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Substrate-independent minds

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Maybe a transition to silicone would be adaptive for life for the following reason:

Are Gamma-Ray Bursts Keeping Life from Developing in the Universe? | Motherboard

... Fortunately, the probability of a lethal GRB goes down quickly the further we are from the galactic center. This means that Earth is relatively protected, yet most other habitable exoplanets would be found closer in. Near the center of a galaxy, lethal GRBs are almost guaranteed—periodic biological cleanses.

What's more, the universe only becomes more compact as we go back in time, and for much of history, life as we know it would be just plain impossible

"It seems the survival of life, as we know it on Earth, was only a recent phenomenon in the history of the Universe caused by the growth of large galaxies," Piran et al write. "Life forms that might have existed earlier or that exist today in other regions of the Universe that are much more susceptible to significant GRB bombardment must have been much more resilient to radiation than life on Earth."

The authors note that regular gamma-ray wipes might be a good thing for the overall development of higher-order life, but if that life happened to already exist at the time, it would likely die a miserable death. In the interim, we should probably worry about other sorts of radiation dooms.​
 
Soupie said:
Maybe a transition to silicone would be adaptive for life for the following reason:

Are Gamma-Ray Bursts Keeping Life from Developing in the Universe? | Motherboard

... Fortunately, the probability of a lethal GRB goes down quickly the further we are from the galactic center. This means that Earth is relatively protected, yet most other habitable exoplanets would be found closer in. Near the center of a galaxy, lethal GRBs are almost guaranteed—periodic biological cleanses.

What's more, the universe only becomes more compact as we go back in time, and for much of history, life as we know it would be just plain impossible

"It seems the survival of life, as we know it on Earth, was only a recent phenomenon in the history of the Universe caused by the growth of large galaxies," Piran et al write. "Life forms that might have existed earlier or that exist today in other regions of the Universe that are much more susceptible to significant GRB bombardment must have been much more resilient to radiation than life on Earth."

The authors note that regular gamma-ray wipes might be a good thing for the overall development of higher-order life, but if that life happened to already exist at the time, it would likely die a miserable death. In the interim, we should probably worry about other sorts of radiation dooms.​
Click to expand...

Look, would one of you fellows just come out and say it??

"I want to live forever in a shiny super-suit with godlike powers ..."

26e6f4b5561545b59663e0f4f9c572b0.jpg


;-)

...

Now, here is an interesting question ... will people be willing to die for Transhumanism?

And once people get their super-suits and immortality or great longevity ... what sacrifices, if any, will they be willing to make ... for anything?

It's one thing to sacrifice for your children (genes, genes!) when you won't live forever as an individual anyway ...

Serious question ... with follow up questions depending on your answer.

... this will be more Vonnegut than Heinlein, serious humor/satire - not hard science but


1. "The ability to do a thing" - as the main characters guiding moral principle

And how he places it between

Do into others

And

("Do what you will, shall be the whole of the law." - Crowley)

2. The paradox of sacrificing your life for others to become immortal


... as an HR issue

I want to try and use ...

If I have energy this weekend I'll start and post an excerpt.

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Possible titles

Do Androids Hunt Electric Snipe?

Do Androids Tip Electric Cows? (DATEC)


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smcder said:
@Soupie @ufology

What do you think of this principle?

"The ability to do a thing is all the right you need to do so."

- Whitley Streiber
Click to expand...
Might makes right?

The ability to do a thing may give one the right to do it, but it is by no means a reason to do it. Nor does it mean it would be wise to do it.

The only alternative is a utilitarian principle, right? I'm not sure it would be superior to might.
 
mike said:
Its all relative i guess, there are some things that have been done that perhaps shouldnt like nukes and MIRVs. But as i believe one of Streibers alleged visitors once told him, the universe has one simple rule

The ability to do a thing is all the right you need to do so.

When we apply this maxim to various scenarios our moral response will differ from example to example, But at the end of the day there is a simple logic to that statement.

I think AI or SI as i prefer to call it, will be implemented in the same way seatbelts were, Seatbelts save lives as the slogan goes.

If it turns out cars fitted with AI dont crash like human piloted ones do now, then we will see them included as standard items like airbags, seatbelts and their poor cousins anti collision systems.

If SI Doctors and surgeons do a statistically better job than biologicals, again they will likely replace them.

Ufologys example is another good one

Other industrys will use them such as mining and prostitution

In their paper, they envision a future where robotic prostitutes are the solution to the sex industry's most glaring problems, such as human trafficking, human degradation and the spread of sexually transmitted infections.

