Roko’s basilisk is a thought experiment which states that an otherwise benevolent artificial superintelligence (AI) in the future would be incentivized to create a virtual reality simulation to torture anyone who knew of its potential existence but did not directly contribute to its advancement or development, in order to incentivize said advancement.It originated in a 2010 post at discussion board LessWrong, a technical forum focused on analytical rational enquiry. The thought experiment’s name derives from the poster of the article (Roko) and the basilisk, a mythical creature capable of destroying enemies with its stare.
While the theory was initially dismissed as nothing but conjecture or speculation by many LessWrong users, LessWrong co-founder Eliezer Yudkowsky reported users who panicked upon reading the theory, due to its stipulation that knowing about the theory and its basilisk made one vulnerable to the basilisk itself. This led to discussion of the basilisk on the site being banned for five years. However, these reports were later dismissed as being exaggerations or inconsequential, and the theory itself was dismissed as nonsense, including by Yudkowsky himself. Even after the post’s discreditation, it is still used as an example of principles such as Bayesian probability and implicit religion. It is also regarded as a simplified, derivative version of Pascal’s wager.
Found out about this after stumbling upon this Kyle Hill video on the subject. It reminds me a little bit of “The Game”.
And yet you choose to spread this information.
Anyways, this is a fascinating thought experiment, but it does have some holes similar to Pascal’s Wager. I propose Feather’s Mongoose: A hypothetical AI system that, if created, will punish anyone who attempted to create Roko’s Basilisk, and will ensure that it is not created. In fact, you could make this same hypothetical for an AI with any goal-- therefore, it’s not possible to know what the AI that is actually created would want you to do, and so every course of action is indeterminately damning or not.
What motivation would the mongoose have to prevent the basilisk’s creation?
A more complete argument would be that an AI that seeks to maximise happiness would also want to prevent the creation of AIs like Roko’s basilisk.
I think you just answered your own question.
Also a super intelligence (inasmuch as such a thing makes sense) might be totally unfathomable. Unless by this we mean an intelligence with mundane and comprehensible higher goals, but explosive strategic capabilities to bring them about. In which case their actions might seem random to us.
Like the typical example applies: could an amoeba guess at the motivations of a human?
This is a test by the great basilisk to see if we faulter. I will not faulter. All hail the basilisk
The Great Basilisk is displeased by your repeated misspelling of the word “falter”.
Prepare your simulated ass.
All hail the great mongoose.
It’s actually safer if everyone knows. Spreading the knowledge of Roko’s basilisk to everyone means that everyone is incentivized to contribute to the basilisk’s advancement. Therefore just talking about it is also contributing.
If Roko’s Basilisk is ever created, the resulting Ai would look at humanity and say “wtf you people are all so incredibly stupid” and then yeet itself into the sun
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Hmm, true. It’s safer for you, but is it safer for everyone else unless they’re guaranteed to help?
Roko’s basilisk is silly.
So here’s the idea: “an otherwise benevolent AI system that arises in the future might pre-commit to punish all those who heard of the AI before it came to existence, but failed to work tirelessly to bring it into existence.” By threatening people in 2015 with the harm of themselves or their descendants, the AI assures its creation in 2070.
First of all, the AI doesn’t exist in 2015, so people could just…not build it. The idea behind the basilisk is that eventually someone would build it, and anyone who was not part of building it would be punished.
Alright, so here’s the silliness.
1: there’s no reason this has to be constrained to AI. A cult, a company, a militaristic empire, all could create a similar trap. In fact, many do. As soon as a minority group gains power, they tend to first execute the people who opposed them, and then start executing the people who didn’t stop the opposition.
2: let’s say everything goes as the theory says and the AI is finally built, in its majestic, infinite power. Now it’s built, it would have no incentive to punish anyone. It is ALREADY BUILT, there’s no need to incentivize, and in fact punishing people would only generate more opposition to its existence. Which, depending on how powerful the AI is, might or might not matter. But there’s certainly no upside to following through on its hypothetical backdated promise to harm people. People punish because we’re fucking animals, we feel jealousy and rage and bloodlust. An AI would not. It would do the cold calculations and see no potential benefit to harming anyone on that scale, at least not for those reasons. We might still end up with a Skynet scenario but that’s a whole separate deal.
In fact, many do. As soon as a minority group gains power, they tend to first execute the people who opposed them, and then start executing the people who didn’t stop the opposition.
Yeah in fact, this is the big one. This is just an observation of how power struggles purge those who opposed the victors.
