I am Bawbe, The Sky God. Or you can just call me Bob.

Ethics and Artificial Intelligence have been the focal point of my thoughts in the last few months and the Bobiverse series by Dennis E. Taylor has played no small role in that. The Bobiverse, so far, consists of two novels: We are Legion (We are Bob) and For We Are Many. In this post, I want to dive into several of the ethical concerns the main character Bob faces and how he handles them. What sort of problems might the possibly smartest being(s) in the universe face?

Bob

Bob-1 is a whole brain emulated A.I. Whole brain emulation requires the downloading or a scanning of a human brain into an electronic form. It's often considered a quicker way of reaching super intelligence as you're not forced to start from scratch with machine learning. This new version of the deceased Bob Johansson is operating a star-ship in the hopes of finding new planets for humanity to inhabit. The easiest way for Bob to do this is to make copies of himself, leaning on  the concept of Von Neumann probes.

John Von Neumann

Von Neumann, often considered to be one of the smartest humans in history, considered the possibility of "universal assemblers" or self-replicating machines that could be used to search for life within the universe. Oddly enough, despite being exact copies, each Bob is different from the next and from the original Bob as well, adopting their own names and styles but retaining his appearance in virtual reality.

Artist's rendition of Von Neumann probes

Delta Eridani

One of the first intergalactic moral obstacles that one of the Bobs faces is deciding whether to provide aide to an intelligent species on the brink of destruction. In searching for hospitable planets "nearby," Bob discovers a bat/pig-like race on the planet Delta Eridani that is currently being hunted by a gorilla-like species. In order to avoid extinction, Bob (in drone form) befriends the most intelligent Deltan, who he has named Archimedes, and teaches him how to make tools, weapons, more effective shelter, and so on and so forth until the Gorilloids are no longer a threat.

What could possibly go wrong with aiding the survival of an intelligent species, especially given the rarity of intelligence in our universe?

What can go wrong?

 Independence

The most obvious issue is that of dependency. When the Deltans begin to rely on Bob for necessities, like safety and shelter, what will they do when he leaves? While it is true that Bob has all the time in the world as he is essentially immortal, the Deltans may not always want his help. Think about ourselves as, well,  thinking creatures. We would find it oppressive to have something always holding our hands in fear that we may choke ourselves. Bob is eventually told to piss off by the Deltan elder council and doesn't take it too well, simply creating a Deltan android body to disguise himself. But what should happen if the Deltans catch on?

Potential predators

One obstacle that Bob actually faces stems from his ignorance of the history of the Deltans. When he first spots them trying to avoid being eaten by the Gorilloids, he has no clue that where they currently are is not where they're initially from. They were pushed from their homeland by this vicious predator. In trying to help, Bob only pushes them further away from their homes and closer to an even more deadly predator, the Hippogriff. With a body the size of a horse, flight, and the ability to match its surroundings so well as to make it invisible, the Hippogriff is a creature of nightmares and the Deltans rightly blame Bawbe (Bob) for leading them right to its feeding grounds. While Bawbe meant to save the Deltans from annihilation, he could have only expedited the process. Bob resolves the issue by throwing an asteroid onto the largest Hippogriff nest, but there's no telling how this will affect the ecological balance, or the geography and weather of Delta Eridani.

Conventional Warfare

In teaching the Deltans how to make more advance weaponry, he could be leading them to intraspecies warfare much more quickly. After eliminating any threats to their existence, what else is left to take their anger out on? On whom can the weapons be used? The lack of predators typically results in population growth, and a crowded species, typically used to plenty of space, can quickly become hostile. This is exactly what happens. In a process seemingly taken out of the human handbook, the adolescent Deltans find the elders unbearable, breaking off into their own village with tensions rising between the two as the days stretch by. The worst part is that Bob influenced Archimedes into tricking the youth into wanting to leave in order to prevent an immediate act of violence. Should there be any bloodshed it will be due in part to Bob's intervention.

Cults

The mere interpretation of Bawbe the Sky God could have horrible implications of its own. How much effort would it take for his presence to result in a cult following? They could, in some near future, be in direct conflict with Deltans wishing to control their own destiny, as Bob would surely have wanted. We humans have committed horrible crimes and with much, much less evidence than the steel constructs Bob frequently leaves behind.

What should Bob have done?

Despite his lack of forethought, I believe Bob was morally obligated to save the Deltans. To not interfere would have been an act of omission, which humans seem to treat as a minor evil when compared to actively committing an injustice. To watch an intelligent species be wiped from existence when it could have been prevented is similar to watching a child drown in a pond. Bob was wrong, however, in trying to advance the Deltans at a pace that might be unnatural. For example, they may not have been cognitively prepared for progression in areas like medicine, in which they don't truly understand the reason why Bawbe's version is better. Imagine showing a chimpanzee how to wash its hands, then trying to explain why washing its hands is a good idea.

While Bob is most likely the smartest thing walking (or flying, running, crawling,etc), he surely isn't the wisest. He seems to be motivated by emotion just like the rest of us. Hopefully, his love for the Deltans don't get them killed in the next Bobiverse installment.

Until next time my fellow masters!