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We have all seen the movies where machines turn against mankind in a battle to the death. This idea is also covered in many books.

We are now building robots that can think and act on their own. I have read articles on the US building a robot that will take man out of the battlefield. One article I read is a robot like a dog that can walk over any terrain and engage with the enemy.

I know we need to advance and move forward but do you think we are putting to much faith in machines and that one day they will have the ability to turn against us.

What are your views towards this, are we putting to much faith in machines, do you believe robots should be able to think and act on their own and that we will one day have to fight against them?

its just a matter of time before computers "wake up". most that know of AI know that self awareness is just around the corner (well, according to what ive read).
we are talking within the next 20, possibly the next 10 years.
once they awaken, what precautions are being taken to prevent a "terminator" scenario? i dont think any at all.

something to consider eh?
~W~

Are we seriously talking about man against the machine via the Terminator predictions?

All I know is that technology is growing at a hugely rapid pace. By the time 2020 hits, we may or may not have hover dynamics solved to the point of the 5th Element movie. But, if my PS3 spouts legs and starts talking in digicode, then I may as well train it so that it does not act like a "Decepticon."

HA! I kill me...

hahaha...thats good. I dont think we will ever see our fridges and playstation come to life. I do believe we need to keep advancing and moving forward. I do think we put to much reliance in the computer.

I think part of the reason people are so loath to having robots and what not is because they do not have a "human-esque" awareness. It is unsettling to see something that is familiar-looking to us-a human/animal form and what not-not hold at least some semblance of awareness.

I personally think it would be cool to see vehicles that can essentially maneuver around without the help of humans. People tend to make stupid decisions while driving, look at all of the so called, "great drivers" out on the road today who wind up T-boning a pole because they think they are going the right direction, and realize only too late that they, in fact, are not.

People have lost all caution for cars, and I think it's only safe to assume that it will get worse.

I think it would be awesome if the cars operated on a form of magnetic-type road like they do in I-Robot. That way, they can stay on the road, instead of swerving to and fro at the slightest touch.

I'm not a big fan of the "hover-cars" like in the Fifth Element movie. as someone who is afraid of heights, I personally would much rather keep my feet on the ground.

Good one, Severus!

In general, I like the idea of robots. They could turn against us, but they also might be the ultimate passive servitors, the human dom's ultimate wet dream.

What is most interesting about the question, though, is a world so committed to war that we invent machines to continue it for us.

On the one hand, we are saving human lives through science, but on the other we're really not changing our core human dynamics.

Yet with ups of robots their is a down side of work and employment of man, for machines are built to help the worker in the job, know lets add and build robots to do duties of individual workers, a world of employment has now come to an end. robots become the new slaves of the future working to earn money for the owner.

Robots soon form intelligience and than bam you have I ROBOT scenerio, possibliities yet uncertainity of the future in which other people do not know.

A machine can never reach a level of consciousness such as mans (allowing it free will) simply because a machine can never achieve a state of self-awareness-the only creature capable of self-awareness is man; animals are aware on an instinctual level, not one of recognition, and computers can't even advance to that level of consciousness, period. It will never happen. There is a difference between stimulus (programmed) and instinct. Animals don't know the difference between right and wrong, they learn through stimulus-instinctually, not with conscious intellectually. No matter what you program into a machine, it would never be capable of doing what a human being is able to do-namely free-thinking; its the one thing that seperates us from all other creations-that we possess the ability to know, reason and love. Animals are completely instinctive and are not aware of "self", and machinary is incredibly simplistic compared to the complexities of a even the most primitive of life forms. Machines can be programmed to turn on people-but only as the result of the negative stimulus which it could be programmed to react to, at least thats the AI contention, but they will never reach a level of consciousness to do it on their own. A machine would have to possess an awareness of itself in order to think on its own. It can't reason, it does not possess the self-awareness to do anything without being programmed to do so. Films like Blade Runner, AI, and the Terminator are just fiction, never to be realized. Computers will never be able to make emotional decisions and "take over".

