The Future of the Mind

[Vraith]

However, you're right that this project will take decades, if not centuries. In fact, Kaku compares the BRAIN initiative (the program Obama announced to map every single neuron in the brain) to the great cathedrals of the middle ages, which took so long to build that the engineers and first builders knew they would never live to see their completion.

The payoff will be huge.

HAH! I'm going to disagree on the first, but cuz I think you're being pessimistic. [I'd bet any amount the mapping...will be done in less than 20, it could be done in less than 10. Holistic/functional models/understanding a bit longer than that...but less than a century, probably less than 50.]. I have a particular reason for that:
In many ways this is like the mapping of the Genome. All the tools for doing it are rapidly becoming cheaper, AND faster/more powerful, AND more widely available, AND the number of people with the specific knowledge/skill set to work the field is growing rapidly.
Most of that was true of the Genome project...and IIRC, it was completed much more quickly than expected and in addition generated mountains of tangential/related sidelines of data and knowledge that weren't initially part of its purpose. I also think the cost came in at, or below the lowest projected costs. [[At the time I made a joke [not a very good one, alas] to someone along the lines of "It cost way less than Walmart makes in a year...hopefully it will tell us if the way some people dress for Walmart is a genetic condition"]]

The payoff WILL be huge, though. I don't doubt that for a second.

[Zarathustra]

Hmm ... maybe it wasn't the actual mapping, but learning what the mapping means ... kind of like how we have our genome, but we still don't know exactly what the damn thing does.

Kaku would be the first to admit that many predictions made in the past fail to take into account the accelerating rate of growth.

However, there are a couple of things which we should consider in making projections. It's true that our expectation for science in general to keep accelerating is a pretty good guess, since we have more scientists alive today than all of history combined. Also, we have discovered most the foundations for reality's mysteries: relativity, quantum mechanics, genetics, evolution, computer science. So all we need to do now is figure out the details.

But it turns out that the details are a lot harder than we initially expected, given our fast progress on the big mysteries. When the first computers and first robots were built, people thought AI was right around the corner. That was over 50 years ago, and we still haven't solved it. The problem of intelligence is a lot more complicated than we first thought.

And while it's true that computer power has been accelerated according to Moore's Law, that will come to an end very soon (2020?) once we reach scales that invoke Heisenberg's Uncertainty Principle. We'll have to switch to quantum computers at that point in order to keep shrinking computers and increasing their power. The only problem is that quantum computers are nowhere close to being feasible ... certainly not 6 years.

So there is plenty of reason for optimism in the long term, but there are some devilish problems in the short term. The next 20-30 years are going to be a trying transition period.

And then we'll see some miracles, if we can live long enough.

[peter]

The book is so crammed with advances that amaze and ideas that exite/worry/stimulate that it becomes almost impossible to know where to start in even thinking about it let alone discussing it.

Absolutely Kato's sincerity is beyond question in respect of his motives for publication and he has been scrupulous in stressing the [current] limitations that the whole area faces.

A few things just to throw into the arena that have [for me at least] emerged as interesting [ugghh!] are :-

The almost exact paralells between the 'yin and yang' divisions of Chinese philosophy and left brain, right brain sepparation of function [coincidence or not]. One could almost lay a similarly male/female division ofattributes on top of this as well.

The massively positive effect that DARPA has had in advancing knowledge across so many fields of scientific endevour. More people should be made aware that many of the innovations they currently enjoy would not be here were it not for military/defence r & d.

The [boardering on] nievely simple manner in which allbeit crude images can formed almost ala 'pinhole camera mode', by mapping the firing of neurones in the brain area that deals with information from the retina - can this be true?

Similarly the idea that you can take a subject/subjrcts and show him/them 500 or so still images and record the particular neuronal firing pattern that occurs upon seeing each image. This allows you to build up a 'library' of digital information pertaining to these images that can then be used to constuct a crude 'video' of peoples thoughts/dreams for 'playback'. Can it really be this easy?


