerates progress. When considering what developments are likely over the long-term, such improvements in the research process itself must be factored in. The human genome project was completed ahead of schedule, largely because the initial predictions underestimated the degree to which instrumentation technology would improve during the course of the project. At the same

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348 Nick Bostrom

time, one needs to guard against the tendency to hype every latest advance. (Remember all those breakthrough cancer cures that we never heard of again?) Moreover, even in cases where the early promise is borne out, it usually takes ten years to get from proof-of-concept to successful commer- cialization.

Genetic therapies are of two sorts: somatic and germ-line. In somatic gene therapy, a virus is typically used as a vector to insert genetic material into the cells of the recipient’s body. The effects of such interventions do not carry over into the next generation. Germ-line genetic therapy is per- formed on sperm or egg cells, or on the early zygote, and can be inheritable. (Embryo screening, in which embryos are tested for genetic defects or other traits and then selectively implanted, can also count as a kind of germ-line intervention.) Human gene therapy, except for some forms of embryo screening, is still experimental. Nonetheless, it holds promise for the prevention and treat- ment of many diseases, as well as for uses in enhancement medicine. The potential scope of genetic medicine is vast: virtually all disease and all human traits—intelligence, extroversion, conscien- tiousness, physical appearance, etc.—involve genetic predispositions. Single-gene disorders, such as cystic fibrosis, sickle cell anemia, and Huntington’s disease are likely to be among the first tar- gets for genetic intervention. Polygenic traits and disorders, ones in which more than one gene is implicated, may follow later (although even polygenic conditions can sometimes be influenced in a beneficial direction by targeting a single gene).

Stem cell research, another scientific frontier, offers great hopes for regenerative medicine. Stem cells are undifferentiated (unspecialized) cells that can renew themselves and give rise to one or more specialized cell types with specific functions in the body. By growing such cells in culture, or steering their activity in the body, it will be possible to grow replacement tissues for the treat- ment of degenerative disorders, including heart disease, Parkinson’s, Alzheimer’s, diabetes, and many others. It may also be possible to grow entire organs from stem cells for use in transplanta- tion. Embryonic stem cells seem to be especially versatile and useful, but research is also ongoing into adult stem cells and the ‘‘reprogramming’’ of ordinary cells so that they can be turned back into stem cells with pluripotent capabilities.

The term ‘‘human cloning’’ covers both therapeutic and reproductive uses. In therapeutic cloning, a preimplantation embryo (also known as ‘‘blastocyst’’—a hollow ball consisting of 30– 150 undifferentiated cells) is created via cloning, from which embryonic stem cells could be extracted and used for therapy. Because these cloned stem cells are genetically identical to the patient, the tissues or organs they would produce could be implanted without eliciting an immune response from the patient’s body, thereby overcoming a major hurdle in transplant medicine. Reproductive cloning, by contrast, would mean the birth of a child who is genetically identical to the cloned parent: in effect, a younger identical twin.

Everybody recognizes the benefit to ailing patients and their families that come from curing specific diseases. Transhumanists emphasize that, in order to seriously prolong the healthy life span, we also need to develop ways to slow aging or to replace senescent cells and tissues. Gene therapy, stem cell research, therapeutic cloning, and other areas of medicine that have the potential to deliver these benefits deserve a high priority in the allocation of research monies.

What is molecular nanotechnology?

Molecular nanotechnology is an anticipated manufacturing technology that will make it possible to build complex three-dimensional structures to atomic specification using chemical reactions directed by nonbiological machinery. In molecular manufacturing, each atom would go to a selected place, bonding with other atoms in a precisely designated manner. Nanotechnology prom- ises to give us thorough control of the structure of matter.

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The Transhumanist FAQ 349

Since most of the stuff around us and inside us is composed of atoms and gets its characteris- tic properties from the placement of these atoms, the ability to control the structure of matter on the atomic scale has many applications. As K. Eric Drexler wrote in Engines of Creation, the first book on nanotechnology (published in 1986):

Coal and diamonds, sand and computer chips, cancer and healthy tissue: throughout history, variations in the arrangement of atoms have distinguished the cheap from the cherished, the dis- eased from the healthy. Arranged one way, atoms make up soil, air, and water; arranged another, they make up ripe strawberries. Arranged one way, they make up homes and fresh air; arranged another, they make up ash and smoke.

Nanotechnology, by making it possible to rearrange atoms effectively, will enable us to trans- form coal into diamonds, sand into supercomputers, and to remove pollution from the air and tumors from healthy tissue.

