Now in Science

[morri908]

Wow.... that's actually pretty cool.... oh.. and a Ph.D in physics? okiday mr. supeh smarteh pants.. XD

[kovu42]

And a minor in MUSIC!!! I might put some more of my stuff on youtube, but I need to get some copyrights first.

[kovu42]

To whom ever it may concern, there is a very large moral and 'humanitarian' question arising along the edge of science, mainly in the field of robotics. Most people here have either seen Terminator or some other movie along that line where robots become self-aware and they decide to help cure humans of our oxygen addictions.

Well, we are reaching a point in science where machines are becoming exponentially smarter every second and more and more of our warfare is handing its paycheck off to the robotics department. We already have machines that can actually learn from experience like a human would! That's a major step in robotics and some are arguing that that is just one step away from the cyber-apocolypse the silver-screen has been profiting from.

I really just wanted to bring this to people's attention (and hopefully someone else will post here... ) and I wanted to know what you know, want to know or just whatever you might think about this.

[Mike]

absolute tripe in my opinion lol. People have babies all the time without worrying that they're going to strangle them. Robots just need to be treated to the same care and education (in different ways I guess)

[kovu42]

Yes but some could argue back that babies don't strangle their parents because they a) rely on their parents so much, especially in the early years and b) by the time they are old enough to be physically able to strangle their parents, they already have the strains of compassion and humanity, those ethical and moral codes that keep an average person from slaying their immediate family. With machines, even in the infancy of a self-awareness, they would have the mind of an adult. They would never learn the compassion or humanity that in infant gains and the machines would simply calculate wether or not mankind is a threat and act acordingly. The scare comes mostly from the cold hard way a machine works, it's thoroughness and sheer relentlessness with which it can perform its functions. If we give it the capacity to learn, their is no putting a lid on that pandora's box and if the machines decide they didn't need us, then that's where Terminator picks up.

[Mike]

If we give it the ability to learn then in my mind it can only be as evil as it's teachers. In a controlled setting I don't think there's any reason to worry. I admit that the way they work, with numbers and logic, is frightening, but emotion is one of the most destructive human qualities anyway.

[DarkLiger]

i agree with mike on the whole emotions things; emotions can bring out the worst in people. Examples...WAR!!!! and REVENGE! Its a scary thought to think terminator could happen to us.

[kovu42]

Yet emotions can bring hope, ideas, courage, strength, the willpower to do good. Emotions save as many lives as they kill. Also, if you give something like a machine the ability to learn (and hence the ability the think, that's the important part) then the capacity for good or evil is limitless. The 'mind' would not be limited by its teachers because only a couple of seconds after machines go self-aware, they will be smarter than all of humanity. (That is an actual fact too). They can think, learn and create which means they can go beyond what a teacher says. The 'controlled setting' we like to imagine is simply not true, it is a fantasy designed to put us at ease and it will not exist as long as we push the realms of science like this. If we want to create AI or self-aware technologies we will not be able to ever maintain complete control.

By the way, I have no strong feelings about this whatsoever, obviously...

[NightmareMoon]

Agreeing with k42 here, think about it guys. K42 makes an obvious point.