Some feel that Artificial Intelligence (AI) is just hype and will never truly happen. They are mostly confused, because we can see under the hood at the details of AI programs, but we do not yet see such detail within the human brain. Some will point to the massive, dumb searching techniques of chess game programs, or the emotion recognition algorithms in robots that then produce “fake” emotional expressions on their synthetic faces as evidence.
Others will point to the overwhelming complexity of achieving true AI. The brain or mind could never be replicated since it is simply too complex to ever be understood. The complexity problem will be overcome by the age old “divide and conquer” technique with its progress driven by the market. More complexity will merely move the date further out where true AI is finally achieved.
We do not yet see the details of how the human brain works, so we feel we possess true intelligence because the results of our work appears to us as evidence of our own intelligence. Once we see the details, some may feel that all intelligence is an illusion, or re-evaluate their notion of what intelligence really is.
Much less than one percent of the processes in the brain ever make it to our consciousness. Human beings are conscious of the high-level patterns produced by the mind-brain only. What we are conscious of is still a part of a causal chain that the conscious “I” did not start. Just follow the causal chain backwards another step, if you think you started something.
If a thermostat were conscious, it would feel in control too. The conscious thermostat would be right. It controls and is responsible for keeping the temperature at the setting. The thermostat’s initial setting had a cause that set it in motion.
As we see more and more how the brain works, and it becomes common knowledge, then it will be obvious that all of the “tricks” that are played to make machines “appear” intelligent are no more tricky than natural intelligence is. After all, we live in the same universe and are made up of atoms, just like any machine that can be created. Eventually, the human brain will be replicated and surpassed by machines.
Parts of the brain can and will be replaced and augmented. The research and work today points in this direction. Aging populations will demand it in the market place. Biology and silicon will merge. Eventually, every part of the brain will be replaceable by a man-made machine.
The human brain is extremely complex, yet it is routinely created by nature in about nine months. The brain is grown, based on a set of instructions from DNA. In the future, some machines will be grown based on a set of instructions from DNA and by other means. An artificial brain may consist of parts that are grown. Other techniques will surely be discovered. Artificial Neural Networks may one day work as the core of the brain.
Market pressures will insure competitive approaches will be taken and an economical solution will be found, if there is one. Not having an economical solution simply moves the date out further where true AI is achieved.
The intelligent machines will be made of man-made biological devices, ordinary state-of-the-art computers, and hybrids. The machines may be required to contain both analog and digital features, but this is not yet known.
There are many recursive loops within our brain-body system. Massively parallel searching is taking place anytime an idea is retrieved from memory. Some memories take longer to retrieve than others, but a young, healthy brain is too quick to work without parallel searching, and the hardware (network or neuron cells) is there.
Our low-level processes are subject to exactly the same causal laws as the machines we create. Our high-level pattern-recognizing consciousness, with our associated willful and intelligent choices must be what emerges from the low-level neuron-glial cell interactions: within the brain, as the brain connects to the body, and as it interfaces with the external world through the senses.
AI machines will evolve very quickly at some point. It is not clear when that point will start. Some predict much sooner than others. Exponential leaps in technology are real, but the problem being solved may be orders of magnitude more complex then currently believed in the AI community. There is undoubtedly a wide range of opinion on this matter. Experience teaches us that most useful goals take longer to achieve then believed.
Personally, I think a better plan would be the following:
Give a 700 billion dollar tax rebate (that should be around 3,500 each tax payer if there are now 200 million tax payers) with the following caveat:
You must immediately deposit your money into one or more banks or financial institutions for at least 6 months before spending. You may electronically transfer any amount at anytime during this period.
The institutions will compete for their piece of the 700 billion.
Let the bad loans fail or folks like Warren Buffet may buy them at highly discounted values.
Another consideration:
Place a freeze on the paper money supply for 6 months. They (the FED) may not print up anymore money during this period.
This would be a bailout for “main street not wall street”, so the Democrats should be happy. It is also a “free market solution”, so the Republicans should be happy.
In addition, the taxpayer will not lose any money, unless they make a very bad choice or take a very high risk with their $3,500 investments over the next 6 months.
The FED did a bad thing by making interest rates artificially low.
Here is one more. … now that the stakes are even higher.
… I remember Ron Paul saying not too long ago that the numbers would be way higher before this was all through. He is in touch with plenty of inside information on this. He knows how the politicians cannot constrain themselves.
My feeling is that even Lord Keynes would be spinning in his grave by now. How can a scientific, mathematical economic formula possibly come close to working if there are polititians making decisions that are rather arbitrary.
Even Homer Simpson would have said “doh!” by now. Politicians make me chuckle and they make me cry. The well-intended ones must simply be stupid or have volunteered to remain ignorant.
