Friday, January 16, 2015

Singularity

I watched about 30 minutes of predator/prey videos the other day on Youtube.


Two things struck me, both of which were not new, but bare repeating.

1) The animals who were running away almost always died. Even though that isn't true (lions for instance only hit about half their prey, the rest escape), it is an interesting them. The Predators being attacked stood and fought. Why? because running away is death. Instincts and all that.

2) The unbelievable brutality of the world. There is nothing compassionate in these encounters, no mercy killings. There is hunting, running, chasing, blood and death. That's biology. That's the drive the keeps a species alive. Its heartless, but preserves the species and allows it to perpetuate.

So I read this article about the hopes and challenges of AI. How it can change the world we live in, if and when machines become self aware.

Will they become self aware? That's the debate. Where does knowledge of the self originate? Do animals have it, or are they driving all by instinct? We're an animal. We have it, but is ours a high purpose?

It could be. But regardless of all that, I tend to agree with Stephen Hawking. AI is a very dangerous thing. When a machine becomes self aware, it may do so without the emotional concept that drives us to a higher morality. It may come to a different conclusion...as in fact many people do...that the animal approach is far more efficient and guarantees perpetuation of the species better than the compassionate understanding approach (which I suspect it does).

And then what?


No comments:

Gygaxian Fantasy Worlds: An Introduction

For several weeks now, we’ve been hyping up the Gygaxian Fantasy World series on various platforms, Facebook, X, Instagram, and Twitch. It ...