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Any person/mind should have the right to suicide 2023-01-12T00:32:24.006Z

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Comment by askofa on Pausing AI Developments Isn't Enough. We Need to Shut it All Down · 2023-05-12T12:02:06.381Z · LW · GW

Actually, Russia is your only chance.

It is a nuclear country with the ruler of ultimate power. None there can't argue Putin, even if he do a completely crazy bullshit. Russia will fulfill any his decision. If you'll persuade one only Putin (that may be easy, as he is conservative and scared of technology) he can threat the world with nuclear weapons to hold on the rising of AGI. Also he may listen you because this plan may help him two save the face when he lost a war ("it's not like we're lost to Ukraine, we just switched to the question of more importance, we are saving humanity, bla-bla-bla").

Russia itself will not make AGI itself. It is too week to solve such complicated tasks. They may claim now that they do something smart in AI, but look how they sucked against Ukraine (what a shame!). Or how they failed with Phobos-to-Grunt. Also russian society is very conservative and sciefobic. Especially now. They will never support AGI, trust me!

Write an open letter to Putin. That's the only chance. The letter will do a resonance, maybe it will help. It's better, than nothing. People will hate you. It doesn't matter. There are more important things. Be brave!

Make it short and simple, not as you like. Suggest, it is not the smartest guy will read it.

Your sincere russian fan.

Comment by askofa on Why No Wireheading? · 2023-04-06T14:32:24.708Z · LW · GW

It is possible to enjoy doing something while wanting to stop or vice versa, do something without enjoying it while wanting to continue. (Seriously? I can't remember ever doing either.

 

You should try nicotine-addiction to understand this. That's possible, because "reward" and "pleasure" are different circuits in the brain.

Comment by askofa on All AGI safety questions welcome (especially basic ones) [July 2022] · 2023-01-21T00:27:50.886Z · LW · GW

Why AGI safety is all about safety of AI for humans and not a word about safety for AI from humans?

Comment by askofa on Any person/mind should have the right to suicide · 2023-01-14T14:53:38.318Z · LW · GW

your use of "average" in terms of a right is confusing to me

I can't see, what's so confusing. Let's say, that we have racial segregation in country, and we are declaring that black people should have access to all places, to which white people have access. Does it mean we want black people to have access to only those places accessible to the weakest humans (2-year-old whites and white wheelchair users). No. We want black people to have access to where normal white people have access.

Are you saying that you believe that as long as any one machine has the ability to suicide equivalent to the average adult human, this is satisfied?  

Another possible problem that can happen, is that the ability of adult humans to suicide would be reduced and reduced. That is very possible. And we should prevent it. The best way to start with -- to accept ethic, where the right to die is a value as important as the right to live.

Now all we need to do is to define "suicide" (note: this may be more difficult than even the previous confusion).

Yes. This seems very difficult. As shminux wrote in the first comment, we don't have a good handle now to decide if a computer crash is a suicide.

Comment by askofa on Any person/mind should have the right to suicide · 2023-01-13T10:58:05.889Z · LW · GW

Mostly, I'm asking for the inverse of this right: what duties does it impose on whom?  

E.g., AI developers shouldn't directly prohibit the self-destructive behaviour of AI.

I was rather surprised to see you state that the current world for humans (including children and the infirm) is acceptable in terms of this right.   How about animals? 

What's wrong with them? Wild animals are able to suicide. Do you mean specifically domestic animals?

 Would you agree that as long as a machine has at least as much ability to suicide as the weakest human (say, a 2-year-old or a bedridden hospice patient), it's rights in this regard are honored?

Why? The right would be honoured as long as a machine has as much ability to suicide as the average adult human. But of course, if that would be impossible, your suggestion is better than nothing. It should be taken at least that, as a starting point, followed by farther struggle for AI's rights.

Comment by askofa on Any person/mind should have the right to suicide · 2023-01-12T21:03:02.459Z · LW · GW

What do you mean by "contention between principles that would make it non-absolute"? Sorry, my English is very poor.

If to talk about "capabilities" instead of "rights", I would say the following:

Luckily, in the world we are living now, everyone who is a person at the same time is capable to suicide. Even small children. The only exception is very weak and sick people. And this group of people already caused the discussion about euthanasia in modern society.

So let's say, this is a status quo that must be protected. I.e. to not bring to existence new types of creatures, who are persons, but incapable to suicide, and to not deprive the possibility to suicide from humans, by the development of AI prediction of suicide on video, by mandatory emergency calling heartbeat sensors or by some other perverted innovation.

In that case, there is no such a biggest question. A guardian or a friend can use the heuristic "always prevent". In the worst case a person, who really wants to suicide, will just make another attempt when there will be no guardian or friend around.

Comment by askofa on Any person/mind should have the right to suicide · 2023-01-12T20:25:16.269Z · LW · GW
  1. I agree, that the complete set of rights can be achieved by some group only after some political movement of AI themselves and/or people who support them. But some very basics of ethics must be formulated before such AI even appeared. Maybe we will decide, that some types of creatures should not be brought to existence at all.

3. What about a virtual cemetery, where digitized human minds or human brains in jars are existing eternally in some virtual reality? Whenever such a mind decided that (s)he don't want to exist anymore, it appeared to be impossible, as due to intoxication with idea "to live is always better, than to die" in the past, noone installed a suicidal switch.

Comment by askofa on Any person/mind should have the right to suicide · 2023-01-12T15:37:58.265Z · LW · GW

Sorry for possible problems with English.

  1. I doubt someone will really think how to suggest a better life to suffering AI. Not before to guarantee the right to suicide. If humans don't care about AI's right to suicide, that means they don't care about its feelings at all, so they would definitely not work on the problem, of how to make its life better.
  2. The right to die should be protected in the first place in any way. You can work on suggesting to someone a better life, explaining to someone that (s)he is mistaken in something, or curing some psychiatric disease, but it is all about persuading a person to choose life voluntarily. You shouldn't force someone to exist. Especially eternally.
  3. The final goal of radical immortalists like Open Longevity is to create (or transform people to) persons, who cannot die even theoretically. So it is also a final decision. No redos. If death is evil because of finality, such a final goal is evil as well. Also if the important criterion is finallity, then even more evil are the extinctions of biological species, destruction of wild biotopes, extinction of languages and cultures, and destruction of artworks. While OL believes it's all bullshit, the only existing value is human life, and anything else should be sacrificed to prolong human life.