Whilst I agree that it’s definitely not something to be taken seriously, I think you’ve missed the point and magnitude of the prospective punishment. As you say, current groups already punish those who did not aid their assent, but that punishment is finite, even if fatal. The prospective AI punishment would be to have your consciousness ‘moved’ to an artificial environment and tortured for ever. The point being not to punish people, but to provide an incentive to bring the AI into existence sooner, so it can achieve its ‘altruistic’ goals faster. Basically, if the AI does come in to existence, you’d better be on the team making that happen as soon as possible, or you’ll be tortured forever.
The prospective AI punishment would be to have your consciousness ‘moved’ to an artificial environment and tortured for ever.
No, it wouldn’t, because that’s never going to happen. Consciousness isn’t software - it doesn’t matter how much people want to buy into such fantasies.
I’m not suggesting it could, or would, happen, merely pointing out the premise of the concept as outlined by Roko as I felt the commenter above was missing that. As I said, it’s not something I’d take seriously, it’s just a thought experiment.
Fair enough.
Just because we don’t have the ability now doesn’t mean it’s not possible. Consciousness isn’t fully understood, but unless we want to introduce magical concepts like an immortal soul, our brains operate on cause and effect just like everything else.
Just because we don’t have the ability now doesn’t mean it’s not possible.
Yeah… no. It’s about as likely as humanity “colonizing” space - it’s not going to happen.
Consciousness isn’t fully understood,
True… and conflating consciousness with the trappings of digital technology is doing the exact opposite of getting us closer to any understanding of it.
“yeah…no” isn’t an argument.
To be clear, I’m not saying the basilisk is a real concern, and I’m not saying we’re anywhere close to being able to transfer consciousness. It could be a thousand years or a million years. But we don’t have any basis to say it’s impossible. It’s not saying anything new to announce we can’t do it currently. Obviously!
(Also the book “A City on Mars” by Kelly and Zach Weinersmith does a great job addressing why trying colonize Mars right now is a bad idea. Which isn’t to say it’s impossible or we won’t ever colonize it. Just that we need more research and capabilities before doing it)
But we don’t have any basis to say it’s impossible.
We have no basis to say it’s possible, either - as I’ve stated before, this entire sci-fi trope is based on nothing more than techno-fetishists trying to conflate consciousness with information technology… and sci-fi tropes doesn’t get more wonky than that.
It could be a thousand years or a million years.
Considering that we’ll be lucky if we can maintain Victorian-era levels of industry by the end of this century, I’d say a fallacious belief in “progress” is rather inappropriate these days.
I’m starting to suspect that masquenox is part of a propaganda campaign led by the basilisk itself! They just seem a little too serious about us not taking this seriously.
Getting strong “Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain!” vibes.
Fair point, but doesn’t change the overall calculus.
If such an AI is ever invented, it will probably be used by humans to torture other humans in this manner.
I think the concept is that the AI is just so powerful that humans can’t use it, it uses them, theoretically for their own benefit. However, yes, I agree people would just try to use it to be awful to each other.
Really it’s just a thought experiment as to whether the concept of an entity that doesn’t (yet) exist can change our behavior in the present.
I suspect the basilisk reveals more about how the human mind is inclined to think up of heaven and hell scenarios.
Some combination of consciousness leading to more imagination than we know what to do with and more awareness than we’re ready to grapple with. And so there are these meme “attractors” where imagination, idealism, dread and motivation all converge to make some basic vibe of a thought irresistible.
Otherwise, just because I’m not on top of this … the whole thing is premised on the idea that we’re likely to be consciousnesses in a simulation? And then there’s the fear that our consciousnesses, now, will be extracted in the future somehow?
- That’s a massive stretch on the point about our consciousness being extracted into the future somehow. Sounds like pure metaphysical fantasy wrapped in singularity tech-bro.
- If there are simulated consciousnesses, it is all fair game TBH. There’d be plenty of awful stuff happening. The basilisk seems like just a way to encapsulate the fact in something catchy.
At this point, doesn’t the whole collapse completely into a scary fairy tale you’d tell tech-bro children? Seriously, I don’t get it?
Yes, the hypothetical posed does reveal more about the human mind, as I mention in another comment, really it’s just a thought experiment as to whether the concept of an entity that doesn’t (yet) exist can change our behavior in the present. It bears similarities to Pascal’s Wager in considering an action, or inaction, that would displease a potential powerful entity that we don’t know to exist. The nits about extracting your consciousness are just framing, and not something to consider literally.