Robot Prostitutes, the Future of Sex Tourism : Discovery News

Robot Restaurant: Robots cook food and wait tables in Harbin | Daily Mail Online

Aged care is another area


At Hanson Robotics, the team believes the immediate future for the business lies in creating animatronic robots for theme parks while it develops for the longer term lifelike androids to work in hospitals and with special needs children.

Hanson Robotics Inc Home - Hanson Robotics Inc

The Future of Artificial Intelligence: AI 140 British Android ‘Jules’ Mimics Facial Expressions with human like qualities

And yes, the issues in regards to "jobs" is a very real one, but not without precident. Tractors replaced the horse. Robots now do many things humans did in years gone by.

Adding SI to hanson robotics type bodys will enable them to delve even deeper into roles done by humans such as tour guides ,waiters, bar staff etc etc. But this is inevitable as it was in the automotive industry, and for the same reasons
Click to expand...


@Soupie

It's from @mike's post - quoted about, here is the relevant section:

"Its all relative i guess, there are some things that have been done that perhaps shouldnt like nukes and MIRVs. But as i believe one of Streibers alleged visitors once told him, the universe has one simple rule
The ability to do a thing is all the right you need to do so.
When we apply this maxim to various scenarios our moral response will differ from example to example, But at the end of the day there is a simple logic to that statement."

He was listing all the things that they said couldn't be done - and I said the question wasn't if they could be done but should they be done. The maxim above conflates the two. To me, simplicity is the sole virtue of that rule. I asked @mike for a source - because I'd like to use it in the short story I'm writing.

I'd like @ufology opinion too!
 
Soupie said:
Might makes right?

The ability to do a thing may give one the right to do it, but it is by no means a reason to do it. Nor does it mean it would be wise to do it.

The only alternative is a utilitarian principle, right? I'm not sure it would be superior to might.
Click to expand...

Alternatives include:

"Do what you will, shall be the whole of the law." Alistair Crowley
And
"Do unto others as you would have them do unto you." Anonymous

a highly Darwinian maxim, by the way, according to this little book:

The Labyrinth: God, Darwin, and the Meaning of Life: Philip Appleman: 9781593720575: Amazon.com: Books
 
Just playing around, but here's a couple of characters from the story I mentioned ... also going to be a female AI

Felix DreXxler - of unknown origin, the name is a mash up of K Eric Drexler the father of nano-technology and Felix Hoenikker - inventor of "Ice 9" in Vonnegut's Cat's Cradle. He write the second X big because everyone mis-spells his name and because it helps him remember a special formula. Prefers the unpronounceable designation DXx - minimizes verbal communication and has eliminated all in person contact.

Ray Langeweile - American inventor (the German word "kurz" means short, "weil" means because - if you type in "kurz weil" in google translate you get "just because" but the German word Langeweile means "boredom" so I went with that.
 
Soupie said:
The first one doesn't seem to be different, and the second one only applies to things we might do to others.
Click to expand...

OK - we are talking about a moral principle: Mike says that the ability to do a thing is its justification ... it can't be a rule for action, because it's not specific ... it has to be in the context of something you are considering doing, not to tell you what to do ... so

As to the first ... that's the point!
As to the second ...

1. *sigh*
2. OK, change it to: do unto the other as you would have done unto you ... that should broaden it up a bit for you ... then it covers the environment, animals ... other parts of yourself etc
3. suppose you are ALL ALONE in the universe, would you need a moral rule??
4. What is your rule?

Work with me here. ;-)
 
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smcder said:
@Soupie @ufology

What do you think of this principle?

"The ability to do a thing is all the right you need to do so."

- Whitley Streiber
Click to expand...

Assuming that by Strieber is interpreting "right" as synonymous with entitlement, power, prerogative, title, privilege, or claim, as opposed to a moral or social condition ( e.g. human rights ), then Strieber has a defensible position. However we don't know the context of the quote, so we can't be sure about it's intended meaning. Can you surround it in the text of it's original form or provide a link to the source?
 
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ufology said:
Assuming that by Strieber is interpreting "right" as synonymous with entitlement, power, prerogative, title, privilege, or claim, as opposed to a moral or social condition ( e.g. human rights ), then Strieber has a defensible position. However we don't know the context of the quote, so we can't be sure about it's intended meaning. Can you surround it in the text of it's original form or provide a link to the source?
Click to expand...

Right, but we do have context for it's use by @mike which is what I'd like to ask your opinion on.

