The Seoul of a New Machine
Rity is the ghost in the machine: an autonomous agent that can transfer itself into desktop computers, PDAs, servers and robotic avatars, and adapt and evolve like a genetic organism. As researchers go from place to place, they are captured and recognized by a network of cameras in the building, allowing Rity to follow them from computer to computer.
The "sobot" can upload itself into a mobile robot -- a simpler cousin of HanSaRam called MyBot -- and follow Kuppuswamy from room to room on its servo-controlled wheels, fetching objects for the researcher with its mechanical arms. If it sees Kuppuswamy sit in front of his office PC, Rity can abandon MyBot like a husk and slip into the desktop machine, to better put itself at its human master's disposal.
(Via Communist Robot.)
Rity's body-swapping antics just might provide a glimpse of our own future abilities. If the human mind can be manipulated digitally and uploaded into a computer substrate, traveling in "meatspace" may become hopelessly outmoded. Instead, we might choose to email ourselves from city to city (or from planet to planet), taking up residence in myriad virtual and mechanical forms along the way. Or, fearing obliteration of the Self, we might elect to spawn virtual clones of ourselves to send on indeterminable errands.
In either case, we may eventually tire of the "real" world in favor of universes of our own invention. If so, we run the risk of permanently isolating ourselves from extraterrestrial intelligences. One could even argue that our perceived failure to discover ET signals or megascale artifacts is due to our universe being custom-designed by unknowable predecessors.
11 comments:
In reality, Rity can't do much yet.
All hat and no cattle, sounds like to me. Until we arrive at a deep (and, yes, essentially metaphysical) understanding of what mind really IS, what you are describing, Mac, just ain't gonna happen. Personally, as I've said here before, I don't think this kind of understanding will be arrived at by human beings in our lifetimes for the simple reason that the reigning "paradigm" is a materialistic one that bascially equates mind and brain. As long as reasearchers hold to this equation, AI will go nowhere. And I guess that I am predicting that they WILL hold to it for some time to come, since materialism seems to be such an attractive paradigm to many Western intellectuals.
Hmmm.... I'm assuming that 'metaphysical' infers something other than physical. Which means perhaps W.M. has solved the problem of causal interaction?
ns
"at its human master's disposal".
Ughh. Just plain CREEPY. Not the story, just the decision to frame the relationship in those terms. I vote for preemptively working to keep the language of domination/submission out of the realm of human/human assistant relationships. Before we're asked to by our human assistants!
Which means perhaps W.M. has solved the problem of causal interaction?
I'm making good progress. Hint: consider the relationship between information itself (all those seuqences of 1's & 0's) and the physical media used to store and process information (the pits and bumps that correspond physically to the 1's and 0's. Think of it as kind of Zen koan.
chris -- Ah, how we long for the days of slavery! And speaking of metaphysics/philosophy, Aristotle's Nichomachean Ethics contains a closely reasoned philosophical defense of slavery! (Not that I agree with the big A in this or much else.)
As long as reasearchers hold to this equation, AI will go nowhere. And I guess that I am predicting that they WILL hold to it for some time to come, since materialism seems to be such an attractive paradigm to many Western intellectuals.
Hee-hee. Look at it this way: if it turns out that you're right and there *is* in fact a soul, would you want AI researchers applying the scientific method to it? Worse, would you want them succeeding? :D
razor -- Couple of points. Closet Hindu that I am, I would not call what I am talking about a "soul," which implies some kind of objective presence along the same lines of existence as, say, a toaster. "Selfhood" might be a more accurate term if we take it to mean something wholly non-objective (indeed, "subjectivity itself" if that's not a contradiction, which it is). At any rate, I'm not worried about AI researchers applying the scientific method to selfhood because this method is inapplicable to this subject (so to speak) in principle. There are, however, other "ways of knowledge" besides science (rigorous, systematic, experimental occultism is one) and these might be more appropriate. This notion is really the basis of my prediction that current research won't succeed in producing genuine ("strong") AI.
ther "ways of knowledge" besides science (Rigourous, systematic experimental occultism is one)
Okay. What has been discovered by these methods?
Okay. What has been discovered by these methods?
Visions and voices. The moral dimension of existence. The reality of nonhuman intelligences. Other worlds. The fact that such discoveries have not been "verified" or "accepted" by the orthodox scientific community in no way invalidates their reality.
Hmm. Seems to me like every one of those things was also discovered - verifiably - by "orthodox science". As for the moral dimension of existence, since when was that an occult or any way supernatural phenomenon?
razor -- I am not aware that orthodox science has contacted any nonhuman intelligences. The "world of the imagination" is, in part, the province of the occult, and this is what is really tapped by s.f. writers. Moreover, the moral dimension of existence was originally discovered by people whom I like to think of as "experimental metaphysicians" -- call them "sages" if you will. Utilitarian/pragmatic science may find ways to logically support morality (though these all depend on what to my mind is an unsatisfactory moral relativism) but the basis was laid down by people (for example Yeheshuah a.k.a. "Jesus") whom I like to think of -- and could probably "prove" if pressed but please not here! -- as occultists. (Plato, the great moralist of Western cultural history, was also an occultist and gave rise to a major "school" of the occult -- so-called "Neoplatonism" that persists to this day.) MOREOVER (note the big "moreover") many of the great early modern scientists whose names are (literally) "written in stone" on the fortress walls of MIT -- to wit, Kepler and Newton among others were also occultists and their occult research, in fact, drove and fed their scientific research. I could go on but hope this is enough for now.
I wasn't aware *anyone* had contacted nonhuman intelligences - who, when, where, and most importantly, why doesn't anyone know?
The world of imagination is flexible intelligence given free rein, nothing more. It's beginning to seem to me like your definition of 'occult' is more mundane than you originally lead me to believe.
The moral dimension of existence was discovered because humans are capable of enlightened self-interest - that *is* the essence of the Golden Rule. We'd have looked right twats if we'd backstabbed and eye-for-an-eyed ourselves to extinction, wouldn't we?
War or - at least - conflict is apparently essential to the human psyche, but so is peace.
Kepler and Newton and co were occultists and alchemists because they were still inventing the scientific method at the time - or are there any alchemical processes that worked I should know about?
and their occult research, in fact, drove and fed their scientific research.
Yes, in the sense that reading about ultrasonic manipulation of the brain in real-life gives me ideas for scifi writing. The occult research itself was abandoned for pragmatic science because occult research did not work.