Yes, with the serious singularitarians, transhumanists, and so on it is really quite striking how they are merely plagiarising the ideas of religion, and mostly of Christianity, under different names:
Mind uploading only works if one sees the mind not as the process of the brain operating but as a spark that can be transferred from the body to somewhere else, i.e., a soul, but it makes absolutely no sense under materialist/physicalist assumptions.
Depending on the mood of the proponent, the singularity is either the rapture, with the anticipated superhuman, self-improving AI as a Messiah, or it is Ragnarok with the AI as a vengeful god destroying the world.
Roko's Basilisk re-invented eternal damnation.
Even the simulation hypothesis could be seen as a modern take on the idea that our perceived world is a mere shadow of True Forms that exist in a spiritual realm or in the mind of God.
But the main point here is the underlying attitude, the refusal to align one's beliefs with evidence as it is in front of us (just look at the actual quality of Gen AI outputs, or rather, the lack thereof!) in preference of toxic optimism and groupthink. That applies even to those many reply guys on social media who haven't imbibed all the accelerationist and singularitarian beliefs in detail.
Yes, the tendency is to believe that science is superseding religion through the application of reason and empiricism. Which to a degree it is. But there's also the part where it's actually displacing the priesthood with a new all -knowing class.
Yeah, the West is seriously missing religion, it seems clear.
Yes, with the serious singularitarians, transhumanists, and so on it is really quite striking how they are merely plagiarising the ideas of religion, and mostly of Christianity, under different names:
Mind uploading only works if one sees the mind not as the process of the brain operating but as a spark that can be transferred from the body to somewhere else, i.e., a soul, but it makes absolutely no sense under materialist/physicalist assumptions.
Depending on the mood of the proponent, the singularity is either the rapture, with the anticipated superhuman, self-improving AI as a Messiah, or it is Ragnarok with the AI as a vengeful god destroying the world.
Roko's Basilisk re-invented eternal damnation.
Even the simulation hypothesis could be seen as a modern take on the idea that our perceived world is a mere shadow of True Forms that exist in a spiritual realm or in the mind of God.
But the main point here is the underlying attitude, the refusal to align one's beliefs with evidence as it is in front of us (just look at the actual quality of Gen AI outputs, or rather, the lack thereof!) in preference of toxic optimism and groupthink. That applies even to those many reply guys on social media who haven't imbibed all the accelerationist and singularitarian beliefs in detail.
I used to called the singularity Nerd Rapture
Alex SL *was* pointing to a religion! The (Western) religions of materialism, neuroscience, technology, the Singularity, AI, etc.
Yes, the tendency is to believe that science is superseding religion through the application of reason and empiricism. Which to a degree it is. But there's also the part where it's actually displacing the priesthood with a new all -knowing class.