Anders Sandberg

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Anders Sandberg
Anders Sandberg FHI.jpg
Sandberg in 2016 pictured wearing his medal with instructions to be cryonically preserved in case of legal death
Born (1972-07-11) 11 July 1972 (age 51)
Solna, Sweden
Education Stockholm University (PhD in Computational Neuroscience)
Occupation(s)Researcher, science debater, futurist, transhumanist and author
Movement Transhumanism
Website www.aleph.se

Anders Sandberg (born 11 July 1972) is a Swedish researcher, futurist and transhumanist. He holds a PhD in computational neuroscience from Stockholm University, and is a former senior research fellow at the Future of Humanity Institute at the University of Oxford. [1]

Contents

Work

Sandberg at the University of Helsinki, in 2006 Anders Sandberg.jpg
Sandberg at the University of Helsinki, in 2006

Sandberg's research centres on societal and ethical issues surrounding human enhancement and new technology, as well as on assessing the capabilities and underlying science of future technologies. [2] His research includes work on cognitive enhancement [3] (methods, impacts, and policy analysis) and technical roadmaps on whole brain emulation, [4] neuroethics, and global catastrophic risks. He analysed how to take into account the subjective uncertainty in risk estimates of low-likelihood, high-consequence risk. [5]

Sandberg is known as a researcher, participant and commentator in the public debate on human enhancement, neuroscience, ethics, and future studies. [2]

He is co-founder of and writer for the think tank Eudoxa, and is a co-founder of the Orion's Arm collaborative worldbuilding project. [6] Between 1996 and 2000 he was Chairman of the Swedish Transhumanist Association. He was also the scientific producer for the neuroscience exhibition "Se Hjärnan!" ("Behold the Brain!"), organized by Swedish Travelling Exhibitions, the Swedish Research Council and the Knowledge Foundation, that toured Sweden in 2005–2006. In 2007 he was a postdoctoral research fellow at the Oxford Uehiro Centre for Practical Ethics, working on the EU-funded ENHANCE project on the ethics of human enhancement. [7]

Sandberg is also an electronic artist, whose renderings have been adapted for book covers by futurist Damien Broderick: The Dreaming, Earth is But a Star, The Judas Mandala, Skiffy and Mimesis, Uncle Bones, Warriors of the Tao, and xyzt. [8]

Sandberg at TEDxTallinn, in 2012 Anders Sandberg in TEDxTallinn.jpg
Sandberg at TEDxTallinn, in 2012

Sandberg has also supported and advocated cryonics, for example by signing an open letter to support research into cryonics [9] and by being an advisor to the UK Cryonics and Cryopreservation Research Network, [10] a UK advocacy group. [11] He has personally arranged to be cryonically preserved after his legal death. [12]

One of his 2014 papers, entitled "Ethics of Brain Emulations", [13] became one of the most downloaded papers in the Journal of Experimental and Theoretical Artificial Intelligence, [14] from a special volume edited by Vincent C. Müller.

With nanotechnologist Eric Drexler and philosopher Toby Ord in 2018 he published a paper entitled "Dissolving the Fermi Paradox". [15] [16] The paper was the first to estimate and rigorously take into account the uncertainties in each term in the Drake equation. These uncertainties, which often span multiple orders of magnitude, can be represented as probability distributions with long tails. Instead of getting a single estimate of the probability of life in our galaxy, they therefore obtained a distribution. They found that there is a high likelihood that we are alone in our galaxy or even alone in the entire observable universe, thus proposing a solution to the famous Fermi paradox, which asks why we do not see signs of intelligent life in the night sky.

In 2018, in response to a question on Physics Stack Exchange, Sandberg published a paper on arxiv.org entitled "Blueberry Earth", which answered the question, "What if the entire Earth was instantaneously replaced with an equal volume of closely packed, but uncompressed blueberries?" The paper got a large amount of news coverage on Slate, [17] The Atlantic, [18] Popular Mechanics, [19] Atlas Obscura, The Chronicle of Higher Education, Forbes, Live Science, Physics World, New Scientist, and many blogs and podcasts.

See also

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Cryonics</span> Freezing of a human corpse

Cryonics is the low-temperature freezing and storage of human remains, with the speculative hope that resurrection may be possible in the future. Cryonics is regarded with skepticism within the mainstream scientific community. It is generally viewed as a pseudoscience, and its practice has been characterized as quackery.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Fermi paradox</span> Lack of evidence that aliens exist

The Fermi paradox is the discrepancy between the lack of conclusive evidence of advanced extraterrestrial life and the apparently high likelihood of its existence. As a 2015 article put it, "If life is so easy, someone from somewhere must have come calling by now."

