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PolySciFi Blog

Saturday, July 17, 2004

 

More Robots

Following up on this post, I stumbled across this collection of articles on Asimov's three laws while reading boing boing. Includes an article by Greg Bear. Lots of interesting stuff, but also a lot of harping on the flaws of the three laws (some of which I agree with, some I don't, but still a good Saturday read).
 
The laws discussion is hosted by the Singularity Institute. They're big pushers of AI (no, not the passable movie with the craptastic ending), and are eagerly anticipating the advent of the singularity. As they define it, a singularity is where an intelligence manages to create an intelligence more intelligent than its creator (being smarter than your parents doesn't count). They seem to think this will be a great day, though I'm somewhat skeptical as SkyNet still scares the beejezus out of me (they also want you to pass out flyers, which also I find kind of freaky).
 
I wonder if the Singularity Institute counts the hive mind concept introduced by Den Beste (If you read no other link in this post read this one). Loosely Den Beste treats hive minds as collections of individual linked processing elements that together produce coordinated actions and the appearance of thought. This includes ants and bees, but also the neurons that make up your brain and the millions of interconnected humans whose hive mind thoughts are memes. Den Beste speculates on what influences the functioning and effectiveness of a hive mind and identifies element processing power, element interconnectivity, and link bandwidth. Den Beste then speculates that the improvements in communications technologies have spawned rudimentary hive minds far more intelligent than any individual human being (for example consider the collective intelligence and processing capabilities of the blogosphere).
 
All of this leads me to wonder if the singularity institute hasn't already missed singularity day. 

Update
Slate has another article on I, Robot. The author is also critical of the movie's failure to adhere to Asimov's general vision. He also brings up some interesting examples of sociopaths basing their behavior on the writings of Asimov (like Aum Shinrikyo of Sarin gas fame).

Comments(1) |
Hey, Sarge, Flud answered for the pair. He had made his notes.
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Hey, Sarge, Flud answered for the pair. He had made his notes.
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