Life Extension Threatened

Our friend Michael Anissimov, a member of the CRN Task Force, maintains a stimulating weblog called Accelerating Future. His articles are always worth reading and often quite insightful. Recently, he wrote:

There are two sides to living as long as possible: developing the technologies to cure aging, such as SENS [Strategies for Engineered Negligible Senescence], and preventing human extinction risk, which threatens everybody. Unfortunately, in the life extensionist community, and the world at large, the balance of attention and support is lopsided in favor of the first side of the coin, while largely ignoring the second. There’s the global warming movement, sure, but no mass efforts to address the bio, nano, and AI risks.

It’s easy to understand why. Life extension therapies are a positive and happy thing, whereas existential risk is a negative and discouraging thing. . . Present-day immortalists and transhumanists simply don’t care enough about existential risk. Many of them are at the same stage with regards to ideological progression as most of humanity is against the specter of death: accepting, in denial, dismissive. There are few things less pleasant to contemplate than humanity destroying itself, but it must be done anyhow, because if we slip and fall, there’s no getting up. . .

So, if you're paying attention to the rapid development of radical new technologies (and if you're reading this blog, then surely you are paying attention), you'll know there is an increasingly good chance that the length of your lifespan might be indefinitely extended -- that is, if your life is not ended suddenly along with all other human lives by a species-destroying disaster, an existential risk.

Michael continues:

Once you realize that humanity has lived entirely without existential risks (except the tiny probability of asteroid impact) since Homo sapiens evolved over 100,000 years ago, and we’re about to be hit full-force by these new risks in the next 3-15 years, the interval between now and then is practically nothing. Ideally, we’d have 100 or 500 years of advance notice to prepare for these risks, not 3-15. But since 3-15 is all we have, we’d better use it.

If humanity continues to survive, the technologies for radical life extension are sure to be developed, taking into account economic considerations alone. The efforts of Aubrey de Grey and others may hurry it along, saving a few million lives in the process, and that’s great. But if we develop SENS only to destroy ourselves a few years later, it’s worse than useless.

Quite so. CRN's main focus is not on the long-range issues of human (or posthuman) expansion of intelligence throughout the solar system and, eventually, the Milky Way galaxy or beyond. We're interested in all that, to be sure, but we're most concerned with getting through the narrow and exceedingly dangerous gateway that leads to the far future.

The powerful new technologies, including molecular manufacturing, that apparently must be developed in order to open that gateway for humanity's enlarged future bring with them grave risks, some of them existential, capable of ending humankind forever.

Are we capable of wisely managing the immense promise and perils now confronting us? Or will the dangerous knowledge that could lead to long lives of astounding abundance instead result in our ultimate destruction?

Mike Treder

Tags: nanotechnology nanotech nano science technology ethics weblog blog

Comments

[Ted Stalets]

From Mike's blog above... the scary part...
"But since 3-15 is all we have, we’d better use it." and... "Are we capable of wisely managing the immense promise and perils now confronting us?"

Briefly, at www.VoteWorldGovernment.org - we have a plan to go from the current global political system - an ineffective United Nations and 190 nation states - with the United States being the "policeman" for the world - to a Democratic World Government.

With such a governing body in the world, we could then develop a Global Constitution by the people - not by national governments. This global governing body would allow the people of the world to come together to decide on how best to deal with existential risks facing humanity.

The political tool we are using is a global referendum - the first of its kind - asking the question of the adults on the planet - via the Internet - "Do you support the creation of a directly-elected, representative and democratic world government?"

As democracy is governence with the consent of the governed - the magnitude of the wishes of humanity in regards to the question above must be asked first.

There is also a brand new book (we are looking for a publisher) which accompanies the above initiative - written by James Stark - entitled "Democratic World Government through a Global Referendum". Jim was also the founder and president of "Operation Dismantle" - the Canadian initiative during the 1970s and 1980s which attempted to get the United Nations to take action against the proliferation of nuclear weapons.

If you would like to find out more - please visit our website - VoteWorldGovernment.org.

Our hope is to establish a Democratic World Government to stop wars between nations, as well as to address global issues such as global warming and the emerging horrors of new WMD (weapons of mass destruction) - via a concerted response of democratic global governance and global law. As you know, we currently don't have any sort of democratic governance on the global scale.

At Vote World Government, we have a workable, non-violent plan to help humanity pass that narrow span of the next 3 to 15 years without annihilating ourselves. It is quite an interesting roadmap, in my opinion.

We would very much appreciate support from the readers of Mike's blog here at CRN - for this very important initiative. I apologize in advance for the plug for our initiative in Mike's popular blog, but dangerous times require bold actions.

I think my lifelong intellectual mentor - R. Buckminster Fuller - said it best... "You never change things by fighting the existing reality... To change something... build a new model that makes the existing model obsolete."

Thanks you.

Ted Stalets
Vice President
Vote World Government

[Michael Deering]

Humanity is being carried along the current of change into the future. The speed of the current is increasing as the rate of change increases. The walls closing in on our path are the existential risks created by new technologies. We remember the past when the current was lazy and the banks far away, but we can see the course up ahead narrowing and feel the water under us rushing faster. Some think if we can just guide ourselves through the coming bottleneck the river will widen out again, but what if it doesn't? What if it just keeps getting narrower and narrower, and the current faster and faster? We can't see far enough ahead to know which fate awaits.

[Vinayagamoorthy]

>>"What if it just keeps getting
>>narrower and narrower, and
>>the current faster and faster?
>>We can't see far enough ahead
>>to know which fate awaits."

Agreed that it is possible for it to get narrower and narrower. But we first have to pass through this impending, very narrow, bottleneck to see if gets narrower or if it gets broader. Isn't it? :-)

[Tom Craver]

Democracy only works when people already consider themselves part of the same group, so that they are able to trust that the democracy will not vote to exploit them. That unity is missing in Iraq, so democracy there is doomed. Imagine trying it on a global scale, with hundreds of distrustful groups!

So I don't think we'll have a WG by the MNT timeframe. We *might* have a North American Union. The "illegal immigration" issue can be seen as part of a dialogue of figuring out how we're going to manage that merger.

[John B]

I agree with Tom Craver - I'd be very surprised were we to have a functional, effective world government in the near term (<40 year) future. The current cultural and political boundaries would require significant weakening and modification for that to be possible, IMO.

I take it back - I can conceive of one possible 'world government' scenario in less'n that time. I believe it could certainly be possible if we run into one or more existential risk a la Dr Bostrom's forecast.

Not that that'd be a particularly good thing, mind...

-John B

[Mike Treder, CRN]

I'd be very surprised were we to have a functional, effective world government in the near term (<40 year) future.

Wanna bet?

[John B]

1) I don't bet. *wry grin*

2) I know Dr Hanson & his research.

3) Per that research, you seem to be in trouble on your odds.

4) You're ignoring any number of alternates here. For instance, today there are at least two governmental structures that "can exercise ultimate authority over world affairs" - the US and USSR both still have their nukes and missiles, Mike. Don't get much more 'ultimate' than that (barring exceedingly effective anti-missile defenses, 'course).

-John B

"World government" - to be a "government", it has to have the means to make any who disagree with it's edicts, obey. To be a "world" government, it has to be able to impose it's will on at least a majority of the world, and be attempting to impose it's will on the remainder.

I don't think any existing nation has sufficient power to grab control of the world by force. Possibly early access to nanofactories could grant someone that power. Pending that, the only real chance for a WG is voluntary national unions that slowly grow larger and more powerful, as the population under them slowly accept expansion of their control. Key word *slowly*.