From: Timothy Bates (tbates@bunyip.bhs.mq.edu.au)
Date: Wed Nov 18 1998 - 22:09:54 MST
Hi all,
Mike Linksvayer said
>Ever since reading Vernor Vinge's "True Names" I've thought a distributed
>artificial intelligence would be one of the neatest things one could do
>with distributed computing (the "Mailman" from the aforementioned story
>was a distributed AI that got its name because it answered questions
>slowly, as if by post).
Great book. The mail man reminds me of a computer implemented out of
people passing notes to each other instead of transistors passing
voltage. This in turn reminded me of what is called "Turing
Functionalism" This is the position that a Turing machine (however
implemented) would be conscious if it ran the consciousness program. One
envisages the paper tape program ticking over for millenia and then
someone cuts it: was the machine half conscious, never conscious?
I asked Daniel Dennett if he was a Turing functionalist: he said yes and
no ;-)
I think he said yes, but that interaction is critical, he views
intelligence as being embedded in the machines environment as well as in
its own hardware. For this reason he doubted that a paper tape Turing
machine could be conscious as the environmental context on which
consciousness is scaffolded (in his, but not my) view, would be invisible
to it: a kind of Nyquist limit for implementation speeds.
best,
tim
____________________
"I program because I was programmed to program."
Dept Psychology
Macquarie University
Sydney NSW 2109
Australia
Ph 61 (2) 9850 8623
FAX 61 (2) 9850 8062
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