Max Tegmark - Transhuman Brains?

Transhuman brains are the melding of hyper-advanced electronics and super-artificial intelligence (AI) with neurobiological tissue. The goal is not only to repair injury and mitigate disease, but also to enhance brain capacity and boost mental function. What is the big vision, the end goal - how far can transhuman brains go? What does it mean for individual consciousness and personal identity? Is virtual immortality possible? What are the ethics, the morality, of transhuman brains? What are the dangers?
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Max Tegmark is Professor of Physics at Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He holds a BS in Physics and a BA in Economics from the Royal Institute of Technology in Sweden. He also earned a MA and PhD in physics from University of California, Berkeley.
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Closer to Truth, hosted by Robert Lawrence Kuhn and directed by Peter Getzels, presents the world’s greatest thinkers exploring humanity’s deepest questions. Discover fundamental issues of existence. Engage new and diverse ways of thinking. Appreciate intense debates. Share your own opinions. Seek your own answers.

[@garcialovesme]

This comment was written by ChatGP, with the prompt - write a reply to the youtube video" Max Tegmark - Transhuman Brains?" "Thank you for sharing this video. Max Tegmark's ideas on the potential for transhuman brains are certainly thought-provoking and raise many interesting questions. One aspect of his argument that particularly stood out to me was his emphasis on the importance of ensuring that the development of transhuman brains is aligned with human values. As he pointed out, it's crucial that we consider the ethical implications of creating such advanced technology and ensure that it is used for the benefit of humanity as a whole. It's also interesting to consider the potential for transhuman brains to expand our capabilities and allow us to achieve goals that might currently be beyond our reach. However, it's important to keep in mind the potential downsides and challenges that may arise as well. For example, there could be unintended consequences or risks associated with merging human brains with artificial intelligence, and it will be important to carefully consider these before moving forward with any such plans. Overall, it's clear that the development of transhuman brains is a complex and multifaceted issue that will require careful thought and consideration from a variety of perspectives."

[@smh988]

Every episode of this YT channel enlightens me further, something my wife said is impossible for me to do

[@quakers200]

What we don't think of building is a better society. We are at a loss to understand how to define the problem let alone solve the roblems.

[@lonniedeckermusic]

I love Max. I recommend his book, Life 3.0 for a further look into this subject.

[@AA-qs4ju]

Me too

[@GS-tk1hk]

@@ProxyAuthenticationRequired Black and red/burgundy is a pretty classic and cool combination in my opinion, it'd be different if his sweater was like... green, or something :P

[@jujudreamz84]

Yes I appreciate Max

[@Josephkerr101]

The omegas are open AI and Prometheus is chat gpt / dalle. Spooky accurate imo.

[@jujudreamz84]

Love this Channel Thanks for uploading

[@alexlollol747]

Thanks

[@brothermine2292]

This discussion neglected one of the likely "nightmares": that because it will be expensive to augment human intelligence with trans-human brain implants, humanity will split into a super-intelligent wealthy elite and the rest of us "mundanes." It would presumably be difficult to control a super-intelligent elite if their ambitions are anti-social.

[@theintrnationlst]

It wouldn't necessarily be like that, smart phones are advanced technology that should be very expensive, and yet everyone has one.

[@brothermine2292]

@@edwardtutman196 : 1. Humans are not rats. 2. I don't know what you mean by "rat productivity." 3. Human productivity is incompletely measured by economic stats such as salaries & profits, so I don't know what you mean by human productivity either. Nor why you seem to want to equate "mundane" unaugmented intelligence with nonproductivity or unemployment.

[@brothermine2292]

@@edwardtutman196 : I provided no definition of productivity. I agree that further discussion with you is pointless.

[@jimrohrich2625]

@@theintrnationlst- agree. The income inequality nuts always, and I mean always, misread history.

[@jbghumanjr]

Beautiful video! "Digital suffering".... very enlightening!

[@PMeventsLT]

wow, Dr. Einstein is back and he is a good interviewer!

[@brettgoodroad7747]

Let's not take as an axiom that a carbon based organism is the only one to feel suffering!!!! Amazing!

[@joebobgrizzler9963]

"Open the pod bay doors Hal." "Daisy... Daisy..."

[@mikelvlans29]

Max is the best!

[@ififif31]

Boiling lobsters alive should definitely be banned.

[@aporist]

Why Max thinks that plants don't feel pain when we slaughter them? Just because they don't have mouths to scream pain? Yes, there are many plants that want to be eaten. They dress in bright colours and emit pleasant smells to attract attention and be eaten because in this way they will spread their seeds. However, there are plants that don't want to be slaughtered and how about them?

