Economics can be put to use in figuring out these big-issue questions.
It’s no secret, write Banerjee and Duflo (co-authors: Poor Economics: A Radical Rethinking of the Way To Fight Global Poverty, 2011), that “we seem to have fallen on hard times.” Immigration, trade, inequality, and taxation problems present themselves daily, and they seem to be intractable. “Quality of life means more than just consumption”: Two MIT economists urge that a smarter, more politically aware economics be brought to bear on social issues. Readers may balk now and then-Tegmark’s solutions to inevitable mass unemployment are a stretch-but most will find the narrative irresistible.
Prophesies have a dreadful record, but they are also endlessly fascinating. Many read like science fiction others, such as a fine chapter on the nature of consciousness, are simply good popular science. Throughout, the author lays out his ideas in precisely detailed scenarios. Later in the book, he delivers a vision of the far future: a universe filled with the products of superintelligence, with organic Homo sapiens a distant memory. In the early chapters, Tegmark portrays near futures that range from Utopian to Orwellian. Autonomous battlefield drones will save soldiers’ lives, but keeping them away from rogue nations, terrorists, and criminals will prove impossible. Thus, autonomous, self-driving cars will save lives. Since computers are improving faster than brains, superhuman AGI will happen, and a beneficial outcome is not guaranteed. This sounds trivial until he points out that both brains and computers are able to do this. He dismisses tabloid scenarios of rampaging robots but warns, “we might create societies that flourish like never before…or a Kafkasque global surveillance state so powerful that it could never be toppled.” The author defines intelligence as the ability to accomplish complex goals. In this expert but often wildly speculative rumination, Tegmark (Physics/MIT Our Mathematical Universe: My Quest for the Ultimate Nature of Reality, 2014, etc.) joins the fierce debate on what will happen when AGI reaches human level and beyond. They don’t yet think, but the contingent of researchers who believe that they will never be smarter than humans is steadily shrinking. Nowadays, computers read, learn, recognize faces, translate languages, and consult other computers. The founder of the Future of Life Institute explores one of the most intriguing scientific frontiers, artificial general intelligence, and how humans can grow along with it.
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