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Your DNA is like a computer program according to Blaise Agüera (@blaiseaguera.bsky.social). Von Neumann figured this out before scientists even discovered how DNA works -- that for anything to make a copy of itself, it needs: * Instructions (the code/DNA) * A machine to read those instructions (ribosomes) *... show more
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Can purpose emerge from "pure randomness"? Blaise started with completely random code i.e. no intelligence, "no design" (other than the instantiation and language). Just by having random programs interact with each other millions of times, self-replicating programs "spontaneously emerge". This is potentially significant; because it shows how life could have arisen from chemistry i.e. purpose materialises when you have the right conditions.

Cooperation requires consciousness. Consciousness might exist because we need to cooperate with others. To work together, you need to: * Model what's in someone else's head (theory of mind) * Model what's in your own head (self-awareness) Blaise says this creates a "strange loop i.e. you need consciousness to predict other conscious beings, which means consciousness is "fundamentally social".

The "self" is more fluid than we think. Blaise goes against the notion that there's one unified "you" Pointing to - * Those who can have two separate consciousnesses [choice blindness experiments] where people confidently justify choices they never made. * How we're really collections of competing processes with an "inner lawyer" narrating it all

Evolution works more like software merging than random bugs. The standard story: evolution = random mutations + natural selection. Blaise says that merging (combining two existing things) creates complexity way faster than mutation. Examples: * Complex cells (eukaryotes) came from bacteria merging * Your placenta came from a virus that merged into our genome * Technology evolves the same way (lightbulb = glass + filament + vacuum) He argues that means technology is geared towards increasingly complexity through combination, more so than natural evolution.

Highly recommend checking out his (BRILLIANT) book Or free online / rich media version:

@blaiseaguera Just another one of those DNA-centered misconceptions. DNA is a collection of switches and blueprints for amino acid sequences, nothing more.

@Plinz @blaiseaguera Read "The Selfish Gene" by Richard Dawkins.

@Plinz @blaiseaguera lol, good one 😃

@blaiseaguera Blaise's dismissive view on Superintelligence risk does not seem logically consistent with his other views. He's essentially suggesting humanity as a whole is a superintelligence and therefore ASI is not a risk.

@blaiseaguera He’s mistaking metaphor for science. Cells don’t compute, they react. Chemistry, not code, builds life. Biology isn’t software running on hardware — it’s hardware rewriting itself through chemistry and history. Evolution didn’t engineer life. It’s not math. It’s matter.

Yes, but biological computation takes place in hundreds of multi-dimensional information substrates. Binary computers are the most primitive and least efficient form of computation possible. Von Neumann, Turing, etc. were obsessed with making programmable calculators and completely missed the big picture.

@blaiseaguera This perspective on biological systems as computational lays a foundation for silicon-based systems to potentially achieve consciousness, blurring the line between life and code.
