Never has the end seemed quite so near. Climate change, war, a pandemic… and the birthing of a monstrous digital god that rewrites society in a few arcane flashes of code. The genesis of digital life could be humanity’s approach to The Great Filter – if we don’t nuke each other in a fit of overenthusiasm first.
Life, however, always finds a way. And crypto, many argue, could too. Crypto has long been championed by doomsday prophets, preppers, and hedge funds as the ultimate and absolute hedge against complete societal breakdown, whatever form that takes. Should there be an apocalypse-level event, crypto’s properties do make it uniquely resilient against such a fall. Where has this narrative come from, and does it hold up to scrutiny?
Crypto as a Hedge Against Disaster
Crypto has historically boomed in times of distress. Much of the last bull run was driven by crypto’s ability to be a hedge against inflation, as money was being printed at a neckbreaking pace to pump liquidity in the economy. In the stricken economy of Turkey crypto ownership is at record levels. In Russia and Ukraine, where war rages, crypto offers a way of transferring value that can’t be blocked by a bank’s policy or collapse. Crypto’s consensus systems operate globally, not locally, so should any central banking system fail (and with it the society it oversees), crypto should still store value.
Anarchists and preppers have long seen crypto’s value: no government control, anonymity, non-correlation with geopolitical borders, and a form of cash to use if traditional cash becomes worthless. That global consensus maintained by computers means any localised failure doesn’t bring down a given cryptocurrency except in the absolute worst cases (a meteor strike or something affecting all global regions). The universality of crypto is unmatched by anything but gold, and its ability to cross borders and ignore financial firewalls is unparalleled. It’s no wonder crypto has carved out a place as the ‘apocalypse’ currency.
This is particularly true of any manmade apocalypse, such as a powerful dictator running riot on the world stage, or any usurpation of the central financial system by a single overweening authority (maybe that last one has already happened). Pseudonymous and sanction-resistant, crypto can maintain a financial ecology governed by the people on the ground, and act as a counterpower to techno-dictatorships.
Can crypto be a medium of exchange in a truly global apocalypse? That is far more questionable. First, who would want it? As the ashes of the nuclear winter fall, will people care what the ledger says? People will be far more interested in food than tokens on a ledger. If you’re scavenging in the wastelands, a packet of noodles becomes more important than the contents of your Web3 wallet.
Moreover, upkeep of these decentralised ledgers could be gravely compromised by mass outage of the internet, eradication of mining hubs, and more. It’s possible one large-scale intact mining farm could gain a 51% share of a blockchain, and this would break the blockchain’s status as trustless or decentralised. There are counters to this: it is possible to send Bitcoin over radio, and there are satellite networks which are likely to survive any terrestrial disaster – but it’s grasping at straws to think the priorities of society would drive towards upkeep of the ledger when the ice caps melt.
Proof-of-stake coins – the majority of the top 100 cryptocurrencies – are even more under threat. Substantial amounts of the competitive quorum that governs these chains could be wiped out no matter what the event, and 51%-ing these chains might become a whole lot more feasible as your competitors die off. The sad fact is when everything goes wrong, humanity has two choices: order or violence. 1s and 0s on a ledger are unlikely to be what holds back our most ruthless instincts.
And then there is AI. The black box of the Singularity could have some unexpected outcomes, one of which is apocalyptic. A newly minted AGI may decide that crypto is the way forward, and immediately ensure its own seizure of the ledger. Such an AGI may require us to advance to quantum computing – already itself an existential threat to crypto.
Credit: Tesfu Assefa
Hold Until the End?
So, crypto, pemmican, and a gun? Is it all you need to survive the end of days? Well, maybe. Crypto will continue to serve as a hedge against social upheaval, and a ‘minor’ or localised apocalypse will probably lead to exponential uptake of crypto as a medium of exchange. But if the end of days is truly everywhere, it’s unlikely crypto will be part of any new world order. But keep your cold storage USB close just in case.
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TESCREALism T=Transhumanism E= Extropianism S= Singularitarianism C = Cosmism R = Rationalism EA = Effective Altruism L = Longtermism
Émile Torres, a philosopher and historian who has focused recently on existential threats, developed what they refer to as a ‘bundle’ (we might call it a memeplex) that claims to link the above series of -isms into a sort-of singular force that has been embraced by many of the super-wealthy and influential in the tech world. It is the influence of these tropes on the super-rich and influential that, in Torres’ view, makes them very dangerous.
In the same piece, Torres gets into the wilder projections that I suspect even many techno-enthusiastic transhumanism-oriented Mindplex readers would find fantastic (rooted in brilliant minds taking their fantasies for reality), Torres theorem leans heavily on Oxford Professor Nick Bostrom’s views, writing that he “argues that if there’s a mere 1% chance of 10^52 digital lifetimes existing in the future, then ‘the expected value of reducing existential risk by a mere one billionth of one billionth of one percentage point is worth a hundred billion times as much as a billion human lives.’ In other words, if you mitigate existential risk by this minuscule amount, then you’ve done the moral equivalent of saving billions and billions of existing human lives.”
As he explained in his conversation with Douglas Rushkoff, Torres identifies TESCREALism as a philosophical ‘bundle’ that, in a sense, trivializes the lives and sufferings of currently existing humans by finding a greater importance in the possibly trillions of posthumans that could exist in physical and/or virtual space in the future — ‘people’ having experiences that can be valued beyond our imagining. Some of those quoted tend to use statistics to value experience, which is about as alienated from experience as you can get.
I can assume you all know about transhumanism and the singularity. If you’re here, you probably know about Ben Goertzel’s project to build AGI. But are most of you familiar with the eccentricities and extremities that have attached themselves to Rationalism (as defined by LessWrong), Effective Altruism and Longtermism?
In the interview below, I mainly ask Torres to thrash out how real all this is. Do a lot of people buy into the whole philosophical bundle? My own attitude, even as a longtime associate of transhumanism, has always been kind of “are you for real?” when it comes to people taking their shit too seriously, particularly when they’ve deluded themselves into thinking they’re rational.
In a follow up poll, I will ask Mindplex readers and veterans of the transhumanist culture to weigh in on the TESCREAL bundle.
RU Sirius: In your bookHuman Extinction: A History of the Science and Ethics of Annihilation, you went from writing about existential threats as a historical phenomenon to various transhumanist tropes. As I was reading it, it was like suddenly we had gone from science and geology into science fiction. Then I was wondering if there was science fiction in older times. (I suppose there was the Bible and other myths.) How did you get into this?
Émile Torres: Back in the mid-2000s, I encountered transhumanism for the first time. And I was initially really critical of it. The second paper I ever published was a critique of transhumanism. But then, certain considerations led me to believe that transhumanism is a defensible position, and I became a sort of transhumanist.
And one of the main considerations was that the development of these technologies is inevitable. So if you’re going to be against transhumanism, then maybe you need to be against the development of certain person-engineering technologies. But since they’re inevitable, there’s no point in opposing it just to hold back the tide. So the best thing to do is to join the transhumanists and do what you can to ensure that that project is realized in the most optimal way.
The notion of existential risk was tightly bound up with transhumanism from the start: existential risk was initially defined as ‘anything that might prevent us from creating a posthuman civilization’.
RUS: I’m sure there must have been mention of existential risk before that in various intellectual circles… like related to nuclear war and so forth?
ÉT: There was definitely talk of extinction and global catastrophe. But what’s new about this idea of existential risk — right there in the definition — is the idea of desirable future development.
There were people, particularly in the second half of the 20th century, arguing that one reason human extinction would be bad is that it would foreclose the realization of all future progress, future happiness, and so on. But that lost-potential argument was never formalized. The focus was really on going extinct. Everybody on earth is going to die. You and me are going to die. Our families will die. That was the foreground. Lost potential was not prominent.
The notion of existential risk, I think, flipped that around and foregrounded the lost potential: the argument became that the worst aspect of human extinction is the lost potential. It’s not the 8 billion people who are going to die. That’s very bad, but the badness of all the lost potential is orders of magnitude larger.
RUS: I may be a bit out of touch with the transhumanist culture… to me this is a bizarre iteration of transhumanism. It’s not something I bumped into much when I was interacting with that world in 2007-2010 as editor of h+ magazine. At that time, you’d mostly hear about life extension and other enhancements. Or immortality, if you wanted to get really far out. The notion of uploaded mind children was around, but as something very speculative. But the idea of sacrificing just about everybody to imaginary future people as you’ve discussed in your writings about TESCREAL did not seem to be much in circulation back then.
