[ExI] Perception of Uploading

[Ben Zaiboc]

On Friday, 6 March 2026 at 21:18, Keith Henson <hkeithhenson at gmail.com> wrote:

> On Fri, Mar 6, 2026 at 4:25 AM Ben Zaiboc via extropy-chat
> <extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote:
> >
> > On 06/03/2026 11:20, Keith Henson wrote:
> > > Twenty years ago, in the context of commenting on Eleizer's sl4 list,
> > > I wrote a short fiction about a medical AI that was psychologically
> > > shaped (much as AIs have been to date) to seek the good opinions of
> > > humans and others of its kind.  I.e., nice.
> > >
> > > I did not intend the story to go that way, but the logic of the
> > > developing story led to the biological extinction of the human race.
> > > (Though nobody died, they all experienced reversible uploading and
> > > decided they liked  that state more than the "real world.")
> > >
> > > It is just fiction, but the illustration is that even the most
> > > friendly AI, combined with human desires, can lead to unanticipated
> > > outcomes.
> >
> > I'm not sure that referring to it as the 'biological extinction' of the human race is that helpful, when the scenario is not the actual extinction of the human race, but the transformation of it into something altogether better.
> 
> Hmm.  Quoting from the story,  (Zaba is a young girl who was the first
> to be uploaded while being repaired, Suskulan is the AI that runs the
> clinic.)
> 
> "She [Zaba] remembered what Suskulan had said about staying awake and
> learning while being healed and how it would change her and the people
> of the tata.
> 
> "It certainly had!
> 
> "For better or for worse?
> 
> "For better in that nobody died of fevers, nasty parasites, or
> malnutrition since Suskulan had come into their lives. People didn't
> even die of old age with a clinic to regress age for them and they
> aged in the spirit world only to the extent they wanted.
> 
> "For worse in that she could not have children unless she left the
> clinic for their gestation. Zaba had read the design notes that led up
> to the creation of the clinics and their spirits and had long
> understood the mathematics behind Suskulan's limits. In the long run,
> births and deaths had to match. If you wanted no deaths, then there
> could be no births."


I always thought that logic was rather supect. Maybe if an upload took up as much, or more, material resources as a biological human, it might make sense.
It also implies no expansion off-planet, which strikes me as very unlikely, given uploading, as it seems to be the ideal enabler for mass colonisation of space.


> 
> https://terasemjournals.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/02/henson-chapters-1-2-3-with-bio-no-illustrations.pdf
> 
> The Clinic Seed part starts several pages in.
> ^^^^^^^^^^^
> 
> If it happens, it would certainly be a transformation.  "Altogether
> better"?  I don't know, for certain different and a complete break
> from the past, no children.  The story has generated only a small
> number of comments over the years; most of the comments have been "a
> triumph of humanity" sort.
> 
> Have you read it?  It's only 7000 words.


Two or three times, over the years.

As I said above, I don't buy the 'no children' idea, and I don't even think that uploading would lead to the depopulation of biological humans that you portray.

Unfortunately, my own writing skills are very poor, or I'd have written my own story, depicting a world where there are just as many, or even more, biological humans on earth (and elsewhere) as now, as well as a much bigger population of uploads.
Most people are born biological, live a few decades, or a few centuries, and at some point decide to upload. Basically business as usual, but with better medicine, and uploading replacing death (at least if you're lucky enough to live in a place where the local authorities allow it).

You now have an actual 'afterlife' that wouldn't be a matter of faith, and the departed would probably actually depart (being able to think much faster, and change into more advanced beings, so very soon probably wouldn't have much in common with the people they leave behind, and possibly there'd be a policy that uploads can't stay on earth, for verious reasons), but you'd have a realistic chance of one day seeing them again, after you upload in your turn.

The uploads would exist in the same realm as superintelligent AIs, both keeping a more-or-less 'hands-off' approach to the biologicals, regarding them as a kind of nursery, or starting point for the growth of higher intelligences (that way, it's possible to tell plausible stories about events after the singularity).


> > The prospect of all humans becoming extinct, and the prospect of all humans voluntarily moving to an uploaded state, are pretty much exact opposites, really, so calling uploading 'extinction' hardly seems a way to get people enthusiastic about it.
> 
> "Enthusiastic" was not an intent.  It is an intentionally ambiguous story.


Fair enough.


> 
> > I think this is a case where being literally correct goes against being generally understood. Adding a parenthetical "but nobody died ..." might just be more confusing than helpful, or lead many people to dismiss the whole thing as silly. I think you have to already be familiar with the concept of uploading for it to make sense.
> 
> People here and on the sl4 list are and were familiar with the
> concept.  My goodness, that was a long time ago.
> 
> Keith

---
Ben