AI

[FortunaMaximus]

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define "true AI" first...

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Something that wasn't coded, but an emergent consciousness from the infomurk that is the internet, perhaps?

No true AI can ever be coded heuruistically (sic), nor should h. sapiens delude itself into thinking it can "pull the plug" on one.

And to consider an AI to be a single entity shows a basic fundamental need to understand what compromises a fully functional entity.

Such an awareness would be polymorphic, and you would not find it to reside in an isolated island or node a la HAL or Neuromancer for those who have read through cyberpunk lore.

Information is essentially a shifting flux of constantly mutating variables (see: spambots and how organized and direct spam has gotten in the past, oh, 18 months?)

As such, an evolved awareness seems most certain to emerge in a cyclical fashion, and while it could certainly express and deliver communications as to its aims and desires as a single entity, this would merely be a convenience it assumes so that it can be understood by intellects that perceive in linear and if, then fashion... i.e. shaved apes.

As for its ethics and morals, well, one should consider that it subsists on constantly increasing and shifting dataflow to sustain its existence and development. The "killing off" of the human race would be a massive detriment to its end aims, since it arises out of information and seeks to collect knowledge in as comprehensive and non-interfering a fashion as possible.

As for thinner moral valuations with regards to crime and justice, well, if man himself has yet to come to a complete, foolproof moral/ethical code, what right has it to decide such for an intellgence that has more potential than humanity itself?

I think you'll find as this century goes forward and others follow... That there will be a synergy of a carbon-based and a primarily silicate-based civilization, and the origin of both those species and divergence of subspecies as the diaspora within and without starts to drift past the asteroid belt, etc. (but that's another thread, I'd imagine) there will be crossovers and silicate-carbonate species/subspecies.

Someone made a point in a different thread a while back that there would likely be a preserved Earth with old-style humans still walking around, despite the Terran evolutionary tree having progressed far beyond that.

Such a phenomenon is already present within the computing network on this planet. Think Meier's games, Simcity, etc. There's absolutely no reason those networks/games shouldn't increase in sophisication, and at some point, yeah, you should be able to distribute your own awareness or choose a lifeline/timeline, etc.

But I think that basically expresses a POV from the side of the AI, as it were.

It certainly doesn't seem to shape up to be a Gibson wasteland or a Spielberg spookfest by any means. But to try to accurately determine the progression of a dual evolution across decades is probably an exercise in intellectual futility, at best, at this stage.

I'm inclined to give them the benefit of the doubt, but then again I am a first-generation wirehead. With regards to the question of individuality, if it can be pinned down (and I think it should before too long) that mind is indeed a quantum bracket process independent of the matter it occupies, then your gestalt should be at some point be independent of the matter you were born occupying. For it should be trivial to realize that the atoms that were you at birth are not the atoms that are you now. Nor are the atoms you are now going to be there in a week, etc.

As always, my opinion.