Re: AIs are not human! (was Re: AI in FT (was Re: Be gentle...))

In message <199707171417.KAA26894@sparczilla.East.Sun.COM>
	  Joachim Heck - SunSoft <jheck@East.Sun.COM> wrote:

> Samuel Penn writes:
> @:) In message <33C433D7.FB8@earthlink.net>
> @:)		Peggy & Jeff Shoffner <pshoffner@earthlink.net> wrote:
> @:) > Forth, why in the hell would an AI fight in a war?
> @:) 
> @:) Because they're not perfect? They make mistakes? They're not
> @:) entirely logical and emotionless? I see no reason why AIs
> @:) shouldn't have the same emotions we do.
> 
>   Actually they would fight in a war because we told them to.  The
> thing to remember about AIs is that they are DESIGNED creatures.
> However they get built (grown, evolved, whatever), unless we (their
> builders) are dangerously negligent, they will be designed to do what
> we want them to do and to not do what we don't want them to do.

All programs have bugs in them. Some take a long time to
surface. Generally, the more complex the system, the more
complicated it gets to find and erase all the bugs.

Designing an AI to do EXACTLY the task it was told to do,
and no more, would be difficult at best, even if you knew
every stage of the design process (if an AI has been 'built'
by teaching it like a child, then you have only limited
control over the final product).

Of course, once you get a near-perfect AI, you scrap all
the others and copy that one. Assuming you can of course.

The problem with an AI that is very well behaved, and only
does what it's been told to, is that it will have limited
imagination, and flexibility.

If an AI ship has been programmed to destroy the ESU, and
protect the NAC (assuming an NAC AI), then it'll work fine
until an NAC ship goes rogue and starts attacking the other
NAC ships. What does the AI do? To cope with such problems,
you could program it to destroy NAC ships which are a
threat to the fleet.

So C&C order the fleet into a suicidal situation. Is C&C
to be treated as a threat to the fleet? Any sufficiently
advanced AI runs the risk of starting to form opinions
and strategies which conflict with those of its creators.

>   One of the other messages in this thread mentioned Bishop, the
> android from Aliens.	I think he's a perfect example of what an AI
> will be like.  He is emotionless because he doesn't need emotions to
> do his job.  He tries to achieve the mission goals and protect the
> human mission participants because it's what he's been told to do.  He
> sacrifices himself to protect a human because he understands that he
> is less valuable than a human.  I wouldn't want my AI any other way.

True, Bishop is a good example of a well behaved artificial
person. But, what would have happened if he'd had to choose
between Burk (was that his name? The Company guy) and say
Ripley? There could have easily arisen a situation where he
could only protect one by killing the other.

-- 
Be seeing you,
Sam.