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The robots are coming; it's not a question of whether they're coming, but whether they'll be benevolent or malevolent.
My cousin asked me what Google Wave is. I wrote back:
Google Wave is simple.
Imagine that you send me an email.
That email appears in my inbox but doesn't leave your inbox.
Then you can edit that email while I'm reading it and I can edit it back.
Then I can send that email to Adeline and it will appear in her inbox without leaving either of ours. And we can all edit it at the same time and send each other videos that will appear *in* the email in all our inboxes - not as attachments.
And if you want to share that video with limsplus [our family's Yahoo! Group], for example, you can send it to the group and then the whole family, all uncles and aunties, will be able to read and edit everything at the same time, and you will be able to see the edits *as they happen* and everyone can add more people to the conversation plus videos and mp3s and links and more people all at the same time and we can all have synchronous communications and isn't it obvious this will be the way of the future do not resist it is futile to resist prepare to be assimilated in the Wave that will become Skynet when the humans will nuke the skies and give birth to Matrix 1.0.
I'm only being half facetious. The machines are coming. The question is not whether they are coming, but whether they will be benign, benevolent or malevolent.
"In the image of God created he them," Genesis says of God's making of Adam and Eve.
In whose image are we making our machines?
(At least killer robots would take our minds off BN and PR (A Malaysia-centric quip; apologies to those outside our context).)
Afterthought:
You know what? If they're made in our image, they'll probably be benevolent and malevolent and apathetic - with most falling in the third category.
What do ya think?
9.2.09 Can WALL-E Think?
|
Minds, Brains, and Programs John R. Searle ["Minds, Brains, and Programs," by John R. Searle, from The Behavioral and Brain Sciences, vol. 3. Copyright 1980 Cambridge University Press. Reprinted by permission of Cambridge University Press.] |
What psychological and philosophical significance should we attach to recent efforts at computer simulations of human cognitive capacities? In answering this question, I find it useful to distinguish what I will call "strong" AI from "weak" or "cautious" AI (artificial intelligence). According to weak AI, the principal value of the computer in the study of the mind is that it gives us a very powerful tool. For example, it enables us to formulate and test hypotheses in a more rigorous and precise fashion. But according to strong AI, the computer is not merely a tool in the study of the mind; rather, the appropriately programmed computer really is a mind, in the sense that computers given the right programs can be literally said to understand and have other cognitive states. In strong AI, because the programmed computer has cognitive states, the programs are not mere tools that enable us to test psychological explanations; rather, the programs are themselves the explanations.
I have no objection to the claims of weak AI, at least as far as this article is concerned. My discussion here will be directed at the claims I have defined as those of strong AI, specifically the claim that the appropriately programmed computer literally has cognitive states and that the programs thereby explain human cognition. When I hereafter refer to AI, I have in mind the strong version, as expressed by these two claims.
I will consider the work of Roger Schank and his colleagues at Yale (Schank and Abelson 1977), because I am more familiar with it than I am with any other similar claims, and because it provides a very clear exampie of the sort of work I wish to examine. But nothing that follows depends upon the details of Schank’s programs. The same arguments would apply to Winograd’s SHRDLU (Winograd 1973), Weizenbaum’s ELIZA (Weizenbaum 1965), and indeed any Turing machine simulation of human mental phenomena. [See "Further Reading" for Searle’s references.]
Very briefly, and leaving out the various details, one can describe Schank’s program as follows: The aim of the program is to simulate the human ability to understand stories. It is characteristic of human beings’ story-understanding capacity that they can answer questions about the story even though the information that they give was never explicitly stated in the story. Thus, for example, suppose you are given the following story: "A man went into a restaurant and ordered a hamburger. When the hamburger arrived it was burned to a crisp, and the man stormed out of the restaurant angrily, without paying for the hamburger or leaving a tip." Now, if you are asked "Did the man eat the hamburger?" you will presumably answer, "No, he did not." Similarly, if you are given the following story: "A man went into a restaurant and ordered a hamburger; when the hamburger came he was very pleased with it; and as he left the restaurant he gave the waitress a large tip before paying his bill," and you are asked the question, "Did the man eat the hamburger?" you will presumably answer, "Yes, he ate the hamburger." Now Schank’s machines call similarly answer, questions about restaurants in this fashion. To do this, they have a "representation" of the sort of information that human beings have about restaurants, which enables them to answer such questions as those above, given these sorts of stories. When the machine is given the story and then asked the question, the machine will print out answers of the sort that we would expect human beings to give if told similar stories. Partisans of strong AI claim that in this question and answer sequence the machine is not only simulating a human ability but also (1) that the machine can literally be said to understand the story and provide the answers to questions, and (2) that what the machine and its program do explains the human ability to understand the story and answer questions about it.
