LTNM’s attractive coating comes in an unfortunate package:
- Many who support LTNM never specify whether they mean the boring 20th-century machines, today’s quite different artifacts, or the fruits of all possible engineering efforts in the deep future. By failing to answer the hard question of defining what a “machine” is — they neglect a point at the core of their claim.
- It locks its adherents into unsolvable pseudo-problems as to the status of cyborgs, hybrots, augmented humans and every possible kind of chimeric being that’s partly natural and partly engineered. An increasing number of mental contortions will be needed as these beings come online, to accommodate the many special cases that don’t fit into LTNM’s binary classification.
- It signals support for the power of evolution but fails to define its secret sauce and to explain why a process consisting of eons of trial and error by mutation and selection should have a monopoly on making minds. Why can’t engineers use those same techniques, augmented by rational design, to embody nature’s amazing properties in new ways and in other media?
- It sounds grandiose and universal, but rarely do its proponents say what it means for detecting life broadly, in the universe. Would they assess functional capabilities, composition or origin story as definitive evidence when evaluating the moral standing of an eloquent and personable alien visitor who is shiny and metallic-looking, and possibly came into being with the help of other minds?
