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thebruce
Dances With Wikis


Joined: 16 Aug 2004
Posts: 6899
Location: Kitchener, Ontario
krystyn wrote:
Making assumptions of someone's or something's inherent value based upon a couple of factors you don't even know the limitations of seems a bit capricious, especially with such a complex set of events. Melissa happened to hold the fate of the universe in her hand, but because she was an A.I., that gave many of you cause to simply align with Dana and her Aunt, because they were human.

Does that not give anyone pause, here? In the context of this universe, and seeing how important and integrated A.I.s will be in the game's version of 2552, I found it problematic.


Ah, but you see - there's a difference. Speaking strictly about Melissa vs Dana, I greatly value Dana's life over the existence of Melissa if it were in question, though I would greatly value Melissa's abilities and skills over Dana's if life were not in question.

However, in the context of the story, if Melissa's death would cause the death of millions of human lives, and there ABSOLUTELY no other solution but for Dana's life to end, then I would be thinking differently. But even huge movies pose that question - is the life of one person worth taking to save the lives of many? Spock dealt with that (but he took his own life), in Master and Commander he had to deal with that choice to save his ship, and many more... usually what it comes down to, is if there is absolutely no other possibility, no other solution or chance of a solution presenting itself, then it's many over one. But in that quandry, many people have been at the point of cutting that rope to someone's death, and at the last second one tiny glimmer of hope appears for another solution that wouldn't involve the taking of the one's life.

So yes, it's quite a deep question, and really you'll never know until you get into a situation where that's a choice that you have make, what exactly you would do... you might crumble under the guilt pressure, or not... who knows.

My point to now has always simply been - Melissa? or Dana?... If millions of lives are at stake now, I would first want to know that there is absolutely no possible way to save those lives without killing Dana, before condemning her to death to save Melissa.
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PostPosted: Wed Nov 24, 2004 11:39 am
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krystyn
I Never Tire of My Own Voice


Joined: 26 Sep 2002
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 		Considering that I never saw it as a strictly Melissa vs. Dana situation, a lot of that deep, philosophical hemming and hawing goes right out that window over there.

I am glad that enough of us took initiative, and 'convinced' Melissa to view Dana as a resource, that we never got to that point. I'd probably be sorely disappointed with the results, otherwise.

PostPosted: Wed Nov 24, 2004 11:42 am
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CoffeeJedi
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Joined: 27 Jul 2004
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Kali wrote:

If human thought processes are in fact binary, does that mean an AI, either created by programmers or ripped from a living human, have a "soul"? Would you need to change your definition of a soul in order to say "no"?


did Melissa have emotions? well, we know that she HAD emotions, but did she actually FEEL them, or just generate a simulated response based on what emotion she determined she should be having?

if she actually FELT them as you or I do, then yes, she had a 'soul', if she merely determined that she should create a 'happy' or 'sad' response based on inputs, then no, she didn't

i've toyed with the idea of taking a talk-bot like Eliza, and adding a 'mood' setting, if you say nice things to it, its 'mood' will improve on a scale of 1-100, and it will choose nicer, happier things to say to you. If you insult it, or use speech labeled as "negative", then its mood value will drop and it will become pesimistic and nasty. This would require a database of weighted words like sunshine and flower having high positive factors, and words like death and taxes having lower weights. But i dropped the idea because it got a bit complicated, you have to filter for negatives like "no" so it would interpret "there is no sunshine and the flowers are dead" to be a negative statement, but I digress.
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PostPosted: Wed Nov 24, 2004 11:43 am
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thebruce
Dances With Wikis


Joined: 16 Aug 2004
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gkrohne wrote:
We're trying to decide whether The HALO AI's are

a) alive
b) sentient beings

We haven't dealt with a real AI (Melissa/Durga/etc), just a living, sentient being that pretends to be the AI (Kristen Rutherford). Based on the evidence we have, Melissa/Durga would pass any test we have for living sentience, because we're testing against a real person, and because the facts we have on the AI are provided by the writers (Bungie and Stewart), who seem to want us to treat the AI's as beings.