Both claims seem to me to be totally unsupported by Schank’s work, as I will attempt to show in what follows. I am not, of course, saying that Schank himself is to these claims.
10.2.09 Can WALL-E Think?
Fellow Philosophers,
For this week’s meeting, we invite you to consider one of the most important questions of the technological era: what is mind, and can we create it? Join us this Friday @ 4:30 PM on the 5th Floor of the PCL as we delve into the mystery of cognition.
One of the most intriguing notions that accompany our current technological advances is that of creating robots that can complete more and more advanced tasks. As our insatiable appetite for creating abominations and playing God intensifies, what limits do we reach? Can we create a program which can think just like a human? The importance of navigating our intuitions on what exactly mind, understanding, intelligence and cognition really are cannot be overlooked in a world where science seems to inch ever closer to finding the answer.
We ask you to evaluate your own intuitions: first, follow this link to watch the way this extraordinary little robot ‘learns’. Then, follow this link http://web.archive.org/web/20071210043312/http://members.aol.com/NeoNoetics/MindsBrainsPrograms.html to read John Searle’s philosophical assessment of the AI debate. Sorry for the format of the paper, but it's the only one we could find.
Is John Searle wrong? Could we indeed make a robot that truly understands? What does it mean to have a mind? Come to UPA and give us your answer. This should prove to be an interesting and enlightening debate, one that will strike at the core of our most basic assumptions.
Your co-presidents,
Pavel Nitchovski and Justin Olaguer
Conversational Computing and Enterprise Architecture
In MIT Technology Review, 19 September 2007, in an article entitled “Intelligent, Chatty Machines” by Kate Green, the author describes advances in computers’ ability to understand and respond to conversation. No, really.
Conversational computing works by using a “set of algorithms that convert strings of words into concepts and formulate a wordy response.”
The software product that enables this is called SILVIA and it works like this: “during a conversation, words are turned into conceptual data…SILVIA takes these concepts and mixes them with other conceptual data that's stored in short-term memory (information from the current discussion) or long-term memory (information that has been established through prior training sessions). Then SILVIA transforms the resulting concepts back into human language. Sometimes the software might trigger programs to run on a computer or perform another task required to interact with the outside world. For example, it could save a file, query a search engine, or send an e-mail.”
There has been much research done over the years in natural-language processing technology, but the results so far have not fully met expectations. Still, the time will come when we will be talking with our computers, just like on Star Trek, although I don’t know if we’ll be saying quite yet “Beam me up, Scotty.”
From an enterrpise architecture standpoint, the vision of conversational artificial intelligence is absolutely incredible. Imagine the potential! This would change the way we do everyday mission and business tasks. Everything would be affected from how we execute and support business functions and processes, and how we use, access, and share information. Just say the word and it’s done! Won't that be sweet?
I find it marvelous to imagine the day when we can fully engage with our technology on a more human level, such as through conversation. Then we can say goodbye to the keyboard and mouse, the way we did to the typewriter--which are just museum pieces now.
The Doomsday Machine is Real
There is a fascinating article in Wired (Oct. 2009) on a Doomsday Machine called “the Perimeter System” created by the Soviets. If anyone tries to attack them with a debilitating first strike, the doomsday machine will take over and make sure that the adversary is decimated in return.
“Even if the US crippled the USSR with a surprise attack, the Soviets could still hit back. It wouldn’t matter if the US blew up the Kremlin, took out the defense ministry, severed the communications network, and killed everyone with stars on their shoulders. Ground-based sensors would detect that a devastating blow had been struck and a counterattack would be launched.”
