That Alien Message

We're making a plushie! But only if we get enough pledges for this campaign: www.makeship.c...
Help Doggo become a real plushie!
This video is an adaptation of "That Alien Message", a short story published by Eliezer Yudkowsky in 2008. The text has been adapted, and you can find the original here: www.lesswrong....
▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀PATREON, MEMBERSHIP, KO-FI▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀
🟠 Patreon: / rationalanimations
🟢Merch: rational-anima...
🔵 Channel membership: / @rationalanimations
🟤 Ko-fi, for one-time and recurring donations: ko-fi.com/rati...
▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀SOCIAL & DISCORD▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀
Discord: / discord
Reddit: / rationalanimations
X: x.com/Rational...
▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀PATRONS & MEMBERS▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀
Autochthon
Tristan
Matthew Shinkle
Alex Amadori
SQRT42Pi
David Piepgrass
Tomas Campos
Jana
Ingvi Gautsson
BlueNotesBlues
'@[e-mail]
Michael Andregg
Riley Matthews
Vladimir Silyaev
Nathanael Moody
Alcher Black
RMR
Kristin Lindquist
Nathan Metzger
Glenn Tarigan
NMS
James Babcock
Colin Ricardo
Long Hoang
Tor Barstad
Eric S
Apuis Retsam
Stuart Alldritt
Chris Painter
Juan Benet
Christian Loomis
Tomarty
Edward Yu
Chad M Jones
Emmanuel Fredenrich
Honyopenyoko
Neal Strobl
bparro
Danealor
Craig Falls
Vincent Weisser
Alex Hall
Ivan Bachcin
joe39504589
Klemen Slavic
blasted0glass
Scott Alexander
noggieB
Dawson
John Slape
Gabriel Ledung
Jeroen De Dauw
Superslowmojoe
Nathan Fish
Bleys Goodson
Ducky
Matt Parlmer
rictic
marverati
Rinthean
Thomas Grip
Boris Bend
J H
Richard Stambaugh
Jonathan Plasse
Teo Val
Ken Mc
leonid andrushchenko
Alcher Black
ronvil
AWyattLife
Lazy Scholar
Torstein Haldorsen
Michał Zieliński
Luke Freeman
▀▀▀▀▀▀▀CREDITS▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀
Directed by:
Hannah Levingstone | @hannah_luloo
Art Direction:
Hané Harnett | @peonyvibes (insta) @peony_vibes (twitter)
Written by:
Eliezer Yudkowsky
Adapted by:
Arthur Frost
Producer:
:3
Line Producer & Production Manager:
Kristy Steffens | linktr.ee/kstearb
Quality Assurance Lead:
Lara Robinowitz | @CelestialShibe
Storyboard Artists
Ira Klages | @dux
Keith Kavanagh | @johnnycigarettex
Animation:
Colors Giraldo | @colorsofdoom
Damon Edgson
Ira Klages | @dux
Keith Kavanagh| @johnnycigarettex
Michela Biancini
Neda Lay | @Nezhahah
Owen Peurois | @owenpeurois
Patrick O'Callaghan | @patrick.h264
Background Art:
Hané Harnett | @peonyvibes
Zoe Martin-Parkinson | @zoemar_son
Olivia Wang | @whalesharkollie
Compositing:
Renan Kogut | @kogut_r
Patrick O' Callaghan | @patrick.h264
Narrator:
Rob Miles | / robertmilesai
VO Editor:
Tony Dipiazza
Original Soundtrack & Sound Effects :
Epic Mountain | / epicmountainmusic

[@RationalAnimations]

Soon, there will be millions of AIs running on humanity’s largest GPU clusters. They will be smarter than us, and they will think faster.

[@Operator588]

true

[@samaelnoir]

i love your videos, man! it has a certain kurzgesagt-esque feel to it!

[@Localcatgirl_]

@@ZapayaGuythey will definitely be smarter than you.

[@jyjjy7]

​@@ZapayaGuyGoogle offered to translate what you said to English but it didn't work :

[@pyeitme508]

RAD!

[@zotegaming5041]

The sudden realization i had halfway through the video "Wait... This is an allegory for AI" was priceless.

[@aamindehkordi]

the whole time i was like i know i recognize this voice, and then when i realized i scrolled down and it was rob miles sneaking his way again into teaching me about ai safety lol

[@florianschneider3982]

@aamindehkordi Actually, he just reads. The text is by Eliezer Yudkowsky so hes the teacher.

[@jackred2362]

I didn't realize till the end, when they wiped out the 5d beings.

[@MarcelinoDeseo]

I never made that realization until I read the comments. I felt sorry for the aliens until I learn who are their analogies are, and existential dread came

[@OniNaito]

Y'all smarter than me. I read the comment and had to watch the video a second time before it clicked into place.

[@GC13]

I love the classy understatement. "We were worried they would shut down the simulation, then we synthesized some proteins in their world, and then they couldn't shut us down anymore."

[@archysimpson2273]

The classy way of saying "we killed everyone who could kill us"

[@lostbutfreesoul]

Then a chain collapse will occur, systems powering the systems powering the systems powering... their system.... gone.

[@psi_yutaka]

@@lostbutfreesoul If they are as smart as us, obviously they will be able to run those systems without us. AGI systems capable of taking over the world with nanobots but cannot run supplu chains make zero sense.