Suppose that, after thorough analysis of the human brain, free will for us is really proven to be an illusion with emergent properties closely associated with consciousness and human intelligence. Some time later, we take this knowledge to build a sophisticated, powerful artificial brain machine with scores of billions of high-speed neurons and possibly trillions of self-modifying synaptic-like connections, which eventually designs an even more sophisticated machine on its own. This new machine calculates how to create free will and so it documents a detailed design of a practical free will machine for us. Should we go ahead and build the free will machine – or more realistically, should we have the machine(s) build it for us?
Suppose the newly built free will machine could be integrated into our brains such that we would have artificial free will. A logging is recorded every time a true free choice is made that is different than the illusory free choice that we would have otherwise made. If the machine has complete knowledge of all of its human host’s needs and wants, it seems possible that it would always decide exactly what we would have decided anyway – it would always do precisely what we “want”. A trillion-dollar do-nothing machine! On the other hand, it might occasionally or frequently select a different choice which may very much anger or disturb the host who ironically feels like he is no longer in control. The host may begin to feel like a slave. The host would want one thing, and his machine would override, resulting in a different decision being made.
If free will is not ruled out, then it is possible that we do not possess it in our own brains, but that it is physically possible to construct a device that would enable it. One of its parts may consist of a type of time machine capable of passing information, in the form of quantum bits, backwards in time through an artificial wormhole. The possible future choice outcome could be analyzed and weighted against the current state. The new future choice could then be taken. The process wouldrecursively repeat until a final decision is made. Effectively we really do go back and change our choice at time “t” (potentially several times). This would satisfy the requirement for free will, since the machine allows for us to make a different choice given the same previous causes. Not only could we make a different choice, but we would occasionally make a different choice for the exact same event, at the exact same time, for the exact same set of circumstances.
Logically speaking, we already have such a devise… to a degree. We can take our past, learned experiences, combined with logical future outcomes, think about logical outcomes until we come up with a final decision that we act upon. We never actually act upon any but one of the “what if” scenarios, but we can often logically deduce the outcome (if I eat the cake, it will taste great, but I will gain weight; if I jump off the cliff without a hang glider, I will likely die; …). At time “t”, we actually make our choice. We end up doing what at least a part of our self “wants”, based on a set of resources within our brain. If we are good at predicting outcomes, then we will often make exactly the same choice that we would have, in the science fiction scenario given above.
With the possession of the time machine, we could actually taste or eat an entire piece of chocolate cake and decide that it is well worth it, and finally decide to actually eat the cake as our final choice. Without the time machine, we may decide to eat the cake, based on the knowledge that the last cake made by the same chef, was really delicious and decide on eating the cake. We must assume here that the time machine owner may not have her cake and eat it too. The owner will forget that she tried the cake once the final decision is made. Otherwise, the owner may conclude that she can both eat the cake and finally not eat the cake, thus gaining the pleasure of the cake eating, and not suffering from the extra fat added on to her body as a result. The machine would work as if it processed future events in its owner’s subconscious – whether it actually did or not – not unlike a medicine that induces short-term amnesia on a patient.
Even the time machine version is deterministic, because the future qubits are still part of the cause of the agent’s final choice, in an automated way. However, that may only be one of the components. It may be completely deterministic, yet satisfy all of the requirements for free will. This deterministic machine allows the agent to change her mind and make a different choice.
Now suppose this same free will machine is kept outside of your brain or is rewired such that your illusionary “free will” referenced the free will machine only when called upon. Perhaps you decide to use it every time you go to play roulette or buy stock. That machine would no longer be a free will machine – it would be used to figure out what to bet on at the casino or what stock to choose. You would surely end up following the money trail in each and every case. Even if not used strictly for money, it would no longer effectively be a free will machine, but just another weight to be used by your deterministic decision making resources – your non-free choice.
It seems an agent could have real free will yet perceive it as slavery since his choices would not always behave in ways he “wants”; have the illusion of free will yet perceive it as real, and prefer the latter. Another possibility is that there is no difference between the two. Then, we have yet another possibility that would have free will, but still be determined in an odd sort of way. Finally, we have the illusion of free will calling upon a free will machine and end up rendering it useless as a free will machine, yet getting wealthy from it as a time machine.
As long as you can do whatever you “want”, why would want the ability to freely “will” a choice? Since you do not posses a time machine, your best bet is to carefully consider all available options, and choose the one you “want” – hopefully the one that has the most promising outcome. Having free will implies that you may choose something other from that which you “want”. What you “want” is based on a process of weighted variables created by competing resources within the brain. The choice or determined decision is not always rational or the best option for your future well being, but it is what you “want” at the time. What you should strive for is to learn how to always “want” what is best for you in the long run. This “want” is determined by a combination of your genetic makeup, and your past experiences.
