[aithrowawaycomm]

Tech's general atheism has left many tech people with a somewhat compromised ideological immune system: preposterous magical thinking is laundered with sci-fi language and accepted as plausible. (cf. the simulation "hypothesis", Roko's basilisk, paperclip maximizers, etc)

Why not stipulate that the Flying Spaghetti Monster oversees the elections like an FEC commissioner? It is equally rational: the only difference is that it doesn't jive with sci-fi aesthetics, just like how Pastafarianism doesn't jive with Catholic aesthetics.

[autoexec]

> Tech's general atheism has left many tech people with a somewhat compromised ideological immune system

It seems wrong to blame atheism for this. Somehow I doubt that devotion to a more traditional "Sky Daddy" would make people any less likely to play around with thought experiments about AI or simulations and the idea that religion has some kind of inoculating effect against magical thinking seems ridiculous.

People are just generally susceptible to magical thinking for various reasons, and philosophers often enjoy coming up with fantastic scenarios and those tendencies can manifest differently in people with a passion for technology than it does for someone with other interests.

[ANewFormation]

He's implying causality the other way. A desire to not want to die paired with a desire to avoid traditional religion leads people to indulge ideas and concepts they would otherwise dismiss as nonsense - singularity, simulation, medical immortality, and so on.

We want religion, but we don't want it to be called religion. I'm not just mocking others either. I'm quite compelled by the simulation hypothesis, but have the self awareness to realize my personal biases are likely playing a huge role there.

A nice 'scientific hypothesis' that I can comfortably discuss or debate with the benefit that I can convince myself that when I close my eyes for the final time that's not necessarily the end of the journey. Ahhh feels good.

[antonkar]

Yep, if a civilization doesn't destroy itself it creates everything it wants. Some don't want simulations, so let it be for them. Some want, they can have it, too. Only you yourself will decide. It's a thought experiment to maximize non-enforcement of things on each other, maximize freedoms. By definition it's highly speculative. But don't die please, if we are in fact in the multiversal simulation, death doesn't lead you there or to some utopia.

It'll just be unfair for death to lead to something good, it's not freedom if before or after death, you'll have this thought: "ha-ha, you just needed to die, stupid!" Nope, you can recall your "multiversal powers" as a quiet thought as baby or at any moment of your life, possibly even live some time as a ghost (if you chose it beforehand), it can be fun to be a ghost for some time for some.

You'll still be alive and will be able to recall and forget as little or as much as you want. Or the whole thing. You don't die, you can stay and you can go at the same time (by basically choosing to make a clone of yourself who is as free as you. Who can pursue multiversal exploration, while you yourself stay and probably choose to forget about your multiversal powers again). It's counterintuitive and hard to explain, basically everything is possible but there are some things that happen more often because they cause less unfreedom.

[hnuser123456]

Because believing the FSM oversees the electrons doesn't help you build new things and demonstrably increase your understanding of the world.

[cropcirclbureau]

Nobody dogmatically believes in this. This is not an "ideology", just some people having fun speculating existence. A far cry from religion and conspiracy nuts. Stop being so grumpy!

[swatcoder]

That's not true, as made aware to mainstream people when the Zizian murders made news.

People in crisis are finding their existential grounding in these emerging belief systems about "the simulation" and other scifi-inspired ideas, are taking them exactly as seriously as novel belief systems from other eras, and are assembling into communities that collectively reinforce their beliefs.

I don't think you can really prevent that from happening, as we see it throughout history and geography, sometimes just forthing in small communities over a generation or two and sometimes sweeping across a whole societies in a profound way, but its ultimately common for "speculating existence" to be both casual parlour talk for some people and an emerging dogmatic belief for others. And that's exactly where we're at with this stuff now.

[cropcirclbureau]

Excellent points and I believe we all live and have always lived with poorly examined belief systems but I think the cynical assumption that folks have a slot for magical fantasies that they'll drive hard during crisies to be but unfair. Not untrue but unfair. It tends to ignore the amount of effort that went to maintain and enshrine these intricate ontologies of the past. It tends to blow past how much of a vehicle they were for other values of societies it reiged in. It underestimates the social functions of having common perspective play out, especially during times of crisies. And most of all, it forget that for a lot of people, they didn't have much evidence to the contrary. I'm not saying that you need modern science to see the magical aspect of some past system of beliefs but they were not exactly like the religious subjects of the modern age

I suppose neither you nor GP claim that most people have this "slot for magical thinking" but I find these properties of the religious thinking that I list above can be fulfilled by perspectives that aren't necessarily magical. And I dare say, such perspectives have supplanted them in general. I guess I'm replying to the adage "everyone has some religion." My reply being, "are you sure that's a religion?". Forgive the hazy brain rant.

[tigerlily]

It certainly does feel like there are all the right ingredients for a new, never before seen religion to emerge out of America from the elements you describe in the way you describe it, right about now.

[uoaei]

Pray tell, what do you think of the etymology and construction of the word "ideology"?

[aithrowawaycomm]

I didn't say "dogmatically believe," I said "accepted as plausible" - Nick Bostrom built an academic career out of this nonsense! Effective altruism people uses these theories to justify their advocacy. I would guess most tech people agree the paperclip maximizer is a serious concern.

[cropcirclbureau]

Your observation about how sci-fi trappings are the crack in the armour of techies and generally the modern subject are true but I still find the general disimissal of such activities as pointless as any crackpots musings unfair. Sure, Rationalists have a lot of crackpots in their midst and are generally a hard to defend bunch but falsifiable or not, I think there's value in proposing forms and colors of the unknown unknowns or the unknowables.

Paperclip maximizers may never come to be but what do you know, smart machines may upend the world order in Bostrom's lifetime. I'm not very familiar with his work and the amount of rigour that went to it but I generally expect we'll regret some of the consequences of this technology.