Vesna

what do you mean "be like"? it depends on what people desire and what is technologically possible. i say people should naturally prefer to be mobile within the real world, rather than to be "fixed" inside some virtual reality computer. what is the point of immortality if your consciousness is bound to some box and not able to explore the universe? how soon do you think people will get bored inside virtual reality computer? infinity is a long time to be spending inside some box. infinity? desire? enough? with infinity, you better never run out of desire, otherwise it might not only be enough, but too much even. what is it "we" desire and what would you rather have, infinity inside virtual reality box, or real-world infinity? are you suggesting that if we don't die we can't go to heaven? perhaps you're suggesting it could be a natural way of evolution, to progress as some "human hive mind" inside some virtual environment. if so that would not be evolution, it would be a step back from a free roaming butterfly to jailed caterpillar. what would you rather, be a butterfly for one day or caterpillar for the whole eternity?

obviously with that kind of technology we expect the virtual world to be as real as reality itself, but then mobile immortality robots could be used to drive around real world rather than to live in some virtual world. if we have that kind of technology then how close to real human body we could make those robots, will people choose virtual reality or would they try to mobilize their virtual selves and drive around like the jar-heads in futurama? the other thing i wanted to say with my first post is that there is no real biological reason, that science knows of, which would limit biological age. in other words, with the kind of technology you are talking about, there might be a parallel tendency to enhance biological body and longevity with artificial implants like Darth Vader, if not with natural substances, medicine and meditation like Yoda.

there is a more real aspect of it... which is esoteric way of contemplation. in the east where it's called 'the way of the force' or Tao it correlates to Yin, feminine or the dark side. questions of feelings, emotions, life and death... It's not a story the Jedi would tell you. It's a Sith legend... The dark side of the Force is a pathway to many abilities some consider to be unnatural. - Is it possible to learn this power? Not from a Jedi.

it took me some time to explain all this and answer all those questions, what is the reason for this personal agenda, how does it relate to discussion? this is very unappreciative of you, especially since you made very insulting false accusation. take on your conspiracy theory and personal insults somewhere else, discuss it with forum managers and while you're at it tell them about this violation of forum rules you just made. then come back and join the discussion if you think you can contribute or would like some more answers. you will not find this definition easily on the internet, when you realize that you may come back and apologize because this definition is priceless and you can not answer any of these questions without it. learn to appreciate knowledge and take personal conflicts out of public discussion.

npts2020, this is computer science thread. "alive/dead", is story about brain as turing machine and just how many springs and gears it takes for you to call some *machine* conscious, emotional, intelligent... it is not about philosophy or religion, but about measurement, algorithmic computability, determinism and predictability - mechanical VS. quantum - spring VS. electron. you seem to refuse to think about it. look, by asking this question i'm pointing your false logic, you need to respond to it in order to get your thoughts in the right perspective and realize the conflict in your opinion: you do not accept one spring is alive, but you accept many springs are, why? you are kind of right, definition of life is probably the least important from non-technical point of view, because however smart or emotional we programmers manage to make AI some philosophers will never accept it as "alive". religious people will have the most trouble with it, as well as anyone else who uses prejudice instead of logic. ask your calculator, it will say "no". YES/NO has two degrees of freedom, you get that with only one bit of information on/off, one/zero, left/right. the fact that is *digital* 'degree of freedom', as opposed to analog, only limits practical precision, or poses "imagination limit" in this particular case. pardon me, you sound as if you don't read messages at all. i'm being exact, not deferring anything, where did you get such idea? you have to explain your logic and reasoning better, especially since you continuously getting mistaken about what was said. try to respond to specific statements directly, then we will be talking about the same thing and you will be able to see more easily if your reply doesn't make sense or if it doesn't relate to what was actually stated. it is you who claim brain is mechanical turing machine, and it is you who calls it "alive" regardless of it being *mechanical*, explain? why do you think one spring is not alive, but many springs are? how many springs it takes before you call it alive? discussion about 'simulation of living processes', i.e. Artificial Intelligence, *is* discussion about life and about mechanics of life, in order to be able to model and measure it, can you explain what part about that is not clear to you? you think life just pops up from nowhere, from zero to hero? maybe some god comes along and makes it out of dirt? it is a gradual process from zero to little bit more + little bit more... hence the name - evolution. you think intelligence just pops up from nowhere, from zero to talking AI? you think simulating intelligence, emotions, feelings and consciousness has nothing to do with "life"? explain?

