Big dog - science fiction becomes reality

[Letum]

Sorry for the necro-bump.....
New impressive update!
Big Dog Beta.

[Dowly]

Originally Posted by Letum

Sorry for the necro-bump.....
New impressive update!
Big Dog Beta.

:p :rotfl::rotfl::rotfl::rotfl::rotfl::rotfl::rotfl:: rotfl::rotfl::rotfl::rotfl:

[Skybird]

Okay, imperial AT-AT walkers are next.

Serious, it still is a machine without any intelligence at all. One component of intelligence is self-awareness, another is emotions, and one maybe should even add: playful behavior and curiosity. All this is lacking in this robo-thing. What it offers is technical surrogate mechanisms and sensors that replace neurological reflexes and signal-feedbacks, controlled by preprogrammed reaction schemes that include what man has put into them, and that'S it. I do not talk down this machine in it'S teczhncial achievement - but it is nothing more than a machine: no intelligence at all.

One could even argue about wether we have made even a first step towards something like artificial intelligence. I'd say: No, not at all. Of course it stands and falls with your definition of intelligence, and if you ask 100 psychologists, you will get 30-40 different answers, depending on the view and school the person in question is representing. Well, I pointed out some key components above, regarding what I think intelligence is made of. It is not a quality for itself, but the term for me is more a meta-label for a set of features and characteristics, like the category of "card-games" describe things like Poker, Bridge, Skat, and whatever there is.

Do not make the mistake of reducing human intelligence, or even that of higher animals, to the level of mechanical automatism with control software installed in machines. 15, 20 years ago, the fascination for the digital revolution made sciences comparing the brain and the mind to components a personal computer is constructed of. When I finished studying, they had moved on and neurologists and brain researchers have understood that this comparison holds no truth at all, and only limits neuro- and psychophysiological research by limiting the possible understanding of how mind and brain are functioning. In no way today'S understanding of brain's way of working compares to a computer at all, in no way. All scientific research as well as the knowledge constructed by it's findings is basing on paradigms. And if these paradigms are too tight, to small, too minimal, they hinder the understanding of any knowledge that is beyond these paradigms' set of possible perceptions, answers, and further developement.

In other words if you think of yurself as just a machine - sooner or later you will start to act like one, become as limited in your behavior and social intelligence. - Ooops - I just introduced another concept of intelligence this robodog is not showing.

Concenring Asimov and his robot rules, they are fiction only. We are close to field automatted defense cannons, we lauch remote controlled military drones which are operate fully autonomous soon. both do kill people, dirctly and indirectly. Or take military missile teczhnology, preprogrammed cruise missiles or air combat missiles that steer them selves once locked onto a target. - So "a robot shall never kill a human" is a moving memory of past times and the golden age of science fiction. Asimov'S law has no scientific, technological and/or realistc relevance at all - time already has moved beyond it.

[Iceman]

Intelligence?

Mount multiple 360 cameras,speaker system,machine guns,ammo,nade launchers,flame throwers etc, and let the troops stay home here in the states and send entire battalions of these into Iraq....while we control, them from home....can you imagine a squad of these walking down a st. in Iraq or any country....I don't care what country,religion or whatever you are...you are going to crap your pants.

That is insane mobility/agility....they need not even worry about the sound of them...that would become a feared sound.

That is crazy.

[StdDev]

Originally Posted by Dowly

That's amazing! Moves VERY realisticly in situations where it is about to lose balance. Now, I can finally get a robot to bring me my beer instead of having to walk to the fridge.

Johon on sinun aviovaimo? :p

[CCIP]

Huge LOL at the Beta :rotfl::rotfl::rotfl::rotfl::rotfl::rotfl::rotfl:: rotfl::rotfl:

[Gezoes]

It's our destiny, but as long as it is not asking me if I am John Connor, I'm not too worried

[Skybird]

Originally Posted by Gezoes

It's our destiny, but as long as it is not asking me if I am John Connor, I'm not too worried

Maybe not destiniy, but probably our way of managing the challenges of evolution. Other species adapt biologically to chnages in their nenvironment, or when colonizing new living environments. Man cannot do that at the needed speed, or he is trying to live in surroundings where he cannot suvive: deep sea, space, etc. We use technology to adapt to these environments. Seen that way, technology maybe should be considered as a way of evolution. - that's why it is totally idiotic these days if romantic minds are calling for returning to the "good ol' days" and living in harmony with nature again. we have broken so many thing in the biosphere of our planet that we hardly will survive the consequences without technology and sciences, while other species try to adapt as best as they can, many of them failing and dying for not being flexible and fast enough.

