<div dir="ltr"><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:comic sans ms,sans-serif;font-size:small;color:#000000"><span style="color:rgb(34,34,34);font-family:Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif">The subject of uploads was beaten to death in the earliest postings to</span><br style="color:rgb(34,34,34);font-family:Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif"><span style="color:rgb(34,34,34);font-family:Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif">this list. Keith</span><br></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:comic sans ms,sans-serif;font-size:small;color:#000000"><span style="color:rgb(34,34,34);font-family:Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif"><br></span></div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:comic sans ms,sans-serif;font-size:small;color:#000000"><span style="color:rgb(34,34,34);font-family:Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif">I was not in on that, so I have resurrected it, I suppose. It does tell me why more aren't joining the posting of Ben and me. I love STross except for the horror novels. bill w</span></div></div><br><div class="gmail_quote"><div dir="ltr" class="gmail_attr">On Sat, Mar 28, 2020 at 4:38 PM Keith Henson via extropy-chat <<a href="mailto:extropy-chat@lists.extropy.org">extropy-chat@lists.extropy.org</a>> wrote:<br></div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0px 0px 0px 0.8ex;border-left:1px solid rgb(204,204,204);padding-left:1ex">The subject of uploads was beaten to death in the earliest postings to<br>
this list.<br>
<br>
I should add that there was considerable concern about modifying basic<br>
personality traits. I think Minsky had something to say about this in<br>
Society of Mind.<br>
<br>
I have written a fair amount about this. Fiction is a problem because<br>
if the entire race uploads (possible), you don't have characters in<br>
your story.<br>
<br>
Keith<br>
<br>
PS. An unfinished story, this chapter follows The Clinic Seed and<br>
UpLift. As writing goes, this isn't very good. If you want good,<br>
read Stross's Accelerando, but it does show some of what went into<br>
thinking about uploads long ago on this list.<br>
<br>
If you care about continuity, you might want to read the two chapters<br>
around The Clinic Seed.<br>
<br>
Chapter 5<br>
<br>
June 2106<br>
<br>
<br>
Seven-thirty a.m. the next morning, well after the sun peeped over the<br>
Eastern hills, Jim Brody drove a little electric truck over from Seton<br>
Hill and (with the help of a few kids who had woken up early) loaded<br>
the dining car in the middle of the train with breakfast and lunch.<br>
Dumping the wastewater tanks and refilling the water supplies in the<br>
cars would have to wait.<br>
<br>
At 7:45 Ed Bledsoe lit off the diesel engines, cranking them from<br>
local power, and let them warm up. Even with metering automation, Ed<br>
knew the engines would smoke under load if they were not warmed up<br>
properly.<br>
<br>
By 8 am the last of the parents had straggled down to the station.<br>
<br>
Half a dozen boys and two girls (early risers who had not stayed up<br>
past midnight) came out when the engine<br>
<a href="http://www.railfan.net/railpix/scott/subphoto.cgi?st-perris/e8truk.jpg" rel="noreferrer" target="_blank">http://www.railfan.net/railpix/scott/subphoto.cgi?st-perris/e8truk.jpg</a><br>
was started. Jim Brody, ticking off the parents as they came aboard<br>
and consulting an unseen list of kids so they would all get at least<br>
one ride in the cab, picked out a boy and a girl and sent them up the<br>
ladder, letting the parents know where their kids were. He also<br>
pulled the connector to local power and put the conductive nanotube<br>
power cable back in its compartment.<br>
<br>
"All aboard!"<br>
<br>
Jim gave the proper historical hand signals to the engineer, backed up<br>
by the engineer being aware of his signal by mind-to-mind local area<br>
contact. As Jim closed the doors Ed advanced the throttle to one half<br>
and then to 3/4. This woke up even the sleepiest of the kids. With<br>
or without the help of adults they converted the bunks back into<br>
seats.<br>
<br>
They either trooped off to the dining car in the middle of the train<br>
or ate from the trolley pushed by two of the older girls who had<br>
talked Jim into letting them do it. The main choice (made up by the<br>
University dining hall kitchen the night before) was scrambled egg,<br>
cheese, ham and bell pepper mix rolled up in a steamed flour tortilla<br>
and a choice of fruits. The adults and some of the older kids drank<br>
coffee and the younger kids had milk or chocolate milk in glass<br>
bottles.<br>
<br>
Being from Trenton, all of the older kids had been in both New York to<br>
