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

On Thu, 17 Jul 1997, Joachim Heck - SunSoft wrote:

>   True enough.  But before I hand a gun to my computer I'm going to
> try real hard to be sure it won't shoot me.  I don't have to
> understand everything about what it will do but some things are
> critical.

Still: Let me offer an analogy. I'm pretty sure you've seen software
with
bugs. Software that is very linear and simple (relatively speaking). 
Software that *could* have been tested to the hilt. Software that
*could*
have been mathematically PROVEN correct. 

But it wasn't. And it's driving the jet plane you're on (among 300 other

passangers). Or it's driving a missile that's *supposed* to hit Moscow, 
not Vienna.
 
If we can't/won't do it now, I'm *very* sceptic it will be done with
much 
more complex systems true AIs will be.

> the AIs will wipe us out.  So the only interesting future is the one
> in which we build AIs that behave.

That's an opinion I can't agree with. The human first reaction to AIs 
will likely be the age-old "destroy or enslave", but the other party may

be capable of more logical thought. I can very well imagine end results 
ranging from peaceful symbiosis through uneasy truce to open war and 
segregation.

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