Lastly, I'll touch upon an area that [sort of] crept up on me in the reading of this book and is way too big to go into in depth here - but, if all this can be done [and I'm guessing in time - a long time - it will] the question has to be asked "do we want it?" Now I'm not a luddite in respect of advancement or anything but it must be understood that such research has the power to massively - massively - change the human condition whether we like it or not. Yes - huge help can be given to sufferers of the scourge of mental illness and dementia etc, but no way does this end there. That is just the tip of the beginning. Take the idea of the 'brain-net'. Melding might seem a good fun thing in the Chrons, but in real life? Would you, do you really know anyone well enough to give them acess to every aspect of your inner mind. Your emotional state, every thought, every idea - to give them acess to the you that to dat, only you have ever seen? Saying you say yes, but your wife does not. Saynig it becomes a social norm to be 'part of the "collective"', that refusal to participte becomes a mark of suspicion above ones head. Take it further - saying 'the collective' becomes what we are. The potential for change to the human condition is no less than 'quantum' and who knows - maybe this is where we are meant to go, but it frightens me.

[Vraith]

Take it further - saying 'the collective' becomes what we are. The potential for change to the human condition is no less than 'quantum' and who knows - maybe this is where we are meant to go, but it frightens me.

I don't see any reason why it has to be "total immersion" in some collective...
I suspect humans won't want/allow that. Everyone [or at least the vast majority] will want some private/self-space. Our social needs and natures have a number of purposes...one powerful one is "fitting in." But another powerful one is to assert and express your distinct self.
I'm certain people will share more.
I think they will also seek further to find [actually create] their singular selves.
A dynamic relationship.
Maybe then we'll outgrow this odd truism that even on the Watch exists: that folk are inherently biased against difference. And start seeing [and respecting] the OPPOSITE...people ALSO carry an inherent bias FOR difference.

[Fist and Faith]

I'd don't think any collective idea will become mandatory. I can't say such an idea could not become an absolute, Borg-like thing, eventually. But it would be a good while before we were capable of forcing it on everybody. And I think the privacy issues we're going through right now, because of the internet, will resolve the issue before that time comes. Maybe we'll have a very different idea about/need for privacy, and being part of the Collective will not be an issue. Or maybe we will have clung to our privacy and individuality so completely that the technology that makes it possible will be forbidden. Or maybe something else.

[Hashi Lebwohl]

If it has to be forced onto people then it is,by definition, bad...even if the thing being forced on them will somehow benefit them. People have to choose it for themselves or it is wrong.

Me? I would choose uploading my brain, or having a USB slot/computer connection wired to my brain, having wires inserted into my brain to increase its efficiency, etc.

[Zarathustra]

Given how much people (esp. young people) share online, I'm not so sure that people will fear the world knowing their innermost thoughts. In fact, they might find it liberating and uniting, as Vraith points out.

There is always potential for abuse, but I don't think a "brain-net" will be much different from the Internet. We'll simply move the user interface from our fingers and eyes to our neocortex, getting rid of the "middle-man." This doesn't mean people will have access to your unintentional or subconscious thought. There are still ways to make sure it only transmits conscious, intentional communication. Maybe it will make people more mindful in their communication.

As the book shows, true mind reading is virtually impossible. Nothing proposed in the book makes it more likely.

[Fist and Faith]

If it has to be forced onto people then it is,by definition, bad...even if the thing being forced on them will somehow benefit them. People have to choose it for themselves or it is wrong.

of course. But the Borg don't concern themselves with that. And I'll bet that the US government wouldn't, either. What about the Taliban? China? Etc etc etc.

There is always potential for abuse, but I don't think a "brain-net" will be much different from the Internet. We'll simply move the user interface from our fingers and eyes to our neocortex, getting rid of the "middle-man." This doesn't mean people will have access to your unintentional or subconscious thought. There are still ways to make sure it only transmits conscious, intentional communication.

