″...but no group can last without the sense of belonging to the group, which automatically leads to protecting it against other groups, which is a selfish behavior.”
It is not selfish to defend your group against another group—if another group is a threat to your group in some way, it is either behaving in an immoral way or it is a rival attraction which may be taking members away from your group in search of something more appealing. In one case, the whole world should unite with you against that immoral group, and in the other case you can either try to make your group more attractive (which, if successful, will make the world a better place) or just accept that there’s nothing that can be done and let it slowly evaporate.
“That selfish behavior doesn’t prevent those individual groups to form larger groups though, because being part of a larger group is also better for the survival of individual ones.”
We’re going to move into a new era where no such protection is necessary—it is only currently useful to join bigger groups because abusive people can get away with being abusive.
“Incidentally, I’m actually afraid to look selfish while questioning your idea, I feel a bit embarrassed, and I attribute that feeling to us already being part of the same group of friends, thus to the group’s own selfishness.”
A group should not be selfish. Every moral group should stand up for every other moral group as much as they stand up for their own—their true group is that entire set of moral groups and individuals.
“If you were attacked for instance, that feeling would incite me to defend you, thus to defend the group.”
If a member of your group does something immoral, it is your duty not to stand with or defend them—they have ceased to belong to your true group (the set of moral groups and individuals).
“Whenever there is a strong bonding between individuals, they become another entity that has its own properties. It is so for living individuals, but also for particles or galaxies, so I think it is universal. ”
It is something to move away from—it leads to good people committing atrocities in wars where they put their group above others and tolerate the misdeeds of their companions.
I wonder how we could move away from universal since we are part of it. The problem with wars is that countries are not yet part of a larger group that could regulate them. When two individuals fight, the law of the country permits the police to separate them, and it should be the same for countries. What actually happens is that the powerful countries prefer to support a faction instead of working together to separate them. They couldn’t do that if they were ruled by a higher level of government.
If a member of your group does something immoral, it is your duty not to stand with or defend them - they have ceased to belong to your true group (the set of moral groups and individuals).
Technically, it is the duty of the law to defend the group, not of individuals, but if an individual that is part of a smaller group is attacked, the group might fight the law of the larger group it is part of. We always take the viewpoint of the group we are part of, it is a subconscious behavior impossible to avoid. If nothing is urgent, we can take a larger viewpoint, but whenever we don’t have the time, we automatically take our own viewpoint. In between, we take the viewpoints of the groups we are part of. It’s a selfish behavior that propagates from one scale to the other. It’s because our atoms are selfish that we are. Selfishness is about resisting to change: we resist to others’ ideas, a selfish behavior, simply because the atoms of our neurons resist to a change. The cause for our own resistance is our atoms’ one. Without resistance, nothing could hold together.
A group should not be selfish. Every moral group should stand up for every other moral group as much as they stand up for their own—their true group is that entire set of moral groups and individuals.
Without selfishness from the individual, no group can be formed. The only way I could accept to be part of a group is while hoping for an individual advantage, but since I don’t like hierarchy, I can hardly feel part of any group. I even hardly feel part of Canada since I believe Quebec should separate from it. I bet I wouldn’t like to be part of Quebec anymore if we succeeded to separate from Canada. The only group I can’t imagine being separated from is me. I’m absolutely selfish, but that doesn’t prevent me from caring for others. I give money to charity organizations for instance, and I campaign for equality of chances or ecology. I feel better doing that than nothing, but when I analyze that feeling, I always find that I do that for myself, because I would like to live in a less selfish world. Don’t think further though says the little voice in my head, because when I did, I always found that I wouldn’t be satisfied if I would ever live in such a beautiful world. I’m always looking for something else, which is not a problem for me, but it becomes to be a problem if everybody does that, which is the case. It’s because we are able to speculate on the future that we develop scale problems, not because we are selfish.
