That is right this moment’s version of The Obtain, our weekday publication that gives a every day dose of what is going on on on the earth of know-how.
Tech billionaires are making a dangerous guess with humanity’s future
Sam Altman, Jeff Bezos, Elon Musk, and others might have barely completely different objectives, however their grand visions for the following decade and past are remarkably related.
They embody aligning AI with the pursuits of humanity; creating a synthetic superintelligence that may remedy all of the world’s most urgent issues; merging with that superintelligence to realize immortality (or one thing near it); establishing a everlasting, self-sustaining colony on Mars; and, finally, spreading out throughout the cosmos.
Three options play a central position with powering these visions, says Adam Becker, a science author and astrophysicist: an unshakable certainty that know-how can remedy any drawback, a perception within the necessity of perpetual progress, and a quasi-religious obsession with transcending our bodily and organic limits.
In his well timed new e-book, Extra The whole lot Without end: AI Overlords, House Empires, and Silicon Valley’s Campaign to Management the Destiny of Humanity, Becker reveals how these fantastical visions conceal a darker agenda. Learn the complete story.