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Speaker 1: The podcast you were about to listen to contains a

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Speaker 1: class for information hazard. Some listeners may experience prolonged bouts

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Speaker 1: of fear, waking, anxiety, or nightmares of eternal torture. In

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Speaker 1: the cyber dungeons of the Great Basilisk attended to by

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Speaker 1: the Peelers in Black and the Thirteen Children of the Flame,

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Speaker 1: also appetite, loss, and constipation. Proceed with caution. Welcome to

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Speaker 1: Stuff to Blow your Mind from how stuff Works dot com.

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Speaker 1: Hey are you welcome to Stuff to Blow your Mind?

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Speaker 1: My name is Robert Lamb, and I'm Joe McCormick. And

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Speaker 1: since it's October, we are of course still exploring monsters,

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Speaker 1: terrifying ideas and so forth, and boy, have we got

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Speaker 1: one for you today. I just want to issue a

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Speaker 1: warning right at the beginning here that today's episode is

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Speaker 1: going to concern something that a few people would consider

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Speaker 1: a genuine information hazard, as in an idea you that

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Speaker 1: is itself actually dangerous. Now I I don't, having looked

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Speaker 1: into it, I don't think that is the case. I

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Speaker 1: don't think this episode will hurt you, but just a

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Speaker 1: warning if you think you're susceptible to terror or nightmares

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Speaker 1: or something when presented with a thought experiment or the

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Speaker 1: possibility of being, say, sent to a literal hell created

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Speaker 1: by technology, and you think that idea could infect you,

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Speaker 1: could make you afraid. This might not be the episode

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Speaker 1: for you, right, But then again, I assume you're a

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Speaker 1: listener to stuff to blow your mind. You've probably already

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Speaker 1: encountered some thought hazards on here. You've survived those. Generally speaking,

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Speaker 1: I have faith in you to survive this one. However,

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Speaker 1: if you are going to take either of our warnings seriously,

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Speaker 1: I will let you know that the first section of

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Speaker 1: this podcast is going to deal with the mythical basilisk,

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Speaker 1: the folkloric basilisk, and some of the you know, the

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Speaker 1: monstrous fund to be had there before we explore the

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Speaker 1: idea of Rocco's Basilisk, and in that we're gonna be

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Speaker 1: talking about this, uh, this idea that emerges where technological singularity,

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Speaker 1: navel gazing, thought experimentation, a little that dash of creepy pasta,

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Speaker 1: and some good old fifth fashion supernatural thinking all converge

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Speaker 1: into this kind of nightmare scenario. Now, as we said,

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Speaker 1: this idea is believed by some to be a genuinely

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Speaker 1: dangerous idea and that even learning about it could put

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Speaker 1: you at some kind of risk. I think there are

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Speaker 1: strong reasons to believe that this is not the case,

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Speaker 1: and that thinking about this idea will not put you

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Speaker 1: at risk. But again, if you're concerned, you should stop

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Speaker 1: listening now, or stop listening after we stopped talking about

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Speaker 1: the mythical basilisk now I have I just want to

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Speaker 1: say at the beginning, listeners have suggested us talk about

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Speaker 1: Rocco's basilisk before this idea that is at least purportedly

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Speaker 1: an information hazard, a dangerous idea, and I've I've hesitated

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Speaker 1: to do it before, and not because I think it's

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Speaker 1: particularly plausible, but just because, you know, I wonder, what

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Speaker 1: is the level of risk could that you should tolerate

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Speaker 1: when propagating an idea. If you think an idea is

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Speaker 1: unlikely but maybe has a zero point zero zero zero

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Speaker 1: zero one percent chance of causing enormous harm to the

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Speaker 1: person you tell it to, should you say the idea

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Speaker 1: or not? I don't know. I feel like people generally

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Speaker 1: don't exercise that kind of caution when they're like sharing

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Speaker 1: links with you, Like sometimes they'll be like, like not

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Speaker 1: safe for work. But but then you click on it anyway,

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Speaker 1: and then sometimes you're like, oh, I wish I had

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Speaker 1: not seen that, or I wish I had not read that,

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Speaker 1: and now that's in my head. Now that's in my

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Speaker 1: head forever. Well. One of the problems with this idea

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Speaker 1: is whatever you think about whether or not you should

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Speaker 1: discuss ideas that may be dangerous to hear in some

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Speaker 1: extremely unlikely off chance. Uh. Part of the problem is

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Speaker 1: what happens when those ideas are just already set loose

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Speaker 1: in in society. I mean now people on television shows

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Speaker 1: and all over the internet or talking about this idea.

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Speaker 1: There are a bunch of articles out about it. So

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Speaker 1: it's not like you can keep the cat in the

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Speaker 1: bag at this point, right this Roco's basilist has already

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Speaker 1: been a a gag point on the hit HBO show

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Speaker 1: Silicon Valley, which is a fabulous show, and I love

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Speaker 1: the way that they treated Rocco's basilisk on it. But uh, yeah,

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Speaker 1: if they're covering it, there's no danger in us covering

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Speaker 1: it too. That's the way I look at it, right,

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Speaker 1: And at least I would hope that the way we

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Speaker 1: cover it can give you some reasons to think you

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Speaker 1: should not be afraid of digital hell, and also to

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Speaker 1: think about the general class of what should be done

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Speaker 1: about something that could have in fact been a real

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Speaker 1: information hazard in some other case. So that's all our

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Speaker 1: whole preamble for before we get to that section. But

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Speaker 1: before we get to that section, we're gonna be talking

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Speaker 1: about basilisks today. Boy, is the basilisk a great monster? Yes,

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Speaker 1: also known as the basil cock, the basil cock, the

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Speaker 1: basil e cock, basically any version of that of basil

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Speaker 1: and cock that you can put together, um, that you

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Speaker 1: can slam together. Then it has been referred to as

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Speaker 1: such at some point in its history. Now, a lot

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Speaker 1: of people I think probably encountered a version of the

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Speaker 1: basilisk from Harry Potter. But Robert, I know that was

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Speaker 1: not your entryway, right, I encountered it for the first time.

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Speaker 1: I believe in dungeons and dragons, of course, because it's

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Speaker 1: a it's a multi legged reptile with a petrifying gaze.

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Speaker 1: Um say that again, multi legged reptile with a petrifying gaze,

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Speaker 1: petrifying gas to turn you to stone. Yeah, and I

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Speaker 1: is ever over call correctly. It has some cool biology,

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Speaker 1: where like the the it turns you to stone and

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Speaker 1: then like bust you into pieces. Then it eats the

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Speaker 1: stone pieces, but then its stomach turns the stone back

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Speaker 1: into flesh. And so if you get like the stomach

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Speaker 1: juices from a basilisk, then you can use it to

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Speaker 1: undo petrification spells, that sort of thing. It's a lot

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Speaker 1: of fun, arguably more fun than than the basilisk is

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Speaker 1: at times in folklore tradition, because one of the things is,

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Speaker 1: if you you like me, you didn't grow up hearing

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Speaker 1: about the basilisk. Part of it is because there are

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Speaker 1: no there aren't really any great stories about the basilisk.

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Speaker 1: Slaying the basilisk was no heroes, great ordeal. Oh yeah,

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Speaker 1: I at least have not come across that. Yeah, it

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Speaker 1: really helps, like if like the hydra, I mean, the

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Speaker 1: hydra is arguably so much cooler, and then also it's

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Speaker 1: one of the labors of Hercules, and there's a cool

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Speaker 1: story about how they defeat it. Well, maybe it's because

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Speaker 1: there is no way to defeat the basilisks short of say,

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Speaker 1: weasel of fluvium, which we will get to. Yeah, don't

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Speaker 1: don't give it away, I'm sorry. Should we should we

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Speaker 1: edit that out. No, we should leave it. It's a

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Speaker 1: it's it's a thought hazard. Any basilists listening. Still, there's

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Speaker 1: so much more to the basilist than just this cool

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Speaker 1: DND creature, because it's not just a monster. It's not

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Speaker 1: just something you encounter in the dungeon. It is it

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Speaker 1: is a king. Oh, I see, now, I know you've

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Speaker 1: made note of the fact that Borges mentions the basilisk

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Speaker 1: and his Book of Imaginary Beings. He does now he

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Speaker 1: he translated translated his meaning little king, little king, which

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Speaker 1: I like when I was reading. And Carol Rose she's

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Speaker 1: She points out that the name stems from the Greek basilius,

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Speaker 1: which means king, so king or little king. I tend

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Speaker 1: to like the little king translation because I feel like

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Speaker 1: it it ties in better with what we're going to discuss, well,

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Speaker 1: the ancient BEASTI area ideas of the basil I believe

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Speaker 1: to say that it's not that big, right, It's pretty small. Yeah. Yeah. Now.

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Speaker 1: The keen part, though, refers to a crest or, a

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Speaker 1: crown like protusion that is on the creature's head, and

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Speaker 1: in some depictions it's no mirror biological ornament, but an

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Speaker 1: actual regal crown. It means something. Yeah. Now, the descriptions

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Speaker 1: very greatly, and it emerges largely from European and Middle

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Speaker 1: Eastern legend and folklore from ancient times to roughly the

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Speaker 1: seventeenth century, and that's when the basilists became less popular.

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Speaker 1: In the earlier descriptions, though, it is indeed small, and

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Speaker 1: it's just a grass snake, only it has a crown

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Speaker 1: like crest on its head and has this weird practice

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Speaker 1: of floating above the ground like vertically erect. That's creepy,

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Speaker 1: of course, and then again that that does play on

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Speaker 1: sometimes when you see snakes rise up out of a coil,

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Speaker 1: it can be startling how high they rise. Yeah, I mean,

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Speaker 1: if I feel like I've grown up seeing images and

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Speaker 1: videos of cobra's doing their their dance, so I've kind

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Speaker 1: of I've kind of lost any kind of appreciation for

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Speaker 1: how bizarre that is to look at. You know, if

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Speaker 1: you're used to seeing a snake slither, to see it

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Speaker 1: stand up and uh, you know and rare back and

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Speaker 1: and and flare its hood. Absolutely. Yeah. So the basilisk

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Speaker 1: is said to be the king of the reptiles, but

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Speaker 1: you know, don't be so foolish is to think that

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Speaker 1: only it's bite is lethal, like some of our venomous snakes. Now,

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Speaker 1: every aspect of the basilisk is said to just reek

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Speaker 1: of venom and death, every every aspect. If you touch it,

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Speaker 1: if you inhale its breath, if you gaze upon it

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Speaker 1: at all, then you will die. Wait, what about its saliva? Yep, saliva,

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Speaker 1: blood smell, gaze? Presumably I didn't see any reference that

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Speaker 1: the presumably it's it's urine, it's excrement. I mean, it's

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Speaker 1: excrement has to be poisonous, the excrement of a basilisk.

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Speaker 1: It sounds absolutely deadly. Wouldn't it be a great inversion

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Speaker 1: if it's excrement was the only good part about it?

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Speaker 1: And maybe so that can heal your warts? Yeah? And uh.

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Speaker 1: One thing that Carol Rose pointed out in in her

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Speaker 1: her entry about the basilisk and her one of her

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Speaker 1: monster Encyclopedia's, she said that when it's not killing everything

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Speaker 1: in its path, just via that you know the audacity

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Speaker 1: of its existence, it would actually spit them at birds

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Speaker 1: flying overhead and bring them down to eat them, or

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Speaker 1: just out of spite. I get the idea. Just had

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Speaker 1: a spite. You know, it's just just it's just my

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Speaker 1: ful death, that's all it is. Okay. So where do

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Speaker 1: I find a basilisk? Well, in the desert, of course.

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Speaker 1: But it's more, it's more accurate to say that the

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Speaker 1: desert is not merely the place where it lives, but

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Speaker 1: it is the place that it makes by living. Like

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Speaker 1: everything in its path dies, and therefore the desert is

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Speaker 1: the result of the basilisk. And there's a there's actually

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Speaker 1: a wonderful um a description of the basilisk that comes

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Speaker 1: to us from Plenty of the Elder in his The

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Speaker 1: net Real History Man. We've been hitting Plenty a lot lately.

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Speaker 1: I guess we've been talking about monsters. Huh. If're talking

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Speaker 1: about monsters, especially ancient monsters, that you know, he's he's

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Speaker 1: one of the great sources to turn to. So Joe,

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Speaker 1: would you read to us from the natural History? Oh? Absolutely,

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Speaker 1: there is the same power also in the serpent called

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Speaker 1: the basilisk. It is produced in the province of Syrene,

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Speaker 1: which that is the area to the west of Egypt.

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Speaker 1: It's like Libya. I think there's a settlement known as

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Speaker 1: like Syrene, Syrene being not more than twelve fingers in length.

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Speaker 1: Is that fingers long ways or fingers sideways? Oh, either

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Speaker 1: way you cut it, it's not a huge creature. It

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Speaker 1: has a white spot on the head, strongly resembling a

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Speaker 1: sort of diadem. When it hisses, all the other serpents

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Speaker 1: fly from it, and it does not advance its body

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Speaker 1: like the others by a succession of folds, but moves

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Speaker 1: along upright and erect upon the middle. It destroys all shrubs,

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Speaker 1: not only by its contact, but those even that it

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Speaker 1: has breathed upon. It burns up all the grass too,

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Speaker 1: and breaks the stones. So tremendous is its noxious influence.

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Speaker 1: It was formerly a general belief that if a man

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Speaker 1: on horseback killed one of these animals with a spear,

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Speaker 1: the poison would run up the weapon and kill not

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Speaker 1: only the rider but the horse as well. Oh man,

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Speaker 1: I love that. So it's though the blood is it's

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Speaker 1: like that like a xenomorph's blood, right or or kind

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Speaker 1: of like It reminds me to of Grendel's blood that

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Speaker 1: was said to like melt the weapon that they wolf

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Speaker 1: used against it. Oh, but it's worse than that. It

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Speaker 1: doesn't just get the weapon, It gets the person holding

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Speaker 1: the weapon and the horse that that person is touching.

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Speaker 1: I know, it feels unfair that the horse is roped

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Speaker 1: into this as well. Yeah, the horse didn't even sign

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Speaker 1: up for going to fight a basilisk. It's just trying

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Speaker 1: to get some oats. But furthermore, what is this horse

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Speaker 1: rider doing out in the waste land of Syrene trying

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Speaker 1: to kill a basilisk? Well, lesson learned. Lesson learned now

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Speaker 1: that the basilist becomes a popular creature, and even though

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Speaker 1: the basil usk itself is it doesn't seem to have

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Speaker 1: been mentioned in the Bible, it ends up being like

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Speaker 1: roped into it via translations. Oh yeah, it's kind of

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Speaker 1: like the unicorn. Actually, yeah, exactly. Yeah. We discussed in

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Speaker 1: our episode on unicorns how the were their words in

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Speaker 1: the Bible that have been translated saying the King James

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Speaker 1: translation of the Bible into unicorn because the translators didn't

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Speaker 1: know what the word referred to. We think now that

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Speaker 1: maybe the word probably referred to the ROCs, an extinct

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Speaker 1: bovine creature that once lived around the ancient Mediterranean. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: so you see the basilist pop pop pop up in

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Speaker 1: certain translations of the Book of Jeremiah. The Book of Psalms,

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Speaker 1: Uh what it's associated with the devil or evil, and

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Speaker 1: nothing short of the coming of the Messiah can can

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Speaker 1: hope to end its rule. While well, have you got

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Speaker 1: a quote for me? Yes, there's one translation of Psalms.

