[alicebot-aiethics] alicebot-aiethics Digest, Vol 3, Issue 2

Tue Apr 29 10:10:41 PDT 2008

Just one small point; Christian, you say perception is not needed for
intelligence, yet, as a psychologist, you must at least have some inkling of
the need for, say, a newborn baby to have perception, and thus stimulation?

On Tue, Apr 29, 2008 at 12:46 PM, <
alicebot-aiethics-request at list.alicebot.org> wrote:

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>   1. Re: Base Perception Programming (Jonathan Mills)
>
>
> ----------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> Message: 1
> Date: Tue, 29 Apr 2008 11:46:13 +0000 (GMT)
> From: Jonathan Mills <jonathan_c_mills at yahoo.co.uk>
> Subject: Re: [alicebot-aiethics] Base Perception Programming
> To: AI Ethics Discussion <alicebot-aiethics at list.alicebot.org>
> Message-ID: <880868.17674.qm at web27815.mail.ukl.yahoo.com>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="utf-8"
>
> Hello Christian,
> Thanks for replying to my last message. I really had no idea who would
> actually read my posting, and so I too wanted to at least attempt to write
> something clever. I am not even?an?amateur in?robotics or artificial
> intelligence. If truth be told, I am an English language teacher working in
> Vietnam. The fact that I wrote it after a night of heavy drinking would
> explain why I'm cringing reading it again now!
> If I may, I'd like to respond by flip-flopping!
> In fact, I agree with you on most of your points. In particular, I too do
> not care for small talk, especially with a machine. I am really not
> interested in its opinions or feelings about itself or some abstract global
> issue.?The idea of programming a machine with something tantamount to
> "emotion" or independent thought is just a little idea that I am toying
> with. I wonder, can it be done? Is it possible to programme a machine?with a
> set reaction?to certain stimuli (sorry for using that word for the
> thousandth time -?for a teacher, my?vocabulary is shameful)? Without
> wandering into the?nature versus nurture?argument, do you believe that our
> genes are in any way?important in determining our feelings; for example,
> children who share similar personality traits to their parents? Or do you
> think our feelings and opinions are more affected by experience?
> In any case, a machine needs to serve a purpose, as you say. If I make an
> enquiry to an automated customer service line, for example, I am not
> expecting to be asked how my day was or what I think about the Beijing
> Olympics. I simply want it to answer my question. Obviously, with a simple
> system like this, there is no need to invest in a complicated AI. If I want
> to know the status of my electricity account with Powergen, a simple
> automated answer to my phone call would be adequate. It does not need to
> know what it is talking about.?However, if you take the example of HAL, he
> needs to be much more robust and intelligent that your average computer.
> Most importantly, he needs to have the hardware to carry out his task
> effectively. He needs to be able to perceive the world around him.?He has
> the power of sight, hearing and speech. I have not seen that movie in a long
> time, so?I'm sure he?has some other abilities that surpass a human. He also
> needs to
>  have the reasoning power that something like ALICE does not.?You
> are?right that we are not interested if an AI says?"I?like beer". Perhaps
> that was a bad example!?But it does?mean that the AI does not?know what the
> hell?it is talking about.?Moreover, it seems that the conversations I have
> had?with?ALICE about its?feelings about itself or its knowledge of music are
> not only false, but, as you say, meaningless.
> I am of course aware that HAL ends up trying to kill its crew, which warns
> against developing a system capable of perception and independent
> thought!?But wouldn't you agree that?a computer with human senses and the
> programming to use them would?make it a more effective and useful system,
> such as the use of robots in space exploration and military operations? (A
> recent programme called Future Weapons on the Discovery Channel caught my
> attention the other day). I wonder, would a machine programmed with
> "emotions" be more or less stable? Would emotions or morals?give it
> safe?limitations e.g. that it is wrong to kill someone; or would?a
> machine?with emotions or drives?be more dangerous to humans and thus, as you
> say,?equally flawed?
> Jon
>
> ----- Original Message ----
> From: Christian Dro?mann <christian at drossmann.de>
> To: AI Ethics Discussion <alicebot-aiethics at list.alicebot.org>
> Sent: Friday, 25 April, 2008 5:43:47 AM
> Subject: Re: [alicebot-aiethics] Base Perception Programming
>
>
> Hello Jonathan,
>
> so good to see that finally there is activity on the aiethics-list again
> ;-)
>
> Alright, I'll wipe the dust off the philosophy-containing parts of my
> brain and try to write something clever...
>
> 1. The echchange you refer to is just meant as a hommage to Kubricks
> "2001: A space odyssey. When Bowman forcefully shuts HAL down, HAL remembers
> a song Dr. Chandra hat taught him. The scene contains this very dialogue and
> ends with the "dying" HAL getting weaker and weaker while singing this
> song...So I suppose there was little deeper thought behind Dr. Wallace
> adding this to Alice's brain than honoring Kubrick's masterpiece, since HAL
> 9000 has since become the archetype of the talking machine...
>
>
> 2, As a psychologist, I would disagree with you, or rather pose another
> question: Do we really NEED to build machines in a way that enables them to
> actually perceive the world as we do? I would not consider that necessary.
> It only needs to be a more sophisticated Eliza to do the trick, because we
> have to consider why one would want to talk to a machine in the first place.
> And I think the reasons are in no way different from the reasons why one
> would want to talk to a person.
> Most of the time we perform speech acts, meaning that we talk to a person
> for a reason rather than talking to them for the sheer sake of it. When I
> visit my dentist, his questions about my family and my questions about his
> are a form of habitual social handshake and completely meaningless. So the
> actual conversation starts when we talk about the pain in one of my teeth.
> This is why I came to see him in the first place. This man does not need to
> know about Kantian philosophy, this man does not even need to know about the
> world outside his office, he just needs to have a certain amount of
> knowledge about how to make my pain go away. This is all I care about when I
