Five Theses, Using Only Simple Words

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xkcd at deskA recent xkcd comic described the Saturn V rocket using only the 1000 most frequently used words (in English). The rocket was called “up-goer five,” and the liquid hydrogen feed line was the “thing that lets in cold wet air to burn.” This inspired a geneticist to make the Up-Goer Five Text Editor, which forces you to use only the 1000 most frequent words. Mental Floss recently collected 18 scientific ideas explained using this restriction.

What does this have to do with MIRI? Well, young philosopher Robby Bensinger has now re-written MIRI’s Five Theses using the Up-Goer Five text editor, with amusing results:

  • Orthogonality: Different computers, and different minds as a whole, can want very different things. They can want things that are very good for humans, or very bad, or anything in between. We can be pretty sure that strong computers won’t think like humans, and most possible computers won’t try to change the world in the way a human would.

That is all. You’re welcome.