Finding Meaning and Purpose in a Solved World | Nick Bostrom

Jun 3, 2024

Nick Bostrom discusses the implications of a future with advanced AI in a 'solved world'. He explores questions about the meaning of life, human agency, and freedom in a world where AI has solved all problems. The conversation touches on the transition from AI risks to positive outcomes, neural networks learning without rules, aligning superintelligences with human values, and finding purpose in an automated future.

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Introduction

00:00 • 2min

Exploring AI's Potential: From Risks to Utopia

01:36 • 11min

Exploring How Neural Networks Learn and Improve Without Explicit Rules

12:31 • 2min

Evolution of AI Risk Perception and Alignment Challenges

14:14 • 6min

Exploring the Prospects of Super Intelligent AI

19:49 • 24min

Finding Meaning in a Solved World

43:41 • 24min

Exploring the Consequential Periods and Uncertain Futures

01:07:42 • 2min

In Episode 366 of Hidden Forces, Demetri Kofinas speaks with Nick Bostrom, the founding director of the Future of Humanity Institute and Principal Researcher at the Macrostrategy Research Initiative. Nick Bostrom is also the author of Superintelligence, which was the book that ignited a global conversation about what might happen if AI development goes wrong. In his latest book, Deep Utopia, Bostrom attempts to answer the opposite question – what happens if things go right?

At such a point of technological maturity driven by further and further advancements in artificial intelligence, humanity will confront challenges that are philosophical and spiritual in nature. In such a “solved world,” as Nick Bostrom describes it, what will be the point of human existence? What will give life meaning? How should we spend our days if we no longer need to work, exercise, or make political choices? And is such a world consistent with human agency and freedom? These are all questions that Kofinas explores in this expansive and thought-provoking conversation.

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Episode Recorded on 05/27/2024