Anson Guthrie enters into conflict with a political regime which, absurdly, claims that it serves the cause of:
"...the whole cosmos evolving from blind matter to pure intelligence -" (p. 47)
Centuries later, Guthrie's successors are in conflict with a global artificial intelligence that is working toward precisely that goal. See Pure Mind. So the cause of pure intelligence or mind is winning? Maybe but Guthrie was right to oppose totalitarians who claimed to serve that purpose. The AI does not coerce although it does attempt to deceive.
In "Pure Mind," I wondered whether "pure mind" meant either "pure spirit" or emotionless intelligence. In the combox, SM Stirling pointed out that it means "a transferable and replicable body of patterned interacting information" - an entirely laudable goal. It would be good if intelligences could be free from particular bodies - which Guthrie himself achieves.
And here the mind-body question returns. Information exists in basically two forms:
unconscious marks on paper or patterns in a computer;
conscious memories in a living brain.
Complicating the issue, a brain has unconscious processes that may or may not become conscious whereas neither a book nor this lap top has any conscious aspect. SM Stirling's phrase quoted above could apply to a body of information that was transferable, replicable, patterned and interactive but not conscious whereas we are in fact talking about conscious intelligences. I mention this point merely to emphasize again the basic mind-body question, including what I think is the indefinability of consciousness.
1 comment:
Kaor, Paul!
And I believe it was right of Guthrie's successors to oppose the AI which had come to control Earth. Also, I would argue that an intent to deceive does not entirely rule out the possibility of forcible coercion by the AI. It COULD have done that, after all.
I am not at all convinced that it would be GOOD for human intelligences to be separated from their bodies. After all, our bodies as wells as our minds (and souls) are a part of what makes us human in the first place.
But all this is merely speculation, however fascinating it is. Because I am not convinced it is even possible to download a human intelligence into an artificial neural network.
Sean
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