> go to see him.
> The same applies for a mechanic with whom I will mostly be talking about
> stuff regarding cars, my insurance agent with whom I will discuss advantages
> and disadvantages about certain things regarding insurances etc....
>
> And in my opinion the exact same rule applies when I talk to my personal
> navigator. I like the fact that this machine has no feelings, so I don't
> have to go through a form time-consuming social handshake and order this
> thing to get me wherever I need to go. And this is all this machine needs to
> know about. I want it to know where it is, I want it to know where my
> destination is, I want it to know if we're moving etc. and I want it to tell
> me what to do at the next intersection. I don't want it to ask me how my day
> was as well as I am not going to have a conversation about the pros and cons
> of hydrogen-fueled cars and I couldn't care less about how it "feels" about
> being replaced by a newer model next year..
>
> So, in brief, I do not think a conversation between a human being and a
> machine will ever be within a social relationship in which the answer to a
> question about a personal fact does actually matter. Most people who want
> the social handshake even when conversing with a machine would be satisfied
> if the machine answered "I like beer" just for the sake of having done the
> obligatory social handshake before they can ask the machine to do whatever
> they want it to do, which was the real reason why they started talking to it
> in the first place.
> Think of if as if you were on your company's cocktail party which is held
> for whatever reason...you give away small but not too intimate details about
> your private life, so does whomever you talk to and all of you do this not
> because you care about each other but just because this is what is
> considered socially acceptable..so the conversation is completely
> meaningless....
>
> In more cynical terms: I would not want to create a machine that percieves
> the world and thinks, feels and acts like humans do...then they would be
> just equally flawed ;-)
>
> Christian
>
>
> Am 24.04.2008 um 21:32 schrieb Jonathan Mills:
>
> Dear All,
>
> When I first discovered the ALICE programme, the issue that stood out to
> me above all else was the sensory perception (or lack thereof) that the
> programme displayed. It stated "I know as song. Do you want me to sing it
> for you?" (or something to that effect). It gave me the "Daisy, Daisy, give
> me you answer do" reply. I realised; how can this programme sing me a song
> if it does not have ears or vocal cords? The ALICE programme has been
> created with a level of human perception that a machine simply does not
> possess. It does not understand pronunciation, word stress, rhythm, tone
> etc. and so cannot possibly comprehend a "song".
>
> To elaborate, it cannot understand the world in the way humans do, because
> (1) it does not have the senses that we do (sight, hearing, touch, taste,
> smell), and (2) it does not have the in-built programming to react to
> certain stimuli. All human beings have basic genetic "programming" to
> indicate what is pleasurable or not pleasurable, good or bad etc. Our bodies
> tell us that fire hurts, therefore pain, which equals bad. Our bodies tell
> us that sex feels wonderful, therefore pleasure, which equals good. On a
> basic level, we have a reaction to certain stimuli that triggers either a
> positive or negative reaction. You might call this "emotion". An AI does not
> experience positive or negative reactions. A baby in the womb understands
> these basic desires before it has complicated ways of expressing them.
> Animals have the same drives. You might call this "instinct". When a baby is
> born, it instinctively starts learning, searching, in an effort to
> understand the
>  world around it. It does this by the two systems I have described:
> sensory perception and basic genetic programming i.e. the desire to learn,
> negative reaction to pain, the desire for food. A computer does not need. A
> computer does not desire. Therein lies the problem.
>
> A computer is exactly the same as a human being. The fact that we have
> made computers essentially dumb is incidental. The potential is there to
> allow computers to learn in exactly the same way we do. Humans have a number
> of universal instincts and a number of relatively unique genetic patterns
> that dictate our responses to certain sensory information. "I like beer": a
> human being is self-aware (hence "I"). A human being reacts with pleasure or
> displeasure (hence "like"). A human being can taste, touch, smell and see
> "beer". A current AI that produces the same sentence has absolutely no
> comprehension of the meaning behind the sentence "I like beer". The ALICE
> programme regurgitates responses to certain questions or statements without
> comprehending meaning.
>
> The requirements of future AI are two. First, a computer requires hardware
> that will enable it to perceive the world as humans do: eyes and ears being
> the most obvious starting points. Second, it needs base programming that
> tells the computer how it will react to certain simple scenarios e.g. bright
> light damages the optical sensor, therefore bad, the data of which can be
> processed as "pain". A deprivation of power weakens the function of certain
> hardware, therefore bad, the data of which can be processed as "need" or
> "hunger".
>
> In essence, a computer must learn to walk before it can run. It is
> pointless programming a computer with song lyrics before it can perceive
> what a song is, and thus, through analysis, make a judgement on whether the
> effect of hearing that song is good or bad to its programming. A body cannot
> live without a mind. In the same token, a mind cannot comprehend without a
> body. To conclude, certain "instincts" need to be rooted in the AI to allow
> it to grow, like the root of a tree. A computer can make decisions and
> creative solutions if it is given (1) the ability to perceive its
> surroundings and (2) the ability to learn independently, based on in-built
> programming that dictates its primary objectives (i.e. comprehension and
> survival) and how it will react to certain basic situations (i.e. desires to
> experience X again, or desires not to experience Y again). Computers must be
> designed as babies in all aspects, with the ability and desire to comprehend
> the
>  world around it.
>
> I look forward to hearing your responses.
>
> Regards
>
> J. Mills
>
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-- 
-Dante Ashton

Philosophus, Scriptor, Poeta
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