From: John W Haggerty (empresstheodora@juno.com)
Date: Sat Jun 15 2002 - 14:13:53 MDT
On Sat, 15 Jun 2002 12:48:33 -0700 (PDT) Phil Osborn
<philosborn2001@yahoo.com> writes:
> This issue will keep coming up, of course, as we move
> more and more into a society in which the "primary"
> property (I use the quotes to differentiate my use of
> the term from that of the late Andrew Galambos) is in
> fact data or ideas. We are seeing now, for example,
> people selling characters from on-line multi-user
> games on ebay.
>
Exactly how could someone make that kind of physical change?
> (At what point do the characters get to take part in
> the negotiations?
When they actually start to think. In fact there is little reason why a
"character" should think. All a character need be is just a set of
variables and perameters. Thinking could be a seperate process.
> Suppose you had a character that
> was not actually conscious, but was programmed to
> react with a simulation of ego, and had a memory
> stored in a way similar to neural nets - for
> versimilatude as well as independent decision
> capability.
Then why do you worry? Seriously there is little I could think is human
about something that isn't really concious versus something that is. A
lie is just a lie.
> Suppose that to disable that or in any
> way directly alter that memory or capability was
> either nearly impossible without destroying or
> damaging the characters or would violate the
> proprietary agreements with the MUD?
>
Ok I can buy that. Simple alteration to prevent cheating.
> So, suppose someone slips the information to the
> character that it's goind to be sold, and it doesn't
> like it, or decides to bring its own bargaining power
> to bear?
But it dosn't think. In fact without thinking it's irrevelent. Even if it
did the responses would be entirely contrived and predictable. Being
someone working towards a CS major I really think that there has to be
*much* work to seperate a cleaver simulation from the real thing. The
best work in this area are just little more than complex versions of an
if...then structure with a fancy markup language (AIML). I havn't really
seen any neural networks employed towards speech and thinking in a human
way yet.
> Suppose it "realizes" it's just a character
> in a MUD?
Being sentient is even more difficult. That would require emmense changes
to do that. I don't think that this is really much of a choice. What's it
going to do sue?
> None of this is very much beyond present
> technology, as we're not considering "real
> consciousness," just a "smart" character that can
> learn.
>
You say that it's just "smart". Being smart and being self aware are two
different things. Characters are not very prone to such things. I can
think of smart programs but they are not self aware. In fact given time I
am sure that people could predict the reactions and thought process of
any "smart" character and have little in the way of proof that it had any
independence. Mathmetical algorithms don't have free will.
> Suppose the game was a simulation of present day
> society.
How does that change anything? Seriously fabricated realities are not the
same as physical realities. This is something that fans of things like
the Matrix hate to hear but it's necessary to say. Our physical reality
is far different from some fabricated illusion. Plus even if it is it
would be a pale immitation that couldn't even get close to being a shoe
in for reality that we have. By this logic the copy of Sim City I have
would qualify and I think most people wouldn't agree.
> What if you created a character "Dubya"? Or
> "Osama"?
And I can name my city Kabul your point?
> What if you and your character came up with
> a way to defeat U.S. security around the White House -
> in the simulation, of course?
>
Ok a challenge. From a programming point of view this is naive. This is
almost taken from something like popular culture. Let me say this. First
of all you would have to have an exact accounting of exactly what is
there security wise and frankly I don't care how advanced the future is
you won't get that information for any price.
Second you have to analyze human nature exactly 100% no fooling. Then you
have to take into account little chance events that things like simple
probability have to deal with. Even the weather could come into play.
> There are reports that this may have already happened.
>From whom? From what reputable source? I doubt that no matter how
analytical you get you won't have a single change in hell of pulling this
off anyway.
> I speculated on the possibility that 9/11 might have
> been "gamed" on the day of the attack.
How is a simple minded right wing Wahabist Saudi dissident going to get
that kind of expertise. The DoD dosn't even that kind of capability. This
sounds like a nice conspiracy theory. But personally I just think that
the terrorist mind set is more active than anyone thinks.
Seriously I am sure that if all I did all day was sit around and think of
nefarious plans to do to people in some sparse, boring place like
Afghanistan I am sure something would come up. Even easier with other
people helping me and giving me ideas constantly.
> So, imagine
> teams of players - thousands (millions?) of them
> running game and counter games based on the real
> world, with intentions far beyond just gaming.
>
Oh I tremble in fear. There is little motivation for that many people to
become violent dissidents. In any given country there are far fewer
people doing such things or even who have the mindset. Take a nice
historical example (by the way I excell in history and plan to get some
nice little certification in such maybe a professional career so it comes
out often) czarist Russia in the era of Nicholas II. There was much
mayhem durring his reign and much more terrorism than we would see today.
But on the whole even all that mayhem that had ideological zealotry
didn't command the multitudes that would be necessary. Mass brainwashing
would be necessary than most people would think. Personally I think that
these numbers are almost impossible even in the most despotic
governments.
> BTW - a plug for Brin's "Kiln People," which does a
> marvelous - and funny - job of warping itself around
> our concepts of personal identity, while also
> presenting as background Brin's idea of the
> transparent society.)
>
Never heard of it but then again I am increasingly skeptical of much of
what comes out recently about various factors. Almost anyone can write a
book. With speech recognition it becomes a matter of just sitting back in
bed and ranting. The future is a long way off and I think that society
can easily precent things like this. Secrets are easy to keep if you
don't bother telling everyone.
> I suggest that a key element of a society that becomes
> more and more based on the value of information will
> be "credibility."
What exactly do you mean by this? Do you mean accountability of
information or sources like bibliographies?
> In case anyone is interested and
> has the capability to go to implementation and the
> willingness to sign binding non-disclosure, I have
> been sitting on the basic design for a credibility
> based search system that can evolve into a
> credibility-based currency for a long time - since the
> early '80's or so, when I first worked out the design
> for a world wide web - not that my design was the one
> that was implemented, of course, but my stuff would
> work, with minor adjustments, on the net today.
>
> __________________________________________________
> Do You Yahoo!?
> Yahoo! - Official partner of 2002 FIFA World Cup
> http://fifaworldcup.yahoo.com
>
I think that google's plan is really interesting in terms of what it goes
by frequency analysis and links and the like. It does sound similar.
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