Life 3.0: Being Human in the Age of Artificial Intelligence

by Max Tegmark

But let’s not let those controversies distract us from the elephant in the room: there can be no positive experiences if there are no experiences at all, that is, if there’s no consciousness. In other words, without consciousness, there can be no happiness, goodness, beauty, meaning or purpose—just an astronomical waste of space. This implies that when people ask about the meaning of life as if it were the job of our cosmos to give meaning to our existence, they’re getting it backward: It’s not our Universe giving meaning to conscious beings, but conscious beings giving meaning to our Universe. So the very first goal on our wish list for the future should be retaining (and hopefully expanding) biological and/or artificial consciousness in our cosmos, rather than driving it extinct. If we succeed in this endeavor, then how will we humans feel about coexisting with ever smarter machines? Does the seemingly inexorable rise of artificial intelligence bother you and if so, why? In chapter 3, we saw how it should be relatively easy for AI-powered technology to satisfy our basic needs such as security and income as long as the political will to do so exists.