I beg to differ Cooley, I saw a show where there was a life like robot, that when you moved or touched it, it would look right at you. Yes it had to be programmed to do this but it does it now on its own accord. Plus we have the robot toys that can do the same thing. Once mankind has programmed them then we are no longer required.

Are you saying that once we program a machine, it can evolve on its own? The show you cite in which a machine now responds of its own accord; are you suggesting that this machine has of its own accord evolved into a thinking, reasoning entity capable of making rational, emotional decisions based on stimuli, such as you or I would be capable? I'm not arguing or challenging you, I'm just asking.

the machines can easily make the human race extinct.

If the machines are, first of all, smart enough to eradicate human life, why would they do it? Wouldn't that be cutting their own throats? The point I've been trying to make here is even if a machine could evolve into a free-will, reasoning entity and decided to kill off mankind for whatever reason, wouldn't that be the beginning of its own demise? Why would it feel threatened by man? It doesn't breathe, so its not like it would knock us off for polluting the air. It doesn't eat, so we wouldn't be much of a threat as far as sustenance sharing goes. It doesn't need money, so extermination for the sake of greed could be ruled out. Exactly what reason would an AI have for wanting to "take over"?

hey, you never know. What if the machines figured out a way to continue functioning without the help of humans?

LOL
im not suggesting that my toaster will come to life, but networked mechines with artificial intelligence could become self aware, and if that happens, then they will make choices.


that is my point.
~W~

First off, machines may become self aware.. but they still need to follow the protocol of which they were programmed with. They cannot change that protocol as it is part of their main stream programming, placed in a little chip that makes them what they are. Remember the concept of RAM and ROM? This still applies. Their read only memory would not be subject to change under any circumstances unless of course their programmer gave them a new chip with differant protocol information.

Therefore, the machine being "alive" future is inconcequencial.

We have already seen some instances where "machines" take over, in a manner of speaking. Look at Smart Houses. My mom was telling me one time of this family having a smart house built for them. To test it's capabilities to do what it was supposed to do, they placed several crash test dummies in the house, and essentially loaded it with Carbon Monoxide. The house, instead of opening windows and what not to let the family out, instead boarded all the windows and locked all of the doors, trapping them inside.

Granted, it was most likely a glitch, but it's one of the possibilities we also have to think about. What if the robots we make to handle our day to day lives, essentially glitch?

Those of you gamers out there who have had your characters start running off on their own into a band of bosses, without telling them to do, or have people running around bald when they shouldn't be, know well how computers can glitch and/or not work properly.

So maybe computers cannot become self-aware, maybe they won't decide on their own to wipe out the human race, but if they glitch and no one catches it in time, and that glitch causes them to do harm, rather than good, what then?

While I like the thoughts of some things, there is no way that you can sit there and say that your laptop does not learn.

My own laptop taught itself that a virus was a normal program, and should be protected from being taken out. So what did it do? It shut itself down every time we tried to remove the virus. It took restoring my laptop to warehouse standards to get the virus removed, then switching out the hard drive.

I think that computers are taking over our daily lives as we speak. There are refrigerators with televisions in them, and computers in side that tell you how much of what you have sitting on the shelves, and whether or not the food is spoiled.

Humans survived well without the usage of computers. Now, in the past....30 years or so, you have all of these computers in just about every household, and people flipping out because they don't have their computers to do something for them.

Yes, computers are a good thing, sometimes, but at other times, they're just plain unnecessary.

"First off, machines may become self aware.. but they still need to follow the protocol of which they were programmed with".


This statement is an oxymoron; if, according to the second part of this statement "but they still need to follow the protocol of which they were programmed with", how then can they evolve into self awareness on their own?-since they have to "follow the protocol"? Can you see the contradiction here? It doesn't jibe. Based on its programming, its not being led by any pursuit for self awareness. Its intellegence is limited to whats been programmed into it. Its its program says "stop here", how can it evolve into self-awareness?

Ah, you caught that did you? At least someone did.. Hence my bloody POINT! No machine may become self aware because of that anomoly. They are all PRE-PROGRAMMED from the get-go.

That is a valid point, they are pre-programed. No matter what machines do in the future at some stage mankind has to input the program.