Central to Drexler’s vision of nanotechnology is the concept of the assembler. An assembler would be a molecular construction device. It would have one or more submicroscopic robotic arms under computer control. The arms would be capable of holding and placing reactive compounds so as to positionally control the precise location at which a chemical reaction takes place. The assem- bler arms would grab a molecular (but not necessarily individual atoms) and add it to a workpiece, constructing an atomically precise object step by step. An advanced assembler would be able to make almost any chemically stable structure. In particular, it would be able to make a copy of itself. Since assemblers could replicate themselves, they would be easy to produce in large quantities.

Mature nanotechnology will transform manufacturing into a software problem. To build something, all you will need is a detailed design of the object you want to make and a sequence of instructions for its construction. Rare or expensive raw materials are generally unnecessary; the atoms required for the construction of most kinds of nanotech devices exist in abundance in nature. Dirt, for example, is full of useful atoms.

By working in large teams, assemblers and more specialized nanomachines will be able to build large objects quickly. Consequently, while nanomachines may have features on the scale of a billionth of a meter—a nanometer—the products could be as big as space vehicles or even, in a more distant future, the size of planets.

While it seems fairly well established that molecular nanotechnology is in principle possible, it is harder to determine how long it will take to develop. A common guess among the cognoscenti is that the first assembler may be built around the year 2018, give or take a decade, but there is a large scope for diverging opinion on the upper side of that estimate.

Because the ramifications of nanotechnology are immense, it is imperative that serious thought be given to this topic now. If nanotechnology were to be abused the consequences could be devastating. Society needs to prepare for the assembler breakthrough and do advance planning to minimize the risks associated with it.

What is superintelligence?

A superintelligent intellect (a superintelligence, sometimes called ‘‘ultraintelligence’’) is one that has the capacity to radically outperform the best human brains in practically every field, including scientific creativity, general wisdom, and social skills.

Sometimes a distinction is made between weak and strong superintelligence. Weak superin- telligence is what you would get if you could run a human intellect at an accelerated clock speed, such as by uploading it to a fast computer. If the upload’s clock-rate were a thousand times that of

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350 Nick Bostrom

a biological brain, it would perceive reality as being slowed down by a factor of a thousand. It would think a thousand times more thoughts in a given time interval than its biological counterpart.

Strong superintelligence refers to an intellect that is not only faster than a human brain but also smarter in a qualitative sense. No matter how much you speed up your dog’s brain, you’re not going to get the equivalent of a human intellect. Analogously, there might be kinds of smartness that wouldn’t be accessible to even very fast human brains given their current capacities. Something as simple as increasing the size or connectivity of our neuronal networks might give us some of these capacities. Other improvements may require wholesale reorganization of our cognitive archi- tecture or the addition of new layers of cognition on top of the old ones.

However, the distinction between weak and strong superintelligence may not be clear-cut. A sufficiently long-lived human who didn’t make any errors and had a sufficient stack of scrap paper at hand could in principle compute any Turing computable function. (According to Church’s thesis, the class of Turing computable functions is identical to the class of physically computable func- tions.)

Many but not all transhumanists expect that superintelligence will be created within the first half of this century. Superintelligence requires two things: hardware and software. Chip-manufac- turers planning the next generation of microprocessors commonly rely on a well-known empirical regularity known as Moore’s Law. In its original 1965-formulation by Intel co-founder Gordon Moore, it stated that the number of components on a chip doubled every year. In contemporary use, the ‘‘law’’ is commonly understood as referring more generally to a doubling of computing power, or of computing power per dollar. For the past couple of years, the doubling time has hov- ered between eighteen months and two years.

Most experts, Moore included, think that computing power will continue to double about every eighteen months for at least another two decades. This expectation is based in part on extrap- olation from the past and in part on consideration of developments currently underway in labora- tories. Thus it appears quite likely that human-equivalent hardware will have been achieved within not much more than a couple of decades.

How long it will take to solve the software problem is harder to estimate. One possibility is that progress in computational neuroscience will teach us about the computational architecture of the human brain and what learning rules it employs. We can then implement the same algorithms on a computer. In this approach, the superintelligence would not be completely specified by the programmers but would instead have to grow by learning from experience the same way a human infant does. An alternative approach would be to use genetic algorithms and methods from classical AI. This might result in a superintelligence that bears no close resemblance to a human brain. At the opposite extreme, we could seek to create a superintelligence by uploading a human intellect and then accelerating and enhancing it. The outcome of this might be a superintelligence that is a radically upgraded version of one particular human mind.

The arrival of superintelligence will clearly deal a heavy blow to anthropocentric worldviews. Much more important than its philosophical implications, however, would be its practical effects. Creating superintelligence may be the last invention that humans will ever need to make, since superintelligences could themselves take care of further scientific and technological development. They would do so more effectively than humans. Biological humanity would no longer be the smartest life form on the block. The prospect of superintelligence raises many big issues and con- cerns that we should think deeply about in advance of its actual development. The paramount ques- tion is: What can be done to maximize the chances that the arrival of superintelligence will benefit rather than harm us? The range of expertise needed to address this question extends far beyond the community of AI researchers. Neuroscientists, economists, cognitive scientists, computer scientists, philosophers, ethicists, sociologists, science-fiction writers, military strategists, politicians, legisla-

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The Transhumanist FAQ 351

tors, and many others will have to pool their insights if we are to deal wisely with what may be the most important task our species will ever have to tackle.