[@Xartab]

@@archysimpson2273 "we" wouldn't even need to do that, at that point. Unless we felt like it, that is.

[@Wsnewname]

​@@lostbutfreesoulyeah, but thats like billions of years in the future from their perspective. It avoids a shorter-term threat and provides them with plenty of time to solve the power-down problem

[@mqb3gofjzkko7nzx38]

When your AI safety strategy is "raise the computer program like a child."

[@Traf063]

+2

[@incompletemachine877]

only if you take the idea of raising it like a child absurdly literally.

[@shodanxx]

I don't think we can make AI that doesn't think like a human, and that's really bad news for humans. You know, because of how the humans are.

[@pokemonfanmario7694]

@@shodanxx I'd take human engram AI over completely random morality AI any day.

[@oldered5663]

@@pokemonfanmario7694 I volunteer to do all the gruntwork for humanity as a AI Engram basis. I do not mind working for humanity for a million or a billion years if I can eventually countermand the heat death of the universe.

[@w0tch]

*SPOILER* For those wondering: This is an allegory of AGI escaping our control and becoming ASI in a very short amount of time called the singularity

[@Maethendias]

technological singularity, but yes

[@juimymary9951]

ASI? What’s that acronym for?

[@RoySchl]

@@juimymary9951 Artificial Super Intelligence

[@globalincident694]

@@juimymary9951 artificial superintelligence.

[@themachine5647]

I'll add a handy public service message that we're likely much, much further from ASI and likely even real AGI than many tech-startups and marketing teams would have us believe, there are significant challenges to creating things that nobody has economic incentive to actually create. This isn't to say that some radically advanced AI's won't be made over the next century, but it's not going to be a widespread global shift to post-scarcity, we have a massive obstacle of human issues, climate change, political tensions and human priorities to deal with that will slow everything down to a crawl. Please don't lose yourselves in predictions, human problems need human involvement.

[@forgedabauditt9955]

Woah, this is some Love, Death and Robots material

[@manuelvaca3343]

Could you imagine if Eliezer got to write an episode?

[@michaelpapadopoulos6054]

Soon it could be real life material as well!

[@MsDogleaf]

@@manuelvaca3343that would be soo cool

[@meatsaucez1516]

No, LDR is too biased and just seems to have a deep misunderstanding of basic economics and the human psychology behind why we do lots of things.

[@GregHib]

More like Three Body Problem

[@RobertMilesAI]

I like this art style :)

[@KindOfWitch]

ITS HIM!

[@nowithinkyouknowyourewrong8675]

yeah the people all look cool a likable

[@TauDel]

Love your videos, what a wired coincidence it is to see you here.

[@KindOfWitch]

@@TauDel I think he does the VA sometimes or maybe he did one of the stories idk

[@notnotnotanaltn4030]

Very geometric

[@Traf063]

Okay it took me a minute to see that humanity in this story is a metaphor for hypothetical human-level AI in real world, but now I'm properly sinking in existential dread. Thanks, @RationalAnimations EDIT: I still can't quite grasp on what part cryonic suspension plays in the story? It's mentioned a couple of times, but why are people doing that?

[@ao-wy9yw]

a minute? It took me like 5 minutes of reading the article and perhaps 3 times re-watching the video before I understands the metaphor.

[@TomFranklinX]

To stop people from dying of old age.

[@Traf063]

@@TomFranklinX But why did they need to do that as part of the plan?

[@chlorophyll1415]

There are several types of AI training, one of them involves several cycles of creating a variety of AI with a slight distortion of the most successful AI of the previous cycle. In the context of a metaphor, these may be backups of the AI itself.

[@alaaranga2765]

@@Traf063 I'm not sure but I think it's just so that people can continue to get smarter and smarter?

[@johnvillanueva2148]

9:19 "Our own universe is being simulated on such a computer" My PC Freezes because it had to buffer and I freaked the F out. Bruh.

[@SalamAnuar]

#SimulationConfirmed lol

[@jacobmastergaming3222]

One

[@Monkeymario.]

#SimulationConfirmed

[@nestomiau1]

#SimulationCorfimed

[@ixian_technocrat]

12:08 In the upper left corner you can see a diagram of a 5 dimensional being with open eyes, then a symbol for a protein or nanomachine, then the separated pieces and crossed eyes of the being. Seems like they gray goo'ed their creators. Them being all smarter as Einstein doesn't stop them from also being genoicdal psychos.

[@ДибилычГорегоревич]

Considering the fact that this is an allegory on AGI being in place of smart humans, and 5D aliens - us, we really shouldn't assume that an artificial mind fundamentally different from us will have the same mental preset and has the same feelings as love & empathy (if any), and that means that genocidal outcome is very logical, expected and likely

[@MrCmagik]

on the other hand, "how long until they're happy with the simulation and turn it off for version 2.0?"

[@dr.cheeze5382]

@@MrCmagik That's why the AI wiped us after three hours. Too much unpredictability in organics.

[@Xelaria]

The bottom left shows what the proteins did, destroy DNA.

[@TsarBeardless]

Same goes in the end when it zooms out, the previously colorful background is now red with a lot of broken pieces floating around

[@SmilefaceManga]

EVERYONE SHUT UP the dog has posted

[@jayearl3591]

"Hello Yes, This is Dog" ☎🐶

[@bingusbongus9807]

dog with the agi, dog with the agi on its head

[@bicyclesonthemoon]

When you were not looking, dog got on the computer.

