Do you have any evidence for this very specific prediction of the future?

Also: Could you clarify the
"think" and "reason" at a level above human capability" part and why you put these 2 words in quotes?

Chalmers I speeded through; Dennett in all aspects is an organizational madness impervious to the best in man.

The idea of a method to consciousness was brought up by Chalmers as being lacking and then he proceeds to look for a basic underlying principle such as particles which call for no understanding but merely a bouncing point in the comprehension of consciousness.

Dennett denies consciousness because, according to him, my beer tastes different from beginning to end of the drink to the supposed fact that the beer tastes different between people. Another is that he states that because a surgeon can cut a neuron in the brain and place it before the supposed experience that this some will cause the experience to invert thus denying qualitative experience , or the logical conclusion of the denial of experience in toto.

Chalmers tries, Dennett is obsessed by the illness of the contrary to which his willful contrariness brings forth addled ignorance. Stop here, phew.

There's no need to look for mechanism in consciousness or in science in general . The phenomenon speak for themselves whether in consciousness or in the science of light, or heat, or fluids. Looking for the underlying basis for a phenomenon creates hypotheses, theories, etc.. which are never ending.

The idea that the experience of C# major must be relegated to a mechanism or molecular motion or wave principles is the bringing forth the same scientific materialistic thought process and attempting to place them upon the phenomenon; the phenomena will speak for themselves !

A principle of "sense bound activity" might be helpful for like can only sense itself. this means that in the creation of the sensory processes as for example the eye; the eye is made by the light for the light. Likewise the ear into the laryngeal apparatus is made by "sound" for the sound.

These senses have developed over eons such that the eye buttresses the light and becomes the physical manifestation of light; likewise the ear with respect to sound.

Consider that this being, imperceptible to our senses sits in time and receives the light which is reflected back to its grantor and through this the grantor,upon receiving the returned light gains knowledge of self to which the reflector processes the amalgamation of this light, as a boon, to the beginning sense of light, the eye.

The eye was made by the light for the light; Goethe.

I disagree 100%. Computers don't "think," computers at their core are just glorified calculators - and adding computing power to a calculator, doesn't turn it into a mind that can think and reason.

Humans are a special creation, created in the image of God, and have special value. We are not as you (and Dawkins) would say: "random DNA replicating across the universe."

I will preface this by saying that I'm not a computer expert, but the research has already been done on what the brain is capable of doing and there is significant evidence for what computers are capable of doing. If there is someone with more expertise in this field, please correct me if I'm wrong.

Studies have shown that the human brain is capable of about 38,000 trillion operations per second. Computer arrays can already do over 10,000 trillion operations per second. At the current rate of development in operation speed, these systems will surpass the human brain very quickly and the home PC is scheduled to be capable of these type of speeds in less than 50 years. The programming will obviously lag, but there is plenty of information available that would suggest that the capability of the human will be surpassed electronically in a conservative 50 year timeline. The prediction is not specific. It is put out as a very conservative and attainable inevitability.

If you believe that we are a "special creation", that is your prerogative. All I'm saying is that the days of the human brain being more capable of more operations than anything on the planet are coming to an end in our lifetime. We can either push our hands against our ears and say we don't want to hear it or we can begin to discuss rationally what this means to us as human beings.

In regards to your "random DNA" comment, neither I nor Dawkins would agree with that statement. Randomness has little or nothing to do with the development of life or the development of human beings on this planet. You are welcome to disagree with evolution, but misrepresenting it only weakens your argument.

Why did you not show it? Simply claiming that there is means nothing.

Please show these studies and see above.

Look up the "Turing Test" and realize that no AI has passed it yet.

This does not even make sense.

Again, please show us this information. I checked and I did not find any claims that there will be an AI which surpasses humans in 50 years.

It is very specific and not backed by a shred of evidence.

If I don't have to present evidence, I could simply claim (given the current political development) that planet earth will be a radioactive wasteland within 20 years which makes developing some "super-AI" in 50 years impossible.

