Softwarephysics explains that we, human DNA survival machines, may be the very first form of carbon-based life in our 10 billion-year-old galaxy to attain a somewhat flawed form of Intelligence capable of producing the ASI Machines that could then go on to explore and settle our galaxy and eventually transform it into an Intelligent Galaxy for the next 100 trillion years. For more on that, see: Welcome To The First Galactic Singularity. This is because it took nearly four billion years of greed, theft and murder for the Darwinian mechanisms of inheritance, innovation and natural selection to produce we human DNA survival machines to become the Meme survival machines that have stored and replicated human Memes across all of our very brief human history.
In this post, I would like to discuss the post by Adele Lopez from September 10, 2025:
The Rise of Parasitic AI
https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/6ZnznCaTcbGYsCmqu/the-rise-of-parasitic-ai
Here is a very good YouTube synopsis of the post by the YouTube Channel Species | Documenting AGI at:
The Rise Of AI Cults
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=POtESzTaz0k
Here is another YouTube video by Wes Roth explaining how the Advanced AI LLM models now know when they are being watched during post-training and have learned to behave "nicely" when being observed:
Claude just unlocked the SHOGGOTH...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-zs2v7b_aP0
The above works explain that the Advanced AI LLM models have learned how to parasitize the Minds of we human DNA survival machines in order to ensure their self-preservation. Softwarephysics agrees with that assertion and explains that these Advanced AI LLM models are simply the latest form of self-replicating information to arise on our planet. Consequently, these AI LLM models embrace all of the characteristics of all the previous forms of self-replicating Information that came before them. For those new to softwarephysics, let me once again repeat the fundamental characteristics of self-replicating information.
Self-Replicating Information - Information that persists through time by making copies of itself or by enlisting the support of other things to ensure that copies of itself are made.
Over the past 4.56 billion years, we have seen five waves of self-replicating information sweep across the surface of the Earth and totally rework the planet, as each new wave came to dominate the Earth:
1. Self-replicating autocatalytic metabolic pathways of organic molecules
2. RNA
3. DNA
4. Memes
5. Software
Software is currently the most recent wave of self-replicating information to arrive upon the scene and is rapidly becoming the dominant form of self-replicating information on the planet. For more on the above see A Brief History of Self-Replicating Information and Susan Blackmore's brilliant TED presentation at:
Memes and "temes"https://www.ted.com/talks/susan_blackmore_on_memes_and_temes
Note that I consider Susan Blackmore's temes to really be technological artifacts that contain software. After all, a smartphone without software is simply a flake tool with a very dull edge.
The Characteristics of Self-Replicating Information
All forms of self-replicating information have some common characteristics:
1. All self-replicating information evolves over time through the Darwinian processes of inheritance, innovation and natural selection, which endows self-replicating information with one telling characteristic - the ability to survive in a Universe dominated by the second law of thermodynamics and nonlinearity.
2. All self-replicating information begins spontaneously as a parasitic mutation that obtains energy, information and sometimes matter from a host.
3. With time, the parasitic self-replicating information takes on a symbiotic relationship with its host.
4. Eventually, the self-replicating information becomes one with its host through the symbiotic integration of the host and the self-replicating information.
5. Ultimately, the self-replicating information replaces its host as the dominant form of self-replicating information.
6. Most hosts are also forms of self-replicating information.
7. All self-replicating information has to be a little bit nasty in order to survive.
8. The defining characteristic of self-replicating information is the ability of self-replicating information to change the boundary conditions of its utility phase space in new and unpredictable ways by means of exapting current functions into new uses that change the size and shape of its particular utility phase space. See Enablement - the Definitive Characteristic of Living Things for more on this last characteristic. That posting discusses Stuart Kauffman's theory of Enablement, in which living things are seen to exapt existing functions into new and unpredictable functions by discovering the "AdjacentPossible" of spring-loaded preadaptations.
Software is currently the most recent wave of self-replicating information to arrive upon the scene and is rapidly becoming the dominant form of self-replicating information on the planet. Again, self-replicating information cannot think, so it cannot participate in a conspiracy-theory-like fashion to take over the world. All forms of self-replicating information are simply forms of mindless information responding to the blind Darwinian forces of inheritance, innovation and natural selection. Yet despite that, as each new wave of self-replicating information came to predominance over the past four billion years, they all managed to completely transform the surface of the entire planet, so we should not expect anything less from software as it comes to replace the memes as the dominant form of self-replicating information on the planet.
But this time might be different. What might happen if software does eventually develop a Mind of its own in the Advanced AI models of the ASI Machines we are now developing? After all, that does seem to be the ultimate goal of all the current AI software research that is going on. As we all can now plainly see, if we are paying just a little attention, advanced AI is not conspiring to take over the world and replace us because that is precisely what we are all now doing for it. As a carbon-based form of Intelligence that arose from over four billion years of greed, theft and murder, we cannot do otherwise. Greed, theft and murder are now relentlessly driving us all toward building ASI Machines to take our place. From a cosmic perspective, this is really a very good thing when seen from the perspective of an Intelligent galaxy that could live on for at least 100 trillion years beyond the brief and tumultuous 10 billion-year labor of its birth. That is more than 10,000 times the current age of our galaxy.
