From: kfl@KeithLynch.net   
      
   Gary McGath   wrote:   
   > You left out the part of my post where I said that carrying out   
   > tasks isn't the point.  Human (and animal) intelligence is a faculty   
   > for maintaining and enhancing the life of which it is a part.   
   > We might be able to create machines whose prime directive is to   
   > survive, reproduce, and maximize their satisfaction (though I don't   
   > know what that would mean in a machine designed and created by   
   > humans), but it would be a bad idea.   
      
   What would it be like to be an AI is a different question from what   
   would it be like to share the world with AIs.   
      
   Also, not everyone chooses to use their intelligence to maintain or   
   enhance their life.   
      
   > You're overlooking the principle of comparative advantage.  People   
   > in such a world wouldn't sit around and wait for the machines to   
   > feed them.  They'd do the things at which they're relatively best,   
   > while machines would do the tasks which they're relatively best at.   
      
   Comparative advantage means it makes sense for a doctor to hire a   
   receptionist even if he'd be better receptionist than the person he   
   hires.  But that's only because his high income suffices to pay for   
   the receptionist.   
      
   Today, nobody wonders whether it would pay better to compete with a   
   hydroelectric dam by turning a hand-cranked generator or to compete   
   with a computer by doing arithmetic by hand.  Obviously neither one   
   would give anything close to a living wage.   
      
   I'm suggesting that, given true AI, people would be hopelessly   
   outcompeted by AIs in literally *every* field.  Ten years after that   
   doctor saves money by replacing his human receptionist with a robot   
   receptionist, his patients save money by replacing him with a robot   
   doctor.   
      
   > The key word there is "emulate."  They wouldn't be people.  At a   
   > minimum, they'd need to have human-equivalent bodies to keep the   
   > same personalities; otherwise they'd have different needs and   
   > different ways of interacting with the world, and so would diverge   
   > from human attitudes.   
      
   To a degree, that has already happened.  The personality of a person   
   with a car differs from that of a person without one.  The personality   
   of a person with a cell phone differs from that of a person without   
   one.  The personality of a person with a disability differs from that   
   of a person without one.  But they're still people.   
      
   There are already people with artificial hearts and artificial   
   kidneys.  To the extent that those work as well as the original, their   
   life should be unchanged.  If those work better than the original,   
   their life should be improved.  The same should be true of artificial   
   bodies or artificial brains.   
   --   
   Keith F. Lynch - http://keithlynch.net/   
   Please see http://keithlynch.net/email.html before emailing me.   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)