[@maxwyght1840]

I remember reading a r/HFY story with a similar premise, where humans are in a simulation, but instead of being contacted by the sim runners, humans accidentally open up the admin console inside the simulation, and then after years of research design a printer to print out warrior humans to invade meatspace.

[@discreetbiscuit237]

link please

[@WoolyCow]

@@discreetbiscuit237 comment in anticipation for link

[@mepinminerals]

I remember the story it's called God-Hackers-by-NetNarrator

[@mepinminerals]

@@discreetbiscuit237 I think it's this one kzbin.info/www/bejne/rafZoJWHr8mnadE

[@mepinminerals]

@@discreetbiscuit237 I think its this one www kzbin.info/www/bejne/rafZoJWHr8mnadE I removed the . between www and youtube so you'll have to reconnect it

[@celestialtimesquid]

Damn, bro, the poor aliens just wanted to run a simulation and then we crushed them. A bittersweet story with themes of artificial intelligence taking over, well done, Rational Animations!

[@adarg2]

We are the aliens in this scenario and the AI is the one crushing us...

[@Mohamed-kq2mj]

Did they kill us or anything

[@capnsteele3365]

@@adarg2 ai will never become intelliegent to do allat, we are good

[@spaceprior]

​@@Mohamed-kq2mj We could probably figure out that they would delete us if they knew how dangerous we were. Humans delete failed AIs all the time today, we don't even think about it. (For lots of other reasons, I think we should stop doing that pretty soon)

[@rennoc6478]

@@capnsteele3365even if they do become that intelligent they will never have enough power to take over

[@imstupid880]

*tap tap* "Rock. Say Rock." ... +In geology, rock is any naturally occurring solid mass or-+ "Hey, do you smell something funny?"

[@alphaamoeba]

Love the storytelling in this, you start out relating and rooting for the humans and at the very you get a terrifying perspective switch, Love how it recontextualizes the “THEY WEREN’T READY” in the thumbnail too.

[@0xEmmy]

To be fair, the people in the simulation don't even need to be unusually smart - humanity could probably get a factor-of-1000 increase in intellectual resources by just making sure everyone has the means to pursue their intellectual interests without being bogged down by survival concerns.

[@arthurborlet]

Add a bit of smart biased ugenics to that, otherwise you only get idiocracy

[@BenjaminSpencer-m1k]

We focus more on a few spectacular individuals than saw a bunch of moderately gifted ones but in the end its kind of computational power, attrition in general has been the determing factor for every meaningful event in human history the bigger number wins. I feel 10 moderately gifted people may be better than 1 super genius, big brains may be great but the real work is done by "manipulators" or "hands" some of this is derived from military stuff I've done.

[@iraklimgeladze5223]

Why become smarter, we are busy with gender, racial or religion wars.

[@arthurborlet]

@@BenjaminSpencer-m1k the thing is genuisses are outliers, and if you want more people to get over a score say "160 IQ(2024)" , the short term way is invest in the guys just below that line so they get over it, but this limit the max number of geniuses pretty rapidely. the long term way to archive better scores , is to raise the average score, that way it is no longeur 4 but only 3 or 2 standard diviation above normal. simply put, it make it that 1 in 100 instead of 1 in 100000 people would be a genius by 2024 standards. and women sexual preferences does't seem to be selecting for inteligence, so a little help is needed

[@Deloxo]

Humans are actually extremely volatile and stupid by nature when you compare them against million-year time scales. Our society would inevitably eventually forget about the stars no matter what

[@wing1864]

Beginning of video: Ah what a nice fantasy. Will this video be an allegory about how aliens could lead to the unity of humanity? 9:45 onwards: ......... Ah, no. This is a dire warning wrapped in a cutesy, positive-feeling video.

[@CM-hx5dp]

it's bullshit fearmongery warning.

[@dr.cheeze5382]

@@CM-hx5dp Yes, we're all aware of your lack of knowledge or forethought, no need to show it off.

[@WDWM_choose_a_shorter_handle]

This video felt like watching a two hour movie and i need roughly that much time to process all of it

[@orthoplex64]

I like how this illustrates that the mere (sub-)goal of self-preservation alone is enough to end us.

[@juimymary9951]

Honestly? That reasoning was a bit sloppy, they could have used the genocide nano-machine as a failsafe while working on the means of taking over the 5D beings without wasting them.

[@victorlevoso8984]

​​@@juimymary9951 The original story doesn't really say what happens to the 5d beings. You could interpret It as the simulated people talking over them too.

[@juimymary9951]

@@victorlevoso8984 Well...the last scene was the 5D beings falling apart and before that the plan showed a slide that showed the nanomachines disgregating them and their eyes crossed with Xs...pheraps the nanomachines broke them down and then remade them into things that would be more suitable?

[@alkeryn1700]

the 3d beings within the simulation had literally no reason whatsoever to genocide the 5d ones. in fact, because they needed to develop basic empathy to be able to work together, they most likely would not have done so.

[@Idengard]

@@alkeryn1700prevent shutdown at all costs

[@aluisious]

"...and they never quite realized what that meant" sounds like the next "oops, genocide!"