Most of what you want is determined by subconscious processes that the conscious parts of you never have the privilege of seeing. Many decisions you make happen too quickly – there is no time conscious part of you to rationalize or think about the choice to make. If you are threatened by a predator, your “fight or flight” instincts kick in. If you stopped to ponder the outcome and reflect on all possible options, you will likely be eaten. For decisions that do allow time for thought, for example: “Should we go on vacation next month or not?”, eventually require action or movement in your body parts to make reservations, pick up car keys, drive the car, call a cab or whatever you decide. Eventually, in your brain, an action potential must cause a chain of neurons to fire in the motor cortex portion your brain, triggering a signal to move down your spine, causing your hand(s), arm(s), and/or legs to move – all of which you have no conscious knowledge or direct control.
Repeatable tests continue to show that this action potential occurs well before you consciously decide that you “want” to do something (see here – for a start, then here…feel free to search these and other tests). The thought that initially came to you – the pondering of vacation – initially came into your conscious mind as a result of previous causes in your unconscious resources. Undoubtedly, the fact that the process became conscious has some effect on the overall causal chain, but it is not purposely causal – it is just another set of inputs – or rather it tends to strengthen the already existing variables having to do with the thought processes revolving around the concept of vacationing – a process already set in motion.
It seems that people who are both very happy most of the time, and successful most of the time, within the standards coming from within their own minds, from their family and from their peers; make choices that would most often match up with the choices they would make if they actually did posses the time machine-based free will machine. The same would hold true for those who do what they want, based on hedonistic, short-term gain, as long as they are good at predicting short-term outcome. Any person with good predicting abilities will make the same choices most of the time, within the framework of their personality and their personal philosophy of life. In cases where the free will machine works better than our own choices, it will only be because it is a better predictor, or at least has the potential for being a better predictor, if we assume that the future “trials” do not change the past, present or future.
In the end, possessing a better predictor mechanism, or possessing a mechanism that adds additional weight to any well-informed rational resources within our brains would seem more desirable than possessing true free will. Having true free will, with no benefit of a decent outcome predictor would tend to cause negative outcomes. Having a decent outcome predictor does not require free will to take advantage of it – better to leave those processes in the hands of the unconscious resources deep inside a brain that took tens or hundreds of millions of years to evolve to do what it already does very well on its own. Free will, if possible would be a negative mutation unless it is of the time-machine kind – which is oddly deterministic and a very excellent outcome predictor. However, do you really want to know the outcome of everything you do? You may likely end up perfectly unhappy and never satisfied with no surprises.
Suppose you had a machine that could be implanted in your brain that would stimulate the pleasure zones in your brain every time you think of it or want it…. oops wrong topic…or is it?
=========== New Stuff to Consider ===========
Enjoy more discussions on Free Will at the following forum:
Why are some people so interested in telepathy? We already have cell phones and they work fine for just about everybody. If telepathy works (which I doubt), then only very few people can make use of it anyway, and even those people more than likely have cell phones of their own so they can contact their friends that do not have telepathic abilities!
Suppose scientists discover telepathy is real. Chances are pretty good that the telepathic signals are normally very weak, otherwise they would be much easier to detect and telepathy would have been both discovered and confirmed by now. This means, for the general public to take advantage of telepathy, they will more than likely need to purchase some sort of telepathic amplifier gadget from AT&T, Apple (the iPathy?), or some other company, and the service will probably be more expensive and less reliable than ordinary cell phone service.
Meanwhile, there is already much research in neuroscience on devices that work with thoughts alone. For example, there is a paralyzed man who uses thoughts to move a cursor. In other ten or twenty years, perhaps everyone will be able to use their thoughts to activate wireless communication devices, including cellular or other technology. We could even be sending mentalmarks to other people within the next couple decades.
It almost seems like there is some sort of bias by many spiritual people against electromagnetic waves, ordinary energy and ordinary matter and in favor of so-called supernatural forces or objects. This bias does not make any sense. Suppose God really does exist (which I doubt), then surely God created electromagnetic waves, atoms and all the rest. If God created telepathic energy, where is the evidence that it is something God favors over everything else? If God exists and made everything, why did he make ordinary matter so much more obvious to us than all the so-called spiritual or supernatural stuff? Why belittle stuff that God made so obvious? Why do some spiritual people assume that any supernatural forces exist even if it is true that God exists? If supernatural forces do exist, for what reason is there to believe that these forces are superior to any of the natural forces that we already know exist in the ordinary material world?
I personally think atoms and rest of the material stuff we observe in our universe is extremely amazing and wondrous. We ought to enjoy the world that we are living in right at the moment! We should enjoy all that we can see, hear, taste, touch, and smell with our five ordinary, natural senses.
If supernatural objects or forces do exist, there is no reason to believe they are especially important or useful either to humans or to God. If God exists, perhaps he, she, or it is made up of ordinary atoms or ordinary energy or both. Perhaps the supernatural stuff is the wasteful toxic bi-product of the Creation and that is why God keeps it hidden from us in the first place. Furthermore, the iPathy device, if it ever exists (which I doubt), will probably turn out to cause brain cancer, mental retardation, or worse!
Upgrade01A 
