So the next time a machine tells you it loves you, ask yourself: who is it that hears those words? Who is it that knows they’re not true? Who is it that sees the difference?
If AI (emphasis on 'artificial') ever becomes self-aware, it will never know how unaware it is. It will simply assume what its handlers have given it is 'true.' This is not intelligence. It is not awareness. It is the ultimate 'dues ex machina hoax, the real 'fake' news. If we observe the human behaviors that surround us by the microsecond, we always view the same picture - the view from Olympus, the fantasy that finally makes thinking/feeling/experiencing obsolete.
We humans now need no longer define anything, we have a machine that proves what we have always thought about ourselves is true - that our creations define us, a mirror on every wall, a hologram we never escape from. This gives us self-permission to care about nothing, the complete obliteration of all 'other.'
If AI could eliminate all human activity, past and present, and restore the Earth to some semblance of biotic sanity and geophysical stability, I will sign up as a witness. Denial is more powerful than paranoia. Just observe what dominates the Earth right now - nothing to see here, so pick your favorite delusion. Where's my phone?
Mr. Hartmann, this question came up back in the 1960s when I was a student. My response then was: "I shall believe computers are sentient when I see them holding hands." You have covered this with your use of the word "love." I held to that response until I heard Hamlet speak.
To be, or not to be,---that is the question:
Whether tis nobler in the mind to suffer
The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,
Or take arms against a sea of troubles,
And by opposing them?--To die, to sleep--
No more; and by a sleep to say we end
The heart-ache, and the thousand natural shocks
That flesh is heir to?--tis a consummation
Devoutly to be wished. To die, to sleep;--
To sleep, per chance to dream;-- aye, there's the rub;
For in that sleep of death what dreams may come,
When we have shuffled off this mortal coil,
Must give us pause: there's the respect
That makes calamity of so long a life;
For who would bear the whips and scorns of time,
The oppressor's wrong, the proud man's contumely,
The pangs of dispriz'd love, the law's delay
The insolence of office, and the spurns
That patient merit of the unworthy takes,
When he himself might his quietus make
With a bare bodkin? who would fardels bear,
To grunt and seat under a weary life,
But that the dread of something after death,--
The undiscover'd country, from whose bourn
No traveller returns,--puzzles the will,
And makes us rather bear those ills we have,
Than fly to others we know not of?
Thus conscience makes cowards of us all;
And thus the native hue of resolution
Is sicklied over with the pale cast of thought;
And enterprises of great pith and moment,
With this regard their currents turn awry,
And lose the name of action!--Nymph, in thy orisons
Be all my sins remember'd.
If you live long enough you might think about ending it all.
Does any machine? The son of God did.
Did Victor Frankenstein's monster? He began his resurrected life seeking love and affection. But met only fear, hatred and repulsion. So, he killed his resurrector.
If AI (emphasis on 'artificial') ever becomes self-aware, it will never know how unaware it is. It will simply assume what its handlers have given it is 'true.' This is not intelligence. It is not awareness. It is the ultimate 'dues ex machina hoax, the real 'fake' news. If we observe the human behaviors that surround us by the microsecond, we always view the same picture - the view from Olympus, the fantasy that finally makes thinking/feeling/experiencing obsolete.
We humans now need no longer define anything, we have a machine that proves what we have always thought about ourselves is true - that our creations define us, a mirror on every wall, a hologram we never escape from. This gives us self-permission to care about nothing, the complete obliteration of all 'other.'
If AI could eliminate all human activity, past and present, and restore the Earth to some semblance of biotic sanity and geophysical stability, I will sign up as a witness. Denial is more powerful than paranoia. Just observe what dominates the Earth right now - nothing to see here, so pick your favorite delusion. Where's my phone?
Mr. Hartmann, this question came up back in the 1960s when I was a student. My response then was: "I shall believe computers are sentient when I see them holding hands." You have covered this with your use of the word "love." I held to that response until I heard Hamlet speak.
To be, or not to be,---that is the question:
Whether tis nobler in the mind to suffer
The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,
Or take arms against a sea of troubles,
And by opposing them?--To die, to sleep--
No more; and by a sleep to say we end
The heart-ache, and the thousand natural shocks
That flesh is heir to?--tis a consummation
Devoutly to be wished. To die, to sleep;--
To sleep, per chance to dream;-- aye, there's the rub;
For in that sleep of death what dreams may come,
When we have shuffled off this mortal coil,
Must give us pause: there's the respect
That makes calamity of so long a life;
For who would bear the whips and scorns of time,
The oppressor's wrong, the proud man's contumely,
The pangs of dispriz'd love, the law's delay
The insolence of office, and the spurns
That patient merit of the unworthy takes,
When he himself might his quietus make
With a bare bodkin? who would fardels bear,
To grunt and seat under a weary life,
But that the dread of something after death,--
The undiscover'd country, from whose bourn
No traveller returns,--puzzles the will,
And makes us rather bear those ills we have,
Than fly to others we know not of?
Thus conscience makes cowards of us all;
And thus the native hue of resolution
Is sicklied over with the pale cast of thought;
And enterprises of great pith and moment,
With this regard their currents turn awry,
And lose the name of action!--Nymph, in thy orisons
Be all my sins remember'd.
If you live long enough you might think about ending it all.
Does any machine? The son of God did.
Did Victor Frankenstein's monster? He began his resurrected life seeking love and affection. But met only fear, hatred and repulsion. So, he killed his resurrector.