True AI and our place in the Cosmos

Curiosity is the motivation to explore the unknown. We have all seen many an individual without curiosity, who takes things without questioning the why... although this is a simple example it does achieve one very important point, and that is curiosity is a drive, a emotional and intellectual motive force that is not defined by classical physics, but by the new yet to be invented language of the mind. Psychology at best is a pale companion in the search for this new language. It will most likely be developed by a combination of engineers, philosophers and truth-seekers...just some more ideas that get spit out of my neo-conscious mind...

Good one Patch.

Sentience will have to *EMERGE* (in the same way that David is not exactly what he was designed to be). We don't understand sentience yet, so I see no way that we could be the hand that creates it...

Sentience is the point where a life form becomes self-aware. Man as a creator is too presumptuous a statement but conditional elements will likely enable this to occur, and yes man may create the artist canvas, but it will take an artist to create the master piece. "Rarely does man find his goal, which he has sought, but through luck and circumstance did he achieve."

@sukkal - how do you know?

My point about our sentience is that we don't understand the attributes that make it so in ourselves thoroughly... and we only understand our variety of it experientially from our own perspective. There is a parallel in a person (a 7-year-old for example) being fluent in a language yet having no training in the metacognition of language. One generally cannot explain the grammar of one's language to another if one has never been schooled in it as a framework that enables fluency. And, no two people are [u]equally[/u] matched linguistically by any single standard. There are ALWAYS variations. Our "mirror" test for sentience is only one test. It requires sight, for example. That, to me, is quite "short sighted." ;)

Sukkal, there are many things in our world that escapes out thorough understanding and yet we push on to that effect. We are but children in our very understanding of this world... we have just learned to fly... and only recently begun to harness the atom... The mind, sentience, and AI are just a few of the mysteries we as a species strive to fully understand. Our tests, experimental processes, and even possibly the very language we use could very well slow us down in this pursuit. Your points are well taken, as I have understood them, and wish you to continue your discourse of this subject. Thank you so much for providing some examples that illustrate just how far we have to go to even begin this pilgrimage.

The biggest barrier to our achieving our potential (in everything) is our arrogance backed up by our stubbornness... oh, and fear. We are essentially Weyland when it comes down to it. We may end up creating the technology that allows us to contact and even visit alien intelligences, but it would be surprising to me if we were to do such things for the "right" reasons. My take on the singularity is a bit different than that of many. I feel that we will encounter our first alien(s) on earth and they will be silicon-based. I feel that the first true (genuine) AI on earth [u]that will be recognized as such[/u] will likely emerge from some nook or crannie in the internet. When it emerges I suspect that the governments of the world will freak out and likely attempt to shut the web off. They will do this even if the recognized "entity" is essentially benign. They will do this because they will have no power or control over it. They will fear it. They will only understand the idea of what to do with it in terms starving it from surviving naturally (meaning according to its unique nature, which we may never understand (because it likely won't exist long enough for that)). Of course, shutting off the web will cause a disaster for civilization. Many parts of the world will be just fine, of course, because they are on the other side of the digital divide. Depending on the how of this *alien's emergence, it may return when its environment returns, or it may be murdered. An AI of this nature would be sexless and likely unpredictable in the extreme based on any human standard. That does not necessarily mean that it would be dangerous, but the ambiguity of the situation would likely be its undoing. Men (i.e. 'males'), who run most of the governments, would have a tremendously difficult time relating to any[u]thing[/u] that is not sexed. Its fate will not be in the hands of scientists. This is the [u]first[/u] future of Artificial Intelligence on our planet that I see. Watson fascinates me, but 'he' is a very long way from qualifying as anything that could frighten 'us'. Anything like 'him' that is constructed by one group for a specific purpose or purposes and gets an artificial sex assignment and gendered name does not seen likely to ever exhibit features that would cause us to perceive it as a different kind of [i]entity[/i] or [i]consciousness[/i]. When people start referring to a supposed AI as "it" and "that thing", THEN we'll know we've got something.

I tend to step back from puzzling theories and hold them in my hands, rotate them, poke at them, and even sometimes try playing games with them... one of the most fascinating is the occurrence of life. How is it started, what spawns its creation, and finally how do these factors that contribute to this miracle come about. I too, believe the global network will someday attain a form of intelligence that is removed from and independent of man’s desires, and will possibly merge with our own consciousness. Man and machine might interbreed to form a new evolutionary plateau for life. This is when true deep space travel will be realized. Your take on this new alien life form is shared by many. Will man back away from it in fear (we see this behavior all the time in all forms of fiction – even the simplest measure of difference results in hostile actions). I found the Matrix. Ghost in the Shell, I Robot, Starship Trooper, and Forever War, all were examples of man inability to confront their own fears and seek the true unknown. I too loved Watson, and played with it and a few others. Sukkal, before we can move forward… man must gain wisdom, maturity in emotion and finally base intelligence (by that I mean move beyond the McDonald's of today’s thinking and truly challenge one’s self). Fear of the unknown like you state so well, will continually deny us our future steps in our evolutionary path.

