<html><body><div style="color:#000; background-color:#fff; font-family:Courier New, courier, monaco, monospace, sans-serif;font-size:14pt"><div id="yiv4523072344"><div><div style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Courier New, courier, monaco, monospace, sans-serif; font-size: 14pt; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><div>On 21/06/2013 15:29, I wrote:</div><div><br id="yiv4523072344yui_3_7_2_28_1371935068758_80">"<i>Why aren't we a thousand miles deep in grasshoppers?</i></div><div id="yiv4523072344yui_3_7_2_28_1371935068758_86"><i id="yiv4523072344yui_3_7_2_28_1371935068758_82">A: disease, parasites, predators, cannibalism, resources to
</i><i id="yiv4523072344yui_3_7_2_28_1371935068758_53">survive/replicate."</i></div><div id="yiv4523072344yui_3_7_2_28_1371935068758_59"> </div><div id="yiv4523072344yui_3_7_2_28_1371935068758_64">On 22/06/2013 <i>11:45</i>, Anders Sandberg wrote:</div><div id="yiv4523072344yui_3_7_2_28_1371935068758_65"><var id="yiv4523072344yui-ie-cursor"></var> </div><div>"This applies if you have a system where evolution applies. The standard <br>interstellar replicator scenarios tend to use multiple local hops, <br>allowing many generations between the start and end point. Plenty of <br>chance for evolutionary drift or divergence, although artificial probes <br>can be equipped with error correction making any accidental diversity as <br>negligible as you want. Stuarts and mine scenario has two generations: <br>the end-state will not have had much chance to evolve (and, again, error <br>correction can prevent it).<br><br>The assumption that given time
parasites will evolve is based on the <br>image that the system
is free to evolve. But non-evolving replicators <br>getting there first can also prevent the appearance of evolving <br>replicators. If the first seeders didn't want to allow them, they could <br>do it. We might *like* the concept of evolving replicators a great deal <br>more than those boring non-evolving, but the latter can win against the <br>rest if they are programmed to be [thorough]."</div><div> </div><div>There seem to be a few assumptions implicit in your statements. You seem</div><div>to assume some kind of central planner control of probe launches into</div><div>the universe - which implies economic and technology control over individuals.</div><div>Otherwise anyone wealthy enough can do their own probe launches. If I</div><div>were interested in such probe launches and replicating systems I would</div><div>recognize that evolution can happen in both software and hardware such</div><div>that a single probe going out can
create entire ecosystems of predator-prey-</div><div>parasites and do its own launches at any point in time later. A single AI</div><div>which can replicate and spread in free space is enough to populate every</div><div>scenario including war-gaming against its own creations to evolve impossibly</div><div>efficient predators. Before the first centrally-planned probe reaches</div><div>another galaxy, independently evolved probes could have sent out a trillion</div><div>competing probes ahead of it.</div><div> </div><div>On 22/06/2013 <i>11:45</i>, Anders Sandberg wrote:</div><div> </div><div>"...the only way to be truly certain nobody else can invade is to turn <br>everything into your kind of replicator. Hence the "deadly probe <br>scenario" is not a likely answer to the Fermi question."</div><div> </div><div>It always takes less energy and resources to destroy than to create.</div><div>This is part of the reason why
offensive WoMD are so much more effective </div><div>than defenses against them. The greater the energy involved the more </div><div>effective offense becomes.</div><div> </div><div>The smallest technological footprint for AI to replicate is presently unknown.</div><div>There is the time footprint, the resources footprint, the signals generated</div><div>by replication footprint, the trails left in both traveling and replication,</div><div>and the thermodynamic footprints both in matter and radiation.</div><div> </div><div>Ideally replication would take place in high noise environments to minimize</div><div>detection. High noise environments are only available in limited regions</div><div>and what qualifies as high noise is technology dependent.</div><div> </div><div>There are many assumptions inherent in what replicating AI systems are</div><div>going to do. I assume they will use wide band
impulse communications which</div><div>appear as white noise [SETI detection won't work]. I assume they will leave</div><div>as little footprint as possible to keep from being tracked [military 101],</div><div>I assume they will stay on the move, disperse themselves, and act in</div><div>a stealthy manner to avoid WoMD. In space stealth also means small footprint</div><div>in every way possible.</div><div> </div><div>So the Fermi Paradox is not hard to understand. If a single civilization</div><div>allows AI - not controlled by central-planners - military strategy for AI that</div><div>can replicate will quickly lead to quiet well dispersed mobile AI with small</div><div>footprints we will never see. The predators among the AI replicators will</div><div>also hunt other predators. The Earth may be nothing more than a loud baby</div><div>animal drawing in predators while other predators watch and wait.
There</div><div>are too many possible scenarios to calculate.</div><div> </div><div>Dennis May<var id="yui-ie-cursor"></var></div></div></div></div></div></body></html>