Anomalies of AIs in modern Science Fiction

[Ian Whates]

Interesting Ian - is there anywhere on the web I could find out more about that?

Quite possibly, Vertigo, but I must admit I've never looked into it -- Heather left the group about two years ago... I'll see if others can remember any of the names of people involved and will get back to you.

 

[mosaix]

However I do think artificial sentience is very likely in the future. It won't happen with the traditional Von Neumann architecture that most modern computers are based on. They are, as you so rightly poiint out, really nothing more that advanced adding machines - based on absolutes of true and false, one and zero and fundamentally sequential in nature (even with parrallel processing each process is still basically sequential). However with the developement of ever more complex neural network systems, which much more closely mimic the way our own brains work, you will begin to get "chaotic" effects and a dgree of randomisation happening, which in turn has the potential to lead to "new" spontaneous, "thoughts" which in turn has the potential for self awareness. This is starting to happen now, though there is still a long long way to go; we have systems that can learn and, theoretically at least, learning is an unending process. I still think future self aware and sentient computers are very high probability.

Hi Vertigo, I agree with everything you say except for the last sentence.

I think we will make something sentient but it won't be a computer. I think the way forward will be with DNA. Once we learn how DNA build things we can use it to build anything we want and a sentient machine with mental capacities higher than our will be on the cards.

Perhaps you would call that a computer and we are just differing over the use of words here.

I see these machines being built for warfare, space travel, delicate work like surgery and hostile environments.

 

[chrispenycate]

By the way - off topic but could some one give me a guideline here - should I really have launced a topic like this in the Lounge area?

If you want to discuss the technicalities of AI, you could always come down to 'Science and Nature'

If it's their literary qualifications, here seems an excellent place.

The lounge is generally a touch less serious, but there again, almost anything goes.

 

[Vertigo]

Good point Mosaic though I do think we are talking semantics here. I would argure that that level of genetic manipulations is what I would probably describe as biotech and is indeed I think likely to be used for just such purposes and I would still call the computers - bio-computers if you like.

Interestingly we are extremely close to that now - there was a fascinating series called CELL on BBC4 a little while back and in the final episode they came up with some stuff that had me totally blown away. For example based on the fact that DNA is to all intents and purposes interchangeable across all (known) forms of life on this planet, it is now believed that all life on Earth is descended from one single cell. Stop and think about what that means for a minute! Life on Earth (at least successful life) was only ever created once on one single instant; all other life has ultimately divided from that first single cell. Wow! But I digress, they also showed a lab where they had figured out how to make the protein factories in cells into which different strips of DNA are fed like a strip of puched program tape (if you remember those) to make the "factory" produce different proteins to make the cell. I'm a total laymen in this area so couldn't possibly give you the names of any of these chemicals/protiens/processes but they have made their own "factories" into which they can feed the DNA and believed they were only a couple of years away from creating a totaly new "designed cell" which would therefore be the "second" totally new life to be created on Earth - actually I'm not so sure I didn't hear recently that they have already done it.

Fascinating stuff - possibly material for a whole new thread

Back on topic I do think this would be a very likely route for the creation of "artifical" intelligence and of course if we are designing a "new brain" we would not have to be limited by the size of the human cranium....

 

[mosaix]

Back on topic I do think this would be a very likely route for the creation of "artifical" intelligence and of course if we are designing a "new brain" we would not have to be limited by the size of the human cranium....

Questions, Vertigo:

Would the intelligence really be artificial, especially if it was a 'wet' machine? I suppose if your definition of 'artificial' is man-made the it would be.

Would the created 'entity' be alive? And how could you tell? And how does this impinge on the first question?

This is such an interesting topic and has implications for the 'free will' thread as well.

 

[Vertigo]

Questions, Vertigo:

Would the intelligence really be artificial, especially if it was a 'wet' machine? I suppose if your definition of 'artificial' is man-made the it would be.

Would the created 'entity' be alive? And how could you tell? And how does this impinge on the first question?

This is such an interesting topic and has implications for the 'free will' thread as well.

Woah you pounced on that one quick Mosaic

I wish I knew the anwers to those questions. Whether such technology could be described as artificial or not is an interesting one I think the definition of artificial is likely to become very very blurred as we move further into the realm of genetics.

Alive - now there is a really big one - not too sure what the true definition of alive is; does sentience and self awareness automatically imply "alive"? Does it have to grow to be alive? But even machines can potentially grow so where do you switch between machine and life - another distinction likely to become very blurred. Banks' drone certainly seem to be alive and Asher specifically states that even androids "hate to die" (I think that was his wording). So I guess they would tend to use that definition. But then again Ashers debates whether the Dracomen created by Dragon, which are definitely biological, can actually be considered to be alive.

With regard to the idea of free will I think that would be an essential component of sentient AIs. I'm not sure a "brain" with something like Asimov's laws controlling/limiting it could truly achieve full sentience.

As you say; an interesting topic. I've been itching to discuss it for some time now (and no this isn't the sole reason I joined Chronos I was simply reminded of it by Gridlinked).

 

[mosaix]

As you say; an interesting topic. I've been itching to discuss it for some time now (and no this isn't the sole reason I joined Chronos I was simply reminded of it by Gridlinked).

OK, Vertigo. I'll let you have the honour of starting a thread. Maybe in 'Technology'?

I'm off out n a minute but I'll look in when I get back.