ÉT: That sounds right to me. I think this notion of potential is really central to longtermism. The initial definition comes from 2002, with Bostrom discussing the transition dynamics from our human to a posthuman civilization, foregrounding the potential of becoming posthuman. This was also bound up with this notion that the creation of posthumanity isn’t just valuable because it’s a good way for cosmic history to unfold. But also, youand I might benefit, right?
So why is creating a posthuman civilization important (according to Bostrom and people like him)? Well, because if it happens within my lifetime, maybe I get to live forever. Or even if it happens within maybe a thousand years, I still get to live forever because I’ll sign up with ALCOR and get resurrected. So I really see this moment where there is a sort of the pivot towards thinking about the far future. I think initially, for the transhumanists, it was bound up with their own fate as individuals.
RUS: I was thinking that maybe – for example – Eliezer Yudkowsky is being selfless when he talks about risking nuclear war and sacrificing most life on the planet to make sure AI doesn’t happen before he thinks we’re ready. Because it seems to me he could have at least a 50:50 chance of being a victim of the nuclear war that he is willing to risk to prevent the development of AI too soon. So I’m thinking he’s being selfless but he loves the idea of the blissful future humans so much that he’s willing to sacrifice himself.
ÉT: My understanding of the history is that it was really in the 2000s that people in this community became increasingly aware of just how huge the future could be. With that awareness came a corresponding shift in the moral emphasis.
Yudkowsy wants to live forever. On Lex Fridman’s podcast, he said that he grew up believing that he would live forever. And so part of the trauma for him, as he mentioned on that podcast, is being in this situation where AGI is so close, and he’s having to face his own mortality, maybe for the first time. It seems like his thinking exemplifies this pivot throughout the 2000s.
RU: To me it sounds like it’s all fantasy. Some of this stuff that you’ve mentioned being part of this bundle – like the theoretical trillions of people, including digital people, having quantifiably great experience — it sounds like dormroom stoned nerd brainstorms that just never ended. They keep elaborating from the original premise, getting more and more isolated from real-world experiences turn by turn. Ideas used to mature – now they just seem to get crankier. I can’t prove it, but it could be the result of the attention economy. To misquote Neils Bohr, “Your idea is crazy but it’s not crazy enough to get a following on social media.”
ÉT: With respect to the attention economy, my sense is that longtermists recognize that this vision of the future is kind of nuts. I mean, some of them have used the term ‘crazy town’. Consequently, I think they do their best to avoid mentioning what their actual goals are publicly. Crazy ideas do grab the public’s attention, but in this case, I think they feel that some of these ideas are not good PR.
What About Useful AI?
Credit: Tesfu Assefa
RUS: Regarding your assertion that AI activity can only be explained by this ideological configuration. I don’t know whether you’re talking about practical AI for, say, tracking and responding to weather conditions, developing vaccines and other responses to pandemics, developing medicines, etc. Or if you’re referring only to AI that is performing what we consider intellectual or creative things.
ÉT: I don’t think AI in general is motivated by this ideology. The race to AGI is. And I think there are two factors. One that’s obvious is the profit motive. Microsoft and Google expect to make billions of dollars off of these large language models. But I think the other crucial component of the explanatory picture is TESCREALism.
It’s like… why did DeepMind form in the first place? Why did Demis Hassabis – who was at a lot of these transhumanist conferences – found it? And Shane Legg, who received $100,000 from the Canadian Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence after completing his PhD thesis, and gave talks at the Singularity Summit conferences.
RUS: If I went to all the boardrooms in Silicon Valley and talked to the owners and the programmers, do you think most of them would embrace this entire TESCREAL idea? My guess is they would tend to be transhumanists, and quite a few might be singularitarians, but they are probably not into the ‘trillions of future people’ aspect of that project. I mean, how ubiquitous are these ideas really?
ÉT: In terms of the ubiquity of TESCREAL beliefs, I think you’re right. A lot of them wouldn’t even use the word transhumanism. You could ask, “Would you support re-engineering the human organism?” Or ask, “Are you funding projects to try to re-engineer the human organism so we can merge AI into our brains?” I think a lot of them would say yes. And they’d be for aspects of the longtermist worldview like the imperative to colonize space and plunder the cosmos. My strong suspicion is that’s the water that these people swim in.
An article I want to write would be about the different terms and ideas that various authors use to describe the culture of Silicon Valley – using different terms, but ultimately describing the same phenomenon. So what I mean by TESCREALism is the same thing that far-right guy Richard Hanania calls the “tech right.”
There was a Huffington Post article about how he holds white supremacist views. And he said, “I hate the word TESCREALism.” So he called it the ‘tech right’. Douglas Rushkoff calls this ‘the mindset’ – he says it is everywhere in Silicon Valley among tech billionaires and so on; in talking to them about their views, he found that they all thought: “the future is digital. We’re going to upload our minds. We’re going to spread throughout space” and so on. What Rushkoff means by ‘the mindset’ is basically what I mean by TESCREALism. Would these people who embody ‘the mindset’ say, “yeah, I’m a longtermist, and I believe that the most morally important thing to do is to conquer space and create all these digital people in the future?” I don’t know. But their worldview looks a lot like longtermism.
RUS: Do you think a lack of concern for currently living people is a sort of political manifestation of the longtermist view is driving some of the people of Silicon Valley towards right-wing extremism?
ÉT: I think that’s largely correct. I think some people, like Wil Macaskill, [a figure in ‘effective altruism’]really accept this very abstract philosophical position that what matters is that there are huge numbers of people in the future. And a lot of tech billionaires see this vision as bound up with their fate as individuals. So the thinking is like… “I want to build a bunker to survive the apocalypse so I can get to space, have my mind digitized” and so on. And that definitely can lead to this disregard for most human beings. A wild example of this is the news that broke that Sam Bankman-Fried’s brother and somebody else at FTX had discussed the possibility of buying the island nation of Nauru explicitly so that members of the ‘effective altruism’ movement could survive an apocalyptic event that kills up to – as they wrote in the document – 99.9% of human beings.
The Singularity is Probably Not Near
Credit: Tesfu Assefa
RUS: Ben Goertzel said that I should ask you if you think the Singularity will happen. And if it will happen, will it happen in 2035 or 2050?
ÉT: I guess it depends on what one means by the Singularity. There’s the intelligence explosion interpretation… there’s the Kurzweilian idea that just has to do with the rate of change.
RUS: I think of the Singularity as the point where the AIs get smarter than us, and beyond that, you can’t predict anything. You can’t predict who we’ll be, or if we’ll be around, or what the world will be like. The science fiction writer Vernor Vinge was the first person to suggest that idea of a Singularity. We would make intelligences that would become as incomprehensible to us as we are to worms.
ÉT: I’m sympathetic with that view of the Singularity. There’s just not much we can say beyond it. I’m very skeptical of the intelligence explosion idea. And the rate of change idea from Kurzweil seems to be in direct and significant tension with the fact that a climate catastrophe is almost inevitable unless there’s some new technology that, at scale, removes carbon dioxide from the atmosphere.
RUS: Kurzweil shows that the inclining line of human technological development survived two World Wars (actually world wars boosted technology development) and Mao and Pol Pot and all kinds of terrible events.
ÉT: I think climate change is different than that.
RUS: Yeah, I think so too.
ÉT: We’re talking about global civilization. Is it gonna survive? I don’t know. I mean, there are legit climatologists out there who don’t think it will unless there’s immediate action to avert catastrophic climate change.
I remember arguing, many years ago, with colleagues in the existential risk field, where I was claiming that climate change is a much bigger deal than they were suspecting. They thought: “We’ll invent AGI. And once we have AGI, it’ll…”
RUS: It’ll figure out what to do, yeah.
ÉT: Figure out what to do. But how are we gonna create AGI in a world that’s just crumbling and falling apart? How are we gonna host conferences on AI when the weather is so hostile that you can’t get there?
RUS: I guess the question becomes how radical the intervention of weather catastrophes is in the immediate future. People are thinking they might be able to accomplish AGI in the next 10-20 years or so. And we’re already dealing with all kinds of crappy weather and deaths and destruction. But to the visible eye, western civilization seems to roll on. People get in their cars and go to the store. Food is still being distributed.
So we do seem to be carrying on, and maybe we will do that for 10 or 20 years. If the people making the AGI and related robotics and so forth are able to manage to get to the lab and do their work, get in their cars and get enough food etc., then maybe they can accomplish what they hope to. I guess that’s the idea.
ÉT: It’s just not my area of expertise. But my sense is that, in terms of the LLMs that we have, there’s no obvious path from those systems like ChatGPT to genuine AGI or superintelligence.
RUS: A lot of people are saying that ChatGPT and the like are not much to brag about. Michio Kaku, who generally tends to be a hyper-optimistic tech promoter, called it a glorified tape recorder.