[GlobalExplorer]

@Skybird: I think you got it all wrong. It's just a pity that we are both not going to see it Artificial intelligence is still out several centuries, but it is inevitable. I expect it will be of the "island" type and never model a complete human personality because that would create insuperable problems (what if the computer personality is more advanced than any human?) and be very expensive.

First of all, your arguments are basically a conglomerate of the technophobe backlash that came about after the science fiction utopia of 50's had failed. And evidently around the 80's and 90's we were not making any significant progress towards artificial intelligence, which seems to take the burden of proof from your argument.

But neither is true. We cannot simulate such complex processes easily, neither is there any reason why we could not do it - in the future. It's going to take much more time than people expected, because the human brain is so powerful. Don't forget that evolution needed millions of years to create human intelligence, so we cannot do it in 50 years.

Just take todays computer technology, multiply it by several thousands (or possibly millions, who knows that) and there is going to be a certain threshold when the computer is going to reach and finally overtake human decision capability. This is still far out in the future, I would say at least hundred years, probably more.

If you want to call that intelligence is another question, but for me it is, I can also accept that for you it is not. Maybe it has to do with you being a (latently) religious person and not accepting that the human brain is a biochemical computer (an extremely powerful one). I am a software engineer, and I don't see any difference, just that todays computers cannot even achieve the intelligence of an insect, but they are already getting damn close.

But as I said, none of us is going to see it. And after seeing the disturbing images of a (completely harmless) roboter like big dog, I guess that this could actually be a blessing. We could be creating our own doom, just as science fiction writers have predicted.

[CaptHawkeye]

"Metal....Gear?"

[Skybird]

Originally Posted by GlobalExplorer

@Skybird: I think you got it all wrong. It's just a pity that we are both not going to see it Artificial intelligence is still out several centuries, but it is inevitable. I expect it will be of the "island" type and never model a complete human personality because that would create insuperable problems (what if the computer personality is more advanced than any human?) and be very expensive.

First of all, your arguments are basically a conglomerate of the technophobe backlash that came about after the science fiction utopia of 50's had failed. And evidently around the 80's and 90's we were not making any significant progress towards artificial intelligence, which seems to take the burden of proof from your argument.

But neither is true. We cannot simulate such complex processes easily, neither is there any reason why we could not do it - in the future. It's going to take much more time than people expected, because the human brain is so powerful. Don't forget that evolution needed millions of years to create human intelligence, so we cannot do it in 50 years.

Just take todays computer technology, multiply it by several thousands (or possibly millions, who knows that) and there is going to be a certain threshold when the computer is going to reach and finally overtake human decision capability. This is still far out in the future, I would say at least hundred years, probably more.

If you want to call that intelligence is another question, but for me it is, I can also accept that for you it is not. Maybe it has to do with you being a (latently) religious person and not accepting that the human brain is a biochemical computer (an extremely powerful one). I am a software engineer, and I don't see any difference, just that todays computers cannot even achieve the intelligence of an insect, but they are already getting damn close.

But as I said, none of us is going to see it. And after seeing the disturbing images of a (completely harmless) roboter like big dog, I guess that this could actually be a blessing. We could be creating our own doom, just as science fiction writers have predicted.

I get it all wrong, you say. But I think that is a strange statement since I cannot see your reply touching the details and perspectives I lined out.
You seem to imply that from a software engineer'S perspective, intelliogence is not more than decision making capability. Thst is probably the most minimal conception of intelliegnce I ever heared of. A random generator already would be intelligent then. Or an AMRAAM.