You're missing the points... we're not dealing with questions regarding how to deal with a fictional work, we're dealing with questions regarding the moral issues raised by the fictional work. The AI being an actress steps out of those posed questions and deals directly with the fiction creation itself. The issues raised are strictly, given an AI as advaced as Melissa, and a human such as Dana, and the situation they're in, which life would you value more and to what purpose?

If you throw the 'fiction' aspect into the equation, well then, I may as well just kill off everyone and condemn humanity to extinction... I mean, it is only fiction...

So ya, it's the "what if..." factor that's the issue here.
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PostPosted: Wed Nov 24, 2004 11:44 am
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thebruce
Dances With Wikis


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krystyn wrote:
Considering that I never saw it as a strictly Melissa vs. Dana situation, a lot of that deep, philosophical hemming and hawing goes right out that window over there.

I am glad that enough of us took initiative, and 'convinced' Melissa to view Dana as a resource, that we never got to that point. I'd probably be sorely disappointed with the results, otherwise.

I guess we really are apples and oranges then Smile both arguing sides that aren't sides of the same object... ah well. But I agree, and thus in the situation of millions of lives resting on Melissa's shoulders, or Dana's life, I would have been searching for the 'use her as a resource' answer - no need to take Dana's life to save millions - Melissa changed her mind and used Dana to her advantage... millions saved, plus one.

CoffeeJedi wrote:
if she actually FELT them as you or I do, then yes, she had a 'soul', if she merely determined that she should create a 'happy' or 'sad' response based on inputs, then no, she didn't

depends on how you define soul Smile
even then, there is no way for us to know if she FELT the emotions or simply emulated them.... BUT we do know that as software, they are programmed responses, then i would say that's infallible evidence that she (given those definitions) emulated the emotional responses. One would need to change the definitions of felt and emulated if trying to defend Melissa's emotions...

Quote:
...If you insult it, or use speech labeled as "negative", then its mood value will drop and it will become pesimistic and nasty. This would require a database of weighted words like sunshine and flower having high positive factors, and words like death and taxes having lower weights.

I know my mood value would drop if I heard Joe Black knocking at my front door Razz
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PostPosted: Wed Nov 24, 2004 11:51 am
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krystyn
I Never Tire of My Own Voice


Joined: 26 Sep 2002
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 		Trouble is, they didn't really save anyone, though, did they? The artifact did what it was supposed to do, and the inevitable (Truth) eventually happened.

PostPosted: Wed Nov 24, 2004 11:53 am
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thebruce
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 		yup, so I'm glad Dana's not dead Razz
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PostPosted: Wed Nov 24, 2004 12:08 pm
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Kali
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Joined: 29 Sep 2004
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thebruce wrote:
I don't think it's a matter of what makes up thought processes, it's a matter of what you consider life. Granted, if you consider life solely to be a matter of thought processes, then there's no argument... but take it a step further - physical life, is the essence of organisms, organic matter, the 'spark' that makes us tick.


No, that's taking it a step back. There are plenty of things that are alive, but you don't hesitate to kill them for the benefit of society. The cold that is currently making my life miserable, is alive. It is a virus. If I could destroy the little bugger, oh, how wonderful life would be.

I'll pose it this way, what if it was choosing between Melissa and a cat? (or a dog for you dog people out there) Now I love my cat. I cannot express how much, just believe me, it's a lot. But if, for some strange reason, I had to choose which one would survive, my cat or Melissa, I'd have to choose Melissa. Why? Because I consider her sentient. There is no qualitative difference between my thoughts and emotions and Melissa's. I'm of the opinion that the only true difference is what our circuitry is made of. So, even though my cat is undeniably alive, she is not sentient, and is therefore of lesser value than the "non-living" sentient AI.

Our society tends to delineate "the person" by their thoughts and emotions, not their physical characteristics. Por ejemplo: The standard refrain when confronting a person who has recently become quadriplegic (sp?) is that there's still so much to live for etc. Another way this can be seen is by the incidence of elective plastic surgery. If we really identified with our physical shape, I don't think we'd see so many people going under the knife. Even those people who are troubled by it can say to themselves, "it's just my body. That's not who I am." Can you even imagine someone saying that about their mind? I can't.

