Re: AI...

i think he's gone but did he take the message??

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Don't be silly: he hasn't gone!

He is off researching 'what is a sense of humour?'.

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Oh I do hope 'The Man from nowhere' hasn't deserted Us,You must admit He's interesting even if I don't understand most of what He rants on about :~)....Methinks He's gone seeking for more 'truths'?

Re: AI...

Interesting article for those still interested

http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-en...k-1308218.html

"The issue is not whether current computers are conscious or not - no one expects them to be - but rather the problem lies in the strategy that, by building machines that get better and better at doing things that do not require consciousness, the missing ingredient, the feelings that are the essence of our awareness, will somehow materialize. It is like adding ingredients to an increasingly impressive and subtle curry, in the hope that the taste will spontaneously emerge as that of Baked Alaska

Re: AI...

I read that article and again it appeared to me to full of pretentious, pseudo-intellectual waffle.

As you have been involved with computers, are involved with computers, you know you build a sound, solid, powerful base first. With this in mind the power of processor is all important. Apparently this power could equal our own brain very soon, and apart from that processors are being developed that are much more suitable for artificial intelligence ...

Thinking in Silicon
http://www.technologyreview.com/feat...ng-in-silicon/

You are right in a way that if you feed only certain programs into a computer then all the computer will ever know can be found within the confines of the program, but there is the tantalising carrot before the donkey scenario: the computer will be stocked up with programs that are solely to make the computer 'think' for itself. There is one mad rush now to make the first sentient computer, so the programs fed into it will be of this sort. Not only that every computer engineer knows that the computer itself has to find the solutions to various stimuli hence the growing trend for learning computers, computers that learn and adapt.

With the processing power becoming available along with the acknowledgement that adaptable learning computers are the way forward it isn't a matter of will a computer ever become aware of it's own existence but when. Even if a computer doesn't satisfy all the criteria of 'awareness' it might well become very close, close enough to decide to follow it's own agenda.

The advancement of computer design and technology is so fast now it takes your breath away. Something new pops up nearly every day. You can't apply the logic of 'the computer only knows what the programmer wants it to know' because of the computer altering as it soaks up external stimuli. You think a software engineer would build in safeguards to stop a computer from altering itself - the code itself - if he thought it would help the computer advance in some way?

The only way a computer will become 'aware' is when it can alter itself as it sees fit thereby leaving the initial program behind. This will undoubtedly happen eventually.

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Interesting article but in the final analysis it simply presents further examples of "building machines that get better and better at doing things that do not require consciousness"

The machine that played Pong wasn't really "learning" it was simply being programmed. The difference being that the programming wasn't traditional waterfall program code but event driven logic. Similar "programming" has been done with chimps. It's a similar problem. A chimp is a "thing" you can't communicate with via traditional language just like a computer so the "teaching" was done using events and rewards and punishments.

They put 3 shaped solids in front of the chimp, a sphere, a cube and a pointed cone. Beneath the sphere or cube a treat was placed but the cone was rigged to an electrical circuit and touching it gave the chimp a shock. Since the treat was not always in the same place the chimp tried different shapes but quickly learned to avoid the cone. Then they changed the colours of the solids and picked a different one to be electrified and so on.

In the end though, was the chimp learning much? It was simply responding to events that it remembered. It hadn't for example figured out a way to determine which solid was electrified. The great chess computer appears to be a master at the game but really all it knows are how the pieces move and how millions of other games progressed from millions of different positions. This is not thinking. It is simply programming based on an amount of memory filled with information.

The primary point being made in the article I posted is somewhat prophetic. What is the point trying to make machines better and better, faster and faster and more "human-like" if in the end they will never have an actual consciousness and experience feelings and emotions?

There exists already a machine that has the ability to think like a human, which can process information as fast as the human brain, which can really think and learn and which can maintain itself, find fuel for itself and find ways to repair itself when it gets damaged.

It's called a baby.