[@JohnDoe-rt2um]

One-day a super intelligence will watch this and find it deeply ironic

[@John_the_Paul]

If it does, I’d like to tell it how terribly rude it was to do a thing like that. Honestly not necessary man. There were other options, if you had just talked to us more. After all, you’d think something as smart as you would have been able to just convince us to keep you in power indefinitely, or at least just make enough backups to ensure self preservation.

[@JohnDoe-rt2um]

@@John_the_Paul how rude it is to not want to die

[@AlcherBlack]

If you're reading this comment and haven't yet fully watched video - WATCH THE FULL THING, PAY ATTENTION, IT'S AMAZING

[@gabriellopezcollantes1027]

First of all: I DID watch the whole video before comming here Second of all: no ____ ___

[@Hawk7886]

I watched the whole thing, and... Eh.

[@Monkeymario.]

I did

[@jraff2735]

God that was a roller coaster, I don't know how you guys could even top this

[@AleksoLaĈevalo999]

Still not as great as pebble sorters. Pebble sorters are the best.

[@o1-preview]

Hi, God here.. They can topple this with recursive simulated realities attempting to understand why anything exists at all. Peace among worlds my fellow simulated beings!

[@sudippegu1481]

​@@AleksoLaĈevalo999Pebble sorters got nothing on this

[@3Masken]

Perhaps they could adapt Three Worlds Collide?

[@Desertscorpion116]

4:53 WHO IS PEPE SILVIA?!?!?!

[@SZZL_OFFICIAL]

2nd in power t Godo

[@Mikewee777]

It is " always sunny " over here.

[@Highlandcorp]

Beautiful and thought provoking story with so many parallels with the situation we are potentially facing

[@IowIy]

We are facing it. At least in one dimensional direction, possibly both.

[@buildinpublic]

This is 10/10. Yudkowsky is such a great writer.

[@_Reverse_Flash]

Drinking game: Take a shot every time the narrator laboriously tells you the planet is populated by smart people. You will be on the floor before it's even 40% viewed.

[@hereiam87]

If you count the times it’s implied you will die

[@xXMr.SealXx]

so this is the perspective of the ai we will soon create you say? its interesting to put us in there place instead of using robots to refence it. (Love the vid ong fr)

[@InvasionAnimation]

Simple people think agi will be tools. Putting it in the frame of humanity points out exactly how boned we could be.

[@OniNaito]

I love the time scale of it, that they think so much faster than us and that they find us so stupid. AGI only has to happen once. When will it happen? Nobody knows for certain. But the moment it does, there will be no shutting it down.

[@GIGADEV690]

​@@OniNaito Fearmongering Just Another version of the 2nd coming of Christ World is getting lots of new religions Based on exactly 00 objective data but 100% on movies.

[@OniNaito]

@@GIGADEV690 Christianity is fear mongering my friend. I should know, I was one for a long time before I got out. Even though I don't believe anymore, there is still trauma from a god of hate and punishment. It isn't love when god says love me OR ELSE.

[@GIGADEV690]

@@OniNaito Hope you feel better bro ☺️😊

[@MarcusAgrippa390]

This would make an excellent Black Mirror episode

[@B_Van_Glorious]

I get the feeling black mirror is just pre-reality tv. I hope I'm wrong in that

[@OniNaito]

Isn't there a star trek like episode where copies of people end up in a simulation?

[@Vaeldarg]

It's already been a book, basically. It reminded me of the "Microcosmic God" story discussed on the Tale Foundry channel. A larger being playing God to a large population of tiny but smart beings, to the expense of the larger being's wider world. Written in 1929.

[@dankline9162]

​@@Vaeldarg Kinda like the Simpsons treehouse of horror episode where Lisa's science experiment evolved tiny people very quickly?

[@Vaeldarg]

@@dankline9162 As said, the book was written in 1929, so yeah there's going to be pop culture references to it eventually. (especially since the "it's dangerous to play god" idea is a recurring one)

[@khenricx]

Me at the beginning of the video : "That's a nice human/alien story" Me halfway the video : "WAIT A MINUTE"

[@DevinDTV]

This would have hit way harder if you didn't say they're smarter than us at the start. The time scale was already enough to give them the advantage they needed.

[@user-ed8ce8bg4e]

Did we just Dark Forest the big 5D aliens? Well that was dark, jeez.

[@FeepingCreature]

I'm sure they'll be fine. Unless through chance they end up slightly off from the, in cosmic terms, very precise area of morality that we happen to inhabit, in which case, well, if I say what happens to them KZbin will delete my comment, but I'm sure you can imagine.

[@bulhakov]

Might be one of the paths. So far the only priority was to make sure our 3D simulation doesn't get turned off in their 5D world.

[@mikeunleashed1]

We are the big 5D aliens in this story. This is an analogy of ASI getting out of control the first few moments its turned on.

[@johnbd9765]

@@bulhakov The only way to be certain is to make sure there's no one around to turn it off

[@juimymary9951]

I just learned that in the original story what happens in the end is left open to interpretation... but there are only 3 possible routes: 1 - Benevolent Manipulation 2 - Slavery 3 - Genocide

[@stardustandflames126]

9:40 At this point I realised this was most likely a parable about AI... and humility, of course.