Transhumanism is a philosophical and intellectual movement that advocates the enhancement of the human condition by developing and making widely available sophisticated technologies that can greatly enhance longevity, cognition, and well-being.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Mind uploading</span> Hypothetical process of digitally emulating a brain

Mind uploading is a speculative process of whole brain emulation in which a brain scan is used to completely emulate the mental state of the individual in a digital computer. The computer would then run a simulation of the brain's information processing, such that it would respond in essentially the same way as the original brain and experience having a sentient conscious mind.

Extropianism, also referred to as the philosophy of extropy, is an "evolving framework of values and standards for continuously improving the human condition". Extropians believe that advances in science and technology will some day let people live indefinitely. An extropian may wish to contribute to this goal, e.g. by doing research and development or by volunteering to test new technology.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">David Pearce (philosopher)</span> British transhumanist

David Pearce is a British transhumanist philosopher. He is the co-founder of the World Transhumanist Association, currently rebranded and incorporated as Humanity+. Pearce approaches ethical issues from a lexical negative utilitarian perspective.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Nick Bostrom</span> Philosopher and writer (born 1973)

Nick Bostrom is a philosopher known for his work on existential risk, the anthropic principle, human enhancement ethics, whole brain emulation, superintelligence risks, and the reversal test. He was the founding director of the now dissolved Future of Humanity Institute at Oxford University.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">James Hughes (sociologist)</span> American sociologist and bioethicist

James J. Hughes is an American sociologist and bioethicist. He is the Executive Director of the Institute for Ethics and Emerging Technologies and is the associate provost for institutional research, assessment, and planning at UMass Boston. He is the author of Citizen Cyborg: Why Democratic Societies Must Respond to the Redesigned Human of the Future and is currently writing a book about moral bioenhancement tentatively titled Cyborg Buddha: Using Neurotechnology to Become Better People.

Morphological freedom refers to an alleged or proposed civil right of a human person either to maintain or modify their own body, on their own terms, through informed, consensual recourse to, or refusal of, available therapeutic or enabling medical technology.

The Institute for Ethics and Emerging Technologies (IEET) is a technoprogressive think tank that seeks to "promote ideas about how technological progress can increase freedom, happiness, and human flourishing in democratic societies." It was incorporated in the United States in 2004, as a non-profit 501(c)(3) organization, by philosopher Nick Bostrom and bioethicist James Hughes.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Human extinction</span> Hypothetical end of the human species

Human extinction is the hypothetical end of the human species, either by population decline due to extraneous natural causes, such as an asteroid impact or large-scale volcanism, or via anthropogenic destruction (self-extinction), for example by sub-replacement fertility.

Many of the tropes of science fiction can be viewed as similar to the goals of transhumanism. Science fiction literature contains many positive depictions of technologically enhanced human life, occasionally set in utopian societies. However, science fiction's depictions of technologically enhanced humans or other posthuman beings frequently come with a cautionary twist. The more pessimistic scenarios include many dystopian tales of human bioengineering gone wrong.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Natasha Vita-More</span> American artist and transhumanist

Natasha Vita-More is a strategic designer in the area of human enhancement and life extension. Her interests are located within the ethical uses of science and technology and socio-political implications of revolutionary advances impacting humanity's future.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Future of Humanity Institute</span> Oxford interdisciplinary research centre

The Future of Humanity Institute (FHI) was an interdisciplinary research centre at the University of Oxford investigating big-picture questions about humanity and its prospects. It was founded in 2005 as part of the Faculty of Philosophy and the Oxford Martin School. Its director was philosopher Nick Bostrom, and its research staff included futurist Anders Sandberg and Giving What We Can founder Toby Ord.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Global catastrophic risk</span> Potentially harmful worldwide events

A global catastrophic risk or a doomsday scenario is a hypothetical event that could damage human well-being on a global scale, even endangering or destroying modern civilization. An event that could cause human extinction or permanently and drastically curtail humanity's existence or potential is known as an "existential risk."

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Toby Ord</span> Australian philosopher (born 1979)

Toby David Godfrey Ord is an Australian philosopher. In 2009 he founded Giving What We Can, an international society whose members pledge to donate at least 10% of their income to effective charities, and is a key figure in the effective altruism movement, which promotes using reason and evidence to help the lives of others as much as possible.

