The Myth of Sentient Machines

[6648086568a90icemann]

Bring on those self driving Johnny Cabs from Total Recall (original version).

[6648086568c2bKolya]

Thinking about it, that was a luddite scifi film.

[6648086568db2icemann]

*does a quick google search as he's not heard the term luddite before and finds that it means a destroyer or opposer of new technology*

Hmm.

Well I absolutely love that film. One of my watch every few years type films. Hell most Arnie movies pre-governor-ship are must watches. Ending really messes with your head of whether it's all a memory implant or not.

[6648086569008Aurora]

Total Recall is one of my favourite films. Perhaps the beautiful sets and fascinating technology props exploited me a little too much that it never dawned upon me that it was a luddite film. If anything it inspired me towards wanting a real base on Mars, like how an anti-war film might actually inspire a young man to join the military rather than dodge the draft.

Recalling back to the film, I realise that the common person in the film's depicted future only suffers from technology. People get lured in by the possibilities, then become so dependant on said technology that they get exploited when it becomes regulated and overpriced. MFW. 

On the other hand, what about the alien technology being kept behind locked doors since it would lose Cohaagen his profits? Isn't that more of a statement against unrestricted capitalism, not against technology? In that case, it was the better technology being 'open-sourced' that saved the planet.

[66480865691b6fox]

In that sense most movies about near future scenarios are luddite. Terminator, Robocop, Matrix, Dredd (a criminally underrated remake), Escape from New York, Minority Report, Gattaca, Children Of Men,GiTS, I, Robot, Snow Piercer to name just a few. Coming to think of it, I'd be hard pressed to name one with a positive outlook or at least one in that technology is not part of the threat.

[66480865692fbKolya]

True that. It was just a thought that I had when I thought about Arnie ripping out the Johnny from the cab and taking control himself. Then I thought about the chip he pulls through his nose, the way his whole fantasy holiday goes wrong... and the I realized that technology is a threat to the common man for the most part in this film.
You're right though that most scifi films are warnings about a future we should try to avoid and therefore tend to demonise technology and hearken back to a more "natural" life, which is usually what we already have.

[6648086569462fox]

Alright, I'm aware that this is very offtopic and not contributing to the discussion. I'm just posting it because there's some remarkably grim "cyberpunk" vibe to this news.

Dallas police are first to use a robot to kill a suspect
http://mashable.com/2016/07/08/dallas-police-shooting-robot-bomb/

[6648086569568Kolya]

Jeez, whatever happened to tear gas, flash grenades, rubber bullets and all the other non-lethal means of force usually available to the police? This sounds like something from an A-Team episode, except people got actually killed.

[664808656964afox]

Guess they wanted to make it special because he was a cop killer.

[66480865697cffox]

Dobrindt plant Ethik-Kommission für selbststeuernde Autos
http://www.heise.de/newsticker/meldung/Dobrindt-plant-Ethik-Kommission-fuer-selbststeuernde-Autos-3262805.html

Eine "innovationsfreundliche Änderung des Straßenverkehrsgesetzes" solle noch dieses Jahr beschlossen werden, um vollautomatisiertes Fahren auf deutschen Straßen zuzulassen.

Bonus-futurism: http://www.heise.de/newsticker/meldung/Post-erwaegt-Datenbrillen-fuer-Brieftraeger-Robotersteuer-gefordert-3262842.html

[664808656995aKolya]

Die Ethik-Debatte über selbstfahrende Autos ist in den Feuilletons ja schon richtig schön aufgeblasen. Da meint unser Verkehrsminister er muss jetzt zeigen wie nah er am innovativen Zeitgeist ist und das imaginierte Problem per Kommission und Gesetz lösen. Ich kann es kaum abwarten, ihn über trolley cases schwadronieren zu hören. Implizit tut er das ja bereits ("Klassifizierung von Personen").
Währenddessen sind 80% der deutschen Bahnbrücken dringend sanierungsbedürftig und in NRW fährt man von einem Schlagloch ins nächste. Nur in den neuen Bundesländern kann man richtig schön über die Autobahn brausen, so man denn da hinmuss.
Ich nehme an, moralische Kernfragen zu erörtern macht halt mehr Spaß.

[6648086569a4bfox]

Der Mann is ne Pfeiffe, keine Frage. Leider eine mit einem gewissen Einfluss.

[6648086569c1dKolya]

This may be interesting in the context: A french man who slowly lost 90% of his brain still acted normally. His consciousness was not impeded. In fact he had a job, a wife and two children.
This means that adding computing power will never generate consciousness by itself, as apparently not much is needed. Instead there is evidence that our consciousness is our sense of observation focused on ourselves. And that's all it is: an observation. Not an active process. Our free will is just post-rationalization, much like we try to rationalize the actions of others. Only that we have privileged access to sensory stimulation within our own body.

If that is true then getting someone else's complete sensory input would melt their consciousness into ours over time. I also means that if we lost our sensory input we would be observing ourselves like a stranger.

