Wright either didn’t know or chose to ignore the thinking that led to Asimov’s Three Laws. While the laws themselves (that robots must keep humans from coming to harm, obey human orders, and preserve themselves, in that order of priority) are impossible to codify, the underlying insight that we make knives with hilts is sound. Science fiction has a dystopian/idiot inventor streak because that makes it easier to get the plot going.
From another angle, part of sf is amplifying aspects of the real world. We can wreck our lives in a moment of passion or bad judgement, or by following a bad idea repeatedly.
Having to figure out the neuroscience by yourself is not an especially good protection against mistakes. Knowing how to make a change is different from and easier than knowing how to debug a change.
I don’t think prohibiting textbooks is necessary or sufficient to give people the pleasure of making major discoveries. Some people are content to solve puzzles, but others don’t just want being right, they want to be right about something new. My feeling is that the world is always going to be more complex than what we know about it. I’m hoping that improved tools, including improved cognition, will mean that we’ll never run out of new things, including new general principles, to discover.
I agree with Psy-Kosh that advice should and would be available, and also something like therapy if you suspect that you’ve deeply miscalibrated yourself. However, there is going to more than one system of advice and of therapy because there isn’t going to be agreement on what constitutes an improvement.
Excuse me if it’s been covered here, but in an environment like that deciding, not just what you want, but what changes turn you into not-you is a hard problem.
Wright either didn’t know or chose to ignore the thinking that led to Asimov’s Three Laws. While the laws themselves (that robots must keep humans from coming to harm, obey human orders, and preserve themselves, in that order of priority) are impossible to codify, the underlying insight that we make knives with hilts is sound. Science fiction has a dystopian/idiot inventor streak because that makes it easier to get the plot going.
From another angle, part of sf is amplifying aspects of the real world. We can wreck our lives in a moment of passion or bad judgement, or by following a bad idea repeatedly.
Having to figure out the neuroscience by yourself is not an especially good protection against mistakes. Knowing how to make a change is different from and easier than knowing how to debug a change.
I don’t think prohibiting textbooks is necessary or sufficient to give people the pleasure of making major discoveries. Some people are content to solve puzzles, but others don’t just want being right, they want to be right about something new. My feeling is that the world is always going to be more complex than what we know about it. I’m hoping that improved tools, including improved cognition, will mean that we’ll never run out of new things, including new general principles, to discover.
I agree with Psy-Kosh that advice should and would be available, and also something like therapy if you suspect that you’ve deeply miscalibrated yourself. However, there is going to more than one system of advice and of therapy because there isn’t going to be agreement on what constitutes an improvement.
Excuse me if it’s been covered here, but in an environment like that deciding, not just what you want, but what changes turn you into not-you is a hard problem.