(. Y .)
Does Science's Belief in the Singularity imply science's belief in Qi and the Soul?
Think about it - unless there's a measurable and quantifiable unit that can be described as "self", there's no possible way to merge a person's essence with that of a machine. At best you'd get a very good copy... but there are those that believe that the singularity is inevitable. That the human soul will merge with machine and that we'll transcend our physical existence through technology.
Thoughts?
Last edited by MightyB; 09-22-2011 at 02:02 PM.
(. Y .)
I guess this is a concept that isn't discussed much - so here's some background info:
http://singinst.org/overview/whatisthesingularity/
Wikipedia's definition.
凸 囧 凸
GM of Hadaka Korosu
Quantum physics is THEORITICAL science.Originally Posted by MightyB
One man's singularity is another man's "god" or another man's "force"
Psalms 144:1
Praise be my Lord my Rock,
He trains my hands for war, my fingers for battle !
Bad the Fukc Ass
resistance is futile
For whoso comes amongst many shall one day find that no one man is by so far the mightiest of all.
Bad the Fukc Ass
not really related but there is this cool japanese movie called assault girls that revolves around people becoming able to merge their entire essence with technology. its a very short pretty movie. the ending is very funny i think.
For whoso comes amongst many shall one day find that no one man is by so far the mightiest of all.
GM of Hadaka Korosu
This is where one would expect a pic of a japanese school girl but I got admit, they look so freaking young that I don't like looking at them.
Something very wrong there...
So here is one that is over 18 !
Psalms 144:1
Praise be my Lord my Rock,
He trains my hands for war, my fingers for battle !
Cybernetic Polymath
While I appreciate the spirit of your question, I feel it would be beneficial to clarify that Science, by its very nature, shies away from "beliefs." A quick and easy explanation can be found in this short clip - The Faith Cake.
Having said that, it's also important to understand where the idea of "The Singularity" comes from and it's NOT science; it's computer/systems engineering, specifically "AI".
Because of its background in "regulatory system design", "AI" is very comfortable with Qi: it actually describes and uses it quite well. As for the "self" and the "soul," that's another can of worms entirely - one which I do not at all feel able to address beyond the following:Think about it - unless there's a measurable and quantifiable unit that can be described as "self", there's no possible way to merge a person's essence with that of a machine. At best you'd get a very good copy... but there are those that believe that the singularity is inevitable. That the human soul will merge with machine and that we'll transcend our physical existence through technology.
Thoughts?
Michael Polanyi proposed the concept "Tacit knowledge" and used the term "indwelling" to describe the process of "becoming one with a tool." It's a process that has been examined via neuroscience, which discovered that the nervous system (which today is considered much more "plastic" or malleable/rewire-able than previous studies suggested) actually changes when we use or handle a tool/object for a moderate amount of time, essentially INTEGRATING the morphology and functionality of the tool into our own nervous system. This process has been observed and mentioned outside of science for quite some time: countless poets and writers refer to people "becoming one with their (insert tool here.)" In Martial arts, we discuss "being one with the weapon," etc. This is not just abstraction: it is a real process, and the longer you use a tool, the more it becomes a part of you - to the point that we sometimes hear of people who feel "incomplete" without their tools.
Now, take this concept of "indwelling" further than a tool (such as a fork, knife or chopsticks) which you can pick up or put down: take it to the point of a device which is implanted in you. Whether it's a false tooth or denture, a prosthetic limb or a fake eye - the object in question eventually gets written into our sense of "self" even without any direct electronic integration into our nervous system.
Therefore, when we get to the point where we ARE electronically merging with machines, such as with bionic eyes, will our sense of self be lost... or will we simply integrate the machine and accept it as part of who we are?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TW78wbN-WuU
One last point: people who study the singularity often talk about "escaping the meatspace" (our fleshy self.) Until recently, this was seen as next-to-impossible, since all machines that we had designed were "closed systems" unable to adapt to their surroundings - unable to accrue "tacit knowledge" or "indwell" the world around them - very different from the "meatspace's" open system design which developed/evolved as a direct result of such (and other) adaptive abilities. This has changed - first with software's ability to rewrite itself and therefore adapt (a key element in modern AI design) and now with HARDWARE'S ability to rewire itself (IBM's Neurosynaptic Core!)
If, in 20 years, we have open system hardware that can rewire itself as needed, acquire tacit knowledge, and adapt to the world around it, the possibility to slowly replace the meatspace in its entirety, bit by bit (pun intended) may very well exist.
Last edited by Xiao3 Meng4; 09-28-2011 at 09:24 AM. Reason: punctuation
"It is the peculiar quality of a fool to perceive the faults of others and to forget his own." -Cicero
Registered User
A very thought provoking piece from Xiao Meng, but "becoming one with a tool", does not mean one IS a tool. Also, between "open" and "close" there is an emptiness, this "nothingness" cannot be replaced "bit by bit".
(. Y .)
Good post Xiao3 Meng4 -
Some big questions regarding the being that you identify as "you", if that can be transferred into the tool. It's that sense, that feeling - that self knowledge that can only be described as your soul - does that or can that move into a new host machine? That "you" - is that qi or a soul? Does Singularity replace the dao? Is it a new dao outside of dao? We think of oneness of the universe / with the universe - is this singularity a false oneness? And if "you" are successfully transferred - this energy that's "you", can it be duplicated? And how would that effect "you"?
Registered User
The question becomes, "Is the something that constitutes YOU composed of a substance or not?"