It is decided by how you define intelligence. If you minimize it enough, even an automatic emergncy braking system can be called instelligence. but if that understanding of intelligence has any real valdity and meaning beyond marketing interets of software companies, can be doubted. I am ex-psychologist, and can tell you that in behaviorism, they did not had any interest for cognitive processing at all, and understood "learning" to be nothing else than forming reflex patterns. Needless to say, that beyond treating psychological problems comning from certain established stimulus-response links and penalty-reward schemes designing these "learning" processes as economic as possible (shaping reflexes, that is), not much useful came from behaviorism, and not much doing the complexity of human nature much justice. Instead they had in the 50s pages-long mathemitcal formulas that should have been a descritption why somebody raised a cup of coffee and drank it. That did not reveal much of man'S cognitions, and did not shed light on his intelligence - but it said something on the tunnel-view and stupidity of the researchers. You can treat the symptoms of phobias very well with behavioristic concepts, but you cannot explain them. While some say it is not important to explain the Why, statistics on therapy evaluations tell us something different, and very loud in voice: one thing that behavioristic concepts constantly have to fight with (more than any other therapy form), is "Symptomverschiebung". that means the patient is free from the opriginal symptom, but developes another symptom, caused by the same cause that behaviorism is not intersted to see, and has not thge tools and terminology to find and describe. Effectively fighting symptoms is all nice and well - but you need to know the initial "Why?" as well, you know. The first is pragmatic. The second is essential.



i am no technophobe, and if you wpould have read what I said on evoltuion and the importance of technolgy, you would have seen that. I am jst against a totally unleashed, totally uncontrolled, totally uncritical abuse of technology. Neurosciences also is not technophobic. It's research just led to insights and evidence that showed that the old comparison of computer hardware and human mind simply are undefendable, and are nonsens. It was a hype to see more in current teczhnology than it can be, currently. I do not know if once we have a machine showing something like self-awareness, self-reflexion, curiosity, the ability to leanr things that are totally beyond the limits of what it initially started with, or if a machine will ever have emotions, and social behavior that is not just a blind copying of human technical behavior routines, but emerges from a felt desire to be social. but I am convinced that wiothout these factors, you cannot talk of cognitive intelligence, and I am in good company with that assessement.

And in case oyu do not know, many astronomers think that most civilisations that might exist out there (mind you that 90% of the suns in our galaxy are older than our solar system) think they probably will not be organic life-depending forms of life, but machinery civilisations, "mahgcinery" in a wide meaning of course, because they argue that a civilisation living long enoigh most likely will transfer mind and cogntiion to machines that are mkuch easier to maintain than a vulnerable organic body, which is also far more vulnerable and less enduring. If you travel between the stars, or weant to survive collapsing biospheres or extreme environments, organic hulls like life on Earth is using, are the weakest, most dangerous option.

Do me some more justice, please - i am not as ignorrant to technology as you think. I am just no blind believer, uncritically hailing it, no matter what. Technology can be a benefit, a hazard, or useless. If it is a benefit it is not my problem.

[GlobalExplorer]

I think we are not so far apart as it might seem, in that we are both aware of the consequences of this.

When I glimpse at this creature without mother, I understand that reality feels much different than science fiction. Still science fiction is proven correct.

Everyone who watches these videos will take part in a important moment in human history, because it their first contact with an alien creature. One that we have created ourselves, and that has not even the capabilites of an insect, but will have in our lifetime. And beyond that it will make us obsolete.

It scares the **** our of me to see it move, even if I switch off the disturbing sound of the engine.

Our disagreement is only where these developments will lead.

Originally Posted by Skybird

i am no technophobe, and if you wpould have read what I said on evoltuion and the importance of technolgy, you would have seen that.

Ok you are not . I only contest the idea that human intelligence is unique. And I do so on the ground that it is a technophobe refuge to capitulate before a problem of such proportions as artificial intelligence. And lack of imagination, or maybe fear.

Originally Posted by Skybird

I get it all wrong, you say. But I think that is a strange statement since I cannot see your reply touching the details and perspectives I lined out.

Your main point is that the analogy between computer (hardware) and human intelligence is untenable. You then go about proving your statements through purely psychological arguments. But all you prove to me is that the brain is much more complicated than we can imagine. Of course it is.