PostPosted: Wed Nov 24, 2004 12:42 pm
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thebruce
Dances With Wikis


Joined: 16 Aug 2004
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Kali wrote:
thebruce wrote:
but take it a step further - physical life, is the essence of organisms, organic matter, the 'spark' that makes us tick.


No, that's taking it a step back. There are plenty of things that are alive, but you don't hesitate to kill them for the benefit of society. The cold that is currently making my life miserable, is alive. It is a virus. If I could destroy the little bugger, oh, how wonderful life would be.

True. So now it's not just a matter of life vs non-life, which in the case of this arg is a valid question, but it's also a matter of what you personally value the entities in question. To some, it's not a matter of just 'life', but a matter of sentience. To some, it's not a matter of sentience, it's a matter of usefulness. Trying to define 'who lives and who dies' will not get anywhere, because values lie in different areas...

All my point is is that Melissa, by physical means, is not alive in the same way that a cat or a human being or even a virus is. Beyond that, who knows, there may be some scientist freak who would value the life of a virus over the lives of millions of people 500 years in the future. *shrug*, but that's not the point...

The point is - given that Melissa is software, and Dana is a living human being, and given the situation they both are stuck in, who's existence do you value more? In other words, I'm not arguing an answer, just the question Wink Laughing

Quote:
There is no qualitative difference between my thoughts and emotions and Melissa's. I'm of the opinion that the only true difference is what our circuitry is made of. So, even though my cat is undeniably alive, she is not sentient, and is therefore of lesser value than the "non-living" sentient AI.

But I'm of the opinion that the fact that you, and your cat, are made of organic, living material makes you alive, and Melissa, while being highly intelligent and potentially more creative or having more to offer humanity, is still an assembly of routines and processes on a human invented system of hardware and material.
The value you or I place on each entity is entirely subjective, and ends up in the defending of opinions Smile, which as we all know gets noone anywhere, and everyone nowhere...

Quote:
Our society tends to delineate "the person" by their thoughts and emotions, not their physical characteristics. Por ejemplo: The standard refrain when confronting a person who has recently become quadriplegic (sp?) is that there's still so much to live for etc. Another way this can be seen is by the incidence of elective plastic surgery. If we really identified with our physical shape, I don't think we'd see so many people going under the knife. Even those people who are troubled by it can say to themselves, "it's just my body. That's not who I am." Can you even imagine someone saying that about their mind? I can't.

It's quite unfortunate, in my opinion, that people do not consider their bodies 'who they are'. There are plenty of examples of people with enormous physical deformities who are happy with who they are, and confident with their abilities... or quadriplegics who go around helping and encouraging others, and would even choose to remain that way if given the opportunity to be 'fixed', because they know that's who they are, and the choice they make even defines who they are.

There are many who believe that plastic surgery is 'the easy way out', a strive for acceptance by people who believe that they will only be accepted based on how they appear. It's quite unfortunate... there is SO much more to life than just our outward appearance. Who we are goes to the core of our being, our individuality and uniqueness, and our ability and willingness to accept that. If you can accept your natural flaws, you can be more influencial, and likeable, and self-confident than anyone else you meet. It's all about self-perception.

There's who you're perceived to be, there's your inner perception of yourself, then there's who you are as a whole.
Changing your appearance, your body, doesn't change who you are inside... that doesn't mean you who are in full has nothing to do with your 'shell', it just means that who you are inside is what's at the core, and all you're doing is changing other people's perception of you outside... But if you change who you are outside, you are no longer who you were as a whole. People's perceptions of you change, your own perception of yourself will have to change to accommodate the new 'body'. You're the same person inside, but you're a different person in the end. The measure of that change is proportionate to the amount of change you or other people will have to do to get used to the 'new person' (and I'm speaking along the lines of your body as a whole, not say, putting on makeup and such - as in the difference between an AI and a human body). But how often do you hear people talk about 'the new me'? Or people who undergo an extreme makeover and in the end people who loved them just can't get over the change, or kids who are afraid because it's suddenly a stranger in front of them... same kind of thing. same person inside, different person outside - as a whole, a different person, to the degree of the change. A haircut in a sense is a change to your outward self, and people need to get used to it when they see it.