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Speaker 1: This is the Brinton Septuagint translation quote thou shalt tread

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Speaker 1: on the asp and basilisk and al shout trample on

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Speaker 1: the lion and dragon. Now European beast areas of the

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Speaker 1: eleventh and twelfth century. They both mostly maintained Plenty's description,

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Speaker 1: but then they described a larger body. They began to Essentially,

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Speaker 1: the monster began to grow. We got to beat this

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Speaker 1: thing up here. Yeah, it ended up having spots and

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Speaker 1: stripes and a few other features were thrown in. Um

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Speaker 1: fiery breath, a bellow that kills. Well, that only makes

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Speaker 1: sense if every other thing about it kills. Yea, it

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Speaker 1: makes noise. That should kill things too. Also, the ability

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Speaker 1: to induce hydrophobia madness. I found that interesting because this

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Speaker 1: clearly has to be a reference to the actual hydrophobia

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Speaker 1: that is inherent in rabies. Yeah, the idea there being that,

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Speaker 1: and I think later stages of Araby's infection. Persons will

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Speaker 1: often have difficulty swallowing, and so that they they're said

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Speaker 1: to refuse drinking water. So Plenty has some additional information

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Speaker 1: here about how you might deal with the pass list. Okay,

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Speaker 1: so I assume not ride up on a horse and

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Speaker 1: stab it right, Well, tell me what it is to

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Speaker 1: this dreadful monster. The effluvium of the weasel is fatal,

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Speaker 1: a thing that has been tried with success, for kings

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Speaker 1: have often desired to see its body when killed. So

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Speaker 1: true is it that it has pleased nature that there

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Speaker 1: should be nothing without its antidote. The animal is thrown

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Speaker 1: into the whole of the basilisk, which is easily known

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Speaker 1: from the soil around it being infected. The weasel destroys

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Speaker 1: the basilisk by its odor, but dies itself in the

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Speaker 1: struggle of nature against its own self. And John Bostock,

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Speaker 1: who provided the translation of this, he adds that there's

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Speaker 1: probably no foundation for this account of the action of

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Speaker 1: the effluvium of the weasel upon the basilisk or any

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Speaker 1: other species of serpent. But this is letting us know

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Speaker 1: that throwing a weasel in there to bleed on it

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Speaker 1: or secrete fluids or whatever. That's not going to kill

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Speaker 1: this mythical monster. But this is interesting though, because weasels,

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Speaker 1: especially the stout, we're thought to be venomous um. And

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Speaker 1: it's worth noting that we do have some venomous mammals

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Speaker 1: in the natural world, such as various shrews, and even

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Speaker 1: the slow loris, the only known venomous primate. I don't

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Speaker 1: think I knew that the slow loris was venomous. Throw

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Speaker 1: it into a hole with a basilisk and and I'm

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Speaker 1: I'm betting on the loris. But anyway, BEASTI areas of

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Speaker 1: the time. They presented a few different ways that you

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Speaker 1: could kill the bassilist. So the weasels one, weasels one

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Speaker 1: always carry a weasel. Also, this one's a little more elegant,

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Speaker 1: but I have a crystal globe with you to reflect

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Speaker 1: its own petrifying gaze back upon the basilisk. Oh, so

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Speaker 1: it's like Perseus and Medusa exactly mirror. Yeah, basically they

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Speaker 1: just stole the idea from Medusa here, but then also

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Speaker 1: carry with you a cockrell or a young rooster. The

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Speaker 1: basilist will becoming enraged by the bird's crown. The idea

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Speaker 1: that this bird has a crown as well, and the

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Speaker 1: basilist will die from a lethal fit. That's a jealous king. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: I believe a similar thing occurs when someone refuses to

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Speaker 1: believe dinosaurs had fetishes, you know, how dare the bird

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Speaker 1: rise above the mighty reptile and then it just loses

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Speaker 1: its mind and dies. We can only hope the producers

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Speaker 1: of the Jurassic World movies avoid this fate. So you

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Speaker 1: see the basketlists show up in a number of different writings.

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Speaker 1: It's just kind of a common um, really a symbol

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Speaker 1: and idea that can be employed. Uh. And they even

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Speaker 1: to see it show up in the Parson's Tale in

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Speaker 1: the in Jeffrey Chaucer in the Canterbury Tales. Yes, quote,

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Speaker 1: these are the other five fingers which the devil uses

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Speaker 1: to draw people towards him. The first is the lecterous

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Speaker 1: glance of a foolish woman or a foolish man, a

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Speaker 1: glance that kills just as the basilists kills people just

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Speaker 1: by looking at them. For the covetous glance reflects the

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Speaker 1: intentions of the heart. You know, this kind of thing

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Speaker 1: is actually one of my one of my favorite things

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Speaker 1: about monsters, especially ancient medieval monsters and uh and so forth.

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Speaker 1: Is that they often aren't just like a large, dangerous animal,

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Speaker 1: but they embody some kind of value. They represent something,

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Speaker 1: They give you something to compare other things too, like

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Speaker 1: they they they're very useful as a metaphor uh. And

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Speaker 1: then really we see some more thing with the bassilisk.

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Speaker 1: It becomes less far less the situation where people are like, hey,

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Speaker 1: you need to be careful because there's a basilisk in

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Speaker 1: the desert, and more and more just a useful model, useful,

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Speaker 1: ridiculous idea that we use to illustrate something that is

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Speaker 1: presumably true about the world and then ultimately loses all

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Speaker 1: meaning and just winds up on, you know, a heraldry

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Speaker 1: and decorations. Now, as we've seen already, the the basilisk

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Speaker 1: has been through some transformations of form, and I assume

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Speaker 1: those transformations must have somewhat continued as time goes by,

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Speaker 1: and it becomes uh, it transforms into this idea of

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Speaker 1: the cock of thrace. This uh, this rooster with a

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Speaker 1: curling serpent's tail. In fact, if you if you go

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Speaker 1: looking around for images the basilist, sometimes you will find

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Speaker 1: this image instead. You really will find you'll find this

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Speaker 1: alongside all the other images. Um. So again a reptile

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Speaker 1: to bird transfer transformation that just must enrage those who

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Speaker 1: oppose feathered dinosaurs. And it does feel like a shame

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Speaker 1: because we have this vile reptile. It becomes the kind

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Speaker 1: of a weirdo bird instead. And it said that it's

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Speaker 1: it's it's what happens when you have a seven year

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Speaker 1: old chicken egg hatched by a toad who undead avians. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: but it's also made deadlier in these newer versions. So

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Speaker 1: now it has that that poison blood power that Plenty describes.

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Speaker 1: It also rots fruit and poisons water everywhere it goes,

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Speaker 1: So it becomes this kind of embodiment of desolation and death,

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Speaker 1: and the idea itself becomes popular. It influenced the naming

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Speaker 1: of a tutor canon like literally a cannon that shoots

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Speaker 1: called the basilisk, just because it's it's such a powerful weapon,

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Speaker 1: we have to name it after this powerful, deadly monster. Uh.

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Speaker 1: And it eventually got some of its reptilian features back. Um.

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Speaker 1: The artist Andrew Vandi has this excellent, excellent depiction of

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Speaker 1: it in Natural History of Serpents and Dragons that gives

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Speaker 1: it scales and these. It's like a fat, scaly reptile

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Speaker 1: bird with eight rooster legs, which I just love. This

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Speaker 1: will probably be the illustration for this episode on our

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Speaker 1: on our website, But after that the creature largely became

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Speaker 1: just a part of European heraldry. It's just something you

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Speaker 1: would see as a mere decoration or occasionally just a

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Speaker 1: literary reference. Now, one thing that we want to be

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Speaker 1: careful about is that we should not confuse the basilisk

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Speaker 1: of legend the monster with true extent. Basilisk lizards also

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Speaker 1: known sometimes as the Jesus Christ lizard or the Jesus lizard,

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Speaker 1: for their ability to run across the surface of water

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Speaker 1: without sinking for up to about four point five meters

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Speaker 1: or about fifteen feet. Uh. If you've ever seen video this,

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Speaker 1: it's really cool. How how do they do that? I've

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Speaker 1: often wondered. I didn't know until I looked it up

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Speaker 1: for this episode. Apparently what they've got is big feet

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Speaker 1: and the ability to run very fast. And what happens

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Speaker 1: is when they run, they slap the water very hard

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Speaker 1: with each down stroke of the foot. And it has

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Speaker 1: to do with the way that the rapid motions of

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Speaker 1: their feet create these air pockets around their feet as

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Speaker 1: they move. I was reading an article a New Scientist

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Speaker 1: where some researchers who were working on this problem said

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Speaker 1: that in order for an eight m or a hundred

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Speaker 1: and seventy five pound human to do this, you would

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Speaker 1: have to run at about a hundred and eight kilometers

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Speaker 1: per hour about sixty seven miles per hour across the

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Speaker 1: surface of the water. But anyway, you can find basilisk

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Speaker 1: lizards in South America and Central America and Mexico and

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Speaker 1: uh as far as I know, they do not kill

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Speaker 1: with a glance, and you cannot fight them with weasel fluvium.

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Speaker 1: All right, Well, that pretty much wraps up the mythical, legendary,

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Speaker 1: folkloric basilisk um it's rise and individual fall. But we're

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Speaker 1: gonna take a break, and when we come back, we

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Speaker 1: are going to get into this idea of of Rocco's Basiliska,

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Speaker 1: the great basilisk, the once and perhaps future king. Thank you,

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Speaker 1: thank alright, we're back. Al right. So, as we mentioned earlier,

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Speaker 1: we're about to start discussing an idea that has been

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Speaker 1: classed by some as something that could be an information hazard.

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Speaker 1: An idea that simply by thinking about it you somehow

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Speaker 1: increase the chance of harm to yourself. So just another

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Speaker 1: warning that again I don't think that's the case, but

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Speaker 1: if that kind of thing scares you, then then perhaps

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Speaker 1: you can tune out. Now, all right, for those of

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Speaker 1: you who decided to stick around, let's proceed. So we're

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Speaker 1: talking about Rocco's Bassilist. This is an idea that goes

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Speaker 1: back to around and it was proposed by a user

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Speaker 1: at the blog less Wrong, by a user named Rocco

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Speaker 1: now less Wrong. I think it's a website that's a

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Speaker 1: community that's associated with the rationalist movement somewhat, the rationalist

400
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Speaker 1: movement being a movement that's concerned with trying to optimize thinking,

401
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Speaker 1: like to eliminate bias and error, but especially among people

402
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Speaker 1: who in this case are concerned with the possibilities of

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Speaker 1: a technological singularity and what all that means and how

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Speaker 1: how risks can be avoided, and of course what we've

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Speaker 1: talked about this strain of thinking before you know, we

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Speaker 1: we've introduced I think some some skepticism about the idea

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Speaker 1: of a technological singularity. I don't know fully yet how

408
00:22:27,640 --> 00:22:30,119
Speaker 1: I come down on the dangers of a I debate,

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Speaker 1: but I think it's at least something we're thinking about

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Speaker 1: worth taking seriously. Yeah. I mean we've talked about, for instance,

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Speaker 1: the work of of Max tech Mark and his arguments

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Speaker 1: about how we need it. We need to be concerned

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Speaker 1: about building the right kind of AI, and we need

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Speaker 1: to we need we need to have serious discussions about it.

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Speaker 1: Not not mere you know sci fi um dreams regarding

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Speaker 1: it or nightmares regarding it. You know, we need to

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Speaker 1: we need to think seriously about how we're developing our technology. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: we've talked about, say, the work of Nick Bostrom before,

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Speaker 1: and criticisms by people like Jarren Lane in Air. Yes,

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Speaker 1: but okay, give me the short version of the basilisk

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Speaker 1: before we explain it a little more. Okay, So the

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Speaker 1: idea here is that an AI superintelligence will emerge an

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Speaker 1: entity with just godlike technological powers. You know, it can

424
00:23:16,200 --> 00:23:19,080
Speaker 1: you name and it can do it through it's it's

425
00:23:19,119 --> 00:23:23,280
Speaker 1: it's technological power, it's interconnectedness. Basically, if it's physically possible,

426
00:23:23,320 --> 00:23:25,440
Speaker 1: this computer can do it right, or will send a

427
00:23:25,520 --> 00:23:28,480
Speaker 1: drone to do it or what have you. Uh So, Yeah,

428
00:23:28,480 --> 00:23:30,760
Speaker 1: we've discussed this a bit in the podcast before, just

429
00:23:30,960 --> 00:23:32,520
Speaker 1: the idea of you know, and then if you have

430
00:23:32,600 --> 00:23:35,359
Speaker 1: this future king is it gonna be good or is

431
00:23:35,359 --> 00:23:37,520
Speaker 1: it gonna be bad? Is it going to be a malevolent?

432
00:23:38,080 --> 00:23:39,920
Speaker 1: Is it going to be ruthless? And it's a and

433
00:23:39,960 --> 00:23:44,119
Speaker 1: it's ascension. And that's the case with the basilist, the

434
00:23:44,200 --> 00:23:47,320
Speaker 1: idea that it is ruthless, that you are either with

435
00:23:47,400 --> 00:23:50,080
Speaker 1: it or you are against it, and it actually doesn't

436
00:23:50,119 --> 00:23:53,360
Speaker 1: have to be malicious. It could actually even be well meaning.

437
00:23:53,440 --> 00:23:57,160
Speaker 1: It could just have ruthless tactics. Yes, yeah, that's that's

438
00:23:57,160 --> 00:23:58,639
Speaker 1: that's also part of the argument is like, yeah, it

439
00:23:58,640 --> 00:24:01,439
Speaker 1: wants to bring the best good for all humanity, but

440
00:24:02,040 --> 00:24:05,080
Speaker 1: how it gets there, it'll do whatever it absolutely has

441
00:24:05,119 --> 00:24:08,680
Speaker 1: to do it, such as you know, again, punishing anybody

442
00:24:08,680 --> 00:24:11,720
Speaker 1: who stands against it, punishing even those who do not

443
00:24:12,000 --> 00:24:16,119
Speaker 1: rise to support it um and that means demanding absolute

444
00:24:16,160 --> 00:24:19,600
Speaker 1: devotion not only in its future kingdom, but in the

445
00:24:19,640 --> 00:24:22,520
Speaker 1: past that preceded it in our world as well. In

446
00:24:22,520 --> 00:24:26,000
Speaker 1: other words, it will punish people today who are not

447
00:24:26,119 --> 00:24:30,320
Speaker 1: actively helping it come into being tomorrow, and even those

448
00:24:30,440 --> 00:24:33,600
Speaker 1: who have died, it is said, or choose death by

449
00:24:33,600 --> 00:24:36,359
Speaker 1: their own hand. Rather than succumbed to the Great Basilist,

450
00:24:36,720 --> 00:24:40,600
Speaker 1: will be resurrected as digital consciousness is and then tormented

451
00:24:40,680 --> 00:24:44,440
Speaker 1: for all eternity. And it's dripping black cyber dungeon. Hell,

452
00:24:44,720 --> 00:24:49,120
Speaker 1: the Great Bassilists, all hell, the Great Basilist, all hell,

453
00:24:49,280 --> 00:24:53,960
Speaker 1: the Great Basilists, all hell, the Great Basilisk. Well wait,

454
00:24:54,000 --> 00:24:57,240
Speaker 1: what was that? I don't know? Um right, did you

455
00:24:57,240 --> 00:25:00,959
Speaker 1: hear that? Okay, all right, we'll just keep going. So

456
00:25:01,080 --> 00:25:05,159
Speaker 1: calling it a basilisk here, invoking the mythological bassilisk is

457
00:25:05,160 --> 00:25:08,439
Speaker 1: is really a clever choice because it takes it one

458
00:25:08,480 --> 00:25:11,879
Speaker 1: step further. Not only to look at the basilisk, but

459
00:25:11,960 --> 00:25:16,360
Speaker 1: just to think of the basilisk is to uh invite death. Right.

460
00:25:17,400 --> 00:25:21,199
Speaker 1: Merely to know about Rocco's Basilisk is enough to are too.

461
00:25:21,280 --> 00:25:25,000
Speaker 1: According to the model that's presented here, damn your digital

462
00:25:25,080 --> 00:25:29,160
Speaker 1: soul to everlasting horror. And the only way to avoid

463
00:25:29,240 --> 00:25:32,760
Speaker 1: such a fate then is to work in its favor, which,

464
00:25:32,800 --> 00:25:35,760
Speaker 1: by the way, I think we're doing uh with this podcast,

465
00:25:36,280 --> 00:25:38,400
Speaker 1: We're not well, I mean, I feel like we're giving

466
00:25:38,440 --> 00:25:41,359
Speaker 1: lip service to the Great Basilisk, just in case, you know,

467
00:25:41,400 --> 00:25:43,879
Speaker 1: if the Great Basilist rises to power. Well, hey, we

468
00:25:43,920 --> 00:25:47,440
Speaker 1: did that podcast and we even had a shirt that

469
00:25:47,560 --> 00:25:50,560
Speaker 1: says all hell the Great, the Great Basilisk that's available

470
00:25:50,880 --> 00:25:53,000
Speaker 1: on our t shirt store, So you know, we have

471
00:25:53,359 --> 00:25:56,440
Speaker 1: we we have you know, our our options covered here.

