What adventure can be greater than to be alive and to try to understand and respond to the world? We respond to the observable universe, to human society and to works of fiction, including the exotic exploits of Dominic Flandry. Sure, I would like to accompany Flandry on the streets of Archopolis or Zorkagrad. However, I do in fact accompany friends and comrades on the streets of Lancaster, Liverpool, Manchester, Birmingham and London. Flandry and his colleagues exist/subsist (?) - we need a new verb - in their author's and our imaginations. They would not exist without us but we would not be who we are without them and we would not be human if we lacked imagination. Their world is part of ours.
Will future AIs include
"emulations" (self-conscious simulations) of Flandry in his universe or even scaled up into ours?
(When discussing Buddhism and theisms, I want to say that Buddhas and gods "co-exist" but, of course, they do not
exist as you and I do. But they are major forces, powerful presences, in imagination, art and consciousness, "higher fictions" in Alan Moore's phrase. We need a new terminology. Dominic Flandry is of the same essence as Ares and Indra.)
1 comment:
Kaor, Paul!
I like that idea, hypothetical AIs of the future creating self conscious "emulations" of Flandry similar to the emulations seen in GENESIS. And not just Flandry, an emulation of Nicholas van Rijn as well. Assuming, of course, that AIs of that kind is possible.
Sean
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