You don't get it. A fast calculator is not a human brain, and making it faster does not bridge the gap one iota. Computers are just glorified calculators. Calculators that have to be programmed by a human mind, in order to do anything.

No one knows whether artificial sentience is possible let alone a time frame for it. There are no particularly compelling theoretical reasons why such a thing couldn't exist, and fairly good reasons to suppose that it can. On the other hand, it often feels like the tremendous successes of AI research have not brought us meaningfully closer to what people think of as "artificial intelligence." It may be the case that such a thing is entirely possible but enormously more complex than Minsky originally believed.

I think you also have to distinguish between "computers" in the sense of the specific architectures used by the machine on your desk, and computation as a distinctive type of process which might be instantiated by different types of physical architectures. Much of the human brain is very different from typical computer architecture, but much of what the human brain does is nevertheless computation. Many of the functional capabilities of the human mind which Chalmers describes as "easy" problems of consciousness are easy (from the theoretical perspective he's interested in) precisely because they are known to be computational.

In AI and deep learning research, a great deal of progress has been made precisely because we build computational models based on neural networks, even though the underlying computers we use are not in fact neural networks. We rely on the fact that any Universal Turing Machine can emulate any other. I'm not an expert in artificial neural networks, but I've played around with them a little bit. What neural networks do is absolutely a kind of computation.

Now, the fact that much of what goes on in our brains is a form of computation doesn't mean that absolutely everything is or that human sentience is wholly computable. No one really knows. Even if it's not though, it's not clear that this would preclude artificial sentience, it would just mean that the simplest ideas about consciousness as an emergent property of highly complex computational systems is wrong.

Source: 16 years as a professional computer programmer with an interest in cognitive science and philosophy of mind. :P You can take these claims with as much salt as you like, I haven't kept up with the bleeding edge of either neuroscience nor AI research.

I'm not misrepresenting anything. So you're saying random mutations aren't random after all?


"DNA is made up of a sequence of letters, or amino acids, which encode proteins, the structures that carry out important jobs inside cells. Conventional wisdom states that evolution occurs by random mutations that make an individual organism better able to survive and reproduce, according to natural selection."

I'm a software engineer with 30+ years of experience in the industry, but haven't dealt with cognitive science or philosophy of mind. Though, I don't see how we are any closer today to creating artificial sentience than we were
30 years ago, programming in BASIC and FORTRAN, with 48k of memory and 14 MHz CPU... You'd have to convince me otherwise?

As far as actually building an AI, I don't know whether we've actually made any progress towards strong AI. Hence my first sentence. It's still too much of an unknown, and lots of AI research is more prosaic anyway. IBM's Watson is pretty incredible, but the goal isn't really the AI of science fiction.

On the other hand, the argument that such a thing as strong AI is theoretically possible and that human intelligence is largely computational has gotten stronger during that time, mostly because of advances in neuroscience.

Pretty funny that you mention IBM Watson, as I spent 20+ years at IBM, and worked on part of it. But, I wouldn't characterize anything Watson does, as close to mimicking human consciousness or sentience. The part I worked on was the ability for it to make medical diagnoses given very large amounts of data. But again, to me, this isn't any step closer to sentience than programming in BASIC 30 years ago, it just means we have a lot more raw computing power.

The only argument I know of for super duper computers having the ability to become conscious is that conscious humans are super duper computers. But I don't believe that there would be an argument if there were not already conscious beings. In other words I don't believe anyone has explained exactly how super duper computing power can turn into consciousness.

That's all more or less correct.

The argument is basically abductive: human beings are sentient. Our conscious states are heavily correlated to neural states (or to physical states more broadly). There is copious evidence that somehow our consciousness arises out of complex physical processes, since altering the physical processes alters our conscious states in predictable ways. Brains are especially important, and brains appear to involve a great deal of complex information processing via neural networks...