The Transhumanist Party is a political party in the United States. The party's platform is based on the ideas and principles of transhumanist politics, e.g., human enhancement, human rights, science, life extension, and technological progress.

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Humanity until this point has been a story of evolution for the survival genes - survival and reproduction ... we are entering a new phase of human evolution—evolution under reason—where human beings are masters of their destiny. Power has been transferred from nature to science.

Transhumanist politics constitutes a group of political ideologies that generally express the belief in improving human individuals through science and technology. Specific topics include space migration, and cryogenic suspension. It is considered the opposing ideal to the concept of bioconservatism, as Transhumanist politics argue for the use of all technology to enhance human individuals.

The aestivation hypothesis is a hypothesized solution to the Fermi paradox conceived in 2017 by Anders Sandberg, Stuart Armstrong and Milan M. Ćirković. The hypothesis, published on 27 April 2017, suggests advanced alien civilizations may be storing energy and aestivating, until the universe cools to better make use of the stored energy to perform tasks.

References

  1. ↑ "Future of Humanity Institute". Archived from the original on 7 April 2024.
  2. 1 2 "Anders Sandberg - Google Scholar Citations". scholar.google.com. Retrieved 23 September 2015.
  3. ↑ Sandberg, A.; Bostrom, N. (2006). "Converging Cognitive Enhancements" (PDF). Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences. 1093 (1): 201–227. Bibcode:2006NYASA1093..201S. CiteSeerX   10.1.1.328.3853 . doi:10.1196/annals.1382.015. PMID   17312260. S2CID   10135931.
  4. ↑ Anders Sandberg, Nick Bostrom (2008): Whole Brain Emulation: A Roadmap Archived 3 June 2013 at the Wayback Machine Technical Report #2008‐3, Future of Humanity Institute, Oxford University
  5. ↑ Ord, Toby; Hillerbrand, Rafaela; Sandberg, Anders (2008). "Probing the Improbable: Methodological Challenges for Risks with Low Probabilities and High Stakes". arXiv: 0810.5515 [physics.soc-ph].
  6. ↑ Orion's Arm, the early years
  7. ↑ Wilks, Jeremy (21 October 2014). "Anders Sandberg : Explorer of the mind". Euronews. Archived from the original on 14 October 2016. Retrieved 7 April 2016.
  8. ↑ Sandberg, Anders. "Curriculum Vitae of Anders Sandberg". aleph.se. Retrieved 7 April 2016.
  9. ↑ "Scientists Open Letter on Cryonics". 15 January 2012. Archived from the original on 26 August 2016. Retrieved 2 February 2016.
  10. ↑ "UK Cryonics and Cryopreservation Research Network" . Retrieved 2 February 2016.
  11. ↑ Chibber, Kabir (11 May 2015). "Meet the people out to stop humanity from destroying itself". Quartz . Retrieved 7 April 2016.
  12. ↑ "V&A · Project focus | Cryonics: who wants to live forever?". Victoria and Albert Museum. Retrieved 11 May 2020.
  13. ↑ Sandberg, Anders (14 April 2014). "Ethics of brain emulations". Journal of Experimental & Theoretical Artificial Intelligence. 26 (3): 439–457. doi:10.1080/0952813X.2014.895113. S2CID   14545074.
  14. ↑ "Most popular articles" . Retrieved 4 November 2018.
  15. ↑ Sandberg, Anders; Drexler, Eric; Ord, Toby (6 June 2018). "Dissolving the Fermi Paradox". arXiv: 1806.02404 [physics.pop-ph].
  16. ↑ "Three of The World's Greatest Minds Just Published a New Take on The Famous Fermi Paradox". ScienceAlert. Retrieved 4 November 2018.
  17. ↑ Kois, Dan. "A Q&A With the Brave Scientist Who Figured Out What Would Happen if the Earth Were Made of Blueberries". Slate Magazine. Retrieved 4 November 2018.
  18. ↑ Zhang, Sarah (2 August 2018). "Blueberry Earth: The Delicious Thought Experiment That's Roiling Planetary Scientists". The Atlantic. Retrieved 4 November 2018.
  19. ↑ "What If the Earth Was Made Out of Blueberries?". Popular Mechanics. 5 August 2018. Retrieved 4 November 2018.
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