Enter...cryonics and friendly AI. Oh, look! Using only physical, reductionist-friendly mechanisms, we can show that a benevolent, powerful entity whose mind is not centered on any particular point in space and whose existence cannot presently be confirmed (let’s call it ‘Omega’ instead of God) might someday be watching over us.
I see analogies with three religious tropes here: the omnipresence of god, religions claim to be non-disprovable and the tendency of religions to give their gods cool-sounding names. The last one is simply confused (‘Omega’ is the designation of a perfect and trustworthy predictor postulated in philosophical thought-experiments which are quite different from speculations about the possibility of building an artificial intelligence). The middle one vaguely misleading—the presence of a powerful and benevolent entity of the AI persuasion in the vicinity of Earth can presently be thoroughly disconfirmed and I’ve never seen anyone claiming otherwise or hedging about it. The first one has some loose connection to the ways things have been discussed around here but I still wouldn’t call it a good characterization of beliefs common on this site.
Seriously, why is it that people have to get all strawman-y and hyperbolic whenever they talk about the obvious similarities between transhumanist ideas and religious thought?
I see analogies with three religious tropes here: the omnipresence of god, religions claim to be non-disprovable and the tendency of religions to give their gods cool-sounding names. The last one is simply confused (‘Omega’ is the designation of a perfect and trustworthy predictor postulated in philosophical thought-experiments which are quite different from speculations about the possibility of building an artificial intelligence). The middle one vaguely misleading—the presence of a powerful and benevolent entity of the AI persuasion in the vicinity of Earth can presently be thoroughly disconfirmed and I’ve never seen anyone claiming otherwise or hedging about it. The first one has some loose connection to the ways things have been discussed around here but I still wouldn’t call it a good characterization of beliefs common on this site.
Seriously, why is it that people have to get all strawman-y and hyperbolic whenever they talk about the obvious similarities between transhumanist ideas and religious thought?