Singularity Thoughts – part 1
Seeing as our comic is advertised as a “post-apocalyptic singularity” web-comic, I better share some of my thoughts about the singularity aspect. For those who don’t know what singularity means, in science fiction it basically means the point in time in the future when computers/robots gain self-awareness and sentience. After that humans either become cyborgs or the computers take over the world. Basically.
Not to spoil anything, but in our story we’ll have a little bit of both; self-aware machines that hate people and self-aware machines that like people (and people that like self-aware machines). For us it isn’t about the robot Armageddon but about exploring the nature of humanity, identity and person-hood in a post-singularity world.
Anyways, that intro aside, I read an interesting article about artificial intelligence. Some scientists are trying to make computers think more like humans.
The concept of how science understands the mind when it comes to building a robot or looking at the brain is that you take a photo, which is then processed as if the mind were a computer, and a recognition of patterns is carried out. There are various types of algorithms and techniques for identifying an object, scenes, etc. However, organic perception, that of human beings, is much more active. The eye, for example, carries out a whole host of saccadic movements — small rapid ocular movements — that we do not see. Seeing is establishing and recognizing objects through this visual action, knowing how the relationship and sensation of my body changes with respect to movement.
Basically, computers perceive the world and then act based on those perceptions and their programming. If X then Y sort of stuff. In contrast, humans perceive the world through our actions. We have to do things like move our eyes, touch something with our hands, squint, etc., in order to understand it.
The ability to act without consciously being aware of what we’re doing, to act with instructions and programming, that is what makes us human and not just organic robots. One important step in creating real artificial intelligence (that we include in our story) is creating a computer that can act outside its programming, that can do things it hasn’t done before.
I’ll share more of my thoughts about artificial intelligence and the singularity in future blog posts. Here’s the link that inspired me today.