Toby – Toby Weston

New Talk – AI FOoM

I was recently asked to give a talk for the DIGITAL TRANSFORMATION & INNOVATION IN BFSI SUMMIT 2024 in Vienna.

I haven’t done one of these things since Covid, so it was useful to update my priors with regard to the future…
…which is bearing down on us like some laser-eyed, fusion-powered Behemoth!

In this talk, I focus on how science fiction can prepare us for AI FOoM! (Fast Onset of Machine intelligence). A scenario that a minority of AI researchers are concerned about, but which has non-trivial consequences for our species.

E/ACC

I’m going to expand this into an essay when I get the time:

I am kind of torn:
Yes e/acc (singularity worshipers) might destroy the world in eleven interesting ways before lunchtime…

– but –

crows, apes, etc, are conscious, will never go foom (a colloquial term for AI hard takeoff), and there’s thousands of planets full analogous sentient agents to keep the spark of consciousness burning if we do disappear up our own brainstems…

– soo – (I guess)

push the button! Turn the page!
Light the blue touchpaper and stand back!

Also…

The singularity is coming whether we like it or not, so for all you/us neo-Luddites out there, maybe it’s time to accept that you/we can’t beat em, so you/we might as well join them.

(as I said, I’m torn)

Edit:
Hmmm… seems like he might be the antichrist after all. (see:THE SINGULARITY IS UPON US!)

The Rahan

Our sisters from another mother…

The Rahans’ mother is our neighbour Venus… on the neighbouring Plane of Rahu.

(work in progress backstory and world building for Anthropocene)

Xeno-Gymnosomata.Translucent, molluscine, palagic. Masters of the Physical Plane. Equipped with dexterous tentacles endowed with a suite of chemo, photo, thermo, and vibration receptors.