This is getting way too complex, and I'm at work Razz blah
Yasmine's essence, her personality and character and memories were transferred to a new 'body'. The AI is now a replica of Yasmine, but it's not who Yasmine was, it's a new Yasmine, based on the original.
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PostPosted: Wed Nov 24, 2004 1:57 pm
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cheebers
Boot


Joined: 30 Aug 2004
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Location: Coeur d'Alene Idaho.
krystyn wrote:
I am glad that enough of us took initiative, and 'convinced' Melissa to view Dana as a resource, that we never got to that point. I'd probably be sorely disappointed with the results, otherwise.

Smile Sorry, krystyn, I don't mean to pick on you but I think you bring up really good points. So, by the same token, enough people took initiative and told Dana, "do whatever you have to do for your Aunt". And she did. Though it included siding with Melissa, it involved the destruction of SP. Was that disappointing? I thought it a fabulous turn of events in the story, though I was quite sad when SP was gone, and even shed a tear. And in the end the story allowed SP to be reunited with Melissa. But, what if she hadn't have been? Would you have not liked ILB as much as you do?

ROBOGriff wrote:
Life: Plain and simple, if it bleeds it's alive. Melissa dosn't bleed.
Okay, maybe that's a drastic oversimplification but it's not worth deep debate.
What!? Not worth deep debate? It immediately brings to mind such infuriating topics as creation, abortion, afterlife. "Playing God" was mentioned in previous posts. These are problems humanity (at least) has been struggling with since the dawn of time! (Maybe not abortion for that long, but its a recent hot topic).

kali wrote:
So, even though my cat is undeniably alive, she is not sentient, and is therefore of lesser value than the "non-living" sentient AI.
I do not know. Sentience is experienceing sensations and feelings. If that is the criteria, I am not convinced Melissa is sentient, and that dogs and cats are not. I believe most behavior, including perceived emotional behavior, is learned. In the same ways that an AI can be taught to exhibet emotions, people and animals are taught to as well. But, all cultures around the world smile when they feel happy. What is it that makes that particular feeling change the shape of their face in the exact same way as everyone else on the planet? When happy dogs wag their tails. Cats purr. Is that instinct? Is that sentience? Is that something undefined? Can Melissa do that?

kali wrote:
If we really identified with our physical shape, I don't think we'd see so many people going under the knife.
But the reason people do go under the knife is BECAUSE they identify with their physical shape. And they want to change it. I agree, that in an ideal society, nobody would care. But we are not ideal, we are human. Humans respond to people by how they look, first and formost. Everything from racism to peircings to makup can be used as an example. Its one of the reasons Star Trek made Data an Android as oppossed to a simple Robot. Its why Dancing Robots are so damn cool. If they look like me, I can identify with it much quicker. I suppose I am being racist against Melissa. I know Dana is sentient and alive because she is like me. I do not have valid proof concerning Melissa.

On the side bar it says I live in North Idaho, probably perceived as one of the racism capitals of the world Sad. But honest, I'm not racist, and Coeurd'Alene is not so bad. Nor am I arguing for racism. I think it is a horrible and dispicable. Perhaps it is better to say I am being xenoist? or xenophobic? Oh well, think of me what you must.
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PostPosted: Wed Nov 24, 2004 2:34 pm
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krystyn
I Never Tire of My Own Voice


Joined: 26 Sep 2002
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Location: Is not Chicago
cheebers wrote:
krystyn wrote:
I am glad that enough of us took initiative, and 'convinced' Melissa to view Dana as a resource, that we never got to that point. I'd probably be sorely disappointed with the results, otherwise.

Smile Sorry, krystyn, I don't mean to pick on you but I think you bring up really good points. So, by the same token, enough people took initiative and told Dana, "do whatever you have to do for your Aunt". And she did. Though it included siding with Melissa, it involved the destruction of SP. Was that disappointing? I thought it a fabulous turn of events in the story, though I was quite sad when SP was gone, and even shed a tear. And in the end the story allowed SP to be reunited with Melissa. But, what if she hadn't have been? Would you have not liked ILB as much as you do?