it's funny... it just so happens that i know the question for that answer, so as a matter of fact i can tell you that 42 might very well be the answer, not sure about decimal places thought.

npts2020, you are not pointing out how definition is ambiguous nor that logic is false, you simply refuse to accept conclusions based on your general opinion about biology and philosophy. you do not accept one spring is alive, but you accept many springs are, why? in any case, this "virtual" definition need not to change at all, only to include additional specification to suit personal taste. unfortunately, any additional differentiation will be opinion based, not based on logic. unless, you can really point out the difference based on logic, mathematics and information technology, not philosophy. it is useful because it tells us exactly what is what, so we can answer the question from a programmer's point of view. it answers all the questions that were posed here - is there any question you think it can not answer or was not addressed properly? are you programmer or philosopher? do you want to chit-chat or discover the very essence of life, universe and everything? definition is required in order to start *programming* and be able to *measure* life, memory, intelligence, consciousnesses, evolutionary potential... before it can talk, because you can not even start to design programs or test software with philosophical or biological opinions. start from dictionary, improve from there. we already have technical definition in terms of information technology. it applies to any dynamical system and all of the concepts we were talking about like alive/dead, evolve/devolve, memory, input, output, sensitivity, reactivity... definition gets better the more context it can define and the less ambiguous it is. OO programming calls this "abstract class" in Java, or "virtual function" in C++. IT definition is where we start if we are to program us some AI. - DEFINITION - information= change memory= info within the system A= info input B= memory(A) C= reaction(B) D= output-> A E= reaction(D) - INTERPRETATION - *) 1st law of everything: any system that has 'B', i.e. memory(input), is flexible system, it has evolutionary potential *) 2nd law of everything: any system that has 'C', i.e. reaction(memory), can act life-like, similar to spring or humans *) 3rd law of everything: any system that has 'D', i.e. "processing power", can evolve memory internally with self-input *) 4th law of everything: any system that has 'E', i.e. reaction(output), can appear intelligent, similar to monkeys and cats - EXPLANATION - flexibility is everything. flexibility is function of elasticity, moving parts and their degrees of freedom. flexibility is ability to change or mutate, it is therefore "evolutionary potential". flexibility provides memory storage and maximum information capacity is a function of flexibility. simultaneously, information volatility or system sensitivity is directly proportional to flexibility, as well as is resistance, resilience, adaptivity, durability, reactivity and liveliness, or potential thereof. now you're talking - *assimilate information*, rather than lose information is evolution in contrast to devolution. it is the key distinction between "alive" and "dead". it is directly proportional to flexibility - memory - sensitivity of the system, and as pointed by Mr Skeptic evolution can be internal as well as external. "information", like programs, thoughts and memory can internally evolve too and even have child processes or replicas. the requirement for life i said is "flexibility" or "evolutionary potential". it was your definition as well, at the time. DNA is just more advanced system of spring-like behavior of ball-like masses (atoms) attached to springs (chemical bonds). yes, and i explained exactly how, where, when and why that happens, or not. again, it is a function of memory/flexibility and external dynamics or information availability. we were talking about *potential*, so it should be obvious. your mistake is that you measure potential with yes/no, instead of with percentage or float. evolutionary *potential* is a probability function according to external potential as much as internal. metal spring the size of a house and weighting 740kg on earth has evolutionary potential of, say 0.00000001ep. it is a probability factor related to specific external conditions and again directly proportional to its flexibility/memory/sensitivity as definition says. but, with infinite time and space... sometime, somewhere chances and circumstances might be more favorable. only Sith deals in absolutes and boolean, Jedi should use percentages and floating point, you're not a Sith Lord, are you? what i'm saying is that your imagination is short and too literal. steel spring on this planet probably can not evolve, but on some other planet it could be more "soft", flexible and therefore have more memory available, be more sensitive and more reactive in more volatile condition with many more springs to combine with... just understand how spiral shape is very different to any other, spirals stick together, they are sensitive while in the same time durable, that's all. in chemistry molecules and atoms are mechanically modeled as spring systems. atoms as balls of mass attached to springs, where spring-like intermolecular interaction is representation of chemical bonds. abiogenesis, evolution and natural selection producing a brain as mechanical turing machine is exactly the story of springs tangling up together under external dynamics, by chance, and eventually evolving via natural selection to conscious beings. there is no real difference between molecules and metal springs, only in degrees of freedom and number of ways atoms can combine. it is *probability*, percentage, chance or "potential" guided by external input. it is a floating point number, not boolean. am i repeating myself?

