[ExI] RIP Singularitarianism

[Benjamin Goertzel]

> What did get you mentioned in my post was the recollection that you
> eventually got sucked into the "a computer is going to conquer the world"
> meme to the extent of citing it as a reason for declining to open source
> Novamente - correct me if I'm wrong, or if you've changed your mind on this
> one.

There are multiple reasons for that decision.

One is commercial...

Another is a feeling that open-sourcing it probably wouldn't help much
anyway.  It's deep and difficult stuff, and hard for anyone to
participate in part-time.  And if anyone has relevant qualifications
and skills and wants to participate in NM full-time without cash
compensation, they can contact me and we can probably work out an
arrangement for them to help the project and get compensated with
stock options.

And, yes, another is a worry that I'm afraid of the risk -- if
Novamente is developed into a human-level AGI -- that someone could
take the code and do something unethical with it.  Either something
unethical to humans, or something unethical to the AGI itself.

So, I can see you disagree with me on this final point.  That's OK.
But my point is that my opinion on this final point (the potential
dangers of releasing AGI code openly) are not particularly relevant to
the work going on at Novamente LLC.  My opinion on this matter is one
among several factors going into our decision not to open-source; but
it's quite irrelevant to the particulars of how we spend our time,
what our technical AGI approach is, etc.

-- Ben G