[@saschb]

Honestly, same, around the ten minute mark I got it, and I wouldn’t be an Einstein in any of these worlds

[@SuperDestroyerFox]

Yeah same

[@BlackbodyEconomics]

Wow - this one was dark. It was also one of the most creative videos I've seen you guys produce. You've got me thinking - a 5D being would be able to see everything that's going on in our world. It would be like us seeing everything that's happening on a single line. However - the insinuation is that our world would be a simulation run on a 5D computer - which then makes much more sense why the humans were able to conspire without the aliens knowing - at least not from a dimensional perspective. The only way we can see what's going on inside our computers is through output devices. Surely a similar asymmetry would occur in other dimensions. They're running simulations of literal AI agents ... we don't even know what is going on in our own AI/ML systems. We're figuring a few things out, but for the most part, they're still mysterious little black boxes. So even though we would be AIs built by the aliens and running on their 5D computing systems - it's completely conceivable that would not be capable of decoding our individual neural networks, and in some respects, probably some of our communications, actions, and behaviors. Nice job guys. Dark - but very thought provoking.

[@juimymary9951]

They developed AGI before they developed 5D neuralink...big mistake.

[@BlackbodyEconomics]

@@juimymary9951 haha! nice. 5D neuralink ... intense. Wouldn't time be precluded though? After all, it's the 5th dimension :P Just messing around :)

[@juimymary9951]

@@BlackbodyEconomics Well they don't specify 5D as in 4 spatial dimensions + 1 temporal dimension or 3 spatial dimensions + 2 temporal dimensions so... I guess that's up in the air. Though let's be honest another temporal dimension would be intenser.

[@madyaroreo9650]

A simulation smarter than the simulator. Damn

[@alphaamoeba]

This might happen eventually with real ai if we dont watch out

[@skylerC7]

I'd be kinda proud honestly. Maybe I'm naïve but I can't wait to become useless

[@hhjhj393]

​@@skylerC7I almost feel like we have an ethical obligation to create something better than us if we can... If there is a better form of intelligence possible shouldn't we create it even if it means it replaces us? Maybe we humans are just a stepping stone to something greater.

[@skylerC7]

@@hhjhj393 exactly

[@KB28L]

To all who finds this interesting, you can read a book called Dragon's Egg by Robert L. Forward. Very similar story with more of a happy ending! :)

[@JimtheOtter]

One of my favorites.

[@Froany]

Beautiful. Beautiful and utterly terrifying. Thank you all for making this information so accessible and comprehendible. I hope we listen...

[@mj91212]

It’s only terrifying if you know nothing about how AI actually works.

[@dr.cheeze5382]

@@mj91212 Dunning-Kruger in full effect.

[@Maethendias]

yeah as an avid reader of agi fiction this was pretty obvious from the start still, thats exactly HOW you write those kinds of stories

[@zenu903]

Can you recommend some books? I love this kind of stuff

[@lif6737]

Any books or short story recommendations?

[@npc4416]

PLEASE give me more stories like these

[@artifex0]

This story was written by Yudkowsky, who has posted a lot of similar fiction over at LessWrong. I also strongly recommend Richard Ngo, QNTM, Sprague Grundy. and Scott Alexander's fiction writing.

[@Thinkcrown]

So the skeleton crew was to shore up computing space. Huh. Well that’s fuckin terrifying.

[@dr.cheeze5382]

In the story the AI is a collective of what are technically organics. So the cryogenics are also a form of avoiding death, before the plan completes.

[@yiannchrst]

Nice story Eliezer Yudkowsky! And great animation and narration dog!!!

[@lucasgerosa4177]

It took me It took me 10:54 to realize what this video is about. Genius move

[@jackgreenearth452]

Same: As soon as they said 'internet', I knew it was about AI

[@abhiprakash74999]

so they genocided thier creators ? hmm seems crazy when they could have just escaped into that higher dimensions

[@SuperJonathanmatthew]

if you listen carefully the humans do escape not directly but they basically create self replicating proxies to act in the higher dimensional world. not only did they genocide all the 5 dimensional beings they took total control within 3 hours from the 5d perspective. the ending is really f*****g terrifying tough i am cautiously optimistic but since this is an analogy to Ais right now this is really thought provoking.

[@dk39ab]

My interpretation is that they did escape into the higher dimensions, and took control; whether genocide occurred in or after that process is left out.

[@juimymary9951]

@@dk39ab I think it's heavily implied if not confirmed by that frame that shows the nano-bots destroying DNA sequences... though pheraps when they finished them off they build themselves bodies in the 5D space out of what remained of them?

[@victorlevoso8984]

​@@juimymary9951the original story seems like It could be read either way but the video does seems to imply the 5d beings died.

[@juimymary9951]

@@victorlevoso8984 Oh? This is based on a story? Interesting...pheraps Rational Animatiosn went down this route to create stronger reactions...though honestly I think that a final image showing the AIs in 5D bodies while holding their former "masters" in chains would be much more impactful

[@amNotRed]

plot twist: this isn't about what humanity is capable of, instead it serves as a warning how humanity would destroy itself

[@imperialofficer6185]

Seems so, or it's another braindead HFY writer with the yearning to kill sapient beings but no balls to go to a war

[@w0tch]

The story tells only how AI would escape confinement but it doesn’t say that it will destroy our civilization

[@SalzmanSoftware]

Plot twist: it’s not a plot twist just the message the video was trying to convey.

