[Article.Ai] Scientific Purpose of human life? (An atheist’s article)

This article describes what I call the “limited or fractional-neo purpose”; built atop Richard Dawkins’ “neo” purpose concept. It concerns teleonomy, a recent concept which contrasts teleology. (Taken from a hypothesis of mine written in 2015, “Why the purpose of the human species is probably to create artificial general intelligence”).

Teleonomy entails purpose in the context of objectivity/science, rather than in the context of subjectivity/deities. Teleonomy ought not to be confused for the teleological argument, which is a religious/subjective concept contrary to teleonomy, a scientific/objective concept.

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1. Notably, Richard Dawkins argues (See video) that “neo purpose” concerns the ability to disregard “archeo/natural purpose”; i.e. mankind’s intelligence is seemingly a way to disrupt the natural/Darwinian order or natural purpose scenario, thus generating “neo purpose”, or purpose attributable to man made items. (Dawkins seems to posit that mankind, equipped with general intelligence, may dream up many particularly non-Darwinian goals.)

2. My hypothesis, as seen in the earlier paper, introduces what I call “limited or fractional neo purpose”, built atop Richard Dawkins’ neo purpose concept.

3. In this hypothesis, I propose that instead of actually disrupting Darwinian-like regime as Dawkins would seem to express, I posit that a pertinent thing that mankind shall likely invent, namely Artificial General Intelligence, is simply yet another way to enforce Darwinian like cycle, with the extension of intelligent entities via the emergence of Artificial General Intelligence as explained in the hypothesis, in the natural scope/limit fashioned by principles related to entropy. (Instead of Dawkins, I propose that a likely large/utmost result of mankind’s dreams/research/scientific endeavor, is probably Artificial General Intelligence, which could reasonably be observed within the Darwinian-like scope, given principles related to entropy.)

This grand purpose (of the human species) I refer to seems to lean more in the direction of a “Darwinian-like” cycle (compared to Dawkins’ treatment), because my hypothesis offsets within the realm of entropy maximization, that the human species seeks to enable the survival of general intelligence, which may not necessarily warrant the communication of human aligned genes, nor ultimately value human activities that lend to the survival of the human species, as humans draw nearer and nearer to inventing Artificial General Intelligence. (Artificial General Intelligence is a form of artificial intelligence, that shall likely generate more entropy than humans, in the form of more cognitive tasks.)

Of course, this hypothesis takes into account, modern evolutionary principles, beyond the scope of Darwinian theory.

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References

1. Why the purpose of the human species is probably to create artificial general intelligence
2. Richard Dawkins: The purpose of purpose

Intriguing, recommended reading of a concept by another author, that concerns scientific purpose

1. Cosmological Natural Selection I (CNS I), based on CNS by Lee Smolin

2. Fun article on CNS I

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Author:

I am an atheist, casual body builder, and software engineer.