so far we were talking about one physical system to accommodate one consciousness. what you are talking about now is to simulate the whole environment where these digital entities can live their lives - The Matrix kind of simulation, and the beauty is that my definition applies there too, even more so, since it is about pure information. you mean: "...like many definitions of words with multiple and interchangeable meanings can be"? i'm glad you realize that. it is the reason why i made a new definition using technical terminology and the power of information technology - IT definition of living process, life, evolution and everything: memory= information within the system A= change/info input B= memory(A) C= reaction(B) do you want to fool someone, or do you want to know the principles behind it? the problem with that kind of understanding is you expect of AI to communicate, you are talking about some very advanced intelligence or about fakes and tricking someone. if you want to know the principles and the real essence of emotions and feelings, then you must be able to understand the basic form of it and how to recognize it. long before AI can tell you anything, you must be able to "read the mind", and *know* what is *information*, feeling, emotion, memory... you can't take definition out science like math, logic or IT, these sciences *are* definitions. you can play around with biology and dream about philosophy, but here, in computer science, it is all about definitions, classifications, relations, logic and mathematics. as a programmer you simply must have a definition as a means to program it and test it, don't expect you can make neural network and it will suddenly start talking to you. you must be able to measure the *information output*, or you will never know if your program works or not, do you see?

npts2020, information technology, don't get carried away with your personal feelings about abstract meanings. definition must apply and it all must boil down to: input - output - memory. we do not expect AI to have children, or do we? *) you want to change your definition? what it is your dictionary? it's wrong. i'm sorry to say, your definition of "life" turns out ambiguous after all. evolution has nothing to do with offspring and parents, ability to reproduce is a part of definition of "life", not "evolution". please use some dictionary. *) chemistry based turing machine brain is a system of springs, there can be no other mechanical reaction, but spring based, do you know? there can be no re-action of any kind without flexibility/memory, look at the definition: memory= information within the system A= change/info input B= memory(A) C= reaction(B) no memory = no flexibility = no reaction = no evolution *) we are talking about *potential*. you are mistaken in your imagination, way too literal. this is off topic really, so just remember that if protein folding were not spirals they would disintegrate and devolve, lose information much more easily. spirals are very special three-dimensional shapes: resilient, very sensitive, interactive and _combinatorial. given enough time and suitable external dynamics springs would be able to combine and evolve into sentient beings, do you not believe in evolution and natural selection?

i agree with Roger, but math or logic is algorithmic process, very much. humans can only "know it" according to something, some theorem, some logical, mathematical or geometrical relation. what i'm trying to tell you is that as soon as you find me a theorem according to which humans are certain about it, i will show you how can i teach AI to think exactly like that. computers are not just 'plus' and 'minus', but also 'xor' and 'or', computers can use the same logic and mathematics as we can, the question is how to teach them. if you teach them to be stupid, then they might compute it to infinity, but if you teach the same knowledge as you know, then they will know the same and be able to compute the same. logic and mathematics are functions of efficiency, it is one thing computers can learn for certain, while emotions and feelings like creativity and melancholy is what we do not understand, description is subjective and a matter of opinion, which makes it vague as opposed to math and logic that are exact - deterministic - algorithmic.

yes, that is a very good definition, not ambiguous at all. "evolutionary potential" actually sums it all up beautifully. i was talking about it too and we have exactly the same definition, only i call it "flexibility/adaptivity/absorbency" or "ability to receive information without losing information", i.e. "memory(input)". memory= information within the system A= change/info input B= memory(A) C= reaction(B) - any system that has B is flexible system, it has evolutionary potential - any system that has C can act life-like, similar to spring and shape memory alloy it is important to realize evolution is not only growth in outside complexity, as when two or more springs tangle together, but also any change/increase of information *inside* the system. brain does not need to grow in mass to be able to receive a "change" and increase the information within, the memory and information inside can also evolve as a change of internal state (memory). so, lets see how our definition works, we have this - evolution is "change" or "mutation" and 'evolutionary potential' is flexibility, ability to change internal state, adapt to external factors by gaining information (memory) rather than losing it. - brick does not have B, no evolutionary potential brick can not take in any info or change inside the system, it can not adapt, evolve nor grow (unless it's sticky). it can not change internal state in a way to increase information within the system, it can only change by breaking and loosing information, this is devolution, hence brick is not alive and dead person decomposing is not alive either. definition seems to work here. - spring has B, it has evolutionary potential spring, or any other dynamical system, automatically has evolutionary potential proportional to it's flexibility. spring can take "change" as input, absorb it and "evolve" accordingly, storing the new information as internal state. even more hilarious, springs can actually tangle together, so they could evolve in even more obvious and less predictable way, by increasing the information with additional external complexity. any *addition* of information to a system by either internal or external change can be called "evolution of the system", hence this ability practically classifies a spring as alive and "spring based" turing machine like brain is automatically alive as well, according to our definition at least. X-Men: "Mutation. It is the key to our evolution. It has enabled us to evolve from a single spring organism into the dominant tangled-spring species on the planet. This process is slow, and normally taking thousands and thousands of years... But every few hundred millennia, some new spring gets tangled in, and evolution springs forward."

