SPOILER WARNING On Tue, 17 Jul 2001, Erik Reuter wrote: > > > > Obviously they've made robots that can act like they love you--the new > > challenge, both technical and moral, is in creating robots that really > > do. > > They are one in the same. Its not such a big challenge, given what else > they can do. a) You and I both know that "they are one and the same" is a philosophical, not a scientific assertion. b) Not knowing how they do what they do do in this fictional world, assuming that they can do another possibly very difficult thing is a matter of pure supposition. > You are assuming there is something almost magical about emotions and > love. I believe if we can ever do the intelligence part, the emotions > will be a snap. Intelligence is hard; emotions are not. Again, a purely philsophical assumption. I think there is something very organic about emotions and love, and that creating robots designed to do specialized things--nannybots, sexbots, comdeybots, etc.--can very likely be done without any desire or plan to attempt to recreate emotions and reflexive awareness of emotions. Such specialized bots as Joe are very complex problem-solving machines (one definition of a.i.), but the ability to create them doesn't automatically imply the ability to make something that approximates being human, or equivalently human, with respect to an interior emotional landscape. One can assert that there's no difference, of course, or that there is no such thing as "an interior emotional landscape" and I think that such assumptions are among the things the movie examines, but as far as I know such an assertion has no grounding in data, theory, or science. It's an assertion that sounds scientific due to its lack of overt sentiment, but it's really nothing more than one philosohpical prejudice among many. > > The difference between these two states of being is a titanic chasm, > > in my opinion, and to blithely suppose that achieving David's state is > > just a matter of the machinery itself strikes me as absurd. It's like > > the difference between software and soul. > > But this is not science. As I said before, it is a fairy tale, not > science fiction. ? If science fiction is not allowed to touch matters of the soul (loosely construed--no implications of an afterlife or such) then you're going to have to throw out a lot of stuff, I think. Is it science fiction if it examines the assertion that the thing we loosely call soul can be reduced to hardware and software? No, it's not science, but no form of science fiction is "science." Can a scientific understanding of humans be had if it doesn't also explain our propensity for fairy tales? > In case it is not clear, I totally disagree with your supposition that > there is something special about emotions. I'm sure it would be easier > to create an emotion simulation program than an intelligence simulation > program. I can program my computer to tell me it loves me, but somehow that wouldn't be nearly as satisfying as having my wife tell me the same thing. Let me ask this: at the beginning of the movie, when Prof. Hobby asks the female robot what love is, and she answers with a series of nothing but physiological responses (rapid breathing, etc.)--is she right? Was making David, then, beside the point, because they had already accomplished their goals? > > To use the obvious example, an Asimovian positronic brain is nothing > > like a modern computer. > > That was fiction. For plausibility, it is better to extrapolate from > current SCIENCE, not from FICTION. Gee, there goes 90% of the SF from my bookshelf. Henceforth let it be decreed that no author of science fiction may posit a technology not easy to extrapolate directly from something that already exists! Let it never be written, let it never be done! :-( More to the point: a David-style artificial mind is extrapolated from two things, not one--modern computers, which can be rebooted, and the human brain, which cannot. If the hypothetical imaginary technology falls a little more on one side than the other, in a matter that is essentially moot because either alternative destroys the personality in question, I can't see why that should make much difference in terms of plausibility. > > If the writer wants to posit a whole new kind of hardware, he can, > > IMO. > > Sure. But if it is implausible enough, I don't consider it science > fiction. Surely you'll grant that your own subjective evaluation of "implausible" is not definitive? <blinks innocently> You're entitled to it, of course. > It does not have to be downloading (meaning some sort of > hardware<->brain connection). There are many other possibilities. One > simple example would be to have the robot follow you around and learn to > mimic you. This could be combined with direct programming of important > traits and knowledge. Which would benefit me how? The superbots clearly reflect their human origin, but if they have the ability to modify themselves and improve their designs over time, which seems to me to be implied, what motive would they have to retain superficial mimicry of my personal traits? That data might go into an encyclopedia somewhere, but that's about it. > As I said in my original post, the technology was just all out of whack. > If they could make such sophisticated robots, with the intelligence that > they had, and for them to be so life-like and long-lived, then they > should have also been able to create a pretty good simulacrum of a given > person. Since it probably wouldn't feel to the person who was simulated > that they had any continuity with the robot, it would not be any form of > immortality. But I think there would be plenty of people who would try > it, nevertheless. Why? If I'm gonna die anyway, I might want my robots to remember me in some way, but what could I get from spending my waning time and resources to train a robot to do an impression of me, however good it is? It might do my ego some good to think the robots that remain will take something of my knowlege or insight into the future, but what do I care if a robot can walk and pick my nose the way I do? > I have different standards for science fiction and for fairy-tales > (fantasy). I wouldn't be complaining if this movie were not billed as > science fiction. Forgive me, but it sounds as though any science fiction that doesn't reinforce a particular philosophical assumption of yours ceases to qualify. What A.I. does is examine the assumption that digitally simulated emotions are the same as real ones. I can't imagine a more science fictional theme. It doesn't give a clear answer. It employs elements of fairy tales (which could include fantasy and religion and the humanities generally) because those are the ways in which humans, as a rule, approach issues of emotion and genuiness of humanity. Without using these kinds of tests of David's "realness" there would be no story, only a naked assertion of yes, no, or maybe. Marvin Long Austin, Texas Nuke the straight capitalist wildebeests for Buddha!