The Doomsday machine has supposedly been online since 1985, shortly after President Reagan proposed the Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI or “Star Wars”) in 1983. SDI was to shield the US from nuclear attack with space lasers (missile defense). “Star Wars would nullify the long-standing doctrine of mutually assured destruction.”
The logic of the Soviet’s Doomsday Machine was “you either launch first or convince the enemy that you can strike back even if you’re dead.”
The Soviet’s system “is designed to lie dormant until switched on by a high official in a crisis. Then it would begin monitoring a network of seismic, radiation, and air pressure sensors for signs of nuclear explosion.”
Perimeter had checks and balances to hopefully prevent a mistaken launch. There were four if/then propositions that had to be meet before a launch.
Is it turned on?
Yes then…
Had a nuclear weapon hit Soviet soil?
Yes, then…
Was there still communications links to the Soviet General Staff?
No, then launch authority is transfered to whoever is left in protected bunkers
Will they press the button?
Yes, then devastating nuclear retaliation!
The Perimeter System is the realization of the long-dreaded reality of machines taking over war.
The US never implemented this type of system for fear of “accidents and the one mistake that could end it all.”
“Instead, airborne American crews with the capacity and authority to launch retaliatory strikes were kept aloft throughout the Cold War.” This system relied more on people than on autonomous decision-making by machines.
To me, the Doomsday Machine brings the question of automation and computerization to the ultimate precipice of how far we are willing to go with technology. How much confidence do we have in computers to do what they are supposed to do, and also how much confidence do we have in people to program the computers correctly and with enough failsafe abilities not to make a mistake?
On one hand, automating decision-making can help prevent errors, such as a mistaken retaliatory missile launch to nothing more than a flock of geese or malfunctioning radar. On the other hand, with the Soviet’s Perimeter System, once activated, it put the entire launch sequence in the hands of a machine, up until the final push a button by a low-level duty station officer, who has a authority transferred to him/her and who is perhaps misinformed and blinded by fear, anger, and the urge to revenge the motherland in a 15 minute decision cycle—do or die.
The question of faith in technology is not going away. It is only going to get increasingly dire as we continue down the road of computerization, automation, robotics, and artificial intelligence. Are we safer with or without the technology?
There seems to be no going back—the technology genie is out of the bottle.
Further, desperate nations will take desperate measures to protect themselves and companies hungry for profits will continue to innovate and drive further technological advancement, including semi-autonomous and perhaps, even fully autonomous decision-making.
As we continue to advance technologically, we must do so with astute planning, sound governance, thorough quality assurance and testing, and always revisiting the technology ethics of what we are embarking on and where we are headed.
It is up to us to make sure that we take the precautions to foolproof these devices or else we will face the final consequences of our technological prowess.
The Doomsday Machine is Real
There is a fascinating article in Wired (Oct. 2009) on a Doomsday Machine called “the Perimeter System” created by the Soviets. If anyone tries to attack them with a debilitating first strike, the doomsday machine will take over and make sure that the adversary is decimated in return.
“Even if the US crippled the USSR with a surprise attack, the Soviets could still hit back. It wouldn’t matter if the US blew up the Kremlin, took out the defense ministry, severed the communications network, and killed everyone with stars on their shoulders. Ground-based sensors would detect that a devastating blow had been struck and a counterattack would be launched.”
The Doomsday machine has supposedly been online since 1985, shortly after President Reagan proposed the Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI or “Star Wars”) in 1983. SDI was to shield the US from nuclear attack with space lasers (missile defense). “Star Wars would nullify the long-standing doctrine of mutually assured destruction.”
The logic of the Soviet’s Doomsday Machine was “you either launch first or convince the enemy that you can strike back even if you’re dead.”
The Soviet’s system “is designed to lie dormant until switched on by a high official in a crisis. Then it would begin monitoring a network of seismic, radiation, and air pressure sensors for signs of nuclear explosion.”
Perimeter had checks and balances to hopefully prevent a mistaken launch. There were four if/then propositions that had to be meet before a launch.
Is it turned on?
Yes then…
Had a nuclear weapon hit Soviet soil?
Yes, then…
Was there still communications links to the Soviet General Staff?
No, then launch authority is transfered to whoever is left in protected bunkers
Will they press the button?
