[ot] Mars colonization

[Airwolf]

Soon, computers will have the power to create entire worlds within themselves. Why should we need to leave Earth to explore, when cyberspace can provide the same thrills with none of the risk? Futhermore, cyberspace can be just as complex as the real world; if you think I'm joking, I suggest you read the Internet. It's harder than counting the grains of sand on a beach.

I think you hit the mark in this paragraph. For many people doing something that no one else (or very few) has done is part of the excitement. The real excitement comes in the risk.
--Personal Story Time --
A few years ago I went skydiving. It was amazing. I was on an adrenalin high for at least a week.
-- End Story --
I am sure that in a few years that VR will be good enough to simulate the jump I made, but it will never be able to replace the risk. For me the risk made it scarier and more pleasurable.

There are people who want to go to Mars and explore space because it is something new and different, there are others that want to do it because they are a scientist and this is their field of study, and finally there are people who want to do it because its hard and they might fail and as part of that failure, they could die.

Many people believe its not about the destination, its about the journey. VR is about the destination and will be fine for the majority but the true adventurers live for the journey.

 

[s/LaSH]

the turing test is bunk because our subjective impression has nothing to do with the reality or unreality of consciousness...

Ah, now this is where we get into the really interesting stuff...

Here's a hypothetical situation. You're in the best VR (virtual reality) ever created in a million years. You're surrounded by immensely sophisticated AIs that mimic real people very well (who cares how). The VR is jacked into your cerebral cortex, and overrides the senses from the rest of your body, so it really is just like you are there, wherever 'there' is. Say it's a city somewhere on early 21st-century Earth.

But IS it hypothetical? Can you prove that it's NOT where you are RIGHT NOW? Are your friends really your friends, or are they just smiling, nodding rows of transistors?

You will never know, because you are not them.

If you think like this (and I do, all the time, and IT HURTS), then you'll put more stock into the Turing test, or a variant thereof. If something passes as intelligent for eight hours out of the day every day for three years, either someone's sitting on the other end of a modem with half the staff of Microsoft rewriting the AI desparately as you interact, or it's developed something akin to true consciousness. I dunno, this is getting off topic. I guess I just wanted to say that, we don't understand consciousness yet; we can't very well write an AI that employs those principles yet either. So if a truly conscious AI comes along, we won't know whether it's truly conscious or not until we've figured out how we ourselves tick, and the AI will probably get very bored waiting around.

Bleargh. I've gone on a whole macroscopic quantum uncertainty kick this evening. I do beg your pardon.

 

[Fast Learner]

See the currently-released film Solaris for an excellent take on this (though not necessarily technological): Are other people more than what we know about them? How do you know they are? What's the real difference between everything you know about someone and the actual person?

Great movie, with very interesting stuff along these lines.

 

[Storminator]

Just thought of this last night:

Internet access from Mars sucks! Eight minutes to in the request to load a page?!?! Another 8 minutes (plus normal server time) to load the page...

Whoever goes to Mars NEEDS to bring some rpgs to pass the time!

PS

 

[Fast Learner]

It's all about creating a serious cache.

 

[tleilaxu]

Ah, now this is where we get into the really interesting stuff...

Here's a hypothetical situation. You're in the best VR (virtual reality) ever created in a million years. You're surrounded by immensely sophisticated AIs that mimic real people very well (who cares how). The VR is jacked into your cerebral cortex, and overrides the senses from the rest of your body, so it really is just like you are there, wherever 'there' is. Say it's a city somewhere on early 21st-century Earth.

But IS it hypothetical? Can you prove that it's NOT where you are RIGHT NOW? Are your friends really your friends, or are they just smiling, nodding rows of transistors?

You will never know, because you are not them.

If you think like this (and I do, all the time, and IT HURTS), then you'll put more stock into the Turing test, or a variant thereof. If something passes as intelligent for eight hours out of the day every day for three years, either someone's sitting on the other end of a modem with half the staff of Microsoft rewriting the AI desparately as you interact, or it's developed something akin to true consciousness. I dunno, this is getting off topic. I guess I just wanted to say that, we don't understand consciousness yet; we can't very well write an AI that employs those principles yet either. So if a truly conscious AI comes along, we won't know whether it's truly conscious or not until we've figured out how we ourselves tick, and the AI will probably get very bored waiting around.

Bleargh. I've gone on a whole macroscopic quantum uncertainty kick this evening. I do beg your pardon.

this is all irrelevent. consciousness has nothing to do with other people's perceptions. if everyone were dead and there was only one sentient computer program in the world then there would be no one to administer the turing test and it would fail by default. humans are not the arbitrators of consciousness, it is independent of us

 

[Storminator]

this is all irrelevent. consciousness has nothing to do with other people's perceptions. if everyone were dead and there was only one sentient computer program in the world then there would be no one to administer the turing test and it would fail by default. humans are not the arbitrators of consciousness, it is independent of us

Could you prove that? By experimentation perhaps?

PS

 

[tleilaxu]

if we are talking about "self-consciousness" then by definition this is something that the self-conscious entity is aware of, not necessarily other beings. There isn't any reason that there has to be observable external phenomenon associated with it. Therefore the Turing test is stupid and doesn't address the issue

 

[Storminator]

if we are talking about "self-consciousness" then by definition this is something that the self-conscious entity is aware of, not necessarily other beings. There isn't any reason that there has to be observable external phenomenon associated with it. Therefore the Turing test is stupid and doesn't address the issue

That might even be true. For a guy who doesn't believe in human nature, you're pretty confident about the nature of conciousness in general.

(poke, poke, stir the pot...)

PS

 

[tleilaxu]

i've said all i have to say about consciousness at this time.

BACK TO MARS!!!

Here's a question: If mars were colonized would you go? I definitely would..... to big an opportunity to pass up...

edit: and i never said i didn't believe in human nature, i was just pointing out the fact that lots of people claim to know something about human nature as though it were self-evident when in fact it is not. all statements made about the eternal and essential human nature should be backed up with sound logical propositions and arguements, not just saying "it's obvious"