Brains are to Minds as Birds are to Flight: Can Software Achieve Consciousness As Readily As Aircraft Have Achieved Flight? Transvision 2010 2010 October 22 Martine Rothblatt [email protected] 1
Brains are to consciousness like birds are to flight
May 10, 2015
Computers can achieve consciousness, despite their simplicity compared to brains, just as aircraft can achieve flight, despite their simplicity compared to birds.
Welcome message from author
This document is posted to help you gain knowledge. Please leave a comment to let me know what you think about it! Share it to your friends and learn new things together.
Transcript
Brains are to Minds as Birds are to Flight:
Can Software Achieve Consciousness As Readily As Aircraft Have Achieved Flight?
Transvision 20102010 October 22Martine Rothblatt
\“One illusion I hope to
dispel is the notion that
our brains are computers
and that consciousness
could emerge from
computation. ”
G Edelman, Second Nature
Greater Shearwater, N Mayer
“One illusion I hope to dispel
is that birds are planes & that
flight could emerge from
aircraft.” Experts Circa 1900
When a famous scientist states something is possible, he is almost certainly right.
When he states that something is impossible, he is probably wrong.
Arthur C. Clarke
So What Gives? Over-Reaction Against Spooky Cartesian Dualism Led to Erroneous Thinking That the Mind MUST Be Embodied in Biology
For Sure the Mind Must Be Embodied
But Software and Hardware Will Do As Well as Wetware and Fleshware
And Birds Are Way More Complex Than Airplanes, Jets & Other Aircraft
Shearwater Gesture, Mayer
Don’t Have to Replicate a Bird to Fly; Don’t Have to Copy a Brain to Be Conscious
Shearwater Sketchbook, N Mayer
As Birds and Jets Differ, So Will Brains &
Cyberconscious Minds
NO EGGS, WORMS OR DOG PROBLEMS
It’s Clear That Mindfiles Need Not Even Approach 100%
• Normal People Remember Only a Small Percent of What They Experience
• Mannerisms, Personality, Feelings, Beliefs, Attitudes & Values Are– Not infinitely variable and unique– Finite sets that repeat across people– Minor variations not material– Recollections & combinations create uniqueness
Fascinating Mindfile Facts: Estimated Number of…
An adult’s short term memory
Up to 7 items for 3 - 20 seconds
Recognizable faces Several hundred
Personality sub-types Few dozen
Universal facial expressions
6
Adult’s thoughts retained per day
7% - 13%
Emotions Few dozen
One Hour a Day of Mindfile Deposits Is Enough
• 5 Years to Complete 100,000 Bainbridges
• 5 Years to Upload, Label & Emotion-Code 100K Photos
• 2000 Hours of You on Video! (In 5 Yrs)
The Lifenaut & CyBeRev Projects
Android Phones: Download PersonalityMD from Google Marketplace
Revival Via Mindware
• Software that enables equivalent functionality to a mind from which mindfiles were abstracted
• “Auto-tunes” based on processing of mindfiles
So What Makes Us Unique?
• The formula for the number of unique personality frameworks available to mindware, known as a “repeating combination”, would be ST, where S = the number of possible personality trait scores and T = the number of possible personality traits. For our example, ST = 2015 = 328,080,401,001.
Antecedents of Mindware
• Gameware Avatars• Autonomous Cars• Social Chatbots• AI Engines
– E.g. Novamente
• Neuro-Electronic Mapping
FROM MINDFILES TO MINDWARE TO MINDCLONES
Bina48
•The First MindClone Begins
•Located in Bristol, VT USA
•As Seen in
www.lifenaut.com
BUT IS CYBERCONSCIOUSNESS ALIVE?
• The expression of a code that enables self-replication and maintenance against disorder– SCHRODINGER
• Capable of replication, mutation, variation and natural selection -- DARWIN
• Something that savors reality, contributes to better enjoyment of reality, a fresh lens on the wonder of creation -- GALILEO
Mindloading Trusts That Our Bodies Are But a Canvas
“The naked fear of sleeving [is just] paranoid essentialism with its back to the wall.”
Morgan, Richard. Altered Carbon. Victor Gollancz Ltd., 2002, p.164.
THE OBJECTIVE CONSCIOUSNESS
CONSCIOUSNESS,> Continuum of abilities> When healthy> To be autonomous> & empathetic> As determined by others
Juries do this for brain intent; Psychologists can do this for mindclone consciousness
A Turing
Biological Essentialists v. Functionalists
Gerald Edelman• “One illusion I hope to
dispel is the notion that our brains are computers and that consciousness could emerge from computation.” Second Nature, Yale University Press, 2006, p. 9
Today’s Presentation• Whether brains are computers is
not determinative of whether consciousness can emerge from computation
• Birds are not planes but airflight emerges from jets
• Autonomy and empathy, semantics and subjectivity, arise from value-weighted pattern associations, regardless of substrate
• Consciousness is what consciousness does
Conclusion
• The Terasem Hypothesis says that consciousness will arise from sufficiently advanced mindware applied to sufficiently detailed mindfiles.
• It is a falsifiable hypothesis as per Popper • Let the testing proceed• I think the odds are in its favor
Related Documents