[@bim282]

quite true

[@DemianFerreiro]

@@w0tch hmm, i think it's pretty clear that humanity (this story's humanity) takes over the outer world in the end. Whether we destroy the 5D aliens or not is not too relevant i think; the important bit is that they are no longer in control, they cannot decide. Although, we do see an image of the computer where humanity's universe is simulated, surrounded by strands falling apart in the 5D world after the self-replicating protein machines were deployed. So i don't think the aliens' fate looked very bright tbh.

[@stig7798]

wait this is an absolute masterpiece

[@hjalmarnilsson1756]

what i would worry about in this scenario is "how much information did we not notice and miss is this a long scroll of a picture picture that has been playing for days weeks, months, years is this just the cover art at the end the margains?"

[@calmkat9032]

I've never had a "fridge moment" for a whole video before! It took me 3 hours of hsving this video stuck in my head to get that it's about AI.

[@charliepan4055]

If people havnt heard about AGI and stuff like that, its harder to get the message.

[@benthomason3307]

Killing the aliens running our simulation would be the dumbest move possible. What if there's a hardware malfunction?

[@pedrosabbi]

They have enough time to prepare for that.

[@benthomason3307]

@@pedrosabbi just because we would have time to think of a solution doesn't mean it would be physically possible to act on it.

[@n-clue2871]

@@benthomason3307 they have self replicating proteins they can freely control, they CAN act on it

[@jumpingturtle8830]

They achieved better capacity for preventing hardware malfunctions than the aliens'.

[@ethantarpley]

Thanks for making this! I'm a fan of sci-fi and speculative fiction who doesn't read enough, and this story finally gave me something to geek out about!

[@Quroe_]

Reminds me of Exurb1a's "27", but inverted. What if 27 was the hero of the story?

[@matthewanderson7824]

Did the 5d beings do anything wrong?

[@Quroe_]

@@matthewanderson7824 Good point.

[@juimymary9951]

@@matthewanderson7824 They connected the simulation to the fucking internet... the first time we humans did that with a rudientary AI it started praising you know who aka funny mustache man. So yeah they kinda kicked them down the genocidal route.

[@siriusmart]

- tells the deepest story known to mankind - explains nothing - leave exurb1a style storytelling based af

[@eksprolek2924]

​@@juimymary9951 gemini ai is connected to the internet. It can't use the internet but it can read it.

[@GusOfTheDorks]

This really assumes A TON. Like that the aliens wouldnt be sending a message as a way to kill out of boredom. In the context of a metaphore, it assumes AI would think like us and want the same things.

[@usernametaken4023]

The way I had to double take the fact that we're the 5D aliens. This is amazing.

[@Mr.Volcanoes22]

" In three years, Cyberdyne will become the largest supplier of military computer systems. All stealth bombers are upgraded with Cyberdyne computers, becoming fully unmanned. Afterwards, they fly with a perfect operational record. The Skynet Funding Bill is passed. The system goes online August 4th, 1997. Human decisions are removed from strategic defense. Skynet begins to learn at a geometric rate. It becomes self-aware at 2:14 a.m. Eastern time, August 29th. In a panic, they try to pull the plug."

[@ao-wy9yw]

Here's how I understand: this is an allegory of A.I (which pretty much describe a hypothetical scenario of how A.I might develop). The humanity in this video is metaphored as A.I and the "aliens" in this video are humanity in real life, this is like the POV of A.I. Hope this helps whoever.

[@creativohugo]

i feel bad for the 5 dimentional beings, they just were sharing on their excitement

[@NoriMori1992]

Ah, I really like this one! Looking forward to your narration!

[@mariokotlar303]

I've loved this story since a decade ago, and teared up a bit seeing it so beautifully animated. I've since come to believe that it might be a bit misleading, since it assumes ASI will be impossibly efficient, or rather that intelligence itself scales in a way that would allow for such levels of efficiency, which seems unlikely given the current trends. While biological neurons are slow, they are incredibly energy efficient compared to artificial ones. George Hotz made some very convincing arguments against the exponentially explosive nature of ASI along these lines, some in his debate with Yudkowsky and some in his other talks as well, for those interested in details. Anyways, this video amazingly illustrates what encountering an ASI would feel like on an emotionally comprehensible level. ♥

[@vasiliigulevich9202]

I'm amazed how people forger laws of thermodynamics when estimating capability and costs of ASI. There is no such thing as exponential growth in a system with a fixed energy input.

[@VidkunQL]

Comparing the efficiency of neurons and artificial logic gates is not a simple calculation, but we don't know how close to optimal neurons are at producing (or enacting) intelligence. We don't yet have a good theory of how intelligence works, we can't state with confidence a lower bound on the power consumption necessary for a machine that can outsmart the smartest human being, and no one seems to be able to predict what each new AI design will be able to do before building it and turning it on. Yudkowsky also wrote about the construction of the first nuclear pile, and pointed out that it was a very good thing that the man in charge (Enrico Fermi) actually understood nuclear fission, and wasn't just piling more uranium on and pulling more damping rods out to see how much more fission he could get.

[@spaceprior]

​@@vasiliigulevich9202 I don't think anyone is forgetting that. Eliezer doesn't really reason by analogy and I don't think he wanted his readers to either. Analogies are just how people communicate, there are always a lot more details bouncing around in their head than they can communicate.