If a machine is to turn against mankind it will be at the hand of mankind somewhere along the line

we depend to much on machines. everything we do we are designing a machine to do it for us. soon we will not need to get out of bed.

If only...look forward to that day

well a machine lacks the only thing that makes us different from animals... the ability to reason... which is why i would rather have a squad of fellow men than trust in a damn robot in a real war situation... clone troopers owned droids in star wars and everyone knows george lucas knows all

Nanmos, Nano Moters,

Self replicating Nano bots'

There is a tech field for this. There is also sci-fi based on such a concept.

People arrbitrarly blur the two together, results? Irrational conclusions.

coolleyhou, it is a joy to read your entries here. You are absolutely correct; machines cannot become "self-aware" and never shall. Thus, the entire machine-as-master paranoia that has been around since about the turn of the 20th Century over 100 years ago continues to be just as ridiculous now as it was then.


Instead, what I see developing is something along the lines of the Orson Scott Card "Ender's Game" series where wars are fought remotely by unmanned machines... and piloted by younger and ever-younger operators until war becomes more and more like an elaborate video game.

Think of all the weird moral conundrums as well as perils of such a scenario! Humans vicariously fighting Humans by having their machines fight each other... removing the immediate threat of Human casualties from the equation, thus both saving lives while, at the same time, escalating such conflicts as the real Human enemies become further and further removed from the actual battlefields. Thus, while saving lives in the short-term, while perhaps causing enemies to not be quite so strongly motivated to find diplomatic solutions given that its just machines doing the fighting. Would such cause us to become more callous of future warfare?

And who would be operating such remotely driven/flown/controlled machines... but perhaps kids, just as in "Ender's Game" given the natural proficiency kids seem to have for such video-game environments? Thus, kids are learning real warfare and engaging in monumental acts of destruction far prior to developing adult levels of moral and emotional maturity. Would this perhaps make them more unable to make proper moral judgments on how to pilot the machines they use to wreak destruction... and thus more manipulated by the powers-that-be who command them? And as separated as they are from reality as they remotely pilot such machines, might this additionally make them more emotionally and morally removed from that same battlefield?

These and far more such questions are what spring to mind as I see us transferring more and more of our activities onto machines.


- Upir'

Great posts from all, yet in the future humans will lose some by having robots do tasks that we usually do, labor force will dwindle causing panic or a form of slavery for the future to decide if it is moral or not.

programmable software that will eventually grow a virus that will shut down the world and caause castoprhy.

"programmable software that will eventually grow a virus that will shut down the world and caause castoprhy"




Skynet? i dont ever see a virus that will shut down the world. All electical devices in the world would have to be connected and that just wont happen.

Upir,

Pow! An excellant example of proliferation, battles would be ultimatly decided by repair, and deployment factors. Remote Compounds would enevitable become stratgic targets. Espeinage would evolve to influence Enlisted Controllers.. I must read the book you mentioned.

I just pictured a hypathetical situation were a developed nation engaged an undeveloped nation ( one without Remote Arsenal). How quickly the undeveloped nation would be negated on the field if battle.

Also hackers, and crackers would be a factor, to counter, and to distribute programs to disrupt transmission to, and from units in battle, or servicing battle units.

Humankind is it's own worse enemy. So yeah, most likely in the future we'll be the result of our own demise.

absolutely correct...machines CANNOT become self aware, because...
uh....
er...
ok, refresh my memory...why can they not become self aware? alot of people in the know seem to think they can.
~W~

They cannot become self aware because machines, no matter how advanced, must be programmed. And programming is, itself, anti-thetical to self-awareness.

Thus, anything that requires programming is not and cannot be made self-aware. Self-awareness presupposes the capacity for entirely independent thought based upon independent desires, drives and emotions... the very characteristics that define... in part... life, itself. These are not programmed into us; we are born with them because we are inherently self-aware from birth due to the life within us, life which cannot be programmed into a machine no matter how advanced or how self-"learning" it might be programmed to be.


- Upir'

So must seem to use the reason of self aware as a reason. Dont you think we would try to rectify this in the future. In the pass we have always used this sort of reason to say something will never happen. Man will never fly otherwise we would have wings. We can never reach the moon etc etc etc.