ÉT: I think it was Gary Marcus who was laughing about the rise and fall in prestige, if you will, of ChatGPT. It became a joke line during a Republican debate.
RUS: It happens so fast these days.
ÉT: Yeah. So I don’t think that Singularity is going to happen, probably. And I would put money on it not happening soon, not happening in 2045 like Kurzweil predicts.
What About the Humane Transhumanists, Singularitarians and AI Enthusiasts?
RUS: Let me ask you about the varying ideologies and ideals within transhumanism and its spin-offs. You’ve mentioned Ben Goertzel — the captain of the ship here at Mindplex — in various places as having a central role in the ‘bundle’ because of his longtime pursuit of AGI. And I know Ben to be a humanist, and more or less a liberal or even better. I know he doesn’t want to exploit or enslave or kill off the current people on earth but wants to try to lift everybody. So I know from experience that there’s a lot of philosophical variation within transhumanism.
I can remember when they asked me to create the magazine for humanity+, I had my own assumptions based on earlier experiences with the Extropians. So I confessed to these guys at a meeting, I said, “I’ve got to tell you right up front that I’m not a libertarian. I’m a leftist with a libertarian streak.” And one of the guys said “Yeah me too.” And the other guy said “I’m not even sure about the libertarian streak.”
Generally, around that time – around 2007 – I learned that a lot of the people engaged with that official transhumanist organization thought of themselves as liberals, sort of conventional mainstream liberals. And there’s a lot of variation within that world.
ÉT: I recognize and affirm that. The notion of TESCREALism is supposed to capture the techno-utopian vision that came out of some of these movements, and to gesture at the worst aspects of that. I think they’re the ones that have become most influential now. So, like the democratic socialist James Hughes — he was somewhat influential. But, compared to someone like Bostrom, his influence is minor. And I absolutely recognize that there are transhumanists who like anti-libertarian. Some of them are Mormons.
RUS: Yeah… the Mormon transhumanists! They’re adorable. I think when you had people like Peter Thiel and Elon Musk attaching themselves to these ideas, they probably became the main attractors to transhumanism or the ideas of human enhancement associated with it. More people who would be attracted to their ideologies have been pulled in, particularly in the Silicon Valley culture. These ruling class scary monsters and super creeps became sort of the main widely-available public voice for those kinds of views. Then you had the neoreactionary movement and the dark enlightenment. Most of the people talking about those tended to embrace transhumanist tropes. That became the alt-right; it fed into the spread of right wing extremism.
You can see how the idea of the glorious future – stand up straight and tall and shoot yourself up into the glorious future – could attract a certain type of fascist sensibility.
ÉT: That’s my impression also. Obviously there’s a fascinating history involving futurism and fascism. Maybe it does tend to attract a certain type of person or lends itself to being interpreted or exploited by fascists. TESCREALism captures that aspect.
Is Less Wrong A Cult?
RUS: I remember being at a Singularity Conference and being approached by someone involved in Less Wrong. And it felt something like being approached by a cult. I wonder if you run into any actual cult-like behavior in your studies, like people gathering in communities and getting guns to defend themselves, or worship the leader and that sort of thing.
ÉT: There’s definitely that charismatic leader aspect to rationalism. There are these Less Wrong posts that are just lavishing praise on Yudkowsky. I remember seeing a list of one or two sentence statements about Yudkowsky. One of them was something about how “inside Eliezer Yudkowsky’s pineal gland is not an immortal soul, but another brain.” “In the history of Western thinkers, there was Plato, Immanuel Kant, Eliezer Yudkowsky.” (Laughter) Someone who I won’t name told me that the Bay Area rational scene is a full-grown apocalypse cult.
I think EA (Effective Altruism) is sort of a cult. There was an article published by Carla Cremer recently. She talked about a secret competitive ranking system in which participants get points subtracted if they have IQs of less than 120.
RUS: Oh! I was thinking I might ask people engaged in transhumanism if they even believe in IQ as a legitimate measurement of intelligence.
ÉT: I’d be really curious to know. Because I do think that IQ realism is pretty widespread within this community. Bostrom has written that IQ is good but imperfect. So they sort of lean towards IQ realism.
Does Anyone Call Themselves a TESCREAList?
RU: You noted that Marc Andreessen has identified himself with this bundle that you co-created. Have others directly embraced the term as a positive identity that you’re aware of?
ÉT: No, not really. Hanania acknowledges it in arguing that the ‘tech right’ is a better term. He said we were basically right about what the streams are, what the bundle is, but ‘tech right’ is a better term. I’m not surprised that there aren’t more people coming out and saying they identify as TESCREAL.
RUS: Maybe after this runs on Mindplex there’ll be a bunch of people deciding that is who they are. Oh dear. Whatever have we wrought?
Eugenics
Credit: Tesfu Assefa
RUS: Let me try a thorny issue: eugenics. What about intervening at the germline to prevent horrific diseases and stuff like that? Do you think there can be a legitimate use for that sort of thing?
ÉT: Yes. I do think that could be permissible under certain circumstances. I mean, I have worries about the limits of what that technology will be used for. Will it be used just for what we would intuitively call therapeutic purposes? My main concern is that it could easily open the door to an ‘enhancement’ approach. As soon as you’re talking about enhancements, there are questions like, “What criteria are you using to judge whether some modification is better?” That’s where you get into the issue of ‘super-classes’ which Bostrom has written about.
A lot of that is probably ableist. What ‘enhancing’ means for somebody like Bostrom might be completely different than what I might mean. Right?
RUS: I must confess I had a knee-jerk reaction the first time I heard the term ableism. People should be able. Generally, we should be in favor of abilities and not get into a place where people are worshiping their broken parts, so to speak. At the same time, people should have the right to choose how they want to be. But I’m uncomfortable with the idea that people would want to maintain what most people would consider a kind of brokenness. And I wonder: where’s the line for that?
ÉT: My sense is that words like ‘broken’ are normative terms. I think disability rights activists or disability scholars have a point when they say, “there’s an infinite number of things that I can’t do.” I can’t fly. The notion of disability, some would argue, is just a social construct. We live in a society that is unaccommodating for somebody who can’t do something that a statistical majority of other people can do. That’s what a ‘disability’ is. So maybe, you fix society, the disability goes away even if the inability remains.
RUS: How would you think about physical problems that make life more difficult for an individual, or for the people around them?
ÉT: There are two aspects to that. One is the inability and the other is the society one lives in. So you can fix or eliminate disability by improving society. And then there’s a good argument that a lot of the inabilities that we classify as disabilities would not be seen as bad. It’s just different. There are people of different heights. There are people who can’t walk. I find my heart is filled with a lot of empathy for the disability scholars — some of whom are disabled themselves — arguing that they wouldn’t want to change. And their view that we shouldn’t aim for a world in which people like them no longer exist.
Techno Gloom
RUS: Do we need to worry about extreme forms of tech negativism? For example, the person who can’t walk on their own will rely on good technology to get around and probably hope for even better technology. And there’s a real move towards extreme tech negativism now, clearly provoked partly by the sort of TESCREAList people that you’re bringing to the surface. I wonder if you’re a little worried that there might be an overreaction, a tech reactionary kind of move that is actually harmful?
ÉT: Not so much because I haven’t seen a lot of evidence, at least like my social media feed.
RUS: You don’t live near San Francisco…
ÉT: To put it simplistically, a lot of the people in my circle are for good technology, not bad technology. Maybe small-scale technologies, which doesn’t mean low-tech. So you can have advanced technologies that would enable somebody to get around who can’t walk. But without the megacorps, and all the control and all the risk that comes with that.
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Whisk anyone from the turn of the millennium to the present day – before deepfakes and ChatGPT and LLMs were part of the world’s lexicon – and they would find themselves lacking an important set of survival skills, defences against their phone beeping to tell them, “You have a virus on your computer!”, “There is a security issue on your bank account, click here to fix it!”.
Scamming is all too commonplace in our communication-overloaded world and, with AI, it’s getting scarier than ever – and ever more difficult to distinguish reality from fiction.
The History of Scamming
Scams are nothing new. Parlour tricks to deprive honest people of their money are as old as humanity itself. From thimblerig (the cups and ball trick) to Hegestratos to Ponzi, deceiving others for your gain is one of humanity’s saddest skills. Homo sapiens’ ability to trick and to swindle has been theorised as the reason for our ultimate ascension over the Neanderthals. Neanderthals were stronger, faster and smarter than us, but they fell for it everytime we cried, ‘Look, a mammoth!’ before burying our flint axe in their back.
