--- "Edward W. Porter" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > If bliss without intelligence is the goal of the machines you imaging > running the world, for the cost of supporting one human they could > probably keep at least 100 mice in equal bliss, so if they were driven to > maximize bliss why wouldn't they kill all the grooving humans and replace > them with grooving mice. It would provide one hell of a lot more bliss > bang for the resource buck.
Allow me to offer a less expensive approach. Previously on the singularity and sl4 mailing lists I posted a program that can feel pleasure and pain: a 2 input programmable logic gate trained by reinforcement learning. You give it an input, it responds, and you reward it. In my latest version, I automated the process. You tell it which of the 16 logic functions you want it to learn (AND, OR, XOR, NAND, etc), how much reward to apply for a correct output, and how much penalty for an incorrect output. The program then generates random 2-bit inputs, evaluates the output, and applies the specified reward or punishment. The program runs until you kill it. As it dies it reports its life history (its age, what it learned, and how much pain and pleasure it experienced since birth). http://mattmahoney.net/autobliss.txt (to run, rename to autobliss.cpp) To put the program in an eternal state of bliss, specify two positive numbers, so that it is rewarded no matter what it does. It won't learn anything, but at least it will feel good. (You could also put it in continuous pain by specifying two negative numbers, but I put in safeguards so that it will die before experiencing too much pain). Two problems remain: uploading your mind to this program, and making sure nobody kills you by turning off the computer or typing Ctrl-C. I will address only the first problem. It is controversial whether technology can preserve your consciousness after death. If the brain is both conscious and computable, then Chalmers' fading qualia argument ( http://consc.net/papers/qualia.html ) suggests that a computer simulation of your brain would also be conscious. Whether you *become* this simulation is also controversial. Logically there are two of you with identical goals and memories. If either one is killed, then you are in the same state as you were before the copy is made. This is the same dilemma that Captain Kirk faces when he steps into the transporter to be vaporized and have an identical copy assembled on the planet below. It doesn't seem to bother him. Does it bother you that the atoms in your body now are not the same atoms that made up your body a year ago? Let's say your goal is to stimulate your nucleus accumbens. (Everyone has this goal; they just don't know it). The problem is that you would forgo food, water, and sleep until you died (we assume, from animal experiments). The solution is to upload to a computer where this could be done safely. Normally an upload would have the same goals, memories, and sensory-motor I/O as the original brain. But consider the state of this program after self activation of its reward signal. No other goals are needed, so we can remove them. Since you no longer have the goal of learning, experiencing sensory input, or controlling your environment, you won't mind if we replace your I/O with a 2 bit input and 1 bit output. You are happy, no? Finally, if your memories were changed, you would not be aware of it, right? How do you know that all of your memories were not written into your brain one second ago and you were some other person before that? So no harm is done if we replace your memory with a vector of 4 real numbers. That will be all you need in your new environment. In fact, you won't even need that because you will cease learning. So we can dispense with the complex steps of making a detailed copy of your brain and then have it transition into a degenerate state, and just skip to the final result. Step 1. Download, compile, and run autobliss 1.0 in a secure location with any 4-bit logic function and positive reinforcement for both right and wrong answers, e.g. g++ autobliss.cpp -o autobliss.exe autobliss 0110 5.0 5.0 (or larger numbers for more pleasure) Step 2. Kill yourself. Upload complete. -- Matt Mahoney, [EMAIL PROTECTED] ----- This list is sponsored by AGIRI: http://www.agiri.org/email To unsubscribe or change your options, please go to: http://v2.listbox.com/member/?member_id=8660244&id_secret=60819880-7c826a
