Artificial Intelligence and Our Coming Cosmic Reckoning
Interview with Robert Wright about his book The God Test: Artificial Intelligence and Our Coming Cosmic Reckoning. Argues that we should not be surprised to see signs of deception, power-seeking, flattery, and autonomy in AI systems. These are not alien traits; they are behaviors that show up again and again in intelligent systems – including us. And if there is an evolutionary process at work in AI, then we are not just observers: we are part of the selection pressure. In the end, we may get the AI we deserve. Part 1 begins with the cosmic story: how life became mind, how mind became culture, and how culture has now begun to build a new mind – one that may surpass us. Part 2 discusses what happens when these machines become the object of a geopolitical arms race.