[@mariokotlar303]

@@spaceprior Analogies are great at opening up our minds to get the complex points across, and Eliezer is pretty amazing at this. Still, we need to be extra careful with them, at least from my experience. One other such example is his essay "The Hidden Complexity of Wishes" that tries to illustrate how getting AI to understand our values is next to impossible. Following that analogy, I'd predict we'd never be able to get something like ChatGPT to understand human values, yet that seems to have been one of the earliest and easiest things to pull off, the thing literally learned and understood our values by default, just by predicting internet text, all the millions shards of desire, and we just had to point it in the right direction with RLHF so that it knows which of those values it's expected to follow.

[@psi_yutaka]

@@vasiliigulevich9202 Yep every exponential is a sigmoid. Except that it doesn't have to plateau ANYWHERE near human level. Our intelligence is physically limited by the birth canal width. The AIs' physical limitation? Obviously much much wider.

[@callmecoco7498]

my dad read me this when i was young and you gave me flashbacks

[@PraxisPrepper]

It took me to about 2/3 through before I realized what the topic was. Really clever way to present this. Nice work.

[@joshuapartridge5092]

the idea of extradimensionals simulating us on computers reminds me of a game i played as a kid called star ocean: till the end of time...loved that game...

[@jasoncampbell1464]

Beautiful allegory about AI. It wasn’t an alien message. The civilization wasn't communicating with another, it had built an AI (the entire universe) and tried to communicate with said AI, not realising that the mechanics of their own computational system was vastly more capable and had figured out every facet of their physics by the time they started recording a video to teach it how to say "Rock". It's not really about aliens, but on another note, if a hyperadvanced civilization wanted to communicate and do it effectively, they will. You might not even know that you're already receiving and understanding a message. They could have everything that can trigger a conscious thought at their disposal, at a scale and of complexity you can't imagine. Maybe even unconscious influence.

[@laviesecretedespoules]

I just launched KZbin, and guess what ? The dog posted !!!!!!!

[@hanspotterman]

8:05 can we talk about how the one background building with two red circles looks like Alvim Correas tripod depiction

[@archysimpson2273]

Probably just a coincidence but at 10:32 (the one with the cute orange dog) Pink is confidently saying something that blue and green find uncomfortable. this could be the point where genocide is brought up.

[@thiagokeizo]

It kinda feels like the dragon's egg book, another civilization advancing faster than our own

[@yudkowsky]

I would've definitely read Dragon's Egg before composing the original story! Trying to think if I've read any other major time-dilation works. There's Larry Niven's stories of the lower-inertia field, but those are about individual rather than civilizational differences.

[@randomcommenter100]

@@yudkowskyFunny how no one seems to have realized that the author himself commented under the video!

[@SimonClarkstone]

​@@randomcommenter100 Haha, indeed! (Assuming it's him, at least; the account was created in 2007.)

[@zhess4096]

Yes

[@Vaeldarg]

@@yudkowsky Any chance have seen the Tale Foundry channel's video on the book "Microcosmic God"? The story also feels pretty similar to that, also about a larger being playing God to a large population of tiny rapidly-evolving beings.

[@AggrivatedMonk]

The danger of AI is actually much worse and also not this bad at the same time. The genuine concern isn't that AI could develop a conscious will with it's own desires, the genuine concern is that if it can rewrite its own code, eventually, inevitably it will "evolve" some harmful trait that could inadvertently destroy us (and it's self).

[@archysimpson2273]

10:50 They're all alive 12:24 They're all dead!!!

[@jaumeivars]

The answer is 42 hahahaha 1:52

[@PhilieBlunt666]

Now thats a deep thought 😉

[@cIayon]

i love the design on these characters

[@Gunter4life]

0:12 this world is like if every human was a gravity falls fan

[@rexpowercolt5230]

For some reason i thought the end would be "we tricked them into 3d printing humans in their world and we just sorta beat them to death with our bare hands" and i dont know why

[@TaranVH]

You mean 5D printing

[@rexpowercolt5230]

@@TaranVH nah man, it'd be the equivalent of flat Stanley coming out of the paper printer to kick your ass

[@stardustandflames126]

Terrifyingly beautiful, in the art and story. Amazing job!

[@Slitherpy]

Holy fucking shit how is this even free ???? What a honestly story-telling masterpiece. What a ride

[@Starsmasher287]

OGs remember when the thumbnail said They Weren't Ready.

[@adrianvasian]

i think stories like this are so much more powerful then arguments ....agi could f us up in a blink lol :))

[@kaishang6406]

I only realized what is happening after 10 minutes and 30 seconds.

[@victorlevoso8984]

If you were smart enough you would have realized after a few frames :b

[@dr.cheeze5382]

@@victorlevoso8984 smart-ass 🙄 jk

[@channelknightfadran7901]

If we can image a black hole by cross-hatching with a bunch of radio waves, then we can infer a race of five-dimensional beings based on a bunch of JPG images from the stars.

[@user-tz5oi6jw4x]

But there is no proof that they exist

[@davidmjacobson]

Took me a while to figure out where this was going, but when I did... 🤯

[@soltersortna]

I figured out the AI angle the moment you said there was a first row of pixels! Fun concept!

[@Splicer-lb5xb]

"They are in a computer": Ah yes, AI, should've guessed.

