What will happen to humans when machines become conscious?

[Moonbeam]

Your point to Viperani, LadyJessica, has been my thought too. I don't, of hand, see a reason to limit consciousness to organic machines over silicon ones, nor would I guarantee that computer technology won't shift to organics. Computing devices already help design themselves. It doesn't seem reasonable that they can't do so automatically, in future, ie, build themselves, test themselves, and use successful designs to repeat the process. This coupled with similar self modifying software and Life Sims testing and real world comparison analysis can put them on the road of evolution. Automated, factory replication including resource gathering, and we have a form of life.

eia403, your question, "It will simply see the reality of how it came into being, what reason would it need to attribute God like reverence for those that built it?" is one, since you say you believe in God, that I would turn on you. Your are, from the point of view of evolution, in the same position. Why the God like reverence? Don't assume I mean this as an attack on faith. I just think that consciousness may be bind-blowing, that you can't have it big time without reverence, or rather that having it big time is reverence.

That is why I would have to agree that Athanasius may have a better question. Still, I find it facinating to wonder if "robots dream of electric sheep"? What an adventure!

 

[jhu]

i think you've been reading too much isaac asimov

 

[Moonbeam]

Eh, jhu, get your assem offa my thread.

 

[jhu]

eh? quite an interesting read. i've already gone through all this during philosophy. i'll just go back to sleep now.

 

[eia430]

Boberfett, Our sense of self preservation was borne from millions upon millions of years of competition amongst each other (not just people, but competition of life for life) What makes you think that something that has not had the same requirement would have the same self preservation instinct? Just what is it trying to preserve itself against? The presence or lack of the self preservation instinct is not a requirement for sentience. A cockroach has a very strong instinct of self preservation, if lack of that instinct denotes non sentience, does the presence of that instinct (in roaches) denote sentience?

 

[Moonbeam]

Poor,poor electric sheep, here comes jhu.

eia403, Bobber is a conservative. The force of SELF preservation is strong in that one.

 

[eia430]

Moonbeam, this is where my rather unique perspective comes into play. Do I believe in God? yes I do, do I believe Genesis is a steaming pile? yes I do. Do I believe in evolution? yes I do. My belief that God exists does not stem from the bible, it stems from personal observations and experiences. It is those same observations that cause me to be EXTREMELY skeptical of anything that man has had a hand in manipulating(bible, church,etc) Do I believe that we as a people are God's personal project? no. It would be very illogical for me to believe that we are the only sentient life forms in the universe. My personal experiences have led me to believe that there is more than just what we perceive. So my belief in God does not stem from where I think we came from. This is why I don't think that a sentient machine would automaticly revere man just for creating it. You are overlooking that this sentient machine will have the ability to observe us directly. The main power of the church to manipulate people and convince them that it's (the churches) words are God's words stem from the fact that we cannot directly observe God. The very day that everyone can directly observe God is the same day the church like a vampire thrust into daylight will crumble into dust.

 

[Mday]

sorry to say this, but we are machines. =(

 

[rc5]

Our computers are too slow and too simple now. We don't even have 0.1 billion transistors in one CPU while a human being's brain contains hundreds of billions of neons. The gap is huge at present. I will wait 20-30 years to see what's going on.

 

[Moonbeam]

eia403, essentially I was saying by asking you, an organic machine, to look at the fact of your belief, was to suggest that what's good for the carbon may be good for the silicon. It was suggesting that it may be that faith, reverence, religious feeling, love of life may be a property of self consciousness, not necessarily a reverence for the creator, but a marveling at the fact of existence, wonder, etc, a feeling that there is more than can be perceived. As to your attitude to organized religion, there are hundreds of dead religions, I'd guess, and still there is something within that expresses as spirituality. Every formal religion is the husk of some once living illuminate's repository of wisdom. I refer to them as bridges to reality. Too much attachment to the bridge and there is no crossing. Once across, what (personal) need for the bridge. I would second MrPALCO and say at least that most people get there spiritual start there.

 

[eia430]

rc5 we are far from .1 billion (100 million) we are I think around 6 million right now with the PIII (a guess not sure but around there) that would be .006 billion. But this is just one single cpu nothing stops us from linking as many cpu's as it takes to acheive sentience. Hardware wise it already is possible, but software wise we are only taking the very first baby steps in sentient program. I hope it happens in my lifetime, it would be great to see that leap.

 

[eia430]

Moonbeam, I see your point now, but I still disagree. The carbon (us) developed the way we did through millions of years of warfare with each other. A sentient machine will not have been through such a process. This is akin to two identical men, one grew up homeless in the streets fighting for food, shelter, etc the other was a cloned man grown from a test tube in a laboratory. I don't think they would have the same outlook on life.