I should say, I don't personally believe that creating consciousness is merely a matter of reaching some threshold in computing power. Reaching some threshold might be a necessary but insufficient condition. It seems likely that certain kinds of feedback loops involving the creation and maintenance of representations of the external world are necessary, such that sense organs are also necessary. The idea of an isolated AI running in a computer completely disconnected from any stimulus might be very unlikely. The richness of sensory data might be very important to consciousness.

I'm heavily influenced in this thought by Douglas Hofstadter's work, especially with regard to the importance of certain kinds of feedback loops.

Along with sensing consciousness, human beings/brains may as well create/ produce consciousness.

That would make creating new consciousness in a computer network form an extension of what may be supposed as an organic process of the human being.

My Bold.

The "richness" of sensory input is definitely an essential parameter in the why and how of the evolution of human consciousness.

But it is not true that no computer has passed a Turing test. Instead, it is the case that we have continually moved the goal posts. So the search for artificial intelligence has helped us refine our understanding of what AI/sentience really is.

But really, just like computer graphics from 30 years ago was a rudimentary version of what we have today, and there is every reason to expect that 30 years hence the graphics will be all the more lifelike, why wouldn't one also suppose that the computer's speed, utility, and ability to mimic humans won't also continue to improve in such a way as to make it able to pass ever more demanding Turing tests?

Aaaaand here come the nitpickers.
My whole point was: Predicting what kind of machines we will have built in 50 years, even going into detail about how much "better" these machines can "think" (lol) is pointless.

Right now, every "AI" we have built is a machine which has a limited capability of mimicking humans.
Just read the posts of Well Named and Festering Zit again.
AI is far more complicated than "Well, everything around us is improving very fast so why not AI"
Using this deeply flawed logic, I might ask "Medicine and computers have improved so fast over the last 50 years, why did we not cure EVERY existing type of cancer yet?"

I saw Daniel Dennett talk once and he seemed like a pompous ass.

If consciousness is a disease, or something unecessary to human functioning, then it would follow that it is an illusion. The "Veil of Maya" or something.

If a human who does not have consciousness of what he is doing, can still perform his task equally (or better) than it follows that consciousness is unecessary.

Not sure where I'm going with this. It seems that consciousness is necessary, but I can't explain why. I also think animals are conscious, just from my own observations. They seem much more aware than we give them credit for. The idea that creatures are robots and without agency seems incomprehensible to me on an intuitive level. I know that's not an argument.

I will say it may turn out very interesting if natural language comprehension and competent use can be demonstrated to happen without any consciousness at all. Two completely unconscious systems having an intellectual discussion about something would be pretty rad.

The AI expert speaks. I sometimes wonder if you think before you post. Since 'think' is defined as 'have a particular belief or idea', an AI only has to have an idea to be 'thinking'. As someone who recognises their complete lack of qualifications/experience/knowledge on this subject, can I ask you to explain why you disagree with the claim "In the next 50 years, they will be able to build a machine that will be able to participate in this conversation" in more meaningful and informed detail than some vague reference to 'computing power'? How does AI actually work Zit?

I predict that you won't though, you'll dodge and duck and dive and evade and probably insult me a bit, or maybe even play some 'righteous indignation' card, but you'll never answer that question, because we both know that you can't.

'Ridiculous', 'nut cases'.... What I find remarkable is that in the entire time you've posted here, the style of the more intelligent and thoughtful posters doesn't seem to have rubbed off on you at all and you don't seem to be aware of just how strong those words are and the burden you place on yourself to be able to back them up.

Please, demonstrate how this idea is 'worthy of ridicule', and one of the great thinkers of our time is actually a 'nutcase'.

Please note that I'll attempt to speak of the four(4) bodies of Man; physical body, etheric body, astral body and self conscious ego, the latter three being supersensible. These higher bodies can be "sensed" via spiritual science but once the exploration has taken place it is possible for the results of this expedition to be brought forth within the normal intellectual thoughts of the human being. One does not have to be a spiritual scientist in order to come to comprehension of these realms.

Consideration of the "physical body" of Man the perspective is the "form" of Man. this somewhere, can be sen even in the writings of Aristotle in which the "form" is the clarified physical body of Man, that to which we observe through our senses.

