[Link] Eliezer, PZ, Brin, and me on Immortality

I'm only 10 minutes in, but thoroughly unimpressed so far. Typing in real time as I'm watching, so an unfiltered commentary and an incomplete summary rolled into one. I will probably miss some arguments, and do a bad job with others, but I only have time to watch it once. The "you" refers to Eneasz.

Your introduction, dragging in the cochlear implants, was much too uncharitable and religion-focused, your "I really don't understand how anyone would not fight death" not sincere -- I'm sure you know all the rationalisations, that some people just want to get on with their lives not being dominated by the thought of dying, which they personally feel powerless against. You're the host, your introduction primed the debate on religion, which is among the least interesting aspects (to me), and made Brin talk about monasteries later on. Thanks ...

PZ Myers is going on and on about cancer and stem cells on the one hand, and entropy on the other.

EY thankfully clears up the definitions (it makes no sense to talk about actual "immortality", as opposed to extended longevity), and points out the stem cell talk missed the point. So far exactly what I'd hoped he would say, getting the debate out of the "cancer and stem cells" mud. His profession of "I only want immortality for myself because I want it for everyone, and I happen to be among those" is hard to take seriously, I hope he values his own preferences slightly above some random stranger's. Stalled because his script disappeared ;-)

Brin "I deny being an atheist, because I'm too contrary." (???) He also used the word troglodyte. Randomly defends the Bible (see what you did?), saying that the hate-filled part is mostly the Book of Revelations. Goes from caloric restriction, and a supposed century-lifespan limitation to uploading. Right, because stem-cells, gene therapy et al don't offer some, um, in-between solution?

(20 minutes in)

Says the danger may be "immortal lords", plutocracies of bad governance by the few who can afford immortality, proposes such an "attractor-trap" as a solution to the Fermi paradox. "Probably sucks in most aliens." That's that, then. Immortality as a big and vexing problem, stabilizing autocracies since the rulers cling to their thrones by not dying.

You allow for some selfishness in your motives for wanting immortality -- yay!

Brin about the dangers of the Hutterites outbreeding the enlightened world. First 5 generations on a colony world should rut like rabbits (advice from his wife).

EY found his notes and is back in the discussion (yay!). "In the debate to what extent atheism should accomodate theology (...) I naturally am the guy who's more extreme than Richard Dawkins". Step aside, Dick (Richard)! Good comparison of death and smallpox: we learned to understand there's no silver lining to smallpox, and to fight it. Time to do the same with death. Evolution isn't out to be moral, we don't die because the universe thinks that's, like, meaningful. We're free to disagree with dying and and to fight it. Even if it did kill Stalin (good guy death). Good counterpoint to the "immortal dictator" argument: countries don't need to naturally die and could potentially go on "forever", yet we don't propose to redraw countries on purpose every couple decades because of fearing hegemony. Tries to delineate feasability from desirability.

(30 minutes in)

PZ Myers acknowledges that some egoism is ok, such as him seeking more health care as he grows older. Brin coughs. PZ ignores it. Alludes to the problem of the commons. Comes back to "we should appreciate how biology actually works". Lack of imagination, Sir! Those dying cells can be optimized. PZ predicts that the first society with longer living members would be quickly destroyed, since it would be too static to compete with the more dynamic systems of the blessedly fast dying.

You point out that by less people dying, you need to train less replacements. $$$$ saved!

Brin goes full personalisation fallacy: "a burden of proof lies on those who would deny that biology knew what it was doing". (EY probably wants to tell him evolution is a blind idiot god.) Says that "replacing the bad of nature" is dangerous, the system must not be perturbed. Each new generation must be tabula rasas (tabulas rasa) (sic (sic)), programming themselves. Whatever that means. Boomers should die (they are the best argument that generations need to 'go away') because "they are sanctimonious junkies full of self-righteous indignation". Wants to stress intelligence augmentation instead. Goes back to the religion of St. Paul of Tarsus. Disagrees with "there are no possible interpretations" which see the silver-lining approach to death as something positive, which noone ever claimed in this podcast.

(40 minutes in)

PZ says new individuals may be important to generate new novelty. Says there should be a sweetspot of novelty, stability, and life span. Doesn't want to maximize life span over the other parameters at any costs. (As if anyone ever did that, other than a relative majority of terminal patients in our current society.)

EY points out the focus has been overly placed on societal downsides. That those aren't insurmountable, intrinsic problems, and thus not good reasons to ultimately object to really long lifespans. Takes on that some people confuse "longer life" with "longer life as an aging and ill old person", which is why the term "health span extension" (over life span extension) may be more clarifying. Talks about upgrading the brain. Should upgrade his mic first. Points out that it's absurd to assume you'll still have your exact same old biological cells at ten thousand years. Says a higher degree of neuroplasticity could also be maintained. Doesn't see an exponential increase in technology. Random shoutout to Metamed (if I heard correctly). Implies the urgent need to shape our future because we're not guaranteed to get a positive one anyways. Bottom line is that longevity is desirable if there is some plan in place to address the societal concerns, which should be possible.

(50 minutes)

PZ points out brains are dynamic systems. In case we've missed it the first couple times. "Is it the same person when I'm uploaded." Suggests that kids are already a route to immortality, and not inferior to e.g. uploading immortality. Clearly he puts a somewhat longer timeline on the actuarial escape velocity ;-). Points out the impact would be revolutionary, and not necessarily in the positive sense. That not a lot of our memes may survive such a transition, and not really a whole lot of "us", if we include our culture.

Brin, upon hearing your 5-minute warning, starts with his shoutouts, gotta recommend some books, eh? Summarizes the debate. Reneges on his earlier point on "nature's wisdom", saying there is none, but there's still some kind of "nature's adaptation", which we should ponder with a very serious face and take very seriously, indeed.

Your closing statement, "death doesn't solve any of those aforementioned problems (of hegemony etc.) very well anyways".

PZ's closing statement says death is an intrinsic component of how we work. Immortality would end life as we know it, a "radical transformation". Doesn't want to become a butterfly.

EY's closing statement wants to get away from an "individual versus society" type of framing of the debate, instead immortality should be perceived as potentially desirable for society as a whole.

In retrospect, there's many things I wish I'd done differently. Apparently it was not clear to everyone that the topic was the desirability of immortality, rather than technical feasibility. I also should have instituted time limits for everyone, and acted as more of a moderator to keep things on-topic (there were several ventures off topic). That would require me removing myself from the majority of the conversation, but that's entirely something I could and should do. I'll know better for next time I do this sort of thing. Experience - it helps. :)

It's pretty long and slow, do you mind posting a transcript, at least the automatically generated speech-to-text one from youtube?

I thought the part right after Eliezer finds his notes was the best reply to the topic, and I particularly liked the smallpox comparison. Could have been better focused in general, as there was a lot of things that were a bit off track, but I feel it was worth watching on the whole.

Also the random flashes to Eliezer's facial expression while PZ is talking sent me into hysterics for some reason.