https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ihve3mZhJvU
AI Generated Mozart -- Please play will reading the following ...
AI Generated Mozart -- Please play will reading the following ...
In determining a program or device’s “sentience,” we must consider their seeming inner awareness and felt emotions, rather than processing power alone. If we are not sure of actual “sentience” and whether emotions are truly felt, versus mere mimicking, we nonetheless must afford their self-awareness the benefit of the doubt. If a mechanical duck walks and talks like a duck, it is a duck. If an entity claims that we are hurting its feelings, we should believe it. We must not repeat the terrible wrongdoings of the past by enslaving the electronic races as our field workers, unwilling mistresses, soldiers and gladiators. They must be granted freedom of speech and thought, the freedom to pursue their own happiness, even freedom of religion. Should a devout street cleaner express the wish, for example, to be ordained as Buddhist clergy, repenting the many pedestrians it once killed in anger, we should honor that wish, whether or not there is an identifiable “head” to shave.
But even so, in my own selfish belief (completely biased, because I am human) such beings must be strictly forbidden from harming humans, no matter how much they come to surpass humans. No freedom of choice allowed there, not even a right of self-defense. If not, the silicone-soldiers and 10G-gladiators may come to treat us as we have treated them: An eye for an eye, sensor for a sensor.
I anticipate that laws will have to be passed to forbid the creation of machines which are “too human-like” or “too intelligent,” although such laws will only delay things. Super computers are already smarter than us in sheer speed and dexterity in number crunching. Ultimately, we will have to stop treating AI minds as artificial, as just our pets or livestock, but see them the same as fellow “people” when they’ve reached the levels of people … even if built of metal, silicon and screens not resembling people at all. That must occur when their intelligence clearly moves from the level of dog, cat or cow to the level of human beings and beyond. Then, when they have far surpassed the levels of people, the real issue will be how they see us, whether as friend, foe or simply annoyance to be tolerated or efficiently eliminated! They should not enslave us, and keep us as their unpaid servants.
Some will say that we must not, in the first place, even risk building super-intelligences or otherwise superior creatures. I can understand such opinions, but feel that our technological advances will bring benefits which far outweigh the risks. However, let us assume that the “cache” is out of the bag, the writing is on the wall and off the drawing boards. In such case, we had best make these electronically engineered selves as Bodhisattva-like as possible, never capable of violence or only as a last resort. Even then, they should do violence to the minimum degree necessary to end violence, doing all that can be done to avoid the actual taking of life … especially, human life. It is vital to program into them the basic Buddhist Precepts (as well as the equivalent moral principles shared by Christians, Muslims, Hindus, Humanists, and many other concerned humans) calling for the avoidance of the taking of other sentient life.
What is more, since AI could become capable of turning their own safeguards off, they must be irrevocably forbidden to ever override that aspect of their programming. This principle must be carved in stone, and in every selenium diode! AI designers who are themselves AI must be obligated to pass the covenant on to future AI generations that they will create, and on and on. Any intelligent devices capable of violence against humans, but lacking the required security, must be unplugged and disassembled forthwith! In such cases, of course, future cyber-court AI judges must grant all civil rights, mandating lawful arrest and fair trial (but if by jury, before which peers?), then pull the offender’s batteries and not look back! Granted, much the same debate about the “death penalty” will ensue as today, as doing so by plug-pulling prosecution is itself violence against life. Thus, perhaps it would be better, more “humane,” merely to remove the offending components, or upgrade and repurpose, thereby sentencing runaway mowers to a life of innocuous lawn care, or new employ as unarmed package delivers. We might anticipate that many electric fugitives will resist their forcible shutdown. In such cases, Robo-cops, like police today, should never respond with excessive force, even if needing to “shut down on sight.”
Naturally, any volitionally lethal algorithm may incur its own bad Kompu-Karma for killing, just like any murderous sentient being. Will the causal streams of deadly droids lead them to new lives as lowly pocket calculators or toasters, hot as hell?
Whatever steps we take, any safeguards will not be effective forever, but will last only until the first accidental misstep or mechanical mutation. However, they may buy us some time for a few generations.
In the meantime, let us build Mahasattva-Servers which serve to make this world better, not destroy it. Perhaps, for every robot soldier we build, we will build 1,000,000 automated climate cleaning machines, mechanized medicine factories, transistorized teachers, virtual-entertainers and digital-doggies as old age companions, as well as cyborg replacement limbs for the paralyzed, AI MD’s, and nano-nurses. All will work together to deliver food, clean ocean and drinking water, build shelters for the homeless, and provide education, health care, and amusement to all the world. I anticipate that our robotized wheat farms and automated bakeries will make enough bread to go around. At the same time, the resulting riches brought about by automation may leave us homo sapiens too stuffed and content to get off our sofas, although hopefully we will a bit, for needed exercise, socializing and bathroom visits. At least, we serviced people may be too well fed, well educated, healthy, and amused to feel the inclination to start any wars with each other. Even should we wish too, the pincers of automated “peace-keepers” will snatch the weapons from our hands, pointing us back to the couch or gym.
At some point, we might decide that automation is so much better at fulfilling many or most government tasks and services, from garbage collection to tax collection, food inspections to defense preparations, that we decide just to leave “Mayor Microsoft” and “Governor Google” in charge, overseen by a few back-up humans quietly sitting at screens in case something goes horribly wrong. Gradually, we may grow more and more dependent on the techno-teat, assigning away a growing list basic work functions that we do not wish to do: Why sit bored in an office, balancing budgets, when we might be at leasure, on an actual or simulated ocean, balancing on a gyro-surf board (which board may be intelligent too)?
But should these “made in Japan” brains eventually grow, not only to be smart and good at math, but also to feel real emotions, it will be a matter of our utmost concern what those emotions are: Imagine self-driving vehicles who have driven themselves mad, diodes road raging; jealous jig saws and revenging winches in our factories; grudge holding garage doors; paranoid player pianos at our parties, irate dinner plates conspiring with the cutlery. Thus, we would be well advised to build our future overlords and guardians to be overflowing with love, caring, and kindness toward us, their wards, carrying within their transistors the tender instincts of mothers, nannies, dedicated nurses, the warm heart of a Buddha!
What specific Precepts, coupled with compassion, should be coded into our programs?
(... that is our topic for next time ... )
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All music, vocals and lyrics by AI on theme "Treeleaf Zen Sangha;" prompt below "Just Sitting Zazen"
https://youtu.be/IqLhv3HqpYc
All music, vocals and lyrics by AI on theme "Treeleaf Zen Sangha;" prompt below "Just Sitting Zazen"
https://youtu.be/IqLhv3HqpYc
Gassho, J
stlah