See post #648 for context, here's an excerpt:

"Its all relative i guess, there are some things that have been done that perhaps shouldnt like nukes and MIRVs. But as i believe one of Streibers alleged visitors once told him, the universe has one simple rule

The ability to do a thing is all the right you need to do so.

When we apply this maxim to various scenarios our moral response will differ from example to example, But at the end of the day there is a simple logic to that statement."


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smcder said:
Right, but we do have context for it's use by @mike which is what I'd like to ask your opinion on.

See post #648 for context, here's an excerpt:

"Its all relative i guess, there are some things that have been done that perhaps shouldnt like nukes and MIRVs. But as i believe one of Streibers alleged visitors once told him, the universe has one simple rule

The ability to do a thing is all the right you need to do so.

When we apply this maxim to various scenarios our moral response will differ from example to example, But at the end of the day there is a simple logic to that statement."
Click to expand...
If the right to do things is based on ability alone, then it appears that we also have the right to reject that claim.
 
Especially around this time of year I used to check out several robotics stores online:

I saw the AIBO demonstrated briefly in Dallas but it always remained out of price ... there was the ICybie, a less capable but as-cool-looking cyber pet:

93e96617c6ff4e07a7834534dd635b04.jpg


I did have the early LEGO Mindstorms kits and made some home brew sensors as well as used NotQuiteC for programming ... good way to learn C++ fundamentals.

BEAM Robotics and Symets
(Mark Tilden - )

Solarbotics
(Arduino/freeduino)

Symet Sample Chapter

The Robot Store

And probably my favorite:

TheRobotStore.com

They used to sell Fischertechnik sets which fascinated me - I was just browsing the site and came across this beastie:

Robot Security Guard

Looks to be millitary surplus, can identify "fleshy targets" and fire on them at two miles range! (This model has been modified to fire paint balls.)

Yours for 300 grand!

Lots of memories browsing this stuff - I came across this sure selling humanoid robots. ... It locked my phone browser up do I didn't get a good look at their products, including the Nao.

Aldebaran Robotics | Humanoid robotics & programmable robots




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Jin Sato's LEGO MINDSTORMS | No Starch Press

The Mindstorms kit came with two motors, touch and light sensors and lots of gears, axles, wheels and bricks and you could do a lot with it - the RCX programmable brick from MIT's Media Labs could be programmed using a visual language that came with the kit or you could download a share ware NQC and do more.

There are sites for home brew sensors and people have built some amazing models - one to solve the Rubik's cube and a card shuffler ... and then some just look cool:

50f85ac0ae99ac4bbc5f9b86685d3432.jpg



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And yet again ... I was wrong! This is a new, exhilarating feeling!

:cool:

Cyborg America: inside the strange new world of basement body hackers | The Verge

"Britain is the birthplace of 21st-century biohacking, and the movement’s two foundational figures present a similar Jekyll and Hyde duality.

One is Lepht Anonym, a DIY punk who was one of the earliest, and certainly the most dramatic, to throw caution to the wind and implant metal and machines into her flesh. The other is Kevin Warwick, an academic at the University of Reading's department of cybernetics. Warwick relies on a trained staff of medical technicians when doing his implants.

Lepht has been known to say that all she requires is a potato peeler and a bottle of vodka. In an article on h+, Anonym wrote:

"I’m sort of inured to pain by this point. Anesthetic is illegal for people like me, so we learn to live without it; I’ve made scalpel incisions in my hands, pushed five-millimeter diameter needles through my skin, and once used a vegetable knife to carve a cavity into the tip of my index finger. I’m an idiot, but I’m an idiot working in the name of progress: I’m Lepht Anonym, scrapheap transhumanist. I work with what I can get."

Anonym’s essay, a series of YouTube videos, and a short profile in Wired established her as the face of the budding biohacking movement. It was Anonym who proved, with herself as the guinea pig, that it was possible to implant RFID chips and powerful magnets into one’s body, without the backing of an academic institution or help from a team of doctors.

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smcder said:
"I’m sort of inured to pain by this point. Anesthetic is illegal for people like me . . . ."
Click to expand...

I wonder how that came about. I've read about this woman (will try to find the link). As I recall, she has ended up in hospitals in the UK as a result of some of her self-surgeries and implants. Medical doctors won't assist her with these experiments, and it's possible that some doctors and hospital administrators sought to prevent her purchasing anesthetics to prevent her injuring herself further. Which I see as a reasonable thing to do.
 
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