Alt-BEAM Archive

Message #03516



To: sbolt@xs4all.nl
From: JVernonM@aol.com
Date: Sat, 22 May 1999 04:28:15 EDT
Subject: [alt-beam] Re: Evolution Comparison


In a message dated 5/22/99 3:37:15 AM Eastern Daylight Time, sbolt@xs4all.nl
writes:

> Imho Moravec's "artificial human" or even a robotic ant colony as a
> result of machine evolution is extremely unlikely. Machines are
> evolving a kind of nervous system, but a brain as we or anything
> alive understands it won't fit their bodies, which only mimick life
> in certain laboratories and hobby rooms, well away from the real
> world of machine evolution. We're not looking at artificial life,
> but at the evolution of something dead.
>
I agree with all you said until this point. The bots you describe will come,
simply because someone dreamed. I firmly believe that if you can see it, it
will happen. Many have had the dream, it's to late, the cat is out of the
bag. Many people said the same thing about the Apollo program. Impossible,
not economical, impractical, blasphemous, all terms used to describe the
dream of landing on the moon. The artificial human is a ways off, I agree.
But, the humanoid servant is just around the corner. And it, my friend, or
something next definitely could change the odds. Imagine if the things became
surpluses down the road, and you could get one for a song, then stick that
million neuron brain you've been fiddling with in your garage for a year. Or
come up with a novel method of altering it's behavior. When a couple of
companies throw their hats into the ring, the ramifications could be endless,
and unpredictable. Henry Ford never envisioned the course automotive
evolution has taken, or how it will change in the next 20 years. Hoover,
Sony, and Honda are standing at the same precipice. If they are successful
when they leap, they could take us all with them.
I've found that when you make declarations like, impossible or never, you
usually end up eating them.
Jim

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