Yes, then devastating nuclear retaliation!
The Perimeter System is the realization of the long-dreaded reality of machines taking over war.
The US never implemented this type of system for fear of “accidents and the one mistake that could end it all.”
“Instead, airborne American crews with the capacity and authority to launch retaliatory strikes were kept aloft throughout the Cold War.” This system relied more on people than on autonomous decision-making by machines.
To me, the Doomsday Machine brings the question of automation and computerization to the ultimate precipice of how far we are willing to go with technology. How much confidence do we have in computers to do what they are supposed to do, and also how much confidence do we have in people to program the computers correctly and with enough failsafe abilities not to make a mistake?
On one hand, automating decision-making can help prevent errors, such as a mistaken retaliatory missile launch to nothing more than a flock of geese or malfunctioning radar. On the other hand, with the Soviet’s Perimeter System, once activated, it put the entire launch sequence in the hands of a machine, up until the final push a button by a low-level duty station officer, who has a authority transferred to him/her and who is perhaps misinformed and blinded by fear, anger, and the urge to revenge the motherland in a 15 minute decision cycle—do or die.
The question of faith in technology is not going away. It is only going to get increasingly dire as we continue down the road of computerization, automation, robotics, and artificial intelligence. Are we safer with or without the technology?
There seems to be no going back—the technology genie is out of the bottle.
Further, desperate nations will take desperate measures to protect themselves and companies hungry for profits will continue to innovate and drive further technological advancement, including semi-autonomous and perhaps, even fully autonomous decision-making.
As we continue to advance technologically, we must do so with astute planning, sound governance, thorough quality assurance and testing, and always revisiting the technology ethics of what we are embarking on and where we are headed.
It is up to us to make sure that we take the precautions to foolproof these devices or else we will face the final consequences of our technological prowess.
The Doomsday Machine is Real
There is a fascinating article in Wired (Oct. 2009) on a Doomsday Machine called “the Perimeter System” created by the Soviets. If anyone tries to attack them with a debilitating first strike, the doomsday machine will take over and make sure that the adversary is decimated in return.
“Even if the US crippled the USSR with a surprise attack, the Soviets could still hit back. It wouldn’t matter if the US blew up the Kremlin, took out the defense ministry, severed the communications network, and killed everyone with stars on their shoulders. Ground-based sensors would detect that a devastating blow had been struck and a counterattack would be launched.”
The Doomsday machine has supposedly been online since 1985, shortly after President Reagan proposed the Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI or “Star Wars”) in 1983. SDI was to shield the US from nuclear attack with space lasers (missile defense). “Star Wars would nullify the long-standing doctrine of mutually assured destruction.”
The logic of the Soviet’s Doomsday Machine was “you either launch first or convince the enemy that you can strike back even if you’re dead.”
The Soviet’s system “is designed to lie dormant until switched on by a high official in a crisis. Then it would begin monitoring a network of seismic, radiation, and air pressure sensors for signs of nuclear explosion.”
Perimeter had checks and balances to hopefully prevent a mistaken launch. There were four if/then propositions that had to be meet before a launch.
Is it turned on?
Yes then…
Had a nuclear weapon hit Soviet soil?
Yes, then…
Was there still communications links to the Soviet General Staff?
No, then launch authority is transfered to whoever is left in protected bunkers
Will they press the button?
Yes, then devastating nuclear retaliation!
The Perimeter System is the realization of the long-dreaded reality of machines taking over war.
The US never implemented this type of system for fear of “accidents and the one mistake that could end it all.”
“Instead, airborne American crews with the capacity and authority to launch retaliatory strikes were kept aloft throughout the Cold War.” This system relied more on people than on autonomous decision-making by machines.
To me, the Doomsday Machine brings the question of automation and computerization to the ultimate precipice of how far we are willing to go with technology. How much confidence do we have in computers to do what they are supposed to do, and also how much confidence do we have in people to program the computers correctly and with enough failsafe abilities not to make a mistake?
On one hand, automating decision-making can help prevent errors, such as a mistaken retaliatory missile launch to nothing more than a flock of geese or malfunctioning radar. On the other hand, with the Soviet’s Perimeter System, once activated, it put the entire launch sequence in the hands of a machine, up until the final push a button by a low-level duty station officer, who has a authority transferred to him/her and who is perhaps misinformed and blinded by fear, anger, and the urge to revenge the motherland in a 15 minute decision cycle—do or die.