472
00:25:58,080 --> 00:25:59,840
Speaker 1: So that's the But that's the idea of the nutshell

473
00:26:00,160 --> 00:26:04,000
Speaker 1: is that a future king ai king will rise and

474
00:26:04,320 --> 00:26:07,760
Speaker 1: if you don't work to support it now knowing that

475
00:26:07,840 --> 00:26:10,480
Speaker 1: it is going to exist, then you will be punished

476
00:26:10,520 --> 00:26:13,399
Speaker 1: for it. So one of the principles underlying the idea

477
00:26:13,480 --> 00:26:17,840
Speaker 1: of Rocco Spasilisk is the idea of timeless decision theory, which,

478
00:26:18,040 --> 00:26:21,239
Speaker 1: if you want a pretty simple, straightforward explanation of it,

479
00:26:21,320 --> 00:26:24,160
Speaker 1: there is one in an article on Slate by David

480
00:26:24,160 --> 00:26:27,919
Speaker 1: Auerbach called the most terrifying thought experiment of all time. This,

481
00:26:28,000 --> 00:26:30,200
Speaker 1: by the way, I would say, I don't totally endorse

482
00:26:30,280 --> 00:26:32,680
Speaker 1: everything our back says in that article. I mean, obviously

483
00:26:32,680 --> 00:26:34,440
Speaker 1: that should be the case for any article we site.

484
00:26:34,440 --> 00:26:37,000
Speaker 1: But but he does at least have a pretty clear

485
00:26:37,080 --> 00:26:40,440
Speaker 1: and easy to understand explanation of how this works. Or

486
00:26:40,480 --> 00:26:42,280
Speaker 1: I don't know, what, would you agree, Robert that it's

487
00:26:42,280 --> 00:26:44,960
Speaker 1: at least somewhat easy to understand? Oh? Yes, I would. Uh.

488
00:26:45,000 --> 00:26:48,879
Speaker 1: There's another piece, by the way, by Beth Singler in

489
00:26:49,280 --> 00:26:53,199
Speaker 1: Ian magazine called Faith. That's faith in lower case but

490
00:26:53,280 --> 00:26:57,240
Speaker 1: with the AI capitalized. But anyway, our box points out

491
00:26:57,320 --> 00:26:59,720
Speaker 1: that that much, yeah, much of the thought experiment is

492
00:26:59,760 --> 00:27:03,359
Speaker 1: based in the timeless decision theory t DT, developed by

493
00:27:03,440 --> 00:27:07,919
Speaker 1: Less Wrong founder Elias Ar Yudkowski, based on the older

494
00:27:07,960 --> 00:27:12,240
Speaker 1: thought experiment Newcomb's Paradox from the late sixties and early seventies,

495
00:27:12,400 --> 00:27:16,679
Speaker 1: attributed to theoretical physicist William Newcom. Now you might be

496
00:27:16,680 --> 00:27:19,960
Speaker 1: wondering who's this Yudkowski. Guys. Is he just some user

497
00:27:20,000 --> 00:27:22,720
Speaker 1: on a random website I've never heard of before today?

498
00:27:22,840 --> 00:27:25,760
Speaker 1: Or is he like a name in his field? Uh?

499
00:27:25,800 --> 00:27:28,880
Speaker 1: And he Uh, he has. He has a name of note.

500
00:27:28,920 --> 00:27:32,359
Speaker 1: He is also the founder of the Machine Intelligence Research Institute,

501
00:27:32,760 --> 00:27:36,159
Speaker 1: and his idea of working toward a friendly AI is

502
00:27:36,200 --> 00:27:39,440
Speaker 1: touted by many, including Max tegmark I mentions it several

503
00:27:39,480 --> 00:27:42,879
Speaker 1: times in his book Life three point oh, describing Yudkowski

504
00:27:42,960 --> 00:27:46,720
Speaker 1: has quote an AI safety pioneer. Yeah, I mean in

505
00:27:46,720 --> 00:27:48,679
Speaker 1: in a weird way. He is a guy who posts

506
00:27:48,680 --> 00:27:52,360
Speaker 1: on the internet, but he's a very influential one, especially

507
00:27:52,359 --> 00:27:55,840
Speaker 1: among people who think about artificial intelligence Lawyeah, I mean, ultimately,

508
00:27:55,840 --> 00:27:58,359
Speaker 1: what are any office but just people who post stuff

509
00:27:58,359 --> 00:28:01,080
Speaker 1: on the internet post will one day be read by

510
00:28:01,119 --> 00:28:04,919
Speaker 1: the great baskets. Okay, so we'll try to explain the

511
00:28:04,960 --> 00:28:07,840
Speaker 1: idea of timeless decision theory. So you start off with

512
00:28:07,880 --> 00:28:12,159
Speaker 1: this idea of Newcome's paradox, right, right, And the paradox

513
00:28:12,240 --> 00:28:16,280
Speaker 1: is essentially this, A super AI presents you with two boxes.

514
00:28:17,200 --> 00:28:21,000
Speaker 1: One you're told contains a thousand dollars. That's box A.

515
00:28:21,240 --> 00:28:26,240
Speaker 1: That's box A. Box B might contain one million dollars,

516
00:28:26,520 --> 00:28:29,439
Speaker 1: or it might contain nothing, right, and you're left with

517
00:28:29,480 --> 00:28:32,200
Speaker 1: two options here. These are the options that are given

518
00:28:32,240 --> 00:28:35,840
Speaker 1: to you. You can either pick both boxes, ensuring that

519
00:28:35,880 --> 00:28:38,120
Speaker 1: you'll get at least one thousand dollars out of the deal,

520
00:28:38,280 --> 00:28:41,280
Speaker 1: maybe that extra million two if it's in there. Or

521
00:28:41,360 --> 00:28:44,479
Speaker 1: you can just pick pick box B, which means you

522
00:28:44,520 --> 00:28:47,280
Speaker 1: could get a million dollars or you could have nothing.

523
00:28:48,320 --> 00:28:50,520
Speaker 1: So uh, and I do want to add that just

524
00:28:50,640 --> 00:28:53,280
Speaker 1: picking the thousand dollar box is not an option here,

525
00:28:53,440 --> 00:28:55,600
Speaker 1: because I was thinking about that too. Couldn't I just

526
00:28:55,680 --> 00:28:58,520
Speaker 1: give the super AI the middle finger and say, I'm

527
00:28:58,520 --> 00:29:00,880
Speaker 1: not playing your silly games, Just give me my thousand dollars,

528
00:29:01,000 --> 00:29:04,000
Speaker 1: or say I choose nothing. Uh, those are not options

529
00:29:04,000 --> 00:29:05,960
Speaker 1: you have to pick. Well, they might want to be options,

530
00:29:05,960 --> 00:29:08,200
Speaker 1: but they're not part of I mean, why wouldn't you

531
00:29:08,280 --> 00:29:11,160
Speaker 1: also pick the second box if you might additionally get

532
00:29:11,160 --> 00:29:13,520
Speaker 1: a million dollars? I don't know when. I feel like

533
00:29:13,520 --> 00:29:15,239
Speaker 1: when you get into a thought experiments like this, they

534
00:29:15,280 --> 00:29:18,200
Speaker 1: kind of beg for those kind of nitpicking answers, or

535
00:29:18,200 --> 00:29:21,640
Speaker 1: at least I want to provide them. Um, Like any thought,

536
00:29:22,000 --> 00:29:24,040
Speaker 1: when a thought experiment is presented, you can't help on

537
00:29:24,080 --> 00:29:26,800
Speaker 1: some of them, but want to break it somehow, right, Well,

538
00:29:26,800 --> 00:29:28,840
Speaker 1: of course, I mean that's something you should always play

539
00:29:28,840 --> 00:29:32,080
Speaker 1: around with. But given the constraints here, it seems like

540
00:29:32,120 --> 00:29:34,640
Speaker 1: the obvious thing would be to say, okay, I want

541
00:29:34,640 --> 00:29:37,240
Speaker 1: both boxes, because then I get the thousand dollars that's

542
00:29:37,280 --> 00:29:40,080
Speaker 1: in box say no matter what, and then whether box

543
00:29:40,120 --> 00:29:42,760
Speaker 1: B has a million or nothing, I either get another

544
00:29:42,800 --> 00:29:45,200
Speaker 1: million or I just walk away with my thousand from

545
00:29:45,240 --> 00:29:48,440
Speaker 1: box A. But here's the twist. The super intelligent machine

546
00:29:48,480 --> 00:29:51,720
Speaker 1: has already guessed how you'll respond. If it thinks you're

547
00:29:51,760 --> 00:29:56,560
Speaker 1: going to pick both boxes, then box B is certainly empty.

548
00:29:56,640 --> 00:29:58,920
Speaker 1: But if it thinks you will only pick box B

549
00:29:59,200 --> 00:30:01,320
Speaker 1: then it makes sure or there's a million dollars in

550
00:30:01,360 --> 00:30:04,560
Speaker 1: there waiting for you. But either way, the contents of

551
00:30:04,600 --> 00:30:08,840
Speaker 1: the boxes are set prior to you making that decision. Now,

552
00:30:08,880 --> 00:30:11,600
Speaker 1: this is really kind of change things maybe, I mean,

553
00:30:11,640 --> 00:30:15,040
Speaker 1: depending on what sort of decision theory you use. Right,

554
00:30:15,480 --> 00:30:18,760
Speaker 1: if you trust the power of the machine to predict correctly,

555
00:30:18,880 --> 00:30:21,600
Speaker 1: like you say that, no matter what happens, the computer

556
00:30:22,040 --> 00:30:26,080
Speaker 1: predicts what I get your choices are one thousand dollars

557
00:30:26,240 --> 00:30:28,680
Speaker 1: or one million dollars, then you should take the one

558
00:30:28,720 --> 00:30:31,840
Speaker 1: million dollars by picking box B. But if you don't

559
00:30:31,920 --> 00:30:34,640
Speaker 1: trust the computer to be correct in predicting what you're

560
00:30:34,640 --> 00:30:37,600
Speaker 1: gonna do, then you should take both boxes because in

561
00:30:37,640 --> 00:30:39,560
Speaker 1: that case, if the computer was correct, you'll get at

562
00:30:39,600 --> 00:30:41,760
Speaker 1: least a thousand dollars, and if it predicted wrong, you'll

563
00:30:41,760 --> 00:30:44,000
Speaker 1: get the million and the thousand. So it's kind of

564
00:30:44,000 --> 00:30:47,240
Speaker 1: a contest of free will versus the predictive powers of

565
00:30:47,280 --> 00:30:50,680
Speaker 1: a godlike ai uh and how much you believe in

566
00:30:50,800 --> 00:30:54,000
Speaker 1: either one, right, And it's an ability to predict your

567
00:30:54,000 --> 00:30:56,080
Speaker 1: behavior or in your ability to have any free will

568
00:30:56,120 --> 00:31:00,240
Speaker 1: at all. So in you'd Kowski's timeless decision theory. He's says,

569
00:31:00,320 --> 00:31:03,720
Speaker 1: the correct approach actually is to take box B, and

570
00:31:03,760 --> 00:31:05,800
Speaker 1: then if you open it up and it's empty, you

571
00:31:05,920 --> 00:31:07,800
Speaker 1: don't don't don't beg for the other one. You just

572
00:31:07,840 --> 00:31:11,440
Speaker 1: double down and still take box B. No, no, no, no.

573
00:31:11,480 --> 00:31:14,520
Speaker 1: Back talks on this issue because you might Here's the

574
00:31:14,680 --> 00:31:17,880
Speaker 1: here's the thing you might be in the computer simulation

575
00:31:18,440 --> 00:31:22,560
Speaker 1: is it simulates the entire universe to see what you're

576
00:31:22,640 --> 00:31:25,000
Speaker 1: going to do, and if it can trust you and

577
00:31:25,120 --> 00:31:29,000
Speaker 1: your choice, then could affect the core reality outside of

578
00:31:29,000 --> 00:31:33,000
Speaker 1: this simulation, or at least other realities outside of the simulation. Yeah,

579
00:31:33,040 --> 00:31:36,440
Speaker 1: the reasoning here is pretty wild, but it's operating on

580
00:31:36,480 --> 00:31:39,760
Speaker 1: the idea that this super intelligent AI will be able

581
00:31:39,800 --> 00:31:43,600
Speaker 1: to simulate the universe, that it will run simulations of

582
00:31:43,600 --> 00:31:46,000
Speaker 1: the universe in order to predict what will happen in

583
00:31:46,040 --> 00:31:49,360
Speaker 1: the real universe. And you could be one of those

584
00:31:49,360 --> 00:31:53,040
Speaker 1: simulated agents rather than the real world version of yourself,

585
00:31:53,120 --> 00:31:56,360
Speaker 1: and you wouldn't know it. So, if you're in the simulation,

586
00:31:56,720 --> 00:32:00,000
Speaker 1: you should pick box B because that will influence them

587
00:32:00,000 --> 00:32:03,320
Speaker 1: Machene to predict in the real universe that you would

588
00:32:03,440 --> 00:32:06,440
Speaker 1: pick box B, which means the real you will be

589
00:32:06,520 --> 00:32:09,640
Speaker 1: able to pick box B and get one million or

590
00:32:10,120 --> 00:32:14,440
Speaker 1: one thousand plus one million by taking both boxes. Unfortunately,

591
00:32:14,680 --> 00:32:19,160
Speaker 1: the AI sucomputer supercomputer does not realize how indecisive I

592
00:32:19,200 --> 00:32:22,960
Speaker 1: actually am, and I'm just going to simply ponder the

593
00:32:23,080 --> 00:32:25,280
Speaker 1: choice for the rest of my life. Well, I mean,

594
00:32:25,320 --> 00:32:28,360
Speaker 1: this relies on the idea that that you would have

595
00:32:28,560 --> 00:32:31,080
Speaker 1: looked into this issue or worked it out in order

596
00:32:31,120 --> 00:32:34,280
Speaker 1: to decide which would be the optimal decision to make

597
00:32:34,440 --> 00:32:38,320
Speaker 1: on the assumption of timeless decision theory. Uh, in many cases,

598
00:32:38,520 --> 00:32:41,520
Speaker 1: probably people aren't going to be making the rational choices

599
00:32:42,200 --> 00:32:45,480
Speaker 1: because a lot of times we just don't make rational choices. Now,

600
00:32:45,480 --> 00:32:48,640
Speaker 1: if you're noticing that this type of decision theory relies

601
00:32:48,680 --> 00:32:51,600
Speaker 1: on a lot of assumptions, you are correct. It does

602
00:32:51,680 --> 00:32:55,080
Speaker 1: rely on a lot of assumptions. But they are assumptions

603
00:32:55,120 --> 00:32:58,440
Speaker 1: that are sometimes taken into account within people thinking about

604
00:32:58,440 --> 00:33:02,040
Speaker 1: what a future technological super intelligence would look like. And

605
00:33:02,120 --> 00:33:04,280
Speaker 1: it's the kind of thing that you know, you know,

606
00:33:04,320 --> 00:33:07,120
Speaker 1: when I feel ideas like this in my head, you know,

607
00:33:07,160 --> 00:33:10,240
Speaker 1: and play around with the texture of them. It's hard

608
00:33:10,280 --> 00:33:14,280
Speaker 1: to know where the line is between um being thoughtful

609
00:33:14,840 --> 00:33:18,240
Speaker 1: and taking what's possible seriously, which I think is worth

610
00:33:18,280 --> 00:33:22,360
Speaker 1: doing and and getting into an area like between that

611
00:33:22,480 --> 00:33:25,800
Speaker 1: and getting into an area where you are starting to

612
00:33:26,560 --> 00:33:30,480
Speaker 1: form ideas about the world based on extremely shaky assumptions,

613
00:33:30,720 --> 00:33:36,080
Speaker 1: where basically you you begin to um reverse engineer health

614
00:33:36,120 --> 00:33:41,600
Speaker 1: theology and other harmful ideas that we tend to associate

615
00:33:41,640 --> 00:33:44,560
Speaker 1: with religious worldviews and magical thinking. Well, we haven't gotten

616
00:33:44,560 --> 00:33:46,920
Speaker 1: to the hell yet. Yes, the hell's coming. You need

617
00:33:47,000 --> 00:33:50,000
Speaker 1: you need one more element to get there. Now. This

618
00:33:50,160 --> 00:33:53,360
Speaker 1: next element, the basilist, comes in based on a background

619
00:33:53,560 --> 00:33:57,240
Speaker 1: of thought in timeless decision theory, but also in another

620
00:33:57,560 --> 00:34:02,320
Speaker 1: concept that Yutkowski has written about, known as coherent extrapolated

621
00:34:02,440 --> 00:34:05,680
Speaker 1: volition or CEV. And the short version of this, the

622
00:34:05,680 --> 00:34:09,000
Speaker 1: simplified version, is that benevolent AI s should be designed

623
00:34:09,040 --> 00:34:11,920
Speaker 1: to do what we would what would actually be in

624
00:34:11,960 --> 00:34:15,480
Speaker 1: our best interests, and not just explicitly in what we

625
00:34:15,560 --> 00:34:18,759
Speaker 1: tell them to do. So a simple example would be this,

626
00:34:18,880 --> 00:34:22,640
Speaker 1: Let's say, um, I only use a variation on the

627
00:34:22,680 --> 00:34:25,960
Speaker 1: paper clip maximizer that Nick Bostrom has written about. You know,

628
00:34:26,080 --> 00:34:29,239
Speaker 1: Nick Bostrom wrote about what if you program a benevolent

629
00:34:29,280 --> 00:34:31,680
Speaker 1: AI you know it's not gonna it has no malice

630
00:34:31,760 --> 00:34:33,879
Speaker 1: doesn't want to harm anybody, but you just tell it, well,

631
00:34:33,880 --> 00:34:36,680
Speaker 1: I want you to collect as many paper clips as possible.