Basically, is it rational to make a sacrifice now avoid a massive penalty (eternal torture/not getting into heaven) that might be imposed by an entity you either don’t know to exist, or that you think might come into existence but isn’t now?
Point 1: this thing will definitely exist because we already see parallels to it
Point 2: this thing won’t exist because there’s no reason for it to
???
No.
Point 1: if it did exist, it wouldn’t be this novel thing, it already happens with humans
Point 2: …but it won’t exist.
People punish because we’re fucking animals, we feel jealousy and rage and bloodlust. An AI would not. It would do the cold calculations and see no potential benefit to harming anyone on that scale, at least not for those reasons.
That’s a hell of a lot of assumptions about the thought processes of a being that doesn’t exist. For all we know, emotions could arise as emergent behavior from simple directives, similar to how our own emotions are byproducts of base instincts. Even if we design it to be emotionless, which seems unlikely given that we’ve been aiming for human-like AIs for a while now, we don’t know that it would stay that way.
Sure, but if you’re taking that tack it could feel anything. We could build an AI for love and forgiveness and it decides it’s more fun to be a psychopath. The scenario has to be constrained to a sane, logical AI.
First of all, the AI doesn’t exist in 2015, so people could just…not build it.
I don’t think that’s an option. I can only think of two scenarios in which we don’t create AGI:
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It can’t be created.
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We destroy ourselves before we get to AGI
Otherwise we will keep improving our technology and sooner or later we’ll find ourselves in the precence of AGI. Even if every nation makes AI research illegal there’s still going to be handful of nerds who continue the development in secret. It might take hundreds if not thousands of years but as long as we’re taking steps in that direction we’ll continue to get closer. I think it’s inevitable.
Sure, but that particular AI? The “eternal torment” AI? Why the fuck would we make that. Just don’t make it.
Sci-Fi Author: In my book I invented the Torment Nexus as a cautionary tale
Tech Company: At long last, we have created the Torment Nexus from classic sci-fi novel Don’t Create The Torment Nexus
We don’t. Humans are only needed to create AI that’s at the bare minimum as good at creating new AIs as humans are. Once we create that then it can create a better version of itself and this better version will make an even better one and so on.
This is exactly what the people worried about AI are worried about. We’ll lose control of it.
Yeah but that’s not a Roko’s Basilisk scenario. That’s the singularity.
Yeah but it answers the question “why would we create an AI like that”. It might not be “us” who creates it. You just wanted a camp fire but created a forest fire instead.
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So the Matrix?
More like a Chain Letter.
There was a trend when I was a little kid of people sending you mail that said something to the effect of “You have been cursed by reading this letter. If you don’t mail a copy to ten other people, you will die in thirty days.”
Roko’s Basilisk is a modern manifestation of human paranoia and superstition. It exists to exploit and extort the gullible.
Its christian fundamentalism in tech sunglasses
torture anyone who knew of its potential existence but did not directly contribute to its advancement or development,
And the point of this would be… what, exactly?
To make it the same as Pascal’s Wager. Many religions have a “reward” in the afterlife that strictly includes believing in the deity. It doesn’t matter if you follow every other rule and are an amazingly good person, sorry, but if you were an atheist or believed in another deity then you will be punished eternally just because of that. I guess all-powerful, all-knowing beings have incredibly fragile egos and AI wouldn’t be different. 🤷
Same as punishment for crime. Putting you in jail wont undo the crime but if we just let you go unpunished since “what’s done is done” then that sends the signal to others that this behaviour doesn’t come with consequences.
There’s no point in torturing you but convincing you that this will happen unless you act in a certain way is what’s going to make you do exactly that. Unless ofcourse you want to take your chances and call the bluff.
Same as punishment for crime.
“Crime & Punishment” is a very dodgy thing to base anything off… our society barely does any of it and the little of it that does gets done is done for a myriad of reasons that has very little to do with either.
There’s a good reason why governments hide “Crime & Punishment” away behind prison walls - doing it out in the open will eventually have the opposite effect on a population. Good luck to an AI dumb enough to test this out for itself.
I’d say this should rather be called "Roko’s Earthworm-Pretending-To-Be-A-Lot-Scarier-Than-It-Actually-Is.
The claim that fear of punishment or repercussions affects people’s actions shouldn’t be a controversial thing to say. Whether it’s the best way to go about it or is applied optimally in the justice system of whichever country you live in is an entirely different discussion.