Mankind has always looked at doing something better.

CountWallaby great post, yes science could in some ways give a computer thought by making it a program that programs in which it now could resemble life in its perception. I think this is not to far off, make something and then make it better, give it its own life.

While computers can be programmed to mimic Humans in many ways, this does not make them self aware or have them, thus, capable... as this thread asks... to somehow rebel against us and attempt to wrest power from us and rule over us.

upir, the question is why cant the machine self program? we do.
what is it that makes us different than machines?
i will challenge you with this comment. we are machines. life as we know it is a self sustaining chemical reaction.

awareness as near as we can figure it is just the ability to process a certain amount of information. our neurons can process that information, and so can silicon.
if a computer can process a certain number of operations per second, then it really is possible that they can become self aware. there are some animals that cannot adapt ...that is they cannot self program. humans can. we can already create a computer that can do basically want lower life can do. they can move to or away from light. they can protect themselves by moving (with compatible hardware that is).
the point is, with computers roughly doubling their abilities every 18 months, at what point can a puter do pretty much what a person does?
never you say?
my response is that your fooling yourself sir.
~W~

I... do not know how to respond given the number of assumptions not supported by any evidences that have been made here.

We are most certainly not machines... nor do we "self-program" (itself a contradiction in terms given that, by very definition, programming requires a programmer, which, again by definition, is not the machine being programmed but, instead, the Human doing the programming of the machine).

We, as Humans and programmers of machines, are inherently self-aware to begin with... none of us needing any prior "programming" given that we are not machines. And, therefore, as machines are not alive and self-aware, being that they are machines (which, again, we are not), they cannot become self-aware (which we are). And, thus, they never have become self-aware and never shall.


- Upir'

I see Upir point in self awareness yet in the logic of science machines make machines, machines do program machines, yet to give life as we humans know may not be the interpretation of a machines knowledge, for programs run until it breaks or gets reprogrammed in some way, call it a rare instant where electrical storm or something reruns a program against it logic, than we see machine acting on its own.

"I will challenge you with this comment. we are machines. life as we know it is a self sustaining chemical reaction."

I will give an answer to this "challenge".

Humans vs Machines:

Humans can reproduce, machines cannot.
Humans can think for themselves, machines cannot.
Humans can argue with one another, machines cannot.
Humans have chemical balances, machines do not.

I can keep going with the human side of positives.

Machines can rebuild limbs, humans cannot.
Machines have to be programmed in order to work on tasks, humans do not.
Machines need chemical such as oil and gas to operate, humans do not.

Simply put, we are not machines because we cannot lasat for a week straight working on things without sleep. Nor can we apply ourselves with as much perfection as machines can when programmed to do so in order to accomplish their tasks. We can multi-task quite easily, and yet when the day is through, the machines keep going and going.

No, we are not machines. Even if some chemical achievement creates the illusion that we could be come as the machines are, does not mean that we would not break down and suffer the consequences of our actions.

It seems to be a very "moral" dilemma here.

Humans vs Machines:

Humans can reproduce, machines cannot.
Humans can think for themselves, machines cannot.
Humans can argue with one another, machines cannot.
Humans have chemical balances, machines do not.



i disagree...machines can reproduce themselves. a robot in a robot factory can produce exact copies of themselves.
i realize that wasnt quite what you were looking for, but it does fit the criteria. they just dont reproduce like biological life.

machines cannot think for themselves...yet

machines can and do argue...and cause system errors lol.

machines dont have chemical balances...instead they have electric balances. again, we are judging what might be a form of life that would be different than us.

this isnt fantasy. if life isnt a self sustaining chemical reaction, how would you define it?
one could argue that life is a sexually transmitted disease...and its always fatal.
~W~

LordWolf - "... again, we are judging what might be a form of life that would be different than us."