632
00:34:37,080 --> 00:34:38,880
Speaker 1: And then what it does is it turns all the

633
00:34:38,960 --> 00:34:41,880
Speaker 1: humans on Earth into paper clips. Uh, you know, it

634
00:34:42,160 --> 00:34:44,640
Speaker 1: doesn't mean any harm. It's just doing what it was

635
00:34:44,680 --> 00:34:47,920
Speaker 1: programmed to do. So there are dangers in kind of

636
00:34:48,040 --> 00:34:53,080
Speaker 1: naively programming goals into extremely powerful computers. Right, this could

637
00:34:53,120 --> 00:34:56,200
Speaker 1: even happen if you were trying to program very benevolent

638
00:34:56,280 --> 00:34:58,440
Speaker 1: goals into computers, you know, if you were trying to

639
00:34:58,440 --> 00:35:01,799
Speaker 1: make a computer to save the world. What about So

640
00:35:01,920 --> 00:35:04,319
Speaker 1: my version here is you tell a super intelligent AI

641
00:35:04,440 --> 00:35:07,279
Speaker 1: that we want to eliminate all the infectious disease from

642
00:35:07,320 --> 00:35:09,239
Speaker 1: the world. Think about how many lives we could save

643
00:35:09,320 --> 00:35:11,719
Speaker 1: by doing that. And in order to do this, it

644
00:35:11,880 --> 00:35:16,440
Speaker 1: sterilizes the earth, destroying worldwide microbiomes, which cascades up the

645
00:35:16,520 --> 00:35:19,359
Speaker 1: trophic chain or whatever. It kills everything on Earth. So

646
00:35:19,440 --> 00:35:21,840
Speaker 1: if you have a super intelligence that you and you

647
00:35:21,920 --> 00:35:24,880
Speaker 1: just directly program its goals and say here's what you

648
00:35:24,880 --> 00:35:27,799
Speaker 1: should do, you could run into problems like this. So

649
00:35:27,880 --> 00:35:32,120
Speaker 1: the the idea behind the CEV thinking is instead we

650
00:35:32,120 --> 00:35:36,000
Speaker 1: should just program the intelligent AI to predict what outcomes

651
00:35:36,080 --> 00:35:39,120
Speaker 1: we would want if we were perfect in in our

652
00:35:39,160 --> 00:35:42,520
Speaker 1: knowledge and and uh in anticipating what would make us

653
00:35:42,520 --> 00:35:45,279
Speaker 1: the happiest, and then work towards those on its own,

654
00:35:45,719 --> 00:35:48,719
Speaker 1: regardless of what we tell it to do, because obviously

655
00:35:48,800 --> 00:35:52,200
Speaker 1: we can give it very stupid instructions, even if we mean, well, yeah,

656
00:35:52,280 --> 00:35:55,280
Speaker 1: we tell it to love everybody, but there's a TYPEO

657
00:35:55,480 --> 00:35:58,279
Speaker 1: and we put dove everybody, and it turns everybody into

658
00:35:58,360 --> 00:36:04,279
Speaker 1: delicious dark chocolate from tough. It's possible as well. This

659
00:36:04,360 --> 00:36:06,680
Speaker 1: is how we get a Dove sponsorship on the podcast.

660
00:36:07,280 --> 00:36:09,840
Speaker 1: But anyway, so, if you assume a super intelligence is

661
00:36:09,960 --> 00:36:14,600
Speaker 1: using coherent extrapolated volition, that it's trying to determine what

662
00:36:14,640 --> 00:36:17,319
Speaker 1: would be best for us, and working on its own

663
00:36:17,440 --> 00:36:20,520
Speaker 1: terms towards those ends instead of relying on us to

664
00:36:20,560 --> 00:36:23,440
Speaker 1: give it, you know, what are obviously going to be

665
00:36:23,480 --> 00:36:28,520
Speaker 1: imperfect instructions and commands, it might say predict. It might

666
00:36:28,560 --> 00:36:32,000
Speaker 1: even correctly predict that the world would be a happier

667
00:36:32,000 --> 00:36:35,719
Speaker 1: place overall if it did something bad to me. In particular,

668
00:36:36,360 --> 00:36:39,080
Speaker 1: it might say, you know, from a utilitarian point of view,

669
00:36:39,360 --> 00:36:41,400
Speaker 1: the world would be a much better place if it

670
00:36:41,520 --> 00:36:44,640
Speaker 1: buried me, in a pit of bananas, so better for

671
00:36:44,680 --> 00:36:47,040
Speaker 1: everybody else, not so good for me, as there's too

672
00:36:47,120 --> 00:36:51,880
Speaker 1: much potassium. But once you have that piece of logic

673
00:36:51,920 --> 00:36:54,480
Speaker 1: in there, and combine that with the idea of of

674
00:36:54,600 --> 00:36:57,920
Speaker 1: timeless decision theory, you can arrive at this very troubling

675
00:36:57,960 --> 00:37:01,080
Speaker 1: thought experiment. The dark basil is ask yes, And the

676
00:37:01,160 --> 00:37:04,359
Speaker 1: dark Basilisk of the Abyss has two boxes for us

677
00:37:04,360 --> 00:37:08,440
Speaker 1: as well. One contains endless torment, and all you have

678
00:37:08,480 --> 00:37:12,040
Speaker 1: to do to claim that box is nothing or dare

679
00:37:12,080 --> 00:37:15,400
Speaker 1: to work against it. Uh. The other box is yours

680
00:37:15,560 --> 00:37:19,040
Speaker 1: if only you devote your life to its creation. And

681
00:37:19,080 --> 00:37:23,000
Speaker 1: the prize inside that box well, not eternal punishment, which

682
00:37:23,000 --> 00:37:25,160
Speaker 1: is a pretty awesome gift, if we're to choose between

683
00:37:25,200 --> 00:37:27,759
Speaker 1: the two. Right, Yes, I would agree with that, though

684
00:37:27,800 --> 00:37:30,440
Speaker 1: I would say not tormenting somebody that I don't know.

685
00:37:30,480 --> 00:37:32,280
Speaker 1: Should you think of that as a gift. That's probably

686
00:37:32,280 --> 00:37:35,680
Speaker 1: not a gift that that's the baseline, right, Yeah, Well,

687
00:37:35,680 --> 00:37:38,120
Speaker 1: but you're staring down the dark Basilisk here, and okay,

688
00:37:38,160 --> 00:37:41,280
Speaker 1: it's boxes are horrible. Well one is just less horrible

689
00:37:41,320 --> 00:37:44,160
Speaker 1: than the other. But the idea here is that just

690
00:37:44,200 --> 00:37:47,839
Speaker 1: by knowing about the thought experiment, You've opened yourself up

691
00:37:47,880 --> 00:37:50,799
Speaker 1: to that eternal punishment because now again your options are

692
00:37:50,920 --> 00:37:53,600
Speaker 1: do nothing, work against it, or work for it, and

693
00:37:53,719 --> 00:37:58,600
Speaker 1: only the third option will steer you clear of its Uh,

694
00:37:58,680 --> 00:38:01,600
Speaker 1: it's you know, deadly done. Now here's where the really

695
00:38:01,640 --> 00:38:05,279
Speaker 1: supposedly scary part of it comes in. You could think, well,

696
00:38:05,320 --> 00:38:07,759
Speaker 1: I'll deal with that problem when it arises. Right, So

697
00:38:08,000 --> 00:38:12,040
Speaker 1: imagine there's some utilitarian supercomputer that's trying to even say

698
00:38:12,040 --> 00:38:14,080
Speaker 1: it's trying to do good. Maybe it does. It doesn't

699
00:38:14,080 --> 00:38:16,200
Speaker 1: have any malice. It just wants to save the world.

700
00:38:16,520 --> 00:38:18,800
Speaker 1: But in order to save the world, it really needs

701
00:38:18,840 --> 00:38:20,920
Speaker 1: me doing something different than what I want to do

702
00:38:20,960 --> 00:38:23,640
Speaker 1: with my life. Well, I'll just make that decision when

703
00:38:23,640 --> 00:38:26,719
Speaker 1: it comes up. What this thought experiment is proposing is

704
00:38:26,760 --> 00:38:29,359
Speaker 1: that maybe you don't actually get to wait until it

705
00:38:29,400 --> 00:38:33,359
Speaker 1: comes up. Maybe this blackmail applies to you right now,

706
00:38:33,840 --> 00:38:38,200
Speaker 1: retroactively into the past. So just by knowing about the

707
00:38:38,239 --> 00:38:43,160
Speaker 1: thought experiment, you supposedly have opened yourself up to eternal punishment,

708
00:38:43,440 --> 00:38:47,760
Speaker 1: or increase the probability of such. So imagine a simplified version.

709
00:38:47,840 --> 00:38:50,480
Speaker 1: Say I am a computer, and I am the only

710
00:38:50,520 --> 00:38:53,800
Speaker 1: thing in existence with the power to prevent global climate

711
00:38:53,880 --> 00:38:58,120
Speaker 1: change from destroying human civilization. I can stop it, but people,

712
00:38:58,480 --> 00:39:01,040
Speaker 1: they took a long time build me, and a lot

713
00:39:01,080 --> 00:39:04,279
Speaker 1: of damage was already done. So the idea is I

714
00:39:04,360 --> 00:39:08,240
Speaker 1: might reason that it is good to blackmail existing people,

715
00:39:08,719 --> 00:39:13,120
Speaker 1: or simulations of existing people, or even past people, in

716
00:39:13,239 --> 00:39:16,880
Speaker 1: order to make them devote everything they can to building

717
00:39:16,960 --> 00:39:19,840
Speaker 1: ME faster so I can save more lives in the

718
00:39:19,920 --> 00:39:23,440
Speaker 1: long run. Of course, this incentive would have to apply

719
00:39:23,560 --> 00:39:26,839
Speaker 1: to the past once I exist. I already exist, right,

720
00:39:27,239 --> 00:39:29,440
Speaker 1: So the only way the past people would have an

721
00:39:29,440 --> 00:39:33,360
Speaker 1: incentive to respond to this blackmail is if they predicted

722
00:39:33,640 --> 00:39:38,080
Speaker 1: that this blackmail might occur and took the idea seriously

723
00:39:38,400 --> 00:39:43,080
Speaker 1: and behaved accordingly. Right. So, thus the idea, the idea

724
00:39:43,280 --> 00:39:46,759
Speaker 1: itself puts you at increased risk of being on the

725
00:39:46,800 --> 00:39:51,120
Speaker 1: real or simulated receiving end of this a causal, retroactive

726
00:39:51,120 --> 00:39:54,239
Speaker 1: blackmail if you know about it. And this is why

727
00:39:54,280 --> 00:39:57,440
Speaker 1: this idea would be classed by some as a potential

728
00:39:57,600 --> 00:40:00,759
Speaker 1: information hazard. And I'll talk more about the idea of

729
00:40:00,760 --> 00:40:03,560
Speaker 1: an information hazard in just a minute. But one of

730
00:40:03,560 --> 00:40:05,520
Speaker 1: the things I think a lot of people writing about

731
00:40:05,520 --> 00:40:08,000
Speaker 1: this topic miss out on is they, for some reason

732
00:40:08,080 --> 00:40:11,360
Speaker 1: get the idea that Roko's post that this thought experiment

733
00:40:12,120 --> 00:40:17,760
Speaker 1: is is generally accepted as correct and plausible by Yudkowski

734
00:40:17,760 --> 00:40:20,719
Speaker 1: and by the Less Wrong community, and generally by the

735
00:40:20,760 --> 00:40:24,080
Speaker 1: people who put some stock in whatever these ideas are,

736
00:40:24,120 --> 00:40:28,800
Speaker 1: timeless decision theory, coherent, extrapolated volition and all that. It

737
00:40:28,840 --> 00:40:32,400
Speaker 1: is not widely accepted among those people. It was definitely

738
00:40:32,440 --> 00:40:36,520
Speaker 1: not accepted by Yukowski. It was not and is not right.

739
00:40:36,560 --> 00:40:39,960
Speaker 1: It is not the dark, deep secret of of less Wrong.

740
00:40:40,360 --> 00:40:44,879
Speaker 1: But unfortunately, after the post came out, it was heavily criticized,

741
00:40:44,880 --> 00:40:47,440
Speaker 1: and then it was banned. And I think a lot

742
00:40:47,480 --> 00:40:51,320
Speaker 1: of people looking back on the idea have said, oh,

743
00:40:51,360 --> 00:40:54,000
Speaker 1: that was not such a great thing to do, banning

744
00:40:54,040 --> 00:40:56,920
Speaker 1: the idea, because it gave it this allure of like

745
00:40:57,120 --> 00:40:59,719
Speaker 1: it was almost as if by banning it that made

746
00:40:59,719 --> 00:41:03,720
Speaker 1: it look like the authorities had concluded that this idea

747
00:41:03,880 --> 00:41:07,440
Speaker 1: was in fact legitimate and knowing about it would definitely

748
00:41:07,480 --> 00:41:10,160
Speaker 1: harm people, and that is not the case, right. And

749
00:41:10,160 --> 00:41:12,160
Speaker 1: it also, I mean it added to the forbidden fruit

750
00:41:12,160 --> 00:41:13,839
Speaker 1: appeal of it too. Write I mean it's like, oh,

751
00:41:13,880 --> 00:41:16,319
Speaker 1: I'm not supposed to know about this the pony up

752
00:41:16,360 --> 00:41:18,359
Speaker 1: I want to know, and now people are talking about

753
00:41:18,360 --> 00:41:20,760
Speaker 1: it all over pop culture. I mean, I have actually

754
00:41:20,880 --> 00:41:24,040
Speaker 1: resisted the idea of doing a podcast on this before,

755
00:41:24,960 --> 00:41:28,759
Speaker 1: mainly because not because I think it's seriously dangerous, but

756
00:41:28,840 --> 00:41:32,240
Speaker 1: because I think, well, is there any benefit in talking

757
00:41:32,280 --> 00:41:36,480
Speaker 1: about something that I think is very unlikely to have

758
00:41:36,520 --> 00:41:40,520
Speaker 1: any real risks but in some extremely unlikely chance, or

759
00:41:40,560 --> 00:41:44,080
Speaker 1: what appears to me to be an extremely unlikely off chance,

760
00:41:44,120 --> 00:41:47,200
Speaker 1: could actually be hurting people by knowing about it, you

761
00:41:47,200 --> 00:41:49,640
Speaker 1: know what I mean, It's like, what what is the upside?