Troublesome for me in answering this is that I had issues with the whole Dana thing, anyhow. Before we realized that this was some half-mad A.I. from the future, her site sure looked hacked to me. Unplug the damned machine, and be done with it, yo.

But then you say, "The game would've stopped right there!"

I'm sorry, but 'the game needing to go on' cannot be the only reason for the game to go on. Dana, even though her role in the game ended up being important and interesting (not nearly on a scale with all the other storylines, sadly), never made sense to me. She was never fleshed out enough. I never understood why we were so eager to help her from the very first second it was indicated that was what we were to do.

The diabetic Aunt, and the mysteriously screwed-up ATM card were conceits that pulled me out of Dana's believability. Deus ex freakin' machina, Batman! I have a hard time even arguing her case (which I have tried to do, in order to see why I land on the side of the issue that I do, like a good little debater), because I just don't get her behavior, for the most part.

So, as much as I would like to justify Dana's value as a person, it was very difficult for me to view her as a person throughout the whole game. And I'm honestly not trying to slam that portion of the game, either. It's super-tough to create a 'game so far' component of an ARG without straying into this bizarro meta territory, and I think 42 did the best they could with the player base they had.

PostPosted: Wed Nov 24, 2004 3:06 pm
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ROBOGriff
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Joined: 20 Aug 2004
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cheebers wrote:


ROBOGriff wrote:
Life: Plain and simple, if it bleeds it's alive. Melissa dosn't bleed.
Okay, maybe that's a drastic oversimplification but it's not worth deep debate.
What!? Not worth deep debate? It immediately brings to mind such infuriating topics as creation, abortion, afterlife. "Playing God" was mentioned in previous posts. These are problems humanity (at least) has been struggling with since the dawn of time! (Maybe not abortion for that long, but its a recent hot topic).


You're looking WAY too deep. Think like a Marine..."If it bleeds, we can kill it!" Then again, I'm the same person who does not watch TV (except for a few shows and NEVER news), so I don't worry myself with things outside of my control (ie. abortion, creation, afterlife, etc.) I feel that people will be people, and I have no intrest in what other people do as long as it does not affect the 10 sq feet surrouonding me. Call me blissfully ignorant if you like, but for me it's that simple.


cheebers wrote:

kali wrote:
So, even though my cat is undeniably alive, she is not sentient, and is therefore of lesser value than the "non-living" sentient AI.
I do not know. Sentience is experienceing sensations and feelings. If that is the criteria, I am not convinced Melissa is sentient, and that dogs and cats are not. I believe most behavior, including perceived emotional behavior, is learned. In the same ways that an AI can be taught to exhibet emotions, people and animals are taught to as well. But, all cultures around the world smile when they feel happy. What is it that makes that particular feeling change the shape of their face in the exact same way as everyone else on the planet? When happy dogs wag their tails. Cats purr. Is that instinct? Is that sentience? Is that something undefined? Can Melissa do that?


I remeber one of the earlier wavs when Durga was sad because she could not help Jersey. Going back to the context, it seems out of place for a hardcore military AI to have feelings at all, but expecially at that moment. Later in the story Durga attempts to keep Jersey safe (the draft). Once again, Durga is acting selfishly. I cannot imagine a military AI acting that way unless there were some underlying logic other than the mission. At the end of the story, the mission is complete, but Durga still wants to protect Jersey. Give me a reason other than she "bonded" with him.


cheebers wrote:

Its why Dancing Robots are so damn cool.


Then you will LOVE this:
http://www.gadgetmadness.com/archives/robosapien_mechapimp_200k.wmv

This is probably my last post for the week. Everyone have a safe and happy Holidays and if you'll accept it, may my God bless you and yours.

<trying to avoid religious debates and tip toe out the door>
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PostPosted: Wed Nov 24, 2004 3:09 pm
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krystyn
I Never Tire of My Own Voice


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 		I want to amend my earlier post with the notion that I have never essentially devalued Dana's life. I have pretty consistently valued both existences, but questioned that automatic assumption that human == more valuable.