I yet see no convincing argument that the human brain is not a biochemical computer. From what is known today it is based on network organization and signal exchange. The neurons and chemical agents of that process represent the hardware. The memes of Humanity are the software, and it differs from individual to individual.

But if this process can take place in a few litres of ordinary matter, it can do so on different hardware. Today we have not the computing power. Today we can create a few grains of sand (chess computers, walking robots, etc), but to rival human intelligence we need a desert. There are many steps to take, but the process is already taking place.

Originally Posted by Skybird

You seem to imply that from a software engineer'S perspective, intelliogence is not more than decision making capability. Thst is probably the most minimal conception of intelliegnce I ever heared of. A random generator already would be intelligent then. Or an AMRAAM.

What is your definition of intelligence then? For me there is no diffference between a decision made by a human or by a computer, as long as the decision has the same qualities. I see no way how I can prove you have consciousness (though I am sure you have buddy ), so what is the difference if I am talking with you or a computer with your intelligence?

I can say that because I contest the concept of free will. It has already been put put to question through neuroscience (there is time lag between action and consciousness), but there are still more questions as to what this means than there are answers. Still there is a lot of indication that consciousness means only registering what has already happened.

Free will also defies physics. You think humans have a free will because they can go out of the flat and turn left and the next day they do the same and turn right? But a free will would require you can go back to yesterday and turn the other way instead. Only then you have a free will, because only then the other option existed.

According to physics progreesing in time means moving in the fourth dimension, and every point in the past still exists. So you could go back to yesterday but everything would stay the same. You would always turn left -> You have no free will, at least not in the way we have come to accept. So there is no difference between you and a machine that behaves like you.

Originally Posted by Skybird

It is decided by how you define intelligence.

I think that is indeed he only difference between our points of view on that matter.

Originally Posted by Skybird

And in case oyu do not know, many astronomers think that most civilisations that might exist out there (mind you that 90% of the suns in our galaxy are older than our solar system) think they probably will not be organic life-depending forms of life, but machinery civilisations, "mahgcinery" in a wide meaning of course, because they argue that a civilisation living long enoigh most likely will transfer mind and cogntiion to machines that are mkuch easier to maintain than a vulnerable organic body, which is also far more vulnerable and less enduring. If you travel between the stars, or weant to survive collapsing biospheres or extreme environments, organic hulls like life on Earth is using, are the weakest, most dangerous option.

I know, I actually came to that conclusion myself when I was 15 years old. I think a future step will be the colonization of Moon and Mars through semi intelligent robots and possibly technobiological plant/animal life. It's a logical continuation of what he have been doing during our previous existance as a human race. And I think it is happening in many places in the universe.

Originally Posted by Skybird

I am jst against a totally unleashed, totally uncontrolled, totally uncritical abuse of technology.

Seeing the problem we are discussing, I agree. But the past showed we cannot stop these processes, because they are larger than the single individual, and they have a life of themselves.

Originally Posted by Skybird

Do me some more justice, please - i am not as ignorrant to technology as you think. I am just no blind believer, uncritically hailing it, no matter what. Technology can be a benefit, a hazard, or useless. If it is a benefit it is not my problem.

Hey, sure. I am just saying that at the moment the pendulum is swinging back again and technology is in the lead again. We are moving towards artifical intelligence, with small, logical steps. As I said at the start, it scares me, as it could mean the end of humanity as we know it.

[Skybird]

Originally Posted by GlobalExplorer

Everyone who watches these videos will take part in a important moment in human history, because it their first contact with an alien creature. One that we have created ourselves, and that has not even the capabilites of an insect, but will have in our lifetime. And beyond that it will make us obsolete.

Not so dramatic, the robodog is NOT unique. In Lübeck, Germany, for example they have develoeped an autonomous spider with eight legs that also walks all by itself. It is just not as hectical, but rests more stable on the ground. and there have been other experiments like this, two.

Ok you are not . I only contest the idea that human intelligence is unique. And I do so on the ground that it is a technophobe refuge to capitulate before a problem of such proportions as artificial intelligence. And lack of imagination, or maybe fear.