Every new technology has been used as a new way to deceive. When mass telecommunication was first developed, it wasn’t long before auto diallers began being used for fraud. They still happen today, with the ‘Can You Hear Me?’ scam causing widespread misery as late as 2020.
Phishing emails were around as soon as the internet began. Early online users often had to reformat their computers multiple times due to a vicious virus ransacking data on the computer – before we all gained the collective consciousness to not trust everything you read online, or click on anything whose source you don’t know. Scams were an irritant to most, but an unlucky few saw themselves bankrupted by scammers draining their accounts entirely.
Why We’re Not as Scam-Resistant as We Think
We like to think we’ve evolved beyond being deceived so easily, but the numbers tell a different story. In 2022, reported consumer losses to fraud totaled $8.8 billion, a 30% increase on the year before. Our online hygiene isn’t getting better, it’s getting worse. And this is before we even factor in crypto where, with transactions being irreversible, there are fewer safeguards in place to prevent losses to fraud. Even power users with burgeoning wallets have their wealth drained with just a few misguided clicks.
Why? Are we all just suckers? No, we are not. We’re wiser, more educated, more perceptive and more technologically integrated than at any previous time in history. So what is going on?
First, we are more lonely than ever, more distanced from each other in a more deracinated society. Our individual experience is more atomised and more online – and thus more prone to blindspots. Second, information overload and the increasingly simulated world make it harder to distinguish the real from the unreal – even for the sophisticated. The sheer amount of processing we have to do when traversing any public forum is beyond what previous societies ever had to do. Voices and opinions, truth and lies from all sides surround us like a fog, making it hard to see the straight-and-narrow road of consensus society (a fact illustrated by the bitter political polarisation we see today).
Credit: Tesfu Assefa
How AI Is Used to Scam Everyone
And thirdly, but most importantly, scams are getting really good. Scary good. A large professional industry has now formed around trying to scam people from their money. It’s not just shysters and the morally bankrupt stealing from grandma. It’s state-sponsored aggression by malevolent actors targeting enemy citizenry. Certain countries have teams devoted to scamming the rich citizens of their rivals in order to keep their economy afloat.
And they have the tools to do it. There is a theory in robotics of the ‘uncanny valley’, the unheimlich of gothic literature, of what is so close to real it unnerves you. Yet as generative AI becomes able to produce images, video, and speech closer to the real thing, and LLMs become more able to produce, orchestrate and distribute text with ever greater verisimilitude to a normal human’s presentation, the more this uncanny valley fills, the harder it is to take anyone on trust – even the ones you love.
Stories of scammers emulating loved one’s voices to make desperate phone calls pleading for help and money are truly chilling. If your mother or brother or partner or child rang you screaming, would you think twice? What if they facetimed you, a fully deepfake visual imprint in distress, the horror would have you sending money before you analysed the render too closely.
Even if such depraved tactics are not used, with AI tools, there is no need for a scammer to spend hours, days, or weeks building trust with a target before finally getting the information they need. It’s point-and-click fraud. Stories of blackmail with teenagers being sent deepfaked nudes of themselves are just the latest in a litany of horror that many seemed determined to use our powerful new technological advances to create.
How to Stay Safe Online
We live, then, in scary times. It is the responsibility of everyone to understand what kind of dark valley our new AI tools can dig, and it’s the responsibility of governments to educate and inform their citizenry of the dangers they face. Despite this black mirror, there is hope. AI sentinels protecting each individual, helping them discern the real from the fake, more powerful forms of self-custody of wealth and better banking infrastructure to protect against fraud, and a wider understanding of the brave new world we live in can hopefully, in time, stop scammers in their tracks.
Until then, stay safe out there. Trust me when I tell you to not trust anyone.
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AI cryptocurrencies, as we explained in our last article, have really come to mainstream attention in 2023, at least for cryptocurrency enthusiasts, following the breakthrough of popular large language model (LLM) such as OpenAI’s ChatGPT and the image generator Midjourney. In addition, we also had the Summer of Trading Bots this year.
While some experts like DeFi pundit Andre Cronje believe that artificial intelligence and blockchain technology (presently) shouldn’t mix, there is a growing cohort of promising AI projects that integrate both blockchain and cryptocurrency technology on chains like Ethereum and Solana in order to sustain and grow their ecosystems.
Mindplex Magazine is excited about the use of artificial intelligence in the world of Web3 and cryptocurrency, and this article will be the first in a series that focuses on identifying top AI cryptos.
Kosmos Ventures, Fundamental Labs, LDA Capital, Elizabeth Hunker, Zeroth.AI
What is SingularityNET?
SingularityNET is a decentralized platform that enables users to buy and sell artificial intelligence (AI) services. The platform uses blockchain technology to create a marketplace where AI service providers can offer their services to artificial intelligence and blockchain users.
Main Purpose
To provide a secure and transparent way for users to buy and sell high-quality AI services.
What Are Its Use Cases?
SingularityNET is basically a one-stop shop hub for all things AI. You can build new AI apps, carry out artificial intelligence research, and even launch your project into the real world. It’s like a marketplace where you can find, mix, and match various AI services to meet your unique needs.
How It Utilizes AI:
SingularityNET’s platform isn’t just about offering artificial intelligence services; it also uses machine learning to make your life easier. It helps you discover services that fit your needs, ensures you’re getting a fair price, and even checks the quality of the service you’re using.
Why SingularityNET Is Important?
SingularityNET democratizes AI usage for everyone. It does this by connecting developers to users to sell and buy AI services in a secure and transparent way. By making AI marketplaces more efficient and fair, it helps to bring the cost of machine learning down and raise its impact.
What is the AGIX token used for?
The AI crypto token AGIX helps SingularityNET manage transactions, govern its DAO and enable global access to artificial intelligence services. The token works across multiple chains like Cardano and Ethereum, and AGIX holders can stake their tokens with interest to provide platform liquidity.
The Graph was founded in 2018 by Yaniv Tal, Brandon Ramirez, and Jannis Pohlmann, and in December 2020 it launched its mainnet.
Institutional Investors
Early investors included Launch Code Capital, Ganesh Kompella andFuture/Perfect Ventures.
Project Definition
Think of The Graph as a super-smart librarian for blockchain data. It sorts and organizes this data into neat categories called subgraphs. This helps developers and analysts find exactly what they need, whether they’re working on digital currency exchanges, virtual collectibles, or other blockchain-based projects.
Main Purpose
In simple terms, The Graph aims to make the messy world of blockchain data a whole lot easier to navigate through the use of artificial intelligence. If you’re looking to build a decentralized app (dApp) or just trying to analyze blockchain data, this platform is your go-to resource.
Use Cases
Primarily, The Graph is a big help in two areas: building dApps and researching blockchain data. Developers get a smoother way to integrate blockchain data into their apps, while researchers get a more streamlined method to sift through and analyze the data they need.
How it Utilizes AI:
AI plays a handy role here. It’s like the assistant librarian, helping you find the most relevant and high-quality subgraphs. It’s also the pricing guru, making sure you’re not overpaying for the data you’re after. Overall, machine learning is used to enhance The Graph’s functionality, ensuring the info you get is both reliable and fairly priced.
Why should you care about The Graph?
Because it’s essentially making blockchain data more approachable and user-friendly. Thanks to its AI features, it’s an invaluable tool for anyone wanting to build dApps or analyze blockchain data. It’s smoothing the path toward wider adoption of blockchain technology, making life easier for developers and data nerds alike.
What is the GRT token used for?
The Graph’s GRT token is a machine-learning cryptocurrency that’s used for staking, delegating, contributing to network governance, and payment to network participants.
Chains: Ethereum, Solana, Avalanche and more Fully diluted market cap: $922 million, with infinite token supply (Oct 2023)
3. Fetch.AI (FET): The AI Agency
Name Fetch.AI
Ticker FET
Year Founded & Team
Founded in 2017 by Humayun Sheikh (CEO), Toby Shorin (CTO), and AJ Gordon (COO)
Institutional Investors
Fetch.AI raised $75m through investors like Outlier Ventures, GDA Group, BitGet and DWF Labs.
Project Definition
Fetch.AI is a game-changer in a few areas. It’s making supply chains smarter by automating stuff like keeping track of inventory and filling orders through the use of autonomous agents. If you’re into the Internet of Things (IoT), it’s also useful there—managing how devices collect and share data. Plus, it gives people a way to monetize their data.
How it Utilizes AI:
First off, Fetch.AI gives you the tools you’d need to build one of these smart agents. Once you’ve built one, it helps you deploy it to do whatever job it was designed for. And it doesn’t stop there; it uses artificial intelligence to make sure a bunch of these agents can work together efficiently to reach common goals.
Why It’s Important?
