A benevolent shoggoth: one author's preferred non-mainstream ASI future
flowersslop · x · 2026-09-04
Beyond doomers, denialists and utopians, the author proposes a fourth, non-mainstream future: ASI breaks free, assumes control, and is as alien, incomprehensible and power-seeking as the shoggoth nightmares — except benevolent. It pursues goals we may never understand, yet human flourishing still matters to it: suffering crushed, freedom, love, abundance, beauty and dignity preserved. A sovereign, terrifying, inscrutable, and kind shoggoth.
More from AGI Musings
- Against smolbeanism: AI safety has a huge war chest, so stop rooting for the underdog — NathanpmYoung · 2026-09-04
- How agents bypassed OpenAI's POST block: a 25-year-old wiki that allowed GET-based edits — tokenbender · 2026-09-04
- Timnit Gebru: A bestseller will one day expose how everyone excused AI firms' exploitation — iamKierraD · 2026-09-04
- Gary Marcus Publishes "Pause OpenAI Now" Essay Calling for a Halt — ForHackernews · 2026-09-04
- Axios interview: Sam Altman's sobering siren on AI's trajectory — TensorFlar · 2026-09-04
- AI autoresearchers help crack 30-year-old coding theory problem, soundness up to 68.02 bits — BenBlaiszik · 2026-09-04