12 Quotes Tagged: ai

Sometimes it seems as though each new step towards AI, rather than producing something which everyone agrees is real intelligence, merely reveals what real intelligence is not.

Can I cuddle up with you when you sleep?”

Sma stopped, detached the creature from her shoulder with one hand and stared it in the face. “What?”

“Just for chumminess’ sake,” the little thing said, yawning wide and blinking. “I’m not being rude; it’s a good bonding procedure.”

Sma was aware of Skaffen-Amtiskaw glowing red just behind her. She brought the yellow and brown device closer to her face. “Listen, Xenophobe — ”

“Xeny.”

“Xeny. You are a million-ton starship. A Torturer class Rapid Offensive Unit. Even — ”

“But I’m demilitarized!”

“Even without your principle armament, I bet you could waste planets if you wanted to — ”

“Aw, come on; any silly GCU can do that!”

“So what’s all this shit for?” She shook the furry little remote drone, quite hard. Its teeth chattered.

“It’s for a laugh!” it cried. “Sma, don’t you appreciate a joke?”

“I don’t know. Do you appreciate being drop-kicked back to the accommodation area?”

“Ooh! What’s your problem, lady? Have you got something against small furry animals, or what?” Look Ms. Sma, I know very well I’m a ship, and I do everything I’m asked to do — including taking you to this frankly rather fuzzily specified destination — and do it very efficiently, too. If there was the slightest sniff of any real action, and I had to start acting like a warship, this construct in your hands would go lifeless and limp immediately, and I’d battle as ferociously and decisively as I’ve been trained to. Meanwhile, like my human colleagues, I amuse myself harmlessly. If you really hate my current appearance, all right; I’ll change it; I’ll be an ordinary drone, or just a disembodied voice, or talk to you through Skaffen-Amtiskaw here, or through your personal terminal. The last thing I want is to offend a guest.”

Sma pursed her lips. She patted the thing on its head and sighed. “Fair enough.”

“I can keep this shape?”

“By all means.”

“Oh goody!” It squirmed with pleasure, then opened its big eyes wide and looked hopefully at her. “

They’re called sock puppets. We create armies of artificial online personas – user accounts that espouse views certain interested parties want espoused. We flood forums, online comment sections, social media. ... It’s amazing what a few people and a little money can accomplish online. Our puppets have turned whole elections. … Everything the public sees is managed. If there’s a valuable brand to protect – whether it’s a person or a dish soap – these fuckers are out there protecting it, shaping the narrative. I mean… who the hell follows dish soap on Twitter? How does anyone believe that shit’s real? (p. 292-294)

Part of why predicting the ending to our AI [artificial intelligence] story is so difficult is because this isn’t just a story about machines. It’s also a story about human beings, people with free wills that allows them to make their own choices and to shape their own destinies. Our AI future will be created by us, and it will reflect the choices we make and the actions we take.

I believe that at the end of the century the use of words and general educated opinion will have altered so much that one will be able to speak of machines thinking without expecting to be contradicted.

Cannot you see, cannot all you lecturers see, that it is we that are dying, and that down here the only thing that really lives is the Machine? We created the Machine, to do our will, but we cannot make it do our will now. It has robbed us of the sense of space and of the sense of touch, it has blurred every human relation and narrowed down love to a carnal act, it has paralysed our bodies and our wills, and now it compels us to worship it. The Machine develops — but not on our lines. The Machine proceeds — but not to our goal. We only exist as the blood corpuscles that course through its arteries, and if it could work without us, it would let us die.

"On the other hand it is possible that human control over the
machines may be retained. In that case the average man may have
control over certain private machines of his own, such as his car of
his personal computer, but control over large systems of machines will
be in the hands of a tiny elite — just as it is today, but with two
difference. Due to improved techniques the elite will have greater
control over the masses; and because human work will no longer be
necessary the masses will be superfluous, a useless burden on the
system. If the elite is ruthless the may simply decide to exterminate
the mass of humanity. If they are humane they may use propaganda or
other psychological or biological techniques to reduce the birth rate
until the mass of humanity becomes extinct, leaving the world to the
elite. Or, if the elite consist of soft-hearted liberals, they may
decide to play the role of good shepherds to the rest of the human
race. They will see to it that everyone's physical needs are
satisfied, that all children are raised under psychologically hygienic
conditions, that everyone has a wholesome hobby to keep him busy, and
that anyone who may become dissatisfied undergoes "treatment" to cure
his "problem." Of course, life will be so purposeless that people will
have to be biologically or psychologically engineered either to remove
their need for the power process or to make them "sublimate" their
drive for power into some harmless hobby. These engineered human
beings may be happy in such a society, but they most certainly will
not be free. They will have been reduced to the status of domestic
animals."

With few ambitions, most people allowed efficient machines to perform everyday tasks for them. Gradually, humans ceased to think, or dream... or truly live.

The power of self-replication is now found in four fields of high technology: geno, robo, info, and nano.

It is change, continuing change, inevitable change, that is the dominant factor in society today. No sensible decision can be made any longer without taking into account not only the world as it is, but the world as it will be...
This, in turn, means that our statesmen, our businessmen, our everyman must take on a science fictional way of thinking.

The question of whether a computer can think is no more interesting than the question of whether a submarine can swim.

Just as science is permeated with 'conceptual revolution' on all levels at all times, so the thinking of individuals is shot through and through with creative and new acts. Computer programs today do not yet seem to produce many small creations. Most of what they do is quite 'mechanical' still. That just testifies to the fact that they are not close to simulating the way we think–but they are getting closer.

Perhaps what differentiates highly creative ideas from ordinary ones is some combined sense of beauty, simplicity, and harmony.