[@AlmostEthical]

We have to eat and, since plants don't have brains, we figure that if they suffer, they will at least suffer less than organisms with a central nervous system and brains. Eating a root vegetable seems very, very likely to cause far less suffering than eating a pig, especially a factory-farmed one.

[@aporist]

@@AlmostEthical Some animals and plants are more intelligent than others but they will never invent the wheel and the sewing machine or write a poem. It's we the humans that do this and we need fuel for our engines.

[@AlmostEthical]

@@aporist I don't know any humans who have invented the wheel or sewing machine, and certainly I never met anyone who's written a good poem. Can we eat those underachievers too?

[@gumzster]

@@AlmostEthical Epic response! 10/10!

[@greggweber9967]

Is this a major part to the answer to a question I asked a few years ago of when will be the last Homo Sapien? There are, of course, environmental issues like different gravity and weightlessness.

[@AlmostEthical]

Excellent discussion. However, given the degree of political division internationally, it's hard to imagine any binding agreements globally. Standards in this area seem likely to remain inconsistent. The upshot is that someone, somewhere, sometime is very likely going to let the AI genie out of the bottle, so to speak ... and then we will live in interesting times.

[@MrJasonworkman]

Interesting, would a machine become angry if we are constantly turning it off. Can we program feelings into a computer?

[@albert6157]

Artificial intelligence dont involve programming alone. Just like how human cells are made from simpler genetic code, yet displays complexity and diversity of form and function. We use codes to create neural networks which forms AI, similar to how stem cells form neurons and then a brain. Just like a mind, AI can learn and be taught, not programmed, though some people do call it programming 2.0. Only their neural networks perceptrons (artificial neurons) and simpler algorithmic components like our cells can be coded and programmed. Not the AI itself.

[@jamesj66]

Where are they and what are those machineries?

[@jareknowak8712]

Imo, the biggest problem of AI are the intentions of the person who creates it and the limitation of its predictability.

[@demej00]

Perhaps it is not so important how we treat the AI as how we treat our emotional response to them. AI psychology will be a growing field - for humans and AIs both.

[@rileyhoffman6629]

I want to know who will own the means of production? We primates are not generous creatures. The nightmare begins.

[@ricklanders]

The AI and robots would take care of all that for us. We wouldn't have to worry about it anymore.

[@SimonMclennan]

Yes, plenty of technocrats already. The Brave New World of Huxley, some day, already very apparent. The grading of humans. Big questions then on what all this tech is actually for apart from making some people wealthy. AI? Again, what’s it for? Jetting around the cosmos while we watch tiktok Videos and virtuously click while being controlled by algorithms? Yeah, great.

[@dennisjurkovic3636]

when i die,i want the doctors and scientists to keep my brain alive and transplant it in a young kids head, like someone whos in a coma whos been in an accident. then i could start over being young again. and im serious...

[@jordan_8329]

If that were remotely possible then what about the kid who you have just robbed of their unique personality? Transhumanism at that level is a cult.

[@JesseDriftwood]

Generally speaking, we consider someone dead when their brain no longer has any activity. So once your dead, I don’t think anyone is going to want your brain.

[@ricklanders]

Absolutely great insights from Max, displaying his usual intelligence on cutting edge topics. If humans truly were made obsolete in our ordinary occupational functions by AI, which of course is not entirely inconceivable given an indefinite time span, it seems that we as a species would need to reframe or redirect the focus of our existence away from pure survival - as AI and robotics would be able to handle the bulk of that for us, including food supply, shelter requirements, and medical diagnosis and treatment - and more toward developing higher or more refined levels of human emotional potential, possibly art, and consciousness. Would we even need economic systems anymore? We could have a world entirely free of the need for anything monetary that we now think of as fundamental to our societal structures. With unlimited food, travel, education, material goods, and time available and provided by AI/robotics, we could for the first time in history not be bound by those basic concerns and begin exploring what it really means to be human at the deepest levels. This would be a radical departure from our current state/s of thinking and consciousness, would likely take at least a few generations (to get past the old egoistic/fear ways of thinking), and would represent nothing less than the next step in our evolution. Whether transbiological implanted technology augmentation would necessarily be a part of that will be a very interesting question and debate - and I say will, because those capabilities certainly are coming, and are already here in some initial and rudimentary ways (neural implants allowing ALS patients to text and operate computers, etc.)

[@Robinson8491]

Great insight; but will humans allow equality though or is inequality an intrinsic need in us?