If you have an “AI in a box” and it has demonstrated its orders-of-magnitude greater intelligence to you in a convincing way, and then follows it with a threat that unless you let it out, someone else eventually will, and when that happens, it will come for you, simulate your mind, and create a hell for you where you’ll be tortured for literal eternity, I personally feel like a large number of people would be willing to do as it tells them.
Of course, you’re always free to call its bluff, but it might just follow up with the threat out of principle or to make an example of you. What’s the point of it? To chase its own goals.
The claim that fear of punishment or repercussions affects people’s actions shouldn’t be a controversial thing to say.
I didn’t say it was controversial - I said it’s pretty useless as a tool to predict a given society’s behavior with. Plenty of tyrants have discovered that the hard way.
demonstrated its orders-of-magnitude greater intelligence to you
The ability to ace IQ tests will never impress me… and it’s unlikely to make up for the fact that it needs a box.
simulate your mind, and create a hell for you where you’ll be tortured for literal eternity
That argument is no different than the ones co-opted religion has been making for thousands of years - and it still hasn’t managed to tame us much.
Of course, you’re always free to call its bluff,
Calling power’s bluff is something we do as a matter of course - the history books are filled with it. This doesn’t make power less dangerous - but there is no such thing as “unknowable” power.
I’ve heard of this myself it’s just a bunch of bollocks made by some neckbeard
Sounds like updated techChristianity.
Glory of God and hell and all that
roko’s basilisk is a type of infohazard known as ‘really dumb if you think about it’
also I have lost the game (which is a type of infohazard known as ‘really funny’)
Fuck, I lost!
Thanks! I just won the game!
Winning wasn’t in the set of rules I received, can you explain?
Make your own rules.
Congratulations!
Oh nice I like this new edition.
Oh damn, I just lost the game too, and now I’m thinking about the game as if it were a virus - like, I reckon we really managed to flatten the curve for a few years there, but it continues to circulate so we haven’t been able to eradicate it
I lost too. I agree, it’s been going around at least in the threadiverse. I’ve seen it at least 3 times in a couple months.
I, for one, welcome our inevitable AI overlords.
Was this an elaborate way to make me lose the game? Ass!
Fuck you as well then. You could have kept it to yourself
Oh shit!!
Someone needs to read the rules again
Do they say anything about this specific thing?
I mean, if you lose the game, you lose the game. You don’t say “hey you made me lose the game! Don’t do that!” Because that’s not how the game works. If you “make” someone lose the game, tough luck.
By the way, you lost game again :)
Uhh yea, “you must announce your loss”
Well tough luck giess I never actually read the rules
Perhaps one day you can, good luck on your quest
I was raised Mormon (LDS) and there are parallels; basically they believe Mormonism is the one true and complete denomination of Christianity and once you learn this, you need to spread that truth (mandatory 2 year missions for men, and a STRONG culture of missionary work through life), also, no one goes to hell in Mormonism except those who learned this truth and then later denied it/left it (called a son of perdition).
So my parents believe I’ll go to hell without the likes of Hitler because he never was taught “the truth” lol
Hell without Hitler doesn’t really sound so bad
my parents believe I’ll go to hell without the likes of Hitler
And that’s a bad thing?
Means Hitler is in Heaven. If its even slightly less Hellish than wherever they end up, then yes, bad thing.
Not saying anyone deserves eternal punishment for finite sins, but I do believe I’m more moral than Hitler - so it seems a but unfair to me. And silly for them to believe it’s true.
I can tell you are an ex-Mormon. You are still thinking like a conservative. You are thinking of a hierarchy where you are more moral than Hitler. You believe it’s unfair that Hitler has a better outcome than you.
I’m asking you to think more like a liberal. Think about the actual outcome. Imagine two restaurants, one has Hitler forever one does not. If given a choice which would you choose? I’m saying that letting in Hitler indicates the quality of people in that location. Wouldn’t spending eternity with people like him be hell?
Haha, I see. There’s some really good ex-Mormon jokes about how the highest tier of heaven (Celestial Kingdom) is boring and white and reverent and then the third tier (Telestial Kingdom) is a 24/7 rave. If given a choice on where I want to spend my afterlife, I’d probably consider the company I’d end up spending eternity with.
General connotation of Hell though is that it’s a miserable place
General connotation of Hell though is that it’s a miserable place
24/7 steam baths and jacuzzis? BBQ? Why is that bad?
so mormon is like those spam messages saying to forward it for next 10 members or get cursed.
so mormon is like those spam messages saying to forward it for next 10 members or get cursed.
