[Lvlug] Artificial brain 'ten years away'

[C. Hever]

On Mon, Jul 27, 2009 at 9:49 PM, Ricardo SIGNES<lvlug at rjbs.manxome.org> wrote:
> * "C. Hever" <py.ohlin at gmail.com> [2009-07-27T21:26:51]
>> If the scientific method: extends your lifespan three or four times
>> its natural expectancy, makes it possible to talk to people all over
>> the world in the blink of an eye, puts people in orbit, lets you run
>> around with a massive music library, etc. ad nauseam, great.
>>
>> If that same method: arrives at conclusions which offend some people,
>> like heliocentrism, evolution, abiogenesis, and, in this case,
>> physicalism, BOOOOOOOO IT'S NOT TRUE
>
> Who is making that claim?

Well for heliocentrism, you've still got these guys:

http://www.theflatearthsociety.org/ (most of them appear to be insane)

For the next two exhaustively tested scientific theories, there are
unfortunately more hangers-on:

http://www.answersingenesis.org/ et al. ... but they're not so much
insane as dishonest

And for the theory as widely accepted among neuroscientists as
evolution is among biologists in general, the "the brain is an
electrochemical computer" theory ... well a lot of people react pretty
viscerally to this one, even those who are otherwise pretty reasonable

As an aspiring computational neuroscientist who is interested in the
possibility of genuinely intelligent AIs based on
biologically-inspired ANNs (as opposed to dumbs**t savants that can
outplay any human at chess but can't even recognize objects in a
picture), I run into this kind of visceral negative reaction a lot

Here's a good example:

http://www.philosophyforum.com/forum/philosophy-forums/branches-philosophy/philosophy-mind/5271-new-mind-more-than-brain.html

Most of the people who believe strong AI or even human-equivalent weak
AI is impossible are raising objections that could easily be answered
by going to a library and keeping up with the 21st century. They're
not even bringing up semi-intelligent critiques like Searle's Chinese
room thought experiment, but dumb crap like "Well, like, a computer
can't be creative" ... except in the admittedly rare cases when
electrochemical computers called "human brains" have original,
creative, daring thoughts

But, anyway, the bottom line is this: in an age where neural implants
are starting to offer cures to things like acquired blindness and
quadriplegia (and I mean *now*, not in some hazy futurist scenario),
clinging to this kind of vitalist rubbish is both absurd and selfish

-- 
"I've ... *seen* things you people wouldn't believe ... attack ships
on fire off the shoulder of Orion ... I watched C-beams glitter in
darkness at Tannhauser Gate! ... all those moments will be lost, in
time ... like ... tears ... in the rain ...... time ... to die."