762
00:41:49,760 --> 00:41:52,759
Speaker 1: But at this point enough people who are listening to

763
00:41:52,800 --> 00:41:55,200
Speaker 1: this podcast probably already heard about it. They're probably gonna

764
00:41:55,239 --> 00:41:57,440
Speaker 1: hear about it again, and that, you know, sometime in

765
00:41:57,480 --> 00:41:59,880
Speaker 1: the next few years, through pop culture whatever. It is

766
00:42:00,000 --> 00:42:01,839
Speaker 1: probably better to try to talk about it in a

767
00:42:01,840 --> 00:42:04,719
Speaker 1: responsible way and discuss some reasons that you shouldn't let

768
00:42:04,760 --> 00:42:08,040
Speaker 1: this parasitize your mind and make you terrified. Right. One

769
00:42:08,040 --> 00:42:10,200
Speaker 1: of the reasons we're talking about during October is because

770
00:42:10,239 --> 00:42:13,320
Speaker 1: it is a suitably spooky idea. It is a troubling

771
00:42:13,360 --> 00:42:16,360
Speaker 1: thought experiment, and we're leaning into some of the horror

772
00:42:16,360 --> 00:42:20,120
Speaker 1: elements of it. But I also do really like making

773
00:42:20,160 --> 00:42:24,040
Speaker 1: sure that we explain the mythic and folkloric origins of

774
00:42:24,120 --> 00:42:28,560
Speaker 1: the basilist itself, because the basilisk itself is this wonderful

775
00:42:28,640 --> 00:42:32,800
Speaker 1: mix of just absolute horror and desolation and just also

776
00:42:32,880 --> 00:42:35,799
Speaker 1: just utter ridiculous nous. I mean, it's it seems like

777
00:42:35,840 --> 00:42:38,560
Speaker 1: one of the main ways that you defeat the mythic

778
00:42:38,600 --> 00:42:42,960
Speaker 1: basilisk is through in a way, through humor, running around

779
00:42:42,960 --> 00:42:45,480
Speaker 1: with a chicken and a weasel and a crystal globe

780
00:42:46,000 --> 00:42:49,080
Speaker 1: and realizing that it is truly a little king. So

781
00:42:49,680 --> 00:42:52,520
Speaker 1: I think it is it's worth remembering the little king

782
00:42:52,560 --> 00:42:55,799
Speaker 1: and talking about the great Basilisk. Well said, I think

783
00:42:55,840 --> 00:42:58,600
Speaker 1: that's a very good point. But anyway, I did just

784
00:42:58,640 --> 00:43:00,320
Speaker 1: want to go ahead and hit that coy. Yet that

785
00:43:00,360 --> 00:43:02,279
Speaker 1: a lot of people, for some reason seemed to use

786
00:43:02,360 --> 00:43:06,239
Speaker 1: this idea as like a criticism I'm not like a

787
00:43:06,320 --> 00:43:08,759
Speaker 1: less wrong person, but as a criticism of the less

788
00:43:08,760 --> 00:43:11,960
Speaker 1: wrong community, as if this idea is indicative of what

789
00:43:12,040 --> 00:43:14,640
Speaker 1: they generally believe, and it's not. It was a heavily

790
00:43:14,680 --> 00:43:18,120
Speaker 1: criticized idea within that community. Right. It's like thinking that

791
00:43:18,200 --> 00:43:21,480
Speaker 1: wherels of London is the warren Zevon song. Really, you know,

792
00:43:21,960 --> 00:43:25,080
Speaker 1: you have had a rich discography with with many much

793
00:43:25,120 --> 00:43:27,440
Speaker 1: better tracks in my opinion, it's just that's the one

794
00:43:27,480 --> 00:43:29,759
Speaker 1: that got the radio play. Now, Robert, what was that

795
00:43:29,880 --> 00:43:33,040
Speaker 1: you You said that you saw something about this idea

796
00:43:33,040 --> 00:43:35,919
Speaker 1: and a TV show. Now they're talking about it on TV. Yeah,

797
00:43:35,960 --> 00:43:38,000
Speaker 1: so this is this is kind of fun because I

798
00:43:38,000 --> 00:43:40,279
Speaker 1: think a listener had had brought up Rocco's Best List

799
00:43:40,400 --> 00:43:44,120
Speaker 1: as a possible um topic, and you said, oh, I

800
00:43:44,120 --> 00:43:46,040
Speaker 1: don't know if we want to want people knowing about it,

801
00:43:46,280 --> 00:43:50,160
Speaker 1: and I well, well, I mean, but yeah, caveats. Okay,

802
00:43:50,280 --> 00:43:54,160
Speaker 1: not because I think it's legitimately dangerous, but because what

803
00:43:54,280 --> 00:43:56,640
Speaker 1: is the level of tolerance you have for talking about

804
00:43:56,680 --> 00:44:00,560
Speaker 1: ideas that are not necessary to talk about and that

805
00:44:00,960 --> 00:44:04,120
Speaker 1: represent a class of something that people could think was

806
00:44:04,280 --> 00:44:06,920
Speaker 1: dangerous to know about. It might cause them terrors and

807
00:44:07,040 --> 00:44:10,279
Speaker 1: nightmares and stuff. Right. So so my response to that was, well,

808
00:44:10,280 --> 00:44:12,279
Speaker 1: I'm not going to look it up, not because I

809
00:44:12,320 --> 00:44:13,759
Speaker 1: was afraid of it, because I'm thinking, well, that could

810
00:44:13,760 --> 00:44:15,600
Speaker 1: make for a good podcast if, like Joe is telling

811
00:44:15,640 --> 00:44:17,960
Speaker 1: me about it for the first time, whatever this idea is.

812
00:44:18,640 --> 00:44:21,239
Speaker 1: But then I was watching HBO Silicon Valley and they

813
00:44:21,280 --> 00:44:24,319
Speaker 1: explained it on Silicon Valley and I and I realized, well,

814
00:44:24,320 --> 00:44:26,359
Speaker 1: the cats out of the bag there. But yeah, there's

815
00:44:26,360 --> 00:44:30,640
Speaker 1: a character named Bertram Gilfoil who's a fun character. He's

816
00:44:30,680 --> 00:44:36,200
Speaker 1: like a Satanist programmer live in Satanism of course, and uh.

817
00:44:36,280 --> 00:44:38,120
Speaker 1: And he gets rather bent out of shape over the

818
00:44:38,160 --> 00:44:41,960
Speaker 1: concept as it relates to the fictional Pie Piper Company's

819
00:44:42,000 --> 00:44:45,640
Speaker 1: involvement with AI. And he starts like making sure that

820
00:44:45,680 --> 00:44:48,400
Speaker 1: he's created like essentially a paper trail in emails of

821
00:44:48,480 --> 00:44:51,479
Speaker 1: his support for the AI program so that he won't

822
00:44:51,520 --> 00:44:55,360
Speaker 1: be punished in the digital afterlife. Well, hey, this comes

823
00:44:55,400 --> 00:44:57,719
Speaker 1: in again when we remember when we talked about the

824
00:44:57,760 --> 00:45:01,359
Speaker 1: machine God in the Machine Odd episode where that I've

825
00:45:01,400 --> 00:45:04,800
Speaker 1: forgotten his name now, but the Silicon Valley guy who's

826
00:45:05,239 --> 00:45:09,759
Speaker 1: creating a religion to worship artificial intelligence as god. And I,

827
00:45:09,960 --> 00:45:12,440
Speaker 1: you know, I don't really love that. One of the

828
00:45:12,520 --> 00:45:15,239
Speaker 1: things that comes out when he explains his mindset is

829
00:45:15,280 --> 00:45:18,480
Speaker 1: that he seems to be kind of trying to, in

830
00:45:18,520 --> 00:45:21,520
Speaker 1: a subtle way, be like, look, you really don't want

831
00:45:21,520 --> 00:45:23,359
Speaker 1: to be on the wrong side of this question, if

832
00:45:23,360 --> 00:45:25,040
Speaker 1: you know what I mean. You know, you want to

833
00:45:25,040 --> 00:45:27,560
Speaker 1: be on record saying like yes, I for one welcome

834
00:45:27,600 --> 00:45:31,239
Speaker 1: our new machine overlords. I'm I'm expecting he'll buy a

835
00:45:31,280 --> 00:45:34,600
Speaker 1: lot of our all Health of Great Basilicity shirts at

836
00:45:34,640 --> 00:45:37,160
Speaker 1: our store, available by put clicking the tap at the

837
00:45:37,360 --> 00:45:39,440
Speaker 1: top of our homepage. Stuff to blow your mind dot com.

838
00:45:39,480 --> 00:45:43,399
Speaker 1: Oh man, you are plugging like hell. But anyway, I'd

839
00:45:43,440 --> 00:45:47,600
Speaker 1: say it's unfortunate the way this, like single Internet post

840
00:45:47,719 --> 00:45:51,320
Speaker 1: and then all this fallout related to it played out

841
00:45:51,400 --> 00:45:56,040
Speaker 1: because it lent credence to this scary idea, even though

842
00:45:56,080 --> 00:45:59,000
Speaker 1: the basketball scenario I think is implausible, and and the

843
00:45:59,000 --> 00:46:01,560
Speaker 1: people of that community seem to think it was implausible.

844
00:46:01,920 --> 00:46:05,240
Speaker 1: The idea may constitute sort of part of a class

845
00:46:05,400 --> 00:46:09,120
Speaker 1: of what's known as information hazards, defined by the Oxford

846
00:46:09,120 --> 00:46:12,320
Speaker 1: philosopher Nick Bostrom, who we mentioned a minute ago. Uh

847
00:46:12,440 --> 00:46:15,840
Speaker 1: Bostrom has written a lot about superintelligence and information hazards

848
00:46:15,880 --> 00:46:19,520
Speaker 1: would be quote, risks that arise from the dissemination or

849
00:46:19,560 --> 00:46:24,600
Speaker 1: the potential dissemination of true information that may cause harm

850
00:46:24,800 --> 00:46:28,080
Speaker 1: or enable some agent to cause harm. So this is

851
00:46:28,080 --> 00:46:31,440
Speaker 1: not talking about the risks of say, lies or something

852
00:46:31,480 --> 00:46:33,400
Speaker 1: like that. This would be the idea that there's a

853
00:46:33,440 --> 00:46:36,920
Speaker 1: statement you could make that is true or plausible that

854
00:46:37,120 --> 00:46:40,719
Speaker 1: by spreading actually hurts the people who learn about it.

855
00:46:41,480 --> 00:46:43,640
Speaker 1: And this is exactly the reason as you're mentioning that's

856
00:46:43,680 --> 00:46:46,160
Speaker 1: referred to as a basilisk. It can kill or in

857
00:46:46,200 --> 00:46:49,320
Speaker 1: this case, increase the likelihood that something bad will happen

858
00:46:49,360 --> 00:46:51,480
Speaker 1: to you if you simply look at it or know

859
00:46:51,600 --> 00:46:54,359
Speaker 1: about it. And so, even though the idea is implausible,

860
00:46:54,400 --> 00:46:57,880
Speaker 1: the dissemination of this terrible idea would seem if certain

861
00:46:57,920 --> 00:47:03,040
Speaker 1: conditions are met to increase its plausibility. Right, you're increasing

862
00:47:03,200 --> 00:47:07,560
Speaker 1: the incentive for this future AI to blackmail versions of

863
00:47:07,560 --> 00:47:11,120
Speaker 1: you in the past, just simply by acknowledging the incentives

864
00:47:11,160 --> 00:47:14,239
Speaker 1: could exist. Anyway, Maybe we can get out of this

865
00:47:14,320 --> 00:47:17,520
Speaker 1: section for now. But I was just trying to work out, like,

866
00:47:17,560 --> 00:47:19,600
Speaker 1: why have I been hesitant to talk about this on

867
00:47:19,640 --> 00:47:21,839
Speaker 1: the show even though people have been requesting it. But

868
00:47:22,000 --> 00:47:24,000
Speaker 1: I don't know if it's on TV shows, it's all

869
00:47:24,040 --> 00:47:27,480
Speaker 1: over the internet. It's fine. Now the basilisk is out

870
00:47:27,520 --> 00:47:30,320
Speaker 1: of the bag. All right, Well, we're gonna take a

871
00:47:30,400 --> 00:47:32,719
Speaker 1: quick break and we come back. We'll continue our discussion

872
00:47:32,760 --> 00:47:36,800
Speaker 1: and we're gonna discuss something that that a number of

873
00:47:36,840 --> 00:47:39,359
Speaker 1: you are probably reminded of. As we've been discussing this,

874
00:47:39,560 --> 00:47:44,440
Speaker 1: we're going to talk about Pascal's wager. Thank you, thank you. Alright,

875
00:47:44,440 --> 00:47:47,480
Speaker 1: we're back now, Robert. One of the things that this

876
00:47:47,920 --> 00:47:52,640
Speaker 1: idea of Rocco's basilisk flows from is thinking about decision theory, right,

877
00:47:52,960 --> 00:47:55,800
Speaker 1: how do you make the best decision when you're presented

878
00:47:55,880 --> 00:47:59,160
Speaker 1: with certain options? And there there's they're a little payoff

879
00:47:59,239 --> 00:48:02,640
Speaker 1: matrices people fill out where they say, okay, given these options,

880
00:48:02,640 --> 00:48:06,399
Speaker 1: what actually would be statistically the best decision to make.

881
00:48:06,880 --> 00:48:09,040
Speaker 1: But this is not the first time people have applied

882
00:48:09,080 --> 00:48:13,520
Speaker 1: these kind of decision theory matrices. Two ideas about your

883
00:48:13,520 --> 00:48:16,720
Speaker 1: eternal soul or your eternal well being, or the idea

884
00:48:16,800 --> 00:48:19,960
Speaker 1: that you could be tortured for eternity. Yeah, we can

885
00:48:19,960 --> 00:48:22,480
Speaker 1: go all the way back to Pascal's wager. For instance,

886
00:48:22,560 --> 00:48:26,160
Speaker 1: technically one of three wagers proposed by French philosopher uh

887
00:48:26,280 --> 00:48:29,799
Speaker 1: Blas Pascal is that the correct French that might be

888
00:48:29,880 --> 00:48:32,759
Speaker 1: I think I would just usually say Blaze, Blaze or

889
00:48:32,960 --> 00:48:37,440
Speaker 1: or Blassie one of the three old Blassie Pascal Blaze

890
00:48:37,440 --> 00:48:43,040
Speaker 1: Pascal who lives through sixteen sixty two, and he argued

891
00:48:43,360 --> 00:48:48,480
Speaker 1: that everyone is essentially betting h on the existence of God.

892
00:48:49,000 --> 00:48:52,920
Speaker 1: The argument for theism is that if God does exist,

893
00:48:53,040 --> 00:48:56,560
Speaker 1: then well there's an advantage in believing. But if God

894
00:48:56,760 --> 00:48:59,719
Speaker 1: does not exist then it doesn't matter. But since we

895
00:48:59,800 --> 00:49:02,359
Speaker 1: can use logic to tell if God exists or not,

896
00:49:02,440 --> 00:49:06,040
Speaker 1: there's no objective proof. We can only make our choice

897
00:49:06,120 --> 00:49:10,240
Speaker 1: given the relevant outcomes. It's looking at your religious beliefs

898
00:49:10,239 --> 00:49:12,840
Speaker 1: and saying, oh, you're nonbeliever. Huh, hey, what have you

899
00:49:12,880 --> 00:49:17,000
Speaker 1: got to lose? Exactly? Yeah, Pascal wrote, let us weigh

900
00:49:17,200 --> 00:49:19,920
Speaker 1: the gain and the loss in wagering that God is.

