[ExI] The second step towards immortality

[Rafal Smigrodzki]

On Fri, Jan 3, 2014 at 6:35 PM, Anders Sandberg <anders at aleph.se> wrote:

Exactly. However, partial transparency might not work: a mind that has
> transparent part X and opaque part Y might have X sincerely willing to
> fulfil an obligation, but X+Y is not. There are ways around it, though. If
> you are OK with "spurs", temporary short branches that get deleted, then
> you and your negotiation partner might send spurs into an encrypted black
> box where they credibly bare their minds to each other, check that they
> both agree, and then send a cryptographically signed agreement bit out
> before being deleted. That way you can show somebody a secret you know, and
> he can offer you a fair price for it, without the secret being leaked if
> there is no trade.


### I have no problems making (or being) a discardable copy but I doubt
that this would allow verifiable commitment, at least not without a lot of
additional conditions being met. Your spur could be doctored, with your
real self having hidden compartments, invisible to introspection but
activated in some situations only. Imagine that most of the time you are
your sunny good-natured self, your copies get along splendidly with others
and cannot be tricked to show the dark side, since they have none. But, the
real yous, under the right conditions (e.g. chance of a big win, resource
grab, or conversely, risk of crippling resource loss) suddenly change -
they renege on contracts, grow horns and a tail, and raise hell.

I don't know what technology might be needed to preclude this type of
deception. The whole issue boils down to property relationships between
different aspects of minds (thoughts) and resources. A mind owns a resource
if no other mind (even a "subconscious" thought) can take the resource
against its will - so somebody reading the mind and understanding its will
can be assured the resource will only be used appropriately. If a different
version of the same mind (in the sense of altered desires, not just an
identical copy) can use the resource, then deception is possible and
potentially lucrative.

It's a difficult problem.

Rafal
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