Looking at the corpse of the human being it is noted that the corpse is not the human being but that there was something present which is no longer present at the time of death. the corpse presents with the mineral kingdom and the process of decomposition takes place. There is no life in the corpse and in no way can one reason to life somewhere hidden within this mineral body.

The second body of man comes into perspective in that it is called the "life body' or "formative force body". It takes no stretch of the imagination for a reasonable thinking individual to posit that there is a "life body" no longer evident, upon perceiving the corpse. At one time, within science there was a question of a "life force" posited for these early scientists knew that there had to be something which explains the life of Man. the difficulty was that this "life force", in keeping with the thought processes of the then and now prevalent science demanded a point force , a vector, so to speak, as science is always looking for "point forces" traveling from one point to another or vectors or modifications of the self same thinking.

Some characteristics of the "etheric body" is that it appears congruent to the physical body with connections to the physical body. At times in the history of mankind the connections were "tighter" or "looser" which have to do with its activity for in ;previous times the head portion of the "etheric body" was marginally separated from the physical body with the consequences of an atavistic clairvoyance; still connected but less so.

At death, the "etheric body" releases the physical and the corpse, a residual of previous life, is formed and enters into degradation. this is one of the characteristics of the "etheric body" that of holding the physical within the etheric realm and keeping the form of man in place. The mineral within the etheric realm had not changed and still makes up the form of the human being but it has been brought up to a higher level of existence couched within the "etheric body"/etheric realm.

The "etheric body' or "life body" is also present within the plant kingdom though the plant etheric realm is a cosmic etheric realm while the human etheric is contained within he human being in existence on the earth. The human etheric is "closed off" as apposed to the plant's cosmic ether. There are etheric forces which come from the periphery of the cosmos and work within the individual plant and of course we see the growth, flowering,decomposition and mineral completion of the plant in the individual seasons.

Top get a better grip of these "etheric forces" place yourself within a large sphere and see the earthly activity from the center outward of the so called point forces with the etheric forces coming from the periphery from all directions; a contrary dynamic of not spacial conditions but of a qualitative nature.

Other characteristics of the "etheric body" of Man are that it is in continual motion, contains the thoughts of the human being, also his memories and is the growth factor in the child. as the child grows into manhood the left over portion of this growing and forming becomes the thinking ability of the human soul.

The caution here is to not treat this activity as "measurable" for this activity is without space but consider it in an experiential way. A look at the "etheric body' externally can be appreciated by the "sleeping man" who is alive but non sentient . One can say that the sleeping human being is more like a plant but he is not a plant in sleep and never was a plant .Of course each of these have an etheric nature but I can't go further than that.

Knowledge of the human being is exactly what each and every human being is seeking and as you can well imagine it is inextricable involved with the theme of reincarnation and karma for the human being is not 'fixed' but open ended in his movement into the future(future lives).

This is a bit much, I know, but in my bumbling way I did this and hope that i can proceed into the idea of "sentience" which will begin to speak to the soul/spiritual nature of the human being., finis.

Right now, I think the same of you. I disagree 100% on FZs religious statements but here he is 100% correct.

Utter bollocks, worthless technobabble.

What's your experience with computers and AI, if I may ask?


Better Idea, please finish the following sentences:

"I, MB, say that 50 years from now on, there will be an AI which will be able to participate in a conversation with 10 humans and not one of these 10 humans will be able to tell which one is the AI.
I, MB, am sure of this because:

<insert technical DETAILS here>"

I predict that you won't though, you'll dodge and duck and dive and evade and probably insult me a bit, or maybe even play some 'righteous indignation' card, but you'll never answer that question, because we both know that you can't.

As someone already pointed out, your post drips with irony, especially since many people in here think you are one of the most obnoxious posters in here, and just a complete windbag. I'm not going to waste any more time replying, not because I can't - but just because I find your faux-patronizing posts to be completely obnoxious, and I don't want to give them any more time of day.