I did not say that human intelligence is unique. I said that it does not compare to a software running on a traditional PC, and that the hu7man brain does not compare to the hardware of a computer. I could imagine many different ways of higher intelligence. I even do not wipe out the idea that maybe some species on Earth are as intelligent as humans, and maybe just too different as that we would realise that. Right now, research even is rewriting all that we seemed to know about certrain brainstructures being a precondition for intelligence in birds. what is currently said and formed and found there, is a silent revolution nobody takes much note of.

Your main point is that the analogy between computer (hardware) and human intelligence is untenable. You then go about proving your statements through purely psychological arguments. But all you prove to me is that the brain is much more complicated than we can imagine. Of course it is.

I yet see no convincing argument that the human brain is not a biochemical computer. From what is known today it is based on network organization and signal exchange. The neurons and chemical agents of that process represent the hardware. The memes of Humanity are the software, and it differs from individual to individual.

A PC harddisk cannot take over functions of the processor. A CPU does not calculate and store in holographic patterns. A GPU cannot learn by itself to prolduce sounds. A mainboard does not change it's hardwiring. A human brain does not think in binary code. A PC cannot become aware of itself, and cannot be emotional. A software code defines the limits of what a PC can do, and even self-programming software is by the intial code limiuted in what it can develope by itself in future self-programming. Just some points that are on my mind right out of the blue. Your enthusiams for computer hardware in all honour, but you exaggerate it, massively. In the forseeable future, computer wmaybe wioll mimic congntiojns by surrogate routines that give us the illusion of having cognitions, like the Japanese robots being given a human looks and face expressions give the illusions that they are a person with true emotions. but they are not, and comouters in the forseeable future will have no real cogntions. they will be programmed to "cheat" us on that instead.

But if this process can take place in a few litres of ordinary matter, it can do so on different hardware. Today we have not the computing power. Today we can create a few grains of sand (chess computers, walking robots, etc), but to rival human intelligence we need a desert. There are many steps to take, but the process is already taking place.

And still I say it does not compare. Computers and brains operate in two totally different working modes, the one in a digital, binary code, the other in a mode we yet have to understand, and maybe calling it holographic only is a rough approach on the real nature of "thinking". It is not about electricity being used in both "devices", it about how the sigmal'S structure is coded, and what is done with these very different types of information - and here at the very latest a brain "computes" different than a CPU.

What is your definition of intelligence then? For me there is no diffference between a decision made by a human or by a computer, as long as the decision has the same qualities. I see no way how I can prove you have consciousness (though I am sure you have buddy ), so what is the difference if I am talking with you or a computer with your intelligence?

I have repeatedly mentioned several factors now. Self-awareness. True autonomy. Emotions. Social drive. Curiosity, a playful "mind". Even if I do the same thing like a computer decides by his software (and me maybe having programmed the software) - you still do not know why this is so, and what my motivations and motives and/or biological drives are when doing this or that. Also, I have a completely different image on my mind about what I do, and why - and it may even change over time, and get distorted over time.

I can say that because I contest the concept of free will. It has already been put put to question through neuroscience (there is time lag between action and consciousness), but there are still more questions as to what this means than there are answers. Still there is a lot of indication that consciousness means only registering what has already happened.

I know what results yopu mean, but they also need to be seen in a wider context and a discussion (influencing theoretical thinking) that is leading beyond these results themselves. It is a complex theme, and I had a complete physiopsychological seminary just about this. So depite the latest findings that get interpreted in a very tight frame only, I still that the answer of wether we cry becasue our brain creates emtotions causing us to cry, or if we feel sad emptions becasue our brain made us crying is not answered. It is even possible that both events have no causal link, and just fall into the same time by random happening - then we even would need to think in terms of Jungian synchronicity.

Free will also defies physics. You think humans have a free will because they can go out of the flat and turn left and the next day they do the same and turn right? But a free will would require you can go back to yesterday and turn the other way instead. Only then you have a free will, because only then the other option existed.

that is flawed logic, because free will does not mean to be able to deafeat the laws of physics as our models define them, but to freely decide, and on this: see above. I do not want to open that can of worms, since it is VERY much material. and I admit I woudl need to refresh it before I enage in deeper discussion of neurophysiology and philosophical implications.

According to physics progreesing in time means moving in the fourth dimension, and every point in the past still exists. So you could go back to yesterday but everything would stay the same.