to answer this question more directly, you look for the changes in a system and try to separate changes caused by input from changes caused by output. once you can isolate output the information can be coded into any kind of pattern according to input, the rest is easy. however, this is only possible if we can actually measure the change, i.e if the "change" itself was some kind of measurable physical displacement. but if any information is stored on quantum scale, then we simply can not measure that change, according to current theory at least: "In quantum physics, the Heisenberg uncertainty principle states that the values of certain pairs of conjugate variables (position and momentum, for instance) cannot both exist with arbitrary precision. This is not a statement about the limitations of a researcher's ability to measure particular quantities of a system, but rather about the nature of the system itself." apparently, the first question to be answered is whether any information inside the brain is stored on quantum level or is all information stored on a physical measurable scale, in which case we can measure a physical displacement as same as with the spring, while the quantum brain scenario would try to measure electromagnetic potentials and distribution, unfortunately never able to obtain the full information. npts2020, yes. but once you agree brain is turing machine you practically classify it as "dead", no different to a dead spring in it's operating principles, so you already have all the answers you need and your definition is the "most general" one, given by Sione. anyway, i have another, thought similar, solution that might give some more room for compromise... *) there is a clear distinction between static and dynamic systems, like brick and spring. the difference is in *flexibility* or ability to sustain and/or adopt to external forces and changes. brick either stays as it was or it breaks into pieces, hence they can not take any "change" as input and their reaction is either "no change" or "loss of information/system collapse". on the other hand, dynamical systems can be flexible, they can, not only endure external input and changes, but they can even absorb the "change" exerted on them, memorize and convert it in some internal state, like spring or shape memory alloy. *) so the question is, where does one dynamical system becomes "alive" and the trick is to answer the question in percentages and floating point, rather than in absolutes and boolean. that would classify a brick to be 0.0% alive, spring would be 0.1% alive, virus would be, say 0.9% alive, bacteria would be 1.0% alive and healthy adult would be 100.0% alive. how does this sound?

npts2020, i submit to you that. thought, there are many definitions, but just as you say people do not agree. for example, the above definition predicts a dead spring has senses, feelings, emotions and reactions. generally speaking this is true because we can use those words to describe how spring behaves. the trouble is that definition suggests it's all for real quite literally. information technology boils everything down to *information*, the most basic form of anything, and it suggests there is no real distinction between spring - virus - bacteria - monkey, it says they all equally alive, or not. this is in accord with bascule and Mokele theory of brain as mechanical turing machine, "system of springs and gears" governed by action/reaction and deterministic results. there is no real difference between simple turing machine like spring and complex turing machine like brain, both are "alive and feeling" or they are both just a dead spring and consciousness is an illusion, according to them. there is no clear path as how to agree completely because what comes out of precise definition does not fit philosophical or religious views, the implications are simply hard to accept. definitions get refused based on opinions and until some AI is clever enough to start talking and explain everything from it's point of view there will hardly be any agreement about intelligence and consciousness, but emotions and feelings can be investigated as soon as wee agree on definition. thought, some people will never agree with any of that until they literally *hear* it coming from AI itself, for the same reason they think animals don't have emotions just because they can't say so, in English that is.