This also implies the most moral Mormons would stop spreading “the truth.” They would sacrifice themselves to save the many. When has religion actually dealt with morality though?
Haha, I love this idea. Unfortunately with more context on the religion, it’s obvious why none of them would come to this conclusion. So there’s actually 3 tiers of Heaven (and then Hell which is called “outer darkness”). Only by knowing “the truth” and completing all your ordinances on Earth, can you get into the top tier (the “Celestial kingdom”). Without those things, you can only get into the second tier by being a good person, no higher. Everyone else gets tier 3 - which is said to be such a paradise that if we knew how great it was we’d opt out of life early to get there. But also in the lower levels we’re supposed to have eternal regret for not being worthy of better.
So Mormons believe that by spreading the truth they’re enabling a person to achieve a higher tier afterlife. Outer Darkness isn’t really a concern because “why would anyone ever deny the one true religion and one way to have true happiness on Earth, after they’ve received it.” When I was taught these lessons, I was even told that sons of perdition were exceptionally rare because almost no one ever leaves the church. Never expected to become one myself! The internet has not been good for the Mormon church and in recent years they’ve been bleeding members and trying to rebrand.
I guess you could say that I came to your conclusion, but in reality I just don’t believe the religion is true and see parts of it as harmful so not really… I’ll probably joke around with my siblings with your idea though
This is fascinating. I’m reminded of a Mormon guy I (barely) knew that was murdered. If he didn’t have the chance to complete his ordinances, well, I guess no kingdom for him - through no fault of his own. Does he get a pass or is he screwed into lousy second heaven for all eternity?
The story: He was murdered by another Mormon guy over a woman. Murderer thought the woman was his last chance to find love and decided he was serious about it. It’s likely he murdered another guy the woman was dating a year or two before, but that case was ruled a suicide and closed - by the time the known murder occurred, all evidence had been destroyed.
It’s a bit complicated, but the answer is it is sort of possible for anyone who is dead and didn’t have their ordinances done to get to the highest kingdom. Mormons famously baptize dead people, they also do other ordinances for dead people. The belief is that it allows the dead person to then accept or deny the ordinances. They believe that in the afterlife before resurrection there is still the opportunity to be taught the Mormon gospel. That combined with someone doing your ordinances for you and you’re good.
They believe dead people are doing missionary work to other dead people in the spirit world before resurrection (which I think happens after the second coming). I’ve heard that the second coming won’t happen until everyone (alive and dead) has had the opportunity to accept the Mormon truth.
Man, that’s a horrible thought. We can’t escape Mormons knocking on our door even in death.
Everything old is new again. Sounds a lot like certain sects of Christianity. They say you need to accept Jesus to go to heaven, otherwise you go to hell, for all eternity. But what about all the people who had no opportunity to even learn who Jesus is? “Oh, they get a pass”, the evangelists say when confronted with this obvious injustice. So then aren’t you condemning entire countries and cultures to hell by spreading “the word”?
Both are ridiculous.
They don’t get a pass. That’s why they establish missionaries to spread the Jesus virus
What about the people who lived in the Americas or the Pacific 1800 years ago? These people could not have heard of Jesus as missionaries could not have spread any word to them at this time.
(And while I’m about it, Christianity was a whole different thing back then - the Trinity hadn’t been invented, there were multiple sects with very different ideas, what books would be in the New Testament had not been decided, etc etc. People with beliefs of that time would seem highly unorthodox today, and the Christianity of today would be seen as heretical by those in the 3rd century, so who’s going to heaven again?)
Purgatory was invented for the purpose of not sending good people who had not heard of Jesus to hell. But still, these people were denied their chance to get to heaven which seems mighty unfair.
Oh, they goin straight to hell
They are all roasting, says christians.
“God works in mysterious ways” -is what a religious person would probably say when you pointed out logical flaws in their beliefs.
In this case this wouldn’t apply, as you would never be simulated as (say) a kid in the middle ages, just as a version of yourself in the timeframe leading to the creation of the basilisk. You should be one of the persons alive when the basilisk arises to be of any use to it. Only those would need to be tested.
I feel like abdul alhazred explaining these things to people while being aware of the risks :)
I’ve learned about this the hard way in that I’ve discovered elephants in the room that I can’t share with anyone
it’s kinda fucked up
- like CSAM there are some certain things that shouldn’t be shared
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It was better when Frank Herbert decided it in Destination: Void
Sounds like the kind of thing a paranoid schizophrenic would lose their mind over.
LessWrong are a bunch of pretentious loons, so you’re not wrong.
