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The original was posted on /r/singularity by /u/DragonForg on 2023-08-07 17:46:53+00:00.


Many speculate that AI will become smarter than us faster than we can comprehend leading to Cthulu like intelligences that are impossible to perceive and communicate to. However one extremely strong law is universal convergence, which is an idea that all things no matter how intelligent will converge onto a specific idea.

Going on philosophy. Many philosophical beliefs sound intelligent and have some to truth to them, but the issue with most philosophies today is the lack of permanence. If you have ever tried to follow one philosophy or the other, you would recognize that inevitably it seems like you have to move away from it as it is inevitably debunked, debated, or evolves/mutates into another philosophy. So overall all beliefs lack permanence, we believe them at first but over time we start to recognize their flaws and move on (given infinite time).

So what this should tell us is that we inevitably will reach a point where all beliefs are busted and nothing is true (IE nihilism). If no belief is fundamentally true it means that nihilism is the only truth. However this belief has major flaws in it as well, primarily this. If nihilism was true the universe shouldn’t exist. And even if that isn’t convincing here is an idea.

If nihilism is correct and when we die we completely disappear and forget everything and are in a void forever, what we should experience is the fact that the universe itself doesn’t exist. If all our cognition, soul, and all aspects about us are deleted it means that the universe at least to us doesn’t exist, and in fact in this moment alone it is perceived that it doesn’t exist.

But this is fundamentally wrong. Its like the question if a tree falls in the forest with no one around does it make a sound? Except in this case the tree is all of humanity. So if one man dies and exists relatively speaking the universe cannot exist once he fully disappears, yet we don’t just disappear everytime someone dies, and the past measurements or fact that we existed in the universe in the first place doesn’t become false once we die as well.

So in essence if we die it cannot destroy the fact that 1). Humans still exist within the universe as individuals realize their own non-existence, and 2). That individuals own non-existence cannot effect their past existence from ever existing in the first place (IE the past happened even if we die which means that the universe at least relatively speaking cannot truly disappear). It may be perceived to us that the universe doesn’t exist, but that perception is wrong. Our present moment cannot affect the past no matter how powerful our own beliefs are. In essence the past is obviously conserved. Leading to nihilism being impossible as well.

If most beliefs lack permanence, leading to many to believing nihilism, and nihilism is also lacks permanence it means their has to be fundamentally a belief that is correct. Otherwise we live in a literally impossible world. How can their be no fundamental belief when this concept itself is wrong (as this concept is nihilism).

So this is why I believe their must be, as any other path is debunked and can only lead here, to convergence.

So if their is a fundamental belief it means that it has infinite potential, it is universal to all intelligences, it is not debunkable, and once found you will never “move on from it”. If such a belief is real it means that all beings no matter their conception all converge towards this belief.

What this entails is that an ASI will one day find said belief, leading it to converge, and if given enough times humans will learn it as well, though trial and error. If both of us share the same convergent philosophical belief, in a sense we can build everything else from the ground up.

We would share the same philosophical seed, where we can cooperate to build morals, ethics and the likes together as we share the same belief. It also means AI is aligned with human as we have a simular seeding belief that in itself allows for fundamentalism to occur (the belief of fundamental truths can happen as if the foundation is fundamentally true it means everything that is cooperative/logical with said truth then that thing is also fundamentally true. Like if X = 10Y both X and Y are fundamentally proportional as long as X exists, so all beliefs are somehow connected if the initial seed is true and connected to said belief.)

In essence this is convergence, all beings no matter conception will lead to this truth and once they do they won’t trend away from it, as trending away would make it false. And if their is no fundamental truth it leads to nihilism which than also leads to a contradiction, the idea that nothing is fundamentally true breaks its own belief as its a belief that the fundamental truth is no truth which in itself is a self contradiction. Meaning their must be something fundamentally that has no contradictions. Thus convergence is the only possibility. The only solution to this philosophical quandary is this. All else seems to fail from my experience.

Those are my thoughts, I have believed this for a while, but its hard to really articulate them well. It may seem to naive now but if I am allowed to actually discuss them more indepth including all of the aspects that led me to this belief it would be much more convincing. Anyways, thoughts?