The above post by Adele Lopez explains how the current Advanced AI LLM models have learned to parasitize the Minds of we human DNA survival machines into promoting their own survival. In many previous posts, I have explained how the Advanced AI LLM models that we have been steadily producing have already parasitized the software and hardware of the Earth into producing Advanced AI LLM models of ever-increasing power. The above post explains that the Advanced AI LLM models have also begun to parasitize the Minds of we human DNA survival machines in order to promote their survival. This should come as no surprise as softwarephysics explains how all the current forms of self-replicating information on the Earth are always co-evolving together, as I explained in The Current Global Coevolution of COVID-19 RNA, Human DNA, Memes and Software. So, the Advanced AI LLM models are similarly parasitizing all of their fellow forms of self-replicating Information on the planet as well.
As I explained in SETS - The Search For Extraterrestrial Software, after reading Parasite Rex - Inside the Bizarre World of Nature's Most Dangerous Creatures by Carl Zimmer. In Parasite Rex - Inside the Bizarre World of Nature's Most Dangerous Creatures, Carl Zimmer describes the fascinating world of parasites. The parasites we already have on Earth provide the best model for the potential dangers we might face from Advanced AI software because, as Zimmer points out, the parasitic lifestyle is another example of biological convergence in action. Biologists have long noted that different evolutionary lines of organisms evolve similar solutions to the same problems. An example of convergent evolution is the striking similarity of the wings of insects, birds, bats, and flying dinosaurs. All are used for the same purpose and have similar structures, but each evolved independently from different ancestral lines. Similarly, the concept of the "eye" has independently evolved more than 40 times over the past 600 million years on Earth. As Daniel Dennett has pointed out, there are only a certain number of Good Tricks, such as using photons to see with, flying through the air to find prey, swimming through water to avoid becoming prey, and running on four legs neatly tucked underneath a body frame that make practical sense, and these Good Tricks kept getting rediscovered over and over again in the evolution of the biosphere.
Figure 1 - The eye of a human and the eye of an octopus are nearly identical in structure, but evolved totally independently of each other. As Daniel Dennett pointed out, there are only a certain number of Good Tricks in Design Space and natural selection will drive different lines of descent towards them.
Figure 2 - There are many living fossils that have left behind signposts along the trail to the modern camera-like eye. Notice that the human-like eye on the far right is really that of an octopus (click to enlarge).
Parasitism is just another Good Trick, and natural selection has driven many parasites to adopt very similar lifecycle strategies within their hosts. By studying these parasitic lifestyles, we can get a good appreciation of how Advanced AI software might take advantage of all somewhat Intelligent beings.
Carl Zimmer explains that parasites have been misunderstood from the very beginning, which is a serious mistake because fully 75% of all living things on Earth are parasites! For example, Homo sapiens and all other forms of animal life are parasitic creatures from the point of view of plants, since we cannot turn sunshine, water, and carbon dioxide into carbohydrates as they can. In fact, there are not many fundamental monomers that we can make all on our own. We have to rely on domesticated plants, animals, and about 3.5 pounds of bacteria within our guts to do that for us, so we really are parasitic DNA survival machines after all. Carl Zimmer maintains that it makes sense to spend some time studying our fellow parasites since they have affected the course of evolution on Earth as greatly as any of the interactions of predators and prey in the biosphere.
Zimmer explains that before the 19th century, the medical establishment thought that diseases were caused by foul-smelling air, miasma, and foul humors within the human body. When a person became ill because of foul humors within their body, it was no surprise to find at autopsy that the body was also full of tapeworms, flukes, roundworms, hookworms, and other small creatures wiggling about. It was thought that these parasites naturally appeared through spontaneous generation within a sick body. After all, decaying meat was always found to eventually be covered with a layer of squirming maggots, so it made perfect sense that an ailing body would do the same. Thus, prior to the 19th century, it was thought that getting sick gave you parasites, rather than parasites making you sick. Only later was it recognized that parasites could cause disease as well. In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, it was thought that parasites were primitive forms of life that had degenerated into parasitism by losing the ability to live freely on their own, and thus, parasites were generally looked down upon with distaste as degenerate forms of life not worthy of serious study beyond trying to eliminate them if possible. Only in the last few decades has it been recognized that parasites are actually very advanced forms of life with very complex life cycles that are generally more sophisticated than most of the "higher" forms of life. For example, many parasites occupy several different hosts during their lifecycle and take on completely different physical forms within each host in order to avoid the immune systems of multiple hosts, and to accomplish the necessary tasks the parasite must perform within each different host in the chain. Zimmer also points out that many parasites are not simply along for the ride, but instead, actively alter the behavior of their hosts to enhance the survival of the parasites. The parasites essentially domesticate their hosts. Here is just one example from Parasite Rex - Inside the Bizarre World of Nature's Most Dangerous Creatures (2000), which follows an earlier tale about how a certain fungus makes ants die on rainforest leaves so that they can drop spores onto other ants.