quantum or turing machine? i'm with you two in this one. i say not only is a brain quantum computer, but the whole universe is a quantum computer. it works on non-computability, just like Improbability Drive that powers the star ship of Zaphod Beeblebrox. Douglas Adams: "There is a theory which states that if ever anyone discovers exactly what the Universe is for and why it is here, it will instantly disappear and be replaced by something even more bizarre and inexplicable.There is another theory which states that this has already happened." immortal, i do not see how that works, could you present the logic behind that conclusion? i don't think "We know that this statement is obviously true". we can only know it to a certain degree by trying to calculate and check it out for real, which is what you assume program will do to infinity. 1.) we can advise computer to limit computation to 'certain degree' of precision, so it can answer in percentages of certainty rather than in absolutes. 2.) if we have any other way of "knowing for sure", then we can teach computer exactly that and AI could use same theorems and logic instead of blind calculation to answer the question. if there is a mathematical or logical proof for that, then theoretically AI should be able to calculate it as much as we could and be certain about it as much as we are. you speak about AI in the context of someone's opinion, in order to trick some specific person at specific time about some supposed AI. i think it should be made clear what is the intention here - to make a really smart AI that can fool us all, or to make even the most stupid AI, but working on the same principles as living system? do we want to trick ourselves or to discover the principles behind it?

as Mokele said, it's about how to recognize and test it in a system like BlueBrain AI project - http://bluebrain.epfl.ch/ - just like with C++ and OO programming, you first need to define the most general class and later derive from there, full self-contained definition must not have any undefined terms. "thought; visualization through a priori processes" while your definitions are "correct" like many definitions of words with multiple and interchangeable meanings can be, you need to be more specific, i.e. how to *know* "visualization" occurred inside BlueBrain AI, how does "visualization" look like, what is it, how do you recognize it? definition needs to narrow the meaning, that is not to include any more abstract concepts. "thought: a portion of an intelligent process" while your definitions are "correct" like many definitions of words with multiple meanings can be, some meanings there are still vague and it does not describe it in a way to be recognized and not confused with something else. we can't really look for some "portion" in BlueBrain AI, we need to know what is "portion" and how to test if it is there or not. [-edit-] current dictionary definitions of these concepts are vague, depend on context and many terms can be used interchangeably. it is correct that technical definition must relate with terms in computer science aka. information technology. it is not important to name the terms at all, thought it is necessary if one wants to compare AI with real living organism. Sione was a bit verbose really, only these three *must* be defined: - information - information input - information output input is pretty much anything that changes the system, therefore information is "change" and memory is "preserved change". output is also some change and the trick seem to be how to recognize one change from another. Verily, this Vichyssoise of Verbiage Veers most Verbose... dear Sione, while your definitions are "correct" like many definitions of words with multiple and interchangeable meanings can be, if you think your definition is good because of low number of symbols, then this definition will beat yours, it will put your definition to shame and your definition can eat the dust and shorts of my definition: info= change A= info input B= info output C= memory(A) D= reaction(C) E= reaction(B) ...so let me simply add that it's my Very good honor to meet you and you may call me "V". [-edit-] Sione's definition is too general, it includes too much. it says system "sees", "hears" or "feels" by receiving info about change/displacement, _infoA. than it has a "choice" to "react" in two ways: 1.) _response©, immediate response without processing _infoA or 2.) _response(B), based on more complex information processing, _infoB. any input/change that stays within the system is a part of "memory", so _reaction© will act on raw _infoA and physical response of such systems can behave life-like without any "brain", similar to shape memory alloy or spring. 'spring' has A, C, D and maybe even B and E, which would, according to Sione, classify a spring not only as emotional, but even intelligent being! according to Sione, spring would "feel" when you compress it, input information about the change becomes a part of the system as "emotion" and spring then "feels depressed", "not happy" about the change and new "emotional state". springs apparently don't "enjoy" the "feeling" of being "depressed" and they "react" with _reaction©, possibly without any _reaction(B), without "thinking". Sione calls this reaction "emotional" or "instinctive", she would actually suggest simple everyday spring is ALIVE! she must be crazy because it sounds crazy, imagine a spring with "senses", "feelings", "emotions" and "reactions", "sensitive" to change and external force, doesn't "like" to be "depressed", always "wants" to go back to original state and it "says" that with it's "reaction"... spring with an attitude, what a nonsense!

this thread seems to be quite like the other one.. it matters because of the time. if you can't tell now, it doesn't mean someone else would not be able to tell it later. if we want to trick someone then it doesn't matter as long as we tricked them. tricking ourselves might be fun, but it is a matter of principle when building something to build it as fast as possible, as good as possible and able to last in valid state as long as possible.