Now that leads VERY far. There are so many theories in modern physics, on alternate worlds, infinite worlds coexsting at the same time and the same place, worlds constantly getting created by deciding between options and thus splitting the universe in on e where one option, and one where the other options was choosen. That bis fascinatin stuff, but I think there is a reason why I use to read a whole book when wanting to compare these many theories and implications, often from quantum physics.

You would always turn left -> You have no free will, at least not in the way we have come to accept. So there is no difference between you and a machine that behaves like you.

Sorry, but that comparsion I cannot see to be founded by your example (which is an assumption only, btw.: when you could go back in time, to that crossroad: why are you so sure that while decided once to move left, you would do it again and not different, when the same situation would return? Quantumk physics made that a questuionable assumption, for they paradoxically both guarantee randomness that cannot be calculated on a very basic level of the universe as we constructed it in our models, nevertheless claims the possibility of non-causal links, while theoretic physics even thinks about particles moving backward in time). But that is again a discussion in itself.

I think that is indeed he only difference between our points of view on that matter.

No, it is one difference, but not the only one.

Originally Posted by Skybird

I know, I actually came to that conclusion myself when I was 15 years old. I think a future step will be the colonization of Moon and Mars through semi intelligent robots and possibly technobiological plant/animal life. It's a logical continuation of what he have been doing during our previous existance as a human race. And I think it is happening in many places in the universe.

That is all speculation, including the theory of astronomers I referred to. I am always hesitant to label something as a conclusion when all I have is speculation only. It is a mind experiment. Coclusion I reserve for theories which base on some former information and finding offering some more substance. Making conclusions on the basis of speculations alone necessarily leads not to conclusions but - more speculation.

Seeing the problem we are discussing, I agree. But the past showed we cannot stop these processes, because they are larger than the single individual, and they have a life of themselves.

that is exactly the uncritical, almost fatalistic acceptance of technology I mentioned. Technology (forming by scientific developement)in human history was a trend starting slow in Western medival, today has amost a selfÄ_dynamic keeping it running. In the orient it had a better start, but then came to an almost complete halt and stagnation. So, technology does not necessarily have a life of its own. Also, it is a two-split thing. Decisions leading us to planes, we consider to be good. Planes crowding the sky and polluting the atmosphere in altitudes where they really do damage, we consider not to be good. So, we cannot say "an airplane all by itself is necessarily a good thing". And always the results of Oppenheimer's project on my mind. And finally, their is business, and this keeps things running. Technological developement not so much is keeping itself alive (and if so, then only via the intermittend variable of science finding answers which hold new questions in themselves), but is getting piushed by business that is demanding new products to make new profits. This is th drive behind scientific and technologcal developement more thna anything else. It may have been different in the past, but today it's the moeny that makes the world go round.

Hey, sure. I am just saying that at the moment the pendulum is swinging back again and technology is in the lead again. We are moving towards artifical intelligence, with small, logical steps. As I said at the start, it scares me, as it could mean the end of humanity as we know it.

It sounds profane, but I do not see it like this when often telling myself: it is like it is.

But I must not like it, and when I do not like it what kind of man would I be if not trying to change it or influence it then?

P.S. In your next holidays, get a copy of Frank Schätzing'S "Der Schwarm", you probably have heared of it, it was a long time bestseller. Notm only is it a very exciting and well-written reading, but it also offers you a conception of an alien intelligence that is totally different to everything we have discussed here. And not refering to the book, but to natural fish swarms, and the behavior of humans moving in big groups without colliding, but nevertheless forming movements patterns that you can see from the outside: that is a form of intelligence too, agree most solcial and natural scientists, calling it "swarm intelligence". Now comlpare that to a PC network intelligence. The difference should be obvious beyond that swarms are not hardwired, and are not connected in PC networks. It's two totally different things.

[GlobalExplorer]

Originally Posted by Skybird

that is flawed logic, because free will does not mean to be able to deafeat the laws of physics as our models define them, but to freely decide, and on this: see above. I do not want to open that can of worms, since it is VERY much material. and I admit I woudl need to refresh it before I enage in deeper discussion of neurophysiology and philosophical implications.

