Why not machines

Post Reply New Topic

No.

I have not exchanged private messages with myself.

This item from Slashdot:

"At 9am next Sunday, six computer programs — 'artificial conversational entities' — will answer questions posed by human volunteers at the University of Reading in a bid to become the first recognized 'thinking' machine. If any program succeeds, it is likely to be hailed as the most significant breakthrough in artificial intelligence since the IBM supercomputer Deep Blue beat world chess champion Garry Kasparov in 1997. It could also raise profound questions about whether a computer has the potential to be 'conscious' — and if humans should have the 'right' to switch it off."

BAD Humans!

This is for the OP!

They're made out of meat.
Meat?
Meat. They're made out of meat.
Meat?
There's no doubt about it. We picked several from different parts of the planet, took them aboard our recon vessels, probed them all the way through. They're completely meat.
That's impossible. What about the radio signals? The messages to the stars.
They use the radio waves to talk, but the signals don't come from them. The signals come from machines.
So who made the machines? That's who we want to contact.
They made the machines. That's what I'm trying to tell you. Meat made the machines.
That's ridiculous. How can meat make a machine? You're asking me to believe in sentient meat.
I'm not asking you, I'm telling you. These creatures are the only sentient race in the sector and they're made out of meat.
Maybe they're like the Orfolei. You know, a carbon-based intelligence that goes through a meat stage.
Nope. They're born meat and they die meat. We studied them for several of their life spans, which didn't take too long. Do you have any idea the life span of meat?
Spare me. Okay, maybe they're only part meat. You know, like the Weddilei. A meat head with an electron plasma brain inside.
Nope. We thought of that, since they do have meat heads like the Weddilei. But I told you, we probed them. They're meat all the way through.
No brain?
Oh, there is a brain all right. It's just that the brain is made out of meat!
So... what does the thinking?
You're not understanding, are you? The brain does the thinking. The meat.
Thinking meat! You're asking me to believe in thinking meat!
Yes, thinking meat! Conscious meat! Loving meat. Dreaming meat. The meat is the whole deal! Are you getting the picture?
Omigod. You're serious then. They're made out of meat.
Finally, Yes. They are indeed made out meat. And they've been trying to get in touch with us for almost a hundred of their years.
So what does the meat have in mind?
First it wants to talk to us. Then I imagine it wants to explore the universe, contact other sentients, swap ideas and information. The usual.
We're supposed to talk to meat?
That's the idea. That's the message they're sending out by radio. 'Hello. Anyone out there? Anyone home?' That sort of thing.
They actually do talk, then. They use words, ideas, concepts?
Oh, yes. Except they do it with meat.
I thought you just told me they used radio.
They do, but what do you think is on the radio? Meat sounds. You know how when you slap or flap meat it makes a noise? They talk by flapping their meat at each other. They can even sing by squirting air through their meat.
Omigod. Singing meat. This is altogether too much. So what do you advise?
Officially or unofficially?
Both.
Officially, we are required to contact, welcome, and log in any and all sentient races or multibeings in the quadrant, without prejudice, fear, or favor. Unofficially, I advise that we erase the records and forget the whole thing.
I was hoping you would say that.
It seems harsh, but there is a limit. Do we really want to make contact with meat?
I agree one hundred percent. What's there to say? `Hello, meat. How's it going?' But will this work? How many planets are we dealing with here?
Just one. They can travel to other planets in special meat containers, but they can't live on them. And being meat, they only travel through C space. Which limits them to the speed of light and makes the possibility of their ever making contact pretty slim. Infinitesimal, in fact.
So we just pretend there's no one home in the universe.
That's it.
Cruel. But you said it yourself, who wants to meet meat? And the ones who have been aboard our vessels, the ones you have probed? You're sure they won't remember?
They'll be considered crackpots if they do. We went into their heads and smoothed out their meat so that we're just a dream to them.
A dream to meat! How strangely appropriate, that we should be meat's dream.
And we can mark this sector unoccupied.
Good. Agreed, officially and unofficially. Case closed. Any others? Anyone interesting on that side of the galaxy?
Yes, a rather shy but sweet hydrogen core cluster intelligence in a class nine star in G445 zone. Was in contact two galactic rotations ago, wants to be friendly again.
They always come around.
And why not? Imagine how unbearably, how unutterably cold the universe would be if one were all alone.

-Apparently written by someone named Terry Bisson

If we depend too much on machines, then many jobs get outsourced by these machines, and we can't work and make a living.

Precisely. We will be deprived of endless hours of banging metal and assembling all sorts of gadgets and trying to sweepup all the crap of civilization instead of enjoying being alive.
Who the hell wants that?

Humans are an artificial intelligence based on the idea that we are an artifice of creation, however formed. We are also intelligent. We also posess emotion, or at least many of us seem to. A machine can have or exhibit emotion for we are complex machines that interface with the world around us. Automated industrial systems may release us from the bonds of self induced slavery humanity has endured from the dawn of our arrival. Humanity should have the choice to work toward goals, not be forced to work towards questionable goals of others, though we can reserve the right to work with others toward common goals. The possibility exists that we can all share in the fruits of our past labors and the labors of our predecessors. A world in which we can work if/when/towards what we want to, not because we have(or are forced) to. Automated industrial systems can produce an economy that is so efficient that what one can purchase for 20,000$ U.S. now, one would be able to purchase for orders of magnitude less if these conditions manifest. Just as how some have described certain economies as having an excess which in its citizenry are able to survive from the excess alone.

There are a hell of a lot of humans around today and it is a very difficult problem to both feed and care for them properly and keep them in an equilibrium with the demands of the planet so the system is sustainable. It requires intelligence and good intent. So far humans have demonstrated neither and their survival is very questionable.

I believe I have demonstrated both intelligence and good intent. Am I not human? To survive I believe we must question.

There are some exceptions to the general trend but so far they don't seem significant.