Probability of THS scenario - in light of the last 10 years

[sir_pudding]

Originally Posted by vicky_molokh

No, I see it as sad because Ghosting would've been just better. I do not see Shadows as videos, I see them as minds that are inferior.

Ghosting requires a destructive brain scan. That's probably a little too invasive a procedure for most people and most applications of Shadows.

That's just diving back into the Sticky Thread.

I don't think so. I'm not making a statement one way or the other about whether the ghost is "you" or not. It is nonetheless a Ghost, and therefore the result of a destructive brain scan. Which destroys your brain, cause it's you know, destructive. If you are happy with your brain as is, you probably don't want to do that.

What exactly is evil or harmful about making a xox, sending it to some conference on Titan or whatever, getting it back and merging with it?

What if you don't merge it? What if you do merge it, but keep multiple copies operating at the same time? What if you want to be in ten places at once at all times? 100? 1,000,000? What if you have a million copies and they regularly merge and duplicate? At what point is it no longer communication but reproduction? At what point is no longer reproduction but the Singularity?

[vicky_molokh]

Originally Posted by sir_pudding

Ghosting requires a destructive brain scan. That's probably a little too invasive a procedure for most people and most applications of Shadows.

I don't think so. I'm not making a statement one way or the other about whether the ghost is "you" or not. It is nonetheless a Ghost, and therefore the result of a destructive brain scan. Which destroys your brain, cause it's you know, destructive. If you are happy with your brain as is, you probably don't want to do that.

Okay, then my view that Ghosts are just better than biosophonts is colouring my posts.

Originally Posted by sir_pudding

What if you don't merge it? What if you do merge it, but keep multiple copies operating at the same time? What if you want to be in ten places at once at all times? 100? 1,000,000? What if you have a million copies and they regularly merge and duplicate? At what point is it no longer communication but reproduction? At what point is no longer reproduction but the Singularity?

What if you don't merge a Shadow?

You still pay for the space and processing power of those xoxes/Shadows, so it neither picks a pocket nor breaks a leg. Interestingly, THS134 and 129 talks about exactly the technique I described (multiple instances running and parallel and merging), and it doesn't say it's illegal. It seems the line between 'oh, copy-merge, ok' and 'aaaaah xoxing!' is blurry.

[sir_pudding]

Originally Posted by vicky_molokh

Okay, then my view that Ghosts are just better than biosophonts is colouring my posts.

Whether they are or not is immaterial. People that feel the way you are probably already dead and ghosted. People who don't, don't. It's pretty clear from the demographics that lots of people are happy to be alive until they die of some cause (or are dying) and then get ghosted.

What if you don't merge a Shadow?

Most people can't merge a Shadow. They can debrief it. They can update it. But there's no way to merge it back into their brain. I imagine most people keep the same Shadow and just update it.

You still pay for the space and processing power of those xoxes/Shadows, so it neither picks a pocket nor breaks a leg.

Asl long as you don't make more than one, sure. That's what the xox prohibition does. It restricts you to one copy of the Shadow.

Interestingly, THS134 and 129 talks about exactly the technique I described (multiple instances running and parallel and merging), and it doesn't say it's illegal.

Isn't that on the same platform?

It seems the line between 'oh, copy-merge, ok' and 'aaaaah xoxing!' is blurry.

What exactly constitutes criminal xoxing isn't especially clear, unless Transhuman Mysteries addresses this, I haven't read it yet.

[whswhs]

Originally Posted by vicky_molokh

You still pay for the space and processing power of those xoxes/Shadows, so it neither picks a pocket nor breaks a leg.

In a pure market economy, that would be true. But in a democracy, it's not. Voters in a democracy can use their vote to support measures that are actively harmful to other voters: taxing them heavily, confiscating their property, excluding them from occupations, abridging their civil rights, censoring them, imprisoning them, enslaving them, exterminating them, or simply looking the other way while private individuals do those things. The franchise controls the state and the state is an organization for compulsion. If you allow a digital individual to xox themself, then you are allowing them to create new voters who share their agenda, almost without limit; in effect, you are allowing plural voting, with N going to aleph sub null. There is a natural failure mode in that voting system, in which individuals game the vote on issues they care about; and there is a larger failure mode, in which biosophonts are reduced to an infinitesimal share of the vote and have no prospect of ever having power. Xoxed voters can both pick the pockets and break the legs of voters who cannot xox. And the fear of that happening is an obvious driver for the hostility to xoxing in THS.

Bill Stoddard

[vicky_molokh]

Originally Posted by sir_pudding

Most people can't merge a Shadow. They can debrief it. They can update it. But there's no way to merge it back into their brain. I imagine most people keep the same Shadow and just update it.