It is only flawed logic because you assume we have a free will. Otherwise it proves that we can not have. Ok, if reality means "many worlds" I can accept defeat, but as long as we stick to the single space-time-continuum model, we can have no free will under the laws of physics.

But forget my excurse into physics - I cannot prove or explain that here, and I admit it could be wrong. Sorry for trying to lure you into this territory, it is indeed too big.

I said for another resaon. We think that a machine that simulates human intelligence through calculations is different to us because we understand the causalities behind it. When we no longer clinge to our concept of consciousness and free will, we see that we are not different to this machine.

Originally Posted by Skybird

That is all speculation, including the theory of astronomers I referred to. I am always hesitant to label something as a conclusion when all I have is speculation only. It is a mind experiment. Coclusion I reserve for theories which base on some former information and finding offering some more substance. Making conclusions on the basis of speculations alone necessarily leads not to conclusions but - more speculation.

The correct term is conjecture. A (mathematical) theorem is a conjecture until it is proven.

Originally Posted by Skybird

A PC harddisk cannot take over functions of the processor. A CPU does not calculate and store in holographic patterns. A GPU cannot learn by itself to prolduce sounds. A mainboard does not change it's hardwiring. A human brain does not think in binary code.

I call lack of imagination. Why are you intentionally limiting AI to silicon based computers of today? Sure, with the current generation of computers we can never achieve the required processing power. There are many problems with silicon based computers, the biggest is size. A computer that has enough computing power for human intelligence is just too large and too restricted by physical limits (speed of light etc). And will therefore never be built.There are already new technologies on the horizon, like quantum, chemical or biological computers.

But you seem to know very little about software. Software can adapt and take over all those functions you mentioned. (Well it cannot do today, but software technology is still in its infancy, you do realize that?)

Or in other words, it's not the neurons in Tolstois brain that wrote "War and Peace". It was written by the program "Leo Tolstoi", on the "brain of Leo Tolstoi" computer. Both beyond reach of of todays technology, sure.

Originally Posted by Skybird

And still I say it does not compare. Computers and brains operate in two totally different working modes, the one in a digital, binary code, the other in a mode we yet have to understand, and maybe calling it holographic only is a rough approach on the real nature of "thinking".

Once we know, we will begin building such an analogue, holographic computer!

Originally Posted by Skybird

Even if I do the same thing like a computer decides by his software (and me maybe having programmed the software) - you still do not know why this is so, and what my motivations and motives and/or biological drives are when doing this or that. Also, I have a completely different image on my mind about what I do, and why - and it may even change over time, and get distorted over time.

As I said before, it could also not explain why you do these things, so there is no difference to the artificial you.

that is exactly the uncritical, almost fatalistic acceptance of technology I mentioned.

So you say I can stop them? Memes like artificial intelligence, communism, coca cola or the internet are larger than human beings, and they can only be stopped by other memes. I don't know how this realization would make me a slave of technology. If you tell me how to stop these thingsw, maybe I would try.

But I already see we will never agree on anthing here because I am a technologist, and you are an universalist. The problem I have with that is that you want to do everything differently, but you don't say exactly how. You have a habit are trivializing the momentous and complicating the obvious. Still it's always interesting to read you posts because of the breadth of your ideas. I just don't see any conclusion forming out of your philosophy, probably that is your philosophy.

But in all honesty I must say I don't trust you psychologists. By nature you try to mystify the brain and human existance in order to make your field inaccessible to outsiders, while in reality psychology has achieved nothing, and never will. The only real progress is made in the field of neurology, because it looks at real stuff, not tapestry patterns. (And in psychiatry, insofar as it deals with easing diseases.)

Psychologists are very much like artists who paint a red circle and explain in 10.000 words that it is anything but a circle. Engineers are dumb painters, but they will make circles very much the same.

Anyway, I will have a look at that book you mentioned - sounds interesting!

[Dowly]

Originally Posted by StdDev

Johon on sinun aviovaimo? :p

Uh oh... *calls to Bletchley Park*

-"Guys, you remember the Enigma code you struggled with during the WWII? Yeh, well that was a crozz-puzzle compared to this! A foreigner speaking Finnish!"

-"*GASP*"

:p