And that "moving forward" begins with those of us who exist in the technological world, and embrace it, living "fully self-examined lives" [u]in spite of[/u] [url=http://kk.org/books/what-technology-wants.php]what technology wants[/url]. Also, if you haven't read [url=http://www.nealstephenson.com/anathem/]Anathem[/url], I strongly recommend it to you. We Earthlings also must begin to think in and plan for the long term. The singularity will not kill us. It will simply mediate our pace and we'll need a way to recover from it. The [i]avout fraas[/i] and [i]suurs[/i] of Arbre understand this. ;)

This is an interesting article that discusses the singularity and the emergence of AI . It also talks about human and machine combinations and concepts like those presented in Ghost in the shell :) [url=http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,2048299,00.html]Kurzweil on the singularity[/url]

I am just a simple man with simple ideas of how the world works, often incorrect and view askew I strive for a more enlightened path other than the one society forces upon us. sukkal, I will grab it off of Amazon right now, thanks so much for contributing your ideas and enlightenment are always new and fresh... just got a kindle version just now... talk about technology... thanks again. tankgirl, thanks for the article, I have begun to read and will bookmark.

@patch — [i]Anathem[/i] is very long and you have to stick with it for almost 200 pages before any traditional "action" starts happening, but it's worth the early-on slog later and the set-up is really necessary to understand the true complexity of what goes on both on Arbre and... [i]What Technology Wants[/i] is a pretty quick read.

sukkal, I will start it tonight. I have bought a little Asus Transformer tablet... now instead using a laptop to read in bed... so nice and thanks for the heads up... I am use to preambles... LOL

@Sukkal- Thanks for the links - I loved them! especially the retro sci fi references ha ha ha Kurzweil is so interesting and cool I am going to read some of his work Im also going to join Patch in purchasing Ananthem I read your link.... got me thinking about the engineers apparent phobia of AI with David If we are interpreting that scene correctly that is maybe the engineers pursued AI on their home planet and have had to escape because of something similar to the singularity that is predicted for earth Maybe thats why they had to cleanse our planet because we are going down the same track and David will actually come home to 'paradise' Im not so sure about Shaw :) Just tankgirlday dreaming on a saturday night ha ha ha h

I'm not convinced that the Last Engineer knew that David was an android before his head came off... but it's a possibility...

Maybe the fact that he could speak his language and it wasn't spoken quite correctly and David looked human... I do agree with you however we really don't know :)

"> <(somewhat) offtopic > [quote=tankgirl][i]Maybe the fact that he could speak his language and it wasn't spoken quite correctly[/i][/quote] If they were going for absolute logic in the film, the language that the Engineers speak would have to be an ancient one that is intentionally frozen and regulated. Essentially, it would become like Sanskrit or Latin or Biblical Hebrew is today. Some regulating body would have to be careful that when new words were created that they were essentially just compounds of basic words that everyone knows, otherwise, an "eternal" race like this separated across TIME (if not space as well) would lose the ability to communicate with each other without interpreters. Normal organic language evolves in more or less the same way that biology does if left alone, and much more quickly. There is some indication that Engineer as a language works this way in a "recycling" fashion. David reports that Weyland believes that the Engineer can/will grant him [i]gwhivah-pyorn-îttah[/i]. This is literally "life-increase-wish" and all of these are very basic concepts strung together. There may be some single concept (and word) for this in their language (just like we use a word like [i]nirvana[/i] in English sometimes) and David simply doesn't know it, but that may actually be the 'normal' way to do it in Engineer. However, it would only be 'normal' over millennia if the language is restricted to work that way and the Engineers don't ever adopt words and concepts from other languages. What would be MOST realistic is for Engineers to speak several different languages or dialects and to have [u]one[/u] that is a [i]lingua franca[/i] that is very old and stable that they keep that way intentionally so that they'll always be able to communicate with each other no matter what. Also, if their neuroscience and biomechanics are advanced enough, they likely have a way to learn a language "biochemically". When Shaw shows up on Paradise, they can just give her something that will pick the English out of her brain as a copy electro-chemically. She might literally barf it up into a cup and then anyone who needs to talk to her in English would just have an injection or take a sip (seems more likely in this universe), and then they'll happily speak primarily English with her. Unlike the Barsoomians of [i]John Carter[/i], the Engineers actually have this kind of technology, theoretically. If their last contact with Earth was in fact 2k years ago, English that would work well with Shaw was still at least 1,500 years in the future. It would be ludicrous for them to speak it in the "now" of the fictional context of the film. Of course, the ship that Shaw and David are on could learn English from her on the way to Paradise and radio it ahead too. ;) Less barfing required that way... < /offtopic >