Deep Utopia

By: Nick Bostrom

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Hardcover | 27 March 2024

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Hardcover
536 Pages

Dimensions(cm)
22.86 x 15.88 x 3.18

Hardcover

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A greyhound catching the mechanical lure--what would he actually do with it? Has he given this any thought?

Bostrom's previous book, Superintelligence: Paths, Dangers, Strategies changed the global conversation on AI and became a New York Times bestseller. It focused on what might happen if AI development goes wrong. But what if things go right?
Suppose that we develop superintelligence safely, govern it well, and make good use of the cornucopian wealth and near magical technological powers that this technology can unlock. If this transition to the machine intelligence era goes well, human labor becomes obsolete. We would thus enter a condition of "post-instrumentality", in which our efforts are not needed for any practical purpose. Furthermore, at technological maturity, human nature becomes entirely malleable.
Here we confront a challenge that is not technological but philosophical and spiritual. In such a solved world, what is the point of human existence? What gives meaning to life? What do we do all day?
Deep Utopia shines new light on these old questions, and gives us glimpses of a different kind of existence, which might be ours in the future.

Deep Utopia is a hybrid literary-philosophical work. A few friends attend a week-long lecture series, delivered by a fictionalized version of Professor Bostrom. The proceedings however are interrupted by questions from the audience, jokes, and satirical events. After the lectures, the friends discuss, critique, and sometimes make fun of what they've heard. They also run into other characters (some real and some imaginary) who bring additional views into play. Later, the friends turn to the Professor's assigned readings, which are fiction stories elucidating key themes that are covered more abstractly in the lectures.
The three structural elements--the lectures, the conversations/action sequences, and the assigned stories--support one another to form a carefully architected whole. They let the reader view the core ideas of the book from multiple perspectives. But the playful format has a function beyond the pedagogical: it also expresses and (as it were) manifests the subject matter of the work. The fictional week of intellectual exploration and fun can itself be seen as a fragment of utopia--a little glimmer, or augury, of the unfathomably vast and wonderful possibilities opened up to humanity at the point of technological maturity.

Industry Reviews

"This is a wondrous book. It is mind-expanding. It is poetic. It is moving. It is funny. The writing is superb. Every page is full of ideas." - Russ Roberts, EconTalk host, President of Shalem College

"Wow!" - Professor Erik Brynjolfsson, Stanford University; Co-author of The Second Machine Age

"When technology has solved humanity's deepest problems, what is left to do? That is one question considered in a new publication by Nick Bostrom. ... He argues that beyond the post-scarcity world lies a "post-instrumental" one ... With the arrival of AI Utopia, this would be put to the test. Quite a lot would ride on the result." - The Economist

"Yeah" - Elon Musk

"A fascinating book" - Peter Coy, The New York Times

"Rather than play the doomy hits, Deep Utopia considers a future in which humanity has successfully developed superintelligent machines but averted disaster. ... [it] examines what meaning there would be in life inside a techno-utopia, and asks if it might be rather hollow." - WIRED

"Bostrom is a marvelously energetic prose stylist; it's uncanny how often he turns subjects like utilitarianism and Malthusian superabundance into genuinely thrilling reading. ... employs a wry understated humor that's often very quiet in its punchlines. ... A complex and stimulatingly provocative look at just how possible a fulfilling life might be." - Kirkus Reviews

"Reminiscent of Plato's dialogues-with a 21st-century twist."- Stuff (NZ)

"This is one of the strangest sort-of popular science (or philosophy, or something or other) books I've ever read. ... I can't say I enjoyed reading this book - but I think I am glad that I did." - Popular Science Books

"A major contribution to human thought and ways of thinking." - Robert Lawrence Kuhn

"A really fun, and important, book... the writing is brilliant... incredibly rich... a constant parade of fascinating ideas." - Professor Guy Kahane, University of Oxford

"Brilliant! Hilarious, poignant, insightful, clever, important." - Professor Thaddeus Metz, University of Pretoria, author of Meaning in Life

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