Well, if it isn't much different from the Internet, then we can be sure people will find ways to gain access to our unintentional and unconscious thoughts. Why would we think we can let people into our minds only part way? As though some punk won't figure out a way in through an unassuming little subroutine.

[Zarathustra]

Well, if it isn't much different from the Internet, then we can be sure people will find ways to gain access to our unintentional and unconscious thoughts. Why would we think we can let people into our minds only part way? As though some punk won't figure out a way in through an unassuming little subroutine.

Well, the book describes how difficult it is to read someone's mind. This is quite a bit different from conscious actions they choose to take. A "brain-net" doesn't let people into your mind. It allows you to do things with your mind without having to go through your fingers or hands.

Think of someone like Stephen Hawking, who can't "access" the world with his body. Well, we now have the technology to allow him to move a computer cursor with his mind, by recording the brain patterns for the intention, "Move right," or "Move left." Then we implant receivers that can detect these thoughts, and now he can move a cursor around just like a mouse. However, just because you move a mouse with your mind-to-hand connection doesn't mean that anyone who views input from your mouse can then trace the connection backward to your mind. Similarly, just because you have an implant in your brain that can detect "move right/left" doesn't mean this implant can also detect something in a completely different part of your brain, which handles memories and emotions. A selective input/output device could allow you to communicate only using your brain, but wouldn't open up other areas of the brain because it's literally not connected to them.

The brain is very subdivided. A probe in a specific part can have profound effects on a very specific activity, and not affect anything else.

I think these questions become clear as you read the book. The brain is not like a computer. Though we can use computers to augment its functions, this doesn't mean someone can "hack" it just like a computer.

[Fist and Faith]

Oh, sure, as far as you're taking this, you're right. I'm thinking of being plugged in much more than that. In the little I read, he discussed how different aspects of an event's memory are stored in different parts of the brain. And when something jars one aspect of the memory, it goes out and gathers the other aspects. Meaning there is something connecting all the aspects in the different parts of the brain. And mark my words (even though we'll be dead before we see it heh), someone will find a way to use that connection, or one of the other thousand types of connections we don't know about yet, to zip around the brain of someone else who's plugged into the Collective.

[Hashi Lebwohl]

of course. But the Borg don't concern themselves with that. And I'll bet that the US government wouldn't, either. What about the Taliban? China? Etc etc etc.

Most government think nothing of mandating wrongness onto their citizens. The citizens are, from their point of view, completely replaceable with other citizens (i.e., children) and are thus individually of no value whatsoever.

Actual telepathy, like something out of a comic book or the Psi Corps in Babylon 5, would require not only the ability to sense the minute electrical currents in someone else's brain but also the ability to correctly interpret those signals. If I say "recall a time when you had some really great sex" there are going to be similar signals triggered in our brains but many of the associations will be different enough as to be unrecognizable from one another. Even if you were a telepath then trying to read my memories of such an event might not even register to you...or worse--you may pick up some altered or distorted memories, which could be awkward to say the least. "F&F, why are you so pale all of a sudden?" "Because Hashi is gross."

[Fist and Faith]

We will learn that the problems with interpreting those signals are legion.

[peter]

Further interesting point I forgot to mention above; dolphins sleep, one half of thier brain at a time [apparently so they can come to the surface to breath when necessary even while 'the other half sleeps'].

[Vraith]

We will learn that the problems with interpreting those signals are legion.

That is almost certainly true.
There's an additional problem:
Like it or not, nothing like all of our thoughts are purposeful. Many of them don't really have any meaningful content.
So you could interpret them absolutely correctly...and still have nothing.

And yea, interpretation:
And what do you do, how do you decide the real, between flashes and actual thoughts/behaviors? Like on these "tests"...for instance the ones that supposedly measure your "real biases," what you "really think" by measuring the speed of your reactions to pictures. That's like claiming that the subject is fat "in reality," WHATEVER their physical weight, cuz they react most quickly to pictures of banana splits and triple-decker burgers.

