205 - Nick Bostrom: Superintelligence, Posthumanity, and AI Utopia

Patreon: https://bit.ly/3v8OhY7 Nick Bostrom is a Swedish philosopher who was most recently Professor at Oxford University, where he served as the founding Director of the Future of Humanity Institute. He is best known for his book Superintelligence (Oxford, 2014), which covers the dangers of artificial intelligence. In this episode, Robinson and Nick discuss his more recent book, Deep Utopia: Life and Meaning in a Solved World (Ideapress, 2024). More particularly, they discuss the alignment problem with artificial intelligence, the problem of utopia, how artificial intelligence—if it doesn’t make our world horrible—could make it wonderful, the future of technology, and how humans might adjust to a life without work. Nick’s Website: https://nickbostrom.com Deep Utopia: https://a.co/d/b8eHuhQ OUTLINE 00:00 Introduction 02:50 From AI Dystopia to AI Utopia  9:15 On Superintelligence and the Alignment Problem 17:48 The Problem of Utopia 21:14 What Are the Different Types of Utopia? 28:04 AI and the Purpose of Mathematics 38:59 What Technologies Can We Expect in an AI Utopia? 43:59 Philosophical Problems with Immortality 55:14 Are There Advanced Alien Civilizations Out There? 59:54 Why Don’t We Live in Utopia? Robinson’s Website: http://robinsonerhardt.com Robinson Erhardt researches symbolic logic and the foundations of mathematics at Stanford University. Join him in conversations with philosophers, scientists, weightlifters, artists, and everyone in-between.