The question of faith in technology is not going away. It is only going to get increasingly dire as we continue down the road of computerization, automation, robotics, and artificial intelligence. Are we safer with or without the technology?
There seems to be no going back—the technology genie is out of the bottle.
Further, desperate nations will take desperate measures to protect themselves and companies hungry for profits will continue to innovate and drive further technological advancement, including semi-autonomous and perhaps, even fully autonomous decision-making.
As we continue to advance technologically, we must do so with astute planning, sound governance, thorough quality assurance and testing, and always revisiting the technology ethics of what we are embarking on and where we are headed.
It is up to us to make sure that we take the precautions to foolproof these devices or else we will face the final consequences of our technological prowess.
The Doomsday Machine is Real
There is a fascinating article in Wired (Oct. 2009) on a Doomsday Machine called “the Perimeter System” created by the Soviets. If anyone tries to attack them with a debilitating first strike, the doomsday machine will take over and make sure that the adversary is decimated in return.
“Even if the US crippled the USSR with a surprise attack, the Soviets could still hit back. It wouldn’t matter if the US blew up the Kremlin, took out the defense ministry, severed the communications network, and killed everyone with stars on their shoulders. Ground-based sensors would detect that a devastating blow had been struck and a counterattack would be launched.”
The Doomsday machine has supposedly been online since 1985, shortly after President Reagan proposed the Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI or “Star Wars”) in 1983. SDI was to shield the US from nuclear attack with space lasers (missile defense). “Star Wars would nullify the long-standing doctrine of mutually assured destruction.”
The logic of the Soviet’s Doomsday Machine was “you either launch first or convince the enemy that you can strike back even if you’re dead.”
The Soviet’s system “is designed to lie dormant until switched on by a high official in a crisis. Then it would begin monitoring a network of seismic, radiation, and air pressure sensors for signs of nuclear explosion.”
Perimeter had checks and balances to hopefully prevent a mistaken launch. There were four if/then propositions that had to be meet before a launch.
Is it turned on?
Yes then…
Had a nuclear weapon hit Soviet soil?
Yes, then…
Was there still communications links to the Soviet General Staff?
No, then launch authority is transfered to whoever is left in protected bunkers
Will they press the button?
Yes, then devastating nuclear retaliation!
The Perimeter System is the realization of the long-dreaded reality of machines taking over war.
The US never implemented this type of system for fear of “accidents and the one mistake that could end it all.”
“Instead, airborne American crews with the capacity and authority to launch retaliatory strikes were kept aloft throughout the Cold War.” This system relied more on people than on autonomous decision-making by machines.
To me, the Doomsday Machine brings the question of automation and computerization to the ultimate precipice of how far we are willing to go with technology. How much confidence do we have in computers to do what they are supposed to do, and also how much confidence do we have in people to program the computers correctly and with enough failsafe abilities not to make a mistake?
On one hand, automating decision-making can help prevent errors, such as a mistaken retaliatory missile launch to nothing more than a flock of geese or malfunctioning radar. On the other hand, with the Soviet’s Perimeter System, once activated, it put the entire launch sequence in the hands of a machine, up until the final push a button by a low-level duty station officer, who has a authority transferred to him/her and who is perhaps misinformed and blinded by fear, anger, and the urge to revenge the motherland in a 15 minute decision cycle—do or die.
The question of faith in technology is not going away. It is only going to get increasingly dire as we continue down the road of computerization, automation, robotics, and artificial intelligence. Are we safer with or without the technology?
There seems to be no going back—the technology genie is out of the bottle.
Further, desperate nations will take desperate measures to protect themselves and companies hungry for profits will continue to innovate and drive further technological advancement, including semi-autonomous and perhaps, even fully autonomous decision-making.
As we continue to advance technologically, we must do so with astute planning, sound governance, thorough quality assurance and testing, and always revisiting the technology ethics of what we are embarking on and where we are headed.
It is up to us to make sure that we take the precautions to foolproof these devices or else we will face the final consequences of our technological prowess.