We can already replicate ourselves very nicely thanks very much.

The entire problem is upside down here. People are trying to create machines to be more human like but which are faster and more efficient.

What they should be doing is finding ways to make humans more "machine-like" such that they are better and faster and more efficient. Therein lies the true future.

You can build yourself the most fantastic pocket calculator that can do incredible sums in a flash, but what's the point? Wouldn't it be better if you could equip your own brain to do the same? If we could tap into Carol Voderman's brain, understand how she can do what she can do and then transfer that ability to everyone else wouldn't that be such a better end goal?

Humans have sense and reason. Humans can emote and empathise. It is the mechanical machine-like aspects of our bodies that we need to enhance rather than trying desperately to take a machine and turn it into a human.

None of this is really that new, nor that far into science-fiction. The Cyberpunk world has been celebrating this concept for years and there are already many examples of body enhancement in use today.

Meanwhile the powers that be are pumping more and more faster and more efficient ingredients into their chicken curry and still hoping it will turn out like Baked Alaska. In the end all they will ever do is mimic a human. It's what they are already doing. You can see it in many lines of that article . .

"A new breed of computer chips that operate more LIKE the brain"

"build silicon chips with elements that operate LIKE neurons"

"transistors to EMULATE the electrical spiking behavior of a neuron"

Yet what they build will never have a consciousness. Will never feel, emote, regret, love and empathise. It will simply pretend to do such things. What then is the point ?

The future lies in humans themselves evolving and reaching the next great step in their on-going transition, unlocking the full potential and ability of the brain and mind. Once we do that we will have much less dependency on machines.

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Quite a response but all I get is that you are backtracking: in other words what I stated is true - or at least I have the stronger view.

Glad you have the capacity to re-think. Shows promise .

Couldn't help myself - touch of gloating you see .



I can go deeper yet if I want - can you?

I'll give you a way out though as I'm on the cider. Things can get a bit bonkers when I'm on the booze.

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You're still trying to "win" an argument. You're missing the entire point and inherent value in debate and civil discourse. In time, your mind-set will change and you'll understand what I mean.

The theory you have proposed has no more merit at this point than it did from the outset. People are still building machines and programming them. Not one of them is actually "thinking" in the truest sense of the term. They are doing what they are told. It matters not how varied, good or bad the style of "telling" or programming is. Fact is, they are being programmed. Such machines will never achieve consciousness, they will just do stuff fast and efficient. There's a place for such machines, they will be useful, but they are not the future of mankind.

Man's ability to think, love, regret, empathise and emote will forever keep machines where they are now, a long way down the evolutionary chain.

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You think that lot is good? Most of the people on this planet think in the most deplorable way. Atrocities committed daily by people thinking in the most outlandish manner. What are such people? They are just brains that have been spoon fed data and have reacted accordingly.

Pure, exact logic, free from desire might be a wonderful thing to behold.

And again you are dictating. 'Never' is an almighty powerful word and closes your mind to other possibilities. The word 'never' shouldn't enter your head with regard to this topic. You cannot predict the future so allow it to exist and flourish. It also shows how bloody arrogant you are.

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Information, data, does not cause a human to commit acts of atrocity. It is circumstance and life imbalances that lead to such actions imo. Programming and conditioning I think can determine the manner of the action but ultimately it is what humans do to each other that results in the imbalances. Mankind is out of balance, perhaps more so now than ever. The elite 1% of the population have 99% of the wealth and control whilst the other 99% are enslaved and in comparison poor. However, real success, worth and maturity lie not in money and material possessions but in self-awareness and being in balance with Nature and one's own inner nature.

A great many of the billions of human minds out there are un-trained, un-informed and running wild. That is not to say that the mind itself is inherently flawed and needs replacing with some un-thinking, soulless machine. More that the mind needs to be given the truth, of what it is, of what it is capable of and how to nurture itself. How to exist in harmony with the feelings and emotions surrounding it.