Well, biosophonts anyway. Infomorphs can.

Originally Posted by sir_pudding

Asl long as you don't make more than one, sure. That's what the xox prohibition does.

Wait, we have a right to make one? As in, one running extra? (i.e. not a shut down backup, of which we have a right to however many we wish)

Originally Posted by sir_pudding

It restricts you to one copy of the Shadow. Isn't that on the same platform? What exactly constitutes criminal xoxing isn't especially clear, unless Transhuman Mysteries addresses this, I haven't read it yet.

Well, sending a Shadow to Titan definitely can't leave it on the same platform. And I'm not familiar with Transhuman Mysteries either.

[vicky_molokh]

Originally Posted by whswhs

In a pure market economy, that would be true. But in a democracy, it's not. Voters in a democracy can use their vote to support measures that are actively harmful to other voters: taxing them heavily, confiscating their property, excluding them from occupations, abridging their civil rights, censoring them, imprisoning them, enslaving them, exterminating them, or simply looking the other way while private individuals do those things. The franchise controls the state and the state is an organization for compulsion. If you allow a digital individual to xox themself, then you are allowing them to create new voters who share their agenda, almost without limit; in effect, you are allowing plural voting, with N going to aleph sub null. There is a natural failure mode in that voting system, in which individuals game the vote on issues they care about; and there is a larger failure mode, in which biosophonts are reduced to an infinitesimal share of the vote and have no prospect of ever having power. Xoxed voters can both pick the pockets and break the legs of voters who cannot xox. And the fear of that happening is an obvious driver for the hostility to xoxing in THS.

Bill Stoddard

So why isn't xoxing legal in other legal systems? Dictatorships, technocracies, meritocracies, cybercracies? (Also, people seem to have no problem with the issue of Shadows, simply by declaring that a Shadow does not spawn a new instance of voting rights. Even though shadows are sapient.)

[sir_pudding]

Originally Posted by vicky_molokh

Well, biosophonts anyway. Infomorphs can.

Like I said, most people.

Wait, we have a right to make one? As in, one running extra? (i.e. not a shut down backup, of which we have a right to however many we wish)

You clearly can have an SAI Shadow that doesn't count as xox. A copy of that would be a xox. You can have any number of LAI Shadows, obviously.

Well, sending a Shadow to Titan definitely can't leave it on the same platform.

Huh? What you are talking about only makes sense with infomorphs which can send themselves to Titan in the first place.

Originally Posted by vicky_molokh

Even though shadows are sapient.

They can be. They can also be LAI. Even SAI shadows are only citizens in some places. In which case their creation is tightly controlled. I'm still curious how this works in Europe. If I'm a European that wants an SAI Shadow, can I hire an SAI to run the emulation for me?

[vicky_molokh]

Originally Posted by sir_pudding

You clearly can have an SAI Shadow that doesn't count as xox. A copy of that would be a xox. You can have any number of LAI Shadows, obviously.

So if I got shadow-scanned and then ghosted, and I send a SAI Shadow to Titan . . ?

Originally Posted by sir_pudding

Huh? What you are talking about only makes sense with infomorphs which can send themselves to Titan in the first place.

Or they may want to keep one instance on Luna to run another conference simultaneously. Whether they will be legally allowed to do it is another matter.

Originally Posted by sir_pudding

They can be. They can also be LAI. Even SAI shadows are only citizens in some places. In which case their creation is tightly controlled. I'm still curious how this works in Europe. If I'm a European that wants an SAI Shadow, can I hire an SAI to run the emulation for me?

I'm still puzzled by the idea of a SAI running a mind scan at all. It seems weird to use a mind (SAI/LAI) to run another mind (Shadow).

[sir_pudding]

Originally Posted by vicky_molokh

I'm still puzzled by the idea of a SAI running a mind scan at all. It seems weird to use a mind (SAI/LAI) to run another mind (Shadow).

The Shadow Mind Emulation software + the SAI/LAI= Shadow. Ghosts aren't fundamentally different except they are all based on an SAI-7 "operating system" as it were. A brain scan is just a bunch of data without software to interpret it and hardware to run it.

[vicky_molokh]

Originally Posted by sir_pudding

The Shadow Mind Emulation software + the SAI/LAI= Shadow. Ghosts aren't fundamentally different except they are all based on an SAI-7 "operating system" as it were. A brain scan is just a bunch of data without software to interpret it and hardware to run it.

Yeah, but I wonder why the 'Daemontools' used to 'mount' brain scan data is an SAI in its own right, and not just specialized software (that lacks cognitive ability without a mind image).