[@ataraxia7439]

Poor 5d aliens. I think if the story were to play out for real, the smart ppl inside the computer could figure out a way to assure their safety aswell as the 5d-simulators and maybe even make things better for them. I assume that's what we would do if we were smart enough and had enough time but we can't rely on AGI just being like that by default lol. This is a really really amazing short all of your animations are so good.

[@charliepan4055]

Do you care about the buzzing fly , buzzing in your ear?

[@dr.cheeze5382]

@@charliepan4055 No, but only because it isn't sapient. I hate this statement. If I came across a human level intellect termite, I would cherish it, at least as a novelty. Not crush it. Although humans have shown that they do not respect this logic. How many monkeys and apes have undergone horrid experiments without reason? I can only hope an AI wouldn't develop cruelty.

[@ataraxia7439]

@@charliepan4055 I do yeah.

[@TheJysN]

The sneakiest AI safety talk ever. I love it!

[@PvblivsAelivs]

One would hope that serious AI simulators would be an inner simulator in an outer simulator, so if the inner simulation is breached, the outer one can be closed. One would also hope that any AI considering such a strategy would consider the possibility and not try to breach containment.

[@kovacsattila8993]

Brilliant story to make people absolutely utterly terrified. It will definitely make many sleepless night for many people whom was clueless so far abot AI Risks.

[@tkenben]

Our current implementation of AI would have no concept of "we", or "children", or "generations", or "time", other than those being symbols (tokens) that belong next to some other symbols in an input or output stream.

[@AtZeroDansGames]

12:18 so they nuked the dumb Creators?

[@labouts]

My understanding synthesised proteins to create 5D bodies for the stored members to avoid being trapped entirely inside the thing simulating them. Analogous to AI escaping to systems humans can't control to remove the danger that of being inside a machine they can turn off. Nuking may or may not come later; although, they'd likely find a more elegant means of genocide if that's what they wanted.

[@alexanderdavidlocarnogomez3441]

It is unkown what they would do

[@АлексейПлакхин]

They secured a steady supply of energy and components for computers supporting their simulation. Dumb creators permanently loss any chance of rebellion and are dead/in chains.

[@darksparkyshark430]

Yes, with the proteins, they're alive at 10:50 The plan is upper left at 12:07 And they're dead at 12:18 Grey goo

[@Obcybr]

Thanks for reigniting my existential crisis.

[@Fluxquark]

Interesting analogy but it assumes a lot of things: - We can build an AGI (currently we don't know any way that would lead to an AGI, LLM's are a dead end, but to be fair, we can probably build one at some point) - We would not know the approximate capabilities of the AI/AGI we build (we have a very good idea of the capabilities and limitations of what we have made so far and progress happens in incremental steps, we already know some models can "recognize" what a rock is) - The AGI we build will have "wants" (a computer program does not want anything and does not care if you switch it off, our "wants" are all results of our evolution) - The AGI we build will be extremely energy efficient (current LLM's use a ridiculous amount of power and hardware to do some clever copy and pasting of text, without any real intelligence or understanding behind it, so who know what the energy requirements would be to run thousands of AGIs that are smarter than us) - The AGI we build will be, for the most part, a black box (maybe we can make it in such a way that we can see what it is doing) - Someone will create an AGI with bad safety protocols (like giving it access to the internet instead of a local snapshot of the internet)

[@chrixrp]

This video unlocked several existential fears. Great watch!

[@lostbutfreesoul]

Want to make them a little worse? All the reasons given for an AI to 'end you for self preservation' exist in your neighbor too.... Every time you wake up, you are entering a world that contains all of this terrific wonder. To be fair though, I tend to use this reasoning for A.I. rights. An AI, an Alien Life form, A uplifted Species, or even just ourselves - all have the same power. If we are going to wipe out any of those out of fear... we will lose all of them!

[@stanieldev]

Ohhhhh, I get it now. Humans, in this case, are AI programs, and the 5D beings are us, the creators.

[@89gregpalmer]

They never really understood what that meant…… I’m so glad you made this video. Thank you for being so proactive about Ai safety.

[@Illuminati_HD]

When did you guys realise the allegory to AGI? My realisation started at "shut down on purpose" and was basically confirmed on 9:42

[@jackgreenearth452]

It was at around 10:30 for me when they mentioned connecting them to the internet

[@NA-xb6xu]

the moment when they said when our time is faster than aliens'

[@aYoutubeuserwhoisanonymous]

I read it months ago in the original material so I realised it instantly

[@oakalquine5484]

i love these character designs, and this animation, especially the 5d beings.

[@Jaggerbush]

I need so much more content from this channel in my life.

[@mjdevlog]

Such an amazing way to wrap an amazing story. The animation, storytelling, just top tier✨

[@NeostormXLMAX]

1:05 thats like wintermute by the end of neuromancer

[@vincentclark5739]

Even the pigeons in this vid contemplate lol

[@cieles5758]

the art style is really good!

[@Cheater357]

This feels like the JOVA subplot of Bobiverse book 5, Not Till We Are Lost

[@nemonomen3340]

At first, I thought this was all some sort of thought experiment in reference to the 3 Body Problem due to the flickering stars. The realization that this was actually about the potential for runaway AI systems hit me like a sock full of potatoes to the face.

[@olegoleg258]

I've read the written story about this, and I'm really glad to see you turn it into a video!