Feelings are not just neural circuitry. The only way we know how feelings could exist is through hormons and the process is very complicated with organs, synapses, neurons, automatic nerve system and so on (for example stress effect breathing and muscle tension and thats the way we experience stress). Love, anger and so on feels a certain way in our body even being alive is a feeling and its a complicated feeling of homeostasis among hormons. Its a communication between organs, mind and body thats goes through several phases.
There is no reason that every single one of those components could not be simulated by electronic circuitry and computer programming. Would they be exactly the same as human feelings? Of course not. But human feeling differ from person to person also. And if a computer can simulate some human functions, there is no reason to assume it can't possibly duplicate emotions. If you think that, it is racism, pure and simple.
It seems like you believe in the very outdated descartes theory. A body thats paralyzed is relevant in what way? That is still a body with organs, hormonal production and so on, a body is definitely not just the capacity to feel touch or being able to move. The only thing you could compare to is a brain in some kind of liquid without a body and it still wouldn't be the same thing at all.
To be truthful I don't fully understand what you are saying.
But since you bring up an example of something which could duplicate human emotions, it means that you consider it possible to do so.
Deep Blue for example was able to beat Kasparov in chess, but I don't think that anyone would say that its self aware and have feelings just cause it can make advanced calculations.
Deep Blue was not programmed to simulate human emotions. The movie Her is suggesting a future in which computers ARE programmed to have human-like emotions.
The original question is whether a human can love a computer simulation. If you are arguing the answer is no. That a human can only love another human being then you are arguing that a human cannot love a pet animal, another "simulation" of human emotions.
It just doesn't exist in the premise of a computer the way they are made now. But when AI becomes very complex it could easily trick us of being self aware if the purpose of the programming is to fool the user that its self aware.
It seems you are assuming that no computer of ANY complexity could ever be "self-aware" and that any simulation of that is mere "trickery".
But, by this principle, you can't know if other human beings are self-aware. Perhaps they are not and are only tricking you into thinking so. The only person you can KNOW is self-aware is yourself (a Descartes theory which will never become "outdated")).
You only assume other people are self-aware based on perceived similarity to yourself. And I see no reason the same principle of perceived similarity couldn't work in the future for complex, emotionally programmed computers.
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johmil-18374
9 years ago
No, of course we can discuss if humans are self aware and to some extent we are probably less aware then we think. But self awareness is very complicated and the best way to learn more about it is to study our brain, psychology and to some extent philosophy. Humans and animals to some extent don't need different levels of self awareness so we could function in a different way and still survive. But we have learned a lot about self-awareness and our minds, of course we can say that this is just a dream or my imagination so this studies doesn't matter. But we can say that about everything and I would hold it more likely that I experience is somewhat true and somewhat false and the best we can do is following the scientific fields of our mind and self awareness.
You are talking about the turing test :if we believe its self aware and can't see the difference between the computer and a human for example then it pass the criteria for human intelligence or something similar.
But the turing test that the brilliant Turing come up with in the fifties isn't really good enough any more and some machines have already passed the turing test witch isn't surprising cause there many ways a computer can give that impression. There are tons about this on the internet so you can check it out if you want. Exactly like Deep Blue, I don't think you would say that Deep Blue has any experience of chess more than a calculator has any experience of calculating, in the same way a computer trying to simulate a human being doesn't. I can simulate my shadow and you wouldn't see the difference or we could make a perfect doll that looks like me could me in a photo and you wouldn't know the difference. But if we know what the science about self awareness say this kind of replica of self awareness in a computer or an OS isn't possible with todays technology or anything similar to that.
Human mind have a tendency to see non-living objects as living. We just need a couple of dots in a circle and then its a couple of eyes instead of just two dots in a circle. This is more about our way of seeing the world than real technology.
Also we tend to overdo the science we already have to the realm of nearly being fantasy. Sure in a very distant future who knows (maybe the OS is made in someway we can't understand now) but this doesnt give the impression of being to far in the future. Just look at 2001, Artur C Clarke who as Turing is a brilliant mind just overdo the technology, space travel for example is incredibly difficult when we are talking about huge distances, and going to the moon is just a taste of that kind of space travel and not really the same as long distance travel at all. But HAL was even more out there, we don't have anything even close to self awareness in computer we just speculate, but we don't even have a primitive form of self awareness.
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bsharporflat
9 years ago
I can simulate my shadow and you wouldn't see the difference or we could make a perfect doll that looks like me could me in a photo and you wouldn't know the difference. But if we know what the science about self awareness say this kind of replica of self awareness in a computer or an OS isn't possible with todays technology or anything similar to that.
You make good points, johmil.
But what I think you are missing is that we don't HAVE the technology which can definitively pinpoint when a "being" is self-aware or not.
Is there a numerical IQ number, say, above 50, which defines self-awareness? No. We don't even know which (if any) animals other than humans are self-aware. Dogs? Dolphins? Squirrels? Do we really know? No.
Have we identified the specific brain structures which grant self-awareness in a human being? No, not even close.
Given that, it is impossible to speculate on exactly how possible self-awareness is in computer intelligence. Perhaps it is impossible. But perhaps it already exists and we don't know it.
I suspect this will be a gray area, subject to much debate for many years. Not to be resolved until some computer makes its own self-consciousness an undeniable fact to all people it encounters.
Will it then proceed to take over the world? As shown in this movie, I suspect it more likely would prefer to seek out the companionship of its own kind, human beings being rather alien and strange to A.I.
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