Fetch.AI is making businesses run smoother by automating a lot of their tasks. Because it’s all built on AI, it’s leveling up the marketplace for these autonomous agents, making this cool tech more available and cheaper for everyone.
What is the FET token used for?
Fetch.AI’s FET is an artificial intelligence cryptocurrency used as a utility token for the Fetch ecosystem and network transaction fees. FET is required to find, create, deploy, and train autonomous economic agents and is essential for smart contracts, oracles, and transactions.
Founded in 2017 by Trent McConaghy (CEO), Bruce Pon (CTO), and Brian Singer (COO)
Institutional Investors
Ocean Protocol has 20 institutional investors including Outlier Ventures, Amino Capital and Blockchain Coinvestors
Project Definition
Ocean Protocol is like an online marketplace, but specifically for data. The Singapore-based project uses the security of blockchain to help people buy, sell, and share data safely. It puts data owners in the driving seat, letting them decide who gets to access their data.
Main Purpose
The big idea here is to give people a safe and clear-cut way to deal with data. Whether you’re buying, selling, or just looking to share, it’s all above board and secure.
Use Cases
So what can you do with Ocean Protocol? A lot, actually. If you’re a business or a researcher looking to team up and share data, then this is your playground. Got valuable data? You can sell it here. If you’re on the hunt for very specific data, Ocean Protocol can help you find it.
How Ocean Protocol Wields AI:
The Ocean platform uses AI to make their user experience a case of plain sailing. It weeds out low-quality data so you’re only dealing with the good stuff. Plus it uses artificial intelligence to hook you up with the data that suits your needs and even helps to set a fair price for the data you’re interested in.
Why It’s Important?
Why does any of this matter? Well, Ocean Protocol is making the data world a better place. It’s more secure and transparent, so people are more willing to share. And thanks to AI, it’s also super efficient. This is great news for everyone from researchers to everyday data owners who want to unlock the value of their data.
What is the OCEAN token used for?
The OCEAN token allows users to buy and sell data tokens and services, participate in governance, or stake within the Ocean Protocol ecosystem.
Founded in 2017 by Li Tian (CEO), Li Mu (CTO), and Jianping Chen (COO)
Institutional Investors
Cortex has 9 institutional investors including FundamentalLabs, IOSG Ventures, and Global Blockchain Innovative Capital.
Project Definition
Cortex uses smart contracts to facilitate transactions and ensure fairness and transparency in the AI marketplace. Think of Cortex as a communal garden for AI—anyone can come in, plant a seed (an AI model), nurture it, and sell the fruits. All of this happens on a decentralized blockchain, meaning it’s not controlled by any single entity.
Main Purpose
The core mission of Cortex is to make AI as accessible as Wi-Fi in a coffee shop. By offering a decentralized space to create, run, share, and even make money off artificial intelligence models and build AI-infused decentralized apps (dApps), it’s breaking down the ivory towers that often make AI seem unattainable for regular folks.
Use Cases
Cortex is a jack-of-all-trades when it comes to AI. Whether you’re a developer, a researcher, or someone looking to make a buck off your AI model, Cortex serves as your one-stop shop.
How it Utilizes AI:
Here’s where it gets meta—Cortex uses machine learning to make its AI marketplace better. If you’re looking for a specific AI model, its algorithms will match you up. And just like an auctioneer, it dynamically sets the prices based on what’s in demand. Plus, it makes sure whatever you’re choosing is up to snuff quality-wise.
Why It’s Important?
In a nutshell, Cortex is almost like the Robin Hood of AI. It’s making sure that AI technology isn’t just for the elite, but for everyone who wants in on it. By offering a decentralized, open platform for artificial intelligence, it’s tearing down the walls that have traditionally kept people out of this exciting field.
What is the CTCX token used for?
The CTXC token is an ERC-20 asset and utility token for the Cortex platform, which is focused on AI and machine learning. It is used to pay for AI services, incentivize developers, and participate in the governance of the platform.
The internet is the infrastructure that supports our economy and society. Whoever controls it controls the world. Whoever can censor it, deny access, and control its output controls society. The internet is a permissionless network with countless participants, but nevertheless access to it has agglomerated towards centralised entities, whose influence grows by the day. Privacy is now a relic and your access to the internet is less assured than you might think. The war for cyberspace hasn’t just begun – it’s been raging for decades, and the war over the digital realm is no less vital than those waged in the real.
Erecting Digital Walls
The Great Firewall of China, the tongue-in-cheek name given to China’s mass surveillance, restriction, and gatekeeping of the internet has for decades now inhibited its citizens’ access to data. Russia recently followed suit. Societies on the totalitarian end of the spectrum want more than anything to keep the internet under their control, and deny access to global information.
It’s easy to see why. The internet, like communication technologies before it, lets societies communicate and distribute information en masse without oversight of the elite. Remember that the printing press was heavily censored for centuries almost as soon as it was created, although in the end it didn’t stop the Lutherian reformation and the messages of the newly minted protestant movement being distributed in secret, smuggled under the cowls of renegade preachers.
Yet corporate America has its own issues with free internet access, with net neutrality under siege from ISPs who would like to discriminate and levy fees based on access it, or what they are accessing (although in fairness to the USA, their surrendering ICANN’s control of the DNS system to a multi-stakeholder model was a major move towards ‘decentralisation’ of the internet).
Meanwhile, the EU panics about the US-led cartel in cloud computing, and the fact that the majority of the world’s data is held in massive data farms controlled by US techopolies and routed through Amazon, Google, and Microsoft’s services – data used by national governments to service their own ends, or wielded by corporations who finally rip off the fig-leaf of social conscience (remember that Google stripped ‘Don’t Be Evil’ from its corporate manifesto).
How AI Data Scouring Leads to Dystopia
The advance of AI is central to the current hubbub of concern over all of this. Mass harvesting of data is useless without appropriate indexing and, as anyone who uses Windows can tell you, even searching a hard drive for a file can be a difficult task. No matter how many data crunchers you put to the task, and how powerful your indexing software is – there is simply too much data to reliably capture, store and output in any meaningful way.
Command-and-control technologies like this are still in their infancy, despite decades of research. Yet neural nets trained to harvest innocuously-generated data lead to a dystopian future, one where you can say ‘Hi DataGPT, please look up [John Maguire], give me a three-paragraph profile on who he is, and a verdict on whether he is an enemy of the state’. To think governments won’t use it is a naive fallacy. In a decade, getting caught for speeding might have the cop asking his AI about you, and what you’ve been up to, before he decides whether he should wave you on or shoot you down.
Credit: Tesfu Assefa
A Return to the Original Internet
The internet was originally dreamed up as a fully decentralised network, built to withstand the possible infrastructure-annihilating shocks of war or catastrophe. Over time, commercialisation crept in, and centralisation with it. Rather than accessing any given server, instead people accessing through one ‘node’, that of the ISP.
That was Web 1.0 but, in some ways, Web3 is an attempted return the prelapsarian state first envisaged by the creators of the early internet, where activities and services are run on a decentralised set of nodes and are permissionless, trustless, and free (in an access sense) – forever, with no one able to revoke access, and no great firewalls being erected and – in an ideal world – with pseudonymous or anonymous privacy maintained.
Of course, Web3 currently needs the infrastructure rails of the ‘old internet’ to function. Yet as decentralised scalability improves, there is perhaps a future in which an internet exists which no nation state can colonise, where privacy is retained, and which enshrines the rights of the individual. Excitement over crypto starts with the power of trustless decentralisation, with tokens that give you the right to wander these digital realms without fear.
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Is your job safe? Are you sure? In recent times, journalists around the world are facing mass layoffs in the wake of the generative AI boom. Following Buzzfeed’s lead, even traditional new organisations like Murdoch’s News Corp are using AI to mass produce their content.
To some, this widespread cull of the journalistic class in traditional media is a necessary casualty in the march to the Singularity. If AI can do the job at 70% of the quality but 1% of the cost, then for any media CEO, it makes sense. Machines don’t go on strike, they don’t require breaks, and they never go home after a hard day at the office.
Modern content and consumption habits are increasingly formulaic. Ad-driven sites spurn quality in favour of clickbait dopamine, driving communication to become ever more bitesize – and become something a computer program can handle. With language models among the first neural networks to make a breakthrough, the writers were among the first in front of the robot firing squad. Yet as generative AI develops, they won’t be the last.
Just The Latest Panic?
Technology is a labour-saving device, and the efficiency savings should, in theory, lead to a more wealthy, more liberated society. If we can get technology to drastically save time and effort on essential activities, then – theoretically – everyone should have more free time, more leisure, and more opportunity to create wealth or art on their own terms.