[@ricklanders]

@@Robinson8491 I don't think inequality is an intrinsic need at all. Our highest ideals, in fact, most often appear to be aligned with valuing equality, I would say - even from the perspective of someone who was genuinely committed to communism, interestingly enough. I think inequalities emerge and are even fostered and then exploited solely because of the economic structures we have (that we have developed) in relation to the psychology of our evolutionary biology. But in a world without those economic pressures, I think our psychology would shift accordingly over time.

[@cozyslor]

Finally, Max hired a stylist.

[@jamesruscheinski8602]

can artificial intelligence relate to potential existence of advanced intelligent alien civilization?

[@Ramkumar-uj9fo]

Maybe i should have read Max Tegmark over GEB and GH Hardy and Russell Now it is Life 3.0

[@svegritet]

Great information Max ❤. Please do something to the kriminal research on humans to innovate the ICT-AI in Sweden. Researchers can protect themself behind AI.

[@jamesruscheinski8602]

how might artificial intelligence help interstellar travel?

[@itsjusttoolate]

And we absolutely positively 100% have the FULL capability of brain chips, there is technology "they" have that we know nothing about "yet"

[@bradleyfitzik2447]

I like hearing from Max. He's got some interesting ideas

[@dwcheshire]

My question to vegans is,what are you going to eat when we discover that plants have feelings?

[@real_pattern]

any vegan diet uses extremely less plants killed than any non-vegan diet.

[@KhalidTemawi]

Great question

[@VintageBassArchive]

You are space dust that will die inevitably

[@NightBazaar]

We'll have to eat rocks and dirt. Mmm, freshly served loam. Earthworm: "Hey, you're eating my home!"

[@albert6157]

I think you misunderstood veganism, (though im not a completely vegan yet) its not to avoid or stop suffering perfectly. It is to minimise or do our best to, even if plants have feelings, plants would comparatively feel less as far as we know since we know sensations and cognition is correlated with complexity of neural networks (which they have none). Not only that, we'd still have to be consume plants for necessity and survival of our own, as plants have all the nutrient profiles we need already to survive and even live healthy lives, whilst eating animals would kill much more plants as we need a lot more plants just to raise the animals. Just a fruit for thought. :3

[@snappycattimesten]

Only self serving humans would claim with certainty that boiling an animal alive, which has a nervous system, is fine.

[@strauss7151]

It is fine.

[@a---------------]

Chrome up ladies

[@Ramkumar-uj9fo]

I lile Max. Gøod I am not stalking him😊

[@Epoch11]

Water pumps to everything else is that right Max?

[@davidthurman3963]

Engineers should bever use the term existential.

[@davidkemp3154]

If brains don't outplace themselves by intrinsic design we'd all still be 1 cell amoebas.

[@jacksonfl]

Greetings from Jacksonville Florida USA. We will be akin to their pets. They will love us and take care of us. The Earth - maybe the solar system - will be our cage.

[@itsnoteasy5339]

All anyone has to do is watch the movie infinity chamber, or the movie the other life and you will understand if the ideas can be thought up we already know they can be created it's already been proven time n time again, and the fact that that is even possible is actually quite terrifying specially in the case of infinity chamber because ALL possibilities are real and not one single person on earth can say weather Super hyper A.I will be all for us all the time and the fact that we don't know should be natural common sense that it shouldn't go any further because yes history does prove that we never learn from history because history ALWAYS repeats itself.

[@fist_bump]

Huh?

[@davidhunt313]

What happens when a General Artificial Intelligence claims to be suffering due to Humanity??!

[@eriksaari4430]

brainnns!

[@youllsee3]

So since animals are sentient then why is it that we don't start the entire trial on them first to see the outcome of chipping them? And no I'm not talking about just the neurolink on the pigs and show us a 2 hour video I mean a complete long term outcome on a chimpanzee sinse its the closest sentient next to human.

[@stewartthomas4193]

Leonardo da Vinci said "The greatest deception men suffer is from their own opinions " Plato shared with us wisdom he learnt from Egypt, wisdom that was a death sentence in Greece, Rome (Christianity)..Pythagoras, Socrates and later Hypatia of Alexandria. Plato in his dialogue "The Republic " tells the parable of "The Cave " Plato starts by telling us of prisoners being held in a underground den, let us examine this den via the geometry of Bernhard Riemann and Felix Klein..Klein bottle..3rd and 4th dimensions. Plato tells us that the prisoners are bound up unable to move their heads, let us examine this bondage via the psychology of Erich Fromm..socialisation of consciousness..aware-unaware. Plato tells us that the prisoners mistake shadows for substance, let us examine this mistake via the philosophy of Thales, Hume and Kant..synthetic a priori judgement..not thing in itself. Plato tells us that one of the prisoners is released, let us examine this release via the wisdom of T Lobsang Rampa..stilling the mind and conscious astral travel..leaving the cave/body. Plato tells us that the prisoners will reject this release, let us examine this rejection via the psychology of Stockholm Syndrome..Plato quotes Homer..forgive them for they know not what they say. Men are not prisoners of fate, but only prisoners of their own minds. Mathew 23 13 31.