the northeast and Philadelphia to the southwest on school outings.<br>
Like those two cities, Pittsburgh had been mothballed 50 years ago in<br>
the population crash.<br>
<br>
Like all the major cities, the suburbs of Pittsburgh had become<br>
manicured parkland. With rare exceptions, the houses had been<br>
encapsulated with diamond and sunk underground often with their<br>
occupants. The streets were visible in some places and had been<br>
removed in others. There were a lot of deer. They didn't see any<br>
wolves.<br>
<br>
As they neared the more built-up center section of the town, the<br>
bigger buildings had the sheen of diamond sheeting when the light hit<br>
them right. Ed slowed the train to 40 mph so the kids could get a<br>
good look<br>
<br>
An hour and a half after they left Greensburg the train pulled into<br>
the huge covered platforms in the Pennsylvanian Union Train Station.<br>
The platform roof had been partly removed at one time to accommodate a<br>
freeway. The train buffs had won out over the auto buffs, the<br>
concrete roadway beams had been replaced by thinner diamond beams and<br>
the train platform roof replaced.<br>
<a href="http://www.bluffton.edu/~sullivanm/burnham/burnham5.html" rel="noreferrer" target="_blank">http://www.bluffton.edu/~sullivanm/burnham/burnham5.html</a><br>
<br>
The kids and adults spilled out of the train and walked through the<br>
hotel lobby--which had also been the original ticket lobby--to the<br>
rotunda that had originally sheltered horse carriages. Ed and Jim<br>
Brody went with the kids and parents.<br>
<br>
Mike DeLong (fireman, brakeman and alternate engineer) was left in<br>
charge of the train. He dragged a hose over to the idling E8 and<br>
filled up the oil tank, dumped the wastewater tanks on the passenger<br>
cars and refilled their water tanks. The diesel oil today was from<br>
soybeans. Filling the tanks by hand was a concession to primitive<br>
technology that he didn't mind.<br>
<br>
The train station had been built around 1900 and renovated 80 years<br>
later with the associated hotel being turned into condominiums. The<br>
condominiums were still “occupied” in the sense that the bodies of the<br>
owners were still in the building or more correctly under it. In the<br>
rare event one of them came out for a stroll in the physical world,<br>
their body was lifted to their condo before their consciousness was<br>
shifted into their warmed up brain.<br>
<br>
The rest of the time, bodies were kept underground. “Occupied”<br>
buildings were reinforced with grown-in-place carbon nanotubes but the<br>
clinic AIs would be unhappy if their patients were not kept as safe as<br>
possible and that meant underground.<br>
<br>
When Ed and Jim reached the Rotunda, most of the kids were clustered<br>
in the center looking up at the skylight with smaller numbers of them<br>
looking out the archways. The skylight was entrancing with the<br>
morning sunlight hitting the ridged diamond panes that had replaced<br>
the original glass and scattering rainbows all over the floor.<br>
<br>
With some difficulty the children were rounded up and herded down the<br>
deserted streets, first south, passing in front of the Mellon Arena,<br>
fully ten times larger than the train station rotunda, then east on<br>
Forbes Ave toward the campuses of the University of Pittsburgh and<br>
Carnegie Mellon University. The three-mile walk through the deserted<br>
city streets took about 40 minutes with the adults carrying the<br>
smallest when they got tired. (They could have had carriages with<br>
real horses if they had wanted them.)<br>
<br>
Like most urban schools, the University of Pittsburgh and Carnegie<br>
Mellon University had been shut down in the population crash. When<br>
cities went under about 10 percent of their original population, they<br>
became just too depressing for humans to live in.<br>
<br>
But like infrastructure everywhere, the city and Universities were<br>
well maintained, roads and sidewalks clean, grass mowed, trees<br>
trimmed, the buildings clean and without a broken window or a sagging<br>
roof anywhere. Electric power and water were on, gas as well though<br>
it was not used for heating, having been displaced by electric heat<br>
and super insulation. Unless buildings were in use by physical state<br>
humans, they were kept cold inside (but not freezing) winter and<br>
summer alike to slow down the degradation of photographs, paper and<br>
other physical artifacts from the pre-crash era.<br>
<br>
As they were crossing the bridge on Forbes Avenue over the train<br>
tracks between Carnegie Mellon University and the University of<br>
Pittsburgh, Kenny caught up the engineer.<br>
<br>
“Mr. Bledsoe?” Kenny asked as they walked along.<br>
<br>
“Eh?”<br>
<br>
“Did they get the idea for the Krell planet from Pittsburgh?”<br>
