From: Ben Goertzel (ben@goertzel.org)
Date: Mon Dec 23 2002 - 14:37:35 MST
Cliff wrote:
> Would Ben5, after that point, be distinguishable from a Tom5,
> Dick5, and Harry5 after they reach that point -- when individual
> identity as we understand it is left behind, does consciousness
> converge or diverge?
Also, even if Ben5 is very different from Dick5, this difference may have no
comprehensible parallel to the differences between Ben and Dick. The
transcension process may be sensitive to small variations in initial
conditions, but it may depend on these variations in a wild & wacky way...
> To be honest, I have some doubts about the Ben5 scenario myself. I'm
> not at all yet certain that the kind of consciousness we are isn't
> inherently complexity-limited in some ways.
Ben5 would quickly grow into a kind of consciousness different from "the
kind of consciousness we are."
> A paranoid personality
> allowed to evolve and self-modify would quickly spin into some form of
> self-destruction, I'd imagine...so given infinite self-modifiability,
> wouldn't the smallest flaws in our personalities or mental health
> spiral out of control?
No, because *I* am *not* a paranoid personality ;)
Of course, destruction is a possible outcome, but I see no rason to believe
it's the most probable outcome...
> Perhaps we could modify our personality in
> such a way to avoid this, but that presumes we know how to handle the
> self-modification tools and know what to change and how, which in turn
> presumes we're "given" those tools and that knowledge by an external
> process such as an FAI. I can't quite picture us bootstrapping it all
> the way given just the "mental room"...
Well, I think AGI will come along before the capacity to fully upload
myself.
But if not, I see no reason why an uploaded human scientist couldn't
progressively improve his uploaded brain via continual design changes &
implementation improvements.... And the community of uploaded humans could
do the same, a lot faster. Imagine a Napster-like service for uploads:
"hey, did you get the latest patch for the cingulate gyrus? Cool huh? What
you're still running cingulate gyrus 3.4 ?? 3.5 rocks!!"
-- Ben G
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