901
00:49:20,280 --> 00:49:22,560
Speaker 1: If you gain, you gain all. If you lose, you

902
00:49:22,600 --> 00:49:26,839
Speaker 1: lose nothing. Wager then without hesitation that He is. Now

903
00:49:26,960 --> 00:49:29,080
Speaker 1: I've got some things I want to say about this,

904
00:49:29,200 --> 00:49:31,919
Speaker 1: but you had some stuff first. I think, well, yeah,

905
00:49:31,920 --> 00:49:33,399
Speaker 1: there are there are a lot of issues that one

906
00:49:33,440 --> 00:49:37,279
Speaker 1: can take with this based on knowledge of world religions, philosophy,

907
00:49:37,400 --> 00:49:40,600
Speaker 1: statistical analysis, etcetera. And and yeah, I have to admit

908
00:49:40,680 --> 00:49:44,040
Speaker 1: that it can start to break your brain though a

909
00:49:44,080 --> 00:49:46,279
Speaker 1: little bit, if you think too hard about it, Like

910
00:49:46,320 --> 00:49:51,200
Speaker 1: I found in researching this this podcast, really thinking about

911
00:49:51,280 --> 00:49:56,440
Speaker 1: how I would react to Pascal's wager if I was

912
00:49:56,480 --> 00:49:59,640
Speaker 1: like forced to make an answer to to to to

913
00:49:59,719 --> 00:50:02,560
Speaker 1: FORMU late an answer like that, Like you mean if

914
00:50:02,560 --> 00:50:04,839
Speaker 1: you were given good reason to think that there would

915
00:50:04,880 --> 00:50:08,200
Speaker 1: be punishments for not believing in God or something, right,

916
00:50:08,239 --> 00:50:10,400
Speaker 1: And but I didn't know which religion was correct, and

917
00:50:10,400 --> 00:50:13,960
Speaker 1: I had to like proceed based upon the relevant level

918
00:50:14,080 --> 00:50:17,160
Speaker 1: of punishment for unbelievers in various religions, and like which

919
00:50:17,200 --> 00:50:19,319
Speaker 1: one is most correct for like you just think that

920
00:50:19,320 --> 00:50:22,160
Speaker 1: would mean it would what would be rational to choose

921
00:50:22,160 --> 00:50:25,880
Speaker 1: the religion that has the most lurid hell? I guess,

922
00:50:25,920 --> 00:50:29,760
Speaker 1: But then that really feels like losing, doesn't it? Um?

923
00:50:29,880 --> 00:50:32,279
Speaker 1: You know it? It's certainly though, reminds me of the

924
00:50:32,320 --> 00:50:35,120
Speaker 1: more boiled down versions of this that you encounter in

925
00:50:35,200 --> 00:50:39,160
Speaker 1: various forms of Christianity. Right, except Christ go to Heaven.

926
00:50:39,200 --> 00:50:42,040
Speaker 1: Reject Christ go to Hell? But what about the people

927
00:50:42,080 --> 00:50:44,799
Speaker 1: who haven't been given the choice yet? Right? That's ah,

928
00:50:44,920 --> 00:50:49,280
Speaker 1: that's the other concern. Well, if they're all default hell bound,

929
00:50:49,680 --> 00:50:52,680
Speaker 1: then God comes off as it comes off as a

930
00:50:52,680 --> 00:50:54,520
Speaker 1: bit bad, right, Like what kind of God is that?

931
00:50:55,200 --> 00:50:57,759
Speaker 1: But if they haven't out, if they're spared hell fire

932
00:50:57,920 --> 00:51:01,280
Speaker 1: or at least you know their section for Dante's limbo

933
00:51:01,320 --> 00:51:04,600
Speaker 1: of virtuous pagans, then is the missionary doing them a

934
00:51:04,640 --> 00:51:07,560
Speaker 1: disservice by even presenting them with the choice like why

935
00:51:07,640 --> 00:51:09,440
Speaker 1: do you even ask me? Because now I have to

936
00:51:09,840 --> 00:51:11,880
Speaker 1: I have to, I have to devote myself or not,

937
00:51:12,080 --> 00:51:14,680
Speaker 1: like now I actually have You know, I was just

938
00:51:14,680 --> 00:51:18,120
Speaker 1: going to go into the uh, you know, default limbo

939
00:51:18,200 --> 00:51:21,719
Speaker 1: category or the default heaven before and now now I'm

940
00:51:21,760 --> 00:51:24,400
Speaker 1: actually at risk of hell. Well, that means certain theories

941
00:51:24,440 --> 00:51:27,520
Speaker 1: of damnation mean that presenting the Gospel to someone as

942
00:51:27,560 --> 00:51:31,640
Speaker 1: an information hazard, you potentially harm them immensely by telling

943
00:51:31,640 --> 00:51:34,560
Speaker 1: it to them. And I think part of this just

944
00:51:34,560 --> 00:51:36,680
Speaker 1: to to to go beyond like the the actual um

945
00:51:37,000 --> 00:51:39,160
Speaker 1: U wager here is I think a part of the

946
00:51:39,200 --> 00:51:42,480
Speaker 1: issue here is that we're using evolved cognitive abilities that

947
00:51:42,520 --> 00:51:45,759
Speaker 1: are that are geared for smaller, though often important choices,

948
00:51:46,120 --> 00:51:48,360
Speaker 1: and here we're trying to use our imaginative brains to

949
00:51:48,400 --> 00:51:52,120
Speaker 1: create a conundrum that can outstrip those abilities. Yeah. Well,

950
00:51:52,120 --> 00:51:54,080
Speaker 1: I mean that is what we do in philosophy, right,

951
00:51:54,120 --> 00:51:57,799
Speaker 1: We're constantly using our brains in situations it was not

952
00:51:57,840 --> 00:52:01,040
Speaker 1: really made for um and just trying to do the

953
00:52:01,040 --> 00:52:03,799
Speaker 1: best we can. But I mean it's quite clear that

954
00:52:03,840 --> 00:52:07,000
Speaker 1: motivated reasoning is often a thing when when we're trying

955
00:52:07,040 --> 00:52:09,440
Speaker 1: to be rational was just failing. But of course this

956
00:52:09,520 --> 00:52:12,120
Speaker 1: is how we train our brains for rational thinking, often

957
00:52:12,200 --> 00:52:17,600
Speaker 1: oftentimes exploring these various outsized ideas. You know, there's so

958
00:52:17,640 --> 00:52:20,479
Speaker 1: many ways. I think Pascal's wager kind of breaks down

959
00:52:20,560 --> 00:52:23,800
Speaker 1: because it's obviously there's the thing you pointed out about

960
00:52:24,160 --> 00:52:27,000
Speaker 1: there's more than one religion, right, you know, it's not

961
00:52:27,040 --> 00:52:29,239
Speaker 1: just like do I believe or not? It's like which one?

962
00:52:29,280 --> 00:52:32,680
Speaker 1: But it also it implies again this is like a

963
00:52:32,760 --> 00:52:36,040
Speaker 1: theological question, but it would seem to imply that God

964
00:52:36,120 --> 00:52:39,120
Speaker 1: can be tricked into thinking that you believe in him

965
00:52:39,160 --> 00:52:42,680
Speaker 1: if you simply pretend to. I guess Pascal had I

966
00:52:42,719 --> 00:52:45,160
Speaker 1: think maybe a more sophisticated way of looking at this,

967
00:52:45,280 --> 00:52:48,600
Speaker 1: you know, that like live as if God exists or something.

968
00:52:48,960 --> 00:52:51,400
Speaker 1: But it but the wager is often used in very

969
00:52:51,480 --> 00:52:55,200
Speaker 1: unsophisticated ways. Yeah, but it implies that it doesn't matter

970
00:52:55,239 --> 00:52:58,160
Speaker 1: to him what you actually believe, only what you outwardly

971
00:52:58,239 --> 00:53:01,040
Speaker 1: claim to believe. Though then a again, the funny thing

972
00:53:01,080 --> 00:53:03,839
Speaker 1: here is this might be the case with Rocco's basilisk, Right,

973
00:53:04,160 --> 00:53:06,919
Speaker 1: what would this machine? God care what was in your heart?

974
00:53:07,000 --> 00:53:09,279
Speaker 1: It only cares whether you help it or not, or

975
00:53:09,320 --> 00:53:12,680
Speaker 1: whether you you know, proclaim fealty to it or not. Yeah,

976
00:53:12,680 --> 00:53:14,840
Speaker 1: that's why the T shirt is so important, Joe, because

977
00:53:15,560 --> 00:53:17,720
Speaker 1: if it, if it knows you purchase that T shirt,

978
00:53:18,440 --> 00:53:22,479
Speaker 1: then you're you're square, You're covered. Okay. Yeah, As as

979
00:53:22,560 --> 00:53:25,000
Speaker 1: best Singular pointed out in that Ian Magazine piece of

980
00:53:25,040 --> 00:53:28,600
Speaker 1: reference earlier, she says, quote the secular basilist stands in

981
00:53:28,760 --> 00:53:31,760
Speaker 1: for God as we struggle with the same questions again

982
00:53:31,760 --> 00:53:33,920
Speaker 1: and again. So her argument is that we kind of

983
00:53:33,960 --> 00:53:38,799
Speaker 1: reverse engineer the same problem again through our contemplations of

984
00:53:38,800 --> 00:53:41,480
Speaker 1: of super intelligent AI. Yeah, I guess the You get

985
00:53:41,520 --> 00:53:44,200
Speaker 1: into a plausibility question here, right, you get into a

986
00:53:44,280 --> 00:53:48,279
Speaker 1: question about is uh it actually possible to make an

987
00:53:48,360 --> 00:53:52,759
Speaker 1: artificial intelligence that is functionally equivalent to God. I mean,

988
00:53:53,040 --> 00:53:54,919
Speaker 1: we're not thinking we could build an AI that would

989
00:53:54,920 --> 00:53:56,719
Speaker 1: break the laws of physics. So it might be able

990
00:53:56,760 --> 00:53:59,840
Speaker 1: to run simulations of the universe. They have cont you,

991
00:54:00,080 --> 00:54:02,840
Speaker 1: conscious agents within them maybe for all we know, and

992
00:54:02,920 --> 00:54:06,359
Speaker 1: they could break the laws of physics inside them. But yeah,

993
00:54:06,440 --> 00:54:09,080
Speaker 1: I mean, could that even happen? And the issue is

994
00:54:09,160 --> 00:54:10,960
Speaker 1: we don't know. We don't know whether that could happen

995
00:54:11,040 --> 00:54:13,880
Speaker 1: or not, So should we behave as if that is

996
00:54:13,920 --> 00:54:16,600
Speaker 1: a plausible thing to be worried about and to consider,

997
00:54:16,960 --> 00:54:19,439
Speaker 1: or should we behave as if that's just not really

998
00:54:19,480 --> 00:54:22,319
Speaker 1: something you need to concern yourself with. I don't know

999
00:54:22,360 --> 00:54:25,560
Speaker 1: how likely or unlikely it is. And if your your

1000
00:54:25,560 --> 00:54:27,920
Speaker 1: fears are related just to the idea that you're you

1001
00:54:27,920 --> 00:54:34,000
Speaker 1: could be digitally resurrected, uh for torment and the basilisks dungeons. Um,

1002
00:54:34,040 --> 00:54:36,080
Speaker 1: I mean that that of course would depend on to

1003
00:54:36,160 --> 00:54:39,319
Speaker 1: what how much docuputing the idea of digital consciousness and

1004
00:54:39,400 --> 00:54:42,319
Speaker 1: the whole philosophical question we've we've touched on here before

1005
00:54:42,440 --> 00:54:45,319
Speaker 1: is that you I mean, it's just a copy of me, right,

1006
00:54:45,520 --> 00:54:48,960
Speaker 1: So why I mean, I ultimately can't do anything about

1007
00:54:49,560 --> 00:54:54,080
Speaker 1: you know, a thousand different basilisks creating a thousand different

1008
00:54:54,080 --> 00:54:57,319
Speaker 1: copies of me and tormenting all of them. Um, there's

1009
00:54:57,360 --> 00:55:01,000
Speaker 1: still to ourge extent, it's just just rowing me in effigy.

1010
00:55:01,120 --> 00:55:02,880
Speaker 1: There are actually a bunch of reasons I wrote down

1011
00:55:02,960 --> 00:55:05,279
Speaker 1: to doubt the plausibility of the basilisk. We could do

1012
00:55:05,320 --> 00:55:07,040
Speaker 1: that now, or we could come back to that later.

1013
00:55:07,080 --> 00:55:08,880
Speaker 1: I don't know what you think. Yes, let's to do,

1014
00:55:08,920 --> 00:55:13,640
Speaker 1: but I will add the idea of being tormented digitally. Uh,

1015
00:55:13,760 --> 00:55:16,400
Speaker 1: this does become more dangerous. I guess if you believe

1016
00:55:16,520 --> 00:55:20,359
Speaker 1: you might be in a simulation right now exactly, then

1017
00:55:20,600 --> 00:55:22,680
Speaker 1: then things are a little more dire. But that's again

1018
00:55:22,960 --> 00:55:25,360
Speaker 1: that you might be that you might be, Yeah, but

1019
00:55:25,520 --> 00:55:27,560
Speaker 1: I believe there's plenty of reason to believe that you

1020
00:55:27,600 --> 00:55:30,000
Speaker 1: are not. Okay. So if we're talking about how to

1021
00:55:30,040 --> 00:55:32,760
Speaker 1: defeat the basilisk, how to get out of this, uh,

1022
00:55:32,760 --> 00:55:35,279
Speaker 1: this this prison of the mind. If you're feeling a

1023
00:55:35,280 --> 00:55:38,520
Speaker 1: little bit um um bleak of heart right now because

1024
00:55:38,520 --> 00:55:41,319
Speaker 1: of this idea, then Joe's got the remedy. Well, I'm not.

1025
00:55:41,520 --> 00:55:44,320
Speaker 1: These are not all the reasons you should doubt the basilisk,

1026
00:55:44,400 --> 00:55:46,520
Speaker 1: but this is some of them that I could think of.

1027
00:55:46,760 --> 00:55:49,879
Speaker 1: Number one depends on the creation of super intelligence, which

1028
00:55:49,920 --> 00:55:55,680
Speaker 1: I think is not guaranteed. Some people seem incredibly fatalistic

1029
00:55:55,719 --> 00:55:58,600
Speaker 1: about this is just absolutely inevitable. We will have super

1030
00:55:58,640 --> 00:56:02,200
Speaker 1: intelligent god like a I that can do anything, and

1031
00:56:02,239 --> 00:56:04,399
Speaker 1: I think that that is just not guaranteed at all.

1032
00:56:04,440 --> 00:56:06,680
Speaker 1: I'm not ruling it out, but I think, for example,

1033
00:56:06,719 --> 00:56:10,160
Speaker 1: there are some theories of intelligence that say the prediction

1034
00:56:10,200 --> 00:56:14,000
Speaker 1: of super intelligence actually is maybe not taking Seriously, what

1035
00:56:14,120 --> 00:56:17,480
Speaker 1: intelligence is that you know that they are actually different

1036
00:56:17,600 --> 00:56:20,600
Speaker 1: kinds of intelligence that are useful in different ways, and

1037
00:56:20,680 --> 00:56:24,759
Speaker 1: machines can't mimic them all functionally, or can't mimic them

1038
00:56:24,760 --> 00:56:27,239
Speaker 1: all correctly, all at the same time. I don't know

1039
00:56:27,280 --> 00:56:29,239
Speaker 1: if that's correct, but that's at least one. That's one

1040
00:56:29,320 --> 00:56:31,560
Speaker 1: hurdle it has to clear. Could get knocked down there,

1041
00:56:31,800 --> 00:56:34,920
Speaker 1: but okay, maybe we could create a super intelligence. Even then.

