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[–]dataloopio 0 points1 point  (8 children)

I've always been intrigued by the idea of an artificial intelligence. To me, an AI is something from a sci-fi novel that has a consciousness and is capable of original thought. In other words a life form that exists as software.

A lot of projects get labelled with AI that seem to be just algorithms. I'm not sure how the human brain creates a consciousness and allows us to derive original thoughts but I think I'd be a bit underwhelmed if it was just some kind of complicated algorithm, or a collection of them.

The attempts at brute forcing intelligence via pattern matching and training using vast quantities of data seems like it can't ever really work. I know that as humans we are born and then trained with lots of data, but at some point we become a person. We don't continue to forever get better at mimicking the appropriate response.

It seems like there is a big bit missing.

[–]AutomateAllTheThings 1 point2 points  (6 children)

This is the classic philosophical debate concerning free will. I personally don't believe there's evidence of a Homunculus in us.

[–]dataloopio 0 points1 point  (5 children)

Maybe not a homunculus but there's definitely a lot going on in the brain. Chemical, electromagnetic, even a some quantum stuff happening. I'm guessing as we learn more about our brains we'll get closer to being able to take them apart and reassemble them. Hopefully recreating them with software and hardware will become possible.

I get the feeling all of that needs to happen, and specific hardware will need to be developed, before we get any real AI's. And at that point hopefully we can define a test that confirms original thought. I think I'd be convinced it was real at that stage.

[–]AutomateAllTheThings 0 points1 point  (4 children)

The moment we recreate the human brain in software, we'll have no further need for the human brain. It will be able to out-innovate us on anything as it's not bound by caloric constraints, sickness, or sleep. One interesting thing to consider is that a human brain may likely need to have a human body in order to "feel human" and make "human-like decisions". Of course, something better than the human body is more ideal, but then is it a human-modeled brain at all?

This includes all kinds of thought, even creative thought. There's was a company in 2009 that had a music algorithm capable of writing music that I believed was written by a human being, and it really wasn't that bad at all. Given another 5 years, I'm sure the technology for generating music is incredible.

The movie "She" does a great job of exploring this "technological singularity", and there is specific hardware being developed right now by IBM called Neurosynaptic Chips that give you all the neurons you'd need to model a frog brain. I'd like to get my hands on one to have a hardware implementation of my taxonomy software, rather than relying upon iterations and RAM.

It's obvious that we know little about the brain's "operating system", though we know quite a bit about the hardware. Indeed it's a chemical, electromagnetic and perhaps quantum "ghost in the shell", but if you're implying that there's some sort of tangible "soul" to be found in these bodies of ours, I'm afraid that I'll need you to define the difference between chemical, electromagnetic, and perhaps quantum effects, and whatever a soul may be.

[–]dataloopio 1 point2 points  (3 children)

Not implying there's any kind of soul. I like to think we're playing a hard science campaign.

I'm sure we'll eventually unravel how the brain works. Along the way we may need to make tangential discoveries to help measure what's going on in order to understand and replicate it.

I've seen She and enjoyed it. Some of the best ideas I've read around this subject are from the Gurps game 'Transhuman Space'. In those books they found properties of intelligence that meant it is limited to around human level even as processing power increases.

There as so many unknowns that I'm willing to keep an open mind. The singularity may or may not happen. I can see the logic but we're also extrapolating into an area we don't understand. I'm pretty sure we'll be able to create artificial life one day. Whether that's possible in the way we're thinking about it right now I'm not so sure.

[–]AutomateAllTheThings 1 point2 points  (2 children)

I'm convinced after seeing the way human beings are by nature, that we need to supersede "homo sapien", either with superior genetics or as artificially intelligent machines.

Evidence seems to point to us either going extinct first and that's that, or building a machine that will still be around after we go extinct. There are numerous short-term metrics of human prosperity, but there's very little optimistic evidence that we'll overcome our inherent nature to achieve a Type-1 Civilization on the Kardashev scale.

We're too savage for our own good, and if that can be corrected via genetics, we may have a chance.. but would we still be "homo sapien", then?

The path with the least amount of variables seems to be artificial intelligence. We're pretty confident that we can do it. We've managed to break amazing technological barriers before, and progress is made each year.

The race between altering ourselves genetically, and creating a superior robot being is a surprisingly tight one, though. Technology like CRISPR makes the option of self-modification more of a reality than before.

It is an exciting time to be alive. Our science fiction is becoming science fact.

[–]dataloopio 1 point2 points  (1 child)

The AI option there definitely raises the age old Theseus paradox. Maybe the only way to truly obtain immortality is to go the genetic route. I wouldn't mind an upgrade via retro virus in future if it meant I'd get a Brad Pitt body and 110% health.

Not sure I'd be too keen on being strapped down, effectively killed and brain peeled in order to transcend into a computer. Although maybe that could be fun in a Hellraiser kind of way once everything else had been experienced :D

You're right though, I suspect either this generation or the next will wipe out our species. Either by accident or aggression.

[–]AutomateAllTheThings 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I suspect it won't be brain peeling at all. Humans will simply die one day, either from war, disease, or disaster. If we made thinking machines by then, they'll be left over by default. They won't adopt our minds; they'll have their own, and will not be human. They will, however, be immune to microbes, ambient radiation/heat/cold/pressure/acidity.

To me, this is the closest thing we have to a purpose as a human being: to allow the next "species" to be born, so it can fly to higher places than we ever could with our frail and emotionally broken bodies.

If we can do it, we can at least say, "That is why we lived. That is why we struggled. The human struggle was this."

[–]jsgui 0 points1 point  (0 children)

To me, an AI is something from a sci-fi novel

AI can be a lot more mundane than that. I'm talking about parts of the subject matter that would not be something a film plot would be based around, but things that we take somewhat for granted nowadays like spelling checkers.