 

[Vertigo]

I think I should defer to you on this one Mosaic and let you start the thread - I've only just joined and If dash around starting too many heavy new threads I'll end up with a reputation

 

[mosaix]

I think I should defer to you on this one Mosaic and let you start the thread - I've only just joined and If dash around starting too many heavy new threads I'll end up with a reputation

OK V, will do it later tonight or tomorrow.

 

[ktabic]

Way back in '95, the New Doctor Who Adventures had a book called The Also People, by Ben Aaronvitch. There was a culture very similar to Iain M Banks The Culture, with drones and vastly superior AI's. The reason given by one of the AIs for keeping people about instead of exterminating them was that, with out humans, there would be nothing to gossip about and it would become boring.

I always kinda liked that explanation.

 

[Vertigo]

Way back in '95, the New Doctor Who Adventures had a book called The Also People, by Ben Aaronvitch. There was a culture very similar to Iain M Banks The Culture, with drones and vastly superior AI's. The reason given by one of the AIs for keeping people about instead of exterminating them was that, with out humans, there would be nothing to gossip about and it would become boring.

I always kinda liked that explanation.

Love it - actually I'm not so sure Banks doesn't express similar sentiments in his culture books - I certainly get that kind of impression from some of his Minds - a kind of fondness for the humans in an almost patronising sort of way.

 

[clovis-man]

Love it - actually I'm not so sure Banks doesn't express similar sentiments in his culture books - I certainly get that kind of impression from some of his Minds - a kind of fondness for the humans in an almost patronising sort of way.

The Minds, indeed the entire Culture, seem to serve as an intergalactic social services department.

 

[Vertigo]

I like that idea clovis-man and would say it is pretty accurate.

Which brings us back to the fact that maybe that is exactly how they would behave - they would after all have been subject to the same nurture if not nature influences as ourselves and it would not be unreasonable to imagine that they would therefore be "conditioned" rather than programmed to behave in much the same way as us; in both the negative and positive ways. And I like to think that, for the most part at least, our positive traits outweigh the negative ones.

 

[Stephen Palmer]

However I do think artificial sentience is very likely in the future. It won't happen with the traditional Von Neumann architecture that most modern computers are based on. They are, as you so rightly poiint out, really nothing more that advanced adding machines - based on absolutes of true and false, one and zero and fundamentally sequential in nature (even with parrallel processing each process is still basically sequential). However with the developement of ever more complex neural network systems, which much more closely mimic the way our own brains work, you will begin to get "chaotic" effects and a dgree of randomisation happening, which in turn has the potential to lead to "new" spontaneous, "thoughts" which in turn has the potential for self awareness. This is starting to happen now, though there is still a long long way to go; we have systems that can learn and, theoretically at least, learning is an unending process. I still think future self aware and sentient computers are very high probability.

How do you imagine this will happen? The total interconnectedness of computers/internet immediately halts any kind of progression towards a self-symbol.

 

[Vertigo]

How do you imagine this will happen? The total interconnectedness of computers/internet immediately halts any kind of progression towards a self-symbol.

Interesting idea but I'm not sure that it would be true. The internet and whatever it might turn into in the future will still I think be a communication medium between computers rather than some form of control mechanism effectively forming one single clossal entity. Therefore I still think each computer will retain its own 'identity'. That's not to say they won't be able to share tasks but only in the way we might delegate different tasks to different members of a team.

 

[Stephen Palmer]

I think there is a big difference between direct and indirect linkage. In fact, it could be argued that the distinction is the single most important part of this discussion. Direct communication happens between all computers. But no animal ever evolved, including ourselves, communicates directly. We are all separate and we all communicate indirectly - through language, emotion, gesture etc. None of us have access to the qualia of another human being. The fact that what is red to me is red to you too is because evolution has created a social animal where such equivalences exist. If it were any other way there'd be madness and chaos, and an end to the species.

 

[Vertigo]

Across networks and the like one computer can have access to the memory (files etc) on another computer but has not direct access to its processing (its thoughts if you like). Though they can send "messages" to each other. So I would dispute that computers have access to the "qualia" of other computers. Their communication is more akin to a faster, more complete equivalent to our own communications.

 

[Stephen Palmer]

Mmm... don't agree. Electronic communication is entirely different IMO to language, emotion, gesture. Computers don't act as a society of individuals. I'd argue they act as a gestalt, which is a different thing.

 

[Vertigo]

Mmmm...back again.

I take your point on communications, in that humans do use more than than just language to communicate - body language plays a big part but probably more than, that tone of voice is a major component which of course still works over the phone, radio etc and it could be argued that computers could emulate that aspect. Interestingly Banks seems to have considered that aspect with his "drones" using coloured "auras" to communicate emotion. I guess that seems very artificial to us (sic) but then again if humans grew up with drones using such means of conveying emotion then they would probably understand it on an unconscious level.

However I still don't really see electronic communication necessarily creating a gestalt set up. I think they maybe could do both; passing information as well as sharing processing - a bit like Reynold's conjoiners (enhanced humans). I still think that computers that have achieved a sufficiently high level of intelligence would indeed be able to act as "individuals".

I guess when it comes right down to it, it is by its nature speculation on what might come in the future and lets face it our past record on such speculation has never been very good

 

[Stephen Palmer]

However I still don't really see electronic communication necessarily creating a gestalt set up. I think they maybe could do both; passing information as well as sharing processing - a bit like Reynold's conjoiners (enhanced humans).

They're already human though.