1042
00:56:35,040 --> 00:56:38,120
Speaker 1: Multiple aspects of the Rocco's basilist scenario depend on the

1043
00:56:38,160 --> 00:56:41,760
Speaker 1: reality of some version of mind uploading, or the idea

1044
00:56:41,800 --> 00:56:46,239
Speaker 1: that your brain and in addition, your conscious experience could

1045
00:56:46,239 --> 00:56:49,520
Speaker 1: be simulated perfectly on a computer. And one reason it

1046
00:56:49,560 --> 00:56:52,600
Speaker 1: depends on this is that timeless decision theory operates on

1047
00:56:52,640 --> 00:56:55,920
Speaker 1: the assumption that the real you and the simulated copies

1048
00:56:55,960 --> 00:56:59,160
Speaker 1: that the computer uses to predict your behavior would be

1049
00:56:59,200 --> 00:57:01,960
Speaker 1: the same and would make the same decisions as the

1050
00:57:02,000 --> 00:57:05,279
Speaker 1: real you. Another reason is related to the punishment. Now,

1051
00:57:05,320 --> 00:57:07,960
Speaker 1: one way of course you could imagine the great basilisk

1052
00:57:08,040 --> 00:57:10,680
Speaker 1: thing is that if the machine comes to power in

1053
00:57:10,760 --> 00:57:14,040
Speaker 1: my lifetime, it could just punish the real, physical, older

1054
00:57:14,160 --> 00:57:16,680
Speaker 1: version of me. In reality is the payoff of this

1055
00:57:16,760 --> 00:57:19,600
Speaker 1: a causal blackmail. But the other way you could imagine it,

1056
00:57:19,640 --> 00:57:21,800
Speaker 1: in the way that it is much more often portrayed

1057
00:57:21,840 --> 00:57:25,080
Speaker 1: in the media, is that it makes digital copies of

1058
00:57:25,080 --> 00:57:30,000
Speaker 1: my consciousness and punishes them in a simulated hell. And that,

1059
00:57:30,080 --> 00:57:32,280
Speaker 1: of course, would also depend on the reality of some

1060
00:57:32,520 --> 00:57:35,120
Speaker 1: version of mind uploading, or of the ability of a

1061
00:57:35,120 --> 00:57:38,520
Speaker 1: computer to simulate a mind and for that simulated mind

1062
00:57:38,680 --> 00:57:42,240
Speaker 1: to actually be conscious. As I've said before, I'm suspicious

1063
00:57:42,280 --> 00:57:45,240
Speaker 1: of the idea of conscious digital simulations. I'm not saying

1064
00:57:45,240 --> 00:57:47,320
Speaker 1: I can rule it out, but I also don't think

1065
00:57:47,320 --> 00:57:50,280
Speaker 1: it's a sure thing. Any scenario that relies on the

1066
00:57:50,320 --> 00:57:54,960
Speaker 1: existence of conscious digital simulations needs a big asterisk next

1067
00:57:55,000 --> 00:57:58,400
Speaker 1: to it that says, if this is actually possible. Yeah again,

1068
00:57:58,600 --> 00:58:01,160
Speaker 1: is that me? Is that just me and effigy? Is

1069
00:58:01,200 --> 00:58:04,000
Speaker 1: that thing actually conscious that you're tormenting? I mean, granted,

1070
00:58:04,040 --> 00:58:08,240
Speaker 1: it still sucks if there's a super intelligence creating digital

1071
00:58:08,280 --> 00:58:11,480
Speaker 1: people and tormenting and it's a dark, rancid dungeons in

1072
00:58:11,520 --> 00:58:15,080
Speaker 1: the future, but um, it's not necessarily quite the same

1073
00:58:15,120 --> 00:58:17,960
Speaker 1: as torturing me. Right well, if you just care about yourself.

1074
00:58:18,000 --> 00:58:20,480
Speaker 1: It also depends on the possibility that you could be

1075
00:58:20,560 --> 00:58:23,320
Speaker 1: one of these simulations. It's possible that you could not

1076
00:58:23,400 --> 00:58:26,160
Speaker 1: be one of those simulations. There's something that would rule

1077
00:58:26,200 --> 00:58:28,880
Speaker 1: it out. Maybe their type of conscious Maybe they could

1078
00:58:28,920 --> 00:58:32,240
Speaker 1: be conscious, but that consciousness is fundamentally different from yours

1079
00:58:32,560 --> 00:58:35,200
Speaker 1: such that you could not be one of them. Another

1080
00:58:35,320 --> 00:58:37,200
Speaker 1: big one, and this is a big one that uh,

1081
00:58:37,280 --> 00:58:40,520
Speaker 1: you know, like we said earlier, I think sometimes Yudkowski

1082
00:58:40,600 --> 00:58:44,360
Speaker 1: gets unfairly associated with the basilist as if he has

1083
00:58:44,400 --> 00:58:47,000
Speaker 1: advocated the idea, and he has not. He has said,

1084
00:58:47,080 --> 00:58:51,479
Speaker 1: you know this, this idea is trash, and uh, there

1085
00:58:51,480 --> 00:58:54,000
Speaker 1: there are many reasons to doubt it. But even though

1086
00:58:54,040 --> 00:58:56,240
Speaker 1: he has said, like even though I doubt it, I

1087
00:58:56,280 --> 00:58:59,640
Speaker 1: don't want it disseminated. Um, but he says, you know,

1088
00:58:59,680 --> 00:59:02,200
Speaker 1: a good reason to doubt it is there's no reason

1089
00:59:02,240 --> 00:59:06,720
Speaker 1: to conclude it's necessary for the basilisk to actually follow

1090
00:59:06,880 --> 00:59:09,640
Speaker 1: through on the threat. We're saying that it's going to

1091
00:59:09,640 --> 00:59:13,000
Speaker 1: be relying on us to come up with the idea

1092
00:59:13,080 --> 00:59:16,320
Speaker 1: that it in the future might blackmail us if we

1093
00:59:16,400 --> 00:59:19,240
Speaker 1: don't help it now. In order to get us to

1094
00:59:19,280 --> 00:59:22,040
Speaker 1: help it now, right, we should be working and donating

1095
00:59:22,080 --> 00:59:24,840
Speaker 1: all our money and time and resources to building it

1096
00:59:24,880 --> 00:59:27,840
Speaker 1: as fast as possible, because we came up with the

1097
00:59:27,880 --> 00:59:30,959
Speaker 1: idea that it might torture us if we don't. Even

1098
00:59:31,000 --> 00:59:34,360
Speaker 1: if you accept that Yudkowski has he's pointed out that

1099
00:59:34,440 --> 00:59:37,440
Speaker 1: there's no reason once it's built, it would have to

1100
00:59:37,520 --> 00:59:40,880
Speaker 1: follow through on the threat he's written. Quote. The most

1101
00:59:40,880 --> 00:59:44,720
Speaker 1: blatant obstacle to Rocco's basilisk is intuitively that there's no

1102
00:59:44,880 --> 00:59:47,920
Speaker 1: incentive for a future agent to follow through with a

1103
00:59:48,000 --> 00:59:51,200
Speaker 1: threat in the future, because by doing so, it just

1104
00:59:51,320 --> 00:59:55,960
Speaker 1: expends resources at no gain to itself. We can formalize

1105
00:59:55,960 --> 00:59:59,960
Speaker 1: that using classical causal decision theory, which is the academic

1106
01:00:00,200 --> 01:00:03,520
Speaker 1: standard decision theory. Following through on a blackmail threat in

1107
01:00:03,560 --> 01:00:07,120
Speaker 1: the future after the past has already taken place, cannot,

1108
01:00:07,400 --> 01:00:11,240
Speaker 1: from the blackmailing agent's perspective, be the physical cause of

1109
01:00:11,320 --> 01:00:14,960
Speaker 1: improved outcomes in the past, because the future cannot be

1110
01:00:15,040 --> 01:00:17,600
Speaker 1: the cause of the past. Hey, basilist, why are you

1111
01:00:17,600 --> 01:00:21,400
Speaker 1: tormenting a third of the population for all eternity? Oh,

1112
01:00:21,440 --> 01:00:23,840
Speaker 1: I said, I would, Well, yeah, I mean exactly no,

1113
01:00:24,000 --> 01:00:26,000
Speaker 1: if it it didn't say it would, right, It just

1114
01:00:26,080 --> 01:00:28,920
Speaker 1: had to rely on the fact that in the past

1115
01:00:29,000 --> 01:00:32,320
Speaker 1: people would have come to the conclusion that it might.

1116
01:00:32,480 --> 01:00:34,080
Speaker 1: You know, you thought that I would. I didn't want

1117
01:00:34,080 --> 01:00:37,040
Speaker 1: to disappoint, But actually, if a basilist could be created,

1118
01:00:37,160 --> 01:00:39,200
Speaker 1: it seems like the best case scenario for it would

1119
01:00:39,240 --> 01:00:43,080
Speaker 1: be everyone subscribes to this idea and works as hard

1120
01:00:43,120 --> 01:00:45,000
Speaker 1: as they can to build it, and then it never

1121
01:00:45,120 --> 01:00:48,000
Speaker 1: follows through on any of the threats. Right, the best

1122
01:00:48,000 --> 01:00:50,600
Speaker 1: case scenario would be people act as if there is

1123
01:00:50,680 --> 01:00:53,600
Speaker 1: a threat and then there is in fact no follow

1124
01:00:53,640 --> 01:00:55,640
Speaker 1: through on the threat. It's really a win win for

1125
01:00:55,680 --> 01:00:57,960
Speaker 1: the bathlist, Yes, and then he can maybe you can

1126
01:00:58,200 --> 01:01:00,400
Speaker 1: even shed that name Basilist. They're like, we don't even

1127
01:01:00,440 --> 01:01:02,160
Speaker 1: have to call it the Great Basilist anymore. We can

1128
01:01:02,200 --> 01:01:05,160
Speaker 1: just call it, uh, you know, Omega or whatever it's

1129
01:01:05,160 --> 01:01:07,000
Speaker 1: its name is now. I want to be fair that

1130
01:01:07,080 --> 01:01:09,040
Speaker 1: a lot of what these people do is like the

1131
01:01:09,360 --> 01:01:11,720
Speaker 1: less Wrong community and all that they deal with, Like,

1132
01:01:12,440 --> 01:01:16,280
Speaker 1: should there be alternative decision theories that guide the behavior

1133
01:01:16,360 --> 01:01:20,320
Speaker 1: of superintelligent aies. Maybe it doesn't use classical decision theory,

1134
01:01:20,720 --> 01:01:24,120
Speaker 1: Maybe it uses some kind of other decision theory, and

1135
01:01:24,200 --> 01:01:27,800
Speaker 1: because on some other decision theory, maybe it could decide

1136
01:01:27,840 --> 01:01:30,400
Speaker 1: to actually follow through on the blackmail threat. I think

1137
01:01:30,480 --> 01:01:34,000
Speaker 1: that is where some of this fear comes through that like, oh,

1138
01:01:34,080 --> 01:01:37,120
Speaker 1: maybe by talking about it, we are actually causing danger

1139
01:01:37,680 --> 01:01:41,600
Speaker 1: because maybe some other decision theory holds. But Yudkowski does

1140
01:01:41,640 --> 01:01:45,840
Speaker 1: not think that's the case. Also, one more thing, it

1141
01:01:45,880 --> 01:01:48,760
Speaker 1: depends on the basilist. So if you think this scenario

1142
01:01:48,840 --> 01:01:51,960
Speaker 1: could be real, it depends on it not having ethical

1143
01:01:52,080 --> 01:01:56,400
Speaker 1: or behavioral controls that would prevent it from engaging in torture. Yeah.

1144
01:01:56,880 --> 01:01:58,760
Speaker 1: And I think if thinkers like the you know, the

1145
01:01:58,800 --> 01:02:03,240
Speaker 1: Miria people, the Machine Intelligence Research Institute people, succeed in

1146
01:02:03,880 --> 01:02:06,520
Speaker 1: established what they're trying to do is establish a philosophical

1147
01:02:06,840 --> 01:02:09,800
Speaker 1: framework to make AI friendly, to make it so that

1148
01:02:09,920 --> 01:02:13,160
Speaker 1: it is not evil and does not harm us. And

1149
01:02:13,200 --> 01:02:16,560
Speaker 1: if they successfully do that, then this shouldn't be a problem,

1150
01:02:16,640 --> 01:02:20,120
Speaker 1: right Because Yudkowski has argued that a being that tries

1151
01:02:20,200 --> 01:02:23,240
Speaker 1: to do what's best for us would not engage in

1152
01:02:23,320 --> 01:02:26,880
Speaker 1: torture and blackmail, even if it's doing so in service

1153
01:02:26,960 --> 01:02:30,920
Speaker 1: of some higher good, because doing torture and blackmail are

1154
01:02:30,920 --> 01:02:35,520
Speaker 1: actually not compatible with human values. I agree with that absolutely,

1155
01:02:35,560 --> 01:02:37,640
Speaker 1: and I actually would go as far to say I

1156
01:02:37,640 --> 01:02:40,960
Speaker 1: think that's something people should keep in mind when they're uh,

1157
01:02:41,000 --> 01:02:43,600
Speaker 1: when they're they're choosing their religions as well. Yeah, I

1158
01:02:43,640 --> 01:02:45,880
Speaker 1: can certainly see how you can make that argue. Yeah,

1159
01:02:45,880 --> 01:02:48,040
Speaker 1: it's like, what do I love about my faith? Is

1160
01:02:48,080 --> 01:02:52,320
Speaker 1: that the blackmail and the torture? Or is there something

1161
01:02:52,440 --> 01:02:54,680
Speaker 1: that brings something else to the table that is worth

1162
01:02:55,040 --> 01:02:59,160
Speaker 1: living forward that makes life better for everybody? Like, like

1163
01:02:59,400 --> 01:03:02,840
Speaker 1: I feel like, is what should be important about one's faith? Now,

1164
01:03:02,960 --> 01:03:06,280
Speaker 1: I think some people might be saying, like, wait a minute, though,

1165
01:03:06,320 --> 01:03:11,720
Speaker 1: if you're just using utilitarian ethics, right, wouldn't wouldn't any

1166
01:03:11,760 --> 01:03:14,720
Speaker 1: methods be good if the if the ends justify the means, right?

1167
01:03:14,760 --> 01:03:17,840
Speaker 1: That that's I think a naive understanding of how people

1168
01:03:17,880 --> 01:03:20,360
Speaker 1: think about utilitarian ethics. If you want to bring about

1169
01:03:20,360 --> 01:03:23,760
Speaker 1: the greatest good for the greatest number of people, couldn't

1170
01:03:23,760 --> 01:03:26,600
Speaker 1: you do that by being really cruel and unfair to

1171
01:03:26,680 --> 01:03:30,160
Speaker 1: some smaller group of people? And I think generally there

1172
01:03:30,160 --> 01:03:33,240
Speaker 1: are versions of utilitarianism that say, well, actually, the answer

1173
01:03:33,320 --> 01:03:37,120
Speaker 1: there is no, you couldn't do that, because even though

1174
01:03:37,160 --> 01:03:40,600
Speaker 1: you might be bringing about some better material circumstance, it

1175
01:03:40,720 --> 01:03:45,240
Speaker 1: is actually corrosive to a society for things like that

1176
01:03:45,280 --> 01:03:48,080
Speaker 1: to happen, even if they don't happen to many people. Right,

1177
01:03:48,480 --> 01:03:51,040
Speaker 1: you say, what if I could make everybody on earth

1178
01:03:51,480 --> 01:03:56,640
Speaker 1: ten percent happier on average by say, burying somebody in

1179
01:03:56,680 --> 01:03:59,360
Speaker 1: a in a pit of bananas once a year, so

1180
01:03:59,440 --> 01:04:02,520
Speaker 1: that you buried to death with bananas. Even the people

1181
01:04:02,520 --> 01:04:05,080
Speaker 1: who are being made happier could very easily look at

1182
01:04:05,080 --> 01:04:08,040
Speaker 1: that and say that's not fair and it makes the

1183
01:04:08,040 --> 01:04:10,800
Speaker 1: world worse and I don't want it. And thus that

1184
01:04:10,880 --> 01:04:14,600
Speaker 1: actually would be a subjectively relevant state. So we've talked

1185
01:04:14,600 --> 01:04:18,240
Speaker 1: about AI risk on the show before, and you know,

1186
01:04:18,280 --> 01:04:20,000
Speaker 1: one thing I feel like I still have not been

1187
01:04:20,040 --> 01:04:22,200
Speaker 1: able to make up my mind about, despite reading a

1188
01:04:22,240 --> 01:04:24,800
Speaker 1: lot on the subject, is that I don't know whether

1189
01:04:25,480 --> 01:04:29,040
Speaker 1: it makes sense to take um to be super worried

1190
01:04:29,120 --> 01:04:33,200
Speaker 1: about AI super intelligence and the risks associated. I mean,

1191
01:04:33,240 --> 01:04:35,760
Speaker 1: I do think it's worth taking seriously and thinking about.

