And the underlying implication is that it is software not hardware which is the real jewel in the crown of life.
The most fundamental feature of post-biological life is that it will have gained complete control not only over its ‘software’ but also over its ‘hardware’.Īs with many writers in the techno-optimist camp Tegmark constantly returns to the hardware-software distinction. Instead of humanity being seen as the ultimate goal and purpose of the entire evolutionary process, for Tegmark humanity is merely a temporary (although essential) staging post in the true goal of the cosmos, which is the emergence of ‘post-biological life’. This grand narrative is a significant development from the older Darwinian evolutionary narrative of the progressive emergence of human life from the primaeval swamp in a process lasting billions of years. Tegmark concludes this section with the passage: “Perhaps life will spread throughout our cosmos and flourish for billions or trillions of years – and perhaps this will be because of decisions that we make here on our little planet during our lifetime”. This makes our cosmic awakening all the more wonderful and worthy of celebrating: it transformed our Universe from a mindless zombie with no self-awareness into a living ecosystem harbouring self-reflection, beauty and hope – and the pursuit of goals, meaning and purpose”. Tegmark argues that in the evolution of humanity “our Universe has awoken and become aware of itself.….Before our Universe awoke there was no beauty….
Life 3.0 which doesn’t yet exist on earth although it is nearly here, is non-human and post-biological or technological: it can “dramatically redesign not only its software but its hardware as well.” Life 2.0 is human and biological: it can “redesign much of its software (through culture), but not its hardware ” Life 1.0 is simple and biological: it is “unable to redesign either its hardware or its software during its lifetime.” It’s a self-replicating information-processing system whose information determines its behaviour (software) and the blueprints for its hardware.”
His definition if life is as “a process that can retain its complexity and replicate. Tegmark is firmly within the stream of many modern thinkers who conceive of life in purely mechanistic terms. As their website proclaims “Technology is giving life the potential to flourish like never before – or to self destruct” Tegmark is a MIT physicist who was one of the founders of the Future of Life Institute, dedicated to the study of risks to the future existence of humanity from multiple threats, including super-intelligent AI.
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