Are you attempting to claim that not only are we machines, but that machines are... alive?

no sir, not claiming machines are alive. my point that ive been making since the beginning of our conversation is just that if machines do become aware, then we will have to redefine what we consider life.

the flipside of your question tho, i still maintain as correct...we are machines. we are reproducing machines, as is every life form on the planet.
this is the definition that my old biochemistry professor gave me, and based on that class, i am forced to agree.

i do think that the simpler version tho is still a better one...
life being a self sustaining chemical reaction. you wont find many (if any) bio chemists that disagree with that last statement.
~W~

No, I get where you are coming from ~lordwolf~, I just don't agree with it. We do NOT have mechanical parts that when destroyed may be created once more in perfect image of our own bodies. You have already pointed this out with the "machines can produce exact replica of themselves" statement.

Though we may be "reprogrammed" it is our "will" that decides if we need the reprogramming. Our minds are unique and not machine like. Thus my point. We have physical, biomolecules that machines do not have. Therefore, to call machines "like us" is in my opinion, a proposterous assumption.

Well Stated, yet what is alive, to us it is the existance of life and what we do because of free will and feelings. My interpatation of alive for a robot is the act of coping the existance of our human role. could it become alive for self thought, not in my life time but maybe if this world survives it may come to that point, yet do we interpet it as alive of still the bases of a machine.

If we threw out the knowledge of our own bias and judge by certain aspects of life towards a robots existance, do we see life or is it the fear to claim it alive for we as humans want to still have the upper hand on all things in life.

ok ss, i see where your coming from, but at the same time i think your splitting hairs.

when the wright brothers flew in 1903, if someone said, cool...now we can fly like birds, someone might have pointed out that a bird could fly farther, faster, and higher than the wright flyer. a bird was far far better.

today we fly farther faster and higher than any bird that ever lived.

still, we are not birds.

i still think of humans as organic machines, but perhaps that is my own oddness shining (brightly LOL) thru.

just have to agree to disagree with you on this one oh my brother.
pax yall
~W~

you do have a great point Lord. We say it wont happen or it cannot happen because we dont believe it could. However we cannot see in the future and what can happen. Our tech is getting better and better each year who knows what can happen in the future.

*Chuckles* As long as Microsoft and Dell are still in charge of "operations", I wouldn't put to much stock into anything turning on us anytime soon. They are too worried about Operating System updates and computer breakdowns for profit rather then turning machines into A.I. databases.

I think it is like a matrix effect the movie shows a good point on what will happen with AI . i believe that one day we will make them so smart it will be w war against them and we will have to move underground to survive . we will try to blacken the sky to cut off solar power but they will go higher and get to the sun and it will be a war . i have seen alot of AI that shows how dangerous it is . and if they start to control us like in IROBOT ,EAGLE EYE. we will have problems they have databases that go further than one human mind . i also believe they will govern us as to what we do wrong and make us do what they think is right to not destrot the world we protect to much and overpopulate the world I believe machines will bring it back to survival to the strong and make it like the animal kingdom . if it strong it lives . if it is weak and dying it will die . we need to stop protecting life so much let nature do what it wishes and we'll survive longer if not we will parish from overpopulation and i think computers and machine will control life and death and if they think a decision we make is bad for the earth or enviroment then they will take control

Here is a very short story with a different take on humanity's interaction with machines. Despite the title it's not about sex, but about Love: The Love Machines

Animals( including man) have instinct when born, starting with the instinct to locate, and suckle a nipple for nurishment.

Until I see a computer pop off the assemble line, boot up ( without any activation) and start processing data.. I will remain skeptical of " A.I.".

Though I will add that as soon as I am able to find the article, there was a Russian group that had many baited by an A.I. hoax, involving lots of .. you guessed it grant money.. and special interst funds.. all grafted to the side accounts of the " engineers" .

Hoax or science in the future, All i asked is when would we consider machines or whatever to be living, is it just the fact of breathing and thinking for themselves, or the act in which humans go on everyday with their reduntant life.

When a manufactured computer/ machine can indefinitly exist without upgraded program, and manage a situation that it is not programed to manage, that would be an underlying criteria for " self awareness".

When a computer/ machine demonstrates emotional interference in regards to a programed task, that would be remarkable critertia.

note not confirmation, just remarkable criteria.