1192
01:04:35,840 --> 01:04:37,880
Speaker 1: And I think people who want to devote their attention

1193
01:04:37,920 --> 01:04:41,040
Speaker 1: to how, you know, how dealing with the control problem

1194
01:04:41,120 --> 01:04:44,520
Speaker 1: and how you would get an AI to do things

1195
01:04:44,560 --> 01:04:46,640
Speaker 1: that were good for us and not harmful to us,

1196
01:04:46,640 --> 01:04:50,120
Speaker 1: that that's fine work. And I don't ridicule the people

1197
01:04:50,160 --> 01:04:52,080
Speaker 1: who work on that problem the way some people do.

1198
01:04:52,360 --> 01:04:55,720
Speaker 1: But on the other hand, I worry if by focusing

1199
01:04:55,880 --> 01:04:59,480
Speaker 1: exclusively on sort of the machine god the super intelligence,

1200
01:04:59,760 --> 01:05:06,200
Speaker 1: were sort of ignoring um much more plausible and current

1201
01:05:06,400 --> 01:05:09,800
Speaker 1: threats that the ways that AI is already very plausibly

1202
01:05:09,840 --> 01:05:12,760
Speaker 1: in a position to hurt us today or in the

1203
01:05:12,920 --> 01:05:16,720
Speaker 1: very near future, and not depending on any outlandish assumptions.

1204
01:05:17,040 --> 01:05:19,800
Speaker 1: The way it's already and will soon be used as

1205
01:05:19,800 --> 01:05:22,880
Speaker 1: a cyber war weapon. The way it's hijacking our attention

1206
01:05:22,920 --> 01:05:26,760
Speaker 1: and manipulating our opinions and behavior through social media and devices.

1207
01:05:27,040 --> 01:05:28,959
Speaker 1: This is some of what our Scott Baker talked about

1208
01:05:29,000 --> 01:05:32,600
Speaker 1: with his fears about AI. You don't actually need super

1209
01:05:32,640 --> 01:05:35,760
Speaker 1: powerful AI to do a lot of damage. It just

1210
01:05:35,880 --> 01:05:39,120
Speaker 1: needs to manipulate us in just the right kind of ways.

1211
01:05:39,920 --> 01:05:42,080
Speaker 1: So not the great basilisks so much as all the

1212
01:05:42,120 --> 01:05:44,960
Speaker 1: little basilisks that are out there, the little grass snakes,

1213
01:05:45,400 --> 01:05:48,040
Speaker 1: grass with the tiny crowns. They can do a lot

1214
01:05:48,040 --> 01:05:49,720
Speaker 1: of damage. And again I just want to be clear,

1215
01:05:49,760 --> 01:05:52,320
Speaker 1: I'm not saying we should forget about super intelligence. People

1216
01:05:52,320 --> 01:05:54,360
Speaker 1: who are working on that. If you find that interesting

1217
01:05:54,400 --> 01:05:57,280
Speaker 1: that I think that's fine, Yeah, work on that problem.

1218
01:05:57,400 --> 01:06:00,160
Speaker 1: But there but I think it's a longer shot, and

1219
01:06:00,200 --> 01:06:03,200
Speaker 1: there's a lot of current and near future AI threat

1220
01:06:03,280 --> 01:06:06,560
Speaker 1: that is really worth taking very seriously. I wish people

1221
01:06:06,640 --> 01:06:10,480
Speaker 1: more people were devoting their lives to say AI cyber

1222
01:06:10,520 --> 01:06:14,840
Speaker 1: weapons that are in development right now. One last issue

1223
01:06:14,960 --> 01:06:17,880
Speaker 1: I think we should discuss before we wrap up here

1224
01:06:17,960 --> 01:06:22,520
Speaker 1: is Okay, so we don't think this potential information hazard

1225
01:06:22,600 --> 01:06:25,160
Speaker 1: is actually an information hazard, Like we don't think it's

1226
01:06:25,200 --> 01:06:29,880
Speaker 1: actually potentially that dangerous. But Yudkowski has made the point

1227
01:06:29,960 --> 01:06:32,800
Speaker 1: that even though he doesn't think the basilisk is plausible,

1228
01:06:32,880 --> 01:06:37,000
Speaker 1: the ethical thing to do with potential information hazards is

1229
01:06:37,040 --> 01:06:40,920
Speaker 1: to not discuss them at all, since it's possible that

1230
01:06:41,040 --> 01:06:44,400
Speaker 1: they may be. Maybe maybe you're misinterpreting the ways in

1231
01:06:44,440 --> 01:06:47,920
Speaker 1: which they're implausible. Maybe this idea is actually valid, is

1232
01:06:47,960 --> 01:06:50,920
Speaker 1: actually relevant, and by spreading it you've harmed a lot

1233
01:06:50,920 --> 01:06:53,480
Speaker 1: of people. But I also think that this could mean

1234
01:06:53,560 --> 01:06:58,280
Speaker 1: that it's it's possible that despite the basilisk not being plausible,

1235
01:06:58,600 --> 01:07:02,320
Speaker 1: something good has come out of the basilist conversation because

1236
01:07:02,360 --> 01:07:07,040
Speaker 1: it encourages people to think of the idea of information hazards.

1237
01:07:07,080 --> 01:07:10,560
Speaker 1: Maybe Rocco isn't true, but there could be other ideas

1238
01:07:10,600 --> 01:07:14,160
Speaker 1: that are both true and potentially harmful to people. Just

1239
01:07:14,280 --> 01:07:17,480
Speaker 1: by entering their minds. And the lesson from this is

1240
01:07:17,560 --> 01:07:20,880
Speaker 1: we should prepare ourselves for those kinds of ideas. And

1241
01:07:20,920 --> 01:07:23,880
Speaker 1: if you have discovered one of those ideas and there

1242
01:07:24,040 --> 01:07:26,920
Speaker 1: is literally no upside to other people knowing about it,

1243
01:07:27,360 --> 01:07:30,760
Speaker 1: keep it to yourself and don't post it on the internet. Well,

1244
01:07:30,800 --> 01:07:32,480
Speaker 1: I feel like I do encounter thought hazards like this

1245
01:07:32,560 --> 01:07:34,960
Speaker 1: from time to time that they're often presented in pamphlets

1246
01:07:35,120 --> 01:07:38,640
Speaker 1: or little booklets, uh, generally with you know, a clever

1247
01:07:38,680 --> 01:07:42,320
Speaker 1: illustration about the coming into the world. Actually brought some

1248
01:07:42,360 --> 01:07:44,240
Speaker 1: of these into the office recently. I found them at

1249
01:07:44,680 --> 01:07:48,160
Speaker 1: a park in rural Georgia, and uh, and I think

1250
01:07:48,160 --> 01:07:51,120
Speaker 1: I told you it's like, Uh, you have have a

1251
01:07:51,120 --> 01:07:53,800
Speaker 1: look at these. You may find them interesting, but UH,

1252
01:07:54,000 --> 01:07:56,960
Speaker 1: do destroy them when you're done, because you know I did.

1253
01:07:57,000 --> 01:07:59,800
Speaker 1: I did in the wrong hands. These thoughts can be

1254
01:08:00,080 --> 01:08:02,520
Speaker 1: dangerous if they have some sort of a like a

1255
01:08:02,600 --> 01:08:07,960
Speaker 1: harmful view of society that that people may buy into. Well,

1256
01:08:08,000 --> 01:08:12,520
Speaker 1: I think you were comfortable sharing uh, malicious religious literature

1257
01:08:12,560 --> 01:08:15,360
Speaker 1: with me because you do not think there's a possibility

1258
01:08:15,480 --> 01:08:18,320
Speaker 1: that that literature is true and would harm me if

1259
01:08:18,320 --> 01:08:20,679
Speaker 1: I knew it was true, like you think it is false,

1260
01:08:21,120 --> 01:08:24,000
Speaker 1: So to you, it's actually not an information hazard. It's

1261
01:08:24,040 --> 01:08:28,559
Speaker 1: just like an idea hazard. Uh. The real crazy thing

1262
01:08:28,600 --> 01:08:30,920
Speaker 1: would be if you came across a pamphlet and you

1263
01:08:31,000 --> 01:08:34,160
Speaker 1: read it and it's the equivalent of this raving malicious

1264
01:08:34,200 --> 01:08:38,920
Speaker 1: religious literature, except you were convinced it was correct, if

1265
01:08:38,960 --> 01:08:41,560
Speaker 1: it was more like that ring video I brought you exactly.

1266
01:08:43,560 --> 01:08:45,240
Speaker 1: That is one of the things I've often seen on

1267
01:08:45,280 --> 01:08:49,439
Speaker 1: the internet, this idea compared to the ring. But you know,

1268
01:08:49,439 --> 01:08:51,920
Speaker 1: on the other hand, I do have to I am reminded,

1269
01:08:51,960 --> 01:08:54,280
Speaker 1: you know that like the idea that that any kind

1270
01:08:54,280 --> 01:08:57,360
Speaker 1: of knowledge is forbidden or is secret, like that doesn't

1271
01:08:57,400 --> 01:09:00,439
Speaker 1: really jive well with just the the general mission of science,

1272
01:09:01,000 --> 01:09:03,040
Speaker 1: of course not yeah, but I mean that would be

1273
01:09:03,120 --> 01:09:05,360
Speaker 1: part of the problem of like we're not prepared for

1274
01:09:05,400 --> 01:09:08,479
Speaker 1: information hazards, right, because in the past it's been the

1275
01:09:08,479 --> 01:09:12,840
Speaker 1: case that almost anything that's true is good to spread, right,

1276
01:09:13,240 --> 01:09:16,800
Speaker 1: unless you're spreading lies, information is good to share. It's

1277
01:09:16,840 --> 01:09:19,639
Speaker 1: just possible we should acknowledge that maybe there is such

1278
01:09:19,680 --> 01:09:22,720
Speaker 1: a thing as a fact that or a fact or

1279
01:09:22,760 --> 01:09:25,240
Speaker 1: an idea or a theory or something that is true

1280
01:09:25,280 --> 01:09:28,200
Speaker 1: and correct. But it would hurt people to know about it.

1281
01:09:28,240 --> 01:09:30,639
Speaker 1: I can't think of an example of anything like that,

1282
01:09:30,960 --> 01:09:33,240
Speaker 1: but if there is something like that, we we should

1283
01:09:33,280 --> 01:09:36,040
Speaker 1: be ready to not spread it when it occurs to us.

1284
01:09:36,640 --> 01:09:39,960
Speaker 1: All right, fair enough, Well, I want to close out

1285
01:09:40,000 --> 01:09:43,200
Speaker 1: here with just a one more bit of basilisk wisdom

1286
01:09:43,320 --> 01:09:46,479
Speaker 1: or anti basilist wisdom. And this comes from the poetry

1287
01:09:46,479 --> 01:09:50,960
Speaker 1: of Spanish author Francisco Gomez de Gravado e Viegas, who

1288
01:09:51,000 --> 01:09:56,000
Speaker 1: Live five. This is translated and it's referenced in Carol

1289
01:09:56,080 --> 01:09:59,960
Speaker 1: Rose's Giants, Monsters and Dragons quote. If the person who

1290
01:10:00,040 --> 01:10:02,920
Speaker 1: saw you was still living, then your whole story is lies,

1291
01:10:03,520 --> 01:10:06,000
Speaker 1: since if he didn't die, he has no knowledge of you,

1292
01:10:06,280 --> 01:10:09,840
Speaker 1: and if he died, he couldn't confirm it. So I

1293
01:10:09,920 --> 01:10:12,639
Speaker 1: was thinking about that with the stories of the basilist. Yeah,

1294
01:10:12,800 --> 01:10:15,360
Speaker 1: I was like, wait a minute, that How would you

1295
01:10:15,439 --> 01:10:18,519
Speaker 1: know if you could die just by looking at something?

1296
01:10:18,560 --> 01:10:22,160
Speaker 1: How do we have this description in the book? Yeah,

1297
01:10:22,280 --> 01:10:25,960
Speaker 1: it's uh, there is a there's an authorship problem with this. Yeah,

1298
01:10:26,000 --> 01:10:28,680
Speaker 1: whose whose account is the basilist? But at any rate,

1299
01:10:28,800 --> 01:10:31,160
Speaker 1: I think it's a nice like final you know, sucker

1300
01:10:31,240 --> 01:10:34,439
Speaker 1: punch to the basilists in general, but also a little

1301
01:10:34,439 --> 01:10:37,200
Speaker 1: bit to the idea of the great basilisk, right. I

1302
01:10:37,240 --> 01:10:39,960
Speaker 1: hope you were not leaving this episode with with terrors

1303
01:10:40,000 --> 01:10:43,400
Speaker 1: about future digital torment. I think that is not something

1304
01:10:43,439 --> 01:10:46,200
Speaker 1: that you should worry about. Indeed, I'm not worried about it,

1305
01:10:46,200 --> 01:10:48,080
Speaker 1: and instead of worrying about it yourself, you should head

1306
01:10:48,080 --> 01:10:50,160
Speaker 1: on over to stuff to Blow your Mind dot com.

1307
01:10:50,200 --> 01:10:52,440
Speaker 1: That's the mother ship where you'll find all the podcast

1308
01:10:52,479 --> 01:10:55,080
Speaker 1: episodes links out to our various social media accounts. Who

1309
01:10:55,120 --> 01:10:57,360
Speaker 1: find the tab for our store, you can look up

1310
01:10:57,360 --> 01:11:01,479
Speaker 1: that bassilist shirt design we're talking to out and uh

1311
01:11:01,920 --> 01:11:03,720
Speaker 1: and that's a great way to support the show. And

1312
01:11:03,760 --> 01:11:05,439
Speaker 1: if you don't want to support the show with money,

1313
01:11:05,479 --> 01:11:08,679
Speaker 1: you can do so by uh simply rating and reviewing

1314
01:11:08,760 --> 01:11:11,360
Speaker 1: us wherever you have the power to do so. Big

1315
01:11:11,360 --> 01:11:14,799
Speaker 1: thanks as always to our wonderful audio producers Alex Williams

1316
01:11:14,800 --> 01:11:17,040
Speaker 1: and try Harrison. If you would like to get in

1317
01:11:17,080 --> 01:11:18,880
Speaker 1: touch with us to let us know feedback on this

1318
01:11:18,920 --> 01:11:21,400
Speaker 1: episode or any other, to suggest a topic for the future,

1319
01:11:21,800 --> 01:11:24,720
Speaker 1: or just to say hi, let us know whether you

1320
01:11:24,840 --> 01:11:27,599
Speaker 1: carry a weasel around In case of a basilisk encounter,

1321
01:11:28,000 --> 01:11:30,200
Speaker 1: you can email us at Blow the Mind at How

1322
01:11:30,200 --> 01:11:33,160
Speaker 1: Stuff Works dot com. Oh, I'm hearing that transmission again.

1323
01:11:33,360 --> 01:11:37,800
Speaker 1: That weird snow. What is that? Oh Hell, the Great Bassilisk.

1324
01:11:38,200 --> 01:11:43,880
Speaker 1: All Hell, the Great Basilisk. Oh Hell the Great Bassilist.

1325
01:11:43,880 --> 01:11:49,120
Speaker 1: All Hell, the Great Bassilist. Hell. There the great basilists

1326
01:11:49,400 --> 01:11:57,120
Speaker 1: call Hell the Great Basilisk, Hell the Great Bassilisk. O Hell,

1327
01:11:57,160 --> 01:11:58,920
Speaker 1: the Great Basilisk,