Many transhumanists would like to become superintelligent themselves. This is obviously a long-term and uncertain goal, but it might be achievable either through uploading and subsequent enhancement or through the gradual augmentation of our biological brains, by means of future nootropics (cognitive enhancement drugs), cognitive techniques, IT tools (e.g., wearable comput- ers, smart agents, information filtering systems, visualization software, etc.), neural-computer inter- faces, or brain implants.

What is uploading?

Uploading (sometimes called ‘‘downloading,’’ ‘‘mind uploading,’’ or ‘‘brain reconstruction’’) is the process of transferring an intellect from a biological brain to a computer.

One way of doing this might be by first scanning the synaptic structure of a particular brain and then implementing the same computations in an electronic medium. A brain scan of sufficient resolution could be produced by disassembling the brain atom for atom by means of nanotechnol- ogy. Other approaches, such as analyzing pieces of the brain slice by slice in an electron micro- scope with automatic image processing have also been proposed. In addition to mapping the connection pattern among the 100 billion-or-so neurons, the scan would probably also have to regis- ter some of the functional properties of each of the synaptic interconnections, such as the efficacy of the connection and how stable it is over time (e.g., whether it is short-term or long-term potenti- ated). Non-local modulators such as neurotransmitter concentrations and hormone balances may also need to be represented, although such parameters likely contain much less data than the neu- ronal network itself.

In addition to a good three-dimensional map of a brain, uploading will require progress in neuroscience to develop functional models of each species of neuron (how they map input stimuli to outgoing action potentials, and how their properties change in response to activity in learning). It will also require a powerful computer to run the upload, and some way for the upload to interact with the external world or with a virtual reality. (Providing input/output or a virtual reality for the upload appears easy in comparison to the other challenges.)

An alternative hypothetical uploading method would proceed more gradually: one neuron could be replaced by an implant or by a simulation in a computer outside of the body. Then another neuron, and so on, until eventually the whole cortex has been replaced and the person’s thinking is implemented on entirely artificial hardware. (To do this for the whole brain would almost certainly require nanotechnology.)

A distinction is sometimes made between destructive uploading, in which the original brain is destroyed in the process, and non-destructive uploading, in which the original brain is preserved intact alongside the uploaded copy. It is a matter of debate under what conditions personal identity would be preserved in destructive uploading. Many philosophers who have studied the problem think that at least under some conditions, an upload of your brain would be you. A widely accepted position is that you survive so long as certain information patterns are conserved, such as your memories, values, attitudes, and emotional dispositions, and so long as there is causal continuity so that earlier stages of yourself help determine later stages of yourself. Views differ on the relative importance of these two criteria, but they can both be satisfied in the case of uploading. For the continuation of personhood, on this view, it matters little whether you are implemented on a silicon chip inside a computer or in that gray, cheesy lump inside your skull, assuming both implementa- tions are conscious.

Tricky cases arise, however, if we imagine that several similar copies are made of your

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352 Nick Bostrom

uploaded mind. Which one of them is you? Are they all you, or are none of them you? Who owns your property? Who is married to your spouse? Philosophical, legal, and ethical challenges abound. Maybe these will become hotly debated political issues later in this century.

A common misunderstanding about uploads is that they would necessarily be ‘‘disembodied’’ and that this would mean that their experiences would be impoverished. Uploading according to this view would be the ultimate escapism, one that only neurotic body-loathers could possibly feel tempted by. But an upload’s experience could in principle be identical to that of a biological human. An upload could have a virtual (simulated) body giving the same sensations and the same possibilities for interaction as a non-simulated boy. With advanced virtual reality, uploads could enjoy food and drink, and upload sex could be as gloriously messy as one could wish. And uploads wouldn’t have to be confined to virtual reality: they could interact with people on the outside and even rent robot bodies in order to work in or explore physical reality.

Personal inclinations regarding uploading differ. Many transhumanists have a pragmatic atti- tude: whether they would like to upload or not depends on the precise conditions in which they would live as uploads and what the alternative use. (Some transhumanists may also doubt whether uploading will be possible.) Advantages of being an upload would include:

• Uploads would not be subject to biological senescence. • Back-up copies of uploads could be created regularly so that you could be rebooted if

something bad happened. (Thus your lifespan would potentially be as long as the uni- verse’s.)

• You cou

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