When robots have feelings

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midcan5

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If the mind is the brain and conscious because of it, does it follow that a conscious machine is a brain is a mind. And if a mind is the moral element of the human and because of that fact possessed with rights does it follow that a conscious machine possesses rights?

By Peter Singer and Agata Sagan

"If, as seems likely, we develop super-intelligent machines, their rights will need protection, too."

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/dec/14/rage-against-machines-robots

and this on the mind: http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/vilayanur_ramachandran_on_your_mind.html

"...the "astonishing hypothesis" — that even our loftiest thoughts and aspirations are mere byproducts of neural activity. We are nothing but a pack of neurons."
http://www.edge.org/3rd_culture/ramachandran06/ramachandran06_index.html

and Amazon.com: Wider Than the Sky: The Phenomenal Gift of Consciousness (9780300107616): Gerald M. Edelman: Books
 
For now, this is the stuff of fiction, but it won't be forever.

Technically, robots and machines already have some legal protections because they are currently considered the property of the person who creates or uses them.

That's not the same as rights, of course.

This will probably become political the day that some kind of man-made machine does something that would make itself different from a piece of property.

Then the question is whether a machine can do something to independently differentiate itself from an animal or a pet (or what's more, a puppet of some human creator).

There is a threshold to cross from being an endearing thing many people want to safeguard under the law, to becoming an individual being, which can protect itself under the law and exercise rights and the responsibilities that come with them.

Another question that I think will emerge for people who give it some serious consideration in the future is that no matter how lifelike a machine may become, it would be difficult to ascertain if machines are exercising free thought and free will.

For instance, if we granted robots the right to vote, would we be giving their human creators proxy votes? And what would the specifications of a rights-worthy robot be?
 
midcan5 said:
If the mind is the brain and conscious because of it, does it follow that a conscious machine is a brain is a mind. And if a mind is the moral element of the human and because of that fact possessed with rights does it follow that a conscious machine possesses rights?

By Peter Singer and Agata Sagan

"If, as seems likely, we develop super-intelligent machines, their rights will need protection, too."

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/dec/14/rage-against-machines-robots

and this on the mind: http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/vilayanur_ramachandran_on_your_mind.html

"...the "astonishing hypothesis" — that even our loftiest thoughts and aspirations are mere byproducts of neural activity. We are nothing but a pack of neurons."
http://www.edge.org/3rd_culture/ramachandran06/ramachandran06_index.html

and Amazon.com: Wider Than the Sky: The Phenomenal Gift of Consciousness (9780300107616): Gerald M. Edelman: Books
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The only reason a machine would be super-intelligent is because that many more people (or man-hours) spent time programming for it, look at deep blue for instance.
No matter how much time is spent on programming a machine, even if you programmed how it should respond in tone, facial expressions and whatever else you thought would make it look like genuine emotion, it will never take away from the fact that all of it's intelligence is artificial - it doesn't come from the machine itself but from instructions.
Why would such a thing ever have rights? You may "feel" it should, but that feeling would likely come from how real you felt the interraction was rather than any scientific basis of it being a free thinking creature with rights that it would care by itself about being violated.
 
There is no such thing as free will. A robot will want to do with it's time whatever we program its desires to be. We could literally make working on the assembly line feel for a robot like sex with Jessica Alba does for us. Would that be a violation of it's rights? Well, if it's a violation of its rights, why is nature programming you "against your will" to constantly hunger, constantly want to breathe, constantly want to reproduce any different? The only reason we normally think differently is because of our naturally spiritualistic thinking which is not materially valid. Free will is a damned lie.

The concept of consciousness itself is just spiritualistic thinking. Consciousness is only the functioning of your brain, not some high and lofty concept outside of space.
 
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KingCondanomation said:
The only reason a machine would be super-intelligent is because that many more people (or man-hours) spent time programming for it, look at deep blue for instance.
No matter how much time is spent on programming a machine, even if you programmed how it should respond in tone, facial expressions and whatever else you thought would make it look like genuine emotion, it will never take away from the fact that all of it's intelligence is artificial - it doesn't come from the machine itself but from instructions.
Why would such a thing ever have rights? You may "feel" it should, but that feeling would likely come from how real you felt the interraction was rather than any scientific basis of it being a free thinking creature with rights that it would care by itself about being violated.
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Why should anything have rights damo? Artificial vs. natural is a meaningless and arbitrary distinction of no value to this debate.
 
Watermark said:
There is no such thing as free will. A robot will want to do with it's time whatever we program its desires to be. We could literally make working on the assembly line feel for a robot like sex with Jessica Alba does for us. Would that be a violation of it's rights? Well, if it's a violation of its rights, why is nature programming you "against your will" to constantly hunger, constantly want to breathe, constantly want to reproduce any different? The only reason we normally think differently is because of our naturally spiritualistic thinking which is not materially valid. Free will is a damned lie.

The concept of consciousness itself is just spiritualistic thinking. Consciousness is only the functioning of your brain, not some high and lofty concept outside of space.
Click to expand...

This is just the other extreme from Midcan, of course there is such thing as free will - you exercise it every time you make a choice. You could argue that those choices have some influences from genetic programming or environmental conditions, but those are just influences, the ultimate decision will be your will.
 
ITs already happened, did you not see how upset Al Gore was when Bush took the presidency?
 
KingCondanomation said:
This is just the other extreme from Midcan, of course there is such thing as free will - you exercise it every time you make a choice. You could argue that those choices have some influences from genetic programming or environmental conditions, but those are just influences, the ultimate decision will be your will.
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Your will is a direct result of those influences.
 
KingCondanomation said:
This is just the other extreme from Midcan, of course there is such thing as free will - you exercise it every time you make a choice. You could argue that those choices have some influences from genetic programming or environmental conditions, but those are just influences, the ultimate decision will be your will.
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those that deny the existence of free will would point out that the "choices" you are making are merely the result of outside forces acting upon you. In reality, you do not make a single choice, it's just an illusion
 
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