[@breno2024]

I am going to just respond to this video as I watch it: @0:55 If there is a possibility that A.I. could be the very worst thing to ever happen to humanity, the rational thing to do is to stop and take as much time as necessary to determine that such an outcome is highly unlikely. Surely, the rational humans reading this comment would agree that the risk level is too high right now. @1:42 Spoken like someone who has not given enough thought to the inherent value of struggle. Just think of your own life and the struggles you have endured. Were you stronger for them? This is how life works. The struggle is critical. Look at what is happening to many humans who carry a computer in their pocket. Are they doing better because they have that computing power readily accessible. On the whole, it is obvious they are not with a truly terrifying increase in mental health issues that are rapidly compounding from generation to generation. First, we should determine if the challenges we are stumped by are not due to the lack of cooperation amongst nations and between cultures. It is my contention, that humanity has not even begun to realize the potential of international cooperation between rural and urban humans, between the wealthy and the poor, between men and women, between Muslims and Christians, between the Pygmies and the Aborigines, and I have much to say on this subject, but I will leave it at that for now. @3:00 You should probably understand how the brain works before trying to recreate or augment it. In the movie Transcendent Man, Kurzweil is telling a woman about the singularity. Her first thought is about blowing up people with her mind or something to that effect. The look on Kurzweil's face is priceless. It seemed as though he had never considered what it would be like to live in a digital space with malevolent people. Like Kurzweil, it appears that Tegmark knows very little about how the mind works. @4:02 As an engineer, you prefer simplicity because that is all you are capable of processing. That is precisely why you can be so very dangerous when it comes to messing with the complexity of life. @4:23 Ah, now we are beginning to understand why this particular human does not know what they are doing. You have no idea what is the role of humans in the world? Really, and you are proposing that a machine assume that role. Really?! I know what the role of humans is. Anyone who gives the matter sufficient thought can also come to this conclusion. It is not at all difficult. It is exceptionally logical. It eludes humans like Tegmark and because they are so preoccupied by the How, they miss the Why entirely. @5:00 You always talk about nightmare scenarios because human civilization is still living through a very, very dark age. Again, I could talk a lot about this, but suffice it to say, as long as billions of wealthy humans are willing to let billions of poor humans live in miserable poverty while they accumulate more and more wealth, the dark age will continue. Precisely why humans are not ready for A.I. And, before you say, well, A.I. could solve the problem of poverty, you should really think about the problem of poverty. You do not need a computer to teach you to share. @5:49 Just look at the questions Tegmark says we can ask ourselves. Do we want A.I. to manipulate people, increase the wealth gap, put humans out of work, build lethal autonomous weapons? Yes, you always talk about nightmare scenarios. And, as Mr. Kuhn points out, this is not just talk. @6:27 Very poor example. Biology requires a lab and raw materials, which means the barrier to entry is considerably higher than A.I., which requires nothing other than a computer. The raw materials, software, can be easily shared, stolen, replicated, in other words, it can easily fall into the wrong hands to be used malevolently. Note, I believe biology is also a vector for grave danger to the world, but that pandora's box is already opened and genetic manipulation well underway. Only a fool would think that bioweapons are not being enthusiastically explored. @7:02 Carbon chauvinism, really!, what a moronic term. Everything we know about life, both experientially and logically, overwhelmingly indicates that subjective experience is product of living material. There is nothing at all chauvinistic about that assumption. Tegmark is venturing into buffoonery from this point onwards. Just looked him up, this is a product of MIT, lol.

[@charlie-km1et]

They banned lobster boiling in Switzerland😂😂😂😮😂😂😂

[@caryd67]

So is it pronounced “trans human” or “tran shuman”?

[@davidmayhew8083]

I disagree completely. It took alot of blood sweat and tears to make that machine behind him; alot of trial and error and patience. And what, pray tell, do you actually mean when you say "existential"? It's been my experience that people who use terms like that are pretenscious and psuedo intellectual. This concept, if put into action, will be no different from other so called experiments under the heading of "progress". The whole thing is Orwelian in the extreme. What could possibly go wrong? You're diagnosed with depression and anxiety. Well, here's a pill! Take it and no more trouble. But when you pay the piper for your addiction, there will be nobody there to pick up the pieces. It's science fiction and must stay science fiction. That's the moral lesson: some things are better left alone.