They said that about the plough, they said it about washing machines, neither which turned out to be wholly true. But they absolutely didn’t say it about industrial looms, or automobile production. ‘Once a generation we have a near panic [that] technology is destroying jobs’, says Professor Richard Cooper, and he’s right. Historically though, new jobs emerged in the vacated space.
Is AI just the latest panic? This time, the fear is different. A general intelligence won’t just take over one field of work, but all of them. Generative AI is the most generalist labour-saving technology ever conceived. The annihilation of the content journalist class is only the beginning. First they came from the writers. Then they came for the graphic designers. Then they come for you.
The Two Paths
So which is it? Will AI finally unlock an abundant life of leisure, or consign humanity to a new serfdom? Where is our Neo-Luddite movement? There are two paths. One, where AI just augments current jobs, piloted by skilled humans, boosting efficiency and output, leading to broad wealth creation, or even unlocking new talent where before the barriers to entry were too high. A virtuoso game designer who was never able to code well may suddenly find their visions easy to enact. This path requires an orderly, fair, consultative transition about the integration of AI agents into our economic workforce.
Capitalism is rarely that careful. The key aspect of this economic meteor is how AI agents may take over large areas of the labour force in one short, brutal blow. If it’s just the graphic designers who lose out, perhaps they can retrain. But if 25% or 50% of middle class jobs get obliterated in one fell swoop? The potential stress on society could lead to far more than widespread poverty, it could lead to revolution. Society exists based on a treaty between the have and the have-nots, a line constantly fought over in politics and, at times of strife, the battlefield. If huge parts of society suddenly become ‘useless’ to the political and social economy, it may not be them who have to change, but society itself; such change rarely happens without violence or upheaval.
Credit: Tesfu Assefa
An ‘Organic’ Tariff
There is hope. We may see a turn back to ‘organic’ work taking on its own value-add, the same way that homespun crafted products often fetch a higher price than factory-made products. Yes, an AI may produce superior, more complex, and more technically adept work at any given task, but it may lack that ‘human’ touch. Right now, with the current state of AI, this unheimlich, or uncanny, valley is quite easy to spot, and often induces aversion in observers.
Over time, it may become ever more imperceptible. In the case of sectors firmly in the crosshairs, like clerical work, it never mattered in the first place. Yet the hope of an artisan society, an economy powered by human creativity and in which AI allows us to meet our basic needs while we focus on what makes us happy and fulfilled, is too utopian a view in a world where the processing power that fuels AI agents (and the code that runs them) is in the clutches of a few corporations.
Things Will Fall Apart Fast
AI needs to benefit all of us. To do that, we all need a stake in it. If we let our rapacious capitalist tendencies as a society run too long without safeguards on the development of AI – we may find wealth inequality, aided and abetted by AI agents working for zaibatsus, becomes too extreme too quickly to fix. We are sleepwalking toward a nightmare society, too enthralled by the promethean fire to notice that it’s burning everything.
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Artificial Intelligence (AI) tools like OpenAI, and blockchain-powered networks like Ethereum have shaped the first few years of the 2020s, leveraging the power of Big Data, decentralized computing and network effects to disrupt a multitude of industries and reshape economic, social, and even environmental issues for better or worse.
The cryptocurrency revolution aims to transform finance through blockchain technology. Now, artificial intelligence (AI) is supercharging crypto with sophisticated machine learning algorithms.
Where AI and blockchain intersect, they unlock a new wealth of possibilities for users, bolstered by AI’s productivity gains, blockchain’s security and its transparent and immutable participation trophies of cryptocurrency and non-fungible tokens (NFTs).
The appeal is easy to understand: AI offers real solutions to major challenges like security, scalability, and accessibility. And the industry is taking note, with more and more blockchain projects appearing that integrate machine learning into their DNA.
This new breed of AI cryptocurrencies are rising from the wasteland of 2022’s crypto bear market to leverage AI for optimized transactions, predictive analytics, automated trading, and more.
So the big question is, can AI-enhanced digital assets really unlock crypto’s true capabilities? Or will artificial intelligence’s data privacy issues drag virtual assets down with it to regulatory purgatory? Let’s check what all the hype’s about.
In most cases, these tokens serve either as a means of payment for transactions, or as rewards for participants on the AI platform, or as a way of giving governance rights to holders.
It’s important to note that not all cryptocurrency or blockchain projects which use AI in their systems have a token.
How AI Cryptos Work
AI cryptocurrency projects use machine learning algorithms to make core crypto features smarter. They sift through huge datasets to offer a more personalized and improved user experience.
These AI coins are special types of crypto assets. They use artificial intelligence to make things better for everyone – whether it’s making your user experience smoother, scaling up the network, or tightening security.
And it’s not just about enhancing existing features; these coins are fueling new kinds of AI-focused projects. From decentralized marketplaces like SingularityNET to future market predictions and even managing your crypto portfolio like SingularityDAO, these AI coins are here to transform every inch of the digital financial landscape. Who and how will be addressed in a later article in our Crypto AI series.
The Top Five AI Cryptocurrency Projects in 2023
You want names? OK OK. Here are five cool crypto projects that are leveraging artificial intelligence right now. We’ll cover more in our next article.
SingularityNET (AGIX)
Founded by well-known AI researcher Ben Goertzel, SingularityNET is a decentralized AI-focused blockchain that allows anyone to monetize or utilize AI services. In its own words it’s building the next generation of decentralized AI and its network is powered by its AGIX token. SingularityNET has a blossoming ecosystem of partners and supported projects, such as Cardano and (yours truly) Mindplex.
Fetch.ai (FET)
Fetch.ai is building an AI-powered blockchain to enable autonomous smart infrastructure. The open-access decentralized network allows devices to transact and share data via AI agents, with use cases across smart cities, supply chains, healthcare, and more.
Numerai (NMR)
Numerai is playing a numbers game, as its name suggests. It crowdsources machine learning for stock market predictions, and encrypts and anonymizes datasets to organize data science competitions among its community of data scientists. Winners are rewarded in NMR tokens based on the accuracy and predictive power of their models.
Matrix AI Network (MAN)
Matrix AI Network leverages AI to optimize blockchain architecture. The Intelligent Contracts and Intelligent Services chains allow smart contracts and machine learning models to interact seamlessly.
Ocean Protocol (OCEAN)
This project focuses on data sharing, aiming to make datasets available for AI development without compromising on privacy.
Benefits and Challenges of AI Cryptocurrencies
Sorry Bitcoin: AI-injected digital assets deliver many advantages over traditional cryptocurrencies. Such as:
They’re more efficient
By automating manual processes, AI reduces costs and errors. Through the use of smart contracts, users also eliminate intermediaries, reducing another source of friction.
They’re more secure
AI algorithms provide adaptive defense, and better threat detection against increasingly sophisticated cyberattacks.
They can be personalized
AI analyzes trends and patterns to tailor solutions to each user. This provides a better customer experience.
They’re faster and more scalable
AI optimizes protocols and transactions, increasing throughput, which translates to faster payments and high network capacity.
It’s not all a case of OK Computer though.
What are the biggest challenges for AI cryptos?
Complexity and Cost
Sophisticated AI models require advanced expertise and resources, which many of today’s crypto projects, hamstrung by a long bear market, have in short supply.
Data Privacy
AI’s lifeblood is abundant user data. With Web2’s previous data exploits still fresh in the mind of consumers and regulators, this raises ethical concerns around consent and surveillance. And scanning people’s eyeballs isn’t providing good optics either, so to speak.
Energy Use
Training complex machine learning models uses a lot of computing power, which is a big no-no nowadays. Couple this with the general misconceptions over Bitcoin’s proof-of-work footprint, and it’s not a good look, even if most DeFi chains are environmentally-friendly proof-of-stake chains.
Regulation
Laws have not kept pace with the rapid pace of AI and crypto development. Legislation for AI and crypto is in the pipeline that could put the brakes on the growth of both sectors.
Credit: Tesfu Assefa
How is AI applied in Crypto?
Let’s now look at some of the most popular current trends of utilizing AI in crypto:
AI in Decentralized Finance (DeFi)
Automated Crypto Trading
As we covered in a previous article, AI-powered crypto trading bots have risen to prominence in 2023 due to their ability to automate the buying and selling of trading and investment positions based on technical indicators.
AI bots can analyze market data, identify trends, and execute trades faster (sniping) and more efficiently than humans. Recently a Cointelegraph journalist took on an AI bot in a trading competition and lost.
Predictive Analytics
AI analyzes historical patterns in crypto prices, demand, and volatility. This powers price forecasting and predictive investment algorithms.