[peter]

At one point the author postulates that it will be possible to share experiences and emotions with a third party - that one person may be enabled to experience what another person is [or has been] 'feeling'. This is a particularly close engagement between minds - and one in the past that, on my particularly 'sorry for myself' or 'on the edge' days, I have wished they could do. "My God! If only they could actually get inside me and experience what it is like being me, then they'd understand!" Now it becomes a possibility I'm not sure I like the idea as much.

[Vraith]

At one point the author postulates that it will be possible to share experiences and emotions with a third party - that one person may be enabled to experience what another person is [or has been] 'feeling'. This is a particularly close engagement between minds - and one in the past that, on my particularly 'sorry for myself' or 'on the edge' days, I have wished they could do. "My God! If only they could actually get inside me and experience what it is like being me, then they'd understand!" Now it becomes a possibility I'm not sure I like the idea as much.

On the really scary side of that...
There is a film called "Strange Days." Cast included Ralph Fiennes, Angela Bassett, Vincent D'Onofrio, some other reasonably well-known folk.
I don't care what anyone says...it's a really good flick [though short of great]...
And has a thing, related to your post, that made the words "HOLY FUCK!" spring out of my mouth, very loudly, in a theater
The thing is this:
A man is raping a woman...headsets exist that "share"...the rapist makes it so that the woman experiences the rape and AT THE SAME TIME, she completely experiences HIS "feelings" and "thoughts" while he is raping her.
I couldn't stop thinking about that for days and days...

[Avatar]

I love that movie.

--A

[peter]

It would save all of that 'empathy' problem; "Ok fuck, you think *you* got it bad. Get a load of this!"

[peter]

The book has moved into the territory of AI [a shame I think but I guess natural enough given that this is the 'future of the mind' rather than the future of 'the human mind']. The author describes the problem of at what point do you have to start considering the ethics of what you are doing in creating 'thinking machines' - and this in turn of course hinges upon at what point you can actually know for sure that the thing you have created is a thinking, feeling, sentient entity. This it turns out is much harder than it looks, but the author takes the 'constructionist' position that effectively sidesteps the problem by saying "Don't waste your time thinking about the problem - just build the machine."

This is ok as far as it goes, but it effectively takes the 'if it looks like an elephant and sounds like an elephant - it is an elephant' position. I'm not sure I buy it. To me it doesn't matter how well you reproduce say 'The Mona Lisa' - it never becomes the Mona Lisa. All it ever achieves is a better and better imitation of the Mona Lisa. Take me. No matter how well I'm ever cloned and imitated I'm never going to believe it's me, even if everyone else does.

Now in the case of sentience, of self-awareness, it might be imitated to perfection but you will never know whether it's real or not; you might pass Laws to protect it, you might have to apply exactly the same ethics in your treatment of it - but you can never say 'it is' with any degree of surety. Surely?

[Zarathustra]

As I said, his constructionist attitude is what makes his turn at the end so surprising. If the issue has been "side-stepped," then why step back into the question at the end? Has it been side-stepped, or not?

I agree that we should continue to try to build AI, because even an approximation has value to us in terms of what it can do, as well as what it can't do. It will augment our own intelligence in the former case, and illustrate how unique our consciousness is in the latter case, and how little we understand it (which opens up the possibility of a deeper understanding through discarding the machine model once and for all). So by all means, build them! But we shouldn't worry about robots taking over.

Speaking of that particular debate (robots taking over), the different views are interesting. Some people think it's inevitable and horrible, while others think it's no more horrible than our children taking our place as we dwindle and die. They will be the "children of our minds." And yet others think we'll just absorb them into humanity as we become more robotic ourselves, a marriage of man and machine. They won't take over and make us obsolete, because we'll merge with them.