<br>
“Krell planet?”<br>
<br>
“In the movie we saw last night. The planet was deserted except for<br>
the machines.”<br>
<br>
“Oh, you saw Forbidden Planet last night. No, Forbidden Planet was<br>
made a 100 years before Pittsburgh was mothballed.”<br>
<br>
“Why do we call cities ‘mothballed’? Does it have anything to do with moths”<br>
<br>
“Actually it does,” Ed replied, as usual, happy to be educating<br>
children by the oldest method.<br>
<br>
“The larvae of some kinds of moths eat clothing and blankets made of<br>
wool. More than 200 years ago, early chemistry workers discovered<br>
that a sharp smelling solid chemical from coal called naphthalene<br>
would keep the moths out of clothes. “<br>
<br>
They paused at a Walk/Don’t Walk light that had been turned on for the<br>
party’s amusement by one of the city’s AIs. Ed went on:<br>
<br>
“It was sold in little balls (Ed held his thumb and finger apart about<br>
half an inch) called ‘mothballs.’ People would store winter clothing<br>
and blankets over the summer with a handful of them.<br>
<br>
“Eventually ‘mothballed’ came to mean anything that was protected and<br>
stored for possible future use.”<br>
<br>
Kenny looked thoughtful.<br>
<br>
“How come adults know everything?” He asked.<br>
<br>
Ed laughed. “We cheat.“<br>
<br>
Thirty years before the AI (or AIs) who were tasked with remembering<br>
and making presentations to CMU visitors would run up a palace of<br>
utility fog on the mall and present a 3D docudrama on the historical<br>
events around the emergence of AIs at CMU.<br>
<br>
Now, in deference to the attempt to raise children in a retro<br>
environment with features of the 1950s, the adults were directed by<br>
messages to their neural interfaces to the McConomy Auditorium, a<br>
110-year-old theater in Carnegie Mellon’s central buildings. The<br>
20-minute presentation to the adults and older kids (the younger ones<br>
could watch or play on the lawn) was in black and white newsreels<br>
format, much of it converted from videos of press conferences.<br>
<br>
“Even with a nearly complete historical record from those times, it’s<br>
hard to pin down when the first AIs became full personalities.” The<br>
narrator spoke in a voice-over showing primitive robots and computers.<br>
<br>
“The problem isn’t unique to AI history, there is a similar problem<br>
about the first railroad." (Montage of drawings and photographs of<br>
early trains.) "About the best we can say is that what we now think<br>
of as AIs didn’t exist before 2032 and definitely did by 2036. In<br>
that year there were more than a hundred scientific papers co-authored<br>
by AIs. Carnegie Mellon was at the forefront of this effort."<br>
(Shots of University labs and bits of recorded slow interactions with<br>
early AIs.) "The key insight was to equip AIs with carefully selected<br>
human motivations."<br>
<br>
“The two biggest problems of the early 21 century were energy and<br>
medical treatment. CMU researchers contributed to both.<br>
<br>
“Solar power from orbit solved, in fact, oversolved, the first by<br>
2035.” (Shots of space elevators and power satellites in orbit,<br>
photos of rectenna farms.)<br>
<br>
“Integrating AIs into nanomedicine clinics solved the medical<br>
treatment problem. It took only a few years. After that AIs and<br>
clinics could be “grown” at low cost and they did their own upgrades,<br>
a lot of it in the field in Africa. They were too late for the<br>
smallpox epidemics that swept out of the Mid East.<br>
<br>
“A side effect of the clinics and widespread use of virtual reality<br>
caused a physical world population crash in the mid-2050s and the<br>
mothballing of the cities.” (Simulated video of dense freeway traffic<br>
dwindling to an occasional car and then none.)<br>
<br>
The rest of the presentation was subtle propaganda mainly to the<br>
children and directed to the goal of them doing their part in<br>
enlarging the population.<br>
<br>
*****<br>
<br>
After filling up the tanks, Mike backed the empty train out of the<br>
station. He operated the first switch he came to remotely and ran the<br>
train under the mainline, down the Neville street tracks, under Forbes<br>
Ave. and parked the train just north of Panther Hollow Lake. Stairs<br>
and a rudimentary platform had been installed along the depressed rail<br>
line.<br>
<br>
Mike set the brakes and shut down the engines. Only the chirping of<br>
birds broke the quiet that settled over the train. Mike sent a<br>
message to Ed that the train was ready for its passengers when they<br>
were. Then using a small bucket of utility fog as a mattress he<br>
settled down under a shade tree and took a nap to make up for staying<br>
up most of the night with friends in Greensburg.<br>
<br>
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