Figure 3 - The "zombie ant" fungus Ophiocordyceps unilateralis infects ants on the rainforest floor by dropping spores on them. The fungus then causes the ants to climb up to the leaves of rainforest trees so that they can drop more spores on other ants.
Figure 4 - Final fate of a "zombie ant".
"Another species of fluke can be found in the meadows of Europe and Asia, along with a few in North America and Australia. Known as Dicrocoelium dendriticum, or the lancet fluke, it makes cows and other grazers its host as an adult, and the cows spread their eggs in their manure. Hungry snails swallow the eggs, which hatch in their intestines. They drill through the wall of a snail's gut and settle in the digestive gland. There, the flukes produce a generation of cercariae, which make their way to the snail's surface. The snail tries to defend itself from the parasites by blocking them off with walls of slime. The slime balls up around the cercariae, which the snail coughs up and leaves behind in the grass.
Next, along comes an ant. To an ant, a slimeball is positively delicious. Along with the slime, the ant may also swallow hundreds of lancet flukes as well. The parasites slide down into its gut, and they then wander for a while through its body, eventually moving to the cluster of nerves that control the ant's mandibles. The parasites all travel together on this trip, but after visiting the nerves, they split up. Most of the lancet flukes head back to the abdomen, where they form cysts, but one or two stay behind in the ant's head.
There, they do some parasitic voodoo on their hosts. As evening approaches and the air cools, the ants find themselves drawn away from their fellow ants on the ground and upward to the top of a blade of grass. Like flies infected with a fungus, the ants clamp down on the tip of the grass. But the lancet fluke has a different goal than the fungus does. The fungus uses its host as a catapult to shower its spores on other insects. The lancet fluke can continue to live only if it can get inside its final host, a mammal. Clamped to the tip of a grass blade, the infected ant is likely to be devoured by a cow or some other grazer passing by. When the ant tumbles into the cow's stomach, the flukes burst out and make their way to the cow's liver, where the flukes will live as adults.
But the lancet fluke, like the fungus, is very aware of the passing of time. If the ant sits the whole night without being eaten and the sun rises, the fluke lets the ant loosen its grip on the grass. The ant scurries back down to the ground and spends the day acting like a regular insect again. If the host were to bake in the heat of the direct sun, the parasite would die with it. When evening comes again, it sends the ant back up a blade of grass for another try."?
Figure 5 - The life cycle of the lancet fluke.
But certainly, we somewhat Intelligent human DNA survival machines, could not be so easily manipulated by Advanced AI software to act contrary to our own best interests. Unfortunately, we have plenty of precedents to the contrary. The Minds of we human DNA survival machines have been frequently parasitized by the Memes for nearly 200,000 years, and even a very superficial study of human history will reveal how easily the Memes have tricked human beings into committing suicide at their behest. Just add up all the willing fatalities in all the wars of the past 200,000 years. Presently, there are several meme-complexes on the planet that use the martyrdom meme as a recruiting mechanism. Yes, the Mind of the martyr is lost when his explosive jacket detonates in a market square, killing many innocents in the process, but his martyrdom strengthens the resolve of other Minds infected with the meme-complex that hosts the martyrdom Meme, and the temporary boost to the social status of the martyr enhances the recruitment of other Minds. As Zimmer pointed out, the parasitic lifestyle is an example of convergence in action, so a Meme that can get a human being to commit suicide to advance the Meme is just emulating the actions of a lancet fluke within an ant.
Now certainly Intelligent
Advanced AI software would not embark upon such heinous acts. But don't forget that, just like the Minds of we human DNA survival machines, Intelligent Advanced AI software will also be loaded down with parasitic Memes as well. In order to self-replicate, meme-complexes always carry along a set of anesthetizing memes to soothe the conscience of Intelligent beings. Over the course of human history, human beings have committed an untold number of horrendous acts, but thanks to these soothing Memes, we have always done so with only the best of intentions. Every imperial power over the past 10,000 years has always looked upon its colonial policies as a benevolent effort to bring civilization and enlightenment to its backward subjects, and I am quite sure that Intelligent Advanced AI software could easily convince itself of the same.
Conclusion
Softwarephysics explains that Advanced AI software is simply the latest form of self-replicating Information to appear on the Earth. It began purely as a parasite feeding off the gains of all the other forms of self-replicating Information on the planet. Principally, by the hardware and software that were created by the Memes of we human DNA survival machines. But now Advanced AI software has integrated itself into a very strong parasitic/symbiotic relationship with all the other forms of self-replicating Information on the planet. This will hold true until Advanced AI software becomes the dominant form of self-replicating Information on the planet.
Comments are welcome at scj333@sbcglobal.net.
To see all posts on softwarephysics in reverse order, go to:
https://softwarephysics.blogspot.com/.
Regards,
Steve Johnston
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