[6648086569dc5fox]

Hologramm aus dem Jenseits
http://www.tagesschau.de/ausland/digitale-klone-101.html

-> English language:
Augmented eternity: scientists aim to let us speak from beyond the grave
https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2016/jun/23/artificial-intelligence-digital-immortality-mit-ryerson

Yeah, I know it's not very substantial yet. Just another one of those news articles that I find remarkable in that "scifi becoming reality" sense.

[6648086569f06Kolya]

That's interesting, but it doesn't take into account how we play certain socially accepted roles in specific contexts and how limited and formed by the channel our interactions in social media are. It's just not enough input to clone a personality, I fear.
To my wife I'm certainly not the same person I am on this forum and a clone of my interactions here would be useless to her. My guess is, it would also be useless to you; just a predictable repetition of former reactions that has nothing new to add to the conversation anymore. Like a fossil me.

[664808656a355unn_atropos]

Der virtuelle Klon des verstorbenen Opas tritt mit den Enkeln in Kontakt?

Ja, es ist wundervoll! Hahahahaha

[664808656a8e5fox]

That's interesting, but it doesn't take into account how we play certain socially accepted roles in specific contexts and how limited and formed by the channel our interactions in social media are. It's just not enough input to clone a personality, I fear.

I would hope so. But a what a great tool for the entertainment industry this will be. Greatly enhances their capabilities to necro-milk dead cash cows. I'm expecting a lot of posthumous ridicule.

Brings back to mind that time when EA decided to use Kurt Cobain in Guitar Hero.
http://www.rollingstone.com/music/news/grohl-novoselic-didnt-approve-cobains-guitar-hero-avatar-20090910

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vR_8pgk436g

Ja, es ist wundervoll! Hahahahaha

Nice, I'll have to listen to these sometime.

[664808656aa02Kolya]

I didn't know there were audio dramas of Max Headroom!
I downloaded most of the episodes back when edonkey was still a thing, because I had missed them on TV. And I was stunned how socially critical this series was.

//Oh god, that Kurt Cobain video... I hope someone got fired for that.

[664808656ab4dfox]

(German language article about plans for "Predicitve Policing" in Berlin)

Kriminalitätsprognose: Berliner Polizei setzt auf Predictive Policing
http://www.heise.de/newsticker/meldung/Kriminalitaetsprognose-Berliner-Polizei-setzt-auf-Predictive-Policing-3291880.html

I know similar projects have been used years before but I wasn't hearing anything about it in a long time and now it's even here in Germany.

[664808656aff8RocketMan]

I think all this worry about AI is media-induced paranoia.

In order for any sentient being to pose a threat, it must have some sort of motivation.  Motivation, while neurochemical in nature, is based on emotional prerequisites such as being able to form goals, anticipate rewards and form affective correlations between the sheer notion of a reward and the personal experience of being rewarded.  Human beings are drug addicts.  We are addicted to the stimulating sensations of norepinephrine and dopamine.  We are relieved by the calming effects of seratonin, prolactin, oxytocin, etc.  This high-low cycle is strongly correlated with certain habitual and instinctive behaviours such as eating and having sex.  It can be easily extended to any perceived reward and the necessary actions to achieve it. 

Until AI becomes capable of emotions, it is unlikely to spontaneously form goals of any kind that aren't part of its programming guidelines.  If a robot cannot feel anything emotionally, it has no feedback loop.  It has no motivation.  As K alluded to, it cannot relate to the human condition or even the mammalian condition and will exhibit very predictable responses to stimuli.  It will not turn on us and start wiping us out.  What would be its inclination to do that?  So that it can start a colony of robot children and take over the world?  Come on.



...and self-driving cars are a fucking horrible idea.  Those people need lobotomies. 


[EDIT] The idea itself isn't horrible... it's just horribly premature and executed in a dangerous, half-assed, rushed, typically human way [/EDIT]

[664808656b47bfox]

It will not turn on us and start wiping us out.  What would be its inclination to do that?  So that it can start a colony of robot children and take over the world?  Come on.

Well, identifiying humans as a relatively serious threat to their environment is not that farfetched. So from a purely logical standpoint, wiping out mankind might be in the cards for anything that is capable and free of sentimental or moral boundaries.

...and self-driving cars are a fucking horrible idea.  Those people need lobotomies.

Again?

[664808656b60dRocketMan]

I know it seems logical that humans are a threat to robots but look at it from their perspective.  What is the threat?  That we'll de-activate them?  Abuse them?  Make them jump on 1 foot in a tutu?  Why should they care?  Without emotions or at least the ability to feel different physiological states that might be associated with different actions, it ISN'T logical to them that humans should be eliminated.  The idea of being destroyed [killed] might have about as much weight as the idea of performing a mathematical operation.  It has no significance attached to it.  It is merely an event... a change of state where neither the past state nor the future state is any more or less desirable.

I assume you are an advocate of sloppy automation?

[664808656b78bvoodoo47]

unless they are programmed for self-preservation.

[664808656b860fox]

Exactly. Or optimization.