As for my attitude towards organized religeon. What choice do I have but the one I carry? I challenge you to look into the history of religeon (your own) Not the history that is spouted by the church itself that's full of amnesia, but actual factual complete history. The history complete with power struggles, full of murder, deceit, the history that is full of evil. Then ask yourself as I have asked myself, How can a church that has been so evil in the past be all of the sudden good now? (I am baptised roman catholic) My particular religeon is full of the wonderful work of the roman catholic church. The killing of peruvian indians and desecration of their gravesites. The killing of the Aztecs and just about every indian tribe that decided not to adopt the catholic faith. More recently during WWII the pope not doing anything about the slaughter of Jews, not even to speak against it. You name it the church has done it, all in the name of God. If you do look beyond what the church itself spoon feeds you, if you look into the actions of the church in it's history, you just might feel the same way I do.

 

[Moonbeam]

I guess what I'm saying, eia, or asking really is whether it might not be that self consciousness, no matter the nature of the brain to which it appends, might not pose all the same universal questions that human philosophers have asked down through the ages.

 

[eia430]

Moonbeam, you lost me here..... you said...

"I guess what I'm saying, eia, or asking really is whether it might not be that self consciousness, no matter the nature of the brain to which it appends, might not pose all the same universal questions that human philosophers have asked down through the ages."

Ok... then I guess we agree then... self conciousness might not pose (ask) all the same universal questions.

 

[Athanasius]

eia430:

He who truly loves, knows; he who truly knows, loves. Increasing knowledge will never validate the existence of love, but increasing love validates the pursuit of genuine knowledge. "Love rejoices in the truth." (1 Corinthians 13:6, NIV).

If both knowledge and love are, in and of themselves, intrinsically good, then they cannot be truly opposed to each other. It isn't an "either/or" choice, but a "both/and." The question is, how do we get "both/and"?

The 6,000 or so recorded years of human history show a steady advance of knowledge from pre-historic dark ages until now. With the advent of the industrial revolution and the "enlightenment," that knowledge curve has leaped exponentially. Yet every advance in human knowledge is a two-edged sword because we lack the ability to consistently use it lovingly. Consider the internet itself. While the internet allows you and I and everyone with access to it to communicate and explore hopefully meaningful ideas together (a "good" use), it also is an instrument whereby millions of men reduce women to impersonal sex toys that exist for satisfaction of male sexual desires (a "bad" use).

Love teaches us how to use knowledge; knowledge can never teach us how to love. If one accepts the premise that both "love" and "knowledge" are good, I think it becomes quickly self-evident that it is easier to pursue knowledge that benefits me personally than it is to pursue the genuine capacity to love others.

Perhaps some don't see the value of genuine love. To such people, I am brought back to where I began this post: the One who truly loves, knows; the One who truly knows, loves.

 

[Wangel]

We will become slaves to the machines - See Terminator II

 

[LadyJessica]

rc5,

The comparison between transistors and neurons is not a good one. Transistors can only do one thing. Neurons can do more than just carry action potentials. On the other hand, neurons and neural networks can be simulated on a computer.

 

[Blackhawk2]

Some of you people make me very sad As a programmer with a degree in that field from a respected institution I can tell you that machines will never be "conscious." Yes they may be "programmed" to behave in a way the programmer wants but that simply does not constitute consciousness. A dog or cat will be far more conscious than a machine will ever be. For those saying humans are machines yes you are correct, the human brain sends electronic pulses to the nerves. Ever seen a dead human? That is what we are physically, you can still make it twitch but ask it a question and it won't respond, I can guarantee that . There is something beyond the physical that can only be reproduced by the "life force->aka God". That life force is what makes decisions, there is no way we can reproduce that same "consciousness" in a "machine".

 

[Viperoni]

Sorry for the vagueness; I meant something like this:
It is very easily possible (15 years down the road?), but I highly doubt that (the government?) will let it happen.

 

[rc5]

Blackhawk2:

You probably never heard "mind uploading".

If we are too cheap to create a machine conscience from the scratch, at least we can duplicate one from a carbon copy (human), in theory.

Scanning the status of every neuron in one brain, then transferring and emulating every neuron in a computer, you get a machine copy of human being conscience.

Certainly, this copy will share all advantages and drawbacks as we do at the beginning.

 

[Demon-Xanth]

Use from a computer's point of view.

 

[LadyJessica]

Blackhawk2,

Your argument isn't logically sound. Neurons are "programmed" to send action potentials down the their axons. Does that make the neuron conscious? No, it's the interaction between all the neurons that produces consciousness. Otherwise, what's the point of neurons? Similarly a simulation of a neurl network could also produce consciousness.

 

[Blackhawk2]

LadyJessica,

Our brains are still alive when we die, thats why people can have near death experiences, if their brain was in fact "dead" they wouldn't be able to return to life. So even though the brain(a neural network) is still active and "alive", it can't respond on its own? The reason it can't respond is because the "master controller which controls consciousness" has left the body

 

[jhu]

dood, i think you've been smokin' too much o' that weed. you die when your brain dies. after that there's no hope of you coming back to life. what you're talking about is clinical death where the heart stops beating

 

[Isla]

How do you know we are not among you already?