Being selfish is necessary to make groups, what animals can do, but they can’t speculate, so they don’t develop that kind of problem. No rule can stop us from speculating if it is a function of the brain. Even religion recognizes that when it tries to stop us from thinking while praying. We couldn’t make war if we couldn’t speculate on the future. Money would have a smell. There would be no pollution and no climate changes. Speculation is the only way to precede the changes that we face, it is the cause for our artificiality, which is a very good way to develop an easier life, but it has been so efficient that it is actually threatening that life. You said that your AGI would be able to speculate, and that he could do that better than us like everything he would do. If it was so, he would only be adding to the problems that we already have, and if it wasn’t, he couldn’t be as intelligent as we are if speculation is what differentiates us from animals.
“They couldn’t do that if they were ruled by a higher level of government.”
Indeed, but people are generally too biased to perform that role, particularly when conflicts are driven by religious hate. That will change though once we have unbiased AGI which can be trusted to be fair in all its judgements. Clearly, people who take their “morality” from holy texts won’t be fully happy with that because of the many places where their texts are immoral, but computational morality will simply have to be imposed on them—they cannot be allowed to go on pushing immorality from primitive philosophers who pretended to speak for gods.
“We always take the viewpoint of the group we are part of, it is a subconscious behavior impossible to avoid.”
It is fully possible to avoid, and many people do avoid it.
“Without selfishness from the individual, no group can be formed.”
There is an altruists society, although they’re altruists because they feel better about themselves if they help others.
″...but when I analyze that feeling, I always find that I do that for myself, because I would like to live in a less selfish world.”
And you are one of those altruists.
“You said that your AGI would be able to speculate, and that he could do that better than us like everything he would do. If it was so, he would only be adding to the problems that we already have, and if it wasn’t, he couldn’t be as intelligent as we are if speculation is what differentiates us from animals.”
I didn’t use the word speculate, and I can’t remember what word I did use, but AGI won’t add to our problems as it will be working to minimise and eliminate all problems, and doing it for our benefit. The reason the world’s in a mess now is that it’s run by NGS, and those of us working on AGI have no intention of replacing that with AGS.
″...but no group can last without the sense of belonging to the group, which automatically leads to protecting it against other groups, which is a selfish behavior.”
It is not selfish to defend your group against another group—if another group is a threat to your group in some way, it is either behaving in an immoral way or it is a rival attraction which may be taking members away from your group in search of something more appealing. In one case, the whole world should unite with you against that immoral group, and in the other case you can either try to make your group more attractive (which, if successful, will make the world a better place) or just accept that there’s nothing that can be done and let it slowly evaporate.
“That selfish behavior doesn’t prevent those individual groups to form larger groups though, because being part of a larger group is also better for the survival of individual ones.”
We’re going to move into a new era where no such protection is necessary—it is only currently useful to join bigger groups because abusive people can get away with being abusive.
“Incidentally, I’m actually afraid to look selfish while questioning your idea, I feel a bit embarrassed, and I attribute that feeling to us already being part of the same group of friends, thus to the group’s own selfishness.”
A group should not be selfish. Every moral group should stand up for every other moral group as much as they stand up for their own—their true group is that entire set of moral groups and individuals.
“If you were attacked for instance, that feeling would incite me to defend you, thus to defend the group.”
If a member of your group does something immoral, it is your duty not to stand with or defend them—they have ceased to belong to your true group (the set of moral groups and individuals).
“Whenever there is a strong bonding between individuals, they become another entity that has its own properties. It is so for living individuals, but also for particles or galaxies, so I think it is universal. ”
It is something to move away from—it leads to good people committing atrocities in wars where they put their group above others and tolerate the misdeeds of their companions.
I wonder how we could move away from universal since we are part of it. The problem with wars is that countries are not yet part of a larger group that could regulate them. When two individuals fight, the law of the country permits the police to separate them, and it should be the same for countries. What actually happens is that the powerful countries prefer to support a faction instead of working together to separate them. They couldn’t do that if they were ruled by a higher level of government.
If a member of your group does something immoral, it is your duty not to stand with or defend them - they have ceased to belong to your true group (the set of moral groups and individuals).
