Ben Goertzel revisits Omohundro's Basic AI Drives, finding six assumptions that decide which minds apply
bengoertzel · x · 2026-10-13
Ben Goertzel launches a 5-part blog series generalizing and repairing Steve Omohundro's 2008 "Basic AI Drives" argument—that advanced AIs inevitably self-improve, self-protect, and resist shutdown, on which much AI-risk thinking rests. Part 1 writes out the argument step by step, extracts six assumptions, and finds the drives are an attractor only for minds satisfying those assumptions; minds built otherwise escape the argument.
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