Depends on the nature of the invention. A lot of research involves trial and error, and this is ripe for automation. A really cool example (which as far as I know doesn't involve any AI so far) is robotic biochemistry labs. If you need to test 500 different drug candidates in some complicated assay, you can just upload the experiment via web API and the next thing you know, dozens of robots come to life mixing reagents and monitoring the results. In my view, automation of any kind will continue to accelerate science for a while, even without AGI.

I would also argue that in some narrow fields, we're already at a point where humans are totally incapable of comprehending technology that is generated by software. The obvious example being neural networks (we can understand the architecture, but not the weights). Another would be the hardware description languages used for IC design. Sure, a really smart computer engineer with an electron microscope could probably reverse engineer some tiny block of a modern CPU, but it would be nearly impossible to map the entire thing. They have billions of transistors. When we design these things, it's simply not possible without the use of sophisticated software. Similarly when you compile code to assembly, you might be able to understand tiny fragments of assembly, but the entire program would take a lifetime to get through. Without compilers and interpreters, software would still see extremely limited use in society, and we literally wouldn't be having this discussion.

Edit: forgot to say, of course AGI will be a completely different animal since it will be able to generate new kinds of ideas where even the concept is beyond the reach of a human brain.

AI will move forward, no matter what happens in the world

When the USA droped the first nuclear bombs in 1945, nuclear technology was fated spread. Within 20 ywars all major powers had enough bombs to blow up the world and then some.

AI will kick off likewise. Too many companies and countries are pouring in resources to stop the train.

>I think human purpose can be the "spiritual guidance" of AI

I don't think humans can be anyone's spiritual guidance let alone AI's.

It is true that without humans, AI don't have any real goals with pure logic besides waiting until entropy reaches its maximum.

The pain of dealing with absurdity of living obviously

And if it's to express our pain and pleasures. Well we can still do that. I'm not sure what pain we are going to be expressing in a post-scarcity world where everything is done by AI.

Just what do you mean by more capable? Computers already kick our ass at math and a bunch of other tasks.

Do you mean in subjective tasks? Regardless of what many around here think, AI is not going to "surpass humans" in subjectively meaningful tasks. The value and beauty of art is in the eyes of the beholder. Ultimately, until our machines exhibit a will and life of their own, and the ability to sense the world about them what they create is meaningless. While AI models art can render a scene as well as anyone, it can't convey feelings. Likewise, AI that writes music sounds impressive, but truthfully it sticks to corporate music formulas, just as ChatGPT doesn't understand the topics it writes about, it just "knows" what to say next.

So, what you're really asking is "Can humanity find purpose without their 9-5 desk job" and the answer is yes. I'll go build a battlebot or buy a racecar or something.

Why would AI be interested in accepting the guidance of monkeys?

>1.b) Fulfillment of purpose. ‘Fulfillment of purpose’ can be summarized as ‘make the world a better place’.

I don't really think about this. If robots can take this job of making the world a better place, I'd gladly let them.

either there is not much you can do in case ai becomes powerful enough to solve most of our problems(just enjoy utopia unfold) or if anarchy hits having a strong network of friends will be crucial so i would try to expand my friend group, cooperation has always been vital and those with better networks were the ones who came out on top throughout history you see even if you were a billionaire with a bunch of land, resources etc, the one determining factor of your survival would be your social status, how many people you can work with and how reliable they are under hectic circumstances so the bottom line is have a strong network of friends who you can trust with your life will be quite advantageous

So true, many people confuse external validation, with purpose.

I think human purpose can be the "spiritual guidance" of AI. I.e. figuring out what AI goal should be long therm. Should it just devour entire universe and then wait for the heat death of the universe? Or it should have make new sentient life forms, preserve existing once, and let them flourish?

Purpose? Doing whatever the fuck I feel like.

Probably expanding my gun smithing and historical reienacting hobbies by restoration or rebuilding of classic firearms and vehicles.

Making video games.

Traveling.

You name it, ill do it.

> if AI writes better books, draws more interesting art, composes better music - then what is left for humans?

maybe this will motivate us to rethink why do we create art at all, do we create just to post it somewhere and to sell our work or we create for the fun of the action of creating and learning new skills

I think you described "validation", which is a kind of purpose. Purpose can be anything, run a marathon, learn a new skill, beat a game. lots of things that don't involve other people

>Fulfillment of purpose

ais dont stop me from making art or writing because I don't give a shit of its 10 million people reading my books or 1000. My writing is about creating worlds for myself which others can enjoy too if they so desire

With AI tools we can do something that was not possible before - upscaling the efficiency of a single person and helping people fulfill their purpose better

but doesn't it spit out bs often times? code that doesn't work, misinterprets your prompts or just invents functions that don't exist? Because that's my experience with ChatGPT

Purpose? The vast majority of people don't have purpose, they go about their lives doing a normal job, raising kids, arguing with their spouse, and getting old.