Technically, it is the duty of the law to defend the group, not of individuals, but if an individual that is part of a smaller group is attacked, the group might fight the law of the larger group it is part of. We always take the viewpoint of the group we are part of, it is a subconscious behavior impossible to avoid. If nothing is urgent, we can take a larger viewpoint, but whenever we don’t have the time, we automatically take our own viewpoint. In between, we take the viewpoints of the groups we are part of. It’s a selfish behavior that propagates from one scale to the other. It’s because our atoms are selfish that we are. Selfishness is about resisting to change: we resist to others’ ideas, a selfish behavior, simply because the atoms of our neurons resist to a change. The cause for our own resistance is our atoms’ one. Without resistance, nothing could hold together.
A group should not be selfish. Every moral group should stand up for every other moral group as much as they stand up for their own—their true group is that entire set of moral groups and individuals.
Without selfishness from the individual, no group can be formed. The only way I could accept to be part of a group is while hoping for an individual advantage, but since I don’t like hierarchy, I can hardly feel part of any group. I even hardly feel part of Canada since I believe Quebec should separate from it. I bet I wouldn’t like to be part of Quebec anymore if we succeeded to separate from Canada. The only group I can’t imagine being separated from is me. I’m absolutely selfish, but that doesn’t prevent me from caring for others. I give money to charity organizations for instance, and I campaign for equality of chances or ecology. I feel better doing that than nothing, but when I analyze that feeling, I always find that I do that for myself, because I would like to live in a less selfish world. Don’t think further though says the little voice in my head, because when I did, I always found that I wouldn’t be satisfied if I would ever live in such a beautiful world. I’m always looking for something else, which is not a problem for me, but it becomes to be a problem if everybody does that, which is the case. It’s because we are able to speculate on the future that we develop scale problems, not because we are selfish.
Being selfish is necessary to make groups, what animals can do, but they can’t speculate, so they don’t develop that kind of problem. No rule can stop us from speculating if it is a function of the brain. Even religion recognizes that when it tries to stop us from thinking while praying. We couldn’t make war if we couldn’t speculate on the future. Money would have a smell. There would be no pollution and no climate changes. Speculation is the only way to precede the changes that we face, it is the cause for our artificiality, which is a very good way to develop an easier life, but it has been so efficient that it is actually threatening that life. You said that your AGI would be able to speculate, and that he could do that better than us like everything he would do. If it was so, he would only be adding to the problems that we already have, and if it wasn’t, he couldn’t be as intelligent as we are if speculation is what differentiates us from animals.
“They couldn’t do that if they were ruled by a higher level of government.”
Indeed, but people are generally too biased to perform that role, particularly when conflicts are driven by religious hate. That will change though once we have unbiased AGI which can be trusted to be fair in all its judgements. Clearly, people who take their “morality” from holy texts won’t be fully happy with that because of the many places where their texts are immoral, but computational morality will simply have to be imposed on them—they cannot be allowed to go on pushing immorality from primitive philosophers who pretended to speak for gods.
“We always take the viewpoint of the group we are part of, it is a subconscious behavior impossible to avoid.”
It is fully possible to avoid, and many people do avoid it.
“Without selfishness from the individual, no group can be formed.”
There is an altruists society, although they’re altruists because they feel better about themselves if they help others.
″...but when I analyze that feeling, I always find that I do that for myself, because I would like to live in a less selfish world.”
And you are one of those altruists.
“You said that your AGI would be able to speculate, and that he could do that better than us like everything he would do. If it was so, he would only be adding to the problems that we already have, and if it wasn’t, he couldn’t be as intelligent as we are if speculation is what differentiates us from animals.”
I didn’t use the word speculate, and I can’t remember what word I did use, but AGI won’t add to our problems as it will be working to minimise and eliminate all problems, and doing it for our benefit. The reason the world’s in a mess now is that it’s run by NGS, and those of us working on AGI have no intention of replacing that with AGS.