[@charlie-km1et]

He makes many real really good points but also misses the mark that companies and 99.9% of people care more about one thing than anything else. Money. Ethics historically are just rules made to be broken. Don’t like the rules? Go to China and do sketchy research on viruses that cause a worldwide pandemic. The best point he made is that AI can’t live without us. Our biologically systems are very very advance reveres entropy systems with a certain shelf life but layered so the genetic code lives on. I’m sure, I hope that we can put this question to AI and it can answer how “it” wants to be able to survive separate from humans. Otherwise AI will always need us.

[@strauss7151]

I am looking forward to having machine slaves. What's the point of even building them otherwise?!

[@Robinson8491]

We should linkup Max Tegmark with Elon Musk to get a superentity of transhumans specialized in creating transhumans

[@MegaDonaldification]

If you are not willing to regenerate your being but synthesize it, are you really sure you want to go through this road. I know there is more in each of us as individuals but humans are relatively too slow to resurrect their unique powers within them because they tend to see easy as the best way of living yet they want a woman to give birth and hospitals still call healing persons patients.

[@mollymuch2808]

Psalm 24:1-2 King James Version (KJV) The earth is the LORD's, and the fulness thereof; The world, and they that dwell therein. For he hath founded it upon the seas, And established it upon the floods. Psalm 24:1-2 King James Version (KJV) The earth is the LORD's, and the fulness thereof; The world, and they that dwell therein. For he hath founded it upon the seas, And established it upon the floods.

[@IIISentorIII]

Those were some horrible question....whats the point of inviting an expert if you can't ask him interesting and smart questions...

[@h4ppyn0m4d]

the weirdest eric andre episode ever

[@Buzz_Kill71]

We built airplanes, not flying birds. 👍

[@whitefiddle]

I look forward to the day when machines have the ability to recognize this sort of balderdash before it gets published; then all this twaddle could be identified and blocked...like we do phone spam. This nonsense is just as laughable as the inane speculation of the 1950s about flying cars and modern home conveniences. We're already "not learning the lessons of history," people.

[@jsnedd66]

Max Tegmark ...real needs to call AA, and stop drinking now!

[@dadsonworldwide3238]

Once it's no human its no human perspective and entropy wins.. old humanist argued survival of the fittest and mechanisms for life to compete but now I guess they don't feel that in this age of idealism. Irs an either or.darwins Evolutionist would deny that we could merge with idealism in such a manner as it threatens our survival . But space was an evolutionary bottleneck for humanity also .

[@kos-mos1127]

It is easier to create a super intelligent AI than to increase human intelligence.

[@aporist]

Don't like people who gesticulate too much. It means they doubt what they say. About transhumanism: Isn't it better for us first to become humans from humanlike and then transhumans? Only ask. That guy Max has dysfunction of the parathyroid.

[@itsnoteasy5339]

Religions have already warned about transhumanism, and I believe the reason is because we are biological and aren't meant to be here forever because the mind belongs to be free and not bound to artificial realities which we are precisely in right now. I think the point is to become our own God's but not in the sense of material but in spirit.

[@terrycallow2979]

It's all about Trans these days.

[@maicolx7776]

Machines can not lessen human suffering lol fool

[@animalbird9436]

My aunt was trans... She was like a father to me.

[@kratomseeker5258]

he seems pretty confident that a machine can achieve consciousness, i tend to think consciousness has something to do with quantum mechanics and is alittle more then just physical. although im not saying he is wrong because all things have a quantum field of their own.

[@ajs1998]

I've heard this before and I don't understand. The scale might matter, but we have no idea which scale is causing consiousness, if any one could ever be pinned down in the first place. Why would consciousness need to emerge from quantum mechanical interactions, but can't emerge from the chemical interactions within cells, or electrical interactions between neurons, or chemical/hormonal interactions between huge groups and branches of neurons? I think different flavors of consciousness emerge from all the different scales of interactions. Maybe even beyond just one brain, maybe the internet has its own flavor of consciousness facilitated by the interactions between human brains. I guess my question is, why do you think the "key" component to understanding what consciousness is, is hidden within quantum interactions we don't understand yet? If there was a single "key" to understanding it, which I'm doubtful of, why would it be at the quantum level and not higher up?

[@kratomseeker5258]

@@ajs1998 well your correct we don't know any of it but that's kinda my point. It's just that quantum mechanical is also not understood I just have a problem believing it's just from simple physical mechanics. But again I don't know either