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Originally Posted by punkworld
This will happen. I won't go into too much detail, but the exponential growth of science and technology makes it almost certain that in the next few decades computers (possibly using technology radically different from that being used these days, like organic - even today there are scientists working on dna-based computing) will reach capacities far exceeding those of humans, will probably become conscious (if we can't program intelligence, increased computing power creates the possibility of high-speed evolution in simulated virtual environments) and are likely to be in direct contact with our brains (Sony recently patented direct-to-brain entertainment).
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That computers will continue to improve is obvious. But, where you get into trouble (
yellow text) is in supposing that the direction and magnitude of that improvement (however fantastic and imponderable from here it may be) will ever approach consciousness.
But, even if we allow for the possibility of computers that truly deserve to be called "conscious" by us, how can we presume that the mechanisms of that artificial consciousness will be anything like our own?
The fact that we may create artificial "consciousness" does not REQUIRE:
1 - That we have acheived a breakthrough understanding of human consciousness
NOR
2- That our success in creating artificial intelligence in any way owes to what we know about human intelligence.
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Originally Posted by punkworld
2HousePlague: Human consciousness is the result of a physical process. There is no reason that such a process couldn't be virtually simulated, resulting in, essentially, the same thing. The transfer might, for example, be done by executing an advanced brainscan and inputting those into a simulation in real-time
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Yes, I agree it could be simulated. In far-fetched theory (and I'm not exactly a Luddite, mind you!) anything is possible.
I'm just saying the download of a conscious human brain (forget about the nature of the receiving medium) -- the download alone, is NOT A CLOSE REALITY SIMPLY BECAUSE WE HAVE AN IDEA ABOUT THE AMOUNT OF DATA. The difference is as wide as semaphore and fiber optics.
j-