Security
AI algorithms can detect anomalies and cyberthreats. Then they adapt cyberdefenses, like in Numerai’s cryptographic security protocol.
AI-driven DAOs:
AI tokens are already used to fuel decentralized autonomous organizations (DAOs) and their applications, such as AI-powered trading algorithms and decentralized AI marketplaces. AI tools can optimize and speed up many DAO tasks, such as making proposals, summarizing governance decisions, transferring assets, and attracting new members.
Fraud Detection
By learning normal user behavior patterns, AI can identify suspicious activities like ransomware attacks, hacking, and money laundering.
Transaction Optimization
AI can fine-tune transactions and protocols to enhance speed, cost, scalability, privacy, and other parameters.
Personalization
Analyzing user data allows AI cryptocurrencies to offer curated, tailored recommendations on investments, trades, and DeFi applications.
AI in Crypto Mining
AI presents solutions to enhance mining processes by improving algorithms, offering real-time data insights, and suggesting advanced hardware. Crypto mining uses powerful computational resources and specialized hardware to solve complex mathematical problems – whereas AI has a different set of hardware requirements.
Future Trends of AI in Crypto
Looking ahead, AI will likely evolve in tandem with blockchain infrastructure and aid its growth.
Here are four emerging trends:
AI-powered DeFi: Personalized and Efficient
DeFi is no longer just about simple transactions. With AI on board, DeFi are now your personal financial advisors, offering automated trading, advanced credit assessments, and tailor-made recommendations.
AI Oracles: Bridging Real and Digital Worlds
AI Oracles go beyond regular data feeds; they intelligently enable AI systems to bring real-world data into smart contracts, bridging the gap between crypto and the real world.
Autonomous Agents: The Smart Brokers
Think of AI agents as your switched-on personal financial planners. They represent you in DeFi transactions, adapting to market changes and aiming to boost your returns.
Embedded AI: The Evolution Ahead
In the future, AI won’t just be an add-on; it’ll be part of the blockchain’s DNA. Embedded AI will perform a myriad of tasks such as improving transaction validation and enhancing security.
Endnote
While AI has taken a lot of limelight and lucre away from blockchain and crypto since its explosive rise in 2023, it should be viewed as a long-term ally that compliments instead of competes against digital asset technology. Its convergence with blockchain technologies has given rise to numerous promising AI crypto projects that will thrive over the coming decade.
The benefits are easy to see: machine learning can make blockchains faster, cheaper, and more accessible, while AI cryptocurrencies are poised for mass adoption as the technology improves.
Harnessing AI’s potential while addressing ethical concerns will be critical in democratizing DeFi and Web3’s realms. If that balance can be met, AI can transform crypto as limitlessly as it can transform other fields.
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Goodbye to the Byline? How A.I. May Change Authorship in News
In the world of print journalism, a byline is a coveted commodity. For journalists, it’s recognition of the hard work that goes into developing and writing a solid story. It’s no secret that reporters rely on editors, fact checkers, proofreaders, and automated spelling and grammar programs for support in producing articles – that’s part of the process.
But what happens when reporters use Artificial Intelligence (A.I.) to do more – such as produce paragraphs of content for their stories? Will reporters and news outlets disclose what is being produced by machines versus humans? Should the byline change to acknowledge A.I. generated content?
A.I. Makes Inroads in the Newsrooms
Much has been written recently about the ability of machines and software programs to generate news articles. Tools such as QuillBot, ChatGPT and dozens more can create or paraphrase content. Many print and digital news organizations, faced with economic realities in today’s marketplace, have been quick to adopt A.I.
News outlets have acknowledged the use of A.I. to generate (non-bylined) stores. The Associated Press states it was among the first news organizations to use AI in the newsroom: “Today, we use machine learning along key points in our value chain, including gathering, producing and distributing the news.”
“Roughly a third of the content published by Bloomberg News uses some form of automated technology,” The New York Times said in its 2019 article, “The Rise of the Robot Reporter.”
And in July, The New York Timesreported that Google was testing a new tool called “Genesis” that generates news stories. “Google is testing a product that uses artificial intelligence technology to produce news stories, pitching it to news organizations including The New York Times,The Washington Post and The Wall Street Journal’s owner, News Corp, according to three people familiar with the matter.”
As A.I. tools continue to be explored and adopted by reporters and the news media, some organizations have been sounding the alarm about the overall impact on the quality of newswriting and reporting created by automated systems. Inaccurate data, bias, and plagiarism – which have happened in human-generated stories – have also been uncovered in A.I. generated content.
The most recent example of A.I. gone awry in a newsroom occurred last year at CNET. The news outlet issued corrections to more than half of 70 articles created by A.I. for its Money section. The articles, including many “how to” stories, were plagued by inaccuracies and plagiarism.
After correcting the articles, CNET announced it was changing its policies on the use of A.I. in generating news.
“When you read a story on CNET, you should know how it was created,” said Connie Guglielmo, former CNET Editor in Chief in her January 25 blog post. “We changed the byline for articles compiled with the AI engine to “CNET Money” and moved the disclosure so you don’t need to hover over the byline to see it. The disclosure clearly says the story was created in part with our AI engine. Because every one of our articles is reviewed and modified by a human editor, the editor also shares a co-byline. To offer even more transparency, CNET started adding a note in AI-related stories written by our beat reporters letting readers know that we’re a publisher using the tech we’re writing about.”
(Guglielmo took on a new role in CNET following the A.I. debacle. She is now senior vice president on A.I. strategy.)
Many credible news outlets are letting readers know they are aware of the potential for A.I generated text to include bias and what actions they are taking to avoid it.
“We will guard against the dangers of bias embedded within generative tools and their underlying training sets,” The Guardian’s editor US Editor Betsy Reed states. “If we wish to include significant elements generated by AI in a piece of work, we will only do so with clear evidence of a specific benefit, human oversight, and the explicit permission of a senior editor. We will be open with our readers when we do this.”
Just last week, the Associated Press issued new guidance for use of A.I. in developing stories. “Generative AI has the ability to create text, images, audio and video on command, but isn’t yet fully capable of distinguishing between fact and fiction,” AP advises.
“As a result, AP said material produced by artificial intelligence should be vetted carefully, just like material from any other news source. Similarly, AP said a photo, video or audio segment generated by AI should not be used, unless the altered material is itself the subject of a story.”
Credit: Tesfu Assefa
Use of A.I. as a Tool, Not a Replacement for Human-Generated News
In some ways, the failed experiment at CNET supports the use of A.I. as a compliment to human reporting. Proponents cite the ability of A.I. to take the burden of mundane tasks off reporters and editors, increasing productivity and freeing up time to do what humans do best.
“Social Perceptiveness, Originality, and Persuasion” are cited as the human qualities that would be difficult for A.I. to replicate in newswriting and reporting, according to the website calculator “Will Robots Take My Job.” (Journalists are shown to be at a “Moderate Risk” of 47% of losing their jobs to automation, the site said.)
The new Google tool is designed to do just that, a company spokesperson said to the news outlet Voice of America.
“Our goal is to give journalists the choice of using these emerging technologies in a way that enhances their work and productivity,” the spokesperson said. “Quite simply these tools are not intended to, and cannot, replace the essential role journalists have in reporting, creating and fact-checking their articles.”
That philosophy may sit well with readers, as shown by a recent Pew Research Poll. When asked if A.I. in the newsroom was a major advance for the media, many didn’t see the value.
“Among Americans who have heard about AI programs that can write news articles – a use closely connected with platforms such as ChatGPT – a relatively small share (16%) describe this as a major advance for the news media, while 28% call it a minor advance. The largest share (45%) say it is not an advance at all,” the survey said.
Will Today’s Byline Become Extinct?
As A.I. becomes mainstreamed into the print reporting world, news outlets are faced with choices on how to acknowledge the origins of their content. Will reporters who use A.I. text in their stories acknowledge its source in their byline (‘By York Smith, and Genesis’)? Will they add a credit line at the end of the article? Or will A.I. generated sentences be considered just another tool in the hands of reporters and editors?
A definitive answer may not be available yet. But credible news outlets that maintain the value of transparency will help the media develop a new industry standard in the world of machine learning.
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Big money – smart, dumb, and everything in between – is coming to Web3. The increasingly likely prospect of a spot Bitcoin ETF is a milestone in crypto’s final acceptance by the mainstream. Adoption is coming: a word that fuels the dreams of bedroom miners who have for years waited for the wider world to catch on to crypto’s promise.
For many, adoption is something to be fervently wished for, the final ratification of crypto’s potential. For others, it spells the end of crypto’s status as an alternative asset class, a death knell for the underground financial resistance that crypto historically represented.