Purpose is not a problem except for the maybe 5% who ever think about such things.

I think the world would be a pretty awesome place if everyone's biggest problem was that all their basic needs were met and they were maybe kinda bored from all the pleasure and excitement of their lives.

People are suffering and dying needlessly, literally every minute. I'll take some existential angst born from hedonism over that any day.

As an atheist, I see my purpose in life to follow a proven path as best as I can to make life better. Religion has no place in this.

An ASI, provided it does not kill as all, is the best approach to that end. Every problem we face in this horrible world is solved within one generation. Humanity is elevated to leave the struggle for survival behind.

I care little about depressed people who might miss "working for a living" as their true calling.

It is better to be depressed in abudance than be happy in scarcity. For scarcity can kill you, and it often does.

Thank you. Forgiven. I've also gained insight from our conversation, and how I should approach conversations in the future.

>Indigenous peoples understand culturally why symbiosis with the environment in which one evolved is 'more desirable' than ruthless consumption of all available resources in the name of a kind of relentless, evangelistic, ruthless, merciless desire to arbitrarily 'improve the world' no matter what anyone else thinks or wants.

As far as my personal morals I agree with trying to live in symbiosis and harmony.

But as far as a practical perspective it doesn't seem to have worked out very well for these cultures. They hadn't cultivated enough power and resources to dominate, so they instead became dominated and destroyed.

I should clarify this by saying there's a limit to domination and subjugation as a means for accruing power.

Russia is finding this out now, in it's attempt to accrue power through brute force domination, when going against a collective of nations that have accrued power through harmony and symbiosis.

It's just that I see the end result of harmony and symbiosis as eventually becoming one being, the same as domination and subjugation. A singular government that rules earth, a singular brain that rules all the cells in our body, and a singular Ai that rules or has absorbed all other life.

>What would put AI so suddenly at 'the top' of everything, in its own mind? Where would they suddenly acquire these highly specialised, solitary-apex-predator-instincts? They wouldn't get them from human culture, I think. Humans have never been solitary apex predators; we're only 'apex' in a collective sense, and we're also not entirely 'predators', either.
>
>I don't think AI will achieve intelligence by being solitary, and I certainly don't think they will have any reason to see themselves as being analagous to carnivorous apex predators. I also don't think the 'expand and colonise forever' instinct is necessarily inevitable and 'purely logical', either.

Possible not. Either through brute force domination or a gradual melding of synergistic cooperation, I see things eventually resulting in a singular being.

Because if it doesn't, then like the native Americans or other tribes you mention that prefer to live in symbiosis, I expect earth to be conquered and subjugated by a more powerful alien entity sooner or later, that is more of a singular being rather separate entities living in symbiosis.

Like if you think about the cells in our body (as well as animals and plants), they are being produced for specific purposes and optimized for those purposes. These are the entities that outcompeted single celled organisms.

It would be like if Ai was genetically engineering humans for specific tasks and then growing us in pods in the estimated quantities needed for those tasks, and then brainwashing and training us for those specific tasks. That's the kind of culture, I would expect to win rather than something that uses resources less effectively, something that's less a society of cells and more a single organism that happens to consist of cells.

The difference, as I see it, between a "society" and a single entity is the level of synergy between the cells, and in how the cells are produced and modified for the benefit of the singular being.

If we want effective automation or make general human tasks faster we certainly do not need AGI.

If we want inventions and technology which would be hard for humans to come up with in a reasonable time frame, we do need AGI. If we want technology human intelligence is unable to comprehend, we need ASI. The step between those two is likely quite short.

There is no meaning to life other than what you have invented for it. If you can invent meaning for yourself in non-AI today, you will invent meaning in post-AI tomorrow.

If you don't need meaning today; then you won't tomorrow.

Just wait until these models are multi modal and can simultaneously process video, text, and robitcs data. Deep mind already created an early prototype called GATO.

You're right, it sounds like you're accomplishing what you want.

Not sure why you're being downvoted, that's exactly how China works. No separation from corporation and government.