Dana's motives, if I can swallow a huge lump of disbelief, are fine, and make sense to me ... ... sort of. Destroying the Sleeping Princess seemed a necessary plot twist to the final re-combination of Melissa's aspects, and it was emotionally satisfying for me to see that green and red text overlaid on the 404 page when it happened. I still don't believe she had to do it, since beyond tweaking her ATM card, and somehow finding out Aunt M. was a diabetic, we had no other proof that Melissa had propogated herself to other networks. All we knew was that she was seriously broken, stuck on hardware that was difficult for her to use, and was at the very least able to call payphones to transmit audio data to crew/strangers. I would've liked more proof of Melissa's abilities in 2004. We saw plenty of it with Durga in 2552! Why not with Melissa? Oooo, creepy webcam photos. ooo, ATM card. ooo, Aunt M. can't eat her own honey. Wink I wanted more!

PostPosted: Wed Nov 24, 2004 3:27 pm
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Kali
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Joined: 29 Sep 2004
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cheebers wrote:

kali wrote:
So, even though my cat is undeniably alive, she is not sentient, and is therefore of lesser value than the "non-living" sentient AI.


I do not know. Sentience is experienceing sensations and feelings. If that is the criteria, I am not convinced Melissa is sentient, and that dogs and cats are not. I believe most behavior, including perceived emotional behavior, is learned.


I don't think sentience is a yes or no proposition but rather, like all animal characteristics, exists on a continuum of expression levels. So no, I wouldn't actually say that my cat does not have thoughts, because clearly she does, but rather, that however sentient she may be, it is not at the level you, I and Melissa are at. Melissa also clearly had emotions. She expressed them to us. Now, I know you're going to argue that they're not real because it's wires instead of neurons, but really I've never understood that argument. Those wires serve the same function as our neurons. Just because they're made of different material does not mean that they function any less effectively. It might "feel" different, maybe she gets a "headache" in her "foot" or maybe her memory chips "itch" at times.

Quote:

But, all cultures around the world smile when they feel happy. What is it that makes that particular feeling change the shape of their face in the exact same way as everyone else on the planet? When happy dogs wag their tails. Cats purr. Is that instinct? Is that sentience? Is that something undefined? Can Melissa do that?


Evolutionary constraints selecting for group cohesion. An important aspect of hominid, hell, expand that to primate, evolution has been the need to live in groups, in social structures. Banding together with others of your species, even though increasing resource competition, decreases predation and increases mating possibilities. Animals that "choose" to survive in this manner must consequently develop methods for maintaining the group, and IMHO, that means some form of communication - facial expressions. All of this applies to any pack animals, actually.

Yes, it's instinct, but that instinct has been shaped, directly influenced by culture. As a species, we are young, and considering we're a travelling sort of creature, it's not surprising that all humans retain the same non-verbal emotive vocabulary. You'd only expect a change in this if there were groups of people who could not produce viable offspring together. (and even then, it would be unlikely)

PostPosted: Wed Nov 24, 2004 3:57 pm
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thebruce
Dances With Wikis


Joined: 16 Aug 2004
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krystyn wrote:
I want to amend my earlier post with the notion that I have never essentially devalued Dana's life. I have pretty consistently valued both existences, but questioned that automatic assumption that human == more valuable.

And I don't think anyone is saying that it's an automatic assumption... I think the point is, that when it comes to nothing but AI or Human, Human has the head start. But again, given this circumstance, if AI over human means saving millions of lives, chances are the AI will be taken over the single human, and that doesn't mean the AI itself has more value, but the result of the decision being made, in a sense, is the lesser of two evils... kill the AI and possibly millions of humans to save one human? or kill the human to save an AI and indirectly possibly millions of humans...

Quote:
We saw plenty of it with Durga in 2552! Why not with Melissa? Oooo, creepy webcam photos. ooo, ATM card. ooo, Aunt M. can't eat her own honey. Wink I wanted more!

I know, it would have been great to see her try to break into some CIA or NASA systems or something Smile but alas, she was extremely limited in her medium, and abilities... ah well...
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PostPosted: Wed Nov 24, 2004 4:07 pm
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