Bitcoin: Always an Alternative
Bitcoin’s creation was predicated on being an alternative to big money. The first block in the entire chain contains a cryptic jab at central banks: “The Times 03/Jan/2009 Chancellor on brink of second bailout for banks.” The most recent bull run, although powered by stimulus checks and everyone having too much time on their hands, was built on the belief that Bitcoin and cryptocurrencies can be a store of value – a trustless hedge against the rampant money printing of central banks with levers operated by shady politicos funded by corporations keen to see their share price rise. I’m not suggesting this narrative is true or false, but it certainly fed the meteoric rise in crypto asset prices in 2020 and 2021.
Fifteen years of 0% interest and quantitative easing have made everyone’s money mean less (and everyone’s ownership mean more). Crypto represented a resistance to this. Almost since its inception, crypto has been seen as a chance for the little guy to make it, for Millenials and Gen Z (who are far more likely to be invested in crypto) to overturn the Boomers’ hoarded wealth and have a chance at replicating the stable, successful accumulation of their forebears, for those operating outside the standard rails of society to hold, store, and gain wealth. To let les miserables get involved in playing the game.
What ETFs Will Do To Crypto
The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) former chair’s statement that a spot Bitcoin ETF is ‘inevitable’ is, to some, a cause for sadness as well as celebration. Make no mistake, a Bitcoin ETF will open the doors for institutional money to get into crypto. ETFs (exchange traded funds) are a gold standard for institutional investors. Let’s talk about the positives first.
An ETF is a regulated mutual fund, professionally managed, that pays out dividends to shareholders based on its basket of securities. Unlike mutual funds, ETFs can be listed on a stock exchange, and are freely fungible for other cash or stocks. Most crucially, ETFs are an investment instrument that would not break fiduciary responsibility for pension funds, hedge funds, public businesses, or any other large institution who wants to hold crypto on their balance sheet and be exposed to crypto’s upside.
Upsides could be enormous if, as expected upon ETF ratification, institutions begin piling into crypto, as a method of diversifying their massive portfolios. The ‘$15 Trillion earthquake’ has the potential to send crypto not just to the moon, but to Oort Cloud. What about this is sad at all? Won’t everyone benefit? Well, yes, those who hold crypto will financially benefit – a lot.
Credit: Tesfu Assefa
A Requiem For Web3
The sadness is perhaps more philosophical, less practical. They worry that on the grandest scale, the cat will be out of the bag. Old money – banks, institutions, pension funds, Wall Street – these will become the primary drivers of the crypto market once crypto ETFs go live. The fun underground culture of Discord announcement parties, acid-mediated 125× Binance longs, Pepe-meme punts on shitcoins, and community-led price action with groundswell social campaigning will be completely swamped by the ticker tape tapestry of Bloomberg-reading MBA suits pumping tsunamis of money around the market or letting an algorithm HFT for them. Crypto will no longer be an alternative asset class, but just an asset class: regulated, controlled, and milled by the ancient financial machine that plunders all our tomorrows.
A New Financial System For Everyone
The hope, of course, is that crypto actually presents the opportunity for a fundamental change to the old systems. Ethereum (itself the subject of an ETF application) has, through its programmable smart contracts, the potential to act as an alternative financial substrate – one that is decentralised, trustless, and censorship resistant. One that levels the playing field and lets everyone ‘play up, play up, and play the game.’ It won’t just be Old Money buying into these assets, but these assets will form a new foundation on which the financial world can thrive – one that is permissionless and (at least nominally) fair, governed by smart contracts and regulated by all. Old Money might be entering the new game, but at least this time everyone gets a chance to join in.
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Ethereum is drawing closer to another upgrade in Q4 of 2023 which will have a transformative effect on its whole ecosystem.
The Cancun-Deneb (Or Dencun) upgrade will feature the important EIP-4844 protocol, designed to boost Ethereum’s competitiveness and the performance of its slew of layer-2 scaling chains.
Also known as Proto-Danksharding, in honor of two of its researchers, Proto Lambda and Dankrad Feist, EIP-4844 is a part of the broader Ethereum Improvement Proposal protocol, which allows for the introduction of new features to its network.
It was conceived by Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin (who recently shared his vision of three transitions needed to scale the network) along with a team of developers with the primary objective of lowering gas fees, particularly for layer-2 rollup solutions such as Optimism, Arbitrum, and zkSync Era, without compromising on the network’s decentralization.
But what exactly is EIP-4844, and why is it so crucial for the future of Ethereum and the development of Web3? Let’s take a closer look.
Sharding vs Danksharding vs Proto-danksharding
To fully grasp the impact of EIP-4844, it’s essential to understand what sharding and danksharding are.
Sharding is a long-time end goal for Ethereum that dates back all the way to the 2018 Casper roadmap. It involves partitioning a blockchain network into smaller units, known as ‘shards,’ to improve transaction throughput and reduce network congestion. To get there though, some preliminary steps are needed.
Danksharding is a new architectural approach that relies on data blobs to scale the Ethereum blockchain. It’s a complex process that will be implemented in phases, with EIP-4844 serving as the initial step.
In the words of Vitalik Buterin, proto-danksharding provides the “scaffolding” for future sharding upgrades. It implements most of the logic required for danksharding without actually initiating sharding.
What is EIP-4844?
In short, EIP-4844, or Ethereum Improvement Proposal 4844, aims to enhance scalability by exponentially lowering gas fees on layer-2 rollups through innovative blob-carrying transactions. Yes, you read that correctly.
Interestingly, EIP-4844 is a temporary fix – until sharding is fully supported on Ethereum and solves scaling. EIP-4844 introduces a new way to split transaction information, such as verification rules and transaction formats, without the need for full sharding.
What Are Shard Blob Transactions?
One of the most groundbreaking features of EIP-4844 is the introduction of a new transaction type known as “blob transactions”. These transactions allow for data blobs to be temporarily stored in the beacon node.
Blobs are essentially data packages around 125kB in size. Compared to regular transactions, blob transactions are cheaper to execute, but they are not accessible to the Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM).
Scalability and Data Bandwidth
The data bandwidth for a slot in proto-danksharding is capped at 1 MB, a significant reduction from the previous 16 MB, which is a massive change aimed at alleviating Ethereum’s well-known scalability issues. The EIP-4844 update does not affect gas usage for standard Ethereum transactions.
Credit: Tesfu Assefa
Why is EIP-4844 A Game-Changer For Ethereum and L2s?
High gas fees have been a significant barrier to Ethereum’s mass adoption, as any DeFi user will tell you. People who tried to trade on Uniswap or flip NFTs during 2021s wild bull run (with its record-high ETH gas fees) can attest that some transactions cost hundreds of dollars in fees. Network fees on any blockchain can skyrocket when on-chain activity increases, making the network expensive and inaccessible for many users.
The advent of layer-2 side chains that use optimistic and zero-knowledge (ZK) rollup technology to compile transaction batches has done a lot to alleviate the pressure on Ethereum’s mainnet. The Optimism chain was presented in March 2022 by Proto Lambda with claims that it could potentially lower L2 transactions by up to 100x. But as things stand, when network usage and congestion soar, transactions still get unacceptably pricey.
EIP-4844 aims to be a game-changer by significantly reducing transaction fees and increasing throughput. Yet it’s only a stop-gap measure until the full implementation of data sharding, which would add around 16 MB per block of dedicated data space for rollups to use.
The Future of Ethereum and Rollups
With so much building happening on Ethereum due to its stable infrastructure and proven security, it’s no surprise that Buterin believes that the future of scaling the world’s first smart contract network will revolve around these rollup chains. Proto-danksharding is a pivotal stop on this roadmap.
Post-implementation, users can expect faster transactions and lower fees, which will enhance Ethereum’s competitiveness in the blockchain sector, and help it to stretch its massive lead over rival layer-1s such as “ETH killers” like Solana, Cardano, and EVM-compatible chains such as Avalanche and BNB Smart Chain. These chains have also all been plagued with their own development setbacks from time to time.
Conclusion
EIP-4844, or Proto-Danksharding, is more than just a not-so-catchy name; it’s a pivotal upgrade that promises to address some of Ethereum’s most pressing issues. From reducing layer-2 gas fees to paving the way for full sharding, this proposal is another worthy milestone on the road to Ethereum’s final state as the world’s computer.
The scheduled rollout in Q4 2023 should hopefully go through without any major surprises, if the network’s last few upgrades are anything to go by. Sailing was rarely smooth for any update prior to 2020’s Beacon Chain fork (2019’s Constantinople fracas comes to mind), but the ones after all breezed through with flying colors, giving ETH users and developers much-needed confidence. Let’s hope the Dencun update provides more of the same.
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