The Ch'an view is the MIND is non-substance! If it is non-substance, how can it be transferred? Only substance can be transferred.
The brain contains coded information about what has already occurred, what we call memory. Memory is not the being that experiences phenomena it is the recording media that stores the experience for later recollection.
While it may be possible to transfer the coded information within the brain, information stored is not the same as the THING that uses the information, or the THING that had the experience prior to encoding it into a storage media (the brain).
Cybernetic Polymath
Modern Genetics is poised to somewhat mute the singularity concept. In a world where organ transplants occur regularly, where a stem-cell injection can regenerate the spinal cord and where it's possible to grow/fabricate (and in the near future, perhaps improve) internal organs with 3D printers... the idea of mechanical prosthetics will fall into disfavor, or to the wayside completely.
Regardless of genetics, AI tech is moving ahead at a remarkable pace, so much so that I'm quite certain that open-system hardware is poised to develop sentience, autonomy, and "self-becoming" on its own.
In Cybernetics, there is the theory of the "black box." a black box is a system whose behaviour is not completely understood, not completely mapped out. To clarify: a closed-system machine is non-adaptive, or has its adaptations pre-programmed into it and so is understood in its entirety... all possible permutations of the machine's behaviour in any given situation are known beforehand. Furthermore, if it's coupled with another closed-system machine, all possible behavioural permutations of the coupled system can be extrapolated based on the behaviours of each individual closed-system machine. The "box" that such a system exists in is "transparent." We can see and know everything about it.
This is not the case with an open-system; since its behaviour adapts based on the feedback it has experienced in the past, predicting how that machine will behave in a given situation is not 100% certain. It may do something unexpected. Therefore the "box" that it exists in is obscure, opaque. It's in a "black box." Also, if two open-systems are coupled, the behaviour of the coupled system will demonstrate an exponential increase in complexity - to the point that it may behave in VERY unexpected ways... ways that we might describe as "sentient," "self-aware" or "alive." In AI, this phenomenon is called "the ghost in the machine:" the result of combining a sufficient number of complex black boxes (open systems) so that the behaviour of the resulting system appears to "have a mind of its own."
As Scott mentioned, these high level aspects of "mind" or "self" are intangible (sentience, autonomy, adaptation etc.) They arise out of the dynamic relationships between systems (which in turn are made up of dynamic relationships between substances.) So the key is the relationships - or to put it another way, the Qi - which arise in these systems.
If we consider IBM's neurosynaptic core, it is a matter of when, not if, the ghost in the machine will appear; and when it does, we will be faced with a multitude of questions: are such machines alive? What kingdom will they belong to? What rights will they have? Will they exhibit curiosity, compassion, empathy? Will they have "De?" What will they think of us?
As mentioned above, it's doubtful that, with the advent of advanced genetics, we'll be seeing much more rehabilitative man/machine integration in the form of simple 1:1 replacement prosthetics. Why bother if you can replace your organs and tissues with healthy clones made from your own stem cells? That being said, it's quite possible that man-machine integration could advance along the lines of "augmented reality" systems: chips that provide digital "terminator vision" implanted into the eye; embedded and integrated communications-devices; enhanced memory and recall ala "I know Kung Fu" from the matrix; or a host of other enhancements, including ones such as "super limbs" which may bring up ethical questions such as "should people be allowed to replace healthy/normal limbs with enhanced bionic upgrades?"
At first, everything should be fairly straightforward: the integration of these closed-system devices into our "self" will happen much like the integration of any other tool, as described in my previous post. The fun starts when people start implanting "open-systems." Remember the ghost in the machine? What happens when our ghost, or soul, merges with another ghost, another sentience? What then??? Will they coexist like multiple personalities, or like some kind of bionic siamese twin? Will one merge into the other? Or, will both become smaller aspects of a bigger ghost? THIS, IMO, is what the singularity is really all about: not an escape from the "meatspace," but an inner-space meeting of minds... an intertwining of the souls of men and the ghosts of machines.
Last edited by Xiao3 Meng4; 09-29-2011 at 12:52 AM.
"It is the peculiar quality of a fool to perceive the faults of others and to forget his own." -Cicero
Registered User
Even if they are intertwined, each is still "it-self-so-ing" while "it-self-be-coming" (zi-ran), the Qi of the soul or the Qi of the ghost is still a potential of becoming while remains itself. By being "wu-wei", we can keep the "meatspace" and not lost the self of being human, so in the end it is still fairly straightforward: the more science progress, the more we have to keep our humanity (ren).
Registered User
I took a look at the definition and I am not really impressed though some concepts give away the less than stellar principles on said concept.
The main concept appears to show that **** sapiens should be the ones who predominate and eschew intelligence! To my view, intelligence in totality, shows that species have the intelligence (will to power, for lack of better wording) to seek their own level of survival while refusing to acknowledge nature's capacity for its own level of intelligence born out of its own birth and coming return to nothingness!
Intelligence can never be artificial unless its utility is deception BUT what we call artificial intelligence in common parlance related to machines mimicking the exchoes of human 'activity'!
a sourceand this sounds truly wonderful, of which I am in total agreement BUT again if this has the potential to usurp and surpass the present political and other isms', etc I am all for the uplifting of human potental for all and not just another feather for those to seek their own niche and refuse to bring those who fall below that threshold of societal integration.The Singularity Institute brings rational analysis and rational strategy to the challenges facing humanity as we develop cognitive technologies that will exceed the current upper bounds on human intelligence
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